Context at a Glance
Author:Traditional Attribution
Topic:judith Chapter 15 Study
This chapter provides a foundational look at the theological themes of judith, analyzed across multiple historic translations for maximum scholarly depth.
Judith 15
New Revised Standard Version
1When the men in the tents heard it, they were amazed at what had happened.
2Overcome with fear and trembling, they did not wait for one another, but with one impulse all rushed out and fled by every path across the plain and through the hill country.
3Those who had camped in the hills around Bethulia also took to flight. Then the Israelites, everyone that was a soldier, rushed out upon them.
4Uzziah sent men to Betomasthaim and Choba and Kola, and to all the frontiers of Israel, to tell what had taken place and to urge all to rush out upon the enemy to destroy them.
5When the Israelites heard it, with one accord they fell upon the enemy, and cut them down as far as Choba. Those in Jerusalem and all the hill country also came, for they were told what had happened in the camp of the enemy. The men in Gilead and in Galilee outflanked them with great slaughter, even beyond Damascus and its borders.
6The rest of the people of Bethulia fell upon the Assyrian camp and plundered it, acquiring great riches.
7And the Israelites, when they returned from the slaughter, took possession of what remained. Even the villages and towns in the hill country and in the plain got a great amount of booty, since there was a vast quantity of it.
8Then the high priest Joakim and the elders of the Israelites who lived in Jerusalem came to witness the good things that the Lord had done for Israel, and to see Judith and to wish her well.
9When they met her, they all blessed her with one accord and said to her, "You are the glory of Jerusalem, you are the great boast of Israel, you are the great pride of our nation!
10You have done all this with your own hand; you have done great good to Israel, and God is well pleased with it. May the Almighty Lord bless you forever!" And all the people said, "Amen."
11All the people plundered the camp for thirty days. They gave Judith the tent of Holofernes and all his silver dinnerware, his beds, his bowls, and all his furniture. She took them and loaded her mules and hitched up her carts and piled the things on them.
12All the women of Israel gathered to see her, and blessed her, and some of them performed a dance in her honor. She took ivy-wreathed wands in her hands and distributed them to the women who were with her;
13and she and those who were with her crowned themselves with olive wreaths. She went before all the people in the dance, leading all the women, while all the men of Israel followed, bearing their arms and wearing garlands and singing hymns.
14Judith began this thanksgiving before all Israel, and all the people loudly sang this song of praise.
1And Judith said, Begin a song to my God with tambourines, sing to my Lord with cymbals. Raise to him a new psalm; exalt him, and call upon his name.
2For the Lord is a God who crushes wars; he sets up his camp among his people; he delivered me from the hands of my pursuers.
3The Assyrian came down from the mountains of the north; he came with myriads of his warriors; their numbers blocked up the wadis, and their cavalry covered the hills.
4He boasted that he would burn up my territory, and kill my young men with the sword, and dash my infants to the ground, and seize my children as booty, and take my virgins as spoil.
5But the Lord Almighty has foiled them by the hand of a woman.
6For their mighty one did not fall by the hands of the young men, nor did the sons of the Titans strike him down, nor did tall giants set upon him; but Judith daughter of Merari with the beauty of her countenance undid him.
7For she put away her widow's clothing to exalt the oppressed in Israel. She anointed her face with perfume; she fastened her hair with a tiara and put on a linen gown to beguile him.
9Her sandal ravished his eyes, her beauty captivated his mind, and the sword severed his neck!
10The Persians trembled at her boldness, the Medes were daunted at her daring.
11Then my oppressed people shouted; my weak people cried out, and the enemy trembled; they lifted up their voices, and the enemy were turned back.
12Sons of slave-girls pierced them through and wounded them like the children of fugitives; they perished before the army of my Lord.
13I will sing to my God a new song: O Lord, you are great and glorious, wonderful in strength, invincible.
14Let all your creatures serve you, for you spoke, and they were made. You sent forth your spirit, and it formed them; there is none that can resist your voice.
15For the mountains shall be shaken to their foundations with the waters; before your glance the rocks shall melt like wax. But to those who fear you you show mercy.
16For every sacrifice as a fragrant offering is a small thing, and the fat of all whole burnt offerings to you is a very little thing; but whoever fears the Lord is great forever.
17Woe to the nations that rise up against my people! The Lord Almighty will take vengeance on them in the day of judgment; he will send fire and worms into their flesh; they shall weep in pain forever. The procession arrives in Jerusalem
18When they arrived at Jerusalem, they worshiped God. As soon as the people were purified, they offered their burnt offerings, their freewill offerings, and their gifts.
19Judith also dedicated to God all the possessions of Holofernes, which the people had given her; and the canopy that she had taken for herself from his bedchamber she gave as a votive offering.
20For three months the people continued feasting in Jerusalem before the sanctuary, and Judith remained with them.
21After this they all returned home to their own inheritances. Judith went to Bethulia, and remained on her estate. For the rest of her life she was honored throughout the whole country.
22Many desired to marry her, but she gave herself to no man all the days of her life after her husband Manasseh died and was gathered to his people.
23She became more and more famous, and grew old in her husband's house, reaching the age of one hundred five. She set her maid free. She died in Bethulia, and they buried her in the cave of her husband Manasseh;
24and the house of Israel mourned her for seven days. Before she died she distributed her property to all those who were next of kin to her husband Manasseh, and to her own nearest kindred.
25No one ever again spread terror among the Israelites during the lifetime of Judith, or for a long time after her death. ESTHER
75ADDITIONS TO ESTHER ADDITIONS TO ESTHER NOTE. The deuterocanonical portions of the Book of Esther are several additional passages found in the Greek translation of the Hebrew Book of Esther, a translation that differs also in other respects from the Hebrew text (the latter is translated in the NRSV Old Testament). The disordered chapter numbers come from the displacement of the additions to the end of the canonical Book of Esther by Jerome in his Latin translation and from the subsequent division of the Bible into chapters by Stephen Langton, who numbered the additions consecutively as though they formed a direct continuation of the Hebrew text. So that the additions may be read in their proper context, the whole of the Greek version is here translated, though certain familiar names are given according to their Hebrew rather than their Greek form; for example, Mordecai and Vashti instead of Mardocheus and Astin. The order followed is that of the Greek text, but the chapter and verse numbers conform to those of the King James or Authorized Version. The additions, conveniently indicated by the letters A-F, are located as follows: A, before 1.1; B, after 3.13; C and D, after 4.17; E, after 8.12; F, after 10.3. Most importantly, the following textual order follows the Greek edition of Esther found in the New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha: New Revised Standard Version. 3rd edition, ed. Michael D. Coogan (Oxford University Press, 2001). Introduction The Greek version of Esther is a translation of the canonical Hebrew book of Esther (i.e., the one included in the "Hebrew Scriptures" ESTHER
76portion of this New Revised Standard Version Bible). The translation was made for Greek-speaking Jews in the second and first century BCE. The translator — very likely the Lysimachus of Jerusalem mentioned in 11.1 — produced a systematic but relatively free translation of the Hebrew. Besides numerous small but often significant omissions and additions, the Greek version includes six extra sections that have no counterparts in the Hebrew. These additional sections are clearly intrusive and secondary, for they contradict the Hebrew at a number of points. While they sometimes make the characters and events more vivid or dramatic, their main purpose is to transform the comparatively subtle and enigmatic Hebrew story of Esther into a more conventional tale of divine intervention and exemplary Jewish piety. The Additions to the book of Esther comprise
107verses. Their contents are as follows: *Addition A: *Addition B: *Addition C: *Addition D: *Addition E: *Addition F: Mordecai's dream (11.2-12) and his discovery of a plot against the king (12.1-6) The royal edict dictated by Haman, decreeing the extermination of the Jews (13.1-7) The prayers of Mordecai (13.8-18) and Esther (14.1-19) Esther's appearing unsummoned, before the king (15.4-19) The royal edict dictated by Mordecai, counteracting the edict sent by Haman (16.1-24) The interpretation of Mordecai's dream (10.4-13) and the colophon (an inscription at the end of a manuscript) to the Greek version (1.11) Although there is no mention of God in the Hebrew narrative, in the Greek version the terms "Lord" or "God" appear more than fifty times. Most of the these occurrences are in the Additions, but occasionally the Greek translation inserts references to God into verses that correspond to the canonical Hebrew text (see 2.20; 4.8; 6.13). The additions provided their authors with an opportunity to express their own particular theological views. Additions A and F introduce ESTHER
77apocalyptic motifs to emphasize God's providential care for the people Israel in a universally hostile world. Addition C attests to the efficacy of prayer and expresses Queen Esther's abhorrence at being married to a Gentile, her loathing of all things worldly and courtly, and her strict observance of Jewish dietary laws — none of which is so much as hinted at in the Hebrew. Thanks largely to Addition D, the climax of the Greek version is reached when God miraculously changes to gentleness the king's "fierce anger" at Esther's unannounced entrance. Taken together, the six additions deemphasize the establishment of Purim and express a deep distrust of Gentiles. Besides giving the story a more explicitly religious character, the additions create new emphases. A and F, which frame the story, graft onto it a new apocalyptic perspective of cosmic struggle between good and evil. The juxtaposition of C's extensive praise of God, with similar terms and phrases applied to Ahasuerus in D, makes explicit the Greek version's intent to contrast the capricious earthly king with God the trustworthy heavenly king. Similarly, the royal decrees in B and E highlight the theme of human commandments versus the law of Moses to which Esther also alludes when she prays in C. Originally, A, C, D, and F were probably composed in either Hebrew or Aramaic (both Semitic languages) and, if so, were already part of that particular Semitic text used by the Greek translator. The florid phraseology of B and E indicates that they must originally have been composed in Greek, perhaps in Alexandria, a sophisticated GreekJewish center. The additions were not composed at the same time. The latest possible date for B, C, D, and E is
93CE, when the historian Josephus paraphrased them in his 'Jewish Antiquities.' The colophon's location (11.1) immediately after F suggests that A as well as F were part of the Semitic text at the time that Lysimachus made his Greek translation in the late second or first century BCE. ESTHER
78Esther (The Greek Version Containing the Additional Chapters) ADDITION A