Poetic and Wisdom Literature of the Old Testament
REL 310
Glossary
- Acrostic
- A poem in which the first letter of each line is in some definite sequence, most usually alphabetic, though sometimes in English poetry they will spell out a word or someone's name. Hebrew acrostics occur in Psalms 15, 34, 37, 111, 112, 145, Proverbs 31:10-31, and the Book of Lamentations. Psalm 119 is an acrostic in which every line of each section begins with the same letter of the alphabet.
- Alliteration
- Repetition of initial sounds in a series of words.
- Allusion
- Reference to some common cultural experience, eg. in literature, history, mythology, or the Bible, that is not spelled out in the text but that the author expects the reader to recognize.
- Anadiplosis
- The phrase at the end of one line is repeated at the beginning of the next. e.g. Psalm 121:1-2 :
From whence shall my help come?
My help cometh from the Lord - Anapest
- Two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable (duh-duh-DA), as in Byron's "The Destruction of Sennacherib"
The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold - Antithesis
- The second line contradicts or contrasts with the first, eg. Proverbs 10:1
A wise son maketh a glad father,
but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother - Archaismv
- The use of archaic words, eg. Thee, Thou art, Thou hast, e'en (evening)
- Archetype
- An original idea or image of something of cultural significance
- Assonance
- Repetition of vowel sounds in a series of words, e.g., " God's Grandeur" by Gerard Manley Hopkins :
All is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
- Blank verse
- Lines of unrhymed iambic pentameter
- Climactic parallelism
- The second line partially balances the first, but also adds a thought or completes it. eg. Psalm 29:1
Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty,
give unto the Lord glory and strength. - Dactyl
- A stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables (DA-duh-duh). So called because the one long and two short reminded people of the bones of our fingers
- Didactic poems
- Poems which teach or give instruction. Didactic poems appeal to reason rather than to the senses
- Dimeter
- A line of poetry with just two meters
- Dirge
- A song or poem of mourning, suffering, or sorrow for sin. Examples are David's Laments on the deaths of Saul and Jonathan (2 Sam. 1:19-27), and on the death of Abner (2 Sam. 3:33), and Psalms 16, 22, 27, & 39 (suffering) and psalms 6, 32, 38, 51, 106, 130, & 143 (repentance)
- Doggerel
- Verse of little literary value, trite
- Dramatic monologue
- A single speaker talking to one or more unseen listeners
- End-stopped line
- A line of poetry that has a full pause at the end
- Enjambment
- A sentence runs over from one line of poetry to the next
- Epanalepsis
- A sentence begins and ends with the some word
- Epic
- A long narrative poem dealing with some great hero or historical event. e.g. Homer's epics on the Siege of Troy and the wanderings of Odysseus
- Exhortatory poem
- Urges the hearers to some form of action
- Foot
- A group of a stressed syllable with one or two unstressed or stressed syllables.
Common feet in English poetry are the anapest, dactyl, iamb, spondee, & trochee - Haiku
- A Japanese poetic form in three lines, of 5, 7, and 5 syllables
- Hemistich
- Half line of verse, particularly half of a Hebrew poetic line
- Hexameter
- A poetic line with six "feet". In English poetry, it usually consists of dactyls and spondees for the first 4, then a dactyl, then a spondee :
eg. | DA-duh-duh | DA-duh-duh | DA-DA | DA-duh-duh | DA-duh-duh | DA-DA | - Hyperbole
- Figurative speech, with intentional overstatement or exaggeration
- Iamb
- A metric foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable.
eg. | duh-DA | duh-DA | duh-DA | duh-DA | - Imagery
- A figure of speech that evokes a mental picture of something. eg. Robert Burns
O, my love is like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June:
O, my love is like the melodie,
That's sweetly play'd in tune - Limerick
- A 5-line poem of a particular form, usually witty or humorous, sometimes obscene
- Lyric Poetry
- Expresses the feelings of an individual, often the poet.
- Macaronic poetry
- Verse which uses a mixture of languages.
e.g. Alfred Denis Godley wrote "The Motor Bus", in a mixture of Latin and English, to show the various endings which Latin Second and Third Declension nouns can take
What is this that roareth thus?
Can it be a Motor Bus?
Yes, the smell and hideous hum Indicat Motorem Bum!
Implet in the Corn and High
Terror me Motoris Bi:
Bo Motori clamitabo
Ne Motore caedar a Bo---
Dative be or Ablative
So thou only let us live:---
Whither shall thy victims flee?
Spare us, spare us, Motor Be!
Thus I sang; and still anigh
Came in hordes Motores Bi,
Et complebat omne forum
Copia Motorum Borum.
How shall wretches live like us
Cincti Bis Motoribus?
Domine, defende nos
Contra hos Motores Bos! - Metaphor
- Comparison of two unlike things
- Meter
- The regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a poetic line.
- Monologue
- The whole poem is presented as if spoken by only one person
- Monometer
- A line of poetry consisting of only one foot
- Neologism - Coined word
- A new word, usually made up by the author
- Nonsense verse
- A form of poetry which is intentionally and overtly paradoxical, silly, witty, whimsical or just plain strange
- Onomatopoeia
- When the sound of a word resembles what it describes (snap, crackle, pop, hiss, snarl)
- Oxymoron
- A phrase containing contradictory elements, e.g. "black light", "jumbo shrimp"
- Parallelism
- Two lines of poetry reflect the same or opposing ideas; the second line repeats the first, usually with slightly different words.
- Pentameter
- A line of poetry with five feet
- Personification
- Attributing human qualities to things that are not human
- Poetic license
- The freedom which poets have to change the word order, use archaic words or speech, eg. raineth, e'en (even, evening), o'er (over), e'er (ever), lookéd
- Pyrrhic
- A metric foot consisting of two short syllables
- Rhyme (or Rime) scheme
- The order in which rhymed words occur. eg. a-b-a-b
- Scan a line of poetry
- Determine the metrical pattern of the line
- Simile
- Comparison of two unlike things using "like" or "as"
- Sonnet
- A poem consisting of 14 lines of iambic pentameters. The first eight lines are called the "octave", the last six lines are the "sextet"
- Spondee
- A metric foot consisting of two stressed syllables eg. | DA-DA |
- Stanza
- A a metrical or thematic group of lines in a poem
- Synonymous parallelism
- the second hemistich (half line of verse) is similar to first, with some variations. eg. Amos 5:24 :
But let judgment run down as waters,
and righteousness as a mighty stream. - Tetrameter
- A line of poetry containing four feet
- Trimeter
- A line of poetry containing three feet
- Trochee
- (pronounced TROE-KHEE) : A metric foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, eg. | DA-duh |
eg. The Song of Hiawatha :
Then the little Hiawatha learned of every beast the language
Copyright © 1999 Shirley J. Rollinson, all Rights Reserved
