Abstract

SPOELSTRA, Joshua Joel. An Inverted Type-Scene? Setting Parameters around a Jacob Cycle Sister-Wife Story. Old testam. essays [online]. 2021, vol.34, n.3, pp.681-695. ISSN 2312-3621.  http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2312-3621/2021/v34n3a3.

The sister-wife episodes in Genesis (Gen 12:10-20; 20:1-18; 26:1-13) are well documented in biblical scholarship. Occasionally, an equivalent story in the Jacob cycle (Gen 25-35) is proffered. This essay investigates the tenability of such a proposal. The primary contribution is setting parameters around the proposed germane fourth story, through integrative exegetical methodologies, to properly assess the smattering of resonant motifs common between Gen 29-31 and the standard type-scene. By bracketing the texts anterior and posterior to the sister-wife stories, a common preface and postface emerge: a wife-at-the-well type-scene and the form-critical element of covenant-making, respectively. With this exegetical framing in place, the numerous motifs in the Jacob cycle-typically crafted via inversion- shared with the other sister-wife stories is cogent enough to conclude that there is a viable case of an inverted sister-wife type-scene in Gen 29-31. Furthermore, a hypothetical rationale for its literary inversion is elaborated.

Keywords : Jacob; Sister-wife; Type-scene; Inversion; Laban; Methodology.

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