Documentary hypothesis with the following books, Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings, as Deuteronomistic History. There is a growing recognition that Genesis developed apart from the Exodus stories until joined to it by the Priestly writer. The Torah (or Pentateuch) is the collective name for the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. According to tradition they were dictated by God to Moses, but when modern critical scholarship began to be applied to the Bible it was discovered that the Pentateuch was not the unified text one would expect from a single author. As a result, the Mosaic
Wife–sister narratives in the Book of Genesis are all related to each other in some way, according to Coats, sharing common content, structure and genre for communicating the content. In all three stories a promise for progeny is not a factor in the content and the structure rather the narratives have a focus on blessing. Hepner concludes, through Biblical exegesis and semantics, that it is plausible that the union of Abraham and Sarah was actually incestuous with Sarah being Abraham's half-sister. For example, in Genesis 20: 13, Abraham, talking to Abimelech, alludes to Leviticus laws or the Holiness code, by using the phrase "lovingkindness." The same word