Rethinking the Supposed JE Document A dissertation presented by Joel S. Baden to The Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of Hebrew Bible Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts May, 2007 2007 Joel S. Baden All rights reserved. iii Peter Machinist Joel S. Baden Rethinking the Supposed JE Document Since the work of Julius Wellhausen in the late nineteenth century, a basic component of the classical formulation of the Documentary Hypothesis has been the belief that the J and E documents of the Pentateuch were combined at an early point into a document known as JE. This combination has never been proven literarily, however, but has been assumed by generations of source critics. In this dissertation, the question of whether such a document ever existed will be examined. First, the origins of the scholarly theory of the JE document will be examined, as well as its ramifications for subsequent scholarship. Second, the twentieth-century views on the formation of the Pentateuch will be discussed, with a particular emphasis on views regarding the combination of J and E. Third, a detailed textual analysis of the narratives of D as compared to J and E will be undertaken, in which it will be shown that D is dependent on the separate J and E documents, and not on their purported combined form. Fourth, the issue of the role of the redactor will be addressed, and it will be demonstrated that the common scholarly attributions of passages to the redactor of JE are mistaken. Fifth, it will be argued that the methodology of the redactor is identical across all books and source documents in the Pentateuch, strongly suggesting that there was but one redactor for the entire Pentateuch. Sixth, some of the major historical assumptions regarding the combination of the source documents will be critically examined. Finally, in the conclusion, an alternative to the classical theory regarding the formation of the Pentateuch will be put forward. iv Table of Contents Abbreviations.......v Introduction......1 Chapter One: The Scholarly Origins of JE10 Chapter Two: Divergent Trends in the Twentieth Century...56 Chapter Three: The Relationship of D to J and E125 Excursus: The Relationship of P to JE.233 Chapter Four: RJE The Reliance on the Redactor.249 Chapter Five: The Singularity of the Redactor(s) ...312 Chapter Six: Unstated Assumptions Underlying the JE Theory..358 Conclusion...383 Bibliography395 v Abbreviations ABD Anchor Bible Dictionary [6 vols.]. D.N. Freedman, ed. New York: Doubleday, 1992. AWEAT Archiv fr wissenschaftliche Erforschung des Alten Testaments DBI Dictionary of Biblical Interpretation [2 vols.]. J.H. Hayes, ed. Nashville: Abingdon, 1999. GKC Gesenius Hebrew Grammar, 28th ed. E. Kautzsch, ed., A.E. Cowley, trans. Oxford: Clarendon, 1910. HUCA Hebrew Union College Annual JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JDTh Jahrbcher fr deutsche Theologie JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament VT Vetus Testamentum ZAW Zeitschrift fr die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Introduction Since its first publication in 1878, the work of Julius Wellhausen has been the starting point for nearly all discussion of the Documentary Hypothesis and its relationship to the historical reconstruction of Israelite religion1. Wellhausens forcefully argued theory of the gradual evolution of Israelite religion, and even more so his view that this evolution is evidenced in the successive writings which are discernible in the redacted Torah, have basically held sway for over a century. The scholars of the period after Wellhausen who followed him in the attempt to separate the documents that make up the Torah essentially fell into three main categories: those who followed Wellhausen nearly to the letter (e.g., S.R. Driver2); those who held to Wellhausens theory of the development of Israelite religion, but slightly revised his division of the sources (e.g., O. Eissfeldt,3 G. Fohrer4); and those who agreed with Wellhausens division of sources, but 1 Geschichte Israels [vol. 1] (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1878); 2nd ed., Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels (Berlin: Druck und Verlag von G. Reimer, 1883; reprint: Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2001). Though he had earlier published his view of the division of the sources of the Pentateuch and the book of Joshua in Die Composition des Hexateuchs (JDTh 21 [1876]: 392-450, 531-602; 22 [1877]: 407-79; printed as a book, Die Composition des Hexateuchs [Berlin: G.Reimer, 1885]), it was the combination of the source division with the presentation of the history of Israelite religion which secured a place in the history of scholarship. 2 Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament (New York: Meridian, 1957). 3 The Old Testament: An Introduction (New York: Harper & Row, 1965). 4 Introduction to the Old Testament (Nashville: Abingdon, 1968). Introduction 2 refuted basic elements of his dating (e.g., Y. Kaufmann, who also challenged his view of Israels religious development5). In all of these cases, the fundamental assumptions underlying Wellhausens work were sustained: a) there are at least four documents that make up the Torah; b) each of these sources represents a different stage in the gradual development of Israelite religion; c) by understanding the order in which the sources were redacted together, we can show the step-by-step evolution of Israelite religion; d) by demonstrating the natural progression of Israelite religion, we can confirm our previous division and ordering of the sources in the Torah. The remarkably clear and forceful manner in which Wellhausen fit parts c) and d) together into a self-reinforcing proof overshadowed the distinctly circular nature of the argument. In recent years, however, a much more concerted effort has been made to address not the details of Wellhausens analysis, as scholars such as those listed above have done, but rather the fundamental principles behind the Documentary Hypothesis itself. This challenge has come from a variety of angles: literary (from scholars such as Rendtorff,6 Blum,7 and Carr8); comparative (van Seters9); and theological (Childs10). Though each of these three perspectives takes a different approach to the rethinking of the study of the 5 The Religion of Israel: Its Beginnings to the Babylonian Exile (transl. and abridged by M. Greenberg; Chicago: University of Chicago, 1960; Hebrew original: Tl!dt h"emn"h hayyi#r"$lt: miyy!m qedem ad sf bt %$n, 8 vols. [Tel Aviv: Bialik Institute-Dvir, 1937-1956]). 6 E.g., The Old Testament: An Introduction (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1991); The Yahwist as Theologian? The Dilemma of Pentateuchal Criticism (JSOT 3 [1977]: 2-10); The Problem of the Process of Transmission in the Pentateuch (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1977). 7 Studien zur Komposition des Pentateuch (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990); Die Komposition der Vtergeschichte (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1984). 8 Reading the Fractures of Genesis (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1996). 9 Prologue to History (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1992); The Life of Moses (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1993); In Search of History (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1997), et al. 10 E.g., Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979). Introduction 3 Torah and its sources, all are in agreement as to the need to reject Wellhausens approach to a great degree. Furthermore, all three are united in their common desire to rethink the classical role of the redactor of the Torah: whether to reject the notion entirely (van Seters), to posit a very different role from what Wellhausen had imagined (Rendtorff, et al.), or to make the redactor responsible for the meaning of, and the focal point of the study of the theology of, the Torah (Childs). The combination of these critiques has led many to conclude that the death-knell of the classical Documentary Hypothesis has sounded. This is over-hasty. The contemporary criticisms of the Documentary Hypothesis seem to be based less on the textual evidence than on an externally-imposed concept of how the text was written and must be read. For van Seters, it is the idea that history writing began not in Israel, but in Greece, and thus the dating of the early narrative strands of the Torah must be lowered, and as a result the whole picture changed; for Rendtorff, et al., it is the belief that if one takes the work of H. Gunkel and M. Noth on form- and tradition-criticism to its logical conclusion, the separation of independent documents must be rejected; for Childs, it is the belief that it is the community of faith that accepts a document as canonical which determines the meaning of the text, thereby lessening the importance of the earlier sources from which the canonical text was formed. In none of these cases is the primary problem the literary one, i.e., the impossibility of reading the Torah as a coherent narrative as it stands in its final form; therefore none of their conclusions addresses the fundamental literary question, i.e., what is the most efficient way to understand the process by which the canonical Pentateuch came into being? Introduction 4 Scholars critical of the Documentary Hypothesis tend to focus their criticism on one aspect of the theory, and, having made what are frequently strong cases regarding the details, proceed to cry for the total abandonment of the classical view.11 While it is true, as we will see, that much of Wellhausens theory requires challenge and refutation, this does not mean that the entire source-critical enterprise must be discarded, or so thoroughly reworked that it becomes unrecognizable. It remains the case, in my opinion, that the simplest and best solution to the literary-critical problems of the Pentateuch is the Documentary Hypothesis in its most basic form, i.e., the theory that the Pentateuch is made up of the combination of four originally independent documents (J, E, P, and D) that have been combined to form a continuous narrative whole stretching from creation to the death of Moses. These sources are independent of one another (that is, none was written to supplement another), narratively continuous, and, for the most part, nearly complete. This stripped-down version of the classical approach the only version, I believe, that is justifiable on solely literary-critical grounds will be used throughout the following study as the backbone for the source-critical analyses found therein. If this basic view of the Documentary Hypothesis is accepted, it allows for the acceptance and subsequent integration of many of the criticisms of Wellhausens theory. This is true particularly because for the most part scholars direct their criticisms not toward the idea that there are sources of the Pentateuch, but rather toward the secondary layers of argument that are built up around the division of the sources. In particular, they 11 E.g., Van Seters, The Pentateuch: A Social Science Commentary (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1999), 76: Ultimately, one must ask whether or not it is still worth retaining such a literary hypothesis; Rendtorff, Pentateuch, 179: The assumption of sources within the meaning of the documentary hypothesis can no longer make any contribution today to the understanding of the formation of the Pentateuch. Childs does not dismiss the classical division of the sources, but does question its relevance, claiming that at times the prehistory is quite irrelevant to understanding the synchronistic dimension of the biblical text (The Book of Exodus [Louisville: Westminster, 1974], xiv). Introduction 5 point out that the evolutionary framework into which Wellhausen placed his sources, and the means by which he imagined them working against each other, are perhaps no longer as easily sustainable as they once were. In short, just as is the case with contemporary critics, both the methods and assumptions of Wellhausen must be closely examined before accepting the conclusions of his work. The standard presentation of Wellhausen and his followers,12 down to the present day, is as follows: J and E were near-contemporaries in the southern and northern kingdoms, respectively, each writing an epic history of the Israelite people. J probably worked first, in the court of Solomon, and E subsequently in the northern kingdom, perhaps as a pro-northern corrective to the southern-oriented J document. At some point, these two epics were combined with each other by a redactor (RJE), into a document known as JE. Subsequent to this, the source D was added, also by a redactor (RJED), and finally the priestly authors both wrote their own version of the text and redacted the whole text together (R) some time in the post-exilic period. Various aspects of this picture have been argued since Wellhausen put it into its classic presentation (and some even before), particularly the existence of an independent E source,13 the dating of P with respect to D,14 and the nature of the priestly source in general (whether it was an 12 Cf. the scholars mentioned above in notes 2-4, among others. 13 Cf., e.g., W. Rudolph, Der Elohist von Exodus bis Joshua (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1938), vs. A. Jenks, The Elohist and North Israelite Traditions (Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1977). 14 Kaufmann, Religion of Israel, and M. Weinfeld, The Place of the Law in the Religion of Ancient Israel (Leiden: Brill, 2004). Introduction 6 independent author or just a redactor).15 As a whole, however, this picture remains the classical view of the composition of the Torah. With the criticisms of contemporary scholars in mind, however, we may begin to question some of the very basics of this hypothesis. In general, we must question Wellhausens influential evolutionary model for the development of Israelite religion, as well as his dating of the sources. On a more specific level, each aspect of the scheme should be fully investigated. Wellhausens synthesis was so effectively presented that subsequent source-critical scholarship has failed to recognize the many assumptions and logical leaps that are implicit in the details of Wellhausens theory. Moreover, because Wellhausen was able to frame his source divisions in a widely-accepted reconstruction of the historical development of Israelite religion, the general outlines of his literary analysis (and many of the details) have remained unchallenged, as scholars have focussed on the larger historical picture. Yet, as Wellhausen himself certainly recognized, historical reconstruction can be done only after one has fully analyzed the text literarily, and if challenges can be raised against Wellhausens literary analysis of the Pentateuch, these will necessarily extend to the historical reconstruction based on it. Source criticism as a method is an entirely literary enterprise, conducted solely on the basis of the philological and exegetical considerations stemming from the text itself. Historical reconstruction should be kept independent of the actual work of source criticism, and approached only as a second stage in the process. It should not be forgotten in connection with this, as we will see, that the historical reconstruction of Wellhausen and his contemporaries was 15 Cf. F.M. Cross, The Priestly Work in Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic (Cambridge: Harvard, 1973) vs. K. Koch, P - Kein Redaktor! Erinnerung an zwei Eckdaten der Quellenscheidung, VT 37 (1987): 446-67. Introduction 7 based almost exclusively on the study of the law codes, rather than the narrative connected with them. The extension of their conclusions regarding the historical development of Israelite law (and its application to the rest of religion) to cover also the narrative sections of the Torah remains methodologically problematic. In the following study, then, I will investigate one specific aspect of the classical reconstruction, namely the supposed redaction of J and E into a JE document, and try to demonstrate that while scholars since Wellhausen (and before) have been mistaken about the nature of this redaction, there is a reasonable alternative which maintains the critical distinction and identification of the two sources. In short, I will show that while J and E are distinct sources, they were not combined into a JE document at any point before their combination with the other sources D and P. It is striking that a thorough study of this aspect of Wellhausens theory has never before been attempted. Numerous studies of the independent sources J or E are available, as are various introductions to the Hebrew Bible which present the classic view of the theory or a slightly revised one. The very basic step of the combination of J and E, however, which has been assumed since Wellhausen, has largely remained unexamined.16 We will see in what follows that a) the combination of the two has been taken for granted, without any critical argumentation, and b) the independent combination of J and E is literarily, and most likely historically, unsustainable. The implications of these conclusions for the entire enterprise of Pentateuchal criticism are potentially substantial; yet, unlike most critics of the classical 16 M. Haran has, throughout his scholarship, maintained the separation of J and E. It was only in his most recent work on the composition of D and the Deuteronomistic History, H""spp"h hammiqr"t, vol. 2 (Jerusalem: Magnes, 2004), however, that he discussed any methodological issues. Harans proposal and argumentation will receive close study in the following chapters. Introduction 8 approach, I am not calling for the Documentary Hypothesis itself to be abandoned, but rather for a fresh look at how the individual sources may have been combined. The structure of the argument presented here is as follows. I will first, in the chapter that immediately follows, investigate the scholarly origins of the idea that J and E were combined into an independent JE document. Since this idea has gone essentially unchallenged for over one hundred years of source-critical scholarship, it is of pressing concern to determine whether the original rationale for it remains valid. I will then turn to some of the seminal immediate post-Wellhausen Pentateuchal scholarship, in an effort to see how the JE theory was adopted and adapted by later scholars. In this second chapter I will also turn to some of the major contemporary critics of the Documentary Hypothesis, not to challenge them directly, but in the hope of learning from them some of the ways in which the classical view could and should be reconsidered. The third, fourth, and fifth chapters represent the bulk of the textual analysis in this study. In the third chapter, I will challenge the classical view that the JE document was known and used by the author of D. In the fourth and fifth chapters, I turn to the question of the existence of the redactor RJE, investigating those passages which have typically been attributed to this figure and questioning the literary grounds on which one Pentateuchal redactor might be distinguished from another, respectively. The sixth chapter is concerned not with the detailed textual argumentation, but rather with some of the larger issues involved in the notion of a combined JE document: the implicit assumptions and presuppositions inherent therein, regarding historical context, the public nature of the documents, and the canonicity of the documents. In the Introduction 9 conclusion to the study, I will present in brief a new reconstruction of the development of the Pentateuch, taking into account the results of the preceding chapters. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE The aim of this chapter is to discover, through a review of nineteenth-century scholarship, the scholarly origins of the idea of the combined JE document. Though there are a number of excellent histories of Pentateuchal scholarship, by their very nature these are of a more general variety, and are ill-equipped to deal in detail with any one particular facet of a scholars work.1 Thus we may learn that Hermann Hupfeld was one of the first scholars to recognize that the Elohistic document, as construed in the late eighteenth- to mid-nineteenth centuries, should in fact be divided into two sources (now known as E and P), and we may also learn a few of his reasons for doing so, and how his work was received. The intricacies of his argument, however, the assumptions underlying it, and the impact it had on a narrower subfield within Pentateuchal scholarship, must be left for a less generalized study.2 In this case, one might want to know not just that Hupfeld determined the existence of two sources E and P, but also how he viewed the original relationship between these two sources; how he imagined each of these sources relate to J and D; and how he envisioned the process of combination that 1 Worthy of particular mention are J. Rogerson, Old Testament Criticism in the Nineteenth Century (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984); E. Nicholson, The Pentateuch in the Twentieth Century: The Legacy of Julius Wellhausen (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998); C. Houtman, Der Pentateuch: Die Geschichte seiner Erforschung neben einer Auswertung (Kampen: Kok Pharos, 1994). 2 See, for example, the single paragraph devoted to Hupfeld in Nicholsons work (Pentateuch, 8-9). Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 11 led to the mixing of the sources as we now have it. Furthermore, one might want to discern the impact these ideas had on future scholarship, not just in the most obvious sense (i.e., that subsequent scholarship has universally recognized the distinction between E and P), but in the details: did the following generation of scholars view the combination of the sources in the same way that Hupfeld did? Did they make changes, and if so, what, and more importantly, why? These are the details that are unavailable in the general histories of Pentateuchal scholarship, and it is for this reason that a renewed effort will be made in this study to review the scholarship on our particular subject. The task at hand is a relatively tricky one. For the most part, virtually no studies have been devoted solely to the question of the combination of J and E. One must, therefore, tease out scholars ideas from among their more general writings. Again turning to the example of Hupfeld, though his book on the sources of Genesis was revolutionary for its division of E and P, how his second Elohist (E) relates to J is not a focal point of his argument. We must therefore carefully examine scattered statements throughout the book to determine his thoughts on this issue. Similarly, in Wellhausens Prolegomena,3 in which the main object is to show the dating of P relative to the rest of the sources, and thereby to reconstruct Israelite religious history, the question of the relationship of J and E is secondary, if not tertiary. Yet we are told something very important about Wellhausens approach to this issue by his constant use of the siglum JE, rather than either J or E. As we shall see, the impact of this particular choice has been far-ranging, and may be the seminal moment in the scholarship of the combination 3 J. Wellhausen, Prolegomena. All page references are to the English translation. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 12 of J and E; yet how many reviews and discussions of Wellhausens most important book have recognized, let alone dealt with, this particular issue? Once one has resolved to make the attempt to determine the history of scholarship of this question, limits must be set, for an absolutely comprehensive history of scholarship on an issue even as specific as this would require an entire volume, if not considerably more. Every scholar who writes about the Pentateuch in general, source criticism, form criticism, traditio-historical criticism, any particular pericope, chapter, or even verse, or writes a commentary on any of the book of the Pentateuch, comes to some conclusion regarding this process, even if it is not explicitly stated at the beginning of the work. Thus, one must make choices regarding which scholars have made the signal contributions to this particular subfield (or sub-subfield). And thus it is that I have chosen only a handful of scholars whom I consider foundational for the concept of JE. With the exception of Hupfeld, whose work was (and remains) a necessary prerequisite for all scholarship on this issue, all the scholars discussed in this chapter are from the generation that helped construct what came to be known as the Newer Documentary Theory: Graf, Kuenen, and Wellhausen, the great triumvirate of source criticism, and Dillmann and Riehm, who represent a contemporary challenge to the idea of the JE document. In this investigation I hope not just to produce a simple history of scholarship, in which the major scholars on the issue are reviewed and subsequently forgotten. Rather, I hope to show that the concept of the JE document was never effectively proven by its initial supporters, and was in fact the result of an entirely different scholarly process. In short, I will demonstrate that the idea of JE can almost be ascribed to an accident of Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 13 scholarship, one that became firmly entrenched and was defended only after it had become a standard part of the formulation of the Documentary Hypothesis. For this reason, its subsequent defenders found it particularly difficult to fully articulate a detailed argument in favor of the concept. Hermann Hupfeld The history of scholarship regarding any aspect of the relationship between the sources J and E must always begin with Hermann Hupfeld (1796-1866). Though K.D. Ilgen was the first to separate what was originally known as the Elohist, or Urschrift, into two sources,4 it was Hupfelds rediscovery and reworking of Ilgens idea that was adopted by virtually all subsequent scholarship.5 The splitting of the Elohist into two sources, the older Elohist and younger Elohist, is justly remembered as Hupfelds great scholarly achievement. But Hupfeld devoted only a quarter of his book to proving this; the remainder he devoted to a close study of each of the (now three) non-Deuteronomic sources, identifying their individual styles and perspectives, and discussing, albeit briefly, their relationship to one another. Hupfelds work preceded that of Graf and Kuenen, and therefore he was still writing under the older premise that P (his older Elohist) was the oldest document of 4 Die Urkunden des ersten Buchs von Moses in ihrer Urgestalt: zum bessern Verstndniss und richtigern Gebrauch derselben: in ihrer gegenwrtigen Form aus dem Hebrischen mit kritischen Anmerkungen und Nachweisungen auch einer Abhandlung ber die Trennung der Urkunden (Halle: Hemmerde und Schwetschke, 1798). The term Urschrift was used by Hupfeld to describe the original Elohist (i.e., P + E), which was understood as the oldest document of the Pentateuch, and which was used as the basis for the subsequent J and D authors. This was also frequently called the Grundschrift, although that term may be better applied to P when it was still conceived as the earliest document of the Pentateuch upon which all others were based. 5 Die Quellen der Genesis und die Art ihrer Zusammensetzung (Berlin: Verlag von Wiegandt und Grieben, 1853). Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 14 the Pentateuch. He viewed the Jahwist as the latest pre-Deuteronomic source, basically staying within the general framework already established by de Wette (on whom he relied heavily). On the basis of the divine names in particular, and also some theological features, Hupfeld assigned his new source (the younger Elohist) to a place in between the previously established pair. After Graf, Kuenen, and Wellhausen destroyed the hypothesis of the priestly Grundschrift, the details of Hupfelds analysis of the three sources was essentially forgotten, a relic of an earlier era of Pentateuchal scholarship. Thus we remember him today almost exclusively for his separation of P and E. This is a mistake, however, as Hupfeld was the first to deal with the issue not only of how to identify the various documents, but also of how these three documents were put together. Though his work was by definition preliminary, many of his observations remain pertinent. Having identified the three sources, Hupfeld asked the following questions: Did the Jahwist know the younger Elohist (E) document?6 Was the younger Elohist even an originally independent document at all?7 And most importantly for our purposes, how were the Jahwist and younger Elohist documents combined? Did one author both write his own narrative and also combine it with the other? Or were they independent documents which were combined by a separate redactor at a later date?8 It is remarkable that these same questions remain relevant in modern scholarship, almost exactly as they were formulated by Hupfeld. Unfortunately, his ideas on the matter have been generally 6 We might ask this question in reverse today, as virtually all scholarship now sees the J document as being older than E; Hupfeld, however, was working under the idea that J was younger than both P and E. 7 For these questions, see particularly pp. 162-68, 193-95. 8 On the role of Hupfelds Redactor, see pp. 195-203. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 15 forgotten, ascribed to an earlier, more nave time in scholarship, relegated to the same dustbin as his early dating of P. Yet since the questions remain, his initial solutions deserve at least the respect of a new hearing. Not all of his conclusions are of equal worth, but his method of achieving them is worth studying. Hupfeld began by dismissing the notion that the later Jahwist author could have combined the two documents. In his view, the presence of so many contradictions between the younger Elohist and the Jahwist, not least of all in the alternating use of the divine name, precluded this idea. For Hupfeld, it was simply not sensible to imagine an author consciously choosing to use a document as his base, or model, and then contradicting it at will, without making any changes to the original. For one striking example, Hupfeld could not imagine the Jahwist leaving the Elohist narrative of the revelation of the divine name in Exodus as it stands (or even knowing it at all), as it contradicts the Jahwists explicit statements to the contrary in Genesis. Htte der Jhvhist die Elohistischen Quellen vor sich gehabt, so wrde er zwar wohl, da er nicht von derselben historischen Ansicht von dem Urpsrung des Namens JHVH ausgieng, sich von der strengen Regel der Elohisten im Gebrauch des Namens !"#$% entbunden, und beide Namen nach dem gewhnlichen Sprachgebrauch angewendet: aber schwerlich seinserseits den Namen #" so ausschliesslich wie jene ihr !"#$% gebraucht, noch weinger aber gegen die Auctoritt und das ausdrcklich Zeugniss der Urschrift Exod. 6,2 ff. diesen Namen in die ganze vormosaische Zeit von Anfang der Dinge an selbst im Munde der Heiden einzufhren, und jenem Zeugniss sogar, wie es scheint, ein entgegengesetztes 4,26 gegenberzustellen, also systemsatisch zu widersprechen gewagt haben; besonders da ein solches System schwerlich durch die Ueberlieferung die sich auf dergleichen nicht einzulassen pflegt gegeben ist. Nur dann ist dieser Widerspruch begreiflich, wenn der sptere unabhngig von dem frhern schrieb.9 If, therefore, the Jahwist was not responsible for the combination of the two documents, then perhaps he was familiar at least with the work of the younger Elohist. 9 Quellen, 166. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 16 Hupfeld rejected this possibility in a similar fashion. It is the blatant contradictions between the two sources which militate against the possibility of J knowing E. Denn das wird doch wohl niemand sich einreden wollen, dass der Verfasser so blind und einfltig gewesen sein knne die handgreiflichen Widersprche in die er sich dadurch mit seiner Quelle setzte nicht zu merken. Dass er aber so dreist gewesen sei ihr mit Bewuststein und Absicht auf eigne Faust ins Angesicht zu widersprechen, ist sicherlich eben so wenig von einem Hebraeischen Schriftsteller anzunehmen. Vielmehr muss bei allen Differenzen und Widersprchen der Hebraeischen Geschichtschrieber, wie gross sie auch seien, unstreitig immer angenommen werden das sie unwissentliche oder unbewuste waren.10 The underlying argument here is that no author could consciously include into his own work, with its particular historical and theological considerations, a work that expressly contradicted his own.11 For Hupfeld, this led to only one conclusion: the two texts were combined at a later date, by an independent Redactor,12 who attempted to keep a considerable amount of each source intact: Da damit zugleich der an sich denkbare Fall dass der Ihvist etwa den jngeren Elohisten bereits in sein Werk aufgenommen habe, ausgeschlossen ist was wenigstens nur unter der unwahrscheinlichen Voraussetzung mglich wre, dass er sich einestheils ber jene Wiederholungen und Widersprche mit seiner Darstellung verblendet oder hinausgesetzt, anderntheils doch wieder hie und da seinen eignen Bericht verstmmelt und mit einem fremden ersetzt habe : so folgt daraus dass die Verbindung der drei Urkunden zu dem vorliegenden Ganzen lediglich das Werk eines sptern Redactors sein muss.13 10 Quellen, 165f. 11 This argument remains effective, which may explain why few scholars attribute the process of combining the sources to any of the individual authors thereof. It is also, however, a good argument against the type of reconstruction suggested by Rendtorff and his school (see chapter 2 below). 12 Here, and throughout this chapter, I follow the author in questions terminology for the editor/compiler of the sources. We will see below in chapter 2 that the commonly used term Redactor has lost virtually any specific meaning (cf. especially the section on the work of J. Van Seters). It is notable that Hupfeld deviated from the standard theory (since de Wette) that the Redactor was the Deuteronomist (cf. Kuenen, An Historico-Critical Inquiry into the Origin and Composition of the Hexateuch [London: Macmillan and Co., 1886], xiii). 13 194f. Hupfeld included what we now call P, the older Elohist, in this process, for many of the same reasons described above in regard to the relationship between J and E. It is unclear whether he believed that either E or J knew P, but this question has been rendered entirely moot by subsequent scholarship. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 17 He compared this process, as many still do, to the harmonization of the Gospels.14 It was at this point that he had to address the question of the nature of the younger Elohist, particularly its beginning in the middle of the Abraham cycle and its many perceived gaps throughout the course of the narrative. Though he did not write with complete certainty, Hupfeld clearly stated his opinion that the literary source produced by the younger Elohist, namely E, was originally a complete document, rather than simply additions to the older Elohist. Endlich, was den Zusammenhang und die Vollstndigkeit der Elohistischen Bestandtheile betrifft, oder die Frage ob es nur einzelne verbindungslose Stcke oder Denkschriften ber hervorragende Puncte der Ueberlieferung seien, oder ein zusammenhngendes die ganze heilige Geschichte dieser Urzeit umfassendes Werk, so stehe ich mich an das letztere anzunehmen, und sie als eine zusammenhngende und vollstndige Urkunde anzusehen.15 Thus he saw in E an overarching narrative, with its own theological perspective. This remains the primary argument of those scholars who support the existence of an independent E source.16 The gaps in the document he attributed to the work of the Redactor, who tried to excise some of the blatant repetitions of material among the various sources: Dafr spricht der von Abraham an durch das ganze Buch fortlaufende (auch in das folgende Buch sich erstreckende) Faden des Zusammenhangs; und oblgeich die Erzhlung erst mitten in der Geschichte Abrahams beginnt, auch nur einige Momente derselben betrifft, und weiterhin bedeutende Lcken darbietet, so zeigen sich doch an solchen Stellen, wie wir gesehen haben, zugleich Spuren eines frhern Zusammenhangs (Beziehungen auf Thatsachen die in die Lcke fallen, und nur aus einer andern Quellen bekannt sind), aus denen erhellt dass die betreffenden Thatsachen auch in dieser Quelle ursprnglich nicht gefehlt haben, der Bericht davon aber von dem Redactor wegen der Wiederholung die er mit den andern Quellen bildete ausgelassen und so die Lcke enstanden ist, wie dies denn auch den beiden anderen Quellen nicht minder widerfahren ist: so 14 Quellen, 195. Cf. especially the seminal article of G.F. Moore, Tatians Diatessaron and the Analysis of the Pentateuch, JBL 9 (1890): 201-215. 15 Quellen, 193f. 16 E.g., Jenks, Elohist, 19: there is significant evidence for the existence of E as a unified and extensive tradition. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 18 dass in dieser Hinsicht die Urkunde den beiden anderen nicht nachstehen drste.17 An important element of Hupfelds concept of the compilation of the sources is quietly inserted at the end here: he believed that the redactional process is evident in all three sources equally. Though he never returned to this point, we may view it as part of his rationale for presuming only one Redactor for all three sources. This leaves the obvious question, however, of why the Redactor would have removed some repetitions, but not all. In this regard Hupfeld argued that the Redactor was conscientious of both the importance of maintaining as much of his source material as possible and the need to present a readable final text once the documents had been combined: Dies beruht auf zwei entgegensetztzen Grundstzen des Verfahrens: einerseits auf der strengen Treue womit der Redactor oder Verfasser des Buchs, wie die lteste Geschichtschreibung berhaupt, seine Quellen wrtlich und vollstndig einrckte, und mit Beibehalkung aller ihrer Eigenthmlichkeiten zusammenstellte; andererseits dass sich damit so viel verstndige Rcksicht auf Zusammenhang und Einheit oder Planmssigkeit der Erzhlung verband, um zu offenbare Widerholungen oder Widersprche zu vermeiden, und die einzelnen Stcke seiner Quellen so anzuordnen und miteinander zu verbinden dass sie ein zusammenhngendes nach der Zeitfolge fortschreitendes Ganzes bildeten, und den (epischen) Plan wonach die Geschichte in den Quellen angelegt war in erweitertem Massstab auch in dem Ganzen wiederzugeben.18 This is basically the approach that the majority of source critics have taken ever since: the redactor did his best to balance the twin demands of reverence for his sources and the need to create a coherent narrative.19 It would seem clear enough from the last two centuries of source-critical scholarship, however, that if this was in fact his aim, the 17 Quellen, 194. 18 Quellen, 195f. 19 Cf., e.g., J. Carpenter and G. Harford-Battersby, The Hexateuch According to the Revised Version (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1900), I:176f. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 19 redactor has done a singularly bad job on both counts. Thus we are left with the all-too-familiar refrain of the incompetent redactor.20 For Hupfeld, the Redactors desire to retain as much as possible of his source material was evident from the very fact that we can separate them still today.21 This much is true. But his approach to the second duty of the Redactor, the removal of contradictions on behalf of the reader, is highly problematic (and remains so in modern scholarship). Hupfeld would have the Redactor not only removing contradictions, but relocating chunks of text to avoid inconsistencies, changing words to make the sources agree in their details, and adding his own text to further harmonize.22 In all this, Hupfeld is the forerunner of mainstream source-critical scholarship. Yet we are left, then and now, with the question of how it is that the Redactor did all this, yet still left the text so unreadable? Nevertheless, Hupfeld presented a relatively coherent picture of the process of composition and combination of J and E: the documents of two independent authors, neither knowing the work of the other, were combined (at the same time that they were combined with P; therefore, we could speak here of three documents) by a Redactor whose main goal was to keep the sources intact as far as possible, but who was aware of the need to resolve some contradictions and repetitions, either by excising the offending 20 See the criticism of this view by Halpern, The First Historians (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University, 1996), 29, 109: R [the Redactor] was a shadowy figure whose dull intelligence led him to overlook the contradictions his conflations had created. He was, in fact, a casual by-product of the source-critical hypothesis, without corporeal form, an editor who existed by definitionat times he created awkwardness by preserving reverently the tiniest fragments of sources; at other times he ruthlessly suppressed whole sections of the same sources. Halpern even singles out Hupfeld as the originator of this view (29 n.32). 21 Quellen, 196. 22 Quellen, 198ff. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 20 portions, or occasionally by inserting a word or two of his own. Hupfelds presentation does have its share of weaknesses. The possibility that the Elohist document(s) were considered canonical goes unmentioned; were this the case, it would leave open the possibility that J knew the earlier document(s), but did not see fit to change them when he authored and inserted his own work. Most importantly, the role of the Redactor is left much too undefined. Hupfeld has attributed every aspect of the relationship between the various documents contradictions, gaps, doublets to the conscious choice of the Redactor, even when these choices sometimes appear to contradict themselves methodologically. Hupfeld did make a positive contribution to the methodology of source criticism, however. Though he did not seem to have fully considered all the options, his decision to treat the individual sources as non-canonical stands as an important counterpoint to the scholars who followed him, particularly in the post-Wellhausen era. His reasoning in determining that the Jahwist did not know the Elohist, though again imperfect, is an important beginning for an examination of the relationship between these two sources. It is particularly valuable since so few scholars, again particularly after Wellhausen, chose to explicitly address this issue. Most importantly, Hupfeld accepted the simplest view of the redactional process available to him. He had discovered that there were three sources; this therefore necessitated their combination. Having ruled out on reasonably well-argued grounds the possibility that this combination could have been achieved by Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 21 the Jahwist source, the Redactor had to be a fourth figure. But Hupfeld stopped there: three sources, and one Redactor, who was responsible for putting all three together.23 Karl Heinrich Graf Though it came to be known as the Grafian hypothesis,24 the idea that the priestly source (or parts thereof) was later than the J and E sources did not originate with Karl Heinrich Graf (1815-1869).25 Nevertheless, his two major essays on the topic formed the foundation for the subsequent work of Wellhausen, which was based almost entirely on Grafs major argument.26 Grafs conclusion, that the priestly document is the latest of the Pentateuchal sources, revolutionized the source-critical approach to the Pentateuch, and essentially wiped away all scholarship on the matter that preceded it.27 After Graf, there was no more Grundschrift; though a minority of scholars continued (and continue) to argue that the priestly source was not in fact later than Deuteronomy, no one has since proposed that P is the oldest of the sources. 23 Halpern, in his criticism of Hupfeld, misses this crucial point: if there are multiple sources, someone must have compiled them. Though the Redactor is a by-product, he is a necessary one. The danger of which Halpern seems unwary is that of multiplying this by-product unnecessarily. Remarkably, even Halpern himself falls into this trap, assuming the figures of RJE and RJEP in his reconstruction of the growth of the Pentateuch. 24 Cf. W. Robertson Smiths preface to Wellhausens Prolegomena, v. 25 This honor probably belongs to Grafs teacher E. Reuss, who was evidently teaching this idea as early as the 1830s, though he did not publish his thoughts on the matter until 1881 (Die Geschichte der Heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments, Braunschweig: C.A. Schwetschke und Sohn, 1881). Cf. Nicholson, Pentateuch, 4f.; Rogerson, Old Testament Criticism, 259; Houtman, Pentateuch, 98f. 26 Cf. the now-famous comment by Wellhausen in the introduction to his Prolegomena: I learnedthat Karl Heinrich Graf placed the Law later than the Prophets, and, almost without knowing his reasons for the hypothesis, I was prepared to accept it (3). 27 Though both W. Vatke and J.F.L. George published studies arguing that at least parts of the non-Deuteronomic law were later than Deuteronomy, their conclusions were rejected until Reuss and his students resurrected (and furthered) them. Cf. Rogerson, Old Testament Criticism, 63-78; Houtman, Pentateuch, 98. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 22 Grafs first essay, Die Geschichtlichen Bcher des Alten Testaments,28 aimed primarily at determining the dating of the laws in P in relation to Deuteronomy, which since de Wette had been recognized as the latest of the Pentateuchal sources. Graf began his essay, however, by demonstrating that the narrative portions of Deuteronomy show familiarity, if not direct dependence, on the narratives found in the works of P, E, and J.29 Graf did not treat each of these sources separately, however; he took it for granted that D is familiar with a combined text of all three (as Hupfeld already did as well), and so simply referred to the whole block as the work of the Jehovist. He laid out his view of how the Pentateuch grew to its present form right at the beginning: Wie das Buch des Jeremia durch sptere Hinzufgung neuer Abschnitte aus einem kleinen Ganzen ein grsseres Ganze geworden ist, wie das Buch des Jesaja durch sptere Zustze von andern Hnden die erweiterte und zum Theil einer andern Zeit angehrende Gestalt erhalten hat, in welcher es uns jetzt vorliegt, so ist aus der Urschrift, dem alten Geschichtsbuche des Elohisten, durch sptere und wiederholte Ueberarbeitung, Erweiterung und Fortsetzung der Geschichtserzhlung die Gesammtheit der Bcher entstanden, die jetzt den ersten Theil des A.T. bilden (Pentateuch und Prophetae priores). Dass von jedem folgenden Bearbeiter die in der Zwischenzeit verfassten Geschichtswerke benutzt worden sind, ist nicht nur natrlich, sondern zeigt sich auch durch verschiedenartige wrtliche Auszge, und die Kritik sucht diese Quellenschriften zu erkennen und ihren einzelnen Verfassern und Zeiten zuzuweisen. Wenn es auch in dieser Hinsicht schwer sein wird, bis ins Einzelnste zu unbestrittenen Ergebnissen zu gelangen, so treten doch zwei Hauptbearbeitungen deutlich hervor, die des sogenannten Jehovisten (ich behalte diesen Namen der Deutlichkeit wegen bei) und die des Deuteronomikers, denen wir aber noch fr den ersten Theil, den jetzigen Pentateuch, einen vierten bis jetzt nicht anerkannten Ergnzer der Gesetzgebung aus der Zeit Esras hinzufgen mssen. Da diese letztere Annahme, nach welcher die Gesetze des Leviticus und das was in Numeri und Exodus damit zusammenhngt, den jngsten Theil des Pentateuchs bilden, der gewhnlichen Ansicht, die gerade diese Gesetze dem Elohisten zuschreibt, zuwiderluft, zugleich aber fr die ganze Ansicht von der Gestaltung der israelitischen Geschichte in jeder Hinsicht von wesentlichem Einfluss ist, so bedarf dieselbe einer ausfhrlichen Begrndung.30 28 Part I: Die Bestandtheile der geschichtlichen Bcher von Gen. 1 bis 2 Reg. 25 (Pentateuch und Prophetae priores), Leipzig: T.O. Weigel, 1866. 29 Geschichtlichen Bcher, 8-34. 30 Geschichtlichen Bcher, 3f. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 23 Graf had already determined that the pre-Deuteronomic work (that of the Jehovist) was basically historical in character, and that the post-exilic (and therefore post-Deuteronomic) work was basically legal. This had significant ramifications for the subsequent development of the source-critical theory, particularly with Wellhausen. Equally importantly, Graf expressed his opinion that the growth of the Pentateuch was essentially a process of accretion, with each subsequent author/editor working with full knowledge of the texts that preceded him chronologically (so that the Deuteronomist knew the Jehovist, and the priestly legislator of Leviticus knew the Deuteronomist and the Jehovist). The most remarkable aspect of his argument, however, as was recognized at the time by Kuenen31 and Wellhausen,32 was the separation of the post-exilic priestly legislation from the pre-exilic, and still considered earliest, priestly narrative. Having shown that Deuteronomy is later than and dependent on the narratives of the Jehovist, Graf went on to show that the legal portions of the Grundschrift, found in Exodus-Numbers, must actually be later than Deuteronomy, in fact post-exilic. Thus he tore in two the Grundschrift, creating two distinct sources out of one, much as Hupfeld had done to the Elohist. The prevailing opinion on the composition of the Pentateuch before Graf was that there was a combined document PEJ which was then united with Deuteronomy (= PEJD).33 Graf added a new piece to this picture: PEJD was now followed by another priestly source, containing only the laws, which we may label simply P2. Thus we had 31 Hexateuch, xxff. 32 Prolegomena, 10. 33 So Hupfeld; see above. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 24 PEJDP2. This view not only created a new source, but ushered in a subtle but powerful conceptual revolution in how critical scholarship viewed the Pentateuch. Grafs focus on the legislation, rather than the narrative, for determining the proper order of Pentateuchal documents meant that the pre-Deuteronomic narrative began to be treated as a single block, followed by the Deuteronomic legislation, which was itself followed by the priestly legislation. Graf made this clear in one of his few direct statements on the matter: Erst wenn man nicht nur Deut. C. 1-30, sondern auch den Leviticus und die nachexilischen Stcke im Exodus (Ex. 12,1-28. 43-51. C.25-31. C.35-40) u. in Numeri (Num.1,1-10,28, C.15.16 u. 17 theilw. 18.19.28-31.35,16-36,13) so wie die namhaft gemachten kleinern Zustze in der Genesis und einige andere, die sich vielleicht noch finden, weglsst, erhlt man die vordeuteronomische Gestalt des Pentateuchs, das Werk wie es aus der Hand des letzten Ueberarbeiters vor dem Deuteronomiker, des sogenannten Jehovisten, hervorgengangen ist. Es war somit weit mehr ein historisches Werk und hat erst durch die sptere Erweiterung den Charakter eines Gesetzbuchs erhalten. Dass das Werk des Jehovisten aus einer Ueberarbeitung eines noch ltern, vielleicht seblst schon nicht mehr in seiner ursprnglichsten Gestalt vorhandenen Werkes nach verschiedenen theils mndlichen theils schriftlichen Quellen der Ueberlieferung hervorgegangen war, bedarf keines neuen Nachweises; bis zu einer Erforschung dieser ltern Quellen zurckzugehen, liegt hier ausserhalb der unserer Untersuchung der Geschichte selbst zu einem irgendwie sichern Ergebnisse fhren.34 It is clear from this that Graf had already split the process of compiling the Pentateuch into three distinct steps: the pre-Deuteronomic narrative (compiled by the Jehovist); the Deuteronomic recension; and the post-exilic priestly legal material. It is worth taking a step back at this point and reflecting on what Grafs first essay meant for the study of the J and E sources and their combination. At its most basic level, the approach of Graf relegated the narrative materials to a secondary status with regard to their usefulness for dating the sources. Graf concluded, before Wellhausen, that the laws were the best way to demonstrate the gradual changes in Israelite religion that led to the 34 Geschichtlichen Bcher, 94f. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 25 distinct sources we now find in the Pentateuch. And Graf claimed, as Wellhausen did after him, that the narratives were all early, and the laws virtually all late. Thus J and E had already with Graf begun to be treated as a single block of narrative, along with what little remained of the Grundschrift after Graf removed the legal material from it. It is also worth noting that Graf made explicit the view that the Pentateuch grew by accretion. Though he dealt with this issue only in regard to the larger blocks (the Jehovist, the Deuteronomist, and the priestly legislator), this approach to the formation of the Pentateuch proved very attractive to subsequent scholarship, and was soon extended to cover the entire process from start to finish. Grafs arguments for the late dating of the priestly legislation were convincing, but his separation of the priestly narrative from the legislation was not. The counter-argument was made nearly immediately by Kuenen. The first glance at Grafs essay was enough to satisfy me that this attempt to split up the Grundschrift was the Achilles-heel of his whole hypothesisThe historical and legislative sections are dominated by essentially the same conceptions and resemble each other so closely that they cannot possibly be severed by a period of three or four centuriesBut what then? Must the laws stand with the narratives, or the narratives fall with the laws? I could not hesitate for a moment in accepting the latter alternativeHardly had I begun seriously to ask myself on what grounds [the narrative sections] had been placed there by others and left there by Graf than I saw more clearly day by day that they had no real claim whatever to be regarded as pre-Yahwistic.35 Graf evidently saw the error of his ways, for in 1869 he published his second essay on the subject, Die s.g. Grundschrift des Pentateuchs,36 in which he undid the mistake of his first essay and reassigned the priestly narratives to the same post-exilic era as the priestly legislation. Thus, having created a new source three years earlier, Graf removed it from 35 Hexateuch, xxi-xxiii. An argument for the unity of the priestly material had already been made by Nldeke in 1869 (Untersuchung zur Kritik des Alten Testaments [Kiel: Schwers, 1869]), but Nldeke continued to place P first chronologically, while admitting that this dating was uncertain. The unity of the priestly material, however, in his view, was not. Cf. Rogerson, Old Testament Criticism, 258f. 36 AWEAT 1,4 (1869): 466-77. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 26 the theory, but left us with yet another new sequence of Pentateuchal composition: EJDP (or JEDP the order of the earliest elements was unimportant and undecided). Though this change appears to affect only the priestly material on either end of the spectrum, in fact the repercussions for the J and E sources were tremendous, if unrecognized as such at the time. By moving the narrative material to agree with the legislative, Graf essentially proclaimed the legal material to be the linchpin for the dating of the sources, leaving the narrative material to the side. Though this contradicted Grafs earlier assumption, that the historical documents were all early, and the legal documents all late, the basic conclusions still held, particularly when it was recognized that the priestly narratives were of a very different character from those in J and E. In this regard Graf largely anticipated Wellhausen: Auch kann in der That, wie das jahwistische Werk mit seinen herrlichen Erzhlungen der Blthezeit der Literatur und des Prophetenthums angehrt, die Beschreibung der Stiftshtte mit ihren wrtlichen zum Theil doppelten und dreifachen Widerholungen, die zwlfmal gleichlautende Aufzhlung Num. c. 7 und dergl. durch pendantische Ausfhrlichkeit und Kleinlichkeit sich auszeichende oder prosaisch trockene Darstellungen [here quoting Nldeke] nur einer Zeit des Verfalls der Literatur angehren.37 With the removal of the priestly narratives to the end of the sequence, the J and E documents were left alone at the beginning.38 Since it had been recognized since Hupfeld that the narratives of J and E are similar, they were stuck together as the narratives that made up the earlier parts of the Pentateuch, as compared with the legal/priestly material that made up the later parts. 37 Die s.g. Grundschrift, 474f. 38 Their dating at the beginning was secure, on the basis of the one useful legislative chunk in E, the Book of the Covenant in Ex. 20-23, which was readily compared with and found earlier than Deuteronomy. J contained Ex. 34, but the legal material in this chapter was (and remains) difficult to assign definitively, essentially leaving J as entirely narrative. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 27 Not only did this mean that J and E were basically unimportant as far as dating the sources was concerned, but it meant that the relationship between the two was no longer obvious. When the Grundschrift, or at least the narrative part of it, still remained at the beginning of the sequence of documents, Hupfelds arguments that E belonged between the Grundschrift and J remained valid. With the removal of the priestly material to the end of the sequence, there was no longer any basis for dating E before J. At the same time, with the exciting new revelations regarding the legal material, there was little scholarly interest in determining the correct order of the pre-Deuteronomic narrative documents. Grafs study, and the scholarly reaction to it, therefore, laid the groundwork for the eventual combination of J and E into one narrative document, known by the siglum JE or the name Jehovist. In short, Graf went from PEJDP2 to JEDP; from four basic documents back to three, as was the case before Hupfeld.39 The difference now was simply that E had been removed from P and given to J. This was the beginning of the idea of the combined JE document. Abraham Kuenen If Graf was the first to fully propose the late dating for parts of the priestly material, Abraham Kuenen (1828-1891) was the scholar who most forcefully argued the idea before Wellhausen.40 Though his views did not differ considerably from Grafs (indeed, among the trio of Graf, Kuenen, and Wellhausen, there is little disagreement on 39 Wellhausen makes this idea explicit; see below. 40 Cf. Robertson Smiths comment in the preface to Wellhausens Prolegomena: [I]n Holland the writings of Professor Kuenen, who has been aptly termed Grafs goel, had shown in an admirable and conclusive manner that the objections usually taken to Grafs arguments did not touch the substance of the thesis for which he contended (v). For an excellent and full treatment of Kuenens ideas, cf. Houtman, Pentateuch, 101ff. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 28 the major points), his manner of expressing them was considerably clearer and more direct. Some of the underlying assumptions and conclusions that Graf left implicit were made explicit in Kuenens work, particularly in his later, most comprehensive work on the subject of the composition of the Hexateuch.41 Kuenen clearly recognized that Grafs theory gave priority to the legal material over the narrative, and did not shrink from it, but embraced this approach: We have seen that the division of the whole mass of laws into these three groups [Book of the Covenant, Deuteronomy, priestly] must ultimately influence our view of the narratives of the Hexateuch.42 The division of the Pentateuch into sources, and the relative dating thereof, was now officially based primarily on the legal material, to which the narratives were then assigned. This is, of course, in stark contrast to the approach taken since Astruc and indeed all the way until Hupfeld, in which it was the contradictions and doublets in the narratives that determined the division of the sources. Kuenen also took up with more force than Graf the issue of the relationship between the J and E sources. He followed Hupfeld in declaring that neither J nor E was responsible for the combination of the two sources, and largely for the same reasons as Hupfeld.43 But he did allow, contra Hupfeld, that the sources knew each other: But no one denies that J may have known and imitated E, or vice versa.44 In large part it seems 41 An Historico-Critical Inquiry into the Origin and Composition of the Hexateuch. 42 Hexateuch, 55. 43 What we do deny is that either of these authors marred his own work by combining it with that of the other[The] harmonist, though he too uses the name Yahw, must certainly be distinguished from J (Hexateuch, 164). 44 Hexateuch, 164. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 29 that Kuenens views on this matter are determined by his acknowledged difficulty in effectively identifying and disentangling the two sources: Nothing is clearer than that the prophetic elements do not form a literary whole. The usual indications of the union of different accounts repetition, discrepancies, differences of language force themselves repeatedly and unmistakably upon us. But it is no less obvious that some of the narratives and pericopes have a common origin: they presuppose each other, and agree in language and style. The ultimate goal of the critic, therefore, must be the complete indication of the connected works and the detached narratives and laws, if there are any which lie at the basis of the prophetic portions of the Hexateuch, and the explanation of the method in which they have been interwoven on the one hand, or welded together and recast on the other. But this remains at present an unattained ideal. As the analysis has been carried gradually further it has become increasingly evident that the critical question is far more difficult and involved than was at first supposed, and the solutions which seem to have been secured have been in whole or in part brought into question again.45 In essence, Kuenen declared the inability of source-critical scholarship to agree on the separation of J and E.46 To a degree, this difficulty remains today; yet neither then nor now is the simple inability to separate the sources evidence that they were combined at an earlier date than or in a separate process from the combination of the rest of the Pentateuch. It was probably the combination of these two factors, namely, the emphasis on the laws and the confusion regarding the relationship between J and E, which led Kuenen to the following statement: The mutual relation of J and E is one of the most vexed questions of the criticism of the Hexateuch, and the use of the symbols themselves must of course be affected by its solution; but, meanwhile, there can be no objection to our indicating all that is left in the Hexateuch after the withdrawal of R, P, and D, by the combination JE.47 45 Hexateuch, 138f. See his confused statements on the nature of J relative to E: The prophetic passages still left in Gen. xx.-l., when E has been removed, agree in the use of Yahw, but are not otherwise homogeneous. They are in part parallel with E, independent of it, and generally more or less divergent from it, and in part dependent on E, and apparently intended to supplement or expand it (147). 46 Note that he contributes to this in part by lumping them together as the prophetic elements, as opposed to the Deuteronomic and priestly elements. 47 Hexateuch, 64. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 30 This is in line with Grafs use of the term Jehovist to denote the pre-Deuteronomic narrative material, and certainly corresponds with Wellhausens use of the same term. But Kuenens statement here exemplifies the common scholarly approach to the J and E sources: since they are difficult to separate and almost entirely narrative, they can be lumped together with little or no distinction. That the narratives had lost virtually all usefulness for Kuenen can be seen from his statement regarding the relationship of the groups of laws to the groups of narratives: An unmistakable affinity exists between the Yahw-sections [J] and the second group of Elohim-passages [E] on the one hand, and the Book of the Covenant on the other.48 In other words, the narratives of J and E, two documents acknowledged as originally individual and separate, are combined in their relationship to the set of laws in Ex. 20-23. Literarily and historically this is impossible, but as Kuenen was (like Graf) simply uninterested in the narratives, he felt no need to treat them separately. The crucial step taken by Kuenen was not only to treat J and E as a unit (the prophetic elements), but therefore to understand them as a literary and historical unit. The reasons for this are unclear; Kuenen himself said by way of explanation only that if we acknowledge, then, that the prophetic elements are independent of the priestly ones, and call in a redactor to unite the two, we still have to inquire into the mutual relations of the prophetic elements themselves.49 Even here, the idea of the redactor is something of an aside. And, like Hupfeld, Kuenen was unable to pinpoint the nature of this redactors work: We may safely say that it was highly intricate in its nature. The redaction was 48 Hexateuch, 62. 49 Hexateuch, 160f. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 31 sometimes scrupulously conservative in regard to the documents, sometimes harmonising, sometimes independent and free.50 Again, however, this process was not of real importance for Kuenen; he devoted virtually no space to discussing the relationship between or combination of J and E, but simply mentioned the problem in passing, without investigating it on either literary or historical grounds. Though Kuenen did not differ greatly from Graf, his statements were much more direct: J and E knew each other,51 and are difficult to extract from one another, and since one of them (it hardly matters which) contains what we believe is the earliest legal material, therefore we can lump them together and call it a day. It is clear from Kuenen, more so than from Graf, that the idea of a combined JE document is not based entirely on literary criteria, but is the result of both a frustration with the inability to effectively identify and separate the individual sources and a fundamental shift of focus from the narratives to the laws as the basis for understanding the sources of the Pentateuch: What we want is simply a common title for all that does not belong to P or D.52 The result of this is a siglum, JE, which does not represent an actual literary or historical item, and which is unsupported by any real theory of its existence. Yet from this point forward, and especially in Wellhausen, it took on a life of its own, and became not a casual way of discussing the pre-Deuteronomic narrative sources, but a real entity in the history of Israelite literature. 50 Hexateuch, 161. 51 Kuenen was able to claim this mutual knowledge on the basis of his idea that the original author of E, in the northern kingdom in ca. 750 BCE, knew the original document J, which was also composed in the northern kingdom, though earlier; that both documents were known and well received in Judah; and that both were expanded into distinctively Judean editions; this process is described by Kuenen, remarkably, as so natural in itself (Hexateuch, 248). 52 Hexateuch, 138. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 32 Julius Wellhausen Of the trio of scholars who laid the foundation for modern source criticism, Graf was the initiator and first proponent; Kuenen the defender and detailed explicator; and Julius Wellhausen (1844-1918) the one who took the ideas and applied them to a fully articulated history of Israelite religion, a feat for which he is justly famous.53 But he was also the only one of the three to attempt a full source-critical analysis of the Hexateuch.54 Though this work is frequently overlooked in favor of the Prolegomena, it is here that we can see how Wellhausen treated the J and E documents and their relationship to one another (as opposed to the Prolegomena, which, as we will see, barely touches upon these sources at all). In the Composition, Wellhausen left little time to wonder how he would treat the issue of the combination of J and E; it is on the first page, in explaining his various sigla, that he wrote, Ich habe fr die s.g. Grundschrift das Zeichen Q gewhlt, als Abkrzung fr Vierbundesbuch (quatuor), welchen Namen ich als den passendsten fr sie vorschlage; den anderweitigen vom letzten Redactor (R) damit vereinigten Stoff insgesamt (= das jehovistische Geschichtsbuch) habe ich JE bezeichnet und darin den Jahvisten und Elohisten als J und E unterschieden.55 We already know from this that Wellhausen will basically follow in the footsteps of Graf and Kuenen, treating the J and E sources as one combined document, even before proving that such a combination took place. This is remarkable in particular because here he was working not within an historical framework, as in the Prolegomena, but was doing purely 53 In the Prolegomena. 54 In Die Composition. 55 Composition, 1f. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 33 literary analysis. Thus it might have been expected that Wellhausen would have seen as part of his task in the Composition the demonstration that J and E were combined prior to their use by the later sources. This task was left until the study of the patriarchal narratives; for the entirety of the primeval history, Wellhausen used the term JE to refer to the non-priestly material. In principle, he did this because he believed (correctly) that there are but two sources present in the primeval history, P (his Q) and non-P: Darum ist es auch in der Natur der Sache begrndet, dass man zuerst nur zwei Fden der Erzhlung in Gen. 1-11 erkannt hat, Q und JE.56 Yet to call the non-P material in the primeval history JE, rather than either J or E, is already to prejudice the results of the investigation. This is particularly so when Wellhausen himself recognized that E is not found before the Abraham cycle in Genesis;57 if this is so, why not call the non-P material in the primeval history J? Furthermore, it should be noted that Wellhausen delayed the above statement until the end of his analysis of Gen. 1-11, rather than stating it at the beginning. And when he did make it, it was as part of an argument that seems to have little to do with the specific text of Gen. 1-11: Aber festhalten muss man, dass die Schrift JE bereits den literatischen Process, aus dem sie hervorging, hinter sich hatte und abgeschlossen vorlag, als sie durch den letzten Redactor (R) mit Q verbunden wurde. Im Vergleich zu Q ist JE als ein Ganzes, als eine Einheit zu behandeln, Q ward nicht mit einer der frheren Ausgaben oder gar den ursprnglichen Quellen von JE zusammengearbeitet, sondern mit der Ausgabe letzter Hand. Alle Teile von JE, so verschiedener Herkunft sie sind, haften doch viel fester unter sich zusammen, als mit Q, sind durch Vorstellungen Ausdrcke und Stil unter sich verwandt und von Q geschieden. Darum ist es auch in der Natur der Sache begrndet, dass man zuerst nur zwei Fden der Erzhlung in Gen. 1-11 erkannt hat, Q und JE, und erst allmhlich auch in JE selbst ein complicirtes Gespinnst zu erkennen beginnt. 56 Composition, 14. 57 Composition, 29. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 34 Man hat alle Ursache, diese Zwieteilung festzuhalten, auch nachdem sich ergeben hat, dass JE nicht in dem Sinne wie Q ein einheitliches Werk ist.58 In short, he treated JE as such in the primeval history not because he saw there a combined literary strand, but because he had already decided that J and E were combined before their combination with P. Therefore, although only J is present at this point, the document interwoven with P in the primeval history, in Wellhausens mind, is JE. Once he began the analysis of Gen. 12-26, Wellhausen made it his stated goal to demonstrate that J and E were combined by the figure he calls the Jehovist.59 His method of doing this was, however, quite unsatisfactory. Wellhausen analyzed sections of the patriarchal narratives which are composed almost entirely of J and E, and showed in each how the Jehovist has combined the two documents, and in particular where the Jehovist has added material to make sense of the combination.60 While his identification of redactional passages could be entirely correct (which it almost certainly is not), this has no bearing on the question of an independent combination of J and E. Without including material from P in the discussion, and without demonstrating that the process of combination differs when P is involved, Wellhausen did nothing more than point out where J and E are combined. He himself seemed to recognize this: Dass JE gegenber Q eine Einheit bildet, und dass der Jehovist von dem letzten Redaktor der Genesis, der die Compilation des Jehovisten mit dem Vierbundesbuche vereinigte, zu unterscheiden ist, habe ich zwar nicht direct, aber indirect, wie mich dnkt, hinlnglich gezeigt.61 58 Composition, 14. 59 Composition, 16. 60 Though most scholars might not agree with his assignment of redactional passages today. For example, Wellhausen sees the redactor of JE at work in the following: 12:10-20; 18:17-19, et al. (Composition, 15-29). 61 Composition, 29. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 35 It is in the subsequent section, the analysis of Gen. 27-36, that Wellhausen admitted the true difficulty of his task. After attempting to distinguish the sources in chapter 25, Wellhausen admitted, Das Endergebnis ist, dass JE zwar auch in diesem Abschnitt aus J und E bestehn muss, dass aber eine durchgefhrte Scheidung unmglich ist. Positiv ausdrckt besagt dies, dass J und E fast unauflslich eng mit einander verbunden sind, zu einem Werke von wirklich beinah einheitlichem Charakter. Nur wo die verschiedenen Gottesnamen ein auffallendes Kriterium an die Hand geben, gelingt es die doppelte Strmung klarer zu erkennen. Darnach ist es nun aber vollkomen unwidersprechlich und insofern sind unsere Kapitel besonders lehrreich , dass J und E in ganz anderer Weise mit einander verbunden sind als mit Q, folglich auch von anderer Hand und in frherer Zeit. Erst ward durch den Jehovisten JE componirt, darnach entstand durch die Zusammenfgung von JE und Q von Seiten eines spteren Redaktors die Genesis in ihrer gegenwrtigen Gestalt.62 In other words, without the criterion of the divine names, J and E are nearly inseparable. Because they are so closely related in terms of style, and are so difficult to separate, the process by which they were combined must have been different from that by which P was added, since P is so readily separable from the rest of the Pentateuch. This is the basic argument that has been used to justify the purported early combination of J and E ever since: simply that they are much harder to separate than the other sources (see below). Yet Wellhausen, and everyone after him, admitted that the two individual documents J and E were stylistically and thematically similar, and both largely narrative in nature. If two similar documents are combined, should they not be more difficult to disentangle than two entirely different documents? It is along these lines that Wellhausen continued to argue through his analysis of Genesis. J and E are more closely connected with one another than with P, so they must have been combined independently of their combination with P.63 The reasoning here is 62 Composition, 35. 63 Cf. Composition, 60f., 72. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 36 clearly inadequate, yet has been remarkably pervasive in scholarship ever since, as we will see. Similarly, subsequent scholarship has supported the early combination of J and E by reference (direct or indirect) to the proof adduced by Wellhausen that the non-legal material in D was based only on the narratives found in JE, and not those in P. Graf had already begun this process by demonstrating that the Deuteronomic narratives were based on his Jehovist, but it must be remembered that for Graf this term included the priestly narratives. Once those had been relocated to join the laws at the end of the process, Wellhausen was able to show clearly that the narratives in D in fact did not know those in P at all. Yet Wellhausen only came to this discussion late in Die Composition;64 by that point, he had already proved to his own satisfaction that J and E were combined early. Thus, in showing the dependence of D on early narratives, he referred only to the combined JE document, rather than the independent sources J and E. In short, Wellhausen never proved that D only knew the combined sources J and E; he assumed it, based on his previous findings. This conclusion has been accepted down through the generations, with almost no effort made to determine if it is true (for some exceptions, see chapter 3 below). We are left to ask, therefore, how, in Wellhausens view, this combination of J and E was achieved. In his view, the fact that the individual voices of J and E are audible even after their combination is testimony, as Hupfeld already recognized, to the efforts of the Jehovist to preserve as much of the original documents as possible when combining them. Obviously, according to Wellhausen, additions were at times necessary in order to 64 193ff. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 37 smooth the differences between the two (e.g., Gen. 16:8-1065). At times the Jehovist had to change the language of one of the documents to match that of the other (e.g., the place names in Gen. 2266). And most obviously, in creating a combined whole, the Jehovist had to delete pieces of either J or E, leaving both documents with significant gaps (e.g., Gen. 28, in which the escape of Jacob is reported according to J, but, according to Wellhausen, must have existed also in E67). Despite all this, not only was Wellhausen able to identify (for the most part) a Jahwistic theology and an Elohistic theology, but even the independent theology of the Jehovist.68 Perhaps unsaid in all this was the unstated (and a priori?) assumption on Wellhausens part that since J and E are so difficult to separate, the redactor who combined them must have been particularly active and destructive of the original sources. As noted above, Wellhausen claimed repeatedly that the Jehovist is identifiably distinct from R, the figure who combined JE with P. Yet Wellhausens description of the work of R seems strangely familiar: Die Ttigkeit des Redactors besteht vornehmlich in der geschickten Ineinanderscheibung der Quellen, wobei er ihren Inhalt mglichst unverkrzt, den Wortlaut und die Ordnung der Erzhlung mglichst unverndert lsst. Aber nicht immer kann er so ohne eigene Eingriffe verfahren. Zuweilen macht er Zustze, etwa um einen Widerspruch zu beseitigen oder einen Spalt zu verdecken, z.B. Gen. 7,6-9. Ein ander Mal nimmt er eine Verstellung in der einen Quelle vor, um sie dem Zusammenhange der anderen anzupassen, z.B. 7,16c: und Jahve schloss hinter ihm zu, was in JE ursprnglich etwa hinter 7,7 stand, wegen der Zusammenarbeitung mit Q aber unmglich vor v.13ss. gebracht werden konnte. Endlich und das ist die Hauptsache hat R auch allerlei Verkrzungen und Auslassungen vorgenommen.69 65 Composition, 20. 66 Composition, 18f. 67 Composition, 32. 68 For an easy example, see Wellhausens treatment of Gen. 28:14, in which the Jehovist makes a conscious change to the theological doctrine of the Jahwist (Composition, 31). Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 38 Wellhausens description of R, given in this single quote, is virtually identical to the description of the Jehovist scattered throughout his textual analysis and collected in the preceding paragraph. One important difference was left unsaid here, however: for Wellhausen, the Jehovist also served as a full author; to him was ascribed the non-priestly Sinai pericope.70 As this claim must be rejected entirely (as we will argue below in chapter 4), the sole methodological distinction between the Jehovist and R is removed. It is clear, therefore, that the difference between the Jehovist and R is not one of methodology, but of results: J and E are hard to separate, P is not. Yet this is obviously not the responsibility of whoever combined them, but is rather due to the very nature of the documents themselves. To summarize: in Die Composition, Wellhausen stated repeatedly that J and E were combined independently of P, but was in the end unable to prove this effectively. Yet the underlying basis for his argument, that J and E are more difficult to separate out than P, has stood the test of time, though it is hardly adequate. In part, the longevity of Wellhausens views on this subject are due to their subsequent application in his Prolegomena, which in fame and influence has remained prominent in biblical scholarship until today. The support for and criticism of this book are extensive and well known, and do not bear repeating here.71 It is our interest simply to examine how 69 Composition, 2f. 70 Composition, 94f. 71 E.g., Nicholson, Pentateuch; D.A. Knight, ed., Julius Wellhausen and His Prolegomena to the History of Israel (Semeia 25, 1983); M. Weinfeld, The Place of the Law. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 39 Wellhausens claims in Die Composition regarding the purported JE document are used in the Prolegomena, and what effect that may have had on subsequent scholarship. For the most part, the Prolegomena is interested in revisiting the same territory already mapped out by Graf, although in far greater detail and in a considerably more convincing manner. Thus, like Graf, Wellhausen spent virtually no space discussing the pre-Deuteronomic narratives; the focus was entirely on proving the relative lateness of the laws. For this reason, also like Graf, Wellhausen was content to treat the pre-Deuteronomic narratives (J and E) as one block (JE, or the Jehovist). It is only in the very last pages of the Prolegomena that Wellhausen addressed these sources individually, and there only in the most superficial way. Having shown the development of Israelite religion in rough strokes, Wellhausen declared it possible to trace the inner development of the tradition in the intermediate stages between the two extremities.72 Relying entirely on his own sensibilities, Wellhausen declared, The second Jehovistic source, E, breathes the air of the prophets much more markedly, and shows a more advanced and thorough-going religiosityThe Deity appears less primitive than in J, and does not approach men in bodily form, but calls to them from heaven, or appears to them in dream. The religious element has become more refined, but at the same time more energetic, and has laid hold of elements heterogeneous to itself.73 This passage, as much as any in Wellhausens work, is steeped in the Enlightenment mindset for which he has been roundly criticized (if at times unfairly74); yet its influence on all subsequent scholarship has been tremendous. There is no proof in this passage, nor even the slightest hint of it; it is no more than a statement of two differing approaches to the deity in two different documents. 72 Prolegomena, 360. 73 Prolegomena, 361. 74 Cf. Houtman, Pentateuch, 113f., for a more balanced opinion. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 40 Nonetheless, this argument was among the first, and certainly the most influential, to argue for the priority of J over E. Though in the wake of Graf and Kuenen the issue of relative dating had been somewhat neglected, the majority opinion still held with Hupfeld that E predated J.75 Wellhausen reversed this on the grounds related above, and has been followed by virtually every scholar since. Yet, crucially, Wellhausen did not come to this conclusion on the basis of the source-critical separation of the documents, for as we saw above, he viewed the two documents as originally independent, complete, parallel versions of the same history; nor did he argue that that E was written to supplement and correct J, for as we have seen, he followed Hupfeld in denying that either author knew the work of the other. Their relative dating was only possible through comparison of their independent theologies. If we can reject Wellhausens gross evolutionary framework as flawed, and the majority, if not the entirety, of scholarship has, then we should also reject his relative dating of J and E on these grounds.76 As a corollary, if one accepts that J and E were originally independent documents (i.e., neither was dependent on the other), then one must also admit that it is impossible to prove their relative dating one way or the other. It is of no little import that in the Prolegomena, this most influential work of biblical criticism, which provided the main impetus for the spread of the Documentary Hypothesis throughout the scholarly world, the combination of J and E into a JE document is assumed rather than proved. Most scholarship following Wellhausen aimed at arguing further the relative dating of D and P, either for or against Wellhausens views; 75 Nicholson, Pentateuch, 13. 76 In this study I will not put forth a theory on the relative dating of J and E for the reasons given above. My concern here is to reject the approach taken by Wellhausen and so many others after him, for whom the relative dating of J and E is part and parcel of the overarching theory of their authorship and combination. Chapter One The Scholarly Origins of JE 41 the dating of and purported combination of J and E was taken for granted, as it was already by Graf. Even for scholars who returned to the literary analysis of the Pentateuch, the assignment of sources tended to be based not just on the literary qualities of the text, but equally on the religious history as developed by Wellhausen; the separation of J and E into individual documents, though attempted, was not considered a priority when compared to the distinctions between JE, P, and D. The far-reaching effect of this approach is evident from even a cursory glance at post-Wellhausen Pentateuchal scholarship. In this regard S. R. Driver, the most influential English-speaking biblical scholar, is also perhaps the most guilty. He acknowledged the difficulty in separating J and E, calling the criteria for doing so indecisive,77 and fell back on Wellhausens theories: J and E, as they are very similar in character and tone, may, for many practical purposes, be grouped together as a single stratum.78 Similarly, G. von Rad stated, The work of the Elohist probably arose one or two centuries [!] later [than that of the Yahwist]. Soon, it was closely intertwined with the work of the Yahwist.79 He