New! Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Sciptures

Jim Davila has posted on his blog PaleoJudaica that Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, Volume 1 (edited by Richard Bauckham, Jim Davila, and Alexander Panayotov) is now being released by Eerdmans. See his blog for more on the genesis and the progress of the project with its nearly 100 new texts and text fragments.

In short, for biblical scholars and students of Christianity and Judaism in Antiquity, this publication is very timely. As with the standard two volume collection of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha edited by Charlesworth, many of the texts and fragments published in this volume will allow for a richer understanding of how Jews of the Second Temple Period (and later) engaged with contemporary challenges by drawing on the resources of earlier traditions. This collection should also allow for further exploration of how traditions of discourse tied to an authoritative figure of the past continued to function in this period (on this, see the recent works of Hindy Najman, especially her 2010 Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation, and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity). Further, the widespread practice of pseudonymous attribution in early Judaism provides useful perspective on how similar dynamics may have been at work in early Christian writings, perhaps even in letters ascribed to the Apostle Paul.

With regard to my own publications and presentations on the Wisdom of Solomon, Psalms of Solomon, and the development of "Solomonic discourse" (Hindy Najman's term), I am particularly interested to see some of the further instances in which the composition of psalms and hymns is associated with the figure of Solomon. A larger collection of pseudepigraphical psalms may also shed more light on the use of psalms and hymns for instructional purposes (what I and others have called didactic hymnody).

 

For those heading to the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature next month, there will be a panel discussion in the Pseudepigrapha Section dedicated to a review of this volume. The session, Nov 25, 1-3:30pm, will include Judith Newman, Hindy Najman, Robert Kraft, Liv Ingeborg Lied, John Collins, and Jim Davila.