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Some Christological Interpolations in the Ezra-Apocalypse

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 August 2011

Joshua Bloch
Joshua Bloch
Affiliation:
New Hyde Park, New York
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Extract

The text of the Ezra-Apocalypse as it has been received in virtually all versions is the work of Christian scribes who must be held responsible not only for the careless manner in which they have transmitted it but also for many readings introduced in it in order to make them conform to teachings expressive of fundamental Christian doctrines. This often involves the changing of the author's words and ideas so as to convey meanings other than those which he, as a loyal Jew, could possibly have given. Reprehensible as such a practice is, it was, nevertheless, indulged in, not infrequently, by pious hands engaged in the copying of sacred texts. The text of the Ezra-Apocalypse was often the victim of such treatment. It is for this reason that even its Syriac version, now existing in only one manuscript, the sole survivor of many that were in circulation, was badly transmitted. This version, perhaps more than any other of the older versions, approaches what the text was in the tongue in which it was originally written. It bears ample evidence of what seems to be faulty editing but which represents, not infrequently, actually also the result of faulty copying. This is true of virtually all other ancient versions of the Ezra-Apocalypse.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 51 , Issue 2 , April 1958 , pp. 87 - 94
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1958

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References

1 See Bloch, J., On the Apocalyptic in Judaism, Philadelphia, 1952, p. 1 f.Google Scholar

2 The Ezra-Apocalypse, London, 1912; ‘IV Ezra,’ in Charles' Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, Oxford, 1913, v. 2, pp. 542–624Google Scholar and The Apocalypse of Ezra, London, 1918 (Translations of Early Documents. Series I).

3 See his Ezra-Apocalypse, London, 1912, p. LIVGoogle Scholar.

4 A study of those and like passages, with a view to determining the element of interpolation detectible in each one of them and the respective reason for it, is a desideratum.

5 Op. cit., p. XXXIII.

6 See The Fourth Book of Ezra, ed. by Bensly, Robert L., Cambridge, 1895, p. XXXIVGoogle Scholar.

7 Box, op. cit., p. 114.

8 Drummond, J. M. (The Jewish Messiah, London, 1877, p. 285 ff.Google Scholar) advanced the view that son as applied to the Messiah was derived from παȋς = servant. For full discussion of the subject see Bousset, W., Kyrios Christos, Goettingen, 1921, p. 53 ff.Google Scholar, in which he revises his previously stated conclusions. For the treatment of the Son of Man in rabbinical literature see Strack-Billerbeck, , Kommentar zum Neuen Testament, etc., Münich, 1922, v. 1, pp. 485–487Google Scholar, 956–959 and v. 3, 1926, pp. 15–22. A thorough study of the Son of Man in the Ezra-Apocalypse is presented in Gressmann's, H.Der Messias, Göttingen, 1929, pp. 379–389Google Scholar. Useful is Kraeling, C. H., Anthropos and Son of Man, New York, 1927Google Scholar and Sjöberg, Erik, “Ben Adam und Bar Anaš im Hebräischen und Aramäischen,” in Acta Orientalia, 1950, v. 21, pp. 57–65 and 91–107Google Scholar. For stimulating discussions of more recent views see Sjöberg, Erik, Der Menschensohn im Äthiopischen Henochbuch, Lund, 1946, pp. 133–139Google Scholar. Cf. Schoeps, H. J., Theologie und Geschichte des Judenchristentums, Tübingen, 1949, pp. 78–82Google Scholar and Rowley, H. H., The Relevance of Apocalyptic, London, 1944Google Scholar.

9 Op. cit., p. 294.

10 Ibid., p. 300.

11 “Niemals hätte ein Christ υἱός in παῖς verwandelt, aber sehr leicht umgekehrt.” See his Die Apocalypsen des Esra und des Baruch in deutscher Gestalt, Berlin, 1924, p. 74 f.Google Scholar

12 See his βασιλɛία τοῦ θɛῦ, Heidelberg, 1926, p. 387.Google Scholar

13 In learned quarters it is generally accepted that the phrase “son of man” is an Aramaic expression Bar ňaša or Bar enaša, rendered in the Greek Gospels by ὸ υὶὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. It found its way into the language of the Christian Church. The correct rendering of the Aramaic phrase is ὸ ἄνθρωπος. Cf. Dan. 7.13 and see Wellhausen, J., Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, Berlin, 1899, v. 6, p. 196Google Scholar and A. von Gall, op. cit., p. 409 ff.

14 See his Der Menschensohn; ein Beitrag zur neutestamentlichen Theologie, Freiburg i. Breisgau und Leipzig, 1896.

15 Bousset, W., Die Religion des Judentums im späthellenistischen Zeitalter, ed. Gressmann, H., Tübingen, 1926, pp. 262–268Google Scholar.

16 See Matthew 26.63 f., Mark 14.61 ff. and Luke 22.69 f. Moore, George F. (Judaism, Cambridge, 1927, v. 2, p. 336)Google Scholar says that “it is not likely that the discovery of the Messiah in Daniel's ‘son of man’ was original with the followers of Jesus or with himself.”

17 See A. von Gall, op. cit., p. 417.

18 See Klausner, Joseph, The Messianic Idea in Israel, New York, 1955, p. 383 ff.Google Scholar

19 See his II Esdras, London, 1933, p. 141.

20 Ibid.