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Veteran Member
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Brighton, England
Posts: 6,947
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Quote:
Originally Posted by afdave
LET'S REITERATE THE IMPORTANCE OF PRESUPPOSITIONS ON DH DEVELOPMENT
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Merely re-iterating your claimed "presuppositions" does not make them any more true and does not make them any more relevant either.
If you wish to show that these "presuppositions" are necessary parts of the DH, then you need to show that the DH does not work without them.
Leaving aside your rant full of hyperbole and loaded words such as "mutilate", let's look at your picture.
The first thing to note is that this is not a representative sample. In the vast majority of places in the Torah (in fact in pretty much every place other than here), the split between sources is - barring the occasional one-line insertion by an editor - on the level of a paragraph or chapter. Dave has chosen place with the most complex mix of sources and chosen to present it as a representative sample.
Having said that, the diagram that Dave has reproduced here is interesting evidence for the DH.
After all, if you take any random piece of text and chop half of it out you will be left with gibberish.
Here, though, chopping half the text out leaves - interestingly enough - a coherent narrative written in a distinctive style.
Now for the really good bit.
If we look at what has been chopped out of this, then we get another coherent narrative written in a distinctive (but different) style as this one.
Moreover, by splitting the text in this manner, all the contradictions and discrepancies in the text have disappeared. The two accounts are different - but neither individual text has any duplications or contradictions like the combined text has.
To show this in more detail, here is the full text of the flood story:
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6:1 And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
6:2 That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
6:3 And Yahweh said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
6:4 There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.
6:5 And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
6:6 And it repented Yahweh that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
6:7 And Yahweh said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.
6:8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of Yahweh.
6:9 These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.
6:10 And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
6:11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.
6:12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
6:13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
6:14 Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.
6:15 And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits.
6:16 A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.
6:17 And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.
6:18 But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.
6:19 And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.
6:20 Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive.
6:21 And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.
6:22 Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.
7:1 And Yahweh said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.
7:2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female.
7:3 Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.
7:4 For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.
7:5 And Noah did according unto all that Yahweh commanded him.
7:6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.
7:7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.
7:8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
7:9 There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.
7:10 And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
7:12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
7:13 In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark;
7:14 They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort.
7:15 And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life.
7:16 And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him: and Yahweh shut him in.
7:17 And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth.
7:18 And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters.
7:19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
7:20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.
7:21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man:
7:22 All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.
7:23 And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.
24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days.
8:1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged;
8:2 The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained;
8:3 And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated.
8:4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.
8:5 And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month: in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the mountains seen.
8:6 And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made:
8:7 And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth.
8:8 Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground;
8:9 But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark.
8:10 And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark;
8:11 And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.
8:12 And he stayed yet other seven days; and sent forth the dove; which returned not again unto him any more.
8:13 And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth: and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and, behold, the face of the ground was dry.
8:14 And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, was the earth dried.
8:15 And God spake unto Noah, saying,
8:16 Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee.
8:17 Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply upon the earth.
8:18 And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him:
8:19 Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and whatsoever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went forth out of the ark.
8:20 And Noah builded an altar unto Yahweh; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
8:21 And Yahweh smelled a sweet savour; and Yahweh said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.
8:22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.
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Here is the J text in isolation:
Quote:
6:1 And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
6:2 That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
6:3 And Yahweh said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
6:4 There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.
6:5 And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
6:6 And it repented Yahweh that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
6:7 And Yahweh said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.
6:8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of Yahweh.
7:1 And Yahweh said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.
7:2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female.
7:3 Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.
7:4 For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.
7:5 And Noah did according unto all that Yahweh commanded him.
7:7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.
7:10 And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
7:12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
7:16 and Yahweh shut him in.
7:17 And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth.
7:18 And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters.
7:19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
7:20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.
7:22 All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.
7:23 And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.
8:2 and the rain from heaven was restrained;
8:3 And the waters returned from off the earth continually:
8:6 And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made:
8:8 Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground;
8:9 But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark.
8:10 And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark;
8:11 And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.
8:12 And he stayed yet other seven days; and sent forth the dove; which returned not again unto him any more.
8:13 and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and, behold, the face of the ground was dry.
8:20 And Noah builded an altar unto Yahweh; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
8:21 And Yahweh smelled a sweet savour; and Yahweh said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.
8:22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.
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Here is the P text in isolation:
Quote:
6:9 These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.
6:10 And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
6:11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.
6:12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
6:13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
6:14 Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.
6:15 And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits.
6:16 A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.
6:17 And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.
6:18 But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.
6:19 And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.
6:20 Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive.
6:21 And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.
6:22 Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.
7:8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
7:9 There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.
7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
7:13 In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark;
7:14 They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort.
7:15 And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life.
7:16 And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him:
7:21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man:
24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days.
8:1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters assuaged;
8:2 The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped,
8:3 and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated.
8:4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.
8:5 And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month: in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the mountains seen.
8:7 And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth.
8:13 And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth:
8:14 And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, was the earth dried.
8:15 And God spake unto Noah, saying,
8:16 Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons' wives with thee.
8:17 Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply upon the earth.
8:18 And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him:
8:19 Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and whatsoever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went forth out of the ark.
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That each of these stories stands alone with fluent narrative and with a distinct style that survives the translation into English should be obvious to everyone.
This is what Dave characterises as "mutilating" the text.
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LET'S TAKE A LOOK AT DEAN'S EVIDENCE FOR THE DH
Here's a graphic of how the Pentateuch supposedly came into existence. Time flows from top to bottom. As you can see, oral tradition is a major part of the theory although Dean tries to deny it. There is even an entire school of criticism known as the "Oral Traditionists" (Uppsala School). But all three schools -- Wellhausen with the DH, Gunkel and his Form Critics, and the Scandinvian Uppsla School all placed a great emphasis on Oral Tradition.
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I have never tried to deny that some scholars place emphasis on oral tradition. What I have said is that (as can be seen on your diagram), the DH proposes the editing together of written sources (the sources on the diagram are written long before they are edited together). Whether these written sources were originally oral traditions (as the creator of this diagram thinks) is not relevant to the DH.
Dave gives the appearance of to wanting to protray the DH as requiring oral sources because he wants to portray it as being incompatible with the early invention of writing. This is simply false. The DH is compatible with its written sources originally being oral traditions (and this is the view of whoever created that diagram), but it does not require that there was no writing at earlier times which is what Dave's "presupposition" asserts.
Dave here claims that the usage of different names within the same text is normal in Jewish texts, and does not need a DH to explain it.
He (and his source) miss the point though, appearing to be clinging to the strawman of "Each source in the DH uses a different name for God". This is simply not true.
Each of the DH sources itself uses different names in different places. But when split using the criteria of style or theme or age of writing, each source is internally consistent in how it uses the different names.
Quote:
NATURE AND ROLE OF PRIESTS
Dean writes in summary ... Stop and think for a minute. If you want to have a theory that there is such a thing as a "P" source document and you take the liberty of chopping up text as Genesis is chopped up above, then OF COURSE you can support your theory. It's quite easy. Just select all the verses which talk about the Aaronic priests having access to God and Voila! ... you have it! "What a beautiful theory!" Rubbish! No one would think of attempting this with any other historical text ... why with the Pentateuch? Keep in mind also that there is not even the slightest hint of the existence of such a "P" document (or any of the others) in any ancient texts anywhere in the world. But there are hints of the existence of written records kept by Adam and his descendants. In fact, they signed the documents they wrote with "these are the generations of ... " and we have independent confirmation from ancient Babylonian and Assyrian tablets that this "toledoth" was in common use.
My rebuttal above also applies to Dean's points C - G as well. If Dean wishes to overcome this challenge, it would helpful to provide an online chart which shows all the supposed divisions of the text into the alleged J E D and P sources, as I have supplied for the first chapters of Genesis.
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Dave has here done exactly what I predicted. He has claimed that each individual measure can be the result of arbitrary splitting.
What he has not done is explain why there is consilience between the ways of splitting - why splitting in each way produces the same results. If we chose to split a text into parts arbitrarily to match one way of differentiating the text, we would expect the comparison of those parts according to other ways of differentiating the text to show random and mixed results - just like we see when we split the text by Toledoths.
Instead, when the text is split as the DH splits it, we see conlisience and correlation between the different ways of differentiating it.
Dave's criticism here works when applied to his own theory, but fails utterly when applied to the DH, because the DH shows consilience that his own Tablet theory does not.
Dave has yet to make any attempt to explain this consilience.
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DOUBLETS AND TRIPLETS
Dean writes ... To answer the first objection, I simply point out that repetition of some accounts is exactly what we would expect from a compilation. On this point, the DH and the Tablet Theory agree.
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But the way the DH splits the text, the repetition is a result of separate sources being compiled. The way Tablet theory splits the text, individual sources each have repetitions.
So the DH and Tablet Theory do not agree here.
What Dave points out here is indeed exactly what we would expect if the DH were true, but goes against what we would expect if Tablet theory were true.
Quote:
LINGUISTIC EVIDENCE
Dean writes ... I'm not sure if I disagree with this or not. Given my view that the Pentateuch is a compilation, I would expect the various tablet sources to vary in their language. If Dean could give a detailed, specific example, I could analyze it.
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If there was variation in language between Tablets, then we would see consistent language within each Toledoth-to-Toledoth section (a single Tablet), but variation between the different Toledoth-to-Toledoth sections. As can be seen by the example of the Flood story, what we actually see is variation within each Toledoth-to-Toledoth section. As I pointed out some examples of in my original post, what we actually see is consistent language within each DH source and variation between each DH source.
In other words, given Dave's own views on what he would expect to see if the Torah is a compilation, we see what Dave would expect to see if the DH were true, and fail to see what Dave would expect to see if the Tablet theory were true.
Summary
Dave starts of with hyperbole, and tries to call separation into stylistically independent narratives "cockamamie" and a "mutilation" of the text, using as an example a piece of text that turns from a single repetitive and contradictory jumble into two coherent narratives when "multilated".
He then points out that some scholars think that the written DH sources were originally oral traditions - which is irrelevant.
He then points out that we should expect to see multiple divine names used (with consistent usage rules) in an individual text - which is exactly what we see in each of the DH sources.
He then claims that each individual way of splitting the text could be arbitrary - but fails to explain why the DH splitting of the text is consilient but the Tablet theory splitting is not.
He then makes two claims about what we would expect from a compiled text - both being claims that the DH matches but the Tablet theory fails to match.
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09-25-2007, 07:41 AM
