Although first published exactly 100 years ago (March, 1913), R.H. Charles' two-volume Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (hereafter APOT) has become foundational to any study of these texts, and casts an immense shadow over the entire field of 20th Century Biblical studies. Anyone first approaching these books will be intimidated by their sheer physicality: two folio-sized behemoths, whole Bibles unto themselves, with an infinity of footnotes, endless rivulets of Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and Syriac, and innumerable cross-references to now forgotten and unknown (mostly German) scholars, texts, and journals. This is what true scholarship is all about. Just these two volumes would be an epitaph anyone would be proud to own, but Charles wrote or edited at least 18 more books (including still-important commentaries on 1 Enoch and Revelation) in his long and over-acheiving lifetime. APOT has never really gone out of print, and I hope that condition remains for a long time to come.
At the same time, I have serious problems with Charles and his entire exegetical Weltanschauung. I'm not talking about errors that weren't known in his time, nor, of course, would I fault him and his team for not knowing things that only were revealed after this book's publication, including the discoveries at Qumran 35 years later. I don't pretend that the book has the same level of importance to today's scholar than it did to previous generations. We shouldn't judge him too harshly for expressing what were, for the most part, the standard assumptions of Christian scholarship in his day. My criticisms of Charles are not with his grasp of the languages or sources, but with his attitude and his method. Charles himself was an archdeacon at Westminster Abbey, and spent a good deal of his life preaching sermons in addition to grappling with higher criticism and redaction criticism. Though he maintains an academic distance in most of what he writes, occasionally the Protestant deacon comes bleeding through and we find ourselves being Baptized into the Holy Spirit by "brother" Robert and his fellow servants in Christ. Over a dozen D.D.'s and M.A.'s serve as co-editors of APOT, some of whom proudly wore the mantle of "Theologian" over "Old/New Testament Historian," the domesticated title today's less evangelical scholars prefer. Though they can no longer argue for miracle stories, Charles and his team take the Bible quite literally as a history book. If a Biblical text describes an event with vividness, the most logical conclusion is that it was written very close to the period described, and probably relies on eyewitness testimony. If a Biblical text quotes a letter from a Seleucid emperor, the most logical conclusion is that the author had intimate access to government archives. That Biblical writers could invent characters, letters, events, or even whole books is a possibility strongly discouraged from consideration or serious debate.
Charles and his theological A-team only engage with "radical" critics who suggest alternate readings or approaches long enough to dismiss them and belittle their non-canonical, not-church-approved method
-- not unlike, say, the attitude found in Against All Heresies. A critical approach can yield encouraging results, sure, but only when those results essentially agree with the traditional view of the Church Fathers and commentators. If they don't, attack the messenger, and recruit plausible-sounding counter-defenses as ex cathedra "refutations."
Finally, though all of this is ostensibly Jewish literature, no Jewish scholars were consulted or included (a situation that hasn't changed much today). Second Temple Judaism itself is seen through the lens of the gospels and caricatured accordingly -- the Pharisees are "fanatics;" post-Hasmonean government was a cesspool of immorality and vice; the best apocryphal texts are the ones that anticipate the message of Jesus; and so on. Such attitudes were commonplaces in Charles's day, and would only begin to change after WWII.
So let's begin at the beginning: the Introduction. What is the Apocrypha? Though a hundred years old, much of what Charles observes here, as far as I can tell, still pretty much holds the floor in mainstream Biblical scholarship today, and will be referred to often in future posts.
§ 1. The origin of the term apocryphal
"How the term 'Apocryphal Books' arose has not yet been determined. It did not, as Zahn, Schurer, Porter, N. Schmidt, and others maintain, originate in the Late Hebrew phrase 'hidden books.' But Talmudic literature knows nothing of such a class. The Hebrew word ganaz does not mean 'to hide', but 'to store away' things in themselves precious. Indeed, so far is it from being a technical term in reference to non-Canonical writings, that it is most frequently used in reference to the Canonical Scriptures themselves.
"When writings were wholly without the pale of the Sacred books—such as those of the heretics or Samaritans—they were usually designated hisonim, i.e. 'outside.' To this class the Apocrypha were never relegated, save Sirach, according to a statement found only in Sanh. 10.1 in the Palestinian Talmud, where it is stated that 'whoso reads the outside books would have no part in the life to come.' But it is clear that there is some error either in the text or the interpretation; for Sirach is very frequently cited by the Rabbis, and two passages of it are cited as belonging to the Hagiographa. The facts show that Sirach was read—read at all events for private edification though not in the synagogues."
Right away we have a serious problem. Even though Charles refutes the idea proposed by previous scholars that the Hebrew ganaz is where the concept of "apocrypha" originated, there must be a Hebrew original lurking underneath any apocryphal or pseudepigraphical text, therefore it follows that the origin of the word itself must also be Jewish. And if there's no Hebrew root to be found, no problem -- circumstantial Hebraic evidence (such as that about Sirach) will be pressed into service.
"Apocrypha" was a Greek word that meant "of hidden origin" or "to keep hidden." The earliest datable use of the term in a Biblical/text-critical context is Irenaeus; therefore, proper textual criticism should begin there, at its earliest attestation. Edgar Hennecke provides a more sober explanation in his 1959 New Testament Apocrypha: "The use of apocrypha for certain writings cannot be explained from Judaism; rather we must turn to the Gentile-gnostic terminology for the root of this usage," he writes, citing The Apocryphon of John and the Paris Magical Papyri (both texts that were known in Charles's day).
Hennecke continues:
"In this connection there belongs the endeavour to carry back Greek philosophy to Oriental secret books which were designated apocrypha Biblica. This terminology was decisive for the introduction of the notion 'apocryphal' into the Church. This is shown by the fact that the word 'apocryphal' first comes before us not in connection with the history of the canon, but in the Church's conflict with gnosis and other heresies. Thus according to Clement of Alexandria, certain gnostics appealed to βίβλος ἀπόκρυφος. These were assuredly not books that had been removed from a Jewish or Christian lectionary, but secret books that were peculiarly precious to the Gnostics." (emphasis added)
Though the Nag Hammadi library was still buried in the sand in 1913, Charles was well-aware of Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria's usage of "apocrypha" to describe "secret books" that originated with the Gnostics, and he may have sensed that the term's actual etymology goes back to pre-Christian "Oriental secret books" (not things like 1 Maccabees) known as apocrypha Biblica. But his orthodoxy cannot allow the Gnostics to even enter into the discussion. The "Apocrypha" are the books so designated by the Church; Church tradition says those books originated with pre-Christian Jews; ergo, the terminology and selection must have somehow originated with them as well. We just haven't found it yet.
This is not an encouraging start.
§ 2. Extent of the Jewish apocryphal writings.
"We are not here of course concerned with all Jewish apocryphal writings, but with those which were written between 200 B.C. and A.D. 120. The most notable of these in the past centuries were those which we may define as the Apocrypha Proper, i.e.
1. 1 Esdras
2. 2 Esdras
3. Tobit
4. Judith
5. Additions to Esther
6. Wisdom of Solomon
7. Ecclesiasticus or Sirach
8. I Baruch
9. Epistle of Jeremy (Jeremiah)
10. Additions to Daniel—The Prayer of Azariah and the Song of the Three Children/Susanna/Bel and the Dragon
11. Prayer of Manasses
12. 1 Maccabees
13. 2 Maccabees
"If we compare the collection of the Sacred books as they are found in the Hebrew Old Testament, the LXX, and the Vulgate, we shall find that the Apocrypha Proper constitutes the excess of the Vulgate over the Hebrew Old Testament, and that this excess is borrowed from the LXX. But the official Vulgate (1592) does not include 1 and 2 Esdras (i.e. 4 Ezra in this edition) and the Prayer of Manasses among the Canonical Scriptures, but prints them as an appendix after the New Testament. The Roman Church excludes them from the Canon. Only 1 Esdras is found in the LXX. That 3 Esdras (i.e. 4 Ezra) was not incorporated can only have been due to an accident. Further, it is to be observed that, whereas 3 and 4 Maccabees and Psalm 151 are found in most manuscripts of the LXX, they are absent from the Vulgate and the Apocrypha Proper.
"Thus the difference between the Protestant Canon and that of Rome represents the difference between the Canon of the Palestinian and the Alexandrian Jews. This difference is not due, as it was thought at one time, to the difference in the language of the originals—a view which appears as early as the controversy of Africanus with Origen; for, as we are now aware, the bulk of the Apocrypha was originally written in Hebrew."
Here Charles repeats the common view, then and now, that the "Apocrypha Proper" constitutes the books Jerome copied from the LXX that were not in the Tanakh, the only real difference between the two being that the LXX was the Bible for Alexandrian Jews, while the Tanakh filled the same role for the Palestinian Jews. The fact that most of these only existed in Greek was sensed to be a problem as early as Origen's day, but, as it happily turns out, most of the Apocrypha were originally in Hebrew as well. Or so Charles believes.
Actually, Jerome copied 9 of the 13 books from earlier Latin translations; 2 from Aramaic; 1 (Additions to Daniel) from the Theodotian LXX; and 1 (Additions to Esther) from a different version of the LXX. So only 2 of the 13 books (Tobit and Judith) he defined as the Apocrypha were known to exist in a Semitic language to Jerome. Charles is being dishonest by not forthrightly mentioning this here. There is no straight line going from Jerome's 13 book miscellany to a hypothetical "Canon of the Alexandrian Jews." (The "two canon" theory later crashed on the rocks at Qumran.)
As for this: "Only 1 Esdras is found in the LXX. That 3 Esdras (i.e. 4 Ezra) was not incorporated can only have been due to an accident" -- only been due to an accident? Could it be that 4 Ezra actually hadn't been written yet? This is the first time an argument from personal incredulity is offered in APOT in lieu of an actual explanation. It won't be the last.
§ 3. Various meanings of the word 'apocryphal'
(1.) "In its earliest sense this term was applied in a laudatory signification to writings which were withheld from public knowledge because they were vehicles of mysterious or esoteric wisdom which was too sacred or profound to be disclosed to any save the initiated. In this sense it is found in a magical book of Moses, which ... may be as old as the first century AD. This book is entitled 'A Sacred Secret Book of Moses.' ... the Book of Daniel is represented as withheld from public knowledge until the time came for its publication ... the writer of 1 Enoch speaks of his revelations as designed not for his own, but for the elect of later generations ... the writer of the Assumption of Moses enjoins that his book is to be preserved for a later period.
"That with large bodies of Jews this esoteric literature was as highly or more highly treasured than the Canonical Scriptures is clear from the claims made by the Rabbis on behalf of their oral, which was originally in essence an esoteric, tradition, since it was not to be committed to writing. Though they insisted on the exclusive canonicity of the twenty-four books, they claimed to be the possessors of an oral tradition that not only overshadowed but frequently displaced the written Law. In 4 Ezra 14:44 sq. we have a categorical statement as to the superior worth of this esoteric literature: 'So in forty days were written ninety-four books. And it came to pass when the forty days were fulfilled, that the Most High spake unto me saying: The twenty-four books that thou hast written publish, that the worthy and the unworthy may read (them): But the seventy last thou shalt keep to deliver to the wise among thy people. For in them is the spring of understanding, The fountain of wisdom, And the stream of knowledge.'"
Having just defined what constitutes the "Apocrypha Proper," Charles then cites part of the Paris Magical Papyri ("A Sacred Secret Book of Moses," which isn't Jewish at all), one line in the canonical Daniel, and two examples of pseudepigrapha as examples of "various meanings of the word apocryphal." This not only provides no support whatsoever for the 13 books making up Jerome's miscellany, it is the grossest of overstatements to then assert that a few lines buried in four books (three of which may have been completely unknown to Jews) prove that, to "large bodies of Jews," hidden/outside/"apocryphal" texts were "as highly or more highly treasured than the Canonical Scriptures." This is apologetic balderdash in all its naked glory, argued solely to bolster the authority of the Apocrypha and prevent the reader from understanding how utterly arbitrary the official Church canon (and the canonization process) actually was. The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha are important, you see, because "large bodies of (ancient) Jews" not only wrote and read these books, they even thought them more important than the Torah itself! I'd love to see the rabbinical support for that statement.
4 Ezra is a late text whose oldest manuscripts only exist in Latin and Syriac. The probability that it was written by Christians is high, thus the acknowledgement by God of the value of an unnamed 70 books is probably nothing more than a justification for the canon of the Christian Bible -- not an early Jewish appreciation of the Apocrypha. Charles is blind to such possibilities.
(2.) But the word was applied to writings that were withheld from public circulation, not on the ground of their transcendent worth, but because their value was confessedly secondary or questionable. Thus Origen differentiates writings that were read in public worship from apocryphal works (Commentary on Matthew 10.18, 13.57). This use became current and prepared the way for the third and unfavourable sense of the word.
(3.) The word came to be applied to what was false, spurious, or heretical. This meaning also appears in Origen, Prolg. in Cant. Cantic. 14.325.
We are on more secure ground here than we were with definition #1. "Apocrypha" can mean both heretical (Gnostic books) as well as secondary or disputible. As the Gnostic heresy subsided, the latter definition came to dominate.
§ 4. The attitude of the Christian Church to the Apocrypha.
"The degree of estimation in which the apocryphal books have been held in the Church has varied with age and place.
"(1) The Greek Fathers such as Origen and Clement, who used the Greek Bible, which included these books, frequently cite them as 'scripture,' 'Divine scripture,' 'inspired,' or the like. Later Greek Fathers rejected in various ways this conception of the Canon, but it was accepted and maintained in the West by St. Augustine. Where the Greek differed from the Hebrew Augustine held that the difference was due to Divine inspiration, and that this difference was to be regarded as a sign that in the passage in question an allegorical—not a literal interpretation was to be looked for. Since he habitually used a Latin Bible, which embraced the Apocrypha, he appealed to the authority of these books as of the rest of the Scriptures. The Council of Hippo (A.D. 393) and that of Carthage (A.D. 397), at both of which Augustine was present respectively as a presbyter and a bishop, drew up a list of Canonical writings, which, though formed by Latin-speaking bishops, was the chief authority on which the Council of Trent based its own decision. In fact the list authoritatively issued by the Council of Hippo and that of Trent agree in nearly every respect, save that the Tridentinc divines appear to have misunderstood the meaning of 1 and 3 Esdras in the list of the African Council. That in this list 1 Esdras meant the apocryphal book which Augustine acknowledged as Scripture and 2 Esdras meant the Canonical Ezra and Nehemiah there is no reason for doubt; but the Tridentine divines, taking 1 Esdras as = the Canonical Ezra and 2 Esdras as = the Canonical Nehemiah, through a misunderstanding declared 1 Esdras (i.e. the apocryphal Esdras) apocryphal.
"(2) On the other hand, teachers connected with Palestine and familiar with the Hebrew Canon, like Africanus and Jerome, declared all books outside the Hebrew Canon as apocryphal.
"(3) Alongside these two opposing views arose a third which held that, though these books were not to be put in the same rank as those in the Hebrew collection, they nevertheless had their value for moral uses, and should be read in the Church services. Hence they were called ' ecclesiastical'— a designation that is found first in Rufinus (ob. A.D. 410). Notwithstanding many variations in the attitude of different authorities and councils these three opinions maintained their ground down to the Reformation."So Africanus and Jerome won the day: the Christian Church would follow the Hebrew Canon as defining "the Old Testament." Perhaps the inclusion of the Apocrypha was a compromise, an acknowledgement of the central importance that various versions of the LXX once had.
"At the Reformation the above ecclesiastical usages were transformed into articles of belief, which may be regarded as characteristic of the Churches by which they were adopted. As we have already remarked, the Council of Trent adopted the Canon of the Council of Hippo and of Augustine, declaring: 'If any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been used to be read in the Catholic Church, and as they are contained in the old Latin Vulgate ... let him be anathema.' All the Apocrypha except 1 Esdras, 4 Ezra, and the Prayer of Manasses belonging to the Apocrypha Proper were declared Canonical.
"On the other hand, the Protestant Churches have universally declared their adhesion to the Hebrew Canon of the Old Testament. Yet amongst these a milder and a severer view prevailed. While in some Confessions, i. e. the Westminster, it is decreed that they are not 'to be any otherwise approved or made use of than other human writings,' a more favourable view is expressed regarding them in many other quarters ; e.g. in the preface prefixed to them in the Genevan Bible : 'As books proceeding from godly men (they) were received to be read for the advancement and furtherance of the knowledge of history and for the instruction of godly manners: which books declare that at all times God had an especial care of His Church, and left them not utterly destitute of teachers and means to confirm them in the hope of the promised Messiah'; and in the Sixth Article of the Church of England: 'the other books the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners.'
"In addition to the spiritual and moral service rendered by these books, the modern student recognizes that without them it is absolutely impossible to explain the course of religious development between 200 BC and AD 100. In this respect the Apocrypha is to be regarded as embracing the Pseudepigrapha as well. If the Canonical and Apocryphal Books are compared in reference to the question of inspiration, no unbiased scholar could have any hesitation in declaring that the inspiration of such a book as Wisdom or the Testaments of the XII Patriarchs is incomparably higher than that of Esther."Setting aside the question of whether scholars can be "unbiased," this is still a breathtaking admission for a confessing Christian to make. The "inspiration" for some of the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha is "incomparably higher" than a canonical book like Esther? Then why on earth were they excluded from the canon in the first place? And, that being the case, why should we still even respect the canon at all?
Charles has cleverly argued throughout this introduction that the texts the Christian Church called "Apocrypha," as well as the texts modern scholarship refers to as "Pseudepigrapha," were regarded as equal to, if not higher than, the Alexandrian canon or LXX of pre-Christian Judaism. And therefore we are completely justified as regarding them as scripture or semi-scripture or just good historical witnesses to the times. But, as I have shown, there are serious cracks in this stained glass fascade he has assembled. There actually is no concept in ancient Judaism of "outside" books comparable to the Christian idea of "apocrypha," an idea which evolved over a couple of hundred years. There is little to no evidence for Hebrew-language originals for most of the books contained in APOT. There was no fixed "canon of the Alexandrian Church" to contrast with a Palestinian one. There were multiple versions and recensions of the LXX, not a single book that Christians inherited circa AD 33. The only Apocrypha that Jerome had in a Semitic-language version were Tobit and Judith, and his choices of apocryphal books were arbitrary. 4 Ezra is probably a Christian text, not a pre-70 Jewish witness to the semi-canonical status of the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha.
Not all of this was clear in 1913, but most of it was. And Charles could have made it clearer to himself and his readers had he questioned his assumptions, or, as scholars like to refer to them, "presuppositions." But Charles had inherited a religious and scholarly tradition, and critical examination could only be carried far enough to where it didn't significantly interfere with or alter that inheritance.
Next: We will go through each book included in APOT, critically reviewing each scholar's method and explanations about dates, authorship, language, etc.
Andrew Brown
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