APOCALYPTIC
AND
APOCRYPHAL
book was translated into English by the last-named writer {op. cit. pp. 1-167), and into German by Ryssel (Kautzsch’s Apok. und Pseud. 1900, ii. pp. 413-446). The Syriac is translated from the Greek; for Greek words are occasionally transliterated, and passages can be explained only on the hypothesis that the wrong alternative meanings of certain Greek words were followed by the translator. The Greek in turn is derived from the Hebrew, for unintelligible expressions in the Syriac can be explained and the text restored by retranslation into Hebrew. Many paronomasicB discover themselves in the course of such retranslation (see ^harles, Apoc. Bar. pp. xliv.-liii.). The necessity of postulating a Hebrew original was first shown by the present writer, and has since been maintained by Wellhausen {Skizzen u. Vorarbeiten, vi. 234) and by Ryssel {Apok. und Pseudepig. A. T. 1900, ii. 411). The final editor of the work writes in the name of Baruch, the son of Neriah. The time extends from the eve of the capture of Jerusalem by the Chaldees till after its accomplishment. If the letter to the tribes in captivity (Ixxviii.Ixxxvi.) be disregarded, the book falls into seven sections separated by fasts, save in one case (after xxxv.) where the text is probably defective. These sections, which are of unequal length, are—(1) i.-v. 6 ; (2) v. 7-viii.; (3) ix.-xii. 4 ; (4) xii. 5-xx.; (5) xxi.-xxxv.; (6) xxxvi.-xlvi.; (7) xlvii.Ixxvii. These treat of the Messiah and the Messianic kingdom, the woes of Israel in the past and the destruction of Jerusalem in the present, as wTell as of theological questions relating to original sin, free will, works, the number of the saved, the nature of the resurrection body, &c. The views expressed on several of the above subjects are often conflicting. In one class of passages there is everywhere manifest a vigorous optimism as to Israel’s ultimate well-being on earth, and the blessedness of the chosen people in the Messianic kingdom is sketched in glowing and sensuous colours (xxix., xxxix.-xl., Ixiii.-lxxiv.). Over against these passages stand others of a hopelessly pessimistic character, wherein, alike as to Israel’s present and future destiny on earth, there is written nothing save “lamentation, and mourning, and woe.” The world is a scene of corruption, its evils are irremediable, its end is nigh, and the advent of the new and spiritual world at hand. The first to draw attention to the composite elements in this book was Kabisch {Jahrbudier f. protest. Theol. 1891, pp. 66-107). This critic regarded xxiv. 3-xxix., xxxvi.-xl., and liii.-lxxiv. as independent sources written before the fall of Jerusalem, a.d. 70, and his groundwork, which consists of the rest of his book, with the exception of a few verses, as composed after that date. All these elements were put together by a Christian contemporary of Papias. Many of these conclusions were arrived at independently by a French scholar, De Faye {Les Apocalypses Juives, 1892, pp. 2528, 76-103, 192-204). The present writer {Apocalypse of Baruch, 1896, pp. liii.-lxvii.), after submitting the book to a fresh study, has come to the following conclusions .——The book is of Pharisaic authorship and composed of six independent writings—A1, A2, A3, B1, IP, B3.. The first three were composed when Jerusalem was still standing and the Messiah and the Messianic kingdom were expected : A1, a mutilated apocalypse = xxvii.-xxx. 1; A", the Cedar and Vine Vision = xxxvi.-xl.; A3, the Cloud V ision = liii.-lxxiv. The last three were written after a.d. 70, and probably before 90. Thus B3 = Ixxxy. was written by a Jew in exile, who, despairing of a national restoration, looked only for a spiritual recompense in heaven. The rest of the book is derived from B1 and B2, written in Palestine after a.d. 70. These writings belong to very different types of thought. In B1 the earthly Jerusalem is to be rebuilt, but not so in B2: in the former the exiles are to be restored, but not in the latter; in the former a
LITERATURE
489
Messianic kingdom without a Messiah is expected, but no earthly blessedness of any kind in the latter, &c. B1 = i.ix. l,xxxii. 2-4, xliii.-xliv.7,xlv.-xlvi.,lxxvii.-lxxxii.,lxxxiv., Ixxxvi.-lxxxvii. B2 = ix.-xxv., xxx. 2-xxxv., xli.-xlii., xliv. 8-15, xlvii.-lii., Ixxv.-lxxvi., Ixxxiii. The above critical analyses were attacked and rejected by Clemen {Stud, und Krit. 1898, 211 sqp). He fails, however, in many cases to recognize the difficulties at issue, and those which cannot be ignored he sets down to the conflicting apocalyptic traditions on which the author was obliged to draw for his subject-matter. Though Ryssel (Kautzsch, Apok. u. Pseud, des A. T. ii. 409) has followed Clemen, neither has given any real explanation ol the disorder of the book as it stands at present. Relation to 4 Asm.—The affinities of this book and 4 Ezra are so numerous (see Charles, op. cit. 170-171) that Ewald and Ryle assumed identity of authorship. But their points of divergence are so weighty (see op. cit. pp. Ixix.-Ixxi.) that this view cannot be sustained. Three courses still remain open. It we assume that both works are composite, we shall perforce admit that some of the constituents of 4 Ezra are older than the latest of Baruch and that other constituents of Baruch are decidedly older than the remaining ones of 4 Ezra. On the other hand, if we assume unity of authorship, it seems impossible to arrive at finality on the chronological relations of these two works. Langen, Hilgenfeld, Wieseler, Stahelin, Renan, Hausrath, Drummond, Dillmann, Rosenthal, Gunkel, have maintained on various grounds the priority of 4 Ezra ; and Schiirer, Bissell, Thomson, Deane, Kabisch, De Faye, Wellhausen, and Ryssel the priority of Baruch on grounds no less convincing. Integrity of the Book.—In Ixxvii. 19 it is said that Baruch wrote two epistles, one to the nine and a-half tribes and the other to the two and a-half at Babylon. The former is found in Ixxviii. -Ixxxvi.; the latter is lost, but is probably preserved either wholly or in part in the Book of Baruch, iii. 9-iv. 29 (see Charles, op. cit. pp. Ixv.Ixvii.). On the other hand, it is not necessary to infer from Ixxv. that an account of Baruch’s assumption was to be looked for in the book. Literature.—In addition to the works cited above, see Rosenthal, Vier apokryphische Bucher, 1885, pp. 72-103 ; Deane, Pseudepigrapha, 1891, pp. 130-162. For a full bibliography see Schiirer, Gesch. d. Jud. Volkes3, 1898, iii. 223-232, and Charles {op. cit. pp. xxx.-xlii.), Ethiopic Book of Enoch.—This is the most important of all the apocryphal or pseudepigraphal writings for the history of religious thought (see Charles, Book of Enoch, 33-53, 312-317, Eschatology: Hebrew, Jewish, and Christian, 1899, pp. 182-192, 203-219). It is quoted by name as a genuine production in the Epistle of Jude 14 sq., and it lies at the base of Matt. xix. 28 and John v. 22, 27, and other passages. It had also a vast indirect influence on the Palestinian literature of the 1st century of our era. Like the Pentateuch, the Psalms, the Megilloth, the Pirke Aboth, this work was divided into five parts, with the critical discussion of which we shall deal below. Modern scholars are agreed that Enoch was originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic. Halevy, Journal Asiatigue, 1867, pp. 352395, is in favour of the former view; but the latter is now more generally advocated on the ground of Aramaic forms in the Gizeh Greek fragment, <f>ovKa, xviii. 8, from T|'S fiav8o/3apa in xxviii. 1, and ^afSbrjpa in xxix. 1, from lanp and ^epov(3iv in xiv. 11, 18. On the other hand, it must be remembered that some Aramaic forms are found in the LXX. and in the Ethiopic version of the Old Testament. Hence, in the face of the powerful arguments of Halevy for a Hebrew original, the question cannot be regarded as yet settled. The Semitic original was translated into Greek. It is not improbable that there were two distinct Greek versions. Of the one several fragments have been preserved in Syncellus (a.d. 800), vi.ix. 4, viii. 4-x. 14, xv. 8-xvi. 1 ; of the other i.-xxxii. in the Gizeh Greek fragment discovered in Egypt and published by Bouriant, Fragments grecs du livre d'Enoch, in 1892, and subsequently by Lods, Dillmann, Charles, Swete, and finally by Flemming and Radermacher. In addition to these fragments there is that of Ixxxix. 42-49 (see Gildemeister in the ZD MG, 1855, pp. S. I. — 62
