Book Of Heb. Sepher Hayashar (Jasher), a work cited in Joshua x. 13 and 2 Sam. i. 18, but no longer extant. Its contents are known to us only by two short extracts, both in poetic form. The quotation in Josh. x. 13 is a poetic apostrophe to the sun and moon, bidding them stand still in the heavens till the discomfiture of the enemy should be complete. In 2 Sam. i. 19-27 is another quotation, the beautiful elegy of. David on Saul and his son. The 18th verse should be rendered, " also he bade them teach the children of Judah The Bow" (the elegy so named, in allusion to "the bow of Jonathan" in v. 22, a tender reminiscence of the poet's friend); " behold it is written in the book of Jasher." Hence it is very naturally conjectured by Gesenius that it was an anthology of ancient songs written in praise of just men (so esteemed for their patriotic zeal and devotion), and called "Book of the Just." Bishop Lowth had before inferred, from the poetical character of the citations, that it was a collection of national songs. This being all that is known of it, the field is open for the wildest conjectures and the most absurd legends and forgeries; and the following specimens will show that it has not been neglected.

Theodo-ret supposed the whole book of Joshua to be an extract from Jasher; Jerome that it was identical with the book of Genesis, an opinion also expressed, among others, in the T.almud; others, that it included the whole Pentateuch, that it was a treatise on archery, and that it contained a series of biographies of just men, yashar meaning just. Dr. Donaldson sees in a portion of the Old Testament narratives a careless elaboration of materials taken from the dismembered book of Jasher, which he attempts to restore to their original order. (See Donaldson, Jashar, Fragmenta Archetypa Carminum He-hraicorum in Masorethico Veteris Testamenti Textu passim Tessellata (London, 1854; revised and enlarged, 1860). - A treatise on Jewish laws written by Rabbi Jacob Tam in the 13th century, and printed at Cracow in 1586, bears the title of " Book of Jasher." With this was afterward confounded a later treatise on ethics under the same title, of which there are several editions. Another mediaeval work in Hebrew bears the same title, and purports to have been discovered at the destruction of Jerusalem in possession of a concealed old man, brought thence to Spain, and preserved at Seville. It was first printed at Naples, afterward at Venice (1625), at Cracow (1628), and at Prague (1668). It contains the histories of the Pentateuch, Joshua, and Judges, intermixed with many legendary statements, taken from the Talmud, Midrash, Josipon, and other sources.

A German translation, with additions, was published at Frankfort in 1674; and an English translation, under the direction of Mordecai M. Noah, at New York in 1840. In 1751 Jacob Ilive, a Bristol type founder, published a forgery entitled " The Book of Jasher, with Testimonies and Notes Explanatory of the Text; to which is prefixed Various Readings; translated into English by Alcuin of Britain, who went a pilgrimage into the Holy Land." This clumsy fraud was revived at Bristol, 1827, and at London, 1833, edited by C. R. Bond. - An article on "The Book of Jasher" is among the "Literary Remains of the late Emanuel Deutsch" (New York, 1874).