The journey of Jephthah’s daughter: On spatial cognition, body and language in Judges 11:37

The journey of Jephthah’s daughter: On spatial cognition, body and language in Judges 11:37

The traditional literal interpretation of the text in Judges 11:37 shows exceptional variation in topographic depiction. The literal interpretation of Driver, published in Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, is an example. From a linguistic perspective, no attention was paid whatsoev...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Hervormde teologiese studies 2021, Vol.77 (1), p.e1-e9
Main Author: Lamprecht, Adriaan
Format: Article
Language:eng ; afr
Subjects:
Bible
biblical hebrew
Book publishing
Cognition
conceptual metaphor
Dictionaries
Hypotheses
jephthah’s daughter
judges 11:37
spatial cognition
Translations
ירד (yrd)
Online Access:Get full text
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Description
Summary:The traditional literal interpretation of the text in Judges 11:37 shows exceptional variation in topographic depiction. The literal interpretation of Driver, published in Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, is an example. From a linguistic perspective, no attention was paid whatsoever to the relation of interiority between an objective body and an objective space. This article proposes a cognitive semantic perspective and argues that the motion-path verb ירד (yrd) in Judges 11:37 carries a metaphorical meaning, and the linguistic processing, that is, the metaphorical mapping of the image schematic structure of CHANGE (up-down) as the source domain onto that of BEHAVIOUR as the target domain, involving activation of cultural spatial and bodily systems. With this background in mind, Judges 11:37 represents a new understanding for similar UP-DOWN image schemas applied in the Hebrew Bible.Contribution: This article contributes to the understanding of the apparent ‘inexact’ sense of the use of ירד (yrd) in Judges 11:37.
ISSN:0259-9422
2072-8050