Yes We Can (Hyperbolize)!: Ideals, Rhetoric, and Tradition Transmission

Biblical scholars often treat idealistic expectations - for kings or eras - as “eschatological” or “messianic” expectations. Yet this sort of analysis often elides the rhetorical nature of the source texts. This article seeks to analyze the rhetoric of Obama’s first presidential campaign as a recent...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Silverman, Jason M. 1980- (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: De Gruyter 2014
In: Journal of the bible and its reception
Year: 2014, Volume: 1, Issue: 2, Pages: 263-284
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains:B Bible / Rhetoric / Hyperbola
IxTheo Classification:HA Bible
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
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Summary:Biblical scholars often treat idealistic expectations - for kings or eras - as “eschatological” or “messianic” expectations. Yet this sort of analysis often elides the rhetorical nature of the source texts. This article seeks to analyze the rhetoric of Obama’s first presidential campaign as a recent comparator, using Bormann’s Symbolic Convergence Theory and recent work on hyperbole. The results of this discussion are then applied to four sample passages from the context of Hebrew Bible to argue that idealistic or “utopian” language need not necessarily imply any of the ideas associated with messianism or millenarianism. In the final analysis this will mean that scholars must be more careful in delineating the diachronic development of ideas in ancient texts.
ISSN:2329-4434
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of the bible and its reception
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1515/jbr-2014-0017