Saturday, January 6, 2024

"Rewritten Scripture."

I have to say, "Rewritten Scripture" is overall one of the most miserable genres that I've ever encountered in my life.

It's basically like they take massive books of the Bible, but tweak it here and there, where so much is just repetition, with only every great once in a while something that's kind of new and interesting thrown in.

And, it's just soooo looooooooonng.

I had heard of this genre for years, but it's only been as part of my "living my best life" schtick that includes me reading vast collections of Jewish and Christian apocrypha that I've really sat down and gone and plowed through some of it it.

Jubilees wasn't too bad -- and it's kind of cool to think that I've now read Jubilees! (in translation) -- but the Biblical Antiquities of pseudo-Philo was really rough going for a lot of it.

And, I think that Josephus's Antiquities are worst of all, if I ever get around to trying to read his entire oeuvre.

The worst part is that a lot of this stuff is just curiosities from Antiquity, and it's not even that culturally influential.

The struggles of being a completist. Sigh.

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