NOTES TO David Petersen's "A Thrice-Told Tale: Genre, Theme, and Motif  
1. For detailed treatments of these three texts, see: C. A. Keller, "Die Gefahrdung der Ahnfrau Ein Beitrag zur gattungs and motivgeschichtlichen Erforschung alttestamentlicher Erahlungen," ZAW 66 (1955) 181-191: K. Koch, "The Ancestress of Israel in Danger," The Growth of the Biblical Tradition. The Form-Critical Method (New York: Charles Scribner 's 1969) 111-132; E. Maly, "Genesis 12:10-20; 20:1-18; 28:7-11 andthe Pentateuchal Question," CBQ 18 (1956) 255-262; E. A. Speiser, "The Wife-Sister Motif in the Patriarchal Narratives," Oriental and Biblical Studies, ed. J. J. Finkelstein and M. Greenberg (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania 1969) 62-82; G. Schmitt "Zu Gen. 26:1-14," ZAW 85 (1973) 143-156.
2. H. Gunkel, Genesis (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1964) 226.
3. The Growth of the Biblical Tradition, 119.
4. Ibid., 129. It is curious that Koch classifies Gen 12 and 26 as ethnological saga, one of Gunkel's rubrics, a rubric to which Gunkel himself did not assign either Gen. 12 or 26.
5. A. Jolles, Einfache Formen: Legende, Sage, Mythe, Ratsel, Spruch, Kasus, Memorabile, Mdrchcn, Witz (Halls: Niemeyer, 1930) 35-36.
6. The Growth of the Biblical Tradition, 120; and on legend, 153 n. 15.
7. R. Hals, "Legend: A Case Study in OT Form-Critical Terminology," CBQ 34 (1972) 166-176. Keller, "Die Gefahrdung der Ahafrau," 182ff., has raised this question about the wife-sister texts. Noting the problems raised by such classification, (1) the inconsistency of terminology, and (2) the fact that important sub-genre are delineated by reference only to content, so place-saga, hero-saga, tribal-saga, Heller argues that we must search for the structure of the individual narratives in order to discern the function of the literature rather than try to determine function on the basis of form-critical classification. See similarly, G. Tucker, Form Criticism of the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971) 34.
8. I follow here the arguments of H. Huffmon, " The Covenant Lawsuit in the Prophets," JBL 78 (1959) 285-295; and J. Harvey, "Le RIB-pattern, requisitoire prophetique sur la rupture de l'alliance," Bib 43 (1962) 172-196.
9. Most of the genre here cited are poetic in style. However, I am not arguing for a poetry versus prose distinction since I think that the prose ' 'prophetic legenda" has been shown by Alex Rofe (" The Classification of the Prophetical Stories," JBL 89 (1970), 427-440) to have discernible characteristics and a concrete setting in life, a disciple-like group whose lionizing of the prophet held the group together.
10. The Growth of the Biblical Tradition, 127.
11. On the signposts for oral poetic composition, see R. C. Culley, Oral Formulaic Language in the Biblical Psalms (Toronto, University of Toronto, 1967) 10-20; M. Parry, "Studies in the Epic Technique of Oral VerseMaking II. The Homeric Language as the Language of Oral Poetry." The Making of Homeric Verse, ed. A. Parry, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1971), 325-364. The characteristics of oral prose composition, have yet to be
delineated systematically.
12. For a similar distinction, see M. Boucher, The Mysterious Parable: A Literary Study (unpublished Brown University Diss. 1973) 55-56. I am indebted to W. R. Schoedel for this reference.
13. In the following analysis of genre, I depend upon certain insights of E. D. Hirsch, Validity in Interpretation (New Haven: Yale, 1967), 68-126. After having finished this paper, I found that R. Knierim has proposed a similar view of the heuristic function of genre, R. Knierim, "Old Testament Form Criticism Reconsidered." Interpretation 27 (1973) 455.
14. Ibid., 86.
15. The genre label, "saga," as used by Old Testament form-critics, lacks precision: cf. Knierim "Old Testament Form Criticism reconsidered," p. 437. R. Neff in an unpublished paper, "Saga," has proposed to revise our definition of saga by limiting its reference to literature like that of the Icelandic sagas. This proposal would allow us to categorize the patriarchal material as saga - as the Abrahamic or patriarchal saga.
16. Hirsch, Validity in Interpretation, 109.
17. On this basic procedure, see J.Muilenburg, "Form Criticism and Be yond," JBL 88 (1969) 1-18.
18. M. Noth, A History of Pentateuchal Traditions (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1972) 28 n. 87.
19. Ibid., 222 n. 591.
20. Keller, "Die Gefahrdung der Ahnfrau."
21. W. F. Thrall and A. Hibbard, A Handbook to Literature (New York: Odyssey, 1960) 294.
22. Ibid., 486.
23. The narrator used the word 'isha (woman/wife) eleven times in this short piece. Such frequency (Genesis 20, a longer unit, uses the term only seven times) constitutes a device which underscores Sarah as woman and as wife.
24. The Yahwistic concern with the first patriarchal family is striking; first wife and then child, Gen. 22, are placed in dire straits, in one case by a man's plan and in the othre case by Yahweh's plan.
25. It is interesting to note that the writer ends the narrative by describing the plague and then, very specifically, by stating that it was "because of the case of Sarah, Abraham's wife; " see BDB, dabar IG.
26. H. W. Wolff, "The Elohistic Fragments in the Pentateuch," Interp 26 (1972) 161-168.
27. A. Leo Oppenheim, The Interpretation of Dreams in the Ancient Near East (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1956) 207.
28. R. E. Clements, Abraham and David, Genesis 15, and its Meaning for Israelite Tradition (Naperville, Ill.: Allenson, 1967) 58.
29. In Gen 12, the patriarch was ejected because he perpetrated the ruse; wealth was incidental. In Gen. 26, he got wealth and was not ejected.
30. The Growth of Biblical Tradition, 122.