{"title":"Institutional differences in Old-Greek and Theodotionic Susanna","authors":"Andrew R. Krause","doi":"10.1177/09518207221137072","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221137072","url":null,"abstract":"Despite the elaborative nature of Theodotionic Susanna, it is not merely an expansion. The narrative details of the different versions betray consistent institutional differences. One notable difference is the near elimination of the public synagogue as a place of assembly, and instead this source speaks of a more generalized, associational assembly that meets in Joachim’s house. The Theodotionic version’s associational, domestic assembly space is closer to the polity of a diasporic collegia assembly. Conversely, in the Old Greek, the perverse elders preside over an assembly building, which is at one point designated as “the synagogue of the city” (OG Sus 28). The Old Greek’s emphasis on a civic synagogue is closer to Palestinian Jewish texts, despite the exilic setting of this story. While such institutional designations are more of a spectrum than a binary difference, such difference in outlook offers invaluable data regarding the contexts of the two versions of this Danielic composition and the parallel presentation of these two different types of synagogues at such an early date is significant.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"33 1","pages":"34 - 50"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48236104","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Jewish and Christian “signature features” in the Testament of Job","authors":"Nicholas List","doi":"10.1177/09518207221137064","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221137064","url":null,"abstract":"Pseudepigrapha research continues to slowly embrace the “default position” when working with texts of uncertain origin: start by investigating the Christian reception of a text, before attempting to work back toward its purported Jewish provenance. Taking a pseudepigraphon as Christian until proven otherwise—as a theoretical and methodological stance—has led some scholars to break with the general consensus concerning the Jewish origins of the Testament of Job, citing a lack of any identifiable Jewish or Christian “signature features” in the work. While sympathetic to the default position, this paper considers features of the Testament that should each be considered distinctively characteristic of Judaism (the intermarriage prohibition, T. Job 45:3) and Christianity (the use of the Greek compounds ἀπροσωπόληπτός, T. Job 4:8 and προσωπολήπτης, 43:13, attested only in Christian texts). The conclusions drawn from this study support the position that the Testament of Job is a Jewish diaspora text and that the instances of Christian language are most satisfactorily explained as later Christian scribal emendation.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"33 1","pages":"51 - 74"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42637200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A jubilee of fifty books known only by title","authors":"Esther Brownsmith, L. Lied, M. Kartzow","doi":"10.1177/09518207221137070","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221137070","url":null,"abstract":"This article ends the special issue that aims to introduce the conception of “books known only by title” as a fruitful new focus of research. In this article, we include an annotated assortment of books known only by title. This collection of fifty such books is not exhaustive, but it may serve as an inspiration and a springboard for future researchers by demonstrating the breadth and rich diversity of this phenomenon. To aid such research, we have provided bibliographic information for each entry. We also discuss ways of categorizing these books and the challenges of those categorizations. The list is hardly exhaustive, but it is selective. Our examples center on the first millennium C.E., and they center on the traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Certain entries may push at those boundaries but were included because of their special interest to us. Most notably, the classical texts of Greco-Roman culture were not included; nor were the canons of East Asia, or many other literary cultures across the globe.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"376 - 398"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48771577","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sibyls, destruction, and loss in the context of reproductive science","authors":"F. Borchardt","doi":"10.1177/09518207221140806","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221140806","url":null,"abstract":"The sixth-century prologue to a collection of Sibylline Oracles introduces the anthology according to a pattern recognizable in prologues to a number of texts of the period. It begins by praising the oracles for the great value they have for readers. But then, it introduces a problem: the oracles have suffered from destruction, loss, and corruption at several points in their history. The prologue goes on to offer a solution: the creation of the very anthology of Sibylline Oracles being produced. The rhetorical function of such a prologue is clear: It ensures the value of Sibylline Oracles while simultaneously demonstrating the utility, or even necessity of the newly created collection. Of interest in this study is the way the prologue introduces and illustrates the problem of destruction, loss, and corruption. In no less than three different vignettes, the prologue shows how the oracles are especially resistant to preservation. And these instances are not alone. A discourse of sibylline loss circulated around the textual world of antiquity. This study argues that the discourse is best understood within the framework of ancient ideals concerning intergenerational transfers of knowledge from fathers to sons, and some ancient theories of reproductive science, which held that only men contained reproductive potential, while women were empty vessels or fallow fields waiting to be filled. The article concludes that sibyls are so frequently sites of loss and destruction of knowledge because, as women, they are believed to lack the capacity to reproduce themselves both intellectually and biologically.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"356 - 375"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42158193","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Fictional books in Coptic apocrypha","authors":"H. Lundhaug","doi":"10.1177/09518207231152828","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207231152828","url":null,"abstract":"Coptic literature abounds with references to books that never existed as physical objects in their own right. This article explores the role of fictional books specifically in a selection of Coptic apocrypha deriving from the entire period of Coptic literary production. Whether presented as apostolic, prophetic, or angelic; earthly or heavenly; historical or contemporary, references to fictional books could function as veracity devices, authority claims, or as materials for storyworld creation. Taking as its points of departure recent work on pseudo-documentarism, transnarrative storyworlds, and the cognitive effects of fiction, this article explores implicit claims to authority and authenticity, as well as the fuzzy boundaries and interrelationships between fictional and factual references in meaning- and world-making.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"323 - 341"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44803622","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Books known only by title","authors":"L. Lied, M. Kartzow, Esther Brownsmith","doi":"10.1177/09518207231161736","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207231161736","url":null,"abstract":"This special issue of the Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha aims to introduce the concept of “books known only by title” as a fruitful new focus of research in the larger field of first-millennium Jewish and Christian literatures. Books known only by title are named literary objects known only through the medium of other writings, surviving neither as extant documents nor as excerpts or quotations of any substantial length. Still, these books are far more than “lost,” “false,” or “forged”: they were vital components of the first millennium literary imagination. This introductory essay provides a conceptual and methodological framework for the study of this hitherto unexplored phenomenon and offers an initial overview of key functions of books known only by title in book lists and literary texts.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"303 - 322"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44799645","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Gender and unruly titles in the booklists of the Gelasian Decree","authors":"Anna Rebecca Solevåg","doi":"10.1177/09518207221141371","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221141371","url":null,"abstract":"This essay offers a new perspective on the booklists of the Gelasian Decree (Decretum Gelasianium) from the sixth century. In this document’s apocryphal booklist, there are several titles featuring female or feminine names that exhibit a certain unruliness. Whether known only by title or by many titles, these entries pose the question of why female figures and texts not usually associated with heresy are constructed under this rubric in the Gelasian Decree. By untangling the lists from the academic discourse on canon and rather understanding them in the context of the document as a whole, the essay offers a fresh reading of the relations between gender, apocryphal books, and church hierarchy. Through an analysis of the occurrences of female/feminine names and signifiers throughout the text, it is found that while male figures are associated with God, the church hierarchy, and canonical and legitimate literature, the categories of apocrypha and heresy are feminized. It is argued that the “unruly” book titles in the Gelasian Degree ultimately resist the organizing efforts of its author.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"342 - 355"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43243747","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Re-imagining identity through national narratives: The representational ethics of Israelites and Other(s) in Jubilees and Josephus’s Judean Antiquities","authors":"Carrie Cifers","doi":"10.1177/09518207221124490","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221124490","url":null,"abstract":"This article brings the literary treasures of ancient Judea into conversation with the interdisciplinary fields of Narrative Ethics and Socio-Narratology while considering Jubilees and Josephus’s Judean Antiquities as participating in the etic genre of national history. This article interrogates the work that each of these narratives do to shape the collective identity of Hellenistic and Roman era Judeans and to shape Judean perceptions of their cultural Others. By analyzing Jubilees 30 and Antiquities 1.337–341 dialogically, this paper claims that Josephus’s re-narrativization of Judean history serves as a corrective to the Israelite representation in Jubilees. It is argued that representations in Jubilees promoted an impermeable boundary between Judeans and Others, with violence as a legitimized and valorized ethic of cross-cultural engagement, whereas Antiquities re-imagined a new future of more permeable boundaries and diplomatic negotiation for first-century C.E. Judeans by re-imagining their past through narrative. Dangerous representations of cultural Others, however, remained a part of the story.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"213 - 228"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49098237","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Wis 14:6: The σπέρμα γενέσεως and Enochic tradition","authors":"David Lincicum","doi":"10.1177/09518207221124488","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207221124488","url":null,"abstract":"This short article proposes a new translation of Wis 14:6, and identifies the giants of Gen 6:1–4 as the “seed of the generative act” that Noah abandons.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"207 - 212"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44496618","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Parabiblical tradition in mediaeval Armenia and its social location(s)","authors":"M. Stone","doi":"10.1177/09518207231152825","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09518207231152825","url":null,"abstract":"The aim of this paper is to commence seeking an answer to the following question: What function did the developed parabiblical (pseudepigraphical) literature play in medieval Armenian culture? The question is approached by the examination of markers in the texts that might show the use to which they were put and reveal the contexts in which the various types of literature were composed, or preserved, or developed. The issues of folk tales and oral transmission are raised. The use of iconographic sources and their relationship to literary documents, oral or written, are investigated.","PeriodicalId":14859,"journal":{"name":"Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha","volume":"32 1","pages":"229 - 243"},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2023-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42216182","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}