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- Andersson, Greger, 1958-
(författare)
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The book and its narratives : a critical examination of some synchronic studies of the book of Judges
- 2001
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- During recent decades, there has been a trend among biblical scholars towards applying methods borrowed from literary studies to the familiar texts of the Old and New Testaments. A major reason for this reorientation is the search for a meaningful and interpretable text; hence, it can be seen as a protest against the historical-critical school and its ambition to reconstruct an authentic text by means of a diachronic analysis. Synchronic scholars argue for a new understanding of the biblical text, claiming that the object of interpretation is the text in its present form, regarded as a literary production. Consequently, they can study texts that are commonly considered to be patchworks or conglomerations as meaningful literary works regardless of their pre-history or authorship. In this thesis I do not focus on studies that concern individual narratives or poems but on those that apply a synchronic approach to large units of texts such as books or collections of books. My example is the book of Judges, and the fundamental issue is whether the synchronists’ description of its structure and of the relationship between the individual narratives and the larger text is sustainable. Through analyses of the book’s introduction and the stories about Ehud, Deborah, Jephthah and Samson, I argue that the scholars under consideration are often compelled to form interpretations that are in conflict with a “natural” or “intuitive” reading. I hence claim that they are not reading these stories in accordance with the conventions that are generally applied to narratives. The arguments in which they refer to implicit devices, allusions and the structure of the larger text are assessed as unconvincing.I argue that that these scholars make two common theoretical mistakes. Firstly, they do not consider the specific restrictions that apply to “the literary point of view”. Secondly, they disregard the fact that narratives are autonomous and hence resistant to reworking. If several independent narratives are put together, they are not thereby transformed into a larger single narrative even though they may contain common patterns and motifs. Hence, the individual story represents the primary level of meaning and discrete elements are understood as motifs within aliterary construction. The stories of the book of Judges are therefore texts within a text. This explains why the book lacks a coherent ideology or morality. The tensions and ambiguities in the book cannot be resolved by classifying it as a literary production and studying it synchronically: on the contrary, doing this confirms and explains the difficulties in the book – that is, the inconsistent character of both the book and its narratives and the bizarre events that are recounted therein – and its polyphonic character.
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- Bergström, Ulf, 1974-
(författare)
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Temporality and the Semantics of the Biblical Hebrew Verbal System
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation investigates the semantic factors behind the temporal meanings of the Biblical Hebrew (BH) verbal forms. Four different forms are studied, viz. qotel, yiqtol-L, qatal, and yiqtol-S. On the basis of comparative and historical linguistic studies, qotel and yiqtol-L are classified as originally progressive forms, whereas qatal and yiqtol-S are classified as originally resultative ones. Since there is a tendency in BH to use the progressive subgroup for future meaning and the resultative subgroup for past meaning, a key to understanding how temporality is expressed in this language is to understand the meaning of the progressive and the resultative verbal types.In critical dialogue with modern typological linguistic research, a unified theory of aspect and tense is developed. The theory defines the meanings of the progressive and resultative verbal types in terms of a distinct kind of aspect, called “stage-based aspect”, and describes how tense meanings arise through reanalysis of these aspectual meanings, a process called temporalization. It is argued that progressive aspect is a basic meaning in qotel and yiqtol-L, and that resultative aspect is basic in qatal and yiqtol-S in its so-called “consecutive” form, wayyiqtol. The study investigates various verbal usages, showing where the stage-aspectual meanings are invariant and where they have been overturned as a consequence of temporalization.Another major question concerns the semantic difference between the forms with shared aspectual meanings. On the basis of the semiotic theories of Bühler and others, it is suggested that yiqtol-L and yiqtol-S (here: yiqtol) are distinguished from qotel and qatal with regard to their appeal function. Full appeal function characterizes utterances that prompt the listener to immediate action. Verbal forms available for this function in BH are qatal and qotel, as well as the imperative. By contrast, the appeal to action in utterances employing yiqtol is invariably non-existent, or mitigated. Hence, reduced appeal function is a semantic feature of yiqtol. This feature may explain why temporalized meanings are especially favoured by yiqtol, since non-present meaning is one among several factors that reduce the appeal function of an utterance.
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- Eidevall, Göran, 1955-
(författare)
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Amos : A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary
- 2017
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Bok (refereegranskat)abstract
- While previous scholarship speculated on reconstructions of the life of Amos the prophet, this commentary focuses on the book carrying his name. According to the traditional view, the core of the book of Amos originated in Israel (the Northern Kingfom) around 750 B.CC.E., during a period of peace and prosperity. Opposing this view, the author argues that the first version of this prophetic book was composed several decades later in Judah, and that it served as a reflection on, and a justification of the downfall of the Northern Kingdom in the 720s B.C.E. This hypothesis helps explain why accusations concerning oppression of the poor are followed by proclamations of punishments affecting the entire nation.
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- Eidevall, Göran, 1955-
(författare)
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Amos i kommentarens form
- 2018
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Ingår i: Ordet är dig mycket nära. - Skellefteå : Artos & Norma bokförlag. - 9789177770237 ; , s. 147-157
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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- Eidevall, Göran, 1955-
(författare)
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Bibelns "heliga" krig?
- 2017
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Ingår i: Pilgrim. - Bjärka-Säby. - 1400-0830. ; 24:1, s. 11-17
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Tidskriftsartikel (populärvet., debatt m.m.)
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