The JEDP theory is a matter of modern chauvinism being applied to an ancient document. Writing in the 3rd person and not indentifying the author was common practice in the ANE. If it is a hang-up for us, then it is is simply our hang-up. There is not one MSS to support that a book of the Bible has evolved in any manner. Most of the "logic" that would support the DH is such that would make the WTS proud.
Pentateuch
by Pippa 35 Replies latest jw friends
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PrimateDave
So, Mr. Dawg, I take it you actually have read Mr. Friedman's book? What specific points in it do you disagree with?
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Mad Dawg
No, I have not read Friedman's book. In fact, I made my post before your's appeared referring to Friedman. Nor do I need to read his book as the JEDP theory has been around for more than a hundred years. The theory is based entirely on speculation about different styles of writing. Their is no MSS evidence for it that I know of. If there is MSS evidence for it, or if Friedman adds anything new, let me know.
I am well aware that Moses did not actually write Genesis, but compiled and edited it. I also recognize that there were some additions after Moses finished his writing. There is no evidence to suggest that these changed the meaning or that they occurred much later.
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BurnTheShips
I don't trust any Friedman unless his first name is Milton.
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PrimateDave
lol @ Burn!
Nice chatting with ya Mad Dawg. Can you recommend something to read that supports your viewpoint? I have an open mind and will consider alternative points of view. I only have a problem with intellectual dishonesty.
As I pointed out in my previous post, the Watchtower condemned the DH, and Friedman specifically, but did not address the underlying premises of the DH. It would have been far more honest and informative to their readers for them to present an unbiased appraisal of the DH in a Watchtower publication and then refute it point by point with clear evidence. After all, consider that the average reader of the Watchtower is most unlikely to understand the ins and outs of the DH.
This is what honest scholarship is about, isn't it? One has to thoroughly understand all sides of the argument first, then sort through the evidence and come up with plausible explanations. If one refuses to consider all the evidence with an open mind, how can one really speak from a position of authority on a matter?
As to whether or not any manuscripts exist to show that books have evolved in the manner described by the DH, I honestly don't know. Perhaps Leolaia or Narkissos could enlighten us on that subject?
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Narkissos
Dave,
I am not aware of any ms evidence to support the DH, actually none must be expected since we are dealing with literary, not textual criticism, the "prehistory" of a work which was widely circulated and copied only in relatively "final" and standardised forms, although in different "editions" (I had a very similar discussion with Earnest a couple of days ago about the Gospel of John). It all relies on internal analysis -- differences of language, syntax, style, narrative gaps, repetitions, doublets, anachronisms, contradictions, redactional seams and so on. Textual facts which require an explanation but not necessarily a consistently and exclusively documentary one (in the sense of pre-existing documents that would have been written separately before being blended).
As I have explained before, in Europe the general scholarly consensus was swayed away from the classical DH pattern in the 80s (to the point that introductions to the Pentateuch in major Bibles such as the French Traduction OEcuménique de la Bible had to be thoroughly revised in the last decade), while in America it didn't happen (yet?).
The Wikipedia article is a decent start: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
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PrimateDave
That is a good article in the Wikipedia, Narkissos. I think very few Witnesses are familiar with that information. I would suggest that even if better evidence later suggests that JEPD is incorrect, a good knowledge of the basic DH framework is indispensible to any discussion of the origins of the Torah and the rest of the Bible. Nevertheless, as you previously pointed out, even the latest theories presented by scholars who reject the JEPD framework do not mark a return to the tradition that Moses authored the Pentateuch. For those who have been taught by Fundamentalist religions that Moses authored the Pentateuch, the very fact that the DH can plausibly refute this teaching based on mere internal analysis is eye opening and liberating indeed. For this reason I don't expect to see an in depth consideration of the DH in publications of the WTS.
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Mad Dawg
Nark said:
It all relies on internal analysis
I agree. There is no external evidence to support the JEDP theory. There is archeological evidence to support the Moses account. To say that we would not expect external evidence for JEDP and “look there isn’t any therefore it must be true” is to argue from silence. Here is a list of articles discussing archeology and the Bible.
-- differences of language, syntax, style,
This is not a problem for Moses. While Moses was responsible for most of the content, he is not solely responsible. Certainly it does not require that the Pentateuch was in its final form much later than Moses.
narrative gaps,
Every historical account has narrative gaps.
repetitions, doublets, anachronisms, contradictions, redactional seams and so on.
These are making problems where none exist:
Ø “If Abraham claimed that Sarah was his sister twice, then the same story must have been added in a second time because surely Abraham wouldn’t have committed the same mistake twice.” This reasoning is nonsense.
o It assumes that people always learn their lesson from a mistake or that they could not possibly repeat an action.
o If I remember correctly, sometimes the same story will appear in two different books of the OT. There is nothing significant about an author repeating an account in another work.
Ø DH theorists try to claim that if a more modern name for something is used for a place, then it could not have been written when it was said to be written.
o First, I generally agree with the premise.
o If a document in English is supposed to be from the year 1600 and it states that “Marco Polo went to China”, we know that it wasn’t written in 1750 because “Cathay” was used at that time by English speaking people.
o However, it is misapplied to Moses.
o Moses did not write in Hebrew or Aramaic. The anachronisms would appear because of the translation into Hebrew.
o If a document was written in 1600 in Swahili referring to China – using the Swahili word for China – was then translated into English in 1970; there is no problem in them term “China” appearing in the translation of 1970.
Ø The contradictions can be reconciled, usually quite easily.
o People who point to lists such as 1001 Contradictions of the Bible as if they have proved something are intellectually lazy and ignorant.
o Most such “contradictions” can be easily explained by getting a little better grasp of the passages in question.
o I am amazed by people that try to claim, “The Bible teaches that pi equals 3, everyone knows that it is 3.14, therefore the Bible has an error in it!”
§ No where in the entire Bible does it say pi equals anything.
§ A vessel that is 10 units across the top and 30 units around the outside can be easily made.
§ A vessel can be made using virtually any ratio of measurements depending on the contour.
Ø Some links on the matter:
o Article on anachronistic names
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Mad Dawg
Winnie the Pooh could not have possibly been written by a single author!
From here
Doublets also occur. We may mention briefly the two accounts of meetings with a Heffalump (W 5; H 3). and two accounts of the building of a house.(H 1; 9), variously connected with Eeyore and with Owl. An excellent example of the redactor's method in intertwining his sources may be seen in the account of Pooh's being stuck in the entrance to Rabbit's house (W 2. 24). When Pooh realizes he is stuck, according to the first source:
'Oh, help!', said Pooh. 'I'd better go back.'
But according to the second source:
'Oh, bother!', said Pooh. 'I shall have to go on.'
The redactor has simply set down these two contradictory statements side by side, and then has attempted to harmonize them by his own conflation:
'I can't do either!', said Pooh. 'Oh, help and bother!
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Narkissos
Dave,
Agreed. I'd say the same thing I have said recently on another thread about the Two-Source Hypothesis (Mark + Q) for the Synoptic Gospels. If the theory has been complexified and nuanced to the point that it no longer offers a simple explanation to the problem, or even makes the problem more complicated than it is and might better be dispensed with, in the meantime it has helped to observe and understand the problem (that is, the texts) much better, highlighting very real differences within each book and transversal similitudes from one book to another. And this of course is not questioned even if it requires a better explanation.
Mad Dawg,
There is a lot of worn-out caricature and fallacy (of the 'strawman' or 'red herring' types in particular) in your argument, plus completely irrelevant issues -- such as about p which hardly affects the Pentateuch (it is usually brought up about 1 Kings) and has nothing to do with the question of writership and datation anyway. When I wrote contradictions I didn't mean with "science" but between the texts themselves, in either narrative or legal sections: for instance the dispositions of the so-called "Covenant code" in Exodus 20:22--23:19 differ from those in other parts of the Torah on a lot of topics (sacrifices and priesthood, 20:24f, compare Deuteronomy 12:5; slavery 21:1ff, compare Leviticus 25, etc.). Of course they can be reconciled -- that's what much of Jewish interpretation has been about in the past 2,000 + years. But the very difficulty bears the mark of legislations pertaining to and arising from different historical, economical, political contexts. Why would a single "lawmaker" working almost abstractly (not even mentioning divine inspiration) in a unique and rather constraint-free context (the Sinai desert) come up with such complexity?
The suggestion that Moses didn't write in Hebrew and that the Torah was translated to Hebrew is rather new to me though. In what language was he supposed to write then? Did the entire nation shift languages at some point? Shouldn't such an event have left some epigraphic or narrative foottrails? Or perhaps you just mean some pre-classical form of Hebrew requiring a gradual adaptation to the evolution of the language... In any case that hardly eases the difficulties with the extant Torah.
The real problem is that very little in the Torah makes sense in a 2nd-millenium-BC context, while most of it is perfectly at home in a period running from the Assyrian to the Persian empires. This is the fact all historians and exegetes are dealing with, even though how it was exactly composed remains a matter for scholarly hypothesis and conjecture.