Beauty,Bath and Beyond: Framing Bathsheba as a Royal Fantasy in 2 Sam 11,1-5

This paper investigates the function of beauty in David and Bathsheba’s encounter in 2 Sam 11,1-5. It argues that the female bather’s pleasant appearance, rather than simply kindling king David’s desire, focalizes the woman as sexually available (and vulnerable) and wraps the whole episode in a royal fantasy of shared intimacy. The focus on Bathsheba’s beautiful body—her wash, her motion towards the king, her self-sanctification and her pregnancy—frames the episode in a very erotic way, suggesting adultery. It conceals the sexual violence committed by the king who sends, takes and sleeps with the woman. David’s violent entitlement to Bathsheba reveals the beauty politics at play in his royal House.     

King Davidʼs Exposure while Dancing: A Queer Reading of 2 Samuel 6

According to the Hebrew version of the transport of the ark to Jerusalem in 2 Samuel 6, King David is so scantily dressed that he publicly exposes himself while dancing before G*d (????). David?s wild, gay and possibly sexual conduct can evoke associations with the behavior of gay persons of today. Queer readers may identify with David and like him turn their backs on dominant rulers—like the members of Saul?s dynasty—if they are not respected because of their queer way of life, but persecuted—as David was persecuted by King Saul. Such an interpretation implies that G*d (????) is on the side of persons like King David, who—from the point of view of other people as well as of David?s wife Michal—behave in a strange fashion, thus act queerly.     

Godot’s Shakespeare

While the connection between Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and King Lear has become something of a critical commonplace, references to other Shakespeare plays can also be found throughout. This essay traces Godot’s debt to two plays in particular. First it argues how Godot not only draws on Hamlet’s graveyard scene for macabre imagery, but how it also construes an extended meta-theatrical parody of Hamlet’s soliloquies about the contrast between acting and talking/thinking. The second half of the essay proposes a number of connections with The Tempest, and specifically with its “salvage and deformed slave” Caliban. It argues how the figure of Caliban not merely functions as a model for a colonial power-dynamic that can be seen to operate here and elsewhere in Beckett, but how Caliban is equally significant as a lyrical figure whose great speech about sleeping, waking, and dreaming informs Beckett’s play in a number of ways.     

Psalm 55 Interpreted in View of its Textual,Metatextual and Intertextual Connections

Psalms 52-55 constitute a cluster of psalms with significant links to one another, to Proverbs, and also to the history of David. Psalms 52 and 55 were both also influenced by motifs from Jer 9. These features point to their having been composed (Ps 52) or edited (Ps 55) with a specific focus in mind. This article attempts to read Psalm 55 on its own, but also within the context of the cluster and in its relationship to Jer 9 as well as David’s history in order to refine our knowledge of the problems, values, hopes and expectations of the Persian period editors who compiled and edited the cluster.     

From the Preface to the French edition of Une exigence infinie

Abstract

In 2008, Rowan Williams sparked a huge controversy in Britain by pleading for more recognition of shari'a law. The present paper aims to explore Mike Higton's suggestion that this plea actually results from Williams's defence of the Enlightenment. The paper will first show that Williams's plea for increased recognition of shari'a is in line with the Enlightenment ideal of sociability. It will subsequently show that this does not mean that Williams gives up on the importance of the secular law. Special attention will be given to the two fundamental principles behind Williams's views on shari'a and these principles will be developed with the help of Edward Schillebeeckx's view of ‘the humanum’. Finally, the paper will also indicate that Williams's two fundamental principles offer a way to better understand the biblical commandment to love one's neighbour—a view that will be developed with reference to the work of Slavoj Zizek.     

A la recherche du “récit de l'Arche”: à la recherche de Saül. De Shilo à Gibea

ABSTRACT

Depuis l'étude fameuse de Rost, le “récit de l'Arche” est devenu une unité narrative indépendante dans le premier livre de Samuel. Les travaux successifs ont toutefois peu à peu ruiné la cohérence de cette unité en lui enlevant son aboutissement avec David à Jérusalem (2 S 6) et même en la faisant commencer dès 1 S 2. S'il apparaît opportun de faire débuter le récit avant 1 S 4, pour garder le contexte de Shilo et du prêtre Éli, on peut alors tenter de le faire dès 1 S 1. Pour cela, il importe de lire le récit de naissance de ce premier chapitre non comme étant celui de Samuel mais comme celui de Saül. En effet, les indices littéraires de ce texte montrent que le nom “Samuel” ne correspond pas au contexte narratif. Or, comme Samuel est totalement absent du “récit de l'Arche”, on peut dès lors proposer une lecture des premiers chapitres sans ce personnage, pas en délimitant des unités narratives indépendantes mais en recherchant une strate rédactionnelle ancienne. De cette manière, ce “récit de l'Arche” devient bien plus un “récit d'accession au pouvoir de Saül”, récit qui nous mène de Shilo (1 S 1; 4) à Gibea (1 S 7,1; 10; 14), en passant par Rama et son voyant anonyme (1 S 9).     

卫三畏的汉学观

卫三畏是近代中关关系史上的重要人物,是美国的第一位汉学教授。他从观念形态、精神产品、生活方式等方面对中国进行了研究,认为中国是一个具有高度文明的国家,但在科学上是保守的,在生活上是落后的。     

In the Shadow of Gillian Rose: Truth as Education in the Hegelian Philosophy of Rowan Williams

Rowan Williams, ex-Archbishop of Canterbury (2002–2012), is a polymath of remarkable breadth and depth. But there remains at least one area in which his philosophical work has gone relatively unacknowledged and that is his view of education. My aim here is to explore a philosophically nuanced notion of truth as education in his work by examining its indebtedness to Hegel, and the recent Hegelianism of Gillian Rose. I argue that not only does a radical re-reading of the negative by Williams shape a formidable social and political critique but that therein the question of the Absolute is renewed in and for our time as one of learning.