The Significance of Yavneh and Other Essays in Jewish Hellenism

631 Pages·2010·3.98 MB·English

by  Shaye JD Cohen

Shaye J. D. Cohen
The Significance of Yavneh
and Other Essays
in Jewish Hellenism
Mohr Siebeck

Shaye J. D. Cohen, born 1948; 1975 PhD in Ancient History, Columbia University;
1974–91 Professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York; 1991–2001 Professor
at Brown University; since 2001 Littauer Professor of Hebrew Literature and Philosophy
(Jewish Studies), Harvard University.
e-ISBN PDF 978-3-16-151469-2
ISBN 978-3-16-150375-7
ISSN 0721-8753 (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism)
Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbiblio-
graphie; detailed bibliographic data is available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.
© 2010 by Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, Germany.
This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that permitted
by copyright law) without the publisher’s written permission. This applies particularly to
reproductions, translations, microfilms and storage and processing in electronic systems.
The book was typeset by Martin Fischer in Tübingen using Stempel Garamond, New-
JerusalemCU and OdysseaU typeface, printed by Gulde-Druck in Tübingen on non-
aging paper and bound by Buchbinderei Spinner in Ottersweier.
Printed in Germany.

With honor and gratitude to all my teachers
םהירבד לע ףיסומכ אלא יתובר ירבד לﬠ בישמכ יניא

Table of Contents
Preface and Acknowledgements ............................... IX
Abbreviations .............................................. XIII
Jewish Hellenism
1 The Beauty of Flora and the Beauty of Sarai .................. 3
2 Sosates the Jewish Homer ................................. 15
3 The Destruction: From Scripture to Midrash ................. 22
4 The Significance of Yavneh: Pharisees, Rabbis, and the End of
Jewish Sectarianism ....................................... 44
5 Patriarchs and Scholarchs .................................. 71
6 False Prophets (4Q339), Netinim (4Q340), and Hellenism at
Qumran ................................................ 93
Josephus
7 Josephus, Jeremiah, and Polybius ........................... 105
8 History and Historiography in the Against Apion of Josephus ... 121
9 Masada: Literary Tradition, Archaeological Remains, and the
Credibility of Josephus .................................... 133
10 Parallel Historical Tradition in Josephus and Rabbinic Literature 154
11 Alexander the Great and Jaddus the High Priest According to
Josephus ................................................ 162
12 Respect for Judaism by Gentiles According to Josephus ........ 187
13 Ioudaios to genos and Related Expressions in Josephus ......... 210
Synagogues and Rabbis
14 Epigraphical Rabbis ...................................... 227
15 Pagan and Christian Evidence on the Ancient Synagogue ....... 244
16 Were Pharisees and Rabbis the Leaders of Communal Prayer and
Torah Study in Antiquity? The Evidence of the New Testament,
Josephus, and the Early Church Fathers ..................... 266
VIII Table of Contents
17 The Place of the Rabbi in the Jewish Society of the Second
Century ................................................ 282
Conversion and Intermarriage
18 Was Judaism in Antiquity a Missionary Religion? ............. 299
19 Adolf Harnack’s “The Mission and Expansion of Judaism”:
Christianity Succeeds where Judaism Fails ................... 309
20 Is “Proselyte Baptism” Mentioned in the Mishnah?
The Interpretation of M. Pesahim 8.8 ........................ 316
21 The Conversion of Antoninus .............................. 329
22 On Murdering or Injuring a Proselyte ....................... 361
23 Solomon and the Daughter of Pharaoh: Intermarriage,
Conversion, and the Impurity of Women .................... 372
Women and Blood
24 Menstruants and the Sacred in Judaism and Christianity ........ 393
25 Purity, Piety, and Polemic: Medieval Rabbinic Denunciations of
“Incorrect” Purification Practices ........................... 416
26 A Brief History of Jewish Circumcision Blood ................ 435
Judaism and Christianity
27 Judaism without Circumcision and “Judaism” without
“Circumcision” in Ignatius ................................ 453
28 Between Judaism and Christianity: the Semi-Circumcision
of Christians According to Bernard Gui, his Sources, and
R. Eliezer of Metz ........................................ 476
29 Does Rashi’s Torah Commentary Respond to Christianity?
A Comparison of Rashi with Rashbam and Bekhor Shor ....... 513
30 A Virgin Defiled: Some Rabbinic and Christian Views on the
Origins of Heresy ........................................ 534
Particulars of First Publication ................................ 549
Index Locorum ............................................. 553
Index Nominum ............................................ 591
Index Rerum ............................................... 602
Preface and Acknowledgements
This volume reprints most of my articles that were published between 1980
and 2006.1 Articles published in 2007 and beyond will have to await a future
volume.2 In preparing the articles for re-publication here, I have treated
them as historical artifacts; I have corrected mistakes and typos (no doubt
introducing new ones in the process), removed some stylistic infelicities,
added some bibliography here and there, but I have not systematically
rewritten the essays or updated them. I have also not introduced stylistic
or substantive consistency across the volume. The essays remain more or
less as they were when first published; in particular I have made sure not to
tamper with the footnote numeration.3 Original pagination is indicated by
numbers in brackets.
Were I to rewrite these essays, I would be much more careful in my use of
the words “Jew” and “Judaism.” As I discuss at length elsewhere, the core
meaning of the word Ioudaios is “Judaean,” a member of the ethnic polity
that inhabits the district of Judaea, and when we discuss ancient texts we
need to keep in mind that this is the primary meaning of the term.4 In many
1 Two major omissions are: “The Rabbis in Second Century Jewish Society,” The Cam-
bridge History of Judaism, volume III: The Early Roman Period, ed. William Horbury,
W. D. Davies, and J. Sturdy (Cambridge University Press, 1999) 922–990 (written in 1983);
“The Temple and the Synagogue,” Cambridge History of Judaism volume III 298–325
(written in 1985).
2 “‘Your covenant that you have sealed in our flesh’: Women, Covenant, and Circumci-
sion,” Studies in Josephus and the Varieties of Ancient Judaism: Louis H. Feldman Jubilee
Volume (Leiden: Brill, 2007) 29–42; “Are Women in the Covenant,” in A Feminist Com-
mentary on the Babylonian Talmud, edited by Tal Ilan et al. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck,
2007) 25–42; “The Judaean Legal Tradition and the Halakhah of the Mishnah,” in Cam-
bridge Companion to Rabbinic Literature, ed. C. Fonrobert and M. Jaffee (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2007) 121–143; “‘Common Judaism’ in Greek and Latin
Authors,” Redefining First-Century Jewish and Christian Identities: Essays in Honor
of E. P. Sanders, ed. Fabian Udoh et al. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 2008)
69–87; “The Name of the Ruse: The Toss of a Ring to Save Life and Honor”(forthcoming);
“Sabbath Law and Mishnah Shabbat in Origen De Principiis,” Jewish Studies Quarterly
(forthcoming); “From Permission to Prohibition: Paul and the Early Church on Intermar-
riage” (forthcoming).
3 Except chapter 25.
4 Shaye J. D. Cohen, The Beginnings of Jewishness (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1997) chapters three and four.