2 Baruch 11

Related ancient text — scholarly reference

Extra-canonical text — not LDS scripture and not in the KJV Apocrypha. Provided as scholarly reference for parallel literature of the Second Temple period and the early Christian era. Read with discernment; the Apostle Jude quotes 1 Enoch and Paul knew this material, but inclusion here is for study, not doctrine.

1Moreover, I, Baruch, say this against thee, Babylon: If thou hadst prospered, And Zion had dwelt in her glory, it would have been a great grief to us that thou shouldst be equal to Zion.

2But now, lo! the grief is infinite, and the lamentation measureless, for lo! thou art prospered and Zion desolate.

3Who will be judge regarding these things? or to whom shall we complain regarding that which has befallen us?

4O Lord, how hast Thou borne (it)? Our fathers went to rest without grief and lo! the righteous sleep in the earth in tranquillity;

5For they knew not this anguish, nor yet had they heard of that which had befallen us.

6Would that thou hadst ears, O earth, nd that thou hadst a heart, O dust, that ye might go and announce in Sheol, and say to the dead,

7"Blessed are ye more than we who are living."

Public-domain text (R.H. Charles 1913 and equivalents). These works are not canonical, but several were widely read in antiquity and one (1 Enoch) is quoted by name in Jude 1:14–15. Useful for understanding the doctrinal landscape from which the apostles and earliest saints taught.