Texts and Languages of 4 Ezra
The nomenclature of the Ezra-Esdras tradition (which includes Nehemiah) is quite confusing. First, there are the books of Ezra and Nehemiah found in English Bibles. Ezra and Nehemiah are companion volumes and, in fact, are subsumed under one title (2 Esdras) in the Septuagint (LXX). In the Latin Vulgate, however, they are separated, but they are not called Ezra and Nehemiah, but are called 1-2 Esdras. But many later Latin manuscripts did not follow that nomenclature and simply referred to both books as 1 Esdras. To add to the confusion, there is a document that contains a paraphrase of several passages: 2 Chronicles 35-36, the entire book of Ezra, Nehemiah 7:38-8:12; and an additional story about Darius' bodyguards. Many Bible versions include this document in their binding under the title of 3 Esdras (viz. Latin Vulgate, Douay Bible, and the Great Bible). The Septuagint includes this document also, but it is incorporated under 1 Esdras and not separately as 3 Esdras.1 So that gives us 1, 2, and 3 Esdras, though not all material is always designated by the same name. Sound confusing? Well, it is.
Now, enter 4 Ezra. This document contains new and different material--more so than any mentioned above. But its total corpus is a compilation of three different textual traditions. The compilation as it stands today makes up 16 chapters. The textual tradition breaks down into the following three divisions: chapters 3-14 comprise the core of the work and two later units were added to serve as an introduction and conclusion/appendix. These two additions are chapters 1-2 and 15-16, respectively. The central chapters are a Jewish apocalypse of which the main character is the scribe (and visionary), Ezra.2 The later units are Christian additions. Because this work is a compilation of three textual traditions, some manuscripts distinguished each segment by assigning a different name to each segment. Hence, chapters 1-2 were referred to as 2 Esdras, chapters 3-14 as 4 Esdras, and chapters 15-16 as >i>5 Esdras. Now, to make what is already confusing even more so, those Bible versions that retained the nomenclature of Ezra and Nehemiah as names over their individual titles, likewise assigned the name 2 Esdras to what we are now calling 4 Ezra. So now we have 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 Esdras - but not all of these designations refer to the same source. Fortunately, Metzger has sorted out some of this confusion in chart form, which is here reproduced for clarity sake (with slight modifications).3
As with many of the pseudepigrapha, 4 Ezra is extant only in translations, most of which are Latin. There is internal evidence to suggest that these Latin translations are themselves a translation from an underlying Greek text. This is especially evident in the quotations from some of the church fathers which, as Metzger says, "presupposes a knowledge of a Greek version of the book."4 The language of original composition, however, is very likely Semitic, probably Hebrew or Aramaic. This is born out by observing various Hebraisms, such as infinitive absolute constructions, initial vav conjunctions at the beginning of a sentence, and parataxis. Myers supplies a full page-and-a-half to demonstrate such linguistic clues.5
Notes
1Bruce M. Metzger, "The Fourth Book of Ezra," in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Apocalyptic Literature & Testaments. Vol. 1, ed. James H. Charlesworth (New York: Doubleday, 1983): 516-17.
2J. E. Wright, "Esdras, Books of," in Dictionary of New Testament Backgrounds, eds. Craig A. Evans and Stanley Porter (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000): 337.
3Metzger, 516.
4Ibid., 520.
5Jacob M. Myers, I and II Esdras, The Anchor Bible (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1974): 115-16.
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