Tradition Kept: The Literature of the Samaritans.

Tradition Kept: The Literature of the Samaritans. By Robert T. Anderson and Terry Giles. (Hendrickson, $34.95). This book introduces and prints significant extracts from the major documents of the Samaritan sect. Part One discusses the Samaritan Pentateuch (expanded like some of the Qumran documents, but with additional sectarian readings favoring Gerizim over Jerusalem, avoiding anthropomorphisms when speaking of the deity, and enhancing the status of Moses), the Samaritan Joshua (that begins with the time of Moses and takes the history down to the Roman occupation), and the Annals and chronicles (that continue the story where the Samaritan Joshua left off and continue the Samaritan story to modern times). Part Two treats Samaritan literature dealing with theology and worship. Tibat Marqe, for example, was written in the third or fourth century C.E. and draws on the Pentateuch, the New Testament, and certain Jewish and Muslim documents. RWK