THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
each reign for one hour, as in Daniel for seventy weeks of years. The shepherds are not human kings but angels of the peoples (Von Hofmann, Schiirer), each feeds his flock for one hour. The first (Assyrio-Babylonian) period comprises twelve hours (lxxxix. 72), the second twenty-three hours (Cyrus to Alexander; the reading of the text, " thirty- five," includes the preceding twelve); this is the central point of the era (xc. 1). After this follow other twenty-three hours (Alexander to Antiochus Epiphanes, xc. 5) and twelve still remain from Antiochus to the time of the writer (xc. 17). If the great horn (xc. 9) refers to Hyrcanus, then the time of this ruler must be looked upon as that of the author. After this goat with the great horn has been sorely beset by all nations, the saving angel appears and causes the destruction of the enemies. The nations fall beneath the sword of the obedient sheep, that is, the faithful Israelites. God sets up his throne in the holy land and holds his judgment there over the fallen angels, and also over the seventy shepherds; they are found guilty and cast into a fiery abyss. Into a similar fiery pit, which opens up at the right of the house of God (Gehinnom), come the > blinded sheep, that is, the apostate Jews. Thereupon God erects a new temple wherein he dwells in the midst of the good sheep, before whom the remaining nations bow down in adoration. The scattered and slain sheep are also gathered together again in this house. Then a white steer is born, the Messiah, to whom all nations do homage, and thereupon all the sheep change into white steers, that is to say, into men resembling patriarchs (for the first men from Adam on have appeared to the seer as white and black steers, lxxxv. 3 sqq.). This first-born steer of the new race, however, the Messiah, changes into a buffalo [wild ox] with large black horns. Since then the tried companions of the kingdom become like the Messiah, he himself is exalted and becomes a superior being. The vision closes harmoniously with the untroubled joy of God in all men. Here the Messiah does not erect the kingdom of God on earth and also does not hold the last judgment, but only appears at the end, after the earth has been purified and subjected to God, as the keystone of the edifice.
It is otherwise in the Psalms of Solomon (see Psbudepigrapha), which show that in the middle of the last century before Christ a vigorous interposition in history for the salvation of his people was expected from the Messiah. These 3. The Psalms may be more exactly assigned Psalms of to about the period 63-45 b.c. The Solomon. Messianic hope must have penetrated deeply into the popular mind at that period, especially among the Pharisees (cf., e.g., iii. 8 sqq.), and the idea that eternal salvation was promised to Israel was firmly held (xi. 7, xii. 6, xiv. 4-5, 9-10, xv. 12-13). More definitely, a salutary action was awaited from the " Son of David," the " anointed of the Lord," whom God will raise up, that he may conquer the heathen rulers, purify the desecrated land of the Lord, gather together the members of his people and reestablish their nationality, while the heathen do homage to him (xvii. 21 sqq.). He is just and sinless and brings to
his people eternal peace and eternal salvation, so that to live beneath his rule will be a blessed condition.
Much more highly developed is the conception of the Messiah contained in the later portion of the Book of Enoch, chaps, xxxvii.-lxxi., written after 38 b.c. While in the older book the 4. The perfect just live upon the earth, in the Later Part spacious and new house of God, in the of Enoch, later writing the abode of the blessed is celestial (xxxix. 4 sqq.), and they will also inhabit the new earth when the evil-doers have been rooted out (xlv. 5). The kingdom of God as described by the later writer is conceived in a more transcendental manner. Heaven is the home of holy men where they live forever like the angels of God; among them there the Messiah dwells eternally (xxxix. 6 sqq.), is called the " chosen one" (xxxix. 6, xl. 5, xlv. 3), the just one (xxxviii. 2), the anointed (lii. 4), the son of man (xlvi. 1 sqq.); in one passage God himself calls him " my son " (cv. 2, cf. Ps. ii. 7). He is the possessor of all justice and wisdom (xlix. 3) ; from him proceeds intelligence and power, he is the staff of the just and the holy, the light of the nations, and the hope of those whose heart is troubled (xlviii. 4); he leads all the inhabitants of the earth to sing the praises of the true God (xlviii. 5); in him dwells the spirit of those who have fallen asleep in righteousness (xlix. 3). Through his wisdom the resurrection takes place, and through his unfailing justice the last judgment (li.-liv., lxi. 7 sqq.). With him the just will enjoy a glorified existence for eternity; the unjust, on the other hand, and especially the kings, the high and mighty ones of the earth, will languish in hell (lxii. 13 sqq., lxiii. 10). In chap. lxxi. Enoch himself is declared to be the son of man and by his translation from the earth is established in heaven in this character, and the later rabbinical theologians make him the equal of the Metatron, that is, the highest spirit, who stands nearest to God and serves him and governs with him. This section was not written by a Christian, since the human personality of the Messiah conceived by Christians as a living reality is entirely lacking in this writing. Even a Christian "reviser" would assuredly have introduced something of this and especially of Christ's sufferings, death, and resurrection. In favor of the opinion that the book was written after the time of Christ is the circumstance that, according to the Gospels, the expression " son of man " was in no wise so common a designation of the Messiah among the contemporaries of Jesus as it must have become after this work was generally known.
Baruch and the Apocalypse of Ezra (IV Ezra), which have been preserved in a Syriac version, belong to the period after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. Baruch seems to have been composed not long after that event. 5. The It proves that the longing for the splen- Apocalypse did future promised by the prophets of Baruch. had been newly and powerfully stimulated by the destruction of Jerusalem and of its sanctuary, and that the people, by manifold explanations and embellishments of these promises, consoled themselves in their unhappy