The purpose of this thesis is to present a test case for diachronic and
synchronic approaches in the book of Joshua, especially Josh 3-4 which is one of the
most complex texts in the Old Testament. The thesis pays attention to how Polzin's
approach, which is regarded one of the best sympathetic readings of Joshua, is
applied to the text of Josh 3-4, and the relevance of the theories of Auld.After preliminaries in Chapter One, Chapter Two introduces the synchronic
readings of Polzin, Hawk, Mitchell, and Winther-Nielsen, attempts to uncover the
problems in applying their methods to this complicated text, and offers a critique of
these sympathetic readings. Through this examination, the writer concludes that
Polzin's methodology does explain a number of difficult problems in this text, but
also that his reading has limitations. One important question is the relevance of these
several approaches to the two different descriptions concerning the twelve stones set
up in the middle ofthe Jordan and on the other side of the river.
Chapter Three investigates the differences between the MT and the LXX of
Joshua 3-4 through text critical analysis, reconstructs the Hebrew Vorlage of LXXJoshua 3-4 considering divergences between major Greek editions (Margolis, Rahlfs,
and Auld), and examines the limitations of Polzin's synchronic study in reading only
from the final text of MT. The large number of text critical issues in this text (Josh 3-
4) makes it difficult to work only from the final form of the MT. A further difficulty
is deciding which text we should follow among the MT, LXX, and Vorlage behind
the Greek text. The impossibility of simple answers drives us to sympathize with a
diachronic approach.For the purpose of reading the literary history of Josh 3-4 in a diachronic
way, the writer considers what position this text holds in the setting of the wider
context of the ark narratives and water-crossing stories in the Old Testament. Thus,
Chapter Four compares the ark story in this text with those in the Pentateuch and
other Former Prophets. Chapter Five compares Joshua 3-4 with the crossing of the
Reed Sea in Exodus 13:17-14:31 and with Elijah and Elisha crossing the river in 2
Kings 2. In these two chapters, the writer considers recent trends in literary criticism
which reject the existence of a Yahwist (J) and prefer to call material which does not
belong to P simply 'non-Priestly', and suggests new directions for literary criticism.
One of these specific features is to read the Pentateuch and the Former Prophets in
reverse order. In this part, the writer examines the relevance of Auld's theory, in
which the shared material by Samuel-Kings and Chronicles is the root work of the
story of Israel before the monarchyWith the help of the investigations already mentioned, Chapter Six attempts
to read the literary history of Joshua 3-4 based on the Hebrew Vorlage of LXX and
on MT of Josh 3-4. This chapter retraces the complex literary history of Josh 3-4 and
discusses the limitations of Polzin's synchronic study in reading Josh 3-4 only from
the final text of MT
