179 THE CONTINUITY OF THE NON-PRIESTLY NARRATIVE priestly text — make the best sense, therefore, as part of an inde- pendent non-priestly text. IV. Connections outside of P and non-P A further challenge to the claim that P was the first to connect the patriarchs and the exodus comes from texts outside of P and non-P. There are a number of passages in the prophetic corpus that clearly know both the patriarchs and the exodus, and at times explicitly link the two into a single history. Since it is commonly claimed (rightly or wrongly) that P is a post-exilic work, any pre-exilic or exilic prophetic writings are particularly relevant to this discussion. Hosea 12 contains numerous references to the Jacob story: to his birth (Hos 12,4), to his wrestling with the divine being (12,4-5), to his encounter with God at Bethel (12,5), to his time in Aram (12,13). The reference to Jacob serving time in Aram for his wife is followed directly by a reference to God bringing Israel out of Egypt (12,14), in a poetic line that links back to the previous verse through clever wordplay at the end of each line: ûbe’iššâ šāmār (12,13bβ) //ûbenābî’ nišmār (12,14b). Micah too demonstrates fairly detailed familiarity with both the exodus and the patriarchal stories. In Mic 6,4–5 we find reference to the exodus, complete with the names of Moses, Aaron, and Miriam, and to the Balaam episode. In Mic 7,15 the prophet asks that God may “show us wondrous deeds as in the days when you went out of Egypt” 18. And at the end of the book, we read “You will keep faith with Jacob, loyalty to Abraham, as you promised on oath to our fathers in days gone by” (7,20). In Jeremiah a very brief history of Israel is recounted, in Jer 32,20-23. It contains reference both to the exodus (“You freed your people Israel from the land of Egypt”, 32,21) and to the promise to the patriarchs (“You gave them this land that you had sworn to their fathers to give them”, 32,22). The subsequent chapter of Jeremiah again makes reference to the patriarchs, this time by name: “I will never fail to take from [David’s] offspring rulers for the descen- dants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob” (Jer 33,26). Emending the Hebrew ’ar’ennû to har’ēnû to better fit the sense of the 18 passage. © Gregorian Biblical Press 2012 - Tutti i diritti riservati