The Composition of Jubilees
Michael Segal
Jubilees is almost universally considered to be the work of a single author, al
though some scholars have allowed for the possibility of local interpolations
or additions to the text. All the many differences between Jubilees and the
biblical books that it rewrites (Genesis and Exodus), including additions,
omissions, and changes to the biblical text, assuming that one can determine
the specific textual version upon which Jubilees is based, are attributed to a
single author, the putative "author of Jubilees." This assumption forms the
basis of the vast majority of studies of Jubilees, which attempt to describe
the perspective of the book as a whole from many different angles.
Although scholars have recognized the generic differences between
different passages in the book (rewritten stories, legal passages, chronologi
cal framework, testaments, etc.), they have not by and large viewed these dif
ferences as any indication of the diverse origins of the passages. The combi
nation of different genres is certainly insufficient in and of itself to support
the possibility of complex literary development, since an author is not lim
ited by generic distinctions. However, as will be suggested here, such a theory
can indeed be demonstrated by highlighting contradictions and tensions
that are found between these different genres throughout the book.
Two scholars have previously proposed that Jubilees developed
through a complex process of literary composition, but neither of their the
ories has been widely accepted. The first, Ernest Wiesenberg, on the basis of
discrepancies within the chronology presented in the book, suggested that
they are the result of redactional layers within the chronological framework