It is enough to
determine with something like probability the century or half-century
which best fits its historical data; and these appear to point to the
reign of Manasseh.

Between D and P there are no verbal parallels; but in the historical
resumes JE is followed closely, whole clauses and even verses being
copied practically verbatim. As Dr Driver points out in his careful
analysis, there are only three facts in D which are not also found in
JE, viz. the number of the spies, the number of souls that went down
into Egypt with Jacob, and the ark being made of acacia wood. But even
these may have been in J or E originally, and left out when JE was
combined with P. Steuernagel divides the legal as well as the hortatory
parts of D between two authors, one of whom uses the 2nd person plural
when addressing Israel, and the other the 2nd person singular; but as a
similar alternation is constantly found in writings universally
acknowledged to be by the same author, this clue seems anything but
trustworthy, depending as it does on the presence or absence of a single
Hebrew letter, and resulting, as it frequently does, in the division of
verses which otherwise seem to be from the same pen (cf. xx. 2). The
inference as to diversity of authorship is much more conclusive when
difference of standpoint can be proved, cf. v. 3, xi. 2 ff. with viii.
2. The first two passages represent Moses as addressing the generation
that was alive at Horeb, whereas the last represents him as speaking to
those who were about to pass over Jordan a full generation later; and it
may well be that the one author may, in the historical and hortatory
parts, have preferred the 2nd plural and the other the 2nd singular;
without the further inference being justified that every law in which
the 2nd singular is used must be assigned to the latter, and every law
in which the 2nd plural occurs must be due to the former.

The law of the Single Sanctuary, one of D's outstanding characteristics,
is, for him, an innovation, but an innovation towards which events had
long been tending. 2 Kings xxiii. 9 shows that even the zeal of Josiah
could not carry out the instructions laid down in D xviii. 6-8. Josiah's
acceptance of D made it the first canonical book of scripture. Thus the
religion of Judah became henceforward a religion which enabled its
adherents to learn from a book exactly what was required of them. D
requires the destruction not only of the high places