The abbreviation used to summarize a once-popular "documentary hypothesis" about how the Pentateuch came to be composed, and is most often associated with the 19th Cent scholar Julius Wellhausen. The hypothesis posited four different sources labelled J, E, D, and P.
The J (from German Jahweh) or Yahwist source, with a preference for the name Yahweh for God, was thought to be found largely in Gen-Num, and stemmed from Judah, about 950-850 BC.
The E (for Elohist) source, with a preference for the name 'elohim for God, also in Gen-Num, supposedly stemmed from the southern kingdom of Israel, but was about a century younger than the J source. J and E were supposed to have combined in many places in the Pentateuch into a composite narrative.
The D or Deuteronomist source comprised most of the book of Deuteronomy and much of a framework around which the books of Jos-2 Ki were composed. This source was identified with the 'law book' found during the repair to the temple in the time of Josiah (2 Ki 22:3-23:25) and was dated about 620 BC.
The P or Priestly source was supposed to have provided most of the material for the genealogies and the ritual-cultic requirements found in the Pentateuch, and thought to stem from the time of the exile or shortly thereafter (6th-5th Cent BC).
Almost ubiquitously accepted for the first three-quarters of the 20th Cent. as the consensus, the theory has now fallen out of favour. The entire hypothesis was, from the start, too loaded with too many unfounded and unguarded presuppositions for it to survive.
See also Who Wrote the Pentateuch
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