The Structure and Meaning of Second Baruch (SBL Dissertation Series 78)

In this work, author Murphy combines aspects of Gwendolyn Sayler's and Wolfgang Harnisch's work. Like Sayler, Murphy believes that a general grasp of the structure of Second Baruch is necessary to order all of its diverse elements in a way which is consistent with the intentions of the author. Like Harnisch, he feels that detailed exegesis of key passages is required in order to determine how the author worked with pre-existent material and how he adapted various ideas to his own purposes. In this book's final chapter, Murphy makes some suggestions about the historical situation to which this analysis points.