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CHAPTER VI.

THE SECOND JEHOVIST AND DEUTERONOMIST.

56. WE have now seen that there is an essential and unmistakable difference between the contents of the Elohistio narrative and those of the remainder of Genesis, whether we look at the phraseology and forms of expression employed, or the general tone of thought which prevails in the one and the other of these two sets of passages, or observe the numerous and striking discrepancies and contradictions, which on close examination are found to exist between them. But one other fact now requires our attentive consideration, viz. that there exist some similar discrepancies between different portions of the non-Elohistic matter itself.

57. We may note the following instances of this phenomenon.

(i) In xii.14–20 we have the account of Abram's weakness and prevarication on Sarah's account at the Court of Pharaoh. It seems incredible that he should have repeated afterwards the very same conduct at the Court of Abimelech, xx.1-17.

(ii) In xiii.14-17 Jehovah promises to give to Abram the land of Canaan, which last agrees with the promise recorded by E in xvii.8.

Yet between these two passages, in xv.18, Jehovah makes a covenant with Abram to give to him the 'land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates.'

(iii) In xiv Abraham is represented as a warlike and spirited Sheikh, who gallantly pursued and routed the whole forces of the confederate kings, which had ravaged the land of Canaan under Chedorlaomer, and carried Lot captive.

Yet in xx he is represented as weak-spirited and pusillanimous, afraid of the people of Gerar because of his wife, and sheltering himself under a mean evasion. (iv) In xiv, again, Abraham has a great body of 318 servants, trained in his own house, whom he leads out to war.

Yet in xxi.25,26, we find him remonstrating with Abimelech about a well which Abimelech's servants had 'taken away by force,' as if he had no such body of men at his command, as he plainly cannot be supposed to have had, when he feared that the people of Gerar would slay him for his wife's sake,' xx.11.

(v) In xvi.7 Hagar, when she fled of her own accord from Sarah, was found by the angel by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur,' between Kadesh and Bered,' v.14; and the spring receives the name 'Lakhai-roi' from the divine consolation she received.

Yet in xxi.14, when expelled with her child by Abraham, who was then living 'between Kadesh and Shur,' xx.1,-evidently therefore in the neighbourhood of this notable spring,-she wanders about in the wilderness of Beersheba, ready to perish for want of water.

(vi) In xxi.14 Hagar is expelled, with her son Ishmael, and Abraham gives her only a bundle of bread and a skin of water.

Yet in xxv.6 we read 'unto the sons of the concubines which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward unto the east country.' But Abraham's concubines, apparently, consisted of Hagar and Keturah only; and the sons of the concubines must, therefore, have included Hagar's son, Ishmael, with Keturah's six sons, named in xxv.2.

(vii) In xxi.22–32 Abimelech, the king of the Philistines, and Phichol the captain of his host, pay a visit to Abraham, and Abimelech makes a covenant upon oath with Abraham.

Yet in xxvi.26-31, apparently the very same king Abimelech, and Phichol the captain of his host, and Akhuzzath, one of his friends, pay a visit to Isaac, and make a covenant upon oath with him, a century afterwards.

(viii) In xxi.31, Abraham gives the name 'Beersheba' (=well of the oath) to the place where he and Abimelech sware to one another, and accordingly Abraham, we are told, 'dwelt at Beersheba,' xxii. 19.

Yet in xxvi.33 Isaac, about a century afterwards, gives the name 'Sheba' to the well, which his servants dug on the day when he and Abimelech sware to one another, and it is added, 'therefore the name of the city is Beersheba unto this day.' (ix) In xxxvii.27,286, Joseph's brethren sell him to the Ishmaelites.

Yet in x1.15 he says himself that he was stolen, or kidnapped, out of the land of the Hebrews.'

(x) In xxxix.20–23 Joseph is put in prison by his master for a (supposed) very grave offence, and there finds favour with the 'keeper of the prison,' and has all the prisoners given into his charge.

Yet in x1.4 Joseph is merely assigned by his master, 'the captain of the guard,' as a servant or slave to wait upon the two noblemen; and the chief butler speaks of him, in xli.12, not as a fellow-prisoner, but merely as an ordinary 'servant of the captain of the guard.'

(xi) In xli.34 Joseph advises that Pharaoh should take-up only 'the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years.'

Yet in v.35 he speaks of his gathering 'all the food of these good years that come.' VOL. III.

E

(xii) In xlv.17-20 Pharaoh sends expressly Jacob's eleven sons with wagons, to bring their father and their families, and come and live in Egypt-'Take your father and households, and come unto me, and I will give you the good of the land of Egypt, and ye shall eat of the fat of the land.'

Yet in xlvii.4 they speak to Pharaoh as if he had never invited them at all.

58. The above instances are sufficient to show that discrepancies exist between different portions of the non-Elohistic parts of Genesis,—although some of them would probably admit of a plausible explanation, if it were not evident, from a careful examination of the text, that they are real discrepancies, arising from a difference of authorship. For we have now to state, and as we hope to show plainly to the satisfaction of the reader, that the non-Elohistic matter of Genesis is by no means homogeneous, but consists of contributions by the hands of three (as we believe) or, as some hold, of four different writers. The evidence of this fact is fully given in the course of the Analysis. We can only here produce the salient points of it, for the information of the general reader.

THE SECOND JEHOVIST (J2).

59. First, then, it would seem that xiv is a chapter sui generis, having no special relations with any other part of Genesis. It comes in abruptly, unconnected with the story before or after, except that, by the mention of Abram's living at Mamre, v.13, and of Lot's being carried captive, it has found its place suitably in the history after xiii.12,18. Still, it might be removed altogether without any loss to, or interruption of, the general narrative. It is, in short, a mere episode; and it brings Abram before us, as observed above, in the character of a powerful and warlike Sheikh, with 318 trained servants in his house, v.14, of which we find no trace whatever in the rest of the history. Rather, the subsequent account of his going to sojourn in Gerar. where Abimelech takes his wife from him, xx.2, and Abraham is afraid of his life, and practises a deceit to save it, v.11-13, shows plainly that, in the view of the writer of

this last Chapter, he had no such an immense body of trained servants, with which he had routed the combined forces of the eastern kings, and needed not therefore to have feared the power of the petty prince of Gerar,-much less have had reason to complain to him that his servants had taken by force the well which he had dug, xxi.25.

60. Accordingly, while HUPFELD, p.142, assigns this Chapter to the Jehovist, yet he notes, on p.118, that he may have probably derived it from an older source.' So KNOBEL observes, Gen. p.143,144

This section belongs to the Jehovistic supplementary insertions . . . Yet we have here no free narration of the Jehovist himself. The style is not sufficiently easy and flowery for this, and the chapter contains too many strange expressions. . The Jehovist must therefore have taken the passage from some older document.

DELITZSCH observes upon this Chapter, p.643, that, though marked as Jehovistic,

it varies much from the character of the other Jehovistic passages, and seems to have been taken by the Jehovist from some separate document.

So ASTRUC, EICHHORN, EWALD, HITZIG, TUCH, all regard this section as standing alone, distinct from all the other matter in Genesis.

61. In the Analysis (66–76) I have fully discussed the contents of this Chapter; and I have there shown that, while it has a few points of contact with each of the other writers in Genesis, yet as a whole it is distinct altogether in style and tone from all of them. It contains four times, v.18,19,20,22, the expression by be, El Helyon, El Most High,' a designation of the Divine Being, which occurs nowhere else in the Pentateuch, and only thrice besides in the Bible, Ps.lvii.2(3), lxxviii.35,56. And the very fact, that it is used in these Psalms, shows that it is not employed in the passage before us merely as a foreign expression, such as might be thought suitable in the mouth of the Canaanite king, Melchizedek; it was used, it seems, by pious Israelites, and accordingly it is put

here, as well as Jehovah,' into the mouth of Abram, v.22. So in v.19,22 we have another peculiar designation of the Supreme Being, Proprietor of Heaven and Earth,' which is found nowhere else in the Bible.

62. Since Jehovah' is used in this chapter, v.22, we may regard it as Jehovistic, and refer to the writer as the Second Jehovist (J). But it does not follow that every portion of the Chapter must be from his hand. We find here many ancient names of places, to which are often added their later equivalents, e.g. v.2,8, Bela, that is Zoar,' v.3, 'the vale of Siddim, that is the Salt Sea, v.7, En-Mishpat, that is Kadesh,' v.17, 'the valley of Shaveh, that is the King's dale.' And the fact, that the first of these explanations is repeated twice seems, to confirm the suspicion which at once arises that these notes are all inserted by a later hand, at a time when the old names were beginning to be almost forgotten. I have shown (Anal. 75) that many of these ancient names are mentioned by the Deuteronomist, who has also, in D.ii.10-12,20-23,iii.9,11, given some indications of a taste for antiquarian research. It seems

not unreasonable to conjecture that these notes may be from his hand, more especially when we observe, (as will now be shown), that there are other Deuteronomistic insertions in the Book of Genesis.

THE LATER EDITOR or DEUTERONOMIST (D).

63. We have seen that a large portion of the Book of Joshua consists, beyond all doubt, of Deuteronomistic matter, which bears every appearance of having been inserted by the Deuteronomist himself, when editing the older document which had come into his hands. In fact, as we have said already (III.566), it would seem most strange that one, who had conceived the grand idea of adding the whole Book of Deuteronomy to the existing Tetrateuch, should not also have revised and retouched the older matter. Accordingly, we believe that we have found