Thursday, October 13, 2022

Bruce W. Longenecker on Early Christian Use of 4 Ezra

  

Christian Use of 4 Ezra

 

The text of 4 Ezra, like all Jewish apocalypses of Early Judaism, did not survive within Jewish circles, but was transmitted within the Christian church, where it played a part in nurturing the theological and liturgical life of various Christian communities. A few examples might suffice to show the extent of its influence.

 

The history of textual transmission itself demonstrates clearly the extent to which 4 Ezra circulated within early Christian circles. One textual critic has recently argued that the original Semitic text of 4 Ezra was translated into Greek, which itself spawned at least four other Greek versions (and no doubt more), each of which lies behind further translations into Latin, Syriac, Ethiopic, and Gregorian. Thijs proliferation of the text into Greek translations at a very early stage, and later into various other languages, demonstrates the manner in which 4 Ezra was appreciated within the Christian church not long after its date of composition.

 

This is supported by the fact that church leaders of the patristic period knew of it and quoted it favourably. So, that for instance, Clement of Alexandria (150-215) cites 4 Ezra 5.35 in Greek (Stromata 3.16). Cyprian (200-58) seems to allude to 4 Ezra 5.54-55 (Treatise to Demetrianus). Ambrose (340-97) cites 4 Ezra on at least seven different occasions (de bono Mortis 10, 11, 12; de spiritu Sancto 2.6; de excess Satyri 1.2; ad Horontianum, Letter 34; Commentarius in Lucan 1.60).

 

4 Ezra has played a part in edifying early Christian piety and prayer. In 4 Ezra 8.20-36, Ezra gives a striking and heart-felt appeal to the eternal and faithful God to show mercy to his people. This section the apocalypse, known as the ‘Confession of Ezra’, shaped the liturgy of the worshipping church; the Apostolic Constitutions, a liturgical collection from the fourth century which comprises several established liturgical compositions, recites the second half of 4 Ezra 8.23 (Apost. Const. 8.7.6; cf. too 4 Ezra 7.103 with Apost. Const. 2.14), while the whole passage from 4 Ezra is cited in Latin liturgical manuscripts dating form between the eighth and fifteenth centuries.

 

The only unfavourable note in relation to 4 Ezra which remains among the literature of early Christian history is a comment made by Jerome. In his defence of prayers for the dead, Jerome argued against Vigilantius and others who found support for their rejection of prayers for the dead in 4 Ezra 7.105-115. Jerome writes defiantly against them: ‘You bring before me an apocryphal book which, under the name of Esdras, is read by you and those of your ilk, and in this book it is written that after death no one does pray for others. I have never read the book’ (Contra Vigilantium 6). Despite Jerome’s own ignorance of the text, his words reveal the way others Christians in his own day valued the Jewish apocalypse in 4 Ezra. (Bruce W. Longenecker, 2 Esdras [Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1995], 110-11)