Ascent to Heaven in Jewish and Christian Apocalypses

by Martha Himmelfarb

Overview

This is a study of the ancient Jewish and Christian apocalypses involving ascent into heaven, which have received little scholarly attention in comparison to apocalypses concerned primarily with the end of the world. Recent developments like the publication of the Aramaic Enoch fragments from Qumran and interest in questions of genre in the study of the apocalypses make this a particularly appropriate time to undertake this study. Martha Himmelfarb places the apocalypses in relation to both their biblical antecedents and their context in the Greco-Roman world. Her analysis emphasizes the emergence of the understanding of heaven as temple in the Book of the Watchers, the earliest of these apocalypses, and the way in which this understanding affects the depiction of the culmination of ascent, the hero's achievement of a place among the angels, in the ascent apocalypses generally. It also considers the place of secrets of nature and primeval history in these works. Finally, it offers an interpretation of the pseudepigraphy of the apocalypses and their function.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195359657
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	08/19/1993
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	399 KB

About the Author

Princeton University

Table of Contents

	Abbreviations	xi
	Introduction	3
1.	From Ezekiel to the Book of the Watchers	9
2.	Heavenly Ascent and Priestly Investiture	29
3.	Transformation and the Righteous Dead	47
4.	The Secrets of Nature, Primeval History, and the Order of the Cosmos	72
5.	The Apocalypses as Writing	95
	Notes	115
	Bibliography	151
	Index	163

Editorial Reviews

"This elegantly written and richly documented study presents the mature fruit of [Himmelfarb's] efforts and, by raising discussion of this literature to a new level of sophistication, constitutes a major intellectual achievement....Himmelfarb presents a highly provocative and generally persuasive study."—The Journal of Religion

"An informative study."—Southwestern Journal of Theology

"Himmelfarb's book is a valuable study that is a pleasure to read. She writes clearly and insightfully about texts that receive relatively little attention, and she uses them to address large issues in the study of the apocalypses....[An] excellent book." —Journal of Biblical Literature

"An important addition to the literature about the ascent apocalypses. Not only is it an up-to-date overview of scholarship and a cutting-edge contribution to the discussion, but given its thorough review of basic issues such as date, provenance, and contents of the documents, it can also serve as a useful introductory text for upper-level and graduate classes reading the ascent apocalypses."—IOUDAIOS Review

From the Publisher