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Midrash Vayisau

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Midrash Vayisau ( Hebrew : מדרש ויסעו ) is one of the smaller midrashim . This small midrash, "the heroic legend of the sons of Jacob", is based on Genesis 35:5 and 36:6, and recounts the story of the wars of Jacob and his sons against the kings of the Amorites and against Esau and his army.

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52-739: The beginning of its discussion of the Amorite war is as follows: "Our teachers said that although they did not pursue after them this time, yet seven years later all the kings of the Amorites gathered themselves together against the sons of Jacob." That the legends contained in Vayisau are very old may be inferred from the Book of Jubilees and from the Testament of Judah ; the midrash betrays its relationship to these old pseudepigraphical writings in many details. The war against

104-600: A monk in Egypt, where he was educated and came into contact with Valentinian groups . He returned to Roman Palestine around 333, when he was still a young man, and he founded a monastery at Ad nearby, which is often mentioned in the polemics of Jerome with Rufinus and John, Bishop of Jerusalem . He was ordained a priest, and lived and studied as superior of the monastery in Ad that he founded for thirty years and gained much skill and knowledge in that position. In that position he gained

156-620: A "Double Sabbath" each year being counted as only one day to arrive at this computation. Jubilees 7:20–29 is possibly an early reference to the Noahide laws . The Hasmoneans adopted Jubilees immediately, and it became a source for the Aramaic Levi Document. Jubilees remained a point of reference for priestly circles (although they disputed its calendric proposal), and the Temple Scroll and " Epistle of Enoch " are based on Jubilees. It

208-525: A few scattered allusions to the Messianic kingdom. Robert Henry Charles wrote in 1913: This kingdom was to be ruled over by a Messiah sprung, not from Levi —that is, from the Maccabean family—as some of his contemporaries expected—but from Judah . This kingdom would be gradually realized on earth, and the transformation of physical nature would go hand in hand with the ethical transformation of man until there

260-509: A group of fallen angels mated with mortal females, giving rise to a race of giants known as the Nephilim , and then to their descendants, the Elioud . The Ethiopian version states that the "angels" were in fact the disobedient offspring of Seth ( Deqiqa Set ), while the "mortal females" were daughters of Cain . This is also the view held by Clementine literature , Sextus Julius Africanus , Ephrem

312-544: A publication now in the public domain :  Singer, Isidore ; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Smaller Midrashim" . The Jewish Encyclopedia . New York: Funk & Wagnalls. .The JE cites the following works: Book of Jubilees The Book of Jubilees is an ancient Jewish apocryphal text of 50 chapters (1,341 verses), considered canonical by the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church , as well as by Beta Israel (Ethiopian Jews). Jubilees

364-554: A result of this persecution, four of these monks, the so-called Tall Brothers, fled to Palestine, and then travelled to Constantinople, seeking support and spreading the controversy. John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople , gave the monks shelter. Bishop Theophilus of Alexandria saw his chance to use this event to bring down his enemy Chrysostom : in 402 he summoned a council in Constantinople, and invited those supportive of his anti-Origenist views. Epiphanius, by this time nearly 80,

416-509: Is also a preserved fragment of a Latin translation of the Greek that contains about a quarter of the whole work. The Geʽez Biblical texts , now numbering twenty-seven, are the primary basis for translations into English. Passages in the texts of Jubilees that are directly parallel to verses in Genesis do not directly reproduce either of the two surviving manuscript traditions. Consequently, even before

468-670: Is considered one of the pseudepigrapha by the Eastern Orthodox , Catholic , and Protestant churches. Apart from the Beta Israel community, the book is not considered canonical within any of the denominations of Judaism . It was well known to early Christians , as evidenced by the writings of Epiphanius , Justin Martyr , Origen , Diodorus of Tarsus , Isidore of Alexandria , Isidore of Seville , Eutychius of Alexandria , John Malalas , George Syncellus , and George Kedrenos . The text

520-524: Is found in Shatberd ms 1141 along with Physiologus and De Gemmis ). The first section discusses the canon of the Old Testament and its versions, the second of measures and weights, and the third, the geography of Palestine . The texts appear not to have been given a polish but consist of rough notes and sketches, as Allen A. Shaw, a modern commentator, concluded; nevertheless Epiphanius' work on metrology

572-469: Is much evidence to suggest Jubilees was written before this date. Jubilees could not have been written very long prior. Jubilees at 4:17–25 records that Enoch "saw in a vision what has happened and what will occur", and the book contains many points of information otherwise found earliest in the Animal Apocalypse in 1 Enoch ), such as Enoch's wife being Edna. The Animal Apocalypse claims to predict

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624-545: Is the Ancoratus (the well anchored man), which includes arguments against Arianism and the teachings of Origen . Aside from the polemics by which he is known, Epiphanius wrote a work of biblical antiquarianism , called, for one of its sections, On Weights and Measures (περὶ μέτρων καὶ στάθμων). It was composed in Constantinople for a Persian priest, in 392, and survives in Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian translations (this last

676-467: Is the Panarion (from Latin panarium , "bread basket" < panis , "bread"), also known as Adversus Haereses , "Against Heresies", presented as a book of antidotes for those bitten by the serpent of heresy. Written between 374 and 377, it forms a handbook for dealing with the arguments of heretics. It lists, and refutes, 80 heresies , some of which are not described in any other surviving documents from

728-846: Is the source for certain of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs , for instance that of Reuben . It was not canonized into the Jewish canon and there is no official record of it in Pharisaic or Rabbinical sources. Some Jubilees traditions are echoed in the 12th-century Midrash Tadshe , the sole exception within Judaism. The earliest clear evidence of it in Jewish tradition is in the Bereshit Rabba (5th century) and Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer (9th century). It appears that early Christian writers held

780-525: The Byzantine Iconoclasts were actually by him. Regardless of this, he was clearly strongly against some contemporary uses of images in the church. Epiphanius was either born into a Romaniote Christian family or became a Christian in his youth. Either way, he was a Romaniote Jew who was born in the small settlement of Besanduk, near Eleutheropolis (modern-day Beit Guvrin in Israel), and lived as

832-731: The Maccabean Revolt (which occurred 167–160 BCE) and is commonly dated to that time. The direction of dependence has been controversial, but the consensus since 2008 has been that the Animal Apocalypse came first and Jubilees after. As a result, general reference works such as the Oxford Annotated Bible and the Mercer Dictionary of the Bible conclude the work can be dated to 160–150 BCE. J. Amanda Guire argues that Jubilees

884-669: The Qumran discoveries, R. H. Charles had deduced that the Hebrew original had used an otherwise unrecorded text for Genesis and for the early chapters of Exodus, one independent either of the Masoretic Text (𝕸) or of the Hebrew text that was the basis for the Septuagint . According to one historian, the variation among parallel manuscript traditions that are exhibited by the Septuagint compared with

936-519: The midrashim that had already been worked on in the Books of Chronicles . With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran in 1947, Charles' Pharisaic hypothesis of the origin of Jubilees has been almost completely abandoned. The dating of Jubilees has been problematic for Biblical scholars. While the oldest extant copies of Jubilees can be assigned based on the handwriting to about 100 BCE, there

988-583: The 60 Christian heresies, from assorted gnostics to the various trinitarian heresies of the fourth century, closing with the Collyridians and Messalians . While Epiphanius often let his zeal come before facts – he admits on one occasion that he writes against the Origenists-based only on hearsay ( Panarion , Epiphanius 71) – the Panarion is a valuable source of information on the Christian Church of

1040-706: The 6th century where it became part of the Ethiopic Bible . In the Christian tradition of the Syriac language , Jubilees is first received in extant sources from the mid-6th to early-7th century Cave of Treasures , and then in Letter 13 to John of Litarba, and Scholion 10, both authored by Jacob of Edessa (d. 708). Later still is the Catena Severi (compiled 861), the Syriac reception of an Arabic chronicle of Agapius of Mabbug, and

1092-671: The Amorites is treated at greater length in the Sefer ha-Yashar , pericope "Beshallach." The midrash itself is contained in Yalkut Shimoni , and is mentioned by Naḥmanides as "Sefer Milchamot Benei Ya'akov". Strack & Stemberger (1991) cite the opinion of G. Schmitt that the work was composed not later than the Bar Kokhba war . The text has been edited according to the Yalkut Shimoni by A. Jellinek , by S. Chones , and by Charles. [REDACTED]  This article incorporates text from

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1144-523: The Bishop of Jerusalem , John II , to condemn his writings. He urged John to be careful of the "offence" of images in the churches. He noted that when travelling in Palestine he went into a church to pray and saw a curtain with an image of Christ or a saint which he tore down. He told Bishop John that such images were "opposed ... to our religion" (see below). This event sowed the seeds of conflict which erupted in

1196-664: The Book of Jubilees in high regard, as many of them cited and alluded to Jubilees in their writings. In relationship to the New Testament, the Book of Jubilees contains one of the earliest references to the idea that God gave the Law to Moses through an angelic mediator. This idea is likewise reflected in the Epistle to the Galatians . Ethiopic-speaking Christians translated Jubilees into Geʽez before

1248-516: The Church of Christ and of those Christians who are committed to your charge. Beware of Palladius of Galatia —a man once dear to me, but who now sorely needs God's pity—for he preaches and teaches the heresy of Origen; and see to it that he does not seduce any of those who are intrusted to your keeping into the perverse ways of his erroneous doctrine. I pray that you may fare well in the Lord. His best-known book

1300-500: The Syrian , Augustine of Hippo , and John Chrysostom among many early Christian authorities. Their hybrid children, the Nephilim in existence during the time of Noah , were wiped out by the great flood . Jubilees also states that God granted ten percent of the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim to try to lead mankind astray after the flood. Jubilees makes an incestuous reference regarding

1352-604: The ability to speak in several languages, including Hebrew , Syriac , Egyptian , Greek , and Latin , and was called by Jerome on that account Pentaglossos ("Five tongued"). His reputation for learning prompted his nomination and consecration as Bishop of Salamis, Cyprus , in 365 or 367, a post which he held until his death. He was also the Metropolitan of the Church of Cyprus . He served as bishop for nearly forty years, as well as travelled widely to combat differing beliefs. He

1404-519: The animal's characteristics, how it produces its poison, and how to protect oneself from the animal's bite or poison. For example, he describes his enemy Origen as "a toad noisy from too much moisture which keeps croaking louder and louder." He compares the Gnostics to a particularly dreaded snake "with no fangs." The Ebionites , a Christian sect that followed Jewish law, were described by Epiphanius as "a monstrosity with many shapes, who practically formed

1456-497: The animals lost their power of speech when Adam and Eve were expelled. Following the Deluge, the earth was apportioned into three divisions for the three sons of Noah , and his sixteen grandsons. After the destruction of the Tower of Babel , their families were scattered to their respective allotments, and Hebrew was forgotten, until Abraham was taught it by the angels. Jubilees also contains

1508-451: The creation, up to Moses receiving the scriptures upon Sinai during the Exodus, is calculated as fifty Jubilees, less the 40 years still to be spent wandering in the desert before entering Canaan – or 2,410 years. Four classes of angels are mentioned: angels of the presence , angels of sanctifications, guardian angels over individuals, and angels presiding over the phenomena of nature. Enoch was

1560-503: The discovery of extensive fragments among the Dead Sea Scrolls , the earliest surviving manuscripts of Jubilees were four complete Geʽez texts dating to the 15th and 16th centuries and several quotations by the early Church Fathers such as Epiphanius , Justin Martyr , Origen , Diodorus of Tarsus , Isidore of Alexandria , Isidore of Seville , Eutychius of Alexandria , John Malalas , George Syncellus , and George Kedrenos . There

1612-528: The dispute between Rufinus and John against Jerome and Epiphanius. Epiphanius fuelled this conflict by ordaining a priest for Jerome's monastery at Bethlehem, thus trespassing on John's jurisdiction. This dispute continued during the 390s, in particular in the literary works by Rufinus and Jerome attacking one another. In 399, the dispute took on another dimension, when the Bishop of Alexandria, Theophilus , who had initially supported John , changed his views and started persecuting Origenist monks in Egypt. As

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1664-478: The end of the 4th century . He is considered a saint and a Church Father by both the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Churches . He gained a reputation as a strong defender of orthodoxy . He is best known for composing the Panarion , a compendium of eighty heresies , which included also pagan religions and philosophical systems. There has been much controversy over how many of the quotations attributed to him by

1716-427: The errors in idolatry. In these passages, Abraham always addresses his words to local people, and he does not leave their land. This probably reflects Islam’s position that aims at converting idol worshippers to monotheistic religion and settling in their place of residence." Epiphanius of Salamis Epiphanius of Salamis ( Ancient Greek : Ἐπιφάνιος ; c. 310–320 – 403) was the bishop of Salamis, Cyprus , at

1768-626: The fact that I have been seeking a curtain of the best quality to give to them instead of the former one, and thought it right to send to Cyprus for one. I have now sent the best that I could find, and I beg that you will order the presbyter of the place to take the curtain which I have sent from the hands of the Reader, and that you will afterwards give directions that curtains of the other sort—opposed as they are to our religion—shall not be hung up in any church of Christ. A man of your uprightness should be careful to remove an occasion of offence unworthy alike of

1820-400: The first man initiated by the angels in the art of writing, and wrote down, accordingly, all the secrets of astronomy, of chronology, and of the world's epochs. As regards demonology, the writer's position is largely that of the deuterocanonical writings from both New and Old Testament times. The Book of Jubilees narrates the genesis of angels on the first day of Creation and the story of how

1872-610: The fourth century. It is also an important source regarding the early Jewish gospels such as the Gospel according to the Hebrews circulating among the Ebionites and the Nazarenes , as well as the followers of Cerinthus and Merinthus. One unique feature of the Panarion is in the way that Epiphanius compares the various heretics to different poisonous beasts, going so far as to describe in detail

1924-533: The often quoted incident of the curtain, which unlike other passages attributed to Epiphanius and quoted by the Iconoclasts, is accepted as authentic by modern scholars: 9. Moreover, I have heard that certain persons have this grievance against me: When I accompanied you to the holy place called Bethel, there to join you in celebrating the Collect, after the use of the Church, I came to a villa called Anablatha and, as I

1976-435: The snake-like shape of the mythical many-headed Hydra in himself." In all, Epiphanius describes fifty animals, usually one per sect. Another feature of the Panarion is the access its earlier sections provide to lost works, notably Justin Martyr's work on heresies, the Greek of Irenaeus' Against Heresies , and Hippolytus' Syntagma . The Panarion was first translated into English in 1987 and 1990. His earliest known work

2028-450: The son of Adam and Eve, Cain, and his wife. In chapter iv (1–12) (Cain and Abel), it mentions that Cain took his sister Awan to be his wife and Enoch was their child. It also mentions that Seth (the third son of Adam and Eve) married his sister Azura . According to this book, Hebrew is the language of Heaven, and was originally spoken by all creatures in the Garden, animals and man; however,

2080-486: The teaching of the Scriptures, I tore it asunder and advised the custodians of the place to use it as a winding sheet for some poor person. They, however, murmured, and said that if I made up my mind to tear it, it was only fair that I should give them another curtain in its place. As soon as I heard this, I promised that I would give one, and said that I would send it at once. Since then there has been some little delay, due to

2132-529: The time. Epiphanius begins with the 'four mothers' of pre-Christian heresy – 'barbarism', 'Scythism', 'Hellenism' and 'Judaism' – and then addresses the 16 pre-Christian heresies that have flowed from them: four philosophical schools (Stoics, Platonists, Pythagoreans and Epicureans), and 12 Jewish sects. There then follows an interlude, telling of the Incarnation of the Word. After this, Epiphanius embarks on his account of

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2184-604: The writings of Michael the Syrian (d. 1199), Barhebraeus (d. 1286), and the Anonymous Chronicle by 1234. Jan van Reeth argues that the Book of Jubilees had great influence on the formation of early Islam . Etsuko Katsumata, comparing the Book of Jubilees and the Quran, notices significant differences, especially regarding Abraham's role in the Quranic narrative . He says that "The Quran has many passages in which Abraham expounds

2236-631: The years of the world, as the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai when he went up to receive the tables of the law and of the commandment" as revealed to Moses (in addition to the Torah or "Instruction") by angels while he was on Mount Sinai for forty days and forty nights. The chronology given in Jubilees is based on multiples of seven. The jubilee year is the year that follows the passage of seven "weeks of years" (seven cycles of sabbatical years , or 49 total years), into which all of time has been divided. Until

2288-966: The 𝕸, and which are embodied in the further variants among the Dead Sea Scrolls, demonstrates that even canonical Hebrew texts did not possess any single "authorized" manuscript tradition before the Common Era . Others write about the existence of three main textual manuscript traditions (namely the Babylonian, Palestinian and pre-𝕸 "proto" textual traditions). Although the pre-𝕸 text may have indeed been authoritative back then, arguments can be made for and against this concept. Between 1947 and 1956, approximately fifteen scrolls of Jubilees were found in five caves at Qumran , all written in Biblical Hebrew . The large number of manuscripts (more than for any Biblical books except for Psalms, Deuteronomy, Isaiah, Exodus, and Genesis, in descending order) indicates that Jubilees

2340-543: Was a new heaven and a new earth. Thus, finally, all sin and pain would disappear and men would live to the age of 1,000 years in happiness and peace, and after death enjoy a blessed immortality in the spirit world. Jubilees insists (in Chapter ;6) on a 364 day yearly calendar, made up of four quarters of 13 weeks each, rather than a year of 12 lunar months, which it says is off by 10 days per year (the actual number being about 11¼ days). It also insists on

2392-499: Was also utilized by the community that collected the Dead Sea Scrolls . No complete Hebrew, Greek or Latin version is known to have survived, but the Geʽez version is an accurate translation of the fragments in Biblical Hebrew found in the Dead Sea Scrolls . The Book of Jubilees presents a "history of the division of the days of the law and of the testimony, of the events of the years, of their (year) weeks, of their jubilees throughout all

2444-561: Was important in the history of measurement . Another work, On the Twelve Gems ( De Gemmis ), survives in a number of fragments, the most complete of which is the Georgian. The letter written by Epiphanius to John, Bishop of Jerusalem, in 394 and preserved in Jerome's translation, is discussed above. The collection of homilies traditionally ascribed to a "Saint Epiphanius, bishop" are dated in

2496-615: Was one of those summoned, and began the journey to Constantinople. However, when he realised he was being used as a tool by Theophilus against Chrysostom, who had given refuge to the monks persecuted by Theophilus and who were appealing to the emperor, Epiphanius started back to Salamis, only to die on the way home in 403. Letter LI in Jerome's letters gives Jerome's Latin translation, made at Epiphanius' request, of his letter, originally in Greek from c. 394, "From Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem" (see previous section for wider context). The final section covers

2548-410: Was passing, saw a lamp burning there. Asking what place it was, and learning it to be a church, I went in to pray, and found there a curtain hanging on the doors of the said church, dyed and embroidered. It bore an image either of Christ or of one of the saints; I do not rightly remember whose the image was. Seeing this, and being loth that an image of a man should be hung up in Christ’s church contrary to

2600-487: Was present at a synod in Antioch (376) where the Trinitarian questions were debated against the heresy of Apollinarianism . He upheld the position of Bishop Paulinus , who had the support of Rome, over that of Meletius of Antioch , who was supported by the Eastern Churches. In 382 he was present at the Council of Rome , again upholding the cause of Paulinus. During a visit to Palestine in 394 or 395, while preaching in Jerusalem, he attacked Origen 's followers and urged

2652-407: Was widely used at Qumran. A comparison of the Qumran texts with the Geʽez version, performed by James VanderKam, found that the Geʽez was in most respects an accurate and literalistic translation. R. H. Charles (1855–1931) became the first Biblical scholar to propose an origin for Jubilees. Charles suggested that the author of Jubilees may have been a Pharisee and that Jubilees was the product of

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2704-470: Was written in c. 170–150 BCE by a Palestinian Jew of "priestly background and Hassidic or Essene persuasion", based on his knowledge of Canaanite geography, biblical festivals and laws. Jubilees covers much of the same ground as Genesis, but often with additional detail, and addressing Moses in the second person as the entire history of creation, and of Israel up to that point, is recounted in divisions of 49 years each, or "Jubilees". The elapsed time from

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