Since I am on the topic of Proverbs (see my previous post), I can’t resist sharing my favourite biblical proverb:
כְּ֭כֶלֶב שָׁ֣ב עַל־קֵאֹ֑ו
כְּ֝סִ֗יל שֹׁונֶ֥ה בְאִוַּלְתֹּֽוLike a dog that returns to its vomit
is a fool who reverts to his folly (Proverbs 26:11)
An apt characterization of fallen human nature, in my humble opinion.
Beginning next week, the Biblical Studies discussion list will be hosting an online colloquium entitled “Proverbs — Recent Trends in Interpretation and Exegesis.” The guest scholar for the colloquium is Knut Martin Heim, Tutor in Biblical Studies at the Queen’s Foundation in Birmingham, England.
Knut has recently published Like Grapes of Gold Set in Silver: An Interpretation of Proverbial Clusters in Proverbs 10:1-22:16 (Walter de Gruyter, 2001; Buy from Amazon.ca | Buy from Amazon.com; see RBL review here). Knut’s volume is one of a growing number of works exploring the compilation, redaction, and structure of the book of Proverbs. This exciting avenue of research bucks the traditional view that ignores a contextual reading of individual proverbs or contends that once a proverb is included in a written collection it is effectively “dead.” In contract, Knut, and others mentioned below, contend that the redactors of the book of Proverbs purposefully arranged individual sayings into pairs and larger groups based on common themes, wordplay, catchwords, paronomasia, etc., creating a new literary context for interpretation and performance.
In addition to Knut’s book, there are a number of other significant works in this area, including the volumes by Snell, Van Leeuwen, and Whybray. In addition, some other important studies are noted below.
Daniel C. Snell, Twice-Told Proverbs and the Composition of the Book of Proverbs (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1993; Buy from Amazon.ca | Buy from Amazon.com).
In this important study, Snell sets out to reconstruct the history of the composition of Proverbs on the basis of the text of the book, i.e., the repetitions found within it.
Raymond C. Van Leeuwen, Context and Meaning in Proverbs 25-27 (SBLDS 96; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1988; Buy from Amazon.ca | Buy from Amazon.com).
According to Van Leeuwen, one of the most crucial problems in the interpretation of literary texts is the determination and use of context in establishing meaning. While form criticism helps define the context of individual pericopes, it doesn’t help with larger contexts. Form criticism was founded on the assumption that smaller oral or literary units had a Sitz im Leben out of which they arose and whose life concerns they served. However, the search for a Sitz im Leben and a concrete referents are particularly acute in certain biblical texts (Psalms, wisdom, legal texts, etc.) where the givens for reconstructing the life situation or historical referent of a text are few or lacking. This problem is acute with Prov 10-22:16; 25-29, as in these chapters we have self-sufficient literary units that are extremely terse and without any historical “hooks.” The concern of this work is the literary context of the proverbs, their Sitz im Buch. This involves two types of contexts: (i) immediate: the juxtaposition of letters, words, sentences, and pericopes, more of less in contiguity; and (ii) distant context: meaningful literary similarities or contrasts that are created and discerned in texts that are not contiguous. Van Leeuwen focuses on the question of contiguous context in the interpretation of Prov 25-27 and argues chapters 25 and 26 are independent literary units, while chapter 27 is a “proverb miscellany” of sorts.
R. N. Whybray, The Composition of the Book of Proverbs (JSOTSup 168; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1994; Buy from Amazon.ca | Buy from Amazon.com).
This study important study by Whybray investigates the process by which the disparate material in Proverbs was brought together to form a single book, and also to seek to understand the structure and character of the book in its final form. Whybray assumes that the proverbs were originally independent and were then assembled into collections employing two criteria for discerning deliberately organized groups of proverbs: (1) identity of sense; and (2) identity of sound (alliteration, assonance, rhyme, verbal repetition). He concludes the book of Proverbs is composed of a number of originally distinct sections of which the majority had complicated pre-histories. Despite the disparate origins, these different sections exhibit some common themes, like the importance of the acquisition of wisdom and the contrast between the righteous and the wicked, etc. There is, however, no evidence of a systematic editing of the whole work for dogmatic or theological reasons. In contrast, the book of Proverbs was compiled as a compendium of traditional educational or instructional material in order to gather on to a single scroll all writings of this kind which the final editor thought should be preserved.
Some other noteworthy works include the following:
If this post has whetted your appetite for this sort of research into the book of Proverbs, I encourage you to participate in the online colloquium with Professor Knut Heim on the Biblical Studies discussion list.
I have been negligent in my posting of new reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature (bad Tyler!). I almost decided to forego the ones that I missed, but I just couldn’t do it! So here they are in all of their glory — this post brings me up to date.
Take special note of the the review of Hossfeld and Zenger’s new Psalms commentary (I have sung their praises often on this blog), a review of the latest editions of the new French translation of the Septuagint, La Bible d’Alexandrie, as well as Joe Cathey’s review.
Phil Harland over at Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean blog has started a series of posts on the History of Satan, inspired by an undergraduate course of the same name he is teaching this term. In his first post (Satan 1), Phil describes the upcoming series as follows:
Welcome to ongoing discussions regarding the origins, development, and significance of personified evil — Satan and his demons — in early Judaism and in the history of Christianity. We will be tracing the history of Satan (a.k.a. the Devil, Beelzebul, Beliar, Mastema, Lucifer, Mephisto) and his minions from ancient Mesopotamian chaos-monsters to early Jewish and Christian fallen angels to modern portrayals in music, television, and film.
His second post (Satan 2) looks some at important predecessors of Satan from the Ancient Near East which help us to understand the rise of the figure of Satan, such as the different chaos monsters like Lotan/Leviathan. His third post (Satan 3) covers some terms often associated with Satan in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, including the term satan “the adversary” often translated (perhaps incorrectly) as “Satan.”
The series is off to a great start and looks to be a very interesting series of posts. I have some ideas about the development of Satan in the Hebrew Bible (especially 1Chronicles 21) as well as the influence of the Septuagint translation to the notion of Satan that I may blog on in the near future if time permits. Of course, it would be interesting to look at Satan in popular culture, as well.
Make sure to take a look at Phil’s blog. You can always say the “Devil made me do it!”
OK, in my heart of hearts I am a Macintosh user. I get excited on days like today when Steve Jobs announces new screaming fast Macintosh laptops and iMacs (all running on Intel chips!). While I wondered about the move to Intel (see here), it looks as if Jobs pulled it off! Read CNET news for up-to-date reporting from Macworld here.
And then there’s my Dell Laptop. I like my laptop (Inspiron 8600), though sometimes I wonder if I got a lemon! I have had to replace the harddrive, motherboard, memory, DVD drive over its 2.5 years lifespan (I’m just glad I bought the extended warranty!). I am in the process of doing a complete re-install of Windows XP. I am hoping that this will get rid of the demons that have been plaguing my system for the last month or so. I don’t know if I picked up some malware or something, if I did I couldn’t find it with all of the spyware programs I ran! At any rate, part of me is really tempted to return to the Macintosh whole-heartedly and forget this cross platform stuff. (I am typing this on my dual processor Mac G4)
But, alas, my workplace is a Windows workplace and I do have a bunch of software that is Windows only which I find indispensable — not as indispensable as my Accordance Bible Software for the Macintosh! — but indispensable nonetheless!
Well, Windows XP has finished re-installing. Now to rebuild my configurations…
The 1936 film Green Pastures — a fascinating retelling of a number of stories from the Old Testament — has just been released today on DVD by Warner Home Video. This film was innovative for its day in that black actors fill every role — from God to Moses, Noah to Pharaoh. The film was adapted from Marc Connelly’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play. It has been available on VHS for a while, but this is the first time on DVD.
Modern viewers may be uncomfortable with some of the racial stereotypes in the film, though I am not sure it warranted a disclaimer such as Warner put at the beginning.
At any rate, it has to be understood and appreciated as a product of its time. Order yours today… I know I did!
For an exhaustive listing of films based on the Hebrew Bible, see my Old Testament on Film pages.
I have always wondered why my Atom site feed wasn’t working properly for people to easily subscribe to my blog easily. I finally decided to figure it out and I believe I have it all fixed. I also added a feedburner RSS 2.0 feed for my blog. Links to both feeds may be found in my left navigation column. Here they are as well:
I have also added auto-discovery to my settings so everyone can find my feed easily.
Let me know if you have any problems with either site feed (and thank you to those individuals who notified me about my feeds in the first place!)
If you like to pretend to be civilized and enjoy a good cup of tea with your scones, you may be interested in the exchange between some (biblio)bloggers about the best cup of tea. Joe Cathey likes the exotic, Jim West prefers the pre-packaged, while Jim Spinti likes the French. (And it appears they can’t agree — see Joe’s follow-up here and Jim’s here)
I personally don’t get into hot drinks much, whether tea or coffee, and I probably haven’t had a cup of tea since my grandmother passed away four years ago. But I did enjoy having a spot of tea with her — especially if it was in conjunction with some of her famous Welsh Cakes! I do know that my Grandma was very particular about tea — and she insisted that the only tea worth drinking was Red Rose Tea, a Canadian classic since 1860. Furthermoe, you should never drink tea with anything in it — it must be clear. And, of course, don’t forget to raise that pinkie!
So sorry, my American friends, my beloved Grandma (RIP) trumps you all!
Red Rose Tea — “Only available in Canada? Pity”
(While Red Rose is available in Britain and the U.S. now, the original Canadian variety is still considered the best!)
Jeremy over at Parableman has posted a very good survey of commentaries on the Book of Psalms. Based on his comments, he appears to be coming from a moderate evangelical viewpoint and doesn’t have much patience for speculation in regards to the Sitz im Leben of individual psalms or conjecture for the redaction and compilation of the book of Psalms.
There are a number of good commentaries on the Psalms that he does not include in his survey, including the following which I think are worth of mention:
For a complete listing of commentaries on the book of Psalms, see my Old Testament Commentary Survey.
I came across this absolutely horrendous rendition of “O Holy Night” (right-click to download for your listening pleasure!) on a humour blog that I often frequent (The Sneeze).
Now, I will be the first to admit that despite my Welsh heritage, I can’t sing (and my family will confirm this fact will far too much vigor) and I doubt that I could do a better job than this poor sap. But, I do know my limitations and I am never under the illusion that I can sing and I would certainly never record myself singing for on audition tape as this fellow did!
Take a listen and let me know what you think — can you do better?