(a) The speculations of St. Paul are closely paralleled by the discussions of moral and religious problems in the earlier part of 2 Esdras. Our author presumably belonged to the school in which the great Apostle was trained ; and, especially in his treatment of sin and the weakness of the Law as a redemptive power, has much in common with him. Sin is essentially transgression of the Law, and alienates from God (2 Es <i'^ 7'« ; cf. Ro 5'3- 20). Its origin is to be found in the Fall of Adam and the evil heart {cor malignnm) which he has trans- mitted to his descendants (2 Es 7"« ^■•^- ^^-ss 4^" ; cf. Ro 5'^ 1 Co 15'^'). Accordingly it is universal, and has universally as its result not only spiritual corruption and infirmity, but physical death (2 Es 3^; cf. Ro 512. 14. 16. 17. 2i)_ In further agreement with St. Paul, and in opposition to the usual Rabbinical doctrine, our author despairs of the efficacy of the Law to redeem and save the sinner (2 Es 9^*^ ; cf. Ro 3-"). Its promised rewards have little encouragement or inspiration for beings so constituted as to be unable to keep it (2 Es 7118-13'). At the best, though the world is perishing, it may still be hoped that a few may be saved (9'^- -'-). It is all a puzzle and pain to tlie apocalyptist. Un- acquainted with the great solvent ideas in which tlie Apostle found satisfaction for heart and mind, he resigns himself to the inscrutableness of God's Avays, the limitations of human intelligence, and the pre-determined Divine purpose in the history and end of the world, while taking what comfort he may from the assurance of God's faithfulness and love to His ancient people (47-"- "s-si- 83-48 531.40).
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ESSENES
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This attitude of mind may not have been uncommon among the Jews of his time.
(b) Tlie points of comparison with the Johannine Apocalypse are of an eschatological kind, and appear most prominently in the later chapters of 2 Esdras. Tlie same visionary metliod of Divine revelation is pursued ; the schemes of the Last Things run upon similar lines ; Kome is again the hostile world-power standing in the background ; and there are not wanting resemblances of diction close enough to suggest a common source (cf. 2 Es 9^ and Rev Q^'^^, 2 Es 4« and Rev l^^). In 2 Es., too, especially when the earlier chapters are com- pared with the later, an inconsistency of eschato- logical representation is revealed, which is reflected not only in the Book of Revelation, but in other NT books as well. Probably it attached to the current conceptions of the time, and did not greatly trouble the author or redactor of our book. In the earlier chapters, the eschatology is entirely of an individual character, concerning itself with the future of the soul, and postulating, immediately after death, a personal judgment and entrance into an eternal world of punishment and reward (l'^^'^-). The later chapters (11. 12) are prevailingly political, and revive the old eschatology of the nation, with its scheme of preliminary woes, world- judgment, and earthly Messianic kingdom of indefinite dura- tion. Some attempt is made in the book to adjust these points of view by the introduction of a temporaiy reign of the ^lessiah before the hnal consummation, Avhich ushers in the glorious Heavenly Kingdom. This reign seems to have been expected to compensate tlie nation for the years of oppression in Egypt ; and, by a comparison of Gn 15"* with Fs 90^^ its length was fixed at 400 years (7-*'^"). By a similar process of inference Slavonic Enoch had determined the duration of the temporary Messianic kingdom as 1000 years, or a millennium. On this matter the Book of Revela- tion follows Enoch.
Withal, there are still left in 2 Es. a number of divergent ideas. At one time the Messiah is pre- sented as a purely human being, an earthly, tem- poral ruler of the line of David (12^^''^') ; at another time he appears as a superhuman, pre-existent being, to whom the title ' Son of God can be ap- plied (7^^- ^ 133" 37. 53 i49)_ In some passages the Judgment is personal and individual, and takes place immediately after death (T^s-ioi. in. 126) . j^ others it is universal, and reserved for a great day at the end of the world {V''- *^- « S^). Now the Messiah is Judge (12^"^^), now God Himself (6^). Side by side with the old restricted view of a resurrection of the righteous only stands the later view of a general resurrection (7-^"'*^), the one at the beginning, the other at the close of the Mes- sianic period, as in the Book of Revelation. These discrepancies belonged to the environment of the early Church, and it was part of her intellectual task to combine them into a harmonious belief.
LiTERATUEE. — G. Volkmar, Das vierte Buck Esra, 1858 ; A. Hilgenfeld, Messias JudcBorum, 1869 ; F. Rosenthal, Vier apokryphische Bucher, 1885 ; R. Kabisch, Das vierte Buck Esra, 1889 ; J. 'Wellhausen, Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, 1899 ; R. H. Charles, The Apocalypse of Baruch, 1896, and Eschato- logy: Hebrew, Jewish, and Christian, 1899 (21913); R. L. Benslyand M. R. James, The Fourth Book of Ezra (= TS iii. 2 [1895]) ; H. Gunkel, ' Das vierte Buch Esra,' in Kautzsch's Die Apokryphen und Pseudepviraphen des AT, 1900; Leon Vaganay, Le Prohlime eschatologique dans le I Ve Um-e d' Esdras, 1906 ; F. C. Porter, The Messages of the Apocalyp- tical Writers, 1905 ; Bruno Violet, Die Esra-Apokalypse, 19i0 ; G. H. Box, The Ezra-Apocalypse, 1912, and 'IV Ezra' in R. H. Charles's Th9 Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the OT,