I thought I might be coining a phrase,
“proleptic metaphor,” until I googled it and discovered that scholars see
proleptic metaphor in Cervantes, Stendahl, and Arnold, just to name three. Skilled
authors are in fact very good at planting semes early on in a stream of
discourse such that, at the appropriate time, they will, retroactively, bear
metaphorical fruit.* Is this going on in Job 28?
An essay by Stephen A. Geller suggests as much. He speaks of the “metaphorical plane” on which much of Job 28:1-11 can be read. On this plane, the godhood and non-godhood of man are explored. The theory of metaphor offered by Benjamin Harshav may serve as a point of departure in describing the semantics of the case. References and discussion below.
Harshav objects to theories of metaphor which
limit it to a quality of words, sentences, or other linguistic units. Metaphor is
rather the result of textual interpenetration of two or more frames of
reference. Metaphor is grasped in a reader’s processing of a text (not a
linguistic unit, which is too limiting a concept). It is more than an inherent
quality of a text – and its occurrence is not a linear process. Metaphor occurs
with an interactive feedback loop. A text projects characters, settings, and
“worlds,” the reader (re-) constructs on that basis; in that context, semantic
integration occurs across multiple frames of references. The usual examples of
metaphor in the literature, Max Black’s “man is a wolf” or John Searle’s “Sally
is a block of ice,” are misleading. In real life, metaphor is an infinitely
more complex phenomenon.
Job 28 may exemplify. I have discussed this
passage before:
A
Poem about Two Kinds of Wisdom
For a prosodic analysis of the Hebrew, go here.
In the translation below I italicize expressions which, as Geller noted before
me in most cases, have both a literal and a metaphorical sense. Bolded
expressions are examples of the topos of liminality.
1 Now silver has a source,
there’s a
place they refine gold;
2 iron is taken from the ground,
rock smelted
into copper.
3 He puts an end to the darkness,
to every limit -
the explorer, that
is, of rock,
of gloom and
murk.
4 He breaks open a channel in a hollow,
places
forgotten
destitute of
humanity;
5 they wander a land
from which
heat comes forth,
its lower
regions convulsed by fire;
6 a place whose rocks are lapis,
the specks
of which are gold.
7 The path to it no raptor knows,
the falcon’s
eye
has not
seen it;
8 proud beasts
have trod it not,
nor has the
lion
traversed
it.
9 He sets his hand against the flint,
overturns mountains
at their root;
10 cleaves Niles in the rocks,
every precious
thing his eye sees;
11 he dams up the flow of streams
that he might bring hidden things to
light.
12 But where can wisdom be found,
where is the
source of understanding?
13 Her location humankind
does not know;
she cannot be found
in the land of
the living.
14 The deep says:
she’s not in
me;
the sea says:
not with me.
15 She cannot be bought
in exchange
for gold;
her price in silver
cannot be
weighed out.
16 She cannot be compared
to Ophir’s
fine gold,
precious
onyx and lapis.
17 Not gold, not glass
are equal in
value,
not vessels
of gold, to her worth;
18 not coral and crystal
to be
mentioned beside her,
better than
rubies a pouch of wisdom.
19 Topaz of Nubia
unequal in
value,
Pure gold
not to be
compared with her.
20 And where does wisdom come from,
where the
source of understanding,
21 that it be hidden from the eyes of the living,
concealed
from the fowl of heaven?
22 Abaddon and Death say:
we heard
hearsay;
23 God knows the way to her,
it’s he that
knows her location,
24 because he spies the earth’s ends,
he sees
what’s beneath the entire heavens.
25 While assigning a weight to the wind,
while he
meted out the waters by measure,
26 when he imposed
a limit on the rain,
a path on
bolts of thunder,
27 he saw her and described her,
he
established her and fathomed her.
28 He said to humankind:
the fear of
the Lord
that is wisdom,
understanding, the avoidance of evil.
The italicized words function semantically in
terms of identity metaphors noted by Geller: man equals (and does not equal)
God; precious stones equal (and do not equal) wisdom.
At the same time, the frames of reference are
tied together across the length of the poem by reference to liminal places
which contain (and do not contain) precious stones (wisdom).
The metaphors are activated within the
context of the whole. The italicized language is proleptic at the moment of
intake. As the whole is processed, the identity metaphors are retroactively
realized. It would be easy to italicize words and expressions in 28:12-27 which
pick up on italicized phrases in 1-11. The exercise, of course, would be
necessarily reductive.
A remarkable fact of the history of
interpretation of Job 28: traditional Jewish interpretation, Geller notes, read
28:1-11 as if God were the subject of the actions described. This is an index of the metaphorical
pull of the language of the passage. The verbal language of 28:1-11, since it is often associated with God as subject, constrains the reader to think of the godlikeness, and un-godlikeness, of man.
Harshav notes, “A
metaphor exists only if two domains exist vividly in a text; the metaphorical
expressions belong literally to one and metaphorically to the other.” In Job 28,
two independent frames of reference are developed by means of identity
metaphors as explained above, and by a host of negative and comparative similes
(e.g., “she cannot be compared to Ophir’s fine gold,” “a pouch of wisdom is
better than rubies”) Interaction occurs within frs, not only across them;
e.g., the non-seeing “raptor” and “the falcon’s eye” counterpoint man who “sees
every precious thing” within the frame of reference established by 28:1-11; in
connection with 28:12-27, man who "explores" and “sees every precious thing” - like God - nevertheless
cannot - unlike God - describe and fathom wisdom.
The juxtaposition of
the two frs develops the identity metaphors step-by-step. As
Harshav notes, “A shift of point of view within what may be called one metaphor
– akin to Picasso’s wish to see the feminine face simultaneously from two
perspectives – is not uncommon in metaphorical patterns.” Thus precious
minerals represent something intensely positive to begin with, yet they are
nothing, as is developed later on, compared to wisdom.
In my view, Geller explains Job 28 aright. I am also not surprised that he sees the chapter, not as an erratic mass, but as an integral part of the larger composition. The
metaphorical sense of the italicized expressions in terms of Harshav’s theory
of metaphor is beyond doubt. Indeed, all of 28:1-11 is related literally
to man the "fathomer" and precious minerals as object of discovery but contains an implicit comparison to God the "fathomer" and wisdom as object of discovery developed in 28:12-27. 28:1-11 becomes metaphorical
in relation to God and wisdom as the whole poem is processed.
Bibliography
Stephen A. Geller, “Where is Wisdom?
[Job 28],” in Sacred Enigmas: Literary Religion in the Hebrew Bible (London:
Routledge, 1996) 87-107; Benjamin Harshav, “Metaphor and Frames of
Reference: With Examples from Eliot, Rilke, Mayakovsky, Mandelshtam, Pound,
Creeley, Amichai, and the New York Times,” in idem, Explorations in
Poetics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007) 34-75.
*It is fun, in a statement about metaphor, to
use an expression like “planting semes.” I’ve run across people whose wooden
view of Scripture makes them break into a sweat when they realize that the
Bible contains playful etymologies which, from a linguistic point of view, are
false. Sooner or later, when reading the Bible or anything else, it is
necessary to “let it be,” to quote the Beatles. As Picasso said, “art is a lie
which tells the truth.” The Bible is full of truth, but its authors are as
faithful to their subjects as Picasso was to his. Since I am a believer, my
response is: praise be to God.
For your asterisk, I would turn your attention to Dante, Inferno 16.124: Sempre a quel ver c'ha faccia di menzogna; to the truth that has the face of a lie.
Posted by: Jared | February 25, 2009 at 09:51 PM
Jared,
Thanks for that. I will have to explore what Dante meant by the statement in context.
Posted by: JohnFH | February 26, 2009 at 07:48 AM
My attention was directed to this by Teodolinda Barolini's book, The Undivine Comedy.
Thanks for this post, by the way. I think this concept will be useful in my class today--I am teaching the Decameron, and the multiple planes of reference, the planting of a frame that is only later brought into another frame, works pretty well with the story of "putting the devil into hell," a tale that starts off with highly religious imagery only retrospectively activated as a metaphor for sexuality. We'll see how it works...and I might post on it myself later tonight.
Posted by: Jared | February 26, 2009 at 12:27 PM
Jared,
You are not the first professor who has written to say that they find the materials on this blog of use in their teaching.
It works both ways.
In my classrooms of Wednesday evening confirmation, Sunday morning services and Bible study, and Tuesday meetings with high-schoolers in Classics Club, the material on your blog and that of others gets recycled at times.
Posted by: JohnFH | February 26, 2009 at 12:35 PM