The most curious efforts to propagate Judaism were, however, those which were clothed in a Sibylline disguise.  In heathen antiquity, the Sibyl was an inspired prophetess whose mysterious oracles concerned the destinies of cities and nations.  These oracles enjoyed high esteem among the cultivated Greeks, and, in the second century B.C.E., some Alexandrian Jews made use of them to recommend Judaism to the heathen world.  In the Jewish Sibylline books the religion of Israel is presented as a hope and a threat; a menace to those who refuse to follow the better life, a promise of salvation to those who repent.  About the year 80 C.E., a book of this kind was composed.  It is what is known as the Fourth Book of the Sibylline Oracles.  The language is Greek, the form hexameter verse.  In this poem, the Sibyl, in the guise of a prophetess, tells of the doom of those who resist the will of the one true God, praises the God of Israel, and holds out a beautiful prospect to the faithful.

The book opens with an invocation: 

    Hear, people of proud Asia, Europe, too,
    How many things by great, loud-sounding mouth,
    All true and of my own, I prophesy. 
    No oracle of false Apollo this,
    Whom vain men call a god, tho’ he deceived;
    But of the mighty God, whom human hands
    Shaped not like speechless idols cut in stone.

The Sibyl speaks of the true God, to love whom brings blessing.  The ungodly triumph for a while, as Assyria, Media, Phrygia, Greece, and Egypt had triumphed.  Jerusalem will fall, and the Temple perish in flames, but retribution will follow, the earth will be desolated by the divine wrath, the race of men and cities and rivers will be reduced to smoky dust, unless moral amendment comes betimes.  Then the Sibyl’s note changes into a prophecy of Messianic judgment and bliss, and she ends with a comforting message: 

    But when all things become an ashy pile,
    God will put out the fire unspeakable
    Which he once kindled, and the bones and ashes
    Of men will God himself again transform,
    And raise up mortals as they were before. 
    And then will be the judgment, God himself
    Will sit as judge, and judge the world again. 
    As many as committed impious sins
    Shall Stygian Gehenna’s depths conceal
    ’Neath molten earth and dismal Tartarus.

    But the pious shall again live on the earth,
    And God will give them spirit, life, and means
    Of nourishment, and all shall see themselves,
    Beholding the sun’s sweet and cheerful light. 
    O happiest men who at that time shall live!