Book of Judith Originally Written in Hebrew

Eliakim (Joakim), the high priest of the story, is also traditionally considered to be the author of the Book of Judith [36]. (We already saw that he was 'a man of letters', writing to the northern towns). This would support the view of commentators that this highly pious work, extremely scrupulous about religious observance, appears to have been written by a priest who was most faithful to Mosaïc Law and who evinces a remarkable knowledge of the Old Testament, especially the Psalms. No doubt the story was written with an enormous amount of eyewitness input from the ubiquitous Achior, whom the high priest would have met after Assyria's defeat. Achior would then have been able to fill in Joakim on all relevant details pertaining to the Assyrian campaign and strategy.

Judith herself could have told the priest about her personal encounter with Holofernes in the Assyrian camp.

And the high priest himself could have added most of the rest; all the basic narrative of the Assyrian incursion into Judæa and its effect upon Jerusalem. Finally, a later scribe could have added notes and glosses, e.g. about Arioch and how long Judith lived. I therefore accept the traditional view that Eliakim was the author of the Book of Judith, and that the original version must have been compiled around 700 BC. Unfortunately we do not now have this original version, which modern critics insist must have been written in the Hebrew language, and that Charles thinks was probably called [37]:, tydvhy hlgm['Book, Roll of Judith']

The Encyclopedia Judaica, too, insists that the original would have been in Hebrew [38]:As is clearly evident from its many Hebraisms, the book was originally written in Hebrew (cf., for example, the expressions: "the space of 30 days" (Judith 15:11 Sept.); "all flesh" (Genesis 6:13), as a designation for human beings; "let not thine eye spare" (Isaiah 13:18); "the face of the earth" (Amos 5:8); and "smote with the edge of the sword" (Psalm 89:43), etc.). In the precise Greek translation there is also discernible the special Erez Israel () spelling (the substitution of the " verb by ").And Charles is equally as insistent about this [39]:The [Greek] translation is so literal that it can be put back into Hebrew with ease, and in some cases becomes fully intelligible only when so re-translated.Moreover, the usual lack of particles shows that the writer was under the influence of a foreign idiom, while the constant recurrence of phrases common in late Greek but frequent in Hebrew shows incontestably the language of the original. Such are e.g. , , the frequent use of , , , , , and many more ....He attributes the confusion of place-names in extant versions of Judith to mistranslation and to errors by copyists [39b]:"The same conclusion is indicated by the confusion in the geographical names, due to the uncertainty in the mind of the translator as well as to mistakes by copyists ...".

According to The Catholic Encyclopedia, the variants in the present text indicate a most ancient original [40]:"With regard to the state of the text it should be noted that the extraordinary variants presented in the various versions are themselves a proof that the versions were derived from a copy dating from a period long antecedent to the time of its translators".

A Description of the Building of Sargon II's City in the Book of Judith

Judith Verses 1:2-4: Fortifying (Building) a City

Commentators on the book of Judith, I [Damien F. Mackey] find, do not tend to linger much over this little passage, which reads:

"He built walls around Ecbatana with hewn stones three cubits thick and six cubits long; he made the walls seventy cubits high and fifty cubits wide. At its gates he raised towers one hundred cubits high and sixty cubits wide at the foundations. He made its gates seventy cubits high and forty cubits wide to allow his armies to march out in force and his infantry to form their ranks".

It might not be surprising that any commentator who considers the Book of Judith to be other than a genuine history would show little interest in so dry an account. Charles, for instance, does not even comment on it. Whilst Dumm takes it entirely as allegorical:[1] “The “wall” and its gateway are of such fantastic proportions that one may assume the author merely wishes to suggest an image of massive power and permanence”. Moore has written along somewhat similar lines as has Dumm here, looking for a metaphorical meaning in these verses, though in the process comparing the Book of Judith account to the actual Median city of Ecbatana. He thus, unlike Dumm, does supply also some interesting factual detail:[2]

"… surrounded … with walls … seventy-five feet wide. Although scholars have often compared the walls of Ecbatana with those of other great cities, such as Babylon (seventy-five feet wide [Herodotus Hist. 1.178]) or Nineveh (wide enough for three chariots to drive abreast on it [Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library 2.3]), to make such comparisons is really to miss the author’s point: while Ecbatana’s grandeur and massiveness attested to the almost superhuman power of Nebuchadnezzar, who was able to conquer such a city, his army was still unable to take insignificant Bethulia, a town protected only by the God of Israel (so Steinmann, p. 48).
All the prodigious dimensions in vv 2-4 are totally fictitious, the invention of the author to evoke an atmosphere of grandeur. To date, no such protective walls have been found at Ecbatana, although, in fairness, it must be noted that because the modern city of Hamadan now covers it, Ecbatana has not been scientifically excavated by archaeologists. On the other hand, other great Persian cities, such as Persepolis, have been excavated thoroughly; and no such protective walls have been found there, either".

The whole thing though takes on a far deeper significance if one regards the Book of Judith, as I do, as being a true history, set in the era of king Hezekiah of Judah, with the city of “Ecbatana” therefore to be looked for in Mesopotamia, not in ‘Persia’.
When scanning these three verses (Judith 1:2-4) in translation above, one finds a heavy use of the pronoun “he”, but not one reference to a personal name. However, it is generally presumed that the king doing the building (fortifying) of this “Ecbatana” is Arphaxad, considering that the latter had just, in the previous verse (1:1), been named as ruler “over the Medes in Ecbatana”.
Such a connection, though, I think is quite unlikely to have been the case in reality. We saw in Chapter 7 (p. 179) that Merodach-baladan may have been, even in his composite form of [I] and [II], a very modest builder indeed. Whereas the building work described in verses 2-4 is on a massive scale,[3] prompting Moore to label it all as “totally fictitious”.

The king who was doing all the magnificent building work in Mesopotamia at this time was in fact Sargon II (Nebuchadnezzar), and the city then being worked on was his pride and joy, Dur-Sharrukin, and not Babylon. Dur-Sharrukin’s foundations had been laid half a dozen years ago (Year 6), and, four years later (Year 10), the king had stayed at home to work on the decoration of its palaces when his Turtan had marched to the west. The work must have been well advanced by now (Year 12) and the whole project would be completed and dedicated in a further half dozen years.
The Book of Judith chapter 1 is all about Nebuchadnezzar, not Arphaxad, and this is no doubt an intentional aspect of the story’s drama, to show what a mighty foe Israel was up against. Moore had referred above to “the almost superhuman power of Nebuchadnezzar”. Arphaxad is just a necessary ‘parenthesis’. Confusion may have arisen over the fact that the historical ‘Nebuchadnezzar’ could boast two mighty cities: namely, Nineveh (as Sennacherib) - called “the great city of Nineveh” in Judith 1:1 - and Dur-Sharrukin (as Sargon II) - called “Ecbatana” in 1:2-4. Roux, unaware that Sargon II was Sennacherib (who had initially favoured Nineveh) contrasts Dur-Sharrukin instead with Calah (Kalhu):[4]

"As a war-chief Sargon liked to live in Kalhu (Nimrud), the military capital of the empire, where he occupied, restored and modified Ashurnasirpal’s palace. But moved by incommensurable pride, he soon decided to have his own palace in his own city. In 717 B.C. were laid the foundations of ‘Sargon’s fortress’, Dûr-Sharrukîn, a hitherto virgin site twenty-four kilometres to the north-east of Nineveh, near the modern village of Khorsabad …".

It would not surprise if Dur-Sharrukin were quickly forgotten, and later easily confused with some better known city such as Babylon. For, as Lloyd has explained:[5] “If … we turn to Khorsabad, we find a city built, occupied and abandoned in the space of a single generation”. I think that such a case of forgetfulness might have applied to the city described as being ‘built’ in the Book of Judith 1:2-4, and thus I suggest that the multiple usages of the pronoun “he” in the translation of these verses all refer to Nebuchadnezzar, rather than to (the usual view) Arphaxad; that the only reference to the city ruled by the latter is in the case of the first mention of “Ecbatana”. The second reference to “Ecbatana”, immediately following it, is actually therefore a reference to the king of Assyria’s jewel city, Dur Sharrukin. The amended text (1:1-4) I propose, should read something like this:

It was the twelfth year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, who ruled over the Assyrians in the great city of Nineveh. (In those days Arphaxad ruled over the [Chaldeans] in [Babylon]). He [Nebuchadnezzar] built walls around [Dur-Sharrukin] … he made the walls seventy cubits high … he raised towers …. He made its gates seventy cubits high and forty cubits wide to allow his armies to march out in force and his infantry to form their ranks. Then King Nebuchadnezzar made war against Arphaxad in the great plain ….

Admittedly, the text as it reads here abruptly juxtaposes “Ecbatana” in the first and second mention – which I am arguing actually intend two different cities. So much so in fact that I am inclined to think, borrowing that phrase from Moore (refer back to p. 27), that “something is now missing …”. On the positive side, there does now seem to be a consistency in the fact that this belligerent king of Assyria, having purposely had the gates of his new city made tall enough and wide enough to accommodate the exit of his massed army, should then (in the next sentence, so to speak) make war against his foe.
Later though, in 1:14, “Ecbatana” resorts back to its first meaning of Arphaxad’s city, which Nebuchadnezzar successfully assaults.
That the walls and gates of Dur-Sharrukin were indeed formidable, we might glean from these accounts of their measurements by Lloyd, with which I shall juxtapose relevant portions of the Book of Judith:[6]

"The city which [Sargon II] laid out took the form of a square, with sides measuring rather more than a mile each, and was surrounded by towered walls with seven gateways. …".

[Nebuchadnezzar] built walls around Ecbatana … At its gates he raised towers.

"The city walls, which were over 20 m thick, were revetted at their base with dressed stonework up to a height of 1.10 m. Behind this facing, undressed stone was roughly laid to form a base for the brick upper structure, which terminated in a crenellated parapet with stone merlons. … the palace platform had a facing of stone in blocks up to 2.7 m long, weighing as much as 23 tons apiece. …".

… walls … with hewn stones three cubits thick and six cubits long; he made the walls seventy cubits high and fifty cubits wide ….

The possibly meaningful measurements that can be compared here are (a) the length of the stone blocks, 2.7 metres long, according to Lloyd, and 6 cubits long according to Judith 1:2, and (b) the thickness (width?) of the city’s walls, over 20 metres thick, or 50 cubits wide. What however immediately complicates any attempted comparison are (i) the variations in measurements and (ii) the fact that the Book of Judith is obviously using round figures, not precise mathematical numbers. “Then, as now”, explains Moore,[7] “the standards of weights and measurements varied not only among the nations but also within the same nation, depending upon time, place, and circumstance”. The cubit, for instance, can vary in length from approximately 440 mm - 640 mm, with what Petrie has called the ‘eastern foot’ being, as he has written, “one-sixth longer than 21.6 [inches] i.e. 25.2” (640).[8] “At Khorsabad” he wrote earlier, which is the place of interest here, “there was a standard of 10.8 (276.8)”.[9] Berriman gives what he has called the “Assyrian Foot” as 329 mm.[10]

And Berriman gives the “Assyrian cubit” as 494 mm.[11]

Of course a third complicating factor is that we do not know (iii) to which actual cubit the author of Judith is referring.
Anyway, taking the ‘Assyrian cubit’ of 494 mm as an approximation, and multiplying it by the Book of Judith’s “six cubits”, we get (494 x 6 =) 2964 mm, or 2.9 metres, comparing favourably with Lloyd’s 2.7 metres for the length of the blocks. And, for the thickness of the walls, we then get (494 x 50 =) 24700 mm, or 24.7 metres, as compared with Lloyd’s “over 20 m thick”. What this does indicate at least is that the Book of Judith has provided us with reasonable figures of measurement, that can indeed be applied to significant Mesopotamian cities, and are not merely fictitious or fantastic.

[1] Ibid.
[2] Op. cit, pp. 124-125.
[3] “The word ‘built’ corresponds to the Heb. banah, which may also have the meaning of repairing with the added notion of enlarging, cf. Jos 19:50; Jg 21:23 … ) …”. Leahy, op. cit, ibid.
[4] Op. cit, p. 315.
[5] The Archaeology of Mesopotamia, pp. 210-202. Emphasis added.
[6] Ibid, pp. 197, 203.
[7] Op. cit, p. 125, n. 2, with reference to O. Sellers’ ‘Weights and Measures’, IDB, IV, pp. 828-839.
[8] Measures and Weights, p. 7.
[9] Ibid, p. 6.
[10] Historical Metrology, p. 55.
[11] Ibid, p. 29.

Canonicity of Judith

Book of Judith Part of Catholic, but not Jewish, Canon

Hebrew Canon

“The book of Judith is not a part of the Hebrew canon. It is an “outside book” …”.[1] Moore gives his reasons for why he thinks the book was not accepted as canonical by the Rabbis, contrasting it here with the fate of the Book of Esther:[2]

The book of Esther had a long and difficult time attaining Jewish canonicity, but it finally did so. … Yet the book of Judith, which in its Semitic form had all the essentials of Palestinian Judaism (i.e., God, prayer, dietary scrupulousness, sacrifice, Temple, Jerusalem – none of which are [sic] even so much as mentioned in the MT of Esther …), was never admitted to the Palestinian canon, nor is the book known to have been present at Qumran.

… Judith may have been excluded from the Hebrew canon because the Rabbis, who were responsible for fixing the canon in the last stages of the canonizing process, disapproved of the book’s universalism, i.e., its accepting attitude toward the towns of Samaria and its approval of an Ammonite’s admittance into the Jewish faith (so Steinmann ….).

… There is genuine merit to Craven’s view that Judith was simply too radical a woman for the rabbis who fixed the Jewish canon to memorialize:

To accept the Book of Judith as a canonical book would be to judge the story holy and authoritative. And to judge the story of the woman Judith holy and authoritative could indeed have been deemed a dangerous precedent by the ancient sages. … she is faithful to the letter of the law but not restricted to traditional modes of behavior. … she fears no one or thing other than Yahweh. Imagine what life would be like if women were free to chastise the leading men of their communities, if they dared to act independently in the face of traumas, if they refused to marry, and if they had money and servants of their own. Indeed if they, like Judith, hired women to manage their households what would become of all the Eliezers of the world?

I suspect that the sages would judge that their communities simply could not bear too many women like Judith. The special genius of this story is that it survived and grew in popularity despite its treatment at the hands of the establishment. ….

Craven again, citing several commentators in support, will refer to “the often made claim that the Book of Judith represents one of the best examples of Jewish story-telling …”.[3]

Moore, with a quote from Orlinsky, now gives what he considers to be the most likely reason amongst those he has already mentioned as to why BOJ was not accepted into the Hebrew canon. And I would agree with his estimation here, though I would note at least also the apparent historical and geographical anomalies in the book:[4]

However, the most likely reason for Judith’s omission from the Hebrew canon is, as H. M. Orlinsky (Essays in Biblical, pp. 279-81) has noted, that the rabbis could not accept it because the book ran counter to their halakah … that a Gentile convert to Judaism had to be circumcised and baptized in order to become a Jew. … In other words, not only did Judith have Achior, an Ammonite, accepted into Judaism, which in itself ran counter to Deut 23:3 … but he was not baptized.

To canonize a book – that is, to make it officially a source of doctrine – when the doctrine did not conform to that of the canonizers, was too much to ask. The Book of Esther, with all its “faults”, offered nothing specific that violated Pharisee halakah. (p. 218)

Enslin, too, has focussed primarily upon the apparently irregular Achior-as-an-Ammonite situation, as the reason for BOJ’s not having become a part of the Hebrew canon, comparing - and contrasting - it with the unusual situation of Ruth:[5]

The author of the book relates that after the triumph of Judith, an officer in the camp of Holofernes, Achior, an Ammonite, “joined into the house of Israel”. According to the Pentateuch, “An Ammonite or a Moabite shall not enter into the assembly of Yahweh, even to the tenth generation shall none of them enter into the assembly of Yahweh forever” [Deuteronomy 23:4] …. If the book of Judith should gain acceptance into the Holy Scriptures, it would contradict the Pentateuchal laws. It is true that Ruth was a Moabite and she converted to Judaism, nevertheless the book of Ruth became a part of the Holy Scriptures. The sages, in order to reconcile the contradictory and opposing view between the book of Ruth and the Pentateuch, declared that the Pentateuchal prohibition regarding the Ammonite and the Moabite referred only to the male but not to the female …. Thus the book of Ruth could be very well accepted in the Hebrew canon.

He goes on to tell which Jewish sage it was who was of sufficient authority to have prevented canonical acceptance of BOJ: namely, Gamaliel:[6]

It is also true that sages during the Second Commonwealth encouraged proselytism regardless of race and no obstacles were placed against the Ammonites. A Mishne relates: “On that day, came Judah, an Ammonite proselyte, and stood before them in the Beth Hamidrash, and said to them, ‘May I enter into the community?’ Rabban Gamaliel said to him: ‘You are not allowed.’ Rabbi Joshua said to him: ‘You are allowed’.” … Thus we have to conclude that in the academy of Javneh there was a division of opinion among the sages regarding the acceptance of Ammonite proselytes. The opinion of Rabbi Joshua became the established law. The opinion of Rabban Gamaliel, however, was enough to keep the book of Judith from inclusion in the Hebrew Bible.

Enslin, continuing on with his discussion of Achior, now turns to a consideration of circumcision and baptism:[7]

Again, it is stated in the book of Judith that when Achior converted to Judaism, he was circumcised; it does not say that he was baptized. During the Second Jewish Commonwealth, the ritual of immersion was not required for conversion to Judaism. At the conclave of the year 65 CE, it was decreed that a proselyte must go through the rites of baptism in order to enter the Jewish community. … The fact that in the book of Judith it is stated that Achior became a proselyte by circumcision alone without baptism was enough to keep the book out of the Hebrew canon. If this book should be included in the Hebrew Bible, it would mean that the book of Judith was holy and authoritative; thus there would be a contradiction between the statement in Judith and the decree of the sages who maintained that baptism is a sine qua non.

As his final reasons for BOJ’s non acceptance into the Hebrew canon, Enslin will argue that the book was written too late for it to have been an ‘inspired’ text, and, moreover, it was written in the ‘diaspora’:[8]

The book of Judith was written in a late period, after the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, as we shall subsequently show. According to the rabbinic tradition, books written after the Persian period were not “inspired” … thus they could not be a part of the Hebrew Bible. Esther’s story was placed in the time of Ahasuerus, while the story of Judith was placed after the time of Antiochus Epiphanes [sic], long after prophecy ceased in Israel. Again, the book of Esther was written in Judaea, while the book of Judith was compiled in the diaspora, and that is also a good reason for its not being included in the Hebrew canon.

No books written in the diaspora were included in the Hebrew Bible.

Damien F. Mackey has already though, in Chapter 7 of his post-graduate thesis, A Revised History of the Era of King Hezekiah of Judah and its Background, begun to pave the way for a resolution to the Achior problem, which is apparently the most serious obstacle to the Book of Judith’s canonical acceptance,[9] by hinting at an identification of Achior with Ahikar, a nephew of Tobit, and hence a Naphtalian Israelite, not an Ammonite. He then discusses this Achior in more detail later in this chapter (e.g. pp. 46-47), along with the other matters raised by Enslin, of late authorship, and, supposedly written in the diaspora (e.g. pp. 58-59).

Catholic Canon

“Although the book did not form part of the Hebrew Canon”, as Leahy explains:[10]

… the [Catholic] Church considered it from the beginning as divinely inspired, having received it together with the other sacred books contained in the LXX. It was quoted with approbation by Clement of Rome (I Cor 55) and cited on an equality with other Scripture by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. 2, 7), Origen (De Orat. 13, 29; Hom. 9 on Jg; Hom. 19 on Jer.) and Ambrose (De Off. Min. 3, 13). The Councils of Hippo (A.D. 393) and Carthage (A.D. 397 and 419) enumerated it among the canonical books. St Augustine (De Doctrina Christiana 2, 8) had it on his list of sacred books.

And Dumm tells:[11] “[Judith] never came into the Hebr. Canon, but it was adopted for reading for the feast of Hannukah, and even Jerome [who did not accept the book as canonical] admitted that the work was “read” in the Church. Final recognition of its canonicity came with the Council of Trent”. Consequently, as Leahy explains (regarding the early C20th view):[12]

The vast majority of Catholic critics regard the book as a record of fact and they endeavour to answer the difficulties urged in the name of history against its accuracy. The arguments which they advance are the following: (a) Jewish and Christian tradition and all commentators prior to the sixteenth century regarded the book as historical; (b) the minute historical, geographical, chronological and genealogical details indicate a straightforward narrative of real events; (c) the author speaks of descendants of Achior being alive in his time (14:6), and a festival celebrated annually up to his day in commemoration of Judith’s victory (16:31). Those who uphold the historicity (or, at least, a historical nucleus) of the narration take the view that ‘Nabuchodonosor’ and ‘Arphaxad’ are pseudonyms disguising historical persons whose identity cannot be ascertained with certainty.

---

[1] M. Enslin, The Book of Judith, p. 24. Cf. Leahy, op. cit, ibid.

[2] Op. cit, pp. 86-87.

[3] Op. cit, p. 6 and n. 20.

[4] Op. cit, p. 87. “Halakah”, Moore notes, “is that body of Jewish Law in the Talmud which interprets and supplements the laws of the O.T”, n. 75.

[5] Op. cit, pp. 24-25.

[6] Ibid, p. 25.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Ibid, pp. 25-26.

[9] Moore has allowed for the possibility of “a number of considerations” rather than simply “the [one major] reason why Judith was not included in the Jewish canon”. Ibid. His emphasis.

[10] Op. cit, ibid.

[11] Op. cit, ibid.

[12] Op. cit, ibid.