Josephus and Philo (1st cent. AD) were Jews writing in Greek under the Roman empire. The reading from Josephus is from 2 sources.
The first, is a passage of his _Jewish Antiquities_, a history of the Jews (based on many of the sources that later became the Old Testament). Here he attacks Greek historians for connecting the rest of the world's peoples to Greeks by foundation myths (all the stories that said Heracles and other heroes founded foreign races--remember Herodotus' stories about Scythes, the son of Heacles, and Candaules who was descended from Heracles). Instead, Josephus uses Genesis to show that the Hebrew tradition presents the "true" origins of all the peoples of the world.
The second, Against Apion is an essay that Josephus wrote to defend his history of the Jews (written in Greek) from the criticisms made by the Greek historian Apion. In the course of this short essay, we learn much about how ancient historians wrote and specifically about some of the historians who told the histories of non-Greek peoples such as Manetho an Egyptian and Berossus a Chaldean. Both of these men, like Josephus, knew their native records and stories but wrote Greek histories about their home countries. Through these authors we can see more examples of history as a way of explaining the connections between different peoples in the world. Josephus in particular is trying to prove the antiquity of the Jews by connecting them with various stories in other histories as far back as Herodotus.
The reading from Philo is different. It is an interpretative account or commentary on part of the Torah. We have talked about rationalization as a way to explain myths by removing the fantastic aspects of the stories (for example, Hecataeus of Miletus made Cerberus a poisonous snake in a cave instead of a three-headed dog in the underworld), but another technique which Greeks sometimes used to explain Homer and other myths is to take the stories as allegories. Greek philosophers particularly liked to treat myths this way--for example, the golden apples that Heracles got from the Garden of Hesperides were treated as allegorical symbols for virtues. This method of understanding myths and early stories was particularly common among ancient Jewish scholars of the Torah. From both Greek and Jewish practice early Christians inherited this interpretative strategy which has remained important for many Christian and Jewish scholars. Allegorical interpretation became so popular in the middle ages that many fictional stories were purposefully written as allegories. If you don't know what allegory is, see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory
Jordann Markowitz
ReplyDeleteIn this account, Esau is forced to give up his birthright to Jacob unlike in the bible where Isaac was tricked to give Jacob the birthright. What would be the significance of this difference?
Sara Welish
ReplyDeleteI other readings we have seen woman as rulers (such as Tomyris of the Masagetae). In the Against Apion section we see at least two women who were rulers of Egypt. Would they only have taken the throne because there were no male heirs or was there another reason for these women taking the throne?
Maeve Tischbein
ReplyDeleteAre there any other accounts of the alternative origins of peoples that wasn't traced to the Greeks? Why would the author claim this? Out of spite of the Greeks?
Katie Burke
ReplyDeleteDid the Greeks force their gods, heroes, history, etc on the other cultures that they conquered? Josephus seems to be saying that they did, but I don't remember seeing any evidence of this in the other readings that we have read.
Erin Bradley
ReplyDeleteWhen Philo is talking about sobriety what does the age of the soul, either elder or younger, have to do with it? The way he explains these two types of souls it seems like neither a younger (champion of bodily ability) or an elder (counselors of the God beloved) soul would drink. It seems like the father of two different souls is drinking and not comprehending?
Shannon Potts
ReplyDeleteHow might Josephus be able to say with such certainty that the Egyptian rulers were in power for such exact lengths of time? (for example 12 years and 1 month, 36 years and 5 months, p201)
Andrew Gordon
ReplyDeleteWhen the sons of Noah disobeyed God by not settling, and started building the Tower of Babel, was the only solution to give them different languages? Their contempt for God and their belief that he was plotting against them could have been reason enough for God to punish them more harshly.
AR
ReplyDeleteJordann,
I am not sure that Philo means that the story said Esau wasd force to give up his birthright. He may have known a different version of the story, but I think he is reading a story nearly identical with that in Genesis but is interpreting it as an allegory. Thus the story about Jacob tricking his father is in Philo's view symbolic of Jacob being "elder" or more endowed with wisdom.
Sara,
Good point, this is p. 201 (Against Apion 1.95-96). Egypt historically did have women rulers, Hatshepsut for one. Herodotus describes at least one of these, Nitokris. See here for more on Egyptian pharaohs:
http://www.womenintheancientworld.com/women%20who%20reigned%20as%20pharaohs.htm
Herodotus also mentions Tomyris the queen of the Massagetae and Semiramis, a babylonian queen, who was one of the great conquerors that Alexander sought to rival. I am no expert on the vexed historical issues about these women rulers in Egypt but I have heard about difficulties that Hatshepsut faced that would indicate that there was resistance to being ruled by a woman. A woman might come to power as the regent or guardian of a young pharaoh not old enough to rule on his own.
Maeve,
Many cultures have similar myths explaining the origins of other peoples of the world. It is a way to explain the relationship between the different nations. Actually I think Josephus is just translating the ancient Jewish accounts into Greek history, and they just happen to contradict some Greek stories. Josephus himself was very familiar with the Greek historiographic tradition and knew how they criticized each other constantly trying to show who was right. Josephus is merely playing the game of historiography by using his "new" research to disprove older accounts. Remember that even Herodotus did this sort of thing. For example, he consulted Egyptian priests and used their information to refute Greek stories. In Against Apion, he is defending himself against another historian who had attacked his claims in Jewish Antiquities. Apion and some other Greeks did not admit the Jews were an old race and thought them relatively recent.
Erin,
I think that Philo has basically gone far off course in his explanation. He wants to explain why Ham is called "younger" son, and he attributes this not to age but to mental maturity. To show that Moses used "younger" in the sense "less wise" he goes through many different examples. Thus this explanation is not directly related to Noah's drunkenness, but rather to why he thought of Ham as younger.
Shannon,
He is following Manetho, as he says. Manetho was a native Egyptian priest who, of course, would have been able to read hieroglyphics and demotic. Manetho also read Greek historians including Herodotus and then worte a history of Egypt in Greek. In this history, Manetho refuted Herodotus and other Greek authors by using Egyptian records that he had translated. Even today Manetho is the main source upon which all ancient Egyptian chronology is founded. However, we know that he is not always right. Still, his work was the most authoritative of its kind in the ancient world and almost all later historians followed it.
AR
ReplyDeleteAndrew,
The story of Babel (notice the supposed aetiology connecting it to Babylon) is an aetiological tale that explains the origin of the different languages of mankind. Of course, modern science suggests that different languages developed over time in populations separated from each other for long enough for independent languages to evolve.
However, if we understood the story of Babel as true or as a legend based in truth, then presumably Christians would say that God loved mankind despite their current arrogance and so did not destroy them entirely. I should note that the angry and jealous God of the Old Testament (think also of the flood story and Sodom and Gomorrah) is very different from the God of the New Testament. Christians have different ways of explaining this.
Doug Ritchey
ReplyDeletePilo sees sobriety as being the most profitable condition for the body and soul, giving us the power to repel disease, sharpen the senses, and engendering readiness throughout the body. Maybe if Alexander and Philip would have shared these same views toward drinking, the blood of Ammon and Achilles would not have come to such a dramatic end.
Zander,
ReplyDeleteI found it very confusing in paragraph 8 of Philo on Noah it talks about Hagar exposing Ishmael, but then right after seems as if she didn't, and what exactly did it it mean that Ishmael inherited sophistry?