5. Early Theories of Composition

For a long time students were uncertainly groping for an answer to the question how to decide concerning the origin of the Pentateuch, for the right key to the problem had not yet been found. For two thousand years the Mosaic authorship was main- tained, the early synagogue following the books of Ezra and Nehemiah in this position (except in certain small particulars, cf. M. Eisenstadt, Ueber Bxbelkritik in der talmudischen Litteratur, Frankfort, 1895), and this way of thinking was followed by the synagogue of the Middle Ages, except in certain particulars (Isaac ibn Jasos, cf. JE, vi. 623; Abraham ibn Ezra, cf. JE, vi. 520-524). The Church Fathers also re garded Moses as the author in spite of the quite common supposition based on IV Ezra xiv., that Ezra, inspired by God, restored in their entirety the Holy Scriptures which had been lost during the Babylonian exile. Andreas Bodenstein, of Carlstadt (Ln$ellua de canonicis scripturis, Wittenberg, 1520), regarded the law as Mosaic, but doubted whether the thread of narration was the same, because in the narrative of the death and burial of Moses the method of expression differs not at all from what precedes. Many after Bodenstein questioned individual passages, so that in the eighteenth century there gradually grew up the interpolation hypothesis." Many objections against Mosaic authorship were disposed of on the hypothesis of retouching or change (such as is suggested by the passage Gen. xii. 6, " the Canaanite was then in the land "), but by no means all. The "fragment hypothesis," originated by Alexander Geddes in England, and taken over in Germany by J. S. Vater, did not long maintain itself, for against the disconnection manifest in many places was the fact that numerous and longer passages were mutually connected. Through similarity of language and of notions in Genesis, particularly in passages where the name Elohim is employed, there was formed the idea, in the minds of J. J. Stiihelin, F. Bleek, and F. Tuch, of a "supplementary hypothesis." An Elohim document, beginning with Gen. i. 1, named the foundation document, was filled out from a later document, the Yahwistic, by the addition of selections and remarks which were not entirely consistent. While this hypothesis seemed to meet many difficulties, the character of the long connected pieces proved that J was once an independent work alongside P, e.g., in the story of the flood, while sometimes J takes rank as the work which is supplemented from the narrative of P.

6. Development of the Documentary Hypothesis

The French physician Jean Astruc (1684-1766), by a literary analysis of Gen. i.-Ex. ii., turned Pentateuchal criticism into anew channel. Using the divine names as a criterion, of the he set the pieces containing the name Document- Elohim in a column designated A, ary those containing the name Yahweh in Hypothesis. a column B, and other pieces also apart, and regarded A and B as orig inally complete and independent narratives. He thought that Moses had used the arrangement in columns and that later copyists had brought all together into one column and so destroyed the order. A was regarded as the work of Levi with the use of an older document, but Ex. i.-ii. by Amram, the father of Moses. The Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch was maintained by Astruc. In this way he thought he had solved chronological difficulties and those arising from duplication in Genesis. Astrue's idea was introduced into Germany by J. G. Eichhorn and given a better basis by the proof that the two chief documents were further -differentiated by linguistic peculiarities. H. Ewald recognized that P and J were traceable not only as far as the first chapters of Exodus; but also in other books, and F. Tuch showed that they were recognizable even in Joshua. As early as 1822 F. Bleek had remarked upon the original relationship of Joshua to the Pentateuchal narrative, of which it formed the conclusion. The special position of Deuteronomy was recognized as early as 1806 by W. M. L. de Watts. H. Hupfeld followed K. D. Ilgen in proving that Elohim was used by two documents. K. H. Graf showed that Lev. xvii.xxvi. were to be discriminated by many individualities from the priestly document, and indicated a fifth document (to which the name "Holiness Code" was attached by A. Klostermann because the characteristic of this body of laws is the designation of God as holy, and emphasis is laid upon Israel's duty also to be holy). Still later analysis was carried farther by those who were not contented with the five sources, at least three documents were "discovered" in the J sections, two in the E sections, two in D, and four in P (Wellhausen's designation for the chronological thread in P was Q-quatuor foxderum later, though only three covenants are mentioned, with Noah, Abraham, and Moses, not one with Adam). And it is assumed that these documents had been subjected to recensions before their incorporation into the Hexateuch, though the question of how far this can be recognised is not satisfactorily answered. It is very probable that into the Priest Code, which has special interest for the law of ritual, additions were interjected, and attempts have been made to determine these, though the certainty and value of these attempts is open to question. That the original Deuteronomy up to and during its inclusion in the Hexateuch did not escape change is certainly probable; but the attempt to use the employment of the singular anti plural numbers as means of discrimination seems unpromising. As an example of the minuteness attempted in analytical investigation, the results of C. Steuernagel's work may be given. The law-book of Josiah was put together from two documents, PI and Sg; PI has three sources, of which one is again resolvable into two originals; similar principal and auxiliary documents are discovered in Sg. Against the discrimination of J into two or more sources, growing mere prevalent nevertheless, cf. E. Honig's Eisleitvng in das Alte Testament (Bonn, 1893), pp.197-200.

Justification of the analysis is attained by a careful reading even of a good translation of the following examples, in which the composition out of at least two sources is recognizable. The history of the flood and of Noah: P is in Gen. vi. 9-22,

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vii. 6, 11-viii. 5 (except vii. 12, l6b, 17, 22-23, viii. 2b), viii. 13a, 14-19, ix. 1-17,28-29; all the rest is J except that in vii. 7-10 there 7. Analysis are editorial additions. Shechem and Illustrated Dinah in Gen. xxxiv.: Hamor is the and chief personage in the narrative of justified. P-verses 1, 2a, 4, 6, 8-10, 14-18, 20-24; Shechem is the principal personage in the other verses, which belong to J. The spying out of the promised land, Num. xiii-xiv.: P is in xiii. 1-17a, 21, 25, 26, 32, xiv. la, part of 2, 5-7, 10, 26-29, 34-38. The rebellion of Korah and of Da than and Abiram: JE makes Dathan and Abiram direct their rebellion chiefly against Moses, and his document is in xvi. lb, 2a, 12-15, 25-34;

P, in which Komh and his 250 followers espoused the cause of equality of all Israel in priestly rights, is in xvi. la, 2b-11, 16-24, 35 (and it appears that Korah had a double part, since in verses 2-7 he seems to stand at the head of the men of various tribes, while in verses 8-11 he is the spokesman of the Levites; Deut. xi. 6 appears to have had a report in which Dathan and Abiram acted inde pendently). The report of Israel's sin in Moab,

Num. xxv. 1-5, is composed from J and E, as the exchange of the designations " Israel " and " the people " indicates; the one, in lb, 2, 4a, mentions the lewdness between Israelites and Moabite women; the other, in verses 3, 5, denounces only the worship of Baal-peor. Further justification is attained by the recognition of varied linguistic peculiarities. If one reads the creation story in Gen. i.-ii. 4a, the genealogies from Adam to Noah (Gen. v., except verse 29), and from Noah to Abraham (Gen. id.), the establishment of the covenant of circumcision

(Gen. xvii.), and the purchase of the piece of ground at Machpelah (Gen. xxiii.), on the one hand, and the narrative of Paradise and the fall (Gen. ii. 4b-iv.), the visit of the three heavenly beings to Abraham, and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen.

xviii-xix., except xix. 29) and the mission of

Abraham's steward in behalf of Isaac (Gen. xxiv.), on the other hand, he will be convinced, even in using a translation, that the two sets of stories can, not be by the same author, and that the differences exist in mote than the material, the disposition of the material, and the purpose. The principal. lin guistic differences of the five main documents of the Hexateuch are given in � 11 of H: L. Strack's

Einleitung (6th ed., Munich, 19061, cf. H. Hol zinger's Einleitung in den Hezoteuch (Freiburg,

1896); see also Feasts and Festivals, I., �� 4-5.

Of the scholars who, at the end of the nineteenth century, thought the authorship of Moses scien tifically tenable, nearly all have died. 8. Modern Some names are K. F. Keil, E. C. Conserva- Bissell, A. Zahn, W. H. Green. Thetive Bavarian clergyman E. Rupprecht Writers. fights almost alone in this cause in Des. RdthBel des Fun fbuehea. Mose und seine falsche Lfsung (Gütersloh,1894), Des Rdthsers L6sung (1895-97), and Wissenschaftliches Hand buch der Einleitung in das Alte Testament (1898).

Roman Catholic and conservative Jewish scholars are apt to be dogmatically hindered from accepting critical conclusions. Of Roman Catholics may be mentioned' F. Kaulen, Einleitung in die heilige Schrift Alten and Neuen Testaments (3 parts, 4th ed., Freiburg, 1897-99), �� 190-201; and A. Seh6pfer; Geschichte des Alten Testaments (Brixen, 1902), � 27; of Jewish scholars, D. Hoffmann, rector of the Rabbinerseminar in Berlin, in Magazin für die Wiwensckaft des Judenthums (1876=80); Abhandlungen �ber die pentateuchiRchen Geaetze (Berlin, 1878); and Die wichtigsten Inatanxen gegen die GrafWellhausensche Hypothese (1904).