Readers and Responsibility

Abstract

Abstract This book has been about producing meaning from biblical narrative in ways that have long been familiar to literary critics of secular literature. In some cases we have seen that conventions of composition in biblical narrative are not entirely familiar. For example, Hebrew narrative is tolerant of, indeed enjoys, the repetition of key words or even scenes in ways that defy modem conventions of composition in English. And the mixture of genres—narrative, law, poetry—in Genesis—2 Kings may disturb our sense of unity. So, too, the way this story appears to be ‘strung together’ out of a seemingly heterogeneous collection of stories. Nevertheless, we have been able to speak of character and plot and point of view, of ambiguity and metaphor and allusion, in terms that connect our reading of this ancient literature with readings of literature of the modem western, especially English-speaking, world.