The Other Old Testament

OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA WATCH: The Other Old Testament (Philip Jenkins). Excerpt:

Although Barnabas is notionally quoting the Exodus story, his citation has precious little in common with the original. He has moreover added a whole eschatological and messianic dimension that absolutely is not in the original. Although he might be inventing these words himself, it is also likely that he is transmitting a whole tradition of Christian midrash on the original Biblical texts.

Christians also drew on the pseudepigrapha, the works attributed to great figures of the Old Testament, to Abraham, Moses or Ezra. Many such works had originated from Second Temple Judaism, but Christian editors soon revised them to their own purposes.

And they wrote a few themselves, very likely more than are immediately obvious.