BibleProject - How to Read the Bible Part 4: Poetry, Narrative and Prose Discourse Genres.

Episode Date: June 23, 2017

This is part 4 of our How to Read the Bible series. Jon and Tim discuss the different literary styles used in the Bible. (It's not just a history book!) In the first part of the show (0-28:00), the guys go over an example of both poetry and narrative in the Bible, Exodus 14 and 15. Its the Hebrew Exodus story told in both narrative style and then Hebrew poetry. In the second half of the show (28:00-End), Tim shares an example of prose discourse in one of Paul's epistles. Tim discusses how Paul's writing style was heavily influenced by philosophers like Seneca. This series is designed to accompany our video series on Youtube called "How to Read the Bible. You can view the accompanying video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUXJ8Owes8E Show Resources: "Introduction to Poetry" by Billy Collins Thomas Long, ​Preaching the Literary Forms of the Bible​. "Jabberwoky" by Lewis Carroll Music Credits: Defender Instrumental by Rosasharn Music Take It Easy by Beautiful Eulogy

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Hey, this is John at the Bible Project. Today on the podcast, we're going to continue our conversation in the series on how to read the Bible. So if you're like me, the Bible can get really intimidating and even confusing. And one reason is because there's different styles of writing in the Bible. So in this episode, Tim and I are going to talk about three main types of literary styles in the Bible, poetry, narrative, and prose discourse. And of the three, perhaps the hardest one is poetry. Yet poetry in the Bible is really important. One out of three chapters in the Bible is not trying to communicate content or information to you.

and what information to you. It's rather trying to create an experience that shapes how you feel and how you think. It's remarkable to me. A third of the Bible is this kind of literature. So in this episode, we break down some examples of biblical poetry, narrative, and discourse, and we talk about their differences. Here we go.

So 33% of the Bible, that's a really clean number there. Yeah, I forget with the decimals where when did it, I'm like, I did by chapters. And then I write it in these notes. I have a somewhere in my notes. Oh yeah, here it is. 502 chapters. The Bible are narrative. Oh, 387 are poetry.

Now it's not always that clean, the chapter can have both. That's true. So I tried to round up, because there are many poems that are embedded in stories. In which case, that's a narrative chapter. I didn't count it as a book. Oh, so poetry actually has a little bit more... Probably poetry, yeah.

But some poems embedded in narratives are whole chapters. So yeah. You would count that as a poetry chapter. Yeah, there's probably another dozen to 15 chapters worth of poetry embedded in small poems. In either Paul's letters, he quotes a number of poems or in other narratives. So yeah, it's probably more like 35%, maybe 36.

Okay, here's the thing with poetry. This is like the dead poet's society. Mm, you can begin with a definition. I'm gonna put that on my list to watch again. Yeah. Remember when he's drawing on the board, they have somebody read from this classic introduction to poetry and he's drawing it's like,

it's like, rip it out. He's drawing a chart and he draws talks about it and then he's like, everyone, yeah, ripping the tape out. It everyone's like, uh, okay. So here's the thing. I, we could read the Encyclopedia Britannica definition of poetry, but we should rip it out.

And we could read a sentence from one of the classic introductions to poetry by Lawrence Perrine, or we could read just an example, one of my favorite examples of the uniqueness of poetry in biblical literature. So you want to start with the example or start with the definition. The example of an actual poem. The example is actually reading a narrative that's told in the Bible,

and then right after it is told a poetic retelling of the narrative you just read. So you can see very clearly how narrative and poetry work differently. So, Exodus chapter 14, classic story, it's where the Israelites walk through the sea as in Azan dry land and Pharaoh's destroyed. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea all that night, the Lord drove back the sea with a strong east, Rwok Rwach Wind, and turned it to dry land, that all that language is echoing Genesis chapter 1. And the waters were divided. Those relights went through the sea, as on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. The Lord said to Moses, stretch your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen. And so Moses, stretch your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back

over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen. And so Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak the sea went back to its place. The Egyptians were fleeing toward it, and the Lord swept them into the sea. The water flowed back, covered the chariots and horsemen. The entire army of Pharaoh that had followed the Israelites into the sea, not one of them survived. Epic scene. So that's the character of Moses in the Israelites. The setting is the the reds the sea. The sea of reeds. The sea of reeds. Yep.

On their way into the wilderness. And the other character is Moses or Pharaoh in his army. Yeah, the conflict is the Egyptians led by Pharaoh Wana. They want to destroy the slaves that they just let go. Yeah, so they're off to go get them. And then, yeah, through Moses, God fights on Israel's behalf. And while Moses is... By taming the sea. Yeah, by taming the waters, making the waters do his bidding, just as they did.

And then the resolution is. In Genesis 1. Pharaoh gets whipped over. Traumt, yeah. So you walk away from the story going, God's creator of all things, and he's on a mission to defeat evil and rescue the helpless.

So that's the story. All right. All right. You turn the page to Exodus 15, and the Israelites sing the first worship song's the story. All right. All right. You turn the page to Exodus 15, and the Israelites sing the first worship song in the Bible, and I've just excerpted the two sections that retell the story you just read. So it opens with, you know, the Lord to my strength, my song, he's my God, I praise him, he's highly exalted. You know, he goes on, verse 4. Pharaoh's chariots and his army, he hurled into the sea.

The best of Pharaoh's officers are drowned in the sea. The deep waters covered them, they sank to the depths like a stone. Your right hand, O Lord, majestic in power, your right hand, O Lord, majestic in power, your right hand O Lord, shattered the enemy. By the blast of your nostrils, waters pile up. The surging waters were like a wall. The deep waters congeal in the heart of the sea.

You blew with your breath the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters. So epic. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Some interesting things to contrast. Well, it opens up Pharaoh's chariots and his army hurled into the sea.

Yeah. That's a very different image than what he got in the story. Right. Yep. You do get the water standing like congealing like a wall later in the pond, but in this first line it just looks like God picked them up and just threw them into the waters. Yeah, but when he says the deep waters congealed

in the heart of the sea, it evokes more emotion for me. Then when he says... Yeah, the narrative's a little clinical, it's just like, and the waters parted, you know, and they stood up like a wall on the right side. Yeah, the narrative's a little clinical, it's just like, and the water's parted, you know, and they stood up like a wall on the right. I think it's narrative can use poetic turns of phrases and stuff. All the time.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, one observation is that the poetry actually made me feel like I was there more than narrative. Oh, interesting. Yes. So it evoked your imagination more than the story. Yeah, I did. And it might have just been the way the story is written. You said it's clinical. It is a little more clinical. Because a good storytelling can do the same thing. That's true. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, God, the blasting, the blasted nostrils.

The blasted nostrils. Pile up the water. Yeah. Blast of your nostrils, you blew your breath. Yeah. And in the narrative, the description is, the Lord drove the sea back with a strong wind. Yeah. It's the same word, breath or wind, Rua. Right. And it's God doing it, but nostrils. Yeah.

And blowing. Yeah. Yeah. It's connecting more ideas. Mm-hmm. I mean, that's, so, okay, yeah, sup poetry. Here, there's one more ideas. I mean, that's so, okay, yeah, so poetry. Here, there's one more. Who's hand is most important in the narrative?

Oh, yeah, Moses. Moses stretched out his hand. Yeah. And then God says, stretch out your hand. And Moses stretched out his hand. So three times Moses's hand is the key thing, shaping the flow of the narrative. In the poem, it's God's hand. Your right hand, Lord. the key thing, shaping the flow of the narrative.

In the poem, it's God's hand. Your right hand, Lord. Your right hand, yeah, yeah. So in the poem, actually, the poem never even mentions Moses. In the poem, only God is the actor through his hand and his nostrils and his mouth. In the poem, Moses is the main actor at the the story of the Lord of the Man. Yeah. So, oh yeah, sorry. In the narrative

Moses is the main actor. So that's the difference there that the poem also is a level of theological reflection where- What does this mean? Yeah, if you were there what you would see is what the narrative tells you. The poem steps back and uses metaphor. God has big nostrils. Yeah. And it's also interpreting the event in a really reflective way that it's got Moses' hand was like God's hand. All of the vivid imagery of them syncing,

the soldiers syncing, grounding. Yeah, so the weightiness of them syncing, the soldiers syncing, grounding. Yeah, so the weightiness of calling them lead. Yeah, they think like lead and like rock. Stone. So, okay, yeah, so there we go, that's good. You get the experience, so what just happened? Well, it seems like the poem was like,

I'm not worried about the making sure that the character, well, I don't know. That's the thing is like poems and stories, there's definitely an overlap. Like if you drew the vent diagram, you know, like you could have right there in the middle this very poetic storytelling. We're reflecting on the memory of an event or of an experience. Yeah, because there's other poems that are so abstract that like you wouldn't, it gives you feelings and emotions and it might conjure up ideas. Okay, sure.

So that would be poems that aren't reflecting on a story. A story. Yeah. In this case, it's one that is. This one it is. It seems like kind of in the middle. Yeah. Yeah, because it's a story has a story telling of a story of a memory Yeah, that's right. So yeah in this case. Yeah, this is why it's a good example because the poems anchored in something that seems more familiar

Yeah, so it's not like abstract poetry But the techniques and the mode of communication is fully poetic. So the elements of story are there, but what else does it have? That turns it, that makes us think, oh, this is more poetry. And that seems to be, it's loose structure. Yeah. It's not really worried about sequence as much. Yeah, sure.

It's not about sequence. You mentioned your imagination was more ignited. Yeah, and I think that's because much more liberal use of metaphor, which is making me connect the ideas that I either haven't connected before, or that just helped me maybe a half, but it just is planting that idea right in front of me.

Yep, yes, yep. have, but it just is planting that idea right from front of me. Yep. Yes. Yep. So I ignited your imagination through its use of metaphors that you wouldn't have thought of. Like you would never think, you'd never read the narrative and go, oh, God blasted with his nose. Yes.

But all of a sudden, and then you, in motion, you felt something when you think of God blasting with His nose breath. Right, or just the example of the wall of water. So, I mean, to me, that's the most magnificent image in the story is, where is it in the story? The water's congealing. Well, where's it in the actual story? Oh, verse 22. Verse 22. A wall of water on the congealing. Well, where is it in the actual story? Oh, verse 22.

A wall of water on the right and left. Yeah, that's it. Wall of water on the right and left. That's an amazing image. Yeah, that's right. It is actually. It is. It's an intense image.

And when I read it in the story, I'm like, whoa. That's intense. But then when I get into the poem, and it says, the surging waters stood up like a wall. Now it's actually making the waters, what's the word anthropomorphizing the waters, the waters stood up. And the surging waters stood up.

So it's like giving the waters more care of a character and animating them. Animating them. Yeah. And then they didn't, it wasn't just a wall. It was a wall that congealed in the heart of the sea. And so I'm picturing the wall now. And it's just as intense, but now there's even more emotion to it.

Yeah, it's like when Jello cools. Congealed. Congealed. Yeah, what's the Hebrew word there? Uh, oh yeah, it's a unique one. Here, I'll look at it. It must be for them to use such a unique English word. Kaff-u.

From kaffa to thicken, condensed, or congeal. It's used here. It's used one time in Zfania when he talks about wine that's left to sit for too long. Congeals. It gets all like thickens and gross. God says, I'm gonna search Jerusalem with lamps and bring justice on those who are complacent,

who are left like wine that congeals. Good. Does wine do that? Wine thickens if you leave it out? Apparently, maybe how they made wine. And then, oh, Job, ask God, don't pour me out like milk, don't congeal me like cheese. Oh, so that's like cheese, yeah, coagulating from, yeah.

Coagulation. And that's it, those are the three times the word occurs in the cheese. Yeah, coagulating from, yeah. Coagulation. And that's it. Those were the three times the word occurs in the Bible. Yeah. Anyway. That's amazing. Like, jello. Yeah, like hardening like jello.

Okay, all right. So let's back up. Let's allow Encyclopedia Britannica to give us a scientific definition of what just happened. Oh, can I say one more thing? Yes, please. Just the cadence. Oh, can I say one more thing? Yes, please. Just the cadence. Oh, oh, yeah, yeah, totally.

Right? That's very important. I just like, there's a rhythm to it. Yes. Yes. And I don't know why that's significant, but all poetry seems to have that. Yeah, and different cultures have different types of structures, rhythmic structures, and a lot of the English, European tradition

has rhyming, is a way to do that. Not really a feature of Hebrew poetry, but Hebrew poetry definitely has a very intentional kind of structure to it. And yeah, that itself communicates. It's called parallelism, where basically you pair, you create little pairs. Sometimes triads, most often pairs,

where you pair two things, and either you create them in a sequence or you are saying the same thing twice. There's a whole variety of ways you can use it. But it creates a structure. Farrows, chariots, an army, hurled in the sea. Best of Farrows officers, drown in the sea. Best of Ferro's officers? Drown in the sea. Deep waters covered them,

sank to the depths like a stone. You can see it. You can see the same thing three times in a row. Three different ways. Yeah, totally. You're right-handle-lord, majestic in power. You're right-handle-lord, shattering the enemy.

That's a good example. Where? You just said one thing. Yeah. But you, the two majestic in power, shattering the enemy are two very different things, and you want said one thing. But you the two majestic and power shattering the enemy are two very different things and you want to say both. I remember learning this instead of rhyming sounds, they rhyme concepts. Concepts. Yeah. Yeah. And then it gets you to pair or bounce off of each other. Two things that you wouldn't have thought. Surging waters, like standing up like a wall,

is paired with deep waters conjeeling like Jello. And you think, oh, listen, how do walls become, you know, it ignites your imagination, and then you're thinking about these two, a wall made out of Jello, right? A Jello-y water. Yes, okay, perfect, perfect. So all of that, this is from Lawrence Perrin, Right? It is. It is a yellowy water. Yes. Okay. Perfect. Perfect.

So all of that, this is from Lawrence Perine, one of the classic Western introductions of poetry called Sound and Sense. He says, poetry is a kind of language that says more and says it more intensely than does ordinary language. It's not a very technical description, but I like it. It says more and says it more intensely than normal language. So normal language says the sea blow over the waters,

they parted and became a wall. Yeah, yeah. So you are saying more by calling the surging waters standing up like a wall, deep waters congealing. Just right there, you're saying more. And you're saying it more intensely. And with the pairing of standing up like a wall and jello congealing waters, now your imagination is set loose.

To create more meaning than any of those words would do by themselves. And that's what poetry does. It's a condensed form of language that uses and pairs, new images, metaphors, ideas, and then you the reader are set free to go on your own experience now and to part, it's participation. Just like stories force you to participate. Poetry forces you to participate through your imagination and through your emotions. So poetry has its main aim to affect how you feel and how you daydream. You could say, its primary goal is not to communicate information.

is not to communicate information. And this is a big hang up, I think, especially more Western religious traditions have, because we think, again, of the Bible is primarily moral instruction literature. And the fact that a third of it is poetry, and it shapes you, and it affects how you think, even morally, but its primary goal isn't to tell you what to do

Yeah, it's goal is to set loose your imagination So this actually just feel yeah, this reminded me of a poem actually. Hmm. So have you heard of Billy Collins? He's a poet talked to me. He's a very I mean, he's a very accessible poet. He's got this poem called introduction to poetry. Hmm. I want to read it I Asked them to take a poem, he's also an instructor. I asked them to take a poem and hold it up to the light like a color slide or press an ear against its hive. I say drop a mouse into a poem and watch him probe his way out or walk inside the poem's room and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to water ski across the surface of a poem, waving at the author's name on the shore. But all they want to do is tie the poem to a chair with rope and torture a confession out of it. They begin beating it with the hose to find out what it really means. Wow, that's really good. Yeah, it's good, huh? Whoa.

What is that really common? Billy Collins introduction of poetry. I'm just going to put that in for future. Future lectures, that's awesome. Yeah. Introduction of poetry. His poems are amazing. It's like the only poetry I've ever read recently that I probably just get absorbed

in it. His poems are great. A couple of things. I have two quotes down in the notes. One is poetry is a surprising form of language. So this is from Thomas Long who actually wrote a book called Preaching from the Literary Forms of the Bible. it's actually a whole book for pastors and teachers, helping giving you ideas for how when you preach from the different kinds of literature from the Bible, you should preach in a totally different way.

Like you shouldn't actually preach or teach from a poem with the same approach as a narrative. Like just, poem isn't trying to communicate information. So don't teach it the same way you would teach. Romance, chapter. So yeah, totally. So he, but he has this great line where he says, poetry works to disrupt the customary ways

in which we use language. Poetry stretches the ordinary uses of words and places them into unfamiliar relationships with each other thereby cutting fresh paths across the well-worn groups of everyday language. So he just did it in this sentence and then what you just read, the Billy Collins is exactly water skiing across a poem. Put your ear up to the hive of the poem. Yeah, totally. It's that. Yes.

It's not such that image is so intense to me because beehives are so... And you would never do that. We would never do that. Yeah, they're like alive with frenetic, dangerous energy. Yes. And he's saying that's what a good poem is. A good poem is.

And to interact with the poem, you've got to put your ear up to it Whoa sticks with you Yeah, it's using language in Surprising the walls of the water stood the surging water stood up. Yeah, surprising Water's don't stand water is yeah oceans don't congeal like jello Waters don't stand. Waters, yeah. Oceans don't congeal like Jello,

but in X's, 15 they do. So it just, just pause. I almost don't wanna read the Encyclopedia Britannico. Definition? Because it's so sterile. It's so clinical. But it isn't just, Alkalus Rita, it's a long, round unsensitence.

Okay. To me, it's actually so ironic. Look, this is the definition of poetry. It's like, okay. It's a kind of literature that evokes a concentrated imaginative awareness of one's experience or emotions by means of well-crafted language that is chosen for its meaning, sound, and rhythm. That's not bad. No, it's not too bad. It's just a long, complicated sentence.

Yeah. There's three things. It's evokes a concentrated imaginative awareness. Mm-hmm. So concentrated. Yeah. It does more with less. It does more with less.

And it's an imaginative awareness. You go inside your mind and start painting pictures and doing this. And what are you aware of in that concentrated imaginative way of your experience and your emotions? And how did poetry do that? Through well-crafted language that is chosen for its meaning, which is also true in narrative, and also true in a good essay, but also for its sound and for its rhythm. And the sound and rhythm communicate things that are really intangible, but they communicate, thanks, as the poem did there. Oh yeah, the famous

example of this is Louis Carroll. I actually don't know that much about Louis Carroll. Yeah, I mean either. He was a British, English author, writer. Oh yeah, he wrote Alice in Wonderland. Oh, okay. Yeah, and then through the looking glass. But he wrote this famous poem called Jabberwocky. Oh yeah, Jabberwocky. And the hunting of the snark, but... And you just use this nonsense language, right? Yeah, yeah. The whole thing about Jabberwaki was using non-existing words.

And the sounds carry the meaning. And the sounds carry the meaning. And the rhythm of it. So this opening line, So this opening line Twas Brillig and the slithy Toves did Gyer and Gimbal in the Wab all Mimsy were the Borough Groves and the Moom Wraths outgrab

Yeah, totally I was I pictured a meadow like a kind of a dark meadow. Yep. That's the Brillig. Oh, no, no The Wab the Wab. Yeah, you and what's going on a dark meadow. Yep, that's the brilig. Oh no, no, oh, the wabe. The wabe. Yeah, and what's going on in the meadow? Ah, yeah, I mean, just like the wind's going through, there's maybe mist and just like. The slithy toves. Yeah, there's these creatures in the meadow. It's kind of a swampy meadow.

Yeah, it was all mimsy. Yeah. But then the m all mimsy. Yeah. But then the mome wraths out grab. And you're like the beginning of plot conflict. It's something. Yeah, the mome wraths. And it's complete nonsense. But it communicates through rhythm and sound.

That's cool. So then once you're using words that you do understand, in Fresh Met, there you go. Okay, so there you go. That's poetry. Poetry is amazing. And I don't read enough of it. I'm actually disciplined this year. I'm going to grab some Billy Collins.

Oh, that's good. I was going to purchase T.S. Eliot, the Four Loves, which I've heard is the most bottomless, one of the most bottomless modern poems. It's so, as funny as it's the easiest thing to not do, like before bed or something, you know, it's like the last thing, because it's not functional. Yeah, and it's hard. Yeah, totally, yeah. Oftentimes. But I've found we've been, we've done a couple times recently where the last thing we do for Turning Out the Light is reading a poem aloud. Oh, cool. And it's actually, I always go to bed with the full imagination.

I've also wanted to memorize poetry, but never have. It seems noble. You want to be the kind of person that memorize poetry itself is someone who has a lot of poems memorized. That's my ideal self. Okay, so let's stop and just maybe land the plan. I'll just say a third of the Bible is this kind of literature. That's crazy. One out of three sentences in the Bible.

Yep. And one out of three chapters. Yeah, one out of three chapters in the Bible is not trying to communicate content or information to you. It's rather trying to create an experience that shapes how you feel and how you think. It's remarkable to me. And the poems reflect on all kinds of concrete events, sometimes, look at limitations, it's all about the fall of Jerusalem. And what is the third of the sermons you heard? Word, poetic sermons. Yeah.

It's a very good question. And that's to me going back to the sun versus the knife. We like to use the knife as a tool. It's easier to handle. Yeah. And it's quick and it's decisive. You get things that I want to do. If I want to change people's behavior,

I grab my knife and I say, here's what this means, here's what you should do, here's how you should change the way you think. And this is, and then, and the scriptures are likened to a knife. Yes, like in Hebrews, double edged. Yeah, so it's not the wrong way back. Yeah, you need that.

Yeah, you need that. Yep, that's right. But then you also need a third of the time. You probably need to just sit in it and let it just put your ear up to the hive. And you know, like, what would that look like? I think most people would walk out of that Sunday service going like, well, that was weird. But that one part was really interesting. And yeah, but that sticks in you.

Yeah. Okay. I think we landed the plane. Yeah. On that one. The last part of the bookstore in our biblical bookstore video, the corner of the bookstore, the corner, because it's only one quarter. It's only one quarter. One quarter of it, 24% of the Bible is pros discourse. You know, like to go back to the grocery store thing, that's where we should put the discourse in the back.

So you have to walk through the rest of the store. Oh yeah, yeah, you have to walk through the... So are you first? You come in, you come in for the discourse. Yeah. But you have to walk through the poetry I'll get there. That's actually kind of how the Bible is organized if you start on page one. That's true.

And if you start on page one of the New Testament, anyway. Yeah, so with prose discourse, that may not be a quiet prose. In American terminology, I don't know what it is. A prose, prose, prose. Proced discourse is not nonfiction. We call this nonfiction in our culture. It's not narrative. I don't know what it is. A pro, a pro, a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro.

A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro. A pro. A pro is a pro. A pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a pro. A pro. A pro is a pro. A pro is a A pro. A is a pro. A is a pro. A or a little essay in body form. It's the quickest way to convey information.

Yeah, as two main goals, typically, usually it's to get your listener to do something and you persuade them by a set of arguments or a set of facts that you arrange as an argument to persuade them to do something. So that's a really important part, is that even pros discourse, the main purpose isn't just to give you information. It's still, it's to get you to do something, to persuade you that you need to make certain kind of choices. And it will do that by engaging your intellect, engaging your reason, your rational capabilities.

If this is the case, and if this is the case, and because of that, these things follow, and in light of all of this, therefore, you should do X, Y, and Z. And that kind of staged sequential linear process of thought and reasoning leading to rational outcomes and decisions. That's a very specific way that our brain works,

totally different than narrative and poetry. And a quarter of the Bible is this kind of literature. In the Old Testament, the best example is the Book of Deuteronomy, which is mostly Moses seeking to persuade his relights to be faithful to the devil. It's one long lecture. Yeah, so the whole book is said as one long lecture and then the essays, there are laws within it

and even little mini narratives, but the biggest sections and the first half in the end are this kind of discourse. So this, remember this, that taught us this. From this, we know this is true. Therefore, do this. That kind of thing. So, deuronamies, but Ecclesiastes is mostly this. Ecclesiastes has many embedded poems within it, actually a lot, but the main framework, the way the philosopher thinks through things, is very much, I saw this, and I concluded this. Therefore, I'm going to do this. And that kind of thing. So this literature is littered with logical connector terms, like therefore, and therefore, but because so that as a result. And that's actually how you learn how to follow it. I remember when we took our introduction to reading the Bible from Ray Lubek,

we actually, we did one semester on narrative and poetry We studied the book of Jonah and then we did one semester on Pro-discourse and we did Ephesians and Do you remember one whole exercise was going through like well? I think I made a photocopy and then I just Highlighted in pink all of the logical connector words And, but therefore he had us do a paragraph word, that's what we did. Actually, he had us do a sentence diagramming after that. I remember that. Remember the sentence diagram.

And you diagram it, you shape the diagram by means of the ends, therefore you subordinate things because so that as a result. Yeah. So, there you go. All of the New Testament letters are shaped by this kind of... The structure. The structure. However, embedded within them are poems. Paul's constantly embedding poems within. Yeah.

And stories sometimes. And stories, yeah, a little mini-story sometimes too. So, this is really significant. Narrative, I think, engages both hemispheres of the brain, because you're seeking pattern and connections, which is the right side. But also through your imagination. Poetry is mostly engaging your right brain, which is image, experience, emotion, feeling, sensory, and then discourses mostly.

The left brain, which is about, also about patterns, like in narrative, but in a more abstract way. It's connected to the logical and it's connected to language. All language is going through your left brain, so you can't read language without engaging your left brain. The whole two brain thing, So you can't read language without engaging your left brain. The whole two brain thing, it's very interesting. But everyone, you know how people say like, I have more left brain or more right brain. Oh, that's not true. Yeah, everybody's using their whole brain.

Everyone's using the whole brain. Unless you've severed your, what's it called, the core, the, whatever, that thick cable of brain that connects your two hemispheres. If that's been severed, then you're in trouble. And there's been a ton of interesting studies on people who have a severed brain. But everyone has that thick cable

and so you can use both such a brain. But it is true. The hemispheres have different, they have disciplines that they do much better. And so the language goes through your left hemisphere. But yeah, experience and emotion is more generated from your right hemisphere. So what I feel like you would know more about this

than I do about the uniquely. A cerebral cortex. Yeah, who was it? That's it. Was it Aristotle or Plato who said, you know, what makes humans is that they're the reasoning animal. Humans uniquely are able to abstract things ideas into the symbolic language and then create whole hypothetical chains of cause and effect to try

and illuminate a decision before me. Do I take this, do I eat this berry? Do I not eat this berry? Totally. Or do I swim in that lake or do I not? And humans uniquely have this ability to create this elaborate cause effect, feed back loops. Yeah. I don't, it doesn't seem like we know exactly how uniquely because we don't experience life like animals. All the Swiss-Lewis-Wish animals are of stories.

Yeah, so we could, we could know. But maybe it's not a difference in kind, but maybe just a degree. Well, yeah, there's definitely a difference. It's like, we have language that other animals don't have, which allows us to understand things in a much more abstract way, create more concepts. And then we have the ability to think about life as a story. So the past

can then inform how we think about now and the future and then we can imagine futures and work towards futures. And animals just don't do that. Like a squirrel when it's bearing a nut isn't thinking like, hey, next summer, our next winner, I'm going to be so glad I buried this nut. Yeah. It's actually just has this instinctual urge to bury the nut. And it doesn't know why. Mm-hmm. Most likely the case. I don't actually know.

Never been a squirrel. Ha-ha-ha. Yeah. Yeah, so that's unique. That's unique. No, but so that's it. Yeah, something about humans, to a degree that no other species on the planet does,

we're able to abstract out cause effect patterns in long chains to motivate behavior that makes no sense. Yes, and we're constantly telling ourselves stories of why things happen. Yeah. And creating meaning through the stories so that we can have motivation to continue to make things. Animals just don't do that. And one really interesting thing I'm thinking about is like, there's a certain kind of,

what do they call it, heuristics? There's a certain kind of heuristic. It's the sunk cost, I don't know what they call it, but it's kind of like the sunk cost heuristic where it's like, if you've already put a bunch of energy into something, you're now more committed to that thing. So even if now it's not going to work out, it's harder for you to abandon that project because you've put so much energy into it.

It doesn't make sense logically. Oh sure. It becomes utterly irrational. It becomes irrational. Why you keep doing that thing? Yeah. But to us, we've created, we've attached so much meaning to all of our labor and we've told a story about why it's so important.

We can't abandon it. And so, and humans just do this all the story about why it's so important, we can't abandon it. And so, and humans just do this all the time, but like a dog won't do it. Like if a dog's been like sitting at a fence, like waiting for, what would be an example? Like, yeah, a certain door waiting for like days for the door to open for to get a treat. And he's just waiting and waiting and waiting and it never happens. And then the door opens like 10 feet away, a different door. The dog's not gonna be like, I'm just committed to this door though.

The dog will never do that. It'll just go to the other door. Oh, there's the treat over there. But humans will actually do that. They'll just sit there like, no, I'm committed to this door. Why do we do that? It's that we're telling, we're attaching all this meaning to it.

And I don't know, this might be more about story than actually discourse at this point. Well, but there, I think the point is that we've abstracted the value of sitting at the door. And it may be a bigger story about it, but the point is we've turned the value into an idea that we used to motivate ourselves. Right.

I like the squirrel, actually. An algae too. Like why would I, you know, on a basic level, we're impulse sensory creatures also. Yes. And so we have that. Maximize pleasure and minimize pain. The lizard brain.

Yeah, but we will also deprive ourselves a pleasure for some long-term goal, and we'll convince ourselves to do it based on an abstract set of reasoning. So that is the difference between the lizard brain and the neocortex. All animals have a neocortex, even like a mouse. It's like the size of a postage stamp. It's very thin and it's a small covering of their brain, but it's that neocortex that allows them to observe that things have happened and then learn

from it. A lizard can't do that. A lizard, it's all instinctual. It's always in the moment impulse, you're saying. You can't like observe another lizard, do something unique and go, oh, I should do that. A mouse can, a mouse can observe another mouse to do something and go, oh, interesting. I should do that. And learn from experience, I mean, that's because of the neocortex. And then humans have this thick folded neocortex.

We've got this massive one that's all over the brain. So, okay, all right, so that's in terms of biblical literature, this is fascinating. So think of a letter like Ephesians, which was the first, it's what we studied, we're going to introduce how to study this type of literature. So it's a great example of post-discourse that's designed to persuade through information and then change behavior, because it's cleanly broken into two halves connected by the word therefore, at the beginning of the second half in chapter four. And the first half, he's actually, it has a poem,

opening and closing it, and there's a lot of storytelling within it, but basically telling the story of Israel and then as a covenant people and then how through the Messiah Gentiles, non-Jews are now included in the covenant family of God, and he's brought eternal life, and he's defeated evil, and he's created a new family. So that's more story driven, but he has full of their force. But then chapter four says, therefore, and then he gets pretty abstract,

like he starts talking about, keep your unity. So he's writing to a community, of a multi-ethnic community. So think of impulse behavior, like attracts like. It's very strong behavior. And ethnic groups, you know, connect, you know, keep kind of high boundaries around themselves. And then the Greco-Roman world of Paul's Day,

it's a very multi-ethnic world. Yeah, your lizard brain selling you not to trust people that are like, don't trust people that aren't like you. And so what Paul was able to accomplish was communities that intentionally removed the barrier as he talked about in chapter 2, removed the ethnic barrier to realize their common humanity in the Messiah, that they are actually one new humanity made up of all kinds of different people. And so he starts saying, listen, we have one faith, one Lord, one baptism,

one God and Father of all, who is overall and through all and in all. It sounds like Holy Spirit language. One Spirit. And then just on the basis of those ideas, he was able to create communities that of people who chose to override one of the most basic human impulses, which is to withdraw from people who aren't like you. So, to me, as such a powerful example, it's like eating, such a powerful impulse, and humans are able to override our... With rationality.

By means of rational chains of thought, to override our basic bodily or our most basic impulses. And that's the power of this literature. Yeah. Is it gets you to think in new ways, to accomplish change on a fundamental level in the lives of the people who read these. That's all what Paul's letters are designed, all these letters in the New Testament, engage your brain to invite you into a new story, turn it into a set of ideas that you then turn

to to motivate a whole different course of action. And that too is a quarter of the Bible literature. And it sits very much, you know, in the first century, it's no joke that most of it's New Testament letters. And those letters are influenced by conventions of Greek and Roman letter writing, Greek and Roman argument and philosophy. Paul's, man, here's the interesting exercise.

Paul grew up in Tarsus, and so people have tried to reconstruct what his education would have been like. Is it? Educated Jewish man, cosmopolitan. Yeah, Tarsus. And man, you go through and you read some of the classic educational texts that people were raised on, and you feel like.

So there's one that gets Seneca. Oh, Seneca's during that. You would have been reading Seneca. Correct. Seneca, Tathadis, was he later? I forget. There's a set of my Amazon wish list. It's about four books.

But the first time I read this, it was reading a section of Seneca and I felt like I was reading the letter to the Romans. Like the idioms, the manner of speech, and what should we say then? So in light of this, tell me this, do you say this? I tell you this, but if that is so, how can this be? That's how, right? You feel like, oh, that's how Paul writes. And then you realize, oh my gosh,

where did he learn how to write? He went to school. And how did you learn back then? You just immersed yourselves in the educational classics. So that's a good example where the writing, didactic reasoning style of the prose discourse of the New Testament is very much this melting pot of

Jewish biblical imagination, culture and imagination merged with the Greek philosophical tradition. Interesting. And yeah it's really cool. Anyway all that's say this literature makes you think and makes you think in deeper ways than you probably would normally and that's its goal is to engage your brain so that you'll make new and different kinds of choices. Thanks for listening to the Bile Project podcast. We'll be continuing this series on how to read the Bible through this summer.

It's also a series on our YouTube channel. You can check that out at youtube.com slash the Bible Project. All these resources are free and it's thanks to your generous support. So thanks for being a part of this. you