I am participating in a conference on paradigm change in Pentateuchal research in Basel, Switzerland, this coming March. It is good to see a growing movement to overcome some positions in Pentateuchal scholarship that have ossified into rigid dogmas. This is from
the official website:
Paradigm Change in Pentateuchal Research
Scientific Conference at the STH Basel, 16-18 March 2017
The Pentateuch forms both in Judaism and in
Christianity the first and fundamental piece of the Bible and is the
basic document of Western religious history. The currently
prevailing paradigm for the study of the Pentateuch in Biblical Studies
dates from the 19th century and forms a cornerstone of Biblical Studies
and of the reconstruction of a history of ancient Israel. This paradigm
extends to the narratives of the Pentateuch as well as to its legal
collections. According to this paradigm, the Pentateuch was composed
over a longer period, with the three most important stages JE (from
before the Deuteronomy), D (the core of Deuteronomy originated in the
7th century) and P (Priestly texts exilic/postexilic). This paradigm was
established by Julius Wellhausen's «Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels»
(1878). While it has been modified in many ways, also it has been in
the last thirty years more and more in a crisis; nevertheless, no
fundamental paradigm shift has taken place. It is the aim of this
conference to discuss this paradigm critically and to explore whether a
fundamental paradigm change can lead out of the current impasse of old
models and open new approaches to the Pentateuch. The international
speakers are experts in the fields of Biblical Studies, Legal History,
Linguistics, and Ancient Near Eastern Studies.
Organisation
Prof. Dr. Matthias Armgardt, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany
Ass.-Prof. Dr. Benjamin Kilchör, STH Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Prof. Dr. Markus Zehnder, Biola University Los Angeles, USA
Picture Credits: «Moses zerschmettert die Gesetzestafeln» (Rembrandt van Rijn, 1659) – Public Domain
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