How diverse is the pentateuch and what difference does it make Essay

How diverse is the pentateuch and what difference does it make - Essay Example In the Pentateuch, the Israelites were appointed as the chosen people of God and the beneficiary of the Ark of Covenant and laid down the foundation of the coming of the Messiah in the presence of Jesus Christ. II. Passages in the Bible that suggests Moses authorship of the Pentateuch There are several passages in the Pentateuch and the Bible that led to the initial conclusion that indeed Moses wrote the entire body of the Pentateuch. ... .'" Mark 7:10Â  "For instance, Moses gave you this law from God..." Mark 12:24Â  "...haven't you ever read about this in the writings of Moses, in the story of the burning bush..." Luke 24:44Â  "...I told you that everything written about me by Moses and the prophets and in the Psalms must all come true." John 1:17Â  "For the law was given through Moses..." John 5:46Â  "But if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me because he wrote about me. And since you don't believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?" John 7:23Â  "...do it, so as not to break the law of Moses..." Acts 26:22Â  "...I teach nothing except what the prophets and Moses said would happen..." Romans 10:5Â  "For Moses wrote..." III. Was the Pentateuch a work of a single author (by Moses) or an anthology of diverse material? It is easy to conclude that the first five books of the Bible were written by Moses given the above Biblical passages suggestion that Moses wrote the entire Pentateuch. Also, the Books were attributed to him not to mention that he was a central figure to it. A close examination on the Pentateuch by scholars beginning in the eighteenth century however led them to conclude that the Pentateuch is not written by a single author, or by Moses alone as the traditional thinking suggests, but rather an anthology of diverse materials. Evidences that Pentateuch is not written by a single author When critical literary analysis was applied to the Pentateuch, it was found that the five books contained numerous duplications, broad diversity of writing style and even contrasting view points. The discovery of the duplication of the texts in the body of Pentateuch led scholars to study that the first five books had its own history of composition (Campbell and O’Brian 3-4). The