The Jewish Annotated Apocrypha

Description

Building on the success of the Jewish Annotated New Testament (JANT) and the Jewish Study Bible (JSB), Oxford University Press now proceeds to complete the trilogy with the Jewish Annotated Apocrypha (JAA). The books of the Apocrypha were virtually all composed by Jewish writers in the Second Temple period. Excluded from the Hebrew Bible, these works were preserved by Christians. Yet no complete, standalone edition of these works has been produced in English with an emphasis on Jewish tradition or with an educated Jewish audience in mind. The JAA meets this need.

• First edition of the Apocrypha addressed to a Jewish audience in the English language
• The first edition of the Apocrypha to include the book of Jubilees
• The first stand-alone Oxford Study Apocrypha to include an Introduction, essays, and sidebars

About the Author(s)

Edited by Jonathan Klawans, Professor of Religion, Professor of Religion, Boston University, and Edited by Lawrence M. Wills, Visiting Professor, Visiting Professor, Brown University

Jonathan Klawans is Professor of Religion at Boston University. He is the author of Impurity and Sin in Ancient Judaism, Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple, Josephus and the Theologies of Ancient Judaism, and Heresy, Forgery, Novelty . Lawrence M. Wills is visiting professor of Judaic Studies and Religious Studies at Brown University. His books include The Jewish Novel in the Ancient World, which was named an Outstanding Academic Book of 1995 by Choice magazine for academic librarians, and also Not God's People: Insiders and Outsiders in the Biblical World.

Table of Contents

Contributors
Contents
Maps, Charts, and Diagrams
Alphabetical Listing of the Books of the Apocrypha
List of Abbreviations
The Editors' Preface
To the Reader
Introduction
Law
Jubilees
Histories and Stories
1 Esdras
Expanded
Tobit
Judith
1 Maccabees
2 Maccabees
3 Maccabees
Prophecies
Letter of Jeremiah
Baruch
Additions to Daniel [3 Pieces]
Prayer of Azariah/Song of the Three
Susanna
Bel and the Dragon
4 Ezra
Poetry and Wisdom
Psalm 151
Prayer of Manasseh
Wisdom of Solomon
Ben Sira
4 Maccabees
ESSAYS
Social Contexts
The Babylonian and Persian Period: History and Culture
The Hellenistic Period: History and Culture
The Roman Period
Ancient Jewish Sectarianism
The Archaeology of Second Temple Judaism
The Hasmonean State and Ancient Jewish Nationalism
The Apocrypha, Canon, and Literary Contexts
Canon
The Septuagint
Dead Sea Scrolls
The Peshitta and the Syriac Biblical Context
The Apocrypha in Rabbinic Literature
Apocrypha in Medieval Hebrew Literature
Wisdom in the Apocrypha
Literary Approaches to the Apocrypha
The Incredible Expanding Bible: From the Dead Sea Scrolls to Haile Selassie
The Apocrypha and Jewish Life
Torah, Law, and Commandments
Prayer in the Apocrypha
Hanukkah in the Apocrypha
Jewish Heroes and the Apocrypha
Gender
Jewish Theology and the Apocrypha
Evil and Sin
Jewish Identity in the Apocrypha
Truth and Lies in Apocryphal Tales
TIMELINE
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF RULERS
TRANSLATIONS OF ANCIENT TEXTS
GLOSSARY
INDEX

Reviews

"It deserves to be part of the library of all scholars of Second Temple Judaism. It will also be particularly helpful in the classroom, presenting as it does a non-Christian interpretation of what most students know as Christian scripture. In that regard, it fulfills its mission admirably, as did the other volumes in this outstanding trilogy." - Sidnie White Crawford, University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, Dead Sea Discoveries 29

"Overall, this volume is an excellent reference book. It targets a Jewish audience, offering guidance for learning the Second Temple heritage which shaped later Judaism. But it would also be a valuable book for Christian students of the bible, not only because the so-called apocryphal texts are part of Scripture in Church tradition, but also because it is important to know the Judaic heritage that formed the foundation of Christianity." - Lydia Gore-Jones, Phronema

"...excellent essays..." - Rabbi Dr. Stu Halpern, The Zahava and Moshael Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought