Childbirth as a Metaphor for Crisis

Childbirth as a Metaphor for Crisis
Author: Claudia D. Bergmann
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2009-03-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 3110209810

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Crises and catastrophes of all kinds have always confronted humans with great challenges. The present study examines the question of how literary texts process and deal with these challenges through the imaginary world of metaphors. It concentrates on the metaphor of childbirth, which compares people racked with crisis to women in labour (and sometimes vice versa). The texts examined are taken from the Ancient Orient and the Old Testament, together with a text exemplar from the Qumran corpus, which takes up the metaphor of childbirth and develops it further.

The Womb and the Simile of the Woman in Labor in the Hebrew Bible

The Womb and the Simile of the Woman in Labor in the Hebrew Bible
Author: Karen Langton
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 178
Release: 2024-10-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040149685

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This book explores figurative images of the womb and the simile of a woman in labor from the Hebrew Bible, problematizing previous interpretations that present these as disparate images and showing how their interconnectivity embodies relationship with YHWH. In the Hebrew Bible, images of the womb and the pregnant body in labor do not co-occur despite being grounded in an image of a whole pregnant female body; the pregnant body is instead fragmented into these two constituent parts, and scholars have continued to interpret these images separately with no discussion of their interconnectivity. In this book, Langton explores the relationship between these images, inviting readers into a wider conversation on how the pregnant body functions as a means to an end, a place to access and seek a relationship with YHWH. Readers are challenged and asked to rethink how these images have been interpreted within feminist scholarship, with womb imagery depicting YHWH’s care for creation or performing the acts of a midwife, and the pregnant body in labor as a depiction of crisis. Langton explores select texts depicting these images, focusing on the corporeal experience and discussing direct references and allusions to the physicality of a pregnant body within these texts. This approach uncovers ancient and current androcentric ideology which dictates that conception, gestation, and birth must be controlled not by the female body, but by YHWH. The Womb and the Simile of the Woman in Labor in the Hebrew Bible is of interest to students and scholars working on the Hebrew Bible, gender in the Bible and the Near East more broadly, and feminist biblical criticism.

Children in Ancient Israel

Children in Ancient Israel
Author: Shawn W. Flynn
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 235
Release: 2018-08-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0191087017

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Flynn contributes to the emerging field of childhood studies in the Hebrew Bible by isolating stages of a child's life, and through a comparative perspective, studies the place of children in the domestic cult and their relationship to the deity in that cult. The study gathers data relevant to different stages of a child's life from a plethora of Mesopotamian materials (prayers, myths, medical texts, rituals), and uses that data as an interpretive lens for Israelite texts about children at similar stages such as: pre-born children, the birth stage, breast feeding, adoption, slavery, children's death and burial rituals, childhood delinquency. This analysis presses the questions of value and violence, the importance of the domestic cult for expressing the child's value beyond economic value, and how children were valued in cultures with high infant mortality rates. From the earliest stages to the moments when children die, and to the children's responsibilities in the domestic cult later in life, this study demonstrates that a child is uniquely wrapped up in the domestic cult, and in particular, is connected with the deity. The domestic-cultic value of children forms the much broader understanding of children in the ancient world, through which other more problematic representations can be tested. Throughout the study, it becomes apparent that children's value in the domestic cult is an intentional catalyst for the social promotion of YHWHism.

Bodies, Embodiment, and Theology of the Hebrew Bible

Bodies, Embodiment, and Theology of the Hebrew Bible
Author: S. Tamar Kamionkowski
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2010-05-20
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 056754799X

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Recognizing that human experience is very much influenced by inhabiting bodies, the past decade has seen a surge in studies about representation of bodies in religious experience and human imaginations regarding the Divine. The understanding of embodiment as central to human experience has made a big impact within religious studies particularly in contemporary Christian theology, feminist, cultural and ideological criticism and anthropological approaches to the Hebrew Bible. Within the sub-field of theology of the Hebrew Bible, the conversation is still dominated by assumptions that the God of the Hebrew Bible does not have a body and that embodiment of the divine is a new concept introduced outside of the Hebrew Bible. To a great extent, the insights regarding how body discourse can communicate information have not yet been incorporated into theological studies.

Poetry and Language

Poetry and Language
Author: Michael Ferber
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2019-09-05
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1108429122

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An accessible introduction to poetry's unusual uses of language that tackles a wide range of poetic features from a linguistic point of view. Equally appealing to the non-expert and more experienced student of linguistics, this book delivers an engaging and often witty summary of how we define what poetry is.

The Gift of Thorns

The Gift of Thorns
Author: A. J. Swoboda
Publisher: Zondervan
Total Pages: 255
Release: 2024-02-20
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0310153298

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Today's follower of Jesus exists at a moment in history when our desires, longings, and wants are being weaponized against us by cultural, spiritual, and relational forces. "Follow your heart" and "You do you" has become our moment's mantras. The result, for too many, is feeling torn asunder by the raging desires within. What do we do with our desire? What about our unwanted desires? And how do we cultivate desires which bring life and freedom and lead to Christ? The Gift of Thorns, by A. J. Swoboda, addresses these questions and more. The path forward is anything but easy. It is assumed by too many in the Christian community that desire is in and of itself bad or dangerous and must be crucified for simply existing. Desire is demonic for some. But, for many others--particularly in the secular West--desire must be followed through and through. This side deifies desire. But these two options sidestep the joy in the great challenge of finding God in our desire. There exists an ancient and sacred way that is forged around the life, wisdom, and power of Jesus and his Spirit. In short, what makes a follower of Christ is not whether or not we have desires. Rather, it is what we do with the desires we have. Near the end of the story of humanity's rebellion, the theme of "thorns" is introduced. As readers will discover, the thematic repetition of "thorns" pops up over and over throughout the Bible. What are the thorns for? They will be, in the words of God, "for you" (Gen. 3:18). The premise of this book is that a world where we do not get all that we want is, well, the greatest gift ever.

Message and Composition of the Book of Isaiah

Message and Composition of the Book of Isaiah
Author: Antti Laato
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2022-01-19
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 3110761815

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The study deals with the theological message and composition of the Book of Isaiah and promotes a thesis that an early Jewish reception history helps us to find perspectives to understand them. This study treats the following themes among others: 1 Hezekiah as Immanuel was an important theme in the reception as can be seen in Chronicles and Ben Sira as well as in rabbinical writings. The central event which makes Hezekiah such an important figure, was the annihilation of the Assyrian army as recounted in Isaiah 36-37. 2 The Book of Isaiah was interpreted in apocalyptic milieu as the Animal Apocalypse and Daniel show. Even though the Qumran writings do not provide any coherent way to interpret Isaianic passages its textual evidence shows how the community has found from the Book of Isaiah different concepts to characterize the division of the Jewish community to the righteous and sinful ones (cf. Isa 65-66). 3 Ezra and Nehemiah received inspiration from the theological themes of Isaianic texts of Levitical singers which were later edited in the Book of Isaiah by scribes. The formation of the Book of Isaiah then went in its own way and its theology became different from that in the Book of Ezra–Nehemiah.

Holy Labor

Holy Labor
Author: Aubry G. Smith
Publisher: Kirkdale Press
Total Pages: 189
Release: 2016-09-21
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1577997395

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Women are valued for their ability to bear children in many cultures. The birth process, though supposedly the most painful experience of a woman’s life, is seen as a necessary evil to achieve the end goal of children and motherhood. And yet, in the face of a typically masculinized Christianity that nevertheless professes that women are equally created in the image of God, shouldn’t childbirth—a uniquely feminine experience—itself shape Christian women’s souls and teach them about the heart of the God they love and follow? Drawing on her own experience of giving birth and motherhood—and the conflicting assumptions attached to them, by Christians and the culture at large—Aubry G. Smith presents a richly scriptural exploration of common conceptions about pregnancy and childbirth that will not only help mothers and soon-to-be mothers understand how to think biblically about birth, but also walks them through how to put the ideas into practice in their own lives. Along the way, she shows all readers how to see God’s own experience of the birth process—and how childbirth leads to a deeper understanding of the gospel overall.

Ben Sira in Conversation with Traditions

Ben Sira in Conversation with Traditions
Author: Francis M. Macatangay
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Total Pages: 435
Release: 2022-08-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 3110762226

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This volume of essays on Ben Sira is a Festschrift on the occasion of the 65th birthday of Prof. Nuria Calduch-Benages. The volume gathers the latest studies on Ben Sira's relationship with other Jewish traditions. With a variety of methods and approaches, the volume explores Ben Sira's interpretation of received traditions, his views on the prevailing issues of his time, and the subsequent reception of his work.