Apocryphal Books > Univeral Deuterocanon > Judith
Judith
The Book of Judith relates the story of God’s
deliverance of the Jewish people. This was
accomplished “by the hand of a female”—a
constant motif (cf. 8:33; 9:9, 10; 12:4; 13:4,
14, 15; 15:10; 16:5) meant to recall the
“hand” of God in the Exodus narrative (cf.
Ex. 15:6). The work may have been written
around 100 BC. There are four Greek
recensions of Judith (Septuagint codices
Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus, and
Basiliano-Vaticanus), four ancient
translations (Old Latin, Syriac, Sahidic, and
Ethiopic), and some late Hebrew versions,
apparently translated from the Vulgate.
Despite Jerome’s claim to have translated
an Aramaic text, no ancient Aramaic or
Hebrew manuscripts have been found. The
oldest extant text of Judith is the
preservation of 15:1–7 inscribed on a 3rd-century
AD potsherd. Whatever the
reasons, the rabbis did not count Judith
among their scriptures, and the Reformers
adopted that position.
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