Biblical Hebrew Forum

["B. M. Rocine" <brocine AT twcny.rr.com>]

>

Dear Liz,

Oh, you're a psychologist!  that explains it all!  ;-)

I think explaining qetseph `al yisra'el as a writer's Freudian slip is
unlikely due to its collocation with Elisha's prophecy, the fortuitous
misinterpretation of the Moabites of the water, and the victories of Israel
in the field.

If we can explain the text within the constraints of a Deuteronomistic
ideolgy, we should.  It is not difficult, after all, to imagine the narrator
having a consistent perspective because of this little verse, is it?

Much simpler than the Freudian interpretation is the "political" explanation
that I offered in my last post.  Again: Israel was simply unwilling to force
tribute from a king for whom paying tribute was so odious as to precipitate
the sacrifice his son and the heir to the throne.  Israel remains noble
rather than paganly money-grubbing.  The Deuteronomist narrator remains
mentally and emotionally whole.  ;-)


Shalom, Bryan

Liz wrote:
 Dear Yigal, et. al.
> I do think the author, the Deuteronomist, believes there are other powers
> out there which act independent of YHWH, as much as he will not rationally
> admit it. (I was a psychologist in my first life.) I do not think it's
> possible to
> remain totally immune from the beliefs of the people around you.
> The scenes with Hezekiah and Sennacherib suggest that the issue of only
> one god in control of the entire world is not completely certain in the
mind
> of the author. I place the Deuteronomist in the period of Zerubbabel, so
> that
> in the scene with Hezekiah it may be that the author is arguing with his
> contempories about this very issue. The proof that YHWH  is in control is
> the restablishment of JErusalem in his own day, and its being saved in
> the days of Hezekiah. I don't think it's a closed issue for him. If it
was,
> he
> would not have need to write the book.
> Liz
> ps. It may be that that author had as much difficulty with this
> as does the modern reader, and so left it oblique.


B. M. Rocine
Living Word Church
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Syracuse, NY 13206

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