Review
======
Title: The Jewish Pseudepigrapha: An Introduction to the Literature of the Second Temple Period
Author: Susan Docherty
Publisher: Fortress Press
Genre: biblical studies, pseudepigrapha
Year Published: 2015
Number of Pages: 180
Binding: paperback
ISBN10: 1451490283
ISBN13: 9781451490282
Price: $49.00
Reviewed by Bryan Buchanan for the Association for Mormon Letters
If Mormonism had to define its Facebook relationship to extrabiblical texts, it would have to be “it’s complicated.” Since Joseph Smith received a revelation in March 1833 (now D&C 91), there has been at least modest awareness of such texts, if not widespread interest. On the more engaged end of the spectrum, there have been those such as Hugh Nibley who have invested great time and effort into finding suspected hints and shadows of Mormon parallels (no, Rick Grunder, not *that* kind of parallel) in ancient narratives. Somewhere in the middle lies the Mormon whose curiosity has been piqued and would like a well-informed guided tour through this admittedly complex forest of documents. Given some legitimate similarities (at least in form) to texts like a rewritten Bible (the genre that the Joseph Smith translation most resembles) or I Enoch (several writers have analyzed the book of Moses in light of this key manuscript), “The Jewish Pseudepigrapha: An Introduction to the Literature of the Second Temple Period” provides a concise, knowledgeable but still approachable handbook for the curious reader.
While other extrabiblical texts of the same period (such as the Dead Sea Scrolls) have enjoyed more notoriety, the author points out that these intertestamental documents “are of immense value for an understanding of Second Temple Judaism and of the early Christian movement which arose within that religious and cultural context.” (1) For the readers of this review, I would add that Docherty’s analysis is also helpful in assessing Mormon scripture in a scholarly manner. For example, the author notes that:
–Pseudonymity “may reflect the writers’ belief that they were not putting forward their own views, but legitimately updating and passing on the traditions of their community. Pseudonymity thus helps to validate a work, providing a sense of authority and antiquity for its theological views or scriptural interpretation, and connecting its audience to Israel’s history.” (2) While Joseph Smith’s project to “translate” portions of the Bible was not explicitly pseudonymous, he certainly would not have characterized it as his own work. The conclusion that he intended to tie Mormonism to Israelite history and early Christianity is inescapable.
–“It is also important to appreciate that these writings were preserved mainly by Christian rather than Jewish communities, and that Christian revisions and additions have evidently been made to some of the original texts. This is, of course, part of a wider phenomenon, whereby Christianity absorbed and took over much of the Jewish literary and theological tradition, including the Scriptures.” (3) Again, one reaches the same conclusion when noting the repackaging of Hebrew Bible and New Testament figures and concepts in Mormon narratives. The shadowy figure of Enoch becomes the archetypical leader of a primitive Zion that prefigures Joseph Smith’s attempts to create a communal society in Missouri. Joseph (of Genesis) becomes the progenitor, not only of Old World tribes, but also of New World peoples and even Joseph Smith himself (both Senior and Junior).
I feel that the concisely presented introductory material thus provides food for thought in terms of Mormon texts as well as the pseudepigraphal documents discussed afterward.
I will concentrate on Docherty’s first two categories as these will likely be of most interest to Mormon readers. She begins with rewritten Bible, classifying this genre (in the words of Geza Vermes) as “a narrative that follows scripture but includes a substantial amount of supplements and interpretive developments.” She expands on this, adding that “the interpreter can, however, omit some episodes, drastically summarize others and include additions which offer a particular explanation of the underlying narrative.” These supplemental texts attempt to “resolve apparent contradictions in the Bible, or to fill in gaps in the story.” (12) For each of her two main examples of this genre, “The Book of Jubilees” and “Biblical Antiquities” of Pseudo-Philo, the author briefly introduces the history, authorship and context for the text and then discusses major features and themes of each. This structure is maintained for each subsequent category throughout the book.
Of similar nature is the genre of parabiblical literature. Docherty distinguishes this category from rewritten Bible by noting that the former does “not treat an extended section of the Bible, nor closely follow its sequence. Instead, they tend to concentrate on the lives of one or two main characters.” (38) One might compare the Joseph Smith translation project as a whole to rewritten Bible while certain sections might be better characterized as parabiblical literature. For example, Melchizedek appears in a solitary verse in the Hebrew Bible but, in Joseph Smith’s reimaging of this chapter of Genesis, he stars in a section of fifteen verses that casts him as a representative of an order of priests endowed with divine powers as well as “the king of heaven.”
This American edition (a 2014 edition was published in the UK by SPCK) of Docherty’s introduction to key intertestamental pseudepigraphal texts is a very useful guide to the field. Short chapters highlighting anywhere from two to four representative texts are highly digestible and provide the key features of the genre at hand. Brief bibliographies at the end of each chapter point the interested reader to lengthier treatments of both the category of literature as well as the specific texts Docherty discusses. Her analysis is concise but also flexible—in several places, she emphasizes that her system of categorizing the mass of texts is descriptive rather than prescriptive and that texts understandably can ooze over the edge of the boundaries she outlines.
While her introduction is very helpful for the ancient pseudepigraphal texts themselves, as I have noted, her analysis is quite pertinent to Mormon texts as well. While a certain amount of technical language is used (so much of it is so common that to avoid it would require a great deal of circumlocution), it is not overdone and the average well-read person will not find the book out of their league. At less than two hundred pages, this is an excellent way for someone to become familiar with key pseudepigraphal genres and texts.