Question
Asked 13 September 2017
Can you list publications on eschatological theories which purport to find concurrence between astronomical events and Jewish holidays?
I've been entertaining myself these days with some popular eschatological theories purporting to find concurrence between astronomical events and Jewish or Christian holidays. An example of such a theorist is John Hagee, but there are more.
In my opinion, these theories are usually not difficult to refute even on their own grounds.
However, I find it difficult to find good publications dealing with these excesses. Can you think of a treatise which pays attention to such theories from theological or historical standpoint?
I'm especially interested in publications on such theories which make explicit use of the Jewish calendar.
All Answers (2)
I don't know this area, but I'd start with some classic accounts of the religious calendars, such as Calendar, Chronology And Worship: Studies in Ancient Judaism And Early Christianity (Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity/Arbeiten Zur Geschichte ... (Ancient Judaism & Early Christianity) by Roger T. Beckwith (Author). This book takes as its theme the related issues of calendar, chronology and worship, as they were conceived and practised in ancient Jewish and early Christian times. After a general discussion of the way the three issues are related, there follow six chapters on the calendar, first the standard Jewish calendar, then the Qumran calendar (giving particular attention to the Book of Enoch and the Temple Scroll) and finally the Christian calendar - both the standard Christian calendar and that observed by the Montanists. Three chapters on chronology come next, one of them offering a chronological solution to a puzzling calendrical problem in the Dead Sea Scrolls, another relating Jewish eschatological expectations to New Testament teaching, and a third examining the chronological calculations of the Hellenistic Jew Demetrius, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, and the Book of Jubilees. The three concluding chapters, on worship, include an investigation of the historical development of the Psalter and a careful survey of the relationship between ancient Jewish worship and early Christian. The book discusses a variety of issues that arise in modern biblical, intertestamental and patristic study, some neglected, some very controversial, and throws new light upon them.
I think the reference/research term you need would be apocalyptic Judaism, which yo can look up in an Encyclopedia of Judaism.
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The School of Missions and Theology
Thank you, this looks interesting. I've already worked with two accessible, yet quite useful resources. One is Emil Schürer's History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus, vol. I (esp. Apendix III), the second one is the book called Calendar and Community: A History of the Jewish Calendar by Sacha Stern.
These books are helpful in explaining why and how the Jewish calendar(s) weren't fixed prior to the 4th century. Beckwith's book will probably yield more results in this direction.
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