UBBL310 (The Rise of the King: I & II Samuel): The Exegetical Process - Part 2

Identify each clause of the passage. Assign to each clause a lower-case letter, beginning with “a,” and restarting for every numbered verse.

Look for structuring elements. Most narratives or stories have the following three parts:

1. Setting to the Scene
   A new scene is introduced - this can be identified by changes in character, setting, genre, or time
    
2. Scene Proper
   The story itself
    
3. Conclusion to the Scene
   The epilogue, where the narrator summarizes the scene or brings it to an end with a new change in character, setting, genre, or time

Find the major breaks in the passage (look for any changes in character, setting, genre, or time). These generally signal a new literary unit.

EXAMPLE:
If there is a change in “time,” ("many days later," "the next day," etc.), that often signals a new literary unit. If there is a change in “setting,” (such as a change in the city or geographic region where the narrative is set), that indicates a new literary unit.

Compose a title, or heading, for your literary units.

NOTE:
In the technical terminology of Biblical Studies, we call an isolated, or demarcated, unit of text a pericope (pronounced pĕr-Í-cup-e). We will use that term going forward instead of "passage." Note also that a pericope can be further subdivided into smaller pericopae (plural of pericope). In each case, in order to be defined as a pericope, it has to be an isolated textual unit that has a clear beginning and ending; hence, it must be "demarcated" from other pericopae. These titles will greatly aid you in finding the passage's focus and in identifying the pericope.

Composing a title/heading is a hard part for a lot of people. Let's see if this exercise helps:

Look at the following four items.  If you had to group two of them together, which would you group together . . . and why?

Now, probably the wisest choice would be to group the apple and the peach together in one group and the pen and pencil together in another. WHAT THOUGHT PROCESSES WENT THROUGH YOUR MIND TO MAKE THAT DECISION?  You unconsciously went through some very quick logical calculations, didn't you?  Both the apple and the peach are part of a larger category to which we can assign the title, FRUIT. Both the pen and pencil are part of a larger category to which we can assign the title, WRITING IMPLEMENTS.

So if you were to make an Outline of this choice, you would do it this way:

A.   Fruits
       1.   apple
       2.   peach
B.   Writing Implements
       1.   pen
       2.   pencil

Think this same way when doing an Outline of your pericope.  What are the larger categories to which you can assign the various phrases?

CREATING AN OUTLINE IS AN ART, NOT A SCIENCE—THERE IS MORE THAN ONE WAY TO OUTLINE A PERICOPE.

After all, can any of you think of a rationale for structuring the above four pictures differently?

How about if, instead of categorizing the items by species, we categorized them by COLOR? Then our Structure Analysis might look something like this:

A.   Red Things
       1.   apple
       2.   red pen
B.   Orange Things
       1.   peach
       2.   pencil

NOTICE THAT I HAD TO COMPOSE A TITLE FOR THE CATEGORY IN WHICH I GROUPED THE ITEMS. YOU WILL HAVE TO COMPOSE TITLES FOR YOUR CATEGORIES TOO.

TIP FOR IDENTIFYING THE MAJOR SECTIONS:
For speeches, you will always have two elements:
A.   an "introductory formula"
B.   a "speech proper"

Many students feel a little nervous about composing titles/headings for all their major sections.  Well there are some easy ways to go about it. First, when you outline a quoted speech, for instance, look for the "introductory formula;" i.e. the little phrase that tells you that a quote from a person in the story is going to follow. Find how many of these your particular text has.  Then find the actual quote or the actual words spoken by a character in the story.  This is called a "speech proper"; i.e. the speech itself. Find these units and keep them together in your outline.

IMPORTANT TIP:
DO NOT just follow chapter and verse division to identify your own divisions. Let the content of the material guide you instead.

To find out where the major divisions occur, let the text guide you and not chapter and verse divisions. Chapter and verse divisions came centuries later than the text itself. Now, in many cases, you will make the same divisions made by the Bible translators, but sometimes, you will disagree with their divisions, and we want you to learn to think for yourselves and not lean on them to make those divisions.

MORE IMPORTANT TIPS:
TIP #1: You must structure the outline as follows:
I.
II. etc.;
    A.
    B. etc;
        1.
        2. etc.;
            a.
            b. etc.;
                1) 2) etc.;
                        a) b) etc.;
                                (1)(2) etc.;
                                         (a)(b) etc.
                                                   i ii etc.;
                                                        aa. bb. etc. (don't worry - you very likely will not get to this level of detail!)

Include the chapter and verse at the end of each line (you may break each verse down to sections a, b, c, d, e, etc., based on separation by commas or other punctuation. See example below).

TIP #2: Never have more than 5 entries of a single category. Otherwise, it's just a list.

If you have a string of listings that exceed 5 in number then you need to group some of them together and sub-divide. In other words if you have A,B,C,D,E,F,G, or a,b,c,d,e,f, or 1,2,3,4,5,6,7, etc., then you need to find how some of these points can be grouped together, see which parts have something in common, etc. When you sub-divide you want to do it by finding what natural affiliation the various parts have. You have to stay in order, but look for the parts that belong together in opposition to what does not.

Organize by looking for parallel phrases or parallel patterns between the major divisions. You may also find key words or key phrases, which are repeated or significant words or phrases.

EXAMPLE: Luke 15:1-32