I just finished up my review of Paul and Pseudepigraphy (PAST 8). This volume wasn’t quite what I expected. As the editors note, the book is not comprehensive, nor does it solve any issues conclusively. The first section deals with critical/methodological issues, the second deals with debated Pauline letters, and the third with non-canonical pseudepigraphy to focus on reception history rather than authenticity.
I was looking for a work that would give a lot of history of research and essays on where we are now and how to move forward. Instead, most of these essays reassess some of the same evidence that has been assessed hundreds of times over. That doesn’t make this an unhelpful volume, but it causes it to lack any sort of unified line of thought. It really is a variegated collection of essays from different perspectives on different topics.
In any case, I do recommend it, if for nothing else but the first contribution, which gives a translation of the most important primary sources relating to pseudepigraphy, along with an annotated bibliography. Having all the relevant passages collected together in one place is immensely helpful for understanding how the church, the Jews, and even Greco-Roman authors perceived pseudepigraphy.
For some of the most important essays on Pauline Style Shift, see my post here.
