THE SOUTHERN HOME OF YHWH AND PRE-PRIESTLY PATRIARCHAL/EXODUS TRADITIONS FROM A SOUTHERN PERSPECTIVE
I. INTRODUCTION
Recent years have seen an enormous change of paradigm concerning the dating and historical background of the pre-Priestly Patriarchal and Exodus material. New models of the origin of these narratives have been proposed, in which these two formerly different origin traditions were linked by a Priestly redactor in exilic or post-exilic times 1. In the new paradigm, the pre-Priestly development of these traditions is intensely associated with the history of the monarchies of Israel and Judah. The Patriarchal narratives — or at least those related to Jacob — and Exodus/ Wilderness traditions are considered as two different, if not competing, foundation stories of the Israelite monarchy, later inherited by Judah after the destruction of the northern kingdom. The Exodus tradition was domi- nant in Israel, where it was promoted as a “chart myth” for unifying Israel under the reforms of Jeroboam II 2. Concerning the Patriarchal narratives, those clinging to a pre-exilic origin adhere to the view that Jacob was an ancestor originally associated with the kingdom of Israel who was later appropriated by Judah 3. In the same vein, the earliest narratives relating to Abraham were primarily con- nected to the population of the southern highlands of Judah in the late
1 K. SCHMID, Genesis and the Moses Story. Israel’s Dual Origins in the Hebrew Bible