Richard Elliott Friedman just wrong on Levite Exodus

I had seen his book to that end a year ago at a library, briefly grokked it, then put it back on the shelf as I found it untenable.

Then, someone who left a comment on a Goodreads review of mine referred me to a blog link of his about the "Kenite hypothesis" for the origin of Yahweh, and made extensive reference to Richard Elliott Friedman.

With a link to this blog post by Friedman.

Several issues, some of which I told said blogger, go directly to Friedman.

First, the fact that Levites have Egyptian names means nothing. So did Moses, as Friedman as well as said blogger claim, and Moses never existed. And, I think Friedman also rejects claims of Moses' historicity.

Second, I've never before heard the E strand of the Torah called "Levite."

Third, while I lean toward some version of the documentary hypothesis, I know that fragmentary hypothesis modifications and tendrils are part of the history of the writing of sections of the Torah.

Fourth, claiming that something like omission of most Exodus plagues by the current J means he never wrote about them? Arguments from omission or silence on textual criticism and higher criticism are untenable by nature and often simply wrong.

Fifth, as Friedman knows, the relations between Levites and priesthood, and the nature of the priesthood and its putative origins, are more complex than he puts forth at times. It's more than simple opposition between self-identified followers of Moses and self-identified followers of Aaron — who is also, of course, not a historical person.

Sixth, Egypt-type ideas are borrowed in biblical books outside the Torah. Isaiah 9 so beloved of Christians is lifted from Egyptian coronation language.

So, I'm glad in a sense I didn't read his book, and he should be glad, too.

And, I must have missed this when I read Friedman's "Who Wrote the Books of the Bible?" No, P didn't write in the time of Hezekiah. That's simply incorrect. So is his reasoning why. If there was no historic Moses and no historic exodus, there is no bronze serpent Nehushtan created by Moses and venerated by Moses-followers for Hezekiah to have destroyed in the name of Aaronic followers.

This would be like Dominicans claiming the Shroud of Turin was created by St. Dominic and the current pope destroying it to uplift Franciscans.

In reality, the whole idea sounds like certain parts of the nation of Judah appropriating an old Canaanite snake cult, or such a cult surviving from the rise of Israel before Judah's invasion, or something like that, and attaching the name of Moses to it.

Friedman is apparently more of a "maximalist" within the realm of modern historical criticism than I realized.

As for the blogger?

As I said there, the "Kenite hypothesis" of how Judah came to worship Yahweh is not directly contradictory to the etymology of the name "Yahweh."