In the rest frame of the nucleus, shadowing is due to hadronic fluctuations
of the incoming virtual photon, which interact with the nucleons. We expan
d these fluctuations in a basis of eigenstates of the interaction and take
only the q (q) over bar component of the hadronic structure of the photon i
nto account. We use a representation in which the q (q) over bar-pair has a
definite transverse size. Starting from the Dirac equation, we develop a p
ath integral approach that allows to sum all multiple scattering terms and
accounts for fluctuations of the transverse size of the pair, as well as fo
r the finite lifetime of the hadronic state. First numerical results show t
hat higher order scattering terms have a strong influence on the total cros
s section sigma(tot)(gamma*A). The aim of this paper is to give a detailed
derivation of the formula for the total cross section.