19th-century bibliographies of Hebrew?

[j...@sfbooks.com]

Hello y'all, it's been a long time, and I'm sorry I'm returning with an
arguably off-topic question. (Seems to me I'm asking about *the*
traditional Classic, but I'm pretty sure the charter doesn't admit
Hebrew...)

To unpack: In the mid-1990s, I wrote a bunch of entries for <The
Encyclopedia of Fantasy> ed John Clute and John Grant. One of these
was about "Jewish Religious Literature", another "Greek and Latin
Classics", and this meant I wound up discussing both biblical
Testaments in relation to fantasy. My discussions were
bibliographically careless, both in general and specifically with
respect to the bibliographic oddities of the encyclopaedia. I'm
now trying to compile corrections, partly because the encyclopaedia,
including my entries, is now online:

<http://sf-encyclopedia.co.uk/fe.php?nm=jewish_religious_literature>
<http://sf-encyclopedia.co.uk/fe.php?nm=greek_and_latin_classics>

Well, one of the bibliographic oddities is that titles should be stated
primarily as those given the first *separate* edition of a work. So
since I cited both "Kings" (in the context of the "Deuteronomistic
History") and "2 Kings" (talking about Elisha), I get to find the first
publication of the Hebrew text of 2 Kings by itself, and also the same
of Kings as a block (the way the Hebrew Bible actually has it). I'm
allowing myself, this time, to cheat by treating all things "meta" a
work (notably commentaries) to appear in an edition without thereby
disqualifying it as a "separate" edition.

Thanks to a recent computer crash, I don't currently have all my
references handy, but by using ?Offenberg's recent bibliography of
Hebrew incunabula, De Rossi's much older bibliography up to 1540, and
<Bibliotheca Sacra> as edited by Masch to get up to about 1780, I've
got a more or less continuous chain that far. After that things get
*much* spottier: Zender, for the British Museum to c 1850; Darlow
and Moule (in this regard *not* updated by Herbert); and I suppose
various other library catalogues, which I'm pretty sure I've so far
consulted none of.

For the books originally published in Hebrew, I'm still missing
Numbers, Deuteronomy, Kings, 2 Kings, Ezekiel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and
Chronicles. (And yes, Ezra and Nehemiah separately, or it would be
much easier.) I also lack continuous-chain coverage of 2 Maccabees,
Luke, and 1st Corinthians (cited because Paul actually comes right
out and says that to unbelievers, the Gospel story looks like fantasy),
but I'm not as worried about those because most of the major Greek and
Latin bibliographies cover them, starting from before <Bibliotheca
Sacra> gives out. (This particular question is one of the few
weaknesses I've found in Fabricius's <Bibliotheca Graeca>, though:
he discusses the Evangelists separately as writers, but only does an
edition list for the whole New Testament. I'm expecting Hoffmann and
Engelmann to solve Luke and 1st Corinthians.)

I know of Tauschnitz editions in the late 19th century of Kings,
Ezekiel, and Chronicles, and of Polychrome editions a bit later of
Numbers and possibly Deuteronomy. (I know of a *1950s* edition of
2nd Maccabees.)

Is there a 19th century bibliography that can bridge the gap and
either show these to *be* the first separate editions, or tell me
what beat them? I've downloaded <Bibliotheca Judaica> but at a
quick glance I don't see an entry for "Bibel" so am not sure where
to look. Meanwhile, this still leaves 2 Kings, Ezra, and Nehemiah
(not to mention Luke and 1st Corinthians) ...

I must be missing some gigantic piece, some perfectly elementary
and obvious bibliography for biblicists. Or more than one. What?

Thanks

Joe Bernstein

PS In case anyone who looks up the entries wants to argue about them,
um, that's fine, but I'm not actually going to defend my over-
confident claims about the sources of various books of the Hebrew
Scriptures. I still think J, in particular, is all kinds of
interesting in relation to fantasy, and that whatever produced the
portrait of David in the books of Samuel is somewhat less so, but
I no longer take for granted that J's reality is provable, or that
of the "Succession History" in 2 Samuel.

--
Joe Bernstein, tax preparer and writer j...@sfbooks.com