ABSTRACT
The Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch (hereafter 2 Baruch), from which the prayer below is taken, comes down to us in a sixth-century Syriac manuscript, presumably translated from the Greek. 1 Opinion is divided concerning whether the original language is Greek or Semitic. 2 Most agree that 2 Baruch was written in the late first century or the early second century ce 3 as a response to the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 ce and the theological challenge that this catastrophe posed to the poet's community. The anonymous poet casts himself as Baruch the scribe of Jeremiah, and the apocalypse itself is set fictionally in the period following the destruction of Jerusalem in 587/6 bce.
