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Compare Apocalypse of Abraham 28:4 and Pseudo Jonathan Genesis 15:12

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses · Targum

Summary

The Apocalypse of Abraham and the Aramaic Targum Pseudo-Jonathan both turn Abraham's frightening vision in Genesis 15 into a preview of four powers that will later oppress his descendants. The Targum names them as Babylon, Media, Greece, and Edom.

Passages

Apocalypse of Abraham 28:4

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

1 And I answered and said: "Mighty, [Eternal One], holy through Your power! Please grant my request, [for this You have brought me up here, so show me]. As You have brought me up to Your height, 2 so explain [this] to me, Your beloved one, what I ask: will what I saw happen to them for long?" 3 And He showed me a great crowd of His people, 4 and said to me: "Because of them, through four movements, as you saw, they will provoke me, and in these my punishment for their deeds will be (accomplished). 5 But during the fourth movement of a hundred years and one hour of the age, which is a hundred years, it will suffer misfortune among the pagans [but one hour in mercy and insults, as among the pagans]."

70–150 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Apocalypse of Abraham

Pseudo Jonathan Genesis 15:12

Targum

11 The nations, that are like unclean birds, came down to plunder the property of Israel; but the merit of Abram protected them. 12 When the sun was about to set, a deep sleep was cast upon Abram, and behold four kingdoms were rising to enslave his children: 'Dread'— that is Babylon; 'Dark'— that is Media; 'Great'— that is Greece; 'Fell'— that is Edom, which is destined to fall and for which there will be no rising; from there the people of the house of Israel will come up. 13 He said to Abram, 'Know for certain that your children will be residents in a land that is not theirs, because you did not believe; and they will be enslaved and afflicted four hundred years.'

300–1200 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Pseudo Jonathan Genesis

References

“... The author of the apocalypse employs two dating methods, or rather offers two divisions of the time-period encompassing the visions shown to Abraham. The first comprises four ascents; secondly, there is a division into twelve ages (28.4–5; 29.2; cf. 27.3). The exact meaning of the four ascents is not entirely clear. The term is used twice. In a vision Abraham sees the heathen running towards the seed of Abraham through four ascents and then burning the temple. God interprets this by telling Abraham that his anger will come upon Abraham’s seed through the four ascents and in them will be retribution for their works. He goes on to say that the fourth ascent is one hundred years, so it is clear that the ascents are to be taken as time-periods (28.5). [...] Most scholars have understood the four ascents to refer to the four kingdoms of Daniel, modified, as they are in other apocalypses, to signify Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. There is good reason for this. The four kingdoms schema, which originates in the vision of Daniel, is elsewhere associated with Abraham’s sacrifice and the vision that he received from God. The account offered in the Targum Yerušalmi has Abraham see the four kingdoms that will rise against him: Babylon, Media, Greece, and Edom (Rome). ...”

Kenneth R. Jones, Jewish Reactions to the Destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70: Apocalypses and Related Pseudepigrapha, JSJSup 151 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 252–253.

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The Duration of Exile

Apocalypse of Abraham32 chapters

Compare Apocalypse of Abraham 28:4 and Pseudo Jonathan Genesis 15:12

Summary

Passages

Apocalypse of Abraham 28:4

Pseudo Jonathan Genesis 15:12

References

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