‘The Old Testament evidence is slight.’ These words may stand as a warning not to expect too much from the pages that follow. Even some of those who have written at length on the question have acknowledged that their conclusions are to some extent provisional and hypothetical and so open to correction by future discoveries. Some leading scholars in the field are no longer as sure as they once were that there were schools in ancient Israel. Viewed as a whole, the tenor of scholarly discussion has moved from confident assertion to doubt and even denial in recent years. This is undoubtedly a result of the nature of the evidence to which appeal has been made. Much of it either comes from other parts of the ancient near east, and so does not prove anything about ancient Israel, or represents what may (but also may not) be the products of Israelite schools, in the shape of writings which make no clear allusion to their authors or their place of composition or use. Explicit evidence from the Old Testament itself is indeed ‘slight’. But it is not lacking altogether, and because of its importance it deserves to be noted before more indirect arguments are reviewed.

To begin with the one Old Testament reference to a school building (leaving Ecclus li 23 on one side), Elisha's disciples are said in 2 Kings vi 1 to have complained that ‘the place where we sit before you is too small for us’.