The Sword of His Mouth

'The Sword of His Mouth' is a study of the rhetorical and poetic form of synoptic sayings which argues that many of these sayings use a "depth rhetoric" which seeks to challenge the hearer's fixed structures of meaning and value, moving one to new action by awakening new insight. This study brings to light important but neglected features of the texts and demonstrates the value of this new approach for gaining fresh insight into their significance. Special attention is given to pattern and tensi