- the name Jesus nowhere appears in the Odes of Solomon
- the Odes refer to one or several figures who are "the beloved," "the son," "the son of God," "the son of the Most High," "the light," "the logos," "the Lord," "the savior," and indeed, "the messiah/christos/anointed."
There is an awkward uncertainty in scholarship whether to classify these texts as OT apocrypha or as NT apocrypha. They were passed down from antiquity alongside the Psalms of Solomon, which are indisputably from the 1st BCE. Thus James Charlesworth published his translation of the Odes in Volume 2 of his collection of "Old Testament Pseudepigrapha." By contrast, Matthew Lattke, "the world's foremost authority" on the Odes, writes in his exhaustive commentary for the Hermeneia series,
Meanwhile Bart Ehrman, America's pre-eminent scholar of the New Testament and early Christianity, excludes them from his popular anthology of New Testament apocrypha (Lost Scriptures: Books that did not make it into the New Testament, Oxford, 2003)."In the index of early Christian literary history, the Odes of Solomon, in the widest sense, should be entered among the New Testament rather than the Old Testament apocrypha and pseudepigrapha." (Odes of Solomon: a Commentary, tr. Marianne Ehrhardt, Fortress Press, 2009), p. 12.
Dating the Odes precisely is probably impossible. Lattke gives a firm terminus ante quem of late 2nd century. This is based on the appearance of Ode 11 in the Greek papyrus P. Bodmer XI, as well as "early testimonies and citations." No specific evidence exists, however, for a terminus post quem. Everything comes down to assumptions about what historical context makes best sense, all things considered. Some of the language is typical of Hellenistic Judaism, and some of it is gnostic or "tinged with" gnostic themes (Lattke). Ultimately there is only one elephant in this room: the reference, or lack thereof, to Jesus of Nazareth, savior and Christ. On this matter it is necessary to read the Odes oneself, and not to rely on scholarly assurances about historical origins and references.
The Odes contain 7 occurences of the term christos/messiah/anointed one. That is, occurences of the Syriac emphatic passive participle msah or msiha: 9:3, 17:16, 24:1, 29:6, 39:11, 41:3, and 41:15. Ode 36 contains a non-substantive use of the verb. Below I have typed out in full these "Christ Odes" from the Lattke/Ehrhardt translation. (Lattke maintains that Greek, not Syriac, is the original language of the Odist(s), and so I have used the Greek transliteration of key terms such as christos, gnosis, and pleroma.)
There is much more to be said about the Odes of Solomon regarding their possible significance in the study of Christian origins. (Rakovsky recently started a thread about them with a different focus.)
Open your ears and I shall speak to you.
Give me your soul, that I may also give you my soul.
The word of the Lord and the intentions of his will
are the holy thought which he thought about his Christos.
For in the will of the Lord is your life,
and his mind is eternal life,
and imperishable is your pleroma.
Be rich in God the Father
and receive the mind of the Most High.
Be strong and be redeemed by his grace.
For I proclaim peace to you, his holy ones,
so that all of those who hear should not fall in the war,
and those, also, who knew him may not perish,
and that those who will receive will not be ashamed.
The eternal crown is truth —
blessed are those who put it on their head —
a stone of great price,
for there were wars on account of the crown.
And righteousness took it and gave it to you,
put on the crown in the true covenant of the Lord.
And all those who were victorious will be written in his book,
for their recording in the book is your victory.
And Victory sees you before her
and wills that you are to be saved.
Hallelujah.
Ode 17
I was crowned by my God, and he is my living wreath.
And I was justified by my Lord, and my salvation is imperishable.
I was released from vanities and am not a man condemned.
My bonds were severed by …
I received the face and figure of a new person.
And I walked in it and was saved.
And the thought of truth led me
and I followed it and did not go astray.
And all who saw me were amazed,
and I seemed to them like a stranger.
And he who knew made me great,
the Most High in his complete pleroma.
And he glorified me by his benevolence
and lifted up my gnosis to the height of truth.
And thence he gave me the way of his steps.
And I opened the gates that were shut,
and broke the bars of iron.
My own iron glowed and melted before me.
And nothing seemed shut to me,
because I was the opening of everything.
And I went to all my shut-in ones to set them free,
lest I leave any who is bound or who binds.
And I gave my gnosis without jealousy
and my consolation through my love.
And I sowed my fruits in hearts
and transformed them in me.
And they received my blessing and lived,
and were gathered to me and were saved,
because they were my members
and I their head.
Glory to thee, our head, Lord Christos.
Hallelujah.
Ode 24
The dove flew onto the head of our Lord Christos, because he was her head.
And she cooed over him, and her voice was heard.
And the inhabitants were afraid, and the sojourners were disturbed.
The birds gave up their wing, and all creeping things died in their hole.
And the primal deeps were opened and covered.
And they sought the Lord like those who are about to give birth,
but he was not given to them for food, because he was not their own.
But the primal deeps were submerged in the submersion of the Lord,
and perished in that thought in which they had been from before.
For they were destructive from the beginning,
and the goal of their destruction was life.
And all that was lacking perished through them,
because they could not give the word, that they might abide.
And the Lord destroyed the thoughts of all those with whom the truth was not.
For they lacked wisdom, those who were arrogant in their heart.
And they were rejected, because the truth was not with them.
For the Lord showed his way, and spread out his grace.
And those who knew it know his holiness.
Hallelujah.
Ode 29
The Lord is my hope; I shall not be ashamed in him.
For according to his glory he made me,
and according to his grace he also gave to me,
and according to his mercy he raised me up,
and according to his majesty he exalted me.
And he caused me to ascend from the depths of Sheol,
and from the mouth of death he drew me.
And I humbled my enemies, and he justified me by his grace.
For I believed in the Christos of the Lord,
and I saw that he is the Lord.
And he showed me his sign, and led me by his light
and gave me the rod of his power,
that I might subdue the thoughts of the peoples;
and humble the tyranny of the mighty,
and make war by his word,
and take the victory by his power.
And the Lord cast down my enemy by his power,
and he became like chaff that the wind carries away.
And I gave praise to the Most High,
because he made great his servant
and the son of his handmaid.
Hallelujah.
Ode 39
Raging rivers, the power of the Lord,
that turn head downward those who despise him,
and entangle their steps
and destroy their fords,
and seize their bodies
and ruin their souls,
for they are more sudden than lightnings
and faster.
But those who cross them in faith will not be disturbed,
and those who walk in them without blemish will not be perturbed.
For the Lord is a sign on the rivers,
and the sign is the way of those who cross in the name of the Lord.
Put on, therefore, the name of the Most High and know him;
then you shall cross without danger while the rivers will be obedient to you.
The Lord bridged them by his Logos,
and the Logos went and crossed them on foot.
And his footprints remained on the waters and were not destroyed,
but they were like wood that is truly fixed.
And on this side and on that the waves rose up,
but the footprints of our Christos Lord stand firm
and are not blotted out or destroyed.
And a way has been established for those who cross after him,
and for those who follow the walk of his faith and revere his name.
Hallelujah.
Ode 41
Let us praise the Lord, all his children,
and accept the truth of his faith.
And with him his children will be known;
therefore let us sing in his love!
We rejoice in the Lord by his grace,
and life we receive by his Christos.
For a great day has shone upon us,
and wonderful is he who gave of his praises.
So we will all league together on the name of the Lord,
and we will honor him in his goodness.
And may our faces shine in his light,
and our hearts meditate on his love by night and by day.
Let us exult out of the exultation over the Lord!
They will be amazed, all those who see me,
because I am of another race.
For the Father of truth remembered me,
he who possessed me from the beginning.
For his wealth begat me,
and the thought of his heart.
And his Logos is with us in all our way:
the savior who gives life and does not reject our souls,
the man who was humbled and exalted by his own righteousness.
The Son of the Most High
has appeared in the pleroma of his Father,
and the light dawned from that Logos
that was in him from the beginning.
The Christos in truth is one,
and he was known from the foundation of the world,
that he might give life to souls forever by the truth of his name.
A new hymn to the Lord from those who love him.
Hallelujah.
Ode 36
The spirit of the Lord rested upon me,
and she lifted me up to the height
and set me on my feet in the height of the Lord
before his pleroma and his glory.
While I gave praise by the composition of his odes,
she brought me forth before the face of the Lord.
And although I was a son of man,
I was called the shining one, the son of God,
while I was glorious among the glorious
and was great among the great.
For according to the greatness of the Most High,
so she made me,
and according to his renewal he renewed me.
And he anointed me from his perfection,
and I became one of those beside him.
And my mouth was opened like a cloud of dew,
and my heart gushed forth a flood of righteousness.
And my drawing near was in peace,
and I was established in the spirit of the plan of salvation.
Hallelujah.