Flavius Josephus: Against Apion

503 Pages·2006·2.87 MB·English

by  John M. G. (RTL) Barclay

FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS
VOLUME 10
AGAINST APION

FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS
translation and commentary
EDITED BY
STEVE MASON
VOLUME 10
AGAINST APION
TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY
BY
JOHN M.G. BARCLAY
BRILL
LEIDEN •BOSTON
2007
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Detailed Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data are available on the
Internet at http://catalog.loc.gov
ISBN 10: 90 04 11791 1
ISBN 13: 978 90 04 11791 4
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PRINTEDINTHENETHERLANDS
introduction v
For
Joel Marcus
an outstanding Mensch,
scholar, and friend
vi introduction
introduction vii
CONTENTS
Series Preface: The Brill Josephus Project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Abbreviations and Sigla . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
Josephus, Against Apion
Book 1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Book 2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Appendix 1: Manetho . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
Appendix 2: Pseudo-Hecataeus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
Appendix 3: Exodus Narratives in Cultural Context. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Appendix 4: The Judeans and the Ass . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Appendix 5: The Sources of the Apologetic Encomium (2.145-286) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
Appendix 6: Judaism in Roman Dress? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371
Indices
Ancient Texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 391
Places and Names mentioned by Josephus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421
Greek and Latin Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 424
Modern Scholars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
viii abbreviations and sigla
series preface: the brill josephus project ix
SERIES PREFACE
THE BRILL JOSEPHUS PROJECT
Titus (?) Flavius Josephus (37–ca. 100 CE) was methods. Philo’s goals were not those of the author
born Joseph son of Mattathyahu, a priestly aristo- of Qumran’s Commentary on Nahum or of the
crat in Judea. During the early stages of the war Church Father Origen. In order to assist the reader
against Rome (66-74 CE), he found himself of this series, the Brill Project team would like to
leading a part of the defense in Galilee, but by the explain our general aims and principles. Our most
spring of 67, his territory overrun, he had basic premise is that we do not intend to provide
surrendered under circumstances that would the last word: an exhaustive exegesis of this rich
furnish grounds for endless accusation. Taken to corpus. Rather, since no commentary yet exists in
Rome by the Flavian conquerors, he spent the English, we hope simply to provide a resource that
balance of his life writing about the war, Judean will serve as an invitation to further exploration.
history and culture, and his own career. He Although we began with the mandate to prepare
composed four works in thirty volumes. a commentary alone, we soon realized that a new
If Josephus boasts about the unique importance translation would also be helpful. Keeping another
of his work (War 1.1-3; Ant. 1.1-4) in the fashion existing translation at hand would have been
of ancient historians, few of his modern readers cumbersome for the reader. And since we must
could disagree with him. By the accidents of comment on particular Greek words and phrases,
history, his narratives have become the indis- we would have been implicitly challenging such
pensable source for all scholarly study of Judea existing translations at every turn. Given that we
from about 200 BCE to 75 CE. Our analysis of needed to prepare a working translation for the
other texts and of the physical remains unearthed commentary in any case, it seemed wisest to
by archaeology must occur in dialogue with include it with the commentary as an efficient
Josephus’ story, for it is the only comprehensive point of reference. A few words about the trans-
and connected account of the period. lation, then, are in order.
Although Josephus’ name has been known Granted that every translation is an inter-
continuously through nearly two millennia, and he pretation, one can still imagine a spectrum of
has been cited extensively in support of any options. For example, the translator may set out to
number of agendas, his writings have not always follow the contours of the original language more
been valued as compositions. Readers have tended expressly or to place greater emphasis on idiomatic
to look beyond them to the underlying historical phrasing in the target language. There is much to
facts or to Josephus’ sources. Concentrated study in be said for both of these options and for each inte-
the standard academic forms—journals, scholarly rim stop in the spectrum. Accuracy is not neces-
seminars, or indeed commentaries devoted to sarily a criterion in such choices, for one might
Josephus—were lacking. The past two decades, gain precision in one respect (e.g., for a single
however, have witnessed the birth and rapid growth word or form) only at the cost of accuracy else-
of “Josephus studies” in the proper sense. Signs of where (e.g., in the sentence). Homer’s epic poems
the new environment include all of the vehicles and provide a famous example of the problem: Does
tools that were absent before, as well as K. H. one render them in English dactylic hexameter, in
Rengstorf’s Complete Concordance (1983), Louis looser verse, or even in prose to better convey the
Feldman’s annotated bibliographies, and now a sense? One simply needs to make choices.
proliferation of Josephus-related dissertations. The In our case, the course was suggested by the
time is right, therefore, for the first comprehensive constraints of the commentary. If we were pre-
English commentary to Josephus. paring a stand-alone translation for independent
The commentary format is ancient, and even in reading, we might have made other choices. And
antiquity commentators differed in their aims and certainly if Josephus had been an Athenian poet,