Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians: Religious Dynamics in a Sasanian Context

325 Pages·2014·3.202 MB·English

Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians
Judaism in Context
17
Series Editors
Lieve Teugels
Rivka Ulmer
Naomi Koltun-Fromm
Judaism in Context contains monographs and edited collections
focusing on the relations between Jews, Judaism, and Jewish
culture and other peoples, religions, and cultures among whom
Jews have lived and flourished.
Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians
Religious Dynamics in a Sasanian Context
Edited by
Geoffrey Herman
9
34
2014
Gorgias Press LLC, 954 River Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA
www.gorgiaspress.com
Copyright © 2 0 1 4 by Gorgias Press LLC
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise without the
prior written permission of Gorgias Press LLC.
2014 ܗ 9
ISBN 978-1-4632-0250-7 ISSN 1935-6978
Cover image: Prof Morgenstern and The Schøyen Collection, MS
2053/253. www.schoyencollection.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians : religious
dynamics in a Sasanian context / edited by Geoffrey
Herman.
pages cm. -- (Judaism in context, ISSN
1935-6978 ; 17)
“This volume explores the contacts between Jews
and Christians within the broader religious and
cultural context of the Sasanian Empire. It collects
the proceedings of a workshop that took place on
March 17-18th, 2010, in Bochum"--Summary.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4632-0250-7 (alk. paper)
1. Religious minorities--Iran--History--to
640--Congresses. 2. Jews--Iran--History--to
640--Congresses. 3. Christians--Iran--History--to
640--Congresses. 4. Sassanids--Congresses. 5.
Zoroastrians--Iran--Congresses. I. Herman, Geoffrey,
editor.
BL2270.J49 2014
200.955’09015--dc23
2014017881
Printed in the United States of America
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Table of Contents ..................................................................................... v
Preface ...................................................................................................... vii
Abbreviations ........................................................................................... ix
Introduction .............................................................................................. 1
Political Theology and Religious Diversity in the Sasanian
Empire ............................................................................................... 7
Adam H. Becker
Another ‘Split Diaspora’? How Knowledgeable (or
Ignorant) were Babylonian Jews about Roman Palestine
and its Jews? ................................................................................... 27
Isaiah M. Gafni
Antizoroastrische Polemik in den Syro-Persischen
Märtyrerakten ................................................................................. 47
Peter Bruns
The Last Years of Yazdgird I and the Christians .............................. 67
Geoffrey Herman
To Convert a Persian and Teach him the Holy Scriptures: A
Zoroastrian Proselyte in Rabbinic and Syriac Christian
Narratives ........................................................................................ 91
Reuven Kiperwasser and Serge Ruzer
The Cologne Mani Codex and the Life of Zarathushtra .................... 129
Albert De Jong
Dynamics of Christian Acculturation in the Sasanian Empire:
Some Iranian Motifs in the Cave of Treasures ............................ 149
Sergey Minov
Zechariah and the Bubbling Blood: An Ancient Tradition in
Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Literature ................................. 203
Richard Kalmin
Bibliography .......................................................................................... 253
List of Contributors ............................................................................. 297
Index ....................................................................................................... 301
v

PREFACE
This volume is the result of a workshop, the aim of which was to
explore contacts between the religious communities and traditions
of the Sasanian Empire, and especially between Persian Christianity
and Babylonian Jewry. The workshop sought to promote greater
cooperation between these fields, and further interest in the value
of adopting a comparative approach in the study of these neigh-
bouring ancient communities.
Published here are papers presented at that workshop that
took place on the 17th–18th March, 2010, entitled “Between Contact
and Contrast”: Jews and Christians in the Sasanian Empire. Two addi-
tional papers, by Adam Becker and Richard Kalmin, who were un-
able to attend, are also published here. The workshop was held
under the auspices of the Käte Hamburger Kolleg, Dynamics in the
History of Religions, at the Center for Religious Studies at Ruhr Uni-
versität in Bochum. I would like to express my gratitude to
Volkhard Krech, the director of the Käte Hamburger Kolleg
(KHK) and to Marion Steinicke, its Scientific Coordinator, for en-
thusiastically hosting the workshop. I wish to thank the KHK
team, and particularly Silke Köster and Thomas Jurczyk for dealing
expertly with all of its logistical needs. Peter Wick and Görge Has-
selhoff, both of Ruhr Universität willingly chaired sessions during
the workshop. I also wish to acknowledge Herr Klaus Grigo of
Bochum, for graciously opening up his unique private antiquities
collection for viewing before the participants of the workshop.
Finally, I would like to express my appreciation to Gorgias
Press: to George Kiraz for willingly accepting this volume; to Rivka
Ulmer, Naomi Koltun-Fromm, and Lieve Teugels, the series edi-

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viii JEWS, CHRISTIANS AND ZOROASTRIANS
tors of Judaism in Context, for including the book in their series, and
to acquisitions editor, Melonie Schmierer-Lee, who has cheerfully
and expertly steered it safely to its harbour.
Geoffrey Herman
October, 2013
ABBREVIATIONS
AJS Association of Jewish Studies
BCE Before the Common Era
CE Common Era
CSCO Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium
SBL Society for Biblical Literature
SE Seleucid Era
ix