Methodology in the Use of the Old Testament in the New

This collection of essays is published on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Annual Hawarden Seminar, celebrating four decades of scholarship on the use of the Old Testament in the New (OT/NT). Special focus is placed on matters with which the seminar has recently grappled concerning methodological approaches in OT/NT discourse. The essays are contributed by seminar members engaging with the topic, and the volume is presented in four thematic sections: methodological insights from outside the NT, the role of OT context, the role of criteria, and responses.The first section opens with an interdisciplinary discussion from research in Hebrew Bible (HB), ancient Jewish literature, OT intertextuality, and ancient media culture. To begin, Susan Docherty provides an overview of research on OT inner-biblical allusions by surveying the contributions of Michael Fishbane, who demonstrated a fundamental continuity between the interpretive techniques of the HB and later forms of Jewish scriptural exposition. Docherty does not suggest a direct equivalence between the reuse of traditions in the HB and the interpretation of Scripture in the NT but rather argues that the methodological tools applied in the former may be relevant for OT/NT studies. In the second chapter, Bill Tooman reviews recent scholarship on inner-biblical exegesis. He begins by recognizing the growing scholarly acceptance that much of the HB was in the process of being written, revised, and edited in the Hellenistic period. As a result, Tooman stresses the importance of Second Temple literature for understanding early Jewish exegesis and highlights several significant developments including the phenomenon of “reverse assimilation,” in which younger texts affect the redaction of older texts, the amalgamation of diverse material, and the function of polysemy. Each of these features, according to Tooman, is more characteristic of the HB than previously assumed. Next, Katherine Dell discusses intertextuality and genre by focusing on scriptural reuse of OT wisdom literature. While intertextuality has the advantage of focusing on the text in its final form, Dell suggests that a genre-based approach can also function well in identifying more allusive forms of intertexts. She goes on to examine links between wisdom texts and Psalms and Job before turning to Jesus’s sayings, noting the potentiality of both methods. In ch. four, Catrin Williams addresses a second area of interdisciplinary discussion. Though OT/NT research has been primarily focused on written texts, Williams discusses insights gained from ancient media culture. She observes the symbiotic relationship between orality and textuality, attested by representations of “oral-textual interplay” in numerous references to scriptural speech and the fact that texts were commonly delivered orally and received aurally. Additionally, though at an early stage in OT/NT studies, Williams indicates that the use of social memory as an analytical category broadens our understanding of scriptural references in the NT beyond that of quotations, allusions, or echoes to include “instances of early Christian collective memory.”The second section of the volume addresses the ongoing debate concerning the role of OT context. In ch. five, Arthur Keefer examines definitional matters surrounding the term context. He points out the “semantic variation” of the term, which can be assumed to refer to “a dozen verses, a group of texts, the entire OT canon, a theological concept, or a single theme” (p. 83). He goes on to evaluate the impact of this variation in the methodologies of representative scholars by illustrating instances of conflicting assessments in three case studies (Hab 2:4 in Rom 1:17; Hos 11:1 in Matt 2:15; Exod 3:6 in Luke 20:37). Keefer concludes that scholars must attend to these semantic variations for a more robust OT/NT methodology. Next, Beate Kowalski examines the notion of context as it relates to allusions. She argues against the use of atomistic or “selective” allusions by NT writers. Even a single word or phrase, according to Kowalski, evokes the entire literary and historical context (the specific segment of the text of the entire biblical writing) of the pretext. She offers two case studies to illustrate her point: Ruth and the prodigal son and Exodus in Revelation. The final two essays in this section offer insights from Philo and the Dead Sea Scrolls, respectively. Kenneth Schenck surveys Philo’s hermeneutical approach in relation to the use of context and concludes that, though Philo frequently attended to the immediate literary context in his reading of the Jewish Scriptures, his eye for detail typically resulted in figural rather than contextual interpretations. Benjamin Wold examines the contextual awareness of Qumran interpreters by extending the analysis of Joseph Fitzmyer to include both Yaḥad texts and “previously unknown” non-Yaḥad material (namely, Cave 4 maunscripts). Wold, unlike Kowalski, focuses on explicit quotations and concludes that “context” is typically accommodated or adapted to the needs or theology of the Qumran community with little concern for the literary/historical setting.The third section examines the role of criteria in detecting allusions and echoes. In ch. nine, David Allen calls for a reevaluation of Richard Hays’s criteria for detecting allusions, published 30 years ago in his seminal work, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul. Though Allen surveys recent criticisms of Hays’s criteria, he points out that they are still considered the most standard basis for identifying allusions. He contends that a more thorough assessment of the role of criteria is required and suggests the need “to offer a different lens to the allusion discourse” (p. 141). He points to Tom Thatcher’s use of social memory theory as a possible way forward. Next, Steve Smith proposes a cognitive linguistic approach for detecting allusions and echoes by employing relevance theory (RT). RT, according to Smith, addresses the subjectivity of the process of identification by providing a set of guides for interpretation: the presence of a textual signal, the echoic strength of the intertext, the accessibility of the OT text, and the role of interpretive benefit. Smith suggests not that RT provides an alternative set of criteria but that “it does permit the scholar to identify whether an allusion was likely to be part of the author’s communicative intent” (p. 154).The final section is comprised of two self-standing essays offering a reappraisal of current approaches and some concluding reflections. Rikk Watts presents a wide-ranging proposal that contends for the NT authors’ view of Israel’s Scriptures as the proper starting point for OT/NT methodology. Drawing on R. G. Collingwood’s notion of “historical re-imagination,” Watts argues, “Given the historical and contextual priority of the Scriptures, it makes better sense methodologically to begin, not with the NT use of the OT, but with Israel’s Scriptures normative shaping of the NT” (p. 165). From this vantage point, Watts believes that scholars can attend to the personal nature of Scripture more closely by accounting for both “the assumptions of that scriptural world . . . and the first-century horizons of the NT’s essentially Jewish authors” (p. 173). In the concluding essay, Steve Moyise offers a few reflections on the progress of OT/NT discourse in each of the three main sections. He does not interact with each chapter in detail but rather draws out emerging themes and issues. For instance, he highlights Michelle Fletcher’s recent monograph Reading Revelation as Pastiche as an example of current research grappling with questions of context and criteria. Moyise concludes by stating that the volume demonstrates that “many traditional questions are being rethought, as well new avenues of research opening up” (p. 186).The volume situates OT/NT discourse from key points of departure up to current lines of research. Moyise points out that the current state of OT/NT discourse stands at the intersection between thorough reassessment of previous methods and the early stages of new avenues of research, particularly from interdisciplinary areas such as ancient media culture and cognitive linguistics. Additionally, the contributions of Docherty and Tooman address a deficit in the subdiscipline by engaging with HB scholarship, as OT/NT discourse has tended to be situated within the purview of NT scholarship. Watts’s contribution also touches on other emerging avenues of research including “prosopological” exegesis. With a focus on methodology, however, the volume does not address issues concerning textual form. Nevertheless, though not an introductory volume, the collection of essays provides an essential point of entry for scholars working in the subdiscipline of OT/NT studies

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