Obituary for "Wisdom Literature"
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Product details
- ISBN 9780198777373
- Weight: 558g
- Dimensions: 148 x 223mm
- Publication Date: 03 Jan 2019
- Publisher: Oxford University Press
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
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An Obituary for "Wisdom Literature" considers the definitional issues long plaguing Wisdom scholarship. Will Kynes argues that Wisdom Literature is not a category used in early Jewish and Christian interpretation. It first emerged in modern scholarship, shaped by its birthplace in nineteenth-century Germany. Kynes casts new light on the traits long associated with the category, such as universalism, humanism, rationalism, empiricism, and secularism, which so closely reflect the ideals of that time. Since it was originally assembled to reflect modern ideals, it is not surprising that biblical scholars have faced serious difficulties defining the corpus on another basis or integrating it into the theology of the Old Testament.
The problem, however, is not only why the texts were perceived in this one way, but that they are perceived in only one way at all. The book builds on recent theories from literary studies and cognitive science to create a new alternative approach to genre that integrates hermeneutical insight from various genre proposals. This theory is then applied to Job, Ecclesiastes, and Proverbs, mapping out the complex textual network contributing to their meaning. With the death of the Wisdom Literature category, both the so-called Wisdom texts and the concept of wisdom find new life.
Will Kynes is Associate Professor of Biblical Studies at Samford University. He is the author of My Psalm Has Turned into Weeping: Job's Dialogue with the Psalms (de Gruyter, 2012), which received the Manfred Lautenschläger Award for Theological Promise in 2015, and co-editor, with Katharine Dell, of Reading Job Intertextually (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013), Reading Ecclesiastes Intertextually (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014), and Reading Proverbs Intertextually (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2019).
