The 'Grammar' of Sacrifice: A Generativist Study of the Israelite Sacrificial System in the Priestly Writings...

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Naphtali S. Meshel (Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies, Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies, Princeton University)

The 'Grammar' of Sacrifice

A Generativist Study of the Israelite Sacrificial System in the Priestly Writings with A 'Grammar'...

Naphtali S. Meshel (Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies, Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies, Princeton University)

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English

Oxford University Press
31 July 2014

Judaism: worship, rites & ceremonies; Judaism: sacred texts

"The notion that rituals, like natural languages, are governed by implicit, rigorous rules led scholars in the last century, harking back to the early Indian grammarian Patañjali, to speak of a ""grammar"", or ""syntax"", of ritual, particularly sacrificial ritual. Despite insightful examples of ritual complexes that follow hierarchical rules akin to syntactic structures in natural languages, and ambitious attempts to imagine a Universal Grammar of sacrificial ritual, no single, comprehensive ""grammar"" of any ritual system has yet been composed. This book offers the first such ""grammar."" Centering on
*S--the idealized sacrificial system represented in the Priestly laws in the Pentateuch--it demonstrates that a ritual system is describable in terms of a set of concise, unconsciously internalized, generative rules, analogous to the grammar of a natural language. Despite far-reaching diachronic developments, reflected in Second Temple and rabbinic literature, the ancient Israelite sacrificial system retained a highly unchangeable ""grammar,"" which is abstracted and analysed in a formulaic manner.

The limits of the analogy to linguistics are stressed: rather than categories borrowed from linguistics, such as syntax and morphology, the operative categories of
*S are abstracted inductively from the ritual texts: zoemics--the study of the classes of animals used in ritual sacrifice; jugation-the rules governing the joining of animal and non-animal materials; hierarchics-the tiered structuring of sacrificial sequences; and praxemics--the analysis of the physical activity comprising sacrificial procedures. Finally, the problem of meaning in non-linguistic ritual systems is addressed."

By: Naphtali S. Meshel (Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies Princeton University)
Imprint: Oxford University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 236mm, Width: 165mm, Spine: 26mm
Weight: 606g
ISBN: 9780198705567
ISBN 10: 0198705565
Pages: 298
Publication Date: 31 July 2014
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , Primary , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

"The ""Grammar"" of Sacrifice Preface 1: Introduction 2: Zoemics 3: Jugation 4: Hierarchics 5: Praxemics 6: Meaning 7: The Grammar of Sacrifice and the Sacrifice of Grammar Bibliography A Grammar of *S Zoemics Jugation Hierarchics Praxemics"

Naphtali S. Meshel is Assistant Professor of Religion and Judaic Studies at Princeton University.

Reviews for The 'Grammar' of Sacrifice: A Generativist Study of the Israelite Sacrificial System in the Priestly Writings with A 'Grammar' of Σ

"[A] meticulous preparation of a ""grammar"" of the sacrificial system represented in biblical and post-biblical priestly texts (P), which he calls S. ... Devising such a system not only allows Meshel to update and revise our previous understanding of representations of biblical ritual and lexicography. * Gabriel Levy, Numen *"