Shepherd Motif in the Old Testament and its Implications for Leadership in Nigeria
Shepherd Motif in the Old Testament and its Implications for Leadership in Nigeria.
Abstract
This research examines the Shepherd Motif in the Old Testament which has been misunderstood, misinterpreted and subjected to criticism in recent times due to the varying degrees of methodologies by scholars.
These scholar use terms like Military dictatorship, aristocracy, autocracy, democracy, kingship, and spiritual leadership to talk on the subject without closely examining the caring motif of the shepherd enshrined in the Old Testament.
The objectives of this research are to justify the assertion that shepherd motif especially, Psalm 23 and other related texts encapsulates provision, protection and care as the basis for understanding and interpretation.
In Psalm 23 some scholars posit that the shepherd motif reveals a caring and guiding shepherd, while others see the caring motif in vv 1- 4. For others vv5-6 speaks of a host.
Some of these scholars focus on the theological import at the expense of exegesis, while others make input from their common life and practical experiences.
In the prophetic literatures most scholars examine the shepherd motif to convey leadership responsibilities of Israel’s leaders who were contrasted with God and his loving-kindness.
The gap which this thesis attempts to fill is the discovery of the motif of untiring desire for care by the shepherd, which Psalm 23 and other related texts in the Old Testament reveal.
The methods used are grammatico-historical exegesis, canonical approach, syntactical-theological method, principles of syntagmatics and paradigmatics.
Introduction
Background of Study
In examining the shepherd motif in the Old Testament it is important and quite necessary to give a brief discussion or survey on the background of its literature, because some of the texts to be examined are poetic and prophetic in nature.
Poetic literatures occupy a considerable part of the Old Testament. It cuts across the major divisions of the Old Testament namely: hrwt=Law, <yaybn=Prophets and the <ybwtk=Writings.
This shows that poetry is very important for Biblical authors. For the sake of this research, the researcher chooses to restrict this study to those poems that are poetic in its entirety.
Poems are indeed very difficult to interpret and it takes more effort than prose. This is not only true with Hebrew poetry but for other languages as well (Longman III 90).
Even though this study is on shepherd motif in the Old Testament, the researcher specially, focus on Psalm 23 because it consists of shepherd imagery and this will give a better understanding of the shepherd motif in the Old Testament.
The researcher does recognise the fact that the entire book of Psalms is not the only poetic book, but we have other books like Job, Song of Songs, Lamentations, Proverbs and most of Ecclesiastes that are also poetic in nature.
References
Anderson, A. Albert, The Book of Psalms, Vol. 1 in the New Century Bible Commentary Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972. Print.
Ashley, R. Timothy, The Book of Numbers in The New International Commentary on the Old Testament Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993. Print.
Baker, Kenneth, NIV Study Bible, Revised Edition, Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002.Print.
Beall, S. Todd, and Banks, A. William, Old Testament Parsing Guide Nashville: Broadman and Holman Publishers, 2000. Print.
Biwul, K. Joel,“Let it make meaning: suggestions for rightly handling scripture in Pastoral Hermeneutics. A paper presented at JBTS 3rd December, 2007. Print.
Boadt, Lawrence, ‘Ezekiel’ in (ed), Raymond E. Brown et al. The New Jerome Biblical Commentary London: Geoffrey Chapman, 2000. Print.
