Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

George:

Here in the West we have a tradition that allows us to write even whole
books in the first person where either we pretend to be a fictional
character (Robinson Crusoe) or a historical character (I Claudius) and
people recognize that it is fiction. It is not considered lying because our
literary tradition allows us to recognize that it is no different than a
parable, albeit an extended one.

The question is, did Biblical Hebrew have such a tradition, and if so, how
would we recognize it? The short parables found in the Bible have clear
contextual clues that tell us readers that here we deal with parable. What
contextual clues would indicate that Qohelet is such a parable?

It is recognized that ancient kings often went by several names, and Qohelet
could very well have been one of the names Solomon was known by. Therefore,
the use of Qohelet for the author’s name does not rule out Solomon.

Basically, what it comes down to, if there is not a tradition that allows
for a first person fiction in ancient Hebrew literary tradition, then for
someone to write as a first person when he wasn’t that person nor did he
leave any other clues that it is fiction, then he is pretending to be that
other person, i.e. a liar.

I know of no such literary tradition in Biblical Hebrew. The text indicates
that it was written by the son of David, a king in Israel, who lived during
a peaceful time when there was great wealth. Either it was written by
Solomon during the tenth century BC or a pretender. A pretender, by
definition, is a liar.

On other but related issues: Daniel 4 is a statement by King Nebuchadnezzar
which, by accident of preservation, was preserved only in the Bible. And
chapters 7 through 12 were written by Daniel: either that or written after
73 AD as it describes the Jewish revolt of 66 AD. You don’t have other
examples to back up your claims re. Qohelet.

Karl W. Randolph.

On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 4:19 AM, George Athas 
<George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>wrote:

> Ron,
>
> I feel you're making another assumption here, namely that if an author is
> taking on the persona of someone else in writing that they must be 'lying'.
> In our world today, we call it 'fiction', not 'lies', and we often consider
> such literature to be among the classics (e.g., 'I, Claudius' by Robert
> Graves, or 'Robinson Crusoe' by Daniel Defoe). There is a difference between
> fiction and lies. Some fiction is lying, while most fiction is simply
> creative writing/expression. Would you call all fiction 'lies'? Jesus told
> fictional tales; would you classify them as 'lies'? If you resort to 'taking
> things at face value', then I'd argue you need to read literature with a bit
> more vigour and rigour, and in fact probably don't use that standard for
> most fictional literature. And, in fact, it would be easy to argue that
> fiction is often the vehicle of truth - in fact, most Christians would argue
> that for Jesus' parables. Literature is not legislation. It is creative
> expression, and author
>  s usually employ their creativity to get their point across. To put it in
> a very crude manner, we often tell 'lies' in order to express the truth
> (can't remember who originally said that).
>
> Your question about whether there is any other biblical literature that
> employs this type of technique reveals another assumption: that you require
> more than one example of it to exist within a confined corpus before you
> believe it might be possible. But what if there is only one example of it in
> the corpus? You are demanding the evidence take a particular shape before
> accepting it as evidence. This, I fear, is not sound methodology, even
> though I understand the sentiment behind it. I realise there is safety in
> numbers, but what are we to do if there is only one example of what you're
> talking about? Something can be legitimately unique.
>
> But, to answer your question, I think there is more than example of
> fictional first-person narrative in the biblical corpus: Daniel 4, and 7-12.
> But that may open another can of worms which I don't wish to open. I fear
> you may also disagree with me on that one, leaving us back at square one.
>
>
> Regards,
>
> GEORGE ATHAS
> Moore Theological College (Sydney, Australia)
> www.moore.edu.au
>