How Are the Mighty Fallen?

A Dialogical Study of King Saul in 1 Samuel

Barbara Green

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 365

Copyright © 2003 Sheffield Academic Press

A Continuum imprint

Published by Sheffield Academic Press Ltd

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 0-8264-6221-9

During her term as Dean of the Graduate Theological Union, Margaret R. Miles encouraged her faculty to work more intensively with each other for a variety of purposes, including to stimulate a richer interdisciplinarity among us. One of the tangible means of promoting such a goal was her inviting us to form study groups of ‘old and new’ friends and colleagues to entertain ‘old and new’ conversations. My thinking, teaching, writing and even living has been deeply affected by my participation with such colleagues, to whom this work is dedicated: Gina Hens-Piazza, Margaret Miles, Sandra Schneiders, Martha Stortz.

Contents

Abbreviations

Introduction

1. The Deuteronomistic History and Historian

2. Introduction to Mikhail Bakhtin

3. Biblical Spirituality: Situated and Transformative Reading

Chapter 1

‘A Different Clay’: Genre Considerations and 1 Samuel 1–3

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Genre

3. Biblical Genre Considerations

4. Polzin on Genre

5. Bakhtin on Utterance

6. My Procedure

7. Exposition of Text: A Performance in Two Acts

8. Conclusions

Chapter 2

Looking Lethal: Chronotopic Representation of the Ark (1 Samuel 4–7)

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Chronotope

3. Polzin’s Contribution

4. My Procedure and Thesis

5. Exposition of Text

6. Conclusions

Chapter 3

Saul’s Skin: The Authoring of a King and a Hero (1 Samuel 8–12)

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Authoring

3. Polzin’s Contribution

4. Authoring a King(ship)

5. Summary and Conclusions

Chapter 4

Incapacity for Answerability: The Firing of King Saul (1 Samuel 13–15)

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Answerability

3. Polzin’s Contribution

4. Setting Saul’s Answerability

5. Exposition of Text

6. Conclusions

Chapter 5

At the Edge: Saul’s Discourses of Desire (1 Samuel 16–19)

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Discourse

3. Bakhtin on Polyphony

4. Polzin’s Contribution

5. My Plan

6. Exposition of Text

7. Conclusions

Chapter 6

‘Only I Am Left to Tell the Tale’: Pursuit and Escape, Surplus and Survival (1 Samuel 20–23)

1. Point of Entry

2. Bakhtin on Surplus of Seeing

3. Polzin’s Contribution

4. My Thesis

5. Exposition of Text

6. Conclusions

Chapter 7

Slung from the Hollow of a Sling: Loophole Language and the Stalking of Saul (1 Samuel 24–26)...