Intertextuality in the New Testament
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 July 2023
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 July 2023
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195393361-0320
- LAST REVIEWED: 25 July 2023
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 July 2023
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195393361-0320
Introduction
Concepts of intertextuality explore the variety of relationships among texts. Intertextual approaches ask analytically how these textual relations work and hermeneutically how they might enable new readings of the connected texts. Properly understood, one can only speak of intertextuality when the interpretation yields extensions, shifts, or the solidification of meaning that could not be generated without exploring the text-to-text relationships. Thus, approaches to the reading and writing of texts that are sensitive to intertextuality are concerned with the decentralization of meaning by exploring ways that meaning can extend beyond more traditional categories such as authorial intention, the text itself, or even historical context. In the theoretical debate in the field of New Testament studies, there is little agreement regarding the validity of intertextual interpretation, let alone if it should be done, and if so with which methods. Some scholars refer to intertextual methods that are based on different types of semiotics, literary criticism, postcolonialism, and other theories of texts, media, and culture. Other biblical scholars, often ones less interested in inter- and transdisciplinary discussions, appeal to intertextuality as a strategy for limiting text-to-text-relations to the production of manageable hypotheses about meaning for the original authors. Intertextual interpretation from this perspective is not a method, but rather a pragmatic strategy or sensitive practice of reading. Most of the literature that engages intertextuality focuses on production-oriented approaches. These perspectives correlate texts only with other texts that the author demonstrably knew or plausibly could have known, and most of them search for intentional allusions or even unconscious echoes of imagined pretexts. Reception-oriented intertextuality investigates textual relationships attested at particular times and in particular places that were in fact produced by actual readers, or that could have been produced by hypothetical readers. Generative intertextuality, however, asks what effects text-to-text-relations have on meaning when these relations are independent of the production- or reception-oriented concerns. The criterion for generative intertextuality is whether interesting effects of meaning are produced by the intertextual connections among any texts in which scholars might be interested, regardless of the historical plausibility of these connections. Many today use the word “intertextuality” without reference to any theory, method, or practice of intertextuality. Those works that are not interested in the hermeneutics or semiotics of the “inter” of text-to-text-relations usually work with a version of the traditional historical-critical approach of Einflussforschung (influence research) or source criticism. Such approaches not only fail to reflect upon the perspective of the “inter,” they also ignore text-theoretical concepts of textuality. In other words, they do not actually work with inter-textuality. They focus instead on the restricted “in.” That is to say, they still work within the older, historical paradigm of examining one text in another text. They continue the program of searching for the material that authors used in order to identify authorial intent. Their sometimes inspiring proposed findings of allusions or echoes can be used and discussed by intertextual approaches as possible “intertextual dispositions” (Holthuis 1993, cited under Theories of Intertextuality Referred to by New Testament Scholars), but these source-in-a-text approaches should not use the word “intertextuality.” They more or less continue the hermeneutics of traditional source criticism with its correlated text-archeological interest in redaction criticism. Those crypto-source-criticism-approaches will largely be ignored in the following bibliography, which focuses instead on books and articles that are more or less based on intertextual theories that have in view the hermeneutical effects of text-to-text-relations that can run in both directions. Such studies are sensitive to the phenomenon of the “inter,” thereby opening new space for uncontrolled and unanticipated meaning effects that cannot be generated apart from reading one text together with other texts. “Text” here is restricted to written texts. The study of relations among other media like pictures, coins, or architecture is called intermediality. Intermedial studies demand special theories, methods, and practices and are not explored here.
Overviews
There are many different uses of the word “intertextuality,” many general theories of intertextuality, and some specific approaches to it in the fields of Old and New Testament studies. Anyone who wants to work competently in the field of intertextual studies has to know the most important general theories of intertextuality, the debates and controversies surrounding these theories, and the most important approaches being used in the field of biblical studies. The overviews that follow offer brief introductions to these matters.
Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on this page. Please subscribe or login.
How to Subscribe
Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here.
Article
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Nabataea and the Nabat...
- Aaron
- Acts of Peter
- Acts of the Apostles
- Adam and Eve
- Aelia Capitolina
- Afterlife and Immortality
- Agriculture
- Alexander the Great
- Alexandria
- Altered States of Consciousness in the Bible
- Ancient Christianity, Churches in
- Ancient Israel, Schools in
- Ancient Medicine
- Ancient Mesopotamia, Schools in
- Ancient Near Eastern Law
- Angels
- Anti-Semitism and the New Testament
- Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
- Apocryphal Acts
- Apostolic Fathers
- Aram
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Ammon and the Ammonite...
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Aram and the Arameans
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Judah and the Judeans ...
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Moab and the Moabites
- Archaeology and Material Culture of Phoenicia and the Phoe...
- Archaeology and Material Culture of the Kingdom of Israel ...
- Archaeology, Greco-Roman
- Art, Early Christian
- Asceticism
- Astrology and Astronomy
- Athaliah
- Atonement
- Augustus
- Babylon
- Baptism
- Barnabas, Epistle of
- Benefaction/Patronage
- Bible and Film
- Bible and Visual Art
- Bible, Exile, and Migration, The
- Biblical Criticism
- Biblical Studies, Cognitive Science Approaches in
- Caesarea Maritima
- Canaanites
- Canon, Biblical
- Ceramics
- Cherubim
- Child Metaphors in the New Testament
- Children in the Hebrew Bible
- Children in the New Testament World
- Christian Apocrypha
- Christology
- Chronicles, First and Second
- Cities of Refuge
- Clement, First
- Clement of Alexandria
- Clement, Second
- Clothing
- Colossians
- Conversation Analysis
- Conversion
- Corinthians, Second
- Cosmology, Near East
- Covenant
- Covenant, Ark of the
- Crucifixion
- Cyrus
- Daniel
- Daniel, Additions to
- David
- Death and Burial
- Deborah
- Demons
- Deuteronomistic History
- Deuteronomy
- Diaspora in the New Testament
- Didache
- Digital Humanities and the Bible
- Divination and Omens
- Domestic Architecture, Ancient Israel
- Early Christianity
- Early Christianity and Slavery
- Ecclesiastes/Qohelet
- Economics and Biblical Studies
- Edom
- Education, Greco-Roman
- Education in the Hebrew Bible
- Egyptian Book of the Dead
- Election in the Bible
- Elijah
- Elisha
- Enoch
- Ephesians
- Epistles, Catholic
- Epistolography (Ancient Letters)
- Eschatology of the New Testament
- Esther and Additions to Esther
- Ethics
- Evil Eye
- Exodus, Book of
- Exorcism
- Ezekiel
- Ezra-Nehemiah
- Faith in the New Testament
- Feminist Scholarship on the Old Testament
- Flora and Fauna of the Hebrew Bible
- Food and Food Production
- Friendship, Kinship and Enmity
- Funerary Rites and Practices, Greco-Roman
- Galatians
- Galilee
- Genesis, Book of
- Gentiles
- Gilgamesh
- Gnosticism
- God, Ancient Israel
- God, Greco-Roman
- God, Son of
- Gospels
- Gospels, Apocryphal
- Great, Herod the
- Greco-Roman Meals
- Greco-Roman World, Associations in the
- Greek Language
- Hagar
- Heaven
- Hebrew Bible, Biblical Law in the
- Hebrew Language
- Hebrews
- Hell
- Hellenistic and Roman Egypt
- Hermas, Shepherd of
- Historiography, Greco-Roman
- History of Ancient Israelite Religion
- Hittites
- Holy Spirit
- Honor and Shame
- Hosea, Book of
- Idol/Idolatry (HB/OT)
- Idol/Idolatry (New Testament)
- Imperial Cult and Early Christianity
- Infancy Gospel of Thomas
- Interpretation and Hermeneutics
- Intertextuality in the New Testament
- Isaiah
- Israel, History of
- James
- Jeremiah
- Jeroboam
- Jerusalem
- Jesus of Nazareth
- Jewish Christianity
- Jewish Festivals
- Jezebel
- Job
- Joel, Book of
- John, Gospel of
- John the Baptist
- Joshua
- Jubilees, Book of
- Judaism, Hellenistic
- Judaism, Rabbinic
- Judaism, Second Temple
- Judas, Gospel of
- Jude, Epistle of
- Judges, Book of
- Judith, Book of
- Kings, First and Second
- Kingship
- Lamentations
- Latino/a/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation
- Letters, Johannine
- Letters, Pauline
- Levi/Levittes
- Levirate Obligation in the Hebrew Bible
- Levitical Cities
- Leviticus
- LGBTIQ Hermeneutics
- Literacy, New Testament
- Literature, Apocalyptic
- Lord's Prayer
- Luke, Gospel of
- Maccabean Revolt
- Maccabees, First–Fourth
- Man, Son of
- Manasseh, King of Judah
- Manasseh, Tribe/Territory
- Mari
- Mark, Gospel of
- Martyrdom
- Mary
- Matthew, Gospel of
- Medieval Biblical Interpretation (Jewish)
- Mesopotamian Mythology and Genesis 1-11
- Messianism
- Metaphor in the New Testament
- Midian
- Midrash and Aggadah
- Minoritized Criticism of the New Testament
- Miracle Stories
- Modern Bible Translations
- Moses
- Music
- Mysticism in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity
- Myth in the Hebrew Bible
- Nahum, Book of
- Names of God in the Hebrew Bible
- New Testament and Early Christianity, Women, Gender, and S...
- New Testament, Feminist Scholarship on the
- New Testament, Men and Masculinity in the
- New Testament, Rhetoric of the
- New Testament, Social Sciences and the
- New Testament Studies, Emerging Approaches in
- New Testament, Textual Criticism of the
- New Testament Views of Torah
- Numbers, Book of
- Nuzi (Nuzi Tablets)
- Old Testament, Biblical Theology in the
- Old Testament, Social Sciences and the
- Orality and Literacy
- Otherness in the Hebrew Bible
- Pain and Suffering in the Hebrew Bible
- Parables
- Paraenesis
- Passion Narratives
- Pastorals
- Paul
- Pauline Chronology
- Paul's Opponents
- Pentateuch
- Performance Criticism
- Period, The "Persian"
- Peter
- Philemon
- Philippians
- Philistines
- Philo of Alexandria
- Piety/Godliness in Early Christianity and the Roman World
- Poetry, Hebrew
- Pontius Pilate
- Priestly/Holiness Codes
- Priest/Priesthood
- Prophets
- Proverbs
- Psalms
- Pseudepigraphy, Early Christian
- Pseudo-Clementines
- Q
- Qumran/Dead Sea Scrolls
- Race, Ethnicity and the Gospels
- Revelation (Apocalypse)
- Romans
- Ruth
- Sacrifice
- Samaria/Samaritans
- Samuel, First and Second
- Satan
- Scriptures
- Second Baruch
- Sects, Jewish
- Septuagint
- Sermon on the Mount
- Sexual Violence and the Hebrew Bible
- Sin (Hebrew Bible/Old Testament)
- Sirach
- Slavery
- Sojourner
- Solomon
- Solomon, Wisdom of
- Song of Songs
- Succession Narrative
- Synagogue
- Synoptic Problem
- Tales, Court
- Talmud
- Targum
- Temples and Sanctuaries
- Temples, Near Eastern
- Ten Commandments
- The Bible and the American Civil War
- The Bible and the Qur’an
- The Bible in China
- The English Bible: History and Translations
- the Hebrew Bible, Ancient Egypt and
- The New Testament and Creation Care
- Thessalonians
- Thomas, Gospel of
- Tobit
- Trauma and the Bible, Hermeneutics of
- Twelve Prophets, Book of the
- Ugarit
- Virtues and Vices: New Testament Ethical Exhortation in I...
- War, New Testament
- Wisdom
- Wisdom—Greek and Latin
- Women, Gender, and Sexuality in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testa...
- Worship in the New Testament and Earliest Christianity
- Worship, Old Testament
- Zadok
- Zechariah
- Zoology (Animals in the New Testament)