What Is the Prayer of Manasseh?

The Prayer of Manasseh survives in Syriac and Greek and dates to sometime between the second century BCE and the early first century CE, before the year 70. Whether the original language was Greek or Hebrew/Aramaic remains uncertain. The text of the prayer is not accompanied by a contextualizing narrative, but it shares some vocabulary with 2 Chronicles 33, which describes the punishment of the Judean king Manasseh for his idolatry: “In his distress, he entreated the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers. He prayed to Him, and He granted his prayer, heard his plea, and returned him to Jerusalem, to his kingdom” (2 Chronicles 33:12–13, NJPS). However, it does not supply the prayer. (The Chronicles narrative itself is a pietistic reworking of 2 Kings 20, where Manasseh shows no contrition.) The language of the prayer is heavily penitential, emphasizing the petitioner’s guilt, unworthiness, and repentance and God’s mercy to repentant sinners.