廣義修辭學下的聖經敘事──《以斯帖記》一章為例

Biblical Narrative from the Perspective of Generalized Rhetoric: Analysis of the Chapter One in the Book of Esther

《聖經》中的敘事文體占了《聖經》的40%。對於讀者而言，如何閱讀聖 經敘事是至關重要的問題。然而，長久以來聖經敘事，特別是《希伯來聖經》 中的敘事，常常被讀者們所忽略。這個忽略並非因為聖經敘事難以理解，而是 因為聖經敘事的內容像是小說一樣引人入勝，內容充滿著情節的高潮迭起，反 而造成讀者難以摸透作者想要傳達的道理。反倒是讀者容易明白《聖經》中的 書信文體，儘管有著較多的邏輯推論與命題，但是讀者知道作者想要論證或是 表達的內容。因此，本文想要提出從廣義修辭學的意義下來詮釋聖經敘事，把 一般讀者認為常見於書信文體中的修辭勸說擴展到聖經敘事裡面。筆者會提出 詹姆士費倫的修辭性敘事理論，特別因著它能有效解釋「作者說服」與「讀者 認同」的發生，並且在分析聖經敘事時有著可操作性強的優勢。最後會列舉 《希伯來聖經》中的《以斯帖記》一章，作為分析的例子。

 

The narrative style of the Bible accounts for forty percent of the Bible. For readers, how to read the narrative of the Bible is the most important thing. However, Biblical narrative (especially those in the Old Testament) has been ignored by readers for a long time. This ignorance is not because the Biblical narrative is difficult to understand, but because the Biblical narrative is like novels which are full of plots and tensions. Thus, it is difficult for readers to understand what the author wants to convey to his readers. Instead, it is easy for readers to understand the Epistles of the Bible which are full of logical arguments and statements. Therefore, this article intends to explain the Biblical narrative from the perspective of generalized rhetoric, and extends the rhetorical persuasion which is thought to be common in Epistles by readers into Biblical narrative. James Phelan’s rhetorical narrative theory is proposed, which can effectively explain the occurrence of “persuasion” and “reader identification”; besides, it has a maneuverable advantage in analyzing Biblical narrative. Finally, an example of analysis from the book of Esther is presented.