Observations on Judah’s Social and Economic History and the Dating of the Laws in Deuteronomy

Abstract

Nadav Na’aman’s recent dating of the Deuteronomic Law by social history is methodologically seminal, even if I disagree with the substance of his argument. In this article, I advance the case that the care of Deuteronomy for the ‘displaced Judahite” (גר) fits the 6th century much better than the 7th, as Na’aman argues.