Baruch and the Letter of Jeremiah

Baruch and the Letter of Jeremiah are among the so-called deuterocanonical books of the Bible, part of the larger Catholic biblical canon. Except for a short article in the Womens Bible Commentary, no detailed or comprehensive feminist commentary on these books is available so far. Marie-Theres Wacker reads both books with an approach that is sensitive to gender and identity issues. The book of Baruchwith its reflections on guilt of the fathers, with its transformation of wisdom into the Book of Gods commandments, and with its strong symbol of mother and queen Jerusalemoffers a new and creative digest of Torah, writings, and prophets but seems to address primarily learned men. The so-called Letter of Jeremiah is an impressive document that unmasks pseudo-deities but at the same draws sharp lines between the groups identity and the others, using women of the others as boundary markers.