Two texts in Barnabas are
brought into the discussion of dating: 4.3-6a and 16.3-4. There are good
reasons to believe that the first text (which mainly consists of quotations from
Scripture) is taken from tradition and originally applied to an earlier period
of time. It is therefore probably best not to base the date of Barnabas
on this text.
This leaves us with 16.3-4: “moreover,
he says again, ‘See, those who have destroyed this temple will themselves build
it.’ This is happening (ginetai). For because of their war, it was
destroyed by their enemies. And now (nyn) the servants of the enemies
will themselves rebuild (anoikodomēsousin) it” (trans. Ehrman).
Verse 3 obviously refers to the temple
in Jerusalem, and the enemies who destroyed it are clearly the Romans. The
problem is that we do not know of any rebuilding of the Jewish temple, and
certainly not wit the assistance of the Romans. Besides, there is a temporal tension
between ginetai (and nyn), indicating the present nature of the building,
and anoikodomēsousin, indicating that it is still in the future. What
then, does the text refer to? There are two entirely different answers to this question.
First, some scholars look for a historical situation where a future rebuilding
of the temple was hoped for, though not yet a reality. The most common proposal
is that it refers to the reign of Nerva who reformed the fiscus Iudaicus,
the tax imposed on the Jews in the Roman Empire after the first Jewish War.
Precisely what the reform implied is debated, but it is essential that Nerva issued
coins with the legend FISCI IVDAICI CALVMNIA SVBLATA (“the removal of the
wrongful accusation of the fiscus Iudaicus”) on the one side and a palm
tree, a Roman emblem of Judea and Judaism, and the other. This indicates that
Nerva entertained a friendly attitude toward the Jews, and it has been
suggested that this also gave rise to a hope of the rebuilding of the temple.
On this basis, Barnabas may be dated to 96-98 CE.
The second line of interpretation takes
Barn. 16.4 as a reference to Hadrian’s building of the temple of Jupiter
on the site of the Second Temple in his new Aelia Capitolina—based primarily on
the information given by Dio Cassius (Hist. 69.12). Whie the former interpretation
stressed the future form of “rebuild,” this interpretation stresses the present
form of the verb ginetai: “This is happening (now”). This must mean that
something is, in fact, going on, at least the preparation for the actual building.
Besides, this interpretation takes seriously that the Romans are in charge of
the building. On the basis, one can argue that Barnabas was written
around 130-132 CE.
Against the second interpretation, it
has been objected that the word “rebuild” requires that Barnabas is referring
to the Jewish temple. It is correct that Barnabas in 16.1 is speaking about the
temple in Jerusalem, but in his mind, this was not the house of God—and thus
not unlike a pagan temple. If we taken into this consideration, it becomes less
strange that Barnabas can speak about a “rebuilding” of the temple, since the
Jupiter-temple could be seen as a replacement of the Jewish temple. Besides (as
an argument against the first interpretation), a rebuilding of the Jewish
temple does not fit the tenor of Barn. 16, where the author stresses
that the “wretched people went astray and set their hope on the building as
though it were God’s house . . . You now know that their hope was in vain”
(16.102). In this context, it would be strange to find a reference to a rebuilding—or
the hope for a rebuilding—of the Jewish temple. In the author’s mind, what he
is referring to is the fulfillment of the prophecy of the destruction of the
temple in Jerusalem—for Scripture had revealed “that the city and the temple
and the people of Israel were destined to be handed over” (16.5).
There are some uncertainties about the
exact historical course of the establishment of Aelia Capitolina (and the
placement of the Jupiter temple), but it is most likely that it was planned and
founded when Hadrian visited the region in 129-130. Even if Barnabas only had
heard rumors of a new city named after Jupiter Capitolina, he would probably
expect that a temple would be erected at the same stie as the destroyed Jewish
temple.
It must be admitted that all arguments
for the dating of Barnabas are based on some speculation and inadequate sources.
The time of Nerva (96-98) cannot be ruled oubt, through a time during the reign
of Hadrian (c. 130-132) seems to fit the text better. (Reidar Hvalvik, “The
Epistle of Barnabas,” in The Cambridge Companion to the Apostolic Fathers,
ed. Michael F. Bird and Scott D. Harrower [Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2021], 272-74)