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Abstract

Intertextuality is a hermeneutical strand of poststructuralism. In biblical scholarship, since Hays’s influential work Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (1989), the term has also been employed to refer to a later text’s interpretation of an earlier text. Regrettably, however, for the past three decades, scholars have failed to come to a consensus on how to understand and apply intertextuality in New Testament studies. Though both literary and biblical studies employ the same term intertextuality, their conception and application of intertextuality differs substantially. Accordingly, this essay will sketch how literary and biblical studies have perceived and utilized the concept of intertextuality. Following this, the study will evaluate these approaches. Finally, the present essay will conclude with a proposal for how to relate intertextuality and New Testament studies that is a cogent middle ground between poststructuralism and biblical studies, thereby compensating for both sides’ deficiencies.

Keywords

intertextuality structuralism poststructuralism reader-response criticism Kristeva Hays Old Testament in the New Testament metalepsis social semiotics heteroglossia

Intertextuality: Its Origin and Notion

Intertextuality was not generated within biblical studies but is a movement that originates within literary and narrative criticism, particularly poststructuralism (see Orr 2003: 20; Riffaterre 1978: 115-63; Young 1981: 1-28; Culler 2001: 110-31; Lundy 2013: 69-92). Briefly stated, unlike structuralism’s efforts to find the relation between elements of human culture and an overarching system or structure, poststructuralism annihilates ‘the myth of a coherent tradition’ (María 1996: 271). Julia Kristeva and her colleagues of the Tel Quel editorial group in Paris, including Jacques Derrida, Philippe Sollers, and Roland Barthes, coined the term intertextuality (McAfee 2004: 4-8; and Kristeva 1980: 64-67). The fundamental notion of intertextuality is two-fold: ‘a text can’t exist as a self-sufficient whole, and it does not function as a closed system’ (María 1996: 268). As such, a text is not merely a cluster of language but a configuration of multiple factors such as culture, society, community, and other texts. A text itself contains the world around the text (María 1996: 272).

When Kristeva proposed the term intertextuality, she did not intend to explore ‘how later writers incorporate earlier texts for rhetorical, poetic, literary and theological purposes’ (Emadi 2015: 10). Instead, her notion of intertextuality is embedded in poststructuralist perspectives (Kristeva 1986: 34-61). To be clear, structuralism views the system of language as a mediator between human thought and reality (David 1969: 623-24). Thus, through linguistic systems and structure, one may understand the world and the culture. In contrast, poststructuralists are skeptical of the possibility of finding definite meaning derived from a formalistic reading (Dinkler 2019: 107). This, therefore, suggests that objectivity does not exist anywhere. In general agreement with poststructuralism, Kristeva rejects the idea of static and closed structures but endorses the idea of open structures (Allen 2000:76).

The primary interest of Kristeva is the interrelationship between culture and text. She sees culture as a universal and general text, and only within the relationship between culture and a written text can the meaning of a text can be understood (Alkier 2009a: 4). For Kristeva, none of the words in a written text are the genuine creation of the author but are derived from other existent texts, ‘so that a text is a permutation of texts and an intertextuality in the space of a given text’ (Kristeva 1980: 36). As such, the meaning of utterances is not determinative but flexible. The reader, text, and all other factors in the culture are interwoven to produce the meaning. In light of this, she proposes a dialogical and yet an ambivalent relationality between culture and text (Irwin 2004: 235-36). For Kristeva, the author does not take the central role for the determination of meaning. Instead, Kristeva substitutes the reader in place of the author. The authorial intent is not critical for determining meaning. Though the writer assigns meaning through the interaction of his/her context (and other texts), the reader’s context and other texts interoperate in her/him to assign meaning (Wolde 1989: 47).

Kristeva understands that intertextuality is not only concerned with the interdependence of literary units (words, sentences, and paragraphs) but is also engaged with interactions and transpositions of sign systems of a particular society (Kristeva 1980: 59-60). Once the transposition of a sign from one position (one text or one social location) into another occurs, it demands a new articulation with regard to the transferred locus. In this respect, Kristeva deviates from the notion of textual interdependency. She asserts:

If one grants that every signifying practice is a field of transpositions of various signifying systems (and intertextuality), one then understands that its ‘place’ of enunciation and its denoted ‘object’ are never single, complete, and identical to themselves but are always plural, shattered and capable of being tabulated. In this way polysemy can also be seen as the result of semiotic polyvalence – an adherence to different sign systems (Kristeva 1984: 59-60).

By stating this, Kristeva disclaims the objectivity of the text. In other words, Kristeva denies that the text presents a clear and stable meaning but produces various meanings depending on the society and sign systems. Kristeva suggests that a single text per se is insufficient to make the meaning of the text. Rather, it ought to be examined within the society as a whole.

This ambivalence of text resonates with Ferdinand de Saussure’s notion of sign. Saussure asserts that the sign is composed of a conceptual image (signified) and a sound pattern (signifier). The signified is one’s thought of the world he/she would like to express, and it is pronounced with words and sound. The sound pattern (signal) is not an actual voice or sound of utterances but the psychological impression of listeners. The sound pattern could be materialized only in the case that the sound pattern is the representation of listeners’ sensory impressions. Therefore, according to Saussure, the relationship between the signifier (sound) and the signified (conceptual image) is arbitrary. Though the different two languages express the same concept (signification), the sound pattern (signal) would be different (Saussure 1974: 56-98).

Alongside this, Kristeva sees text as practice and productivity (Kristeva 1980: 36). The text is practice in the sense that it represents, albeit partially, the larger cultural and social textuality. The text is productivity in the sense that it is an outcome of the existent discourse and will continuously produce the resonance of ongoing discourse in society. This presents affinities with Bakhtin’s notion of dialogism and heteroglossia. Dialogism refers to the interactions between multiple dialogues by multiple entities. Dialogism is a form of semiotics that includes all possible relations, such as those between people, society, community, culture, and even within an individual person. Heteroglossia refers to another’s speech in another’s language. It is the inter-subjectivity that would be refracted and expressed by different voices. According to Bakhtin,

The internal dialogism of the word finds expression in a series of peculiar features in semantics, syntax, and stylistics that have remained up to the present time completely unstudied by linguistics and stylistics (nor, what is more, have the peculiar semantic features of ordinary dialogue been studied) (Bakhtin 1981: 279).

Thus, dialogism is concerned with the multiple voices that influence a text, while heteroglossia considers different voices within a discourse (see Bakhtin 1986; Morris 1994; Holquist 2004).

There is a critical dissonance between Bakhtin and Kristeva, however. Bakhtin’s dialogism does not necessarily require ‘the death of the author’, which is pronounced by post-modernism. Rather, Bakhtin explores the potential that meaning could be determined by the dialogue between texts and readers. Thus, he affirms that an actual author employs a language in a specific social situation, but authorial intent cannot be the only determining factor for meaning. Bakhtin situates the dialogue in between texts and readers as an important position and eliminates the absolute authority of the author to understand intertextual texts. Thus, though Bakhtin and Kristeva share in common the perspective that the text should not be separated from other sources such as culture, society, and other texts, they differ in terms of how they view the author’s place in creating meaning.

To summarize thus far, for Kristeva, culture and texts are inextricably interconnected, and the culture is a matrix in which texts can be generated (Kristeva 1980: 36). A text is the product of multiple system networks. It has meaning potential since it contains ‘numerous combinations, relations, overlaps and multiple meanings because every text is a mosaic of other texts’ (Gillmayr-Bucher 2006: 15). In light of this, a dialogical relationship between culture and text is the central notion of intertextuality. Neither the structure nor the author of the text determines the text’s meaning. Instead, readers and their interactions with extralinguistic factors determine a text’s meaning. As such, intertextuality is not only about textual interplay but is inextricably related to extralinguistic features such as culture and society.

Intertextuality in Biblical Studies

As noted above, the gist of intertextuality is concerned with how different entities, such as the author, the borrowed text, the new text, and its reader, which have different social, cultural, and textual contexts, dialogue to produce meaning. Many diverse (and unrelated) things are subsumed under the umbrella term ‘intertextuality’ including historical criticism, authorial intent, rhetorical technique, and reader-response criticism (Aichele and Phillips 1995a: 8). In biblical studies, however, many thinkers have shown a stubborn disregard for the multifaceted intertextuality. Conventionally, they have paid attention to one particular aspect, namely: how the earlier text is used by the later author in what context and for what purpose. Two specific types of approaches represent such a phenomenon; (1) the use of the Old Testament (OT) in the New Testament (NT) and (2) historical-critical approaches.

Intertextuality and the Use of the OT in the NT

Traditionally, intertextual studies have been ill-informed within New Testament studies because it has been understood to be a study of the explicit citations/quotations from the OT in the NT so that a final and historical meaning of a given text can be determined. Such approaches often involve demonstrating that the NT writer employs the OT to show the fulfilment of the OT in the Christ event (see Ellis 1957; Fitzmyer 1961: 297-333; Gundry 1967; Black 1971: 1-14; Shires 1974; and Longenecker 1975; Beale 1984a: 129-54; Beale 1989: 89-96; Bauckham 1993: 183; and Kaiser 1994: 55-69). Such an approach to intertextuality continues today. There are scholars who employ the ‘grand thematic narrative’ of the OT to interpret the NT. This movement can be seen as part of the traditional approach in the sense that the meaning of the NT is determined by the OT (See Wright 1993: 151-56; 1998; Keesmaat 1999: 55-66; Das 2016). In this kind of study, exegetes assume that the later text (the NT) adopts the thematic narrative of the older text (the OT or second temple literature) without contemplating the cultural, historical, and social gap between the two texts.

In his work According to the Scripture, Dodd discusses two points related to the NT’s use of the OT. One point concerns the larger context of the citation, and the other concerns the kerygma of the OT. He contends that the kerygma of the OT is essential to understand the NT use of the OT (Dodd 1952: 12). He also asserts that the target text should be interpreted without ignoring or neglecting the context of the OT passages (Dodd 1952: 133). This interpretative tendency continues even today (see Lindars 1961; O’Day 1990: 259-67; Keesmaat 1999; Gheorghita 2003; and Bredin 2003: 187). Beale believes that when NT writers use the original OT texts, they develop the original meaning of the earlier text, including the ‘thick meaning’ of the earlier texts. In other words, he does not define intertextuality only as a rhetorical device for an author to write literature. Rather, Beale defines intertextuality as an NT author using intertexts without ignoring the original meanings (Beale 1984b; Beale 1999: 97-99; Beale and Carson 2007; and Beale 2012).

Donald Juel is a pioneer in exploring the use of the OT in the NT through a synchronic approach. Whereas Dodd contends for the legitimacy of the context of the OT, Juel values the Jewish context more than the context of the OT. He opposes Dodd, asserting that first-century Christianity did not interpret the quoted passage by the OT theme or kerygma. Rather, Juel argues that the NT writers’ use of the OT should be understood according to the Qumran and Rabbinic Midrash (Juel 1988: 31-57). By doing this, he pursues synchronic approaches rather than diachronic (Also see Evans and Sanders 1993: 13-14). Therefore, though he asserts that he is doing a messiah-centred exegesis, he differentiates his view from the patristic and medieval reading.

Intertextuality and Historical-Critical Approaches

Other traditional methods of studying intertexts are historical-critical approaches, particularly redaction criticism. In this approach, the original author’s intent and their historical and social settings are a significant key to understand the intertexts (see Moyise 2006: 24-34; Allegro 1956: 174-87; Fitzmyer 1957: 513-37; Borgen 1965; Hodgson 1979: 361-78; Vorster 1989: 16-21; Allison 1993; and Davies and Allison 2004: 1.1-5). Hence, the meaning depends on the author of the receptor text. The goal of such approaches is to identify how the NT author reconfigures the ancient text through his theological agenda and Sitz im Leben (Moyise 2006: 25; and Huizenga 2009: 3). Whether taking the OT as a source text or as a redacted text, traditional approaches assume that texts have one single meaning. In such approaches, the chronological or diachronic adoption of the older text is the interpretive key for intertextual studies. Moreover, the locus of meaning is found in the writer/author. The writer, who includes the pre-text and its social setting, sets up the guidelines for meaning. Thus, in this method, the best interpretation follows the guidelines of the author to discover the meaning of the text.

A Shift of the Current of Intertextuality

Having said that, two seminal works were published in 1989: Intertextuality in Biblical Writings edited by Sipke Draisma (1989) and Richard B. Hays’ Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (1989). These books shifted the discussion of intertextuality in biblical studies. Though their notions of intertextuality do not agree, the two volumes were a turning point in the field and inspired a new wave of intertextual studies in the NT. These works are skeptical of the traditional approaches of identifying meaning according to historicity and authorial intent (Hatina 1999: 28-43). Instead, this new wave comprises two large interpretative tendencies: (1) metalepsis and (2) reader-centred reading. The former, proposed by Hays, is concerned with literary devices and techniques, while the latter, commended by Intertextuality in Biblical Writings, pertains to the intertextuality of poststructuralism.

Though Hays is aware of the notion of intertextuality as originated by poststructuralism, he does not adopt it but limits his research scope to the inner resonances of the biblical text. Hays’s primary interest is the rhetorical and semantic features of intertexts. Though he differentiates his notion of intertextuality from the traditional comparative approaches, Hays does not pay attention to the contemporary reader’s social and cultural aspects of intertextuality (Yoon 2013: 71). Rather, Hays attempts to elucidate how the later writer employs oblique citations––which he labels as an echo of the OT––as the literary technique of the author (Hays 1989: 29-31; and Hays 2005: 34-45). In this regard, Hays aligns with literary criticism, investigating how the referenced text functions in a new context. Since Hays’s proposal, many scholars afterwards have employed Hays’s notion and method to identify the more subtle or latent references of the OT in the NT. These scholars’ interests are in how the receptor text combines, rearranges, transforms, and substitutes the source text (Brodie et al. 2006: 288-90). Such studies pay attention to the rhetorical and logical function of a text and interpret metalepsis, particularly allusion or echo, in a text which reverberates with other texts (see Thompson 1991; Keesmaat 1994: 29-56; Dunn 1994: 155-78; Allison 2000; Wagner 2002; Brodie 2004; Stanley 2004; Keesmaat 2006: 182-212; Stanley 2008: 3-14; Leonard 2008: 241-65; Beetham 2009; Leithart 2009; Wilk 2009: 83-99; and Stanley 2016: 42-62).

In addition to Hays’s program, Intertextuality in Biblical Writings also fiercely challenges the conventional notion and application of intertextuality. Unlike Hays, however, contributors to this volume adopt the notion of poststructuralism, suggesting that NT writers were not reiterators of the previous texts but a reader who determined the meaning according to their own cultural context (cf. Friedman 1991: 146-80; Moore 1994: 123-24; Aichele and Phillips 1995a; Aichele and Walsh 2002; Boda and Porter 2005: 215-18; and Aichele 2009: 139-56; Porter 2017: 23-55). Willem S. Vorster asserts that intertextuality differs from source–critical approaches that use the OT as a source text in the NT and from redaction-critical approaches that are author-oriented. He argues that the text is not simply reused but redefined so that the intertext should receive a more attention to its progress rather than its influence as a source (Vorster 1989: 21).

Ellen José van Wolde also explains that intertextuality replaces the chronological and diachronic approaches with a synchronic approach (Wolde 1989: 46). Put differently, instead of the linear adoption of an older text, the NT writer produces meaning within the interaction of his context and other texts. Thus, ‘the earlier text only achieves significance through what the later text makes of it’ (Wolde 1989: 45). In sum, the interpreter of the NT as a modern reader also has his/her context and texts that contribute meaning to the text. In this regard, three meaning potentials can be proposed due to the different context and readers: (1) the meaning generated between the older text and its reader, (2) the meaning produced between the later text and its reader, and (3) the meaning made by the later text and the modern reader.

Intertextuality, Culture, and Semiotics

In addition to the scholars mentioned above, recent scholars discuss the notion of intertextuality within cultural realm. Aichele and Philips, for instance, avoid the linear, unidirectional, and chronological adoption of the older text into the new text. They argue that intertextuality should not be restricted by the domain of literary relations. To them, intertextuality can be expanded to encompass even more complex relationships, such as the ideology of the society, which is how interpreters read and understand the text according to their own cultural and ideological backdrop (Aichele and Phillips 1995b: 7-18; and Aichele and Walsh 2002).

In his book, The New Isaac, Huizenga advocates for Umberto Eco’s notion of texts that are particular expressions of the cultural encyclopedia (Eco 1997: 43-44). In other words, ‘the text, which consists of encyclopedic materials, determines what materials from the encyclopedia are to be actualized’ (Huizenga 2009: 23). In this regard, Huizenga sees a text as a social semiotic. The reader takes an intermediary role between text and culture and observes the intentio operis (the intention of the work) through a dialectical relationship between the given text and the cultural encyclopedia (Huizenga 2015:17-35).

Dale Allison advocates for the subjectivity of intertextuality. Though he does not deviate from literary interdependence approaches, Allison argues that readers have an important role in interpretation of intertexts because the allusion is implicit, and there is no guarantee for the precise reconstruction of the allusion in intertexts. Allison suggests that shared elements, word order, and structure are important for intertextual studies. He provides six criteria (historical audience, common words, collocation, prominence, same source, thematic congruence) to discern subtle intertexts, and these criteria show similarities to those of Hays (Allison 2000: 10-13). Thus, it is the reader’s role to fill in the gaps (Allison 2000: 1-24).

Peter Leithart asserts that the meaning of texts is not in the texts, but outside (Leithart 2009: 113). His main concern is not methodological, however, but is rather with the person who interprets Scripture. Leithart argues that when interpreters are familiar with both referred and referring texts, they can reach the meaning of the later texts (Leithart 2009: 138-39). He thinks that interpreters cannot do an exegetical work without eisegesis. As such, the reader can grasp a richer meaning when s/he enters the author’s world and cultural context (Leithart 2009: 133).

Similarly, Stefan Alkier contends that a text itself does not generate the meaning. A text is just a meaning potential. A text’s meaning can be actualized only within the relationship amongst other texts. Thus, Alkier does not see a text as an objectively described closed structure (Alkier 2009a: 3-4). Agreeing with the notion of intertextuality as defined by poststructuralism, Alkier views intertextuality as a subfield within semiotic studies of biblical texts (Alkier 2009a: 7). Because of this, Alkier considers NT studies the study of linguistic signs. Following Saussure’s theory, a ‘sign’ is not inherent to a verbal object but is a system of social semiotics (Alkier 2009a: 8). Therefore, for Alkier, there is no necessity for a strict distinction between author-oriented and reader-oriented interpretations in social semiotics. Rather, Alkier proposes a methodology to identify intertextuality that is an interaction of three intertextual avenues: production-oriented, reception-oriented, and experimental perspectives (Alkier 2009a: 9-11). Alkier argues that the three perspectives should cooperate to find the meaning of intertexts.

Xiaxia E. Xue has also recently published concerning social semiotic perspectives (Xue 2015; Xue 2016: 277-308; and Xue 2019: 127-54). Xue does not canvass intertexts as a chronological or diachronic adoption of the source text by the receptor text. Instead, aligning with the social semiotic view, Xue postulates that a text is not an isolated island but inevitably intertextual (Xue 2015: 2). The most distinctive feature of her work is to propose an analytic tool for interpreting intertexts. Xue criticizes predecessors’ works regarding the use of the OT in Rom. 9–11 and demonstrates that no programmatic analysis has been applied to intertextual studies of the pertinent text (Xue 2015: 6-19). Xue advocates for thematic formation as an analytic program and analyzes Rom 9–11 within the context of its social communities, particularly Jewish contemporaries (Xue 2015: 21).

Based on social semiotics, Doosuk Kim also utilizes a functional linguistic approach, to examine the intertextual relation between Paul’s apocalyptic text in 2 Cor. 12.1-10 and Jewish literature, particularly 1 Enoch and hekhalot Rabbati and Zutari. Whereas many scholars find interrelations between Jewish mysticism and Paul’s heavenly account in 2 Cor. 12.1-10, Kim analyzes the heteroglossia of Paul’s account against other texts. Through a linguistic analysis, Kim maintains that even if four texts exhibit structural, lexical, and formal affinities, Paul’s appraisal language differs from other texts. The difference is derived from the situational context and elaborated in the larger thematic context of 2 Cor. 10–12 (Kim 2020: 17-47).

Intertextuality and Socio-Rhetorical Criticism

Lastly, there is an eclectic approach to intertextuality called socio-rhetorical criticism, which conflates social-scientific and literary-critical approaches. Duane F. Watson’s edited volume (2002a), The Intertexture of Apocalyptic Discourse in the New Testament, is a representative work. The contributors to this volume adopt Vernon K. Robbins’s socio-rhetorical criticism and apply it to their target texts. Robbins argues that socio-rhetoric is an interpretive system in which various analytic approaches are interwoven. As the name indicates, Robbins integrates two large approaches into his program, namely social-scientific and literary criticism (Robbins 1996b: 4). Robbins argues that a text consists of multiple textures and intertexture is one of them. In order to interpret a text as a whole, he argues that its multiple textures need to be identified, which include inner texture, intertexture, social and cultural texture, ideological texture, and sacred texture (Robbins 1996a: 2-5). Hence, when one reads a text, both inner texture (literary-critical approaches) and social and cultural texture (social-scientific approaches) should be taken into account. This multiplicity, however, does not dismiss the integrity of the text but contributes to the tapestry as a whole (Robbins 1996b: 235).

In terms of intertexture, Robbins argues: ‘intertexture in a text covers a spectrum that includes: (l) oral scribal intertexture; (2) historical intertexture; (3) social intertexture; and (4) cultural intertexture’ (Robbins 1996b: 96). Oral scribal intertexture refers to the study of the use of older texts in new texts, such as quotations, citations, allusions, and echoes (Robbins 1996b: 97-108; and McGrath 2016: 176-86). Cultural intertexture, according to Robbins, does not denote the general or abstract culture in the time of the NT. Rather, ‘it concerns particular self-understandings within particular contexts’ (Robbins 1996b: 113). Robbins argues that social intertexture is a narrower category than cultural intertexture that is the common perspectives of people in a particular society who share social practices, languages, convictions, and concepts (Robbins 1996b: 117). Historical intertexture is concerned with a particular event that occurred at a particular time (Robbins 1996b: 118). Therefore, intertextual studies as proposed by Robbins are concerned with ‘the intersection of the inner world of the text, which is created by literary and narrative means, with the outer world within which the text developed’ (Watson 2002b: 2).

To summarize, intertextual studies in the biblical studies discipline can largely be represented by five strands. First, traditional and theological approaches are interested in explicit citations to identify how an old text helps to shape a new text and how the NT fulfils the OT through Christological lenses. Second, historical-critical approaches regard the borrowed text as a source to construe the context of the new text and analyze how the later author employs sources within his theological framework to formulate his message. Third, literary-critical approaches define the use of the earlier text as metalepsis. Such methods examine what literary functions the referred text has in a new context. Fourth, poststructuralist approaches are concerned with how the reader grasps the intertexts in his/her cultural, social, and intertextual interactions. Fifth, eclectic approaches, such as socio-rhetorical criticism, combine analysis of inner texture, which is about the literary function, and external texture, which pertains to the social and cultural context.

Evaluation of Poststructuralism’s Intertextuality

As noted above, poststructuralism has declared the death of the author and thus decentralizes the location of meaning. Poststructuralism subverts the claim of structuralism that the meaning of a text is found in the text itself. This movement challenges the autonomy of the text and relocates meaning away from the author or the text to the reader. As such, meaning is not static but dynamic, depending on the reader and his/her interactions with culture, society, and other texts (Dinkler 2019: 108). Therefore, poststructuralism’s intertextuality is a reader-centred criticism. The reader’s culture and his/her contemporary texts are significant for establishing the meaning of a text (see Fish 1980; Tompkins 1981: 201-32; Loader 2000: 277-300).

Having said that, reader-response criticism has not gained widespread popularity within NT studies. Rather, most scholars within biblical studies have assessed it as an incompatible means for interpretation and exegesis of biblical texts for several reasons. One of the most important reasons is that biblical studies has traditionally considered the original meaning of the text as the centre of interpretation (Porter 1990: 284). Alongside textual exegesis, the purported historical events of the text and the original audience’s understanding according to the historical background have been deemed as pillars of biblical interpretation (Porter 1990: 284-85; Vanhoozer 2009: 367-452). Put differently, biblical studies takes into primary consideration the historical components of a text, such as historical background, author, reader, etc., whereas reader-response criticism gives primacy to ahistorical interpretations of intertexts (see Osborne 2006: 158-80; Klein et al. 2004: 213-72; Köstenberger and Patterson 2011: 57-150; Porter and Stovell 2012: 27-47; Bartholomew 2015: 335-75).

Alongside this, the term ‘reader-response’ has been inconsistently employed in NT studies. To be clear, in literary studies, reader-response criticism was largely understood and used to refer to the shift in the central authority being in the text or author to being in the reader. In this way, the reader is whoever encounters a particular text and understands it through his/her cultural background and interaction with other texts. As such, the reader is not confined to the historical and original reader. In biblical studies, though many scholars have utilized the term ‘reader-response criticism’, they have employed it differently from the way in which poststructuralism defines it (Porter 1990: 280-85).

One of the pioneers of reader-response criticism in biblical studies is Robert Fowler. He defines reader-response criticism as the ways in which ‘the author of the gospel has undertaken to direct and control the reader’s experience of reading the gospel (Fowler 1981: 149)’. Fowler defines the reader as the historical gospel reader or implied reader (Fowler 1981: 150-51). Thus, though Fowler utilizes reader-response criticism, the work itself is actually heavily based on formalism. In addition to Fowler, many other scholars have exhibited a lack of clarity about reader-response criticism. Some of them use the term but have not precisely defined who the reader is. To them, it seems that the reader is not the modern-day readers of biblical texts as exegetes or interpreters, but rather the original reader or implied reader (see Culpepper 1983; Petersen 1984: 38-51). As such, this kind of reader-response methodology is not the kind of methodology referred to by this term in poststructuralism.

Part of the confusion surrounding reader-response criticism stems from that fact that poststructuralists have failed to provide substantiated analytic programs for intertextuality. Even if poststructuralism’s notion of intertextuality is theoretically plausible, it is not practical for producing the meaning of a text if a text is only deconstructed. That is to say, poststructuralist intertextuality should provide meaning-defining systems. Kristeva’s notion of intertextuality is discursive because it is a jumble of different kinds of meaning-making sources, such as history, culture, texts, readers’ perception, author’s perspectives, and so on. As Jonathan D. Culler rightly points out, if one adopts Kristeva’s notion completely, the study of intertextuality becomes impractical (Culler 2001: 116). Given this, it is conceivable to argue that Kristeva’s concept of intertextuality is an ideology, not a methodology (Yoon 2013: 74). Put differently, Kristeva’s model may be seen as more descriptive than programmatic, which makes it difficult to adopt on account of the numerous undefined and unorganized aspects of her theory (Pfister 1991: 210).

Many scholars agree about this critique of Kristeva, even though they were inspired by her and have sought to transfer her ideology into methodologies (Alkier 2009a: 6). Xue also claims that ‘this view of intertextuality does not provide a way to analyze the complex of relations within texts, [so that] post-structural intertextuality is much more a literary concept than an interpretive tool’ (Xue 2015: 27). Within biblical studies, in particularly, interpretation of the text is one of the most important tasks. Interpretation is not just a theoretical proposition but an actual proposal through exegetical/interpretative methods (Blomberg 2012: 29-31). Therefore, apart from systemization of the ideology, there is no real way to apply intertextuality as a real method for textual analysis.

Evaluation of Biblical Studies’ Intertextuality

As reviewed above, intertextuality has been employed by biblical researchers as an innovative modern method to interpret the use of the OT or Second Temple literature in the NT. Yet, regretfully, they have lumped old comparative approaches into that term and utilized it according to their own theological presuppositions, that is, the new author considers the original context of the citation and Jesus is the fulfilment of Scripture. Alongside this, biblical scholars have utilized historical criticism as an equivalent to intertextuality. These two domains of study, however, are not compatible since historical criticism pursues meaning in the original authorial intent while intertextuality is concerned with the reader’s context (Hatina 1999: 28-42; Moyise 2009: 32). As Wolde acutely criticizes, ‘the term intertextuality is a modern literary theoretical coat of veneer over the old comparative approaches’ (Wolde 1989: 43). Simply put, biblical exegetes are doing the same things just with a new name. As such, it would be better not to use the term intertextuality in biblical studies if scholars employ it only for the study of the OT in the NT (Yoon 2013: 73-74).

Even though Hays’s work began a new stream of intertextuality studies, and though a number of scholars champion Hays’s metalepsis, this approach has not been free from criticism. Numerous scholars argue that Hays and his followers do not actually embody the true spirit of intertextuality. Put differently, Hays employs the concept from poststructuralism but applies it in a structuralist way, that is, a literary-critical approach (Moyise 2002: 15; Paul 2000: 258). In addition to this lack of terminological clarity, Hays has also been criticized for his lack of precise definitions in his own proposal. The primary critique here is that echo and allusion are dubious terms in and of themselves and that no clear definitions are provided to distinguish between and clearly delineate these words (Evans 1993: 47-51). Stanley Porter, for instance, criticizes Hays’s metalepsis of echo and allusion, stating that the notion of ‘availability’ is dubious to explain if an ‘echo’ is recognizable to the audience who does not share the same or similar understanding of what the author refers to (Porter 2008: 29-40; Porter 2016: 9-15).

In contrast to Hays’s use of intertextuality, certain other scholars have begun to effectively distinguish intertextuality from allusion and echo, instead of employing an inconsistent notion of intertextuality. Steve Moyise, for instance, suggests alternatives, namely: (1) Intertextual echo, (2) Dialogical intertextuality, and (3) Postmodern intertextuality (Moyise 2000: 17-18). Kristen Nielsen rejects both interpretative movements of allusion/echo and poststructuralism; she does not accept the claim that ‘the role of the reader can be defined as that of a producer’ (Nielsen 1990: 89). That being said, however, she presents a critique of the traditional perspective on interpretation, particularly interpretation that is author-oriented and that finds meaning in authorial intent. She points out that if interpreters only find the meaning from authorial intent, it would be very limited and restricted since readers do not have enough information about the author but only have a text (Nielsen 1990: 90). Nielsen avers that the two extremes are not contradictory. The author’s intertextuality and the reader’s intertextuality are ongoing dialogues that, in effect, mean that one does not abolish the other (Nielsen 1990: 91). David Yoon also points out that though intertextuality has been a fashionable term in NT, many have employed the term without a solid definition. Yoon suggests that ‘one cannot strip away the postmodern underpinnings of the definition of intertextuality since the term is still utilized by literary critics who adhere to its postmodern origins’ (Yoon 2013: 72). He ultimately recommends jettisoning the term if it is used with different definition from that given to it by poststructuralism.

Lastly, though recently an increasing number of scholars have shown interest in the social and cultural spheres of intertextuality, regrettably only a few of them have proposed analytic programs (Porter and Pitts 2008: 9-40; Alkier 2009a: 3-21; Alkier 2009b: 223-48; Orosz 2009: 191-204; Dawson 2017: 9-40; Xue 2016: 277-308; Xue 2019: 127-54; Kim 2020: 17-47). Most scholars who delve into social and cultural aspects of the text utilize social-scientific or socio-rhetorical approaches. Though one should not neglect the explorations of such approaches, social-scientific methods do not provide analytic programs for how social and cultural contexts are encoded in texts. This is because the primary interest of social-scientific criticism is to investigate social phenomena through sociological theories and then implement the theory to interpret the text. As such, these approaches do not analyze the text to provide the answer for how social and cultural environments can be realized through texts. However, intertextuality requires discovery of the interactions between a text and its social and cultural context and the relations between a text and other texts in a particular culture and society. Within the interactions and relations, the meaning of intertexts can be discovered.

The Middle Ground: A Proposal of Intertextuality Theory

As proposed at the outset of this essay, the goal of this discussion is to suggest a renegotiated understanding of intertextuality that compensates for the deficiencies of both poststructuralism and biblical studies. Two premises for intertextuality are relevant here. First, intertextuality can be understood as being part of discourse analysis, which implies that intertextuality is a kind of textual analysis. Second, intertextuality can be defined as a social semiotic (Porter 2017: 40), which means that the analysis of intertextuality is concerned with how extralinguistic facets are encoded in linguistic forms.

Though this proposed understanding of intertextuality partially agrees with the poststructuralist idea that a single text only has meaning potential and cannot be read definitively, this proposal presents a significant difference from poststructuralism. Unlike poststructuralists, NT interpreters primarily deal with meaning derived from the text. In this regard, the intertextuality that the current research pursues is not reader-response criticism but a textual study. However, ‘textual’ does not denote an inner-textual exegesis that presupposes that a text inherently generates the meaning, as other forms of biblical intertextuality have maintained. Whereas traditional biblical studies attempt to find meaning through inner-textual analysis or historical/social settings, this study proposes intertextuality as an intermediate system, linking a specific form of meaning (text) to the general meaning potential. In this line of thought, regarding a text as a social semiotic is important for the intertextuality of the NT. To be clear, the context of culture is the total sum of complex knowledge, encompassing all kinds of social groups, experiences, and knowledge that are shared by all its members. Culture holds the highest meaning potential. Within culture, multiple semantic systems are interwoven and encoded in a language form, which is a text. This leads to the conclusion that the meaning of a text is produced through the interface of all kinds of social activities and systems and that a text is a lexico-grammatical form of some meaning within the society and culture (Lemke 1995b: 1).

This view argues that a text is not just a cluster of words but a product of the interaction between multiple social and cultural variants. As such, a word alone does not have an immanent meaning, and a text alone does not produce a definite meaning. Analysis of an individual text may produce the meaning potential of the text. When textual interactions within a particular social and cultural environment are tested, however, a fuller and more complex meaning of a text can be found. In other words, analysis can provide a more plausible meaning of a text when the text is read against other texts written in the same cultural and social environments (Lemke 1995a: 86-89; Lemke 1988: 32). As already noted, poststructuralists find meaning through the tripartite interaction between a text, other texts that the reader has read, and the reader’s cultural presuppositions. The intertextuality of the NT being proposed here, however, pays attention to the interactions among the target text, other contemporary texts, and the culture of a particular time as construed by social discourse.

Heteroglossia, in particular, can be an important method to find the meaning of a text in intertextuality (Porter 2017: 40). Though many texts may have a similar subject matter, each text will have a distinct voice depending on the social groups and individuals involved. If the same patterns and types of discourse are found in texts, then intertextual relations can be posited. Through investigating the different voices of each text, however, one may be able to spell out the meaning of the individual text in comparison with other texts. This is a significant concept for research into NT texts. NT writers were not isolated from their social and cultural background. Religious, social, and cultural backgrounds form the foundation for their utterances, and the original readers also understood the language of the text within their own situational, social, and cultural settings. Yet even though NT writers employed terms and content that were similar to those in the contemporary literature of the time, their writings may also contain distinct voices from other texts based on their unique social environment.

Conclusion

This essay proposes that intertextuality studies of the NT need to be redefined. Intertextuality is not equivalent to the study of the NT’s use of the OT, and NT scholars should be clear about the limitations of the notion of intertextuality as suggested by poststructuralists. With that said, the present study regards a text as a social semiotic. Culture has the highest meaning potential and is the highest meaning matrix. Each text is a product of social and cultural activity. Cultural and social aspects are encoded in text since the writer produces a text through the interactions of his/her cultural and social environment. Through intertextual studies, interpreters may find the meaning of a text because heteroglossic features exist in the same social discourse that has similar thematic formations. Therefore, the meaning of an individual text can be found when the text is tested against other texts that are in the same social discourse, containing the same discourse pattern and themes (Xue 2015: 42).

Abbreviation

BibInt

Biblical Interpretation

CBR

Currents in Biblical Research

ICC

International Critical Commentary

FAT

Forschungen zum Alten Testament

FRLANT

Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments

JBL

Journal of Biblical Literature

JGRChJ

Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism

JSNT

Journal for the Study of the New Testament

JSNTSup

Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplements

JSOT

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament

LBS

Linguistic Biblical Studies

LENT

Linguistic Exegesis of the New Testament

NIGTC

New International Greek Testament Commentary

NovTSup

Supplements to Novum Testamentum

NTM

New Testament Monographs

NTS

New Testament Studies

NTTS

New Testament Tools and Studies

SBLDS

Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series

SBLSymS

Society of Biblical Literature Symposium Series

SJOT

Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament

Trinity Journal

WUNT

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament

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Intertextuality and New Testament Studies

Abstract

Keywords

Intertextuality: Its Origin and Notion

Intertextuality in Biblical Studies

Intertextuality and the Use of the OT in the NT

Intertextuality and Historical-Critical Approaches

A Shift of the Current of Intertextuality

Intertextuality, Culture, and Semiotics

Intertextuality and Socio-Rhetorical Criticism

Evaluation of Poststructuralism’s Intertextuality

Evaluation of Biblical Studies’ Intertextuality

The Middle Ground: A Proposal of Intertextuality Theory

Conclusion

Abbreviation

References