Genesis 1-11 - David M. Carr

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(hereafter “SB Gilgamesh” as opposed to the Old Babylonian [OB] versions) shows that some scribes could bring flood traditions into relation with other textual traditions. Nevertheless, the broader picture of Mesopotamian primeval narratives and traditions shows that narrative integration of creation and flood episodes—seen particularly in the Atrahasis Epic—was the exception rather than the rule.

      Finally, I must emphasize that the Mesopotamian literary tradition regarding primeval times is varied, constituted as it is by works of various genres in two languages (Sumerian and Akkadian) that were composed over many centuries. There are important differences across this corpus. For example, the Akkadian texts, which generally lie closer than the Sumerian texts to the time of the composition of Gen 1–11, are distinguished from those Sumerian texts by their more resolutely negative view of the heavy labor put on humans by the gods and their more exclusive picture of humans as created through a process of formation, generally a god or goddess crafting humans out of clay (where several Sumerian texts depict humans as sprouting from the earth).33 In addition, it appears that certain texts enjoyed more prominence in different periods of the Mesopotamian scribal context. In particular, it seems that the Enuma Elish Epic, composed in the later second millennium and synthesizing earlier traditions of varied kinds (e.g., the Anzu and Atrahasis Epics), became increasingly prominent across the first millennium BCE and particularly influenced later representations of primeval times.34 For example, Berossus’s Babylonian History, composed in the early third century, particularly reflects the version of creation seen in tablet VI of the Enuma Elish Epic.35

      The Limited Usefulness of the ‘Creation’ Category for Reading Gen 1–11

      The following commentary will explore more similarities and distinctions between texts in Gen 1–11 and their Mesopotamian (and other) counterparts. The point for now is to emphasize how the broader focus of the Gen 1–11 materials corresponds to the focus of many Mesopotamian primeval narratives on the overall origins of human city culture and specific temple cults as well. Both sets of material undermine a common contemporary conceptual division between cosmos-oriented “creation stories” on the one hand and other primeval stories on the other. Such an understanding assumes a semi-scientific division of the order of the natural world from social, ethnic, and other constructed orders (e.g., canals, cities), a division that was foreign to the world of the Bible.36 Where modern readers might separate off the seven-day account of Gen 1 or the Eden story of Gen 2–3 as being stories of “creation,” ancient authors and readers probably would have seen the entire primeval history of Gen 1–11, including its account of post-flood peoples and cities in Gen 10:1–11:9, as an overall account of the primeval origins of the audience’s natural-ethnic-social world.37

      Literary Stages in the Formation of Gen 1–11

      P, Non-P, and Models for their Relationship

      Two and a half centuries of scholarship have established a basic distinction in Gen 1–11 between a Priestly strand (often designated “P” in the following) starting in the seven-day creation account of Gen 1:1–2:3 and a non-Priestly strand (non-P; often termed “J”) starting with the garden of Eden story in Gen 2:4–3:24. The following commentary will argue for and develop this picture. The basic distinctions between these Priestly and non-Priestly materials have been established for over a century and will only be fine-tuned in minor respects across this commentary.

      Basic Shape of P and non-PIn most cases, the conflator who combined them seems to have preserved major blocks of each. From the P source, the conflator preserved the P creation account in Gen 1:1–2:3, Adam-to-Noah genealogy in most of Gen 5*,38 and the Shem-to-Abraham genealogy of Gen 11:10–26. From the non-P primeval history, the conflator preserved stories about first humans found in Gen 2:4b–4:26; the brief account of sons of God and daughters of humanity in Gen 6:1–4; the stories of Noah and his sons in 9:20–27; and building of Babylon in 11:1–9. Nevertheless, the conflator appears to have more finely interwoven P and non-P sources in two cases where P and non-P contained parallel materials: the story of the flood (Gen 6:5–9:17) and the overview of offspring of Noah’s sons (Gen 10). In general, across the primeval history the conflator appears to have preserved the P narrative as the primary structuring element, while non-P materials have been more selectively preserved and reorganized to supplement this Priestly substructure. That said, substantial portions of both P and non-P strata have been preserved, forming relatively readable parallel strands.39 Though the conflator occasionally eliminated portions of the non-P narrative in the process of producing a readable text, the combined P/non-P result still preserves enough of each source to produce relatively secure hypotheses about their original contents.

      Non-P = Post-P in Gen 1–11?Thus this commentary does not join with a number of recent studies that have argued for the post-Priestly, supplementary character of all or most of the non-P material in Gen 1–11. Starting in the late eighties, studies by Wenham (1987), Blenkinsopp (1992, 1995), Ska (1994), and Krüger (1997) argued that major portions of the non-P primeval history were post-Priestly expansions of the Priestly primeval history,40 and this approach was then developed extensively in several early twenty-first century monographs along with numerous essays.41 Overall, these studies have made significant contributions to our understanding of texts in Gen 1–11. Where many (including the present author) were once tempted to place the non-P (a.k.a. “Jahwistic”) primeval history in the early monarchal period, these more recent studies of the non-P primeval history materials have highlighted elements in it that point to a relatively later date, at least for portions of that history. Moreover, many of these studies have illuminated the character of the present (conflated) Gen 1–11 text by showing elegant ways in which the non-P parts of Gen 1–11 are selected and arranged in relation to the P materials that surround them.

      P and non-P conceived separately, not supplementarilyThat said, there still are strong indicators that the P and non-P strands in Gen 1–11 were originally composed separately before they were combined: the extensive doubling of P and non-P elements (not typical when redactional strata are added), the relative readability of both strands as originally independent sources, the existence of competing conceptual systems in P and non-P, and identifiable secondary attempts to harmonize those systems. These features will be discussed at more length in the following commentary.42

      P’s Relation to Non-PFurthermore, there are subtle indicators that P was partially modelled on corresponding parts of the non-P primeval history. To be sure, the narratives do not verbally parallel each other, and there is no locus where P cites non-P. In this sense, P is not a paraphrase of non-P nor is it a transformation of non-P in the manner of Chronicles vis-à-vis parts of Samuel–Kings. At the same time, the two strands are distinguished from other Near Eastern chronologies by a shared contrast in both narratives between the deity’s creation of an ideal initial creation order (P in Gen 1:1–2:3; non-P in Gen 2:4b–25) and then the disruption of that order by evil (non-P in Gen 3:1–4:24; P in Gen 6:11–13). Moreover, P’s depiction of the corruption of the earth by pre-flood violence (Gen 6:11–13; cf. 9:5–6) seems to adapt elements of the non-P depiction of events surrounding Cain’s pollution of the earth through the murder of his brother, Abel (Gen 4:8–14).43Across the following commentary I will discuss yet other elements in P that appear to have had their original home in the corresponding non-P narratives. These and other indicators suggest that the author(s) of P, though uninterested in providing an exact mirror of every element in non-P, had the non-P primeval history among its literary precursors.

      Layers and Dating of the Pre-P Primeval History

      The supplementary character of the non-P floodThis commentary will develop the case for one main, additional theory about the formation of the non-P strand: the idea that the non-P material in Gen 1–11 originally did not originally include a flood story. This idea was developed long ago in 1872 by Julius Wellhausen, largely on the basis of the fact that the etiology of various professions linked to Lamech’s sons in Gen 4:20–22 did not seem to presuppose that these sons and their descendants would be destroyed by a global flood.44 Ten years later Karl Budde offered a source version

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