Chapter Nine The Sibylline

J. J. Collins

Oracles, or inspired utterances, are a very widespread form of religious speech. Much of the Hebrew is taken up with the oracles of the prophets. Prophecy declined in the post-exilic period, but we know from that there were prophets who uttered oracles throughout the Hellenistic period.1 These oracles have only been preserved in summary form or are very short. We do have, however, a lenghty corpus of Jewish oracles, attributed to the . The standard collection of consists of twelve books, numbered 1-8 and 11-14. The anomalous omission of the numbers 9 and lO from the sequence of books is due to the nature of the manuscript tradition.2 There are, in fact, two distinct collections. The first contains books 1-8,3 and was published in Basel in 1545. The second collection begins with a ninth book, which is made up of material found also in the first collection: Book 6, a single verse which has been placed at the begin• ning of Book 7 and Bk. 8:218-428. Then follows Bk. 10, which is identical with Sib. Or. 4. Books 11-14 follow in sequence. The first two books of the collection should be numbered 9 and 10, but since they only repeat material found in Books 1-8, they are omitted in the editions. The numb• ering of Books 11-14 is retained. Books 11-14 were first published by in 1817 and 1828.4 The twelve books of the Oracula Sibyl/ina were written over a span of more than 700 years. Books 3, 4 and 5 are generally recognized as Jewish works from the period before Bar Kokhba. It is also probable that Bk. 11 was composed by a Jew about the turn of the era, and that Books 1-2

1 Meyer, 'Prophecy and Prophets'; Michel, 'Spatjiidisches Prophetentum.' 2 The two major editions of the Sibylline Oracles are those of Geffcken, Die Dracula Sibyllina and Rzach, Dracula Sibyllina. For a complete English translation, with introductions and notes by Collins see Charlesworth, . For full discussion of the text of the Sibyllina see Geffcken, Die Dracula Sibyl/ina, XII-LIII, and Rzach, 'Sibyllinische Orakel,' 2119-22. Rzach gives the more complete listing of the manuscripts which make up each group. 3 This collection consists of 2 manuscript groups,

. The anonymous prologue is found only in group

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preserve substantial portions of an underlying Jewish from about the same time. Books 12-14 are Jewish, but much later. Book 8 preserves substantial Jewish material from the late second century C.E. Books 1-2, 6, 7 and 8 are Christian in their final form. 5

The Phenomenon of Sibylline Oracles The twelve books of the standard collection are all, in their final shape, either Je'o/ish or Christian. Sibylline prophecy was, however, originally a pagan phenomenon. The Sibyl herself is always depicted as an aged wo• man, uttering ecstatic prophecies. In the earliest attestations, from the fifth and fourth centuries B.C.E., the word Sibyl refers to a single individual,6 but if there ever was a historical Sibyl she was lost in the mists oflegend by that time. As from the fourth century B.C.E. we read of a number ofSibyls.7 The most famous were those ofErythrea in Asia Minor and ofCumae in Italy. Varro listed ten - Persian, Libyan, Delphic, Cimmerian, Erythrean, Samian, Cumean, Hellespontian, Phrygian and Tiburtine.8 The Suda (a tenth century lexicon) and the anonymous preface to the standard collec• tion repeat this list but identify the Persian Sibyl with the Hebrew. ( 10: 12, 1-9) lists four: the , Herophile of Marpessus (whom he identifies with the Delphic, Erythrean and Samian Sibyls), Demo of and Sabbe of the Hebrews (also called Babylonian or Egyptian by some). The most famous collection of Sibylline oracles in antiquity was the official one at . According to popular legend these oracles originated in the time of Tarquinius Priscus.9 It is quite probable that Rome had acquired a collection of oracles in Greek hexameters before the fall of the monarchy.10 These oracles were entrusted to special keepers, first two men, then ten, finally fifteen. Consultation had to be authorized by a decree of the senate. No other body of literature was granted such prestige in the Greco-Roman world. When the temple of Jupiter was burnt down in 83 B.C.E. the were destroyed. When the temple was rebuilt seven years later, oracles were gathered from various places, especially Erythrea. 11 In view of

5 Geffcken, Komposition; Rzach, 'Sibyllinische Orakel'; Collins, 'The Sibylline Oracles.' 6 So , in , De Pythiae Oracu/is 6 (397a), Aristophanes, Peace, 1095ff.; , Phaedrus, 244b. 7 So Aristotle, Problemata, 954a; Heracleides Ponticus in Clement, Stromata I: 108, I. 8 See , Divinae Institutiones, I :6. 9 The legend is recounted in the anonymous preface to the Sibyllina. See also Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities 4:62. 10 On the Roman oracles see Diels, Sibyllinische Blatter; Rzach, 'Sibyllinische Orakel,' 2103-2116 and Bloch, 'L'origine des Livres Sibyllins Rome.' See also Cancik, 'Libri Fatales.' 11 Dionysius of Halicarnassus 4:62,5-6.

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