>PBS will air “The Bible’s Buried Secrets” on Tuesday, November 18 at 8 p.m. The two-hour “Nova” program will focus on how the Pentateuch came into existence.

In preparation for the program, PBS has interviewed Michael Coogan, Professor of Religious Studies at Stonehill College and Director of Publications for the Harvard Semitic Museum. In this interview Coogan presents his views into how scholars today understand the composition of the Pentateuch.

The following is an excerpt from the interview:

Q: Most people may see the Bible as a single text, but is it?

Michael Coogan: One way of thinking about the Bible is that it’s like an anthology of literature made over the course of many centuries by different people. Think of an analogy: The Norton Anthology of English Literature, which covers over a thousand years, from Beowulf into the 20th century. The Bible covers a similar span. The earliest texts in the Bible likely date to before 1000 B.C., and the latest texts go at least to the 2nd century B.C., and for Christians, into the 2nd century A.D. So it is an anthology of the literature of ancient Israel and early Judaism, and for Christians, of earliest Christianity, as well.

Like any anthology, it’s selective. There were many other texts that the ancient Israelites and early Christians produced that we no longer have. We have reference in the Book of Numbers, for instance, to the Book of the Wars of Yahweh. Yahweh was the name of the God of Israel. And it must have been a wonderful book, but all we have is a kind of learned footnote.

Q: If it’s an anthology, what ties the Bible together?

Read the rest of the interview here.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Archaeology, Michael Coogan, Pentateuch

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