Prophetic Rhetoric: Case Studies in Text Analysis and Translation : Ernst Wendland, Xulon Press, 2009

Abstract

This work by Ernst R. Wendland has attempted to make a discourse analysis of nine books from the prophetic books, one from the Major Prophets and eight from the Minor Prophets, for the purpose of providing Bible translators with some insights as to how to communicate the rhetorical impacts of the text to the audiences of modern day. The main arguments of this work are based on the assumption that “literary structure and form are inherent parts of meaning,” as Dr. Lynell Zogbo notes.<BR> With the contributions of text linguistics in mind, this work has explored the ways that a text has its textual cohesion and semantic coherence in order to impact its audiences. In this regard, the chief attention of this work has been devoted to the literary forms and structures of prophetic discourses. This work successfully demonstrates how the literary structures and forms of the text facilitate our understanding of its major themes. In particular, it is convincingly argued that diverse rhetorical devices for demarcation and bonding help the reader to distinguish the constituent parts of the text, and then to uncover its thematic peaks and evocative climaxes.<BR> What is noteworthy in this regard is that this work provides a detailed explanation of the rhetorical devices such as aperture and closing signals, metaphor, verbal shift, direct speech, rhetorical question, and so on. Wendland focuses his special attention on the rhetorical features of recursion and variation, with the result of arguing that those devices enable the author to demarcate the text and to bring the attention of the audience to the central content of the text. He goes on to make a case that the sound effects of a text has an important rhetorical function because they add excitement and emphasis to the text when it impacts the audience.<BR> On the basis of the above insightful observations, this work has come up with several suggestions that have to do with Bible translation. The main suggestion is that Bible translators should make every effort to transfer all the rhetorical effects of the text into their target languages by means of contextualizing the original text. To borrow the words of Wendland, this way of translating produces a “literary-oratorial version” which is relevant to the audience of today.<BR> In my view, there are some areas in which this work should be improved. First, this work does not provide sufficient explanation of some key terms like thematic peak, thematic nucleus, and climax. As a result, the line between those terms is blurred in such a way that we cannot see the criteria by which the terms are defined. Second, due to its preoccupation with the forms of the text, it seems to me that this work focuses too much on textual cohesion so that it displays little interest in the way meanings of words form a thematic network (or semantic coherence) within the whole text in an effort to persuade the audience. <BR> Despite these limitations, it is true that this work contributes much to drawing out the operations and functions of rhetorical devices of the text, and more importantly, it presents a vivid picture of how Bible translators should communicate the rhetorical effects of the original text in their target languages.