Review of the dissertation of Mzonzima Gwala

by koot van wyk (DLitt et Phil, ThD)

Kyungpook National University

Sangju Campus

South Korea

conjoint researcher for Avondale College

Australia

5 March 2012

           Mzonzima Gwala belongs to the Nguni group of Africans of which Zulus in Kwazulu Natal are examples of the Southern movement of these Africans. According to the historian F. Van Jaarsveld, they arrived in that area slightly before or after 1830. No archaeology was ever done on establishing their date of arrival. One can assume that if the 1820 British Settlers had minor problems settling, then it is evidence of their absence in the area where they settled. It is unlikely that people will just give off their land without resistance. He mentioned that the Zulus counted about 7 million speaking it but 14 million that understands it. It is the highest percentage of local languages, according to him. What he does not mention is that the same number, about 7 million Afrikaners speaks another local language, born in Africa, called Afrikaans, and that about 30-40 million people understands their language. Instead of looking to Zulu as lingua franca (Gwala 2004: ) it would be better to consider Afrikaans that is already a lingua franca.

         Gwala completed his dissertation a few months later than this researcher in the same year. This researcher also studied under prof. dr. Izak Cornelius and his colleagues at Stellenbosch University, and never regretted it. They were all aware of that fact that higher-criticism and all its rubrics and tentacles: source-; redaction-; literary-; genre-; reader’s response-; audience-; relecturing-; would not have affected this researcher who reacted constantly against the tenets of these neo-orthodox favorites.

        It is of the utmost importance for any Seventh-day Adventist studying at Stellenbosch Ancient Languages department to spend much time in rewriting the epistemology and methodology that is based on these neo-orthodox principles.

       Gwala did his dissertation on “The reception of Genesis 1-3 in Nguni culture”. For the first 91 pages of his dissertation, he had to explain and dealt with this important aspect of Seventh-day Adventist scholarship. The question is, what did he do with cardinal Adventist Hermeneutical principles studying at a Calvinistic environment?

      What we have discovered about Gwala’s dissertation, is that he is aware of the dangers of reader’s response criticism as a science but that he swallowed it hook and sinker and employed it as basis for his dissertation. Let us look at his own words:

"The role of the reader is crucial to all forms of reception theory. As one takes a closer look at the role of the reader, one discovers two crucial issues, the first one being subdivided into three subcategories, i.e. (Gwala 2004: 18).

(1a) it has led to the acceptance of the decisive and the creative  contribution of the reader to make textual communication possible;” (Gwala 2004: 18).

[Although the modern mind think of God in the taxi driver seat and  him/herself in the back, the reality is still the biblical picture of God  taking control of our lives if we allow Him to do so. The Metaphor may be creative but the underlying principle is still the same as the source text].

“(1b) the reader is not a passive receptor of the author or of the meaning of the text;” (Gwala 2004: 18).

[The Rationalist is not passive at all. He/she rejects miracles,  supernatural, virgin birth, incarnation and flushing God out of the text,  uses anthropological and humanistic mechanism to read the text. Instead of on his/her knees, and depending on the Holy Spirit, the reader is working feverishly with scissors, wastebasket and glue to realign the text to his/her own experience].

(1c) the participation of the reader is the key to the successful completion of the process of communication; (Gwala 2004: 18).

[The completion is to meet God, have a relationship with Him and to worship Him. That is the only communication that has to be completed. The very text is complete as canon and needs no further completing actions. The reader can only get more involved with God or not but the text remains untouched and unaffected. As Edward Heppenstall use to say, the Word of God is not dependent upon the vote of the majority. It is the Word of God by itself in its own veracity].

“(2) Interpreters have been enabled to find a new point of integration for the various directives present in the text." (Gwala 2004: 18)

[Interpreters enable themselves to find new points for directives in the  text contrary to the explicit directives of the text and this phenomenon  does not per se provides legitimacy to the extra-biblical creativity of  cultures other than Hebrew, Aramaic or biblical communities to change, chop-off, and replace].

"Iser (1974:38-39, cf. Lategan 1992:627) argues that the text contains certain deliberate gaps or open spaces; therefore in this way the text requires an input from the reader and makes the reader co-responsible for the creation of the text as meaningful communication. (Gwala 2004: 20)

The role of the Bible as a document of ancient communication does not really bridge the gap (McKnight 1993:239). When the Bible is approached as both an ancient document" (Gwala 2004: 21).

[First of all, the gaps in the text are not always deliberate. In fact, they are hardly ever deliberate. The authors like Moses used recipes, war reports, attendance sheets, witness accounts, memo information and diaries to compile the book of Numbers. Between the seams of these various genres there are gaps but those gaps are not deliberate "so as to give freedom to the reader to create his/her own concepts here". The gap that exists is not necessary to be bridged (contra McKnight 1993:239) since the analysis of the content supplies enough information necessary to support the main tenets of the Word of God and His intentions with humanity and their salvation in a covenantal  relationship. For example, Moses made extracts from the Book of Adam (Genesis 5:1) of four chapters and that is it. That is enough to know. The biblical text is never in need of improvement by modern readers or any readers. The text explains itself. The views of Iser, Lategan and McKnight are horizontal and humanistic. The only One who can create or recreate the text is the Holy Spirit and if by Revelation of Jesus to John He did not do that, no one can. See Koot van wyk “Studying the book of Numbers” nr. 193 in http://www.egw.org at VANWYK NOTE (2009-10-24)].

The dangers of reader’s response criticism are not unknown to Gwala:

“1.2.2.3 THE WANDERING VIEWPOINT

It is very important that the reader be present in the text in more than one way. This is what Iser (1978:108-134), according to Lategan (1992:627), means by the so-called “wandering viewpoint” of the reader. All the perspectives of the text are opened to the reader, e.g. the narrator, the characters, the plot and the implied reader. It is worth noting that in presenting these different options to the reader, the text is in fact mediating between the reader’s position and where the text would like the reader to be.” (Gwala 2004: 21)

“1.2.3 CRITICISM OF READER RESPONSE THEORY

One will notice that some critics maintain that the method destabilizes the text. Other critics object that reader response theory is not prepared to accept the consequences of its own position. The text exercises a decisive control over the reader. Reader response theory proponents try to counter the criticism by introducing two elements, i.e. the text immanent - recognizing the text as a closed system of signs; and text transcendent - taking the reader’s sign system into account. The reader response approaches also have their own limitations, as cited by McKnight (1993:247 and 248):

”Reader response approaches are not comprehensive”

“Reader response approaches to the Bible may be judged from the perspectives of both religious and historical study as inappropriate because of the literary orientation of such approaches.”

“The fact that reader response approaches to the Bible grew out of the literary study of fictional literature (primarily novels) makes such an approach suspect to some.”

“Reader response criticism does not ignore the author and the intention of the author, but the construction of the author and the author’s intention is taken to be only a penultimate strategy in reader response criticism.”

“Reader response criticism is very unsettling and overwhelming for “modern” readers who want to control the text and discover the meaning on the basis of a secure foundation. (Gwala 2004: 23)

[Reader response criticism is unsettling of the veracity aspects of the text since it introduces modern creative elements that may not have been originally in mind in the text. It is not because of their wish to control the text but their wish to be controlled by the text since the text explains itself, which is a fundamental principle in Reformation Theology and Biblical Hermeneutics].

“This reader response approach represents a victory for the reader. Readers are free to make sense for themselves” (McKnight [1993: 239 and 240] mentioned by Gwala 2004: 24).

[This aspect is inacceptable for Seventh Day Adventism. The text provides the agenda by itself, explains itself and serves as navigation both in ancient times as contemporary since many prophets saw things happening around us that are not clear in his own day but in ours. It is a victory for sinful man and rationalists and humanists but not for faithful Bible readers].

“The world of the reader will be seen as “like” the biblical world in his or her context” (Gwala 2004: 24)

[This is unbiblical].

“The views that McKnight is advocating on the issue of reader response have also been adopted by the researcher [Gwala] as he focuses both on the text and the reader” (Gwala 2004: 24).

[This decision and methodology of Gwala here is unacceptable for Seventh-day Adventists].

“Lategan (1992:628) states that the focus reader response theory is, inter alia, on the reader as textual construct and on the world or symbolic universe created by the text. The importance of historical issues is not denied, but a literary approach is preferred as the primary means of gaining an understanding of the text (Lategan 1992:628)” (Gwala 2004: 24).

[The methodology of Lategan shows remarkable correspondences with modern-day Calvinism which is preteristic (readers in Jeremiah’s day and historical meaning) and thus idealistic (symbolic meaning in our day) in the interpretation of prophets. Knowing very well the dangers of reader response theory, Gwala made his decision:

“Having studied the works of Iser, Jauss, Lategan, Fokkema etc. on the issue of reader response theory, the researcher is convinced that the research methodology employed is appropriate for the study undertaken in this doctoral work” .(Gwala 2004: 25).

One can see Gwala’s view of RRT in the following claim:

“Reader response theory is the methodological approach that the researcher [Gwala] will adopt in this doctoral research.” (Gwala 2004: 25).

[The methodology of Gwala is under criticism here by historical traditional Adventism. Adventists do not adopt. They chew for a long time and then transform a paradigm into a proper workable paradigm that eventually amounts to a paradigm shift in order to study the issue. It takes years and a lot of unwinding to do so. To just accept the paradigm offered by neo-Orthodox Calvinists from Stellenbosch in his deliberations, Gwala has not contribute to Seventh-day Adventist theology. It is merely an extention of Calvinism. ].

“In the Hebrew Bible creation day one (creation of light) corresponds with day four (heavenly bodies designated light-bearers). Day two (waters which afterwards formed the seas) corresponds with day five (fish and fowls). Day three (dry land emerges) corresponds with day six (terrestrial animals and man created)”.

[The observation by Gwala that one day “corresponds” with another day, is his own guess. There is no indication in scripture or in the text or in the Hebrew that connects these elements with each other. To say it was meant to “correspond” is extra-biblical and if that is RRT then even more unacceptable. See koot van wyk, “Bible Basics for very Beginners: Understanding the book of Genesis. Textbook and Workbook” (2009-11-27) http://www.egw.org at VANWYK NOTE nr. 205]

“2.2.1 Creation/ Cosmogony in the Ancient Near East

To set the tone for the discussion of Genesis 1 and 2, it is important to note that one cannot begin to discuss issues around the Hebrew Bible as if these happened in a vacuum. The original “implied readers” in this instance were not living on an island, but were part of the Ancient Near East. The focus will be on how certain cultures in the Ancient Near East understood the concept of cosmogony or creation” . (Gwala 2004: 27)

[The Book of Adam is his own reports on what God told him in personal communication walking in the Garden of Eden, as to what happened at Creation. The original implied readers were not so much intended by Adam as that he makes a faithful index of what God told him. Whether the strong structure of chapter one is Moses rearrangement or originally that way by Adam, is unknown. But Genesis 5:1 says he used the Book of Adam as source. Gwala’s cultures can only be post-Flood cultures that started after 2523 BCE while Adam lived and wrote his book 4171 BCE until about 900 years later, but still pre-flood, of course preserved by Noah, handed to Abraham and preserved further until it reached the hands of the mother of Moses and then Moses].

Let us look at some of Gwala’s Ancient Near Eastern sources:

Sumerians: only limited data says Kramer (Gwala 2004: 27).

Enuma elish (Gwala 2004: 29) [Our comment is that it is dating to 650 BCE whereas Moses wrote his book Genesis in 1460 BCE].

Cult of Atum at Heliopolis

Hymn to Ptah

Shabaka stone [This is very late and far after Moses in 1460 BCE, namely 715 BCE].

Instruction of Merikare (Gwala 2004: 30).

Instruction of Amenemope (Gwala 2004: 30-31) [This source is very late at a time when Hebrews were dispersed over the Ancient Near East so that inculturation was definitely a phenomenon, namely in 650 BCE].

Baal myth from Ugarit [ The date is post-Moses in 1460 BCE namely between 1260-1230 BCE (D. Pardee in personal communication)].

“In all the Egyptian creation myths the focus is mostly on the creation of the cosmos and there is little if any mention of the creation of human beings” (Gwala 2004: 32).

[This is not correct. See E. A. Wallis Budge, “The History of the Creation of the Gods and of the World. Version A.” Chapter VIII in The Gods of the Egyptians or Studies in Egyptian Mythology Vol. 1 (London: Methuen & Co., 1904), 308-321. One example will suffice:

The book of knowing the creations of Ra.

On page 312 it reads explicitly kheper reth pu em remu per em maat-a “[and] came into being men and women from the tears [which] came forth from my eye”.]

The positive part of Gwala’s dissertation needs to be mentioned: On pages 33-41, dealing with Creation, Gwala stayed within the domain of traditional Adventism. No gap-theory between 1:1-1:2 (page 41). Sabbath was on the Seventh-day (35, 38.). Footnote 11 on page 41 with the free will of man to choose and God that will not interfere with man, is traditional Adventism. His view of what a day is with dark before light as in the Hebrew Bible on page 44 is traditional Adventism.

“The pictorial day theory – claims that the six days mentioned in Genesis are the six days during which God revealed to Moses the events of creation” (Gwala 2004: 45).

 [Actually, it was shown to Adam not Moses].

“The author of Genesis was undoubtedly acquainted with the creation myths of the polytheistic religions of Egypt and Mesopotamia. There are enough indications in Genesis to suggest that he was consciously opposing Babylonian as well as Egyptian creation stories (Vawter 1973:38; Deist 1988:36-40). If one compares the two creation stories mentioned above, one will note that in the Babylonian cosmogony, the gods and matter are co-existent and co-eternal, while in the Hebrew version God exists independently of His creation. In the Babylonian epic there is no mention of the “sun” and “moon”, because these were considered deities. In the Babylonian epic there is no emphasis on the completion of work as well as sanctification and blessing on the seventh day” (Gwala 2004: 46).

[This whole paragraph made contains a methodological error since the question is, which came first, the chicken or the egg? Adam could not be aware of polytheistic ideas that he wanted to counter. They did not exist in his day. It came from the Book of Adam (Genesis 5:1) and is cited from by Moses in 1460 BCE long before any of these sources mentioned above existed].

[The cosmogony of Vawter 1973: 40 cited on page 48 is not correct. See Moses’ advanced cosmogony in the book of Job that the earth is hanged on nothing. It is probably the insights of the Egyptian Astronomer Senenmut that influenced Moses]. 

“The early Church theologians regarded the plural “us” as indicative of the three persons of the Godhead (Gwala 1996:50). The other view would be to see the use of “we” as “royal use” or merely a grammatical form, which is characteristic of decisions (Westermann 1978:10), and there is no indication of a partner (Samuelson 1992:119)” (Gwala 2004: 52).

[Adrio König, the Calvinistic Systematic Theologian is of the second opinion here. Gwala is not clear what his opinion is here.]

 “This first verse does not mean that God completed his still unfinished work on the seventh day, but the work was by now (seventh day) completed (Gwala 1996:52). Gwala (1996:52) states that the notion of blessing as well as that of sanctification must be viewed in relation to the Sabbath. Nichol (1953:221) claims that the Sabbath calls for abstention from common bodily labour and for the devotion of the mind and heart to holy things.” (Gwala 2004: 56).

[This paragraph of Gwala was very well written. Knowing the opinion of his and my professor dr. Johan Cook on this matter, I am happy that he did not buy into that theory of Cook. It is not factually supported the way Cook explained it. In an essay “Did God work on the Seventh Day?” I have gone into depth in the ideas and interpretation of Cook].

“Nichol (1978:231) disputes the fact that Adam was with Eve and he describes the scenario this way: ‘the statement that “she gave also to her husband with her,” does not imply that he had been with her all the time, standing mute at the scene of temptation. Instead, she gave him of the fruit upon rejoining him that he might eat it “with her” and thus share its presumed benefits’. White (1980:32-35) argues that Eve, unconsciously at first, separated from her husband in her employment. This argument may be correct; however there is no biblical justification for such a position. She does not even attempt to deal with the phrase, “she gave also to her husband with her” (Gwala 2004: 77 at footnote 4 is this astonishing remark).

[Ellen White is cited and somehow he says “Ellen White does not even attempt to deal with the phrase” For a theologian of Adventism, this is a bit out of place to use even. The whole tenet is not correct. Ellen White made it clear that it was because Eve wandered away from her husband that she was tempted. Thus, Nicoll’s idea is in line with the logic of the text. He arrived later on the scene].

“Vawter (1973:54) suggests that the “tree of life” without question tells us that we are in the realm of symbols and that the author of Gen. 1-3 has borrowed this figure of speech from Mesopotamian literature, where it frequently occurs as a legendary plant. This is portrayed on Figure 3.9 on the following page, which represents the “sacred tree” on an Assyrian seal (Vawter 1973:54)”.

[Figure 3:9 is unacceptable. This is too late. To use an Assyrian iconographical picture (820-700 BCE) to explain Genesis 1-3 (1460 BCE) is highly irregular. It is like using the swastika to explain cross of Jesus].

To cite Davidson 1990: 39 on page 82 for the role of the serpent in fertility cults is irrelevant since he is using the Gilgamesh epic (650 BCE) while Moses wrote in 1446 BCE.

Figure 3:11 is too late. The Babylonian Cherub is irrelevant. On page 91.

In an article on the “Hermeneutics of Iconography” at http://www.egw.org VANWYK NOTE I have gone critically into the work of Othmar Keel and others who uses late example to bring to the text and by doing so distorts the image of the text.

Finally, Gwala should be criticized for his use of the RRT (reader response theory). He should not use late iconography to explain ancient words. He should not be hesitant of Ellen White’s approach. The data of Genesis is not set against the backdrop of the Ancient Near East but rather the Ancient Near East is against the backdrop of truth handed down by generation prior to the flood and mixed and mingled with misunderstanding after the miracle of the confusion of languages after 2523 BCE (flood). Positively, he kept to main Adventist positions and thus are commended for that.

The following articles were put online at http://www.egw.org at VANWYK NOTE and are relevant to the ideas above but all of them post-date his dissertation [2004] so that one cannot expect him to have had access to these ideas. The issue is this: what is he going to do about it in future?

538 Job Studies: Suffering and the why of it: Short Notes on the Book of Job  kootvanwyk 2011-12-14 

537 Job Studies: Ideal Shepherd Motif: Postmodern link of a different kind for Job and Gudea in thought and history  1  kootvanwyk 2011-12-13 

504 Genesis 1 theories by Hugo Radau 1902 and van wyk notes  kootvanwyk 2011-08-29

514 Creationist Studies: Genesis 1 Debate: Misconceptions about biblical cosmology  kootvanwyk 2011-10-12

490 Understanding the human element in the origin of Biblical Books   kootvanwyk 2011-08-07 

485 Towards a Methodology of Studying any configuration of the Ancient Near East  kootvanwyk 2011-08-01

484 Hermeneutics of Ancient Near Eastern Iconography  kootvanwyk 2011-08-01 

417 Tree planted by waters in Amenemope and Scripture   kootvanwyk 2011-03-07 

416 Rationalism and Higher Criticism in Classical Greek Historiography  kootvanwyk 2011-03-05 

394 Understanding Ugarit better 2  kootvanwyk 2011-01-31 

297 Issues in the Old Testament Debate  kootvanwyk 2010-05-14 

290 Creation reports in the Ancient Near East (2)  kootvanwyk 2010-05-02 

289 Creation reports in the Ancient Near East (I)  kootvanwyk 2010-04-26

279 Old Testament Theology in Adventism  kootvanwyk 2010-04-18 

240 Enoch or the Gilgamesh tradition development?  kootvanwyk 2010-02-05

222 Imago dei or image of God in the Coptic of Genesis 1:26   kootvanwyk 2009-12-22

205 Bible Basics for very Beginners: Understanding the book of Genesis Textbook and Workbook   kootvanwyk 2009-11-27 

193 Studying the book of Numbers  kootvanwyk 2009-10-24

158 Evaluation of the Post-modernism seminars  kootvanwyk 2009-08-18 

157 Subjective norms and Objective norms: the big choice for the SDA younger generation  kootvanwyk 2009-08-16

156 The Aristotelian paradigm shift with the neo-generation SDA's  kootvanwyk 2009-08-15 

82 Neo-Babylonian Literature: Creation and Rebellion Motifs in the Legend of the Worm   kootvanwyk 2009-03-10

53 Proverbs and Amenemope compared   kootvanwyk 2009-01-28 

42 Diagram of Keys to unlock Meaning   kootvanwyk 2009-01-09

38 Guide to Adventist teachers: Adventist Theology beyond Conventionalism  kootvanwyk 2008-12-27 

35 Hermeneutics of suspicion and affirmation on SDA issues   kootvanwyk 2008-12-19