How does a biblical narrative shape the life and action of its readers ? This question is receiving a wide interest in contemporary theology. Reading the 'Bible as literature' has provided a renewed interest in the creation of meaning in biblical narrative. Moreover, there is a current of narrative theology and ethics, which views human life and action as a form of narrative. narrative is approached through the philosophy of Paul Ricoeur. The narrative theory of this hermeneutic philosopher offers (...) the means for comprehending the formative force of narrative, as well as the limits of narrative figuration. Ricoeur's interest in the relation between narrative and ethics and his view of the tensions between text and reader are applied to an interpretation of the biblical Joseph narrative from Genesis. The results of this interpretation are used to treat problems of narrative ethics and narrative theology. similarities between biblical narrative and the narrative of one's life, a narrative does not answer all problems for its readers. As a story of reconciliation and providence the Joseph narrative makes a strigent appeal of transformation to its readers. It is up to the reader to answer this call by reading for good. (shrink)

Although Paul Ricoeur's writings are widely and appreciatively read by theologians, this book offers a full, sympathetic yet critical account of Ricoeur's theory of narrative interpretation and its contribution to theology. Unlike many previous studies of Ricoeur, Part I argues that Ricoeur's hermeneutics must be viewed in the light of his overall philosophical agenda, as a fusion and continuation of the unfinished projects of Kant and Heidegger. Particularly helpful is the focus on Ricoeur's recent narrative theory as the context in (...) which Ricoeur deals with problems of time and the creative imagination; and it becomes clear that narrative stands at the crossroads of Ricoeur's search for the meaning of human being as well as his search for the meaning of texts. Part II examines the potential of Ricoeur's narrative theory for resolving certain theological problems, such as the dichotomy betweens the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. (shrink)

The Qur’an has told the stories of many prophets and past tribes in order to convey the message it wants to give to its addressee. The Qur’an has narrated the stories that were narrated in the Bible in accordance with its purpose, by correcting the distorted points and without going into the details reported in the ‘Kutub-i al-Qadim’. One of the stories told in both the Qur’an and the Bible is Dawoud (David) and the plaintiffs. In this study, (...) the story of Dawoud and the plaintiffs deals with the evaluation of the story of Davud and the plaintiffs and the opinions expressed in the interpretation of the story in the context of Mushkil al-Quran al-Karim. From the earliest times to the present day, commentators have adopted different interpretations of the story of Dawoud and the plaintiffs. Some commentators, taking into account the literal meaning of the verses, interpret the verses based on the fact that the case described in the story is real. On the other hand, some interpret the parable based on the assumption that the case event expresses a representative expression, not a genuine event. The commentators who adopt this understanding are also divided into two as those who interpret the tale over the narrated narrations and those who interpret the tale over wording. The main reason why commentators adopt different interpretations of the tale is that the narrations about the background of the tale, primarily from the Bible, whether to be accepted or not. It is stated that the different opinions expressed in the article by the commentators, whom we have included in the classification, with the fear that they will harm the authority of prophethood, are difficult for the understanding of the story. In this article, different works that emerged according to the interpretation style of the commentators will be resolved in the context of the interpretations made by the same commentators. (shrink)

Introduction: beyond reason and revelation -- Pt. I. Reading Hebrew scripture -- Ch. 1. The structure of the Hebrew Bible -- Ch. 2. What is the purpose of the Hebrew Bible? -- Ch. 3. How does the Bible make arguments of a general nature? -- The philosophy of Hebrew scripture: five studies -- Ch. 4. The ethics of a shepherd -- Ch. 5. The history of Israel, Genesis-kings: a political philosophy -- Ch. 6. Jeremiah and the problem (...) of knowing -- Ch. 7. Truth and being in Hebrew scripture -- Ch. 8. Jerusalem and carthage -- Pt. III. Conclusion -- Ch. 9. God's speech after reason and revelation -- Appendix: what is "reason"? some preliminary remarks. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 62.3 (2001) 463-482 [Access article in PDF] The "Antiquarianization" of Biblical Scholarship and the London Polyglot Bible (1653-57) Peter N. Miller The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were the heroic age of the antiquaries. Roaming from text to context and back again, these scholars completed the revolution begun by the humanists who realized that Greek and Roman texts could never be understood isolated (...) from the men and societies that made them. These scholars, from Petrarch to Poggio, from Panvinio to Peiresc to Perizonius, looked beyond the page and collected, described, and compared the material remains of the ancient world. That these investigations transformed the understanding of the past and effected a revolution in the method of historical inquiry was insisted upon by Arnaldo Momigliano beginning half a century ago. 1 In recent years these antiquaries have also attracted the attention of historians of early modern art, science, archaeology, politics, and scholarship. 2 [End Page 463]This renewed focus on antiquaries as agents of late humanism has tended to concentrate on their contribution to understanding ancient Greece and Rome, but they were also responsible for the first generation of serious scholarship about the ancient and modern Near East. Drawing on the same methods to ask the same questions they had asked of classical antiquity these antiquaries directed their attention to the extra-European world. Like the study of the earlier Renaissance of Greece and Rome, that of Israel and Egypt was stimulated by a profusion of new materials, streaming back to scholars' studies from the missionaries, merchants, and diplomats traveling to the Ottoman East in greater and greater numbers. It is breadth of inquiry that characterizes this new approach--more texts in more languages--but also a much greater explanatory weight placed on objects as evidence and more confidence in using knowledge provided by people presently living in far-away places to shed light on those who lived there long ago. In this approach to a region and its culture as a whole early modern antiquaries created oriental studies.Because so much of the contemporary interest in the Near East was driven by the ingrained association of these lands and their peoples with the history narrated in the Bible, early oriental studies is inseparable from biblical scholarship. Pietro della Valle's letters from the East were, after all, signed "Il Pellegrino," and Fabri de Peiresc's efforts to recover the Samaritans and their history were triggered by his desire to contribute to the publication of their Pentateuch. It is because oriental studies like these were shaped by the ways and means of antiquaries that so much seventeenth-century biblical scholarship can be described as having been "antiquarianized." Like the earlier humanists who had given Virgil and Horace a context, those fascinated and obsessed with understanding every jot and tittle of the sacred text turned to the Bible's context for help: the history of the ancient Near East as it could be reconstructed from texts, objects, and the long-lived traditions preserved by marginal groups like the Samaritans or in out of the way places like the Coptic monasteries of Wadi Natrûn. This antiquarianization reflects the move from the word to the world that had begun with Petrarch. Early modern sacred philologists--the Englishman Thomas Fuller called this figure "The True Church Antiquary"--set out to prove, by the most sophisticated methods available, that sacred history was historical.At the heart of this inquiry lay a belief in historia sacra, understood as both a theory of providential history and a methodology of historical scholarship. The theory gave them the confidence to pursue with reason the truth of revelation because all had to reflect the plan of the One Creator. The practice encouraged scholars to recruit the evidence of history, philosophy, archaeology, and geography to the service of the sacred, all confirming the triumph of Christianity. They [End Page 464] were convinced that erudition could only amplify, and not undermine, the conclusions already reached by faith. 3 It was this... (shrink)

There are many narrations about the Stories of the Prophets in basic hadith, tafsir and historical sources. In addition to the Qur'an, some information about the stories of the prophets is contained in the Torah and the Bible. The stories of the Prophet were known to Jews and Christians before the advent of Islam. Even the Arabs of the jahiliyyah period had some knowledge about the parables. When the revelation about the stories of the Prophet was revealed, the polytheists (...) were extremely disturbed by it and "esâtîru'l-evvelîn" was used to describe these stories as the tales of the past tribes. Apart from the verses in the Qur'an about the stories of the Prophet, both the hadiths in the hadith sources and the narrations in the historical sources, some of this information was authentic information, while some of it consisted of fabricated information. Among these narrations, there are weak narrations such as Isrâiliyyât, as well as sound ones. It is important how the authors who wrote the works of Kasasu'l-Enbiyâ were affected by the hadiths in the main sources and whether they included these narrations in their works. Therefore, in this study, some hadiths related to the Stories of the Prophets in the Kitâbu'l-Anbiyâ section of Sahîhu'l-Bukhârî, which is one of the most important hadith works and accepted as the most reliable book after the Qur'an, were tried to be examined. In particular, some narrations that the authors of Kasasu'l-Enbiyâ's works were not included in their works, although they were mentioned in Sahîhu'l-Bukhârî, were discussed. In fact, there are many hadiths related to the subject in Sahihu'l-Bukhari. However, in this study, six narrations that were not mentioned by the authors of history, tafsir and Kasasu'l-Anbiya were mentioned. While referring to the aforementioned narrations, no analysis of the hadiths was made in order not to go beyond the scope of the subject and not to exceed the limits of the study. The reasons why these narrations are not references in the Kasasu'l-Anbiya literature are emphasized. Thus, these narrations, which are not mentioned in Kasasu'l-Enbiya's works but are mentioned in the Kitabu'l-Anbiyâ section of Sahîhu'l-Bukhârî, are examined and their source status for the stories of the Prophet is examined. (shrink)

The sciences of recitation and hadith are like two parts of a whole that ensures the safe transmission of the two basic sources of religion. Each discipline has its own basic conditions for the establishment of the security of information transfer. In the science of hadith, narrations are divided into two as mutawatir and ahad, according to the number of narrators. According to the number of the narrators of each layer who provide the transmission of Ahad news, it was determined (...) as meshur, azîz and garîb, and the conditions of soundness were created to determine the accepted or rejected ones. Hese two branches of science had similar and different conditions. Memorizing the texts has been the main assurance in the transmission of the Qur'an and hadith from generation to generation. On the other hand, it is seen that the change of the Torah and the Bible is a result of not being memorized and preserved only in the books. The warning about staying away from avoiding mushafi in the transmission of the Qur'an; and the sahafi in the transmission of the hadith has brought to the fore the scholars who have deepened in these sciences and have a strong memory. The condition of soundness/acceptance, which is the correctness of the proof in the science of recitation, expresses a multidimensional reality of meaning, which also includes the condition that there should be no disconnection between the narrators in the science of hadith. In the study, first of all, the sound conditions of the science of recitation were examined in detail under separate headings. Secondly, the sound conditions of the science of hadith are explained. Finally, the sound conditions used by these two disciplines in the transmission of the narration and the related issues are discussed from a comparative perspective. (shrink)

Narrative theology emphasizes the overall aim and recounting of God's ways revealed in Scripture and ongoing in history. An exploration of 1 and 2 Peter from this perspective accentuates the theological role of these short letters in shaping the identity of God's people.

The correct understanding of the Qurʾān verses is possible by examining the concepts in them linguistically and revealing the meaning they express in the integrity of the Qurʾān. The verb “h-m-m” is one of these concepts. This verb has been used as sulasi mucerred in a total of seven verses in Āl-i 'Imrān 3/122, al-Nisāʾ 4/113, al-Māʾidah 5/11, at-Tawba 9/13, 74, Yūsuf 12/24, al-Mu'min 40/5. In our study, the aforementioned verses in which the verb “h-m-m” is used, have been examined (...) through the sources of tafsir and based on the meaning of the mentioned word in the unity of the Qurʾān, the verse of "Woman had tend to him. He also tended to the woman. If he had not seen the proof of his Lord. This is what We did to drive away evil and immorality from him. Surely, he is one of Our sincere servants." (Yūsuf 12/24) has been analyzed. First of all, information about the verb “h-m-m” was given within the scope of the conceptual framework, then it was emphasized that in which verses the related verb is used and how it can be considered within the context of the verse in Yūsuf Surah and narrations about revelation reasons of this verse. In the context of the relevant verse, the views in the "Manar Tafsir" have been handled separately since it differs from almost all commentaries in terms of approach. Although it is examined how the relevant verse in Yūsuf Surah is handled in the Bible, this aspect of the subject has not been mentioned because it will not contribute to our study and because of the limited structure of the article. In the handling of our subject, as a method, the integrity of the Qurʾān within the scope of the verb “h-m-m”, the narrations about the revelation reasons and the context of the verse were taken as basis. The aim of our study is to reveal what is meant by the verb “h-m-m” in the mentioned verse, based on the uses of the verb in the Qurʾān and considering the context of the relevant verse and narrations about its revelation reasons. In this context, it can be said that the verb “h-m-m” in the relevant verse of Yūsuf Surah means to decide and attempt an attack in connection with sexual impulses. (shrink)

This critical reading/dialogue follows a straightforward structure. Firstly, it presents some of the major insights in J.D. Crossan’s book, attending to its inner logic on his critique on the violence which little by little creeps into the biblical texts. Secondly, it engages in a critique of his reading of Revelation, which is Crossan’s starting point for his discussion on violence. He observes here a direct contradiction with the Jesus of history, centre of interpretation for Scripture. This article points to certain (...) lacunae in his reading of Revelation and, finally, moves to a conclusion offering new ways to interpret and question Revelation’s violent imagery within its own literary context.Contribution: This article is a critical dialogue with one of J.D. Crossan’s latest books: How to Read the Bible and Still Be a Christian: Struggling with Divine Violence From Genesis Through Revelation. This is a vibrant and insightful book about how violence ultimately crept into the canonical texts, tainting even its ‘good news’. Crossan’s concern with this crude violence surfaces as he teaches different groups and he is asked why the Bible ends in Revelation on such a violent note, essentially with ‘a war to end all wars’, somehow buttressing the ‘myth of redemptive violence’. The special focus of this article resides thus on a nuanced reading of Revelation which tries to understand, in context, the function of such violent images. (shrink)

Jesus' healing, preaching, and death are not about abstractions like “patriarchal system,” but seek to establish new patterns of personal relationship and human solidarity among all women and men, bringing liberation and healing even to those at the margins of society.

For several decades, research on situated cognition and affectivity has neglected cases in which environmental features in the niche have a negative impact on agents’ cognitive and affective wellbeing. Recently, however, a new research cluster has emerged that explores how things, technologies, and organisational systems across corporate, healthcare, and educational sectors wrongfully harm certain kinds of agents. This article contributes to this research cluster by integrating work on negative niche construction, structural oppression, enculturation, and self-narration. It thereby offers a (...) new perspective on the negative, structurally oppressive impact of the socio-culturally shaped niche on enculturated self-narration. The main argument is that master plots, understood as narrative arrangements that dominate in the socio-culturally shaped niche, contribute to the structural oppression of enculturated self-narrators with systematically undermined socio-cultural identities. An analysis of the influence of pronatalist master plotting on enculturated self-narration serves to illustrate and strengthen the overall argument. (shrink)

The primary narrative problem of the analyst is, then, not how to tell a normative chronological life history; rather, it is how to tell the several histories of each analysis. From this vantage point, the event with which to start the model analytic narration is not the first occasion of thought—Freud's wish-fulfilling hallucination of the absent breast; instead, one should start from a narrative account of the psychoanalyst's retelling of something told by an analysand and the analysand's response to (...) that narrative transformation. In the narration of this moment of dialogue lies the structure of the analytic past, present, and future. It is from this beginning that the accounts of early infantile development are constructed. Those traditional developmental accounts, over which analysts labored so hard, may now be seen in a new light: less as positivistic sets of factual findings about mental development and more as hermeneutically filled-in narrative structures. The narrative structures that have been adopted control the telling of the events of the analysis, including the many tellings and retellings of the analysand's life history. The time is always present. The event is always an outgoing dialogue. Roy Schafer is clinical professor of psychology and psychiatry at Cornell University Medical College, adjunct professor of psychology at New York University, and a supervising and training analyst at Columbia University's Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research. He is the author of A New Language for Psychoanalysis, Language and Insight, and Narrative Actions in Psychoanalysis: Narratives of Space and Narratives of Time. (shrink)

In this study, David Bordwell offers the first comprehensive account of how movies use fundamental principles of narrative representation, unique features of ...

The Bible has influenced contemporary culture both positively and negatively. The present volume is a collection of papers that were discussed at an international colloquium on the use of the Bible in Ethics in the Department of Biblical Studies at the University of Sheffield in April 1995. Participants came from many parts of the world and from different backgrounds, and the papers reflect their varied interests and the contexts in which they work. The contributors, in addition to the (...) three editors, are John Barton, Bruce Birch, Mark Brett, Mark Chapman, David Clines, Philip Davies, Cheryl Exum, Stephen Fowl, Norman Gottwald, John Haldane, Walter Houston, Sharon Ringe, Chrisopher Rowland, Lisa Sowle Cahill and Gerald West. (shrink)

The traditions about isrāʾīliyyāt that were seen almost in all the types of Islamic sciences appeared in the sources of tafsīr from early periods. These traditions that were generally used to explain the Qurʾān were seen problem and critisized by some exegetical specialists. Even though corresponding to a relative later period in the classical era, an approach was tried to put forward in view of the traditions about isrāʾīliyyāt. This methodological concern for isrāʾīliyyāt in classical period has increased and been (...) influential for many researchers from east and west to work on this issue in modern times. There has been reached to important results about the issues of the definition of isrāʾīliyyāt, the source of it, its spread in Islamic sciences, its aim of usage, the progress of these positive-negative attitudes against these traditions in historical process. But it is important to discuss some evaluations and analysis again that put forward in this process when different cases about the issue are taken into consideration. According to this, a series of problem, such as how the isrāʾīliyyāt can be defined in tafsīr, when the criticism of isrāʾīliyyāt started, whether Biqāʿī was the first exegete who made reference to Bible or not will be discussed considering relevant resources in this article.Summary: Since the early periods, isrā’īliyyāt narratives were used as a source of information in tafsīrs. These narratives, which are transmitted in various tafsīrs of the Qur’ān, one of the main sources of Islamic religion, have also taken the methodological interests of some exegete since the early periods. This interest continued in the modern period, and both Western and Eastern researchers made research on isrā’īliyyāt. Some of the findings, analyses, and claims available in researches on this subject will be reexamined in this article. The first of these is the problem of the definition of isrā’īliyyāt. In contemporary research, inclusive definitions are made for isrā’īliyyāt, seen in all sources. These definitions do not allow for a refined description of isrā’īliyyāt which is handled in terms of different intentions in the sources of each different field and which varies in terms of the issues it covers, leading to the underestimation of some of its aspects in relevant fields. In the definitions, it is stated that isrā’īliyyāt is mostly learned from the Ahl al-Kitāb, (the People of the Book) it became widespread along with Islām and it included narratives about caliphs, dynasties, and Mahdī, as well. Another issue is to be emphasized that they are fictive or mythological. In classical tafsīrs, isrā’īliyyāt is observed to be related mainly with the history of the Ahl al-Kitāb or with the subjects they know about. In the modern era, the narratives about the ancestors of the Arabs have been identified as isrā’īliyyāt. If some of the isrā’īliyyāt narratives are related to the history of Arabs, then their resource should be the historical-cultural memory of Arabs. However, as almost all Qur’ānic stories were somewhat known before the revelation period and relations with the Ahl al-Kitāb dated back to times long before the Islamic period, the claim that these narratives became widespread along with Islām should be revised. It is also problematic to emphasize the legendary nature of some of the isrā’īliyyāt and to make that as a reason to reject all. Such emphasis also leads to the underestimation of the functions of narratives in tafsīrs. In isrā’īliyyāt, tafsīr was used for i) interpreting the ambiguous words in the stories, ii) to bring evidence to the Ahl al-Kitāb, and ii) tarhīb-targhīb (encouragement-warning). These narratives can be used as a source in tafsīr unless they are explicitly falsified by the data of fields such as history, history of religions and archaeology as well as the Qur’ān and the true Sunnah. The first criticisms of isrā’īliyyāt are claimed to belong to exegete like Ibn al-‘Arabī (d. 543/148) or Ibn ‘Aṭīyah (d. 541/1147). However, criticism of isrā’īliyyāt is also observed in the tafsīrs of earlier exegete, such as al-Māturīdī (d. 333/944), al-Māwardī (d. 450/1058) or al-Ṭūsī (d. 460/1067). They do not necessarily have to use the term isrā’īliyyāt explicitly in their criticism like the later ones. If the narratives they criticize and the reasons for their criticism are the same as those of the later exegete, it will be necessary to date the criticism of isrā’īliyyāt back to the 4th Century of the Hegira. The understanding that "the expression in the story is sufficient, it is unnecessary to deal with the ambiguities; instead, it is necessary to deal with the lesson and wisdom in the story" is one of the criteria that Muḥammad ‘Abduh (d. 1905), who is deemed to be the pioneer of the strict criticism of isrā’īliyyāt in the modern period, took as basis in this criticism, is valid for the exegete of the classical period, as well. Although exegete, such as al-Ṭabarī (d. 310/923), al-Māturīdī, al-Rāzī (d. 606/1210), and Abū Ḥayyān (d. 745/1344) who had this understanding, gave place to isrā’īliyyāt, these people recognized that "these narratives were not final, binding or necessary”, indeed. The understanding that such expression in the story is sufficient, which is one of the reasons for such awareness in the classical period, seems to have turned into a strict rejection in the modern period. Another issue is the claim that Biqā‘ī (d. 885/1480) was the first exegete to systematically benefit from the Bible in tafsīr in the classical period. However, al-Daylamī (d. 593/1197) before Biqā‘ī, is also observed to have used the Old Testament systematically in tafsīr. He cited the Tanakh in his period in two ways. He either directly quoted from the translation of Tanakh or the Hebrew text written in Arabic letters. Another exegete who used the Tanakh as a source in his tafsīr was al-Ṣafadī (d. 696/1296). He enriched his tafsīr with systematic quotations from the Tanakh. Therefore, the use of the Bible as a source of interpretation in the classical period should not be started with Biqā‘ī. The reason why the pioneer exegete of the classical period did not directly use the Bible is claimed to be the fact that they falsified it and deemed the isrā’īliyyāt narrated from the predecessors to be more reliable. However, it is known that a significant portion of the isrā’īliyyāt, which was orally transferred from the predecessors, is based on written sources, particularly including the apocryphal texts. So just like the Bible, isrā’īliyyāt, which was orally transferred from the predecessors, is problematic in terms of authenticity. This allows us to argue that classical exegete have an inconsistent attitude, indeed. On the other hand, when we take into account the fact that classical exegetes criticize these narratives from time to time and believe that they are not final or binding, the problem of potential inconsistency disappears. Accordingly, they did not deem chain transmission of these narratives from the predecessors by reliable transmitters to be a sufficient reason for their acceptance and adoption for good and all. (shrink)

This study casts light on how the issue of childlessness is portrayed in the Bible. The discussion begins with a commentary on Michal’s story, which provides the foundation for further reflection on how childlessness was dealt with in the biblical world, especially in the situations where no miraculous divine solutions were provided. Several humanly devised solutions, acceptable and practiced in the ancient world are presented. The last part of the paper focuses on the more eschatological view of human existence (...) provided in the New Testament, showing that childlessness is a form of suffering included in the promise of redemption brought about by the inauguration of God’s kingdom. As such the response of the redeemed community is to be characterized by love and compassion. (shrink)

This article proposes a periodisation of the narrative work of Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986). Two meta-literary notions guide the first period: that of an absolute text and that of a text governed by chance, in which the former is linked to the Kabbalah and the latter to Gnosticism. The next period, which is the focal topic of this study, is governed by the notion of figure in the biblical sense of the term. Borges introduces this notion in his 1949 essay (...) "The Mirror Of Enigmas" that summons texts by Léon Bloy, Thomas de Quincey and Novalis. Through these influences, Borges sketches a figurative poetics whose apocalyptic character situates the work thus produced in the indecision between the eschatology and the scatology. (shrink)

The first part of the book, dedicated to 'Rhetorical and Epistemological Aspects of Science Writing', addresses how scientific pursuits and methods feed into multi-level texts that generate responses within science, society, and culture.

This book gives an introduction to the various theological perspectives regarding revelation. It includes a survey of the views of liberal, evangelical, Calvinist, and Charismatic theologians. The author presents his succinct view in the last chapter.

These comments concern Bordwell’s explicit and implicit claims about cinematic authorship in his 1985 Narration in the Fiction Film. Distinctions are drawn between causal and attributionist conceptions of authorship, and between actualist and fictionalist views about the spectator’s attitude toward authorship. A key question concerns the autonomy or independence of a viewer’s competent uptake of story and narration, as opposed to its dependence on knowledge of authorship or authorial design. The example of cinematic quotation in Resnais’s Mon oncle (...) d’Amérique is used to illustrate the pertinence of the latter option. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Siren Songs: Gender, Audiences, and Narrators in the OdysseyErwin F. CookLillian Doherty. Siren Songs: Gender, Audiences, and Narrators in the Odyssey. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995. viii 1 220 pp. Cloth, $37.50.Siren Songs makes a significant contribution to feminist literature on Homer. Most importantly, Doherty is able to show in detail how the very sensibilities that make Homer appealing to the modern reader can seduce the (...) unwary into accepting the poem’s androcentric frame of reference. If her book’s ideological model based on gender and class hierarchy leads to repeated imprecisions and reductionism, this affects its argument in detail, but not in outline.Doherty’s methodology is objectivist, assumes an essentialist definition of the female, and consciously avoids positioning the Odyssey in the context of archaic Greek gender constructions. One place where she at least acknowledges that the Odyssey originated in a specific culture exposes a problem some will have with this book: “It may be objected that my conclusions are hardly surprising given the aristocratic focus of early Greek epic and the patriarchal norms of archaic Greek society. In this context, it may be urged, the surprise is to see lower-class and female characters even this fully represented” (170). She responds that her conclusions refute arguments by Farron and Rose that in giving prominence to female and lower-class characters Homer makes an antiaristocratic statement. This tactic runs the risk of reducing her own efforts to a book-length refutation of a pair of articles.Many Homerists will also be surprised to read that “the production and reception of a narrative text is never a direct act of communication between the author and the external audience but a ‘bracketed’ or mediated communication” (87). Thus, the poem’s external audience is not “composed of living human beings, who have read and judged the epic since its creation, but... a hypothetical audience posited by the epic narrator” (19). Further, no true repetition exists in literature (182–83). These assertions derive from critical approaches to the modern novel, and although true to a certain extent of all literature they are arguably least true of poetry composed in performance using metrical formulae.Chapter 1 surveys scholarship on whether Penelope recognizes Odysseus before the mnesterophonia. Doherty argues that Penelope’s motivation remains obscure because of an accumulation of narrative indeterminacies created by multiple focalization (45–46; though cf. her apparent assumptions on 143). She lauds Felson-Rubin and Winkler for their insistence on regarding Penelope as an agent capable of acting in her own self-interest, and equal to her husband in metis. Yet they ultimately fail to stand outside the poem’s androcentric frame of [End Page 461] reference and to see that Penelope’s excellence is based on traits she shares with males. It thus becomes necessary to establish narrative openings that expose “instabilities within ideology” (52) or permit the reader “to project active and even subversive female subject positions” (63). Narrative redundancies serving to reinforce the androcentric frame must also be acknowledged, however, for opening the text may inadvertently render its androcentric frame more palatable.Chapters 2 and 3 reconstruct the poem’s internal and external audiences. Doherty argues that these audiences included women. Although Eumaeus’ ability to evaluate the beggar’s storytelling ability proves he is no stranger to epic performance, he “must be considered an ‘overhearer’ rather than a member of the regular audience” (72–73). Eumaeus can, however, support a very different view of class relationships in Homer: when Telemachus appears unexpectedly, Eumaeus kisses his eyes and greets him as a father greets a long-absent son, and Telemachus addresses him as atta; Eumaeus is able to buy a slave on his own; and he may have an advisory role at court since he says he used to question people claiming to have seen his master.The Nekuia is central to Doherty’s project in these chapters. Odysseus’ decision to pause after his catalogue of women divides the Nekuia “roughly along gender lines, and draws attention to the fact that the internal audience of Phaeacians is also marked for gender” (67). In her approval of Odysseus’ tale, Arete... (shrink)