EAN: 9781433107856

A BIBLICAL THEOLOGY OF GERASSAPIENCE - JOEL AA ...

Ancient cultures  such as that of the Hebrews  commonly associated wisdom with advanced years.
In A Biblical Theology of Gerassapience the author investigates the validity of this
correlation through an eclectic approach - including linguistic semantic  tradition-historical
and socio-anthropological methods - to pertinent biblical and extra-biblical texts. There are
significant variations in the estimation of gerassapience (or «old-age wisdom») in each period
of ancient Israel's life - that is  in pre-monarchical  monarchical  and post-monarchical
Israel. Throughout this study  appropriate cross-cultural parallels are drawn from the cultures
of ancient Israel's neighbors and of modern societies  such as the West African Yoruba tribe.
The overall results are bi-dimensional. On the one hand  there are semantic elements of
gerassapience  such as the elusiveness of «wisdom» and the mild fluidity of «old age». Both
terms have strong contextual affinity with minimal exceptions. Thus  the attribution of wisdom
to old age is evident but not absolute in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). On the other hand 
gerassapience is depicted as primarily didactic  through direct and indirect instructions and
counsels of the elderly  fostering the saging fear-of-Yahweh legacies. On the whole 
socio-anthropocentric tendencies of gerassapience (that is  of making old age a repertoire of
wisdom) are checked by theological warrants of theosapience (Yahwistic wisdom). Therefore  in
the Hebrew Bible  the fear of Yahweh is also the beginning of growing old and wise.

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