Lives of the Prophets

• This page is edited by Géza G. Xeravits, Sapientia College of Theology, Budapest

Lives of the Prophets is a first century C.E. Jewish document, generally included in collections of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha.

Manuscript Tradition

Greek text: The most ancient witness is the so-called codex Marchalianus (Vat.gr. 2125), from the sixth century C.E. (An1). Scholars agree that every other text-type of the work originate from this version. Two versions are preserved among the writings of Epiphanios of Salamis (Ep1 and Ep2), one MS from the 13th century C.E., and one from the 10th century. Another witness is preserved among the writings of Dorotheos of Antioch (Dor), in a MS from the 13th century. The recension which is closest to the codex Marchalianus text is called recensio anonyma (An2), it comes from the 10th century. Finally, another type of the work can be reconstructed from various passages of the church fathers (Schol, i.e. recensio scholiis adiecta).

Besides of the Greek versions, we know various other translations of the Lives of the Prophets: Latin, Syriac, Armenian, Ethiopic, Georgian, Arabic, Church Slavonic, and Old Irish, which shows that the ancient Church read this work with predilection.

History of research

Two Greek MSS were edited synoptically by Eberhard Nestle, Marginalien und Materialien (Tübingen: Heuckenhauer 1893), 2: 1-64; with an introduction and with a long list of important Syriac variants. The Greek text-forms of the Lives of the Prophes in their entirety were edited by Theodor Schermann, Prophetarum Vitae Fabulosae. Indices apostolorum discipulorumque Domini Dorotheo, Epiphanio, Hippolyto aliisque vindicata (Leipzig: Teubner 1907); with a comprehensive introduction (pages ix-lxxi); the Greek texts are published in pages 1-104. Schermann further studied the manuscript evidence in his Propheten- und Apostellegenden nebst Jüngerkatalogen des Dorotheus und verwandter Texte (TU 31/3, Leipzig: Hinrichs 1907).

The Christian origin of the collection was consistently claimed recently by David Satran in a series of publications, most comprehensively in his 1995 monograph. Although Christian reworking is discernable at a couple of instances, the collection is rather of Palestinian Jewish origin.

References (major studies)

Translations

Charles Cutler Torrey, The Lives of the Prophets. Greek Text and Translation (JBL Monograph Series 1, Philadelphia: SBL 1946): English translation.

D.R.A. Hare, The Lives of the Prophets, in: The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (1983-1985 Charlesworth), edited volume, 2: 379-384: English translation.

N. Fernandez Marcos, Vidas de los profetas, in: Apócrifos del Antiguo Testamento (1984-2009 Díez Macho/Piñero Sáenz), edited volume, 2: 505–525: Spanish translation.

Anna Maria Schwemer, Vitae Prophetarum (JSHRZ I/7, Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus 1997): German translation.

A próféták élete. Bevezetés, fordítás és jegyzetek (2010 Xeravits), book: Hungarian translation.

Introductions

Albert-Marie Denis, Introduction à la littérature religieuse judéo-hellenistique (2 vols., Turnhout: Brepols 2000), 1: 577–607.

Lorenzo DiTommaso, The Book of Daniel and the Apocryphal Daniel Literature (2005 DiTommaso), book, 339-345: bibliographic collection.

Dictionaries

P. Enns, Lives of the Prophets, in: The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism (2010 Collins / Harlow), dictionary, 892b-894a

Studies

Anna Maria Schwemer, Studien zu den frühjüdischen Prophetenlegenden Vitae prophetarum (1995-96 Schwemer), book

David Satran, Biblical Prophets in Byzantine Palestine: Reassessing the Lives of the Prophets (1995 Satran), book

Articles

1800s

• I.H. Hall, Notes on the "Lives of the Prophets", JBL 6 (1886) 97-102.

1980s

• David Satran, Daniel: Seer, Philosopher, Holy Man, in: Ideal Figures in Ancient Judaism: Profiles and Paradigms (1980 Collins, Nickelsburg), edited volume, 33-48.

• Michael A. Knibb, The Ethiopic Version of the Lives of the Prophets, BSOAS 43 (1980) 197-206.

• Michael A. Knibb, The Ethiopic Version of the Lives of the Prophets II, BSOAS 48 (1985) 16-41.

1990s

• David Satran, Biblical Prophets and Christian Legend: The Lives of the Prophets Reconsidered, in: Messiah and Christos. Studies in the Jewish Origins of Christianity Presented to David Flusser on the Occasion of His Seventy-Fifth Birthday (TSAJ 32, eds. I. Gruenwald et al., Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 1992), 143–149.

• Anna Maria Schwemer, Elija als Araber. Die haggadischen Motive in der Legende vom Messias Menachem ben Hiskija (yBer 2,4 5a; EkhR 1,16 § 51) im Vergleich mit den Elija-Legenden der Vitae Prophetarum, in: Die Heiden. Juden, Christen und das Problem des Fremden (eds. R. Feldmeier and U. Heckel, WUNT 70, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 1994), 108-157.

• Anna Maria Schwemer, Die Verwendung der Septuaginta in den Vitae Prophetarum, in: Die Septuaginta zwischen Judentum und Christentum (eds. M. Hengel and A.M. Schwemer, WUNT 72, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 1994), 62-91.

2000s

• Géza G. Xeravits, Some Remarks on the Figure of Elijah in Lives of the Prophets 21:1-3, in: Flores Florentino (JSJSup 122, eds. T. Hilhorst and E.J.C. Tigchelaar, Leiden: Brill 2007), 499-508.

• Pieter W. van der Horst, Die Prophetengräber im antiken Judentum, in: Interesse am Judentum. Die Franz-Delitzsch-Vorlesungen 1989 – 2008 (Münsteraner Judaistische Studien 23, eds. J.C. de Vos and F. Siegert, Berlin/Münster 2008), 55–71.

• Anna Maria Schwemer, Vitae Prophetarum und Neues Testament, in: Biblical Figures in Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature (2008 Lichtenberger/Mittmann-Richert), edited volume, 199-230.

• Géza G. Xeravits, The Wonders of Elijah in the Lives of the Prophets, in: Biblical Figures in Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature (2008 Lichtenberger/Mittmann-Richert), edited volume, 231-238.

• Géza G. Xeravits, Remarks on the Miracles of Elisha in the Lives of the Prophets 22:5-20, in: With Wisdom as a Robe: Qumran and Other Jewish Studies (2009 Dobos/Koszeghy), edited volume, 360-364.