udde has maintained
that the primitive work contained no account of the Deluge,
and traced the descent of all the nations, Israel included,
back to Cain, and he declares he can detect in the earlier
chapters of Genesis traces of a first Jehovist, whom he
calls J1. A second Jehovist, J2, who flourished between 800
and 700 B.C., is supposed to have added to the contribution
of the first, certain details borrowed from the Babylonian
tradition, such as the Deluge, the story of Noah, of Nimrod,
etc. Finally, a third Jehovist is said to have thrown the
versions of his two predecessors into one, taking J2 as the
basis of his work.

**** The date and origin of the Elohist have given rise to
no less controversy than those of the Jehovist: the view
most generally adopted is that he was a native of the
northern kingdom, and flourished about 750 B.C.

Putting on one side the primitive accounts of the origin of the human
race which his predecessors had taken pleasure in elaborating, he
confined his attention solely to events since the birth of Abraham;* his
origin is betrayed by the preference he displays for details calculated
to flatter the self-esteem of the northern tribes. To his eyes, Joseph
is the noblest of all the sons of Jacob, before whom all the rest
must bow their heads, as to a king; next to Joseph comes Reuben, to
whom--rather than to Judah**--he gives the place as firstborn. He groups
his characters round Bethel and Shechem, the sanctuaries of Israel;
even Abraham is represented as residing, not at Hebron in Judea, but at
Beersheba, a spot held in deep veneration by pilgrims belonging to the
ten tribes.*** It is in his concept of the Supreme Being, however, that
he differs most widely from his predecessors. God is, according to him,
widely removed from ordinary humanity. He no longer reveals Himself at
all times and in all places, but works rather by night, and appears
to men in their dreams, or, when circumstances require His active
interference, is content to send His angels rather than come in His own
person.****

* Budde seems to have proved conclusively that the Elohist did not write
any part of the primitive history of mankind.

** Gen. xxxvii. 21, 22, 29, 30; xlii. 22, 27; whereas in Gen. xliii. 3,
8-10, where the narrative is from the pen of the Jehovist, it is Judah
that plays the principal part: it is possible that, in Gen. xxxv