THE INTERPRETATIO JUDAICA OF THOT-HERMES

GERARD MUSSIES

Interpretatio and Interpretatio Judaica The use of the word interpretatio in combination with an adjective in• dicating a nationality, which is so well known in the modern science of religion, was created, as far as known by Tacitus. In ch. 48 of his treatise "On the Origin and Situation oj the Germans" he deals with the tribes that in his time were dwelling along the middle reaches of the Oder, and when discussing the Naharvali he mentions as a peculiarity of their religion that they venerated as gods a pair of brothers, the Alci: "interpretatione Romana Castorem Pollucemque." On this model the expression, of which the adjective can be changed to fit the specific context, has become the technical term to refer to the practice of polytheistic peoples of com• paring their pantheons and identifying the different deities with one another. As far as it appears in classical texts this practice was carried out in two distinct ways, either by mentioning in some way or other side by side both the names of the gods or goddesses compared, or by simply substituting the vernacular deities for the foreign. Both methods are used by Herodotus. Having mentioned the existence of a temple of Apollo and Artemis in Buto in Egypt, and adding that these two are considered to be the children of Dionysos and Isis, he finally reveals their identity: Alyu1t'W1'tL o~ 'A1toUwV (l~V Tnpo~, Ll1j(l~'t1jp o~ TIal~, "Ap'tE.(lt~ o~ Bou~~a'tt~ (II 155-156); Dionysos has been explained as Osiris ten chapters before (II 144).' Likewise in his description of the Scythians he first says that they worship Hestia, Zeus, Gaea, Apollo, Aphrodite Urania, Ares, and some of them also Poseidon, then he goes on: OVO(lcX~E.'t~t o~ ~xu9la'tL 'Ia'tt1j (l~V T~~l'tt, ZE.U~ o~ op9o't~'t~ M't

1 II 155-156. For the implications of Herodotus' remark in II 50 that the names of almost all the Greek gods stem from Egypt, see the discussion between R. Lattimore, Herodotus and the Names oj Egyptian Gods, Class. Phil. 34, 1939, 357-365, and 1. M. Lin• forth, Greek and Egyptian Gods (Herodotus II 50 and 52), Class. Phil. 35, 1940, 300-301. 90 GERARD MUSSlES

'Ea'tLOtL, IIE'tEf.l1tIXf.lEVUL 'tWL XIXL LlLOVUaWL (OGIS 130, 7-10). The briefest possible manner is the mere juxtaposition of the names, for instance ZEU~ 'npO!lcXao'Tj~ in inscriptions of Antiochus I of Commagene (OG IS 383, 41; 384, 5), and 0 ZE.U~ 0 ~1X~cX~LO~ in one of Attalus II (OGIS 331, 34, 49). We shall have to come back to this shortest type of equation because it has been adduced to explain why Thot and Moses were identified. It was more frequently applied in syncretistic series of more than two equations, such as 'A1toAAwv Mcep'Tj~ "HALO~ 'Epf.lij~ (OGIS 383, 54; 385, 7), or LlL1 'HAL~ Me.ycXA~ ~lXpcX1tLOL (OGIS 678, 3). The complete suppression of the foreign name could occur in combina• tion with an identifying formula of some kind as we find it in Plutarch's Life oj Artaxerxes III 1 "There is a sanctuary of a war goddess there (viz. Pasargadae) whom one might compare with Athena" (~v 'A6'Tjv&.v eXv 'tL~ &1tE.LXcXaE.LE.v). The mere replacement of the foreign names by those of the native gods or goddesses without further comment is instanced by Julius Caesar's remarks on the religion of the Gauls who worship, he says, "Mercury, Apollo, Mars,Jove, Minerva," and that of the Germans who have only "Sol, Yulcanus and Luna" (Bell. Gall. VI 17; 21). If we now proceed, on the analogy of the above instances of interpretatio Graeca etc. to extend the use of the term to the Jewish practice of identify• ing pagan deities, we must be aware of the fact that we are then giving it a different content. For it stands to reason that the interpretation of heathen gods by a monotheistic people cannot be carried out on the basis of comparing two polytheistic systems, but in the proper sense only by equating Yahweh with, for instance, the Zeus who had developed to the one deity that comprised and unified in himself all the others and was therefore simply called 0 6E.o~. It is this Jewish interpretation which is im• plicitly made by St. Paul when speaking on the Areopagus about "the god who created the world and everything in it" and next quoting the fifth line of Aratus' Phaenomena: "for we are of His kindred" (Acts XVII 28). For although St. Paul (or St. Luke) takes care not to mention it, the name to which the pronoun "His" refers is "Zeus" occurring no less than three times in the four lines of the poem that precede the quoted one. 2 Much more explicitly the Jewish exegete Aristobulus (or Pseudo• Aristobulus) had interpreted the same poem two centuries or so before St. Paul; he quoted the first nine lines of it, but substituted the second and third mention of Zeus by 8E.oG, defending this by saying that that was what the name really stood for: 'to I~P 'tij~ OLIXVOLIX~ 1X1hwv l1tl 8E.oV &VIX1tEf.l1tE.'tIXL (ap. Eusebius P.E. XIII 12).

2 Cf. F. J. Foakes Jackson - K. Lake, The Beginnings of Christianity. Part I: The Acts of the Apostles, London 1933, IV, 218; V, 246-247.