The

Abstract

"The mark of a great hypothesis is its ability to provide explanations, sustain detailed investigation and endure. For a considerable time one could have said that Martin Noth's hypothesis of a Deuteronomistic History (DtrH) , proposed in 1943, had filled all these requirements admirably.l Nevertheless there have been some important developments in more recent study which, if they are correct, have serious implications for the hypothesis. These developments impinge on it in three key areas. The first is Noth's proposal that DtrH was composed during the exile; the second, that it was a unified and well planned whole, the work of a skilled author; the third, that it was constructed via a judicious combination of source material and redactional commentary"