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550 Baruch, Apocalypse of

THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA

Baruch, bewailing and lamenting the fall of Jerusalem, is addressed by an angel of God sent to reveal great mysteries to him (ch. i.). He goes with the angel, and after crossing a stream at the place where heaven is fastened (not the ocean, but the " mayim ha'elyonim " [upper waters]; Gen. R. iv. Baruch 3; Hag. 15a; compare Abraham, TesAscends to tament of), they reach the first heavFirst en. The angel tells Baruch that the Heaven, heaven's thickness equals the distance from heaven to earth, or the distance from east to west (thus the Slavonic text: the Greek reads "from north to south"; Tamid32a; a S- 13a). Baruch sees men in animal form, who, as the angel explains, " are they who built the tower, and God has transformed them"(ii.). This means that the builders of the tower ("dor hafiagah ") were trans-

Pirke R. El.

vi.

550 Num.



R.

The phenix attends

xii. 4.

the sun in its course as guard catching on its wings the rays, in order to keep them from scorching everything. At daybreak the rustling of the phenix awakens the cocks on earth, who then give the signal of dawn in their peculiar utterance (compare Targ.

on Job xxxviii.

The Zohar

36).

(iii.

22J, 23a, 49S)

some other celesmanifestation, which causes the crowing of the

also tells of a heavenly wind, or tial

so inhuman that they would not let a woman who helped with the building leave her work during travail. A similar rabbinical legend about a Jewish

even the Talmud knows the blessing "p-Q ^vh |D3 IK'S ("blessed be He who has given the cock intelligence [to distinguish between day and night]," Ber. 60S). As in the rabbinical sources (Pirke R. El. vi. Yalk., Eccl. 967), the angels draw the sun's chariot (ch. vii., viii.), and at night four angels remove the sun's crown (according to Pirke R. El. I.e., the sun is attended by different angels by night and by day; and since, accordCelestial ing to Yalk. I.e., there are eight in all, the number in the Baruch Apocalypse Phenomena. tallies with that in rabbinical literature). They remove the crown in order to cleanse it of the impurities with which it becomes spotted through the sins of man on earth (Test. Patr., Levi, 3; Eliyahu R. ii.); and for this reason it is renewed every day (compare the words

woman

in the

H

formed into demons (Sanh. 109a, J^^i

D'HB')-

For

this reason they

are not in the place of torment, which is in the third heaven, but at the entrance to heaven (Hag. 16a compare Demonology). The third chapter gives the reason for the punishment inflicted on the tower-builders. They were

in

Egypt

(Pirke R. El. xlviii.



compare

"Sefer ha-Yashar, Shemot," ed. Leghorn, p. 113J) is probably the original of this. The fourth chapter, describing the third heaven, seems to have been badly mutilated in the Greek text; the Slavonic version must therefore be followed. Baruch sees a dragon as long as the distance from The Third east to west. It drinks an ell from the Heaven, sea daily; because three hundred and sixty rivers constantly empty into the sea, and would cause it to overflow, so that there would be nothing left dry on earth. The inside of the dragon is as large as the belly of Hades. The Greek text adds that it is this dragon which eats the bodies of those that have spent their lives in evil. The dragon seems to be identified with Hades in other respects also; and the representations of the dragon (the Leviathan) and Hades are confused. There is no connection between this part of the chapter and the section immediately following, in which Baruch asks which tree seduced Adam, and the angel answers that it was the vine planted by Samael (this view is widely spread in the apocalyptic and rabbinical literature; compare Ginzberg, "Die Haggada bei den Kirchenvatern, " pp. 38-41). In this connection, too, it is stated that the Deluge washed the vine bodily out of the Garden of Eden whereupon Noah took possession of it and planted it (Ginzberg, In its present form the section on the vine I.e. p. 40). is a Christian interpolation intended to reconcile the harmfulness of wine with its use in the communion In this way the original legend on the service. planting of the vine by Noah and the arch-fiend becomes radically changed. See Asmodeus. Chapters vi. to ix., treating of the sun, moon, and stars, are the most interesting part of the work. The sun is represented as a man with a crown of This is probably derived fire, sitting on a chariot.

from the Greek conception, but found also elsewhere in rabbinical literature, as in Slavonic B. of Enoch

cocks



nju



morning service nWD, TDH DV bs2 BHriD " who reneweth every day the work of crea-

IVCWO, tion").

The conception

It is represented as

a

of the

woman

moon sitting

is

also Greek.

on a chariot

drawn by oxen and lambs. It was once as large as the sun and even more beautiful; but at Adam's did not display the proper compassion, and it therefore made to wax and wane. This agrees only in part with the Haggadah variously given in the Talmud and Midrash, that the moon suffered this decrease in its size through its pride and guilt (Shebuot 9a; Hul. 60 b; Gen. R. vi. 3). In the fourth heaven Baruch first sees in a wide plain a pond about which are large numbers of birds. fall it

was

The angel explains

that this is the place to which the souls of the righteous go in order that they may live together in choirs. The idea that the souls of the righteous are transformed into birds frequently occurs in the Cabala (compare " Tikkune Zohar, "ed. Lemberg, vi. 22b see also Sanh 92S) this idea is probably of Egyptian origin. The fourth heaven also contains the water which descends to earth in the

form of rain

is

rain.

.



For although the original source of it must first ascend to heaven to mingle with the water there in order

the sea,

The Fourth that it may bring forth fruit, since seaand Fifth water is salt. In this way, according Heavens,

to Gen. R. xiii. 10 and Eccl. R. i. 7, the passage at the end of ch. x. is to be explained. In the fifth heaven Baruch meets Michael, prince of the angels and keeper of the celestial keys, who is descending to receive the prayers of men and to carry a report of their virtues to God. The expression " gates of prayer " (" sha'are tefillah ") already occurs frequently in the Talmud (Ber. 32b) and in the liturgy. Concerning the office here ascribed to Michael, compare Ginzberg, in I.e. p. 13. The conclusion of the Apocalypse (ch. xii.-xvii.) describes the acts of the angels who accompany men on earth (Hag. 16a) and report in heaven concerning