What parts of the Bible have literary quality?

[The Evil One]

It is possible to read the Bible as literature rather than as scripture - IE to read it for its aesthetic value rather than for any particular truth value, much as we would read the ancient literature of any culture.

But, whihc parts of the Bible actually have literary value?

The long strings of begats clearly don't have much. Nor do the long catalogues of laws. And the narrative style of the Gospels leaves much to be desired. But some of the poetry in the OT is quite pretty.

What does everybody else think?

(Inspired by a comment by Goliath on another thread)

[pistonhips]

Good question. Inherent in the myth that is peddled "it's a good BOOK regardless of whether you're an adherent of the faith.." is that there must be some elements that are also present in other good literature; suspense, character development, plot, even readability fer christ's sake. I have to say that I can't see any of these in abundance.

[spin]

A small selection from the Hebrew bible:

Sections of Job which show the trouble that a "good person" can have in a world which is not manifestly good

The sacrifice of Isaac

Ps 23 (and many other psalms)

The story of Samson

The death of Uriah

Most of Ecclesiastes

Much of Genesis

Daniel

The life of Saul

The life of David


spin

[spin]

Good question. Inherent in the myth that is peddled "it's a good BOOK regardless of whether you're an adherent of the faith.." is that there must be some elements that are also present in other good literature; suspense, character development, plot, even readability fer christ's sake. I have to say that I can't see any of these in abundance.

I'd have to say that you are applying criteria many of which are not applicable to ancient literature, being based on modern literary forms which only developed after the Renaissance. This is not to say that you won't find any of the things you mention in the bible, for they are there, but that you should be looking at other things, the expression of thought and emotion. If you can appreciate Allan Ginsberg, Emily Dickinson, Emily Bronte, then you surely can appreciate parts of the bible.


spin

[Naruto]

[Pointless post]

_I_ liked the part where Jesus died, personally :p

[/Pointless post]

[graymouser]

Let's see...

Parts of Genesis and Exodus are pretty decent as narrative; skipping all the law and theology, you can read pretty well through Joshua, Judges, and all the Samuel / Kings stuff (skipping things like the elucidation of all the stuff for the Temple). The psalmody has quality as poetry, though if you want it to be pretty in English you'd best stick to the King James (though the rest of the KJV Tanakh stuff is pretty lethal). Ecclesiastes is pretty much the only book in the Bible that does any serious stuff toward getting philosophical; it's also amusingly contradictory to the bulk of the rest of the stuff. Proverbs and Wisdom round out that section, though they can be a bit God-y at times.

In the New Testament...well, Revelation makes a great fantasy story, as long as you don't think it's actually going to happen. And John's Gospel probably has the best literary quality of the four.

-Wayne

[pistonhips]

I'd have to say that you are applying criteria many of which are not applicable to ancient literature, being based on modern literary forms which only developed after the Renaissance. This is not to say that you won't find any of the things you mention in the bible, for they are there, but that you should be looking at other things, the expression of thought and emotion. If you can appreciate Allan Ginsberg, Emily Dickinson, Emily Bronte, then you surely can appreciate parts of the bible.


spin

Those are good points. In fact I've been unable to plow my way through numerous so-called literary classics , or having managed to make my way through have gained little pleasure.

Spin, can you detail why some of those passages you mentioned appeal to you as worthy on the merits of being well-written (or you may characterize them differently but still in a positive way)? Sometimes someone casting things in a different light can make it more enjoyable to others.

[spin]

Spin, can you detail why some of those passages you mentioned appeal to you as worthy on the merits of being well-written (or you may characterize them differently but still in a positive way)? Sometimes someone casting things in a different light can make it more enjoyable to others.

I just picked things at random and could have chosen others, but the life stories of both Saul and David are interesting because they are not flattering and don't hold back on the nitty gritty, displaying the good and the not so good, the vanity, pride, the strengths and the weakness of both characters.

I could have mentioned the story of Ruth which deals with responsibility, humility, worthy actions in a good hearted romance, yet telling of hardship and anguish. And it's short.

There is something about the stories told with a stark simplicity yet able to convey complexity of thought and feeling. The story of Samson, especially his relationship with Delilah, its consequences and his redeeming death make it a good example of this story-telling.

The image of God as his shepherd is shown to be very comforting to the writer of psalm 23. In the description of himself as the sheep under the tutelage of the shepherd we find a very graphic description of the safety the speaker feels despite the adversities that appear, due to his trust in his god. This is the best of literature. (And yes it's about some dude talking about God, but we can look at the communication rather than the trappings.)

Every time I have to deal with the creation accounts in Genesis here on this forum the more I come to appreciate their complexity of thought. They display their dependence on the past and earlier literature, but at the same time they have lives of their own, doing new things that their redactors and rewriters have placed in them. I usually point out the structure of the first creation account because it is usually missed, how the notion of "waste and void" are essential to the development of the creation, giving form to the creation and then filling the various parts up. At the same time we have the enunciation of the sabbath day and its prime importance, as it even appears at the end of the creation. We find that to create his cosmos this god merely has to speak and it happens, what a supreme creator this god is to its writer. Does it matter that this creation has nothing to do with reality or science? Looking at it as a literary creation, I definitely think not. It's awful science, but then they didn't have the thousands of years of developments that we have. But wow, what a lot of thought went into the construction of the story, the results of which are stunning. And it would be worth reading that other interesting creation, the Enuma Elish, to get some perspective.

I could go into the angst of having to part with a son who was given to you in your old age, when your wife was apparently barren, and you bring the child up lovingly, to be suddenly told that you had to sacrifice him... Or I could look at the two mothers claiming the one child and how Solomon astutely dealt with the conflict... But you can get the idea at least that I think there's a lot for the non-religious to find of value in the bible.


spin

[The Evil One]

OK spin, I can go for most of the sections you consider good literature, but much of Genesis? I can see how you might consider individual sections to have literary value, but overall as a book it suffers rather badly from the begat-syndrome that I was talking about before...

[spin]

OK spin, I can go for most of the sections you consider good literature, but much of Genesis? I can see how you might consider individual sections to have literary value, but overall as a book it suffers rather badly from the begat-syndrome that I was talking about before...

Just cut the begats out and look at the creations, the wily snake story, double-threaded flood story, the thrice told patriarch playing his wife as his sitory to the king, Lot in trouble, Abraham's wanderings, that very un-nice Jacob, the jealousy of Joseph's brothers and their redemption in Egypt. I think there's a lot there and also a lot that's not very nice at all. I look at the worthwhile content. :)


spin

[graymouser]

I find it amusing how much greater literary value the Hebrew Bible has than the Christian additions, when all is said and done.

-Wayne

[The Evil One]

Just cut the begats out and look at the creations, the wily snake story, double-threaded flood story, the thrice told patriarch playing his wife as his sitory to the king, Lot in trouble, Abraham's wanderings, that very un-nice Jacob, the jealousy of Joseph's brothers and their redemption in Egypt. I think there's a lot there and also a lot that's not very nice at all. I look at the worthwhile content. :)

All right, let's think about this. The snake story is a fairly typical example of a just-so story, but I don't think it's a particularly good example of the genre. Now maybe I'm not being fair on it, since I've never read it in the original, only in various translations, but it doesn't have the kind of "beautiful language" which i would associate with literary quality. It's kind of boring, in fact, until you get to the bit where God curses the snake, which is rather stirring. But otherwise, the story is very thin, very one-dimensional. The same could be said of the creations.

The double-threaded flood story is an example of bad editing. Bad editing is surely not a quality that you expect from "good literature".

See this is the thing. A lot of these stories read as very flat and boring, even if they are founded on interesting folkloric ideas, or else they suffer form having been mauled around by redactors. This is what makes me dubious about Genesis as literature.

Now Song of Solomon or Job or Psalms I could see more as worthy literature.

[spin]

I find it amusing how much greater literary value the Hebrew Bible has than the Christian additions, when all is said and done.

Well, I'm a Hebrew bible man. I use it more than the xian books, but you could look at the bit about love in 1 Cor 13 (we have tended to abuse and debase the chapter though), the temptation of Jesus has become an icon in our culture, the sermon on the mount is quite effective, the drama of Peter's betrayal, the spectacle of Pilate's interaction with the populace, but then it's a thinner volume with a lot less depth of tradition behind it.


spin

[DrJim]

If you look carefully into the prophets, there is an awful lot of extraordinary poetry (eg. Joel 1-2, Isa 28). Lots of metaphors that build up and seem to shift their meanings, word-plays, alliteration, and so forth. Its much easier to appreciate if willfully suspend belief / disbelief in its truth claims, and just concentrate on the sort of images your mind can conjur up.


Although there are some rough edges in the incorporation of sources (especially with the David and Goliath episode), 1 Samuel is utterly brilliant. Saul is an estraordinary tragic figure.

Finding literature in the bible is often met with disgust by some believers. I had a student in a class flatly refuse to take part in a discussion of how one might make a film of some bits of 1 Samuel: what the characters would be like, and so forth.

So long as you don't read it with the kinds of expectations you have for modern works, the literary qualities of the H.B. are pretty high. Of course, its "literature" was always subservient to ideological / theological motives and agendas and hence to manipulation. The anceints not only produced different kinds of literature than we do, they did it for different reasons.

Jim

[Godless Wonder]

I haven't seen any parts of the Bible that are particularly good literature. Genesis? Good literature? No, 'fraid not. The Psalms? Well, I was never much for poetry, but they don't strike me as being all that great examples of poetry. Coleridge's Rhyme of the Ancient Marinier for example kicks the Bible's ass. As does Alice in Wonderland, and lots of Rudyard Kipling's stuff.

Perhaps it's good literature by "ancient literature" standards, but that's not a reasonable way to measure it. You wouldn't say that a large force of horse drawn iron chariots makes for a great army, though by "ancient army" standards it might once have been a reasonable thing to say.

I think that the Bible is not great literature, it's great propaganda.
Part of what makes it great propaganda is its sheer size. If the 4 gospels were all that it consisted of, it would be a mere pamphlet. Instead, it's got thousands of pages of mystical mumbo jumbo and all sorts of crazy goings on, that can be pored over for years and years. I think any random conglomeration of writings from as many authors compiled into a book of its size would have some examples within it of what would be considered good writing. I think those who would claim the Bible is great literature must look at it through the lens of Christianity.

Then again, what constitutes great literature is I suppose largely in the mind of the reader, so who am I to tell another person what they should or shouldn't consider to be great literature? For me, the Bible falls far short of the mark though.

[The Admiral]

I like the part describing the homo-sexual love affair between David and Jonathon.

The Admiral

[spin]

All right, let's think about this. The snake story is a fairly typical example of a just-so story, but I don't think it's a particularly good example of the genre.

Can you be very fair when you compare a text written at the turn of the 20th century (Kipling) with one written nearly two thousand before it? Someone brought up on video games doesn't appreciate backgammon.

And yes it's an aetiological story, but it is more than that. What do you think for example of the nice part about the nakedness? and the hiding? and the buck-passing?

Now maybe I'm not being fair on it, since I've never read it in the original, only in various translations, but it doesn't have the kind of "beautiful language" which i would associate with literary quality.

Beautiful language is a bit of a con. It's based on your expectations and that's why so many English speakers think French sounds beautiful without even understanding a word... social conditioning. If you want literary effects, read Hebrew poetry, but then you start to need the Hebrew to appreciate it. Most of the things I have suggested are things you can appreciate in English translation. But it will take some acclimatisation, because we are used to Lord of the Rings and Star Wars, much more passive cultural artifacts in the sense that the experiencer has to do so little work. You sit back and have your senses stimulated rather than partake in the literary experience. So, naturally...

It's kind of boring, in fact, until you get to the bit where God curses the snake, which is rather stirring. But otherwise, the story is very thin, very one-dimensional. The same could be said of the creations.

Have you tried identifying with the human subjects?

The double-threaded flood story is an example of bad editing. Bad editing is surely not a quality that you expect from "good literature".

In no sense bad editing. For the purposes of the redactor I'd think it was good editing to capture as much of each story as possible and still maintain a coherent narrative. Repetition is quite normal in oral storytelling and you must remember that texts were read aloud, probably even when read alone, but mainly to illiterate listeners.

See this is the thing. A lot of these stories read as very flat and boring, even if they are founded on interesting folkloric ideas, or else they suffer form having been mauled around by redactors. This is what makes me dubious about Genesis as literature.

In another thread I spoke about the first creation account in Genesis, which has had a number of redactors and yet I find it a very impressive passage.

I think you are finding narrative simplicity and calling it "dull and boring". Again prose fiction is mainly a post-renaissance literary manifestation, so much of what we take for granted was developed in the short time from then until now. A deceptively simple narrative can hide complex thought, such as the sacrifice of Isaac. I'm sure you can appreciate the thing that was asked of Abraham and the conflict he was put in, especially when God had promised that his offspring would become the chosen people and now God was asking him to sacrifice his only child, a child of old age. It may have been petty play by God, but if we read the passage closely we cannot but feel the pains of a parent, but the story is told with such disarming simplicity.

Now Song of Solomon or Job or Psalms I could see more as worthy literature.

I can't cope with SoS, but elsewhere I have cited Job and the Psalms as containing examples of poetic literature that I could recommend.


spin

[spin]

I haven't seen any parts of the Bible that are particularly good literature. Genesis? Good literature? No, 'fraid not. The Psalms? Well, I was never much for poetry, but they don't strike me as being all that great examples of poetry. Coleridge's Rhyme of the Ancient Marinier for example kicks the Bible's ass. As does Alice in Wonderland, and lots of Rudyard Kipling's stuff.

Aren't you fundamentally disqualifying yourself from commenting?


spin

[DrJim]

Perhaps it's good literature by "ancient literature" standards, but that's not a reasonable way to measure it.

But by what standard should we measure ancient literature? Of course, I assume you are only reading it in translation. Would Kipling still kipple in Korean? A lot is lost in the translation, but if you simply dismiss the anceint convensions and expressions as valid considerations when evaluating the text, then you are not really even reading the translaitons seriously.

You wouldn't say that a large force of horse drawn iron chariots makes for a great army, though by "ancient army" standards it might once have been a reasonable thing to say.
But this is hardly a valid comparison: Armies have an objective criteria we can judge them by: the ability to wipe out the other army. Superiority here can be measured by technological evolution. This is something rather different than evaluating the qualities of literature cross culturally and accross time.

I think any random conglomeration of writings from as many authors compiled into a book of its size would have some examples within it of what would be considered good writing.
You assume the sheer volume of the biblical writings would result in something that fit your narrow standards if any of the writers were worth their salt. You are not prepared learn something about the past but assume that if the anceint Israelite writers were any good they would been able to read your mind about what would eventually be called good.


Instead, it's got thousands of pages of mystical mumbo jumbo and all sorts of crazy goings on Folks who have actually tried to sort through the mumbo-jumbo and apparent craziness tend to appreciate the quality of the writing that went into it quite a lot. Of course its an anthology that serves ideological and theological purposes. It is a literary represetnation of a national / religious heritage. All sorts of stuff get piled into it. But that hardly means many individual sections are not masterpieces. If you are not willing to make the effort to sort through it, that's your buisiness of course, but folks who are see a lot more there than you do.

I think those who would claim the Bible is great literature must look at it through the lens of Christianity.
So Jews can't appreciate the Bible's literature, then. Hmmmmm.

Then again, what constitutes great literature is I suppose largely in the mind of the reader, so who am I to tell another person what they should or shouldn't consider to be great literature? For me, the Bible falls far short of the mark though.

Of course, everyone is entitled to their opinions and there is a great subjectivity involved in any of this. But if you are not willing to examine your own subjectivity and the cultural and linguistic gap between you and the biblical literature, your opinion is not a well educated one. You seem to be mistaking accessibility for quality. They are not the same thing.

[The Evil One]

And yes it's an aetiological story, but it is more than that. What do you think for example of the nice part about the nakedness? and the hiding? and the buck-passing?

Nice part? What's nice about it? It's just a completely plain summary statement of events.

[...]

But it will take some acclimatisation, because we are used to Lord of the Rings and Star Wars, much more passive cultural artifacts in the sense that the experiencer has to do so little work. You sit back and have your senses stimulated rather than partake in the literary experience. So, naturally...

[...]

Have you tried identifying with the human subjects?

Now see, what you're basically saying here (and elsewhere in your post in other ways) is that we can give these stories literary value if we make an effort to do so ourselves. This is a very different thing to them actually having aesthetic value on their own. If we have to put it there, then it can't have been there to start with.

Identifying with Adam and Eve - the text gives me no reason to do so. Because the story is told in such a boring way. And in such a superficial way. The whole thing's over in less than a chapter - there's literally hardly anything to it. Characterisation, motivation, emotion, imagery, allusion, metaphor - all the things that make up the toolbox of the poet(s) who is constructing a text of literary value - all these things are missing from the section in question. (Unless you buy the theory that the entire thing is metaphorical. Which is irrelevent to the question of whether it is aesthetically pleasing.)

Sure, I can in my head construct an idea of Adam and Eve's characters, what they may have said to one another and what they may have been feeling. In other words, I can as a creative individual flesh out the bare bones of what the text actually provides. And sure, such a fleshed-out version may have aesthetic value. But that doesn't mean that the original text itself has aesthetic value. So far as I can see, it doesn't.

I don't think it's unfair of me to use modern-day literary standards to evaluate an ancient work, because many other other ancient works hold up reasonably well under those same standards - the Mabinogion, the Iliad, in particular Beowulf, (and the Eddas, I'm told though I've not read them), Native American and African folklore...

In no sense bad editing. For the purposes of the redactor I'd think it was good editing to capture as much of each story as possible and still maintain a coherent narrative.

I respectfully disagree with the notion that anything about the Flood narrative is coherent. Agreed, the editing in the Flood story is "good editing" if the goal is to retain as much as possible of two separate accounts, but in terms of the literary aesthetic (which is what this thread is about), it is bad editing, because it makes for a shabby and confusing plotline (whether it's read aloud or not).



I think you are finding narrative simplicity and calling it "dull and boring".
Well, yes. If it's simple to the point that there's nothing to hold the attention.

[spin]

Nice part? What's nice about it? It's just a completely plain summary statement of events.

They're not necessary to the story that you want them to be telling. What are they doing there then?

...what you're basically saying here (and elsewhere in your post in other ways) is that we can give these stories literary value if we make an effort to do so ourselves. This is a very different thing to them actually having aesthetic value on their own. If we have to put it there, then it can't have been there to start with.

No. Most good literature asks you to identify with the protagonists in order to partake in the kathartic event. You can't appreciate Hamlet unless you identify with him and his struggle over his love for his parents and the responsibility imposed upon him of revenging his father. You can't appreciate Gulliver's Travels unless you can identify with Gulliver and join in his reactions, as you must with Winston Smith when he shouts out to his torurer, "do it to Julia", for if you can't identify with him you miss out on the dilemma. If you don't identify there is no katharsis and you perceive nothing. You may as well have been watching a Spielberg flick.

Identifying with Adam and Eve - the text gives me no reason to do so. Because the story is told in such a boring way.

You mean on reading the story you couldn't place yourself in Eve's position and not find yourself making the same (wrong) choice as she? I find what reveals them to God in the story is their covering up. It's a very nice irony in the story. They feel they have to hide because suddenly they know they are naked.

And in such a superficial way.

Hey, we are living in a superficial age. If the story doesn't jump up and thump you, it doesn'r reach you and you're on to something else. This is our problem more than the literature's.

The whole thing's over in less than a chapter - there's literally hardly anything to it.

And yet it's one of the most popular stories of all time. Funny that. It's usually not judged by it length. (Check out Blake's "Sick Rose". But then it's probably too short.)

Characterisation, motivation, emotion, imagery, allusion, metaphor - all the things that make up the toolbox of the poet(s) who is constructing a text of literary value - all these things are missing from the section in question.

First, characterisation is a much more modern concept and you can't retroject it into any ancient text. Secondly we are mainly dealing with prose in the snake story, so your poetic notions seem to be misplaced. You get motivations and emotion, but then you have to work at it. You don't get the long pans with Tom Hanks silhouetted against the sun or his hand shaking to "tip" you off that you should feel something.

Sure, I can in my head construct an idea of Adam and Eve's characters, what they may have said to one another and what they may have been feeling. In other words, I can as a creative individual flesh out the bare bones of what the text actually provides. And sure, such a fleshed-out version may have aesthetic value. But that doesn't mean that the original text itself has aesthetic value. So far as I can see, it doesn't.

Adam and Eve's characters are not there. The motivations and the emotions are. All you have to do is explore them. You don't have to be creative. Just explorative of what's there.

I don't think it's unfair of me to use modern-day literary standards to evaluate an ancient work, because many other other ancient works hold up reasonably well under those same standards - the Mabinogion, the Iliad, in particular Beowulf, (and the Eddas, I'm told though I've not read them), Native American and African folklore...

To understand much of this literature you have to work at it. And which of any of these give you character?? I think you are working under double standards. If it's in the bible it's of lesser quality.

I respectfully disagree with the notion that anything about the Flood narrative is coherent.

What exactly do you find incoherent in the flood?

Have you read the stories told in the Kalevala? You have things told and retold differently and shifted around to be seen from various angles, but I don't hear people calling it incoherent. There's lots of inexact repetition in Beowulf... incoherent? No way.

Agreed, the editing in the Flood story is "good editing" if the goal is to retain as much as possible of two separate accounts, but in terms of the literary aesthetic (which is what this thread is about), it is bad editing, because it makes for a shabby and confusing plotline (whether it's read aloud or not).

What is shabby or incoherent about it that cannot be said about Beowulf, Kalevala, the Prose Edda, the Rig Veda, etc.?

If it's simple to the point that there's nothing to hold the attention.

I have said elsewhere it's literature from another culture and you need to acclimatise yourself to it.

What I said was that the narrative technique was simple. That doesn't mean that the content is.


spin

[Postcard73]

Now see, what you're basically saying here (and elsewhere in your post in other ways) is that we can give these stories literary value if we make an effort to do so ourselves. This is a very different thing to them actually having aesthetic value on their own.I think the question here is a lot broader than just the Bible. Does any literary or artistic work have aesthetic value on its own? I personally consider aesthetic value to be determined subjectively by the person viewing the work.

[Celsus]

*deep sigh*

[Goliath]

*deep sigh*

I honestly don't get it. Why would any atheist want to defend such a horrible book as the bible?

Sincerely,

Goliath

[Celsus]

I honestly don't get it. Why would any atheist want to defend such a horrible book as the bible?
Do you consider the Enuma Elish to be a horrible book? Do you consider Hesiod's Work and Days to be a horrible book? What about Ovid's Metamorphoses? What about Manetho's, Herodotus', and Berossos' histories?

Joel

[Hugo Holbling]

*deep sigh*

May i join you?

[spin]

Do you consider the Enuma Elish to be a horrible book?

The Enuma what?


spin

[The Evil One]

They're not necessary to the story that you want them to be telling. What are they doing there then?

To be "good literature" I expect it to do something more than "this happened. Then this happened. then this happened."


You can't appreciate Hamlet unless you identify with him and his struggle over his love for his parents and the responsibility imposed upon him of revenging his father. You can't appreciate Gulliver's Travels unless you can identify with Gulliver and join in his reactions, as you must with Winston Smith when he shouts out to his torurer, "do it to Julia", for if you can't identify with him you miss out on the dilemma. If you don't identify there is no katharsis and you perceive nothing.

Agreed! A thousand times agreed! Now those works you cite give me a reason to identify with the characters which is just not there in Genesis 3.

I don't know, maybe it's a brevity thing - the text being so short and all - but we're not told anything about Adam and Eve, we're not given anything to work with. They're just names, they're not people. I can't identify with a name.

But if it is a brevity thing, then that props up what I'm saying: it's bad literature to deal with events in such a hurried and off-the-cuff manner that the reader cannot engage with what is going on.


You mean on reading the story you couldn't place yourself in Eve's position and not find yourself making the same (wrong) choice as she? I find what reveals them to God in the story is their covering up. It's a very nice irony in the story. They feel they have to hide because suddenly they know they are naked.

Where you see irony, I really, really don't. Sure I could place myself in Eve's position, but all that means is I can imagine a talking snake coming and telling me to eat the fruit. What I can't do is get a good idea of how Eve felt in that position, because the text gives me nothing to work with.


Hey, we are living in a superficial age. If the story doesn't jump up and thump you, it doesn'r reach you and you're on to something else. This is our problem more than the literature's. [...] You don't get the long pans with Tom Hanks silhouetted against the sun or his hand shaking to "tip" you off that you should feel something.

I am starting to resent your implication that I am judging the Bbile (and finding it aesthetically wantign) by shallow modern standards only. I am judging it, as I have said before, by the standard of a thousand years of literature in Middle/Modern English and the great literatures of other cultures over thousands of years. As I have said, by those standards there are sections of the OT that hold up, but I find it incredible that one would consider genesis 3 to be one of them.



And yet it's one of the most popular stories of all time. Funny that.
You know and I know that that is because of the large number of people who believe it to be true and sacred, not because of any particular literary value it may have or not have.

Oh and yes, there are plenty of other short-short works that do have literary value: they seldom attempt a four-character, multi-twist plot though.


First, characterisation is a much more modern concept and you can't retroject it into any ancient text. Secondly we are mainly dealing with prose in the snake story, so your poetic notions seem to be misplaced. You get motivations and emotion, but then you have to work at it.

I find characterisation in plenty of other parts of the OT - just not genesis 3. And in plenty of other ancient literature - Iliad, Beowulf et al. I apologise if you missed the fact that I used "poet" in the broader sense. The fact that I cited "Characterisation, motivation, emotion, imagery, allusion, metaphor " as tools of the "poet" might have given that away.

I don't find I have to work at it in the Iliad or Beowulf. Nor, in fact, do I have to work at it perceptibly in certain other parts of the OT (e.g. Job).



To understand much of this literature you have to work at it. And which of any of these give you character?? I think you are working under double standards. If it's in the bible it's of lesser quality.

You clearly do not recall my earlier posts. I have already said that there are quite a lot of bits of the OT that I consider to have literary merit. I am just taking issue with your stance that Genesis can be said to be one of them.

I get character from the Iliad and Beowulf.

What exactly do you find incoherent in the flood?

The Flood

1 When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, "My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal ; his days will be a hundred and twenty years."
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days-and also afterward-when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
5 The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.

A basic introductory passage: contains much confusing, unsatisfying topic-jumping. The 120 years bit is introduced, surely at the wrong part fo the story: that comes after the flood. The Nephilim and heroes are introduced and then dropped from the story.

REmainder of this chapter is coherent.

Genesis 7
1 The LORD then said to Noah, "Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2 Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made."
5 And Noah did all that the LORD commanded him.

Repeats the end of the previous chapter with the well-remarked changes from 2 to 7. I don't buy this as stylistic repetition.

4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made."
5 And Noah did all that the LORD commanded him.
6 Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. 8 Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. 10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, on the seventeenth day of the second month-on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.
13 On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. 14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark.
Again, jumbled repetition for no discerible purpose.

3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. 5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.
6 After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. 8 Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. 10 He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark.

This is just plain confusing. First the ark gets stuck on a mountain, then we get the other version with the birds. It's BAD EDITING creating BAD LITERATURE: quite apart from anything else, any narrative flow which the original tales may have possessed has been torn to shreds by their being patched together.

And so on and so forth: the double covenent, etc etc.


I have said elsewhere it's literature from another culture and you need to acclimatise yourself to it.

I don't agree. As I've pointed out, there is literature from the very same culture - example Job, Psalms Song of Solomon - whose aesthetic quality I find immediately accessible. So I think the reason I don't find any value in Genesis 3 is more that it's not there than I don't see it.

What I said was that the narrative technique was simple. That doesn't mean that the content is.
In the case of genesis 3, it is, though. There's a string of events. That's it. No more. Literary quality demands more than a string of events.

[Goliath]

Do you consider the Enuma Elish to be a horrible book? Do you consider Hesiod's Work and Days to be a horrible book? What about Ovid's Metamorphoses? What about Manetho's, Herodotus', and Berossos' histories?



It's hardly possible for me to think that any of those books are horrible, since I've never heard of them before.

Sincerely,

Goliath

[spin]

To be "good literature" I expect it to do something more than "this happened. Then this happened. then this happened."
I get the idea that we can get nowhere. Art requires one to know something about the methods employed in that art. Art from another culture can seem obscure and uninteresting to someone who doesn't have sufficient knowledge of the methodologies involved. For example people listening to say Sibelius' 4th Symphony without an "acculturation" to the idiom wouldn't get much out of it. Someone who only knows Eminem will judge the Sibelius as being without merit. Many other examples, I'm sure you can think of.

What happens in the garden is a relatively simple narrative, but it has powerful symbolic content. I talked about the irony in the passage regarding the nakedness. Another aspect to it is that it is the normal thing for most cultures including to the Hebrew culture of the time to cover up, so clothing oneself as they did would seem the right thing to do but was in fact wrong.
Agreed! A thousand times agreed! Now those works you cite give me a reason to identify with the characters which is just not there in Genesis 3.
Interesting, because if I hadn't mentioned Hamlet we would have been dealing with literature in which character was trivial. Next to none in Gulliver's Travels and the same for Smith, O'Brien and Julia from 1984.
I don't know, maybe it's a brevity thing - the text being so short and all - but we're not told anything about Adam and Eve, we're not given anything to work with. They're just names, they're not people. I can't identify with a name.
You have people doing things and those things do seem reasonable, don't they? Could you have done them in those circumstances, knowing only what they knew?
But if it is a brevity thing, then that props up what I'm saying: it's bad literature to deal with events in such a hurried and off-the-cuff manner that the reader cannot engage with what is going on.
Work at it a little.
Where you see irony, I really, really don't.
Do you mean that the sentence where I thought I explained the irony wasn't clear or that I wasn't correct?

Don't you find it interesting that God knows that there is something wrong by the fact that they feel the need to cover up? that by covering up they reveal the truth? and that if they'd remained uncovered, they may have covered up better?
Sure I could place myself in Eve's position, but all that means is I can imagine a talking snake coming and telling me to eat the fruit. What I can't do is get a good idea of how Eve felt in that position, because the text gives me nothing to work with.
That doesn't mean that there is nothing there, only that you can't find anything. I have attempted to give an explanation.
I am starting to resent your implication that I am judging the Bbile (and finding it aesthetically wantign) by shallow modern standards only. I am judging it, as I have said before, by the standard of a thousand years of literature in Middle/Modern English and the great literatures of other cultures over thousands of years. As I have said, by those standards there are sections of the OT that hold up, but I find it incredible that one would consider genesis 3 to be one of them.
Part of the reason is because of its archetypal power. I have seen the scenes represented hundreds of times, each trying to grasp as much of that power as possible and the next artist thinks that he can do it better. Stories of the period are consistently undertold.
You know and I know that that is because of the large number of people who believe it to be true and sacred, not because of any particular literary value it may have or not have.
I don't agree. But then I also like stuff that doesn't get the same following.
I find characterisation in plenty of other parts of the OT - just not genesis 3. And in plenty of other ancient literature - Iliad, Beowulf et al. I apologise if you missed the fact that I used "poet" in the broader sense. The fact that I cited "Characterisation, motivation, emotion, imagery, allusion, metaphor " as tools of the "poet" might have given that away.

I don't find I have to work at it in the Iliad or Beowulf. Nor, in fact, do I have to work at it perceptibly in certain other parts of the OT (e.g. Job).
I'd say you get emotions, but I doubt character, ie insight into the workings of the figure's psyche.
You clearly do not recall my earlier posts. I have already said that there are quite a lot of bits of the OT that I consider to have literary merit. I am just taking issue with your stance that Genesis can be said to be one of them.
So you also negate the literary merits of the creation, of the sacrifice of Isaac, of the sale of Joseph into Egypt and his brothers' come-uppance?
I get character from the Iliad and Beowulf.
Well, ok. You seem to have a different understanding of the term from me. I explained my understanding briefly above.

When you start you approach to the flood story about four verses too early, it doesn't augur well for what follows, which includes pre-ordained complaints over the fact that the two accounts were woven together. But I'll accept that you have trouble with this fact and that you find it disturbing and you keep falling over vestiges of the threading, so it's just bad literature for you.
quite apart from anything else, any narrative flow which the original tales may have possessed has been torn to shreds by their being patched together.
It seems that the major complaint is the joining together of the two sources. This is the reason for it not being coherent to you.

I must admit having worked on the text a few times, I have separated the sources and dealt with them separately.
I have said elsewhere it's literature from another culture and you need to acclimatise yourself to it.
I don't agree. As I've pointed out, there is literature from the very same culture - example Job, Psalms Song of Solomon - whose aesthetic quality I find immediately accessible. So I think the reason I don't find any value in Genesis 3 is more that it's not there than I don't see it.
On this I'll just have to beg to differ. Understanding of are usually requires a learning curve. The best one who doesn't know the genre can do is recognize things that are similar in the art that one already knows.
What I said was that the narrative technique was simple. That doesn't mean that the content is.
In the case of genesis 3, it is, though. There's a string of events. That's it. No more. Literary quality demands more than a string of events.
This seems to be a simple negation of what I said, repeating the claim that a "string of events" cannot in itself be considered literary. And obviously I disagree with you, so why just repeat it? The choice of the events is fundamental to any narrative. That choice is literary. Why did we need the discovery of the "crime"? Why did they feel they had to hide? In fact the only part of the story I found unsatisfying is the fact that the serpent merely appears at the right time to seduce Eve and is therefore only a plot device. The serpent's seduction is interesting with its appeal to good reason, which is sadly no defence for Eve.

The hegemony of the religion is what has given us access to such stories. Access doesn't necessitate that we should be able to understand or appreciate them without considerable effort. They are glimpses from far off and require patience to find any merits they may contain. If you don't find any, that is not necessarily a reflection of the literature's lack of content. It may simply be the reader's distance from the literature.

This is a subject which I don't think can get stretched too much further. I appreciate you don't find merit in the storytelling in Genesis, whereas I do. I don't see how we can get beyond that without lengthy analyses of the texts involved and then we may not come to any agreement. As discussion of the literary merit of Genesis is not central to my activities here, I'll probably leave the subject to you to continue or conclude.


spin

[The Evil One]

This is a subject which I don't think can get stretched too much further.
You're damn right. Just to answer your other questions briefly: yes, I find the flaws in the literary style of the creation and flood present through a large proportion of genesis, for much the same reasons: jerky storytelling, endless begat-style interruptions, and skimming over the narrative far too quickly for aesthetic purposes.