A review of the article “Moses and the Pentateuch” by J. W. Wenham
Introduction
The long-standing consensus among Christians and Jews over Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch was severely challenged by the documentary hypothesis in the late 1860’s. Among others, Julius Wellhausen’s publications advanced the theory that Jewish religion underwent Darwinist evolution from primitive animism to sophisticated monotheism. From linguistic and stylistic analysis , at least four post-Mosaic authors were identified such as the Jehovist, the Elohist, the Priestly and the Deuteronomist. John Wenham, representing a more conservative perspective, presented a case for Mosaic authorship while recognizing post-Mosaic elements in the Torah .
Summary and Critique
The author started his article by defending the validity and necessity of a scholar to begin an investigation with a set of presuppositions, not tabula rasa. Therefore, a predisposed commitment to Christ’s view of Old Testament as “true, inspired and authoritative” is not illegitimate while in the process of resolving apparent discrepancies. He outlined some principles to approach the issue of authorship – that we are bound by the biblical text as originally given, not by tradition, while recognizing difficulties in textual transmission, which does not vitiate its revelation. The outworking of these principles is evident as he weighed the traditional Jewish solution as “too simple” and discussed the problem of large numbers in tribal censuses as an issue of textual transmission, instead of authorship. Regarding the authorship of Genesis-Numbers, Wenham cited some texts, which may suggest post-Mosaic editing but not demonstrably late to build a “weighty historical argument” for post-Mosaic authorship. It is only to be expected that such national and religious documents may have undergone updating of genealogical list, archaic names and explanatory comments to clear up ambiguities.
However, in Deuteronomy, there were most likely post-Mosaic elements in the introduction (1:1-5), ending and explanatory remarks (2:10-12, 20-23; 3:9, 4:45-49). At the same time, we must take into account the explicit statements that the bulk of writing was Mosaic (31:24). Here, Wenham proposed two alternatives:
1) that the writing of Mosaic and pre-Mosaic materials was anonymous, undertaken during the early monarchy or
2) his preferred view that Genesis-Numbers were Mosaic, with minor modifications during transmission while Deuteronomy, while basically Mosaic, was written by a narrator during the time of Joshua .
In summing up, he argued for the latter option in view of the lofty content especially in Genesis, the great foundation of monotheism, which requires a man of Moses’ genius and its style, in which glosses, explanations and frequent synonyms were necessary to address an intended audience comprised of a mixed multitude (Exodus 12:38) from remarkably diverse background .
Conclusion
Due to attestations in the both Testaments of Moses’ principal authorship, nothing less than the veracity of Scripture is at stake . However, this does not necessarily preclude post-Mosaic redaction that made it more intelligible to subsequent generations and updated archaic names of locations . In my opinion, such redactions were almost certainly undertaken beyond the concluding chapters of Deuteronomy.
In all fairness, a conservative believer may recognize such explanatory remarks as having post-Mosaic origins while maintaining that the form and substantial bulk of the Torah was Mosaic. Perhaps, having alluded to another article , Wenham did not mention the faulty assumptions of the documentary hypothesis that the Jews were unable to repeat themes, use multiple names for God or that an author is incapable of different writing styles as other Semitic literatures. Apart from that, there is also strong internal evidence that point to Mosaic authorship such as Genesis and Exodus having "a large number of idioms and terms of speech, which are characteristically Egyptian in origin, even though translated into Hebrew ." As Christians, we have every reason to be confident.
Introduction
The long-standing consensus among Christians and Jews over Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch was severely challenged by the documentary hypothesis in the late 1860’s. Among others, Julius Wellhausen’s publications advanced the theory that Jewish religion underwent Darwinist evolution from primitive animism to sophisticated monotheism. From linguistic and stylistic analysis , at least four post-Mosaic authors were identified such as the Jehovist, the Elohist, the Priestly and the Deuteronomist. John Wenham, representing a more conservative perspective, presented a case for Mosaic authorship while recognizing post-Mosaic elements in the Torah .Summary and Critique
The author started his article by defending the validity and necessity of a scholar to begin an investigation with a set of presuppositions, not tabula rasa. Therefore, a predisposed commitment to Christ’s view of Old Testament as “true, inspired and authoritative” is not illegitimate while in the process of resolving apparent discrepancies. He outlined some principles to approach the issue of authorship – that we are bound by the biblical text as originally given, not by tradition, while recognizing difficulties in textual transmission, which does not vitiate its revelation. The outworking of these principles is evident as he weighed the traditional Jewish solution as “too simple” and discussed the problem of large numbers in tribal censuses as an issue of textual transmission, instead of authorship. Regarding the authorship of Genesis-Numbers, Wenham cited some texts, which may suggest post-Mosaic editing but not demonstrably late to build a “weighty historical argument” for post-Mosaic authorship. It is only to be expected that such national and religious documents may have undergone updating of genealogical list, archaic names and explanatory comments to clear up ambiguities.
However, in Deuteronomy, there were most likely post-Mosaic elements in the introduction (1:1-5), ending and explanatory remarks (2:10-12, 20-23; 3:9, 4:45-49). At the same time, we must take into account the explicit statements that the bulk of writing was Mosaic (31:24). Here, Wenham proposed two alternatives:
1) that the writing of Mosaic and pre-Mosaic materials was anonymous, undertaken during the early monarchy or
2) his preferred view that Genesis-Numbers were Mosaic, with minor modifications during transmission while Deuteronomy, while basically Mosaic, was written by a narrator during the time of Joshua .
In summing up, he argued for the latter option in view of the lofty content especially in Genesis, the great foundation of monotheism, which requires a man of Moses’ genius and its style, in which glosses, explanations and frequent synonyms were necessary to address an intended audience comprised of a mixed multitude (Exodus 12:38) from remarkably diverse background .
Conclusion
Due to attestations in the both Testaments of Moses’ principal authorship, nothing less than the veracity of Scripture is at stake . However, this does not necessarily preclude post-Mosaic redaction that made it more intelligible to subsequent generations and updated archaic names of locations . In my opinion, such redactions were almost certainly undertaken beyond the concluding chapters of Deuteronomy.
In all fairness, a conservative believer may recognize such explanatory remarks as having post-Mosaic origins while maintaining that the form and substantial bulk of the Torah was Mosaic. Perhaps, having alluded to another article , Wenham did not mention the faulty assumptions of the documentary hypothesis that the Jews were unable to repeat themes, use multiple names for God or that an author is incapable of different writing styles as other Semitic literatures. Apart from that, there is also strong internal evidence that point to Mosaic authorship such as Genesis and Exodus having "a large number of idioms and terms of speech, which are characteristically Egyptian in origin, even though translated into Hebrew ." As Christians, we have every reason to be confident.
Comments
thank you,
Mike Messerli
Keep writing for His glory and the good of His people, bro!