Studying Pseudepigrapha
Apocalyptic Literature Historically Pacifistic
An interview with James Mueller (right), Associate Professor of Religion
Cn: You work primarily with non-canonical Christian and Jewish texts from the Hellenistic and Roman periods. What is the origin of this literature?
JM: Well, the last canonical book of the Hebrew Bible was written about 165 BCE, and the first book of the New Testament wasn't written until about 50 CE (Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians)....so there's a 200-year gap in between. Of course a lot was being written in this gap [as the Dead Sea Scrolls attest to], but little of it made it into the canon. Much of it got shuffled off to all sorts of different places, and a lot of it was not preserved because once you decide what's authoritative, you aren't going to spend any time and effort copying what's not authoritative anymore. Some may actively, in fact, seek out the non orthodox material and destroy it. So a lot of this literature is preserved in [obscure] languages out away from the general Mediterranean world or in mountain regions where orthodoxy couldn't penetrate.
Cn: Is this material difficult to locate?
JM: Many things are continuing to be found. It's sort of archeological work that goes on in museums and libraries. I'm interested in bringing that material to an English speaking audience, so I'm involved in translation projects that take those sorts of manuscripts and make critical texts of them, make English translations of them, write commentaries on them—in a sense I sort of do the ground work that's essential for other people to do their other kinds of work. If I translate a fifth century Christian apocalyptic text of the Tours of Hell, for example, that feeds into Dante scholars, Milton scholars and others.
There has developed in the last generation of scholars this subfield that just does this early Jewish literature. We provide the material for those people who want to comment extensively on the canonical material, but at the same time, we in the field are developing our own series of commentaries on these Jewish books. I'm involved with an international project to produce a 40 plus volume commentary series on the Pseudepigrapha. I'll produce one of those volumes, and I’ll be the primary editor on several more and oversee, with an international team, the whole series.
Cn: What is Pseudepigrapha?
JM: Pseudepigrapha is a technical term for non-canonical literature. It literally means "falsely ascribed writing," usually a person writing in the name of a well-known historical figure. Writers did this to lend weight to their work... "I just found this book and it was written by Enoch three millennia ago...look at what it says..." In some cases, the writers of these works would claim that the spirit of a well-known person inspired them or communicated through them.
But in the end it all works to be the same thing...an authoritative voice supposedly from the past telling us usually something important about our present. In eschatological works—the descriptions of the end of the world—it's very much that you'll have a book by somebody like Enoch and he will "prophesy" everything up to the present which is real easy to do when you've already seen it happen, and then prophesy what's about to happen. Almost all of these books can be dated fairly accurately by the point at which the prophecy goes wrong.
Generally, during the age that we're talking about there's a widespread notion that we're near the end. These apocryphal writers are committed to the notion that the end is coming very soon, and they are plotting the drama in which God brings about the end.
The end is a fabulous thing for the people who are writing because they always envision themselves on the right side of the equation. "When judgement comes, and it's coming real soon, and when you're brought up in front of God don't you want to go with the sheep and not with the goats? [You'd better change your ways..."] So there's always exhortation in this literature—it never fails. Even the modern versions have this exhortation to a certain mode of thinking or acting.
Cn: Was this exhortation ever used as political coercion?
JM: Sometimes it's political,
sometimes it's social, sometimes it's religious...in the ancient world
those three aren't very separable. This brings up another notion
that's often confusing for people who look at this literature and that
is that there's always this sense that eschatological or apocalyptic literature
is a sort of call to arms—a literature of the political... "We need to
fight our oppressors; we need to throw the oppressors out." There
is that strain in it...this Armageddon last war and all that sort of business...that's
in there somewhat, but for the most part, the literature is pacifistic.
It's really the
literature of people who have, in some ways, lost hope in the historical
process, but have not lost hope that God ultimately will redeem the historical
process in a way that brings them to a good place. So they're saying
"We can't defeat the Romans, but we have full faith and confidence that
God can defeat the Romans and is planning to do so very soon." And
some celebrate their oppression. That sounds weird—they're not happy
to be oppressed—but they're saying... "look, it must be really close because
things are getting really bad." Roman oppression was the worst...in
the first century inflation was 100% per year...and if you lived in Palestine
you lived along the Jordan Rift, which is earthquake prone so natural disasters
were a threat right along with political disasters and economic disasters...everything
looked hopeless.
Cn: Are there parallels between these apocryphal writings and modern day believers in the end of the world?
JM: Many groups believe the end is coming soon. They point to "crises" such as the Persian Gulf War or the oil crisis of the 70s, and they argue that these events show how close we are to God's return. You don't have to go to the guy walking down the street in the sandwich board, all you have to do is go to any number of evangelical churches and find a firm commitment to the notion that the end is coming soon. Not the end in the sense that we'll all blow ourselves up, but the end in the sense that Jesus comes back and takes the believers. There are a lot of publications out there that sell very well on a continuing basis pushing the notion that it's all going to happen real soon...
Cn: As a scholar of this material,
are you ever expected to defend or discount these beliefs?
JM: My position is not to
say whether they're right or wrong... [but since] the background goes all
the way back [2000 years ago] to the early Hellenistic and Roman period
Jewish writings that I study, my place is to ask, What is it that brings
this kind of thinking about? Whether it be ancient world or modern
world, I find it very interesting.
This semester Professor Mueller is editing a dictionary of Early Judaism and teaching a seminar on end of the world speculation.
