Re-thinking Biblical Story and Myth

Selected Lectures at the Theodor Herzl Institute, 1986-1995
Re-thinking Biblical Story and Myth consists of selected non-doctrinal lectures presented at the Theodor Herzl Institute in New York City over ten years. A probing perspective that counters the usual confusion of the historical with the moral landscape, while cautioning against a literalist reading of biblical narrative, unites the individual lectures. This type of reading forces a recognition that a mode of thought appropriate for moral comprehension is rarely suitable for historical interpretation. In addition, this work calls for a re-assessment of some highly prized and fairly common perspectival usages applied to biblical content. Overall, the author calls for a re-orientation of modes of thought in interpreting biblical content focusing on the distinction between a moral lesson and the impulse towards historicization characterized by such stories as Adam and Eve.