Ancient Hebrew Poetry

A Short Introduction to the Book of Qohelet

The key word in the book of Qohelet is hebelהֶבֶל  . A multi-purpose metaphor, the literal meaning is “gas,” “hot air,” “vapor” (6:11a; cf. Job 27:12), a hyponym of רוּחַ “breath,” “wind.” The metaphor is active on some occasions, as in 6:11 already cited and 1:14b “it’s all hot air and preoccupation with air.” It is less active in others, as in 7:6b-7 “this too is vapor, that corruption turns the wise into fools, and makes the heart stray with a gift.” In Qohelet,  הֶבֶל, , like רוּחַ in הֶבֶל וּרְעוּת רוּחַ , is a metaphor for something that disappoints. “Crock” in American slang is an example of a multivalent metaphor of approximately the same range. Like הֶבֶל in Qohelet, “a total crock” may refer to nonsense, a sham, or something that contradicts the way things ought to be. Once it is observed that something is a crock, it doesn’t take long for everything to seem a crock. Qohelet puts it this way (1:14-15):

Anticipatory Pronouns, Delayed Identification, and Qohelet 6:3-6

Many languages permit pronouns to be used in advance of the noun they pick up on. In English, for example, it is possible to say, “Given his well-known hatred of the spotlight, I would not throw a birthday party for Frank.” Ancient Hebrew also permits such sequences, reversed vis-à-vis the norm. For example, in Ps 87:1b-2, both “his” and “foundation on the holy mountains” receive delayed identifications:

Rules of Intellectual Discourse

A reader of this blog sent a link to a post entitled On Caring About and Pursuing the Truth. The post makes a number of points I resonate with. First of all, the idea that the implications and consequences of some issues are so momentous that we can’t afford to suspend judgment. We are forced to come to conclusions on matters such as belief in God and basic questions of morality, for example, because of the high stakes involved. If someone tells you they are undecided on such questions, there are three possibilities: they are superficial people; they have come to a conclusion, but do not want to be up-front about it - they may even be hiding the fact that they have come to a conclusion from themselves; they see both sides of the question with frightful clarity.

The DSS Exhibit in Milwaukee – A Review

I just returned from a visit to the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit at the Milwaukee Public Museum. The exhibit is attracting tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of visitors. The crowd that comes is a cross-section of area demographics; male and female, young and old, white and black, Jew and Christian; if anything, the crowd is younger than average with respect to usual museum crowds. Most who visit concentrate their attention on the scrolls and all the doodads on display which are meant to conjure up life in Palestine from the third century bce to the first century ce. Ever the contrarian, I concentrated my attention on the visitors themselves, on overhearing their conversation.

The absurdity of minimalism and an AAR session I want to attend

One approach to the reconstruction of the past which continues to have relatively wide currency in biblical studies is referred to as minimalism. At its most extreme, with respect to the history of ancient Israel, minimalism manifests itself in historiography which refuses to discuss not only events but entire epochs referred to in the Hebrew Bible because those epochs, such as those of the Exodus, Settlement, Judges, and United Monarchy, are not attested outside of the biblical corpus.

The Knoppers-Ristau Volume on Israelite Historiography: A Review of the RBL Review

Fellow bloggers have been having a heyday with RBL reviews that ought never to have passed muster with the powers that be. Alan Lenzi (go here, here, and here; it’s possible, to use one of Charles Halton’s favorite phrases, that Alan goes a wee overboard) and Art Boulet (go here) for example. Note Brooke Lester’s comment. Charles Halton took up examples here and here. I discussed Bruce Waltke’s RBL review of a volume by Michael Fox here; IMO it is a helpful review; Waltke was kind enough to respond in the comments. Relatedly, Doug Magnum discusses a book by Lawrence Schiffman and takes up the insider/ outsider question (here; note comments). If I were an editor of book reviews, I would get a nasty reputation. 9 times out of 10, I would “return to sender” for revisions.

James McGrath calls me a liberal: my response (2)

There are examples of salient differences which sort out liberal from conservative biblical scholars. But liberals and conservatives do not necessarily differ over the recognition of a diversity of voices in scripture, or over the need, from a confessional point of view, of interpreting individual passages in light of all others (a long-standing principle of the Reformed tradition, one reason it tends to be theocentric rather than merely christocentric). We also do not differ over the importance of identifying correctly the literary genres in which texts are written.

James McGrath calls me a liberal: my response (1)

On a long 200-and-counting comment thread over at James McGrath’s place, in which a spirited Thom Stark and a crazed yours truly throw mud at each other to the delight of a captive audience, James, serious man that he is, interrupts the show of rhetorical pyrotechnics, and calls, as he sees it, my bluff. “[I]t might be fairer,” he avers, “if you were to acknowledge that you are thoroughly liberal in your view of Scripture, and only conservative in (some of) what you choose to build upon it.” Below the jump, my sincere response. We’ll see how James responds in turn.

The Heath Care Bill: What’s actually in it

It really is the case that the best information on topics of immediate interest is available, not in the mainstream media, but via online resources, blogs included. Someday this will also be the case with respect to topics of general interest and historical interest. For an informative factsheet on the Health Care Bill by a serious leftie, Jane Hamsher, go here. Executive summary: the bill will make things worse, not better, for more people than not. Hamsher takes the time, point-by-point, to explain why she is not convinced by her own party's talking points. Take a look at the sheet and figure out whether it will make things better for the people you care about most, and in what time frame. 

Divine Anger according to Abraham Heschel

Some of the most insightful treatments of biblical texts and themes come from scholars whose area of specialization lies beyond the Bible. Examples include students of literature like Erich Auerbach, Meir Sternberg, and Robert Alter. Anthropologists like Mary Douglas. Philosophers like Soren Kierkegaard and Emmanuel Levinas. 

Then there is Abraham Joshua Heschel. To my mind Heschel is the most important example of a philosopher and theologian who was conversant with the entire tradition, Jewish and non-Jewish, philosophical and devotional, and found it within himself to set aside Maimonides and all the others in an attempt to reclaim the God of the Bible from the viselike grip in which philosophers and tradition have held him. This works itself out with riproaring intensity in his treatment of divine anger and divine pathos as absolutely essential features of the experience of God vouchsafed to ancient Israel and to Israel’s prophets in particular. Key quotes: