² This is how the book of Joshua, the sixth book of the Hebrew Scriptures, describes the fall of Jericho that occurred almost 3,500 years ago. But did it really happen? Many higher critics would confidently answer no.a They claim that the book of Joshua, along with the previous five books of the Bible, is made up of legends written up many centuries after the alleged events took place.

Higher Criticism​—How Reliable?

4-6. What are some of Wellhausen’s theories of higher criticism?

⁴ Higher criticism of the Bible got started in earnest during the 18th and 19th centuries. In the latter half of the 19th century, the German Bible critic Julius Wellhausen popularized the theory that the first six books of the Bible, including Joshua, were written in the fifth century B.C.E.​—about a thousand years after the events described. He did say, though, that they contained material that had been written down earlier.​¹ This theory was printed in the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica, published in 1911, which explained: “Genesis is a post-exilic work composed of a post-exilic priestly source (P) and non-priestly earlier sources which differ markedly from P in language, style and religious standpoint.”

⁵ Wellhausen and his followers viewed all the history recorded in the earlier part of the Hebrew Scriptures as “not literal history, but popular traditions of the past.”​² The earlier accounts were considered to be merely a reflection of the later history of Israel. For example, it was stated that the enmity between Jacob and Esau did not really happen, but it reflected the enmity between the nations of Israel and Edom in later times.

⁶ In harmony with this, these critics felt that Moses never received any commandment to make the ark of the covenant and that the tabernacle, center of Israelite worship in the wilderness, never existed. They also believed that the authority of the Aaronic priesthood was fully established only a few years before the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, which the critics believed happened at the beginning of the sixth century B.C.E.​³

7, 8. What “proofs” did Wellhausen have for his theories, and were they sound?

⁷ What “proof” did they have for these ideas? Higher critics claim to be able to divide the text of the early books of the Bible into a number of different documents. A basic principle they use is to assume that, generally speaking, any Bible verse using the Hebrew word for God (’Elo·himʹ) on its own was written by one writer, while any verse referring to God by his name, Jehovah, must have been written by another​—as if one writer could not use both terms.​⁴

⁸ Similarly, anytime an event is recorded more than once in a book, it is taken as proof of more than one writer at work, even though ancient Semitic literature has other similar examples of repetition. Additionally, it is assumed that any change of style means a change of writer. Yet, even modern-language writers often write in different styles at different stages in their careers, or when they are dealing with different subject matter.b

9-11. What are some outstanding weaknesses of modern higher criticism?

⁹ Is there any real proof for these theories? Not at all. One commentator noted: “Criticism, even at its best, is speculative and tentative, something always liable to be modified or proved wrong and having to be replaced by something else. It is an intellectual exercise, subject to all the doubts and guesses which are inseparable from such exercises.”​⁵ Biblical higher criticism, especially, is “speculative and tentative” in the extreme.

¹⁰ Gleason L. Archer, Jr., shows another flaw in the reasoning of higher criticism. The problem, he says, is that “the Wellhausen school started with the pure assumption (which they have hardly bothered to demonstrate) that Israel’s religion was of merely human origin like any other, and that it was to be explained as a mere product of evolution.”​⁶ In other words, Wellhausen and his followers started with the assumption that the Bible was merely the word of man, and then they reasoned from there.

¹¹ Back in 1909, The Jewish Encyclopedia noted two more weaknesses in the Wellhausian theory: “The arguments by which Wellhausen has almost entirely captured the whole body of contemporary Biblical critics are based on two assumptions: first, that ritual becomes more elaborate in the development of religion; secondly, that older sources necessarily deal with the earlier stages of ritual development. The former assumption is against the evidence of primitive cultures, and the latter finds no support in the evidence of ritual codes like those of India.”

12. How does modern higher criticism stand up in the light of archaeology?

¹² Is there any way of testing higher criticism to see whether its theories are correct or not? The Jewish Encyclopedia went on to say: “Wellhausen’s views are based almost exclusively on literal analysis, and will need to be supplemented by an examination from the point of view of institutional archeology.” As the years went by, did archaeology tend to confirm Wellhausen’s theories? The New Encyclopædia Britannica answers: “Archaeological criticism has tended to substantiate the reliability of the typical historical details of even the oldest periods [of Bible history] and to discount the theory that the Pentateuchal accounts [the historical records in the earliest books of the Bible] are merely the reflection of a much later period.”

13, 14. In spite of its shaky foundations, why is Wellhausen’s higher criticism still widely accepted?

¹³ In view of its weakness, why is higher criticism so popular among intellectuals today? Because it tells them things that they want to hear. One 19th-century scholar explained: “Personally, I welcomed this book of Wellhausen’s more than almost any other; for the pressing problem of the history of the Old Testament appeared to me to be at last solved in a manner consonant to the principle of human evolution which I am compelled to apply to the history of all religion.”​⁷ Evidently, higher criticism agreed with his prejudices as an evolutionist. And, indeed, the two theories serve a similar end. Just as evolution would remove the need to believe in a Creator, so Wellhausen’s higher criticism would mean that one does not have to believe that the Bible was inspired by God.

¹⁴ In this rationalistic 20th century, the assumption that the Bible is not God’s word but man’s looks plausible to intellectuals.c It is much easier for them to believe that prophecies were written after their fulfillment than to accept them as genuine. They prefer to explain away the Bible accounts of miracles as myths, legends, or folk tales, rather than consider the possibility that they really happened. But such a viewpoint is prejudiced and gives no solid reason to reject the Bible as true. Higher criticism is seriously flawed, and its assault on the Bible has failed to demonstrate that the Bible is not the Word of God.