Priests and Levites in Deuteronomy

Abstract

central element in critical reconstruction of history of Hebrew priesthood is relationship of priests and Levites. A basic theory of Wellhausen school is that distinction made in Priestly Code between two orders was unknown before Exile; in seventh and early sixth centuries all priests were Levites and all Levites were priests or potential priests. distinction is said to begin with Ezekiel's degradation of idolatrous priestsusually identified as priests of provincial shrines abolished by Josiah-to rank of temple servants (Ezek. xliv 4 ff.). One of assumptions on which this theory is based is that in Deuteronomy Levites and priests are synonymous terms. In 1954 late Professor G. E. Wright published an article, The Levites in Deuteronomy, VT 4 (1954), pp. 325-30, in which he questioned this generally accepted view. He tells how, in his study of Deuteronomy for Interpreter's Bible, he began by accepting commonly held assumptions but was led by a careful examination of text to conclusion that these assumptions had oversimplified matter (p. 326) and that the difference between P and D with regard to Levites has been exaggerated (p. 330). present paper has resulted from similar misgivings arising initially out of writer's independent study of and Levites for Interpreter's Dictionary of Bible. These misgivings have not been silenced by Professor J. A. Emerton's erudite reply to Wright, Priests and Levites in Deuteronomy, VT 12 (1962), pp. 129-38. Indeed it is Emerton's defence of claim that Deuteronomy recognizes right of Levites to act as priests that this paper attempts to examine.