Review Melanchthon / Whitaker (eds.): Terror in the Bible

Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon / Robyn J. Whitaker (eds.) Terror in the Bible Rhetoric, Gender, and Violence Foreword by Phyllis Trible (International Voices in Biblical Studies, 14) Atlanta: SBL Press 2021 246+xiv pp., USD 35.00 (paperback) / USD 55.00 (hardcover) ISBN 9781628374216 Free download: https://www.sbl-site.org/assets/pdfs/pubs/9781628375008_OA.pdf Stefan Silber (2022) The title of the book alludes to an exegetical classic from 1984. In Texts of Terror, the exegete Phyllis Trible analyzed four narratives in the Hebrew Bible in which women suffer terror, and which can still trigger fear and horror in readers today. Trible exam- ined the texts without glossing them over, placing the perspective of the raped and murdered women at the center of her analysis and wrestling with the texts in the hope of wringing a blessing from them despite everything, which could also give hope to the abused women among today's readers. In her preface to the present book, Trible recalls the antecedents and aftermath of her book and shows how this new anthology is in continuity with her own work. She also makes clear that the twelve authors of the new volume are working on new questions, contexts, and challenges on the basis she provided and welcomes this further development. She is to be agreed with in every respect: "Terror in the Bible" not only examines old and new biblical "texts of terror", but also brings numerous new and current contextual perspectives into play, through which the volume irradi- ates red-hot actuality. It also provides a series of suggestions, models, and methods for approaching the horror of these terror texts and wringing blessings from them for the abused, while at the same time using texts of the Bible to expose, prophetically critique, and offer healing resistance to the multifaceted terror of the present. In the introductory first chapter, editors Melanchthon and Whitaker explain the vari- ous relationships that can arise between terror and text: Bible texts can narrate and even legitimize (only sometimes ostensibly) horrific violence. They have been mis- used for violence and terror, and they can also trigger violent trauma in the reader, who makes connections that are not intended in the text. Exegesis and biblical pas- toral ministry must be prepared to react to such and other terror constellations. In ad - dition, biblical texts speak to different contexts such as sexism and patriarchy, the di- versity of sexual identities and practices, postcolonial constellations and racism, and other forms of exclusion and the exercise of power. The book was edited in Australia, and much of the writing also reflects Australian and Pacific contexts. However, there are also contributions from other continents. Overall, the diversity of contexts helps to transfer the basic provocations of the book to other contexts as well. Therefore, read- ing the book is also worthwhile in Germany. In the next two chapters, the narrative of the murder of the Midianite chieftain's daughter Kosbi (Num 25) is examined from various perspectives. Laura Griffin reads the text against the background of Australian colonial history and draws attention to the fact that the apparently consensual relationship between the daughter of a chief and an Israelite is punished by death, apparently to preserve the ethnic identity of the conquerors. In Num 31, however, the enslavement and rape of the underage (unmar- ried) Midianite girls is explicitly permitted: Their subordinate social position does not allow them to become a threat to male identity. In her contribution, Karen Eller reads the same story from a queer perspective and highlights voids and ambiguities that, read in an imaginative way, allow us to discover a pleasurable recognition of queer sexuality. In her study, Rachelle Gilmour intensifies one of Phyllis Trible's four analyses: she re- veals that in the narrative of Tamar’s rape by her brother Amnon (2 Sam 13), Absa- lom does not listen to his sister either, but only follows his own agenda. Nor does the narrator himself listen to Tamar: only we as readers have the possibility to let her speak. Gerald West comes to a similar conclusion in his analysis of the Ahitophel narrative: The sexual and patriarchal violence of this narrative remains unreflected on the level of the text and can only be revealed by the readers. Dorothy Lee presents many different interpretations of the questions of “pure” and “impure” in Mk 7 from four perspectives: She believes that the plurality of interpreta- tions is highly significant, especially for feminist and other critical and inclusive read- ings. David Tombs also confronts a New Testament text and reads the passion nar- ratives as “texts of terror”: Aware of the historical practice of crucifixion by the Roman world power, the dehumanizing violence that is only hinted at in these texts can be brought into conversation with terror, sexual violence, and torture in the present, and the salvific death of Jesus can be seen in a new light. Angela Sawyer places her analysis of the biblical “Daughter Zion” in the context of family violence in Australia and asks how contemporary daughters, mothers, and widows today are moved by the violence Deutero-Isaiah associates with Daughter Zion. Robyn J. Whitaker establishes relationships between Queen Jezebel in 1/2 Kings and the early Christian prophetess the author of Revelation polemically calls by that name (Rev. 2) and evaluates this polemic as rhetorical sexual violence. The con- tribution of Adela Yarbro Collins on the ministries of women in the New Testament and the early centuries is interesting but falls outside the scope here. The last three chapters bring biblical narratives into a fruitful and sometimes horrify - ing dialogue with contemporary terror contexts: Brent Pelton connects the egregious sexual violence against the unnamed woman in Ri 19 with the slave-like labor of mi- grant farm workers in Australia. Jione Havea asks about the rights and dignity of women of different contexts today considering the discussion of the inheritance rights of the five sisters in Num 27, and Monica Melanchthon reads the narrative of Jeph- thah's daughter (Judg. 11) in juxtaposition to an autobiographical account of an In- dian Dalit who understands himself as "the son of a whore" (216). Through this life account, Melanchthon uncovers psychological motifs in the Jephthah story that do not whitewash or justify the terror of his daughter's sacrifice, but place it within a broader social, political, and colonial framework and thereby are able to reveal the terror inherent in these structures. These three chapters also have in common that they use narrative and other literary elements beyond the academic method. Also, in the other contributions of the book it becomes clear again and again that the interpretation of terrible texts and dehuman- izing contexts often requires the use of alternative exegetical methods to follow the often-necessary changes of perspective and to fill lacunae of the texts creatively. The methodological diversity of the contributions impresses and encourages a more con- fident approach to exegetical methodology. "Terror in the Bible" is no light fare, for the book not only confronts cruel texts and vi- olent structures, but also requires the reader to confront the structures of violence and terror in his or her own context and to confront them with the biblical text. Each contribution to the book proves – often even several times – that it is possible to wrest a blessing from the biblical texts of terror by consistently adopting the perspec- tive of the abused. The text of the book is available online for free download. It is to be hoped that the book will also carefully be read in the German-speaking world, because it draws at- tention to global exegetical developments that are not naturally accessible in Ger- man. Not least in the context of coming to terms with the many abuse scandals in the church, but also in connection with other global and family structures of violence, op- pression and terror, this unusual view of the Bible is very helpful. translated from Stefan Silber’s review in bbs 4.2022 https://www.bibelwerk.de/fileadmin/verein/buecherschau/2022/Melanchthon_Terror.pdf