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Bible Encyclopedias
Sanctuary
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
or
1. Nature of Article
2. The Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis
The Three Stages
3. Difficulties of the Theory
(1) Slaughter Not Necessarily Sacrificial
(2) Sacrifice and Theophany
(3) Alleged Plurality of Sanctuaries
(4) The Altar of God's House
(5) Local Altars in Deuteronomy
4. The Alternative View
(1) Lay Sacrifice
(2) Three Pilgrimage Festivals
5. The Elephantine Papyri
The Elephantine Temple
1. Nature of Article:
The present article is designed to supplement the articles on
2. The Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis:
It is said that there are three distinct stages of law and history.
The Three Stages:
(1) In the first stage all slaughter of domestic animals for food purposes was sacrificial, and every layman could sacrifice locally at an altar of earth or unhewn stones. The law of
(2) The second stage is presented by Deuteronomy in the Law and Josiah's reformation in the history. Undoubtedly, Deuteronomy 12 permits local non-sacrificial slaughter for the purposes of food, and enjoins the destruction of heathen places of worship, insisting with great vehemence on the central sanctuary. The narrative of Josiah's reformation in 2 Kings 23 tallies with these principles.
(3) The third great body of law (the Priestly Code, P) does not deal with the question (save in one passage, Leviticus 17 ). In Deuteronomy "the unity of the cult is commanded ; in the Priestly Code it is presupposed .... What follows from this forms the question before us. To my thinking, this: that the Priestly Code rests upon the result which is only the aim of Deuteronomy" ( Prolegomena , 35). Accordingly, it is later than the latter book and dates from about the time of Ezra. As to Leviticus 17:1-9 , this belongs to H (the Law of Holiness, Lev 17 through 26), an older collection of laws than the Priestly Code (P), and is taken up in the latter. Its intention was "to secure the exclusive legitimation of the one lawful place of sacrifice.... Plainly the common man did not quite understand the newly drawn and previously quite unknown distinction between the religious and the profane act" (Prolegomena , 50). Accordingly, this legislator strove to meet the difficulty by the new enactment. See
3. Difficulties of the Theory:
(1) Slaughter Not Necessarily Sacrificial
The general substratum afforded by the documentary theory falls within the scope of the article PENTATEUCH . The present discussion is limited to the legal and historical outline traced above. The view that all slaughter of domestic animals was sacrificial till the time of Josiah is rebutted by the evidence of the early books. The following examples should be noted: in Genesis 18:7 a calf is slain without any trace of a sacrifice, and in Genesis 27:9-14 (Jacob's substitute for venison) no altar or religious rite can fairly be postulated. In 1 Samuel 28:24 the slaughter is performed by a woman, so that here again sacrifice is out of the question. If Gideon performed a sacrifice when he "made ready a kid" ( Judges 6:19 ) or when he killed an animal for the broth of which the narrative speaks, the animals in question must have been sacrificed twice over, once when they were killed and again when the food was consumed by flames. Special importance attaches to Exodus 22:1 (Hebrew 21:37), for there the
(2) Sacrifice and Theophany
The view that the altars were erected at places that were peculiarly holy, or at any rate were subsequently sanctified by a theophany, is also untenable. In the Patriarchal age we may refer to Genesis 4:26 , where the calling on God implies sacrifice but not theophanies, Abram at Beth-
(3) Alleged Plurality of Sanctuaries
The hypothesis of a multiplicity of sanctuaries in
(4) The Altar of God's House
Moreover a curious little bit of evidence shows that the "house" had quite a different kind of altar. In 1 Kings 1:50 f; 1 Kings 2:28 ff, we hear of the horns of the altar (compare Amos 3:14 ). Neither earth nor unhewn stones (as required by the Law of Ex 20) could provide such horns, and the historical instances of the altars of the patriarchs, religious leaders, etc., to which reference has been made, show that they had no horns. Accordingly, we are thrown back on the description of the great altar of burnt offering in Ex 27 and must assume that an altar of this type was to be found before the ark before Solomon built his Temple. Thus the altar of the House of God was quite different from the customary lay altar, and when we read of "mine altar" as a refuge in Exodus 21:14 , we must refer it to the former, as is shown by the passages just cited. In addition to the early legislation and the historical passages cited as recognizing a House of God with a horned altar, we see such a house in Shiloh where Eli and his sons of the house of Aaron (1 Samuel 2:27 ) ministered. Thus the data of both
(5) Local Altars in Deuteronomy
Deuteronomy also recognizes a number of local altars in Deuteronomy 16:21 (see ICC , at the place) and so does Later Deuteronomistic editors in Joshua 8:30 ff. There is no place for any of these passages ia the Wellhausen theory; but again we find one house side by side with many lay altars.
4. The Alternative View:
(1) Lay Sacrifice
The alternative view seeks to account for the whole of the facts noted above. In bald outline it is as follows: In pre-Mosaic times customary sacrifices had been freely offered by laymen at altars of earth or stone which were not "sanctuaries," but places that could be used for the nonce and then abandoned. Slaughter, as shown by the instances cited, was not necessarily sacrificial. Moses did not forbid or discourage the custom he found. On the contrary, he regulated it in Exodus 20:24-26; Deuteronomy 16:21 f to prevent possible abuses. But he also superimposed two other kinds of sacrifice - certain new offerings to be brought by individuals to the religious capital and the national offerings of Nu 28; 29 and other passages. If the Priestly Code (P) assumes the religious capital as axiomatic, the reason is that this portion of the Law consists of teaching entrusted to the priests, embracing the procedure to be followed in these two classes of offerings, and does not refer at all to the procedure at customary lay sacrifices, which was regulated by immemorial custom. Deuteronomy thunders not against the lay altars - which are never even mentioned in this connection - but against the Canaanite high places. Deuteronomy 12 contemplates only the new individual offerings. The permission of lay slaughter for food was due to the fact that the infidelity of the Israelites in the wilderness ( Leviticus 17:5-7 ) had led to the universal prohibition of lay slaughter for the period of the wanderings only, though it appears to be continued by Dt for those who lived near the House of God (see Leviticus 12:1-8 :21, limited to the case "if the place ... be too far from thee").
(2) Three Pilgrimage Festivals.
The
5. The Elephantine Papyri:
The Elephantine Temple.
Papyri have recently been found at Elephantine which show us a Jewish community in Egypt which in 405
Literature
J. Wellhausen, Prolegomena to the History of Israel , chapter i, for the critical hypothesis; H. M. Wiener,
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Orr, James, M.A., D.D. General Editor. Entry for 'Sanctuary'. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/isb/s/sanctuary.html. 1915.
