Friday, May 25, 2018

Habakkuk 3 and ANE myth

FOR SHAVUOT: Habakkuk’s Mythological Depiction of YHWH (Prof. Marvin A. Sweeney, TheTorah.com).
Habakkuk 3 is framed as a lament, in which the psalmist asks God to save him and his people from danger. The core of the psalm is a divine theophany, in which YHWH is described as coming from afar to battle his enemies in classic ANE mythological fashion.
When I was a doctoral student, a few of us read early biblical Hebrew poetry with Frank Moore Cross for a semester, including Habakkuk 3. On the basis of the grammar and content, Cross regarded it to be an early poem reused in the book of Habakkuk. That seemed convincing to me at the time.

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