566 Jonathan Grossman expresses one meaning only is to be preferred (36). However, the usage of ambiguous expressions has clearly been adopted by various writers as part of the literary means by which they compose their literary creations (37). These usages allow for the expression of subtle irony, layered messages, or other literary and narrative goals. In this article, we have suggested that the through the repeated use of this narrative tool, the syntactic obtuseness where the subject can be understood as either the human character or God, serves a literary-theological purpose — the emphasis of the principle of dual- causality. This goal is achieved through the usage of ambiguous expressions, careful reading that is influenced by the order in which literary details are placed within the narrative, and dual readings with intertextual connotations. Essentially, the reader identifies the story of Absalom’s rebellion as part of the divine response to David’s behaviour in the first reading, through its inclusion in the series of narratives that immediately follow David’s offence and Nathan’s prophecy of punishment. The double layers that we have described in this paper, and through the use of the literary means described above, come to strengthen this approach, as opposed to providing an alternative reading. Bar-Ilan University Jonathan GROSSMAN Ramat-Gan Israel SUMMARY The principle of dual causality, according to which the same event is projected twice for two different reasons — Divine and human — is known among scholars and researchers of the Bible. One of the outstanding narratives in which this principle becomes evident to the reader is Absalom’s rebellion: the narrator tells the story in terms of political conflict, but hints of a deeper explanation, which sees the rebellion as a Divine punishment for David. This paper portrays how ambiguous expressions were employed in order to form the principle of dual causality in this narrative. (36) It stands to follow, therefore, that ambiguity is be avoided at all costs. See, for example, A. WAJSBERG, “Graphic Representation of Syntactical Ambiguity”, Leshonenu la’am 45 (1994) 93-97. Similarly, L. Charlap holds that the reader’s function is to establish a unified reading wherever possible, and provides several approaches for resolving ambiguities (“On Some Types of Ambiguity in the Biblical Text: A Textual-Semantic Aspect Seen through the Exegesis of Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra”, Hebrew Linguistics 45 [1999] 37-52). Clearly, our approach differs in that it recognizes that in various circumstances, the ambiguous reading is preferred. (37) See, for examples, Empson’s classic study: Seven Types of Ambiguity (New York 1953). 3