Gregory A. King
So Moses the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the LORD. And He buried him in the valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor; but no man knows his burial place to this day. Although Moses was one hundred and twenty years old when he died, his eye was not dim, nor his vigor abated. So the sons of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the days of weeping and mourning for Moses came to an end. Deuteronomy 34:5-8.
Even though it is not unusual for a literary work such as the Pentateuch to conclude with the death of its leading figure (see the same feature in Joshua 24:29, 30), this very feature creates a problem concerning the issue of authorship. For centuries, many Jews and Christians have assumed that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. Yet how can Moses have written in advance about his own death?
A historical appendix – In responding to this question, several points should be kept in mind. First, the position that Moses is the author of the Pentateuch does not demand that he wrote the account of his own death in advance. Though this position was evidently held by Josephus, who stated that Moses “wrote in the holy books that he died, which was done out of fear, lest they (the Israelites) should venture to say that, because of his extraordinary virtue, he went to God,”1 evidence from elsewhere in Scripture reveals that claims that a certain prophet or apostle was the author of a given biblical document does not demand that every single portion of the document came from that person's hand. For instance, the next-to-last chapter of Jeremiah concludes with the words, “Thus far are the words of Jeremiah” (Jer 51:64), indicating that the concluding chapter of Jeremiah was written by someone else. Proverbs, which three times alludes to Solomon as author of the book (Prov. 1:1; 10:1; 25:1), credits Agur and Lemuel with the last two chapters. As the Gospel of John comes to an end, there is a brief note by the community of faith (notice the use of “we” in John 21:24), vouching for the trustworthiness of the account. In none of these cases does the inclusion of a historical appendix or other concluding verses by another person change the identity of the document's primary author any more than a later postscript added by an editor to a contemporary autobiography after the author's death would negate that person as the author.
Evidences of Mosaic authorship – A second point to keep in mind is that there are a number of references to the writing activity of Moses sprinkled throughout the Pentateuch. Exodus 24:4 states, “And Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord.” Deuteronomy 31:9 asserts, “So Moses wrote down this law.” And Numbers 33:2 indicates that Moses kept something of a travel diary as Israel journeyed in the wilderness. There is ample evidence indicating that Moses was closely involved in writing the material that came to compose the first five books of the Bible.
The inclusion of a historical appendix by another person does not change the identity of the document's primary author.
A third point worth noting is that Jesus apparently considered Moses the author of the earliest part of Scripture. In John 5:46, He declares, “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote of Me.” This perspective of Jesus is a fact that should be taken into account by those who are dismissive of the view that Moses authored the Pentateuch.
A fourth point to be made is that a number of internal evidences support the position that Moses wrote the Pentateuch. These evidences include the eyewitness details that would be expected from an actual participant in the events described therein (see Exod 15:27), the thoroughgoing acquaintance with Egypt that is on display, the fact that a greater percentage of Egyptian words is used here than elsewhere in the Old Testament, and the fact that the flora and fauna referred to are found in Egypt and in the Sinai peninsula. These features are what one would expect from Moses, who was raised and educated in Egypt and who also spent many years in the desert.
A final point to make is that recent years have witnessed increasing appreciation for the unity of the Pentateuch and its careful literary artistry. Whereas a previous generation of biblical scholars tended to divide the first five books of Scripture into their supposed literary sources,2 this view has been strongly challenged by both conservative and liberal scholars with cogent and compelling arguments given in favor of a single author behind most of the material of the Pentateuch. In light of these arguments, there is good reason to affirm the traditional position and identify this single author as Moses with perhaps Joshua or another leader responsible for the account of his death in Deuteronomy 34.
1 Flavius Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 8.48.
2 See the chapter by P. D. Merling.
The pyramid of Khafre and the Sphinx. (ca. 2500 bc). Both were already more than 1000 years old when Israel and Moses left Egypt.