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The Bible as Rhetoric: Studies in Biblical Persuasion and Credibility

(review)

Mary Anne O'Neil

Philosophy and Literature, Volume 15, Number 1, April 1991, pp. 152-153

(Article)

Published by The Johns Hopkins University Press

DOI: 10.1353/phl.1991.0069

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152Philosophy and Literature

reception ofDiderot's dialogue brings out a significance that could not havebeen intended by Diderot, Jauss treats this not as an error, but as an unfoldingofthe latent meaning ofthe workthrough history. Noting that Hegel's readingnevertheless seems to reduce Diderot's philosopher to a moment in a dialecticthat transcends and subsumes him, Jauss closes his essay with a question: doesthe dialectic necessarily close offa continuing dialogue, orcould it "allow newtruth to arise from a polyphony ofvoices without garnering for the voice ofthe otherthe unhappy fate that awaits Diderot's philosopherin Hegel's inter-pretation" (p. 147)?

Like Bakhtin's, Jauss's commitment to dialogue is based on respect for thevoice of the Other. His book is full of references to fellow scholars, in whose

workhe almost invariably finds something valuable; it is refreshingly free ofpolemics. Forall its imposing erudition, Jauss's discourse remains open, weavingtogethera chorus ofvoices, and always questioning.

University ofOregonSteven Rendall

The Bible as Rhetoric: Studies in Biblical Persuasion and

Credibility, edited by Martin Warner; ? Sc 236 pp. London:Roudedge, 1990, $55.00.

For the general topic of this eighth volume of the Warwick Studies in Phi-losophy and Literature, Warner has proposed "the ways in which persuasive(and related literary) procedures ofthe biblical writers cut across or reinforce

their concern with truth" (p. 5). British and American scholars of religiousstudies, literature, and philosophy have responded in eleven essays that considersubjects as varied asbiblical language, symbolism, structure, and the classificationofbiblical texts as historical orimaginative writings. Moreover, to elucidate therhetorical techniques ofthe Bible, these essays adopt diverse critical perspectives:structuralist, deconstructive, feminist, intertextual, and reader response.

The initial and final essays suggest strategies that allow us to experience theBible as both sacred truth and literary text. Lynn Poland's excellent "The Bibleand the Rhetorical Sublime" argues that the post-Romantic preference forsymbolism overallegory has robbed the Bible ofits affective power, while CyrilBarrett's "The Language of Ecstasy and the Ecstasy of Language" proposesthe reading of mystical or prophetic texts as poetic metaphor, a languageembodying truth, but not truth that is empirically verifiable. Three unrelated

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Reviews153

articles challenge traditional interpretations ofthe Old Testament and Apoc-rypha. ForJohn Barton, the enduring powerofthe prophets results not fromtheiranalyses ofthe moral decline of theirnation, but rather from theirskillin assimilating "the shortcomings of Israel and Judah to models which weregenerally held, in the ancient world, to cause divine displeasure" (p. 63). DavidClines demonstrates that the Book ofJob gives no answers to the problems ofsuffering and moral retribution. In fact, the prologue and epilogue, as well asthe protagonist's singularity, contradict the text's purported meaning. MargaritaStocker considers the Book ofJudith another unstable text which anxiously

portrays its heroine as both masculine and feminine, selfand other.Part Two gains coherence by concentrating on the Gospels, Epistles, and the

issues of their claims to truth. Both Stewart Sutherland and Roger Trigg re-

affirm the importance ofhistorical truth to any reading ofthe New Testament,with Trigg suggesting that we apply the criteria of law rather than those ofscience to our assessment of the evangelists' presentation of history. Warneraligns himselfwith them in his study of persuasion in the Fourth Gospel byclaiming that "the whole persuasive strategy ofthe Gospel depends on its beingsubjected to rational controls at the levels ofnarrativejudgment and sign" (p.177). David Jasperand George Kennedy present the opposing view. ForJasper,the authoritative proclamations ofMarkare a response to the early Christians'desire to "entextualize" themselves, that is to assert theiridentity and communal

interdependence by means ofa written text. Kennedy convincingly argues thatPaul's proofs ofChrist's divinity rely on interpretation and emotion ratherthanfact. They are "rhetoric," not "history." Finally, Michael Edward's insightful,almost lyrical, treatment of the Gospel ofJohn tries to close the gap in thisdebate by considering the fourth evangelist as both historian and literary geniuswho retells actual events but places them in a narrative framework that revealsdivine providence as the guiding force ofhuman history.

The essays are preceded by a useful introduction in which Warnersituatesand evaluates each essay in terms ofcurrent critical debates. He and the other

essayists are well aware that, while the insistence upon the literary qualities ofthe Bible initiated by such works as Frye's The Great Code and Alter's andKermode's The Literary Guide to the Bible has enriched ouraesthetic sensibilities,it has also threatened the Bible's unique place in Western thought. These authorsremind us that it is possible to read the Bible as both literature and philosophy.As rhetorical critics, that is, critics interested in the way language embodies thetruth as well as persuades us ofthe truth, they have opened up new avenuesto our understanding of the Old and New Testaments. Warner's volume iscertainly an important contribution to literary criticism ofthe Bible.

WhitmanCollegeMary Anne O'Neil