CRITICISM AND INTERPRETATION 209
other reason, might well claim the attention of
critical students of the Old Testament.
Briefly stated Sievers' conclusions with refer-
ence to the sources are these: J, E, and P were
not derived direct from free oral tradition, but
one and all from earlier literary sources which were
metrical. These earlier sources can be recovered
by observing the changes of metre within the
present text. J rests on four principal sources,
a source written in seven-stress periods, another
in six-stress periods, another in seven-stress
periods alternating with a short verse, and a
fourth in six-stress periods alternating with a
short verse. J also contains fragments of a
source written in four-stress periods. E rests
on three main sources, one written in sevens,
one in sixes, and one in sixes alternating with a
short verse. P is analysed into six sources ; the
main source is written in sevens ; the other
sources include one written in sixes, one in sevens
alternating with a ' short verse, and another in
which every two seven-stress periods are followed
by a short verse. The main source in simple
sevens admitted of an occasional short verse.
It is difficult to judge of this complicated
theory from passages where there is much mixture
of J, E, and P, or of Sievers' sources of these
sources. It is better to take what appears even
to Sievers to be a long continuous passage from
a single source, and to see by what means and