Exploring the Old Testament

A Guide to the Pentateuch

Gordon J. Wenham

• Publisher: IVP Academic
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9780830853090
• eBook ISBN: 9780830870080
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

Exploring the Old Testament: A Guide to the Pentateuch offers a clear overview of the "five books of Moses," as well as an introduction to the historical and textual questions that modern scholarship has posed and the answers it has proposed.This critically informed, textually sensitive introduction to the Pentateuch introduces students to

• the basic features of the Pentateuch
• the social world of the Bible
• the latest scholarship on the composition of the Pentateuch
• literary techniques and forms
• theme, composition and rhetorical function of the Pentateuch

In this textbook you will find double-column formatting for ease of use, annotated bibliographies for further reading, sidebar explorations of select historical and textual topics in greater detail, a glossary of terms, and relevant charts and maps.

Chapter 1

WHAT IS THE PENTATEUCH? BASIC FEATURES

The Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, has always been regarded as one of the most significant parts of Scripture. It offers an explanation of the world and its inhabitants. It explains the origins of sin and traces its consequences. It introduces the idea of a chosen people through whom the world will be redeemed. In the law it sets out a pattern for the ideal society and in the Ten Commandments expresses principles of behaviour that have commanded almost universal respect. Thus traditionally these opening books have been regarded both by Christians and Jews as the most important and authoritative part of the Old Testament.

Yet for modern readers these key books are often viewed as the most problematic, historically, ethically and theologically. But it is this clash between tradition and modern thinking that has led to such continuing interest in these books. An introduction to the Pentateuch cannot pretend to solve the modern reader’s problems, but we hope it will lead to an understanding of the debates and the reasons behind different approaches to resolving these issues.

NAME

The word Pentateuch, Greek for ‘five books’, draws attention to the most obvious feature of this part of the Bible. It is essentially a long narrative, which according to its own chronology covers some 2700 years of world history concluding with the death of Moses. But this period is very unequally covered. Genesis with 50 chapters and 1534 verses covers some 2300 years. Then Exodus to Numbers 14 covers the events at Sinai, just over a year in chronological time, in 81 chapters and 2617 verses. The remaining chapters of Numbers (22 with 739 verses) deal with the 40 years of wanderings in the wilderness, and the last book Deuteronomy, focusing on the last day or so of Moses’ life, comprises some 34 chapters with 955 verses.

This unevenness in the representation of chronological time in the narrative helps us to see the writer’s chief interest, namely the law-giving at Sinai and its reinterpretation by Moses just before he died. So it is quite apt that Jews term the Pentateuch the Torah, which is usually translated ‘law’ in English. Genesis provides the background to the law- giving, Exodus to Numbers is largely taken up with the proclamation of the law, while Deuteronomy offers a most authoritative commentary on the law by Israel’s greatest prophet Moses.

GENRE

But should the whole Pentateuch be described as ‘law’ when so much of it is narrative? It is essentially a history of the world from creation to the death of Moses with a number of digressions dealing mainly with the law. Would it be better to call it a biography of Moses (van Seters 1999), or a national history (van Seters 1999; Whybray 1995)? This issue of genre is important for it gives a clue to the author’s understanding of his work and how he hoped his readers would understand it. So these alternatives need to be explored a little more carefully.

BIOGRAPHY OF MOSES

Probably the most obvious description of Exodus to Deuteronomy is a biography of Moses. It tells of his birth to a Levite family, his adoption by an Egyptian princess, and his upbringing in the Egyptian court. It tells how he was forced to flee from Egypt, and became a shepherd in the wilderness of Midian. There, at the burning bush, he encountered God, who sent him back to rescue his fellow Israelites from Egyptian slavery. The drama heightens with Moses demanding that the Pharaoh release the Israelites, and the Pharaoh refusing despite the ever-graver plagues that his obstinacy brought on the Egyptians. But eventually Israel is released and Moses leads them triumphantly through the Red Sea to Mount Sinai, where the law is given and the covenant between God and Israel is sealed. In both law-giving and covenant making Moses plays a central role as mediator between God and Israel. He receives the Ten Commandments and all the other rules and regulations. Then when the people break the covenant by making the golden calf, it is Moses’ intercession that turns back God’s anger so that the nation survives and is allowed to proceed towards the promised land of Canaan. He does the same again, when the spies bring back a discouraging report about the difficulty of conquering the land and the people wish to return to Egypt: Moses intercedes for the people and ensures that at least their children will enter the land. Finally, like the patriarchs before him when they knew they were about to die, Moses summons the whole nation, and in three speeches and two poems he gives his last will and testament to the nation. Then he dies, and is buried in an unmarked grave in Transjordan.

Thus many features of Exodus to Deuteronomy are well explained if these books are seen as a biography of Moses. However, it is not so obvious that the whole Pentateuch fits this definition: Genesis seems rather loosely related to the life of Moses. One would not have expected so much background material as Genesis provides to have been included if the whole Pentateuch were intended to be a biography of Moses. Some features of the patriarchs’ careers do seem to foreshadow Moses’. For example Abraham’s exodus from Egypt is described in terms that resemble the later exodus (Gen. 12:20—13:1). Moses’ great role as a prophetic intercessor is foreshadowed by Abraham (Gen. 18:23–33; 20:7 cf. Exod. 33:12–16; Num. 14:13–19). Jacob’s career as a shepherd, his encounter with his future wife by a well, and his deathbed blessing (Gen. 29; 49) all parallel episodes in Moses’ life (Exod. 2:16—3:6; Deut. 33). But in the context of the whole of Genesis these features seem to be marginal to its chief interests. There are many aspects of the book that would suggest that Genesis at least is most interested in the origin of the people of Israel and the 12 tribes, and in the promise of the land of Canaan.

NATIONAL HISTORY

For these reasons van Seters, while holding that an early form of Exodus to Numbers may have been a biography of Moses, prefers to see the current Pentateuch as the first part of a national history of Israel: the second part consists of the next section of the Hebrew Bible from the book of Joshua to 2 Kings. (He believes that the second part of this history was actually written before the first.) The two parts of this national history thus trace Israel’s history from the call of Abraham to the death of Moses: the second runs from the conquest of the land under Joshua’s leadership to the fall of Jerusalem and the people’s exile from the land.

Van Seters draws attention to the work of Herodotus, the Greek historian, as providing a fitting analogy to the Pentateuch as a national history. Interestingly, Herodotus’ near- contemporaries Hecataeus and Hellanicus linked their national histories to primeval events, such as the flood, just as Genesis 1—11 does. Somewhat later in time (c. 300 BC) but closer in space the Babyloniaka of Berossus and the Aegyptiaka of Manetho do something similar. It has therefore been conjectured that both Greek and Hebrew works ultimately derive their pattern from Mesopotamian forerunners.

It is undoubtedly the case that there are strong Mesopotamian parallels to Genesis 1—11, as we shall see in the next chapter. There are also Mesopotamian historical works that span up to eight centuries, but they do not link the eras they relate to primeval times. This is one reason why Blenkinsopp (1992) and Whybray (1995) think the Pentateuch is unique. It is also unlike the Greek histories in recounting events from an impersonal divine perspective, as opposed to the very personal style of Herodotus, who clearly informs the reader at the outset that he is telling the story. Finally the enormous quantity of law and other ethical material sets the Pentateuch apart from Greek historical works.

TORAH OR LAW

The difficulties of defining the Pentateuch as either a biography of Moses or as a national history make it worth re- examining the traditional term for the Pentateuch as the law, which is of course very common in the New Testament (e.g. Luke 24:44) and the term used in the Hebrew Bible for the first five books. On the face of it ‘law’ seems a good description of Exodus 20 to the end of Deuteronomy, at least if one ignores the narrative framework of the laws, but it seems somewhat awkward to describe the stories of Genesis as law, or the account of Moses’ early life and the exodus from Egypt.

However, the Hebrew word torah, conventionally translated ‘law’ is a much broader idea than its English translation conveys. Torah derives from the verb yarah to ‘teach’ or ‘instruct’, so we would be wiser to render torah as ‘instruction’ rather than ‘law’. And Genesis of course is full of instruction, about the nature of God, the history of the world and Israel. It is also instructive in giving examples of behaviour that should be imitated and mistakes that should be avoided. The same is true of the early chapters of Exodus, which demonstrate the folly of the greatest of earthly kings pitting himself against almighty God. Likewise Israel’s mistakes in the wilderness are surely recorded, to remind them both of God’s mercies in the past and of the danger of making the same mistakes again in the future (Deut. 1:19–45; 9:6—10:11). Obviously all the laws and ritual legislation could well be termed ‘instruction’ too: these laws are not restrictions hemming people in from doing what they like, rather they are God’s wise advice, which if followed, will lead to a happy and prosperous society. As Deuteronomy puts it: ‘Keep them and do them: for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people”’ (Deut. 4:6).

For these reasons I think there is merit in retaining the old Hebrew term torah to describe the Pentateuch, translating it or at least understanding it as ‘instruction’ rather than ‘law’. This instruction though is more than merely imparting information. It is not purveying historical facts for facts’ sake or laws for laws’ sake; rather it is seeking to persuade its hearers to obey. It instructs in order to persuade: ‘that it may go well with you, and with your children after you’ (Deut. 4:40).

However, persuasive instruction is not unique to the first five books of the Bible. The Book of Proverbs aims to instruct and to persuade, as do the prophets; but their poetic form distinguishes them from the Pentateuch. Instruction through narrative is the hallmark of most of the historical books of the Old Testament, from Joshua to Esther, so that in a broad sense these books too could be called torah ‘instruction’. To capture the uniqueness of the Pentateuch, it would probably therefore be best to define it as torah ‘instruction’ in the form of a biography of Moses.

WHY FIVE BOOKS?

Whether understood as a biography of Moses, national history or instruction Genesis to Deuteronomy constitute a consecutive coherent narrative, so why and when was it split up into five separate books? Chapter divisions were the inventions of Stephen Langton, an Archbishop of Canterbury about AD 1200; and verse numbers were introduced in the sixteenth century, although the division into verses goes back at least a thousand years earlier. Other subdivisions of the text, which are not apparent in English translations, only in the Hebrew original, are earlier still and are designed to divide the text into manageable sections for reading in synagogue worship. But the origin of the division into five books is lost in the mists of time, and appears to go back well into pre-Christian times.

The division into five books and their names was simply taken for granted in the first century AD. Matthew, who portrays Jesus as the second Moses, presents his teaching in five large blocks, which are often seen as reflecting the five books of the law. The first-century Jewish writers Josephus and Philo know the fivefold division and mention some of their names. Other texts from the second and third centuries BC, such as Ecclesiasticus and the letter of Aristeas, also seem to presuppose the division into five books.

But the most interesting evidence comes from the book of the Psalms. The Psalter, like the Pentateuch, is divided into five books. But, as has been realized fairly recently, this is no superficial feature of the Psalms but is fundamental to the editor’s understanding of the Psalms. The psalms about the law stick out by the position, e.g. Psalm 1, or their length, Psalm 119. Psalm 1 is an invitation to the reader to meditate on the law day and night to ensure his own prosperity; the law envisaged is not just the five books of Moses, but the five books of the Psalms. Here we have a high claim for the value of the psalms in their own right, but this claim rests on the unquestioned premise of the significance of the law. It also of course presupposes that the Pentateuch existed in five books, an arrangement that the Psalter is imitating.

If we knew when the Psalter was arranged in its present form, we could say that the fivefold division of the Pentateuch must be earlier still. Unfortunately it is impossible to be dogmatic about this. There is nothing in the Psalms that looks as though it comes any later than the exilic, or perhaps early post-exilic period. In this case the Psalms could have been arran...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Key to Panels
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 What Is the Pentateuch? Basic Features
• 2 Genesis 1—11
• 3 Genesis 12—50
• 4 Exodus
• 5 Leviticus
• 6 Numbers
• 7 Deuteronomy
• 8 Theme of the Pentateuch
• 9 Composition of the Pentateuch
• 10 Rhetoric of the Pentateuch
• 11 Epilogue
• Glossary
• Index
• About the Author
• Other Books in this Series
• More Titles from InterVarsity Press
• Copyright Page