AHARON MEGGED
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Moses, the redeemer ofIsrael, leader, legislator, and lord of prophets,
is no hero . David, appointed by the Lord, founder of the monarchy,
melodious singer of Israel, is no hero. Even "Samson the Hero," a
figure that seems borrowed from paganistic myth, a "wild" and "un–
tamed" character, is no great hero . Moreover, historical biblical nar–
rative contains not even a single wholly saintly figure, like that of
Jesus in the New Testament, for example, or the later Christian
saints.
It
is only Old Testament interpretation some hundreds of
years later that crowns its figures with divine righteousness and
might, and it is only in biblical chronicle, poem, or parable (Job was
a parable) and not in narrative, that unambiguously and wholly
positive or negative heroes exist.
All of the aforementioned characters and a host of subordinate
ones (it is sufficient to mention the stories of Joseph, Samuel, Jona–
than , Absalom, Elijah, Elisha, Jonah, and Ruth) are never larger
than life . They live and breathe within natural proportions, and like
all flesh and blood, they possess inner contradictions, weaknesses,
defects, emotional conflicts, struggles, sins, pangs of conscience, and
ambivalent feelings both toward loved and hated, and they struggle
with God and Fate. In fact, these are the model progenitors of the
tragic heroes and antiheroes of modern literature to a much greater
extent than the figures of Greek drama, who are defeated by supreme
or mysterious or external forces beyond their control.
And this is what makes ancient Hebrew narrative a theater of
the soul rather than a theater of fate. For example, Abraham's rising
in the morning, taking a piece of bread and a skin of water, and giv–
ing them to Hagar before casting her with her son into the desert, al–
though "the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight"; the scene
in which Joseph stands before his brothers and treats them as if they
were strangers though he recognizes them, cruelly accusing them of
spying and ordering Benjamin to be brought before him; the scene
in which Moses, holding the Tables of the Covenant on Mount Sinai
when God commands him to descend because the people has "speedly
swerved from the path," implores "Why has God turned His wrath
against His people?" before breaking the Tables; Saul's mingled joy
and sorrow at the return of David, a youthful competitor whom he
both loves and hates, after slaying Goliath, and whom he commands
to sit and play before him, then strikes and misses; David's weeping
above the palace gates, "Absalom, Absalom, my son, my son, who
will prefer my death, mine instead of thine, Absalom, my son , my
son," followed by an official announcement of the death of a son who
had revolted against him, hounded him, and sought to murder him,
