A Paper for Religious Thought 525

A Paper for Dr. Robert A. Kraft, University of Pennsylvania

Religious Thought 525 Judaism in the Hellenistic Era

October, 1974

A Brief Survey ofthe Book of Jubilees

Robert C. Newman

The book of Jubilees is one of the pre-Christian writings ofJewish authorship traditionally categorized among the Old TestamentPseudepigrapha, being so placed in Charles' standard work, The Apocrypha andPseudepigrapha of the Old Testament.[1] This is to say that the work was notaccepted as Scripture either by Rabbinic Judaism (the canonical Old Testament)or by the Roman Catholic Church at the Council of Trent (OT apocrypha). Jubilees gives every evidence of beingpseudepigraphal in the broader sense also, as it presents itself as arevelation to Moses at Sinai. Aswe shall see below, the work may also be classed in the category of works withan apocalyptic character.

Text

The text of Jubilees is preserved to us principally in fourEthiopic manuscripts from the late middle ages.[2] These are supplemented by a large fragmentof the work in Latin, probably translated in the fifth century AD, consistingof about ¼ of the whole, from chapter 13 to the end.[3] There was also an ancient Greek versionof Jubilees, which is attested by a number of citations among Greek-speaking Christianauthors, beginning with Justin Martyr in the second century and continuing tothe twelfth century,[4]when interest in the work seems to have died out.

Working with these materials, Charles suggested that boththe Ethiopic and Latin versions came from the Greek, but that the Greek itselfwas in turn a translation from Hebrew.[5] Recent manuscript finds in the cavesnear Qumran have included fragments from at least ten different copies ofJubilees, all in Hebrew,[6]confirming Charles' view and indicating some definite connection between theQumran community and the book of Jubilees.

Contents and Character

The book of Jubilees is written in the form of a revelationfrom God to Moses on Mt. Sinai, mostly through the mediation of the Angel ofthe Presence. It is basically arepetition of the material in Genesis and the first twelve chapters of Exodus,with some noteworthy modifications, additions and deletions.

There is, for instance, a tendency to withdraw God from manby the interposition of angelic intermediaries (paragraph above, 17:11, andoften), although this is not absolute (27:21). Several orders of angels are mentioned, including wickedangels led by their chief named Mastema, who is apparently to be identifiedwith Satan.

Jubilees also tends to make its good characters look betterand the bad ones worse. Forinstance, God's command to Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac is pictured ashaving been instigated by Mastema (17:16; cp. Gen 22:1). Likewise God's attempt to kill Moses ashe returned to Egypt (Ex 4:24) is transfered to Mastema. Abraham is portrayed as rejectingidolatry from his youth (12:16ff; cp. Josh 24:14). His lying in Egypt is not mentioned (13:11ff). His tithing to Melchizedek is missingfrom the extant manuscripts (13:25), although apparently it was present in theoriginal. In substantial contrastto the Biblical account, Jubilees indicates that Jacob is perfectly good (35:6,12), whereas Esau is almost totally wicked.

There are a number of features in Jubilees which we wouldcall midrashic, as the treatment of the Scriptural text is similar to thatfound in the Rabbinical Targumim and Midrashim. Thus, the two highest orders of angels join God in keepingthe Sabbath (2;18), a feature reminiscent of the Rabbinical idea that Godspends his time studying the Torah and Mishnah (Ab. Z. 3b, Bab. Mez. 86a). Adam's creation in the first week andEve's in the second (!) explains the Biblical injunction for a male-femaledistinction in purification periods (3:8-13). Men and animals speak one language before Adam's expulsionfrom Eden (3:20; Hebrew! 12:25-26).

There is also a priestly interest in the material. Throughout the book we find detailsregarding the names of persons anonymous in Scripture. Much emphasis is laid on the exactdates of events and on the calendar as a whole, as we shall see below. Likewise, we find considerable detailregarding the patriarchal sacrifices (e.g., 3:24, 6:2ff, 16:22ff, 32:48), andthe principal Jewish festivals and fast are instituted (or at leastforeshadowed) hundreds of years before Moses.

The book of Jubilees also shows an interest in eschatology,especially in chapter 21. Thiswill be discussed in connection with the theology of Jubilees, below.

Dependence on Other Writings

Jubilees is obviously dependent on the Pentateuch. This dependence seems so strong that itis hard to credit Zeitlin's belief that Jubilees was intended to displace it.[7] Not only does the book make use of thePentateuch for the time-period from Adam to Sinai (Gen 1 to Ex 12), but theextensive liturgical material in Jubilees clearly presupposes the rest ofExodus, Leviticus and Numbers as well.

None of the works I have examined discussed the dependenceof Jubilees on other Scripture, nor have I attempted any such detailed workmyself. Jub 12:16ff may reflectthe author's meditation on Josh 24:14, as mentioned above. The writer's emphasis on weeks of yearsprobably indicates his knowledge of Dan 9:24ff and 2 Chron 36:21, as well asthe Pentateuchal institution of the Sabbatical cycle for land use. Doubtless many other such parallelscould be found. In any case,Jubilees seems to show a knowledge of and very high regard for the Pentateuch. Except for some calendric statements,the few disagreements between the two are probably unintentional.

Among extra-canonical writings, Jubilees seems to show aknowledge of 1 Enoch. Jub 4:17-23speaks of Enoch writing a book and mentions several subjects in it. According to Charles, these subjectsindicate that the writer of Jubilees was familiar with three of the earliestsections of 1 Enoch (chapters 6-16, 23-36, and 72-90).[8] 1 Enoch also seems to use a calendarvery similar to, if not identical with, that of Jubilees.[9] A book of Noah is also mentioned in Jub10:13 and 21:10. Although no suchwork is extant, Charles has suggested that such a work served as a source forsome of the Noah material in both 1 Enoch and Jubilees.[10]

Date

The book of Jubilees is universally conceded to originate inthe Second Temple period, but otherwise a wide range of dates has beensuggested, from about 400 BC (Zeitlin) to the first century AD (Headlam).[11] Most scholars have followed Charles inassigning Jubilees to the late second century BC, although a substantialminority (Albright, E. Meyer, and Finkelstein) favor the early part of the samecentury.[12]

As far as external evidence is concerned, if Jubilees independent on parts of 1 Enoch, then it was written after them. These parts are dated by Charles in theearly second century BC.[13] Although one may argue either that hisdates are wrong, or that the 1 Enoch sections were written to supply a bookhertofore only in the mind of the author of Jubilees, it appears that the dataare consistent with Jubilees having a date from the early second centuryonward.

The Damascus Document, or Zadokite Fragment, firstdiscovered in the Cairo Geniza but now known at Qumran, also helps in datingJubilees. In column 16, lines 3and 4, we read:

… an exact specification of the timewhen Israel will be blind to these things is spelled out with equal exactnessin the Book of the Divisions of the Times into their Jubilees and Weeks.[14]

This pretty clearly refers to Jubilees, which is also knownat Qumran, and therefore the Damascus Document was written later. Since the latter must have been writtenbefore the fall of Qumran about AD 70, Jubilees could be no later than thefirst century AD and is probably not even that late.

The internal evidence is consistent with this range (or,even more narrowly, with the second century BC), but otherwise it isproblematical. Jub 3:31 speaks ofthe Gentiles "uncovering themselves," which immediately suggests thegymnasium. But, as Zeitlin pointsout, this criterion alone could equally well date the Pentateuchal episode ofNoah and Ham as Hellenistic.[15] However, this reference, together with15:33, which speaks of Israel's "departure from circumcision," leadsFinkelstein to date Jubilees in the period 175-140 BC, when the Jews were mostseriously tempted to extreme Hellenization. Furthermore, 50:12 contains a prohibition against fightingon the Sabbath, which would seem to be pre-or early Maccabean, unless it camefrom a person or group who never was reconciled to the Maccabean casuistry onthis point.

On the other hand, 38:14, which speaks of the Edomites beingin servitude to Israel "to this day," would seem to favor a date inthe reign of John Hyrcanus (134-104 BC), when Israel reconquererd these ancientneighbors, or even later, which would seem to be inconsistent with the abovedata. Of course, it is possiblethe writer had Moses' day in mind, but the Edomites were not subject to Israelthen, either. Perhaps the authorwas just using Biblical terminology without thinking through all itsimplications.

The eschatological passage in Jubilees chapter 23 is anotherplace to attempt dating, on the theory that apocalyptic writers placedthemselves in the last days. Inverses 16-25, we see that the end-time is characterized by a generation gap,many forsaking the covenant, wickedness, famine, rebellion, oppression,defilement of the temple and invasion by Gentiles. Unlike most apocalypses, however, Jubilees follows this witha spontaneous return to the law and (apparently) a gradual improvement inconditions. As nothing is said whichcould really refer to the Maccabees, the passage looks rather pre-Maccabean,except for the defilement of the temple. Here again we have ambiguity. Perhaps the book is pre-Maccabean and considers the actuvities of Jasonand Menelaus to constitute defilement of the temple, or perhaps it ispost-Maccabean by an author who discounts the importance of Judah and hisbrothers.

In conclusion, the second century BC looks best for the dateof Jubilees, but it is difficult to choose between a time immediately beforeAntiochus desolates the temple (say 175-168) or later during the reign of JohnHyrcanus (say 130-105).

Theology

Theologically, the writer of Jubilees shows considerableinterest in the law and the priesthood, as noted above. He seems to have a high regard for thePentateuch, even though he occasionally contradicts it.

Exegetically, the methods employed by Jubilees are very muchlike those of the Rabbis, even though a number of the results are different.[16] The Jubilees halakoth for the Sabbath (2:25-30, 50:6-13) are morestringent, for instance, viewing violations as eternal rather than merelycapital offenses (2:27). Objectsare not to be carried from house to house (2:30), nor is marital intercourse(50:8) or warfare (5:12) allowed on this day.

In regard to festivals,[17]the passover meal is only to be eaten in the temple court, rather than at anyhome in Jerusalem, as permitted by the Rabbis. However, it may be eaten throughout the night, rather thanjust to midnight. Old grain may beoffered at the Feast of Weeks in famine situations, though this is not allowedby the Talmud.

We see similar differences in regard to the laws ofsacrifice, marriage and tithing. Finkelstein feels that the halakothof Jubilees are mostly earlier than the Rabbinic ones.[18]

Moving on to other areas of theology, angelology has beentouched on above. Details aregiven in Charles.[19]

The writer's view of the kingdom of God is given in 23:9-31and is discussed by Ladd.[20] As in most apocalyptic andeschatological literature of Judaism, the kingdom is preceded by a period ofwoes. The climax, however, is nota supernatural intervention into history, but the return of God's people to thelaw, which is the key to bring in the kingdom (23:26).

The resulting kingdom is an earthly one which apparentlycomes in gradually (23:26-30) but lasts forever (23:30), in contrast to mostother apocalypses. There is noMessiah in this kingdom passage, and the only possible messianic reference inthe whole work (31:18-19) probably refers to David.

Also noteworthy is the apparent absence of a resurrection,combined with a continuation of the individual. Of the righteous, it is said (23:30)

Andtheir bones shall rest in the earth

Andtheir spirits shall have much joy,

which is consistent with the "eternal sleep"mentioned in 23:1 and 36:1,18. The wicked, however, are castinto Sheol (7:29, 22:22).

Authorship

The book of Jubilees seems to be a unified work by a singleauthor, even though several sources appear to have been used.[21] But what sort of person is the author?

Using the descriptions of Jewish groups found in Philo,Josephus and Pliny the Elder, all of which apply to the first century of ourera (and therefore probably at least a century after Jubilees was written), ourauthor does not fit well into any of the categories. The author does not seem to be a Sadducee, for his outlookis too deterministic, he believes in the immortality of the soul, makesmidrashic additions to Scipture, and has a complex angelology. Of course, it is possible that in someof these points we or our ancient sources have misunderstood theSadducees. In any case, it isconceivable that Sadduceeism changed considerably in a century, as theUnitarians and Methodists have certainly done so over the course of theirhistories. But the connection ofJubilees with the Sadducees is certainly not obvious.

Neither does the author seem to be a Pharisee, at least notone of the first century AD or Talmudic sort. Jubilees has no resurrection, a different (and veryimportant) calendar, and a strong emphasis on divergent halakoth.

Naturally, one is inclined to look to the Essenes or Qumranfor our author, since manuscripts of Jubilees were used by the latter, andJubilees' stringency and calendar also point in this direction. However, as Noack observes,[22]Jubilees lacks the characteristic Qumran emphasis on the Holy Spirit, thecommunal meal and ritual bathings for the laity. Most important, however, is the difference in outlook. Qumran is a strongly separatistcommunity which considers itself alone as the righteous remnant, whereasJubilees looks forward to Israel as a whole returning to God and his law. It is certainly possible that theperspective of Jubilees is the earlier attitude which gradually hardened as thecall for repentance was ignored, but this cannot be said as yet to have beendemonstrated.

Of the other sects, the Zealots are probably too late andcertainly too militaristic to have authored Jubilees; the Theraputae arelinguistically probably too Greek; and the other sects are too vaguely known tous to make any judgment possible. Therefore, it appears that our author either belongs to no group at all,to a group we know virtually nothing about, or that he belongs to one of thebetter-known groups at an earlier and rather different-looking stage of theirhistory. At the moment, thesuggestion that the author is an Essene of pre- or proto-Qumran would seem tobe the safest bet.

Calendar

The calendar of the book of Jubilees is certainly a centraltheme, if not the central theme, of the work. The title of the book (prologue) is calendric; 1:14 speaksof Israelites going astray in these matters; 6:23-38 gives a fairly detailedpicture of the calendar, and a good fraction of the Jubilees' material notfound in the Pentateuch consists of specific dates of various liturgical orredemptive events.

From chapter six, we learn that the year in Jubilees isexactly 52 weeks long (6:30), or 364 days (6:32), and that it was divided intofour thirteen-week quarters (6:28). With such a year, all the Jewish festivals (which, according toScripture, fall on fixed days of the month), also fall on fixed days of theweek, with no change from year to year. Presumably each quarter (with 91 days) would consist of a 31-day monthand two 30-day months.

This is a sort of solar calendar, since its year correspondsto the solar year (just under 365 ¼ days) more closely than its months(average 30 ⅓ days) correspond to the lunar month (29 ½days). The Islamic calendar with12 months totalling 354 days is strictly lunar, whereas the Rabbinical (andmodern) Jewish calendar is a luni-solar one, with 12 lunar months, plus athirteenth one intercalated every two or three years, so that the averagelength of the years match the solar year.

It is possible to make the Jubilees' calendar more explicit if we assume that certain similar calendars wereactually identical. For instance,the calendar presupposed in 1 Enoch 72 starts the year at the spring equinox(agreeably, Jubilees has Passover in the first month), and each quarter hasthree months of length 30, 30 and 31 days, in that order. This would give us the additionalinformation that it is the 3^rd, 6^th, 9^th and12^th months which are longer, given that Jubilees uses the samecalendar. A list of festival daysand dates from Qumran would fit this arrangement and add the detail that theyears starts on a Wednesday.[23] Baumgarten also cogently argues that theday in both Qumran and Jubilees calendars begins at sunset. Thus we have the following commoncalendar for Jubilees, 1 Enoch and Qumran, with each day of the week beginningthe previous evening compared with our (Gentile) reckoning:

Is it possible that this calendar was used by a Jewish sectfor any substantial length of time? To answer this, it is important to recognize that the Jewish festivalsare partly agricultural in nature (this is reflected in Jubilees as well as inthe Scripture) and therefore the calendar must stay synchronized with theseasons, which in the long run are tied to the exact length of the solar year,just under 365 ¼ days. Since the Jubilees calendar is only 364 days long, there is a cumulativeerror of about four months per century. It is therefore impossible that this calendar can have been used overthe century or two that the Qumran community existed unless some sort ofintercalation was employed. However, we have no information from Jubilees, 1 Enoch or Qumran toindicate the kind or even the existence of intercalation, so any suggestionsgiven must be rather speculative. Nevertheless, let us look at some possibilities.

Leach[24]suggests that a year of average length 365 days may be obtained withoutviolating Jubilees' week-structure by adding a full week (not counted as daysof the month) every seven years. He feels that this could be done at the Feast of Tabernacles, wherethere exists a special Scriptural emphasis every seven years anyway. With such a scheme, the cumulativeerror is reduced to just under 25 days per century. This error is still very large, but might just be tolerablefor a short-lived community.

For further refinement, the calendar could be made asaccurate as the Greek Octaeteris system then in use (in which three 30-daymonths were intercalated every eight years) by a rather complicated andimplausible trick suggested by Leach.[25] On the 49^th year of eachJubilee cycle, the usual week is added because it is a seventh year, but thistime after the Day of Atonement (month 7, day 10) rather than atTabernacles. At the end of thisadded week (which constitutes the Jubilee year), the whole month is startedover (i.e., from month 7, day 1), effectively adding the necessary ten days,though unfortunately interrupting the sequence of weekdays. Although Leach feels this solves theproblem of having no agriculture on the 50^th (Jubilee) year (whichis only this added week, or at most, 17 days), his model seems a bit too heavyat present for the data to support it. However, it does reduce the cumulative error in the calendar to aboutone day per century.

A more reasonable suggestion is made by Finegan.[26] He notes that the late Rabbinic work Pirqede Rabbi Eliezer (completed in the 9^thcentury AD) mentions a "28-year cycle of the sun." If to Leach's first suggestion ofadding a week every seventh year, we add an additional week every 28^thyear, the cumulative error in the Jubilees' calendar can be cut to about oneday per century, which is comparable to the error in the Julian calendar beforethe refinements instituted in modern times by Pope Gregory.

Finally let us ask, was the Jubilees' calendar aninnovation, or was it the traditional Jewish calendar in the centuries beforethe beginning of our era? Internalevidence in Jubilees could point either way, for both traditionalists andinnovators have been known to ascribe to God and to antiquity their favoriteviews. Both Morgenstern and Segal,[27]though differing sharply on details of the history of the calendar, think thata solar calendar like that of Jubilees was once used widely in Israel, but thatat the time of Jubilees it was being (or had recently been) replaced by theBabylonian luni-solar calendar used by the Jews today.

It is true that the flood account of Genesis 7 and 8, having30-day months, gives some calendric intormation which predates the presentJewish luni-solar calendar and suggests an earlier calendar of a solarsort. However, the numbers givenin Gen 7:11, 24 and 8:3, 4 suggest a calendar of five successive months of 30days each, which disagrees both with the Jubilees' calendar and the Jewishluni-solar calendar used today. Itis possible that these Pentateuchal dates surrounding the flood may have formeda core from which the writer of Jubilees either attempted to build up a newcalendar or to justify a similar (but not identical) calendar already inexistence. Therfore it does notappear that the question of the antiquity of the Jubilees' calendar has as yetbeen solved.

[1] R. H.Charles, The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (2 vols.; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913). Hereafter referred to as CAPOT.

[4] CAPOT, 2:2; George E. Ladd, "The Kingdom of God inthe Jewish Apocryphal Literature: Jubilees," Bibliotecha Sacra 109 (1952): 164-174.

[6] D. S.Russell, The Method and Message of Jewish Apocalyptic (London: SCM Press, 1964), p. 38.

[7] SolomonZeitlin, "The Book of 'Jubilees' and the Pentateuch," JewishQuarterly Review 48 (1957-58): 218-235.

[9] JackFinegan, Handbook of Biblical Chronology(Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress, 1964), §§ 98-103.

[11] H. H.Rowley, Relevance of the Apocalyptic (2^nded.; london: Lutterworth Press,1947), pp. 84f.

[12] LouisFinkelstein, "Pre-Maccabean Documents in the Passover Haggadah. Appendix: The Date of the Book of Jubilees," HarvardTheological Review 36 (1943): 19-24.

[14] Theodore H.Gaster, ed., The Dead Sea Scriptures(Garden City, NY: Doubleday,1956), p. 85.

[16] See LouisFinkelstein, "The Book of Jubilees and the Rabbinic Halaka," HarvardTheological Review 16 (1923): 39-61.

[17] Ibid. See also the notes by Box in R. H.Charles and G. H. Box, The Book of Jubilees or the Little Genesis (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1917).

[22] Bent Noack,"Qumran and the Book of Jubilees," Svensk Exegetisk Årsbok 22-23 (1957-58): 191-207.

[23] Joseph M.Baumgarten, "The Beginning of the Day in the Calendar of Jubilees," Journalof Biblical Literature 77 (1958): 355-360.

[24] E. R.Leach, "A Possible Method of Intercalaction for the Calendar of the Bookof Jubilees," Vetus Testamentum 7(1957): 392-397.

[27] JulianMorgenstern, "The Calendar of the Book of Jubilees," VetusTestamentum 5 (1955): 34-76; J. B. Segal,"Intercalaction and the Hebrew Calendar," Vetus Testamentum 7 (1957): 250-307.

Months 1, 4, 7, 10:
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30

Months 2, 5, 8, 11:
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
					1	2
3	4	5	6	7	8	9
10	11	12	13	14	15	16
17	18	19	20	21	22	23
24	25	26	27	28	29	30

Months 3, 6, 9, 12:
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28
29	30	31