Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul

by Richard B. Hays

Publisher:

Yale University Press

, 1989

Overview

Paul’s letters, the earliest writings in the New Testament, are filled with allusions, images, and quotations from the Old Testament, or, as Paul called it, Scripture. In this book, Richard B. Hays investigates Paul’s appropriation of Scripture from a perspective based on recent literary-critical studies of intertextuality. His uncovering of scriptural echoes in Paul’s language enriches our appreciation of the complex literary texture of Paul’s letters and offers new insights into his message.

Key Features

• Examines Paul’s use of Old Testament quotations and allusions
• Applies an intertextual approach to the study of Paul’s letters
• Explores the role of the church as an interpretive community

Contents

• The Puzzle of Pauline Hermeneutics
• Intertextual Echo in Romans
• Children of Promise
• A Letter from Christ
• “The World is Near You”: Hermeneutics in the Eschatological Community

Top Highlights

“(6) History of Interpretation. Have other readers, both critical and precritical, heard the same echoes?” (Page 31)

“(1) Availability. Was the proposed source of the echo available to the author and/or original readers?” (Page 29)

“(3) Recurrence. How often does Paul elsewhere cite or allude to the same scriptural passage?” (Page 30)

“there are eighty-nine Old Testament quotations in the Pauline letters, fifty-one of which occur in Romans.” (Page 34)

“Paul repeatedly interprets Scripture in ways that must have startled his first audience.” (Page 1)

Endorsements

A major work on hermeneutics. . . . Hays’s study will be a work to use and to reckon with for every Pauline scholar and for every student of Paul’s use of Old Testament traditions. It is sophisticated, in both a literary and theological sense, and written with considerable wit and confidence.

—Carol L. Stockenhausen, Journal of Biblical Literature

Hays has without doubt posed the right question at the right time within the horizon of a particularly important problematic. . . . A new beginning for the question concerning the reception of the Old Testament in the New.

—Hans Hübner, Theologische Literaturzeitung

A powerful reading. . . . [Hays’s] careful and fresh exegesis . . . challenges not a few traditional or highly regarded readings. . . . A major contribution both to Pauline studies and to our understanding of earliest Christian theology as a living dialogue with the scriptures of Israel.

—James D. G. Dunn, forthcoming in Literature and Theology

A fresh interpretation of Paul’s references to the Jewish Scriptures. . . . Written in a lively, semipopular style, this important study succeeds in showing that Paul’s scriptural quotations and allusions are often more ’polyphonic’ and rhetorically meaningful than traditional exegesis has allowed.

—David M. Hay, Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology

Product Details

• Title: Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul
• Author: Richard B. Hays
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Print Publication Date: 1989
• Logos Release Date: 2019
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Subjects: Bible. N.T. Epistles of Paul › Relation to the Old Testament; Bible. O.T. › Quotations in the New Testament; Bible. N.T. Epistles of Paul › Criticism, interpretation, etc
• ISBNs: 9780300054293, 0300054297
• Resource ID: LLS:CHSSCRPTRLTTRPL
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-29T22:43:34Z

About Richard B. Hays

Richard B. Hays (born May 4, 1948) is Dean and George Washington Ivey Professor of New Testament at Duke Divinity School in Durham, North Carolina. His service as dean is for an intentional interim period while a national search is conducted. Hays received his B. A in English literature from Yale College and Master of Divinity from Yale Divinity School, and a Ph. D from Emory University.