Thank you. PA often seems to be the most sensible one of the lot.
Modern feminist exegesis: What could a daughter do but obey her father?
pat
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In a message dated 1/12/01 3:46:28 PM Eastern Standard Time,
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> John Marenbon. _The Philosophy of Peter Abelard_.
> Cambridge UP, 1999.
>
> p. 80 [re Ab's little book of hymns and sequences
> done at Hel's request] "Sometimes Ab uses and reshapes
> an extra-biblical tradition - for instance, in his
> presentation of Jephtha's [sic] daughter's sacrifice."
> p. 275 "The story of Jephtha, who must sacrifice his
> daughter if he is to keep an oath made to God, is a
> case in point; but here Ab just blames Jephtha for
> making the original promise."
> p. 319-20 "At least in the _Planctus_ for Samson and
> J's d [please forgive the abbreviation], the events
> they commemorate are at once lamentable disasters and,
> in some sense, victories...for J's d...when by
> accepting execution she at once enables her father to
> fulfil his hasty vow...and shows an exemplary calm and
> constancy in the face of death. Ab talks of J's d
> elsewhere, in the _Hymnarius Paraclitensis_ and in his
> Letter 7. In both places J'd d is presented as an
> heroic woman....She...accepted death...encouraging
> rather than fearing it....[Ab asks one to consider how
> she would have borne up had she been a Christian asked
> to deny Christ or die. This argument is also applied
> to the pagan Diogenes.] Ab presents the girl's death
> in terms of a marriage ceremony - an idea he took from
> a first-century work called the _Liber antiquitatum
> biblicarum_."
> Marenbon then discusses the ambiguous tone of Ab's
> poem.
> "It is hard to be sure of the tone of the remark, but
> the girl's words and manner until now would suggest
> one of haughty sarcasm. If so, the comment would bring
> to its climax a contrast which Ab has developed
> throughout the poem, between the calm resolution of
> the victim...and...the horror of her situation,
> underlined by the mock wedding ceremony, and the folly
> which lies behind this unnecessary execution of an
> innocent, openly berated in the final verse."
>
> Hope this helps.
> MG
>
>
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