Enigmatic references to unknown books are scattered throughout the Bible. We read of the Book of Jashar and the Book of the Wars of Yahweh, but we cannot read the books themselves, for no copies are known to exist. What is surprising, however, is not how many but how few references to such now-lost books we find in the Bible. After all, as the Bible itself says, “Of making many books there is no end” (Ecclesiastes 12:12). This was true even in ancient times.
Although there are more than 20 potential candidates for lost books of the Bible, in 54 references (see the second sidebar to this article), most scholars believe this list really boils down to fewer than a half dozen. For example, the works cited in 1 and 2 Kings as the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah (referred to 15 times) and the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel (referred to 18 times) may in fact be the same work, perhaps written in two columns, one for Israel and one for Judah.1 The Acts of Solomon (see 1 Kings 11:41) may be another name for this same work.2 The text was probably a single annal written by a priest of Jerusalem in the seventh century B.C.
What may seem at first glance to be the titles of 18 different lost books referred to in 1 and 2 Chronicles are probably descriptive terms that refer to just one work.3 We may see an example of how various descriptive terms were used as titles in Paul’s Letter to the Romans. Referring to a passage in 1 Kings 19:10–14 concerning Elijah (in Greek, Elias), Paul writes: “Do you not know what the scripture says in Elias?” (Romans 11:2).4 In this same way, we have in Chronicles references to the Book of the Kings of Israel, of Judah, of Judah and Israel, of Israel and Judah, of Samuel, of Gad, of Nathan, etc. These may all be descriptive references to different passages in the same book.
Sometimes the biblical reference seems to designate a list rather than a narrative work. This may be the case, for example, with the Book of the Chronicles, mentioned in Nehemiah 12:23: “The Levites…were recorded in the Book of the Chronicles.”
There are, however, two intriguing titles that appear to be important lost literary works: The Book of Jashar and the Book of the Wars of Yahweh.
The Book of Jashar is quoted twice, and perhaps a third time, in the Hebrew Bible-Old Testament. (This awkward designation is necessary because only two clear references appear in the Masoretic text [MT], the Jewish textus receptus of the Hebrew Bible. The third quotation appears only in the Septuagint [LXX], the early Greek translation that became the basis of the Christian Old Testament.)
All three quotations, however, are archaic poetry.
The first quotation is the famous passage in which Joshua, addressing God, commands the sun to stand still:
Sun, stand still in Gibeon! Moon, (stand still) in the valley of Aijalon! The Sun stood still, the Moon stayed; Until He [Yahweh] had taken vengeance upon the nations of His enemies—as it is written in the Book of Jashar.
Joshua 10:12–13
The antiquity of the passage is suggested by the relatively poor state of preservation of the Hebrew text. It is apparently an ancient incantation addressed to the heavenly bodies to prolong daylight, or perhaps to lengthen predawn darkness, so that Israel has time to complete its victory against the Amorites.
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A prose explanation follows this poetic account: “Thus the sun halted in mid-heaven, and did not press on to set, for a whole day; for Yahweh fought for Israel. Neither before nor since has there ever been such a day, when Yahweh acted on words spoken by a man” (Joshua 10:13–14).
As explained by this prose text, the poetic language quoted from the Book of Jashar reflects Israel’s early understanding of its wars as “sacral events, with God as commander in chief directing tactics through the agency of heavenly powers who are conceived as members of the divine Sovereign’s court.”5 The same understanding of Israel’s wars is reflected in another war song whose antiquity is widely recognized by scholars, the famous Song of Deborah:
The stars fought from heaven, From their courses they fought against Sisera. The torrent Kishon swept them away, The raging torrent, the torrent Kishon. March on, my soul, with courage!
Judges 5:20–21
The second quotation from the Book of Jashar is David’s moving lament over the death of Saul and Jonathan (2 Samuel 1:19–27). The poem (quoted in full in the first sidebar to this article) is a remarkable witness to David’s poetic skill and to his personal friendship with these tragic heroes. The biblical text tells us that the lament is quoted from the Book of Jashar.
The third quotation is attributed to King Solomon. After the Ark of the Covenant has been brought to Jerusalem and placed in the Temple, a cloud, indicating the Presence of the Lord (the Kavod of Yahweh), fills the building:
Then Solomon declared: “Yaweh has chosen To abide in a thick cloud: I have now built for You A stately House, A place where You May dwell forever.”
1 Kings 8:12–13
As noted earlier, in the Hebrew Bible this quotation is not attributed to the Book of Jashar. In the Septuagint, however, a slightly different text is.6
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The nature of these quotations suggests that the Book of Jashar, if indeed it was a book, was a collection of early Israelite poems or songs, perhaps related to battles and wars. Some scholars contend that the songs or poems were never recorded in a book at all, but were part of a familiar oral repertoire drawn on by professional singers. These singers preserved Israel’s epic and lyric traditions, especially those related to major festivals, within various social settings.
Support for the identification of the Book of Jashar as a collection of war songs comes from an alternative etymology of Jashar. The most common explanation of the name is simply that it means what it says, literally “straight,” also “honest” and “upright.” So it is the book of “one who [or “that which”] is straight, honest, just, righteous, upright.” If this is correct, the collection may refer either to the heroic individuals who are the subjects of its contents or perhaps to all Israel as the upright people.7
But there is another possibility: In Hebrew Jashar is composed of three letters: ysûr. If two letters are transposed (scholars call this a metathesis), we would have sûyr, which means “song.” On this basis, it has been argued that the title really means the Book of Song. In this connection it is interesting to note that elsewhere in the Bible when archaic poetry is inserted in a prose text, the poem is called a song (sûyr) (see Exodus 15:1; Numbers 21:17; Deuteronomy 31:30).
The distinguished biblical exegete Cyrus Gordon, now 90 years old, has come up with one of the most ingenious analyses of the Book of Jashar. According to Gordon, the Book of Jashar contained the epic literature of ancient Israel and celebrated the achievement of nationhood.8 The quotations from the Book of Jashar in the Hebrew Bible, he noted, have striking parallels in other eastern Mediterranean epics. The theme of the sun standing still occurs not only in the Book of Judges, but also in Homer’s Iliad, first in the 028form of a prayer that the sun should not set before victory is won (Iliad 2.412–418), and then when the goddess Hera controlled the setting of the sun during the battle over Patroclus’s corpse (Iliad 18.239–242).
David’s lament over the death of Saul and Jonathan is paralleled in the dirge of Andromache, Hecuba and Helen over the death of Hector (Iliad 24.723–775). Another parallel comes from a Canaanite epic transcribed on cuneiform tablets recovered from Ugarit.a There the women weep in a dirge mourning the slain hero Aqhat (1 Aqhat 171–172, 183).
Since both quotations from the Hebrew Bible are in poetry and both deal with war, Gordon believes that the Book of Jashar was probably a “poetic epic that told of the Hebrew Conquest culminating in David’s reign. When Israelite historiography turned to prose writing, as in most of Genesis through Kings, the earlier poetic texts eventually were lost. But the two surviving excerpts of the Book of Jashar indicate that it would have ranked high in world literature.”9
In contrast to the Book of Jashar, there is only one quotation in the Bible from the Book of the Wars of Yahweh. It is a difficult, corrupted text that leaves 029doubt not only about what it means, but what it is: We do not even know how many verses it includes: only one or more? To confuse matters even more, the Masoretic text and the Septuagint preserve somewhat different traditions.
The reference occurs in Numbers 21, which describes part of the Israelites’ trek to the Holy Land. Although the Israelites are victorious at Hormah, they nevertheless continue to complain to Moses. The march proceeds, station by station. The text takes note of the boundary between Moab and the Amorites, east of the Jordan. Then, somewhat abruptly, the text announces: “That is why it is said in the Book of the Wars of Yahweh” (Numbers 21:14). Next, a poem begins in most translations. In the Revised English Bible, however, the poem begins a few words later. The New Jewish Publication Society translation concludes that a few words at the beginning of the poem must be missing, so it begins the quotation of the poem with an ellipsis (three dots), then drops a footnote reading, “The quotation that follows is a fragment; text and meaning are uncertain.”
Here is my translation of the poem, followed by that in the New Revised Standard Version.
My translation:
The Benefactor [that is, Yahweh] has come in a storm; Yea, He has come to the wadis of the Arnon. He marched, he turned aside—to the seat of Ar; He leaned toward the border of Moab.
The New Revised Standard Version translation:
Waheb in Suphah and the wadis. The Arnon and the slopes of the wadis that extend to the seat of Ar, and lie along the border of Moab.
Numbers 21:14–15
It is easy to see the difficulties in translating—and understanding—the poem.
Where the poem ends is also a matter of debate. Later in this same chapter are two other old poems, the Song of the Well (Numbers 21:17–20) and the Amorite Song of Heshbon (Numbers 21:27–30). Some scholars contend that the quotation from the Book of the Wars of Yahweh extends through the Song of the Well; others would include the Song of Heshbon.
Since the poem—or at least the initial part—appears in a passage about marking boundaries, it was probably inserted by the narrator because it locates the boundary of Moab at the Arnon River.
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But it may also be interpreted as presenting the Divine Warrior poised on the edge of the Promised Land before the most celebrated battles of the Exodus-Conquest. He has come in the whirlwind with his hosts to the sources of the Arnon River in Transjordan. He marches through the wadis, turning aside to settle affairs with Moab before marching against the two Amorite kings to the north and then across the Jordan to Gilgal and on to conquer Canaan. The image fits well with the title the Book of the Wars of Yahweh.
Most scholars have concluded that the Book of the Wars of Yahweh was probably an anthology of old war poems dealing with the conflict between the invading Israelites and the original inhabitants of Canaan. Some have suggested that the Book of the Wars of Yahweh and the Book of Jashar are really the same book. If so, it is interesting to speculate whether other archaic poems in the Bible, such as the Song of the Sea (Exodus 15:1–18), the Song of Miriam (Exodus 15:21), the Song of Moses (Deuteronomy 32) and the Song of Deborah (Judges 5), were included in these ancient anthologies of Israel’s heroic past.
A final word about two lost texts that are referred to in the Bible as midrash. A passage in 2 Chronicles 13:22 refers to the “Midrash of the Prophet Iddo,” and 2 Chronicles 24:27 mentions the “Midrash of the Book of Kings.” Midrash (plural, midrashim) is a type of literature, oral or written, that starts from a canonical text and elaborates on it, often fancifully, in the form of stories in order to interpret its meaning. In the postbiblical period, the rabbis created a whole literature of midrash, considered sacred, that took on a life of its own, emerging in the Talmud alongside the biblical text. These biblical references to midrash indicate that this process began even earlier, in biblical times. Michael Fishbane of the University of Chicago has referred to this as “inner biblical exegesis.”10 Fishbane and others have identified passages in the biblical text that qualify as 031inner biblical interpretation, some of which could also qualify as biblical midrash. That is what we may suppose the Midrash of the prophet Iddo and the Midrash of the Book of Kings were like. But the text of these midrashim is, unfortunately, lost.
Although it is true we no longer have the actual texts of these “lost books of the Bible,” in one sense these books were never truly lost. The Book of Jashar and the Book of the Wars of Yahweh refer to a body of oral epic literature that stands behind what we now call the Torah and the narrative books that follow and is preserved in those works. Midrashim are preserved not only in the third part of the Hebrew Bible (known as Writings), but in the Apocrypha and the talmudic tradition of rabbinic Judaism. These stories have survived in Jewish tradition from ancient times to the present as the “legends of the Jews.”11
Enigmatic references to unknown books are scattered throughout the Bible. We read of the Book of Jashar and the Book of the Wars of Yahweh, but we cannot read the books themselves, for no copies are known to exist. What is surprising, however, is not how many but how few references to such now-lost books we find in the Bible. After all, as the Bible itself says, “Of making many books there is no end” (Ecclesiastes 12:12). This was true even in ancient times. Although there are more than 20 potential candidates for lost books of the Bible, […]
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In 1928 a Syrian farmer accidentally struck an ancient tomb with his plow. Subsequent excavations revealed the remains of the 14th-century B.C. city of Ugarit. Archaeologists discovered thousands of cuneiform tablets. Several found in the library of the chief priest of the temple of Baal record the major Canaanite myths.
Endnotes
1.
Tryggve N.D. Mettinger, Solomonic State Officials, Coniectanea biblica, Old Testament series 5 (Lund: Gleerup, 1971), pp. 36–42.
2.
Alfred Jepsen, Die Quellen des Königsbuches (Halle: M. Niemeyer, 1956), pp. 54–60.
3.
Some scholars have suggested that the Chronicler invented such references to legitimate his portrayal of the history of Judah. See Rosemarie Micheel, Die Seher- und Prophetenueberlieferungen in der Chronik, Bieträge zur evangelischen Theologie 18 (Frankfurt am Main, 1983), pp. 79–80; citation from John W. Wright, “Iddo,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1992), vol. 3, p. 376.
4.
Robert H. Pfeiffer, “Chronicles, I and II,” in Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1962), vol. 1, p. 578.
5.
Encyclopaedia Judaica, s.v. “Book of Jashar.”
6.
The LXX text in Codex Vaticanus and the Lucianic recension add the words “Is it not written in the Book of the Upright One [Book of Jashar]?”
7.
If the latter is the case, the title may be related to the term Jeshurun, a variant form of the name Israel (cf. Deuteronomy 32:15, 33:5, 26).
8.
Cyrus H. Gordon, “Ugarit as Link between Greek and Hebrew Literatures,” Revista degli Studi Orientali 29 (1954), pp. 161–169.
9.
Gordon and Gary A. Rendsburg, The Bible and the Ancient Near East, 4th ed. (New York: Norton, 1997), pp. 171–172; 4th ed. originally published in 1953 as Introduction to Old Testament Times.
10.
Michael Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985).
11.
See Louis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1961), a shorter version of a seven-volume work of the same title, published in 1956 by Simon and Schuster as Legends of the Bible.
