{"id":24,"date":"2018-01-10T09:41:15","date_gmt":"2018-01-10T14:41:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/?post_type=chapter&p=24"},"modified":"2018-01-13T10:03:11","modified_gmt":"2018-01-13T15:03:11","slug":"introduction","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/chapter\/introduction\/","title":{"raw":"Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION","rendered":"Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION"},"content":{"raw":"
\r\n\r\nCHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nFirst the inevitable question: Why another book on the bible? Answer:\u00a0(1) Teaching a class in which I use the Bible as a text has taught me that many\u00a0liberal arts students have no familiarity with the book, and have difficulty\u00a0approaching the Bible for a number of reasons. Most have never read it, yet\u00a0some find it irrelevant, and some find it too \"sacred\u201d ever to read it. This book\u00a0is intended as a secular Midrash and students' companion to the Bible. I treat\u00a0the Bible as comprised of stories, human stories, to be approached with\u00a0curiosity, not religious awe. I treat the texts of the Bible with the respect due to\u00a0any great literature. I try to show that the Bible is not irrelevant, but has an\u00a0importance to the contemporary consciousness. (2) Many colleagues in the\u00a0liberal arts report a lack of Biblical knowledge on the part of their students.\u00a0This lack of familiarity with the stories of the Bible makes it difficult to\u00a0understand and respond to many of the literary texts of our culture, which\u00a0often assume a familiarity with the basic stories of the Bible. (3) I love these\u00a0stories, and I love writing and thinking about them. (4) I am on sabbatical\u00a0leave and I have to do something.\r\n\r\nI employ no particular literary theory, if that is possible. I was trained in old-fashioned New Criticism where I learned that the text itself is important and primary. But, I deconstruct when doing so\u00a0helps to point to useful information or to understand what the story means. I mention literary forms when that\u00a0is useful, and I point to features of the texts that may have been overlooked. I draw on the works of historians and of critics who know more than I about the times and places referred to in the stories. I\u00a0have certain beliefs, which will manifest themselves in the readings I offer. I do\u00a0not pretend to be a Bible scholar; I too, like most readers, know the work in\u00a0translation. If this approach is eclectic I offer no apology. The critic's task is\u00a0always to point - to point to aspects of the work that may have been\u00a0overlooked or under-emphasized. I want to de-mystify the texts and make\u00a0them accessible to readers as important literary texts. I remember vividly my own sense as a child that the Bible was somehow special and otherworldly - too sacred to be read or thought about. I assumed that only priests and pastors had the \u201cright stuff\u201d which allowed them to read the text. And I noticed that they did nothing to dissuade me of that belief.\r\n\r\nMy general notion of\u00a0literature includes these claims: literature is about the world, interpretation is a\u00a0creative act, intention is a necessary condition for writing of any kind, there are\u00a0four focal points for any work of literature: poet, text, world, and reader. In\u00a0what follows, if I emphasize one of these over the others it will be text. The\u00a0biblical text is complex and sophisticated narrative exhibiting many layers of\u00a0intention in its final form. In the second book of Samuel, for example, we read\u00a0the exciting love story of David and Bathsheba, and learn how David, driven by\u00a0desire for the beautiful Bathsheba, brings her to his bed and makes her\u00a0pregnant while her husband Uriah is in David's army fighting the enemies of\u00a0Israel. David eliminates Uriah by sending a letter (carried by Uriah) to the\u00a0commander telling him to place Uriah in the fiercest fighting and then to fall\u00a0back leaving him alone to be killed. After Uriah is killed Bathsheba mourns for\u00a0him for the appropriate time and then David brings her into his house and\u00a0takes her as his wife. (2 Sam. 11,12)\u00a0 Shortly after this we are told \"what David had done was wrong in\u00a0the eyes of the Lord.\" And then, as we read in the King James Version:\r\n
And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto\r\n\r\nhim, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one\r\n\r\nrich and the other poor.\r\n\r\n2. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds:\r\n\r\n3. But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb,\r\n\r\nwhich he had bought and nourished up; and it grew up together\r\n\r\nwith him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and\r\n\r\ndrank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a\r\n\r\ndaughter.\r\n\r\n4. And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he\r\n\r\nspared to take of his own flock and his own herd, to dress for the\r\n\r\nwayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man's\r\n\r\nlamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.\r\n\r\n5. And David's anger was greatly kindled against the man;\r\n\r\nand he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done\r\n\r\nthis thing shall surely die:\r\n\r\n6. And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did\r\n\r\nthis thing, and because he had no pity.\r\n\r\n7. And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith\r\n\r\nthe Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I\r\n\r\ndelivered thee out of the hand of Saul;\r\n\r\n8. And I gave thee thy master's house, and thy master's\r\n\r\nwives unto thy bosom, and gave thee the house of Israel and Judah;\r\n\r\nand if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto\r\n\r\nthee such and such things.<\/blockquote>\r\nDavid will pay for his lust; the child he conceived in sin will die and the other\u00a0threats will also come to pass. The punishment will fit the crime: the child\u00a0conceived in sin will die; the man who could not control his sexual appetites\u00a0will be punished by having his wives taken in front of everyone. Note the layers\u00a0of narrative here. Nathan tells David a parable. David is moved by the story.\u00a0He sentences the fictional man to die. Nathan tells David that he is the man.\u00a0The story is used to get the king to see himself and to judge his own acts. Just\u00a0as Uriah carries his own death warrant to Joab in the form of a letter of\u00a0execution, David comes to issue a death sentence on himself through Nathan's\u00a0story. When Joab opens the letter carried by Uriah he will see David's\u00a0intention; when David \"opens\" the story carried by Nathan he will see the\u00a0Lord's intention.\r\n\r\nNathan relates a fictional narrative in order to get the king to see the\u00a0truth about his own situation. Nathan's intention is clear - he uses story to\u00a0reveal truth. Once he gets David to see that the rich man in the story has done\u00a0wrong then all he has to do is get him to see that he is like the rich man in the\u00a0appropriate moral way. Self-delusion, though powerful in human affairs, can\u00a0be broken by story. David has then judged himself. But there is another layer\u00a0of intentional meaning here also. \"The Lord sent Nathan...\" adds a layer to the\u00a0narrative which reveals another story of alleged divine intervention in the\u00a0understanding of the events. And this story in turn is related by a writer or\u00a0editor who is shaping the larger story of the books of Samuel for his audience.\u00a0We get the sense that David would never have admitted guilt for killing Uriah\u00a0in order to have Bathsheba, but he is able to see and respond to characters in\u00a0stories. As readers we too are to respond to the stories and to that end have\u00a0been given narrative access to the larger story pointed to by phrases like \"The\u00a0Lord sent Nathan....\"\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nThe Old Testament version of Esther begins:<\/strong>\r\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Now it came to pass in the days of Ahasuerus<\/em>, (this is the\u00a0 Ahasuerus which reigned, from India even unto Ethiopia, over an\u00a0hundred and seven and twenty provinces:)<\/em> (King James, Esther 1)<\/blockquote>\r\nNot only does this sentence signal that the reader is to accept the story\u00a0as a report but it also establishes time and place. \"The events here related\"\u00a0functions like \"and it came to pass\" except that \"the events here related\" stands\u00a0between a past \"lived\" event and the report of the event while \"and it came to\u00a0pass\" is most often used to suggest an inevitable and divinely ordered string of\u00a0events manifesting themselves in time. While Nathan used fictional narrative\u00a0in order to get the king to see the truth, the writer of Esther uses the truth, or\u00a0at least what we might call \"factoids\" to establish a fictional narrative. That is,\u00a0we are given a list of events which are placed in time and space by markers that\u00a0sound decidedly like those of factual reports or historical documents. The story\u00a0unfolds quickly: the king is giving one enormous party for the people, to show\u00a0off his majesty, and after several days of drinking and feasting he decides to\u00a0order his queen to dress up in something pretty and come forward to display\u00a0her beauty and at the same time make the king feel even more mighty and\u00a0splendid. She refuses to come in answer to the royal command, and the king,\u00a0not used to being disobeyed, is incensed by her disobedience. He confers with\u00a0his wise men, who are versed in law and religion, and they advise him that in\u00a0order to keep order and not have women getting \"uppity\" he must punish the\u00a0queen by banning her from his sight and replace her with a queen who is more\u00a0able to conform to the rules of the kingdom. He does ban Queen Vashti, and\u00a0he begins the search for a new queen. This plot device is necessary in order to\u00a0get Esther into the king's bed. After trying out many young and beautiful\u00a0virgins the king chooses Esther as his new queen. We just do not know if there\u00a0really was an Esther who was a Jewish queen at this time, but the story uses\u00a0every device to make the events appear to be actual. Real or fictional matters\u00a0not for the story goes on to show how Esther under the direction of her\u00a0kinsman, Mordecai, is able to save the Jewish people from an execution order\u00a0by outsmarting Haman who, as the king's second in command, has gotten the\u00a0king to order the destruction of the Jewish people in all the provinces. Esther,\u00a0at threat of death, pursues a plan to overturn Haman and to topple him from\u00a0power while at the same time preventing the destruction of her Jewish people.\r\n\r\nAt a crucial point Haman misreads the king's intentions, for when the\u00a0king asks Haman \"What should be done for the man whom the king wishes to\u00a0honour?\" Haman believes that the king is speaking of him. Misreading\u00a0intentions can be dangerous and Haman misreads not only the king's\u00a0intentions but also Esther's intentions and in a complete reversal of fortunes\u00a0he ends up hanged on the very gallows he had built to hang Mordecai. The\u00a0letters from the king to the provinces are changed to allow the Jews to defend\u00a0themselves and they end up killing 75,000 of their enemies instead of being\u00a0destroyed themselves. The story is one that is read by rabbis on Purim, one of\u00a0the great festivals celebrated by the Jews every year.\r\n\r\nAfter reading the book of Esther in the Old Testament then you should\u00a0read the version that appears in the apocrypha. The second version differs\u00a0from the first in having about 140 more lines and all of those additional lines\u00a0tell of God's involvement in the plot. Dreams and portents are suddenly\u00a0present and the intention of the author is clear in the additional lines. God,\u00a0who does not appear in the Hebrew version, is suddenly omnipresent in the\u00a0Greek version, and we can read the intentions of the Greek\u00a0author in those added lines. Now God is the author of human\u00a0events and is directly involved through dreams and intervention in the\u00a0unfolding of events. We readers are to see that God is directly responsible for\u00a0the outcome of stories and is controlling the events from afar.\r\n\r\nMuch of the great writing of our Western tradition comes from a\u00a0Judeo-Christian culture. It is difficult to read Dante, Spinoza, Milton, Goethe,\u00a0Shakespeare, Descartes, Newton, Kant and hundreds of others without some\u00a0knowledge of the stories and the ideas of the Bible. Contemporary artists\u00a0continue to draw on the images and forms of the biblical stories to create their\u00a0stories, and whether they are believers or not the basic patterns of the Bible\u00a0are still present to be considered, incorporated or dismissed. The biblical\u00a0stories, of course, have special meaning for Jews and Christians because they\u00a0are believed to be a record of God's covenant with a chosen people. In the Old\u00a0Testament this covenant is in the form of a promise of land in return for obedi-\u00a0ence to a set of rules. In the New Testament the covenant is in the form of a\u00a0promise for salvation in return for obedience and belief. The \"promised land\"\u00a0of the Old Testament is land on this earth; the \"promised land\" of the New\u00a0Testament, as described by Paul and other early Christians, is not of this earth.\r\n\r\nIt seems obligatory in a book like this to state where I \"am coming\u00a0from.\" I am not a Jew. I am not a Christian. I was raised in a Christian family.\u00a0We attended an Episcopal church when I was a small boy; after my mother\u00a0remarried we attended a Lutheran church where I was confirmed at a young\u00a0age. Shortly after that we started to attend a Methodist church, but none of\u00a0these changes was, to my knowledge, based on any matters of doctrine, but\u00a0rather on social reasons. I remember getting in trouble with the Lutheran\u00a0pastor as a child because in Bible class I would ask real questions. \"Thou shalt\u00a0have no other Gods before me,\" it said in the catechism. Why? The canned\u00a0answer was: \"The Lord, thy God, is a jealous God.\" \"Why is he jealous?\" I\u00a0would ask, \"what would God have to be jealous of?\" \"Don't ask questions,\" the\u00a0pastor would say, \"just memorize the material.\" That was the lesson of the\u00a0church: do not ask questions; just memorize the stuff. There really was no life\u00a0in the church. People came in, sat down, listened quietly, put some money in\u00a0the collection plate, and then left to carry on with their lives as before. After\u00a0hearing a sermon on the evils of \"drink\" and card playing, in which the\u00a0punishments for disobedience were extremely uncomfortable, we would all get\u00a0in our car and go to one of my step-uncle's for an afternoon of drinking beer\u00a0and playing pinochle. I learned to hate Jews (for they were somehow\u00a0responsible for killing Jesus), Catholics (for they had all the riches), and\u00a0Methodists (I cannot remember why). I learned hypocrisy, racism, and sexism\u00a0(now called the \"traditional\" values by nostalgic writers who find the word\u00a0\"traditional\" all fuzzy and warm). I read the Bible frequently because the\u00a0stories were full of violence, sex, and mystery. I remember asking my mother\u00a0what `womb' means and she was very nervous and asked me where I had heard\u00a0that word. When I told her I found it in the Bible she did not seem to know\u00a0what to say. I had her! She arranged for my step-father to teach me about the\u00a0\"birds and the bees.\" He in turn sub-contracted to a teen-aged farm hand who\u00a0gave me a brief but descriptive lecture about things that I already knew. (The\u00a0lecture, I remember, started like this: \"So, you want to know about f...ing...,\"\u00a0my teacher at least exhibiting a sense of the dramatic.)\r\n\r\nAfter a few years in public schools and four years in the United States\u00a0Marine Corps, I learned about sex and violence in more direct ways, and\u00a0stopped reading the Bible until I was in university. At the University of\u00a0California in Santa Barbara I was assigned as a teaching assistant to Professor\u00a0Douwe Stuurman, who taught a course on the Bible. His classes were always\u00a0full of interesting people. In the front row were the nuns, who, he said, were\u00a0there to spy on him. Then came the middle-aged students looking for therapy,\u00a0the literature and philosophy students, and the atheists who sat in the back. I\u00a0tried to sit in a different part of the room each time. Stuurman had a Freudian,\u00a0Eastern, Calvinist, Proustian background and the ability to mesmerize an\u00a0audience. Above all he opened up the text for me. I read it with fresh eyes.\u00a0These stories were marvellous works of art! Stuurman's lectures were inspiring\u00a0(I used to call them \"Stuurman on the mount\") and unlike my Lutheran pastor,\u00a0he asked questions all the time. When not at the university I spent my time\u00a0cleaning the Unitarian Church in Santa Barbara, which meant that I had the op-\u00a0portunity to talk with Lex Crane, who was ministering there then. His\u00a0background in literature was extensive and we used to have long talks about\u00a0\"meaning\" while I should have been cleaning the toilets. I flirted with the idea\u00a0of becoming a Unitarian minister, but never got the \"call.\" Because of this and\u00a0more, I believe the Bible is worth reading and studying, not as moribund\u00a0scripture but as living literature.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nThe first few stories in the Old Testament develop a recurring pattern in human affairs:<\/strong>\r\n\r\n \r\n
- the creation\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0creation (innocence)\r\n\r\n- the fall and the first murder \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0conflict (sin)\r\n\r\n- the flood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0suffering (purification)\r\n\r\n- the rainbow\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0resolution (salvation)\r\n\r\n- the tower of Babel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0beginnings<\/blockquote>\r\n \r\n\r\nThis pattern is familiar to us because we do in fact find ourselves in a\u00a0world that we cannot explain the origin of, even in our most thorough going\u00a0scientific descriptions. \"Why is there anything at all?\" is a basic question that\u00a0defies answers. We can easily understand how that question leads to religious\u00a0answers, to answers that defy verification, for it is difficult to imagine an\u00a0answer to that question that would be verifiable in the strict scientific sense.\u00a0The answer we are given is a story that begins: \"In the beginning of creation,\u00a0when God made heaven and earth....\" The story tells us how not why. It does\u00a0not presume to know why but takes as \"evidence\" for what might have been a\u00a0clear notion of what is: we find ourselves walking on the earth, surrounded by\u00a0the sky, nurtured by sunshine and water, sharing our world with many other\u00a0species of animals, fish and birds. Plants, trees, flowers abound. Where did\u00a0they come from? In this story we are told that they come form the creative\u00a0command of a powerful spirit-god who creates by fiat. \"Let there be light\" - and\u00a0there was light begins the whole chain of events. Other stories tell of the\u00a0beginnings of life in different ways. For example, the Hopi Indians have a\u00a0creation myth which tells the story this way:\r\n\r\n \r\n
In a remote time Spider Grandmother thought outward into space.\r\n\r\nShe thought and breathed and sang and spun the world into\r\n\r\nexistence. So threads and stories, spinning and spirals all began\r\n\r\nwith Spider Grandmother.[1]<\/a><\/blockquote>\r\n \r\n\r\n\"Thought,\" \"breathed,\" \"sang,\" are the operative verbs in this story. They\u00a0suggest a certain kind of creation: mental, intangible, structured. Diction,\u00a0which is merely choice of words, reveals intent. A particular\u00a0recipe lies behind a description which employs just these words, a recipe which\u00a0includes a pattern for building \"reality\" as well as a description of a given\u00a0\"reality.\" Reading stories always entails paying close attention to the writer's\u00a0diction, for in the selection of a vocabulary a writer chooses a value system.\u00a0Look at these lines by Wordsworth:[2]<\/a>\r\n\r\n \r\n
No motion has she now, no force;\r\n\r\nShe neither feels nor sees;\r\n\r\nRolled round in earth's diurnal course,\r\n\r\nWith rocks, and stones, and trees.<\/blockquote>\r\n \r\n\r\nWhat a simple vocabulary Wordsworth uses to tell us of a motionless young\u00a0woman who has died. The words \"force,\" \u00a0 \"motion,\" and \"diurnal\" come from\u00a0the vocabulary of science and are used here to contrast life and death with the\u00a0scientific vocabulary of Newtonian physics. \"Diurnal\" is the only word in the\u00a0stanza likely to send a reader to the dictionary. And what does this word\u00a0mean? \"Daily.\" Wordsworth could have used \"daily\" in the line; it is a word he\u00a0would have had in his vocabulary. But he chooses \"diurnal.\" What does he gain\u00a0by this choice? \"Diurnal\" hints at \"die,\" \"urn,\" \"eternal\" - all words, and through\u00a0them images, which cluster around the chosen word and reveal a complex of\u00a0emotional and intellectual concerns that \"daily\" just does not. It is in the choice\u00a0of diction that the poet negotiates the meaning transfer from intention to\u00a0interpretation.\r\n\r\nThe poet who wrote the creation story in Genesis also reveals intention\u00a0through diction. One repeated phrase that in its repetition is highlighted as\u00a0surely as is the light which results form the first command is the phrase \"God\u00a0saw that it was good\" repeated after each creative act. From the very beginning\u00a0we are told of a world that has value and goodness built right into it by the act\u00a0of the creator-god. Good is not added like a cosmetic but is shown through the\u00a0language to be a fundamental part of the cosmos. As the myth of our\u00a0beginnings unfolds in the thoughts and spinnings of the Genesis poet we see\u00a0that into this place of perfect good enters chaos as a result of disobedience and\u00a0jealousy. Good is followed immediately by its opposite and God drives Adam\u00a0from the garden.\r\n\r\nOne way of approaching these early stories is to think of them as maps.\u00a0They were constructed after the fact as ways of explaining and charting the\u00a0unknown past of how and why. In that respect they are backwards looking. But\u00a0they also contain a perspective from the present projecting into the future.\u00a0They contain within them a story about how we ought to be. And the language\u00a0of these stories is often the language of dream - symbolic language - a language\u00a0that means more than it says, a language that is found in poetry and in\u00a0children. When our immediate family experienced the first death in the family\u00a0which our kids experienced it happened like this: the phone call came saying\u00a0that Grandpa Jim had died and that his funeral would be in a military cemetery\u00a0in a few days. Margaret, our daughter, was about three years old. She heard\u00a0her mother on the phone and guessed that something was wrong. She asked\u00a0her older brothers (seven and eight) what was going on. \"Grandpa Jim is\u00a0dead.\"\r\n\r\n\"What does that mean?\"\r\n\r\n\"They will put him in a hole in the ground.\"\r\n\r\n\"And put dirt over top of him.\"\r\n\r\n\"And you will never see him again.\"\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nShe was puzzled. Later she went off to bed without saying much of\u00a0anything. In the middle of the night I heard her weeping quietly in her crib. I\u00a0went to pick her up and held her against my chest. She was in that state\u00a0between sleeping and waking and was sobbing over and over again: \"I don't\u00a0want to go down in that hole; I don't want to go down in that hole.\" That is\u00a0symbolic language. What heart knew head guessed. The stories of the Bible\u00a0are written in that kind of language. At the level where the human cry of\u00a0mortality and mystery emerges is to be found the story line of the best of the\u00a0stories from the Bible collection. At another level, of course, is the official line,\u00a0which offers an explanation, a reading of the stories, proclaims an\u00a0interpretation, an ordering conceptual map.\r\n\r\nThe Bible stories can be seen as maps - maps of concepts constructed in\u00a0language which trace psychological or social processes. But do they record\u00a0or construct the facts? In what follows I will argue that, like all literature,\u00a0they do both. A recent literary critic puts the distinction this way:\r\n\r\n \r\n
The recognition that our concepts are constructions of language\r\n\r\nsystems...tells us nothing about their relation or lack of relation to\r\n\r\nreality. It follows that the antithesis between \"constructing\" and\r\n\r\n\"recording\" is unreal, for it opposes a genetic category to a logical\r\n\r\none; it confuses the process by which formulations come into being\r\n\r\n(constructing) and the logical status of these formulations (\"record-\r\n\r\ning\"). The opposition becomes unreal as soon as we recognize how\r\n\r\nmuch constructing is required in the process of recording. The fact\r\n\r\nthat a reader's interpretation of a text is, in a sense, his construc-\r\n\r\ntion is no argument against (or for) its adequacy to the text.\r\n\r\nSimilarly, the fact that a literary work is constituted by the imagina-\r\n\r\ntion, or by a system of literary conventions, does not prevent it\r\n\r\nfrom qualifying as a record or representation of reality.[3]<\/a><\/blockquote>\r\nA valuable approach as reader is to consider that reading a text is a\u00a0performing art. I do not mean by this that one needs to learn to be an oral\u00a0interpreter, although that is a good skill to develop. I mean that in reading a\u00a0text one must engage every bit of creativity, of sensitivity, of intellect and\u00a0feeling that one possesses. The story is in the text, but its full experience is in\u00a0the mind of the reader. The story provides form and directs responses, and the\u00a0reader completes the communicative act. Think of the text as a musical score\u00a0and yourself as a performing musician. The notes are there - are in the score -\u00a0and you must be able to perform them on your musical instrument. You need\u00a0to bring technical skill, sensitivity to nuance, and knowledge of the language\u00a0of musical notation to the task.\r\n\r\nI believe that most of us at some time or other confuse items from one\u00a0logical category with items from another, and, as a result end up believing and\u00a0stating silly or nonsensical things. Sometimes we confuse the menu with the\u00a0meal, or the map with the landscape, or our theory with reality; in short we\u00a0sometimes make category mistakes. We sometimes confuse our favorite\u00a0theories about the world with the way the world is. Stories often contain\u00a0theories of a kind (or official lines as I will call them) - these are\u00a0combinations of presuppositions, conventions, assumptions, and assumed value\u00a0judgements. And these official lines are evident in the verbal structure of a\u00a0compound narrative. In what follows I will try to show that separating the\u00a0official line from the story line is a necessary aspect of reading the Bible.\u00a0Stories provide maps of a culture's deepest hopes and fears, of its value system\u00a0and its \"take\" on reality. Maps, of course, like language, select certain features\u00a0and ignore others; and like language, maps are cultural expressions of\u00a0elements significant to a society.\r\n\r\nLook at a reproduction of the Roman Peutinger Table, a ribbon map\u00a0originally some twenty-five feet long by one foot wide showing the Roman\u00a0world from Britain to India. A complex strip map, it was apparently\u00a0constructed to aid generals and merchants to find their way around the\u00a0empire. It is a map with Roman efficiency: great chunks of recalcitrant land are\u00a0forced into a narrow highway from Rome to the ends of the world. Physical\u00a0space is distorted to fit the utility of the enterprise. In another marvellous map\u00a0of the thirteenth century, the Ebstorf map, which is some nine feet in diameter,\u00a0Jerusalem is shown in the very center of the map with Christ's head at the top,\u00a0feet at the bottom and hands to the east and west. The mapmaker projects\u00a0certain features from the worldview into the view of the world. \"Maps are\u00a0by nature distortions of physical space.\" And interpretations are by nature\u00a0distortions of stories.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nWe can say that a map is distorting physical space only if we know what\u00a0would count as non-distorted physical space. Just as there can be no\u00a0counterfeit money unless there is some genuine money, there can be no\u00a0distortion unless there is some way of knowing about it. Stories too are like\u00a0that. A general model for map making and story telling looks like this:\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nScientists, story tellers, and map makers\r\n\r\n \r\n
1. select certain features from the physical world based upon\r\n\r\ncomplex considerations of beliefs, function, and reality;\r\n\r\n2. make guesses about the way the world works, and put these\r\n\r\nguesses in the form of hypothesis, map, painting or story;\r\n\r\n3. these guesses are improved upon, amended, corrected, or\r\n\r\nthrown away.\r\n\r\n <\/blockquote>\r\nThe stories in the Bible grow out of a certain place and a certain\u00a0people. By now they are overlaid with centuries of interpretation and have\u00a0become presented as Repositories for Truth instead of vehicles for truth. The\u00a0god of the Old Testament, for example, is a complex projection based in part\u00a0on the needs of a nomadic people: above all this god had to be a portable god,\u00a0not one assigned to a particular valley or mountain, but one that moved with\u00a0his people. Place dictates image. We can expect to find in these stories a\u00a0concern with survival in a near-desert climate - a desire and hope for the oasis\u00a0with its life giving water, shelter and comfort. Is it any wonder that the Garden\u00a0of Eden appears as the perfect place for human life? Later ages will describe\u00a0this metaphoric place not as \"a palm at the end of the mind\" but as a place with\u00a0streets paved with gold. And that change in image tells us something about the\u00a0story tellers.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nThe Bible is sometimes referred to as a \"transparent\" text or a\u00a0\"laminated\" text. The images here suggest an important aspect of the biblical\u00a0texts. If the text is transparent what is it we readers are supposed to see\u00a0through the text? And if laminated what makes up the layers? The transparent\u00a0text is supposed to reveal the Truth of God. Readers, says this approach, are\u00a0to look through the text to see the hand of the divine at work behind the\u00a0scenes. Reading in this way requires the reader to have a point of view to begin\u00a0with, to start with an official line which is used as a template for the stories'\u00a0meaning. In this way the text is not so much transparent as it is a mirror. One\u00a0tends to see one's own preconceptions when looking through this \"transparent\"\u00a0text. To think of the biblical text as laminated is to become aware of the layers\u00a0of textual accretions that have built up over the years and through the\u00a0translations. Stories, legends, poems, oral materials, chronicles, letters, have all\u00a0been folded into the final product, with frames and transitions added, and with\u00a0direct commentary from time to time.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nIn what follows I want to point to the excellence of the Hebrew texts in\u00a0translation, suggest a way of reading those texts which depends upon the\u00a0creative involvement of the reader, and provide you with some sense of the\u00a0excitement of reading these stories with fresh eyes and an open mind. Reading\u00a0these stories is a way of reading yourself.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nTHE HOLY LAND\r\n\r\nThe stage for the Biblical drama is the world of the ancient Near East,\u00a0the meeting place of three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe. This territory\u00a0today is made up of the modern states of Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel,\u00a0Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran. Now (1990) the area is well\u00a0known to North Americans from daily maps on television used as backdrops\u00a0for news reports about the United Nations action against Iraq in the area.\u00a0Once more the winds of war are blowing in the Middle East, an area of the\u00a0world buffeted by those winds for centuries. It is an area of conflict between\u00a0peoples looking for a home. It is an area of conflict because for centuries other\u00a0countries have dominated various parts of the land for military strategy, for\u00a0religious strategy, or for commerce. Today oil brings the armies to the desert.\u00a0In the past it has been land, water, agriculture, trade routes and other reli-\u00a0gious concerns of the day.\r\n\r\nThe Middle East is an area of widely contrasting terrain, climate and\u00a0culture. It includes the rugged mountains of Armenia, the great Arabian\u00a0Desert, and, in between, the long, crescent-shaped strip of land known as the\u00a0Fertile Crescent, which stretches from Egypt on the southwest, up the\u00a0Mediterranean coast through Israel and Syria, and down the Tigris-Euphrates\u00a0Valley to the Persian Gulf. It has always been an exciting and romantic setting\u00a0for the magnificent characters who have walked on its stage. The patriarchs\u00a0walked the desert sands with their flocks. Pharaohs built pyramids for their\u00a0long sleep. Legendary heroes like Moses and Jesus are to be found here in the\u00a0desert, conversing with their God, teaching their flocks. Here Alexander the\u00a0Great stretched out his arm of conquest. Here too the Roman armies fought\u00a0the local peoples. Caesars walked the earth here. David and Solomon reigned\u00a0briefly over a united kingdom of Israel. In Egypt Antony and Cleopatra loved\u00a0and lost. Deborah, Rebekah, Jael, Mary and Elizabeth, Sarah: these powerful\u00a0and strong women people the stories set in this landscape. Today tanks are\u00a0strewn across the landscape; a reminder in sculptured and bullet pocked iron\u00a0of the continuing conflict in this desert of despair.\r\n\r\nAt stage centre, as far as Hebrew history is concerned, is the land of\u00a0Palestine, a narrow corridor between the Mediterranean Sea and the Arabian\u00a0Desert with Syria and Lebanon on the north, and Egypt on the south. Pushed\u00a0up against the Mediterranean on the west and with Jordan on the east, the\u00a0modern state of Israel is impressive first of all because of its size. It is very\u00a0small. Measuring about 150 miles \"from Dan to Beersheba,\" the Biblical idiom\u00a0for its north-south extremities (Judges 20:1), it has nevertheless always played\u00a0a significant role in the political, economic, and cultural life of the ancient\u00a0world. Situated astride the major highways joining Egypt and Mesopotamia,\u00a0Palestine commanded a strategic location for military and commercial affairs.\u00a0Trade between Assyria, Babylon, Persia and Egypt often moved through the\u00a0lands of Palestine. Too often the larger neighbours were also moving soldiers,\u00a0chariots and war machines into the area as the power struggles between larger\u00a0nations waxed and waned. At times in her history, for example, during the uni-\u00a0fied reigns of David and Solomon, Israel was able to capitalize on her strategic\u00a0location and gather income from the trade caravans travelling north and south.\u00a0But more often than not, one of the larger nations was on her soil as an\u00a0invading army or as a landlord exacting tribute and taxes from the people.\r\n\r\nIn such a small country one does not expect the vast topographical\u00a0differences that one finds. Southern Israel (the Judean Wilderness) is dry\u00a0rocky land that looks like places on the moon. Rough, rocky terrain gives life\u00a0to a few thistle-like plants, small trees, and tough grass wherever there is any\u00a0moisture at all. This is the land of the Dead Sea, a large land-locked body of\u00a0water so filled with salts as to make sinking in it impossible. Around the Dead\u00a0Sea are the hills and valleys in which Qumran and Masada were built over\u00a02000 years ago. Here the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the caves around\u00a0Qumran, and here Herod the Great built a magnificent castle for his family\u00a0and for protection should he ever need it. Summer temperatures climb to 48\u00a0degrees Celsius as the brilliant sunshine is reflected off the rocky terrain much\u00a0like a reflecting oven. With a stark beauty of its own the Judean Wilderness fig-\u00a0ures prominently in many of the bible stories from both the Old and New\u00a0Testaments. Even here some rain falls in the winter months and provided\u00a0water for the hardy settlers who stored it in deep underground cisterns for use\u00a0during the dry summer months. There are really just two seasons in Israel:\u00a0summer and winter, the first running from May to October. The moisture\u00a0laden winds from the Mediterranean and the long season of winter rains\u00a0nourish olive, fig, orange and date trees on many of the hill slopes of the\u00a0Judean Wilderness. Fields of grain and vineyards are spread across the\u00a0intervening valleys.\r\n\r\nThe Central Highlands have been divided historically into three regions\u00a0of Galilee, Samaria (Ephraim) and Judah (or Judea). Galilee, in the north, is\u00a0separated from the central heartland of Samaria by the important east-west\u00a0Valley of Jezreel, through which passed the major trade route linking the\u00a0Palestinian coast and Syria. The Valley of Jezreel is a fertile plain drained by\u00a0the Kishon River and across from which Mount Tabor (1,843 ft.) and Mount\u00a0Gilboa (1,6987 ft.) face each other. It was at Mt. Tabor that Deborah gathered\u00a0her armies to defeat Sisera as we are told in the book of Judges.\r\n\r\nNorth of Jerusalem one finds vegetation and a hospitable landscape,\u00a0and though no well-defined geographical feature separates Samaria from\u00a0Judah one has to travel but a few miles south or east of Jerusalem or\u00a0Bethlehem before entering upon the forbidding Judean Wilderness mentioned\u00a0above. Here the stony, gray hills support no vegetation throughout most of the\u00a0year. South of Beersheba the Judean Hills flatten out into the barren southern\u00a0steppe, the Negeb, which merges with the Sinai Desert.\r\n\r\nThe Jordan valley is the most characteristic geographical feature in\u00a0Israel. A part of the great geological rift which extends through Syria and\u00a0continues southward as the Wadi Arabaly it parts the country lengthwise from\u00a0north to south, and through it the Jordan River descends in its serpentine\u00a0course. The Jordan's waters are supplied by springs at the foot of Mount\u00a0Hebron and empty finally into the Dead Sea. The Jordan supplies three lakes,\u00a0and one gets a sense of the rapid descent of its waters by contrasting the\u00a0surface level of the three. Lake Huleh is 223 feet above sea level; the Sea of\u00a0Galilee is 695 feet below sea level, and to the south, the Dead Sea is 1,285 feet\u00a0below sea level. From the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea is, as the crane flies,\u00a0only about 65 miles but three times that distance as the river meanders from\u00a0north to south.\r\n\r\nClaims and counter claims to the lands in the Near East have been an\u00a0integral part of the history of the area and continue to be a source of conflict.\u00a0Prime Minister Begin of Israel has argued since 1967 that Israel should hold\u00a0the Golan Heights and the West Bank of the Jordan because the country is so\u00a0defined in the Bible. So far Israeli tanks have been able to provide backing for\u00a0the Biblical argument.\r\n\r\nAbraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob, Samson, Deborah, and\u00a0all the other characters from the Old Testament stories live their lives here in\u00a0this land where water is so precious and where the sand and the stars meet at\u00a0the horizon on endless clear nights. The Judean Wilderness is just that: a\u00a0wilderness. To cross it took a wily, tough and hardy people who knew how to\u00a0survive in an inhospitable land without easy access to food and water. Where\u00a0rocks are everywhere in the landscape it is no surprise that they play an\u00a0important and recurring part in the imagery of the stories. When water is so\u00a0scarce it is not surprising that wells and rivers become central meeting places\u00a0for bringing together the people and the flocks. Every betrothal scene in the\u00a0Old Testament is set by a well. Moses' main concern while leading the tribes\u00a0through the wilderness is to find water.\r\n\r\nFor one raised in North America with its vast distances, miles and miles\u00a0of countryside, forests that go on for miles and miles, it comes as a shock to\u00a0discover that Bethlehem is but three miles from Jerusalem. In my Sunday\u00a0School memory the journey from Bethlehem to Jerusalem was a long journey\u00a0indeed especially when travelling on a donkey. But then my Sunday School\u00a0memory was filled with all sorts of falsehoods.\r\n\r\nOne of the most interesting sites is the marvelous Caesarea on the\u00a0Mediterranean Sea. Built about 2000 years ago, Caesarea still exhibits\u00a0evidence of the Roman influence, with its baths, its wide streets, and its arena\u00a0for sporting events. Herod the Great, who figures prominently in the Jesus\u00a0story, was a rich and powerful king who has to be one of the world's greatest\u00a0opportunists. As powerful men struggled for ascendancy in Rome and one\u00a0\"Caesar\" after another crossed the Tiber to seek the highest office on earth,\u00a0Herod was able, by quick maneuvering and clever \"politicking\" to stay always\u00a0on the side of the person in power. He snuggled up to the right general time\u00a0after time and hence was able to keep the power and influence required to rule\u00a0and exploit the country. He was also interested in architecture, was influenced\u00a0by the Romans in all things, and built many of the lasting monuments in\u00a0Jerusalem, Jericho, Masada, and Caesarea.\r\n\r\nAs Martin Noth puts it:[4]<\/a>\r\n\r\n \r\n
About 22 miles south of the Carmel solient there was a fairly old,\r\n\r\nquite small place called \"Strato's Tower\". This place had been made\r\n\r\nover to Herod in the year 30 B.C. with a whole coastal area. On its\r\n\r\nsite Herod had a magnificent city built at great expense over a\r\n\r\nperiod of twelve years, with artificial harbour installations and with\r\n\r\nall the public buildings such as theatre, ampitheatre, and hippo-\r\n\r\ndrome which formed part of a complete Hellenistic-Roman city. In\r\n\r\nthe year 10 B.C. it was ceremoniously opened with magnificent\r\n\r\ngames for which Augustus and Livia gave a considerable sum.\r\n\r\n...Herod called the city \"Caesarea\"....<\/blockquote>\r\nCaesarea, Bethlehem, Jericho, Nazareth: all are cities we have heard of\u00a0from Sunday School days on. But the most famous, the most beloved, the most\u00a0complex and mysterious of cities is Jerusalem. Even before David's time\u00a0Jerusalem was an important city, but from David on its place in history was\u00a0assured. To go there today is to go back in time at least 3,000 years, and it is to\u00a0visit the holy site for three of the world's largest religions. Divided into four\u00a0quarters (the Jewish Quarter, the Armenian Quarter, the Christian Quarter,\u00a0and the Arab (Moslem) Quarter), old Jerusalem thrives behind its ancient\u00a0walls with some of its inhabitants waiting for the Messiah to arrive through the\u00a0Golden Gate, others waiting for the Second Coming of Christ, and others\u00a0waiting for Mohammed to reappear. This is the city of Godot. Everyone is\u00a0waiting. Waiting for Godot. Waiting for God. It contains more temples,\u00a0mosques, and churches per square foot than any other city in the world. Bullet\u00a0pocked stone walls are silent testimony to the fact that the religious conflicts of\u00a0thousands of years are still very much alive. Evidence from the first temple\u00a0period abounds and one feels while walking in the Old Jerusalem that there\u00a0are several layers of city below one's feet. It is here that David chose to build\u00a0his capital: \"In view of the jealousy and bad feeling between the two Kingdoms\u00a0of Judah and Israel...with the sure instinct of the wise statesman he chose a city\u00a0on neutral soil between the territories of the two kingdoms. This was Jerusa-\u00a0lem...\" Later Solomon would fortify the city and still later battle after battle\u00a0would be fought there as it became the holy place for Jews, Moslems, and\u00a0Christians, and the temporal place to capture if one wanted to control the\u00a0area. Babylonians, Romans, Crusaders, each motivated by different urges\u00a0fought and died there to gain control of the city - this magic and bloody city of\u00a0Jerusalem. The three religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam\u00a0share few\u00a0things: these are one God, the patriarchs, especially Abraham, and Jerusalem.\r\n\r\nTo Jews and Moslems one belief is central: \"Hear, O Israel, the Lord of\u00a0our God, the Lord is one\" or as Moslems put it, \"There is no God but God.\"\r\n\r\nBoth religions demand submission to the will of God - \"Islam\" means\u00a0\"submission\" - and regard fulfillment of his commands as the main road to\u00a0salvation. Both separately, have a large body of law, a regimen of rite and\u00a0custom. Jews derive theirs from the Hebrew Bible and the rabbinical traditions\u00a0of the Mishneh and Talmud. And more, because Judaism is ready to develop\u00a0and to disagree: it has several strands today, conservatism of belief going,\u00a0usually, with strictness of observance. But all agree that a covenant with God,\u00a0sealed at Sinai, selects the people of Israel for special favour - including the\u00a0\"land of milk and honey\" - in return for special devotion.\r\n\r\nMoslems draw their beliefs from the Koran , the word of God revealed\u00a0through Mohammed; and from the quite distinct Hadith, traditions of what the\u00a0Prophet himself said or did. An Arab trader, he received his first \"revelation\"\u00a0about 610 A.D. (the start of the Moslem era). Moslems are not free to develop\u00a0their tradition just because times have changed: \"the messenger of God\" was\u00a0the last of the prophets (of whom Jesus was one), and the revelation he\u00a0received final and complete. Belief in God, prayer, fasting, pilgrimage and\u00a0charity are the pillars of Islam.\r\n\r\nChristianity is the odd religion out. Central to it is not the oneness of\u00a0God, but his incarnation in the person of His son, Jesus Christ; who, we are\u00a0told \"was crucified, dead and buried. The third day he rose again...he ascended\u00a0into heaven.\" Why? For the redemption of humankind, from the sin it had in-\u00a0herited from Adam and Eve. In the Christian story it is God's grace expressed\u00a0through His only son which promises redemption and victory over death.\r\n\r\nThe common denominator: Jerusalem. Hence, it is not strange that\u00a0Jerusalem is, to continue the theatrical image, at the very heart of stage centre,\u00a0bustling today with Jews, Christians, and Arabs who live, work, pray, and fight\u00a0together focussed by their beliefs and sharing a complex, violent, and\u00a0passionate history.\r\n\r\nThe Bible gives us a particular, a prejudiced, look at this history;\u00a0though, of course, it is not a history book in the modern sense of history. As\u00a0Auerbach says, \"the Old Testament presents universal history: it begins with\u00a0the beginning of time, with the creation of the world, and will end with the Last\u00a0Days, the fulfilling of the Covenant, with which the world will come to an end.\"\u00a0Throughout this \"history\" some sense of place is essential in understanding the\u00a0feelings of the characters who are working out their destinies on this particular\u00a0human stage.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Quoted here from \u201cHopi\u201d a Corporation of Public Broadcasting film produced by New Day Films in New York.\r\n\r\n2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 William Wordsworth \u201cA Slumber Did My Spirit Seal,\u201d The Norton Anthology of English Literature<\/em>, W.W. Norton and Company, Third Editon, page 142.\r\n\r\n3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Gerald Graff, Literature Against Itslef<\/em>, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1979, page 199.\r\n\r\n4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Martin Noth, The History of Israel<\/em>, Harper and Row, New York, 1958, page 415.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n\u00a0<\/strong>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n
\r\n\r\n[1]<\/a> Quoted here from \u201cHopi\u201d a Corporation of Public Broadcasting film produced by New Day Films in New York.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n\r\n[2]<\/a> William Wordsworth, \u201cA Slumber Did My Spirit Seal,\u201d The Norton Anthology of English Literature, <\/em>W.W.Norton and Company, 3rd Edition, page 142.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n\r\n[3]<\/a> Gerald Graff, Literature Against Itself<\/em>, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1979, page 199.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\r\n\r\n[4]<\/a> Martin Noth, The History of Israel<\/em>, Harper and Row, New York, 1958, page 415.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"
\n

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

First the inevitable question: Why another book on the bible? Answer:\u00a0(1) Teaching a class in which I use the Bible as a text has taught me that many\u00a0liberal arts students have no familiarity with the book, and have difficulty\u00a0approaching the Bible for a number of reasons. Most have never read it, yet\u00a0some find it irrelevant, and some find it too “sacred\u201d ever to read it. This book\u00a0is intended as a secular Midrash and students’ companion to the Bible. I treat\u00a0the Bible as comprised of stories, human stories, to be approached with\u00a0curiosity, not religious awe. I treat the texts of the Bible with the respect due to\u00a0any great literature. I try to show that the Bible is not irrelevant, but has an\u00a0importance to the contemporary consciousness. (2) Many colleagues in the\u00a0liberal arts report a lack of Biblical knowledge on the part of their students.\u00a0This lack of familiarity with the stories of the Bible makes it difficult to\u00a0understand and respond to many of the literary texts of our culture, which\u00a0often assume a familiarity with the basic stories of the Bible. (3) I love these\u00a0stories, and I love writing and thinking about them. (4) I am on sabbatical\u00a0leave and I have to do something.<\/p>\n

I employ no particular literary theory, if that is possible. I was trained in old-fashioned New Criticism where I learned that the text itself is important and primary. But, I deconstruct when doing so\u00a0helps to point to useful information or to understand what the story means. I mention literary forms when that\u00a0is useful, and I point to features of the texts that may have been overlooked. I draw on the works of historians and of critics who know more than I about the times and places referred to in the stories. I\u00a0have certain beliefs, which will manifest themselves in the readings I offer. I do\u00a0not pretend to be a Bible scholar; I too, like most readers, know the work in\u00a0translation. If this approach is eclectic I offer no apology. The critic’s task is\u00a0always to point – to point to aspects of the work that may have been\u00a0overlooked or under-emphasized. I want to de-mystify the texts and make\u00a0them accessible to readers as important literary texts. I remember vividly my own sense as a child that the Bible was somehow special and otherworldly – too sacred to be read or thought about. I assumed that only priests and pastors had the \u201cright stuff\u201d which allowed them to read the text. And I noticed that they did nothing to dissuade me of that belief.<\/p>\n

My general notion of\u00a0literature includes these claims: literature is about the world, interpretation is a\u00a0creative act, intention is a necessary condition for writing of any kind, there are\u00a0four focal points for any work of literature: poet, text, world, and reader. In\u00a0what follows, if I emphasize one of these over the others it will be text. The\u00a0biblical text is complex and sophisticated narrative exhibiting many layers of\u00a0intention in its final form. In the second book of Samuel, for example, we read\u00a0the exciting love story of David and Bathsheba, and learn how David, driven by\u00a0desire for the beautiful Bathsheba, brings her to his bed and makes her\u00a0pregnant while her husband Uriah is in David’s army fighting the enemies of\u00a0Israel. David eliminates Uriah by sending a letter (carried by Uriah) to the\u00a0commander telling him to place Uriah in the fiercest fighting and then to fall\u00a0back leaving him alone to be killed. After Uriah is killed Bathsheba mourns for\u00a0him for the appropriate time and then David brings her into his house and\u00a0takes her as his wife. (2 Sam. 11,12)\u00a0 Shortly after this we are told “what David had done was wrong in\u00a0the eyes of the Lord.” And then, as we read in the King James Version:<\/p>\n

And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto<\/p>\n

him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one<\/p>\n

rich and the other poor.<\/p>\n

2. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds:<\/p>\n

3. But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb,<\/p>\n

which he had bought and nourished up; and it grew up together<\/p>\n

with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and<\/p>\n

drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a<\/p>\n

daughter.<\/p>\n

4. And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he<\/p>\n

spared to take of his own flock and his own herd, to dress for the<\/p>\n

wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man’s<\/p>\n

lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.<\/p>\n

5. And David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man;<\/p>\n

and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done<\/p>\n

this thing shall surely die:<\/p>\n

6. And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did<\/p>\n

this thing, and because he had no pity.<\/p>\n

7. And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith<\/p>\n

the Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I<\/p>\n

delivered thee out of the hand of Saul;<\/p>\n

8. And I gave thee thy master’s house, and thy master’s<\/p>\n

wives unto thy bosom, and gave thee the house of Israel and Judah;<\/p>\n

and if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto<\/p>\n

thee such and such things.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David will pay for his lust; the child he conceived in sin will die and the other\u00a0threats will also come to pass. The punishment will fit the crime: the child\u00a0conceived in sin will die; the man who could not control his sexual appetites\u00a0will be punished by having his wives taken in front of everyone. Note the layers\u00a0of narrative here. Nathan tells David a parable. David is moved by the story.\u00a0He sentences the fictional man to die. Nathan tells David that he is the man.\u00a0The story is used to get the king to see himself and to judge his own acts. Just\u00a0as Uriah carries his own death warrant to Joab in the form of a letter of\u00a0execution, David comes to issue a death sentence on himself through Nathan’s\u00a0story. When Joab opens the letter carried by Uriah he will see David’s\u00a0intention; when David “opens” the story carried by Nathan he will see the\u00a0Lord’s intention.<\/p>\n

Nathan relates a fictional narrative in order to get the king to see the\u00a0truth about his own situation. Nathan’s intention is clear – he uses story to\u00a0reveal truth. Once he gets David to see that the rich man in the story has done\u00a0wrong then all he has to do is get him to see that he is like the rich man in the\u00a0appropriate moral way. Self-delusion, though powerful in human affairs, can\u00a0be broken by story. David has then judged himself. But there is another layer\u00a0of intentional meaning here also. “The Lord sent Nathan…” adds a layer to the\u00a0narrative which reveals another story of alleged divine intervention in the\u00a0understanding of the events. And this story in turn is related by a writer or\u00a0editor who is shaping the larger story of the books of Samuel for his audience.\u00a0We get the sense that David would never have admitted guilt for killing Uriah\u00a0in order to have Bathsheba, but he is able to see and respond to characters in\u00a0stories. As readers we too are to respond to the stories and to that end have\u00a0been given narrative access to the larger story pointed to by phrases like “The\u00a0Lord sent Nathan….”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Old Testament version of Esther begins:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Now it came to pass in the days of Ahasuerus<\/em>, (this is the\u00a0 Ahasuerus which reigned, from India even unto Ethiopia, over an\u00a0hundred and seven and twenty provinces:)<\/em> (King James, Esther 1)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Not only does this sentence signal that the reader is to accept the story\u00a0as a report but it also establishes time and place. “The events here related”\u00a0functions like “and it came to pass” except that “the events here related” stands\u00a0between a past “lived” event and the report of the event while “and it came to\u00a0pass” is most often used to suggest an inevitable and divinely ordered string of\u00a0events manifesting themselves in time. While Nathan used fictional narrative\u00a0in order to get the king to see the truth, the writer of Esther uses the truth, or\u00a0at least what we might call “factoids” to establish a fictional narrative. That is,\u00a0we are given a list of events which are placed in time and space by markers that\u00a0sound decidedly like those of factual reports or historical documents. The story\u00a0unfolds quickly: the king is giving one enormous party for the people, to show\u00a0off his majesty, and after several days of drinking and feasting he decides to\u00a0order his queen to dress up in something pretty and come forward to display\u00a0her beauty and at the same time make the king feel even more mighty and\u00a0splendid. She refuses to come in answer to the royal command, and the king,\u00a0not used to being disobeyed, is incensed by her disobedience. He confers with\u00a0his wise men, who are versed in law and religion, and they advise him that in\u00a0order to keep order and not have women getting “uppity” he must punish the\u00a0queen by banning her from his sight and replace her with a queen who is more\u00a0able to conform to the rules of the kingdom. He does ban Queen Vashti, and\u00a0he begins the search for a new queen. This plot device is necessary in order to\u00a0get Esther into the king’s bed. After trying out many young and beautiful\u00a0virgins the king chooses Esther as his new queen. We just do not know if there\u00a0really was an Esther who was a Jewish queen at this time, but the story uses\u00a0every device to make the events appear to be actual. Real or fictional matters\u00a0not for the story goes on to show how Esther under the direction of her\u00a0kinsman, Mordecai, is able to save the Jewish people from an execution order\u00a0by outsmarting Haman who, as the king’s second in command, has gotten the\u00a0king to order the destruction of the Jewish people in all the provinces. Esther,\u00a0at threat of death, pursues a plan to overturn Haman and to topple him from\u00a0power while at the same time preventing the destruction of her Jewish people.<\/p>\n

At a crucial point Haman misreads the king’s intentions, for when the\u00a0king asks Haman “What should be done for the man whom the king wishes to\u00a0honour?” Haman believes that the king is speaking of him. Misreading\u00a0intentions can be dangerous and Haman misreads not only the king’s\u00a0intentions but also Esther’s intentions and in a complete reversal of fortunes\u00a0he ends up hanged on the very gallows he had built to hang Mordecai. The\u00a0letters from the king to the provinces are changed to allow the Jews to defend\u00a0themselves and they end up killing 75,000 of their enemies instead of being\u00a0destroyed themselves. The story is one that is read by rabbis on Purim, one of\u00a0the great festivals celebrated by the Jews every year.<\/p>\n

After reading the book of Esther in the Old Testament then you should\u00a0read the version that appears in the apocrypha. The second version differs\u00a0from the first in having about 140 more lines and all of those additional lines\u00a0tell of God’s involvement in the plot. Dreams and portents are suddenly\u00a0present and the intention of the author is clear in the additional lines. God,\u00a0who does not appear in the Hebrew version, is suddenly omnipresent in the\u00a0Greek version, and we can read the intentions of the Greek\u00a0author in those added lines. Now God is the author of human\u00a0events and is directly involved through dreams and intervention in the\u00a0unfolding of events. We readers are to see that God is directly responsible for\u00a0the outcome of stories and is controlling the events from afar.<\/p>\n

Much of the great writing of our Western tradition comes from a\u00a0Judeo-Christian culture. It is difficult to read Dante, Spinoza, Milton, Goethe,\u00a0Shakespeare, Descartes, Newton, Kant and hundreds of others without some\u00a0knowledge of the stories and the ideas of the Bible. Contemporary artists\u00a0continue to draw on the images and forms of the biblical stories to create their\u00a0stories, and whether they are believers or not the basic patterns of the Bible\u00a0are still present to be considered, incorporated or dismissed. The biblical\u00a0stories, of course, have special meaning for Jews and Christians because they\u00a0are believed to be a record of God’s covenant with a chosen people. In the Old\u00a0Testament this covenant is in the form of a promise of land in return for obedi-\u00a0ence to a set of rules. In the New Testament the covenant is in the form of a\u00a0promise for salvation in return for obedience and belief. The “promised land”\u00a0of the Old Testament is land on this earth; the “promised land” of the New\u00a0Testament, as described by Paul and other early Christians, is not of this earth.<\/p>\n

It seems obligatory in a book like this to state where I “am coming\u00a0from.” I am not a Jew. I am not a Christian. I was raised in a Christian family.\u00a0We attended an Episcopal church when I was a small boy; after my mother\u00a0remarried we attended a Lutheran church where I was confirmed at a young\u00a0age. Shortly after that we started to attend a Methodist church, but none of\u00a0these changes was, to my knowledge, based on any matters of doctrine, but\u00a0rather on social reasons. I remember getting in trouble with the Lutheran\u00a0pastor as a child because in Bible class I would ask real questions. “Thou shalt\u00a0have no other Gods before me,” it said in the catechism. Why? The canned\u00a0answer was: “The Lord, thy God, is a jealous God.” “Why is he jealous?” I\u00a0would ask, “what would God have to be jealous of?” “Don’t ask questions,” the\u00a0pastor would say, “just memorize the material.” That was the lesson of the\u00a0church: do not ask questions; just memorize the stuff. There really was no life\u00a0in the church. People came in, sat down, listened quietly, put some money in\u00a0the collection plate, and then left to carry on with their lives as before. After\u00a0hearing a sermon on the evils of “drink” and card playing, in which the\u00a0punishments for disobedience were extremely uncomfortable, we would all get\u00a0in our car and go to one of my step-uncle’s for an afternoon of drinking beer\u00a0and playing pinochle. I learned to hate Jews (for they were somehow\u00a0responsible for killing Jesus), Catholics (for they had all the riches), and\u00a0Methodists (I cannot remember why). I learned hypocrisy, racism, and sexism\u00a0(now called the “traditional” values by nostalgic writers who find the word\u00a0“traditional” all fuzzy and warm). I read the Bible frequently because the\u00a0stories were full of violence, sex, and mystery. I remember asking my mother\u00a0what `womb’ means and she was very nervous and asked me where I had heard\u00a0that word. When I told her I found it in the Bible she did not seem to know\u00a0what to say. I had her! She arranged for my step-father to teach me about the\u00a0“birds and the bees.” He in turn sub-contracted to a teen-aged farm hand who\u00a0gave me a brief but descriptive lecture about things that I already knew. (The\u00a0lecture, I remember, started like this: “So, you want to know about f…ing…,”\u00a0my teacher at least exhibiting a sense of the dramatic.)<\/p>\n

After a few years in public schools and four years in the United States\u00a0Marine Corps, I learned about sex and violence in more direct ways, and\u00a0stopped reading the Bible until I was in university. At the University of\u00a0California in Santa Barbara I was assigned as a teaching assistant to Professor\u00a0Douwe Stuurman, who taught a course on the Bible. His classes were always\u00a0full of interesting people. In the front row were the nuns, who, he said, were\u00a0there to spy on him. Then came the middle-aged students looking for therapy,\u00a0the literature and philosophy students, and the atheists who sat in the back. I\u00a0tried to sit in a different part of the room each time. Stuurman had a Freudian,\u00a0Eastern, Calvinist, Proustian background and the ability to mesmerize an\u00a0audience. Above all he opened up the text for me. I read it with fresh eyes.\u00a0These stories were marvellous works of art! Stuurman’s lectures were inspiring\u00a0(I used to call them “Stuurman on the mount”) and unlike my Lutheran pastor,\u00a0he asked questions all the time. When not at the university I spent my time\u00a0cleaning the Unitarian Church in Santa Barbara, which meant that I had the op-\u00a0portunity to talk with Lex Crane, who was ministering there then. His\u00a0background in literature was extensive and we used to have long talks about\u00a0“meaning” while I should have been cleaning the toilets. I flirted with the idea\u00a0of becoming a Unitarian minister, but never got the “call.” Because of this and\u00a0more, I believe the Bible is worth reading and studying, not as moribund\u00a0scripture but as living literature.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The first few stories in the Old Testament develop a recurring pattern in human affairs:<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

– the creation\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0creation (innocence)<\/p>\n

– the fall and the first murder \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0conflict (sin)<\/p>\n

– the flood\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0suffering (purification)<\/p>\n

– the rainbow\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0resolution (salvation)<\/p>\n

– the tower of Babel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0beginnings<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

This pattern is familiar to us because we do in fact find ourselves in a\u00a0world that we cannot explain the origin of, even in our most thorough going\u00a0scientific descriptions. “Why is there anything at all?” is a basic question that\u00a0defies answers. We can easily understand how that question leads to religious\u00a0answers, to answers that defy verification, for it is difficult to imagine an\u00a0answer to that question that would be verifiable in the strict scientific sense.\u00a0The answer we are given is a story that begins: “In the beginning of creation,\u00a0when God made heaven and earth….” The story tells us how not why. It does\u00a0not presume to know why but takes as “evidence” for what might have been a\u00a0clear notion of what is: we find ourselves walking on the earth, surrounded by\u00a0the sky, nurtured by sunshine and water, sharing our world with many other\u00a0species of animals, fish and birds. Plants, trees, flowers abound. Where did\u00a0they come from? In this story we are told that they come form the creative\u00a0command of a powerful spirit-god who creates by fiat. “Let there be light” – and\u00a0there was light begins the whole chain of events. Other stories tell of the\u00a0beginnings of life in different ways. For example, the Hopi Indians have a\u00a0creation myth which tells the story this way:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In a remote time Spider Grandmother thought outward into space.<\/p>\n

She thought and breathed and sang and spun the world into<\/p>\n

existence. So threads and stories, spinning and spirals all began<\/p>\n

with Spider Grandmother.[1]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

“Thought,” “breathed,” “sang,” are the operative verbs in this story. They\u00a0suggest a certain kind of creation: mental, intangible, structured. Diction,\u00a0which is merely choice of words, reveals intent. A particular\u00a0recipe lies behind a description which employs just these words, a recipe which\u00a0includes a pattern for building “reality” as well as a description of a given\u00a0“reality.” Reading stories always entails paying close attention to the writer’s\u00a0diction, for in the selection of a vocabulary a writer chooses a value system.\u00a0Look at these lines by Wordsworth:[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

No motion has she now, no force;<\/p>\n

She neither feels nor sees;<\/p>\n

Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course,<\/p>\n

With rocks, and stones, and trees.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

What a simple vocabulary Wordsworth uses to tell us of a motionless young\u00a0woman who has died. The words “force,” \u00a0 “motion,” and “diurnal” come from\u00a0the vocabulary of science and are used here to contrast life and death with the\u00a0scientific vocabulary of Newtonian physics. “Diurnal” is the only word in the\u00a0stanza likely to send a reader to the dictionary. And what does this word\u00a0mean? “Daily.” Wordsworth could have used “daily” in the line; it is a word he\u00a0would have had in his vocabulary. But he chooses “diurnal.” What does he gain\u00a0by this choice? “Diurnal” hints at “die,” “urn,” “eternal” – all words, and through\u00a0them images, which cluster around the chosen word and reveal a complex of\u00a0emotional and intellectual concerns that “daily” just does not. It is in the choice\u00a0of diction that the poet negotiates the meaning transfer from intention to\u00a0interpretation.<\/p>\n

The poet who wrote the creation story in Genesis also reveals intention\u00a0through diction. One repeated phrase that in its repetition is highlighted as\u00a0surely as is the light which results form the first command is the phrase “God\u00a0saw that it was good” repeated after each creative act. From the very beginning\u00a0we are told of a world that has value and goodness built right into it by the act\u00a0of the creator-god. Good is not added like a cosmetic but is shown through the\u00a0language to be a fundamental part of the cosmos. As the myth of our\u00a0beginnings unfolds in the thoughts and spinnings of the Genesis poet we see\u00a0that into this place of perfect good enters chaos as a result of disobedience and\u00a0jealousy. Good is followed immediately by its opposite and God drives Adam\u00a0from the garden.<\/p>\n

One way of approaching these early stories is to think of them as maps.\u00a0They were constructed after the fact as ways of explaining and charting the\u00a0unknown past of how and why. In that respect they are backwards looking. But\u00a0they also contain a perspective from the present projecting into the future.\u00a0They contain within them a story about how we ought to be. And the language\u00a0of these stories is often the language of dream – symbolic language – a language\u00a0that means more than it says, a language that is found in poetry and in\u00a0children. When our immediate family experienced the first death in the family\u00a0which our kids experienced it happened like this: the phone call came saying\u00a0that Grandpa Jim had died and that his funeral would be in a military cemetery\u00a0in a few days. Margaret, our daughter, was about three years old. She heard\u00a0her mother on the phone and guessed that something was wrong. She asked\u00a0her older brothers (seven and eight) what was going on. “Grandpa Jim is\u00a0dead.”<\/p>\n

“What does that mean?”<\/p>\n

“They will put him in a hole in the ground.”<\/p>\n

“And put dirt over top of him.”<\/p>\n

“And you will never see him again.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

She was puzzled. Later she went off to bed without saying much of\u00a0anything. In the middle of the night I heard her weeping quietly in her crib. I\u00a0went to pick her up and held her against my chest. She was in that state\u00a0between sleeping and waking and was sobbing over and over again: “I don’t\u00a0want to go down in that hole; I don’t want to go down in that hole.” That is\u00a0symbolic language. What heart knew head guessed. The stories of the Bible\u00a0are written in that kind of language. At the level where the human cry of\u00a0mortality and mystery emerges is to be found the story line of the best of the\u00a0stories from the Bible collection. At another level, of course, is the official line,\u00a0which offers an explanation, a reading of the stories, proclaims an\u00a0interpretation, an ordering conceptual map.<\/p>\n

The Bible stories can be seen as maps – maps of concepts constructed in\u00a0language which trace psychological or social processes. But do they record\u00a0or construct the facts? In what follows I will argue that, like all literature,\u00a0they do both. A recent literary critic puts the distinction this way:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The recognition that our concepts are constructions of language<\/p>\n

systems…tells us nothing about their relation or lack of relation to<\/p>\n

reality. It follows that the antithesis between “constructing” and<\/p>\n

“recording” is unreal, for it opposes a genetic category to a logical<\/p>\n

one; it confuses the process by which formulations come into being<\/p>\n

(constructing) and the logical status of these formulations (“record-<\/p>\n

ing”). The opposition becomes unreal as soon as we recognize how<\/p>\n

much constructing is required in the process of recording. The fact<\/p>\n

that a reader’s interpretation of a text is, in a sense, his construc-<\/p>\n

tion is no argument against (or for) its adequacy to the text.<\/p>\n

Similarly, the fact that a literary work is constituted by the imagina-<\/p>\n

tion, or by a system of literary conventions, does not prevent it<\/p>\n

from qualifying as a record or representation of reality.[3]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A valuable approach as reader is to consider that reading a text is a\u00a0performing art. I do not mean by this that one needs to learn to be an oral\u00a0interpreter, although that is a good skill to develop. I mean that in reading a\u00a0text one must engage every bit of creativity, of sensitivity, of intellect and\u00a0feeling that one possesses. The story is in the text, but its full experience is in\u00a0the mind of the reader. The story provides form and directs responses, and the\u00a0reader completes the communicative act. Think of the text as a musical score\u00a0and yourself as a performing musician. The notes are there – are in the score –\u00a0and you must be able to perform them on your musical instrument. You need\u00a0to bring technical skill, sensitivity to nuance, and knowledge of the language\u00a0of musical notation to the task.<\/p>\n

I believe that most of us at some time or other confuse items from one\u00a0logical category with items from another, and, as a result end up believing and\u00a0stating silly or nonsensical things. Sometimes we confuse the menu with the\u00a0meal, or the map with the landscape, or our theory with reality; in short we\u00a0sometimes make category mistakes. We sometimes confuse our favorite\u00a0theories about the world with the way the world is. Stories often contain\u00a0theories of a kind (or official lines as I will call them) – these are\u00a0combinations of presuppositions, conventions, assumptions, and assumed value\u00a0judgements. And these official lines are evident in the verbal structure of a\u00a0compound narrative. In what follows I will try to show that separating the\u00a0official line from the story line is a necessary aspect of reading the Bible.\u00a0Stories provide maps of a culture’s deepest hopes and fears, of its value system\u00a0and its “take” on reality. Maps, of course, like language, select certain features\u00a0and ignore others; and like language, maps are cultural expressions of\u00a0elements significant to a society.<\/p>\n

Look at a reproduction of the Roman Peutinger Table, a ribbon map\u00a0originally some twenty-five feet long by one foot wide showing the Roman\u00a0world from Britain to India. A complex strip map, it was apparently\u00a0constructed to aid generals and merchants to find their way around the\u00a0empire. It is a map with Roman efficiency: great chunks of recalcitrant land are\u00a0forced into a narrow highway from Rome to the ends of the world. Physical\u00a0space is distorted to fit the utility of the enterprise. In another marvellous map\u00a0of the thirteenth century, the Ebstorf map, which is some nine feet in diameter,\u00a0Jerusalem is shown in the very center of the map with Christ’s head at the top,\u00a0feet at the bottom and hands to the east and west. The mapmaker projects\u00a0certain features from the worldview into the view of the world. “Maps are\u00a0by nature distortions of physical space.” And interpretations are by nature\u00a0distortions of stories.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We can say that a map is distorting physical space only if we know what\u00a0would count as non-distorted physical space. Just as there can be no\u00a0counterfeit money unless there is some genuine money, there can be no\u00a0distortion unless there is some way of knowing about it. Stories too are like\u00a0that. A general model for map making and story telling looks like this:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Scientists, story tellers, and map makers<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

1. select certain features from the physical world based upon<\/p>\n

complex considerations of beliefs, function, and reality;<\/p>\n

2. make guesses about the way the world works, and put these<\/p>\n

guesses in the form of hypothesis, map, painting or story;<\/p>\n

3. these guesses are improved upon, amended, corrected, or<\/p>\n

thrown away.<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The stories in the Bible grow out of a certain place and a certain\u00a0people. By now they are overlaid with centuries of interpretation and have\u00a0become presented as Repositories for Truth instead of vehicles for truth. The\u00a0god of the Old Testament, for example, is a complex projection based in part\u00a0on the needs of a nomadic people: above all this god had to be a portable god,\u00a0not one assigned to a particular valley or mountain, but one that moved with\u00a0his people. Place dictates image. We can expect to find in these stories a\u00a0concern with survival in a near-desert climate – a desire and hope for the oasis\u00a0with its life giving water, shelter and comfort. Is it any wonder that the Garden\u00a0of Eden appears as the perfect place for human life? Later ages will describe\u00a0this metaphoric place not as “a palm at the end of the mind” but as a place with\u00a0streets paved with gold. And that change in image tells us something about the\u00a0story tellers.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Bible is sometimes referred to as a “transparent” text or a\u00a0“laminated” text. The images here suggest an important aspect of the biblical\u00a0texts. If the text is transparent what is it we readers are supposed to see\u00a0through the text? And if laminated what makes up the layers? The transparent\u00a0text is supposed to reveal the Truth of God. Readers, says this approach, are\u00a0to look through the text to see the hand of the divine at work behind the\u00a0scenes. Reading in this way requires the reader to have a point of view to begin\u00a0with, to start with an official line which is used as a template for the stories’\u00a0meaning. In this way the text is not so much transparent as it is a mirror. One\u00a0tends to see one’s own preconceptions when looking through this “transparent”\u00a0text. To think of the biblical text as laminated is to become aware of the layers\u00a0of textual accretions that have built up over the years and through the\u00a0translations. Stories, legends, poems, oral materials, chronicles, letters, have all\u00a0been folded into the final product, with frames and transitions added, and with\u00a0direct commentary from time to time.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In what follows I want to point to the excellence of the Hebrew texts in\u00a0translation, suggest a way of reading those texts which depends upon the\u00a0creative involvement of the reader, and provide you with some sense of the\u00a0excitement of reading these stories with fresh eyes and an open mind. Reading\u00a0these stories is a way of reading yourself.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE HOLY LAND<\/p>\n

The stage for the Biblical drama is the world of the ancient Near East,\u00a0the meeting place of three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe. This territory\u00a0today is made up of the modern states of Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel,\u00a0Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran. Now (1990) the area is well\u00a0known to North Americans from daily maps on television used as backdrops\u00a0for news reports about the United Nations action against Iraq in the area.\u00a0Once more the winds of war are blowing in the Middle East, an area of the\u00a0world buffeted by those winds for centuries. It is an area of conflict between\u00a0peoples looking for a home. It is an area of conflict because for centuries other\u00a0countries have dominated various parts of the land for military strategy, for\u00a0religious strategy, or for commerce. Today oil brings the armies to the desert.\u00a0In the past it has been land, water, agriculture, trade routes and other reli-\u00a0gious concerns of the day.<\/p>\n

The Middle East is an area of widely contrasting terrain, climate and\u00a0culture. It includes the rugged mountains of Armenia, the great Arabian\u00a0Desert, and, in between, the long, crescent-shaped strip of land known as the\u00a0Fertile Crescent, which stretches from Egypt on the southwest, up the\u00a0Mediterranean coast through Israel and Syria, and down the Tigris-Euphrates\u00a0Valley to the Persian Gulf. It has always been an exciting and romantic setting\u00a0for the magnificent characters who have walked on its stage. The patriarchs\u00a0walked the desert sands with their flocks. Pharaohs built pyramids for their\u00a0long sleep. Legendary heroes like Moses and Jesus are to be found here in the\u00a0desert, conversing with their God, teaching their flocks. Here Alexander the\u00a0Great stretched out his arm of conquest. Here too the Roman armies fought\u00a0the local peoples. Caesars walked the earth here. David and Solomon reigned\u00a0briefly over a united kingdom of Israel. In Egypt Antony and Cleopatra loved\u00a0and lost. Deborah, Rebekah, Jael, Mary and Elizabeth, Sarah: these powerful\u00a0and strong women people the stories set in this landscape. Today tanks are\u00a0strewn across the landscape; a reminder in sculptured and bullet pocked iron\u00a0of the continuing conflict in this desert of despair.<\/p>\n

At stage centre, as far as Hebrew history is concerned, is the land of\u00a0Palestine, a narrow corridor between the Mediterranean Sea and the Arabian\u00a0Desert with Syria and Lebanon on the north, and Egypt on the south. Pushed\u00a0up against the Mediterranean on the west and with Jordan on the east, the\u00a0modern state of Israel is impressive first of all because of its size. It is very\u00a0small. Measuring about 150 miles “from Dan to Beersheba,” the Biblical idiom\u00a0for its north-south extremities (Judges 20:1), it has nevertheless always played\u00a0a significant role in the political, economic, and cultural life of the ancient\u00a0world. Situated astride the major highways joining Egypt and Mesopotamia,\u00a0Palestine commanded a strategic location for military and commercial affairs.\u00a0Trade between Assyria, Babylon, Persia and Egypt often moved through the\u00a0lands of Palestine. Too often the larger neighbours were also moving soldiers,\u00a0chariots and war machines into the area as the power struggles between larger\u00a0nations waxed and waned. At times in her history, for example, during the uni-\u00a0fied reigns of David and Solomon, Israel was able to capitalize on her strategic\u00a0location and gather income from the trade caravans travelling north and south.\u00a0But more often than not, one of the larger nations was on her soil as an\u00a0invading army or as a landlord exacting tribute and taxes from the people.<\/p>\n

In such a small country one does not expect the vast topographical\u00a0differences that one finds. Southern Israel (the Judean Wilderness) is dry\u00a0rocky land that looks like places on the moon. Rough, rocky terrain gives life\u00a0to a few thistle-like plants, small trees, and tough grass wherever there is any\u00a0moisture at all. This is the land of the Dead Sea, a large land-locked body of\u00a0water so filled with salts as to make sinking in it impossible. Around the Dead\u00a0Sea are the hills and valleys in which Qumran and Masada were built over\u00a02000 years ago. Here the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the caves around\u00a0Qumran, and here Herod the Great built a magnificent castle for his family\u00a0and for protection should he ever need it. Summer temperatures climb to 48\u00a0degrees Celsius as the brilliant sunshine is reflected off the rocky terrain much\u00a0like a reflecting oven. With a stark beauty of its own the Judean Wilderness fig-\u00a0ures prominently in many of the bible stories from both the Old and New\u00a0Testaments. Even here some rain falls in the winter months and provided\u00a0water for the hardy settlers who stored it in deep underground cisterns for use\u00a0during the dry summer months. There are really just two seasons in Israel:\u00a0summer and winter, the first running from May to October. The moisture\u00a0laden winds from the Mediterranean and the long season of winter rains\u00a0nourish olive, fig, orange and date trees on many of the hill slopes of the\u00a0Judean Wilderness. Fields of grain and vineyards are spread across the\u00a0intervening valleys.<\/p>\n

The Central Highlands have been divided historically into three regions\u00a0of Galilee, Samaria (Ephraim) and Judah (or Judea). Galilee, in the north, is\u00a0separated from the central heartland of Samaria by the important east-west\u00a0Valley of Jezreel, through which passed the major trade route linking the\u00a0Palestinian coast and Syria. The Valley of Jezreel is a fertile plain drained by\u00a0the Kishon River and across from which Mount Tabor (1,843 ft.) and Mount\u00a0Gilboa (1,6987 ft.) face each other. It was at Mt. Tabor that Deborah gathered\u00a0her armies to defeat Sisera as we are told in the book of Judges.<\/p>\n

North of Jerusalem one finds vegetation and a hospitable landscape,\u00a0and though no well-defined geographical feature separates Samaria from\u00a0Judah one has to travel but a few miles south or east of Jerusalem or\u00a0Bethlehem before entering upon the forbidding Judean Wilderness mentioned\u00a0above. Here the stony, gray hills support no vegetation throughout most of the\u00a0year. South of Beersheba the Judean Hills flatten out into the barren southern\u00a0steppe, the Negeb, which merges with the Sinai Desert.<\/p>\n

The Jordan valley is the most characteristic geographical feature in\u00a0Israel. A part of the great geological rift which extends through Syria and\u00a0continues southward as the Wadi Arabaly it parts the country lengthwise from\u00a0north to south, and through it the Jordan River descends in its serpentine\u00a0course. The Jordan’s waters are supplied by springs at the foot of Mount\u00a0Hebron and empty finally into the Dead Sea. The Jordan supplies three lakes,\u00a0and one gets a sense of the rapid descent of its waters by contrasting the\u00a0surface level of the three. Lake Huleh is 223 feet above sea level; the Sea of\u00a0Galilee is 695 feet below sea level, and to the south, the Dead Sea is 1,285 feet\u00a0below sea level. From the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea is, as the crane flies,\u00a0only about 65 miles but three times that distance as the river meanders from\u00a0north to south.<\/p>\n

Claims and counter claims to the lands in the Near East have been an\u00a0integral part of the history of the area and continue to be a source of conflict.\u00a0Prime Minister Begin of Israel has argued since 1967 that Israel should hold\u00a0the Golan Heights and the West Bank of the Jordan because the country is so\u00a0defined in the Bible. So far Israeli tanks have been able to provide backing for\u00a0the Biblical argument.<\/p>\n

Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob, Samson, Deborah, and\u00a0all the other characters from the Old Testament stories live their lives here in\u00a0this land where water is so precious and where the sand and the stars meet at\u00a0the horizon on endless clear nights. The Judean Wilderness is just that: a\u00a0wilderness. To cross it took a wily, tough and hardy people who knew how to\u00a0survive in an inhospitable land without easy access to food and water. Where\u00a0rocks are everywhere in the landscape it is no surprise that they play an\u00a0important and recurring part in the imagery of the stories. When water is so\u00a0scarce it is not surprising that wells and rivers become central meeting places\u00a0for bringing together the people and the flocks. Every betrothal scene in the\u00a0Old Testament is set by a well. Moses’ main concern while leading the tribes\u00a0through the wilderness is to find water.<\/p>\n

For one raised in North America with its vast distances, miles and miles\u00a0of countryside, forests that go on for miles and miles, it comes as a shock to\u00a0discover that Bethlehem is but three miles from Jerusalem. In my Sunday\u00a0School memory the journey from Bethlehem to Jerusalem was a long journey\u00a0indeed especially when travelling on a donkey. But then my Sunday School\u00a0memory was filled with all sorts of falsehoods.<\/p>\n

One of the most interesting sites is the marvelous Caesarea on the\u00a0Mediterranean Sea. Built about 2000 years ago, Caesarea still exhibits\u00a0evidence of the Roman influence, with its baths, its wide streets, and its arena\u00a0for sporting events. Herod the Great, who figures prominently in the Jesus\u00a0story, was a rich and powerful king who has to be one of the world’s greatest\u00a0opportunists. As powerful men struggled for ascendancy in Rome and one\u00a0“Caesar” after another crossed the Tiber to seek the highest office on earth,\u00a0Herod was able, by quick maneuvering and clever “politicking” to stay always\u00a0on the side of the person in power. He snuggled up to the right general time\u00a0after time and hence was able to keep the power and influence required to rule\u00a0and exploit the country. He was also interested in architecture, was influenced\u00a0by the Romans in all things, and built many of the lasting monuments in\u00a0Jerusalem, Jericho, Masada, and Caesarea.<\/p>\n

As Martin Noth puts it:[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

About 22 miles south of the Carmel solient there was a fairly old,<\/p>\n

quite small place called “Strato’s Tower”. This place had been made<\/p>\n

over to Herod in the year 30 B.C. with a whole coastal area. On its<\/p>\n

site Herod had a magnificent city built at great expense over a<\/p>\n

period of twelve years, with artificial harbour installations and with<\/p>\n

all the public buildings such as theatre, ampitheatre, and hippo-<\/p>\n

drome which formed part of a complete Hellenistic-Roman city. In<\/p>\n

the year 10 B.C. it was ceremoniously opened with magnificent<\/p>\n

games for which Augustus and Livia gave a considerable sum.<\/p>\n

…Herod called the city “Caesarea”….<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Caesarea, Bethlehem, Jericho, Nazareth: all are cities we have heard of\u00a0from Sunday School days on. But the most famous, the most beloved, the most\u00a0complex and mysterious of cities is Jerusalem. Even before David’s time\u00a0Jerusalem was an important city, but from David on its place in history was\u00a0assured. To go there today is to go back in time at least 3,000 years, and it is to\u00a0visit the holy site for three of the world’s largest religions. Divided into four\u00a0quarters (the Jewish Quarter, the Armenian Quarter, the Christian Quarter,\u00a0and the Arab (Moslem) Quarter), old Jerusalem thrives behind its ancient\u00a0walls with some of its inhabitants waiting for the Messiah to arrive through the\u00a0Golden Gate, others waiting for the Second Coming of Christ, and others\u00a0waiting for Mohammed to reappear. This is the city of Godot. Everyone is\u00a0waiting. Waiting for Godot. Waiting for God. It contains more temples,\u00a0mosques, and churches per square foot than any other city in the world. Bullet\u00a0pocked stone walls are silent testimony to the fact that the religious conflicts of\u00a0thousands of years are still very much alive. Evidence from the first temple\u00a0period abounds and one feels while walking in the Old Jerusalem that there\u00a0are several layers of city below one’s feet. It is here that David chose to build\u00a0his capital: “In view of the jealousy and bad feeling between the two Kingdoms\u00a0of Judah and Israel…with the sure instinct of the wise statesman he chose a city\u00a0on neutral soil between the territories of the two kingdoms. This was Jerusa-\u00a0lem…” Later Solomon would fortify the city and still later battle after battle\u00a0would be fought there as it became the holy place for Jews, Moslems, and\u00a0Christians, and the temporal place to capture if one wanted to control the\u00a0area. Babylonians, Romans, Crusaders, each motivated by different urges\u00a0fought and died there to gain control of the city – this magic and bloody city of\u00a0Jerusalem. The three religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam\u00a0share few\u00a0things: these are one God, the patriarchs, especially Abraham, and Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

To Jews and Moslems one belief is central: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord of\u00a0our God, the Lord is one” or as Moslems put it, “There is no God but God.”<\/p>\n

Both religions demand submission to the will of God – “Islam” means\u00a0“submission” – and regard fulfillment of his commands as the main road to\u00a0salvation. Both separately, have a large body of law, a regimen of rite and\u00a0custom. Jews derive theirs from the Hebrew Bible and the rabbinical traditions\u00a0of the Mishneh and Talmud. And more, because Judaism is ready to develop\u00a0and to disagree: it has several strands today, conservatism of belief going,\u00a0usually, with strictness of observance. But all agree that a covenant with God,\u00a0sealed at Sinai, selects the people of Israel for special favour – including the\u00a0“land of milk and honey” – in return for special devotion.<\/p>\n

Moslems draw their beliefs from the Koran , the word of God revealed\u00a0through Mohammed; and from the quite distinct Hadith, traditions of what the\u00a0Prophet himself said or did. An Arab trader, he received his first “revelation”\u00a0about 610 A.D. (the start of the Moslem era). Moslems are not free to develop\u00a0their tradition just because times have changed: “the messenger of God” was\u00a0the last of the prophets (of whom Jesus was one), and the revelation he\u00a0received final and complete. Belief in God, prayer, fasting, pilgrimage and\u00a0charity are the pillars of Islam.<\/p>\n

Christianity is the odd religion out. Central to it is not the oneness of\u00a0God, but his incarnation in the person of His son, Jesus Christ; who, we are\u00a0told “was crucified, dead and buried. The third day he rose again…he ascended\u00a0into heaven.” Why? For the redemption of humankind, from the sin it had in-\u00a0herited from Adam and Eve. In the Christian story it is God’s grace expressed\u00a0through His only son which promises redemption and victory over death.<\/p>\n

The common denominator: Jerusalem. Hence, it is not strange that\u00a0Jerusalem is, to continue the theatrical image, at the very heart of stage centre,\u00a0bustling today with Jews, Christians, and Arabs who live, work, pray, and fight\u00a0together focussed by their beliefs and sharing a complex, violent, and\u00a0passionate history.<\/p>\n

The Bible gives us a particular, a prejudiced, look at this history;\u00a0though, of course, it is not a history book in the modern sense of history. As\u00a0Auerbach says, “the Old Testament presents universal history: it begins with\u00a0the beginning of time, with the creation of the world, and will end with the Last\u00a0Days, the fulfilling of the Covenant, with which the world will come to an end.”\u00a0Throughout this “history” some sense of place is essential in understanding the\u00a0feelings of the characters who are working out their destinies on this particular\u00a0human stage.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Quoted here from \u201cHopi\u201d a Corporation of Public Broadcasting film produced by New Day Films in New York.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 William Wordsworth \u201cA Slumber Did My Spirit Seal,\u201d The Norton Anthology of English Literature<\/em>, W.W. Norton and Company, Third Editon, page 142.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Gerald Graff, Literature Against Itslef<\/em>, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1979, page 199.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Martin Noth, The History of Israel<\/em>, Harper and Row, New York, 1958, page 415.<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n

[1]<\/a> Quoted here from \u201cHopi\u201d a Corporation of Public Broadcasting film produced by New Day Films in New York.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[2]<\/a> William Wordsworth, \u201cA Slumber Did My Spirit Seal,\u201d The Norton Anthology of English Literature, <\/em>W.W.Norton and Company, 3rd Edition, page 142.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[3]<\/a> Gerald Graff, Literature Against Itself<\/em>, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1979, page 199.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[4]<\/a> Martin Noth, The History of Israel<\/em>, Harper and Row, New York, 1958, page 415.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":276,"menu_order":1,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-24","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/24","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/276"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/24\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/24\/revisions\/77"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/24\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=24"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=24"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/readingthebible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=24"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}