Literary Genres (in the Bible)

LITERARY GENRES (IN THE BIBLE). - Sacred exegesis, whose "supreme norm is to discern and establish what the writer intends to say" (encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu), cannot neglect one of the most important principles of all exegesis, namely the examination of what today is commonly called literary genres, that is, "those forms of writing, governed by particular norms, in use in a given epoch and region, for the purpose of expressing one's thoughts" (G. M. Perrella, p. 88).

Indeed, the truth of a historical narrative is one thing, that of a poem another, that of a parable another; not without a smile does one think of those pilgrims who on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho, already from the 4th century, venerated the inn of the Good Samaritan, or of those Christians of past times who awaited a millennial kingdom of Christ on earth, and also, in the profane field, of the indignation of J. J. Rousseau in accusing La Fontaine of having taught falsehood to little children.

No one, in truth, has ever doubted the existence of various literary genres in the Bible; but there has been some hesitation in admitting it in the books that the Bible presents to us in the form of historical narrative. Since rationalist exegetes abused this to assimilate many biblical narratives to pagan myths or to profane fables devoid of any historical value, the Magisterium of the Church showed itself at first quite reserved. However, the encyclical Providentissimus (1893) promulgated the fundamental principle already formulated by St. Augustine: that the sacred author did not intend to teach the intimate nature of visible things, but wished only to give his contemporaries a popular exposition corresponding to the common manner of expression of those times (Enchiridion biblicum, Rome 1927, n. 106). Then the Biblical Commission in 1905 and 1909, applying the same principle to the first chapters of Genesis, admitted that sometimes the sacred author "had not intended to relate a true and properly so-called history" (loc. cit., n. 154), but rather "notitiam popularem, prout communis sensus ferebat per ea tempora, sensibus et captui hominum accomodatam" (loc. cit., n. 336). For the first time the encyclical Spiritus Paraclitus (1920) uses the words "literary genres," acknowledging the principle to be sound, provided no abuse is made of it; it admits, that is, literary genres with which the complete and perfect truth of the divine word can be reconciled (loc. cit., n. 474). Finally the encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu (1943) does not hesitate to make the examination of literary genres one of the principal tasks of the exegete; it wisely notes that to "determine what the ancient Orientals wished to signify by their words" there do not suffice "the laws of grammar or of philology or even the context; the interpreter must furthermore, as it were, mentally return to those remote centuries of the East and clearly discern which literary genres the writers of that remote age wished to employ. For the ancient Orientals, to express their concepts, did not always use those forms or genres of speech that we use today; but rather those that were in use among the people of their times and their countries." Still more precise, the letter of the Pontifical Biblical Commission of 16 January 1948 affirms that "the literary forms of the first eleven chapters of Genesis do not correspond to any of our classical categories and cannot be judged by the standard of the modern Greco-Latin literary genres. One cannot therefore deny or affirm in a block the historicity of all those chapters without wrongly applying to them the norm of a literary genre under which they cannot be classified."

Indeed, A. Bea rightly notes (Il problema del Pentateuco, p. 124), commenting on these words, "history, in the strict, scientific sense, today is defined as the narrative of a past event, resting on documents that accurately report the fact, placing it in time and space and describing it just as it really unfolded." On the other hand, in the literature of ancient peoples and of the Egyptians, "it is rather a transmission of particular facts, in the form of annals, or a mixed presentation of facts and legends or myths, or of popular tradition transmitted orally, not in writing nor in authentic documents." Therefore the same letter of the Pontifical Biblical Commission invites the Catholic exegete to study "the literary procedures of the ancient peoples of the East, their psychology, their manner of expression, and the very notion that they formed of historical truth," a notion, adds Bea, "quite different from our Aristotelian way of reasoning and expounding" (loc. cit., p. 126).

The literary genre must therefore not be determined a priori, as if to escape difficulties, but from the study of contemporary literatures and from an in-depth examination of the book or biblical passage in question. The exegete does not have recourse to literary genre for a merely apologetic purpose; but, most respectful of the Word of God which "expresses itself through the affirmation of the hagiographer, he wishes to determine this affirmation with all possible accuracy so as not to attribute to God what God does not say.

Therefore the question of literary genre is not limited to some passage bristling with difficulties, such as the first chapters of Genesis; it extends to the whole Bible: one may say that every book has its own literary genre to be established. However, to speak of literary genre, even with regard to a historical book, does not mean denying it all historical value. That would be to forget that there are many ways of narrating history, that is, of reporting true events. Thus a portrait, the work of a great artist, can be as rich in strictly historical truth as a simple photograph, and the epic of a true poet as much as, indeed much more than, the report of a carabiniere. For example, according to the ancient canon of the Jews, the books of Joshua, of Judges, of Samuel and of Kings form part of the "prophetic" books: not that they do not report events of the past, but they do so to remind the people of Israel of the demands of God's Revelation, not to satisfy the curiosity of future scholars. One cannot deny that a correct interpretation must take this into account. Thus, far from stripping Sacred Scripture of its truth, as the rationalists of the past century had believed, a more attentive consideration of literary genres will make no few difficulties, not yet resolved, vanish, and above all will allow the true thought of the hagiographer and consequently the authentic Word of God to be determined with much greater accuracy.

Stanislao Lyonnet