From “The Growth of the Hexateuch”

The ascription of the Pentateuch to Moses, explicit in the various English versions of the Bible, rests upon a tradition of obscure origin. The books themselves do not claim him as their author. Indeed, it may be argued that the attribution of certain specific passages to him – e.g., Exod. 24:4; 34:27; Num. 33:2; Deut. 31:9 – rather suggest that these passages are unique in this respect, and that the Pentateuch as a whole does not come from his hand. It is not until we come to Chronicles, with its continuation in Ezra and Nehemiah, that we find reference to “the law of Moses,” meaning the Pentateuch (II Chr. 23:18; 30:16; Ezra 3:2; 7:6; Neh. 8:1; cf. “the book of Moses,” II Chr. 35:12; Ezra 6:18; Neh. 13:1). The tradition of Mosaic authorship thus appears to have been current about 250 B.C. In view of the absence of earlier testimony one can scarcely maintain that it took form much before that date, nearly a thousand years after Moses’ death.

Apart from Jerome’s identification of Deuteronomy with the law book of Josiah, there appears to have been no challenging of the tradition on critical grounds until the eleventh century, when two rabbis, Issac and Ibn Ezra, ventured to question the Mosaic authorship of certain passages, with, however, no immediate result. It was not until 1520 that the matter was raised again by Carlstadt, who, in his De Canonicis Scripturis, called attention to the fact that the style of the Old Testament narrative remained unchanged after the account of the death of Moses, and suggested that this might have some bearing upon the question of the authorship of the Pentateuch. In the two centuries which followed, a number of scholars raised further questions on other grounds, noting (a) the occurrence of two or more versions of what appeared to be the same incident, (b) the inconsistencies in the narrative, and (c) its recurring chronological difficulties.

It will be convenient at this point to list some of the more outstanding instances of these phenomena, not all of which, however, were noted by the critics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries:

A. Parallel Narratives and Laws. – (a) Abraham twice met what appeared to be a dangerous situation be representing his wife to be his sister (Gen. 12:10-20; 20:1-18), and Isaac once resorted to the same expedient (Gen. 26:6-11). (b) Abraham three times received the promise of a son (Gen. 15:4; 17:16; 18:10), and (c) four explanations of that son’s name, Isaac, meaning, “he laughs,” are given (Gen. 17:17-19; 18:12-13; 21:6a, 6b). (d) Hagar is twice expelled from Abraham’s household on account of Sarah’s jealousy, to find herself at a well in the desert where she is succored by an angel who tells her that she is to be the mother of a great people (Gen. 16:4-14; 21:9-21). (e) Jacob twice gives the name Bethel to a place formerly called Luz (Gen. 28:19; 35:6; 15). (f) Jacob’s name is twice changed to Israel (Gen. 32:28; 35:10). It might, of course, be argued that these phenomena can be accounted for by assuming that Moses had composed the book of Genesis from existing document or divergent oral traditions. The fact that similar duplications occur in the record of events in which he was himself involved is less easily explained: (g) The name Yahweh is twice revealed to Moses (Exod. 3:14-15; 6:2-3). (h) On each occasion this revelation is accompanied by a promise that God would deliver Israel from Egypt (Exod. 3:7-8; 6:5-6) and (j) Moses is commissioned to this end (Exod. 3:10-18; 6:11). (k) Moses twice hesitates to accept this appointment (Exod. 4:10-13; 6:12), and (l) twice receives Aaron as his spokesman (Exod. 4:14-16; 7:1-2). While it is, of course, possible that Moses was reluctant to undertake the task assigned to him and that it was necessary for God to speak to him twice, it is, to say the least, curious that no reference whatever is made on the “second” occasion to the “former” experience. (m) Twice the quails are given (Exod. 16:13; Num. 11:4-6, 31-32), and (n) twice water is brought from the rock (Exod. 17:1-7; Num 20:1-13).

The questions raised by the numerous repetitions in the legislation are less disturbing, for such repetitions could be accounted for on the theory that certain laws had, for whatever reason, been promulgated more than once. Nevertheless, it is curious that during the stay of the people in Sinai – a period of less than a year according to the present narrative (Exod. 10:1; Num. 10:11) –Moses should have found it necessary to command (o) three times the observance of the feasts of unleavened bread (Exod. 23:15; 34:18; Lev. 23:6), and of ingathering or tabernacles (Exod. 23:16b; 34:22b; Lev. 23:33-36; cf. Lev. 23:39-43), and (p) six times the keeping of the Sabbath (Exod. 20:8-10; 23:12; 31:13-17; 34:21; 35:1-3; Lev. 23:3).

B. Inconsistencies Within the Narratives and Laws. – (a) According to Gen. 1:26-27 man and woman were created together after the rest of creation, herbs, trees, fish, birds, and animals, had been completed; according to Gen. 2:7 man was created first, then the trees (vs. 9), then the animals (vs. 19), and finally woman, formed from a rib of the man (vss. 21-22). (b) According to Gen. 6:19-20 Noah was commanded to take into the ark with him one pair of each kind of animal, birds, cattle, etc.; contrast 7:2-3, where he is commanded to preserve alive seven pairs of clean beasts to one pair of unclean. (c) Gen. 7:12 records that the rain of the Flood was on earth for 40 days; in 7:24 it is stated that the waters prevailed upon the earth 150 days. (d) According to Gen. 41:34 Joseph advises Pharaoh to prepare for the coming famine by storing up one fifth of the grain yield during the intervening plenteous years; according to vs. 35 he advised him to gather all the food. (e) Moses’ father-in-law is named Reuel in Exod. 2:18, 21 and Num. 10:29 – unless the name here is Hobab – and Jethro in Exod. 3:1; 4:18; 18:1-12. (f) According to Exod. 25:10-22 Moses, while on the holy mount, received directions for the making of the ark. These directions were carried out by Bezaleel (37:1-9) after Moses had brought down from the mount the second set of the tables of the law (34:29), which were placed in the ark (40:20) upon the completion of the tabernacle. According to Deut. 10:1-5 Moses himself made the ark after the incident of the golden calf, before going up the mount to have the ten words inscribed on a new set of tables, and these were placed in the ark immediately upon his return. (g) According to Num. 2 the sacred tent was in the midst of the camp, while Exod. 33:7 (cf. Num. 11:24-30; 12:4) states that it was pitched outside the camp. (h) According to Num. 13:27 the spies report to Moses that the land of Palestine is extremely fertile; yet in vs. 32 they say that it “eateth up the inhabitants thereof” – that is, that the people are weak and undernourished; yet, a further contradiction, the same verse describes them as “men of great stature.” (i) According to Num. 22:20 God gave Balaam permission to accompany the princes of Balak, yet in vs. 22 it is stated that “God’s anger was kindled because he went.” (j) According to Josh. 2:15 Rahab’s house was on the wall of Jericho, which (6:20) collapsed when the people shouted; yet (6:22) Joshua commanded the spies whom Rahab had befriended to go to her house and bring her out, which they did (6:23).

There are also numerous inconsistencies in the laws. These are, however, of another nature than the contradictions in the narrative, and are in themselves of little weight against the tradition of single, Mosaic authorship. For it could be held that the promulgation of a new law by implication repealed any earlier command to which it stood in contradiction, especially since the Pentateuch assumes that Moses’ career as lawgiver extended over a period of forty years. Nevertheless, it must be said that adequate grounds for postulating such a legal development within this relatively brief period would seem to be lacking. And when it is found that certain of the laws have a marked affinity with certain parts of the narrative which, as regards both style and content, are clearly distinct from other parts of the narrative with which other laws are in agreement, it is reasonable to infer that the inconsistencies in the laws and the inconsistencies in the narrative point in the same direction.

As a concrete instance Exod. 20:24 may be noted. Here the erection of an altar – and so the establishment of a sanctuary – is permitted in every place where Yahweh records his name. This is congruent with such passages as Gen. 12:7; 22:9; 26:25; 35:7. It is inconsistent with Deut. 12 where only one sanctuary is recognized as legitimate. If it be argued that the law in Exod. 20:24 was implicitly repealed by Deut. 12, reference need only be made to such passages as Judg. 6:24, 26; I Sam. 14:35 where the fact that the erection of altars is recorded without reprobation indicates that Exod. 20:24 was regarded as still valid – and therefore that Deut. 12 was unknown. Nor can it be held that Deut. 12 did not come into effect until the Jerusalem temple was built, for in the present form of the narrative a central sanctuary was provided by the making of the tabernacle (Exod. 40) which, it is recorded in Josh. 18:1, after the conquest of Canaan was set up permanently at Shiloh.

C. Chronological Difficulties. – (a) In Gen. 12:11 Sarah is represented as a woman of such physical attractiveness as to be an object of desire to the Pharaoh. Gen. 17:17 states that she was ten years younger than Abraham; she would therefore have been at least sixty-five at this time since it is stated in 12:4 that Abraham was seventy-five years old when he came to Palestine. (b) According to Gen. 25:26 Isaac was sixty years old when Jacob and Esau were born; by 26:34 he was a hundred when he blessed Jacob on his deathbed (cf. 27:2, 4), but according to 35:28 he did not die until he was a hundred and eighty. He was, accordingly, eighty years dying. (c) Jacob had returned to Palestine before his father died (33:18), and was present at his funeral (35:29); his stay with Laban had been for only twenty years (31:41); chs. 34-35, according to the present record, thus cover a period of some sixty years. Against this is the notice in 37:2 that Joseph was seventeen years old when he first began to annoy his brothers; he had been born nine years after his father, having served Laban seven years (29:20-30), had married Leah and Rachel (cf. 29:31-35; 30:9-21), that is, four years before his return to Palestine. In the light of this chronology the events in chs. 34-35 had not covered more than thirteen years. (d) If it is argued that the notice of Isaac’s death has been misplaced, other difficulties result. For Joseph, sold into Egypt at the age of seventeen, was thirty years old when he came to power (41:46), spent seven years preparing for the famine (41:29-30), and brought his father to Egypt two years later (45:11), that is, twenty-two years after he had been sold to the Ishmaelites. Isaac would then be a hundred and fifty-five years old, with still twenty-five years to live. His name is not included in the list of those going into Egypt (46:8-27). If we admit that the notice of Isaac’s death has simply been misplaced, then we must suppose that, according to the narrator, Jacob had returned from Egypt to be present at his funeral. But Jacob was a hundred and thirty-years old when he went to Egypt (47:9), and died seventeen years later (47:28), and so eight years before his father.

(e) Chronological difficulties of a somewhat different nature are involved in Exod. 1-12. According to 12:40 the Israelites had been in Egypt for 430 years. Since according to the present narrative (as it has been seen) Joseph was thirty-nine when they arrived, only seventy-one years of this period had elapsed when he died at the age of a hundred and ten (Gen. 50:26). According to Exod. 7:7 Moses, whose birth is recorded in 2:2, was eighty years old at the time of the Exodus. Hence, allowing for a good margin for the events recorded in 1:9-22, some two hundred and fifty years are “covered” in 1:6-8. (f) According to Num. 10:11 the Israelites left Sinai in the second month of the second year, reckoning from the Exodus (cf. Exod. 19:1, where the reckoning is explicit). They arrived at Kadesh (Num. 20:1) in the first month, presumably of the third year, since no dates are mentioned between chs. 10 and 20. Aaron’s death is recorded in 20:23-28, and 33:38 places this in the fifth month of the fortieth year after the Exodus. Thus a period of something more than thirty-seven years is “covered” by 20:1-22 (with this cf. Deut. 2:14; Num. 21:12-13).

It is the presence in the text of difficulties and inconsistencies such as these which makes it impossible to accept the traditional theory that the Pentateuch is the work of one man. The critics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were thus led to attempt the formulation of a theory of sources. They did not, however, discover the clue which ultimately was to make possible the isolation of those sources, and so the determination of their origin and character.

Cuthbert A. Simpson. “The Growth of the Hexateuch.” The Interpreter’s Bible. Edited by George Arthur Buttrick. (New York: Arlington Press, 1952), p. 185-200.