Biblical Literature

10/24/2006: Tuesday Notes

2006-10-24T17:58:00.000-07:00

The Talmud is basically a form of commentary on the Jewish Religion. It goes greatly in depth and I suggest reading the link I have provided on the topic. There are 2 parts to the Talmud: The Mishnah, which in Hebrew means repetition, and Gemara, which means to complete or to study (according to wikipedia). These terms linked into today's discussion of "The Slave" by Isaac Bashevis Singer. To be quick "The Slave" is a story of two star crossed lovers named Jacob and Wanda who struggle to be together... And it's chalk full of Biblical references because Jacob holds a wealth of knowledge on the Jewish Religion. We referenced pp. 5, pp. 6, pp. 259, pp. 158 (was a pretty important one about Wanda asking questions of theodicy) and pp. 278 (Dr. Sexon said that if he were doing a blog he would blog this page. :)

We are now beginning to study Wisdom literature of the Bible, from the list of Creation, Revolution, Law (which for practically reasons we are sort of skipping over in this course), WISDOM, Prophecy, Gospel and Apocolipse.

Because there are no more originals, because everything that we say or do has been done before it can be said that if you know the stories then you have power over them where as if you do not know the stories then they will have power over you. This is what the Wisdom literature of the Bible is all about. It is a guide to some knowledge of what as already been so that we can know what is or to expect of our actions etc... In theory. This is not only true of the sayings in the Bible but also of any sort of old saying of "fable" that may lead to a story. Take the Hero story. It has components that are the same every time whether we are talking about a Greek mythic hero or a modern day fire fighter who save a little girl.

We listed The Book of Job, Salomon, and Proverbs as examples of Biblical Wisdom literature. There are 2 types of Wisdom literature: simple and complex. They are all common in style, theme and wisdom. Often the speakers of wisdom are ironical characters of there own advice. And those who gain wisdom from their teachers are full of questions. (Dr. Sexson wants to know how many ? Are in Hamlet... I couldn't find it.)

No Jus' Talk!

2006-10-24T17:42:00.000-07:00

ATTENTION

Dr. Sexson says, "Please do NOT use the word 'jus'' in class."

Jus' is a derivative of the adverbial form of the word "just" and according to Merriam Webster online dictionary it means:

Main Entry: 3 just: Pronunciation: 'j&st, 'just, 'jest also without Function: adverb1 a : EXACTLY, PRECISELY b : very recently 2 a : by a very small margin : BARELY b : IMMEDIATELY, DIRECTLY 3 a : ONLY, SIMPLY b : QUITE, VERY 4 : PERHAPS, POSSIBLY - just about : ALMOST

Meaning... that when we use it in this way in class we are minimizing the importance/significance of what we are talking about.

Tuesday: September 26, 2006

2006-09-26T19:16:00.000-07:00

As a literature major, especially in higher up classes, subject matter begins to overlap between classes. I recently made, or at least think that I made, a connection between a story by William Blake and the Bible because of my overlapping classes. The story by Blake is of "Visions of the Daughters of Albion" of VDA. The Blake Archive says, "The characters and their words represent Blake's critique of colonialism, slavery, sexual repression, and attitudes towards women in his day. " to summaries quickly a part of what is happening in this particular story.
A further analysis is that Blake was very interested in characters in which both male and female orientation is obvious in a single body. In VDA it is thought that Albion, the character for which the story is names, is one of Blake's male/female characters. The male part of the character is representative of Albion, or experience, while the female part is represented by Jerusalem, or innocence. In my mind Blake is exceptional at creating intertwining stories that link and blend both mythological and biblical inspirations. Essential the equation that Blake has built for this story is a sort of hierarchy of events beginning with the muses: the muse of epic poetry is the ring leader, Zeus is the father (Albion), and Mnemosyne is the mother. If Zeus represents God and Mnemosyne represents memory then when they are combined we would get the Muses, who represent inspiration of art, or imagination. So Blake through this story Blake made the equation of God + Imagination = The Daughters of Albion. (Here I have gone a bit further into explanation than I needed to...)
Now if we take a quick look at the prophet Hosea we will see a some what similar story. A story in which Yahweh comes to Hosea and tells him to get a wife of harlotry. And so he does this. Hosea, representing Yahweh, and his wife, representing Israel, representing the "fallen women" which is a reflective view of female status during this time period.
The original point I was trying to get at was that if Blake saw Albion married to Jerusalem then I see a parallel between Hosea being married to Israel. For both are marriages representative of place, and both are reflective of

Thursday: September 21, 2006

2006-09-21T17:26:00.000-07:00

At this point in the class it is easy to see how the Bible, as a piece of literature, has influenced the creation of so many various other works of literature. This becomes an especially popular occurrence where there are defined lacunae in the Bible itself. One such example of this that occurred to me was between the Bible, specifically Genesis 34, and the book The Red Tent by Anita Diamant. The Red Tent is a perfect example of the above mentioned biblically influenced literature, turning the brief yet powerful tale of the rape of Dinah from Genesis 34 into over 300 pages of experience.
This book in particular came to my mind after Tuesday's lecture on feminine aspects in the Bible. One Q&A that I found directly related to the text and the Bible was: Q: How is it that the female characters worship gods other than the god of Jacob? A: (Diamant): Bible mentions the presence of "teraphim," which are household idols/gods in the house of Laban. At the time of the story, a whole pantheon of gods and goddesses were worshipped. The notion of monotheism grew out of this context, in which the family god or El (a generic name for "god") of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, co-existed with other gods. From a Jewish/Christian perspective, this is long before Sinai and the Ten Utterances, which command "You shall have no other gods before me." Which is in itself a tantalizing nod to the existence of other dieties.
I enjoy the importance of these sorts of books because I think that by filing out such a lacuana it gives the reader, especially as a reader for "Biblical Foundations of Literature" class, a further experience into Biblical literature by allowing for details of time, place and character that the Bible has some difficulty capacitating. (This and other questions of the sort are addresses at the above link for The Red Tent)

Thursday: August 31, 2006

2006-08-31T18:33:00.000-07:00

Hello. I think I'll start this with a quick disclaimer: This first entry will be short and sweet because I just typed out a whole long (rather witty) little number of a first entry and some how successfully made it disappear... So that's that.
I'm really excited about the reading for this class. Some might think "The whole Bible!". And I must admit that at first I was a little turned off to the idea. But now that we've had a whole two days of classes I'm getting a bit more warmed up. And thanks to Dr. Sexson's fabulous interpretations/abbreviated/explanations of things it looks like this should be a highly entertaining semester.
So far I would have to say that I really like "The Book of J", by Harold Bloom. It's for sure a captivating read. It's really a great compliment to the Bible, and definitely very helpful in the way that things are worded differently. I like being able to look at things from a few different angles. I think that it really creates a much more full understanding.
And for now I'm off to more reading...