Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol VIII:
The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs.: Note by the American Editor.

Note by the American Editor.

I had prepared annotations for these pages which I find will require more space than this overloaded volume can afford.  Let me indicate some sources of information which the student may find convenient.  Thus, in Liddon’s Bampton Lecture (4th ed., London, 1869), consult p. 71 for remarks on Philo and Alexandrian Jews; see also p. 91.  Concerning the “Book of Enoch,” pp. 7 and 302; see Westcott, Study of the Gospels (London, 1867), p. 109, a reference to the Book of Jubilees, and its lack of reference to Messiah.  See Jewish doctrine of the Messiah, pp. 86, 143, 151; the “Book of Henoch,” pp. 69, 93, 101; apocryphal words of Jews, p. 428.  He places the “Book of Henoch” earlier than the “Book of Jubilees,” and the Twelve Patriarchs after that.  Compare Westcott’s Historic Faith (London, 1883), a quotation from Goldwin Smith, on “the blood of Christ,” note 8, p. 237.

I cannot forbear to note, among useful suggestions in these Testaments, that (on p. 11) of the share of Simeon in the persecution of Joseph.  It explains the real purpose of Joseph in selecting Simeon as the hostage to be left in Egypt (Gen. xlii. 21-24.)  Joseph heard the mutual reproaches of his brothers, and foresaw that Simeon would be made to suffer as most guilty:  so he was withdrawn.  Again, a like anxiety (Gen. xlv. 2) appears when Simeon was sent back with them to his father.  Other suggestions may be noted as substantially illustrating the sacred narrative.