Structural Analysis of Biblical and Canaanite Poetry

Structural Analysis of Biblical and Canaanite Poetry
Author: Willem van der Meer
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 439
Release: 1988-12-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567427803

Structural Analysis of Biblical and Canaanite Poetry introduces a new method of structural analysis of biblical and Canaanite poetry, pioneered by Pieter van der Lugt. This method incorporates translation and textual criticism, divides the texts into poetical verses, identifies internal parallelisms, and produces a concordance of all words used in a passage. Contributors to this Structural Analysis of Biblical and Canaanites Poetry apply, critique, and engage van der Lugt's methodology.

Innovations in Hebrew Poetry

Innovations in Hebrew Poetry
Author: Eric D. Reymond
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 186
Release: 2004-01-01
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9004130667

Although scholars point to similarities between Sirach and the book of Proverbs and sometimes characterize Ben Sira's relationship to biblical poetry as one of imitation (often unsuccessful imitation), this study considers the innovative and unique aspects of Sirach poetry, especially its use of parallelism, and demonstrates that Ben Sira does not rely exclusively on Proverbs or any other biblical book as a model. "Innovations in Hebrew Poetry" provides detailed readings and philological analysis for the nine poems in the Masada scroll, and general observations on many other Sirach and biblical poems complement the analysis. Paperback edition is available from the Society of Biblical Literature (www.sbl-site.org)

Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah

Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah
Author: P.A. Smith
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2014-09-03
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 900427586X

Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah attempts to integrate the insights of rhetorical criticism into a diachronic study of Isaiah 56-66. Whereas previous, redaction-critical approaches to these chapters have tended to be strongly fissive in their treatment of this material, insights from rhetorical and stylistic criticism are used here to emphasize the elements of unity and coherence in longer sections of text, and to provide additional criteria by which to delimit and structure sections of this poetry. On this basis, a number of new proposals will be presented concerning the structure and extent of the poems in Isaiah 56-59 and 65-66. The two concluding chapters, building upon the insights from the preceding section, develop a whole series of new suggestions concerning the old problems of the authorship and historical background of Isaiah 56-66.

Rhetorical Criticism and the Poetry of the Book of Job

Rhetorical Criticism and the Poetry of the Book of Job
Author: P. van der Lugt
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 568
Release: 2021-11-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004493530

Rhetorical Criticism and the Poetry of the Book of Job deals with the structure and meaning of the poems we find in Job 3-42,6. It is demonstrated that these poems exhibit a consistent pattern of cantos and strophes. The recurring structures often place the various thematic aspects of the texts in a different light. The analysis of the poems relates their rhetorical framework to the device of distant repetitive parallelism. These verbal repetitions appear to display distinct patterns and help to discover recurring and leading ideas. The final section offers a new theory on the demarcation of the (three) speech-cycles which give structure to chs. 4-31 and 38-41. This theory is of special importance for the interpretation of chs. 24-28. The work is of interest for all who study the forms and meaning of classical Hebrew poetry.

Matthew, Poet of the Beatitudes

Matthew, Poet of the Beatitudes
Author: H. Benedict Green
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 355
Release: 2001-03-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567196763

Green argues that the Beatitudes in Matthew's version are a carefully constructed poem, exhibiting a number of the characteristics of Hebrew poetry as we know it from the Old Testament; but as certain of these, such as rhyme and alliteration, cannot survive translation, what we have here is an original composition in Greek. This is shown to be no isolated phenomenon in the gospel; a series of texts found at specially significant points in it disclose similar characteristics. The findings cut across conventional source attributions and reveal the creative hand of the evangelist. By studying the individual beatitudes in their relation to each other as revealed by the formal structure, fresh light is thrown upon their meaning and their background in the scriptures of the Old Testament.

God's Good Covenant

God's Good Covenant
Author: Loren F. Bliese
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2021-06-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1725296233

In this study of Hosea Loren Bliese documents his current research into how the poetics of the Hebrew Bible were enhanced by arranging the counts of words and structures in order to beautify the message. The two words “good” and “covenant” are the only words that come once each in the five parts of the book. They point to a structural theme of the book, that God’s covenant is good in contrast to idolatrous relationships that lead to disaster. Hosea’s symbolic numbers are derived from both twenty-two of the Hebrew letters, and from twenty-six, the value of the divine name YHWH along with other numbers related to the name. Plays on the word “repent” or “return” have a build-up of repetitions to the end where the plea “Return, Israel, to the LORD your God” is prominent. Each of these words is marked by numeric significance. The book is a discourse analysis of Hosea’s whole text, focusing on features of prominence, including symbolic numbers. The study analyzes thirty of the forty-five poems in Hosea with the form of metrical chiasmus pointing to a central peak. Bliese has developed this in previous writings. Abundant chi-square probability calculations support his analysis.

The War Between the Two Beasts and the Two Witnesses

The War Between the Two Beasts and the Two Witnesses
Author: Tony Siew
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 348
Release: 2005-08-07
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567132013

Siew seeks to examine the events that will unfold within the three and a half years before the dawn of the kingdom of God on earth. He argues that John composed the textual unit of Rev 11:1--14:5 as a coherent and unified literary unit structured in a macro-chiasm. He pays special attention to the fusion of form and content and seeks to elucidate how the concentric and chiastic pattern informs the meaning of the literary units within 11:1--14:5, and proposes that the text of 11:1--14:5 is best analyzed using Hebraic literary conventions, devices, and compositional techniques such as chiasm, parallelism, parataxis, and structural parallelism. The macro-chiastic pattern provides the literary-structural framework for John to portray that the events of the last three and a half years unfold on earth as a result of what transpires in heaven. Specifically, the war in heaven between Michael and the dragon has earthly ramifications. The outcome of the heavenly war where Satan is defeated and thrown out of heaven to earth results in the war on earth between the two beasts of Rev 13 and the two witnesses of Rev 11. The narrative of the war in heaven (12:7-12) is seen as the pivot of the macro-chiastic structure. Siew pays close attention to the time-period of the three-and-a-half years as a temporal and structural marker which functions to unite the various units in 11:1--14:5 into a coherent and integral whole. The events of the last days will be centred in Jerusalem.

The War Between the Two Beasts and the Two Witnesses

The War Between the Two Beasts and the Two Witnesses
Author: Antoninus King Wai Siew
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 348
Release: 2005-11-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567030210

Siew seeks to examine the events that will unfold within the three and a half years before the dawn of the kingdom of God on earth. He argues that John composed the textual unit of Rev 11:1--14:5 as a coherent and unified literary unit structured in a macro-chiasm. He pays special attention to the fusion of form and content and seeks to elucidate how the concentric and chiastic pattern informs the meaning of the literary units within 11:1--14:5, and proposes that the text of 11:1--14:5 is best analyzed using Hebraic literary conventions, devices, and compositional techniques such as chiasm, parallelism, parataxis, and structural parallelism. The macro-chiastic pattern provides the literary-structural framework for John to portray that the events of the last three and a half years unfold on earth as a result of what transpires in heaven. Specifically, the war in heaven between Michael and the dragon has earthly ramifications. The outcome of the heavenly war where Satan is defeated and thrown out of heaven to earth results in the war on earth between the two beasts of Rev 13 and the two witnesses of Rev 11. The narrative of the war in heaven (12:7-12) is seen as the pivot of the macro-chiastic structure. Siew pays close attention to the time-period of the three-and-a-half years as a temporal and structural marker which functions to unite the various units in 11:1--14:5 into a coherent and integral whole. The events of the last days will be centred in Jerusalem.

Text in Context

Text in Context
Author: Andrew David Hastings Mayes
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 496
Release: 2000-09-07
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0198263910

The scholarly study of the Old Testament is now marked by a rich diversity of approaches and concerns. In the last two decades, an interest in the text and the implications for its interpretation is no longer the preserve of a single scholarly community, while the reconstruction of the history of the people from whom it derived has been transformed by new methods. This new book published under the auspices of the Society for Old Testament Study reflects these new approaches anddevelopments, and has a particular concentration on literary and historical study. Thus, it not only clearly recognizes the diversity now inherent in 'Old Testament study', but also welcomes the integration into its field of the wide range of approaches available in current literary and historicalinvestigation.The study of the biblical text and how it is received and interpreted by its various readerships has a certain logical priority over the study of its historical background and authorship. Yet an ongoing investigation of issues relating to the latter cannot await definitive conclusions on the former. So, essays on the text and its reception discuss primary issues which arise in Old Testament study, while those on background and authorship reflect the continued vitality of, and the freshperspective possible in, more traditional scholarly concerns.