6 - Second Temple Judaism

This chapter begins with a description of King David’s encounter with the unnamed wise woman of Tekoa who appears in Second Samuel 14, after Absalom has been banished following his murder of Amnon for having raped his half-sister, Tamar. Joab wants David to be reconciled to Absalom, so he sends to Tekoa to find a "wise woman". Joab tells the woman to pretend to be mourning.  The woman tells Dvid that her son has killed his brother, and now the rest of the family wants to kill him. When David decides that her son’s life should be spared, the Tekoite woman tells him that he should similarly spare the life his son Absalom. Second Samuel 14:14 is quoted:

For we must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; neither doth God respect any person: yet doth he devise means, that his banished be not expelled from him.

The first part of this verse describes death as being irreversible, but the second part implies that God possesses the means to rescue the righteous from death. Hebrew translations merely imply the continuance of a person’s seed in the form of living descendants, but the Latin Vulgate (as well as the King James Bible partly based on the Vulgate) provide a more hopeful interpretation. Christianity is so predicated on a beatific afterlife that it assumes this fundamental belief is present in the Old Testament. For the most part, however, it is not. Ideas about life after death did not even immediately affect the Jews after their exposure to the Persians and the Greeks, yet belief in the afterlife ultimately was embraced.

It is believed that the Book of Ecclesiastes (or Qoheleth, after the narrator, traditionally believed to be King Solomon) was written either during the Persian period (539-332 BCE) or the early Hellenistic period (332-65 BCE). Like Job, Ecclesiastes so thoroughly denies life after death that it reads like a refutation of prevailing Persian and Greek beliefs. The stoic fatalism of Ecclesiastes is common to all Near Eastern wisdom literature, but the writing style places it in the Second Temple period. Bible scholar Choon-Leong Seow identifies two words in Ecclesiastes of Persian origin: pardis, meaning garden or orchard and cognate with the English word paradise, and pitgam, meaning proverb or aphorism and cognate with the English word apothegm (a concise saying or maxim). This pair of loan words are the only examples of Persian in Hebrew writings prior to the Achaemenid period. They could either indicate Persian or Hellenistic influence, since the Greeks also borrowed them.

The case for Persian influence is better supported by the presence of Aramaic words, the common tongue of the western portions of the Persian Empire. By the Roman and Byzantine periods, Aramaic had largely supplanted Hebrew as the spoken language of the Jews. Persian loan words later became prevalent during the Talmudic period since Babylonia played host to the largest community of displaced Jews. By the end of the Persian period witnessed the rise of an Israelite commercial and monetary economy. Ecclesiastes contains some references to this post-agrarian phenomenon. Ecclesiastes 5:10 reads::

He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase: this is also vanity.

Like all commentators on a money-based economy, the writer of Ecclesiastes observes that money cannot buy happiness. Chapter 5, verse 12 states:

The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep.

Whether of not the writer was indeed a king, hard work and an increasing level of affluence inspires the observations recorded in Ecclesiastes 5:18-20:

Behold that which I have seen: it is good and comely for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor that he taketh under the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his portion. Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labor; this is the gift of God. For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy of his heart.

Wealth is rarely distributed in an evenhanded manner. The writer expresses his dismay about the oppression of the poor, economic injustice, and prosperity’s inability to avert disaster and calamity. The goal of earning a profit on investments must be attended by care for the less fortunate. Ecclesiastes 11:1-2 offers sound advice:

Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days. Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth.

Judea was well-positioned to exploit the late Persian and Greek passion for international trade, yet despite exposure to cultures that believed that an afterlife exists that rewards moral virtue, the author restates both the Book of Ecclesiastes and the Book of Job’s stoicism in the absence of such hopes. Ecclesiastes 3:16-22 is replicated, verses that refer to God’s pending judgement of the righteous and the wicked, but that make no mention of divine rewards or punishments beyond the brief lifespans of human beings:

And moreover I saw under the sun the place of judgment, that wickedness was there; and the place of righteousness, that iniquity was there. I said in mine heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked: for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work. I said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts. For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth? Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?

The autobiographical tone of Ecclesiastes was an innovation, but the sentiments of the writer are those of traditional Hebrew fatalism. A rhetorical question is posed in Ecclesiastes 3:21 which indicates that the writer was aware of conceptions of a beatific afterlife, but the next verse confirms that he did not accept these heathen conceptions. Acknowledgement of these foreign beliefs, however, marks a turning point in Hebrew thought. These thoughts would later bear fruit, but the writer of Ecclesiastes persists in driving more nails into humanity’s collective coffin. Ecclesiastes 9:10 states:

Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

This verse, and those that precede it, mirrors the Old Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh. Goddess and alewife Siduri offers similar words of reconciliation and acceptance to Gilgamesh:

Now you, Gilgamesh, let your belly be full! Be happy day and night, of each day make a party, dance in circles day and night! Let your clothes be sparkling clean, let your head be clean, wash yourself with water! Attend to the little one who holds onto your hand, let a wife delight in your embrace. This is the (true) task of mankind.

The Book of Ecclesiastes inaugurates attitudes that Josephus and the New Testament associate with the Sadducees, a group drawn from the upper ranks of Hebrew society. By the 1st century, CE, however, the Sadducees had become indifferent to the needs of their perceived inferiors. In Antiquities of the Jews, Book XVIII, Josephus decribes these boorish elitists:

But the doctrine of the Sadducees is this; that souls die with the bodies. Nor do they regard the observation of anything besides what the law enjoins them. For they think it an instance of virtue to dispute with those teachers of philosophy whom they frequent. But this doctrine is received but by a few: yet by those still of the greatest dignity. But they are able to do almost nothing of themselves. For when they become magistrates; as they are unwillingly and by force sometimes obliged to be; they addict themselves to the notions of the Pharisees: because the multitude would not otherwise bear them.

Josephus describes the contrasting beliefs of the Pharisees:

They also believe that souls have an immortal vigor in them: and that under the earth there will be rewards, or punishments; according as they have lived virtuously or viciously in this life: and the latter are to be detained in an everlasting prison; but that the former shall have power to revive and live again. On account of which doctrines they are able greatly to persuade the body of the people: and whatsoever they do about divine worship, prayers, and sacrifices, they perform them according to their direction.

Rejection of an afterlife by the Sadducees was based on Old Testament writings, which, with very few exceptions. do not allude to life after death.

The later book of the Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sira, also known as the Book of Sirach and Ecclesiasticus, reflects the lack of belief in an afterlife expressed by its predecessor, the Book of Ecclesiastes. Rewards and punishments are experienced in this life, and adversity is a test of one’s faith. Sirach 14:16-17 describes the inevitability and finality of death:

Give, and take, and sanctify thy soul; for there is no seeking of dainties in the grave. All flesh waxeth old as a garment: for the covenant from the beginning is, Thou shalt die the death.

Two methods for outlasting death have been previously mentioned in connection with other Near Eastern belief systems. The first method depends upon passing the mantle to one's descendants. This is described in Sirach 30:4-6:

Though his father die, yet he is as though he were not dead: for he hath left one behind him that is like himself. While he lived, he saw and rejoiced in him: and when he died, he was not sorrowful. He left behind him an avenger against his enemies, and one that shall requite kindness to his friends.

The second method relies on establishing lasting fame during one’s lifetime, and is described in Sirach 41:11-13:

The mourning of men is about their bodies: but an ill name of sinners shall be blotted out. Have regard to thy name; for that shall continue with thee above a thousand great treasures of gold. A good life hath but few days: but a good name endureth forever.

The Greek translation of the Hebrew text is more optimistic about the possible existence of a hereafter. The author believes that this is because it was created after the publication of the Book of Daniel, an era when Jews were becoming increasingly enchanted with the concept of life after death. The notion of a beatific afterlife became better developed in the Psalms and by the later prophets. The valley of the dry bones described in Ezekial 37 is a noted example, but the author believes that popular interpretations of its meaning may be reading more meaning into the text than it was originally intended to convey. Despite this, Ezekial 37:1-10 could refer not only to the resurrection of the Jewish nation, but to bodily resurrection as well:

The hand of the LORD was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the LORD, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones, And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord GOD, thou knowest. Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live: And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD. So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone. And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them. Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.

No other passage of the Hebrew Bible is potentially as descriptive of the process of bodily resurrection. Zoroastrian beliefs about resurrection also commenced with the bones of a deceased person, but the author dismisses any possible connection due to Ezekial’s chronological and physical distance from the Persian context of Zoroastrianism. It is, rather, an authentic and independent prophetic vision. It is noted that the verses that follow Ezekial 37:1-10 clarify that the resurrection of the dry bones is metaphorical and should not be taken as a literal description of bodily resurrection. Below is Ezekial 37:11-14:

Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts. Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And ye shall know that I am the LORD, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves, And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the LORD have spoken it, and performed it, saith the LORD.

Despite the prosaic and temporal nature of the intended meaning of Ezekial’s prophecy, it did furnish imagery for subsequent Judaic visions of a beatific afterlife. The Tagum interprets it as a prophecy of the resurrection of the ten lost tribes of Israel. Paintings of this vision discovered in an elaborate 3rd-century C.E. synagogue known as Dura-Europos depict a literal, bodily resurrection. Early church fathers, particularly Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian strongly connected Ezekial 37 to personal resurrection.  

Like Ezekial 37, the author notes that Isaiah 24-27 describes life after death metaphorically, rather than literally, but is ambiguous enough to provide grounds for a literal interpretation. The author believes Isaiah’s vision, received from God, might also reflect contemporary beliefs in the afterlife of the Israelites, Canaanites, and Persians. Isaiah 25:8-9 is a bold and unambiguous statement about what came to be called the Day of the LORD:

He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the LORD hath spoken it. And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

The author notes parallels between these verses and Canaanite beliefs in the victory of Ba’al’s victory over Mot. Ba’al conquered death, but this struggle had to be renewed periodically for him to be regurgitated from the mouth of Mot. In Isaiah’s vision, YHWH supplants Ba’al, is savior of Israel, and is LORD over life and death. Further, God’s victory over death is a single event which does not need to be regularly repeated.

Isaiah provides a less easily interpreted apocalyptic vision in verses 26:19-21:

Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.

Every Abrahamic faith has connected this passage with the concept of resurrection, but its context is uncertain. Historical analysis has not determined when it was written or what it refers to. Chapters 24 through 27 of the Book of Isaiah has been called the “Isaianic Apocalypse.” The first 39 chapters of this book were written in the 8th century BCE. The balance is attributed to a second Isaiah, or Deutero-Isaiah. Many scholars believe that chapters 24 through 27 are related to chapters 46 through 60 which discuss the return of the Israelites from captivity. Later parts of chapters 56 through 66 are attributed to yet another Isaiah designated as Third Isaiah. The Isianic Apocalypse, however, cannot be confidently ascribed to any of these writers. Like Ezekial’s vision of the dry bones, it is uncertain whether Isaiah 24 through 27 refers to a metaphorical or a literal resurrection.

The author believes that, on the surface, Isaiah may be stating that the righteous dead will arise from the grave to punish sinners. Canaanite mythology and ritual is referenced in an ironic manner. The inspiration for this apocalypse could be the destruction of Jerusalem by Assyrian invaders. This siege, in the reign of King Hezekiah, was lifted when the Assyrian army was struck with a plague. Immediately afterward, Hezekiah himself became sick. The recovery of the king, and the recovery of the people after the Assyrian siege, rather than resurrection could be the inspiration for Isaiah’s verses. The deliverance of Jerusalem from the Assyrians in 701 BCE, described in Second Kings, was regarded as an act of divine intervention.

The first unambiguous reference to resurrection in the Old Testament is found in Daniel 12:1-3:

And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book. And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.

The book that Daniel refers to is prominent in Jewish tradition. It can be identified with the book mentioned by Moses in Exodus 32:31-33:

And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin--; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written. And the Lord said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.

Some of the language of Daniel 12:1-3 is taken directly from Isaiah 26:19 which proclaims that the dead will “awaken,” transforming the ambiguities of Isaiah into literal terms. Daniel adds details about who will be resurrected and how this will happen. The idea that both good and bad people will arise is unprecedented in the Hebrew Bible, but had been advocated by Zoroastrians who believed that, ultimately, everybody would be saved. Judaic thought was based on the more discriminating criteria of Daniel until the rise of Rabbinic Judaism. The rabbis believed that all Israel will be saved. for all Israel will be righteous. Romans 11:26-27 states:

And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

The Hebrew word dera’on, translated as “eternal abhorrence” occurs only in Daniel 12:12 and Isaiah 66:24. This underscores the influence of the vision contained in the 66th chapter of Isaiah on the prophetic visions of Daniel. Isaiah 66:23-24 states:

And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.  And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

Daniel combines these and other passages from Isaiah and Ezekial in a complex and sophisticated manner in the declaration of his own prophetic vision. This complexity, according to the author, is not the result of self-conscious scholarly exegesis, but is the product of an unconscious, dreamlike, and transcendent experience. In Daniel’s era, pious Jews were suffering not because they failed to honor God’s laws, but because they defiantly insisted on obeying them. 

Daniel 12:3 promises a special reward for those who labor to make other people wise:

And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.

Under the influence of ancient Near Eastern mythological tradition, the writer may be literally identifying resurrected sages with actual stars. Other verses of the Hebrew Bible identify the stars as being angelic beings. An excerpt from the Song of Deborah, Judges 5:19-20, contains this information:

The kings came and fought, then fought the kings of Canaan in Taanach by the waters of Megiddo; they took no gain of money. They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera.

Job 38:6-7, part of God’s response to suffering Job, is similar:

Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof; When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

The Hebrew term zohar is translated as “brightness” in Daniel 12:3 and is also the title of the principal work of the Kabbalah, the Zohar. Daniel 7:13-14 describes the adjacency of the “Son of Man” to God:

I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

These verses have been used to explain how wisdom-givers may be transformed into angels. Subsequent writings variously identify the Son of Man. In the Gospels, he is Jesus. In the First Book of Enoch, he is identified as Enoch. Metatron is identified with Enoch, and thus with the Son of Man in the Third Book of Enoch. Modern scholars describe Third Enoch as pseudepigraphal, as it says it is written by "Rabbi Ishmael" who became a "high priest" after visions of ascension to heaven. Its main theme is the ascension of Enoch and his transformation into Metatron, the greatest of angels in Jewish myths and legends. His legends are predominantly found in mystical Kabbalistic texts. The brief content of Daniel 7:14 became the basis for Jewish ascent mysticism; apocalypticism, Merkabah (a school of early Jewish mysticism), and, especially, the Kabbalah. Leaders who are elevated to angelic status are regarded by the author as likely being those who have experienced martyrdom.  Many scholars note the relationship between Daniel 7:14 and a possible martyrdom described in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah. Isaiah 53:8-10 states:

He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.

These verses do not reveal that the righteous sufferer is martyred, nor do they refer to an afterlife. They do reveal that the sufferer comes close to death but is saved by God to witness the birth of his offspring.

Bible scholars who are professed Christians faithfully ascribe the composition of the Book of Daniel to the Persian period, but other scholars surmise that is was written in the subsequent, turbulent era of the Maccabees. This latter approach negates much of the prophetic content of Daniel, since most of the world empires envisioned in the 2nd and 7th chapters had already come and gone.  The Maccabean Revolt was a Jewish rebellion led by the Maccabees against the Seleucid Empire and against Hellenistic influence on Jewish life. The main phase of the revolt lasted from 167 to 160 BCE and ended with the Seleucids in control of Judea, but conflict between the Maccabees, Hellenized Jews, and the Seleucids continued until 134 BCE, with the Maccabees eventually attaining independence. Second Maccabees 6:21-28, quoted below, describes the decision of Eleazar who, like the three Hebrew boys of Daniel 3, chose death over disobedience.

But they that had the charge of that wicked feast, for the old acquaintance they had with the man, taking him aside, besought him to bring flesh of his own provision, such as was lawful for him to use, and make as if he did eat of the flesh taken from the sacrifice commanded by the king; That in so doing he might be delivered from death, and for the old friendship with them find favour. But he began to consider discreetly, and as became his age, and the excellency of his ancient years, and the honour of his gray head, whereon was come, and his most honest education from a child, or rather the holy law made and given by God: therefore he answered accordingly, and willed them straightways to send him to the grave. For it becometh not our age, said he, in any wise to dissemble, whereby many young persons might think that Eleazar, being fourscore years old and ten, were now gone to a strange religion; And so they through mine hypocrisy, and desire to live a little time and a moment longer, should be deceived by me, and I get a stain to mine old age, and make it abominable. For though for the present time I should be delivered from the punishment of men: yet should I not escape the hand of the Almighty, neither alive, nor dead. Wherefore now, manfully changing this life, I will shew myself such an one as mine age requireth, And leave a notable example to such as be young to die willingly and courageously for the honourable and holy laws. And when he had said these words, immediately he went to the torment:

Although the date of the composition of the Book of Maccabees is not contemporary with the events described within it, this passage from  Second Maccabees represents, according to the author, the creation of a new literary genre, “martyrology.” A pattern for the celebration of heroes willing to die for what they believed in was established long before the word “martyr” was later used by Christians. The author writes that “Martyrdom is a complex social process in which the death of an innocent victim is taken as a proof of the religion by the audience, be it literary or actual.” A model is set for future martyrs to emulate. Second Maccabees 6:31 concludes the story of Eleazar:

And thus this man died, leaving his death for an example of a noble courage, and a memorial of virtue, not only unto young men, but unto all his nation.

Young men were also martyred, but their attitudes were defiant, rather than resigned. The opening verse of the 7th chapter of Second Maccabees sets the scene for the deaths of seven youths:

It came to pass also, that seven brethren with their mother were taken, and compelled by the king against the law to taste swine's flesh, and were tormented with scourges and whips.

Verse 14 contains the last words of the fourth of the seven martyred sons:

So when he was ready to die he said thus, It is good, being put to death by men, to look for hope from God to be raised up again by him: as for thee, thou shalt have no resurrection to life.

Bodily resurrection, a quintessentially Jewish idea, is more emphasized in Maccabees than in the Book of Daniel. Resurrection of the body and the restoration of the world distances this emerging tradition from Greek philosophical conception of the afterlife. With few interludes, the rebellious Israelites were continually persecuted by occupying powers. After the siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE, Emperors Vespasian and his general, future Emperor Titus destroyed much of the Temple and took as punitive tribute the Menorah and other Temple artefacts back to Rome. Josephus writes that 1,100,000 Jews perished during the revolt, while a further 97,000 were taken captive. The Fiscus Judaicus (Jewish tax) was instituted by the Empire as part of reparations. Under Domitian, the enforcement of the tax became stringent.

The mother of the seven martyrs of Second Maccabees chapter 7 encouraged her condemned sons by exalting God’s power. Verses 22 and 23 record her words:

I cannot tell how ye came into my womb: for I neither gave you breath nor life, neither was it I that formed the members of every one of you; But doubtless the Creator of the world, who formed the generation of man, and found out the beginning of all things, will also of his own mercy give you breath and life again, as ye now regard not your own selves for his laws' sake.

Verse 28 reinforces this admonition by inferring that a God who could who could create something out of nothing assuredly recreate, or resurrect, a human being who had been martyred. This verse is believed by some scholars to be the first clear statement of creatio ex nihilo:

I beseech thee, my son, look upon the heaven and the earth, and all that is therein, and consider that God made them of things that were not; and so was mankind made likewise.

Other historians have disputed the presence of the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo among pre-Christian Jewish authors and the general disinterest in creatio ex nihilo prior to medieval rabbinic writers. Saadia Gaon introduced ex nihilo creation into the readings of the Jewish bible in the 10th century CE in his work “Book of Beliefs and Opinions” where he imagines a God far more awesome and omnipotent than that of the rabbis, the traditional Jewish teachers who had so far dominated Judaism, whose God created the world from pre-existing matter. Currently Jews, like Christians, tend to believe in creation ex nihilo, although some Jewish scholars maintain that Genesis 1:1 allows for the pre-existence of matter to which God gives form.

Previously, creation testified to God’s power and the Sabbath was instituted as a celebration of this power. After the advent of the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo, creation also became demonstrative of God’s power to resurrect. Contemporarily, Zoroastrians also professed belief in God’s ability to raise the dead. These beliefs may or may not have influenced Judaism, but Jewish beliefs were innovative for their association of resurrection with martyrdom. The author expresses his confidence in identifying Second Maccabees 7:28 as a doctrinal gamechanger: “The notion of life after death developed in the land of Israel to explain the martyrdom of the righteous for their religious beliefs.”

In addition to Zoroastrian and persistent Canaanite influences, ancient Mesopotamian religion impacted Judaism during the Second Temple period. The Jews, like any other sensible people, appreciated the importance of Babylonian tradition and wisdom which is evident in biblical and extra-biblical sources. Their presence in the Enoch literature is due to the control by the Maccabees of both the political and religious realms. A group of alienated priests retreated to the desert and established the Qumran community during the reign of Hasmonean leader John Hyrcanus (134–104 BCE) or somewhat later. Qumran was inhabited by a Jewish sect of the late Second Temple period, which most scholars identify with the Essenes; however, other Jewish groups were also suggested.  It was occupied most of the time until 68 CE and was destroyed by the Romans during the First Jewish–Roman War, possibly as late as 73 CE.

The separatist priests were Zadokites, the founders of the Second Temple. They developed their own traditions which are evident in the Enoch literature. Biblical information about Enoch is skeletal. The 5th chapter of the Book of Genesis describes the direct descendants of Adam. Enoch is the subject of verses 18-24:

And Jared lived an hundred sixty and two years, and he begat Enoch: And Jared lived after he begat Enoch eight hundred years, and begat sons and daughters: And all the days of Jared were nine hundred sixty and two years: and he died. And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methuselah: And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters: And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years: And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.

Similarities between Enoch and the Mesopotamian traditions of Enmeduranki and Adapa, wise men who journeyed to heaven and founded divinatory priesthoods and ecstatic prophetic guilds, are evident in the visions of Daniel and the enormous body of pseudepigraphical literature compiled into the books known as First Enoch, Second Enoch, and Third Enoch. These books were written by a variety of authors, and each book exhibits a variety of traditions which may have originally been circulated separately. Much of this material is based on Mesopotamian sources whose inspiration was not alone confined to the Second Temple period.

Enoch’s position as seventh descendant in the generations of Adam occupies the same position as that of Enmeduranki in the list of Sumerian kings. Enoch lived for 365 years, a possible link to Enmeduranki association with the solar god Shamash. In heaven, Enmeduranki was enthroned by the gods and given the secret techniques of divination, experiences shared by Enoch in the apocryphal record of his afterlife. Like the Flood narrative, Mesopotamian influence was adapted reconfigured for Israelite purposes. Enoch’s unique position in the Bible provided a framework within which conceptions of translation, transformation, angelification, and Messianic redemption could be contained. The fleshing out of Enoch’s story led to the creation of the first extra-canonical Hebrew literature. Enoch’s journey to heaven and his subsequent transformation validates the ecstatic and mystical experiences of Those who continue to inhabit earth, a precursor to the story of Jesus’s resurrection and ascension.

Enmeduranki’s relationship to the ecstatic baru priests was based on his having shared with them the secrets of divination. Mesopotamian divination utilized lecanomancy (observation of oil in water), hepatoscopy (inspection of the liver of a sacrificed animal), and an enigmatic technique that involved the use of a cedar rod. Enmeduranki learned these secret techniques from the gods Shamash and Adad, then taught them to selected human beings. The disenfranchised priests of Qumran also claimed to possess secret knowledge. The Enoch literature describes an elaborate cosmology and reveals, in detail, how God’s justice rewards the dead in heaven and punishes the wicked. It also urges preparation for the sudden, apocalyptic end of the world that will destroy those who have oppressed God’s people and the establishment of a peaceful, everlasting kingdom that is exclusively populated by righteous people.The books of Enoch develop the standard apocalyptic theme that evil may permeate the world, but God will soon set things aright.

Enoch shared the secret of a solar calendar with the Qumran community. This system for reckoning time is comprised of 12 months, each of which has 30 days. Intercalated days stand outside of the normal week, so annual holidays always fall on the same day of the week. A unique calendar inspired the community to consider themselves Sons of Light, in contrast to every other Israelite whom Qumran regarded as Sons of Darkness. The standard Hebrew calendar was based on the phases of the moon. Their distinctive way of parsing the year, along with the Enoch literature, reinforced the sectarian nature of the separatist group that produced ft.

Fragments of First Enoch discovered in a cave are written in Aramaic, suggesting that parts of its story may date back to the 3rd century BCE. It could predate the Book of Daniel, and some scholars have proposed that it could predate the 5th chapter of Genesis. Most likely, both First Enoch and Genesis are drawn from the same source material. First Enoch provides abundant information about life after death, divine judgement, and apocalyptic ideology. Chapter 14 describes, in detail, Enoch’s journey to heaven to intercede on behalf of the fallen angels. Verse 8 is the beginning of this ascent:

And the vision was shown to me thus: Behold, in the vision clouds invited me and a mist summoned me, and the course of the stars and the lightnings sped and hastened me, and the winds in the vision caused me to fly and lifted me upward, and bore me into heaven.

The remaining verses of Chapter 14 describe the heavenly Temple, a pattern for the earthly Temple. Devout Jews believed that the Second Temple was a flawed copy, both its structure and its priesthood, long before it was destroyed by the Romans.

First Enoch 22 describes the final disposition of the dead. Below are verses 5-9.

I saw (the spirit of) a dead man making suit, and his voice went forth to heaven and made suit. And I asked Raphael the angel who was with me, and I said unto him: 'This spirit which maketh suit, whose is it, whose voice goeth forth and maketh suit to heaven?' And he answered me saying: 'This is the spirit which went forth from Abel, whom his brother Cain slew, and he makes his suit against him till his seed is destroyed from the face of the earth, and his seed is annihilated from amongst the seed of men. Then I asked regarding all the hollow places: 'Why is one separated from the other?' And he answered me saying: 'These three have been made that the spirits of the dead might be separated. And this division has been made for the spirits of the righteous, in which there is the bright spring of water. And this has been made for sinners.

The author emphasizes the importance of Abel’s role as a prototypical martyr in this vision of Enoch. Four categories of dead are awaiting judgement, and their ultimate disposition can be determined by the condition of the places where they await judgement. This bureaucratic compartmentalization of the dead suggests an acquaintance with the methods ancient empires used to dispose of the inhabitants of a city they had taken by force of arms. Israel’s position at the crossroads of the ancient world resulted in repeated exposures to foreigners whose social and religious traditions sequentially influenced the beliefs of the Israelites. The author notes that prevailing Greek beliefs about the afterlife, however, failed to make an impact. The heaven of the books of Enoch rewarded the righteous and punished sinners. This requires that the dead be resurrected into a physical body, a solid, non-Platonic receptacle for pain or pleasure.

First Temple period editors of scripture were primarily focused on countering the religions of the Canaanites which embraced idolatry, prostitution, and infant sacrifice. An innovation of the Second Temple period was a relative openness to the religious insights of other cultures. Zoroastrianism emphasized the importance of emulating whatever is good and avoiding everything that is evil. Cyrus had overthrown the Babylonian oppressor and was even described as a “Messiah” by Isaiah. By the standards of that era, Jews could regard Zoroastrians as a relatively upright people. Similarly, Greek philosophy advocated good morals and self-denial. Both groups, however, were idolaters, a practice abhorred by the Jews, but both stood head and shoulders above the fleshly and murderous religions of the Canaanites.

No longer the isolated, embattled state of the First Temple period, Second Temple period Israel was now part of a larger empire and possessed good communications with the rest of the world. The sect that produced the Book of Daniel took pains to exclude Greek influences but did repurpose (perhaps unknowingly) Canaanite imagery in descriptions of the enthronement of the “Son of Man” and the “ancient of days.”  Daniel was a prophetic book, and most Jews came to accept it. The Sadducees rejected belief in the afterlife, so this group naturally rejected the Book of Daniel. The following chapter of “Life After Death” details how different parts of Jewish society reacted to the novel (for Judaism) idea that an afterlife exists.