Luna

he fundamental ideas which ultimately developed into Jewish Apocalyptic go back to a hoary antiquity. Many of these ideas are present in one form or another in the Old Testament; but the different sources, some undoubtedly indigenous, others extraneous, whence these ideas emanated have, in all probability, a much longer history behind them. With the history and development of early Apocalyptic thought we are not here concerned, since our object is only to deal with Jewish Apocalyptic, and this merely in its broad outlines as it appears in what is called the Apocalyptic Movement.

When specifically Jewish Apocalyptic commenced it is[91] not possible to say, for the doctrines and hopes and fears which it taught must have been in men’s minds and have been widely inculcated long before it appeared in the form in which we know it, namely, its literary form. But it is not difficult to indicate the approximate date at which the Apocalyptic literature, known to us, began to come into existence; this was somewhere about the period 200-150 B.C.; from that time it continued to grow during a period of about three centuries. The early beginnings of this literature, therefore, date from a time prior to the Maccabæan struggle. Before the Maccabæan era the two great opposing parties, Sadducæan and Pharisaic, did not exist. It is more than probable, however, as we have seen, that the tendencies which, later, developed and became directly antagonistic were already in being, and that the Maccabæan struggle had the effect of greatly strengthening them.