#apocrypha readthrough

[lionofchaeronea]

Current reading in the Apocrypha is the Wisdom of Yeshua ben Sira, also known as Sirach or Ecclesiasticus. This work was long known only in the Greek translation by ben Sira's grandson, made in Ptolemaic Egypt in 132 BCE, but much of the original Hebrew has now been assembled from various sources, including the Cairo Genizah and the Dead Sea Scrolls. I've still got a ways to go -- it's a pretty long book -- but I do have some initial thoughts:

In some respects, ben Sira comes across as very conservative. The opening chapters put heavy stress on filial piety and respect for the wisdom of the aged. There's certainly nothing unprecedented about this in the Hebrew Bible, but the degree of emphasis is notable. It reminds me a little of Confucianism.

On the other side of the coin, ben Sira also repeatedly stresses the importance of almsgiving, the obligation to care for the poor and sick, and the need to give right judgments. This is very much in the social justice tradition found in (e.g.) the Minor Prophets.

Chapter 11, verse 28, immediately leapt out at me: "Call no one happy before his death; by his end, a person becomes known." (NRSV) Classics aficionados will recognize this as the exact sentiment voiced by Solon to Croesus before the latter's disastrous war with Cyrus in Herodotus's Histories. I have no idea whether ben Sira was actually familiar with Herodotus, but the coincidence is striking.

All in all, I'm enjoying the book. Wisdom literature just fascinates me, whether it comes from the Bible, Ancient Egypt, or Mesopotamia. I've even toyed with the idea of writing a monograph on it. Maybe one day.

[lionofchaeronea]

Current reading in the Apocrypha is the Wisdom of Solomon, sometimes simply called Wisdom. As the name makes pretty clear, it falls into the genre known as "wisdom literature," which also includes Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job, as well as many works from throughout Greece, the Near East, and Egypt.

What was especially interesting to me here was the sustained tension between Biblical tradition and Greek culture. The author is very much concerned to keep Greek philosophy at arm's length, and even, at times, to attack it. He criticizes Greek "make merry while we can" hedonism as it was practiced by the Cyrenaics and (at least in caricature) by the Epicureans; he also takes potshots at the natural philosophy of the Presocratics, making it clear that he doesn't believe water, fire, or any of the other posited material causes can explain the cosmos. In a related vein, he's fiercely opposed to Hellenistic ruler-cult, which he views as idolatry that's the worse morally by as much as the statue worshiped is more beautiful. Yet there are also traces of Greek influence on the author's thought. He accepts the four Aristotelian virtues of courage, wisdom, justice, and temperance, and he refers multiple times to the soul's being "imprisoned" in the body, which is very much a Platonic/Pythagorean idea.

This is all in keeping with the tenor of the apocryphal books I've read thus far. The Jews of the Hellenistic period clearly struggled with the question of how far, if at all, the Torah could be reconciled with the Greek way of looking at the world. It's really no wonder that the divisions between Hellenized and tradition-minded Jews turned into full-blown civil conflict under Antiochus IV Epiphanes.

[lionofchaeronea]

Current reading in the Apocrypha is the Greek version of the Book of Esther. Esther is among my favorite books in the Hebrew Bible/OT -- even beyond the proto-feminist overtones, it's just a really good story -- so this one holds particular interest for me.

The translation into Greek was done in the second or first century BCE, probably by one Lysimachus of Jerusalem, whose name is dropped at the end. It's significantly longer than the Hebrew original -- 16 chapters rather than 10 -- but the additions don't really change the basic plot so much as give it greater vividness. For example, where the Hebrew begins with Artaxerxes' drinking party in Susa, the Greek plunges us into a prophetic dream of Mordecai, which casts the struggle of the Jews against the nations in apocalyptic terms. (This opening actually creates some awkwardness, since it means we're introduced to Mordecai twice, genealogy and all.) In a similar vein, after Artaxerxes, prompted by Haman, issues a decree for the slaughter of the Jews throughout the Persian Empire, the Greek gives us what purports to be the text of the decree. This is very much in keeping with the Hellenistic fondness for "enhancing" historical narratives with letters that claim to be the ipsissima verba of a given character, usually a king or general, but which are in fact the composition of the historian.

The reasons for this version's exclusion from the OT canon are also interesting. The point at issue seems to have been, not the additions made by Lysimachus, but the simple fact that the book is in Greek, not in Hebrew. I can sympathize with this point of view, but at the same time, part of me feels it's a pity that the extended version was banished to the Apocrypha. It's such an interesting window into the complex interaction of Jewish and Greek cultural strands in Hellenistic Judaism.

[lionofchaeronea]

Just a quick note: I'm probably going to be posting off-and-on about the read-through of the Apocrypha I'm currently engaged in. My interest in those books is scholarly, and I'm definitely not out to proselytize, but I know some folks would rather not engage with posts that touch on religion, so I'll tag each post with "apocrypha readthrough". That way, if you'd prefer not to see them, you can just block that particular tag.