Levels of Style: A Bridge between the Composition and Delivery of New Testament Writings

In English Classical scholars commonly describe the ancient concept of stylistic levels with the presupposition that it merely involves literary style, how a message is expressed in a text. A study of what the rhetorical treatises say about the stylistic levels shows, however, that they affected not only composition, but also delivery and audience reactions. The delivery and reception of a text was strongly influenced by how it was written and structured. There was a close relationship between composition, delivery and reception and this relationship can be understood with the help of the levels of style.

This paper introduces a method of analyzing stylistic variation in New Testament writings. Identifying and assessing compositional features that are important in defining the stylistic level, e.g. word choices, rhetorical figures, and instances of hiatus, the paper will demonstrate how these features work together to build up the text’s stylistic intensity. That level of stylistic intensity in turn defines how the text should be accurately delivered.