Since Martin Buber in Two Types of Faith acknowledged Jesus as his "great brother," other Jewish writers have sought to ascertain a place for Jesus within the larger context of Jewish history. In the aftermath of the Shoah, specifically in the afflicted consciousness of humanity, Jew and Christian alike began to ask how this tragedy could have happened, especially among and against people of faith. In an effort to assure that such a tragedy never happens again, the focus of some fell upon Jesus, previously the obstacle to reconciliation, but now perceived as the obvious and most viable...

This commentary is opened by a study offering information about all aspects of the Gospel of Thomas, especially about its relation to other texts of early Christian literature, including the canonical Gospels. The successive commentary is based upon the Coptic version and discusses also all fragments of the original Greek text. The volume is divided into two parts: The first discusses the function of each logion (saying) within the frame of piety and theology of the Thomasine group, for which the Gospel is composed; The second part discusses its literary shape and its history, including...

2 Baruch is a Jewish pseudepigraphon from the late first or early second century CE. It is comprised of an apocalypse (2 Baruch 1-77) and an epistle (2 Baruch 78-87). This ancient work addresses the important matter of theodicy in light of the destruction of the temple by the Romans in 70 CE. It depicts vivid and puzzling pictures of apocalyptic images in explaining the nature of the tragedy and exhorting its ancient community of readers.

Gurtner provides the first publication of the Syriac of both the apocalypse and epistle with a fresh English translation on the opposite page....