Page:A critical and exegetical commentary on Genesis (1910).djvu/358

 impression that Abram forfeits the character of 'Muslim and prophet' (We.) even when he assumes the rôle of a warrior.

Literary character.—Many features of the chapter show that it has had a peculiar literary history. (a) The vocabulary, though exhibiting sporadic affinities with P (, $11. 12. 16. 21$;, $14$; [= 'person'], $21$) or E (, $7. 13$;, $24$), contains several expressions which are either unique or rare (see the footnotes):, $14$; ; , $14$; , $13$ ,, $18-20. 22$; , $20$; , $4$.[*]—(b) The numerous antiquarian glosses and archaic names, suggesting the use of an ancient document, have no parallel except in Dt. 2$10-12. 20-23$ 3$9. 11. 13b. 14$; and even these are not quite of the same character. (c) The annalistic official style, specially noticeable in the introduction, may be genuine or simulated; in either case it marks the passage sharply off from the narratives by which it is surrounded.—That the chapter as it stands cannot be assigned to any of the three sources of Gen. is now universally acknowledged, and need not be further argued here. Some writers postulate the existence of a literary kernel which may either (1) have originated in one of the schools J or E, or (2) have passed through their hands. In neither form can the theory be made at all plausible. The treatment of documentary material supposed by (1) is unexampled in Gen.; and those who suggest it have to produce some sufficient reason why a narrative of (say) E required to be so heavily glossed. As for (2), we have, to be sure, no experience of how E or J would have edited an old cuneiform document if it had fallen into their hands,—they were collectors of oral tradition, not manipulators of official records,—but we may presume that if the story would not bear telling in the vivid style that went to the hearts of the people, these writers would have left it alone. The objections to P's authorship are equally strong, the style and subject being alike foreign to the well-marked character of the Priestly narration. Ch. xiv. is therefore an isolated boulder in the stratification of the Pent., a fact which certainly invites examination of its origin, but is not in itself an evidence of high antiquity.

1-4. The revolt of the five kings.—1. The four names

1. ] G ; V in illo tempore, reading all the names in the nom. G has the first in gen. and the rest nom.; G$A$ further inserts, which has some unusual renderings: for , $11. 16. 21$ (nowhere else in OT); for, $3$ (not again in Pent.: twice in Jos. and 4 t. in Book of Isa.);   for , $13$,—though this might be explained by the unexpected occurrence of the gentilic in this connexion (Aq. ).]