George Athas:
You wrote: “Genesis does not name its author. And nowhere in the
Pentateuch is it claimed that Moses wrote Genesis. Mosaic authorship of Genesis
is
predicated on notions external to any evidence within the text itself.”
If we look at the “evidence within the text itself”, we can tell that the
Patriarchal narratives were composed in the mid-14th century BCE, many
centuries before the composition of the rest of the Bible. Start with the
following words:
TD(L. NHRYM. K$-D-YM. MLK (LM. GRR (per item #80 on the Tuthmose III
list). )B-Y-MLK.
All of them are redolent of the world of the mid-14th century BCE.
And how about XNYKYW? That’s either mid-14th century BCE or older. “The
language [of chapter 14 of Genesis] contains some unique or very rare words
and phrases. One such, hanikh [XNYK, though its peculiar form at Genesis
14: 14 is XNYKYW] (v. 14), meaning ‘an armed-retainer’, appears but this once
in the Bible, but is found in the Egyptian execration texts of the
nineteenth-eighteenth centuries B.C.E. and in a fifteenth-century B.C.E.
cuneiform
inscription from Taanach, Israel.” Nahum M. Sarna, “Understanding Genesis”
(1966), at pp. 110-111.
Or how about the peculiar number 318? That particular, peculiar, specific
number is redolent of the early 14th century BCE. “[T]he number 318 in
[Genesis] 14: 14 is analogous to the number of Hurrian handmaids plus the bride
[from the Hurrian state of Naharim/Mitanni] in an Egyptian scarab of
[Akhenaten’s father] Amenhotep III”. Gary A. Rendsburg, “The Redaction of
Genesis”
(1986).
Abraham’s actions at the end of chapter 14 of Genesis deftly recall the
royal etiquette of the time period of the Great Syrian War in the mid-14th
century BCE. Here’s another scholarly comment acknowledging that: “[E]ach
element of Genesis 14 has its exact counterpart in the laws of war and in the
etiquette of booty restoration found sporadically in the [Late Bronze Age]
international treaties of Boghazkoi [Hittites] and Ugarit.” Yochanan Muffs, “
Abraham the Noble Warrior: Patriarchal Politics and Laws of War in Ancient
Israel”, in “The Journal of Jewish Studies London”, 1982, vol. 33, no.
1-2, at p. 82.
Moreover, the mid-14th century BCE ambience of the Patriarchal narratives
is by no means limited to the stories about Abraham, much less to chapter 14
of Genesis. Jacob is portrayed as doing what Akhenaten historically did
regarding statues and NHRYM: both men broke off all relations with their irate
father-in-law from NHRYM and never turned over those blessed statues. Note
that both men had been forced against their will to marry a particular
daughter of that father-in-law from far-off Naharim. Meanwhile, Jacob’s father
Isaac, like Akhenaten’s father, had also married a woman from far-off NHRYM,
but by contrast never had any problem getting along with his in-laws in
eastern Syria. Akhenaten was a younger son who was not his father’s favorite
son, but whose birth mother was his father’s original main wife #1. Ditto
for all the Patriarchal successions: each of Isaac, Jacob and Judah is
likewise a younger son who was not his father’s favorite son, but whose birth
mother was his father’s original main wife #1. As to specific historical
events, the Amarna Letters talk about a son of the leader of Shechem consorting
with tent-dwelling people, just as happens in chapter 34 of Genesis. Note
that in both cases the leader of Shechem is assassinated soon thereafter.
What do university scholars have to say about that ton of evidence that the
Patriarchal narratives are uniquely redolent of the mid-14th century BCE,
are much older than the rest of the Pentateuch, and feature a completely
different author? “[N]owhere in the Pentateuch is it claimed that Moses wrote
Genesis. Mosaic authorship of Genesis is predicated on notions external to
any evidence within the text itself.” Note that university scholars
consistently lump the late material in the first 10 chapters of Genesis with
the
truly ancient Patriarchal narratives in the last 40 chapters of Genesis. There
are many scholarly books on the entire Book of Genesis, but few scholarly
books that deal with the entire last 40 chapters of Genesis while not spending
time on the first 10 chapters of Genesis. With the sole exception of
chapter 14 of Genesis, university scholars consistently claim that the same
authors of the rest of the Pentateuch also composed the Patriarchal narratives.
Yet look at all the objective evidence above that the Patriarchal narratives
were composed in the mid-14th century BCE, many centuries before the
composition of the rest of the Pentateuch.
Since you raise the question of authorship, aren’t you interested in
investigating the authorship of the Patriarchal narratives by looking at the
peculiar, truly ancient nomenclature and substantive content of the Patriarchal
narratives? Dare I ask what you a-r-e interested in regarding the
Patriarchal narratives? If the names TD(L and K$-D-YM aren’t super-exciting to
you,
as evidencing an extremely old text, then pray tell what i-s
super-exciting to you about the Patriarchal narratives?
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois
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