Texts and Languages of 2 Baruch
There are four works that have been attributed to Baruch, the scribe of Jeremiah the prophet. There is some confusion regarding which book is being referred to, so scholars have resorted to identifying at least two of the four books by the surviving language which preserves the text. 2 Baruch is preserved only in the Syriac language (discounting a few Greek fragments that have been discovered). The evidence suggests that its Vorlage was either Hebrew or Aramaic. Later it was translated into Greek and then finally from Greek into Syriac.1 That it was translated from the Syriac into the Greek is explicitly stated at the heading of the Syriac version. The discovered Greek fragments attest to this. It can further be deduced that the Greek had a Hebrew or Aramaic Vorlage by comparing it with other Jewish writings. There are word plays that can be demonstrated if the text is translated back into Hebrew, but the word plays cannot be seen in the secondary language. Klijn states further: "In some cases the Syriac text is intelligible only after translating it into Hebrew."2 It seems plausible, therefore, to accept the judgment of a Hebrew original.
Notes
1J. Edward Wright, "Baruch, Books of," in Dictionary of New Testament Background, eds. Craig A. Evans and Stanley Porter (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000): 149.
2A. F. J. Klijn, "2 (Syriac Apocalypse of) Baruch," in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Apocalyptic Literature & Testaments, ed. James H. Charlesworth, Vol. 1 (New York: Doubleday, 1983): 616.
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