Friday, January 27, 2006

STILL MORE LOST BOOKS: Robert A. Kraft's website has endless goodies. I've just run across a couple that deal with ancient lost parabiblical books. First is a page associated with course he taught in 2002-03 on parabiblical literature. It consists of a critical evaluation of material found in:
RESCH, ALFRED. Agrapha. Aussercanonische Schriftfragmente. Gesammelt und untersucht und in zweiter völlig neu bearbeiteter durch alttestamentliche Agrapha vermehrter Auflage hrsg. von Alfred Resch. Mit fünf Registern. (Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur 30.3-4, Neue Folge 15.3-4) Leipzig, 1906 [first ed 1889]. [Pp. XVI + 426.]

Particularly notable are these quotes from what appear to be lost Old Testament pseudepigrapha:
  • L[ogion] 3b [Syr Didasc 26, as scripture says: Jacob will be blessed in his firstborn]
  • L 4a [Barn 15.1-2, and in another place it says: If my sons keep the sabbath, then will I put my mercy on them]
  • L 4b [Syr Didasc 21, regarding sabbath: You shall not lift a foot to do any work, and you shall not emit a word from your mouth]
  • L 5 [Barn 7, in the prophet: And let them eat from the goat ...]
  • L 7 [Tertullian, exhort cast 7, in Leviticus: Let my priests no longer marry]
  • L 10 [Didasc 2.23, thus says the Lord: I stretched my hands over him and it is for a myth and a parable]
  • L 14 [Clement Alex, Strom 6.9.78, the Lord: ask and I will do, be aware and I will give]
  • L 20 [1 Clement 26.2, somewhere it says: And if you elevate me, I will also confess you]

There's also a discussion of lost apocrypha/pseudepigrapha of Jeremiah and Ezekiel.

In addition Bob has a large and impressive page on Lost Apocrypha of the New Testament, conceived along the lines of M. R. James's Lost Apocrypha of the Old Testament. (Bob is also expanding and revising the latter; more on both projects here. And note his collection of material on Og the Giant, which I only just noticed.)

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