Who Wrote The Bible?

Richard Friedman

4/5

"I really liked it"

Richard Friedman wrote the first edition of Who Wrote The Bible? back in 1987, but this book is still used today to bring the concept of the Documentary Hypothesis to the layman.

For those unaware, the Documentary Hypothesis posits that the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the Bible), which are traditionally attributed to Moses, were actually written by several different “schools” or people, and later combined. This theory has been around for about 200 years, but is still hotly debated to this day. It will probably be a long time before there is any sort of consensus about exactly who wrote which portions of the Pentateuch and Torah (and when). However, Friedman boldly claims that this hypothesis, or at least some version of it, is almost definitely true:

At present, however, there is hardly a biblical scholar in the world actively working on the problem who would claim that the Five Books of Moses were written by Moses— or by any one person… the hypothesis itself continues to be the starting point of research, no serious student of the Bible can fail to study it, and no other explanation of the evidence has come close to challenging it.

Regardless of the surrounding debate, Friedman’s book is a fantastic introduction to the theory, at least as it existed in 1987— and as it existed to Friedman. As long as you understand you’re getting a single perspective about the history of the Torah, you’ll learn a lot from this book.

As someone who has, by and large, never studied the Bible in any sort of critical sense, this book was quite the ride. It’s fascinating to see the complexity of these ancient texts. There is an immense amount of historical data hidden inside the construction of the Torah that I had never considered.

Whether you’re Jewish or Christian or not, if you’re interested in the early history of Israel and Judaism, I highly recommend you read this book. You’ll come away with a greater understanding of the surrounding world these authors wrote in, an explanation for some of the contradictions apparent in Biblical texts, and much more.

I should also warn that for some, this book will challenge your beliefs about the Torah. Ultimately, this book does not attempt to answer the question is the Bible holy scripture? It’s definitely more about, quite literally, who wrote down these words, and when? But in the process of answering that question, Friedman attempts to answer why it was written in specific ways. For example, some of these biblical authors had external motivations to praise their own class or people group, and did so quite plainly in their writings. Whether these writings are selfish fiction or divinely inspired is, I think, outside the scope of this book.

Summary

I did take notes for this book, but they’re quite… scattered. This book is quite simply too much for me to fully understand and write about— like a textbook, in some ways.

So, I’ve decided not to publish my notes, and instead attempted to summarize them below.

First, Definitions!

• The complete Jewish holy scripture is called the Tanakh. Christians call this same set of books (generally) the Old Testament.
• The first 5 books of the Tanach are called the Torah (meaning “instruction” or “law”), or the Pentateuch.
  • In order: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy

The Tradition

A long-held Christian and Jewish belief is that Moses wrote the Torah. However, there are many problems with this assumption. First, the Torah never makes such a claim. In fact, there are portions of the Torah we know for a fact could not have been written by Moses. For example… the description of his death and burial! Also, what kind of “humble” person writes this about themselves?

Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.
— Numbers 12:3 (NIV)

I digress…

So if Moses didn’t write them, then who did? It’s complicated…

Doublets

For a long time, people have noticed that some stories appear in the Bible twice… we call that a doublet. And if you look closely, there are common differences between many of the doublets— for example, for some doublets, one version of the story usually refers to God as “Elohim” in Hebrew, which is a generic term for god, whilst the other version will use “Yahweh”.

These doublets helped begin the idea that perhaps the Torah, as we have it today, was written by at least 2 people, writing similar stories, then later combined.

The Levites and the Aaronids

To understand the authors behind these sources, and their motivations, you have to immerse yourself in the ancient near east, and consider their culture, their society, their politics, and their long-held traditions.

In this time, there was an important cultural battle between the Levites and the Aaronids. These two people groups were locked in a power struggle over the Israelite priesthood for hundreds of years. The Levites (from the tribe of Levi) claim to be descendants of Moses, while the Aaronids claim to be descendants of Aaron. At various times in Israel’s history, power and authority shifts between the Levites and the Aaronids.

These two specific people groups are important because they were the priests! Perhaps the most important group in Israel for us, if we’re studying about the religion of Israel. Almost all the Biblical authors are theorized to have been either Aaronid or Levite priests, and you can see it in their writing.

The Four Sources

In the late 1800s, Julius Wellhausen created the Documentary Hypothesis and theorized that the Pentateuch was written by four sources, which he called J, E, D, and P. Almost 200 years later, Richard Friedman and many other biblical scholars still support some aspects of Wellhausen’s original theory, including those exact 4 sources.

The discovery that the Torah of Moses was really four works that had once been separate was not necessarily a crisis in itself. After all, the New Testament also began with four Gospels— Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John— each of which told the story in its own way. Why then was there such a hostile reaction, among Christians and Jews, to the idea that the Old Testament (or Hebrew Bible) might begin with four “gospels” as well? The difference was that the Hebrew Bible’s four sources had been combined so intricately and accepted as Moses’ own writing for so long, about two thousand years; the new discoveries were flying in the face of an old, accepted, sacred tradition. The biblical investigators were unraveling a finely woven garment, and no one knew where these new investigations would lead.

So, what are the four sources, and who wrote them?

J

• Named after its use of the name Yahweh (or Jehovah) for God

  • Yahweh means “I am” or “yes” in Hebrew
  • Yahweh is the name God gives himself in Exodus

• J is a very early source

• J/E could be based on each other or some older common source

• Likely written between 848 to 722 BC, during the ~200 year split between Israel (north) and Judah (south).

  • Likely written in Judah
  • Because it refers to dispersion of Simeon and Levi, but not the other tribes, it was likely written before the Assyrians destroyed and exiled Israel in 722 BC

E

• Named after its use of the name Elohim for God

  • Elohim is a generic Hebrew word for god

• E is a very early source

• J/E could be based on each other or some older common source

• Likely written during the ~200 year split between Israel (north) and Judah (south)

  • Likely written in Israel, which was destroyed in 722 BC by the Assyrians

• Friedman claims E was written by a male Levite priest.

• E ridicules Judah, praises Moses, ridicules the golden calves (which Jeroboam used in northern Israel to oust the Levites from power), and never discusses the Ark of the Covenant (since it would have been held in Judah’s Jerusalem).

• E shows a transformation from Elohim to Yahweh at the burning bush.

JE

While technically not a main source, it’s important to point out that at some point, J and E were combined to create JE. J and E were created in isolation of one another, while Israel and Judah existed separately; but once they reunited, someone combined the two sources, reflecting newfound unity.

D

• Named after its prevalence in Deuteronomy

• Friedman and other scholars say that D not only wrote Deuteronomy, but also the 6 books following it: Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel, and 1 and 2 Kings. These books tell the story from Moses to the destruction of Judah.

  • 1 Kings 13 contains a prediction about King Josiah, who didn’t come to power until 300 years later; this is the longest explicit prediction of a person by name in the whole Bible.
  • Josiah is touted as the ultimate king who fulfills Deuteronomy; for this author, he is the Moses of kings.
  • There are specific words and phrases in Deuteronomy that are only fulfilled by Josiah, down to the specific wording of the instruction.

• D was likely written by a Levite.

  • The law institutes Levites as the priestly class requires the king to write a copy of the law in front of a Levite, requires centralization of sacrifice which gives 10% to the Levites, etc.

• Existed by the time Josiah found it in the Temple and read it

• Likely written in two versions, called Dtr1 and Dtr2

  • Dtr1 does not prepare Israel for the exile they experienced when Josiah died
  • Dtr2 adds passages suggesting that Yahweh will punish (exile) Israel despite how good Josiah was

• Friedman claims D was likely written by Jeremiah (or his scribe, Baruch)

  • Jeremiah was alive, had the skills, was a Levite priest of Shiloh, was in Jerusalem when Josiah was around and discovered Deuteronomy, was in Egypt for the exile/Dtr2, the book of Jeremiah mirrors the language of Deuteronomy

P

• Named after its focus on priestly matters

  • E.g., ritual sacrifice, a cosmic “far away” attitude towards God, a focus on God’s justice and punishments

• P has the most scholarly debate surrounding its author and creation date

• Friedman claims P was written in antiquity (722-587 BC), before the First Temple was destroyed, to rival JE

  • This author was a male Aaronid priest from Judah who read JE and disliked the Levite stories within
  • If P knew JE, then P was written after JE (after northern Israel fell in 722 BC)

R

We call R the Redactor, because they combined all the previous sources and made final revisions.

• R combined all the previous sources, sometimes interweaving two sources for a single story (e.g., creation, the flood), sometimes leaving them separate (e.g., Moses striking the stone for water). R inserted very little new content.

• R used 3 external source documents to assist in this compilation: the Book of Generations, a plague narrative, and a list of stops the Israelites made during the 40 years of wandering.

• R was likely an Aaronid priest, primarily because:

  • R places P stories (which promote Aaronids) before JE stories.
  • When R was written, the Aaronids were the definite priests.

• R couldn’t have created the Bible before ~516 BC, because JEPD weren’t finished until then.

• R was likely written before Nehemiah.

  • In Nehemiah 8:17, Ezra is reading the Torah and discovers a “new” law instructing them to celebrate the day of Booths, and they had apparently never done this. Well, R inserts a new holiday in Leviticus 23, listed after all the other holidays— the Booth holiday. Thus, it’s likely that R was written before Nehemiah.

• Friedman says that R, the author of the final Pentateuch, is Ezra, who was appointed to Judah as chief prophet after the Babylonian exiles returned

  • Ezra was an Aaronid priest, a scribe, and when he reads the Torah in Nehemiah, he finds “new” laws never previously used (hint: his own additions)

• Some of R’s decisions has dramatic implications on our understanding of scripture. For example, R combined the just and cosmic god described in P, with the merciful and personal god found in JED. Friedman says the resultant Bible is more than the sum of its parts, and I agree.

A Brief History of Israel

NOTE: All dates are very relative; much is unknown about these events. I’ve collected some of these dates from the book, others from Wikipedia, others from other sources.