4. The Author and Date of the Book.—It is now impossible to ascertain the author or date of this production, inasmuch as neither the book itself nor ancient history gives us the slightest clue to this subject. Whoever the author was, he seems to have lived in Palestine (comp. v. 47), and certainly was master of the Greek, as is evident from his superior style, which resembles that of Symmachus, and from his successfully turning the Hebraisms into good Greek (comp. viii. 5 with Ezra viii. 17; ix. 13 with Ezra x. 14). The compiler must have lived at least a century before Christ, since Josephus follows his narrative of the times of Ezra and Nehemiah (comp. Antiq. xi. 5; xi. 45). The book must therefore have existed for some time, and have acquired great reputation and authority, to make the Jewish historian prefer its descrip tion of those days to that of the canonical books.
5. The Canonicity and importance of the Book.— This book was never included in the Hebrew canon, nor is it to be found in the catalogues of the Hebrew Scriptures given by the early Fathers, e. g., Melito, Origen, Eusebius, etc., and St. Jerome emphatically warns us 'not to take plea sure in the dreams of the 3d and 4th apocryphal books of Ezra (Praef. in Esdr. et Nechem.) The Councils of Florence (1438) and Trent (1546) decided against its canonicity—Luther would not even trans late it, ' because there is nothing in it which is not better said by Esop in his Fables, or even in much more trivial books' ( Vorrede oaf den Baruch); the version given in the later editions of Luther's Bible being the work of Daniel Cramer, and the Protes tant Church generally has treated it with great contempt, because it contradicts the canonical books of Ezra and Nehemiah. On the other hand, Josephus, as we have seen, regards it as a great authority, and it was treated with great reverence by the Greek and Latin Fathers. St. Augustine mentions it amongst the canonical books (De Doctr. Christ., lib. ii. 13), and quotes the passage,
`truth is the strongest' (chap. iii. 12), as Ezra's prophecy respecting Christ (De Civit. Dei, xviii. 16); the same sentence is quoted as Scripture by Cyprian (Efiist. lxxiv. ; comp. also Clemens Alexandrinus, Strom. i. ; Athanasius, Orat. iii. Cont. Arianos ; Justin Martyr, Dial. cum Tr ph.) Now modern criticism has justly taken the middle course between treating it with contempt and regarding it as ca nonical, and has recognised in it an important auxiliary to the settling of the text, and to the adjusting of the facts recorded in Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah, since this book has evidently been made from a different recension of the Hebrew, and has some readings and divisions preferable to those contained in the canonical books (comp. chap. v. 9 with Ezra ii. 12; chap. ix. 12 with Ezra x. 6; chap. ix. 16 with Ezra x. 16). Both Bertheau in his commentary on Ezra and Nehemiah (Exeget. Handbuch, part xviii.), and Fritzsche in his Commentary on the apocryphal Ezra (Exeget. Handb. z. d. Apokr., part i.), have shewn the important services which the canonical and canonical records may render to each other.
6. Literature on the Book.—Joseph. Antiq., x. 4. ; xi. 1-5 ; Josippon ben Gorion, ed. Breit haupt, 171o, p. 47, ff.; Trendelenburg, in Rich horn's allg. Biblioth. i. p. 'So, E ; Eichhorn, in d. Apokr. Schriften d. A. T., p. 335, ff. ; Herzfeld, Geschichte d. V. Israel von d. Zerstkrung d. ersten Tenzpels, p. 32o, ff. ; Ewald, Geschichte d. V. Israel, iv. p. 131, ff. ; Keil, His torisch-Kritische Einleitzeng in d. A. T., ed. 1859, p. 677, ff. ; Fritzsche, Kierzgef. exegetisches Hand buch z. d. Apokr. a'. A. T., i. p. 3, E; Davidson, The Text of the O. T. considered, etc., p. 987, ff.; Bertheau, Ezra, Nehemias and Ester, Exeget., Handbuch z. A. T., part viii.—C. D. G.