The Covenant Concept as an Organizing Principle in Luke-Acts

Conventionally, a concept refers to an alignment among three intertwined components: the term (a linguistic label comprised of one or a few words), the phenomena to be defined (the referents, extensions, or denotation or a concept), and the properties or attributes that define those phenomena (the definition, intension, connotation of a concept).⁵

A good concept consists of these components but specifically it mediates eight criteria: coherence, operationalization, validity, field utility, resonance, contextual range, parsimony, and analytic/empirical utility.⁶ Generally, covenant meets the componential requirements of a concept in that “covenant” is a term that refers to the phenomena of varied binding agreements between two available parties arranged for some specific shared interest advancing purpose where the attributes that define those phenomena depend on the variation. In particular, covenant mediates the eight criteria specifying a concept. Covenant, has a coherent definition that identifies its essential meaning, is semantically reduced (parsimony) yet is resonant by incorporating many variations in meaning such as that of kinship, treaty-type or grant-type covenant and thus has a contextual range, an extension of resonance, since it “travels”, its meaningfulness reaches other linguistic, cross-cultural and cross-generational contexts. Yet the concept does not completely define its actual operations. Covenant is operationalization only to a degree. Its ←2 | 3→definition does not allow for complete differentiation at the phenomenal level, that is, the ordering of its referents (things/events/objects/entities) or how it operates may differ between cases. Nonetheless the concept produces validity that has a field and analytic utility.

The relative high degree of the covenant concept’s contextual range is due to its characteristic structuring of stories/narratives, which governs the meanings incorporated into the definition of the concept. Rendtorff provides a comparative example between the Primeval History in Genesis 1–11 and Sinai Story in Exodus 19–24 and shows how the use of covenant allows the structure of the stories to parallel and to endow a common meaning to the sequence of events.⁷ Ipso facto, the covenant concept’s definition identifies certain referents or narrative elements that are sequenced in a characteristic way, which formalize it. This may explain why the covenant concept is found interconnected in a range of books in both testaments of Christian scripture. The covenant concept as defined above incorporates the meanings of narratives that are structured similarly in different linguistic, cultural and generational contexts. In this sense the covenant concept seems to display a derived historical character. Yet as stated above the operationalization of the covenant concept varies with differences at the phenomenal level. Each occurrence of the concept is subjected to differing socio-cultural and religious influences yielding many different interpretations or theological emphases yet lend themselves to incorporation into the definition of the core concept. Based on this reasoning it would seem that the issue reflected by the disparity between the concept’s clear resonance and variegated operationalizations is essentially the relation of “history” and “theology”. How is this possible since history and theology, the historical and theological methods, do not mix as is argued chiefly by Troeltsch and Räisänen?⁸ How is the covenant concept able to relate history and theology ←3 | 4→so that it retains its integrity as a concept? This problematic is indeed an essential and relevant question that stills the air and readies listeners to hear the Lukan voice on covenant. The covenant concept’s ability to relate “history” and “theology” is best explained by the combined analyzes of Poststructuralism as conveyed by the seminal framework of Barthes (1972), later re-articulated,⁹ and of Social Memory Theory represented by the seminal work of Assmann (2011).

Poststructuralism, Barthes and Luke-Acts

Poststructuralism encompasses a wide spectrum of approaches and is therefore best understood in its seminal form. This strategy sets the tone for this study by clarifying the understanding of history and casting light on the constructivist character of historic texts, specifically on the difference between the signifier and the signified.¹⁰ Barthes advances Saussure’s initial postulate by developing a semiological system that is agreeable with historical criticism and “does not in any way contradict the necessary principles of totality and History.”¹¹ Barthes is interested in the function of mythology, which he defines as “a system of communication, that it is a message […] a mode of signification” whether verbal, visual or written. He states that myth “converts history into nature” it naturalizes “particular convictions and values.”¹² The text therefore, “is an effect of the meanings and values in circulation at its own historical moment.”¹³

Barthes in Mythologies investigates why and how knowledge becomes natural. He explains that it is the acceptance of a myth, informed by primarily by bourgeois thinking, which leads to the naturalization of knowledge. A myth according to Barthes is constructed from a previously existing semiological chain called a linguistic system.¹⁴ A sign in this initial chain is the result of the associative total of a signifier and signified. Myth takes the modes of representation of language in ←4 | 5→the linguistic system (a global sign or a sum of signs) and builds a second mythical system, a second-order system, by changing the linguistic system’s sign into its own signifier. The final term of the linguistic system, the sign, which becomes the first term of the mythical system, a signifier, is apprehended already containing meaning and its own signification, “a sufficient rationality […] a kind of knowledge, a past, a memory, a comparative order of facts, ideas, decisions.”¹⁵ Yet when the myth takes the linguistic sign it also empties and impoverishes it of history regressing it “from meaning to form”.¹⁶ Hence, this mythical signifier, according to Barthes “is at the same time meaning and form, full on the one side and empty on the other.”¹⁷ Yet, as form the mythical signifier does not eradicate meaning altogether but only diminishes its value, distances it without completely severing ties to it, since it still requires reference to it. However it is not the form of the mythical signifier that accesses this meaning but it is through the myth’s signified, called concept. As Barthes states, “this history which drains out of the form will be wholly absorbed by the concept”,¹⁸ which is open to “the whole of History” and is “a certain knowledge of reality” since it can draw on the abundance of several signifiers.¹⁹ Yet the knowledge contained in the concept “is confused, made of yielding, shapeless associations […] not at all abstract, purified essence; it is a formless, unstable, nebulous condensation, whose unity and coherence are above all due to its function.”²⁰ What brings coherence? It is by the signification of the myth. The correlation of the mythical form and the mythical concept results in signification, which is the myth itself. According to Barthes, the signification of the myth occurs by the relational process of deformation, in which the mythical concept alternates between the mythical signifier and its form thus distorting the meaning. This process is halted and delineated by reality – which process will re-engage, as the mythical concept is not fixed.²¹ What this means is that present historical reality and intentionality stop the deformation process. The concept then is determined “at once historical and intentional”.²² As history it supplies the form with partial analogies and at the same time as the intentionality of history ←5 | 6→it defines myth’s speech.²³ In this manner the mythical signification is motivated and uttered.²⁴ This yields myth as naturalized, a socially usable communication.