Notes on Jubilees 1

      Prologue gives admirable account of contents of the book. At once a history and a chronological system dominated by sacred number 7.  History extends from creation to legislation on Sinai. Thus it embraces Genesis and part of Exodus.  A11 is re-written from standpoint of strictest Judaism.

      throughout all the years of the world. These words imply intention of the author to write history up to time of Messianic kingdom. Cf. i. 26.

      1. third month, on the sixteenth day of the month. Completes imperfect date of Exod. xix. l. (Same day as God appears to Jacob on way to Egypt, xliv. 5.) For the rest of the verse cf. Exod. xxiv. 12.

      2-4 a. Exod. xxiv. 15-18.

      3. out of.  Emended in accordance with Exod. xxiv. 26, מתוך by a change of one letter.

          flaming. Change of one vowel would give 'devouring' as in Exod. xxiv. 17.

      4. God taught him the earlier and the later history. Cf. i. 26; also Megilla 19 b 'The Holy One, blessed be his name, showed to Moses all the minutiae of the law and all that the Sopherim would renew in later times' ; so also Shem. Rabb. 40 (Wünsche, 282), Menachoth 29 b, Wajikra Rabb. 26 (Beer).

      5-10. Ezra ix. 9, 10, 11 ; Exod. xxiii. 33, xxxiii. i, 3 ; Deut. xxx. 1-20, xxxi. 19, 20, 24-6, 27 ; 2 Kings xvii. 7-17.

      5. write them, &c. Cf. Exod. xxxiv. 27.

          how I, &c. Cf. Ezra ix. 9.

          transgressing. An emendation, slhlto from 'asheto of bed.

      6. Deut. xxx. I.

      7. write. See i. 27 (note). On verse cf. Deut. xxxi. 27 ; E.xod. xxxiii. 3.

    10. Captivity of Israel who had forsaken ' my sanctuary', &c. Cf. Deut. x.xviii. 15-68, and Lev. xxvi. 14-39.

    11-13. Idolatry and captivity of Judah. Cf. Ezek. xx. 28, 31 ; 2 Chron. xxxiii. 3, xxviii. 3 ; 1 En. xcix. 7.

    12. I will send witnesses . . . but they will not hear.  Cf. 2 Chron. xxiv. 19, xxxvi. 15-16; Jer. xxv. 4; Matt, xxiii. 34 ; Luke xi. 49.

          but . . . will slay the witnesses. Neh. ix. 26.

          work evil before My eyes. 2 Kings xxi. 15.

    13. Cf. xxi. 22 ; Isa. i. 15 ; 2 Kings xxi. 14.

          for a prey = lahabl emended from lahebl.

    14. Captive Judah forgets service of God. Cf. Deut. iv. 28, xxviii. 36, 64.

    15-17. Repentance of Judah will bring return and rebuilding of the Temple.

    15. Deut. iv. 30, 29; Jer. xxix. 13, 14.

    16. remove them the plant of uprightness. The expression 'Plant of uprightness' = Israel from the outset. Original perhaps is Jer. xxxii. 41. Cf. i En. x. 6, xciii. 2, 5, 10. Not improbably ' in this land' was lost after the verb. We might read וגטעתים for והסיעתים = 'I will plant them in this land.' Cf. Jer. xxxii. 41. Reversal of the judgement in 13 is required here. 

          they shall be for a blessing and not for a curse. Zech. viii. 13.

          the head and not the tail. Deut. xxviii. 13 ; i En. ciii. 11.

    17. The second Temple, ab > ' their' before God. Cf. Exod. xxv. 8, xxix. 45; Lev. xxvi. 12; Ezek. xiv. 11; Jer. xxiv. 7, xxx. 22.

    18. Cf. Deut. xxxi. 6.

    19. do not forsake . . . rule over them. 2 Kings xxi. 14; Deut. ix. 26; Ps. cvi. 41.

    20. Ps. li. 10. Beliar, see note on xv. 33.

    21. Deut. ix. 26, 29. a holy spirit. Cf. i. 23 and xv. 14 (note).

    22. Deut. xxxi. 27. confess, lie. Lev. xxvi. 40; Neh. ix. 2.

    23. turn, &c. 2 Chron. vi. 38.  circumcise. Deut. x. 16, xxx. 6.  I will cleanse them ... eternity. Implies no more exile for Israel.

    24. I will be their Father, &c. From 2 Sam. vii. 14; used in 2 Cor. vi. 18 of all Christians. In 2 Sam. vii. 14 these words refer to Solomon, God is the Father of the nation in Deut. xxxii. 6; Isa. Ixiii. 16; Jer. xxxi. 9; Cf. also Exod. iv. 22, 23; Deut. xiv. i ; Isa. xliii. 6; Judges ix. 4. In Sir. xxiii. i ; Wisd. ii. 16, &c., it is used of the righteous individual, elsewhere of righteous Israel. In Jubilees Israelites are God's children in virtue of their physical descent from Jacob. Cf. Wisd. xviii. 13. Also Sayings of the Fathers, iii. 22 (Taylor's ed.).

    25. children of the living God. Hosea i. 10.

    26. Moses receives 'Jubilees' as a secret revelation. Cf. esp. 4 Ezra xiv. 6, also Exod. xxxiv. 27-28 ; Deut. x. 2-4. Conclusion of this verse implies that history of 'Jubilees' is to be brought down to author's own time — that of the early Maccabees. Like 1 En. xxv. 3, l.xxvii. i ; Ass. Mos. x; i En. xci-civ, he expected God would dwell with man. He lived in hourly expectation of the 'end of the times'.  Like author of 'Beast Visions', 1 En. lxxxvii-xc, he believed this would be accomplished by a Messiah, but his Messiah was to spring from Judah, cf. xxxi. 18 n.

    27. Angels only accompany Jahweh in Deut. xxxiii. 2, they mediate indirectly in Ezek. xl. 3. Zechariah and Daniel assign even a larger role to the angels. Test. Dan. vi further develops the idea. In N.T. times the ministry of angels has become the universal means of approaching or hearing from God. Expressly affirmed by Philo, De Somniis, i. 22, Josephus, Ant. XV. 5.3; Paul (Gal. iii. 19), Stephen (Acts vii. 53), and author of 'Hebrews' ii. 2, also Samaritans (Gesenius, Carm. Sam. 15), De Sacy, xii. 16. Hostility to Christians caused Rabbis to revert to older view in Shabb. 88 i, Shem. Rabb. 28. The angel here writes, not the Pentateuch, but a history up to the Messianic kingdom, but Deut. xxviii-xxx may be meant.

    28. Read this verse after 25.  eyes of all. Cf. Rev. i. 7.

          King on Mount Zion. Cf. Isa. xxiv. 23.

    29. angel of the presence, derived from Isa. lxiii.9. Cf. Test. Judah x.w. ; i En. xl. 2 ; probably Michael, Israel's guardian angel ; Weber, Jüdische Theologie,² 168 ; Dan. x. 13, 21, xii. i ; I En. xx. 5 ; 2 En xxii. 6.

          went before, &c. Exod. xiv. 19.

          from the day of the [new] creation > 'new', inserted wrongly.

          when > b. Possibly an interpolation, or a mistake of ώς for έως; translate ' until '.

          Author as Isa. Ixv. 17, Ixvi. 22 ; Test. Levi xviii, believed in a gradual transformation of the world, moral and physical.  Perhaps borrowed from Mazdeism (cf. Soderblom, La Vie future d'après le Mazdéisme, 254).  From 1100 B.C. this view was supplanted by the belief in a violent and sudden revolution of things (l En. xci. 16, xiv. 4; I Apoc. Bar. xxxii. 6, Ivii. 2 ; 4 Ezra vii. 75 ; 2 Peter iii. 13 ; Rev. xxi. 1.  The author divides this process of renewal into three periods:  1st, Deluge, v. 12, 13; 2nd, choice of Israel, i.e. foundation of Hebrew nation, .xix. 25, cf. ii. 22; 3rd, establishment of Messianic kingdom, cf. i. 29, iv. 26, v. 12. This division is unique.

          renewed for healing, as Rev. xxii. 2.