We are next told (ch. lxxvii) how Baruch went to the people and admonished them to be faithful, holding out hopes that their brethren might return from the captivity. The people promised to remember the good that God had done to them, and requested him to write a letter before his departure to their brethren in Baby- lon. He promised to do so, and send the epistle by the hands of men, and also to forward a letter to the nine and a half tribes by means of a bird. Accordingly, he sat alone under an oak and wrote two letters. One he sent by three men to Babylon, and the other to the tribes beyond the Euphrates by an eagle which he called. He charged the eagle not to pause till he reached his destination, and, to encourage him, remind- ed him of Noah's dove, of Elijah's ravens, and how "Solomon, in the time of his reign, whithersoever lie wished to send or to seek anything, commanded a bird, and it obeyed him as he had commanded it." Then the letter is subjoined (ch. lxxvii-lxxxvi). It consists of a general exhortation to the captive tribes to be faithful, in the hope of being soon restored to a happier lot. The last chapter (lxxxvii) relates how he folded and sealed the letter, tied it to the eagle's neck, and despatched it.
(II.) Author, Bate, etc—The work, according to its title in the MS. in which it has been preserved, was "translated from Greek into Svriac." Notwithstanding VIII.— fir
the Hebraic coloring of its thought and language, it may very well have been written originally in Greek. There can be no doubt that it was written by a non-Christian Jew. Though it is rich in Messianic passages, no ex- pression betrays a Christian hand. The book is per- vaded by the strong and exclusive feeling of a Jew. con- fident, amid the most terrible humiliation, in the divine election of his race. It bears a strong resemblance in general structure, and even in particular thoughts and expressions, to the fourth book of Ezra. We must, of course, assign it a similar time and authorship to the epistle of Baruch above noticed, which Ewald locates in the reign of Domitian (Gesch. Isr. vii, 84 sq.). This is confirmed by allusions to the destruction of the Temple (ch. xxxix), and the references to Daniel's " times" as if fulfilled. See Drummond, The Jewish Messiah (Lond. 1877), p. 117 sq. See Baruch.
9. The Fourth Book of Ezra (the first according to the Ethiopie and Arabic) is, from its apocalyptic char- acter, styled by Nicephorus (Can. iii, 4) the Apocalypse of Ezra CAiroica\v\}/ic, 'EaSpa). See Esdras, Second Book of.
10. 11. The Apocalypse of Zephaniah and that of Zeckariah are referred to by Jerome (Ep. ad Pammach.), and cited as lost apocryphal books in an ancient MS. of the Scriptures in the Coislinian Collection (ed. Montfau- con, p. 194).
11. Pseudo-Revelations Purporting to Refer to Chris- tian Characters. — Of these the most important are the following •
1. The Apocalypse of St. Peter is mentioned by Eu- sebius (Hist. Eccles. iii, 3, 25), and was cited by Clement of Alexandria, in his A dumbrations, now lost (Euseb. loc. cit. vi, 14). Some fragments of it have, however, been preserved by Clement, in his Selections from the Lost Prophecies of Theodotus the Gnostic, and are published in Grabe's Spicilegium (i, 74 sq.). From these we can barely collect that this apocalypse contained some mel- ancholy prognostications, which seem to be directed against the Jews, and to refer to the destruction of their city and nation. This work is cited as extant in the ancient fragment of the canon published by Muratori, a document of the 2d or 3d century, with this proviso, that "some of us are unwilling that it be read in the Church," as is perhaps the signification of the ambigu- ous passage, "Apocalypsis Johannis et Petri tantum re- cipimus; quam quidam ex nostris legi in ecclesia no- lunt." Eusebius designates it at one time as " spurious," and at another as " heretical." From a circumstance mentioned by Sozomen (Hist. Eccles. vii, 19), viz. that it was read in some churches in Palestine on all Fridays in the year down to the 5th century, Liicke infers that it was a Jewish-Christian production (of the 2d century), and of the same family with the Preaching of Peter. It is uncertain whether this work is the same that is read by the Copts among what they call the apocryphal books of Peter.
There was also a work under the name of the Apoc- alypse of Peter by his Disciple Ch merit, an account of which was transmitted to pope Honorius by Jacob, bish- op of Acre in the 13th century, written in the Saracenic language; but this has been conjectured to be a later work, originating in the time of the Crusades.
In the ancient Latin stichometry in Cotelerius (Apos- tolic Fath rs~), the Apocalypse of St. Peter is said to con- tain 2070 stichs, and that of John 1200. It is cited as an apocryphal book in the Indiculus Scripturarum after the (iiKest'wm-s of Anastasius of Xica;a, together with the . [pocalypse of Ezra and that of Paul. There is in the Bodleian Library a MS. of an Arabic Apocalypse of St. Pete?; of which Nicoll has furnished an extract in his catalogue, and which may possibly be a translation of the Greek apocalypse. See Peter.