I read the Deuterocanonicals. They inspire me, which is,
admittedly, a totally
silly reason for accepting them, but I like them. (So shoot me).
In any discussion of the coolness of the deuterocanonicals, I have to bring up Wisdom 2:12-20, which is the clearest and most amazing Messianic prophecy I’ve ever read:
12 "Let us lie in wait for the righteous man, because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions; he reproaches us for sins against the law, and accuses us of sins against our training. 13 He professes to have knowledge of God, and calls himself a child of the Lord.
14 He became to us a reproof of our thoughts; 15 the very sight of him is a burden to us, because his manner of life is unlike that of others, and his ways are strange. 16 We are considered by him as something base, and he avoids our ways as unclean; he calls the last end of the righteous happy, and boasts that God is his father. 17 Let us see if his words are true, and let us test what will happen at the end of his life; 18 for if the righteous man is God’s son, he will help him, and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries. 19 Let us test him with insult and torture, that we may find out how gentle he is, and make trial of his forbearance. 20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death, for, according to what he says, he will be protected.”
And 5:1-13 offers a great image of the Second Coming:
1 Then the righteous man will stand with great confidence in the presence of those who have afflicted him, and those who make light of his labors. 2 When they see him, they will be shaken with dreadful fear, and they will be amazed at his unexpected salvation. 3 They will speak to one another in repentance, and in anguish of spirit they will groan, and say, 4 “This is the man whom we once held in derision and made a byword of reproach—we fools! We thought that his life was madness and that his end was without honor. 5 Why has he been numbered among the sons of God? And why is his lot among the saints? 6 So it was we who strayed from the way of truth, and the light of righteousness did not shine on us, and the sun did not rise upon us. 7 We took our fill of the paths of lawlessness and destruction, and we journeyed through trackless deserts, but the way of the Lord we have not known. 8 What has our arrogance profited us? And what good has our boasted wealth brought us? 9 All those things have vanished like a shadow, and like a rumor that passes by; 10 like a ship that sails through the billowy water, and when it has passed no trace can be found, nor track of its keel in the waves; 11 or as, when a bird flies through the air, no evidence of its passage is found; the light air, lashed by the beat of its pinions and pierced by the force of its rushing flight, is traversed by the movement of its wings, and afterward no sign of its coming is found there; 12 or as, when an arrow is shot at a target, the air, thus divided, comes together at once, so that no one knows its pathway. 13 So we also, as soon as we were born, ceased to be, and we had no sign of virtue to show, but were consumed in our wickedness."
. Fast.