Fromme und Frevler. Studien zu Psalmen und Weisheit. Feschchrift für Hermann Spieckermann zum 70. Gerburtstag, eds. Körting und Kratz, 2020
Tübingen. www.mohrsiebeck.com Das Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheberrechtlich ges... more Tübingen. www.mohrsiebeck.com Das Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist ohne Zustimmung des Verlags unzulässig und stra ar. Das gilt insbesondere für die Verbreitung, Vervielfältigung, Übersetzung und die Einspeicherung und Verarbeitung in elektronischen Systemen. Das Buch wurde von epline in Böblingen aus der Times New Roman gesetzt, von Gulde Druck in Tübingen auf alterungsbeständiges Werkdruckpapier gedruckt und von der Buchbinderei Spinner in Ottersweier gebunden.
Proverbs vii is undergirded by a complex pedagogical process. The teacher uses the Strange Woman ... more Proverbs vii is undergirded by a complex pedagogical process. The teacher uses the Strange Woman as a pedagogical vehicle and surrounds her figure with erotic language and themes. Thus reality is construed indeterminately. By attaining the skills to deconstruct the Strange Woman's speech, the student may perceive the shadow-side of her invitation. This process thereby serves to prepare the student to adapt to more complex obstacles along the path to wisdom. 4Q184 displays a significantly different approach to achieving a similar pedagogical goal. While utilizing both the language and themes of Proverbs vii, the ambiguities surrounding the Strange Woman are objectified and regularized. In this way, the description of this figure comports with the dualistic view of reality which the teacher at Qumran seeks to impress upon the young. Thus the pedagogy of 4Q184 minimizes the student's ability to adapt to indeterminate obstacles on the way to wisdom.
ECCLESIASTES 8:1-9 has long posed interpretive problems. William A. Irwin remarked on the views o... more ECCLESIASTES 8:1-9 has long posed interpretive problems. William A. Irwin remarked on the views of his contemporaries in 1945, "By common consent we have here a series of more or less disconnected comments, perhaps in some way gathered about the general theme of monarchs and despots." 1 This fragmenting interpretive tendency, undoubtedly facilitated by a text that is among the most difficult in the book, is not merely a thing of the past. Several scholars have more recently expressed doubts about the coherence of the passage, interpreting it as a dialectic between traditional wisdom and contrary, relativizing statements. 2 In addition to these assumptions regarding the role of traditional material, problems in delimiting the scope of the passage and radically different translations of A version of this essay was presented under the title "Visionaries, Kings, and the Rhetoric of Retribution in Ecclesiastes 8:1-9" at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in Atlanta, Georgia, in November 2003.1 am grateful for the insights and conversation at that venue and also especially for the comments and criticisms of C. L. Seow. All of the essay's shortcomings are my own. 1 William A. Irwin, "Ecclesiastes 8:2-9," JNES4 (1945) 130-31, here 130. 2 Diethelm Michel ("Qohelet Probleme: Überlegungen zu Qoh 8,2-9 und 7,11-14," Theologia Viatorum 15 [1979-80] 81-103, esp. 87-92) believes that 8:2-5 is a quotation of traditional wisdom that is critiqued in w. 6-9. He is followed by Pane Beentjes, "'Who Is Like the Wise?': Some Notes on Qohelet 8, 1-15," in Qohelet in the Context of Wisdom (ed. Anton Schoors; BETL 136; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1998) 303-15, here 306. Roland E. Murphy {Ecclesiastes [WBC 23A; Dallas: Word, 1992] 82) sees w. 2-4 as modifying v. 1, w. 6-12a as modifying v. 5, and vv. 14-15 opposing vv. 12b-13. Norbert Lohfink (Kohelet [NEchtB; 4th ed.; Würzburg: Echter Verlag, 1993] 60) also proposes the final two pairs of opposition. Evidence of this tendency is found also in the most recent full-scale commentary on Ecclesiastes by Ludger Schwienhorst-211 212 THE CATHOLIC BIBLICAL QUARTERLY | 68,2006
Qohelet draws upon the metaphors of a mercantile economy in order to assign values to human life.... more Qohelet draws upon the metaphors of a mercantile economy in order to assign values to human life. The primary context in which he calculates these values is time-under-the-sun. In the economy of time-under-the-sun, there are both absolute and relative credits. On the one hand, the inevitable onset of death reduces all credits or debits to zero. Yet on the other hand, Qohelet claims that the enjoyment of one's profits during one's lifetime is a relative credit. The sage, however, also perceives another sort of reckoning which reaches beyond his empirical observation. He speaks of a matrix outside of the rule of the sun, which he calls .עולם In this space beyond time God has ordained a judgment in which the pious will profit and the impious will suffer loss. The onset of a new order beyond the sun raises the possibility that zero might not be the final answer after all.
Martin Luther’s comments in a section of Table Talk continue to be used as evidence that he denie... more Martin Luther’s comments in a section of Table Talk continue to be used as evidence that he denied the Solomonic authorship of Ecclesiastes. A comparison of the passage with Luther’s “Preface” to Jesus Sirach demonstrates that the majority of Luther’s comments in that section of Table Talk pertain to Sirach. However, the passage also has clear parallels in Luther’s “Preface to Solomon’s ‘The Preacher,’” suggesting that it is a mixture of Luther’s comments on Ecclesiastes and Sirach. The portions of Table Talk which do pertain to Ecclesiastes have commonly been misinterpreted. Luther does not deny that Solomon was the author of Ecclesiastes; he denies that Solomon was the scribe. He thought that Ecclesiastes was written down by students on the basis of the oral teachings of their master, much like his own Table Talk.
This article offers an interpretation of Job 28 in terms of modern theological discourse, with a ... more This article offers an interpretation of Job 28 in terms of modern theological discourse, with a focus on epistemology. The poem sets two ancient models of wisdom and knowledge in opposition: wisdom through individual exploration and wisdom through revelation. The first model finds its contemporary analogue in the Cartesian quest by a rational mind to possess objective knowledge. The second model, which the poem commends as its solution, is analogous to Michael Polanyi's articulation of personal knowledge as submission to and embodiment of the superior knowledge of another.
Corporeal metaphors are central to the theology of the book of Job, especially in relation to the... more Corporeal metaphors are central to the theology of the book of Job, especially in relation to the themes of divine power and human dignity. Job's body is the testing ground of the śāṭ ān's hypothesis about Job's self-interested piety and the compass point from which Job narrates his place in the world. Job's experience leads him to describe his body as disintegrated and dishonored. He imagines God as a warrior who brutalizes him with an outstretched arm, a powerful hand, and a sharp eye. The divine speeches, however, offer Job a new orientation to his body and the cosmos through the bodies of animals. While the powerful beasts and monsters that populate God's creation are reined in and kept in their proper places, God also cares for them and celebrates them as glorious and proud. This is a universe in which the wild and chaotic are restrained without being shamed. In light of this vision, Job recants his earlier view about the insignificance and shame of his body and confesses that God governs the world according to an order that is quite different from the one he had imagined.
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4Q184 displays a significantly different approach to achieving a similar pedagogical goal. While utilizing both the language and themes of Proverbs vii, the ambiguities surrounding the Strange Woman are objectified and regularized. In this way, the description of this figure comports with the dualistic view of reality which the teacher at Qumran seeks to impress upon the young. Thus the pedagogy of 4Q184 minimizes the student's ability to adapt to indeterminate obstacles on the way to wisdom.
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