What sociology-anthropological issues of the ANE are at play in text (kinship, economics, honour/shame, ethnic identity, cult etc)?

How to Write an Exegesis Paper.

Introduction

A paragraph introducing the text, perhaps including a comment about why you are interested in this text. If you know Hebrew/Greek, please work with the original text.
Text Criticism: establishing the original text.

• ·  Indications of differences between ancient versions in study bible footnotes or commentaries
• ·  Any significant variations between English translations that alert you to problems in the original
• ·  Information from commentaries regarding how well the text has been preserved

Text criticism examines the validity of the original text, noting textual variants as either scribal errors or deliberate changes. If there are no variations in the early witnesses you can leave this section out or just comment that no major textual variations are evident.

“The World behind the Text” Analysis: questions relating to the people, events, and issues that led to the production of the text.

• ·  What was the (purported) historical setting of the text itself claims?
• ·  What is the most likely historical setting of the final redaction of the text?
• ·  What sources, oral and written, might have contributed to the text?
• ·  Where does the text come in the Christian/Jewish canon and how does it relate to the material

around it?

• ·  What sociology-anthropological issues of the ANE are at play in text (kinship, economics, honour/shame, ethnic identity, cult etc)?

“The World of the Text”: reading the Bible as literature, and exploring the world of the text.

• ·  What genre of literature does the text belong to (e.g. wisdom, narrative, poetry, parable, law code, epistle, prophetic oracle, didactic material etc.)? What features are consistent with that genre and what are unique features in this text?
• ·  How is the text structured, what we call the rhetorical analysis?
  o How is the message being conveyed? How has the author constructed the text and what

rhetorical devices have been used (e.g. word play, repetition, metaphor etc.)?

• ·  What significant lexical or grammatical features contribute to the author’s meaning? Would it be

helpful to do a word study of a key word?

• ·  For narrative analysis, the following provides more detailed instructions:

A narrative chart: Before reading other commentaries prepare a narrative analysis of your text using a chart such as this, based on Yairah Amit’s Reading Biblical Narratives (Fortress Press, 2001). You may like to include this chart as an appendix to your exegesis paper. Note that you have been asked to especially focus on time and place in your exegesis.

Section heading	Verses	Beginnings and endings	Plot/Events	Characterization	Narrator’s perspective	Time	Place	Other notes to pursue

Scene-by-scene analysis:

This is the detailed exegesis, where you unpack issues and features that throw light on the passage. The scenes are identified by your rhetorical analysis and/or narrative analysis.

The information in this section will come from a combination of your observations and what you have read in commentaries, Bible dictionaries and relevant articles.

“The World in Front of the Text”: questions relating to the reception of the text: what are the concerns, experiences and perspectives of the reader?

• ·  How has the text been read and interpreted through the ages (e.g a prophetic text that has been used in the New Testament; or apocalyptic texts that have been interpreted as speaking of the end of time)? What is the history of the interpretation of the text?
• ·  How does the text relate to your own issues and concerns?
• ·  What does a theological interpretation of the text suggest (remember, any one text is partial, only a

glimpse of a much bigger whole)?

• ·  Whose interests are served by the text, or the traditional interpretations of the text, that is which ideologies does it support? (here is where feminist, postcolonial, liberation etc hermeneutics come to the fore)

Conclusion

A short paragraph drawing together the significant findings from the study. No new material should be included here.

BIBLIOGRAPHY/REFERENCE LIST

Include all resources, properly referenced.

You should be aiming to read at least 3-4 scholarly commentaries (with at least one being a Jewish scholar), one or two recent articles and 2-3 relevant entries in dictionaries. Be discerning about using on-line resources: look for “peer reviewed” journals and Bible dictionaries through theological library websites. Many on-line theological resources that are freely available are either out of copyright and therefore not current scholarship or devotional in nature and therefore not scholarly.

DETAILED GUIDE FOR NARRATIVE ANALYSIS IN EXEGESIS

(Rev Dr Jeanette Mathews, 2017, adapted from Anstey, “How to write an exegesis paper” CSU 2005)

Use this guide as the basis of your exegesis and supplement your findings with material from commentaries, word books, bible dictionaries etc. In your discussion devote at least a solid paragraph to the use of time and space in the narrative.

Narrative Analysis asks the following sorts of questions:

• ·  What is the structure of the narrative?
• ·  What are the sections and how are they related?
• ·  What is the overall message of the passage?
• ·  How does it fit into the bigger story?

A good method to determine the answers to these questions is to analyze your reading of the passage using a chart as shown below. Here is an example of a narrative analysis using Gen 22:1-19, the story of God asking Abraham to sacrifice Isaac:

1. Notice the placement of the story in relation to other stories around it – is there any connection?

Gen 22:1-19 begins “after these things” – you need to be aware of what that is referring to. Notice, for example, that Abraham is “distressed” about Ishmael being sent away (ch 21) but says nothing about being asked to sacrifice Isaac.

1. Make a chart with six columns: verse, text-type (ie dialogue, narration, dream, etc.), place and time (eg ‘up a hill for two days,’ ‘in foreign land for 20 years’), characters and events (eg ‘Abraham sees a ram’), other notes, section heading.

Section heading	Verses	Plot/Events	Characters	Narrator’s perspective	Time	Place	Other notes to pursue
God tests Abraham	1	God encountering Abraham	God, Abraham	Omniscient throughout	“After these things” -What things?	In land of Philistines (? See Gen 21:33)	“tested” “here I am” (1)
	2	Instruction to travel to “Moriah”	God			Tradition links Moriah with the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.	Similar language to earlier instructions from God eg Gen 12.1 4 refs to Isaac: “your son, your only son, the one you love, Isaac” [but Ishmael?]
Abraham and Isaac’s	3	Instruction to travel to “place	Abraham, donkey,		Early in morning		Isaac mentioned last; had to carry
journey to Moriah		shown by God”	young men, Isaac		3 days covered in one verse!		wood for the offering
	4		Abraham		Third day	“the place” visible but “far away”	“third day”?
	5		Abraham, young men, “the boy”				“we will come back to you” – wishful thinking? Prophecy? Misdirection?
	6	Walking towards the mountain	Abraham, Isaac				Isaac carrying the wood, Ab carrying the knife. Why “carry” the fire?
	7	“ Dialogue between father and son	“		Pace slows down for dialogue		“here I am” (2) “my son” shows tenderness. Irony in Isaac’s question
	8	“ Dialogue	“		“		“God will provide the lamb” – prophecy? Wishful thinking?
Preparing the sacrifice	9	Lots of action at “the place” in a short time.	“		Not clear how long it took to get there. Pace quickens	“the place”	Dispassionate description! “bound” = Aqedah: gives the Jewish name to the story. Isaac’s silence
	10	Sacrificial action begun	“		Pace is slower: 3 verbs describe Ab’s action	“	Kill/slaughter – is this the normal word for sacrifice? Isaac’s silence.
The angel’s intervention	11	Sacrificial action disrupted by angel’s voice	Angel of the Lord, Abraham, [Isaac]			“ Angel called “from heaven”	Abraham x 2 (cf v 1) “here I am” (3)
	12	Instruction and affirmation of Abraham	Angel of the Lord			“	“I know you fear God” – cf v 1 where God was testing Ab (didn’t know?) Repetition of “your son, your only son” (cf v 2)
	13	Abraham notices the ram and sacrifices it [instead(?) of Isaac]	Abraham, Ram in thicket		Rapid pace: 5 verbs in one verse	“	Ram not lamb!

 

	14	Abraham named the place	Abraham			“	Place named “Jireh” (“Yah provided”) “to this day” suggests the story is being told at a later time
Abraham’s vindication	15	Angel’s voice again	Angel of the Lord			“from heaven”	“a second time”
	16	The Lord’s Vow (monologue)	“ “says the Lord”		Vv 16-18 form a long speech that interrupts the pace of the narrative		“says the Lord” is a prophetic formula. Repetition of “your son, your only son” (cf v 2, 12)
	17	“	“				Blessing, “numerous offspring as stars of heaven” reminicent of promise in Gen 12, 15, 17. This phrase and “sand on the seashore” used many times in OT.
	18	“	“				Nations blessed through Ab’s offspring, cf Gen 12:3
Abraham’s return to Beer-sheba	19	Down from the mountain to where he started.	Abraham, young men		Lots of activity and passing of time in one verse.	Return to place of origin	NO ISAAC!!

1. Group verses in natural clusters and mark these divisions in the sixth column: For your passage it might look like this:

vv 1-2: God tests Abraham
vv 3-8: Abraham and Isaac’s journey to Moriah vv 9-10: preparing the sacrifice
vv 11-14: the angel’s intervention
vv 15-18: Abraham’s vindication
v 19 Abraham’s return to Beersheba

1. Look for other significant features such as repetition, passage of time (look for when the narrative “slows down”), character development, key words in the story, names of people and places, metaphors.

In Gen 22:1-19 Abraham says “here I am” in response to three summons – 2 from God and one from Isaac. Isaac’s name is used 5 times, and 4 times it is prefaced with “his son”. “God” is designated by the names “God” and “the Lord” and speaks to Abraham directly (vv 1-2) but also through an “angel of the Lord” (v 11-12). God “tests” Abraham and at the end says “now I know that you fear God” – does this mean God has changed in the narrative as well as Abraham? That is, didn’t God know at the beginning of the story? Jewish tradition equates “Moriah” with the temple mount in Jerusalem. The word “bound” (v 9) is unique in the Hebrew bible and gives the traditional Jewish name for the story (Aqedah).

1. Summarize the findings from the chart and your analysis in a few succinct paragraphs which will explain to the reader what the passage is about.
2. Note any questions arising from your own analysis of the text, so that you have some guidelines for what you need to look for as you begin to read commentaries etc. Try to have at least three questions.
   1. How do the dialogues between Abraham and God and Abraham and Isaac compare to each other?
   2. Is it significant that Abraham says “god will provide the lamb” but the creature that is there at the end is a ram (adult sheep)?
   3. Does the location (a journey up the mountain) add tension?
   4. Is this mountain significant? Are the names of Moriah and “the Lord will provide”

significant in Israel’s history?

1. 1. Why doesn’t Isaac appear again in the narrative after the aborted sacrifice?