SOURCE: "Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy" in A Complete Literary Guide to the "Bible," edited by Leland Ryken and Tremper Longman III, Zondervan Publishing House, 1993, pp. 121-36.

[In the essay that follows, Baroody and Gentrup examine the literary structure of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy in order to establish the complex interrelationship between their narrative elements and the presentation of Torah as law.]

The life of Moses, from his birth and early years in the opening of Exodus to his death and legacy at the close of Deuteronomy, provides the narrative frame for most of the Pentateuch. As distinguished from Genesis, which encompasses a human history of at least four thousand years, these four monumental books, after the first two chapters of Exodus, span a period of only forty years, from Moses' calling at age 80 until his death at age 120.

A marvelous collection of narrative and law is concentrated within this time frame. Nothing short of an epiclike birth and odyssey of a nation, achieved by the divine agency of spectacular miracles, is recounted here. Its whole legal and religious constitution is also included, a narrative strategy that is roughly equivalent to setting a country's legislative and theological principles within the biography of its founder. Through its fascinating combination of story and statute, these books, anticipating Horace, teach and delight simultaneously. The events of Moses' life and the emergence of Israel into nationhood are presented as a series of encounters and dialogues with God, whose main plan, through personal revelation in the form of miracles and laws, is to restore his people to the divine image and companionship of creation (Gen. 1:26-27; 3:8-9).

Literary critics with a background in Western literature tend to view these books, especially Exodus, as an epic (at least epiclike) and to compare them to the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid, and Paradise Lost. Richard Moulton, whose Literary Study of the Bible in its 1895 and 1899 editions can justly be regarded as the first major modern work emphasizing purely literary analysis of the Bible, is associated with this view. Its most persuasive advocate is Leland Ryken, who detects in Exodus the epic conventions of a journey and founding of a nation, supernatural intervention and machinery, a central national hero, a basis in history, the values and experiences of an entire society, and what he calls "type scenes" and "high style" (Words 127-35; see also Literature). As an epic hero Moses best parallels Virgil's Aeneas: both figures require divine persuasion to obey their calling to found a nation, both continually receive divine direction, and both perform religious worship. The most recent tendency, however, has been to follow Robert Alter's Art of Biblical Narrative (1981) in considering narrative without comparison to classical epic (see also Steinberg).

Both the Romans and the Hebrews were also known for their fully developed legal systems. A major difference, however, is that the national epic of the Romans is wholly narrative; its laws must be found in separate official documents, whereas the story of the founding of the Hebrew nation is replete with law, so much so that the traditional understanding of the Pentateuch as books of instruction (i.e., Torah) neglected its narrative features. It is the significant contribution of modern critics to have called attention to the literary quality of Hebrew narrative, which, nevertheless, some have regarded as primarily a framework for the presentation of law.

Narrative and Law

The books of Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy certainly do constitute a marvelous unity of narrative and legislative genres, a fusion expressing indirectly the biblical axiom that principles and actions are inseparable. Earlier combinations occur in the creation and patriarchal accounts in Genesis, but the pattern is particularly developed in these latter four books, in which the juridical often predominates.

Literary critics of biblical and Jewish literature, such as Edward Greenstein (84) and Barry Holtz ("Midrash" 178-79), have increasingly recognized the interrelationship between these seemingly distinct genres. The point is perhaps more easily understood when Torah or law is translated "instruction" or "teaching." Joel Rosenburg describes how narrative is frequently "a didactic prop for the laws" and how laws often appear as "events" in the narrative (65). David Damrosch considers this mixture in the Pentateuch "the most important generic innovation of its age" (Narrative Covenant 35-37). This hybrid genre sometimes adds poetry (e.g., Ex. 15; Deut. 32) and prophecy (e.g., Ex. 34:11-17; Lev. 26:32-46; Deut. 18:15). Other scholars focus on distinct genres. Leland Ryken identifies Exodus 1-20 and 32-34, Numbers 10-14 and 20-24, and Deuteronomy 10 and 34 as the "main narrative sections" (Words 130). Leonard Thompson recognizes the acknowledged law codes as Exodus 20-23, 25-31, and 34:10-27, all of Leviticus, and Deuteronomy 12-26 (154).

Exodus

Reflecting this broader pattern in the four books, there are two main parts to Exodus: the primary narrative (chs. 1-19) describing Moses' early life and calling, the ten plagues and subsequent liberation from Egyptian bondage, and the journey to Mount Sinai; and the legal material pertaining to the giving of the Ten Commandments and to tabernacle worship (chs. 20-40). Each part contains insertions of the other genre, mixing storytelling and lawgiving. J. P. Fokkelman outlines the major alternations of these (56-58).

The combination of the tenth plague and Passover is a clear example. The narrative first announces the certain deaths of the firstborn of humans and livestock (ch. 11), except of those who observe the elaborate instructions of Passover. YHWH's people must take an unblemished lamb one-year old and roast and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. On this first occasion, they must apply the lamb's blood to the doorposts and lintels of their dwellings and consume the meal after clothing and preparing themselves for immediate departure from Egypt. These and other details are to be observed in perpetuity (12:1-28).

The rest of the account shifts back to narrating the terrible fulfillment of the plague on the Egyptians and the Israelites' flight from the land (12:29-42) but returns briefly at the end to proscriptions against the participation of uncircumcised "foreigners" or "strangers" in the Passover. This is a logical digression, since for the first time in at least eighty years Israel was liberated from slavery to the uncircumcised. Laws for consecrating the firstborn follow, inserted here rather than being included with subsequent ones because the tenth plague was based on the value of the firstborn (13:1-2, 11-16). After the Passover account, the Exodus begins, signaled by a return to narrative. The pursuing Egyptians destroyed at the Red Sea, the miracle supplies of manna and water, the war with Amalek, the appointment of judges on Jethro's advice, and the arrival at Sinai are then recounted (chs. 16-19).

The second part of Exodus focuses on legal instructions, beginning when the Lord dispenses the Ten Commandments (20:1-20) and the "Book of the Covenant" (20:21-23:33), a series of laws that clarifies the Decalogue and begins and ends with prescriptions about worship that anticipate those related to the building and equipping of the tabernacle (25-31, 35-40). Within these passages there are also alternations between narrative and legislative material. Just as the primarily narrative first half of Exodus had been interrupted by the lengthy legislative Passover section, so, conversely, the primarily legal second half is relieved by the story of the idolatry of the golden calf (chs. 32-34).

The episode dovetails well with the material that precedes and follows it, namely, the instructions for proper tabernacle worship (chs. 25-31) and their later repetition in the construction narrative (chs. 35-40). The topic of true worship unifies each segment. Although the Hebrews have been liberated from Egypt and have experienced other miracles, they readily seek to worship another god. While Moses is on Mount Sinai receiving the instructions for the tabernacle, the people revolt and command Aaron, "Make us gods." Ironically, the gold and silver used for the image, part of the spoils taken from the Egyptians, were intended for the furnishing of the tabernacle (36:2-7). The jewelry specified, earrings, symbolizes the people's failure to use their ears properly in hearing YHWH's words as they promised (19:7-8).

In contrast to the detailed account of the tabernacle, Aaron makes the calf very quickly—in less than a sentence: "I cast it [the gold] into the fire, and there came out this calf' (Josipovici's translation, 97). (Aaron's passive posture and self-defensive tone, Gabriel Josipovici observes, recalls that of Adam blaming his fall on Eve [97].) The figure of the idol recalls the cattle that had such a prominent role in the conflict with Pharaoh, who refused to let the Israelites leave Egypt to sacrifice properly to YHWH (Ex. 3:18; 5:3-17; 8:8-29) and anticipates the calf idol of Jeroboam (I Kings 12:25-33).

Although the account of the fashioning of the false image is terse, "the narrative lovingly lingers on every detail of the making of the Tabernacle" (Josipovici 96-97; see also his whole treatment of the subject, 90-107). The earlier call in Egypt to proper worship is consummated at the close of Exodus when the tabernacle has been built and the Lord's presence inhabits it. The account represents the lengthiest use of repeated description in the Pentateuch or any book of the Bible, rivaled only by the related one of the temple of Solomon, first commanded to David (2 Sam. 7; 17:1-15; 28:11-29; 1 Chron. 21:28-22:19) and later constructed by Solomon (I Kings 5-8; 2 Chron. 2-7).

The description of the tabernacle moves from the interior to the exterior. First described is the Holy of Holies with its ark, tablets of the Ten Commandments, cherubim, and mercy seat; then the features of the Holy Place, the table of shewbread, lampstand, and altar of incense; and finally the outer court with its bronze altar. When repeating all this information in the actual construction, the account switches to a narrative format (chs. 35-40). Thus, the repeated third-person perspective: "he [or, 'they'] did … as the Lord had commanded Moses." This second version has an exterior-to-interior organization. The building of the whole tabernacle is described first, then its smaller units, such as the inner sanctuary. This is, of course, the reverse of the original instructions, a pattern of repetition that results in a chiastic structure for chapters 20-40, the description of Holy of Holies-exterior courts-exterior courts-Holy of Holies.

By ending with the construction of the tabernacle, the book of Exodus concludes precisely in contrast to its beginning. Whereas in Egypt the Israelites were enslaved, with no opportunity to worship their God, now they are free and able to serve him. The penultimate words of the book fittingly encapsulate what has been the goal of all the building effort: "So Moses finished the work. Then a cloud covered the tent, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle" (40:33-34).

Later readers have commonly associated the tabernacle of Exodus with creation, the ark of Noah, and Solomon's stone temple. The links are ancient; they are assumed at least as early as Philo and Josephus (Josipovici 95, 99-102). The New Testament book of Hebrews also features the tabernacle and portrays Jesus as fulfilling the sacrifice and priesthood systems of the Pentateuch.

Leviticus and Numbers

While Exodus decrees the structure of the tabernacle and outfits the priesthood that functions there, Leviticus records YHWH's commands about the sacrificial system (chs. 1-7) and the ritual holiness he requires (chs. 11-17). The narrative passage between these two sets of laws unites them and serves to distinguish between true and false worship (chs. 8-10).

Here is recounted how Moses consecrates Aaron and his sons according to the divine directions of Exodus 29, after which Aaron properly offers sacrifice. Immediately, however, his two sons, Nadab and Abihu, offer the "strange fire" specifically prohibited in Exodus 30:9 and are themselves consumed by fire. Because the incident involves sacrifice, it relates to the content of the first set of laws, and because the mysterious sin of Aaron's sons reflects on their moral character, it also relates to the second set. The episode illustrates perfectly the overall role of law in the Bible. In Leviticus, Damrosch says, "the law is represented in its ideal, fully functioning from, the best model against which to assess the complicated uses and misuses of law by characters throughout Old Testament narratives" ("Leviticus" 66).

Although nearly all readers have seen this interlude as the book's only narrative, several scholars have recently examined laws that seem to share those generic features. For example, in his discussion of levitical burnt offerings, Damrosch suggests that the different kinds of sacrifices permitted, depending on economic status—bullock, lamb or goat, dove or pigeon—are "instances of narrative variety within the ritual order" ("Leviticus" 66-69). The tripart discription of each type of offering and certain repeated phrases such as "sweet savour unto the LORD" confer even a lyrical and dramatic quality to these laws.

Numbers is a narrative and a supplemental lawbook between the sacramental lawbook of Leviticus and the social lawbook of Deuteronomy. It recounts the journey of the emerging nation from Sinai to the eastern side of Jordan, where it is about to enter the Promised Land. Here the mixed form of narrative and legal material is particularly striking and elaborate. The dozen major shifts back and forth, not counting the short passages of narrative implementation within the legal sections, are almost dizzying. Jacob Milgrom (xv-xvii) identifies the major alternations between narrative (N) and law (L) as follows: 1-10:10 (L) 10:11-14:45 (N); 15 (L); 16-17 (N); 18-19 (L); 20-25 (N); 26-27:11 (L); 27:12-23 (N); 28-30 (L); 31-33:49 (N); 33:50-56; 34-36 (L). The alternating sections entail two major topics—God's continuing elaboration of his principles and, despite his meticulous care, the sustained murmuring and rebellion of his people.

YHWH's additional statutes are decreed at major stations along the way, for example, at Sinai, where Passover is again observed (1-10:10), at Kadesh (chs. 15, 18-19), and at Moab (chs. 28-30, 34-36). Sometimes a new law is introduced to meet a specific need, as with the daughters of the deceased Zelophehad to insure their family inheritance (27:1-11), a provision later repeated in the closing chapter and applied generally to other heiresses (36).

Within Numbers the main narratives tell of rebellion, recalling the ones in Exodus. Those who resist YHWH and Moses include Miriam and Aaron (ch. 12), Korah (chs. 16-17), the elder generation of Israelites who refuse to enter the land (chs. 13-14), and the new generation who, just as they are about to enter it, worship Baal-Peor (ch. 25). The most significant episode is the refusal to enter this land of "milk and honey," figs, pomegranates, and grapes so huge that two men are needed to carry one cluster (ch. 13). The report that the present inhabitants are giants next to whom "we were in our own sight as grasshoppers" causes the congregation to reject the enthusiastic belief of Caleb and Joshua that they can win the land. For this disobedience they are forbidden to enter it, and instead, ironically, their children, whom they claimed would die victims in the desert, will fulfill the national destiny.

In contrast to this dispiriting incident, successes are also recounted, such as the conquest of Sihon, king of the Amorites, and Og, king of Bashan (ch. 21), and the turning of the attempted curses of the prophet Balaam into blessings (chs. 22-24).

Deuteronomy

The fifth book of the Pentateuch follows the pattern of narrative and legal combination as Moses recapitulates to the new generation their salvation history (chs. 1-11) and then elaborates upon the social significance of the law (chs. 12-30). As Jacob Milgrom summarizes, "By the admixture of these two genres," Deuteronomy is "a parade example of this literary type" (xvi). After the people recite the detailed list of curses for disobedience and of blessings for obedience to YHWH (chs. 27-30), Moses commissions Joshua as his successor (ch. 31) and sings a song of celebration (ch. 32). Now 120 years old, he views the land from Mount Nebo, a land that he, like his generation, cannot enter, and then, like Jacob in Genesis, blesses each of the tribes (ch. 33). The final brief narrative records his death and eulogizes him, avowing that the people have finally learned to obey divinely appointed leadership in the case of Joshua (ch. 34).

The book does not proceed chronologically but in the reverse order of preceding material: from the wilderness journeys of Numbers back to the two presentations of the Decalogue in Exodus. This is an appropriate order for the new generation, its intended audience. Moses recalls their recent experience before charging them with the law and describing events before they were born. The structure of Deuteronomy presents itself in chiasmic relationship with the previous three books, particularly Exodus and Numbers.

Blessings and Cursings

The pattern of alternation between narrative and law throughout these four books is supplemented by a series of blessings and curses. These naturally culminate in Deuteronomy as the people are about to enter their land. Each book closes with a blessing that is dependent on right worship and the avoidance of idols and images, as Leviticus 26 makes clear. Otherwise, disastrous results are assured.

At the end of Exodus Moses blesses the nation for completing the tabernacle (39:43), and afterwards, the habitation of the Lord's glory within it furnishes a nonverbal blessing (40:34). Numbers begins with the blessing of the people by the priests (6:24-27) and concludes with the blessings of Balaam who was hired to curse Israel (chs. 22-24). The blessings of the narrative in Deuteronomy (chs. 7 and 11) include the promise that remembrance and obedience will bring about "the days of heaven upon the earth" (11:21). The most extensive blessings and curses occur after the law is restated and the nation is gathered on Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim to repeat them responsively (chs. 27-28). After a song of Moses, longer than his celebration after crossing the Red Sea forty years before, the leader pronounces blessings on each of the tribes (chs. 32-33). These benefits are implementations of the priestly blessing commanded by YHWH himself:

The Lord bless thee, and keep thee:
The Lord make his face shine upon thee,
    and be gracious unto thee:
The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee,
    and give thee peace.
(Num. 6:24-27)

Stylistic Arrangements of Laws

The laws on a particular subject in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy are rarely codified in one place but appear in at least two books, often in three, or even all four. To find all that the Pentateuch has to say on a subject, the various particulars and details of a legal topic must be gathered together. In other words, the commands are not fully expounded in a logically arranged legal treatise. This lack of organization produces a pattern like a weaving or a tapestry.

The format of commandments is also relevant to their interpretation. They are structured according to two basic formulas, absolute or conditional, and the former varies additionally according to a negative or positive pattern, slightly similar to the parallelism of Hebrew verse, which amplifies statements through the means of complement, development, or antithesis.

The laws or teachings begun in Exodus and concluded in Deuteronomy, then, are of two kinds, absolute or apodictic ones, usually introduced by the contrasting formulas "Thou shalt" or "Thou shalt not," and conditional or casuistic ones, expressed in a narrative form, such as "If a man [does this], then [this will happen]." The Decalogue illustrates the apodictic kind in contrasting forms, three positive and seven negative. Although most of the Ten Commandments are stated negatively, the introduction and central laws uniting commitment to God and to the human family are stated affirmatively: "I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage," "Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy," and "Honor thy father and thy mother." Then follow the remaining negations: not to kill, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness, or covet.

Brief commands of this kind are often embellished by a positive/negative pattern. For example, the prescription "Judges and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates" is a positive command requiring judges in all cities in all of the tribes to be "just," but this is followed by two negative warnings against favoritism and bribery and then by a final reminder to be "just" (Deut. 16:18-20). Thus, the law is given four times, developed by parallel negative statements in a parallel positive frame.

Other series of laws are usually arranged to achieve variety by alternating absolute and conditional forms. Sometimes the casuistic instructions are brief, and sometimes they treat a specific topic at length. Those found in Deuteronomy 22 are good examples. Observing the usual pattern, the passage starts with the absolute type of command (two in this case), followed by two conditional ones, then a series of absolute commands, and an even longer series of conditional ones; it concludes with a terse absolute command.

More specifically, the first precept combines a negative-positive (shalt not-shalt) formulation for variety: "Thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt in any case bring them again to thy brother." Then a number of conditional and absolute clarifications are added, such as if the unfortunate person does not live near or is unknown, one is expected to retain the lost goods until they are claimed (vv. 1-4). This rather lengthy command is succeeded by a briefer absolute one about distinctions between male and female dress (v. 5). Two conditional situations ensue: if a bird's nest is discovered and there are young in it, the mother bird must be spared for she is needed by her youth (vv. 6-7); and when building a new house, a battlement or railing must be built for the roof so that no one can fall from it (v. 8). A series of absolute laws then condemns other mixtures, like those against which the above gendered-dress codes were based, to represent the divine insistence against any kind of compromise with pagan practice and to reemphasize the divine distinctions of creation. Thus vineyards may not be planted with mixed seed, nor plowing be done with both an ox and an ass, nor wool and linen be combined in the composition of clothes (vv. 9-12). The last is combined with the absolute command that fringes or tefillin be worn on the borders of the garments. This is succeeded by a series of "if" conditions about marriage and chastity, concluding with the law that if a man has sexual relations with a single woman he is required to compensate her father and must marry her for a lifelong union (vv. 13-28). And there is a final absolute statement that no man shall abuse his father's wife (v. 30).

Scholars and critics have been puzzled by the seeming lack of logical or literary unity among various topics addressed in legal sequences and have found each other's explanations unsatisfactory. Victor Hamilton summarizes the attempts by Gerhard von Rad, Moshe Weinfeld, Norman Geisler, Calum Carmichael, and S. Kaufmann, for example, at configuring some sort of inherent order in the laws (415-18). But instead of solutions based on models outside of or elsewhere in the Pentateuch, as some of the above critics propose, the unity of a collection of laws might well be assumed. The juxtaposition of assorted commandments suggests a subtle relationship. Their miscellaneousness itself may be the unifying principle. Chapter 22 just discussed is such a passage.

An analogy to this type of organization is that of the great American poet Walt Whitman in section 15 of "Song of Myself." This section shares the structure and many of the same details as Deuteronomy 22. For example, in the first nine lines Whitman combines images of a contralto singing from the organ loft with a carpenter dressing his plank and singing with his plane, the married and the unmarried celebrating a festival dinner, the hunter of wild birds seeking his prey, deacons being ordained at an altar, spinning girls making clothes, and farmers observing their growing grain.

The subsequent lines in the section, and Leaves of Grass as a whole, achieve just what chapter 22 and the whole book of Deuteronomy do: they give insight into how unrelated elements may be associated. Both continually mix the obviously divine and sacred with the ordinary and common, the social hierarchy with the simplest occupations of each human being. Some of the elements in "Song of Myself" may even allude to Deuteronomy. Whitman refers to making a roof, to the one-year honeymoon, to various forms of sexual expression and, like the Bible, to the ideals of family life. Both proclaim the unity of life and the sanctity of every part and aspect of it. Walt Whitman's "I make holy whatever I touch" expresses the spirit of Deuteronomy. God's attention to the seemingly insignificant and disparate details of life sanctifies them. Together, they affirm the call of everyone and of every activity to be holy.

The commandments in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy develop, comment on, or expand the Decalogue. The tradition is that 248 are positive ("Thou shalt") and 365 are negative ("Thou shalt not"), thus making up 613 commandments. (Jesus reduces these 613 to two commandments in Matthew 22:37-39). Any given topic may be expressed by what "thou shalt" or what "thou shalt not" do. For example, there are 53 positive commands about sacrifices offered to God and 69 negative ones, 19 mandatory commandments about the temple and 22 prohibitions. Food, festivals, agriculture, commerce, justice, and all personal and community activity receive similar parallel treatment (Wigoder 129-39). Such a lengthy list of laws on these subjects reflects the consciousness of the holiness of all of life.

Literary Devices

Repetition is the chief literary device of the Pentateuch, indeed of the entire Old Testament. The series of plagues upon Egypt and the pattern of repeated deliverance from them illustrate the method. So too does the series of rebellions, judgments, and deliverances during the journey of the Hebrews to the Promised Land, a pattern repeated in the book of Judges and in the prophets until the nation goes into captivity, as recorded in 2 Kings.

Robert Browning's The Ring and the Book and William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying provide analogues for repeating episodes or parts of a story from new or different perspectives. Both authors narrate the same events in these works from the points of view of different characters. Similarly and specifically, repetition in Deuteronomy gains in perspective from retelling material after forty years of wandering and from the contrast between the people's point of view and Moses'.

Three times in his opening address of Deuteronomy Moses tells the congregation, "The LORD was angry with me for your sakes" (1:37; 3:26; 4:21) due to their behavior recounted in Exodus and Numbers. They provoked YHWH "from the day that thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt, until ye came unto this place" and "ye have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you" (9:7, 24). The suggestion is that Moses feels his punishment at being forbidden to enter the Promised Land is not primarily due to his own failure but to his frustration brought about by them. In Numbers the emphasis is clearly on Moses' own culpability, on his harsh outcry at Horeb and his disobedience in striking, instead of speaking to, the rock to bring forth water, as he had done earlier at Massah in Exodus 17.

Through the device of repetition Deuteronomy provides other fresh perspectives and details on previously recorded actions. For example, Moses interceded not only for the people when the golden calf was made but also for Aaron, with whom the Lord was "very angry" (9:20; cf. Ex. 32). We discover for the first time that Moses, not only Joshua and Caleb, had addressed the people when they rejected their destination and had encouraged them to remember their miraculous deliverance out of Egypt and their divine preservation in the wilderness when God cared for them as a father cares for a son (1:21-23). Also new is the information that while heeding the advice of his father-in-law Jethro about appointing judges, Moses himself had anticipated this need and gave careful instructions to the appointees (1:9-18). We hear more of his activities, exhortations to obedience, and warnings, especially against idolatry.

We also hear more about YHWH in Deuteronomy and are given more commentary on earlier episodes. In the conquest of Sihon, king of the Amorites, a victory often recalled in the Old Testament, we learn that Moses himself sent messengers to that ruler, whereas in the account in Numbers only Israel the nation is mentioned. Israel's role in this event, presumed to be divinely ordained, is specifically ascribed to YHWH in Deuteronomy, and the conquest is associated with the deliverance from Egypt. Sihon's resistance is like Pharaoh's. The Lord "hardened his spirit, and made his heart obstinate," and he provided victory for the Hebrews over him (Deut. 2:26-37).

Another form of repetition involves codes of law. Sometimes they are briefly interrupted or slightly changed, as in the two receptions of the Decalogue and the two accounts of the tabernacle in Exodus. The most extended case is the two parts of Deuteronomy: the first, as already discussed, restates Israel's history, while the second, giving the book its Greek name, repeats the whole law, adding new provisions on specific subjects. In most cases the repeated version involves significant modifications, elaborations, and differences in focus from the first, and these help complete the sacred history and teaching. For example, there is a new emphasis on rejoicing in, not just obeying, YHWH (12:7, 12, 18; 14:26; 16:11, 14-15; 26:11; 27:7). Another form of repetition is a summary, and Deuteronomy is able, fittingly, as the final legal book, to encapsulate the whole law in the familiar shema: "Hear, 0 Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: and thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might" (6:4-5).

The legal material in Exodus and Deuteronomy has much in common, but it is arranged differently and the contexts are different. J. A. Thompson provides a list of parallel laws for the two books (25-30). Exodus, with its proximity to the tabernacle and Leviticus, emphasizes worship; Deuteronomy emphasizes personal and social relationships.

Other literary devices are irony and reversal. The abject slavery of the Hebrews and the decree for the deaths of male newborn as Exodus opens is the complete reversal of the great favor enjoyed by Joseph and Jacob and all his family at the close of Genesis. There is, however, the irony that the future deliverer of the people will be spared and even brought up in the household of Pharaoh by the intervention of his daughter. The self-efforts of the young Moses to help his people only result in his rejection and exile for forty years.

Ironically, only when he is thoroughly convinced of his inadequacies, which he exhibits by arguing against YHWH's call, can he lead the nation to liberty. A crueler irony perhaps consists in Moses' final failure. After his great patience with the rebellious Israelites for forty years and the three times he interceded with the Lord to spare their impending annihilation, the "meekest of men" loses his temper, and he, like the adult generation, misses the Promised Land.

Despite God's special miracles on their behalf, the daily supernatural manifestations of the daytime pillar of cloud and the nighttime pillar of fire, the presence of God in the tabernacle, and the daily provision of manna, the people still grumble, complain, rebel, and apostatize. The explicit irony involved consists of the comparison made between the ten occasions when Egypt's pharaoh rejected YHWH's demands in the account of the ten plagues in Exodus and the "ten times" his own nation rejected him (Num. 14:22).

Most ironic of all is the people's rejection of the real meaning of the central events of their history: the Creation and the Exodus. The first affirms their companionship with God by being created in his image. The second, the Exodus, proclaims the freedom of his people to be true worshipers of the only true God. The persistent underlying message of these four books is that human beings are the only ordained image of divinity. By rejecting the original "image and likeness" in themselves, human beings are doomed to seek in various forms of idolatry and false worship an image of God.

There are also, however, affirmative ironies and reversals. Thus, in Numbers 22-24 Balaam tries three times to curse Israel but instead blesses them. There is even a comic element to the story in the prophet's failure to perceive an angel blocking his path whom his donkey can see. Finally, God reminds his people, as in Deuteronomy, that they do not enter the Land of Promise because of their greatness or righteousness. They are indeed the least of peoples, selected to show God's glory, and have been most unfaithful, but the Lord loves them and wishes to fulfill his promises to their fathers (7:7-8; 9:4-8).

Themes

As Martin Buber and Abraham Heschel have observed, the major goals of the whole Old Testament are the celebration of the human race and the realization of intimacy between God and humankind. Even those who emphasize that the Pentateuch's primary concern is to reveal God's greatness, not man's, recognize that salvation is the "characteristic activity" of God (Cole 28). God wishes his people to enjoy him and to be his friends and stewards of creation. In Genesis the companionship theme is developed through individuals and families in the figures of Adam and Eve, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In the next four pentateuchal books this concept is expanded to a whole nation.

YHWH's chief means of establishing this intimacy between himself and his people is the institution of laws and a system of worship. His deliverance of Israel from slavery (Ex. 1-15), the provision for his physical presence (chs. 25-40), his sustaining them (Numbers), and the declaration of his principles (Leviticus and Deuteronomy) exemplify this divine desire for relationship. Such intimacy requires, most of all, holiness. Through the law, every detail of life is sacramentalized. As YHWH states in Exodus 31:3 and over and over again in Leviticus, he intends to "make holy" this representative people. Victor Hamilton appropriately observes that even "Leviticus describes a holiness that applies to everyone," not just to priests, "a holiness within the reach of all, out of the reach of none" (245-46).

The main way God's people can show their loyalty and reciprocal desire for intimacy with him is through the avoidance of idolatry. One of the first commands of the Decalogue, spoken in YHWH's own voice (just as he spoke to Adam and Eve in the Garden) is "I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me" and "Thou shalt not make thee any graven image or any likeness of anything …" (Ex. 20:2, 4).

So intense is the condemnation of idolatry that it engages much of Moses' later commentary on the first dispensation of the commandments (Deut. 5-9). To worship other gods will result in destruction "from off the face of the earth" (6:14-15) instead of the promised blessings, which include the absence of "all sickness" (7:12-16). False images must be destroyed by fire and no vestige retained, not even the silver or gold on them: "for it is an abomination to the LORD thy God" (7:25). Even if a prophet, family member, "or thy friend who is as thine own soul" suggests worshiping a false god, that person must be executed (ch. 13). Moses says of such worshipers that "they sacrificed unto devils, not to God" (32:17). (Milton's view of the false gods in Paradise Lost, books 1 and 2 especially, derives from passages such as this.) Prohibition of idolatry is just as strong a thematic interest in later biblical books.

Anticipating the New Testament's two greatest commandments, worshiping and obeying God must be concurrent with love and care for others, which may be summarized thus: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself: I am the LORD" (Lev. 19:17). This is the theme of the second half of the Decalogue, of some concluding commandments of Exodus and Leviticus, and especially of the second half of Deuteronomy.

Loving God is inseparable from loving others, which the numerous provisions for the poor, the widow, and the orphan affirm, as do the many allusions designating others as "brother" or "neighbor." The order to rescue and return any lost or endangered possession of another (22:1-4), the requirement to leave some of any harvest behind for those in need (24:19-22), the right to satisfy one's hunger in any field or vineyard but not to take more food than is needed (23:24-25), and the command not to embarrass by repossession (24:10-11) illustrate the biblical responsibility for others' welfare and reputation treated in these books. As Nahum Sama observes, there is also a strong emphasis on caring for the stranger, usually accompanied by the statement "Remember you were once strangers in Egypt" (4-5). Because of these provisions, Thomas Henry Huxley, the champion of agnosticism, claimed that the code of Deuteronomy transcends the most humane considerations of modern law.

Conclusion

The mass of Scripture that comprises Exodus through Deuteronomy is traditionally read either for its legal content (Torah) or for its remarkable narratives, rarely both together. Later retellings of the Passover and the Exodus, for instance, testify to their inherent narrative appeal and historical applicability; in Dante's letter to his patron comparing the allegory of The Divine Comedy to an allegorical interpretation of the exodus from Egypt, in the American slave song "Go Down, Moses," and in the film The Ten Commandments, for example. On the other hand, the long tradition of Jewish commentary on the legal portions of these books testifies to their importance distinct from the narrative content. The literary approach taken here has attempted to give due attention to both genres and to consider their interrelationship. A literary approach to these books combines the traditionally Jewish focus on the law and the traditionally Christian concentration on the narrative parts that the New Testament especially allegorizes. A literary approach takes account of all that is there.

What is found in Exodus through Deuteronomy is a sophisticated patterning of both narrative and legal sections, which often serve each other as "breaks" or shifts. A mixing of genres seems to be the norm, unlike the neoclassical disdain for it. The combinations often follow either a chiastic or an A-B-A pattern, that is, a narrative passage relieved by a legal one and succeeded by another narrative text, or vice versa. Another organizational device operating in the arrangement of laws could be designated discordia concors, a harmony in disunity. The miscellaneous variety of these ordinances embraces all of human experience and calls all of it to the life of holiness. Every detail of life is sacramentalized.

It is these two elements of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—the legal component, which addresses humanity's need for righteousness, and the narrative one, which describes the miraculous saving acts of God that give proof to the covenant on which that righteousness is founded—that together reveal YHWH's plan in these books to restore his people to the divine image and companionship purposed in creation.

Works Cited

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Damrosch, David. The Narrative Covenant. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987.

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