Sleeping with the Enemy: Recent Scholarship on Sexuality in the Book of Judges
Reviewing the publications of the last three decades, this article demonstrates that the period in question has been predictably marked by sharply increased attention to the sexual aspects of the book of Judges, and especially by sustained attempts to discover sexuality in the texts that had been co...
| Published in: | Currents in biblical research |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Sage
2013
|
| In: |
Currents in biblical research
|
| Further subjects: | B
Delilah
B sexual symbolism B feminist interpretation B Sisera’s assassination B Sexuality B Jephthah’s daughter B Eglon’s assassination B Judges B Jephthah’s mother B Levite’s concubine B Samson |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Electronic
|
| Summary: | Reviewing the publications of the last three decades, this article demonstrates that the period in question has been predictably marked by sharply increased attention to the sexual aspects of the book of Judges, and especially by sustained attempts to discover sexuality in the texts that had been commonly read with little to no reference to it. Refreshing as it is in many respects, this trend suffers from multiple vulnerabilities, including the exegetes’ tendency to stretch semantics of the biblical lexemes, ignore the syntactic layout and context of the discussed fragments, rely on problematic sexual symbolism, and produce interpretations that are less than edifying for contemporary Western audiences. As a result, much, although by no means all, of the recent quest for sexuality in Judges is unsustainable, as far as both the text and the reader are concerned. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1745-5200 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Currents in biblical research
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1177/1476993X12455472 |