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PREACHING OLD TESTAMENT NARRATIVE

When I read a passage from the OT before preaching from it, I usually announce that it can be found on the left side of the Bible, a side little heard in our land. I am being only slightly facetious when I say this. Wherever Bishop Marcion is spending his eternity, he has gotten the last laugh; his 2d-century attempt to expunge the OT from the Christian church is nearly complete. One can go many weeks in many parishes and hear precisely nothing from the Hebrew Bible. This article is no place to rehearse the many reasons for this tragedy—and it is nothing less than that. That story has been offered in several accessible places (see most recently E. Achtemeier, Preaching from the Old Testament [Westminster/John Knox, 1989]). I do, however, wish to focus on one of the reasons for the loss of the OT, the reason that most directly relates to the concern of this article.

The OT is best characterized by its narrative quality. This simple and obvious fact has been noted for centuries by hundreds of commentators of every theological stripe. But be careful to note what I said. I did not say that the OT is best characterized by its narratives, although they are nothing less than magnificent. It is the narrative quality of the OT that is noteworthy. Of course there are many, many places in the OT that are hardly narrative in genre; a reading of Leviticus should make that certain (though even there narratives creep in; see ch. 10, for example). What I mean by a narrative quality is the narrative substratum of the whole work, a substratum that is certainly narratively based. A quick review of several central OT texts can confirm this claim.

When Moses is called at the burning bush by the mysterious I AM, he is called to be nothing less than a raconteur, a teller of the story of Israel. In Exod 4:15-1 6, after God has in effect kicked the reluctant Moses toward his Egyptian destiny, God gives the new prophet quite specific instructions: “You will speak to him (brother Aaron), and you will put the words in his mouth. I will be with your mouth and his mouth. I will teach both of you what you will do. He shall speak for you to the people; he will be a mouth for you, and you shall be for him as God” (my translation).

“You shall be for him as God.” Moses is nothing less than the mouth of God for Aaron and thus for the people. But what is the mouth of God? The mouth of God is the mouth of a storyteller as the speeches of God to Moses (Exod 3:6-12, 14-22) indicate. God speaks in stories and bids Moses do the same. One of the delightful ironies of the long story of God and Moses is that Moses most clearly becomes a great storyteller when talking to God on the sacred mountain; Moses does his best storytelling when toe-to-toe with God in a courageous attempt to save the sinning people of Israel (Exod 32)! In fact, it could be said that Moses reminds God of the great story that God taught Moses in the first place (vv 11-13)! And this story is so powerful that the very mind and intention of God is changed (v 14).

Other texts underline this narrative substratum of the OT. When the great salvation of the Israelites in the Exodus is celebrated in the Passover ritual, the question, What is all this?, is answered by the extended narration of the Exodus story (see Exod 13:13-1 5). When first fruits are offered to the sanctuary, the priest commands the worshipper to recite the sacred narrative in response to the great bounty of God (Deut 26:5-11). In these places and in others it can be seen that the OT rests on a narrative substratum, and that substratum extends beyond the bounds of individual narrative texts. When we read the OT, we need to read narratively.

And precisely here is the problem for preaching. Though the OT is characterized by a narrative quality, preachers have tailed to take that fact with sufficient seriousness. In the past twenty years great strides have been taken in our understanding of narrative texts and more specifically in our understanding of OT narrative texts. Early probes were made by E. Good, Irony in the Old Testament (2d ed; Almond, 1981). and D. Gunn, The Story of King David (JSOT, 1978) and The Fate of King Saul (JSOT, 1980), to name only a few outstanding representatives, but the landmark in this burgeoning field remains R. Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative (Basic, 1981). In that book for the first time we were introduced more systematically to the consummate artistry of the OT narrators, to their deft characterizations, their subtle manipulations of plot, their intricate shifting of points of view. After Alter’s ground-breaking work it could never again be said that those who wrote the Bible were either primitive or simplistic or naive. When one reads the narratives of the OT, one reads nothing less than great art. And if there were any doubt of the truth of that claim, M. Steinberg’s magisterial The Poetics of Biblical Narrative (Indiana University, 1985) should lay it to rest.

And now enters the preacher. She must learn to appreciate the high quality of the narrative she is reading in the Hebrew Bible to be sure, but she must do far more than appreciate its superb artistry. She must learn to employ that high art in the recreative telling of the OT narrative. These narratives cry out for re-presentation. Too often preachers have distilled them into points, or in my favorite metaphor for the process, they have rendered them into discursive speech. If you have ever watched the process of “rendering the fat,” you will understand the gross transformation the narrative text must undergo once it is rendered into a non-narrative. In the decidedly post-biblical world in which we preach, we are called as in the days of the Bible itself to tell the story, a story that has not been heard nearly often enough in late-2Oth century churches. In my opinion, then, one of the greatest reasons for the loss of the OT in our churches is that the story and the stories are not being told and are thus not known. Jeremiah 2 warns us all of the grave dangers of the loss of the story.

But what to do? Only the barest of suggestions can be given. For further detail, please see my book, Preaching the Old Testament (Abingdon, 1991). A quick example. Our text is Exodus 32, one I am certain is at least vaguely familiar as a “story about idolatry.” Indeed, the golden calf has become the very symbol of idolatry in the western world. But is that all there is here? A careful narrative reading suggests otherwise.

The narrator of this memorable tale provides rich and ambiguous characterizations of the two main figures, Aaron and Moses. Aaron has been deputized by Moses as the one to arbitrate disputes among the people while he is gone to converse with God. But when confronted by an angry mob, demanding the creation of gods “who will go before us” Aaron astonishingly complies and carefully fashions a splendid little calf. What is he doing? Read his dialogue with the people (vv 1-5) very carefully. The OT narrators draw the portraits of their characters through what they say. Now watch carefully when Moses descends the mountain, furiously destroys the calf, and confronts Aaron. Note exactly what Moses says and how Aaron responds. There is more in that response than the hilarious lie of v 24. How does Aaron relate to the people of Israel? See vv 22-23. Then observe Moses’ response to the sinfulness of the people as he ascends the mountain to speak to God precisely on their behalf.

Through careful characterization, the narrator has drawn a sharp contrast between Aaron and Moses and this might cause us to ask the question of the quality of leadership represented by each man; who is the real leader of Israel? If I then choose to narrate this great story, allowing the story to have its own say, I will focus my telling on the figures of Moses and Aaron, allowing their contrasting characters to raise the questions of real leadership. If I do my telling faithfully, basing it squarely on the artistry of the text, I will not need to point out to my hearers what I am doing. I will have shown them, or better put, the Bible itself will have shown them what real leadership is. By telling the story we honor the Bible and we honor people’s wisdom in allowing them to appropriate the Bible’s own claim for themselves. Narrative preaching is exactly biblical preaching in the full sense of that word, no more and surely no less.

So here is a call to tell the stories of the OT, because Marcion was wrong after all. The OT does not speak of an alien God, cruel and despotic, vastly different than the God of Jesus Christ. The gospel is in the narrated OT, and if our people are to know the full richness of the biblical witness, they must be allowed to hear the OT. I suggest that one of the very best ways that they can hear is for you and me to tell the OT stories; like Moses, God calls us to tell. For it is certain that unless there be a real change in a person’s story, there can be no real conversion.

By John C. Holbert, Associate Professor of Preaching, Perkins School of Theology.