ETHNICITY AND JEWISH IDENTITY IN JOSEPHUS By DAVID McCLISTER A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2008 1 © 2008 David McClister 2 To the memory of my father, Dorval L. McClister, who instilled in me a love of learning; to the memory of Dr. Phil Roberts, my esteemed colleague; and to my wife, Lisa, without whose support this dissertation, or much else that I do, would not have been possible. 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I gladly recognize my supervisory committee chair (Dr. Konstantinos Kapparis, Associate Professor in the Classics Department at the University of Florida). I also wish to thank the other supervisory commiteee members (Dr. Jennifer Rea, Dr. Gareth Schmeling, and Dr. Gwynn Kessler as a reader from the Religious Studies Department). It is an honor to have their contributions and to work under their guidance. I also wish to thank the library staff at the University of Florida and at Florida College (especially Ashley Barlar) who did their work so well and retrieved the research materials necessary for this project. I also wish to thank my family for their patient indulgence as I have robbed them of time to give attention to the work necessary to pursue my academic interests. BWGRKL [Greek] Postscript® Type 1 and TrueTypeT font Copyright © 1994-2006 BibleWorks, LLC. All rights reserved. These Biblical Greek and Hebrew fonts are used with permission and are from BibleWorks, software for Biblical exegesis and research. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...............................................................................................................4 ABSTRACT.....................................................................................................................................7 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................9 Josephus and His Writings........................................................................................................9 The Bellum Judaicum......................................................................................................13 The Antiquitates Judaicae ...............................................................................................19 The Vita and the Contra Apionem...................................................................................25 A Brief History of Research ...................................................................................................29 The Present Study and Its Contribution..................................................................................40 2 ETHNICITY, SELF-DEFINITION, AND THE ANCIENTS ...............................................47 The Concept of Ethnicity........................................................................................................47 Greek Ethnicity and the Roman World ..................................................................................67 Josephus and Ethnicity ...........................................................................................................84 Conclusion ..............................................................................................................................89 3 THE MILIEU IN WHICH JOSEPHUS LIVED AND WROTE............................................93 Mistreatment of Jews in Greco-Roman Society .....................................................................93 Josephus’ Own Experiences .................................................................................................110 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................114 4 HELLENISTIC CULTURE AND JEWISH ACCULTURATION .....................................117 The Question of Jewish Hellenization..................................................................................117 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................144 5 JEWISH ETHNICITY IN JOSPEHUS’ BELLUM JUDAICUM .........................................147 The Bellum Judaicum and the Greek Tradition of Historiography ......................................147 Some Greek Elements Within the Bellum Judaicum............................................................167 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................178 6 JOSEPHUS’ PRESENTATION OF THE JEWS IN HIS ANTIQUITATES JUDAICAE ....181 The Fluid Nature of Foundational History/Myth..................................................................181 Examples of Josephus’ Positive Portrayal of Jews and Jewish History by Means of Greek Models...........................................................................................188 5 Use of Greek Forms, Paradigms, and Terms.................................................................188 Exempla .........................................................................................................................204 Stories of Positive Impressions on Non-Jews ...............................................................213 Management of Negative Impressions .................................................................................217 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................237 7 JEWISH ETHNICITY IN JOSEPHUS’ VITA AND CONTRA APIONEM.........................239 The Vita ................................................................................................................................239 The Contra Apionem.............................................................................................................244 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................264 8 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS...................................................................................268 REFERENCE LIST .....................................................................................................................279 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................................297 6 Abstract of Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy ETHNICITY AND JEWISH IDENTITY IN JOSEPHUS By David McClister May 2008 Chair: Konstantinos Kapparis Major: Classical Studies Flavius Josephus was a Jewish historian who lived in the first century CE. When the First Jewish War began in 66 CE, Josephus was given a leading role in the defense of Galilee in northern Palestine. He was captured by the Roman forces and accompanied them to Jerusalem where he witnessed the fall of the city in 70 CE. After that Josephus was taken to Rome where he wrote an account of the Jewish war with Rome (the Bellum Judaicum), a history of the Jews (the Antiquitates Judaicae), a short autobiography (the Vita), and a defense of the antiquity of the Jews (the Contra Apionem). All of these works were intended for a non-Jewish audience. Josephus wrote at a time when anti-Jewish sentiments were common, and the recent defeat at the hands of Rome only exacerbated the negative image ascribed to Jews. It is the thesis of this dissertation that Josephus produced his literary works not simply to satisfy the curiosity of interested Gentiles concerning Jewish origins and customs, but to craft and negotiate an ethnicity for the Jews that would portray them as a people worthy of Roman respect. Ethnic identity is a social construct that is shaped in a complex matrix of psychological and social factors, and often in response to a perceived crisis that threatens a person’s or group’s sense of social belonging. Josephus lived under the kinds of conditions in which groups typically feel the need to adjust and 7 reassert their social identity. I suggest that this lens can provide a useful way of reading Josephus, and can account for the shape and purpose of his works. Josephus’ strategy for creating this ethnic portrait was to depict the Jews as having essentially the same qualities of the noble Greeks of the past, whom the Romans respected. In this undertaking Josephus was participating in a long-standing debate within Jewish circles over the limits and extent of Hellenization among them. What was new was that Josephus used the vehicle of Greek historiography to accomplish his purpose. All of his literary works drew heavily on well-known Greek historiographical models for their presentations of the events, their characterizations of the Jewish people, and their refutations of Gentile slanders. The result was a picture of Jewish history and piety in which the Jews are seen to embody well-respected Greek ideals. It is not known how widely Josephus’ works circulated in his own day or shortly thereafter, nor do we know how successful they were in their purpose of creating a bold, new picture of Jewish identity. There are indications that Josephus’ works did not effect much change in how Gentiles viewed Jews in the Roman empire. However, the success of the project (measured in terms of social acceptance) is not the object of this study, nor is it a criterion