Jubilees

The Hermeneia Translation

James C. VanderKam

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781506467030
• eBook ISBN: 9781506467047
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

The book of Jubilees was written by a Jewish author in the second century BCE. Although no original copies of the manuscript remain, the fragments from the Dead Sea Scrolls confirmed the general accuracy of later copies and suggested important amendments. The text retraces the book of Genesis and parts of Exodus and thus is one of the earliest sustained commentaries on the narratives presented in those texts. The translation in this volume is drawn from the author's monumental two-volume work in the Hermeneia commentary series and takes into account all of the textual data now available. The translation is accompanied by carefully selected notes that illuminate the text and is ideal for classroom use.

Translation of the Book of Jubilees

Prologue

These are the words regarding the divisions of the times for the law and for the testimony, for the events of the years, for the weeks of their jubilees throughout all the years of eternity as he related (them) to Moses on Mount Sinai when he went up to receive the stone tablets—the law and the commandment—by the word of the Lord as he had told him that he should come up to the summit of the mountain.

The Setting and Purpose of the Book (Chapter 1)

Narrative Setting (1:1–4)

1:1/ During the first year of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, in the third month—on the sixteenth of this month—the Lord said to Moses: “Come up to me to the mountain. I will give you the two stone tablets, the law and the commandment that I have written so that you may teach them.” 2/ So Moses went up the mountain of the Lord. The glory of the Lord took up residence on Mount Sinai, and a cloud covered it for six days. 3/ When he summoned Moses into the cloud on the seventh day, he saw the glory of the Lord like a fire blazing on the summit of the mountain. 4/ Moses remained on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights while the Lord showed him what (had happened) beforehand as well as what was to come. He related to him the divisions of the timesfor the law and for the testimony.

Conversation between the Lord and Moses (1:5–26)

The Lord’s First Speech (1:5–18)

5/ He said to him: “Pay attention to all the words that I tell you on this mountain. Write them in a book so that their generations may know that I have not abandoned them because of all the evil they have done in breaking ^[1] the covenant between me and your children that I am making today on Mount Sinai for their offspring. 6/ So it will be that when all of these things befall them they will recognize that I have been more faithful than they in all their judgments and in all their ­curses.^[2] They will recognize that I have indeed been with them.

7/ “Now you write this entire message that I am telling you today, because I know their defiance and their stubbornness (even) before I bring them into the land that I promised by oath to their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: ‘To your posterity I will give the land that flows with milk and honey’. When they eat and are full, 8/ they will turn after other ^[3]gods who will not save them from any afflictions. Then the testimony is to correspond ^[4]with this testimony. 9/ For they will forget all my commandments—everything that I command you—and will follow the nations, their idols, and their abominations. They will serve their gods, and (this) will prove an obstacle for them—an affliction, a pain, and a trap. 10/ Many will be destroyed. They will be captured and will fall into the enemy’s control because they abandoned my statutes, my commandments, my covenantal festivals, my Sabbaths, my holy things which they have hallowed for me among them, my tabernacle, and my temple that I sanctified for myself in the middle of the landso that I could set my name on it and that it could live (there). 11/ They will make for themselves high places, (sacred) groves, and carved images; they will bow to all the works of their error. They will sacrifice their children to demons and to every product (conceived by) their erring minds. 12/ I will send witnesses to them so that I may testify to them, but they will not listen and will kill the witnesses. They will persecute those too who study the law. They will neglect everything and will begin to do evil in my presence. 13 Then I will hide my face from them. I will deliver them into the control of the nations for captivity, for devastation, and for devouring. I will remove them from the land and disperse them among all the nations. 14/ They will forget all my laws, all my commandments, and all my verdicts. They will forget beginning(s) of the month, Sabbath, festival, jubilee, and covenant.

15/ “After this they will return to me from among the nations with all their minds, all their souls, and all their strength. Then I will gather them from among all the nations, and they will search for me so that I may be found by them when they have searched for me with all their minds and with all their souls. I will rightly disclose to them abundant peace. 16/ I will plant them^[5] as a righteous plant with all my mind and with all my soul. They will become a blessing, not a curse; they will become the head, not the tail. 17/ I will build my temple among them and will live with them; I will be their God and they will be my true and righteous people. 18/ I will neither abandon them nor become alienated from them, for I am the Lord their God.”

Moses’s Intercession for the Nation (1:19–21)

19/ Then Moses fell prostrate and prayed and said: “Lord my God, do not allow your people and your heritage to go along in the error of their minds, and do not deliver them into the control of the nations with the result that they rule over them lest they make them sin against you. 20/ May your mercy, Lord, be lifted over your people. Create for them a just spirit. May the spirit of Belial not rule over them so as to bring charges against them before you and to make them stumble away from every proper path so that they may be destroyed from your presence. 21/ They are your people and your heritage whom you have rescued from Egyptian control by your great power. Create for them a pure mind and a holy spirit. May they not be trapped in their sins from now to eternity.”

The Lord’s Second Speech (1:22–26)

22/ Then the Lord said to Moses: “I know their contrary nature, their way of thinking, and their stubbornness. They will not listen until they acknowledge their sins and the sins of their ancestors. 23/ After this they will return to me in a fully upright manner and with all (their) minds and all (their) souls. I will cut away the foreskins of their minds and the foreskins of their descendants’ minds. I will create a holy spirit for them and will purify them in order that they may not turn away from me from that time forever. 24/ Their souls will adhere to me and to all my commandments. They will perform my commandments. I will be their Father and they will be my children. 25/ All of them will be called children of the living God. Every angel and every spirit will know them. They will know that they are my children and that I am their Father in a just and proper way and that I love them.

26/ “Now you write all these words that I tell you on this mountain: what is first and what is last and what is to come during all the divisions of the times that are for the law and for the testimony and for the weeks of their jubilees until eternity—until the time when I descend and live with them throughout all the ages of eternity.”

Narrative Note about the Angel and Divine Words about the Future (1:27–28)

27/ Then he told the Angel of the Presence to dictate to Moses ^[6] (starting) from the beginning of the creation untilthe time when “my temple is built among them throughout the ages of eternity. 28/ The Lord will appear in the sight of all, and all will know that I am the God of Israel, the Father of all Jacob’s children, and King on Mount Zion for the ages of eternity. Then Zion and Jerusalem will be holy.”

Narrative Note about the Revelation and Its Scope (1:29)

29/ The Angel of the Presence, who was going along in front of the Israelite camp, took the tablets (that told) of the divisions of the years from the time the law and the testimony were created—for the weeks of their jubilees, year by year in their full number, and their jubilees from [the time of the first creation until]^[7] the time of the new creation when the heavens, the earth, and all their creatures will be renewed like the powers of the sky and like all...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Table Of Contents
• Preface
• Abbreviations and Sigla
• Introduction
• Translation of the Book of Jubilees