A critical presentation of Jewish history, institutions, and literature from 175 B.C. to A.D 135.

Emil Schürer's Geschichte des judischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi, originally published in German between 1874 and 1909 and in English between 1885 and 1891, is a critical presentation of Jewish history, institutions, and literature from 175 B.C. to A.D. 135. It has rendered invaluable services to scholars for nearly a century. The present work offers a fresh translation and a revision of the entire subject-matter. The bibliographies have been rejuvenated and supplemented; the sources are presented according to the latest scholarly editions; and all the new archaeological, epigraphical, numismatic and literary evidence, including the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bar Kokhba documents, has been introduced into the survey. Account has also been taken of the progress in historical research, both in the classical and Jewish fields. This work reminds students of the profound debt owed to nineteenth-century learning, setting it within a wider framework of contemporary knowledge, and provides a foundation on which future historians of Judaism in the age of Jesus may build.

"Without any doubt . . . a major work of scholarship . . ." - Journal of Jewish Studies

"The obsolete has been excised fomr text, notes, and bibliographies, which have all been revised. And of course a quantity of wholly new material, unknown to Schürer, has had to be incorporated, such as archaeological finds, the Qumran and Bar Kokhba documents and the Babylonian tablets which have recently been throwing light on obscure areas of Seleucid (and Parthian) chronology...All that was best in the original has been preserved: notably its depth of learning, laudable succinctness, and remarkable clarity of organization." - The Classical Review

"The appearance of Vol. I of the new Schürer is of such significance that it is not exceeded in importance by any recent publicati9on and approached by very few. Schürer is the handbook par excellence for scholars, who are now in greatest debt to the editors for a labor of devotion and an achievement of sheer excellence...It is impossible to overpraise this volume." - The Classical World

"The editors have rendered a magnificent service to scholarship by this excellent translation and updating of Schürer's classic." - The Catholic Biblical Quarterly

"With the completion of this project, the world of scholarship will possess an indispensable tool for the study of this period, which is the heyday of Judaism." - The Jerusalem Post

"This is one of the few indispensable books." - Journal of Theological Studies

"...it is the opinion of this reviewer that the new Schürer will be an indispensable resource for future historical work on this period..." - Religious Studies Review