Methods of the narrative analysis: monarchies in the Ancient Israel
Abstract
This article offers a method for narrative analysis regarding the stories told in the Biblical books of Samuel and Kings. This method provides an opportunity for drawing some preliminary conclusions about the historicity of the events narrated. Key parameters are 1) the high number of small details, which is an evidence that the narrator was close to the event; 2) the narrator’s emotional involvement, which may hint to his personal participation or that of the people from his inner circle in the events described. Stories which comprise a large number of common places, on the contrary, seem to be less historically accurate. As the result, one can subdivide the narration flow as found in the Books of Samuel and Kings into several blocks, which represent different levels of historical actuality and precision.
About the Author
A. S. Desnitsky
Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences;
The Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
Andrey S. Desnitsky, Ph. D. habil. (Philol.), Professor, Senior Research fellow, Department of Ancient Orient
Moscow
References
1. Desnitsky A. S. The history of Ancient Israel as a modern problem. Orientalistica.2019;2(1):134–149. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.31696/2618-7043-2019-2-1-134-149.
2. Desnitsky A. S. Criteria and methods for reconstructing the events of the history of the Ancient Israel. Orientalistica. 2019;2(2):399–420. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.31696/2618-7043-2019-2-2-399-420.
3. Desnitsky A. S. King David: myth and history. Orientalistica. 2019;2(3):710–723. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.31696/2618-7043-2019-2-3-710-723.
4. Desnitsky A. S. How many monarchies were there in Ancient Israel? Identifying and stating the Problem. Orientalistica. 2020;3(1):15–30. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.31696/2618-7043-2020-3-1-15-30.
5. Veinberg I. P. The genesis of History. The history of the Historiography in the Middle East (mid of the 1st millennium BC). Moscow: Evreiskii Universitet; Nauka; 1993. (In Russ.).
6. Sternberg M. The Poetics of Biblical Narrative: Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading. Bloomington: Indiana University Press; 1986.
7. Alter R. The Art of Biblical Narrative. New York: Basic Books; 1983.
8. Berlin A. Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns; 1994.
9. Desnitsky A. S. The Leaders (Judges) and Kings of Israel. Moscow: Ripol-Klassik; 2018. (In Russ.)
10. Aster S. Z. The Shock of Assyrian Imperial Ideology and the Responses of Biblical Authors in the Late Eighth Century. In: Farber Z. I., Wright J. L. (eds) Archaeology and History of Eighth-Century Judah. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature; 2018, pp. 475–487.
For citation:
Desnitsky A.S. Methods of the narrative analysis: monarchies in the Ancient Israel. Orientalistica. 2020;3(2):323-347. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.31696/2618-7043-2020-3-2-323-347
Views: 457
Email this article 