Most of you know I took (and passed!!) my Ph.D. comps this past April and May (see HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE). One of the questions I prepared–and answered–dealt with the history of scholarship on the composition of the Pentateuch, focusing especially upon the last 30 years. This is certainly a still quite unsettled issue within scholarship, and it is a fascinating topic as well. The overall trajectory has seen a movement away from traditional source criticism towards more tradition-historical approaches or even those emphasizing literary unity.
In working on this topic I did a great deal of reading, obviously. I then synthesized and organized the information into a cogent, articulated response in outline form. That larger, original outline was then wittled further from 12 pages down to 5.
Given the perpetual importance of this topic and the question, I have decided to share here, in .pdf format, each of the two outlines. Please note these files, as well as anything on this blog, falls under the jurisdiction of Creative Commons Copyright law and is not to be reproduced or distributed without author’s consent. Full attribution must be made to me as well.
I would also be curious of your thoughts on the files, and how you plan to–or do–use them.
Here are the two files:
Here is a bibliography of those sources which are treated in the outlines:
Blenkinsopp, Joseph. The Pentateuch: An Introduction to the First Five Books of the Bible. Anchor Bible Reference Library. New York: Doubleday, 1992.
Blum, Erhard. Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte. WMANT 57. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukurchener Verlag, 1984.
_________. Studien zur Komposition des Pentateuch. BZAW 189. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990.
Campbell, Anthony F. and Mark A. O’Brien. Sources of the Pentateuch: Texts, Introductions, Annotations. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993.
_________. Rethinking the Pentateuch: Prolegomena to the Theology of Ancient Israel. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005.
Carr, David M. Reading the Fractures of Genesis: Historical and Literary Approaches. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996.
Clines, David J.A. The Theme of the Pentateuch. JSOTSupp 10. 2nd ed. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1997.
Dozeman, Thomas B. and Konrad Schmid, eds. A Farewell to the Yahwist? The Composition of the Pentateuch in Recent European Interpretation. SBL Symposium Series 34. Atlanta: SBL, 2006.
Mann, Thomas W. The Book of the Torah: The Narrative Integrity of the Pentateuch. Atlanta: John Knox, 1988.
Noth, Martin. The Deuteronomistic History. Sheffield: University of Sheffield, 1981.
_________. A History of Pentateuchal Traditions. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1972.
Rendtorff, Rolf. The Problem of the Process of Transmission in the Pentateuch. JSOTSupp 89. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1990.
Van Seters, John. The Pentateuch: A Social-Science Commentary. Trajectories 1. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999.
Von Rad, Gerhard. “The Form-Critical Problem of the Hexateuch.” Pages 1-78 in The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays. London: SCM Press, 1966.
Wellhausen, Julius. Prolegomena to the History of Israel. New York: Meridian Books, 1957.
Whybray, Roger N. The Making of the Pentateuch: A Methodological Study JSOTSupp 53. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987.