Alexander in the Jewish Tradition: from Second Temple Writings to Hebrew Alexander Romances

chapter 15 Alexander in the Jewish tradition: From Second Temple Writings to Hebrew Alexander Romances Aleksandra Klęczar “Each age makes his own Alexander”, Richard Stoneman wrote in the intro- duction to his own translation of the Greek Alexander Romance.1 The post- Alexander world would return to his character over and over, to illustrate a number of various and conflicting features. The king would obviously be recalled by numerous Greek and Roman writers in their works, but the reflected memory of his deeds and life was preserved in the histories of numerous other cultures, and not necessarily only the ones that he personally encountered. The Jews, the majority of whom lived on the lands conquered by Alexander and who were directly affected by his actions, were one of these cultures. Sometimes under the influence of other traditions and sometimes indepen- dently, Alexander’s story was also told by, and for, the Jews. In fact, it started to be distributed in the Jewish circles very early on. The earliest written accounts on Alexander in Jewish tradition are older than the ones we have preserved from the Greco-Roman world. They start with the appearance of Alexander in the historical and prophetic narratives of the Second Temple period. In one of the most recognizable prophetic biblical passages, the Book of Daniel repre- sents Alexander as a warrior he-goat conquering the previous imperial power and ruling over the world; in a similar context he appears in Book iii of the Sibylline Oracles, one of the parts of the Oracles that was quite certainly com- posed in the Jewish milieu. Alexander’s image in 1Maccabees, presented in short but poignant passages, is similarly connected with power, but set within a rather negative context of the rise of hubristic and inimical power of the Seleu- cid state.The fragmentarily preserved treatise OntheJews by pseudo-Hecataeus also recalls, in a number of passages, the person and deeds of Alexander, pre- senting him in the context of the Jews and their obedience to the Law. Later, after the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple, the character of the Macedonian king became an object of special interest for Josephus, who 1 Richard Stoneman, The Greek Alexander Romance, (London: Penguin 1991), 2. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi: 10.1163/9789004359932_016 380 klęczar mentions him a number of times in his works and devotes to him an important chapter in Book xi of his Jewish Antiquities. There is a set of rather fascinating stories about Alexander in the Talmud and in the Midrashic narratives. Some of the episodes repeat the stories known from Greek and Roman sources, but often with differences in details or with dif- ferent focus and meaning, and it is a common consensus that they stem rather from an independent oral source than from a reworking of a literary Greek text. Such is the story in the tractate Tamid 31b–32a (Alexander in dispute with the Elders of the South, an equivalent of the disputation with the Gymnosophists, found in Plutarch’s Life of Alexander 64–65 and in the Romance iii, 6). Other cases include the Talmudic versions of narratives known otherwise from dif- ferent Jewish sources, like the story of Alexander in Jerusalem, appearing both in Josephus and in the Rabbinic tradition2 or those shared (often with changes included) with the Romance tradition: Tamid 32a contains the stories of Alex- ander’s journey to the land of darkness, of his encounter with the Amazons and of Alexander at the gates of paradise, all of which appear also in the Romance.3 Other material in common for the Romance and Rabbinic writings includes the stories of Alexander’s ascent into the air4 and his descent to the bottom of the sea.5 Among the stories there are also some that do not have a direct equivalent in the existing Greek Alexander literature such as the story of the King of Kazia, present in a number of version in Talmudic literature,6 the story of the throne of Solomon7 and the narrative about the bones of the prophet Jeremiah.8 In the late Middle Ages (12th–14th c.), a number of Hebrew versions of the Alexander Romance emerged. They differ very much between one another and it is enough to compare the (relatively) sober account of Sefer Toledot 2 Megillat Taʾanit 9, Yoma 69a, Genesis Rabbah lxi, 7. 3 The Land of Darkness: Alexander Romance β ii, 39–41; see also Iter ad paradisum; the Ama- zons: iii, 25–26. 4 Abodah Zarah iii, 1, 42c, Numbers Rabbah 13, 4, Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer 11, 28b–29a, Yalkut Shimoni to 1Kings, 18. 5 Midrash Tehilim Ps. 93, 5, Yalkut Shimoni Ps. 93, 848 (in both cases the deed is ascribed to Hadrian, but follows the typical set of motifs from the story about Alexander’s descent and the knowledge of this incident as connected with Alexander is evident from other Rabbinic sources: Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer 11, 28b–29a, Yalkut Shimoni to 1Kings, 18, which mention the sea adventure of Alexander in connection with his other exploits). 6 Baba Mezia ii, 5, 8c; Genesis Rabbah 33, 1; Pesikta de-Reb Kahana 9, 24; Leviticus Rabbah 27, 1; Midrash Tanhuma Emor 6, Yalkut Shimoni Ps. 36, 727. 7 Targum Sheni i, 2. 8 The story of the bones of Jeremiah: Midrash Haggadah Numbers, 30, 15..

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