Rejection and Redemption in the Wisdom of Solomon and the Letter of Barnabas

Wisdom and Barnabas represent somewhat contemporaneous Alexandrian works that deal with the sensitive Heilsgeschichte of Israel and the gentiles. Both use either Israel or the foreigners as foils to make points regarding a certain people’s general rejection or redemption. At times the works highlight their points by using hyperbole but obscure their purposes by using ambiguous terms. In contrast to Barnabas, Wisdom omits details with respect to the exact criteria expected for foreigners accepting Israel’s God. Finally, whereas Wisdom ultimately gives way to Jewish ethnocentrism, Barnabas eventually endorses an ecclesial particularism that may or may not exclude the Jews. Wisdom and Barnabas likely reflect respective social-historical settings, such as gentile persecution of the Jews, on the one hand, and gentile infatuation with Jewish law, on the other.