Trible on the woman from Bethlehem

Trible on Judges 19-21

Texts of Terror

What did Trible point out that you had not noticed on your own?

Interpretive tools used by Trible

Rhetorical criticism - descriptive analysis of persuasive communication

• The study of everything that makes Alfred Hitchcock’s movie Psycho different from a newspaper article about a murder.
• Pacing, ambiguity that heightens the horror

Text criticism - comparing different ancient manuscripts

• Sometimes one is likely more original, other times both possibilities are worth considering
• Did the woman leave because she was angry or because she was a whore?
• Was the woman dead when he found her?

Redaction criticism - the work of editors

• A small addition At that time there was no King in Israel turns the whole story into a reason to support the monarchy.

Canonical criticism - the significance of the sequence of books

• The art of disc jockeying or making a playlist
• In some Bibles the story is followed by the book of Ruth
• In some Bibles the story is followed by the story of Hannah in 1 Samuel
• Either way, it is probably not a coincidence that a happy story about a positive female figure comes next

History of interpretation - later texts in the Bible and ancient interpreters

• Premodern interpreters ignored the story rather than make it fit with the assumption of perfection

Reader response - postmodern readerly interpretation

• How should readers today respond?

Other women in early Israel

Deborah - woman judge

Ruth - cute story that condones intermarriage

Yael - woman who kills an enemy of Israel

Review of tools of interpretation

Archaeology

Rhetorical criticism

Form criticism

Source criticism

Redaction criticism

Canonical criticism

Text criticism

Typology (pre)

Reader-response (post)