1 BIBLICAL BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT The two chapters of Part 2 examine the content, context and provenance of the promise of New Covenant in Heb. 8:10b. These chapters provide grounding for the validation of ministry outcomes derived from this stich. Chapter 4 considers the Old Testament background; Chapter 5, the New. These chapters pay close attention to the message of this stich in Jeremiah and Hebrews. They also consider related passages in Ezekiel. They examine the historical and theological background of the themes of covenant in general and the New Covenant in particular. They draw on rhetorical criticism to demonstrate the central importance of the New Covenant to the intent of the authors of Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Hebrews. 1 1 Rhetorical criticism is an effective method for the examination of intent: or as Muilenburg puts it, the discovering of “the text and fabric of the writer’s thought“. James Muilenburg, ‘Form Criticism and Beyond’, Journal of Biblical Literature 88, no. 1 (1969): 7, https://doi.org/10.2307/3262829. The rhetorical-critical approach drawn upon for the book of Jeremiah is that of Lundbom. See Jack R. Lundbom, Jeremiah: A Study in Ancient Hebrew Rhetoric, Second edition (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1997); Jack R. Lundbom, Jeremiah 21-36: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, vol. 21B, Anchor Bible Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 2004); Jack R. Lundbom, Writing Up Jeremiah: The Prophet and the Book (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2013). For Ezekiel see Thomas Renz, The Rhetorical Function of the Book of Ezekiel (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 1999). For Hebrews see David Mark Heath, ‘Chiastic Structures in Hebrews: A Study of Form and Function in Biblical Discourse’ (Stellenbosch, South Africa, University of Stellenbosch, 2011).