'Two parts: Weeks of seven weeks': The end of the age as terminus ad quem for 2 Baruch

Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha

Volumn 7, Issue 14, 1996, Pages 3-14

  Roddy, Nicolae ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA AT OMAHA   (United States)

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EID: 61149112495     PISSN: 09518207     EISSN: 17455286     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/095182079600001401     Document Type: Review

References (34)

1. See especially 2 Bar. 32. 2-3: 'For after a short time the building of Zion will be shaken that it might be rebuilt; but this building will not remain, for after a time it too will be uprooted. '
2. A. F. J. Klijn (trans. ), '2 (Syriac Apocalypse of) Baruch', OTP, I, pp. 616-17.
3. See also idem, 'The Sources and Redaction of the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch', JSS 1 (1970), pp. 65-76.
4. G. B. Sayler, Have the Promises Failed? A Literary Analysis of 2 Baruch (SBLDS, 72; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1984), p. 104.
5. Although somewhat dated, the most comprehensive summary of the problems of dating this apocalypse is provided by P. Bogaert, Apocalypse de Baruch: Introduction, traduction du Syriaque et commentaire (Sources chrétiennes, 144; Paris, 1969), pp. 270-92.
6. Klijn, '2 Baruch', pp. 616-17, 630 n. 28a.
7. There is, of course, also the spatial aspect of apocalypticism, as indicated in J. J. Collins's widely recognized definition of 'apocalypse' in 'Apocalypse: The Morphology of a Genre', Semeia 14 (1979).
8. Baruch's desire to have revealed knowledge of this cosmic order is just one of many wisdom motifs contained within the text. Cf. 1 En. 2. 1-5. 10, where cosmic order is presented as an example of unwavering obedience to God and associated with wisdom.
9. With its roots in the eschatological vision of Trito-Isaiah, the conviction of a decisive end of time is especially pronounced in such texts as Apoc. Abr. 29; 2 En. 65; and 4 Ezra 7. 113.
10. For a discussion of the Two Age doctrine in 4 Ezra, see M. E. Stone, Features of the Eschatology of IV Ezra (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989), pp. 47-81.
11. Cf. 16. 1; 32. 5; 44. 8, 9, 10; 67. 1.
12. Cf. 28. 1; 29. 1, 3, 4; 48. 41.
13. Cf. 29. 2, 8; 30. 2; 41. 1; 48. 33, 36, 38.
14. Cf. 14. 1; 16. 1; 23. 6; 54. 4; 56. 2.
15. Cf. 21. 11; 48. 46. The notion of a pre-ordained number of souls is implied in 4 Ezra 4. 36: 'when the number of those like yourselves is completed'.
16. F. J. Murphy gives closer attention to the anthropological considerations of the Two Age doctrine in The Structure and Meaning of Second Baruch (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1985), pp. 52-60.
17. The Anointed One is directly mentioned in three passages: chs. 29-30; 39-40; and 72-73. According to the text, he will be revealed during the final tribulations of the present age (29. 3); he is apparently pre-(earthly)existent and will return with glory after his mission is fulfilled and the time of corruption has ended (30. 1; 40. 3); at this time the resurrection of those who sleep in hope of him will occur (30. 2); finally, he is a warrior/deliverer who will defeat the hosts of the enemy and convict and execute the last despot (40. 1-2; 70. 2).
18. The text of this passage comes from a sixth- or seventh-century MS contained in Bibliotheca Ambrosiana B. 21 Inf. in Milan, fols. 257a-265b.
19. See M. Kmosko, Epistola Baruch filli Neriae (Patrologia Syriaca, I. 2; Paris: Graffin, 1907), cols. 1215-36.
20. An Arabie version of 2 Baruch, probably a translation from the Syriac, has been published in F. Leemhuis, A. F. J. Klijn and G. J. H. van Gelder, The Arabic Text of the Apocalypse of Baruch (Leiden: Brill, 1986).
21. M. Testuz, Les idées religieuses du livre des Jubilés (Geneva: Droz, 1960), p. 138.
22. e année, l'année sacrée du jubilé, était à la fois la clôture de la période écoulée et l'initiale d'un nouveau cycle' (Testuz, Jubilés, p. 138).
23. Testuz posits the giving of the law at Sinai as the beginning of a new era (Jubilés, pp. 138-39).
24. O. S. Wintermute (trans. ), 'Jubilees', OTP, II, pp. 35-142.
25. Cf. 1 En. 12. 3-13. 7.
26. Bogaert, Apocalypse de Baruch, p. 290.
27. De Gry and Bogaert failed to take into account the fact that there was no year '0'. The difference between 31 BCE and 67 CE is 97 years, not 98.
28. Octavian and Agrippa's decisive defeat of Antony and Cleopatra on the Adriatic coast of Greece. See M. Grant, History of Rome (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1978), pp. 245-46.
29. In addition to other corresponding historical events, Bogaert supports this date on the basis of the Manasseh legend in the ninth dark waters of Baruch's cloud vision (64. 1-10). He sees in Manasseh's five-faced idol a reference to Domitian's revival of the cult of Janus, whose five-faced quadriform statue was erected in the Forum during the middle of the third century BCE.
30. Bogaert does not know what to make of the literal interpretation. He simply states, 'L'interprétation littérale qui comterait les deux semaines de sept semaines comme étant chacune composés de sept fois sept semaines d'anés (7 × 7 × 7) s'exclut d'elle-même par son invraisemblance' (Apocalypse de Baruch, p. 290).
31. Grant, History of Rome, pp. 245-46.
32. I am indebted to Prof. Jay Holstein of the University of Iowa for this insight into Esther.
33. Sayler, Have the Promises Failed?, p. 106.
34. C. Sigwalt, 'Die Chronologie der syrischen Baruchapokalypse', BZ 9 (1911), pp. 397-98