VU Research Portal
Oral Performance and the Veil of Text van Veen, Ben Frits
2021
document version
Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record
Link to publication in VU Research Portal
citation for published version (APA)
van Veen, B. F. (2021). Oral Performance and the Veil of Text: Detextification, Paul's Letters, and the Testcase of Galatians 2-3.
General rights
Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.
• Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research.
• You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ?
Take down policy
If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
E-mail address:
vuresearchportal.ub@vu.nl
Download date: 19. Oct. 2021
Oral Performance and the Veil of Text
Oral P erformance and the Veil of T ext Ben F. van Veen
It is common opinion in biblical scholarship that the biblical documents functioned in a predominantly oral context dominated by the spoken word. Detexti- fication is the result of addressing the complex relation between this formally acknowledged functioning as oral performance and the daily praxis of current biblical scholarship in which these documents func- tion as autonomous texts in an ever-expanding uni- verse of text, detached from its original oral delivery.
The argument is that, in addition to the difference in media, it is crucial to differentiate the mindsets behind these media as well.
A highly literate reader in the present structures thought differently from someone in the past who is formed by oral-aural communication and whose encounter is shaped by what is anticipated by Paul in the composition of his letters. Therefore, the leading question in detex- tification is: How can a biblical scholar here-and-now relate to the text of the letters of Paul in a printed or di- gital version in such a way that he or she can understand how the apostle envisioned his original addressees to structure their thoughts in the event of delivery because of the organization of the documented wording? In short and technically speaking, How to understand how they understood? Two testcases are provided from the Letter to the Galatians (Gal 2–3). The first testcase consists of a detextified understanding of the syllogistic reasoning in Gal 3.10–12. The second testcase is on Gal 2.18–21 in which the following rhetorical strategy in the delivery is detextified: Paul is recalling the experience of baptism to counter his adversaries’ call for circumcision.
Detextification, Paul’s Letters, and the Testcase of Galatians 2–3
Ben F. van Veen
Omslagontwerp:
