The ambivalence of authority in Deuteronomy : reaction, revision, rewriting, reception

Abstract

The Book of Deuteronomy employs a variety of literary techniques to promote its reception, which makes it a paradigmatic case of proto-canonical literature. Deuteronomy’s claim to authority is derived in two ways. It reacts to the Neo-Assyrian rhetoric of hegemonic power and it revises a pre-existing collection of laws transmitted in the Covenant Code. Deuteronomy was subversively rewritten and interpreted, but at the same time its promotion of its own reception proved successful in its actual transmission. Deuteronomy is explored as an example of the productive ambivalence of Scriptural authority in its literary expression and its socio-historical contexts.