Publisher's Synopsis
From the INTRODUCTION.
In the fourth book of Ezra (the second of Esdras in our Apocrypha) the transition from the thirty-fifth to the thirty- sixth verse of the seventh chapter must strike even a superficial reader as singularly abrupt. That this want of coherence was felt by the earliest of modern commentators on the book, is proved by his elaborate attempt to supply a train of thought in order to bring the two verses into connexion. It was not however till the beginning of the eighteenth century that appeal was made to another representative of the lost original. Then appeared Ockley's translation of the Arabic version, where between the verses in question a long passage intervenes, which carries on the thread of the narrative in an artless and appropriate manner. In the present century the text of the Arabic has been printed, the long neglected Armenian translated, and the apparatus criticus of the book greatly increased by the publication of the text and translation of the following versions: the Aethiopic, the shorter Arabic (Arab.), and, last but not least, the Syriac, and in all of them the hiatus is, found to be filled up in essentially the same way. As these versions seem generally to be of independent origin, and some are of considerable antiquity, their agreement on this point raises a strong presumption that the additional matter formed part of the Greek text from which they were derived. Not only so, but there is decisive evidence that the Latin version also once contained the passage which is now absent; for Ambrose, in his treatise De Bono Mortis, drew largely for illustration froin this version, and especially from the missing portion. The Benedictine editors of his works were perplexed at references which they could not verify, and suggested that a solution might be found in the examination of fresh MSS. They casually refer to two, one of which belonged to their own library (at St. Germain des Pres); this was in all probability the 'MS. Sangermanensis' (Cod. S.), which a distinguished member of this order (Pet. Sabatier) upwards of sixty years later made use of for his great work, especially in the fourth book of Ezra. In late years it has been collated in a few passages by Dr. Hase for Volckmar's Esdra Propheta, and very fully by Dr. Zotenberg for Hilgenfeld's Messias Jud orum, and it is now regarded by the common consent of scholars as the oldest and best authority for the Latin text of our book. It is in the second volume of the Latin Bible now numbered MS. 11504, 11505, fonds Latin, Bibl. Nat., Paris. Sabatier described it as nine hundred years old at the time when he wrote (1751), and editors invariably speak of it in general terms as a MS. of the ninth century, but the precise date at which it was written is recorded in the MS. itself, viz. the eighth year of Louis le Debonnaire (=A.D. 822). Great as is the critical value of this MS., a still higher interest attaches to it in the history of the transmission of our book of Ezra, for the researches of Prof Gildemeister lead to the conclusion that it once contained the lost verses, and that it is the parent of all later MSS."
