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Jubilees follows an early version of Deuteronomy 32 found in a pre-Masoretic text that describes the nations divided between patron deities while God keeps Israel. The Masoretic tradition changed this to the number of Israel’s descendants.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Deuteronomy 32:8
Hebrew Bible
7 Remember the ancient days; bear in mind the years of past generations. Ask your father and he will inform you, your elders, and they will tell you. 8 When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided up humankind, he set the boundaries of the peoples, according to the number of the heavenly assembly. 9 For the Lord’s allotment is his people, Jacob is his special possession. 10 The Lord found him in a desolate land, in an empty wasteland where animals howl. He continually guarded him and taught him; he continually protected him like the pupil of his eye.
Date: 750–400 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Jubilees 16:18
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
17 And (that) all the seed of his sons should be Gentiles, and be reckoned with the Gentiles; but from the sons of Isaac one should become a holy seed, and should not be reckoned among the Gentiles. 18 For he should become the portion of the Most High, and all his seed had fallen into the possession of God, that it should be to the Lord a people for (His) possession above all nations and that it should become a kingdom and priests and a holy nation. 19 And we went our way, and we announced to Sarah all that we had told him, and they both rejoiced with exceedingly great joy.
Date: 170–125 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... The Interpolator is here restating the then-common understanding of Deuteronomy 32:8-9: God appointed various angels (“sons of God”—this phrase appears in place of “sons of Israel” in the Septuagint and other ancient versions of Deuteronomy 32:8) to rule over the other nations of the world, but He rules directly over Israel, without an angelic intermediary ..."
James L. Kugel, A Walk through Jubilees: Studies in the Book of Jubilees and the World of Its Creation (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 99.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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