Book of Jubilees

JUBILEES, BOOK OF, an apocryphal work of the Old Testament. It is the most advanced pre-Christian representative of the Midrashic tendency, which had already been at work in the Old Testament Chronicles. As the chronicler had rewritten the history of Israel and Judah from the standpoint of the Priests' Code, so our author re-edited from the Pharisaic standpoint of his time the history of the world from the creation to the publi cation of the Law on Sinai. His work constitutes the oldest commentary in the world on Genesis and part of Exodus, an en larged Targum on these books, in which difficulties in the biblical narration are solved, gaps supplied, dogmatically offensive ele ments removed and the genuine spirit of later Judaism infused into the primitive history of the world.

Titles of the Book.—"Jubilees" is an admirable title as the book divides into jubilee periods of forty-nine years each the history of the world from the creation to the legislation on Sinai. It is also frequently designated "The Little Genesis," a title which may have arisen from its dealing more fully with details and minutiae than the biblical work. For the other names by which it is referred to, see Charles's The Book of Jubilees, pp. xvii.–xx.

Object.

The object of our author is the defence and exposi Lion of Judaism from the Pharisaic standpoint of the 2nd century B.C. against the disintegrating effects of Hellenism. In his elabo rate defence of Judaism our author glorifies circumcision and the sabbath, the bulwarks of Judaism, as heavenly ordinances, the sphere of which was so far extended as to embrace Israel on earth. The Law, as a whole, was to our author the realization in time of what was in a sense timeless and eternal. Though re vealed in time it was superior to time. Before it had been made known in sundry portions to the fathers, it had been kept in heaven by the angels, and to its observance there was no limit in time or in eternity. Our author next defends Judaism by his glorification of Israel. Whereas the various nations of the Gentiles were subject to angels, Israel was subject to God alone. Israel was God's son, and not only did the nation stand in this relation to God, but also its individual members. Israel received circumcision as a sign that they were the Lord's, and this privilege of circumcision they enjoyed in common with the two highest orders of angels. Hence Israel was to unite with God and these two orders in the observance of the sabbath. Finally the destinies of the world were bound up with Israel. The world was renewed in the creation of the true man Jacob, and its final renewal was to synchronize with the setting-up of God's sanctuary in Zion and the establishment of the Messianic kingdom. In this kingdom the Gentiles had neither part nor lot.

Date.

(1 ) The book was written during the pontificate of the Maccabean family, and not earlier than 135 B.C. For in xxxii. 1,

Levi is called a "priest of the Most High God." Now the only high priests who bore this title were the Maccabean, who appear to have assumed it as reviving the order of Melchizedek when they displaced the Zadokite order of Aaron: Jewish tradition ascribes the assumption of this title to John Hyrcanus. It was retained by his successors down to Hyrcanus II. (2) It was written before 96 B.c. or some years earlier in the reign of John Hyrcanus ; for since our author is of the strictest sect, a Pharisee, and at the same time an upholder of the Maccabean pontificate, Jubilees cannot have been written after 96 when the Pharisees and Alexander Jannaeus came to open strife. Nay more, it cannot have been written after the open breach between Hyrcanus and the Pharisees, when the former joined the Sadducean party. We may, however, observe that our book points to the period already past— of stress and persecution that preceded the recovery of national independence under the Maccabees, and presupposes as its his torical background the most flourishing period of the Maccabean hegemony.

Author.

The author was a Pharisee of the straitest sect. He maintained the everlasting validity of the law, he held the strict est views on circumcision, the sabbath, and the duty of shunning all intercourse with the Gentiles ; he believed in angels, and in a blessed immortality. He was an upholder of the Maccabean pontificate. He glorifies Levi's successors as high-priests and civil rulers, and applies to them the title assumed by the Maccabean princes, though he does not, like the author of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, expect the Messiah to come forth from among them. He may have been a priest.

The Views of the Author on the Messianic Kingdom and the Future Life.—According to our author the Messianic king dom was to be brought about gradually by the progressive spiritual development of man and a corresponding transformation of nature. Its members were to reach the limit of i,000 years in happiness and peace. During its continuance the powers of evil were to be restrained, and the last judgment was apparently to take place at its close. As regards the doctrine of a future life, our author adopts a position novel for a Palestinian writer. He abandons the hope of a resurrection of the body. The souls of the righteous are to enjoy a blessed immortality after death. This is the earliest attested instance of this expectation in the last two centuries B.C.

LITERATURE.

See the commentaries by R. H. Charles, The Book of Jubilees or the Little Genesis (1902), which deals exhaustively with all the questions treated in this article; his edition in Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha (vol. ii. 1913) ; and his English translation the S.P.C.K. Translations of Early Documents (1917).