Foreign Nations in the Wisdom of Ben Sira: A Jewish Sage between Opposition and Assimilation 3110270102, 9783110270105

Table of contents :
Preface
1. Introduction
1.1. The Historical Figure of Ben Sira
1.2. The Book of Ben Sira
1.3. Political Circumstances in Ben Sira’s Time
1.4. Jerusalem in Ben Sira’s Time
1.5. Ben Sira and Foreign Nations / Cultures: A Survey of Previous Research
1.6. Research Aim
2. Covenant with Mankind according to Sirach 17
2.1. Introduction
2.2. Translation and Textual Criticism of Sir 16:24–17:24
2.3. Commentary on Sir 16:24–17:24
2.4. Short Overview of the Covenant Theology of the Old Testament
2.5. Conclusion
3. Wisdom, Israel and Other Nations in Sirach 24
3.1. Introduction
3.2. Translation and Textual Criticism of Sir 24
3.3. The Tradition-Historical Background of Sir 24
3.4. Commentary on Sir 24:1–34
3.5. The People of Israel and Other Nations in Sir 24
3.6. Conclusion
4. “Put the Nations in Fear of You” – The National Prayer in Sirach 36
4.1. Introduction
4.2. Translation and Textual Criticism of Sir 36:1–17
4.3. Previous Research of the Passage
4.4. Commentary on Sir 36:1–17
4.5. Ben Sira’s View of Foreign Nations in Sir 36
4.6. Conclusion
5. Foreign Nations in Ben Sira’s “Laus Patrum” (Sir 44–50)
5.1. Introduction
5.2. The Beginning of “Laus Patrum” (Sir 44:1–15)
5.3. From the Antediluvian Figures to Moses
5.4. Phinehas in Sir 45:23–26
5.5. From Joshua to David
5.6. From Solomon to Ben Sira’s Own Time
5.7. Excursus: Why Did Ben Sira Omit Ezra?
5.7.1. Ben Sira’s anti-Levitical Bias
5.7.2. Ben Sira’s Interest in People Who Built Something
5.7.3. Ben Sira Was Unaware of Ezra Traditions
5.7.4. Ben Sira’s Universalism versus Ezra’s Particularism
5.7.5. Ben Sira’s Aversion to Reforms
5.7.6. Ben Sira’s Pan-Aaronite Attitude
5.7.7. Different Types of Scribes
5.7.8. Ezra’s Political Quietism as a Reason for His Omission
5.8. Three Foolish Folks in Sir 50:25–26
5.9. Conclusion
6. Ben Sira and Foreign Rule: an Analysis of Short Passages
6.1. Sirach 4:15
6.2. Sirach 8:2
6.3. Sirach 10:1–5
6.4. Sirach 10:8
6.5. Sirach 10:14–18
6.6. Sirach 16:6–10
6.7. Sirach 39:23
6.8. Conclusion
7. Summary
Bibliography
Index of Modern Authors
Index of Passages

Citation preview

M a r k o Marttila Foreign Nations in the Wisdom of Ben Sira

Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Studies Edited by

Friedrich V. Reiterer, Beate Ego, Tobias Nicklas

Volume 13

De Gruyter

Marko Marttila

Foreign Nations in the Wisdom of Ben Sira A Jewish Sage between Opposition and Assimilation

De Gruyter

ISBN 978-3-11-027010-5 e-ISBN 978-3-11-027011-2 ISSN 1865-1666 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication

Data

Marttila, Marko, 1974— Foreign nations in the wisdom of Ben Sira : a Jewish sage between opposition and assimilation / Marko Marttila. p. cm. — (Deuterocanonical and cognate literature studies, ISSN 1865-1666 ; v. 13) Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 978-3-11-027010-5 (hardcover 23 x 15,5 : alk. paper) 1. Gentiles in the Old Testament. 2. Bible. O.T. Apocrypha. Ecclesiasticus — Criticism, interpretation, etc. I. Title. BS1199.N6.M37 2012 229'.406—dc23 2011043914

Bibliographic

information

published

by the Deutsche

Nationalbibliothek

The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.

© 2012 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston Printing: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen VII.< ist unkorrekt". See also Günther Hölbl, Geschichte des Ptolemäerreiches. Politik, Ideologie und religiöse Kultur von Alexander dem Großen "bis zur römischen Eroberung (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2004), 169 (and the illuminating pedigree of the Ptolemaic family in pp. 4 0 3 405). After the death of his co-regent Philometor, Euergetes II consolidated his throne by annihilating all the potential usurpers and other people who could pose a threat. Therefore, the citizens of Alexandria modified the name of the king to "Kakergetes" (= malefactor); Hölbl, Geschichte des Ptolemäerreiches, 172.

12

Skehan and Di Leila, Wisdom, 134.

6

Introduction

Ben Sira and his grandson work in tandem.13 According to Williams, a sixty-year gap between a grandfather and his grandson is plausible. He further argues that Ben Sira published his wisdom work ca. 175 B.C.E. at which time he was about sixty years old and his grandson was an infant. Then the grandson arrived in Egypt in his early forties in 132. When the grandson completed the translation 116/115, he was himself approximately sixty years old. A sixty-year gap between a grandfather and his grandchild is quite normal in our western societies nowadays, but one may with good reason ask, whether it fits with the life of the ancient Near East. It is presumable that in most cases people began to conceive children as soon as they were biologically mature for that. According to a common opinion in Antiquity, the puberty of the boys was passed at about the age of eighteen, but soon after this milestone it was important to get a wife and children, because the life expectancy was not high for ordinary people. Before the Hellenistic period, people who were in their early forties could not expect to live much longer. In Hellenistic Palestine, the average lifetime was probably around fifty years.14 Extremely seldom were there people who achieved the age of seventy years or even eighty years - numbers that are mentioned in Ps 90:10. With this background in mind, it is understandable that fathers and mothers were relatively young adults when their babies were born. This practice is reflected in later rabbinic sources, notably in b. Qidd. 29b which declares that the one, who is twenty and single, lives in sin.15 Is it thus difficult to suppose that Ben Sira was about thirty when the son (or daughter) was born who at the age of thirty became the father (or mother) of the Greek translator? This deduction does not, of course, rule out the possibility that Ben Sira could have had several children, some of them probably born in his early twenties. Nonetheless, it is worth paying attention to a fresh suggestion by Giuseppe Veltri,16 that

13

David S. Williams, "The Date of Ecclesiasticus," VT XLIV (1994): 563-566. Williams's thesis has found acceptance by Perdue, Wisdom Literature, 235.

14

Thomas Pola, "Eine priesterschriftliche Auffassung der Lebensalter (Leviticus 2 7 , 1 8)," in Was ist der Mensch, dass du seiner gedenkst? (Psalm 8,5). Aspekte einer theologische Anthropologie. Festschrift für Bernd Janowski zum 65. Geburtstag (ed. M. Bauks et al.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 2008) 389-408 (397,403-405). Pola, "Lebensalter," 396.

15 16

Giuseppe Veltri, Libraries, Translations, and 'Canonic' Texts: The Septuagint, Aquila and Ben Sira in the Jewish and Christian Traditions (JSJSup; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 201. As such the word nänno*; is a hapax legomenon in the LXX. The Book of Exodus uses nponannos once (Exod 10:6), and 3 Macc 2:21 employs mpomaTwp; see Christian Wagner, Die Septuaginta-Hapaxlegomena im Buch Jesus Sirach. Untersuchungen zu Wortwahl

7

The Historical Figure of Ben Sira

we should understand the Greek word mammo? in the translator's prologue in a broader sense than usually has occurred. Instead of referring solely to grandfather, this word in Classical Greek often denotes forefather as well. Such a use of the term can be found, for instance, by Plato and Josephus. In Ant. 8.155, Josephus calls Abraham "our forefather" (o mammo? ^wv). This kind of interpretation of mammo? would provide us with a wider framework, and instead of only one generation between Ben Sira and the Greek translator of his work, there could have been two generations. There is another possibility which must be seriously reckoned that the information provided by the prologue is fictitious: there was no family relationship between Ben Sira and the later translator at all. Such a reference in the prologue has only been composed to gain more prestige for the translated text.17 In any case, the translator had to convince his audience of his own trustworthiness, and this explains why the prologue was composed.18 und Wortbildung unter besonderer Berücksichtigung des textkritischen technischen Aspekts (BZAW 282; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1999), 127.

und

übersetzungs-

17

Hjelm, The Samaritans and Early Judaism, 130, argues that the using of the grandfather as authority for a manuscript is a well-known pseudonymous device. Therefore, this reference should not be given too much credit as an indication of authorial identity. Unfortunately, Hjelm does not mention any ancient parallels for the prologue of the Greek Ben Sira.

18

For further details, see Anssi Voitila, "For Those Who Love Learning. How the Reader Is Persuaded to Study the Book of Ben Sira as a Translation," in Houses Full of All Good Things. Essays in Memory of Timo Veijola (ed. J. Pakkala and M. Nissinen; PFES 95: Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008), 451-460. According to Veltri, it was important for the author of the prologue to stress that the translation was made in Egypt where the other books of LXX originated. In other words, Egypt was in the "grandson's" mind a synonym for a place of translational activities. This explains w h y the "grandson" moved from Palestine to Egypt. See Giuseppe Veltri, Eine Tora für den König Talmai. Untersuchungen zum Ubersetzungsverständnis in der jüdischhellenistischen und rabbinischen Literatur (TSAJ 41; Tübingen: Mohr, 1994), 133-140. In fact, however, it seems that the Greek translations of the Biblical books were made not only in Alexandria, but also in Leontopolis (the Book of Isaiah?), in Palestine, and in the eastern diaspora; Martin Rösel, "Schreiber, Ubersetzer, Theologen. Die Septuaginta als Dokument der Schrift-, Lese-, und Ubersetzungskulturen des Judentums," in Die Septuaginta - Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten. Internationale Fachtagung veranstaltet von Septuaginta Deutsch (LXX.D), Wuppertal 20.-23. Juli 2006 (ed. M. Karrer and W. Kraus; W U N T 219; Tübingen: Mohr, 2008), 83-102 (89). An interesting but remote parallel to the translator's prologue in the Greek Sirach is the epilogue in the Greek Esther: "In the fourth year of the reign of Ptolemy and Cleopatra, Dositheus, who said that he was a priest and a Levite, and his son Ptolemy brought to Egypt the preceding Letter about Purim, which they said was authentic and had been translated by Lysimachus son of Ptolemy, one of the residents of Jerusalem" (English translation according to NRSV). As the translator's prologue to Sirach, this addi-

8

Introduction

Uncertainties always remain in calculations when our sources are so minimal, but, in my opinion, we could still accept Williams's suggestion as a working hypothesis. If we count years backwards from 175 the supposed year of Ben Sira's death - we may assume that Ben Sira was probably born sometime between 240-230 B.C.E. We do not know whether he was born in Jerusalem, or in some other town or in a rural area. During his career he certainly was active in Jerusalem, as the Greek translation mentions in its epilogue: (50:27) naiJstav avveaewg xa\ IMIOR^^S ijapoJcßv iv T W ßtßAt'W T O U T « ' I ^ A O U S M O S Stpa^ EAsa^ap 6 'Ispoo"oAu^tT^s, §s ävw^ßp^o"sv