Copyright holder: Tyndale University, 3377 Bayview Ave., Toronto, Ontario, Canada M2M 3S4 Att.: Library Director, J. William Horsey Library Copyright: This Work has been made available by the authority of the copyright owner solely for the purpose of private study and research and may not be copied or reproduced except as permitted by the copyright laws of Canada without the written authority from the copyright owner. Copyright license: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License Citation: ***** Begin Content ****** TYNDALE UNIVERSITY 3377 Bayview Avenue Toronto, ON M2M 3S4 TEL: 416.226.6620 www.tyndale.ca Note: This Work has been made available by the authority of the copyright owner solely for the purpose of private study and research and may not be copied or reproduced except as permitted by the copyright laws of Canada without the written authority from the copyright owner. Leung Lai, Barbara M. Through the 'I'-Window: The Inner Life of Characters in the Hebrew Bible. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. [ Citation Page ] Through the 'I'-Window The Inner Life of Characters in the Hebrew Bible Barbara M. Leung Lai Sheffield Phoenix Press 2011 [ Title Page ] Copyright © 2011 Sheffield Phoenix Press Published by Sheffield Phoenix Press Department of Biblical Studies, University of Sheffield 45 Victoria Street, Sheffield S3 7QB www.sheffieldphoenix.com All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in am/ form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without the publishers' permission in writing. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Typeset by Forthcoming Publications Printed by Lightning Source ISBN 978-1-907534-20-1 ISSN 1747-9614 [ Title Page Verso ] Contents Preface .... ix Abbreviations .... xi Introduction .... xiii Chapter 1 Characterization and Internal Profile .... 1 1. Character Studies of the Old Testament: A Critical Review .... 1 2. A Psychological Approach to Hebrew Personalities and Biblical Religious Experience .... 7 3. Toward an Advancement of a Psychological Approach to Character Studies: What a Text-Anchored and Reader-Oriented Approach Can Offer .... 11 Chapter 2 Methodological Considerations .... 13 1. Toward an Integrated Methodology of Internal Profiling .... 14 2. Interpretive Tools .... 26 3. Concluding Remarks: Toward a Theoretical Basis .... 42 Chapter 3 Daniel: Aspirant Sage or Dysfunctional Seer? .... 43 1. Reading Strategy .... 43 2. The World behind the Text .... 46 3. The Public Daniel (Chapters 1-6) .... 51 4. The Private Daniel (Chapters 7-12) .... 65 5. From Reader’s Emotive Experiencing to the Danielic Internal Profile .... 75 Chapter 4 Uncovering the Isaian Personality: Wishful Thinking or Viable Task? .... 78 1. Reading Strategy .... 78 2. The Fifteen 'I'-Passages: A Textual-Psychological Reading .... 88 3. Toward an Isaian Internal Profile .... 152 [ Page vii ] [ Page ] viii Chapter 5 The Hebrew God: Hearing God’s Bitter Cries .... 154 1. Reading Strategy .... 155 2. Reading the Divine 'I'-Texts .... 157 3. Toward an Internal Profile of the Hebrew God .... 166 Conclusion .... 168 Bibliography .... 171 Index of References .... 183 Index of Authors .... 191 Introduction Through the 'I’-Window: The Inner Life of Characters in the Hebrew Bible—the title indicates the nature (uncovering), the scope (internal profiling), and the unexplored domain (the inner lives of Isaiah, Daniel and to a certain extent, the Hebrew God) of this endeavour. Five factors shape the interpretive interest of this undertaking. First, the post-modern notion of the ‘self and the prominence of emotion studies in the past decade incite an impetus to look into the interiority of the Hebrew characters explored in the book. Second, the long-standing claim that individuality/selfhood does not even exist among personalities in the Old Testament creates a certain discontent.1 Notwithstanding the idea of cor- porate personality in the Hebrew mentality as best demonstrated within the book of Psalms, the emotive dimension of each individual psalmist is often explosively laid raw in front of the readers (e.g. Pss. 44; 73). Third, this research interest exemplifies a biblical scholar’s passage from moder- nity to post-modernity. Internal profile and its peripheral topics (e.g., self, emotion, interiority, voice, and their interconnectedness)—which have been dormant in my modern mind and repressed in my reader perspec- tive—are now placed in the foreground of exploration.2 Fourth, as a reader of the Russian literary theorist Mikhail M. Bakhtin, approaching the first- person texts included in this study from a Bakhtinian perspective has 1. Cf. Philip R. Davies, first Persons: Essays in Biblical Autobiography (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), pp. 13-14. See also, John J. Pilch, Introducing the Cultural Context of the Old Testament (New York: Paulist Press, 1991), esp. pp. 95-116. Pilch presents a renewed angle of perception between individuality and corporate personality. The Hebrew culture values group-centric identity and corporate solidarity (pp. 97-98). Using Ps. 22, an individual psalm of lament as an illustration, Pilch points out that from beginning to end, the psalmist ‘echoes group orientation’. Apparently, Pitch seeks to distinguish between ‘individualism’ (as group-centric dynamics) and ‘individuality’ (the ‘person’ perceived as an entity). He further concludes that ‘while individualism is totally lacking in the Bible, there definitely is no lack of individuality’ (p. 114). 2. According to Francis L.K. Hsu, the autonomy of the self is not recognized in traditional Chinese culture. The Chinese ‘self can be described as interdependent and sociocentric (or situation-centered). Cf. Hsu, ‘The Self in Cross-cultural Perspective’, in A.J. Marsella, G.A. DeVos, and F.L.K. Hsu (eds.), Culture and Self: Asian and Western Perspectives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 24-55. [ Page xiii] [ Page ] xiv yielded some promising results,3 particularly along the trajectory of the Bakhtinian view on polyphony and dialogism. This realization has called for some conceptual and methodological reorientation for an original study of this nature. Incorporating the Bakhtinian perspectives is thus an encouraging step to expand the horizon of reading, pushing explorations further beyond the more traditional terrains. Fifth, as the title of the book indicates, the ‘uncovering’ in this endeavour together with the uniqueness of the subject (internal profile) demand a multi-disciplinary and integra- tive approach and a carefully hammered out methodology.4 This ‘multi- integrative’ necessity becomes a vibrant and invigorating force, thus a highly motivated engagement. Employing a psychological lens among other interdisciplinary interpre- tive tools, this book is an endeavour to uncover the internal profile of three Hebrew personalities: the sage Daniel, the prophet Isaiah, and the Hebrew God as presented in three prophetic texts (Isa. 5.1-8; Jer. 8.18-9.2 [8.19-9.3]; Hos. 11.1-9). Although Philip R. Davies maintains that dimensions of the inner life of the characters (such as feelings, conflicting emotions, hopes and regrets) are virtually absent in the Hebrew Bible,5 dimensions of the Danielic and Isaian ‘inner depths’ (and to a certain extent, the Hebrew God) can be detected. Using the 'I'-window (places where the character speaks in the first-person singular voice) as a ‘port of entry’, this study deals with the selected first-person texts of the Old Testament.6 It focuses on the apocalyptic portion of Daniel (chs. 7-12); the fifteen identifiable 'I'- passages in Isaiah (5.1-30; 6.1-13; 8.1-18; 15.1-16.14; 21.1-12; 22.1-15; 24.1- 23; 25.1-12; 26.1-21; 40.1-8; 49.1-6; 50.4-9; 51.17-23; 61.1-11; 63.7-19), and the 'I' voice of the Hebrew God as represented in Isa. 5.1-7, Jer. 8.18-9.2 [8.19- 9.3], and Hos. 11.1-9. This port of entry is an unexplored dimension of the angles of approach that have already been discussed to this point. Oriented in the empirics of a text-centered and reader-oriented inter- pretive model, this book undertakes a three-world approach (that is, the world behind the text, the world of the text and the world in front of the text) to psychological biblical studies. With an array of tailor-made, 3. Cf. Barbara M. Leung Lai, ‘What Would Bakhtin Say about Isaiah 21: 1-12? A Re-Reading’, OTE 23.1 (2010), pp. 103-16. 4. The selected first-person texts in this study represent a variety of biblical genres (narrative, poetry, prophetic writings, and apocalyptic literature) and subgenres (first- person call/vision report, prayer, monologue/imaginary dialogue, third person projec- tion of first person views, etc.). Treating the biblical materials collectively towards the portraiture of the internal profile of each personality demands a set of methodology that is intentionally tailor-made. 5. First Persons, pp. 13-14. 6. This, I believe, is an area of oversight for character studies in the recent past. [ Page ] xv perspectival reading tools (i.e. ‘points of entry’), it examines the interplay of self/dialogical-self and emotion, voice/polyphony and interiority, auto- biography and personhood, and language of religious faith (prayers, laments, praises) and internal profile. In advancing the field of psychologi- cal biblical studies, the primary purpose of the book is to demonstrate an interfaced model7 of psychological exegesis on the internal profile of the three personalities. Each in its own ways is still an uncharted terrain of Old Testament studies. Both psychology and biblical studies are systems of interpretation.8 With a text-anchored approach to the selected first-person texts, the ‘empirics’ of reading9 (emotive experiencing) is the backbone of this study. My point of departure is neither a school of psychology nor any pre-adopted psychological theories. The subject matter (internal profile) as well as its peripheral topics (self, emotions, interiority, speaking voices, etc.), together with specific biblical genres represented in the selected texts (e.g. Apocalyptic, Hebrew poetry, first-person call/vision report, lament and other language of religious faith, and the more sophisticated third-person projection of first-person view, etc.) entail attention to the ‘empirics’ of the reading process. Thus an elevated level of reader engagement and experience is anticipated. At the interface of these three perspectives— biblical, psychological, and experiential—the anticipated outcome is that a rich Danielic and Isaian internal profile, as well as dimensions of the interiority of the Hebrew God, may emerge. 7. According to J. Harold Ellens, the relationship between psychology and the Bible is less a matter of integration and more a matter of interface that affords mutual illumination (see Ellens, ‘The Bible and Psychology: An Interdisciplinary Pilgrimage’, Pastoral Psychology 45 [1997], pp. 193-208 [193]). 8. To Andrew D. Kille, psychology is itself a hermeneutic system, seeking models for understanding human behaviour (‘Psychology and the Bible: Three Worlds of the Text’, Pastoral Psychology 51 [2002], pp. 125-34 [127]). 9. I borrow this term and concept from Schulyer Brown, Text and Psyche: Experiencing Scripture Today (New York: Continuum, 1998). The ‘empirics’ of reading refers to the experiential dimension of reading as an event. ***** This is the end of the e-text. This e-text was brought to you by Tyndale University, J. William Horsey Library - Tyndale Digital Collections *****