Save the Lost Bible

For the last eight years, a team of 75 world-renowned scholars have been hard at work on the most important addition in decades to the canon of key Jewish texts-the Lost Bible Project and its ground-breaking new anthology, Outside the Bible: Ancient Jewish Writings Not Included in Scripture. The project is nearing completion, but we need your help to take it through its final steps: to print and electronic publication.

The vast and varied body of Jewish writings from the Second Temple period exceeds that of the Hebrew Bible itself. And in most respects it is of comparable importance, as it constitutes the intellectual, theological, and ideological mix from which Rabbinic Judaism, the foundation of modern Judaism, evolved. In this new anthology, editors James Kugel, Lawrence Schiffman, and Louis Feldman bring these important writings together for the first time in a Jewish context.

Key texts from the Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, and writings of Josephus, Philo, and others, with introductions and commentary written for scholars and general readers alike, provide new insights into the history, literature, and traditions of Judaism and early Christianity.

Outside the Bible, projected at 2,000 pages (1.5 million words) is the proud recipient of two National Endowment for the Humanities grants and private funding. To date, we have raised $225,000, but we need $150,000 more for its final, critical stage.

I know Jewish culture and continuity are very important to you. And that is why I'm asking you to make a gift in support of Outside the Bible. By helping to bring this momentous project to fruition, you are making an investment in the future of Jewish learning and education.