Torah for Christians: The Documentary Hypothesis
How did the Bible come to be? Here is one theory!
TORAH FOR CHRISTIANS
SEASON FIVE EPISODE TWO
THE DOCUMENTARY HYPOTHESIS
To a Bible scholar, the four scariest letters in the English alphabet are J, E, D and P. if you want to know why, stick around. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
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Welcome to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr.
When we step out of the religious world, a place where Orthodox Jews believe that God gave Moses every word of the Torah on Mount Sinai, the question of how the Bible came to be is rife with controversy. We’ll focus on the Torah today because more ink has been spilled on this topic than any other.
There are several different theories as to how the Torah was compiled. Many still believe that the Torah is of divine origin, as I stated earlier. Most Jews and even some Christians believed this until the Age of Rationalism began in the 19th Century, when secular, critical thinking came to the fore, especially in Western and Central Europe.
The most prominent theory of Biblical criticism arose in Germany in the mid-19th Century. It’s called by many names: Form-Criticism, the Documentary Hypothesis or even the Graf-Wellhausen Theory, named after the German scholars Karl Heinrich Graf and Julius Wellhausen. Wellhausen proposed that the Torah was composed primarily of four sources, which he labeled J, E, D and P.
J stands for Jahweh; in German, the name Yahweh, Lord, is spelled with a J, not a Y. The theory proposes that every time we read the name YHVH, Lord, in the Books of Genesis and Exodus, it is the J source. Furthermore, J also stands for Judah, the Southern Kingdom. The Documentary Hypothesis claims that the J documents are from the court of King Solomon and the building of the First Temple, making J the earliest level of the Torah
E stands for Elohim, which we translate as God. When we see Elohim written in Genesis and Exodus, it is primarily the E source. E also stands for Ephraim, shorthand for the Northern Kingdom. These are the Israelites who rebelled after the death of King Solomon and established their own form of cultic worship at Dan and Beth El, placing golden calves on these altars. Since the Assyrian armies destroyed the Northern Kingdom in 722 BCE, we might assume that the E documents began to be compiled before then.
D, the Deuteronomic source, was compiled in the 7th Century, BCE during the reign of King Josiah. The tip-off is found in the Book of II Kings, when Josiah cleans the Temple and “suddenly” discovers a lost scroll of the Torah. Using this text, Josiah institutes a series of religious reforms, in concert with the Prophet Jeremiah. Many Biblical scholars posit that this lost scroll is Deuteronomy; the structure and grammar of Deuteronomy resemble that of the Book of Jeremiah, suggesting that these works were compiled at roughly the same time – and perhaps by the same person.
The final work is P, the Priestly source. P comprises the Book of Leviticus, much of Numbers and snippets in both Genesis and Exodus. When we read about sacrifices or holidays in Leviticus, this is P. Questions of ritual purity, marriage, and other religious concerns are also squarely in the realm of P. P arose after the Babylonian Exile. Whether Ezra read from P, D or even some other text at the Water Gate of Jerusalem on Rosh HaShanah upon the return of the Exiles is uncertain.
So, now we have J, E, D and P. There is still one more letter to consider, R. R stands for the Redactor, the source that puts it all together. By definition, R is post-Exilic and lived in the Land of Israel. We don’t know as much about this Priest-led era as we do about later periods in Jewish history but somehow, the Torah came together during the centuries between the return from Babylonia and the rise of the Pharisees in the 2nd Century, BCE.
Until the mid-1970’s, this theory was the dominant one in Biblical scholarship. However, we now have alternate theories. Without going into any technical detail, some scholars question the dating of these four sources – or even if there are 4 sources at all. Perhaps there are more than 4 sources; perhaps there is just J and E, with fragments of text coming from other places. Or perhaps D and P are whole, with fragments from other places. Or perhaps there are no sources at all; the Torah is complete unit after all.
And then, there is one more theory. This theory posits multiple sources, as most modern Bible scholars do. But the difference in this theory is that D, Deuteronomy, is the earliest source. The scroll that Josiah found in the Temple is the first complete work; the other books came later, during the Exile and beyond. We don’t know for sure if this theory has legs, but it is important to raise it – and consider its implications if we accept it as true.
Ultimately though, we will never know how the Torah came to be. And that perhaps is its greatest strength. Or, as Dr. Richard Elliott Friedman writes, in the end it is not important who wrote the Bible; it is important who reads the Bible.
With that in mind, let’s take a moment and then we’ll look at the Documentary Hypothesis in action. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
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Welcome back to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr. Before we return to our discussion of the Documentary Hypothesis, I want to thank you for listening to this podcast. Please remember to review and rate this episode on Apple, Spotify, or whatever service you are using. Also, please go back and listen to previous episodes if you have not done so already. A transcript is also available on our website, www.torahforchristians.net . And if you would like to read my weekly Torah Study, please go to Bible Stories They (Never) Taught You in Religious School, available for free on www.Substack.com or through our website. I have also started another Substack page called Wednesday Torah, where I share random thoughts on the Jewish experience. Please subscribe to both.
The first part of this podcast has been pretty technical, I admit, and it’s not for everyone. But it is critical knowledge if we are to deepen our understanding of how the Bible and the Jewish People came to be. And even if we ultimately reject the theory, we should know about it.
So, let’s look at some examples of J, E, D and P in action. For this, I’d suggest that you pause this recording and get yourself a Bible. We’ll begin with the story of Noah, found in Genesis, Chapter 6, verse 9. Most of the Noah story is the P, Priestly, source. We see the word “God” multiple times in this story; but when we see topics such as the construction of the Ark, that tells us that P is speaking.
There are, however, J, Yahwist, inserts in this story as well. For example, verses 1-5 of Chapter 7 is the J source. This source tells us that Noah should bring 7 pairs of clean animals and only 1 pair of unclean animals into the Ark. The story of the dove in Chapter 8 is also considered a J source.
For a great example of the E, Elohist source, we can look to the story of the Binding of Isaac, the Akedah, found in Genesis 22. The Divine Name in this story is Elohim, God. There may have also been some redaction in this story, we don’t know for sure of course, but the story stands as an E story.
The Documentary Hypothesis, or its successors, also help to explain Biblical duplication. For example, there are two creation stories: the 7 days and the Garden of Eden. There are actually two variations on the Noah story: two by two or 7 pairs, as we saw earlier, or even 40 days vs 100 days of flooding.
But perhaps the most critical doubling is the 10 Commandments. Here is where we can remind ourselves of the debate between the JEDP people and the Deuteronomy first people. In the Book of Deuteronomy, the 10 Commandments are, of course, from the D source.
But what about Exodus? Richard Elliott Friedman, whose work I am following here[1], suggests that the Exodus version was inserted by the Redactor; it was an independent document. In essence, Friedman admits that the Deuteronomy version precedes the Exodus version. That does not mean it is more authoritative; it means that it is probably a later embellishment, a fitting insertion into the Sinai story.
We have not discussed the books that follow Deuteronomy. Perhaps the historical books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings are part of D, or at least parts of them are from D. Some prophetic works may precede the compilation of the Torah; some Prophets are post-Exilic and may parallel the completion of some of these books. And much of the Writings arrives centuries after the closing of the Torah.
No matter how you think of the origins of the Torah, please realize that secular Biblical scholarship is still a great way to make tenure in any ancient studies department at a large, prestigious university. When we combine literary analysis with archeology, modern linguistic studies, and anthropology, we quickly realize how little we actually know and how exciting this field is. And, to paraphrase Dr. Friedman again, it is better to focus on what the Bible says rather than on how the Bible came to be.
Next week, we will look at the first 11 chapters of the Book of Genesis, the prehistory of the Jewish people. We’ll compare the two creation stories, the two Noah stories and other important and interesting passages as we prepare to meet Abraham the following week. And we’ll use the Documentary Hypothesis to draw out some interesting ideas.
I want to thank you for listening to Torah for Christians. Please be sure to check out our website, www.torahforchristians.net, for a full list of podcast episodes; I’m sure that you will enjoy listening to all of them. In addition, you can subscribe to my Substack columns, Wednesday Torah – an occasional weekday musing about the world around us, based on the principles of the Torah – as well as Bible Stories They (Never) Taught You in Religious School, a weekly Torah Study, which is published every Friday morning. I’m sure that you will enjoy all these offerings.
Have a wonderful week and remember; Hinei Mah Tov … L’hitra’ot, till we meet again. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
[1] Friedman, Richard Elliott: The Bible With Sources Revealed (Harper San Francisco, 2003).
