Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

COVENANT, BOOK OF THE

Exod. 20:23–23:19, a collection of words, judgments, statutes, and commandments that has been located in the Sinai theophany between the Decalogue and the covenant ceremony. This legal corpus receives its title from Exod. 24:7, which further serves to cement this collection of laws into its literary setting as a feature of the Mosaic covenant.

It is generally agreed that the Book of the Covenant is the oldest recorded Israelite compilation of laws drawn from a variety of oral traditions. It has been edited and revised as the society in which these laws were authoritative grew and developed. Evidence of this history of development is complex, and, as of yet, no compelling reconstruction of its redactional history has been put forward, due in part to the lack of an obvious structure throughout the collection. The commandments can be grouped into paragraphs by topic, but both the internal logic of paragraphs and the relationships between paragraphs seem random. This, however, is one of several similarities between the Book of the Covenant and other biblical law codes as well as those of the ancient Near East.

The Book of the Covenant has often been divided into two sections based on the type of legal material that predominates in each: Exod. 20:23–22:16 is primarily casuistic (resembling case law) in form; 22:17–23:19 is primarily apodictic (commandment-like) in form. Further divisions can be made according to general topics.

Bibliography. J. I. Durham, Exodus. WBC 3 (Waco, 1987), 305-38; B. M. Levinson, ed., Theory and Method in Biblical and Cuneiform Law. JSOTSup 181 (Sheffield, 1994); J. W. Marshall, Israel and the Book of the Covenant. SBLDS 140 (Atlanta, 1993); J. M. Sprinkle, “The Book of the Covenant”: A Literary Approach. JSOTSup 174 (Sheffield, 1994).

Cheryl Lynn Hubbard

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

COVENANT, BOOK OF THE

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)