190 Jonathan Cohen
artful character, provides the stimulus for the recovery of its “spokenness.”
Rosenzweig, in his penetrating article “Th e Secret of Biblical Narrative
Form,” illustrates this phenomenon by way of reference to the creation
story, the story of the building of the Tabernacle, and the famous confl ict
between Jacob and Esau for the blessing and the birthright.27
Before we look at some of these passages, let me provide some back-
ground on the connection between Rosenzweig’s theological categories
and his aesthetics of Bible interpretation. Th e Jacob and Esau story, for ex-
ample, is told in what Rosenzweig would call an “epic” manner. Like all
stories written in the epic mode, it is told as an “objective” occurrence that
has happened in the past. Although many readers might be scandalized by
elements in the plot (especially the mendacity of Rebecca and Jacob), no
judgment is directly passed on the characters. Th e narrator does not take
up a “subjective” posture toward events; neither is the reader directly called
on to do so (as the reader most certainly is, say, in the story of the Flood
or the story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah). Th is aesthetic
mode, the seemingly neutral articulation of a story, refl ects the theologi-
cal dimension of creation.28 Th e natural world, with its lawful interconnec-
tions, appears before us as a past given, as an object, even though its artful-
ness also seems to point to a hidden, supervening intelligence and will. Just
as one can aspire to behold the world as an interlocking, “objective” whole
(in the manner of, say, classical philosophy or certain trends within mod-
ern science), so a work of art can be beheld with a view to articulating its
oneness and wholeness — the manner in which all the parts are intelligibly
interrelated — its “epic” aspect.
However, another mode of experiencing the world and also, microcos-
mically, works of art is available to us. According to Rosenzweig, this is the
mode wherein a particular confi guration of events that occurs to a particu-
lar individual at a specifi c time and space creates a unique, unrepeatable
moment of meaning. One sees or hears something that speaks privately to
one’s idiosyncratic life story — and nothing is the same again. One senses
that the course of one’s life must change as a result of an event or an en-
counter with someone or something and that it would be untrue to the
experience to continue with one’s life as if nothing had happened. One is
commanded to reorient oneself and conduct oneself otherwise. From a
theological point of view, experiences such as this represent the dimension
of revelation in Rosenzweig’s thought.
Within the framework of Rosenzweig’s aesthetics, moments like these
are termed “lyric” or “anecdotal.” A symphony, for example, can be beheld