Deferential Self-Reference in the Book of Samuel
In: Vetus TestamentumSearch for other papers by Yoo-ki Kim in
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In the Hebrew Bible, the self-deferential phrase is used to save the addressee’s face in conversation. It can occupy virtually every position that the first-person pronouns can take. However, it does not occur consistently in a given speech. This article examines the use of self-deferential phrases in the book of Samuel, especially in the dialogues that involve David. It demonstrates that the occurrence of self-deferential phrases depends on the judgment and attitude of the speaker toward the situation of the conversation, not only on the status gap between the interlocutors. The self-deferential phrase in the book of Samuel, as an indicator of the speaker’s state of mind toward the addressee, serves as a dynamic signal that provides readers with an important clue about the narrator’s understanding of the situation.
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17
M. Di Giulio, “Mitigating Devices in Biblical Hebrew”, Kleine Untersuchungen zur Sprache des Alten Testaments und seiner Umwelt 8/9 (2008), pp. 52-55. Di Giulio, “Mitigating Devices”, pp. 33-62, identifies three mitigating devices in Biblical Hebrew: “external mitigation”, “internal mitigation”, and “shift of the deictic center”.
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22
In the words of Brown and Levinson, Politeness, p. 72, in this situation the speaker “can claim that other things are more important than face, or that the act is not an fta [= face threatening act] at all”.
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28
According to Miller, Representation of Speech, p. 275, ʿabdô and the antecedent of the suffix are usually in the same clause.
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30
Klein, 1 Samuel, p. 207 notes that “David showed his own loyalty to Jonathan by referring to himself as Jonathan’s servant”.
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32
Tsumura, The First Book of Samuel, pp. 614-615 notes that the narrator shows the tenseness of this conversation through literary devices such as extraordinary quotation formulas.
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36
Revell, The Designation of the Individual, p. 244 suggests that the use of the plural (“us”) is deferential. Even if the deferential character of the plural form of the pronoun is acknowledged, the plural should be distinguished from the deferential phrase in question.
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E.J. Bridge, “Self-Abasement as an Expression of Thanks in the Hebrew Bible”, Bib 92 (2011), p. 264 views Joab’s action as a coercion, which requires increase of David’s face.
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Deferential Self-Reference in the Book of Samuel
In: Vetus TestamentumSearch for other papers by Yoo-ki Kim in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
In the Hebrew Bible, the self-deferential phrase is used to save the addressee’s face in conversation. It can occupy virtually every position that the first-person pronouns can take. However, it does not occur consistently in a given speech. This article examines the use of self-deferential phrases in the book of Samuel, especially in the dialogues that involve David. It demonstrates that the occurrence of self-deferential phrases depends on the judgment and attitude of the speaker toward the situation of the conversation, not only on the status gap between the interlocutors. The self-deferential phrase in the book of Samuel, as an indicator of the speaker’s state of mind toward the addressee, serves as a dynamic signal that provides readers with an important clue about the narrator’s understanding of the situation.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 235 | 55 | 4 |
| Full Text Views | 189 | 6 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 67 | 3 | 0 |
