Early Israel was an oral society. Biblical literature depicts the early Israelites as semi-nomadic wanderers who finally settled in Canaan and followed a pastoral and later, an increasingly agrarian lifestyle. This was not a setting in which we should expect writing to flourish. Rather, the “literature” of the early Israelites was an oral literature – the songs and stories, proverbs and folktales of a traditional society. The orality of the early Israelite tribes is reflected in biblical literature. According to Deuteronomy, every Israelite confessed about his ancestors: “my father was a wandering Aramean” (Deut 26:5). Archaeological research also has suggested that the early Israelites in Canaan were pastoralists who eventually settled into an agrarian lifestyle. This suggests that the roots of early Israel were semi-nomadic shepherds who lived on the desert fringes of the Near East until around 1300 b.c.e. Consequently, the origins of these wanderers in the archaeological record are obscure. When the early Israelites do begin to show up in the archaeological record, they are shepherds and farmers. But did these shepherds and farmers write books? Who would have read such books anyway? Few, if any, could read. The social infrastructure necessary for the widespread use of writing in Israel would not begin to emerge until the late monarchy. Rather, the beginnings of the Bible are to be found in oral literature – in the stories and songs passed on from one generation to the next.