Source layer behind the Book of Jashar poetic citations

This article describes an entity that is not directly attested as an extant recoverable work; it is inferred from source-citation traces and should not be read as ordinary documentation of a surviving text.

Epistemic status

Draft article. The Book of Jashar is named in biblical source formulae, but the recoverable source layer remains inferred and non-extant.

Summary

Joshua 10:13 and 2 Samuel 1:18 both point to the Book of Jashar. Inferpedia treats the missing object here as the source layer behind those poetic citations rather than as a reconstructed book.

What is being inferred

The inferred entity is a poetic, archival, or source-memory layer behind the Jashar references. The current evidence does not establish its extent, date, genre, or internal contents.

What is attested

Two primary biblical loci preserve the title or source label. That gives stronger warrant than a single isolated reference.

Why infer this entity

Repeated named-source formulae are meaningful traces of textual dependence or source memory. They justify a draft article while requiring conservative specificity.

Evidence ledger

• E1, Joshua 10:13: primary trace for a Book of Jashar citation.
• E2, 2 Samuel 1:18: second primary trace for the same named source label.

Counterarguments

The phrase could be a conventional citation label, a later editorial signal, or a source-memory label rather than one stable book-like work.

Confidence scores

Direct attestation: 58. Existence warrant: 78. Specificity: 58. Reconstruction dependence: 80. Counterevidence: 16.

What would change the score

A philological study of the Jashar formula, manuscript variants, or a convincing explanation that the two citations are not independent traces would change the warrant.