Genesis Narratives from H?
Jim Getz and John Hobbins both replied to my previous post on whether the narratives in Genesis are from P or H (or better, PT or HS). I wanted to respond to their responses.
I would be interested in hearing what Knohl has to say on the subject of the narratives being from H. In The Sanctuary of Silence, he attributes all of Genesis to PT in one paragraph on p.60. He states, “In most of [Genesis] we find no linguistic features typical of HS; thus, we may assign them to PT, as is commonly accepted.” If he has rethought this, I would like to hear his arguments.
I would love to hear what Jim’s colleague has to say in her dissertation. If you don’t mind, please ask her to drop a comment on my blog if she has the time.
Jim points out that the Covenant Code is earlier than material in D, P, and H. I would agree, but I don’t think anyone would assign it to J. J may have been the one who edited it into Exodus, but it was around before that.
As for van Seters, there is a great deal on which he can be criticized and places where I disagree with him, but I think his main point that J is post-D is solid. At the very least, it certainly cannot be assigned to the 10th century any longer. This is a conclusion that has been reached by a number of scholars in Europe.
John points towards Milgrom. I quickly looked through his Anchor Bible commentary and his Fortress Press commentary (both on Leviticus) and didn’t see anything that suggested he assigned the narratives in Genesis to HS. Milgrom, like Knohl, sees P and H as being pre-exilic. He sees H as being later than JE, D, and P. I agree with him on P being pre-exilic, but I would date H to the post-exilic period, and thus still later than what used to be called J.
One final question to both Jim and John: If we assign the narratives to H, what then is left of P? Wouldn’t H have then taken over pretty much all of the Priestly Source? If that is the case, then all we have done is change the letter we use to refer to the Priestly Source.
On December 14th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
One brief remark: Knohl does not see the hand of HS as entirely absent from Genesis—see, e.g., his n. 150 on p. 103 of Sanctuary of Silence. —Stephen C.
On December 14th, 2007 at 7:14 pm
Kevin,
first of all, thanks for keeping the discussion going on this. It’s a great topic.
I pointed to Milgrom because he made the most persuasive attempt I know of at distinguishing between P and H in Leviticus. So I would use his P and H assignments in Leviticus as one starting-point. He builds, of course, on earlier scholarship.
Kevin, if you date H to post-exilic times against Milgrom, how do you explain Ezekiel? Don’t Ezek and H have a lot in common? Perhaps I’m not remembering correctly; I’m away from my books at the moment, and can’t check on it now.
As for J, E, etc., are you familiar with Erhard Blum’s work? I won’t try to summarize it, except to say that in his work on the Jacob cycle, he makes a good case for old (pre-exilic, pre-D) nuclei. In that sense, I take John van Seters to be wrong, insofar as he dates “J” as a whole to post-D. It could be that other “J” material is in fact exilic to early Persian Period. I have a hard time reading Gen 12:1ff., for example, and not thinking of it as worded with the exiles in Babylonia in mind.
At SBL Washington, it was fun to hear Ron Hendel make this confession of faith (he’s working on the new AB commentary to Genesis): “I believe in J, E, D, and P.” What a hoot. If I’m not mistaken, he thinks of E as a distinguishable source.
Another person to read on the topic of the sources is Alessandro Rofe, but I don’t know if he has (re-)examined the specific issues we are broaching.
On December 18th, 2007 at 2:20 am
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