Van Seters' Source Division of Exodus 19-20

One bite at a time, I'm going to try to understand John Van Seters' view on Exodus 19-20 in his Life of Moses. In this post, I will feature his division of sources, which is on page 251. J will be italicized, and P will be in boldface. I will use the King James Version.

Exodus 19

¹In the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of Sinai.

²For they were departed from Rephidim, and were come to the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness; and there Israel camped before the mount.

³And Moses went up unto God, and the LORD called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel;

⁴Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself.

⁵Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine:

⁶And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.

⁷And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before their faces all these words which the LORD commanded him.

⁸And all the people answered together, and said, All that the LORD hath spoken we will do. And Moses returned the words of the people unto the LORD.

⁹And the LORD said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee for ever. And Moses told the words of the people unto the LORD.

¹⁰And the LORD said unto Moses, Go unto the people, and sanctify them to day and to morrow, and let them wash their clothes,

¹¹And be ready against the third day: for the third day the LORD will come down in the sight of all the people upon mount Sinai.

¹²And thou shalt set bounds unto the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, that ye go not up into the mount, or touch the border of it: whosoever toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death:

¹³There shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether it be beast or man, it shall not live: when the trumpet soundeth long, they shall come up to the mount.

¹⁴And Moses went down from the mount unto the people, and sanctified the people; and they washed their clothes.

¹⁵And he said unto the people, Be ready against the third day: come not at your wives.

¹⁶And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; so that all the people that was in the camp trembled.

¹⁷And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God; and they stood at the nether part of the mount.

¹⁸And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the LORD descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.

¹⁹And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice.

²⁰And the LORD came down upon mount Sinai, on the top of the mount: and the LORD called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up.

²¹And the LORD said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto the LORD to gaze, and many of them perish.

²²And let the priests also, which come near to the LORD, sanctify themselves, lest the LORD break forth upon them.

²³And Moses said unto the LORD, The people cannot come up to mount Sinai: for thou chargedst us, saying, Set bounds about the mount, and sanctify it.

²⁴And the LORD said unto him, Away, get thee down, and thou shalt come up, thou, and Aaron with thee: but let not the priests and the people break through to come up unto the LORD, lest he break forth upon them.

²⁵So Moses went down unto the people, and spake unto them.

Exodus 20

¹And God spake all these words, saying,

²I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

³Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

⁴Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

⁵Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

⁶And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

⁷Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

⁸Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.

⁹Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:

¹⁰But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:

¹¹For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

¹²Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.

¹³Thou shalt not kill.

¹⁴Thou shalt not commit adultery.

¹⁵Thou shalt not steal.

¹⁶Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

¹⁷Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

¹⁸And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off.

¹⁹And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die.

²⁰And Moses said unto the people, Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not.

²¹And the people stood afar off, and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was.

²²And the LORD said unto Moses, Thus thou shalt say unto the children of Israel, Ye have seen that I have talked with you from heaven.

²³Ye shall not make with me gods of silver, neither shall ye make unto you gods of gold.

²⁴An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee.

²⁵And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it.

²⁶Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon.

COMMENTS: In my recent post on Raymond Collins' article about the "Ten Commandments" in the Anchor Bible Dictionary, I noted that Collins believes that Exodus 20:18 followed Exodus 19:25, since, if the Decalogue in Exodus 20:1-17 followed Exodus 19:25, we have Moses speaking to the people, as God interrupts him to give Israel the Ten Commandments---which is awkward. It appears that Van Seters' division of sources retains that particular problem, for he attributes Exodus 19:20-20:17 to P. But he has his reasons for doing so, which he discusses on pages 250-251. Here are some of them:

First, there appears to be a tension between God wanting Moses to sanctify the people so that they can approach Mount Sinai (vv 10-11, 13b, which Van Seters attributes to J), and God not wanting the people to approach the holy mountain at all (vv 12-13a). Van Seters attributes the latter view to P, and he associates Exodus 19:20-25 with P rather than J, for Exodus 19:20-25 talks about restrictions and the priests.

Second, "v. 20 repeats the statement of v. 18 about Yahweh coming down", and so Van Seters attributes those verses to different sources: v 18 is J, and v 20 is P.

Third, Van Seters actually does seem to admit that his division of sources has Moses "still going up and down the mountain in the middle of the theophany"---but he thinks that the "interest here is Priestly, even to the point of anticipating the later laws regarding the holiness of the sanctuary and priestly office." What I take to be Van Seters' argument is this: Moses goes down to speak with the people about God's restrictions on access to the mountain, even while God is giving the Ten Commandments. So the theophany is occurring, even while Moses enforces regulations regarding the holiness of God's sanctuary (in this case, Mount Sinai). Or perhaps one can argue that Moses goes down to tell the people to get away from the mountain, and then God speaks---meaning that Moses was preparing the Israelites for God to give the Ten Commandments.

I'll stop here, for now, but there's a good chance that I'll revisit Van Seters on the issue of Exodus 19-20.