Introduction To Narrative }

Introduction To Narrative What is narrative? “Narrative” derives from the Latin narratio, meaning “to relate.” Narrative is therefore a literary form by which a story is related. It is one of several literary forms that is used in the Bible. Taken together, all these forms serve the overriding purpose of the Bible to convey a saving knowledge of God to the reader. Narrative is the most extensively used literary form in the Bible. Approximately 40% of the Old Testament and significant portions of the New Testament (much of the Gospels and Acts) are narrative. In the OT1: Mostly or entirely narrative Genesis Joshua Judges Ruth 1 & 2 Samuel 1 & 2 Kings 1 & 2 Chronicles Ezra memoirs Nehemiah Daniel Jonah Haggai Substantially narrative Exodus Numbers Jeremiah Ezekiel Isaiah Job } Is there a distinction between “narrative” and “story”? The distinction is a technical one that depends on who is making the distinction. For example, one usage claims that narrative conveys a story by means of discourse. “Story refers to the content of the narrative, what it is about. A story consists of such elements as events, characters, and settings, and the interaction of these elements comprises what we call the plot. Discourse refers to the rhetoric of the narrative, how the story is told. Stories concerning the same basic events, characters, and settings can be told in ways that produce very different narratives. The four Gospels provide excellent examples of this.”2 Another set of authors define them as essentially synonymous, but prefer narrative over story because “…story has come to mean something that is fictional as in ‘bedtime story’ or ‘a likely story.’ It also tends to mean a single story with a single set of characters and a single plot….the term narrative is preferred in technical usage since it is a more objective, less prejudicial term.”3 1 2 Fee./Stuart, p. TU= Mark Allan Powell, What Is Narrative Criticism?, (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, NVVM), p. OP= 3 Gordon Fee and Stuart…. W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN N= What other literary forms are used in the Bible? Again, depends on who you listen to and how they define the terms. This division is helpful for the OT: 4 In addition to narrative, they describe: History: “Narrative always involves individual characters whereas history…can easily move in and out between groups and various individuals who are only superficially described.” Law: “Legal portions of the Bible include covenant, law, and ritual legislation.” Oracles of Salvation: “…a word from God that assures the people of the validity of God’s promise and often of his deliverance from crisis. The form contains a word from the içêÇ (oracle), reassurance that God has heard the cries of his people, and an affirmation of Gods’ commitment to his promises. This is often framed in a messenger formula at the beginning (“Thus says the içêÇ”) and a concrete point of fulfillment at the close.” Announcements of Judgment: “Similar to the form of the oracle of salvation, announcements of judgment often begin with a messenger formula (“Thus says the iloa”) but differ in that the contain an accusation followed by an announcement of judgment.” Apocalyptic: “…apocalyptic presents God’s perspective in graphic visions filled with the unexpected and often mysterious scenes of heaven and the future.” 4 Ronald L. Giese, Jr., “Literary Forms of the Old Testament,” in Cracking Old Testament Codes, D. Brent Sandy and Ronald L. Giese, Jr., (Nashville, TN: Broadman and Holman, NVVR), pp. 20–23. W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN O= Lament: “Laments include as part of their form an invocation and plea to God, a complaint, a request or petition, and a statement of confidence in God’s response.” Praise: Most psalms are either psalms of praise (security, orientation) or lament (distress, disorientation). …praise psalms, instead of asking for deliverance, seek to share primarily one emotion or experience, one response to a celebratory event, act of deliverance, or truth.” Proverb: “Proverbs in form are brief, usually timeless pieces of advice which commonly have some literary devices to aid in memory.” Non-Proverbial Wisdom: “In form, non-proverbial wisdom encompasses units longer than singlestatement proverbs such as parables, wisdom poems , and dialogues, as well as shorter units such as riddles.” How does narrative represent the world? God is omniscient. He knows the hidden thoughts and motives of the characters. He knows what takes place in secret inside closed rooms. He interacts with the characters in the real world in order to bring them into a better understanding of Him. Space God The Real World Ch. A Ch. B Ch. C Real Time The “Similicrum” Narrative Time The narrator is also omniscient. He also knows the hidden thoughts and actions of the characters. (Which must mean that the work is either fictional, or as Biblical writers claim, inspired .) He interacts with the reader in order to bring the reader into a better understanding of God. He does this by creating a representation of the real world, the “similicrum,” that is highly selective and stylized. W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN P= What elements convey meaning in the narrative? Fokkelman identifies NO levels of meaning5 ism tic cri e tiv rra na l ica tor s -hi ico ach at ro mm app gra analytical outlines sentence diagramming word studies What is narrative “criticism”? The word “criticism” has acquired a negative connotation in common usage and is generally thought to imply that there is something questionable or outright wrong about the item being criticized. In fact, “criticism” comes from the Greek word krivnein, which means to “distinguish,” “judge,” or “reach a decision.”6 Various methods of biblical “criticism” are therefore ways of approaching the text in order to facilitate discernment about the text and what it is trying to convey. For example, for most of the last century, biblical scholarship in academia has been dominated by so-called “source criticism.” This approach to biblical texts involveds attempting to discern the individual sources used by a “redactor” (i.e., “editor”), who cobbled these together into a final form. Perhaps the most well-known example of this approach is the “documentary hypothesis,” promulgated in the late NVth=century=by German theologians who believed that they could discern four separate sources in the Pentateuch, which they labeled J, E, D, and P.7 An example from New Testament studies is the argument that an unknown document labeled “Q” is the source of the Gospels. In recent years, the validity of this approach to Scripture has come under scrutiny and is regarded much more skeptically than in the past. Rather than trying to dissect a completed text into underlying sources, many scholars are now advocating that the text be accepted as a completed literary composition and evaluated using the techniques of literary analysis. Robert Alter’s book, The Art of Biblical Narrative, is usually credit with making this view popular.8 Scholars are now acknowledging that Biblical texts— 5 J. P. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry in the Books of Samuel (Dover, NH:Van Gorcum, NVUS), vol. II, p. 4. 6 BAGD, p. QRN= 7 J—Jehovist, for the use for “Jehovah” as the name of God, E---Elohimist, reflecting the use of “Elohim” as the name of God, P---Priestly, D---Deuteronomist. 8 For a history of the rise of narrative criticism and a discussion of the importance of Alter’s book, seeTremper Longman ááá, “Literary Approaches and Interpretation,” in A Guide To Old Testament Theology W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN Q= narratives, in particular—are very tightly-crafted literary compositions which often use rather subtle techniques to convey meaning to the reader. Indeed, some argue that understanding the authorship, audience, occasion and historical setting of the composition is of less importance than reading the text with care and sensitivity to the nuances of its literary construction. This view can be expressed in the following diagram, which depicts some concepts central to narrative criticism. The real author is the historical figure who created the written text. The real reader is any historical reader who reads the text, including the original, intended reader and you. Narrative criticism regards the text as a finished, written literary composition. Real Author Text Implied Author Narrator Real Reader Narrative Story Implied Reader Narratee As the real reader interacts with narrative, he reconstructs an implied author of the text. This implied author is different from the real author. For example, “[e]ven though Robert Louis Stevenson wrote both Treasure Island and Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, the implied authors of these two novels are not identical.”9 “When a person reads a story, he or she will inevitably form some impression about that story’s author. The story itself conveys a sense of the author’s values and worldview. For example, anyone who reads John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress or Dante’s Inferno will no doubt conclude that the authors are Christians. Impressions like these define what literary critics refer to as the implied author of a narrative. The goal of such a definition, however, is not to arrive at a partial understanding of what the real author migh have been like, but to elucidate the perspective from which the narrative must be interpreted. The implied author’s point of view can be determined without considering anything extrinsic to the narrative.”10 “The implied author of biblical narrative is a prophet. His omniscience and omnipresence, part from modern demands of documentation, is due to heavenly inspiration.”11 Similarly, a real reader interacting with the narrative will discern that the narrative is aimed at an implied reader. “The implied reader is distinct from any real, historical reader in the same way that the implied author is distinct from the real, historical author. The actual responses of real readers are unpredictable, but there and Exegesis, ed. Willem A. VanGemeren, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, NVVT), pp. NMMÓNON. 9 Powell, p. R= 10 Ibid. 11 Bruce K. Waltke, Humble Rulers: Exposition of 1 & 2 Samuel, course notes, p. NN. W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN R= may be clues within the narrative that indicate an anticipated response from the implied reader….[N]arrative criticism does not interpret works from the perspective of the text’s actual, original audience; it is not necessary to know everything that they knew in order to understand the text aright. The implied reader, however, does know some things that are not stated in the text. For example, the implied reader of the Gospels surely knows that a talent is worth more than a denarius (the text assumes this), although real readers today might not have this knowledge. In other cases, the situation can be reversed. Real readers may find that they do have knowledge (e.g., information from the other Gospels) that the implied reader of a given narrative lacks.”12 According to Waltke, the implied audience of Old Testament narrative is “the universal covenant community that shares the narrator’s evaluative point of view (2 Tim 3:16).”13 The implied author may use a narrator to help guide the reader through the narrative. The narrator provides the voice through which the implied author tells the story. Similarly, the reader may discern that the narrator is telling the story to someone, who narrative critics call the narratee. “In Luke–Acts the story is ostensibly being told to someone named Theophilus…and the implied reader is simply invited to listen in on the telling. In other works, the narratee is not explicitly identified, but the reader still senses that he or she is overhearing a story being told to someone….The narrator and narratee are not identical with the implied author and the implied reader. They are rhetorical devices, created by the implied author. They are part of the narrative itself, part of the discourse through which the 14 story is told.” What other literary devices might the implied author used in constructing the narrative? The techniques used by the author to craft a narrative are referred to as “poetics”—this term is derived from the Greek word, poievw, which means “to do or to make.” It refers to the manner in which the text is “done” or “made”—that is, how the text is put together—rather than specifically to the genre of poetry, as one might initially think. Poetic Techniques: 1. Repetition involves a recurrence of similar or identical elements. Leitwort. Term coined by Martin Buber, who defined it as “a word or word root that is meaningfully repeated with a text or sequence of texts or complex of texts….those who attend to these repetitions will find a meaning of the text revealed or clarified, or at any rate made more emphatic.” 2. Contrast associates or juxtaposes things that are dissimilar or opposite 3. Comparison associates of juxtaposes things that are alike or similar 4. Causation and Substantiation order the narrative though relationships of cause and effect causation: cause-!effect substantiation: effect-!cause 5. Climax represents a movement from lesser to greater intensity 12 Powell, p. NVÓOM= Waltke, p. NO 14 Powell, p. OT= 13 W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN S= 6. Pivot involves a change in the direction of the material, either from positive developments to negative ones, or vice versa. 7. Particularization and Generalization involve movement in the text toward explication that becomes either more specific or more comprehensive 8. Statements of purpose structure the narrative according to a movement from means to ends 9. Preparation refers to the inclusion of material in one part of the narrative that serves primarily to prepare the reader for what is still to come. 10. Summarization offers a synopsis or abridgement of material that is treated more fully elsewhere. 11. Interrogation is the employment of a question of problem followed by its answer or solution. 12. Inclusio refers to a repetition of features at the beginning and end of a unit, as exemplified by the use of antiphons in liturgical poetry (cf. Ps. 8:1,9). Purposes include: a. framing a unit b. stabilizing the material enclosed c. emphasizing by repetition d. establishing the nexus with the intervening material for rhetorical effect 13. Patterns: e.g., Symmetrical: ABCA'B'C'—invites comparison of parallel elements Chiastic: ABCB'A'—emphasizes the central element, which often contains a turning point (pivot) Concentric: ABCC'B'A'—lends coherence (no pivot) 15. Intercalation refers to the insertion of one literary unit in the midst of another. 16. Janus is a literary unit that looks both forward and backward to unit two units. 17. Intertextuality/allusion involves a reference in one passage to another. 18. Irony, in which “the audience shares with the author knowledge of which a character is ignorant.”15 19. Actual time versus literary time Appendix from Powell: Narrative Criticism in Exegesis 15 Richard L. Pratt, Jr., He Gave Us Stories, (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, NVVM), p. OQT. W. Risk=L=dlqk=L=MNJOMMN T=