Anat

rob, your example is relevant to your other thread about archaeology and text criticism. If the archaeologists agree the exodus didn't happen as described, then what event prompted the ancient composition of a song praising Yahweh for drowning horses and their riders? Isn't it time to reconsider the dating of this song?

Steven Avery

Please, Api. I used to try to make heads and tails of such theories, such as the Elohimist and the "yahwist" elements being separate authors. They simply fall apart on examination (as well as not having even a scintilla of historic or documentary manuscript evidence) but that doesn't stop the scholars, they have lots of time and lots of journal articles and tenure and status can be dependent on coming up with *some* authorship theory that sounds scholarly.

If you accept a supernatural Mosaic authorship of the Torah, with the attendant support of Sinai and the Decalogue, of course you are likely to put your faith where your mind is, and be a believer of some sort (you omitted Karaites).

Our lives and scholarship and knowledge are inextricably connected to our beliefs.

Those who want to reject the basis of the Tanach will of course NOT be believers and of course will embrace whatever alternate theories they can, no matter how illogical and insipid, to distance themselves from the threat to their autonomy that is represented by the authority of the scriptures.

Shalom,
Steven

Diogenes the Cynic

How did Moses manage to write a Hebrew text before the Hebrew language even existed?

Apikorus

No, in fact the multiple source theory of the Torah is widely viewed as compelling. According to you, Steven, there is some mass conspiracy afoot by thousands of bible scholars worldwide just so they can get tenure and status and "sound scholarly." That is of course ludicrous.

Sure, and there are Muslim "scholars" who can explain to you how the Qur'an is divine and perfect.

Incidentally, Marcus Jastrow in the late 19th century applied primitive text critical methods to the study of the Epic of Gilgamesh. He identified several textual seams, concluded it was conflate, etc. Subsequent archaeological finds have largely confirmed his work. (See J. Tigay, Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic and also Tigay's article in his own volume, Empirical Models of Biblical Criticism.) We also have several excellent examples of conflation from the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Samaritan Pentateuch.

Steven Avery

Yes, we had not discovered the DSS when JEPD was going strong. The DSS took us back far earlier in time vis a vis Hebraic documents than what we had earlier. What documents from the DSS support JEPD theories ?

Shalom,
Steven

Apikorus

Well of course the DSS are all late compared with the Torah, but in terms of redaction criticism, the Temple Scroll from cave XI has been quite important.

Chris Weimer

If you would look into the textual types of the DSS, you would know what he's talking about. The DSS are not of a single text type. The best preserved manuscript, the Isaiah-B scroll, diverges greatly than the Isaiah manuscript that the depositers obviously didn't care much about, and is in far better condition than it. That and the Samaritan and Septuagintal readings.

So let's not try to twist what he actually said.

Apikorus

I don't think Cross's theory of local text types bears on the source critical issues Steven is concerned with. What Steven would like to see (actually, what he'd hate to see) would be a 7th c. BCE fragment of Numbers 16, say, with only the J/E story of Dathan and Abiram's Reubenite revolt and no mention of Korach, which is P. That would constitute prima fascia evidence that the MT of Numbers 16 is conflate, and I admit we don't have such evidence at present. But we do have rather strong internal evidence from the Hebrew Bible itself.

Loomis

If Friedman did not understand that there never were any “Children of Israel� in Deuteronomy 32:8 (and apparently he didn’t), then what does that say about his understanding of the sources of the Pentateuch?

And here is something that REALLY grinds my ass: :grin:

This statement is misleading and irresponsible because it denies the syncretic way the religions and stories in the Bible evolved. In some stories the ‘God’ of Israel was a god named El:

“El elohe Israel� (Genesis 33:20)

Same deal. This statement is misleading and irresponsible because it denies the syncretic way the religions and stories in the Bible evolved. In some stories the ‘God’ of Israel was a god named El.

The word El occurs about 245 times in the OT. And 213 times out of 245, the word El stands as a proper name of the god at issue. (The context is not lost.) El was the most high god of the Ugarits, the Canaanites, and (in some stories) the Israelites.

Be honest rob117: Why is it better for people like richard2 to believe that ‘the God of Israel was Yahweh’ – as Friedman suggests, than it is to know that the Pentateuch does not present a coherent view of who Israel’s god really was?


One more thought: The benefit of emphasizing the differences between El and Yahweh is that Yahweh is sort of a “dead end,� whereas El points back to the earlier stuff.

It looks to me like Friedman is unwilling to give that subject (Ugarit) the attention it deserves.

Steven Avery

And lets not ignore the fact that the all JEPD theories simply got no support from the DSS. As a predictive theory it zilchified.