Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write off the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Monday, August 22, 2016

Index - Apocrypha & Pseudepigrapha





Index to Studies in the
Apocrypha & Pseudepigrapha


What is the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha? How are they to be Read and Studied?

NASSCAL: Studies in Christian Apocrypha - How to Submit Essays, Editions, Monographs, etc.

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 1

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 2

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 3

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 4

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 5

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 6

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 1 Enoch, Part 7 Final

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 2 Enoch

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 3 Enoch

The Sibylline Oracles of the Pseudepigrapha, Part 1

The Sibylline Oracles of the Pseudepigrapha, Part 2

The Sibylline Oracles of the Pseudepigrapha, Part 3 Final


Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 4 Ezra

Phillip J. Long - Discussion of 2 Baruch

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~ MORE TO COME ~

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List of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha

Pseudepigrapha are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed author is not the true author, or a work whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past. Some of these works may have originated among JewishHellenizers, others may have Christian authorship in character and origin.

1. Apocalyptic and related works:

1 (Ethiopic Apocalypse of) Enoch (Jewish, ca. 200 BCE–50 CE)
2 (Slavonic Apocalypse of) Enoch (Jewish, ca. 75–100 CE)
3 (Hebrew Apocalypse of) Enoch (Jewish, in present form from ca. 5th to 6th cent. CE)
Sibylline Oracles (both Jewish and Christian, ca. 2nd cent. BCE–7th cent. CE)
Treatise of Shem (ca. near end of first cent. BCE)
Apocryphon of Ezekiel (mostly lost, original form ca. late 1st cent.BCE)
Apocalypse of Zephaniah (mostly lost, original form ca. late 1st cent. BCE)
4 Ezra (original Jewish form after 70 CE, final Christian additions later)
Greek Apocalypse of Ezra (present form is Christian ca. 9th cent.CE with both Jewish and Christian sources)
Vision of Ezra (a Christian document dating from 4th to 7th cent.CE)
Questions of Ezra (Christian, but date is imprecise)
Revelation of Ezra (Christian and sometime before 9th cent. CE)
Apocalypse of Sedrach (present form is Christian from ca. 5th cent. with earlier sources)
2 (Syriac Apocalypse of) Baruch (Jewish, from ca. 100 CE)
3 (Greek Apocalypse of) Baruch (Christian utilizing Jewish sources, ca. 1st–2nd cent. CE)
Apocalypse of Abraham (Jewish primarily, ca. 70–150 CE)
Apocalypse of Adam (Gnostic derived from Jewish sources from ca. the 1st cent. CE)
Apocalypse of Elijah (both Jewish and Christian, ca. 150–275 CE)
Apocalypse of Daniel (present form ca. 9th cent. CE, but contains Jewish sources from ca. 4th cent. CE).

2. Testaments:

Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (current form is Christian, ca. 150–200 CE, but Levi, Judah, and Naphtali are Jewish and date before 70 CE and probably 2nd–1st cent. BCE)
Testament of Job (Jewish, ca. late 1st cent. BCE)
Testaments of the Three Patriarchs (Jewish Testaments of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob from ca. 100 CE which are linked with the Christian Testament of Isaac and Jacob)
Testament of Moses (Jewish, from ca. early 1st cent. CE)
Testament of Solomon (Jewish, current form ca. 3rd cent. CE, but earliest form ca. 100 CE)
Testament of Adam (Christian in current form ca. late 3rd cent. CE, but used Jewish sources from ca. 150–200 CE).

3. Expansions of Old Testament and other legends:

The Letter of Aristeas (Jewish, ca. 200–150 BCE)
Jubilees (Jewish, ca. 130–100 CE)
Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah (has three sections, the first Jewish from ca. 100 BCE, and 2nd and 3rd sections are Christian. The second from ca. 2nd cent. CE, and the third— Testament of Hezekiah, ca. 90–100 CE)
Joseph and Asenath (Jewish, ca. 100 CE)
Life of Adam and Eve (Jewish, ca. early to middle 1st cent. CE)
Pseudo-Philo (Jewish, ca. 66–135 CE)
Lives of the Prophets (Jewish, ca. early 1st cent. CE with later Christian additions)
Ladder of Jacob (earliest form is Jewish dating from late 1st cent.CE. One chapter is Christian)
4 Baruch (Jewish original but edited by a Christian, ca. 100–110 CE)
Jannes and Jambres (Christian in present form, but dependent on earlier Jewish sources from ca. 1st cent. BCE)
History of the Rechabites (Christian in present form dating ca. 6th cent. CE, but contains some Jewish sources before 100 CE)
Eldad and Modat (forged on basis of Numbers 11.26–29, before the 1st CE is now lost, but quoted in Shepherd of Hermas ca. 140 CE)
History of Joseph (Jewish, but difficult to date).

4. Wisdom and Philosophical Literature:

Ahiqar (Jewish dating from late 7th or 6th cent. BCE and cited in Apocryphal Tobit)
3 Maccabees (Jewish, ca. 1st cent. BCE)
4 Maccabees (Jewish, ca. before 70 CE)
Pseudo-Phocylides (Jewish maxims attributed to 6th cent. Ionic poet, ca. 50 BCE–100 CE)
The Sentences of the Syriac Menander (Jewish, ca. 3rd cent. CE).

5. Prayers, Psalms, and Odes:

More Psalms of David (Jewish psalms from ca. 3rd cent. BCE to 100 CE)
Prayer of Manasseh (sometimes in Apocrypha, Jewish from ca. early 1st cent. CE)
Psalms of Solomon (Jewish, ca. 50–5 BCE)
Hellenistic Synagogal Prayers (Jewish, ca. 2nd–3rd cent. CE)
Prayer of Joseph (Jewish, ca. 70–135)
Prayer of Jacob (mostly lost Jewish document from ca. 4th cent. CE)
Odes of Solomon (Christian but influenced by Judaism and probably also Qumran, ca. 100 CE)
See also[edit]
Apocrypha for books rejected by Jews but accepted by some Christians
New Testament apocrypha for books in the style of the New Testament



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Biblical Apocrypha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_apocrypha
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about a class of books included in some Bibles.
For other books generally excluded from Bibles, see Apocrypha.

This article is about biblical books printed apart from the New and Old Testaments.
For books whose inclusion in the Old Testament canon is controversial,

The Biblical apocrypha (from the  Greek ἀπόκρυφος, apókruphos, meaning "hidden") denotes the collection of ancient books found, in some editions of the Bible, in a separate section between the Old and New Testaments[1] or as an appendix after the New Testament.[2] Although the term apocrypha had been in use since the 5th century, it was in Luther's Bible of 1534 that the Apocrypha was first published as a separate intertestamental section.[3] To this date, the Apocrypha is "included in the lectionaries of Anglican and Lutheran Churches."[4] Moreover, the Revised Common Lectionary, in use by most mainline Protestants including Methodists and Moravians, lists readings from the Apocrypha in the liturgicalkalendar, although alternate Old Testament scripture lessons are provided.[5]
The preface to the Apocrypha in the Geneva Bible explained that while these books "were not received by a common consent to be read and expounded publicly in the Church," and did not serve "to prove any point of Christian religion save in so much as they had the consent of the other scriptures called canonical to confirm the same," nonetheless, "as books proceeding from godly men they were received to be read for the advancement and furtherance of the knowledge of history and for the instruction of godly manners."[6] Later, during the English Civil War, the Westminster Confession of 1647 excluded the Apocrypha from the canon and made no recommendation of the Apocrypha above "other human writings",[7]and this attitude towards the Apocrypha is represented by the decision of the British and Foreign Bible Society in the early 19th century not to print it (see below). Today, "English Bibles with the Apocrypha are becoming more popular again" and they are often printed as intertestamental books.[8]
Most of the books of the Protestant Apocrypha are called deuterocanonical by Catholics per the Council of Trent and all of them are called anagignoskomena by the Eastern Orthodox per the Synod of Jerusalem. The Anglican Communion accepts "the Apocrypha for instruction in life and manners, but not for the establishment of doctrine (Article VI in the Thirty-Nine Articles)",[9] and many "lectionary readings in The Book of Common Prayer are taken from the Apocrypha", with these lessons being "read in the same ways as those from the Old Testament".[10] The Protestant Apocrypha contains three books (3 Esdras, 4 Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh) that are accepted by many Eastern Orthodox Churches and Oriental Orthodox Churches as canonical, but are regarded as non-canonical by the Catholic Church and are therefore not included in modern Catholic Bibles.[11]

Biblical canon

Vulgate prologues

Jerome completed his version of the Bible, the Latin Vulgate, in 405. In the Middle Ages the Vulgate became the de facto standard version of the Bible in the West. The Vulgate manuscripts included prologues[12] that Jerome clearly identified certain books of the Vulgate Old Testament as apocryphal or non-canonical.
In the prologue to the books of Samuel and Kings, which is often called the Prologus Galeatus, he says:[13]
This preface to the Scriptures may serve as a “helmeted” introduction to all the books which we turn from Hebrew into Latin, so that we may be assured that what is not found in our list must be placed amongst the Apocryphal writings. Wisdom, therefore, which generally bears the name of Solomon, and the book of Jesus, the Son of Sirach, and Judith, and Tobias, and the Shepherd are not in the canon. The first book of Maccabees I have found to be Hebrew, the second is Greek, as can be proved from the very style.
In the prologue to Esdras he mentions 3 and 4 Esdras as being apocrypha.[14] In his prologue to the books of Solomon, he says:[15]
Also included is the book of the model of virtue (παναρετος) Jesus son of Sirach, and another falsely ascribed work (ψευδεπιγραφος) which is titled Wisdom of Solomon. The former of these I have also found in Hebrew, titled not Ecclesiasticus as among the Latins, but Parables, to which were joined Ecclesiastes and Song of Songs, as though it made of equal worth the likeness not only of the number of the books of Solomon, but also the kind of subjects. The second was never among the Hebrews, the very style of which reeks of Greek eloquence. And none of the ancient scribes affirm this one is of Philo Judaeus. Therefore, just as the Church also reads the books of Judith, Tobias, and the Maccabees, but does not receive them among the canonical Scriptures, so also one may read these two scrolls for the strengthening of the people, (but) not for confirming the authority of ecclesiastical dogmas.
He mentions the book of Baruch in his prologue to the Jeremias and does not explicitly refer to it as apocryphal, but he does mention that "it is neither read nor held among the Hebrews".[16] In his prologue to the Judith he mentions that "among the Hebrews, the authority [of Judith] came into contention", but that it was "counted in the number of Sacred Scriptures" by the First Council of Nicaea.[17] In his reply to Rufinus, he affirmed that he was consistent with the choice of the church regarding which version of the deuterocanonical portions of Daniel to use, which the Jews of his day did not include:
What sin have I committed in following the judgment of the churches? But when I repeat what the Jews say against the Story of Susanna and the Hymn of the Three Children, and the fables of Bel and the Dragon, which are not contained in the Hebrew Bible, the man who makes this a charge against me proves himself to be a fool and a slanderer; for I explained not what I thought but what they commonly say against us. (Against Rufinus, II:33 [AD 402]).[18]
According to Michael Barber, although Jerome was once suspicious of the apocrypha, he later viewed them as Scripture as shown in his epistles. Barber cites Jerome's letter to Eustochium, in which Jerome quotes Sirach 13:2.;[19] elsewhere Jerome also refers to Baruch, the Story of Susannah and Wisdom as scripture.[20][21][22]

Apocrypha in editions of the Bible

Apocrypha are well attested in surviving manuscripts of the Christian Bible. (See, for example, Codex VaticanusCodex SinaiticusCodex AlexandrinusVulgate, and Peshitta.) After the Lutheran and Catholic canons were defined by Luther (c. 1534) and Trent[23] (8 April 1546) respectively, early Protestant editions of the Bible (notably the Luther Bible in German and 1611 King James Version in English) did not omit these books, but placed them in a separate Apocrypha section apart from the Old and New Testaments to indicate their status.

Gutenberg Bible

This famous edition of the Vulgate was published in 1455. Like the manuscripts it was based on, the Gutenberg Bible lacked a specific Apocrypha section;[24] its Old Testament included the books that Jerome considered apocryphal, and those Clement VIII later moved to the appendix. The Prayer of Manasses was located after the Books of Chronicles, and 3 and 4 Esdras followed 2 Esdras (Nehemiah), and Prayer of Solomon followedEcclesiasticus.

Luther Bible

Martin Luther translated the Bible into German during the early part of the 16th century, first releasing a complete Bible in 1534. His Bible was the first major edition to have a separate section called Apocrypha. Books and portions of books not found in the Masoretic Text of Judaism were moved out of the body of the Old Testament to this section.[25] Luther placed these books between the Old and New Testaments. For this reason, these works are sometimes known as inter-testamental books. The books 1 and 2 Esdras were omitted entirely.[26] Luther was making a polemical point about the canonicity of these books. As an authority for this division, he cited St. Jerome, who in the early 5th century distinguished the Hebrew and Greek Old Testaments,[27] stating that books not found in the Hebrew were not received as canonical. Although his statement was controversial in his day,[28]Jerome was later titled a Doctor of the Church and his authority was also cited in the Anglican statement in 1571 of the Thirty-Nine Articles.[29]
Luther also expressed some doubts about the canonicity of four New Testament books, although he never called them apocrypha: the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Epistles of James and Jude, and the Revelation to John. He did not put them in a separate named section, but he did move them to the end of his New Testament.[30]

Clementine Vulgate

In 1592, Pope Clement VIII published his revised edition of the Vulgate, referred to as the Sixto-Clementine Vulgate. He moved three books not found in the canon of the Council of Trent from the Old Testament into an appendix "lest they utterly perish" (ne prorsus interirent).[31]
The protocanonical and deuterocanonical books he placed in their traditional positions in the Old Testament.

King James Version

The English-language King James Version (KJV) of 1611 followed the lead of the Luther Bible in using an inter-testamental section labelled "Books called Apocrypha", or just "Apocrypha" at the running page header.[32] The KJV followed the Geneva Bible of 1560 almost exactly (variations are marked below). The section contains the following:[33]
Included in this list are those books of the Clementine Vulgate that were not in Luther's canon. These are the books most frequently referred to by the casual appellation "the Apocrypha". These same books are also listed inArticle VI of the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England.[34] Despite being placed in the Apocrypha, in the table of lessons at the front of some printings of the King James Bible, these books are included under the Old Testament.

The Bible and the Puritan revolution

The British Puritan revolution of the 1600s brought a change in the way many British publishers handled the apocryphal material associated with the Bible. The Puritans used the standard of Sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone) to determine which books would be included in the canon. The Westminster Confession of Faith, composed during the British Civil Wars (1642–1651), excluded the Apocrypha from the canon. The Confession provided the rationale for the exclusion: 'The books commonly called Apocrypha, not being of divine inspiration, are no part of the canon of the Scripture, and therefore are of no authority in the church of God, nor to be any otherwise approved, or made use of, than other human writings' (1.3).[35] Thus, Bibles printed by English Protestants who separated from the Church of England began to exclude these books.

Other early Bible editions

In the Zürich Bible (1529–30) they are placed in an Appendix. They include 3 Maccabees, along with 1 Esdras & 2 Esdras. The 1st edition omitted the Prayer of Manasseh and the Rest of Esther, although these were included in the 2nd edition. The French Bible (1535) of Pierre Robert Olivétan placed them between the Testaments, with the subtitle, "The volume of the apocryphal books contained in the Vulgate translation, which we have not found in the Hebrew or Chaldee".All English translations of the Bible printed in the sixteenth century included a section or appendix for Apocryphal books. Matthew's Bible, published in 1537, contains all the Apocrypha of the later King James Version in an inter-testamental section. The 1538 Myles Coverdale Bible contained an Apocrypha that excluded Baruch and the Prayer of Manasseh. The 1560 Geneva Bible placed the Prayer of Manasseh after 2 Chronicles; the rest of the Apocrypha were placed in an inter-testamental section. The Douay-Rheims Bible (1582–1609) placed the Prayer of Manasseh and 3 and 4 Esdras into an Appendix of the second volume of the Old Testament.
In 1569 the Spanish Reina Bible, following the example of the pre-Clementine Latin Vulgate, contained the deuterocanonical books in its Old Testament. Following the other Protestant translations of its day, Valera's 1602 revision of the Reina Bible moved these books into an inter-testamental section.

Modern editions

All King James Bibles published before 1666 included the Apocrypha,[36] though separately to denote them as not equal to Scripture proper, as noted by Jerome in the Vulgate, to which he gave the name, "The Apocrypha."[37] In 1826,[38] the National Bible Society of Scotland petitioned the British and Foreign Bible Society not to print the Apocrypha,[39] resulting in a decision that no BFBS funds were to pay for printing any Apocryphal books anywhere. Since that time most modern editions of the Bible and reprintings of the King James Bible omit the Apocrypha section. In the 18th century, the Apocrypha section was omitted from the Challoner revision of the Douay-Rheims version. In the 1979 revision of the Vulgate, the section was dropped. Modern reprintings of the Clementine Vulgate commonly omit the Apocrypha section. Many reprintings of older versions of the Bible now omit the apocrypha and many newer translations and revisions have never included them at all.
There are some exceptions to this trend, however. Some editions of the Revised Standard Version and the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible include not only the Apocrypha listed above, but also the third and fourthbooks of Maccabees, and Psalm 151.
The American Bible Society lifted restrictions on the publication of Bibles with the Apocrypha in 1964. The British and Foreign Bible Society followed in 1966.[40] The Stuttgart edition of the Vulgate (the printed edition, not most of the on-line editions), which is published by the UBS, contains the Clementine Apocrypha as well as the Epistle to the Laodiceans and Psalm 151.
Brenton's edition of the Septuagint includes all of the Apocrypha found in the King James Bible with the exception of 2 Esdras, which was not in the Septuagint and is no longer extant in Greek.[41] He places them in a separate section at the end of his Old Testament, following English tradition.
In Greek circles, however, these books are not traditionally called Apocrypha, but Anagignoskomena (ἀναγιγνωσκόμενα), and are integrated into the Old Testament. The Orthodox Study Bible, published by Thomas Nelson Publishers, includes the Anagignoskomena in its Old Testament, with the exception of 4 Maccabees. This was translated by the Saint Athanasius Academy of Orthodox Theology, from the Rahlfs Edition of the Septuagint using Brenton's English translation and the RSV Expanded Apocrypha as boilerplate. As such, they are included in the Old Testament with no distinction between these books and the rest of the Old Testament. This follows the tradition of the Eastern Orthodox Church where the Septuagint is the received version of Old Testament scripture, considered itself inspired in agreement with some of the Fathers, such as St Augustine, rather than the Hebrew Masoretic text followed by all other modern translations.[42]

Anagignoskomena

The Septuagint, the ancient and best known Greek version of the Old Testament, contains books and additions that are not present in the Hebrew Bible. These texts are not traditionally segregated into a separate section, nor are they usually called apocrypha. Rather, they are referred to as the Anagignoskomena (ἀναγιγνωσκόμενα, "things that are read" or "profitable reading"). The anagignoskomena are TobitJudithWisdom of SolomonWisdom of Jesus ben Sira (Sirach)BaruchLetter of Jeremiah (in the Vulgate this is chapter 6 of Baruch), additions to Daniel (The Prayer of AzariasSusanna and Bel and the Dragon), additions to Esther1 Maccabees2 Maccabees3 Maccabees1 Esdras, i.e. all of the Deuterocanonical books plus 3 Maccabees and 1 Esdras.[43]
Some editions add additional books, such as Psalm 151 or the Odes (including the Prayer of Manasses). 2 Esdras is added as an appendix in the Slavonic Bibles and 4 Maccabees as an appendix in Greek editions.[43]

Pseudepigrapha

Technically, a pseudepigraphon is a book written in a biblical style and ascribed to an author who did not write it. In common usage, however, the term pseudepigrapha is often used by way of distinction to refer to apocryphal writings that do not appear in printed editions of the Bible, as opposed to the texts listed above. Examples[44] include:
Often included among the pseudepigrapha are 3 and 4 Maccabees because they are not traditionally found in western Bibles, although they are in the Septuagint. Similarly, the Book of EnochBook of Jubilees and 4 Baruch are often listed with the pseudepigrapha although they are commonly included in Ethiopian Bibles. The Psalms of Solomon are found in some editions of the Septuagint.

Classification



It is hardly possible to form any classification not open to some objection. Scholars are still divided as to the original language, date, and place of composition of some of the books that come under this provisional attempt at order. (Thus some of the additions to Daniel and the Prayer of Manasseh are most probably derived from a Semitic original written in Palestine, yet in compliance with the prevailing opinion they are classed under Hellenistic Jewish literature. Again, the Slavonic Enoch goes back undoubtedly in parts to a Semitic original, though most of it may have been written by a Greek Jew in Egypt.)The Apocrypha of the King James Bible constitutes the books of the Vulgate that are present neither in the Hebrew Old Testament nor the Greek New Testament. Since these are derived from the Septuagint, from which the old Latin version was translated, it follows that the difference between the KJV and the Roman Catholic Old Testaments is traceable to the difference between the Palestinian and the Alexandrian canons of the Old Testament. This is only true with certain reservations, as the Latin Vulgate was revised by Jerome according to the Hebrew, and, where Hebrew originals were not found, according to the Septuagint. Furthermore, the Vulgate omits 3 and 4 Maccabees, which generally appear in the Septuagint, while the Septuagint and Luther's Bible omit 2 Esdras, which is found in the Apocrypha of the Vulgate and the King James Bible. Luther's Bible, moreover, also omits 1 Esdras. It should further be observed that the Clementine Vulgate places the Prayer of Manasses and 3 Esdras and 4 Esdras in an appendix after the New Testament as apocryphal.

A distinction can be made between the Palestinian and the Hellenistic literature of the Old Testament, though even this is open to serious objections. The former literature was written in Hebrew or Aramaic, and seldom in Greek; the latter in Greek.
Next, within these literatures there are three or four classes of subject material.
  • Historical,
  • Legendary (Haggadic),
  • Apocalyptic,
  • Didactic or Sapiential.
The Apocrypha proper then would be classified as follows:--

Cultural impact

  • Christopher Columbus was said to have been inspired by "Six parts hast Thou dried up." from 4 Esdras 6:42 to undertake his hazardous journey across the Atlantic.[45]
  • The introitus, "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them", of the traditional Requiem in the Catholic Church is loosely based on 4 Esdras 2:34–35.
  • The alternative introitus for Quasimodo Sunday in the Roman rite of the Catholic Church is loosely based on 4 Esdras 2:36–37.
  • The Story of Susanna is perhaps the earliest example of a courtroom drama, and perhaps the first example of an effective forensic cross-examination (there are no others in the Bible: except perhaps Solomon's judgement at 1 Kings 3:25).
  • Bel and the Dragon is perhaps the earliest example of a locked room mystery.
  • Shylock's reference in The Merchant of Venice to "A Daniel come to judgment; yea, a Daniel!" refers to the story of Susanna and the elders.
  • The theme of the elders surprising Susanna in her bath is a common one in art, such as in paintings by Tintoretto and Artemisia Gentileschi, and in Wallace Stevens' poem Peter Quince at the Clavier.
  • Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, the title of James Agee's 1941 chronicle of Alabama sharecroppers, was taken from Ecclesiasticus 44:1: "Let us now praise famous men, and our fathers that begat us."
  • In his spiritual autobiography Grace Abounding to the Chief of SinnersJohn Bunyan recounts how God strengthened him against the temptation to despair of his salvation by inspiring him with the words, "Look at the generations of old and see: did any ever trust in God, and were confounded?"