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Queen Alexandra-Complete-Revised Queen Alexandra: The Anomaly of a Sovereign Jewish Queen in the Second Temple Period Thesis submitted for the degree of “Doctor of Philosophy” by Etka Liebowitz Submitted to the Senate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem November 2011 This work was carried out under the supervision of: Professor Daniel R. Schwartz Acknowledgements This dissertation commenced almost a decade ago with a conversation I had with the late Professor Hanan Eshel, of blessed memory. His untimely passing was a great loss to all. It continued at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where I was privileged to study with the leading scholars in the field of Jewish History. First and foremost, I wish to thank my supervisor, Professor Daniel Schwartz, for the generous amount of time and effort he invested in seeing this dissertation to fruition. I learned much from his constructive suggestions and valuable insights, from our meetings, and from his outstanding classes on Josephus at the Hebrew University. I would also like to express my deep gratitude to the other members of my supervisory committee for their guidance, encouragement and useful critiques: Professor Lee Levine, who initially served as my supervisor until his retirement, and Professor Tal Ilan, whose pioneering feminist studies on the topic of Queen Alexandra led the way for my research. Professor Ilan devoted much time to this project, and has become a valued colleague, mentor and friend. My grateful thanks are also extended to Rivkah Fishman-Duker and Dr. Shaul Bauman for their comments, suggestions and invaluable assistance with various chapters. Finally, I wish to express my gratitude to my beloved family for their understanding, encouragement and support throughout my studies – my husband, Moshe, my children Shlomo, Tzipi and Naomi, and my mother, Rifka, who was an independent (and anomalous) woman many years before the feminist movement. This work is dedicated to my daughters – may they grow up to be independent and knowledgeable women who are genuinely admired and loved. I give thanks to God for allowing me to reach this milestone: הודוּ לה ' כִּ י טוב . כִּ י לְ עולָם חַסְ דּו Abstract Introduction The nine-year reign (76-67 BCE) of Queen Alexandra (or Shelomzion HaMalkah as she is popularly known) represents a turning point in Jewish history. It marks the final stage of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel – following her death the Hasmonean kingdom started to disintegrate due to a war of succession between her sons and Judaea was conquered by the Roman Empire. Moreover, it signals the beginning of a division between political and religious power in Israel, an issue with which the modern State of Israel again struggles today. It also represents a unique event both in Jewish history and antiquity in general: notwithstanding the fact that they had two adult sons, Alexander Jannaeus bequeathed the throne to his wife Alexandra. Despite the rarity of a woman holding absolute power in antiquity, numerous basic questions concerning her identity, political actions, and presentation in various historical sources have not yet been addressed. This dissertation aspires to provide answers to these issues by analyzing the descriptions of Queen Alexandra in primary sources and examining the development of her image from the Second Temple Period until the modern period. Such an investigation will also reflect the changing attitude towards women and political power throughout the centuries. Biographical Outline Biographical data concerning Alexandra are based on Josephus’ Antiquities and War , the primary sources for most of our knowledge. Born circa 140 BCE, Alexandra experienced a period that encompassed revolutionary events, both in her internal (Jewish) and external (Hellenistic) surroundings. She lived during the epoch of the first independent Jewish (Hasmonean) state in the Second Temple Period, which most probably influenced her political actions later on when she became queen. She was a contemporary of the Seleucid Queen Cleopatra (Selene) of Syria (ca. 130 BCE - 69 BCE), a strong and powerful queen, which undoubtedly influenced her acceptance by Hasmonean society as well as her own conviction that she too could also rule as a queen i i Alexandra probably married Alexander Jannaeus around 111 BCE, a year before the birth of her eldest son, Hyrcanus II. Subsequently, probably not later than 100 BCE, she gave birth to her younger son, Aristobulus II. She was thirty-seven years old when her husband, Alexander Jannaeus, ascended the throne in 103 BCE. At the age of sixty-four, Alexandra inherited the throne following Alexander Jannaeus’s death and ruled for nine years, passing away at the age of seventy-three. Research Questions and Hypothesis This study addresses the following questions: 1. What explains the contradictory descriptions of Queen Alexandra in Josephus’ writings? 2. Why did Alexander Jannaeus bequeath the kingdom to Alexandra and not to one of his sons as was the accepted practice in most ancient societies? 3. What factors influenced the patriarchal Hasmonean Jewish society to accept Alexandra as an independent queen? How did the different segments of Jewish society in the Second Temple period view her role as a queen? 4. How has Queen Alexandra’s image changed over the centuries, from its inception in the Second Temple Period up until the early modern period? This dissertation argues that Alexander Jannaeus bequeathed the throne to his wife since he believed that she would rule the kingdom better than either of their sons. He realized that Alexandra would be an astute queen, and that her piety and willingness to delegate authority would unite the nation behind her. The fact that Ptolemaic queens often inherited the throne may have influenced Alexander’s decision to some degree. Likewise, apocryphal literature shows the readiness of Hasmonean society to accept a pious woman leader such as Queen Alexandra. Still, the decisive factor was Alexandra’s capability to be a strong and wise ruler, and this hypothesis is supported by Josephus. This work will also demonstrate that the status of women in Byzantine society, in particular the presence of female rulers, affected the outlook of historical accounts of Queen Alexandra’s reign. And, of all the primary sources, rabbinic literature has played the decisive role in a positive portrayal of Queen Alexandra up until the present time. ii ii The methodology of this study includes an analysis of the language and content of primary sources: Josephus’ writings, Qumran documents and rabbinic literature. Inasmuch as these primary source materials provide only a limited amount of information, an interdisciplinary approach is also applied. This entails a comparison of other ancient literary works dealing with female sovereigns as well as of Jewish- Hellenistic literary works in the apocryphal literature that portray female leaders. A feminist perspective that focuses upon women and their role in society due to the marginalization of women in history as written by men will provide the framework for this study. A focus upon Queen Alexandra’s reign is important not only in its (or her) own right but also for the implications it may have for Hasmonean society and its attitude towards women. Chapter 1: Scholarly Research to Date Modern scholarly studies on Queen Alexandra commenced with Johann Müller’s thirty-nine page Latin monograph, published in 1711 and continued in the nineteenth centuries with studies by German-Christian scholars such as Heinrich Ewald (1851), Ferdinand Hitzig (1869), Julius Wellhausen (1874), and Emil Schürer (1891). Prominent Jewish scholars of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, such as Joseph Derenbourg, Heinrich Graetz, Simon Dubnov, and Joseph Klausner, based their studies on both Josephus’ writings and rabbinic literature. Disagreements among scholars over an evaluation of Alexandra’s reign are usually due to their acceptance or rejection of rabbinic literature’s favorable description, or to the contradictions within and among Josephus’ writings. The development of women ’s/gender studies in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries stimulated a growing interest regarding women in antiquity in general, and Queen Alexandra in particular. From 1989 onwards, Queen Alexandra has been the focus of about ten scholarly articles, mostly dealing with specific issues related to her reign. She features in several books dealing with the Hasmonean period and women in antiquity, has served as the inspiration for two M.A. theses and one Ph.D. dissertation on the Book of Judith , and plays a leading role in Tal Ilan’s recent book, Silencing the Queen (2006), on women in rabbinic sources. Still, to date, no in-depth comprehensive historical iii analysis following the development of Queen Alexandra’s image from its inception in ancient sources up until the early modern period has been written. This dissertation endeavors to fulfill such a desideratum. Chapter 2: Translation and Discussion of Josephus’ Descriptions of Alexandra in War and Antiquities Josephus’ descriptions of Queen Alexandra in Jewish War and Jewish Antiquities are the main primary source of information on her life. Yet it is difficult to obtain a clear picture inasmuch as these accounts contain numerous variations and inconsistencies. War emphasizes the queen’s piety while Antiquities highlights her strategic moves and adds new episodes to the narrative , including a scathing summation of her rule at the end of book 13. Scholars view War as presenting a more positive appraisal of Queen Alexandra and Antiquities a more negative one. Various explanations have been proposed for these divergent descriptions, in particular, the influence of Josephus’ sources. Based upon a new original translation alongside a philological and source-critical analysis, I propose the following hypotheses: 1) War does not provide a totally favorable portrait of Queen Alexandra; 2) Antiquities , for the most part, does not condemn her; 3) and although the most derogatory statements about Queen Alexandra in Antiquities originated in Josephus’ source, their very inclusion in the narrative indicates some expression of Josephus’ own opinion.
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