The Deuteronomistic History

1. What is the Deuteronomistic History:

 Why the Deuteronomistic History?

 Deuteronomy is the last book of the Pentateuch, which closes with the
death of Moses (Deut. 34)

 But there are several connections between Deuteronomy and the

following historical books, or the “Former Prophets” (Joshua, Judges,
Samuels, and Kings)

 Moses constantly alludes to the crossing of the Jordan and the

conquest of the land beyond (Deut 4:1, 14; 7:1; 9:1 …). These events
are recorded in the book of Joshua. (Hexateuch: Pentateuch+Jushua)

 Deut 6:12-15 refers to Judg 2:12-14:

Deut 6:12-15:

12. Take care that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you
out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery … 14. Do not
follow other gods, any of the gods of the peoples who are around you,
15 because the Lord your God, who is present with you is a jealous
God. The anger of the Lord your God would be kindled against you
and he would destroy you from the face of the earth.

Judg 2:12-14:

12. They abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had
brought them out of the land of Egypt; they followed other gods
from the gods of the peoples who were all around them, and bowed
down to them; and they provoked the Lord to anger… 14. So the
anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he gave them over
to plunderers who plundered them, and he sold them into the power
of their enemies all around, so that they could no longer withstand
their enemies.

 The destruction of Jerusalem and the deportation of the people, which

is recorded at the end of 2 Kings, is also alluded to in Deuteronomy

Deut 28:63

And just as the Lord took delight in making you prosperous and
numerous, so the Lord will take delight in bringing you to ruid and
 destruction; you shall be plucked off the land that you are entering to
possess.

2 Kgs 25:21

The king of Babylon struck them down and put them to death at
Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah went into exile out of its land.

 Why not reading Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuels, and Kings

together as a coherent work called “Deuteronomistic History”.

 The development of the idea of the Deuteronomistic History

 Before Martin Noth

 1805, M. de Wette

1) Identified the book found in the temple under the reign of Josiah
(2 Kgs 22)

2) Advocated the existence of a Tetrateuch (Genesis, Exodus,

Leviticus, and Numbers), dissociating Deuteronomy from the rest
of the Pentateuch.

 1843, Heinrich Ewald

1) Called Deuteronomist, an editor who wrote under the reign of

Manasseh, who composed the books of Deuteronomy and
Joshua.

2) Insisted on the break between Joshua and Judges: the first

collection of the Bible is not the Pentateuch but the Hexateuch.

 1899, Julius Wellhausen:

1) Documentary Hypothesis

2) Hexateuch: “the older sources extended up to Joshua, since it is

in this book only that the Israelites eventually take possession of
the land promised by Yahweh to the Patriarchs and to Moses”
(Römer, The So-called Deuteronomistic History, 19)

 1943, Martin Noth:

 Abandoned the idea of a Hexateuch, while insisted on the continuity

between Deuteronomy-Joshua.

 “The Deuteronomistic texts belonged to a coherent and unified

redaction, due to one redactor, the Deuteronomist (which he
 abbreviated ‘Dtr.’)” (Römer, The So-called Deuteronomistic History,
23)

2. One author theory: Martin Noth

 The existence of the Deuteronomistic History:

In The Deuteronomostic History (), Noth argues that the books of

Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, 1 & 2 Samuel, and 1 & 2 Kings in the Old
Testament constitute a self-contained book, named Deuteronomistic History,
which was written during the post-exilic period (middle 6th BCE) by a writer
staying in Palestine, to explain the fall of Jerusalem in 587 BCE.

 Noth’ evidence that the Deuteronomistic history is a self-contained whole.

 The language of Dtr. is very straightforward and dispenses with a

particular artistry or refinement: it is the simplest Hebrew in the Old
Testament. The limited variety of expression has led to frequent
repetition of the same simple phrases and sentence constructions, in
which the “Deuteronomistic” style it easily recognized.

 Dtr. Brings forward the leading personages with a speech, long or short,
which looks forward and backward in an attempt to interpret the course
of events, and draws the relevant practical conclusions about what people
should do. For instance, Joshua 1: outlines the task of occupation of the
land,

Joshua 23; moving into the period of the “judges.”

With transition from this “judges” period to the Kings period, there is a
quite lengthy speech by Samuel in 1 Sam 12. After the completion of the
temple in Jerusalem: Solomon makes a detailed speech in the form of a
prayer to God (1 Kings 8:14ff)

 Third, there are several elements of a simple and unified theological

interpretation of history, such as the recurring emphasis on obeying the
“voice” of God, and the lack of all positive interest in cult practices.

 The Nature of DH and the motive to write it

 A valuable historical source, a self-contained whole (Noth, 4-11; 75-78),

though some passages were lately added to DH, such as the story of
Samson (Noth, 40).

 Noth emphasizes the significance of the fall of Jerusalem to the writing of

DH. According to Noth, the fall of Jerusalem was the motive for the Dtr.
to write DH to explain this catastrophe
  Authorship, Date, and Place

 Author: not a group of people but an individual who did not belong to the
sphere of officials, priests, or prophets (Noth, 99).

 Date: DH was written during the time of the exile after the fall of
Jerusalem, “in the middle of the 6th century B.C. when the history of the
Israelite people was at an end” (Noth, 79).

 Place: DH was written in Palestine because “[t]he fact that Dtr. had
access to such a variety of literary sources might suggest that he had
stayed behind in the homeland rather than being deported” (Noth, 142).

3. Two-redactor theory: Frank Moore Cross

 Arguments against Noth:

 Von Rad: “Von Rad has singled out a theme, the promise to the house
of David, which must be dealt with systematically; the neglect of this
theme is a serious failure in Noth’s study” (Cross, 277)

 H. W. Wolff:

“He cannot conceive of the Deuteronomist taking up the tedious

task of composing a great theology of history as a labor devised and
designed to teach only the message that disaster of Israel is final”
(Cross, 277)

“Wolff correctly discerns a theme of hope which comes from the

hand of a Deuteronomistic editor in the Exile …” (278)

 We are left unsatisfied by each of these attempts to analyze the themes

of the Deuteronomistic history, especially in their treatment of Kings.
Each seems too simple, incapable of handling the complexity of the
theological lore in the great collection. (278)

 Two redaction theory: there are two editions for DH.

 The first edition: written in Josianic period around 609 BCE by the first
Deueronomistic redactor, with two main themes

 The first theme: the sin of Jeroboam I (the symbol of infidelity.)

 The second theme: the unconditional promises to David: the symbol of

fidelity (The second theme reaches its climax in the reform of Josiah, 2
Kings 22: 1-23: 25)
  “The Deuteronomistic historian thus contrasted two themes, the sin of
Jeroboam and the faithfulness of David and Josiah.” (284)

“The two themes in the Deuteronomistic Book of Kings appear to

reflect two theological stances, one stemming from the old
Deuteronomic covenant theology which regarded destruction of
dynasty and people as tied necessarily to apostasy, and a second,
drawn from the royal ideology in Judah: the eternal promises to
David.” (284)

 The second edition: a minor revision by a member of that Deuteronomistic

school during the Exile.

 “We should attribute this subtheme to the Exilic editor (Dtr2) who
retouched or overwrote the Deuteronomistic work to bring it up to date
in the Exile, to record the fall of Jerusalem, and to reshape the history,
with a minimum of reworking, into a document relevant to exiles for
whom the bright expectations of the Josianic era were hopelessly past.”
(285)

 This subtheme is found articulated most clearly in the pericope dealing

with Manasseh and the significance of his sins of syncretism and
idolatry, in 2 Kings 21: 2-15. (285)

 Nevertheless, there are a limited number of passages which appear to

be addressed to exiles and to call for their repentance, or in one case
even promise restoration of the captives to their land. These latter are
most naturally regarded as coming from the hand of an Exilic editor.
(287)

4. Multiple Layers of DH by Göttingen School:

 Rudolf Smend (1851-1913, who studied and taught at Göttingen University)

 The first edition: DtrH (the Deuteronomist Historian): the basic narrative
of the DH

 Latter additions: DtrN (Nomistic): emphasis on the obedience to the

Torah of Moses, with two interests

 Law: Josh. 1:7-9

 The beginning of v. 7 (Only be strong and very courageous)

repeats the beginning of v. 6 (Be strong and courageous)

“The repetition is made for the purpose of the interpretation.

 But this assumption presupposes a temporal and material gap between
the drafting of vv. 6 and 7. The author of v. 7 is thus probably not the
same as the author of the Deuteronomistic History” (“The Law and
the Nations: A Contribution to Deuteronomistic Tradition History,”
Reconsidering Israel and Judah, p. 97)

 New content in v. 7: obedience to the Law

 Remnants of enemy nations remain in the land even after Joshua’s

conquest: Josh. 13:1bβ-6, 23; Judg. 1:1-2:5, 2:17, 20-21, 23

 Josh. 13:1bβ-6:

Josh. 13:1bβ: and very much of the land still remains to be

possessed.

“In the context of the later stratum (that is, according to the way
it is explicated in vv. 2–6), v. 1bβ unquestionably means: the
land in large measure has not yet been conquered. This statement
decidedly contrasts with DtrH’s presentation. The summary
passages Josh 10:40–43 and 11:16–20, 23 explicitily claim the
total conquest of the land and the nearly total expulsion of its
inhabitants.” (101)

“In conclusion, Josh 13:1bb–6, just like 1:7–9, is a later person’s

interpretiveaddition to the narrative of DtrH.” (101)

“The most important piece of evidence is the correspondence between the

content of the insertion and DtrN in the fundamental fact that the
land has not been fully conquered and the complete eradication
of the previous inhabitants is still to come, if it is even to be
achieved at all.” (108)
 Walter Dietrich (a student of Smend)

 DtrP (the prophetic Deuteronomist): most of the prophetic stories and

oracles in Samuel and Kings are later additions.

5. Three layers (Thomas Römer)

 Example: Deut 12:1-19, consisting of three layers: vv. 13-18, 8-12, 2-7

 Deut 12:13-18: the background of it is urbanizing and modernizing, both

of which fit into the political and economic changes in Judah during the
seventh century BCE (Römer, 59)
  Deut 12:8-12The background of is the exile, during which the Israelites
were supposed to stay away from the land and the Deuteronomists must
face the problem of worship outside of Judah (Römer, 61-62).

 Deut 12:2-7: an ideology of separation from the nations dwelling in the

land indicates the Persian context of returning (Römer, 63).

 Römer proposes a compromise between the double-redaction theory and the

multiple-redaction theory, a threefold redaction of DH; that is, there are three
layers of DH, responding to three different social, political and historical
contexts:

 the Neo-Assyrian layer.

 the Neo-Babylonian layer.

 the Persian

 Author: Deuteronomistic School instead of an individual.