The documents behind the Old Testament

Lola has kindly lent me her copy of Who Wrote the Bible?
by Richard E. Friedman. It's a well-told tale of the puzzle of how the early parts of the Bible were pieced together, with helpful context on when, where, why, and by whom. By no means a dry academic tome!

I'm hoping to finish it by Wednesday - you can take a peek by clicking on the image:

Latter-Day Athenian

Here's the article on Machiavelli noted by Mussy:

The Florentine

The man who taught rulers how to rule.

by Claudia Roth Pierpont

Tales in contention: dialogic narration in David

Robert Alter (The David Story) offers an interesting gloss on the contradictory narratives of chapters 16 and 17 of 1 Samuel. In 16, he says, Saul is introduced to David who is young, and musical, and David becomes part of his household, helping keep bad spirits at bay. In 17, David slays Goliath, and Saul asks "Whose son is the lad?"

Here's Alter:

What we need to ask, however, is why the redactor set these two stories in immediate sequence, despite the contradictions that must have been as evident to him as to us. A reasonable conclusion is that for the ancient audience, and for the redactor, these contradictions would have been inconsequential in comparison with the advantage gained in providing a double perspective on David...

In the Bible ... the variants of a single story are sometimes placed in a kind of implicit dialogue* with one another (compare the two accounts of creation at the beginning of Genesis). Here, in the first, vertically oriented story, with its explicit instructions from God to man, David is emphatically elected by God, is assiociated with the spirit and with song, and gains entree in the court of Saul by using song to master the spirit. In the second story, with its horizontal deployment in space, David makes his way into Saul's presence through martial prowess, exhibiting shrewdness, calculation, and rhetorical skill. (fn. 55 p. 110-11)

One might note that neither story is very "historical" in tone - there's the sacred plan of God spelled out in the first, and the folktale nature of David the giant slayer in the second: the stories don't clash merely on the level of "fact" or "events," but also on the level of genre, the kind of story being told. This multiplication of source is of course typical of the book we call the Bible --the "book of books." Also noteworthy is how many paired, doubled tales are told. Think of the deaths of Saul (there are two), the stories of David having Saul in his power (in the cave and in the camp).

As Alter notes, both in the creation stories of Genesis and in the introduction of David, it is the second, horizontal tale that leads to the "history" that follows:

Interestingly it is this folk-tale version of David's debut rather than the theological one that will lead directly into the historical (or at least, historylike) narrative of David's rise and David's reign.

*Alter here seems to be drawing on the work of Mikhail Bakhtin who developed the idea that literary works, indeed language itself, may be inherently "dialogical," a rich and difficult concept that seems closely linked to the unfolding of speech in time. A couple of pointers:

• His theory of dialogism is focused on the idea that culture, or even existence itself, is inherently responsive, involving individuals acting at a particular point in time and space, in reaction to what has gone and before and in expectation of what is to follow. 

• The dialogic work carries on a continual dialogue with other works of literature and other authors. It does not merely answer, correct, silence, or extend a previous work, but informs and is continually informed by the previous work. Dialogic literature is in communication with multiple works. This is not merely a matter of influence, for the dialogue extends in both directions, and the previous work of literature is as altered by the dialogue as the present one is. In this sense, Bakhtin's "dialogic" is analogous to T. S. Eliot's ideas in "Tradition and the Individual Talent," where he holds that "the past should be altered by the present as much as the present is directed by the past." [1]
  

David

David Hebrew: דָּוִד, Standard Dawid Tiberian Dāwîḏ, Arabic: داوود or داود, Dāwūd, "beloved"), was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. He is depicted as a righteous king—although not without fault—as well as an acclaimed warrior, musician and poet (he is traditionally credited with the authorship of many of the Psalms). The biblical chronology places his life c.1037 - 967 BC, his reign over Judah c.1007 - 1000 BC, and over Judah and Israel c.1000 - 967 BC.^[1] An alternative transliteration of the Hebrew name David is Daveed as found in the Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the King James Bible in the Hebrew Lexicon.

More here.

Fall readings and schedule

Just a reminder that the texts for our reading this fall will include Samuel I and II and the beginning of Kings from the Old Testament.


An excellent edition of the entire epic tale is Robert Alter's The David Story: A Translation with Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel.








The text of the Eliot recommended by Paul is the The Waste Land, Norton Critical Edition.

First meeting will be Wed., Sept. 3, 1 - 3 p.m. at the Fruitville.

All meetings WEDNESDAYS 1:00 P.M. to 3:00 P.M.

September 3

September 10

September 24

October 1

October 8

October 22

November 5

November 26

December 3

December 10

December 31

Dead Sea Scroll on Stone

JERUSALEM — A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.
...

Much of the text, a vision of the apocalypse transmitted by the angel Gabriel, draws on the Old Testament, especially the prophets Daniel, Zechariah and Haggai. New York Times.

A different sort of Genesis story

This has nothing directly to do with either the David story, or the roots of Modernism, but as a remarkable effort to represent the current state of our knowledge of human migration, it's "context" nonetheless.

Paradiso I: A new translation

This translation of Paradiso I is from an unpublished work in progress by Peter D'Epiro, author of Sprezzatura: 50 Ways Italian Genius Shaped the World, What are the Seven Wonders of the World?, and most recently The Book of Firsts: 150 World Changing People and Events from Caesar Augustus to the Internet. Many thanks to the author for permission to post it here.

The glory of the One who moves all things
Penetrates through the universe, and shines
In one part more and in another less.
Within the heaven that most receives His light
Was I, and saw such things as who descends
From there has neither wit nor power to tell—
Because, in drawing near to its desire,
Our understanding enters such a depth
That it must leave the memory behind.
Nevertheless, as much of the holy realm                 10
As I could treasure up within my mind
Shall now be made the subject of my song.

O good Apollo, for this final task
Make of me such a vessel of your power
As you require for your beloved laurel.
Up to this point, one summit of Parnassus
Has served me well, but now I need them both,
Entering on the arena that remains.
Come into my breast and, there within me, breathe,
As once, on that occasion when you drew                20
Marsyas from the scabbard of his limbs.
O power divine, but grant me of yourself
So much that I may figure forth the shadow
Of the blest realm imprinted in my mind,
And you shall see me come to your chosen tree
And crown myself beneath it with those leaves
Of which my theme and you will make me worthy.
So seldom, father, are they gathered now
For triumphing of Caesar or of poet—
The fault and bitter shame of human wills—            30
That certainly the Peneian bough begets
New joy within the joyous Delphic god
Whenever it makes any long for it.
A tiny spark gives rise to mighty flames.
Perhaps by my example sweeter voices
Will offer prayer, and Cyrrha may respond.

Through different points the lantern of the world
Rises on mortals, but through that which joins
Four circles with three crosses, it sets forth
Upon a better course and in conjunction                     40
With better stars, tempering the wax of the world
And stamping it more after its own fashion.
Its entrance by a portal near that point
Had made it morning there and evening here—
That hemisphere all bright, the other dark—
When I saw Beatrice turned to her left
And looking at the sun—no eagle ever
Fixed so intent a gaze upon its orb.
And as a second ray will issue from
The first and, by reflection, reascend,                         50
Just like a pilgrim yearning for his home,
So by her action, which my eyes infused
Into my mind, was my own action guided:
Against our wont I gazed upon the sun.
So much is granted to our powers there
That here is not, by virtue of the place,
Made as the proper home of humankind.
I could not bear it long, yet not so briefly
As not to see it sparkling all around,
Like iron that comes molten from the fire--                60
And suddenly it seemed that day to day
Was added, as if He who has the power
Had decked the heavens with a second sun.


Wholly intent upon the eternal wheels
Were Beatrice’s eyes: on her I fixed
My own, when I had lowered them from there.
Gazing on her, I was transformed within,
Like Glaucus when he tasted of the herb
That made him a companion of the sea gods.
Transcendence of humanity cannot                       70
Be told in words; thus let the example stand
For those to whom His grace reserves the experience.

If I was only then that part of me
Which You created last—O Love that rule
The heavens—You know, who raised me with your light.

And when the wheeling that You, being desired,
Render eternal had drawn me to itself
By the harmony You temper and distribute,
So vast a portion of the sky appeared
Enkindled by the flaming sun that never                         80
Did rain or river make so broad a lake.
The newness of the sound and the great light
Aroused in me such keenness of desire
To know their cause as I had never felt.
And she, who saw me as I saw myself,
To set my agitated mind at ease,
Opened her lips before I framed my question,
Saying to me: “You make yourself obtuse
With false surmise, so that you cannot see
What you would see if you had cast it off.                       90
You are not now on earth, as you believe;
For lightning, fleeing from its proper site,
Moves not so fast as you return to yours.”

If I was freed from one perplexity
By the brief words she uttered with a smile,
I yet was more entangled in a new one,
And so I said: “I was content to rest
From one great wonder—now I wonder how
I rise above these lighter substances.”


And she, when she had heaved a sigh of pity      100
And bent her eyes upon me with the look
A mother casts on her delirious child,
Began to say: “All things that are, have order
Among themselves: this order is the form
That makes the universe resemble God.


The higher creatures here behold the trace
Of the Eternal Excellence, which is
The end for which that system was created.
Within this order that I now explain,
All natures are inclined by different lots--                    110
Some to their principle nearer, some less near.
And so it is they move to different ports
On the great sea of being, and each one
Receives the instinct that will bear it on.
This instinct bears the fire toward the moon;
This is the motive force in mortal hearts;
This holds the earth together and makes it one.
And not only do the arrows of this bow
Shoot creatures void of all intelligence,
But those endowed with intellect and love.                   120
The Providence ordaining all these things
Makes ever quiet with Its light the heaven
In which the sphere with the greatest speed revolves.
And to that place, as to a site decreed,
The virtue of that bow-string bears us on,
Which, shooting, always aims at joyful targets.

But truly, as a shape will often not
Accord with the intention of the art
When material is deaf in its response,
The creature too will sometimes leave this course,       130
Because it has the power, thus impelled,
To swerve aside and aim its journey elsewhere.
And just as sometimes fire from a cloud
Falls downward, even so the primal impulse,
Diverted by false pleasure, turns toward earth.
If I can judge correctly in these matters,
You should not wonder at your rising more
Than at a stream that falls from a mountain top.
The wondrous thing would be if, free from hindrance,
You would have settled down below, just as                 140
A fire that is still would be a marvel.”

And then she turned her gaze toward heaven again.

After Purgatory

We have moved off the mountain and for now are found here.

Apokalypse

Given the heavily Apocalyptic burden of the late cantos of the Purgatorio, it is worth noting this amazing set of blockbook illustrations of the Apocalypse from the 15th century. Via AKMA.

Homage from Longfellow

A sonnet on the Purgatorio:

With snow-white veil and garments as of flame,

She stands before thee, who so long ago

Filled thy young heart with passion and the woe

From which thy song and all its splendors came;

And while with stern rebuke she speaks thy name,

The ice about thy heart melts as the snow

On mountain heights, and in swift overflow

Comes gushing from thy lips in sobs of shame.

Thou makest full confession; and a gleam,

As of the dawn on some dark forest cast,

Seems on thy lifted forehead to increase;

Lethe and Eunoë -- the remembered dream

And the forgotten sorrow -- bring at last

That perfect pardon which is perfect peace.

One of six sonnets about The Comedy composed by H.W. Longfellow -- he was translating the entire poem at the time.

Numerical Concinnity

Shaw shares a link to this interesting look at number in the Comedy:

The Divine Comedy and Kabala
Dante Alighieri
1265 - 1321