Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 75:298 (Apr 1918)
Article: A New Solution Of The Pentateuchal Problem
Author: Melvin Grove Kyle

BSac 75:297 (Jan 1918) p. 195

A New Solution Of The Pentateuchal Problem

Melvin Grove Kyle

The principal purpose in publishing “A New Solution of the Pentateuchal Problem” was accomplished, when, in the January issue of the Bibliotheca Sacra, I presented the constructive materials in the case. It is on the consideration of those materials that the solution will meet approval or disapproval. But whether we approve or disapprove there are difficulties and objections which will arise. Such difficulties and objections, in so far as they arise out of the Pentateuch itself, and not out of some proposed solution of the Pentateuchal problem, I will endeavor to give brief consideration now.

Difficulties And Objections

Brief answer must be given to a question which immediately arises: Is the technical use of these law words found anywhere else in the Old Testament? A complete answer, involving as it does the examination of every instance of the use of these law words “commandments,” “judgments,” and “statutes” in the remainder of the Old Testament, would extend this article many pages. Only the results of such examination will be stated: The technical use of these legal terms occurs in the Book of Joshua, occasionally in Second Samuel and First Kings, in the Chronicles, Nehemiah, and Ezra, and in Ezekiel. It does not occur at all in the

BSac 75:297 (Jan 1918) p. 196

Psalms, except a few instances near the end of the book, nor in the Wisdom Literature, and very seldom, if ever, in the Prophets other than Ezekiel. That is to say, the use of these technical terms occurs at the introduction of the law into the promised land, according to the face value of the record, and again at the second establishment of the law in the land at the close of the exile. Thus the result of this investigation would, in the main, agree well with the Documentary Theory, It agrees equally well with the facts pointed out in this study of the Pentateuch. Thus the result is, with some exceptions, neutral in this discussion.

It might be objected that this solution of the Pentateuchal Problem, the kinds and uses of the laws, is based entirely upon the legal portions of the law books. Such an objection is plausible, but specious; one easily deceives himself by it. It would be more correct to say that the criteria of this solution of the Pentateuchal problem are found in the legal portions of the law books; the application of these criteria, however, extends to the narrative portions as well: for the narrative portions make the legal portions intelligible. The laws alone would, for the most part, mean nothing to the history of religion in the world without the setting which the historical narrative gives. Imagine, if you can, the existence of these laws wi...