ABSTRACT
Any delicious meal relies on preexisting ingredients, and this book is no different. While a full literature review of either metaphor studies or ancient food studies would be unnecessary (and tedious), my broader argument relies on two claims that cannot be taken for granted. First, I circumvent most of the metaphor work in biblical studies by introducing a specific kind of metaphor: realized metaphor, in which the “vehicle” of a metaphor is literally true within a fictional narrative. Second, I argue that the metaphor of women as food is far from novel; it persists across time and culture, albeit with varying details, and it was clearly present in the milieu of the biblical author. My discussion of these two realms, metaphor and food symbolism, will provide a theoretical foundation for the three case studies to come. In addition, I conclude the chapter with a reflection on the tension between universalism and contextualization that characterizes my metaphorical–philological approach.
