Style and Structure in Biblical Hebrew Narrative

The pages of the Hebrew Bible are filled with stories - short and long, funny and sad, histories, fables, and morality tales. The ancient narrators used a variety of stylistic devices to structure, to connect, and to separate their tales - and thus to establish contexts within which meaning comes to light. What are these devices, and how do they guide our reading and our understanding of the text? Style and Structure in Biblical Hebrew Narrative explores some of the answers and shows scriptural interpretation can be a matter of style."

Part one of Style and Structure in Biblical Hebrew Narrative examines a wide variety of symmetrical patterns biblical Hebrew narrative uses to organize its units and subunits, and the interpretive dynamics those patterns can imply. Part two addresses the question of boundaries between literary units. Part three examines devices that biblical Hebrew narrative uses to connect consecutive literary units and subunits.

Chapters in Part One: Structures of Organization are "Reverse Symmetry," "Forward Symmetry," "Alternating Repetition," "Partial Symmetry," "Multiple Symmetry," "Asymmetry." Chapters in Part Two: Structures of Disjunction are "Narrative Components," "Repetition," and "Narrative Sequence." Chapters in Part Three: Structures of Conjunction are "Threads," "Links: Examples," "Linked Threads: Examples," "Hinges: Examples," and “Double-Duty Hinges: Examples.”

Jerome T. Walsh, PhD, (1942-2021) was editor of the series Berit Olam: Studies in Hebrew Narrative and Poetry. He is author of 1 Kings in that series (Liturgical Press, 1996). Walsh also authored Style and Structure in Biblical Hebrew Narrative (Liturgical Press, 2001). He was a member of the Society of Biblical Literature and of the Catholic Biblical Association of America, and held the Tschoepe Chair of Homiletics in the Institute for Religious and Pastoral Studies of the University of Dallas.