Resistance Literature and Biblical Studies

Thanks to several recent studies that succeed in examining early Jewish writings through the lens of resistance (Hugh Page’s Israel’s Poetry of Resistance; Anathea Portier-Young’s Apocalypse against Empire; Richard Horsley’s Revolt of the Scribes), I have begun working through some of the major works on the theory and history of resistance literature.

Barbara Harlow’s 1987 study, Resistance Literature (New York; London: Methuen), focused on the literature of 20^th century resistance movements that included the element of armed resistance. Looking at movements from Central and South America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, Harlow provided a rich picture of the ways in which literature contributes to resistance movements. While on the face of it, these movements in themselves do not appear immediately relevant to biblical studies, there are a number of elements of her analysis which can readily be seen to illumine the study of ancient texts. I enumerate six of these below.

First, Harlow is concerned with literature that is produced within a context of foreign domination, whether under occupation or in exile. Both of these notions, occupation and exile, figure prominently in the Hebrew Bible, early Jewish writings, and the New Testament.

Second, she focusses on literature that reflects an arena of struggle in which the culture and cultural heritage of the oppressed engages with the cultural, social, and political intervention of the oppressor. The writings of the ancient Israelites as well as those of Second Temple Jews show an awareness of and an engagement with cultural forces both within and without Israelite society or the author’s particular Jewish community.

Third, one important dimension of the struggle which she notes is that of the struggle to control the historical record. Early Jewish and Christian literature is heavily focused on the past, and particularly in remembering the events of the past in a way in which highlights the significance of these events for the present community. Complementary and even competing portraits of the past are preserved within the pages of scripture.

Fourth, in addition to the historical record, resistance movements seek to control the means of cultural production, even against the challenges of censorship or oppression by the dominant culture. In one instance, an author’s book was banned in Arabic and so he published it in Paris in French. Utilizing the language of the colonizing power allows an indigenous writer to adapt, invert, and even create new forms in the language of the oppressor. While not responding to precisely the same challenges, the translation of Hebrew scriptures into Greek, and the production of new writings either in Greek, Aramaic, or Hebrew, can be viewed, in a context of cultural struggle, as practices of resistance or accommodation or both.

Fifth, Harlow draws attention to the potential within resistance movements of utilizing a “rhetoric of nostalgia” which seeks to return to a previous ideal age, a stance which can create a tension even within resistance movements between the need to deal with the pragmatic needs of the moment and the need to hold out a vision of a utopian future. Such dynamic tensions are observable within the biblical texts and traditions as well.

Finally, Harlow points out that Western readers can inadvertently fail to engage with non-Western literary products on their own terms by using reading strategies that are culturally conditioned. In particular she mentions the notion of looking for the universal element and ignoring the historical particularity in a given text. Such a recognition provides a valuable reminder to readers of ancient texts as well to beware of uncritical reading strategies which seek to domesticate ancient texts so that they fall within the framework of what is culturally acceptable in contemporary culture, whether Jewish, Christian, or secular.

Such considerations suggest the value of further studies which seek to appreciate the ways in which some biblical texts themselves may have been written, or at least utilized, to inspire resistance within their readers to hegemonic social forces and cultural ideals.