Communities of faith as texts in the process of biblical interpretation '

In this article the author illustrates that the relationship between the Bible and the Church could also be described from the post-modern perspective o f intertextuality. He argues that communities o f faith are texts in an allencompassing network of textuality. However, these texts, as all other texts, are involved in clusters of related texts that show an affinity with one another. Within these clusters the related texts become more prominent and significant than texts “further away” in the network o f textuality. He uses this view to argue that the Church, along with the Synagogue, has a special responsibility in the process of interpretation of the written biblical texts. He also argues that all the approaches that biblical scholars have utilized through the ages, when viewed as different perspectives on the network of textuality, could assist in our reading of communities of faith as texts.


INTRODUCTION
In recent years renewed attention has been given to the relationship between the Bible and the Church, that is, the Christian communities of faith.A num ber o f publications2 in the recent past show that there is a growing concern that the Bible has lost its voice for communities o f faith, and that it has to be reclaimed.The points o f view expressed in these pub lications are, o f course, differently motivated.W ithout elaborating on each o f the following, and without attempting to be exhaustive, the following divergent convictions can be mentioned: 1.1 W riters with fundamentalist convictions want to liberate the Bible from the so-called tyranny o f historical enquiry which dissects the Bible and destroys it as a document o f faith.They want to guard the Bible as the inerrant, authoritative W ord o f God3.
1.2 Some w riters from mainstream churches, without confessing to fun damentalist principles, express their concern about, what they would call, the degrading o f the doctrines on the authority and inspiration o f Scripture when the human dimensions o f the Bible are emphasized4.
1.3 Other publications react against an overly-analytical approach to bib lical criticism.In many o f these publications it is historical criticism, in particular, that is scrutinized critically.It is not historical criticism as such that is criticized, but the so-called insufficiency o f this approach to promote theological interpretation.Criticism is also directed at many historicalcritical studies which devote all their attention to Literarkritik and Form kritik (the analytical methods) without paying attention to Redaktionskritik (the synthetical method)5.
1.4 Still other publications pay renewed attention to the relationship between the Bible and the Church from the point of departure that the role of the reader has to be appreciated.Since scholars have realized that read ing is a creative process in which the reader contributes to the process of interpretation from a certain perspective, the focus o f attention has shifted to the communities of faith as readers o f the Bible.
1.5 Some scholars express their appreciation o f the interpretations of marginalized and ordinary readers6.They emphasize the fact that biblical interpretation is not only the enterprise o f a privileged, academic guild of scholars, but also the prerogative o f ordinary and marginalized people of faith.Some even say that we have the ethical obligation to side with marginalized and ordinary readers to learn from them7.
1.6 In certain contexts the democratization and popularization of academic studies also play an important role in the revival o f the discussion on the relationship between the Bible and communities o f faith.Scholars are increasingly realizing that biblical studies and exegesis cannot be prac tised in an ivory tow er8.1.7 Still others are interested in the relationship between the Bible and communities o f faith, because they appreciate and they want to celebrate a plurality o f interpretations.These people are normally committed to the post-modern notion that texts do not bear only one, fixed meaning, but that a plurality o f meanings is created when texts are read in different con texts9.
Closely associated with the last-mentioned conviction, namely that o f post modernism, some scholars have recently introduced the notion o f inter-textuality as a possible mode o f description of the relationship between the Bible and communities o f faith10.These scholars are in favour o f rethink ing this relationship from the post-modern perspective that communities of faith are part o f the intertextual network in which biblical texts operate.I associate m yself closely with this perspective, and I will try to elaborate on some aspects o f this view in the present article.

INTERTEXTUALITY: A PLURALITY OF VIEWS
W ithout repeating in full everything that has been said about intertextuality elsewhere11, and without elaborating on Bakhtin's and K risteva's work here, I will firstly deal with different views on textuality in this section.Thereafter, I will clarify which view o f intertextuality I will apply in this article.D egenaar12 has provided a useful summary o f different views on lan guage, text, textuality and intertextuality.I will here concentrate on his categorization o f the different views on text.He mentions seven pos sibilities:

2.1
The first view refers to the etymology of the word "text" .The Latin word texere means "to weave" .The word text would then entail the weav ing of w ords13.According to this view a text is then the interweaving o f signs, a web o f relationships between signs which stand in need o f inter pretation.
2.2 From a psychological perspective a text is regarded as a document that informs the reader about the state o f mind o f the author.According to this view the intention o f the author becomes the final source o f authority regarding the meaning o f signs in the text.
2.3 Structuralism regards the text as an autonomous whole, a self enclosed structure o f meaning.The authority for the meaning is inherent in the text itself.
2.4 Structuralism can also function in a different way by viewing the text as a manifestation o f a depth structure which constitutes the authority for the meaning.
2.5 Semiotics emphasizes the role o f the reader, and holds the view that meaning is manifested in the act o f reading the signs o f a text.The rela tionship between the text and the perform ance o f the act o f reading con stitutes the authority for the meaning.

2.6
In terms o f a deconstructive reading, a text is an intertextual event14.Two views could, however, be distinguished here, a narrow er and a broader one.According to the narrow er view intertextuality refers to the interrelationships between texts in the normal sense o f the word, text as referring to the interweaving o f signs in a book, article or poem.Inter textuality is then concerned about the way in which a text refers to other texts15, and how these texts relate to one another16.According to the broader view intertextuality refers to the interrelationships between texts in the abnormal sense of the word text as referring to any object of understanding.It includes the textuality o f all things -"A text becomes an episode in an all-enclosing textuality" 17.

2.7
From a political perspective the text is regarded as a site o f strug gle18 -"By viewing society and history as texts one becomes conscious o f the relationships of power between signs which reverberate through all texts, also literary texts.The understanding of meaning is not a neutral affair, but an involvement in a struggle in which choices have been made and are to be m ade" 19.
In my description of the relationship between the Bible and com munities of faith I want to link up with the broader deconstructionist view on textuality, as well as with the political view o f the text as a site o f strug gle -"Since the term text is not limited to written texts, the term intertext enables one to bring into play appropriate signs taken from different areas o f human experience.These signs come into play, not as external factors, but as part o f textuality which enriches the meaning of the written text"20.
This broader notion of textuality therefore allows one to propose that communities o f faith can be regarded as texts in the process o f biblical interpretation.Communities of faith are part of the intertextual network of relationships in which biblical texts are involved.However, when dealing with religious texts as part of culture, one can also regard these texts as sites of struggle.How communities o f faith as texts are involved in this struggle will be elaborated on in a later section.

COMMUNITIES OF FAITH AND WRITTEN RELIGIOUS TEXTS
What role do biblical texts play within different communities o f faith?And what influence do different communities o f faith have on the meaning of biblical texts?These questions already suggest that the relationship between communities o f faith and biblical texts should be regarded as reciprocal.On the one hand do communities of faith orientate themselves according to biblical texts.They also understand themselves in the light of these texts; they find their identity formulated by these texts.On the other hand, different communities of faith also contribute to the understanding of these biblical texts.Because o f the above-mentioned creative role of the reader, one should also recognize that communities o f faith shape these texts "according to their image" .That means that communities of faith, as ideologically biased readers, bring along a tradition of interpretation, certain convictions, norms and values, etc. when they engage in reading biblical texts.The reciprocal relationship between biblical texts and com munities o f faith thus entails: (i) that the written religious texts have an identity-shaping and life-orientating effect on the communities o f faith; and (ii) that the communities of faith have a meaning-shaping effect on the w rit ten religious texts.
However, one should not view this reciprocal relationship only from a synchronical perspective, that is, a description of the contemporary inter action between biblical texts and communities o f faith.This relationship can also be described from a diachronical perspective.Through the ages this relationship has existed on different levels.This relationship is manifested not only on the level o f textual reception, but also on the level of textual production.Communities o f faith, within the political and cultural world o f their time, formulated their religious experiences into ini tially oral, and later written, texts.These texts exercised an influence in the ever-new attempts at reinterpreting old texts and producing new texts.Textual interpretation or reception triggered renewed textual production.As soon as these texts gained authoritative status among the communities o f faith, they became the expression o f religious identity, as well as an identity-forming force for later generations.In post-modern language one could say that all texts (written or otherwise) carry traces o f other texts (written or otherwise).All these texts exhibit a dialogic character -they are in constant dialogue with other earlier and contemporary texts.All these texts are intersections o f other textual surfaces.
The reciprocal processes o f textual production and textual reception in ancient and contem porary contexts tend to obliterate the boundaries between these processes.Textual production becomes textual reception, and vice versa.The boundaries between texts and their interpretations become irrelevant.Even the boundaries between what is inside a text, and what is outside, start to vanish.It is on this point that we can utilize the post-modern language o f intertextuality.biblical texts and the communities of faith that produce and interpret them become part o f an allencompassing textuality -part o f an intertextual network o f relationships that span not only contemporary reality, but also the ages.

THE STATUS OF COMMUNITIES OF FAITH AS TEXTS
The important questions, o f course, are now: " What is the status o f com munities o f faith as texts in this intertextual network of textuality?Do com munities o f faith have any privileged position within the network o f tex tuality in which biblical texts are involved?" .
In term s o f a purely deconstructionist view o f intertextuality, one would say that no text has any privilege over against other texts.All texts are equal.As Miscall21 puts it: " ...textual authority and status are always in question since texts are interdependent and use each other.No text is an island" .This would mean that communities o f faith would have no privileged position with regards to the written biblical texts over against any other text in the all-encompassing network of textuality.The interac tion between communities of faith and their written religious texts would be on a par with any other community's interaction with these texts, or other texts.What is important are not the participating texts, but their interrelationship, their intertextuality.
At this point I would like to agree with Beal22, Nielsen23, Van Wolde24 and others that such a view would make reading impossible.As Beal25 puts it: " ...n o intertextual reading can choose the 'general text'everything, all at once, everywhere -as its object o f interpretation" .O r as the often-quoted Fish26 has indicated: " ...w hile relativism is a position one can entertain, it is not a position one can occupy.No one can be a relativist, because no one can achieve the distance from his (sic!) own beliefs and assumptions which would result in their being no more author itative for him (sic!) than the beliefs and assumptions held by others..." (his italics).According to Fish, understanding always takes place con textually.Although there is a plurality o f meanings, the beliefs and assumptions of the reader/hearer determine which one o f these meanings becomes prominent27.However, these beliefs and assumptions " are not individual-specific or idiosyncratic, but communal and conventional"28.Fish therefore introduces the now well-known notion o f interpretive com munities.
If these qualifications of intertextuality by Beal, Fish and others are true, it then follows that a certain degree o f framing, or matrixing (as Voelz29 calls it), is inevitable in intertextual interpretation (over-against intertextual theory).To quote from Beal30 again: "For the practice of inter textual reading, however, as opposed to theories of intertextuality, one must have such lines of delimitation, no matter how arbitrarily they may be set, and no matter how quickly they may be transgressed....the practice of intertextual reading must find its place somewhere between the closed structure of a single text (however defined) and the uncontainably surplussive fabric o f language (called intertextuality)" .
How is this matrixing, or framing, done?And what status do com munities of faith have in this process of delimitation?Although one could, as Beal, Fish, Nielsen and others do, refer to the beliefs, values, assump tions, etc. o f the interpretive community, such a view would locate the decision-making authority solely within the text of the communities of faith.I do not want to deny that the interpretive interests of a community of faith do play an important role in this process.However, I would rather like to focus not on the interpretive communities alone, but on the interac tion between texts within the intertextual network.
I would like to suggest that, although one cannot deny the allencompassing nature of the network of intertextuality, one can detect certain clusters of related texts in this network31.All texts are equal, but all texts do not have an affinity for each and every other text.This does not mean that each and every other text does not influence the intertextual rela tionships.This does also not mean that the intertextual network becomes stable and solid again.To use a metaphor from astronomy: although there are an unknown number o f heavenly bodies that constantly influence one another, and that are because o f this influence in constant motion, there is also a solar system such as ours.Within the all-encompassing universe there are clusters o f related bodies that we call solar systems.
This metaphor tries to explain that one should not shy away from acknowledging that within the all-encompassing network o f textuality, communities of faith do relate more closely to religious texts as express ions of faith than they do to other texts.Exactly because o f their inter textual interaction, they have a closer affinity with one another.There is nothing strange about this cluster o f related texts32.As Kort33 puts it: "Since all communities have language and practices, it can even be said that all languages and practices have their own 'communities' and that there is nothing strange or unusual about the peculiar words and actions of religious communities.Religious communities no longer need think of themselves as exceptional in this regard, since no one reads anything without being located somewhere" .
How are these clusters of related texts formed?In this regard I want to refer back to the political perspective on texts as sites o f struggle34.To quote D egenaar35 again: "By viewing society and history as texts one becomes conscious o f the relationships of power between signs which reverberate through all texts, also literary texts.The understanding of meaning is not a neutral affair, but an involvement in a struggle in which choices have been made and are to be m ade" .These choices are made in and through the clustering o f related texts.The choices are made in the dif ferent texts' struggle to be heard.With regard to communities of faith, these choices are made in the struggle for identity and meaningfulness within a world of other texts36.
O f course one should keep in mind that not all communities o f faith feel an affinity for all written religious texts.The Jewish community, for example, operates as text within the cluster o f texts of which the Hebrew Bible is a part.The Christian community partly operates within the same cluster of which the Hebrew Bible is a part, but this cluster already becomes transformed because of this community's affinity with another text, that of the New Testament.These cluster-forming processes as strug gles for identity and meaningfulness are of course not only something of the past, o f ancient times.These processes continue through the ages so that contem porary communities of faith are still part o f the same intertextual network.This point again illustrates how the boundaries between textual production (as a struggle for identity and meaningfulness) and tex tual reception (as a struggle for identity and meaningfulness) are obliterated.
After this lengthy discussion I would like to conclude this section by answering the question: "What is the status o f communities o f faith?"The status of communities o f faith should be understood within the clusters of related texts.For the interpretation o f the Hebrew Bible two communities o f faith certainly have a more prominent status, namely Judaism and Christianity37.Although these communities are not homogeneous, they share certain religious texts as expressions o f their identities and meaning fulness.This in itself emphasizes that these two communities o f faith as texts are also inevitably in a dialogic relationship.However, Christianity's understanding o f the Hebrew Bible takes place in an adapted cluster of texts, a cluster that also includes the New Testament.W ithin this cluster the Christian Church (in all its variety) has a special responsibility38 as the context within which the Bible as Old and New Testaments has to be inter preted39.The relationship between the Bible and the Church should thus be cultivated, because they are both texts within a certain cluster o f related texts.However, this relationship should also be cultivated with acknowl edgement o f the fact that this cluster of related texts in part overlap with another cluster of related texts, and that they are all part of an allencompassing network of textuality.Davies40 puts it as follows: "In a very obvious sense, the religious institutions and communities o f Judaism and Christianity have a claim on their bibles.This claim is valid within those communities, but to try and universalize it is to deny that these bibles should play any part in study of the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world, or of Western culture, whose domains include but also extend beyond church or synagogue"41.

READING COMMUNITIES OF FAITH AS TEXTS
A text as a set of signs is always in need of interpretation.This is, of course, also true of communities of faith as texts42.Communities o f faith as texts, as we have seen above, are intertextually woven into the network of textuality -within clusters of related texts, as well as within the allencompassing textuality.The reading o f communities o f faith as texts is therefore necessary for the intertextual understanding o f other related texts, such as the written biblical texts.
Through the ages various approaches to the reading o f written bibli cal texts have been developed.The modern approaches vary from the historical-critical approach that seeks to illuminate the origins, develop ment and transmission o f the written texts, to narrative and structuralist analyses that seek to "unlock" the presumed structures within the written texts themselves, and to reader-orientated approaches that seek to illumi nate the contexts in which the written texts are read.Drenched in the spirit o f modernism , biblical scholars have often regarded these approaches as means to obtain "objective" meaning, be it from the world behind the texts, the world o f the texts, or the world in front o f the text.Therefore, scholars often treat these approaches as rigid methods -often coupled with claims o f exclusivity.Within such a modernist perspective on these approaches, one would be tempted to regard only the reader-orientated approaches as suitable to investigate communities o f faith in their interac tion with the w ritten biblical texts.
H ow ever, when these approaches are regarded as various perspec tives, sometimes complementary and sometimes contradictory, on the allencompassing netw ork o f textuality, or even as still another set o f texts involved in this network, it becomes clear that all o f these approaches could also be used to read communities o f faith as texts.A historical-critical approach would then, for example, assist in determining the ten sions within a not at all homogeneous community of faith.It would also be able to assist in tracing the development o f the tradition(s) of interpretation in that particular community of faith.A structuralist-semiotic approach could assist in the description of the interrelationships within that com munity o f faith that determine the prevalent conventions on interpretation, as well as the value systems, beliefs and convictions.A narrative analysis could, for example, assist in determining the themes, characters, elements o f tension, etc. that constitute the "plot line" o f that particular community o f faith.
These approaches, when viewed in this way, then do not have the function of producing "objective truths" , but rather serve as different per spectives on the all-encompassing network of textuality, or better still, as participants in the intertextual interplay between, amongst other things, communities o f faith and the written biblical texts.

CONCLUSION
In this article I have attempted to illustrate that the relationship between the Bible and the Church could also be described from the post-modern per spective of intertextuality.I have argued that communities of faith are texts in an all-encompassing network o f textuality.However, these texts, as all other texts, are involved in clusters o f related texts that show an affinity with one another.W ithin these clusters the related texts become more prominent and significant than texts "further away" in the network o f tex tuality.I have used this view to argue that the Church, along with the Synagogue, has a special responsibility in the process o f interpretation of the written biblical texts.I have also argued that all the approaches that biblical scholars have utilized through the ages, when viewed as different perspectives on the network of textuality, could assist in our reading o f communities o f faith as texts.Cf, e g, M A Noll, Between faith and criticism.Evangelicals, scholarship, and the Bible in America, Grand Rapids, Michigan 1991.

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C f the Catholic statement "The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church" (1993).R P Carroll, "Cracks in the Soul of Theology", in J L Houlden (ed), The Interpretation o f the Bible in the Church, London 1995, 142-143 evaluates this document as follows: "It is deeply encouraging, on the one hand, to encounter an intelligent document emanating from the Vatican on the subject of the Bible which recognizes the integrity of the historical-critical approach to the Bible and which gives permission for the pious to use such methods by recom mending many of the most contemporary approaches to reading the Bible.On the other hand, it is somewhat discouraging to discover that these encouraging features are only surface deep.This is not a critical document which embraces a fully developed critique of the Bible, incorporating the lessons o f the Enlighten ment into a mature and reflective reading o f the Bible".
Braaten & Jenson, op cit, x also react against an overly-critical biblical criticism: "The historical-critical method was a gift to the church o f the Enlightenment....However, the marriage between scholarly criticism o f the Bible as a collection o f ancient documents and the church's belief in its divinely inspired message of salvation has ever since proved to be unstable.The methods o f critical reason have tended to take over the entire operation o f biblical inter pretation, marginalizing the faith o f the church and dissolving the unity o f the Bible as a whole into a multiplicity o f unrelated fragments.The academy has replaced the church as the home o f biblical interpretation".6 Cf, e g, the views expressed in Semeia 73 (1996).C f in this regard the film "Gabbeh", where carpet-weaving is used as a meta phor for text.14 C f J Derrida, "Living on: border lines" in H Bloom et al., Deconstruction and criticism, New York 1979, 84 who distinguishes between "text" ("a differential network, a fabric o f traces referring endlessly to something other than itself, to other differential traces") and "book" ("a self-enclosed sphere o f meaning").Van Wolde, Tijdschrift voor Theologie 30 (1990), 336ff distinguishes between intertextuality related to textual production, and intertextuality related to textual reception.17  , op cit, 1994, 44: "To use a metaphor we might say that a text is always part of an ongoing dialogue between older and younger texts.Our task as exegetes is therefore to try to trace this dialoguethis intertextuality -through history.We are not concerned with just any inter textuality, but with the intertextuality that comes out of the historical situation in which the text was written, used and re-used, and the historical situation in which I live as a scholar and as a person".24 Van Wolde, Tijdschrift voor Theologie 30 (1990), 341-342 criticizes views of textuality that either focus exclusively on the object (the written text), or that focus exclusively on the subject (the reader).25 Beal, op cit, 26.26 S Fish, Is there a text in this class?The authority o f interpretive communities, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1980, 319 27 C f Clines, biblical Interpretation 1/1 (1993), 78: "If we ask who it is that authorizes or legitimates an interpretation, who it is that says something may count as an interpretation and not be ruled out o f court, the answer can only be: some group, some community, some collective that is in the business of count ing and that holds court, ruling interpretations in o r out....W hat we call legitimacy in interpretation is really a matter o f whether an interpretation can win approval by some community or other" .28 "Often signs (events/ideas) are matrixed, i e, connected with other signs or sets o f signs for interpretation with other events or ideas in some sort of a context".32 Voelz, op cit, 1989, 32 argues as follows: "It seems also true to conclude that several types o f sign sets or texts are particularly important in/for the interpre tive task.That is to say, when a given matrix of signs is interpreted, certain types of (component) signs/sign sets/texts provide 'anchors', as it were, for the interpretation of all other signs within that given matrix... all signs are 'not created equal', ...som e seem to be more important and more dominating than others -they are interpretive 'keys', as it were -and it directs our attention to which signs/sign sets o f a given matrix serve as judge, so that their meaning is determinative for the meaning of the complex of signs under consideration as a whole" (his italics).C f also Voelz's, Semeia 69 (1995) "The essay ...w ill contend that a 'confessional' understanding o f the interpretive task is not only desirable but inevitable and necessary, and that not only in a Christian context" .38 C f K Nielsen, op cit, 1998 who concludes her paper with a section on "Responsible Exegesis Today".39 Cf Clines, biblical Interpretation 1/1 (1993), 77: "I have to admit, of course, that, even though the church does not 'own' the Bible, biblical research would probably not exist -certainly not in the form or to the degree that it does at pre sent -if it were not for the church.And I allow that there is, whether we like it or not ...a symbiotic relationship between the academic study o f the Bible and the religious communities who esteem the Bible.But it is an uneasy relation ship.The academics want to resist the church's agenda, and the church wants to resist the academy's conclusions" .40 Davies, op cit, 13.

41
C f also the following quotations from Davies, op cit, 14: "Just as there is a need to articulate the role and meaning o f the scriptures in the context of Judaism and Christianity, so there is no realistic hope o f imposing an ecclesial interpretation outside the ecclesial domain....T he discourse o f the church about its scriptures, then belongs within the church domain, and cannot be extended beyond it ...w hile the right to a 'confessional' discourse about the scriptures must be upheld, it cannot claim a jurisdiction over how bibles are to be defined and read outside its own bounds" .42 C f G Green, "The Hermeneutic Imperative: Reading the Bible as scripture", Nederlands Theologisch Tijdschrift 50 (1996), 29: "When one endeavours to view reality through the lenses of scripture, ...not only the biblical text but all events become deutungsbediiiftig -in need of interpretation....If the meaning o f the text is always open-ended, it follows that there can be no escape from interpretation".
of this article was read as a paper on 4 August 1998 at the XVIth Congress o f the I.O .S.O .T. in Oslo, Norway. 2 Cf, amongst others, the following: J D Smart, The strange silence o f the Bible in the church.A study in hermeneutics, Philadelphia 1970; P A Bird, The Bible as the church's book, Philadelphia 1982; C E Braaten & R W Jenson (eds), Reclaiming the Bible fo r the church, Grand Rapids, Michigan 1995; P R Davies, Whose Bible is it anyway?JSOT Suppl.204, Sheffield 1995; the Catholic statement "The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church" of 1993.J L Houlden (ed), The Interpretation o f the Bible in the Church, London 1995 and L Ruppert & H-J Klauck (eds), Die Interpretation der Bibel in der Kirche, Stuttgart 1995 contain discussions and evaluations o f this document.3 Cf, e g, H Vander Goot, Interpreting the Bible in theology and the church.New York 1984.4 7 C f particularly the various publications o f G O West: biblical hermeneutics o f liberation: Modes o f reading the Bible in the South African context, Pietermaritzburg, 1991; "The relationship between different modes o f reading (the Bible) and the ordinary reader" , Scriptura S9 (1991), 87-110; "Some para meters o f the hermeneutic debate in the South African context", Journal o f Theology fo r Southern Africa 80 (1992), 3-13; "No integrity without contextuality: The presence o f particularity in biblical hermeneutics and pedagogy", Scriptura SI 1 (1993), 131-146.8 C f my own contributions to this end: L C Jonker, " Bridging the gap between 'professional' exegetes and Bible readers", Old Testament Essays 10/1 (1997), 69-83; and L C Jonker, J Botha & E M Conradie, Die Bybel in fokus.Leesgids vir 'n nuwe tyd.Cape Town 1997.9 Cf, e g, D J A Clines, "Possibilities and priorities o f biblical interpretation in an international perspective", biblical Interpretation 1/1 (1993), 67-87; Davies, op cit; and W A Kort, "Take, Read".Scripture, textuality, and cultural practice University Park, 1996.ISSN 0257-8891 = SKRIF EN KERK Jrg 20(1) 1999 10 C f in particular K Nielsen "A mainline Protestant view" in H S Wilson (ed), Christian fundamentalism today, Geneva 1994, 40-52; and Kort, op cit.
15 Cf, e g, Carroll's discussion o f Jeremiah: R P Carroll, "Intertextuality and the Book o f Jeremiah: Animadversions on Text and Theory" in J C Exum, & D J A Clines (eds), The new literary criticism and the Hebrew Bible, JSOT Suppl.143, Sheffield 1993.The treatment o f the book of Ruth by K Nielsen, "Intertextuality and Hebrew Bible", Paper read at the XVIth Congress o f the I.O .S.O .T. in Oslo, Norway 1998 also falls in this narrower category.16 Degenaar, op cit, 1. 18 C f H Bloom, The Anxiety o f Influence: A Theory o f Poetry, New York 1973; and H Bloom, A Map o f Misreading, New York 1975.T K Beal, "Ideology and Intertextuality: Surplus o f Meaning and Controlling the Means of Production" in D N Fewell (ed), Reading between texts.Inter textuality and the Hebrew Bible, Louisville, Kentucky 1992, 27-39.23 C f the following statement of Nielsen

Fish
cit, 1989 and Voelz, Semeia 69 (1995).30 Beal, op cit, 28.31This view more or less corresponds to the views ofVoelz, op cit, 1989, 30-31: , 160-161 section on "Validity of Interpretation and the Community" in his article on intertextuality.33 Kort, op cit, 121.34 Miscall, Semeia 69 (1995), 45-46 refers to Bloom's theory about texts: " ...a theory that speaks not of easy borrowings and smooth influences, but o f the anxiety of influence, o f the burdensome feeling o f belatedness (of coming too ISSN 0257-8891 = SKRIF EN KERK Jrg 20(1) 1999 late on the scene) and o f the conflict with a precursor....F o r Bloom, writing and reading, which are two sides of the same coin, are dominated not by estab lishing meaning and truth but by confrontation with another.In the confronta tion power and possession are sought; . . ." 35 Degenaar, op cit, 9. 36 Cf T K Beal, op cit, 32: "If ideology is a strategy of containment, then the interpretive rules in biblical studies, which establish closure ...o n the general text and legitimize certain intertextual relationships, are certainly ideological.They are, so to speak, modes o f production for making sense from a surplus of intertextual possibilities" .37 Voelz, Semeia 69 (1995), 149, in a summary of what his article is about, states: