The constitutive economic contradiction in ancient Israel of the first millennium was one between palatine estates and the agricultural labour of village communities. Some biblical texts, such as Genesis and Exodus (the tension between Joseph and Jacob), Job and Proverbs, respond to such a situation in a number of ways: Genesis 41 to Exodus 15 by narrative structures; Job, textual form; and Proverbs, ideological oppositions. Though the socio-economic contradictions are responded in unexpected and mediated ways, they will be revealed by the ideological and narrative resolutions in the text.