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My point of departure is Benjamin's "Lehre vom Ähnlichen," since this text elaborates a theory of reading and writing based on the concept of "nonsensory similarity." The "strange ambiguity of the word reading in relation to both its profane and its magical meaning", which is often cited in Benjamin criticism, is derived from a precise figure, namely the constellation as a model for writing and the concomitant practices of anagrammatical dispersion.
The Book of Job from the Old Testament is juxtaposed in detail with its hypertext in Thomas Mann's novel: the chapter where Jacob mourns for his "dead" Joseph. An argument is made that Mann's awareness of rabbinical literature creates a connection with the Akedah tradition, i.e., different ways of dealing with the sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham in Genesis. The notion that Abraham actually does kill Isaac, as suggested by a medieval rabbinical text, is interwoven into the analysis of Jacob's mourning for Joseph who appears as an Issaac-like sacrificial victim in Mann's novel. A connection is established between Abraham, Job and Jacob as figures whose children are claimed by God, and their reactions to this test are compared.