Recrafting Israel: Toward an Ethnotechnical Conception of the Nation
This paper argues that the strong desire to ascribe the status of nation to the Israel of the Hebrew Bible – a tendency that makes sense in terms of how the biblical text is presented and in terms of contemporary discourse that seeks to advance theories of nations and nationalism – inevitably runs u...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Brill
2015
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| In: |
Biblical interpretation
Year: 2015, Volume: 23, Issue: 3, Pages: 316-339 |
| IxTheo Classification: | HB Old Testament ZB Sociology |
| Further subjects: | B
Israel
nation
nationalism
cyborg
myth
artifice
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| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | This paper argues that the strong desire to ascribe the status of nation to the Israel of the Hebrew Bible – a tendency that makes sense in terms of how the biblical text is presented and in terms of contemporary discourse that seeks to advance theories of nations and nationalism – inevitably runs up against a number of theoretical challenges, which compound in light of biblical Israel’s antiquity. Given these challenges, I propose an approach to the nation whereby the biblical Israel is “recrafted” according to an “ethnotechnical” dynamic: a neologistic attempt to fuse the schools of nationalist theory such that a primarily modernist social-science theory of the biblical nation of Israel still finds traction in the antiquity of ethnosymbolism and primordialism. Following Donna Haraway’s literary assertion that “myth and tool mutually constitute each other” (a statement made in calling postmodern feminists to action), I argue that myth and artifice (and myth as artifice) combine in an ethnotechnical device by which nations are called to retroactively inscribe themselves, and then to continue reinscribing themselves. Such a move simultaneously enhances our biblical readings and informs our understanding of collective identities; in short, it satisfies the strong desire.
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| ISSN: | 1568-5152 |
| Contains: | In: Biblical interpretation
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/15685152-00230A02 |