I have read the Scriptures since I was a little boy, but only in the last 5 years have I become aware of the use of chiastic structures. A Chiasm is a way to organize lines of poetry, or prose, so the author can put emphasize a broader theme. Once you know what to look for, spotting the chiastic structure can bring a passage alive with meaning.
Robert L. Alden has written about chasmus and offers this definition.
Sometimes the device is called alternation or introverted parallelism. The word “chiasm” itself comes from the name of the Greek letter chi, which looks like our English letter X. An outline of a verse, a paragraph, or even a book which conforms to such a shape is called “chiastic.” The simplest outline would be A-B-B-A, but more elaborate ones are easily discovered (Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 21/3 (1978): 199).
One example shared by Alden is from Psalms 110:
The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at My right hand Until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.” 2 The Lord will stretch forth Your strong scepter from Zion, saying, “Rule in the midst of Your enemies.” 3 Your people will volunteer freely in the day of Your power; In holy array, from the womb of the dawn, Your youth are to You as the dew. 4 The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind, “You are a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek.” 5 The Lord is at Your right hand; He will shatter kings in the day of His wrath. 6 He will judge among the nations, He will fill them with corpses, He will shatter the chief men over a broad country. 7 He will drink from the brook by the wayside; Therefore He will lift up His head.
The chiastic structure of the above Psalm is shown in the following diagram. Note how each line has a corresponding thought in a later line: A to A’, B to B’ and C to C’. D is the primary thought for the poem and rests at the apex of the chiasm.
For me, chiasmi reveal the beauty of the poetry and I incorporate it into my own material. I recently posted 2 poems that were originally written as one longer poem with a chiastic structure. The two parts; Where is Your Face? and There is Your Face? were created as one holistic thought where G is the primary emphasis of the poem.
A few critics in this century have held the view that the whole gospel is governed by one great chiasm or inverted (concentric) parallelism. That is, the gospel is divided into two halves, like the two halves of a parabola: pericopes at the outer limits of the halves correspond to each other (e.g., chaps. 1–2 and 26–28), pericopes a little further in correspond to each other (e.g., chaps. 3–4 and 24–25), and so on until one reaches the center of the chiasm at the center of the gospel. Green (1968) sees the center in chap. 11, while Fenton (1959) and Ellis (1974) see the center in chap. 13 (Anchor Bible Dictionary, vol 4 pg. 627).
In my own study of Scripture, I have found a few places in the teachings of Jesus where he used chaismus to express a larger meaning to his words. As time permits, I will post two examples that have meant a lot to my own understanding of Scripture.
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Hi – I don’t comment on many blogs but had to on yours. It’s really nice! I really like how you write – very to the point. Thanks for having this site. I don’t have time to read all the information you have right now, I found this site when looking for something else on Yahoo, but I’ve bookmarked your homepage and will check back soon to see the latest articles. I always enjoy reading on the web about religion. Do you have any particular biblical study guides? I’m looking for one to start reading, I just finished one and need a new one to read. I have a web site with daily Bible readings on it. Please bookmark it – it as at http://www.GotTB.com. Do you have a favorite Bible passage or story? I would not even know where to being the processing of picking just one. God’s Peace!
HI Billy, nice to hear from you on my blog. My favorite passage is the story of the prodigal son. You can watch me teach on this passage and then you will know why.
http://www.morethancake.org/2008/07/are-you-ready-for-a-family-reunion.html
Other than my blog, the only published books I have are listed here for sale on Amazon.
http://www.morethancake.org/my-books
God bless
Hey, man, just stopped by your site while looking up chiasms on the interwebz. Great job and wonderful way to give an overview.
Keep up the good work. I’m planning on looking around your site a bit more as it looks quite interesting.
The Geekpreacher
I Broter wandering if you looked at John 1 as this is a good construction. Believe it or not I found this quite by accident on Logos(yes I followed the link) because of not being satisfied with our explanation of Acts 2:38 and baptismeal regeneration. Learned of this Hebrew construction and definetley interested in learning this. Fortunately this did not work in Acts 2. To my benefit I started looking at many commentaries to see if there was one who gave good explanations and found one by Mills which I would think is a bit more inductive. The biggest point he made in his commentary is one of the things I absolutely was taught first in bible study-context! He went to Acts 1 to show a certain trgiving of the great commission or as most understand reported by Luke a second time and hits on Spirit baptism as this answers(to me at least) Acts 2:38 and Mark on his version.
Sorry, did not mean to go so deep in depth but when seeing someone actually knowing of chiastic constructions and still alive is a good thing and excites me.
HI David,
Thanks for stopping in. I have not looked into John 1, but anytime I teach through a passage I look for evidence of chiastic structures.
God bless in your study.
J.R.,
Are you aware of chiastic structures found in the Book of Mormon?
Mike,
I only Study the Christian Scriptures and have not spent any time in the book written by Joseph Smith or any other man. Sorry, I can’t help you on that front.