The most important versions are the following. It is assumed in the article that the Greek text of the book up to Baruch 3:8 is itself a translation from a Hebrew text now lost. The same remark may be true of the rest of the book or of a portion of it (see above,III ).
1. Latin:
There are two versions in this language: (1) The Vulgate (Jerome's Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) which is really the Old Latin, since Jerome's revision was confined to the Hebrew Scriptures, the Apocrypha being therefore omitted in this revision. This version is a very literal one based on the Greek It is therefore for that reason the more valuable as a witness to the Greek text. (2) There is a later Latin translation, apparently a revision of the former, for its Latinity is better; in some cases it adopts different readings and in a general way it has been edited so as to bring it into harmony with the Vatican uncial (B). This Latin version was published in Rome by J. Maria Caro (died circa 1688) and was reprinted by Sabatier in parallel columns with the pre-Jeromian version noticed above (see Bibliotheca Casinensis, I, 1873).
2. Syriac:
There are also in this language two extant versions: (1) The Peshitta, a very literal translation, can be seen in the London (Walton's) Polyglot and most conveniently in Lagarde's Libr. Apocrypha. Syriac., the last being a more accurate reproduction. (2) The Hexapla Syriac translation made by Paul, bishop of Telle, near the beginning of the 7th century AD. It has been published by Ceriani with critical apparatus in his beautiful photograph-lithographed edition of the Hexapla Syriac Bible.
3. Arabic:
There is a very literal translation to be found in the London Polyglot, referred to above.
LITERATURE.
For editions of the Greek text see under APOCRYPHA. Of commentaries the fullest and best is that by Kneucker, Das Buch Baruch (1879), who gives an original German rendering based on a restored Hebrew original. Other valuable commentaries are those by Fritzsche (1851); Ewald, Die Propheten2, etc. (1868), III, 251-82 (Eng. translation); The Prophets of the Old Testament, V, 108-37, by Reusch (1855); Zockler (1891) and Rothstein (op. cit.); and in English, Bissell (in Lange's series edited by D. S. Schaff, 1880); and Gifford (Speaker's Comm., 1888). The S.P.C.K. has a handy and serviceable volume published in the series of popular commentaries on the Old Testament. But this commentary, though published quite recently (my copy belongs to 1894, "nineteenth thousand"), needs strengthening on the side of its scholarship.
Arts. dealing with introduction occur in the various Bible Dictionaries (Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Westcott and Ryle; Hastings, Dictionary of the Bible (five volumes), J. T. Marshall, able and original; Encyclopedia Biblica, Bevan, rather slight). To these must be added excellent articles in Jewish Encyclopedia (G. F. Moore), and Encyclopedia Biblica (R. H. Charles).
T. Witton Davies