However, he was soon transferred to Halle (1889–1894) and told to concentrate on the Hebrew Bible by the Prussian academic appointments authority.

His 1895 book Creation and Chaos in the Primeval Era and the Eschaton compared the symbolism in Genesis and Revelation 12.

[4] Gunkel founded the series Research into the Religion and Literature of the Old and New Testaments (1903–) with Wilhelm Bousset.

[2] He also co-edited with Leopold Zscharnack the second edition of the German religious encyclopedia Religion in History and the Present (1927–1931), in which he authored over one hundred articles.

[6] Gunkel and the school thought that the oral traditions that form the origins of the Hebrew Bible were directly tied to other Near Eastern religions.

[10] Because of its utility, form criticism became immensely influential in Germany and Europe during the 20th century, with important scholars like Gerhard von Rad and Martin Noth applying and developing it.