Interpreting Hebrew Poetry (review)

Hebrew Studies 35 (1994) 199 Reviews INTERPRETING HEBREW POETRY. By David L. Petersen and Kent Harold Richards. Guides to Biblical Scholarship. Gene Tucker, ed. pp. x + 112. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992. Paper, $6.95. In their contribution to the "Guides" series from Fortress Press, Petersen and Richards intend to provide a brief introduction to the unique features of Hebrew poetry. Since one-third of the Hebrew Bible is in poetic form, the necessity of some familiarity with this topic requires no explanation. The first chapter, "Understanding Hebrew Poetry," argues that there no longer exists a consensus with regard to parallelism and meter constituting the "essential characteristics" of the poetry. Thus the authors' propose to lay the groundwork for a new consensus, "one based on recent linguistic and literary study of Hebrew poetry and on theories on poetry in all languages" (p. 2). The chapter addresses the definition of Hebrew poetry. It outlines some of the problems related to the study of it, especially those problems particular to it because of our temporal and cultural distance from the time of the Bible. However, they claim that the principle problem consists in "the isolation of the study of this ancient poetry from the study of non-Semitic poetry," mainly on account of the almost exclusive focus on parallelism by commentators. Thus, "One important goal of this book is to place the study of Hebrew poetry within the broader context of (more general) reflection about poetry..." (p. 6). As a first step, they outline various "theories of poetry." The first of these, the "emotive or experience theory" of poetry, emphasizes that "poetry is a form of discourse that expresses profound human emotions and feelings" and thus tends to be more "poet-centered" (p. 8, cf. R. Lowth, 1. Muilenburg). A contemporary critic such as R. Alter would exemplify a second heading, the "mimetic" or "imitation of reality" theory, a more "poem-centered" approach. A third set of "goal-oriented" theories shifts the focus from the poet or poem to the audience, and examines in particular the craft of the poets, their techniques, and their skill as communicators and advocates (cf. M. O'Connor, 1. Kugel, A. Berlin). The final set of theories deals in a radical way with the poem itself "as a self-contained, new reality with indeterminate, even conflicting, power for the reader" (p. 12). The authors conclude this first chapter by emphasizing the importance of maintaining a dialogue among the diverse methods and approaches. Petersen and Richards begin their second chapter ("Parallelism") with a close look at the seminal work of Robert Lowth. They point out important Hebrew Studies 35 (1994) 200 Reviews factors which commentators often overlook. Lowth, for example, presents the "specifics" of synonymous, antithetic, and synthetic varieties of parallelism only after a more general discussion of meter and parallelism and the relationship between the two (p. 22). The authors then proceed to summarize the various approaches to parallelism generated in recent years (S. Geller, J. Kugel, A. Berlin, R. Alter, M. O'Connor, and T. Collins, among others), highlighting grammatical and semantic aspects of this phenomenon. They conclude that, "Lowth was correct : parallelism is a matter of correspondence." However, there exists "considerable variety in identifying what is at the heart of the correspondence " (p. 34). Petersen and Richards thus propose to take "a very broad understanding of parallelism. It occurs in the interaction of semantic and grammatic equivalence and opposition" (p. 35). The juxtaposition of the two (or three) parts effects a mutual interaction which generates something wholly different from the sum of individual elements which compose it. In chap. 3, on "Meter and Rhythm," Petersen and Richards continue the perspective of grammatical analysis as the starting point for their discussion. They ask whether Hebrew poetry involves syllabic or accentual meter, concluding that "...it seems appropriate to delete meter as a category for understanding biblical Hebrew poetry. Rather, the language of rhythm and rhythmic patterns is more consistent with the texts in view" (p. 42). From this perspective, one can more easily recognize and discuss the key elements of "regularity and variety" which, in their opinion, are central to the way Hebrew poetry works. Thus, one should...