JoyJuice

Hi all,

How do we know that in tradition, Genesis was the first book written?

Is there any argument for a proper order of books through scholarship?

TheBigKahoona

How do we know that in tradition, Genesis was the first book written?

How do we know chapter one is the first chapter?

JoyJuice

We don't. Sometimes they start a movie by beginning it from the end.

Ever see Pulp Fiction?

So again, any suggestions?

johntheapostate

There is some textual evidence that Genesis or parts of Genesis were written at a later date than many of the other books of the Hebrew scripture.

For example Genesis 36:31 " These were the kings who reigned in Edom before any Israelite king reigned " It goes on to list the kings.

By presupposing the reign of Israelite kings, the text shows that this particular passage was written after some or all Israelite kings would doubt the validity of a 250 year document if it contained the statement " These are the presidents who were elected before the twin towers fell"

It is also interesting to note 1 Chronicles 1:43 " These were the kings who reigned in Edom before any Israelite king reigned" This and the next verses are word for word exactly the same as in Genesis.

In my opinion the probability that the verses from Genesis were copied from Chronicles is much greater than the other way round


There is another example that is of concern to those believers who believe that it is crucial that the claim that Moses wrote Genesis is correct.


Genesis 14:14 " When Abram that his relative had been taken captive, he called out the 318 trained men born in his household and went in pursuit as far as Dan"

To the casual reader this would not raise much concern but one must remember that A city named Dan did not exist until the conquest of Canaan.

Judges 18:28-29 " The Danites rebuilt the city and settled there. they named it Dan after there forefather Dan, who was born to Israel, though the city used to be call Laish"

So we can see that the city did not exist until after Moses died and certainly not at the time of Abram.

Celsus

We don't. By convention it is the first because the subject matter it deals with is chronologically of the earliest times (from Creation to Egypt).
Actually there are many. It's not a simple story though, and the arguments are long and tedious, consensus non-existent, so I'll just give the gist. Scholars study the Pentateuch (first 5 books) or Tetrateuch (first 4 books) of the Bible together, and the division into "books" was in no small part due to the size of the scrolls these would have had to fit into (Pentateuch literally means 5 containers, for the 5 scrolls). Scholars used to divide the Pentateuch into 4 broad sources, termed "J" (Yahwist), "E" (Elohist), "P" (Priestly), and "D" (Deuteronomist), which were dated more or less to the 9th, 8th, 7-4th, 7th centuries respectively (with tendency toward later datings). Unfortunately, there has been little enthusiasm for retaining the J-E distinction (J in Genesis gives away plenty of information that makes the source seem exilic at earliest). Alternatively, even JE, P, and D's orders have been disputed, some thinking that JE comes after D, P is usually last, etc. You could probably randomly order these and find a scholar to support your position (P is usually given the status of superstructure, but whether it came first or last is hard to determine).

As for the other books of the Bible, their order was never chronological. Ruth is a post-exilic pulp fiction, and is always treated separately from the Joshua-Kings section, known as the Deuteronomistic History because the writing style and influence generally seems to be similar to the Deuteronomist of the Pentateuch. Chronicles comes later, and seems to be based on Kings, or else Kings and Chronicles have an earlier, independent source. The prophets are a big mess, and no one can agree on their dating, especially given that a lot of them purported to write of an age when they were actually criticising later regimes. Both Zechariah and Isaiah have at least two writers (Isaiah usually divided into 3). Malachi is probably actually part of Zechariah as well. Psalms, Proverbs, Daniel and Esther were probably the last books of the Bible to be written/compiled (Daniel gives plenty of internal clues), sometime in the 2nd-1st centuries BCE. Meanwhile, Job has alternatively been seen as one of the last or one of the first books to be written, but it definitely bears the hand of two distinct sources.
By convention again. Chapters and verses were added much later (and are completely arbitrary), by the Masoretes I believe. For example most people speaking of the first creation story in Genesis will describe it as going from 1:1 to 2:4a, because that's where it probably ends, right in the middle of verse 4 of the second chapter (a and b are conventions for splitting verses into the first and second halves).

Joel

Clivedurdle

If Daniel is as late as first second century BCE does that mean it is not an eye witness account? Would it be better to think in terms of genres, so that in fact Daniel and Revelation are very similar not just in content but time?

Anat

Celsus, TMK the division into chapters and the numbering of verses was done by an English priest in the 13th century. The Jews accepted this numbering because it helped Jews in locating quotes during debates with Christians. However the Masoretic version has a different method of subdividing the text. For subdivisions they insert a Hebrew P (for p'tuhah = open) which serves as an 'end-of-line' sign - the text continues on the next line, or a Hebrew S (for s'gurah = closed) which means one must leave some open space and continue on the same line. Thus, in case of your example of the first creation story, there is a {P} After each day of creation (See Genesis 1), including one after Genesis 2:3. After that it does get a bit weird: The next subdivision is in the middle of chapter 3, where verse 16 (the woman's fate) is separated by two {S} marks, then there is a {P} after verse 21 (after YHWH dresses the 2 people with fur coats, but before expelling them from Eden) and then a {S} after verse 24 (when the expulsion is complete).

Internal division of verses can be done based on the Masoretic cantilation marks (ta'amei mikra). You can view an example in Gen 1 with cantilation. There is a mark in each word, placed at the beginning of the stressed syllable of the word. There is a heirarchy of these marks, signifying heirarchial subdivision of the text in the sentence according to syntax - from the most major dividers - more or less equivalent to modern '.' and ';' through lower ranking dividers (more or less equivalent to commas) to the lowest level, that actually serve to connect syntactically related words together. Which mark is used from the syntactically relevant category determines whether the word should be read in rising or falling tone etc, which determines the 'melody' of the reading - this is important for liturgy.

Anat

Celsus, on authorship and documentary sources, I understand there isn't even consensus regarding which verse belongs to which source (other than the most obvious cases). On the net I have found so far at least 2 versions, one in Larue's article and one based on Friedman, and I found some differences between them. How would it be possible to date the various sources if there isn't agreement on what comes from whom? And since there are signs of redaction and editing, how can there be an objective criterion for placing a verse or a segment of a verse in one source rather than another? Is there a non-circular way to solve this problem?

Celsus

Yes. The anachronisms are stark to all but those with a firm theological commitment to inerrancy (see here.
They already are grouped together, as "Apocalyptic" literature, which flourished from about the 2nd century BCE to 2nd century CE. Parts of Ezekiel are also recognised as Apocalyptic, or at least proto-Apocalyptic.

Joel

Celsus

A better question to ask is whether applying these "sources" is a valid argument in the first place. I wrote about the problems with Friedman's approach (which applies in some ways to the other documentarians) at my forum here. There are large agreements about P and D is pretty much Deuteronomy (with some earlier sources), so we could stab at them when dating it. We have a fixed terminus ante quem for the sources at the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and some of the texts may well be earlier (For instance, Numbers 6:24-26 may be very early indeed).
It's a matrix which is essentially circular. Starting from simple principles (e.g., obsession with geneaologies, law codes = P material, use of "Yahweh" before the burning bush revelation to Moses = J), scholars build a coherent picture of what the sources are characterised by, and then in turn use those general characteristics to identify further material as part of those sources. For example, the J-E distinction was originally developed only to explain two sources found in Genesis up to the burning bush of Exodus. Later scholars expanded it till they found J and E material everywhere in the Tetrateuch, except that no one could agree on whether it was J or E, or J1, J2, J3, J4, or E1, E2 etc. Understanding the general theology of these materials then leads to speculation of a suitable Sitz im Leben for the material, and thus the date. We might, for instance, note the calling of Moses is uncannily similar to the calling of the later prophets, and thus presupposes them (once we distance ourselves from apologetic silliness that Moses wrote the books). This might suggest a terminus post quem for that set of material (in this case the 8th-7th centuries). Alternatively, if we understand the deep Mesopotamian roots of Genesis or the tower of Babel unit as a satirical work on Babylon's ziggurats, then the late pre-exilic/exilic period (6th century) might also prove to be a safe estimate for a bottom date for that part of the material. But the short answer to your last question is simply, "No."

Joel