The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The ... - josephprestonkirk

448 OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA AT QUMRAN
developed by nineteenth-century scholarship and summarized in the monumental
work of R. H. Charles, 4 have remained in use to this day. Thus,
for instance, still prevalent is the traditional division between the
“Apocrypha,” namely Jewish writings incorporated in the Greek Christian
canon (e.g., Tobit, Wisdom of Solomon, Ben Sira), and the “Pseudepigrapha,”
namely, Jewish works preserved in various Christian traditions (e.g., 1
Enoch, Jubilees, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs). Although the corpus
represented by these categories has been considerably augmented, 5 the
basic framework of analysis changed but little. 6 This situation is partly
due to the absence of a more suitable nomenclature. Consequently the old
terms continue to be applied to works outside the traditionally known corpus,
and even to new unknown writings from Qumran, a situation which
often blurs the new import of recently discovered data.
As a matter of fact, the Qumran library uncovers an entirely novel picture,
in which types of pseudepigraphic and apocryphal compositions
existed concurrently in Second Temple Judaism. Moreover, the Qumranic
documents reveal an intricate fabric of interlinks between what is termed
“Apocrypha” and “Pseudepigrapha.” Obviously the century-old literary
was given by Jozef T. Milik, Ten Years of Discovery in the Wilderness of Judaea (trans. J.
Strugnell; SBT 26; London: SCM Press; Naperville, IL: Allenson, 1959), 31–37,
most of which deals with the already known writings. Subsequent surveys did not
advance far beyond it. Cf., for instance, Geza Vermes, The Dead Sea Scrolls: Qumran in
Perspective (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981), 209–11, and more recently James C.
VanderKam, The Dead Sea Scrolls Today (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 153–56.
4. Embodied in his detailed commentaries to 1 Enoch, Jubilees, and the Testament of
the Twelve Patriarchs, and later in the collection he edited and contributed to APOT.
5. See the collection assembled in OTP. This collection assembles only works corresponding
to the category of Pseudepigrapha; namely, its two volumes correspond
to the single second volume edited by Robert H. Charles, an impressive increase in
number of texts included.
6. For instance, the work of defining the apocalyptic literature, taken up by John J.
Collins, is based on the corpus determined by Charles. Cf. his presentation in
“Towards the Morphology of a Genre,” Semeia 14 (1979): 1–20; idem, “The Jewish
Apocalypses,” Semeia 14 (1979): 21–60. Recently an attempt was made to redefine
pseudepigraphy in the light of the Qumran material. See Moshe J. Bernstein,
“Pseudepigraphy in the Qumran Scrolls: Categories and Functions,” in Biblical
Perspectives: Early Use and Interpretation of the Bible in the Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. M.
E. Stone and E. G. Chazon; STDJ 28; Leiden: Brill, 1998), 1–26. One may however
question Bernstein’s categories. The distinction between “Authoritative pseudepigraphy”
and “Convenient pseudepigraphy,” he proposes, is artificial. The consequential
criterion for establishing types of pseudepigraphy is the manner and degree in which
the pseudepigraphic framework is imposed on a given composition. If it is expressed
only in the title, it is secondary to the composition (such as the David canonical
Psalms). But if the entire writing is conceived to fit a pseudepigraphic figure (such as
Enoch in 1 Enoch), then pseudepigraphy is part of the author’s original concept of his
oeuvre. Only in such a case is pseudepigraphy present in the full sense of the term.