Introduction

This chapter concerns the intertexture of James 2.1–13, and, most particularly, it focuses on the intertexture of James 2.5, an apparent allusion to a well-known saying of Jesus. Since the stated purpose of this inquiry is to ascertain the socio-rhetorical function of James 2.5, it is helpful to clarify why and how the intertexture of the unit is integral to my goal.

Intertextual analysis is important for socio-rhetorical criticism because it takes very seriously the point that all language is a social possession (Halliday, 1978, pp. 1–35) and bases itself on the notion that all texts are constructed on the foundations of antecedent texts (see the essays in Draisma, 1989; Vorster, 1989, pp. 19–20; Kristeva, 1969, p. 52). Following Robert Alter's (1989, p. 112) definition of allusion as “the evocation in one text of an antecedent … text,” whether oral or written, and recalling that allusion is a fundamental aspect of rhetorical invention, it is rather obvious that the intertextual conception of a text as a mosaic of many earlier textual fragments is of primary rhetorical interest. Moreover, as a facet of socio-rhetorical criticism, intertextual study does not only call attention to the ways in which the rhetor appears to activate previous texts; it also addresses the rhetorical subject of the potential effects that allusions have as new figurations in the rhetor's strategy of persuasion.