DOCSLIB.ORG

Chapter One the Bible and Literature

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Chapter One the Bible and Literature Eiselein, Goins, Wood / Studying the Bible Chapter One The Bible and Literature Introduction This textbook is a companion to Bible courses taught in the English Department at Kansas State University, in particular ENGL 470 The Bible. The course and the textbook examine the Hebrew Bible and the early Christian writings of the New Testament. Both the course and the textbook are introductions to the analysis of biblical texts, their histories, and their interpretations. The emphasis throughout this textbook is on the literary qualities of these texts as well as their cultural and historical contexts. Such a textbook raises, at the start, perhaps two important questions. (1) What exactly is the Bible? The answer to this question is perhaps more complicated than it might seem. And (2) Why would it be taught in a university department devoted to the study of literature, the study of writing and language, and the study of rhetoric and culture? The answer to this question is, from our perspective, more obvious than it might seem at first. The Bible The Bible is not a book, although it is sometimes known as “the good book” and lays claim to being the most famous and best-selling book of all time. Instead, it is really a book of books or an anthology of books. In fact, the word “Bible” derives from the Greek word biblia, which means “little books.” It is a diverse library of reading. The specific books or exact contents of the Bible varies by tradition, as we explain in more detail in chapter two. The books of the Hebrew Bible, also known as the Tanakh, and their order and arrangement are not the same as Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, or Protestant Bibles. The Christian traditions divide the Bible into the Old and New Testaments. The Old Testament is similar many respects to the Hebrew Bible, though there are some significant differences. The Protestant Old Testament includes the same books as the Hebrew Bible but arranges and sometimes titles them differently. The Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox include additional books or parts of books (about fourteen) in their Old Testament line-up that are not part of the Jewish or Protestant “canon.” (The canon is the group of books that a specific religious tradition has determined to be authoritative scripture, and canons vary by tradition.) The early Christian writings within the New Testament are a part of the Christian Bibles but not, of 2 Eiselein, Goins, Wood / Studying the Bible course, the Hebrew Bible. Some narratives have been divided into two books, even though they are actually one continuous book (1 and 2 Samuel, for example). Some narratives are a single book in some traditions but divided in others: for example, Ezra- Nehemiah is a single book in the Jewish, Roman Catholic, and Greek Orthodox Bible (though it is known as 2 Esdras in the Orthodox canon), but two separate books in the Protestant Bible. The books of the Hebrew Bible were written mostly in Ancient or Classical Hebrew, though there are some sections in Aramaic. The early Christian writings were composed in Koine Greek, the Greek dialect common to the Hellenistic world from Alexander the Great’s conquests (335–323 BCE) through Jesus’s life and ministry and the development of the early Christian church and on to the early part of the Byzantine Empire, as a separate from the West part of the Roman Empire, which collapsed in the 400s CE. (Throughout this text, following current scholarly practice, we will use CE to denote the Common Era, also known as AD or anno domini, which means “the year of our Lord” in Latin. We use BCE to refer to the time Before the Common Era, also known as BC or “before Christ.”) The books of the Old Testament were written over a long period of time from about the 12th century BCE until about the 2nd century BCE, while most scholars believe that New Testament texts were composed between about 41 BCE (1 Thessalonians, the oldest existing Christian text, was probably composed about 49-51 BCE, though some scholars date it to as early as 41-44 CE) and 150 CE (2 Peter, generally thought to be the last New Testament book to be written, may have been composed as early as the end of the first century or as late as 140-150 CE). Although students and scholars still study these texts in their original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek languages, the Bibles most often read in the twenty-first-century United States are, of course, translations. The King James Version (KJV) of the Bible, first authorized by King James of England in the early 1600s CE, is one of the oldest and widely admired English translations of the Bible, and it is still often used, studied, and read. But there are many modern translations as well, which make use of scholarship, historical discoveries, and manuscripts and texts not available in the seventeenth-century. One such translation is the New Revised Standard Version or NRSV, which is an outstanding scholarly translation, and the one cited in this textbook, unless otherwise noted. There are a number of other great modern translations of the Bible available: the New International Version or NIV, the English Standard Version or ESV, Robert Alter’s translation of the Hebrew Bible from W.W. Norton, the Roman Catholic Jerusalem Bible, the Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, David Bentley Hart’s highly literal translation of the New Testament from Yale UP, among many others. Paraphrased versions of the Bible in 3 Eiselein, Goins, Wood / Studying the Bible English, like the Living Bible or The Message or the Good News Bible, have multiplied since the 1970s, and they can make these biblical texts easier to read, but they are not perhaps the most accurate or useful for the scholarly or literary study of the Bible. Many of these translations (and paraphrases) in English, as well as many other languages, are available to read free online at sites, such as BibleGateway: https://www.biblegateway.com. The Bible is enormously important to various faith traditions across the globe. The God of Abraham, whom we meet in the first book of the Bible, Genesis, is the God claimed by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Bible is also an essential set of documents for studying world histories, cultures, and literatures. It is by far the most studied and most quoted, alluded to, and referred to “book” in world history. It is not the most ancient still surviving literary text we still have – that honor belongs to the Epic of Gilgamesh, which dates as far back as 2100 BCE and for which we have tablets dating to about 1800 BCE, and includes a story of a flood remarkably similar to the one found in Genesis, chapters 6 to 8. Still, the Bible includes some of the oldest still extant literary writings we have, and their influence on world history, religion, culture, and literature has been immense. Literature For the most part, the books of the Bible were composed as literary texts. Among the various literary genres collected into the Bible, readers will find the following: Fig. 1. Genres of the Bible. Genres Selected Examples Religious and devotional poetry Psalms Erotic poetry Song of Songs Dramatic monologues and dialogues Job Short Stories Ruth, Jonah, Esther, Judith Prophetic oracles Amos, Hosea, Jeremiah, and many others Historical narratives Samuel and Kings, for instance, or Acts in NT Wisdom writings Proverbs, but also Ecclesiastes and Job or James in the NT Apocalypse Daniel in OT and Revelation in NT Legal codes, divine decrees Exodus 20-40, Leviticus, Deuteronomy Biography (Gospel) Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John 4 Eiselein, Goins, Wood / Studying the Bible Letters or epistles Paul’s writings, the General Epistles Within books or genres, there are also other genres or literary kinds that appear throughout the Bible. For instance, Jesus often teaches by telling a kind of story known as a parable, as does the prophet Nathan in 2 Samuel 12. The Bible also includes battle hymns (the Song of Deborah in Judges 5), various other kinds of songs and prayers (including Lamentations), proverbs and maxims and riddles (not just in Proverbs), genealogies (in Genesis and Exodus, 1 Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, but also Matthew 1), legends and fables (see, for example, Jotham’s fable in Judges 9:7-15), literary criticism (see the explanation of Jotham’s fable in Judges 9:16-21, or perhaps Paul’s careful interpretation of the story of Hagar and Sarah from Genesis in Galatians 4:21-5:1), orations (for example, Moses in Deuteronomy or Paul in Acts), sermons (Hebrews), and more. The literary styles used throughout the Bible also vary greatly. Sometimes the language is concise and terse, with very little description or elaboration, and other times the language is very descriptive, vivid, and highly figurative. Yet throughout this language and these texts signify in intense, complex, and not always obvious ways. These texts with their highly suggestive language and styles do not always mean the same thing to all readers, of course, and indeed they are often be interpreted in very different ways by the same reader (or re-reader) at different points or moments in their lives. What most readers of the Bible would agree on, regardless of their perspective, is that these texts reveal or yield a truly amazing range of profound meanings that can clarify or confuse, trouble or amuse, and leave readers thinking and wondering. We have written this textbook with the firmly held assumption that knowing more about the literary nature of biblical texts and knowing some key features of their historical and cultural contexts will help readers understand them better, more fully, and with more insight.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • A Resource Guide for Studying and Appropriating the Psalms
    Leaven Volume 7 Issue 3 I Lift Up My Soul Article 10 1-1-1999 I Lift Up My Soul: A Resource Guide for Studying and Appropriating the Psalms Paul Watson Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven Part of the Biblical Studies Commons, Christianity Commons, and the Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Watson, Paul (1999) "I Lift Up My Soul: A Resource Guide for Studying and Appropriating the Psalms," Leaven: Vol. 7 : Iss. 3 , Article 10. Available at: https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol7/iss3/10 This Resource Guide is brought to you for free and open access by the Religion at Pepperdine Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Leaven by an authorized editor of Pepperdine Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]. Watson: I Lift Up My Soul: A Resource Guide for Studying and Appropriatin 160 Leaven, Summer, 1999 ILift Up My Soul: A Resource Guide for Studying and Appropriating the Psal By Paul Watson We are experiencing among our not to suggest that oldel"'tesources the new Interpretation Biblical people a renewed and increased are not also valuable); and third, Studies series. Intended for use in interest in the psalms, which is most that they be readable and accessible congregational Bible classes, this is encouraging. We are turning to the to any serious student of the psalms. a ten-unit study guide. The first two psalms in many different settings-- I hope that you will find these units provide a general overview of in classes and small groups, in the resources as helpful and insightful the psalms; the remaining eight pulpit, in private devotional mo- as I have.
    [Show full text]
  • A Quick Guide to Biblical Genres
    A QUICK GUIDE TO BIBLICAL GENRES HISTORICAL NARRATIVE ● Historical narrative is Scripture that gives factual retellings of real events. ​ ● These books of the Bible are not based in myth, they are based in fact. ● As we read, it’s important for us to pause and reflect on the fact that these events actually happened! ​ ​ ● Historical narrative comprises 43% of the Bible. God loves to tell stories of His faithfulness. ● Old Testament narrative is found in: ○ Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1-2 Samuel, 1-2 Kings, 1-2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther ○ Parts of Job and the Prophets ● New Testament narrative is found in: ○ Matthew, Mark, Luke, John (see ‘The Gospels’ below for more) and Acts THE LAW ● Biblical law is Scripture that outlines God’s commands to His covenant people. ​ ● Laws come in several forms: ○ Moral Law- laws about how to live, for all people in all times ○ Ceremonial Law- laws about tabernacle and temple worship for the Israelites ○ Civil or Judicial Law- laws that governed, preserved and protected Israelite society ● It’s important for us to note that the law was given after God redeemed the Israelites out of Egypt. Grace ​ came before the law. ● The law was designed to be used by governing authorities, not individuals. ● Biblical law is found in ○ Leviticus, parts of Exodus, Numbers and Deuteronomy POETRY ● Biblical poetry is Scripture written in verse. ​ ● This type of Scripture is full of symbolic language, metaphors, word pictures and expressions of feeling. ● Psalms make up the majority of biblical poetry, but poetry can also be found in: ○ Song of Solomon, Lamentations, and several OT narratives ● There are several authors of Psalms, with David being the most well-known author.
    [Show full text]
  • Select Bibliography on Solomon Islands, 2003–2017
    Select Bibliography on Solomon Islands, 2003–2017 Clive Moore School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry The University of Queensland August 2017 Select Bibliography on Solomon Islands, 2003–2017 Biography Clive Moore CSI, is an Emeritus Professor in the School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry at The University of Queensland, where previously he held the McCaughey Chair of History. He is a leading Pacific historian whose major publications have been on New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands, the Pacific labour reserve, Australia’s Pacific Island immigrants, federation, masculinity and sexuality. Inaugural President of the Australian Association for the Advancement of Pacific Studies (2006–10), in 2005 he was awarded a Cross of Solomon Islands, and between 2011 and 2017 he was a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. In 2012, he was made Outstanding Alumni of the Year at James Cook University, and in 2015 he was awarded the John Douglas Kerr Medal of Distinction by The Royal Historical Society of Queensland and the Professional Historians Association (Queensland). His has major monographs are Kanaka: A History of Melanesian Mackay (Port Moresby, Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies and University of Papua New Guinea Press, 1985); Sunshine and Rainbows: The Development of Gay and Lesbian Culture in Queensland (St Lucia, Qld, University of Queensland Press, 2001; New Guinea: Crossing Boundaries and History (Honolulu, University of Hawai’i Press, 2003); Happy Isles in Crisis: The Historical Causes for a Failing State in Solomon Islands, 1998–2004 (Canberra, Asia Pacific Press, 2004); The Forgan Smith: History of a Building and its People at The University of Queensland (St Lucia, Qld, The University of Queensland, 2010); and, Making Mala: Malaita in Solomon Islands, 1870s–1903s (Canberra, Australian National University Press, 2017).
    [Show full text]
  • Elizabeth Singer Rowe
    Elizabeth Singer Rowe: Dissent, Influence, and Writing Religion, 1690-1740 Jessica Haldeman Clement PhD University of York English and Related Literature September 2017 Abstract This thesis addresses the religious poetry of Elizabeth Singer Rowe, arguing that her Dissenting identity provides an important foundation on which to which to critically consider her works. Although Rowe enjoyed a successful career, with the majority of her writing seeing multiple editions throughout her lifetime and following her death, her posthumous reputation persists as an overly pious and reclusive religious poet. Moving past these stereotypes, my thesis explores Rowe’s engagement with poetry as a means to convey various aspects of Dissent and her wider religious community. This thesis also contributes to the wider understanding of Dissenting creative writing and influence in the years following the Glorious Revolution of 1688, using Rowe’s work as a platform to demonstrate complexities and cultural shifts within the work of her contemporaries. My argument challenges the notion that Rowe’s religious poetry was a mere exercise in piety or a display of religious sentimentalism, demonstrating powerful evolutions in contemporary discussions of philosophy, religious tolerance, and the relationship between the church and state. A popular figure that appealed to a heterodox reading public, Rowe addresses many aspects of Dissent throughout her work. Combining close readings of Rowe’s poetry and religious writings with the popular works of her contemporaries, this study explores latitudinarian shifts and discussions of depravity within her religious poetry, the impact of the Clarendon Code and subsequent toleration on her conceptualisation of suffering and imprisonment, as well as her use of ecumenical language throughout her writings.
    [Show full text]
  • Studia Orientalia 111 Studia Orientalia Volume 111 Published by the Finnish Oriental Society Studia Orientalia Volume 111 Published by the Finnish Oriental Society
    STUDIA ORIENTALIA 111 Studia Orientalia Volume 111 Published by the Finnish Oriental Society Studia Orientalia Volume 111 Published by the Finnish Oriental Society Helsinki 2011 Studia Orientalia, vol. 111, 2011 Copyright © 2011 by the Finnish Oriental Society Societas Orientalis Fennica c/o Department of World Cultures P.O. Box 59 (Unioninkatu 38 B) FI-00014 University of Helsinki FINLAND Editor Lotta Aunio Advisory Editorial Board Axel Fleisch (African Studies) Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila (Arabic and Islamic Studies) Tapani Harviainen (Semitic Studies) Arvi Hurskainen (African Studies) Juha Janhunen (Altaic and East Asian Studies) Hannu Juusola (Semitic Studies) Klaus Karttunen (South Asian Studies) Kaj Öhrnberg (Librarian of the Society) Heikki Palva (Arabic Linguistics) Asko Parpola (South Asian Studies) Simo Parpola (Assyriology) Rein Raud (Japanese Studies) Riikka Tuori (Secretary of the Society) Typesetting Lotta Aunio ISSN 0039-3282 ISBN 978-951-9380-79-7 WS Bookwell Oy Jyväskylä 2011 CONTENTS Ordenanzas jerezanas sobre la guarda de la frontera frente a Ronda y su serranía a comienzos de la guerra de Granada (1482–1484) ......................................................1 JUAN ABELLÁN PÉREZ Categories of Proper Language in Classical Arabic Literature ................................23 LALE BEHZADI Algerische Literatur im achtzehnten Jahrhundert ....................................................39 MAREK M. DZIEKAN Economía de los Centros de Culto del Reino de Granada: Los bienes habices de la mezquita y rábitas del Padúl (Valle de
    [Show full text]
  • Interpreting Biblical Poetry
    Interpreting Biblical Poetry The poetry in the Old Testament (primarily the Psalms, but also some songs within narrative, as well as Song of Songs and poetic portions of the Prophets) was written in Hebrew, using Hebrew conventions. Whereas traditional English poetry relies on rhyme and meter, Hebrew poetry commonly uses other conventions (such as acrostics, parallelism, and contrast) that can be difficult to convey in English translation. Although poetry is more rare in the New Testament, there are portions of text (especially in the letters) that are styled as poetry because they are likely from early hymns or liturgies. Inductive Bible Study Applied to Poetry (Example: Psalm 34) 1. Observation: What do you notice about the text? What questions does it raise for you? (Read the text in at least two different versions of the Bible.) 2. Interpretation: What is the author trying to communicate? Who is the author or editor? (not all psalms were written by David; some are anonymous; “of David” may not mean that David is the author—it could mean “for” or “in the style of”) What is the literary context? (the psalms were not written in the order they are arranged in now, but they were intentionally edited together in collections and so may have some relationship to the psalms around them) What literary features does the author use? (acrostic, parallel lines, contrast, themes, etc.) Is there a clear historical context for the psalm/song? What did this psalm/song mean in its historical context? What does this psalm/song communicate about who God is, how he relates to his people, and how he wants his people to live and act? What does this psalm/song communicate about the faith, struggles, and emotions of someone living in covenant relationship with God? 3.
    [Show full text]
  • Celestial Crusades and Wars in Heaven: the Biblical Epics of the Late 1500S
    Celestial Crusades and Wars in Heaven: the Biblical Epics of the Late 1500s Silvia Giovanardi Byer A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of in the Department of Romance Languages Chapel Hill 2008 Dr. Dino Cervigni (advisor) Dr. Ennio Rao Dr. Federico Luisetti Dr. Amy Chambless Dr. Elvira Giosi ©2008 Silvia Giovanardi Byer ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii Abstract SILVIA GIOVANARDI BYER: Celestial Crusades and Wars in Heaven: the Biblical Epics of the Late 1500s. (Under the Direction of Dino Cervigni) This dissertation examines two examples of biblical epic literature: Antonino Alfano’s Battaglia celeste (1568) and Erasmus of Valvasone's Angeleida (1590), situating their works and this genre within their ancient, medieval, and early modern context as primordial struggles between the forces of good and evil and the complex cultural reality of post-Tridentine culture. While these two biblical epics have drawn only scant attention, limited mostly to specialized literary circles, biblical epic in general bears out the influence of such classical masterpieces as Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid. At the same time, readers will undoubledly discover these two biblical epic’s relationship to, and likely influence on, John Milton’s masterpiece Paradise Lost. Furthermore, iii Angeleida and Battaglia celeste exemplify the biblical epic genre in their intent to educate and entertain. Likewise, both works develop the primordial and mythical battle between the archangel Michael and Lucifer to explore the timeless theme of conflict between good and evil, virtue and sin, while elucidating and reflecting the political and religious realities of the authors’ rapidly changing world in Italy’s post-Tridentine complicated historical time.
    [Show full text]
  • Psalm 133: a (Close) Reading 2 Journal of Hebrew Scriptures
    The Journal of Hebrew Scriptures ISSN 1203-1542 http://www.jhsonline.org and http://purl.org/jhs Articles in JHS are being indexed in the ATLA Religion Database, RAMBI, and BiBIL. Their abstracts appear in Religious and Theological Abstracts. The journal is ar- chived by Library and Archives Canada and is accessible for consultation and research at the Electronic Collection site maintained by Library and Archives Canada (for a direct link, click here). VOLUME 8, ARTICLE 20 F. W. DOBBS-ALLSOPP, PSALM 133: A (CLOSE) READING 2 JOURNAL OF HEBREW SCRIPTURES PSALM 133: A (CLOSE) READING F. W. DOBBS-ALLSOPP PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY 1. INTRODUCTION The art of reading remains the paradigmatic practice of literary criticism, even (and perhaps especially) on this, the thither side of theory. The princi- pal thrust, for example, of T. Eagleton’s recent poetry primer is to call stu- dents of literature back to the practices and habits of close reading.1 In Bib- lical Studies, too, there have been kindred voices raised urging scholars and students of biblical poetry to move from a preoccupation with matters of underlying structure and prosody (never irrelevant issues) to a pursuit of “the poetry per se,” a pursuit, that is, of reading.2 Readings (always in the 1 How to Read a Poem (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007), 1. 2 E. L. Greenstein, “Aspects of Biblical Poetry,” Jewish Book Annual 44 (1986– 87), 42. The 1980s in particular witnessed a great amount of interest in scrutinizing key formal features (e.g., parallelism, meter, line structure) characteristic of biblical Hebrew verse, e.g., L.
    [Show full text]
  • READING ECCLESIASTES from ASIA and PASIFIKA International Voices in Biblical Studies
    READING ECCLESIASTES FROM ASIA AND PASIFIKA ASIA FROM ECCLESIASTES READING International Voices in Biblical Studies This follow-up to Reading Ruth in Asia (2015) extends Qoheleth’s question in Ecclesiastes 3:9 to the toils of biblical critics: Is there gain READING ECCLESIASTES through oral (e.g., stories, legends, customs, ways) and written (e.g., Tamilin reading? and ChineseContributors scriptures) from Asia texts and as Pasifika they ponder approach this Ecclesiastes question. FROM ASIA AND PASIFIKA inVoices new fromdirections Palestine, through Pakistan, sources and not Pasifika usually add encountered to those from in biblical India, Malaysia, China, Sri Lanka, and Australia and expand the conversation theirscholarship. interpretations Topics of of wisdom, this ancient gender, text. justice,Reading vanity, Ecclesiastes bitterness, from Asialife, anddeath, Pasifika labor, isexile, a call pain, for moreand philosophy contextual, inviteintertextual, readers interscriptural, to reconsider JIONEand postcolonial HAVEA readings from within and beyond Asia and Pasifika. research fellow with Trinity Theological College (Aotearoa New is a native pastor (Methodist Church in Tonga) and Theology Research Centre in Australia. He is the author of Jonah: An EarthZealand) Bible and Commentary with Charles (2020) Sturt andUniversity’s the editor Public of Vulnerability and Contextual and Resilience: Body and Liberating Theologies (2020) and Sea of Readings: The Bible in the South Pacific (2018). PETER H. W. LAU He taught at Seminari is an Theoloji honorary Malaysia research 2010–2018. associate at He the is Universitythe coauthor of ofSydney Unceasing and a Kindness:visiting lecturer A Biblical at SydneyTheology Missionary of Ruth (with and GregBible Goswell, College. and coeditor of Reading Ruth in Asia and Lau Havea 2016), author of Esther in the Asia Bible Commentary series (2018), (with Jione Havea).
    [Show full text]
  • Ugaritic Narrative Poetry Kindle
    UGARITIC NARRATIVE POETRY PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Simon B Parker | 288 pages | 01 Jun 1997 | Society of Biblical Literature | 9780788503375 | English | none Ugaritic Narrative Poetry PDF Book Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email. One text 1. The classic discussion is Liverani, Prestige and Interest , — Psalm This similarity in style and formula is not surprising, given the shared tradition of Ugaritic and Israelite poets. Third Tablet. Adam fell that men might be; And men are, that they might have joy. A Manual of Ugaritic. The next three columns, 1. How did one become a brother in the Bronze Age? Be the first to ask a question about Ugaritic Narrative Poetry. Unlike biblical literature, the Ugaritic texts show a wealth of narrative poetry, often called myths and epics 4 ; a fair collection of rituals cf. Other nice tetracola occur at 1 Sam. The book presents not only a fun, quick read for those with passing interests, but a valuable, compact resource for professionals working with the original language. Yea cursed is he that putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm. According to his version of the events, the armies of Hatti and Assyria were poised for battle when:. Average rating 4. Hellenistic sources sometimes equate Anat with the virgin warrior Athena, as in a fourth-century bce bilingual inscription in Phoenician and Greek from Lapethos on Cyprus. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, , The form this might take in the Egyptian composition of the books of Lehi and Nephi is not addressed herewith. I have laid the Book of Mormon version out as poetry below and placed the Hebrew of the Massoretic Isaiah text in the right-hand column for comparison:.
    [Show full text]
  • Bloomfield, the Poetry of Interpretation
    The Poetry of Interpretation: Exegetical Lyric after the English Reformation Gabriel Bloomfield Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2019 © 2019 Gabriel Bloomfield All rights reserved ABSTRACT The Poetry of Interpretation: Exegetical Lyric after the English Reformation Gabriel Bloomfield “The Poetry of Interpretation” writes a pre-history of the twentieth-century phenomenon of close reading by interpreting the devotional poetry of the English Renaissance in the context of the period’s exegetical literatures. The chapters explore a range of hermeneutic methods that allowed preachers and commentators, writing in the wake of the Reformation’s turn to the “literal sense” of scripture, to grapple with and clarify the bible’s “darke texts.” I argue that early modern religious poets—principally Anne Lock, John Donne, George Herbert, William Alabaster, and John Milton—absorbed these same methods into their compositional practices, merging the arts of poesis and exegesis. Consistently skeptical about the very project they undertake, however, these poets became not just practitioners but theorists of interpretive method. Situated at the intersection of religious history, hermeneutics, and poetics, this study develops a new understanding of lyric’s formal operations while intimating an alternative history of the discipline of literary criticism. CONTENTS List of Illustrations ii Acknowledgments iii Note on Texts vi Introduction 1 1. Expolition: Anne Lock and the Poetics of Marginal Increase 33 2. Chopology: How the Poem Crumbles 87 3. Similitude: “Multiplied Visions” and the Experience of Homiletic Verse 147 4. Prosopopoeia: The Poem’s Split Personality 208 Bibliography 273 i LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Poetry, Reason, and Revelation
    Drops of Gold: Poetry, Reason, and Revelation Spain in the Middle Ages was not a melting pot. It probably would be more apt to visualize it as an eco-system, in which diverse species; i.e., Muslims ( Arab and Berber), Spaniards ( Christians), and Jews -- continually negotiated and renegotiated to establish and maintain their territories, ( read: cultures and physical loci.) Perhaps as a consequence of their mutual threat to each other and their individual vulnerability, each culture reinforced its own identity with an incredible outpouring of cultural activity, the concentrated offspring of its life force.i Two of those species were not indigenous; they carried the revelatory messages of other times and places. They bore similar scars of shared encounters with alien thought, and shared a history of intimacy born of ancient enmity, shared territorial experience, and linguistic kinship. Judeo-Hispanic poetry of the Golden Age of Spain ( about 1000-1148) is the evidence of an unusual hybridization process and intricate environmental circumstances, both intellectual and physical. Like Arabic-Hispanic poetry, it grew briefly on foreign soil, before being uprooted. The progenitors of Judeo-Hispanic poetry most probably were the oral poetry traditions of nomadic Arabic tribes who roamed the middle east before the coming of Islam, Islamic poets of the Abassid dynasty in Baghdad, oral traditions of the Israelites, Biblical poetry, possibly the songs of the Iberian peninsula and the philosophy of the Kalam. Arabic speaking Jews of the middle East first encountered Greek thought in Arabic, especially in ninth century cosmopolitan, bustling Baghdad. The emergence of the first Jewish philosophers was an outgrowth of the Kalam schools of the eighth to eleventh centuries, the Muslim theology of the Abbasid caliphate, especially of the Mutazalites.
    [Show full text]