REREADING THE DAVID-MEPHIBOSHETH NARRATIVE FROM A PASTORAL HERMENEUTICAL PERSPECTIVE: A SOCIAL MODEL

People with disabilities have experienced varying degrees of acceptance throughout recorded history.2 This paper articulates that modern societies tend to discriminate against people with disabilities whom they perceive as incapacitated to do what non-disabled people can do. Not many biblical scholars have attempted to appropriate Mephibosheth’s deformity with disability phenomena in our modern society today. This article argues that the biblical narrative about Mephibotheth’s deformity should inform members of the public to be proactive by responding positively to people with disabilities in our modern society. The narrative is reread from a pastoral hermeneutical perspective in which a social model of disability is employed to explore the ambivalence associated with disability in our society today. In the final analysis, I will make recommendations towards emancipation of people with disabilities