Perspective Criticism: Point of View and Evaluative Guidance in Biblical Narrative

An study of how perspective criticism (analysis based on narrative perspective) enables interpretation of biblical stories even where their intent is unclear.

Perspective Criticism sets out a new and illuminating biblical methodology designed to help the reader of biblical narratives in which there is a character engaged in action but no explicit indication from the storyteller on how the action is to be evaluated. Gary Yamasaki argues that in these cases we are receiving cryptic guidance from the author through the narrative technique of point-of-view.

In such cases the methodology of Perspective Criticism may be applied to reveal this abstruse guidance. Gary Yamasaki provides a series of frames of analysis within the theory of Perspective Criticism which may be applied to biblical stories: the spatial, psychological, informational, temporal, phraseological, and ideological perspectives. Because the majority of the point-of-view devices found in biblical narratives are also used in cinematic storytelling, the book includes accessible analyses of film scenes, providing pop-culture illustrations of the workings of the point-of-view perspective. Gary Yamasaki concludes by applying his method to two case studies: the New Testament story of Gamaliel, and the Old Testament story of Gideon.

In his work Yamasaki creates a valuable foundation for the deeper understanding of biblical narrative, a gift to anyone who has struggled with the concealed messages that should be divined in biblical point-of-view narratives.

Gary Yamasaki is Professor of Biblical Studies at Columbia Bible College, Abbotsford, BC. He is the author of Watching a Biblical Narrative: Point of View in Biblical Exegesis (2007), and is the founder of the Perspective Criticism Website (http://perspectivecriticism.com).