Prophetic Oracles Research Articles

Speech-Forms in Hebrew Law and Prophetic Oracles

Speech-Forms in Hebrew Law and Prophetic Oracles

The Unforgivable Sin Logion Mark Iii 28-29/ Matt XII 31-32/Luke XII 10: Formal Analysis and History of the Tradition

The stimuli for this study came from two directions. The first was a comment by Ernst KASEMANN that Mark iii 29 had dismembered the original stylistic of a Christian prophetic oracle coined as a sentence of holy law and found in its more original form in Matt. xii 32 1). Additional considerations not discussed by KASEMANN have confirmed that the saying is from a Christian prophet 2). The research which led to this conclusion also indicated not only that the Markan form of the saying is older than the Matthean, but that a pre-Markan form could be reconstructed. The second stimulus came from the provocative collection of essays written by James ROBINSON and Helmut KOESTER 3) which challenges current NT scholarship to break through the crusts of the categories which, although they have enabled research to progress to its present point, now impede creative advances. In particular, ROBINSON proposes the dismantling of static categories and their replacement with more dynamic ones, in which tradition criticism would play a major role. Thus instead of posing the question regarding the two forms of this saying in the static mode Which is the older form ?-a mode which leads to a static com-

Prophecy and Tragedy *)

In order to avoid any misunderstanding arising from the somewhat misleading title of this paper I may as well state at once that it is not my purpose to consider tragedy as a kind of prophecy or to represent the tragedians as a sort of prophets of their age. It is the much humbler subject of the function (or better functions) of prophetic utterances, oracles, prophetic dreams, premonitions and warnings in Greek tragedy I have in view. That is not to say that I am writing under the delusion that it would be possible to deal exhaustively?in a brief survey?with the many aspects and problems of this subject*). What I want to make clear is the eminent relevancy of these phenomena both to dramatic structure and to tragic meaning. When we are studying them in the body of Greek Tragedy it will be well to bear in mind the following general considerations, which may serve as preliminary remarks: i. It would be an understatement to claim that prophecy and its concomitants were important in Greek life of the classical period. In point of fact the latter was inextricably bound up with them. So their occurrence in drama, strange as it may sometimes seem to us, was taken as a matter of course by the audience and presumably not, in the first place, as a dramaturgic convention or means. 2. If it is right (as must be the case) that these phenomena are instrumental to the dramatic interpretation of myth or saga (which is tragedy), neither should it be forgotten that in a great number of

The Gezer Calendar and the Seasonal Cycle of Ancient Canaan

A FIXED CALENDAR, Emile Duerkheim once wrote, expresses the rhythm of the collective activities while at the same time its function is to assure their regularity. By virtue of these characteristics an analysis of the calendar of a given society, or even an investigation into a specific and detailed calendar problem will often reveal aspects of social and economic life that surpass the mere nature of the initial enquiry. The present paper illustrates this point. An attempt to clarify the meaning of a technical term in the Gezer Calendar (henceforth: G. C.), by means of comparing it with similar Hebrew expressions in the 0. T. and in the literature of the Judean Covenanters, as well as with pertinent Akkadian and South-Arabic terminology, leads to some general remarks on the relative importance of flaxgrowing and grass-cropping in Palestinian agriculture. The emerging economic factors are then shown to be actually mirrored in 0. T. narratives and also in biblical imagery. The resulting new insight into the seasonal cycle of Canaan provides a key for the better understanding of the calendaric realism underlying some prophetic oracles. It further reveals the widespread and continuous employment of some technical agricultural terms which were perpetuated in the Near East since the second millennium B. C. Palaeographically, and orthographically, the G. C. is a product of the tenth century B. c.,' as a comparison with the Phoenician inscriptions from Byblus shows.2 Archaeological and historical con-