Please write an essay, 4pgs long. MLA format. Respond to the following prompt. Please write an argument of your own, supported by textual evidence including quotation, paraphrase, and summary. Please do not use online sources (if you do use online sources, at least cite them responsibly).

TIP: Your essay does not need to answer every one of the questions asked in the prompts. The prompts are designed to get you thinking; if you try to do everything, you will not be able to focus narrowly enough.

TIP: Base your analysis on the text. In order to support your assertions, please quote passages and summarize events as needed, without letting summary take over your essay.

TIP: Don’t be afraid to write an argument. Your job is not to Survey the Whole Entire Bible, but rather to show how well you have learned the course’s techniques of close analysis and educated interpretation, and how well you can synthesize (bring ideas together) across two or three books of the Bible.

Prompt:

Lamentation is a formal pattern in the Psalms: it begins with an introductory address and a complaint, has a turn toward God (a confession of trust), followed by a request (petition), and a vow of praise. This pattern suggests that although suffering and complaint express exile or alienation from God, the process of writing or singing the psalm results in an expression of closeness or trust in God by the end. Comparing the 2 Samuel and Matthew(attached). Compare and contrast two texts in which this pattern of exile and reconciliation takes place. What similarities do they have, and what differences become apparent as you compare? How do those differences tell us something about each of the books? (You could, if you are feeling ambitious, consider the way the Israelites’ continual cycles of doubt and reconciliation in Exodus or in Judges resemble a lamentation pattern, write large at the level of the community.) Write an essay in which you examine the role of doubt, alienation, and / or complaint with respect to reconciliation between the devotional community and God.

One tip from me: since the time is short, you can just read any online versions of these two books from the Bible to help you read faster. Only use the passage I provide when you need to quote. Cuz mine is Oxford Study Bible and the language is different from the online versions. And you don’t need to answer all the questions in the prompt, do the best as you can.