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The Southern Home of Yahweh and Pre-Priestly Patriarchal/Exodus Traditions

from a Southern Perspective. Biblica 99/2 (2018), 166-188.

Article  in  Biblica · January 2018

DOI: 10.2143/BIB.99.2.3284919

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Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina
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 THE SOUTHERN HOME OF YHWH AND
PRE-PRIESTLY PATRIARCHAL/EXODUS TRADITIONS FROM
A SOUTHERN PERSPECTIVE

I. INTRODUCTION

Recent years have seen an enormous change of paradigm concerning

the dating and historical background of the pre-Priestly Patriarchal and
Exodus material. New models of the origin of these narratives have been
proposed, in which these two formerly different origin traditions were
linked by a Priestly redactor in exilic or post-exilic times 1. In the new
paradigm, the pre-Priestly development of these traditions is intensely
associated with the history of the monarchies of Israel and Judah. The
Patriarchal narratives — or at least those related to Jacob — and Exodus/
Wilderness traditions are considered as two different, if not competing,
foundation stories of the Israelite monarchy, later inherited by Judah after
the destruction of the northern kingdom. The Exodus tradition was domi-
nant in Israel, where it was promoted as a “chart myth” for unifying Israel
under the reforms of Jeroboam II 2.
Concerning the Patriarchal narratives, those clinging to a pre-exilic
origin adhere to the view that Jacob was an ancestor originally associated
with the kingdom of Israel who was later appropriated by Judah 3. In the
same vein, the earliest narratives relating to Abraham were primarily con-
nected to the population of the southern highlands of Judah in the late

1
K. SCHMID, GenesisandtheMosesStory.Israel’s Dual Origins in the Hebrew Bible
(Siphrut 3; Winona Lake, IN 2010); IDEM, “Genesis and Exodus as Two Formerly Indepen-
dent Traditions of Origins for Ancient Israel”, Bib 93 (2012) 187-208; TH.B. DOZEMAN –
K. SCHMID, eds., FarewelltotheYahwist?The Composition of the Pentateuch in Recent
European Interpretation(SBL Symposium Series 34; Atlanta, GA 2006); E. BLUM, “The
Literary Connection Between the Books of Genesis and Exodus and the End of the Book
of Joshua”, FarewelltotheYahwist?, 89-106.
2
K. VAN DER TOORN, FamilyReligioninBabylonia,SyriaandIsrael.Continuity and
Change in the Forms of Religious Life (Leiden 1996) 287-315. See now HBAI6 (2017),
dedicated to Jeroboam’s Israel.
3
A. DE PURY, “The Jacob Story and the Beginning of the Formation of the Penta-
teuch”, FarewelltotheYahwist?, 51-72; E. BLUM, “The Jacob Tradition”, TheBookof
Genesis. Composition, Reception, and Interpretation (eds. C.A. EVANS – J.N. LOHR –
D.L. PETERSEN) (VTSup 152; Leiden 2012) 181-211; I. FINKELSTEIN – TH. RÖMER,
“Comments on the Historical Background of the Jacob Narrative in Genesis”, ZAW126
(2014) 317-338.

BIBLICA 98.1 (2017) 166-188 doi 10.2143/BIB.99.2.3284919

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