Autor: Purcell, Brendan M.

Buch: The Drama of Humanity

Titel: The Drama of Humanity

Stichwort: Job, AT, Hintergrund, Propheten, Jeremia, Hosea,

Kurzinhalt: 800 B.C Propheten; Universalisierung: Mensch, Gesellschaft, Gott; Differenzierung der Erfahrung contra Kult;

Textausschnitt: () That movement towards universalization can be seen with regard to man, society and God.
()
As regards man, the prophets themselves recognize that Israel as a people under God has contracted to the prophets as individuals. Jeremiah is the representative figure, who as a lone spiritual personality shoulders the responsibilities for the sake of the whole people of Israel. In him, the chosen people had become the chosen man.
()
Since mere observance of legal and cultic prescriptions could be accompanied by a life in violation of the spirit, the prophetic critique had to oppose the newly differentiated experience of the right order of the individual soul to the externals of mere behaviour. To carry out this critique, the prophets had to develop a new vocabulary for a new anthropology of personal responsibility ... Obviously, Job will, in part, turn on the fact that not even the good conduct of a man in accordance with the law and the cult is sufficient.
()
From the viewpoint of society, the older, institutional order of the kingdom was shattering under the blows of pragmatic history ... the prophets responded: for them, Israel was seen to be only one people among the nations. From now on, the new Israel would be whatever society lives in historical form in obedience to God. ... a recognizable movement towards a universalizing of the notion of a people under God.
()
And God, too, was increasingly seen as the God of the Nations as much as of the Chosen People. So that the prophetic differentiation was achieved in terms of a breakthrough from a particular people under their unique God to a universal humanity under one God, Yahweh.
()
And it is precisely because of this universalization of the Jewish experience, that their writers felt they could and should address the all of mankind that was represented by their ancient Near Eastern neighbours, in the kind of wisdom literature of which Job is perhaps the greatest expression.