Old Testament Legends being stories out of some of the less-known apochryphal books of the old testament (Kindle) by M.R. James





Sometimes interesting, mostly tedious

Originally Published in 1913  

M.R. James has collected additional stories from the Old Testament era. None of these is included in the canon books. These are not stories from the Apocrypha but even more stories. In times past, some churches actually treated some of these stories as scripture.

According to M.R. James, some of these are quite ancient and some are newer. The stories are arranged chronologically and feature Adam, Eve, Cain, Abraham, Job, Joseph ,Jeremiah and Solomon. A new, non-Biblical character is Ahiker, advisor to the King of the Chaldeans.

The stories about Adam and Eve mostly concern how they deal with being sent from the Garden of Eden. The story of Job is a re-telling of his book in the Bible, but it is more satisfying than the original.

M.R. James (1862-1936)
The story of Solomon is very bizarre. Solomon uses a ring to control demons in order to build the Temple. Abraham gets a lot of attention in these stories and we get to read stories about him as a young man and as an old man. There is a long story about Joseph (the interpreter of dreams) and a young woman that conspires to marry him.

The problem with these stories is the writing. They were written in a style that mimics the King James version, which was the par for the course for Biblical translation when M.R. James wrote this book. But, it's just makes some of these stories even more difficult to enjoy reading.

 There is one more issue with this Kindle version. Many times the capital "C" is actually replaced with a capital "G". So we have Gain and Abel and the Gaananites. It's no big deal, especially since I paid nothing for this version, but just be aware of it if you choose to read these stories.

 I rate this book 2 stars out of 5.

 This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Old Testament Legends.

 Reviewed May 29, 2009

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