The Shorter Books Of The Apocrypha

The plan of this volume of commentary on the New English Bible texts of the shorter books of the Apocrypha follows the pattern of the now well established New Testament series. The main divisions of the text are those provided by the New English Bible itself, but these are further subdivided for the purposes of the commentary which is printed in short sections following the relevant portion of the text. The books presented in this volume are Tobit, in which the angel Raphael guides Tobit's son Tobias on various adventures, Judith, with its dramatic tale of the beheading of Holophernes, The Rest of the Chapters of the Book of Esther (together with the Book of Esther), Baruch, A Letter of Jeremiah, The Apocryphal Additions to Daniel (The Song of the Three, Daniel Daniel, Bel, and the Snake), and The Prayer of Manasseh.

This comprehensive, up-to-date introduction to the Old Testament apocryphal books summarizes their context, message, and significance. The first edition has been very well reviewed and widely adopted. It is the most substantial introduction to the Apocrypha available and has become a standard authority on the topic. The second edition has been substantially revised and updated throughout to reflect the latest scholarship. The book includes a foreword by James H. Charlesworth.

The term "apocrypha" comes from the Greek word meaning "hidden" or "secret". Originally, the term was applied to sacred books whose contents were too exalted to be made available to the general public."The Apocrypha" includes 15 books, all but one of which are Jewish in origin and found in the Septuagint (parts of 2 Esdras are possibly Christian and Latin in origin). Influenced by the Jewish canon of the OT, the custom arose of making the Apocrypha a separate section in the Protestant Bible.The Catholic view, expressed as a doctrine of faith at the Council of Trent, is that 12 of these 15 works (in a different enumeration, however) are canonical Scripture; they are called the Deuterocanonical Books.14 of these books are included in this volume and these are the books;The First Book of Esdras, The Second Book of Esdras, The First Book of the Maccabees, The Second Book of the Maccabees, The Book of Baruch, The Book of Bel and the Dragon, Ecclesiastes or the Preacher, The Book of Esther, The Book of Judith, The Prayer of Manasseh, The Song of Solomon, The History of Susanna, The Book of Tobit, The Book of Wisdom.

What books were left out of the Bible and why? First issued in 1926, this is the most popular collection of apocryphal and pseudepigraphal literature ever published. Here, in one place, are the infancy gospels, the letter of Jesus to Abgarus, the Gospel of Nicodemus, the Legends of Paul and Thecla, the Epistles of Clement and Barnabus, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Books of Adam and Eve, the Secrets of Enoch, the Psalms and Odes of Solomon, the many Testaments of the Patriarchs, and many more ancient books which were highly revered, but ultimately left out of the Bible.

The final book of the Bible, Revelation prophesies the ultimate judgement of mankind in a series of allegorical visions, grisly images and numerological predictions. According to these, empires will fall, the "Beast" will be destroyed and Christ will rule a new Jerusalem. With an introduction by Will Self.

Mr Bartlett's volume, like the others in the series, contains the text in the New English Bible. After a general introduction to the book as a whole, the text is given in short passages, with a commentary directly following each. These Jewish historical works, the two books of the Maccabees, were written to describe the struggles of the Jews in the second century BC against encroachment of the Greek way of life and against the political domination of the Syrians. The particular purpose of this commentary is to bring out the political and religious motives of the various parties to the struggle.

This comparative study shows that Protestants and Catholics are not as separated theologically as they may think. An excellent reference tool or textbook.

Collected and Translated by Montague Rhodes James. There are many ancient, lost books relating to the Bible and this work covers the ones that are most hard to find, dating between 100 BCE and 100 CE. In many cases we do not have the full works, but have various sections and fragments. The author, Montague James, used quotations found mostly in the works of the Greek Ante-Nicene Fathers like Origen, Hippolytus and Clement of Alexandria to piece together what we are missing. He also uses important lists compiled from Greek, Latin and other languages in order to reveal what we know of other missing books that would, in some cases, otherwise be unheard of. This important piece of scholarship should be part of anyone's library who is seriously researching lost and ancient texts.