Comparing The Priestly Source And J-Source In The Book Of Genesis

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1.The three accounts of the flood story all consist of similarities and differences. To begin with, the two stories of the flood in the book of Genesis consists of the Priestly Source (P Source) and the Yahwist Source (J Source). The flood story begins in Genesis 6, the overlapping portions and repetition in the story shows that multiple sources were combined. In the first six verses, God explains that humans are wicked. YHWH saw “wickedness in humankind” and was “sorry he had made humankind” (Genesis 6:5-Genesis 6:6) unlike the P-Source where the deity is called God and is concerned with the fruitfulness of humans and animals. The difference in the name of the deity and character of the deity is an indicator that they are different sources. In the J-Source the deity is called YHWH and is described as being …show more content…

In the J and P-Sources, the power of the flood is all done by one deity. Nobody has an power that can stop the deity, making the story much simpler, because there is no conflicts and no controversy going on unlike the flood in the Old Babylonian account. In this story the deity, Enili, tries to destroy the human race multiple times, but his plans are conflicted with by the deity Anu. Anu warns Atrahasis, who is his favorite human, of Enili attempts of destroying humanity. Even during Enili's forth attempt, which he imposes an oath among the god’s to not reveal to the humans that he is going to flood the earth, Anu indirectly warns Atrahasis. This led to him building the ark and saving humanity. Polytheism affect the narrative in many ways. The god’s are able to intervene with each others plans, affecting the outcome of the story while in monotheism the outcome of the story is controlled by only one deity, so the story has no controversy among the