Bilden Jes 6,1-11 und 1Kön 22,19-22 eine Gattung? Ein umfassender exegetischer Vergleich. (Teil 1)

Kurzfassung/Abstract

A detailed comparison of Is 6 and 1Kings 22,19–22 reveals that the two texts substantially differ in their worlds of thought and intentions. They are not based on a common set of ideas – a characteristic which would be required if they were to constitute a single genre. As a visionary commission account, 1Kings 22,19–22 is the objective testimony of an independent prophet who was granted insight into the heavenly council. The text represents JHWH as an unostentatious king with superior dominion over history. He defeats his sworn enemy Ahab by turning the latter’s own eagerness for power into a deadly weapon against him.
Is 6, on the other hand, is a vocation account where the prophet gives a personal testimony of how he saw the holy and divine king of kings ruling from his lofty throne. In the course of this visionary experience, the prophet is saved from his people’s mortal entanglement in sin and impurity by accepting the commission of hardening. JHWH appears as the centre of the cosmos, the master of a divine and life-engendering order. Anything alive, from the seraphim to the creatures populating the earth, is oriented towards him. This "fullness of all the earth" (Isa 6,3) is, at the same time, passively filled with and actively praising his glory. JHWH’s people do not participate in this abundance of life since their sin and impurity imply the practical rejection of JHWH’s rule and its benefits. With the help of divine grace, the prophet is removed from his people’s way to death when he recognizes JHWH as king and serves him as an envoy. By fulfilling the commission of hardening, the prophet ultimately reestablishes JHWH’s rule in his people’s heart - although this paradoxically results in their complete alienation from JHWH and brings them from the sphere of life to that of death and chaos.
The above-outlined substantial differences of the two texts go along with formal and structural divergencies which outweigh the similarities on the textual surfaces. All in all, the comparison shows that the two texts do not follow the same generic pattern but use a number of traditional narrative elements independent of any specific genre.