1 - The Hebrew Bible Background of the Feminized and Masculinized Protagonist

Summary

The feminized and masculinized heroes in the First Temple period are traced as background for feminized and masculinized heroes of the Second Temple period. The differences turn out to be more quantitative than qualitative.

The present study focuses on Israelite heroes in the period 500 BCE–100 CE, but in the background, towering over these figures, are the more famous early protagonists of Israelite literature. Their stories are derived from a number of sources that were ultimately edited together, forming the continuous history of humanity and Israel that runs from Genesis through 2 Kings. We may set aside the current debates about whether the early strands can be assigned to epic sources J (Yahwist) and E (Elohist) and about the precise dates of the early sources of the history books. I do assume here, however, that there were early heroic and historical sources that likely arose before 600 BCE. An ironic aspect of the traditions of these early heroes must be noted: although by the first century CE the early major heroes – Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses – came to be treated as more perfectible figures, they were not originally so depicted. In the early traditions of the Bible, even the greatest heroes were marked by serious moral inconsistencies. The lesser heroes of the Second Temple period – Ezra, Daniel, Esther, and so on – were thus not the only problematized heroes of the Bible. Actually at one time they all were. The problematic nature of biblical heroes has long been recognized. “The closer one examines the biographies of biblical heroes,” says Elliott Rabin, “the more difficult it can be to discern what is heroic about them.”¹ Yet, as noted in the Introduction, it is precisely this problematic nature that allows the biblical heroes to be read as true characters rather than types. Amy Kalmanofsky has drawn attention to the gender-play in Hebrew Bible texts: “The fact that [biblical authors] sometimes portrayed masculine women and feminine men suggests that on some level the Bible’s authors understood that gender was socially constructed, and that gendered characteristics and behaviors are not fixed.”² The range of complexity in both the First and Second Temple texts is such that we will see some overlaps along with the differences. And although Kalmanofsky mainly treats First Temple texts, we will see that both the greater heroes before 600 BCE and the lesser heroes after 600 BCE exhibit challenging constructions of gender, yet problematized in different ways. The following survey of First Temple and related figures thus provides us with a field of comparison to help us perceive certain developments in the Second Temple period. There are important continuities and discontinuities between the earlier period and the later texts that constitute our main study.

God as a Character

The first problematized hero to be considered is God. The rich debate about the gender of God in the Hebrew Bible will not be explored here except to state certain of its contours. Despite the understandable modern desire to treat God in a gender-neutral way, many scholars of ancient narrative argue that the figure encountered in the text is gendered as male. Yahweh is as masculinized as other ancient Near Eastern male deities, such as El or Marduk, and performs deeds that are often seen as masculine: Yahweh is often depicted as the Divine Warrior, and in addition, God creates, makes laws, judges, punishes, becomes angry, and kills.³ In general, God dominates. Although one might assume that God in the Hebrew Bible is modeled on the male head of the family – the rosh bet-’ab – the blustery and demanding “jealous” God is probably more indebted to the image of the king of the great empires overshadowing Israel and not the family father. The covenant theology in the Bible is expressed in terms of the vassal treaties between a great king and a lesser nation, with God as the great king in this metaphor. The hyper-masculinized depiction of Yahweh as a demanding, jealous god may have resulted from Israel’s experience of being ruled over by the hyper-masculinized great kings – first by Assyria, then Babylon and Persia. A postcolonial interpretation may be suggested: the jealous God was a compensation mechanism of a colonized people. God makes demands like a foreign king, not like a family patriarch, as if to say, “Our God is more powerful than the Assyrian king.”

Yet in the richness of biblical expressions, God often takes on female characteristics as well. In the section of Isaiah known as Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40–55), God is a bride, mother, and midwife, and at Isa 42:14 a woman in labor. Some argue that this destabilizes God as masculine and a masculine warrior, yet even in Second Isaiah, insists Rhiannon Graybill, the masculine God is appropriative, co-opting the female creative powers of motherhood and taking possession of both gender-modes: “Yahweh is preoccupied with controlling creation” and is in fact a “better mother.”⁴ Still, these discussions indicate that God could be described using various metaphors and that Second Isaiah tried to shift God’s image with feminine, maternal metaphors; God was feminized. Does God then have a fluid gender? Does God move from masculine to feminine to nonbinary and back? God’s gender was performed, constructed, and reconstructed. The fact that God is often referred to by the pronoun “he” may not even be as relevant as it first appears. In Hebrew, all words are either masculine or feminine, with no neuter “it.” As a result, arguments have been advanced for avoiding the male gender for God, and a number of responses have been offered as well.⁵ However, for the present study, attention is drawn to the question of how the character God is variously presented – generally masculine, yet sometimes feminized or even feminine.

Abraham, Sarah, Hagar, and Jacob

The middle third of Genesis, chapters 12–36, concerns Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and their family history as they take wives and produce children. According to Matthias Winkler, the male ancestors of Israel, though imperfect, operate within the accepted codes of masculinity (though we will see exceptions below). However, in Genesis the ancestors of other nations – Ham, Lot, Ishmael, Esau – differ not in being feminized but are instead hyper-masculinized: wild, savage, sexually perverted, aggressive, and dominating.⁶ Yet in the so-called patriarchal narratives of the Bible, the matriarchs also figure prominently. The women in these stories – Sarah, Hagar, Rebekah, Rachel, Leah, Zilpah, and Bilhah – are just as important as the men, commanding almost as much space in the narrative. The main difference in the depiction of women as characters is that they speak much less; we hear the men’s words but not the women’s. While in Esther writing is a public, masculine trait, in early biblical narrative speaking is also a masculine trait – or, more precisely, the reporting of words spoken is explored for the male characters; the words of men are more often recounted using direct speech.⁷

One might expect, as Winkler seems to assume, that the male heroes of Genesis were unambiguously masculinized, but important questions arise. Certainly, “Abram the Hebrew” in Genesis 14, a powerful warlord, could hardly be more masculinized. As a valiant and respected, even feared fighter, he acts almost as his own nation, entering into alliances and saving the fortunes of others. This narrative appears to emerge from a warrior tradition, more similar to the stories in Judges than to those of the patriarchs in Genesis. Yet more common among the stories of Abraham, and more remembered, are his dramatic interactions within his family. In this context, he moves from one problematized depiction to another. In Genesis 12 and 20, he places his wife in danger by passing her off as his sister. Here Abraham is weak, losing control of his wife’s sexual status, and is almost cuckolded by foreign kings. In the first installment of the Sarai/Hagar episode (Genesis 16), Abram steps back from a difficult conflict between his wife and her enslaved servant. He is feminized by passively allowing Sarai’s acts of domination to proceed without playing the patriarch’s role. True, some of these stories may be attributed to different sources, but at the very least the collection of Abraham stories varies, from the most masculinized depiction – the warlord of Genesis 14 – to the most feminized or at least problematically masculinized – Abram keeping a low profile in the household while Sarai expels Hagar and Ishmael. Yet Abram’s role as family patriarch is not necessarily being questioned. Rather, the principle noted in the Introduction applies here: we problematize what we love. Abraham’s role as patriarchal father is problematized.

If Abram is passive in regard to Sarai and Hagar, failing in his duties as family patriarch, is Sarai then masculinized? She makes demands of both Hagar and Abram and takes on the authority of the chief wife in Abram’s household. This, however, would not necessarily be masculinized activity; she is simply performing the role of the favored wife over those under her power. Is Sarai’s assumption of the power within the patriarchal, slave-owning household merely an extension of masculine powers? In reference to Islamic interpretation of the incident, Wilda C. Gafney considers this possibility. Sarai takes over the powers that normally reside in the male head of household: “First Sarai perpetuates patriarchal values deliberately and intimately, seizing Hagar’s sexuality and fertility. Then she continues her domination of Hagar in anger. Sarai initially takes her anger out on Abram, within limits: no actions accompany her words to him … . When Abram removes himself from the fray, Sarai takes her anger out on Hagar. Sarai brutalizes Hagar.”⁸ Would referring, then, to Sarai’s behavior as masculinized ignore the structural and permanent power that elite women enjoyed in the pyramid of society? For the present study we are thinking of masculinized in relation to typical authority, and if women typically have such power over enslaved persons, it is therefore not masculinizing, unless we define all active, aggressive, oppressive acts as masculine. Gafney goes on to provide a summary that expresses her understanding, with which I concur: “Sarah’s actions evoke both complicity with dominant male abuse of subordinated women and the independent abusive actions of dominant-culture women against subordinated women.” The question, however, need not be decided. We are interested in the way that men, women, and others – for instance, eunuchs – are depicted and ask whether they are problematized by being depicted at variance with dominant gender codes. At the very least, we note that in the Sarai/Hagar story Sarai directs the flow of action, manipulating the passive Abram, and in addition – and quite atypical – more of her words are reported than Abram’s. The male patriarch’s only directly quoted words – “Your slave-girl is in your power; do to her as you please” (16:6) – are passive and accommodate Sarai’s agency. As for Hagar, oppressed by her slaveowner Sarai and placed in a life-threatening situation, she nevertheless exhibits a powerful endurance and even resistance and agency. She is the only person in the Bible to give God a name (El-roi; Gen 16:13). The women in the Bible often push themselves onto the stage of the drama, insisting on being taken seriously as characters, and this is the case with Hagar. Is she masculinized? Her unusual relation to God, and the fact that her words are reported (Gen 16:8, 13), suggests that she is.

Of the three major patriarchs – Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – Jacob plays the role of the trickster. But unlike most tricksters, he quickly finds that he is not always in charge of his circumstances. Indeed, he often moves about at the whim of others. He is often successful only because of the actions of his mother Rebekah, who is even more a trickster than he. This is likely an intentional irony propounded by the Genesis storyteller: the male trickster wanders far and conquers; the female trickster breaks the laws of the home. But by playing the part of a trickster, is Rebekah masculinized? By being outtricked by his mother, is Jacob feminized? Rachel Adelman answers both of these questions in the affirmative.⁹ Yet this should be nuanced: interest in the irony of this reversal may have dominated over any interest in the problematized gender roles. That is, problematized gender roles may have been of less interest to the ancient audience than it is to us. Problematized gender roles may not be the guiding theme of the narrative but rather the means by which a higher theme – the threat to lineage and the irony of success – is communicated. That may have been the real interest.

Moses

Moses, like Joseph, moves between manliness and feminized behavior; perhaps this was the storyteller’s intention from the beginning. The Exodus from Egypt, one of the greatest moments in the history of Israel, is launched not by men but by heroic women. We are introduced early on to two Hebrew midwives, who, unlike many women in the Bible, are provided with names: Shiphrah and Puah (Exod 1:15). They are forthright, exhibiting a common trait: they are tricksters (1:19). Because they have feared God, they are rewarded for their heroism by being given families of their own (1:21). Other strong women follow after these models. Moses’s sister is watchful as he is placed in a papyrus basket on the river (2:4); we later learn that this is Miriam. And even the Pharaoh’s daughter, who is not given a name, steps out of her position and adopts the babe found floating in the water. When Moses later kills an Egyptian for beating a Hebrew man, he is forced to flee to Midian. By this point the women, both Hebrews and Egyptian, have shown exemplary courage, but Moses has been passive, rebuked by his own countryman, and forced to flee. True, he has killed a man – an active profile – and he is himself a victim of circumstances, yet he will often appear passive in this story, while women continue to shine in the narrative. This occurs especially in the strange interlude in which Moses is attacked by God and saved by the quick actions of his wife Zipporah (Exod 4:24–26). Likely a surviving snippet of an old source, this short passage suggests that Moses is about to be punished by God for failing to circumcise his son. He is now dependent upon his wife to rectify the dangerous situation. In Exodus 3, he is unsure of himself before God, and time and again he seems undone by the rebellious Israelites. The effect of this literary masterpiece is to create a storyworld in which the women at the beginning show consistent, manly courage, while Moses is undone in one encounter after another. Moses does grow over the course of Exodus, or at least by the end of Deuteronomy, but the character who first appears before us in Exodus is feminized relative to the active women.¹⁰ Other scholars have also wondered about the male and female traits of Moses. Graybill assembled the odd passages of the Pentateuch in which Moses’s body is challenged or altered: his inability to speak, his radiant glow that is terrifying, his temporary skin disease, and God’s unexplained attack on him in Exod 4:24–26 (noted above). Graybill assimilates Moses’s story to the typical prophet legend and notes that “prophecy displaces hegemonic masculinity and normative practices of male embodiment. Moses represents an alternate ‘Mosaic masculinity,’ organized around an open, fluid, and vulnerable male body.”¹¹ We will have reason below to note that a man is often depicted with a fluid gender identity in order to channel a masculine god; it is almost a shamanic preparation. Yet for whatever reason – and beyond the scope of this book – it is interesting that in European art, David and Jesus are often feminized, while Moses and Paul are highly masculinized and rarely feminized. Is it because the latter two, even Paul, gave “law”?

Deborah and Jael

Many women in the Bible, especially foreign ones, use deceit as a strategy. This has sometimes led to the assumption that deceit is a feminine trait in the Bible, but deceit is also a positive strategy of the male trickster (Jacob above, and Ehud in Judges 3). And is it only a post-biblical mindset that expresses reservations about deceit in the first place? Still, deceit does appear often in stories about women’s agency. One of the greatest of these occurs at the time of Deborah the prophet (Judges 4–5). In the rough-and-tumble period before there is a king in Israel, she calls Israel to war against Canaan. The Israelite men are led by Barak, who is reticent to command in battle without Deborah at his side (4:8–9). He thus appears strangely feminized, and perhaps, as a result, Deborah prophesies that God will give the enemy General Sisera into the hand of a woman, whom we later learn is Jael, likely a non-Israelite. Barak is now overshadowed by the female pair of Deborah and Jael. Jael uses her nurturing voice and sexualized appeal to lead Sisera into her tent. He is reduced from a great general to a passive heap, asking Jael to stand outside the tent to tell others that he is not there. Once he falls asleep between her legs, she drives a phallic tent peg clean through his head into the ground. The exchange of masculine and feminine in this story could not be more provocative. Jael exhibits all of the traits of a foreign deceitful woman: lying, temptation, sexual aggression, manipulation, and an evident lack of moral restraints. And as elsewhere (Genesis 38, Joshua 2), this combination of traits, found residing in a foreign woman, is what saves Israel. Whatever ancient Israelites thought of women’s wiles, the positive display of deceit by foreign women is part of the narrative enjoyment. But another aspect of gender can also be observed here. Brian Doak has examined the way that the bodies of biblical heroes are described and finds that while the bodies of male biblical figures – Jacob, Saul, David – are closely described, Deborah’s body is not.¹² As women’s words are seldom reported, so also their bodies are not described. Yet we will find that both aspects – the description of women’s bodies and the reporting of their words – increase in the Second Temple period.

Gideon

The stories of the great hero Gideon in the Book of Judges vary in terms of how they characterize this hero. In one section, Gideon is a brash, ruthless, self-willed figure who triumphs without God’s aid (Judg 7:24–8:28), and in another he appears unsure of himself, chosen last by God, succeeding only when God favors him (6:1–7:23).¹³ This suggests again the two paradigms for the Israelite hero, the self-willed and the passive, found here perhaps in two separate sources, yet the distinction may not be as clear as it seems. Gideon’s misgivings about his own abilities may simply reflect a motif from the prophetic tradition: when called by God, the prophet often insists that he is not worthy (Jer 1:6–10); the same was true for Moses. In addition, though Gideon’s repeated requests for signs from God may strike modern readers as a sign of weakness, this was an accepted practice in the ancient world; it may not have registered as weak. Still, the distinction between the two paradigms was not only noticed by modern readers; both Josephus and the rabbis rewrote the Gideon story to depict a more consistently masculine persona.¹⁴ We will find in Chapter 5 that Matthew and Luke rewrote Mark to eliminate markers of passivity.

Saul

Just as Gideon appears in two modes, so also Saul; likely merged are a pro-Saul tradition and an anti-Saul tradition.¹⁵ The anti-Saul tradition came to dominate in the Bible, emphasized to offer a contrast to the larger figure of David. Saul is now caught between the super-ego of the prophet Samuel, who looms over the hapless Saul, and the wunderkind David, who will be chosen by God as his replacement.¹⁶ Saul is also the perfect transitional boundary figure between the pre-monarchical judges and the stable kingship of David – he is a king but not the king. We focus here on this negative tradition for reasons that will become obvious. Saul, who represents an incorrect notion of kingship, is destined to fail, while David, who is favored by God’s intervention, will establish a great nation. J. Cheryl Exum provides an insightful comparison of the difficult heroes Samson and Saul. Though they share some of their attractions and failures, she argues that Saul is a tragic figure and Samson is not: “Both Samson and Saul are hailed as deliverers of Israel from the Philistines, both fail at the task, and both die seemingly ignominious deaths at the hands of their oppressors in the process. Yet Saul reaches tragic depths not experienced by Samson, however grim his disfigurement and death in Philistine captivity may be.”¹⁷ Yet a quirky aspect of the negative Saul tradition must be noted: his interior life is reported, and that may be precisely because he seems to be mentally ill, racked by dark forces (see also below). Indeed, he has a fatal flaw: low self-esteem.¹⁸ If one hesitates to refer to this phenomenon in the early textual traditions as feminized, it is at least problematized by being interiorized. In the Second Temple period, this will overlap with feminized.

David and Jonathan

Whereas Saul had a false start in founding the kingdom of Israel, David is presented as the rightful king destined to establish a nation, even if he has sinned and will not be permitted by God to erect a temple. A surprising aspect of the story of David is that it contains so many plots and subplots. He is the most complex and multidimensional character in the Bible: chosen youth, trickster, bold warrior, sinning king, brutal avenger, merciful king, tragic father, aging and dying monarch. There is also more attention given to his physical appearance and inner character. Is David also at times feminized? At 1 Sam 17:42, he is described using the same terms (yefeh mar’eh, beautiful in appearance) as used for Joseph, Esther, and Rachel, yet such descriptions of physical beauty are used for heroic men as well as important women. Perhaps because David’s accomplishments as a young man are so prominent, European artists created an image of an androgynous, even girlish figure (Donatello c. 1430; Claude Vignon c. 1623). Yet if he is feminized, this is only one of his personae (contrast here 1 Sam 16:12, 18).

Exum also turned her attention to the narrative of David, focusing especially on the end of his life. Registering it as tragic, she describes both masculine and feminine traits. David is generally an aggressive, assertive male agent, marked by great successes and dramatic escapes from those who would do him harm. At one point, however, the narrative shifts to a different tone: in the rebellion of David’s son Absalom (2 Samuel 13–19) we encounter a “rare, intimate view of David … ; in his vulnerability the king becomes most sympathetic.”¹⁹ This section includes grief, tragic conflict, even some interiority for David. The audience must wonder what his grief is like, and this suggests vulnerability and complexity (especially 2 Sam 18:33–19:8). David J. A. Clines poses a further question: does the author see David’s vulnerability as a problem? Clines says yes: David’s vulnerability in regard to his son’s attempted coup is a sign of weakness. The king is feminized.²⁰

Much of David’s story is also taken up with his friendship with Jonathan, the son of Saul. The bond between David and Jonathan, treated over a number of chapters, is so deep and personal, “passing even the love of women” (2 Sam 1:26), that it raises many issues for modern readers about masculinity, femininity, and gendered relationships. Many moments in the story seem to suggest a sexual intimacy, and this indeed may be the case (2 Sam 1:26). Heroes cross-culturally enjoyed strong bonds of friendship with other heroes, and in some cases it was assumed that the best love match for a hero, including sexual relations, must be with another male hero rather than with a woman. In Greek and Roman epic, for example, Achilles has a close relation with Patroclus, while Aeneus is bonded with Pallas and Nisus with Euryalus (Aeneid 9). Exum, however, assumes that the relation of David and Jonathan reflects the heroic friendship of equals but not sexual love.²¹ Saul’s inability to transfer power to his son Jonathan defines the drama, and the two “true” heroes, David and Jonathan, are responsible for the founding of Israel. To be sure, Jonathan loses his own identity to become wrapped up in David’s, but David is the story’s main hero. According to Exum, the subordination of Jonathan is not feminization but clientage. Yet Susan Ackerman presses us toward the second option, a homoerotic relationship.²² David and Jonathan are lone heroes who do not live according to usual norms; they make their own rules. Although Bathsheba may seem a special mate for the older David, in his youth he may have explored the far superior relationship with a fellow hero, Jonathan. Ackerman also concludes that Jonathan, as the less dominant of the two, is emasculated and feminized, as Enkidu is in regard to Gilgamesh. And it must be emphasized as well that if David is the dominant partner, he would not be feminized by a sexual relationship with Jonathan, although Jonathan would.

We need not resolve all of these questions but simply note that the main protagonists of Israel’s history display traits of strength, agency, and masculinity and yet at times also exhibit a faltering, vulnerable, passive side. The two are not impossible in the same figure in ancient Israelite narrative, and indeed, it is the nature of heroes cross-culturally to exhibit weakness – in Greek tradition, Jason is constantly overwhelmed – and even femininity. In cultural memory, it is heroes more than others who can cross boundaries and violate norms, displaying both strengths and weaknesses. In one tradition not preserved in the Iliad, Achilles dresses as a girl to escape capture (Statius, Achilleid 1.198–282). Just so, David wanders between peoples and camps in his early history and is marked by a variety of gender shades. We are struck both by the performativity of his different personae and the many constructions of a legendary king.

Ahab and Jezebel

When King Ahab rose to power in Israel in 871 BCE, he cemented a political alliance by marrying the Phoenician queen Jezebel. The king and queen were then together written into history as dangerous innovators in Israelite life. They sponsored the worship of Baal and Asherah and suppressed the prophets of Yahweh who opposed them. In the biblical record, Ahab is depicted as a weak keeper of the throne, overly influenced by the more active presence of his wife Jezebel. That King Ahab and his Phoenician queen Jezebel essentially shared the duties of ruling over Israel is striking. She advises Ahab and appears at times to be running the kingdom, which the authors of the Israelite history noted well. Ahab is feminized and Jezebel masculinized; she becomes a phallic and brutal woman. Like Judith – who nevertheless remains throughout her book a heroine of virtue – Jezebel combines the feminine arts of dress and cosmetics with masculine acts of brutality. This aspect of her reputation has survived until today; active women in US politics, especially women of color, are routinely labeled Jezebel by conservative religious voices, both black and white.²³ Within the ancient narrative of this royal couple, we also encounter constant references to Ahab as passive or feminized and Jezebel as active and masculinized. Ahab is often retiring, reclusive, depressed. At 1 Kgs 21:5, he mopes while Jezebel is extremely active; she even moves to prop him up. She has agency even though she must write in Ahab’s name. At Esth 5:14, we will find that Haman’s wife Zeresh also advises him, and there as well the male antagonist is depressed and barely able to act. Ahab will ultimately repent, and Jezebel will be killed while her body is eaten by dogs. The destruction of the reviled enemy’s body is not unusual in the Bible, and is not gender-specific, but the fact that her body is shamed by being eaten by dogs certainly reads to modern eyes like a misogynistic emphasis. The punishment of being returned to the elements by being eaten by dogs is found in Ancient West Asian treaty curses, and Jezebel is indeed perceived as a violator of the covenant treaty.²⁴ The relish taken here, then, in describing her death suggests that the text is a potent revenge fantasy concerning a strong, masculinized woman.

Joseph

The five books of Moses consist of two great narrative arcs: the creation of the family line of Abraham and his offspring in Genesis and the Exodus from Egypt led by Moses. What connects these two arcs – what brings the family of Abraham’s offspring down to Egypt so that the Exodus can occur – is the story of Joseph (Genesis 37–50). Joseph, then, is a liminal or boundary figure between the early stories of the patriarchs and the Exodus led by Moses. Although the Joseph story is necessary to make the connection between a wandering, landless people and a people who will inherit a land, the origins of the Joseph story are unclear. The date of the Joseph story has long been viewed as uncertain. Even when there was more confidence in the separate existence and dating of the J and E epics, some scholars were with good reason hesitant to assign the Joseph story to these epics.

The Joseph narrative differed from the early epic tradition in a number of key ways and has at times even been considered novelistic. Joseph was one of the twelve sons of Jacob, and not one of the three major patriarchs, yet his story accounts for almost a quarter of Genesis. The narrative was thus expanded far beyond the economical style of the earlier sagas. Other aspects also seem novelistic: God does not intervene in the story in an explicit way; the focus is on domestic issues and settings, limited to just a few characters; and travel and exotic foreign locales dominate the story. Yet most important for our discussion is the fact that Joseph is a passive, introspective character and we witness the interiorizing of Joseph’s emotional states. These novelistic traits have at times been adduced as evidence of a later dating, perhaps in the Persian or even Hellenistic periods, and another argument for a late dating is the similarity in structure to Esther and Daniel 1–6. Joseph’s ability to interpret dreams likewise reflects parallels with Daniel: at Gen 41:38, Pharaoh asks, “Who has the spirit of God (ruah elohim) like Joseph?,” and at Dan 4:8–9, another foreign king says the same regarding Daniel. Finally, the pro-Egypt stance of the story of Joseph has indicated to many scholars that it was composed by diaspora Jews in Egypt during the Persian period.²⁵ Others, however, have questioned the location of the text among diaspora Jews in Persian or Hellenistic Egypt. The story may rather be early and composed in Israel and the Egyptian sojourn simply an exotic story element. J. Robin King notes the similarity of the Joseph story to a number of early ancient Near Eastern texts. The themes of travel, exile, and reconciliation are found also in the Egyptian Story of Sinuhe, dated to the nineteenth century BCE. Erhard Blum and Kristin Weingart suggest that the Joseph story was a mirror-reading of Sinuhe, reversing many of its motifs.²⁶ As a result of these arguments, a consensus on the dating of the Joseph story remains elusive.

The Joseph story may have served as a precursor to our other texts or may itself have been composed during the Second Temple period. Either way, we take note of that aspect of the character of Joseph that might be termed passive and feminized. The story begins with our hero separated out and alienated from his brothers: he “brought a bad report of his brothers to their father” (37:2). The motive for the beginning of this conflict is not explained, but the dysfunctional family dynamics continue to play out:

Jacob loved Joseph more than any other of his children, because he was the son of his old age; and he had made him a long robe with sleeves. But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him, and could not speak peaceably to him.

(37:3–4)

Joseph’s character, we find, is very different from that of the patriarchs. He would at first seem to be recklessly assertive but also naïve or even lacking emotional intelligence in alienating his brothers with his dreams. While the more traditional epic in the Bible creates elevated, somewhat unreal, Golden-Age heroes, the Joseph story brings the protagonist down to a more identifiable, novelistic level. Says André Lacocque, “Joseph reports incredibly offensive dreams to the very people from whom he should expect the worst. Such a naiveté on his part is probably to be understood as a total absence, not only of imagination – a grave flaw in a sage! – but also of self-assertion …. It is precisely this absence of aggressiveness on his part that obliterates, in his eyes, any offense in his revelations.”²⁷ Joseph, then, seems to feel innocent at the same time that he is provocative, oblivious to the possibility that anyone could object to his account of his dreams.

Following Joseph’s failed encounter with his brothers, other scenes reveal further aspects of his character. The first is his encounter with Potiphar’s wife, in which she implores him repeatedly to have sex with her. Although Joseph has consistently resisted her pleas, she finally lays hold of his garment as he runs away. She yells to her household that “the Hebrew” has tried to have sex with her, and upon his return Potiphar throws Joseph into Pharaoh’s prison. In the Introduction, we noted the distinction between true characters and mere types, repeatable figures that one would expect from folktales. It is tempting to suggest that Joseph is the first true character in ancient literature, a distinct, complex individual, and not a type, yet it may be more complicated. Abraham, Jacob, and Moses, and perhaps Sarah and Rebekah as well, all have a strong presence and individuality, and more important, Abraham was varied enough in his desires and actions to suggest the rough beginnings of a true three-dimensional character. The patriarchs and matriarchs are not fully described, appearing sometimes only in brief scenes, but precisely because of the great gaps in the narrative the reader is forced to supply aspects of character. In addition, we should not forget the earlier Egyptian Sinuhe, perhaps the inspiration for the story of Joseph. This wandering Egyptian may also exhibit the shadings of a true character. At any rate, does Joseph, in fleeing his mistress, reveal himself to be frightened and emasculated? How are we to understand Joseph’s character in terms of manliness? Joseph being accosted by Potiphar’s wife places him in a difficult situation not unlike that of the later Susanna. As an enslaved person he is powerless, but does his self-restraint register in the story as masculine? Would a more masculine hero have had sex with her or perhaps, like a trickster, known how to get away without losing his robe? Joseph, says Lacocque, is close to being a suffering servant, often interpreted as a prefiguration of Jesus.²⁸ He is literally and figuratively the boundary figure, and unlike some other boundary figures of folklore, such as the trickster, hero, or wild man, Joseph does not control his movements. His experiences, extended out over many chapters, recounted in more detail than in the other narratives, become virtually operatic.

Although the encounter with Potiphar’s wife has often attracted the most attention in the tradition, the extended middle of the Joseph story – the interactions between Joseph as Egyptian official and his brothers – contains more haunting literary effects. Adelman insightfully compares the characters of Joseph and Esther. They both act out a passive “feminine” phase in which they are passively viewed more than they view others, and then an active, masculine phase in which they are the ones who see: “Joseph too negotiates the terrain of personal transformation through a process of being an object in the eyes of others, then abject (beyond the purview of sight [in the pit and dungeon]), and finally the subject of sight, ‘the seer.’”²⁹ Joseph comes to act out a revenge fantasy in which he almost sadistically forces his brothers to act as appendages of the Pharaoh’s court, jumping through hoops and meeting his demands. It is an orgy of arbitrary commands, of manipulation and agency. Joseph is still dysfunctional but now in quite an opposite way: whereas formerly he was the victim of others’ violent actions, now he is obsessed with his ability to inflict fear in his brothers. Why is this section so long, so excruciatingly drawn out, as if probing a wound? Adelman here follows Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, who argues that Joseph is not testing the brothers, as the surface might suggest, but testing himself.³⁰ (Recall that in the Introduction it was noted that the Greek epic hero processes internalized fear by externalizing it and taking action.) Joseph was traumatized by their treatment of him as a youth and by his time in the dungeon; his therapy consists of his processing his experiences and his submerged identity in Egypt. How will he work through the issues with his brothers and reconcile with them? How will he ever find peace? By the end, the brothers, especially Judah, have grown psychologically and are ready to be reconciled with Joseph, and Joseph has learned a truer kind of agency – how to get what he wants. It has taken far too long and it is almost tragic, but that is the very nature of tragedy: people only learn through great suffering.

Other aspects of this novelistic narrative suggest a feminized Joseph. As noted in the Introduction, weeping is reported on a number of occasions in early biblical texts, found in scenes of mourning, on one hand, or reconciliation, on the other, and associated with both men and women. Left alone in the desert, Hagar wept over her plight (21:16), and Esau cried after losing his birthright (27:38). Yet it is much more strongly emphasized in regard to Joseph, who is depicted as weeping five times.³¹ More to the point, some of these are described as private, even secret crying within the household – a very “modern” intimation of emotions. The difference is significant. We are presented with Joseph’s inner, intimate turmoil, revealed to the audience but not to the other characters. For Adelman, the fact that Joseph weeps counts as evidence of feminization, and it does reveal Joseph’s interior emotional state. Milena Kirova also notes the atypical intensity and interiorization of his weeping: “The weeping of [Joseph] is personal; it is an intimate experience, without any ritualistic and/or public theatrical effect. He often attempts to weep in secret.”³² Joseph’s crying, Kirova continues, differs from David’s in that the latter has royal and public aspects, or in regard to his crying over Jonathan, David, like Achilles, weeps as one hero for another. This is not the case with the more domestic Joseph.

Why this narrative investment in a feminized man? Does a problematized or feminized protagonist provide an avatar through which the audience can experience growth, integration, or moral development? We note with Adelman, for instance, that as Joseph and Esther move from feminine to masculine ways of acting, they also remove their masks and are more honest about their true identity. They construct “a more complex personhood” and also a more integrated male/female moral agency. Indeed, both Joseph and Esther use their public status and long-denied ethnic identity in order to save their people. “Joseph’s and Esther’s greatest strength,” says Adelman, “serves also as their most poignant source of vulnerability.” But to emphasize the converse, their most poignant source of vulnerability serves as their greatest strength.³³

Later Interpretations of Joseph

Modern scholars perceive a complex protagonist in the Joseph story in Genesis; but soon after, ancient interpreters were creating a different hero. James L. Kugel traces a very positive view of this biblical figure in many sources, noting that “his behavior in the face of temptation is exemplary – so much so that one might even say that he was not tempted!”³⁴ In some traditions, it is not just Potiphar’s wife who lust after the lad but an entire assembly of ladies; Joseph becomes a hero of self-mastery (Artapanus, On Joseph; Jubilees 39:5–8; Sir 49:15; 1 Macc 2:53; Wis 10:13–14; 4 Macc 2:1–4). A text from Qumran, 4QApocryphon of Joseph^b (4Q372) 1.15–16, perceives a hero who is tested: “He became weary … and he summoned the powerful God to save him from their hands. And he said, ‘My father and my God, do not abandon me in the hands of gentiles.’” This utterance has even been compared to Jesus’s prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane and his cry from the cross (see Chapter 5).³⁵ The later Testament of Joseph will press this to an extreme, in that Joseph sacrifices his own self-interest to preserve the reputation of his brothers; but to return to the first century CE, Josephus presents Joseph as a statesman and a philosopher-king, a model of virtue: he exhibits courage, self-mastery in refusing the advances of Potiphar’s wife, and modesty in his relations with his brothers.³⁶ Joseph is the perfect model for Josephus to present to Greek and Roman audiences, as he simply projects onto Joseph the Stoic virtues of the day.

Despite these positive assessments, however, other authors reveal a great ambivalence about this figure. Philo, who wrote differently to outsiders and to his fellow Jews, presents two different Josephs. At times he is very respectful of the memory of Joseph (On Joseph 9.40–10.53), but elsewhere he presents him as an allegory of bad leadership and vice, interpreting him as “body” in contrast to “mind.”³⁷ Adelman finds other instances of the more negative tradition, the feminized Joseph who twice fails to save himself. Rabbinical tradition is also split on Joseph. The rabbis referred to Joseph, and no one else, as ha-tzadik, the righteous, but in other passages he is a dandy who preens and primps, styling about in his special coat.³⁸ When he is elevated in Egypt, he becomes smug, playing the dandy by curling his hair and batting his eyes. It was this trait that supposedly first caused the brothers to have contempt for him, and also attracted Potiphar’s wife, so that even this turn of events was his fault. We will note in Chapter 3 that the character of Daniel was also questioned by the rabbis.

Deuteronomy

We complete this survey of early Israelite literature with literary traditions that may arise at the end of the First Temple period, during the exile, or even during the Second Temple period: Deuteronomy, the Suffering Servant of Isaiah, Job and Ecclesiastes, and the non-Israelite Ahikar. They provide context for the discussions that follow. Deuteronomy is relevant not for its depiction of Moses but for its rhetorical construction of the addressee as ideal moral agent. Unlike Exodus through Numbers, which contain descriptions of Moses’s role using third-person narration, Deuteronomy more often depicts Moses speaking directly to Israel. Moses as speaker has risen in importance, but the people as collective addressee are prominent as well. The ideal agent in Deuteronomy is not a king or a family patriarch but a person treated as a citizen of Israel. When God’s covenant is enacted, all the stakeholders are to gather together; in theory, they are all moral agents, including women, children, and foreigners. Deuteronomy’s call to a stronger moral agency is addressed to “the leaders of your tribes, your elders, and your officials, all the men of Israel, your children, your women, and the aliens who are in your camp” (Deut 29:10–12; contrast Exod 19:14–15). The actual audience of Deuteronomy, of course, is likely still the free male heads of household, or even priests or members of court, but it is important to note the creation of a scenario that includes women and sometimes children, resident aliens, and enslaved persons in the assembly of the people, at least in the rituals, and the address of the moral agent often assumes the gathered orders of society. Many of those named, of course, would have little say in this; it is rather a myth of the constitution of Israel, as Alexander Hamilton could say, “Here, sir, the people govern,” when only a small fraction of the people could vote. But to be fair to both Deuteronomy and Hamilton, the authors are affirming shared citizenship in contrast to kings. Bernard M. Levinson has addressed this issue:

[Deuteronomy] provides a utopian model for the organization of the state, one that enshrines separation of powers and their systematic subordination to a public legal text – the “Torah” – that delineates their jurisdiction while also ensuring their autonomy. This legislation establishes an independent judiciary while bringing even the monarch under the full authority of the law.³⁹

To press this even further, there is an interiorizing aspect to the ideal agent, especially in the famous passage near the end of Deuteronomy:

Surely, this commandment that I am commanding you today is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away. It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will go up to heaven for us, and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us, and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?” No, the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe.

(30:11–14)

This brings us to a related attribute of Deuteronomy, the emphasis on hearing. In the Hebrew Bible, seeing is viewed with some ambivalence. Israel is not to see God in the form of representations, but they did see the miracles God performed. Yet the creation of the golden calf demonstrated that seeing was not sufficient for them to internalize the lesson. A shocking distance remains between seeing and believing. Steven Weitzman argues that Deuteronomy responds to this by embarking on a major program oriented toward hearing. If Israel hears God’s voice, they will stand a greater chance of remaining true: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone!” (6:4). Gathered Israel is called upon to remake themselves, not through sight but through hearing. True, Deuteronomy begins by calling upon the functions of both seeing and hearing, but it transitions from faulty seeing to the more reliable hearing. This play with the senses is a way of shaping or re-shaping the audience’s self “as something that can be retrained.” Weitzman makes strong claims for this text: “Deuteronomy may qualify as one of the earliest efforts at self-reform on record.”⁴⁰ Although, as noted in the Introduction, scholars have often seen the idea of an identifiable “self” as absent in Israel – Hebrew thought is supposedly focused on external actions, not internal reflections – Weitzman rightly insists that with so much emphasis on moral decision-making, the moral “self” is willed into existence as the locus of the executive function of hearing and doing God’s word. Ronald Hendel likewise says that Deuteronomy “defines the new course of Judaism as a religion of interior choice and commitment.”⁴¹ The constant rhetorical challenge of Deuteronomy to obey God’s law constructs a disciplined self within the Israelite citizen. The intensity of the rhetorical and psychological language is such that one cannot help but perceive a focus, partly interiorized, in regard to the moral self.

The Suffering Servant of Second Isaiah

The Suffering Servant is an important yet mysterious figure described in the Book of Isaiah, found in the section designated by scholars as Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40–55). Written during the exile and therefore just before the Second Temple period, Second Isaiah contains four passages that refer to an anonymous servant of God; these passages are referred to as Servant Songs (Isa 42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–11; 52:13–53:12). Whether they were written by the author of Second Isaiah or by a different author and inserted into the text is not important for our discussion. What is important is the way the texts create an ethereal, vulnerable moral agent. We focus on the longest and the most famous of the Servant Songs, 52:13–53:12. It creates the most vivid images of weakness but also the powerful images of the vindication of this humble figure. While in the other servant songs the figure has some active role – the servant will establish justice (42:1–4), the servant is a hidden weapon of God (49:1–6), the servant is a teacher (50:4–11) – in the fourth song the servant doesn’t do anything. Yet this song begins with a very positive overture:

Indeed, my servant shall prosper,

   be exalted and raised to great heights.

(52:13)⁴²

The next verses, however, depict a downward turn, the special suffering of this enigmatic figure:

So marred was his appearance,

   unlike that of a man,

   his form, beyond human semblance

(52:14).

He will, to be sure, move nations (v. 15), but the pathetic images begin to accumulate:

He was despised, shunned by people.

   A man of suffering, familiar with disease.

As one who hid his face from us,

   he was despised, we held him of no account.

(53:3)

The servant also places himself – or is placed – in the position of bearing the sufferings of others to effect their salvation:

Yet it was our sickness that he was bearing,

   Our suffering that he endured.

We accounted him plagued,

   smitten and afflicted by God;

But he was wounded because of our sins,

   Crushed because of our iniquities.

He bore the chastisement that made us whole,

   and by his bruises we were healed.

(53:4–5)

Indeed, “the Lord visited upon him the guilt of all of us” (53:6). Also striking is the servant’s silence and humble role:

He was maltreated, yet he was submissive,

   he did not open his mouth;

like a sheep being led to slaughter,

   like a ewe, dumb before those who shear her,

   he did not open his mouth.

(53:7)

Throughout, the servant has a function as one who intercedes, as Abraham and Moses had interceded, but the servant’s death in several passages has special significance. However, one must be careful not to over-interpret some of the terms. Marc Z. Brettler and Amy-Jill Levine see the servant’s life and death as a metaphorical sacrifice, not an actual divinely wrought sacrifice as one finds in traditional Christian interpretations of the death of Jesus. It is not even clear that the servant is killed; the language is typical for psalms of lament, which often culminate with a near-death experience.⁴³ Still, it skirts close to a vicarious punishment for others, which even if non-sacrificial, is practically unknown in the Hebrew Bible. This is what marks the Suffering Servant as an innovation: this figure’s lament serves to bring forgiveness and rescue for Israel as a whole. The text may be creating a new theological interpretation that will resonate later in 2 Maccabees 7, 4 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon 2–5, and the Gospel of Mark. Yet the theme of the whole is that although the servant is shamed (53:3–9), at some future time he will be greatly honored; this is how the song begins and ends.

It is not clear who the servant represents. A number of reasonable suggestions have been offered, with no strong consensus yet emerging. The Suffering Servant could suggest some king of Judah, even a future king, or a priest. The Servant could be an ideal prophet, intentionally left anonymous, and since women could be prophets, the ideal prophet could include women. The figure could also represent a particular prophet such as Jeremiah. Most commonly it is suggested that the servant is a personification of Israel, as 41:8 refers to “Israel my servant.” The passive nature could simply be based on the servant’s identity as a temporarily defeated Israel. Israel exhibits a passive righteousness now in order that God can vindicate Israel later; there will be a transition from shame to honor. Indeed, the triumph will be truly astounding but accomplished by God, not the servant. Considering the attention to righteous groups in Isaiah 56–66 and Daniel 11–12, it is possible that the passive, silent servant represents just such a subset within Israel. (See also Chapter 2 on Ezra.) Yet regardless of the precise designation of the figure, the Suffering Servant can be recognized as an idealized yet very passive agent. Recall that in the Introduction it was noted that in Second Isaiah God is often depicted as a woman, nurturing or even bearing her children Israel, yet it should be noted that the Servant is not feminized per se. By being abused, and not triumphing on his own but only through the actions of God, the servant can be said to be emasculated relative to the codes that would apply to past kings and heroes, but there are few signs of feminization. It is not clear, then, how the passive images of the servant in these songs compare to God-as-woman elsewhere in Second Isaiah. Ultimately, the servant is both passive and triumphant.

The Christian interpretation of the Suffering Servant as a prefiguration of Christ is so compelling that for many modern readers it is difficult to hear this passage without making that association. Yet it is important to interpret the Servant Songs within their original context. We begin with a general observation: the Suffering Servant is both tragic and triumphant – and is not consistently passive. Ironically, the passive presentation is also an active strategy to effect mercy on God’s part, as if the servant is a sacrifice. The servant hopes for God’s deliverance, and is not disappointed. There are two other ironies associated with this passage. First, the lowliness, victimization, and passivity of the servant – that is, the servant’s reduction in agency – is contrasted to the cosmic scope of God’s agency in the rest of Second Isaiah. God has grown beyond the national deity of Israel to a more universal status. When Israel lost independent nationhood and became the plaything of great empires, Second Isaiah compensated by affirming that the God of Israel ruled over the entire universe, even those nations who abused Israel. In addition, God will ultimately return Israel to its appropriate role as chief among the nations. A second irony is that although the Book of Isaiah was quoted or alluded to by Jews and Christians more often than almost any other book of the Bible, these references rarely include the Suffering Servant passages. Isaiah was a treasured text across the various parties within Judaism and earliest Christianity, but the Suffering Servant was not a central quoted part of that audience experience. To be sure, Ellen Bradshaw Aitken, Adela Yarbro Collins, and George W. E. Nickelsburg have shown that the relation between Wisdom of Solomon, the Lord’s Supper in the Gospel of Mark, and other passages can only be understood as a development of Isaiah 52–53.⁴⁴ The passive and feminized hero tradition is what is common to these texts, and the Suffering Servant may have been recalled by the authors of Wisdom of Solomon and the Gospel of Mark. In addition, it is possible that the mysterious figure of the Teacher of Righteousness at Qumran was identified with the servant, as well as the persecuted righteous one in Wisdom of Solomon 2–5.

Job and Ecclesiastes

We mention briefly two important Israelite texts that feature problematized protagonists, Job and Ecclesiastes (Kohelet). The dates for these two texts cannot be established with certainty, yet what is clear is that they both break sharply from the conservative wisdom found in Proverbs, the wisdom psalms, and Ben Sira. Job presents the righteous indignation of a man punished by God for no apparent reason, while Ecclesiastes depicts an existentialist Solomon who cannot perceive a higher moral purpose in everyday striving. In each case, the audience of the texts would experience the pure adrenaline derived from challenging the guidelines of accepted wisdom. Yet neither protagonist is really comparable to what we are addressing in this study. Job is set upon by God yet does not submit and does not stand down; rather, he rises up and remains active and vocal. It is a satire of the active role, almost like Don Quixote: although Job is truly reduced and powerless, he insists on haranguing God. The one who speaks in Ecclesiastes, though enjoying the good things in life that are typically considered the blessings of wisdom, is passive and even depressive, incapable of affirming much at all or of taking an active role. One is comically active, the other comically passive, but both outside the bandwidth of characters that we are interested in here.

The Story of Ahikar

The Story of Ahikar, a non-Israelite wisdom novella, is included here as a text that bears some similarities to our other examples. The earliest fragments of Ahikar, dated to about 400 BCE, were uncovered at a Jewish military colony at Elephantine in Egypt; it was an international text that likely influenced Jewish thought. Although the Elephantine fragments leave large gaps in the narrative, the many later versions provide hints as to what might have transpired in the early text. In order to compare Ahikar the protagonist with our other texts, we include here some plot elements only preserved in the later copies.⁴⁵

The courtier Ahikar is childless and so adopts his nephew Nadan and begins to instruct him with his best proverbs, the stock-in-trade of the court sage. Nadan, however, is not improved by this teaching but rather rebels by abusing his slaves and squandering his newfound wealth. His conflict with Ahikar comes to a head, and Nadan responds by forging letters to implicate his uncle in an attempted coup. Ahikar, we come to realize, is a passive or ineffective protagonist; his proverbs have failed to instruct Nadan, and though he is a court sage, he is unable to refute the charges against him. He searches for the right words but is silent. Condemned to death, Ahikar is saved, not by his family, the typical social unit in proverbs, but by a friend who hides him. In his moment of crisis and hiding, he also grows in cunning, becoming a stronger figure.⁴⁶ When the kingdom is attacked and the king regrets having condemned his wise counselor, Ahikar is brought forth to save the day. Now re-instated and the battle won, he accosts his nephew with powerful “parables” rather than earnest “proverbs,” which shame the young man. (This distinction between the powerless nature of proverbs and the dynamic power of parables may not be present in the early Elephantine version.) Nadan is executed and Ahikar ends the story in a more secure position at the head of the court.

The fact that Ahikar begins as a passive protagonist but does not remain so is a pattern we saw in Joseph and will see again in Esther. In addition, it is possible that although Ahikar is described as a courtier of the Assyrian king, the character is likely based on an actual Ahikar who was an Aramean. This ethnic dynamic may be similar to that which propels the Israelite court narratives. The similarity of Arameans within the Assyrian world to Jewish traditions of the ethnic-minority courtier is intriguing. Were ethnic Arameans a court minority before Jews? Abraham, recall, was also a “wandering Aramean” (Deut 26:5) before he charted a new family path, becoming the ancestor of Israel. In addition, the Jews at Elephantine were alternately labeled as Judeans and Arameans.⁴⁷ At any rate, the narrative of the Aramean Ahikar resonated with Jews, who not only preserved the text but incorporated his character both as an Israelite (in Tobit) and also as a convert to Judaism (Achior in Judith). Outside of Israel and within, the passive protagonist could be explored as part of the laboratory for virtue in novelistic texts, even if, or especially if, the protagonist changes. In the Introduction we drew attention to other non-Israelite texts that are similar: the Egyptian wisdom texts Ankhsheshonqy and Any and the Greek Argonautica and Roman Aeneid.

This treatment of biblical and related figures, most from the First Temple period but some from later centuries, serves as a comparative stage for new developments in the Second Temple period, or for new explorations of older literary patterns. The most important observation, that First Temple biblical figures are often feminized or problematized, reminds us to consider the Second Temple texts in this literary tradition. What is important in the later period is not the fact of innovation – although some of what we will observe will be totally new – but the new emphases and indeed what appears to be the goal of these literary developments: a deeper moral psychology.