Intertextual Echoes in Paul’s Letters: Methodology and Theological Significance
Abstract
This article investigates how the Apostle Paul’s letters deploy language, images, and narrative patterns from Israel’s Scriptures and how those intertextual signals carry theological freight in his argumentation. Because Paul writes as a Scripture-saturated Jewish theologian addressing mixed congregations, his prose regularly evokes the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings in ways that do not always rise to the level of explicit quotation yet nonetheless guide readers to larger textual horizons. Following Richard B. Hays’s now classic program for weighing echoes—availability, volume, recurrence, thematic coherence, historical plausibility, history of interpretation, and interpretive “satisfaction”—the study refines a working method for distinguishing genuine intertextual phenomena from coincidence and then applies that method across four sustained case studies: Romans 5–8, 1 Corinthians 10, Galatians 3–4, and Philippians 2:6–11 (Hays 1989, 29–33; Beetham 2008, 16–22; Beale 2012, 39–61). These texts collectively display how Paul reads Israel’s story in a way that centers on the Messiah and that yields claims about human plight and rescue, the nature of the people of God, and the eschatological arrival of promised life in the Spirit.
Methodologically, the article argues that intertextual identification and interpretation require both literary attentiveness and historical restraint. Echoes must be demonstrated by converging indicators rather than proposed on the basis of isolated lexical overlap or creative ingenuity. Theologically, it argues that Paul’s intertextual practice is not mere ornament; it is the engine of his reasoning. In Romans, Exodus imagery frames Christian initiation and Spirit-led sonship; in 1 Corinthians, the wilderness becomes a mirror that disciplines Gentile churches; in Galatians, Abraham and Deuteronomy govern the logic of blessing, curse, and promise; and in Philippians, the Isaianic confession of universal allegiance to Israel’s God is placed on the lips of the church as it acclaims Jesus as Lord (Wright 1991; Fee 2014; Longenecker 1990; Bauckham 2008).
The concluding synthesis proposes that Paul models a coherent way of reading Scripture: figural, christologically ordered, ecclesially located, and eschatologically framed. That pattern neither erases original contexts nor sidelines the communal process of reception; instead it reads earlier texts within the wider canon under the claim that the Messiah’s death and resurrection disclose Scripture’s goal. On this view, to track echoes responsibly is to learn not only what Paul teaches but how he expects assemblies to hear the older texts as God’s address in the present (Hays 2005; Watson 2016; Vanhoozer 1998).
Introduction
Intertextuality names the way texts derive and generate meaning in relation to other texts. Within biblical studies the term is contested, ranging from post-structuralist frameworks in which textual relations proliferate without authorial control to historically oriented accounts that attend to compositional strategies and reception. The present study takes a middle path. By “intertextuality” I refer to patterned engagements with earlier Scripture that can be shown to be literarily signaled and historically plausible and that are best explained as the writer’s reuse of Israel’s sacred writings in service of his current aims (Moyise 2010, 6–13; Beale 2012, 40–46). This definition allows us to honor the rhetorical craft of the New Testament authors while also respecting the constraints under which they and their audiences operated. It is neither a license for free association nor a denial that readers beyond the author’s horizon play a role in recognizing and extending textual connections.
A basic taxonomy clarifies the field. A “quotation” is a formally marked reproduction of prior Scripture, often flagged by formulae such as “as it is written” or “the Scripture says” and accompanied by lexical overlap at more than one point in a clause or phrase. An “allusion” is a deliberate but less overt reference to a source, still intended to be recognized by competent hearers. An “echo,” finally, is subtler still. It may involve a single lexical item that stands out in a given context (“seed,” “rock,” “type”) or a syntactic pattern that evokes a known scriptural line, or even a narrative configuration that aligns the present argument with an earlier episode. Echoes are not established by mere similarity but by the convergence of markers within a passage and across a letter, together with the interpretive payoff that comes when the proposed source context is allowed to sound in the background (Hays 1989, 29–33; Beetham 2008, 16–22).
Paul’s letters are densely intertextual because he was at home in Israel’s Scriptures and because he addressed assemblies whose identity he derived from Israel’s story. Paul was educated “at the feet of Gamaliel” and could describe himself as a Pharisee zealous for the law (Acts 22:3; 23:6; Phil 3:4–6). Such claims, coupled with the sheer volume of explicit citations in his letters, indicate both knowledge and habit: Paul argues by revoicing Scripture. He does not build his theology beside Israel’s canon but through it, and he expects his hearers to learn to inhabit that canon as their family narrative (Dunn 1998, 33–58; Longenecker 1999, 19–44). The structure of his pastoral reasoning relies on this shared scriptural world. When he confronts idolatry, he tells the wilderness story; when he teaches about belonging, he turns to Abraham; when he explicates the Messiah’s status, he cites or echoes Isaiah; when he describes life in the Spirit, he borrows the exodus itinerary and the new covenant promises.
For that reason, the central claim of this article is straightforward. To read Paul well requires learning to detect and weigh scriptural echoes and then asking how those echoes carry the load of his argument. Detection without theological analysis misses the point; theological claims without attention to the intertext risk detaching Paul from his sources. The study thus proceeds with a double focus: a method for identification and a thick account of function. The method is drawn in the first instance from Hays’s seven criteria, together with clarifications offered by subsequent discussion (Hays 1989, 29–33; Porter 2008). The account of function is derived inductively from case studies and then synthesized under classic doctrinal headings—Christology, soteriology, ecclesiology, and eschatology.
The historical question of audience competence must be faced at the outset. Christopher D. Stanley has urged caution, arguing that some reconstructions of intertextual play assume a level of scriptural literacy that many Gentile believers would not have possessed. If Paul’s assemblies included the poor and the non-literate, and if scrolls were scarce and costly, then we should not assume that subtle cues would be widely recognized (Stanley 1992, 266–71; 2004, 36–54). This is a necessary corrective to romanticized pictures of early Christian learning. Yet it need not eliminate the category of echo. Three observations temper the concern. First, the letters were read aloud in gatherings that included leaders, catechists, and Jews as well as Gentiles. Intertextual cues could therefore function pedagogically even if not every listener caught them on first reading. Second, the cues often travel in clusters—lexical, thematic, and narrative—so that recognition accrues across the discourse. Third, the decisive question is not whether every hearer could have named chapter and verse, but whether the reuse explains features of the Pauline argument better than alternative accounts. In that sense, “recognition” includes the letter’s long ecclesial reception, not only the first audience’s instant recall (Hays 1993; Beale and Carson 2007, 23–30).
A second preliminary concerns textual form. Paul’s Scripture is overwhelmingly the Septuagint, the Greek translation that sometimes diverges from the Hebrew Masoretic text in ways that matter for exegesis. When Paul’s phrasing aligns with the LXX, the interpreter should consider how the Greek wording shapes the intertext. In Philippians 2:10–11, for example, the near identity with the Greek of Isaiah 45:23 enhances the claim that the universal confession associated with Israel’s God now attaches to Jesus (Bauckham 2008, 182–205; Capes 1992, 76–103). In Galatians 3:10 Paul’s rendering of Deuteronomy 27:26 aligns with Greek formulations that stress comprehensive obligation. Attention to textual form therefore belongs to any careful weighing of echoes. Likewise, when Paul compresses or adapts wording, as in his paraphrastic uses of Isaiah in Romans, the adaptation should be studied as a rhetorical act rather than treated as a mistake (Wagner 2002, 39–45).
Finally, a word on scope. Intertextual discussions sometimes balloon into catalogues of possible connections. The present work resists that impulse by concentrating on four extended passages where there is broad scholarly recognition of scriptural engagement and by asking how the echoes function within the line of thought. These passages also cover the central load-bearing elements of Paul’s theology: Adam and the new humanity (Romans 5), the exodus and Spirit-led sonship (Romans 6–8), the wilderness as a setting for ecclesial discipline (1 Corinthians 10), Abraham and the logic of promise and law (Galatians 3–4), and the confession of Jesus as Lord in Isaianic terms (Philippians 2). The aim is to model a reproducible way of proceeding: begin with careful detection, test proposals against published criteria, read the Pauline paragraph in light of the source context, and then give an account of the theological yield (Beale 2012, 39–61; Hays 2005; Watson 2016). The following section details the method more fully before turning to the case studies.
Methodology: How to Identify Intertextual Echoes
Richard B. Hays’s *Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul* (1989) proposed a disciplined set of criteria for intertextual detection that remains foundational. The seven tests—availability, volume, recurrence, thematic coherence, historical plausibility, history of interpretation, and satisfaction—are not simple boxes to check but overlapping forms of evidence that, when convergent, justify confidence in a proposed echo (Hays 1989, 29–33). Availability asks whether the source text would have been accessible to Paul and reasonably within reach of his hearers. This involves not only physical access to a scroll but also the plausibility that a passage was well known within Jewish and early Christian discourse. The Servant Songs of Isaiah, the Shema, Abraham promises, and exodus narratives plausibly qualify. Volume measures the degree of linguistic overlap: repeated lexemes, rare expressions, and shared syntagms count more than common vocabulary. Recurrence presses beyond the local context to the author’s corpus: does Paul elsewhere cite or allude to this same passage in ways that reveal familiarity? Thematic coherence evaluates whether the intertext sits naturally within the argument: a proposed echo that pulls against the rhetorical flow likely fails. Historical plausibility considers what Paul could have intended given his aims and milieu. The history of interpretation asks whether other readers—patristic, medieval, modern—have heard the same resonance. Finally, the criterion of satisfaction asks whether the proposed echo yields a reading that makes better sense of the passage than alternatives.
Several refinements intensify the method. First, lexical and syntactic volume can be indexed. Shared n-grams (“every knee… every tongue”), rare pairings (“form of a servant”), or unusual constructions carried over from the LXX strengthen volume. Conversely, single common words (“glory,” “law,” “seed”) are too weak by themselves unless other criteria converge. Second, the syntagmatic order matters. When two or three key lexemes occur in similar order within a short span, the case strengthens. Third, interpreters must control for alternative sources. Greco-Roman moral discourse, Jewish para-biblical literature, and liturgical formulae also shaped Paul’s diction. Where such sources provide a simpler explanation, the biblical echo claim weakens unless the canonical intertext does additional explanatory work (Porter 2008, 29–40; Longenecker 1999, 19–44).
Hays’s category of “metalepsis” is methodologically crucial. An echo may cite only a fragment, but that fragment can pull a larger source context into the reader’s horizon. Metalepsis is not speculation about everything a reader could associate; it is an argument that the partial signal is best understood as a doorway into the wider passage. In Philippians 2, the line from Isaiah 45:23 is not merely a memorable phrase; it carries with it the Isaianic insistence on the exclusive lordship of Israel’s God and the eschatological vision of universal acknowledgment. When Paul places that line in a christological hymn, the metaleptic effect is to include Jesus within that lordship (Bauckham 2008, 182–205). In Galatians 3, the reference to the curse of the law invokes the Deuteronomic covenantal frame of blessing and curse and the call to return (Deut 27–30). Metalepsis thus functions as a controlled expansion: the echo invites the larger scriptural scene to inform the Pauline argument without authorizing arbitrary importation of remote details (Hays 1989, 18–21; Beale 2012, 54–61).
A second refinement concerns textual plurality. Because Paul’s Bible is the LXX, apparent divergences from the Hebrew often vanish when the Greek is considered. Moreover, Paul sometimes adapts wording for rhetorical fit. Christopher D. Stanley’s studies of citation technique demonstrate that such adaptation was common in antiquity and should be evaluated against contemporary practice rather than against modern expectations of exact quotation (Stanley 1992, 42–79). This means that proposed echoes should be tested against plausible Greek forms and with an eye to known patterns of paraphrase and conflation. J. Ross Wagner’s work on Isaiah in Romans shows that Paul’s revoicing of Isaiah is both textually careful and theologically intent, often weaving together lines from different Isaianic contexts to serve a single argument (Wagner 2002, 39–45).
Third, audience competence must be integrated without becoming a veto. It is wise to estimate what kind of resonance different audiences could have heard. Stanley distinguishes informed, competent, and minimal audiences and shows that Paul sometimes writes to achieve an effect even if only a subset can fully trace the intertext. The letter’s performance context—the public reading, the presence of teachers, the cumulative effect of catechesis—supplements the individual listener’s recall (Stanley 2004, 36–54). The criterion of satisfaction can incorporate this point: a proposal that depends on impossibly arcane knowledge should be rejected; one that would have been readily available to Jewish hearers and gradually learned by Gentile hearers, and that improves the reading, deserves weight.
A fourth point concerns controls against overreading. Echo hunting can become a sport. To guard against that, the interpreter should explicitly consider alternative explanations—idiom, coincidence, non-biblical sources—and should be prepared to show how the proposed intertext advances the argument. If recognizing the echo does not change how we read the paragraph, the claim is weak. Conversely, where the echo clarifies a puzzling move—such as Paul’s identification of the rock as Christ or his singular “seed”—the gain in explanatory power itself counts as evidence (Hays 1989, 29–33; Beetham 2008, 19–22).
This methodological sketch assumes that intertextuality is more than a literary game; it is a theological practice. Paul understands Scripture as God’s address to the assemblies in the present. That conviction licenses figural interpretation: earlier persons, institutions, and events are seen to prefigure later realities in ways that are grounded in God’s purposes across time. Goppelt’s classic account of typology helps here: true types involve historical correspondence, ordained relation, escalation toward the eschaton, and retrospective recognition (Goppelt 1982, 17–22). Beale develops similar criteria within a canonical framework, insisting that New Testament reuse unfolds Old Testament trajectories without cancelling original sense (Beale 2012, 39–61). The interpretive community’s confession and worship further shape reception: what the church sings and confesses frames how it hears echoes (Hurtado 2003, 99–134; Martin 1983).
Finally, intertextual method should be integrated with close exegesis. Echoes are not free-standing findings; they belong within line-by-line reading. In the case studies that follow, each passage is first read in its own literary context; the proposed echoes are then introduced, weighed by the criteria, and allowed to do hermeneutical work. The aim is not exhaustiveness but demonstration: to show how disciplined identification yields theological clarity. The method, in summary, is to (1) observe potential triggers, (2) test them by Hays’s criteria with attention to Greek textual form and alternative sources, (3) read the Pauline argument in light of the invoked scriptural context, and (4) state the theological yield in terms that serve both academic analysis and ecclesial reading (Hays 1989; Beale and Carson 2007; Watson 2016; Vanhoozer 1998).
Case Study I: Romans 5–8. Adam/Christ and a New Exodus
Romans 5–8 forms the heart of Paul’s depiction of God’s saving action in the Messiah and the Spirit. The section opens with the Adam–Christ contrast (5:12–21), pivots to baptismal participation (6:1–14), elaborates emancipation from sin’s tyranny (6:15–23), dramatizes the entanglement of law and sin (7:7–25), and climaxes in Spirit-led life, adoption, and hope (8:1–30), before the doxological close (8:31–39). Though exegetes debate the precise rhetorical seams, the narrative arc is clear: Paul retells the human plight and God’s remedy using the idiom of Israel’s Scriptures. Two intertextual strands dominate: Genesis and Exodus.
In 5:12–21 Adam is called a “type” (typos) of the coming one. The term does not reduce Adam to a symbol; it sets up a historically grounded correspondence with eschatological escalation (Goppelt 1982, 17–22). The passage alternates “one man’s trespass” with “one man’s righteous act,” “condemnation” with “justification,” and the reign of “death” with the reign of “life.” The vocabulary resonates with Genesis—transgression, death’s spread—but the weight lies in the narrative structure. Paul reads the primal transgression as the headwater of a narrative now resolved in the Messiah’s obedience. The Adam story is not only about origins; it is about representation. Just as Adam’s act constituted many as sinners, the Messiah’s act constitutes many as righteous. The metaleptic effect is to invite the audience to hear Genesis as prelude to a new humanity defined by the Messiah (Beale 2011, 956–61; Dunn 1998, 89–96; Moo 2018, 321–35).
The typology is sharpened by Paul’s handling of “law.” The law’s entrance “so that trespass might increase” (5:20) should be read against the backdrop of Israel’s history, where Sinai names a covenantal arrangement that reveals sin’s character while also setting Israel apart. By staging Adam before law and then Israel under law, Paul constructs a double horizon: the problem is as old as humanity, and the Israel story intensifies it. The remedy matches the scope: righteousness and life through the faithful act of the one (Wright 1991, 141–56; Dunn 1998, 86–96).
Chapter 6 shifts register from representation to participation. The baptismal language—“baptized into Christ Jesus,” “buried with him through baptism into death,” “walk in newness of life”—is not a free-floating sacramental metaphor. It connects to an exodus pattern already embedded in Pauline discourse. In 1 Corinthians 10:1–2 Paul can say Israel was “baptized into Moses” in the cloud and sea; in Romans 6, to be baptized into the Messiah is to participate in a passage from slavery to new service (Fee 2014, 437–56). The control of the metaphor is ethical: baptism discloses an ontological shift in lordship—no longer under Sin as a master but under grace—yet the frame evokes the exodus itinerary: through water, away from a tyrant, toward service (Wright 1998). The recurrence of slavery language (“present yourselves… as instruments for righteousness,” 6:13; “set free from sin,” 6:18, 22) strengthens the echo. Volume is modest lexically but strong narratively; thematic coherence is high; the satisfaction criterion is met because the exodus pattern explains why baptism functions as a boundary-crossing event into a new polity (Keesmaat 1999, 25–60).
Romans 7’s complex “I” rehearses Israel’s experience with law. Whether the “I” is autobiographical, Adamic, Israelite, or rhetorical, the chapter stages the paradox that a good commandment, encountered by the flesh, becomes an occasion for sin’s exploitative power. The echo here is not a single verse but the Sinai-wilderness sequence where the law’s holiness stands in tension with Israel’s transgression (Dunn 1998, 130–56). The metaleptic effect prepares for Romans 8, where the Spirit does what the law could not: the “righteous requirement of the law” is fulfilled in those who walk according to the Spirit (8:4).
Romans 8 gathers exodus motifs into an eschatological key. “No condemnation” answers the curse theme; “the Spirit of life” answers the pillar of cloud; “led by the Spirit” (8:14) replays “led” language from the exodus; “adoption” (huiothesia) fulfills Israel’s sonship (Exod 4:22–23) now extended in the Messiah (Scott 1992, 126–57); groaning creation and Spirit intercession push the narrative toward new creation (Moo 2018, 469–545; Wright 2002). When Paul speaks of believers as “fellow heirs with Christ” (8:17), the inheritance theme from Abraham is simultaneously in view, binding Genesis and Exodus into a single horizon. The argument’s satisfaction is high: hearing Romans 5–8 against Genesis–Exodus explains the progression from representation (Adam/Christ) to passage (baptism/exodus) to presence and guidance (Spirit/cloud) to inheritance and rest. The intertext is not decorative; it structures Paul’s depiction of salvation.
Excursus: Further Soundings in Romans 5–8
Two features of Romans 6–8 intensify the exodus pattern. The first is the pairing of lordship and slavery imagery with cultic language. When Paul speaks of presenting bodies as instruments for righteousness (6:13) and of “obedience from the heart to the pattern of teaching” (6:17), he invokes the cultic logic of consecration now transposed into daily life. The thematic coherence with exodus is strong: liberation is not an end in itself but a transfer of service from Pharaoh to the LORD (Exod 8:1; 9:1). The second is the interplay of Spirit and adoption. The cry “Abba, Father” (8:15) is not an isolated devotional note; it resonates with Israel’s filial vocation and with prophetic promises of renewed sonship after exile (Hos 1–2; Jer 31; Ezek 36–37). The lexical link to “adoption” (huiothesia) is rare and technical, and James M. Scott’s work shows that Paul likely draws on Israel-as-son traditions to frame Gentile believers’ status (Scott 1992, 126–57). The metalepsis extends beyond Exodus to the larger return-from-exile hope, filling out the inheritance motif (Isa 63:16; 64:8).
Romans 7 deserves its own intertextual note. The prohibition “You shall not covet” (7:7) brings Exodus 20:17/Deuteronomy 5:21 into the room. That choice is instructive: coveting is an inward desire as much as an outward act, illustrating how the law rightly reaches into the heart and, in fallen flesh, becomes the very site of sin’s exploitation. The echo’s satisfaction is significant: Paul shows how law can be holy and good while explaining why it becomes an occasion for death. The rhetorical “I” thus dramatizes Israel under the good commandment yet captive to another power. Read metaleptically, the commandment at Sinai exposes the generic human plight intensified in Israel’s story, preparing for the Spirit’s liberating action (Dunn 1998, 130–56; Moo 2018, 433–68).
One last observation concerns Romans 8:18–30. Creation’s groaning alludes to prophetic laments and to the hope of new creation (Isa 65–66). The vocabulary of “firstfruits of the Spirit” and “redemption of our bodies” coordinates Pentecost and resurrection in a way that reprises exodus and Sabbath-rest motifs: the firstfruits mark the beginning of a harvest not yet complete. Thus the exodus frame expands into a creational horizon; the people freed through water and led by the Spirit await the renewal of the world (Beale 2011, 297–312; Wright 2003).
Case Study II: 1 Corinthians 10. The Church in the Wilderness
The problem in Corinth is not theoretical. Believers live amid pagan associations where meals are bound to patronage and cult. In 1 Corinthians 8–10 Paul navigates the tension between knowledge and love, liberty and idolatry, conscience and community. Chapter 10 supplies the decisive warning. Paul tells the Corinthian church the story of the wilderness as their own family history and reads it typologically as instruction “for us.”
The passage opens with a barrage of “all” statements: all under the cloud, all passed through the sea, all were baptized into Moses, all ate the same spiritual food, all drank the same spiritual drink, yet “with most of them God was not pleased” (10:1–5). The repeated “all” universalizes the benefits and heightens the shock of subsequent judgment. The mention of “baptized into Moses” is an arresting compression. While Exodus does not use baptism language, Paul’s metaphor aligns the passage through water under the cloud with Christian initiation. The metaleptic reading invites the Corinthian audience to see that the presence of sacraments and experiences does not guarantee fidelity. The typological connection is confirmed by the term “types” (typoi): “These things happened as types for us, that we might not desire evil as they did” (10:6) (Fee 2014, 437–56; Thiselton 2000, 733–48).
Paul then cites and echoes particular episodes. “Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, ‘The people sat down to eat and drink and stood up to play’” (10:7) evokes Exodus 32:6. The wording follows the LXX closely. The context is the golden calf, a paradigmatic case of Israel fabricating a cultic representation and then rationalizing it as a feast to the LORD. For Corinthians tempted to interpret temple meals as “nothing” because “an idol is nothing,” the episode exposes how feasting can mask idolatry. “We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did” (10:8) recalls Numbers 25 and the Baal of Peor episode; “we must not put the Lord to the test” (10:9) recalls Numbers 21; and “do not grumble” (10:10) compresses multiple murmuring episodes (Ciampa and Rosner 2010, 445–510). The volume criterion is satisfied by explicit citation and close paraphrase; recurrence is strong because Paul often uses Israel-in-the-wilderness to structure admonition (e.g., Phil 2:14–15); thematic coherence is high because the issue in Corinth is eating in contexts that entangle the church with idolatry.
The most striking line is, “For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ” (10:4). The phrase “followed them” aligns with later Jewish traditions about a well or rock that accompanied Israel, but Paul’s point does not rely on that lore. The identification “the rock was Christ” functions christologically and ecclesiologically. Christ is the agent of provision and presence in Israel’s story; he is also the one whose table now defines the church’s identity (10:16–21). The metalepsis reaches into Exodus 17 and Numbers 20, where water from the rock saves the people amid contention, and it extends to Deuteronomy 32, the Song of Moses, where the Rock is a title for Israel’s God. Without collapsing Christ into the Father, Paul includes Christ within Israel’s divine action in a way consistent with his wider practice of applying YHWH texts to Jesus (Capes 1992; Hays 1997, 160–71; Bauckham 2008).
The function of the intertext is pastoral discipline. The church must “flee from idolatry” (10:14) not because meat is metaphysically charged but because participation binds. “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation (koinōnia) in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?” (10:16). The echo of Israel’s sacrificial meals and the contrast with pagan tables move the argument from knowledge to allegiance. One cannot “participate in the table of the Lord and the table of demons” (10:21). The wilderness story thus becomes a script for ecclesial ethics: sacramental privilege does not nullify covenant responsibility; past grace heightens the call to vigilance (Hays 1997; Works 2014).
Two objections require response. First, is Paul’s use of “the rock was Christ” a leap that his audience could not follow? Here recurrence helps: Paul’s communities already confess “one God, the Father… and one Lord, Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 8:6), a reformulation of the Shema that aligns the Lord Jesus with Israel’s confession. Within that framework, hearing Christ as the agent of wilderness provision is not foreign. Second, does the typology flatten Israel’s uniqueness? The text itself resists that by preserving the specificity of episodes and by maintaining the moral edge: the church learns from Israel not by imagining itself superior but by seeing itself warned “upon whom the ends of the ages have come” (10:11). Eschatology intensifies responsibility rather than erasing distinction (Thiselton 2000, 733–48).
Excursus: Psalmic and Deuteronomic Backgrounds in 1 Corinthians 10
Paul’s appeal to the “Rock” reverberates not only with Exodus 17 and Numbers 20 but also with Deuteronomy 32, where the Rock is a title for Israel’s covenant God—“The Rock, his work is perfect” (Deut 32:4)—and where Israel is chastised for forsaking “the Rock who begot you” (32:18). The Song of Moses functions as a covenant lawsuit rehearsing kindness and infidelity. When Paul warns Corinthians against idolatry and murmuring, he implicitly summons this lawsuit background. The satisfaction criterion is met because the Deuteronomic rock-theme explains Paul’s juxtaposition of sacramental privilege and judgment and his insistence that feasting can be an arena of covenant breach (Capes 1992, 76–103).
The psalmic tradition adds depth. Psalm 78 recounts wilderness infidelity—including craving food and testing God despite manna and water—linking provision and unbelief. Psalm 95 warns the hearer today not to harden the heart “as at Meribah.” These songs were part of Israel’s worship. Their metaleptic presence in 1 Corinthians 10 suggests that Paul expects Gentile churches to inherit Israel’s liturgical memory as their own training in obedience. The echo thus functions catechetically, embedding warning within prayer (Hays 1997, 165–71; Thiselton 2000, 741–48).
Finally, the Greco-Roman banquet background intensifies the urgency. Meals established social bonds with patrons and deities. Paul’s intertext is not a mere prooftext against meat; it is a reframing of allegiance. The Lord’s table is Israel’s table renewed; to sit there is to be bound to the Lord of the exodus, which renders participation at rival tables incoherent (Fee 2014, 451–56; Ciampa and Rosner 2010, 471–90).
Case Study III: Galatians 3–4. Abraham, Deuteronomy, and the Two Covenants
In Galatians Paul wages a sustained defense of the gospel of Messiah and Spirit against pressures to require works of law as boundary markers for Gentile converts. Chapters 3–4 supply the theological core by rehearsing Abraham and re-reading Deuteronomy. The argumentative burden is to show that the blessing promised to Abraham has come to the nations in the Messiah apart from law observance, and that the law’s role—good and God-given—was temporary and ancillary to that promise (Longenecker 1990, 115–40; Moo 2013, 194–274).
Paul begins with experience anchored in Scripture: “Did you receive the Spirit by works of law or by hearing with faith?” (3:2). He then cites Genesis 15:6: “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.” The metaleptic invitation is to recall the narrative in which God promises offspring as numerous as the stars to a childless patriarch and ratifies the covenant. Paul’s claim is not that Abraham’s faith is a bare example but that the Abraham story itself sets the pattern for Gentile inclusion: “In you shall all the nations be blessed” (Gen 12:3; cf. 18:18; 22:18). Those who are “of faith” are Abraham’s children, and Scripture “preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham” (3:8–9). The argument insists that the Abraham promise is the controlling horizon; events four centuries later cannot annul it (3:17–18) (Wright 1991, 141–56; Hays 2000).
Galatians 3:10 introduces Deuteronomy: “For all who rely on works of law are under a curse, for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all the things written in the book of the law, to do them’” (Deut 27:26). Paul’s use of the verse has been contested on the grounds that Deuteronomy’s context is covenant renewal within Israel rather than a general statement of moral impossibility. Yet Paul’s point is not that the law is bad but that deploying the law as the means of covenant status invokes its own covenantal sanctions. If one takes up the law as the path to righteousness, one must keep the whole. That is precisely Deuteronomy’s insistence (Collins 2003; Moo 2013, 224–34). The contrast then proceeds by Scripture: “The righteous shall live by faith” (Hab 2:4) and “The one who does them shall live by them” (Lev 18:5). The former points forward to a life received by trust; the latter articulates a principle of performance. Paul’s conclusion is that Messiah redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for us—“for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree’” (Deut 21:23)—so that the blessing of Abraham might come to the nations and we might receive the Spirit through faith (3:13–14). The dense intertext ties Abraham, Deuteronomy, and prophetic expectation into a single soteriological claim: God’s promise governs; the law reveals sin and, when misused, curses; the Messiah bears that curse to extend Abraham’s blessing; the Spirit is the promised gift (Hays 2002; Wright 2013).
The “seed” argument in 3:16—“not ‘and to seeds,’ as of many, but ‘and to your seed,’ who is Christ”—is often treated as special pleading. But Paul’s move is not a grammatical trick devoid of context. In Genesis 22:17–18 the promise narrows to a single offspring through whom the nations will be blessed; the singular is not incidental. Paul reads that narrative development christologically: the representative seed is the Messiah, and those who belong to him share his status as Abraham’s offspring and heirs (3:29). The metaleptic effect is to align the whole narrative arc of Genesis with a representative figure through whom universal blessing arrives (Collins 2003; Hays 2000).
Galatians 4 turns to allegory with Hagar and Sarah (4:21–31). Paul announces that he is speaking “allegorically” (allēgoroumena), a rare self-label. The point is not to deny the historical reality of the women; it is to read them as two modes of existence: slavery and freedom, flesh and promise, the present Jerusalem and the Jerusalem above. Isaiah 54:1 (“Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear”) enters to mark the restoration of Zion and the expansion of the people beyond prior bounds. The echo is not random; it fits the wider Isaianic theme that the return from exile brings a family expansion centered in God’s servant and Spirit (Martyn 1997, 437–66; Betz 1979, 219–56). The effect is ecclesial: Gentile believers are children of promise like Isaac; their identity is shaped by the freewoman. The pastoral implication matches the intertext: do not submit again to slavery, whether in the form of pagan elements or law-as-boundary; live as heirs (4:1–7; 5:1).
Two methodological notes arise. First, Hays’s criteria illuminate why the Deuteronomy echoes in 3:10–14 are strong. Availability and recurrence are unquestioned; volume includes explicit quotation; thematic coherence is obvious; satisfaction is marked because the quotations tie together curse, promise, and redemption in a way that explains Paul’s cross-centered soteriology. Second, the “seed” argument meets the history-of-interpretation test differently: patristic and later readers wrestled with the move, yet many saw here a paradigm of figural reading that concentrates the promise in the Messiah and then expands it to the church by participation (Wright 2013; Hays 2002). The net effect is to show that Paul’s intertextual practice is a governed exercise of theological reasoning, not free association.
Excursus: Faith(fulness), Exile, and Restoration in Galatians 3–4
Two debated elements warrant attention. First, the genitive construction pistis Christou (3:22; cf. Rom 3:22) may mean “faith in Christ” or “the faithfulness of Christ.” Hays has argued for the latter in Galatians 3:1–4:11, reading Paul’s narrative as centered on the Messiah’s faithful obedience that secures the promise. On that reading, Scripture “imprisons all under sin” so that the promise comes “by the faithfulness of Jesus Messiah to those who believe” (Hays 2002, 126–52). The intertextual payoffs are significant: Isaiah’s servant, who is faithful unto death, stands behind the claim, as does the Deuteronomic need for a covenant-keeping representative. Even if one prefers the objective-genitive reading, the narrative of Christ’s faithful death remains central in the immediate context of 3:13 and 4:4–5.
Second, the exile–return framework undergirds the move from Hagar/Sinai to Sarah/Zion. Isaiah 54:1 belongs to a stretch of Isaiah that promises restoration after judgment. Paul’s use of the verse indicates that he reads the present inclusion of Gentiles and the liberation of Jews from law-captivity as the longed-for restoration. The Jerusalem above is the eschatological Zion envisioned by prophets; it begets free children not by flesh but by promise and Spirit (Martyn 1997, 437–66). The metaleptic expansion of Isaiah 54 stabilizes the ecclesial claim: the family is larger than ethnic Israel yet anchored in Israel’s hope.
Reception history corroborates the weight of these echoes. Patristic interpreters frequently read Galatians 4’s allegory within the broader prophetic story of barren Zion giving birth to multitudes. Medieval and Reformation readers debated the law–gospel relation but regularly tethered Paul’s argument to Genesis and Deuteronomy as its controlling texts. The history-of-interpretation criterion does not equal proof, but it shows that the church’s sustained hearing aligns with the proposed intertextual network (Longenecker 1990; Moo 2013).
Case Study IV: Philippians 2:6–11. The Servant and the Name
Philippians 2:6–11 is widely regarded as a preformed hymn or confession that Paul quotes or adapts. Whether preformed or composed by the apostle, its structure is clear: descent into obedience unto death, followed by exaltation to universal acknowledgment. The passage is thick with scriptural language and frames communal ethics (“have this mind”) with doxology.
The climactic confession—“at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Messiah is Lord”—reverberates with Isaiah 45:23: “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.” In its Isaianic context, the line belongs to a unit (Isaiah 40–55) that affirms the unique sovereignty of Israel’s God over idols and nations and anticipates a future acknowledgment by all peoples. The LXX wording maps closely onto Philippians 2:10–11. The metaleptic force is decisive: the confession reserved for the God of Israel is now directed to Jesus as “Lord,” with the result that “God the Father” receives glory. The text does not collapse Jesus into the Father; it includes Jesus within the unique identity of Israel’s God in a way consistent with the earliest Christian pattern of worship addressed to and through Jesus (Bauckham 2008, 182–205; Hurtado 2003, 99–134; Capes 1992, 76–103).
Further Isaianic resonances enrich the reading. The hymn’s pattern of humiliation and exaltation echoes Isaiah 52:13–53:12. “My servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up and greatly exalted,” followed by the servant’s suffering and vindication, parallels the hymn’s “being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death… therefore God highly exalted him.” The phrase “form of a servant” (morphē doulou) and “he emptied himself” invite hearing the servant’s poured-out life and God’s vindication (Hooker 1959, 90–116; Gorman 2009, 1–30). The volume criterion is not carried by word-for-word quotation but by pattern, rare collocations, and the Isaianic complex that the early church repeatedly drew upon to interpret Jesus’s passion.
Debate persists about Adamic echoes. Some read “in the form of God” and “in the likeness of men” against Genesis 1–3, construing Christ as the faithful human who does not grasp at equality with God in the way Adam reached for what was not his. Others emphasize preexistence and contrast with heavenly beings. The two are not mutually exclusive. If Adam is in the background, the echo strengthens the claim that Jesus fulfills the human vocation by obedient self-giving, thus becoming the head of a new humanity (Dunn 1980, 114–21; Silva 2005, 94–115). If preexistence dominates, the Isaianic frame still governs the theological effect: the one who shares in God’s status embraces the path of servanthood for the sake of the many, and God publicly vindicates him.
The hymn’s ecclesial function emerges from its framing exhortation. “Have this mind among yourselves, which also is in Christ Jesus” does not reduce the passage to ethics; it shows how high confession grounds lowly conduct. The community is to enact the Messiah’s pattern of attending to others before self, resisting rivalry and vainglory. The intertextuality serves formation: by singing or confessing this Isaianic-Philippian text, the church rehearses a story in which God exalts the obedient one and thus learns to evaluate honor and shame by the measure of the cross (Fee 1995, 191–229; Martin 1983). The result is not only doctrinal clarity about Jesus’s status but a communal habitus shaped by the scriptural narrative.
Excursus: Form, Lexis, and Worship in Philippians 2:6–11
The hymn’s key terms bear brief comment. Harpagmon (“something to be exploited”) describes not a grasping act already performed but a status not seized for advantage. Morphē (“form”) signals the outward mode that expresses inward reality; the “form of God” and “form of a servant” thus depict a true correspondence, not a mere appearance. The participle genomenos (“becoming”) and the phrase en homoiōmati anthrōpōn (“in the likeness of men”) echo LXX idiom for human condition without implying unreality. The descent is then matched by hyperypsōsen (“highly exalted”), a rare intensification that resonates with Isaiah’s “high and lifted up.” The lexical cluster thus supports the Isaianic frame without excluding Adamic undertones (Silva 2005, 94–115; Fee 1995, 191–229).
Formally, the passage fits ancient *hymnos* conventions—naming the subject, recounting mighty deeds, inviting response—yet it subverts honor-shame expectations by locating glory in obedience unto death (Martin 1983). The worship setting matters. If communities sang or confessed this text, then intertextual formation happened not only in exegesis but in liturgy. The Isaianic confession became a congregational act, teaching believers to associate Jesus’s name with the allegiance due to the God of Israel. That doxological pedagogy explains why Paul can deploy the hymn paraenetically: the sung confession produces the mindset he commands (Hurtado 2003, 99–134; Bauckham 2008, 182–205).
Theological Significance
The case studies converge on four doctrinal loci. First, Christology. Paul’s echoes place Jesus within the sphere of Israel’s God’s actions and prerogatives while maintaining relation to the Father. Applying Isaiah 45:23 to Jesus implies that the homage due to the God of Israel is rendered to the risen Lord, a move that explains the early pattern of prayer, invocation, and doxology addressed to and through Jesus (Bauckham 2008; Hurtado 2003; Capes 1992). Adamic and servant resonances clarify that the path to exaltation is obedience unto death; Jesus’s status is realized through faithful action that restores the human vocation and brings many to life (Dunn 1998, 281–88; Gorman 2009). In Romans and 1 Corinthians, Christ is present within Israel’s exodus as agent of provision and judgment; in Galatians, he is the seed through whom the blessing comes and the curse is borne. The echoes thus yield a high yet narratively grounded christology.
Second, soteriology. The Abraham–Deuteronomy–Isaiah constellation frames salvation as fulfillment of promise and release from curse through the Messiah’s death. The law’s function is neither ladder to life nor arbitrary hurdle; it exposes sin and, when made the basis for status, places the doer under its own curse (Gal 3:10). The Messiah’s cross answers that curse in order that the blessing and the Spirit might be given to the nations. Romans 6–8 shows that salvation is participatory: believers are baptized into the Messiah’s death and raised to new life, set free from a tyrant master, and led by the Spirit into filial obedience. The exodus echo keeps the logic corporate and historical: God forms a people by liberating them, giving his presence, and leading them toward inheritance (Wright 1991; Beale 2011; Moo 2018).
Third, ecclesiology. Intertextuality builds identity. When Paul calls Israel’s ancestors “our fathers,” Gentile believers are inscribed into Israel’s story, not as replacement but as expansion of the family promised to Abraham. The “Jerusalem above” in Galatians and the Spirit-led sonship in Romans define the church as a community whose charter documents are Israel’s Scriptures read through the Messiah. The table language in 1 Corinthians 10 establishes boundaries of belonging: participation at the Lord’s table forbids participation in idolatrous tables. The echoes thus mark the church as a Scripture-shaped body that learns from Israel’s successes and failures and locates its worship within the scriptural economy of sacrifice and feast (Hays 1997; Gladd 2019).
Fourth, eschatology. Paul’s refrain that the ends of the ages have come upon the church (1 Cor 10:11) interprets the present as the time of fulfillment. Exodus motifs become signs of a new age: the Spirit replaces and surpasses the pillar of cloud; baptism replaces the sea crossing as the boundary rite; adoption and inheritance announce that the promised rest has begun, though groaning persists until new creation. The Isaianic confession in Philippians 2 marks the eschatological horizon: universal acknowledgment of Jesus’s lordship to God’s glory. The echoes thereby orient the assemblies to live between already and not yet: already liberated, already gifted with the Spirit, already counted as Abraham’s family; not yet free from suffering, not yet seeing the universal confession, not yet at rest (Ladd 1974; Beale 2011; Wright 2003).
These doctrinal readings are not imposed on the texts; they emerge from how the echoes function within Paul’s paragraphs. Intertextuality is the skeleton of the argument. Remove the exodus and the logic of Romans 6–8 collapses into abstraction. Silence Abraham and Deuteronomy and the argument of Galatians loses its covenantal texture. Strip Isaiah 45 from Philippians 2 and the hymn’s climax becomes ambiguous. With the echoes in place, Paul’s theology displays internal coherence: the Messiah is the faithful one through whom God keeps promise; salvation is participation in his death and life; the church is the expanded people of Abraham, disciplined by Israel’s story; the age to come has begun in the Spirit and awaits consummation.
Methodological and Hermeneutical Reflections
Three reflections arise from the preceding analysis. The first concerns the risk of overreading. Because echoes cannot be proved with mathematical certainty, the temptation is to discover them everywhere. The antidote is disciplined application of criteria and modesty in claims. Availability and recurrence should be established where possible; volume should be more than a single common word; thematic coherence must be argued from the paragraph’s flow; history of interpretation should be consulted to see whether others have heard what we propose; and, most importantly, satisfaction must be demonstrated by showing how the echo clarifies the argument (Hays 1989, 29–33; Beetham 2008, 19–22). When competing proposals exist, the one that best explains the rhetorical move ought to be preferred. Conversely, when recognition of an echo yields no interpretive gain, we should abstain.
The second reflection concerns intent and canon. Critics worry that christological readings impose later meanings onto earlier texts. But the apostolic claim is not that earlier authors consciously predicted each later event; it is that God’s coherent purpose across time allows earlier patterns to reach fuller significance in the Messiah. Vanhoozer’s speech-act framing is helpful: the original utterance has a determinate sense in its context, while God as the ultimate speaker can extend the range of that sense in later canonical uses without negating the first (Vanhoozer 1998, 310–58). Hays’s language of figuration and metalepsis similarly protects both historical integrity and theological extension (Hays 2005). Beale’s canonical method insists that trajectories within the Old Testament itself—exodus as paradigm, servant as representative, Abraham’s promise to the nations—prepare for expansion (Beale 2012, 39–61). On this account, intertextual readings are not arbitrary acts of creativity but reasoned claims about how the canon’s parts fit together under God’s authorship.
A third reflection concerns community and Spirit. Paul writes to assemblies and expects his letters to be read aloud, taught, and enacted. He assumes a learning process in which Gentiles come to share a scriptural imagination. The Spirit’s role is not to bypass careful reading but to enable reception: the veil is taken away when people turn to the Lord (2 Cor 3:16). That theological claim has hermeneutical consequences. It means that recognition of echoes is not a purely individual exercise; it is shaped by communal worship, catechesis, and mission. The earliest church’s practices—baptism, the Lord’s Supper, confession that Jesus is Lord—were already intertextual performances. The letters extend and police those practices by revisiting older texts. Academic method should therefore remain accountable to the church’s hearing without surrendering to uncritical tradition (Hurtado 2003; Martin 1983; Fowl 1998).
Two further clarifications help adjudicate contested cases. First, with regard to audience competence, Stanley’s caution is well taken. Not every listener could have tracked subtle Isaianic allusions. Yet Paul’s aim is not to pass a literary exam but to shape a people. If intertextual cues are repeated across letters, embedded in teaching, and embodied in rites, then even minimal audiences can learn to hear them over time. The reference point is not a single reading but an ongoing communal apprenticeship to Scripture (Stanley 2004; Hays 1993). Second, with regard to the relation of law and promise, the Deuteronomy echoes in Galatians show that Paul’s critique is not a rejection of Torah but a protest against misusing Torah as boundary. The law’s own witness—its curse formulae and its call to return—grounds Paul’s claims. Intertextual method helps avoid caricature by keeping the Deuteronomic context in view (Moo 2013; Longenecker 1990).
What, then, are the limits of figural reading? The limits are set by the canon and by the gospel. Figuration must be tethered to textual signals and to the rule of faith: Jesus the Messiah crucified and raised according to the Scriptures. Proposals that violate the canon’s grain or displace the cross and resurrection from the center fail the test. By the same measure, proposals that honor those controls, that can be shown to arise from textual cues, and that yield clarity about Paul’s argument warrant reception—even as they remain open to communal testing and refinement (Watson 2016; Vanhoozer 1998).
Conclusion
Paul’s letters do theology by rereading Scripture. The Adam–Christ contrast, the baptismal crossing, the wilderness warnings, the Abraham promise with its curse and blessing, and the Isaianic confession of Jesus’s lordship are not decorative motifs; they are the scaffold of Paul’s reasoning. When those intertexts are traced with care, the lines of his theology come into focus. Christ is the faithful human and faithful Israelite included within the actions of Israel’s God; salvation is promise-fulfillment and curse-removal leading to Spirit-enabled participation; the church is the enlarged family of Abraham and the Spirit-led community, warned by Israel’s history and nourished at the Lord’s table; the end-time has arrived and will be consummated in universal acknowledgment of Jesus.
Methodologically, the study has commended Hays’s criteria as a set of guardrails that slow down overconfident proposals and embolden warranted ones. Historical plausibility, textual form, recurrence, and interpretive yield must be brought into conversation every time. Theologically, the study has urged that intertextual practice belongs within a canonical vision in which God’s purpose ties earlier and later texts together without erasing historical integrity. The church’s worship and confession are not extraneous to that process; they are the setting in which echoes are learned and sustained.
For contemporary readers, three implications follow. First, the way to learn Paul’s theology is to learn Israel’s Scriptures with him. Ministers who teach Romans 6–8 should lead congregations through the exodus; those who expound Galatians should dwell in Genesis and Deuteronomy; those who preach Philippians 2 should sound Isaiah 40–55. Second, communities should expect Scripture to shape identity and ethics, not only beliefs. The wilderness story disciplines eucharistic practice; Abraham’s promise shapes table fellowship; the servant hymn trains humility. Third, intertextual reading is a skill to be cultivated patiently. Assemblies, like Corinth and Galatia, grow into recognition over time. The Spirit forms that capacity through proclamation, sacrament, and shared life. In such settings, Paul’s echoes still teach the church not only what to confess but how to read.
Bibliography
Betz, Hans Dieter. 1979. *Galatians: A Commentary on Paul’s Letter to the Churches in Galatia*. Hermeneia. Philadelphia: Fortress.
Beale, G. K. 2011. *A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New*. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
———. 2012. *Handbook on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament: Exegesis and Interpretation*. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
Beale, G. K., and D. A. Carson, eds. 2007. *Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament*. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
Beetham, Christopher A. 2008. *Echoes of Scripture in the Letter of Paul to the Colossians*. Biblical Interpretation Series 96. Leiden: Brill.
Bauckham, Richard. 2008. *Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Capes, David B. 1992. *Old Testament Yahweh Texts in Paul’s Christology*. WUNT 2/47. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.
Ciampa, Roy E., and Brian S. Rosner. 2010. *The First Letter to the Corinthians*. Pillar New Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Collins, C. John. 2003. “Galatians 3:16: What Kind of Exegete Was Paul?” *Tyndale Bulletin* 54 (1): 75–86.
Cullmann, Oscar. 1950. *Christ and Time: The Primitive Christian Conception of Time and History*. Philadelphia: Westminster.
Dunn, James D. G. 1980. *Christology in the Making: An Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation*. London: SCM.
———. 1998. *The Theology of Paul the Apostle*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Fee, Gordon D. 1995. *Paul’s Letter to the Philippians*. NICNT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
———. 2014. *The First Epistle to the Corinthians*. Revised ed. NICNT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Fowl, Stephen E. 1998. *Engaging Scripture: A Model for Theological Interpretation*. Oxford: Blackwell.
Gladd, Benjamin L. 2019. *From Adam and Israel to the Church: A Biblical Theology of the People of God*. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic.
Goppelt, Leonhard. 1982. *Typos: The Typological Interpretation of the Old Testament in the New*. Translated by Donald H. Madvig. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Gorman, Michael J. 2009. *Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul’s Narrative Soteriology*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Hays, Richard B. 1989. *Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul*. New Haven: Yale University Press.
———. 1993. “On the Rebound: A Response to Critics of *Echoes of Scripture*.” In *Paul and the Scriptures of Israel*, edited by Craig A. Evans and James A. Sanders, 70–96. JSNTSup 83. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
———. 1997. *First Corinthians*. Interpretation. Louisville: Westminster John Knox.
———. 2000. “Galatians.” In *The New Interpreter’s Bible*, vol. 11, 181–348. Nashville: Abingdon.
———. 2005. *The Conversion of the Imagination: Paul as Interpreter of Israel’s Scripture*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Hooker, Morna D. 1959. *Jesus and the Servant*. London: SPCK.
Hurtado, Larry W. 2003. *Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Keesmaat, Sylvia C. 1994. “Exodus and the Intertextual Transformation of Tradition in Romans 8:14–30.” *Journal for the Study of the New Testament* 54: 29–56.
———. 1999. *Paul and His Story: (Re)Interpreting the Exodus Tradition*. JSNTSup 181. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
Ladd, George Eldon. 1974. *The Presence of the Future: The Eschatology of Biblical Realism*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Longenecker, Richard N. 1990. *Galatians*. WBC 41. Dallas: Word Books.
———. 1999. *Biblical Exegesis in the Apostolic Period*. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Martin, Ralph P. 1983. *Carmen Christi: Philippians 2:5–11 in Recent Interpretation and in the Setting of Early Christian Worship*. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Martyn, J. Louis. 1997. *Galatians*. AB 33A. New York: Doubleday.
Moo, Douglas J. 2013. *Galatians*. BECNT. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
———. 2018. *The Letter to the Romans*. 2nd ed. NICNT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Moyise, Steve. 2010. *Paul and Scripture: Studying the New Testament Use of the Old Testament*. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
Porter, Stanley E. 2008. “Allusions and Echoes.” In *As It Is Written: Studying Paul’s Use of Scripture*, edited by Stanley E. Porter and Christopher D. Stanley, 29–40. SBLSymS 50. Atlanta: SBL Press.
Scott, James M. 1992. *Adoption as Sons of God: An Exegetical Investigation into the Background of Υἱοθεσία in the Pauline Corpus*. WUNT 2/48. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.
Silva, Moisés. 2005. *Philippians*. 2nd ed. BECNT. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
Stanley, Christopher D. 1992. *Paul and the Language of Scripture: Citation Technique in the Pauline Epistles and Contemporary Literature*. SNTSMS 74. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
———. 2004. *Arguing with Scripture: The Rhetoric of Quotations in the Letters of Paul*. New York: T&T Clark.
Thiselton, Anthony C. 2000. *The First Epistle to the Corinthians: A Commentary on the Greek Text*. NIGTC. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. 1998. *Is There a Meaning in This Text? The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge*. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.
VanMaaren, John. 2013. “The Adam-Christ Typology in Paul and Its Development in the Early Church Fathers.” *Tyndale Bulletin* 64 (2): 275–97.
Vos, Geerhardus. 1994. *The Pauline Eschatology*. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing.
Wagner, J. Ross. 2002. *Heralds of the Good News: Isaiah and Paul ‘In Concert’ in the Letter to the Romans*. NovTSup 101. Leiden: Brill.
Watson, Francis. 2016. *Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith*. 2nd ed. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark.
Wright, N. T. 1991. *The Climax of the Covenant: Christ and the Law in Pauline Theology*. Minneapolis: Fortress.
———. 1998. “The New Inheritance According to Paul.” *Bible Review* 14 (3): 36–41.
———. 2002. “The Letter to the Romans.” In *The New Interpreter’s Bible*, vol. 10. Nashville: Abingdon.
———. 2003. *The Resurrection of the Son of God*. Minneapolis: Fortress.
———. 2013. *Paul and the Faithfulness of God*. 2 vols. Minneapolis: Fortress.
