The Historicity of the Patriarchal Narratives

"The Historicity of the Patriarchal Narratives" (Walter de Gruyter, Berlin/New York, 1974) is a book by biblical scholar Thomas L. Thompson, Professor of Old Testament Studies at the University of Copenhagen.

Subtitled "The Quest for the Historical Abraham", Thompson's book, together with John Van Seters's "Abraham in History and Tradition" (1975), marked the culmination of a growing current of dissatisfaction in scholarly circles with the then-current consensus (or near-consensus) on the Patriarchal narratives. The consensus can be summarised as the view that archaeology had provided evidence that the narratives were plausible, that the Patriarchs were essentially historical figures, and that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob could be placed with a high degree of confidence in the 2nd millennium BC. This view was expressed by John Bright in his influential "History of Israel" (1959, 2nd edition 1960) in these words: " [O] ne is forced to the conclusion that the patriarchal narratives authentically reflect social customs at home in the second millennium rather than those of later Israel". [ [http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/epn_4_selman.html#7 John Bright, "History of Israel", quoted in Martin J. Selman, "Comparative Customs and the Patriarchal Age"] ] Thompson and Van Seters pointed out that in fact none of the archaeological evidence cited by the dominant scholars of the time (notably William F. Albright, E. A. Speiser, Cyrus Gordon, and Bright himself) actually provided irrefutable proof for the historicity of the Patriarchal narratives. "Not only has archaeology not proven a single event of the patriarchal traditions to be historical, it has not shown any of the traditions to be likely." ["The Historicity of the Patriarchal Narratives", p.328, quoted in review by Dennis Pardee in [http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-2968%28197707%2936%3A3%3C222%3ATHOTPN%3E2.0.CO%3B2-Y&size=LARGE&origin=JSTOR-enlargePage "Journal of Near Eastern Studies", Vol. 36, No.3 (July 1977)] ] Albright's reputation never quite recovered from the publication of Thompson's book. [ [http://books.google.com.kh/books?id=e1x9Rs_zdG8C&dq=&pg=PP1&ots=3o0u6HYPvz&sig=elF1DM6SQWF_b3XmQ27aocIZXq0&prev=http://www.google.com.kh/search%3Fq%3DA%2BCentury%2Bof%2BBiblical%2BArchaeology%2Bby%2BRoger%2BMoorey%26ie%3Dutf-8%26oe%3Dutf-8%26aq%3Dt%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26client%3Dfirefox-a&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title#PPA114,M1 P.R.F. Moorey, "A Century of Biblical Archaeology", p.114] Moorey's book is a standard text on the history of "Biblical archaeology.]

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