The three general editors of the Cambridge Bible Commentary series have all, in their teaching, experienced a lack of readily usable texts of the literature which is often called psuedepigrapha but which is more accurately defined as extra-biblical or parabiblical literature. The aim of this series is to help fill this gap. The welcome accorded to the Cambridge Bible Commentary has encouraged the editors to follow the same pattern here, except that carefully chosen extracts from the texts, rather than complete books, have normally been provided for comment. The introductory material leads naturally into the text which itself leads into alternating sections of commentary. Within the severe limits imposed by the size and scope of the series each contributor will attempt to provide for the student and general reader the results of modern scholarship, but has been asked to assume no specialized theological or linguistic knowledge.