Humanities 1110 20072008 Greek and Biblical Traditions

1
Welcome!
2
Humanities 1110 2007-2008Greek and Biblical
Traditions

• Winter Term 2008
• Unit 4 Hebrew Bible
• Jonah, Ruth, Esther
• 9 January

3
Welcome!

• Reminder
• Test 2
• (30 of the course grade)
• Next Wednesday,
• 16 January 2008,
• 830 a.m.1000 a.m.

4
Lecture

• Thesis Evidence from inner-biblical
  interpretation in its various modes shows that
  there are different understandings of the
  relationship between Israel and the Divine,
  ranging from where the Divine is close to the
  community or removed from it.

5
Lecture

• Critical Skills
• Literary Criticism
• Identifying literary units
• Repetition of words, and themes metaphor
• Structure of Narrative e.g. inclusio
• Genre
• Redaction (Editorial) Criticism
• Modes of Inner-Biblical Interpretation
• Ideological Criticism
• Tradition and Inner-Biblical Interpretation
• Redescription

6
Lecture

• What are the modes of inner-biblical criticism
  discussed by Benjamin Sommer?

7
Review of Two Case Studies1Creation Narrative

• Genesis 11-24a
• 26 And God said, Let us make man in our
  image27And God created man in His image, in the
  image of God He created him male and female he
  created them. 28God blessed them and God said to
  them, Be fertile and increase.

• Genesis 24b-324
• 7 the LORD God formed man from the dust of the
  earth. He blew into his nostrils the breath of
  life, and man became a living being.

8
Comments

• (1) The mode of Divine activity in Genesis
  11-24a is not specified other than He
  created, whereas Genesis 24b presents divine
  activity in terms of a human craft, making a clay
  figure/figurine. (2) In the tradition, these
  accounts are harmonized so that each narrative
  presents a different aspect) of the divine
  nature.

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Comments

• In a redescription, however, these narratives
  represent different understandings of the divine,
  two different ideologies. Both are in TNK. The
  editor is conservative both narratives are
  included without comment as to the relationship
  between them.

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Review of Two Case Studies2David and Bathsheba
Frame Narrative

• 2 Samuel 10-12
• 111 At the turn of the year, the season when
  kings go out to battle, David sent Joab with
  his officers and all Israel with him, and they
  devastated Ammon and besieged Rabbah David
  remained in Jerusalem. 2 Late one afternoon,
  David rose from his couch1226 Joab attacked
  Rabbah of Ammon and captured the royal city.

• 1 Chronicles 19-20
• 201 At the turn of the year, the season when
  kings go out to battle, Joab led out the army
  force and devastated the land of Ammon, and then
  beseiged Rabbah, while David remained in
  Jerusalem Joab reduced Rabbah and left it in
  ruins.

11
Comments

• (1) Note the marginal comment The narrative of
  Davids adultery and murder is embedded in the
  account of the war with Ammon.
• (2) Chronicles omits the narrative of David and
  Bathsheba. See the marginal notes for 2 Samuel
  some rabbinic sources say that David did not
  commit adultery, for Uriah would have given
  Bathsheba a conditional divorce, and the
  Ammonites killed Uriah, not David (part of the
  tradition).

12
Scholium (plural scholia)Scribal Comment (in
margin?)

• 1 Kings 151-8
• 5 For David had done what was pleasing to the
  LORD and never turned throughout his life from
  all that He had commanded him, except in the
  matter of Uriah the Hittite.

• Comments
• Sometimes later, scribal comments are
  subsequently copied into the text.
• See the marginal comment.
• This text is missing in LXX (Septuagint, Greek
  translation of TNK).

13
Comment

• The textual evidence mentioned in the marginal
  note refers to Codex Vaticanus, a fourth century
  CE manuscript in book form (codex) which includes
  most of TNK and the Christian texts that make up
  the Christian New Testament. The earlier
  translation of TNK into Greek, the Septuagint.

14
Prophecy

• And though I kept sending all My servants, the
  prophets, to them daily and persistently
  (Jeremiah 725).
• Then I heard the voice of my Lord saying, Whom
  shall I send? Who will go for us? And I said,
  Here am I send me. 9And He said, Go, say to
  that people Hear, indeed, (Isaiah 68-9).

15
Prophecy

• 10Come, therefore, I will send you to Pharaoh
  11But Moses said to God, Who am I that I should
  go to Pharaoh? 12And he said, I will be with
  you that shall be your sign that it was I who
  sent you 13 Moses said to God, When I come to
  the Israelites and say to them, The God of your
  fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me,
  What is name? What shall I say to them? 14
  He continued, Thus shall you say to the
  Israelites, Ehyeh sent me to you15 Thus
  shall you speak to the Israelites The LORDhas
  sent me to you (Exodus 310-15)

16
David and Bathsheba2 Samuel 11-12

• David sent Joab (111)
• 3and the king sent someone to make inquiries
  about the woman
• 4David sent messengers to fetch her
• 5she sent word to David, I am pregnant.
• 6Thereupon David sent a message to

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David and Bathsheba2 Samuel 11-12

• Joab, Send Uriah the Hittite to me a
• and Joab sent Uriah to David.
• 12 David said to Uriah, tomorrow I will send
  you off.
• 14 In the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab,
  which he sent with Uriah.
• 18 Joab sent a full report of the battle to
  David.

18
David and Bathsheba2 Samuel 11-1225

• 22 The messenger set out he came and told
  David all that Joab had sent him to say.
• 27 After the period of mourning was over, David
  sent and had her brought into his palace she
  became his wife and she bore him a son.
• 121 But the LORD was displeased with what David
  had done, and the LORD sent Nathan to David. He
  came to him and said,.
• 1225 and He sent a message through the prophet
  Nathan .

19
Comments

• The omission of this narrative by the Chronicler
  implies that the Chronicler identified this
  material as a single literary unit, a short
  story.
• The verb send is used fourteen times this verb
  gives the narrative its forward motion. One
  character either sends someone somewhere, or
  sends a message to someone by a messenger.
• David is the chief sender. The messenger is the
  senders servant (subordinate).

20
Comments

• Davids desire is realized when he sent a
  message for Bathsheba to be brought to the
  palace to be his wife.
• The narrative divides into two equal parts.
• The beginning of the second part, the reversal at
  the mid-point is 121 But the LORD was
  displeased with what David had done, and the LORD
  sent Nathan to David. He came to him and said,.
  

21
Comments

• There is an inclusio with 121 at the conclusion,
  1225 where God sent a message to the prophet
  Nathan.
• Send appears once more in the frame-story
  Joab sent messengers to David (1227).
• Prophets are in the service of the divine, and
  carry messages from the divine to an audience.

22
Comments

• Prophet Greek, pro- phêmi. Pro can mean
  either before or on behalf of. A prophet may
  speak beforehand about a future event (Nathan re
  the child), but always the prophet speaks on
  behalf of his superior.
• The Greek translation of this text uses apostellô
  for send. The noun related to this verb is, in
  English, apostle. This word is important in early
  Christian literature, especially Pauls letters.
• In Latin, mitto, from which mission and
  missionary are derived.

23
Comments

• We can now better appreciate the text from
  Jeremiah
• And though I kept sending all My servants, the
  prophets, to them daily and persistently
  (Jeremiah 725).
• In prophetic narratives, 2 Samuel 11-12, for
  example, the divine is presented as fairly close.
  
• In non-prophetic narratives, the divine is remote
  or absent.

24
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet
25
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet

• The institution of the prophet, however, already
  implies a shift away from the immediacy of the
  divine, as shown in the creation narrative in
  Genesis 2-3, where the divine came to the garden
  for conversation.

26
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet

• Moses, in the Deuteronomist narrative, does have
  an immediate experience of the divine Never
  again did there arise in Israel a prophet like
  Moseswhom the LORD singled out, face to face,
  for the various signs and portents that the LORD
  sent him to display in the land of
  Egypt(Deuteronomy 3410-11).

27
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet

• You speak to us, they said to Moses, and we
  will obey but let not God speak to us, lest we
  die (Exodus 2016).
• Moses is the go-between, the intermediary,
  between the divine and the community.

28
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet

• The Spokesperson as Intermediary
• When Moses tried to get out of his prophets job,
  God became angry
• 13But he said, Please, O Lord, make someone
  else Your agent. 14The LORD became angry with
  Moses, and He said, There is your brother Aaron
  the Levite. He, I know, speaks readily

29
Moses, the Paradigmatic Prophet

• The Spokesperson as Intermediary
• Thus he shall serve as your spokesman, with you
  playing the role of God to him,. (Exodus 416).

30
Organizational Chart
31
Prophecy as a Cross-Cultural Phenomenon

• Identify Prophets in Non-Israelite Literature
• Cassandra in
• Agamemnon.
• Cassandra is the spokesperson for
• Apollo.

32
The Joseph Novella and the Distant Divine

• There are no citations of divine sayings except
  in Genesis 484.
• No divine origin is given for Josephs dreams in
  375 and 9 unlike Matthew, where an angel of
  the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream or
  variant of the formula (118, 213, 19, 22).
• The emphasis is on Josephs ability to interpret
  the dream, because the Pharaoh had dreams too.
  Compare Daniel in Daniel.

33
The Joseph Novella and the Distant Divine

• Joseph tells Pharaoh that his dreams have a
  divine origin God has revealed to Pharaoh what
  He is about to do (4128) this statement is
  part of Josephs interpretation.
• Who, cross-culturally, is a dream interpreter?

34
The Joseph Novella and the Distant/Hidden Divine

• It is Joseph who is the pious character that
  makes the connection with the divine, though,
  unlike the Exodus story, or the Flood stories,
  there is no narrative of divine intervention
• God has sent me ahead of you to ensure your
  survival on earth 8So, it was not you who sent
  me here, but God and He has made me a father to
  Pharaoah (457-8).
• But Joseph said to them, Have no fear! Am I a
  substitute for God 20Besides, although you
  intended me harm, God intended it for good, so as
  to bring about the present resultthe survival of
  many people. (5019-20).

35
Narrative Construction of Jonah
Chapter 1 innocent(14)
Chapter 4 do not yet know their right hand
from their left (11)
Inclusio
Chapter 3
Chapter 2
36
Jonah Inner-biblical Interpretation Polemic

• The theme of innocence calls to mind Genesis 18,
  where Abraham debates with the divine being
  concerning the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah.
• 23Abraham came forward and said, Will You sweep
  away the innocent along with the guilty? 24What
  if there should be fifty innocent within the
  city will you then wipe out the place and not
  forgive it for the sake of the innocent fifty who
  are in it.

37
Jonah Meta-Prophetic Narrative

• Typically, the prophet conveys a message from the
  divine to human beings for example
• And He said, Go, say to that people
• Hear, indeed, but do not understand
• See, indeed, but do not grasp.
• .
• Lest, seeing with its eyes
• And hearing with its ears,
• It also grasp with its mind,
• And repent turn and save itself. (Isaiah
  69-10)

38
Jonah Meta-Prophetic Narrative

• Jonahs message was Forty days more and Nineveh
  shall be overthrown (34), a proclamation of
  judgment only (12).
• The response The people of Nineveh believed
  God. They proclaimed a fast (35). Contrast
  Isaiah 6.
• The prophetic message of judgment and the
  possibility of repentance is uttered by the King
  of Nineveh (37-9)
• 8Let everyone turn back from his evil ways and
  from the injustice of which he is guilty. 9Who
  knows but that God may turn and relent? He may
  turn back from His wrath, so that we do not
  perish.

39
Jonah Meta-Prophetic Narrative

• The result of the message
• 410 God saw what they did, how they were
  turning back from their evil ways. And God
  renounced the punishment He had planned to bring
  upon them, and did not carry it out.
• Turn, like send, is a metaphor, derived from our
  embodied experience in space, to express a
  re-orientation in the domain of religious
  discourse.
• The response of the divine was as much in
  response to the Kings edict (He had the word
  cried through Nineveh By decree of the king and
  his nobles No man or beast 37) as in
  response to Jonahs message.

40
Jonah Mode of Divine Activity

• In this narrative, the divine acts closely
• The word of the LORD came to Jonah (11)
• But the LORD cast a mighty wind upon the sea
  (14).
• The LORD provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah
  (21).
• The LORD commanded the fish, and it spewed Jonah
  out upon the dry land.
• The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second
  time (31).
• The divine provides three things in chapter 4.

41
Narrative Construction of Ruth
Chapter 4 The gate of Bethlehem
Chapter 1 BethlehemBethlehem turn10x barley
harvest122
Chapter 3 Naomis plan threshing
Chapter 2 barley harvest 223
42
Intertextuality in Ruth 418 This is the line
of Perez
38 In the middle of the night, the man gave a
start and pulled backthere was a woman lying at
his feet!
36Thus the two daughters of Lot came to be with
child by their father. 37The older one bore a son
and named him Moa he is the father of the
Moabites today.
16So he turned aside to her by the road and
said, Here, let me sleep with youfor he did
not know that she was his daughter-in-law.
43
Narratives of Male Vulnerability

• So the LORD God cast a deep sleep upon the man
  and, while he slept, He took one of his ribs and
  closed up the flesh at that spot (Genesis 221).
• 20Noah, the tiller of the soil, was the first to
  plant a vineyard. 21He drank of the wine and
  became drunk, and he uncovered himself within his
  tent. 22Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his
  fathers nakedness (Genesis 920-22).

44
Narratives of Male Vulnerability

• Genesis 1930-38 33That night they made their
  father drink wine, and the older one went in and
  lay with her father he did not know when she lay
  down or when she rose.

45
Narratives of Male Vulnerability

• 18 Jael came out to greet Sisera and said to
  him, Come in, my lord, come in here, do not be
  afraid. So he entered her tent, and she covered
  him with a blanket.19He said to her, Please let
  me have some water I am thirsty21 Then Jael
  wife of Heber took a tent pin and grasped the
  mallet. When he was fast asleep from exhaustion,
  she approached him stealthily and drove the pin
  through his temple till it went down to the
  ground. Thus he died (Judges 417-21).

46
Narratives of Male Vulnerability

• 38 In the middle of the night, the man gave a
  start and pulled backthere was a woman lying at
  his feet! (Ruth).

47
Mode of Divine Activity in Ruth

• There is no explicit divine activity in Ruth,
  rather it is Naomi who is the central figure, and
  she expresses what the divine has done (the
  LORD has dealt harshly with me 121).
• At most the narrative mentions a report of divine
  activity for in the country of Moab she had
  heard that the LORD had taken note of His people
  and given them food (16).

48
Narrative Construction of Esther

• 1-5
• Esther becomes queen (217)
• the book of annals
• (221-23)
• Hamans edict (38-15)
• The stake (514)

• 6-7
• Reversal of Fortune
• the book of annals (61)
• Haman impaled (710)

Mordecai takes Hamans Place (81-2) Counter
Edict 83-919 916-32 Etiology 101-3 Mordecai
49
The Divine and Esther

• Mordecais message to Esther On the contrary,
  if you keep silent in this crisis, relief and
  deliverance will come to the Jews from another
  quarter, while you and your fathers house will
  perish. And who knows, perhaps you have attained
  to royal position for just such a crisis
  (414).

50
Esthers Tactics (5-7)

• Esther requests the king and Haman to come today
  to the feast that I have prepared for him (54),
  where she will make her request.
• The occasion is a wine feast. Esther requests the
  king and Haman to come a feast, and tomorrow I
  will do your Majestys bidding (58). Haman was
  happy and lighthearted (59) because no one
  else was there except the king, Esther, and
  himself (512) And tomorrow too I am invited by
  her along with the king (512).

51
Esthers Tactics (5-7)

• So the king and Haman came to feast with Queen
  Esther. 2On the second day, the king again asked
  Esther at the wine feast, What is your wish,
  Queen Esther? (71-2).
• Esther names Haman. The king leaves. The king
  returns !_at_!!!! and finds
• Haman in a compromising position Haman was
  lying prostrate on the couch on which Esther
  reclined. Does he mean, cried the king, to
  ravish the queen in my own palace? (78). Queen
  Esther does nothing to help Haman.

52
Esthers Tactics (8-9)

• Esther requests a counter-edict (83-6)
• Esther writes a second letter of Purim.
• Esther uses happy-hour to effect her plans
  Queen Esther is the perfect hostess.

53
Intertextuality and Esther

• There is no (explicit) allusion to the
  paradigmatic narrative, the Exodus.
• The reference to Agag is found, as the editor
  indicates, in Exodus 178-16 and 1 Samuel 15.
  King Saul failed to exterminate the Amalekites.
  Esther is a midrash on this story.

54
Intertextuality and Esther

• What is Adele Berlins explanation for the
  absence of references to the divine and religious
  observance in this text?
• The best explanation for their absence ,
  especially the absence of Gods name, is that,
  given that the story is so comic, at times
  bordering on lewd, such reticence about things
  religious is preferable, lest religion be
  debauched (JSB 1624).

55
The Thesis
Close Mediated
Remote
Deanthropomorphization
56
Thesis

• But Joseph said to them, Have no fear! Am I a
  substitute for God 20Besides, although you
  intended me harm, God intended it for good, so as
  to bring about the present resultthe survival of
  many people. (5019-20).
• let dispatches be written countermanding those
  which were written by Haman son of Hammedatha the
  Agagite, embodying his plot to annihilate the
  Jews throughout the kings provinces (Esther
  85).

57
Thesis

• The novellas about Joseph and Esther are stories
  by which the community celebrates its continuing
  identityits survivalby commemorating those
  resourceful individuals whose interventions saved
  the community from destruction.
• These novellas, along with Ruth, are a feature of
  post-exilic literature, when the Judaic community
  has experienced living outside of Israel.
• Deanthropomorphization as a polemic against
  polytheism, Israelite literature describes the
  divine in non-human terms and metaphors.