130. - Collection Point® | The Total Digital Asset Management System

1. Investigating Structure 51
Covenant (Patriarchs, Land)
Freedom
Freedom
Redemption
Covenant
Freedom
Covenant (Land, Patriarchs)
I do not know how this can be tested. It seems artificial to separate
'Redemption' from the 'Covenant' which follows it, viz. 'You shall be
my people...'
My own attempt at structuring, before meeting the work of the
scholars considered here, resulted in this pattern (see below):
a b d e a e f a e d b a
c c
The phrase 'I am Yahweh' forms an inclusio around the whole, and
also around the central section. The climax at the centre is the promise
'I will take you to me for a people, and I will be your God' which
also forms part of the content of Genesis 17 where 'El Shaddai' occurs
for the first time. In the centre e is used again to take up what has
been promised and to make this climax even stronger. 1
The basic structure of the outer sections is abde edba, with the addition
of the covenant in the first part to frame the two important
elements: the Land of Canaan and the Egyptian bondage.
a I am Yahweh
b I appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
(as El Shaddai not Yahweh)
c hed my covenant
d to give to them the land of Canaan
the land of their sojourning. ..
e I have heard the cry of the children of Israel
whom the Egyptians keep in bondage
c and I have remembered my covenant
1. This is, of course, an explanation of the purpose of the structuring which
cannot be proved; it seemed and seems plausible to me.