Did Moses Write the Torah, or Pentateuch? – Why It Matters
Many modern “scholars” believe the first five books of the Bible, called the Torah, or Pentateuch, written after the exile, that is, after 586 BCE, while the older Jewish and Christian view is that Moses wrote it. Did Moses write the Torah, or Pentateuch? Why does it even matter?
The Torah was originally one scroll when originally written in ancient Hebrew, which had no written vowels. The reader would supply the vowel sounds, and people would listen when it was publicly read by the priests so they could learn the correct pronunciations. Later, in the 3rd century BCE, when the Torah was translated into Greek, which had written vowels, it became necessary to divide the Torah into five parts, which came to be called, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. From this the name Pentateuch was used to describe these five books, which were originally only one scroll in the ancient Hebrew. In any case, the entire Torah, or Pentateuch, is often referred to in the scriptures as, “the Law”, “the Law of Moses”, or sometimes, as just “Moses”.
