Picturing Theology

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P i c t u r i n g T h e o l o g y

Figures of Speech (continued)

Apostrophe

This is a strange but graphic figure which sounds as if the speaker were talking to himself in a sort of externalized soliloquy. For instance, David says to his dead son, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!” (2 Sam. 18:33). What a moving expression of David’s grief this is; no other mode of expression could be quite so expressive in this instance. Then there is the use of this figure in which the kings of earth address a fallen city, “Alas! alas! thou great city, thou mighty city, Babylon! In one hour has thy judgment come!” (Rev. 18:10). This figure of speech seems best adapted to the expression of deep emotion. As such, it readily grabs our attention and draws out our interest. Here’s one most of us never heard of, but which we frequently use in everyday speech. We say, “This is his hour” when we don’t really mean an hour just sixty minutes long. We mean this is his time of glory, or suffering, or whatever we associate with his current experience. We have substituted a part for the whole. In Scripture it occurs in such passages as this: in Judges 12:7 we are told Jephthah was buried “in the cities of Gilead” (Hebrew) though actually only one of those cities is meant; in Luke 2:1 “all the world” is used to mean the world of the Roman Empire; in Deuteronomy 32:41 “if I whet the lightning of my sword” the word lightning is used for the flashing edge of the gleaming blade. Perhaps now we have seen enough of the prevalence and expressive value of figures of speech to help us appreciate the color and realism they lend to the language of the Bible. Also, interpretively, our review should take some of the mystery out of our encounters with these forms, in studying the Bible. Synechdoche