Brueggemann’s insistence on the inevitability of imagination in the interpretive process represents the first concurrence. According to Brueggemann (2002:19), imagination is the vehicle for interpretation. Moreover, he believes that the biblical text both embodies and insists on the ongoing work of imaginative interpretation (Brueggemann 2003:xii). He points out that the Christian canon came about as a result of the ‘work of tradition’, which is the process of interplay between ‘historical reportage’ and ‘canonical formation’ (Brueggemann 2003:7). This defining enterprise of the biblical formation, transmission, and interpretation may be termed ‘imaginative remembering’ (Brueggemann 2003:7). He understands imagination to be the human aptitude for entertaining images of meaning and reality that are beyond the evident givens of observable experience. For him imagination is the hosting of ‘otherwise’ (Brueggemann 2002:17). Biblical literature ‘is not merely descriptive of a commonsense world; it dares, by artistic sensibility and risk-taking rhetoric, to posit, characterise and vouch for a world beyond the “common sense”’ in which Yahweh is the defining character (Brueggemann 2003:9). He understands that the biblical text enables a counter-imagination of the world¹¹ (Brueggemann 1993:18–25).

When interpreting the biblical text, the reader stands in this same line of risk-taking imaginal engagement, reading the text with an eye towards the world beyond the common sense which the text posits, characterises and vouches for. Brueggemann’s (2002:17) insistence on two things marks his contribution in terms of expanding the hermeneutic enterprise to include an imaginal engagement with the text. Firstly, that imagination is inevitable in the interpretive process if interpretation is ever to be anything more than simple reiteration. Rather than mere reiteration, interpretation is ‘the movement of the text beyond itself in fresh ways, often ways never offered until this moment of utterance’ (Brueggemann 2002:17). He finds the transformative energy of the text in the ‘interplay between the normative and the imaginatively playful’ (Brueggemann 2003:xii, author’s italics). Imagination is ‘an inescapable process for those of us who insist that this old text is a contemporary word to us. We transport ourselves out of the twenty first century back to that ancient world or, conversely, we transpose ancient voices into contemporary voices of authority’ (Brueggemann 2002:17).

Secondly, faithful imagination is characteristically not autonomous fantasy, but good-faith extrapolation (Brueggemann 2002:16). The affirmation that the Scriptures are inspired says more than we can understand, and pertains not only to the origin of the text, but to its transmission and interpretation as well (cf. Brueggemann 2002:24). The Spirit meets us afresh in our faithful reading in each new time, place and circumstance (Brueggemann 2002:16). The faithful affirmation that the biblical text is the Word of God is not a guarantee that an imaginal engagement and interpretation will be inspired, but it represents a point of departure from which the interpreter may be open to the whispering of the Spirit in, and through the text.

Ricoeurian hermeneutics, likewise, places a high value on the imagination. Ricoeur is interested in the role of figurative texts in the formation of human subjectivity and understands religious studies to be a hermeneutical inquiry into the imaginative potential of myth, symbol, and story to aid our efforts to exist with integrity (Wallace 1995:14). He finds ‘in reading itself the key to the heuristic functioning of the productive imagination’ of texts (Ricoeur 1981:2, author’s italics). Ricoeur (1977:26) maintains that poetic texts are any literary texts that have the ability to disclose a view of a possible world that, in the process of reading, eclipses the tangible, objective world. They are imaginative literary constructions that by virtue of the refiguration of possibilities, reconstruct reality and invite the reader to inhabit this projected world by adopting those refigured possibilities as his or her own (Hall 2006:193).

According to Ricoeur (1981), the act of reading should be seen as:

The intersection between the text and life engenders the imagination according to the Bible (Ricoeur 1981:3).¹² A Ricoeurian hermeneutic that focuses on the mediating capacity of texts presents a method of interpretation with the potential to supplement historical critical hermeneutical endeavours in order to come to a richer understanding of the biblical text. Precisely herein lay its contribution in terms of expanding the hermeneutic enterprise.

One of the key characteristics of Ignatian spirituality is its deep appreciation of the imagination. The sixteenth century Spanish mystic grasped the important role of the imagination in an engagement with the biblical text. Living during the Renaissance, at the dawn of modernity (Marsh 2004:23), Ignatius was an excellent analytical thinker, familiar with the ideas of leading contemporary theologians and philosophers, with an advanced degree from the University of Paris which was one of the most esteemed European universities of his day (Fleming 2008:55). He balanced his analytical engagement with the biblical text with his remarkable imagination, described by Fleming (2008:55) as ‘the mental quality of thought that drove his spiritual life’. In Ignatian spirituality this mental quality of thought came to be known as imaginative contemplation. Ignatius’ main focus in imaginative contemplation was on an active engagement of the imagination with the biblical text as a means for spiritual formation. Through imaginative contemplation of the text the reader of the Bible is brought into contact with the reality of God that the text references.¹³

Ignatius believed that imagination has the capacity to facilitate a transformational encounter with God. This is where I deem Ignatius makes the greatest contribution in terms of expanding the hermeneutical endeavour beyond a narrow, exclusively critical engagement with the text. An imaginative contemplation of the text, or what I would want to call an imaginal engagement with the text, allows the person of God encountered in the text (or who is referenced in and through the text as we have seen with Ricoeur’s contribution) to transform the areas of a person’s life¹⁴ that go beyond where the intellect is able to (Fleming 2008:58). This is especially valuable for church pastors, spiritual directors and those concerned with sharing the Scriptures with others in the hope of a transformational encounter. It is a valuable tool for facilitating a transformative encounter through the text by actively engaging the imagination.

Next an explanation of how an imaginal engagement with the text occurs is illustrated from Proverbs 14:27. This is done in two steps by, firstly, considering Ricoeur’s hermeneutic contribution as this is more philosophical and general and, secondly, considering the practical contribution which an Ignatian imaginative contemplation may make. In conclusion, the poetics of the text is briefly described to tie up a summary of an imaginal engagement with the text described in this article.

Ricoeurian hermeneutics invites the reader to make the issue at stake in the text their own. With symbolic texts such as Proverbs, what is said in the text, or the first order reference, leads the reader to discover what the text is about, i.e. the second order reference or ‘about what’ the text is.¹⁵ The text draws the reader into the symbolic world that it projects. Through appropriation, that is, the fourth and last pole of a Ricoeurian hermeneutic,¹⁶ the world that the text references for the reader may become the reader’s very own world. It is this phase in the hermeneutic process that is considered here.

The proverb employs two powerful metaphors in order to imagine or picture for the reader a symbolic reality. Of symbols Ricoeur (1962:194) writes ‘[s]ymbol is a sign in this, that like every sign it intends something beyond and stands for this something’. The symbol of the source or fountain of life is a powerful metaphor for the fear of Yahweh, precisely because of the tangibility of the symbol that effectively carries the force of the metaphor. However, to come to an understanding of what the symbol refers to, and its intended meaning, does not occur instantaneously. ‘Symbol invites thought’ (Ricoeur 1962:193). This simple maxim says two things simultaneously. Firstly, the symbol invites; the reader does not posit the meaning, the symbol gives it. Secondly, what it gives the reader is something to think about, something to ponder or consider. The maxim suggests that everything has already been said enigmatically and, yet, at the same time it requires that the reader always has to begin over, begin again so that everything occurs in the dimension of thought (Ricoeur 1962:193).

The text is grounded in the concrete situation of the Ancient Near East, where the drier climate heightens the importance of water as a necessity for life. The source or fountain functioned within that society as a very well-known symbol of life and sustenance or nourishment. In the proverbial world that is referenced by the text, the fear of Yahweh is as indispensable as a source or fountain is to life. Heim (2013:354) affirms that the fear of Yahweh and the fountain or source of life together form a non-referring existential assertion, the fountain or source of life describing the fear of Yahweh more closely. Like water in its purest form, at the source, the fear of Yahweh is life-giving (Heim 2013:354).

The source or fountain (singular) of life is antithetically posed against the snares (plural) of death to indicate that there is only one source of life, but many snares of death. Berlin ([1985] 1992:135) describes the effect of parallelism as setting up relationships of equivalence between two propositions. In the case of the proverb two relationships are established, namely, one of equivalence between the fear of Yahweh and the purpose of keeping away from, and one of opposition between the source of life and snares of death. In the case of this proverb, the relationship is established between the two colons, comprising a single proposition. Heim (2013:354) illustrates this in tabulated form:

Berlin stresses that parallelism in itself does not have meaning but that it, ‘like other formal features in a text, does help to structure the text and thereby has an impact on how its meaning is arrived at’ (Berlin [1985] 1992:135, author’s italics). She concludes ‘parallelism calls attention to itself and to the message which it bears. Parallelism embodies the poetic function, and the poetic function heightens the focus on the message’ (Berlin [1985] 1992:140). Thus, parallelism structures this text by simultaneously setting up a relationship of equivalence between the fear of Yahweh and the purpose of keeping away from the snares of death, as well as a relationship of opposition between the source of life and snares of death. The structure of the proverb testifies to the structure of the proverbial world in which there is a coherency between the fear of Yahweh and the purpose of keeping away from the snares of death. The preposition מִן in מִמּקְֹשֵׁי denotes a sense of ‘out of’ or ‘away from’ indicating direction of movement in a spatial sense away from (Holladay 1988a:200) the snares of death. In combination with the metaphoric employment of the motif of the source of life, the benefit of the fear of Yahweh is effectively conveyed with (סוּר + לָ ( לָסוּר the infinitive construction designating a purpose clause; the fear of Yahweh is for, or has the purpose of keeping one far from the snares of death. In the symbolic-textual world of Proverbs the fear of Yahweh, as also in the immediately preceding proverb (Prov. 14:26), provides safety.

The idea that is expressed seems to be that the fear of Yahweh directs the righteous-wise person’s movement, giving expression to the anthropocentric viewpoint of this proverb that places considerable emphasis on a person’s own role in escaping misfortune (Boström 1990:217–218). In the symbolic world constructed in the book for its readers, a person may, through the fear of Yahweh, escape the snares of death. Boström (1990:217–218) notices in the snares of death a covert reference to the fate of the wicked-fool that is brought on by their own behaviour. With the purpose of keeping the righteous-wise out of the snares of death, the single source of life is contrasted with the many snares that may ensnare a person. Heim (2013:355) notes the symbolic reference of the snares of death: ‘mortal danger, even hazards that are far from obvious to the uninitiated’. Here, the reader of Proverbs glimpses a world beset with many dangers that can ensnare a person, but at the same time is offered a view of the single source of protection, that is, the fear of Yahweh.

It is also worthwhile at this stage to consider other textual references that may contribute to a richer understanding of the text under consideration. Sandoval (2006:6) notes that the book of Proverbs constructs for its readers a ‘complicated symbolic moral world’.¹⁷ If through the first order reference the text aims at a second order reference, a symbolic reality that the text hopes the reader will appropriate as his or her own, then not just the single proverb, but the book as a whole is concerned with a larger symbolic-textual reality.¹⁸

The almost identical wording of this proverb and Proverbs 13:14 have been noted.¹⁹ The wording of Proverbs 13:14 is exactly the same as the wording in 14:27, except that תּוֹרַת חָכָם (the teaching of the wise) is here substituted with יִרְאַת יְהוָה (the fear of Yahweh), and both are compared to the source of life that keeps one far from the snares of death. The result of the variant repetition is that the teaching of the wise is explicitly identified with the fear of Yahweh, and is even interchangeable (Heim 2013:356),²⁰ indicating that the fear of Yahweh is not to be divorced from genuine wisdom. The difference in focus between the two proverbs is that this variant appeals to the reader’s self-motivation to adhere to the received standards of the divine will, whereas Proverbs 13:14 recommends the value of somebody else’s teachings, namely, those of the wise (Heim 2013:355). In the symbolic world sketched for the reader in Proverbs, the teaching of the wise and the fear of Yahweh are not opposed to each other but are united (cf. Prov. 1:7 and 9:10) in keeping the righteous-wise far from the snares of death. With this precept, the proverb sets up an interconnectedness between the teaching of the wise and the fear of Yahweh,²¹ as is also the case in Proverbs 15:33 where instruction in wisdom is connected with the fear of Yahweh.

It is not difficult to see why scholars²² group verse 26 and 27 together since the theme of both is the fear of Yahweh. Heim (2001:184) also notes the fact that ‘both display synonymous-sequential parallelism, and the scarcity of synonymous parallelism in this collection suggests that whenever two verses stand together this may be intentional’. In combination, verses 26 and 27 vividly paint the fear of Yahweh as a place of refuge and a source of life, that is, a sphere of secure safety and nourishing sustenance. Together they invite the reader to inhabit the safe sphere that the fear of Yahweh provides, that is, to appropriate for themselves the fear of Yahweh. Within the broader structure of the chapter these proverbs inform the meaning of the other fear of Yahweh proverb (Prov. 14:2), in which the reader is told that to walk in straightness is to be safe and secure, and that it is a matter of life or death also for the next generation.

Ignatian imaginative contemplation opens up the text for the reader to experience (not just think about) the metaphors or symbols in the text. Two striking metaphors are at the heart of the proverb: the fountain of life and the snares of death. Fishbane (1992) describes the well of living water as a biblical motif and quotes Talmon on the matter of motif:

He focuses attention on the biblical motif as a concrete fact and a religious metaphor (Fishbane 1992:4). The concrete nature of מָקוֹר )מְקוֹר is the construct state, a spring, fountain, or source²³ (Holladay 1988b:212) was appreciated as a source of life and nourishment in the Ancient Near East (Fishbane 1992:4). ‘The primordial character of natural springs … from which water bursts forth from the depths of the earth, should not be forgotten’ (Fishbane 1992:4). The metaphor finds its very strength in the tangibility of the vehicle (the source of life). Opposed to the source of life in the proverb are the snares of death. This is also a very vivid metaphor which was well known among the peoples of the Ancient Near East, since it was based on the concrete situation prevailing at the time. A מוֹקֵשׁ, snare was any device used to capture or ensnare an animal or bird. The מקְֹּשֵיׁ מָותֶ, snares of death, came to be used mostly in its metaphoric sense of entrapment (Holladay 1988c:187) and is another biblical symbol.²⁴

Ignatius would invite the reader of the text to try to imagine himself or herself as an active participant in the text. This may best be facilitated in three steps.

After alerting their imaginations readers may ask themselves: What can I see in the text? What can I hear? What can I smell? What can I feel? What can I taste? In this way, the metaphors may come alive to readers as the text intended it.

With regard to the sample proverb, the experience of the source of life will, guided by the text,²⁵ most probably be a positive one, whereas the experience of the snares of death will most probably be a negative experience. Here readers can give rein to their imaginations in calling up associations from their life environments that the symbols in the text call forth. What things in the reader’s life experience seem restrictive, even unexpectedly ensnaring? How can this be brought into relation with the fear of Yahweh that is the source of life? How is the fear of Yahweh in their lives to be accessed as a source of life? Hildebrandt (1992:443) points out that the antithetic poetic structure, so frequently used by the sages, unleashes a powerful motivation combination: approach + avoidance. That which is good is to be approached, whereas that which is not good is to be avoided. By using two powerful metaphors the proverb combines both an approach and an avoidance motivation to persuade the reader of the value of the fear of Yahweh. The proverb encourages approach toward, or favourable reception of, the good, and at the same time persuades avoidance and rejection of the bad.

What decision does the text want me to take; how will I let this imaginal engagement with the text affect my practical living? In this way, the illocutionary force of the text may be accessed and the reader may respond in a way fitting and appropriate to his or her own personal situation.

In conclusion, the poetics of the proverb may be described in the following way: the proverb employs two powerful metaphors, the literary motif of the source or fountain of life and the symbol of the snares of death, both grounded in the concrete situation of the Ancient Near East. The dryer climate heightens the importance of water as a necessity for life. The source or fountain functioned within that society as a very well-known symbol of life and sustenance or nourishment. The motif of the source of life is a powerful metaphor for the fear of Yahweh, precisely because of the tangibility of the symbol that effectively carries the force of the metaphor. Together with the metaphoric utilisation of the motif of the source of life, the benefit of the fear of Yahweh is effectively conveyed with the infinitive construction designating a purpose clause, namely that the fear of Yahweh is intended for keeping the reader far from the snares of death. Parallelism structures the text by simultaneously setting up a relationship of equivalence between the fear of Yahweh and the purpose of keeping the reader away from the snares of death, as well as a relationship of opposition between the source of life and the snares of death.