The Library
1774 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.
1000–901 BC
1 work
c. 1200–900 BC; date heavily disputed
Avestan
Zarathustra
Seventeen hymns in the prophet's own voice, addressed to a single wise lord who created light and darkness and set two primal spirits at the beginning, one choosing truth and one the lie — and every person after them choosing too. At the end comes a judgement by fire and molten metal, and a world made fresh.
100–1 BC
2 works
c. 100 BC
Hebrew
1QS
Anonymous
The constitution of the yahad: how a candidate is examined over two years, how property is merged, how the seating is ordered, and the penalties — a hundred days for slandering a companion, thirty for falling asleep in session, expulsion for pronouncing the Name. At its centre stand two spirits, of truth and of falsehood, set in every heart until the appointed end.
c. 75–50 BC
Hebrew
1QM
Anonymous
A forty-year campaign of the sons of light against the sons of darkness, laid out like a manual: the wording on each trumpet and banner, the dimensions of the shields, the ages of the cavalry, and the priests who must not enter the killing so as not to be defiled — with the outcome decided seven times, three to each side and the last by God's own hand.
901–1000
1 work
c. 970–990
Old Church Slavonic
Cosmas the Priest · 10th century
An attack on a Bulgarian movement that rejected the material world, the cross, the sacraments, and the wealthy clergy — while conceding that the clergy deserved much of the criticism.
1201–1300
1 work
c. 1240–1250
Latin
Liber de Duobus Principiis
Anonymous
A scholastic defence of two eternal principles, good and evil, arguing that a wholly good God cannot be the origin of a world containing so much wrong.
5 of 1774 works