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48 Structure and the Book ofZechariah
Another instance of structural treatments of the same text would be
those on the Tower of Babel story by J.P. Fokkelman1 and Isaac
M. Kikawada. 2 I believe that the same points an be made from
examining work done on any of these passages.
I have chosen to discuss work on a different passage. Exod. 6.2-8 is
an especially useful text to consider, since we have in print two treatments
by scholars at the forefront of structural studies and the comments
of each scholar on the other's work. Auffret also refers to a
suggestion of A.M. Besnard. 3 In addition, this is a passage which I
analysed independently before these essays appeared. An examination
of these three independent enquiries may therefore give us some
insight into the reliability of the methods employed.
Auffret draws attention to various words and phrases, namely:
God (vv. 2, 7, 7); (I am) YHWH (vv. 2, 3, 6, 7, 8); told (IDK + V?K)
(vv. 2, 6); to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (vv. 3, 8); know(n) (vv. 3, 7);
swore (oath) (vv. 4, 5, 8); (give) land (vv. [4], 5, 5, [8, 8]; Israelites
5, 6); Egyptians, bondage etc. (vv. 5, 6, 7).
He also characterizes each verse or part verse according to its content:
Y(HWH), O(ath), C(anaan) or E(gyptians). This seems oversimplified:
v. 3, containing Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is assigned to
Y, while that part of v. 8 containing the same three names is assigned
toC. 4
Auffret argues that rvn, vv. 4, 5, is correctly translated 'oath'
and appeals to P. Weimar's Uantersuchungen zur priesterschriftlichen
Exodusgeschichte.5 Even if that is so the actual phrases used in vv. 4-8
are different (Tina n» Tinpn, v. 4; Tra n» "ono, v. 5; T n« T«fi»,
v. 8) and it needs to be proved that the author saw these as matching
and balancing each other.
He further affirms that Besnard was right to put v. 4 to correspond
to v. 8aba since 'the recollection of the oath to give the land where
the Fathers were sojourners squares with the promise to give it to the
Israelites as patrimony'. I should like to know why we may disregard
1. Narrative Art in Genesis (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1975), pp. 11-45.
2. The Shape of Genesis 11.1-9', in Jackson and Kessler (eds.), Rhetorical
Criticism, pp. 18-32.
3. Le mystere du nom (Lectio Divina, 35; Paris: Cerf, 1962), pp. 54-56.
4. 'Literary Structure', pp. 46-47.
5. (Forschung zur Bibel, 9; Wurzburg, 1973), pp. 104-106.