In the second part of the book, Van Seters went on to put forward his own theory on the origins of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), arguing, with Martin Noth, that Deuteronomy was the original beginning of a history that extended from Deuteronomy to the end of 2 Kings. However, against Noth and others, he held that the so-called Yahwist, the oldest literary source in Genesis, Exodus and Numbers, was written in the 6th century BCE as a prologue to the older Deuteronomistic History, and that the so-called Priestly Writer of the Pentateuch was a later supplement to this history. This approach represented a revival of the "supplementary hypothesis" of a previous era of Pentateuchal studies. This literary hypothesis was expanded and defended in several of Van Seters’ later works. Along with similar revisionist works by Hans Heinrich Schmid of Zurich and Rolf Rendtorff of Heidelberg, published in 1976 and 1977, this led to a major reevaluation in Pentateuchal criticism.