Abstract
In this paper I reflect on the theological relationship between silence and words, between futility and faith, and I do so in the context of prophecy as hope. I engage with the Book of Jeremiah to ask how the reversals and seeming contradictions in prophetic utterances of desolation and redemption break open the trauma of the present and orientate it towards the future through the invocation of hope. I hold in creative tension the Wittgensteinian paradox that whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent, and the impulse (which is always a theological impulse) to speak against the void in order to arrive at that of which one cannot speak. We must constantly push against the limits of language in order to recognise its creative possibilities and its defeats.
| Original language | English |
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| Title of host publication | Prophetic Witness and the Literary Reimagining of the World |
| Subtitle of host publication | Poetry, Theology and Philosophy |
| Editors | Hilary Davies |
| Place of Publication | London |
| Publisher | Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group |
| Volume | 5 |
| Publication status | Accepted/In press - 2020 |