Cultural Linguistics and Religion: Human Anatomical Terms in the Holy Bible

Abstract

This study investigates, within the scope of Cultural Linguistics, underlying cultural conceptualisations of human anatomical (body part) terms in the Holy Bible linked to the Christian worldview. It comes as a response to the call for further research on the reciprocal relationship between language and religion from other sub-disciplines. In recent years, the analytical framework of Cultural Linguistics has shown how religious language can embody the specific worldview that lies at the core of the religion through analysis of the language and conceptualisations associated with the religion and its belief systems. This study applies corpus-linguistics and the analytical framework of Cultural Linguistics to unpack cultural metaphors, cultural categories and cultural schemas associated with body part terms in the Bible. This approach, referred to as Corpus-Cultural analysis, was used to collect data and analyse conceptualisations drawn from the original Hebrew and Greek manuscripts, Bible concordance, Bible encyclopedia and dictionary, as well as scripture commentaries. The findings reveal that body part terms in biblical texts play an important role in providing a significant conceptual base for representing the Christian worldview of the specified body parts. For example, the term ‘heart’ is conceptualised as the seat of, emotions, determination or courage, intellect, understanding and conscience in the Bible. In addition, it was found that various conceptualisations derive from several sources, including ancient Hebrew and Greek worldviews, Jewish religion and customs, translation of original text into English, biblical commentaries, and religious literature. Overall, the study concludes that the Corpus-Cultural approach contributes to the in-depth understanding of Holy texts.