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Oral Performance and the Veil of Text
van Veen, Ben Frits
2021
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van Veen, B. F. (2021). Oral Performance and the Veil of Text: Detextification, Paul's Letters, and the Testcase
of Galatians 2-3.
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Table of contents
Preface 3
Table of contents 5
Introduction 9
A. Text and an emerging communis opinio in biblical scholarship 9 1. Confusion of roles: Reader and/or historian? 11 Caution to the reader #1: To give priority to the historian 13 2. The communication model: Sender, message, and addressee 14 3. Umberto Eco: “What one calls ‘message’ is usually a text” 15 4. Media muddle: The implicit equation of “letter” and “text” 16 B. Hypothesis (1): Two different media functionings at issue 17 Caution to the reader #2: The level of text and textualization 17 C. “Oral performance”: Preliminary considerations 18 1. Parlance: “Public reading” and “reading” 19 2. Public reading and the crucial role of the body 20 3. The importance of the study of oral tradition 21 4. Ancient literacy in the first-century Mediterranean world 22 5. Contemporary orality and a predominantly oral mindset there-and-then 23 6. Recapitulation: Oral performance 25 D. “Text”: Preliminary considerations
1. Corpus Paulinum: Some text from the start 26 2. Illustrations: The “text” of the “New Testament” 26 3. Textual criticism: Ausgangstext and “text” 27 4. Text: The necessary media to transmit a dead language 29 5. Etymology of text: Between textum and text-as-known-to-us 29 6. Paul Ricoeur: The emancipation of text 30 Caution to the reader #3: The Galatians as knowing subjects in actu – not the reader 34 Caution to the reader #4: Detextification and textification 34
7. Recapitulation: Text 35
E. Hypothesis (2): Media and mindsets – to understand how they understood 36 F. Detextification: How to get before the letter functioning as text to us? 37
3. The Platonic state of mind and text 54 E. Walter Ong: Coming to grips with different mindsets 55 1. Oral residue: “Text” in need of historicization 55 2. Ancient rhetoric as speech art 57 3. “Meaning” and the text area 58 4. Memorizing over against analyzing 60 5. The golden rule of Walter Ong 62
F. Conclusions 65
2. Pauline scholarship and oral performance, but what about “text”? 68 A. Werner Kelber: The Oral and the Written Gospel 68 B. Paul Achtemeier: OMNE VERBUM SONAT 73
Excursus: Silent reading in antiquity? 78
C. Pieter Botha: Letter Writing and Oral Communication in Antiquity 82 D. Louis Martyn: Events in Galatia 85 E. Joanna Dewey: Textuality in an Oral Culture: Pauline Traditions 89 F. Arthur Dewey: A Re-Hearing of Romans 10.1–15 94 G. Casey Davis: Oral Biblical Criticism 96 H. David Rhoads: Biblical Performance Criticism 102 I. Bernhard Oestreich: Performanzkritik der Paulusbriefe 109 J. Larry Hurtado: Oral Fixation and New Testament Studies? 113 K. Glenn Holland: “Delivery! Delivery! Delivery!” 127 L. Conclusions
3. Detextifying Paul’s letters 136
A. Textualing history
1. Textualizing text hic et nunc pro nobis 141 2. Textualizing oral performance illic et tunc pro eis 154
B. Historicizing text 164
C. Infographic 165
D. Conclusions 167
4. Detextification: Testcases in Galatians 2–3 170 A. Example 1: How does Paul reason in Gal 3.10–12 171 1. Moisès Mayordomo: Argumentiert Paulus logisch? 171 2. Michael Bachmann: Zur Argumentation von Galater 3.10-12 176 3. An alternative grasp: Gal 3.10–12 as enthymematic reasoning 179 B. Example 2: Freischwebende theology or rhetorical strategy in Gal 2.18–20? 204 1. Hans Dieter Betz: Galatians (Hermeneia) 206 Excursus: Ancient rhetorical sources and oral performance 210 2. Richard Longenecker: Galatians (WBC) 212 3. Louis Martyn: Galatians (AB) 214 4. Martinus de Boer: Galatians (NTL) 218 5. Detextified understanding: The recall of baptism countering the call to
C. Conclusions 233
Conclusions 237
A. A new perspective on “text” 237
1. Detextification avant la lettre: Louis Martyn and David Rhoads 238 2. Implicit equation of “letter” and “text”: Larry Hurtado and Joanna Dewey 239 3. The turn from production to product:
Paul Achtemeier and Richard Longenecker 240 B. “Text”: The present portal to representation 241 1. Abstraction and the abstracted context which comes with autonomous text 242 2. “Interpretation,” “performance,” and “hermeneutics”:
Freischwebend or historical? 243
C. “Text” and “context” 244
1. Relating presence and representation: Textualizing history 244 2. In our presence coming to representation of their presence: Historicizing text 245 D. Detextification: How, to whom, what mindset, and whose perspective[s]? 246 1. Anticipated participation and abstraction 247 2. Explicit parts and implicit whole: Metonymy and collective memory 247 3. A reversed example: Reading the letter as autonomous text 249 4. Paul and other teachers: Rhetoric and counter rhetoric 249 5. Counter rhetoric: Negative rhetoric, rhetoric of confusion, and Umdeutung 250 E. In the end: There is always manifestation in the realm of history 252
Bibliography 254
Summary 270
Samenvatting 272
