I've been wanting to get to this post.
I think it is a genuine insight of Wiseman that the toledoth show, from the text of Genesis itself, that Genesis is composed of earlier documents edited together. What I find fascinating is that the documents he identifies through the toledoth broadly match the documents identified by documentary hypothesis scholars through changes in vocabulary and style.
Well, it appears we have some agreements here. Even I noticed differences in the text and sensed we were dealing with multiple books within a book. I have no doubt this is what some of the early JEDP theorists picked up on. The problem is the direction they went with it. I have no issue with the existence of multiple styles within Genesis, but the theories that followed just didn't follow were haven't been born out by any evidence.
The Tablet theory actually offers historical textual support to this issue, and preserves the authorship of Moses.
It is interesting you are trying to defend Moses writing Genesis by saying he didn't actually write the books that make up Genesis, he just edited them together.
Well there was also the issue of translating, and the issue of sifting out which writings didn't belong, and compiling the various accounts into one book.
The church has always held, though, that God is the true author of Genesis, and Moses was merely an instrument. Even those that believe in the dictation theory are in essence admitting that Moses really didn't have anything to do with the book, here merely wrote down the words God dictated. I think the Tablet theory actually gives Moses a more prominent role. Compiling ancient works like this is no easy task. A child could merely write from dictation.
As it has been pointed out already, the bible doesn't say Moses wrote Genesis. It doesn't even say he wrote Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers or Deuteronomy......
It sounds like instead of arguing that Moses didn't write the Torah, you're making the case instead that it is
possible Moses didn't write the Torah. The evidence you are offering is that it appears he wrote other books, therefore he must not have written the Torah. But this is not a valid argument by any stretch. Moses, by all accounts, would have been a very good writer.
There is evidence that some of the epistle writers wrote other letters that are not in the Bible. Does this mean they did not write the ones in the canon?
It's not a compelling argument. Let's see if your case gets stronger.
If you look at Joshua, you will find him not just reading the book of the law, Joshua 8:34, but adding to the scroll himself. Joshua 24:26 And Joshua wrote these words in the Book of the Law of God. Yet Joshua's words here are not found in any of the books of the Pentateuch you think Moses wrote even though the bible tells us Joshua wrote in the same scroll.
I'm not following the argument here either. So you say Joshua wrote in the book of the law, or that he didn't? Did Joshua write somewhere on the scroll or are you implying he added to the law of Moses? It would appear if he added to the actual law, we'd see it. Commentators seem to believe he merely wrote the words of this covenant on the scroll of the law somewhere to emphasize the seriousness of the matter. Maybe it was kind of like putting your hand on a bible and swearing. I don't think that's too far a stretch. I make notes on my bible all the time. Am I now a co-author? Am I adding to scripture?
Now, if you're merely saying that Moses had help with the Torah, I would have to agree to an extent. He needed God's help to be sure. He also would have needed someone to recored this death and burial. Even during the writing of the Torah, Moses may have used an account some members of his family wrote in Num. 3:1.
But the books are attributed to Moses. Jesus made it very clear he was the author, even making the statements Moses wrote.
Now I'm contrasting this with you case, that Moses did not actually write it, but all I'm getting is the idea that it's possible he didn't. You're not actually making a positive case for any author.
No, you still have two different texts composed in two different styles by two different writers, compiled together by an editor, whether the toledoth marks the end of the first account or the beginning of the second.
My statement was this it completely debunked the idea that there are 2 creations accounts. I never said they were not 2 different texts, by different authors, in fact I affirmed that. I never claimed they weren't compiled together.
I don't think you're following why the colophon phrase destroys the 2 creation account. Let me explain briefly. The account starting in 2:4b isn't a creation account at all. It's the account of the Garden of Eden, the Fall, and events shortly after the fall. The only reason anyone considered it to be a creation account of the heavens and earth is because they thought Gen. 2:4 a was a title. Now that we have textual evidence it could have been a colophon, everything falls into place. I would think even the most hardened TE would admit his.
According to Wiseman's interpretation, the colophon, assuming it is a colophon, could refer to the writer, the owner, or the subject of the text. It is pure speculation to assume it means Adam was the writer of the genealogy rather than the plain meaning of the Hebrew that the subject was the genealogy of Adam. The use of the toledoth to describe the subject of the genealogy rather than the author also fits the very first toledoth, the generations of the heaven and earth which do describe creation, of the heaven and the earth in the first account, and the earth in the second, but were hardly written by the heaven and earth.
Okay, you've misunderstood a lot of things both from Wisman and myself. First, Adam is not the author of a genealogy in Genesis, nor does it make sense that he would be. Only someone with fathers and grandfathers and great grandfathers would be in possession of a genealogy. Adam certainly would not be the writer or owner of a genealogy like this, that started with him and recored his own death. In the Tablet theory, Noah is the owner of this tablet. And it makes perfect sense. He is the only one in the genealogy that has not died yet.
And yes you are right, a colophon could refer to the writer, the owner, or the subject of the text. In this case, it seems context is making it very clear it is the actual authors in Genesis. They never actually record the deaths of any of the signers. Thus the plain signature, this is the account of Noah, this is the account of Shem, etc. They are in essence, family histories, and if the subject of the text is not recorded as dying, this suggests it he is actually the author. Again, context is what I'm drawing from. All the discoveries did was make me aware of the colophon writing style. We don't this turn a blind eye to context.
Writing may predate Abraham but you need to be careful trying to apply scientific dating to creationist dating systems which compress the history of human habitation of the Middle East into a much short times span. If you are trying to compare the two dating systems you need to realise that the evidence from archaeology puts the origin of writing long after the earliest settlements in the region. Before writing was developed sufficiently to record stories, simpler forms were used for counting and keeping accounts of quantities being stored and traded, followed by simple symbols identifying what was being counted. It is interesting that while there is no reference to writing or books before Moses, we do have references to counting or numbering with Abraham, Gen 15:5 And he brought him outside and said, "Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them." The word number according to Strongs is saphar "A primitive root; properly to score with a mark as a tally or record". You had numbers before that, just look at Noah dealing with seven pairs of clean animals, but no reference to writing the numbers down or keeping a tally. Even if some cities were experimenting with recording their stories on clays tablets, this skill would have been impractical for a nomadic herdsman, large clay tablets telling stories needed libraries or temples to store them. It was only when the Israelites came out of Egypt the home of papyrus that we read of them writing their accounts in scrolls, they did have two tablets with writing on them, but these were carried by a team of levites.
This of course is based on an evolutionary presupposition that men evolved. I don't share that presupposition. Adam was created very smart. The talking and reasoning skills of the Genesis people suggests intelligence. I have no problem believing they had had a written as well as spoken language. If Noah could learn to build an ark, he could learn to write. In fact the writing would have been very advanced being the world spoke one language at the time. Written language may have slowed a bit at the time of the dispersement, but again, humans were created intelligent.
Even if they were the authors, it doesn't make the texts literal. Remember you have two different with two different accounts of the creation each giving a different sequence of the creation. That is not what you would expect from two literal historical records.
No, there is only one creation account. The next account is about a Garden which God planted. Perhaps the plants of the field is a phrase stumbling you. It's very simple, though. Field plants were cultivated plants. Those required 2 things: a human cultivator, and water. Read the text carefully. You'll see it, I promise.
What confused modern cultures about this, is the ostensible title phrase which seemed to imply this was a creation account. Once that is gone, the meaning just falls of the text. This was the Garden/Fall account of Adam.
From the editorial comments in the Pentateuch it is more likely Moses writings were edited too, rather than him being the one who did the editing. But even if Moses edited Genesis, the Israelites and their forefathers had spent time in both Egypt and Mesopotamia, there is no reason the creation accounts could not have been written to refute pagan creation stories they were surrounded by, echoing these stories in the the process of refuting them and pointing to the Lord as the creator.
For those who don't believe Genesis, yes, there is no reason. But I believe the historical narrative of Genesis. I don't think it was merely a made up lie to battle another religion.
I would have though a better approach would be to look at the text objectively and see what sort of cultural and cosmological background it was written in. If there isn't any to be seen, then fair enough, but if there is, then why shouldn't we understand that God spoke to people of that time in terms they understood, rather than assume God couldn't or wouldn't speak to people that way and force these preconceptions into the text?
I think that Moses and the people of this time understood these colophon phrases. And I think they perfectly understood the creation account.
I'm referring to issue like etymology, in which we try to understand words like rayqia from ANE culture rather than from the actual usage in Genesis. I'm speaking about applying cosmologies to Genesis from ANE cultures which came thousands of years later, rather than looking at the usage and context of what is written in Genesis.
I really appreciate Wiseman's book, it revolutionised my understanding of Genesis back when I was a literalist and a creationist. It made me realise there were other ways to understand the text other than the straight literal six day reading of Genesis 1, IIRC he claimed that God revealed the six days to Adam over six days rather than creation itself taking place in six days. I found it very encouraging too at the time that Genesis was a reliable account written by eye witnesses with the tablets passed down through the generations from patriarch to patriarch.
Who claimed this? I've not seen this claimed in the tablet theory.
It was only gradually I began to realise Wiseman didn't actually have any evidence to support this claim. But it did show me that there were different ways to read the text and instead of being threatened by documentary hypothesis, that the text of Genesis itself supports the idea it was edited together from other texts, though I think their ideas of who wrote the different sources, JEDP, and their reasons for writing them, are pretty speculative too. But I don't have a problem with the possibility of post exilic composition, the book of Psalms with contains psalms of David as well as laments about exile in Babylon must have been compiled in this period.
What the Wisemans discoveries and research did, was blow the claim out of the water that writings didn't exist at the time of Abraham and earlier. This was the premise of the early JEDP theory. People latched onto it and have never let go, even those the staring premise died a long time ago. There is nothing to JEDP except they noticed different writing styles within Genesis. It's an obsolete theory, that's remained popular.
