David and His Theologian: Literary, Social, and Theological Investigations of the Early Monarchy

Keeping the above-mentioned points in mind, let us return to 2 Chr 6: According to the Deuteronomist, foreigners are still to hear in the future of God's great name. These foreign royals know about the God of Israel and some even implement his instructions. To have included this phrase in 2 Chr 6: However, omitting the phrase fits within the broader scheme of things in the narrative.

As Jonker indicates, the Chronicler is unlike the postexilic communities who finalised both the Pentateuch and the Deuteronomistic History from a mind-set which was still captivated by the exilic experience. The Chronicler rather breaks out of the confines of the past. Furthermore, as Jonker further indicates, very interesting nuances will be missed if the book of Chronicles is not also situated in its wider international context. The influence of the international situation of the time on the origin of writings such as Chronicles has a strong impact on the thoughts of the Chronicler as a writer of the time.

While the Deuteronomist's Solomon prays for the foreigner, the inclusion of the omitted statement by the Chronicler brings in an element of condescension. By omitting the statement, the Chronicler's Solomon eliminates that condescension. Jonker's argument helps one to make sense of this situation when he says: The reasoning above can apply in this case.

The fact that a foreigner like Cyrus can be acknowledged as the "messiah" 2 Chr It has been repeatedly said above that in his edition of the dedication of the temple, the Chronicler has a point of his own to make and where there seems to be a dissenting theological sentiment, he does not hesitate to do the necessary intervention. In light of these observations, I discern a theological motive in the omission in 2 Chr 6: It is a theological persuasion that accepts the foreigner. It is an inclusive ethnic theology that has a diminishing effect on xenophobia.

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The theological motive discerned in the omission in 2 Chr 6: As indicated in the introduction, 2 Chr 6: The use of Ps This realisation sensitised the argument not to take for granted the omission in 2 Chr 6: A close reading confirmed that the omission is a conscious theological expression. It expresses a theology that includes the foreigner and belies the exclusion of a foreigner discernible in the Kings' version as argued above. In the light of the xenophobic attacks that occasionally erupt in South Africa, this theological expression cannot be underrated.

It then continues and describe xenophobia as follows: Xenophobia is also a manifestation of racism. Racism and xenophobia support each other and they share prejudiced discourses. They both operate on the same basis of profiling people and making negative assumptions. The profiling in the case of racism is on the basis of race, in the case of xenophobia on the basis of nationality. This state of affairs needs to be strongly decried. A biblical paradigm for a theology of reconstruction in South Africa that can easily be interpreted to support such situations needs to be avoided.

Jesse Ndwiga Kanyuwa Mugambi proposes Nehemiah as a biblical paradigm for a theology of reconstruction in Africa to replace the Exodus motif which "was so dominant that there were hardly any other biblical texts that could be associated with African Christian theology. The idea of Nehemiah as a biblical paradigm for a reconstruction theology in Africa needs to be treated with caution. In a dissertation, Elelwani Farisani vehemently disagrees with this proposal although he does not make another proposal.

In agreement with Farisani, in another article I argue that. The concern of this essay is that in the future there may once again be readers who might hold discriminatory ideologies and use Ezra-Nehe-miah as a justification for such ideologies. Thus, I would dispute in this article a similar proposition.

Making sense of the events in Ezra-Nehemiah, Tamara Cohn Eskenazi argues that the book "advocates ethnic purity and prohibits intermarriage in order to sustain group iden-tity. Apparently, some of Judah's best families either did not have the same concern or defined the community in more inclusive terms. They considered 'foreign' women as acceptable marriage partners even for priests.

It is this different voice from Ezra-Nehemiah that I would like to consider in this article as appropriate for a biblical paradigm for a theology of reconstruction in South Africa. By omitting the condescending statement of the Deuteronomist's Solomon, the Chronicler's Solomon brings 2 Chr 6: This theology is illuminated in Steven Schweitzer's analysis of 1 Chr 2: Schweitzer comments on this inclusion as follows: If this is the case, then inclusion of foreigners among the "sons of Israel" by the chronicler is similar to the point made by the conclusion to the Book of Ruth, which provides David with a Moabite genealogy via this exemplary woman of foreign descent.

In Ruth, the great king of Israel acquires a Moabite heritage. Ruth, with its concluding genealogy, thus reads as a comment on the position of foreigners in society; that is, it apparently ends by posing the question: This reasoning is similarly expressed by James Thomas Sparks. He also finds interest in the fact that the Judahite genealogy contains references to "foreigners," those who were not descended from Israel and who were incorporated into Judah through marriage, without any comment by the Chronicler, positive or negative.

He argues that "the Chronicler seems to suggest in the genealogies that if such foreigners cannot be accepted by those claiming to be 'Israel' ", then the right thing to do is to redefine Israel to include them. It also entails foreigner-friendliness. It promotes unity and discourages division. It is a theology that has a diminishing effect on racism and xenophobia. It is a theology we need in South Africa. For these reasons, in the place of Nehemiah, this article proposes the Chronicler as a biblical paradigm for a reconstruction theology in South Africa.

This essay had three objectives. The first objective was to examine the use of Psalm in 2 Chr 6: The investigation's findings came in the affirmative. The Chronicler replaced the Mosaic covenant with the Davidic covenant in these parallel verses. The theological purpose was to propose a future that was rooted in the Davidic promise rather than in the obedience associated with the Exodus and desert wanderings-concepts that were still constitutive of for the Deuteronomistic History. It also led to the second objective. The second objective was to investigate whether the omission in 2 Chr 6: The investigation produced findings that agree with the view that there was indeed a theological motive behind the omission.

To have included the omitted phrase in 2 Chr 6: The contraction of 1 Kings 8: The foreigners know God unlike in 1 Kings where they will know Him in the future. King Huram of Tyre 2 Chr 2: The prayer for the foreigner in 1 Kgs 8: At this point I am inspired by Raimond Gaita's revelation of the contents of the concept of common humanity in the preface of his book. Treat me as a human being, fully as your equal, without condescension-that demand or plea , whether it is made by women to men or by blacks to whites, [or by foreigners to natives 76 ] is a demand for justice.

Not, however, for justice conceived as equal access to goods and opportunities. It is for justice conceived as equality of respect. Only when one's humanity is fully visible will one be treated as someone who can intelligibly press claims to equal access to goods and opportunities. Victims of racial or other forms of radical denigration, who are quite literally treated as less than fully human, would be ridiculed if they were to do it. The struggle for social justice, I argue, is the struggle to make our institutions reveal rather than obscure, and then enhance rather than diminish, the full humanity of our fellow citizens.

This plea by Gaita expresses the sentiment sensed by this article in the prayer for the foreigner in 1 Kgs 8: The nuanced understanding of the relationship between God and foreigners exhibited by the Chronicler in 2 Chr 6: It is this theological inference to this verse that makes it important for the discourse on the biblical paradigm for a theology of reconstruction in South Africa. This leads to the third objective of this article. The third and the last objective of this article was to use 2 Chr 6: This is in contradistinction to the proposal of Nehemiah by Mugambi and others.

The uneasiness about Nehemiah is based on the fact that the book of Ezra-Nehemiah has been used in the past to justify ideologies that promoted gross violations of human rights and that there may once again be readers who might hold discriminatory ideologies and use Ezra-Nehemiah as a justification in the future.

It has also been demonstrated that this is not in isolation but within the theological ambit of the Chronicler. Taking the xenophobic attacks that have been experienced in South Africa, it is logical to propose a biblical paradigm that has a diminishing effect on discriminatory tendencies. Chronicles is such a paradigm.

Edited by Oded Lipschitz and Joseph Blenkinsopp. Edited by Patrick W. Skehan, Eugene Ulrich and Peter W. The Anchor Bible 17a. A Commentary on the Book of Psalms: The Vitality of Worship. Edited by Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Westminster John Knox Press, Thinking About Love and Truth and Justice.

Kingship According to the Deuteronomistic History. Israel's Place among the Nations. Sheffield Academic Press, Interacting with the Persian Imperial Context? Understanding the Bible Commentary Series. The Role of the Churches. Edited by Jesse N. All Africa Conference of Churches, The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah: Introduction, Commentary, and Reflections.

The New Interpreter's Bible Vol. Monotheism and Institution in the Book of Chronicles. John Knox Press, Edited by Peter W. The Chronicler's Use of the Deuteronomistic History. Harvard Semitic Monographs From Liberation to Reconstruction: African Christian Theology after the Cold War.

East African Educational Publishers, Edited by Mary N. Getui and Emmanuel A. Christian Theology and Social Reconstruction. Myers, and Astrid B. Selected Essays by Eduard Nielsen. Verskillende Perspektiewe op God se Teen-woordigheid. Zion the City of the Great King: A Theological Symbol of the Jerusalem Cult.

Person Jr, Raymond F. The Deuteronomic History and the Book of Chronicles: Scribal Works in an Oral World. Society of Biblical Literature, Towards a Peoples History, 17 April Reading Utopia in Chronicles. Towards an understanding of 1 Chronicles The Vitality of Worship: A Commentary on the Book of Psalms. Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. A new theology for South Africa. A Theology of Reconstruction: Nation-building and Human Rights. Cambridge University Press, New Century Bible Commentary.

Israel in the Books of Chronicles. The Vitality of Worship Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, , Grogan, Psalms Grand Rapids: John Knox Press, , Doubleday, , Baker Academic, , Selected Essays by Eduard Nielsen, ed. Gads, , Tyndale House , The occurrence in Genesis Ollen-burger, Zion the City of the Great King: JSOT Press, , For further discussion on the connection between this designation and the north see Ollenburger, Zion the City of the Great King, Baker Books, , O'Kennedy, Twee Weergawes, The article takes note of the theological debate on the omission of "this day" in 2 Chr 6: Williamson, Israel in the Books of Chronicles Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, , Scholars Press, , Scribal Works in an Oral World Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, , He argues that this is common in oral traditions.

His theory is that "an individual singer does not reproduce an exact replica each time he performs the same song. His supposition is that while the Deuteronomic History and the Chronistic History are literary works they were still embedded within an oral tradition pp. Mohr Siebeck, , This theological stance is reflected in Richard D. Nelson's observation that "based on the tenets of Deuteronomy, Kings keeps up a steady critique of the nation's failure to preserve the purity and unity of the cult And what was the purpose of providing details that would bring the historical aspects of that version into question?

Here, we have obviously raised questions that cannot be answered by investigating just the historical problems of the book. There are far more questions, first of literary composition, and then questions of intent and purpose, which in this context are finally theological questions. And here it is obvious that the very historical questions that arise from a closer reading of the book and need to be addressed by historical research, also reveal a whole set of theological questions that invite us to delve deeper into the traditions to understand them.

As we move from Joshua into the book of Judges, the tone and mood of the writing changes considerably. While the main themes of Joshua are emphasized by the promise "I will be with you" 1: From the beginning of the book, the people are fragmented and beleaguered by powerful Canaanites who are pressing them from all sides. The confidence that permeates the book of Joshua has disappeared, replaced by a sense of desperation in the face of enormous obstacles. The thematic comments of Judges are the opening question, "Who shall go up for us against the Canaanites?

Scattered tribes who were desperately trying to gain a stable foothold in the land have replaced the idea of "all Israel. After the death of Joshua in the Book of Judges the leadership of Israel passed into the hands of local military leaders who arose to address specific crises. Most of these leaders were inept and terribly flawed. Even the well-known figures of Gideon and Samson are more like anti-heroes. Gideon was a cowardly Ba'al worshipper who led his entire family into Ba'al worship 8: Sampson, in spite of his Nazarite vows and God-given strength, was more concerned with Philistine women than he was with the welfare of Israel, a vice that cost him his life.

The best leader in this entire period was a woman, Deborah, who proved to be a capable civil as well as a military leader 4: In general, the book portrays an increasingly deteriorating situation. The people continually abandoned the worship of God and adopted the fertility religion of the Canaanites. The leaders were unable to bring any unity to the people and could not provide any spiritual leadership. Besides the obvious differences in the perspective of the two books, there are also differences in historical details between the books.

The perspective of failure and hardship that had been only an underlying strand of Joshua emerges in Judges as the main topic. This is evidenced in several specific examples that serve to highlight the differences. We have already noted that one of the main themes of the Book of Joshua is the idea of "all Israel" fighting a unified campaign against the Canaanites 3: Yet the minority voice of Joshua also preserves the memory of individual campaigns by individual tribes, such as Judah's campaign against Debir In the Book of Judges, there is never a unified Israel.

From the beginning of the book isolated tribes are fighting for their very survival against superior forces in isolated campaigns. In Judges, this idea of independent tribes fighting for their own territory is even connected with the leadership of Joshua:. Judah and Simeon made an alliance to defeat Adoni-Bezek of the Perizzites 1: Judah campaigned against Canaanites in Hebron and the southern desert, sometimes with the aid of Simeon 1: Western Manasseh and Ephraim continued, largely unsuccessfully, to fight the Philistines along the Megiddo Plain 1: Zebulon, Asher, and Naphtali all tried unsuccessfully to drive the Canaanites from their territory, but settled for moving in among them 1: The Amorites, a general term for Canaanites, forced the tribe of Dan to remain in the hill country 1: Rather than sweeping claims of conquest, Judges interprets the failure of the people to take the land as a test from God, either to see if they would remain faithful to God 2: The book also sees the Israelites' struggles to secure the land as a judgment for failing to remain faithful to God and allowing the worship of Baal to flourish 2: As the book unfolds in recounting the exploits of the shophtim it becomes more apparent that they are local leaders rather than "all Israel" leaders.

Othneil led Judah in campaigns against Arameans from the northeast 3: Ehud led the Benjamites against the Moabites who were raiding across the Jordan from the east 3: Deborah led the Ephraimites against the Canaanite city-state of Hazor , while Gideon led a small band from Manasseh against a Midianite and Amalekite coalition Jephthah raised an army from among Manasseh and Gilead to fight the Ammonites who were trying to expand their territory across the Jordan 11 , and precipitated a brief civil war because he did not invite the Ephraimites to participate Finally, Samson became the hero of the tribe of Dan because of his harassment of the Philistines To further emphasize the scattered nature of the tribes and the apparent total lack of unity, the Book of Judges concludes with accounts of a destructive civil war.

The tribe of Benjamin was nearly annihilated because they chose to fight rather than recognize the authority of the other tribes over them. All of this serves to highlight the fact that Judges agrees with the minority voice in Joshua that the Israelite settlement in the land was much more complicated than the smooth operation that the first chapters of Joshua portrays. This again raises serious historical questions about Israel's entry into the land and the nature of the conquest.

But it also raises questions about the nature of the material in Joshua and Judges, and how we should hear that material as Scripture. Joshua presents the entry into the land as a rapid conquest in which the Israelites eliminated all opposition and possessed all of the land as they obeyed God and followed his leadership. They were led by a single leader appointed by God and achieved success because God fought for them and was with them.

The impression given is that Israel was a tightly unified people working together as one, unified in their worship of God and in their goal of settling the land and eliminating the Canaanites from the land. Yet within Joshua there is a minority voice, another memory that acknowledges the entry into the land was anything but smooth, and that Israel was not a unified people.

It consistently acknowledges that there was a great deal of land left unconquered, and that the process of entry into the land could be seen more in terms of settlement rather than conquest. Judges presents the Israelites as a minority, precariously holding onto small enclaves of land within a much larger and stronger Canaanite majority.

Following the minority voice of Joshua, it acknowledges that many of the territories or cities reported as subdued under Joshua by all Israel were not taken until much later or by actions of individuals or alliances of tribes. The impression is given that Israel was a very loosely confederated collection of individual tribes who sometimes came together for a common cause. They were plagued by disunity both socially and religiously, lacked any stable leadership, and often fought among themselves. This raises the primary historical questions of the two books.

Was Israel's entry into the land by conquest or by settlement? Did Israel enter the land suddenly as a strongly unified conquering people? Or did they migrate into the area over a period of time gradually spreading over the land as they were able to gain enough strength to challenge the Canaanite city-states? Or was it some combination of conquest and settlement, in which they fought some initial battles on the fringes of Canaanite territory to establish a foothold in the land, and then gradually infiltrated into Canaanite territory over a period of centuries?

Or was there even a more complicated history in which they allied themselves with some Canaanite city-states and fought others, at the same time that they joined up with remnants of ancestral tribes who had remained in the central highlands around Shechem since the time of Abraham?

Or was the whole entry into the land nothing more than a peaceful migration of people who were forced into fighting battles as the people of the land resisted being crowded by newcomers, and the conquest stories are only tribal legend? And these questions then lead to literary questions about the relationship between the Books of Joshua and Judges. The traditional view has been that the books are sequential, with Joshua telling the story of the initial successful settlement in the land under the leadership of Joshua, while Judges tells of a later time after the death of Joshua when God was punishing the people for disobedience.

Yet, is it possible, in light of the minority voice in Joshua, that the books are not as sequential as traditionally thought? Is it possible that the differences in the books may not even be as much historical as they are theological? That is, much like the different versions of the Gospels, do the two books simply present a different emphasis of essentially the same period in Israel's history? To this question we will return.

Of course, historians and biblical scholars have offered various theories to address these questions. For various reasons, as noted at the beginning of this study, the historical questions have tended to dominate study of this material. As a result, many of the theories are to answer the historical questions raised by the books, since this has tended to be the area of most concern even to those who want to use the Bible as Scripture. While there are many variations and refinements of the historical approach, most of them can be summarized under four major categories.

This view favors the majority voice of Joshua as being the historical core of the traditions. It also assumes the biblical books are primarily a historical record of Israel's entry into the land preserved within the community simply because they were historical records. A well-known proponent of this perspective is Yezekiel Kaufmann.

This perspective basically accepts the traditional way of viewing the books. It assumes that the accounts are basically historically reliable as they stand in the Bible with the character of Joshua as the focal point. He led the Israelites in a near total conquest of the land in a series of lightning strikes against the Canaanites, successful because God led them into the battles and fought for them. Judges portrays a much later time when the Israelites had abandoned the worship of God, and therefore were suffering under God's condemnation.

All of the failures of the people can be traced to their disobedience. The entire account is of military battles being fought; there was no peaceful occupation of the land at any time. What appear to be discrepancies in the accounts could be explained if we had more information. Lacking that, we simply have to accept the majority voice of Joshua as the most reliable and suspend judgment on anything that does not fit with the idea of a literal and absolute conquest of the land as portrayed in Joshua unless or until we have more information.

This perspective tries to balance Joshua and Judges as historical sources, but actually favors the evidence of archaeological data and historical reconstruction built from them as more reliable sources of historical evidence than the biblical texts.

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Wright, and John Bright are well-know proponents of this perspective, although they would differ in details. This view sees the traditions of a conquest of the land as a valid historical memory of Israel, but one that has been greatly modified by tradition and the retelling of the story within the community over the centuries. While the basic details of the biblical traditions need to be taken seriously as preserving that historical memory, they cannot be taken literally or at face value without some corroborating evidence that would lend support to them.

Where archaeology cannot directly support the biblical traditions, they should not be taken as reliable history, although they may still preserve valid historical memory. We simply have no way to know in cases where there is no supporting evidence. Some scholars at this point would feel much more free to speculate about the actual history, while others would insist that we should follow the biblical text in the absence of contrary evidence. So this view tends to lean heavily on archaeology to support the basic history, assuming that the biblical story line has been heavily schematized and simplified in the biblical accounts.

This view would see Joshua as a leader in early Israel, but one that become a hero figure in later generations. As a result, the traditions expanded his role and attributed some of the actions of later figures, for example some of the conquests of David, to him to validate his position as God's leader of the people. This view leans toward Judges, as well as the minority voice of Joshua, as a more reliable source of early Israel's history. The majority voice of Joshua is rejected as being too idealized and too heavily influenced by theological and tribal agenda to be of much value.

The methods employed are far more historical, trying to reconstruct history from ancient documents, artifacts, and preserved traditions in order to build a historical stage on which to set the biblical material. As a result, there is heavy dependence on comparative religion, as well as logical interpretation and reconstruction of history, a technique common in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Albrecht Alt and Martin Noth are the most well known advocates of this approach. Israel's movement into the land is seen as a relatively peaceful migration of tribes who gradually settled among the city-states of Palestine. After an extended period of consolidation in the 11th and 10th centuries, the settlement climaxed in a period of expansion under the leadership of David in the 9th and early 8th centuries.

The Israelites who first entered the land joined remnants of family units who had not joined the migration to Egypt with Jacob and had remained through the centuries in the central highlands around Shechem. They fought isolated battles as they expanded their territory and encroached into Canaanite controlled areas. But there were no "all Israel" wars, which was a romanticized nationalistic ideal projected back into this period from a much later time, reflected in the book of Joshua.

Joshua himself was only a local Ephraimite leader who gradually became associated with the "all Israel" ideal. There was no "people" until the tribal confederation portrayed in Joshua This covenant ceremony became the focal point for the rise of the unified people that would become the nation of Israel. This perspective rejects both Joshua and Judges as reliable historical accounts, and rather depends on modern social theory to address the historical issues.

The methods employed are a specific type of social theory that sees progression and development in society as the result of class struggle between the "haves" and the "have nots. Proponents of this perspective are George Medenhall and Norman Gottwald. In this view, the idea of "tribe" should be understood as a social unit, not a family unit.

The relationships that appear as family relationships in the traditions are actually ways to describe social relationships and interactions. The conflict present in the accounts between Israelites and Canaanites should be understood as an internal class struggle between peasant villagers Israelites and wealthy city dwellers Canaanites , a struggle between the "haves" and the "have nots.

The association of all the later Israelites with the early events of the exodus, Sinai, and entry into the land is a projection back into history of the story of the group that emerged as a dominant "tribe" in the area. They simply adopted the story of the small group of escaped slaves that first entered the land and made it a national heritage.

These different perspectives on the historical issues of the books each attempt to construct a plausible historical scenario of the material in Joshua and Judges. As can be seen from this brief survey, there are arguments on all sides of the issue, some depending more on the biblical texts in various ways while others depend more on evidence external to the text, reconstruction, and speculation.

But the diversity of the opinions, none of which provides adequate explanation to all aspects of the biblical text, suggests that in asking historical questions we may be asking questions that the text itself cannot answer, or perhaps was never intended to answer. This has led biblical scholars to turn to other methods for addressing the apparent historical discrepancies in the books. These perspectives use a literary approach in examining the text, asking questions of how the tradition developed, how the books were composed, what the relationship might be between the books and to other biblical traditions in terms of story line, what is actually intended to be communicated, history and methods of composition, and possible sources.

Of course, some of these methods are just as speculative as historical reconstruction. But many have found that examining the texts in terms of literary dynamic and intent has produced a better understanding of the texts than trying to answer the historical questions.

As we might expect, there are a variety of perspectives in a literary approach. However, all begin with a basic assumption: That simply means that the study of the biblical material may use historical aspects of the text if possible, but that the primary focus is the text themselves and the story they communicate. We should note that, in similar ways to historical investigation, some of the literary methods do not have a direct or theological intent. That is, the immediate goal of literary analysis is not to reach theological statements, but to understand the books as literature produced by a certain community in history.

That may well yield theological results, since the community is a faith community and these are religious texts. But the immediate goal of these approaches is to learn more about the text as a literary work. Here also we should distinguish different uses of the term "literary", since it is used in three major ways.

First, in its broad meaning, "literary" simply means a focus on the text, as opposed to the history of which the text tells or in which it was produced. In this sense, literary methods include any technique of investigation that is primarily concerned with a document or piece of writing as literature. Second, a much more technical meaning of the term emerged in the 19th century in which literary analysis was directly connected to historical research. It referred to the study of various strands of tradition or sources, whether oral or written, that were used to compose a document.

The study of these sources was a prolegomena, as Julius Wellhausen put it, to historical investigation, trying to establish reliable sources for the study of history. The first two perspectives surveyed below are generally of this type. Third, today literary criticism is still a technical term but used much more broadly to refer to the study of the inner workings of a document, things like plot development, rhetorical dynamic, features such as irony and satire, word play, structure, the use of certain patterns or forms, all the features that go into making a piece of literature.

The last two perspectives below work from this broader definition. This "new literary criticism" is far less connected with historical issues, although most do not neglect it completely. However, in some of the more radical developments in literary criticism, such as structuralism, there is no need to place a piece of literature into a historical context. It is assumed that the "meaning" of literature by its very nature is self-contained within the piece of literature. We cannot take time here to trace the development of source analysis, although a couple of observations are necessary.

As mentioned above, source analysis arose as an adjunct to historical investigation in trying to establish the reliability of documents as historical resources. In its early phases, literary analysis was concerned with establishing the oldest strand that went into the composition of a literary work. Historians assumed that the earliest strand would be the most historically reliable. However, as the emphasis began to shift more to the text itself rather than to the history it could illuminate, the concern shifted to sources as clues to the compositional technique of the literature, and therefore as clues to the nature of the work itself.

Sources in the Pentateuch. The general conclusion was that the Pentateuch was a composite work that grew out of the life of the community of Faith over several centuries rather than beings composed at one time by Moses himself. Later study allowed a larger role for the older Mosaic traditions, but did not change the perspective that the book in its final form was the product of a long development with a variety of strands of tradition.

Much like the different views of the four Gospels, the Pentateuch was formed from different strands of traditions that circulated in Israel representing different perspectives on Israel's history see The Synoptic Problem. As scholars applied the methods of source analysis and viewed the Pentateuch in terms of various strands of tradition or sources, the question arose about the extent of those sources.

That is, could sources be seen in other places in the Old Testament beyond the Pentateuch? This issue revolved around the relationship of the Book of Deuteronomy to the writings both before and after it. While Deuteronomy had been traditionally included as the last book of the Pentateuch, it is also obvious that it relates very closely to the book of Joshua that follows it since the story line of entry into the land from the Pentateuch continues in Joshua.

And, as we have seen, Joshua has close connections with Judges, while Judges in turn sets the stage for the rise of the monarchy recounted in Samuel and Kings. This relationship of the books of Joshua through Kings had long been recognized in Jewish tradition where they are known together as The Former Prophets the Latter Prophets are the prophetic books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Book of the Twelve so-called Minor Prophets.

The new question was how to understand the literary relationship of Deuteronomy as part of the Pentateuch to the material in the Former prophets, and especially in Joshua.

The first approach to this issue simply extended the results of study of the Pentateuch to the Former Prophets. Scholars had identified several specific strands of tradition in the Pentateuch and so they concluded that the connection of Deuteronomy with Joshua and the books that followed could be explained by tracing the same strands of tradition into the Former Prophets, at least through the early chapters of Joshua.

In this view, even though Deuteronomy was recognized to be a separate strand of tradition from much of the rest of the Pentateuch labeled the D tradition or source , it was seen as part of an unfolding story that continued through Joshua. Joshua was the fulfillment of the promises of possessing the land made throughout the Pentateuch and especially in Deuteronomy. While Joshua shared the same perspective as the narratives in the Pentateuch, Judges was seen as a different kind of writing, taking the story in a different direction both in terms of literary structure and in terms of content and theological themes.

As a result, the strands of tradition together were grouped as Gen-Exod-Lev-Num-Deut-Josh, with Jud-Sam-Kings forming a later set of traditions that told Israel's history in a different way this follows the Hebrew canon in which Ruth and Chronicles are not seen as part of this history; see Canons of the Hebrew Bible.

In effect, this lengthened the Pentateuch "five books" to a Hexateuch "six books". The term Hexateuch was simply a way to refer to the idea that Joshua should be seen with the books of the Pentateuch and separate from Judges through Kings. While the idea of a Hexateuch could explain the relationship of Deuteronomy with Joshua, problems with this proposal quickly emerged.

The sources that could be seen rather easily in the Pentateuch, and upon which the while idea rested, could not be easily traced in Joshua if at all. Also, while the relationship of Deuteronomy and Joshua was clear, how that relationship should be seen in terms of the other four books of the Pentateuch remained uncertain since Joshua had little connection with those four books. Likewise, there was no adequate explanation, if all six books were to be seen as comprising a common set of traditions, why Deuteronomy should have influenced Joshua so heavily, but not have influenced the books preceding it more.

Also, the idea of a Hexateuch separated Joshua from the rest of the Former Prophets, something unlikely considering the close connections between the minority voice in Joshua and Judges that we have already seen.

The whole issue of the literary relationship of the Pentateuch and the Former Prophets went a different direction with the work of Martin Noth. While his ideas are detailed and have been extended and revised by others, his basic proposal was that the book of Deuteronomy along with the Former Prophets should be seen as an independent work reaching its final form during the Israelite exile to Babylon.

The entire work, Deuteronomy along with Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings, incorporated many older traditions and perhaps even earlier versions of Deuteronomy itself. In its final exilic development it interpreted Israel's history from that later perspective c.

Deuteronomy was the introduction to this entire historical work that was called the Deuteronomic History. This accounted for the close connection of Deuteronomy with Joshua and the books that followed.

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This in effect reduced the Pentateuch to a Tetrateuch "four books". Historically, the implications of this perspective is much more far-reaching than the Hexateuch proposal. While the Hexateuch was not used to argue a literal historical record for the material of either Joshua or Judges, it did allow a more traditional approach to the historical issues.

Generally, the traditions of both the Hexateuch and the remaining Former Prophets were thought to be very old traditions. With Joshua connected with Deuteronomy, the sequential unfolding of settlement in the land, with later apostasy in the period of the Judges, was more likely. However, with the Tetrateuch approach, the entire account of settlement in the land was seen as a very late development in Israel's history, at least in the form it appears in the books now.

While various scholars took the historical questions more seriously than others in working with this approach, to many this suggested that these later traditions were not as reliable as historical records since they were actually written years after the events in a radically different historical context. Later studies were more ready to allow greater validity to oral tradition in the ancient world, as well as allowing very old strands of tradition to be incorporated into the final work.

Still, the effect of this approach was to push the historical issues into the background in favor of seeing the Deuteronomic History as more of a social or theological interpretation of history rather than simply the recording of historical data. Noth's proposal has been widely accepted since it allows us to explain many of the features of the biblical text for which historical or source approaches could not. Some have not accepted his perspective for fear of what it might do to certain theories about the nature and authority of Scripture.

Yet, in many ways it provides a perspective from which to take the biblical traditions seriously apart from the magnitude of historical problems that emerge in Joshua and Judges. Still, many have challenged his proposal on other grounds than just certain view of Scripture. From slightly different perspectives both Brevard Childs and James Sanders raised questions that went beyond dealing with traditions and sources from which the books were composed.

The new questions they raised sought to understand how the books related to each other in terms of functioning together as part of the canon of Scripture for a community or communities of Faith. The fact remains that in spite of all the previous proposals, the actual canon of Scripture has been a Pentateuch followed by the account of Israel's settlement in the land.

This concern with canon takes that order seriously, yet without returning to a position that allows the historical questions to override the biblical text itself. It was not the biblical text that forced the various divisions, but the assumptions in asking historical questions and using historical methods that led to trying to sort the material out along historical lines.

This does not suggest that the historical methods did not produce helpful results, only that finally they do not deal adequately with the biblical text as Scripture for the Church. The perspective of a canonical whole asserts that how the community of Faith arranged the biblical material, whether by redactors or authors, whether from oral tradition or documents, whether ancient or newer traditions, is the governing factor in how we should see the material.

The primary question is not, "what were the sources from which this document was composed? This has significant implications for how we see the relationship between Joshua and Judges, as well as the relationship of those books to the larger canon. From this view, Deuteronomy, with its summary of the exodus, focus on the giving of torah at Sinai, as well as the covenant curses and blessing with which the book concludes, is clearly the conclusion of the Pentateuch.

Biblical Theology

The central section of the book includes a reiteration of many of the Mosaic instructions, and so must be seen in relation to the torah traditions of Exodus through Numbers. Yet, it awaits the crossing of the Jordan and entry into the land to fulfill what the exodus and the promises to Abraham had begun, and so ends in expectation of the future.

Joshua assumes this emphasis on the instructions from God to his people about how to live in their world the torah ; while we often think of "law," the Hebrew term torah actually means "instruction;" see Torah as Holiness. In fact, faithfulness to those instructions becomes the primary focus as the people enter the land, both from the ending of Deuteronomy and the beginning of Joshua.

Likewise Judges uses faithfulness to God's instructions as the criteria for evaluating the spiritual status of the people throughout the book. Failure to follow those instructions is one reason given in Judges for the hardship that the people endured at the hands of the Canaanites. Rather than dependence on just the Book of Deuteronomy for this emphasis on faithfulness, Joshua and the books following depend on the entire preceding tradition from creation to the exodus contained in the Pentateuch.

Specifically, the twin themes of God's grace exodus and faithful response Sinai that have unfolded throughout most of the Pentateuch in the exodus and Sinai narratives, provide the groundwork upon which the entry to the land is built. The Former Prophets track the outworking of the implications of the exodus and the giving of the torah at Sinai through Israel's subsequent history.

So, there is an integral relationship between Joshua and the Pentateuch. It is not on the level of sources or traditions, but in terms of what was important to the community who shaped these traditions, how Israel lived out in the land the implications of the covenant they had made with God at Sinai following the Exodus.

1. Harpsichord Pieces, Book 2, Suite 9, No. 8: Le Bavolet Flotant;
2. Forced Perspective;
3. Bible Living.
4. Suggested Reading;

This suggests that the unity of the material is a thematic or theological unity, and not a unity or disunity of sources. It also suggests that the sequence and organization of the material is not chronological and not dependent on sources, but is theological and dependent on the testimony of the community to their own history.

This also suggests that the material of the Former Prophets, while closely connected thematically with the Pentateuch, is a significantly different kind of material. There is a clear break between the formative era of the exodus and the wilderness wandering and the later entry into the land. While Joshua succeeded Moses as leader, the roles of the two men were radically different. It was left to Joshua to put into practice in the land the principles that God had revealed to Moses in the desert. The movement into the land in the first chapters of Joshua was far more than a geographical move; it was a significant shift in the way Israel related to God.

The "land" becomes its own theological symbol as the traditions unfold, the place where faithfulness to God will be tested, the place where life must actually be lived as God's people. The canonical approach to reading Joshua and Judges as part of a larger literary work in conjunction with the Pentateuch has been modified in various ways as further suggestions have been made. Yet, it has remained the primary way to understand the material beyond a purely historical reading.

Noth's proposal of a Deuteronomic History reaching its final form in the time following the exile of Israel to Babylon, with the Book of Deuteronomy as its anchor, has remained widely accepted although modified. Rather than seeing the book in terms of sources or compositional strategies, now the emphasis is on the Deuteronomic History as the post-exilic communities' theological interpretation of their entire history from the perspective of exile.

Most would acknowledge an earlier form of Deuteronomy that is much older than the present book, but reworked and edited in light of the events of the exile. Likewise, the traditions in Joshua and Judges are understood as very old traditions, but occur in their present form as the result of being cast into a new interpretive framework in light of the exile.

It is really this interpretative framework that is emphasized in talking about a Deuteronomic History or the Deuteronomist who composed it. The interpretative framework is both historical and theological. Historically, the traditions are read in light of the outworking of Israel's history into the post-exilic era, a time when Israel had been driven from the land and enslaved by foreign powers.

Theologically, the torah and covenant traditions become the criteria for reading Israel's subsequent history in the exile. These come together since Israel's history in the exilic came to a disappointing end, a failure that the community attributed to Israel's unfaithfulness in keeping the commitment to God that the people took to themselves at Sinai. The interpretative framework then is a theological perspective of Israel's history read in terms of faithfulness to God. In light of all this, we can return to some of the historical questions raised at the beginning.

There are still no answers to those specific historical problems. But perhaps it is more obvious now that some of those historical problems are important to us because we have not heard the biblical text as the faith community of Israel intended it to be heard. That is, we have asked historical questions when the books are not history. This does not suggest that they are fictional; that reaction is as much a part of our own biases in favor of our modern categories as were the assumptions that allowed the historical problems to dominate the books in the first place.

But it does say that there is a theological dimension to the books that simply does not concern itself with historical harmony, and will not yield to historical questions. In fact, the very dissenting voices in Joshua and Judges that raise the historical questions may provide us the best clue to how we can hear the books theologically.