TIP OF THE DAY 118: Characters round and flat

MJ. Smith

I am adding these posts to the previous tip list L/V 10 Tip of the Day

QUESTION: What Logos/Verbum resources have significant discussions on characterization in Biblical narrative?

ANSWER: drawing on a search against my library

Bartholomew, Craig G., and David J. H. Beldman, eds. Hearing the Old Testament: Listening for God’s Address. Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2012.

Berlin, Adele. Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative. Vol. 9. Bible and Literature Series. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994.

Brown, Jeannine K. The Gospels as Stories: A Narrative Approach to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2020.

Thomas, Huw. In the Way of the Story: Reading Biblical Narrative. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2021.

QUESTION: What is characterization by comparison and contrast?

SOFTWARE: A search brings up Thomas, Huw. In the Way of the Story: Reading Biblical Narrative. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2021.

ANSWER: a graphic organizer approach:

David and Goliath stand in clear contrast to each other, but in this example the reader is just a stone’s throw away from the exit of one character. David and Saul make a much more challenging comparison, over the course of both their narratives. Both experience the rare biblical instance of a physical description (1 Sam 10:23; 16:12), both mess up big time and are confronted by prophets (1 Sam 15; 2 Sam 12), and both lend themselves to comparison and contrast.

The reader can try comparing characters. One simple activity is to draw up a two-columned paper in which the qualities of each character are lined up either side. However, for this to work well in biblical analogies the reader should look to one side and allow it to raise questions of the other—because that is how these analogies are often working in the stories. In comparing the stories of the paralytic and Bartimaeus (Mark 2:1–12; 10:46–52) the task involves noticing something in one story and then asking it of another; the paralytic is brought by four others, but does anybody bring Bartimaeus? Such asks lead to a recognition of what both stories share in common. Both healings face obstructions: in Bartimaueus’s story that stand-out characteristic of him persisting and shouting louder raises a question about the paralytic who, in this story, never says a word.

Why might that be?

And what is it about the bystanders that differs?

Why does Jesus behave so differently?

What do they each do at the close of their stories?

In analogies, one character asks such comparisons of another.[1]

Berlin, Adele. Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative. Vol. 9. Bible and Literature Series. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994.

The passage about Esau and Jacob just cited also shows contrast between two characters, and this is another technique of characterization. There are actually three types of contrast: 1) contrast with another character, 2) contrast with an earlier action of the same character, and 3) contrast with the expected norm.

Even if a characterization is implicit in the words or deeds of a character, it stands out more clearly if it is contrasted with its opposite, e.g. Nabal and Abigail, Esau and Jacob. In these two cases the contrast is spelled out in the discourse: ‘The woman was intelligent and beautiful but the man was hard and evil in his dealings’ (1 Sam 25:3); ‘Esau was an expert hunter, an outdoorsman, but Jacob was a mild man, an indoor type’ (Gen 25:27). Sometimes the contrast is not so evident on the surface of the discourse, but is implicit in the story. The Joseph story contains a contrast between Reuben and Judah in several episodes (Gen 37:21–29; 42:37–43:11) in which Reuben, although he means well, is always less effective than Judah.

Even subtler is the contrast between Uriah and David in 2 Sam 11:7–14. David, the Commander-in-Chief, cannot get a lowly soldier to do what he wants him to do. David, who has slept with Uriah’s wife, cannot get Uriah to sleep with her. David, who has remained at home while the troops are at army camp, cannot get Uriah to go home; Uriah remains ‘camped out’ with the king’s servants. Everything that Uriah says and does points up the immorality of David’s words and deeds. Ironically, it is innocent Uriah who pays with his life while the life of the guilty David is spared. But even in death Uriah undermines the control that David tries to assert, for the plan goes slightly awry and other soldiers are needlessly killed.[2]

QUESTION: In the opinion of Adele Berlin, what character types are encountered in scripture?

ANSWER: from Berlin, Adele. Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative. Vol. 9. Bible and Literature Series. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994.

In literary criticism it is customary to distinguish flat characters and round characters. Flat characters, or types, are built around a single quality or trait. They do not stand out as individuals. Round characters, on the other hand, are much more complex, manifesting a multitude of traits, and appearing as ‘real people’. In addition, to quote M. H. Abrams, ‘Almost all dramas and narratives, properly enough, have some characters who serve as mere functionaries and are not characterized at all.’. I see here three categories (not the usual two—flat and round) and to avoid confusion I will rename them. The round character is the full-fledged character; the flat character is the type; and the functionary is the agent. All can be found in biblical narrative, and the same person may appear as a full-fledged character in one story and as a type or agent in another.[3]

QUESTION: Give examples of full-fledged character, type character, and agent character.

ANSWER: Drawn from multiple sources:

Full-fledged (round) characters:

Moses

David

Judith

Tobit

Peter

Paul

Type (flat) characters:

Pharaoh of the Exodus

Jezebel

Holofernes

Antiochus IV Epiphanes

Herod (of Matthew 2)

Agent characters:

The servant who informs David of Absalom's actions (2 Samuel 13:30-33)

The messenger who tells Eli about the capture of the Ark (1 Samuel 4:12-18)

The servants who carry out Holofernes' orders (Judith 10:17)

The messengers sent by Nebuchadnezzar (Judith 1:7-11)

The servants at the wedding in Cana (John 2:5-9)

The man carrying a jar of water, who leads the disciples to the upper room (Mark 14:13-15)

Names-only characters:

This is my own addition so that all Biblical people can be classified. It consists of people who are mentioned only in lists, e.g. genealogies, returnees from exile. . .

Eliezer of Damascus (Genesis 15:2)

Jaalah (Ezra 2:5-6. 1 Esdras 5:33)

Diotrephes (3 John 1:9)

Agabus (Acts 11:28, 21:10)

Note that when a person appears in multiple narratives, their character type may be different in different narratives.

[1] Huw Thomas, In the Way of the Story: Reading Biblical Narrative (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2021).

[2] Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative, vol. 9, Bible and Literature Series (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994), 40.

[3] Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative, vol. 9, Bible and Literature Series (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994), 23–24.