exegetist

But this objection likewise falls to the ground, because a German exegetist supposes that Jonah must have taken refuge in the floating body of a dead whale -- even as the French soldiers in the Russian campaign turned their dead horses into tents, and crawled into them.

Aronofsky and Handel say, with good reason, that they are continuing the Jewish tradition of creating midrash, in which the exegetist adheres to either some aspects of the original story, on the one hand, while creating freely, on the other hand, thus giving the biblical account a new interpretation.

But this objection likewise falls to the ground, because a German exegetist supposes that Jonah must have taken refuge in the floating body of a dead whale--even as the French soldiers in the Russian campaign turned their dead horses into tents, and crawled into them.

When the voice of the exegetist no longer sounds--and who would dare believe it reverberates long in the ears of its listeners--the texts return to their immobility, becoming once again enigmatic, strange, sometimes even ridiculously archaic.