Fable and Fact: Judging the Language of Scripture (Judges 9:8-15) from Antiquity to Modernity

Jon Whitman*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

In the movement of scriptural interpretation from antiquity to the modern period, critical attention in the Christian world recurrently turns to a provocative passage in the book of Judges. The passage (Judg 9:8-15) is a story about talking trees, a tale that is repeatedly called a fable (fabula) by Christian interpreters. In seeking from varying perspectives to explain the role of a fabulous dialogue in the discourse of truth, such interpreters suggest pressing issues in the assessment of figurative language. These issues include the controversial concept of the literal sense of Scripture; its potential relation to a literary sense of the text; the broader relation between scriptural and literary texts in general; and finally the complex interplay between factual and fabulous modes of expression. In this expansive movement a decisive turning point is the late-medieval period. During this period commentary on the fundamental test case in Judges displays revealing changes in critical orientation. To assess those changes, it is important to investigate a broad range of interacting developments in exegesis, semiotics, homiletics, rhetoric, and poetic theory. The implications of this formative activity eventually extend far beyond the Middle Ages to the modern period. In the end, what is involved in the historic encounter with the passage in Judges is far more than the interpretation of a story. It is the intricate intersection of fable and fact in the changing poetics of Scripture itself- A nd beyond Scripture, in the intriguing poetics of imaginative language at large.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)149-185
Number of pages37
JournalHarvard Theological Review
Volume113
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Apr 2020

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 President and Fellows of Harvard College.

Keywords

  • critical theory
  • fable
  • imaginative language
  • literal sense
  • poetics
  • scriptural interpretation

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