Chapter IV: Introduction (2)

It will be seen that the construction hangs mainly on two leading ideas: _tribal affinities_ typified by various phases of the marriage relation; and _migrations_. As regards the first, we have seen (page xii) that there is a true principle at the root of the method. It springs from the personification of a tribe under the name of an individual, male or female; and we have admitted that many names in Genesis have this significance, and probably no other. If, then, two eponymous ancestors (Jacob and Esau) are represented as twin brothers, we may be sure that the peoples in question were conscious of an extremely close affinity. If a male eponym is married to a female, we may presume (though with less confidence) that the two tribes were amalgamated. Or, if one clan is spoken of as a wife and another as a concubine, we may reasonably conclude that the latter was somehow inferior to the former. But beyond a few simple analogies of this kind (each of which, moreover, requires to be tested by the inherent probabilities of the case) the method ceases to be reliable; and the attempt to apply it to all the complex family relationships of the patriarchs only lands us in confusion.¹――The idea of _migration_ is still less trustworthy. Certainly not every journey recorded in Genesis (_e.g._ that of Joseph from Hebron to Shechem and Dothan, 37¹⁴ ᶠᶠᐧ: _pace_ Steuernagel) can be explained as a migratory movement. Even when the ethnological background is apparent, the movements of tribes may be necessary corollaries of the assumed relationships between them (_e.g._ Jacob’s journey to Ḥarran: page 357); and it will be difficult to draw the line between these and real migrations. The case of Abraham is no doubt a strong one; for if his figure has any ethnological significance at all, his exodus from Ḥarran (or Ur) can hardly be interpreted otherwise than as a migration of Hebrew tribes from that region. We cannot feel the same certainty with regard to Joseph’s being carried down to Egypt; it seems to us altogether doubtful if this be rightly understood as an enforced movement of the tribe of Joseph to Egypt in advance of the rest (see page 441).

¹ Guthe (_Geschichte des Volkes Israel_, 1‒6) has formulated
a set of five rules which he thinks can be used (with
tact!) in retranslating the genealogical phraseology into
historical terms. There is probably not one of them which
is capable of rigorous and universal application. Thus, the
marriage of Jacob to Leah and Rachel does not necessarily
imply that Jacob was a tribe which successively absorbed
the two clans so named: it is just as likely that the union
of Leah and Rachel with one another _produced_ the entity
called Jacob.

But it is when we pass from genealogies and marriages and journeys to pictorial narrative that the breakdown of the ethnological method becomes complete. The obvious truth is that no tribal relationship can supply an adequate motive for the wealth of detail that meets us in the richly coloured patriarchal legends; and the theory stultifies itself by assigning ethnological significance to incidents which originally had no such meaning. It will have been noticed that Cornill utilises a few biographical touches to fill in his scheme (the youthful ambition of Joseph; his sale into Egypt, etc.), and every other theorist does the same. Each writer selects those incidents which fit into his own system, and neglects those which would ♦embarrass it. Each system has some plausible and attractive features; but each, to avoid absurdity, has to exercise a judicious restraint on the consistent extension of its principles. The consequence is endless diversity in detail, and no agreement even in general outline.¹

♦ “embarass” replaced with “embarrass”

¹ Luther (_Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft_,
1901, 36 ff.) gives a conspectus of four leading theories
(Wellhausen, Stade, Gunkel, Cornill), with the purpose of
showing that the consistent application of the method would
speedily lead to absurd results (46). He would undoubtedly
have passed no different verdict on later combinations,
such as those of Steuernagel, _Die Einwanderung der
israelitischen Stämme in Kanaan_; Peters, _Early Hebrew
Story_, 45 ff.; Procksch, _Das nordhebräische Sagenbuch: die
Elohimquelle_, 330 ff. etc.――What Grote has written about
the allegorical interpretation of the Greek legends might
be applied word for word to these theories: “The theorist
who adopts this course of explanation finds that after one
or two simple and obvious steps, the way is no longer open,
and he is forced to clear a way for himself by gratuitous
refinements and conjectures” (_History of Greece_, edition,
1888, page 2).

It is evident that such constructions will never reach any
satisfactory result unless they find some point of support in
the history of the period as gathered from contemporary sources.
The second millennium B.C. is thought to have witnessed one
great movement of Semitic tribes to the north, viz., the Aramæan.
About the middle of the millennium we find the first notices of
the Aramæans as nomads in what is now the Syro-Arabian desert.
Shortly afterwards the Ḫabiri make their appearance in Palestine.
It is a natural conjecture that these were branches of the
same migration, and it has been surmised that we have here the
explanation of the tradition which affirms the common descent
of Hebrews and Aramæans. The question then arises whether we can
connect this fact with the patriarchal tradition, and if so with
what stratum of that tradition. Isaac and Joseph are out of the
reckoning, because neither is ever brought into contact with the
Aramæans; Rebekah is too insignificant. Abraham is excluded by
the chronology, unless (with Cornhill) we bring down his date
to _circa_ 1500, or (with Steuernagel) regard his migration as
a traditional duplicate of Jacob’s return from Laban. But if
Jacob is suggested, we encounter the difficulty that Jacob must
have been settled in Canaan some generations before the age of
the Ḫabiri. In the case of Abraham there may be a conflation
of two traditions,――one tracing his nativity to Ḥarran and the
other to Ur; and it is conceivable that he is the symbol of two
migrations, one of which might be identified with the arrival
of the Ḫabiri, and the other might have taken place as early as
the age of Ḫammurabi. But these are speculations no whit more
reliable than any of those dealt with above; and it has to be
confessed that as yet archæology has furnished no sure basis for
the reconstruction of the patriarchal history. It is permissible
to hope that further discoveries may bring to light facts which
shall enable us to decide more definitely than is possible at
present how far that history can be explained on ethnological
lines.¹

¹ To the whole class of theories considered above (those which
try to go behind the Exodus), Luther (_l.c._ 44 f.) objects
that they demand a continuous occupation of Palestine
from the time when the legends were formed. He hints at
a solution, which has been adopted in principle by Meyer
(_Die Israeliten und ihre Nachbarstämme_, 127 ff., 415,
433), and which if verified would relieve some difficulties,
archæological and other. It is that two independent
accounts of the origin of the nation are preserved: the
Genesis-tradition, carrying the ancestry of the people back
to the Aramæans, and the Exodus-tradition, which traces the
origin of the nation no further than Moses and the Exodus.
There are indications that in an earlier phase of the
patriarchal tradition the definitive conquest of Canaan was
carried back to Jacob and his sons (chapters 34. 38. 48²²);
on Meyer’s view this does not necessarily imply that the
narratives refer to a time subsequent to Joshua. A kernel
of history may be recognised in both strands of tradition,
on the assumption (not in itself a violent one) that only
a section of Israel was in Egypt, and came out under Moses,
while the rest remained in Palestine. The extension of the
Exodus-tradition to the whole people was a natural effect of
the consolidation of the nation; and this again might give
rise to the story of Jacob’s migration to Egypt, with all
his sons.

3. _The patriarchs as individuals._――We come, in the last place, to consider the probability that the oral tradition, through its own inherent tenacity of recollection, may have retained some true impression of the events to which it refers. After what has been said, it is vain to expect that a picture true in every detail will be recoverable from popular tales current in the earliest ages of the monarchy. The course of oral tradition has been too long, the disturbing influences to which it has been exposed have been too numerous and varied, and the subsidiary motives which have grafted themselves on to it too clearly discernible, to admit of the supposition that more than a _substantial nucleus_ of historic fact can have been preserved in the national memory of Israel. It is not, however, unreasonable to believe that such a historical nucleus exists; and that with care we may disentangle from the mass of legendary accretions some elements of actual reminiscence of the prehistoric movements which determined the subsequent development of the national life.¹ It is true that in this region we have as a rule only subjective impressions to guide us; but in the absence of external criteria a subjective judgement has its value, and one in favour of the historic origin of the tradition is at least as valid as another to the contrary effect.――The two points on which attention now falls to be concentrated are: (a) the personalities of the patriarchs; and (b) the religious significance of the tradition.

¹ Compare Winckler, _Die Keilinschriften und das Alte
Testament_³, 204: “Es ist nämlich immer wahrscheinlicher,
dass ein grosses für die Entwicklung des Volkes massgebend
gewordenes Ereigniss in seiner Geschlossenheit dem
Gedächtniss besser erhalten bleibt als die Einzelheiten
seines Herganges.”

(a) It is a tolerably safe general maxim that tradition does not invent names, or persons. We have on any view to account for the entrance of such figures as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph into the imagination of the Israelites; and amongst possible avenues of entrance we must certainly count it as one, that they were real men, who lived and were remembered. What other explanations can be given? The idea that they were native creations of Hebrew mythology (Goldziher) has, for the present at least, fallen into disrepute; and there remain but two theories as alternatives to the historic reality of the patriarchs: viz., that they were originally personified tribes, or that they were originally Canaanite deities.

The conception of the patriarchs as tribal eponyms, we have
already seen to be admissible, though not proved. The idea
that they were Canaanite deities is not perhaps one that can
be dismissed as transparently absurd. If the Israelites, on
entering Canaan, found Abraham worshipped at Hebron, Isaac at
Beersheba, Jacob at Bethel, and Joseph at Shechem, and if they
adopted the cult of these deities, they might come to regard
themselves as their children; and in course of time the gods
might be transformed into human ancestors around whom the
national legend might crystallise. At the same time the theory
is destitute of proof; and the burden of proof lies on those
who maintain it. Neither the fact (if it be a fact) that the
patriarchs were objects of worship at the shrines where their
graves were shown, nor the presence of mythical traits in their
biographies, proves them to have been superhuman beings.――The
discussion turns largely on the evidence of the patriarchal
_names_; but this, too, is indecisive. The name Israel is
national, and in so far as it is applied to an individual it is
a case of eponymous personification. Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph
(assuming these to be contractions of _Yiẓḥaḳ-el_, etc.) are
also most naturally explained as tribal designations. Meyer,
after long vacillation, has come to the conclusion that they are
divine names (_Die Israeliten und ihre Nachbarstämme_, 249 ff.);
but the arguments which formerly convinced him that they are
tribal seem to us more cogent than those to which he now gives
the preference. That names of this type frequently denote tribes
is a fact; that they may denote deities is only a hypothesis.
That they may also denote individuals (_Yaḳub-ilu_, _Yašup-ilu_)
is true; but that only establishes a possibility, hardly a
probability; for it is more likely that the individual was
named after his tribe than that the tribe got its name from an
individual.――The name Abram stands by itself. It represents no
ethnological entity, and occurs historically only as the name
of an individual; and though it is capable of being interpreted
in a sense appropriate to deity, all analogy is in favour of
explaining it as a theophorous human name. The solitary allusion
to the biblical Abram in the monuments――the mention of the
‘Field of Abram’ in Shishak’s inscription (see page 244)――is
entirely consistent with this acceptation.――It is probably a
mistake to insist on carrying through any exclusive theory of
the patriarchal personalities. If we have proved that Abram was
a historical individual, we have not thereby proved that Isaac
and Jacob were so also; and if we succeed in resolving the
latter into tribal eponyms, it will not follow that Abraham
falls under the same category.

There is thus a justification for the tendency of many writers to put Abraham on a different plane from the other patriarchs, and to concentrate the discussion of the historicity of the tradition mainly on his person. An important element in the case is the clearly conceived type of _character_ which he represents. No doubt the character has been idealised in accordance with the conceptions of a later age; but the impression remains that there must have been something in the actual Abraham which gave a direction to the idealisation. It is this perception more than anything else which invests the figure of Abraham with the significance which it has possessed for devout minds in all ages, and which still resists the attempt to dissolve him into a creation of religious phantasy. If there be any truth in the description of legend as a form of narrative conserving the impression of a great personality on his age, we may venture, in spite of the lack of decisive evidence, to regard him as a historic personage, however dim the surroundings of his life may be.¹

¹ Compare Höffding, _Philosophy of Religion_ 199 ff.: “Its
essence [that of legend] consists in the idea of a wonderful
personality who has made a deep impression on human
life――who excited admiration, furnished an example, and
opened new paths. Under the influence of memory, a strong
expansion of feeling takes place: this in turn gives rise
to a need for intuition and explanation, to satisfy which
a process of picture-making is set in motion.... In legends
... the central interest is in the subject-matter, in the
centripetal power, which depends on an intensification
of memory rather than on any naïve personification and
colouring....”

(b) It is of little consequence to know whether a man called Abraham lived about 2000 B.C., and led a caravan from Ur or Ḥarran to Palestine, and defeated a great army from the east. One of the evil effects of the controversial treatment of such questions is to diffuse the impression that a great religious value attaches to discussions of this kind. What it really concerns us to know is the spiritual significance of the events, and of the mission of Abraham in particular. And it is only when we take this point of view that we do justice to the spirit of the Hebrew tradition. It is obvious that the central idea of the patriarchal tradition is the conviction in the mind of Israel that as a nation it originated in a great religious movement, that the divine call which summoned Abraham from his home and kindred, and made him a stranger and sojourner on the earth, imported a new era in God’s dealings with mankind, and gave Israel its mission in the world (Isaiah 41⁸ ᶠᐧ). Is this conception historically credible?

Some attempts to find historic points of contact for this view of Abraham’s significance for religion will be looked at presently; but their contribution to the elucidation of the biblical narrative seems to us disappointing in the extreme. Nor can we unreservedly assent to the common argument that the mission of Moses would be unintelligible apart from that of Abraham. It is true, Moses is said to have appealed to the God of the fathers; and if that be a literally exact statement, Moses built on the foundation laid by Abraham. But that the distinctive institutions and ideas of the Yahwe-religion could not have originated with Moses just as well as with Abraham, is more than we have a right to affirm. In short, positive proof, such as would satisfy the canons of historical criticism, of the work of Abraham is not available. What we can say is, in the first place, that if he had the importance assigned to him, the fact is just of the kind that might be expected to impress itself indelibly on a tradition dating from the time of the event. We have in it the influence of a great personality, giving birth to the collective consciousness of a nation; and this fact is of a nature to evoke that centripetal ‘intensification of memory’ which Höffding emphasises as the distinguishing mark and the preserving salt of legend as contrasted with myth. In the second place, the appearance of a prophetic personality, such as Abraham is represented to have been, is a phenomenon with many analogies in the history of religion. The ethical and spiritual idea of God which is at the foundation of the religion of Israel could only enter the world through a personal organ of divine revelation; and nothing forbids us to see in Abraham the first of that long series of prophets through whom God has communicated to mankind a saving knowledge of Himself. The keynote of Abraham’s piety is _faith_ in the unseen,――faith in the divine impulse which drove him forth to a land which he was never to possess; and faith in the future of the religion which he thus founded. He moves before us on the page of Scripture as the man through whom faith, the living principle of true religion, first became a force in human affairs. It is difficult to think that so powerful a conception has grown out of nothing. As we read the story, we may well trust the instinct which tells us that here we are face to face with a decisive act of the living God in history, and an act whose essential significance was never lost in Israelite tradition.

The significance of the Abrahamic migration in relation to the
general movements of religious thought in the East is the theme
of Winckler’s interesting pamphlet, _Abraham als Babylonier,
Joseph als Aegypter_ (1903). The elevation of Babylon, in the
reign of Ḫammurabi, to be the first city of the empire, and the
centre of Babylonian culture, meant, we are told, a revolution
in religion, inasmuch as it involved the deposition of Sin,
the old moon-god, from the supreme place in the pantheon in
favour of the ‘Deliverer Marduk,’ the tutelary deity of Babylon.
Abraham, a contemporary, and an adherent of the older faith,
opposed the reformation; and, after vainly seeking support
for his protest at Ur and Ḥarran, the two great centres of
the worship of Sin, migrated to Canaan, beyond the limits of
Ḫammurabi’s empire, to worship God after his fashion. How much
truth is contained in these brilliant generalisations it is
difficult for an ordinary man to say. In spite of the ingenuity
and breadth of conception with which the theory is worked
out, it is not unfair to suggest that it rests mostly on a
combination of things that are not in the Bible with things
that are not in the monuments. Indeed, the only positive point
of contact between the two data of the problem is the certainly
remarkable fact that tradition does connect Abraham with two
chief centres of the Babylonian moon-worship. But what we
chiefly desiderate is some evidence that the worship of the
moon-god had greater affinities with monotheism than the worship
of Marduk, the god of the vernal sun. [The attempt to connect
Joseph with the abortive monotheistic reform of Chuenaten
(Amenophis IV.) is destitute of plausibility.]――To a similar
effect Jeremias, _Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten
Orients_², 327 ff.: “A reform movement of protest against the
religious degeneration of the ruling classes” was the motive of
the migration (333), perhaps connected with the introduction of
a new astronomical era, the Taurus-epoch (which, by the way, had
commenced nearly 1000 years before! compare 66). The movement
assumed the form of a migration――a Hegira――under Abraham as
Mahdi, who preached his doctrine as he went, made converts
in Ḥarran, Egypt, Gerar, Damascus, and elsewhere, finally
establishing the worship of Yahwe at the sanctuaries of
Palestine. This is to write a new Abrahamic legend, considerably
different from the old.

§ 5. _Preservation and collection of the traditions._

In all popular narration the natural unit is the short story, which does not too severely tax the attention of a simple audience, and which retains its outline and features unchanged as it passes from mouth to mouth.¹ A large part of the Book of Genesis consists of narratives of this description,――single tales, of varying length but mostly very short, each complete in itself, with a clear beginning and a satisfying conclusion. As we read the book, unities of this kind detach themselves from their context, and round themselves into independent wholes; and it is only by studying them in their isolation, and each in its own light, that we can fully appreciate their charm and understand, in some measure, the circumstances of their origin. The older stratum of the primæval history, and of the history of Abraham, is almost entirely composed of single incidents of this kind: think of the story of the Fall, of Cain and Abel, of Noah’s drunkenness, of the Tower of Babel; and again of Abraham in Egypt, of the flight or expulsion of Hagar, of the sacrifice of Isaac, etc., etc. When we pass the middle of the book, the mode of narration begins to change. The biography of Jacob is much more a consecutive narrative than that of Abraham; but even here the separate scenes stand out in their original distinctness of outline (_e.g._ the transference of the birthright, Jacob at Bethel, the meeting with Rachel at the well, the wrestling at Peniel, the outrage on Dinah, etc.). It is not till we come to the history of Joseph that the principle of biographical continuity gains the upper hand. Joseph’s story is, indeed, made up of a number of incidents; but they are made to merge into one another, so that each derives its interest from its relation to the whole, and ends (except the last) on a note of suspense and expectation rather than of rest. This no doubt is due to the greater popularity and more frequent repetition of the stories of Jacob and Joseph; but at the same time it bears witness to a considerable development of the art of story-telling, and one in which we cannot but detect some degree of professional aptitude and activity.

¹ Compare Gunkel, _Genesis übersetzt und erklärt_ page XXXII,
to whose fine appreciation of the “Kunstform der Sagen” this
§ is greatly indebted.

The short stories of Genesis, even those of the most elementary type, are exquisite works of art, almost as unique and perfect in their own kind as the parables of our Lord are in theirs. They are certainly not random productions of fireside gossip, but bear the unmistakable stamp of individual genius (Gunkel, _Genesis übersetzt und erklärt_ page xxx). Now, between the inception of the legends (which is already at some distance from the traditional facts) and the written form in which they lie before us, there stretches an interval which is perhaps in some instances to be measured by centuries. Hence two questions arise: (1) What was the fate of the stories during this interval? Were they cast adrift on the stream of popular talk,――with nothing to secure their preservation save the perfection of their original form,――and afterwards collected from the lips of the people? Or were they taken in hand from the first by a special class of men who made it their business to conserve the integrity of the narratives, and under whose auspices the mass of traditional material was gradually welded into its present shape? And (2), how is this whole process of transmission and consolidation related to the use of writing? Was the work of collecting and systematising the traditions primarily a literary one, or had it already commenced at the stage of oral narration?

To such questions, of course, no final answers can be given. (1) It is not possible to discriminate accurately between the modifications which a narrative would undergo through constant repetition, and changes deliberately made by responsible persons. On the whole, the balance of presumption seems to us to incline towards the hypothesis of professional oversight of some sort, exercised from a very early time. On this assumption, too, we can best understand the formation of legendary cycles; for it is evident that no effective grouping of tradition could take place in the course of promiscuous popular recital. (2) As to the use of writing, it is natural to suppose that it came in first of all as an aid to the memory of the narrator, and that as a knowledge of literature extended the practice of oral recitation gradually died out, and left the written record in sole possession of the field. In this way we may imagine that books would be formed, which would be handed down from father to son, annotated, expanded, revised, and copied; and so collections resembling our oldest pentateuchal documents might come into existence.¹

¹ See Gilbert Murray, _Rise of the Greek Epic_, page 92 ff.

Here we come upon one important fact which affords some guidance in the midst of these speculations. The bulk of the Genesis-tradition lies before us in two closely parallel and practically contemporaneous recensions (see page xliii ff. below). Since there is every reason to believe that these recensions were made independently of each other, it follows that the early traditions had been codified, and a sort of national epos had taken shape, prior to the compilation of these documents. When we find, further, that each of them contains evidence of earlier collections and older strata of tradition, we must assume a very considerable period of time to have elapsed between the formation of a fixed corpus of tradition and the composition of Yahwist and Elohist. Beyond this, however, we are in the region of vaguest conjecture. We cannot tell for certain what kind of authority had presided over the combination of the legends, nor whether it was first done in the oral or the literary stage of translation. We may think of the priesthoods of the leading sanctuaries as the natural custodians of the tradition:¹ the sanctuaries were at least the obvious repositories of the cult-legends pertaining to them. But we cannot indicate any sanctuary of such outstanding national importance as to be plausibly regarded as the centre of a national epic.² Or we may assign a conspicuous share in the work to the prophetic guilds which, in the time of Samuel, were _foci_ of enthusiasm for the national cause, and might conceivably have devoted themselves to the propagation of the national tradition. Or, finally, we may assume, with Gunkel, _Genesis übersetzt und erklärt_, that there existed in Israel, as among the Arabs, guilds of professional story-tellers, exercising their vocation at public festivals and such like gatherings, for the entertainment and instruction of the people. The one certainty is that a considerable time must be allowed for the complex mental activities which lie behind our earliest literary sources. It is true that the rise of a national epos presupposes a strongly developed consciousness of national unity; but in Israel the national ideal was much older than its realisation in the form of a state, and therefore we have no reason for placing the unification of the traditions later than the founding of the monarchy. From the age of Samuel at least all the essential conditions were present; and a lower limit than that will hardly meet the requirements of the case.

¹ Compare Stade, _Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche
Wissenschaft_, i. 347 ff.

² Procksch, _Das nordhebräische Sagenbuch: die Elohimquelle_,
however (392 f.), suggests Shiloh as the place where the
national legend was developed.

We may here refer to a matter of great importance in its bearing
on the possibility of accurate oral transmission of the legends:
viz. the recent effort of Sievers (_Metrische Studien_, ii.,
1904‒5) to resolve the whole of Genesis into verse. If his
theory should be established, it would not merely furnish the
most potent instrument of literary analysis conceivable, but it
would render credible a very high degree of verbal exactitude
during the period of unwritten tradition. The work of Sievers
is viewed with qualified approval both by Gunkel, _Genesis
übersetzt und erklärt_ (page xxix f.) and Procksch, _Das
nordhebräische Sagenbuch: die Elohimquelle_ (210 ff.), and it is
certain to evoke interesting discussion. The present writer, who
is anything but a ‘Metriker von Fach,’ does not feel competent
to pronounce an opinion on its merits. Neither reading aloud,
nor counting of syllables, has convinced him that the scansion
holds, or that Hebrew rhythm in general is so rigorously exact
as the system demands. The prejudice against divorcing poetic
form from poetic feeling and diction (of the latter there
is no trace in what have been considered the prose parts of
Genesis) is not lightly to be overcome; and the frequent want
of coincidence between breaks in sense and pauses in rhythm
disturbs the mind, besides violating what used to be thought
a fundamental feature of Hebrew poetry. Grave misgivings are
also raised by the question whether the Massoretic theory of
the syllable is (as Sievers assumes) a reliable guide to the
pronunciation and rhythm of the early Hebrew language. It seems
therefore hazardous to apply the method to the solution of
literary problems, whether by emendation of the text, or by
disentanglement of sources.

B. STRUCTURE AND COMPOSITION OF THE BOOK.

§ 6. _Plan and Divisions._

That the Book of Genesis forms a literary unity has been a commonplace of criticism since the maiden work of Ewald¹ put an end to the Fragmentary Hypothesis of Geddes and Vater. The ruling idea of the book, as has already been briefly indicated (page ii), is to show how Israel, the people of God, attained its historical position among the nations of the world; in particular, how its peculiar relation to God was rooted in the moral greatness and piety of its three common ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and how through God’s promise to them it had secured an exclusive right to the soil of Canaan.² This purpose, however, appears less in the details of the history (which are obviously governed by a variety of interests) than in the scope and arrangement of the work as a whole, especially in the ‘framework’ which knits it together, and reveals the plan to which the entire narrative is accommodated. The method consistently followed is the progressive isolation of the main line of Israel’s descent by brief genealogical summaries of the collateral branches of the human family which diverge from it at successive points.

¹ _Die Komposition der Genesis, kritisch untersucht_
(1823).――In that essay Ewald fell into the natural error of
confusing unity of plan with unity of authorship,――an error,
however, which he retracted eight years later (_Theologische
Studien und Kritiken_, 1831, 595 ff.), in favour of a
theory (virtually identical with the so-called Supplementary
Hypothesis) which did full justice to the unity and
skilful disposition of the book, while recognising it to
be the result of an amalgamation of several documents. The
distinction has never since been lost sight of; and all
subsequent theories of the composition of Genesis have
endeavoured to reconcile the assumption of a diversity of
sources with the indisputable fact of a clearly designed
arrangement of the material. The view which is generally
held does so in this way: three main documents, following
substantially the same historical order, are held to
have been combined by one or more redactors; one of these
documents, being little more than an epitome of the history,
was specially fitted to supply a framework into which the
rest of the narrative could be fitted, and was selected
by the redactor for this purpose; hence the plan which we
discover in the book is really the design of one particular
writer. It is obvious that such a conception quite
adequately explains all the literary unity which the Book
of Genesis exhibits.

² See Tuch, _Commentar über die Genesis_ XVI ff.

A clue to the main divisions of the book is thus furnished by
the editor’s practice of inserting the collateral genealogies
(_Tôlĕdôth_) at the close of the principal sections (11¹⁰⁻³⁰;
25¹²⁻¹⁸; 36).¹ This yields a natural and convenient division
into four approximately equal parts, namely:

I. The Primæval History of mankind: i.‒xi.²
II. The History of Abraham: xii. 1‒xxv. 18.
III. The History of Jacob: xxv. 19‒xxxvi. 43.
IV. The Story of Joseph and his brethren: xxxvii.‒l.

A detailed analysis of the contents is given at the commencement
of the various sections.

¹ The genealogies of 4¹⁷⁻²⁴ᐧ ²⁵ ᶠᐧ and 22²⁰⁻²⁴ do not count:
these are not _Tôlĕdôth_, and do not belong to the document
used as a framework. Chapter 10 (the Table of peoples) would
naturally stand at the close of a section; but it had to be
displaced from its proper position before 11¹⁰ to find room
for the story of the Dispersion (11¹⁻⁹). It may be said,
however, that the _Tôlĕdôth_ of Adam (chapter 5) should mark
a main division; and that is probably correct, though for
practical purposes it is better to ignore the subdivision
and treat the primæval history as one section.

² Strictly speaking, the first part ends perhaps at 11²⁷ or ³⁰;
but the actual division of chapters has its recommendation,
and it is not worth while to depart from it.

It is commonly held by writers on Genesis that the editor has
marked the headings of the various sections by the formula
[וִ]אֵלֶּה תּוֹלְדוֹת, which occurs eleven times in the book: 2⁴ᵃ 5¹ ¹ 6⁹
10¹ 11¹⁰ 11²⁷ 25¹² 25¹⁹ 36¹ 36⁹ 37². Transposing 2⁴ᵃ to the
beginning, and disregarding 36⁹ (both arbitrary proceedings),
we obtain ten parts; and these are actually adopted by Franz
Delitzsch, _Neuer Commentar über die Genesis_ as the divisions
of his commentary. But the scheme is of no practical utility,
――for it is idle to speak of 11¹⁰⁻²⁶ or 25¹²⁻¹⁸ as sections
of Genesis on the same footing as 25¹⁹‒35²⁹ or 37²‒50²⁶; and
theoretically it is open to serious objection. Here it will
suffice to point out the incongruity that, while the histories
of Noah and Isaac fall under their own _Tôlĕdôth_, those of
Abraham, Jacob, and Joseph fall under the _Tôlĕdôth_ of their
respective fathers. See, further, page 40 f.

¹ זָה סֵפֶר תולדות.

§ 7. _The Sources of Genesis._

The Book of Genesis has always been the strategic position of Pentateuchal literary criticism. It was the examination of this book that led Astruc, in 1753,¹ to the important discovery which was the first positive achievement in this department of research. Having noticed the significant alternation of the divine names in different sections of the book, and having convinced himself that the phenomenon could not be explained otherwise than as due to the literary habit of two writers, Astruc proceeded to divide the bulk of Genesis into two documents, one distinguished by the use of the name אֱלֹהִים, and the other by the use of יְהֹוָה; while a series of fragmentary passages where this criterion failed him brought the total number of his _mémoires_ up to twelve. Subsequent investigations served to emphasise the magnitude of this discovery, which Eichhorn² speedily put on a broader basis by a characterisation of the style, contents, and spirit of the two documents. Neither Astruc nor Eichhorn carried the analysis further than Exodus 2,――partly because they were influenced by the traditional opinion (afterwards abandoned by Eichhorn) of Mosaic authorship, and did not expect to find traces of composition in the history contemporaneous with Moses. We shall see presently that there is a deeper reason why this particular clue to the analysis could not at first be traced beyond the early chapters of Exodus.

¹ _Conjectures sur les mémoires originaux, dont il paroît que
Moyse s’est servi pour composer le livre de la Genèse._

² _Einleitung in das Alte Testament_, 1780‒3 (1st edition).

While the earlier attempts to discredit Astruc’s discovery took
the direction of showing that the use of the two divine names is
determined by a difference of meaning which made the one or the
other more suitable in a particular connexion, the more recent
opposition entrenches itself mostly behind the uncertainties
of the text, and maintains that the Versions (especially LXX)
show the Massoretic Text to be so unreliable that no analysis
of documents can be based on its data: see Klostermann,
_Der Pentateuch_ (1893), page 20 ff.; Dahse, _Archiv für
Religionswissenschaft._, vi. (1903), 305 ff.; Redpath, _American
Journal of Theology_, viii. (1904), 286 ff.; Eerdmans, _Die
Komposition der Genesis_ (1908), 34 ff.; Wiener, _Bibliotheca
Sacra and Theological Review_ (1909), 119 ff.――It cannot be
denied that the facts adduced by these writers import an element
of uncertainty into the analysis, _so far as it depends on
the criterion of the divine names_; but the significance of
the facts is greatly overrated, and the alternative theories
propounded to account for the textual phenomena are improbable
in the extreme. (1) So far as I have observed, no attention is
paid to what is surely a very important factor of the problem,
the _proportion_ of divergences to agreements as between LXX
and Massoretic Text. In Genesis the divine name occurs in one or
other form about 340 times (in Massoretic Text, יהוה 143 times +
אלהים 177 times + י׳ א׳ 20 times). The total deviations registered
by Redpath (296 ff.) number 50; according to Eerdmans (34 f.)
they are 49; _i.e._ little more than one-seventh of the whole.
Is it so certain that that degree of divergence invalidates
a documentary analysis founded on so much larger a field of
undisputed readings? (2) In spite of the confident assertions of
Dahse (309) and Wiener (131 f.) there is not a single instance
in which LXX is ‘demonstrably’ right against Massoretic Text.
It is readily conceded that it is probably right in a few cases;
but there are two general presumptions in favour of the superior
fidelity of the Massoretic tradition. Not only (a) is the
chance of purely clerical confusion between κ̅ς and θ̅ς greater
than between יהוה and אלהים, or even between י׳ and א׳, and (b) a
change of divine names more apt to occur in _translation_ than
in _transcription_, but (c) the distinction between a proper
name יהוה and a generic אלהים is much less likely to have been
overlooked in copying than that between two appellatives κύριος
and θεός. An instructive example is 4²⁶, where LXX κύριος ὁ θεός
is ‘demonstrably’ wrong. (3) In the present state of textual
criticism it is impossible to determine in particular cases what
is the original reading. We can only proceed by the imperfect
method of averages. Now it is significant that while in Genesis
LXX substitutes θεός for יהוה 21 times, and κύριος ὁ θεός 19 times
(40 in all), there are only 4 cases of κύριος and 6 of κύριος
ὁ θεός for אלהים (10 in all: the proportions being very much the
same for the whole Pentateuch). LXX thus reveals a decided (and
very natural) preference for the ordinary Greek θεός over the
less familiar κύριος. Dahse urges (page 308) that Massoretic
Text betrays an equally marked preference for יהוה, and has
frequently substituted it for אלהים; but that is much less
intelligible. For although the pronunciation of יהוה as אֲדֹנָי might
have removed the fear of the Tetragrammaton,――and that would be
a very good reason for leaving יהוה where it was,――it suggests no
motive at all for inserting it where it was not. There is force,
however, in Gray’s remark on a particular case (_A Critical and
Exegetical Commentary on Numbers_ page 311), that “wherever [ὁ]
κ̅ς appears in LXX it deserves attention as a possible indication
of the original text.” (4) The documentary theory furnishes
a better explanation of the alternation of the names than any
other that has been propounded. Redpath’s hypothesis of a double
recension of the Pentateuch, one mainly Yahwistic and the other
wholly (?) Elohistic, of which one was used only where the other
was illegible, would explain anything, and therefore explains
nothing; least of all does it explain the frequent coincidence
of hypothetical illegibility with actual changes of style,
phraseology, and standpoint. Dahse (following out a hint of
Klostermann) accounts for the phenomena of Massoretic Text (and
_The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch_) by the desire to
preserve uniformity within the limits of each several pericope
of the Synagogue lectionary; but why some pericopes should be
Yahwistic and others Elohistic, it is not easy to conceive. He
admits that his view cannot be carried through in detail; yet
it is just of the kind which, if true, ought to be verifiable
in detail. One has but to read consecutively the first three
chapters of Genesis, and observe how the sudden change in the
divine name coincides with a new vocabulary, representation,
and spiritual atmosphere, in order to feel how paltry all such
artificial explanations are in comparison with the hypothesis
that the names are distinctive of different documents. The
experience repeats itself, not perhaps quite so convincingly,
again and again throughout the book; and though there are cases
where the change of manner is not obvious, still the theory
is vindicated in a sufficient number of instances to be worth
carrying through, even at the expense of a somewhat complicated
analysis, and a very few demands (see page xlviii f.) on the
services of a redactor to resolve isolated problems. (5) It was
frankly admitted by Kuenen long ago (see _Historisch-critisch
Onderzoek naar het ontstaan en de verzameling van de boeken des
Ouden Verbonds_ i. pages 59, 62) that the test of the divine
names is not _by itself_ a sufficient criterion of source or
authorship, and that critics might sometimes err through a
too exclusive reliance on this one phenomenon.¹ Nevertheless
the opinion can be maintained that the Massoretic Text is far
superior to the Versions, and that its use of the names is a
valuable clue to the separation of documents. Truth is sometimes
stranger than fiction; and, however surprising it may appear
to some, we can reconcile our minds to the belief that the
Massoretic Text does reproduce with substantial accuracy the
characteristics of the original autographs. At present that
assumption can only be tested by the success or failure of the
analysis based on it. It is idle to speculate on what would
have happened if Astruc and his successors had been compelled
to operate with LXX instead of Massoretic Text; but it is a
rational surmise that in that case criticism would still have
arrived, by a more laborious route, at very much the positions
it occupies to-day.

¹ It should be clearly understood that as regards Priestly-Code
and Yahwist the distinction of divine names is but one
of many marks of diverse authorship (see Driver _An
Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament_⁸, 131
ff., where more than _fifty_ such distinguishing criteria
are given), and that after Exodus 6, where this particular
criterion disappears, the difference is quite as obvious as
before. As regards Yahwist and Elohist, the analysis, though
sometimes dependent on the divine names alone, is _generally_
based on other differences as well.

The next great step towards the modern documentary theory of the Pentateuch was Hupfeld’s¹ demonstration that אלהים is not peculiar to one document, but to two; so that under the name Elohist two different writers had previously been confused. It is obvious, of course, that in this inquiry the divine names afford no guidance; yet by observing finer marks of style, and the connexion of the narrative, Hupfeld succeeded in proving to the ultimate satisfaction of all critics that there was a second Elohistic source (now called Elohist), closely parallel and akin to the Yahwistic (Yahwist), and that both Yahwist and Elohist had once been independent consecutive narratives. An important part of the work was a more accurate delimitation of the first Elohist (now called the Priestly Code: Priestly-Code), whose outlines were then first drawn with a clearness to which later investigation has had little to add.²

¹ _Die Quellen der Genesis und die Art ihrer Zusammensetzung_
(1853). Hupfeld’s discovery had partly been anticipated
by Ilgen (_Urkunden des ersten Buchs von Moses_ [1798]).
Between Eichhorn and Hupfeld, criticism had passed through
two well-defined phases: the Fragmentary Hypothesis (see
page xxxii f. above) and the Supplementary Hypothesis, of
which the classical exposition is Tuch’s fine commentary
on Genesis (1858; reissued by Arnold in 1871). The latter
theory rested partly on a prejudice――that the framework of
the Pentateuch was necessarily supplied by its oldest source;
partly on the misapprehension which Hupfeld dispelled;
and partly on the truth that Yahwistic sections are so
interlaced with Elohistic that the former could plausibly
be regarded as on the whole supplementary to the latter.
Though Tuch’s commentary did not appear till 1858, the theory
had really received its death-blow from Hupfeld five years
before.

² See Nöldeke, _Untersuchungen zur Kritik des Alte Testament_,
1869, pages 1‒144. It is worthy of mention here that this
great scholar, after long resisting the theory of the
late origin of Priestly-Code, has at last declared his
acceptance of the position of Wellhausen (see _Zeitschrift
für Assyriologie_, 1908, 203).

Though Hupfeld’s work was confined to Genesis, it had results of
the utmost consequence for the criticism of the Pentateuch as a
whole. In particular, it brought to light a fact which at once
explains why Genesis presents a simpler problem to analysis than
the rest of the Pentateuch, and furnishes a final proof that
the avoidance of יהוה by two of the sources was not accidental,
but arose from a theory of religious development held and
expressed by both writers. For both Priestly-Code (Exodus
6² ᶠᶠᐧ) and Elohist (Exodus 3¹³ ᶠᶠᐧ) connect the revelation of
the Tetragrammaton with the mission of Moses; while the former
states emphatically that God was not known by that name to the
patriarchs.¹ Consistency demanded that these writers should use
the generic name for Deity up to this point; while Yahwist, who
was bound by no such theory, could use יהוה from the first.² From
Exodus 6 onwards Priestly-Code regularly uses יהוה; Elohist’s
usage fluctuates between א׳ and י׳ (perhaps a sign of different
strata within the document), so that the criterion no longer
yields a sure clue to the analysis.

¹ A curious attempt to turn the edge of this argument will
be found in the article of H. M. Wiener referred to above
(_Bibliotheca Sacra and Theological Review_, 1909, 158 ff.).

² For a partial exception, see on 4²⁶.

It does not lie within the scope of this Introduction to trace the extension of these lines of cleavage through the other books of the Hexateuch; and of the reflex results of the criticism of the later books on that of Genesis only two can here be mentioned. One is the recognition of the unique position and character of Deuteronomy in the Pentateuch, and the dating of its promulgation in the eighteenth year of Josiah.¹ Although this has hardly any direct influence on the criticism of Genesis, it is an important landmark in the Pentateuch problem, as furnishing a fixed date by reference to which the age of the other documents can partly be determined. The other point is the question of the date of Priestly-Code. The preconception in favour of the antiquity of this document (based for the most part on the fact that it really forms the framework of the Pentateuch) was nearly universal among scholars down to the publication of Wellhausen’s _Geschichte Israels_, i., in 1878; but it had already been shown to be groundless by Graff² and Kuenen in 1866‒69.

¹ De Wette, _Beiträge zur Einleitung in das Alte Testament_
(1806‒7); Riehm, _Gesetzgebung Mose’s im Lande Moab_ (1854);
al.

² _Die geschichtliche Bücher des Alte Testaments_ (1866). Graf
did not at first see it necessary to abandon the earlier
date of the _narratives_ of Priestly-Code; for an account
of his subsequent change of opinion in correspondence with
Kuenen, as well as the anticipations of his final theory
by Vatke, Reuss, and others, we must refer to Kuenen _An
Historico-Critical Inquiry Into the Origin and Composition
of the Hexateuch_ xix ff., or Holzinger’s _Einleitung in den
Hexateuch_, especially page 64 ff.

This revolutionary change was brought about by a comparison of
the layers of legislation in the later Pentateuch books with
one another, and with the stages of Israel’s religious history
as revealed in the earlier historical books; from which it
appeared that the laws belonging to Priestly-Code were later
than Deuteronomy, and that their codification took place during
and after, and their promulgation after, the Exile. There
was hesitation at first in extending this conclusion to the
_narratives_ of Priestly-Code, especially those of them in
Genesis and Exodus 1‒11. But when the problem was fairly
faced, it was perceived, not only that Priestly-Code in Genesis
presented no obstacle to the theory, but that in many respects
its narrative was more intelligible as the latest than as the
oldest stratum of the book.

The chief positions at which literary criticism has arrived with regard to Genesis are, therefore, briefly these: (1) The oldest sources are Yahwist and Elohist, closely parallel documents, both dating from the best period of Hebrew literature, but distinguished from each other by their use of the divine name, by slight idiosyncrasies of style, and by quite perceptible differences of representation. (2) These sources were combined into a composite narrative (Jehovist) by a redactor (Redactorᴶᵉʰᵒᵛⁱˢᵗ), whose hand can be detected in several patches of a literary complexion differing from either of his authorities. He has done his work so deftly that it is frequently difficult, and sometimes impossible, to sunder the documents. It is generally held that this redaction took place before the composition of Deuteronomy, so that a third stage in the history of the Pentateuch would be represented by the symbols Jehovist + Deuteronomy. (3) The remaining source Priestly-Code is a product of the Exilic or post-Exilic age, though it embodies older material. Originally an independent work, its formal and schematic character fitted it to be the framework of the Pentateuchal narrative; and this has determined the procedure of the final redactor (Redactorᴾᵉⁿᵗᵃᵗᵉᵘᶜʰ), by whom excerpts from Jehovist have been used to fill up the skeleton outline which Priestly-Code gave of the primitive and patriarchal history.

The above statement will, it is hoped, suffice to put the reader in possession of the main points of the critical position occupied in the Commentary. The evidence by which they are supported will partly be given in the next four §§; but, for a full discussion of the numerous questions involved, we must here refer to works specially devoted to the subject.¹

¹ The following may be mentioned: Kuenen, _Historisch-critisch
onderzoek naar het ontstaan en de verzameling van de boeken
des Ouden Verbonds_², i. (1885) [English translation,
_The Hexateuch_ (1886)]; and _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_
(translated into German by Budde); Wellhausen, _Composition
des Hexateuchs_, etc. (²1889); and _Prolegomena zur
Geschichte Israels_ (⁶1905) [English translation 1885];
Westphal, _Les Sources du Pentateuch_ (1888, 1892); Reuss,
_Geschichte der heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments_ (²1890);
Robertson Smith, _The Old Testament in the Jewish Church_
(²1892); Driver, _Introduction to the Literature of the Old
Testament_ (⁸1909); Holzinger, _Einleitung in den Hexateuch_
(1893); Cornill, _Einleitung in das Alte Testament_ (⁶1908);
König, _Einleitung in das Alte Testament_ (1893); Carpenter
and Harford-Battersby, _Composition of the Hexateuch_ (1902)
[= volume i. of _The Hexateuch_ (1900)].