Again I attach
much more weight than Graf did to the change of ruling ideas which
runs parallel with the change in the institutions and usages of
worship; this has been shown mostly in the second part of the
present work. Almost more important to me than the phenomena
themselves, are the presuppositions which lie behind them.
Not everything that we have hitherto discussed proves, or is meant
to prove, Graf's hypothesis. On the other hand, however, there is
abundance of evidence, which has not yet been noticed. To discuss
it all in detail, would take another book: in this work only a
selection can be with all brevity indicated, if the limits are
not to be transgressed which are imposed by the essentially
historical character of these prolegomena. In these discussions
the Pro will as a rule naturally suggest itself in the refutation
of the Contra.
IX.I.
IX.I.1. Eberhard Schrader mentions, in his Introduction to the Old
Testament, that Graf assigns the legislation of the middle books
of the Pentateuch to the period after the exile; but he does not
give the least idea of the arguments on which that position is
built up, simply dismissing it with the remark, that "even
critical analysis enters its veto" against it.
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