Righteousness in the Book of Proverbs
By: Sun Myung Lyu
Series: Forschungen zum Alten Testament. 2. Reihe -- 55; Forschungen zum Alten Testament -- 55.
Publisher: Mohr Siebeck
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Tübingen
Language: eng
Number of pages: 154
ISBN-13: 9783161498725
Copyright date: 2012
Subjects: Righteousness; Rechtschaffenheit; Ethik; Criticism, interpretation; Exegese; Social justice; Bibel; Bible; Biblical teaching; Ethics in the Bible; Religious aspects
Description: This study brings insights from character ethics in addition to the much discussed biblical scholarship on social justice in order to elucidate the concept of righteousness present in the book of Proverbs. The author's choice of Proverbs as a wisdom text in relation to the concept of righteousness reflects the realization that previous scholarship has not dealt with righteousness as a concept in its own right but as a corollary to the issue of social justice. Like character ethics, Proverbs use its depiction of the righteous person as its prominent pedagogic device of moral discourse. In other words, instead of offering abstract statements about morality, Sun Myung Lyu portrays the life of the righteous person as the paradigm of moral life, which is pregnant with numerous realizations into specific actions befitting diverse life situations. What the righteous person embodies is righteousness, the character in toto, which encompasses yet transcends specific virtues and actions. After presenting a comparative study of Proverbs with the Psalms and the ancient Egyptian wisdom texts, the author concludes that despite many similarities and parallels, Proverbs still stands out in its strong emphasis on character formation and internalization of virtues as foundations of morality in general and righteousness in particular.
Notes: Originally presented as the author's thesis (Ph. D.--University of Wisconsin, Madison).

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: Theories of righteousness in biblical studies; title: The righteous person in the Book of Proverbs; title: Formation of the righteous character; title: Promoting righteousness: evaluative discourse in the Book of Proverbs; title: Concept of righteousness in Proverbs; title: Concept of righteousness in Proverbs in light of the book of Psalms.