Priestly

See also: priestly

English

Etymology 1

Variant of Priestley.

Proper noun

Priestly (plural Priestlys)

1. A habitational surname from Old English.

Etymology 2

Semantic loan from German priesterlich and Priesterschrift (“Priestly source”, literally “priest document”), so called because of the reconstructed source’s emphasis on cultic issues. See priestly.

Adjective

Priestly (not generally comparable, comparative more Priestly, superlative most Priestly)

1. (history) Pertaining to the Priestly source (“P”), one of the sources of the Torah or Pentateuch according to the documentary hypothesis.

   Coordinate terms: Yahwistic, Elohistic, Deuteronomistic

   • 1971, Norman Habel, Literary Criticism of the Old Testament, →ISBN, page 79:

     Thus we continue to meet the new Priestly expression, “you (they) shall know that I am Yahweh” […]

   • 2004, Steven L. McKenzie, Abingdon Old Testament Commentaries: I & II Chronicles, →ISBN, page 27:

     Then, Welch (1939) went the opposite way, asserting that the original layer, written before the end of the exile showed Deuteronomy’s influence and that more Priestly texts were secondary.

   • 2005 [2000], Reinhard G. Kratz, translated by John Bowden, The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament, →ISBN, page 110:

     Noth made the necessary objections to that view and demonstrated that these are additions in the Priestly style which presuppose the bringing together of P and the non-Priestly text in Genesis–Numbers and the combination of Genesis–Joshua.