Julius Wellhausen

In the 1950s, Yehezkel Kaufmann challenged the regnant Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis that the Priestly Text was the final Pentateuchal source to be written, and that it dates to the Post-Exilic Period. One pillar of his argument is that the Priestly Text seems wholly ignorant of Deuteronomy’s 7^th century B.C.E. law of centralization of worship, and thus dates to earlier in the First Temple period. And yet, a closer look at P’s laws shows that it is simply taking centralization for granted.

Israelite religion developed from a revolutionary idea: monotheism. And religion alone, not external factors, accounted for the remarkable preservation of Jewish national identity and consciousness in exile.

Clue: Seven pairs of kosher animals are brought to the ark so that Noah can sacrifice to YHWH after the flood.

To instill Jewish readers with a sense of pride in their religion, Rabbi Joseph Hertz, the Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom in the early 20th century, challenged Wellhausen’s Documentary Hypothesis, especially the claim that rabbinic Judaism was a degraded form of Israelite religion. Instead, Hertz went on the offensive, comparing Christian values unfavorably to Jewish values.

Julius Wellhausen’s analysis of the Torah is perfused with the anti-Jewish sentiment prevalent in Bismarck’s Second German Reich. This adversely affected the use of the Documentary Hypothesis among Jewish scholars until Yehezkel’s Kaufmann’s introduction of a Jewish variation on the theory.

Applying our critical faculties to study the Bible, asking questions about its origin, context, and genre.