Jacob Onyumbe Dissertation

Piles of Slain, Heaps of Corpses: Lament, Lyric, and Trauma in the Book of Nahum by Jacob Onyumbe Wenyi The Divinity School Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Ellen F. Davis, Supervisor ___________________________ Stephen B. Chapman ___________________________ Anathea Portier-Young ___________________________ Gerald O. West Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Theology in the Divinity School of Duke University 2017 i v ABSTRACT Piles of Slain, Heaps of Corpses: Lament, Lyric, and Trauma in the Book of Nahum by Jacob Onyumbe Wenyi The Divinity School Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ Ellen F. Davis, Supervisor ___________________________ Stephen B. Chapman ___________________________ Anathea Portier-Young ___________________________ Gerald O. West Abstract of a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Theology in the Divinity School of Duke University 2017 i v Copyright by Jacob Onyumbe Wenyi 2017 i v Abstract With its description of God as wrathful and vengeful and its graphic depiction of war and violence, Nahum has often been treated as a dangerous book, both in church settings and in academic circles. This dissertation is an effort to confront violence, both in my community and in the book of Nahum. It is a contextual reading of Nahum against the background of the wars that have plagued my country, the Democratic Republic of the Congo since the early 1990s. It argues that Nahum’s description of God and its depiction of war scenes were meant to evoke in seventh-century BCE Judahite audiences the memory of war and destruction at the hands of the Assyrians. The vivid images of YHWH’s war against Nineveh do not give readers a historical report on the fall of Nineveh, neither do they intend to foreshadow the historical fall of that Neo-Assyrian capital city in 612 BCE. Rather, they more likely reflect the prophet-poet’s attempt to depict a world that would have spoken to the painful collective memory of those who survived the destruction of Lachish and other Judahite towns during Sennacherib’s invasion of Judah in 701 BCE. The prophet uses lyric poetry to evoke (rather than narrate) Judah’s memory of war and reveal the immediate and comforting presence of YHWH within the conditions of war. He presents that revelation by adapting two traditional literary forms, the biblical Oracle against foreign Nations (OAN) and the Ancient Near Eastern city lament. Given the rhetoric of the book within its early audience, I show that this book can also speak powerfully into the conditions of Congolese Christians who have suffered the trauma of war. iv Dedication To the Martyrs of Kaniola Your blood still cries out to God! v Contents Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iv Dedication ........................................................................................................................... v Contents ............................................................................................................................. vi Abbreviations ..................................................................................................................... xi Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... xiii Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Tri-polar Contextual Biblical Hermeneutics of Reconciliation ........................ 7 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 7 1.1 African Tri-polar Biblical Hermeneutics: Draper and West ................................. 11 1.2 Autobiographical comments ................................................................................. 20 1. 3 Tri-polar Biblical hermeneutics of Reconciliation .............................................. 24 1.3.1 Contextualization ............................................................................................. 24 Contextualization and the Study of War Trauma ................................................. 32 1.3.1 Distantiation ..................................................................................................... 35 1.3.1 Appropriation ................................................................................................... 37 Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 40 Chapter 2: War, Traumatic Violence, and Congolese Collective Memory ...................... 41 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 41 2.1 Personal and Collective Memories ....................................................................... 41 2.2 Congolese Wars: Historical Overview.................................................................. 49 2. 3 Into the “Whirlwind of Violence:” Listening to the Stories of Survivors in North Kivu and South Kivu. ................................................................................................. 52 vi 2.3.1 The Many Faces of Violence ........................................................................... 54 Rape and sexual violence ...................................................................................... 57 Beating, maiming, abductions, summary executions, and massacres. .................. 63 Economic and environmental consequences of violence ...................................... 65 Destruction of Communities ................................................................................. 67 Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 72 Chapter 3: The Historical Context of the Vision of Nahum: Assyrian Invasions and Judah’s Collective Memory .............................................................................................. 74 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 74 3.1 Scholarly Discussions on the Historical Context of Nahum ................................. 76 3.2 Nahum as an OAN and a Text of Resistance ........................................................ 81 3.3 Assyrian Palace Art and Royal Propaganda ......................................................... 87 3.3.1 Lion Hunt Reliefs from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal ............................. 90 3.3.2 Sennacherib’s Invasion of Judah and the “Lachish Reliefs” at Nineveh ......... 95 3.3.2.1 Lachish before Sennacherib ...................................................................... 96 3.3.2.2 Sennacherib at Lachish ............................................................................. 97 3.4 Trauma and the Inhabitants of Lachish ............................................................... 106 3.5 Nahum and the Destruction of Lachish .............................................................. 108 Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 109 Chapter 4: On the Genre, the Form, and the Poetics of the Book of Nahum ................. 110 Introduction ............................................................................................................... 110 4.1 The Genre Question in Nahum ........................................................................... 111 4.2 Nahum as an OAN and a Modified City lament ................................................. 114 vii 4.2.1 Subject and Mood .......................................................................................... 120 4.2.2 Divine Abandonment and Return .................................................................. 120 4.2.3 Assignment of responsibility ......................................................................... 121 4.2.4 Divine Agent of destruction ........................................................................... 122 4.2.5 Destruction ..................................................................................................... 123 4.2.6 Lamentation over the destruction of the City ................................................ 126 4.3 The Poetics of Lyric ............................................................................................ 129 4.3.1 Parataxis ......................................................................................................... 129 4.3.2 Extravagance of Lyric and the Sublime ......................................................... 132 Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 143 Introduction to Chapters 5 and 6 ..................................................................................... 144 Chapter 5: Imaging God Amid Chaos ............................................................................ 148 Introduction ............................................................................................................... 148 5.1 YHWH as Jealous and Vengeful – Nahum 1:1, 2-3a ......................................... 149 5.2 YHWH’s

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