Auerbach compared Homers writing to that of biblical writers. He was comparing the literature to see who the better writer was. He claimed that “Homer can be analyzed . . . but he cannot be interpreted”. To understand that we must know what those words mean.
Analyzed- To separate (a material or abstract entity) into constituent parts or elements; determine the elements or essential features.
Interpretation - An explanation of the meaning of another's artistic or creative work.
Now given these definitions from Dictionary.com I would have to agree with Aurback. Homer spells everything out in his writing. No stone goes unturned and nothing is leaven to the imagination. “His mother’s father-a great thief and swindler” Homer even has to explain the back story of people who just make an appearance in a flashback. There is nothing left to interpret because he holds our hand and tells us everything we need to know. All we have to do is analyze it by looking at all the pieces in the writing.
The biblical writers took a different approach to this. In Abraham and Isaac it says “Behold, here I am”. That was god talking to Abraham, and we are given no context to where god is or even if he is in a physical or astral form. “and they came to the place which God had told him of,” again in this it is just a vague place that we do not know about. We can interpret the bible and analyze it. People can fill in the blanks and find meaning in it because everything is not feed to us. People can take away different meaning from it because we interpret it and that is something we all do differently.
Auerbach felt that the biblical authors did a better job than Homer did. Homer had to explain everyone motivation and everything that happened. The biblical writers did not have to explain everything in their stories. They left things up to interpretation. Homers stories are entertaining but that is all they are. The biblical stories are meant to teach us and make us think.
David, this is a good post. You do a nice job of summarizing Auerbach's argument in the essay and showing how it fit with both texts.
ReplyDeleteHere's one thing that I wonder though: what does Auerbach have to say about the cause/effect of these different styles?
To put it another way, what might cause these writers to approach the stories differently? Different motivation, intents, goals? And finally, how do these stylistic differences effect how we read and ultimately experience the stories differently?