The Letter of Aristeas: 'Aristeas to Philocrates' or 'on the Translation of the Law of the Jews' (Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature): 8 [Annotated] 3110439042, 9783110439045

Table of contents :
Preface
Table of Contents
I. INTRODUCTION
1. The Present Commentary
2. Historical Value
3. Title of the Book
4. The Author of Aristeas and His Provenance
5. Date
6. Textual Criticism
a. The Manuscripts
b. Josephus and Eusebius
7. Integrity of Aristeas and Its Sources
8. Genre, Literary Forms and Structure
a. Genre
b. Literary Forms
c. Structure
9. Relation to Other Jewish Literature
10. Audience and Purpose
II. GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY
Editions and Translations
Other Literature
III. TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY
Preface (§§ 1–8)
The Library Project (§§ 9–11)
The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27)
Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a)
Ptolemy II’s Letter to Eleazar (§§ 34b–40)
Eleazar’s Reply to Ptolemy (§§ 41–51a)
The Construction of the King’s Gifts (§§ 51b–82)
Ptolemy Requisitions Gifts for the Jerusalem Temple (§§ 51b–56)
The Table (§§ 57–72)
The Bowls (§§ 73–82)
Jerusalem and its Environs (§§ 83–120)
The Temple (§§ 84–87)
The Temple’s Water System (§§ 88–91)
The Priests and Their Ministrations (§§ 92–95)
The High Priest’s Vestments (§§ 96–99)
The Citadel (§§ 100–104)
The City and Its Streets (§§ 105–106)
The Surrounding Countryside and Comparison to Alexandria (§§ 107–111)
Palestine and its Resources (§§ 112–118)
The Mines of Arabia (§§ 119–120)
Eleazar’s Farewell to the Translators (§§ 121–127)
Eleazar’s Apologia for the Law (§§ 128–171)
Why Distinguish between Clean and Unclean Animals (§§ 128–133)
Eleazar Criticizes Gentile Idol Worship (§§ 134–139)
The Purpose of Kosher Law (§§ 140–143)
Kosher Laws Explained Allegorically (§§ 144–157)
Tefillin and Mezuzot (§§ 158–160)
Kosher Laws Continued (§§ 161–171)
The Reception of the Translators at Alexandria (§§ 172–186)
Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 1)
The Symposia (§§ 187–300)
The First Symposium (§§ 187–202)
The Second Symposium (§§ 203–220)
The Third Symposium (§§ 221–235)
The Fourth Symposium (§§ 236–247)
The Fifth Symposium (§§ 248–261)
The Sixth Symposium (§§ 262–274)
The Seventh Symposium (§§ 275–292)
Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 2)
Aristeas’s Praise of the Translators (§§ 295–300)
The Execution of the Translation (§§ 301–307)
The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316)
The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321)
Epilogue (§ 322)
Abbreviations
Index of Names and Subjects
Index of Ancient Sources
Index of Modern Authors

Citation preview

Benjamin G. Wright III The Letter of Aristeas

Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature (CEJL)

Edited by Loren T. Stuckenbruck and Pieter W. van der Horst · Hermann Lichtenberger Doron Mendels · James R. Mueller

De Gruyter

Benjamin G. Wright III

The Letter of Aristeas ‘Aristeas to Philocrates’ or ‘On the Translation of the Law of the Jews’

De Gruyter

ISBN 978-3-11-043904-5 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-043134-6 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-043149-0 ISSN 1861-6003

Library of Congress – Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. 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.dnb.de. © 2015 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Typesetting: Dörlemann Satz GmbH & Co. KG, Lemförde Printing and binding: Hubert & Co GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

IN LOVING MEMORY OF MY DAD TERRY WEBER (OCTOBER 30, 1927–MAY 21, 2015)

WHO TAUGHT ME THAT SAILING IS MORE THAN BEING IN A BOAT IT IS A LESSON IN LIVING

Preface No one writes a book on one’s own, and I have certainly not written this one alone. This project has taken much longer than I had anticipated when I first agreed to do it, and so, I have many people to thank, some for their direct input and effect on what ultimately I thought and wrote and others for saving my sanity and offering the emotional and spiritual support that I needed to complete this project. My first expression of gratitude goes to Loren Stuckenbruck, who is one of the finest people that I know. I ended up writing this particular commentary, because at a very difficult time in my life, he showed me great compassion for which I am grateful to him. I thank him for his patience in waiting for a book that I should have sent him long ago. He also encouraged me and provided important feedback for me at various stages of the work. His graduate assistant Amanda Bledsoe also read the manuscript and made numerous helpful suggestions. There are many scholarly colleagues to whom I owe a great debt for their encouragement and support, and in the same manner as so many other prefaces that I have read, I ask forgiveness of anyone whose name I have omitted inadvertently. Hindy Najman has been a constant conversation partner. She is one of the most collaborative colleagues I know. I am indebted to her for always pushing me to think farther down the path than where I am. Many colleagues have read or heard pieces of this commentary over the years, either through direct conversation or giving feedback on sections of the text or answering my questions, and they all have had an impact on the final product. Others have been consistently encouraging of this project, especially at times when I thought it would never materialize. I am grateful to Sylvie Honigman, Erich Gruen, Albert Pietersma, Cameron Boyd-Taylor, Tessa Rajak, Jan Joosten, Jim Aitken, Eibert Tigchelaar, Robert Kraft, Annette Yoshiko Reed, Steven Fraade, Robert Hiebert, Sidnie Crawford, Judith Newman, Liv Lied, Matthias Henze, Esther Chazon, Adele Reinhartz, Charlotte Hempel, Alison Salvesen, Michael Law, Géza Xeravits, Josef Zsengellér, Gabriele Boccaccini, Francis Borchardt, Eva Mroczek, Myles Schoonover, Stewart Moore. Whatever shortcomings this book has rest on my shoulders alone, however. Over the years, I have had opportunities to speak about the Letter of Aristeas at a number of

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institutions and seminars, and this commentary has benefited from every one of those conversations. I appreciate the kind invitations to speak and all of the questions and challenges that came my way on those occasions. They all helped to sharpen my thinking and to make this a better work of scholarship. I have received valuable support from my colleagues at my home institution, Lehigh University. Specifically my thanks go to the Humanities Center and its director Edurne Portela for a generous summer grant in 2009 and to my former student Deborah Streahle, who spent a summer as a research assistant in 2009 tracking down available images of manuscripts of Aristeas. Marian Gaumer, the Academic Coordinator in the Religion Studies Department, always has a positive and encouraging word to say. I am especially indebted to my Lehigh faculty colleagues, Suzanne Edwards, Khurram Hussain, Bill Bulman, Rob Rozehnal and Roslyn Weiss. I owe a special expression of gratitude to my colleague and my friend of 35 years – although that word seems inadequate to the relationship that we have had all this time – Michael Raposa. We have seen many joyful and difficult times together, and he has supported my work in myriad ways as friend, colleague and department chair. On a personal level, my family and many friends have lived through this process with me. In so many ways, their contributions have ranked right up with those of my scholarly colleagues, since laughter, consolation, music, a shared meal and a good bottle of wine (or two) are all good for the soul. Many thanks to Frank and Michele Pappalardo, Bill and Carole Schachter, Roy and Cheryl Donkin, and my breakfast club, Rick Santee and Don Kirts. Thanks to my sister and brother-in-law, Carol and Chaz Hutchison for all the rides to the airport. Finally, I owe the greatest debt to my family – my spouse Mary and my three children, Rachel, Nathan and Kate. Without them and their love, the rest means nothing. Mary has been the single greatest support anyone could hope for, and she has taught me the true meaning of the word partner. As I have written this book, my children have moved from middle school to high school through college and into their adult lives. It has been a delight watching them mature, and I could not be more proud of them. To the most important people in my life, I dedicate this book. Bethlehem, PA January 14, 2015

Benjamin G. Wright

Table of Contents Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VII

I. INTRODUCTION 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

The Present Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Historical Value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Title of the Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Author of Aristeas and His Provenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Date . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Textual Criticism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . a. The Manuscripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . b. Josephus and Eusebius. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7. Integrity of Aristeas and Its Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8. Genre, Literary Forms and Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . a. Genre. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . b. Literary Forms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . c. Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9. Relation to Other Jewish Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10. Audience and Purpose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3 6 15 16 21 30 31 33 35 43 43 51 53 59 62

II. GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY Editions and Translations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Other Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

77 78

III. TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY Preface (§§ 1–8) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 The Library Project (§§ 9–11) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121 Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

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Ptolemy II’s Letter to Eleazar (§§ 34b–40) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Eleazar’s Reply to Ptolemy (§§ 41–51a) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Construction of the King’s Gifts (§§ 51b–82) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ptolemy Requisitions Gifts for the Jerusalem Temple (§§ 51b–56) The Table (§§ 57–72) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Bowls (§§ 73–82) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jerusalem and its Environs (§§ 83–120) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Temple (§§ 84–87) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Temple’s Water System (§§ 88–91) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Priests and Their Ministrations (§§ 92–95) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The High Priest’s Vestments (§§ 96–99) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Citadel (§§ 100–104) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The City and Its Streets (§§ 105–106) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Surrounding Countryside and Comparison to Alexandria (§§ 107–111). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Palestine and its Resources (§§ 112–118) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Mines of Arabia (§§ 119–120) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Eleazar’s Farewell to the Translators (§§ 121–127) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Eleazar’s Apologia for the Law (§§ 128–171) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Why Distinguish between Clean and Unclean Animals (§§ 128–133). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Eleazar Criticizes Gentile Idol Worship (§§ 134–139) . . . . . . . . . . The Purpose of Kosher Law (§§ 140–143) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Kosher Laws Explained Allegorically (§§ 144–157) . . . . . . . . . . . Tefillin and Mezuzot (§§ 158–160) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Kosher Laws Continued (§§ 161–171) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Reception of the Translators at Alexandria (§§ 172–186) . . . . . . Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Symposia (§§ 187–300). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The First Symposium (§§ 187–202). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Second Symposium (§§ 203–220). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Third Symposium (§§ 221–235) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Fourth Symposium (§§ 236–247) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Fifth Symposium (§§ 248–261) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Sixth Symposium (§§ 262–274) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Seventh Symposium (§§ 275–292) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Aristeas’s Praise of the Translators (§§ 295–300) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Execution of the Translation (§§ 301–307) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

156 165 177 177 182 189 193 193 200 204 207 213 219 221 227 233 236 246 246 256 266 271 292 302 313 327 335 335 352 367 378 387 400 410 424 429 433

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The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441 The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453 Epilogue (§ 322). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457 Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Index of Names and Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Index of Ancient Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Index of Modern Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

459 462 478 497

I. INTRODUCTION

1. The Present Commentary The Letter of Aristeas is in some ways an understudied work. This might seem like a strange statement to those who know the bibliography on this product of Alexandrian Judaism, since it figures prominently in a wide range of introductions to Second Temple Jewish Literature and in various scholarly studies, from those concerned with Aristeas itself to those in which Aristeas serves as evidence for the nature of Alexandrian and/or Hellenistic Judaism in the second century BCE (or as a precursor to Philo). Of course, it occupies a central place in any discussion about the origins of the Septuagint. Indeed, the work is one of the few complete Jewish texts from Alexandria in its period, and thus, it is an indispensible source of potential information about both the Jewish community in Alexandria and elite, educated Jews in the Hellenistic world during the Ptolemaic period. At the same time, however, the kinds of studies that one might expect of such an important text have not really been done. Very few monographs have been devoted to it, and there has not really been a complete and full commentary written on the work. The closest thing to a real commentary one encounters is Raffaele Tramontano’s 1931 volume, La Lettera di Aristeas a Filocrate, which is subtitled Introduzione, Testo, Versione e Commento.1 The commentary, however, is given as extended annotations in footnotes to the text and accompanying Italian translation, and Tramontano concentrates mostly on textual and linguistic matters, particularly the relationship between the Greek of Aristeas and the papyri. Prior to Tramontano most of the scholarly work on Aristeas took the form of editions of the text and translations, sometimes with longer or shorter notes. (See the bibliography at the end of this introduction.) A short time after Tramontano, Henry Meecham produced two volumes on Aristeas, which are not commentaries proper but rather a series of studies on various aspects of the work. The first, The Oldest Version of the Bible: ‘Aristeas’ on Its Traditional Origin. A Study in Early Apologetic with Translation and Appendices, is an expansion of Meecham’s Hartley Lecture in which he discusses

1

(Naples: Ufficio Succursale della Civilta Cattolica, 1931).

4

I. Introduction

its “historical value, literary character, and teaching.”2 The second, The Letter of Aristeas: A Linguistic Study with Special Reference to the Greek Bible, treats vocabulary, grammar, style and diction and includes almost 150 pages of notes on individual words.3 While these studies are invaluable for any study of Aristeas, they do not do the work of a full-fledged commentary. In German P. Riessler made a translation with short notes in Altjüdisches Schriftum ausserhalb der Bibel.4 In 1951, Moses Hadas published a volume dedicated to Aristeas in the Dropsie College Jewish Apocryphal Literature series that included an extensive introduction, text and annotations.5 Hadas’s annotations were substantially shorter than Tramontano’s, and it is clear that he relied on his Italian predecessor in numerous places. In 1962, André Pelletier published his critical text of Aristeas in the Sources Chrétiennes series, which was accompanied by a French translation and notes.6 Pelletier completely reexamined a number of the manuscripts of the work and included several that were not known to earlier editors of Aristeas. While Pelletier’s is the best critical text available (and the one on which this commentary is based), his notes are sparser than even Hadas’s. The situation had not really changed even up to 2003, when Sylvie Honigman published the most recent monograph on Aristeas, as an examination of her bibliography demonstrates.7 This commentary, then, is meant to help fill a rather gaping hole in the scholarship on Aristeas, since it is really the first full-length commentary on the work, Tramontano’s volume notwithstanding. This circumstance

2 3 4 5

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(London: Holborn, 1932) iii. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1935). (Augsburg: Dr. Benno Filser Verlag G. m. b. H., 1928) 193–233. Aristeas to Philocrates (Letter of Aristeas) (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1951). The text was a reproduction of H. St. John Thackeray’s critical text published as “Appendix. The Letter of Aristeas” in Henry Barclay Swete, An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1902), Introduction 501–18; Text 519–74. Lettre d’Aristée a Philocrate: Introduction, Texte critique, Traduction et Notes, Index complet des Mots grecs (Sources Chrétiennes 89; Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1962). The Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria: A Study in the Narrative of the Letter of Aristeas (London/New York: Routledge, 2003). The same issue appears to be true of two volumes that were not available to me: Clara Kraus-Reggiani, La Lettera di Aristea a Filocrate. Introduzione – Esame analitico – Traduzione (Rome: Universitá di Roma, Istituto di filologia classica, 1979) and Frederic Raurell, Carta d’Arísteas. Introducció, text revisat, traducció i notes (Barcelona: Institut Cambó – Fundació Bíblica Catalana, 2002).

1. The Present Commentary

5

places certain responsibilities on the commentator, and I have felt those responsibilities most acutely. In this commentary, I do not claim to have answered all the questions posed about Aristeas. On the contrary, I am sure that I have not even addressed all the questions that might be asked of it. I can assure the reader that I have been as diligent as possible in trying to dig down underneath scholarly claims about this work to the evidence on which these claims are based. Anyone who has worked in this field has had the experience of examining scholarly assertions that have been transmitted through several scholarly generations only to discover at times how little basis exists for them. So, if someone argues that Aristeas’s author is familiar with Aristotle, for example, I have gone to the pertinent passages in Aristotle in order to make an independent assessment of that argument. In that sense, I have tried not simply to repeat what other scholars have said about the book, but I have examined for myself the basis on which they have said it. At the same time, it would be impossible to include all of the previous scholarship on the book. Meecham’s notes on vocabulary, as I noted above, number close to 150 pages. To try to include everything would result in a commentary of multiple volumes. Furthermore, since Aristeas is the only complete narrative that gives an account of the Septuagint’s origins, it receives attention for what scholars think it contributes to the quest for understanding those origins. Given the current state of Septuagint Studies, however, the question of Septuagint origins would require its own lengthy monograph. The same is true for reconstructions of the Jewish community in Alexandria in the second century BCE. Although I recognize that Aristeas offers critical evidence for the status of Jews in Alexandria and for the nature of Judaism there, I do not see it as my task to make a reconstruction of that community. At times I will of necessity comment on how Aristeas might bear on such problems, but in this commentary my primary interest is in Aristeas as a literary product of Alexandrian Judaism, and I am not worried about the historical questions of the origins of the Septuagint or the nature of the Alexandrian Jewish community. Thus, the reader should not expect to find discussions of these historical problems. My aim in this commentary, then, is to address what I see as the most critical issues in Aristeas, to argue for particular ways of reading the book, to illuminate as much as possible, and to direct readers to more specialized studies that can take them further into the topic. Others will have to judge how successful I have been in achieving this goal.

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2. Historical Value Over the course of its transmission history, Aristeas gained popularity primarily because it contained the legend of the Septuagint’s origins, which itself has undergone a long and varied history, both as part of Aristeas and excerpted from it.8 Josephus gives an extensive paraphrase of the work in Antiquities 12, although his narrative lacks some sections. Philo almost certainly knew Aristeas, and it served as the basis for his story of the translation in Life of Moses 2.25–44.9 Early Christians held the work in high esteem precisely because it purported to narrate the origins of their scriptures. In the fourth century, the Church Father Eusebius of Caesarea (Preparation for the Gospel 8.2–5; 9.38) cited large sections of the work. In the course of Aristeas’s transmission, the story of the translation developed from the narrative in Aristeas that portrays the translators working cooperatively to the decidedly miraculous account epitomized in the story as Epiphanius of Salamis tells it in his tractate On Weights and Measures § 3. In antiquity both Jews and Christians accepted the legend as an historically accurate account of the Septuagint’s origins. In the sixteenth century, however, Luis Vives in his commentary on Augustine’s City of God (1522) expressed doubt that Aristeas could have been written by an eyewitness to the events. A century and a half later, the Oxford scholar, Humphrey Hody, in his Contra Historiam LXX Interpretum Aristeae nominae

8

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This commentary is not the place for an in-depth study of the various forms of the legend from antiquity onwards, especially in its later versions separated from its original context in Aristeas. In any case, that study has already been written. See Abraham Wasserstein and David J. Wasserstein, The Legend of the Septuagint: From Classical Antiquity to Today (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006). I use the term “Septuagint” in this commentary to indicate the Greek translation of the Pentateuch, since that is ostensibly what the author means when he refers to the “legislation” of the Jews. Often the term “Septuagint” is meant to cover the entire corpus of the Jewish-Greek scriptures, some of which are translations and some of which were composed in Greek. For a plea to use the term Septuagint in this more restricted sense while using the abbreviation LXX/OG (Septuagint/Old Greek) for the larger corpus, see Benjamin G. Wright, “The Septuagint and Its Modern Translators,” in Die Septuaginta–Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten: Internationale Fachtagung veranstaltet von Septuaginta Deutsch (LXX.D), Wuppertal 20.–23. Juli 2006 (Ed. Wolfgang Kraus and Martin Karrer; WUNT 219; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 103–14. See Wassertein and Wasserstein, Legend, 37–45 and Francis Borchardt, “Philo’s Use of Aristeas and the Question of Authority,” delivered at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature.

2. Historical Value

7

inscriptam Dissertatio (1684), made an extensive argument proving that Aristeas could not be an historical account. In his opinion, Aristeas was a Hellenistic Jewish forgery intended to claim authority for the Septuagint.10 Hody writes about Aristeas: “I am not unaware that manuscript copies of Aristeas are preserved in the Royal Library at Paris and elsewhere. But for such a trifling work, which I reject completely as a suppositious foundling, I did not regard it as worth while to trouble my friends and to send to distant places.”11 Hody intended this disparaging conclusion, which subtly appeals to anti-Jewish tropes, to prove convincingly that the Septuagint could not have been an inspired and holy text. Although some scholars after him tried to overcome his arguments against Aristeas’s historicity – most especially Isaac Vossius argued strongly against Hody’s conclusions – none successfully pushed them aside, and subsequent scholarship, taking cues from Hody’s analysis, generally ignored Aristeas. Contemporary scholars are largely agreed that Hody’s assessment of Aristeas as a forgery inaugurated a period of relative neglect of the work. Scholarly neglect of Aristeas also had to do with why scholars were interested in the work in the first place. For the most part, scholars have turned to Aristeas primarily in order to reconstruct the origins of the Septuagint. Other than the story preserved in Aristeas, the only other early account of the Septuagint’s origins comes in a fragment of the Alexandrian Jewish writer Aristobulus, which is an apocopated and variant form of the story told in Aristeas. Since it is really the longest and most complete source available, scholars have mined it for its potential information about how the translations came about, with the attendant consequence that those parts of the work that do not deal specifically with the Septuagint’s origins receive very little attention.12 Hody’s work had established successfully the general framework in which discussions of the historical value of Aristeas would be conducted right up to the present day. The discovery of large caches of papyri in Egypt in the nineteenth century fanned the historicist flames, since these docu-

10

11

12

See Gordon Goodwin, “Humphrey Hody,” in The Dictionary of National Biography (Vol. 26; London: Smith Elder & Co., 1891) 77–78. Hody reissued his Contra Historiam LXX incorporated into his treatise De Bibliorum Textibus Originibus, Versionibus Graecis, et Latine Vulgata (1705). The quote is cited by Hadas in his commentary (Aristeas to Philocrates, 84). For a convenient summary of the early modern study of Aristeas, see Sidney Jellicoe, The Septuagint and Modern Study (Oxford: Clarendon, 1968) 30–35. Gabriele Boccaccini, Middle Judaism: Jewish Thought, 300 B. C.E. to 200 C.E. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991) 163–64 briefly makes the same point.

8

I. Introduction

ments clearly demonstrated not only that the Septuagint was translated largely into the koine Greek used in Egypt but also that Aristeas itself was a genuine Hellenistic Jewish document. The question of historical value, however, still gets framed in the terms that Hody established in the seventeenth century, even if they are tweaked somewhat. Although almost all scholars recognize that Aristeas was written sometime in the second century BCE and the translation of the Pentateuch most likely was accomplished in the third century – thus, the author indeed lived a considerable time after the events that he describes – if genuine historical reminiscences can be found in the work, then at the least, Aristeas must preserve some historical memory of the origins of the translations. The only question is how much genuine material does one need to make a case for Aristeas’s general trustworthiness? It is understandable and natural that scholars would mine Aristeas for any possible historical information, since this narrative is the only one that has any claim to the possibility of preserving some memory of the Septuagint’s origins. Outside of it we know nothing at all about the translation’s genesis.13 Thus, Aristeas naturally has been the primary focal point for anyone trying to uncover the origins of what served as the sacred scriptures for many Hellenistic Jews as well as early Christians. Two consequences of Aristeas’s uniqueness have affected contemporary Septuagint scholarship. First, some scholars have attempted explicitly to revive Aristeas as an historical source, at least in part – mostly to allow for royal patronage to play a role in the translation’s beginnings.14 Thus, Honigman proposes an ingenious solution to the problem of royal patronage and deposit in the Alexandrian Library, suggesting that initative for the translation project came from the Jewish community in order to enhance its prestige in Hellenistic Alexandria. Unable to support the project on its own, the community turned to the king for support, which it received. A copy of the Septuagint was deposited in the Library only much later, in the time of the writing of Aristeas, in connection with the founding of the Jewish politeuma in the 160s BCE. Thus, royal patronage and deposit in

13

14

See below in section 5 for a discussion of the relationship between Aristobulus and Aristeas. See especially, Elias Bickerman, “The Septuagint as a Translation,” in Studies in Jewish and Christian History (vol. 1; Leiden: Brill, 1976) 167–200; Nina Collins, The Library in Alexandria & the Bible in Greek (VTSup 82; Leiden: Brill, 2000); Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, chaps. 5–6; Tessa Rajak, Translation & Survival: The Greek Bible of the Ancient Jewish Diaspora (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009) chap. 2.

2. Historical Value

9

the Library took place almost a century apart.15 Tessa Rajak also takes royal involvement seriously, although she sidesteps in some respects issues of historicity by calling Aristeas “historical myth,” which represents “an understanding of the past shared within a group and (somehow) among its individual members.”16 Thus, the distinction between fact and fiction becomes meaningless. Yet, Rajak argues that what we read in Aristeas comports with what we know of early Ptolemaic Alexandria and that the Septuagint was translated for reasons of prestige – on the part of Jews who wanted to “go Greek” and also on the part of the king who “gained prestige from his control of a foreign law code.”17 At its core, Rajak wants to have her cake and eat it too, since for her historical myth likely preserves some memories of the actual events. Ultimately, however, Rajak finds royal involvement plausible and thus likely, despite all of Aristeas’s other problems. Yet, plausibility does not necessitate historical veracity, and Aristeas’s story of royal patronage might well be little more than the product of a convincing author.18 Finally, Arie van der Kooij imagines that the work of translation could only have been done by scholars imported from Jerusalem for the express purpose of placing it in the Library, because “[i]t was only natural to make the Greek version of the Pentateuch available in the library.”19 A second consequence emerging from the recognition of Aristeas’s uniqueness is that the work often functions as the implicit framework within which theories of Septuagint origins are set, and thus, its claims about the nature of the Septuagint are accepted as genuine indications of

15 16 17 18

19

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 136–39. Rajak, Translation & Survival, 47. Rajak, Translation & Survival, 86, 88. For an argument that Aristeas deliberately creates a fictional account that his readers would have understood as fiction, see Sara Raup Johnson, Historical Fictions and Hellenistic Jewish Identity: Third Maccabees in its Cultural Context (Hellenistic Culture and Society 43; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004) 35–38. Arie van der Kooij, “The Septuagint of the Pentateuch and Ptolemaic Rule,” in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance (Ed. Gary N. Knoppers and Bernard M. Levinson; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 299; see also idem, “Perspectives on the Study of the Septuagint: Who are the Translators?” in Perspectives in the Study of the Old Testament and Judaism: A Symposium in Honour of Adam S. van der Woude on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday (Ed. Florentino García Martínez and Ed Noort; VTSup 73; Leiden: Brill, 1998) 214–29. Natalio Fernández Marcos, “The Greek Pentateuch and the Scholarly Milieu of Alexandria,” Semitica et Classica 2 (2009) 81–9, also sees the Library as the most likely milieu for the translation.

10

I. Introduction

the Septuagint’s original context.20 Whether the Septuagint is understood to have been translated for use in liturgy21 or to serve as the law code for the Jews,22 one can detect the influence of Aristeas in the reconstructions, even if some of Ps.-Aristeas’s claims have to be discarded as unhistorical. One problem that Rajak’s approach brings to the fore is the issue of the extent to which we should look to what Irene Peirano calls “fakes” as providing, whether intentional or not, any communication of historical reality.23 Although Peirano studies Roman period pseudepigrapha, her assessment of these texts fits well the issues that we encounter with Aristeas. The practice of producing fakes was grounded in rhetorical education in which both role-play and fictionality occupied central positions.24 An important feature of rhetorical education required the student to adopt the persona of another person, and indeed these impersonating exercises, called prosopopoeiae, comprised one of the progymnasmata or elementary rhetorical exercises students were expected to master. In these the student often adopted the identity of a fictional speaker before the audience, which itself was fully aware of and participated in the fiction that the speech created.25 In this way, then, pseudepigrapha of these sorts contain a slippage between the historical and the fictional. That is, the speaker might well appeal to historical events or persons without necessarily intending to pass off the speech as what actually happened, and we should not look to texts that display the characeristics of rhetorical education (as does Aristeas) and

20

21

22

23

24 25

For a description and critique of some recent theories and the place of Aristeas as their implicit or explicit frameworks, see Benjamin G. Wright, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Question of Septuagint Origins Redux,” JAJ 2 (2011) 304–26. H. St. John Thackeray, The Septuagint and Jewish Worship: A Study in Origins (London: Oxford University Press, 1921). See especially Joseph Mélèze Modrzejewski, The Jews of Egypt from Rameses II to Emperor Hadrian (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1995 [translation of original French publication from 1992]); Dominique Barthélemy, “Pourquoi la Torah a-t-elle été traduite en grec?” in On Language, Culture, and Religion: In Honor of Eugene A. Nida (Ed. Matthew Black and William A. Stanley; Paris: Mouton, 1974) 23–41; Gilles Dorival, “De nouvelles donées sur l’origine de la Septante?” Semitica et Classica 2 (2009) 73–79. Irene Peirano, The Rhetoric of the Roman Fake: Latin Pseudepigrapha in Context (Cambridge: Cambridge Univerity Press, 2012) 3, defines “fakes” as “texts which self-consciously purport either to be the work of the author to whom they are attributed or to be written at a different time from that in which they were composed.” By this definition, Aristeas falls into both categories. Peirano, Rhetoric of the Roman Fake, 25. Peirano, Rhetoric of the Roman Fake, 26.

2. Historical Value

11

that appeal to external, historical realities as having any inherent motivation to present a sober and accurate relating of real events to the reader.26 Since all the evidence of Aristeas points to an author who had a rhetorical education, we would do well to remain suspicious of the picture Ps.-Aristeas paints for us, even if it might seem to be historically plausible. Another major problem with all of the theories that impute some historical veracity to Aristeas is that they accept at face value the construction of Aristeas that the Septuagint was intended at its point of production to replace the Hebrew text from which it was made, a function that is not borne out by the translations themselves. The crux of the problem, it seems to me, lies in what Aristeas claims about the nature of the Septuagint and what we encounter when we look at the Septuagint translations themselves. At this juncture, then, I need to say forthrightly that I do not think that Aristeas has any claim to contain historical recollections of the Septuagint’s origins and that reconstructions of Septuagint origins that rely, even obliquely or indirectly, on the testimony of Aristeas fail on precisely this point. I reach this conclusion based on considerations that are very different from the ones that Hody (and most subsequent scholarship) have employed. Over the course of the history of scholarship on Aristeas, it has become crystal clear that arguments about what elements of the text are historical or unhistorical cannot resolve the issue and that we have to turn to other considerations.27 My conclusions about Aristeas’s lack of historicity rest on theoretical insights from translation studies, particularly the work of Gideon Toury and Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS), and on the methodological underpinnings of the New English Translation of the Septuagint (NETS) project.28 Toury argues that all translations are facts of their target cultures.

26 27

28

Peirano, Rhetoric of the Roman Fake, 31. The following material summarizes arguments that I have made in several earlier publications. Along with the article in the prior footnote, see particularly “Translation as Scripture: The Septuagint in Aristeas and Philo,” in Septuagint Research: Issues and Challenges in the Study of the Greek Jewish Scriptures (Ed. Wolfgang Kraus and R. Glenn Wooden; SBLSCS 53; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2006) 47–61; “The Letter of Aristeas and the Reception History of the Septuagint,” BIOSCS 39 (2006) 47–67; “Transcribing, Translating, and Interpreting in the Letter of Aristeas: On the Nature of the Septuagint,” in Scripture in Transition: Essays on Septuagint, Hebrew Bible and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of Raija Sollamo (Ed. Anssi Voitila and Jutta Jokiranta; JSJSup 126; Leiden: Brill, 2008) 147–61. For the most complete articulation of Toury’s ideas, see Descriptive Translation Studies and beyond (Benjamins Translation Library 4; Amsterdam/Philadelphia:

12

I. Introduction

Moreover, the intended function of a translation (position), its surface makeup (product), and the strategies employed by the translator (process) are intrinsically related.29 For Toury, “the prospective systemic position or function of a translation determines its appropriate surface realization (= textual-linguistic makeup), which governs the strategies whereby a target text (or parts thereof) is derived from its original, and hence the relationships which hold them together.”30 Presumably in such a teleologically driven enterprise as translation, if two of Toury’s three interrelated aspects of translation are known, then one ought to be able to theorize about the unknown third. Of course, this is precisely the situation that we have with the Septuagint. We do not know its original function, but we can get some purchase on its textual-linguistic makeup and on the strategies that the translators used to realize that makeup. When we examine the Septuagint itself through the lens of Toury’s product and process, we find that at its point of production, the Septuagint had a linguistic relationship with its Hebrew parent text, a relationship that can be characterized as subservient and dependent, which means that “the Greek text qua text has a dimension of unintelligibility.”31 Albert Pietersma uses the image of horizontal and vertical dimensions of a translation. On

29 30 31

John Benjamins, 1995). For explanations of NETS principles, see Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright, “To the Reader of NETS,” in A New English Translation of the Septuagint and the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included Under that Title (Ed. Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright; New York: Oxford, 2007); Albert Pietersma, “A New Paradigm for Addressing Old Questions: The Relevance of the Interlinear Model for the Study of the Septuagint,” in Bible and Computer: The Stellenbosch AIBI Conference. Proceedings of the Association Internationale Bible et Informatique “From Alpha to Byte” University of Stellenbosch 17–21 July, 2000 (Ed. Johann Cook; Leiden: Brill, 2002) 337–64; and Cameron Boyd-Taylor, Reading Between the Lines: The Interlinear Paradigm for Septuagint Studies (Biblical Tools and Studies 8; Leuven: Peeters, 2011). See the convenient chart in Toury, Descriptive Translation Studies, 13. Toury, Descriptive Translation Studies, 13. Pietersma, “A New Paradigm,” 350. For more detail, see pp. 350–57. The point here is not whether the Greek is good or not. Rather the issue is the relationship between the Septuagint and its Hebrew parent text and how that relationship emerges in the textual-linguistic makeup of the translation. Almost all Septuagint scholars recognize that at points the Greek of the Septuagint cannot be understood without some recourse to the Hebrew parent. In that sense the Greek text has a dimension of unintelligibility. This is not to say that the Septuagint cannot also display Greek that reads like normal Greek and even at times show literary and rhetorical sensitivity on the part of the translators.

2. Historical Value

13

the horizontal plane, the translator joins morphemes together into syntactical units, but on the vertical plane the source text “forms the de facto context for units of meaning.”32 Thus, the vertical dimension will sometimes interfere with the horizontal plane to such a degree that semantic coherence in the translation suffers. In such cases, the parent text becomes an arbiter of meaning for the translation. Thus, the product and process of the Septuagint point to a relationship with the Hebrew source text at its point of production. In other words, the Septuagint does not appear intended at that point of production to supplant the Hebrew text and to serve as an independent replacement of it. In time, of course, the Septuagint achieved independence from its source text, and in later reception history both the Septuagint’s status as scripture and its independence from its Hebrew source prompted a different assessment of the text, even in those passages where the translation lacked semantic coherence. Achieving independence in the reception history brought along with it a theological assessment that treated the text as if it had been an independent replacement for the Hebrew text all along. Here is where Aristeas enters the picture. The author portrays the Septuagint as being a free-standing replacement for the Hebrew text from its very origins, a translation that served as the sacred scripture of the Alexandrian Jewish community right from the beginning. Yet, this assessment clashes with what we can understand from examining the translation itself. If one were to go solely by the way that the author describes the translation, one would expect the Septuagint to be a well-formed text when judged by the standards of Greek composition, philosophically sophisticated, able to stand its ground in the great Alexandrian Library with any other great work of Greek literature. To use Pietersma’s horizontal-vertical distinction, for Aristeas the linguistic aspects of the Septuagint do not seem to have a vertical dimension; the Septuagint can stand on its own in the same way that a work of Greek composition can. All of the divine and philosophical qualities of the Hebrew text inhere in the translation – and here the vertical dimension is at least recognized – but for Aristeas the Septuagint could reside in the Alexandrian Library with all the other great works of Greek literature, its textual-linguistic makeup presumably indistinguishable from any of those other texts. Since Aristeas’s assessment of the Septuagint appears so out of step with what we observe in the translations themelves, what was Aristeas’s author

32

Pietersma, “A New Paradigm,” 351.

14

I. Introduction

trying to achieve?33 In short – and this will get played out throughout the commentary – by the time of Aristeas’s composition in the second century BCE, the Septuagint had indeed become separated from its parent text, and Jews regarded it as their sacred scripture, an independent replacement for the Hebrew parent. In Toury’s language, its position had changed from what it was at the time of its translation. Aristeas offers its readers a myth of origins for its status at the time of Aristeas’s composition.34 All of the elements of the narrative play some role in arguing that the Septuagint originated as an independent replacement for the Hebrew and was accepted from the start as the sacred scripture of the Alexandrian Jewish community. Yet, if position, product and process are related as Toury argues, I find it hard to see how Aristeas’s version of the Septuagint’s origins can account for the textual-linguistic makeup that we observe in the Septuagint itself. The inability of Aristeas’s story to explain the Septuagint as we have it pushes me to the conclusion that the Letter of Aristeas witnesses to the reception history of the Septuagint and not to its point of production. Aristeas gives an account of the Septuagint and its status in the second century BCE, which the author projected back to its origins. I conclude this short section by reproducing my earlier conclusions about Aristeas of which I remain convinced: Aristeas does not contain any genuine reflection of the original intended function of the LXX; it legitimizes what the LXX had become by the middle part of the second century BCE. In other words, Aristeas offers us a foundation myth of origins for the LXX’s transformed function/position as an independent, scriptural authority. The story in Aristeas of the translation of the LXX, then, belongs to the reception history of the LXX, and it has practically no evidentiary relevance for the question of the origins of the translation. Those origins remain clouded, but because Aristeas contains the oldest “account” of the making of the translation, it exerts a seductive power on those investigating the circumstances in which the LXX originated. However much we might be tempted to adopt its viewpoint, Aristeas testifies to a place in the process of transmission of the LXX at which the translation had become independent and scriptural. In the end, however, we must search for the intended function of the

33

34

Of course, the author presumes that the same group of translators rendered the entire Pentateuch – that is, it is a single translation – when it is clear that different translators produced the five books of the Pentateuch. I used the term “myth of origins” in “The Letter of Aristeas and the Reception History of the Septuagint.” Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 37–41, uses the designation “charter myth” and argues that Aristeas’s purpose was “to turn the story of the origins of the LXX into a myth” (p. 41). In many ways we agree on basic points about Aristeas. In contrast to the position I outlined above, Honigman wants to retain some aspects of historicity for Aristeas.

3. Title of the Book

15

LXX not in the external sources, but in the place where Toury’s model predicts it will be found, in the textual-linguistic makeup of the third-century BCE translation itself.35

3. Title of the Book We do not know securely what the work’s actual title was. The earliest attestation of a possible title comes in Josephus’s paraphrase of large portions of the text in Antiquities Book 12 (1st c. CE), although it could just as easily be read as a description of the work rather than a proper title. Speaking of the symposia that king Ptolemy II Philadelphus organized for the Jewish translators, Josephus writes in 12.100: “… so that whoever wishes to know the details of the questions at the banquet can learn them by reading the book of Aristaios, which he composed on this account” (ὡς τῷ βουλομένῳ τὰ κατὰ μέρος γνῶναι τῶν ἐν τῷ συμποσίῳ ζητηθέντων εἶναι μαθεῖν ἀναγνόντι τὸ Ἀρισταίου βιβλίον, ὃ συνέγραψε διὰ ταῦτα). Philo of Alexandria (1st c. CE), who as an Alexandrian at least would have been in a position to know Aristeas and probably knew the story of the translation of the Pentateuch from the work, does not acknowledge his source for the story, and thus, we learn nothing from him about Aristeas’s original title. Eusebius of Caesarea (4th c. CE), who also transmits significant portions of Aristeas in his Preparation for the Gospel Book 9, gives the title as he knew it in the fourth century: “But Aristeas also in the book that he wrote On the Translation of the Law of the Jews [περὶ τῆς ἑρμενείας τοῦ τῶν Ἰουδαίων νόμου] …” (9.38). Epiphanius of Salamis (315–ca. 403 CE) simply refers to Aristeas’s “composition” or “treatise” (σύνταγμα), a very general term that almost certainly does not constitute a specific title. Within the Greek manuscript tradition, the most frequent designation is simply “Aristeas to Philocrates” (Ἀριστέας Φιλόκρατει). The first known attestation of the title of the work as a letter is found in the 14th century manuscript designated Q (Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris 950), which transmits fragments of Aristeas.36 These excerpts bear the heading “From the Epistle of Aristeas to Philocrates (ἐπιστολῆς Ἀρεστέως πρὸς

35 36

Wright, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Reception History of the Septuagint,” 67. Some scholars make the mistake of dating this manuscript to the 4th century and thus, take the designation “letter” more seriously. See, for example, Rajak, Translation & Survival, 31, likely following Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 30.

16

I. Introduction

Φιλοκράτην), a description of the golden table that King Ptolemy made and sent to Jerusalem to the then high priest Eleazar.”37 Honigman speculates that the first-person narrative and the personal address with which Aristeas opens misled the scribe who created this designation. He thus mistook what the text itself calls a “narrative” (διήγησις; §§ 1, 8, 322).38 Whatever the reason, it seems clear that the title of the work did not carry originally the titular designation “epistle” or “letter.”39 Of all the possibilities, then, Eusebius’s title might well have the best claim to originality.40 At the least, it represents the earliest unambiguous title attributed to the book. On the other hand, however, it is the only title given in the tradition that does not include the name of its purported author, Aristeas. Although the title Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates has gained almost universal recognition in the modern period, it has the least chance of being original. As a result, in the title of this commentary, I have decided to invoke both of the best possibilities: Aristeas to Philocrates or On the Translation of the Law of the Jews and throughout the commentary, I will refer to the work as Aristeas for short.

4. The Author of Aristeas and His Provenance The author of Aristeas presents himself as a Gentile courtier of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who had been sent on a deputation to Jerusalem to fetch seventy-two Jewish translators from the high priest Eleazar. This “Aristeas” narrates the entire story. Aristeas opens with a first-person address from the purported author to his “brother” Philocrates, but we only find out his name for the first time in § 19. In fact, the name “Aristeas” only occurs three times in the entire work, § 19, § 40 and § 43. Aristeas’s author cannot be identical with the narrator, however. First, he is not a Gentile but transparently a Jew. The verbal reminiscences of the Septuagint that occur at several places in the work could only have come from a Jewish author. Moreover, although “Aristeas” is presented as worshipping Greek deities (see § 16), the piety reflected throughout the work is Jewish – the two most notable examples being the long apologia for the Jewish law put into the mouth of the high priest Eleazar (§§ 128–171)

37 38 39 40

For the Greek text, see Thackeray “Introduction,” 510. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 1. See below, section 8a, on the genre of Aristeas and its epistolary characteristics. So Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 30.

4. The Author of Aristeas and His Provenance

17

and the consistent (to the point of being tedious) references to the obviously Jewish god voiced by the translators in the seven symposia. In numerous places, “Aristeas” refers to the sovereignty and power of God, who is clearly the Jewish god. So, for example, in §§ 16–17, after Aristeas explains to Ptolemy II that he, as king, worships the same god as the Jews, only under a different name, he prays to that god that the king would grant his petition and free the Jewish slaves in Egypt. We can say a few things about the author beyond his Jewish identity. His literary product betrays a decent level of Greek education, which provided him access to Hellenistic literature. As will be seen below in the introduction and throughout the commentary, the author employs Greek literary forms and rhetorical devices, and he appears to have read in a range of Greek literature.41 Moreover, he certainly wrote in Alexandria as evidenced by his intimate knowledge of Ptolemaic bureaucratic terminology and royal ideology. He also evinces knowledge of official decrees and the forms that they take, and some scholars, as a result, have suggested that he operated in official circles. While he clearly has some understanding of Ptolemaic officialdom, his knowledge does not allow a firm conclusion that he belonged in official Ptolemaic circles. Our author also exhibits familiarity with the language of Homeric textual scholarship, which flourished in Alexandria, particularly at the famous Mouseion and Library, the latter of which figures prominently in Aristeas.42 Additionally, his description of Jerusalem and its environs bear all the marks of an idealized picture that does not reflect eyewitness knowledge of the city.43 All the signs point directly to Alexandria as the author’s, and thus Aristeas’s, provenance. Although contemporary scholarship unanimously reports the narrator’s name as “Aristeas,” the ancient sources are divided on the spelling. The Greek manuscripts (all of which are medieval or later) give the name as “Aristeas,” while the indirect witnesses to the work, from the earliest

41

42

43

See below, section 8, for a discussion of Aristeas’s genre and the use of literary forms and rhetorical devices. On his use of this language, see the commentary below; also Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, as well as Maren R. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). In fact, Aristeas is an important source for information about the ancient Library of Alexandria; see P. M. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria (3 vols.; Oxford: Clarendon, 1972) and Roger Bagnall, “Alexandria: Library of Dreams,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 146 (2002) 348–62. See below in section 7 and in the commentary for more detailed discussion of this issue.

18

I. Introduction

evidence in Josephus onwards, spell it “Aristaios.” Werner Schmidt has argued that the proximity to the name “Andreas” in § 40 and § 43, where “Aristeas” follows after “Andreas,” has attracted the same ending. Further, a linguistic development in which the vowels αι and ε were no longer differentiated along with the gradual identification of the purported author with Aristeas of Prokonnesos or Aristeas the Jewish historian, resulted in the spelling found in the manuscripts, which developed out of the name “Aristaios,” the spelling of the earliest witnesses to the book.44 While Schmidt makes a compelling case and he adopts the spelling Aristaios, I have kept with scholarly convention and refer to the narrator as “Aristeas.”45 Schmidt’s argument about the spelling of the author’s name also bears on a problem that scholars have debated about our author: Was he the same person as Aristeas the Exegete (or sometimes, the Historian), a fragment of whose work “On the Jews” (περὶ Ἰουδαίων) Eusebius cites from Alexander Polyhistor?46 Oswyn Murray has made the most recent case for the identity of the two authors.47 The argument turns on Aristeas § 6: “And previously I transmitted to you, concerning these things that I considered worthy of mentioning, a record, which we received from the most learned high priests throughout the most learned land of Egypt concerning the race of the Jews.” Murray thinks it “almost inconceivable” that if Aristeas’s “On the Jews” and Aristeas were written at about the same time that our author would not have intended to connect the two works. Further, Murray believes that Aristeas the Exegete’s work purported to come from a Greek courtier of Ptolemy II, although he admits that no evidence exists

44

45

46

47

Werner Schmidt, Untersuchungen zur Falschung Historischer Dokumente bei PseudoAristaios (Bonn: Rudolph Habelt, 1986) 20–21. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 3, calls Josephus’s spelling of “Aristaios” “merely a variant spelling, for which, in Josephus’ day at least, the pronunciation would be identitical, though the variant might be due to an unknown link in the chain of transmission.” Schmidt’s arguments demonstrate that more is at work than Hadas recognizes. On this writer, see Robert Doran, “Aristeas the Exegete,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (Ed. James H. Charlesworth; vol. 2; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1985) 855–59 and Carl R. Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors Volume I: Historians (SBLTT 20/SBLPS 10; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1983). The fragment concerns Job and seems to be aware of the Greek translation of the book of Job. Oswyn Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 56 (1970) 140–43.

4. The Author of Aristeas and His Provenance

19

for this claim.48 From here he moves to an argument for the identity of the two authors. Since Murray’s second claim is pure speculation, the most critical issue is whether our author intended to refer to Aristeas’s “On the Jews” in § 6. First of all, it is important to note that we possess but a single extant, brief, third-hand citation of “On the Jews,” given without any context at all. Second, the reference in Aristeas § 6 “concerning the race of the Jews” serves as a description of the purported earlier work and not a title. A close reading of § 6 casts doubt on whether our author is even claiming the he wrote such a work. He writes that he sent to Philocrates a “record” (ἀναγραφήν) he had procured from Egyptian priests. This description does not comport closely with what little we have of Aristeas the Exegete, which contains a brief summary of the story of Job. In short, Murray’s confidence that our author was referring to Aristeas the Exegete’s work seems misplaced. At best, the question of whether our author meant to invoke the other Aristeas remains open, and I do not find Murray’s arguments about their identity compelling.49 If our author was not the Gentile courtier and ambassador that he claims to be, but rather an educated, Alexandrian Jew, why would he adopt the guise of a Gentile? While Jews practiced pseudepigaphy on a fairly frequent basis, in most cases the pseudepigraphic figures belonged to the tradition and lived in older times. Some Jews did write in the names of Gentile figures, usually well-known and ancient ones: Orpheus or the Sibylline Oracle for example. The Gentile narrator of our work seems to be neither old nor well known. In the case of Aristeas, the reasons for using pseudepigraphy connect closely with the purpose of the work, which I will treat more extensively below. For the present section, a short summary will suffice. By writing in the voice of a Gentile narrator, our author reassures his educated Jewish co-ethnics/religionists that the Gentiles who occupy the upper strata of Hellenistic Alexandrian society understand and accept Jews as Jews. That is, Gentiles understand that the Jewish “legislation,” which is how the author refers to the law most often, in the form of the Septuagint is fundamental to Jewish identity. Even though Jews engage in practices that might seem strange or that separate them from Gentiles, they share central 48 49

Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 340–41. For earlier attempts to argue for the identity of the two, see Tramontano’s summation of these arguments and his refutation of them in La Lettera, 43–46. In addition, if the original spelling of the purported author’s name was “Aristaios,” as Schmidt contends, then the persuasive force of arguments identifying the two authors is further blunted. As Doran (“Aristeas the Exegete,” 857) notes, most scholars have not found arguments for the identity of the two Aristeas’s persuasive.

20

I. Introduction

values with educated, upperclass Gentiles, who understand these values and cherish them. Thus, those Alexandrian Jews who, on the one hand, have a Greek education and aspire to participate fully in Alexandrian society but, on the other hand, continue to practice customs that Gentiles might find odd or strange can have the confidence to participate in the larger culture, since those with whom they will socialize recognize why Jews hold to these practices. In other words, our Gentile narrator serves as a mouthpiece for Gentile appreciation of Judaism.50 For our author, a Gentile voice communicates that confidence best. Finally, a word about how I refer to the author throughout the commentary. Hongiman has argued that the designation Pseudo-Aristeas is not appropriate as a name for our author. She gives three reasons: (1) the author is unknown, and thus, there is no Aristeas to impersonate; (2) even if we accept Murray’s argument connecting the author of Aristeas and Aristeas the Exegete, our author was creating a persona not impersonating someone else; and (3) it is not appropriate to use the adjectival prefix “pseudo” to eliminate confusion between the author and the main character of the work. She thus prefers the “admittedly clumsy” B.Ar.51 While I essentially accept Honigman’s first two reasons, rather than anthropomorphize a book, I do think that it is worth distinguishing between the character and the author by using Ps.-Aristeas, as I will refer to Aristeas’s author. While he might not be impersonating some person of note and the main character of the work might well be a literary creation of our author (as I think he is), our author does offer us his narrative in the guise of this Aristeas, and since we do not know him by any other name, I see no reason not to use the adjectival prefix “pseudo” both to identify him and to differentiate him from Aristeas, the narrator of our story. Thus, throughout the commentary, I designate the book as Aristeas (using italics), our author as Ps.-Aristeas, and his main character as Aristeas (without quotation marks).

50

51

For a detailed articulation of this position, see Benjamin G. Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship and Structures of Authority in the Letter of Aristeas,” in Scriptural Authority in Early Judaism and Ancient Christianity (Ed. Géza Xeravits et al.; DCLS 16; Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 2013) 43–62. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 2.

5. Date

21

5. Date The date of Aristeas is perhaps the single most debated aspect of the book. Dates have been suggested from the third century BCE to the time of Josephus in the late first century CE. Moreover, what counts as relevant evidence has been a point of contention as well. While I do not think that an exact date for Aristeas is possible to determine and any date will carry with it some uncertainty, I believe that one can arrive with some confidence at an approximate date that will satisfy the available data. Three general periods have been suggested for dating the work52: (1) an early date in the third century closer to the events Aristeas supposedly narrates, supported mostly in older scholarly literature and generally not accepted in present scholarship; (2) a middle date in the second century BCE, which is generally accepted, although within a fairly large range; and (3) a later date in the Roman period after 30 BCE, which is almost universally not supported. Of these three, the best interpretation of the data puts Aristeas somewhere in the second century BCE, but scholars have argued for earlier or later dates in that century. Of all the studies done on Aristeas, those by Elias Bickerman and Moses Hadas most thoroughly examine the evidence for dating.53 As in other studies, they examine both internal and external evidence to try to pin down a date for the book. Hadas has been especially successful at showing how most of the internal evidence – particularly appeals that Aristeas alludes to specific historical events and situations, whether they be the political situation or references to the geography of Judea – are inconclusive at best for establishing a date.54 Indeed, in most cases, these matters involve a fair amount of speculation in order to derive a date. So, for example, the reference to Idumea in § 107 is often taken as a terminus ante quem, since Ps.-Aristeas assumes that it is independent, and it was not conquered until John Hycanus’s reign in 127 BCE. Hadas notes, however, that the reference to Idumea falls within the larger description of Judea, which itself is highly idealized, and thus, one ought not to expect

52

53

54

For specific studies supporting the dates in the various periods, see Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 48 n. 1 and Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 113. Elias Bickerman, “The Dating of Pseudo-Aristeas” in Studies in Jewish and Christian History: A New Edition in English including The God of the Maccabees (Ed. Amram Tropper; 2 vols; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 108–33 [Translation of “Zur Datierung des Pseudo-Aristeas,” ZAW 29 (1930) 280–98]; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 9–54. Bickerman also deals with some of these same issues, also concluding that they cannot establish a date for the book.

22

I. Introduction

historical specificity in such an idealized portrait.55 I agree with Hadas’s general conclusion that internal evidence of this sort cannot establish a date.56 Hadas also points out the inadequacy of much external evidence, and in the end he opts for a date of about 130 BCE based on his assessment that Aristeas refers to a revision of an earlier translation and that the prologue to the Greek translation of Ben Sira intends an unrevised version. If this is the case, then Aristeas, in his estimation, must have been written shortly after the prologue to Sirach, which he dates to about 132 BCE. As will become apparent in the course of the commentary – see especially the commentary on § 30 – I do not agree with Hadas (who relies on Paul Kahle to a large extent) that Ps.-Aristeas has in his sights a revised version of an earlier translation, and thus, the essential basis for Hadas’s date collapses.57 Bickerman also challenges what he calls “erroneous interpretations and excessively subtle critical arguments” for dating.58 In order to determine a range of dates, he looks for evidence in Aristeas that would have not been in existence under Ptolemy II Philadelphus and that would have gone out of existence at some later time. So, for example, he cites Ps.-Aristeas’s use of the geographical-administrative designation “Coele-Syria and Phoenicia” (κοίλην Συρίαν καὶ Φιονίκην; § 12) as pointing to a time after 200 BCE, since, according to Bickerman, this was the official Seleucid designation for the region; the Ptolemies used “Syria and Phoenicia” (cf. § 22). Unfortunately, however, in this case Bickerman is not quite correct. A Seleucid inscription discovered near Hefzibah employs the phrase “Syria and Phoenicia” (l. 14). The inscription preserves a series of commands from Antiochus III during the Fifth Syrian War dating from 201–195 BCE. In ll. 14–15 we read: […] πέμπηται ἐπὶ τὸν ἐν Συρίαι καὶ Ποινίκηι στρατηγόν (“to be sent to the commander in Syria and Phoenicia”). Thus, the use of

55 56

57

58

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 10. As a result, I will not treat every argument that has been made in scholarship. Within the commentary, I will comment ad loc on some of the historical data that have been mustered in the arguments over Aristeas’s date. See below in section 9 for Aristeas’s relationship with the Greek prologue to Ben Sira. Uri Rappaport has continued to argue for a late third-century BCE date, based on what he sees as the historical realities in Aristeas. These arguments do not successfully overcome the philological and formulary evidence that I use here to derive a date for the work. See U. Rappaport, “When was the Letter of Aristeas Written?” in Studies in the History of the Jewish People and the Land of Israel: In Memory of Zvi Avneri (Ed. A. Gilboa et al.; Haifa: University of Haifa, 1970) 37–50 [Hebrew with English abstracts] and “The Letter of Aristeas Again,” JSP 21 (2012) 285–303. Bickerman, “Dating,” 115.

5. Date

23

the phrase in Aristeas cannot be pinned down to the Ptolemies, as Bickerman claims, and it cannot really help to establish a date for the work.59 Despite this difficulty, Bickerman took the right track to arrive at a range of dates within the second century BCE; he relied primarily on linguistic usage in the “official” documents recorded in Aristeas compared with the same phrases in Egyptian papyri, which often have precise dates. Such official formulae and phrases became popular in specific periods, which can be seen in the extant papyri. Moreover, these types of phrases appear independent of content, since they are formal aspects of the documents in which they are found. Although the body of comparanda is now more extensive than Bickerman knew, his approach still seems the best way to arrive at a satisfactory date. His method does require some refinement, however, since the phrases on which Bickerman concentrated continued in use after the period to which he dates Aristeas. His argument was that these later uses reflect an ossification, and thus they had lost their earlier nuances.60 The increased number of examples now available indicates that Bickerman was engaging in a bit of special pleading. Bickerman concentrated on the following linguistic features found in Aristeas: (1) the formula of greeting χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι (§ 35); (2) the formula valetudinis in the high priest Eleazar’s letter (§ 41); (3) the preamble ἐὰν οὖν φαίνηται in Demetrius’s report (§ 32); (4) the phrase καλῶς οὖν ποιήσεις plus a participle in the official letters (§ 39, § 46); and (5) the plural designation τῶν ἀρχισωματοφυλάκων in § 12 and § 40. Stewart Moore brings (1), (2) and (5) up to date with papyri that have been published since Bickerman did his work.61 Schmidt in his study of the “official” documents examines a slightly different list from Bickerman’s. He discusses Bickerman’s (1), (2) and (4), but he includes the preamble to and the reinforcing decree of the prostagma in § 24.62 E. Van ’t Dack gives more detail

59

60

61 62

For the inscription, see Y. Landau, “A Greek Inscription Found Near Hefzibah,” IEJ 16 (1966) 54–70. A critique of Bickerman’s method was made by P. M. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 2.290–91. For the use of formulae and other criteria deriving from the official documents, see also Stewart Moore, “‘With Walls of Iron’: Jewish Ethnic Identity in Hellenistic Egypt” (JSJSup; Leiden: Brill, Forthcoming) 298–303. [Moore’s forthcoming volume is based on his 2014 Yale University Ph.D. dissertation. I give page numbers throughout to the dissertation, since the JSJSup voume has not yet appeared.] Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 301. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 118–27, who uses as his basis the collection of Ptolemaic papyri of Marie-Thérèse Lenger, Corpus des Ordonnances des Ptolémées (C.Ord. Ptol.) (Brusselles: Palais des Académies, 1980).

24

I. Introduction

for (5).63 Since Schmidt, Moore and Van ’t Dack bring Bickerman’s work up to date, I will concentrate on their discussions and supplement them with Bickerman’s comments where appropriate. Before I discuss the specific phrases from the list above, the decree given in §§ 22–25 also offers some clues to a range of dates. Bickerman notes that both the form and content of the prostagma in §§ 22–25 “are appropriate.”64 Schmidt looks at the section of the decree given in § 24 in some detail. He understands the first section of § 24 as a preamble (“Thus … in all things”). He compares this section to three papyri – C.Ord.Ptol. 50 (131–125 BCE); C.Ord.Ptol. 82 (48–44 BCE); and C.Ord.Ptol. 76 (41 BCE) – and finds similarities in the preambles but not enough affinity to use them for dating. They do appear to place the prostagma in Aristeas in the second century (or later), however, since third century BCE papyri do not have such preambles.65 The statement “no one shall administer any of these matters with any frivolous delay” demonstrates similarities to two mid-second century BCE prostagmata – C.Ord.Ptol. 41 (145/144 BCE) and C.Ord.Ptol. 43 (145/144 BCE). Schmidt argues that although the language in Aristeas does not reflect the papyri exactly, the correlations are close enough to suggest that Ps.-Aristeas composed his prostagma with contemporary formulae in mind. He notes further that even though an earlier, third-century non-epistolary prostagma gives a deadline, only the second-century papyri (as also in Aristeas) suggest that the king might have some reason to expect that his order would be disobeyed, and so this reinforcing addition was appended to the decree.66 For the first of Bickerman’s epistolary criteria, he argues that the salutation χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι found in Ptolemy’s Letter to Eleazar (§ 35) indicates a date after about 170 BCE and that its uses after 100 BCE “become hackneyed,” and consequently they are not relevant to the date of Aristeas.67 Schmidt disagrees, however, and observes that the formula is used all the way into the Roman period; Moore shows that the phrase peaks

63

64 65 66 67

E. Van ’t Dack, “La date de la lettre d’Aristée,” Studia Hellenistica 16 (1968) 263–78. He also argues for dating based on the apparent allusions in Aristeas § 28 and § 182 (cf. also §§ 297–300) to official Ptolemaic archives. As with other historically based arguments for dating, the speculative aspects of the argument increase, and I am less convinced by this argument. Bickerman, “Dating,” 116. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 119–21. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 121–22. Bickerman, “Dating,” 120.

5. Date

25

in three different periods: the 150s BCE; 119–90 BCE; and the 60s–50s BCE.68 In addition, the papyri discovered and published since Bickerman’s time belie his claim that the phrase becomes hackneyed in the later period. Schmidt explains further that the official letter evolved out of the private letter, and this phrase can be found in private letters of the third century BCE, although not in official letters of the same period. Thus, the salutation in this letter can only establish a likely date for Aristeas after about 160 BCE. It cannot help to arrive at a satisfactory lower date. Schmidt also takes into consideration the formula valetudinis of Eleazar’s letter to Ptolemy. Such greetings occur already in private letters as early as the fourth century BCE and in royal letters in the third century.69 The latter are not Ptolemaic, however.70 Schmidt can only cite one example of this formula in Ptolemiac papyri, a letter of Cleopatra III and Ptolemy IX Soter II from 115 BCE (C.Ord.Ptol. 60). If we assume that Ps.-Aristeas used language that he knew from official Ptolemaic usage, then a lower date of about 100 BCE might be indicated.71 Bickerman’s third criterion was the phrase ἐὰν οὖν φαίνηται in Demetrius’s report to the king about acquiring the Jewish law (§ 32). He argues that it is characteristic of documents only after 160 BCE, since before that time it would have contained a dative-case pronoun, ἐάν σοι φαίνηται. According to Bickerman, it disappears in the first century BCE. For his part, Schmidt rejects the use of the phrase as a criterion, because it is more typical of the petition, and in the case in Aristeas, it is not part of a petition.72 Yet, Moore has shown that the phrase does undergo development over time, and he looks at its several forms. The major development goes from the use of the dative pronoun to its disappearance from the phrase. Only three exact uses of the same phrase as in Aristeas survive in the papyri, which date to 163, 152 and 147 BCE, but the dative predominates before about 180 BCE. The next three decades transition from the use of

68

69

70 71

72

Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 122–23; see especially the chart in Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 301. Bickerman, “Dating,” 118, notes that as early as 270 BCE “it became fashionable to insert immediately after the praescriptio a syntactically independent declaration about the welfare of the writer and the reader of the letter.” See Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 124. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 124, also notes that if we see the phrase as adopted from private letters, then it has no bearing on dating Aristeas. If Ps.-Aristeas knew the greeting from contemporary non-official letters, then that situates the work between the third century BCE and the end of the first century BCE. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 118–19.

26

I. Introduction

the dative to uses without, and the numbers are roughly equal. The form without the dative dominates from 149–40 BCE.73 Bickerman next focuses on the use of the phrase καλῶς οὖν ποιήσεις plus a participle in the letters of both Ptolemy and Elezar (§ 39 and § 46), which appears in letters of the third and second centuries BCE. Bickerman maintains that the phrase “disappeared from use in the first century B. C.E.,” perhaps around 100 BCE, although he has to admit that it does appear later in some “conservative bureaucratic offices.”74 Again, Bickerman’s own data throw doubt on his conclusions. Schmidt, however, turns to a different phrase in the conclusion to Ptolemy’s letter (§ 40) that appears already in private letters of the third century BCE: γράφων δὲ καὶ σὺ πρὸς ἡμᾶς περὶ ὧν ἐὰν βούλῃ κεχαρισμένος ἔσῃ (“Now also if you write to us about anything you might wish, it would be welcome”). In these letters, as in Aristeas, the phrase always stands right before the concluding formula, ἔρρωσο. A good example is P.Mich. 1.6 from the Zenon papyri: γράγε δὲ καὶ σὺ ἡμῖν τὶ ἄν σοι ποιοῦντες χαριζοίμεθα. ἔρρωσο. According to Schmidt, the phrase first occurs in official letters in the Roman period.75 One of the most significant linguistic usages and perhaps the most diagnostic is the use of the term ὁ ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ (chief bodyguard) in the plural, particularly the genitive plural. In earlier Ptolemaic times the chief bodyguard (singular) occupied a specific office and did not represent a class of people. Bickerman claims that the earliest attestation of this class comes in a papyrus from 155 BCE.76 The ἀρχισωματοφύλακες would have ranked one step underneath the king’s “first friends” and thus would have been a group of some importance. Later, Bickerman argues, the designation was devalued by being awarded too often, even being given to local police commissioners.77 Thus, he would use this phrase to situate Aristeas at a time when the title still held some importance, between 163 BCE and 125 BCE. Moore shows that the distribution of the title in the plural predominates in papyri from 159–110 BCE, although there is a single attestation in the 50s BCE.78 Van ’t Dack studies this designation in the most detail, and he considers it an important criterion for dating the book, primarily because 73 74 75

76 77 78

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 302. See especially the chart on p. 301. Bickerman, “Dating,” 124. See Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 125–26. He gives SB 4. 7461, 10–11 from the Roman period as the first example in an official letter. Bickerman, “Dating,” 125. Bickerman, “Dating,” 126. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 301.

5. Date

27

its development can be followed with some chronological accuracy. He identifies three stages in the evolution of the term that roughly agree with Bickerman’s analysis: (1) the earliest stage, where the title indicated an official court function performed by a very small number of dignitaries; (2) a second stage where the title became purely honorific and was held by numerous individuals (as a result one sees a movement from “so-and-so ὁ ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ” to “so-and-so τῶν ἀρχισωματοφυλάκων”); (3) the third stage in which the title had become so debased that local authorities can carry the title.79 The term in the plural occurs two times in Aristeas, in § 12 (given to Sosibius and Andreas) and in § 40 (referring to Andreas). Van ’t Dack argues that the parallel in § 40 between Andreas τῶν ἀρχισωματοφυλάκων and Aristeas, “whom we hold in honor,” demonstrates that the title is honorific in Aristeas. Moreover, the use of the genitive plural points to a number of people who hold this honorific title. The genitive plural first appears in papyri after Ptolemy VI Philometer reascends the throne in 163 BCE, and the earliest datable occurrence is April 13, 155 BCE. In this same period one observes in at least two cases from 157–156 BCE and 158–157 BCE two persons who are apparently given the title ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ.80 The fact that Aristeas, who is supposed to hold an influential position at court, accompanies Andreas to Jerusalem and is not given the title suggests a period before the title has begun to be devalued. In the 140s to 130s BCE, we begin to see subordinate officials awarded the title. According to Van ’t Dack, no person of superior rank holds the title after the 130s.81 The use of the genitive plural, then, would be consistent with a date somewhere between approximately 160 BCE and 130 BCE. To summarize the data, whereas some elements that we find in Aristeas occur earlier in the third century BCE or later into the first century, in broad strokes, all of these phrases and terms taken together position Aristeas in the second century BCE. Some of the material, such as the prostagma in §§ 22–25, can only help to confirm this general placement. The greeting χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι, the phrase ἐὰν οὖν φαίνηται, and the term ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ help to establish an upper date of around 160 BCE. The formula valetudinis pushes the lower date to somewhere around 100 BCE. The range of dates given by the use of ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ in the plural and the predominance of variations of the phrase ἐὰν οὖν φαίνηται (without a

79 80 81

Van ’t Dack, “La date,” 264–65. Van ’t Dack, “La date,” 267. See the numerous examples in Van ’t Dack, “La date,” 268.

28

I. Introduction

dative pronoun) to the middle of the second century BCE, when combined with the other evidence, leads me to a date ranging from the 150s BCE to the last decade of the second century BCE. This date comports well with the linguistic evidence, and it coheres generally with dates that scholars have offered taking into consideration more difficult historical arguments without having to rely on them as the primary basis for dating Aristeas.82 One additional criterion that has been used to date Aristeas is its possible relationship to the Jewish-Greek writer Aristobulus. The argument goes like this: since Aristobulus also seems to know that the translation of the Jewish law took place under Demetrius of Phalerum, if one can establish

82

Bickerman concludes that Aristeas was written between 145–125 BCE (“Dating,” 133) based on both linguistic and historical considerations; on the basis of the linguistic data Schmidt suggests 145–100 BCE, but when he factors in historical material that he thinks relevant, he narrows the range to 124–115 BCE (Untersuchungen, 127, 143); Moore offers a date of 160–130 BCE based on the linguistic data plus the ideological context of Aristeas as he understands it (“Walls of Iron,” chapter 5); Meecham opts for a late Ptolemaic period date (c. 100 BCE) based on linguistic evidence (Letter of Aristeas, 332); Hadas gives about 130 BCE, although without a lot of conviction (Aristeas to Philocrates, 54); Oswyn Murray offers “the end of the second century BCE” (“The Letter of Aristeas,” Studi ellenistici 2 [1987] 16); Pelletier, Lettre, 57–58, ignores the linguistic evidence and goes with a date at the beginning of the second century BCE (in agreement with Tramontano, La Lettera and H. Vincent, “Jerusalem d’apres la Lettre d’Aristée,” RB 6 [1909] 571–72). As I noted above, the historical arguments seem to me to be inherently more difficult to make, and thus, I rely on the linguistic evidence, which produces an admittedly wider range of possible dates, but a range I think can be defended. If one were to try to narrow the dates further, however, the political situation of the Ptolemies in the mid-second century BCE might be worth considering, although we do not know much specifically about the situation of the Jews in Alexandria under the different Ptolemies. We do know that Jews connected with Onias and Leontopolis supported Ptolemy VI Philometer and Cleopatra II against Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II (and later under Cleopatra III). When Ptolemy VIII assumed the throne in 145, he apparently began a purge of intellectuals from Alexandria. Ptolemy VIII might have considered the Jews political enemies, and they might well have been part of that purge. After his death in 116 BCE, the situation would likely have been more favorable to Jewish emergence back into Alexandrian society. Since there were periods in Egypt where power moved back and forth, this is not a lot on which to hang one’s hat for a narrower range of dates. For a discussion, see Katell Berthelot, Philanthrôpia Judaica: Le débat autour de la “misanthropie” des lois juives dans l’Antiquité (JSJSup 76; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 207–8, who opts for the reign of Ptolemy VI. For a narrative of this period in Ptolemaic history, see Gunther Hölbl, A History of the Ptolemaic Empire (London/New York: Routledge, 2001) Part III.

5. Date

29

Aristobulus’s date and the direction of any literary dependence between them, then these data will help to date Aristeas. As part of an argument that Plato followed the Jewish law, Aristobulus claims that the law and the events surrounding the Exodus already had been translated partially. Later Demetrius of Phalerum oversaw a translation of everything: It is clear that Plato followed the tradition of the law that we use, and he is conspicuous for having worked through each of the details expressed in it. For before Demetrius of Phalerum, before the dominion of Alexander and the Persians, others had translated accounts of the events surrounding the exodus from Egypt of the Hebrews, our countrymen, and the disclosure to them of all that had happened as well as the domination of the land, and the detailed account of the entire law … But the complete translation of everything in the law occurred at the time of the king surnamed Philadelphus, your ancestor, who brought great zeal to the undertaking, while Demetrius of Phalerum attended to matters related to these things. (Fragment 3; Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 13.12)83

Most scholars date Aristobulus to the reign of Ptolemy VI Philometer in the second century BCE, taking seriously Clement of Alexandria’s reference to that monarch in Stromateis 1.22.150.1.84 Holladay places Aristobulus in the early part of Ptolemy VI’s reign in the 170s BCE. Adela Yarbro Collins places him in the latter part, somewhere between 155–145 BCE. Thus, if Aristobulus knew and used Aristeas, then Aristeas would have an earlier date. If the situation were reversed, then Aristeas would be situated in the latter part of the second century BCE. It is not likely, however, that either Aristobulus or Aristeas used the other. The argument for literary dependence has to resolve too many issues to be convincing. So, for example, if Aristobulus influenced Aristeas, why does Aristeas show no trace of Aristobulus’s major theme in this section that Plato knew and used the Jewish Law? If Aristobulus used Aristeas,

83

84

The translation comes from Carl R. Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors Volume III: Aristobulus (SBLTT 39/SBLPS 13; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995) 155, 157. Clement of Alexandria also preserves a form of this fragment in his Stromateis (1.22.150). The beginning portion is almost exactly the same as in Eusebius. About the later translation, Clement’s version is somewhat more expansive, saying, for example, that the translation included the “law and the prophets.” On the date of Aristobulus and the problems relating to it, see Holladay, Aristobulus, 74–75; Adela Yarbro Collins, “Aristobulus,” in OTP 2.832–833; and Nikolaus Walter, Der Thoraausleger Aristobulos: Untersuchungen zu seinen Fragmenten und zu pseudepigraphischen Resten der judisch-hellenistischen Literatur (TU 86; Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1964) 13–26.

30

I. Introduction

then he only took very select items from the earlier text and ignored the large remaining bulk of it, including significant information, such as Demetrius’s connection with the library, the aim that the translation should be placed there and the number of translators. Holladay argues that if there were literary dependence, then Aristobulus likely was the prior text, since as a rule, it is more undeveloped than Aristeas, both in its use of allegory and in its tradition about the translation of the law. This would place Aristeas in the same general time period as we established above based on the linguistic evidence. The greater likelihood, however, is that given the difficulties of establishing any literary dependence, the more probable explanation is that the two authors made use of a common tradition or knew two versions of the same tradition.85 Any verbal or ideological similarities are not specific enough to establish literary dependence, and they derive from the common origins of both the story and of these texts in Alexandria.86 Thus, if literary dependence cannot be established, the fragments of Aristobulus cannot provide evidence for the date of Aristeas.

6. Textual Criticism At present scholars know twenty-three Greek manuscripts that preserve all or part of Aristeas. In addition Josephus includes a long paraphrase of the work in Antiquities 12.11–118, and the church father Eusebius of Caesarea transmits excerpts of the work in his Preparation for the Gospel 8.2–5, 9 and 9.38. The first printed text of Aristeas was the Latin translation of Matthias Palmerius in 1471, which was included in the first Latin Bible published in Rome.87 Simon Schard published the first Greek edition of the

85

86

87

Note Oswyn Murray who writes, “[T]here must have been a legend already in existence, but what it was we do not know, and will probably never know” (“Aristeas and his Sources,” in Studia Patristica Vol. XII [Ed. Elizabeth A. Livingstone; Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1975] 123) Holladay, Aristobulus, 65. See also, Collins, “Aristobulus,” 835. Walter, Der Thoraausleger Aristobulos, 88–103, concludes that Aristobulus cannot be younger than Aristeas, but he does not think that they are dependent on one another. Collins, Library in Alexandria, 9, also argues against literary dependence between Aristobulus and Aristeas, but she reasons from there that they are independent witnesses to the tradition about translation. On this argument, see the General Comment on §§ 9–11. Printed by Conrad Sweynheym and Arnold Pannertz. See Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 30–31.

6. Textual Criticism

31

text in 1561, depending on two manuscripts, Munich Monacensis 9 (O) and Vaticanus 383 (K). That edition stood for more than 300 years until Moritz Schmidt incorporated three other manuscripts into an edition in 1870. Ludwig Mendelssohn had anticipated completing a full edition of the text, but he died before he could complete it. His text of paragraphs 1–51 appeared in 1897 after his death. The great German scholar Paul Wendland completed Mendelssohn’s work, and it was he who divided the text into the standard 322 paragraphs.88 As can be seen on almost every page of the subsequent editions of Henry St. J. Thackeray and André Pelletier, Wendland’s edition remains a valuable resource for the text. Thackeray and Pelletier have performed the essential text-critical task of establishing a stemma of the manuscripts and of evaluating the value of the sections in Josephus and Eusebius. In the commentary below, I have not found it necessary to redo their work.89 Pelletier’s edition is the best currently available, and, as I remarked above, serves as the basis for my translation.90

a. The Manuscripts The extant Greek manuscripts are listed below91: A: Codex Parisinus 128 (Paris; Thackeray, Codex Regius), 12th–13th century. B: Codex Parisinus 129 (Paris; Thackeray, Codex Regius), 12th–13th century. C: Codes Parisinus 5 (Paris; Thackeray, Codex Regius), 14th century. D: Codex Parisinus 130 (Paris; Thackeray, Codex Regius), 15th century.

88 89

90

91

Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 33. Pelletier, Lettre, 8–41; Thackeray, “Appendix,” 501–18. See also Tramontano, La Lettera, 2–7, who mostly relies on Thackeray, although he includes a couple of additional manuscripts that Thackeray did not know. Wendland also knew a Codex Smyrnaeus, which contained a small bit of Aristeas (“is fol. 1 frustulum tantummodo epistulae huius continent”). It was destroyed in a fire in 1922. For the various editions of Aristeas, beginning with that of Simon Schard in 1561, see the bibliography. I will point out in the textual notes any places where my translation is based on a text different from Pelletier’s. Pelletier, Lettre, 8–9, lists them in order of date. I give the name designation as they are provided in Pelletier, which differs in some instances from the names by which Thackeray knows them. For complete descriptions of all of the manuscripts, except for E, N, O, U, W, X (not in Thackeray’s list), see Thackeray, “Appendix” 504–13.

32

I. Introduction

E: Codex Atheniensis 389 (Athens), 15th century. Thackeray knew this manuscript but did not use it in his collations.92 F: Codex Burneiensis 34 (London), 15th century. G: Codex Marcianus 534 (Venice; Thackeray, Codex Venetus), 11th century. H: Codex Vaticanus 747 (Rome), 11th century. I: Codex Palatinus 203 (Rome), 11th century. K: Codex Vaticanus 383 (Rome), 12th–13th century. L: Codex Vaticanus 746 (Rome), 15th century. M: Codex Ottobonianus 32 (Rome), 15th century. N: Codex Scorialensis Σ I. 6 (Madrid), 16th century. Thackeray knew this manuscript but did not use it in his collations. O: Codex Monacensis 9 (Munich), 11th century. Thackeray knew this manuscript but did not use it in his collations.93 P: Codex Barbarinus (56) 474 (Rome), 12th–13th century. Q: Codex Parisinus 950 (Paris; Thackeray, Codex Regius), 14th century. R: Codex Basileensis O.IV 10 (Omont 21; Basel), 16th century. S: Codex Vaticanus 1668 (Rome), 12th–13th century(?).94 T: Codex Laurentianus 44 (Florence), 11th century. Pelletier notes that this manuscript is likely the oldest of all the Greek manuscripts of Aristeas. U: Codex Seragliensis 8 (Istanbul), 12th–13th century. This manuscript preserves five vignettes with space set aside for two others and another has been cut out.95 The manuscript was unknown to Thackeray. Tramontano included it in his list of manuscripts. W: Codex Angelicanus 114 (Rome), 16th century. Neither Thackeray nor Tramontano knew this manuscript. X: Codex Monacensis 82 (Munich), 16th century. Thackeray did not know this manuscript. Z: Codex Turicensis 169 (Zurich) 12th–13th century. Both Thackeray and Pelletier establish a stemma of manuscripts based on two primary criteria: the presence of lacunae in the text and agreement of unique variants and word order. Pelletier relies primarily on the manuscripts from the 11th–13th centuries for his analysis. Of these A H K U +

92 93 94

95

Thackeray, “Appendix,” 518. He says the same about N and O. Thackeray, “Appendix,” 503, gives a short discussion of this manuscript. Thackeray, “Appendix,” 513, lists this manuscript as 13th century with a question mark; Pelletier, Lettre, 9, gives it as 12th–13th century with a question mark. Pelletier, Lettre, 9.

6. Textual Criticism

33

G I (the two least lacunose manuscripts) form one large group divided into the two subgroups indicated here, and T B + P S Z form the second group also with two subgroups. This leaves O, which is not affiliated with either of the two main groups. Ms Q, which contains two extracts from Aristeas (§§ 9–12 and §§ 57–103), is affiliated with O in those passages that it preserves. There are, then, three main traditions of the text represented by the two major groups noted above and O Q, which lie closer to the second main group than to the first, although they do not derive from the ancestor(s) of that group.96 Of the remaining manuscripts of later date, D F L are affiliated with A; R is a copy of K; W relates to mss H and U in the first group; E does not descend from any of A H K U, but its characteristics place it in that group; M and X are direct copies of I. In the second group, C, which only preserves portions of Aristeas, is closest to S Z.97 Of the various groups, Pelletier argues that overall the best and most coherent representation of the tradition, primarily because its relationships are very close, is the first major group, particularly A H K U and their affiliated manuscripts. In this he agrees essentially with Thackeray, who identified A H K along with G I – he did not use U – as the best form of the text and who also noted the close relationship among the members of this group.98 Moreover, Thackeray observes that the B T + P S Z group shows much greater variation both from the presumed ancestor of this group as well as among themselves. B presents the greatest number of textual variants.99

b. Josephus and Eusebius Josephus situates his paraphrase of Aristeas within his larger narrative of the successors of Alexander. Antiquities 12 begins with the wars of the diadochi and then narrows to Ptolemy I Soter’s reign in which he conquered Jerusalem and took war captives to Egypt (cf. Aristeas §§ 12–13). He also relates that other Jews came to Egypt because of “the excellence of the country and Ptolemy’s liberality” (12.9). The information here bears a resemblance to some paragraphs in Aristeas, but it is not clear whether

96 97 98

99

See the stemma table in Pelletier, Lettre, 21. For details of the evidence for these affiliations, see Pelletier, Lettre, 14–22. Pelletier, Lettre, 21–22; Thackeray, “Appendix,” 504. Most scholars have recognized the primacy of this group. See Thackeray, “Appendix,” 504, 511.

34

I. Introduction

Aristeas’s narrative influenced Josephus, although it is certainly conceivable that it did. When he gets to Ptolemy II’s reign, he begins with the translation of the law into Greek, giving a loose rendering of Aristeas with some notable exceptions. In all, Josephus paraphrases, more or less closely, §§ 9–46, §§ 51–81, §§ 172–187, §§ 292–305 and §§ 308–321. He omits the preface (§§ 1–8), the list of the translators’ names (§§ 47–50), saying that he does not think it necessary to give them, since the names were recorded “at the end of the letter.”100 He also does not transmit the travelogue (§§ 82–120) or Eleazar’s farewell and the allegorical interpretation of the law (§§ 121–171). He picks up the story with the arrival of the translators at Alexandria, but he leaves out the symposia (§§ 188–291), the mention of ritual washing (§§ 306–307) and the epilogue (§ 322). As a rule, Josephus’s text differs in many respects from the Greek manuscripts of Aristeas, and it often has little text-critical value, except on occasion to confirm readings in either Eusebius and/or the manuscripts, especially in the second major group (particularly ms B).101 In other cases, Josephus’s readings have been the basis for scholarly emendations that help to make sense of a difficult or even unintelligible text.102 As part of an argument about the excellence of the mode of life of the Jews, Eusebius narrates a barebones version of Aristeas, which he attributes explicitly to “Aristeas” in his Preparation for the Gospel Book 8. Although he leaves out large sections of the narrative – he specifically calls it an “abridgment” (8.5) – he cites the text fairly closely, and so his citations have good text-critical value. Eusebius relates the following passages: (1) 8.2, §§ 9–11, § 28; (2) 8.3, §§ 29–34; (3) 8.4, §§ 35–41a; (4) 8.5, §§ 41b–46, §§ 310–317. In the same work at 9.38, Eusebius describes the plentiful water in Jerusalem. As part of this description, he quotes Aristeas §§ 88–90 on the water supply to the temple. Pelletier sums up the value of Eusebius’s text well: “Briefly to compare the text of Aristeas with the cita-

100

101

102

Josephus does not refer to Aristeas as a letter, and so he means the letter written from Eleazar to Ptolemy (§§ 41–46). For a detailed study of the ways that Josephus modifies Aristeas, especially his atticising revisions, see André Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe, adaptateur de la Lettre d’Aristée: un reaction atticisante contre la Koiné (Études et Commentaires 45; Paris: Klincksieck, 1962). See particularly the concluding chapter where he summarizes the reasons for Josephus’s deviations from Aristeas. For Josephus’s agreement with Eusebius, see the examples of § 28, § 31, § 33, § 43 and § 46; for his reading as the preferable one, see, for example, the text-critical notes to § 26, § 54, § 57 and § 73; for scholarly conjectures, see as examples, § 58, § 66 and § 71.

7. Integrity of Aristeas and its Sources

35

tions given by Eusebius, one senses, on the one hand, an Alexandrian Jew who writes in the language of his time, and on the other hand, a man of the church concerned to purvey this document for the use of a pagan public in a Greek that has developed and in a time when the Ptolemaic institutions were forgotten. … The tradition of Eusebius – we should say the state of the text of Aristeas around 320 – only presents those variations expected by virtue of the very different environment and époque.”103

7. Integrity of Aristeas and its Sources J.-G. Février questioned the general integrity of Aristeas, contending that the travelogue and description of Jerusalem and it envirions (§§ 83–120), Eleazar’s farewell to the translators and his apologia for the Jewish law (§§ 121–171), and the short section on the allegorical explanation of the translator’s ritual hand washing (§§ 306–307) were not authentic but rather the products of different authors and that all of these sections were incorporated into the book at a later date.104 Although scholars generally accept that all of the elements of Aristeas as we have it made up the original form of the work, Février’s arguments deserve to be noted.105 His position relies on his assessment both of external sources for the work, primarily Josephus, and internal issues that he identifies in the sections he considers inauthentic.

103

104

105

Pelletier, Lettre, 40–41. “Bref, d’une façon générale, à comparer le texte d’Aristée avec la citation qu’en fait Eusèbe, on sent d’une part un Juif alexandrin qui écrit dans la langue de son temps, d’autre part un homme d’Église soucieux de monnayer ce document à l’usage public païen, dans un grec qui évolué et dans un milieu où les institutions ptolémaïques sont oubliées. … La tradition d’Eusèbe, qui doit nous dire l’état du texte d’Aristée vers 320, ne présente guère qui les différences attendues en raison de la différence meme des milieu et des époques.” J.-G. Février, La Date, la Composition et les Sources de la Lettre d’Aristée a Philocrate (Paris: Librairie Ancienne Édouard Champion, 1924). Février’s position is often ignored. Jellicoe does not mention him other than to note his acceptance of a late date for the book (Septuagint and Modern Study, 48 n.1). Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 13–14, remarks about the problems connected with the structure of the book, “J.-G. Février, therefore, proposed in 1925 [sic] that there had been several stages of redaction, with final completion only in imperial times. After this obsession with alleged ‘later interpolations’ became unfashionable among scholars, the clue to the explanation of the structure of B.Ar. was sought in a new comprehensive understanding of the text.”

36

I. Introduction

Février’s appeal to Josephus is straightforward – Josephus does not have these sections in his paraphrase of Aristeas in Antiquities book 12.106 According to Février, since Josephus follows Aristeas closely, often wordfor-word, he would have no real motive for omitting these sections. Thus, he argues, it is more likely that Josephus’s text already had the connection between §§ 82 and 172 together rather than that he eliminated the intervening material.107 Février’s arguments do not necessitate his conclusion, however. Josephus actually does not follow Aristeas’s wording very closely in many places, as Pelletier has demonstrated. Additionally, Pelletier has examined the text of Josephus in detail and has proposed convincing reasons for his omission of these sections.108 For the description of Jerusalem and its environs, Pelletier observes that Josephus’s aims in the Antiquities do not necessitate this section. Plus, Josephus omits other descriptions of this genre, and he has already given a description of the Temple in Antiquities 3 in his discussion of the Tabernacle and the priestly duties.109 The omission of the allegorical interpretation of the law in Eleazar’s speech along with the moralizing explanation of hand washing also do not fit into Josephus’s vision of Judaism. For him the law of Moses is about piety, under which justice, temperance and moral virtue fall (Ag.Ap. 2.170–171).110 With respect to §§ 306–307 in particular, in Ant. 12.106 Josephus portrays the translators “washing their hands in the sea and purifying themselves” rather than washing and praying, and he refers to their activity as “translation” not as “reading and explication” (see Aristeas § 305). Moreover, if we assume that Josephus had the full text of Aristeas as it stands now, then Ant. 12.85 summarizes § 172 to create a smooth transition from what has just preceded, precisely because Josephus did not need the intervening sections for his purposes, which were to narrate the translation of the law under Ptolemy. He also does not include the symposia that Ptolemy holds in honor of the translators (to which he refers) – a section that Février does not want to excise. He summarizes this large segment of the text that he otherwise omits, and then he actually reverts back to the beginning of it with his reference to Menedemus (Ant. 12.99–101). Thus, Josephus did not stay close to his sources at all times, especially in cases where he omitted events chronicled in his source narrative. In these cases, Josephus appears 106

107 108 109 110

He also does not transmit the introductory paragraphs and the final one. Février contends that this omission is “trés naturel” (La Date, 24). Février, La Date, 23–25. Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe, 199–202. Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe, 200. Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe, 200–1.

7. Integrity of Aristeas and its Sources

37

to be summarizing the content of Aristeas or making transitions to other material that suits his purposes. The internal reasons that Février gives for rejecting the authenticity of these sections also fail to convince. For the trip to Jerusalem and the geographical descriptions, he claims that they reflect a simple pilgrimage narrative rather than one in which ambassadors bring royal gifts.111 He is suspicious of Eleazar’s speech because of “its violent polemic” in an otherwise irenic work.112 In both cases, however, other explanations make sense of these sections within the structure of the work. So, for example, the idealistic descriptions in §§ 83–120 do not come from some pilgrimage account but from Hellenistic sources, primarily Aristotelian, that describe an ideal city, a picture that Ps.-Aristeas wants to paint of Jerusalem. The intensity of Eleazar’s speech is for the most part directed against Egyptian culture and religion and not against enlightened Greeks who shared some of these same perceptions113 Février’s primary motivation for making these arguments derived from an attempt to address the structure of the book.114 Scholars such as Honigman have since made effective arguments for a structure to Aristeas that do not necessitate carving up the work into original and unoriginal parts, and these arguments convince me of Aristeas’s literary integrity.115 I have worked, then, from the position that Aristeas as we have it stems from the author I have called Ps.-Aristeas. A close reading of Aristeas reveals an author who employed a range of source materials in his work. It can be difficult to assess Ps.-Aristeas’s sources, however, primarily because he so thoroughly incorporates them into his story. As a rule, he reworks his sources so that they fit his narrative, and one does not find extensive, close verbal parallels to his probable source materials. In general, Ps.-Aristeas uses several different types of sources: Jewish literature; Greek/Hellenistic literature; and official documents.116

111 112 113

114

115

116

Février, La Date, 27. Février, La Date, 28–29 (“la violence de sa polemique”). For more, see the commentary on these sections. See also section 10 below on the audience and purpose of Aristeas. His analysis also forced him to date the book very late. For Février the composition/ redaction of Aristeas and its date are related. The data I have analyzed in section 5 demonstrate well that such a late date is very unlikely. See, Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 17–25; see also Meecham, Oldest Version, 213–15. The categories are Oswyn Murray’s in “Aristeas and his Sources,” 124. As he says on that page: “We are lucky enough to possess at least one arguable case of dependency

38

I. Introduction

Of his Jewish sources, Ps.-Aristeas most clearly knows the Greek Pentateuch, although exact verbal overlaps are few. So, for example, Ptolemy orders a table constructed as a gift for Eleazar to be used in the Temple (§§ 51–72). In § 56, we learn that “wherever things were written down, he ordered that their measurements be followed.” Here Ps.-Aristeas intimates that the king followed the measurements delineated in the Pentateuch as the guideline for the construction of the table. Yet, when the actual table gets described in §§ 57–72, Ps.-Aristeas uses the wording of Exodus 25 on three or four occasions, and only in brief phrases at that.117 The same holds true for the description of the high priest’s vestments in §§ 96–99. The individual terms that name the items are shared with Exodus 28 and 29, but otherwise almost the entire description employs language different from the biblical text. Ps.-Aristeas does cite the Pentateuch directly on one occasion (§ 155). In his allegorical interpretation of the food laws, Eleazar quotes Deut 7:18, which is followed by a clear allusion to Deut 10:21. Ps.-Aristeas characterizes the citation as “scripture” (γραφή). Outside of this one instance, however, it is not always certain to what degree Ps.-Aristeas is relying on the text of the Pentateuch for his narrative, since he could have known most of the words and phrases that he employs from the incorporation of these terms into Jewish piety and practice, which likely would have happened between the translation being made in the third century BCE and Ps.-Aristeas’s literary activity as much as a century and a half later. Moreover, it is somewhat surprising that he does not use Pentateuchal language more often, given the topics about which he is writing. Yet, Ps.-Aristeas certainly regards the Septuagint as scripture, he apparently knows its text, and he does employ its language periodically. It is entirely possible that in the face of the kind of Greek that he would encounter in the Septuagint Ps.-Aristeas felt the need to rewrite what he took from the translations into a Greek that fit not only his own style in the work but also his overall conception of the Septuagint as a prime example of Greek literature.

117

in each of these categories.” In this introduction I only provide examples. Detailed discussions of what sources Ps.-Aristeas used in any given passage can be found throughout the commentary. Hadas prints what he considers to be quotations from the Pentateuch in capital letters in his Greek text. In the description of the table, he has four short phrases in § 57 and § 58 in capitals. I am not as sanguine as is Hadas that these constitute quotations, particularly in cases where only one word or the name of an object agrees with the Septuagint. Ps.-Aristes might have known these terms from their uses outside of the Septuagint, even if they ultimately derived from that source.

7. Integrity of Aristeas and its Sources

39

Outside of the Pentateuch, Février has made an extended argument that Ezra-Nehemiah had an important influence on Ps.-Aristeas. In fact, he calls Ps.-Aristeas “a direct imitation” of the earlier text.118 He bases his conclusion on several parallels that he sees between the two works. So, for example, he understands Aristeas’s embassy to Jerusalem to be the same as Ezra and Nehemiah being sent to that same city.119 Both Ezra and Nehemiah come with royal gifts, as does Aristeas.120 The gathering of the people to hear the law in Alexandria resembles the same gathering in Nehemiah 8.121 Although Oswyn Murray is partial to Février’s case, he arrives at a conclusion that I think is the only one possible here, that the case cannot be clinched, since if Ps.-Aristeas is using Ezra-Nehemiah, he has taken many liberties in a very free adaptation of the narrative.122 In fact, even Février is aware of this problem and has to admit that much of Ps.-Aristeas’s use of these books might have been partially unconscious.123 This admission cuts to the heart of the matter here. If there is dependence, the resulting text is a freely adapted, maybe even unconscious, use of a source. These caveats raise serious questions in my mind that we can refer to Ezra-Nehemiah as direct sources for Ps.-Aristeas. The case is simply too tenuous.124 Based on the evidence of the text of Aristeas, we can ascertain that our author had a good Greek education. He is familiar with a range of Greek texts and philosophical traditions, and he refers specifically to Greek authors and philosophers. Ps.-Aristeas cites one Greek author specifically in § 31, Hecataeus of Abdera, who wrote in the late fourth century BCE and is best known for his ethnographic treatise the Aegyptiaca. His work survives in some fragments and testimonia, but its best preservation is in

118 119

120 121 122 123

124

Février, La Date, 32 (“une imitation directe”). Février, La Date, 33. I confess that other than the fact that people are going to Jerusalem, I do not see this as the same thing at all. Février, La Date, 35. Février, La Date, 36. Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 126. Février, La Date, 36. He says, “[I]l est même possible qu’elle ait été en partie inconsciente.” Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 126, points out that Février strangely relies on the Hebrew text of Ezra-Nehemah for his parallels. Better would have been 1 Esdras in which, for example, one finds the banquet contest among the three pages, which, according to Murray, might have “suggested” Aristeas’s symposia held in honor of the translators. See also, Meecham, Oldest Version, 226–29.

40

I. Introduction

Diodorus Siculus’s Bibliotheca Historica Book 1.125 Ps.-Aristeas attributes to Hecataeus through Demetrius of Phalerum a praise of the character of the Jewish law. This statement does not appear in the extant material from Hecataeus on the Jews, but Ps.-Aristeas might well have thought it from him, since Hecataeus did write a short ethnographic excursus on the Jews that is generally positive.126 Elsewhere, in the symposium section, Ps.-Aristeas uses language about kings and their responsibilities that looks very much like Hecataeus’s descriptions of Egyptian kings as reported in Diodorus, and he might well have used Hecataeus for some of this material. Ps.-Aristeas’s other Greek sources appear anonymously, and as with the Jewish sources, they can be difficult to pin down in many cases. Certainly Ps.-Aristeas draws on a wealth of Greek philosophical traditions, showing at different times the influence of well-known Peripatetic, Stoic and Pythagorean themes and ideas. If we look for particular Greek sources, after Hecataeus, perhaps the best case can be made for Ps.-Aristeas knowing and using the ideas of the Greek philosopher Aristotle. In several passages in the descriptions of Jerusalem and its environs, Aristeas evinces close similarities to Aristotle’s Politics Book 7 in which he describes the ideal city. In other passages spread throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas shows familiarity with Aristotelian ethical language, especially as we find it in the Nicomachean Ethics, and in § 122 the translators are said to be “zealous for the middle way,” an obvious reference to Aristotelian ethical

125

126

On Hecataeus and the Jewish Pseudo-Hecataeus, see Bezalel Bar-Kochva, PseudoHecataeus, “On the Jews”: Legitimizing the Jewish Diaspora (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996) and Menahem Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism (3 vols.; Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1976) 1.20–44. This excursus survives in the ninth-century author Photius, who says that it came from Diodorus Book 40, which is not extant elsewhere. Recently Reinhard Kratz has argued that the excerpt in Photius could not have come from Hecataeus (“Biblical History in Excerpts from Hecataeus, Berossus and Manetho,” presented at “Judea in the Long Third Century BCE: The Transition Between the Persian and Hellenistic Periods,” Tel Aviv University, May 31–June 1, 2014). For the text see Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 19–21 (English) or Stern, Greek and Latin Authors, 26–35 (Greek, English and notes). The praise of the law likely does not derive from a Jewish author whom Josephus knows as Hecataeus, who writes a work On the Jews, whom scholars generally dub Pseudo-Hecataeus. Ps.-Aristeas might also know this Jewish Pseudo-Hecataeus, since there are a number of similarities between Aristeas and On the Jews in the descriptions of Judea and Jerusalem. See comments ad loc in the commentary below.

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thought.127 One might also suggest other Greek authors as influences on Ps.-Aristeas, such as Euhemerus or Megasthenes.128 In connection with Ps.-Aristeas’s use of Hellenistic sources, a brief comment on the symposia is in order. The extent to which this section is modeled on genuine works about the nature of kingship (the so-called Peri Basileus literature) has been much debated. Gunther Zuntz and Oswyn Murray best represent the two sides of the issue. Zuntz maintained that one could reconstruct a treatise on kingship on which Ps.-Aristeas rather mechanically depended for many paragraphs, whereas Murray has countered that our author has freely adapted various source materials to produce this section. Given the way that Ps.-Aristeas adopts and adapts his sources throughout the work, Murray’s assessment better fits our author’s method of operation.129 Ps.-Aristeas, in addition to his Greek education, also had knowledge of and apparently had access to official Ptolemaic documents. He refers in several places to the administrative habits of the Ptolemaic bureaucracy – ruling by edicts (§ 28), official records of journeys (§ 283), the recording of the king’s audiences (§§ 298–299). He includes a number of what he introduces as official documents of different types – decrees, memoranda, letters – that lend an air of authenticity to the narrative. In the documents that he cites, he reveals a familiarity with second-century documentary style as well as more formal aspects of their composition. In most cases, it seems likely that he has composed his own documents, modeling them after genuine examples, using contemporary formulae.130 In §§ 22–25, however, even though he rewrites the text to suit his own narrative agenda, Ps.-Aristeas seems to have depended on genuine third-century sources for Ptolemy’s prostagma freeing the Jewish slaves in his realm. In this prostagma,

127

128

129

130

In this I disagree with Murray, who says about Ps.-Aristeas, “The author shows little interest in classical Greek literature, but considerable knowledge of Hellenistic literary genres and of individual works of the period” (“Aristeas and His Sources,” 22). See the commentary for those places where it appears that Ps.-Aristeas is dependent on classical sources. For specific suggestions and more discussion, see the comments and notes to individual passages. Gunther Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I: ‘The Seven Banquets,’” JSS 4 (1959) 21–36; Oswyn Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” JTS 18 (1967) 337–71. For more detailed discussion, see the Excurses below p. 327–335 and 424–429. For this conclusion, with which I agree, see Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 126. For some of these formulae, see the section above on the date of Aristeas and ad loc below in the commentary.

42

I. Introduction

unlike his other documents, we encounter third-century BCE formulae. The entire decree shows similarities to an extant decree from 262/261 BCE (P. Rainer 24,552, now C.Ord.Ptol. 22) concerning free persons who have been detained as slaves.131 What then can we say about Ps.-Aristeas’s use of his sources? Murray calls his method “creative plagiarism,” although he also describes Ps.-Aristeas as “a creative artist in his own right, though admittedly more ingenious than inspired.”132 Talk about damning with faint praise! I would assess Ps.-Aristeas’s work somewhat differently, emphasizing the creative part. Such creativity was actively encouraged in a student’s rhetorical education. In the earliest stages of education, the enkyklios paideia, students learned to read and write by copying and reciting important classic texts, especially Homer. In the higher stages, such as rhetorical education, the student was expected to take the received knowledge of his elementary studies and work with it. Literary texts now became fodder not only for paraphrasing and improvement but “as points of departure, providing clues to be expanded, developed, or twisted to create situations that were outside of the realm of the original text.”133 Thus, in rhetorical contexts the precursor texts served as the foundation or “backdrop” for new fictional works.134 So, when Ps.-Aristeas rewrites and essentially inverts the Exodus story, he is doing nothing more than what he would have learned to do with “canonical” works in his rhetorical training. We should not be surprised, then, that Ps.-Aristeas only acknowledges his sources rarely or that he reshaped and rewrote them to suit his own rhetorical purposes. The important question in my view is what institutions existed in the Jewish community that would have enabled Ps.-Aristeas to gain the extensive familiarity with the Septuagint so that he could employ it in the same manner that he used his Hellenistic sources? We know little to nothing about educational systems within the Jewish community. Was there a Jewish gymnasium in which Jewish “classical” texts would be studied and used for rhetorical purposes? If not, in what contexts would this have happened? Given the evidence of other Jewish authors in Egypt, such as Aristobulus, Ezekiel the Tragedian, and Artapanus, Ps.-Aristeas is not an isolated case of this kind of knowledge and use of Jewish texts. 131 132 133

134

For detailed discussion, see the commentary on §§ 22–25. Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 126, 128 respectively. Peirano, Rhetoric and the Roman Fake, 16. See also Teresa Morgan, Literate Education in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) 124. Peirano, Rhetoric and the Roman Fake, 16.

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As I see it, then, we have in our author a person who has wide-ranging knowledge of Jewish and Hellenistic literature and a close acquaintance with Ptolemaic court protocols and bureaucratic language, and he draws freely on them all. Rather than a plagiarist of any kind – particularly since what Murray regards as plagiarism is representative of standard literary practice in ancient rhetorical training – I am more drawn to the creative artist, who makes effective use of his source material to further his own agenda. That his sources can often be hard to identify with confidence testifies to his creative adaptation of them. He seems to have learned his rhetorical lessons well. While Ps.-Aristeas’s product might not rise to literary heights – we can certainly argue about the literary merits of the work – our author has a story to tell, and like other ancient authors, his telling creatively adopts and adapts other ancient sources. In the end, however, Ps.-Aristeas tells his own story, and he does that not by plagiarism but by inventive and creative incorporation of the precursor texts on which he depends.

8. Genre, Literary Forms and Structure a. Genre The generic category of Aristeas has been the subject of some scholarly dispute, and scholarly assessments of its genre have swung in a pendulum-like arc. Although many modern works refer to it as a letter, it is not qualified as such in ancient sources, and it only receives the title first in a fourteenth century manuscript, as I noted above. Despite the absence of such an explicit designation, Hadas, clearly understanding himself to be a voice crying in the wilderness, in 1951 stated that Aristeas was not a letter “despite the virtual unanimity of modern editors and translators in styling it as such.”135 In fact, Hadas even cited the vocatives at the beginning and end of the work along with the internal addresses to Philocrates as prima facie evidence that it was not a letter. For him, the references to a διήγησις, “narrative,” in § 1, § 8 and § 322 were determinative, and the term constitutes a generic description, following the second-century CE rhetorician Theon’s definition of a διήγησις as a “discourse expository of things that happened or might have happened.”136 Hadas includes Aristeas under the

135 136

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 56. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 57. Even though Theon wrote in the first or second century CE, as Hadas notes, he likely preserves material that is much older. Although

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third category of Asclepiades of Myrlea’s three kinds of truth, the plasma, which is “an imaginative treatment of history which should preserve historical verisimilitude and present a ‘poetical’ truth.”137 In this sense, then, as far as Hadas is concerned, Pseudo-Aristeas is not doing history in its ancient mode, but rather he was pursuing a “higher poetic truth.”138 Most recent scholarship has followed Hadas’s conclusions and has accepted that the author’s reference to a διήγησις describes the present narrative.139 Honigman also understands the author’s characterization of his work as a διήγησις, although she departs from Hadas, since she argues that Ps.-Aristeas is interested in doing historiography.140 She calls the work “a kind of historical monograph.”141 As she reads Aristeas, the author adheres to many of the conventions of ancient history writing, such as an introduction that sets out the agenda clearly, the subject of political deeds, undertaking an embassy, and the author’s motivation for recording the narrative, for example. Yet, at the same time, she has to admit that some features of the work are unusual for this type of literature. So, the topic of piety “that runs throughout B.Ar.’s introduction” derives from a different sort of writing, the philosophical epistle, and it “oversteps the narrow realm of his-

137

138 139

140

141

she does not deal explicitly with the question of Aristeas’s overall genre, simply calling it a narrative, see Johnson’s work on the issue of fiction and audience in Historical Fictions. Asclepiades of Myrlea was a 2nd–1st century BCE grammarian whose work only survives in testimonia and fragments. His categories of truth are cited by Sextus Empiricus in his Adversus Grammaticos 252, cited in Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 57. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 57. Numerous other scholars have followed Hadas. Erich Gruen, for example, accepts that Aristeas is a διήγησις, “an unspecific and widely applicable term, signifying a literary prose narrative … No ancient writer ever calls it a letter. Die¯ge¯sis can encompass any number of genres and fits snugly into none; it could count as a piece of historical fiction, a monograph, or even a novella. The treatise as a whole is one of a kind but different features have close affinities with a range of Hellenistic writings” (“The Letter of Aristeas,” in Outside the Bible: Ancient Jewish Writings Related to Scripture [Ed. Louis H. Feldman et al.; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2013] 2711). Against this grain, Zuntz (“Zum Aristeas-Text,” Philologus 102 [1958] 240–46) maintains that the word describes an already extant narrative, which the narrator then cites in his text. See below for more discussion. He is followed by Pelletier, Lettre, 100 n. 1. For her full argument, see Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 29–35. The summation of her argument here comes from those pages. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 30.

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toriography.”142 As she understands Aristeas, then, despite the difficulties presented by the introduction of piety as a theme, Ps.-Aristeas conceived of his work as an historical διήγησις, that is a “true history” as opposed to myth-telling, which he specifically invokes as the opposite of his work in § 322. That true narrative, however, does not have political benefit in mind, as Polybius does in his work, for instance, but rather “philosophical benefit.” Ps.-Aristeas was interested in philosophical utility that “was predicated on the truth of its content,” as the phrases “will satisfy you more” and “benefiting the mind” in § 322 indicate.143 Although he does not explicitly identify a genre for Aristeas, Richard Hunter also positions Aristeas within Greek historiographic tradition, observing that “Ar begins and closes with what look like allusions to Thucydides and Thucydidean ideals.”144 Among these are: (1) the claim that the narrative is worthy of record (§ 1 ἀξιολόγου; § 322 ἀξιολόγων; cf. Thucydides 1.1.1); the appeal to clarity (§ 1 σαφῶς; cf. Thucydides 1.22.4); the distinction between his work and the tellers of legends (§ 322 μυθολόγων; cf. Thucydides 1.21.1, 1.22.3–4 [μυθῶδες]). Moreover, claims that Ps.-Aristeas is telling the truth, such as in §§ 296–300 at the end of the symposia, also reflect Thucydidean concerns.145 Yet, Hunter also realizes that these ideas were in the Hellenistic period “part of the fabric and common language of historiographic rhetoric and thus to some extent divorced from their origins.”146 Consequently, even though Aristeas has elements common in historiographical literature, by the time of Ps.-Aristeas, these same elements might appear in different literary contexts. A complicating factor for a confident determination of Aristeas as historiography is that Aristeas begins and ends with an address to Philocrates in the vocative, a technique that is rare in historiography, and thus at the least Aristeas takes on the trappings of a letter, despite Hadas’s efforts to turn

142 143 144

145

146

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 33. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 35. Richard Hunter, “The Letter of Aristeas,” in Creating a Hellenistic World (Ed. Andrew Erskine and Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones; Swansea: The Classical Press of Wales, 2011) 55. Hunter, “Letter of Aristeas,” 56, cites Aristophanes’s The Birds for the appeal to checking the records and Lucian’s True Histories 1.25–26 for the trope of a story sounding incredible, although it is true. Hunter, “Letter of Aristeas,” 55. Part of his argument, however, relies on Oswyn Murray’s conclusion that our author “shows little interest in classical Greek literature” (“The Letter of Aristeas,” 22). The analysis in the commentary will show that Murray underestimates Ps.-Aristeas somewhat.

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them into evidence for historiography. Although Honigman appeals to the philosophical epistle as a possible influence on Ps.-Aristeas, she rejects the identification, maintaining that Aristeas “is not formally a letter.”147 Yet, the vocative address to Philocrates that frames the work has prompted some more recent scholars to return to earlier assessments and argue that Aristeas is indeed an epistle as judged by ancient literary standards. Although she admits that Aristeas “bears few of the marks of epistolary form,” Tessa Rajak appeals to the wide variation observed in Greek literary epistles in order to argue that it should be accepted as such.148 Lutz Doering has made the most detailed case that Aristeas ought to be considered a letter, but one of a type that is often neglected in discussions of whether Aristeas has any formal epistolary characeristics, the “technical” epistolary treatise.149 He challenges the generic designation of a διήγησις by offering alternative interpretations of its three occurrences in § 1, § 8 and § 322. In § 1, Doering accepts Zuntz’s argument that the use of the term refers to an extant narrative and not to the contents of the present work. In his translation of the paragraph, Doering renders the participle συνεσταμένης as “has come about” rather than “having composed,” a translation that highlights the sense that Zuntz’s position requires. He further notes that the use of the term in § 8 distinguishes the body of the work from the foregoing introductory material, and thus it does not function as a technical description of the entire work. Finally, he proposes that in § 322, in light of the concluding sentence, διήγησις might refer to the author’s intention to write about things related to what he has just written but that

147 148

149

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 33. Rajak, Translation & Survival, 31. As part of her argument, however, she cites Paris 950 (Ms Q), referring to it as a 4th century manuscript, which we have already seen is in error. In reality it comes from the 14th century. Lutz Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters and the Beginnings of Christian Epistolography (WUNT I 298; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 217–32. Doering is not the first to argue that Aristeas should be seen as an epistle. I focus on his arguments because they are the most recent and detailed, and he takes account of earlier scholarship. See, for example, Meecham, Oldest Version, 204–10, who states forthrightly that Aristeas is an epistle, which is distinguished from a letter by its intended literary quality. He situates Aristeas between contemporary Greek epistles and those in the New Testament. He does not, however, discuss any of Aristeas’s formal epistolary features. On the relative neglect of these letters in discussions of ancient transmission of knowledge as well as ancient letters generally, see D. S. Langslow, “The Epistula in Ancient Technical and Scientific Literature, with Special Reference to Medicine,” in Ancient Letters: Ancient & Late Antique Epistolography (Ed. Ruth Morello and A. D. Morrison; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007) 211–34.

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he could not include in the present work. Thus, Doering finds no warrant in any of these cases for claiming that Aristeas generically is a διήγησις. In favor of its epistolary character, Doering points out the vocative address at both the beginning and the end of the work. More than that, however, the “sustained addressee contact” throughout the text argues in favor of some epistolary intention on the part of the author. Taking his cues from Loveday Alexander’s analysis of the preface to Luke’s gospel, Doering looks to Hellenistic scientific and technical treatises for comparanda.150 Although Aristeas lacks a parties’ formula and a salutation at the beginning, by using a plain vocative with a preface “it is in line with one type of ‘epistolary treatises’ or Lehrbriefen, particularly on scientific or technical matters.”151 Of these Doering situates Aristeas on the grid developed by D. S. Langslow for technical treatises in epistolary form as one having “To X” in the title with vocatives in the opening and closing (Langslow’s type B) and maintaining a high degree of addressee contact throughout the main body of the text (Langslow’s category 3).152 Doering also recognizes, however, that Aristeas does indeed employ features of historiography, such as the insertion of official documents, and he is sympathetic to Hongiman’s conclusion that Aristeas blends genres. On the basis of his observations, he concludes, “Perhaps, then, we can follow Honigman, with the necessary modifications, in her suggestion of genre blending throughout Arist., by which the author Arist. transfigures [italics original] historiography in developing his account as the charter myth for the origins of the Septuagint.”153 Rather than a διήγησις, though, Doering

150

151 152

153

Loveday Alexander, “Luke’s Preface in the Context of Greek Preface-Writing,” NovT 28 (1986) 48–74. The term “scientific” does not carry its modern meaning. Alexander (57) notes that the “scientific tradition” incorporates all topics, including “medicine, philosophy, mathematics, engineering, rhetoric, right down to the magical sciences of the second century AD with treatises on astrology and the interpretation of dreams.” For a position directly challenging Alexander’s analysis, see Sean A. Adams, “Luke’s Preface and its Relationship to Greek Historiography: A Response to Loveday Alexander,” JGRChJ 3 (2006) 177–91 in which he argues that Luke’s preface has numerous similarities to Greek historiography and uses historiographical vocabulary. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 230. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 230, drawing on Langslow, “The Epistula.” See particularly Langslow’s chart on p. 216. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 232. Here Doering explicitly adopts and extends Honigman’s notion of Aristeas as a “charter myth” in light of Tessa Rajak’s idea of collective memory in which she describes Aristeas as “historical myth” (p. 231 n. 92).

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sees Aristeas as primarily an epistolary treatise in which the author has adapted historiographic techniques for his purposes. Can we decide between these two primary options of historiography (à la Hongiman’s blended generic formulation) or epistolary treatise (à la Doering)? To some degree these options are not too far apart. Honigman admits that Aristeas does not conform in every respect to Hellenistic historiography, while Doering recognizes the presence of historiographic techniques. One focus of the problem is the term διήγησις and the extent to which it is used in Aristeas as a generic self-designation. Although Doering makes impressive positive arguments about the epistolary character of the work, especially with respect to the sustained addressee contact throughout Aristeas, his interpretation of διήγησις has some problems. Of the three occurrences of διήγησις in the work, two come in the preface (§§ 1, 8) and one in the epilogue (§ 322). In § 1, it is part of a long genitive absolute that opens the work. Doering’s translation of the middle-passive participle συνεσταμένης as “has come about” does not really do it justice, since the verb συνίστημι is well attested, especially in Aristotle, with the meaning “compose,” and in the middle voice can mean “put together or organize.” If one then translates the verb in the middle voice in § 1, “Having composed/put together a noteworthy narrative, O Philocrates, about the meeting that we had with Eleazar, the high priest of the Judeans, since you place a high value, as you constantly remind (me), on hearing about the details and purpose of our deputation, I have attempted to expound it clearly for you, having realized the disposition you have to love learning,” then διήγησις does indeed serve as a description of the present work. The question, then, is whether διήγησις functions as a generic designation or not. One obvious comparison that has already been mentioned is with the preface to the Gospel of Luke. There the gospel writer, whose preface (1:1–4) also shows affinities with the technical or scientific epistles, refers to others who have produced “accounts” (διήγησιν). As far as his own narrative is concerned, he does not characterize it with a noun but rather says that he writes “in order” and “accurately.” By implication, however, one can read the preface to say that the gospel writer has also produced a διήγησις, just as others have before him, only his gives a more accurate account than theirs. Thus, the gospel writer, like Aristeas, combines the literary framework of the epistolary treatise and the prose account.154

154

In the preface to the book of Acts, the same author calls his first volume a λόγος, here likely a narrative (LSJ, s.v. λόγος V.).

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The use of διήγησις in § 8 serves a slightly different purpose. Here it separates the preface from the main narrative. Yet, the verb ἐπανήξομεν, “return,” harks back to the use of διήγησις in § 1 as well as to the start of the narration as the author has set it out in brief in §§ 3–4. It does not function here as a generic marker, as Doering notes.155 A comparable use of διήγησις can be found in 2 Macc 2:32 at the end of the epitomator’s preface. The situation there is somewhat more complicated, since two letters have been added to the beginning of the work before the preface, which itself does not employ vocatives but does use the first person.156 Yet, when the epitomator wants to transition to the main body of the work, he writes: “At this point forward therefore let us begin our narrative (διηγήσεως), without adding any more to what has already been said; for it would be foolish to lengthen the preface while cutting short the history (ἱστορίαν) itself.” Certainly διήγησις does not carry a technical, generic sense here, and it compares with the use that we find in Aristeas § 8. When we come to the epilogue in § 322, Ps.-Aristeas marks it with several vocabulary words that recall the preface (see commentary ad loc). With respect to the term διήγησις, it is the object of the verb ἀπέχεις, which means to have or to receive in full. Thus, the sentence communicates the idea that Philocrates has now received the complete account that Ps.-Aristeas intended to give him. Moreover, he contrasts his own account with the “books (τὰ βιβλία) of the tellers of legends,” and thus implicitly equates his διήγησις with a βιβλίον. This equivalence, then, casts doubt on Doering’s proposal that διήγησις refers to things that are not included in the present work. Since the term here clearly harks back to § 1, along with other vocabulary items, διήγησις in § 1 almost certainly refers to the present work. How far can we push the use of διήγησις as a generic indicator? The διήγησις was part of the progymnasmata or preliminary exercises in rhetoric.157 Normally it designates a narrative in prose, and thus it might be a

155

156

157

Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 219, citing Loveday Alexander, The Preface to Luke’s Gospel: Literary Convention and Social Context in Luke 1.1–4 and Acts 1.1 (SNTSMS 78; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993) 111. On 2 Maccabees, see Robert Doran, 2 Maccabees (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012) and Daniel R. Schwartz, 2 Maccabees (CEJL; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008). See Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, chap. 2. On the standard elements of the progymnasmata, see George A. Kennedy, A New History of Classical Rhetoric (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994) esp. 202–8. On rhetorical education, particularly as it can be understood through the papyri, see Morgan, Literate Education, esp. chap. 6.

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loose genre indicator. Erich Gruen understands the term as a designation of the present work but not as an indicator of genre.158 In Honigman’s estimation, the contents of the preface and other historiographic techniques in Aristeas enable her to conclude more specifically that Aristeas is “related to the genre of Hellenistic historiography,” and she calls it “a kind of historical monograph.”159 Yet, as I noted above, she also admits that a number of features in Aristeas do not comport with historiography. Doering, on the other hand, minimizes the historiographic elements and emphasizes the epistolary features of the work. In favor of the epistolary treatise, we do have to take seriously the efforts that Ps.-Aristeas makes to sustain the idea that this is a correspondence with Philocrates, especially since the addressee contact in Aristeas extends throughout the work and is not present simply in an opening or closing. This addressee contact also comes at the junctures (either beginning, end or both) of major sections of the work. This practice does not comport well with historiographical writing.160 Ultimately, both Honigman and Doering conclude, however, that in Aristeas we encounter a blending of genres that has caused confusion over a genre designation. Genre blending and bending seems to be a feature of Hellenistic literature, and Ps.-Aristeas reflects his time period and its literary proclivities. As far as the overall genre of the work is concerned, if the reference to a διήγησις in § 1 refers to the present work, as I think it does, then at least in a general sense, this functions as a generic indicator. The author is describing his work as a prose narrative, which shares many similarities with Hellenistic historiography. He also brings that prose narrative under the umbrella of a correspondence with his “brother” Philocrates. The vocatives of the opening and closing and the second person address within the main body enhance the author’s ability to construct his Gentile pseudepigraphic author for a work addressed primarily to educated, elite Jews. Doering actually points in this direction, when he writes about the second-person address in the main body: This intervention is a literary device serving to establish the relationship between the explicit addressor and the explicit addressee in such a way as to allow the implied reader, and through him or her also the first real readers of the text, to find their position vis-à-vis this piece of communication. In this respect, we need to recall that both the explicit addressor ‘Aristeas’ and the explicit addressee, his biological brother (Arist. 120 and particularly 7) ‘Philocrates’ (i.e. A3 and R3), are Gentiles by descent.

158 159

160

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2711. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 30. See the commentary ad loc, where I point out historiographic techniques in the work. See the list in Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 222.

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On the other hand, the real author (A1) is an Alexandrian Jew, and the implied reader (R2) … is construed in such a way as to allow reception also and particularly by Jews.161

In this sense, then, Aristeas is related to Hellenistic historiography, and it is related to the technical treatises with which Doering compares Aristeas. Hunter expresses the problem well: “What in fact places Ar firmly in the mainstream of Hellenistic prose is its knowing anxiety about genre; it is a work filled with ‘effects of the real’, one which of course is the simple fact that it is structured as an address to a single individual …”162 Aristeas thus represents a conscious blending/bending of genres that invokes both historiography and epistolography in order to exploit the advantages that they confer for the communicative goals that Ps.-Aristeas intends for his text. In this sense, then, we do not need to feel compelled to come down on one side or the other of the issue. Aristeas is a hybrid constructed for precisely the advantages that such genre hybridity confers.

b. Literary Forms Within the blended genre that characterizes the work as a whole and in keeping with Hellenistic period literature, Ps.-Aristeas employs throughout his work a variety of literary forms, some of which were included in the progymnasmata, the elementary school exercises of rhetorical education, along with various other rhetorical forms and devices, all of which testify to Ps.-Aristeas’s Greek education. Their combined effect is a work that evinces poikilia, literary diversity.163 Within this diversity, Ps.-Aristeas deploys several elements of the progymnasmata. He includes an extended ekphrasis – a description of a place or object that brings the subject before one’s eyes – in his descriptions of the table and bowls that the king orders constructed as gifts for the Jerusalem temple (§§ 57–82).164 The high priest’s apologia for the Jewish law (§§ 128–171) takes the form of an elaboration on the chreia, a homily or praiseworthy reminiscence about some person, 161 162 163

164

Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 223. Hunter, “Letter of Aristeas,” 56. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 16. For more discussion of these forms, see the commentary ad loc. On ekphrasis, see Kennedy, New History, 206 and Ruth Webb, Ekphrasis, Imagination and Persuasion in Ancient Rhetorical Theory and Practice (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2009).

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as well as the ethopoeia, the personification of an historical character.165 The two instances of the king bowing before the Hebrew scrolls (§ 177) and later the translation (§ 317) are both examples of an action chreia.166 The description of the countryside surrounding Jerusalem (§§ 107–111) incorporates a synkrisis, comparison, using Alexandria to make Jerusalem compare favorably with the great city.167 Outside of the usual elements of the progymnasmata, Ps.-Aristeas employs other non-rhetorical literary forms found in the Hellenistic period: the description of the high priest’s vestments (§§ 96–99) is an example of paraphrasis, paraphrase, which shortens and rewrites the description in Exodus; the journey to Jerusalem (§§ 83–120) shows the influence of the travelogue and utopian geography popular among Hellenistic ethnographers; the seven symposia (§§ 187–300) resemble philosophical and royal symposia, and in them Ps.-Aristeas adapts the Peri Basileus, On Kingship, literature to the question-and-answer format of these banquets.168 Ps.-Aristeas also displays a sense of basic stylistic flair.169 So, for example, he will at times repeat the same word or phrase within a short distance, as in § 67 (θεωρίαν … θεωρίαν). Paragraphs 77–78 are especially interesting in this regard, having two cases (παντελῶς ἀνεξήγητος [§ 77] … παντελῶς ἀνεξήγητος [§ 78] and ἀργυροῦ … χρυσοῦ … ἀργυροῦ καὶ χρυσοῦ [§ 77]). On the other hand, he also is concerned for varia-

165

166

167 168

169

The simple chreia is usually shorter than what we have in Aristeas. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 49–50, calls the section “something of a chreia in the sense of a Cynic or Stoic homily.” Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 18, 20–21, says that it is an elaboration on the form, even though it departs somewhat from the different patterns set out in the rhetorical handbooks. See Kennedy, New History, 204. On the elaboration of a chreia, see Ronald F. Hock and Edward N. O’Neil, The Chreia and Ancient Rhetoric (Vol. 2; Atlanta: SBL, 2002) chap. III. On the ethopoeia, see Kennedy, New History, 205–6. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 18. See Hock and O’Neil, The Chreia, 89. On synkrisis, see Kennedy, New History, 205. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 18. On the royal symposium, see Oswyn Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” in Aspects of Hellenistic Kingship (Ed. Per Bilde et al.; Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 1996) 16–27. See Excursus for a discussion of Peri Basileus literature and the commentary for extensive discussion of the symposium. Several of the examples in this section come from Pelletier, Lettre, 61–62, who has the most detailed discussion of Aristeas’s use of stylistic devices. His examples could easily be multiplied, however.

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tio, variation, as is particularly evident both in the numerous terms for asking or questioning that he employs in the symposia, when each of the seventy-two translators must respond to a question, and in the various ways that the king approves of each answer. Thus, for example, we find the verbs ἐρωτάω, ἐπερωτάω, πυνθάνομαι, λέγω, φήμι and collocations of κελεύω or παρακαλέω with ἀποκρίνομαι or ἀπόφημι, all employed to express the king asking a question or giving an answer. He has a fondness for alliteration – so, for example, in § 155 (μνείᾳ μνησθήσῃ) and § 182 (ἐκέλευσε τὴν ἑτοιμασίαν, εἰς ἕκαστον ἐπιτελεῖν). Ps.-Aristeas especially likes to use this technique with words separated by καί as in § 17 (πολλακῶς καὶ ποικίλως), § 26 (μεγαλομερείᾳ καὶ μεγαλοψυχίᾳ), and § 70 (πεποιημένα καὶ προσηγμένα).170 We find several examples of homoioteleuton, the repetition of word endings creating a rhyming pattern, as in § 70 (τῆς ἐπειρίας καὶ τέχνης τὰς ὑπεροχάς).171 Figures of speech also crop up in Aristeas. Some examples include: litotes, understatement for effect, often using double negatives, which we find in § 16 (οὐκ ἀνοικείως) and § 107 (οὐκ ἀλόγως); irony, as in § 19, when, after being informed there are more than one hundred thousand Judean slaves in his kingdom, the king replies to Aristeas’s request for their freedom with μικρόν γε, “indeed it is a small thing”; asyndeton, the elimination of conjunctions for effect, as in § 11 where the clause ὑπολαμβάνονται Συριακῇ χρῆσθαι does not connect to what comes before with any conjunction; and anaphora, use of the same words to begin successive lines, phrases or clauses as in § 92 (οἱ μέν … οἱ δέ … οἱ δέ … οἱ δέ …).

c. Structure The basic structure of Aristeas does not present many difficulties. In fact, very few scholars even discuss the issue. The work is structured with a frame narrative that emphasizes the translation of the Hebrew law into Greek, which surrounds a series of what are usually styled as digressions. A basic outline is as follows: Preface (§§ 1–8): The narrator introduces the subject of the work as concerning the deputation to Eleazar the High Priest.

170

171

See other examples in § 150 with delta, § 166 with tau and alpha in the same phrase, § 184 with pi, § 186 with kappa, and § 190 with pi. See other instances in § 80, § 88, and § 107.

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The Library Project (§§ 9–11): Demetrius of Phalerum informs the king that the Laws of the Jews are missing from the Alexandrian Library collection and that they require translation. The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27): Aristeas petitions the king for release of Judean slaves who had been taken prisoner under Ptolemy I. The king accedes and issues an order freeing them. Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a): Demetrius sends a memorandum to the king, which adds detail to §§ 9–11 and which encourages the king to send for translators from Jerusalem. Ptolemy II’s Letter to Eleazar (§§ 34b–40): A copy of the letter from Ptolemy to Eleazar informing the high priest of the manumission of the slaves and requesting that he send six translators from each of the twelve tribes. Eleazar’s Reply to Ptolemy (§§ 41–51a): A copy of Eleazar’s letter, which accedes to the king’s request and which describes the qualities of the translators. Ps.-Aristeas appends a list of the translators’ names. The Construction of the King’s Gifts (§§ 51b–82): A long ekphrasis describing the requisition of the gifts (§§ 51b–56), the construction of the table for the temple (§§ 57–72), and the construction of the bowls (§ 73–82).172 Jerusalem and Its Environs (§§ 83–120): An extended travelogue comprised of several subsections describing: the Jerusalem temple (§§ 84–87); the temple’s water system (§§ 88–91); the priests and their ministrations (§§ 92–95); the high priest’s vestments (§§ 96–99); the citadel (§§ 100– 104); the city of Jerusalem and its streets (§§ 105–106); the surrounding countryside and a comparison with Alexandria (§§ 107–111); Judea and its resources (§§ 112–118); and the mines of Arabia (§§ 119–120). Eleazar’s Farewell to the Translators (§§ 121–127): A second description of the translators’ qualities and Eleazar’s reluctant farewell. Eleazar’s Apologia for the Law (§§ 128–171): An extended allegorical interpretation of Jewish law with several subsections that is framed as a response to the visitors’ questions: an initial explanation about the significance of clean and unclean animals (§§ 128–133); condemnation of Gentile idol worship (§§ 134–139); the purpose of kosher law (§§ 140–143); the allegorical interpretation of kosher laws (§§ 144–157); tefillin and mezuzot (§§ 158–160); a resumption of allegorical explanations of kosher law (§§ 161–171).

172

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 150, includes §§ 83a in this section. I think that while the οὖν of § 83 connects this section with the upcoming travelogue, it belongs as the beginning of the new section.

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The Reception of the Translators at Alexandria (§ 172–186): The king receives the translators with great joy and makes accommodation for them. The Symposia (§§ 187–300): The longest section of the book comprised of seven symposia (§§ 187–292) during which each translator responds to a question about kingship that ends with the narrator’s praise of the translators (§§ 295–300). Each symposium is a self-contained unit: (1) §§ 187–202; (2) §§ 203–220; (3) §§ 221–235; (4) § 236–247; (5) §§ 248–261; (6) §§ 262–274; (7) §§ 275–292. The Execution of the Translation (§§ 301–307): The translators are taken to a quiet location where they carry out the work of translation by each individual translating and then all comparing their work to arrive at an agreed-upon final product. The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316): The translation is read to the assembled community of Alexandrian Jews and a curse is placed on anyone who would introduce changes. Examples are offered of Gentiles who tried to use translations of the Torah but who were stricken by God for it.173 The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321): The king approves of the translation and the translators depart for Jerusalem with gifts. Epilogue (§ 322): The narrator recalls themes from the preface as a way of tying up the narrative.174 Few scholars would argue with this basic outline. The issues arise when one tries to identify what holds all these disparate parts together. We saw above that Février could not fathom why these pieces should belong in the same work, and his solution was to argue for later incorporations into Aristeas. In the light of the unconvincing nature of such arguments, what does hold these sections together? Honigman has argued convincingly that in Aristeas we have an example of ring composition, a technique found throughout classical Greek and Hellenistic literature, in which the end links to the beginning, creating a symmetry – and in this case enclosing the digressions

173

174

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 150, gives § 317 as the end of this section. It seems a better division to end with the note about Theodektes’s propitiation of God and have Demetrius’s final report begin the next section. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 149–50, offers an outline that distinguishes two related narratives that she identifies: the central narrative, which is the story of the translation of the law and the deputation to Eleazar, and the secondary narrative, which she calls the Exodus paradigm. As will become apparent, I agree with those scholars who see this secondary narrative as more central to Ps.-Aristeas’s overall program.

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that make up most of the work.175 Rachel Barney distinguishes between two types of ring composition: pyramid and bookends. In Aristeas we find an example of the “bookends” type of ring composition, where “the closing part gestures back to the beginning without any rings being discernible in between – an A:B:A pattern in which the great bulk of the work falls into the central B.”176 Even acknowledging the use of ring composition, the question remains as to what purpose the various digressions serve in the narrative. A number of solutions have been suggested, whose lines converge toward an overarching raison d’etre that brings these diverse pieces together into a whole, and these focus on the story of the Exodus and how Ps.-Aristeas has rewritten that story. In its briefest form, Aristeas has taken the Exodus story and has rewritten it as a foundation story for Jews who live in Alexandria. From Ptolemy II’s freeing of the slaves to the construction of elements for the temple, to the travel to Jerusalem, to the symposia, Ps.-Aristeas rewrites, adapts and inverts parts of the story, which he does without much apparent reliance on the specific textual wording from the Septuagint, thereby converting it into a story expressing/reinforcing Alexandrian Jewish identity.177 Of course, the frame story of the translation is Aristeas’s version of the giving of the law. Moreover, if we bear in mind Ps.-Aristeas’s habit of blending and bending Hellenistic genres, the combination of Hellenistic genres and literary forms with an adaptation of elements of the Exodus story provides the thread that strings these digressions together.178

175 176

177

178

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 14–15. Rachel Barney, “Platonic Ring Composition and Republic 10,” in Plato’s Republic: A Critical Guide (Ed. Mark L. McPherran; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010) 33. For various ways of construing the use of the Exodus account see Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, chap. 3, who sees the Exodus story as a secondary narrative along with the central narrative of the translation. Noah Hacham, “The Letter of Aristeas: A New Exodus Story?” JSJ 36 (2005) 2–20 and Arkady Kovelman, Between Jerusalem and Alexandria: The Dynamic of Jewish and Hellenistic Culture (Brill Reference Library of Judaism 21; Leiden: Brill, 2005) chap. 4 see the Exodus as more thoroughly undergirding Ps.-Aristeas’s story. Paul McKechnie, “Ptolemy Philadelphus: A New Moses,” in Ptolemy Philadelphus and his World (Ed. Paul McKechnie and Philip Guillaume; Mnemosyne Supplements History and Archaeology of Classical Antiquity 300; Leiden: Brill, 2008) 234–46 views Aristeas as one work “in the developing tradition of Jewish quasi-biblical literature of the Hellenistic period” (p. 246). On the issue of rewriting the biblical story and the use of Hellenistic genres and mimesis of other Hellenistic cultural projects as a way of constructing Alexandrian

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Thus, the account of the liberation of the Jewish slaves comes prior to the account of the translation and transforms an evil pharaoh who will not allow the Israelites to leave Egypt into Ptolemy II, who becomes the “benevolent pharaoh” who both frees the Jewish slaves willingly and facilitates the giving of the law, even to such an extent that Noah Hacham and Paul McKechnie picture him as a Moses figure.179 Each of the four major digressions fits into the Exodus story that begins with manumission. First, the ekphrasis on the construction of the table and the bowls recalls the construction of the Tabernacle and its accoutrements.180 As many scholars have pointed out, §§ 52–56 allude to the dimensions of the table that were written in the Torah. Thus, Ptolemy wanted to build a colossal table but did not, since its size was already determined, and thus “wherever things were written down, he ordered that their measurements be followed” (§ 56). The description of the table originates in Exodus 25, on which Ps.-Aristeas has likely based his ekphrasis. Second, the long travel section incorporates several episodes from the Exodus story: the workings of the temple, its sacrificial system and priestly ministrations parallel material from both Exodus and Leviticus; the description of the high priest’s vestments originates in Exodus 28, although as in the ekphrasis on the table and bowls, Ps.-Aristeas departs significantly from the biblical text from which he draws his inspiration; the description of Jerusalem and it surroundings creates an ideal city for a Hellenistic Jewish audience in light of the idealistic description of a land “flowing with milk and honey” (see Num 13:26–27; 14:7–8). The description of the size of the land, six million aroura, relies explicitly on the number 600,000 people

179

180

Jewish identity, see Sylvie Honigman, “‘Jews as the Best of All the Greeks’: Cultural Competition in the Works of Alexandrian Judaeans of the Hellenistic Period,” in Shifting Social Imaginaries in the Hellenistic Period: Nations, Practices, and Images (Ed. Eftychia Stavrianopoulou; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 208–32. Honigman argues that Ps.-Aristeas engages in cultural competition in order to shape a Jewish identity as the best of all the Greeks. In addition she contends that Ps.-Aristeas rewrites “the content of the Septuagint” (p. 224). The phrase “benevolent pharaoh” comes from Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 56. On the liberation, see also Hacham, “Letter of Aristeas,” 4–7. On Ptolemy as Moses, see Hacham, “Letter of Aristeas,” 12 and McKechnie, “Ptolemy Philadelphus.” While Ptolemy II does parallel Moses at times, I find it hard to see how he is both the pharaoh of the Exodus and Moses. As I will argue, Eleazar functions more like Moses the lawgiver. See Hacham, “Letter of Aristeas,” 11–12, Kovelman, Between Jerusalem and Alexandria, 117–18 and Honigman, “Best of All the Greeks,” 224.

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who left Egypt in Exod 12:37 (here “men”) and Num 11:21 (here “people”).181 Third, Eleazar’s apologia for the law places the high priest in the place of Moses who gives the law to Israel. Eleazar’s allegorical exposition of the law puts these interpretations into the mouth of Moses, effectively making the high priest a stand-in for him. Thus, passages like Eleazar’s caution, “Do not come to the exploded conclusion that Moses legislated these matters on account of a curiosity with mice and weasels or similar creatures” (§ 144) make the high priest’s (aka Ps.-Aristeas’s) interpretations equal Moses’ real intent. They participate in what Hindy Najman has called “Mosaic discourse”: (1) they rework and expand the older tradition, claiming its authority; (2) they are understood to be Torah; (3) they re-present the Sinai revelation; and (4) they are ascribed to Moses.182 Fourth, the seven symposia also explain Jewish law and thought, even appealing directly to the Decalogue in § 228. In addition, and perhaps more importantly, Ps.-Aristeas represents the translators, who clearly are supposed to recall the seventy elders who ascended the mountain with Moses, as uniquely qualified to take Moses’ legislation and render it into Greek – both in language and in thought – and so in a way their function is akin to Eleazar’s and by extension to Moses’.183 Ps.-Aristeas’s reconfiguration and rewriting of the Exodus story runs through the narrative and serves as the glue that binds the frame narrative and the digressions into one story. In contrast to those who see the digressions as ancillary to the main story, these episodes drive the story forward. Rather than being ancillary, they are vital to the structure of the narrative, and they play significant roles in advancing the main themes of the story. Some significant pieces of the Exodus story get excised in Ps.-Aristeas’s account, however, primarily because for our author Alexandria is not a place that needs to be escaped; indeed the situation is quite the opposite. Aristeas allows us to see a Jewish community very much at home in Alexandria and seemingly integrated into its larger Hellenistic milieu. As a consequence, one of the most important scenes in the biblical story, the giving

181

182

183

See Victor Tcherikover, “The Ideology of the Letter of Aristeas,” HTR 51 (1958) 78. Other suggested parallels are not necessarily as convincing. See, for example, Tcherikover’s contention that the claim that Jerusalem is in the center of the country and on a mountain corresponds to Isa 2:2 and Mic 4:1 (“Ideology,” 77). On these elements and the phenomenon of Mosaic discourse, see Hindy Najman, Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism (JSJSup 77; Leiden: Brill, 2003). For details of these points, see the commentary ad loc.

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of the law on Mt. Sinai, has no equivalent event in Aristeas. Sinai simply does not need to happen with a benevolent pharaoh from whom no flight is necessary. Thus, no desert wandering takes place either. Finally, even though Ps.-Aristeas knows LXX Deuteronomy, he has to ignore the injunction in 17:6 that prohibits the Israelites from ever going back to Egypt. Not only have the people come back to Egypt, they are flourishing there.184

9. Relation to Other Jewish Literature Other than the Septuagint, on which Ps.-Aristeas relies at numerous points, Aristeas evidences very little in the way of relations with other Jewish literature. I have already discussed the possibility of a relationship with Aristobulus above. Scholars frequently bring three other texts into Aristeas’s orbit: The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides, the Prologue to the Greek translation of Ben Sira and 3 Maccabees. J. J. Lewis in a short article argued that Ps.-Aristeas drew from the Sentences for some of the moral maxims in the symposia.185 Unfortunately, Lewis does not discuss how he dates the Sentences to a period earlier than Aristeas, and some of his suggested parallels are actually quite distant from one another. Walter Wilson has suggested a date for the Sentences between 100 BCE and 100 CE, which would negate Lewis’s argument, and any possible literary relationship would go in the other direction.186 Wilson has also demonstrated a heavy reliance in the Sentences on biblical teaching, a possible source for Aristeas as well. In other cases where some similarity exists, the subject is probably a commonplace shared between the two texts. So, for example, in Sentences 69 and 76, Pseudo-Phocylides encourages moderation, an Aristotelian ideal that we also find in Aristeas § 223, § 237 and § 284. These sorts of parallels are simply too general to take as evidence for literary dependence, one way or the other. It seems unlikely that the two texts have a literary relationship, although they do seem to

184

185 186

See Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 350. Noah Hacham, “Letter of Aristeas,” 14–15, thinks that the use of the Exodus story in this way intentionally reorients it as a way of justifying Jewish residence in Egypt. His argument really is one from silence. I agree with Moore that Aristeas simply accepts the fact of an Alexandrian Jewish residence and betrays no awareness or interest at all in justifying it. J. J. Lewis, “The Table-Talk Section in the Letter of Aristeas,” NTS 13 (1966) 53–56. Wilson, Walter T. The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides (CEJL; Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 2005) 7. Wilson does not discuss at all any possible relationship between Aristeas and the Sentences, and Lewis’s article does not appear in his bibliography.

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emerge from an educated Jewish environment, perhaps only at a short remove from each other. The Greek translation of Ben Sira was made at a time roughly contemporary to the composition of Aristeas. In the prologue that introduces the translation, the translator, who identifies himself as Ben Sira’s grandson, appeals to similar themes that we find in Ps.-Aristeas’s preface (and elsewhere in Aristeas). Most prominent is the appeal to loving learning. Aristeas comments on Philocrates’s disposition to love learning (φιλομαθῆ, § 1; φιλομάθειαν, § 171) and in § 300 he connects usefulness with love of learning (εἰδόντες ἣν ἔχεις φιλομάθειαν εἰς τὰ χρήσιμα). The translator of Ben Sira invokes love of learning on three occasions in the Prologue (ll. 5, 13, 34), connecting usefulness and love of learning in l. 5 similarly to Aristeas (τοὺς φιλομαθοῦντας χρησίμους εἶναι). Yet, loving learning frequently appears in Plato, for example (cf. Phaedo 67B, 82C, 82D; Republic 376B), and this theme does not point to a literary relationship. The two texts share other terms that also appear in literary Greek, as, for instance, προάγω plus the infinitive with reference to literary activity (Aristeas § 171; Sir Prologue l. 12) or the verb περιποιέω (Aristeas § 121; Sir Prologue l. 11). As with the Sentences, literary dependence seems unlikely; use of φιλομαθ- terms together with other literary terms scattered throughout Aristeas and present in the Prologue to Ben Sira certainly point to a common literary environment, however, that of late second century BCE Alexandria, rather than direct dependence one on the other.187 The most substantial case for Aristeas having some possible relationship with another Jewish text can be made for 3 Maccabees. Sterling Tracy in 1928 argued from several close verbal similarities and common themes between Aristeas and 3 Maccabees that Aristeas was written in order to counter the position taken in 3 Maccabees.188 This conclusion has failed to convince many, but since Tracy’s article, scholars routinely have taken note of the close relationship beween the two texts, usually eschewing depend-

187

188

J. H. A. Hart, Ecclesiasticus: The Greek Text of Codex 248 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909), 232, 244, argued that Ps.-Aristeas depended on the Prologue. See Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 320–23 for the parallels and critique of Hart’s arguments. Boccaccini, Middle Judaism, 184, contrasts the Prologue with Aristeas, arguing that, unlike Aristeas, Sirach has no place for Gentiles or Gentile culture, particularly around the issue of true or false paideia. I disagree with the characterization of Sirach, and thus, I would not make such a contrast. Sterling Tracy, “III Macabees and Pseudo-Aristeas. A Study,” YCS 1 (1928) 241–52.

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ence for a more vague characterization.189 Yet, the two texts admittedly do exhibit a number of similarities for which some accounting needs to be made. Cyril Emmet in his introduction to 3 Maccabees in Charles’s Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament lists an impressive number of examples of vocabulary words that are shared between 3 Maccabees and Aristeas both in the official documents and throughout the two texts. Of the 24 significant words or phrases common to both works (outside of the official documents), 10 do not occur at all in the Septuagint. For example, both texts employ terms such as ἐντυχία, ἀπόλυσις, ἀλόγως, ἕως (“dawn”), κατευφημέω and μεγαλομερής, none of which occur in the Jewish-Greek translations.190 Recently Sara Raup Johnson has described the relationship of 3 Maccabees with Aristeas (as well as with 2 Maccabees, Greek Esther and Greek Daniel) as being one of “direct contact” that “is certain,” even if insufficient evidence exists to determine “in which direction influence occurred.”191 Johnson has made the most extensive case for thematic commonalities, pointing out an extensive list: (1) focus on the Jews’ relationship with foreign rulers; (2) a world that presupposes that Jews are highly placed in the court; (3) an environment of normally harmonious relationships between Jews and these foreign kings, even to the point of the kings’ admiration for the Jews; (4) Jewish loyalty to the ruling powers; (5) a concomitant commitment to observing Jewish law; (6) the interdependence of Jews in Egypt with those of the Jewish homeland.192 Beyond the thematic parallels, Johnson makes a compelling case that rather than viewing Aristeas and 3 Maccabees as taking opposite views of the Jews’ relationship to foreign kings, with Aristeas advocating participation in Hellenistic culture and cooperating with Gentiles and 3 Maccabees emphasizing confrontation and separation, these two works “are in fact in perfect agreement on all essential points.” They address the same concerns and make the same point, but their differences result from adopting diverging “imaginative” points of view.193

189

190

191 192

193

See Meecham’s critique of Tracy in Oldest Version, 229–35 in which he expresses doubt but calls Tracy’s theory “very suggestive” and “worked out with care and thoroughness.” Cyril W. Emmet, “The Third Book of Maccabees,” in Charles, APOT, 1.157–59. The full list appears on p. 157. Johnson, Historical Fictions, 141. Johnson, Historical Fictions, 144–66. See also the list of common themes provided by H. Anderson in his introduction to 3 Maccabees in Charlesworth, OTP 2.516. Johnson, Historical Fictions, 168.

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From the available evidence, I would draw a slightly different conclusion from those of Emmet and Johnson, however. Direct contact between Aristeas and 3 Maccabees seems less certain to me. While the two texts do share a number of the same terms, they sometimes are used with different meanings. Thus, ἐντυχία refers to a meeting in Aristeas § 1 and to a petition in 3 Macc 6:40. The close agreement in some of the language of official documents is easily accounted for if 3 Maccabees was composed at a date close to that of Aristeas. So, for example, the greeting χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι in Ptolemy’s letter to Eleazar (§ 35) and in the letters quoted in 3 Macc 3:12 and 7:1 reflects standard letter greetings in this period. The same is true of other bureaucratic language. Moreover, the thematic similarities between Aristeas and 3 Maccabees do not all carry the same evidential value for the argument. So, themes (1), (5) and possibly (6) above are general themes that make sense in a diaspora setting and that are present in a range of Jewish texts alone or in combination. Theme (2) really describes 3 Maccabees more than Aristeas, since the primary evidence for possible Jewish court presence in Aristeas is Ps.-Aristeas’s familiarity with Ptolemaic bureaucratic terminology and at least some acquaintance with court procedures, not any specific narrative element. Themes (3) and (4) make good sense as narrative elements in texts that were written in the late Ptolemaic period, and they function somewhat differently in the two texts. Overall, then, rather than direct literary contact, I think it more likely that Aristeas and 3 Maccabees originated in a contemporaneous period in Alexandria where the concerns and issues facing the Jewish community were addressed in both texts. Johnson is correct, I think, to see the aims of the two texts to be the same, but I do not think the evidence that usually gets cited for direct contact clinches the argument.

10. Audience and Purpose Like any literary composition, the purpose of Aristeas is tied to the audience for whom it was written. The options for its intended audience are primarily two – Jews or non-Jews – although some scholars have tried to take a middle course arguing that Ps.-Aristeas was writing primarily for Jews with Gentiles also on his literary radar screen. The earliest scholarship took it as almost self-evident that the work was polemical/apologetic and addressed to a Gentile audience as a work of propaganda. Herbert Andrews exemplifies this position: “The whole tone of the letter from beginning to end proves conclusively that its author was a Jew and that the Greek role

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was assumed to strengthen the force of the argument and commend it to non-Jewish readers.”194 Victor Tcherikover challenged the reigning communis opinio about Aristeas, arguing that the work, while being apologetic, was not a propagandistic tract aimed at Gentiles, but rather it had a Jewish audience in its sights.195 In his estimation, in the second century BCE, elite, educated Jews in the Alexandrian community were not “inclined toward assimilation” but nonetheless were caught between being “enclosed in a spiritual Ghetto” and being “reckoned among the ‘barbarians.’”196 Thus, some kind of rapprochement was needed, and Aristeas’s solution answers the questions of the class of educated Jews to which its author belonged.197 For the most part, Tcherikover’s arguments have held sway, at least as far as Aristeas’s audience is concerned, and most scholars now accept that Ps.-Aristeas was writing to fellow Judeans. John Barclay has been the most prominent dissenter against Tcherikover’s position. While not disputing that Jews were a primary audience, he points to the presentation of Judaism “in its most attractive guise” combined with the use of a Greek narrator as major reasons for including Greeks as a potential audience. Indeed, for Barclay, Ps.-Aristeas’s literary posing as a Gentile courtier of Ptolemy II indicates a Gentile implied reader.198 What Barclay does not take fully into consideration, however, is the function of this Gentile narrator. If we turn Barclay’s implied reader from a Gentile into a Jew, the guise of a Gentile narrator makes good sense, as I argued above.199 Ps.-Aristeas’s courtier enables Jews to move confidently

194

195

196 197 198

199

Herbert T. Andrews, “The Letter of Aristeas,” in Charles, APOT, 2.84. For other scholars taking this position, see the discussions and bibliography in Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 59–60 and Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 291 n. 2. Tcherikover made his arguments in two articles, one dealing specifically with Aristeas and one more generally concerned with Alexandrian Jewish literature. See “Ideology,” especially the outline of his main arguments on pp. 60–63 and “Jewish Apologetic Literature Reconsidered,” Eos 3 (1956) 169–93. Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 81. Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 81. John M. G. Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE) (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996) 148. Others assume, rather than argue for, a largely Gentile audience. See, for example, Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend, 25, for whom Ps.-Aristeas has a clear “apologetic and propagandistic purpose … to show the pagan reader how well regarded the Jews were at the Ptolemaic court.” Section 4. See the full argument in Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.”

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within the Hellenistic environment in which they live knowing that elite, educated Greeks understand and approve of Jewish practices.200 In his arguments about the overall purpose of Aristeas, Moore has made a solid corroborating case for a Jewish audience. Looking at both the digressions and the frame narrative, he concludes that they work together to put forward a specific construction of ethnic identity for Egyptian Jews. His careful analysis of ethnic markers in the text shows that a major focus of Aristeas was to “re-valorize” ethnic boundaries by providing “new ‘cultural stuff’ to be enclosed within that boundary.”201 Thus, to the degree that Ps.-Aristeas was concerned with ethnic boundaries between Greeks and Jews, his work would perforce have been addressed to Jews for whom these boundaries were most critical. As should be apparent at this juncture, audience and purpose cannot be easily pulled apart, even for analytical purposes. Scholars have suggested a dizzying array of purposes for Aristeas, and I could not hope to discuss all of them here, even those relegated to a Jewish audience, of which there are quite a few. A number of them focus on the theme of inner-Jewish tensions, which has several different variations, depending on whether one understands the translation of the Septuagint or broader cultural concerns as the central theme of the work. For those who commit to the former position, Paul Kahle made the classic case, arguing that Aristeas was written in support of one particular revision of an earlier Greek translation.202 D. W. Gooding and Gunther Zuntz, however, have demonstrated effectively the inadequacy of Kahle’s arguments.203 Another permutation envisions Ps.-Aristeas as having the temple at Leontopolis in his sights, where the Septuagint is either the scriptural collection of Leontopolis or a work translated in opposition to a rival version promulgated at Leontopolis.204 Yet,

200

201 202 203

204

In the case of Aristeas, we should probably distinguish between Greeks and Egyptians when thinking about his audience, since Ps.-Aristeas also works to distinguish Jews from Egyptians. On this triadic relationship of ethnic designators in Egyptian Judaism of this period, see Moore, “Walls of Iron.” Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 326. Paul Kahle, The Cairo Geniza (2nd ed.; Oxford: Blackwell, 1959) 213–15. D. W. Gooding, “Aristeas and Septuagint Origins: A Review of Recent Studies,” VT 13 (1963) 357–64; Gunther Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies II: Aristeas and the Translation of the Torah,” JSS 4 (1959) 117–19. For the Septuagint as the scriptures of Leontopolis, see Oswyn Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” JTS 18 (1967) 361–69. On the oppositional side, see Sidney Jellicoe, The Septuagint and Modern Study (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968) 50; idem, “The Occasion and Purpose of the Letter of Aristeas: A re-examination,”

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in order to argue these cases, a significant amount of reading between the lines has to occur, and one strains to find in Aristeas any evidence that the Leontopolis temple was in view or that there is some rival translation in his sights. Two other major interpretative approaches with their particular variations have dominated scholarship: that Aristeas was written to argue in some way that traditional Torah-observant Judaism and Hellenism were compatible or that Ps.-Aristeas wrote in order to define for Alexandrian Jews what their relations with the homeland should be. Of the first interpretation, Tcherikover expresses the position in a nutshell: “It was a necessity to find a compromise, a synthesis, which would allow a Jew to remain a Jew and, at the same time belong to the elect society of the Greeks, the bearers of world culture.”205 Advocates of the second interpretation differ as to what kind of relationship with Jerusalem and the Judean homeland they understand Ps.-Aristeas to be supporting. Some find the relationship to be antagonistic, and thus, Aristeas was written as a response meant to defend the Alexandrian Jewish community against traditionalist Jews from Judea who argued that the scriptures could only be in Hebrew206 or to show how much better off the Jews were under Ptolemy II (and thus in Egypt) than under the Hasmoneans.207 Johnson brings together the frame narrative and the digressions and arrives at a multi-faceted purpose that combines the translation, compatibility of Judaism and Hellenism and relations with Judea and Jerusalem: “His [i.e., Ps.-Aristeas’s] main purpose … was to show, in particular, that the Septuagint is a perfectly, even divinely, accurate translation, made by scholars who were equally well qualified in Greek and Jewish traditions, working in an atmosphere of ideal harmony, cooperation, amd mutual respect, and that therefore an Alexandrian Jew who kept the law according to the Septuagint was every bit as pious as

205 206

207

NTS 12 (1965–66) 144–50; also A. F. J. Klijn, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Greek Translation of the Pentateuch in Egypt,” NTS 11 (1964–65) 154–58, who does not single out Leontopolis but sees Aristeas as a polemic against another translation. Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 81. George Howard, “The Letter of Aristeas and Diaspora Judaism,” JTS 22 (1971) 337–48. Jonathan A. Goldstein, “The Message of Aristeas to Philokrates: In the Second Century B. C.E., Obey the Torah, Venerate the Temple of Jerusalem, but Speak Greek, and Put Your Hopes in the Ptolemaic Dynasty,” in Eretz Israel, Israel and the Jewish Diaspora: Mutual Relations (Ed. Menachem Mor; Studies in Jewish Civilization I; Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1991) 1–23.

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a Jew who attended the Temple in Jerusalem.”208 John Collins dismisses the idea of any anti-Judean tendencies and claims that Aristeas is rather “a manifesto of the self-sufficiency of Diaspora Judaism.”209 Moore takes Collins’s position a step farther and argues that Aristeas is fundamentally about Judean ethnic identity in Egypt, and Ps.-Aristeas wants to add “a commitment to the homeland which was apparently lacking or insufficient.”210 How to make sense of these wildly different interpretations? First of all, I do not think that we need to determine a single, overriding purpose for the work, as if the author had only one thing in mind.211 A number of these interpretations highlight important aspects of what Ps.-Aristeas was trying to accomplish. In fact, I think that there are two broad and intersecting goals that Ps.-Aristeas was pursuing that make sense of both the frame narrative and the digressions and that have subsidiary supporting arguments: (1) to construct/reinforce a Jewish identity that would provide a solid justification for elite, educated Jews to participate in the larger Hellenistic world of Alexandria as Jews and (2) to offer a myth of origins for the primary basis on which a Jewish identity should be built, the Greek version of the Pentateuch, the Septuagint. The major issue that Ps.-Aristeas addresses focuses on what it means to be a Jew/Judean in Hellenistic Alexandria, particularly as it bears on educated Jews like himself who are comfortable living in that Hellenistic world.212 In other words, what does it mean to be a Jew living in Hellenistic Alexandria and at the same time adhering to specifically Jewish beliefs and practices, such as monotheism and Jewish food restrictions? For the most part, I agree with Moore that ethnic identity lies at the root of Ps.-Aristeas’s concerns. As he points out, ethnic identity is a complex phenomenon, and we have to take into account not only Greek-Judean interractions but also Greek-Egyptian and Egyptian-Judean.213 Ethnic identity not only mattered

208 209

210

211

212

213

Johnson, Historical Fictions, 38. John J. Collins, Between Athens and Jerusalem: Jewish Identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora (2nd ed.; Grand Rapids, Mich.; Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2000) 103. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 363. Moore, like Johnson, explicitly takes into account the translation of the Septuagint as well as the digressions. Erich Gruen makes the same point, although I do not agree with his suggestion as to the purpose(s) of Aristeas. See Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998) 220–21. On the use of the adjective Jew and/or Judean, see below in the Notes section under § 1. See Moore, “Walls of Iron.” Especially chaps. 2–4.

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within a group, but it also marked people from the outside, for example, for tax purposes. The papyri from Heracleopolis, which are roughly contemporary with the composition of Aristeas, have demonstrated the broad implications of employing particular ethnic markers and ethnic identification in late Ptolemaic Egypt. In the third century BCE, for instance, Jews would likely have been classed for tax purposes as “Hellenes” and differentiated from Egyptians. By the second century BCE, Jews might be listed separately from Hellenes, but they likely retained a status commensurate with those people categorized as Hellenes.214 This situation makes it likely that reinforcing and solidifying definitions of ethnic identity for the innergroup and delineating proper relationships with other ethnic groups would be a concern for people like Ps.-Aristeas, and indeed, we find our author taking pains to distinguish Judean religious practices from Egyptian religious practices (§§ 138), even though he can appeal to Egyptian learning as a source of praise of the Jews (§ 6, 140).215 In addition, Ps.-Aristeas locates the origins of free Jews in Egypt in military service. In the narrative world of the text, Ptolemy I transplanted a large multitude of Jews into Egypt, recruiting about 30,000 men into the army and enslaving the remaining elderly men, women and children (§§ 12–14). Later we learn that these soldiers, who likely at first had the status of mercenaries, were absorbed into the army as regular soldiers (§ 36). These soldiers likely comprised the initial population of the Jewish politeuma to which Ps.-Aristeas refers in § 310, since politeumata in Egypt had military origins. Such soldiers would have had a favored tax status as did Hellenes, and they formed the initial basis for ethnic political organization.216 Here again, Ps.-Aristeas demonstrates his interest in establishing an ethnic identity for Alexandrian Jews that aligns them with his Hellene co-residents of Alexandria. When we move to the various digressions, Eleazar’s apologia for the Jewish law looms large, since as many scholars have noted, his speech

214

215

216

Willy Clarysse and Dorothy Thompson, Counting the People in Egypt: Volume 2: Historical Studies (Cambridge Classical Studies; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006) 147–48. For more on the Heracleopolis papyri and the Jewish politeuma, see the commentary. On the separation of culture from religion and its impact here, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 305–8. On these issues, see Sylvie Honigman, “Politeumata in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt,” Ancient Society 33 (2003) 61–102 and “Soldiers and Civilians in Ptolemaic Egypt: The Jewish Politeuma at Heracleopolis (Review of Urkunden des Politeuma der Juden von Heracleopolis [144/3–133/2 v. Chr.] [P. Polit. Iud.]),” Scripta Classica Israelica 21 (2002) 251–66.

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seems to be in tension with other parts of the work (cf. § 16). Through the mouth of his high priest, Ps.-Aristeas emphasizes the meaning and importance of obeying the “legislation” that Moses gave. In his allegorizing interpretation, keeping the laws is a matter of moral formation, values that Jews explicitly share with elite, educated Greeks. Eleazar specifically addresses two separate issues – idol worship and kosher law. When it comes to idols, Eleazar condemns their worship as essentially euhemerism (§§ 135–136). After a general condemnation, he singles out Egyptians for special censure because of their worship of animals (§ 138). Then follows the famous “walls of iron” passage that insists on Jewish separation “so that we might not intermingle with any other nations” (§ 139). How do we resolve the tension between the more universalizing and accommodationist tendency expressed throughout most of Aristeas with the separatist statements here? Some scholars have concluded that through the mouth of Eleazar Ps.-Aristeas wants to assert Jewish superiority over Gentile religion and practice. So, for example, Gruen sees Eleazar’s words as a strong statement that overrides any idea of universalism.217 Yet, when looked at closely, and in relation to other Jewish writers who much more obviously assert the superiority of the Jews, it is difficult to accept that Ps.-Aristeas has this as either a primary or secondary goal.218 In order to resolve the tension, we must keep in the forefront of our minds Ps.-Aristeas’s audience. Those of his co-ethnics/religionists who like him were comfortable in their Hellenistic environment must have had to confront the problem of Greek religious worship and perhaps even intermarriage. Monotheism for Ps.-Aristeas, then, becomes an important ethnic marker for Jews, especially because it prevents “intermingling.”219 In the narrative world of the text, Ps.-Aristeas presents us with enlightened Greeks, especially ‘Aristeas’ himself, who also understand that in reality there exists only one, supreme god (§ 16). The message is clear; there are Greeks, even in high places, who understand the insistence on worshipping one god. Whatever Greeks might have thought about Ps.-Aristeas’s condemnation of idolatry is not particularly relevant, since he is not writing to Greeks; he is trying to provide for his fellow Jews a rationale for maintaining distinctly Jewish practices while at the same time living in the larger

217 218 219

Gruen, Heritage and Hellenism, 216. For a fuller discussion, see the commentary, pp. 248–251. On the sexual connotations of the verbs here and in § 152, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 317–18.

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Hellenistic environment. For his readers, then, Ps.-Aristeas confirms that one can walk the fine line between participation and separation. When he turns to kosher law, Eleazar explains that the various laws that keep Jews separate actually represent values that enlightened Greeks share (cf. §§ 168–170). The conclusion of the section in § 171 sums up the point that Ps.-Aristeas is trying to make: “Thus I am persuaded, O Philocrates, to clarify for you, because of the love of learning that you possess, the utmost dignity and natural reasonableness of the Law (τὴν σεμνότητα καὶ φυσικὴν διάνοιαν τοῦ νόμου).” In explaining the kosher laws in this way, Ps.-Aristeas reaffirms Jewish ethnic boundaries with both Greeks and Egyptians. In the face of potential Greek criticism, he argues that these practices are rational – an explanation that Greeks in the narrative world of the text readily accept – and at the same time Jews do not avoid certain foods for the same reasons that Egyptians do.220 In order to make his case even more convincingly, Ps.-Aristeas presents Eleazar’s interpretations not as his own understanding, but rather as Moses’ intention when he gave the law – and of course, Eleazar’s speech relies on the Greek translation and not the Hebrew text. In that sense, Ps.-Aristeas presents the Septuagint as revealing Moses’ reasons for giving the law. Thus, as I outlined above, this section participates in Mosaic discourse, which grants the interpretation (in this case both Eleazar’s allegorizing interpretation and the Septuagint) the status of Torah.221 Finally, the pseudonymous narrator ‘Aristeas’ plays an important role in Ps.-Aristeas’s drive to solidify Jewish ethnic identity. Throughout the narrative, Ps.-Aristeas carefully establishes a foundation for the kind of life that he and his like-minded compatriots already live. Here I think that Moore is correct when he says that in Aristeas we have a “revalorizing” of boundaries, not originary boundary drawing or re-drawing.222 Ps.-Aristeas is not making a defense of Judaism – certainly not to a Jewish audience – rather he is worried about what things are most important to maintaining a Jewish identity as his audience also absorbs elements of Greek culture. Two issues confront our author, however – reinforcing essential aspects of Jewish identity for his audience and crafting a strategy for engaging nonJews in the environment who not only do not observe these practices but 220 221

222

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 322–24. Najman, Seconding Sinai. For more details on Mosaic discourse as applied to Aristeas, see Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship,” 46, 50. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 326. So, for example, in Aristeas circumcision and Sabbath observance are not seen as issues to deal with, likely because they were not perceived to be issues that needed reemphasizing.

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who might pose dangers that lead to their violation. This is where our Gentile narrator comes in. For most scholars, ‘Aristeas’ serves a narrative function that lends coherence to the narrative, supports the veracity of the story and helps to create a consistent and logical narrative world.223 Indeed, our pseudonymous narrator fulfills all these functions, but again, we must remember that ‘Aristeas’ is speaking to an audience of Jews. He inquires about Jewish practices, observes Jewish cult, explains things Jewish to Philocrates as well as to the king (see § 16); indeed he is ubiquitous, constantly inserting himself explicitly into the narrative. In his role as an “outsider,” he becomes the ideal Greek who accepts Jews along with their ethnic practices and to whom they subsequently can relate. He affirms that Greeks like himself recognize and accept Jewish difference. Ps.-Aristeas takes pains to communicate that enlightened Greeks in Alexandria who inhabit the higher social strata get Judaism. They realize that Moses gave the law to Jews to inculcate values that accord with their own. Whatever anxieties elite Jews might have about certain aspects of Hellenistic culture – polytheistic religion, for example – Greeks like ‘Aristeas,’ Ptolemy II and Demetrius erect no barriers to Jewish involvement in the broader world of Hellenistic Alexandria – even at the highest social strata.224 Eleazar’s apologia leads directly to the reception of the translators in Alexandria and the seven symposia. Taking up a large portion of the work, they cannot simply be a digression, and indeed they are not. They contribute to the author’s overall agenda by showing an ideal situation of commensality between educated Greeks and Jews. Ps.-Aristeas highlights Gentile willingness to accommodate Jews when he pictures the king ordering the meals prepared according to Jewish dietary needs and setting aside the usual Greek religious preliminaries and instead having a Jewish prayer (§§ 181–185). Ps.-Aristeas’s portrayal of the translators as trained in both Jewish and Greek literature pays off when each is allowed to display his wisdom in the symposia, often fusing Greek ideas with appeals to the Jewish God. These friendly and cordial symposia testify to the interactions possible between folks like Ps.-Aristeas and Gentile elites like Aristeas and Ptolemy II.225 223

224

225

Actually very few scholars treat the significance of a Gentile narrator. The major exception is Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 67–71, who offers the reasons set out here. See also Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora, 139. For a more detailed argument about our pseudonymous narrator, see Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.” For more details on these issues, see the commentary on the symposia and the two excurses there.

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Before turning to the place of the travelogue and connections to Judea and Jerusalem, we must move to consideration of the translation of the Hebrew law into Greek. Throughout Aristeas the author reveals his indebtedness to the Septuagint, which no doubt constituted scripture for him. The frame narrative of the translation is integral to Ps.-Aristeas’s purpose, since for him Jewish ethnic identity is grounded in Moses’ legislation, which determines his understanding of the translation. For Ps.-Aristeas the Septuagint can take the place of the Hebrew for Greek-speaking Jews, since it is a second version of Moses’ legislation. As I noted above, his work constructs a myth of origins for the Septuagint as he knew it, as sacred scripture and as a free-standing replacement for the Hebrew, which it likely was not at its point of production in third century BCE.226 As part of that enterprise, Ps.-Aristeas employed several authority conferring strategies to establish that the Septuagint could stand alongside of and replace the Hebrew text. So, for example, by virtue of the translators’ training and philosophical bona fides established in the symposia, they are able to render the philosophical and divine Hebrew text (see Demetrius’s characterization in § 31) into a Greek text that had the same qualities. Certainly casting the Septuagint in Eleazar’s speech as embodying Moses’ intentions for the law both equates the Septuagint with the Hebrew and ties the Septuagint directly to issues of Jewish identity. As part of his construction of the myth of the Septuagint, Ps.-Aristeas makes two basic contentions about the nature of the translation – its high literary quality and its sanctity. First, the king requisitions it for inclusion in the Alexandrian Library. This episode (§§ 9–11; §§ 28–34), which forms the first part of the frame narrative, establishes that the Septuagint is intended to be a literary text that can stand next to the great works of classical Greece. Presumably made for monolingual Greek readers, the translators have not only transferred Moses’ intention to the Greek, but their own training in Greek literature has equipped them to create a work of high literary quality. Somewhat surprisingly however, after this episode

226

This is not the place to enter into a detailed discussion of the relationship of Aristeas and the problem of the Septuagint’s origins. Suffice it to say here that at its point of production the Septuagint was likely not intended to be scripture nor to replace the Hebrew, on which it was dependent linguistically. For detailed arguments for this position, see Pietersma, “A New Paradigm”; Pietersma and Wright, “To the Reader of NETS”; and Boyd-Taylor, Reading Between the Lines. On Aristeas as a myth of origins for the Septuagint, see Wright, “Letter of Aristeas.” Honigman in Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship has argued that Aristeas in constructing a “charter myth” for the Septuagint. For more detail, see above Section 2.

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we do not hear of the Library again, and Ps.-Aristeas never tells us that it was actually deposited there after its completion. The second episode (§§ 301–316) of the frame narrative, the execution of the translation and its acceptance by the Jewish community, serves to reinforce its sanctity. Here the translators’ moral rectitude gets re-emphasized and the Jewish community binds itself to the translation as sacred scripture in the mode of biblical episodes.227 When presented with the newly finished translation, Ptolemy bows and orders that the books “be preserved reverently” (συντηρεῖν ἁγνῶς; § 317). Also in this section we see the only hints in the work that some divine purpose might be involved. On the completion of the Septuagint, the narrator comments, “And thus it happened that the work of the translation was completed in seventy-two days, appearing as if the circumstance happened by some plan” (§ 307). The great bulk of Aristeas, then, reflects Ps.-Aristeas’s reason for composing this work, which might be put thusly: Any anxieties that educated Jews might feel about full participation in the broader Hellenistic environment are unnecessary. Those Greeks with whom they would associate understand the reasons for practices that might separate Jews from others, and they willingly accommodate them. These are set out in the Jews’ ethnic legislation with the goal of inculcating high moral standards of justice and gentleness, values shared with elite Greeks, who also hold the Septuagint in high regard as the lawcode of the Jews as well as a philosophical document that is divine. In Aristeas, the Sinai event gets replayed in Greek for Jews in Alexandria, and this time rather than drive the Jews out, the Egyptian king facilitates the giving of the law. Jewish ethnic identity is grounded in Moses’ legislation, and maintaining distinctive Jewish practices as Moses laid them down would not prevent Jews from being part of Alexandrian society, since the Greeks recognized the Jewish law’s prestige and value from the very beginning. Even more, I think, the high regard that we see Greeks in Aristeas express for the Jewish God, the Jews (as embodied by Eleazar and the translators) and the Septuagint reflects a certain ethnic pride. Yet, such pride does not constitute a claim to Jewish superiority over Greeks and Greek culture. As we will see throughout the commentary, Ps.-Aristeas tries to situate Jewish thinking and praxis as commensurate with the finest of the Greeks. In this way, he portrays Alexandrian Jews as the “best of all Greeks,” not better than but the finest of. He and his fellow

227

For more detail, see the commentary below and Harry M. Orlinsky, “The Septuagint as Holy Writ and the Philosophy of the Translators,” HUCA 46 (1975) 89–114.

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Judeans can maintain their ethnic identity while at the same time they can see themselves as Hellenes, insiders within Hellenistic society.228 At this stage there remains to take account of the long travelogue in which Ps.-Aristeas describes Jerusalem, Judea, and the Jewish temple and cult, since it, like the symposia, occupies a good portion of Aristeas. The fact that scholars have proposed for these sections, like the work itself, interpretations that are diametrically opposed to one another testifies to the opacity of its place in the narrative. When considered in the light of what I have outlined above as the purpose of the work, we can get some sense of how these sections fit in. We should consider the description of the temple and cult separately from Jerusalem, Judea and environs, however, since they accomplish different aims. Ps.-Aristeas’s description of Judea and Jerusalem construct it as the ideal politeia, as Honigman has explained.229 Indeed, he makes an explicit comparison with Alexandria in § 109 in which Jerusalem fares better than the Egyptian metropolis largely because of its more suitable size and its ideal relationship with the countryside. Certainly Ps.-Aristeas desired to affirm the relationship of Alexandrian Jews with the homeland, and part of being a Jew/Judean was to maintain a connection to that place, even if Alexandrian Jews might not have traveled there often or at all.230 Thus, the favorable comparison between their present place of residence and the homeland reminds Alexandrians of their Judeanness. The description of the temple and the cult ties the sacred space and the cult to Jerusalem – and thus to Jewish identity. It also has another function as well. Although the narrator begins the long section from § 83 to § 120 by saying that what follows will describe the journey, he immediately jumps into his description of the temple. This unexpected starting point makes some sense in the narrative, however. Preceding this section Ps.-Aristeas relates an epistolary correspondence between Ptolemy II and the high priest Eleazar after which comes his ekphrasis of the construction of the table and bowls. In the correspondence between Ptolemy and Eleazar, Ps.-Aristeas portrays the exchange not as one between a superior and an inferior but rather as one between equals. Just as Ptolemy is king 228 229

230

I have borrowed the phrase from Honigman “Jews as the Best of All Greeks.” See “La Description de Jérusalem et de la Judée dans la Lettre d’Aristée,” Estratto da Athenaeum 92 (2004) 73–101 and “Best of All the Greeks,” 223. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 330–36, makes the same point, although he argues that Ps.-Aristeas wants to include commitment to the homeland as an element of ethnic identity since it was lacking previously. I am not convinced of this last point. See the commentary for more discussion.

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of the great Alexandria and Egypt, Eleazar is ruler of the great Jerusaem and Judea. Yet, Eleazar also conducts the ministrations in the temple, and Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the high priest in his finery is clearly meant to evoke awe at the high priest. This awe-inspiring high priest, Eleazar, the ruler of the Judeans, authorizes the translation of the Hebrew law into Greek, and he sends learned men, who will make certain that the resulting Greek translation will be the equivalent of the Hebrew. Consequently, it is not surprising that Ps.-Aristeas places the speech of Eleazar explaining the kosher laws hot on the heels of travelogue section. Eleazar, then, functions as the Judean counterpart to the Greek Ptolemy. The latter authorizes the translation – and thus gives it approbation – as the ideal Greek who certifies its acceptability as Greek literature, and the former authorizes it as the ideal Judean who can assure its authenticity as sacred scripture. Thus, the Septuagint is valorized both in the eyes of Greeks and Judeans. The travelogue section, then, like the other digressions, is not ill-suited to the work, nor is it extraneous to the purposes that Ps.-Aristeas has for his work. The various digressions allow our author to display his education and rhetorical skills, but at the same time each of these sections contributes to the main goals for which Ps.-Aristeas was writing.

II. GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

Editions and Translations Andrews, H. T. “The Letter of Aristeas.” Pp. 83–122 in Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English. R. H. Charles, ed. Vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon, 1913. Hadas, Moses. Aristeas to Philocrates (Letter of Aristeas). Jewish Apocryphal Literature. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1951. Gruen, Erich S. “The Letter of Aristeas.” Pp. 2711–2768 in Outside the Bible: Ancient Jewish Writings Related to Scripture. Louis H. Feldman et al., eds. Vol. 3. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2013. Kraus-Reggiani, Clara. La Lettera di Aristea a Filocrate. Introduzione – Esame analitico – Traduzione. Rome: Universitá di Roma, Istituto di filologia classica, 1979. Mendelssohn, Ludovicus. Aristeae quae fertur ad Philocratem epistulae initium (31–50). Jurievei (Dorpat): Typis Mattiesianis, 1897. Pelletier, André. Lettre d’Aristée a Philocrate: Introduction, Texte critique, Traduction et Notes, Index complet des Mots grecs. Sources Chrétiennes 89. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1962. Raurell, Frederic. Carta d’Arísteas. Introducció, text revisat, traducció i notes. Barcelona: Institut Cambó – Fundació Bíblica Catalana, 2002. Riessler, P. “Brief des Aristeas.” Pp. 193–233 in Altjüdisches Schriftum ausserhalb des Bibel. Augsburg: Dr. Benno Filser Verlag G.m.b.H., 1928. Schard, Simon. Aristeae, De legis diuine ex Hebraica lingua in Graecum translatione. Basel, 1561. Schmidt, Moritz. “Der Brief des Aristeas an Philokrates.” Pp. 242–312 in Archiv für wissenschaftliche Erforschung des Alten Testamentes. Adalbert Merx, ed. Vol. 1. Halle: Verlag der Buchhandlung des Waisenhauses, 1869. Shutt, R. J. H. “Letter of Aristeas.” Pp. 7–34 in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. James H. Charlesworth, ed. Vol. 2. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1985. Thackeray, H. St. J. “Appendix. The Letter of Aristeas.” Pp. 501–574 in An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek. Henry Barclay Swete, ed. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1902. Thackeray, H. St. J. “Translation of the Letter of Aristeas.” JQR 15 (1903) 337– 391. Tramontano, Raffaele. La Lettera di Aristeas a Filocrate: Introduzione, Testo, Versione e Commento. Naples: Ufficio Succursale della Civilta Cattolica, 1931. Wendland, Paul. Aristeae ad Philocratem Epistula cum ceteris de origine versionis LXX interpretum testimoniis. Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1900.

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Other Literature Adams, Samuel L. Wisdom in Transition: Act and Consequence in Second Temple Instructions. JSJSup 125. Leiden: Brill, 2008. Adams, Sean A. “Luke’s Preface and its Relationship to Greek Historiography: A Response to Loveday Alexander.” JGRChJ 3 (2006) 177–191. Aitken, James K. “The Septuagint and Egyptian Translation Methods.” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the IOSCS, Munich, Germany, Aug. 2, 2013. Alexander, Loveday. “Luke’s Preface in the Context of Greek Preface-Writing.” NovT 28 (1986) 48–74. Alexander, Loveday. The Preface to Luke’s Gospel: Literary Convention and Social Context in Luke 1.1–4 and Acts 1.1. SNTSMS 78. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Anderson, H. “3 Maccabees.” Pp. 509–529 in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. James H. Charlesworth, ed. Vol. 2. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1985. Attridge, Harold W., ed. The Harper Collins Study Bible. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2006. Bagnall, Roger. “Alexandria: Library of Dreams.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 146 (2002) 348–362. Bagnall, Roger. “Practical Help: Chronology, Geography, Measures, Currency, Names, Prosopography, and Technical Vocabulary.” Pp. 179–196 in The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Bagnall, Roger S. and Peter Derow. The Hellenistic Period: Historical Sources in Translation. New Edition. Oxford: Blackwell, 2004. (First edition published as Greek Historical Documents: The Hellenistic Period. SBLSBS 16. Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1981). Baltussen, Han, ed. Greek and Roman Consolations: Eight Studies of a Tradition and Its Afterlife. Swansea: Classical Press of Wales, 2012. Barbu, Daniel. “Aristeas the Tourist.” Bulletin der Schweizerischen Gesellschaft für Judaistische Forschung 23 (2014) 5–12. Barclay, John M. G. Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE). Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996. Barclay, John M. G. “Using and Refusing. Jewish Identity Strategies Under the Hegemony of Hellenism.” Pp. 13–25 in Ethos und Identität: Einheit und Vielfalt des Judentums in hellenistisch-römischer Zeit. Matthias Konradt and Ulrike Steinert, eds. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2002. Bar-Kochva, Bezalel. Pseudo-Hecataeus on the Jews: Legitimizing the Jewish Diaspora. Hellenistic Culture and Society 21. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. Barney, Rachel. “Platonic Ring Composition and Republic 10.” Pp. 32–51 in Plato’s Republic: A Critical Guide. Mark L. McPherran, ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

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III. TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY

Preface (§§ 1–8) 1. Having composed a noteworthy narrative, O Philocrates, about the meeting that we had with Eleazar, the high priest of the Judeans, since you place a high value, as you constantly mention, on hearing about the details and purpose of our deputation, I have attempted to expound it clearly for you, having realized the disposition you have to love learning. 2. For indeed it is the greatest thing for a person “always both to increase learning and to make progress,” whether through written accounts or through the actual reality that we experience. For thus is a pure disposition of mind constructed, taking up whatever is most beautiful; and when one has gravitated towards the most supreme thing of all, piety, it will provide an unerring standard, when it is employed. 3. Since we had a predilection for inquisitively looking into religious matters, we volunteered for the embassy to the aforementioned man, who is esteemed by both citizens and foreigners alike for integrity and reputation and who has won the greatest benefit for those around him and for those citizens in other places, for the translation of the divine Law, because it is written among them on parchments in Hebrew letters. 4. Indeed, we undertook the embassy eagerly, seizing an opportunity with the king concerning those who had been deported from Judea into Egypt by the king’s father, who first both had possessed the city and had taken over the government of Egypt. It is worthwhile to explain these things to you as well. 5. For I am convinced – since you, all the more, have a predilection toward matters most holy and toward the disposition of those people who conduct themselves according to the holy legislation, concerning which we propose to explain – that you will listen gladly, having recently come to us from the island, also desiring to hear whatever exists for the restoration of the soul. 6. And previously I transmitted to you, concerning those things that I considered worthy of mentioning, a record, which we received from the most learned high priests throughout the most learned (land of) Egypt, concerning the race of the Judeans. 7. For to you, as one who has an eagerness to learn about matters that can aid understanding, it is necessary that I communicate, on the one hand, most especially with all who are like-minded, and on the other, even more so with you who possesses a genuine purpose, who has been established in character as a brother not just according to descent but also being the same

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as we are, with an eager desire for beauty. 8. For delight in gold or any other contrivance valued by the vain-glorious does not have the same benefit that the training of education and attention to these things does. But lest we engage in idle chatter, talking at length of introductory matters, we will resume the thread of the narrative. Textual Notes231 § 1. Pelletier follows Zuntz’s emendation of ὑπομνήσκοντος, making the participle a genitive absolute, “as you constantly mention,” rather than the nominative singular ὑπομνήσκων of the Greek manuscript tradition.232 § 2. Ms K reads the comparative κυριώτερον, “more supreme.” § 3. Pelletier accepts the conjecture of U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (followed by his student Wendland) of εἰς τὸν προειρημένον ἄνδρα πρεσβείαν, which produces a grammatical phrase in Greek, “for the embassy to the aforementioned man” and which is the basis for my translation. § 5. Thackeray reconstructs the reading of the Greek manuscript tradition, δηλοῦντες μὲν ὥς σε, which is certainly corrupt, as δηλοῦν, ἀσμένως, which makes good sense in the context of “concerning which we propose to explain – that you will listen gladly.” § 8. For “training of education,” ms G has “education itself,” and ms I reads παιδείας διαγωγή, “course of education.”

231

232

In the Textual Notes sections, I discuss the most significant textual variants, including those from the many scholarly emendations that have been suggested for the text of Aristeas. For the most complete list of textual variants and their witnesses along with scholarly conjectures and emendations, see Paul Wendland, Aristeae ad Philocratem Epistula cum ceteris de origine versionis LXX interpretum testimoniis (Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1900); H. St. J. Thackeray, “Appendix. The Letter of Aristeas,” in An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek (Ed. Henry Barclay Swete; 2nd ed.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1902) 501–74; and Raffaele Tramontano, La Lettera di Aristeas a Filocrate: Introduzione, Testo, Versione e Commento (Naples: Ufficio Succursale della Civilta Cattolica, 1931), supplemented by additional manuscripts and some new collations in André Pelletier, Lettre d’Aristée a Philocrate: Introduction, Texte critique, Traduction et Notes, Index complet des Mots grecs (Sources Chrétiennes 89; Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1962). Rather than cite the pages in these editions, which would unnecessarily add to the length of this volume, in the Textual Notes sections I will identify the editor who accepts or makes the suggestion, and the reader interested in more detail can consult these editions under the individual paragraphs. See G. Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas-Text,” Philologus 102 (1958) 246.

Preface (§§ 1–8)

101

General Comment Paragraphs 1–8 form the introduction to the entire work and set the stage. Scholars debate the overall genre of Aristeas, since it at least formally is presented as a personal communication to Philocrates, and indeed the introduction and epilogue do bear some epistolary characteristics. The author, however, refers to his project as a διήγησις, a prose narrative reporting a series of events (§§ 1, 8, and 322), a form that comprised part of the Hellenistic rhetorical curriculum, the progymnasmata.233 Other literary forms from the progymnasmata appear in Aristeas, demonstrating, at the least, the author’s literary pretensions.234 The author of 2 Maccabees also calls his work by the same name (see 2 Macc 2:32), and the author of the Gospel of Luke implies that his work is a διήγησις (see Luke 1:1–4 and Introduction section 8a). According to his “introductory matters” (τῶν προλεγομένων, § 8), Ps.-Aristeas’s purpose is (1) to narrate the “meeting that we had with Eleazar the high priest of the Jews,” which concerned the translation of the Jewish law (§§ 1–3), (2) to explain his role in the freeing of the Jewish captives (§ 4), and (3) to inform Philocrates about the Jews and their law (§§ 5–6). Of course, this explicit purpose is attributed to the pseudepigraphic narrator. (For the purpose of the Jewish author of Aristeas, see the discussion in the Introduction, section 10.) Aristeas’s introduction mentions two works in what appears to be a series of three specific correspondences between Ps.-Aristeas and Philocrates, whom he calls his “brother” (§ 7). The phrase “as you constantly mention” presumes an ongoing relationship between the two men. Paragraph 6 refers to a previous “record” (ἀναγραφή) that Aristeas sent containing information about the Jews that he had gotten from Egyptian priests. The use of the verb διαπέμπω in the immediate context does not make entirely clear whether this was an independent work that Aristeas composed or whether he transmitted to Philocrates the record as he had received it from Egyptian priests. Many scholars have noted that here our pseudonymous author might be trying to associate himself with a certain Aristeas, often

233

234

For detailed discussion of the διήγησις, epistolarity and the generic form of Aristeas, see the Introduction, section 8a, as well as the discussion in Sylvie Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria: A Study in the Narrative of the Letter of Aristeas (London/New York: Routledge, 2003) chap. 2 and Lutz Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters and the Beginnings of Christian Epistolography (WUNT I 298; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) chap. 5.2. On the progymnasmata, see further the Introduction with bibliography cited there and Moses Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates (Letter of Aristeas) (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1951) 56–57 and Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 15–25.

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called “the Historian,” who wrote a work entitled On the Jews, which is known from a fragment quoted in Eusebius of Caesarea’s Preparation for the Gospel 9.25, which he says he found in Alexander Polyhistor.235 It also forms part of the literary conceit of the book, since this previous knowledge explains why ‘Aristeas,’ a Gentile, knows so much about Judaism and why he has such concern for Jewish slaves. The present work, then, is the second in the series. In § 322, the author anticipates a third work in which “I will attempt to write down the remainder of those things worth saying.” The author attempts to situate his work historically by mentioning two persons in the introduction. The first is Eleazar, “the high priest of the Jews.” Although Eleazar plays an important role in Aristeas, we learn few specifics about him. Josephus (Ant. 12.43) identifies our Eleazar as the brother of the Oniad high priest Simon I: “But as he [i.e., Simon I], when he died, left an infant son named Onias, his brother Eleazar … took over the priesthood.”236 Scholars differ in their opinions as to whether Josephus’s Eleazar is the same high priest as the one in Aristeas. Henry Meecham and Elias Bickerman, for example, maintain that Ps.-Aristeas is referring to the same high priest that Josephus mentions.237 James VanderKam makes the most detailed argument in favor of the identification of Aristeas’s Eleazar with the brother of Simon I identified by Josephus, both of whom lived in the third-century BCE. He argues that whatever other historical difficulties with Aristeas there might be Ps.-Aristeas has connected two historical figures, Ptolemy II and the high priest Eleazar.238 Erich Gruen rightly cautions, however, that Josephus might well have inferred (and thus created) such an identity as a result of the mention of Eleazar in Aristeas and that the name Eleazar “is a conventional name for Jewish spiritual leaders in Hellenistic

235

236

237

238

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 94–95, notes that the character of Eusebius’s Aristeas is very different from our author, and he thinks the likelihood is that this verse is part of the literary fiction of the work. For discussion of this connection, see the Introduction, section 4. Translations of Josephus Book 12 come from Ralph Marcus, Josephus VII (LCL; Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1957). Henry G. Meecham, The Oldest Version of the Bible: ‘Aristeas’ on Its Traditional Origin. A Study in Early Apologetic with Translation and Appendices (London: Holborn Publishing House, 1932) 326–27; Elias Bickerman, “The Dating of Pseudo-Aristeas”, in Studies in Jewish and Christian History: A New Edition in English including The God of the Maccabees (Ed. Amram Tropper; 2 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 130. James C. VanderKam, From Joshua to Caiaphas: High Priests After the Exile (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004) 167.

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literature”239; see, for example, the torture and death of a certain Eleazar by Antiochus IV narrated in 2 Maccabees 6 and 3 Maccabees 6. Indeed, Josephus’s reference comes as part of his paraphrase of Aristeas, and his identification together with Ps.-Aristeas’s character are the only references to a high priest by this name in this period, which certainly justifies VanderKam’s assessment of Eleazar as “an otherwise obscure high priest.”240 If Josephus’s identification depends on Aristeas, as Gruen suggests, we might wonder about whether Ps.-Aristeas invented this character, as he almost certainly did Philocrates and his narrator Aristeas. Ps.-Aristeas identifies the second person without naming him. In § 4, he notes that he took the opportunity of the deputation to address the king concerning “those who had been deported from Judea into Egypt by the king’s father.” We learn in §§ 12–27 that the king who took the Judeans captive was “Ptolemy son of Lagos,” that is, Ptolemy I Soter. Thus, the king of Aristeas is his son Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who reigned from 283 to 246 BCE. The author of Aristeas reveals many of his core values in these opening paragraphs, particularly as he explains the reason for his work. In § 1 he refers to Philocrates’s “love of learning,” the importance of which he reinforces by the quotation “always both to increase learning and to make progress” (προσμανθάνειν ἀεί τι καὶ προσλαμβάνειν). This citation, given in iambic trimeter, may be a combination of two lines by Sophocles (Frags. 779 and 622) or a quote from some lost work of his.241 Learning, either through written texts or one’s own experience, leads to a “pure disposition of mind,” because it is concerned with things that are “most beautiful” (τὰ κάλλιστα). Such an attitude inclines one toward piety (εὐσέβεια), “the most supreme thing of all,” a word not used at all in the Septuagint.242 The

239

240 241 242

Erich S. Gruen, “The Letter of Aristeas,” in Outside the Bible: Ancient Jewish Writings Related to Scripture (Louis H. Feldman et al., eds.; Vol. 3; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2013) 2716. See also the discussion comparing Aristeas and Josephus in André Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe, adaptateur de la Lettre d’Aristée: un reaction atticisante contre la Koiné (Études et Commentaires 45; Paris: Klincksieck, 1962) 95–125 and Maria Brutti, The Development of the High Priesthood during the pre-Hasmonean Period: History, Ideology, Theology (JSJSup 108; Leiden: Brill, 2006) 141–47. VanderKam, Joshua to Caiaphas, 167. See Pelletier, Lettre, 101. Throughout the commentary, I use the term Septuagint in its narrow sense of the Greek Pentateuch, since this is the subject of Aristeas. Elsewhere I use the abbreviation LXX/OG to refer to the larger corpus of Jewis-Greek translations. The term

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culmination of thought in piety, which generally connotes reverence toward a god or gods, reflects a Hellenistic value, especially in conjunction with knowledge/learning. The theme of piety runs throughout the book and is connected with all of the main characters. Indeed, Ps.-Aristeas connects the value of loving learning that he imputes to Philocrates to that of piety, and thus he constructs an ethos for his narrator. Philocrates, also then, likely serves as a kind of stand-in for the readers that Ps.-Aristeas hopes to address, people who are like Philocrates (and doubtlessly himself), who love learning and who are disposed towards piety.243 Pelletier notes that the Corpus Hermeticum, a collection of treatises attributed to Hermes Trismegistus (the thrice-great Hermes) originating in the Ptolemaic, Roman and early Christian periods, contains a similar connection between understanding/knowledge, desiring the beautiful and piety; see vi.5: If you understand god, you will understand the beautiful and good, the exceedingly bright whose brightness god surpasses. For this is incomparable beauty and inimitable good, as is god himself. As you understand god, then, also understand the beautiful and the good … If you ask about god, you ask also about the beautiful. Only one road travels from here to the beautiful – reverence (εὐσέβεια) combined with knowledge (γνῶσις).244

Ps.-Aristeas returns to the theme of piety again and again throughout his narrative, and it is especially prominent in the symposium section in the discussions of proper kingly behavior (see below § 12, § 42, § 210, § 215, § 229, § 255). Notes § 1. Having composed. Lutz Doering, relying on the analysis of Gunther Zuntz, argues that the Greek participle συνεσταμένης means “has come about” and refers to a narrative previously in existence that the narrator has before him rather than to the present narrative.245 Yet, the verb συνίστημι often means “compose” when referring to an author or writing, and in the middle voice means “organize.” While Zuntz (and Doering) are

243

244

245

εὐσέβεια does occur elsewhere in this corpus; see, for example, Isa 11:2; 33:6; Prov 1:7; 13:11. Dries de Crom, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Authority of the Septuagint,” JSP 17 (2008) 154–58. Pelletier, Lettre, 102. On the Corpus Hermeticum, see Brian V. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a New English Translation, with Notes and Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992) from which this translation was taken. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 219; see Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas-Text,” 246.

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correct that the sentence is difficult, I have taken the participle as a middle voice rather than a passive voice, and thus, it more likely refers to the narrative that Ps.-Aristeas is about to present to Philocrates, particularly in light of the subsequent “I have attempted to expound it clearly for you.” For more detailed discussion, see the Introduction section 8a. Philocrates. The person addressed here is otherwise unknown, although the name is well attested in a variety of ancient sources; see, for example, Aristotle, Rhetoric 2.3.13 (1380b); Aeschines On the Embassy 2.6; Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Philosophers 7.185, 10.16; Athenaeus, Deipnosophists 264. about the meeting which we had. Throughout the book, Ps.-Aristeas switches between using the first person plural, as here – often called the editorial plural – and the first person singular. The translation reflects this shift in person throughout. high priest. Many scholars, including Hadas, Pelletier and Meecham note that ἀρχιερεύς is the usual Greek term for a high priest.246 It occurs often, for example, in 1–4 Maccabees. In the LXX/OG translations we find it only in Lev 4:3; Josh 22:13, 24:33. The more usual translation in this corpus is ὁ ἱερεύς ὁ μέγας, which is a word-for-word rendering of the Hebrew ‫הכהן‬ ‫הגדול‬. Judeans. Throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas associates the geographical area Judea with the people who live there and who have ended up in Egypt. In § 6, we find the phrase τοῦ γένους τῶν Ἰουδαίων, the race of the Judeans. How to translate the Greek word Ἰουδαῖος has engendered a great deal of scholarly comment. Steve Mason has argued that in earlier periods the term should always be rendered “Judean” rather than “Jew,” primarily because it referred to the ethnic-political community of those connected with Judea. While they did share a set of ancestral practices that we would call religion, Ioudaioi were not primarily a religious community.247 Shaye Cohen sees the late second century BCE, especially the book of 2 Maccabees, as a decisive turning point in the use of the term, since in his estimation prior to the writing of 2 Maccabees Ioudaios referred to a member of the Judean ethnos. Only in 2 Maccabees and later do we see the term

246

247

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 93; Pelletier, Lettre, 100 n. 2; Henry G. Meecham, The Letter of Aristeas A Linguistic Study with Special Reference to the Greek Bible (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1935) 53. Steve Mason, “Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of Categorization in Ancient History,” JSJ 38 (2007) 457–512.

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Ioudaios used to mean “Jew” in its religious sense.248 Adele Reinhartz, reacting primarily to Mason’s arguments, points out that broadening Ioudaios from a narrow geographical term to one that includes other aspects of Jewish identity reduces the term Jew simply to a religious designator. She contends that the word “Jew” incorporates all the elements of identity that scholars like Mason want to attribute to the word Judean, and thus, there is no reason to make such a substitution as a general rule that has as one of its consequences rendering Jews increasingly invisible in our texts.249 For his part, Ps.-Aristeas identifies Ioudaioi as members of an ethnos who originally came from Judea under Ptolemy I (see § 4, § 22, § 23), who have a unique set of laws and ethnic practices that are associated with their geographical place of origin. For Ps.-Aristeas, at least, Ioudaioi come from or came from Judea. For this reason, I have followed Cohen’s basic distinction and have translated Ioudaios as “Judean” rather than “Jew.” In the commentary and notes, however, I see no reason to avoid using the term Jew, since for the purposes of analysis, as we see in the text at numerous points, Ps.-Aristeas appeals to a number of aspects of Jewish identity (ethnic, political and religious) as characteristic of his Judeans. Thus, I use the term Judean when I am referring to a primarily geographical/ethnic connection and Jew when I intend a more expansive set of identity markers. § 2. written accounts. The Greek term ἱστορία indicates the written results of one’s inquiries, hence in the plural in an author like Aristotle, Rhetoric 1.4.13 (1360a). In this case Ps.-Aristeas uses written accounts and personal experience as a complementary pair. reality. The Greek term πρᾶγμα has a wide range of meanings. It can refer to an occurrence, but since it is used here in the singular, I take it to connote more than the individual occurrences that happen to people. Rather it points to the entirety of the things that a person experiences first-hand. mind. The Greek ψυχή has a range of meanings as well. Here it refers to human intellectual capacity, but shortly later in § 5, I translate “soul,” since there it denotes the emotional or psychological aspects of the self. § 3. integrity. In classical literature the word καλοκἀγαθία has connotations of nobility and probably corresponds to the values possessed by a “gentleman.” See also the same adjective applied to Aristeas and Andreas 248

249

See Shaye J. D. Cohen, The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties (Hellenistic Culture and Society 31; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999) 104–6. Adele Reinhartz, “The Vanishing Jews of Antiquity,” Marginalia Review of Books (June 24, 2014: http://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.org/vanishing-jews-antiquityadele-reinhartz/; last accessed Dec 23, 2014).

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107

in § 43. Here Eleazar is being made out to be a good Hellenistic gentleman.250 See the uses in Herodotus 1.30, Aristophanes, Equites, 185 and Thucydides 4.40. who has won the greatest benefit. The Greek phrase is admittedly difficult. Thackeray, Meecham, and H. T. Andrews assume that the verb κατακτάομαι must mean, “to be in possession of,” and consequently they add the phrase “of documents” to make sense of the clause – “and is in possession of documents of the greatest service” (Thackeray).251 Ps-Aristeas uses the simplex of the verb in § 4 for possession. The compound rather means, “to win or get for oneself.” In that sense no additional wording is necessary to fill out the meaning and no difficulty attends construing ὠφελείαν as the object of the participle. for the translation of the divine law. The vocabulary for translation, transcription and interpretation in Aristeas is quite varied. The Greek term used here, ἑρμηνεία, can mean “translation” or “interpretation,” and Ps.-Aristeas plays on that ambiguity throughout the book. Thus, in the end, he can claim that in the Septuagint, the translators have produced a faithful translation and they have accurately transferred the meaning of the Hebrew original into Greek. Moreover, Ps.-Aristeas also uses forms of the verb μεταγράφω, which often means “transcription” but in some passages in Aristeas can refer to translation.252 In this first use, as a general characterization of the entire project, I have rendered it as translation. I will comment on these terms as they occur in the text. The phrase “divine law” indicates that the text being translated is likely the Pentateuch, not any larger corpus of Jewish texts, although that is never made explicit. The fact that Ps.-Aristeas employs language from the books of Exodus (e.g., §§ 96–99 on the high priest’s vestments) and Deuteronomy (see § 155 in a hybrid citation) and that he might allude to passages in Genesis, Leviticus and Numbers (see, for example, § 305, the Joseph story; § 128, kosher law;

250 251

252

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2716. H. St. J. Thackeray, “Translation of the Letter of Aristeas.” JQR 15 (1903) 342; Herbert T. Andrews, “The Letter of Aristeas,” in Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (Ed. R. H. Charles; Vol. 2; Oxford: Clarendon, 1913) 94; Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 173. For more detail on this vocabulary, see Benjamin G. Wright, “Transcribing, Translating, and Interpreting in the Letter of Aristeas: On the Nature of the Septuagint,” in Scripture in Transition: Essays on Septuagint, Hebrew Bible and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of Raija Sollamo (Ed. Anssi Voitila and Jutta Jokiranta; JSJSup 126; Leiden: Brill, 2008) 147–62.

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§ 158 on the fringes that Jews wear on their clothes) makes it likely that Ps.-Aristeas has the Pentateuch in mind. them. Refers to the Judeans, although no immediate antecedent exists in the text. in Hebrew letters. In the present context, the adjective ἑβραϊκός certainly means Hebrew, since it refers to the language of the Torah that will be translated. See also the prologue to Sirach, where we find an adverbial usage ἑβραϊστί meaning “in the Hebrew language.”253 The word γράμμα appears frequently in Aristeas and most often refers to a letter of the alphabet; see § 11, § 30, § 38, § 98, § 176. It can also have a collective meaning of “things written” (§ 43) and “literature” (§ 121).254 § 4. who first had both possessed the city and taken over the government of Egypt. R. J. H. Shutt translates the participle κεκτημένου as “who was the original founder,” but the verb κτάομαι does not carry that meaning.255 The phrase τὰ κατὰ τὴν Αἴγυπτον is a bureaucratic formula meaning government or affairs of a state; Polybius uses it often.256 § 5. legislation. Ps.-Aristeas employs this term throughout his work to refer to the law of Moses; see § 15, § 31, § 128, § 129, § 133, § 147, § 176, § 313. It also serves to designate the Pentateuch for Philo of Alexandria; see, for example, Life of Moses 2.2, 25, 31, 38, 47, 51, 290. the island. This location is probably not Pharos, the place where, according to later tradition, the translators eventually work. (See the comment below on § 180.) Hadas and Pelletier suggest Cyprus as Philocrates’s most likely port of departure.257 § 6. record. The Greek term ἀναγραφή appears several times in Aristeas. It literally means to put something into writing, and for Ps.-Aristeas, it is a flexible term indicating something that is written down.258 In § 83, it is part

253

254 255

256 257 258

For the problems of whether ἑβραϊστί can refer to Aramaic, see Randall Buth and Chad Pierce, “Hebraisti in Ancient Texts: Can ἑβραϊστί Ever Mean ‘Aramaic’?” in The Language Environment of First Century Judaea: Jerusalem Studies in the Synoptic Gospels (Ed. Randall Buth and R. Steven Notley; Vol 2; Leiden: Brill, 2014) 66–109. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 174. R. J. H. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (Ed. James H. Charlesworth; Vol. 2; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1985) 12. Pelletier, Lettre, 103 n. 3. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 94; Pelletier, Lettre, 103 n. 4. I think that Doering is incorrect, then, to take its use in § 296 as a term referring to the entire narrative (Ancient Jewish Letters, 219). On the genre of Aristeas, see the discussion in the Introduction, section 8a.

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of the transition from the description of the king’s gifts for the Temple to the travelogue, where Aristeas justifies his “description” of them. In § 296, again it is part of the narrator’s comments, here indicating his narrative of the seven symposia. Finally in § 302, it refers to Demetrius’s recording of the final translation. most learned (2x). Although no textual variants exist for this term, its repetition so closely after the first occurrence raises the possibility that it is a textual corruption. high priests. From early in Greek historiography and ethnography, since there was no native pharaoh, Egyptian priests were looked to as the representatives of Egyptian culture. Ps.-Aristeas might well be trading on this idea here and in places like § 140. This reliance upon Egyptian priests as the authoritative representatives of an ancient culture goes back to Herodotus, who throughout Book 2 of the Histories consults Egyptian priests for information about Egypt.259 Ian Moyer notes that for the Greek historian, Egyptian priests have a “privileged status within Herodotus’ rhetoric of authority” and that “[t]o the early Greek historians the Egyptian priest … had evidently become the proper representative of Egyptian culture.”260 Ps.-Aristeas leans on this reputation, and in fact, in § 6 he refers to “the most learned high priests (λογιωτάτων) throughout the most learned (λογιωτάτην) (land of) Egypt,” using the same adjective that Herodotus employs to characterize the Egyptian priesthood that he consults (cf. 2.77.1). Thus, the appeal to Egyptian priests as sources for claims about the Jews appropriates a Greek discourse that works to affirm the antiquity and thus the reliability of those claims. § 7. brother. Ancient letters frequently call the addressee or addressees “brother” or “brothers” as a way of creating familiarity with co-ethnics, as an indication of similar status even though no blood relation obtains, or as a means of constructing national relations.261 See, for example, the letters in 1 Macc 12:5–18 and 2 Macc 1:1–9. Ps.-Aristeas’s use of the term does not appear as a simple epistolary device, however. He takes pains to create a narrative world for his main character, Aristeas, by referring to Philocrates as a brother “according to descent” (κατὰ τὸ συγγενές), a non-epistolary use of “brother,” although he follows his appeal to common descent with a reference to Aristeas’s and Philocrates’s shared desire for beauty.

259

260 261

For discussion of this idea, see Ian S. Moyer, Egypt and the Limits of Hellenism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011) chapter 1, esp. 51–62. Moyer, Egypt and the Limits, 52 and 61 respectively. See Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, passim.

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§ 8. lest we engage in idle chatter … These remarks comprise a general topos for transitioning from introductory material to the main part of the narrative; see also 2 Macc 2:32. education. The Greek term παιδεία has the general meaning of rearing or training a child. Thus, education is the shaping or forming of the individual. In Greek education, Homer occupied a central place, and the term παιδεία came to stand for all of Greek literature. Thus, education fundamentally concerned learning Greek literature through the educational curriculum beginning with the progymnasmata.262 Education and learning are important themes for Ps.-Aristeas, and he will return to them at several points throughout the narrative.

The Library Project (§§ 9–11) 9. After he had been appointed over the king’s library, Demetrius of Phalerum was furnished with much money in order to collect, if possible, all the books in the world, and making purchases and transcriptions, he brought to completion, as much as he could, the king’s plan. 10. Thus, while we were present, he was asked, “How many thousands of books have been obtained?” He said, “More than two-hundred thousand, O King; I will hasten in a short time to fulfill the remainder of five hundred thousand. But it also has been reported to me that the laws of the Jews are worthy of transcription and of inclusion in your library.” 11. “What is there, therefore, to prevent you from doing this?” he said. “For everything that you need has been provided to you.” But Demetrius said, “Translation is still required; for in Judea they use their own characters, just as the Egyptians use their own arrangement of letters, inasmuch as they also have their own language. The Judeans are supposed to use Syrian. This is not so, but they use another style.” After being informed of these things, the king proposed to write to the high priest of the Judeans so that Demetrius might bring to completion the aforementioned matters. Textual Notes Both Josephus and Eusebius preserve this portion of the story, and in several instances, Eusebius’s version represents the better textual tradition than the Greek manuscripts.

262

Werner Jaeger, Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture (3 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1939–1944).

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111

§ 10. Eusebius has the conjunction οὖν, and ms O has γάρ. The other Greek manuscripts do not have a conjunction. // “I will hasten,” σπουδάσω, is from Eusebius. The Greek manuscripts have πληρώσω, which most likely came into the manuscripts under the influence of πληρωθῆναι “fulfill” in the immediate context. // “It has been reported,” προσήγγελται, of Eusebius is a perfect tense, which suits the context better than the aorist of the Greek manuscripts. § 11. Mendelssohn proposed a rearrangement (accepted by Zuntz) of the text in order to make it clearer, placing a full stop after “Egyptians” and then reading “They are supposed to use an arrangement of letters in Syrian. This is not so …”263 Although the text is a bit difficult, I have followed Pelletier, who does not accept this conjecture. // Pelletier opts for Eusebius’s reading of “Judea,” Ἰουδαίαν, rather than “of the Judeans,” Ἰουδαίων, of the Greek manuscript tradition, a decision that makes the noun agree with the article without positing an assumed “country of” or some similar phrase. This reading, then, invalidates Hadas’s claim that Ps.-Aristeas never mentions “Palestine” but instead employs the designation Coele-Syria (see § 12).264 Although Meecham accepts the text of the Greek manuscripts, he notes that only here in Aristeas does the noun Ἰουδαῖοι lack a definite article.265 General Comment This short section provides the necessary background for the translation of the Jewish law. The king gave Demetrius money to acquire “all the books in the world.” When the king asks about the librarian’s progress, Demetrius responds that he has acquired 200,000 books and would soon complete the rest to total 500,000. He also notes that the “laws of the Judeans are worthy of transcription.” Since transcribing presumably would refer to copying books in Greek, this reply apparently creates some confusion on the king’s part, and he asks why this has not been done already. Only then does Demetrius tell him that the books need to be translated, because they are not in Greek. He notes that the Jews use “their own characters” (χαρακτῆρσι ἰδίοις), which he compares to the language of the Egyptians, who also have their own “arrangement of letters” (τῇ τῶν γραμμάτων θέσει). Demetrius’s reference to the Judeans using “Syrian” presumably indicates Aramaic

263

264

265

G. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies II: Aristeas and the Translators of the Torah,” JSS 4 (1959) 115–16. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 98. He also uses “Syria” and “Phoenicia and Syria.” See the notes on these designations. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 182.

112

III. Translation and Commentary

as the common language, and his subsequent disclaimer that they really use “another dialect” (ἕτερος τρόπος) probably indicates Hebrew, since in § 3 Aristeas referred to the Jewish law that was written in “Hebrew letters.”266 Since Demetrius’s short dissertation on language began with the need for translation, he presumably is referring throughout to the written form of these languages. A major difficulty in Aristeas’s narrative is the claim that Demetrius of Phalerum “was appointed over the king’s library.” Almost all scholars have understood the connection between Demetrius and Ptolemy II as an anachronism on the part of Ps.-Aristeas. Demetrius was apparently born around 350 BCE. He became ruler in Athens in about 315 and was expelled from the city around 307. From there he went to Thebes and then to Alexandria where he served Ptolemy I. Diogenes Laertius (3rd century ce) reports in 5.78, quoting Hermippus, a student of Callimachus: After Cassander’s death, being afraid of Antigonus, he fled to Ptolemy Soter. And there he spent much time, and he counseled Ptolemy, among other things, to bestow the kingdom on the sons of Eurydice. And he was not persuaded but transferred the diadem to his son by Berenice. After his (i.e., Ptolemy I’s) death, he (i.e., Ptolemy II) thought it fit to guard him (i.e., Demetrius) closely (παραφυλάττεσθαι) in the country until there be some decision concerning him. There he lived quite discouraged, and somehow, when he was sleeping, he was bitten on the hand by an asp, and he let go of life. And he is buried in the nome of Busiris in the neighborhood of Diospolis.

Based on this passage, the standard scholarly reconstruction of events has been very consistent: Although an advisor to Ptolemy I, because he supported Ptolemy II’s half brother instead of Ptolemy II, he was banished from Alexandria shortly after Ptolemy I’s death. He died in exile in 280 BCE, perhaps as the result of a murder. According to this chronology, Demetrius could not have been active in the court of Ptolemy II, since the king exiled him upon his accession.267

266 267

See Buth and Pierce, “Hebraisti,” 83–85. Elias Bickerman, “Dating,” 109, wants to preserve royal patronage as the motivation for the translation, and he also wants to give some credence to the narrative in Aristeas. About the Demetrius-Ptolemy II connection he simply claims that Hermippus, on whom Diogenes was dependent, is no more trustworthy than the sources that testify to the connection. He does not challenge the point of the passage in Diogenes, as Nina Collins does (see below). Tessa Rajak in Translation & Surtvival: The Greek Bible of the Ancient Jewish Diaspora (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009) 42, also gives the same justification for at least the plausibility of Demetrius’s role in the library and hence in the origins of the Septuagint.

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113

Ps.-Aristeas seems also to designate Demetrius as the head of the royal library, an assignment that many modern scholars dispute. Almost universally they agree that Demetrius, as advisor to Ptolemy I, was the driving force first behind the founding of the Mouseion in Alexandria and subsequently the Library and the initial collecting of books.268 Whether he, under Ptolemy I, or Zenodotus of Ephesus, under Ptolemy II, was the first librarian remains a matter of some disagreement. Yet, the language of Aristeas seems at least consonant with Demetrius’s role in the founding of the Library, as we know it from the ancient sources: “After he was appointed over the king’s library” (κατασταθεὶς ἐπὶ τῆς τοῦ βασιλέως βιβλιοθήκης). In a recent monograph, Nina Collins has tried to revive the historical value of Aristeas’s testimony about Demetrius, and thus of Aristeas itself. She argues first that four important sources – Aristeas, Aristobulus, Epiphanius and the twelfth-century scholiast Johannes Tzetzes – linking Ptolemy II and Demetrius are independent witnesses to the relationship and second that Diogenes Laertius’s account does not provide clear evidence of Ptolemy II’s exile of Demetrius.269 Both of these arguments contain major difficulties. If we look at the sources Collins invokes as independent witnesses to Demetrius serving under Ptolemy II, the relationship between Aristobulus and Aristeas is potentially much more difficult to sort out than Collins allows. Simply looking at the history of scholarship on this issue demonstrates the problems. Just about every possible relationship has been suggested, from dependence by Aristobulus on Aristeas, dependence by Aristeas on Aristobulus, the use of the two authors of a common tradition, to complete independence of the two.270 From the standpoint of Collins’s claims, it matters not what the chronological order might have been. If they

268

269

270

See, Edward A. Parsons, The Alexandrian Library, Glory of the Hellenic World: Its Rise, Antiquities, and Destructions (London: Cleaver-Hume, 1952) chap. VI; P. M. Frazer, Ptolemaic Alexandria (Vol. 1; Oxford: Clarendon, 1972) 306–7. Nina Collins, The Library in Alexandria & the Bible in Greek (VTSup 82; Leiden: Brill, 2000) chap. 3. On the Aristobulus-Aristeas relationship see the Introduction, section 5 and especially Carl R. Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors, Volume III: Aristobulus (SBLTT 39/SBLPS 13; Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press, 1995). See also Erich S. Gruen, Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition (Hellenistic Culture and Society 30; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998) 209. Some scholars continue to argue against the authenticity of this fragment of Aristobulus; see Abraham Wasserstein and David J. Wasserstein, The Legend of the Septuagint:

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are dependent on one another, then they bear witness to a single tradition. This same conclusion is reached if they rely on a common Alexandrian tradition about the origins of the Septuagint. In such a case, they are not truly independent, since they both depend on a common tradition. So, even if they might be independent of one another – a case that Collins has not made convincingly – they still might not “separately confirm that the translation was made under Ptolemy II.”271 That would be another matter. Moving to Epiphanius, Collins claims that, since Epiphanius’s report contains details about the library not in Aristeas, his account must be independent of Aristeas and thus a witness untainted by Aristeas. But as with Aristobulus, this conclusion is not a necessary one. Epiphanius’s mention of Demetrius comes in the middle of a very long section of On Weights and Measures in which the story of the translation gets cut up and told in pieces as part of an apology for the Septuagint against other translations. The basic data of Epiphanius’s story – particularly Ptolemy’s appointment of Demetrius over the library, the collection of books, the question about the number of them, the lack of the laws of the Jews, the king’s letter, the gifts (specifically the table), the manuscripts with Hebrew in gold letters – all derive ultimately from the legend that we find in Aristeas, even if Epiphanius has not taken them directly from the work but has used some intermediate source. There is no reason to assume some independent source for these elements, even if Epiphanius’s version of the story is much expanded and elaborated. His account does not give us an independent confirmation of the Aristeas story.272 The situation with the twelfth century writer Johannes Tzetzes is more complex than Collins represents it in her book. In the early nineteenth century, F. Osann discovered a scholium in the margins of a fifteenth-century parchment codex of Plautus that concerned the Alexandrian Library. Later that scholium was shown to be based on the Prolegomena to Aristophanes by Tzetzes. Indeed, as Collins notes, the Plautine Scholium does not mention the translation of the Hebrew books, but the Prolegomena on which

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From Classical Antiquity to Today (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006) 31–33. Collins, Library in Alexandria, 10. Pelletier, Lettre, 87, concludes that Epiphanius is dependent on Aristeas, either directly or indirectly. Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend of the Septuagint, 123–24, however, disagree and claim that Epiphanius “took this information along with the rest of his account from a single source.” They do not claim that somehow Epiphanius’s account confirms Aristeas’s, and indeed their reasons for the conclusion are not sufficient to prove their case.

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it is based does. And here we see what had certainly become by the time of Tzetzes the familiar story of the seventy-two translators. Whatever sources Tzetzes might have had, one of them was certainly the legend of the translation of the Septuagint that ultimately derived from Aristeas. I see no reason to suppose that the connection between Demetrius and the translation under Ptolemy II must derive from any source that would be independent of and thus confirming of Aristeas’s story.273 In all these cases, Collins assumes: (1) if a mention of Demetrius does not comport exactly with Aristeas, then it must come from a source independent of Aristeas and (2) the presence of other material about the Library that is not in Aristeas proves that the connection between Demetirus and Ptolemy II must also derive from some ancient source other than Aristeas. Neither of these two assumptions follows necessarily from the texts as we have them. What we know of Demetrius’s life comes largely from Diogenes Laertius in his Lives of the Philosophers. Collins argues that the advice that Demetrius gives to Ptolemy I about succession was the best one could give and that Ptolemy II “could not have faulted the courtier’s advice.”274 Just a short sentence or two later, she changes the terms of the discussion when she says that Diogenes is trying to prove “the perfidy of Demetrius.” She further wants the verb παραφυλάσσω to mean “watched carefully” rather than “guarded closely,” and she suggests that Demetrius retired to the country in his old age where he was watched “simply because he was ill.” Thus, by Collins’s reckoning, Demetrius was active early in Ptolemy II’s reign, he was not exiled, but he simply retired to the country, an old man. Unfortunately, Collins’s creative reading of the text does not really work. First, Diogenes does not accuse Demetrius of perfidy (nor does any scholar that I have consulted). Diogenes simply states that Demetrius gave advice to Ptolemy I about succession. Unfortunately for Demetrius, Ptolemy did not take the advice. As a result, the new monarch, Ptolemy II, who was not the subject of Demetrius’s advice, exiled him to the country. Diogenes’s account specifically says that Demetrius lived “quite discouraged” (ἀθυμότερον). Michael Sollenberger suggests that the asp’s bite might well indicate that Demetrius committed suicide. Such an end was a usual feature of stories featuring what Sollenberger calls the “ἀθυμία-death motif” in which a counselor falls out of favor with the king, becomes despondent

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For a detailed treatment of the Plautine Scholium, see Parsons, Alexandrian Library, chap. 7. See Collins, Library in Alexandria, 98–103. Collins, Library in Alexandria, 70.

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and then commits suicide. This same motif occurs in five other places in Diogenes Laertius, two of which come from Hermippus.275 The best course in this case would be to read the text in the most straightforward manner – according to Diogenes Laertius, Demetrius was neither a trusted counselor nor the librarian under Ptolemy II. Of course, the other mistake that Collins makes is one made by any number of scholars; they feel the necessity to find historical clues in Aristeas to the origins of the Septuagint, since for Collins the historicity of Aristeas serves as one pillar of an argument for her dating of the translation of the Septuagint. As I have argued in the Introduction, my assessment of Aristeas leads me to conclude that this is precisely the wrong way to proceed with this text. The Letter of Aristeas does not preserve an historical memory of the origins of the Septuagint. Rather it contructs a basis for a particular Jewish identity, and it provides a myth of origins for the translation of the Pentateuch. The main question we have to answer is why would Ps.-Aristeas connect Demetrius with Ptolemy II?276 If Aristeas does not offer an historical account, then a connection between Ptolemy II and Demetrius might not be so odd, particularly if the book is written more than a century after the making of the translation.277 Scholars have offered several reasons for Demetrius’s presence in the work. Honigman suggests that since Demetrius plays a central role in initiating

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See 1.95, 2.112, 2.142 (from Hermippus), 4.3, 6.99 (from Hermippus). Michael G. Sollenberger, “Diogenes Laertius’ Life of Demetrius of Phalerum,” in Demetrius of Phalerum: Text, Translation and Discussion (Ed. William W. Fortenbaugh and Eckart Schütrumpf; Rutgers University Studies in Classical Humanities IX; New Brunswick/London: Transaction Publishers, 2000) 326. Tessa Rajak also wants to preserve royal involvement, although she takes a somewhat dfferent approach to Demetrius’s involvement and hence the idea of royal patronage of the translation. In her estimation, Aristeas is historical myth that mixes “fiction with history.” She argues that Aristeas’s story is perfectly plausible and that royal patronage fits the historical circumstances of a Jewish community that could not as yet organize and afford such a large project (Translation & Survival, 42, 48, 88–89). These arguments cut both ways, however, since Ps.-Aristeas might well have invented the story with Demetrius’s and Ptolemy’s involvement precisely because they contribute to his literary aims and not at all because they are historical memories. Indeed, the need to preserve some historical memory in Aristeas arises, I think, because we do not know anything about the Septuagint’s actual origins. For more discussion, see the Introduction, section 2. See also the other mistakes that Ps.-Aristeas makes. So, for example, his claim that the philosopher Menedemus of Eritrea is among those who praise the Jewish translators (§ 201).

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and finally transcribing the translation, his presence is a function of Jewish collective memory associating a prominent person with the origins of the translation. As a well-known scholar, he serves as “the best possible warrant for the quality of the manuscript on which the translation and edition of the LXX was based.”278 Pelletier simply says, “The prestige of the two names [i.e., Demetrius and Ptolemy II] serves his propagandistic intentions.”279 Sara Raup Johnson makes the most convincing case when she argues, “Demetrius’s status lends enormous weight to the respect that he is made to express for the Jewish Law, at least in the eyes of Aristeas’s Greek-speaking Jewish audience … By placing the project in the hands of the very founder of the Alexandrian Library and assuring us of that distinguished intellectual’s respect for the Law and his concern for its accuracy, Aristeas means to offer historical proof of the Septuagint’s authenticity.”280 Certainly at over a century’s remove from the actual events, Ps.-Aristeas’s use of both Ptolemy II and Demetrius serves the apologetic function of projecting the status of the Septuagint back in time and into the Greek structures of power in Alexandria, thereby arguing for the long-standing status of the Jewish community and respect for Jewish customs in the city. Notes § 9. library. The Library of Alexandria was apparently attached to the Mouseion, founded under Ptolemy I Soter, and the institution, together with generous Ptolemaic patronage, attracted a growing intelligentsia to Alexandria in the late fourth and third centuries BCE. No ancient account of the Library’s founding survives, and the Letter of Aristeas actually

278 279

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Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 89–90. Pelletier, Lettre, 67. “Le prestige de ces deux noms servait ses intentions de propaganda.” Sara Raup Johnson, Historical Fictions and Hellenistic Jewish Identity: Third Maccabees in its Cultural Context (Hellenistic Culture and Society 43; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004) 37–38. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2717, agrees with this assessment. Johnson also thinks that the author of Aristeas was fully aware of the anachronism in his work, but whether that is the case or not is another issue, which does not affect the argument here. For a consideration of Johnson’s arguments, see Benjamin G. Wright, “History, Fiction and the Construction of Ancient Jewish Identities: Steven Weitzman, Surviving Sacrilege: Cultural Persistence in Jewish Antiquity (Harvard University Press, 2005); Sara Raup Johnson, Historical Fictions and Hellenistic Jewish Identity: Third Maccabees in its Cultural Context (University of California Press, 2004); Carol A. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran (Brill, 2004),” Prooftexts 26 (2006) 449–67.

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contains the earliest mention of the Alexandrian Library.281 Most ancient sources regard Ptolemy II Philadelphus as its founder, although P. M. Fraser and Stephen Tracy argue that the impetus must have gone back to Ptolemy I.282 The Library became the center of ancient philological activity, particularly focused on establishing an authoritative text of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. It also became a hub of intellectual activity that would have necessitated access to a large number of texts. No ancient sources describe the Library’s demise, which, as with its origins, remains a mystery. Scholars have proposed numerous scenarios for a cataclysmic destruction – from Julius Caesar in 48 BCE to later Roman emperors to Christians in the fourth century CE to Muslims in the seventh century – but it is just as likely that the Library’s holdings deteriorated from a lack of upkeep as that it was destroyed in some cataclysmic event.283 all the books in the world. The picture that Aristeas paints of Philadelphus trying to acquire as many books as existed comports with other ancient testimony about the Ptolemies, who had a penchant for bringing learned people to Alexandria and for collecting books. In his vision of the library and the project of collecting all the books of the world, Ps.-Aristeas is participating in what Richard Hunter calls “the Alexandrian myth” in which Alexandria under the early Ptolemies is presented as the new Athens. The city becomes the place, like Athens before it, “where everyone and every culture sooner or later washes up and is then preserved.”284 Such acquisition and preservation became a well-known characteristic of the early Ptolemies; Galen (17.1.607–8), for instance, tells a story in which Ptolemy III borrowed books of Sophocles, Euripides and Aeschylus from Athens, and after he had made beautiful copies, he kept the originals, sending only the copies back.285 This acquisitive propensity of the Ptolemies can be seen

281

282

283

284

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Aristobulus, although he mentions Demetrius and Ptolemy II, does not refer at all to the Library. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 321–22. Stephen V. Tracy, “Demetrius of Phalerum: Who Was He and Who Was He Not?” in Fortenbaugh and Schütrumpf, Demetrius of Phalerum, 344. On the founding of the Mouseion and the Library and their histories in Alexandria, see Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, vol. 1 chap. 6 along with the valuable corrective in Roger Bagnall, “Alexandria: Library of Dreams,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 146 (2002) 348–62. Richard Hunter, “The Letter of Aristeas,” in Creating a Hellenistic World (Ed. Andrew Erskine and Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones; Swansea: The Classical Press of Wales, 2011) 50. For the Greek text, see Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 2.480 n. 147.

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with cult statues (a statue of Sarapis; Tacitus, Histories 4.83–84) and people as well (Alciphron, Epist. 18.4–9). Honigman argues that it serves as one of the primary paradigms for establishing the charter myth for the Septuagint, the “Alexandrian paradigm.”286 making purchases and transcriptions. This procedure is apparently how books were acquired for the library; see the anecdote about Ptolemy III above. The Greek term μεταγραφάς here and subsequently in the phrase μεταγραφῆς ἄξια (§ 10) clearly means “transcribing/transcription,” since only later does Demetrius distinguish what he has been doing from “translation” of the Hebrew books. § 10. while we were present. The phrase forms part of the literary conceit of the book. Aristeas notes several times that he was present at the events that took place, and at every important moment we are reminded that he was an eyewitness; see § 83, § 91, § 96, § 100, §§ 297–300. For the importance of this trope, see the Introduction. two-hundred thousand. A literal translation of the Greek would have the king ask how many “tens of thousands” of books had been acquired. Demetrius answers “twenty” or 200,000. five hundred thousand. Johannes Tzetzes, relying on Callimachus in the Plautine Scholium, claims that in the two libraries in Alexandria there were 42,800 volumes (“in the outer library”) and 400,000 “mixed volumes” and 90,000 single volumes (“in the palace library”).287 worthy of transcription … (§ 11) translation. While the phrase μεταγραφῆς ἄξια certainly indicates transcription and not translation, it might seem rather odd, since in the immediate context we learn that the laws of the Jews are not in Greek but in their own language, which requires translation. Throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas plays with the meanings of words having to do with translation, transcription and interpretation. Indeed, the verb μεταγράφω can mean “translate,” even if that is not its most usual meaning. The Greek ἕρμηνεία can mean “translation” or “interpretation.” In Aristeas the compound verb διερμηνεύω (cf. § 15) also means, “to translate.” In the context of § 11 translation is clearly intended; see also the distinction between transcribing and translating in § 15. Whereas 286

287

See Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 41–52 and eadem, “The Narrative Function of the King and the Library in the Letter of Aristeas,” in Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers (Ed. Tessa Rajak et al.; Hellenistic Culture and Society 50; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007) 134–40. Parsons, Alexandrian Library, 108–9, gives an English translation of the relevant portions. Both Epiphanius of Salamis and Johannes Tzetzes speak of two libraries. Aristeas only mentions one.

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here Ps.-Aristeas plays on the distinction between transcribing and translating, elsewhere he exploits the ambiguity between translation and interpretation. Moreover, the term μεταγράφω, which in §§ 10–11 indicates transcription, also has fuzzy boundaries elsewhere in the book between transcription and translation (see, for example, §§ 45–46). The intentional play in which Ps.-Aristeas engages forms part of his intent to argue that everything that is in the Hebrew version of the law is also available in the Greek translation. The Greek is not subordinate to the Hebrew, but rather it is equal to it. So, in § 307, where Ps.-Aristeas gives the only indication that some divine plan might have been at work – “the work of translation (μεταγραφῆς) was completed in seventy-two days, appearing as if this circumstance happened by some plan” – μεταγραφή clearly indicates translation. Thus, for Ps.-Aristeas, transcribing and translating, which can also include interpretation, are rough equivalents, and he employs this language intentionally to establish that the Greek can fully take the place of the Hebrew text for the Alexandrian Jewish community.288 § 11. their own characters … their own language. This entire section is not completely transparent in Greek. Only here does χαρακτήρ (“character, letter”) occur in Aristeas. Combined with the adjective ἴδιος, the phrase means “peculiar/distinct/their own characters,” perhaps indicating an alphabet. In other places (see § 3, § 30, § 38, § 43, § 98, § 121, § 176), as well as in the immediate context, we find γράμμα, which in the plural often means a set of characters. Indeed, the plural in § 43 as part of Eleazar’s letter of reply to Ptolemy might be translated “your letter” (i.e., “the things that you wrote”). Thus, the distinction here may be between alphabet and form of writing. So, the Egyptians have “their own arrangement (or perhaps system) of writing.” Zuntz notes that it is unlikely that the word γράμμα can indicate a hieroglyph, but as I read the text, this is not an important problem.289 As the text stands, the referent for “inasmuch as they have their own language” could be the Jews, the Egyptians, or both. I am inclined to see the phrase referring to the Egyptians as parenthetical, and thus, this phrase would refer to the Judeans. The gist of this sentence then seems to be that since the Judeans and the Egyptians have different spoken languages, their written texts cannot simply be copied, but they must be translated. The king would be aware of the fact that native Egyptians use a different lan-

288

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For more detailed arguments about these issues, see Wright, “Transcribing, Translating, and Interpreting.” Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies II,” JSS 4 (1959) 115.

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guage and form of writing; the Judeans present a comparable circumstance, Demetrius is saying. Syrian. The form of the adjective Συριακῇ is rare, and it indicates Aramaic, as do other related forms.290 In Josephus’s account of Demetrius’s response, he uses the phrase Συρίων γραμμάτων (Syrian letters; Ant. 12.15). In the LXX/OG the only occurrences of the same adjectival form as in Aristeas come in a colophon to the translation of Job (42:17) and in 2 Macc 15:36. Other references to the Syrian/Aramaic language use Συριστί (e.g., 4 Reigns 18:26//Isa 36:11; Dan 2:4). style. The Greek τρόπος, manner, form or style, might seem an unusual word choice in this context. If Ps.-Aristeas had wanted to say that the Judeans use another dialect, as some scholars translate this word, the term διάλεκτος, might have sufficed, since it usually connotes an accent or manner of speaking, but this word potentially could give rise to confusion, since the present context is about writing, not speech. Thus, the most straightforward interpretation of this section is that Egyptians have their own distinct letters/characters as do the Syrians. Judeans are thought to use Syrian characters (Aramaic square script), but they do not. Rather, they have their own style of letters. Is this perhaps a recognition on the part of Ps.-Aristeas that Jews in this period still wrote with what we now call paleo-Hebrew characters? Note the number of “biblical” manuscripts from Qumran that are written in this manner.

The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27) 12. But I thought that there was an opportune moment concerning matters about which I frequently asked Sosibius of Tarentum and Andreas, the head bodyguards, concerning the deliverance of those deported from Judea by the king’s father – for he invaded the whole of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia; exploiting good fortune together with bravery, some he transplanted and others he took captive, making everything subject to fear, while also he deported one hundred thousand from the land of the Judeans into Egypt, 13. from whom he armed about thirty thousand chosen men and settled them in garrisons in the country. Already a considerable number had come previously with the Persian, and before these, other auxiliaries had been sent out with Psammetichus in order to fight the king of the Ethiopians, but these did not number as many as those Ptolemy son of Lagos deported.

290

Buth and Pierce, “Hebraisti,” 71–74, 82–85.

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14. Just as we previously said, selecting the best who excelled in youthful vigor and in strength, he armed them, but the remaining quantity, the old and very young and also women, he let go into servitude, not having so much a personal inclination as being prevailed upon by the soldiers because of the service that they had rendered in the military actions. But when we had gotten a certain pretext for their release, just as we made clear above, we said these words to the king: 15. “May it never be unreasonable to be convicted by deeds themselves, O King. For as to the legislation that has been laid down for all the Judeans, which we propose not only to transcribe but also to translate, what rationale do we have for our mission when a considerable multitude exists in servitude in your realm? But with a perfect and bounteous spirit release those confined in hardships, since the god who established the law for them directs the kingdom for you, just as I have discovered through investigation. 16. These people revere God, the overseer and creator of all things, whom all, even we, also worship, O King, using different names, Zeus and Dis. Not dissimilar to this, the first people signified that one through whom all things are endowed with life and come into being, as guiding and having lordship over all things. Since you have surpassed all people in magnanimity, grant a release for those held fast in servitude.” 17. The king did not wait a long time, but we prayed to God inwardly to prepare his mind to release all of them – for the race of human beings, since they are a creation of God, is also changed and turned around again by him. Therefore in many and diverse ways I called upon the one who has lordship over the heart, that the king might be compelled, just as I asked, to bring it about. 18. For I had great hope, having brought forward an argument concerning the salvation of people, that God would effect the fulfillment of those things that I had asked. For whatever people think to do through pious disposition for righteousness and attention to good works, God, who has lordship over all, directs their actions and designs. 19. And raising his head and looking with a gracious countenance, he said, “How many tens of thousands do you presume there will be?” And Andreas, who was standing by, declared, “A little more than one hundred thousand.” And the king said, “It is indeed a small thing that Aristeas asks of us.” Sosibius and certain others present said, “It is also worthy of your generosity that you dedicate the release of these people as a thank-offering to the supreme god. For having been greatly honored by the one who rules all things and being glorified more than your ancestors, it is fitting for you if you also make very large thank-offerings.” 20. And being in very good humor, he ordered an addition to the soldiers’ pay and twenty drachmae provided for each slave and that an edict be issued about these matters and that a register be made immediately, acting magnanimously with eagerness, since

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God fulfilled our entire purpose and constrained him to release not only those who had come with his father’s army but also anyone already there or those introduced into the kingdom after these events. They declared that the gift was more than four hundred talents. 21. And I do not consider it unprofitable to place into the record a copy of the edict, for the munificence of the king will be much more evident and abundantly manifest, since God strengthened him to become a salvation for numerous multitudes. 22. It was as follows: “As the king has commanded: Everyone who campaigned with our father in the areas of Syria and Phoenicia, invading the country of the Judeans, took possession of Judean slaves and conveyed them into the city and the country or have even sold them to others – and similarly, if any were already present or even afterwards some of these were brought in – those possessing them should release them immediately, receiving at once for each slave twenty drachmae, the soldiers with the payment of their salaries and the remaining others from the royal treasury. 23. For we consider that these were taken prisoner against the will of our father and against propriety, but it was because of military recklessness to destroy their country and to effect the removal of the Judeans into Egypt. For the spoils taken by the soldiers were sufficient, more even than necessary. Therefore, the oppression of the people is completely unreasonable. 24. Thus, since we are acknowledged to apportion justice to all people, but even more to those who are unreasonably oppressed, and since we strive in everything to attend well to justice and piety in all things, we have decreed that however many Judeans are in servitude anywhere in the kingdom for whatever reason, their owners shall release them having received the prescribed payment, and no one shall administer any of these matters with any frivolous delay. But within three days of the day that this decree is published, lists will be produced for those put in charge over these matters, making known the slaves straightaway. 25. For we have determined that to accomplish this will be a benefit both for us and for affairs of state. But anyone who wishes may report about those who have disobeyed, after which the one informing will assume ownership of the guilty, and their property will be confiscated into the royal treasury.” 26. When the decree was submitted, as it was read over by the king, it contained everything except for the clause “if any were already present or afterwards some of these were brought in.” The king added this himself, since he possessed munificence and generosity. He also commanded that a lump payment of expenses be divided among the staff-officers of the soldiers and the royal bankers. 27. Thus, after it was decreed, it went into effect in seven days; the payment came to more than six hundred and sixty talents. For many children at the breast were freed along with their moth-

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ers. After the matter was raised whether the twenty drachma should be paid for these, the king ordered that it be done, accomplishing completely everything he had resolved. Textual Notes Many of the textual variants in this section can be characterized as outright mistakes of various sorts. Some more significant variants do occur, however. Josephus transmits a version of this section. § 15. In place of σοι, “for you,” mss A H K U have the genitive σου, which results in the claim that God directs “your kingdom.” § 16. The Greek manuscripts have misunderstood the accusative cases of what Ps.-Aristeas clearly intends as divine names and have punctuated ζῆνα (or ζῆν ἅ)‧ καὶ διά. All scholars reconstruct Ζῆνα καὶ Δία, “Zeus and Dis.” § 18. In the first clause the Greek manuscripts have “attention,” ἐπιμέλειαν, which probably is a harmonization to the same word in the second clause. On the basis of its use in § 272, Wendland conjectures ἐπιτέλειαν, “fulfillment,” which Thackeray and Pelletier accept and print in their editions and which is the basis for the present translation. § 20. The transition from “into the kingdom after these events” to the next sentence is somewhat abrupt. Wendland conjectured a possible lacuna before this last sentence, although no Greek manuscripts indicate any problem. Josephus gives a smoother transition, but since he is paraphrasing here and not quoting, he is not much help. § 21. The Greek codices have “magnificence,” μεγαλομοιρία, which Thackeray (followed by Hadas) prints. Meecham and Pelletier adopt Schmidt’s conjecture of μεγαλομέρεια, “munificence.”291 The same issue arises in § 26, § 28, and § 84. In § 28 Eusebius has μεγαλομέρεια, against the manuscripts, which provides the basis for the conjecture in these other paragraphs. § 23. Pelletier’s reading, παρὰ τό γε δέον, “more even than necessary,” adopted here, represents the conjecture of A. Wilhelm.292 The manuscripts read παρὰ τὸ πεδίον, “near/by the field,” which does not suit the context very well, since the point of the passage is to suggest why continuing oppression of the Jews through enslavement “is completely unreasonable.” A key phrase for understanding this section is παντελῶς ἀνεπεικής in the next sentence. In order to have the two sentences make sense, Hadas has “further oppression,” which is not warranted by the Greek.293 The

291 292

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Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 194. A. Wilhelm, “Zu dem Judenerlasse des Ptolemaios Philadelphos,” APF 14 (1941) 30–35 (Pelletier, Lettre, 243). Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 106.

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more straightforward way of understanding the passage is that what the soldiers had done already was unreasonable – hence the problem with reading παρὰ τὸ πεδίον. Werner Schmidt argues that the phrase makes sense by appealing to Soter’s campaigns into Judea.294 I do not find the appeal on historical grounds convincing, since Aristeas is notoriously problematic on precisely these matters. § 24. Pelletier accepts Moritz Schmidt’s reconstruction of the nominative plural participle ὁμολογούμενοι, “since we are acknowledged,” over the adverb or dative plural participle of the manuscripts. The nominative balances the participles on both sides of the coordinating conjunction “and,” since the second ἐκζητοῦντες is also nominative plural. // “Anywhere,” πανταχῆ, makes better sense in the context, and the manuscript readings πάντα μή or παντὶ μή are certainly corruptions. § 25. “Upon which,” ἐφ’ ᾧ, is the suggestion of Mendelssohn, adopted by Pelletier. It makes much better contextual sense than either ἔφην or ἔφη in the manuscripts. § 26. Although Josephus paraphrases Aristeas for the most part, sometimes he gives better readings than the Greek manuscripts.295 In this paragraph, Josephus has the reflexive αὐτός, “himself,” rather than αὐτό found in all the manuscripts, a reading that is much better suited to the context. General Comment Paragraph 12 switches from the conversation between the king and Demetrius about the translation of the Jewish law to the first-person involvement of Aristeas. The narrative leads us to think that Aristeas was present for the conversation between Demetrius and the king, because he sees this time as “an opportune moment” to address the king about the status of Judean slaves whom the king’s father, Ptolemy I, supposedly had brought to Egypt after an invasion of “Coele-Syria and Phoenicia.” This entire section rewrites the Exodus story of the liberation of the Hebrew slaves. Although Ps.-Aristeas whitewashes his responsibility for enslaving Judeans, Ptolemy I plays the part of the enslaving pharaoh, and Ptolemy II becomes a beneficent, liberating pharaoh, obviating the need for a Judean liberator. (For more detail on the Exodus themes in Aristeas, see the Introduction.) That Judeans came to Egypt under Ptolemy I appears in several ancient sources, although the reasons for the emigration are not consistent. Diodorus

294

295

Werner Schmidt, Untersuchungen zur Fälschung Historischer Dokumente bei PseudoAristaios (Bonn: Dr. Rudolph Habelt GMBH, 1986) 16–18. On Josephus’s treatment of Aristeas, see the Introduction and Pelletier, Flavius Josèphe.

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Siculus in 19.80–85 and 20.113 describes two different incursions by Ptolemy I. The first in 312/311 BCE involved Coele-Syria and Phoenicia, in particular the city of Gaza; in 302/301, Ptolemy “subjugated all the cities of Coele-Syria.”296 Diodorus, however, says nothing about Judean captives. We learn about them through Josephus and his sources. He cites the Greek historian Agatharchides of Cnidus (2nd century BCE) in Ant. 12.4–7 (with a parallel citation in Against Apion 1.208–212) about Ptolemy’s seizure of Jerusalem on the Sabbath after which he took “many captives both from the hill country of Judea and the district around Jerusalem and from Samaria and those on Garizein” and took them to Egypt to settle them there. In Against Apion 1.186–189, Josephus also cites “Hecataeus of Abdera,” likely Pseudo-Hecataeus, who notes that after Ptolemy’s victory at Gaza many Jews voluntarily went with Ptolemy because of “his kindness and humanity.”297 Whatever the case, our sources (1) agree that during this period Ptolemy was active militarily in the region and (2) suggest that as a result of these campaigns Jews were taken to Egypt, either willingly or unwillingly. The account in Aristeas – noting that Ptolemy “made everything subject to fear” – comports more closely with Agatharchides than with Pseudo-Hecataeus. Sylvie Honigman takes the motivational differences in the sources, specifically Ps.-Aristeas’s comment about Ptolemy’s use of fear, to connect this section with the Exodus story to indicate Ps.-Aristeas’s literary intent. While our sources demonstrate that some Judeans undoubtedly came to Egypt as slaves under Ptolemy, Honigman notes that this explanation could not reasonably account for the bulk of the Jewish presence in Egypt, as Ps.-Aristeas suggests. Rather than a genuine historical reflection, then, she proposes that this section comprises part of an “Exodus paradigm” that results in the law, in the form of the Septuagint, being given to the Jews in

296

297

Hadas thinks it unlikely that the reference is to 302/301, since according to him, Ptolemy concluded that campaign via treaty (98). Presumably the reason would be that captives would not be available to him as Aristeas claims. On these traditions, see Jonathan More, “Kingship Ideology: A Neglected Element in Aristeas’ Charter Myth for Alexandrian Judaism,” in Septuagint and Reception (Ed. Johann Cook; VTSup 127; Leiden: Brill, 2009) 307–10. Pseudo-Hecataeus was a Jewish writer composing in the name of the well-known Greek historian, whom Ps.-Aristeas also knows. See Carl R. Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors Volume I: Historians (SBLTT 20/SBLPS 10; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1983) 277–302 and Bezalel Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus on the Jews: Legitimizing the Jewish Diaspora (Hellenistic Culture and Society 21; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996).

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Alexandria, albeit under a benevolent king. Ptolemy I, in effect, gets cast in the role of the pharaoh who enslaves, and Ptolemy II takes the role of the liberator, only in the present context, God does not intervene to force an oppressive pharaoh to free his people nor do they have to leave Egypt.298 In § 17, Aristeas prays that God will “compel” the king to free the Jewish slaves, and in § 18 we find that God indeed has directed Ptolemy’s actions.299 There is no doubt that the Exodus story underlies important sections of Ps.-Aristeas’s narrative, particularly the elements connected with the translation of the law into Greek, which our author portrays as a second giving of the law that can stand alongside the first, although the law is given in Alexandria and not on Sinai. According to Ps.-Aristeas, Ptolemy deported approximately 100,000 persons, 30,000 of whom he pressed into service in military garrisons. Ps.-Aristeas observes that Ptolemy I was not the first to use Judean mercenaries but that they had been in Egypt with “the Persian” (see Note) and the Egyptian pharaoh Psammetichus (see Note). Indeed, scholars have long known of a Jewish military presence in Egypt well before the beginning of the Ptolemaic dynasty. As early as the mid-seventh century BCE a Judean colony was founded on the island of Elephantine in Upper Egypt that for the most part was comprised of mercenaries. Numerous papyri in Aramaic survive from the fifth century BCE that testify to life in the Elephantine Judean colony.300 At the same time that he singles out those Judeans who were conscripted into Ptolemy’s military, Ps.-Aristeas tries to absolve Ptolemy I of guilt for enslaving “the remaining mass.” As Ps.-Aristeas tells it, Ptolemy acceded to 298

299

300

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 53–56 (for the liberation of the slaves). On the larger issue of the “Exodus paradigm,” see 53–63. On Ptolemy as a liberating pharaoh, see also Arkady Kovelman, Between Alexandria and Jerusalem: The Dynamic of Jewish and Hellenistic Culture (Brill Reference Library of Judasm 21; Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2005) 105–7. Paragraphs 17–18 are missing in Josephus’s version of the events. Rather than divine prompting as the motivation for the release of the Jewish slave, Josephus attributes it to Ptolemy’s munificence. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2719, thinks that Josephus wanted to emphasize Ptolemy’s generosity, and thus, he eliminated divine compulsion, which might compromise Ptolemy’s magnanimity. On the Jewish colony and the papyri from Elephantine, see Bezalel Porten, The Elephantine Papyri in English: Three Millennia of Cross-Cultural Continuity and Change (2nd rev. ed.; Atlanta: SBL, 2011); idem, Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968); and Bezalel Porton and Ada Yardeni, Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt (4 vols.; Winona Lake, Ind.: Hebrew University, 1986–1999).

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his soldiers’ requests for slaves as compensation for their participation in the campaign. Throughout Aristeas, the author attempts to place the first two Ptolemies, particularly Ptolemy II, in as positive a light as possible. How much of this portrayal – which includes Ptolemy II’s generous gifts for the temple, his manumission of Judean slaves, his bowing before the manuscripts of the law, his treatment of Eleazar as an equal, and his wining and dining of the translators – might reflect his desire to portray the Ptolemies of his own time as positively disposed towards the Jews or how much represents the literary needs of his narrative is not immediately clear. Gruen has theorized that some of these characterizations, particularly those of Ptolemy II, are actually intended to poke fun at the monarchs, showing the “self-assurance” of the Jewish community in Alexandria.301 Taking advantage of his opportunity, Aristeas addresses the king. We see in this speech several themes that resonate throughout the book. First, Aristeas notes that the Jewish God who gave the Jews their laws also directs Ptolemy’s kingdom. Because God has “lordship over all,” he directs all actions in the world. The idea of God’s “lordship” (Gk. κυριεύειν) permeates this entire section (§ 16, § 17, § 18), and later in the series of banquets that Ptolemy gives in honor of the newly arrived translators, we see this theme, if not always the identical term, repeated again and again. Second, Ps.-Aristeas trades on a general notion of “Hellenic monotheism” that we can find expressed by Stoic philosophers, particularly in Chrysippus. Scholars debate the extent to which Greek philosophical belief in “a/the god” was monotheistic in the sense of later Christian belief, but in the Hellenistic period some philosophers thought that a single principle stood behind the cosmos, including the various gods. John Kenney epitomizes this position: As a spiritual tradition rooted in ancient polytheism, its [i.e., Hellenistic monotheism’s] understanding of the divine began with the multiple divine powers and then focused on a primordial divine unity and a final principle of order and value for the sacred cosmos. Throughout this tradition the gods were not rejected, although they

301

Erich S. Gruen, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Cultural Context of the Septuagint,” in Die Septuaginta – Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten (Ed. Martin Karrer and Wolfgang Kraus; WUNT 219; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 134–56 and Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition (Hellenistic Culture and Society 30; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998) 218–20. This argument links up with other arguments of Gruen’s, which I will treat later, in which he claims that Ps.-Aristeas wants to make the Jews the superiors of the Greeks, an argument with which I disagree. I cannot judge the extent to which Ps.-Aristeas is engaging in humor, since modern estimations of what is humorous might not coincide with ancient ones.

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were superseded as theological interest was concentrated upon that absolute and transcendent principle into whose fecund unity all gods and divine powers could be resolved – for they were its manifestations at derivative levels of reality.302

Beginning with Plato, emphasis on an “absolute and transcendent principle” meant that the various gods might be seen as different modes of that principle. In this way, polytheism and monotheism performed an intimate theological pas de deux.303 In the way that Aristeas argues that Ptolemy also worships the Jewish god but under different names, he offers no simple syncretism. Rather he places the Jewish god in the place of that “absolute and transcendent principle” that exercises control over the cosmos. Zeus and Dis serve as modes of the transcendent Jewish God, at least as the relationship is presented to the Hellenistic ruler. And here we find an important theme that resurfaces often in Aristeas. While Ps.-Aristeas makes certain universalistic appeals about the values inherent in the Mosaic law and in Jewish practice, they end up being subservient to the particularistic elements of Judaism, whether they concern the nature of God, specific laws of the Jews or aspects of religious practice. For Ps.-Aristeas, the problem is how Jews can maintain Jewish practices that potentially result in separation from non-Jews and live in the mainstream of Hellenistic Alexandrian society and culture. The two names of deity that Aristeas singles out are also significant in their own right. Other Greek authors etymologize them in the accusative case as they are here, Ζῆνα and Δία, as coming from the verb ζῆν, “to live,” and the preposition διά, “through.” Diodorus Siculus, describing the teachings of the “Atlantians” about the gods, offers the euhemeristic explanation that Zeus (Gk. Δία), because he was such a kind and honorable king who gave many benefactions to the masses, received the name Ζῆνα and was revered as lord of the universe after his death, since he was responsible for “right living” (τοῦ καλῶς ζῆν) among human beings (3.61.6). Earlier in 1.12.2, Diodorus etymologizes the name using the same two forms, but here he specifically connects them to creation: “But the spirit they [i.e.,

302

303

John Peter Kenney, “Monotheistic and Polytheistic Elements in Classical Mediterranean Spirituality,” in Classical Mediterranean Spirituality: Egyptian, Greek, Roman (Ed. A. H. Armstrong; New York: Crossroad, 1986) 289. See Michael Frede, “The Case for Pagan Monotheism in Greek and Graeco-Roman Antiquity,” in One God: Pagan Monotheism in the Roman Empire (Ed. Stephen Mitchell and Peter van Nuffelen; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010) 53–81 and Stewart Moore, ‘Walls of Iron’: Judean Ethnic Identity in Hellenistic Egypt (JSJSup; Leiden: Brill, Forthcoming) 319–21.

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the Egyptians] address as Δία, as we translate the term, who, being the cause of life in animals, they consider in a certain way to be the father of all things.”304 Aristeas makes this same connection between the etymologizing of the names of Zeus and the status of the Jewish God as creator, since when the first people used these names, they signified God “through whom all things are endowed with life and come into being.” The Jewish writer Aristobulus attests a similar understanding to that of Aristeas of the relationship between these two names for Zeus and the status of the Jewish God, which suggests that the connection is well known in Alexandrian Jewish intellectual circles, although the context in Aristobulus differs markedly from that in Aristeas. Speaking of two poems he has cited, one an Orphic poem and one from Aratus, Aristobulus says, “I think it has been demonstrated clearly that the power of God permeates all things. And as was necessary, we have signified this by removing the divine names Δίς and Ζεύς used throughout the verses [i.e., in the Orphic poem and in Aratus]; for their inherent meaning relates to God and for this reason we have expressed it this way” (Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 13.12.7).305 The response of Aristeas in this passage is to pray to God, obviously the Jewish God, to induce Ptolemy to release the Judean slaves. Prayer is indeed a theme in Aristeas, particularly the admonition to supplicate God, which constitutes a significant topos within the answers of the translators to the king’s questions in the symposia section (i.e., § 192, § 193, § 196, § 197). The reason for Aristeas’s prayer is explicit: since God rules over all things, God rules over human hearts and can sway them. Aristeas makes the argument for manumission, and God brings about the fulfillment.306 In §§ 22–25, we encounter the first of several “official” documents that Ps.-Aristeas inserts into his narrative, a practice common in Greek historians as well as in other Jewish texts, both historiographical and novelistic, such as 2 Maccabees, 3 Maccabees or Josephus’s Antiquities. The types of

304

305 306

See Pelletier, Lettre, 110–11. Meecham, Oldest Version, 250, refers to Orphic fragment 164. Translation is that of Holladay, Aristobulus, 173. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 102, refers to Prov 21:1 for a similar thought: “Like a stream of water, so is the heart of a king in God’s hand” (NETS). Kovelman, Between Alexandria and Jerusalem, 113, goes even farther, claiming that Ps.-Aristeas is alluding also to Prov 21:2–3: “Every man seems righteous to himself; however, the Lord directs hearts; to be right and to be truthful is more pleasing with God than blood of sacrifices” (NETS). Indeed there are some overlaps here, including the verb κατευθύνω (§ 18; Prov. 21:2). Yet, in Aristeas, God directs actions and designs, not the heart per se. The thought is the same, but I doubt literary dependence here.

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documents vary – decrees, letters, inscriptions, etc. – and whether authentic or spurious, they enhance the historical plausibility of the work.307 In the case of Aristeas, scholars have for a long time recognized the author’s familiarity with Ptolemaic bureaucratic language (see below and the Introduction), and, like other Hellenistic Jewish writers, he incorporates into his narrative documents that he claims are authentic.308 Of those in Aristeas, the most significant is the decree/edict (πρόσταγμα) in §§ 22–25 that authorizes the release of the Jewish slaves, which Aristeas claims is a copy (ἀντίγραφον) of the original, since not only does it have an authentic “ring” in many respects, it bears important similarities to a papyrus decree of Ptolemy II dating to 262/61 BCE. In 1936, Herbert Liebesny published P. Rainer 24,552 (now C.Ord.Ptol. 22), whose extant remains contain two decrees of Ptolemy II, one dealing with the registration of livestock for tax purposes and the other concerning the registration of “free native persons” who have been enslaved.309 Liebesny argued that on the basis of the language found in C.Ord.Ptol. 22 the decree in Aristeas was a genuine πρόσταγμα of Ptolemy II. He was followed in this conclusion by the great German papyrologist Ulrich Wilcken.310 William Westermann, however, contended that the decree in Aristeas was not a genuine Ptolemaic decree, but despite that assessment,

307

308

309

310

On Aristeas, see Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 71–74. On the use of documents in Greek historiography and in Jewish use of Greek historiography, see P. J. Rhodes, “Documents and the Greek Historians,” in A Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography (Ed. John Marincola; 2 vols.; Oxford: Blackwell, 2007) 56–66 and Gregory E. Sterling, “The Jewish Appropriation of Hellenistic Historiography,” in Marincola, Companion, 231–43. See, for example, 3 Maccabees 3 and 7 for two other “official” documents. These two, however, have the form of circular letters rather than formal decrees, but there is some similarity of language. Aristeas also includes official letters between Ptolemy II and the Jewish high priest Eleazar (see below). Herbert Liebesny, “Ein Erlass des Königs Ptolemaios II Philadelphos über die Deklaration von Vieh und Sklaven in Syrien und Phöniken (PER Inv. Nr. 24.552 gr.),” Aegyptus 16 (1936) 257–91. The translation here comes from Roger S. Bagnall and Peter Derow, The Hellenistic Period: Historical Sources in Translation (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004) 111–12. The papyrus was republished as SB V 8008, and is now designated C.Ord.Ptol. 22 in Marie Thérèse Lenger, Corpus des Ordonnances des Ptolémées (C.Ord.Ptol.) (Brusselles: Palais des Académies, 1980). In this section I cite the line numbers as given in Lenger’s edition. For Wilcken’s treatment of the papyrus, see “Urkunden-Referat. II. PER INV. 24552 GR,” APF 12 (1937) 221–23.

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he thought that Ps.-Aristeas most likely depended on and revised the decree of the Rainer papyrus.311 Several pieces of evidence connect the two texts. Both begin with the phrase βασιλέως προστάξαντος (Aristeas includes the article τοῦ), the typical Ptolemaic introduction to a decree. One of the most significant pieces of evidence for a possible third-century model for Aristeas is the reference in both Aristeas and C.Ord.Ptol. 22 to the region of τοὺς/τῶν κατὰ Συρίαν καὶ Φοινίκην, “Syria and Phoenicia.” This designation seems to have been an official Ptolemaic title for this area in the third century BCE.312 Elsewhere Ps.-Aristeas calls the region Coele-Syria and Phoenicia (κοίλην Συρίαν καὶ Φιονίκην; § 12).313 The most likely reason for such a shift would be that in § 22 Ps.-Aristeas was using the language of a source dating from the earlier period. The Hellenistic world possessed a rich vocabulary of slave language, but only the term, σῶμα, the general word for “slave” or even “person,” appears in the Aristeas decree and in C.Ord.Ptol. 22.314 Other commonly used terms for slaves in Ptolemiac papyri such as δοῦλος and ἀνδράποδον do not appear in either text. Elsewhere in Aristeas, § 186 and § 294 refer to royal slaves, and in both passages the Greek term is παῖς. In addition, both Aristeas and C.Ord.Ptol. 22 employ a variation of the term for household slave to indicate a condition of servitude: σωμάτων ἐν οἰκετίαις (“persons in servitude”; Aristeas § 24) and ὄντα οἰκετικά (“being/already menial servants”; C.Ord.Ptol. 22 l. 14).

311

312

313 314

William Wetermann, “Enslaved Persons Who are Free,” AJP 59 (1938) 1–30. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2720, suggests that the decree in Aristeas “shows that its author had a close familiarity with the language of the royal chancellery.” Oswyn Murray is predisposed to accept Westermann’s conclusion; see “Aristeas and his Sources,” in Studia Patristica XII (Ed. E. A. Livingstone; TU 115; Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1975) 125. Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 21; Bickerman, “Dating,” 115; Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 45. See the Introduction for the consequences of this change for the date of the book. For a general overview of slave terms, see Benjamin G, Wright, “δοῦλος and παῖς as Translations of ‫עבד‬: Lexical Equivalences and Conceptual Transformations,” in Proceedings of the IXth Congress of the IOSCS, Cambridge, England (Ed. Bernard Taylor; SBLSCS 45; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997) 263–77; Idem, “‘Ebd/doulos: Terms and Social Status in the Meeting of Hebrew Biblical and Hellenistic Roman Culture,” Semeia (Slavery in Text and Interpretation) 83/84 (1998) 83–111; John Byron, Slavery Metaphors in Early Judaism and Pauline Christianity (WUNT 162; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2003) and the literature cited therein.

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In addition to the linguistic parallels, the two decrees share several content elements. First, both decrees require the registration of the slaves who are the subject of each decree. In C.Ord.Ptol. 22, the slave-holder is to “declare or present” the slave. Later in line 13 the topic is slaves who are already registered (τῶν ἀπογραφέντων).315 The decree in Aristeas, although a demand for registration is not explicit, clearly has registration as the issue, since after the decree has been published, lists or registers (τὰς ἀπογραφάς) must be produced for the appropriate officials (§ 24). Second, in both cases punishment attaches to anyone disobeying the edict, and third, both texts reward informers who report on anyone who violates the order.316 Combined, these pieces of evidence convinced Westermann that Aristeas §§ 22–25 reflect genuine Ptolemaic bureaucratic practices. Along with these agreements, however, Westermann points to several features of the decree in Aristeas that raise difficulties for seeing it as a genuine Ptolemaic prostagma.317 Ps.-Aristeas says that the phrase “if any were already present or afterwards some of these were brought in” (§ 22, § 26) was not part of the original decree but that Ptolemy added it himself because of his munificence. Such an addition fits with a larger agenda in Aristeas to portray the Ptolemies as rulers who were beneficent to the Jews. Thus, whatever source he might have possessed for the decree in Aristeas, it almost certainly did not contain this phrase. Other details raise suspicions as well. The overall “moralizing and apologetic tone,” to use Westermann’s characterization, is completely out of place as judged by other official prostagmata, especially the dual absolution of Ptolemy I Soter of any wrongdoing in the enslavement of the Jews and the idea that enslavement of war captives was “completely unreasonable” (§ 23). Next, the decree allows for three days between its publication and the production of the slave-lists. Complying in such a short time would seem to be impossible, and certainly out of sync with times set in the papyri. C.Ord.Ptol. 22 gives twenty days for implementation, and P.Gradewitz 1, a papyrus dealing with taxes on slaves,

315

316

317

Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 29–30, also argues that the two decrees preserved in C.Ord.Ptol. 22 have in common the matter of registration of livestock and slaves, and so the context makes it clear as well that registration is the primary concern. Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 21, has a fourth commonality, “the requirement of presentation of the slaves before the officials in charge.” The decree in Aristeas, however, only requires that lists be presented to the officials that make known the identities of these persons. It does not actually require that the actual slaves themselves appear. Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 22, 24–26.

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stipulates two months for Alexandria and six months for the countryside for registration of slaves. Erich Gruen writes of the three days, “This is an absurdly short time for all owners of Jewish slaves … from everywhere in the realm to register and deliver up their human property.”318 Finally Westermann offers two other matters as evidence that the decree in Aristeas cannot be genuine. First, the decree provides a reimbursement of twenty drachmae for each slave who is to be freed. In C.Ord.Ptol. 22, a papyrus in which forfeiture of a slave is a distinct possibility, no reimbursement is envisioned. Second, the decree in Aristeas rewards an informer with ownership of the disobedient person against whom the informer reported. About this provision, Westermann writes, “But no similar case of compensating a delator [i.e., informer] with ownership of the condemned person is known to me out of the entire range of Greek and Hellenistic legislation.”319 Three pieces of evidence, then, convinced Westermann that C.Ord.Ptol. 22 was Ps.-Aristeas’s immediate source: (1) the designation “Syria and Phoenicia”; (2) the exclusive use of σῶμα as the term for a slave; and (3) the explicit notice that the decree did not contain the provision for freeing slaves acquired after the actions by Ptolemy I Soter.320 On the opposite side, Werner Schmidt devoted a detailed study to the decree and reached conclusions that directly challenge Westermann’s position that C.Ord.Ptol. 22 was the immediate source of the decree in Aristeas. He concluded, in consonance with Westermann, that the prostagma in Aristeas is not itself a genuine prostagma, but quite contrary to Westermann, he found that Ps.-Aristeas did not simply revise an earlier decree. In Schmidt’s estimation, Ps.-Aristeas composed the decree in §§ 22–25 himself incorporating earlier “authentic material.”321 Schmidt examined the structure of the prostagma as well as its individual elements and compared them with authentic documents from the third century. With respect to structure, for example, § 23, which criticizes the taking of the Judean slaves, is positioned as an indispensible part of the prostagma that links together the surrounding material. Such a statement is unparalleled in any other papyri, and it was certainly Ps.-Aristeas’s composition and was meant to be a critical element of his decree. Moreover, the prostagma contains two separate commands to free slaves in the same prostagma (§ 22, § 24). Such

318 319 320 321

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2721. Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 25. Westermann, “Enslaved Persons,” 21–23. For the detailed arguments, see Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 35–75 (“authentischen Materials”). He brings impressive papyrological evidence to his discussion.

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a repetition within the same decree to the same addressee has no parallel elsewhere in the Ptolemaic papyri.322 The introduction in § 22 (βασιλέως προστάξαντος plus a conditional relative clause) that precedes the first command to free slaves can be found in third century BCE papyri, but a preamble that introduces a command, as we have in § 24, only comes in the second century BCE, and when a preamble does introduce a decree, it comes at the beginning and not in the middle of the prostagma.323 Similar difficulties attend the individual elements of the prostagma in Aristeas. So, although the phrase τοὺς κατὰ Συρίαν καὶ Φοινίκην does reflect general third century BCE usage, Schmidt notes that its use in Aristeas is less precise than in those documents.324 Moreover, even if “Syria and Phoenicia” was the official designation of this area in the third century BCE (and Westermann points to other papyri that use it) then Ps.-Aristeas could have known it from any number of sources. The same is true of the use of slave terms. One would have to argue that C.Ord.Ptol. 22 is unique in its exclusive use of σῶμα in order for this term to be decisive evidence for dependence. With respect to the phrase “if any were already present or afterwards some of these were brought in,” Schmidt agrees that it could not be part of a genuine prostagma, arguing that the identification of who has been enslaved and who needs to be manumitted in the first section of the prostagma, which seems to contain the most authentic third-century elements, does not make complete sense. The first sentence of the decree concerns Judean slaves (τῶν Ἰουδαικῶν σωμάτων). Yet, the subject τινες in the clause that extends Ptolemy’s command to other pesons than those captured in Judea (§ 22) does not accord with the phrase τῶν Ἰουδαικῶν σωμάτων earlier, since in the narrative world of the story Judeans – at least Judeans who could be enslaved – were not already present in Egypt. Likewise, in the grammar of the same clause τῶν τοιούτων has a different sense as well, since it has to refer to τινες, the subject of the clause, and not to the earlier “Judean slaves.”325 This confusion indicates that Ps.-Aristeas did not revise an already existing prostagma – which, emanating from a royal chancellery, would have made sense – but rather he utilized different bits and pieces of Ptolemaic bureaucratic terms and phrases from different periods to construct his prostagma. As Schmidt puts it, “Such a patchwork of unharmonious components is certainly not the product of a

322 323 324 325

Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 36–37. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 37–38. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 43–44. See Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 47–48, 72.

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III. Translation and Commentary

royal chancellery; the factual and linguistic differences between the individual dispositions preclude even the revision of an authentic document.”326 Yet, Schmidt’s analysis and conclusions do reconfirm the general scholarly position that Ps.-Aristeas has access to and knows Ptolemaic bureaucratic language, in this case with third-century BCE formulae, although most of the similarities between Aristeas and Ptolemaic usage stem from the second century BCE bureaucratic practice. The prostagma in §§ 22–25, however, originated from his pen to suit his literary needs. Notes § 12. Sosibius of Tarentum. The name Sosibius is well known in the Ptolemaic court. During the time of Ptolemy II, a grammarian of that name and a contemporary of Callimachus worked in the Alexandrian Mouseion. Later, under Ptolemy IV Philopater (reigned 221–205 BCE), Polybius tells of a Sosibius who was a chief advisor to the king and whose influence extended into the reign of Ptolemy V Epiphanes (Histories 15.25). This Sosibius, according to Polybius Histories 15.32, had a son of the same name who was a member of the royal bodyguard (Gk. σωματοφύλαξ; see below). Andreas. In Histories 5.81, Polybius also knows of an Andreas, who was Ptolemy IV Philopater’s physician and who was killed in Theodotus’s abortive attempt to murder Ptolemy (see also 3 Macc 1.2–3 on Theodotus’s unsuccessful plot). head bodyguards. The Greek term ἀρχισωματοφύλαξ, which occurs here and in § 40 (in a partitive genitive construction), is known from Egyptian papyri. Both Meecham and Hadas note that the term can be found in third-century BCE papyri.327 In § 12 Sosibius and Andreas are called “the head bodyguards” as if they are the only ones, but in § 40 the author refers to Andreas only using the genitive plural (as a partitive, “one of”). There the term seems to indicate a class of officials, the chief or head bodyguards. The title apparently was an honorific for a class of high-ranking people who performed various duties in the Ptolemaic hierarchy.328 Bickerman

326

327

328

Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 73. “Ein solches Flickwerk unharmonischer Einselteile ist mit Sicherheit kein authentisches Produkt der königleichen Kanzlei; die sachlichen und sprachlichen Unstimmigkeiten zwischen den einselnen Dispositionen schliessen selbst die Umarbeitung eines authentischen Aktensuckes aus.” Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 332; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 98. For the development of this term and its importance for dating Aristeas, see the Introduction, section 5. For details, see Pelletier, Flavius Joséphe, 106–8 and E. Van ’t Dack, “La date de la lettre d’Aristée,” Studia Hellenistica 16 (1968) 263–278.

The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27)

137

claims that the term as a class designation was unknown at the time of Philadelphus, and the oldest attestations of the word in this sense only occur in papyri of the second century BCE and later.329 So, for example, see P.Tebt. 1.79.52 (148 BCE), UPZ 2.224, fr. 3.7 (131 BCE), P.TorChoach 11 (119 BCE) and BGU 8.1772 (57/56 BCE). The singular occurs in the LXX/OG of 1 Reigns (1 Sam) 28:2 with reference to David, where it renders ‫ראש‬, and the plural is found in the Old Greek of Esther (late second- or first-century BCE) where it translates ‫משמרי הסף‬, “guards of the threshold.” Coele-Syria and Phoenicia. The term designates an area that included ancient Palestine. Bickerman claims that it is the Seleucid designation (rather than Ptolemiac) for the region, but in fact the situation is more complex than that (see Introduction).330 § 13. thirty thousand chosen men. 1 Macc 10:36 also notes that 30,000 Jews were enrolled in a Hellenistic king’s army, and they were stationed in garrisons as well. In this case, however, they became part of the Seleucid ruler Demetrius I’s army. On the basis of this agreement and the similarity between § 37 and 1 Macc 10:37, Arnaldo Momigliano argued that Ps.-Aristeas must have read 1 Maccabees.331 While it must be granted that there is a similarity, I do not understand why, then, Ps-Aristeas makes use of just this one piece of numerical information from 1 Maccabees. Moreover, in 1 Maccabees 10, Demetrius anticipates enrolling these Jewish mercenaries, who would act as part of an occupation force, a purpose different from that of Aristeas. The similarity can be accounted for if any dependence were the other way around or if the letter reported in 1 Maccabees 10 had been available in Egypt.332 Whatever the case, I find the idea of direct literary dependence very unlikely. settled them in garrisons. According to Aristeas, Jews served as mercenaries in the Ptolemaic army. Here we see a reflection of the origins of the Jewish politeuma, a form of polity that had soldiers as its original members, mentioned in § 310. See the note at that paragraph for more detail. the Persian. The reference here is most likely to Cambyses, who invaded Egypt in 525 BCE. Ps.-Aristeas claims that Judeans accompanied him, 329 330 331

332

Bickerman, “Dating,” 125–26 and Van ’t Dack, “La date.” Bickerman, “Dating,” 115. Arnaldo Momigliano, “Per la data e la caratteristica della lettera di Aristea,” Aegyptus 12 (1932) 161–73. He is followed by a number of scholars, most recently BarKochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 278. See the revision of Emil Shürer’s, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (Ed. Geza Vermes et al.; 3 vols.; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1973–1986) I.179, III.682.

138

III. Translation and Commentary

most likely, given the context, as mercenaries. The Jewish papyri from Elephantine (5th century BCE) in Upper Egypt demonstrate the presence of Jews in a military colony there, and it is well within reason that Cambyses employed Jews in his army.333 Psammetichus. The text of Aristeas does not make clear whether the Egyptian king is Psammetichus I or II. Herodotus relates that Psammetichus I (ruled 664–610 BCE) used Greek mercenaries in his campaigns (Histories 2.152). He also records in Histories 2.161 that Psammetichus II (ruled 595–589 BCE), grandson of Psammetichus I, died “shortly after invading Ethiopia.” This meager evidence might suggest that Ps.-Aristeas had in mind the campaign of Psammetichus II. Ptolemy, son of Lagos. This is the first explicit mention of any Ptolemy in the book, although the author has referred to Ptolemy II Philadelphus and his father obliquely on several occasions already (see § 4, § 10, § 12). Ptolemy I Soter, one of Alexander the Great’s generals, gained control of Egypt after Alexander’s death in 323 BCE. § 15. legislation. The Greek word νομοθεσία, legislation, is used synonymously with νόμος, law. Both refer to the laws that Moses gave to Israel. Throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas calls Moses νομοθέτης, legislator, implicitly equating him with other Hellenistic law-givers, such as Solon or Lycurgus. (See note to § 5.) not only to transcribe, but also to translate. Here a clear distinction is made between copying/transcribing (μεταγράφω) and translating (διερμηνεύω). As we learn later, one of the primary reasons for Aristeas’s deputation is to acquire reliable Hebrew manuscripts from which to make the translation (see also the note to § 30). The implication there is that no satisfactory transcriptions of the Jewish law are present already in Alexandria. § 17. pray. Prayer and supplication of God comprise an important theme in Aristeas, appearing frequently in the book (see § 184; § 196; § 248; §§ 305–306).334 that he might be compelled. Aristeas prays that God might move Ptolemy to release the slaves. The fulfillment of the supplication, then, is framed as a matter of divine intervention (cf. § 20). Whatever Ptolemy’s own motivation might have been, God compels him to grant Aristeas’s request. Jose333

334

For the Jewish colony at Elephantine and the Aramaic texts from there, see the bibliography in n. 300. On Jewish prayer in the Second Temple Period, see Judith H. Newman, Praying by the Book: The Scripuralization of Prayer in Second Temple Judaism (SBLEJL 14; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1999) and Jeremy Penner, Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Judaism (STDJ 104; Leiden: Brill, 2012).

The Liberation of the Jewish Slaves (§§ 12–27)

139

phus, however, portrays the situation as one of Ptolemy’s self-motivated generosity and does not mention Aristeas’s prayer (cf. Ant. 12.23).335 § 19. tens of thousands … one hundred thousand. See note to § 10. In the second instance, a literal translation would be “ten tens of thousands,” that is, one hundred thousand. supreme god. The phrase τῷ μεγίστῳ θεῷ recalls § 16 and the equation of the Jewish god with “Zeus and Dis,” which are synonyms for the great king of the gods. In Theogony 465, 479, for instance, Hesiod calls Zeus by both epithets, describing the god as “great Zeus” (Διὸς μεγάλου, 465; Ζῆνα μέγαν, 479). See also the Stoic Cleanthes’s Hymn to Zeus (3rd c. BCE) in which Zeus is lauded as “the first cause (ἀρχή) of nature, who governs all things with law.” In Jewish works, the epithet occurs in Greek compositions that belong to the LXX/OG collection and that likely originated in Alexandria, especially in 3 Maccabees: see Esth 16:16 (E.16); 2 Macc 2:36; 3 Macc 1:9, 16; 3:11; 4:16; 5:25; 7:2, 22.336 thank-offering. The Greek term χαριστήριον is a general Greek term for some kind of thanksgiving offering or sacrifice to a god or gods; see, for example, Xenophon, Cyropaedia 4.1.2, 7.2.28. It is not used for offerings to the Jewish god anywhere in the Septuagint. The only place it occurs in the LXX/OG corpus is 2 Macc 12:45, where it does not indicate any kind of sacrifice or offering but a reward “laid up for those who fall asleep in godliness.” § 20. twenty drachmae. The drachma was a Greek weight/monetary unit. 100 drachmas totaled 1 mna and 60 mnas totaled 1 talent. The mna and the talent were accounting units, not minted coins. Toward the end of the fourth century, Ptolemy I abandoned the heavier Athenian drachma for a lighter Phoenician drachma that remained in use throughout the Ptolemaic period.337 Many scholars have noted that Aristeas’s arithmetic does not pan out. The number of slaves released, based on the four hundred talents given in this paragraph, would turn out to be the one hundred thousand slaves taken by Ptolemy I and then an additional 20,000 of those “already there

335 336

337

See Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2719. See the Introduction for a discussion of Aristeas and 3 Maccabees. For likely Alexandrian provenances for Esther Addition E and 2 Maccabees, see Carey A. Moore, Daniel, Esther and Jeremiah: The Additions (AB 44; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1977) 195–199 and Daniel R. Schwartz, 2 Maccabees (CEJL; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008) 45–55, respectively. Roger S. Bagnall, “Practical Help: Chronology, Geography, Measures, Currency, Names, Prosopography, and Technical Vocabulary,” in The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009) 189–91.

140

III. Translation and Commentary

or introduced into the kingdom after these events.” Later in § 27 the figure is given as 660 talents, which would amount to about 198,000 slaves, a dramatically different figure. Josephus has the latter amount as 460 talents. Furthermore, a price of twenty drachmas seems very low for a slave of any kind. To give just a couple of examples, Westermann lists several slave prices recorded in the Zenon papyri. A sampling finds: in 259 BCE, Zenon bought a 7-year old slave girl for 50 drachmas (P.Cair.Zen. 59003.5); in the Hauron a male slave sold for 150 drachmas and a girl slave for 300 (PSI 4:406, 18–19). In fact, the 20 drachmas of Aristeas are more in line with the taxes paid on the sale prices of slaves than on the price itself.338 Josephus in his version of the story has a much more reasonable price per slave of 120 drachmae (Ant. 12.25, 28). each slave. The Greek word here and in § 22, § 24 is σῶμα “body.” Greek had a large number of words for specific types of slaves, and this term is very general. It can also mean “person” as well, and its use in Aristeas §§ 22–24 traverses both meanings. The first two occurrences in the text of the royal decree clearly intend slaves, and that is how I have translated it. The third time it is paired with the noun οἰκετία, which indicates a state of servitude (cf. § 14 and § 16). In this case I have rendered it “persons.” See the General Comment above on C.Ord.Ptol. 22, which also uses this term. § 21. copy of the edict. The Greek term τὸ ἀντίγραφον, copy, indicates that what follows is the exact form of the royal decree (πρόσταγμα). (See General Comment for more detail.) § 23. oppression. This term connects the condition of the Judeans with the Hebrew people of the Exodus accounts, since the Greek term καταδυναστεία first occurs in the Septuagint of Exodus and was apparently coined by the translator from the verb καταδυναστεύω, which also occurs in LXX Exodus and which Ps.-Aristeas uses in § 24.339 Thus, Ps.-Aristeas employs a septuagintal term to describe the people’s condition. While he labors to exonerate Ptolemy I, this noun evokes an oppressive pharaoh. As we will see in numerous occasions, the Exodus story and the giving of the law on Sinai lie in the background of Ps.-Aristeas’s narrative.

338

339

William L. Westermann, Upon Slavery in Ptolemaic Egypt (New York: Columbia University Press, 1929) 60–61 and idem, The Slave Systems of Greek and Roman Antiquity (Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society 40; Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1955) 36. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 57. The verb is not unique to the Septuagint, however, although it is not a frequently occurring verb in Greek literature.

Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a)

141

The use of the term also points again to Ps.-Aristeas’s hand in the composition of the prostagma. § 24. piety. In this passage Ptolemy uses the noun εὐσέβεια of himself, the only place in Aristeas where that happens. Ptolemy’s striving for piety constitutes the basis upon which claims of or advice about piety are given to him elsewhere in the work. § 26. staff-officers. The Greek ὑπηρέτης has the general meaning “servant, attendant,” but this translation would not really parallel “royal bankers” in the verse. In a military context the term refers to staff-officers who attend the general, a translation that makes better sense in the context. Hadas, following Andrews in APOT, translates “paymasters,” probably because the term is connected with the royal bankers.340 royal bankers. The Greek term τραπεζίτης originally referred to someone who operated a money-changing table, hence, a banker. The royal bankers were responsible for the king’s treasury.341 § 27. seven days. Just like the three days that Ptolemy gives slave owners to produce and free their slaves, seven days from a decree being made and going into force, that is, being published abroad for public knowledge, is an unreasonably short time.

Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a) 28. Now when these matters had been accomplished, he commanded Demetrius to make a report on the copying of the Jewish books. For these kings used to administer everything through edicts and with great caution, and nothing was done negligently or without purpose. Therefore I have also placed in the record a copy of the report and copies of the letters, and the quantity of the objects sent and the condition of each, because each of them excelled in magnificence and artistry. Herewith is a copy of the report. 29. “To the Great King from Demetrius. As you commanded, O King, concerning the books that are wanting for the completion of the library, how they are to be collected, and those that have by chance fallen away from proper repair, paying more than incidental attention to these matters, I submit a report to you here. 30. The books of the law of the Judeans along with a few others are wanting. For it happens that they are expressed in

340 341

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 109. On banking in Egypt, see M. I. Rostovtzeff, The Social and Economic History of the Hellenistic World (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1941) 1.404–7.

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III. Translation and Commentary

Hebrew letters and language, but they have been written rather carelessly and not as is proper, just as it has been reported by the experts. For they have not attained royal curation. 31. Now it is necessary that these books, having been made exact, be with you, because this legislation is both very philosophical and uncorrupted, inasmuch as it is divine. Therefore both writers and poets, as well as the mass of historians, have avoided a mention of the aforesaid books and of the men who have been governed and those that are being governed by them, because what is beheld in them has a certain holiness and sanctity, as Hecataeus of Abdera says. 32. If, therefore, O King, it seems good, it shall be written to the high priest in Jerusalem to send men who have lived exceedingly good lives and are eminent, skilled in matters pertaining to their own law, six from each tribe, so that after examining the agreement of the majority and obtaining exactitude in the translation, we may place it conspicuously, worthy of the affairs of state and of your purpose. Farewell always.” 33. Now when this memorandum had been produced, the king commanded that a letter be written to Eleazar concerning these matters, reporting that the release of the captives had been accomplished. He contributed for the construction of the bowls and flagons and a table and libation cups that weighed fifty talents of gold and seventy talents of silver and a considerable quantity of precious stones – now he commanded the treasurers to offer to the artisans the selection of those that they might prefer – and coinage for sacrifices and other things up to one hundred talents. 34. So we will explain the construction for you, as soon as we go through the copies of the letters. Textual Notes Both Josephus and Eusebius transmit versions of this section. § 28. Most of the manuscripts read ἀντιγραφῆς, which is the text that Pelletier adopts. Josephus and Eusebius both have ἀναγραφῆς, the reading accepted by Hadas and others.342 The neuter form, ἀντίγραφον, is used in § 21 to refer to the copy of Ptolemy’s decree given there. The decision is difficult here, and if the neuter were used in § 28, one might be more inclined to read with Josephus and Eusebius, reasoning that the second occurrence was harmonized with the first. // Most scholars read διῳκεῖτο, an imperfect, following ms O and Eusebius, rather than the pluperfect διῴκητο (or variations thereof) in the rest of the manuscript tradition.343 This textual variant looks to be primarily ittacistic, but it does have an impact on how one would

342 343

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 108. For the variations, see, Pelletier, Lettre, 118.

Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a)

143

translate this verb. // On μεγαλομέρεια, see the textual note to § 21. § 29. Pelletier has read the present tense participle ἀπολειπόντων according to the suggestion in Mendelssohn-Wendland. The manuscripts read the aorist ἀπολιπόντων. Eusebius has the aorist passive participle ἀπολειφθέντων. // The editors of Aristeas almost all agree that the paragraph should end with τάδε. The manuscripts have σοι as the end of the sentence and § 30 as beginning with τὰ δέ. Pelletier argues persuasively that § 29 needs to end with something like τάδε and that the conjunction δέ does not suit the situation of the start of § 30.344 § 31. Pelletier follows Wendland in reading αὐτά, which agrees in gender with βιβλίων to which it refers, rather than αὐτάς, which appears in the manuscripts. // Pelletier, following Hadas and others earlier, brackets the phrase καὶ πολιτευομένων as suspicious, since it appears neither in Josephus’s nor in Eusebius’s text. § 32. Eusebius omits the participle ὄντας after πρεσβυτέρους, which Pelletier restores, since here, unlike § 39 and § 46, πρεσβύτερος is a quality of the men involved “not a simple epithet.”345 § 33. Most modern editions print σημάναντας, whose number agrees with Eusebius and Josephus (who has δηλοῦντας), instead of σημάναντα found in the manuscripts. The participle has no obvious referent. Meecham retains the reading of the manuscripts, suggesting that the participle agrees with an unwritten noun γράμματα.346 Pelletier argues, more compellingly, on the basis of similar usage in a third-century BCE decree from Priene, that the plural actually refers to a royal bureau of chancellery.347 General Comment In this section, after the king’s edict to free the Jewish slaves, the action returns to the translation of the Jewish law. Here Ps.-Aristeas offers a second document, which he presents as a copy of an authentic one (see above § 21). In this case, Demetrius writes an εἴσδοσις (see the use of the noun in § 28 and § 33), which in the case of the present document is difficult to translate, since it occurs rarely. LSJ give only the two uses in Aristeas and P.Lond. 1.23 iv I as sources for it.348 Given the context in Aristeas, the best translation might be “report” or “memorandum,” since most (but not all) of its features resemble Ptolemaic memoranda. Schmidt argues that Ps.-Aris-

344 345 346 347 348

Pelletier, Lettre, 243. Pelletier, Lettre, 244 (“πρεσβυτέρους n’est ici une simple épithète”). Meecham, The Letter of Aristeas, 204. Pelletier, Lettre, 224. Josephus is also listed, but this is his paraphrase of Aristeas.

144

III. Translation and Commentary

teas has endeavored to present an authentic-sounding document, using official language that might be found both in a ὑπόμνημα, memorandum, and an ἔντευξις, petition. Indeed, the correspondence in §§ 29–32 has clear resonances with both types. So, for example, the prescript, βασιλεῖ μεγάλῳ παρὰ Δημητρίου, “to the great king from Demetrius,” is similar to prescripts found in memoranda stemming from “a later Ptolemaic period,” although the king’s name is usually included.349 The prescript’s opening formula, “To A from B,” is also characteristic of Ptolemaic era petitions as well.350 Moreover, the genitive absolute at the beginning of § 29 reflects official Ptolemaic usage in both the memorandum and the petition.351 The verb προσαναφέρω (§ 29, § 30) by the second century BCE has taken on a technical meaning of presenting something to the king to consider and thus suits a memorandum rather than a petition.352 Yet, the concluding formula εὐτύχει διὰ παντός, “farewell always” fits better with the petition than with the memorandum, as John White has shown and Schmidt admits.353 Finally, the phrase ἐὰν οὖν φαίνεται, “if it seems good,” occurs frequently in Ptolemaic era papyri, but in different forms at different times and in different sorts of documents.354 This evidence, like that of the earlier prostagma, points to this report as a composition of Ps.-Aristeas and not a genuine document. Why our author incorporates elements of different kinds of documents remains unclear, although Schmidt suggests that the farewell, so indicative of a petition, represents Ps.-Aristeas’s attempt to portray the relationship between Ptolemy and Demetrius as a genial one.355

349 350

351 352

353

354

355

Schmidt, Untersuchingen, 79 On the petition, see John Lee White, The Form & Structure of the Official Petition (SBLDS 5; Missoula, Mont.: Society of Biblical Literature, 1972). Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 79; White, Form & Structure, 28–30. Schidt, Untersuchungen, 79. See its use in this sense in C.Ord.Ptol. 64 l. 2, an inscription from 96 BCE of an ordinance of Ptolemy X Alexander I. White, Form & Structure, 30. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 80. He also notes that “always” is probably here for emphasis. Unfortunately, unlike his practice with other sections, Schmidt offers no comparative papyrological evidence for this claim. For the petition, see White, Form & Structure, 48–49. Thackeray, “Translation,” 348, claims that the form in Aristeas, using the passive form of φαίνω and lacking a dative case pronoun, does not occur in papyri earlier than 163 BCE. Meecham, Oldest Version, 107, and Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 98, follow Thackeray on this point. Curiously, Schmidt, Untersuchungen, does not treat this phrase at all in his discussion of the report. For the development of this phrase and the implications for dating the book, see the Introduction, section 5. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 80.

Demetrius’s Report (§§ 28–34a)

145

As part of his introduction to the text of the memorandum, Ps.-Aristeas comments on the habit of the Ptolemies to act by means of edicts, a comment that he uses as the pretext to include other official documents, such as the letters sent between Ptolemy II and Eleazar, the Jewish high priest (§§ 35–51), as well as his elaborate description of the gifts that Ptolemy sent for the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem (§§ 51–82). Scholars have been fortunate to have a rather large number of papyri that testify to the workings of Ptolemaic officialdom throughout the third and second centuries BCE, some of which have served in this commentary as comparative documents for those contained in Aristeas.356 Yet, in making his comment, Ps.-Aristeas betrays his distance from the events that he claims to have witnessed. Two elements give him away. First, the use of the imperfect tense διῳκεῖτο, translated into English by “used to …,” indicates durative action in the past – that is, something that happened over time, before the time of our author.357 Second the plural τοῖς βασιλεῦσι τούτοις, “these kings,” referring to the Ptolemies, would make no sense coming from someone writing in the reign of Ptolemy II.358 The text of the memorandum focuses on the necessity to acquire the “books of the law of the Judeans” and to provide for their translation. The pivotal sentence comes near the beginning (§ 30) – “For it happens that they are expressed in Hebrew letters and language, but they have been written rather carelessly and not as is proper, just as it has been reported by the experts” – and it has long been a topic of scholarly debate. The terms referring to Hebrew are the same ones in § 11 that refer to the language of the Egyptians, γράμμα and φονή. Here both words are grammatically dependent on the participle λεγόμενα, expressed, and they probably indicate the two aspects of language, the written letter and the spoken sound. Thus, in this case it would be fair to translate φονή as “language,” but it probably should be taken in the sense of language as spoken or pronounced.359 The key problem that has occupied scholars, however, is the verb σεσήμανται, which I have translated as “written.” One finds two opposing

356 357

358

359

See, for example, the collection in Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances. Pelletier, Lettre, 118, says that the imperfect tense is “ambiguous,” and taken on its own he is correct. He does not, however, take into consideration the plural “kings,” which strengthens the argument for Ps.-Aristeas’s distance from the reign of Ptolemy II. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 2, 70, 86, especially, makes this point. See also Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2722 and Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 109. Pelletier, Lettre, 119, takes it in this sense and translates “pronunciation.”

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III. Translation and Commentary

camps in scholarly literature with respect to the meaning and significance of this term. One camp, most prominently represented by Paul Kahle, argues that the Greek word should be understood to mean “translated,” and thus, it refers to previous Greek translations that were executed carelessly and that the Septuagint is expected to eclipse.360 This conclusion forms a fundamental building block in Kahle’s theory of Septuagint origins as presented in The Cairo Geniza.361 The other camp, represented by Gunther Zuntz among others, holds that the word means “written” or “transcribed” and that it refers to Hebrew manuscripts of the Jewish books.362 Kahle translated the phrase ἀμελέστερον … σεσήμανται as “carelessly interpreted,” which for him could only refer to earlier Greek translations, since in his view, Demetrius would not have been interested in the Hebrew for any reason. He further appeals to the example of Theopompus and Theodektes in §§ 314–316 as evidence that this passage refers to earlier translations. (On these figures, see the commentary on these paragraphs.) Thus, in Kahle’s estimation, Ps.-Aristeas must have been concerned with translations that were made in his own time and with defending them against earlier translations.363 Zuntz showed convincingly that the verb σημαίνω could not mean “translate” or “interpret” but must mean “write,” and thus the two parts of the sentence refer to the same thing, Hebrew manuscripts.364 More recently Maren Niehoff has offered a variation on Kahle’s position, arguing that the verb σημαίνω connoted marking with signs, an activity that would be practiced on Greek manuscripts, and thus, § 30 refers to “the neglected state of the present Greek text.”365 Niehoff’s interpretation forms a crucial piece of evidence for her larger argument that Ps.-Aristeas took a conservative position vis-à-vis other Jews who had been engaging in Homeric text-critical work on Greek translations

360

361 362

363 364 365

I will not give all the details of the scholarly arguments here. For a detailed discussion of the various positions on this term and their implications, see D. W. Gooding, “Aristeas and Septuagint Origins: A Review of Recent Studies,” VT 13 (1963) 358–62. Paul Kahle, The Cairo Geniza (2nd edition; Oxford: Blackwell, 1953) 212–13. See, Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies II, 117–19. More recently, see Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 48–49. Although Gooding, “Aristeas and Septuagint Origins,” 361, disagrees with several conclusions of Zuntz’s, on this point he agrees completely. Kahle, Cairo Geniza, 212. Zuntz, “Atristeas Studies II,” 117–19. Maren R. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011) 33–34.

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of the law. In her estimation, Ps.-Aristeas wanted to recover a “pre-critical stage” of the text, which would be accomplished by a new translation of the Torah into Greek.366 While Niehoff’s proposal is an ingenious attempt to get behind the text of Aristeas, it suffers from the need to create social groups and inner-Jewish arguments for which Aristeas provides, on the most optimistic reading, precious little evidence, and it relies on speculative readings of particular texts. So, for example, she takes the curse put on anyone who would change the text in § 311 as directed against “an already existing practice of biblical scholarship among Alexandrian Jews.”367 I do not see any reason to construct some historical situation of conflict for this text to make sense, especially given its literary significance for claims about the status of the Septuagint as scripture. Moreover, for Niehoff’s reconstruction to be persuasive, previous translations of the Septuagint must have existed that had been subjected to the practices of Homeric textual scholarship, and Ps.-Aristeas must have known them. For this reconstruction, § 30 and the verb σεσήμανται must refer to earlier translations as Kahle argued. How one decides to interpret § 30, then, has a significant affect on how one answers questions about the origins of the Septuagint and Aristeas’s possible contributions to that effort. Most recent scholarship has fallen on the side of those who think that the verb means “written,” and even Niehoff accepts the force of Zuntz’s argument against the meaning “interpret” or “translate.” Niehoff, however, takes Zuntz’s subsequent discussion – in which he says that even with the meaning of σημαίνω as “write,” Aristeas’s story is inconsistent – to indicate that Kahle’s claim that these were Greek translations had merit, although she does not reckon with D. W. Gooding’s arguments that successfully overturn Zuntz’s presumed inconsistencies and contradictions.368 In addition, her discussion of σημαίνω depends on the text-critical meaning of the noun σημεῖον, which indicates critical signs in the margins of texts.369 If we look elsewhere in Aristeas, the verb σημαίνω occurs outside of § 30, 6 times, none of which can bear a technical meaning related to textual criticism. In § 33 it has the sense of “report”; in § 120 it has the sense of “write”; in § 143 it means “to explain”; in § 192 something is signaled in a dream or action; in § 200

366 367 368

369

Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 34. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 27. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 33; Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies II,” 119–22; Gooding, “Aristeas and Septuagint Origins,” 364–70. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 33.

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it refers to signaling by applause; and in § 315 again it refers to signaling in a dream. The noun σημεῖον occurs 4 times in Aristeas, none of which refer to text-critical signs. In § 44 it comes in the phrase “a sign of friendship and love”; in § 150 it refers to a symbol in allegorical interpretation; in § 159 it occurs with reference to tefillin; and in § 270 it is used in the phrase “sign of love.” In short, neither the verb nor the noun have technical uses with respect to textual criticism anywhere else in Aristeas, and it seems unlikely that the verb σημαίνω can bear that meaning here. Thus the second part of § 30 refers to Hebrew manuscripts not to earlier Greek translations. The translation, whose production Ps.-Aristeas narrates, renders the Hebrew into Greek for the first time as far as our author is concerned. For many scholars the issues at stake in the interpretation of § 30 have to do with the potential use of Aristeas for reconstructing the historical origins of the Septuagint translations. (Niehoff accepts the legendary character of Aristeas on the origins of the translation, however.) As I set out in the Introduction, I do not think that Aristeas helps in that quest. So, what is going on in this important paragraph, if it is not history? As Zuntz and Honigman specifically note, Ps.-Aristeas resorts frequently to the use of the language of Alexandrian textual scholarship, and this discourse has an ideological function for our author. Within the literary and narrative world of the text, in § 30, Ps.-Aristeas establishes the reason that the king should write to Eleazar to send translators. The reason seems clear enough. The Hebrew manuscripts of the law that are in Alexandria have been transmitted “carelessly” (ἀμελέστερον) because they have not benefited from the oversight of the king, and this has been ascertained by consulting “experts,” probably Jewish scholars (who presumably were knowlegable in the text-critical procedures that Homeric scholars performed on Homer and thus would know if the Hebrew manuscripts were the most reliable?). The lack of royal patronage to establish the best text, and thus by extension an acceptable translation, also provides Ps.-Aristeas with a convenient explanation for what he clearly sees as the reason that “writers and poets and the mass of historians” do not mention the Jews and their laws. If the Hebrew manuscripts are not the most authentic, that would cast doubt on the authenticity of the resulting Greek translation. Such a difficulty would undermine one of Ps.-Aristeas’s major aims, to argue that the Greek translation at its inception qualified as sacred scripture.370 Even here, so early in

370

See the Introduction as well as Benjamin G. Wright, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Reception History of the Septuagint,” BIOSCS 39 (2006) 47–67 and Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship.

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the book, Ps.-Aristeas establishes what he thinks to be a necessary genetic relationship between the Hebrew original and the Greek translation. Within Aristeas’s narrative world, Demetrius argues further that the king must have these Jewish books, because the Hebrew law is “philosophical and incorruptible, inasmuch as it is divine” (§ 31), but only a text that has been made perfect or exact (διηκριβωμένα) can bequeath that character to its translation. The solution then requires that the king, who is the only one who can take on this responsibility,371 requisition translators who can perform this task, and, as we discover later, they bring with them “parchments” of the law “on which had been written in golden writing in Jewish characters” (§ 177), which come from Jerusalem and have the authorization of the high priest himself. The text that comes from Jerusalem has the imprimatur of the high priest Eleazar, and as we will see in the letters to follow and throughout Aristeas, Ps.-Aristeas portrays Eleazar as the ruler of the Judeans, who has a status vis-à-vis his subjects comparable to Ptolemy II’s status in Egypt. Thus, the text that comes from Jerusalem has received the royal care necessary to assure its reliability and authority. Paragraph 30 and the subsequent request for scholars from Jerusalem, then, rather than any genuine memory of the Septuagint’s origins, is part of a broader ideological interest that will ultimately certify that the Greek translation accurately represents both the meaning and character of the most pristine Hebrew original.372 The claims made in Demetrius’s report, especially that the Jewish law is “both very philosophical and uncorrupted, inasmuch as it is divine,” comprise the cornerstone in Ps.-Aristeas’s edifice of the Septuagint translation as the sacred scripture of Alexandrian Jews. This description of the Hebrew text provides the basis for what Ps.-Aristeas will want to claim as the character of the translation itself. Here we see our author’s desire to position the Jewish law as the equal of anything the Greeks have, perhaps even more than the equal. On the one hand, the term “philosophical” asserts the reasonableness of the law. In fact, in § 161 Eleazar says that the Jewish kosher law was a “sign of proper reason (ὀρθὸς λόγος),” which, although not the precise language of Stoic philosophy, shows some influence of Stoic ideas.373 On the other hand, the adjective “divine” (θείαν) denotes a con371 372 373

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 49. See Introduction, section 2 and Wright, “Aristeas and Reception History.” Luca Mazzinghi, “Law of Nature and Light of the Law in the Book of Wisdom (Wis 18:4c),” in Studies in the Book of Wisdom (Ed. Géza G. Xeravits and József Zsengellér; JSJSup 142; Leiden: Brill, 2010) 37–59. Of note in this regard is Aristobulus, who argued that both Plato and Pythagoras knew the Jewish law and included it in

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nection to the deity (see Note). The Jewish law, then, contains the best of human reasoning and divine approbation. In order to ensure that the translation will possess these same qualities, the king will find translators who have two vital characteristics – they excel in living their own lives, presumably in accordance with their native laws, and they have expertise in “matters pertaining to their own law,” that is, they are in a position to know what it means. According to Demetrius in § 32, they will collaborate, come to agreement, and obtain “exactitude” (διηκριβωμένα), which invokes the image of textual scholars producing a text edition, that is, producing the best translation possible.374 So, in the hands of these scholars, the Greek version will replicate the Hebrew one. These adjectives also indicate the prospective function of the translation. In the target language the translation will have the same character as its Hebrew parent; it will be a literary work to be admired – the king will “place it conspicuously,” presumably in the library, for Greeks to read, study and admire along with the other great works of Greek philosophy and literature.375 As part of Demetrius’s report to Ptolemy, where he encourages the king to request of the Jewish high priest men to translate the Jewish law for the library, he suggests that the translators number “six from each tribe” (§ 32). This is a somewhat curious formulation, since it would imply that Ps.-Aristeas, an Alexandrian Jew writing in the mid-to-late second century BCE, understood this tribal organization to be recognized and possibly even in force still in his own time – at the very least it would hold some significance for his readership. For the most part, scholars working on Aristeas pass this comment by in relative silence. Yet, the appearance of twelve

374

375

their philosophical systems (Fragment 3, Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 12.1; see Holladay, Aristobulus, 153–54). Honigman has made the most extensive case for Ps.-Aristeas’s use of the language of Homeric scholarship with respect to the Septuagint. For § 32, see Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 46. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, chap. 2, wants to turn this conclusion on its head, but her arguments depend on a reading of σεσήμανται in § 30 that is difficult to sustain. Her reading of Aristeas derives from her analysis of the terms for text-critical analysis. While she offers insightful readings of a number of passages, the conclusions she draws are very speculative, particularly her reconstruction of a group of Jews against whom Ps.-Aristeas is writing, who have subjected the Greek translation to Homeric text-critical procedures. See my discussion above. On the issue of the prospective function of a translation, see the Introduction, section 2 and the discussion of the work of Gideon Toury, particularly Descriptive Translation Studies and beyond (Benjamins Translation Library 4; Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1995); on Descriptive Translation Studies and Aristeas, see Wright, “Letter of Aristeas and Reception History,” 48–52.

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tribes in Hecataeus of Abdera, to whom Ps.-Aristeas refers at the end of § 31, and later in Philo of Alexandria hint that the twelve tribes might have had a special significance in Egyptian Judaism. References to the twelve tribes in Aristeas are primarily linked to the translators whom Eleazar ultimately sends to Alexandria. So in § 32, § 39 and § 46, we find the phrase ἀφ’ ἑκάτης φυλῆς ἕξ, “six from each tribe,” and §§ 47–50 list the names of all the translators given by the number of the tribe, although no tribal names appear. The only other mention related to the tribes is in the description of the high priest’s vestments, where the stones on the breastplate are said to represent “the names of the tribal leaders according to what would have been the original order” (§ 97). Inexplicably, later in the travelogue when Ps.-Aristeas describes the land surrounding Jerusalem, he makes no mention of the tribes, even though he does talk about the construction of Jerusalem and the surrounding countryside being proportional (§ 113). Since Aristeas does not narrate any historical account of the Jewish people, the origins of the tribes are not articulated explicitly, although, as we shall see below, one story might lie behind Ps.-Aristeas’s comments. Perhaps the key piece of pre-Aristeas evidence is the tradition of Jewish origins attributed to Hecataeus of Abdera in his Aegyptiaca. According to Diodorus Siculus (first century BCE) in Bibliotheca Historica 1.46, Hecataeus visited Egypt during the reign of Ptolemy I and thereafter composed his work on Egypt. In book 40, Hecataeus says that the Jews were evicted from Egypt.376 Moses, “outstanding both for his wisdom and for his courage” led the Jews to Jerusalem where he built the temple, established the Jews’ religious practices, gave them laws, and formed their political institutions. “He also,” writes Hecataeus, “divided them into twelve tribes, since this is regarded as the most perfect number …” This tradition, which likely derives from Egypt and from Egyptian Jewish sources, credits Moses with the twelve-tribe organization. Later, in the first century CE, Philo of

376

Translations of Hecataeus come from Menahem Stern, Greek and Latin Writers on Jews and Judaism (3 vols.; Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1976) 1.28. Book 40 of the Bibliotheca Historica only survives in the 9th century work of the Byzantine Christian Photius in his Bibliotheca. On the excursus regarding the Jews in Diodorus Book 40, see Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 25–39. Reinhard Kratz has concluded that the material in Diodorus Book 40 attributed to Hecataeus of Abdera cannot have been from him; see “Greek Historians on Jews and Judaism in the 3rd Century BCE,” presented at University of Tel Aviv, “Judea in the Long Third Century BCE: The Transition between the Persian and Hellenistic Periods,” May 31–June 3, 2014.

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Alexandria also suggests that Moses was responsible for the twelve tribes. In On Flight and Finding 183–184, he refers to the arrival at Ailim/Elim mentioned in a single biblical verse, Exod 15:27, where there are twelve springs.377 He notes that “twelve is a perfect number” and then lists several instances of things that come in twelves – the zodiac, the twelve months (also pointed out by Hecataeus), the hours of day and night. He continues, “And Moses commemorates the number in several places, registering twelve tribes of the nation, legislating twelve loaves of increase, ordering twelve inscribed stones placed upon the full-length robe, to be woven upon the breastplate.” The verbs used here – register, legislate, order – make Moses the originator of these uses of the number twelve, including the organization of twelve tribes. Elsewhere, in Life of Moses 1.188–190, Philo connects the twelve tribes with the twelve streams at Ailim.378 In this connection, John Gager has pointed out that both Hecataeus and Philo make Moses “conform to standard Greek models.” With respect to the division into tribes, Gager points to Plato, who in the Laws 745D suggests that the ideal legislator should divide the people into twelve parts.379 Perhaps, then, we have in these sources evidence that membership in one of twelve tribes constituted an ideal polity among Egyptian Jews, one that pictures Jewish polity on the model of the ideal Greek polis and that brought a kind of citizen identity akin to that claimed by Greeks.380

377 378

379

380

For Philo the significance has to do with “springs of education” and virtue. The Exagogue of Ezekiel the Tragedian (fragment 16) also emphasizes the arrival at Ailim, but even though the twelve springs are mentioned, nothing is made of the significance of the number. For this text, see Carl R. Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors, Volume II: Poets (SBLTT 30/SBLPS 12; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989). John G. Gager, Moses in Greco-Roman Paganism (SBLMS 16; Nashville: Abingdon, 1972) 31–32. On the selection of the 72 elders, see below on §§ 46–50. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 57, ties the twelve-tribe model to the selection of the elders and suggests that Ps.-Aristeas is working on the model of the civic organization of the ideal Greek polis. There is probably much more to say on this subject than I can in this commentary. I thank Jan Joosten for his extended conversation with me about this issue. Joosten has argued that a similar phenomenon can be seen in the book of Judith. He concludes that Hecataeus, Aristeas, and Judith provide evidence that the twelve-tribe system is still operable in the post-exilic period and that this is an Egyptian Jewish phenomenon. He further suggests that the Jews at Elephantine incorporated elements from both the Northern kingdom and Judeans and that perhaps this kind of Judaism characterized the Egyptian diaspora, which might account for an active twelve-tribe identification in Egypt. I am not convinced that this system

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Since there is no evidence that Ps.-Aristeas is concerned with anything but the Pentateuch, I wonder whether lying behind the reference to translators coming from every tribe is a tradition that seems to be connected with Egyptian Jews that Moses represents the ideal lawgiver and organizer of the Jews and that makes him responsible for a twelve-tribe system of social organization. If that were the case, the reference to six translators from every tribe would communicate to Egyptian Jews that the Jewish people undertook the task of translation as a whole and that it implicitly had Mosaic authority – a point that would reinforce Ps.-Aristeas’s broader agenda of establishing the Septuagint as holy scripture. On a literary level, this mention of twelve tribes precedes Ptolemy’s letter to Eleazar the high priest. As we will see below, that letter regards Eleazar as a kind of head of state who has some independent authority as leader of his people. The situation further recalls another remark of Hecataeus that “the Jews never have a king, and authority over the people is regularly invested in whichever priest is regarded as superior to his colleagues in wisdom and virtue” (Diodorus 40.3.4). Notes § 28. make a report. The vocabulary designating the type of correspondence between Demetrius and the king is very inexact. Outside of the citation of the report, we find the verb εἰσδίδωμι, to hand in a report, and the noun εἴσδοσις (§ 28, § 33), a report or memorandum, both of which are general terms and which occur infrequently with this meaning. Within the report, we find the verb προσαναφέρω, which, as I noted above, becomes a technical term for submitting a report. The correspondence itself looks somewhat like a hybrid of a memorandum and a petition. The precise terms for these kinds of correspondences, ὑπόμνημα and ἔντευξις, do not appear in Aristeas. I have placed in the record. The verb καταχωρίζω can mean to enter in a register or record or to place on record or write down in a book. Here the latter meaning pertains. Aristeas says that he will place on record, that is, in his correspondence with Philocrates, the reports and letters along with

was still in force in this period, although I do think it quite likely that the twelve-tribe organization linked to Moses was an element of Egyptian Jewish identity. For Joosten’s thoughts on Judith, see “The Original Language and Historical Milieu of the Book of Judith,” in Meghillot V–VI: A Festschrift for Devorah Dimant (Ed. Moshe Bar-Asher and Emanuel Tov; Jerusalem: University of Haifa/Bialik Institute, 2007) *159–*176. On the Elephantine papyri, see n. 300.

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the details of the gifts, which is precisely what he does in the successive paragraphs. § 29. Great King. Some evidence suggests that the epithet “Great King” could be used of the Ptolemaic ruler. I have not encountered the epithet used of Ptolemy II, but the Adoulis Inscription (c. 246 BCE), erected by Ptolemy III, uses the epithet: “Great King Ptolemy (son) of King Ptolemy and Queen Arsinoë the Brother and Sister Gods.”381 § 30. The books of the law of the Judeans. In Greek the noun “books” lacks the definite article. Most commentators supply the article in English, particularly in the context of § 28 in which Demetrius refers to “the copying of the Jewish books,” where the article is present. Thackeray renders the phrase “certain books of the Jewish law,” taking seriously the lack of the article and referring to a more remote context in § 10 where the word νόμιμα also lacks an article. The singular of νόμος, law, indicates that in Aristeas the Jewish law is contained in several volumes; see also § 38. curation. The Greek noun πρόνοια has to do in general with foresight. In this passage, the term seems intended to indicate royal patronage or curation/oversight. That is, the manuscripts have not been copied carefully because the king has not superintended them. § 31. the men who have been governed and those that are being governed. The verb πολιτεύω in the passive means to be governed or administrated. Stewart Moore suggests a closer connection to the Judeans being constituted as a politeuma, when he translates “men who have been and are constituted as a unit.” The verb does not have to have this technical connection, however, and I do not think that it has this sense in the present passage.382 Hecataeus of Abdera. Hecataeus wrote his Aegyptiaca in the third century BCE, and it is preserved in fragments transmitted in Diodorus Siculus. Josephus seems to know two other works, one on Abraham and one on the Jews, that he attributes to Hecataeus, which many scholars regard as falsely attributed and thus refer to them as by Pseudo-Hecataeus.383 Which fragments, how many there are, and whether they belong to Hecataeus or

381 382 383

Bagnall and Derow, The Hellenistic Period, 51–53. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 309; on πολιτεύω, see LSJ. Some scholars argue that Josephus actually knows only one work, of which On Abraham and On the Jews are variant titles; see Holladay, Historians, 283. For passages attributed to Pseudo-Hecataeus and the issues connected with this anonymous Jewish writer, see Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus.

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Pseudo-Hecataeus is still a matter of scholarly discussion.384 The reference in Aristeas is difficult, since the author invokes Hecataeus as evidence that the Jewish law is holy.385 The extant fragments of Hecataeus contain no parallel to such a statement, but the earliest references to Pseudo-Hecataeus material are not until two centuries after Aristeas. On the other hand, some material, especially about the twelve tribes recalls material from the Aegyptiaca. Consequently, uncertainty remains as to whether Ps.-Aristeas relies here on the genuine Hecataeus or on a forged statement about the Jewish law. Bezalel Bar-Kochva argues that only the last clause of this section, “what is beheld in them has a certain holiness and reverence,” comprises the intended citation of Hecataeus, and he regards it as likely coming from Hecataeus himself.386 divine. The claim that the law is divine (θείαν) does not establish that it came about via revelation or that God was its author. The term has a range of uses in ancient literature, and although it could indicate that God was its origin, the term usually connotes belonging to a god, pleasing to a god, being like a god in some way or being devoted to the service of a god.387 Other similar terms in Aristeas, such as ἅγιος (§ 45) or σεμνός (§ 5, § 31, § 313; cf. § 144), also lack precision about whether the law originated with God in a revelatory manner. See further discussion of this issue below on Eleazar’s apologia for the law. § 32. elders. Although the Greek word πρέσβυς can refer simply to someone who is old, it can have titular force, referring to the leader of a community, and that is its connotation here. These men are leaders of the Jewish community. For more extensive comment on these “elders,” see also the comment on §§ 46–50 below.

384

385

386 387

For differing views, see R. Doran, “Pseudo-Hecataeus,” in OTP, 2.905–19; Holladay, Historians, 277–335; Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus; Stern, Greek and Latin Writers, 1.20–44. Holladay, Historians, 278, takes the phrase “because what is beheld in them has a certain holiness and reverence” as referring to the Jews. Although the noun “men” (=Jews) could be the antecedent of the pronoun “them,” I think it more likely in the context of talking about the Jewish law and its divine character that Ps.-Aristeas intends the word “these,” at the beginning of § 31, that is, the Jewish books, as the referent. Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 139–42. Ian W. Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact: The Inspiration of the Pentateuch in the Book of Aristeas,” JSJ 41 (2010) 3.

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translation. The Greek term here is ἑρμηνεία, the more usual word rendered as “translation,” although it can have the connotation of interpretation as well. § 33. captives. The Greek term here, αἰχμάλωτος, “captive,” seems to refer to the entire body of slaves being released. Yet, in the edict cited in §§ 22–25, the phrase “and similarly, if any were already present or afterwards some of these were brought in” would appear to allow for non-captives among the slaves to be released too. bowls … flagons … libation cups. The references to these items require two observations. First, within the narrative, Aristeas is referring to the gifts that the king has constructed for the Jerusalem temple, which he will describe. When he gives the actual descriptions of these items, the libation cups (σπονδεῖον) do not appear there. This passage contains the only reference to them in Aristeas. Second, the names of the vessels do not accord with those given in the Septuagint of Exodus for the accoutrements of the cult that appear to have the same function. In Exod 25:29, God commands Moses to construct “its bowls (τρύβλια) and censers and libation cups (σπονδεῖα) and ladles (κυάθους)” out of pure gold. In Exod 24:6, Moses pours blood out of “bowls” (κρατῆρας), but in the descriptions of the items that Moses must produce for the cult, the Greek word κρατήρ only refers to the bowls that are on the ends of the lampstand in the Tabernacle. The word I have translated as “flagon,” φιάλη, denotes in Exodus the saucers that are used on the altar, whereas in § 79, the only mention of the term in the section on the construction of the bowls, they do not seem intended for such use. sacrifices. The Greek term θυσία is a general word used for sacrificial burnt offerings. It is used in the Septuagint as a translation for several different Hebrew terms for sacrifice. When Philo (Embassy to Gaius, 157) notes that Augustus also gave gifts to the Jewish temple, including money for sacrifices to the Jewish God, he uses this term.

Ptolemy II’s Letter to Eleazar (§§ 34b–40) 34b. Now the king’s letter took this form: 35. “King Ptolemy to Eleazar the high priest, greetings and good health. Since it has happened that a large number of Judeans have settled in our country, whom the Persians took from Jerusalem during the time when they held power and yet who also came with our father into Egypt as prisoners – 36. of these he assigned a good number to the regular military at higher than mercenary pay, and similarly also those who were already there whom he judged faithful, to

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them he gave garrisons that he built so that native Egyptians might [not] be afraid of them, but now we, having inherited the kingdom, meet all people in a more benevolent manner, but more so especially your fellow citizens. 37. We have set free more than one hundred thousand captives, paying to those who held them a cash price commensurate with their value, making good also whatever damage was done by the attacks of the crowds, deciding to do this as a pious act and offering a thank-offering to the supreme god, who has maintained the kingdom for us in peace and in most excellent reputation throughout the entire world. We have appointed to the army those who are at the prime of military age, and we have established over business matters those who are capable enough to attend us, who are worthy of trust by the court. 38. Now since we desire also to show favor to them and to all the Judeans throughout the world and to future generations, we have decided that your Law shall be translated into Greek letters from the Hebrew letters spoken by you, in order that these books of the Law also might be with us in our library along with the other royal books. 39. You will act well and worthily of our zeal by selecting elders who have lived exemplary lives, who have experience in the Law and who are able to translate, six from each tribe, so that from the majority there may be found agreement, since this is an inquiry that concerns important matters. For we believe that completion of this task will bring great reputation. 40. Now concerning these matters we have sent Andreas of the chief bodyguards and Aristeas, men held in honor by us, who will confer with you and will bring offerings of first fruits to the Temple and one hundred talents of silver for sacrifices and other things. Now also if you write to us about anything you might wish, it would be welcome, and you will act in a manner worthy of friendship, since whatever you choose will be carried out with alacrity. Farewell.” Textual Notes Josephus and Eusebius report this section. § 35. Almost all the manuscripts read the compound verb ἐπισυμβαίνει. Manuscripts K and Z along with Eusebius begin the sentence ἐπεὶ συμβαίνει, since it has happened, which is the reading adopted here.388 The sentence is difficult, beginning in § 35 with § 36 as a long digression. The main verb only arrives at the beginning of § 37, ἠλευθερώκαμεν, we have set free. // Eusebius has the infinitive κατῳκίσθαι from the verb κατοικίζω. (Josephus has the same verb,

388

Pelletier has ms K and Eusebius as witnesses to the reading, while Thackeray includes ms Z as well.

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but as a participle.) The manuscripts all have κατοικεῖσθαι, which derives from κατοικέω. Both verbs can mean “settle, dwell,” but in § 13 we find the verb κατοικίζω, and all scholars agree that should be the verb in this place. // The various editors accept ἀνασπάστους found in mss G I O1 and Eusebius for “having been taken, deported.” The manuscript tradition otherwise has either ἀναστάτους or ἀναρπάστους. Parallel usage in other ancient writers, such as Hecataeus (cited by Josephus in Against Apion), Herodotus and Polybius, supports the reading accepted here. § 36. The textual witnesses are divided between προόντας (mss O T and Eusebius), adopted here, and παρόντες (the remainder of the manuscripts). As in § 22, where πρόειμι occurs as well, the contrast is between captives brought from Judea and Jews who were already present in Egypt. // All of the manuscripts read the negative μή. Josephus and Eusebius lack it. The problem is a contextual one. Most editors omit or bracket the negative, since the passage seems to suggest a contrast between Ptolemy I, who established Jews in military fortresses in order to intimidate native Egyptians, and Ptolemy II, who rules more benevolently and thus does not require such measures. Moore has argued that the negative makes perfect sense here in light of the rest of Ps.-Aristeas’s comments about military service and the use of violence.389 Moore’s analysis focuses on Ptolemy II, however, whereas the negative refers to the actions of Ptolemy I. Since Ptolemy II’s reign is contrasted with the events of Ptolemy I’s, some confusion remains. I have retained the brackets of the editors in recognition of this confusion (see General Comment below). § 37. All editors accept Schmidt’s correction of the manuscript tradition, which has χειρῶν, hands, to χρειῶν, business matters. § 40. Eusebius has the perfect passive κεχαρισμένος, which is to be preferred over the manuscript readings of καὶ χαρισάμενος, which does not make good sense in the context and is an obvious corruption. General Comment Unlike the previous two “official” documents – a prostagma and a memorandum – Ps.-Aristeas reportedly preserves a copy of a letter (ἐπιστολή) sent from Ptolemy II to Eleazar requesting men to translate the Jewish law. As was the case with the previous documents, several elements of the letter resemble the practices of official letters from the Ptolemaic period,

389

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 307–11. He also argues that the negative is missing in Josephus and Eusebius because the relationship between Egyptians and Judeans changed in the Roman period to a less congenial one, and thus the lack of the negative in these authors reflects a later development.

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although sometimes with important differences. Schmidt notes that there are few royal letters from this period but quite a number of private letters. Since the royal letter develops out of the private letter, the form of the private letter can be compared to that in Aristeas, although the private letters are characterized by a good deal of variation.390 Two elements of the greeting are noteworthy. First, the letter addresses Eleazar with his title, high priest (ἀρχιερεύς). If the addressee of a letter is subordinate to or does not have the equal standing with the sender, the addressee is usually referred to without a title. A title given after the name of the addressee indicates the equal and/or independent status of the addressee.391 The greeting form of χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι appears in letters from the Ptolemaic period, but only in a period later than the reign of Ptolemy II.392 So, for example, in Lenger’s collection of Ptolemaic papyri, the verb ἐρρῶσθαι only appears twice in opening formulae.393 In C.Ord. Ptol. 60.12 (115 BCE) the papyrus begins with the standard “A to B χαίρειν” formula, followed by ἐρρώμεθα. In C.Ord.Ptol. 63.2 (99 BCE) we find the identical formula to that in Aristeas.394 The closing formula in § 40, ἔρρωσο, is one of the standard letter closing formulae encountered throughout the Ptolemaic period. One other phrase, characteristic of Ptolemaic letters, should be pointed out here. In § 39, Ptolemy requests from Eleazar six men from each tribe to translate the Torah into Greek. The request begins with a phrase found in second-century Ptolemaic documents, καλῶς οὖν ποιήσεις, “you would

390 391 392 393

394

Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 81–83. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 87–89 following Bickerman, “Dating,” 117. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 225, calls this an “augmented salutation.” After forays into several scholarly collections of letters, I have not been able to find a single example of the phrase χαίρειν καὶ ἐρρῶσθαι before the middle of the second century BCE. Earlier letters do contain a health wish, but it is consistently at the beginning of the body of the letter and not as part of a formulaic opening. In addition to Lenger’s collection, see John L. White, Light from Ancient Letters (Foundations and Facets; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986). Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances, 176, 182. These examples would appear to bear out Bickerman’s claim (“Dating,” 120) that this formula never occurs under Ptolemy II and only appears well after his death. Chan-Hie Kim, in his study of letters of recommendation, also supports this conclusion. He finds the use of ἐρρῶσθαι in the early Ptolemaic period, but the combined opening as we have it in Aristeas only appears in the late Ptolemaic period. (The Familiar Letter of Recommendation [SBLDS 4; Missoula, Mont.: SBL, 1972] 28.) See also, John L. White, “The Greek Documentary Letter Tradition Third Century B. C.E. to Third Century C. E.,” Semeia 22 (1982) 93; Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 225.

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do well.” A couple of papyrological examples will suffice here. In C.Ord. Ptol. 52.16 (124–116 BCE), a short letter from Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II, Cleopatra II and Cleopatra III to a certain Lochos concerning a request, we read, “Therefore you would do well (καλῶς οὖν ποιήσεις) to carry it out as they ask.” C.Ord.Ptol. 60 mentioned above also uses the identical phrase in a letter from Cleopatra II and Ptolemy IX Soter II (115 BCE) to a certain Phommous about a request from priests of the god Chnum at Elephantine.395 Although the letter itself repeats a good deal of what was already revealed in Aristeas’s initial idea about manumission (§§ 12–15), Ptolemy’s prostagma (§§ 22–25), and Demetrius’s report (§§ 29–32), we find several points of interest in this new document. Only here are the Persians held responsible for bringing captive Jews into Egypt. Earlier in § 13, Ps.-Aristeas notes that a considerable number had come into Egypt “with the Persian,” but there he gives no indication that they were prisoners. Here they are clearly captives of some sort. Otherwise this report is consistent with the earlier one that the Jews in Egypt came largely with the Persians and with Ptolemy I Soter. The comment in § 36 that Ptolemy I employed Jews in the military agrees with the earlier one in § 13, which notes that he settled these Jewish mercenaries in garrisons. Again, this letter goes a step farther and places the mercenaries in fortresses with the apparent purpose of eliminating fear in the native population; presumably the good relations between the soldiers and the native Egyptian population would testify to Ptolemy’s benevolence and prevent some kind of indigenous insurrection.396 Some confusion enters the picture, however, with the use of the negative μή. Although Ps.-Aristeas situates Ptolemy II’s reign in contrast to Ptolemy I’s, he still tries to absolve Ptolemy I, since in the earlier section, Ptolemy allows for those not engaged in military duty to be taken as slaves at the instigation of his soldiers not because he had any interest in enslaving them. This claim is repeated in the prostagma (§ 23). This might justify the presence of the negative. The new Greek king Ptolemy I wanted to extend his benevolence to native Egyptians and did not want them to be frightened of garrisoned mercenaries. Yet just after this claim, Ptolemy II describes his own reign as more benevolent than his father’s (φιλανθρωπότερον). If, given the context, he intends to contrast his approach with his father’s, what 395 396

Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances, 126, 176. The information in Josephus, Against Apion 2.44 about Ptolemy I entrusting Egyptian fortresses to Jews because of their loyalty and bravery would seem to be derived from Aristeas. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2724, notes that there is “no reason to question the employment of Jews by the Ptolemies both in the regular armies and as garrison troops.”

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else could it be than that Ptolemy I garrisoned mercenaries to make the native people afraid? Ptolemy II is more benevolent than that and wants no one to fear, including and especially the Judeans. On one reading (without μή), Ptolemy I does not fare so well, and Ps.-Aristeas has Ptolemy II place the blame for enslavement and a fearful native population squarely on his father’s shoulders as a way of contrasting Ptolemy II’s benevolence with his father’s lack of it. On another reading (with μή), Ps.-Aristeas wants to rescue Ptolemy I’s reputation at the same time he lauds Ptolemy II’s kindnesses. In doing this he introduces some confusion into how Ptolemy I ought to contrast with his son. In either case, however – and it is indeed difficult to judge which reading to accept – Ps.-Aristeas’s view of Ptolemy II is consistent with the way he presents him elsewhere in the work. Although the number 100,000 agrees with the one given in § 19, no mention is made there of any compensation to the manumitted slaves. In this passage, we meet with the only intimations of Egyptian anti-Judaism found in the book. As part of the manumission, not only will the former owners of the Jewish slaves receive compensation, the Jews themselves are to receive reimbursement for any damage incurred “by the attacks of the crowds.” Whether this phrase refers to any specific incident or not is unknown. In other Jewish works of the period, though, we find more explicit reference to Egyptian anti-Jewish sentiment as, for example, in the later works, such as Wisdom of Solomon or Philo’s Embassy to Gaius, but especially in 3 Maccabees, a work to which Aristeas is often compared (see Introduction). In his appeal to Eleazar, Ptolemy II presents his act of manumission as an offering to the Jewish god (see also § 19). We have already seen that two developing and related themes in the book are universalism in which the Jewish god is worshipped by some enlightened Hellenes, albeit using different divine names, and the claim that the Jewish god maintains the Hellenistic monarch’s kingdom (§ 16, § 19). The latter theme will be hammered home in the series of symposia in which the king questions the Jewish scholars whose responses invariably refer to the Jewish god. In this letter, Ptolemy’s motive is portrayed as being one of gratitude to the Jewish god for the preservation of his kingdom, which reflects the attitude that the Judean translators enjoin upon him in the symposia. Note the parallel with § 19 through the mention of divine preservation/election and Ptolemy’s “excellent reputation.” The topic then turns to the translation project. Perhaps as a function of the fact that the letter is addressed to the Jewish high priest, the translation is framed partially as Ptolemy’s beneficence to the Jews. Elsewhere in the book the purpose of the translation is to complete the king’s library. All of a sud-

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den, in a letter to the Jewish high priest, Ptolemy expresses his desire to show favor both to those Judeans who had been enslaved and to their co-ethnics “throughout the world.” This raison d’etre, combined with the compensation offered to the former slaves in § 37, gives the impression that Ptolemy is trying to highlight his magnanimity in a correspondence with Eleazar, who is portrayed as a head of state himself. In fact, Ps.-Aristeas betrays here that the king’s library plays a literary role in the narrative, but not much more, since for him the translation of the Septuagint is about the giving of the law in Greek to the Alexandrian Jewish community, who rather than make an Exodus out of Egypt, receive the law in Egypt, where they reside. When we get to Philo’s version of the story in the first century CE, the translation of the law is made to exhibit its beauty to all of humanity, since while it was in Hebrew it was available to the Jews only (Life of Moses 2.26–27). In Philo, then, we see a picture of the law’s true universality.397 Notes § 36. regular military at higher than mercenary pay. This phrase employs the vocabulary of Ptolemaic military organization. The initial term στρατιωτικὸν σύνταγμα (“regular military”) implies regular army battalions. Jean Lesquier questions whether the Ptolemies actually had regular συντάγματα, even though they were normal features of Greek militaries.398 The second key term, μισθοφορίαις, refers to mercenary pay, and it relates to the usual designation for foreign mercenaries in Ptolemaic military parlance, μισθοφόρος.399 Hence Ps.-Aristeas seems to be saying that Ptolemy employed Judeans in the regular battalions, paying them at the regular military pay rate, which was more than mercenaries normally would be paid. For the use of the related term τάγματα to mean “soldiers,” see § 26. citizens. The term πολίτης means a freeman or citizen. In the present context it refers to Judeans as fellow citizens of Eleazar. Ptolemy is assuring the Judean high priest/ruler that he is treating Eleazar’s countryfolk well. § 37. 100,000. This number agrees with that given by Andreas (also mentioned here in § 40) in § 19. thank-offering. On this offering see the note at § 19. 397

398

399

On Philo’s construction of the Septuagint, see Hindy Najman and Benjamin G. Wright, “Perfecting Translation: The Greek Scriptures in Philo of Alexandria,” to appear in History, Criticism and Interpretation (Ed. Joel Baden et al.; JSJSup. Leiden: Brill, Forthcoming). Jean Lesquier, Les Institutions Militaires de L’Egypte sous les Lagides (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1911) 366–67. Lesquier, Institutions, 16–17.

Ptolemy II’s Letter to Eleazar (§§ 34b–40)

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supreme god. See the note at § 19. appointed to the army … worthy of trust. Cf. 1 Macc 10:37, which has a very similar formulation: “And some of them will be stationed in the large fortresses of the king, and some of these will be assigned to the affairs of the kingdom, which are confidential.” The only phrase that the two texts have in common is “assigned to affairs” – ἐπὶ χρειῶν καθεστάκαμεν (Aristeas) and κατασταθήσονται ἐπὶ χρειῶν – having the same verb and prepositional phrase. Moreover in 1 Macc 10:36, the number 30,000 men would be inducted into the army of Demetrius I, a claimant to the Seleucid throne. On the basis of these similarities, Arnaldo Momigliano argued that Aristeas § 37 was based on 1 Maccabees, but since the rest of the language is so different, direct dependence seems unlikely.400 military age. The Greek term ἡλικία refers generally to a time of life or to a person’s age. It has the additional connotation of prime of life, and in the context of military language it indicates someone who is at the age for military service. business matters. The Greek word χρεία has a broad semantic range. As a general term it often means “business” or “purpose.” What it connotes here is not completely clear. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) renders it “offices of state.” Andrews has a variation: “official positions.” Pelletier takes a more general approach, translating it “certain services.”401 In the present context, almost any of these options can be defended. As I understand the passage, Ptolemy notes that those who are at the right age for military service have been incorporated into the army; others who are trustworthy have been brought into the court and placed in charge of certain affairs. Thus, I have tried to keep the more non-specific semantics of the term by rendering “business matters.” For the term used with several different connotations, see 1 Maccabees 10, 12, 13. § 38. translated. The verb μεθερμηνεύω unambiguously means “translation.” Meecham notes that it is a late word found in Polybius, the Prologue to Sirach and the New Testament.402 It is not used anywhere in the translated LXX/OG corpus.

400

401

402

Momigliano, “Per la data,” 161–73. I cannot agree with Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 278, who sees this argument as clinched. See the note on § 13 above. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 56, suggests that “[h]eirs of the biblical Joseph have thus been raised to provide wise advisers to the new Pharaoh.” I doubt that there is a deliberate allusion here to the Joseph story, although it is suggestive. Thackeray, “Translation,” 349; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 115; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 99; Pelletier, Lettre, 125 (“certains services”). Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 207.

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Greek letters from the Hebrew letters spoken by you. The entire phrase is somewhat difficult, since the Greek word γράμμα indicates something written, whereas λέγω has at its root something spoken. Although a possible interpretation, Shutt’s rendering “from what you call Hebrew letters” does not make the best contextual sense and does not really render the sense of the Greek phrase, ἐκ τῶν παρ’ ὑμῶν λεγομένων Ἑβραϊκῶν γραμμάτων. Pelletier glosses the phrase with “that which you call the Hebrew text in the Greek tongue,” where he renders the verb as does Shutt and then tries to finesse the two occurrences of γράμμα.403 This approach is only moderately successful in my estimation, since γράμμα does not really mean language in the sense that Pelletier intends, that is, a spoken tongue. While it is clear what the intended meaning is – that Ptolemy intends to have the law that is in Hebrew translated into Greek – the phraseology is awkward, and I have retained the difficulty in the English translation here. § 39. elders. See note to § 32 and General Comment to §§ 46–50. from the majority there may be found agreement. This is the first time that we hear about the translation procedure to be followed. It is decidedly un-miraculous in contrast to later versions of the story in which the translators work individually and miraculously their resulting translations agree with one another. See, for example, Irenaeus, Against All Heresies, 3.21.2 (in Eusebius, Church History 5.8.11 ff.; second century CE) and Epiphanius of Salamis, On Weights and Measures, 2–17 (fourth–fifth century CE).404 § 40. chief bodyguards. See the note to § 12 and the Introduction, section 5. Aristeas … held in honor. The phrase “held in honor” used of Aristeas is the only indication in the book, other than his presence before Ptolemy, that he is a member of Ptolemy’s court. first fruits. In previous references to sacrifice, Ps.-Aristeas has employed the general words χαριστήριον and θυσία, with only the latter appearing in the Septuagint. Here our author decides on ἀπαρχή, a word that refers to the sacrifice of firstlings in Greek tradition but that serves in the Septuagint as the primary word for the first-fruits sacrifice in Jewish sacrificial ritual (see, for example, Exod 22:28; 23:19; 25:2; Lev 2:12; 23:10). Because of YHWH’s sovereign possession of all things, what appears first from humans, animals and agriculture belongs to God. So, for example, in the Jewish scriptures first fruits are explicitly required of grain, fruits, oil,

403

404

Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 15; Pelletier, Lettre, 127 (“ce que vous appelez le texte hébreu en langue grecque”). On the development of the legend, see Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend.

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dough, honey, precious metals, etc.405 The paragraph in Aristeas refers specifically to the Jewish Temple, and thus both “first fruits” and “sacrifices” (θυσίας) are intended to be Jewish offerings. friendship. The word has a political meaning, connoting a genial and mutual relationship between peoples. It is often connected with formal alliances, as, for example, in 1 Macc 10:20, 23; 12:1, 3 and 8. Hellenistic kings often had a circle of “Friends,” a formal title, who were honored advisers.406 In 1 Macc 10:20, the Seleucid king, Alexander Balas, makes the Hasmonean Jonathan one of the king’s Friends. In Eleazar’s reply (see below), he addresses Ptolemy II as “genuine friend,” which emphasizes the comparable status that Ps.-Aristeas wants us to believe existed between the two men.

Eleazar’s Reply to Ptolemy (§§ 41–51a) 41. To this letter Eleazar replied approvingly in this way: “Eleazar, the high priest, to King Ptolemy, a genuine friend, greetings. May you be in good health as well as the queen, Arsinoë, your sister, and your children. It would be well and as we desire; we ourselves are also in good health. 42. After receiving the letter from you, we rejoiced greatly because of your plan and noble design, and gathering together the entire people, we read it publicly to them in order that they might know what piety you have toward our god. And we displayed the flagons that you sent, twenty of gold and thirty of silver, five bowls, and a table for offering, and for the bringing of sacrifices and the repairs that might be necessary for the Temple, a hundred talents of silver, 43. which Andreas and Aristeas, who belong to those honored by you, noble and good men who also excel in education, worthy in every respect of your conduct and righteousness, brought. These have also communicated to us the messages from you, about which they have heard from us things that fit well with what you wrote. 44. For everything that is advantageous to you, even if it is against nature, we will submit to. For this is a sign of friendship and love. For you have also provided great and unforgettable benefactions in many ways for our citizens. 45. Therefore, we have offered sacrifices immediately on behalf of you, your sister, your

405

406

See, Richard O. Rigsby, “First Fruits,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary (Ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992) 2.796–97. See Rolf Strootman, “Literature and Kings,” in A Companion to Hellenistic Literature (Ed. James J. Clauss and Martine Cuypers; Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) 30–45. For a good, short summary on the king’s “Friends,” see 31–32.

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III. Translation and Commentary

children and your Friends, and the entire multitude lifted exaltations that things should always happen for you just as you desire and that God, who is ruler of all things, should preserve the kingdom for you in peace with glory and that the transcription of the holy Law would come about in a manner beneficial to you and with security. 46. When everyone was present, we selected elders, noble and good, six from each tribe, whom we have also sent, who have the Law. Therefore, you will do a good deed, O Just King, if you order that when the transcription of the books is completed the men might be safely restored to us again. Farewell.” 47. Now those of the first tribe are: Joseph, Ezekias, Zacharias, John, Ezekias, Elissaios. The second: Judah, Simon, Somoel, Adaiah, Mattathias, Eschlemias. The third: Neemias, Joseph, Theodosios, Baseas, Ornias, Dakis. 48. The fourth: Jonathan, Abraios, Elissaios, Ananias, Chabrias [#6 is missing; Chelkias?]. The fifth: Isaac, Jacob, Jesus, Sabbataios, Simon, Levi. The sixth: Judah, Joseph, Simon, Zacharias, Somoel, Selemias. 49. The seventh: Sabbataios, Zedekiah, Jacob, Isaac, Jesias, Natthaios. The eighth: Theodosios, Jason, Jesus, Theodotos, John, Jonathan. The ninth: Theophilos, Abram, Arsamos, Jason, Endemias, Daniel. 50. The tenth: Jeremiah, Eleazar, Zacharias, Baneas, Elissaios, Dathaios. The eleventh: Samuel, Joseph, Judah, Jonathan, Chaleb, Dositheos. The twelfth: Isaelos, John, Theodosios, Arsamos, Abietes, Ezekiel. Seventy two in all. 51a. So these matters got into this reply to the king’s letter due to those who advised Eleazar. Textual Notes § 41. Eusebius’s text for this letter varies quite a bit from the manuscript tradition. For the phrase ταύτην τὴν ἐπιστολήν, Eusebius simply has ταῦτα, “these things.” // For Eleazar’s wish for Ptolemy’s health, the text accepted here, αὐτός τε ἔρρωσο presents a small difficulty, since the optative of the second clause καλῶς ἂν ἔχοι would seem to call for some kind of conditional in the first clause. Eusebius substitutes εἰ αὐτός τε ἐρρώσαι, “if you yourself are well,” which may be a harmonization to the greetings of letters found in 2 Macc 9:20 and 11:28 and which resolves the problem of the lack of a conditional. § 42. Eusebius’s reading of προσδέηται, “what is necessary/required additionally,” probably represents an exegetical understanding of the original δέηται. § 43. Thackeray, Pelletier and Hadas (following Thackeray) accept Eusebius’s reading of ἐκόμισεν, an aorist singular, which has perhaps suffered from attraction to the previous neuter plural ἅπερ.407 Both Josephus and the Greek manuscripts attempt

407

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 116.

Eleazar’s Reply to Ptolemy (§§ 41–51a)

167

to solve the singular/plural dilemma in different ways. Josephus’s solution confirms the correctness of Eusebius’s reading. He has ἐκόμισαν, an aorist plural. Many of the Greek manuscripts have a third, plural imperfect ἐκόμιζον.408 § 44. Eusebius’s text lacks καὶ σύ, but some form is present in the Greek manuscripts, which differ on whether the independent pronoun is in the nominative (mss O T) or dative (mss G I Z) case. Josephus has a different reading altogether, which requires a possessive pronoun in the accusative. The nominative makes the best sense. // All the major editions of Aristeas print Eusebius’s reading of τρόπους in the prepositional phrase “in many ways.” The Greek manuscript tradition lacks the word. Pelletier prints it in pointed brackets indicating its somewhat tenuous status. § 46. The Greek manuscript tradition, except for ms T, agrees on the reading ἐπελεξάμεθα, in the middle voice, as opposed to Josephus and Eusebius, who have the active voice. The verb ἐπιλέγω mostly has the meaning of select or choose when used in the middle voice. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) reads active voice. I have followed Pelletier who accepts the middle. // Thackeray (followed by Hadas) and Pelletier adopt the reading of all the Greek manuscripts, ἀπεστείλαμεν, we sent, in the aorist. Eusebius and Josephus both have a perfect tense, although they have different verbs; Eusebius has ἀπεστάλκαμεν and Josephus has πεπόμφαμεν. General Comment In Eleazar’s response to Ptolemy, Ps.-Aristeas continues the epistolary protocols that make the two men of equal status. Eleazar’s name is accompanied by his title, “high priest,” and he addresses Ptolemy as “King Ptolemy.” Schmidt remarks that the location of the men’s respective titles, Eleazar’s after his name and Ptolemy’s before his, is usual for a diplomatic letter.409 In addition Eleazar’s use of the first-person plural further emphasizes the equality.410 Ptolemy’s recognition of Eleazar’s position as essentially a head of state is now taken up and then reciprocated. This equality is further emphasized when Eleazar addresses the king as a “genuine friend” (see the note to § 40 on the king’s Friends), a phrase that does not occur elsewhere in the extant papyri and inscriptions.411 Within the body of the letter, however, Eleazar expresses a more deferential attitude than one might expect

408

409 410 411

For an extended discussion, see Tramontano, La Lettera, 69. See also, Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 105–6. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 101. Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 226. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 101.

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from the opening, as Doering notes. He thanks the king for the letter and the gifts; he reports on the delivery of the letter and his response; he also offers his service to Ptolemy “even if it is against nature” and reports that sacrifices were conducted on behalf of Ptolemy and his family.412 The simple greeting, χαίρειν, is found often in the papyri. In this letter, the usual second part of the greeting, ἔρρωσο, comes in the following sentence where Eleazar expresses his wish that the king and his family are well (see text-critical note above). This formula valetudinis is found very early in Hellenistic-period private letters.413 The inclusion of both the queen and the children in a wish for good health is unknown in letters of the Ptolemaic period, however, but they can be found in the addresses of some letters to royalty.414 In general, however, Schmidt concludes that this practice conforms more with Jewish practice, as can be seen in some dedicatory inscriptional evidence (see CIJ 1440) and letters (see the letter from Onias to Ptolemy VI in Jos. Ant. 13.67).415 The closing formula, ἔρρωσο, is one standard closing in Ptolemaic papyri, as I noted above. Upon receiving Ptolemy’s letter and gifts, Eleazar says that he has read the letter to the assembled Jewish community. This instance is one of two, the other in §§ 308–311, where the Jews act en masse to approve of some action. The import seems to be that the Jews as a people approve of the enterprise of translation and that they accept the results of the translators’ labor. Whereas Ptolemy’s letter contained no quantities of the gifts that he sent, Eleazar acknowledges their receipt, and he further enumerates the totals of each gift, another expression that points to some deference on Eleazar’s part.416 The overall purpose of this letter is to demonstrate Eleazar’s (and the people’s) willing desire to cooperate in Ptolemy’s translation enterprise. Of course, Aristeas is in the thick of things. Although in this passage we do not hear Aristeas speaking in the first person as elsewhere, the letter

412 413 414 415

416

Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 226. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 102. See Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 102–3. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 104; Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 226. Schmidt, Untersuchungen, 103, cites C.Ord.Ptol. 52 (part of an exchange of letters between the priests at Abaton and Philae and Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II) as referring to the royal children: “To king Ptolemy [Euergetes II], his sister Cleopatra [II], and his wife Cleopatra [III], to the gods Euergetes, greetings from the priests of the great goddess Isis, who are in Abaton and Philae.” Presumably, the “gods Euergetes” are the children. For the text, see Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances, 126–28. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 117, comments, “This is in the nature of a receipt.”

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makes clear that Aristeas (and Andreas) both delivered the message from Ptolemy and “heard” Eleazar’s reply. In this way, Aristeas and Andreas, as the letter carriers who can communicate additional messages beyond the letters, move the negotiations forward, and thus, Aristeas’s presence as an eyewitness to the events is further reinforced. Eleazar even claims that he will act “against nature,” if doing so works to Ptolemy’s advantage (§ 44). The meaning of the Greek παρὰ φύσιν later becomes very charged, since it features prominently in Paul’s critique of Gentile sexual practices in Rom 1:26–33. Here, however, Eleazar exaggerates as an indication of his willingness to do whatever will benefit the king. The subsequent sentences confirm this interpretation, since Eleazar emphasizes his friendship for Ptolemy, primarily as a response for his great benefactions toward the Jews. Andrews, however, translates the sentence, “I will consent to everything which is advantageous to you even though your request is very unusual.” In this way he pushes the interpretation of the sentence in a direction that reflects some uncertainty on Eleazar’s part about the propriety of translating the Pentateuch.417 Andrews makes too much out of the phrase by rendering it this way, since the entire letter is composed to show Eleazar’s eagerness to assist the enterprise, and there is no indication elsewhere in Aristeas of any uncertainty about making a translation from Hebrew to Greek. The parallels between Ptolemy’s letter and Eleazar’s reply continue in § 45 in which, after the comment that he had offered sacrifices on behalf of Ptolemy and the royal family, the high priest reports that all the Jews express the hope that God would direct Ptolemy’s rule and preserve his kingdom. Eleazar connects this desire with a hope that the translation of the Jewish law would benefit the king. The term used in § 45 and § 46, μεταγραφή, in most cases in Aristeas connotes transcription or copying. In these two instances, Eleazar uses the noun with respect to the task that the men whom he is sending will accomplish, and in that sense, then, the term might mean translation as well, a meaning that is part of its semantic range in Greek.418

417

418

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 99–100. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 117, admits the possibility of this interpretation, although he does not slant his translation in this direction. See also Meecham, Oldest Version, 201, where he takes the same position. He offers as supporting evidence rabbinic ambivalence about the translation of the law into Greek. On the rabbinic traditions, see Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend, chap. 3. LSJ note the meaning for the verb, and cite Thucydides as one example. They do not give this meaning for the noun. For the issues surrounding translation language in Aristeas, see Wright, “Transcribing, Translating, and Interpreting.”

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Eleazar then refers to the selection process, reprising the idea that these men represent the twelve tribes (see above p. 150). He further requests that the translators be returned to him once the project is complete, reflecting his anxiety that once in Alexandria Ptolemy will keep them there – a picture consistent with the reputation of the early Ptolemies, as we have seen. In the Greek manuscripts of Aristeas, the letter then ends, and Aristeas, who is narrating, appends the names of the translators. This circumstance differs slightly from Josephus, who does not include the translators’ names, but says that they were also written in the letter (Ant. 12.57). Josephus’s language, however, is not very specific, since the verb ὑπογράφειν, which he uses here, can mean, “to add to,” among other things, and it could easily refer to the same arrangement as we have in the Greek manuscripts. Epiphanius of Salamis gives a full list in his work On Weights and Measures 9, which bears close resemblance to that of the Aristeas manuscript tradition.419 One significant difficulty with the list is its number. Although in several places the number is given as “six from each tribe,” which would total seventy-two, inexplicably Aristeas has only seventy-one names, listing only five from the fourth tribe. Epiphanius’s list contains the full seventy-two, providing the name Χελκίας where the Greek manuscripts of Aristeas lack the sixth name. Josephus, even though he does not list the names adds more confusion to the situation. In his citation of the letter, he includes the statement that Eleazar had selected “six elders from each tribe” (Ant. 12.56), but in 12.57, where he decides not to cite the individual names, he writes, “I have not thought it obligatory to give the names of the seventy elders.” Why Josephus reports two different numbers is not certain. One suggestion is that the latter number is a slip. By Josephus’s time, the title “The Seventy” had already gained currency, and the number seventy originates from the designation of the translation.420 A more likely possibility

419

420

This treatise survives in full only in Syriac, although some Greek manuscripts preserve pieces of it. For a translation of the Syriac, see James Elder Dean, Epiphanius’ Treatise On Weights and Measures (The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 11; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1935). See, for example, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 118. Wendland takes the sixth name from the fourth tribe from Epiphanius to fill out the list in his text. Note also Josephus’s remark in Ant. 1.129 that he gives Hebrew names Greek forms: “With a view to euphony and my readers’ pleasure, these names have been Hellenized, the form in which they appear is not that used in our country.” This comment should caution us about placing too much significance in the forms of the names, since

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in my view is that Ps.-Aristeas is alluding to the seventy elders who ascend the mountain with Moses (Exod 24:1–2, 9–11). With Eleazar taking the place of Moses (see below on the high priest’s interpretation of the food laws), the resonance of the seventy elders who go up onto Sinai with Moses would be hard to miss, and Josephus’s reference to seventy elders might well reflect that connection.421 As a possible source of Jewish prosopographical information, this list of names has drawn some scholarly attention. Naomi Cohen, in two articles, has argued that the list is early and authentic (apparently meaning that there really were seventy-two translators who made the translation). Although she recognizes that Aristeas was composed after the events it purports to narrate, she works under the assumption that “the author based his narrative upon authentic sources which he then freely embroidered to suit his (probably at least partially) didactic objective, and contemporary literary taste.”422 Unfortunately, however, in both articles Cohen completely presumes the historical veracity of the narrative in Aristeas, and thus she treats the translators as real Judeans who went to Alexandria and actually translated the Hebrew into Greek. So, as evidence of the early date of the list, she notes that the name Σαββαταῖος, which reflects the Hebrew name Shabtai, “is not attested to in Judea in Hasmonean or in early Roman times.”423 Since Aristeas has it that the translators came from Judea, in her estimation, it is to Judea that one should look for prosopographical evidence. Yet, we do find the name in Egyptian papyri, which is exactly where we should be looking for names listed by an Alexandrian Greek writer. In fact, a Σαββαταῖος, a Jewish potter, is the signatory on a contract from the second or first century BCE (BGU 6.1282/C.Pap.Jud. 46).424 Cohen

421 422

423 424

a writer educated in Greek offers them to us, and there is no reason to think that Ps.-Aristeas would not have done similarly. See Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 56–58. Naomi Cohen, “Jewish Names as Cultural Indicators in Antiquity,” JSJ 7 (1976) 109. Cohen, “Jewish Names,” 111. Victor A. Tcherikover and Alexander Fuks, Corpus Papyrorum Judaicarum (Vol. 1; Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1957) 191. See also BGU 10.2009 where the name occurs in a fragmentary papyrus. For Jewish names or other prosopographical information in this period, see Tal Ilan, Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity: Part I Palestine 330BCE – 200CE (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002) and F. Preisigke, Namenbuch: Enthaltend alle griechischen, lateinischen, ägyptischen, hebräischen, arabischen und sonstigen semitischen und nicht semitischen Menschennamen soweit sie in griechischen Urkunden (Papyri, Ostraka, Inschriften, Mumienschildern usw.) Ägyptens sich vorfinden (Heidelberg, 1922) along with supplements

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further argues, again assuming that the list represents real people, that the translators not only had to know Greek and Hebrew, they must have been recognized religious authorities. As such they would have likely come from Judea rather than Alexandria.425 The circularity in the argument is patent. When she turns to specific names, historicizing becomes the default for her discussions. For example, she notes about the name Χαβρίας, which most scholars have not recognized as a Greek name, that sources tell of an Athenian soldier of the mid-fourth century who was active in Egypt’s attempt to rid itself of Persian rule. She then moves back to Judea and says, “At this time, but not later, someone in Judea, whose sympathies were strongly anti-Persian – in contrast to his Persian oriented compatriots – might well have chosen to bestow the name of this ‘deliverer’ upon his son.”426 Because this Chabrias’s popularity was short-lived, she imagines that this name would not have been given to a Jewish child after the failure of this rebellion. Thus, the Judean translator, who must have been named after this Athenian hero, could only have lived close to the events – that is, in the latter part of the fourth century or so. This conclusion becomes one piece of evidence for her contention that the list of the translators is authentic and likely originated around the time that Ps.-Aristeas claims the translation was made. One final example will help to demonstrate the point here. One of Cohen’s main objectives is to argue that in some cases Jews adopted Gentile names that sounded similar to semitic names, and this mutual homophony helps to explain their popularity. One prime example is the name Abram, which appears in the Aristeas list as Ἀβραῖος or Ἄβραμος. She points out that the name had no real popularity in either Palestine or Babylonia: “With the exception of the Letter of Aristeas … there is not a single instance of the use of Abraham as a contemporary proper name in the extant body of Jewish-Hellenistic literature.”427 The name also does not appear in Palestinian or Babylonian epigraphy or in any of the names from the Elephantine papyri, which reflect primarily a Judean or Babylonian onomasticon.

425 426

427

by Daniele Foraboschi, Onomasticon alterum papyrologicum (3 vols.; Milan: Milano-Varese Istituto editoriale cisalpino, 1967–1971) and by Emil Kiessling’s continuation of a fourth volume. Currently the most convenient place to find papyri in electronically accessible form and to search them is papyri.info, a website dedicated to searching the aggregate collections of papyri online. Cohen, “Jewish Names,” 109. Naomi Cohen, “The Names of the Translators in the Letter of Aristeas: A Study in the Dynamic of Cultural Transition,” JSJ 15 (1984) 39. Cohen, “Jewish Names,” 99.

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But once one gets outside of these two areas, the name begins to appear. Cohen even cites first an Egyptian papyrus that mentions an Ἀβραμος who paid a grazing tax in Thebes – in 165 BCE – and there are altogether seven occurrences of the name (or a close variant) in Victor Tcherikover and Alexander Fuks’s Corpus Papyrorum Judaicarum.428 Yet, her conviction that the list in Aristeas reflects Judeans who went to Alexandria in the third century BCE seems to blind her to the evidence that she cites herself of the name in Egypt at the approximate time of (and subsequent to) Aristeas’s composition. Whatever the origin of the name in the Egyptian papyri, its presence there, in some papyri of the second century, makes its appearance in the list of names given by an Alexandrian Jew of the second century BCE unremarkable. Tal Ilan includes the names of the translators in her Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity Part I: Palestine 330BCE–200CE, but she is much more circumspect about the problems connected with the narrative in Aristeas. She admits that the story is most likely a fiction, and thus, the names given in Aristeas are probably not those of real Judeans who went to Egypt to work. She specifically notes that a good portion of the names date from the Hasmonean period or later, and she further points to F. Preisigke’s work to show that of the forty-three or so different names in the list in Aristeas, only eight of them are not extant in some form in Egyptian sources. Many others on the list are found in Egyptian sources and nowhere else. She disagrees with Cohen’s conclusions and summarizes, quite justifiably, “I think it is much more likely that these were names common for Jews in Egypt in antiquity as their provenance in that country indicates.”429 Honigman remarks about the names list that it “may be associated with the ‘antiquarian’ taste of the Greeks.”430 She remains uncertain about whether Ps.-Aristeas composed the list or got it from some earlier source. With respect to the studies of both Cohen and B. S. J. Isserlin,431 she correctly observes the connection in their articles between trying to establish a Palestinian provenance and rehabilitating the historical veracity of the

428

429 430

431

Their nos. 50 (the papyrus that Cohen cites); 284 (77 CE); 365 (111 CE); 374 (1st c. CE); 412 (8/9 CE); 428 (101 CE); Inscr. 1530A (1st c. CE) [plus two from much later periods: 471 (3rd c. CE) and 512 (6th–7th c. CE)]. Ilan, Lexicon, 48. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 72. She links it especially with spurious lists like that of the friends of Lycurgus who assisted him when he took power in Sparta, originally supplied by Hermippus and later reported in Plutarch. B. S. J. Isserlin, “The Names of the 72 Translators of the Septuagint (Aristeas 47–50),” JANES 3 (1973) 191–97.

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narrative. Two arguments appear to her decisive for rejecting a Palestinian origin for the list: (1) Alexandrian Jews made the translation and not persons imported from Judea and (2) the theme of importation belongs to her Alexandrian narrative paradigm, which points to its invention.432 Although I have some differences with Honigman on the details, given the fictional nature of the narrative in Aristeas, I conclude that little chance obtains that the list reflects any “authentic” collection of translators’ names. The list contains names that Ilan rightly observes are common in Egypt in this period, and the fact that the papyri do not attest some names in Aristeas’s list simply testifies to the exigencies of preservation and not to their absence from the Egyptian onomasticon. To what extent Ps.-Aristeas might have had some source that contained the presumed names of translators unfortunately cannot be known from the text as we have it. Notes § 41. Arsinoë your sister and your children. The reference is most likely to Arsinoë II, the second wife and sister of Philadelphus. She, like Philadelphus, was the child of Ptolemy I and Berenice. As a teenager, she was married to Lysimachus of Thrace with whom she had three sons. Following Lysimachus’s death, she married her half-brother Ptolemy Ceraunus (son of Ptolemy I and Euridice). She apparently helped to conspire against him, and as a result, he killed her two younger sons, while the eldest escaped. She fled back to Egypt, where she married Philadelphus after he exiled his first wife, Arsinoë I. Although consanguineous marriage was not a Macedonian practice, it was widely accepted in Egypt and became relatively common among the Ptolemies. As queen of Egypt (our letter uses the term Βασίλισσα), she wielded great power, and after her death (c. 270 BCE), she was deified and became part of the cult of the “Brother and Sister Gods.” Certainly by the time of the composition of Aristeas this cult would have been well known in Alexandria, and thus, this Arsinoë is likely Ptolemy’s second wife by that name. According to a scholium on Theocritus Idyll 17.128, she died without bearing any children to Ptolemy.433 The scholium

432

433

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 73. She further notes that one might want to look at the list for philological purposes but insists, rightly in my view, that it is useless as history. Theocritus was a third century BCE bucolic poet whom Ptolemy II patronized and who wrote poetry praising both Ptolemy and Arsinoë. For translation and commentary on Theocritus, see A. S. F. Gow, Theocritus (2nd ed.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1952) and Richard Hunter, Theocritus Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003).

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also indicates that Ptolemy made his children by Arsinoë I legally those of Arsinoë II. It reads: “And he married his kin sister Arsinoë, and he gave to her in adoption the children born to the first Arsinoë. For his sister and wife died without bearing him children.”434 Such a tradition would explain the greeting of both Arsinoë and children in our letter, presuming the queen here is the more famous Arsinoë II.435 § 42. piety … towards our God. For the first time in the work, Ps.-Aristeas connects Ptolemy’s piety as being directed toward the Jewish god. This connection subtly transforms § 16, where Ptolemy is told that the gods that he worships are the same as the Jewish god, but with different names.436 As we will see elsewhere in his work, Ps.-Aristeas never suggests that the god of the book is any god other than the Jewish deity. repairs. Shutt translates the Greek ἐπισκευή as “furnishing,” privileging completely the context. Pelletier has “developments,” which approaches Shutt’s translation but is not as explicit. The term means “repair” or “restoration,” however, and I have followed Hadas for the rendering here.437 § 43. Andreas. He is introduced in § 12 as one of Ptolemy’s head bodyguards. See the note there. good men. The adjective is καλοκἀγαθία, the same one applied to Eleazar in § 3. See the note there. education. This same attribute describes the translators in § 121. The intimation here is that Andreas and Aristeas are fine Greek gentlemen who possess moral character formed through paideia. communicated to us. Frequently ancient letter carriers were given the responsibility of augmenting or further emphasizing the contents of the letter, especially in situations where the letter carriers were ambassadorial, as they certainly are in Aristeas. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas portrays Andreas and

434

435

436 437

καὶ τὴν οἰκείαν ἀδελφὴν Ἀρσινόην ἔγημε καὶ εἰσεποιήσατο αὐτῇ τοὺς ἐκ τῆς προτέρας Ἀρισνόην γεννηθέντας παῖδας. ἡ γὰρ ἀδελφὴ καὶ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ ἄτεκνος ἀπέθανεν. For the scholia to Theocritus, see C. Wendel, Scholia in Theocritum Vetera (Leipzig: Teubner, 1914). For a summary of Arsinoë II’s career, see Grace H. Macurdy, Hellenistic Queens: A Study of Women-Power in Macedonia, Seleucid Syria, and Ptolemaic Egypt (The Johns Hopkins University Studies in Archaeology 14; Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1932). Doering, Ancient Jewish Letters, 226–27. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 15; Pelletier, Lettre, 129 (“aménagements”); Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 117.

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Aristeas as communicating messages to Eleazar who then responds to these oral messages.438 § 44. citizens. Here Ps.-Aristeas constructs the Jews as free persons living in their own polis with Eleazar as their head as we saw in § 36.439 The term here and in § 36 contrasts with the position of the majority of Jews living in Ptolemaic Egypt, who, according to Ps.-Aristeas, had been enslaved until Ptolemy manumitted them. See the General Comment on §§ 28–34 on the connection between the twelve tribes and Ps.-Aristeas’s construction of Moses as organizing an ideal polity for the Jews. § 45. sacrifices. This is the general term for sacrifice that Ps.-Aristeas has used elsewhere for offerings presented in the Jewish Temple. See the note at § 33. Friends. A special title for a king’s closest advisors. See the note at § 40. ruler of all things. On the Jewish god as having lordship over everything, see the comment on § 16. § 46. six from each tribe. See the General Comment on §§ 28–34. § 47–50. Joseph … Ezekiel. Ps.-Aristeas gives the names of the translators. One reason that he might have done so would be to make a statement about the nature of their product. James Aitken has compared the Septuagint with Egyptian translations from Greek into Demotic and has observed that many of the Demotic translations are explicitly called “renderings” or “copies” of the original. In such cases, the scribe’s name is never given, even though in other kinds of compositional documents the scribe would be identified. Ps.-Aristeas “in seeking to identify them [i.e., the translators] by name, elevates the status of the translation from a mere ‘copy’ to a self-standing literary work.”440 As we have seen (and will see), establishing that the Septuagint is a self-standing work of literature that can stand alongside of and replace the Hebrew version is one of Ps.-Aristeas’s prime goals in the work. seventy-two in all. In addition to the number deriving from having six translators from each of the six tribes (see the General Comment under §§ 28–34), Honigman observes that the number 72 also comports with

438

439 440

See Peter M. Head, “Letter Carriers in the Ancient Jewish Epistolary Material,” in Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon (Ed. Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel Zacharias; Library of Second Temple Studies 70; London: T&T Clark, 2009) 210–18. See also Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 19. James K. Aitken, “The Septuagint and Egyptian Translation Methods,” presented at the Annual Meeting of the IOSCS, Munich, Germany, Aug. 2, 2013. My thanks to the author for making a copy of the paper available to me.

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the idea that the civic body of a Greek city would be comprised of tribes and that Plato’s ideal city had twelve civic tribes. She connects the selection process of the translators that happens with all the people present with this Greek civic model where the chosen ambassadors serve as the representatives of the entire people. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas alluded to both ideals, the notion of the biblical tribes and Greek civic tribes, a concept that would likely have been well known to his readers, and perhaps even more recognizable in a Hellenistic city such as Alexandria.441 § 51. So these matters … Eleazar. This entire sentence is somewhat difficult. Hadas’s translation is typical of most: “Such, then, was the reply to the king’s letter given by Eleazar and his colleagues.” This translation really does not reflect the Greek grammar, however, since it ignores the neuter plural article, which means “these things,” and the fact that the phrase ὑπὸ τῶν περὶ τὸν Ἐλεάζαρον means “by those who surrounded Eleazar” or more colloquially, his advisors. Meecham argues that the phrase includes the leader in the party, but he gives no evidence for this contention.442 Thus, the Greek suggests that the material in the letter, perhaps more narrowly the names of the translators, was suggested to Eleazar by his closest advisors. Pelletier glosses the sentence as “This is the response that the king’s letter received from the chancellery of Eleazar,” which also hedges the Greek but which recognizes that Ps.-Aristeas in this paragraph portrays Eleazar as a head of state who would have his own court, Friends and chancellery to produce official documents.443 That is, as the ruler of the Jews, the bureaucratic apparatus surrounding Eleazar is thought of in the Ptolemaic model.

The Construction of the King’s Gifts (§§ 51b–82) Ptolemy Requisitions Gifts for the Jerusalem Temple (§§ 51b–56) 51b. As I promised, I will provide an explanation of the furnishings. For the objects were wrought with surpassing artistic skill, since the king made a large contribution and he oversaw the craftsmen for each object. Therefore, they could not overlook anything or complete them with indifference. Now I will describe first those things having to do with the table.

441 442 443

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 57. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 148. Pelletier, Lettre, 131 (“Telle est la réponse que la lettre du roi reçut de la chancellerie d’Éléazar”).

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52. Thus, the king was eager to build the piece of furniture to be colossal in its dimensions. But he ordered inquiries to be made of those in the locality about how large the previous one was that stood in the temple in Jerusalem. 53. But when they reported the measurements, he asked additionally, if he should build it larger. Thus, some of the priests and others said that there was nothing to prevent this. But he said that he wished even to make it fivefold in size, but he hesitated lest it be useless for the ministrations. 54. For he was not content simply to place the things that he gave in that place, but rather he would have greater gratification if those appointed duly performed the appropriate ministrations on the furniture that he provided. 55. For it was not due to a lack of gold that he had made the objects previously completed proportionally smaller, but the reason for it was clear – he said that they had been established in their dimensions in this manner. For had there already been warrant, they would lack nothing. Therefore he did not overstep or set aside those things that were proper. 56. Thus, as to the various types of the arts, he ordered that they be used to the highest degree, since he intended everything to be majestic and he had a good ability for perceiving how objects looked. Wherever things were not written down, he ordered them to be made according to beauty; wherever things were written down, he ordered that their measurements be followed. Textual Notes Josephus preserves a version of this section in which most of the textual variants are minor. § 51b. As might be expected, the manuscripts differ on the form of the noun κατασκευασμάτων. Ms B takes it as a participle and has the compound with ἐπί. C has the noun σκεύασμα, which means “furniture” in the plural. Ms B’s reading might well be a harmonization to the noun ἐπισκευή in § 42. § 53. Instead of the compound verb ἐπικωλύειν, to prevent, Josephus and ms T have the simplex κωλύειν. The two verbs are practically synonymous. The simplex appears in § 278 and § 321. § 54. Schmidt, taking a cue from Josephus whose paraphrase of this section has τἀναθήματα, proposed the article τά before παρ’ αὐτοῦ. Pelletier places it in brackets to indicate its uncertainty, but the grammar of the sentence seems to require the article or something like it. § 55. All the manuscripts, except B, which has a dramatically divergent text here, have the phrase ἐπὶ τὰ τῇς, which is clearly corrupt. Mendelssohn proposed ἐπιταγῆς, which fits the sense and resolves the graphic corruption. Most scholars have accepted the emendation, and it serves as the basis of my translation.

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General Comment This section and the ones that follow in which the gifts that Ptolemy sent for the Temple in Jerusalem are described have the form of an ekphrasis, a graphic description of a thing or person, one of the fourteen rhetorical techniques belonging to the progymnasmata or elementary rhetorical curriculum. The grammarian Theon gives this definition: “A speech that brings the subject matter vividly before the eyes” (Progymnasmata 118.1.7).444 While the most famous ekphrasis in ancient literature was the description of Achilles’s shield in Iliad 18, one could compose an ekphrasis on any number of subjects besides works of art, including persons, events, animals or places.445 Ps.-Aristeas’s ekphrasis concentrates on the gifts that Ptolemy commissioned as works of art. Indeed, the repeated mentions of the artisans’ skills and the artistry of the completed table and bowls reinforce the artistic quality of these works. Honigman lists this section as one of four “digressions” in the book (along with the journey to Jerusalem, Eleazar’s apologia for the law, and the series of symposia).446 Throughout the section, Ps.-Aristeas emphasizes the king’s concern that these gifts be artistically made, while at the same time not overstepping what was required of them in order that they be used in the cultic ministrations. In the course of the ekphrasis, particularly in the section on the table, the balance between the gigantic proportions that Ptolemy desired for the table and its potential use in the cult is delicately struck. Josephus comments that although his account did not require the description of the gifts, he would give it anyway in order to show that Ptolemy wanted to honor the Jewish god and to highlight the king’s “love of art and magnanimity” (Ant. 12.57–59). Ptolemy II had a well-established reputation in antiquity for delighting in art and opulence. Athenaeus (second to third century CE), for example, in his Deipnosophists 196–203, cites Callixinus of Rhodes’s History of Alexandria, in which Callixinus describes a grand procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus. Among the many fantastic elements of this procession, Callix-

444

445 446

For a complete discussion of the ekphrasis, its various meanings and uses, see Ruth Webb, Ekphrasis, Imagination and Persuasion in Ancient Rhetorical Theory and Practice (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2009). On ancient Greek rhetoric, see George A. Kennedy, A New History of Classical Rhetoric (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994). Webb, Ekphrasis, 61. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 15–21. The genres of some of these digressions belong to those usually included in the progymnasmata. See below and the Introduction.

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inus describes in lavish detail a banqueting tent that held one hundred and thirty couches, that had the hides of many animals suspended in the middle of it, and that had flowers strewn all over the floor, giving the illusion of a meadow. The account overflows with descriptions of gold and silver objects, both in the tent and in the procession.447 Certainly the portrait of Ptolemy offered in Aristeas coheres with that given in Athenaeus.448 Ps.-Aristeas begins with the table, presumably the table of the showbread, whose origins are found in the account of the construction of the Tabernacle in Exod 25:23–30 [MT; 25:22–29 LXX] and 37:10–16 [MT; 38:9–11 LXX]. The mention in § 52 of “the previous one” is somewhat vague. I take it in this case to refer to the table that Ptolemy’s gift was meant to replace. In the course of Jewish tradition we hear of four tables in the central Jewish cult space: (1) the one attributed to Moses in Exodus; (2) one that Solomon made for the newly constructed Temple (1 Kgs 7:48); (3) one that was presumably fabricated for the reconstructed Second Temple at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, since it is not listed among the items that Cyrus gave to the exiles in Ezra 1:7–9,449 and (4) one constructed anew and brought into the Temple after Judah Maccabee’s recapture of the Temple, since in 1 Macc 1:22 we read that Antiochus IV took the table as part of his plundering of the Temple but in 4:41–51 the priests who cleansed the temple bring a table into it. In the narrative world of Aristeas, Ptolemy’s table would be intended to replace the one constructed for the rebuilt Temple after the Exile.

447

448

449

For Athenaeus’s complete description of the procession, see C. B. Gulick, Athenaeus of Naucritus (LCL 208; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1928) and E. E. Rice, The Grand Procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983). Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2726–27, also refers to the poet Posidippus (3.22–23), who mentions an enormous couch. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2727, argues that the picture of Ptolemy ordering these larger-than-life gifts in Aristeas is a subtle mocking of the monarch on the part of Ps.-Aristeas. See also his Heritage and Hellenism, 219–22. There are various Jewish traditions about what happened to the different items in the Temple at the time of the Babylonian destruction. Paraleipomena Ieremiou 3 reports that before the temple was destroyed, Jeremiah and Baruch took the “holy vessels,” which the earth swallowed up. No table is mentioned, though. Nor is one listed in the items that Jeremiah hid in a cave in 2 Macc 2:4–8. Here it is the tent, the ark and the altar of incense. In 2 Baruch 6, however, Baruch sees an angel come down and take all the cultic accoutrements, including two tables, one of which is presumably the table of the showbread, and the angel hides them in the earth so that no foreigners can capture them.

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Often someone composing an ekphrasis will emphasize and praise the size and lavish construction of the objects or sights, a good example being Athenaeus’s description of Ptolemy’s procession. In Aristeas, we learn, both here and in § 81, that Ptolemy oversaw the entire enterprise himself so that everything would be done with the appropriate craftsmanship. In fact, because there seemed to be no specific regulations about the table’s measurements, he desired to build the table as large as five times its original size. He ends up making it smaller than he originally wanted so that it could be used within the Temple cult. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas continues a theme that we have seen already and will again later, that Ptolemy does not transgress proper respect for the Jewish god and the Jewish people. Of course, he compensates for the table’s lack of size with a command that arts of every sort should make the table as beautiful as possible and that this same artistic approach should be applied to everything that would be donated. In the end, where no regulations existed, things were made “according to beauty,” that is with all the artistic flair that could be mustered. Where regulations existed, they should be followed. Notes § 51b. As I promised. See § 33. The correspondence between Ptolemy and Eleazar has intervened. § 52. colossal. The Greek term ὑπέροπλος often has a negative connotation, meaning “monstrous” or the like. This is certainly not the case here. in the locality. The same noun, τόπος, appears here as in § 54 but with a different referent. The phrase is vague enough to cause some confusion. The most likely interpretation has Ptolemy inquiring of “priests and others” in Jerusalem about how large the table could be, based on the “previous one.” How he made those inquiries we are not told. Of course, within the narrative world of the text, he could simply have asked Eleazar in his letter or through his ambassadors. § 54. in that place. The Greek word τόπος, “place,” is frequently used as a euphemism for the Jerusalem Temple. Cf. 2 Chr 6:32–33; 3 Macc 2:9, 10, 14. § 56. majestic. The adjective σεμνός means “holy” when applied to the gods or things divine, but when it describes human things, it connotes an august or majestic quality. The implication here is that Ptolemy spared no artistic resource in order to achieve a majestic product. ability. The Greek here is φύσιν, usually translated as nature, but the reference is to Ptolemy’s good artistic eye. not written down … written down. The phrases are general ones. The second, διὰ γραπτῶν in Greek, simply means that when the gifts were

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constructed, if there were regulations about how they should be made, they were followed. Compare the same phrase in 2 Macc 11:15: “For the king granted every request which Makkabaios delivered to Lysias in writing (διὰ γραπτῶν) concerning the Judeans.” Andrews and Meecham both claim that this phrase is a direct reference to the instructions given in Exodus 25, and Andrews (followed by Pelletier) goes much too far when he translates, “where there were no instructions laid down in the Jewish Scriptures.”450 Both scholars assume that Ps.-Aristeas would have used the Septuagint extensively (and exclusively?), but the extent to which Ps.-Aristeas is dependent on the specific wording of septuagintal texts is a problematic question (see below). That said, however, the reference to written instructions might well refer to the same texts as those later referred to as “scripture” (§ 155, § 168), although I do not regard this as a necessary conclusion.

The Table (§§ 57–72) 57. So they fashioned the table two cubits in length and a cubit and a half in height, of pure gold, making the creation solid on every side. Now I mean not of gold overlaid around something, but a metal plate was fastened on. 58. And they made a rim a palm’s breadth all around and twisted molding, having a design of ropes in low relief, which had marvelously carved relief on three sides, since it was triangular. 59. And on each side the full shape of the workmanship had the same arrangement, so that whatever side would turn, the appearance was identical, and when (the twisted molding) rested on the rim, on the one hand, the slope facing the table had a most beautiful shape, but on the other hand, the outer slope faced the view of anyone who approached it. 60. Therefore, whatever side would turn, it happened that the tip of the two slopes was acute, being situated at the highest spot, since it was constructed as a triangle, as we said earlier. There existed arrangements of precious stones in it in the middle of the ropes, each one interweaving with the other. It was inimitable in its creation. 61. All were fastened through holes by golden pins to keep them secured. And at the corners clasps bound them firmly together. 62. From the

450

Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 215; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 100. Pelletier, Lettre, 133, 135, has “Là où il n’y avait tien de prescript par l’Écriture, il ordonna de viser à faire beau. Pour tous les articles au contraire qu’on fabriquait en suivant des texts, il prescrivait l’exacte conformité des dimensions.”

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sides, which slanted upwards toward the view, on the rim all around, a row of eggs was fashioned out of precious stones, being in prominent relief with continuously ribbed low reliefs, which were in place close to one another around the entire table. 63. Underneath the egg relief made of stones, the craftspersons made a garland of all kinds of fruit, visibly projecting with grape clusters and ears of corn, and in addition dates and apples, olives and pomegranates and the like. And fashioning the stones in the exact shape of the aforementioned fruits, having the color of each kind, they fastened them to the gold horizontally around the entire construction of the table. 64. Next after the arrangement of the rim, there was work beneath in a similar fashion to the egg construction that had been fabricated and the remainder of the ribbed and low relief work, because the table was made to be used on both sides, whichever side one chose, so that the positions of the wave molding and of the garland were also downward toward the section of the feet. 65. Therefore, they made a solid metal plate over the entire breadth of the table four fingers deep, so that the legs could be inserted into it, having pins with fasteners to fasten on the border in order that the table might be used from whichever side they chose. In appearance, then, it looked the same, the construction being identical both ways. 66. On the table itself, they made a winding pattern in relief, which had prominently in the middle precious stones of many kinds, both rubies and emeralds, and also onyx and other types that excelled in extreme beauty. 67. Next after the arrangement of the winding pattern, there was set an open web, which was amazing, affording a central view that was rhombus-like. Upon it was inlaid crystal stone and what is called amber, affording the viewer an inimitable sight. 68. They made the legs with capitals having lilies, the lilies having a bend under the table, and the parts seen on the inside had genuine gold-leaf. 69. The support of the leg on the ground was of ruby, on every side a palm’s breadth, in appearance having the shape of a boot and being eight fingers wide, upon which rested the entire plate of the leg. 70. And they constructed out of stone sprouting ivy entwined with acanthus with a grapevine wrapping around the foot along with its clusters, which were of stone, all the way to the top. And the arrangement was the same for the four legs. Everything had been made effectively and fitted, having the unchangeable superiority of experience and skill to approach reality, so that even when a breeze of air blew, the positioning of the leaves allowed for movement, since the arrangement of everything was modeled on reality. 71. They made the front of the table out of three parts, as if it were a triptych, joined together to each other by dovetailing with nails according to the thickness of the construction, the fitting together of the joints being constructed to be invisible and undetectable. The thickness of the whole

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table was not less than half a cubit, so that the entire piece amounted to many talents. 72. For since the king had decided to add nothing to the size, whatever was necessary to spend on the larger construction, this he dedicated to even more decoration. And according to his decision everything was completed in an amazing and remarkable manner, both with inimitable skill and illustrious beauty. Textual Notes Josephus recounts a version of this section. § 57. All of the Greek manuscripts are missing the phrase πήχεος δὲ τὸ εὖρος after μῆκος. Josephus has the phrase, which, except for the conjunction, is verbatim from Exod 25:22(23) in the Septuagint. Scholarship has been divided on its authenticity in Aristeas. Thackeray omits it in his JQR translation, followed by Hadas who omits it from his Greek text.451 Tramontano does not have it in his text. Thackeray and Tramontano cite as their major piece of evidence Codex Ambrosianus, which lacks the phrase in Exod 25:22, and thus, they assume that Ps.-Aristeas did not have the phrase in his source. Wendland follows Josephus’s reading, which agrees with the Septuagint, assuming that it fell out of the text inadvertently. Andrews and Pelletier include the phrase in pointed brackets to indicate its uncertainty, a practice that I have followed here.452 The inclusion of the phrase, in any case, assumes that Ps.-Aristeas was using the Septuagint, and thus he would not have omitted the phrase. § 58. Wendland, based on Josephus’s paraphrase and followed by most scholars, suggests τρίγωνα, triangular, instead of the Greek manuscripts’ τριγωνία, triangle, since the table had four legs and could not have been three-sided. The translation here follows Wendland’s suggestion. § 62. The phrase in the manuscripts, ἐκτύπωσιν ἔχουσα προσοχῆς, seems corrupt as it stands. Schmidt emends προσοχῆς to προοχῆς, which makes better sense. Pelletier accepts this emendation, and I have translated it here. § 64. Wendland’s suggestion of κάτω τά instead of the manuscripts’ reading of κατά makes sense of a problematic text. It also makes the relative pronoun ἥ superfluous. // The Greek manuscripts introduce the third clause of the paragraph with καί, which does not make a logical connection. Thackeray suggested διὰ τό, which makes the link to the table more sensible and is the basis of the present translation. § 65. After περόνας, pins, the manuscripts have κατὰ κλεῖσιν, a manifest error for κατακλεῖσιν. A preposition is needed, and Thackeray made the easiest suggestion of σύν, which is the

451 452

Thackeray, “Translation,” 122. Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 100.

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basis for my translation. // Some forms of αἱρέω and αἴρω are homographs, except for the diacritical marks, which were not written in antiquity. The manuscripts read αἴρωνται from αἴρω, which means to take or to raise up, to exalt. The more likely reading is αἱρῶνται, which means to choose. I have followed Pelletier in reading the latter. § 66. The Greek manuscripts all contain the word πυλιάδων, an otherwise unknown term, which LSJ guess from the context means “an unknown precious stone.” The term is certainly a corruption, however. On the basis of Josephus’s ποικίλης, many colored, G. Lumbroso conjectured that Aristeas originally read πολυειδῶν, of many kinds, a conjecture that almost all scholars have followed.453 § 71. The manuscripts all have ἄθετον, without a place, which makes little sense in the context. Josephus’s ἁόρατον, unseen, gives rise to the reasonable conjecture ἀθέατον, invisible, which I have translated above. General Comment The description of the table goes way beyond the plan that God gives to Moses in the Septuagint of Exodus 25. There the instructions take up a scant three verses. It is not clear the extent to which Ps-Aristeas depends on the account in the Septuagint of Exodus for his description, since in the fifteen paragraphs that he devotes to the table, only a few words and phrases overlap with Exodus, all of them in §§ 57–58. The first, “two cubits in length and a cubit and a half in height,” reflects the measurements of Exodus 25, although not quite verbatim – compare δύο γὰρ πήχεων τὸ μῆκος τὸ δὲ ὕψος πήχεος καὶ ἡμίσους of Aristeas § 57 to δύο πήχεων τὸ μῆκος καὶ πήχεος τὸ εὗρος καὶ πήχεος καὶ ἡμίσους τὸ ὕψος of Exod 25:23. The difference is more profound if the phrase “and a cubit in width” is not original, as some scholars argue. The same observation – close verbal parallels but not verbatim reproduction – holds for the other examples: χρυσίου δοκίμου (pure gold; cf. Exod 25:23 χρυσίου καθαροῦ); στεφάνην παλαιστιαίαν κυκλόθεν (a rim a palm’s breadth all around; cf. Exod 25:25 στεφάνην παλαιστοῦ κύκλῳ); and κυμάτια στρεπτά (twisted molding; cf. Exod 25:25 στρεπτὸν κυμάτιον). Whereas Ps.-Aristeas certainly knows Greek translations of the Pentateuch, his purpose in this section owes more to his rhetorical use of ekphrasis – that is, creating a stunning vision that will produce awe in his readers – than to any dependence on LXX Exodus. The excessively detailed description of the table’s construction makes it difficult to imagine exactly what it would have looked like; it certainly is

453

See the apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 136.

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Fig. 1. Egg and Dart pattern

convoluted. Gruen comments that in this section, “one wonders whether he [i.e., Ps.-Aristeas] may not be deliberately pushing the ekphrasis genre to its outer limits as a form of burlesque.”454 Yet, from the ledge of the table down toward the insertion points of the legs Ps.-Aristeas might be reproducing the appearance of a Greek column head or a building cornice. In Ionic style, there were often three registers: at the top, the cyma (κῦμα) or wave moulding on the cornice, next down, an egg-and-dart pattern, and finally at the bottom, a band featuring floral designs. Good comparative examples might be the capitals from the Ionic temple at Locri or the cornice from the stoa at the Erechtheum in Athens.455 [See Fig. 1.] Even if he does not reproduce

454 455

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2728. For an image from Locri, see William Bell Dinsmoor, The Architecture of Ancient Greece: An Account of Its Historic Development (3rd ed.; New York: Batsford,

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these registers exactly as they would appear on a cornice or on a capital, he employs the architectural terms, and his descriptions would likely remind the reader of this type of architectural pattern. Ps.-Aristeas’s major point in this section, however, as it is in the other sections that describe the gifts constructed for the Jerusalem temple, is to emphasize Ptolemy’s respect and honor for the Jewish god and his munificence and generosity to the Jews, whose expertise he has requested of Eleazar (see above on §§ 51–56). Paragraph 72 reiterates the thought of §§ 55–56 that the elaborate artistry of the decoration compensated for the fact that the commitment to build the table according to the size requirements already established by the Jews, even though no written stipulations prohibited a larger piece of furniture, prevented Ptolemy from building a much larger version. So, what he did not spend on increased size, he lavished on decoration. Notes § 57. cubit. Several different types of cubits were employed for length and land measures. Here the reference is likely to the sacred cubit as a measure of length. Roger Bagnall estimates that one sacred cubit was .525 meters or 20.6 inches.456 § 58. twisted molding. This is the usual translation of στρεπτὸν κυμάτιον in the Septuagint. The phrase κυμάτια στρεπτά in Aristeas clearly refers to the same molding, but here it is also said to be triangular in shape, leaving the impression that it has three separate sides and is not attached directly to the ledge of the table. Twice, in § 59 and § 60, we read, referring to this molding, ὃ ἂν μέρος στρέφοιτο (“whatever side would turn”), which leaves the impression that it is some kind of rail that could spin around. Thackeray suggests that Ps.-Aristeas understood στρεπτά “in the sense of ‘revolving,’” even though he translates the phrase “ledges of twisted work.”457 Hadas renders the phrase “rails that revolved,” although this translation glosses the entire phrase through the understanding of στρεπτά as indicating some kind of turning (probably dependent on Thackeray, whom he cites).458 The noun κυμάτιον, a diminutive of the noun κῦμα (swell, wave, billow), can refer to a waved molding.459

456 457 458 459

1950) 137; for the Erechtheum see the photograph at http://www.stoa.org/athens/ sites/acroerechtheion/source/p08024.html (last accessed Dec. 28, 2014). Bagnall, “Practical Help,” 186. Thackeray, “Translation,” 353 n. 2. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 123. LSJ, s.v. κυμάτιον with the reference back to κῦμα.

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§ 59. and when … approached it. The construction of this sentence in Greek makes it very difficult to derive some clear meaning, especially because the participle that opens the sentence, κειμένου, is singular. It appears to be a genitive absolute with an assumed, but not entirely obvious, subject, in this case most likely the twisted molding/rail mentioned in § 58. The gist seems to be that when the triangular rail had a side downwards, one side faced towards the table and the other faced whoever was standing in front of the table. Since each side of the rail was constructed identically, whoever viewed a side saw an identical decoration. § 62. row of eggs. Ovoid molding was a common feature in Greek archtitecture, often appearing in the so-called egg-and-dart pattern and associated with Ionic style. Ps.-Aristeas likely drew on a common architectural form for this feature of the table.460 § 64. wave molding. Here Ps.-Aristeas uses κῦμα alone, rather than the diminutive plus adjective employed above and in Exodus. This type of molding was a standard feature of Greek architecture, used especially on the cornices of buildings. It is also typical of Ionic style.461 § 65. four fingers. Greek measurements such as this probably were not standard in all places, but the general estimate of one finger is based on the sacred cubit, which was comprised of 7 hands, which was made up of 28 fingers.462 If a sacred cubit was .525 meters (20.6 inches) in length, one finger measures about.74 inches. § 68. gold leaf. The final phrase of the paragraph has generated several different translations. The issue is how to render τὴν πετάλωσιν. Several commentators take the word to refer to leaves that accompanied the lilies on the tops of the legs. These commentators usually translate along the lines of Thackeray: “And the parts which met the eye represented the leaves in an upright position” (see Andrews, Hadas, Pelletier).463 I have followed Shutt’s interpretation in my rendering of “genuine gold leaf.”464 The noun πέταλον, leaf, is neuter, even though some of its forms look close to those of πετάλωσις, the noun employed here, which is feminine and which LSJ derive from πεταλόω, to cover with leaves or plates. Thus, the idea in this sentence seems to be that even the parts of the lilies that bent underneath the table but that could still be seen were covered with genuine gold leaf, 460 461 462 463

464

See Dinsmoor, Architecture, chap. 4. Dinsmoor, Architecture, chap. 4. Bagnall, “Practical Help,” 186. Thackeray, “Translation,” 354; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 102; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 127; Pelletier, Lettre, 137. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 17.

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even though that might not have been necessary. Josephus’s description of this part differs from the Greek manuscript tradition. He writes, “As for the feet, they had capitals made to imitate unfolding lilies, with their petals (πετάλων) bent back under the table, while within they held their stamens (τὴν βλάστησιν) erect to be seen” (translation from LCL). § 69. upon which rested the entire plate of the leg. This is admittedly a very strange phrase. The problematic term is ἔλασμα, a metal plate. The same word is used in § 65, and the legs of the table are inserted into it. It should probably be glossed with something along the lines of Thackeray’s translation: “upon this rested the whole plate into which the leg was inserted.”465 Others gloss the term as “stress” or “mass” and produce a translation such as Pelletier’s: “it is upon this plate that bears all the thrust of the foot.”466 The idea here is that the entirety of the leg and the plate into which it was inserted rested on the ruby leg support that was fashioned in the shape of a boot. § 70. reality. The Greek noun ἀλήθεια usually gets glossed as truth, but it can refer to truth in the sense of being consistent with reality or nature, hence the present translation.

The Bowls (§§ 73–82) 73. Of the drinking bowls, two were gold in construction, having scales in relief from the base up to the middle of the piece and with great skill having a colligation of stones in the middle of the scales. 74. Then there was superimposed a winding pattern, a cubit in height, and there was relief work out of variegated stones, displaying the loving labor of artistry along with beauty. Upon this was fluting, upon which was an intermixing of lozenges, having the appearance of net-work up to the rim. 75. And in the middle, bosses of stones, one next to the other, arranged alternately by their types, no less than four fingers, made up the manifest beauty. On the crown of the rim, a pattern of lilies with their blossoms and clusters of grapes were represented all around. 76. These drinking bowls possessed such a construction of gold, holding more than two measures. And the silver ones had a smooth preparation, indeed being like a mirror, remarkably having the same quality as one, so that everything that was brought close beamed forth more clearly than in actual mirrors. 77. But it is not possible

465 466

Thackeray, “Translation,” 354. Pelletier, Lettre, 137 (“c’est sur cette pierre que porte toute la poussée du pied”).

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to describe their true appearance when they were finished. For when they were completed, being placed one beside the other – I mean first a silver bowl, then a gold one, again a silver one and a gold one – the appearance of the arrangement was completely indescribable, and when people drew near to the sight, they could not tear themselves away due to the illumination and the pleasure of the sight. 78. For the dynamism of the appearance was varied. For when one looked at the gold construction by itself, a certain fascination accompanied amazement, the mind continually being drawn to each work of art. And again when anyone wanted to look at the arrangement of the silver vessels, everything gleamed all around, however one stood, and caused even greater merriment among the spectators, so that the artistic skill of those pieces that had been executed was completely indescribable. 79. They engraved the golden broad bowls with garlands of grape vines in the middle, and around the lip they entwined in relief a garland of ivy and myrtle and olive, setting precious stones in it. And they completed the rest of the relief work in different ways, striving eagerly to make everything for the preeminence of the king’s reputation. 80. In general, neither in the king’s treasuries nor in any other was there such work either in artistry or in lavish expense. For the king devoted not a little forethought to them, loving the fame accrued for things having such beauty. 81. For often he would disregard public business and carefully attend the artisans so that they might execute the objects in a manner appropriate to the place to which the works were being sent. Therefore, everything was accomplished majestically and in a manner worthy both of the king who was sending them and of the high priest who presided over the place. 82. For the number of the stones was bounteous and great in size, being no less than five thousand. And everything was so superior in workmanship that the contribution of the stones and the artistry of the artisans was more than five times the value of the gold. Textual Notes Josephus relates the construction of the vessels. § 73. All of the Greek manuscripts lack the noun gold (χρυσοῖ), which Wendland and Thackeray supply from Josephus’s account, which reads χρύσεοι. Hadas and Pelletier set the word off in pointed brackets indicating its uncertainty.467 It certainly seems that some such description is necessary, and I see no reason to indicate any uncertainty to the reading. § 75. All of the Greek manuscripts have

467

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 128.

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the dative singular σχοινίῳ, which parallels the nominative case τύπωσις and thus does not fit the grammar of the sentence. Josephus’s dative plural σχονίαις prompted Schmidt’s conjecture of σχοινιαί, clusters, that has been adopted by virtually all scholars and that makes the sentence grammatical. § 78. The Greek manuscripts all have the indicative ἔστηκε after ὡς ἄν τις, which would normally require a subjunctive. Wendland suggests ἐστήκῃ, which Pelletier accepts and is the basis of the translation here. Thackeray retains the indicative in his text. § 79. Almost all of the Greek manuscripts read πορείας, which is a corruption of τορείας, relief work, as is clear from the use of the latter word in § 73. Mss K and A(corr) preserve the correct reading. General Comment As practically all commentators note, the description of the bowls is much more intelligible than that of the table. In this section, Ps.-Aristeas shows no dependence on the account in LXX Exodus, where only brief mention is made of these vessels. Exodus 25:28 reports God’s command to Moses: “And you shall make its (i.e., the table’s) bowls (τρύβλια) and censors and libation cups (σπονδεῖα) and ladles, those with which you shall pour a libation. Of pure gold you shall make them.” Later in Exod 38:12, Moses constructs these vessels. Unlike the biblical account of the table’s construction, no specific decoration is prescribed for the vessels. In the Exodus account, the translator has used τρύβλιον, a cup or bowl, and σπονδεῖον, a cup from which a libation is poured. Neither of these terms appears in Aristeas. Ps.-Aristeas distinguishes two kinds of vessels, but he uses κρατήρ (“drinking bowl”), which in ancient times was a large bowl used to mix wine and water from which other cups would be filled or later a large drinking bowl, and φιάλη (“broad bowl”) a large flat bowl that was used for drinking or pouring libations. Moreover, the Exodus account prescribes that the bowls, censors, libation cups and ladles be made of pure gold. In Aristeas, the drinking bowls are made from both silver and gold and the broad bowls are made from gold. The construction of the bowls in Aristeas recalls the descriptions of drinking vessels in Athenaeus’s account of the procession of Ptolemy II in the Deipnosophists. Athenaeus writes that drinks were served in several kinds of elegant, large, and elaborately decorated drinking vessels, including the κρατήρ and φιάλη, all of which were made from gold and were studded with precious stones (199, 202).468 Whether Ps.-Aristeas would

468

See Rice, Grand Procession, 12–13, 20–21.

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have known this account is not clear, but the two descriptions of these vessels offer primary evidence of Ptolemy’s reputation for ostentatious displays of his wealth and artistic sense.469 The latter part of this section further reinforces that impression, when Ps.-Aristeas writes that Ptolemy would even neglect state affairs in order to supervise the work on these vessels (§ 81). Moreover in this same paragraph Ps.-Aristeas reemphasizes the equal standing of Ptolemy and the High Priest Eleazar that also is reflected in the openings and closings of the letters between the two: “Therefore, everything was accomplished … in a manner worthy both of the king who was sending them and of the high priest who presided over the place.” Notes § 73. scales. The Greek φολιδωτός refers to scales of reptiles or to something clad in scales, such as overlapping metal plates on armor. Here the adjective functions as a substantive, thus, scales. § 74. lozenge. The Greek term is ῥόμβος, a four-sided figure with equal sides in which only the angles opposite one another are equal.470 § 76. two measures. The Greek is δύο μετρητάς, whereas Josephus uses δύο … ἀμφορέας. The implication here is that each vessel held two liquid measures. A μετρητής was 38.9 liters or approximately 10.5 gallons and was the approximate amount held in one amphora of wine.471 Hence, Josephus’s and Aristeas’s volumes are the same. Hadas translates the phrase “twenty gallons each.”472 § 79. golden broad bowls. Although Aristeas does not stipulate a number, Josephus reports that the king made thirty such bowls. striving eagerly. Shutt translates here “competing with each other.”473 He apparently has taken the immediately preceding adverb διηλλαγμένως, in different patterns or ways, as meaning “individually.” He thus glosses the participle φιλοτιμηθέντες as “competing.” I do not think that this is the sense, however. The idea is that the relief work was made in different patterns and that the workers strove to make everything worthy of the king’s reputation. § 80. loving the fame. The verb φιλοδοξέω refers to loving fame or reputation. So, Ps.-Aristeas tells us that the artisans worked to make certain that

469 470 471 472 473

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2729. LSJ, s.v. ῥόμβος. Bagnall, “Practical Help,” 188. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 129. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 18.

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everything lived up to the king’s reputation for art, and the king paid great attention to the construction, because he loved the fame that resulted. § 81. majestically. Greek σεμνῶς; see the note at § 56.

Jerusalem and its Environs (§§ 83–120) 83. Therefore I have explained these things to you, assuming that a description of them was necessary. What follows comprises the journey that we made to Eleazar, but first I will explain the setting of the entire country. For when we arrived at the locales, we saw the city situated in the middle of the entirety of Judea upon a mountain that rose to a great height.

The Temple (§§ 84–87) 84. The Temple, which had great splendor, was built upon the summit. And there were three enclosure walls; each wall was more than seventy cubits in size, and the width corresponded accordingly as did the length of the construction of the building, everything being built with a lavishness and expense that excelled in all respects. 85. And from the doorway and the fasteners upon it to the doorjambs and the secure nature of the lintels, it was plain that the money spent had been extravagant. 86. And the configuration of the curtain was very much like the door in every respect, and especially when the fabric was overtaken by unceasing movement due to the current of the wind, because the current came from the bottom, billowing up to the taut part at the top, the object had a certain pleasantness and the sight was hard to look away from. 87. The construction of the altar was of commensurate size to the place, and the sacrifices that were consumed by the fire were commensurate with the structure. And the ascent was likewise, in accordance with decency. The incline of the place was proper for the ministering priests, who were covered to the ankles with robes of fine linen. Textual Notes These paragraphs begin a long section of Aristeas (§§ 83–171) that Josephus does not transmit. Eusebius does not have §§ 83–87. § 83. The translation “I will explain” is based on ms O, which reads δηλώσω. All the other manuscripts read δηλῶσαι or δήλωσον, which are obvious corruptions. // The phrase that forms the basis for my translation, ἐπὶ τοὺς τόπους, at the locales, is clearly corrupt in the manuscripts. Scholars have offered a number of emendations. Thackeray and Pelletier read as here. Thackeray notes

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that the text of mss G and I has the phrase ἐπὶ τοὺ[lacuna]ς καὶ τόπους, which he thinks represents an original text like that above. Pelletier notes that in his 1561 edition Simon Schard emended the text as above, and he follows Schard and Thackeray.474 Tramontano, followed by Meecham, says that the phrase παραγίνομαι ἐπὶ τοὺς τόπους also occurs in 3rd–2nd century BCE papyri.475 // Pelletier and Thackeray differ on whether to read Ἰουδαίας, of Judea, or Ἰουδαίων, of the Judeans. All of the manuscripts read the latter, and Thackeray follows the manuscript tradition.476 Pelletier follows Schmidt’s emendation, and additionally he points to § 11, where Judea appears also. I have followed Pelletier in my translation. § 84. On the emendation to μεγαλομερείᾳ, see the note to § 21 (although Eusebius is not a witness in this paragraph). // The translation “excelled” follows the reading ὑπερβαλλούσῃ of the second corrector of ms A rather than the περιβαλλούσῃ of the remaining manuscripts.477 § 86. Pelletier adopts Wendland’s emendation of the manuscripts, γινομένης τῆς ὑποδρομῆς, to γίνεσθαι τὴν ὑποδρομήν, a reading I have followed. // As many commentators have noted, the meaning of the clause διὰ τὸ ἀπ’ ἐδάφους γίνεσθαι τὴν ὑποδρομὴν κατὰ τὴν κόλπωσιν μέχρι τῆς ἄνω διατάσεως – what I have translated “because the current came from the bottom, billowing up to the taut part at the top” – is obscure.478 Schmidt tried to resolve the

474

475

476

477

478

Pelletier, Lettre, 142. Thackeray, “Translation,” 356, gives no indication that he is aware of Schard’s reading, even though it is the same. Tramontano, La Lettera, 89 (cf. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 226). Tramontano cites several papyri. Using the resources of papyri.info (http://papyri.info/) I was able to identify the phrase in several. See, for example: BGU 6.1247 (Syene, 137 BCE); UPZ 1 11 (Memphis, 160 BCE); SB 5.8033 (Diospolis Magna, 182 BCE). This is Pelletier’s reading of the evidence as given in his apparatus. Thackeray has mss K A G I with Ἰουδαίων and the remainder of the manuscripts with Ἰουδαίας. See Thackeray, “Appendix,” 534. I have not been able to check the manuscripts to determine who is correct. Thackeray (502) writes that he personally collated all the manuscripts that he knew. Pelletier (8) says that he collated all the manuscripts himself, either directly or using microfilm, except for mss Z F L M and R. So, I am at a loss to explain the different attributions in the apparatuses of these two scholars. Pelletier’s collations are more recent, and I am inclined to follow his readings. Again there is a discrepancy between Thackeray and Pelletier, which I am at a loss to explain satisfactorily. Thackeray reads ms B as having ὑπερβαλλούσῃ with two lambdas, whereas he has the corrector of A with a single lambda. Pelletier’s apparatus has only the corrector of ms A with ὑπερβαλλούσῃ – and with two lambdas. See Thackeray, “Translation,” 356; Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 227; and Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 18. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 132, adopts the emended reading without comment.

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problem by emending to κατά to κατατείνειν, extend, and thus it would read, “the swell (or billow) extended up to the taut part at the top.” Meecham appears not to accept the emendation.479 Pelletier prints and translates the text as it appears in the Greek manuscripts, a reading that I have followed here. § 87. Mendelssohn suggested a correction in two places in the transmitted text of this paragraph that almost all scholars after him have followed and that is the text I have translated: συμμέτρως ἔχουσαν for σύμμετρον ἔχουσα and λειτουργούντων for λειτουργῶν τῶν. General Comment The long section (§§ 83–120) that begins with § 83 shifts from the ekphrasis of the previous paragraphs to two other well-known types of Hellenistic literature: the travelogue and the geographical treatise, which Ps.-Aristeas alleges is an eyewitness account. As Daniel Barbu observes, Aristeas serves as the ideal Greek tourist, who relates the curiosities and peculiarities of Jerusalem, Judea and its inhabitants. He is able to highlight the similarities and differences between Greeks and Jews and to establish the places where the Judean and the Hellenistic are comparable.480 Gruen places Aristeas in the same category as Iambulus’s story about the strange inhabitants of an island in the Indian Ocean (Diodorus Siculus 2.55–60) or Euhemerus’s report of an island off the coast of Arabia, which contains a detailed description of the inhabitants’ temple and sacred precincts (Diodorus Siculus 5.41–46).481 The question of whether Ps.-Aristeas ever traveled to Judea and Jerusalem has been debated, but the most recent scholarship, represented by Sylvie Honigman’s article on this section, emphasizes that Ps.-Aristeas had no intention of providing an eyewitness account. On the contrary, the section’s close relationship to various Hellenistic sources and models suggests that he had a literary and ideological aim in mind.482 She

479

480

481 482

He translates the phrase, “owing to the fact that, since there was an undercurrent, the curtain bulged out from the bottom to its highest extent” (Letter of Aristeas, 227). Daniel Barbu, “Aristeas the Tourist,” Bulletin der Schweizerischen Gesellschaft für Judaistische Forschung 23 (2014) 10. We have seen places already where this idea has emerged, as, for example, in § 16. It will become a more obvious theme in Eleazar’s speech and in the symposia. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2730–31. For a brief review of the positions about the work’s value as an eyewitness account, see Sylvie Honigman, “La Description de Jérusalem et de la Judée dans la Lettre d’Aristée,” Estratto da Athenaeum 92 (2004) 74 n. 2; see also eadem, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 23–4.

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maintains, however, that Ps-Aristeas “depends on more than real geographical details,” but, she writes, “Nevertheless, our author has gleaned some of his realistic details from acquaintance with more ancient travelers.”483 These “gleaned” elements provide the evidence of Ps.-Aristeas’s intentions in this section, which is to represent Jerusalem in the framework of an ideal Hellenistic city but also, as Honigman points out, given Ps.-Aristeas’s interest in the Temple, to transfer those characteristics to the Jewish holy site and to create a new type of ideal polity, the theocracy.484 She also observes that many of the elements of Ps.-Aristeas’s descriptions resemble those of Aristotle in his Politics 7, and it seems likely that this work served as one of Ps.-Aristeas’s sources for §§ 83–120. Ps.-Aristeas’s comment in § 83, that when the delegation arrived in Judea, they saw a city in the middle of the region situated “on a mountain that rose to a great height,” begins his idealistic description of Jerusalem and its environs. The idea that an important city should be in the center of a country and stand on a mountain has symbolic significance in both Greek and Jewish utopian geography. So, to take one Greek example, Plato, in the Laws 745B, prescribes that a lawgiver should found his city “as nearly as possible in the center of the country” (ὅτι μάλιστα ἐν μέσω).485 Within Israelite and Jewish tradition, Jerusalem rested on a holy mountain, Zion, and often Mount Zion and Jerusalem are used synonymously in textual sources (cf. 2 Kgs 9:31; Ps 48:1; Isa 10:12, 40:9, 66:20; Joel 3:17; Jub. 1:28–29; 4 Ezra 13:35; 4QpIsaa [4Q161] ii.21). Immediately after this brief notice of Jerusalem’s location, Ps.-Aristeas turns his attention to the Temple. He remarks that it sits upon the summit of Jerusalem’s mountain, a location that resonates with other passages

483

484

485

“La Description,” 75 (“s’appuie sur plus de details géographiques reels. Cependent, notre auteur peut avoi glané ces elements réalists dans les relations de voyageurs plus ancient”). Honigman, “La Description,” 77–78. I will discuss the relevant source materials, both those that show Ps.-Aristeas’s literary context and those on which he might have depended, where appropriate below. Victor Tcherikover, “The Ideology of the Letter of Aristeas,” HTR 51 (1958) 78, also makes the point that the goal of §§ 83–120 is to “describe Palestine as a Holy Land, where the sublime ideal of Biblical theocracy was fulfilled.” In his case, however, he emphasizes the biblical allusions of the larger section. These will be dealt with at the appropriate places below. This is the same section in which Plato recommends dividing the citizenry into twelve parts. See above on § 32.

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from Jewish literature (e.g., Ezek 43:12; Hag 1:3; Josephus, Ant. 8.3486), including some that anticipate an eschatological temple that sits on the highest mountains (cf. Isa 2:2; Mic 4:1–2). Ps.-Hecataeus (apud Josephus, Against Apion 1.198) notes that the Temple is located near the center of the city (κατὰ μέσον μάλιστα τῆς πόλεως; note the similarity to Plato’s language), although he does not mention the mountain. Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the Jerusalem Temple also continues the use of ekphrasis, which he employed for his descriptions of the king’s gifts for the Temple. He remarks on two occasions, § 84 and § 85, how much expense had been expended on the construction of the building. Only a magnificent edifice would be worthy of housing Ptolemy’s lavish gifts. Honigman notes that Euhemerus of Messene (late 4th century BCE; as transmitted in Diodorus Siculus 5.41– 46) discusses the well proportioned temple of Zeus Triphylios in the city of Panara on the island Panchaea in order to show that the description that Ps.-Aristeas offers is consistent with a literary topos of descriptions of this sort.487 Ps.-Aristeas comments here on four features of the Temple: the three enclosure walls; the doorway; the curtain; and the altar. The first three features enable our author to point out the extravagance or beauty of the Jewish Temple. With respect to the altar, he emphasizes the decorum with which the priests carry out the sacrifices. Since Ps.-Aristeas explicitly numbers three walls, it is unlikely that he is referring to the outside wall that would have encompassed the entire area of the temple. Hadas suggests that they denote the walls that separated the temenos into courts for gentiles, Israelites, and then the altar precincts, which were accessible only to priests.488 Other descriptions of the Temple differ with respect to the number of courtyards. Josephus’s descriptions of Solomon’s Temple (Ant. 8.95–98) and Herod’s Temple (Ant. 15.396–402) contain an outer wall with porticos and an inner wall surrounding the sanctuary, thus defining two courtyards. The outer courtyard was for women and other impure Israelites; Israelite men and priests accessed the courtyard that surrounded the sanctuary itself. The Temple Scroll from Qumran, however, imagines three courtyards that would have required three enclosure walls (the outer wall and two inner ones). As Lawrence Schiffman has emphasized, though, the Temple Scroll is utopian and bases its construction of the Temple on

486

487 488

Josephus has descriptions of both Israelite and Judean temples, written in the style of ekphrasis: Solomon’s Temple in Ant. 8 and Herod’s Temple in Ant. 15. Honigman, “La Description,” 88–89. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 132.

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the biblical Tabernacle account and that of Solomon’s Temple.489 Ezekiel’s utopian description of a renewed Temple follows the model of Solomon’s Temple, having an outer wall and an inner wall creating two courtyards (Ezekiel 40). Ps.-Hecataeus simply describes a wall surrounding the sanctuary setting off a courtyard where the altar stood (Josephus, Against Apion, 1.198). All of these descriptions ascribe differing dimensions to various parts of the structure or to its walls, and Ps.-Aristeas does not appear to depend on any of these for his seventy-cubit walls. Ps.-Aristeas singles out the doorway/entrance as an example of the “extravagant” (ἀφειδής) cost of the construction. Josephus offers lavish descriptions of the doors/porticos in both Solomon’s Temple (Ant. 8.95– 98) and Herod’s Temple (Ant. 15.411–416). Ps.-Aristeas does not say where the curtain is hung in the Temple. The biblical accounts of Solomon’s Temple differ with respect to a curtain. In 1 Kings 6 the description of the Holy of Holies does not mention a curtain but rather doors that Solomon made for the entrance (6:31). Second Chronicles 3:4, however, has a curtain hung in the entrance to the Holy of Holies, which recalls the curtain that sequestered the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle (cf. Exod 26:31–33). Later, a curtain was closely associated with the Temple, and Ben Sira even refers to the Jerusalem Temple as the “house of the curtain” (50:5). Of course, in the Synoptic Gospels in the New Testament, the curtain is famously torn at the time of Jesus’ death (Matt 27:51; Mk 15:38; Lk 23:45). In each of these cases, the Greek word is καταπέτασμα, which Ps.-Aristeas also uses; it is also the word used in the Septuagint to refer to the curtain in front of the Holy of Holies (see note). Curtains were also used in Greek temples, where the standard term seems to have been παραπέτασμα. Pausanias (Description of Greece 5.12.4), for instance, mentions a curtain (παραπέτασμα) in the temple of Zeus in Olympia that was let down from the roof with cords and not drawn up from the floor “as is that in the temple of Artemis of Ephesus.”490

489

490

Lawrence H. Schiffman, “Descriptions of the Jerusalem Temple in Josephus and the Temple Scroll,” in Historical Perspectives: From the Hasmoneans to Bar Kokhba in Light of the Dead Seas Scrolls (Ed. David Goodblatt et al.; STDJ 37; Leiden: Brill, 2001) 69–82. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 133, remarks that curtains in Greek temples were called παραπέτασμα, since they were pulled up from the floor. (Thus, the reason for the use of παρά in the compound rather than κατά.) In Pausanias’s account, however, he uses the term παραπέτασμα, even though it was let down from the roof. His account also reports that “Antiochus,” presumably Antiochus IV Epiphanes, dedicated this curtain. In 1 Macc 1:22 we hear that Antiochus removed the curtain from

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Ps.-Aristeas simply notes that the size of the altar was “commensurate to the size of the place” as were the sacrifices proper for the size of the altar. Ps.-Hecataeus gives dimensions for the altar of twenty cubits long and ten high (Josephus, Against Apion 1.198), which are much bigger than those stipulated in Exod 27:1 (5x5x3 cubits) but which agree with the bronze altar that Solomon constructed (2 Chron 4:1). Ps.-Aristeas emphasizes the decorum of the ministrations (cf. 3 Macc 1:10), noting that the priests wore “robes of fine linen” (see note) down to their ankles so that when they went up to the altar they would not expose themselves to those below (cf. Exod 20:26). Notes § 84. the building. Or, “the house.” The Greek, τὸν οἶκον, can refer to a building or house. The Temple is often referred to as God’s house in Jewish sources (see, for example, Exod 23:19, 34:26; 2 Sam 7:13; 1 Chron 26:27; Ezra 6:16; Tob 1:4; 4QApocJer C [4Q385a] 18.5; 4Q522 9 ii.5). I have rendered the word with the less technical noun, “building,” since our author has taken on the personality of a non-Jew for whom it would presumably not be a technical term. Ps.-Aristeas uses the more usual Greek word ἱερόν at the beginning of the paragraph. § 86. curtain. The Greek word καταπέτασμα is the usual one used in Jewish and Christian sources to indicate the curtain that separates the Holy of Holies from the rest of the sacred space. Given the widespread use of the term, Ps.-Aristeas’s use of it does not demonstrate in and of itself use of the Septuagint as a source for this section. The word’s frequency for the curtain in the Tabernacle in the Septuagint (Exodus 26, 37) undoubtedly accounts for its appearance in Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the Temple, though. The association had probably become well known by the time Ps.-Aristeas wrote. Yet, in combination with how Ps.-Aristeas describes the priests’ robes in § 87 (see below), it is likely that Ps.-Aristeas had LXX Exodus as a source for his composition. § 87. altar. Ps.-Aristeas calls the altar in the Jerusalem Temple a θυσιαστήριον. In the Septuagint, two words appear for altars, θυσιαστήριον and βωμός; the first refers to Israelite altars and the second to the altars of the Temple, and on the basis of Pausanias and 1 Maccabees, C. Clermont-Ganneau, Les dieu satrape et les Phéniciens dans le Péloponèse (Paris: Imprimiere nationale, 1878) 56–60, suggested that the “woolen curtain, adorned with Assyrian weaving and Phoenician purple” mentioned by Pausanias was the curtain that came from the Jewish Temple. Although some have followed Clermont-Ganneau in this speculation, it remains no more than speculation.

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other peoples. Ps.-Aristeas’s choice of θυσιαστήριον was no doubt determined by its use in the Greek translations. sacrifices. The Greek term used here for sacrifices, θύματα, refers to slaughtered victims, although it does not have to connote sacrifices to a deity. In Gen 43:16, for instance, the Septuagint translator has Joseph ask his servants to “slaughter victims” for his brothers to eat. The term also applies to Israelite sacrifices (Exod 29:28, 34:25; Deut 18:3) or non-Isaelite sacrificial victims (Exod 34:15). robes of fine linen. The phrase in Aristeas is practically identical to that in Exod 36:35 (LXX; 39:27 in the MT); the Septuagint translator rendered the Hebrew as χιτῶνας βυσσίνους, and Ps.-Aristeas has it as βυσσίνοις χιτῶσιν, the only difference being the order of the words in the phrase. Although Ps.-Aristeas could easily have known the phrase from somewhere other than the Septuagint, he is much more likely to have drawn it from the Greek translation.

The Temple’s Water System (§§ 88–91) 88. The building faces to the east, and the back of it faces to the west. The entire floor is set with stones, and the slopes head toward the appropriate places for the carrying of water, which is for the washing of the blood from the sacrifices. For many thousands of beasts are brought during the days of the festivals. 89. The supply of water is inexhaustible, since there is a strong, natural spring flowing continually inside, and furthermore there are marvelous and indescribable reservoirs under the ground, just as was explained, five stadia around the foundation of the Temple, and each of them has innumerable pipes, so that the channels connect together on each side. 90. And all of them were covered with lead down to the floors and the walls, and above them was poured a great amount of plaster so that everything became fit for service. And there were many outlets at the base of the altar, invisible to all except to those whose ministry it was, so that, by the downward incline and slope, the enormous amount of collected blood of the sacrifices might be cleansed entirely. 91. Having learned this myself, I will explain the construction of the reservoirs just as I know it. For they led me more than four stadia out of the city, and at a particular place they urged me to bend down and listen to the noise made by the meeting of the waters. Thus, the size of the receptacles was made clear to me, just as I have explained.

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Textual Notes Eusebius transmits these paragraphs and at times has a text that varies from the manuscripts. He does not report any of the other paragraphs that treat the city and the surrounding countryside. His reporting of Aristeas picks up again with Eleazar’s apologia for the Mosaic law. § 88. The translation is based on a reading of ἐπιφορᾶς, carrying, rather than Eusebius’s reading ἐπιρροῆς, flowing in, which looks to be a change that Eusebius made because water is the topic of his larger section. § 89. The phrase “with each other” is based on the text of mss O and Q, ἑαυτά. The remainder of the manuscripts and Eusebius have ἑαυτάς, which does not agree in gender with the pronoun’s clear referent, τῶν ῥευμάτων, the channels, which is neuter. Its use in the sentence is difficult (see note to this section). § 90. The reading of the perfect infinitive μεμολιβῶσθαι, “to have been covered in lead,” comes from mss O B1 and Eusebius. All of the other manuscripts read μεμολιβοῦσθαι, which looks to represent a contraction with –εσθαι, which is not a perfect infinitive ending. General Comment As in other sections, here Aristeas goes to great pains to convince his reader that he was an eyewitness to these events, thereby giving the narrative a higher level of veracity (see Introduction). Already early in the twentieth century, H. Vincent argued that this section (as well as others in the description of Jerusalem) must have derived from a first-hand account of the area.491 As Honigman has noted, recent excavations have determined that there were in this period cisterns in the area around the Temple, and ancient sources connect water sources with Jerusalem generally and the Temple specifically.492 So, for example, Tacitus (Hist. 5.12.1) claims that the Temple area was fed by an “inexhaustible spring” and that the hill on which the Temple stood contained cisterns for water storage, whose existence he credits the city founders with creating in order to withstand sieges. Eusebius in his Preparation for the Gospel 9.35 and 37 cites several Jewish sources, including this passage from Aristeas, that comment on the abundance of water in Jerusalem. Finally, Sir 50:3 claims that Simon II dug cisterns, apparently within the retaining walls of the Temple (cf. 50:2). The

491

492

H. Vincent, “Jerusalem d’apres la Lettre d’Aristée,” RB 5 (1908) 520–32 and 6 (1909) 555–75. Honigman, “La Description,” 78–79. She also refers again to Euhemerus’s description of the water sources for the temple of Zeus Triphylios to show the literary nature of the reference (see above). See also Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 134–35.

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results of archaeological excavations along with ancient testimonies do not provide a sound basis for arguing that our author knew all of this information from first-hand experience, however.493 Several elements in §§ 88–89 hint at two proximate sources for Ps.-Aristeas. Both the eastern orientation and water flowing from streams in the vicinity of the Temple are part of Ezekiel’s description of the new Temple (see 47:1–12).494 Ps.-Aristeas also seems to be familiar with Aristotle’s plan for the ideal city in his Politics 7.3–4 (1330b 1–12). First, for Aristotle, a city should face to the east, since winds that come from the east “are the healthiest.” Second, he advises that there should be abundant water from springs and fountains as well as cisterns to hold rainwater, both to assure the city’s sustainability in time of war and siege and also for the general health of its citizens (cf. Tacitus, who also mentions siege during war). Ps.-Aristeas emphasizes both of these aspects of the ideal city, which he applies to the Temple and its cultic ministrations.495 With respect to the pipes mentioned in § 90, there is one interesting note in Eusebius’s Preparation for the Gospel 9.37, which immediately precedes his citation of Aristeas on the Temple and its water systems, a section from a work of the epic poet Philo, called On Jerusalem, which Eusebius knows from Alexander Polyhistor. Philo mentions pipes that lie under ground, which carry off water (although it is not at all clear if this water was used in cultic sacrifice). Eusebius reports, “Then once again, he relates the following concerning the pool of the High Priest and draining off of the water: ‘And from high up pour out through the earth channels, pipes.’ And whatever else follows these things.”496 Otherwise, the description of the construction of the pipes and Aristeas’s trip outside the city to see the

493

494

495

496

Honigman, “La Description,” 75, suggests that Ps.-Aristeas has here real information but that he has taken these data from earlier accounts. C. T. R. Hayward, The Jewish Temple: A Non-Biblical Sourcebook (London/ NewYork: Routledge, 1996) 32, speculates that perhaps Ps.-Aristeas’s extensive treatment of the water sources indicates that his account of the Temple and its altar related to traditions about the Temple and its altar being connected with the foundations of the earth above large abysses, as we see in other Jewish texts. In my view, this suggestion reads too much into the text. Honigman, “La Description,” 80–81, discusses Aristotle’s recommendations about water supply, although she does not mention the attendant directional orientation here. Pelletier, Lettre, 146 n. 3, suggests that the spring mentioned here could be the Gihon. See the Introduction, section 7 for more discussion of Ps.-Aristeas’s practice of adopting material from both Jewish and non-Jewish sources. Translation comes from Holladay, Poets, 245.

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cisterns and hear the rushing water serve to emphasize the efficiency of the sacrificial ministrations and the order and care with which they are carried out. Notes § 88. east … west. The biblical accounts of the Temple in both Kings and Chronicles lack any reference to the directional orientation. Ezekiel’s ideal temple, as noted above, faces eastward. sacrifices. The Greek term is θυσία. See note to § 40. festivals. In this passage Ps.-Aristeas implies that the main sacrificial activity takes place around the festival times, presumably when many pilgrims would crowd into the city, rather than the daily sacrifices that take place in the Temple, although in his letter to Ptolemy Eleazar does mention making sacrifices on the king’s behalf (§ 45). The Jewish liturgical calendar stipulated three pilgrimage festivals – Passover, Weeks and Booths – during which many people made their way to Jerusalem. Several ancient Jewish sources comment on the crowded conditions in Jerusalem during these festivals (cf. Josephus War. 6.422–426 [Passover]; Philo Special Laws 1.69–70 [“every festival”]). § 89 the channels … on each side. This entire clause is difficult, and scholars have taken different approaches to it. Part of the problem is to decide what the referent of “channels” is. If it is the pipes, as seems likely, then the idea is that all of these join together so that the water empties into the various reservoirs. five stadia. Cf. also § 91, where Aristeas is taken four stadia outside the city. An Attic stadion measured about 185 meters (607 ft.). Thus, the distance here is about 925 meters (3035 ft.), and in § 91 it is approximately 740 meters (2428 ft.).497 § 90. floors. The Greek term is ἔδαφος, the same word used in § 88. I have used the same English rendering here, although one could render it “foundations” in this case.

497

David Gilman Romano, Athletics and Mathematics in Archaic Corinth: The Origins of the Greek Stadion (Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society 206; Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1993) 16.

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The Priests and Their Ministrations (§§ 92–95) 92. Now the service of the priests is not to be surpassed by anything in physical strength or in its state of decorum and silence. For all, of their own accord, work diligently at a greatly laborious task, and each is concerned with what has been assigned. And they serve unceasingly, some the supply of wood, others the oil, others the fine flour, others things having to do with the spices, yet others things having to do with the complete burning of the flesh, making extraordinary use of strength. 93. For with both hands grasping the legs of the calves, most of them being almost two talents each, amazingly with each hand they throw them up to a considerable height, and they do not miss the correct position. And similarly, the legs of the sheep and the goats are remarkable for their weight and fat. For with respect to all of them, those whose charge it is select the flawless and the ones with excessive fat, then they discharge the aforementioned task. 94. But there is a specially assigned place for rest, where those who are resting sit. And when this happens, some of those who had taken an interval of rest rise willingly; no one gives any orders for the acts of service. 95. But complete silence is instituted so that it might be supposed that not a single person is present in the place, even though those who are ministering are close to seven hundred – and also the great number who bring the sacrifices to be offered – but also they discharge everything with reverence in a manner worthy of great divinity. Textual Notes Very few textual variants affect these paragraphs. For the most part, those that Thackeray lists are obvious corruptions and mistakes that need not be reported here. § 93. Two manuscripts, B and T, have the masculine nominative singular πλείων rather than the neuter πλεῖον, which perhaps was written with omega by attraction to the surrounding words, which have omega-nu as their endings. // “two talents” ταλάντων δύο. According to Pelletier, ms O reads the singular ταλάντου (although Thackeray attributes the reading to ms B). § 95. The text translated here as “so that it might be supposed,” which Pelletier prints as ὥσθ’ ὑπολαμβάνειν, represents the conjecture of Schmidt, which he gave as ὥστε ὑπολαμβάνειν (accepted in this form by Thackeray). Pelletier has elided the vowel and softened the “t” sound based on the upsilon with rough breathing that follows. All of the Greek manuscripts have ὡς τύπον λαμβάνειν, which makes no sense in the context and represents an obvious corruption.

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General Comment The combination of the description of the Temple, its water and now the service of the priests reflects a literary tradition like that found in Diodorus Siculus’s report of Euhemerus.498 Ps.-Aristeas has emphasized throughout the efficiency and decorum of the cultic service, and in these paragraphs he adds further detail to that theme. The priests serve in silence (mentioned twice), and they have a clear division of labor that results in their ability to sacrifice large numbers of animals with dispatch. In keeping with her argument that Ps.-Aristeas has used Aristotle’s Politics as a source for this section and that the intent is to transfer the characteristics of the ideal city to a theocracy, Honigman sees this description as reminiscent of Aristotle’s comment, “For law is a kind of order, and good law necessitates good order; but a very great multitude cannot participate in order: indeed this would be a task of divine power, a power that holds together the universe” (7.4 [1326a 29–33]). Whereas other parts of the description of Jerusalem, the Temple, and its environs likely reflect a specific use of Aristotle, this section bears only a faint resemblance to the Greek philosopher. None of the terms that Aristotle employs for “order” appear in Aristeas, and in Politics 7 Aristotle is making the point that the ideal city requires a combination of good governance along with a limited population, a very different point from Ps.-Aristeas’s. If this is Ps.-Aristeas’s adaptation of Aristotle, it is a thorough adaptation in which Ps.-Aristeas has departed dramatically from his source. While Ps.-Aristeas endeavors in almost every case to maintain the narrative fiction of ‘Aristeas’ as a Gentile representative of Ptolemy II, his insistence on Aristeas’s first-hand experience creates a bit of a problem here, since Gentiles would not have been allowed into the area of the Temple where the sacrifices would be carried out.499 In § 103, he specifically says that for security reasons men who have been appointed to protect the Temple, who are unarmed, only allow five people at a time into the citadel to observe the rites. This report might account for the delegation’s ability to observe the rites without entering sacred space, but that report only comes later and does not account for the implication that Gentiles would be entering a space that would have been forbidden to them. Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the enclosure walls in § 84 presumably divides the Temple area into courtyards, but our author conveniently does not say what function those spaces might have.

498

499

Honigman, “La Description,” 88–90. See also Murray, “Aristeas and his Sources,” 125, where he notes “the obvious literary character of Aristeas’ descriptions.” See Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2732.

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III. Translation and Commentary

Notes § 92. supply of wood … oil … fine flour … spices. Ps.-Aristeas lists the materials connected with the sacrificial cult. The Greek term ξυλεία properly refers to the supply of wood, but it does not appear in the Septuagint, where only the word for wood, ξύλον, occurs. Oil (ἔλαιον) and fine flour (σεμίδαλις or σεμίδαλιν) are regular components of the daily sacrifices (Exod 29:38–43) and individual offerings (Lev 2:1–3; 5:11). The term spices (ἀρώματα) does not occur in the Septuagint as a collective term for the substances used in the sacrificial cult. complete burning. The verb ὁλοκαυτέω generally means to offer something whole, and it is the main verb used in the Septuagint for a whole burnt offering. See § 87 where sacrifices are consumed by fire. extraordinary. The adverb διαφερόντως can mean either “in different ways,” as Shutt has rendered it, or “excessive, extraordinary,” as I and most other scholars translate it.500 In order to make his rendering meaningful, Shutt understands § 93 as referring to the priests “dividing” the legs of calves, which certainly stretches the meaning of the participle διαλαβόντες. Rather than tearing the animals apart, the image is one of the priests taking these large animals and almost effortlessly, because of their great strength, throwing them up onto the altar in the proper position for sacrifice. § 93. the legs of the sheep. The word “legs” is not explicit in the text. Hadas renders “the portions of the sheep.” The Greek is τὰ τῶν προβάτων. I have taken the neuter plural article to refer back to τὰ σκέλη, the previous use of the term legs, which is neuter plural. § 95. complete silence. C. T. R. Hayward suggests that Ps.-Aristeas derived his insistence on silence throughout the entire cultic ministrations from biblical texts, such as Hab 2:20 and Zech 2.13, but he relies on the Hebrew texts, which call for silence.501 The OG translation of these passages uses the verb εὐλαβέομαι, to act reverently or cautiously, which does not connote silence. There is no convincing evidence that Ps.-Aristeas has familiarity with the Hebrew text of these books. seven hundred. Where Ps.-Aristeas derived this number is uncertain. Ps.-Hecataeus as reported by Josephus (Against Apion 1.22[17]) gives a figure of fifteen hundred priests “at the most.” Between the large number of priests who are ministering at the same time and the “great number who bring the sacrifices,” some scholars have suggested the scene fits a festival season rather than the daily sacrifices, which comports with Ps.-Aris-

500 501

Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 19. Hayward, Jewish Temple, 33–34.

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teas’s previous comments about the large number of sacrificial victims offered during the festivals and reinforces the idea that he has festivals in mind.502

The High Priest’s Vestments (§§ 96–99) 96. We were greatly astonished when we beheld Eleazar at his service, both at the facts of his dress and his glory, which were exhibited through his attire of which he wore a robe and the precious stones all around it. For there are golden bells all around its hem, giving forth a unique musical sound. And next to each of these are pomegranates embroidered with brilliant colors, remarkable in hue. 97. And he was girded with a distinctive and striking girdle, woven with the most beautiful colors. And upon his breast he wore the so-called “oracle” in which are set twelve stones, differing in kinds, attached with gold, the names of the tribal leaders according to what would have been the original order, each one flashing forth an indescribable natural color individual to itself. 98. And upon his head was the so-called tiara and upon that the inimitable mitre, the sacred diadem, engraved upon gold leaf with holy letters, the name of God, between his eyebrows, filled with glory. He is thought worthy of these in his ministrations. 99. The appearance of these things produces awe and confusion, so that one might think that he had gone out of this world into another. And I insist that any person who comes near to the sight of those things that I have previously recounted will come into amazement and indescribable wonder, when turning his mind to the sacred construction of each thing. Textual Notes As in the previous section, there are few important textual variants here. § 98. Pelletier accepts the reading of the definite article ὁ before ὄνομα τοῦ θεοῦ in ms O (Thackeray lists also mss B T Z). The question of “a name of God” or “the name of God” prompted Pelletier to give a specific explana-

502

See especially, J. G. Février, La Date, la Composition, et les Sources de la Lettre d’Aristee à Philocrate (Bibliotheque de l’Ecole des Hautes Études 242; Paris: Librairie Ancienne Édouard Champion, 1925), who draws the conclusion from this passage and others that the author of Aristeas is a pilgrim to Jerusalem and not a royal representative. Of course, for this to be the case, these descriptions must be based on the author’s own presence in Jerusalem, which seems very unlikely. See the Introduction, section 7. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 136–37, thinks it likely that Ps.-Aristeas was drawing on a pilgrimage account for his narrative.

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III. Translation and Commentary

tory note.503 He argues that there is no reason to omit the article, even if the Jewish author is writing in the guise of a Gentile. Since the proper name of the Jewish god is in focus, the article makes better sense in the phrase. // Ms T uses the genitive case δόξης instead of the dative as in the remainder of the Greek manuscripts. While both are possible, the weight of the manuscript evidence here and the suitability of the dative to the phrase argue for its originality. § 99. Pelletier has opted for the reading of ms T over the rest of the Greek tradition in reading ἀνεκδιήγητον instead of ἀδιήγητον, again prompting a specific textual note.504 Ps.-Aristeas employs several related terms to communicate the indescribable nature of some objects. As recently as § 89, he used ἀδιήγητος to characterize the reservoirs and in § 97 the adjective ἀνεξήγητος describes the stones representing the twelve tribes on the high priest’s breastplate. Pelletier argues that when Ps.-Aristeas comes to summing up the entire scene, the ineffable quality of the whole is better represented by the triple-prefixed verb, which emphasizes the indescribability even more. In all practicality, however, these terms are functionally synonyms, and whether the Greek is ἀνεκδιήγητον or ἀδιήγητον, the English translation would remain essentially the same. General Comment In his description of Eleazar, Ps.-Aristeas takes a bit of a detour from his general descriptions of Jerusalem and the Temple, including the priesthood as it ministers there. He picks up this theme again in the following paragraphs. Of course, the high priest Eleazar, to whom we are re-introduced here, will become a central figure later in the narrative. Part of the point of this section is apparently to justify the representation of Eleazar as an equal of Ptolemy II, since Ps.-Aristeas offers a grand description of the high priest and his appearance. That he begins with the clause, “and we were greatly astonished” and ends by reiterating the indescribability of Eleazar’s appearance sets the tone. The obvious place to look for the source of Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the high priest would be the Septuagint of Exodus. But, while there are a number of parallels to the Exodus account, the situation seems to be more complex than simply borrowing directly from the text, since there are also quite a number of differences in the two descriptions, even where language is shared between the two texts. Of the articles of the high priest’s dress mentioned in Exodus 28, Ps.-Aristeas mentions the robe (χιτών), the full-

503 504

Pelletier, Lettre, 245. Pelletier, Lettre, 245.

Jerusalem and its Environs (§§ 83–120)

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length robe (ποδήρης, see below), the girdle (ζώνη), the oracle (λόγιον), the tiara (κίδαρις) and the mitre or turban (μίτρα). To the two terms for the priest’s headdresses, he adds βασίλειον, diadem, as an appositive to the μίτρα, thus implicitly affirming what we have seen already, that Eleazar as high priest is also the ruler of the Judeans.505 Ps.-Aristeas does not mention the ephod/shoulder strap (ἐπωμίς) at all, which is mentioned in the initial list of garments in Exod 28:4 and 6.506 Moreover, it is not altogether clear whether the word ποδήρης is intended to indicate a separate garment or the hem of the χιτών (as I have translated it here). In Exod 28:4, the word seems to indicate a full-length robe, but later in 28:27 (LXX; 28:31 MT) it appears as an adjective with ὑποδύτης to signify an undergarment that reaches to the feet. In any case, the golden bells, which Ps.-Aristeas says are on the ποδήρης, do not appear on this garment in Exodus, but on the bottom of the undergarment in Exod 28:29(33). The same is true of the pomegranates, which Ps.-Aristeas positions with the bells on the hem of the robe and which are on the undergarment in the same verse in Exodus. Somewhat curiously, although Ps.-Aristeas comments on the twelve stones that represent the twelve eponymous tribal ancestors of Israel and their individual colors, he does not mention the Urim and Thummim, which are carried on the λόγιον. As in the biblical and other non-biblical texts, Ps.-Aristeas has the twelve stones set into the λόγιον. There is some dispute, both in ancient and modern times, about whether the Urim and Thummim were used in the Second Temple period.507 It is possible that Ps.-Aristeas knows a tradition also known to Josephus (albeit in a different version) that the stones on the λόγιον shone forth at various moments of the high priest’s activity. In § 98, Ps.-Aristeas comments on the flashing forth of the stones. This description in the context is part of an ekphrasis that portrays the wonders of the priestly garments, but in Ant. 3.216–218, Josephus notes first that the high priest wore two “sardonyxes” on his shoulders, one of which shone when he was present at the sacrifices. He then writes: “Yet will I mention what is still more wonderful than this:

505 506

507

See the comment in Hayward, Jewish Temple, 35. This Greek term translates the Hebrew ‫אפד‬, usually transliterated as “ephod” in English. The Septuagint eliminates the distinction in Hebrew between the ephod of Exod 28:4 and the shoulder straps of 28:6. For a survey of the issues that argues for the availability of the Urim and Thummin in the Second Temple period, see Lisbeth S. Fried, “Did Second Temple High Priests Possess the Urim and Thummim?” Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 7 (2007) article 3 (http://www.jhsonline.org/Articles/article_64.pdf; last accessed Dec. 31, 2014).

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for God declared beforehand by those twelve stones which the high priest bore on his breast and which were inserted into his breast-plate, when they should be victorious in battle; for so great a splendor shone forth from them before the army began to march, that all the people were aware of God’s being present for their assistance.” Whether the flashing of the stones in Aristeas reflects a tradition like that of Josephus in which the stones on the breastplate (which Josephus says the Greeks called “oracle”) shone or whether it is simply Ps.-Aristeas’s composition as part of an ekphrasis is really difficult to judge.508 This section shares other descriptive phrases from Exodus 28 as well. In § 97, Ps.-Aristeas specifies that the λόγιον is worn “upon the chest” (ἐπὶ τοῦ στήθους), a phrase that matches Exod 28:23, 26 also in connection with the λόγιον. The “golden bells” and the “pomegranates” also derive from Exodus, as do the twelve stones, although in Aristeas we find the phrase λίθοι δεκαδύο, which is not found together in Exodus. Finally, with respect to the mitre, Ps.-Aristeas employs the term ἐκτυποῦν, “engraved,” and the phrase πετάλῳ χρυσῷ, “gold leaf,” to describe how the name of God was represented on the priest’s headwear. While each of these terms and phrases taken alone, or even in a small cluster, might be explained in ways other than knowledge of the biblical text, the relatively high frequency of the same or similar terms in such a small section suggests that Ps.-Aristeas was familiar with the description of the high priest’s garments from the Exodus account, although he adapts it quite freely for the purposes of ekphrasis in this section.

508

I make no presumptions about whether this passage reflects any actual use of the Urim and Thummim by the high priest. Fried thinks that if the ephod on which the stones were set is mentioned in second-temple texts, then this must have included the Urim and Thummim that were carried upon it. With respect to Aristeas, she says that Ps.-Aristeas “alludes” to the Urim and Thummim here and that “[t]he use of Exodus 28 (itself a second temple text) as the basis for the description of Eleazar’s vestments suggests that both the author and his readers assumed the contemporary high priest to be equipped in every way exactly as was the first high priest, Aaron” (pp. 18–19). This assumption is unwarranted in my view. Even if Ps.-Aristeas and his readers assumed such a thing, we are in no position to assume that the text has the Urim and Thummim in view, especially given the other differences that we see from Exodus 28 in this section.

Jerusalem and its Environs (§§ 83–120)

211

Notes § 96. astonishment. The Greek term translated this way in the initial phrase is ἔκπληξις. The word usually has a negative connotation, meaning “terror,” “consternation” or some “vehement passion” (LSJ). It certainly does not carry the negative connotation here. Perhaps the noun has taken over the more positive aspects of some uses of the verb from which it is derived, ἐκπλήσσω, where the sudden overcoming of emotion can be positive, such as “with love or joy.” brilliant colors. The translations of the Greek ἄνθεσι reflect differing assessments of Ps.-Aristeas’s dependence on the Septuagint. The noun ἄνθος can denote a flower or blossom, but also brightness or brilliance. Some scholars will translate the word “with flowers” (Hadas, Andrews) deriving the meaning from Exod 28:14 where tassels intermingled with flowers are placed on the shoulder straps of the ephod.509 Other scholars (Thackeray, Pelletier) understand the word as referring to the brilliant colors of the embroidered pomegranates, presumably (although they do not explicitly note it) because the account in Aristeas fails to mention either the ephod or the shoulder straps with which flowers are associated in Exodus.510 Shutt goes the farthest and renders the sentence: “Alongside of them are ‘tassels’ adorned with ‘flowers,’ and of marvelous colors.”511 There is no textual warrant for this translation, however, other than to bring Aristeas into further alignment with the text of Exodus. I understand this word along with Pelletier and Thackeray and have thus translated “brilliant colors,” although admittedly some reference to flowers is also possible. § 97. oracle. The word in Aristeas is λόγιον as we saw above. While there are no variants for the term in the manuscripts of Aristeas, a number of Septuagint manuscripts have the Greek term λογεῖον in place of λόγιον in Exodus. (Rahlfs’s text has the former term.) Λογεῖον means “a place for speaking, especially a term in Attic theater,” whereas λόγιον indicates an “oracle or utterance.” J. W. Wevers in his Göttingen edition of Exodus has λόγιον in his main text, and P. Walters (Katz) has convincingly argued that the translator of Exodus would have used λόγιον and that λογεῖον is an ittacistic variant despite the fact that it is a distinct Greek word.512 Philo 509 510 511 512

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 104; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 139. Thackeray, “Translation,” 258; Pelletier, Lettre, 151. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 19. John William Wevers, Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum Auctoritate Academiae Scientiarum Gottingensis editum II.1: Exodus (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1991); P. Walters (Katz), The Text of the Septuagint: Its Corruptions and Their Emendations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973) 283–84.

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III. Translation and Commentary

and Josephus, who both refer to this object as λόγιον, provide additional evidence that the Hebrew ‫ חשן‬was rendered by λόγιον in the Jewish-Greek scriptures and that Ps.-Aristeas knows the form used in the Septuagint.513 original order. The intent of this phrase is unclear. In Exod 28:9–10, God commands Moses to engrave six names of the “sons of Israel” on one stone and six on the other “according to their generations.” The phrase “the original order” in Aristeas could be an allusion to this command or it might allude to the birth order of the sons of Jacob, the eponymous ancestors of the tribes of Israel, as they are given in Genesis. Josephus in Ant. 3.163–171 has a very detailed description of the breastplate in which he lists the types, order and arrangement of the stones on which are engraved the names of the “sons of Jacob, whom we consider as our tribal chiefs (φυλάρχους).” This last word is the same one that Ps.-Aristeas employs for the tribal leaders whose names are engraved. § 98. the holy letters of the name of God. This phrase presumably refers to the tetragrammeton, the four-letter name of God usually transcribed as YHWH. In neither the Hebrew nor the Greek of Exodus is the name of God alone engraved on the mitre. In the Hebrew, the phrase is “holy to the Lord” (‫)קדש ליהוה‬, and in the Septuagint, the translator rendered the Hebrew phrase ἁγίασμα κυρίου, “holiness of the Lord.” Perhaps Ps.-Aristeas’s statement indicates that he is aware that the four-letter name comprises at least part of the phrase inscribed on the headdress. For him to know this, he would either have to know that the Greek κύριος represents the Hebrew four-letter name or have enough access to Hebrew (either his own knowledge or someone else’s) to know that the four-letter name appears here. It is not at all clear which of these might be the case, although there is no evidence that Ps.-Aristeas knows any Hebrew at all. In Josephus’s description of the high priest’s headgear in Ant. 3.178 as in Aristeas, he reports only that the name of God appears engraved on the headdress. Moreover, Ps.-Aristeas calls the letters “holy” (as does Josephus as well) and not the name, which presumably indicates that the name was written in some form of Hebrew. Pelletier argues that this phrase refers to paleo-Hebrew letters.514 In the Second Temple Period, we do find texts written in this older Hebrew script, and some manuscripts from the Dead

513

514

For more on the terms λογεῖον and λόγιον in Aristeas, see the comment below on § 158 and Benjamin G. Wright, “Three Ritual Practices in Aristeas §§ 158–160,” in Heavenly Tablets: Interpretation, Identity and Tradition in Ancient Judaism (Ed. Lynn LiDonnici and Andrea Lieber; JSJSup 119; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 11–29. Pelletier, Lettre, 152 (“alphabet archaïque”).

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Sea have the four-letter name written in paleo-Hebrew script rather than the Aramaic square script (2QExodb, 1QPsb, 4QIsac, for example). Even later, Simon bar Kochba used paleo-Hebrew script on coins. Perhaps more to the point, and more relevant for Ps.-Aristeas, in some Greek manuscripts the tetragrammeton was written either in paleo-Hebrew letters or in a stylized square script (see 8HevXIIgr, P.Oxy 1007 [Gen 2:7, 16–23; 3:16] and P.Oxy 3522 [Job 42:11–12], for example). Origen mentions this practice of writing the name in archaic letters in his commentary on Psalm 2.515 It seems unlikely that Ps.-Aristeas is here referring to the idea that the Hebrew language is the divine language, an idea that develops fully later in Judaism, although Hebrew does have a special value for the author of Jubilees; see Jub. 12.25–27, where God reveals Hebrew, “the tongue of creation,” to Abraham. If Ps.-Aristeas had been appealing to this idea, however, one might expect other references to the Hebrew language to show some evidence of that ideology, so, for example, in Demetrius’s reference to Hebrew in § 11. § 99. confusion. The Greek noun ταραχή usually denotes trouble, disorder, and confusion. Apparently the point that Ps.-Aristeas is trying to make here is that the incredible sight of Eleazar dressed in his priestly garments creates such a state of mind that one might think that s/he has left this world. As in other parts of the work where the author uses ekphrasis, this description is over the top. Hayward tentatively speculates that this description might also attribute the character of an angel to Eleazar, but nothing in the text convinces me that one ought to read it this way.516

The Citadel (§§ 100–104) 100. In order to get a thorough knowledge of everything, we ascended the citadel of the city, which lies close by, and looked. It is situated upon the most lofty site, fortified with many towers, which have been built of tall stones up to the very top, for protection of the areas around the Temple, just as we were informed, 101. so that, if there occurred any kind of attack or revolt or assault of enemies, none would be able to make their way into

515

516

Emanuel Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible (2nd revised edition; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001) 220. Origen says, “καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἀκριβεστάτοις δὲ τῶν ἀντιγράφων ἑβραίοις χαρακτῆρσιν κεῖται τὸ ὄνομα, ἑβραικοῖς δὲ οὐ τῆς νῦν ἀλλὰ τοῖς ἀρχαιοτάτοις” (cited by Pelletier, Lettre, 152). Hayward, Jewish Temple, 36.

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III. Translation and Commentary

the sacred precincts surrounding the building. Placed upon the towers of the citadel were artillery and various engines of war, and the place was at the very summit of the aforementioned precincts. 102. As it were, men who were most trustworthy and who had provided great demonstrations to their native land protected the towers. These could not leave the citadel, except for festivals, and then only a part of them, nor could anyone enter. 103. They were extremely strict, even if the leader gave some order for someone to enter in order to observe, even as occurred with us. For being unarmed and two in number, they barely admitted us so that we could view the proceedings of the sacrifices. 104. And they said that this matter was guaranteed by oaths. For they had all sworn, out of necessity discharging by divine providence the obligation of the oath, that even though they were five hundred, not to let in more than five people at the same time. For the citadel was the entire protection for the temple. And the one who founded it thus secured the preservation of the things about which we have spoken. Textual Notes § 100. Ms B reads ὡς μεταλαμβάνωσι προφυλακῆς for the phrase ὡς μεταλαμβάνομεν πρὸς φυλακήν, for protection … just as we were informed, of the rest of the manuscript tradition, which completely changes the meaning. The reading of ms B is clearly secondary. § 104. The Greek manuscripts all read ἐπιτελουμένου. Pelletier has adopted Wendland’s emendation to ἐπιτελουμένους, discharging, and I have followed Pelletier. The emendation to an accusative plural participle rather than the genitive singular makes the word agree with the plural of “they had all sworn” on which it depends. // Whether to read ὁρισμόν with the manuscripts (and with Thackeray) or ὁρκισμόν (translated here as “oath”) as Mendelssohn emended the word (and adopted in Pelletier’s text) is a very difficult question. The usual meaning of ὁρισμός is “boundary, limitation” or even “a definition or wager.” LSJ gives subsidiary meanings of “decree” and “vow,” but these are based on Septuagint meanings.517 On the other hand, ὁρκισμός refers to the administration of an oath, and thus more directly in normal Greek has to do with oaths. I have followed Pelletier’s text, although all scholars understand this passage to refer to the fulfillment of an oath by the men chosen to guard the citadel. // Wendland and Schmidt,

517

Ascribing new meanings to Greek words based on their use in the Septuagint is inherently problematic, and LSJ has been subject to criticism for these kinds of definitions. See John A. L. Lee, “A Note on Septuagint Material in the Supplement to Liddell and Scott,” Glotta 47 (1969) 234–42.

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perhaps on the basis of the phrase in the text of § 100, suggest emending τὴν προφυλακὴν of the manuscripts to πρὸς φυλακήν. There seems to be no reason to make this emendation, however, since the text reads perfectly well as it stands. General Comment As is true of so many other aspects of Aristeas, scholars have attempted to take this report of the citadel and identify it with some specific fortress in Jerusalem in order (a) to narrow down a date for the book or (b) to give it some historical credence.518 In this instance, the reference to the citadel accomplishes neither of these agendas. That there were citadels or fortresses at various times in Jerusalem is beyond doubt. In Nehemiah 2:8 and 7:2 we hear of a citadel (‫ בירא‬in Hebrew and transliterated βιρα in Greek).519 2 Maccabees 4:12, 28 and 5:5 also mention a citadel (ἀκρόπολις) in Jerusalem, where Menelaus took refuge from Jason in the aftermath of rumors of Antiochus IV’s death in Egypt. Josephus recounts that Herod constructed his citadel “Antonia” on this site and that it was near the temple (War 1.75; Ant. 15.403, 18.91). Antiochus IV, according to 1 Macc 1:33 and Josephus Ant. 12.252, built a citadel (ἄκρα) in the “lower part of the city” that overlooked the Temple (so Josephus) after he took Jerusalem by deceit and ravaged it. Given the mid- to late-second century date for the composition of Aristeas, our author might be referring to any of these fortresses except Herod’s, but all he would need to have is some account like that in 2 Esdras to know that a citadel existed near the Temple. Bezalel Bar-Kochva observes that the location of the citadel in § 100 actually conflicts with the statement in § 84 that the Temple sits on the “summit” of the mountain. Bar-Kochva

518

519

See, for example, Vincent, “Jerusalem”; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 104; Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2733. See also Meecham, Oldest Version, 181–82. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 140, argues that this reference is of little help in dating the book, although he seems to think that Ps.-Aristeas is referring to a particular historical structure. In Greek, Ezra and Nehemiah are part of a double tradition found in 1 Esdras, which includes some portions of 2 Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, whose exact relationship to the biblical book is not clear, and 2 Esdras (Greek), which is a closer translation of Ezra and Nehemiah. In 2 Esd 12:8 (=Neh 2:8) there is no reference to the bira’, but in 2 Esd 7:2 the word is transliterated in Greek. For more on these books, see R. Glenn Wooden’s introductions to them in the NETS translation (Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright, eds., A New English Translation of the Septuagint and the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included under that Title [New York: Oxford University Press, 2007] 393–93, 405–7).

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concludes that since the description of the citadel does not recall any biblical passage or any contemporary Hellenistic practice, Ps.-Aristeas must be depending on “personal knowledge” here, although he qualifies that statement to mean that this knowledge could have come from “pilgrims returning from Jerusalem.”520 How we would know that this is “personal knowledge” I cannot determine, but I find it unlikely that Ps.-Aristeas knows any of the specific structures mentioned above. To have a citadel to protect a critical space makes perfect sense in a Hellenistic city, especially the kind of ideal one that Ps.-Aristeas is constructing in these sections. Whatever the case might be with respect to the realia of a citadel or citadels in Jerusalem, Ps.-Aristeas’s purpose is not to give a precise description of the city as it was. His is an ideal city, as we have seen above. In the present case, Honigman has made the intriguing suggestion that Ps.-Aristeas paraphrases Aristotle’s recommendation about fortresses in order to assert that a monarchical high priest heads the Jerusalem theocracy.521 “As to fortified positions, what is expedient is not the same for all forms of constitution alike; for example, a citadel-hill is suitable for oligarchy and monarchy, and a level site for democracy; neither is favorable to an aristocracy, but rather several strong positions,” says Aristotle (Politics 7.11 [1330b]). Thus, the philosopher outlines three possibilities: a single citadel for monarchies and oligarchies; a level plane for democracies; and numerous strongholds for aristocracies. Ps.-Aristeas’s single citadel, although it happens to coincide with the reality of ancient Jerusalem, combined with the position of Eleazar the high priest, who can stand as an equal to Ptolemy II and who is assumed to be the ruler of Jerusalem and the Jews, fits Aristotle’s model of a monarchy, except that the Jewish monarch is a priest. Of course, this situation also coheres with Hecataeus’s observation that the Jews did not have a king but were ruled by a high priest (apud Diodorus Siculus, 40.3) and with what we know about the political situation in Jerusalem in the second century. Ben Sira, for example, in his praise of Aaron and the contemporary high priest Simon II not only reflects a politics that has a high priest as the secular ruler, he is all in favor of it.522 Of course, under the Hasmoneans, the high priest wielded tremendous secular power as well. 520

521 522

Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 274–75. Bar-Kochva makes this argument as part of a longer discussion of this passage’s impact on finding a date for the book. On Aristeas’s date, see Introduction, section 5. For additional critique of identifying Ps.-Aristeas’s citadel with historical instantiations of citadels in Jerusalem, see Bickerman, “Dating,” 114. Honigman, “La Description,” 83–84. On Ben Sira’s view of the high priest, see Martha Himmelfarb, “The Wisdom of

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There is a subtle point to be made here, however. Ps.-Aristeas might well possess sources that describe Jerusalem or other knowledge about the city, its Temple and the office of the high priest, but his goal is to demonstrate that Jerusalem is an ideal city, a theocracy, that is ruled by a monarchical high priest, and as such both the city and its leader have a status that can stand up to and even equal that of Alexandria and Ptolemy II. By appealing to Aristotle’s construction of the ideal city, Ps.-Aristeas makes strong claims about Jerusalem’s significance vis-à-vis Alexandria. The use of ekphrasis to describe the high priest and his city further emphasizes the glory of both. Ps.-Aristeas describes a permanent garrison that occupies the citadel to protect the Temple, whose sacred areas must be kept safe from either foreign invasion or domestic revolt.523 These men are only allowed out of the citadel, and only a few at a time, during the periods of festival. In this way, the Temple’s security was safeguarded constantly. Notes § 100. we were informed. The verb μεταλαμβάνω, which has a root meaning of “to have a share of, to partake in,” is almost always transitive, but here it is intransitive. § 101. building. See the note on § 84. artillery. The Greek term ὀξυβελής designated a type of ancient Greek crossbow, of which it was a larger type of the smaller γαστραφέτης (literally “belly shooter”), that fired sharp arrows.524 § 102. native land. The Greek πατρίς refers to one’s native or “father”

523

524

the Scribe, the Wisdom of the Priest, and the Wisdom of the King According to Ben Sira,” in For a Later Generation: The Transformation of Tradition in Israel, Early Judaism and Early Christianity (Ed. R. A. Argall et al.; Harrisburg, Penn.: Trinity Press International 2000) 89–99; Benjamin G. Wright, “Ben Sira on Kings and Kingship,” in Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers (Ed. Tessa Rajak et al.; Hellenistic Culture and Society 50; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007) 76–91; and Otto Mulder, Simon the High Priest in Sirach 50: An Exegetical Study of the Significance of Simon the High Priest as Climax to the Praise of the Fathers in Ben Sira’s Concept of the History of Israel (JSJSup 78; Leiden: Brill, 2003). Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 141, notes that Josephus gives the reason of defending against insurrection for the citadel’s function, but Hadas’s comment is misleading. In Ant. 5.238–245, Josephus notes that the Romans placed a legion in the citadel to suppress any insurrection on the part of the Jews. This reason differs dramatically from that of Ps.-Aristeas, who has Judeans manning the garrison and protecting the Temple of their own city. On the gastrophetēs and Greek artillery, see Duncan B. Campbell, Greek and Roman Artillery 339 BC–AD 363 (Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2003) 1–15.

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land. This is the only place in Aristeas where the noun occurs. Combined with the great demonstrations of their loyalty, Ps.-Aristeas paints a picture that those who manned the citadel were great patriots to their home country. This expression of Judean nationalist sentiment contrasts with Ps.-Aristeas’s attitude elsewhere, since his work gives the impression that he feels no discomfort living in a diaspora community in Alexandria. Here, though, that sentiment is attributed to Judeans living in Jerusalem. Alexandrian Jews might have felt similarly about the importance of Jerusalem, but this does not represent dissatisfaction with life in Alexandria. § 103. the leader. This is evidently the high priest, Eleazar. In § 122, Eleazar is explicitly referred to as the leader of the translators who will be sent to Jerusalem, although the words used to indicate leadership come from two different but related verbs, προκαθηγέομαι here and καθηγέομαι in § 122. sacrifices. The Greek term is θυσία. § 104. five hundred … five. The larger number does not seem to reflect numbers of troops in any division of a Hellenistic army. It seems more likely that the two numbers are meant to emphasize the care that was taken for security. Even at five hundred to five, these men were careful of the Temple’s security. the one who founded it. Ps.-Aristeas does not specify any specific personage. If he did have one in mind, then identifying the founder might depend on which citadel one thinks Ps.-Aristeas intends in the section. As I noted above, I do not think that this is the critical issue. A much more likely identification is Moses, even though Ps.-Aristeas does not name him. Numerous traditions about Judean origins that circulated in Egypt assumed that Moses founded Jerusalem after he left Egypt with his people. Some of these traditions are reported in anti-Jewish authors, but others retain greater neutrality. A long excerpt on Moses and the Jews, attributed to Hecataeus of Abdera’s Aegyptiaca, claims that Moses dedicated the Temple in Jerusalem, which he founded.525

525

The passage comes through Diodorus Siculus Book 40 as preserved in the Bibliotheca of Photius. See the note on Hecataeus at § 31. Also, Gager, Moses in Greco-Roman Paganism, 26–37.

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The City and Its Streets (§§ 105–106) 105. The size of the city is suitably proportioned, having a circumference of forty stadia, as far as one can conjecture. The position of its towers is like that of a theater, and the thoroughfares appear – some above and some below – in the accustomed manner, and pathways (appear) through them. For the terrain of the place has a slope, since the city was built on a mountain. 106. There are stairs to the thoroughfares. Some make their way at a high level and others do so below them, and they mostly keep separate on the way, because of those who are in a state of purity, since they will touch nothing that is forbidden. Textual Notes § 105. One manuscript, B, instead of the noun χύμα, size, has a different noun, σχῆμα, shape, form. // The phrase “in the accustomed manner” reflects the adverb εἰθισμένως rather than the participles εἰθισμένων of the majority of the manuscript tradition or ἠθισμένων of mss K G I T*vid Z (an evident ittacism), from which, as Andrews and Meecham note, it is very difficult to derive any sensible meaning.526 Thackeray accepted the adverb as an emendation from H. A. Redpath and most scholars have accepted it.527 I have followed Thackeray/Redpath in my translation. § 106. The nominative masculine plural participle, διεστηκότες, they keep separate, is Thackeray’s emendation from the manuscripts’ accusative plural διεστηκότας, which does not make grammatical sense in the present context.528 General Comment The description of Jerusalem itself is actually very short, encompassing only these two paragraphs. The text is not always easy to translate and interpret, however. Moreover, where Ps.-Aristeas gets his information is not clear. Honigman argues that even here, Ps.-Aristeas is dependent on Aristotle’s Politics, but the two texts are actually quite different. Aristotle’s mention of streets comes in a discussion about the arrangements of private 526 527

528

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 105; Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 237. Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 105, attributes the emendation to Thackeray. Thackeray, however, in “Appendix,” 503, writes, “For one happy emendation … the writer is indebted to the Rev. H. A. Redpath.” For a complete explanation, see Thackeray, “Translation,” 359 n. 3. Ms O2 has the feminine genitive singular –κυίας, which brings the participle into agreement with the following τῆς ὁδείας.

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dwellings, and at first he advocates straight streets (εὔτομος) “in the new fashion” of Hippodamus of Miletus,529 but for security reasons in war, he says that it might be better to use the plans of cities “in ancient times,” since it is harder for armies to make their way through cities of this type. He ultimately recommends using the advantages of both plans. Ps.-Aristeas, on the other hand, uses none of Aristotle’s vocabulary. In § 105, he designates two types of streets: the δίοδος, a thoroughfare or way in, and the διέξοδος, a way out or a passage. To complicate matters, in § 106 he says that there are stairs (διαβάθραι)530 to the thoroughfares (δίοδος) that are evidently different from the passages. Both Thackeray and Hadas understand “in the accustomed manner” to mean that the thoroughfares (δίοδος) lie across the slope in the manner of rows in a theater and the passages (cross-streets in this view; διέξοδος) run up and down as theater aisles would.531 The stairways are then another way of traveling up and down between the streets. Thus, if Ps.-Aristeas is relying on Aristotle here, he completely reconfigures his prescriptions. In fact, the only thing that they have in common here is that both authors think that cities should have streets. Ps.-Aristeas continues to emphasize the religious character of the place, however. He comments on those who travel these streets, and he specifically notes that they keep separate as they travel so that those who are in a state of ritual purity do not come into contact with anything that would render them impure. Here Ps.-Aristeas almost certainly has the biblical purity laws in view. Later in §§ 128–171, Ps.-Aristeas composes for the high priest Eleazar a long speech that includes an explanation of the kosher laws in which the assumption is that Jews observe these laws, even though they have an allegorical meaning. In this section, we see that same assumption, that Jews actually observe these laws. Notes § 105. a circumference of forty stadia. Ps.-Aristeas is not the only ancient source to provide a size for the city of Jerusalem. Ps.-Hecataeus as quoted by Josephus (Against Apion 1.198) says that the city has a circumference

529

530

531

Hippodamus was a Greek polymath of the fifth century BCE, who devised a grid plan for urban planning. LSJ define the word as a “ladder”; Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 237, glosses it as “stairways.” See their translations in Thackeray, “Translation,” 359; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 143.

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of about fifty stadia (περίμετρος; περίβολος in Aristeas).532 In War 5.159, Josephus himself gives a size of thirty-three stadia at the time of the siege of Jerusalem. Finally, a certain Timochares, who according to Eusebius, wrote a Life of Antiochus, gives the size of the city as forty stadia, the same as in Aristeas (Preparation for the Gospel 9.35). § 106. purity. The Greek term employed here is ἁγνεία. This noun is rare in the Septuagint, only occurring in Num 6:2, 21. Only the translator of Numbers preferred words from the stem ἁγν-, which has a root meaning of purify; Exod 19:10 (the verb ἁγνίζω) has the single occurrence of the root outside of Numbers. Elsewhere in the Septuagint the preferred terms are words that come from the stem καθαρ-, which refers to cleaning or cleansing.

The Surrounding Countryside and Comparison to Alexandria (§§ 107–111) 107. It was not without reason that the first settlers constructed the city with fitting proportions, and they planned wisely. For the country is broad and beautiful, and some parts are flat, such as those in what is called Samaria and those bordering the country of the Idumaeans, and some are mountainous, such as those parts in the middle, where it is necessary to be unremitting in the cultivation and attention to the land so that by doing so the inhabitants might have an abundance of fruitfulness. Since this happens, everything is cultivated with much abundance in the entirety of the aforementioned country. 108. But in those cities that have great size and an accompanying prosperity, an abundance of population results, but the countryside is neglected, everyone inclined towards individual enjoyment, all people being in constitution prone towards pleasure. 109. This is what happened to Alexandria, which surpassed all other cities in size and prosperity. For those from the country who dwelled abroad there and stayed for a long time brought matters of trade into decline. 110. Thus, so that they might not stay, the king commanded that no one could sojourn for more than twenty days. And to those who were in charge of business matters he similarly issued orders in writing that if it became necessary to summon anyone, a decision must be rendered within five days. 111. Considering

532

Oswyn Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 124–25, notes the “strong affinity” between Aristeas and Ps.-Hecataeus’s Peri Ioudaion (see also his “The Letter of Aristeas,” Studi ellenistici 54 [1987] 21).

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it very important, he ordered judges and their staffs into the districts, so that the farmers and agents, who were pursuing making money, might not diminish the city’s storehouses – I mean the income from agriculture. Textual Notes § 107. All of the manuscripts contain the phrase τῶν κατὰ τὴν Σαμαρεῖτιν λεγομένων, which is clearly corrupt, the ending of the participle having been attracted to the genitive plural article. Mendelssohn emended the final word to λεγομένην, which makes the participle agree with τήν, producing the sensible phrase “in what is called Samaria.” // The phrase contained in all the manuscripts, τῶν πρὸς τὴν γεωργίαν, is obviously missing something between the first article and the preposition. Thackeray has filled it out on the basis of the clause “bordering on the country of the Idumaeans” as συναπτόντων τῇ τῶν Ἰουδαίων χώρᾳ χρή, “bordering on the country of the Judaeans.” The verb at the end is necessary to complement the infinitive γίνεσθαι later in the clause. Pelletier has followed Wendland’s emendation (a correction of Wilamowitz-Moellendorff’s suggestion) of πρὸς μέσην τὴν χώραν χρή, “those parts in the middle of the country,” employing the same verb as Thackeray. Thackeray’s suggestion does not really make adequate sense here, though, since Ps.-Aristeas is describing the Judeans’ country, and thus a reference to areas bordering on the land of the Judeans seems superfluous in the context. Later, in his translation, Thackeray translates “namely those adjoining the country of Judaea,” but in a footnote he admits that Wendland’s reading “is perhaps nearer the mark.”533 // Toward the end of the paragraph, ms B preserves the correct reading μετά, “with,” rather than the particle μέν of the rest of the manuscript tradition.534 § 109. For the phrase “those who dwelled abroad,” I have followed Pelletier in preferring mss O and T, which read ἐπιξενούμενοι. Thackeray follows the majority of the manuscript tradition in reading ἀποξενούμενοι. Both can indicate living abroad, but the subtle differences in meaning are decisive here. The verb ἐπιξενόομαι has the sense of being entertained as a guest or having hospitable relations with someone. On the other hand, ἀποξενόω has the connotation of being banished or forced into exile. In the context, these are people who have moved from the country to the city, and there is no indication of forced movement. Thus, ἐπιξενόομαι fits the context

533 534

Thackeray, “Translation,” 360. It also reverses the word order. Thackeray gives the reading as an emendation of Mendelssohn, but Pelletier lists it as coming from ms B. Since Pelletier has reexamined the manuscript, I have followed his apparatus here.

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much better. § 111. On the basis of the phrase in § 1, Mendelssohn conjectured that πρὸ πολλοῦ at the beginning of the verse should be περὶ πολλοῦ. There seems to be no real reason to depart from the reading of the manuscripts here. General Comment This section actually says very little about Jerusalem or Judea, but it effectively amounts to a comparison between Jerusalem and its Judean environment and Alexandria and its surrounding countryside. Hadas regards this section as a synkrisis, a comparison that was one of the exercises in the progymnasmata of rhetorical training.535 As a rhetorical exercise, in the synkrisis one tried to show that “one thing is proved better or worse than another by systematic comparison of the qualities of both.”536 In this case, two basic qualities are at stake: city size and the agriculture that sustains it. Based on Ps.-Aristeas’s comment in § 109 that Alexandria surpassed all other cities in size and prosperity, Hadas concludes that even a pious Jew would have to recognize that Alexandria is superior to Jerusalem.537 Given the way that the section is constructed, however, Honigman is probably closer to the mark when she notes that if we look to Ps.-Aristeas’s possible sources, Jerusalem fares better than Hadas recognizes.538 If we compare Aristeas again to Aristotle’s Politics, we find in 7.4 [1326a] that the philosopher is no great fan of large cities, since “experience also shows that it is difficult and perhaps impossible for a state with too large a population to have good legal government.” For Aristotle, the well-governed city must have some constraints on population. So, while Aristotle does not explicitly argue that a city must be of more moderate size, this is clearly the implication of the passage; bigger is not better. Returning to §§ 107–111, we find that Jerusalem, on the one hand, is characterized as a more moderately sized city that has “fitting proportions” (συμμετρία; see also § 105) and that no city, on the other hand, surpasses Alexandria in size. Moreover, those who settled Jerusalem “planned wisely.” Ps.-Aristeas’s characterization of Alexandria’s population directly contrasts (although implicitly) with that of Jerusalem. In the Egyptian context, people moved from the country to the city, which increased the population and which had two results: the countryside was neglected. That is,

535 536 537 538

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 50, 143. Webb, Ekphrasis, 43. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 144. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 24.

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agriculture declined, and people pursued their own enjoyment, “all people being in constitution prone towards pleasure” (§ 108). The only way to resolve the problem was by a royal decree that permitted only twenty days stay in the city. The king (Ptolemy II?) even ordered officials to go into the Egyptian nomes to assure that farming – here defined in terms of economic benefit – would not decline. By contrast, Jerusalem suffers from no such difficulties. In fact, Ps.-Aristeas notes that even though parts of the country are mountainous, the Jews constantly labor to make the land abundant and fruitful. Ps.-Aristeas’s description of the troubles in Alexandria bear a remarkable similarity to the description of Peisistratus’s reign in Athens in the Aristotelian composition Athenian Constitution 16539: Peisistratus’s administration of the state was, as has been said, moderate and more constitutional than tyrannic; he was kindly and mild in everything, and in particular he was merciful to offenders, and moreover he advanced loans of money to the poor for their farming. In doing this he had two goals, to prevent their stopping in the city and make them stay scattered about the country, and to cause them to have a moderate competence and be engaged in their private affairs, so as not to desire nor to have time to attend to public business. And also the land’s being thoroughly cultivated resulting in increasing his revenues; for he levied a tithe from the produce. And for this he organized the local justices and often went to the country on circuit in person, inspecting and settling disputes in order that people might not neglect their agriculture by coming into the city.

In this text the tyrant gave loans to the poor so that they would not linger in the city but support themselves by farming and thus increase the city’s revenues from taxes. In addition, he sent magistrates into the countryside to keep these people from coming to the city.540 In the case of Athens, however, Peisistratus was able to head off any difficulties by acting ahead of time, whereas according to Aristeas, in Alexandria the decree preventing people from staying in the city was a response to an already problematic situation. In any case, however, none of these measures were necessary in Judea. Additionally, the divide between the idyllic nature of life on the land (usually shepherding) and the decadence and extravagance of city living was well established in Alexandria already in the third century BCE. For instance, the contrast in the third century BCE between Theocritus’s Idylls and their

539

540

The authorship of the Athenian Constitution is disputed, but it likely came from a student of Aristotle’s and not the philosopher himself. See P. J. Rhodes, The Athenian Constitution (Penguin Classics; London: Penguin Books, 2002). Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 144, cites this part of the text.

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romanticizing of pastoral life and Herodas’s Mimes with their urban amorality could not be more dramatic. In this sense, Ps.-Aristeas draws on a tradition that would likely resonate with his readers, but he puts it to a different use, contrasting the large population of Alexandria and its pursuit of pleasure with Judeans who produce abundance on the land.541 When taken in toto, it appears that in Ps-Aristeas’s view Jerusalem stacks up quite well against Alexandria. In terms of the synkrisis, one would certainly think Jerusalem the better of the two cities. To what degree Ps.-Aristeas is intending overt criticism of Alexandria might be debated, since his argument is certainly subtle. Yet, the result emerges clearly as part of a larger agenda in this and the surrounding paragraphs. Jerusalem resembles much more closely than does Alexandria the ideal city as Aristotle envisions it. It is moderate in size, which leads to good government, and it is self-sufficient, since the land is cultivated and abundantly fruitful.542 Both of these conditions provide the opportunity for an ideal quality of life for its citizens. Notes § 107. what is called Samaria. The clause assumes that Samaria, as a region, is actually part of Judea. Hadas simply says without any further comment that the “what is called” delimiter is used because Samaria was an “unfamiliar designation.”543 Yet as early as 2 Kings 17:24 we find a reference to the “cities of Samaria,” which at the least envisions Samaria as a region surrounding the capital of the north. (See also Ezra 4:2, 10.) Bickerman suggested that “Samaria” in Aristeas actually refers to three toparchies, Aphairema, Lydda, and Ramathaim, that passed into the hands of the Jews in 145 BCE according to 1 Maccabees (10:30, 38; 11:34).544 country of the Idumeans. The Idumeans were the inhabitants of the ancient kingdom of Edom, which lay south and east of Judea. The manner of referring to the area in Aristeas seems to presume a situation before the Hasmonean John Hyrcanus conquered Idumea in the latter part of the second

541

542 543 544

Peter Green has called this romanticizing of pastoral life by poets such as Theocritus “urbanized pastoralism.” See Peter Green, Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990) 233–47. On self-sufficiency as a characteristic of the ideal city, see Aristotle, Politics 7.4 (1326b). Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 143. For Bickerman’s discussion, see “Dating,” 127–29. See also, Bar-Kochva, PseudoHecataeus, 282–84. Bar Kochva accepts Bickerman’s basic dates of between 145 BCE and 127 BCE.

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century BCE and integrated it into Judea.545 Bar-Kochva argues that this phrase could not have been used after Hyrcanus’s conquest of Idumea, especially since “country of the Idumeans” would have been inappropriate for that time period. Bickerman originally understood the phrase as politically charged but later changed his mind and denied any political significance to the phrase.546 Gruen maintains that there is no reason that Idumea could not be referred to in this way no matter what the political circumstances.547 the inhabitants. The Greek simply has the relative pronoun οὗτοι here. It has no obvious antecedent in the preceding lines, and so it probably refers to the people who live in these mountainous regions. It is possible, though, that the pronoun refers to the mountainous areas, and then one might render “these places/regions.” § 108. in constitution prone towards pleasure. For this idea, Ps.-Aristeas might well be dependent on Aristotelian ideas, particularly as expressed in his Nichomachean Ethics. In his discussion of the idea of the mean in 1109a, Aristotle says, “… we are of ourselves more inclined to pleasure, which is why we are prone to profligacy …” This same sentiment arises elsewhere in Aristeas in § 222, and § 122 also alludes to Aristotelian ethics, when the translators are said to be men who are “zealous for the middle way,” an obvious reference to Aristotle’s doctrine of the mean. § 110. the king. The monarch at issue is not stated. In the context it is hard to avoid the conclusion that Ps.-Aristeas is referring to Ptolemy II. Hadas assumes that this is the case. He thinks that the situation in § 111 might reflect a decree of Ptolemy “if it is not merely a reminiscence of Aristotle” (referring to the Athenian Constitution).548 Gruen says that the situation presumed in this section would have been impossible at the time of Philadelphus, making this more evidence of the later origin of the book.549 § 111. judges … staffs. The word χρηματισταί refers to circuit judges in the Ptolemaic period, which takes the place of the δικασταί in the Athenian Constitution.550 The χρηματισταί are mentioned with relative frequency in the papyri, so, for example, with respect to the right of Egyp545

546 547 548 549 550

See Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 131–32, 279–82. Bar-Kochva cites archaeological evidence that would put the date of conquest in 112/111 BCE. See the discussion in Bar-Kochva, Pseudo-Hecataeus, 281–82, particularly 281 n. 33. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2734. He also includes Samaria in this statement. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 145. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2734. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 89.

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tians who have negotiated certain contracts with Greeks to sue and obtain justice from these judges. By contrast Egyptians who have contracted with other Egyptians cannot resort to these judges but must use judges in native courts: ὑπέχειν καὶ λαμβάνειν τὸ δίκαιον ἐπὶ τῶν χρηματιστῶν … μὴ ἐπισπᾶσθαι τοὺς χρημα(τιστὰς) ἀλλ’ ἐᾶν [[κρι]] διεξάγεσθαι ἐπὶ τῶν λαοκριτῶν (C.Ord.Ptol. 53.213–219 = P.Tebt. 5.213–214; 121–118 BCE).551 The word ὑπηρέται is a general word indicating servants or assistants. Fraser notes that in an inscription from 172 BCE we find a ὑπηρέτης of a group of judges, and thus the language here probably reflects actual Ptolemaic practice.552 districts. Ps.-Aristeas uses the usual term for the political divisions of Ptolemaic Egypt, νομός, nome. agents. The meaning of προστάτης, literally someone who stands before, is difficult here. It is not a very precise word, usually referring to a leader or chief, even an administrator, but it also can connote someone who guards or protects. Thackeray suggests taking it to refer to both the farmers and the storehouses, and thus, he would translate “the farmers who are also the protectors of the city.”553 Such a rendering makes some sense in the context in which the king is trying to keep farmers on the land in order to produce grain for the country. That interpretation makes the conjunction καί do a lot of semantic heavy lifting in the phrase, however. It seems more likely that the προστάται are those administrators who act as agents for the farmers. These two classes of people would need to be settled in the country in order for the system to function properly and to provide enough food for the city.

Palestine and its Resources (§§ 112–118) 112. We have made this digression because of the aforementioned things that we received so excellently from Eleazar. For the industry of those who do agriculture is great. Also their country is plentifully wooded with olive trees and cereal crops and pulse, with grapevines and much honey as well. Other fruit trees and date palms are without number among them. And there are both many sorts of cattle and plentiful pastures for them.

551

552 553

For the full text, see Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances, 133. These officers appear in third century BCE papyri as well. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 3.977 n. 148. Thackeray, “Translation,” 361.

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113. Therefore they recognized well that those districts required a high population, and they laid out the construction of the city and the villages proportionally. 114. The Arabs transport into the area a great amount of spices and precious stones and gold. The country is fully suited to agriculture and to commerce. The city has many crafts, and it does not want for anything imported by sea. 115. For it possesses convenient harbors that furnish these goods, the one at Ashkelon and Joppa and Gaza, and similarly also at Ptolemaïs, which the king founded. But it is situated centrally to the aforementioned areas, not being very far away. The country has everything in abundance, being everywhere well watered and having great security. 116. Around it flows the river that is called Jordan, which never stops flowing. The country had no less than six million aroura at the beginning – but afterwards neighboring peoples encroached upon it – and six hundred thousand men settled one hundred aroura lots. The river, which fills up just like the Nile in the days of the harvest, irrigates much of the land. 117. This stream empties into another river in the country of the people of Ptolemaïs, and it goes out to the sea. Other “torrents,” as they are called, flow down, encompassing parts of Gaza and the country of Azotus. 118. It is surrounded by natural defenses, being difficult to invade and impregnable to large numbers, because the passages are narrow, flanked with steep cliffs and deep ravines. Furthermore, the entire mountain range that surrounds the entire country is rugged. Textual Notes § 113. Mss B P T Z read προσδέονται, whereas the rest of the manuscripts have the unprefixed form δέονται. The prefixed form is preferable because its main meaning “to need still or besides” makes the best sense in the context. The country is plentiful in natural resources, but the founders realized the area would still require a large population. § 115. The initial definite article in the phrase in ms B, τόν τε κατὰ τὴν Ἀσκαλῶνα …, is written in the genitive plural in most of the manuscripts and the neuter nominative/accusative plural in some others. Its most likely referent is λιμήν, harbor, which is masculine, and thus ms B’s text is the likely original. § 116. Thackeray suggested adding the words τῆς δὲ χώρας to the beginning of the second sentence, since it is manifestly incomplete. Virtually all scholars have accepted this suggestion, and this is the text I have translated above. // The verb in the small parenthesis, “but afterwards neighboring people’s encroached upon it,” is somewhat difficult textually. Instead of ἐπέβησαν, they encroached, ms P reads ὑπέβησαν, they stepped back or retreated. As Thackeray notes, however, this version creates logical problems between “at the beginning” and “after-

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wards.”554 A foreign advance, which took some land after the initial settlement, makes the most sense here. // The phrase “one hundred aroura” is written in the manuscripts as ἑκοντάρουροις. J. P. Mahaffy, followed by virtually all scholars, emended the text to the nominative plural ἑκοντάρουροι, which is found in the papyri and which agrees with the adjective ἔγκληροι, having lots or shares.555 § 117. Most of the Greek manuscripts read ἐκβάλλει, branch out (when used of a river), except for G I and T, which have ἐμβάλλει, empty itself (of a river). The latter reading suits the context and represents the best textual reading.556 // The spelling of the genitive plural ethnic “people of Ptolemaïs” in the manuscripts is Πτολεμαίων, which Pelletier argues is an adaptation. Wendland suggested Πτολεμαέων, which looks to be taken from Josephus. Pelletier prefers the spelling Πτολεμαιέων based primarily on epigraphic evidence. He cites a third century BCE text from Ptolemaïs-Hermius where the spelling is Πτολεμαιέων.557 Other examples of the same spelling can be found in texts from Delos (119/118 BCE) and Rhodes (first half of first century BCE).558 § 118. The manuscripts disagree about the part of speech and case of ἀσφαλείαις, defenses. The dative plural of the second corrector of ms O (according to Pelletier’s collations) is almost certainly the correct reading. It agrees with the adjective it governs, αὐτοφυέσι, and the phrase is a proper grammatical complement to the verb περιέχεται. Ms T has the adverbial form ἀσφαλῶς, and the remainder of the manuscripts read an adjectival form, ἀσφαλές. General Comment This section continues two themes that we have seen in §§ 83–111: Ps.-Aristeas’s use of traditions about ideal cities and the synkrisis or comparison. In Ps.-Aristeas’s focus on the countryside in these paragraphs, we encounter features of what Honigman calls “utopianizing geography,” which is related to well established Greek interest in geography and ethnography, particularly with Egypt and India in view.559 For Ps.-Aristeas, Egypt is for

554 555 556

557 558

559

Thackeray, “Translation,” 362–63. See Pelletier, Lettre, 162. This is Pelletier’s apparatus. Thackeray’s apparatus lists G P B Z as reading ἐμβάλλει. As in other places, I am not sure of the reason for the discrepancy. Since Pelletier re-collated all of these manuscripts, except for Z, I have followed his collation in making this textual decision. Pelletier, Lettre, 246. See Getzel M. Cohen, The Hellenistic Settlements in Syria, the Red Sea Basin, and North Africa (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006) 219. Honigman, “La Description,” 93–94 (“la géographie utopisante”).

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obvious reasons the primary subject of comparison. In these paragraphs, Honigman observes that we can see “a rather complete inventory of the principal themes that appear in recurring ways in the narratives of utopianizing geographies that are preserved for us.”560 These include: an abundance of agriculture (§ 112); a large population (§ 113); an important river (§ 116); an abundance of riches and gold (§ 114). We can see, then, in his comments in § 113 and § 114 that include both city and surrounding countryside that Ps.-Aristeas brings together his portrayal of Jerusalem as the ideal city and geographical traditions that construct the country as a kind of utopian space. So, in § 113, both the city and country villages are laid out proportionally, a description that recalls the comments on Jerusalem in § 105 and § 107 but that now includes the villages. Although he has mentioned the land’s abundance in § 107, he returns to it in § 112, adding more details that resemble other Greek traditions, such as Megasthenes’s description of India (Diodorus Siculus 2.35.3) and Euhemerus’s description of the temple of Zeus Tryphilius in Panchaea (Diodorus Siculus 5.43.2–3).561 Euhemerus also notes the importance of a large population (πολυανθρώπια; Diodorus Siculus 5.41.2) in his description of Arabia, as does Hecataeus in his comments on Egypt (Diodorus Siculus 1.31.6). Ps.-Aristeas’s remarks about the Jordan River explicitly compare it with the Nile, even to the point of exaggeration about the Jordan’s geography and behavior, although the comment could also allude to Josh 3:15, which says that the Jordan overflows its banks during the harvest time. Within the idealizing context of these paragraphs, Ps.-Aristeas’s claim that the Jordan floods like the Nile, encircles the country, and empties into a river that flows to the sea helps to accomplish a literary goal. Whereas earlier we saw that Jerusalem compared very favorably to Alexandria and, in fact, it had fewer problems than the Egyptian city, here the countryside also compares favorably with idealized descriptions from Greek tradition that view Egypt (and India) through a utopian lens. One can compare especially Agatharcides’s descriptions of the Nile and Megasthenes’s reports about the Ganges and Indus rivers (all transmitted in Diodorus Siculus 3.10 [Nile] and 2.35–42 [Ganges and Indus]).562 Ps.-Aristeas even makes sure that the element of 560

561 562

Honigman, “La Description,” 94 (“un inventaire assez complet des principaux themes apparaissant de façon récurrente dans le récits de géographes utopisants qui nous sont conserves”). See Honigman, “La Description,” 94–95. See Honigman, “La Description,” 95–96. For Diodorus Siculus and his sources, see Kenneth S. Sacks, Diodorus Siculus and the First Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).

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rich natural resources, such as spices, gems and gold, make their way into his picture of Judea. In this case, however, these substances are imported via Arabs and through port cities. Even here, our author could be relying on Hellenistic precursors, such as we see in Euhemerus (Diodorus Siculus 5.41.4–42.2), who reports that Arabs buy frankincense and myrrh from the land of Hiera and then sell these aromatic substances all over the world. Thus, not only Jerusalem, but the entirety of Judea is “fully suited to agriculture and commerce; the city has many crafts, and it does not want for anything imported by sea” (§ 115). Finally, natural defenses also feature in Greek geographical descriptions of ideal countries. Both Agatharcides and Megasthenes detail the natural defenses of Egypt and India, respectively. All in all, the description of the Judean countryside plays a similar role to the description of Jerusalem. For our author, Aristeas has come from Alexandria, one of the premier cities in the world, and from Egypt, a country whose riches and utopian character were legendary. Ptolemy’s deputy travels as an ambassador to Jerusalem and Judea, a city and country ruled by Eleazar, whom Ps.-Aristeas has already portrayed as having an equal status to Ptolemy. Such a leader must rule over a city and territory that can compare and compete with Ptolemy’s possessions. A simple correspondence between equals would not suffice to make the point, and so Ps.-Aristeas borrows from well known traditions of Greek ethnography and utopian geography in order to emphasize that Eleazar, Jerusalem and Judea are every bit the equal of Ptolemy, Alexandria and Egypt. Notes § 112. We have made this digression … This transition parallels others that Ps.-Aristeas makes; see, for example, § 83, where Aristeas tells Philocrates that he felt the description of Ptolemy’s gifts “necessary.” The mention of Eleazar creates some difficulty here, however. What was it that Aristeas received from Eleazar? Hadas thinks that it is likely to be the description of Alexandria and Egypt in §§ 108–111, but the text gives no prior indication that any of the preceding description (nor that which is to come) originated with the high priest.563 Perhaps the reference is to the letter that Eleazar wrote to Ptolemy agreeing to send translators (§§ 41–46)? I can only agree with Gruen that “the matter must remain unsettled.”564 § 113. dense population … cities and villages. Compare the statement of Ps.-Hecataeus cited in Josephus, Against Apion 1.198: “The Jews have

563 564

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 145. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2735.

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many fortresses and villages in different parts of the country, but only one fortified city, which has a circumference of about 50 stades and some one hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants; they call it Jerusalem.” § 114. Arabs. Already in the fifth century BCE, Herodotus, Histories 3.107–113, connects the Arabs with the trade in spices. He describes in these chapters how the Arabs produce these rare and aromatic substances, which they then export. Much later, Diodorus Siculus gives somewhat conflicting accounts. In 2.49.2 he says that the Arabs produce myrrh and frankincense, along with other spices, in order to trade them. In the passage I cited above (5.41.4–6), he writes that the island of Hiera produces frankincense and myrrh, which is sold to the Arabs who then export them all over the world. § 115. Ashkelon and Joppa and Gaza, and similarly also Ptolemaïs. The text creates confusion, since the beginning of the paragraph says, “For it [i.e., Judea] possesses (ἔχει) good harbors.” Some scholars have taken this to mean that the Jews had control of these cities and have used that interpretation as evidence for the book’s date.565 The text only indicates that these cities had harbors that are close in proximity to Judea through which goods traveled. According to 1 Macc 10:76 (see also 13:11 and 14:5), the Hasmoneans Simon and Jonathan occupied Joppa. Gaza fell to Alexander Jannaeus at the beginning of the first century BCE (Josephus, Ant. 13.358– 364). Ashkelon and Ptolemaïs (modern-day Acco) did not fall into Jewish hands at any time in this period. But, of course, for the Jews to utilize these cities as ports does not necessitate that they have political control over them. Given the obvious literary character of the account, this passage offers no assistance in dating the book. These harbors enable Ps.-Aristeas to make his idealized claims about Jerusalem and Judea as comparable to Alexandria and Egypt. § 116. aroura. The term indicates arable land and was used as a measurement of area. According to Herodotus 2.168, an aroura equals the length of 100 Egyptian ground cubits, which measure 52.5 cm each, on each side (ἡ δὲ ἄρουρα ἑκατὸν πηχέων ἐστὶ Αἰγυπτίων πάντῃ). Thus one aroura equals about 2756m2.566

565 566

This is the conclusion of Wendland, cited in Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 146. Alexander Mlasowsky (Hannover), “Aroura” (Brill’s New Pauly; Ed. Hubert Cancki and Helmout Schneider [Antiquity volumes]; Leiden: Brill Online. http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/search?s.q=aroura&s.f.s2_parent=s.f.book.brill-s-newpauly&search-go=Search; last accessed Jan. 2, 2015) and Bagnall, “Practical Help,” 186.

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neighboring peoples advanced. This short parenthetical remark seems to mean that after the original settlers had taken possession of their land, people from surrounding countries had taken some of it. See Textual Notes above. six hundred thousand … one hundred aroura lots. The number of settlers is the same as the number of men who left Egypt with Moses (Exod 12:37; Num 11:21). By multiplying 100 aroura lots times 600,000, one arrives at the six million aroura given as the area of Judea. In Egyptian papyri of the third century, we find 100 aroura lots being given to military veterans. In P. Petrie 2.27 (Arsinoite nome; 226–225 BCE), for example, as part of a will, several Macedonians who served in the cavalry are given 100 aroura pieces of land.567 In the Exodus passage, the 600,000 are called πειζῶν, foot soldiers, and thus, Ps.-Aristeas borrows the Egyptian practice of giving veterans land and applies it to Moses giving members of his army parcels of land in exchange for their service. One can compare Sir 16:10 and 46:8, where the 600,000 are called foot soldiers explicitly. For the size of the country, compare Ps.-Hecataeus (apud Josephus, Against Apion 1.195), who says that the area is three million aroura. § 117. torrents. The Greek χείμαρρος refers to a mountain stream swollen with water from melting snow. Here it more likely refers to wadis that swell up with water during the rainy season and are dry the remainder of the year. Azotus. Modern-day Ashdod, which lies north of Gaza and Ashkelon.

The Mines of Arabia (§§ 119–120) 119. It is also said that iron and copper mines existed previously in the nearby mountains of Arabia. But these were deserted during the time when the Persians held power, since officials at the time made a false report that working them was unprofitable and expensive 120. in order that through the working of the aforesaid mines the region might not be despoiled and more or less be made inaccessible due to the sovereignty of those Persians, who seized upon a pretence for entry into these areas. Therefore they made this false report.

567

For the text of the papyrus, see the Duke Data Bank of Papyri http://papyri.info/ ddbdp/p.petr.2;;27 (last accessed Jan. 2015). For other papyrological references, see Tramontano, La Lettera, 120.

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So, what was necessary concerning these matters I have indicated to you in a summary, O Philocrates, my brother. I will next explain the facts about the translation. Textual Notes § 119. Ms I adds οἱ before Πέρσαι to make the noun definite. No other Greek manuscript has this reading, and it is certainly secondary. § 120. The reading followed here is τῶν εἰρημένων, the aforesaid. Ms G has προειρημένων, adding the prepositional prefix to underscore the meaning of “say beforehand.” General Comment The reason for these two paragraphs on the mines of Arabia is not particularly clear. As the conclusion to Ps.-Aristeas’s description of Judea, we should probably connect the mines with Judea as well, even though they are “nearby” in Arabia. The resources of iron and copper might be a reference to Deut 8:9, part of the description of the plenty of the land, “a land whose stones are iron and from whose hills you may mine copper.” The location in Arabia, however, might also hark back to Greek descriptions of that country, which according to Agatharcides (apud Diodorus Siculus 3.12), had many large mines that produced enormous quantities of gold.568 Thus, we might well have here Ps.-Aristeas combining his Jewish scriptural

568

Paul Carbonaro, La Lettre d’Aristée et la Mythe des Ages du Monde (CahRB 79; Pendé: Garabalda, 2012) argues that Agatharcides’s comments need to be read in light of Hesiod’s myth of an age of gold and people of a race of gold (Works and Days, 106–201). In his estimation then, Ps.-Aristeas depends on Hesiod’s myth. I am not convinced that Carbonaro has established firmly any clear link between Agatharcides’s and Hesiod’s myth, and so I am dubious of the claim for Aristeas. Carbonaro’s claim is part of a larger argument that Aristeas looks to Ptolemy’s and Eleazar’s time as an age of gold and that the work is a political tract written against the Hasmonean dynasty. Even though this background makes sense of the various digressions in the book, I am not convinced of scholarly claims that Aristeas is a political tract of this sort. (See also, George Howard, “The Letter of Aristeas and Diaspora Judaism,” JTS N. S. 22 [1971] 337–48 and Jonathan Goldstein, “The Message of Aristeas to Philokrates: In the Second Century B. C.E., Obey the Torah, Venerate the Temple of Jerusalem, but Speak Greek, and Put Your Hopes in the Ptleomaic Dynasty,” in Eretz Israel, Israel and the Jewish Diaspora: Mutual Relations [Ed. Menachem Mor; Studies in Jewish Civilzation I; Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1991] 1–23.) I simply do not see evidence of a political agenda in the text itself. This is particularly true of the digressions, which make better sense as part of a different type of literary enterprise, as I have argued throughout this commentary.

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sources and his knowledge of Greek ethnographic and geographic traditions to paint his picture of Judea. Our Aristeas concludes this description by calling it a summary. His claim that he has described “what was necessary” (ὅσον ἔδει) recalls the introduction to this section in § 83, where he tells Philocrates that his description of the king’s gifts for the Jerusalem temple was “necessary” (ἀναγκαίαν εἶναι). Notes § 119. officials at the time. The text does not clarify who these officials are. Are they Judeans? Arabs? Again, given Ps.-Aristeas’s goals for the other parts of the section, one might suspect that these are Judeans trying to protect the mines from Persian exploitation. § 120. of those Persians. The Greek has the demonstrative pronoun ἐκείνων, which refers to the Persians mentioned previously in § 119. who seized … false report. There are three different ways that these clauses have been translated. Rather than “false report,” Shutt translates διαβολή in § 119 and § 120 as “false allegation” and reads these two clauses together. He then renders the passage, “because they had seized the pretext of moving into the mining areas on account of this allegation which had been made.”569 Thus, the “false allegation” becomes for him the pretext the Persians need to enter these areas. I do not think that the Greek can sustain this interpretation. Hadas (whose translation Gruen uses) renders it “by raising the false report, they removed the occasion for their entering those regions.”570 Again the two clauses are read together, and the resulting sentence means that the false report kept the Persians from entering that part of the country. I have followed Pelletier, who renders the two clauses separately. The first goes with the previous sentence, and the second stands on its own. The meaning here is that the Persians had found some reason to advance into the area and for that reason Judean officials concocted the false report, which diverted the Persians from paying attention to the mines. translation. The usual word for translation, ἑρμηνεία, is used.

569 570

Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 21. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 149.

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Eleazar’s Farewell to the Translators (§§ 121–127) 121. Thus, Eleazar selected excellent men who excelled in education, inasmuch as indeed they were the product of parents of high distinction. These had not only acquired skill in the literature of the Judeans, but also not incidentally they had given heed to preparation in Greek literature. 122. Therefore they were well suited to be appointed to embassies, and they discharged them whenever it became necessary. They possessed a great natural disposition for conversations and questions about the Law, being zealous for the middle way – for this is the best state – and avoiding course and rude thought. And similarly they rose above being conceited and believing that they could despise others, but they engaged in conversation, both listening and answering each question appropriately. They all observed these matters strictly, and they even desired to surpass each other in them. All were worthy of their leader and the virtue that he possessed. 123. It was evident, given the difficulty that they had leaving, how they loved Eleazar and he them. Besides writing to the king about their restoration, he appealed to Andreas to do as much as possible, urging that we help to accomplish this, inasmuch as we were able. 124. Even when we promised to pay careful attention to these things, he said that he was exceedingly distressed. For he knew that the king, who was a lover of goodness, considered it the best of all things to send for any person, from whatever place he might be identified, who excelled others in training and intelligence. 125. For I have come into possession of something he said well, that surrounding himself with just and prudent men would provide the best protection for the kingdom, since friends who give frank advice are beneficial. This is indeed the case with those whom Eleazar sent. 126. And he established by an oath that he would not let the men go if there were some other pressing need impelling him for his own circumstances, but for the common improvement of all the citizens he was sending them off. 127. For living well consists of keeping the laws, and this is accomplished by hearing much more than by reading. Therefore by setting forth these matters and others similar to them, he made clear what his disposition was towards them. Textual Notes § 121. Instead of γάρ, mss A H K U have οὖν, which makes this conjunction match the one at the beginning of the previous sentence. The logical connection here should be from οὖν to γάρ. § 122. Mss B P T Z read παραδεδεγμένοι, the reading followed here, rather than παραδεδειγμένοι of the remainder of the manuscripts. Although it is probably an ittacistic variant, παραδεδεγμένοι comes from the verb παραδέχομαι, to engage

Eleazar’s Farewell to the Translators (§§ 121–127)

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to do something, while παραδεδειγμένοι derives from παραδέικνυμι, to exhibit. § 123. After καὶ ἐκεῖνος αὐτούς, ms B adds δηλονότι ἠγάπησεν to create “and he clearly loved them,” a clause that parallels the previous phrase. While it fills out the thought, it is not necessary and represents an expansion of the text. § 124. All the Greek manuscripts read ἀφροντίσειν, to be careless or heedless, which makes no sense in the context. Wendland suggested εὖ φροντίσειν, to pay careful attention, which makes good sense; later editors follow him. This emendation is the basis of the present translation. § 125. After the participle ἔχων, ms B introduces ὁ Πτολεμαῖος. The king has not been mentioned in a while, and he is clearly the subject of the participle. Ms B makes it explicit. § 127. At the beginning of the last clause, the Greek manuscripts have the relative pronoun ὅς. Mendelssohn, whom Pelletier follows, suggested οἷος. A literal translation of the last sentence then would be something like: “Therefore, by setting forth these matters and others similar to them, he made clear his disposition, how/what it was to them.” General Comment Although the translators have been the subject of discussion in Demetrius’s report to Ptolemy, as well as in Ptolemy’s letter to Eleazar and in Eleazar’s reply, and we learned their names in §§ 47–50, this section reintroduces them as Eleazar prepares to send them to Alexandria with Aristeas and Andreas. These few paragraphs paint a portrait of the men, which will get filled out in the symposia that Ptolemy holds in their honor upon their arrival in Alexandria (§§ 187–292). Certainly at least part of the motivation for the description here is to give some substance to Ptolemy’s request that Eleazar send “elders who have lived exemplary lives, who have experience in the Law and are able to translate” (§ 39). These men would be Eleazar’s emissaries to Alexandria, and as such they ought to possess the same qualities as he (cf. § 122). Ps.-Aristeas begins by emphasizing their education and their lineage, which communicate important characteristics of the translators. An Alexandrian Jewish audience, familiar with these cultural categories, would have understood the translators to be men of nobility who had been trained/educated to the highest standards, probably in the gymnasium. They are “excellent” (ἀρίστους), a term related to ἀρετή that in Greek had deep associations with rank or nobility and high moral character, and a word used of Eleazar in § 122, translated here as virtue.571 These transla-

571

According to Werner Jaeger, the term ἄριστος in the plural referred to the nobility. See his Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture Volume 1 Archaic Greece. The Mind of

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tors were not ordinary folk; they had noble births and had excelled in their education. They were well suited to represent Eleazar, a man of these same qualities, in Ptolemy’s court.572 Indeed, Ps.-Aristeas says in § 122 that they were qualified to serve as Eleazar’s ambassadors, and he implies that this would not be the first embassy on which the high priest had sent them. As part of their background, we learn that they knew Jewish literature very well, but also that they were proficient in Greek literature. The former ability shows that they fit what Ptolemy had requested, to be men who had lived exemplary lives. As we have seen and will again, piety is a central theme in the book, and Ps.-Aristeas points out the translators’ piety on more than one occasion. Such piety for Jews can only be defined as living according to the Jewish law. The claim that they knew Greek literature addresses three important issues. First, in the immediate context, Ps.-Aristeas has already noted that the translators were highly educated, and within the Alexandrian context, paideia would mean specifically Greek education. The second issue is a larger one that plays out over the course of the work as a whole. These translators are the conduits through which the Hebrew law becomes a Greek text. If the translation is to possess the same qualities as the Hebrew original, which a Greek no less distinguished than Demetrius has called “philosophical,” “uncorrupted” and “divine” (§ 31), then the translators must be capable of producing a translation that results in a work of Greek literature, which is both fitting for the king’s library (the narrative goal of the text) and that expresses the sophistication of the law at the same time. The third has to do with Ps.-Aristeas’s claim that part of the literary bone fides of the translation depends on its production according to the standards of Homeric scholarship in Alexandria. For that to be possible, the translators had to be men who were at home in Greek as well as Jewish literature.573 To shift the language somewhat, “these translators were perfectly capable of employing the norms of the target language and culture when producing their translation.”574 Ps.-Aristeas continues to combine Jewish and Greek values in § 122, when he describes the translators as having a talent for discussing the law (as Eleazar will do shortly) and “being zealous for the middle way,” and this thought extends the initial idea of the translators as learned in both Jewish and Greek lit-

572 573 574

Athens (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965) chapter 1 “Nobility and Areté.” See also LSJ under ἄριστος for the use of the word to mean of high birth and of high moral character. Both of these senses of the word apply to the translators in Aristeas. de Crom, “Letter of Aristeas,” 156. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 42–49. Wright, “Aristeas and Reception History,” 56.

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erature. The latter reference transparently refers to the Aristotelian ethical notion of the mean as it is set out in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics (e.g., 1105b–1107a), for example. This claim also sets up the translators as excellent philosophers, a portrayal that becomes central to the symposia section later on. To cite just one place, in § 256 the translators speak about moderating one’s passions, another Aristotelian theme that relates to the idea of the mean. Here Ps.-Aristeas is trading on a fairly widespread tradition that viewed the Jews as a race of philosophers. The most well known comes from Clearchus of Soli (as reported in Josephus, Against Apion 1.179–181), a student of Aristotle, who says that his famous teacher knew that the Jews were descended from Indian philosophers. Once he met a Jew in Asia Minor who “not only spoke Greek, but had the soul of a Greek.”575 Along with picturing the translators as having the qualifications and accomplishments to perform the work for which they had been selected, at least one of the goals of this section (as also Eleazar’s apologia that follows) seems intended to refute certain negative stereotypes of Jews. In § 122, we are told specifically that these men “rose above being conceited and believing that they could despise others.” This last phrase bears a striking resemblance to claims that we see in Greek literature that Jews were misanthropes. That is, they hated human beings other than themselves. A number of non-Jewish sources, such as Manetho and Apollonius Molon, refer to an Exodus story that at its core tells the story of lepers who gathered around an Egyptian priest named Moses and who were expelled from Egypt. As a result, these people demonstrated hatred for all people other than their own.576 These stories undoubtedly would have had wide currency among non-Jews in Alexandria in this period, and Ps.-Aristeas’s picture of urbane, educated men who adhere to Aristotle’s mean and who do not despise others seems pitched to counter just such stories. Paragraphs 123–126 focus on Eleazar’s anxiety that once in Alexandria Ptolemy would prevent the translators from returning to Jerusalem. The touching remarks about the mutual love between the translators and Eleazar heighten the anxiety about their return. Ps.-Aristeas here is playing

575

576

For the text, see Menahem Stern, Greek and Latin Writers, 1.50. On the Jews as philosophers, see Erich S. Gruen, “Jewish Perspectives on Greek Culture and Ethnicity,” in Hellenism in the Land of Israel (Ed. John J. Collins and Gregory E. Sterling; Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001) 83–84. On these legends, see Gager, Moses in Greco-Roman Paganism and Peter Schäfer, Judeophobia: Attitudes toward the Jews in the Ancient World (Cambridge, Mass.; Harvard University Press, 1997). For the texts of ancient non-Jewish writers about Judaism, see Stern, Greek and Latin Writers.

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on well-known tropes about the Ptolemies and their acquisitional habits. I already have had occasion to refer to Galen’s story of how Ptolemy III “borrowed” manuscripts from Athens to make transcriptions and then sent back the copies rather than the originals (see above p. 118). It seems that the Hellenistic kings were also known for surrounding themselves with human capital. The Greek writer Alciphron (3rd century CE) includes among his Letters an imaginary correspondence between the Greek dramatist Menander (4th–3rd century BCE) and his courtesan, Glycera, about an invitation he has received from Ptolemy inviting him to come to Alexandria.577 Ptolemy’s request, as Menander summarizes it, sounds much like Ptolemy II’s to Eleazar. In both cases there is no evident coercion on the part of either Ptolemy, although the verb μεταπέμπω in the middle voice, as we have here, has the sense of “summon” and thus could imply a command rather than a gentle request.578 Indeed both Eleazar and Menander express some hesitation about Ptolemy’s motives – Menander’s concerning the political dangers of being in a king’s court (Letters 4.18.9) and Eleazar’s about the return of the translators. In the end, the two stories conclude in the same way – Ptolemy does not get what he might well desire – even though the reasons differ. In Aristeas, Eleazar sends the translators, but he is insistent that they be returned (and they are eventually); in Alciphron, Menander does not want to go and be separated from Glycera. He would rather be wreathed with ivy leaves in Greece “while Glycera sat in the theater and looked on” than crowned “with the diadems of Ptolemy” (Letters 4.18.10). As Tessa Rajak comments, “The key to both sets of events is the Egyptian king’s automatic assumption that cultural progress is achieved by the physical translocation of individuals.”579 Certainly in both cases the assumption on the part of the invitee is that the individuals would remain in Ptolemy’s court. Ps.-Aristeas puts it well in § 125: “For I have

577

578 579

The king is almost certainly supposed to be Ptolemy I, given the usual date assigned to Menander’s death. For the full text of the correspondence, see Allen Rogers Benner and Francis H. Forbes, The Letters of Alciphron, Aelian and Philostratus (LCL; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1949). For a detailed discussion of the correspondence and the light it sheds on Aristeas, see Tessa Rajak, “An Invitation from Ptolemy: Aristeas, Alciphron and Collective Memory,” in For Uriel: Studies in the History of Israel in Antiquity Presented to Professor Uriel Rappaport (Ed. M. Mor and J. Pastor; Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar, 2005) 145–64. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2737. Tessa Rajak, “Translating the Septuagint for Ptolemy’s Library: Myth and History,” in Die Septuaginta – Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten (Ed. Martin Karrer and Wolfgang Kraus; WUNT 219; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 188.

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come into possession of something he said well, that surrounding himself with just and prudent men would provide the best protection for the kingdom, since friends who give frank advice are beneficial.” These men would be enlisted among the king’s Friends and would occupy a permanent place in Ptolemy’s court. Two interpretive problems arise in §§ 126–127. The first has repurcussions for how we understand some of the larger themes of the work. After swearing that he would not let the translators leave him (due to anxiety about their return), Eleazar decides to let them go “for the common improvement of all the citizens.” The term translated here as “citizen,” πολίτης, can refer to a member of a city or state as well as to one’s own fellow citizens.580 So, the question here is whether Ps.-Aristeas intends the term to have a universal connotation – that is, Eleazar sends the translators to benefit all the citizens of Alexandria – or he sends them to benefit his fellow citizens (see Hadas’s translation, “all his countrymen”), the Jewish inhabitants of Alexandria. Either interpretation can fit into the themes of the book. Certainly Ps.-Aristeas represents the Jews as sharing many values with Ptolemy. Paragraph 16 is in some respects a quintessential expression of a universalistic outlook. Sending the translators to Ptolemy to have the law placed in the library would benefit all who read the Jewish law. Yet, as we will see, the work also focuses on Jewish practice and the place of Jews in the Gentile world. Eleazar’s allegorical interpretation of the food laws and his condemnation of Gentile idolatry focus attention on Jewish practice. After the translation of the law is completed, the Jewish community adopts the Septuagint as its sacred scripture, and nothing is said at the end of the book about placing the law in the library. In which sense one should understand the term here, then, is not completely clear, although I lean toward Eleazar speaking about his co-ethnics in Alexandria. Perhaps Ps.-Aristeas deliberately left this section somewhat vague. The second difficulty concerns the clause in § 127, “this is accomplished by hearing much more than by reading.” The beginning of the paragraph might lend some support to the interpretation of πολίτης as fellow citizen, since the benefit that the translators bring seems to be an ability to live well by keeping “the laws,” which cannot refer to anything but the Jewish laws they were meant to translate. We find an interesting parallel in the Prologue to the Greek translation of Ben Sira in which the author’s grandson, who translated the work, argues that he is translating his grandfather’s work “for those living abroad if they wish to become learned, preparing their

580

Á la the Latin civis (LSJ s.v. πολίτης).

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character to live by the law” (ll. 34–36). Yet, in Aristeas this living well happens more by listening than by reading. The term “listening,” ἀκρόασις, also carries the connotation of obedience, in older English parlance, hearkening as opposed to simply hearing (see Hadas’s translation). Yet, the noun translated “reading,” ἀνάγνωσις, means a reading aloud, but it also has the connotation of study. Moreover ἀνάγνωσις occurs elsewhere in Aristeas in § 283 and § 305, where it has a positive sense. In § 305, the word contributes to the larger picture of the translators as engaging in the same kind of scholarship as the Homeric exegetes of Alexandria. So, while on the surface this opposition might seem to cast a negative shadow on reading/ study, that seems unlikely. More probably, this contrast refers to what will happen later when the translators do their work. Via the methods of Alexandrian scholarship, they prepare their translation, which is read to the Jewish community (§ 308) – the “reading part.” Afterwards the gathered community assents to what was read – the “hearing” part – which presumably enables them to live well as Jews in a larger Gentile environment. Dries de Crom has argued that these two terms play an important role in the authority structures of Aristeas. He contends that the authority of the translation “can only be fully understood by means of oral instruction (akroasis), not just by direct reading of the text.”581 Reading focuses on those who have direct access to the text, those in the privileged position that the translators and Demetrius occupy. Hearing points to those who have indirect access to the text, to those who need it mediated to them in order to have access to it. This mediation requires interpretation of the text, and, of course, we see such interpretation paradigmatically in Eleazar’s speech explaining the significance of the food laws. Yet, we also see the relationship played out toward the end of the book, when the translators, who have direct access, have finished their work and it is read aloud to the gathered community. As de Crom puts it, “[T]here is more to the authority of the translation than the production of a good and accurate text; it is not just the meticulous labor of an individual translator or a group of translators. The diffusion of the translation and its reception are an essential aspect of the process without which a translation is not ‘complete’, that is, is not authoritative.”582

581 582

de Crom, “Letter of Aristeas,” 152. de Crom, “Letter of Aristeas,” 154. de Crom also cites the example of the Prologue to Ben Sira, which, although it does not use the same terms as Aristeas, highlights the importance of reading (Ben Sira’s and his grandson’s/translator’s activity) and his publication for the benefit of others. Here, however, there is no indication that

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The picture of the translators as we have it here has played a central role in some scholarly reconstructions of the origins of the Septuagint (see Introduction, section 2). Arie van der Kooij has argued, based especially on the description in this section and the implication in § 305 that the translators were versed in a reading tradition of the text and that the portrait of the translators in Aristeas places them in circles of scribes, and he looks to these circles as the place from whence the translators of the Septuagint would have come.583 Certainly Ps.-Aristeas describes the translators in language that constructs them as scholars, and the idea that scribes might function as emissaries is familiar from the book of Ben Sira, where the author writes about the scribe who gains experience and wisdom from travel (34:9–13). So far, so good, and I agree with van der Kooij that this is Ps.-Aristeas’s literary goal. Van der Kooij takes an additional step with which I cannot agree, however. He takes this picture and projects it backwards to the time of the actual translation, and as a result he contends that Aristeas presents a plausible picture of a Ptolemaic king asking for learned scholars, who would have operated in “temple circles.”584 However plausible a picture Ps.-Aristeas might construct for us, this is a construction of the second century BCE. The fact that we encounter “interpretation” in the translations of the Pentateuch does not require an historical situation in which translators come from “temple circles” in Jerusalem under the authority of a high priest. Such a picture simply assumes that Aristeas’s narrative accurately reflects the circumstances of the translation more than a century to a century and a half in the past. However nicely Ps.-Aristeas paints the picture, it is a picture made for his own contemporary needs, and even though he draws on Alexandrian traditions about the translations’ origins, the way that Ps.-Aristeas characterizes the translations raises significant questions about our ability to give the kind of historical credence to his narrative that van der Kooij does.585

583

584

585

hearing is the process by which others will receive the text. In fact, it seems in the Prologue that reading is presumed as providing access in both cases. Arie van der Kooij, “Perspectives on the Study of the Septuagint. Who are the Translators?” in Perspectives in the Study of the Old Testament and Early Judaism: A Symposium in Honour of Adam S. van der Woude on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday (Ed. Florentino García Martínez and Ed Noort; VTSup 73; Leiden: Brill, 1998) 214–29. Arie van der Kooij, “The Septuagint of the Pentateuch and Ptolemaic Rule,” in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance (Ed. Gary N. Knoppers and Bernard M. Levinson; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 293. For more detailed arguments against the historical value of Aristeas, see the Introduction, section 2. For the problems of contemporary historical reconstructions of

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Moreover, if one looks at the translations themselves and at contemporary Egyptian translations from Greek to Demotic, we already have models in Egypt for how the Septuagint translations were likely done and the level of training the translators might have had.586 Notes § 121. Eleazar selected excellent men. Moore argues that the deputation to bring back translators from Jerusalem implied that there were no Judeans in Alexandria who coud read Hebrew or that, if there were, they were incompetent. He remarks, “If I were a Judean scholar in Egypt, I might well find this suggestion offensive, and this is precisely the point.”587 That is, Ps.-Aristeas wants Judeans, when they think of the Septuagint, to think of Judea; the Septuagint is a marker of Judean identity and thus attachment to the homeland. I do not think that this conclusion is warranted. Indeed, the translation is connected with the Judean homeland, but Eleazar and the learned translators function as part of an authority-conferring schema in which the Septuagint at its point of production becomes holy scripture. One does not need to historicize the matter by appealing to any memory of one’s ancestors translating the text.588 Ps.-Aristeas is not at all denigrating Egyptian translators; he is establishing the Septuagint as equally the scriptures of Alexandrian Judaism, in which Moses’ intent inheres (see below on Eleazar’s speech), in the same way that the Hebrew text constitutes the scriptures for Judeans in the homeland. education. The Greek term παιδεία refers to the system of Greek education centered in the gymnasium. It also connotes a set of cultural values that were meant to characterize important citizens of Greek cities.589 The implicit claim is that the translators have a foundation in Greek paideia that will enable them to transfer the meaning and intent for the Hebrew

586

587 588 589

the Septuagint’s origins based on Aristeas, see Benjamin G. Wright III, “The Letter of Aristeas and the Question of Septuagint Origins Redux,” JAJ 2 (2011) 304–26. For Egyptian translations from Greek to Demotic and the implications for Septuagint origins, see Aitken, “Septugint and Egyptian Translation Methods” and Benjamin G. Wright, “The Production of Greek Books in Alexandrian Judaism,” presented at “Judea in the Long Third Century: The Transition between the Persian and Hellenistic Periods,” University of Tel Aviv, May 31–June 3, 2014. Jonathan Goldstein, “The Message of Aristeas to Philokrates,” 1–23, uses this passage (and others) to derive a date and purpose for Aristeas. I find his arguments unconvincing. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 353. As does Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 352. See Jaeger, Paideia.

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law into their Greek translation and thus render it a fine example of Greek literature. literature of the Judeans … Greek literature. The word translated “literature” is γράμμα (pl. γράμματα), which appears in Aristeas nine times, mostly referring to letters or alphabetic characters. So, as we saw above, Demetrius tells the king that the laws of the Jews are written in Hebrew characters (§ 30). These need to be translated into Greek letters (§ 38). In the plural the word can connote a piece of writing or even documents, and that is the sense here. In this passage the Greek literally translates as “they not only acquired skill/experience in the writings/documents (i.e., literature) of the Jews, but also not incidentally they had given heed to preparation in that (i.e., literature) of the Greeks.” § 122. embassies. At its core, the Greek word πρεσβεία refers to the rights of an elder, to rank or dignity (presumably conferred at least partially by age). In 1 and 2 Maccabees, we read of Jewish embassies of different sorts. In 1 Maccabees 8, 12, 14 and 15, delegations go to Rome on behalf of the Jews. These passages are not described using the term πρεσβεία, however. 2 Maccabees 4:11 does describe the mission of John son of Eupolemus to the Romans as a πρεσβεία. 1 Maccabees 9:70; 10:51; 11:9; and 13:14 all refer to Hasmonean kings dispatching ambassadors or envoys to represent them. In these texts sending deputations seems to be the prerogative of a king, and the fact that this embassy comes from Eleazar reinforces his authority as the ruler of the Jews who possesses the requisite status to conduct business with Ptolemy. natural disposition. The Greek εὐφυΐα usually means a natural goodness or even shapeliness. Here Ps.-Aristeas wants the reader to understand that the translators possessed their ability to accomplish the task both through nature and education. § 125. since friends … are beneficial. This last clause is a genitive absolute. Shutt understands the sense to be a report of what the king’s Friends have advised him, and thus he translates, “this was the frank advice given him by his friends for his benefit.”590 There is no word for advice and with the word παρρησία, frankness or openness, in the dative, it is hard to see it functioning as the subject of a clause. More likely, the clause expresses attendant circumstance. This is how Hadas takes the clause, and I have followed him. On the king’s Friends, see the note to § 40.

590

Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 21.

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Eleazar’s Apologia for the Law (§§ 128–171) Why Distinguish between Clean and Unclean Animals (§§ 128–133) 128. It is worthwhile to mention briefly the explanations that he gave to those things that we asked of him. For I consider that most people have some curiosity about those matters in their legislation concerning food and drink and those beasts considered unclean. 129. For when we inquired why, since creation is one, on the one hand, certain things are considered unclean for food, and on the other hand, certain things are also unclean to touch – for the legislation regards most things religiously, and in these doubly religiously – he began thusly in response to these questions: 130. “You observe,” he said, “what kind of result is produced by conduct and associations, since people who associate with evildoers become perverted, and they are miserable in the whole of life. But if they live together with wise and prudent people, out of ignorance they meet with improvement in their manner of living. 131. Therefore, our lawgiver first defined matters concerning piety and justice, explaining each in detail, not only prohibitively but probatively, showing plainly both the damages and the punishments brought by God upon the guilty. 132. For first of all he demonstrated that God is the only one and that his power is made manifest in everything, every place being full of his sovereignty, and that nothing that human beings do secretly on the earth escapes his notice, but whatever anyone does becomes manifest to him, as are those things yet to occur. 133. Therefore, after treating these things fully and accurately and making them evident, he showed that even if someone might think to accomplish evil, let alone actually do it, he/she would not escape notice, giving proof of God’s might throughout the entire legislation.” Textual Notes Eusebius transmits §§ 128–171, but his version of these paragraphs differs from the Greek manuscripts in many minor details, sometimes preserving the better text but more often not. § 128. The phrase translated “briefly” stands alone in the genitive plural βραχέων in the manuscripts of Aristeas and in Eusebius. Normally the genitive plural with the preposition διά means “in a few words” (see LSJ). As a result, Wendland has conjectured the prepositional phrase here, and Viger has suggested that it was also in Eusebius’s text.591 Pelletier places the preposition in brackets

591

See the apparatus of Pelletier, Lettre, 166.

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indicating its uncertaintly, but I have translated it here. // The phrase πρὸς τὰ δι’ ἡμῶν ἐπιζητηθέντα, to those things that we asked of him, gets mangled in the manuscript tradition. The text translated here comes from Eusebius. Other variations that are almost certainly corruptions are: πρὸς ἡμῶν ἐπιζητηθέντα (mss A H K U), πρὸς δι’ ἡμῶν ἐπιζητηθέντα (mss G I Z*), πρὸς δὲ ἡμῶν ἐπιζητηθέντα (mss B O [δ’ ἡμῶν] P T Zcorr Eus). // The reading νομίζω, I consider, is that of ms B; all other manuscripts and Eusebius have the infinitive νομίζειν. // The phrase τοὺς πολλούς, most people, is the reading of ms B. Since it functions as the subject of an infinitive, it must be in the accusative case. All the other manuscripts and Eusebius read the dative τοῖς πολλοῖς. // Mss G I O T have the more common βρωμάτων, food, for the more unusual and likely original βρωτῶν, meats or food. The same word occurs in § 129. § 129. The manuscript tradition is divided between πάνυ (most manuscripts), exceedingly, and πάλιν (mss G I O T and Eusebius), some having both together (mss A H K U). Pelletier argues that πάλιν was the original reading, given how difficult it is.592 πάνυ would have been written in the interlinear space and thus would have been passed along in some manuscripts as a substitute for πάλιν. This suggestion also explains the combination of both words. Different scholars have proposed alternatives. Wendland emends to παντελῶς, a word used elsewhere in Aristeas (§ 23, § 77, § 78, § 136, § 164). Schmidt suggests παντάπασι. The context definitely calls for some intensification. I have followed Pelletier and have translated “doubly.” § 131. Eusebius connects this paragraph with the previous one using οὖν, which all scholars accept. Ms B has δέ, and all other manuscripts have no connector at all. // The phrase πρῶτον ὁ νομοθέτης comes from Eusebius. Pelletier suggests that the reading ὁ πρωτονομοθέτης (mss A H K U G T; I omits the article) is a byzantine corruption, given the popularity of words compounded with πρωτο- in this period.593 // All of the Greek manuscripts read ἐνδίκως, justly. Eusebius has ἐμδεικτικῶς, probatively, which seems called for here in the contrast. // The participle προδηλώσας in Pelletier’s text reflects the conjecture of Schmidt, who has emended the manuscripts, which have the adjective προδήλους modifying τὰς βλάβας. Mras has conjectured the imperfect προὐδήλου.594 Wendland accepts the adjective but has to supply the participle θεὶς, which he adds on the basis of § 133, which has πρόδηλα θεὶς. The participle seems required here, however, since § 132 is a

592 593 594

See his critical note, Lettre, 246. See his critical note, Lettre, 247. See the apparatus of Pelletier, Lettre, 168.

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long interruption and § 133 actually picks up from where § 131 leaves off. Pelletier argues reasonably that the participle essentially acts as an apodosis for which the clause containing the participle in § 131 is the prodosis.595 General Comment These paragraphs form the introduction to a long section in which the high priest Eleazar offers an apologia for the Jewish law. This speech sits at the center of the book and acts as a transition, pivoting from the law in its original Hebrew to the law in its Greek translation.596 Moreover, it comes directly on the heels of the claim that the translators were experts in both Jewish and Greek literature. Thus, Eleazar’s speech serves as an important statement about Jewish values, but in light of the close relationship that Ps.-Aristeas creates between Eleazar and the translators, Eleazar’s thoughts likely are meant to reflect theirs as well. Between Eleazar’s explanation of the Jewish law and the translators’ proficiency in Greek thought, shown at great length in the symposia, these sections fill out the earlier claims about the translators. Indeed, almost immediately after Eleazar’s speech, the translators arrive in Alexandria, are fêted with banquets where they demonstrate their philosophical acumen, and then they get down to translating. Yet, on the surface at least, Eleazar’s comments present quite a contrast to those passages that emphasize the commonalities between Jews and Gentiles (cf. epecially § 16). Aristeas’s otherwise eirenic and somewhat universalistic outlook seems contradicted in Eleazar’s speech. A great deal has been written about this sudden shift from what appear to be claims to universality to claims of Jewish particularity, separateness and indeed superiority, and much emphasis has been placed on this section for understanding the broader aims of the work. For some scholars, Eleazar is emphasizing the superiority of Judaism over Hellenistic culture and religion, and the other eirenic elements are minimized. So, for example, Erich Gruen interprets Eleazar’s remarks as constituting “strong words and powerful sentiments, not to be obscured or suppressed in the warm glow of some alleged universalism.”597 John Barclay takes a similar approach when he

595 596

597

See the critical note in Pelletier Lettre, 247. J.-G. Février, La Date, 28–29, argues that the tone of §§ 128–171 does not fit the rest of the book and thus these paragraphs were a later addition to the work. He also notes the lack of this material in Josephus and Philo. For a complete discussion of the issues, see the Introduction, section 7. Gruen, Heritage and Hellenism, 216. See also Gruen, “Jewish Perspectives,” 67–68.

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writes, “This sense of superiority, of the Jews’ higher spiritual and moral class, is the central motif in Eleazar’s speech on the Law.”598 Other scholars have argued that although Eleazar is critical of aspects of Gentile religion and practice, such criticism would have resonated with philosophically minded Gentiles. Honigman makes the most detailed case for this position. She contends that the entire apology is written as an elaboration on the chreia, a standard form in the progymnasmata, even if in Aristeas it is somewhat unusual.599 As such, however, the elements that appear in Eleazar’s speech are standard requirements of the form. Moreover, Honigman argues that this section possesses no real originality. “The Apology for the Law is so inconspicuous in its religious boldness that it is misleading to assume, as has been done on occasion, that it contains violent polemics against Greeks stemming from a Jewish monotheistic point of view.”600 In her view, the polemics are not unusual at all within Greek thought. The stance of B.Ar.’s author in this case would certainly not be seen as that of a Jewish philosopher targeting ‘pagan’ views en bloc. His shafts come from within the realm of Greek philosophical polemic. In fact, the arguments found in B.Ar. do not go beyond conventional clichés, and in this sense the Apology for the Law does not display any more philosophical originality than the 72 sayings of the Symposium … The attacks contained in the Apology are aimed at specific aspects of Greek (and Egyptian) philosophy and religion that were widely criticized by Greeks themselves.601

598

599

600

601

John M. G. Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora from Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE) (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1996) 145. See also Ellen Birnbaum, “Allegorical Interpretation and Jewish Identity among Alexandrian Jewish Writers,” in Neotestamentica et Philonica: Studies in Honor of Peder Borgen (Ed. D. E. Aune et al.; NovTSup 106; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 311–14 and Reinhard Feldmeier, “Weise hinter ‘eisernen Mauern’. Tora und jüdisches Selbsvertändnis zwischen Akkulturation und Absonderung im Aristeasbrief,” in Die Septuaginta zwischen Judentum und Christentum (Ed. Martin Hengel and Anna Maria Schwimmer; WUNT 72; Tübingen: J. C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1994) 20–37. Feldmeier tries to finesse the claim somewhat, but he emphasizes the superiority angle much more than Ps.-Aristeas’s accommodation of enlightened Gentiles. He also appeals to the symposia held in honor of the translators. See below on these sections. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 20–23. See also, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 50–51. On the chreia, see Ronald F. Hock and Edward N. O’Neil, The Chreia and Ancient Rhetoric (2 vols.; Atlanta: SBL, 1986, 2002). Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 21. John Collins makes the same point about Eleazar’s speech and Aristeas as a whole; see “Hellenistic Judaism in Recent Scholarship,” in Jewish Cult and Hellenistic Culture: Essays on the Jewish Encounter with Hellenism and Roman Rule (JSJSup 100; Leiden: Brill, 2005) 11–12. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 21, 23. For similar assessments, see

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As I read Aristeas, there are two different issues at stake. The first is whether Ps.-Aristeas is trying to make the case that Jewish religion and morality are superior to Gentile religion and morality. To read Aristeas as advocating Jewish superiority cannot resolve adequately the paradox of a text that, on the one hand, emphasizes the common sets of values between Jews and Gentiles and, on the other hand, expresses such a damning critique of and, in the views of some scholars, vitriolic polemic against those same Gentiles. To take a comparative example from Alexandria, we can look at the Jewish writer Aristobulus, who himself transmits a story of the translation of the Septuagint. This Alexandrian writer attempts to make the Jewish scriptures the foundation for all Greek achievements. For example, he claims that Plato “is conspicuous for having worked through each of the details contained in it [i.e., the Jewish Law]” (Fragment 3).602 Indeed, not only Plato but Pythagoras and Socrates also follow Moses’ understanding of God’s creation of the cosmos.603 Ps.-Aristeas engages in none of this sort of “we-are-better-than-the-Greeks-because-they-depended-on-us” discussion. By comparison, what Ps.-Aristeas says about the Greeks (and Gentiles generally) throughout the work never rises to this level and is relatively mild by comparison. In light of this comparison – and Aristobulus is by no means alone among ancient Jews in making this case – I think that the arguments of Honigman, Collins, Holladay and others make better sense in that they explain how these two perspectives can coexist in the text without resorting to the same levels of revisionism as someone like Aristobulus. This is not to say that cultural competition was not part of Ps.-Aristeas’s message, however. We do need to keep in mind, though, that the intended audience of this work was Jewish and not Gentile. Eleazar’s speech works to construct and affirm Jewish identity, and evidence of cultural competition needs to be read in that light. Part of that identity construction involves the setting and/or buttressing of ethnic boundaries via the identification of dis-

602 603

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 62–64; John J. Collins, Between Athens and Jerusalem: Jewish Identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora (2nd ed.; Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 2000) 192–94; Carl R. Holladay, “Jewish Responses to Hellenistic Culture in Early Ptolemaic Egypt,” in Ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt (Ed. P. Bilde et al.; Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 1992) 147–48. See Holladay, Aristobulus, 152–53. See Aristobulus Fragment 4 in Holladay, Aristobulus, 163. On Aristobulus’s claims about how Greek authors have depended on Moses and Jewish traditions, see Gruen, “Jewish Perspectives,” 72–75. Ironically, I think, Gruen’s discussion of Aristobulus highlights the differences from Aristeas and thus by comparison shows Ps.-Aristeas to be much less concerned with claiming that Jews were superior to Greeks.

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tinctive ethnic markers. Thus, in the larger context of §§ 128–171, Ps.-Aristeas sets Jews apart from certain aspects of Greek religion, ones that elite Gentiles also might criticize. He also works to separate Jews from Egyptians and place Jews on the same side as enlightened Gentiles. I will look at individual aspects below, but here it suffices to point out that in Ptolemaic Egypt, Jews were categorized most often, at least for tax purposes, as Hellenes, distinguished from native Egyptians, a categorization that brought more favored status than being included with Egyptians. Even when in later documents Judeans were listed separately from Hellenes, their status does not seem to have been reduced.604 As a general matter, the essential ethnic markers to which Eleazar appeals in his speech serve to make clear the boundaries between Jews, Greeks and Egyptians, and one method for clarifying and reinforcing boundaries is to make a case for the surpassing value of one’s own culture vis-à-vis those from whom one desires to be distinct.605 In that sense, evidence of cultural competition encoded by a Jewish author for a like-minded Jewish audience does not have to be construed as a case for superiority in the way that some scholars have articulated it. In other words, the fact that Aristeas was meant for internal Jewish consumption has to affect the way that we read the work, particularly when it comes to how Ps.-Aristeas tried to construct identity and reinforce ethnic boundaries. More will be said on specific issues and passages below. Even though I do not think that Ps.-Aristeas is trying to establish Jewish superiority, he certainly emphasizes Jewish separation in this long section. But separation from what? Throughout Eleazar’s speech, he explains how the law separates Jews from evildoers, idolators, “vain people” (§ 138), “worthless people” (§ 142), etc. Missing is any overtly nationalistic appeal.606 The high priest does not encourage separation from Gentiles qua Gentiles, but from anyone who would do evil or follow worthless philosophies or worship idols. The desire is to be separate in order to avoid moral taint, and

604

605

606

Categorization for tax purposes was often fluid and determined by ethnicity (Jews as Hellenes), occupation (teachers, actors, etc.) or use to the state (soldiers). On this kind of categorization, see Willy Clarisse and Dorothy J. Thompson, Counting the People in Hellenistic Egypt. Volume 2. Historical Context (Cambridge Classical Studies; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2006) particularly 147–48 on the Jews. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 322. On ethnic markers and on cultural competition, see Sylvie Honigman, “‘Jews as the Best of All the Greeks’: Cultural Competition in the Works of Alexandrian Judaeans of the Hellenistic Period,” in Shifting Social Imaginaries in the Hellenistic Period: Nations, Practices, and Images (Ed. Eftychia Stavrianopoulou; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 208–32. See Collins, Athens and Jerusalem, 193–94.

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this purpose will affect how we read others passages in Eleazar’s interpretation of Jewish law. The speech that Ps.-Aristeas puts in Eleazar’s mouth serves as part of a larger agenda in which he aims to convince his Jewish audience that enlightened Gentiles understand that Jewish customs – eating only certain foods or praying in strange ways – that result in separation do not result from any kind of xenophobia, but Moses instituted them for reasons that Gentiles share, the inculcation of high moral standards. In these ways, Eleazar’s long speech is grounded in the same outlook that we have seen previously, that Jews and elite, educated Gentiles who occupy the upper echelons of Alexandrian society share a set of common values and ideas. Part of the evidence of this commonality can be found precisely in those practices that are constitutive of Jewish identity.607 The section begins with our narrator again reasserting his participation in the events he will describe and emphasizing his character’s non-Jewishness by the reference to “their legislation.” As an introduction to Eleazar’s speech, the delegation asks the high priest about “food and drink and those beasts considered unclean,” since, according to Aristeas, the Jews’ dietary regulations aroused curiosity in most people. While widespread interest in Jewish food customs among Gentiles seems unlikely, a number of ancient writers, such as Strabo, Apion, Epictetus, Plutarch, Juvenal, Tacitus and Porphyry, comment on Jewish eating practices.608 Aristeas differs from these other writers, as we shall see, in that our text does not mention Jewish avoidance of pigs, a topic that dominates Gentile interest in Jewish eating practices.609 It is hard to tell whether Ps.-Aristeas is addressing actual questions about or criticisms of Jewish dietary habits as part of his larger agenda to argue for legitimate Jewish participation in enlightened Greek society or whether he has created these arguments as coming from straw men who can be answered easily. So, in § 129, for the members of Ptolemy’s embassy, the basic question is why clean and unclean distinctions are made within a created order that is “one.” Here Ps.-Aristeas uses a genitive absolute μιᾶς καταβολή οὔσης, “since the establishment/foundation

607

608

609

For a more detailed argument, see the Introduction and Benjamin G. Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship and Structures of Authority in the Letter of Aristeas” in Scriptural Authority in Early Judaism and Ancient Christianity (Ed. Isaac Kalimi et al.; DCLS 16; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2013) 43–61. See the short discussions on each in James N. Rhodes, “Diet as Morality: Tracing an Exegetical Tradition” (MA Thesis, Catholic University of America, 2000) ch. 2 and for the texts, see Stern, Greek and Latin Authors. So, for instance, writers such as Strabo, Apion, Epictetus, Plutarch and others all emphasize Jewish abstinence from pork as distinctive.

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is one,” and thus, the meaning is probably close to Pelletier’s translation of “since there is only a single origin of things.”610 Paragraph 130 begins Eleazar’s direct speech, but he does not initially answer his guests’ question. The sentiment expressed in this paragraph, that one’s associates have an impact on one’s behavior, is fairly widespread in antiquity, and it sets up Eleazar’s subsequent comments on dietary laws, which focus on Jewish separation.611 Indeed, when he says that people who associate with the “wise and prudent” improve their way of living “out of ignorance” (ἄγνοια), Eleazar attributes mere association with either perversion or improvement. Because of the consequences of associating with the wrong people, Moses, who here as elsewhere in Aristeas is called “lawgiver,” set out basic principles of piety (εὐσέβεια), explained them, and then taught that God would execute retribution on those who were guilty. This claim is grounded in the Jewish view of God, which, according to Eleazar, Moses demonstrated “first of all.” Three different aspects of God establish God’s ability to punish the guilty. First, the Jewish god is the only god (μόνος). Ps.-Aristeas employs language here that differs from Deut 6:4, where in the Septuagint, God is “one” (εἷς). In Aristeas the claim is that there is only one God, a position that stands in direct contrast to other peoples who think that there are many gods (§ 134), and that point gets reinforced in §§ 139 and 140 in the phrases “the only and powerful God” (τὸν μόνον θεὸν καὶ δυνατόν) and “the true God” (τὸν κατὰ ἀλήθειαν θεόν).612 Second, God is all-powerful. Ps.-Aristeas exploits a distinction between God’s power or strength, using the word δύναμις, which human beings can observe in all things, and God’s sovereignty or lordship, expressed in the term δυναστεία.613 Ps.-Aristeas ascribes both power and sovereignty to God. In several places in the symposia held in honor of the translators, divine power enables human desires and intentions (§ 236, § 248, § 252). To escape misfortune is due to God’s power (§ 268), and this same divine power acts in concert with the constitution of the human body to preserve it (§§ 156–157). When it comes to God’s sovereignty, Jews reflect on it constantly (§ 141), and God instills

610

611

612 613

Pelletier, Lettre, 167 (“qu’il n’y a qu’une seule origine des choses”). Is Genesis 1 lurking behind this claim of the oneness of creation? That is, God made all things good. See, for example, Prov 13:20; Sir 13:1; Philo, On Joseph 83; Theognis 35–36; Menander, Frag 218 K; 1 Cor 15:33 (dependent on Menander). Barbu, “Aristeas the Tourist,” 8, notes that foreign influence as a corrupting force is a recurring theme in Greek historiography. Meecham, Oldest Version, 246–47. See Tramontano, La Lettera, 135.

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fear by expressing God’s lordship (§ 194). God, because God is sovereign, can reward piety with the fulfillment of one’s plans (§ 255), which we have already seen in §§ 17–18, when Aristeas prays to God for Ptolemy to manumit the Judean slaves.614 Thirdly, Ps.-Aristeas emphasizes God’s omniscience. Not only does God see and know everything that goes on upon the earth among human beings, God also knows things that are still to happen. No human action or even intention to act escapes God’s notice (§ 133). The idea that nothing that happens on the earth escapes God’s notice can be found in numerous places in Jewish literature. In many cases the texts anthropomorphize God’s awareness as the deity seeing what goes on. So, for example, see Psalm 23:18 (OG); Prov 15:3; Sir 16:17; 17:19 (specifically of the Israelites); 23:19. The use of the verb λανθάνω, escape notice, hints at God’s ability to see what goes on without resorting to anthropomorphism. Ps.-Aristeas says that Moses has demonstrated God’s omniscience “throughout the entire legislation.” We find this same idea – that God sees and knows all – in other early Jewish texts. It is an important aspect of God in Sirach, the quintessential statement of which is 23:18–20 where Ben Sira speaks about the adulterer: 18. There is a person who transgresses against this bed, saying in his soul, ‘Who will see me? Darkness surrounds me, and the walls will hide me, and no one sees me. Why am I discreet? The Most High will never remember my sins.’ 19. And people’s eyes are his fear, and he was unaware that the eyes of the Lord are ten thousand times brighter than the sun, as they look upon all the ways of human beings and as they look into obscure parts. 20. Before all things were created, they were known to him, so also after they were completed (NETS).615

614

615

Philo uses the noun δύναμις frequently with respect to God in the sense of power or force. See, for example, On the Creation 7, 20, 21. He does not tend to use the noun sovereignty to apply to God but rather to human lordship, mastery or political power. Ps.-Aristeas’s rough contemporary Aristobulus does not refer to God’s sovereignty in the extant fragments, but he does employ δύναμις in a similar sense to Ps.-Aristeas. See especially Fragment 4 (Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel, 13.12) where Aristobulus argues that Orpheus has borrowed from Moses: “Moreover, Orpheus, in verses taken from the collection of sayings attributed to him entitled ‘Concerning the Holy Word,’ also expounds in this way about everything being governed by the power of God, about the origin of what has come to be, and about God’s being over everything” (Holladay, Aristobulus, 165). See also Sir 42:20

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Ben Sira also affirms that God knows and can reveal the future: “For the Most High knew all knowledge, and he saw into the sign of the age, relating things that passed and the things that will be, and revealing the tracks of hidden things” (42:18–19 NETS). In later Alexandrian tradition, the author of Wis 1:6 can say that God knows the innermost human intentions: “For wisdom is a kindly spirit, but it will not hold blasphemers free of the guilt of their words, because God is a witness of their inner feelings and a true overseer of their hearts and hearer of their tongues” (NETS). Notes § 128. most people have some curiosity. Part of the question at the beginning of the speech is the identity of “most people.” While one could perhaps think of other Jews as the referent, it seems more likely that Ps.-Aristeas’s set up of Eleazar’s speech functions within the narrative world of the text, since ultimately one of Eleazar’s main points is the coherence of Jewish values with those of Gentiles like Ptolemy and Aristeas.616 The Greek term περιεργία, curiosity, is the same term used in § 144 to begin the second discourse in the speech on kosher law. food and drink and those beasts. It appears as if much of this section relies on the laws given in Leviticus 11. There verses 1–23 regulate pure and impure food and verses 24–47 contain laws dealing with clean and unclean animals. The only reference to drink is in 11:34, which is part of a series of stipulations about the status of vessels into which the carcass of a swarming thing might fall. Any liquid container in such a vessel that could be drunk is rendered unclean. Although the phrase “food and drink” occurs again in § 158 about first fruits and in § 162, introducing a second section on kosher law, only food is explicitly discussed. § 129. religiously. The Greek adjective δεισιδαίμων, from which the adverb used here derives, can have either a negative connotation of superstitious or a positive one of fearing the gods. Folker Siegert thinks that both senses are intentionally played upon, but as I read the text, Ps.-Aristeas intends a positive meaning here, hence my translation, “religiously,” that tries to capture that sense.617 Hadas, Pelletier and Shutt, apparently follow-

616

617

Although he does not come down on one side of the issue or the other, James Rhodes makes the suggestion that the reference could be to diaspora Jews. See “Diet as Morality,” 56. Folker Siegert, “Early Jewish Interpretation in a Hellenistic Style,” in The Hebrew Bible/Old Testament; The History of Its Interpretation (Ed. Magnes Saebø; Vol. 1.1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1996) 150.

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ing Andrews and Thackeray, render the word as “scrupulous,” which does not fully capture the element of god-fearing inherent in the term.618 § 130. wise and prudent. Ps.-Aristeas here draws on Aristotelian thought.619 In his Nicomachean Ethics Book 6 (1139a–1145a), Aristotle distinguishes between two kinds of intellectual “virtues”: σοφία and φρόνησις, wisdom of universal truths and wisdom of practical truth. Ps.-Aristeas employs the adjectives σοφός and φρόνιμος to appeal to this distinction. For other examples of Ps.-Aristeas drawing on Aristotle, see the General Comment on §§ 83–120 and §§ 121–127. § 131. piety and justice. Two significant themes in Aristeas. We have seen piety several times already. Justice is one of the primary virtues inculcated through obeying the Jewish food laws. Hadas points out that for Philo (On the Decalogue 52), “piety is the beginning of the virtues.”620 The same might be said of Aristeas. probatively. The adverb derives from the adjective ἐνδεικτικός, meaning probative or indicative. Ps.-Aristeas uses the verbal form in § 133 to mean to give proof. Here the idea is that negative commandments also have an aspect of indication or pointing to a deeper meaning.621

Eleazar Criticizes Gentile Idol Worship (§§ 134–139) 134. Therefore, having made this beginning, he also demonstrated that “all the rest of humanity, except us, think that there are many gods, being themselves more powerful by far than those gods whom they worship in vain. 135. For they make statues out of stone and wood, asserting that the images are of those who have made certain inventions useful to them for their lives, which they worship, whose lack of consciousness is obvious. 136. For if anyone should be divinized in that way, due to an invention, this is completely silly. For such people, taking certain things that were in creation, put them together and showed further their utility. They themselves did not create their original state. 137. Thus, it is empty and vain to deify those who are the same as themselves. For yet even still there are many who are more inventive and more learned than people of old, but they would

618

619 620 621

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 153; Pelletier, Lettre, 167; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 21. See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 153. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 153. Siegert, “Early Jewish Interpretation,” 152.

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not be quick to worship them. And those who form these things and invent fables, they consider them to be the wisest of the Greeks. 138. Is it even necessary to speak of certain other quite vain people, like the Egyptians and those like them, who rely upon wild beasts and most serpents and animals, and they worship these, and they sacrifice to them, both alive and dead? 139. Therefore the lawgiver, who was wise, contemplated each matter, being prepared by God for knowledge of all things, and he fenced us around with unbroken palisades and with iron walls so that we might not intermingle at all with any other nations, being pure in both body and soul, having been set free from vain opinions, revering the only and powerful God above all of the entire creation.” Textual Notes § 134. Eusebius and ms P have the dative πολλῷ in place of πολλῶν of the remainder of the manuscripts. The dative serves an adverbial function, “by far,” and suits the grammatical context better. § 136. Scholars are divided on how this paragraph should begin. Thackeray and Hadas (following Thackeray) have it as εἴ τι in agreement with most of the Greek manuscripts. Pelletier adopts εἴτε, the reading in mss O and T and Eusebius. How one begins depends somewhat on how one reads the verb in the clause, which the manuscripts have as θείη, a 3rd singular aorist optative from τίθημι but which is almost certainly corrupt. Wendland conjectured θεωθείη, and Thackeray suggested θεὸς εἴη.622 Pelletier has accepted Tramontano’s argument that the simplest resolution to the problem is to read the active verb θεοῖ, from which θείη is a corruption, and retain the prior τις, while reading εἴτε at the beginning. Thus, the phrase reads εἴτε γὰρ κατ’ ἐκεῖνό τις θεοῖ, which is the basis for the translation above. // The Greek manuscripts all read the nominative plural ἀνόητοι, but Eusebius preserves the preferable singular, ἀνόητον, silly. § 137. The entirety of the Greek tradition recognizes the need for an optative of φθάνω, but the forms differ. The best sense comes from the 3rd plural present optative φθάνοιεν of ms O2 and Eusebius. Other forms are φθάσειαν in ms B, φθάσοιαν in T and φθάνοισαν in the remainder of the manuscripts. § 139. The reading of ms P and Eusebius, ἀπολελυμένοι suits the grammar better than the remainder of the manuscripts, which read ἀπολελυμένων.

622

Hadas prints Thackeray’s text throughout in which Thackeray prints all conjectures that he accepts in pointed brackets.

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General Comment Eleazar transitions to the main topic of his discussion not with an explication of the food laws, which was the original question, but with a critique and condemnation of Gentile idol worship, which he divides between two peoples, Greeks and Egyptians. One of the important interpretative questions connected with this initial sentence concerns the audience of Eleazar’s speech and whom Eleazar intends to include in or exclude from his condemnations of idolatry. In the translation I have placed quotation marks before the word “all,” since this word represents the transition from Aristeas’s segue from Eleazar’s introduction to his speech (§§ 130–133) to the actual words of Eleazar in this section. Eleazar thus begins, “all the rest of humanity, except us (παρ’ ἡμᾶς), think that there are many gods” (§ 134). To whom does the first person plural pronoun refer? At first blush it might be taken to refer to Eleazar and the Jews, in the context of the speech, where Eleazar is speaking to Ptolemy’s emissaries, and most scholars attribute this sense to it.623 Yet, the pronoun might also, and perhaps more logically in the context, refer to Eleazar, the Jews and to those listening to him, that is, to Aristeas and Andreas (and any remaining members of the embassy?). If this is the case, Ps.-Aristeas intends to separate Aristeas and Andreas, and those like them, such as Ptolemy II, from those condemned for worshipping idols. Thus, the critique that follows does not extend to all Greeks but only to those who are not sophisticated enough to reject idol worship. This statement, then, would cohere with § 16 where our protagonist tells Ptolemy that enlightened Greeks and Jews worship the same God but under different names. The major issue becomes the separation that the food laws create between the Jews and “worthless people” (§ 142), who seem likely also to be those Greeks and Egyptians who worship idols.624 Thus, as we will see, Moses created mechanisms in the Jewish law so that the Jews would not mix with immoral people and not be tainted by idolatry. Ps.-Aristeas sets up this walling off of the Jews from other nations in the famous “walls of iron” chreia in § 139, which I will treat below. This

623

624

See, for example, Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2738. Working with the interpretation that Eleazar is referring to Jews alone, Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 316–17, tries to account for the difference between Eleazar’s speech and that of Aristeas earlier where he argues that Zeus and Dis are simply different names for the same god as the Jews worship. If the interpretation I propose here is correct, then this dissonance recedes. M. A. L. Beavis, “Anti-Egyptian Polemic in the Letter of Aristeas 130–165 (The High Priest’s Discourse),” JSJ 18 (1987) 147. Of course, this argument would further undercut arguments that Eleazar’s speech is intended to emphasize Jewish superiority.

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interpretation also supports Honigman’s contention that the critiques that Eleazar offers are philosophical ones that would make sense to enlightened Gentiles as well as to Jews.625 This reading of the section, while it helps to make sense of other passages in the book, admittedly sits somewhat uncomfortably with the other uses of the first-person plural in the remainder of Eleazar’s speech. So, when in § 139 Eleazar refers to the boundaries that Moses set up so that the Jews might not mix with other nations, the first-person plural must refer only to the Jews, and this must also be the case in § 140 and following, when Eleazar interprets the food laws for Aristeas. Thus, for my interpretation to make sense, it must be that the first instance of the first-person plural pronoun includes the members of the embassy from Ptolemy and that the third-person condemnation of idolatry forms the segue from Eleazar’s initial inclusion of Aristeas and Andreas among those who understand that there are not many gods to the use of the pronouns in § 139 and following that refer only to the Jews. Eleazar’s invoking of “the lawgiver,” i.e., Moses, in § 139 might be seen as the element that distinguishes the first-person pronoun in § 134 from the remainder of the speech. That is, Eleazar’s message is that “we,” a category that includes Aristeas and Andreas, differ from those who worship idols, but Moses gave “us,” the Jews, special laws to prevent “us” from intermingling with those who do. Whichever interpretation one accepts, however, certain elements of the text remain difficult to reconcile with other elements. Whatever the case, it is certainly notable that Eleazar’s critique of Gentile idol worship does not run along the same lines as most other Jewish condemnations, of which there are many (see, for example, Isa 44:1–20; 45:20–46:2; Bel and the Dragon; Joseph and Aseneth 13:11; Sibylline Oracles 3.29–34, 547–548, 601–607; 1 Enoch 91:9; Apocalypse of Abraham). Our author adopts a euhemeristic explanation for the origin of Greek idols. Euhemerus (4th c. BCE), who came from Messene in Sicily, argued that many of the gods were human beings who had been deified because of the great benefits they had bestowed on the rest of humanity.626 In adopting Euhemerus’s approach to the Greek gods, Ps.-Aristeas stands within a tra-

625 626

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 20–21. Euhemerus’s work does not survive except in quotations in Diodorus Siculus. I have already referred to Euhemerus’s discussion of the island of Panchaea, cited in Diodorus Book 5, but the explanation of the deities was cited in Diodorus Book 6, which only survives in quotations in Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 2.2. On Euhemerus and his influence, see Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 1.293–98.

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dition of Greek philosophical critique of traditional Greek polytheism.627 Indeed, as part of his criticism that idol worship is “vain” and “empty,” he notes that among his contemporaries many people are more learned and creative than those who were divinized, and yet no one thinks to worship them. Even so, these ancient inventors are called the “wisest among the Greeks.”628 With respect to this critique, Tcherikover notes that Eleazar does not use “sharper words” to condemn idols and that he does not “emphasize the moral and religious depravity of paganism.”629 Eleazar’s critique does not simply lump all Greeks together, but instead he carves out a space for those who also would question the validity of making idols.630 As a contrast, we can look at two examples, the Wisdom of Solomon, a later Alexandrian Jewish work, and the Epistle of Jeremiah. In these texts, the anti-idolatry vitriol greatly exceeds the rhetoric in Aristeas for whom idol worhip is “silly” (ἀνόητον), “vain” (μάταιον) and “empty” (κενόν). In the Wisdom of Solomon, the author makes four different criticisms of idols. The two more minor critiques take the line that humans are set up as gods. In an explanation unique to the Wisdom of Solomon, a father torn by grief from a child who has died honors it as a god (14:15). The second is essentially euhemeristic in which people set up images of a far-away king, which they then worship as a god (14:16–17). The main and most trenchant criticisms, however, have to do with the confusion of nature with deity and with worshipping the works of human hands. In one case, people confused the beauty of nature with deity and thus began to worship elements such as the sun, moon and stars (13:2). In the other case, people were willing to worship figures made of wood, gold and silver (13:10–19). The reaction of the author, however, distinguishes Wisdom of Solomon from Aristeas.

627

628

629 630

For some of those critiques, see Walter Burkert, Greek Religion (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1985) 305–37 and Frederick C. Grant, Hellenistic Religions (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1953) 71–104. See also, M. L. West, “Towards Monotheism,” in Pagan Monotheism in Late Antiquity (Ed. Polymnia Athanassiadi and Michael Frede; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999) 21–40. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 155, claims that this phrase derives from Euhemerus, but I cannot find anything in Diodorus’s citation of Euhemerus that bears this out. Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 69–70. Jewish condemnation and ridicule of Gentile idol worship is widespread. On the issue, see Johannes Tromp, “The Critique of Idolatry in the Context of Jewish Monotheism,” in Aspects of Religious Contact and Conflict in the Ancient World (Ed. Pieter W. van der Horst; The Hague: Gegevens Koninklijk Bibliotheek, 1995) 105–20.

Eleazar’s Apologia for the Law (§§ 128–171) 14.8 14.9 14.10 14.11

14.12 14.13 14.14

261

But the handmade idol is accursed, and the one who made it, because he worked it, and the corruptible thing was named a god. For equally hateful to God are the impious and their impiety, for what has been done will be punished together with the one who did it. Therefore, there will be a visitation also upon the idols of the nations, because, though part of the divine creation, they have become an abomination, a stumbling-block for the lives of human beings and a trap for the feet of the foolish. For the invention of idols was the beginning of fornication, and the discovery of them the corruption of life. For they did not exist from the beginning, nor will they last forever. For through human conceit they entered the world, and because of this a speedy end was planned for them.

This author expects God to punish those who worship idols as well as those who make them (as also the Epistle of Jeremiah v. 72). They are “hateful,” and an “abomination.” They have corrupted “all of life.” Later in chapter 14 the author attributes the origin of as many evils as he can imagine to worshiping idols (14:22–26), and he calls idol worship “the beginning and cause and end of every evil” (14:27). While the Wisdom of Solomon contains some satire, the Epistle of Jeremiah specializes in it. In this short anti-idol tract, composed as a letter of the prophet to “those who would be led as captives into Babylon,” the author focuses on the helpless nature of the idols to do anything on their own behalf (vv. 14, 26, 54, 56–57, 67). They are “fake” and not sentient. The cumulative effect of this text is to heap satirical scorn on the idols and those who make and worship them. Again Ps.-Aristeas’s language never rises to the levels of scorn and satire found in this text. After disposing of Greek idolatry, Eleazar turns his attention to Egyptian theriolatry, the worship of animals. Ps.-Aristeas employs the same adjective, “vain,” to the Egyptians as he did to the Greeks. Greek and Roman writers had a fascination with Egypt and its customs and often referred to Egyptian animal worship.631 The question here is the extent to which Ps.-Aristeas is drawing on a traditional critique of theriolatry. The classic description of

631

For a short survey of ethnic stereotypes that includes Egyptian theriolatry, see Gideon Bohak, “Ethnic Stereotypes in the Greco-Roman World: Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Jews,” in Proceedings of the Twelfth World Congress of Jewish Studies, Division B, History of the Jewish People (Ed. Ron Margolin; Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 2000) 7*–15*. On Egyptian animal worship, see also Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 153–57.

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this practice was from Herodotus (Histories 2.65–70), but the Greek historian takes an ethnographical approach to these matters and does not offer a critique of them.632 Diodorus (probably relying on Hecataeus of Abdera633) as well presents a description of the Egyptian practice of animal worship, and his account, while laced with a vocabulary of amazement, is generally positive towards the Egyptians. For Diodorus, the practice of animal worship is “extraordinary” (παράδοχος), and he writes, “[A]ll the practices of the Egyptians in their worship of animals is astonishing and beyond belief” (πάντα δὲ θαυμάσια καὶ μείζω πίστεως ἐπιτελοῦντες οἱ κατ’ Αἴγυπτον εἰς τὰ τιμώμενα ζῷα; 1.86.1). Yet, again, we do not encounter an outright negative critique of the practice. With respect to the Greek attitude toward Egyptian animal worship, John Heath strikes the right tone: “The Egyptians mixed up the human with the beast and the beast with the divine in a fashion that could never be tolerated by the Greeks. Herodotus may exaggerate when he claims that in Egypt animals are without exception held to be sacred, but his account accurately depicts the Greek puzzlement [my emphasis] at an alien culture’s attitudes towards both beasts and the divine.”634 Roman authors, on the other hand, appear to have taken a more uniformly critical stance toward theriolatry. I will cite just three examples. Cicero, in his De natura deorum 1.43, calls theriolatry “insanity” (dementia). In Book 8 of the Aeneid, Virgil describes the battle of Actium and refers to Cleopatra’s “monster-gods, barking Anubis and his mongrel crew.” Finally, Plutarch in his Isis and Osiris 71 ridicules animal worship: “But the great majority of Egyptians, in doing service to the animals themselves and in treating them as gods, have not only filled their sacred offices with ridicule and derision, but this is the least of the evils connected with their silly practices.”635 Before coming back to Aristeas, I must at least point to an Alexandrian

632

633

634

635

On Herodotus’s account of Egypt and its purpose, see, Moyer, Egypt and the Limits of Hellenism, chap. 1. On the relationship, see Oswyn Murray, “Hecataeus of Abdera and Phaoronic Kingship,” The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 56 (1970) 144–50. John Heath, The Talking Greeks: Speech, Animals and the Other in Homer, Aeschylus, and Plato (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) 25–26. The major Greek and Roman texts that mention animal worship are given in Arthur Stanley Pease, M. Tulii Ciceronis: De Natura Deorum (2 vols.; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1955) 2.289–91. He writes on p. 290, “But at best animal worship appeared to intelligent Greeks and Romans as exotic and at worst repulsive.” This former assessment seems based on Herodotus and Diodorus, the latter on the Roman authors.

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Jewish tradition of condemnation of Egyptian animal worship of which Ps.-Aristeas is part. The Sibylline Oracles 3.29–34 critique animal worship as part of a broader condemnation of those who are “a craftly and evil race of impious and false double-tongued men and idolatrous idol worshipers who plot deceit” (3.36–38).636 The author of the Wisdom of Solomon 12:23–27 heaps “the utmost condemnation” on Egyptians because they took “as gods the most despised and loathsome of animals” (see also 15:18–19). Philo often refers to contemporary Egyptian practices, and in several place he singles out animal worship for condemnation. In On the Decalogue, 76–80, after commenting that Egyptians worship both those animals that are tame and useful and those that are savage, Philo writes, What could be more ridiculous than this? Indeed strangers on their first arrival in Egypt before the vanity of the land has gained a lodgement in their minds are like to die with laughing at it, while anyone who knows the flavor of right instruction, horrified at this veneration of things so much the reverse of venerable, pities those who render it and regards them with good reason as more miserable than the creatures that they honor (80).637

Ps.-Aristeas’s critique of Egyptian theriolatry, then, stands in this general tradition of Jewish critique, but in the other three Alexandrian Jewish authors we have examined, the vitriol is much more palpable than in Aristeas. Our author does not share the mild fascination of authors such as Hecataeus (whose account forms the basis for Diodorus’s account) and Herodotus, although it is hard to imagine that Ps.-Aristeas does not know (or know of) these reports. Given his appeal elsewhere to Hecataeus as a source, Oswyn Murray has suggested that the critique in Aristeas is an attack on Hecataeus meant “to show that Jewish religion is more defensible than Egyptian.”638 Yet, even though Ps.-Aristeas might well be trading on widely known curiosity and even condemnation of Egyptian animal worship, I do not think that the reference here to theriolatry is a “cliché,” as Honigman suggests.639 It possesses too much of the broader Jewish condemnation of animal worship to be simply a cliché.

636

637

638 639

This section could date anywhere in the late Hellenistic or early Roman periods. On the date of this section and makeup of book 3, see John J. Collins’s introduction to, “Sibylline Oracles,” in OTP, 1.354–361. Translation from F. H. Colson, Philo (vol. 7; LCL; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958). See also in Philo On the Posterity of Cain, 158, 165; On the Special Laws 2.146; On the Contemplative Life, 8–9. Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 127. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 21. For a wider view of Greek and Jewish stereotypes of Egyptians, see Katell Berthelot, “The Use of Greek and Roman

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I think it more likely that Ps.-Aristeas’s complete condemnation of Egyptians as animal worshippers plays on well-known tropes (at least in Jewish sources) as a way of aligning the Jews with Greeks who have an enlightened mind. Here he emphasizes specific practices that might lead his fellow Jews to compromise what seems to be a basic element of their identity, allegiance to the one god. This boundary requires constant shoring up, and the walls of iron that Moses established make those boundaries clear.640 To this point in his speech, Eleazar has argued that Moses’ legislation kept Jews away from evildoers who would pervert their manner of life, and now Moses has legislated to keep Jews free from the taint of polytheism and idol worship. Ps.-Aristeas reemphasizes the point of this critique in his famous assessment that “the lawgiver … fenced us around with unbroken palisades and with iron walls so that we might not intermingle at all with any other nations … having been set free from vain opinions” (§ 139). Moses, whom God “prepared for knowledge of all things,” gave the law so that the Jews would not be tempted to worship anything in creation, but they would revere “the only and powerful God” who stands above and apart from everything in creation. So here we have both a justification and an explanation for Jewish separation from Gentiles, which Ps.-Aristeas will further emphasize in his explanation of the kosher laws, which serve as the mechanism that separates Jews from all others as well as a reminder of high moral values. Although the claim that the Jews do not “mingle at all with any other nation” might seem to exclude anyone who is not a Jew, the setup, tone and language of this section, as we have seen (and will see below), frame those Gentiles who share these criticisms as allies of the Jews in their allegiance to the one God, and Ps.-Aristeas attempts to distinguish between those Gentiles who get and share Jewish monotheism641 from those who remain mired in idolatry of any sort. These Gentiles, at least in Ps.-Aristeas’s assessment, occupy the center of Greek society in Alexandria, and so, while Jewish separation is essential as a way of maintaining a distinctive Jewish identity, Greeks like Ptolemy, Aristeas and Andreas pose no threat to that identity. The figure of Moses as Ps.-Aristeas presents him in this section fascinates when compared to the way he is portrayed in other Jewish literature.

640

641

Stereotypes of Egyptians by Hellenistic Jewish Apologists, with special reference to Josephus’ Against Apion,” in Internationales Josephus-Kolloquium Aarhus 1999 (Ed. J. U. Kalms; Münster: Lit, 2000) 185–221. For more on this issue with respect to polytheism and idols, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 315–21. See also Collins, “Hellenistic Judaism in Recent Scholarship,” 17.

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Ian Scott observes that in Aristeas generally but especially in this section Ps.-Aristeas does not ascribe to Moses prophetic qualities. For other Jewish authors, particularly Philo, Moses gives the law through divine revelation and prophetic inspiration. Not so in Aristeas. For our author, the Jewish “legislation” derives from the rational mind of Moses who was “prepared by God for knowledge of all things.”642 In this way, rather than a prophetic figure, Moses looks more like prototypical Greek lawgivers, such as Lycurgus or Solon. Nowhere in Aristeas does God get credit for giving the law; that is Moses’ doing. “The net result is a depiction of the Law as an entirely human artefact, shaped from the beginning to end by Moses alone. God’s involvement is limited to his having gifted the legislator with a prodigious mind.”643 Notes § 134. revere. In this section Ps.-Aristeas employs two different verbs for honoring or worshiping gods. He does not distinguish Jewish from Gentile worship with these verbs, applying both to Jews and Gentiles. Here and in § 139 and § 140, he chooses σέβομαι, which is a general term for honoring a god. In § 137 and § 138 he opts for προσκυνέω. See note to § 135. § 135. statues. The Greek word ἄγαλμα refers generally in a positive sense to a glory or honor. In a religious context it can denote a gift to the gods or a statue to honor a god. Ps.-Aristeas clearly gives the term a negative cast that it does not have normally. worship. The verb προσκυνέω means to bow down before something or someone. It characterizes Gentile idol worship here and in § 137 and § 138. In § 177 and § 317, the king reveres or bows down to the scrolls of the law and then to the translation. sacrifice. The verb is θύω, a general verb for sacrificing and related to the noun used several times in Aristeas for sacrifices. See the note to § 33. § 136. divinize. Ps.-Aristeas uses the verb θεόω in this paragraph, which means to deify or make into a God. In the next paragraph, he chooses ἀποθεόω, which also means to deify. The different but synonymous verbs look to be employed for variation. original state. The term κατασκευή is a favorite of Ps.-Aristeas (according to the concordance in Pelletier it occurs 22 times in the work). Here it refers to the original state within creation of the materials out of which human beings have constructed or refashioned their inventions and “showed fur-

642 643

Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 14–20. Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 20.

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ther their utility.” Although human ingenuity could refashion these materials, humans did not create them in the first place. This is beyond human ability – only God can do this. § 137. vain. Ps.-Aristeas uses the adjective μάταιος twice in this section, once to refer to Greek idolaters and then with the prefix πολυ-, completely or quite, to condemn Egyptians who worship animals. It has the connotation of foolish when referring to people. The adjective, noun and verb appear frequently in both Jewish and Christian anti-idol contexts, perhaps most famously in Paul’s condemnation of idol worship in Romans 1 (see the verb in 1:21). invent fables. Ps.-Aristeas exhibits throughout the work a critical attitude toward myths. For him, they are fables, that is, untrue stories. In this paragraph, he uses μυθοποιέω, invent fables or myths. See also the notes to § 168 and § 322. § 138. animals. The Greek word κνώδαλον refers to any wild and dangerous animal, anything from lions to snakes. It can also connote beasts more generally or even sea-monsters. In this paragraph it distinguishes certain animals from wild beasts (θηρία) and serpents (ἑρπετῶν), and thus probably takes the more general meaning. I have thus rendered it “animal.” § 139. intermingle. The verb ἐπιμείγνυμι can have the connotation of sexual intercourse, and Ps.-Aristeas uses the verb in that sense in § 152. Of course, Eleazar’s more general claim in this paragraph and earlier ones about inappropriate associations might hint at sexual relations, since the verb here easily could bear that suggestion. Citing this connotation as one piece of evidence, Moore argues that one of the ethnic boundaries that Ps.-Aristeas reinforces is the prohibition on marriage outside of the ethnic community.644

The Purpose of Kosher Law (§§ 140–143) 140. “Whence the priests who guide the Egyptians, who carefully investigated many things and who comprehend matters, have given us the name ‘men of God,’ which does not belong to the rest, with the exception of anyone who reveres God truly, but there are people who are concerned with food, drink and shelter. 141. For their entire disposition has recourse to these things. But for our people these things have been considered as nothing, but throughout the whole of life their reflection is on the sovereignty

644

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 317–18.

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of God. 142. Therefore, so that we might not become perverted, being polluted by nothing or associating with worthless people, he fenced us around on every side by purifications and through food and drink and touch and hearing and sight that depend on laws. 143. For in general all things are to natural reason similar, being managed by a single power, and for each single thing there is a profound reason that we abstain from the use of some of them and that we avail ourselves of others. And for the purpose of illustration, running over one or two things, I will explain to you.” Textual Notes Most of the variants in this section are scribal mistakes or minor variants. § 142. Eusebius has the connecting conjunction οὖν, which makes better sense than the preposition ἐν of most Greek manuscripts or τε ἐν of ms B. The preposition probably came into the tradition under the influence of μηθενί, which follows immediately and which might seem to require a preposition. // Thackeray, Tramontano, Pelletier and Hadas accept the reading συναλισγούμενοι from the contract root συναλισγέω, pollute. The compound verb is a hapax legomenon, only occurring in Aristeas, although it is listed in LSJ as συναλίσγομαι, the spelling found in ms T and Eusebius. The simplex of the verb occurs in Dan 1:8. The meaning suits the context here. On the basis of the alternative spelling, Wendland suggested συμμισγόμενοι, from the root συμμίγνυμι, to mix with, which, although the meaning also fits the context, has not gained acceptance in the editions. The present translation is based on συναλισγούμενοι. General Comment Eleazar now moves to answer the original question, and we come to the primary subject of his speech, the Jewish food laws. This short introduction follows directly from § 139 in its emphasis on the Jews’ reverence for God. In both § 139 and § 140, Ps.-Aristeas employs the verb σέβομαι to characterize the Jews’ attitude toward “the only and powerful” or “true” God. In § 140, however, Eleazar cites Egyptian priests, who are said to investigate carefully and know about many things, to provide testimony to the piety of the race of the Jews. Ps.-Aristeas has already invoked the “most learned” Egyptian priests in § 6, and he appeals to them here again as authorities who would know such things. (See the note on § 6 above.) According to Ps.-Aristeas through the mouth of the high priest, these Egyptian priests have applied the epithet “men of God” (ἀνθρώπους θεοῦ) to the Jews, a title that is given to Moses in the singular in Deut 33:1 and to Elijah in 3 Reigns 17:18. In the LXX/OG, however, the phrase is never used in the plural, and the noun is arthrous, τοῦ θεοῦ. Despite these

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slight differences, I find it hard to think that Ps.-Aristeas is not alluding to Deuteronomy at the least, since Moses, the “man of God” and the Jewish lawgiver, has given the laws so that Jews would know how to revere God properly. Thus, the singular applied to Moses is extended to the Jews as a people.645 This title allows Eleazar to distinguish the Jews from all other people, a concern of the speech in general. In this statement, there seems to be no exception even for enlightened Gentiles, since the Jewish food laws apply only to the Jews, and thus § 140 would run directly counter to the accommodation made for some Gentiles elsewhere in Aristeas. Yet, although the title “men of God” certainly applies to the Jews, Eleazar does not say that all other people “are people of food and drink and shelter,” that is, they are preoccupied about these physical and material needs; he says that all other people do not have the title “men of God.” The grammar of the Greek remains tantalizingly vague: … ἀνθρώπους θεοῦ προσονομάζουσιν ἡμᾶς ὃ τοῖς λοιποῖς οὐ πρόσεστινα εἰ μή τις σέβεται τὸν κατὰ ἀλήθειαν θεὸν ἀλλ’ εἰσὶν ἄνθρωποι βρωτῶν καὶ ποτῶν καὶ σκέπης, “they have given us the name ‘men of God,’ which does not belong to the rest, with the exception of anyone who reveres God truly, but there are people who are concerned with food and drink and shelter.” In this respect, Hadas’s translation of and comment on the final clause are misleading, since he translates it “The rest of men are of food and drink and raiment” and comments, “Humanity is here divided into two categories, men of food, and men who revere the true God.”646 As I see it, there are indeed two categories, but they do not of necessity align with Jews on one side and Gentiles on the other, as Hadas’s translation intimates. Again, Ps.-Aristeas seems to carve out some liminal space that might be inhabited by people who are not Jews but who revere the true God, since he offers an exception for those who worship God truly, and this group might not be composed only of the Jews. In this sense, § 140 does not run counter to § 16 and § 134; it allows for Gentiles who are not people of food, drink and shelter to revere the true God. Moreover, we might reflect back to the first person plural pronoun at the beginning of Eleazar’s speech in which he seemed to be including Aristeas, Andreas and other enlightened Gentiles among those who do not worship idols.

645

646

See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 156 and Pelletier, Lettre, 171. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2739, points to Wis 18:13, where the Egyptians, because of the events of the Exodus, acknowledge the Israelites as “child of God,” but here the phrase is θεοῦ υἱόν. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 156.

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With respect to such quotidian concerns, as far as Eleazar is concerned, the Jews do not worry about them at all; they constantly reflect on “the sovereignty of God.” In this way, Eleazar sets the Jews off as a philosophical people who contemplate God rather than worry about material needs.647 Reinhard Feldmeier notes that the Jewish aversion to consideration of food, drink and clothing also compares to Stoic and Cynic values, which reinforces Ps.-Aristeas’s appeal to the Jews as philosophers.648 Given the way that he has Eleazar interpret the food laws, Ps.-Aristeas’s framing of the Jews as philosophers prepares the reader for Eleazar offering a rational basis for both Jewish separatism and the laws that create it, explicating the rationale that Moses had when he originated the law. Thus, he removes Jewish separation from the realm of the ethnographic habits of foreign (and thus strange) peoples and places it into the context of the Hellenistic philosophical school. As we have seen elsewhere (and will again), this statement reflects a basic value in the book – the Jews practice piety in the sense of the term εὐσέβεια, a value they share with enlightened Greeks in Hellenistic Alexandria. The language of § 142 recalls the beginning of Eleazar’s speech in § 130. In both cases, the high priest remarks that the Jews do not associate with certain people so that they do not become perverted (διαστροφή).649 In this paragraph he explicitly refers to the food laws, which will be taken up in full starting in § 144. He also mentions purifications (which do not get explained in Eleazar’s speech), but touch, hearing and sight do become, at least indirectly as we shall see below, topics of Eleazar’s apology. The high priest’s differentiation beween natural reason (φυσικὸν λόγον) and profound reason (λόγον βαθύν) serves as a preliminary answer to the question that Aristeas asks at the beginning of this section in § 129, that if creation is one, why are some things thought unclean and others clean. Here Eleazar refines the basic argument that Moses developed the food laws with a rational basis. On the one hand, from the standpoint of a

647

648

649

As we saw above, the idea of the Jews as a race of philosophers appears in several Greek writers of the 4th to 3rd centuries BCE. Theophrastus (Περὶ Εὐσεβείας in Porphyry, De Abstinentia 2.26), Megasthenes (Indica in Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 1.15.75.2) and Clearchus of Soli (De Somno in Josephus Against Apion 1.176–183) all refer to the Jews as philosophers. For the texts see, Stern, Greek and Latin Writers, 1.8, 10, 45 ff., 49 ff. Feldmeier, “Weise hinter ‘eisernen Mauern,’” 32. He gives Cleanthes’ “Hymn to Zeus” as a Stoic example, where Cleanthes denigrates pursuing fame, money and bodily pleasures as controverting the “law of God.” See Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 317 for the possible sexual innuendo in this paragraph.

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natural reason or logic, from general human knowledge, things in nature look very similar, and nothing is inherently unclean by nature.650 Eleazar explains that this is because a single power, that is, God, maintains nature. As Tramontano notes, this is in no way a statement that denigrates the natural world.651 Yet, Eleazar argues further that there is a deeper more profound reason or logic that distinguishes clean from unclean, which he will go on to explicate. The distinction between the natural and the profound allows Ps.-Aristeas to continue to establish an important point, that the food laws are not irrational but rather they are supremely rational, have moral action at their base and are grounded in creation, which God brought into being and maintains. Furthermore, as we shall see, while they separate Jews from “worthless people,” they do not pose barriers to Jewish participation in the larger Alexandrian cultural world and association with others who worship the true God and possess high moral values, especially with enlightened Gentiles such as Aristeas and Ptolemy II.652 Notes § 140. shelter. The Greek word σκεπή has the general meaning of covering, shelter or protection (see LSJ). The modern translations understand it to refer to clothing (Hadas, “raiment”; Andrews and Shutt, “clothes”/ “clothing”; Pelletier, “dress”; Tramontano, “clothes”).653 Meecham regards clothing as the proper connotation primarily on the basis of σκέπασμα in 1 Tim 6:8.654 The reason for this preference is not clear to me, especially since LSJ does not list clothing as one of the primary meanings of the word. Food and drink reflect human needs for survival, and in that sense, human beings require shelter as well. Compare the use of the term in Sirach, for example, where in its six occurrences it means shelter. See particularly 29:21–22: “Life’s beginning is water and bread and clothing (ἱμάτιον) and a house (οἶκος) for hiding indecency. Better is the life of a poor person under a shelter of rafters (ὑπὸ σκεπὴν δοκῶν) than splendid food among strangers.” Thus, I have departed from other translations and have rendered the word as “shelter.”

650 651 652 653

654

Siegert, “Early Jewish Interpretation,” 151. Tramontano, La Lettera, 142–43. For more detailed argument, see Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.” Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 157; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 108; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 22; Pelletier, Lettre, 171 (“costume”); Tramontano, La Lettera, 141 (“vestito”). Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 251.

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§ 142. fenced us around on every side. The phrase πάντοθεν ἡμᾶς περιέφραξεν is practically the same as that in § 139. Here Ps.-Aristeas has added πάντοθεν, on every side, to show how completely the law protects Jews from unwanted and problematic associations. § 143. natural reason … profound reason. The two phrases here are not typical of other Alexandrian Jewish literature. Neither of the phrases is found in Philo, for example.

Kosher Laws Explained Allegorically (§§ 144–157) 144. “Do not come to the exploded conclusion that Moses legislated these matters on account of a curiosity with mice and weasels or similar creatures. But everything has been set in order solemnly for pure investigation and the outfitting of character for the sake of justice. 145. For of the winged creatures that we use, all are tame and distinguished by extreme cleanliness, having for food grains and pulse: pigeons, doves, locusts, partridges and also geese and all similar kinds. 146. Concerning those winged creatures that are forbidden, you will find wild ones and carnivorous ones and ones that oppress the others with the strength that they have, and through injustice they get food by consumption of the tame ones mentioned above. And not only these, but they snatch up lambs and kids, and they even harm humans, both dead and alive. 147. Therefore through these he established a sign, giving them the designation ‘unclean,’ that it is binding on that person for whom the legislation has been ordained, to avail him/ herself of justice and to oppress no one, relying on his/her own strength, nor to rob anyone, but to govern his/her life by justice, just as the tame ones of the aforementioned birds by nature consume the pulses upon the earth and do not oppress to the destruction of their kind. 148. Therefore, through these the lawgiver has granted a sign to those who are intelligent, to be just and to accomplish nothing with force, nor to oppress others, relying on their own strength. 149. For whereas it is not permitted to touch the aforementioned animals because of each one’s disposition, how can one not guard absolutely against reducing one’s habits to that condition? 150. Therefore, everything of which we avail ourselves concerning these and the beasts has been set out figuratively. For the dividing and separating of the nails of the hoof are a symbol for separating each of our actions that they might turn out well. 151. For the strength of entire bodies along with their operation rests upon the shoulders and legs. Therefore by signifying through these things, he compels us to accomplish all things with a view toward justice with discretion. And yet we are for this reason distinct from

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all people. 152. For most of the rest of humankind defile themselves when they have associations, committing great injustice, and countries and entire cities exalt themselves by them. For not only do they procure males, but also they defile mothers and even still daughters. We, however, have been kept apart from these things. 153. And the one who has the aforementioned habit of being separated he [i.e., the lawgiver] also has characterized as having memory. For all those things that are cloven-hoofed and chew the cud clearly exhibit the quality of memory to those who are perceptive. 154. For chewing the cud is nothing other than the recollection of life and existence. For living is thought to endure through food. 155. Therefore, he exhorts also through the scripture when he says, ‘With remembrance remember the Lord who has done great and amazing things in you.’ For when understood, they appear to be great and glorious. For first, there is the fashioning of the body and the digesting of food and the distinct nature of each member. 156. But much more, the arrangement of the senses, the operation and unseen movement of thought, the quickness to act in any circumstance and the invention of arts encompass a boundless character. 157. Therefore he has exhorted us to keep in remembrance that the aforementioned things are preserved by divine power along with their constitution. For every time and place he has appointed in order always to call to mind the ruling and preserving nature of God.” Textual Notes § 144. Most of the manuscripts have πάντα, everything, which Pelletier has in his text, whereas a minority of manuscripts have ταῦτα, these things. The demonstrative pronoun is taken to refer to mice and weasels, while πάντα is more inclusive, fitting better the tone of the section. § 145. Eusebius has the conjunction καὶ after the verb καθέτηκε, while most of the Greek manucripts do not. Ms B has καθέστηκεν ἅ, where the relative pronoun witnesses to the need for some connection between the verb and the following phrase. // Most manuscripts read ἄττακοι, locusts. One Eusebian manuscript (i) has what looks to be a simple error of kappa for gamma, but the result is a different word, ἄτταγοι (as given in Thackeray; Hadas has ἀτταγαί, which is probably more grammatically correct), from the noun ἀτταγᾶς, a kind of bird, perhaps a partridge (see LSJ). Locusts appear in the list of birds in Lev 11:22 but in that verse as τὸν ἀττάκην, and thus ἄττακοι is likely the correct reading. § 146. Most manuscripts have τὰ λοιπά, the others or the rest, as the object of the participle καταδυναστεύοντα, oppress. Ms B has the genitive case, which would ostensibly link the phrase to the previous noun δυνάμει, which does not make as much sense. § 147. The verb καταδυναστεύω, used again

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in this paragraph, can take either an accusative or a genitive object. Most Greek manuscripts have the accusative μηδένα, although ms T has the genitive μηδένος. I have read the accusative with all the editions. // Eusebius and Greek manuscripts U and O1 have the perfect participle in the accusative case, πεποιθότας, which suits the grammar of the sentence. The rest of the Greek manuscripts have the nominative plural πεποιθότες, which does not fit as well. Ms B has the dative πεποιθόσιν. // Eusebius has an expansion of the last phrase of the paragraph, “and do not oppress to the destruction of their own kind,” rewriting it as πρὸς τὴν ἐπαναίρεσιν οὔτε τῶν ὑποβεβηκότων οὔτε τῶν συγγενικῶν, “to the destruction neither of those who are inferior nor of those of their own kind.” § 148. Mss B and T (only T is listed in Pelletier) use the genitive ἑτέρων as the object of the infinitive καταδυναστεύειν instead of the accusative, which is the reading of the majority of the manuscripts and that accepted here and in the editions. § 150. Eusebius’s reading at the beginning of the paragraph, πάντα οὖν τά, represents what must have been the correct text in contrast to the Greek manuscripts, which have πάντων, an obvious corruption. // For the verb in the first sentence, there are three primary variants. Eusebius’s reading of the perfect passive, ἐκτέθειται, has been set out, represents the best possibility. The other two are ἐξέθετο (active voice) of ms B and the problematic ἐκθέοιται of the remainder of the manuscripts. § 151. A major question involves the case of the infinitive σημειοῦσθαι, to signify. The majority of the manuscripts have it in the nominative/accusative case with the article τό, but in these cases it has no clear relationship to the rest of the sentence. Pelletier reads with Eusebius (o), which has the dative article τῷ and with ms B, which also has the dative, although it has a different infinitive, ὁμοιοῦσθαι. This reading establishes the relationship and thus my translation of “by signifying.” Thackeray conjectures a relative clause, ὃ σημειοῦται, which is really not necessary (see Tramontano).655 § 152. For the phrase “they procure males,” the manuscripts and Eusebius offer different readings. Pelletier, whom I follow here, accepts Eusebius, who has πρὸς ἄρσενας προσάγουσιν. The Greek manuscripts simply use the accusative and read προσάγουσι τοὺς ἄρσενας. With the preposition, the compound verb means to bring with or before, which fits the sense of the paragraph and thus, my use of “procure” in the translation. With the accusative the

655

In his text in Swete, Thackeray prints τὸ σημειοῦσθαι surrounded by daggers to show its tentative nature and notes “Fortasse legendum ο σημειουται” in the apparatus. Only in “Translation,” 367 n. 7 does he suggest the relative clause as the correct reading, which he uses as the basis for his translation.

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verb means to put to, bring to or apply, a sense that could work but one that does not fit as well. Schmidt conjectured the verb προάγουσι, lead or bring forward, with the accusative, which Thackeray places in his text. // The word θυγατέρας, daughters, needs to be in the accusative case in this sentence. Eusebius and ms O have it this way. The rest of the manuscripts have the nominative case.656 § 153. Mss B P T and Eusebius read τρόπος, habit, while the rest of the manuscripts have the obvious corruption τόπος. // The second clause of the first sentence requires a finite verb, which we find in Eusebius. The Greek manuscripts have the infinitive κεχαρακτηρικέναι, to have characterized, which probably suffered from attraction to the earlier accusative article or the infinitive εἶναι. // Eusebius and ms O2 preserve the correct third singular verb ἐκτίθεται, exhibit, whereas the other manuscripts have the first singular ἐκτίθεμαι. § 155. Eusebius adds τοῦ θεοῦ after κυρίου in the composite quotation from Deut 7:18 and 10:21, which is probably not original. Pelletier notes that the phrase is also missing in codex Sinaiticus and in the first hand of Vatican ms 1209. The familiarity of the phrase probably explains its addition.657 § 156. The last three words of the paragraph have variations in the manuscripts. Pelletier prints in his edition ἀπέραντον (found only in ms B658) περιέχει τρόπον, which I have translated “encompass a boundless character.” Eusebius (and in Thackeray ms K) has ἐπέραστον, amiable. Pelletier argues reasonably that the original text read ἀπέραντον, which generated the variant ἐπέραστον. The final stage was ἀπέραστος, the reading that Meecham prefers and that Thackeray prints in his text.659 § 157. At the end of the paragraph Eusebius moves the conjunction καὶ and begins a genitive absolute: συντηροῦντος καὶ τὰς ἀρχὰς καὶ μεσότητας καὶ τελευτάς, while preserving the beginning and the middle and the end. Wendland suggested that this is an interpolation based on Plato, Laws 715E.660 General Comment A wide range of issues emerges in this section that will continue through to § 170. In these paragraphs, Eleazar gives an allegorical interpretation

656

657 658

659 660

This variant is listed in Pelletier. Thackeray does not have this variant anywhere in his apparatus. Given his usual thoroughness, I am at a loss to explain why. See Pelletier, Lettre, 35. Pelletier, Lettre, 247, remarks that only ms B has this reading. Thackeray, however, has the note “BPTZ txt HAGI” in his apparatus. I cannot explain the divergence between the two. Meecham, Oldest Version, 257. Pelletier, Lettre, 35.

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of Jewish food laws, largely dependent on Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, although other biblical passages factor in as well. Several important questions attend this section. In the narrative world of the text, Eleazar is speaking to Aristeas, Andreas and the embassy from Ptolemy, but can we know to whom Ps.-Aristeas directed these interpretations? Since the work is most likely directed at Jews and not Gentiles (see Introduction, section 10), which Jews was Ps.-Aristeas trying to reach? George Howard has argued that the audience was Palestinian Jews who were “arrogant” and thought themselves superior to those who “live among other people, appreciate their culture, befriend them and respect them.”661 In his view, Ps.-Aristeas directed Eleazar’s speech at those whom he considered to be the true sectarians, Palestinian Jews, who had no tolerance for diasporic co-ethnics/religionists of the sort that Aristeas represented. His choice of a high priest to articulate the author’s views is part of the overall purpose of the work in which diaspora Jews address those in Palestine. Howard’s view fails to account very well either for the work as a whole or for the audience in this specific section, however. Other scholars have argued that Eleazar’s explanation of the law is meant to combat among Alexandrian Jews Gentile criticism of the food laws. Indeed, ancient Greek and Roman writers had a long tradition of critique of a supposed Jewish misanthropy, and the food laws played an important part in those traditions.662 Certainly the word “exploded” (or “collapsed”) in § 144 could suggest that Ps.-Aristeas is referring to how these perceptions have been destroyed by explanations such as Eleazar will offer. Yet, as Tcherikover notes, if this explanation were really intended to counter Gentile criticism, it is highly unlikely that Gentiles would have had any awareness of Jewish attitudes toward animals like mice and weasels.663 Yet, in Greek and Roman writers the most frequent reference to Jewish

661

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George Howard, “The Letter of Aristeas and Diaspora Judaism,” JTS N. S. 22 (1971) 347. For discussions, see Schäfer, Judeophobia, 66–81, Gager, Moses in Greco-Roman Paganism and Louis H. Feldman, Jew & Gentile in the Ancient World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993) chap. 5. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 320–21, however, argues that the explicit reference to these two creatures alludes to the Stoic Chrysippus, who according to Cicero, says, “Again, if you see a spacious and beautiful house, you could not be induced to believe, even though you did not see its master, that it was built for the sake of mice and weasels (muribus illam et mustelis aedificatam putes); if then, you were to imagine that this elaborate universe, with all the variety and beauty of the heavenly bodies and the vast quantity and extent of sea and land, were your abode and not that of the gods, would

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avoidance is to pork, which does not even get mentioned in Eleazar’s entire speech.664 Gruen goes farther than Tcherikover and insists that this introduction is a “rhetorical contrivance by the author … The author simply seeks to set up a situation in which Eleazar can propound Jewish ethical principles.”665 Given Aristeas’s importance as a source of information about Alexandrian Jewry, I sympathize with the attempts to wring out some historical nuggets from these sections. Yet, I find Gruen’s conclusion more satisfying, with one caveat – that Ps.-Aristeas’s “rhetorical contrivance” has an important literary function in this section, one that coheres with the issues at stake in the rest of the work. Ellen Birnbaum understands the allegorical explanation of the kosher laws as “an expression of Jewish identity.”666 As a general statement, she is perfectly correct, but I disagree (as I have explained above) with the contention that the point is to show the superiority of Judaism, as Birnbaum and others have claimed. Certainly this Jewish author was not advocating assimilation; Jewish separateness matters a great deal to Ps.-Aristeas. The point, as I have argued in the Introduction, is to imagine a Jewish identity that accomplishes two converging goals: (1) to encourage Jews to maintain their traditional ways and to live as Jews in Hellenistic Alexandria, to convince Jews that they could do so and participate fully in Alexandrian society at large and (2) to establish the Septuagint as the basis on which that identity is founded. In Ps.-Aristeas’s view, there is no contradiction here; there is a tightrope to walk, however, and Eleazar’s explanation of the food laws illustrates best how carefully Ps.-Aristeas traverses it.667 The section is indeed addressed to Jews, but to Alexandrian Jews who likely were struggling with precisely these difficult

664 665

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667

you not be thought absolutely insane?” (De natura deorum 2.17). The thought, however, seems very far from Aristeas. Tcherikover, “Ideology,” 62. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2740. See also Katell Berthelot, “L’interprétation symbolique des lois alimentaires dans la Lettre d’Aristée; une influence pythagoricienne,” JJS 52 (2001) 257, who notes that the text explicitly addresses “curiosity” and not hostility. Ellen Birnbaum, “Allegorical Interpretation and Jewish Identity among Alexandrian Jewish Writers,” in Neotestamentica et Philonica: Studies in Honor of Peder Borgen (Ed. D. E. Aune et al.; NovTSup 106; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 308. See the last sentence in Birnbaum’s section of Aristeas (“Allegorical Interpretation,” 314): “Perhaps the work in general addressed how Jews could have participated in the larger culture and, at the same time, maintained a pride in their ancestral heritage, offering the possibility that one could really do both.” If by “pride” she means actual observance of Jewish law rather than a more general sense of Jewish superi-

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questions. In that sense, Eleazar’s reference to others’ views about the food laws represents an important rhetorical feature of the section. Eleazar’s comments in § 144 might incidentally remind some of Aristeas’s readers of Gentile critiques of Jewish food laws, but I doubt that Ps.-Aristeas is trying to respond to specific critiques, since the mainstays of Greek and Roman curiosity and/or disapproval – eating pork, Sabbath observance, circumcision – do not enter into his speech at all. John Barclay has it right, I think, when he talks about Aristeas as having a strategy of negotiation, of “using and refusing.”668 Ps.-Aristeas uses his Greek education and cultural position to argue for Judaism as consistent with elite Greek culture, but he also refuses to compromise on certain distinctive elements of Jewish identity that in practice separate Jews from Gentiles. He implicitly combats the notion that Jews are barbarians, particularly by employing Greek methods of interpretation to show that the laws that set off Jews from Greeks actually embody “impeccably Hellenistic morals.”669 In addition, Eleazar’s interpretations are not framed as his own understanding, but as Moses’ original intention for the law. In this way, Ps.-Aristeas’s interpretations of the dietary regulations are authorized as scripture for the Alexandrian Jewish community, since they are truly from Moses. Ps.-Aristeas, then, is engaged in what Hindy Najman has called “Mosaic discourse,” that is, discourse tied to a founder in which “to rework an earlier text is to update, interpret and develop the content in a way that one claims to be an authentic expression of the law already accepted as authoritatively Mosaic.”670 Whereas the promulgation of the translation represents a second giving of the law, we already see in Eleazar’s speech the

668

669

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ority, then I agree. For the larger argument, see Introduction, section 10 and Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.” John M. G. Barclay, “Using and Refusing. Jewish Identity Strategies Under the Hegemony of Hellenism,” in Ethos und Identität: Einheit und Vielfalt des Judentums in hellenistisch-römischer Zeit (Ed. Matthias Konradt and Ulrike Steinert; Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2002) 20–22. Barclay, “Using and Refusing,” 20–21. Where I disagree with Barclay is in his contention that Aristeas reveals Jews “entirely at ease in the Ptolemaic court” and by extension in Hellenistic Alexandria. As should be clear from the Introduction and numerous places in the commentary, I think that Ps.-Aristeas, by reinforcing ethnic identity and boundaries, is addressing some anxieties among elite, educated Jews about the combination of participation (“using”) and Jewish practice (“refusing”). Hindy Najman, Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism (JSJSup 77; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 13. For more detailed discussion of this issue related to Aristeas and to Eleazar’s speech in particular, see Introduction, section 8.

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beginning of that process of law-giving. Eleazar, as the high priest in Jerusalem, somewhat ironically gives Moses’ intention for the law in Greek, and thus the translators, who carry out the work of transforming the law from Hebrew into Greek, become extensions of Eleazar’s insight into what Moses meant when he gave the law.671 They might not be the inspired channelers of Moses that Philo envisions in Life of Moses 2.38–40, but in a way they are the lawgivers in this second giving of the law.672 As has been the case elsewhere in the work, Ps.-Aristeas has a more complicated relationship to the biblical texts than scholarship has sometimes allowed. At its core, the section relates to the food laws as they are articulated in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, but with significant differences. In his speech, Eleazar focuses attention on clean and unclean flying creatures (see Notes below) and on cloven-hoofed animals that chew the cud. He makes nothing out of the mice and weasels here, although he returns to them in more detail in §§ 163–168 in the completion of the speech, where they form a kind of inclusio. In § 144 they serve as examples of the kinds of creatures about which Moses legislated, although not out of “curiosity” about the creatures themselves. As I noted above, pigs are notably absent from Eleazar’s apology, but so also are many other animals, not least of which are the prohibited and acceptable fish and sea creatures (Lev 11:9–12; Deut 14:9–10) and most of the “unclean creeping things that creep upon the earth” (Lev 11:29–38).673 If we look at the biblical texts, we see that, although they might be the springboard for Eleazar’s comments, the relationship to the biblical laws is not a simple one. So, Eleazar enumerates the clean and then the unclean flying creatures, which include locusts, unlike the biblical laws, which separate out the “winged creeping things that walk on all fours” from the birds (see Lev 11:21–24). Eleazar’s speech also has the reverse order of kosher and non-kosher animals from the biblical prohibitions, clean then unclean in Aristeas and unclean then clean in the biblical texts. Moreover, Eleazar explicitly enumerates clean birds and only refers in general to the unclean

671

672 673

On this idea, see also Benjamin G. Wright, “Scribes, Translators, and the Formation of Authoritative Scripture,” in In the Footsteps of Sherlock Holmes: Studies in the Biblical Text in Honour of Anneli Aejmelaeus (Ed. Kristin de Troyer et al.; CBET 72; Leuven: Peeters, 2014) 23–28. On Philo’s view of the Septuagint, see Najman and Wright, “Perfecting Translation.” In trying to explain the absence of pork, Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 322–23, makes the tentative proposal that the animals treated in this section reflect the Egyptian animal cult and that Ps.-Aristeas is attempting to distinguish Jews and their dietary habits from Egyptians.

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ones as “wild and carnivorous,” whereas both Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 enumerate the unclean birds and do not provide an explicit list of the clean birds. While Eleazar’s formulation of the laws differs from the biblical text, it makes complete sense in the narrative context, since the point is to emphasize positive moral values that are embodied in the dietary practices. Finally, in § 149, in order to emphasize his hermeneutical point, Eleazar maintains that Jews cannot even touch these unclean animals. This claim does not cohere with either Leviticus or Deuteronomy where contact with the carcasses of these animals renders one unclean but touching the live animal is nowhere mentioned. When it comes to the cloven-hoofed and cud chewers, the language is much closer to that of the Septuagint of Leviticus and Deuteronomy. The biblical texts employ the verb διχηλέω, divide, with the noun ὁπλή, hoof, to indicate cloven or split hoofed animals (Lev 11:3, 7; Deut 14:6). They also have a second phrase with the verb ὀνυχίζω, trim or pare nails, with its cognate noun ὀνυχιστήρ, nail/hoof (Lev 11:3; Deut 14:6)674 or the more usual noun for hoof, nail or claw, ὄνυξ (Lev 11:7; Deut 14:8). In Aristeas, however, the verb διχηλέω takes the object ὄνυξ once (§ 150), and one time it is used without an object to mean divide the hoof (§ 153). The septuagintal term ὀνυχιστήρ does not appear at all in Aristeas. Ps.-Aristeas adds another verb, διαστέλλω, separate, into this mix, and it represents something of a stichwort in this section.675 Its addition produces the phrase διχηλεύειν καὶ διαστέλλειν ὁπλῆς ὄνυχας, dividing and separating the nails of the hoof, which is close to but not identical with the septuagintal usage. Both the biblical passages and Ps.-Aristeas use the term μηρυκισμός for chewing the cud. More important than Aristeas’s relationship with the Septuagint, however, is the interpretive hay that Eleazar makes out of the food laws. The key term within the text comes in § 150, where Eleazar says that they have been “set out figuratively” (τροπολογῶν ἐκτέθειται). While most scholars translate the phrase “by way of allegory” or something akin to that, the word here is not one of the usual Greek terms for allegory.676 In early Greek literature the term ὑπόνοια, which referred to hidden meanings or deeper senses of things, σύμβολον, a symbol, or αἴνιγμα, a dark saying, 674 675

676

LSJ lists this noun as a LXX hapax legomenon. Rhodes, “Diet as Morality,” 62–64, notes the importance of the verb in this section as the operative term for Jewish separation, and thus it appears that Ps.-Aristeas has added it here in order to provide linguistic emphasis to the correlation of the separation of the hoof and the separation of Jews from others. For this translation, see, for example, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 161.

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were the most prominent terms applied to the activity of signaling that texts might have other meanings than those on the surface.677 Only in the Hellenistic period does the term ἀλληγορία, allegory, appear, which represents a shift in the concept from the earlier ὑπόνοια (“under-thought”) in philosophy to the later use in rhetoric of ἀλληγορία (“otherwise-speaking”), and it only becomes widespread much later.678 Rather than characterize Eleazar’s hermeneutic with any of these terms, Ps.-Aristeas employs the verb τροπολογέω, which LSJ lists as occurring for the first time in this passage. A compound of τρόπος and λέγω, the verb seems to indicate a figurative meaning that has a moral component.679 In this section, we encounter as well the noun σημεῖον and the verbal cognate σημειόω. These words do not usually connote some kind of hidden or concealed thought, but their basic meaning has to do with signifying or indicating, pointing to something. Nonetheless, even though the language in Aristeas is idiosyncratic, Eleazar’s hermeneutical approach to the food laws falls within the general orbit of Hellenistic allegory in a general sense, understood as finding hidden meanings below the surface of the literal text. Since Aristeas is perhaps the first Jewish work to use this technique of exposing figurative or allegorical meanings of Jewish scripture, two important questions attend Ps.-Aristeas’s approach: (1) Did Ps.-Aristeas depend on other models for this kind of interpretation? and (2) What was he trying to accomplish by employing this method? With respect to the first question, Glenn Most points out that in the Hellenistic period the Stoics were the most fervent proponents of allegorical interpretations, but they applied allegory as a way of bringing the older Greek poets into their philosophical orbit.680 Allegory later moved into rhetoric and was taught as a rhetorical device. While Stoic hermeneutics might have had some impact on Ps.-Aristeas, he does not appear to employ his figurative understanding of scripture to similar ends as the Stoics, that is, to aid in the construction of a philosophical system (although see below).

677

678

679

680

See Dirk Obbink, “Early Greek Allegory,” in The Cambridge Companion to Allegory (Ed. Rita Copeland and Peter T. Struck; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010) 16. Glenn W. Most, “Hellenistic Allegory and Early Imperial Rhetoric,” in Copeland and Struck, Cambridge Companion to Allegory, 37. In medieval Christian exegesis, tropological interpretations of scripture look to recover a moral meaning of the passage. Although a distinction is made between allegory proper and tropological exegesis in Christian medieval interpretations, the distinction does not seem to have been made in earlier Greek literature. Most, “Hellenistic Allegory,” 28.

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Katell Berthelot has looked in another direction, and she has argued that Ps.-Aristeas found his primary inspiration in the tradition of Pythagorean akousmata (sg. akousma) or symbola, teachings of Pythagoras, a number of which dealt with allegorical interpretations of food prohibitions.681 To give one example, Iamblichus in his Protrepticus (chap. 21, symbolic interpretation 33), who says that he gets his information from Aristotle, gives one akousma in which Pythagoras forbids eating the red mullet because one should not associate with a person who does not blush or turn red out of excessive impudence. He derives this lesson from the relationship between the word for the fish, ἐρυθῖνον, and the verbs meaning to blush, ἐρυθιάω, and to cease blushing, ἀπερυθιάω.682 His lesson, that the fish’s characteristics signify a deeper moral lesson about human relationships, works in a very similar way to what we see in Eleazar’s speech. Berthelot notes several other cases where Pythagoras prohibited eating predatory animals, as we see in Aristeas § 144 and §§ 165–167.683 She concludes convincingly that Ps.-Aristeas might well have known Aristotle’s lost treatise On the Pythagoreans as well as some of the lesser known authors who transmitted the akousmata. Thus, as we have seen elsewhere, our author draws on various sources, both Jewish (and scriptural) and Greek, in order to construct his narrative. Whereas the food laws derive from the Jewish scriptural tradition, the inspiration for interpreting them in this particular manner likely comes from traditions of Pythagorean approaches to avoiding the consumption of particular foods.684 As to the second question – what does this method of interpretation accomplish for Ps.-Aristeas? – David Dawson makes an extended case that the allegorical interpretations in Aristeas and his fellow Alexandrian Aristobulus effectively subordinate Greek thought to Jewish scripture. By uncovering the true meaning of Torah, these Alexandrian Jewish writers subordinate the authoritative writers of Greek culture and allegorically

681

682 683

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Berthelot, “L’interprétation symbolique,” 260 and eadem, Philanthrôpia Judaica: Le débat autour de la “misanthropie” des lois juives dans l’Antiquité (JSJSup 76; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 197–200. See Berthelot, “L’interprétation symbolique,” 261. Berthelot, “L’interprétation symbolique,” 261. She notes that one Pythagorean akousma connects weasels with informers, which shows that Ps.-Aristeas knew specific Pythagorean akousmata. See the comment on this claim below on §§ 165–167. For more detail on the weasel’s biology, see the note for § 165. Berthelot, “L’interprétation symbolique,” 262–65, discusses the larger relationship between Judaism and Pythagoreanism that could account for Ps.-Aristeas’s knowledge of the akousmata.

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attach those non-scriptural meanings to scriptural texts. Thus, as Dawson concludes, “Jewish interpretive subordination is in fact a hermeneutical usurpation in which classical writers are demoted to the status of Mosaic epigones, condemned merely to echo his original and sublime insights. Authentic Greek culture is actually Jewish.”685 Indeed, Aristobulus explicitly claims that Plato and Pythagoras, for instance, derived their ideas from the Jewish laws. In fact, his brief notation of the translation of the law comes as part of this contention (Frag. 3; Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 13.12.1 ff.).686 Ps.-Aristeas makes no clear claim to Greek subordination, however, and Dawson seems to read the passages in Aristeas within the framework of Aristobulus’s (and later Philo’s) remarks.687 In contrast to Dawson’s characterization, Aristeas evinces a more complex and ambivalent assessment of the relationship between Jewish and Hellenistic culture, one primarily oriented to his co-ethnics/religionists and that addresses their ability to participate in the wider culture. In this respect, Aristeas differs from Aristobulus. I see the allegorical interpretations in Eleazar’s speech working similarly to how Most describes allegory working among Stoics in the Hellenistic period: Allegory was a way of decontextualizing them [i.e., localized texts and traditions] out of the determinate local situations and traditions from which they had originally arisen and for which they had once been intended, and of recontextualizing them within conceptual systems that were universally valid and comprehensible – and thereby it supplied meaning to them which one did not need to have special local knowledge or to be a member of a specific political community in order to understand and appreciate. In this way, a broad cultural heritage could be rescued, if not from immediate extinction, then from gradual irrelevance; and on the one hand, disoriented Greeks could thereby manage to maintain their traditional allegiances, while, on the other hand, the rescued prestige of their traditions could benefit their rescuers too, shedding the corroborative light of an ancient wisdom upon new Stoic doctrines.688

685

686

687

688

David Dawson, Allegorical Readers and Cultural Revision in Ancient Alexandria (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992) 82. For other examples in Aristobulus, see Dawson, Allegorical Readers, 74–82 and Adela Yarbro Collins, “Aristobulus,” in OTP 2.831–42. See for example, Dawson, Allegorical Readers, 74–82, where he spends much more time explicating Aristobulus than Aristeas. I think this is also true of Feldmeier, “Weise hinter ‘eisernen Mauern,’” 25, who also reads Aristeas together with Aristobulus and Philo. Most, “Hellenistic Allegory,” 28.

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Although Most is describing Stoics, I think much the same thing could be said of Aristeas’s use of allegory. Even though Ps.-Aristeas is not attempting to develop a new Jewish philosophical system, he decontextualizes and recontextualizes the “local” traditions, and he attempts to rescue them by attributing to them universal validity. One important difference between what the Stoics were doing as members of the majority culture and what Ps.-Aristeas was advocating as a member of a minority culture is that Ps.-Aristeas was working both to maintain the “traditional allegiances” of his co-ethnics/religionists and at the same time to argue for Jewish legislation as a kind of special knowledge that could be affirmed within the majority culture. I think that this explanation better accounts for the two contrasting positions that we find throughout Aristeas, that, on the one hand, Jewish legislation has a special character that separates Jews from Gentiles and in some ways supercedes their traditions, and that, on the other hand, numerous exceptions are made for those enlightened Gentiles who understand the universal applicability of the Jewish law and the true nature of God. Indeed, even in the paragraphs we are concerned with here, we find Ps.-Aristeas making exceptions for certain Gentiles. In § 148, for instance, Eleazar says that Moses gave the laws about eating particular birds “to give a sign to those who are intelligent” (σημειοῦσθαι τοῖς συνετοῖς). By eschewing the usual first-person plural references to the Jews, is Ps.-Aristeas creating space here for anyone, Gentiles included, who might be insightful enough to see why Moses legislated as he did? In the significant passage in § 152, where Eleazar condemns certain sexual practices, he does not make a blanket condemnation of Gentiles as a whole, but he refers to “most of the rest of humankind” (οἱ γὰρ πλείονες τῶν λοιπῶν ἀνθρώπων). This seems to me, within the narrative world of the text, to connote something like “present company excepted.” These hedges are consistent with others that we have already seen that make room for some Gentiles as standing in a similar place to the Jews, thus making them cultural allies when it comes to the morality that Moses implanted in the Jewish Law. Ps.-Aristeas, then, is not polemicizing against the larger culture by arguing for its origins in Judaism, but he is demonstrating the ways that Jews and enlightened Gentiles share a common set of values, even though Jewish practices might look different or strange to outsiders and at times create difference from them. James Rhodes puts it nicely: “But for the Jews and Gentiles who can eat together and share philosophical dialogue, the meaning of ‘separation’ has inevitably shifted. In demonstrating the ‘profound logic’ (§ 143) of the dietary laws, the author has turned boundary markers into bridges that make possi-

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ble a rapprochement between philosophically minded Jews and devout Gentiles.”689 Ps.-Aristeas differs somewhat from the Hellenistic allegorizers, however, in that he does not advocate abandoning observance of the Jewish food laws. If Hellenistic allegory developed as a mechanism for preserving the poets, especially Homer, by identifying a hidden meaning below the surface meaning, it was acceptable to jettison the literal meaning in favor of the hidden. Ps.-Aristeas does not take this tack. On the contrary, he strives to preserve the literal observance, even though his interpretive task would have been much easier if he thought that practical observance of the kosher laws had become obsolete in the face of their moral meaning. Throughout this section the unspoken but clear assumption is that actual Jewish practice lies at the root of the matter. Observance, not simply assent, causes separation and potential social friction. This is precisely the problem that Ps.-Aristeas seems to be trying to overcome. Non-observance does not appear to be an option for him, though.690 Indeed, the practice of eating certain foods and not eating other foods constitutes the indication, σημεῖον, of the moral meaning. We encounter a similar attitude on Philo’s part in On the Migration of Abraham 89–91. He scolds Jewish allegorists, who have apparently decided that the surface meaning of scripture does not require observance and who emphasize the symbolic meaning, saying that they treat the literal “with easy-going neglect.”691 Later Christian writers also exploit the allegorical approach to scripture more in line with earlier Stoic aims. That is, in order to salvage the food laws (and other Old Testament texts) as applicable to Gentile Christians, they dispense with the literal meaning in favor of a deeper meaning that they regard as universal. Exemplary of this approach is the Epistle of Barnabas 10.

689 690

691

Rhodes, “Diet as Morality,” 69. See also, Berthelot, Philanthrôpia Judaica, 202–3. Barclay, “Using and Refusing,” 21, suggests that these new interpretations of Jewish tradition “will not divide Jew from Jew in socially significant ways” as long as they do not undermine actual Jewish practice. In this passage, however, the examples he gives are the Sabbath, the Feasts and the Temple cult, but he does not cite the food laws. In Special Laws 4, where he does examine the kosher laws, he is not explicit about whether or not Jews need to follow them. Occasionally, Philo will set aside the literal meaning of the text, however. For a general discussion of Philo’s exegetical approach to scripture, see P. Borgen, “Philo of Alexandria,” in Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period: Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, Qumran Sectarian Writings, Philo, Josephus (Ed. Michael E. Stone; CRINT Section 2.II; Assen/Philadelphia: Van Gorcum/Fortress, 1984) 259–63.

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As hinted at in the verb τροπολογέω, Eleazar’s allegorical interpretation of the dietary laws focuses on their moral meanings, which depend on recognizing the inherent character of the animals that are either permitted or forbidden. The major theme of the initial paragraphs of this section emphasizes justice as the overarching value that the food laws instill. The flying creatures are distinguished on the basis of their propensity to oppress others with injustice. The tame birds do no such thing, but the wild and carnivorous ones oppress others and unjustly consume the tame birds. They even oppress beasts and humans. Thus, for Eleazar, the designation “unclean” was intended to show that the binding nature of the Jewish law means that those who keep the law are bound by the standards of justice that Eleazar has shown reside in the food laws. Since the tame birds eat “the pulses upon the earth” and do not oppress others, Moses legislated that those who consume these animals must see that they cannot accomplish their goals by force or oppression. Eleazar extends the same hermeneutical approach of linking the nature of the animals consumed (or not) to moral meanings to cloven-hoofed animals and those that chew the cud, which he treats as having two different purposes. With respect to the cloven-hoofed, the interpretation is more obscure than that of the birds. Clearly the idea of dividing conveys the distinction between good, that is just, and evil actions, although Eleazar does not articulate the idea as explicitly as this. He only makes a brief comment about separating actions. He seems to be suggesting in § 151 that the hooves, since they serve as the foundation of the legs and shoulders, which as he notes support the strength and energy of bodies, indicate that just actions performed with discretion are the foundation of ethical behavior. The last sentence in § 151, which again points to Jewish distinctiveness or separation (διεστάμεθα from διαστέλλω), does not have a clear relationship to what has come before. What distinguishes Jews from all people? The word διότι, which means “wherefore, for what reason,” only establishes a general connection. Is the distinction that only Jews act with justice and discretion? Since Ptolemy, for example, also acts justly, this is not likely the meaning. What seems to be distinctive about Jews, according to Eleazar, is the clear recognition through the food laws either that justice must be the foundational principle of action or that of all people Jews possess the food laws that so obviously teach these ethical principles. Ps.-Aristeas’s figurative interpretations of the food laws, although innovative, fall within a broader conception that the keeping of the dietary restrictions, however they are interpreted, constitutes a central feature of Jewish identity. So, for example, in the diaspora story of Daniel in the king’s court of Daniel 1, the young men are offered the royal diet of food

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and wine, which they decline in favor of vegetables and water. The servant who allows them to eat this diet worries that he will be held responsible if the Jewish youths end up in poorer condition than the others. After ten days, the Jewish youths “appeared better and fatter than all the young men who had been eating the royal rations” (Dan 1:15). Thus, although their dietary practices separate them from the others, they still participate in a foreign court. Here we see a comparable issue to that in Aristeas, the effort to maintain Jewish identity as a minority community living in a majority culture. In a somewhat different approach, at Qumran the “pure food” was kept from initiates, who were considered impure until they had passed through the trial period to full initiation (1QS 6.16–23), and one feature of the punishment for someone “who breaks one word of the law of Moses” (1QS 8.21) was exclusion from the “pure food.” In the case of the Qumran community, food practices function as part of the sectarian identity being constructed vis-à-vis the larger Jewish society, which was seen as impure. These sectarians saw themselves as the real, remnant of Israel surrounded by an impure Israel and thus functionally as a minority community within a larger majority. Even though they had removed themselves physically, food still served as a central marker of identity. Paragraph 152 complicates this picture, however, since Eleazar singles out particular sexual practices as indicative of what separates Jews from others, although as we noted above, he does allow for exceptions. These practices, he says, not only are widespread among non-Jews; countries and cities even take pride in them. This kind of basic moral defilement does not characterize Jews.692 First, these people “procure” males. William Loader claims that male prostitution is the focus here, although the verb προσάγουσιν does not specifically refer to procuring prostitutes.693 Second, these Gentiles have intercourse with both mothers and daughters (see Notes). In both cases Jews do not practice such things. The critique of Gentile sexual practices occurs frequently in Jewish literature, and it likely originates in the legal prohibitions in Leviticus 18 and 20. In some cases it goes hand-in-hand with the practice of idolatry, where worship of idols causes sexual perversion. So, for example, Wis 14:12 states flatly, “For the invention of idols was the beginning of fornication.” The most well known passage connecting the two is Romans 1 where, because of

692

693

See William Loader, The Pseudepigrapha on Sexuality: Attitudes towards Sexuality in Apocalypses, Testaments, Legends, Wisdom, and Related Literature (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 2011) 433. Loader, Pseudepigrapha on Sexuality, 433.

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idol worship, God “gave them [i.e., Gentiles] up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves” (1:24).694 It is tempting to see some connection in Aristeas between the condemnation of idolatry in §§ 134–138 and the focus on sexual practices here, although Ps.-Aristeas does not offer one as the cause of the other and the two are not in close proximity to one another. Nonetheless, other Alexandrian Jewish writers also condemn similar practices without any overt connection with idolatry. Pseudo-Phocylides offers many aphorisms on marriage and sexuality, among them prohibitions of same-sex intercourse (190–193). The Sibylline Oracles also accuse Gentiles of mother and daughter intercourse (5.390–391) and male same-sex relations (5.393), as well as male prostitution (3.185–186).695 So, whether connected with idolatry or taken on its own, Gentile sexual promiscuity and perversion are the targets of a wide range of Jewish condemnations, and although they probably come out of readings of the sexual laws in scripture, they serve for Jewish writers as a means of blanket condemnation of Gentiles as suffering from a general moral defilement. Here again, we see Ps.-Aristeas walking his tightrope. On the one hand, he is drawing on a tradition that Jews employ as a means of condemning Gentiles, and yet on the other hand, our author does not have such a general judgment as his aim. Thus, his language reflects both the traditions that he uses and his own attempts to walk them back in order to find common ground between enlightened Gentiles and Jews like himself. Eleazar next turns to chewing the cud, which he connects with the cloven-hoofed: “And the one who has the aforementioned habit of being separated he also has characterized as having memory.” The idea of memory and recollection rests on the fact that ruminants chew their food a second time – even though Ps.-Aristeas assumes that his reader knows about this process.696 Since life is sustained through food, its second chewing signifies recollecting or ruminating on life. This statement leads to a quotation of “scripture” (see Notes), a composite citation of Deut 7:18 and 10:21, whose point is to show that God has done “great and amazing things in you,” which for Eleazar are the fashioning and working of the human body and the operation of the senses.697 Recalling that God has created 694

695

696

697

Other Jewish texts that make similar claims are 2 Enoch 34 (most explicitly in the long recension) and Pseudo-Philo’s Biblical Antiquities 25:9–13. On sexuality in the Sibylline Oracles and Pseudo-Phocylides, see Loader, Pseudepigrapha on Sexuality, 56–77 and 457–76. Philo, on the other hand, describes the process before discussing its allegorical importance. See Special Laws 4.107. See Tramontano, La Lettera, 152.

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human beings prompts the continued remembrance of how God preserves all things, which recalls Eleazar’s comments in § 141 that God is sovereign over all things. Thus, cud chewing ultimately signals the recollection of “the ruling and preserving nature of God” (§ 157).698 Notes § 144. exploded. The Greek καταπετωκότα, the passive participle of καταπίπτω, which normally means to fall down, here is clearly used in a metaphorical sense. Meecham argues for “exploded,” which Hadas follows. Thackeray renders it “rejected.” Pelletier resorts to a phrase, “which has collapsed.” Andrews and Shutt diverge from this general trend and have “degrading” and “contemptible” respectively. Tramontano renders the word “common.”699 There is an interpretive issue at stake here. Andrews’s, Shutt’s and Tramontano’s translations do not presume some Gentile critique of the Jewish law to which Ps.-Aristeas is responding. To think that Moses was simply concerned with prohibiting the eating of specific creatures is a terrible idea. The translations of Meecham, Hadas and Pelletier, however, suggest that Ps.-Aristeas is aware of criticisms of Jewish food laws that he regards as “exploded” or “collapsed,” because they do not understand the real reason that Moses legislated these prohibitions. See above for additional comments on this term and its significance here. Moses. This is the only place in the work where Moses is explicitly named. Usually he is simply referred to as νομοθέτης, lawgiver. curiosity. This is the same word, περιεργία, that Eleazar uses in § 128 when he remarks that most people have some curiosity about Jewish dietary restrictions. character. The Greek word τρόπος refers to a person’s habits, customs or way of life. In this sense, the idea is that keeping the dietary laws creates a habit of life that is moral. § 145. locusts. These insects are included in the list of birds that are acceptable for Jews to eat. Hadas notes that this is a strange inclusion.700 Yet it might be Ps.-Aristeas’s way of understanding the laws concerning things that fly in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, on which he relies in this 698

699

700

Epistle of Barnabas 10:11 allegorizes ruminants as showing that Christians should associate only with those who fear God and “ruminate on the word of the Lord.” Meecham, Oldest Version, 252; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 159; Thackeray, “Translation,” 367; Pelletier, Lettre, 173 (“d’avance écroutée”); Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 108; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 22; Tramontano, La Lettera, 143 (“volgare”). Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 159.

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section. With respect to the category of flying creatures, Ps.-Aristeas uses the word πτηνός rather than the πετεινός, which is the term employed in both Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14. In neither of the LXX passages are clean birds enumerated, only the unclean birds. Compare Philo, On the Special Laws 4.117, where he also lists clean species of birds. In Leviticus, immediately after the list of unclean birds comes the “creeping things that fly” (i.e., insects) among which locusts feature prominently. A similar situation attains in Deuteronomy. Although 14:11 says, “You shall eat any clean bird (ὄρνεον),” these are not listed; only the unclean birds are. Immediately following this list is a very brief notation about creeping things that fly: “All creeping ones of those that fly – these are unclean for you; you shall not eat from them. You shall eat of any clean winged creature (πετεινόν)” (14:18–19, NETS). The statement in Aristeas might be read as including the birds and the creeping things that fly in the same category. Ps.-Aristeas, then, creates his own clean list of winged creatures. § 147. unclean. The use of ἀκάθαρτα in this paragraph coheres more closely with Deuteronomy than with Leviticus 11. In the list of unclean birds in Lev 11:21–23, the animals are not called unclean, but “abominations” (βδελύγματα). The term “unclean” only describes the carcasses of these animals (Lev 11:24). In Deut 14:12–19, the flying creatures are either “clean” (καθαρός) or “unclean” (ἀκάθαρτος). § 152. males … mothers … daughters. This paragraph returns to the theme of associations first raised in § 130, but in this case the topic is illicit sexual associations. Most commentators take these references as referring to the biblical prohibitions regarding legitimate sexual partners in Leviticus 18–20.701 While I agree that we likely have a reflection of the Leviticus prohibitions, as elsewhere (see above on the king’s gifts and the high priest’s garments) the degree of direct influence is sometimes overestimated. The procuring of males almost certainly is a condemnation of perceived gentile immorality based on the biblical prescriptions about males having sex with males (e.g., Lev 18:22; 20:13; see General Comment above). In this light many commentators describe the mothers and daughters statement as prohibiting incestuous relationships. Indeed, many of the legal proscriptions in Leviticus have to do with regulating sex in close kinship relation701

Arkady Kovelman, Between Alexandria and Jerusalem, 89, thinks that the entirety of the first part of Eleazar’s apology (§§ 130–152) is an interpretation of Lev 18:3–24. He argues, for example, that the reference at the beginning to Greeks and Egyptians is a reflection of Lev 18:3, which enjoins Israelites not to do the same things as Egyptians and Canaanites. In general, while he uncovers several connections between the passages, I think that he overstates the case.

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ships. Leviticus 18:17a does contain the simple prohibition, “You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter.” Admittedly this biblical injunction is embedded in the larger context of laws against incest within the same household and is in the context of sleeping with a sister-inlaw (see Lev 18:16 and 17b), but, in fact, Aristeas only contains a condemnation of having sex with a mother and her daughter. No indication is given that these women are part of any close kinship relation with the offending male, and so the sex is incestuous only in this very specialized sense. Honigman argues that this injunction targets Stoics and Cynics, who might be thought to engage in incestuous sex. She cites Plutarch (On the Contradictions of the Stoics 22), who, in criticizing the Stoic Chrysippus, writes, “In one of his books of Exhortations, he says that sexual intercourse with mothers or daughters or sisters, eating certain food and proceeding straight from the childbed or deathbed to a temple have been discredited without reason.”702 Neither the biblical law nor Chrysippus clarify that one’s own mother, daughter or sister are the objects of the forbidden sex. From whatever context Ps.-Aristeas has taken his criticism, however, he does not make the exact relationship of the mother and daughter any more specific than these other sources. In all of these cases, both biblical and philosophical, the term “sisters” is absent from the relationships that Eleazar discusses. Some scholars have suggested that this absence reflects Ps.-Aristeas’s sensitivity about consanguineous marriages among the Ptolemies.703 While this is possible, even plausible, nothing in the text, other than the lack of the word “sister,” points specifically to such sensitivity. § 154. is thought. Pelletier notes that the verb νομίζει in this paragraph is used in an intransitive sense. Thackeray retains its transitive sense, making Moses the subject of the verb and rendering “for he considers that life exists by taking food.”704

702

703

704

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 22. She cites this text as part of a larger argument that Eleazar’s criticisms in the apology are stock criticisms that reflect a larger discourse that Greeks level against certain practices. In making this argument, she does not take into consideration the potential scriptural texts at hand, which I find problematic to the overall argument. (The section number of Plutrach is given in accordance with the text as available on the Perseus Digital Library website, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2008.01.0389; last accessed Jan 3, 2015). See Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 109, citing Wendland approvingly. Also see Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 160; Pelletier, Lettre, 175; Berthelot, “L’Interprétation symbolique,” 256. Thackeray, “Translation,” 368.

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§ 155. scripture. In this paragraph and in § 168, Ps.-Aristeas refers to the Jewish law as ἡ γραφή, usually translated “scripture.” Although the word generally indicates something with written characters or a piece of writing, in § 155, the designation introduces a quotation of Deut 7:18, which is followed by an allusion to Deut 10:21, and thus indicates a technical usage. It is the earliest occurrence in Greek-Jewish literature of the term in this technical sense. In fact, the use of the noun γραφή is somewhat unusual to refer to scripture. More usual is some form of the verb γράφω in the formula “it is written” or a variation of it. Philo often uses the plural αἱ γραφαί (e.g., On the Creation of the World, 78; On Abraham 61), although he also uses the singular occasionally (On Abraham 68). In the Hebrew and Aramaic scrolls found at Qumran, many of which are roughly contemporary with Aristeas, several different formulae introduce scriptural texts, including a number employing the verb ‫כתב‬, write, which parallels the verbal Greek usage. The later use of the noun in § 168 has a more general sense of sacred/authoritative writing. In both cases, however, the term likely refers to the law and not to a wider collection of works. For Ps.-Aristeas, the law of Moses is scripture. These two uses also should be viewed together with § 316 where the law is referred to as a book, τὸ βιβλίον. If these formulae are any indication, it appears as if the second century BCE was a time when Jews both in Palestine and in the Diaspora were beginning to regard certain written texts as sacred and authoritative, which were given the designation “scripture” and were introduced by some formula, most commonly a verbal form.705 This observation, of course, does not imply that there was any fixed list of books that all or even a significant portion of Jews would have agreed upon or that the text of these books had become fixed in the tradition.706

705

706

On the Qumran formulae, see Moshe J. Bernstein, “Scriptures: Quotation and Use,” in Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Ed. Lawrence H. Schiffman and James C. VanderKam; New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 840. For a detailed argument about how Aristeas represents the Hebrew and Greek law as scripture, see Francis Borchardt, “The LXX Myth and the Rise of Textual Fixity,” JSJ 43 (2012) 1–21, especially 10–12. He also argues that Ps.-Aristeas is arguing for a fixed text of scripture. On this issue, see the discussion below on §§ 310–311. The scholarly publications on the development of the biblical canon are too numerous to cite here. See, for example, Eugene Ulrich, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Origins of the Bible (Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature; Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 1999) and Lee Martin McDonald and James A. Sanders, eds., The Canon Debate (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2002).

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With remembrance … amazing things. Here, as elsewhere, the relationship of Aristeas to the LXX is complicated. Saying that we have here a composite citation of Deut 7:18 and 10:21 means that Aristeas shares some vocabulary with these passages. The opening phrase, μνείᾳ μνησθήσῃ, is exactly that used in Deut 7:18. The following words approximate Deuteronomy but do not reflect an exact citation based on the texts we now have – κυρίου τοῦ ποιήσαντος ἐν σοί in § 155 as compared to ὅσα ἐποίησεν κύριος ὁ θεός σου in Deut 7:18. This last phrase might also be compared to Deut 10:21, which has ὅστις ἐποίησεν ἐν σοί. The phrase “great and amazing things,” τὰ μεγάλα καὶ θαυμαστά, only approximates the phrase in LXX Deut 10:21, τὰ μεγάλα καὶ τὰ ἔνδοξα ταῦτα. Thus, there is enough similarity to the two passages, together with the designation that this is “scripture,” to think that Ps.-Aristeas knew the Deuteronomy text but enough difference to wonder in what form he knew it.

Tefillin and Mezuzot (§§ 158–160) 158. “For also with food and drink, he has commanded those who have offered the first part of a sacrifice to avail themselves of them right away. And indeed also he has given us a symbolic reminder on our clothes, just as also on doors and gates he has prescribed that we set up the sayings to serve as a reminder of God. 159. And also he has commanded us expressly ‘to fasten the sign upon our hands,’ showing clearly that every activity must be accomplished with justice, keeping in mind our own constitution and above all the fear of God. 160. And he has also commanded that ‘when sleeping and rising’ that we study God’s provisions, not only in word but also with thoughtful discrimination, observing their own movement and impression when they go to sleep and when they wake, that there is a certain divine and incomprehensible changeover between them.” Textual Notes § 158. Some Greek manuscripts have corrupted the clearly original ἀπαρξαμένους, who have offered first fruits, to other verbs in several ways: ἀρξαμένους in ms I and ἀρπαζομένους in ms K. Mss B and T omit the verb altogether. // Eusebius transmits the preferable form συγχρῆσθαι, to avail or make use of. The Greek manuscripts all contain the corrupted form συγχωρῆσαι, from the verb συγχωρέω, to meet together. § 159. The reading τῆς ἑαυτῶν κατασκευῆς, our own constitution, has been accepted from Eusebius. The manuscripts all lack the reflexive pronoun and the noun. Some manuscripts link the phrase μνήμην ἔχοντας, having

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in mind, with the last phrase about fear of God. Ms B has αὐτῆς, ms P τοῖς, ms Z καὶ τοῖς, and the remainder τῆς. Simon Schard (1561) apparently had the reading τῆς ἡμῶν συστάσεως, our composition, in a recent marginal hand in ms O.707 This addition looks like an attempt to supply an obviously missing phrase of the sort that Eusebius transmits. § 160. All of the Greek manuscripts have the participles κοιταζομένους καὶ διανισταμένους, when sleeping and rising. Eusebius adds καὶ πορευομένους in agreement with Deut 6:7. It is unoriginal, even though it is in a different order from the biblical verse. // Eusebius and ms K include the adverbial καί after ἀλλά, which parallels the δὲ καί construction at the beginning of the verse.708 // Although Eusebius adds the article τήν to the noun ὑπόληψιν, the anarthrous noun of the Greek manuscripts is probably best, since nouns combined with καὶ are often governed by one article only in Aristeas (see, for example, twice in § 158). General Comment The phrase “food and drink” in § 158 resumes the thread of Eleazar’s speech by recalling the same phrase in § 128. These three short paragraphs deal with a series of Jewish practices: the eating and drinking connected with sacrificial offerings: the placement of fringes on garments; the use of mezuzot; and the use of phylacteries.709 So, whereas the phrase “food and drink” picks up the earlier thread, these paragraphs still form something of a digression from it, to which Ps.-Aristeas will refer again explicitly in § 162. The interpretation of the first sentence hinges on how one interprets the participle ἀπαρξαμένους, whether it is used in a technical Jewish sense of offering first fruits as required in a number of pentateuchal laws (e.g., Lev 2:12; 23:10; Num 15:17–21; 18; Deut 12:6–7; 26:1–11) or in the more general sense of the Greek term, to begin a sacrifice or to offer firstlings. In the Septuagint, the verb ἀπάρχομαι does not appear in the pentateuchal laws but only the noun ἀπαρχή, first fruits, and in the biblical laws these sacrifices belong to the priests. Nothing is said there about when or what a layperson is to eat following the giving of the first fruits. The idea that Jews are to offer sacrifice and then immediately partake of food and drink

707 708

709

See the note in Pelletier, Lettre, 178, “in mg. manus recens O Schard.” Thackeray also has ms P as a witness to this reading. Pelletier, although he collated ms P himself, does not list it as a witness to this text. For an earlier version of my arguments in this section, see Wright, “Three Jewish Ritual Practices.” Also, Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 25–28.

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(whether it is of the sacrifice or not) seems to connect with the preceding sentence in § 157. It does not appear specifically to single out the pentateuchal laws about first fruits offerings, and thus, it is not a technical term in this case. Eating and drinking following sacrifice, then, enables Jews to “call to mind always the ruling and preserving nature of God” – that is, the sacrifice emphasizes that God rules over everything, and eating and drinking recall God as preserver and sustainer. There follows a rather enigmatic sentence that contains no clear ritual reference, but the phrase “symbolic reminder on our clothes” likely refers to the “fringes” or “tassles” that were to be worn on clothes according to Num 15:38–39 and Deut 22:12 (Num 15:38: κράσπεδα ἐπὶ τὰ πτερύγια; Deut 22:12: στρεπτὰ … ἐπὶ τῶν τεσσάρων κρασπέδων τῶν περιβολαίων σου). The oblique reference to the fringes in Aristeas comports much better with the Numbers passage, which also connects the fringes with remembering: “And the Lord spoke to Moyses saying: … And let them make for themselves fringes on the hems of their garments throughout their generations, and you shall put on the fringes of the hems a blue thread. And it shall be for you on the fringes, and you shall see them [i.e., the fringes] and remember (μνησθήσθεσθε) all the commandments of the Lord, and you will do them” (NETS). In Aristeas they also serve as a reminder (μνείας δέδωκεν, “he [i.e., God] has given us a reminder”). The same noun occurs in the second half of the sentence with respect to the mezuzot (see below), where God is explicitly invoked. Although the description in Aristeas does not resemble closely either the Numbers or Deuteronomy passages in that none of the specific vocabulary for these fringes from either of these texts occurs here, the distance should not be a surprise at this point, given how Ps.-Aristeas has handled material from the Septuagint elsewhere in the work. It is difficult, however, to think that Ps.-Aristeas did not have something like the Numbers passage in mind. In the second half of the sentence following the reference to the fringes, Ps.-Aristeas refers to the Jewish practice of affixing mezuzot to door-jambs and gates in accordance with the commands to do so in Deut 6:9 and 11:20, where the commands are worded in identical fashion: καὶ γράψετε αὐτὰ ἐπὶ τὰς φλιὰς τῶν οἰκῶν ὑμῶν καὶ τῶν πυλῶν (“and you shall write them on the door-posts of your houses and on your gates”). Although the version of the command in Aristeas bears more resemblance to the biblical passages than his remarks on the fringes, important differences distinguish Aristeas from the pentateuchal commandment. First of all, even though Aristeas locates mezuzot on the gates, Deuteronomy also has them affixed to door-posts or door-jambs, while Ps.-Aristeas simply has “doors,” actually a slightly different location. Second, the biblical command to “write”

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refers to τὰ ῥήματα, the words. Ps.-Aristeas uses the phrase τὰ λόγια, which are placed or set up on the doors and gates.710 Perhaps the most critical interpretive point in this clause is the meaning of this last phrase, τὰ λόγια, which in the singular has the meaning of announcement or oracle. Modern translators have taken different approaches to the phrase. Hadas renders it, “the chapters,” which seems to presume that Ps.-Aristeas was referring to some specific content of the mezuzot, and Pelletier translates “the divine ,” apparently taking the phrase as indicating the law more generally. Shutt’s translation, “Words,” seems to follow Pelletier’s lead.711 We do encounter the noun λόγιον, in two other places in Aristeas, § 97 and § 177, and these uses help us to establish the meaning here. In §§ 96–99, which describe the high priest’s clothing, Ps.-Aristeas refers to the λεγόμενον λόγιον, “the so-called oracle,” in which twelve stones are set. As I noted above in the comment on these paragraphs, it is curious that Ps.-Aristeas does not connect the high priest’s λόγιον with any oracular function nor with the Urim and Thummin. The evidence from the Septuagint, where the “oracle of judgments” is described in LXX Exod 28:23–26, suggests some function for the λόγιον when the high priest “enters the holy place before the Lord” (28:26). Indeed, Num 27:21 ascribes an oracular function to the Urim and Thummin, which are affixed to the λόγιον. In § 177 the plural τὰ λόγια matches more closely the use in this passage. There the translators have arrived in Alexandria bearing manuscripts of the Jewish Law. When the translators unpack and unroll the scrolls, King Ptolemy reponds with reverence: “…pausing for a long time and doing obeisance about seven times, [the king] said, ‘I thank you, O men, and even more the one who sent you, but mostly the God whose τὰ λόγια these are.’” Here the phrase clearly refers to the Jewish law as it is inscribed in the manuscripts that the translators have brought. If we look outside of Aristeas to other Second Temple Jewish literature, we find that the phrase can refer to oracular or prophetic speech (or more generally to divine utterances) or to the law. So, in Num 24:4, Balaam hears

710

711

As in other cases, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 162, sets a number of phrases in capital letters, indicating that they are quotations. Given the way that Ps.-Aristeas articulates this entire section, I am much less sanguine that these overlaps with the biblical language constitute quotations, although they certainly recall, perhaps even deliberately allude to, the biblical passages. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 163; Pelletier, Lettre, 177 (“les divines ”); Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 23. For the details of the argument that can only be summarized in this section, see Wright, “Three Ritual Practices,” 13–21.

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λόγια θεοῦ, “oracles of God.” In Deut 33:9–10, τὰ λόγια σου [i.e., God’s] come in the context with covenant, statutes and law.712 The same phrase refers to the Israelites in the wilderness, who were “stung” to remind them of “your oracles” (Wis 16:11). In On Rewards and Punishments 1 and On the Contemplative Life 25, Philo employs the term to refer to Jewish scripture, but in the sense of scripture as prophetic oracle or divine utterance. In the first case, these are associated with Moses, who is considered a prophet, and in the second, Philo distinguishes laws, oracles (λόγια) delivered by prophets and psalms. Josephus in Jewish War 6.311 also uses the term to refer to Jewish scripture but in the sense of prophetic oracle or divine speech. In the New Testament the term denotes divine utterance and perhaps prophetic oracles predicting the coming of Christ. In light of this evidence, the most appropriate translation for the phrase τὰ λόγια in Aristeas seems to be “sayings” or “utterances,” that is, the Jewish law, which Moses legislated through his rational intellect by which he apprehended divine truth, has the quality of divine speech.713 Indeed, even in § 155, where Ps.-Aristeas calls the law “scripture,” γραφή, it is communicated by speech: “[H]e exhorts also through the scripture when he says (λέγων).” Ps.-Aristeas does not obviously invest the phrase with the meaning of prophetic oracle, and his apparent reluctance to highlight the oracular function of the high priest’s λόγιον, which by the time of Ps.-Aristeas is probably a conventional term for a specific high priestly garment, might suggest that he wants to downplay this connotation. Since the reference to mezuzot in § 158 is the earliest specific reference to this Jewish practice in the Second Temple period, we might ask if Aristeas reveals any clues to the content of the mezuzot, since later a circumscribed body of texts became normative for mezuzot (and phylacteries, see below). It certainly seems that Ps.-Aristeas is familiar with the practice, especially since what he says about them does not demonstrate a close relationship with the Septuagint. For the mezuzot discovered at Qumran, several texts appear, particularly Exod 20:1–14, Deut 6:6–18 and the Ten Commandments.714 It seems very unlikely that Ps.-Aristeas thought that the entire law was contained in these small boxes. If we assume that he was familiar with the practice of putting mezuzot on the doors of Jewish houses then 712 713

714

Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 26. Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 26. He also concludes that all this evidence points to Jews in this period using the plural λόγια “as a standard label for the body of God’s commands.” That is consistent with how Ps.-Aristeas uses the term. See Lawrence H. Schiffman, “Phylacteries and Mezuzot,” in Schiffman and VanderKam, Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, 675–77.

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he had to know better than that. Which texts he thought they ought to contain is an open question, however. Even though at Qumran there seems to have been a “short list” of texts that belonged in mezuzot, there is no reason to assume that the practice at Qumran would have been normative for Alexandria. Paragraph 159 focuses on a second context, phylacteries (or tefillin), in which biblical passages were to be used ritually. As we have already seen in this section, Aristeas shares some vocabulary with the corresponding passages in the Septuagint, in which there are four places where God commands these items to be worn. Deuteronomy 6:8 and 11:18 both require binding God’s commandments to the hand and probably the forehead, the two passages differing only with respect to the second-person singular or plural: Deut 6:8 καὶ ἀφάψεις (ἀφάψετε, pl. Deut 11:18) αὐτὰ εἰς σημεῖον ἐπὶ τῆς χειρός σου (ὑμῶν, pl. Deut 11:18) καὶ ἔσται ἀσάλευτον πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν σου (ὑμῶν, pl. Deut 11:18: “and you shall bind them on your hand, and they will be unshakeable before your eyes”). Two passages in Exodus connect the phylacteries with the hand and forehead as part of the divine injunction to offer to God the firstborn of every womb, and they also differ from one another in small but important details. Exod 13:9 reads, καὶ ἔσται σοι σημεῖον ἐπὶ τῆς χειρός σου καὶ μνημόσυνον πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν σου, ὅπως ἂν γένηται ὁ νόμος κυρίου ἐν τῷ στόματί σου (“And it will be [or: there will be] a sign for you upon your [sg.] hand and a memorial before your [sg.] eyes, in order that the Law of the Lord might be in your [sg.] mouth”). The second passage, 13:16, comes after a father’s reply to his son about God killing the firstborn of Egypt and the command to redeem the firstborn: καὶ ἔσται σοι σημεῖον ἐπὶ τῆς χειρός σου καὶ ἀσάλευτον πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν σου. ἐν γὰρ χειρὶ κραταιᾷ ἐξήγαγέν σε κύριος ἐξ Αἰγύπτου (“And it shall be for [or: there will be] a sign on your [sg.] hand and immovable before your [sg.] eyes. For with a mighty hand the Lord brought you out of Egypt”). Aristeas shares with both texts the significance of the phylactery as a “sign,” σημεῖον, although Ps.-Aristeas employs the verb περιάπτω meaning to fasten to bind around, rather than the rough synonym ἀφάπτω found in Deuteronomy. The Exodus passages do not have a verb meaning to bind or fasten. The basic word order of the commands differs as well, since the phrase “on the hands” in Aristeas (n.b. the plural) precedes the verbal command. In one respect, Aristeas shares an important feature with Exod 13:9, where the sign is explicitly said to be a memorial. Not only does Eleazar’s entire speech resound with the idea that these laws signify other things, the high priest also repeatedly reminds his hearers of the need to remember God’s nature and humans’ relationship to God. Thus, the phy-

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lactery serves as a reminder “of our own constitution” in § 159 in addition to the function of the mezuzot as reminders of God in § 158. Aristeas also departs from the biblical texts in two potentially significant ways. First, and most obviously, Aristeas says nothing about binding anything before one’s eyes. As with the use of mezuzot, it is difficult to know with any certainly whether this absence has a connection with contemporary Jewish practice that Ps.-Aristeas might have known or performed. At the least, it reinforces the conclusions that I have made elsewhere in this commentary about how he uses the text of the Septuagint or the traditions found there.715 Second, in both Exodus and Deuteronomy God’s words are bound on the hands and before the eyes. In Ps.-Aristeas’s comment on phylacteries, the “sign” is bound. As we have the passage in Aristeas, it seems as if the phylacteries themselves are the sign, not whatever texts might be contained in them. In the phylacteries unearthed at Qumran, a fairly consistent set of texts appears, but unless Ps.-Aristeas is assuming that the sayings mentioned in § 158 are also at issue here, he shows no concern at all about the contents of the phylacteries. Rather he emphasizes their signifying value.716 As Tramontano notes, the Exodus passages that require use of phylacteries are connected with the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which is not the case in Aristeas.717 In Deuteronomy, the practice is connected with remembering the commandments that God has given the Israelites so that they might remain in the land and receive God’s blessings. Aristeas gives no indication as to how often or under what circumstances phylacteries should be used, but the practice seems to be regularized outside of any particular festival occasion. Moreover, the meaning of the practice also differs from 715

716

717

Pelletier, Lettre, 178–79, speculates that Ps.-Aristeas intentionally avoids using the term “phylactery” and suggests that its use on the forehead would cause embarrassment because of what the word might connote in Greek. Normally it refers to a guard-house or military outpost, but outside of military architecture, it is applied to amulets and is thus a magic term. Pelletier conjectures that this identification would have motivated Ps.-Aristeas to avoid the word or any mention of the placement on the forehead. While he is correct in noting that the Septuagint does not use a specific noun for this object but that Philo uses the term φυλακτήριον with some frequency, this argument from silence reads too much into the text to be convincing. Perhaps the Greek noun simply had not come into use in Alexandria as yet in this period. On the Qumran phylacteries and the texts they contained, see Sidnie White Crawford, Rewriting Scripture in Second Temple Times (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B Eerdmans, 2008) 33–34. For additional comments on phylacteries in Aristeas, see Wright, “Three Ritual Practices,” 21–23. Tramontano, La Lettera, 154.

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that given both in Exodus and Deuteronomy. Here, as is the case in Aristeas with other rituals and laws, Jews use phylacteries to remind themselves of the importance of regulating their behavior in light of justice, and in this specific case, they are reminded of their own “constitution,” which recalls §§ 155–157, where Ps.-Aristeas also focuses on the nature of human beings and fear of God. This significance might generally comport with Deuteronomy rather than with Exodus, but Ps.-Aristeas essentially transforms the meaning of the act as it is set out in the biblical texts, since he says nothing about remaining in the land or about the blessings listed in Deut 6:10–12 and 11:14–16 (although 6:13 does contain the idea of fearing God). Paragraph 160 continues Eleazar’s interpretations of what Moses “commanded” (κελεύει in § 158, § 159 and § 160). Here he comments on the injunction in Deuteronomy 6 that Israelites should talk about the law in all circumstances: “And you shall teach them to your sons and talk on them while sitting at home and going on the road and lying down and rising up” (Deut 6:7 NETS). This verse immediately precedes the command to bind the laws on one’s hand, commands whose order is reversed in Aristeas. As part of the interpretation, two participles are essentially quoted from Deut 6:7, κοιταζομένους καὶ διανισταμένους, when sleeping and rising. Ps.-Aristeas reports that the obligation is to “meditate or study” (μελετᾶν) rather than recite or talk as in Deuteronomy. The infinitive recalls the obligation of the righteous to meditate on the law in Ps 1:2 (OG), where the same verb occurs, although, there is no clear evidence that Ps.-Aristeas knows any of the Psalms in Greek. Nevertheless the verb μελετάω might point to some intertextual play that affects interpretations of the Mosaic commandments. The grammar of this sentence creates some confusion as to what Ps.-Aristeas’s interpretation of the biblical command means. Although the first person plural does not appear explicitly in the paragraph (which is one Greek sentence), the infinitive μελετᾶν continues the infinitives from § 159, which themselves go back to § 158. In each case the infinitive complements the verb “to command.” In § 158, the first-person pronoun establishes the context for these three paragraphs – “he has given us a symbolic reminder.” Thus, in each case, the grammar allows for the understanding that Moses commanded us to do something. Yet, the reflexive pronoun ἑαυτῶν changes the person from first to third and thus, “their own movement and impression.” Who these third person folks are is somewhat obscure, unless they are meant to be the Jews – thus moving from “us” to “them,” but in both cases referring to the Jewish people. This seems like the most likely understanding. If we understand the actions Jews are to take in the paragraph, Ps.-Aristeas expects that Jews will meditate on or study God’s “provisions”

300

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(κατασκευάς). This noun has a variety of connotations in Aristeas. In the immediate context it refers to the basic makeup or nature of human beings (§ 157, § 159). In § 136, the term indicates the basic stuff out of which things are created – idol makers take things already in creation and fashion them; they do not make their basic constitution. In this light, particularly given the context and what follows next, κατασκευή likely refers to what God has created. Thus, rather than studying the law, as in Deuteronomy, Jews are to meditate on God’s creation, probably on the nature of human beings in light of § 157.718 This meditation is to be performed “not only in word” (οὐ μόνον λόγῳ) – does this phrase refer to contemplating or reciting specific passages about creation? – but also by observing one’s own “movement and impression” in the states of waking and sleeping. This last statement focuses the attention on waking and sleeping as the times when one ought to meditate on what God has created. This interpretation fits well with other later Jewish interpretations, especially rabbinic ones, that identify morning and evening as times for recitation of scripture. Whereas the injunction in Deuteronomy 6 forms an exhortation to recite or talk constantly about the “words” Moses is giving to the Israelites, that is, while at home, while out on the road, when waking or when going to sleep, the interpretation in Aristeas connects sleeping and waking as the regular times when meditation is enjoined.719 The two states receive such a focus in Aristeas, because of the “incomprehensible changeover between them,” which suggests some action on the part of the deity in this transition from one state to the other. It is not clear to what extent in this passage Ps.-Aristeas draws on Greek philosophical speculation about sleep, but given his familiarity in other places with Greek philosophical tradition, it cannot be ruled out. Aristotle, for example, understands sleep as a state that has some of the qualities of non-existence: “Moreover, the change from not-being to being must pass through the intermediate condition, and sleep seems to be in its nature such a condition, being as it were a boundary between living and not living, and the sleeper being neither altogether non-existent nor yet existent. For life most of all appertains to wakefulness, on account of sen-

718

719

Sarit Kattan Gribetz,“Take to Heart These Instructions: The Shema in the Second Temple Period, a Reconsideration,” JAJ (Forthcoming), calls this passage a “direct reference to Genesis 1:2.” Although this is a possible interpretation, I am not convinced that this is the case. Certainly the related adjective with alpha-privative, ἀκατασκεύαστος, occurs there, but κατασκευή occurs a number of times in Aristeas, and its meaning can be determined well enough based on that internal usage. For other texts that employ the same or a similar interpretation, see Gribetz, “Take to Heart.”

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sation” (On the Generation of Animals 5.1)720 Yet, whereas in Aristotle’s thought all rational animals move from this intermediate state to a waking state without the assistance of any external force, Ps.-Aristeas’s use of the adjective θεία, divine, at least suggests that God plays a role in the change of one state to the other, and in the logic of Eleazar’s speech, that is the reason that Moses identified the two states as times for meditation. It might perhaps mean, as Sarit Gribetz reads it, that waking and sleeping represent God’s “ability to rejuvenate a person by giving renewed life at the moment of waking, that is, continual, daily (re-)creation.”721 Moreover, in On Sleep and Sleeplessness 2, Aristotle identifies movement and sense impression as the two characteristic elements of the animal soul. During sleep, movement based on the sensory perception during waking can present itself to the one asleep (see On Dreams 3). These stimuli are retained in sleep (via dreams): “In order to answer our original question [i.e., about the nature of dreams], let us now, therefore, assume one proposition, which is clear from what precedes, viz. that even when the external object of perception has departed, the impressions it has made persist, and are themselves objects of perception” (On Dreams 2).722 Thus, Ps.-Aristeas seems to be saying that by attending to “God’s provisions,” by “observing their movement and impression” immediately in the context of sleep, Jews constantly will be reminded of God’s laws, even in the “divine interchange” between the two states, in the same way that the “sign upon our hands” reminds them of the laws’ intent.723 Notes § 160. thoughtful discrimination. The Greek word is διάληψις, which at its base has to do with grasping with the hands or, with respect to thought, separating or distinguishing things. The two states of sleeping and waking

720

721

722

723

Translation from Arthur Platt, On the Generation of Animals: Aristotle (Adelaide: University of Adelaide [ebooks@Adelaide], accessed Dec 6, 2012; original publication, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1912). For details about Aristotle’s views on sleep, see Rosamund Kent Sprague, “Aristotle and the Metaphysics of Sleep,” The Review of Metaphysics 31 (1977) 230–41. Gribetz, “Take to Heart.” She sees this as a microcosm of “the entire world’s initial creation and its continual recreation each morning.” Translation from J. L. Beare, On Dreams: Aristotle (Adelaide: University of Adelaide [ebooks@Adelaide], accessed Jan 2, 2013; original publication, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1931). I am grateful to Prof. Edward Halper of the University of Georgia (via my Lehigh colleague Prof. Roslyn Weiss) for pointing me to this last interpretation of the phrase.

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III. Translation and Commentary

seem to represent outward and inward actions, and the rest of the passage is structured with both inward and outward features. So, here “in word” is the outward action and “thoughtful discrimination” is inward. The various translations demonstrate the difficulty of pinning down an exact meaning for the term. Hadas renders the word as “in reviewing in thought.” Andrews resorts to an adverb, “distinctly.” Shutt translates it as “understanding,” and Pelletier as “by applying intelligence.”724 movement and impression. These two states continue the emphasis on inward and outward. Jews are to observe or take account of both the outward manifestations of waking, movement (κίνησις), and the inward in sleeping, impression (ὑπόληψις).

Kosher Laws Continued (§§ 161–171) 161. “Now the extraordinary nature of the fine language concerning separation and remembrance has been shown to you, since we have explained the dividing of the hoof and the chewing of the cud. For it was not legislated at random or by an intrusion into the mind, but rather with a view toward truth and with a visible sign of proper reason. 162. For by making prescriptions concerning food and drink and other things concerning touching, he commanded us to do or to hear nothing without purpose nor to turn to injustice by utilizing the power of reason. 163. And about animals the same principle is found. For the habit of the weasel and mice and those similar to them, which have been described, is injurious. 164. For mice damage and injure everything, not only for their own food, but also whatever they at some moment fall upon to injure becomes completely useless for humans. 165. And the species of weasel is peculiar. For besides the aforementioned, it has another ruinous behavior. For it conceives through its ears, and it gives birth by mouth. 166. And for this reason this habit of human beings is unclean. For by receiving anything through hearing and embodying these things in speech, they surround others with evils, and they perform uncleanness in no ordinary way, staining themselves completely with the taint of impiety. Your king does well to remove such people, just as we are informed.” 167. And I said, “I suppose that you are speaking of informers, for he unremittingly encompasses them with torments and painful deaths.” And he said, “For indeed I do speak of these, since watching

724

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 163; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 109; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 23; Pelletier, Lettre, 179 (“en appliquant l’intelligence”).

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for the destruction of people is unholy. 168. And our law commands that we injure no one either through word or deed. Therefore, concerning these things, which we briefly recounted, we have shown you that all these things have been regulated with a view toward justice, and nothing has been set down through scripture without purpose or through legend but so that through the whole of life and in our actions we practice justice to all people, remembering the God who holds sovereignty. 169. Therefore, every word concerning foods and unclean creeping things and beasts is offered for justice and just intercourse among people.” 170. Therefore, he seemed to me to give an excellent explanation for each of these things. For about those things brought for sacrifice – calves, rams and he-goats – he said that it is necessary to sacrifice out of herds and flocks, taking the tame ones, and nothing wild, so that those who bring the sacrifices are conscious of nothing arrogant in themselves, regarding them as a visible sign by the one who designated them. For the one who brings a sacrifice makes an offering of the entire character of his/her life. 171. Therefore concerning these things also I consider it worthwhile to set down an account of the discourse. Thus I am persuaded, O Philocrates, to clarify for you, because of the love of learning that you possess, the utmost dignity and natural reasonableness of the Law. Textual Notes § 161. Thackeray prints λογίας in his text (followed by Hadas), but Pelletier adopts the reading εὐλογίας, fine language, from ms A (also adopted by Wendland). Ms P has ἀλογία, unreasonable, which certainly does not fit the context here. // The Greek manuscripts lack the conjunction καί, which Eusebius transmits, in the phrase οὐ γὰρ εἰκῆ καὶ κατὰ τὸ ἐμπεσόν …. Some conjunction separating the prepositional phrase from the first words of the sentence seems required, and thus, Thackeray and Pelletier read καί in their texts. § 162. Only mss G I P Z and Eusi preserve the entire phrase ἐπὶ βρωτῶν καὶ ποτῶν. The remainder lack καὶ ποτῶν, an omission that looks as if it might well be the result of parablepsis, where a scribe’s eye skipped from the conjunction before ποτῶν to the same one immediately after it. // Eusebius alone preserves the dative article τῇ in the phrase τῇ τοῦ λόγου δυναστείᾳ. Greek grammar requires the article in this syntactical arrangement. § 164. One manuscript of Eusebius, Eusi, preserves the preposition εἰς before τὸ παντελῶς ἄχρηστον. All the Greek manuscripts lack it. Without the preposition, the phrase would have to function as the subject or object of the infinitive, γίνεσθαι. Here it functions as the object, but this verb does not normally govern the accusative case alone. Thus, a preposition seems required to give the sense of “com-

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pletely useless” required in this paragraph. § 166. While the Greek manuscripts all read τῶν ἀνθρώπων, which goes with the noun “habit,” thus, the habit of human beings, Eusi, which preserves several authentic readings, has the dative case τοῖς ἀνθρώποις. This reading produces the equally possible sentence, “And for this reason this habit is unclean for human beings.” All modern editors have followed the Greek manuscript tradition, as have I for my translation. § 167. The Greek manuscripts all read ἡ γὰρ ἐπαγρύπνησις ἀνθρώπων ἀπωλείᾳ ἀνόσιος, “since watching for the destruction of human beings is unholy.” Eusebius reads the prepositional phrase εἰς ἀνθρώπων ἀπωλείαν. Pelletier notes that in the Hellenistic period the simple dative of cause gave way to other expressions, especially prepositional phrases. In that case, perhaps Eusebius did not fully understand the text, and as a result, he transformed it into a syntactical form more consistent with the Greek of his time.725 § 168. The second sentence in this paragraph is difficult, and Thackeray and Pelletier adopt different approaches to resolving the difficulty. Thackeray’s text reads, καὶ περὶ τούτων οὖν, ὅσον ἐπὶ βραχὺ διεξῆλθον, προσυποδείξας σοι …. He has accepted the first person aorist from Euso and has emended the case of the participle from the accusative of the manuscripts, προσυποδείξαντα, to the nominative. Pelletier has accepted Schmidt’s emendation of the problematic participle to the first person plural finite verb προσυποδείξαμεν, and he adopts the infinitive διεξελθεῖν from the Greek codices. The infinite phrase, then, serves as an explanatory phrase to the main verb. In either case, the meaning is pretty clear. I have followed Pelletier, since, while his solution involves an emendation, his text relies on the strength of the Greek manuscripts and does not depend solely on Euso, which by itself does not often preserve the best textual reading. // Thackeray and Pelletier accept the adverb μυθωδῶς, mythically, preserved in ms B and Eus, instead of θυμωδῶς, passionately, of the rest of the Greek manuscripts, which is clearly a spelling error. § 169. Eusebius transmits the grammatically correct phrase ὁ πᾶς λόγος. Thackeray and Pelletier, followed by the various translations, accept the lectio difficilior of the manuscripts that lack the article. In this case, it is easiest to imagine Eusebius’s reading developing from that of the manuscripts. § 170. Eusebius preserves the verb δεῖ, it is necessary, which Thackeray and Pelletier adopt instead of the Greek tradition’s reading of ἀεί, always. The infinitive “to sacrifice” requires such a verb in the clause. // Manuscripts B P T Z omit all of the words from ἥμερα after λαμβάνοντες through προσφέροντες due to homoioteleuton. // Euse-

725

Pelletier, Lettre, 37.

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bius transmits the nominative case participle κεχρημένοι, which suits the grammar of the sentence and which Thackeray and Pelletier accept. The Greek manuscripts have κεχρημένου, a genitive, whose case has suffered from attraction to the genitive case following it. General Comment After the brief detour in §§ 158–160, Eleazar’s speech returns to the theme of kosher law, first by recalling both that Eleazar has elucidated the meaning of chewing the cud and separating the hoof and then by returning to matter of “food and drink.” Again, Eleazar emphasizes the connection between the laws and separation and remembrance, which have been central to the entire speech. He takes pains to remark, as he has already, that the Jewish laws did not originate randomly or through some exterior force, but “with a view toward truth and a visible sign of proper reason.” The implication of the sentence is that Moses developed these laws as the lawgiver of the Jews through reason, and Ps.-Aristeas, although he does not explicitly say that God had no role on the giving of laws, practically eliminates divine action in that event. Thus, as elsewhere, Moses’ role compares to that of other Greek lawgivers, and the Jewish law and observance has a rational and philosophical basis. In this paragraph, Ps.-Aristeas introduces a new noun (which he employs again in § 171), σεμείωσις, which connotes a visible sign. So, not only are the food laws symbols that have a deeper meaning, they also serve as outward signs of Jewish identity – that is, others can observe them visibly. This dual quality, the outward practice of these laws and their symbolic nature, constitute central Jewish identity markers. Yet, as we have seen, Ps.-Aristeas does not think that these practices pose fundamental obstacles to Jewish participation in the broader Gentile environment of Alexandria. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas valorizes these identity markers, while at the same time suggesting that they do not prevent Jews from being at home in the larger Gentile world.726 As we will see shortly in the symposia, as far as Ps.-Aristeas is concerned, enlightened Gentiles not only recognize these restrictions, but they are happy to abide by them, which then allows our author to imagine the kinds of cultural interactions that he wants to facilitate and/or encourage. Not only are the laws a visible sign, they constitute a sign of “proper reason” (καὶ σημείωσιν ὀρθοῦ λόγου), a phrase that recalls § 143 where Eleazar appeals to both “natural reason” and a “profound reason” for

726

See Moore, “Walls of Iron,” chap. 5.

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the law. The reference in § 161 most likely deepens the connection that Ps.-Aristeas wants to make between Mosaic Law and Greek philosophy.727 I have had occasion to note already in Eleazar’s speech several places where Greek philosophical tradition lies in the background. Indeed, the emphasis on reason as a critical standard for the law continues in § 162, in which Eleazar notes that Jews are prohibited from using reason to engage in injustice. With Eleazar’s interpretation of the nature of mice and weasels we come full circle in the apologia as we approach its conclusion in § 169. As with the birds, the ruminants and animals with cloven hooves, Eleazar focuses on the traits that these two animals have that can be allegorized for their moral symbolism. These creatures, he refers to as representative of κνωδάλων, animals. These probably denote the kosher category of “creeping things” to which Eleazar refers specifically in § 169. Mice, he says, damage everything that they contact and make it unfit for human use. The injury that mice cause reminds Jews that they cannot cause injury in either word or deed (§ 168). Eleazar’s interpretation of the weasel relies on ancient biological tradition about the animal’s method of conception (see note below), but it takes a somewhat strange turn in Eleazar’s speech. The moral lesson is straightforward: weasels conceive through their ears and give birth through their mouths, and so things that are heard (taken in through the ears) and then given form in evil speech (birthed through the mouth) are unclean and impious. But then Eleazar gives a very specific interpretation, which initiates a short dialogue with Aristeas, when he says that the king does well to “remove” people who do such things, which we learn means putting them to a painful death. This interpretation looks more like the form of answers to questions that the translators give at the banquets held in their honor (and might perhaps anticipate them). Then, in order to clarify, we have a short digression – a conversation in which Aristeas specifies that these must be informers and Eleazar replies that these are precisely the people that he has in mind. In keeping with the moral and religious nature of his apologia, Eleazar characterizes such activity as “unholy.” Paragraph 168 picks up where the thought left off in § 166. Scholars have sought explanations, largely in vain, for this odd exchange in the course of a larger discourse where general moral meanings of the law are elucidated (see notes below). Almost all have noted that earlier in § 25 with respect to the freeing of Jewish slaves informing is encouraged in order

727

See Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2742.

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to assure that no one violates Ptolemy’s order. Even more, in the prostagma Ps.-Aristeas has introduced heavier penalties than we find in the genuine prostagmata, so he actually enhances the tension.728 Some have understood this passage in light of and in connection with 3 Maccabees, where Jews suffer due to the acts of informers, although the connection amounts to little more than noting the cross-reference.729 Moore rightly notes that these kinds of problems in the text do not require the postulating of different sources à la Fevrier, and he views them as a kind of ethnic double standard, acceptable when the behavior benefits one’s group and unacceptable when these actions work against it.730 The odd departure from how Eleazar’s speech works elsewhere might lead one to conclude that some real-life situation lies behind this passage, but its obscurity prevents anything other than speculation about any specific referent.731 Paragraphs 168 and 169 conclude Eleazar’s lengthy speech, and they recapitulate the central ideas of what has come before: (1) the moral meaning of the laws reminds Jews that they must act justly; (2) the legislation has been set out with purpose so that Jews act righteously with all people; (3) the law enables Jews to remember the sovereign God who exercises rule over all things. In fact, in these two paragraphs alone, Eleazar uses the noun δικαιοσύνη three different times and the adjective δικαίος once, which emphasizes justice as the central component of the Jewish law. Eleazar emphasizes again the purpose of the food laws as enjoining justice and separateness, here articulated as just association with other people. The categories of food, creeping things and beasts in § 169 approximate those in the biblical laws, but for the first time, drink is not mentioned together with food. The last two paragraphs contain Aristeas’s summation and concluding remarks to Philocrates. Aristeas resorts to indirect discourse to comment on the victims brought for sacrifice, to which Eleazar apparently applied

728 729

730

731

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 312. See, for example, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 36. On the critique, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 312–13. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 313. See Février, La Date, 22–31 for his arguments about different sources. Collins, Between Athens and Jerusalem, 100, proposes that Ps.-Aristeas was written under Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II (Physcon) and that “Pseudo-Aristeas may be subtly suggesting how such informers should be treated” (100). Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2742, takes a slightly different tack and claims that through Eleazar’s speech, Ps.-Aristeas, whatever the precise historical circumstances, “sought to link his ethical pronouncements with Ptolemaic policy.”

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the allegorical scheme as he did the birds that are eaten. Tame animals can be sacrificed but not wild ones. In this way, those who offer the sacrifices become conscious not to be arrogant. Thus, the sacrifices serve as symbolic reminders in the same way that ordinary food does. Sacrifices, like ordinary food, have a moral meaning in that whoever brings a sacrifice brings the entirety of the quality of his/her life. This explanation of the sacrifices also recalls § 158, which mentions the consumption of the first part of sacrifices. Paragraph 171 formally concludes this section. As we have seen elsewhere in the book, the narrator Aristeas introduces or concludes sections of the work with direct statements to Philocrates. So, for example, at § 120, Aristeas makes a formal separation between the description of Jerusalem and its environs and Eleazar’s farewell and apologia for the law with a note stating the necessity of what he has written and what he will move to next. In this passage, he again appeals to Philocrates’s “love of learning” (cf., § 1), and he offers one last assessment of the Jewish law, referring to its “utmost dignity” (σεμνότητα) and “natural reasonableness” (φυσικὴν διάνοιαν), perhaps contrasting his interpretations of the law with those who see the scriptural texts as mythical or legendary (as in Aristobulos; see note below). This last phrase likely pertains to the allegorical interpretations and the philosophical quality of the law. As we shall see below, the translators themselves are excellent philosophers who display their philosophical prowess at the series of banquets held in their honor.732 Notes § 161. fine language. The Greek term εὐλογία has as its base meaning good or fine language. It also can connote praise or fame. Here it refers to what has been well said in the law of Moses. Hadas translates “doctrine,” Shutt renders “sound reason,” Pelletier has “reasons,” and Andrews has “analogy,” all of which I consider too far outside of the semantic range of the noun.733 Since Thackeray has λογίας in his text, he translates “saying,” which is much closer to the intention of the text but lacks the praiseworthy aspect of the prefixed form, which I prefer in line with Pelletier.734 By rendering the term “fine language,” I have tried to retain the flavor of the prefix. 732

733

734

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 166, and Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2743, think that the phrase points to the allegorical interpretations. I think that the reference is broader than that. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 163; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 23; Pelletier, Lettre, 179 (“raisons”); Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 109. Thackeray, “Translation,” 369.

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dividing of the hoof. In § 150, Ps.-Aristeas used the infinitive of the verb διχηλεύω, to divide, as do the parallel biblical passages in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. Here our author has apparently invented a noun, διχηλία, the dividing of the hoof, which is a hapax legomenon in koine Greek.735 § 162. food and drink. One might be tempted to make the break between sections at § 162 because of the repetition of this phrase (see § 128, § 142 and § 158). Yet, this is a second resumption of the above, since § 161 refers to the split-hoofed and cud-chewing animals discussed in §§ 150–151. Given the two incidences of the phrase “food and drink,” however, one could understand our author as creating either an A:B:A´:B´ or an A:B:B´:A´ structure. touching. Eleazar repeats the prohibition of touching certain things, which we already saw in § 149. Here as there, we see no indication that such contact is with the carcasses of animals as in the biblical laws. reason. Scholars are divided over whether the Greek word λόγος should be translated “word/speech” or “reason.” Thackeray, Pelletier and Shutt opt for “speech” and “spoken word” respectively. Andrews and Hadas think “reason” the best rendering.736 In translating “reason” here, I have taken my cue from § 161, where Eleazar speaks about the law being legislated “with a view toward truth and a visible sign of proper reason (ὀρθοῦ λόγου).” If the law represents proper reason, then acting with injustice, in contravention of the law, must represent the use of improper reason. § 165 conceives … by mouth. This explanation of the biology of weasel reproduction is fairly well known in antiquity, although it takes two different forms. The Greek traditions, with which Aristeas generally agrees and with which Ps.-Aristeas apparently was familiar, have the animal conceive through its ears and give birth by mouth. See, for example, Ovid, Metamorphosis 9.322–323 (gives birth through the mouth) and Plutarch, Isis and Osiris 74 (conceives through its ears and gives birth through its mouth). The later traditions, including Christian ones, reverse the processes. The weasel conceives through its mouth and gives birth through its ears. See the Epistle of Barnabas 10:8 (conceives through its mouth); Ps.-Clementine Recognitions 8:25 (gives birth through its ears); Physiologus 21 (conceives

735

736

This is according to Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 258 and the Online LSJ found on the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae web site (http://stephanus.tlg.uci.edu/lsj/#eid=1& context=lsj), which has only this passage as attesting the word. Thackeray, “Translation,” 369; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 23; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 109; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 163; Pelletier, Lettre, 181 (“parole”).

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III. Translation and Commentary

through the mouth and gives birth through its ears).737 Aristotle knows that some say that weasels give birth through the mouth (the earlier Greek tradition), although he debunks it in On the Generation of Animals 3.6.2 (756b–757a). He explains the tradition by noting that weasel young are very small and the mother often carries them around in her mouth. This action might make it appear that birth happens through the mouth.738

737

738

There are traditions that give the animals in the Physiologus in varying chapter orders. Emil Peters, Der griechische Physiologus und seine orientalischen Übersetzungen (Berlin: S. Calvary & Co., 1898) has it as chapter 8, but in a note he gives 9, 11 and 23 as chapter locations in different translations. Berthelot, “L’Interpretation symbolique,” 62, comments on a seemingly remarkable agreement between Aristeas and a Pythagorean akousma on the weasel, that the animal is connected with telling falsehoods or tales, and by extension informing. Berthelot’s source for this akousma is Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie, The Pythagorean Sourcebook and Library: An Anthology of Ancient Writings which Relate to Pythagoras and Pythagorean Philosophy (Ed. David R. Fidler; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Phanes Press, 1987). In his section on Pythagorean symbols, Guthrie lists 75 symbols or akousmata. Number 63 (p. 161) reads, “Avoid the weasel. (Avoid tale tellers).” Unfortunately, no ancient source is provided for this maxim. In attempting to track it down, I consulted Thomas Stanley, The History of Philosophy: containing the lives, opinions, actions and discourses of the philosophers of every sect (4th ed.; London: A. Miller, 1743), which Fidler cites as an important source of akousmata and their ancient attestations. In his long section on Pythagoras, Stanley does not mention this saying. In subsequent research, I came upon M. Dacier, The Life of Pythagoras with his Symbols and Golden Verses Together with the Life of Hierocles and his commentaries upon the verses (London: Jacob Tomson, 1707). Dacier gives the same 75 akousmata as Guthrie (only two centuries earlier). His #63 (like Guthries’s) is the saying about the weasel. On page 129, before #60, Dacier comments, “Here follow some other symbols, which ‘tis pretended were collected by Plutarch: I have sought them in his works, but to no purpose; however, I think fit to subjoin them to the former but without the Greek text, which I could never meet with.” Indeed, my searches of Plutarch’s various remarks about Pythagoras did not turn up any references to weasels. If one consults Guthrie’s original 1919 publication, however, he lists the symbols in the same order that Fidler’s later edition of his work does, except that in the original publication, Guthrie identifies the list of symbls as coming from Hierocles. But, as with Plutarch, Hierocles’s commentary on Pythagoras’s Golden Verses (which is all that survives of Hierocles’s literary output) produces no reference to the akousma about the weasel. In addition, searches of other ancient sources that talk about Pythagoras (e.g., Aristotle, Diogenes Laertius, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Clement of Alexandria) produced no references to this saying. Moreover, other modern scholars who discuss and cite Pythagorean akousmata fail to mention this saying: see, for example, F. Boehm, De Symbolis Pythagoreis (Berlin: M. Driesner, 1905); H. Diels, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (Berlin: Weidmann-

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§ 166. habit. See the note on § 144. Notable in this instance is the claim that a habit or manner of life can be unclean (ἀκάθαρτος), a term that Ps.-Aristeas otherwise has reserved for the nature of certain animals whose consumption is prohibited. § 167. informers. The noun, ἐμφανιστής, occurs in Ptolemaic papyri for informers. See, for example, P.Tor.Choach. 12.8.12, 32 (117 BCE). H. Graetz saw the reference to informers in this paragraph as referring to an incident under the Roman emperor Tiberius. The Roman historian Tacitus (Annals 6.19) supposedly says that he put a number of informers to death.739 Graetz used this incident as evidence for the date of the book. Pelletier convincingly shows, however, that Tacitus is not referring to informers but to people who were connected to Sejanus.740 Tacitus writes: [Tiberius] cunctos qui carcere attinebantur accusati societatis cum Sejano necari iubet. “[Tiberius] ordered the death of all who were lying in prison who were accused of associating with Sejanus.” § 168. scripture. See the note at § 155. unholy. The Greek term is ἀνόσιος, unholy or profane. The word contrasts with the claim made immediately following that the law commands Jews to harm no one in either word or deed. through legend. The adverb μυθωδῶς means fabulously or through legend. In two other places in the book, Ps.-Aristeas uses compound words with

739

740

sche Buchhandlung, 1903); W. K. C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy (vol. 1: The Earlier Presocratics and the Pythagoreans; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962); Walter Burkert, Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972). My suspicion is that Dacier’s list has gotten to Guthrie (whether directly or through some intermediary), and he has taken #60–#75 as authentic, even though Dacier expressed reservations. Where Dacier received his information that these akousmata came from Plutarch, I do not know. I am convinced, though, that at least the maxim about the weasel (and probably all those numbered 60–75 in Guthrie) likely did not derive from ancient sources, but they can be traced back to Dacier (or rather from the source where he got them). Thus, one cannot use this akousma to argue with any confidence that Aristeas has gotten his information about weasels from Pythagorean sources. I do think, however, that Berthelot’s case is still a good one, even without this piece of evidence, which would, admittedly, be a clincher. H. Graetz, “Die Abfassungszeit des Pseudo-Aristeas,” Monatsschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums (1876) 289–308, 337–49. Pelletier, Lettre, 181–82. He also refers to Raphael Taubenschlag, Il delatore e la sua responsabilita nel diritto dei papyri. Studi in onore di Vincenzo Arangio-Ruiz (Naples, 1953) 501–7. I have not been able to consult this volume. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 15, also rejects Graetz’s theory.

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III. Translation and Commentary

the stem μυθ-. In § 137, he calls those who deify benefactors inventers of fables or legends. In the last paragraph of the work, Ps.-Aristeas refers disparagingly to “the books of the tellers of legends.” In that sense, he argues in this paragraph that nothing in the Jewish law has that character. Gruen thinks that the term might be a subtle critique of Hellenistic poetry.741 The term figures in ancient discussions about passages in Homer in which aspects of the text might seem incredible, and some ancient theorists used the term μῦθος to refer to events that did not or could not happen.742 Aristobulos (Fragment 2.10.2; Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 10.2), for example, uses the term when discussing anthropomorphic representations of God (in this case, whether God has hands). He exhorts his reader to see these passages in their “natural sense” and not in “mythical” or “popular” ways. He goes on to interpret God’s hands in a metaphorical sense. It seems that Ps.-Aristeas, in a similar way, in offering the moral meaning of Jewish laws, is aware of and alludes to such scholarly discussions and wants to shield the biblical laws from literalistic and “mythical” interpretations.743 § 169. creeping things. Although earlier in Eleazar’s speech he did not use the term, here Ps.-Aristeas employs the noun ἑρπετόν, which can be translated “reptile” or “creeping thing,” the same word used in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 to indicate a class of unclean creatures. In Lev 11:29–30, the mice and the weasel are specifically said to belong to this class (along with the dry-land crocodile, field mouse, chameleon, gecko, lizard and blind rat, which are not mentioned in Aristeas). § 170. give an excellent explanation. The Greek word ἀπολογεῖσθαι often has the connotation of making a defense. It can also mean to explain, which seems more in keeping with the tenor of the speech that Eleazar makes to Aristeas and his companions. The use of the term does not necessarily indicate some polemical context for the speech that Ps.-Aristeas meant to address.744 brought for sacrifice. Ps.-Aristeas introduces a new term for offering a sacrifice, the verb προσφέρω, which occurs frequently in the Septuagint meaning to offer or bring an offering (e.g., Exod 24:26, 32:6; Lev 1:2, 5, 13).

741 742

743

744

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2742. Adam Kamesar, “The Literary Genres of the Pentateuch as Seen from the Greek Perspective: The Testimony of Philo of Alexandria,” SPhilo 9 (1997) 157–62 (=Festschrift David Winston). For the text of Aristobulos, see Holladay, Aristobulus 136. For a discussion of this passage in Aristobulos, see Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship, 61–63 (also for Philo, chap. 5). Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2743.

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The three animals listed, calf (μόσχος), ram (κριός) and he-goat (χίμαρος), all appear in the Septuagint among the sacrifices made in the Tabernacle. the one who designated them. The various translations give either “lawgiver” (Andrews) or “legislator” (Thackeray, Hadas, Shutt, Pelletier).745 While this might be the general connotation, the Greek term διατάξαντος means “one who designates.” Elsewhere, Ps.-Aristeas calls Moses νομοθέτης, when referring to his role as lawgiver (§ 131, § 139, § 148, § 312). In my translation I have tried to maintain a distinction between the two words. Moses appointed these tame animals as appropriate for sacrifice.

The Reception of the Translators at Alexandria (§§ 172–186) 172. So, after he made a sacrifice, selected the men and prepared many gifts for the king, Eleazar sent us off with a large security escort. 173. And when we arrived at Alexandria, an announcement of our arrival was made to the king. And when Andreas and I were present at the court, we gave a friendly greeting to the king and delivered the letters from Eleazar. 174. So, considering it of great value to meet with the men who had been sent, he ordered all the remaining officials to leave and to summon the men. 175. This seemed incredible to all, because the usual custom was that those who arrived for an official audience came into the king’s presence on the fifth day and those who were from kings or prominent cities scarcely were present in the court within thirty days – but deeming those who had come worthy of greater honor and judging the prominence of the one who sent them, he dismissed those whom he considered superfluous, and he stayed behind, walking around until he had greeted those who had arrived. 176. And they came with the gifts that had been sent and the remarkable parchments on which the legislation had been written in golden writing in Judean characters, the parchment being worked amazingly and the common joins constructed to be imperceptible. When the king saw the men, he inquired about the books. 177. And when they uncovered them rolled up and they unrolled the parchments, pausing for a long time and prostrating himself about seven times, the king said, “I thank you, O Men, and even more the one who sent you, but mostly the God whose utterances these are.” 178. And when with one accord all, both those who had arrived and

745

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 110; Thackeray, “Translation,” 370; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 167; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 24; Pelletier, Lettre, 183.

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those who were present, said with one voice, “Well done, O King,” he was so filled with joy that he was brought to tears. For the tension of the soul and the great strain of honor compel shedding tears on the occasion of success. 179. And exhorting them to put away the rolls into their place, he then greeted the men and said, “It is right, O god-fearing men, to pay homage first to those things for whose sake I sent for you and after that to hold out the right hand to you. Therefore I have done that first. 180. So I regard as great this day in which you have arrived, and it will be marked every year for my entire lifetime. For it also happens that it has fallen on the occasion of our victory over Antigonus in the naval battle. Therefore I desire this day also to dine with you.” 181. “And everything,” he said, “will be readied for you in accordance with those things of which you avail yourselves and for me along with you. And when they showed satisfaction, he commanded that the best lodgings near the citadel be given to them and that the matters relating to the banquet be prepared. 182. And the chief steward Nicanor, summoning Dorotheos who was appointed over the translators, ordered that he complete the preparations for each one. For thus the king established a practice that you can see continuing even now. For however many cities have their own customs for drink and food and bedding, that number was also assigned to them. And so things were prepared according to these customs whenever someone might come before the king so that being disturbed by nothing, they would pass the time cheerfully. This also occurred for these visitors. 183. Because he was attentive, the man Dorotheos had stewardship of these things. He spread out all the things that he administered that had been set aside for such hospitality. He made the couches into two parts, just as the king had commanded, for he ordered that half should recline at his right hand and half after his own couch, neglecting nothing for the honor of the men. 184. And when they had reclined, he ordered Dorotheos to fulfill thusly the customs that all those who had come before him from Judea practiced. Therefore, he excused the sacred heralds and those who sacrificed and the others, for whom it was customary to offer prayers, and of those who arrived with us, he summoned Elissaios, who was the eldest of the priests, to offer a prayer. He stood and said these notable words, 185. “May the Almighty God, O King, fill you with all the good things that he has created, and may he grant that you, your wife and children and those who are like-minded possess all these things unfailingly for your entire life.” 186. And after this man had said these things, applause broke out along with shouting and joyous cheer for a long time. And at that time they turned to enjoying the things that had been prepared, all of the service being completed due to Dorotheos’s organization, among whom were also the royal servants and those honored by the king.

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Textual Notes Josephus resumes his paraphrase of Aristeas at this point. § 173. The Greek manuscripts all transmit finite verbs, παρῆμεν in K A P T and B (which also adds ὡς δέ, representing the need for some temporal sense), παρεῖμεν in H G I Z. The context demands some subordinate clause, and Schmidt conjectured the participle παρειμένοι, the reading that Pelletier adopts and that is the basis for the translation above. Josephus (Ant. 12.86) preserves a participle, ἀφικόμενοι, although from a different verb (see the same verb in § 175). § 175. The Greek manuscripts all transmit ἔθνος, nation (or the plural). The second correcting hand of ms O, O2, has ἔθος, custom, as does Josephus, which is the correct reading. Pelletier comments that the correction in O is accompanied by a marginal note indicating that this was a conjecture by the scribe and not a reading from another manuscript.746 // The unanimous reading of the Greek manuscripts, χρήσιμον, clearly does not fit the context. Josephus’s paraphrase points to some kind of official business. Hadas retains this manuscript reading, which Thackeray prints in his critical text, while Wilcken (accepted in Pelletier) conjectured χρηματισμόν. Thackeray must have changed his mind about this reading, since he adopts Wilcken’s proposal in his English translation.747 Pelletier’s text is the basis for the present translation. See § 81 for the same word with the meaning of public business. § 176. Some uncertainty surrounds the phrase διαφόροις διφθέραις, remarkable parchments. Josephus lacks the adjective. Thackeray admits some uncertainty about the reading, although he retains it.748 A second issue is whether the first term should be the substantive διαφόραις (see Josephus, Against Apion 1.189) or the adjective. Pelletier argues convincingly that the adjective is most conducive to the context.749 // This paragraph is one long sentence without a finite verb in the Greek manuscripts. Schmidt conjectured the addition of ἦν to accompany γεγραμμένη, which rectifies the lack. Pelletier accepts this correction. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) does not. Even without the finite verb, the meaning of the sentence is clear, but I have followed Pelletier here, since it makes better grammatical sense. // The manuscripts are divided between the masculine perfect participle and the feminine, which reflects some confusion among the manuscripts about the gender of the following noun. Mss U2 and O2 preserve the gram-

746 747

748 749

Pelletier, Lettre, 248. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 166; Pelletier, Lettre, 184; Thackeray, “Translation,” 370 n. 4. Thackeray, “Translation,” 370 n. 5. Pelletier, Lettre, 248–49.

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matically correct genitive singular τοῦ ὑμένος, necessitating the masculine participle, εἰργασμένου, which is the reading of all the editors (although Thackeray [followed by Hadas] encloses it in pointed brackets). The fact that the surrounding participles and nouns are all feminine has likely had an attracting influence. § 177. All of the Greek manuscripts have the article τά as the object of the first verb in the sentence. Zuntz (“Zum Aristeas-Text,” 245) emended to the pronoun αὐτά, since an object “them” seems required. Pelletier has accepted this change, which seems reasonable based on the grammar of the sentence. // The Greek manuscripts all have the present participle άνειλημάτων (or ἀνειλημμάτων). Josephus preserves the aorist, ἐνειλημάτων, rolled up, which is required in the context. § 181. The Greek manuscripts all have some form of the obviously corrupt phrase πάντα δύναμιν. Mendelssohn suggested πάντα δ’ ὑμῖν, which makes sense in the context and accounts for the graphic corruption. All editors of the text adopt this reading. § 182. All editors accept the emendation ἀρχεδέατρος, chief steward, for the corrupt ἀχιήτρος. (See Notes below for more detail.) // Ms O preserves the necessary finite verb ἦν instead of the participle ὤν of the rest of the manuscripts. // The Greek manuscripts all transmit the phrase ἃ μὲν ἔτι, although the plural pronoun has no clear antecedent. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) accepts this text. Mendelssohn emended to ὃ μένον ἔτι, which brings the pronoun into agreement with its apparent antecedent, the participle διατεταγμένον, and makes the dependent clause with a main verb and verbal complement, “that you can see continuing even now.” Pelletier has accepted this emendation, and it forms the basis of my translation. // All editors recognize that the beginning of the third sentence in the manuscripts, ὅσαι γὰρ πόλεις εἰσιν οἷς συγχρῶνται, is corrupt. Thackeray, based on Josephus, emends οἷς to αἳ τοῖς αὐτοῖς in order to make a sensible clause, which Hadas follows. This correction then construes συγχρῶνται as part of the dependent clause. Wendland, whom Pelletier follows,750 goes a different direction. He eliminates the verb to be and creates the graphically similar clause, ὅσαι γὰρ πόλεις ἔθεσιν ἰδίοις συγχρῶνται. Josephus uses the noun ἔθος in the immediate context, providing some warrant for Wendland’s emendation. As it stands, the wording of this sentence remains somewhat uncertain. § 183. Josephus preserves the obviously correct ἀνὰ χεῖρα, at the right hand, in place of the corrupt ἄναρχα of the Greek manuscripts. § 184. Josephus also has the name Ελισσαῖον instead of the Greek manuscripts’ Ελεάζαρον. Although there is one Eleazar among the names of

750

Pelletier, Lettre, 249–50, compares the phrase with two passages in Polybius where similar language is used. I do not see such comparison as decisive, however.

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the translators in §§ 47–50, Josephus’s text suggests that the occurrence of the name in this passage in the Greek manuscripts is an inadvertent mistake, probably originating as a harmonization to the name of the high priest who has recently finished speaking in the narrative. General Comment This introduction to the symposia to follow continues to develop important earlier themes. The pseudepigraphic narrator emphasizes again his presence at all these events, and thus, a Gentile remains the filter through whom Gentile understanding and admiration of Judaism is mediated. Aristeas’s presence is especially important here, since the bulk of the remainder of the work narrates the symposia at which the Judean translators display their philosophical prowess. Aristeas’s assertion of familiarity with Ptolemaic court protocol enhances the veracity of his narrative for Aristeas’s readers. As we have seen earlier with his knowledge of Ptolemaic προστάγματα and of titles for various officials (see § 111), Ps.-Aristeas indeed is familiar with Ptolemaic officialdom. In the present instance, however, we do not possess independent details about Ptolemaic practices when it comes to receiving foreign dignitaries, how long they had to wait until they were called to court, for example. Fraser and other scholars who note that this paragraph reflects Ptolemaic practice do so on the basis of these other elements of Ps.-Aristeas’s knowledge. If Ps.-Aristeas’s explanation about protocol in § 175 does reflect actual practice, then it is hard to avoid the conclusion that our Jewish author not only was familiar with Ptolemaic practices but that he might well have had access to the Ptolemaic court, although the evidence on which one could surmise such access is still relatively thin in Aristeas. Ps.-Aristeas further emphasizes Ptolemy II’s high admiration for the Jews and their law as well as his personal involvement in matters related to the translation. Our author has taken great pains throughout to show how the Alexandrian Gentile elite understands and empathizes with Jewish ideals. The present section goes to almost ridiculous lengths to accomplish that aim. So, for example, immediately after greeting each translator, the king displays almost nervous expectation about the rolls, and when they unroll them before the king, he prostrates himself before them, not once but about(!) seven times. The practice of prostration, expressed with the Greek verb προσκυνέω, connotes falling down in worship of a god. Arrian in his Anabasis 4.11–12 relates an episode where certain of Alexander the Great’s compatriots encouraged Macedonians to prostrate before him as Persians did (an accepted practice in the Persian empire); others resisted, claiming that such honors belong only to gods and that Alexander was no god but a human being. In the end Alexander was not accorded such hon-

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ors. That Ptolemy prostrates himself before the rolls and then proclaims that they are the utterances of a god comports with the Greek understanding of this practice. The idea of a Hellenistic ruler worshipping an eastern deity in this way certainly is not unheard of in this period. The Chronicle Concerning Antiochus and the Sin Temple (BCHP 5) narrates the Seleucid ruler Antiochus III entering the temple of the moon goddess Sin in Babylon and performing prostration.751 Somewhat awkwardly, however, even though Ptolemy recognizes the rolls of the Jewish law as containing utterances of the Jewish god, in § 179 he explicitly acknowledges that he is paying homage to the rolls themselves, rather than offering direct worship of the deity, although here the rolls seem intended to be representative of the god, perhaps because the scene takes place in Alexandria where the king has no immediate access to the presence of the god in a temple: “It is right … to pay homage (σεβασμὸν ἀποδοῦναι) first to those things for whose sake I sent you.” Indeed, the king becomes so overcome that he is reduced to tears. Although joy is the occasion for the emotional reaction, Ps.-Aristeas explains that the tension and “great strain of honor” that are at stake in such an enterprise “compel” (ἀναγκάζει) tears when it succeeds. Josephus’s paraphrase probably gets close to the meaning: “since it is natural for great joy to affect one as the signs of grief do” (Ant. 12.91). The end result of all this activity not only points to the awesome character of the Jewish Law and its centrality for Jewish life but also to the role that Ps.-Aristeas has it play for Jewish-Gentile relations, as we saw in Eleazar’s interpretation of the food laws. The description of the parchments together with Ptolemy’s reverence embodies Demetrius’s claim in § 31 that the law is “philosophical and divine.” Before the rolls arrived 751

This Chronicle is one of a number of Babylonian cuneiform tablets that record major events in Babylonian history. Irving Finkel and R. J. van der Speck, who have been editing the Hellenistic period chronicles (=BCHP), have published the texts, translations and brief commentary online. For van der Speck’s edition and translation of BCHP 5, go to http://www.livius.org/cg-cm/chronicles/bchp-antiochus_sin/antiochus_sin_01.html#TEXT and related links (last accessed Jan. 3, 2015). Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2744, argues that Ptolemy’s prostration “goes beyond the bounds of propriety.” He marshalls the Arrian passage in order to show the inappropriate nature of the king’s action in Aristeas. The difference between these two texts is that in Aristeas the prostration is directed at least indirectly at the god. In Arrian’s narrative the point is that Alexander is not a god and therefore does not deserve such an honor. It is not a condemnation of the practice altogether. Additionally, in light of Antiochus’s performance in BCHP 5, I doubt that Ps.-Aristeas meant this scene to portray Ptolemy’s action as ridiculous. In the context of § 16 and the later questions of the symposia, Ptolemy’s actions here seem perfectly explicable.

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with the translators, this claim only had an abstract reality. Now Ps.-Aristeas uses an ekphrasis to give substance to those claims: the golden characters, the imperceptible joins in the skins and the incredibly worked surface, all of which present an overwhelming vision that matches the divinity of the utterances themselves. These elements function similarly to the descriptions of the gifts that the king constructs for the temple in Jerusalem and of the curtain in the temple and the high priest’s vestments. The stunning appearance and divine quality of the manuscripts, which does everything but take his breath away, prompts the king’s response. Not only does the king admire the Jews, he takes a deep personal interest in the arrangements for the translators in which that admiration takes practical form. Elsewhere we have seen the king’s personal involvement in the smallest of details, particularly in the construction of the gifts for the Jerusalem temple. In § 181 he commands that everything be prepared in accordance with Jewish food laws, both for the translators and himself. Here we see a working out of the principles that Eleazar introduced in his explanation of the food laws – Jewish practices are not a barrier to Jewish-Gentile interactions, since elite Gentiles understand that they embody values that they and the Jews hold in common. Rather than erect a social boundary between the translators and the king, commensality is perfectly possible, even with the monarch, based on the restrictions of the food laws. Moreover, as we saw in the interpretations of the food laws, the king’s willingness to observe the Jewish food laws with the translators also might well emphasize the extent to which the translators are philosophers, since other philosophical groups, such as Pythagoreans, also observed similar kinds of constraints on food and behavior. Although the king assigns Nicanor (who delegates to Dorotheos) care for the translators, he cannot really keep his hands out of the pie. The third person singular pronouns in §§ 183–184 are a bit ambiguous, but the logic of the narrative has Dorotheos make the intial arrangements and divide the couches “just as the king ordered.” This phrase leads one to read the subsequent pronouns as referring to the king. After the translators recline in § 184, Ptolemy commands Dorotheos; Ptolemy dismisses the heralds; and Ptolemy summons Elissaios to pray.752 Just as significantly, Ps.-Aristeas portrays the king’s decision to honor Jewish customs as establishing a pol-

752

Tramontano, La Lettera, 173, argues that the pronouns all refer to Dorotheos, since the king initially in § 182 had ordered his chief steward to make all the arrangements. In my view, he has not taken the phrase “just as the king ordered” enough into consideration.

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icy that “you can see continuing even now.” For our author, this custom only began with the arrival of the Judean translators. Most commentators view this clause as a slip on the part of the author that reveals his remove from the events he narrates.753 While this might be the case, within the narrative world of the text, the putative author “Aristeas” is already looking back at the events in which he has supposedly participated, and the phrase might just as well establish the relationship of the main character to his earlier experience.754 For the dining arrangements, Dorotheos divides the couches into two parts so that half of the translators are on the king’s right and half on the left. In this way, the diners appear to be seated at a kind of triclinium. Greek dining arrangements could take different forms. The classical banquet room was an andron, a square room that had couches arranged on three sides or around the perimeter of the room on which men would recline during a symposium, drinking parties at which eating and drinking were accompanied by debate, discussion or simple revelry. One could find round spaces as well (the tholos), as we see in Athenaeus’s description of a large dining tent for Ptolemy II (Deipnosophists 196).755 In the Hellenistic and Roman periods, especially in the east, one finds in places such as Herod’s Jericho palaces large rectangular banqueting rooms that had couches on three sides, the short but central end space being reserved for the ruler. This arrangement emphasized the hieraechical nature of the seating.756 Every indication

753

754

755

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See, for example, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 171 and Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2745. Pelletier, Lettre, 187, says something similar, although not as a matter of narrative logic. He writes, “Mais l’expression indiquerait un recul suffisant déjà au début du second siècle av. J. C.” On ancient sympotic spaces, see Birgitta Berquist, “Sympotic Space: A Functional Aspect of Greek Dining-Rooms,” in Sympotica: A Symposium on the Symposium (Ed. Oswyn Murray; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990) 37–65 and Frederick Cooper and Sarah Morris, “Dining in Round Buildings,” in Murray, Sympotica, 66–85. See Katherine M. D. Dunbabin, The Roman Banquet: Images of Conviviality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) 46–52. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 171, compares this arrangement to 3 Macc 5:16, where the king has his guests seated opposite him, which places great emphasis on the social hierarchy. Still, with the king centrally positioned in Aristeas, we do not have an egalitarian seating configuration. Oswyn Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” in Aspects of Hellenistic Kingship (Ed. Per Bilde et al.; Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 1996) 25, notes that equality, by which he means the freedom to speak freely, looms large, even in these contexts. Of course, a hierarchically arranged space and freedom to speak are not mutually exclusive.

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in Aristeas is that something like this arrangement is what our author has in mind. Although the spatial configuration would suggest that the king held the place of highest honor, Ps.-Aristeas continues to assert that Ptolemy did nothing that would compromise the honor of the men who had come or of the one who had sent them. Religious rituals could also be performed in connection with symposia, and in Aristeas the king sends away those ritual experts who would have performed sacrifices or prayers to the gods. In their place, he asks a certain Elissaios, specifically said to be the eldest of the priests (see note below) to pray. The prayer reflects the general thrust of the questions to the translators in the successive symposia, that Ptolemy will flourish only with the favor of the Jewish god. Gruen cites a similar situation in Diodorus (1.70.5) where the Egyptian high priest at the offering of a sacrifice prays for the king to receive health “and other good things” if he acts justly toward his subjects.757 Notes § 172. after he made a sacrifice. As in § 33 and § 45, Ps.-Aristeas uses the general term for a sacrifice, θυσία. The verb here is different from that in § 45, however. There Eleazar brought sacrifices (προσηγάγομεν) on behalf of Ptolemy and his family. In this passage he makes a sacrifice (ποιησάμενος). Both verbs appear in the Septuagint with sacrifice as the object. Paragraph 45 is part of the letter that Eleazar sent with Aristeas and Andreas to Ptolemy, so the sacrifice here might well be intended to be the same sacrifice mentioned earlier in the letter. us. As elsewhere the first-person pronoun reinforces the eyewitness nature of the account. a large security escort. The Greek phrase μετὰ ἀσφαλείας πολλῆς means literally, with great safety. Pelletier argues that based on the usage of ἀσφαλεία in Polybius and the papyri that the term can have the more specific meaning of a security escort, and he translates the phrase “with a large escort.”758 This seems to be Ps.-Aristeas’s intention here. Given the picture of Eleazar in § 175 and elsewhere in Aristeas as an equal to Ptolemy, in this paragraph the high priest, acting as a ruler, feels compelled to assure the safety of the translators and Ptolemy’s deputation for the long journey to Alexandria. § 173. the letters. In the disjointed narrative that is Aristeas, “letters” here likely refers to the letter from Eleazar beginning in § 41, despite the differ-

757 758

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2745–46. Pelletier, Lettre, 183–84 (“avec une nombreuse escorte”).

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ence in number. There it is assumed that Aristeas and Andreas had already been to Jerusalem and had given the gifts to the high priest. It should be noted that even in that earlier section, the description of the construction of the table and the bowls comes after the letter from Eleazar saying that he had received gifts from Ptolemy. § 175. audience. The Greek word χρηματισμός occurs several times in Aristeas. In § 81 it refers to state business, but more usually it has to do with the audiences granted ambassadors. This is the sense it carries in this passage and § 191, § 297 and § 299. the prominence of the one who sent them. The king summons the translators immediately, causing surprise from Aristeas, since anyone coming for an audience with the king had to wait at least five days, sometimes as long as thirty. The king waives this waiting period because of Eleazar’s prominence. This episode continues the theme of the equality of the two rulers that began with the exchange of letters in which they addressed each other as equals. § 176. Judean characters. This phrase differs from that used in § 3, § 30 and § 38, where the adjective ἑβραϊκός, “Hebrew,” occurs. There is no clear reason for the change, but Hadas, based on a suggestion by Solomon Zeitlin, proposes that this phrase refers to Hebrew square characters and that the passage was added after the destruction of the Second Temple when this type of square font was used much more than earlier.759 This argument does not convince me, however. There are no text-critical issues with the phrase in Aristeas. The argument about the general use of square script coming after the fall of the Second Temple is contradicted by the Dead Sea Scrolls, which overwhelmingly use the Aramaic cursive script. Yet, throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas designates those who live in the geographical area of Judea as Judeans. (See the note to § 1.) It is just as plausible that in the logic of the narrative the arrival of Judeans in Alexandria prompted the use of the adjective Judean rather than Hebrew. See also Demetrius’s comment in § 11 that “in Judea they use their own characters,” a phrase that could easily prompt the more explicit “Judean characters.” The question remains, however, what Ps.-Aristeas means by the phrase. Might Ps.-Aristeas intend to refer to what we call paleo-Hebrew as Judean characters? In the Hasmonean period in Judea, the paleo-He-

759

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 168. Pelletier, Lettre, 185, notes Zeitlin’s suggestion, having gotten it from Hadas. It does not appear that this idea comes from one of Zeitlin’s published works but rather that as editor of the Dropsie series he suggested it to Hadas who adopted it.

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brew script was often used for public consumption, on coins, for example, and it was the “marked” script – that is, it communicated Jewish identity. Aramaic cursive script was the “unmarked script” that would have been used for most occasions. To what extent Ps.-Aristeas was aware of scribal training in writing Hebrew and in what contexts particular Hebrew scripts might have been used we simply have no idea, but whatever the reason for the change, the shift from “Hebrew letters” to “Judean characters” seems intentional in the narrative.760 imperceptible. Ps.-Aristeas describes the joins in the rolls as part of an ekphrasis intended to demonstrate their amazing quality and hence their divine character. Normally in antiquity leather sheets would be sewn together, while papyrus sheets would be glued.761 In one case, however, the Greek Minor Prophets scroll from Nahal H ever preserves evidence of both stitch˙ ˙ ing and gluing of leather. The sheets joining columns 17 and 18 together look to have been glued.762 If the idea here is that the joins were glued – and thus imperceptible – then the roll would appear to the viewer (such as king Ptolemy) to be a remarkably long single sheet of leather. § 177. utterances. As we saw with respect to § 158, the phrase τὰ λόγια can serve as a short-hand description of the law, or at least parts of it. While it is tempting to translate “oracles” here as do a number of editors (Pelletier, Andrews, Thackeray), Ps.-Aristeas does not portray the Jewish law as having oracular qualities. Hadas is probably closer to the mark with his translation of “holy words.”763 § 178. god-fearing. The adjective θεοσεβής, which often has the sense of being religious, appears only here in Aristeas. It introduces the king’s justification for bowing down to the scrolls, even before greeting those who brought them.

760

761

762

763

See David S. Vanderhooft, “Aramaic, Paleo-Hebrew, and ‘Jewish’ Scripts in the Ptolemaic Period,” delivered at “Judea in the Long Third Century: The Transition between the Persian and Hellenistic Periods,” University of Tel Aviv, May 31–June 3, 2014 (to appear in the conference volume). See the evidence for the Judean Desert in Emanuel Tov, Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert (Leiden: Brill, 2004) 35–37. See Emanuel Tov with Robert A. Kraft and P. J. Parsons, The Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nahal Hever (8HevXIIgr) (The Seiyal Collection I) (DJD VIII; Oxford: ˙ ˙ Clarendon Press, 1990) 15 and plates. Pelletier, Lettre, 185; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 111; Thackeray, “Translation,” 371; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 169. See also Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 26.

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§ 179. rolls. This section employs several different words for the objects that the translators brought with them to Alexandria. In § 176, the “parchments” (ταῖς … διφθέραις) are said to be remarkable, and the king inquires about “the books” (τῶν βιβλίων). When they appear before the king, the translators unroll the “parchments” (τὰς ὑμένας; see the singular in § 176, which could also be translated “skin” or “surface”). In the present paragraph, they are designated as “rolls” (τὰ τεύχη). In each case, the words are in the plural, indicating more than one scroll or text. Is there any clue as to whether Ps.-Aristeas is assuming five separate rolls, one for each of the Mosaic books? Pelletier refers to an inscription from Priene honoring a certain A. Aemilius Zosimus, who apparently was secretary of the city and archived documents and who made multiple copies on different writing materials. The important phrase, ἐν δερματίνοις καὶ βυβλίνοις τεύ[χ] εσ[ιν shows the use of τεῦχος to mean a roll.764 Unfortunately, other than the indication that the translators brought multiple rolls or books, Aristeas offers no evidence of how many rolls the author might have envisioned coming to Alexandria. § 180. it will be marked. Ptolemy tells the translators that their arrival would be celebrated annually “during my lifetime.” Aristeas’s celebration differs from the one that Philo reports. At the end of his account of the translation, Philo notes that every year on the island of Pharos, Jews and non-Jews commemorated the translation of the law at the place where it was accomplished (Life of Moses 2.41). If Philo knew Aristeas, as seems likely, then his report either reflects an actual annual festival on Pharos that commemorated the translation or he has moved the notice of the commemoration from its place and location in Aristeas for his own apologetic reasons.765 victory over Antigonus. Ptolemy connects the translators’ arrival with a recent naval victory. Scholars have unanimously pointed out the historical difficulty here. Ptolemy II did engage in a naval battle with Antigonus II Gonatas of Macedon (First Syrian War; ca. 260 BCE), but Ptolemy’s fleet was soundly defeated. A later naval battle between the same Antigonus and

764

765

Pelletier, Lettre, 186. For the text of the inscription, see http://epigraphy.packhum. org/inscriptions/main?url=oi%3Fikey%3D252886 (last accessed Jan. 5, 2015). For the phrase, see Priene 34 l. 11. Pelletier cites the phrase as ἐν βυβλίνοις καὶ δερματίνοις τεύχεσιν, which, according to the text available to me, is incorrect. On Philo’s dependence on Aristeas, see Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend, 35–45, although they do not discuss the celebration on Pharos, and Francis Borchardt, “Philo’s Use of Aristeas and the Question of Authority,” delivered at the 2013 Annual Meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature.

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Ptolemy III at Andros (Third Syrian War; ca. 246 BCE) seems also to have resulted in a Ptolemaic defeat.766 Elias Bickerman suggested that the name “Antigonus” resulted from a textual corruption and that the reference is to a naval battle against Antiochus I (ca. 280). Such a battle could possibly have occurred in a brief period before the First Syrian War, but the evidence for it is meager.767 Yet, as Pelletier notes, there is no textual evidence for such a corruption, and it would have had to happen before the first century CE, since Josephus refers to Antigonus in his paraphrase of Aristeas (Ant. 12.93).768 Whichever of the two battles against Antigonus to which Ps.-Aristeas might be referring, it is entirely possible that a Ptolemy would/ could have portrayed a defeat as a victory to the Alexandrian public from whom the actual battle result might be kept. Rulers ancient and modern have often turned foreign defeats into domestic victories as a means of ensuring continued support for their rule or as justification for continued war. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas might well have known a tradition that Ptolemy defeated Antigonus, despite what we know now. Scholars also note that Ps.-Aristeas presupposes that Arsinoë II is still alive at this time, when she likely died (ca. 270 BCE) before both battles took place. This historical error, of course, only shows what other data readily demonstrate – that Aristeas was written after the period in which the author sets the events. § 181. near the citadel. Tramontano takes this location to be the equivalent of the area around the royal palaces (cf. Josephus, Against Apion 2.26).769 This was the area known as the Lochias, which Fraser locates “close to the eastern limit of the original city.”770 Indeed it was an area that had proximity to the palaces, as Josephus reports. According to Strabo (apud Josephus, Ant. 14.116–117), the Jews were given “a large section of the city.” Ps.-Aristeas does not identify this area with the residential area of the

766

767

768 769 770

Janice J. Gabbert, Antigonus II Gonatas: A Political Biography (London: Routledge, 1997) 54–57. Bickerman, “The Dating,” 109. In footnote 8, Bickerman presumes that this battle was connected with Egyptian acquisition of Miletus and Halicarnassus, “which could be taken only via a naval expedition, which must then be presupposed.” Collins, Library in Alexandria, 38 n. 115, appeals to Bickerman’s solution in order to make this passage provide corroborating evidence for her dating of the translation under Ptolemy II. For a brief remark and bibliography on this short period, see W. W. Tarn, Hellenistic Civilization (G. T. Griffith, rev.; New York: The New American Library, 1975) 16. Pelletier, Lettre, 187. Tramontano, La Lettera, 169. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 1.22. The area today is under water. Fraser also puts the Jewish quarter in this area of the city.

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Jews, however. All he tells us is that the Judean translators were provided the best lodgings here. It seems probable, though, that in his narrative he would have them housed in the area of Jewish residences. § 182. chief steward. Although it is partly a text-critical issue, the title of this official is also a literary matter. The title in the manuscripts, ἀρχίητρος, refers to a chief physician, not a likely candidate to be the logistics person for the translators. An inscription from the reign of Ptolemy IX Soter II (116–108/88–80 BCE) refers to someone who was an honorary kinsman (συγγενής) and the chief steward (ἀρχεδέατρος).771 The latter title appears to have been that of the major domo in the Ptolemaic court.772 Nicanor … Dorotheos. The name Nicanor was relatively popular in Ptolemaic Egypt in the third and second centuries BCE. It can be found in papyri of these centuries from Karanis, Oxyrhynchos and Heracleopolis, for example.773 The name Dorotheos, by contrast, is rare in the papyri, and it does not occur in the LXX/OG corpus at all. each one. The Greek phrase εἰς ἕκαστον can refer to each translator or to every detail. Hadas translates it “in every particular.” Thackeray renders it “for everything.” Andrews, Shutt and Pelletier take the pronoun in the masculine to refer to each translator.774 Given the overall sense of the paragraph that focuses on the attention given to the translators, I have taken the second approach and read the pronoun as masculine rather than neuter. § 184. sacred heralds and those who sacrificed. The Greek term ἱεροκῆρυξ refers to people who attended sacrifices and the word θύτης to the sacrifices themselves. By sending these men away, Ps.-Aristeas intimates that these people would normally offer sacrifices on such occasions, which the king, out of consideration for his Judean guests and in keeping with his order to Dorotheus to fulfill Judean customs, was eschewing. Thus, the theme of enlightened Gentiles and Jews having commensality is boldy illustrated. eldest of the priests. Hadas comments about this phrase, “It is probable (the alleged distribution by tribes notwithstanding) that all or most of the translators would be priests.”775 He makes no argument for this assertion.

771

772 773 774

775

The full text of the inscription can be found in Wilhelm Dittenberger, Orientus graeci inscriptions selectee supplementum sylloges inscriptionum graecarum (vol. 1; Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1903) #169, pp. 250–51. See also #181 (under Ptolemy XI) and Tramontano, La Lettera, 170 for other evidence. See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 170. Papyrus searches were done using the web capabilities of Papyri.info. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 171; Thackeray, “Translation,” 372; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 111; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 24; Pelletier, Lettre, 187. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 172.

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This is the only time that any of those sent from Jerusalem are called priests. It might be possible to assume that within the narrative world of the text, a high priest would send other priests to do the translating and that priests would be the best people to do the job. Of course, this explanation becomes problematic in the face of Ps.-Aristeas’s earlier claim that members of all twelve tribes were represented. Priests did not come from all tweve tribes. So, perhaps the best way to think about this section (if we desire some kind of consistency in Aristeas) that Ps.-Aristeas assumed that some members of the translators would have been priests, since they would have come from the tribe of Levi. In § 310 “the priests and the elders of the translators” constitute some of the leaders who approve the translation. Whether the genitive “of the translators” applies to both priests and elders or only to elders is not clear. § 185. Almighty God. This is the only time that God is called παντοκράτωρ in Aristeas. Although Hadas correctly notes that it is a frequent epithet in the LXX/OG translations, this is true mostly for the books of Reigns (Samuel and Kings in Hebrew) and the prophets.776 The epithet does not occur in the Greek Pentateuch, for example. your wife and children. Although the name of the king’s wife is not mentioned here, it is almost certainly Arsinoë II, whom Eleazar greets in the letter that begins in § 41. (See the note on Arsinoë there.)

Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 1) Symposia, or drinking parties, were essential components of ancient Greek commensality. The most famous work associated with such parties was Plato’s Symposium in which the participants at a symposium give speeches about love. The archaic and classical forms of these occasions are not the primary places that we need to look in order to understand the symposia that Ptolemy hosts in honor of the Judean translators, however. For Aristeas we need to look at the Hellenistic royal symposia, so lucidly examined by Oswyn Murray.777 Although the Hellenistic royal symposia had their

776 777

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 172. Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 15–27. Murray is the one scholar who has written extensively on symposia in general, but specifically on those in Aristeas. As we will see below, he has also done the most important work on Aristeas and the

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origins in the older form of the symposium, these earlier symposia were too limited in their numbers and were too exclusive for the needs of the new breed of monarchs in the Hellenistic world. Murray proposes three models for the larger and more lavish royal symposia: (1) the tyrannical symposia of the sixth century BCE; (2) Macedonian royal feasts; and (3) Persian royal feasting.778 Briefly, the tyrannical symposia supplied a model for lavish banquet halls and entertainment, whereas Macedonian royal banquets contributed notions of larger size. Diodorus (17.16.4), for example, describes the pavilion of Alexander that reportedly held as many as one hundred couches and thus would seat up to two hundred people.779 The Persian feasts featured tryphe, luxury, as an indispensible characteristic of kingship, and Greek respect for Persian luxury “became … an element in Hellenistic conceptions of monarchy.”780 Callixinus’s description (in Athenaeus’s Deipnosophists; see above p. 179) of Ptolemy’s banquet pavilion is perhaps the most famous of the Hellenistic symposia. At this event, the formal symposiasts were complemented by “literary meta-symposiasts” whose task was to direct the discussion and conversation in appropriate directions.781 Indeed, the entire symposium was held in conjunction with a religious procession. The symposia of concern here in Aristeas seem to be of this extravagant sort, except that those attendees who would normally be present to guide the conversation are themselves the symposiasts, a portrayal that Murray argues suggests “ignorance and confusion on the part of the author about the actual practices of early Hellenistic symposia.”782 In Murray’s estimation, the culture of symposia declined in the second and first centuries BCE, which by a later period than Aristeas “resulted in an antiquarian attitude of self-conscious

778 779

780 781 782

so-called Peri Basileus literature. Norbert Meisner, Untersuchungen zum Aristeasbrief (Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung der Würde eines Doktors der Theologie vorgelegt bei der Kirchlichen Hochschule Berlin, 1970), also deals extensively with the symposia as well as the kingship ideal in Aristeas. Like Murray, he argues against Zuntz’s account of the symposium. Murray’s work supersedes Meisner’s, whose analysis of individual passages I will cite below where applicable. Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 15, 16, 18. Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 18, also notes the different and to Greeks more barbaric Macedonian drinking habits that acted as exempla of negative behavior. Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 19. The description is Murray’s (“Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 21). Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 22–23. See also the note on § 217 and the order of the symposium that might also have prompted Murray’s comment.

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occsymposium/symposiaasional revivalism,” and Aristeas becomes evidence for this decline in sympotic culture.783 Nonetheless, the significance of Hellenistic royal symposia for constructions of Hellenistic kingship is reinforced in the work, since Ps.-Aristeas, despite his confusion about what actually happened at early Hellenistic symposia, makes the royal symposium a central part of his work (taking up about one-third of Aristeas) at which his Judean symposiasts demonstrate their philosophical acumen before the king who has brought them to Alexandria, a prowess that very much equals that of the king’s usual symposiastic companions. The seven symposia in Aristeas form the context for a series of conversations on the nature of what it means to be a king. In the classical period Greeks engaged in theoretical discussions about monarchy, even though they did not see kingship as appropriate for Greeks. Kings were for barbarians. In the Hellenistic period, however, monarchy became widespread in the Greek world, and some even looked to it as a possible ideal form of government.784 By the fourth century BCE, the influence and contributions of philosophers to matters pertaining to government were widespread, especially with respect to the education of kings; philosophers were thought able to assist in developing the skills of governing, and they were eager to be at court.785 Unfortunately, direct evidence in this period for literature on the nature of kingship is lacking, although indirect evidence suggests a thriving discussion about the subject. The Letter of Aristeas constitutes one of the more important pieces of evidence for kingship literature in this period, since it seems to represent a number of important emphases in it. Significantly, these Hellenistic works did not set out a coherent or systematic political theory. As Murray puts it,

783 784

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Murray, “Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 23. See Oswyn Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy in the Hellenistic World,” in Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers (Ed. Tessa Rajak et al.; Hellenistic Culture and Society 50; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007) 14–15. Also E. R. Goodenough, “The Political Philosophy of Hellenistic Kingship,” YCS 1 (1928) 55–102. Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 16. Meisner, Untersuchungen, chap. 5, argues that Aristeas’s basic notion of kingship is Pythagorean. In “Philosphy and Monarchy,” 20–21, Murray gives his conclusions about the “Pythagorean” writers preserved in Stobaeus (upon whom Meisner relies for a good deal of his analysis), calling them “pale reflections of earlier views of kingship, rather than original works in their own right.” See Murray’s complete analysis in his thesis “Peri Basileias: Studies in the Justification of Monarchic Power in the Hellenistic World” (D. Phil. thesis. Oxford, 1971) 245–84.

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Hellenistic views of kingship were based on ideas common since the fourth century, that the justification of monarchic rule lay essentially in the virtues of the monarch. This created an ideology or … “a discourse,” a general set of attitudes, which could be and were used to justify the rules of particular kings. The result was not so much a political theory or even political thought as a literary genre or a collection of topoi and analogies.786

As part of his earliest work on these texts, Murray attempted to reconstruct a typical Hellenistic treatise On Kingship (περὶ βασιλεύς).787 The major characteristic of kingship was defined as ἀνυπεύθυνος ἀρχή, unaccountable rule, and the most important problem for governing was to assure that such rule was good and not tyrannical. The major understanding of a good ruler articulated in Peri Basileus literature was that good men carry out good rule.788 As a consequence, the character of the king formed the basis for constraints on monarchy. In this sense, then, kings did not have to worry very much about their relation to the law. As Murray argues, “[T]hus a problem that has afflicted all absolute monarchies was answered by defining it out of existence; for if a king ceased to be good, he became a tyrant.”789 A significant emphasis of these treatises, as one might expect then, was what qualities and duties characterized the virtuous ruler, and they would have contained lists of virtues that the king should have and the reasons that they were important. Among these qualities were philanthro¯pia (love of his subjects), protection of his subjects, pronoia (foresight) and proper worship of the gods.790 With this brief background, the issues in Aristeas come into sharper focus. The work combines these two major components of Hellenistic rule – the centrality of the symposium as the mechanism for demonstrating the king’s virtues and the literature that at least on the surface was meant to instruct kings on how to be good rulers and not fall into tyranny. Our ancient sources connect the early Ptolemies with both of these elements of Hellenistic rule. According to Plutarch (Moralia 189d), for example, Demetrius of Phalerum, one of the main players in Aristeas, advised Ptolemy I “to obtain and read books on kingship and leadership; for the advice which 786 787

788 789 790

Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 21. See “Peri Basileus.” For the detailed summary on which I rely here, see “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 22–27. He bases his reconstruction partially on Aristeas, on fragmentary evidence of Hellenistic treatises and on post-Hellenistic works. Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 23. Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 23. Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 24. On philanthro¯pia, see Berthelot, Philanthrôpia Judaica.

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their friends dare not give to kings is written in such books.” We have already seen Callixinus of Rhodes’s ekphrastic description of the lavish dining pavilion of Ptolemy Philadelphus and the extravagant symposium held there. Ps.-Aristeas, then, has drawn on these two widely recognized features of Ptolemaic rule in order to construct his narrative, even if his representations suffer from difficult problems. As I noted above, Murray thinks that the picture of the symposia in Aristeas does not represent the way that actual Ptolemaic symposia would have been conducted. Similar difficulties attend the content of the symposia, the advice on kingship. Two major questions dominate the scholarly discussion of the symposia in Aristeas: (1) to what extent does Aristeas reflect an actual treatise on kingship and (2) what is the Jewish or Greek character of the symposia and the questions and answers? In this short excursus, I will only sketch out the positions concerning (2), since the details of the questions and answers will give a better sense of how that problem might be resolved. With respect to (1), Oswyn Murray and Gunther Zuntz formulated the two major positions.791 In 1959, Zuntz proposed that Ps.-Aristeas drew from a single, written source: “[O]ne is struck by the outline of a well-ordered system of ‘Rules for rulers”, every detail of which can be amply paralleled from the relevant Greek literature. Therewith it becomes probable that the writer drew the material for this part of the section, point for point, from one written source.”792 For Zuntz, many of the references to the Jewish god are simply tags that can be detached from the answer without any harm done to the text. In other cases, the Jewish features are constitutive of the argument. Once the more overtly Jewish and other irrelevant material to kingship is weeded out, Zuntz argues that the remainder contains the hints of the “well-ordered system” that he discovers there.793 A second argument that Zuntz offers is that in a number of cases the answers do not fit the questions asked. So, for example, one group of questions asks “How should the king do x?” Zuntz claims that the lack of fit that he sees suggests that Ps.-Aristeas’s source did not have a question and answer format, and thus, he badly turned what would have been statements in the source into these maladjusted question and answer sessions.794

791

792 793 794

Oswyn Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 123–28 and idem, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” JTS 18 (1967) 337–71 and Günther Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I: ‘The Seven Banquets,’” JSS 4 (1959) 21–36. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 29. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 22, 27. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 29.

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The questions having to do with kingship number about half of the seventy-two, according to Zuntz. In the remainder, several contain answers that reflect rather general Greek popular philosophy, and in these Zuntz conjectures a second source, assuming that Ps.-Aristeas, who in Zuntz’s estimation has followed one source so closely, would not simply have been independently creative elsewhere.795 If Zuntz’s theory about the text is correct, then lying beneath the surface of Aristeas is a real Peri Basileus treatise that can be reconstructed, and this would be the only one available in the Hellenistic period. Murray disagrees with Zuntz’s arguments, and he proposes that the material on kingship along with the questions and answers are Ps.-Aristeas’s invention. The essential task, then, is to look for any potential models that he might have used and possible sources that he might have known.796 Murray takes exception to the way that Zuntz has identified material concerning kingship per se. Where Zuntz has about twenty-nine questions in this group, Murray argues for around forty-seven. Thus, in his estimation, Zuntz has left out a large segment of the evidence.797 Moreover, he also is not convinced that the “how” questions and answers do not cohere, as Zuntz maintains. As he sees it, “Aristeas has carefully adapted these reasons to fit a ‘how?’ question, by prefacing them with the word γιγνώσκων, ‘by realizing that … ’. In other words, the question ‘how can I remain in a certain state?’ can legitimately be answered with ‘by realizing that you ought to, for the following reasons.’”798 So, according to Murray, where did Ps.-Aristeas find his inspiration for this section? In creating the setting that he did, Ps.-Aristeas was drawing on familiar images of Ptolemaic court life, where, as elsewhere in the Hellenistic world, literary and learned conversation was popular entertainment at these symposia.799 Ultimately, Murray identifies three major sources for Ps.-Aristeas in this section: (1) Hellenistic popular philosophy (and here he agrees with Zuntz about the content); (2) Hellenistic doctrines of kingship; and (3) Jewish thought.800 Where Zuntz saw in Aristeas sources that had

795 796

797 798 799

800

Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 31. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 246. Meisener, Untersuchungen, 160, also rejects Zuntz’s position. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 250–51. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 251–52. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 246–47, appeals to several other texts that use a similar model, such as Plutarch’s Symposium of the Seven Wise Men, and, of course, biblical models such as the Queen of Sheba’s visit to Solomon. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 249. Meisner, Untersuchungen, 76,

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been badly mangled in their rewriting, Murray does not see an underlying Peri Basileus source; “rather the illogical, vague, and repetitious whole is the work of one mind, itself illogical, vague, and repetitious.”801 Nonetheless, for Murray, Hellenistic kingship literature has had a deep influence on Aristeas, and the work is a critical witness to it. With regard to the question-and-answer format of the symposia, Murray offers a couple of models that might have influenced Ps.-Aristeas. The first comes from 1 Esdras 3–4, the story of three body guards to king Darius who engage in a rhetorical contest about which is superior, wine, the king, women or truth. Each bodyguard argues for his own suggestion, and ultimately truth wins out. The one who argues for truth uses the occasion of his victory to hold Darius to a vow to rebuild Jerusalem. In this example, the scene opens with a banquet after which the bodyguards make their cases. The second example comes from the popular Greek Alexander Romance in which Alexander the Great asks riddles of ten Indian gymnosophists with the intent of punishing them for instigating a revolt against him. Any one of them that gives an incorrect answer condemns them all to death. The answers all convince. Murray suggests that the ten questions may have provided Ps.-Aristeas with the framework of ten questions in seven banquets with the remaining two divided between the last two symposia, when six banquets with twelve questions each would seem to have been more logical and obvious.802

801 802

concludes that Ps.-Aristeas has a Greek Vorlage for the symposia and that he did not draw from the Jewish scriptures. Murray’s analysis demonstrates that Meisner is incorrect on the first point, and my analysis of the symposia below will demonstrate that I think him wrong on the second point. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 251. Murray, “Aristeas and his Sources,” 125–27. On the use of Ezra-Nehemiah in Aristeas, see Février, La Date, 31–39 and the Introduction, section 7. For Alexander and the gymnosophists, there are several versions. On the different versions of the questions and answers, see Aleksandra Szalc, “Alexander’s Dialogue with Indian Philosophers: Riddle in Greek and Indian Tradition,” Eos Commentarii Societatis Philologae Polonorum 98 (2011) 7–25. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 41–42, cites approvingly the theory of W. W. Tarn (in an appendix to The Greeks in Bactria and India [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1938] 414–36) that the Pali Milindapanha had access to a Greek work that he calls “Questions of Ptolemy Philadelphus” written under Ptolemy III that both Aristeas and the Pali text use as a source for their respective episodes of kings and philosophers. The existence of such a Greek work that was known to the author of the Milindapanha has been convincingly questioned by J. Gonda, “Tarn’s Hypothesis on the Origin of the Milindapanha,” Mnemosyne 2 (1949) 44–62.

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My own view of how to think about Ps.-Aristeas’s sources for the symposia coincides more with Murray’s. Not only do I find his arguments compelling and his critiques of Zuntz persuasive, we have seen in other sections of the book how Ps.-Aristeas has freely adapted source material without reproducing it. So, for example, in the descriptions of the table and the vessels for the temple and the high priest’s clothing, the Septuagint serves as a source, and although he could have reproduced much of its language had he chosen to do so, he did not. In the description of Jerusalem and its environs, Greek utopian literature has had a deep influence on him, and yet, he does not reproduce his sources. As I see it, this procedure reflects our author’s standard operating procedure, and there is no reason to think that he has not worked in the same manner when he composes the section on the symposia. Indeed, this section can be repetitious and sometimes downright tedious, but I think with Murray that it is the creative product of our author. I will only make a few comments here on the problems of identifying Greek and Jewish material in the content of the translators’ answers to the king’s questions. It is an issue in the arguments of both Zuntz and Murray above. Zuntz seems to have a high level of confidence that these traditions can be pulled apart. Murray is not as confident, although he does make distinctions of this sort. To take one example of the problems that we will see as we examine the questions and answers in detail and try to determine the Greek or Jewish character of much of this material, Doron Mendels has argued that two different treatises “on kingship,” Aristeas and the Temple Scroll from Qumran raise and deal with the same issues even though they do so quite differently.803 In his estimation the overlap in topics shows that “most of the questions and answers in the seven banquets could have been derived from a Jewish ideological Vorlage, which was dressed in a Hellenistic framework and terminology.”804 Unfortunately, in a number of Mendels’s examples, the agreement is only superficial. To give just one example, Mendels argues that the Temple Scroll’s injunction for the king to have the law written for him by priests so that presumably he can learn it (as in Deuteronomy 17) and thereby obey and administer it (col. 56) correlates with § 283 where the king is to read “accounts of journeys, which, having been written for kings, are intended for the improvement and preservation of humankind.” Unfortunately for Mendels’s case, the two statements are

803

804

Doron Mendels, “‘On Kingship’ in the ‘Temple Scroll’ and the ideological Vorlage of the seven banquets in the ‘Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates,’” Aegyptus 59 (1979) 127–36. Mendels, “‘On Kingship,’” 136.

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not the same at all. The Temple Scroll intends that the king have the law in order to be subject to it and live by it. Aristeas is not concerned with law, nor does this passage exhort the king to obey the law. This supposed agreement is not in reality an agreement. The advice in Aristeas does not derive from some Jewish Vorlage on kingship whose ideology coheres with the Temple Scroll. We will see more examples like this in the commentary to follow. After examining the questions in some detail, I will resume this excursus with some concluding and summarizing remarks on the symposia section as a whole.

The Symposia (§§ 187–300) The First Symposium (§§ 187–202) 187. And when, after an interval, he got an opportunity, he asked the one occupying the first seat – for they were reclining according to age – “How can one continue his kingdom intact until the end?” 188. And after pausing briefly, he said, “You would thus administer it best by imitating the continuing lenience of God. For by employing long-suffering and punishing the culpable more leniently than they deserve, you will turn them from moral wickedness and lead them to a change of mind.” 189. The king praised him and asked the next one, “How should one accomplish all things?” And he answered, “If he observed justice toward all, he would accomplish everything well for himself, comprehending that every thought is clear to God, and by taking the fear of God as the starting point you will fail at nothing.” 190. And this one also he received very well, and he asked another, “How might one have Friends who are favorable to him?” That one said, “If they observe you having much foresight concerning the multitudes you rule. And you will do this by looking attentively at how God, who provides health and nourishment and all remaining things at their proper time, gives benefactions to the human race.” 191. Approving of this person, he asked the next one, “How in audiences and judgments might one obtain a good reputation even from those who have not been successful?” And he said, “If in every word you are impartial, and if you do not act arrogantly or with your own strength against those who do wrong. 192. You will do this if you have regard for the method of God. For supplications are fulfilled for the worthy, and for those who have not succeeded, the harmfulness of their supplications is signaled to them through dreams or actions. God does not strike them according to their wrongdoing or according to the greatness of God’s strength, but God exercises lenience.” 193. And commending this

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one well, he asked the next one in order, “How might one be unconquerable in military engagements?” And he said, “If he does not trust in multitudes or in forces, but he always appeals to God, so that God might direct his enterprises for him as the king administers everything justly.” 194. And approving of this one also, he asked another, “How might one be regarded with fear by one’s enemies?” And he said, “If, while procuring a great provision of arms and forces, he would recognize that these are fruitless over a long period of time in producing any conclusion, for God, by granting reprieves and exhibiting elements connected with his sovereignty, prepares fear in every mind.” 195. And praising this one he said to the next, “What would be the best thing for one’s life?” That one said, “To know that God has power over all things and that we ourselves in our most honorable deeds do not direct our plans. But God completes the affairs of all, and the one who has power guides.” 196. And assenting that this one also had spoken well, he asked another, “How, when one maintains all these things inviolate, might he finally transmit the same legacy to his descendents?” And he said, “By always praying to God to receive good designs for acting on future matters and by exhorting one’s descendents not to be overcome by fame or wealth. For God is the one who bestows these things, and not because of themselves do they have an excess of all things.” 197. And confirming these things, he inquired of the one who came next, “How might one bear whatever comes to pass with equanimity?” And that one said, “If you accept the preconception that all human beings come into being because of God in order to share in the greatest evils as well as the greatest good, and it is not possible to be human without a mixture of these. But God, whom we must supplicate, grants stoutness of heart.” 198. And also showing this one favor, he said that all had declared their opinions well. “And after asking yet one more, I will finish for now, so that turning towards enjoying ourselves, we might spend the time pleasantly. But in the upcoming six days in succession, I will learn something more from the rest in turn.” 199. Then he asked the man, “What is the aim of courage?” And he said, “If one accomplishes what one resolves rightly and according to purpose in actions that are dangerous. So everything is brought about profitably for you by God, O King, when you deliberate well.” 200. And when all had assented and indicated it with applause, the king said to the philosophers – for not a few were present among them – “I think that these men excel in virtue, and they understand a great deal. When they receive questions such as these unexpectedly, they answer as is proper, all of them making God the starting point of their reasoning.” 201. And the philosopher Menedemos of Eretria said, “Indeed, O King. For since all things are governed by providence, and assuming this correctly, that human beings

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are created by God, it follows that all sovereignty and beautiful speech have a starting point in God.” 202. And after the king expressed approval, these matters ceased, and they turned to merriment. And when evening fell the symposium broke up. Textual Notes Josephus does not narrate the symposia at all, but rather he summarizes the entire episode. See the General Comment section below for more discussion. § 188. The manuscripts have the clause καὶ βλιμάζων τοὺς ἀξίους ἐπιεικέστερον καθώς εἰσιν ἄξιοι, which has several problems. The reading βλιμάζων of some Greek manuscripts created confusion in the tradition. Some manuscripts have the non-existent form βλημάζων, while others attempt to find different verbs that make meaning here. The verb itself refers to squeezing hens to see if they are fat, and it takes on a lewd connotation. Tramontano tries to argue that it is a euphemism for striking and hence punishment.805 This seems a lexical stretch, and Zuntz suggested an emendation of κολάζων, punishing, which Pelletier has adopted.806 Some word for punishment seems necessitated in the context, and I have followed Zuntz and Pelletier.807 The doubling of the adjective ἄξιος looks a bit suspicious. Zuntz suggested emending the first instance to αἰτίους, which Pelletier follows and is the basis for my translation of “culpable.”808 Shutt follows the transmitted text here. Finally, Schmidt conjectured the conjunction ἤ before καθώς because of the comparative nature of the entire clause. Pelletier has printed the conjunction in pointed brackets, indicating his tentative acceptance of it. With or without it, the comparative sense of the clause is obvious. § 189. The question πῶς ἂν ἕκαστα πράττοι of the manuscripts is admittedly difficult. Zuntz suggested κάλλιστα in place of ἕκαστα, while Wendland added it after that word.809 Tramontano calls the addition “gratuitous,” and Pelletier has not accepted it.810 The present translation does not either. // Following the question, L. Cohn suggested

805 806

807 808 809 810

Tramontano, La Lettera, 176. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 25, defines βλιμάζων as “inflicting punishment,” and if indeed this were the meaning, then staying with the transmitted text would be proper. It seems as if Shutt may be following Tramontano in this lexical approach, but at least according to LSJ, there is no other evidence for this meaning. Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas Text,” 242. Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas Text,” 242. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 26. Tramontano, La Lettera, 177.

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adding ὅτι, which can indicate direct speech in Greek.811 Pelletier prints it in pointed brackets. I have not followed this emendation, which is unnecessary. None of the other occurrences of the verb ἀπεκρίθη in the symposia have ὅτι accompanying them, and there is no reason that the verb itself cannot signal direct discourse. Hadas translates as if the first portion of the answer is indirect speech and only the second part is direct speech. Although the verb is in the third person, I think that the direct speech begins right away, and I have translated accordingly. // The manuscripts are divided between the accusative ἑαυτόν and the dative ἑαυτῷ, which seems better suited to the context. Cohn suggested that the pronoun was not necessary and recommended eliminating it from the text.812 Pelletier prints it in square brackets, but I do not see the necessity to indicate uncertainty about it. § 190. The manuscripts transmit the question as πῶς ἂν ὁμοίους ἐαυτῷ ἔχοι τοὺς φίλους, “How can he have Friends like himself.” For the grammar of the sentence, the phrase ὁμοίους ἐαυτῷ is out of place. Wendland suggested modifying ὁμοίους to ὁμοίως and adding δικαίους, producing “How can he have friends who are similarly just.” Zuntz replaced ὁμοίους with εὐνόους, favorable, which Pelletier prints in his text. I have followed this text.813 § 191. Schmidt corrected the indicative τυγχάνω of the manuscripts to the optative τυγχάνοι in line with other verbs of the questions. Most editors have followed this suggestion, as I have here. § 193. The majority reading of the manuscripts has ὄχλοις, multitudes. In the context, the reading of ms P, ὅπλοις, arms, is understandable (see § 194) but almost certainly not the correct reading. § 194. The reading of the Greek manuscripts, εἴη εἲ δὲ εἴη, is patently corrupt. Wendland’s suggestion of εἰδείη makes the most sense of the corruption and has the additional benefit of being graphically similar. // On the basis of Wis 12:16–18, Zuntz suggested adding ἰσχύν, strength, to create the phrase “exhibiting strength of his sovereignty.”814 Pelletier rejects this suggestion.815 The perceived difficulty of the juxtaposed articles τὰ τῆς is a chimera, as Ps.-Aristeas employs this construction (with different cases of the second article) on numerous occasions in the book. § 198. There is some confusion about the two occurrences of ἑξῆς, in turn or succeeding. Ms U omits the first occurrence, and Wendland follows this reading as unnecessary.

811 812 813 814 815

See Pelletier’s critical apparatus, Lettre, 190. See Pelletier’s critical apparatus, Lettre, 190. Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas Text,” 243–44. Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas Text,” 244. Pelletier, Lettre, 250.

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Pelletier prints the word in his text, although in square brackets. It does seem potentially unnecessary, and the sentence could make sense without it, but I have kept it in my translation. According to Thackeray, the second occurrence is omitted in mss B P T Z. (Pelletier only has T in his apparatus.) It is apparently written above the line in ms O. Nonetheless, the sentence requires some expression that indicates “in succession.” General Comment The scene for this first banquet continues from the introduction to the symposium section as a whole in §§ 172–186 in which the translators recline at the meal and the first symposium begins (§ 184). Only in § 198 do we learn that this is the first of a planned seven consecutive symposia to be held in honor of the translators. Over the course of these feasts, the king poses a question to each of the seventy-two translators, who in turn offers an answer. As commentators have noted, this section tends to get repetitive and somewhat tedious, but measuring over a third of the length of the work, it clearly has importance for our author. Since the nature of each question is different, and there does not seem to be any overall structure to which questions are asked when – although sometimes there are small subunits where similar topics are discussed in close order – I will discuss each question and answer on its own, pointing out the subunits where they occur. One of the topics of Peri Basileus literature was how a king could govern well, and this subject dominates the first few questions. In the first instance (§§ 187–188), the king asks how he can keep his kingdom intact during his reign, and here the phrase “until the end” connotes the length of the king’s reign. Ptolemy will ask later about handing his kingdom on to his heirs. The first translator’s answer employs the verb διευθύνω, set right or maintain, having here a sense of administer, since the topic becomes the king’s justice. Many scholars have noted that throughout the seventy-two answers, the Jewish translators make constant reference to God. In this case, the king is exhorted to imitate (μιμούμενος) God. Thus, the first answer sets up a comparison that will recur in other answers – as God is to the world, the king is to his kingdom and subjects.816 In this answer, Ptolemy is encour816

See the fragment attributed to a certain Pythagorean Sthenidas of Lokri (preserved in Stobaeus) who compares the king to God in this way, cited in Goodenough, “Political Philosophy,” 73–74. The concept of imitation is the primary evidence that convinces Meisner, Untersuchungen, chap. 5, that Aristeas expresses a Pythagorean notion of kingship. Murray, “Peri Basileus,” 272–73 shows that this idea occurs more widely in Greek and Jewish thought in this period and is thus not uniquely characteristic of Pythagorean thought.

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aged to imitate God and be “long-suffering” (μακροθυμία), a word that gains popularity in Jewish and Christian literature but that already appears in Menander in the fourth century BCE with this meaning. Some scholars note the “Jewish” character of this line of thinking, since rather than make any reference to theories of the divinity of the monarch, Ps.-Aristeas makes a clean distinction, which emphasizes the sovereign’s humanity.817 Yet, I think it important not to make too much of this absence, especially if it becomes part of an attempt to try to pull apart the “Jewish” from the “Greek” elements.818 Whether Ps.-Aristeas is intentionally working to tear down any notion of the divine character of the king is not entirely clear, since he never directly takes on the issue of the Ptolemaic ruler cult.819 Certainly not everyone thought the king divine, and the issues related to the Hellenistic ruler cults are quite difficult and messy. Does avoiding the issue of the king’s potential divinity ineluctably indicate “Jewishness”? I strongly suspect not. Yet, in Aristeas the king is always subordinated to God, and whether or not this is a uniquely Jewish critique, the thrust comes through with clarity. For Ps.-Aristeas, God tempers just punishment with leniency or clemency (ἐπιεικής), which marks one of the virtues of a good king, although this answer produces some potential dissonance with other answers. On the one side, this reply compares favorably with Hecataeus of Abdera’s remarks about Egyptian kings (in Diodorus Siculus 1.70.6).820 As part of a public ritual, the high priest openly extols the king’s virtues, which include punishing “crimes less severely than they deserve.” On the other

817

818

819

820

See, for example, Mendels, “‘On Kingship’ in the ‘Temple Scroll,’” 132, who says, “This concept [that the king is flesh and blood] is so different from the pagan idea of the deity of the sovereign ….” I am not certain what such attempts accomplish in the end. Do they tell us that we have here a Jew who has taken advantage of and sees little problem with Hellenistic education and traditions? We do not really need to pull these elements apart to know that. Ps.-Aristeas was an Alexandrian-Jewish intellectual who, as we have seen repeatedly, appears, like his philosopher-translators, equally at home in Jewish and Hellenistic literature. On the ruler cult, see Ludwig Koenen, “The Ptolemaic King as a Religious Figure,” in Images and Ideologies: Self-definition in the Hellenistic World (Ed. Anthony Bulloch et al.; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) 25–115. For other pertinent comments on the Ptolemaic ruler-cult, especially those of Ptolemy I and II, see A. E. Samuel, “The Ptolemies and the Ideology of Kingship,” in Hellenistic History and Culture (Ed. Peter Green; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993) 181–82. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 173–74.

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side, in § 166, when Eleazar approves the king’s policy towards informers, Aristeas replies that he visits upon them severe torments and painful deaths – hardly the actions of a lenient monarch.821 Moreover, in the very next question, when asked about how the king can accomplish things, the translator replies with almost the direct opposite virtue from lenience, justice (δίκαιον).822 So, the king is not to treat everyone according to the letter of the law in order to preserve his kingdom, that is, he is to be clement, but he is to treat everyone according to the letter of the law; he must observe justice, if he is to accomplish all things. One could forgive the king if at this point, he were to show some confusion, although his responses throughout the symposia are unfailingly approving. The point of the king acting leniently is to turn the guilty away from evil and to have them repent. The term μετάνοια here does not indicate penitence in the sense of its later Jewish and Christian use, but rather a change of heart or regret.823 That is, by treating with clemency those guilty of acting out of bad morals, the king will change their minds, and they will leave their moral wickedness behind. This answer leads directly into the second question (§ 189) in which the king inquires about how to accomplish successfully everything he undertakes. Two issues emerge here. The first is that the king ought to be just, a moral virtue that both Jewish and Greek traditions presume that kings need. More than this, however, appeals to justice resonate throughout the work; the words δίκαιος and δικαιοσύνη, justice or in some contexts righteousness, occur more than fifteen times in the symposium section alone. Indeed, the idea also permeates Eleazar’s speech in which he says repeatedly that one of the points of the Jewish law is justice/righteousness. Gruen points out that Ps.-Aristeas mixes the more traditional Greek understanding of justice with the religious connotation of righteousness. In § 24, the king’s prostagma freeing the slaves appeals to his execution of justice for “unreasonably oppressed” people. Later in § 166, he brings together, just as he does here, the execution of justice with the idea of fear of God.824 As a general matter, however, it seems that Ps.-Aristeas uses the words primarily in the sense of justice, a sense that works well for the most part and that I have used throughout in my translation.

821 822 823

824

See Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2746. In fact, LSJ gives one meaning of ἐπιεικής as “not according to the letter of the law.” Tramontano, La Lettera, 177 also notes that the word here differs from later Jewish and Christian usage. For God’s leniency that leads to repentance, cf. Wis 11:23. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2747.

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The appeal to fear of the Lord in § 166 is connected with the use of tefillin. As Eleazar says numerous times, the reminder is that every action must be accomplished with justice/righteousness. There the combination is justice, a mindfulness about the makeup of human beings and fear of God. In this paragraph, however, the three-fold combination is justice, the idea that thoughts are manifest to God and fear of God. In each case an aspect of the place of humans in the cosmos conjoins an appeal to justice and fear of God. The recognition of the human condition, then, should evoke fear of God, which is the basis for acting justly. The idea of fearing God appears frequently in Jewish wisdom literature. It is a central theme in the Wisdom of Ben Sira, which was translated into Greek at a time close to the composition of Aristeas, likely in Alexandria. In Sirach, fear of God is intimately connected to wisdom and proper fulfillment of the law (cf. Sir 19:20). In the present paragraph, the exhortation to make fear of God the starting point of all actions reflects a similar approach to that of Sirach, although Eleazar’s speech comes closer, since justice and fear of God result from reflection on the law. Of course, the translators do not tell the king that he must observe Jewish law (although by preparing a kosher banquet he has voluntarily observed the food laws), but here, as in Eleazar’s speech, Ps.-Aristeas establishes that Jews and Greeks share values like justice. Thus, at a basic level there is more similarity between this answer and other Jewish texts than might be apparent initially. The third question (§ 190) focuses on the problem of the king having “Friends” who will act favorably toward him. A king needs advisors whom he can trust and who will not plot behind his back. The question seems to be concerned with how Ptolemy can find such trusted advisors. The Jewish respondent’s answer marshalls two important aspects of Hellenistic ideology of kingship. If those who would be the king’s advisors see him acting with foresight (πρόνοια) toward his subjects, they will be favorably inclined toward the king. The king’s duty is to exercise continual foresight by watching out for the welfare for his people.825 Ps.-Aristeas has already hinted that Ptolemy acts with foresight. In § 80, our author writes that Ptolemy exercised much foresight in having the gifts for the temple constructed.826 In the earlier paragraph, the term connotes planning ahead and consideration beforehand. Here, Ptolemy needs to take his cue from God – again, imitation of God reinforces the king’s position vis-à-vis his

825 826

Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 25. Tramontano, La Lettera, 179.

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subjects – who acts to benefit (εὐεργετεῖ) all of humankind.827 One of the fundamental responsibilities of a Hellenistic king is to provide benefactions for the ruled.828 For Ps.-Aristeas’s Jewish translator, then, foresight involves looking out for, or considering beforehand, what benefactions the king can bestow on his people, since this is presumably how God acts. When the translator states that God grants all things “at their proper time,” he is expressing the same thought that can be found especially in the Psalms. See, for example, Psalm 103:27 (LXX) and 144:15 (LXX).829 In question four in this first symposium (§§ 191–192), the king worries about how to maintain his good reputation even with suppliants whose petitions have not been granted. The answer is one of the longer ones in this section, but it essentially returns to the theme of the first question and answer. Impartiality without arrogance will accomplish this goal.830 For the third time, the respondent turns the king’s attention to how God acts, to his “method.” Here, though, it is difficult to see how the king should act like the deity, since God signals some of those whose supplications are “harmful” by sending them dreams. They deserve punishment for their unworthy or harmful petitions, but God does not exert his power on them, he shows ἐπιείκεια, lenience, a synonym for the term used in § 188, although it has more of the connotation of equity or fairness.831 As in the first answer, some dissonance can be detected here, since impartiality (ἴσος) connotes equality,

827

828

829

830

831

Later Alexandrian Jewish writers also point to God as one who gives benefactions, and thus God acts as a king. See, for example, the use of the same verb in Philo, On the Creation of the World, 23 (among many passages) and Wis 3:5; 11:5, 13; 16:2. See Klaus Bringmann, “The King as Benefactor: Some Remarks on Ideal Kingship in the Age of Hellenism,” in Bulloch et al., Images and Ideologies, 7–24. These texts, however, do not use the same language as Aristeas. In § 190 the prepositional phrase κατὰ καιρόν expresses the thought. In the Psalms, the translator uses the adjective εὔκαιρος and the noun εὐκαιρία. J. J. Lewis, “The Table-Talk Section in the Letter of Aristeas,” NTS 13 [1966] 53–56, cites this passage, among several others, as part of an argument that Aristeas is dependent on Pseudo-Phocylides for a number of his moral claims. While it is true that Aristeas and Pseudo-Phocylides both take up similar moral issues, the parallels that Lewis cites seem to me no more than that, parallels. They are not close in language, and in fact, most of the sentiments are general ones, so, for example, about justice or moderation or honoring parents. They do not produce a compelling case for literary dependence. On Pseudo-Phocylides, see Walter T. Wilson, Pseudo-Phocylides (CEJL; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2005). LSJ refers to ἐπιεικής, and although the connotation has the sense of equity, LSJ add “as opposed to strict law.” Thus, it has much the same sense as its counterpart in § 188.

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and almost by definition, leniency treats some persons differently from others. The tension is not resolved in these answers, and indeed, they betray no awareness that any tension might exist. Question number five (§ 193) introduces the topic of the king as a military leader, an important subject of Hellenistic kingship literature, since one of the king’s primary duties was to protect his kingdom and subjects. The king’s question accords with the broad concern, but the answer is not one that would likely be found in the Hellenistic Peri Basileus literature. The respondent sets aside any notion of relying on military forces. Rather he tells the king that he must appeal to God, and to the extent that the king maintains justice, God will “direct his enterprises.” That is, God will protect a just king, and in this sense, Ps.-Aristeas exhibits a central idea in both Jewish and Greek conceptions – the virtue of the king is paramount to his success. As many scholars point out, the idea that one relies on God and not force of arms appears frequently in Jewish literature. One of the best examples is 1 Macc 3:19: “For victory in war is not in the multitude of the force, but rather, power is from heaven.”832 The next question (§ 194) continues the focus on the king’s military leadership. Earlier the king had asked about how to be regarded with favor by his friends. Now that is turned around to ask about how he can provoke fear in his enemies. As the previous respondent replied to the king, so this one answers in similar fashion. Reliance upon arms will have no bearing on the king’s objectives. In an implicit recommendation for the king to imitate God, this respondent advises that reprieves (i.e., leniency towards enemies) and demonstration of his sovereign power will produce fear. We see a similar sentiment in Wis 12:16–18833: 16. For your strength is the beginning of righteousness, and your sovereignty over all causes you to spare all. 17. For you show your strength when people doubt the completeness of your power, and you rebuke any insolence among those who know it

832

833

See Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2747; Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 23; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 175. Hadas, however, also refers to Thucydides 5.112.2 where the Athenians are arrayed against the Melians. Here, however, we do not find the same thought. The Melians say, “[W]e trust in the fortune by which the gods have preserved it [i.e., their city] until now, and in the help of men, that is, of the Lacedaemonians; and so we will try to save ourselves.” This is quite a different sentiment from what we find in Aristeas and in Jewish literature. See Tramontano, La Lettera, 181. He also refers to Sir 43:29, but that verse does not come nearly as close to the thought here as does the passage from Wisdom of Solomon.

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18. Although you are sovereign in strength, you judge with fairness, and with great forbearance you govern us, for you have the power to prevail whenever you choose.

In § 194, however, fear of God does not have the same valence as it did in § 189. Here divine reprieves apparently dispose enemies positively towards God, and divine display of power connected with God’s sovereignty will engender fear. Presumably the king ought to act the same way. What kind of power the king should demonstrate is a bit ambiguous, though, since perhaps the greatest source of a human king’s ability to demonstrate power is his military force. Here the comparison between God and king breaks down, since God’s sovereign power and the king’s and their potential to incite fear would seem to be very different in kind.834 Question seven (§ 195) moves to a different topic, living well, although in certain respects the answer does not differ much from previous ones. To the question of what is the best thing for the king’s life, the answer is recognition of God’s sovereign power over all and awareness that even the king does not control his own plans. Only God has control of human affairs, and God directs because he has the power to do so. This sentiment, that God has power over everything and guides everything, occurs on several occasions in Aristeas, and it forms a sub-theme in the book. All the way back in § 18, our narrator Aristeas observed that whatever humans think they do on their own is actually directed by God, “who has lordship over all.” In § 132, Eleazar appeals to God’s power, which is made evident in all things. Indeed, according to Eleazar (§ 141), the Jew’s entire life is devoted to contemplating God’s sovereignty. All of these assertions could lay the foundation for an argument that reduces the importance of the king in the face of God’s sovereignty. Yet, Ps.-Aristeas never makes this argument. For him, monarchy, particularly the kind of benevolent monarchy that he constructs in his work, is simply a fact of life, an institution that he does not question. As Murray points out, Ps.-Aristeas is not interested in any theoretical discussion about ideal forms of government.835 His approach is eminently more practical.

834

835

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 176, cites Ps 130:4, which he quotes as, “For with Thee there is forgiveness, that Thou mayest be feared.” But this is the Hebrew. In the Old Greek, Ps 129:3–4 reads, “If you mark lawlessness, O Lord, Lord, who can stand – because with you there is atonement.” Presumably Ps.-Aristeas was not using the Hebrew, and the Greek makes no reference to fear. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 359.

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Question eight (§ 196) raises one of the most troubling issues for any ancient monarch – how to assure that the king’s property and rule will be passed to his descendent(s). As Gruen observes, the answer given in this paragraph “ignores the central issue of monarchic and dynastic rule.”836 Rather than giving the king any practical advice, the respondent exhorts him to pray that God give him good designs for future actions. He should also admonish his heirs not to be taken in by wealth and fame. After all, just as God directs the king’s affairs, God is responsible for their good fortune and for their wealth. Of course, none of this would help the king with his dilemma at all. Ps.-Aristeas uses the verb for prayer, εὔχομαι, six times in his work. In two of those cases a Gentile is the one praying – here and in § 17, where Aristeas prays that God would motivate the king to release the Jewish slaves. In the other instances Jews do the praying – in § 248, where it is said that Jews pray for their children, in § 45 in Eleazar’s letter to Ptolemy, and in § 305 and § 306, where the translators pray before they begin their work and Aristeas asks them why they do it. The ninth question (§ 197) employs more than one philosophical concept while at the same time invoking the Jewish god. The question itself has a philosophical cast. The king asks how he can endure events with equanimity (here using the adverb μετρίως), a concept that includes temperance or modesty. That is, the king wants to know how he can avoid responding with passion to adverse things that happen, since reacting with passion was seen as not having control of oneself. The importance of reacting temperately when adversity strikes is a commonplace in Hellenistic thought, and it appears in Jewish literature of the period.837 Two salient examples are 4 Maccabees, which has as its central theme the dominance of reason over passion/emotion and Philo’s portrait of Abraham upon the death of Sarah in On Abraham 257–260, where Abraham chooses to react to his wife’s death with “moderation of feeling.” This control evokes amazement and admiration in those who see him. In the answer, the Jewish elder replies that humans share a common condition, that God brings humans into a world of great good and terrible evils. Indeed, it is impossible to be human in any other way. He articulates this assumption using the key word translated here “preconception” (πρόληψις), which connotes a mental scheme into which experi-

836 837

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2748. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2748, writes, “The need to react to adverse circumstances in a moderate or temperate fashion is a common Hellenistic motif.” See also Goodenough, “Political Philosophy,” 70.

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ence is placed, a term that had common currency in Hellenistic philosophy, but especially in Stoicism.838 The answer begins with a presumed shared assumption about human life that can then lead to the advice that the same God who brings humans into the world also grants the courage to live in it through supplication. This kind of advice mitigates the force of the comparison of the king and God. Although Ps.-Aristeas compares Ptolemy to God in terms of their relative status with respect to their kingdoms, here he makes the critical point (as we will see in other places as well) that the king is not God, since God directs his affairs, God will make his kingdom secure from military defeat, and God grants him stoutheartedness to endure the vicissitudes of life. The final question in this first symposium (§ 199) again is framed in explicitly philosophical terms. The king asks about the aim of courage (ἀνδρεία), which is one of the four cardinal Stoic virtues: prudence, courage, temperance and justice. Within the Stoic system courage can be defined as “correct judgment as to what must be endured.”839 This definition is reflected in the answer, which focuses on deliberation (the verb βουλεύω twice) and purpose (πρόθεσις). Still, the possibility of acting with courage in these situations does not depend solely on the king’s ability to deliberate well. In the end, only God can assure that things happen “profitably” for him. As a conclusion to this first symposium, Ps.-Aristeas establishes a pattern that he will follow for the remainder of these parties. The king, either with others (Symposia 1, 3, 4, 5 and 7) or by himself (Symposia 2 and 6), cheers the answers he has been given, and except for the second symposium, the group then turns its focus to merrymaking, presumably symposiastic drinking.840 At the conclusion of this first party, Ps.-Aristeas spares no effort in making his most important and broad point in the symposia. Ptolemy expresses his pleasure even before the last question and answer. After the last answer is completed, all present applaud the translators. He then addresses the philosophers who are present, perhaps as the meta-sym-

838

839

840

See LSJ; Tramontano, La Lettera, 182; Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 275; and Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 177. Marcia L. Colish, Stoic Tradition from Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages: 1. Stoicism in Classical Latin Literature (Leiden: Brill, 1990) 44. Ellen Birnbaum, “Portrayals of the Wise and Virtuous in Alexandrian Jewish Works: Jews’ Perceptions of Themselves and Others,” in Ancient Alexandria between Egypt and Greece (Ed. W. V. Harris and Giovanni Ruffini; Columbia Studies in the Classical Tradition 16; Leiden: Brill, 2004) 134 n. 19, also notes that the other guests present join the king in Symposia 1, 3, 4, 5 and 7.

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posiasts who would be expected to guide the conversation were this a more usual symposium, saying that the Jews excel in virtue, a point that Eleazar’s speech drives home as well. In this case, however, the term is ἀρετή, which is only used in Aristeas of Eleazar (§ 122), the translators (§ 200) and indirectly, of the king (§ 215). He praises their ability to respond to questions on the spot, but more than that, their responses are proper, since they take God as their starting point, which, of course, is precisely what the translators have already urged the king to do (§ 189) and will again. The philosopher, Menedemus of Eretria, speaks for the entire group, and he reinforces the king’s point with a logical argument that a philosopher might presumably make. He makes his case based on two ideas that we have seen already in this first symposium: (1) God’s sovereignty and (2) his status as Creator. In claiming that providence (προνοία) governs the cosmos, Menedemus attributes an important virtue of the Hellenistic monarch to God.841 The argument proceeds from these two assumptions about God, and thus, it “follows” (ἀκολουθεῖ), in a syllogistic manner, according to Menedemus, that God must be the starting point for all “sovereignty” (δυναστεία) and “beautiful speech.” From the lips of a Greek philosopher comes the same point that the Jewish translators have made (and will make repeatedly) – God is the source of all sovereignty. Thus, by implication, even Menedemus admits that Ptolemy only has sovereignty and any kind of success due to the favor of the Jewish god. Gruen remarks on the end of this symposium that by having the philosophers give approbation to the “brief, rather repetitious, and not particularly profound comments of the Jews, he [i.e., Ps.-Aristeas] casts a less than flattering light upon the philosophers.”842 I see the matter somewhat differently. Whatever else he might be trying to accomplish, by making the philosophers approve of and repeat the Jewish translators’ answers, Ps.-Aristeas constructs the translators as philosophers who are just as good as the king’s men, and he thus establishes further their credentials as translators who can/will render the philosophical and divine law (§ 31) into Greek. They have been prepared in both Hebrew and Greek literature, so their linguistic capabilities are not in doubt. They have the philosophical acumen to translate, and Ps.-Aristeas, beyond their obvious virtue, will establish their bona fides in piety a bit later on, which makes them capable of penetrating the divine aspects of the text.

841 842

Meecham, Oldest Version, 248, cites a range of Jewish texts that make this equation. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2748.

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Notes § 187. he asked. Translators of Aristeas have dealt with the translators’ questions in one of two ways. Some, like Thackeray, Andrews, Tramontano and Hadas, treat the questions as indirect speech and render the questions in the third person.843 So Hadas has here, “he asked the first man … how he might preserve his kingdom unimpaired to the end.” Others like Pelletier and Shutt, with whom I agree, have treated the questions as direct speech in the third person as a circumlocution – thus, the translation given above.844 The Greek syntax can support either interpretation.845 according to age. Traditional symposia differentiated between men and boys, who might be present as wine-pourers or singers or who might accompany their fathers. For those who attended traditional Greek symposia, sympotic etiquette required that boys be seated differently from adults, often the adults reclining and the boys sitting.846 As we saw above, Hellenistic royal symposia were more spatially hierarchical than the earlier and smaller classical symposia, but I have not found any evidence that these symposia distributed seating according to the age of the symposiasts.847 Thackeray compares the seating arrangement in Aristeas to Gen 43:33, where Joseph’s brothers sit before him “the firstborn according to his seniority and the younger according to his youth” (NETS), but it is impossible to know if Genesis served as a model for Ps.-Aristeas. Thackeray also cites Josephus, Ant. 12.210, who narrates a feast of John Hyrcanus (using the verb ἑστιάω, entertain or feast) to which important people were invited. One person who attended “was placed at the foot of the table, being slighted as still a youth (παῖς) by those who assigned places according to rank (ἀξίαν).”848 In this example seating is not according to age but

843

844 845

846

847

848

Thackeray, “Translation,” 372; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 112; Tramontano, La Lettera, 175; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 173. Pelletier, Lettre, 190; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 25. I have not been able to examine many of the photographs of manuscripts, but at least Monacensis 9 (Pelletier’s O) does not distinguish any questions in the book via punctuation – even those that are obviously questions, such as in §§ 10 and 11. Of course, the addition of punctuation occurs at a later point in the transmission of the text and itself represents an interpretive move. For boys at symposia, see Jan N. Bremmer, “Adolescents, Symposion, and Pederasty,” in Murray, Sympotica, 135–48. There is no mention, for example, in the entirety of Murray, Sympotica of seating by age. Thackeray, “Translation,” 372 n. 4. The translation of Josephus comes from Marcus, Josephus VII.

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according to rank, and Josephus specifically notes that this was a social slight. Thus, we cannot view this arrangement as a normative practice, and Josephus’s feast, which is not said to be a symposium, does not really bear on our passage. § 189. in each instance. The Greek question πῶς ἂν ἕκαστα πράττοι is difficult and has potential text-critical issues connected with it (see Textual Notes above). Yet, once the decision was made to retain the reading as the manuscripts have transmitted it, the task remains to ascertain what it means. The main problem is the neuter plural pronoun. To what does it refer? Here it is the object of πράττοι, which as a transitive verb has a fairly broad range of meanings. It usually connotes acting, accomplishing or achieving. In light of the answer to this quesiton, which highlights success, the sense should be how the king can successfully accomplish what he sets out to do. § 190. Friends. We have already seen how Ps.-Aristeas connects Ptolemy II and the high priest through the idea of the king’s Friends. (See § 40, § 41 and the note to § 40.) The term is likely used here in that technical sense. That is, how can the king find advisors whom he can trust? § 192. wrongdoing. The noun here, ἁμαρτία, is often translated as “sin.” In its use in Aristeas, however, the word does not carry this sense, but the more general idea of fault or wrongdoing. § 193. commending. The particple κατεπαινέσας is a compound from κατά and ἐπαινέω. It occurs here, in § 212 and § 266, and apparently nowhere else in Greek. The standard Greek lexicon, LSJ, does not even have a listing for it. § 194. logical conclusion. The Greek term συμπέρασμα refers to the conclusion of an Aristotelian syllogism. Thus, it can have the sense of a logical conclusion from a philosophical argument. In this instance, then, it means that there can be no certain result from maintaining large provisions of arms. reprieves. The noun ἀνοχή can have several different senses. Primarily it refers to stopping, especially of hostilities, and thus, it connotes a truce or armistice. It can also refer to time, so possibly a delay.849 The word can also mean forbearance or relief, and most scholars take it in this sense in Aristeas, giving it the sense of reprieve, as I have in my translation as well. § 196. legacy. Scholars have translated this term in different ways depending on how they construe the grammar of the sentence. I disagree with most of the ways this sentence has been translated. Most scholars have something

849

Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 354, takes it this way, although in the one case cited in LSJ it is accompanied by the noun “days” to indicate this meaning.

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like Thackeray: “how he could preserve all his possessions unimpaired and finally deliver them to his descendants in the same condition.”850 The difficulty is that the phrase τὴν αὐτὴν … διάθεσιν is the object of the verb παραδιδοῖ, which stands in the middle of the phrase. Thus, the phrase, as the object of the verb, cannot mean “in the same condition.” The noun διάθεσις is what is delivered. In that case, the word should mean something like LSJ’s disposition of property, which I have rendered as “legacy.” § 198. upcoming six days in succession. This scheme creates a strange division of the questions. The first five symposia have ten each and the last two eleven. Murray suggested the model of Alexander and the Indian Gymnosophists as one possible explanation for the division (see Excursus above). Josephus (Ant. 12.99) reports that Ptolemy “made the symposium last for twelve days.” He dispenses with the details, referring the reader to Aristeas for them. Why the numbers differ between the manuscripts of Aristeas and Josephus is not at all clear. Perhaps Josephus felt the awkwardness of the division and opted for a more even division in which each day would have six questions, although he only says that the king asked each person a question. Moreover, the upcoming six days after the present symposium would necessitate holding one on the Jewish Sabbath. While one clear ethnic marker in Aristeas is observance of the food laws, Ps.-Aristeas seems remarkably comfortable with his translators participating in such activities on the Sabbath day. The translators’ presence at a symposium on the Sabbath does not necessarily signal that it held no importance for the Alexandrian Jewish community. It might just as easily indicate that such activities were an accepted option for Sabbath observance, including being involved with Gentiles. Perhaps at this time there were no specific obligations on the Sabbath as long as one was doing no work, as Moore suggests.851 § 201. Menedemus of Eretria. Most of what we know of Menedemus’s biography comes from Diogenes Laertius (third century CE). Born in the Greek city of Eretria in the late fourth century BCE, he is said to have studied philosophy under Stilpo at Megara and Phaedo in Elis. He was a friend of Antigonus Gonatas, who looked to Menedemus as one of his teachers.852 Diogenes (2.140) also says that he was part of a delegation to Ptolemy and Lysimachus, although as a friend and teacher of Antigonus Gonatas, it 850

851 852

Thackeray, “Translation,” 374. See also, Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 177; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 112; Pelletier, Lettre, 192, who follow roughly the same translation. On the issue of the Sabbath and the symposia, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 338–39. On Menedemus, see W. W. Tarn, Antigonus Gonatas (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913) 22–24.

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seems that even if he was part of a delegation, it is unlikely that he would be among the guests at a symposium given by Ptolemy. It is uncertain why Ps.-Aristeas includes him here. Gruen suggests that his renown as a philosopher was likely the reason.853 There might be another possible reason to combine with Ps.-Aristeas’s desire to include a well-known philosopher of Ptolemy’s age. Diogenes also reports a tradition that Menedemus was well known for his dinners, at which he would dine until late in the day with two or three friends and then he would invite in anyone who came by. If Ps.-Aristeas connected Menedemus with holding banquests of this sort, his presence at Ptolemy’s banquet might seem appropriate, both because he was a prominent philosopher and because he was an avid symposiast. § 202. these matters … merriment. In Aristeas the order of the symposia seems to be that the king and his guests begin to feast (§ 186) and after some time the questioning begins. After the conversation, the “merriment” ensues, which presumably includes the drinking of wine, since at the end of each banquet they turn to celebration, toasts and drinking to health, for example. In its classical form, the symposium, that is, the drinking party itself, would follow a meal and was the venue for the conversation and/or entertainment together with the drinking. Ps.-Aristeas seems to have the idea of the conversation following (or occurring during) a meal, which is then followed by the merriment of the drinking party. when evening fell. The times of the first two symposia seem to differ somewhat in Aristeas, or at least they are not precise. Symposia three through seven have no explicit end given. This first symposium concludes when evening falls. In the second symposium, after the answers are completed the king exhorts the men to go to sleep (§ 220).

The Second Symposium (§§ 203–220) 203. And on the day after these things took place, the program pertaining to the reclining and the symposium was carried out again according to the same arrangement. When the king thought that it was a good time to put questions to some of the men, he asked some of those next in order to those who had replied on the previous day. 204. So with the eleventh he began to have a conversation. For on the previous day there were ten who had been questioned. And when there was silence, he inquired, “How might one remain rich?” 205. And after pausing briefly, the one who received the

853

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2749.

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question said, “If he does nothing unworthy of his rule or is not licentious or does not make expenditures for empty and vain things, but by benefaction he will lead his subjects to have good will towards himself. For also God, whom one must follow, is the cause of good things for everyone.” 206. After the king praised this one, he asked another, “How might one maintain the truth?” To this he answered, “By knowing that lying brings great shame to all people, and much more to kings. For since they have power to do what they want, on what account should they lie? But you must take hold of this, O King, because God is a lover of truth.” 207. And he approved of this one completely, and looking attentively at another, he said, “What is the teaching of wisdom?” And he answered, “Just as you do not wish evil things to come upon yourself but you wish to have a share of all good things, so you should behave this way toward your subjects and those who do wrong. So you should admonish virtuous and good people most equitably. For God also leads all people with equity.” 208. Praising him, he said to the one after him, “How might one be benevolent?” And that one said, “By observing that the race of humans both grows and is even born over much time and in great sufferings. Whence it is necessary that one not administer punishment easily nor inflict injuries, knowing that human life is established with both pains and penalties. Therefore perceiving each of these things, you will turn toward mercy. For also God is merciful.” 209. Approving of this one, he inquired of the next in order, “What is the most necessary habit of kingship?” “To keep himself incorruptible,” he said, “And to be sober for the greater part of life, to esteem justice and to make friends of such people. For also God is a lover of justice.” 210. And showing his approval of this one, he said to another, “What is the demeanor of piety?” And he declared, “To grasp that God continually effects and knows all things, and no person who performs injustice or works evil escapes his notice. For as God gives benefactions to the whole world, so also, by imitating him, you should give no offence.” 211. And agreeing with this one, he said to another, “What is the measure of kingship?” And he declared, “To rule oneself well and not be carried away by wealth and fame to desire anything arrogant and unseemly, if you would reason well. For you have everything that you need, but God is one who needs nothing and is equitable. And you think in the manner that a human being does. Do not grasp at many things, except for those things sufficient for kingship.” 212. And commending him, he asked another, “How might one reckon the most virtuous things?” And that one answered, “If he would continually put forward justice in everything and he would consider injustice to be the same as the loss of life. For also God always proclaims the greatest good for the just.” 213. And after praising this one, he said to the next in order,

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“How can one be undisturbed in sleep?” And he declared, “You have asked about a matter that is hard to answer. For we cannot certify ourselves at the same time with these matters pertaining to sleep, but we are encompassed by lack of reason according to immediate sensation. 214. For we experience according to our mind the things that occur just as they would be seen. But we are unreasonable inasmuch as we suppose that we are going about upon the sea or in boats or that we are carried away in flight and are lifted up to other places and other such things, which also we thus suppose to occur. 215. Save insofar as it is accessible to me, so I have discussed it. In every manner, you, O King, should bring back to piety what you say and what you do so that you yourself may be conscious that, preserving virtue, you do not choose to grant favors against reason nor while exercising power you set aside justice. 216. For even more, in those matters that each person passes the time while awake, the mind returns to those same things while asleep. But God directs the mind, turning every thought and action upon the most beautiful things, whether one is awake or asleep. Therefore also around you there is always tranquility.” 217. The king applauded this one also and said to another, “Since you are the tenth one to answer, when you have given your opinion, we will turn to the meal.” And he asked, “How can we avoid doing anything unworthy of ourselves?” 218. And he said, “Always look to your own reputation and dignity in order that you might say and think in accordance with them, knowing that all those whom you rule will think and talk about you. 219. For you must not appear lesser than actors. For the role that is necessary for them to play, observing it, they will perform everything that accords with it. You, however, are not an actor, but you actually reign, since God has given to you leadership worthy of your character.” 220. After the king had applauded very kindly with cheerfulness for a long time, he exhorted the men to sleep. And when those matters concerning these men were completed, they turned to the arrangement of the next symposium. Textual Notes § 205. The Greek manuscripts express making an expense as δαπάνῃ … συντελοῖ. The verb συντελέω takes the direct object in the accusative case or has a complementary prepositional phrase (or both). Mendelssohn suggested reading δαπάνην, which Pelletier has followed. Thackeray notes it, but retains the dative. I have followed Pelletier’s text. // The following clause has no logical connector in almost all of the manuscripts to join it to its predecessor. Mendelssohn suggested δέ, which is also in ms L, in all likelihood because that scribe felt the same absence as modern scholars, and which would follow μηδέ in the earlier clause. Most editors print this

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word in pointed brackets to show its tentative inclusion. § 206. Most manuscripts have the infinitive προλαμβάνειν, which emphasizes the “beforehand” nature of the action. Mss B and T have προσλαμβάνειν, to take hold of, which suits the answer much better. § 207. Most editors have noted the difficulty of the first part of this paragraph. Mendelssohn suggested adding ἐπὶ τὸν ἕτερον after τοῦτον and eliminating ἕτερος as the explicit subject of the verb for answering. This accords also with § 281 that has a very similar construction. Curiously, Thackeray, who elsewhere refers to Mendelssohn’s conjectures, simply writes “post τουτον fort επι τον μετ αυτον vel aliguid simile excidit.”854 Pelletier prints the prepositional phrase in pointed brackets and ἕτερος in square brackets to show his essential agreement with Mendelssohn. Hadas notes the addition (which he attributes to Wendland, who relied on Mendelssohn) but prints the text as it is found in the manuscripts.855 § 208. Wendland suggests the noun πόνος, pain, rather than χρόνος, time. Most editors do not accept this conjecture, since the text concerns human birth, which takes time and is accompanied by suffering. There seems no need to emend the text here. // For the noun αἰκίαις, suffering or injury, a number of Greek manuscripts have some form of the noun αἰτία, blame. This variant looks as if it reprises the idea that the king should be lenient, but the text in those places does not eliminate blame. § 211. The Greek manuscripts read ὡς οὐδέν, as nothing. Wendland suggested ὅσα δέον, whatever is necessary, which makes better sense here. Hadas prints the manuscript tradition although he translates according to Wendland’s suggestion.856 Pelletier adopts Wendland’s emendation, which I have followed here. § 213. At the end of this paragraph, the evidence of the manuscripts indicates some textual corruption. Some of them have τῇδε and others have τί δή, an obvious corruption. Mendelssohn, followed by Thackeray, conjectured τάδε, which connotes time rather than place (which is the sense of τῇδε), and it fits the sense of the paragraph better. Wendland added the article τῇ to Mendelssohn’s conjecture, but it is not necessary. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) prints τάδε; Pelletier simply has it as part of the text. I have followed this reading in my translation. § 214. The last clause of the paragraph in the manuscripts, καὶ ὁ ταῦθ’ ὑπολαμβάνων (-νειν) μὴ καθεστάναι, Thackeray notes as being “very obscure” (locus perobscurus).857 In fact, the negative here does not

854 855 856 857

Thackeray, “Appendix,” 554. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 180. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 182, 183. Thackeray, “Appendix,” 556.

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fit the sense at all. Thackeray prints this text surrounded by daggers but makes no attempt to make sense of it. Several emendations of this clause have been suggested, but most scholars have accepted Wendland’s καίτοι ταῦθ’ ὑπολαμβάνομεν καθεστάναι, which has the double benefit of making sense and of being graphically close to the manuscripts. Pelletier accepts this emendation, and I have followed it here. § 215. The manuscripts transmit the genitive reflexive pronoun ἑαυτοῦ, which does not fit the sense, since the dative case is required here (cf. § 260). Schmidt, followed by Thackeray, reads ἑαυτῷ, which Pelletier adopts. § 216. In the manuscripts, this paragraph has no mention of God. It is the only one of the seventy-two answers that does not. In his text in Swete, Thackeray prints in daggers (as does Hadas who follows him) the phrase ὡς δέ. In his translation, he changes his mind and emends the ὡς to θεός, god. He writes, “I should now read θεὸς δέ (in place of ὡς δέ of the manuscripts) and ἐγρηγορότος. The divine name is never wanting in the concluding words of each speaker, and κατευθύνειν elsewhere is used actively and generally of the guiding hand of God (cf. § 18 a very similar passage).”858 Hadas does not follow Thackeray, but Pelletier does. Thus, the change from the nominative perfect participle ἐγρηγορώς to the genitive produces a temporal sense at the end of the clause, “when one is awake or in sleep.”859 § 219. The reading of the manuscripts, οὐδὲ αὐτό, is manifestly corrupt. Schmidt suggested ὃ δὲ αὐτοῖς, with the dative case acting as the indirect object of the infinitive ὑποκρίνεσθαι, producing the phrase “the role that is necessary for them to play.” Wendland suggested the accusative case αὐτούς, which makes the pronoun the subject of the infinitive and results in “the role that they must play.” In the end, the difference is not great. Pelletier has followed Wendland’s emendation, which is a bit more elegant, and this is the basis for my translation. § 220. The manuscripts, which Pelletier follows, read καθυπνοῦν, to go to sleep. Hadas argues that this verb “makes the sentence following strange.”860 The present sentence might indeed feel odd depending on the interpretation of the next one, which refers either to planning the next day’s symposium or to moving to the next course of the present banquet. Those who think that the reference is to the next course of the symposium will indeed have a confusing text on their hands. So, in order to try to make some sense out of these sentences, Wendland offered the emendation καταπαύειν, get some rest, which Andrews has

858 859 860

Thackeray, “Translation,” 377 n. 1. See LSJ, which notes that the perfect tense of ἐγείρω functions as a present. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 186.

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followed.861 The other alternative would be to transpose the last two sentences so that the group turns to the next course (see § 217) and then the king applauds them and exhorts them to sleep. This seems to be Thackeray’s preference, although his solution is somewhat more complex. He translates “take some rest” in line with Wendland’s emendation but refers to the verb of the manuscripts in his footnote. He seems inclined toward some dislocation of the two sentences.862 I do not think that one needs to interpret the sentences this way, however, and there is no need for emendation (see Notes below). General Comment Ps.-Aristeas comments that the second symposium is organized in the same way as the previous one, an observation that he also makes for symposia 3, 4 and 6. In fact, his introduction to this symposium closely resembles what he said about the first in § 187–188. In posing the first question, the king picks up where he left off the day before, and he begins with the eleventh translator (§ 204). This is the only symposium after the first that reports the sequential number of the translator after the very first to whom a question is asked. The king’s initial question in this symposium about how one might remain rich presents the respondent with an opportunity to make a claim about wealth that one finds in Jewish wisdom literature, but here with a slight twist. The Jewish sages worried about the conditions under which wealth was acquired. So, for example, Ben Sira is dubious that one can be in business and earn wealth justly (26:29–27:3), but riches “free from sin” are good (Sir 13:24). Wealth must be acquired honestly and then used for good – both one’s own and that of others (Sir 14:3, 8–10). In the end, however, God ultimately has control over who is wealthy. God can make the poor person rich (Sir 11:27), and God will punish those who are wealthy and sinful (Sir 5:8; 11:24–26).863 In the case of Aristeas, the acquisition of wealth is not at issue. The nature of the question precludes any discussion of acquiring it, and the answer does not treat it at all either. In fact, the answer has its own problems. The initial part of the response focuses implicitly on squandering 861 862 863

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 114. Thackeray, “Translation,” 377 n. 3. One can see similar sentiments in a variety of Early Jewish texts, including a number among the Dead Sea Scrolls. See Benjamin G. Wright and Claudia V. Camp, “‘Who Has Been Tested by Gold and Found Perfect?’ Ben Sira’s Discourse of Riches and Poverty,” Henoch 23 (2001) 153–174 and Catherine M. Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Qumran Community (STDJ 40; Leiden: Brill, 2002).

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wealth, and thus it deals with the issue at hand. Worthless expenditures and licentious living will waste one’s wealth.864 The second part seems crafted to emphasize the introduction of the deity. The king must be a benefactor so that his subjects will think well of him. In this action, the king follows God, who is the source of all good things, and the statement recalls God as benefactor in § 190. Yet, this response stops short of saying that if the king benefits his subjects that God will keep him rich. This goal is completely absent from the second part of the answer. In this comparison, however, the contrast between the nature of God, who presumably has inexhaustible resources, and the king, who does not, could not be any clearer, since human benefaction expends the king’s limited resources as do vain expenditures. The next question (§ 206) focuses on truth (ἀλήθεια). The response offers little beyond the mundane observation that lying brings shame, particularly on kings who have the power to do what they want anyway. They thus have no need for lying. The idea that a king especially should reject lying probably originates in the connection between a king’s legitimate rule and his virtue. In the preface of his Anabasis, Arrian expresses a similar thought about Ptolemy I: “My view is that Ptolemy and Aristobulus are more trustworthy narrators, for Aristobulus took the field with King Alexander; Ptolemy not only did the same, but, as he was a king himself, falsehood would have been more shameful to him than to anyone else.”865 This same virtue is on the list that the Egyptian priests must recite publicly (which is discussed in Hecataeus of Abdera in Diodorus 1.70; see above). Additionally, Ptolemy II is told that he must hold onto this notion, because “God is a lover of truth.” This reference to God feels tacked on and not really relevant, as do a number of others in the symposia. It seems to assume that the king should love truth, since God does – thus exploiting the king-deity comparison – even though this is not stated explicitly. The phrase “lover of truth” (φιλαλήθης) does have philosophical resonances, particularly in Aristotle, who in his Nicomachean Ethics discusses truth and the one who loves truth: “For the man who loves truth (φιλαλήθης) and is truthful when nothing is at stake will be even more truthful when something is at stake” (4.7 [1127b]). Moreover the phrase is also connected 864

865

Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 64, notes that the meaning “licentiousness” for the Greek ἀσελγής is late. Clasical Greek ἀσελγεία had the meaning of insult or violence toward another person. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2749, notes the passage. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 180, also refers to the passage, but thinks it is about Alexander and not Ptolemy. The translation comes from E. Iliff Robson, Arrian (LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929).

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with Greek deities. According to Tramontano, some coins minted in Laodicea bear the epithet “Zeus, Lover of Truth.”866 To what degree Ps.-Aristeas intentionally might be adopting epithets of Greek deities for the Jewish god is not certain, although in light of the claims that he makes in § 16, this idea is certainly not far-fetched. The third question (§ 207) in this symposium illustrates the difficulties in attempting to pull apart Jewish elements from Greek ones. When the king asks about the teaching of wisdom, the reply comes in a variation of the golden rule, in a combination of both its negative and positive forms, as almost all scholars note.867 The respondent begins with the negative, that the king does not want evil to befall him, the implicit implication being that he should not visit evil on others. Then comes the positive, that since he desires good things, he should treat others leniently. Ps.-Aristeas does not articulate the answer in the classic form of the Jewish version in Lev 19:18, but rather he turns the ethical maxim into one that encourages the king to act with equity, just as God does. The focus on equity or leniency (ἐπιεικεία) reprises an answer in the first symposium that treats the same issue (§ 192). Here, however, the king’s motivation should be his own desire for “a share in all good things.” So, he should treat his subjects the same way. While it might be tempting to attribute this section to the Jewish tradition of the author, (1) he does not employ the traditional Jewish form(s) and (2) the same idea occurs in Greek writings. So, for example, Isocrates in his speech to Nicocles (3.61) gives the negative version: “Manifest your good will towards me in deeds rather than with words. Do not do to others that which angers you when they do it to you. Practice nothing in your actions for which you condemn others with your words. Expect to fare well or ill according as you are disposed well or ill toward me. Do not be satisfied with praising good men, but imitate them as well.”868 For other examples, see Pittacus of Mytilene (7th–6th BCE), Frag. 10.3; Thales (7th–6th BCE in Diogenes Laertius 1.36); Epictetus, Enchiridion 31. As with so many other questions and answers in the symposia, and throughout the work generally, Ps.-Aristeas has thoroughly reconfigured whatever sources he might have used, making them very difficult to isolate. He has learned well and digested both Jewish and Greek learning – and in that sense is very much 866

867

868

Tramontano, La Lettera, 187. I have looked through numerous images of Laodicean coins and have not been able to find any of these myself. Meecham, Oldest Version, 292. He cites both positive and negative versions in Jewish and Early Christian literature. See, Sir 31:15; Matt 7:12//Lk 6:31; Pirke Avoth 2.14; Tob 4:14 (B); Hillel in b. Shabb 31a; Acts 15:20, 29, among others. See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 181, and Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2750.

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like his translators – so that it seems something of a fool’s errand to try to say that such-and-such an element is Jewish and that such-and-such an element is Greek. I imagine that Ps.-Aristeas himself would not have made that kind of distinction anyway. In the fourth question (§ 208) in this symposium, the king asks how he can be benevolent (φιλάνθρωπος). In its strongest sense this quality refers to loving humankind, and its weaker sense of gentleness can characterize both humans and animals. The adjective is widespread in Greek writing from Aristotle’s Politics to the papyri. Yet, this is a quality that can be particularly associated with rulers, as we see, for instance, throughout the book of 2 Maccabees. In a later Jewish wisdom text, the Wisdom of Solomon, the author ascribes the quality of benevolence both to Wisdom and to God (1:6; 7:23; 12:19). Polybius (Histories 5.11.6) distinguishes between the tyrant and the good king, and two of the qualities that differentiate them are benefactions (εὐεργεσία; cf. § 210) and benevolence (the noun φιλανθρωπία).869 Indeed, already in § 36, Ptolemy refers to his own benevolence to his subjects and especially to the Jews. Later, in § 265, the king will ask about the most essential possession of a king, and benevolence (using the noun; see also § 290) comes first in the short list. The answer focuses on the king’s awareness of the human condition. Since human beings are born and persist in a world characterized by suffering, the king needs to practice mercy (ἔλεος), particularly because God is merciful (ἐλεήμων). This call for mercy coheres with Ps.-Aristeas’s exhortation to leniency in § 188 and § 192. He seems to be trying to strike a balance between the king’s justice and his clemency – that is, justice tempered by mercy. Of course, as in most other answers, God serves as the example of how the king should act. The next question (§ 209) inquires about habit. The work τρόπος refers to the way one lives one’s life and thus can mean habit or custom, even one’s temperament, as well as character. The short answer given is that the king must be incorruptible. How that answer gets filled out here is consistent with what we have seen elsewhere already. Although the respondent mentions sobriety (probably in the sense of self-control), the central feature is justice, as can be seen by the ending, where God is called a “lover of

869

Pelletier, Lettre, 198, cites this passage in a comment on § 209. It seems to me to be more appropriate here. Murray, “Philosophy and Monarchy,” 24, says that in the Peri Basileus literature φιλανθρωπία constituted the “central” virtue that a king must possess. Everything else stems from this prime virtue, especially royal benefactions.

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justice” (cf. § 206). In a short few paragraphs of the first two symposia, this virtue has already become an important topic of kingly behavior. In this case, however, neither the question nor the answer really introduces anything new to the proceedings. Question six (§ 210) harks back to several other passages, especially to the very first question the king asked. It concerns piety (εὐσέβεια), a central theme of the entire work and one that we have seen on multiple occasions. The appeal in the answer to God’s omniscience recalls Eleazar’s speech (§ 132) where he notes that secret deeds do not escape God’s notice.870 In both passages, Ps.-Aristeas employs the verb λανθάνω, which creates a verbal link between the two places.871 The idea that the king should imitate God refers back to § 188, where the same verb appears. There the king was to be lenient in imitation of God. Here the king must give benefactions (expressed with the verb εὐεργετέω; cf. § 190) as God does, and these are equated with the “demeanor” (κατάστημα) of piety, since by acting this way, the king will not give offence to God. In this question, as in others, the virtues that are supposed to characterize the good king have already been attributed to Ptolemy elsewhere. In § 44, in his letter to Ptolemy, Eleazar comments on his many benefactions to the Jews (using the same verb as here). The question in § 211 embraces the totality of kingship, although the answer does not get us farther than we have come thus far. The term ὅρος often has the general meaning of a limit or boundary. In this case, it connotes the standard or measure. That is, by what standard is true kingship measured? The answer reprises material that the king has already heard. The exhortation to self-control was the subject of § 197 on equanimity, even though the vocabulary is different. Not getting carried away with wealth and fame repeats in the same words the advice that the king heard about handing his kingdom to his descendents (§ 196) – they should avoid pursuing these things. The reference to God’s leniency repeats what has been said elsewhere (§ 188, § 192). Ps.-Aristeas’s translator again compares the king to God. The king has what he needs, and God needs nothing. Yet, Ps.-Aristeas maintains the distinction between the king and God as he has from the beginning of the symposia. The king is human and thinks as

870 871

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2750, notes this parallel as well. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Exegesis, 146, notes a saying of Pittacus of Mytilene, who remarks that the gods know even contemplation of a sinful act. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 182 refers to Hesiod, Works and Days, 252, where he discusses Zeus’s many agents who roam the earth observing human behavior.

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a human. The implication seems to be that the king, because he is human, might crave things that he does not need. The respondent warns against this way of behaving. The king should need only those things sufficient for kingship. Presumably the content of the symposia presents the king with them. Tramontano suggested that this paragraph implicitly inveighs against the Hellenistic ruler cult, and given the way that the king is compared to God throughout the symposia, I think that there may be something to that argument, even though Ps.-Aristeas never explicitly criticizes the ruler cult in any way.872 The eighth question (§ 212) comes back again to the issue of justice, which has become familiar in a short time. The king asks how he can reckon the most virtuous things. The answer does not move much beyond previous statements about justice, except that here injustice is compared to loss of life, which probably was the case for those who ended up on the wrong side of royal injustice. The respondent holds out a carrot to Ptolemy however, intimating that God will give “the greatest good” to those who are just. The answer to the ninth question (§§ 213–216) is the most extensive of the second symposium. The question itself is rather mundane, how to sleep undisturbed. The answer, on the other hand, delves into the phenomenon of dreams, which seems to depend on naturalistic explanations, such as Aristotle’s in his treatise On Dreams. Yet, even after a naturalistic explanation, the respondent introduces God as the one who directs the mind, even in sleep. We saw in Eleazar’s speech (§ 160) that Ps.-Aristeas was likely influencd by an Aristotelian understanding of sleep to explain the biblical injunction to study the scriptures at all times. Here he distinguishes between reason and sense perception in the dreaming state, as does Aristotle.873 For the classical philosopher, dreams are essentially a specialized type and effect of sense perception. Moreover, the stimulatory movements that affect the senses during the day resurface in dreams due to inactivity. As Aristotle writes in On Dreams 3, “For by day, when the sense and intellect are working together, they (i.e., stimulatory movements that affect the senses) are extruded from consciousness or obscured … But by night owing to the inaction of the particular senses, and their powerlessness to realize them872

873

Tramontano, La Lettera, 192. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 183, refers to Tramontano’s position and disagrees with it. A number of ancient Greek writers produced works on dreams, among them Theophrastus, Chrysippus and even Demetrius of Phalerum. Later Philo of Alexandria writes a long treatise on dreams, which, unlike Aristotle but more like Plato, he attributed to God’s intervention.

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selves … they are borne to the headquarters of sense perception, and there display themselves as the disturbance (of waking life) subsides.”874 The Jewish translator’s explanation sounds quite like Aristotle’s, when he says that the things that occupy one in the waking state return in sleep (§ 216). That is as far as the similarity extends, however. In Aristotle, the stimulatory movements that produce sense perception resurface in dreams. In Aristeas, the Jewish elder appeals to three cardinal virtues of kingship literature: the king’s piety, his virtue, and his exercise of justice. These are the things that he claims will return to the king in sleep. This assertion leads directly into the statement that God actually directs a person’s mind and thus his/her thoughts and deeds to the most virtuous and beautiful things (τὰ κάλλιστα). The implication in this answer is that whenever the king dreams (since here he invokes both waking and sleeping states), if he is occupied with piety, virtue and justice to which presumably God has turned his mind, these will be the content of his dreams, a statement that runs counter to the elder’s previous, more naturalistic explanation of dreams. Indeed, Aristotle went to lengths to debunk the idea that dreams come from the gods. Gruen calls this answer “one of the more flagrant examples of non-sequiturs in the symposium.”875 The answer gets even more confusing, since the last statement – that there is always tranquility or stability around the king – presumes that he already practices the advice that he is receiving, apparently for the first time.876 The final question and answer of this ten-question banquet (§§ 217–219) turns to the king’s public image, which recalls his question about reputation in § 191. When the king asks about avoiding unworthy behavior (note the use of the same adjective ἀνάξιος in § 205), the respondent takes two tacks. First, he exhorts the king to be conscious of his reputation (δόξα) and his dignity (ὑπεροχή). Since people will talk about him, he must act in accordance with the public image of a king. The second tack uses the theater as a metaphor. The idea here is that actors play a part. They know what they have to do to act the role, and they do it. The king’s role is to

874

875 876

Translation from Beare, On Dreams. On ancient dreams, see Patricia Cox Miller, Dreams in Late Antiquity: Studies in the Imagination of a Culture (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994). Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2751. Meisener, Untersuchungen, 156, cites Herodotus 7.16.B.2, Cicero, De Divinatione 1.45 and Somnium Scipionis (De Republica 6.10) as examples of dreams tied to king theory. Cicero’s stories significantly post-date Aristeas, and the single example in Herodotus seems to presume an Aristotelian understanding of dreams.

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maintain a good reputation and dignity.877 He is not an actor, though. That is, he does not pretend to be a king with the implication that more is at stake than playing at being a king. As in other cases, the answer could end here without lacking anything, but the elder goes on to claim that God has established the king’s rule in accordance with his character (τρόπος; cf. § 209). The choice of the actor (ὑποκριτής) as the contrast to the king likely reflects Ps.-Aristeas’s familiarity with his Alexandrian cultural world. Alexandria boasted a history of patronage of the arts, both literary and performance, going back to Ptolemy I Soter. Theocritus (Idylls 17.112–116) tells us that Ptolemy II was a “lover of the Muses,” and he was especially well-known for his support of Dionysus, the theater and the Artists of Dionysus.878 According to Thomas Falkner, there were connections between the Alexandrian Library and performing artists.879 He cites the example of Philikos, a priest of Dionysus, who participated in the great procession that Callixenus of Rhodes describes. “Philikos provides an interesting link between performing artists and the poet-scholars of the Library, and as the new creative centre for tragedy Alexandria would have had in residence many poet-scholars writing with an eye to production.”880 This metaphor, then, could well offer some glimpse into the urbane and Hellenized life that a Jew like Ps.-Aristeas might have lived.881 Ps.-Aristeas’s contrast between the king and the actor distinguishes him from some forms of popular philosophy, certainly from the Stoics. In Stoic thought, at least in the form that Epictetus articulated it, all people are actors who play the role that the author writes for them. He says in Enchiridion 17, “Remember, you are an actor in a drama, of such a kind as the author pleases to make it … If it is his pleasure that you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor or a private person, see that you act it naturally.

877 878

879 880 881

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2751, states that these are “Hellenic aims.” Thomas Falkner, “Scholars versus actors: text and performance in the Greek tragic scholia,” in Greek and Roman Actors: Aspects of an Ancient Profession (Ed. Pat Easterling and Edith Hall; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002) 346–47. Falkner, “Scholars versus actors,” 347. Falkner, “Scholars versus actors,” 347. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2751, comments that actors had a low social status, and thus the comparison is “somewhat demeaning” to the king. Gruen’s remark about actors holds true for the Roman period. In Ptolemaic Egypt the situation was likely different. Falkner, “Scholars versus actors,” 348, for example, calls actors and scholars in this period “custodians of tradition” who “are advocates for the same client.”

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For this is your business, to act well the character assigned you.”882 In Stoic thought, then, even the king is an actor who has been assigned a role. While one might read the insertion of God into the answer to reflect Stoic influence – that is, God has assigned the king this role – the explicit separation between monarch and actor mitigates this interpretation, although the reference to God does not cohere very well with the first part of the reply. Notes § 203. symposium. Back in § 181, Ps.-Aristeas used the neuter noun συμπόσιον, a drinking party. Here he shifts to the feminine noun συμποσία, drinking together. He uses the former in § 202, § 236, § 286, § 294 and the latter in § 203, § 220, § 297. Sirach employs the neuter noun three times (31:31; 32:5; 49:1) in the phrase συμπόσιον οἴνου, banquet of wine. 3 Maccabees 5:15, 16, 17 and 7:20 all have the feminine, while 5:36 and 6:33 have the neuter. In Aristeas, the two terms seem to be roughly synonymous.883 § 210. effects. The verb ἐνεργέω means to operate or be in action. It is often used of divine activity in Greek literature, and it appears frequently later in the New Testament.884 § 212. the most virtuous things. The meaning of this entire sentence can be construed in different ways. Most scholars take the phrase τὰ κάλλιστα adverbially. So, Thackeray translates “how his deliberations might be for the best” (also Andrews and Hadas).885 Pelletier and Shutt take the verb διαλογίζοιτο to refer to thoughts, although the verb connotes balancing accounts, calculation, consideration or distinguishing between two things.886 In light of the answer given here, I have taken the verb in its base sense of reckoning or calculating and the superlative of καλός in its sense of virtue or honor, rendering τὰ κάλλιστα as the object of the verb, which results in my translation above.

882

883

884 885

886

For the Greek text and translation, see Epictetus at the Perseus Digital Library (http:// www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0235 %3Atext %3Denc%3Achapter%3D17. Tramontano, La Lettera, lists Sirach as using the feminine noun, but that is not the case. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 182, notes it as an Aristotelian term. Thackeray, “Translation,” 376; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 114; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 183. Pelletier, Lettre, 199; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 27.

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proclaims. The verb προσημαίνω can be used of divine foretelling. Herodotus employs it with this meaning. Here, however, the sense of divine proclamation is used with the connotation of heralding, which the verb can also have. § 216. God directs the mind. The grammar of this clause is problematic. The noun for “mind” does not appear, but the participle τρεπομένην, translated “turning,” is the only feminine element in the clause. It must refer back to the noun ἡ διάνοια in the previous clause. Thus, “mind” becomes the understood object of the verb. § 217. turn to the meal. The usual order of the symposium was to have a meal and then turn to drinking. The sympotic conversations took place largely together with the drinking. In that case, Ps.-Aristeas has things out of order for the usual symposium, since he has the king’s questions precede the meal (δεῖπνον).887 § 220. arrangement of the next banquet. Scholars have taken this phrase in two distinct ways. Pelletier and Shutt both understand it to refer to the arrangement of the next day’s symposium.888 Andrews, Hadas and Thackeray view it as a reference to the next stage of the present symposium.889 There are three critical terms: the verb ἔληξεν, leave off or cease; ἑξῆς, next, and its referent; and διάταξιν, arrangement. In the syntax of the sentence, ἑξῆς comes between the article and the noun it governs, and it could refer either to the symposium or to the arrangement/course. It seems most likely that διάταξις refers to the arrangement of an entire symposium, since this is how it is used in in every other instance in the work (cf. § 203, § 221, § 236 and § 262) – in each case, the banqueters follow the same arrangement as the day before. This makes narrative sense as well. The king applauds and tells his guests to get some sleep. And then “when those matters concerning these men were completed (ἔληξεν)” they – the king, Nicanor and Dorotheus? – plan the next day’s symposium. Admittedly there is no adequate solution that solves every problem, but I am persuaded to agree with Pelletier and Shutt. The text does remain somewhat confusing, though, particularly since no other symposium concludes in this way. This solution does not require any changes to the text, however, which, as I view it, is always preferable to making changes for which we have no manuscript evidence. 887

888 889

Note Oswyn Murray’s contention (quoted in full above p. 328) that the symposia in Aristeas are marked by “ignorance and confusion” (“Hellenistic Royal Symposia,” 23). Pelletier, Lettre, 203; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 27. Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 114; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 187; Thackeray, “Translation,” 377.

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The Third Symposium (§§ 221–235) 221. And on the next day, while the same arrangement was being followed, when the king determined that it was an appropriate time to ask some questions of the men, he asked the first of those who were left over for the next session of questioning. “What constitutes the best way to rule?” 222. And that one declared, “To master oneself and not to get carried away by impulses. For it is natural for all people to incline their thought toward something. 223. Thus, for the majority it is likely that they have a bent toward food and drink and pleasure, but for kings it is the acquisition of territory in pursuit of great fame. Yet moderation in all things is virtuous. So, whatever things God gives, receive, and keep them. But do not desire things that are out of reach.” 224. And the king, pleased with the things that were spoken, said to the next one, “How might one avoid envy?” After a time, that one declared, “First, if he would consider that God apportions both fame and great wealth to all kings, and no one becomes a king on his own. For everyone wants to have a share of this fame, but they are not able, since it is a gift from God.” 225. And after praising the man with many words, he asked another, “How might one despise his enemies?” And he said, “By exercising goodwill toward all people and by cultivating friendship, you would have no reason for anyone to be an enemy. And to show favor to all people and to receive an excellent gift from God, that is the best thing.” 226. And agreeing with these things, he exhorted the next one in order to answer, saying to him, “How might one continue being held in honor?” And he said, “By giving freely and being munificent to others with willingness and grace, he will never want for fame. And in order that what has already been said will endure with you, beseech God always.” 227. And speaking well of this one, he asked another, “To whom must one be generous?” And that one said, “To those who are friendly to us – everyone thinks that it is necessary to be generous toward them. But I suppose that it is necessary to have a bounteous generosity to those of contrary opinions so that in this way we might bring them over to what is proper and beneficial for them. For it is necessary to entreat God in order that these things be accomplished, since he rules over the minds of all.” 228. And consenting to these things, he bade the sixth one to give his opinion, asking, “To whom is it necessary to show favor?” And that one answered, “Always to parents, since also God has given the greatest commandment concerning honor of one’s parents. And next he regards the subject of friends, calling the friend the same in the soul. And you do well to establish all people in friendship with yourself.” 229. And exhorting this one also he inquired of the one who came next, “What is worth as much as beauty?” And he said,

368

III. Translation and Commentary

“Piety – for this beauty is what holds first place. And its power is love. For it is the gift of God, which also you possess, embracing all good things in it.” 230. And applauding very kindly, he said to another, “How, after failing, might one lay hold of the same fame again?” And he declared, “It is not possible for you to fail, for in all have you sown favor, which sprouts forth goodwill, which, overpowering the greatest of weapons, embraces the greatest security. 231. And if some do fail, they must no longer do those things by which they have failed, but while making friends, they must practice justice. So, being a worker of good things and not the opposite is a gift of God.” 232. And being pleased by these things, he said to another, “How might one avoid grief?” And he said, “If he would harm no one and help everyone, following justice. For its fruits furnish freedom from grief. 233. But it is necessary to supplicate God, so that things that crop up contrary to our purpose might not harm us. Indeed, I mean things like death, diseases, pains and such. But to you, who are grounded in piety, none of these things might approach.” 234. And also praising this one warmly, he asked the tenth, “What is the greatest form of fame?” And he said, “To honor God. And this is not with gifts and sacrifices, but in purity of soul and out of the devout conviction that everything has been constructed by God and is administered according to his will. This opinion you also continue to hold, by which it is signaled to all by the things you have accomplished and those you will accomplish.” 235. And with a louder voice the king greeted and exhorted them all, those present, and especially the philosophers, together joining in a shout of approval. For also they [i.e., the translators], in their conduct and speech, surpassed the philosophers by a lot, since they made God their starting point. And after these things, the king led the way in showing kindness through toasts. Textual Notes § 224. The manuscripts are divided as to the prepositional phrase translated here as “on his own.” Most have either παρ’ ἑαυτόν or περὶ ἑαυτόν. Ms O2, however, has παρ’ ἑαυτοῦ, which Pelletier has accepted. The preposition παρά with the genitive case connotes issuing from a person or simply from. In this case, then, the phrase would mean from oneself. The preposition plus accusative case means by, near, beside, which is harder to wring meaning from in this place. Thackeray following Wendland has the accusative case, even though he derives the same meaning for the phrase as here.890 // Pelletier follows the suggestion of Mendelssohn to reverse the

890

Thackeray, “Translation,” 377.

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manuscript reading ἐστι βασιλεύς, which would result in a more natural Greek word order. The other editors all follow the manuscripts here. The resulting meaning is not affected. § 226. Pelletier notes that for the phrase τοὺς ἄλλους, to others, Zuntz suggested τοὺς ἀνθρώπους, which he argued was corrupted from an abbreviation of ΑΝΟΥΣ in the Greek tradition. There is really no need for this suggestion, and Pelletier rightly rejects it. § 227. Almost all the manuscripts read πῶς τινα at the beginning of the answer. Wendland had suggested πρός τινα, which turned up in Pelletier’s collation of ms O (in the second corrector O2), and this is the basis for the present translation. § 231. The Greek manuscripts all have the aorist κατακτησαμένους, which does not really fit the tense structure of the paragraph. Zuntz suggested the future κατακτησομένους, which suits the tense relationships better and which Pelletier adopted for his text. § 233. The sentence begins with an infinitive ἱκετεύειν with no complement, even though the various modern translators act as if there is one. Cohn suggested that δεῖ should be inserted. Apparently it was omitted by haplography with the conjunction δέ that immediately precedes it.891 Pelletier prints the addition in pointed brackets, and it is the basis for the present translation. // In the majority of Greek manuscripts, the last sentence of the answer begins δὲ σοὶ εὐσεβεῖ, which is ungrammatical, since δέ cannot begin a clause. Thackeray suggested the addition of αὐτῷ. Although it has other variants, ms P begins εὐσεβεῖ δὲ σοί, which Wendland proposed and which Pelletier prints in his text. General Comment Just as the third symposium begins with the comment that this banquet followed the same order as the previous ones, § 221 simply repeats what has already been said at the beginning of the second symposium. The paragraph ends with the first question of the session about how to rule. The answer (§ 222–223) pulls together different themes. We have already seen the advice about self-control (§ 211; cf. also § 197), which likely shows the influence of Stoic ideals.892 The Jewish elder observes that all people have certain preoccupations; for most it is food, drink and pleasure. The reference to food and drink, especially, brings to mind Eleazar’s

891 892

See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 206. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2752. Throughout his notes Hadas continually tries to appeal to Jewish parallels to the thought in Aristeas. In this case he cites Pirke Avot 4.1 (Aristeas to Philocrates, 186), but this example is very distant from the thought expressed in our text.

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speech where he allegorizes Jewish laws, but he also distinguishes the Jews from most other people, who are overly concerned with “food and drink and shelter” (§ 140). The substitution of pleasure here for shelter likely emphasizes the contrast between restraint and lack of self-control. It also distinguishes the king from the masses, since kings incline toward land acquisition in order to achieve renown.893 Certainly kings do not lack for food and drink, but many ancient texts describe in great detail the pleasure that kings pursue. So, Ps.-Aristeas is being somewhat disingenuous here, since kings, of all people, have the means to pursue pleasure (as well as food and drink). Separating the king from the mass of people who are preoccupied with these pursuits, though, especially in light of Eleazar’s earlier remarks, rhetorically casts him in a similar light as the Jews, who also are set apart from the mass of people. The mention of the king’s fame or reputation (δόξα) recalls the second symposium only a few paragraphs earlier (§ 218) in which the king is told to look after his reputation. The call for moderation, then, introduces some ambiguity into the answer. Should the king pursue land acquisition (as ancient kings did), but do it in moderation?894 The elder’s connection of moderation and virtue ties his answer to concepts of Hellenistic ideal kingship in which a king’s rule depends on his virtue, but how the king should act ideally with respect to conquering land seems confused here. Of course, moderation alludes to the Aristotelian moral idea of the middle way, a virtue that also characterizes the translators who have come to Alexandria (§ 122).895 The final sentence in which the elder introduces God does not really fit with the answer thus far, although it reprises a theme that has arisen already in § 211, that a king should not grasp for more than what God gives. The second question (§ 224) addresses envy, which in Aristotelian thought was a matter of excess and in Stoic thought was a passion con-

893

894

895

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 187, suggests that § 223 reflects ancient character writing, such as Theophrastus’s Characters or Aristotle’s taxonomy of kings in Politics 3. I am not sure that there is enough of a character type described here to warrant any close connection. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2752, argues that this answer actually has a “subversive tone,” since Ptolemy II was well known for his extensive land holding. I am not as convinced that this perspective comes out as clearly in the text as Gruen suggests. The idea appears in other Hellenistic Jewish literature. See, for example, Pseudo-Phocylides 59–69 and 98, which focuses mostly on moderating passions. See the parallels in Lewis, “Table-Talk.”

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nected with pain.896 Although the king wants advice on avoiding envy, the elder does not really address the issue. He replies that God apportions the fame (cf. § 218, § 223) and wealth that kings possess. Kings do not assume rule by their own power. While others want this fame, it only comes as a gift from God, a theme that recurs several times in the symposia (see § 229, § 231, § 272, § 276, § 290). The only hint that the answer deals with envy is in the claim that all people desire a part of the king’s fame, but the answer in no way discusses avoiding envy. The idea that God determines who is king occurs often enough in Jewish literature to be almost a commonplace (e.g., 1 Chr 29:12; Prov 8:15; Wis 6:3; Sir 10:4) and is not likely Ps.-Aristeas’s critique of the ruler cult as some have suggested.897 The next question (§ 225) treats the king’s relationship with enemies for a second time (cf. § 194), this time how to despise them. The respondent avoids the question altogether, however, telling the king that he can avoid having enemies completely by displaying good will and friendship. It is not entirely clear whether the king is worried about foreign or domestic enemies. In § 194, foreign enemies were the topic, but that is not unambiguously the case here. By showing favor, the elder implies that the king will receive an unspecified “excellent gift” from God, which seems to apply the principle of act-consequence that is so central to Jewish wisdom literature, namely that there are appropriate consequences for all human actions, which the deity metes out in many (but not all) instances.898 Question four (§ 226) returns to the theme of the king’s honor or fame, which constitutes a sub-theme to this third symposium (see § 230 and § 234 as well). In this case, the answer does relate to the question. The exhortation to display the two qualities of μεταδοτικός and μεγαλομερής relates to the king’s ability to use his wealth for the benefit of others. By being munificent, the king will never want for honor or fame, a quality that Ps.-Aristeas views in a positive light. The virtue of being one who gives freely (μεταδοτικός) appears in the virtues of Egyptian kings that we have seen in the passage from Hecataeus of Abdera (apud Diodorus 1.70.6). Munificence has already been ascribed to Ptolemy earlier in the book using the related noun

896

897

898

See the lists in Christopher Jedan, Stoic Virtues: Chrysippus and the Religious Character of Stoic Ethics (London: Continuum, 2009) 162–64. See also Pseudo-Phocylides 70–75, which takes a Stoic approach to the issue of envy. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2752, against Tramontano, La Lettera, 198, who makes the suggestion. On the act-consequence principle, see Samuel L. Adams, Wisdom in Transition: Act and Consequence in Second Temple Instructions (JSJSup 125; Leiden: Brill, 2008).

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μεγαλομέρεια in § 21 and § 26.899 We see here as elsewhere Ps.-Aristeas constructing Ptolemy as an ideal king by attributing qualities and virtues to him elsewhere in the work and then making those same qualities part of the questions and answers of the symposia. The final exhortation to beseech God has no intrinsic relation to the answer and is essentially a tag line. The king’s question of § 227 follows well upon the heels of the previous one. Here he wonders to whom he should be generous (φιλότιμος). The obvious answer would be to be generous to those who are amenable to the king. Yet, the elder speculates (“I suppose”) that generosity to those who disagree with the king (τοὺς ἀντιδοξοῦντας) will bring them around to his own position, which is identified with the beneficial way of thinking. Although the same vocabulary does not appear, this quality characterizes the translators in § 122. Of course, no answer is complete without a reference to God, and here the king must pray to God, because God directs minds (cf. § 216). We have seen an example of how God acts this way in § 17, where Aristeas prays to God to “prepare his [i.e., the king’s] mind” to manumit the Jewish slaves, something that he ultimately does. By inserting God in this way, we see that Ps.-Aristeas seems to fall into small patterns with these references. Thus, in two consecutive paragraphs the king should beseech God. Such small patterns or repetitions along with the repetition of topics reinforce what might be seen as the tedious character of the symposia overall. Next (§ 228) the king inquires about showing favor or kindness (χαρίζω). The answer is the only one to appeal directly to the Jewish law. The first part of the answer singles out parents. Three elements of the response suggest that Ps.-Aristeas has the fifth commandment in mind. First, Ps.-Aristeas specifically claims that God gave the commandment. Second, he uses the term ἐντολή, which only occurs here in Aristeas and is common for God’s commandments in the Septuagint (although not in the Decalogue per se).900 Third, both Exod 20:12 and Deut 5:16 have the verb τιμάω,

899

900

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 189, refers to a genre of writing called “mirrors of princes,” which in the Middle Ages were instruction books for kings and rulers but which can also refer to a broader category of writings that deal with kingship. A good example might be Xenophon’s Cyropaedia. On the mirror for princes and the Cyropaedia, see Vivienne Gray, Xenophon’s Mirror for Princes: Reading the Reflections (Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 2011). Hadas also invokes Ben Sira’s idea of concern for one’s name as a Jewish/Hebrew parallel to the idea found here. Ben Sira, however, is mostly concerned with post-mortem survival in the form of one’s good memory, which is very different from Ps.-Aristeas’s concern. Pelletier, Lettre, 204.

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and Ps.-Aristeas uses the noun related τιμή, even though the main verb in the question is χαρίζω. While scholars such as Hadas and Tramontano are correct that Greek tradition also expects parents to be honored, these two features of the answer tie it directly to the Decalogue, and there seems little doubt that he is alluding to the biblical injunction here.901 The continuation of the answer uses the third person singular verb, which makes God the subject of the second verb. God gave a commandment, and then God turned to friends. In this part of the response, Ps.-Aristeas comes close to the wording of Deut 13:7 from which he seems to have lifted his phraseology, although the context of Deuteronomy differs completely from Aristeas.902 There the friend is called “one who is like your own soul” (ὁ φίλος ὁ ἴσος τῆς ψυχῆς σου), and here the phrase is ἴσον τῇ ψυχῇ τὸν φίλον. Ps.-Aristeas has also adapted the meaning, since in Deuteronomy the friend “who is like your own soul” is the perfect friend, one of a number of possible friends, perhaps more colloquially a bosom-buddy.903 In Aristeas, all friends are like one’s own self. Of course, similar ideas can be found in Greek literature. So, for example, according to Diogenes Laertius (5.1.20), Aristotle expressed a very similar idea in different language when he said that friends are the “same soul dwelling in two bodies” (μία ψυχὴ δύο σώμασιν ἐνοικοῦσα).904 Even if he knew Greek sentiments like the one attributed to Aristotle, however, the close wording of this passage to the Deuteronomy text, like the commandment to honor parents, convinces me that the pentateuchal text is Ps.-Aristeas’s proximate source here.

901

902

903 904

Tramontano, La Lettera, 200–1, cites Greek sources for this idea, and Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 189, simply claims that it does not have to refer to the fifth commandment. Meisner, Untersuchungen, 156, wants to insist that this idea comes from Hellenistic, specifically Pythagorean thought, with no reference to the Jewish scriptures. To substantiate this claim, all of these scholars have to ignore Ps.-Aristeas’s reference to the greatest commandment and forget about Ps.-Aristeas knowing the Pentateuch, the very subject of much of the work. The evidence that I cite here convinces me, however, that he has the Jewish scriptures in mind, even if he is aware of the importance of the idea in Greek thought. This excerpting of a phrase from a passage having nothing really to do with the issue at hand witnesses to one way that these authoritative texts might be used. Given what we have seen elsewhere in the work, it seems very likely that Ps.-Aristeas knows Deuteronomy, as he does other passages in the Pentateuch. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 340–41, writes, “[A] pastiche created from Septuagintal proper nouns embedded in good Koinê was sufficient to present an embodied, contemporary Scriptural reality.” Pelletier, Lettre, 204. The reference comes from Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 189.

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III. Translation and Commentary

In the short question and answer of § 229, the king’s question about beauty prompts an answer focused on piety, one of the oft-repeated and central ideas of the work. The Jewish elder equates piety with the highest beauty – it “holds first place.” Piety has an enervating force, however, and that is love (ἀγάπη). The sentiment in this paragraph relates to Ps.-Aristeas’s use of piety in § 2, where he connects piety and beauty already at the beginning of the work. There, however, piety takes on an intellectual cast, since it sits in a context with loving learning and having a pure disposition of mind. The addition here is love, which moves piety out of the intellectual sphere. Love motivates piety and thus connotes a love for God.905 Yet, by the same token this love is also a gift from God. As we have seen elsewhere, Ptolemy is constructed as already embodying the ideals that Ps.-Aristeas holds dear, including piety. In this paragraph, he already possesses love. In the eighth question of this third series (§§ 230–231), Ptolemy wants to know how to regain one’s fame or reputation after failing. The answer is somewhat obsequious, the respondent saying that the king cannot fail, a response that coheres with Ps.-Aristeas’s agenda to have Ptolemy already embody the ideals of kingship. So in § 205, the king is advised to give benefactions in order to procure good will. This favor also has greater effect than weapons (cf. § 225 on enemies and goodwill). The elder goes on to say that if perchance someone were to fail, the remedy is simple: cease those actions that make one fail, make friends, and execute justice. Ps.-Aristeas has already established the last two actions as major themes of the symposia. The final line about God seems to have no relationship to the question or answer, since the point here is not doing good or bad things; it is about failing and recovering from failure.906 Question nine (§ 232–233) treats the problem of grief. Like envy in Stoic thought, grief was a product of pain and was to be avoided, precisely the point of the king’s question. This answer, like the one about envy, does not accord with Stoic prescriptions on avoiding these passions, however. For the Stoic, external forces are beyond human power to control, and thus they are to be treated with reason and with a passionless response. The answers that come from the Jewish elders encourage precisely the oppo-

905 906

Pelletier, Lettre, 204–5, calls love the “mobile intérieur” of piety. Meisner, Untersuchungen, 157, refers to Isocrates, To Nicocles, 2.21 where the nouns εὔνοια and ἀσφάλεια occur. The uses in that passage, however, are very different from here. The closest that it comes is in the claim that the best bodyguard for Nicocles is the virtue of his friends.

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site.907 The king’s actions can affect external forces. So, if he does no harm and executes justice, then he will not have grief.908 Furthermore, he must supplicate God that nothing harmful will come to him. Because the king already possesses piety, the elder assumes that nothing will harm Ptolemy. The idea that by supplication and pious behavior nothing bad will happen seems a facile theological formulation, especially in the face of all the examples in Jewish literature of precisely the opposite. The ideas that are brought together in this paragraph are familiar already – administer justice, pray to God, and be pious. The final question in this third symposium (§ 234) returns to the matter of fame or reputation. The king wants to know the best form of fame, to which the response is to honor (τιμᾶν) God. Unfortunately the appeal to God does not really answer the question that has been asked, since it never addresses fame or its best form. This answer is also unusual in the symposia, because God is placed at the heart of the answer and is not an addendum to an answer that otherwise would be fine without appeal to the deity.909 The content of what it means to honor God illustrates the tendency in Aristeas to emphasize the universal values that Jews and Gentiles share. For Ps.-Aristeas, offerings and sacrifices do not express true honor of God. Rather other values characterize it, values such as God’s creatorship and his sovereignty over creation (cf. § 139, § 141, § 201, § 210), expressed here as construction and administration. Although for the king true piety does not come through sacrifices, Ps.-Aristeas does not advocate abandoning sacrifices as a means of worship of God; after all, the king sends gifts to Jerusalem for the sacrificial cult, and Eleazar offers sacrifices on behalf of the king before he sends the translators (§ 40, § 45, § 172).910 The concern 907

908

909 910

Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 24, remarks that this paragraph “echoes, and perverts, the Stoic division of all actions and experiences into such as are, and such as are not, within our power.” Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2753, says that the word δικαιοσύνη in this paragraph has the sense of righteousness rather than justice, but I do not see the necessity of understanding the term in a different sense from how it is used almost everywhere else in the work. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 191, followed by Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2754. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2754, refers to Isa 1:11–17 and Ps 49:8–15 (OG), but these passages contain critiques of the cultic system as it was being practiced. The point in Aristeas is completely different, and these biblical passages are not really relevant to the issue. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 191–92, cites 2 Enoch 45:3 and Philo, On Noah’s Work as a Planter 126, both of which make sacrifices secondary to “a pure mind” (2 Enoch) and “hymns and praises” offered “by the invisible and pure mind” (Philo).

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here is to reemphasize the point he has made throughout the work, that Jews and Greeks have much in common and that the king can practice the same kind of devotion to God that is inculcated in Jews through the Mosaic law. Even though Moses legislated iron walls and palisades between Jews and others, if the king (and by extension other Greeks) desires, the boundaries can be more porous than perhaps one might expect. The values expressed in this paragraph reveal a widely shared concern among Hellenistic-Jewish intellectuals in Alexandria about the relationship of Jews and Judaism to the larger Hellenistic environment. The Hellenistic-Jewish author Aristobulus expresses very much the same thought as Ps.-Aristeas, using the same phrase, διαλήψεως ὁσίας, devout conviction. (See the Introduction for the relationship between Aristobulus and Aristeas.) In fragment 4.8 preserved in Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 13.12.3–8, we see almost identical values to those that Ps.-Aristeas espouses throughout his work.911 The passage is worth quoting in full here: “All philosophers agree that it is necessary to hold devout convictions (διαλήψσεις ὁσίας) about God, something which our school prescribes particularly well. And the whole structure of our law has been drawn up with concern for piety (εὐσέβειας), justice (δικαιοσύνης), self-control (ἐγκρατείας), and other qualities that are truly good.”912 Here we see the concern to portray the Jews as philosophers – he even calls the Jews by the technical term for a philosophical school (αἵρεσις), which Ps.-Aristeas does not. Aristobulus shares with Aristeas the idea that the values of piety, justice and self-control are promulgated in the Jewish law, although Ps.-Aristeas does not use the term ἐγκρατεία for self-control. Nonetheless, this excerpt from Aristobulus opens a window into the larger issues at stake for Jewish intellectuals in Alexandria, issues of great concern to Ps.-Aristeas and his like-minded colleagues. The symposium closes with the king and the philosophers joining in applauding the translators. Ps.-Aristeas explains that the Jewish translators “surpassed” (προέχοντες) the king’s philosophers. Rather than a universal claim to Jewish superiority, I think that Ps.-Aristeas here suggests that in the context of the symposia, the translators have gotten the better of the philosphers. While I recognize the elements of cultural competition inherent in this passage, this is one of the only places in the work that might directly articulate some kind of Jewish superiority. I would claim that, in

911 912

The fragment numbering is from Holladay, Aristobulus, 174–75. Holladay, Aristobulus, 175. I have borrowed the translation “devout conviction” from Holladay.

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light of the rest of the work, one cannot hang one’s hat on this passage in order to solidify the case that Ps.-Aristeas is arguing for Jewish superiority. The convivial character of these banquets also argues against Ps.-Aristeas making claims to Jewish superiority. Making God the starting point of all their answers parallels the end of the first symposium when Menedemus also refers to God as a starting point (cf. also § 189). This as well is not a statement of a general Jewish superiority. In fact, given the applause accorded the translators, it seems as if they desire the approbation of the philosophers.913 By having the king’s philosophers congenially acknowledge the superiority of the Jews’ answers, Ps.-Aristeas retains the idea of friendly debate that would take place in a symposium, and he further cements his portrayal of the Jews as philosophers who can rank right along with the Hellenistic philosophical schools. Notes § 221. way to rule. The Greek term ἀρχή in the context of government usually means power, sovereignty or majesty. It can also connote the method of government. In light of the present answer, I have translated “way to rule” as a means of getting at this connotation, which I think is operative here. § 224. gift. Ps.-Aristeas refers to gifts often in his work, and he employs four different words914: δόμα (§ 224); δῶρον (§ 172, § 176, § 225, § 231, § 234, § 272); δώρημα (§ 276); δόσις (§ 20, § 22, § 26, § 27, § 82, § 229). Even though these words have various shades of meaning for a gift, they are essentially synonyms in Greek and function that way in Aristeas. § 226. held in honor. The Greek verb δοξάζω and its related noun δόξα occur frequently in Aristeas. They both have to do in their basic meanings with forming opinions. In cases such as Aristeas, they connote the opinion that someone holds about someone else of a very positive sort, and thus they can be represented in English with reputation, honor, fame, glory or magnificence. For the most part, I have used fame or reputation, since the issue at stake in the symposia concerns the king’s positive image in the eyes of others. § 227. generous. The adjective φιλότιμος usually has the negative connotation of loving honor or distinction, of being prodigal or lavish (in a negative sense). Clearly Ps.-Aristeas thinks of it as a positive value, and so I have translated in the spirit of Hadas and Shutt as “generous.”915

913 914 915

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 191, makes this point. See Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 284. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 189; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 27.

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§ 229. love. The noun ἀγάπη does not appear in the translation of the Pentateuch.916 In the translations of other books, it occurs in 2 Rgns (2 Sam) 13:15 of Amnon’s love for his sister, which is contrasted to his hatred for her, in Eccl 9:1, 6 again where it is contrasted with hate, in Song of Songs eleven times where it refers to the feeling between the two lovers, in Wisdom of Solomon three times about love for Wisdom, and in Jer 2:2 where it denotes the love of one’s youth. In all these cases, it is an intense emotion, especially when it describes the feeling between lovers. Of course, in the New Testament and Early Christianity the word is used for the love between the deity and humankind. § 231. practice justice. Meecham notes that this word, δικαιοπραγέω, translated practice justice, is an important ethical term for Aristotle.917 It occurs thirteen times in the Nicomachean Ethics. Ps.-Aristeas employs it again in § 279. § 232. freedom from grief (2x). The noun ἀλυπία is found in a number of ancient Greek authors, most prominently in Aristotle and Plutarch but also in Menander and Epictetus.918

The Fourth Symposium (§§ 236–247) 236. And on the following day the symposium took place according to the same arrangement so that when there was a good time for the king, he asked the next in order to the ones who had previously answered. And he said to the first, “Is it possible to teach being prudent?” And he said, “It is the constitution of the soul through divine power to accept everything that is good and to turn away what is contrary.” 237. And having assented, he asked the next one, “What tends most towards health?” And that one declared, “Moderation. But this cannot happen unless God prepares the mind for it.” 238. And exhorting this one, he said to another, “How can one render proper gratitude to parents?” And he said, “Do not grieve them. But this is not possible unless God becomes a guide for the mind towards what is most virtuous.” 239. And after assenting to this, he asked the next one, “How 916

917 918

If the citations in LSJ are to be trusted, the use of ἀγάπη in Aristeas may be one of its earliest attestations in Greek. One would need to look in a searchable database, such as the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae to confirm that this is indeed the case. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 286. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 286, refers to Aristotle and Menander without any specific passages. The noun occurs 7 times in Aristotle’s Rhetoric and Nicomachean Ethics, 16 times in Plutarch’s corpus. See also Menander, Fragment 549.1.

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might one become fond of listening?” And that one said, “By determining that everything is advantageous to know, so that whatever happens, selecting something from what has been heard, applying it, one might counteract the circumstances of the moment with the guiding hand of God. For it is the case that the accomplishment of all actions comes from him.” 240. And after praising this one, he said to another, “How can one avoid acting contrary to the law?” To this he replied, “By knowing that God has given to lawgivers intelligence in order to preserve human life, you ought to follow them.” 241. And approving of him, he said to another, “What is the advantage of family ties?” And he answered, “If we have in common whatever happens, they will fail to diminish us – even should we suffer as they do, for it is obvious how strong kinsfolk are – 242. but when these events have ceased, both glory and prosperity will accrue to such people. For cooperation that occurs with kindliness is of itself indissoluble in all circumstances – since with success there is nothing required of them – but it is necessary to supplicate God to grant every good thing.” 243. And when he approved of this one as he had the others, he asked another, “How does fearlessness come about?” And he said, “When the mind is conscious that it has done nothing evil, God has directed it to deliberate all things well.” 244. And agreeing with this one, he said to another, “How might one have right reason at hand?” And he said, “If he would continually observe the misfortunes of people, knowing that God takes away good times from some, but glorifying others, he promotes them to receive honor.” 245. And when he had warmly approved this one as well, he invited the next one to answer, “How does one avoid turning to laziness and pleasures?” “By keeping at hand,” he said, “that he governs a large kingdom and he leads many multitudes, and he must not think about anything else but to provide for their care. So he should beseech God that he not neglect any of his duties.” 246. And when he praised this one also, he asked the tenth, “How might one recognize when someone acts with treachery towards him?” He replied to this question, “If he observe carefully that conduct is noble and good order is maintained in greetings and counsels and the rest of the social dealings of those with him and that they do not exceed what is proper in showing favors and the remainder of matters of conduct. 247. But God will bring you understanding of the best things, O King.” So the king applauded and praised them all by name, as did all those who were present, and they turned to celebrating. Textual Notes § 238. Thackeray reads the participle λυπήσας, grieve, of ms P rather than the infinitive of the remainder of the manuscripts. Pelletier follows this reading, which works better in the context. § 239. Pelletier prints in brackets a

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second occurrence of the particle ἄν before the verb ἀντιπράσσηται, since it might be there via dittography. He comments that the repetition of the particle in Hellenistic Greek is not necessarily unheard of, especially since the conjunction is separated from a verb that states a different circumstance, but it is somewhat unexpected.919 § 242. Most editors recognize that the entire last part of the paragraph is probably corrupt, although Thackeray and Pelletier print the reading of the manuscripts. Wendland conjectured a complete rewriting of the paragraph from the sentence beginning with τὸ γὰρ συνεργές, which most editors have not accepted as the text. Despite the difficulties, the meaning is relatively clear. // All editors add the word θεόν after the verb δέον, assuming that it dropped out due to haplography. In addition, the infinitive ἱκετεύειν, to supplicate, ought to have an object. Pelletier follows Thackeray in printing it in pointed brackets, showing for him its tentative status. § 246. C. L. Struve suggested the particle ἄν after πῶς since a verb in the optative mode follows.920 Thackeray and Pelletier both print the word in pointed brackets, since it is possible for an optative to follow πῶς on its own. Ps.-Aristeas uses ἄν frequently in the symposium section, however. § 247. Mendelssohn suggested the verb ἄξει, will bring, instead of ἔξει, will have, of the manuscripts. The verb ἔχω does not really fit here. The reading παρέξει, will furnish, of ms P clearly attempts to make sense out of the problematic verb. Thackeray prints ἄξει in pointed brackets, while Pelletier simply prints it as the text. // Only ms O has the phrase ὁ δὲ βασιλεύς at the beginning of the wrap-up to the symposium. Pelletier prints it as his text. All the other conclusions to symposia, except the sixth, refer explicitly to the king, and such a reference is likely here. General Comment The beginning of this symposium is already familiar from the previous two. In the first question (§ 236), the king asks whether prudence can be taught. The Greek verb φρονέω connotes having understanding, prudence, or practical wisdom. It is distinguished from σοφία, learning or speculative wisdom, a term that Ps.-Aristeas uses in § 207 and § 260. This question perhaps alludes to the philosophical debate about whether practical wisdom could be taught.921 Aristotle, for example, in the Nicomachean Ethics argues that it cannot, that it is “a truth-attaining rational quality, con-

919 920

921

Pelletier, Lettre, 250. C. L. Struve, Opuscula selecta, II (Leipzig, 1854), cited in the critical apparatus of Pelletier, Lettre, 210. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 24.

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cerned with action in relation to things that are good and bad for human beings” (6.5 [1140a]). So, for example, Pericles and men like him were considered prudent because they possessed a “faculty of discerning what things are good for themselves and for humankind” (6.5 [1140b]). Again in the same part of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle claims that practical wisdom is a virtue contained in the parts of the soul that have reason. The soul’s very constitution is to deliberate what is good or bad. The response to the king’s question, although not exactly answering it, also echoes this same debate. Of course, our Jewish respondent must insert some reference to the deity, here for the first and only time in the symposia not using the noun “God” but invoking divine power as the motivating force behind the soul’s choices. The idea that the king requires God’s direction or assistance to acquire virtue forms something of a sub-theme in this symposium (cf. § 237, § 238, § 239, § 243; but see also § 194 and § 216). The second question (§ 237) continues in the vein of Greek philosophical insight. When the king asks about health, the answer is moderation (σωφροσύνη), an important philosophical virtue. It is one of Plato’s four cardinal virtues, and he connects it with bodily health in Charmides 157A: “[B]y the use of such words moderation is engendered in our souls, and as soon as it is engendered and present, we may easily secure health to the head and the rest of the body as well.” Of course, this cannot happen for King Ptolemy unless God plays an active role. Various Hellenistic-Jewish works feature moderation as an important virtue. See, for example, Pseudo-Phocylides 55–96 where moderation is a theme.922 In the table etiquette rules in Sir 31:22, Ben Sira extols the benefits of moderation, even though the translator does not use the Greek term. Finally Wis 8:7 connects moderation and practical wisdom (φρόνησις) as two virtues that come from Wisdom. The third question (§ 238) reprises the matter of responsibilities to parents (cf. § 228). This time the king’s question focuses on proper gratitude. The answer is simple: do not grieve them. Both the question and the answer appear to be fairly generic and widespread and nowhere close to being as specific as the treatment of parents in § 228. The advice given here looks much more like a general wisdom admonition, such as we find in Sir 3:12 where the sage tells his charges not to “grieve” their fathers, than any deliberate reference to the Decalogue.923 Yet, in both Jewish and Greek mores, a child’s responsibilities to parents were paramount. In Greek and Roman literature, writers viewed ingratitude not as a simple lack of being grateful

922 923

Wilson, Pseudo-Phocylides, 113. The Greek translator of Sirach employs the same verb, λυπέω, as here.

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but as impiety, which was a worse transgression.924 The respondent then adds the obligatory reference to God, remarking that only God’s guiding can make this possible, which attributes human virtue ultimately to God. The fourth question, which asks about being fond of listening (φιλήκοος; § 239), has education at its root. The response connects listening with knowing and the value that the combination has for proper decision-making. The Greek text is difficult, but the general idea is clear. When a crisis occurs, one can select from what one has heard (and thus what one knows) in order to respond to that crisis in the best possible way. That the circumstances are a crisis seems to be implied by the verb ἀντιπράσσηται, counteract. God figures here as God does elsewhere, since the deity guides the mind, and thus every accomplished action comes from God. The fifth question (§ 240) implicitly raises the issue of the king’s relation to law. In this paragraph, the object of inquiry is not Jewish law, but whether any king is above the law or whether he is subject to it as is everyone else, a question that was was debated in ancient kingship theory. Both Plato (Statesman 294A) and Aristotle (Politics 3.13 [1277a]) thought that rulers of a particular sort were above the law. For Plato it would be the man who understood the art of kingship, and for Aristotle it would be the man who was preeminent in virtue. For each, the law comes in second place. In the Hellenistic period some philosophers argued for a constitutional type of monarchy that distinguished between virtuous kingship and tyranny. Others argued for a more absolute form of monarchy where the king was above the law in the tradition of Plato and Aristotle.925 Within Jewish tradition, a long tradition established that the king must follow the law. Deuteronomy 17:18–19, for example, requires the king to read the law every day in order to make more certain that he will know it and keep its commandments. Whereas the question indirectly positions the king beneath the law, the answer makes that position explicit. God has endowed various lawgivers with intelligence, and their laws “preserve human life.” The obvious result is that the king ought to follow the law. The use of the plural “lawgivers” indicates that Ps.-Aristeas is not simply thinking of Moses, whom he calls the Jews’ legislator throughout the work. He almost certainly has in mind famous lawgivers such as Solon or Lycurgus as well with whom he implic-

924

925

See J. W. Hewitt, “Gratitude to Parents in Greek and Roman Literature,” The American Journal of Philology 52 (1931) 30–48. For a detailed discussion, see Richard A. Billows, Kings & Colonists: Aspects of Macedonian Imperialism (Leiden/New York: Brill, 1995) chap. 3. See also, Goodenough, “Political Philosophy,” 62–64.

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itly compares Moses elsewhere. It is somewhat remarkable, then, how Ps.-Aristeas speaks of lawgivers other than Moses. He attributes to them a kind of inspiration, since God has given them the intelligence to devise these laws. Although not divine inspiration per se, Polybius is compelled to call Lycurgus’s laws for Sparta “more divine” (θειότεραν), because of their excellence.926 Ps.-Aristeas may perhaps set Moses apart from these other lawgivers in § 139 when he says that Moses was “prepared by God for knowledge of all things.” Yet he certainly does not single out Moses in this passage as being different from other famous lawgivers.927 Question six (§§ 241–242) turns again to family, but this time not to parents but more generally ties of kinship (συγγένεια). How we understand this term will determine how we interpret the passage. Does συγγένεια refer to the official, constructed relationships of the king and his “Friends” or does it mean blood or ethnic ties? Hadas points to the phrase “both glory and prosperity will accrue to such people,” which he translates “our esteem and attainments will rise in their regard,” as indicating courtly constructions of kinship.928 Yet, he has assumed that the two qualities of glory and prosperity belong to “us,” whoever that might be. Moore is correct to point out that there is no necessity to read this passage as referring to courtiers.929 Since the respondent begins with the first person plural, it seems more likely that its use indicates ethnic ties. The answer, then, explains that shared suffering does not overcome kin when they cooperate to confront whatever circumstances arise. When success occurs nothing more need be required of those who have helped. Moore understands this passage as “a brief meditation on the significance of ethnicity,” and he then makes the move to try to find some historical referent in the text. He concludes, as part of a larger set of arguments about the purpose of Aristeas, that this question and answer refer to contributions made by Egyptian Jews to the Hasmonean cause and “encourage material contri-

926 927

928 929

See Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 3. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 63, argues that for Greek writers “there was a tendency for a single individual … to be made the exemplar and bearer of the disparate national traditions.” He suggests that this might have been the case for Alexandrians. More interesting, and to the point however, is the Jews’ representation of Moses in this manner. For the larger argument about Moses, the law and what kind of inspiration is accorded it, see the various comments infra and in Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact.” Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 195. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 343.

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butions to Judea now that the immediate crisis is past.”930 Given the nature of the symposium section as a whole, I find this sort of historical specificity unlikely. The various admonitions address the problem of kingship, and they apply to the situation of Jews in Alexandria vis-à-vis the larger Gentile environment in which they live. Rather than a focus on Judea, Ps.-Aristeas worries about his fellow Jews in their present context, one in which they have succeeded to a degree but still experience some anxiety about their position as a minority group within a larger, dominant culture. The short seventh question and answer (§ 243) focuses on fearlessness, an important Stoic virtue. The answer seems to allude to Stoic solutions to the problem of fear, but, of course, it also appends the proviso that God directs the mind (cf. § 237, § 238, § 239). Perhaps the best illustration of the Stoic view comes from the Roman moral philosopher Seneca in his Letter 85 to Lucilius. He cites the Stoic syllogism “He who is brave is fearless; he who is fearless is free from sadness; he who is free from sadness is happy.” He goes on to refute criticism of this position that argues that even the bravest experience some fear. Seneca counters, “For indeed the man who does feel fear, though he feels it rather seldom and to a slight degree, is not free from wickedness, but is merely troubled by it in a milder form” (Letter 85, section 24).931 Thus, put in the language of the passage in Aristeas, when the mind knows that it has no wickedness, then a person will possess true fearlessness, because the fearless person will know that evils feared by others are not really evils. They only appear to be. The following question (§ 244) asks about right reason, an idea central to Greek philosophical conceptions of virtue, ethics and politics, particularly in Stoic thought. In the passage here in Aristeas, the connection between right reason and the changing fortunes of human beings is not really clarified. In Stoic ethics, right reason is the foundational principle of the cosmos and living correctly involves living in accordance with reason. One’s fortunes might change, but the person who lives according to reason knows, as we saw above with fearlessness, the true nature of these events. What is in one’s control is ethically important. Outside of that, things are indifferent, that is, they are ethically irrelevant.932 The use of reason matters most – and that was the point of the king’s question. Yet, the respondent completely deserts the question for a theistic explanation of

930 931

932

Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 343. Translation from Richard Mott Cummere, Seneca: Epistles 66–92 (LCL; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1920). See Colish, Stoic Tradition, 44.

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fortune; God changes people’s fortunes. Of course, God’s actions cannot be ethically irrelevant at all, but in fact, they are ethically crucial. Thus, the answer does not simply avoid answering the question; it completely shifts the ground. Indeed, the idea that one’s fortunes can change quickly is relatively common in Jewish literature as well. We read, for example, in the Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides: “Neither be distressed by evils or overjoyed by success. Often in life unbelievable suffering comes to the confident and to the distressed a sudden release from evil” (118–120). Ben Sira’s perspective on changing fortunes looks more like the answer in Aristeas, when he says, “Do not wonder at the work of a sinner, but trust in the Lord and keep at your job; for it is easy in the sight of the Lord to make the poor rich suddenly, in an instant” (11:21). In question nine (§ 245) the king wants to escape laziness and submission to pleasure. Whereas laziness enters the discussion anew, pleasure (ἡδονή) has appeared already in § 108 and § 223 (see also § 277) as describing the desires of the masses of people. In § 223, the king’s desires differed from mere pleasure, and in this passage the elder appeals to the king’s duty to care for his subjects in order to communicate that the king must be above such desires. The requirement for a king to care for his people was grounded in the expectation of the king as benefactor, an important theme in Ps.-Aristeas’s symposia (cf. § 190, § 205, § 208, § 210, § 226, §§ 258–259, § 273). In a sense, benefaction was the equivalent of caring for one’s subjects, since whatever a king did to preserve and support the commonweal of Greek cities was seen as benefaction.933 If he remembers these duties to the people, he will not succumb to pleasure and laziness. He must pray to God, however, that he not neglect his responsibility. The final question of this fourth symposium (§ 246–247) raises an issue that must have been a concern for many an ancient king: treachery on the part of someone close to him. The Jewish elder offers practical advice to the king: Watch carefully that those around him act appropriately and openly. So, for example, if courtiers distribute favors that are not appropriate to their station, then the king should beware.934 The implication is that behavior that transgresses the expected behavioral norms might constitute clues to treacherous intent on the part of those around the king.

933 934

Bringmann, “King as Benefactor,” 9. Tramontano, La Lettera, 210, cites Sir 19:26 and 37:7 as relevant passages. They do deal with guile, but not with respect to a king’s rule. The difficulty of telling truth from deceit occupies the attention of many ancient sages, but the passage in Aristeas is treating a specific situation.

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Notes § 237. mind. Pelletier notes that the Greek term διάνοια in the Septuagint usually translates the Hebrew word ‫לבב‬, heart, and it does not distinguish between the intellectual and the affective. He thus would accept a literal translation of “unless God disposes the heart.”935 There is no evidence, however, that Ps.-Aristeas is working with Greek terms in the senses that they might have in the Septuagint. In non-translation Greek, the term refers to the faculty of thinking, and thus at some points it may be translated “mind” and at others “understanding” (cf. § 246). §§ 241–242. The translation here is adapted from Moore.936 He makes a convincing case that the word ἀτυχοῦσι should be read as a finite verb and not as a participle, primarily on the strength of the particle μέν that follows it. This particle, then, pairs with δέ at the beginning of § 242 to form a normal μέν … δέ construction. The parenthetical remark that most editors have as beginning at the start of § 242 actually ends there, having begun with “even should we suffer.” I do not agree with Moore when he argues that the phrase καὶ κακοπαθῶμεν begins a rhetorical question. As I see it, this phrase moves the argument one step further along. If there are shared circumstances, and even shared suffering, kinship is strong enough to overcome any harm from them. See above under General Comment for more discussion. § 246. treachery. The Greek word δόλος can mean a trick or cunning as well as treachery. In this passage it is not made clear whether the treachery is the king’s overthrow or his undermining. Hadas thinks the reference is to those who would assume more authority than was their due in domestic and foreign affairs, and he suggests that the Ptolemy whose reign this best fits would be Ptolemy IV Philopater (222–205 BCE).937 The kind of general advice that is contained in this passage gives me pause when it comes to trying to wring specific historical evidence out of it, however, and I do not think it helps us either to pinpoint historical circumstances or to date the work.

935 936 937

Pelletier, Lettre, 208. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 341–42. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 196.

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The Fifth Symposium (§§ 248–261) 248. On the following day, seizing the opportunity, he asked the next one, “What is the greatest negligence?” To this he replied, “If he took no heed of his children and he did not strive in every way to raise them. For we always pray to God, not so much for ourselves as for our offspring, that they might have all good things. Yet to desire that children possess temperance, this comes by the power of God.” 249. After declaring that he had spoken well, he asked another, “How is one a lover of his country?” “By setting as a goal,” he said, “that it is good to live and die in one’s own country. Being an alien brings contempt to the poor and shame to the rich, as though they were exiled due to a crime. Therefore, showing kindness to all, just as you always do – God granting you favor before all – you will appear as a lover of your country.” 250. So after hearing this one, he inquired of the next, “How does one govern a woman?” “Knowing that women are rash,” he said, “and energetic about what they desire, and they change their minds easily because of fallacious reasoning, and by nature they have a weak constitution. So it is necessary to have dealings with them soundly and in order not to provoke strife. 251. For life is set right when the pilot knows to which mark it is necessary to direct his route. So he will invoke God, and his life will be piloted in every respect.” 252. After joining in agreement with this one, he asked the next, “How might one be without fault?” And he said, “By doing everything nobly and with consideration and not being persuaded by slanders but by examining for oneself things that are said and with judgment setting right matters related to petitions and through judgment carrying them out, you will be faultless, O King,” he said. “But to intend these things and to engage in them is a work of divine power.” 253. He was delighted by what was said, and he asked the next one, “How can one be free from wrath?” To this he said, “By knowing that he has authority over everything, and if he resorted to wrath, he would bring about death. Yet it would be unprofitable and painful if life were taken away from many, because he has supreme authority. 254. So if everyone obeys and no one opposes, of what use is it to become wrathful? But it is necessary to recognize that God administers the entire cosmos with good will and without any anger. And you, O King, must follow this example,” he said. 255. The king said that he had answered well, and he inquired of the next one, “What is good counsel?” “To do all things well,” he declared, “with consideration, in your deliberation comparing also the harmful aspects in the opposite side of the argument in order that after thinking about each one, we might have been well-counseled and our purpose accomplished. But, moreover, most significant is that by the sovereignty of God every deliberation of

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yours will have fulfillment when you practice piety.” 256. After he said that this one had been correct, he asked another, “What is philosophy?” “To consider well each contingency,” he declared, “and not to be carried off by impulses but to study carefully the damage that results from the passions and to act properly at the right moment, moderating one’s passions. So in order that we acquire attention to these things, it is necessary to serve God.” 257. After approving of this one also, he asked another, “How can one find acceptance while living abroad?” “By being to all as an equal,” he said, “appearing as inferior rather than as superior to those among whom he sojourns. For in general God accepts what is humble by nature, and the human race treats kindly those who are made subject.” 258. And after he bore witness to these things, he asked another, “How might one build and have it endure into the future?” To this he said, “If he would complete by his actions great and majestic things, in order that those who view them spare them because of their beauty, and if he were to pass over none of those who constructed such things nor compel others to finish the portions of their service without pay. 259. For if he considered that God treats the human race with great care, providing them health and sensibility and other like things, he himself would do something accordingly, rendering the reward for difficult labor. For things accomplished in accordance with justice – these things also will endure.” 260. And when he said that this one had spoken well, he asked the tenth one, “What is the fruit of wisdom?” And he said, “Not to be conscious within himself of having done evil and to lead one’s life in truth. 261. From these will be for you, O Mighty King, greatest joy, tranquility of soul, and fine hopes in God as you hold sway over your realm piously.” And when they heard it together, all assented with multitudinous applause. And after these things, the king, filled with joy, turned to drinking to their health. Textual Notes § 248. Wendland proposed the reading of σπεύδοι instead of σπεύδη (or perhaps the subjunctive σπεύδῃ) of ms B.938 (Ms T has a space for five or six letters here.) The word is missing in the other manuscripts. This reading would parallel the optative mode in the first clause creating parallel verbal modes. Thackeray and Pelletier include it as their text. // Ms P preserves the reading παιδία, children, instead of παιδείαν, education, in the rest of the manuscript tradition. The former reading makes better sense, and the latter

938

B does not have the iota subscript, but that could easily have dropped out in the transmission process.

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reading looks like a case of an ittacism that creates another word. § 250. The beginning of this question is missing the particle ἄν with πῶς – compare § 249, § 253, § 257, and § 258 in this symposium. Struve proposed the addition that has been followed by all editors.939 // The beginning of the answer has an obvious lacuna, since it begins with the conjunction ὅτι. Mendelssohn suggested the participle γινώσκων, knowing (probably on the model of passages like § 244, § 253 and § 254), which all editors have followed. § 252. In like manner to § 250, Struve, followed by all other editors, added ἄν after πῶς.940 // The Greek manuscripts transmit the phrase ὁ δὲ ἔφησεν ὡς at the beginning of the answer. The conjunction is grammatically difficult in the sentence. Mendelssohn suggested that this had been corrupted from ὁ δὲ ἔφη σεμνῶς, concluding that the verb was originally ἔφη, as in other answers (cf. § 227, § 238, § 248 and § 250).941 This word division would have resulted in the dropping of the mu from σεμνῶς. Editors are divided on whether to adopt this suggestion. Thackeray in his Greek text (followed by Hadas) follows the manuscripts. In his translation, he accepts this proposal.942 Tramontano accepts the conjectured reading, as well. Pelletier prints Mendelssohn’s text. The arguments on either side make sense. I have followed Pelletier, because (a) the proposal resolves the grammatical awkwardness in the sentence, (b) it then balances the participles and (c) it separates the two occurrences of καί to make better grammatical balance. § 255. Wendland proposed adding the article τά before βλαβερά, harmful aspects, which Pelletier prints in pointed brackets, even though it would seem to be necessary for the point being made. // Mendelssohn suggested τελείωσιν ἕξει, will have fulfillment, for the obviously corrupt τέως ἵν’ ἐχισοῖ (or a variant thereof) of the Greek manuscripts. The various editors have accepted this suggestion. § 257. The nominative case ἡ ξενιτεία, living abroad, manifestly does not fit. Mendelssohn suggested the prepositional phrase ἐν ξενιτείᾳ, which all editors have followed. § 258. The question in this paragraph lacks an object for the verbs. Schmidt proposed that the pronoun ἅ had fallen out before ἄν. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) and Pelletier have accepted the suggestion with caution and print the pronoun in pointed brackets. It serves as the basis for my translation. § 261. All the manuscripts have the infinitive λαμβάνειν, which Pelletier

939 940 941

942

See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 212. See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 212. But see § 240, where the verb is ἔφησε. Ps.-Aristeas uses a variety of different verbs for the action of replying to questions, most likely for stylistic effect. Thackeray, “Translation,” 381 n. 4.

390

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calls “very suspicious.”943 Thackeray also felt this way and printed the word in square brackets, indicating a high degree of uncertainty. Mendelssohn and Cohn made suggestions that would make the infinitive the main verb in the clause, but these have not been generally accepted.944 General Comment Instead of the usual note about the arrangement of the symposium, Ps.-Aristeas plunges right into the fifth. Hadas suggests that this symposium has no special relevance to kingship, and except for § 255 and § 258, that appears to be the case. He epitomizes this symposium as emphasizing the king as an exemplar of ethical behavior and as making the king subject to “ordinary principles of ethics.”945 This conclusion might be imputing too much structure to the symposium, since arguably some of the questions do not even refer to ordinary ethical principles. Question two about loving one’s country is not really an ethical problem, for instance. Certainly Ps.-Aristeas will sometimes gather together in a few adjacent questions issues that might relate to one another (cf. the first symposium where the first questions concern judgment and leniency). I do not see enough structure anywhere in the seven symposia to argue that an entire symposium is held together by some theme or concept. When the king finds an opportunity, he first asks about negligence, a new topic (§ 248). The Jewish translator focuses the answer on children, who have only been spoken about obliquely in § 196 as descendents to whom a kingdom might be passed. The answer in this passage emphasizes the importance of proper childrearing, a common topic of Jewish wisdom literature (cf. Prov 23:13–14, 24; Sir 30:1–13). In Aristeas, however, the goal is explicit, that children should have temperance, σωφροσύνη, a value already discussed in § 237. The insertion of God in this advice articulates the anxiety of parents for their children. So they pray to God for them. As is so often the case in the symposia, however, human desires for good, even parents’ desire for their children to be sensible, originate in the power of God. The second question (§ 249) turns to how one can love one’s country. Polybius especially likes the term φιλόπατρις, arguing that a good man should be a lover of country (Hist. 1.14.4). The answer in this paragraph is somewhat confusing, however. Although it could be understood as a

943 944 945

Pelletier, Lettre, 216 (“ultimun verb. valde suspectum”). See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 216. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 196–97.

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criticism of Jews living outside of their own country, that seems unlikely considering the general tone of the work but also the question and answer of § 257 about living abroad. The answer that being an alien is undesirable for rich or poor suggests that Ps.-Aristeas intends the term ξενία in its meaning of not being a citizen and not having citizenship rights, which he suggests brings with it the same feeling of being exiled for some crime. Gruen notes the tension here between dwelling in one’s homeland and living as an alien, although the elder’s answer does little to clarify the problem or to resolve that tension.946 As he notes, in the second part of the answer it is not clear how showing kindness to everyone makes one a lover of one’s own country (unless the author means all of one’s fellow citizens, although that reading is by no means the obvious one).947 In keeping with his thesis about the relationship between Aristeas and the Jewish homeland, Moore argues that, in light of the use of the Greek term πολίτης with respect to Eleazar as head of a Jewish body of citizens, Aristeas refers to refugees who had fled to Egypt and that the author “is encouraging these refugees to return to Judea, a move which would apparently redound to the benefit of other Judeans in Egypt and Judea.”948 Aryeh Kasher, as well, understands this passage as articulating “the genuine national affinity of the Jews of Egypt to their historic homeland.”949 The situation in Hellenistic Egypt appears to be more complicated when it comes to the term πάτρις or homeland, however. Jean Bingen shows how Egyptian papyri of the Ptolemaic period record names of fathers (πατρόθεν) and homeland (πάτρις) when identity must be established. The second identifier was the ethnic origin of the individual identified, often that of his/her ancestors. So, in the Hellenistic Greek of Ptolemaic Egypt, one’s πάτρις was one’s ethnic identity.950 In the narrative world of Aristeas, Ptolemy’s πάτρις would have been Macedon and would have

946 947 948 949

950

Gruen, Diaspora, 241. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2756. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 346. Aryeh Kasher, “Political and National Connections between the Jews of Ptolemaic Egypt and their Brethren in Eretz Israel,” in Eretz Israel, Israel and the Jewish Diaspora: Mutual Relations (Ed. Menachem Mor; Lanham, Md: University Press of America, 1991) 27. Jean Bingen, Hellenistic Egypt: Monarchy, Society, Economy, Culture. Edited with an Introduction by Roger S. Bagnall (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007) 60–61, 78. His discussion focuses on the meaning of the epithet φιλόπατρις given to Cleopatra VII. He notes specifically papyri of the period of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, P. Revenue Laws and C.Ord.Ptol. 21.

392

III. Translation and Commentary

implicitly referred to his ancestors. Moreover, affectionate ties to homeland were not unique to Jews in this period. There was a long tradition in Greek literature of love of one’s homeland and sorrow at being dissociated from it along with special shame connected to exile from one’s homeland.951 The answer in § 249 is consistent with all of these views. So we are faced with the problem of what contemporary reference, if any, is being made here. Certainly Ps.-Aristeas has an attachment to Judea as the Jews’ homeland. Given the attention that he pays to Judea, Jerusalem, the Temple and the high priest, that cannot be denied. Yet, if he is making explicit allusions to contemporary issues, our author has chosen to express these sentiments episodically in the context of a series of Hellenistic royal symposia where Jews are instructing a Gentile king on kingship. I find it unlikely, then, that (a) the people to whom Moore thinks this advice is addressed would be intended to read the work and (b) this advice would be sufficiently obvious that they would understand what it was they were supposed to do. I remain convinced, particularly when this passage is read within the context of the rest of Aristeas, that the major thrust is to work out how educated Alexandrian Jews could imagine their participation in the Hellenistic cultural environment of the city in the second century BCE. Alexandrian Jews should care about Judea and their roots there, but their home is the great Egyptian city, where they have to work out their social and cultural position. Question number three (§§ 250–251) returns to family relationships, but this time specifically with respect to women. The king asks how one governs a woman. The answer looks to be what most in the modern world would take as a standard bit of misogynist mischaracterization. The answer does not focus on what social or political roles women might play, but on their nature, an important topic of philosophical reflection in classical antiquity. While it might be misogynistic, this answer echoes discussions in classical sources, particularly in Plato and Aristotle, in which there was some disagreement about women’s nature. The answer given in § 250 comports for the most part with the position of the Peripatetic school. In classical philosophy, the matter of women’s nature arises in thinking about the constitution of the ideal polis and women’s place in it. Although he is not immune

951

So, for example, Euripides and Theognis who both refer to the difficulty of being away from one’s πάτρις. For these and other passages, see Thomas Heine Nielson, “The Concept of Patris in Archaic and Classical Sources,” in Once Again: Studies in the Ancient Greek Polis: Papers from the Copenhagen Polis Centre 7 (Ed. Thomas Heine Nielson; Historia Einzelschriften 180; Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2004) 49–76.

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to misogynistic sentiments, Plato argues for a kind of sexual equality in the governing of the ideal state. Aristotle, on the other side, argues that women’s constitution is by nature subordinate to men’s. Women possess deliberative reasoning, Aristotle believes, but it is “without full authority” or “less trustworthy” (ἄκυρον; Politics 1.13 [1260a]).952 Theophrastus, an important disciple of Aristotle, is reported to have said that educating women would make them lazy, talkative busybodies.953 Both Plato and Aristotle agree, however, that men and women differ in their psychologies, and our Jewish respondent also focuses his answer on the psychological features of women’s nature. Aristotle’s views also seem to have influenced Philo of Alexandria, who, too, sees women as naturally inferior to men, particularly when he allegorically identifies men with “mind” (νοῦς) and women with “sense perception” (αἴσθησις) (On the Creation of the World 165).954 Ps.-Aristeas identifies four aspects of women’s nature in this reply. That women have a weaker constitution than men is so ubiquitous in ancient sources as to be a commonplace. The other three qualities correlate with the two major reasons that some thinkers argued for women’s inferiority. To be “rash” (θρασύ) and “energetic” (δραστικόν) about what one desires alludes to the place of the passions in women’s decisions, which stands in contrast to the use of proper reason, which would avoid or control these reactions. Elsewhere in the symposia, our author emphasizes the need for the king to control passions or to act with moderation (§ 222, § 237, § 256, § 284), but apparently it is not in women’s nature to behave this way. As we saw above, Aristotle argued that women’s reasoning power was deficient with respect to men’s. Ps.-Aristeas employs the noun παραλογισμός, which can connote false reasoning or a weakness in the power of reasoning.

952

953

954

On the differences between Plato’s and Aristotle’s views, see Nicholas D. Smith, “Plato and Aristotle on the Nature of Women,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 21 (1983) 467–78. For Aristotle, see also Elizabeth V. Spelman, “Aristotle and the Politicization of the Soul,” in Discovering Reality: Feminist Perspectives on Epistemology, Metaphysics, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science (Ed. Sandra Harding and Merrill B. Hintikka; Synthese Library 161; Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003) 17–30. Reported by Stobaeus. Sarah B. Pomeroy cites the comment in Goddesses, Whores, Wives and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity (New York: Schocken Books, 1975) 131. For the Hellenistic period, where she talks more about the social realities of women’s lives, see Sarah B. Pomeroy, Women in Hellenistic Egypt from Alexander to Cleopatra (Detroit, Mich.: Wayne State University Press, 1984). On Philo, see Joan E. Taylor, “Spiritual Mothers: Philo on the Women Therapeutae,” JSP 23 (2002) 38–46.

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In either sense, applying this noun to women accords with other writers for whom women’s power to reason lacks something when compared to men’s. The king’s response to such behavior should be to deal “soundly” or even “wisely” (ὑγιές) with women, so that friction does not result, an answer, which really tells the king nothing practical. The king’s relationship to a woman (presumably his wife, Arsinoë II) is analogous to a pilot navigating a ship. The pilot knows how to navigate to get where he is going. The image is a popular one in Greek writing, especially in Plato, and it probably is doing double duty in this answer, since the metaphor often places the ruler, or the true philosopher, in the place of the pilot. (See, for example, Plato’s Republic 488A–E). The insertion of the reference to God really does not make a lot of sense, since the elder says that God pilots the king’s life, when the image of the pilot was invoked to provide a model for the king to deal with his wife.955 Moving on to question four (§ 252), the king now shifts back to matters related to exercising his duties as a king. The adjective ἀναμάρτητος, without fault, can have a moral sense of being guiltless or sinless or a more neutral meaning of not making a mistake. In this case, the word would appear to have some moral component. That is, how can the king remain morally without fault in his dealings with others – at least this is how the reply understands the question. The Jewish elder identifies the king as the source of ultimate judgment, and he must exercise deliberation and examine things for himself without relying on false accusations (διαβολαῖς). An important aspect of kingly duty is the just and fair administration of petitions (ἔντευξις), and the Jewish respondent exhorts the king not only to deal with petitions but to make sure that they are carried out. Quite a number of petitions survive in Ptolemaic-era papyri, and official references to petitions occur in royal letters that address those requests. So, for example, in a papyrus from the reign of Ptolemy IX Soter II (Lathyrus), we see

955

Some modern scholars have tried to discern contemporary references in this section on women. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2758, thinks that the author is poking fun at the power that Arsinoë II had. As in other cases, there is really no indication that Ps.-Aristeas intends to make some reference to historical realities (whether before his own time or in his own time). I remain convinced that the nature of the symposia in Aristeas is based largely on the philosophical and ethical construction of kingship, despite the fact that a number of questions do not seem to concern kingship directly. The question, as I see it, is why Ps.-Aristeas includes such an extended section treating this topic, which might just as well be that it was a topic of interest.

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the phrase, “we have received the petition from …” (C.Ord.Ptol. 58.5).956 A. E. Samuel remarks that the large number of petitions from this period comprises “one category of texts which show the concept of the king as the direct source of benefit and justice to the populace.”957 As we have seen elsewhere, Ps.-Aristeas stresses the importance of royal beneficence. The question and answer in § 252 are thus connected directly to that concern. The reference to God at the end seems like a tag line. As in other answers in the symposia, even the intention to act in these kingly ways finds its genesis in God’s power. The fifth question (§§ 253–254) also turns to an issue that concerned ancient Greek writers, wrath or anger. In many, if not most cases, the emotions of wrath or anger are discussed along with the importance of employing reason.958 In this respect, the topic relates to the discussion of women’s nature above. The response, however, focuses on the practical aspects of the problem, and by this approach, the respondent does not address the king’s question. The answer does assume, however, that wrath will banish reason, since there would appear to be no purpose for a king to be wrathful with his subjects if they all obeyed him. The king has the authority to inflict pain and death, that is true, but to do so out of wrath would neither benefit him nor his kingdom. We see examples of a king’s wrath banishing reason in the story of the elderly Eleazar in 4 Maccabees 5–6 and of the mother and her seven sons in chapters 8–12. After Eleazar responds with reason rejecting the royal command that he eat pork, the king’s guards violently and irrationally torture him, through which he controls his own passions and emotions. Finally one of the king’s men asks him why he is acting so irrationally (6:14) to destroy himself, which of course, the reader knows is precisely the opposite of the situation. In the narrative of the mother and her seven sons,

956 957

958

The collection of Lenger, Corpus du Ordonnances, contains four such responses. Samuel, “The Ptolemies and the Ideology of Kingship,” 190. Samuel notes that in this period the bureaucracy would have processed the petitions, but he also writes, “[T]he terminology of the appeals makes the king the source of the euergasia which the petitioner requests” (190). Both Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 199, and Pelletier, Lettre, 212, claim that before the year 100 BCE petitions would have reached the king, but after that special functionaries handled all those duties. Samuel’s assessment seems to contradict that claim. On Greek and Hellenistic notions of anger, see Susanna Braund and Glenn W. Most, eds., Ancient Anger: Perspectives from Homer to Galen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) and Kostas Kalimtzis, Taming Anger: The Hellenic Approach to the Limitations of Reason (London: Bristol Classical Press, 2012).

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III. Translation and Commentary

rather than violate Jewish law, the sons control their own passions while the king gets increasingly more infuriated and as a result of his submission to his emotions, he resorts to crueler and crueler tortures. After the young men’s violent deaths, the author concludes, “Since, then, the seven brothers despised sufferings unto death, everyone must concede that devout reason is sovereign over the emotions … By reason they prevailed over their emotions” (13:1, 3). Our author claims that the king must follow – note the use of ἀναγκαῖον, which implies a level of constraint or compulsion959 – the example of God (cf. § 188, § 190, § 210), who manages the entire cosmos with good will (εὐμένεια) and without anger (here ὀργή). In these aspects, the Jewish god resembles the Stoic Logos, which also governs the cosmos with reason, thus making acting with anger decidedly out of harmony with that basic principle. Question six (§ 255) raises the issue of counsel, an important matter for any king. The answer focuses on the king’s own consideration and deliberation as an important precursor to receiving good advice. Here the noun διαλογισμός, consideration, refers to the king’s personal attention to an issue. It was used in the same way in § 252 where the king was advised not to listen to slanders. In this passage, the king must weigh both sides of an argument so that he will be prepared to receive any advice about it. In this way, as in § 252, he will make the best decision and not be at the mercy of those who might want to sway him. Unstated, but clearly in the background, lies the importance of reason and control of the emotions as the basis for making decisions, which seems to be a mini-theme in this symposium.960 An invocation of God introduces a kind of act-consequence equation to the advice. That is, God will fulfill all the king’s deliberations if he acts with piety. We find a similarly tame form of the act-consequence relationship in § 225, but it does not occur much in the symposia or in Aristeas overall. Question and answer seven (§ 256) on philosophy follows almost an identical template to § 255. After the king asks his question, the elder’s reply practically mirrors the previous answer. The king’s personal consideration of the issue here is expressed with the verb διαλογίζω rather than the noun of § 255. In this case, rather than deliberate both sides of an argument, the king must examine the damage (βλάβας; see βλαβερά in

959 960

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2757, calls the language “unusually strong.” Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 200, identifies reason as the point of this question and answer.

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§ 255) in order to act properly.961 The king’s relationship to God differs in this paragraph in that he must serve God in order to gain the ability to be attentive to the problem. God, then, functions as elsewhere in the symposia as the origin of a person’s ability to act or think properly. This is the only place in the work that discusses philosophy explicitly, even though love of and pursuit of wisdom or knowledge undergirds much of the advice given in the symposia. Ps.-Aristeas’s basic approach to the question exhibits Aristotelian/Peripatetic characteristics. The idea that one needs to control passions characterizes Stoic approaches as well, but here moderation, a Peripatetic solution, constitutes the way to do so. Moreover, Ps.-Aristeas employs a typically Peripatetic term μετριοπαθής, moderating passion, rather than any specifically Stoic term.962 Diogenes Laertius, in his Lives of the Philosophers 5.31, expresses the difference well: “And he [i.e., Aristotle] said that the wise man is not free from passion (ἀπαθῆ, the Stoic word), but he moderates passion (μετριοπαθῆ).”963 This reflection on philosophy concludes the sub-theme on passions and their moderation in the fifth symposium. While the subject appears elsewhere in the work, this short but sustained discussion exemplifies the way that Ps.-Aristeas will bring together similar topics in a brief scope. This method suggests that, although the symposia exhibit no clear structure overall, hitting on one topic most likely brought to our author’s mind others of a similar nature, which results in these small mini-themes. Question and answer eight (§ 257) comprises one of the odder passages in the symposium. Gruen simply says that the advice “is rather puzzling.”964 Both the question and the answer seem to stand at odds with other questions. Already in this symposium (§ 249), living outside of one’s country was compared to exile due to some crime. Now the king asks about how one finds acceptance when one sojourns abroad. There is no suggestion that this circumstance came about because of exile. The advice is even stranger, since a king is receiving it: be everyone’s equal and do not act superior. Of course, elsewhere in the symposia, the Jewish elders recognize explicitly the king’s differences from his subjects. They make no attempt to encourage the king to be the equal of his subjects. Presumably royalty living abroad 961

962

963 964

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 201, notices the similarity and attributes it to the model that Ps.-Aristeas used. Here he seems to accept the arguments that Zuntz makes about the nature of the symposia. These are the two schools of philosophy from which Ps.-Aristeas primarily draws in his work. Tramontano, La Lettera, 215, also contrasts Aristotelian and Stoic views here. Gruen,“Letter of Aristeas,” 2757.

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III. Translation and Commentary

would be able to live in the manner that they were used to and experience no need to act as the equals of the local people. Even the injection of God does not really fit with the earlier part of the answer. The two participles in the last sentence, ταπεινούμενον and ὑποτασσομένους, do not connote equality but subjection and lowly status. Certainly, even if he were to follow the advice already given, such a status would not be appropriate for the king. Hadas valiantly tries to make some sense of the advice by noting that becoming people’s equal is good Stoic advice for a king.965 The passage does not concern the king’s relationship with his subjects, but with those among whom he lives while not in his country. The entire passage remains a quandary. The next question (§ 258–259) moves in a completely different direction. In the previous question the elder advised the king not to act in a manner superior to those among whom he was living when abroad. Here the king asks about something that only the wealthiest and most powerful people could do – build monuments that become testaments to their status and power. But how to construct them so that they endure? The only way to have this happen, the Jewish elder responds, is to make certain that those who build these “majestic” monuments are justly compensated for their labor and they are not overlooked. That way, they will not vandalize what they have built. When God is introduced, the answer becomes at least partially about benefaction. God cares for the human race by giving them health, for instance, and by analogy, the king, who occupies God’s place with respect to his subjects, ought to give them “the reward for their sufferings.” Only actions that originate in justice will endure. Although it has been a while since its last mention, this last sentence reprises the emphasis on justice that occurs with some frequency earlier in the symposia. On giving workers their proper wages, see, for example, Pseudo-Phocylides 19, Tob 4:14 and Sir 34:27. The final question (§ 260–261) recalls those in § 207 (“the teaching of wisdom”) and § 232 (“fruit of justice”).966 The teaching of wisdom, that is, the content of wisdom, was essentially to abide by the golden rule. This answer ends with the results of living by wisdom. The first part of the answer, however, concentrates on how to live by wisdom – by having a clear conscience and living according to truth. The last sentence combines the results of such a life – tranquility, joy, hope in God – with piety, since the respondent assumes that the king will govern “piously.”

965 966

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 201. Tramontano, La Lettera, 217.

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As in the first and third symposia, all those gathered show their appreciation, and the symposium continues with drinking and merriment. Notes § 248. raise. The Greek verb ἄγω, has the connotation of raising or educating children. Thackeray, Andrews, Hadas and Pelletier prefer “educate.”967 Hadas specifically indicates that he understands the emphasis on temperance as referring to a Greek educational curriculum.968 Given the prevalence of Aristotelian ideas generally in the work, I have opted for the more general meaning of bring up or raise, which can also accommodate the more narrow meaning. Shutt translates the word “bring up.”969 § 249. showing kindness. The participle here is εὐεργετῶν, which can also refer to the giving of benefactions. In that sense, the word is appropriate as applied to Ptolemy. Two Ptolemies, Ptolemy III and Ptolemy VIII bore the epithet εὐεργέτης, benefactor. § 250. govern. The Greek verb ἁρμόζω has a wide range of meanings. It has the general meaning of suit, fit or accommodate, and it can also refer to betrothal in marriage or governing. The same verb is used again in § 267, there referring to governance of a kingdom. Given the Jewish elder’s appeal to the image of the pilot who navigates the ship, I think it more likely that the king is asking about how to govern or regulate his wife rather than accommodate or fit with her in the sense of live with or live amicably with, as Andrews, Thackeray, Hadas and Pelletier have it or “reach agreement” à la Shutt.970 § 253. supreme authority. The Greek adjective κύριον is used here as the neuter substantive in its secular sense of supreme or lordly authority. The masculine substantive appears routinely in the Septuagint to translate the Hebrew tetragrammeton, or four-letter name of God. The only place in Aristeas where it is used in a religious sense as a reference to God is in the quotation from Deuteronomy in § 155, where the Septuagint text uses the term.

967

968 969 970

Thackeray, “Translation,” 380; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 116; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 197; Pelletier, Lettre, 213. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 197. Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 29. Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 116; Thackeray, “Translation,” 381; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 199; Pelletier, Lettre, 213; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 29.

400

III. Translation and Commentary

The Sixth Symposium (§§ 262–274) 262. So on the next day, the arrangement of the details for the banquet was as before, and when an opportune moment came, the king questioned those who were left. To the first he said, “How can one avoid turning to arrogance?” 263. And he answered, “If he would hold on to impartiality and he would remind himself in every case that he leads human beings, while at the same time being human. And God pulls down the arrogant, and he exalts the fair and the humble.” 264. And exhorting him, he asked another, “Who should be employed as counselors?” “Those who have proved themselves through many affairs,” he said, “and those who have kept their goodwill to him guileless and those who have the same habits as he. And towards such ends there is a manifestation of God to those who are worthy.” 265. So after praising him, he asked another, “What possession is most essential for a king?” “The kindliness toward and love of his subjects,” he replied. “For through these an unbreakable bond of goodwill occurs. And God accomplishes these things so that they happen according to your purpose.” 266. And after complimenting him, he inquired of another, “What is the aim of rhetoric?” And that one said, “To persuade your opponent by demonstrating errors through an orderly argument. For you will win over your listener not by being contradictory but by employing praise in order to persuade. So persuasion succeeds through the activity of God.” 267. He said that he had spoken well, and he asked another, “How, since the multitudes in the kingdom were so diverse, can one govern them?” “By assuming the role that is proper for each,” he said, “taking justice as a guide. And thus you do, since God grants that you reason soundly.” 268. And after showing favor to this one, he said to another, “Over what things should one grieve?” To this he replied, “The things that happen to our friends when we see that they are long-lasting and inescapable. But yet for those who have died and who are set free from misfortunes, reason indicates no grief. But all humans grieve, reflecting upon themselves and what benefits them. Yet to escape from every misfortune comes by the power of God.” 269. And saying that his answer was as it should be, he said to another, “How does disgrace come about?” And that one said, “When arrogance and unceasing impudence lead, dishonor and destruction of reputation cling closely. But God rules all reputation, inclining where he will.” 270. And when he had confirmed the elements of this one’s answer, he asked the next, “To whom should one entrust oneself?” “To those who associate with you due to goodwill,” he said, “and not due to fear or obsequiousness, who refer everything back to deriving some profit. For one is a sign of love, the other, a sign of ill-will and opportunism. For whoever is motivated to claim a larger share

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than is due by nature is a traitor. But you have the goodwill of all, since God has granted you excellent counsel.” 271. And saying that this one had answered wisely, he said to another, “What maintains a kingdom?” To this he said, “Care and attention, so that no evil is done through those who are appointed over the people for their needs – just as you do, since God has granted you noble purpose.” 272. And after encouraging this one, he asked another, “What protects favor and honor?” And he said, “Virtue. For it is the consummation of good deeds, and it rejects evil, just as you maintain goodness towards all, having this gift from God.” 273. And showing favor and accepting this one also, he asked the eleventh – for there were two more than seventy – “How might one be disposed peaceably within himself even in the midst of wars?” And he responded, “By determining that nothing evil has been done to any of your subjects and that everyone will struggle because of benefactions received, knowing that even if they give their lives, you are the custodian of their patrimony. 274. For you do not cease restoring everyone, since God has granted to you graciousness.” And expressing approval with applause, he received them all with great friendliness, and drinking to the health of each even more, he turned to making merry, joining with the men with gladness and much joy. Textual Notes § 262. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) prints the indefinite τις in his text according to the manuscripts. Pelletier prints it in square brackets expressing doubts about it. Of the thirty-five instances in the symposia where a question begins with πῶς ἄν, this would be the only case where an indefinite pronoun occurs.971 While dubious, Pelletier is clearly reluctant to remove it, since it has the support of the manuscript tradition. § 267. In the question, the manuscripts are divided between the future indicative ἁρμόσει and what appears as if it is supposed to be an aorist subjunctive, ἁρμόση, although the subjunctive should have iota subscript. Various editors have suggested the optative ἁρμόσαι, which would be expected with πῶς ἄν in Aristeas. Thackeray and Pelletier accept the optative as the correct text, and it is the basis for the present translation. § 270. The Greek manuscripts transmit one of two forms of ὁράω: ὁρᾶται in most manuscripts and ὁρᾶ in mss B and Tcorr. This verb does not really fit the context. Mendelssohn suggested ὀρμᾶται, motivated, which suits the context well and can easily account for the other forms as errors. Again, both Thackeray and Pelletier accept it as the proper text, and this is the word I have translated. § 274.

971

Tramontano, La Lettera, 218, argues that it is an indefinite and not an interrogative.

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The last sentence is clearly missing a verb. Mendelssohn proposed adding ἐτράπη, he turned, as in § 261 in the singular and in the plural in § 186 and § 202. All the editions print the verb in pointed brackets. General Comment The sixth symposium begins as do most of the others with a statement that all the details had been arranged as in the earlier banquets. In this symposium we have eleven questions and answers, since there are seventy-two translators to be questioned over seven symposia. The first question (§§ 262–263) directly concerns arrogance (ὑπερηφανία), a subject of importance for our author. It has come up already in § 211 as part of the answer to a question about the primary aim of kingship, where the king is advised not to do anything that is arrogant (ὑπερήφανος). The same adjective occurs in § 170 with respect to Jews offering sacrifices, that they “are conscious of nothing arrogant in themselves.” We will encounter it again in § 269. The answer consists of three parts. First, the king must be impartial (cf. § 191), a theme related to those of justice and the use of reason. For example, in § 252 the king must deliberate for himself the merits of arguments, and he must use proper judgment in dealing with petitions of his subjects. Second, the king must remember that he is a human being who leads (ἡγεῖται) human beings. Throughout the symposia the consistent references to God and his sovereignty, even over the king, create a subtext that the king is not divine in any way. Whether Ps.-Aristeas intended this idea as a critique of the ruler cult remains uncertain, and as we saw above, some scholars understand statements like that in this paragraph in this way. Here, at least, Ps.-Aristeas does confront directly the issue of the king’s humanity. This emphasis on the king’s humanity leads to the third part, which could come directly from any number of Jewish sources, especially from wisdom literature, that emphasize how God deals with the arrogant.972 In Sirach 10, for instance, arrogance forms a subtheme in a larger section on rulers in which the translator uses both the same noun as in Aristeas and its related verb to describe those whom God will overthrow. The beginning of arrogance is sin (10:13), and “Thrones of rulers the Lord brought down, and he seated the gentle in their place” (10:14).973 Ben Sira also reinforces

972

973

That God can take away from some and give to others has already appeared in § 244 (Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2758). Tramontano, La Lettera, 218, sees reminiscences of 1 Reigns 2:7–9, Psalm 145(OG) and Job 12:18, but none use the same term as in Ben Sira and Aristeas, nor are they as specific about the relationship beween rulers and arrogance as is Ben Sira.

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a king’s humanity when he notes that kings will get sick and die and that “when a person dies he inherits creeping things and beasts and worms” (10:11). The second question (§ 264) treats a topic of great importance to kings: who should be their advisors. This is not the first time the subject has arisen. In § 246, as part of the answer about treacherous people, the Jewish elder advised the king to look at how people behave in counsels, and in § 255 the king asked directly about what is good advice. It will resurface in § 270. The present answer harks back to some of the previous advice. The identification of those who have proved themselves and are guileless recalls the advice of § 246 where behavior in both social situations and in official duties offers clues to the motives of those around the king. Here we find added the idea that those who share the king’s habits or character will make good advisors. One unspoken implication of this answer is that the translators embody such characteristics, and thus, they can serve as good advisors to the king, which, of course, is the role that they play in the symposia. After this practical advice, the reference to God only confuses matters.974 In fact, it is not altogether clear what is meant. Apparently if a king is worthy, he will receive a manifestation of God about whom to accept as a counselor.975 Question three (§ 265) reprises a significant theme of the symposia. The question is rather vague, asking about what is most necessary for the king to possess. The answer focuses on care for his subjects, a topic that is dealt with in different ways in § 190, § 207, § 245, § 271, § 273 and § 291. The meaning of the answer depends on how one understands the combination φιλανθρωπία καὶ ἀγάπησις. Most commentators take the two nouns as synonyms, either applying to the king or to the subjects. So, Hadas translates, “Indulgence and love to his subjects,” indicating that the king exemplifies these qualities.976 Thackeray, on the other hand, renders, “The good wishes and love of his subjects,” attributing these qualities to the ruled.977 Murray, however, thinks that φιλανθρωπία refers to the king’s love of his subjects and that ἀγάπησις encompasses love of subjects for their ruler.978 Given the way that φιλανθρωπία and its related terms are used elsewhere 974 975 976

977 978

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 203, calls this reference “clearly an addition.” On the different possible meanings of ἐπιφάνεια, see Tramontano, La Lettera, 219. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 205. He argues that in this period the noun often means “amnesty,” and thus it would refer to the king. Since Hadas takes the two nouns as synonyms here, he must attribute both to the king. Thackeray, “Translation,” 383. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 353–54.

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III. Translation and Commentary

in Aristeas, I think Murray’s solution makes the best sense. The noun occurs again in § 290 connected with the king’s method of rule. The verb is used in § 257 to describe human beings who treat “kindly those who are made subject.” The adjective appears in § 208 in the king’s question and is thus directly connected with aspects of rule. In each case φιλανθρωπία extends from social superiors to inferiors.979 Moreover, as Murray observes, this mutual feeling results in a reciprocal and unbreakable bond between king and subject.980 Of course, as always, the respondent is obliged to credit God with accomplishing the consequences of the practical advice offered. In the next question (§ 266), the king asks about the goal of rhetoric. This topic has not arisen directly as yet, although the answers to the questions in § 252 and § 255 have an indirect relationship to the subject. The response that the point is to demonstrate error through logical argument does not say more than the king undoubtedly would know. Ps.-Aristeas portrays a rhetorical argument in essentially the same manner that he does potential war. In both cases, whether in conflict or when engaged in argument, both of which place people in contradictory stances, one wins over opponents and enemies by eliminating anything that would create a division between the two sides. In § 225, the king obviates any reason to have enemies by treating all with goodwill. In this passage he eliminates oppositon by persuading through praise. Both Hadas and Gruen observe that of all people kings, by virtue of their power, probably have the least practical use for rhetorical persuasion, and so the advice likely forms part of the larger theme of the need for the king to govern by reason.981 As we have seen time and time again, the appeal to God almost negates the force of the practical advice. The aim of rhetoric is to use its strategies to persuade, but ultimately only God persuades. The fifth question and answer (§ 267) address what must have been pressing on some level for the Ptolemaic kings: how to govern the different ethnic groups that made up Egyptian society in this period. The fact that Ptolemy rules over “multitudes” has already been mentioned twice before (§ 190, § 245). In this passage we have the added information that they are diverse. As I noted above in the comment on § 249, people were identified by their ethnicity in Ptolemaic Egypt. Part of the reason had to

979

980 981

Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 354, notes that it often is used of superiors to inferiors. See also Tramontano, La Lettera, 219. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 354. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates 204; Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2759. The latter point is Hadas’s.

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do with civic stratification and identification. Evidence from Egypt suggests that some ethnic groups received permission to form communities (πολιτεύματα) that enjoyed some rights, particularly living “according to their ancestral laws.”982 The exact extent to which these communities had juridical independence is not always clear, but some independence seems assured.983 When the Jewish translator speaks of assuming the role proper to each, he might well be referring to Ptolemy’s relationship to each of these groups that have been granted rights to self-governance for some legal matters. Thus, justice becomes a guide for the king with such ethnic groups.984 The rather obsequious conclusion to the answer reinforces the importance of reason in the execution of the king’s duties, although as always, its origination comes from God. The sixth question (§ 268) reformulates the one asked in § 232. Rather than avoidance, however, the issue is what things deserve expressions of grief. The answer admits to very little that warrants grief – only those things that are long-lasting and inescapable. Death, however, does not qualify nor do misfortunes that are avoided or escaped. Furthermore, our respondent says, grief is essentially selfish or self indulgent, since humans grieve over things that matter to them.985 Reason overcomes grief, however. In these respects, the answer accords with popular philosophical approaches to grief, especially Stoic ones. This short answer also reflects wider ancient concerns about orientations to grief, especially in works on consolation that tried to show the destructive nature of excessive grief. As Han Baltussen puts it, “Since grief was considered an inconvenient and disruptive emotion, the rhetorical and philosophical methods, like the traditional approaches before, aimed to reduce excessive grief and contain the disruptive effects it had on family and society.”986 Earlier philosophical approaches, Platonic, Aristotelian and Stoic, had a deep effect on Hellenistic thinking, especially

982

983

984 985 986

See below on § 310 in which the Greek term is used of at least some Jews. On this paragraph, see as well, see Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 347. On civic stratification in Ptolemaic Egypt, see Aryeh Kasher, The Jews in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt (Texte und Studien zum Antiken Judentum 7; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1985) chap. 1 and Tcherikover and Fuks, Corpus Papyrorum Judaicarum, 1.7. See Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 355. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2759. Han Baltussen, “Introduction,” in Greek and Roman Consolations: Eight Studies of a Tradition and Its Afterlife (Ed. Han Baltussen; Swansea: Classical Press of Wales, 2012) xiv.

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III. Translation and Commentary

in the belief that human emotion could and should be controlled, a theme that permeates the symposia in Aristeas.987 The seventh question (§ 269) is a version of the one about disgrace in § 218 and about how to maintain honor or fame in § 226 and § 234. Reputation, or fame/glory, also appears in § 230 and § 282, and for Ps.-Aristeas it forms a critical aspect of kingship. The answer here is simple: if one acts arrogantly (ὑπερηφανία, cf. § 262) and impudently, one’s reputation will be destroyed. The claim that God controls one’s reputation and imputes it to whom God wants runs directly counter to saying that the king has control of his reputation. Question eight (§ 270) is a virtual repeat of the question in § 264. To entrust oneself to someone is to make them one’s closest confidant or advisor. The answer singles out people of goodwill. Some people will associate with the king out of fear or obsequiousness, and he can tell that by the fact that they look for their benefit in all things. Goodwill signals love for the king while other behaviors signify opportunism. The connection between such behavior and traitors recalls § 246 in which the king asks specifically about treachery. There the king is advised to observe people’s behavior in court protocols for clues to who is not acting in the king’s interest. The invocation of God creates something of a vicious circle. The good counsel that God has granted the king assures him of the good will of the people, but earlier the king is told to look for goodwill in order to identify good counselors. The ninth question (§ 271) reprises one of the crucial duties of a king: care for his subjects. We have already seen this emphasis in § 190, § 245 and § 265. This answer introduces a new element: the actions of the king’s agents or bureaucracy, a major feature of Ptolemaic rule. The king must take care to be sure that those who represent him and work for him do not do evil to his subjects. Of course, the Ptolemies developed a vast bureaucracy in Egypt, and the papyri testify to the extensive dealings that ordinary people had with that bureaucracy – and the difficulties that they sometimes encountered. The addition of God here adds nothing to the answer and, in fact, seems somewhat obsequious. The combination of μέριμνα and φροντίς, care and attention, also occurs in Job 11:18,988 but the context is completely different. Although the noun φροντίς does not occur elsewhere

987

988

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 204–5, notes that philosophers of all the Hellenistic schools wrote tractates on consolation. On this literature, see most recently Baltussen, Greek and Roman Consolations. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 296.

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in the symposia, the related verb φροντίζω, pay attention, consider or provide for, is used in § 245 to express the king’s responsibility to care for his subjects. Question ten (§ 272) comes back to the king’s honor. What protects it? A simple answer: virtue. Of course, this one-word answer sums up much of the advice that the king has been getting. Virtue defined a king, as we have seen already. In some ways, virtue forms the subtext of the majority of the questions and answers in the symposia, even though this is the only place in the symposia where the king is expressly told that he must be virtuous. The gift of God in this passage is goodness, καλοκἀγαθία, the same noun that describes the high priest Eleazar in § 3, thus further emphasizing the equal standing of the priest and Ptolemy that we have observed elsewhere in the work (cf. § 285 as well). In the final question of this symposium (§§ 273–274) the king inquires about how he can maintain equanimity, even in war. This question has in the background a concern for control of the passions and apatheia that we have seen elsewhere,989 and it also looks to be a variation of the question in § 197, although the answer is different. In the present passage, we hear the same answer as we just heard in the previous paragraph – that no evil is done to one’s subjects. The entire answer seems to presume, however, that the issue is how to get the people to support or even fight for the king. The implication of the second part of the answer is that if the king has been a good benefactor, the people will fight for him because of those benefactions they have received (εὐεργετήματα).990 Moreover, these people are aware that even if they die, the king will take care of their property and inheritance, which here looks to be raised almost to the status of a benefaction. The implication is that the king will make sure that the dead person’s property is inherited properly, something that apparently the king already does, because God has made him gracious in this way. With this final answer, the king expresses his approval of all the answers, even as he has done for every single answer, and he and his guests turn to drinking and merriment.

989

990

Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2760, notes that the issue was a particular concern of Stoics and Epicureans. Of course, benefaction has been a constant theme throughout the symposia (see § 190, § 205, § 210, § 259).

408

III. Translation and Commentary

Notes § 262. arrogance. In a note, Meecham only provides references from the LXX/OG translations and the New Testament for the Greek term ὑπερηφανία. Elsewhere he often cites references from classical literature.991 The term is not relegated to Jewish and Christian texts, but is a good classical term with uses in Plato, Aristotle, Menander (4th–3rd c. BCE) and Philodemus (2nd–1st c. BCE), for example. § 263. impartiality. The Greek term ἰσότης can mean either equality or impartiality. Since the king is being reminded that he is human as are his subjects, one might prefer equality. Yet, the passage explicitly recognizes the king as a ruler, and in light of the importance of justice in the symposia, I think that impartiality makes the best sense in this case. fair. The adjective ἐπιεικής and its related noun ἐπιείκεια are favorites of Ps.-Aristeas in the symposia. The noun usually connotes clemency, leniency or equity, as in § 191 and § 207. The adjective can also refer to being lenient or equitable (see § 188 and § 211). In a moral sense, which seems to be the intent here, the adjective can mean fair, good or reasonable, hence my translation above. § 264. habits. The noun τρόπος has a broad lexical range and occurs several times in Aristeas. It can refer to one’s character or way of life, as well as habits. In the present context, the point is that the king’s couselors are like the king, and thus they would understand how to advise him well. As such, one could render either character, way of life or habit. The emphasis of the other two qualities in this description focuses on things the king can observe. Since character in contemporary English often connotes something innate or internal, way of life or habit seem the best options. § 265. your purpose. The noun προαίρεσις has no pronoun to tell us whether God acts according to God’s purpose or according to the king’s. The term has a variety of possible meanings and elsewhere in Aristeas it means “predilection” or “inclination” (§ 3 and § 14) or even “design” (§ 42). In several cases “purpose” fits best (§ 20, § 32, § 233). In § 20 and § 233, God acts to fulfill someone else’s purpose, and in Aristeas we do not find God fulfilling God’s own purpose. Thus, the most likely meaning here is that God acts to make happen what the king already desires. § 267. govern. The same dilemma pertains to this use of ἁρμόζω as in § 250. Is the king asking about how to live amicably with the various ethnic groups or how to govern them? Although the answers to some questions

991

Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 71. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 202, recognizes the classical use but states that it is “more common in the LXX.”

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in the symposia encourage the reduction of the distance between king and subject, the overall aim of those questions focuses on kingly duties having to do with how to govern or rule well. Nothing in the symposia suggests to me that the idea is how to get along with different people. The major concern of the king’s questions and of the answers is how one can rule and maintain a well-functioning kingdom. assuming the role. The verb συνυποκρίνομαι has the connotation of accommodating by pretending. In § 219, we have already seen the metaphor of an actor playing a role applied to the king. Here, rather than pretending, the advice seems to imply that the king might have to deal with different groups of subjects differently. Moore interprets this passage as testifying to “Aristeas’s remarkable confidence that ethnic boundary markers are remaining intact in the Egyptian melting pot.” I think, however, that this interpretation is based on a misunderstanding of the text.992 First, Moore takes the verb ἁρμόσαι to mean that the king wants to know how to get these different ethnic groups to live together amicably.993 However one interprets the verb here, the dative case pronoun functions as the object of the verb, and thus it should be translated “govern them” as I have or “live amicably with them” as some other scholars have. That is, the king is asking about his relationship to those whom he rules and not their own mutual relationships. Moore understands the first of two participles in the answer as indicating that the king must decide the proper role for each ethnic group.994 But the grammar of the sentence and the way that the answer is framed suggest that the two participles that make up the action in the answer both refer to the king. The first participle, συνυποκρινόμενος, then, refers to the king as the one who must play a different role for different groups. The second participle λαμβάνων, which follows, must refer to the king taking justice as a guiding principle. The passage, then, does not reinforce the legal sanction for ethnic boundaries, as Moore contends, but it contains advice for how the king might deal with groups that have some level of self-governance. Joseph Manning has shown eloquently that this is in fact what the Ptolemies did. They played the role of pharaoh for an Egyptian audience and also acted as Hellenistic rulers in other contexts.995 992

993 994 995

Moore subsequently tries to identify an historical moment that fits the text, but since I think that he has not quite gotten the intent of the text, I disagree with the connection he makes. See Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 347. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 347. Moore, “Walls of Iron,” 347. Joseph G. Manning, The Last Pharaohs: Egypt under the Ptolemies, 305–30 BC (Princeton/Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2010).

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III. Translation and Commentary

§ 269. dishonor. According to LSJ, the noun ἀτιμασμός is very rare, only occurring here and in 1 Macc 1:40.996 § 273. patrimony. Here Ps.-Aristeas employs the noun βίος in the plural. It stands in parallel with ἐκ τοῦ ζῆν ἀποτρέχωσιν, give their lives. Pelletier refers to an oath of loyalty to Augustus made in an inscription (OGI 532) by “the Paphlagonians and those Romans who do business with them” in 3 BCE.997 In lines 15–16, we read, “I will spare neither my body nor my soul nor my life nor my children” (μήτε σώματος φείσεσθ[αι μή]τε ψυχῆς μήτε βίου μήτε τέκνων).998 In this case, the people’s lives are expressed in their bodies and souls. The βίος, then, likely refers to their familial property, their patrimony. Given the juxtaposition of βίος and ζῆν in Aristeas, where the infinitive refers to a person’s life (cf. also § 154, § 212, § 253), I have taken βίος in the sense of patrimony.

The Seventh Symposium (§§ 275–292) 275. And on the seventh day, after much preparation had been made, since a great many others had arrived from the cities – for a considerable number of ambassadors were present – the king, when an opportune moment came, asked a question of the first of those who remained: “How can one be undeceived?” 276. And that one said, “By examining the one speaking and what is said and the subject of it, and over much time asking the same things in other ways. But having a sharp mind and being able to discern each matter is an excellent gift of God – since you possess this gift, O King.” 277. And when he had expressed his approval with applause, the king asked another, “Why do most people not accept virtue?” “Because by nature,” he said, “all have become intemperate and inclined toward pleasure. For this reason injustice has grown and the immense quantity of greed. 278. But the state of virtue checks those being threatened by a state of pleasure, and it urges self-control and a preference for justice. Yet God guides all of these things.” 279. After he declared that this one had answered well, the king asked the one after him, “What is necessary for kings to follow?” And he said, “The laws, so that those who act honestly might restore people’s lives. Just as 996 997 998

Noted also by Tramontano, La Lettera, 221. Pelletier, Lettre, 220–21. The text can be found in Wilhelm Dittenberger, Orientis graeci inscriptions selectae (vol. 2; Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1905) no. 532. The translation comes from Robert K. Sherk, The Roman Empire: Augustus to Hadrian (Translated Documents of Greece and Rome 6; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988) 31.

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you, when you do this, establish for yourself an everlasting memorial, by following the divine ordinance.” 280. And when he had said that this one had spoken well, he asked the next one, “Whom is it necessary to appoint as chief magistrates?” And this one said, “Whoever has a hatred for evil and imitates the ruler’s conduct, so that they might always have a good reputation, by doing just things. Just as you accomplish this, O Mighty King, since God has granted you a crown of justice.” 281. And voicing his acceptance of this one, he looked at the next and said, “Who is it necessary to install as commanders over the armies?” And he replied, “Those who excel in courage and justice, and those who make more of saving their men than of having victory, rashly risking life. For just as God benefits all, also you, imitating him, benefit those under you.” 282. He said that he had answered well, and he asked another, “What person is worthy of admiration?” And he said, “The one furnished with reputation, wealth and power and who is in spirit just like all people. Just as you are worthy of admiration for doing this, since God has granted to you diligence about these things.” 283. And when he had agreed also with this one, he said to another, “With what matters is it necessary for kings to spend most of their time?” And he said, “Busying oneself with reading and with accounts of journeys, which, having been written for kings, are intended for the improvement and preservation of humankind. By doing this, you achieve glory out of the reach of others, since God fulfills your intentions.” 284. And he addressed this one energetically as well and asked another, “What must one’s conduct be in recreation and relaxation?” And he said, “To watch with restraint whatever entertains and to put before one’s eyes with decorum and moderation things that happen in life is profitable for one’s life and proper. For even in these things there is a certain edification. 285. For often out of the slightest things some desirable things are brought to light. And you have exercised every restraint and pursued knowledge through your activities, being honored by God because of your noble character.” 286. Being well pleased by the things that had been spoken previously, he said to the ninth, “How should one conduct oneself at banquets?” And he said, “By inviting those who love learning and those who can suggest what is useful to the kingdom and to the lives of those who are ruled – nothing more harmonious and more accomplished would you find. 287. For these are loved by God, since they have trained their minds toward matters of excellence – just as you do this, since all things are guided rightly for you by God.” 288. He was delighted by what was said and inquired of the one following, “Which is best for the multitudes to have established for them, a king who is a commoner or a king who is of royal descent?” And that one said, “The best by nature. 289. For kings have been established who are from royalty and

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III. Translation and Commentary

who have been both savage and cruel to their subjects. But much more also have certain commoners, who have been put to the test by evils and who have shared poverty, when they rule multitudes, turn out to be more hard to bear than unholy tyrants. 290. But as I said before, a good character that has also had a share of education is capable of ruling. Just as you also are a great king, not by being eminent at this in the glory of your rule or in wealth, as much as surpassing all people in fairness and humanity, since God has given you these gifts.” 291. He praised this one for a long time. Then he asked the last one of all, “What is the greatest thing in kingship?” To this he said, “To establish its subjects always in peace and to provide for justice quickly in their disputes. 292. But these things happen because of the ruler, when he is the one who hates evil, loves good and considers it important to save a human life. Just as also you hold injustice to be the greatest evil and by governing all things justly, you have prepared for yourself an everlasting reputation, since God has granted that you have a mind pure and unsullied by any evil.” 293. And when this one had finished, applause burst out with shouts and cheers for a long time. And when it ceased, the king took a cup and drank to all those present and to the words that had been spoken. And finally he said, “The greatest of good things has happened to me because you have come here. 294. For I have benefited greatly by the teaching that you have set down about kingship.” And to each he ordered that three talents of silver be given together with the slave who delivered it. And when everyone together had spoken approval, the banquet was filled with joy, since the king turned to festivity unremittingly. Textual Notes § 275. The Greek manuscripts all have ἦ as the verb in the question. Pelletier accepts the correction of Struve to εἴη as in so many other questions in the symposia.999 Both he and Thackeray print the corrected verb as the main text. § 276. Almost the entire Greek manuscript tradition has the phrase τὸν λέγοντα καὶ τὸν λεγόμενον. Yet, clearly the author’s intention is to distinguish between the person speaking and what was said. In Pelletier’s apparatus, ms O has the neuter article τό, which makes the best contextual sense. Thackeray has it as a correction, noting that all Greek manuscripts (“codd omn”) have the masculine accusative. § 277. Manuscripts B P T all have the genitive τῶν ἀνθρώπων. The remainder of the manuscripts have τινες, some, preceding it. This pronoun becomes unnecessary with οἱ πλείονες, and both Thackeray and Pelletier accept the reading of B P T.

999

See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 222.

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413

§ 279. The manuscripts indicate a good deal of confusion about the text leading to the king’s question. Manuscripts K A G I C, according to Thackeray, simply have ὁ Βασιλεὺς ἠρώτα. The notes in Pelletier and Hadas indicate that there is some lacuna in the text. Hadas simply says, “W-MS fills intervening lacuna with τον μετ’ αὐτόν.”1000 Pelletier comments on ms H’s text, “H omits even the space that the others supply.”1001 Elsewhere in Aristeas the king asks someone specific, the next one or the following one, in every case. Several manuscripts try to fill in with phrases used in other places. Other than ms H, B and T have ἕτερον, and P has τὸν ἑξῆς. Manuscript O reads τὸν μετ’ αὐτόν, which agrees with earlier editorial suggestions. Thackeray (followed by Hadas) simply leaves the phrase without the lacuna filled in. Pelletier accepts the reading of Ms O. Given the evidence of the remainder of the questions, it seems that some indication of the next person should be part of the text. I have followed Pelletier’s decision here. § 281. The Greek manuscripts all have the participle περιβάλλοντας, putting on or over or surrounding, which does not really fit the context. Schmidt suggested παραβάλλοντας, which can mean to expose to danger. Thackeray and Pelletier have accepted it as their text, and I have translated it. § 283. All Greek manuscripts have the prepositional phrase πρὸς τὰς βασιλείας, for kingdoms, which makes little sense. Mendelssohn proposed τοὺς βασιλεῖς, for kings, which Pelletier accepts. Thackeray retains the reading of the manuscripts and translates “for kingdoms.”1002 Hadas prints the text of the manuscripts, but translates “for the use of kings,” which really presumes Mendelssohn’s reading.1003 I have followed Pelletier’s text. // The manuscripts have the adjective ἐφικτός, easily reachable, where the context suggests the opposite should be the case. Manuscript K tries to solve the problem with ὡς οὐκ ἐφικτόν. Wendland (and according to Thackeray Ms Zmg) read ἀνεφικτόν, which both Thackeray and Pelletier print.1004 § 284. The manuscripts are obviously confused as to the first verb in the answer, having either ὁπλίζεται or πλίζεται. Schmidt corrected to παίζεται, which Pelletier and Thackeray print in their main texts and which I have translated. // The phrase βιοῖ σωφρονῶν καὶ 1000 1001 1002

1003 1004

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 208. Pelletier, Lettre, 222 (“τὸν ἄλλον H om. vel spatium praebent cett.”) Thackeray, “Translation,” 386, where he notes the possibility of Mendelssohn’s emendation. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 210. Pelletier, Lettre, 224, simply notes Wendland’s conjecture here and makes no note or remark about the marginal reading in ms Z given in Thackeray. Z is one of the manuscripts that Pelletier did not personally collate.

414

III. Translation and Commentary

κατέχων in the manuscripts looks to be corrupt. Thackeray and Pelletier both accept Wendland’s correction of βίῳ συμφέρον καὶ καθῆκον. § 286. All the manuscripts transmit the phrase χρήματα τῆς βασιλείας, property of the kingdom, which does not really fit the context. Mendelssohn proposed χρήσιμα τῇ βασιλείᾳ, useful for the kingdom, which has been accepted by modern editors and which I have translated. § 288. The manuscripts all have κατασταθῆναι ὑπ’ αὐτῶν. Mendelssohn suggested the more usual construction with ἐπί, which later editors have accepted. // Two textual problems attend the final phrase of the paragraph. First, mss H K A G I transmit ἀρεστόν rather than the superlative ἄριστος of the rest. The context clearly demands the superlative. Second, all of the manuscripts preserve the neuter article with this adjective. The question, however, asks about what person should be king. Schmidt proposed the masculine accusative article τόν, which Pelletier accepts as his main text. Thackeray retains the neuter article of the manuscripts. I have followed Pelletier, since the masculine seems necessary here. § 292. Most Greek manuscripts simply read μέγιστον, greatest, which needs to modify some missing noun. Manuscripts U and B both have κακόν, which all editors accept as the proper text and which I have translated. General Comment This last symposium begins like all the others, except for one feature: more preparations had to be made, since the audience had grown. Our narrator tells us that many ambassadors from the cities had come. Hadas notes that increasing the audience is a rhetorical technique used in the Greek romances for the denouement.1005 We are not told why so many ambassadors have arrived, but the subtext seems to be that the fame of the Jewish translators has spread. The ambassadors must have heard about these impressive philosophers and come to hear them. The increased audience, then, reinforces the theme of the symposia that the Jews are a race of philosophers, indeed better ones than the king’s.1006 Ps.-Aristeas has already indicated in his description of the arrival of the Jewish translators that Ptolemy received embassies as a matter of course (§ 175) and that he had an official who was responsible for them (§ 182). We hear throughout the literature

1005 1006

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 52, 208. On Jews as philosophers, see most recently, Erich S. Gruen, “Jews and Greeks as Philosophers: A Challenge to Otherness,” in The “Other” in Second Temple Judaism: Essays in Honor of John J. Collins (Ed. Daniel C. Harlow et al.; Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 2011) 402–22.

The Symposia (§§ 187–300)

415

of the Ptolemaic period of embassies being sent to and from Egypt (e.g., 1 Macc 10:51). Of course within the narrative itself, Aristeas and Andreas were sent on an official embassy to Eleazar in Jerusalem. In the first question and answer of this final symposium (§§ 275–276) the king wants to ascertain how he can avoid deception. The question relates to an earlier one in § 246 about recognizing treachery, and it further recalls the interest in informers in § 25 and § 166 (although in § 25 informing is not portrayed negatively). Hadas calls the answer “a simple bit of shrewd advice.”1007 The king must test or scrutinize (δοκιμάζων) the speaker, what he says and what he is talking about. He can ferret out potential deception by asking the same questions in different ways. The inclusion of God comes as part of a rather ingratiating compliment that God grants a sharp mind to discern these things – a quality of mind that the king already possesses. Question number two (§§ 277–278) raises the issue of virtue, which has been something of a subtext throughout the symposia, since the most important ancient justification for a king’s position was his virtue. Ptolemy is clearly portrayed as virtuous, as was Eleazar (§ 122). In the course of such a large number of questions and answers, however, our author clearly had only a limited number of possible answers to work with, and he has repeated himself on several occasions. He does so here as well. People do not accept virtue, since they are by nature (φυσικῶς) intemperate or uncontrolled (ἀκρατεῖς) and inclined toward pleasure. This last phrase replicates the verb and noun (τρέπω and ἡδονή) in the king’s question of § 245.1008 The noun ἡδονή, pleasure, also describes people in general in § 108 and “the majority” in § 223. Injustice (ἀδικία) flourishes as a result. The Jewish respondent, then, contends that a state of virtue – here κατάστημα can refer to one’s mental condition or state of the soul – produces just the opposite state of affairs, characterized by ἐγκράτεια, self-control, and δικαιοσύνη, justice. These latter two states reinforce central themes of the symposia, the need for the king to be just and to act with moderation and self-control (cf., for example, § 193, § 209, § 211, § 212, § 222, § 231, § 237, § 256). A number of scholars have associated Aristeas’s view that people incline toward pleasure with the Jewish concept of the yetzer, or the inclination of human beings to do evil.1009 I am not convinced of this point. The primary

1007 1008 1009

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 208. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 298. See Meechan, Letter of Aristeas, 277 and Oldest Version, 255–58; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 118; Tramontano, La Lettera, 275; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 208.

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III. Translation and Commentary

evidence cited for the idea of the yetzer in this period is usually Sir 15:14, “It was he [i.e., God] who created humankind in the beginning, and he left them in the power of their own yetzer.” In Sirach the Hebrew term does not mean evil inclination or even an innate inclination, but free choice, as the NRSV translates it.1010 Philo’s division of a soul that animates humans and animals and the intelligent and reasonable soul (see, for example, Special Laws 4.123–124) also does not reflect this idea.1011 It is crucial to note that Ps.-Aristeas talks about a natural proclivity to turn or incline toward pleasure and lack of self-control, not a natural impulse toward evil. This assessment of the human condition seems much closer to the Stoic idea that humans are driven by impulses (ὁρμαί) and that one’s ability to use correct reason (cf. § 244) and to control one’s passions through reason constitutes the remedy. While Jewish traditions of exegesis of Gen 6:5, for example, might well have influenced Ps.-Aristeas, Meecham’s contention that the idea that humans have an evil impulse implanted at creation “is clearly enunciated in the Letter of Aristeas” overstates the case and, based on the internal evidence of the work, cannot be sustained.1012 We have in this passage, as elsewhere, the author drawing on popular philosophical sources along with ideas drawn from Jewish thought to express his ideas. Question three (§ 279) has as its topic the relationship between the king and the law, which has already been raised briefly in § 240. In Hellenistic kingship theory, this relationship is more complex than Ps.-Aristeas expresses it in his work. Plato, Aristotle and the Stoics argued that a king rules because of his virtue, and in that sense, he is independent of the written law. Either he gives laws based on the ideal Law, with a capital L, or he himself is Law. Plato and Aristotle hold out little or no hope that such a completely virtuous ruler will arise, and so, in Plato’s case, he opts for the second best option, “ordinance and law” (τάξιν τε καὶ νόμον; Laws 875D). Isocrates also expresses a similar viewpoint, when he says “Obey the laws that have been set down by kings, but consider their character (τρόπον) the mightiest law” (To Demonicus 36). Elsewhere in the symposia, Ps.-Aristeas places great emphasis on the king’s duty to be just, and justice was one of the results of the ideal king embodying or conforming 1010

1011 1012

See the explanatory note to this verse in Harold W. Attridge, ed., The Harper Collins Study Bible (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2006) as well as Patrick W. Skehan and Alexander A. Di Lella, The Wisdom of Ben Sira (AB 39; New York: Doubleday, 1989) 371–72. Contrary to Hadas’s claim (Aristeas to Philocrates, 208–9). Meecham, Oldest Version, 255–56. On Stoic ideas of evil, see A. A. Long, “The Stoic Concept of Evil,” The Philosophical Quarterly 18 (1968) 328–43.

The Symposia (§§ 187–300)

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to the ideal Law.1013 Yet, in this paragraph, Ps.-Aristeas does not appear to be referring explicitly to these notions, because in the answer, the respondent replies that the king must follow “the laws” (τοῖς νόμοις), which suggests adherence to some law code rather than the ideal Law.1014 The Jewish translator does connect obedience to the laws with honesty or justice, however, noting that following the laws enables one to act in accordance with this value (δικαιοπραγοῦντες) and thus fulfill the ruler’s duty to safeguard his people. Of course, there is also a model set out in the Jewish scriptures for how the king should relate to the laws, and that is the so-called laws of the king in Deuteronomy 17. Of the various prescriptions for the king, one enjoins him to read the law every day “so that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, diligently observing all the words of this law and these statutes” (Deut 17:19). It is difficult to know whether Ps.-Aristeas is applying this injunction to the Ptolemaic king, when Deuteronomy refers specifically to an Israelite king (cf. 17:15 where no foreigner is permitted to rule over the Israelites). Elsewhere, Ps.-Aristeas has employed biblical injunctions as applying to the king (see § 228 on parents). It may be that Ps.-Aristeas has introduced this idea here in order to curb the power of the king in theory, since in § 253 he has mentioned the king’s absolute power and authority over his subjects. At the end of the answer, the Jewish translator appeals to the king’s sense of enduring fame and memory about which the king has asked on several occasions, most concretely in his question about building projects in §§ 258–259. There the respondent emphasized the enduring nature of acts of justice. Here the respondent says that an “eternal memorial” results from such actions that “follow the divine ordinance.” This appeal to God differs from many others in the symposia in that no noun for God appears. The phrase “divine ordinance” (θείῳ προστάγματι) seems to refer to a command of God, athough what command is not at all clear. In both the LXX and the papyri, the phrase can indicate a command that a deity gives to a person or to a people. In P.Cair.Zen. 59034.19, for example, a certain Zoilos refers to divine commands (τοῖς ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ προστάγμασιν) that Sarapis has given about building a temple. In the Septuagint the noun can refer to specific commandments in the law (cf. Lev 26:46 in the plural;

1013

1014

For a detailed discussion of Hellenistic kingship philosophy with respect to kings and the ideal Law, see Goodenough, “Political Philosophy,” 60–66. Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies 1,” 25, contends that this passage reflects one of several “typical tenets of the Greek theory of government.” But as I have noted, Ps.-Aristeas does not seem to be talking about the ideal Law.

418

III. Translation and Commentary

Deut 19:4 about murderers) or to a specific ad hoc command that God gives (cf. Num 9:18 where the Lord commands the Israelites to encamp in a particular place). In this paragraph the singular seems to refer to a command of God that the king follow the laws, which will result in honest behavior. In light of the singular use and in contrast to the plural “laws” that begins the answer – with no noun for God, which is unusual in the symposia – I suspect that our author might indeed be making an allusion to the commandment in Deuteronomy 17 that the king follow the law, even though he would be adapting that command to suit a foreign king.1015 Questions four and five (§§ 280–281) make specific a theme that our author has raised as a general matter elsewhere, namely, with what sort of people ought the king to surround himself (cf. § 246, § 264, § 270). In the first instance, the question concerns a civil office, and in the second, a military leader. Magistrates (στρατηγοί) must hate evil, but more importantly, they should imitate the ruler’s conduct. The argument here is a step removed from several answers to the king’s questions, that he must imitate God, and it creates a hierarchy of exemplars. The king must imitate God, and the magistrate must imitate the king. The respondent also demonstrates an awareness of how important confidence in these magistrates is, since the point is that they maintain a good reputation and thus, presumably, the people’s trust. Moreover, a concern for the king’s reputation pervades the symposia (e.g., § 217, § 226, § 230, § 234, § 258, § 269, § 272), and presumably the trustworthiness of magistrates reflects on the king’s reputation. Of course, the Jewish elder compliments the king, who already behaves this way. When it comes to military commanders, they must exercise both courage (ἀνδρεία) and justice (δικαιοσύνη), the two cardinal virtues that best suit military leadership. The advice to appoint commanders who do not risk life rashly seems a bit counter to what a king might require, since victories often mattered more to the survival of the realm than soldiers’ lives. Hadas suggests that it represents the value that particularly the Stoics set on human life.1016 Within this answer, the issue is connected to the king’s

1015

1016

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 209, thinks that this statement “demonstrates our author’s universalist and spiritual concept of Judaism.” He concludes this, however, on the basis that Ps.-Aristeas could not have expected the king to follow a particularly Jewish commandment (although he does not say what he thinks that commandment to be). This assumption is not warranted, however, as we have seen elsewhere in the book. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 210. On the qualities of a ruler that are similar to these, see Xenophon, Memorabilia 3.2 (Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 25).

The Symposia (§§ 187–300)

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responsibility to be a benefactor. Since God works good things for all (εὖ ἐργάζεται), the king must imitate him – a move back up the exemplary hierarchy from § 280 – and benefit those under him. In this case, the pronoun “those” seems to refer to the soldiers rather than to the commanders. If § 280 can serve as an analogy, the military commanders should be imitating the king, as the magistrates are supposed to; thus, the downward benefit of the benefaction ought to accrue to the soldiers. The king’s concern for their lives seems to be viewed as a benefaction. In § 273 we also see some reflection on fighting a war, where the answer also focuses on the king’s benefactions and his restoring of the people. In question six (§ 282) the king inquires about who should be admired. The answer adds nothing new to what has been said already in the symposia. This is the third time, though, that the king has been advised not to place himself above other people (cf. § 257, § 263). In this light, the combination of requiring the king to follow “the divine ordinance” in § 279 and the exhortation not to regard himself as superior might well allude to Deuteronomy 17 in which both duties occur. There the king is to keep the law “so that his heart may not be exalted above his brothers” (17:20 NETS). The answer concludes with the complimentary, almost obsequious, remark that the king is already admired because God has enabled him to be diligent about doing these things. The next three questions all treat the king’s daily life. In question seven (§ 283) Ptolemy asks specifically about how to spend his time. The answer is very practical – he should concern himself with the administrative affairs of the kingdom. To explain this passage, some scholars have cited Plutarch (Sayings of Kings and Commanders 189d), who cites a letter of Demetrius of Phalerum to a Ptolemy in which he encourages him to buy books and read them, because “those things that friends are not bold enough to recommend to kings, they have written in books.”1017 Murray dismisses the relevance of the passage, since in his view records of journeys are completely different from kingship treatises, which seem to be the subject of Plutarch’s citation.1018 The answer in Aristeas recommends two activities, however, reading and records of journeys, which function as a compound object of the infinitive διατρίβειν. Unfortunately, our author does not specify exactly what a king should be reading other than official records of journeys, and even the word “journeys” does not have any more spe-

1017

1018

E.g., Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 26; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 210–11; and Pelletier, Lettre, 224. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 257.

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III. Translation and Commentary

cific meaning. It could refer to military marches or to inspections. Perhaps Ps.-Aristeas intended the term to cover all official travels, both military and civilian. The passage is not clear enough to warrant any firm conclusion as to what documents Ps.-Aristeas intends the king to read. The qualifier that these written documents “are intended for the improvement and preservation of humankind” gets us no closer to identifying them. The eighth question (§§ 284–285) turns to the king’s recreational behavior. The answer assumes that the king will watch theatrical performances. The Jewish respondent does not condemn such activity, but rather he says that such performances can be profitable and edifying, since even “the slightest things” might reveal something profitable. Yet, the king must watch “with restraint,” which philosophy instills, probably through Peri Basileus advice, such as the Jewish translators are giving to Ptolemy.1019 In this passage we hear the echoes of the encouragement to moderation that we have encountered in several answers in the symposia. The answer betrays some ambivalence about the theater as well, since apparently at least some performances in the theater can lead to lack of restraint. We see a similar ambivalence in another Alexandrian Jew, Philo, who can describe his own attendance at dramatic theater performances (On Drunkenness 177; Every Good Man is Free 141) and yet can decry its frequently unbridled and dissolute character, especially when mock wars and other spectacles were staged (On Husbandry 35–36).1020 Of course, we know of at least one Alexandrian Jew, Ezekiel the Tragedian, who composed a play based on the Exodus story.1021 Question nine (§§ 286–287) turns to the symposium itself. The question and answer do not really fit together, since the king inquires about conduct and the answer focuses on whom to invite. Of course, the Jewish translator advises the king to invite people exactly like those whom he is questioning – learned people who can give the king good advice about administering a kingdom and ruling his subjects. As elsewhere, the picture of the ideal advisor fits these Jewish emissaries to a T. Ps.-Aristeas again constructs the Jewish translators as philosophers. Such people are not only good for a

1019 1020

1021

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 212. On Philo’s view of the theater, which is generally critical, see Jeff Jay, “The Problem of the Theater in Early Judaism,” JSJ 44 (2013) 222–32. The author does not treat this passage from Aristeas. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 211, understands this passage as a criticism of the theater. Based on rabbinic views, he calls this “[s]trange advice from a Jewish teacher.” I see no reason for this to be strange, given what we can derive from Aristeas about the lives of educated Alexandrian Jews.

The Symposia (§§ 187–300)

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symposium; God loves them, because they have undertaken such learning.1022 This advice is consistent with Hellenistic period developments in which philosophers were seen as advantageous resources for kings, despite the views of Epicurus, who, according to Plutarch, thought it inappropriate for philosophers to attend symposia (Moralia 1095C).1023 As we saw in the excursus above, the invitation of philosophers as symposiasts seems a little unusual for Hellenistic practice, where such learned people often would function as meta-symposiasts, there to steer the conversation. With the last two questions, we approach the end of the seven symposia. These questions are among the longest in the seventy-two questions and answers, and with one question asking about kings and one about kingship, they function as a general summary of Ps.-Aristeas’s main points in the previous seventy. Question ten (§§ 288–290) addresses who is the best sort of person to be king. Should it be a commoner or someone of royal descent? Based on everything that has been said so far in the symposia, the answer is obvious – this is essentially a false choice. The “best by nature” ought to rule, a criterion that Ps.-Aristeas has raised on several occasions and that various political philosophers propounded.1024 The respondent demonstrates that both types of people can make terrible rulers, those of noble birth, who are cruel to their subjects, or commoners, who have experienced the trials of common people and who can turn out to be worse than nobility. The best person to rule is the virtuous person, one who has good moral character (ἦθος) and who has been educated (παιδεία; cf. § 121). Great riches and fame do not make a good ruler, but rather fairness (ἐπιεικεία) and humanity (φιλανθρωπία), qualities that Ps.-Aristeas has emphasized throughout. This answer, then, simply reiterates what has been said elsewhere and really does not add anything new to the discussion. In the eleventh question in this symposium and the seventy-second of the symposia (§§ 291–292), the king asks what is the greatest achievement of kingship. The respondent replies that the best situation is when subjects can live in peace and have justice administered, characteristics that we have seen throughout the symposia. A kingdom can only exist in this way, however, if it has a monarch who hates evil (cf. § 280), loves good (n.b. § 272 where virtue “rejects evil”), and values human life (cf. § 281) – that is, a 1022

1023 1024

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 212, suggests that this statement reflects the author’s universalism, since God apparently loves all people of learning, not just Jewish ones. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2762. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 212, argues that this is a Cynic-Stoic view, since nature was so important to them, but this idea certainly agrees with Plato’s and Aristotle’s views as well.

422

III. Translation and Commentary

virtuous king.1025 This last respondent, like so many others, compliments the king, who will achieve the reputation he has inquired about on several occasions in the symposia. Of course, it is only fitting that the answers end with an appeal to God, who has given the king such a disposition. The symposia conclude with an inclusio that is formed by the reiteration of the applause that preceded the seven symposia in § 186: After Elissaios offered his prayer, “applause broke out along with shouting and joyous cheer for a long time” (κατερράγη κρότος μετὰ κραυγῆς καὶ χαρᾶς εὐφροσύνου πλείονα χρόνον). In § 293, “And when this one had finished, applause burst out with shouts and cheers for a long time” (κατερράγη κρότος μετὰ φωνῆς καὶ χαρᾶς ἐπὶ πλείονα χρόνον). After the king’s final approval of the translators’ answers, he gives each man three talents of silver and a slave.1026 As in all the other symposia, the festivities continue after the conversation. Notes § 279. What. The modern translations differ on how to render the Greek interrogative τίσι. Hadas, Shutt and Pelletier all interpret it as referring to persons: “Whom should the king follow?”1027 Hadas, who seems to be following Tramontano, argues that this question represents a personification of the law and is an allusion to Plato’s Crito.1028 I think it much more likely that since the answer focuses on law and the pronoun is in the plural, that the question has to do with what a king should follow. I see no necessity, then, to follow Hadas, Shutt and Pelletier for the translations nor to accept the interpretation of Tramontano and Hadas. § 280. chief magistrates. Although the Greek word στρατηγός in its classical usage refers to a military commander, in Greek and Roman Egypt it refers to the governor of a nome. Since the next paragraph refers to military commanders, a civil administrator must be the subject here.1029

1025

1026

1027

1028 1029

See Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 353, who notes that for Ps.-Aristeas, the three-fold combination of peace, justice and kingly virtue are most important. Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 120, apparently does not think that the Jews would/ should be given slaves. He adds the verb “appointed” in italics, so that the king gives the money but appoints a slave to deliver it. See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 215. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 209; Shutt, “Letter of Aristeas,” 31; Pelletier, Lettre, 223. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 209. Pelletier, Lettre, 222–23; Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2761.

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crown of justice. The phrase crown of justice/righteousness perhaps means that God has rewarded the king with justice because of his actions, which have been noted on several occasions in the symposia. The term στέφανος denoted a physical wreath or crown given as an honorary symbol or for a victory, but it came to have a metaphorical meaning, which might be most appropriate here.1030 Many scholars have noted that the phrase occurs in the TLevi 8:2 and 2 Tim 4:8. Neither instance sheds much light on its use in this paragraph, however. In 2 Timothy the crown of righteousness is an eschatological reward, and in TLevi a crown of righteousness is one of several metaphorical priestly garments with which Levi is invested in a vision. § 282. in spirit just like all people. There is some disagreement among scholars as to how this phrase ought to be translated. The Greek, καὶ ψυχὴν ἴσον πᾶσιν ὄντα is subject to more than one possibility. Most translators have understood it as I have translated it above. Murray takes it to mean that the king’s soul is equal to his riches, fame and power. Andrews translates it in this way as well.1031 Given the repetitive nature of the symposia in which some answers evince concern about the king not allowing himself to feel superior, I have adopted this interpretation. § 283. accounts. The Greek term ἀπογραφή usually denotes a list, and specifically it can denote a tax list, a census list or a muster list of soldiers. This unspecified use in Aristeas does not enable one to determine if the author has an exact type in mind. § 286. accomplished. The Greek has the adjective μουσικώτερον, which strictly means “musical.” It can have a more metaphorical meaning of elegant, fitting or accomplished. Hadas thinks that the adjective used here recognizes the substitution of philosophical conversation for the more classical appearance of entertainment and music at a symposium.1032 The book of Ben Sira also refers to music as well as conversation at a banquet, although it is not clear if these gatherings were formal symposia (cf. 32:3–6). § 290. fairness and humanity. In addition to the qualities of ἐπιεικεία and φιλανθρωπία within Aristeas, see Polybius 5.10.1 where the same pair of nouns describes Philip of Macedon, who, Polybius says, gained a victory over the Athenians not so much by force of arms as by his fairness and

1030 1031

1032

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 209–10, notes this meaning. For examples, see LSJ. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 356; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 119. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 212.

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III. Translation and Commentary

humanity. See also §§ 193–194 where the reply encourages the king not to rely on force of arms. § 293. drank to. The Greek verb ἐπιχέω has the general meaning of pour out or on, but with the genitive case, as we have in this paragraph, it can mean to drink to something. Most translators render it with something like “drank a toast,” the sense I have followed here. Hadas has “poured a toast,” which almost has the sense of making a libation.1033

Excursus on Aristeas, Hellenistic Symposia and Peri Basileus Literature (Part 2) After having examined the symposia in some detail, we are in a position to make some synthetic remarks. The form of the symposia and the various topics of the questions and answers make it hard to sustain Zuntz’s theory that Ps.-Aristeas had a specific Peri Basileus treatise as one of his sources. Certainly our author has drawn on kingship theory in order to construct his work, but Murray’s assessment of Ps.-Aristeas’s technique in this section makes better sense of what we encounter in these seven banquets than does Zuntz’s. If we only compare Aristeas to another, somewhat earlier treatise on kingship, that of Isocrates in his letter to Nicocles, we find a number of important thematic commonalities but very little else that is similar. Ps.-Aristeas employs a question and answer format, which seems to be his invention.1034 His material is nowhere as systematic or as well organized as Isocrates’s treatise. Finally, the most compelling argument for rejecting Zuntz’s theory is Ps.-Aristeas’s use of his sources. Throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas incorporates and adapts his various source materials to suit the narrative that he constructs. This is equally as true for the Jewish scriptural material as it is for his Greek sources. Whether it is his description of the king’s gifts for the Jerusalem Temple or his description of Judea and Jerusalem, for example, he transforms his sources to fit the requirements of his narrative.1035 Such practice on Ps.-Aristeas’s part makes Zuntz’s account dubious, Murray’s trenchant criticisms notwithstanding.1036

1033 1034 1035 1036

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 215. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 346. For discussion of this point, see Murray, “Aristeas and His Sources,” 124–25. See Part 1 of this Excursus that precedes the detailed commentary on the symposia, above 327–335.

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Within this section, Ps.-Aristeas has incorporated several different types of material.1037 Along with his use of kingship theory, he certainly knows popular philosophical ideas and Jewish scriptural texts, all of which he fuses together into a whole that makes the project of separating the Greek from the Jewish elements beside the point. If, for instance, we take the advice in § 193 not to trust in arms and force, we might ask if this idea comes from Jewish or Greek sources. One can certainly find it in Jewish literature (cf. 1 Macc 3:19), yet, as we saw in Polybius, who attributes Philip of Macedon’s victories less to force of arms than to his “fairness and humanity,” Greek authors also could prefer virtue to military might. The difference is the Jewish author’s insistence that the king must appeal to God – but, of course, our author appeals to God in every question in an attempt to bring all of these ideas under the umbrella of the Jewish god. Doing so does not make it any less difficult in many cases to distinguish Greek from Jewish. So, while our author has drawn on Peri Basileus literature, he has not produced a Peri Basileus treatise of the sort that we read in earlier Greek literature. Into this mix he has imported subjects that do not properly belong in these works, such as topics more suited to Greek philosophical discourse. The questions about grief or wisdom or the nature of philosophy reveal the influence of popular philosophical ideas on Ps.-Aristeas. This material does not originate from any single philosophical school or approach. Whereas the ideas of temperance and control of the passions (cf. § 197) can be found in Aristotle, so can they be encountered in Stoic thought. The inability to tie Ps.-Aristeas’s philosophical ideas to any one school of thought reemphasizes both his adaptation of his source material to his narrative and in this case, the likelihood that these ideas came from more popular philosophical discourse rather than from the author’s connection with or adherence to any specific philosophical approach. With respect to the Jewish material in this section, the author’s references to God seem intended to claim all of the ideas in the section as expressions of Judaism, however awkward and artificial their inclusion might feel at times. Indeed, there is nothing in this section that is incompatible with Jewish thought.1038 Yet, Ps.-Aristeas only infrequently makes transparent references or allusions to specific Jewish texts, the reference to the fifth commandment in § 228 being remarkable by its uniqueness. Certainly he trades in Jewish commonplaces, just as he does Greek ones. So, when he

1037

1038

On the types of material and sources, see Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I”; Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship”; and More, “Kingship Ideology.” The point is also made by Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 361.

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says in § 224 that God determines who is king, he makes a statement that can be found with frequency in Jewish literature. Perhaps certain texts, like Deuteronomy 17, the so-called Laws of the King, form part of the inspiration for this section, but that is by no means obvious. One gets the feeling that as other Jewish authors, such as Artapanus and Josephus, try to demonstrate how Greeks and Egyptians have gotten their knowledge and wisdom from the Jews, so Ps.-Aristeas also tries to show that the Jews possess this knowledge, that it is Jewish and that Jews can express it on terms equal with or better than Greek philosophers. Ps.-Aristeas’s obvious comfort with Hellenistic culture forms the backdrop of his portrayal of the Jewish translators as being able to compete with Greeks on their turf as well as to serve as trusted advisors to the king. Yet, the manner in which Ps.-Aristeas claims these ideas as Jewish and the portrayal of the translators as philosophers is much more restrained than in other Jewish works whose authors explicitly cast Judaism as superior to Greek and Egyptian culture. Artapanus explicitly claims that every element of Egyptian culture derived from Moses’ genius, including, astonishingly, the worship of animals. Ps.-Aristeas does not come close to making such assertions. The symposia seem quite affable affairs, where not only the king but the gathered non-Jewish philosophers as well applaud the translators’ efforts.1039 Yes, the Jews best the king’s philosophers in a way, but Ps.-Aristeas does not set these symposia up as competitions. They are not life-and-death situations as are the questions in the story of Alexander and the Gymnosophists. The king’s philosophers are not involved in the conversation, nor are they portrayed as dismayed at the superiority of the Jews’ answers. Rather than a statement of Jewish superiority and especially in comparison with other Alexandrian-Jewish works that emphasize it, I am more inclined to view the symposia as an expression of the possibilities of Jewish and Greek commensality.1040 This is what happens when people gather at symposia; they engage in philosophical discourse, and some might get the philosophical upper hand. These exchanges amount to friendly competition in which everyone drinks together afterwards. Indeed, this is what happens in Ps.-Aristeas’s symposia. For Ps.-Aristeas, Jews and Greeks can do more than co-exist; they can flourish together. Jews can rival Greeks or at least stand on the same ground with them in literature and philosophical ideas, and Greeks are willing to compensate for Jewish particularism, as

1039 1040

Contra Gruen, Heritage and Hellenism, 216–17. Again, contra Zuntz, “Aristeas Studies I,” 32–33 and Gruen, Heritage and Hellenism, 217–18.

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exemplified by the king’s willingness to arrange the banquets according to Jewish dietary habits.1041 These conclusions raise the question of the section’s purpose. At almost one-third of the book, the symposia are not a diversion from the author’s main point, but rather they are central to it. If the section is not meant to establish the superiority of Jews over Greeks, what is its purpose in the book? I think that it serves several functions. Murray observes, correctly in my view, that at least part of the purpose is “to demonstrate the wisdom of the elders and the respect shown to them by Philadelphus and his philosophical experts. Thus, the status of the translators would enhance the status of their translation and their faith.”1042 One of the means by which Ps.-Aristeas constructs a scaffold of authority for the Greek translation of the law is to show that the translators have training in both Hebrew and Greek, and as a result, their product can stand as a work of Greek literature in addition to its status as the authoritative scripture of the Alexandrian Jewish community.1043 The symposia firmly establish the translators’ credentials for the translation project, which results in a work that is “divine” and “philosophical,” as is the Hebrew original. By utilizing both Jewish and Hellenistic sources, he demonstrates the translators’ ability to carry out the enterprise of producing a Greek version of the law that functions as a Greek book and that can stand independently of the Hebrew original. By adapting the question-and-answer form found in other stories of kings and wise men and combining it with advice to kings, our author makes his point more than abundantly clear. Murray argues, however, that the extensive length of the section must have greater significance than this, and he suspects political motives as well.

1041

1042

1043

See Honigman, “Best of all the Greeks” and Barclay, “Using and Refusing.” Some scholars have begun to use the term hybridity to characterize this kind of cultural appropriation. The term comes out of post-colonial critique and its classic articulation was by Homi Bhabha in several places but most accessibly in The Location of Culture (London: Routledge, 1994). Along with ideas of mimicry, the concept of hybridity entails much more than cultural appropriation by a colonized people. Rather, the term indicates a variety of strategies of appropriation and resistance. I hesitate, then to use the term of Aristeas, since we do not know how Aristeas might have functioned as part of resistance strategies as well as ones of appropriation. Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 361. Murray also understands the book to have a proselytizing purpose, even if only partially. I am more dubious of this conclusion. Wright, “Transcribing, Translating, and Interpreting,” 153–54. See also de Crom, “Letter of Aristeas.”

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Yet, although he reconstructs an elaborate political motive for the section connected with the temple at Leontopolis, he has to admit that “Aristeas was not, of course, so incompetent as to leave in his text clear proof that he wrote with the events as a background.”1044 This is a significant admission, and one that should give the interpreter pause, but are there other possible functions for the section? As I argued above, the symposia contribute to Ps.-Aristeas’s desire to portray Jews and Greeks as able to live together, despite Jewish particularism about matters such as food laws. The translators, and hence elite, educated Jews, are readily accepted into the halls of power as Jews, where Greeks dominate. Whether Aristeas reveals that Jews were already employed as advisors to the Ptolemaic crown, as Murray argues, or not, Ps.-Aristeas makes the argument that Jews can participate in the majority culture without compromising their Judaism.1045 They can even give the king profitable advice on kingship. By integrating Jewish and Greek perspectives in the symposia, our author makes a statement about Jewish and Greek value systems, one that he has made in a different way throughout the book, even in Eleazar’s speech: Educated Jews and Greeks share a common set of values that allows Jewish integration into elite Greek society.1046 Finally, within the narrative world of the text, the symposia reinforce the comparable status of Ptolemy and Eleazar, both of whom display elsewhere in the book several of the qualities discussed in the questions and answers of the symposia, even though the exact terms might not be used to describe them. So, to take Ptolemy, his justice is specifically noted in § 24, his generosity in § 26 and his concern for a good reputation in § 39 and § 80. Eleazar specifically calls himself Ptolemy’s friend in § 41, emphasizing the quality of the people whom the king trusts (cf. § 40). The gifts to the temple are clearly framed as an act of both piety and benefaction, qualities repeatedly emphasized in the symposia, and Eleazar explicitly mentions that Ptolemy has given the Jews benefactions (§ 44). The king is a “lover of goodness” (§ 124; cf. § 292); he safeguards his kingdom (§ 125). The portrait of Ptolemy both in the symposia and throughout the letter paints a picture of a foreign king to whom the Jews can be subject and still maintain their distinctive Jewish identity.1047 Now to Eleazar, although not as perva1044 1045 1046 1047

Murray, “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 368. For Murray’s argument, see “Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship,” 370–71. See Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.” See More, “Kingship Ideology,” 319, who also makes this point. He also claims, however, that other than δικαιοσύνη, the various virtues treated in the symposia are not found in either Ptolemy I Soter or Ptolemy II Philadelphus (312). He seems to

Aristeas’s Praise of the Translators (§§ 295–300)

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sive as with Ptolemy, Ps.-Aristeas portrays the high priest as a good judge of character who has surrounded himself with friends and as someone who protects his “kingdom” – see § 125 where he is explicitly compared favorably to Ptolemy in these respects. His willingness to send the translators is also framed as an act of benefaction to Ptolemy’s realm. While not a central function of the symposia, the virtues and characteristics discussed in this section reinforce Ps.-Aristeas’s earlier portrayal of Ptolemy and Eleazar as equals, and by extension the people that they represent.

Aristeas’s Praise of the Translators (§§ 295–300) 295. So if I have gone on at length about these matters, O Philocrates, forgive me. For I have marveled at the men beyond what is fitting, since on the spur of the moment they gave answers that required a great deal of time, 296. and also since the one who asked the questions had thought carefully about each one and those who answered made their responses one after the other. They were clearly worthy of admiration from me and from those present, and especially from the philosophers. And I suppose that to those who receive the description it will appear unbelievable. 297. But to lie about things that are being narrated is not right. And if I were to pass over anything in these matters, it would be impious. But, just as it happened, we have set it out clearly, being acquitted of any error. Therefore, acknowledging the power of their speech, I have tried to get hold of every detail of what happened, both in the king’s audiences and in the symposia, from those things that were recorded. 298. For it is the custom, just as you know, to record everything that is said and done from the time when the king begins to give audiences until the time he goes to sleep, something good and beneficial to do. 299. For on the next day before any audiences take place, the things that were done and spoken previously are read, and if something is not correct, that matter gets set aright. 300. Therefore, we have set everything down, as it has been recounted, having gotten everything accurately from those things that were recorded, since I know that you have a love of learning for things that are useful.

reach this conclusion because the specific terms do not always appear. But this is not an accurate assessment. First, the quality of piety is applied specifically to Philadelphus. Second, if one does not worry about specific vocabulary but rather the actions taken, several of the qualities from the symposia characterize Philadelphus, as I have enumerated them here.

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Textual Notes § 295. The manuscripts transmit ἐγὼ δὲ εἶπα πλείονα καί, and I have spoken at length. Scholars have noticed the close resemblance with Diodorus Siculus 1.90.4. On this basis and the request for forgiveness that calls for some conditional, Mendelssohn suggested ἐγὼ δὲ εἰ πεπλειόνακα, which Pelletier follows and is the basis for the present translation. Also with respect to Diodorus, Wendland thought that the simple dative object τούτοις required the preposition ἐν, but scholars have not generally followed him. Pelletier remarks that this suggestion is “less grammatically satisfying.”1048 § 298. The manuscripts seem to be corrupt when it comes to the expressions of time in this paragraph. The Greek tradition has ἀφ’ ἧς ἂν ἡμέρας … οὗ. Various editors have tried to rectify the problem of ἡμέρας by suggesting ἡμέρας ὥρας (Wendland following T. Gomperz) or ὥρας alone (Mendelssohn). Pelletier makes a compelling argument that the likely earliest reading was simply ἀφ’ ἧς. Subsequently ὥρας was joined, and then at a second stage of corruption, ἡμέρας was written mistakenly for ὥρας.1049 Since none of the existing manuscripts read ὥρας, Pelletier prints ἡμέρας in the text in square brackets, indicating its very tentative status. The present translation essentially ignores the word ἡμέρας to arrive at the best sense. § 300. The syntax of the paragraph is somewhat convoluted, but the manuscripts transmit the phrase πάντ’ οὖν ἀκριβῶς πάντων (mss B T simply have τῶν) ἀναγεγραμμένων. The simple genitive case seems inadequate to express the relationship intended in the phrase. Wendland suggested παρὰ τῶν ἀναγεγραμμένων, with the preposition making the relationship explicit: “everything accurately from those things that were recorded.” Thackeray prints the phrase παρὰ τῶν in pointed brackets, while Pelletier has these words in his text, and it serves as the basis for my translation. General Comment This section, though longer than others of the same kind in Aristeas, creates a transition between obvious sections of the work. In each place where such a segue occurs, the author makes a transitional comment to Philocrates. Besides the introduction (§§ 1–8) and the Epilogue (§ 322), we find remarks directed to Philocrates at § 34, § 51, § 83, § 112, § 120 and § 171. In § 120 and here, perhaps due to the subject matter that he has just narrated – Eleazar’s apologia and the symposia – Ps.-Aristeas harks back

1048 1049

Pelletier, Lettre, 251 (“grammaticalement peu satisfisant”). Pelletier, Lettre, 251–52.

Aristeas’s Praise of the Translators (§§ 295–300)

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to his description of Philocrates in the Preface. In both cases he refers to Philocrates’s love of learning, and in both places he emphasizes that he has made his account for this reason. The transition in §§ 295–300, however, is longer than any of the others and makes appeals that the others do not. In line with a range of ancient genres, Ps.-Aristeas has chosen to use “ego-narrative” for his work, that is, an account that claims to be from an eyewitness. Such first-person accounts in historiography can be traced back to Herodotus, but by the Hellenistic period this device was employed in a wide range of genres, including fiction, to lend an air of veracity to the narrative and intentionally to blur the line between historiography and fiction.1050 The narrator’s personal apology for the length of this section (§§ 295–296) allows the author in the guise of Aristeas both to summarize his assessment of the translators and to reinforce Aristeas’s presence at the events. He takes the opportunity to marvel at the skill of the translators who could answer on the spur of the moment questions that the king apparently had thought through beforehand. The crucial point, though, is the admiration that this “Gentile” has for these men, but just as significantly, the admiration that the philosophers present had for them. Aristeas has seen this himself – at least that is how I understand the phrase “from me and from those present, and especially from the philosophers.”1051 The reiteration of this specific aspect of the symposia (cf. § 201 and § 235) points to at least one of the reasons that the author included this section, that Jews can stand with Greeks on the Greeks’ turf. The next sentence, however, potentially exposes even a bit more. The claim that this account might sound “unbelievable” (ἄπιστον) to those who “receive” (παραληψομένοις) it sounds like a direct appeal to his audience.1052 Surely the sentence has a rhetorical function in the section, since it serves as a transition to the second proof of the narrative’s veracity. Yet,

1050

1051

1052

On the ego-narrative as a literary device in Hellenistic works as well as in Aristeas, see Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 67–71. On the decision to use a Gentile as the pseudonymous author of the work, see in addition Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.” For a discussion of the genre of the book and its subgenres, see the Introduction. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 70, 169 n. 24, thinks that the narrator has not been present at the symposia and that this explains the appeal to official documents. Given the phrase that includes “Aristeas” with those at the symposia and the fact that he is ubiquitous throughout the book, I do not agree. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2764, argues that the insistence on the veracity of the narrative is conventional and aims to set it within the framework of Hellenistic historiography.

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this narrative might indeed sound incredible to a Jewish audience who read it. A group of Judeans comes to Alexandria, dines with the king on seven successive nights, answers his questions with such aplomb that he ranks them ahead of his own philosophers (who must be eminent, given their presence at court) – such a story might be greeted with suspicion. In order to head off any incipient criticism that he is exaggerating (and thus acting like a writer of fictional accounts rather than historical?) our narrator Aristeas offers an alternative set of evidence, official documents that he has seen in which the entire affair is transcribed (§§ 297–300). Consistent with Greek historiographical technique, Ps.-Aristeas has included copies of official documents elsewhere in the book. Yet, he also has alluded to the presumed availability of official documents without citing them explicitly – the Ptolemies administered their kingdom via edicts (§ 28) and Ptolemy had available to him official records of “journeys” (§ 283). Of course, numerous papyri have survived that testify to the extensive use of letters and reports as means of administering the Ptolemaic realms. Here, however, the narrative claims that everything that was said and done during the king’s audiences was recorded and then read back for correction.1053 The narrative pretense seems to be that Aristeas was so taken by the power of their discourse, certainly the length of it, that he wanted to make sure that he was accurate in transmitting every detail to Philocrates. In this section, then the narrator offers two proofs of the success of the translators’ responses to the king’s questions – his eyewitness experience and, if the power of their speech has biased his reflections, the transcriptions of the symposia taken from the royal archives.1054

1053

1054

Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 216–17, mentions U. Wilcken, “Ὑπομνηματισμοί,” Philologus 53 (1894) 80–126 in which he publishes a papyrus from 232 CE that looks to be the journal or diary of a strategos in Egypt. For Wilcken’s arguments that the Ptolemies did use such archives, see 110–17, where Aristeas is one of his pieces of evidence. Hadas’s main purpose in citing Wilcken’s article is to argue that it has no significance for dating Aristeas. He does say, however, that probability “supported by various items of evidence” favors the Ptolemies keeping such archival records as well. He does not say, however, what those items might be. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 216, argues that the insistence on credibility exposes the symposia as fiction. He cites “romance writers” of the period. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 67–74, however, effectively demonstrates the widespread use of these kinds of narratives and thus makes a more convincing argument about how the nature of the section contributes to the work’s overall attempt at proving its veracity by employing techniques common in historiography.

The Execution of the Translation (§§ 301–307)

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Notes § 295. beyond what is fitting. The phrase ὑπὲρ τὸν δέον adds a rhetorical flourish to reemphasize the marvelous nature of the translators’ answers to the king’s questions. § 296. description. Ps.-Aristeas calls his narration of the symposia an ἀναγραφή, a record or description. The term also can refer to public records. It does not have generic implications like διήγησις, which Ps.-Aristeas uses to refer to the entire work. (On the διήγησις and the genre of Aristeas, see the Introduction, section 8.) § 297. impious. This word translates the phrase οὐχ ὅσιον, literally, not pious or devout. The phrase seems to function as a backhanded way of swearing by the gods. The introduction of religious language reinforces the narrator’s insistence that he is telling the truth. error. The Greek term is ἁμάρτημα, which usually means fault or failure, but can also refer to some sinful action. It is tempting, although not necessary, in light of the use of οὐχ ὅσιον in the preceding sentence, to give it a religious tinge in translation. I have avoided doing that here, however, since the entire section does not have religious import. love of learning. The noun φιλομάθεια occurs here and in § 171, both describing Philocrates. Its cognate adjective and adverb occur in three places, two of which refer to Philocrates (§ 1, § 7). In § 286 it characterizes the kinds of people that Ptolemy ought to invite to banquets, and thus, it also indirectly describes the Jewish translators (§ 286).

The Execution of the Translation (§§ 301–307) 301. After three days, Demetrius took them to the island, passing over the breakwater, which was seven stadia long, and crossing the bridge, he went towards the northern sections, having made a meeting-place prepared by the beach in a house, which was magnificent and in a very quiet location. He called upon the men to complete the work of the translation, since everything that they needed had been well provided. 302. And they accomplished it, making each detail agree by comparisons with each other. And that which came out of the agreement Demetrius thus suitably set in writing. 303. The work of their sessions would last until the ninth hour, and afterwards they disbanded to look after the care of their bodies, everything that they preferred having been supplied plentifully for them. 304. As well, each day Dorotheus also supplied for them the same things that he prepared for the king. For this was the order that the king gave to him. And each day at the first hour they came into the court, and when they had

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made salutation to the king, they departed to their own place. 305. And as is the custom of all the Jews, when they had washed their hands in the sea in order that they might offer prayer to God, they turned to reading and explication of each detail. 306. And I asked them also about this, why they washed their hands at the time they offered prayer, and they explained that it is a testimony that they have done no wrong. For every action happens by the hands. So excellently and piously they refer everything to righteousness and truth. 307. So just as we have said previously, in this way each day they gathered together at this spot, which was delightful due to its quietness and brightness, in order to complete their appointed task. And thus it happened that the work of transcription was completed in seventy-two days, appearing as if this circumstance happened according to some plan. Textual Notes § 301. After reporting Menedemus of Eretria’s praise of the translators (§ 201), Josephus picks up the narrative again by completely skipping over the entire symposia narrative with the comment, “after this they stopped inquiring into these issues” (Ant. 12.101). When he resumes his agreement with Aristeas, instead of προσελθών of the manuscripts, he has προελθών, an easy error to make. Zuntz reads with Josephus, but Pelletier does not, since the change to this sense is “not absolutely required.”1055 Pelletier keeps the reading of the Greek manuscripts. § 304. The absolute use of the word ἐκτός at the beginning of the paragraph has caused some editors to suggest an emendation to νυκτός, which makes the beginning read “At night and every day …” There really is no need for the emendation, since ἐκτός can mean besides or as well, which is how I have translated it above. Pelletier retains the manuscript reading. § 305. Several problems attend the beginning of the paragraph (see Notes), but textually, there is confusion about the case of the participle for washing, since the noun “the Jews” in the context is dative. Most manuscripts have either the accusative plural or the dative plural. Josephus has a present tense middle participle in the nominative case. The manuscripts all have aorist middle participles. The second hand of ms O has ἀπονιψάμενοι, an aorist middle participle in the nominative case. The grammar really requires a nominative case here, and O2 and Josephus help to establish the best reading. § 307. Most manuscripts transmit the phrase τερπώ τινα, which is certainly corrupt. According to Thackeray, mss B T Z read τερπνότητα, delightful, which suits the con-

1055

Zuntz, “Zum Aristeas Text,” 245; Pelletier, Lettre, 252 (“que le sens n’exige pas absolument”).

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text well. Pelletier only lists ms O as having this reading, and it is in an erasure. The adjective obviously is the better reading, and it forms the basis for the present translation. General Comment In this relatively short section we come to the actual translation process, which is narrated in essentially one paragraph. Exactly what this paragraph means is not so easy to determine, however. Before the Jewish translators begin their work, Demetrius, who has been absent from the narrative since submitting his report to the king in §§ 28–32, reappears as a central character and escorts the translators to an unnamed island that was joined to the mainland by a long breakwater. Later ancient tradition and most modern scholars identify that island as Pharos, location of the famous lighthouse (see especially Philo, Life of Moses 2.35), and the ancient geographer Strabo (1st c. BCE) describes a seven stadia long breakwater that reached Pharos from the mainland and that had two openings for ships (17.792).1056 The major point for our author is that the island was quiet and clearly out of the way so that the translators could better accomplish their task. The summary statement of § 302 recalls Demetrius’s report in which he advises the king to request the translators, who would work by attaining agreement on the translation by comparing their work and arriving at a translation. In § 302, we encounter the same term σύμφωνον from Demetrius’s report (§ 32) and the related noun συμφωνία. So, indeed, the translators did reach agreement on the translation, after which Demetrius wrote their agreed-upon translation in what is described as a master copy. Between this paragraph and § 305, where Ps.-Aristeas gives a bit more information about the translation process, the translation work is represented in ways that suggest that Ps.-Aristeas was comparing the translation of the Septuagint to the work of Alexandrian scholars of Homer. The translators reach agreement by making comparisons, for which Ps.-Aristeas employs the term ἀντιβολή, which can indicate the collation of manuscripts, a procedure that scholars in Alexandria practiced in order to arrive at standard textual editions of Greek works. Here, however, the term clearly refers to comparing the individual translators’ translation work in order to

1056

On the location of Pharos and the lighthouse, see Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria, 1.17–20.

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arrive at a single translation.1057 As with the language of translation in Aristeas, this ambiguity is likely deliberate or used in a general sense, a way for Ps.-Aristeas to connect the product of the translators with Greek works of some status, even though the processes might not be identical.1058 Ps.-Aristeas’s message comes through clearly, however. The translation would be a good Greek book, set firmly within the orbit of Greek learning and scholarly activity, worthy of its place in the library, and the collaborative nature of the project would likely call to mind how Alexandrian grammarians worked.1059 Moreover, unlike later traditions, Ps.-Aristeas does not portray the translation as a miraculous event that God guides or inspires.1060 The closest he comes is to say that the entire project was completed in seventy-two days “as if this circumstance happened by some plan (οἱονεὶ κατὰ πρόθεσίν τινα τοῦ τοιούτου γεγενημένου)” (§ 307). In § 305, two more processes are added to the procedure. After preparing themselves for the task by washing their hands and praying (see below), “they turned to reading (ἀνάγνωσιν) and explication (διασάφησιν).” Arie van de Kooij has linked these precedures in Aristeas with the activities of Alexandrian scholars in their work on Homer.1061 He cites Dionysius Thrax, a second century BCE pupil of Aristarchus of Samothrace, who taught that the first aspect of interpreting Homer was reading aloud (ἀνάγνωσις) and the second was “explanation according to the poetic tropes present there” (ἐξήγησις). Whereas ἐξήγησις, at least in Dionysius Thrax, refers to poetry, Ps.-Aristeas uses the extremely rare word διασάφησις, a noun formed from the verb διασαφέω, meaning make clear or show plainly. Why Ps.-Aristeas chose this term rather than ἐξήγησις is not clear, although Honigman suggests that the connection of ἐξήγησις

1057

1058 1059

1060 1061

See Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 21 who argues on the basis of the scholia to Homer that the meaning of collating manuscripts is later than Ps.-Aristeas’s time period. In addition, these terms form a central part of her argument that we have an historical problem being addressed, that Ps.-Aristeas is opposing other Jews who are applying the principles of Homeric exegesis to the Pentateuch. See the Introduction and the General Comment on §§ 28–34 for a brief assessment of Niehoff’s theory. See Pelletier, Lettre, 230–31. See Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 46–47, who connects the collaborative nature of the project with procedures of the Peripatetic school, which presumably had great influence in Alexandria. On translation in Aristeas more generally, Wright, “Transcribing, Translating and Interpreting.” On the development of the legend, see Wasserstein and Wasserstein, Legend. van de Kooij, “Perspectives on the Study of the Septuagint,” 219–24.

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with poetical interpretation makes the use of διασάφησις understandable.1062 The term is used in the Septuagint of Gen 40:8 to describe the interpretation of dreams, and it is possible that the implications of the Genesis passage might have led Ps.-Aristeas to use διασάφησις instead of ἐξήγησις. In Gen 40:8, Pharaoh’s eunuchs have no one to interpret a dream. Joseph replies that explanation (διασάφησις) of dreams comes from God. Later, in Genesis 41, Joseph is pitted against Pharaoh’s interpreters (ἐξηγητής; 41:8, 24), who could not interpret the dream. One might wonder, then, whether for Ps.-Aristeas, who would have known the story of Joseph in the Septuagint, Jewish interpreters offer διασάφησις, which implicitly has the sanction of their God, while Gentiles perform ἐξήγησις. If this is the case, then at the same time that Ps.-Aristeas tries to compare the work of the translators to that of the Alexandrian grammarians, he also distinguishes the translators’ efforts as being dependent on the Jewish god and perhaps even gives God an implicit hand in the translation process. Whatever the reason, Ps.-Aristeas does indeed seem to be relating the work of the translators to that of the Alexandrian grammarians.1063 Ps.-Aristeas thus envisions the following process that led to the final translation. After washing and praying, the translators read the Hebrew text aloud and then explicated it, presumably in a collaborative effort – these last two processes reflect the work of the grammarians. When the interpretation was finished, they translated and compared what they had done, arriving at a translation upon which they had all agreed. This final product was communicated to Demetrius who wrote it down. Yet, this is not the whole story. As part of the process of translation, the translators also engage in pious religious behavior. As we saw above, before setting to work, the men “washed their hands in the sea and they offered prayer to God.” As elsewhere in the work, Aristeas asks them about this custom (as he did Eleazar earlier about the food laws), and they reply with an allegorizing interpretation, à la Eleazar’s interpretation of the law.

1062

1063

Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 47. Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, does not comment on this term. According to LSJ, this noun occurs in the Septuagint of Gen 40:8, but other than Aristeas only there. Other scholars have pointed this out. Besides Honigman and van der Kooij, see Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 218, and Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2765. Van der Kooij, “Perspectives on the Study of the Septuagint,” 219–21, also invokes the Hebrew scribe as a model here, but I am not as convinced of this equation. Given his use of vocabulary throughout the book, my view is that Ps.-Aristeas appeals to Alexandrian scholarship as the model that confers a certain authority on the Septuagint as a Greek work.

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Washing symbolizes that they have not done any wrong, since “every action happens by the hands.”1064 In this short section that describes the making of the translation, Ps.-Aristeas continues to work out its dual nature by reinforcing the dual character of the translators. In § 121, he has already informed us that these men were equally proficient in Hebrew and Greek literature. In several places, but especially in the symposia, he has portrayed them as intellectually the equal of the Greeks and as being pious with respect to their Judaism. Now again, we see their piety expressed in tandem with their working procedures, which are reminiscent of the Alexandrian grammarians. Yet, if the distinction I suggested above between διασάφησις and ἐξήγησις holds, then the interpretations that they derive from this work implicitly have divine sanction. Thus, they are eminently qualified to imbue their product with the same characteristics that inhere in the original – it will be both philosophical and divine (cf. § 31). The translation will be a Greek book, produced to the exacting standards of other Greek texts in Alexandria, but the translators also represent the assurance to Greek-speaking Jews that the translated law will contain all that Moses intended. To this end, Ps.-Aristeas describes the translators and compares them with Eleazar in §§ 121–123. Only one thing remains in order to bring the translation into conformity with the terms that have already been put forward, and that comes in § 310, the claim that the translation was made accurately. As Honigman points out, this representation of the translation process probably has consequences as well for how Ps.-Ariseas understands the status of the Hebrew text. She writes, There may be a further implicit message in the deliberate blurring of the distinction between textual editing and translation. In an edited text, the only text worth retaining is the one resulting from scholarly efforts. In our present case, the LXX would represent this text, while the Hebrew original is equivalent to poor quality manuscripts. The message may be that the Hebrew original can be forgotten now that the LXX has been achieved.1065

1064

1065

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 120, refers here to Aristobulus Fragment 2 in which he explains anthropomorphic descriptions of God. For him, hands are metaphors for power. (See Holladay, Aristobulus, 138–39 for the text.) This explanation does not really have anything to do with Aristeas, however, since Ps.-Aristeas is not making hands a metaphor. He means that actions actually take place via one’s hands, and so washing them symbolizes a state of righteousness. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 49. Cf. § 30 on the poorly copied Hebrew text.

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I would make the point a little differently, since I am not sure how much Ps.-Aristeas would have desired to establish the status of the Greek text at the expense of the Hebrew, which after all is philosophical and divine and came to Alexandria from Jerusalem on magnificently worked and copied scrolls. The idea of poor Hebrew manuscripts enables Ps.-Aristeas to have scrolls come from Jerusalem, the center of Judean piety, from the high priest, and thus, they bear his imprimatur. Throughout the work, Ps.-Aristeas has tried to establish that the creation of the Septuagint is the functional equivalent of Moses giving the law to the Israelites. Eleazar’s speech, positioned as it is in the middle of the work, where it makes the transition from the scriptures in Hebrew to the scriptures in Greek, goes a long way toward making that case. The events narrated subsequently in §§ 308–316 solidify this claim (see below). Ps.-Aristeas constructs the Septuagint as taking the place of the Hebrew text for the Jews of Alexandria. The Greek text is everything that the Hebrew is, and it can function as the sacred scripture for Greek-speaking Jews in Alexandria in the same way that the Hebrew text is sacred scripture for the Judeans who use it. This characterization of the translation forms the central point in the mythmaking that Ps.-Aristeas performs in his narrative – the Greek translation can take the place of the Hebrew, it can serve as the primary locus of Alexandrian Jewish identity, and it can stand on a par with works that constitute the primary source of identity for Greeks. Thus, we end up with two independent forms of the divine and philosophical law, one in Hebrew for Hebrew-speaking Judeans and one in Greek for Greek-speaking Jews, separate and equal. In this way, Ps.-Aristeas constructs an argument that will permit elite Jews in Alexandria to see themselves as able to participate fully in the majority Greek society and culture, while at the same time maintaining their distinctive Jewishness.1066 Notes § 301. meeting-place. The modern translations usually translate συνέδριον as “meeting” or “session.” The more usual meaning is a council, but it can also indicate a meeting-place. The phrase here συνέδριον ποιησάμενος in the context suggests that Demetrius led the men to the island to a meeting-place that he had prepared for them there on the beach, where he charged them to do their work. The feminine noun συνεδρεία, which more properly means a session, meeting or conference session, occurs in § 303 with respect to the times when the translators met to work.

1066

See Wright, “Pseudonymous Authorship.”

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§ 302. Demetrius … writing. Some modern translators, such as Andrews, understand Demetrius as supervising the copying of the translation, although the prepositional phrase παρὰ τοῦ Δημητρίου means “by Demetrius.”1067 § 303. ninth hour. Approximately between 2 pm and 3 pm. This section appears disjointed, since Ps.-Aristeas gives the time when the translators finished before the time when they began, although there is no reason to suspect any textual problems. In §§ 303–304, we are told that each day the translators greeted the king at court in the first hour (roughly between 6 am and 7 am), went off to their meeting-place, and then worked until the ninth hour, after which they took care of themselves. § 304. same things that he prepared for the king. Since the king made certain that the meals at the symposia were prepared according to Jewish dietary regulations, one assumes that the same would be the case here, although that restriction is not stipulated. The point is that the men were treated royally. § 305. custom of all the Jews. Ps.-Aristeas calls the practice of washing and then praying an ἔθος, a habit or custom. Although he interprets the practice allegorically, in this paragraph washing and then praying are not explicitly grounded in the lawgiver’s legislation. This is what Jews do typically, Aristeas tells Philocrates. washed … prayer. The modern translators take different approaches to this sentence. Hadas, for example, envisions two coordinate actions, washing and praying.1068 The grammar of the sentence, however, subordinates the praying to the washing, since the clause with the verb for praying takes the form of ὡς ἄν with the optative. The men wash their hands in order that they might pray. Washing, then, is a prerequisite for prayer to God. For the practice of washing before prayer in the Second Temple period, see, for example, Jdt 12:7–8, where Judith bathes and then prays, and SibOr 3.591–593, which says of the Jews, “At dawn they lift up holy arms toward heaven, from their beds, always sanctifying their flesh [some MSS: hands] with water.” § 306. I asked them. Josephus does not report the allegorical explanation. This entire section is paraphrased in his Antiquities, and thus, it should not be a surprise that he does not include everything from Aristeas.1069

1067 1068 1069

Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 120. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 219. See Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 220. Février, La Date, 30, argues that this is an interpolation, but given the paraphrastic nature of the section, I do not agree. See the Introduction, section 7.

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The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316) 308. And when it was complete, Demetrius assembled the people of the Judeans at the place where the translation had been executed and read it aloud to all, since the translators were also there. These got great approbation from the multitude, since they were the cause of great good. 309. So they also approved of Demetrius and requested that he give their leaders a copy, since he had transcribed the entire Law. 310. And when the rolls were read, the priests and the elders of the translators and some from the politeuma and the leaders of the people stood and said, “Since the exposition has been made well, piously and accurately in every respect, it is good that it remain just as it is and there be no revision at all.” 311. And then all assented to what had been said. They ordered that there be a curse, just as is their custom, upon anyone who might revise by adding or changing anything at all of what had been written or by making a deletion. They did this well so that it would always be preserved everlastingly and permanently. 312. And when these matters were announced to the king, he rejoiced greatly. For he supposed that his plan had been securely completed. And everything was also read to him, and he marveled greatly at the mind of the lawgiver. And he said to Demetrius, “How have none of the historians and poets undertaken to make mention of these enormous achievements?” 313. And that one said, “Because the legislation is sacred and has come about through God, and God struck some of those who did undertake it, and they ceased the attempt.” 314. For also he had heard Theopompus say that when he was about to narrate some things that had been translated previously, dubiously, from the Law, he suffered a confusion of his mind for more than thirty days. And after it abated, he propitiated God to make clear to him why this event had occurred. 315. And when it was indicated in a dream that it was his meddlesome desire to bring divine matters to common people, he desisted and thus recovered. 316. And also of Theodektes, the tragic poet, I understood that when he was about to cite something in a play that had been recorded in the book, he suffered cataracts in his eyes. And having a suspicion that this was why the calamity had happened, he propitiated God for many days and recovered. Textual Notes § 311. In this paragraph Josephus preserves the best text when he transmits ἐκέλευσαν in the plural. The manuscripts and Eusebius all have the singular. The confusion is whether Demetrius or the elders ordered that a curse be made. The last sentence of the paragraph confirms the plural here, since the plural participle, πράσσοντες, they did this, makes clear that the

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elders made the curse. § 312. Josephus and Eusebius (Thackeray also has ms B as a witness) preserve the word ποιητῶν, poets. The Greek manuscripts have either the adjective ποιητικῶν or the adverb ποιητικῶς. The error probably arose since the adjective ἱστορικῶν that precedes it can be used as a substantive, historians, as it is here, and the original noun was attracted to the form of the adjective. § 314. Eusebius preserves the proper spelling and case of the name Theopompus. Josephus has the nominative case, rather than the genitive, but he also preserves the correct spelling. The Greek manuscripts have either Θεοπέμπου or Θεοπέμπτου. Pelletier notes that the latter spelling is found in a letter by Theophilus, bishop of Alexandria in 404 CE about an Egyptian bishop of this name, and thus, it probably is a local Egyptian variant of the name.1070 // The various editors have preferred Eusebius’s present optative λάβοι to the infinitive of the Greek manuscripts. The sentence is a form of indirect speech in an historic tense, which would be more likely to use the optative mode than the infinitive. General Comment These paragraphs narrate the Judeans’ acceptance of the translation. Heretofore the translation project had been a royal patronage enterprise meant to supply the Jewish law in Greek for the Alexandrian Library.1071 In these last paragraphs of the book that motivation is almost completely missing. The request of Demetrius that he give a copy to the leaders of the Judeans preserves a vestige of the original commission and the implicit recognition that the translation belongs to the king.1072 Otherwise, these paragraphs appeal to biblical precedents in a scene where the Jewish community in Alexandria approves and adopts the new translation as its sacred scripture. Consequently, in the beginning of this section, the translators, the Jewish community and its leaders take center stage as the primary beneficiaries of the project. Harry Orlinsky has made the most complete case that in the scene that we observe in these paragraphs the combination of reading aloud to the people followed by some expression of consent comprises the biblical proce1070

1071

1072

Pelletier, Lettre, 253. Thackeray lists both Josephus and Eusebius as having the name Θεοπόμπου, but this reading seems to be in error. Marcus, Josephus VII, 54, notes that the manuscripts have the correct spelling. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 220–21, makes the same point. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2766, argues that this shift reveals that the translation was made more for internal community needs than through royal design. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 221.

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dure for making something authoritative and binding. So, in Exod 24:3–7, Moses takes the leaders of the people aside to worship God, then he “recounted to the people all God’s words and statutes. And all the people answered with one voice, saying, ‘All the words that the Lord has spoken, we will do and heed’” (NETS). In 4 Reigns 23, when Josiah is presented with the scroll found in the temple, he gathered “all the elders of Iouda and Ierousalem”; then he read the scroll aloud to the people and to the priests and prophets, all of whom agreed to enter into the covenant. And, of course, in 2 Esdr 18:1–8 (=Neh 8:1–8 MT) Ezra brought the “book of the law of Moyses,” and he read from it to all the people all morning. They responded with “Amen.”1073 In the case of Aristeas, two separate processes that include reading and response take place. On the first occasion, in § 308, the Jewish πλῆθος is assembled. While the word often means multitude or assembly, it can refer to an entire people or population, in this case the people of the Judeans in Alexandria. There is already a precedent in Aristeas for translating the word as people. In § 42, in Eleazar’s letter to Ptolemy, he comments that when he had received the letter, he read it aloud to the entire people in Jerusalem (τὸ πᾶν πλῆθος). Thus, as early as this paragraph, we are told that the Judean people have approved the translation project, even before it has begun. After Demetrius’s reading of the translation in § 308, the people showed their approval of it by giving approbation (ἀποδοχή) to the translators. The second time, in § 310, when the “rolls” were read, various leaders of the people stood up and approved the translation, claiming that it had been done “well (καλῶς), piously (ὁσίως) and accurately (ἠκριβωμένως) in every respect.” By now such characterizations should not be surprising but rather expected. That Ps.-Aristeas intended this instance as a second moment of authority-granting is indicated by the conjunction καθώς, which when referring to time means as or when. Thus, Ps.-Aristeas portrays the people’s approval of the translators in the first case and the acceptance of the translation in the second as occurring concurrently. These two statements of acceptance continue Ps.-Aristeas’s habit of describing the translators in consonance with their translation. The entire scene alludes to the people’s acceptance of the Hebrew law at Mt. Sinai, both the leaders and the people as a whole. The entire congregation of the Jews recognizes that the Greek translation has equal status to the Hebrew. In that sense, then, we have a second giving of the law in which the Greek can replace the

1073

Harry M. Orlinsky, “The Septuagint as Holy Writ and the Philosophy of the Translators,” HUCA 46 (1975) 94–95.

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Hebrew and now constitute the scriptural corpus of the Jewish community in Alexandria, since it is everything that the Hebrew is. Replacement, however, does not imply denigration. As far as Ps.-Aristeas is concerned, the Hebrew still functions as the legislation and scriptural corpus of those in Jerusalem and Judea. The point is that now the Jews of Alexandria have Moses’ legislation in Greek that bears the authoritative stamp of Jerusalem, that can function independently of the Hebrew and that possesses all the characteristics of the original as well as being a work of Greek literature. This scene is an important component of the culminating scenes that cement a theme that has run throughout the work. In addition to the community approval and acceptance of the translation as authoritative and binding on the Alexandrian Jewish community, § 311 repeats that everyone agreed to everything that had been said, but now there is the futher addition of a curse against anyone who might alter the text in any way. As almost every scholar of Aristeas has recognized, Moses’ command in Deut 4:2 likely stands behind this injunction not to make changes to the translation: “You shall not add to the word I command you, and you shall not take away from it. Keep the commandments of the Lord your God with which I command you today” (NETS). Giuseppe Veltri notes the meaning shifts between the two texts. The passage in Deuteronomy focuses on observance of the Torah, whereas Aristeas focuses on the inviolability of the text.1074 For Veltri, this emphasis on the text of the translation “is a hint regarding the interest of the Alexandrian Library as a centre eager to obtain a precise and critically excellent manuscript according to a canon of classification, as Quintillian notes.”1075 I think that Veltri is mistaken in this claim. Actually, the library is nowhere mentioned in this section, and the imprecations put on changes to the text originate from the Jewish leaders. Moreover, the passage does not reflect any interest in the practices of Hellenistic grammarians, for whom the process of comparison and collation within the context of the library arrived at standard editions of the texts.1076 Francis Borchardt argues that the interest in an inviolate

1074

1075 1076

Giuseppe Veltri, Libraries, Translations, and ‘Canonic’ Texts: The Septuagint, Aquila and Ben Sira in the Jewish and Christian Tradition (JSJSup 109; Leiden: Brill, 2006) 36. Veltri also argues that the point of this passage “is that the translated text of the Torah should be kept in the library of the king.” I think that Veltri is wrong here. The library has disappeared from the scene in favor of the Jewish community’s acceptance of the translation as its scripture. Veltri, Libraries, 36. Actually Josephus makes more of this sort of argument than the manuscript tradition of Aristeas. See the Note below.

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text represents a desire for a fixed text of scripture, which, at least in the narrative, stems from the Ptolemaic court that established the working rules (e.g., Demetrius in § 32).1077 Yet, again, at this important juncture, the Jews insist on no changes to the text, which I read as a further explication of the issue of the claim that the translation is accurate and that it has no need for modification. The notion of an inviolate text, then, does not represent so much a concern with fixity as it does with the importance of the relationship between the original and the translation. The scrolls that came from Jerusalem were the best form of the Hebrew texts that could be had – they had the patronage (implicitly) of Eleazar as the ruler of the Judeans – and the translation of those scrolls was the most piously executed and accurate that could be accomplished, hence the desire to preserve the text without alterations.1078 The translation receives the patronage of Ptolemy II, who, by appointing Demetrius to supervise the project, could make certain that the Greek form of the text was the best one possible, accomplished by men who had requisite skills and worked under the best condition. Thus, both the Hebrew text and the resulting Greek translation benefit from royal oversight and, moreover, the translation has the additional advantage of authorization from Eleazar. What most scholars do not note, however, is that Ps.-Aristeas says that it is the custom (ἔθος) of the Jews to put a curse on anyone who would make changes to the text, a practice that is not found in Deuteronomy or any of the other possible biblical precursor texts for this passage. Curses are connected in the biblical text with breaking of the covenant, however. Deuteronomy 28, for example, contains a list of curses that will afflict those who break the covenant. The injunction in Deut 4:2 to “keep the commandments” might be interpreted as keeping the commandments in the exact form that they were given; otherwise various curses would strike, since later in that chapter Moses warns that if the people “act lawlessly and make an engraved image of anything and do what is evil before the Lord your God to provoke him to anger, I call sky and earth to witness against you today that by destruction you will perish from the land …” (Deut 4:25–26 NETS). Whether in this case Ps.-Aristeas is equating a curse applied to changing the text with breaking the covenant – a possible reading of the implications of Deuteronomy – which the people have accepted by approving the translation, is not obvious, though. Yet, in the narrative

1077 1078

Borchardt, “LXX Myth,”12–15, especially for the last point, 15. Admittedly, this might be a matter of a difference of emphasis between Borchardt and me on this issue, but that emphasis is of some significance, I think.

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of Aristeas, the Jewish people demonstrate the most concern that the text must remain inviolate. It seems more likely, then, that the curse is directed at anyone, Jew or Gentile, who alters what is already considered a perfect text. Although one might think that this imprecation would be directed primarily at Jews who would change the text, given the narrative world that Ps.-Aristeas creates, might the placing of the curse reflect an anxiety that the scholars in the Library, where presumably the text would reside, would make alterations to it? The two examples of Theopompus and Theodektes point to a different issue connected with the translation. In § 312, the king, who is hearing the law read for the first time and is struck by Moses’ intelligence, asks why none of the Greek historians and poets had ever mentioned it. The question probably should be seen in light of § 31 where Demetrius cites Hecataeus of Abdera as accounting for why writers, poets and historians had avoided discussing the Jewish law. The answer is almost the same in this passage as in the earlier one: because the books are sacred. Of course, this is something of a ridiculous question, since ample ancient testimony exists to knowledge of the Jews, their lawgiver and even their laws on the part of Gentiles throughout the Mediterranean world, a fact that Ps.-Aristeas must have been aware of.1079 Demetrius responds that since the law was sacred and “came about through God” (see Notes), God struck down anyone who tried. When Theopompus wanted to include some elements from the law, he was afflicted with a mental malady for thirty days. After appealing to God, he learned that his desire to bring “divine matters” (τὰ θεῖα) to common people was the cause. When he ceased this desire, he was cured. Theodektes was to put something in a play and as a result suffered from cataracts. When he propitiated God, he was cured. In both cases, Greek authors intended to reveal sacred matters to common people. There are two main ways that scholars have interpreted these writers’ actions. The first understands the word “common” (κοινούς) to mean impure, as it does in 1 Macc 1:47 where it refers to impure animals that are sacrificed.1080 This explanation is not adequate, however, since the two writers themselves would be considered impure, and thus, the distinction between them and the “common people” to whom they were revealing divine things would really be non-existent. Moreover, in the scene as Ps.-Aristeas creates it here,

1079 1080

See Stern, Greek and Latin Writers. See Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 307; Tramontano, La Lettera, 249; Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 223.

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Gentiles, who would be impure by this reasoning, not only hear the law, but a Gentile actually reads it aloud to the assembled Jews. A better explanation relies on the Greek notion that great wisdom or divine/sacred things can only be revealed to those who are properly prepared to hear them. So, for example, Apuleius (Metamorphoses 11.23) reports that he could not reveal how he was initiated into mysteries or he would be punished. Philostratus in his Life of Appollonius of Tyana 3.12–13 relates how his scribe Damis had to remain outside a Brahmin fortress because he had not achieved the proper state necessary for entry to secrets.1081 Thus, to include material from Moses’ law in a history or a play would be to throw pearls before swine, so to speak, to make it accessible to people who were not ready or able to understand its true value. Before this could happen, God stopped it. It is not enough for anyone who has the linguistic skills to use the text; it must be accompanied by piety as well, and the enterprise of the translation was executed with the appropriate piety, even on the part of the king and those around him who participated in the translation enterprise.1082 Here again, we might hark back to § 16, where Aristeas reveals to the king that he worships the same god as the Jews, even if by a different name. By this point in the narrative, Ps.-Aristeas has established firmly the piety of Ptolemy, and by implication Demetrius and Aristeas as well, so that the reader knows that they should not be included among “common” people who are not able to hear what is to be read. Together with § 30, Paul Kahle appealed to the imprecation in § 311 and these notices of Theopompus’s and Theodektes’s aborted efforts at using Moses in their works as evidence for his theory that there were earlier translations than the Septuagint, since they both seem to refer to previous translation efforts.1083 As we saw above, Kahle’s reading of § 30 does not hold up under scrutiny, and the same applies here. Ps.-Aristeas certainly has created the sections on Theopompus and Theodektes, and his purpose is not to reject earlier translations. Rather his point is that divine realities cannot be revealed to inappropriate people. In the case of Theopompus, his attempt was dubious or rash to reveal material from Moses in a history that anyone might read. The reference to translations made earlier, almost certainly functions as a literary means of claiming that only the translation produced by those men who came from Eleazar had the proper authority and sanction, both from the king and from Eleazar, not that Ps.-Aristeas

1081 1082 1083

These examples are cited by Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 12. Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 60–61. Kahle, Cairo Geniza, 212–13.

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was polemicizing against some earlier form of Greek scriptures. With Theodektes, apparently God considered that putting something in a play would again reveal sacred things to people who could/should not hear them. Pelletier interprets this short sentence as indicting Theodektes’s indiscretion of putting such divine matters in such a profane medium as a play, although that seems an unlikely interpretation, given Ps.-Aristeas’s remarks about the theater earlier in the symposia.1084 In neither of these men’s cases, though, is our author worried about the fact that there might have been other translations against which this one was competing. The potential uses to which these writers would put the law and the audiences who who might hear it constitute the problem in the text.1085 The political organization reflected in § 310 has been the subject of much scholarly discussion, primarily because Aristeas is the only ancient witness to a Jewish politeuma in Alexandria. The term has a range of meanings and represents different sorts of organizational possibilities – from an ethnic political organization in which its officials had jurisdiction over certain judicial and regulatory matters regulated by their ethnic laws (πάτριοι νόμοι) to a voluntary civic organization.1086 Outside of this mention of a politeuma in Aristeas, we hear of Jewish politeumata in the Ptolemaic period in Berenike in Cyrenaica through inscriptional evidence, in the vicinity of Leontopolis and in Heracleopolis through the Jewish papyri discovered there.1087 Members of ethnic politeumata likely would not have

1084

1085

1086

1087

Pelletier, Lettre, 237: “c’est l’indiscrétion … que constitue sa mise en oeuvre dans la literature profane et specialement au theater.” For another critique of Kahle, see Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 134–35. For the idea that the Septuagint is the first and only translation, see Orlinksy, “Septuagint as Holy Writ,” 97, although he does not make this claim explicitly in opposition to Kahle. For a more positive assessment of Kahle and Aristeas, see Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 69–70. John J. Collins, Jewish Wisdom in the Hellenistic Age (Louisville, Ken.: Westminster John Knox, 1997) 140–41; Lester L. Grabbe, A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period: Volume 2. The Coming of the Greeks: The Early Hellenistic Period (335–175 BCE) (London/New York: T&T Clark, 2008) 181–185. See also Bradley Ritter, Judeans in the Greek Cities of the Roman Empire: Rights, Citizenship and Civil Discord (JSJSup; Leiden: Brill, Forthcoming) Chap. 4 and Sylvie Honigman, “Politeumata and Ethnicity in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt,” Ancient Society 33 (2003) 61–102. Bradley Ritter, “On the ‘πολίτευμα in Heracleopolis,’” Scripta Classica Israelica 30 (2011) 9–37, contests the idea that the politeuma mentioned in P.Polit.Jud. 8 refers to a Jewish politeuma. Most scholars have not followed him on this claim. For a different take on the implications of the Heracleopolis papyri for the organization

The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316)

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citizenship in the cities in which they lived.1088 Both Philo and Josephus are silent on the matter of an Alexandrian politeuma. (Josephus has one mention, but he undoubtedly depends on Aristeas for it.) In addition, the text suggests a distinction between the leaders of the people (ἡγούμενοι τοῦ πλήθους; cf. § 42, § 308) and “some from the politeuma” (τῶν ἀπὸ τοῦ πολιτεύματος), along with “the priests and elders of the translators.” This situation is confusing to say the least. If a Jewish politeuma existed in Alexandria along the lines of what the Heracleopolis papyri from the mid-second century BCE suggest – that some Jews there were explicitly organized into a politeuma – then this evidence might help to clarify the passage in Aristeas at least somewhat. The Heracleopolis papyri show, for example, that even though not all Jewish communities were organized into politeumata, Jews from outside the politeuma might petition its officials to uphold their rights under ethnic law.1089 The difference between Jews who belonged to the politeuma and those who did not might shed light on the distinction in Aristeas between the leaders of the people and some from the politeuma, who probably represent different groups.1090 The πλῆθος constituted the larger group of Judeans living in Alexandria and would have included members of the Jewish politeuma, a group whose origins most probably have to do with military service.1091 Ps.-Aristeas identifies some of these people as among the dignitaries who make the imprecation against any textual alteration to the translation. Moreover, Honigman notes that politeumata in Ptolemaic Egypt are not attested there before the reign of Ptolemy VI, and thus, the association referred to in § 310 would have only been founded in Ps.-Aristeas’s general timeframe and would have been a feature of his Alexandria but not of Ptolemy II’s. In the context of a passage that works to give official sanction and approval to the Septuagint translation, mention of members of the recently constituted politeuma, even retrojected back into the time of Ptolemy II would certainly add to the binding authority of the translation. Bradley Ritter, however, understands § 310 not as a reference to a Jewish community organized as a political body that had some jurisdiction

1088

1089 1090 1091

of politeumata, especially in Alexandria, and the possible reasons for Philo’s and Josephus’s silence about a Jewish politeuma there, see Honigman, “Politeumata and Ethnicity.” See Paul Trebilco, Jewish Communities in Asia Minor (SNTSMS 69; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991) 169–71. Honigman, “Politeumata and Ethnicity,” 67–68. Honigman, “Politeumata and Ethnicity,” 69. Honigman, “Politeumata and Ethnicity,” 63–64; Grabbe, History of the Jews, 182.

450

III. Translation and Commentary

based on certain of its native customs but rather as a voluntary cultic association, like the Idumean politeuma in Memphis, that was organized for worship. That Aristeas contains the only mention of this body suggests to Ritter that it could not have continued as a significant force in the later Jewish community in Alexandria, since Philo and Josephus do not refer to it.1092 Whether the politeuma of Aristeas was organized into a political body or it represented a voluntary, cultic association – and this issue undoubtedly will continue to be debated – Ps.-Aristeas clearly portrays those gathered at the reading of the translation as the most important representatives of the various groups – i.e., the translators, the representatives of the politeuma and the leaders of the people – who along with the people as a whole affirm the authority of the translation and accept it as their scriptures.1093 Whatever the organizational reality of the Jews in Alexandria in the second century BCE, Ps.-Aristeas wants his readers to see these groups as the most important folks who could approve of the translation and hence confer authority on it. As in the inscription from Berenike, a voluntary association might achieve a level of social importance, and certainly the politeuma of Heracleopolis constituted a central and influential political organization. The major point for Ps.-Aristeas, then, is that the politeuma along with the others present gives the stamp of authority of the Jewish community on the freshly completed translation. Immediately afterward, when all of this had been announced to Ptolemy, the translation is presented and read to the king, who also approves of it. Thus, the Jews and their most important representatives as well as the Gentile king all celebrate and grant authority to the translation after hearing it read.1094 1092 1093 1094

Ritter, Judeans in the Greek Cities, Chap. 4. Orlinsky, “Septuagint as Holy Writ.” Two other interpretations have been offered for this reference. Constantine Zuckerman, “Hellenistic Politeumata and the Jews: A Reconsideration,” Scripta Classica Israelica 8–9 (1985–1988) 171–85, held out the possibility that the people from the politeuma were actually from the civic body of Jerusalem, who had come with the translators. Even though Ps.-Aristeas represents Jerusalem as a Greek polis elsewhere, the problem, of course, is that there is no textual warrant for this reading, since nowhere are any other people from Jerusalem mentioned. This would be a very roundabout way of introducing other representatives from Eleazar. Given the way that the translators are portrayed, there seems no reason to introduce a group that has not even been hinted at previously. The second possible interpretation was suggested by Gert Lüderitz, “What is the Politeuma?” in Studies in Early Jewish Epigraphy (Ed. Jan Willem van Henten and Pieter Willem van der Horst; AGJU 21; Leiden: Brill, 1994) 183–225, who argued that those from the politeuma might have been the elders of Alexandria. His argument seems to stem from doubts that

The Proclamation of the Translation (§§ 308–316)

451

Notes § 308. at the place … executed. Hadas notes with some justification that this phrase reflects the festival connected with the remembrance of the translation. For the festival, which Ps.-Aristeas does not mention (although cf. § 180), see Philo, Life of Moses 2.41–42. people. For πλῆθος as a designation for the Jewish people, see § 42 and 1 Macc 8:20 and 2 Macc 11:16. § 310. priests and elders of the translators. The partitive genitive construction makes it difficult to know whether the priests and elders both belong to the group of translators or whether only the elders do. In the progression of the leaders, the translators come first, then people from the politeuma and then the leaders of the people. The priests and elders both, then, should be those of the translators. In § 184, Elissaios, a member of the translation team, is specifically called a priest. So, the paragraph enumerates representatives of the translators (priests and elders), the politeuma and the people (leaders, ἡγούμενοι). The letter from the Spartans to the Jews in 1 Macc 14:20 is addressed to elders (πρεσβυτέροις), priests (ἱερεῦσιν) and “the rest of the citizenry” (τῷ λοιπῷ δήμῳ). politeuma. There is no adequate English translation equivalent for the Greek term. Hadas renders it “corporate body,” which robs it of its technical sense. Andrews has “Jewish community,” which makes the term coextensive with the “Jewish people.” Thackeray has “some members of the [Jewish] community.” Pelletier does not translate the word, but rather transliterates it and includes a note explaining it. This seems to me the best policy, and I have followed his practice in the translation above. Tramontano takes the entire phrase τῶν ἀπὸ τοῦ πολιτεύματος as a periphrasis for the politeuma as a whole. This interpretation does not seem likely since in this section we are dealing with representatives of larger groups.1095 accurately. Throughout the work, the translation process has been portrayed as a collaborative intellectual enterprise on the part of the translators. They are pious, yes, but the miraculous aspects of the legend, so pronounced in later versions of the story, cannot be found in Aristeas. Claims

1095

the Jews had a politeuma in Alexandria at all. The other evidence for politeumata in Jewish communities certainly mutes the force of those doubts. In this commentary, however, it is not my goal to sort out the issues of what the reality of the politeuma might have been in the Alexandrian Jewish community. I am worried about what Ps.-Aristeas wanted to accomplish by invoking the politeuma in this authority-conferring scene. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 221; Andrews, “Letter of Aristeas,” 120; Thackeray, “Translation,” 389; Pelletier, Lettre, 233; Tramontano, La Lettera, 243.

452

III. Translation and Commentary

to accuracy make the point that Alexandrian Jews can accept the Greek translation as scripture, without making that accuracy a product of divine intervention, as Philo and others would have it. § 311. They ordered … deletion. Josephus’s version varies a lot from the manuscript tradition in the larger section, in which his list of the officials differs as well. For this sentence, however, he goes in a completely different direction. He does not have the curse, and rather than imprecations against change, he claims that the leaders encouraged correction, if anyone found changes being made: “Accordingly, when all had approved this idea, they ordered that, if anyone saw any further addition made of the text of the law or anything omitted from it, he should examine it and make it known and correct it” (Ant. 12.109). Why he has taken this tack is not immediately clear. § 313. sacred. The Greek term σεμνός appears in § 31, where Hecataeus of Abdera employs it as a description of the Jewish law. The word has the general meaning of revered or august and can be used of human beings as well as of things devoted to the gods. Cf. § 81, “Therefore, everything was accomplished solemnly (σεμνῶς).”1096 came about through God. The phrase is somewhat odd in the use of the preposition διά rather than ὑπό that might be expected. Most scholars take this and other similar phrases in the work as evidence that Ps.-Aristeas assumes the divine origins of the law. Ian Scott, however, argues that in Aristeas divine involvement is indirect for the most part and that God is not portrayed as the author of the scriptures. In this passage, Scott maintains, Ps.-Aristeas makes a distinction between the indirect involvement of God in Moses’ legislative activity, represented through διά, and God’s function as the author of law as the preposition ὑπό would connote.1097 some of those who did undertake. Hadas thinks that this phrase refers to the making of previous translations.1098 In the context, however, it does not. It only answers the king’s specific question about why the law had not been mentioned previously – the answer was that some tried to mention it, but God smote them. This is not a statement about translations made prior to the Septuagint. § 314. Theopompus. A fourth century BCE historian from Chios. He was expelled from Chios after the death of Alexander the Great and apparently took refuge in Egypt under Ptolemy I. § 315. dream … cataracts (§ 316). These punishments reflect the statement

1096 1097 1098

See Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 6–7. Scott, “Revelation and Human Artefact,” 8–12. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 223.

The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321)

453

of the translator in § 192 that God reveals the harmfulness of people’s actions through “dreams or actions.” § 316. Theodektes. A fourth century BCE rhetorician and tragic poet. He was a friend of Aristotle. Both he and Theopompus were students of Isocrates and competitors in a rhetorical contest held by Artemisia of Caria, where Theopompus bested him. I understood. In § 314 Aristeas reports the story of Theopompus, which apparently Demetrius had heard directly from the historian. Of course, this would be difficult historically given the difference in the two men’s respective dates. In § 316, the narrator, our Aristeas, has heard the story of Theodektes, and he relates it. book. This instance is the first where the bare, singular noun βίβλος refers to a collection of scripture. In 1 Macc 1:56 the plural noun βιβλία is used in the phrase τὰ βιβλία τοῦ νόμου, the books of the law. Elsewhere in Aristeas, the author has used ἡ γραφή (§ 155, § 168) and τὰ λόγια (§ 158) to refer to scripture. If the object of Ps.-Aristeas’s discussion all along has been the Pentateuch in some form as we know it, then this paragraph would indeed be the first use of the noun in this sense in Jewish literature. Borchardt points out that strictly speaking we do not have to assume that the reference is to the Pentateuch. While that may be true in a strict sense, given the evidence from Qumran, 1 Macc 1:56, and other places in Jewish literature, it is clear that the idea of books of Moses was widespread in Second Temple Judaism. The Septuagint itself is the translation of the five books. In this light, I see no good reason to doubt that Ps.-Aristeas had the Pentateuch in mind.1099

The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321) 317. And when the king received the report from Demetrius concerning these matters, as I have said already, he bowed and ordered that great care be taken of the books and that they be preserved reverently. 318. And he invited the translators to visit him often after they had been restored to Judea – for he said it was right that they be sent back. But when they visited, as was right, he would have them as Friends, and they would receive from him the greatest generosity. 319. And he ordered that the preparations for their departure be attended to, treating the men munificently. For he gave to each one three robes of the best material, two talents of gold, a cup worth a talent and complete carpeting for a dining room. 320. And he

1099

Borchardt, “LXX Myth,” 10.

454

III. Translation and Commentary

also sent to Eleazar along with them on their departure ten silver-legged couches and everything that goes with them, a thirty-talent sideboard, ten robes, purple cloth, a distinguished crown, a hundred bolts of fine woven linen, broad bowls, bowls, and two golden drinking bowls, as an offering. 321. And he wrote also urging that, if any of the men chose to return to him, Eleazar would not prevent it, since the king valued greatly being in the company of educated men, and on such as these he would spend his wealth abundantly and not on vanities. Textual Notes § 317. The opening sentence has two complications. Eusebius preserves the better text by having the demonstrative pronoun τούτων rather than the article τῶν as the object of the preposition περί. Clearly the events leading up to this sentence are at issue here, and thus the demonstrative makes the best sense. The next two words in Eusebius, which are missing completely in the manuscripts, refer to the report of Demetrius. Eusebius, however, has τὰ περί, although the preposition has likely been attracted to the preceding one. The context calls for something like παρά in the sense of from, which C. G. Cobet and Wendland conjecture and which Pelletier adopts.1100 The resulting text reads περὶ τούτων τὰ παρὰ τοῦ Δημητρίου and is the basis for my translation. § 318. The Greek manuscripts all read πολυδωρίας. Mahaffey suggested that the text should read πολυωρίας.1101 Pelletier rejects this emendation, although Thackeray (followed by Hadas) accepted it, printing it in his text in pointed brackets. Pelletier comments that Mahaffey “only found reasons to his liking” for making the emendation. I have followed Pelletier’s text in my translation.1102 §§ 319–320. In these two paragraphs, we find a possible ittacistic confusion that affects the meaning of the text. In § 319 most manuscripts have κυλίδιον, which according to LSJ is a diminutive of κοιλία, a body cavity – a reading that is patently corrupt. Mss A U O2 T and Josephus have the much more likely κυλίκιον, a cup, a reading also found in mss A U O T and Josephus in § 320.1103 Wendland suggested κυλικεῖον in both places. Pelletier makes a convincing argument that in § 319 κυλίκιον should be the reading and in § 320 Wendland’s suggestion of κυλικεῖον is best. In § 319, a cup is one of the gifts that Ptolemy gives to the translators. In § 320, the king sends furniture to

1100 1101 1102 1103

See the critical apparatus in Pelletier, Lettre, 236. J. P. Mahaffey, “An Emendation,” Classical Review 8 (1894) 349. Pelletier, Lettre, 238 (“se fonde sur des raisons de convenance”). Thackeray also adds ms B to this list. He did not have mss U or O.

The Departure of the Translators (§§ 317–321)

455

Eleazar, among which is a sideboard.1104 I have translated Pelletier’s text. § 320. For the fine woven linen included among Ptolemy’s gifts to Eleazar, the Greek manuscripts preserve a prepositional phrase, εἰς τοὺς ἑκατόν, which does not make sense in the context. Josephus preserves the noun, ἱστούς, which I have translated “bolts” and which makes better sense. It is easy to see how the noun could be corrupted to the prepositional phrase in transmission. General Comment After the scene of the approval concludes, the king fulfills Eleazar’s desire to have the translators return to Jerusalem (§ 123). But first, Ps.-Aristeas culminates the theme of the equal status of the Greek translation with the Hebrew original when the king shows reverence to the translation by bowing down (προσκυνήσας). In § 177, the king bowed down to the Hebrew scrolls when they arrived, his reverence demonstrating the divine character of the text and the status of the Jewish god, “whose utterances these are.”1105 By having him bow down before the translation, Ps.-Aristeas has the king express that the Greek translation has achieved a status equal to the Hebrew original. It has effectively replaced it both for the Jewish community and for the king who authorized and patronized the translation in the first place.1106 At this point in the narrative, one might expect the king or Demetrius to order that the translation be placed in the library, since that was its intended function in the beginning. That is not to be. The king orders that the books be “preserved reverently (ἁγνῶς).” While the adjective ἁγνός can mean upright or undefiled when used of persons, it usually has the religious connotation of being devoted to a god or gods when used of things. Indeed, the same adjective describes the contents of the Jewish law according to Hecataeus of Abdera, and it certainly has a religious connotation in this passage.1107 What began as a project to include the laws of the Jews in the Alexandrian Library ends up as a project that produces sacred scripture for the Jewish community, which is recognized by the Gentile authorities.

1104 1105

1106 1107

For Pelletier’s complete argument, see Lettre, 253–54. See above, p. 317 for a discussion of bowing down. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2744, argues that bowing down would be “undignified” for the king, but as I have shown above, the idea of a king showing such reverence for a god is not unusual in the ancient world. See Wright, “Aristeas and Reception History,” 179–88. Pelletier, Lettre, 238; Tramontano, La Lettera, 252.

456

III. Translation and Commentary

The king then sends the translators on their way. In these last couple of paragraphs, Ps.-Aristeas reprises characterizations of Ptolemy that have become standard in the work. When the translators visit him – and the participle παραγενηθέντος has the force of when, not if – he would be generous to them. Indeed he is generous on this occasion, when he treats them munificently (μεγαλομερῶς), a quality that the king is said to possess in § 21 and § 26 using the noun μεγαλομέρεια. He sends the translators away with magnificent gifts, along with another splendid array of gifts to Eleazar as an offering to the Jewish god – a clear expression of his piety that mirrors his gifts as offerings in § 42. And in § 321, Ps.-Aristeas again hints at Ptolemy’s reputation for importing significant intellectuals to his court, when in his letter to Eleazar, he requested that if any of the translators wanted to return that they would be permitted, because the king “valued greatly being in the company of educated men.”1108 That Ptolemy sends the men back to Jerusalem, even though he values such men in his court, resolves Eleazar’s anxiety about their return articulated in § 124 and § 126, since he realized Ptolemy’s desire to have intellectuals permanently around him. Notes § 317. the books. In this case, the king bows down before “books” in the plural. We have already seen the Hebrew texts described as rolls and parchments. This reference seems implicitly to recognize the multiple volumes of the Pentateuch in its translated form.1109 § 320. fine purple linen and a crown. The list of gifts sent to Eleazar reflects at least some conventions of what kinds of gifts kings send. In 1 Macc 10:20, Alexander sends purple cloth (πορφύρα) and a golden crown (στέφανος). broad bowls, bowls, and two golden drinking bowls. The king had already sent broad bowls (φιάλη) and drinking bowls (κρατήρ) (see § 33, § 42). A τρύβλιον is new to the list and is a more common word for bowl.1110 It is also a type of bowl used in the service in the Tabernacle in Exodus 25 and 38 in the Septuagint. Ps.-Aristeas did not include this type of bowl among the gifts originally sent to Eleazar when he had requested the translators to come to Alexandria (§§ 73–82). The τρύβλιον appears now among gifts to Eleazar, but the σπονδεῖον still does not find its way into the list of bowls and cups sent to Eleazar.1111

1108 1109 1110 1111

On Ptolemy’s reputation, see above p. 179. See Benjamin G. Wright, “The Production of Greek Books,” 14. Meecham, Letter of Aristeas, 309. See the General Comment on §§ 73–82.

Epilogue (§ 322)

457

Epilogue (§ 322) 322. And you have the narrative, just as I promised, O Philocrates. For I suppose that these matters will satisfy you more than the books of the tellers of legends. For you are inclined toward intense attention to matters that are capable of benefitting the mind, and in these you spend much time. And I will also attempt to write down the remainder of those things worth saying so that, by going through them, you might attend to the most excellent prize of your desire. Textual Notes There is no significant textual variation for § 322. General Comment In the Epilogue, Ps.-Aristeas works to establish, as he did in the beginning of the work, that Philocrates should take his narrative (διήγησις) seriously as a reliable story. He distinguishes it from the books of “tellers of legends” (μυθολόγοι). Among some Greek literary theorists, such as Asclepiades of Myrleis (1st c. BCE), μῦθος designates events that could not and/or did not happen.1112 Ps.-Aristeas clearly has perjorative intent in the contrast between his work and those of the myth-tellers. This contrast further enhances the claims to veracity that Ps.-Aristeas tries to establish from the very beginning of his narrative. Gruen notes that “[t]his is the conventional affectation of Greek historians,” and we have seen throughout that Ps.-Aristeas employs many of the forms and techniques of Greek historiography.1113 Ps.-Aristeas’s characterization of Philocrates as interested in “matters that are capable of benefitting the mind” indirectly describes the purpose of the work, which aligns it with Greek historical writing.1114 The appeal to the reader’s pleasure is also a feature of such writing. So, at the end, as in the beginning, Ps.-Aristeas signals what kind of purposes he has in mind for his work.1115

1112

1113 1114

1115

See the discussion with respect to Philo and the Septuagint in Kamesar, “The Literary Genres of the Pentateuch,” 157–62. Gruen, “Letter of Aristeas,” 2768. Hadas, Aristeas to Philocrates, 226, argues that the author here is only distinguishing his work from these others in degree and that he makes no pretense to writing history. Given how Ps.-Aristeas describes his work and the techniques he employs, Hadas is off the mark here. For a discussion of Aristeas’s genre, see the Introduction, section 7. See Honigman, Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship, 29–35.

458

III. Translation and Commentary

In good Greek style, Ps.-Aristeas repeats several items almost verbatim that come from the Prologue, which both recall and reprise its content in shorter scope. Philocrates is described as having intense attention (περιεργίαν; cf. § 3, περιέργως), and he is interested in matters that benefit the mind (τῶν δυναμένων ὠφελεῖν διάνοιαν; cf, § 7, τῶν δυναμένων ὠφελῆσαι διάνοιαν). Several other vocabulary items reoccur here: νένευκας/νενευκυῖα (§ 2); τῶν ἀξιολόγων/ἀξιολόγου (§ 1); τό κάλλιστον/τὰ κάλλιστα (§ 2).1116 Ps.-Aristeas refers here to a possible third work in a series of three. In § 6, he mentioned an earlier communication with Philocrates. The present narrative is the second. What the “remainder of those things worth saying” might be our author does not reveal. It is impossible to know whether these two other works addressed to Philocrates are literary pretense or part of an actual series of works of which this is the only one extant.1117 Notes § 322. these matters. My translation renders the Greek neuter plural demonstrative pronoun ταῦτα. Without any clear antecedent, the pronoun most naturally refers to unspecified matters. In the larger context of Aristeas, however, the king has bowed down before the books, which in Greek are also neuter plural. So, another possible interpretation of the pronoun here and thus of Ps.-Aristeas’s message is that the translated books would be more satisfying to Philocrates than those of the tellers of legends. I think this interpretation less likely, since in § 322 Ps.-Aristeas is tying things up from his Prologue to the work, which is concerned specifically with his narrative of the embassy.

1116 1117

Tramontano, La Lettera, 258. On the connection of our author with the “Aristeas” who authored a work On the Jews, see above in the commentary on §§ 1–8 and the Introduction, section 4.

Abbreviations All biblical books, Dead Sea Scrolls and other ancient works are given according to the abbreviations established in the SBL Handbook of Style (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1999). For abbreviations of papyri, see the Checklist of Papyri Editions at http://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/scriptorium/ papyrus/texts/clist_papyri.html. AB AGJU

Anchor Bible Arbeiten zur Geschichte des antiken Judentums und des Urchristentums AJP American Journal of Philology APF Archiv für Papyrusforschung APOT R. H. Charles, ed., Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (2 vols.; Oxford: Clarendon, 1913) BCE Before the Common Era BIOSCS Bulletin of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies CahRB Cahiers de la Revue biblique CBET Contributions to Biblical Exegesis and Theology CE Common Era CEJL Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature CIJ Corpus inscriptionum judaicarum CRINT Compendia rerum judaicarum ad Novum Testamentum DCLS Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Studies DJD Discoveries in the Judaean Desert HTR Harvard Theological Review HUCA Hebrew Union College Annual IEJ Israel Exploration Journal IOSCS International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies JAJ Journal of Ancient Judaism JANES Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society JGRChJ Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism JJS Journal of Jewish Studies JQR Jewish Quarterly Review JSJ Journal for the Study of Judaism

460 JSJSup JSP JSS JTS JTS N. S. LCL LSJ

Abbreviations

Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplements Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Journal of Semitic Studies Journal of Theological Studies Journal of Semitic Studies New Series Loeb Classical Library H. G. Liddell, R. Scott, H. S. Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon (9th ed. with revised supplement; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996). Online at http://stephanus.tlg.uci.edu/lsj/#eid=1&context=lsj LXX Septuagint, restricted to the Pentateuch LXX/OG The corpus of Jewish-Greek translations ms/mss manuscript(s) MT Masoretic Text NETS Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright, A New English Translation of the Septuagint and the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included under that Title (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007) NovT Novum Testamentum NovTSup Novum Testamentum Supplements NTS New Testament Studies OG Old Greek OTP James H. Charlesworth, ed., The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (2 vols.; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1983, 1985) RB Revue biblique SBL Society of Biblical Literature SBLDS Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series SBLEJL Society of Biblical Literature Early Judaism and Its Literature SBLMS Society of Biblical Literature Monograph Series SBLSBS Society of Biblical Literature Sources for Biblical Study SBLSCS Society of Biblical Literature Septuagint and Cognate Studies SBLPS Society of Biblical Literature Pseudepigrapha Series SBLTT Society of Biblical Literature Texts and Translations SNTSMS Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series SPhilo Studia philonica STDJ Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah s.v. sub verbo, under the word TSAJ Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum TU Texte und Untersuchungen VT Vetus Testamentum VTSup Vetus Testamentum Supplements

Abbreviations

WUNT YCS ZAW ZNW

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Yale Classical Studies Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft (und die Kunde der älteren Kirche)

461

Index of Names and Subjects Abaton 168 Abram 166, 172 Acco 232 Achilles’s shield 179 Actium 83, 225, 262 actors 251, 354, 363–365 addressee contact 47–48, 50 Adoulis Inscription 154 Aegyptiaca 39, 151, 154–155, 218 Aeschylus 118, 262 affairs of state 123, 142, 163, 192, 346, 386, 419 Agatharchides of Cnidus 126 Ailim/Elim 152 akousma/akousmata 281, 310–311 Alciphron 79, 90, 119, 240 Alexander Balas 165 Alexander the Great 138, 317, 333, 452 Alexander Polyhistor 18, 102, 202 Alexander Romance 333 Alexandria 3–5, 8–9, 17, 28–30, 34, 39, 52, 54–58, 60, 62, 66–67, 70, 72–74, 112, 113, 117–119, 127–128, 134, 138–139, 148, 151–152, 170–174, 177, 217–218, 221, 223–225, 230–232, 237–242, 244, 248, 250, 264, 269, 276–277, 295, 297–298, 305, 310, 313, 318, 321–322, 324, 329, 342, 362, 364, 370, 376, 384, 393, 432, 435–436, 438–439, 442–444, 448–451, 456 Alexandrian Library 8, 13, 54, 71, 114, 117, 118, 364, 442, 455 Alexandrian myth 118 Alexandrian paradigm 119 allegorical interpretation/allegory 30, 34, 36, 38, 54, 148, 241, 274, 279–285, 308, 393, 440

alliteration 53 alphabet 108, 120, 212 ambassador(s) 19, 37, 177, 181, 231, 238, 245, 322, 410, 414 anaphora 53 Andreas, companion of Aristeas 18, 27, 106, 121, 122, 136, 157, 162, 165, 169, 175, 236, 237, 258, 259, 264, 268, 275, 313, 321, 322, 415, andron 320 anger 359, 387, 395–396, 445 animal worship/theriolatry 68, 261–264, 266, 278, 426 Antigonus II Gonatas 83, 324–325 anti-Judaism 7, 66, 161, 218 Antiochus I 325 Antiochus III 22, 318 Antiochus IV Epiphanes 103, 180, 215 Antonia fortress 215 Aphairema 225 Apion 252 Apollonius Molon 239 apologia 16, 35, 51, 54, 58, 67, 70, 155, 179, 201, 239, 248, 306, 308, 430 Arabia 54, 195, 230, 233–234 Arabs 228, 231, 232, 235 Aramaic 108, 111, 121, 127, 138, 213, 291, 322–323 square script 121, 213, 322 Aratus 130 Aristarchus of Samothrace 436 Aristeas (narrator) 15, 16–20, 27, 39, 50, 53, 54, 55, 60, 68, 69–70, 72–73, 101, 102, 103, 106, 109, 125, 127–131, 139, 153, 156, 157, 160, 164, 165, 168, 169, 170, 175, 176, 195, 202, 203, 205, 231, 235, 237, 252, 254, 255, 258, 259, 264,

Index of Names and Subjects 268, 269, 270, 275, 306, 307, 308, 312, 317, 321, 322, 345, 346, 372, 415, 428, 431, 432, 437, 447, 453 Aristeas the Exegete/Historian 18–20, 82, 101 Aristeas of Prokonnesos 18 Aristobulus 7–8, 28–30, 42, 59, 113–114, 118, 130, 149, 250, 254, 281–282, 358, 376, 438 Aristotle 5, 40, 48, 105–106, 196, 202, 205, 216–217, 219–220, 223–226, 239, 256, 281, 300–301, 310, 358, 360, 362–363, 370, 373, 378, 380–382, 392–393, 397, 408, 416, 421, 425, 453 aroura 57, 228–229, 232–233 arrogance 343, 400, 402, 408 Arsinoë I 174–175 Arsinoë II 154, 165, 174–175, 325, 327, 394 Artapanus 42, 426 Artemisia of Caria 453 Asclepiades of Myrlea 44 Ashdod 233 Ashkelon 228, 232–233 asyndeton 53 Athens 112, 118, 186, 224, 240 Augustus 156, 410 Balaam 295 banker 123, 141 benefactions 129, 165, 169, 335, 343, 353, 358, 360–361, 374, 285, 398, 399, 401, 407, 419, 428, 429 benefactor 312, 358, 385, 399, 407, 419 Ben Sira/Sirach 22, 59–60, 108, 163, 198, 216, 241, 242, 243, 254–255, 270, 342, 357, 365, 372, 381, 385, 402, 416, 423 Berenice 112, 174 Berenike in Cyrenaica 448, 450 bowls 51, 54, 57, 73, 142, 156, 165, 179, 189–192, 322, 454, 456 brother 16, 50, 99, 101–102, 109, 112, 174, 234 Brother and Sister Gods 154, 174

463

Callimachus 112, 119, 136 Callixinus of Rhodes 179, 331 Cambyses 137–138 captives of war 133 censers 156 Chabrias 166, 172 character 40, 99, 102–103, 148–150, 155, 175, 213, 220, 237–238, 242, 271–272, 274, 285, 288, 303, 323, 330, 340, 354, 360, 364, 403, 408, 411–412, 416, 420–421, 429 chewing the cud 272, 278, 279, 285, 287, 288, 302, 305, 309 chief bodyguard 26, 157, 164 Chios 452 chreia 51–52, 249, 258 Chronicle Concerning Antiochus and the Sin Temple (BCHP 5) 93, 318 Chrysippus 128, 275, 290, 362 circumcision 69, 277 citadel 54, 205, 213–218, 314, 325 citizen(s) 99, 152, 157, 162, 165, 176, 202, 225, 236, 241, 244, 391, 451 civic tribes 177, 196 clean/unclean 54, 246, 252, 255, 269–271, 278–279, 285, 289, 302–304, 306, 311–312 Clearchus of Soli 239, 269 Clement of Alexandria 29, 269, 310 Cleopatra II 28, 160, 168 Cleopatra III 25, 28, 160, 168 Cleopatra VII 262, 391 cloven-hoofed animals 272, 278, 279, 285, 287, 306 Coele-Syria 22, 111, 121, 125–126, 132, 137 co-ethnics/religionists, Jewish 19, 68, 109, 162, 241, 275, 282–283 commensality 70, 319, 326–327, 426 consanguineous marriage 174, 290 Corpus Hermeticum 104 courage 151, 336, 347, 411, 418 court, royal/Ptolemaic 27, 61, 62, 63, 112, 136, 157, 163, 164, 177, 238, 240, 241, 277, 313, 317, 326, 332, 432, 433, 440, 445, 456

464

Index of Names and Subjects

cubit 182, 184–185, 187–189, 193, 198–199, 232 cult, Jewish 70, 73, 180, 249 cultural competition 57, 250–251, 376 culture 20, 37, 60–61, 65, 67, 69–70, 72, 109, 118, 129, 238, 248, 251, 262, 275–277, 281–283, 286, 328–329, 384, 426, 428, 439 Cynic 52, 269, 421 homily 51–52 Cyprus 108 Cyrus 180 Daniel (Greek) 61 Darius 333 Dead Sea Scrolls 322, 357 Decalogue/Ten Commandments 58, 296, 372–373, 381 decree/s, edict, memoranda (see also prostagma) 17, 23–24, 41–42, 123, 131–135, 140, 141, 142, 143, 214, 224, 226 Delos 229 Demetrius I 137, 163 Demetrius of Phalerum 23, 25, 28–29, 30, 40, 54, 55, 70, 71, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113–117, 118, 119, 121, 125, 137, 141, 143–144, 146, 149, 150, 153, 154, 160, 213, 237, 238, 242, 245, 318, 322, 330, 362, 419, 433, 435, 437, 439, 440, 441, 442, 443, 445, 446, 447, 453, 454, 455, Demotic 176, 244 deputation to Eleazar 16, 48, 53, 55, 99, 103, 138, 244, 321 Deuteronomy, book of 59, 107, 268, 279, 289, 292, 294, 297–300, 309, 373, 399, 417, 444, 445, 446 dialect 112, 121 diaspora 62, 66, 152, 218, 255, 275, 285, 291 digression(s) 53, 55–58, 64–67, 70, 74, 157, 179, 227, 231, 234, 293, 306 Diogenes Laertius 105, 112–113, 115–116, 310, 351, 359, 373, 397 Dionysius Thrax 436

Dionysus, patron god of the arts 364 Dis 122, 124, 129, 139, 258 documents, official 23, 25, 37, 41, 47, 61–62, 130–131, 134, 135, 136, 143–145, 158, 159, 160, 177, 324, 431–432 Dorotheus, servant 326, 366, 433 drachma 122–124, 134, 139, 140 dreams 47, 147–148, 301, 335, 343, 362–363, 437, 441, 452–453 drinking parties 320, 327 edict 41, 122, 123, 131, 133, 140, 141, 143, 145, 156, 432, Edom 225 education 10–11, 17, 20, 39, 41–42, 49, 51, 74, 100, 110, 152, 165, 175, 236–238, 244–245, 277, 329, 340, 382, 388, 399, 412 Greek 17, 20, 39, 41, 51, 110, 238, 244, 277, 399 rhetorical 10–11, 42, 49, 51, 74 ego-narrative 431 Egypt 7–8, 17–18, 28–29, 33, 37, 42, 57–59, 61, 65–67, 74, 85–88, 99, 103, 105, 108–109, 121, 123, 125–127, 135, 137–138, 141, 149, 151–152, 156, 158, 160, 162, 172–176, 215, 218, 227, 229–233, 239, 244, 251, 261–263, 297, 326, 364, 391, 404–406, 415, 422, 426, 432, 449, 452 Egyptians 64, 67–69, 110–111, 120–121, 130, 145, 157–158, 160, 226–227, 251, 257–258, 261–264, 266, 268, 278, 289, 426 ekphrasis 51, 54, 57, 73, 179, 181, 185–186, 195, 197, 209–210, 213, 217, 319, 323 Eleazar, high priest 16, 23–25, 34–38, 48, 53–55, 57–58, 62, 67–74, 99, 101–103, 107, 120, 128, 131, 142, 145, 148–149, 151, 153, 155–156, 158–159, 161–162, 165–171, 175–177, 179, 181, 187, 192–193, 195, 201, 203, 207–210, 213, 216,

Index of Names and Subjects 218, 220, 227, 231, 234, 236–242, 244–245, 248–253, 255, 256, 258–261, 263, 264, 266–271, 273–283, 285–290, 293, 297, 299, 301, 305–309, 312–313, 316, 318–319, 321–322, 327, 341–342, 345–346, 348, 361–362, 369, 370, 375, 391, 395, 407, 415, 428–430, 437–439, 443, 445, 447, 450, 454–456. Eleazar, victim of Antiochus IV 103 Elephantine 127, 138, 152, 153, 160, 172 Elijah 267 Elissaios, translator 166, 314, 319, 321, 422, 451 embassy 39, 44, 99–100, 238, 245, 252, 258–259, 275, 415, 458 emendation 34, 100, 178, 184, 193, 194, 195, 214, 215, 219, 222, 237, 304, 316, 337, 338, 355, 356, 357, 413, 434, 454 enkyklios paideia 42 Epictetus 252, 359, 364–365, 378 Epicurus 421 epilogue 55, 430, 457 Epiphanius of Salamis 6, 15, 119, 164, 170 epistle/epistolary (see also letter) 16, 24, 44, 46–48, 50, 51, 73, 101, 109, 167 characteristics 101 greeting formula 23 philosophical 44, 46 scientific 48 technical 46, 48 treatise 46–48, 50 equanimity 336, 346, 361, 407 Erechtheum 186–187 Esther (Greek) 61, 137 ethnic boundaries/identity/markers (see also identity, Jewish) 64, 66–67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72–73, 106, 250–251, 266, 277, 351, 383, 404, 409 ethnographers, Hellenistic 52 ethnos 105–106 ethopoeia 52

465

ethos 78, 104, 277 euhemerism 68 Euhemerus of Messene 41, 195, 197, 201, 205, 230–231, 259–260 Euridice, wife of Ptolemy I 174 Euripides 118, 392 Eusebius of Caesarea 6, 15–16, 18, 29–31, 33–35, 102, 110–111, 124, 130, 142–143, 157–158, 164, 166–167, 193–194, 201–202, 221, 246–247, 254, 257, 259, 267, 272–274, 282, 292–293, 303–305, 312, 376, 441–442, 454 Exodus, book of 52, 56, 57, 107, 140, 156, 180, 185, 188, 191, 199, 208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 297, 298, 299 Exodus, event/story 29, 42, 56, 57, 58, 59, 125–127, 140, 162, 239, 268, 420 Exodus paradigm 55, 126–127 Ezekiel the Tragedian 42, 152, 166, 176, 198, 202–203, 420 Ezra 39, 180, 196, 199, 215, 225, 443 Ezra-Nehemiah 39, 333 fake(s) 10, 261 fame 190, 192–193, 269, 308, 336, 346, 353, 361, 367–368, 370–371, 374–375, 377, 406, 414, 417, 421, 423 fear of God 255, 256, 288, 292–293, 299, 314, 323, 335, 341–342, 345, 417 Festival(s)/Feast(s) 200, 203, 206, 207, 214, 217, 284, 298, 324, 451 Booths 203 Passover 203 Unleavened Bread 298 Weeks 203 figures of speech 53 first fruits 157, 164–165, 255, 292, 293–294 flagons 142, 156, 165 food/dietary laws 38, 66, 69, 171, 241–242, 246, 252, 253, 255, 256, 258–259, 267, 268–270, 271,

466

Index of Names and Subjects

272, 275–281, 283–286, 288, 290, 302–303, 305, 307–308, 309, 314, 318–319, 342, 351, 428, 437 foreign kings 61 foreign rulers/kings 61 formula valetudinis 23, 25, 27, 168 frame narrative/story 53, 56, 58, 64–66, 71–72 Friends, of the king 26, 165, 166, 167, 176, 177, 241, 245, 335, 338, 342, 350, 383, 453 fringes 108, 293–294 Galen 80, 118, 240, 395 Ganges River 230 Gaza 126, 228, 232–233 Genesis, book of 8, 107, 212, 349, 437 genre 16–17, 36, 41, 43–45, 47, 50–51, 56, 101, 108, 179, 186, 330, 372, 431, 433, 457 Gentile(s) (see also Greek[s]) 16, 19, 20, 50, 60, 61, 62, 63, 68, 70, 102, 169, 172, 197, 205, 208, 241, 242, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 255, 258, 259, 260, 264, 265, 268, 270, 275, 277, 283, 284, 286, 287, 288, 289, 305, 317, 318, 319, 326, 346, 351, 375, 384, 392, 431, 437, 446, 447, 450, 455 gentleman 106–107 gifts, royal 37–39, 51, 54, 55, 109, 114, 123, 128, 145, 154, 156, 168, 179, 180, 181, 187, 197, 231, 235, 289, 319, 322, 342, 375, 424, 428, 454, 455, 456 Gihon spring 202 Glycera 240 God, of the Jews 17, 55, 68, 70, 72, 122, 123, 124, 127, 128, 129, 130, 138, 139, 155, 156, 161, 164, 165, 166, 169, 175, 176, 179, 181, 185, 187, 191, 199, 207, 208, 210, 212, 213, 246, 250, 253, 254, 255, 257, 258, 261, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269, 270, 272, 283, 287, 288, 292,

293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299, 300, 301, 303, 305, 307, 312, 313, 314, 317, 318, 321, 327, 331, 335, 336, 337, 339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 353, 354, 356, 357, 358, 359, 360, 361, 362, 363, 364, 365, 366, 367, 368, 370, 371, 372, 373, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 379, 381, 382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 387, 388, 390, 394, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399, 400, 401, 402, 403, 404, 405, 406, 407, 408, 410, 411, 412, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 421, 422, 423, 425, 426, 434, 436, 437, 438, 440, 441, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447, 448, 452, 453, 455, 456 government 99, 108, 223, 225, 329, 345, 377, 417 grand procession of Ptolemy II 179–180, 191 Greek 34, 35, 53, 58, 65, 66, 71, 72, 73, 100, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 117, 119, 120, 121, 124, 127, 128, 132, 134, 136, 138, 139, 140, 141, 146, 147, 148, 154, 155, 156, 159, 162, 163, 164, 169, 171, 172, 175, 176, 177, 181, 188, 189, 192, 193, 196, 198, 199, 200, 203, 205, 206, 208, 209, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 217, 218, 221, 226, 229, 230, 233, 234, 235, 237, 238, 244, 245, 249, 250, 252, 255, 260, 265, 266, 268, 270, 275, 278, 279, 281, 282, 288, 291, 293, 298, 299, 301, 303, 304, 308, 309, 310, 311, 312, 313, 317, 318, 321, 322, 326, 331, 333, 334, 338, 340, 341, 342, 344, 345, 348, 349, 350, 358, 359, 360, 369, 373, 377, 378, 380, 381, 386, 391, 394, 395, 399, 405, 408, 422, 423, 424, 425, 427, 433, 435, 436, 438, 439, 442, 443, 444, 445, 447, 451, 452, 458 architecture 186–187, 188 cornice 186, 187 cyma 186

Index of Names and Subjects egg-and-dart 186, 188 molding 182, 183, 185, 187, 188 culture/religion 9, 16, 60, 68, 69, 70, 72, 249, 250, 251, 259, 261, 277, 281, 282, 359, 426 ethnography 109, 229–230, 231, 235 historiography/historians 45, 47, 109, 126, 130, 131, 253, 262, 432, 446, 457 koine/language 3, 6, 8, 12, 17, 38, 60, 170, 309 literature/sources 13, 17, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 45, 55, 70, 71, 110, 140, 237, 238, 239, 245, 248, 279, 291, 331, 348, 365, 373, 392, 424, 425, 427, 437, 444, translation(s) 9, 18, 22, 59, 60, 61, 64, 69, 74, 103, 120, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 185, 200, 241, 245, 248, 381, 427, 439, 443, 445, 452, 455 Greek(s) (persons; see also Gentiles) 37, 63, 64, 65, 68, 69, 70, 72, 74, 128, 149, 150, 152, 173, 195, 210, 227, 238, 239, 245, 249, 250, 251, 258, 260, 261, 262, 263, 269, 277, 282, 289, 290, 328, 329, 342, 376, 426, 427, 428, 431, 437, 439 gymnosophists 333, 351, 426 Halicarnassus 325 Hasmonean period 171, 173, 234, 322 Hasmoneans 65, 165, 171, 173, 216, 225, 232, 234, 245, 322, 383 Alexander Jannaeus 232 John Hyrcanus 225, 226, 349 Jonathan 165, 232 Simon 232 head bodyguard 121, 136, 175 Hebrew 14, 52, 53, 65, 71, 74, 105, 107, 108, 112, 114, 119, 120, 121, 138, 145, 146, 148, 149, 150, 156, 162, 164, 169, 170, 171, 172, 176, 200, 209, 212, 213, 215, 238, 244,

467

245, 248, 278, 291, 322, 323, 327, 345, 348, 372, 386, 399, 416, 427, 437, 438, 439, 443, 444, 455 letters 99, 107, 114, 142, 145, 157, 164, 323 text, parent/source 11, 12, 13, 14, 39, 69, 71, 120, 149, 150, 164, 206, 244, 437, 438, 439, 445, 456 Hecataeus of Abdera 39, 40, 126, 142, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 158, 197, 198, 199, 206, 216, 218, 220, 221, 230, 231, 233, 262, 263, 340, 358, 371, 446, 452, 455 Hefzibah inscription 22 Hellenes 67, 73, 161, 251 Hellenism/Hellenistic culture 61, 64, 65, 66, 68, 70, 72, 73, 101, 104, 107, 128, 129, 248, 277, 282, 426 Hellenistic Judaism 3 Heracleopolis 67, 326, 448, 449, 450 Hermes Trismegistus 104 Hermippus 112, 116, 173 Herod 197, 198, 215, 320 Herodotus 107, 109, 138, 158, 232, 262, 263, 363, 366, 431 Hiera, island of 231, 232 hieroglyphs 120 high priest(s) 16, 18, 23, 38, 48, 51, 52, 53, 54, 57, 58, 68, 73, 74, 99, 101, 102, 103, 105, 107, 109, 110, 131, 142, 145, 149, 150, 151, 153, 156, 159, 161, 162, 165, 167, 169, 171, 190, 192, 202, 207, 208, 209, 210, 212, 216, 217, 218, 220, 231, 238, 243, 248, 251, 252, 267, 269, 275, 278, 289, 295, 296, 297, 317, 319, 321, 322, 327, 334, 340, 350, 392, 407, 429, 439 vestments 38, 52, 54, 57, 107, 151, 207, 210, 319 bells 207, 209, 210 diadem 207, 209 ephod 209, 210, 211 girdle 207, 209 mitre 207, 209, 210, 212

468

Index of Names and Subjects

oracle 207, 209, 210, 211, 295, 296 pomegranates 183, 207, 209, 210, 211 robe 152, 198, 199, 200, 207, 208, 209 tiara 207, 209 Hippodamus of Miletus 220 historiography 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 50, 51, 109, 131, 253, 431, 432, 457 Holy of Holies 198, 199 homeland, Jewish 61, 65, 66, 73, 244, 391, 392 Homer 42, 110, 118, 148, 284, 312, 435, 436 Homeric scholarship/exegesis 17, 146, 147, 238, 242, 436. homoioteleuton 53, 304 Iambulus 195 identity, Jewish/ethnic 17, 19, 56, 57, 64, 66, 67, 69, 71, 72, 73, 106, 116, 152, 153, 244, 249, 250, 251, 252, 264, 276, 277, 285, 286, 305, 323, 391, 428, 439 idol/idol worship/idolatry 54, 68, 241, 251, 252, 256, 258, 259, 260, 261, 263, 264, 265, 266, 268, 286, 287, 300 Idumea, Idumeans 21, 225, 226, 450 imitation of God 339, 340, 342, 344, 353, 361, 411, 418, 419 impartiality 335, 343, 400, 402, 408 India 92, 195, 229, 230, 231, 239, 333, 351 Indus River 230 informers 133, 134, 281, 302, 306, 307, 311, 341, 415 inscriptions 22, 23, 86, 131, 144, 154, 167, 227, 324, 326, 410, 450 intermarriage 68 interpretation 34, 36, 38, 47, 54, 58, 68, 69, 107, 119, 120, 148, 156, 171, 241, 242, 243, 252, 274, 275, 277, 280, 281, 282, 284, 285, 299, 300, 306, 308, 312, 318, 319, 437, 438

Ionic style 186, 188 Ioudaios/oi 105, 106 irony 53 Isis 168, 262, 309 Israel 22, 40, 58, 65, 138, 151, 209, 212, 217, 234, 239, 240, 286, 391 Jason 166, 215 Jerusalem 9, 16, 17, 27, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 40, 51, 52, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 65, 66, 71, 73, 108, 126, 142, 145, 149, 151, 156, 177, 178, 179, 181, 187, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 201, 203, 205, 207, 208, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 223, 224, 225, 230, 231, 232, 235, 239, 243, 244, 278, 308, 319, 322, 327, 333, 334, 375, 392, 415, 424, 439, 443, 444, 445, 450, 455, 456 Jewish community (see Judaism, Alexandrian) John son of Eupolemus 245 Jordan River 228, 230 Joseph 107, 163, 200, 349, 437 Josephus 6, 15, 18, 21, 30, 31, 33, 34, 35, 36, 40, 102, 103, 110, 121, 124, 125, 126, 127, 130, 139, 140, 142, 143, 154, 157, 158, 160, 166, 167, 170, 171, 178, 179, 184, 185, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 197, 198, 199, 203, 206, 209, 210, 212, 215, 217, 220, 221, 229, 231, 232, 233, 239, 248, 264, 269, 284, 296, 315, 316, 317, 318, 325, 337, 349, 350, 351, 426, 434, 440, 441, 442, 444, 449, 450, 452, 454, 455 Judah Maccabee 180 Judaism 3, 5, 7, 9, 20, 36, 40, 58, 60, 63, 64, 65, 66, 69, 70, 102, 105, 126, 129, 132, 138, 151, 152, 161, 212, 213, 217, 234, 239, 243, 244, 248, 249, 252, 264, 275, 276, 277, 281, 283, 317, 376, 414, 418, 420, 425, 426, 428, 438, 448, 453 Alexandrian 3, 5, 13, 14, 19, 20, 35, 51, 55, 56, 59, 63, 65, 67,

Index of Names and Subjects 72, 73, 120, 130, 147, 149, 150, 162, 173, 174, 218, 237, 244, 260, 263, 275, 276, 277, 281, 287, 340, 343, 351, 392, 420, 426, 427, 439, 444, 451, 452 Palestinian (see also Judeans) 275 Judea 21, 40, 54, 65, 71, 73, 74, 86, 93, 95, 99, 103, 105, 106, 110, 111, 121, 125, 126, 135, 151, 158, 171, 172, 174, 193, 194, 195, 196, 223, 224, 225, 226, 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 244, 314, 322, 323, 384, 391, 392, 424, 444, 453 Judeans 48, 63, 66, 73, 74, 99, 103, 105, 106, 108, 110, 111, 120, 121, 122, 123, 125, 126, 127, 135, 137, 140, 141, 145, 149, 152, 154, 156, 157, 158, 161, 162, 171, 173, 182, 194, 209, 217, 218, 222, 225, 235, 236, 244, 245, 251, 322, 391, 432, 439, 441, 442, 443, 445, 448, 449, 450 Julius Caesar 118 justice 36, 48, 72, 123, 227, 246, 256, 271, 285, 292, 299, 303, 307, 335, 339, 341, 342, 343, 344, 347, 353, 354, 360, 361, 362, 363, 368, 374, 375, 376, 378, 388, 395, 398, 400, 402, 405, 408, 409, 410, 411, 412, 415, 416, 417, 418, 421, 422, 423, 428 Juvenal 252 Karanis 326 king 8, 9, 15, 17, 24, 25, 26, 29, 38, 41, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 70, 71, 72, 73, 99, 103, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 127, 128, 129, 130, 136, 137, 138, 139, 141, 142, 143, 144, 148, 149, 150, 153, 154, 156, 160, 161, 162, 163, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 176, 177, 178, 179, 182, 184, 190, 192, 193, 197, 203, 216, 221, 224, 226, 227, 228, 235, 236, 237, 238, 240, 241, 243, 245, 260, 265,

469

285, 289, 295, 302, 306, 313, 314, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 326, 327, 329, 330, 331, 333, 334, 335, 336, 337, 339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 350, 351, 352, 353, 354, 355, 357, 358, 359, 360, 361, 362, 363, 364, 365, 366, 367, 368, 370, 371, 372, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 379, 380, 381, 382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 387, 388, 390, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399, 400, 402, 403, 404, 405, 406, 407, 408, 409, 410, 411, 412, 413, 414, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422, 423, 424, 425, 426, 427, 428, 429, 431, 432, 433, 434, 435, 440, 441, 442, 444, 446, 447, 450, 452, 453, 454, 455, 456, 458 kingship 41, 55, 328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335, 339, 342, 344, 353, 361, 362, 363, 370, 372, 374, 382, 384, 390, 392, 394, 402, 406, 412, 416, 417, 419, 421, 424, 425, 428 kosher law (see food laws) 54, 68, 69, 74, 107, 149, 220, 255, 264, 276, 278, 284, 305, 306, 342 ladles 156, 191 law code 9, 10, 417 Law, Jewish/of Moses 10, 16, 19, 25, 28, 29, 30, 34, 35, 36, 39, 40, 51, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 61, 65, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 74, 99, 101, 107, 108, 110, 111, 112, 114, 117, 119, 120, 122, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 145, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 154, 155, 157, 158, 162, 164, 166, 169, 179, 201, 236, 237, 238, 241, 242, 245, 248, 249, 251, 252, 258, 264, 265, 269, 271, 275, 276, 277, 278, 280, 282, 283, 285, 290, 291, 295, 296, 297, 299, 300, 301, 303, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309, 311, 312, 317, 318,

470

Index of Names and Subjects

323, 324, 330, 334, 335, 341, 342, 348, 370, 372, 376, 379, 382, 396, 416, 417, 418, 419, 422, 427, 437, 438, 439, 442, 443, 446, 447, 448, 449, 452, 453, 455 legislation, Jewish/Moses 6, 19, 58, 68, 71, 72, 99, 108, 122, 138, 142, 246, 252, 254, 264, 265, 271, 283, 307, 313, 440, 441, 444 legislator/lawgiver 57, 138, 152, 153, 246, 253, 257, 259, 264, 265, 268, 271, 272, 278, 288, 305, 313, 382, 440, 441, 446 leniency 335, 340, 341, 343, 344, 355, 359, 360, 361, 390, 408 Leontopolis 28, 64, 65, 428, 448 Letter (see also epistle) 15, 16, 23, 25, 26, 34, 41, 43, 44, 45, 46, 49 54, 62, 109, 114, 120, 131, 137, 141, 142, 144, 145, 149, 153, 156, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 174, 175, 177, 181, 192, 203, 231, 237, 313, 321, 322, 327, 346, 361, 394, 419, 424, 432, 442, 443, 451, 456 Leviticus, book of 57, 107, 279, 289, 309 libation cups 142, 156, 191 literary diversity (poikilia) 51 literary forms 17, 51, 52, 56, 101 litotes 53 liturgy/liturgical 10, 203 Lochias, in Alexandria 325 Locri 186 locusts 271, 272, 278, 288, 289 lordship of God 122, 128, 176, 253, 254, 345 love 48, 60, 69, 99, 103, 104, 148, 165, 179, 211, 239, 303, 308, 327, 330, 358, 368, 374, 378, 390, 392, 397, 400, 403, 406, 411, 429, 431, 433 love of learning 60, 69, 103, 303, 308, 429, 431, 433 Luke, Gospel of 47, 48, 101 Lycurgus 138, 173, 265, 382, 383 Lydda 225

lying 153, 299, 311, 332, 353, 358 Lysimachus of Thrace 174, 351 Manetho 40, 86, 239 manumission/liberation of slaves 54, 57, 121, 125, 127, 128, 130, 160, 161 Megasthenes 41, 230, 231, 269 memorandum (-a) 41, 54, 142, 143, 144, 145, 153, 158 memory 8, 22, 47, 90, 116, 117, 149, 240, 244, 272, 287, 372, 417 Memphis 194, 450 Menander 240, 253, 340, 378, 408 Menedemus 36, 116, 348, 351, 352, 377, 434 Menelaus 215 mercenary (-ies) 67, 127, 137, 138, 156, 160, 161, 162 mercy 353, 360, 396 meta-symposiasts 328, 347, 421 mezuzot 54, 293, 294–296, 297, 298 mice 58, 271, 272, 275, 278, 302, 306, 312 middle way 40, 226, 236, 238, 370 Miletus 220, 325 military 67, 90, 122, 123, 127, 138, 141, 156, 157, 158, 160, 162, 163, 233, 298, 336, 344, 345, 347, 418, 419, 420, 422, 425, 449 mines of Arabia 54, 233, 234 Minor Prophets scroll 93, 323 misanthropy 239, 275 moderation 59, 343, 346, 367, 370, 378, 381, 393, 397, 411, 415, 420 monotheism 66, 68, 83, 93, 94, 128, 129, 260, 264 Mosaic discourse 58, 69, 89, 277 Moses 4, 6, 21, 36, 56, 57, 58, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 77, 83, 87, 101, 108, 138, 151, 152, 153, 156, 162, 171, 176, 180, 185, 191, 212, 218, 233, 239, 244, 250, 252, 253, 254, 258, 259, 264, 265, 267, 268, 269, 271, 275, 277, 278, 283, 285, 286, 288, 290, 291, 296, 299, 300, 301, 305,

Index of Names and Subjects 308, 313, 324, 376, 382, 383, 426, 435, 438, 439, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447, 451, 452, 453 Mouseion 17, 113, 117, 118, 136 Mt. Sinai 59 myth 9, 14, 45, 47, 66, 71, 116, 118, 119, 234, 457 charter 14, 47, 71, 119 historical 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 21, 22, 28, 44, 45, 47, 50, 52, 61, 66, 67, 78, 81, 83, 86, 91, 94, 102, 113, 116, 117, 125, 126, 131, 147, 148, 151, 153, 171, 173, 198, 215, 216, 225, 243, 251, 276, 307, 324, 325, 383, 384, 386, 394, 409, 432, 436, 457 of origins 14, 66, 71, 116 myth-telling/tellers 45, 457 narrative (διήγησις) 5, 6, 8, 14, 16, 20, 28, 33, 34, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 49, 50, 53, 55, 56, 58, 62, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 99, 100, 101, 104, 105, 108, 109, 110, 112, 125, 127, 128, 130, 131, 135, 141, 148, 149, 156, 162, 171, 173, 174, 180, 181, 201, 205, 207, 208, 238, 243, 255, 275, 279, 281, 283, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 326, 327, 331, 366, 391, 395, 415, 424, 425, 428, 431, 432, 434, 435, 439, 445, 446, 447, 455, 457, 458 narrator (Aristeas, Gentile) 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 44, 53, 55, 63, 69, 70, 72, 73, 101, 103, 104, 109, 252, 308, 317, 345, 414, 431, 432, 433, 453 Nehemiah 39, 180, 215, 333 New Testament 46, 163, 198, 296, 365, 378, 408 Nicanor, chief steward 314, 319, 326, 366 Nile River 228, 230 Numbers, book of 107, 221, 294

471

omniscience, God’s 254, 361 Onias 28, 102, 168 onomasticon 83, 172, 174 oracle(s) 207, 209, 210, 211, 295, 296, 323 Orpheus 19, 254 Orphic poems 130 Oxyrhynchos 326 paideia (see also education) 42, 60, 175, 238, 244 paleo-Hebrew 93, 121, 212, 213, 322, 323 Pali Milindapanha 333 Panara 197 Panchaea, island of 197, 230, 259 papyri 3, 7, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 49, 67, 127, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 140, 144, 145, 153, 159, 167, 168, 171, 172, 173, 174, 194, 226, 227, 229, 233, 311, 321, 326, 360, 391, 394, 406, 417, 432, 448, 449 paraphrasis 52 parents 236, 343, 367, 372, 373, 378, 381, 383, 390, 417 particularism 129, 283, 286, 426, 428 patronage, royal/Ptolemaic 8, 9, 112, 116, 117, 148, 154, 364, 442, 445 Peisistratus 224 Pentateuch 6, 8, 9, 14, 15, 38, 39, 65, 66, 103, 107, 108, 116, 153, 155, 169, 185, 243, 312, 327, 373, 378, 436, 453, 456, 457 Peri Basileus 41, 52, 327, 328, 330, 332, 333, 339, 344, 360, 420, 424, 425 Persian, the 121, 127, 137, 160, Persians 29, 156, 160, 233, 235, 317 petition 17, 25, 54, 62, 144, 153, 343, 387, 394, 395, 402, 449 Phaedo, philosopher 60, 351 pharaoh 57, 59, 109, 125, 127, 140, 163, 409, 437 Pharos 108, 324, 435 Philae 168 philanthro¯pia 330

472

Index of Names and Subjects

Philikos, priest of Dionysus 364 Philip of Macedon 423, 425 Philo of Alexandria 3, 6, 15, 108, 151, 152, 156, 161, 162, 202, 203, 211, 248, 253, 254, 256, 263, 265, 271, 278, 282, 284, 287, 289, 291, 296, 298, 312, 324, 343, 346, 362, 375, 393, 416, 420, 435, 449, 450, 451, 452, 457 Philocrates 15, 16, 19, 45, 46, 48, 49, 50, 60, 69, 70, 99, 101, 103, 104, 105, 108, 109, 153, 231, 234, 235, 303, 307, 308, 429, 430, 431, 432, 433, 440, 457, 458 Philodemus 408 philosophers, Jews as 239, 269, 308, 319, 340, 348, 368, 376, 377, 414, 420, 426, 432 philosophy 47, 149, 149, 150, 249, 280, 306, 332, 347, 351, 364, 388, 392, 396, 397, 417, 420, 425 Epicurus/Epicurean 407, 421 Peripatetic/Aristotelean 37, 40, 59, 224, 226, 239, 256, 350, 362, 363, 365, 370, 392, 397, 399, 405, 436 popular 332, 364, 405, 416, 425 Pythagorean 40, 281, 310, 311, 319, 329, 339, 373 Stoic 40, 52, 128, 139, 149, 269, 275, 280, 282, 283, 284, 290, 347, 364, 365, 369, 370, 371, 374, 375, 384, 396, 397, 398, 405, 407, 416, 418, 421, 425 Phoenicia 22, 111, 121, 123, 125, 126, 132, 134, 135, 137 Photius 40, 151, 218 piety 16, 36, 38, 44, 45, 99, 103, 104, 123, 141, 165, 175, 238, 246, 253, 254, 256, 267, 269, 348, 353, 354, 361, 363, 368, 374, 375, 376, 388, 396, 398, 428, 429, 438, 439, 447, 456 pilot of a ship 387, 394, 399 Pittacus of Mytilene 359, 361

plasma 44 Plato 29, 60, 129, 149, 152, 177, 196, 197, 250, 274, 282, 327, 362, 381, 382, 392, 393, 394, 408, 416, 421, 422 Plautine Scholium 114, 115, 119 Plutarch 173, 252, 262, 290, 309, 310, 311, 330, 332, 378, 419, 421 polis 152, 176, 392, 450 politeia/citizenship 73, 391, 449 politeuma/politeumata 8, 67, 137, 154, 441, 448, 449, 450, 451 Polybius 45, 108, 136, 158, 163, 316, 321, 360, 383, 390, 423, 425 polytheism 128, 129, 260, 264 Porphyry 252, 269, 310 prayer 17, 36, 70, 122, 127 130, 138, 139, 252, 254, 314, 319, 321, 336, 346, 372, 375, 385, 387, 390, 422, 434, 436, 437, 440 Priene 143, 324 priest(s ) Egyptian 19, 101, 109, 160, 168, 239, 266, 267, 321 Greek 364 Jewish 54, 57, 102, 178, 180, 181, 193, 197, 199, 204, 205, 206, 208, 216, 293, 314, 321, 326, 327, 334, 358, 441, 443, 449, 451 production, point of 11, 12, 13, 14, 71, 244 progymnasa (-mata) 10, 49, 51, 52, 101, 110, 179, 223, 249 pronoia/forethought/foresight 154, 190, 330, 335, 342–343 propaganda 62, 117 prosopopoeia 10 prostagma 23, 24, 27, 41, 133, 134, 135, 136, 141, 144, 158, 160, 307, 341 prudence 347, 380 Psammetichus I 138 Psammetichus II 138 Ps.-Aristeas 10, 11, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45,

Index of Names and Subjects 46, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 140, 141, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 155, 158, 160, 161, 162, 164, 165, 167, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 179, 180, 181, 182, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 191, 192, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 202, 203, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 237, 238, 239, 240, 241, 243, 244, 245, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 253, 254, 255, 256, 258, 260, 261, 263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279, 280, 281, 282, 283, 284, 285, 287, 288, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299, 300, 301, 305, 306, 307, 309, 311, 312, 313, 317, 318, 319, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, 327, 329, 331, 332, 333, 334, 338, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352, 357, 359, 360, 361, 362, 364, 365, 366, 370, 371, 372, 373, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 380, 382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 389, 390, 391, 392, 393, 394, 395, 397, 402, 404, 408, 410, 414, 416, 417, 418, 420, 421, 422, 424, 425, 426, 427, 428, 429, 431, 432, 433, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439, 440, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447, 448, 449, 450, 451, 452, 453, 455, 456, 457, 458 pseudepigrapha/pseudepigraphy 10, 19 pseudepigraphic author/pseudonymity 50, 101, 317

473

Pseudo-Hecataeus 40, 126, 154, 155 On Abraham(?) 154 On the Jews 40, 154, 458 Pseudo-Phocylides 59, 287, 343, 370, 371, 385, 398 Ptolemaic Alexandria 9 archives 24, army/military 137, 162, 176 bureaucracy/bureaucratic language 17, 41, 62, 131, 132, 133, 135, 136, 144, 227 court 43, 63, 136, 317, 326, 332, 445 documents 41, 159 dynasty/Ptolemies 127 Egypt 67, 176, 227, 251, 326, 364, 391, 404, 449 officialdom 17, 145, 317 patronage 117 period 3, 26, 28, 62, 104, 139, 144, 158, 159, 168, 226, 391, 415, 448 Ptolemaïs 228, 229, 232 Ptolemy Ceraunus 174 Ptolemy I Soter 33, 54, 67, 103, 106, 112, 113, 115, 117, 118, 121, 125, 126, 127, 133, 134, 138, 139, 140, 151, 158, 160, 161, 174, 240, 330, 340, 358, 364, 428, 452 Ptolemy II Philadelphus 15, 16, 17, 18, 22, 24, 25, 26, 34, 36, 38, 41, 54, 56, 57, 62, 63, 65, 70, 72, 73, 74, 102, 103, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 120, 125, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 133, 135, 136, 138, 139, 141, 142, 144, 145, 149, 150, 153, 154, 156, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 174, 175, 176, 179, 180, 181, 182, 191, 192, 197, 203, 205, 208, 216, 217, 224, 226, 231, 234, 237, 238, 239, 240, 241, 245, 252, 254, 255, 258, 259, 264, 270, 275, 285, 295, 307, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 327, 328, 331,

474

Index of Names and Subjects

333, 339, 340, 342, 346, 347, 348, 350, 351, 352, 358, 360, 361, 362, 364, 370, 371, 372, 374, 375, 381, 391, 404, 405, 407, 414, 415, 419, 420, 428, 429, 432, 433, 443, 445, 447, 449, 450, 454, 455, 456 Ptolemy III Euergetes 118, 119, 154, 240, 325, 333, 399 Ptolemy IV Philopater 136, 386 Ptolemy V Epiphanes 136 Ptolemy VI Philometer 27, 28, 29, 168, 449 Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II 28, 160, 168, 307, 399 Ptolemy IX Soter II 25, 160, 326, 394 Ptolemy X Alexander I 144 Ptolemy XI 326 Pythagoras 149, 250, 281–282, 310 Queen of Sheba 332 Qumran 121, 197, 286, 291, 296, 297, 298, 334, 453 Ramathaim 225 reading 36, 236, 21, 242, 243, 411, 419, 434, 436, 442, 443, 450 reason 149, 150, 221, 267, 269, 270, 271, 302, 305, 306, 308, 309, 346, 353, 354, 362, 374, 379, 381, 384, 393, 394, 395, 396, 400, 402, 404, 405, 416 reception history 13, 14 religion 67 Egyptian 37, 67, 249 Gentile/Greek 68, 70, 248, 249, 250, 251 Judean/Jewish 67, 105, 106, 129, 151, 250, 263 reputation 99, 109, 157, 161, 170, 179, 190, 192, 193, 335, 343, 354, 363, 364, 370, 374, 375, 377, 400, 406, 411, 412, 418, 422, 428, 456 rhetoric/rhetorical 10, 11, 12, 17, 42, 43, 45, 47, 49, 51, 52, 74, 101, 109, 179, 185, 223, 260, 276, 277, 280,

333, 400, 404, 405, 414, 431, 433, 453 devices 17, 51, 52 handbook 52 ring composition 55, 56 ritual 34, 35, 164, 220, 294, 297, 299, 321, 340 prayer 70, 130, 138, 139, 314, 321, 346, 422, 434, 437, 440 washing 34, 35, 36, 200, 434, 436, 437, 438, 440 Rome 245 ruler cult 340, 362, 371, 402 Sabbath 69, 126, 277, 284, 351 sacred scripture/s 8, 13, 14, 71, 72, 74, 148, 149, 241, 291, 439, 442, 446, 455 sacrifice/offering 122, 130, 139, 142, 156, 157, 161, 162, 164, 165, 168, 169, 176, 193, 197, 199, 200, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 209, 214, 218, 257, 265, 269, 292, 293, 294, 303, 304, 307, 308, 312, 313, 321, 326, 368, 375, 402, 454, 456 Samaria 126, 221, 222, 225, 226 Sarapis 119, 417 scholium/a 114, 115, 119, 174, 175, 364, 436 to Theocritus 175 scientific treatises, Hellenistic 47, 48 scripture 6, 8, 13, 14, 38, 64, 65, 71, 72, 74, 147, 148, 149, 153, 164, 182, 212, 241, 244, 250, 272, 277, 280, 281, 284, 287, 291, 292, 296, 300, 303, 311, 333, 362, 373, 417, 427, 439, 442, 444, 445, 448, 450, 452, 453, 455 Sejanus 311 Seleucid(s) 22, 137, 163, 165, 318 self-control 360, 361, 369, 370, 376, 410, 415, 416 separation, Jewish 19, 61, 67, 68, 69, 72, 129, 248, 251–253, 258, 264, 269, 270, 272, 276, 277, 279, 283, 284, 285, 286, 305, 307

Index of Names and Subjects Septuagint/LXX 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 19, 38, 42, 57, 59, 61, 64, 65, 66, 69, 71, 72, 74, 103, 107, 114, 116, 117, 119, 126, 139, 140, 145, 147, 149, 150, 153, 156, 162, 164, 176, 182, 184, 185, 187, 198, 199, 200, 206, 208, 209, 211, 212, 214, 221, 241, 244, 250, 253, 276, 279, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 312, 313, 321, 334, 372, 386, 399, 417, 435, 436, 439, 447, 449, 452, 453, 456 equivalent of/replacement for Hebrew 13, 14, 71, 176, 439 legend of 115 origins 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 15, 47, 71, 112, 114, 116, 146, 147, 148, 149, 243 scholarship 8 Studies 5 seventy elders 58, 170, 171 Seventy, the 170 Sibylline Oracles 81, 259, 263, 287 Simon I 102 Simon II 201, 216 Simon bar Kochba 213 Sin, Babylonian moon goddess 93, 318 slaves/enslavement 17, 41, 42, 53, 54, 56, 57, 67, 102, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 138, 139, 140, 141, 143, 156, 160, 161, 162, 176, 254, 306, 341, 346, 372, 393, 412, 422 sleep 292, 293, 299, 300, 301, 302, 352, 354, 356, 357, 362, 363, 366, 429 Socrates 250 soldiers 67, 122, 123, 125, 128, 137, 160, 162, 172, 233, 251, 418, 419, 423 Solomon 161, 180, 197, 198, 199, 260, 261, 263, 322, 332, 344, 360, 378 Solon 138, 265, 382 Song of Songs 378 Sophocles 103, 118 Sosibius 27, 121, 122, 136 Sparta 173, 383

475

Sthenidas of Lokri 339 Stilpo, philosopher 351 Stobaeus 329, 339, 393 Strabo 252, 325, 435 superiority, Jewish 68, 72, 128, 223, 248, 249, 250, 251, 258, 275, 276, 376, 377, 426, 427 syllogism 348, 350, 384 symposium/symposia 15, 17, 34, 36, 39, 40, 41, 45, 52, 53, 55, 56, 58, 59, 70, 71, 73, 104, 109, 130, 161, 179, 195, 237, 248, 249, 253, 305, 317, 318, 320, 321, 327, 328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335, 337, 338, 339, 341, 343, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352, 354, 356, 357, 358, 359, 360, 361, 362, 363, 365, 366, 369, 370, 371, 372, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 380, 381, 384, 385, 389, 390, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399, 401, 402, 403, 406, 407, 408, 409, 412, 414, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422, 423, 424, 426, 427, 428, 429, 430, 431, 432, 433, 434, 438, 440, 448 philosophical 52 royal 52, 327–329, 349, 392 tyrannical 328 synkrisis 52, 223, 225, 229 Syria 22, 111, 121, 123, 125, 126, 132, 134, 135, 137 Syrian language 110, 111, 121, Syrian Wars 22, 324, 325 First 324, 325 Third 325 Fifth 22 Tabernacle 36, 57, 156, 180, 198, 199, 313, 456 table 16, 38, 51, 54, 57, 73, 114, 141, 142, 165, 177, 179, 180–181, 182–184, 185–187, 188, 189, 191, 322, 334, 349, 381 Tacitus 119, 201, 202, 252, 311 talent(s) 123, 139, 140, 142, 157, 165, 184, 204, 412, 422, 453, 454

476

Index of Names and Subjects

tax (-es) 67, 131, 133, 140, 173, 224, 251, 423 technical/epistolary treatise, Hellenistic 46, 47, 48, 50, 51 tefillin/phylacteries 54, 148, 293, 296, 297, 298, 299, 342 temperance 36, 346, 347, 387, 390, 399, 425 Temple, Jewish 36, 51, 54, 56, 57, 65, 73, 74, 109, 128, 145, 151, 156, 157, 165, 176, 178, 179, 181, 187, 193, 196, 197, 198, 199, 202, 203, 205, 208, 213, 214, 215, 217, 218, 235, 319, 322, 334, 342, 392, 424, 428, 443 altar 156, 180, 193, 197, 198, 199, 200, 202, 206 cisterns 201, 202, 203 curtain 193, 195, 197, 198, 199, 319 Herod’s 197, 198, 215, 320 Leontopolis 64, 65, 428 Solomon’s 180, 197, 198 water system 34, 54, 200, 202, 205 Temple Scroll 197, 334, 335 text-critical signs 147, 148 Thebes 112, 173 theocracy 196, 205, 216, 217 Theodektes 55, 146, 441, 446, 447, 448, 453 Theodotus 136 Theognis 253, 392 Theon (rhetorician) 43, 179 Theophrastus 269, 362, 370, 393 Theopompus 146, 441, 442, 446, 447, 452, 453 tholos 320 Thucydides 45, 107, 169, 344 Tiberius 311 Torah 55, 57, 58, 65, 69, 108, 147, 159, 281, 444 transcription 107, 110, 111, 119, 120, 138, 166, 169, 240, 432, 434 translation 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 18, 22, 28, 29, 30, 34, 36, 38, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 59, 60,

61, 64, 65, 66, 69, 71, 72, 74, 99, 100, 101, 103, 105, 107, 109, 110, 111, 112, 114, 115, 116, 117, 119, 120, 121, 124, 125, 127, 138, 142, 143, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 153, 156, 161, 162, 163, 164, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 174, 176, 185, 200, 206, 234, 235, 238, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 248, 250, 265, 277, 282, 317, 324, 325, 327, 378, 386, 408, 427, 433, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439, 440, 441, 442, 443, 444, 445, 446, 447, 448, 449, 450, 451, 452, 453, 455 Translation Studies 11 translators, Jewish 6, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 30, 34, 35, 36, 39, 40, 53, 54, 55, 58, 70, 71, 72, 107, 108, 115, 116, 128, 130, 148, 149, 150, 151, 153, 161, 164, 168, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 218, 226, 231, 237, 238, 239, 240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 248, 249, 253, 278, 295, 306, 308, 314, 317, 319, 320, 321, 322, 324, 326, 327, 334, 339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 346, 347, 348, 349, 351, 357, 360, 361, 363, 368, 370, 372, 375, 376, 377, 381, 390, 402, 403, 405, 414, 417, 420, 422, 426, 427, 428, 429, 431, 432, 433, 434, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439, 440, 441, 442, 443, 449, 450, 451, 453, 454, 455, 456 travelogue 34, 35, 52, 54, 57, 71, 73, 74, 109, 151, 195 twelve tribes 54, 150, 151, 152, 153, 155, 170, 176, 177, 208, 209, 327 tyrant 224, 330, 360, 412 universal/-ism 68, 129, 161, 162, 241, 248, 256 283, 284, 295, 375, 376, 418, 421 Urim and Thummim 209, 210 utopian literature/geography 52, 196, 197, 198, 229, 230, 231

Index of Names and Subjects values, moral 19, 20, 68, 69, 72, 106, 238, 241, 248, 250, 252, 255, 264, 269, 270, 279, 283, 319, 342, 275, 376, 390, 417, 428 variatio 52 vestments, high priest’s 38, 52, 54, 57, 107, 151, 207, 210, 319 virtue 36, 71, 152, 153, 236, 237, 256, 330, 336, 340, 341, 344, 347, 348, 354, 358, 360, 361, 363, 365, 370, 371, 372, 374, 381, 382, 384, 401, 404, 407, 410, 415, 416, 418, 421, 422, 425, 428, 429 washing, Judean ritual 34, 35, 36, 434, 436–438, 440 wealth 40, 192, 336, 346, 353, 357, 358, 361, 367, 371, 398, 411, 412, 454

477

weasel 58, 271, 272, 275, 278, 281, 302, 306, 309, 310, 311, 312 wisdom/Wisdom 70, 151, 153, 243, 255, 256, 282, 342, 353, 357, 359, 360, 371, 380, 381, 388, 390, 397, 398, 402, 425, 426, 427, 447 woman/women 67, 122, 197, 290, 333, 387, 392, 393, 394, 395 yetzer 415, 416 Zenodotus of Ephesus 113 Zenon papyri 26, 140 Zeus 122, 124, 129, 130, 139, 197, 198, 201, 258, 361 Lover of Truth 359 Tryphilius 230 Zion 196

Index of Ancient Sources Jewish Scriptures/Old Testament

Genesis 1 253 1:2 300 2:7 213 2:16–23 213 3:16 213 6:5 416 40:8 437 41:8 437 41:24 437 43:16 200 43:33 349 Exodus 12:37 58, 233 13:9 297 13:16 297 15:27 152 19:10 221 20:1–14 296 20:12 372 20:26 199 22:28 164 23:19 164, 199 24:1–2 171 24:3–7 443 24:6 156 24:9–11 171 24:26 312 25 38, 57, 182, 185, 456 25:2 164 25:22(23) 184 25:22–29 (LXX) 180 25:23 185 25:23–30 (MT) 180

25:25 185 25:28 191 25:29 156 26 199 26:31–33 198 27:1 199 28 38, 57, 208, 210 28:4 208 28:6 208 28:9–10 212 28:14 211 28:23 210 28:23–26 295 28:26 210, 295 28:27 (28:31 LXX) 208 28:29 (28:33 LXX) 208 29 38 29:28 200 29:38–43 206 32:6 312 34:15 200 34:25 200 34:26 199 36:35 (LXX) 200 37 199 37:10–16 (MT) 180 38 456 38:9–11 (LXX) 180 38:12 191 39:27 (MT) 200 Leviticus 1:2 312 1:5 312 1:13 312

Index of Ancient Sources 2:1–3 206 2:12 164, 293 4:3 105 5:11 206 11 275, 278, 279, 288, 289, 312 11:1–23 255 11:3 279 11:7 279 11:9–12 278 11:21–23 289 11:21–24 278 11:22 272 11:24 289 11:24–47 255 11:29–30 312 11:29–38 278 11:34 255 18 286 18:3 289 18:3–24 289 18:16 290 18:17a 290 18:17b 290 18:22 289 18–20 289 19:18 359 20 286 20:13 289 23:10 164, 293 26:46 417 Numbers 6:2 221 6:21 221 9:18 418 11:21 58, 233 13:26–27 57 14:7–8 57 15:17–21 293 15:38 294 15:38–39 294 18 293 24:4 295 27:21 295

Deuteronomy 4:2 444, 445 4:25–26 445 5:16 372 6 299, 300 6:4 253 6:6–18 296 6:7 293, 299 6:8 297 6:9 294 6:10–12 299 6:13 299 8:9 234 7:18 38, 274, 287, 291, 292 10:21 38, 274, 287, 291, 292 11:14–16 299 11:18 297 11:20 294 12:6–7 293 13:7 373 14 275, 278, 279, 288, 289 14:6 279 14:8 279 14:9–10 278 14:11 289 14:12–19 289 14:18–19 289 17 334, 417, 418, 419, 426 17:6 59 17:15 417 17:18–19 382 17:19 417 17:20 419 18:3 200 19:4 418 22:12 294 26:1–11 293 28 445 33:1 267 33:9–10 296 Joshua 3:15 230 22:13 105 24:33 105

479

480 1 Reigns/1 Samuel 2:7–9 402 28:2 137 2 Reigns/2 Samuel 7:13 199 13:15 378 3 Reigns/1 Kings 6 198 6:31 198 7:48 180 17:18 267

Index of Ancient Sources Habakkuk 2:20 206 Haggai 1:3 197 Zechariah 2:13 206

4 Reigns/2 Kings 9:31 196 18:26 121 17:24 225 23 443

Psalms 1:2 (OG) 299 23:18 (OG) 254 48:1 196 49:8–15 (OG) 375 103:27 (OG) 343 129:3–4 (OG) 345 130:4 345 144:15 (OG) 343 145 (OG) 402

Isaiah 1:11–17 375 2:2 58, 197 10:12 196 11:2 104 33:6 104 36:11 121 40:9 196 44:1–20 259 45:20–46:2 259 66:20 196

Proverbs 1:7 104 8:15 371 13:11 104 13:20 253 15:3 254 21:1 130 21:2 130 21:2–3 130 23:13–14 390 23:24 390

Jeremiah 2:2 378

Job

Ezekiel 40 198 43:12 197 47:1–12 202 Joel

11:18 406 12:18 402 42:11–12 213 42:17 121 Ecclesiastes 9:1 378 9:6 378

3:17 196 Esther (OG) 137 Micah 4:1 58 4:1–2 197

Daniel 1 285

Index of Ancient Sources 1:8 267 1:15 286 2:4 121 Ezra 215 1:7–9 180 4:2 225 4:10 225 6:16 199 Nehemiah 215 2:8 215

7:2 215 8 39 8:1–8 443 1 Chronicles 26:27 199 29:12 371 2 Chronicles 215 3:4 198 4:1 199 6:32–33 181

New Testament Matthew 7:12 359 27:51 198 Mark 15:38 198 Luke 1:1–4 48, 101 6:31 359 23:45 198 Acts 15:20 359 15:29 359

Romans 1 286 1:21 266 1:24 287 1:26–33 169 1 Corinthians 15:33 253 1 Timothy 6:8 270 2 Timothy 4:8 423

Apocrypha Tobit 1:4 199 4:14 398 4:14 (B) 359 Judith 12:7–8 440

Esther, Additions to 16:16 (E.16) 139 Wisdom of Solomon 260 1:6 255, 360 3:5 343 6:3 371 7:23 360 8:7 381

481

482 11:5 343 11:13 343 11:23 341 12:16–18 338, 344 12:19 360 12:23–27 263 13:2 260 13:10–19 260 14 261 14:8–14 261 14:12 286 14:15 260 14:16–17 260 14:22–26 261 14:27 261 15:18–19 263 16:2 343 16:11 296 18:13 268 Sirach/Ben Sira Prologue 108 5 60 11 60 12 60 13 60 34 60 34–36 241–242 3:12 381 5:8 357 10 402 10:4 371 10:11 403 10:13 402 10:14 402 11:21 385 11:24–26 357 11:27 357 13:1 253 13:24 357 14:3 357 14:8–10 357 15:14 416 16:10 233 16:17 254 17:19 254

Index of Ancient Sources 19:20 342 19:26 385 23:18–20 254 23:19 254 26:29–27:3 357 29:21–22 270 30:1–13 390 31:15 359 31:22 381 31:31 365 32:3–6 423 32:5 365 34:9–13 243 34:27 398 37:7 385 42:18–19 255 42:20 254 43:29 344 46:8 233 49:1 365 50:2 201 50:3 201 50:5 198 Epistle of Jeremiah 260 14 261 26 261 54 261 56–57 261 67 261 72 261 Bel and the Dragon 259 1–4 Maccabees 105 1 Maccabees 1:22 180, 198 1:33 215 1:40 410 1:47 446 1:56 453 3:19 344, 425 4:41–51 180 8 245 8:20 451 9:70 245

Index of Ancient Sources 10 137, 163 10:20 165 10:23 165 10:30 225 10:36 137, 163 10:37 137, 163 10:38 225 10:51 245, 415 10:76 232 11:9 245 11:34 225 12 163, 245 12:1 165 12:3 165 12:8 165 12:15–18 109 13 163 13:11 232 13:14 245 14 245 14:5 232 14:20 451 15 245 2 Maccabees 61, 105, 130, 360 1:1–9 109 2:4–8 180 2:32 49, 101, 110 2:36 139 4:11 245 4:12 215 4:28 215 5:5 215 6 103 9:20 166 11:15 182 11:16 451 11:28 166 12:45 139 15:36 121

483

1 Esdras 39, 215 3–4 333 3 Maccabees 60–62, 130, 139, 161, 307 1:2–3 136 1:9 139 1:10 199 1:16 139 2:9 181 2:10 181 2:14 181 3 131 3:11 139 3:12 62 4:16 139 5:15 365 5:16 320, 365 5:17 365 5:25 139 5:36 365 6 103 6:33 365 6:40 62 7 131 7:1 62 7:2 139 7:20 365 7:22 139 2 Esdras 215 7:2 215 12:8 215 18:1–8 443 4 Maccabees 346 5–6 395 6:14 395 8–12 395 13:1 396 13:3 396

484

Index of Ancient Sources

Pseudepigrapha Apocalypse of Abraham 259 2 Baruch 6 180 1 Enoch 91:9 259 2 Enoch 34 287 45:3 375 4 Ezra 13:35 196 Joseph and Aseneth 13:11 259 Jubilees 1:28–29 196 12:25–27 213 Letter of Aristeas § 1 16, 43, 45, 46, 48, 49, 50, 60, 62, 100, 101, 103, 104–106, 223, 308, 433 §§ 1–3 101 §§ 1–8 34, 53, 99–100, 101, 430,458 § 2 100, 106, 374, 458 § 3 100, 106–108, 112, 120, 175, 322, 407, 408, 458 §§ 3–4 49 § 4 101, 103, 106, 107, 138 § 5 100, 106, 108 §§ 5–6 101 § 6 18, 19, 67, 105, 108–109, 267, 458 § 7 101, 109, 433, 458 § 8 16, 43, 46, 48, 49, 100, 101, 110 § 9 117–119 §§ 9–11 34, 54, 71, 110

§§ 9–12 33 §§ 9–46 34 § 10 111, 119–120, 138, 154, 349 §§ 10–11 120 § 11 53, 108, 111, 119, 120–121, 145, 194, 213, 322, 349 § 12 22, 23, 27, 104, 111, 125, 132, 136–137, 138, 175 §§ 12–13 33 §§ 12–14 67 §§ 12–15 160 §§ 12–27 54, 103, 121–124 § 13 137–138, 158, 160 § 14 140, 408 § 15 108, 119, 124, 138 § 16 16, 53, 68, 70, 124, 128, 139, 140, 161, 175, 195, 241, 248, 258, 268, 318, 447 §§ 16–17 17 § 17 53, 127, 128, 138, 346, 372 §§ 17–18 254 § 18 124, 127, 128, 345, 356 § 19 16, 53, 139, 161, 162 § 20 124, 138, 139–140, 377, 408 § 21 124, 142, 143, 372, 456 § 22 106, 132, 133, 134, 135, 140, 158, 377 §§ 22–24 140 §§ 22–25 24, 27, 41, 42, 130, 131, 133, 134, 136, 156, 160 § 23 106, 124, 133, 134, 160, 247 § 24 23, 24, 125, 132, 133, 134, 135, 140, 141, 341, 428 § 25 125, 306, 415 § 26 34, 53, 124, 125, 133, 141, 372, 377, 428, 456 § 27 140,141, 377 § 28 24, 34, 41, 124, 142, 143, 153, 154, 432 §§ 28–32 160, 435 §§ 28–34a 54, 141–142 §§ 28–34 71 § 29 143, 144, 154

Index of Ancient Sources §§ 29–32 144 §§ 29–34 34 § 30 22, 108, 120, 143, 144, 145–148, 149, 150, 154, 245, 322, 447 § 31 34, 39, 71, 108, 143, 149, 151, 154–155, 318, 348, 438, 446, 452 § 32 23, 25, 143, 150, 151, 155–156, 408, 435, 445 § 33 34, 143, 147, 153, 156, 176, 321, 456 § 34 430 §§ 34b–40 54, 156–157 § 35 23, 24, 62, 157–158 §§ 35–41a 34 §§ 35–51 145 § 36 67, 157, 158, 160, 162, 176, 360 § 37 137, 157, 158, 162–163 § 38 108, 120, 154, 163–164, 245, 322 § 39 23, 26, 143, 151, 159, 164, 237, 428 § 40 16, 18, 23, 26, 27, 136, 158, 159, 162, 164–165, 350, 375, 428 § 41 23, 166, 174–175, 327, 350, 428 §§ 41–46 34, 231 §§ 41–51a 54, 165–166 §§ 41b-46 34 § 42 104, 166, 175, 178, 408, 443, 449, 451, 456 § 43 16, 18, 34, 107, 108, 120, 166–167, 175 § 44 148, 167, 169, 176, 361, 428 § 45 155, 169, 176, 203, 321, 346, 375 §§ 45–46 120 § 46 23, 26, 34, 143, 151, 167, 169, 176 §§ 46–50 152, 155 §§ 47–50 34, 151, 176–177, 237, 317 § 51 177, 430

485

§ 51b 178, 181 §§ 51–72 38 §§ 51–81 34 §§ 51–82 145 §§ 51b–56 54, 177–178 §§ 51b–82 54, 177 § 52 180, 181 §§ 52–56 57 § 53 178 § 54 34, 178, 181 § 55 178 §§ 55–56 187 § 56 38, 57, 181–182 § 57 34, 38, 184, 185 §§ 57–58 185 §§ 57–72 38, 54, 182–184 §§ 57–82 51 §§ 57–103 33 § 58 34, 38, 184, 187, 188 § 59 187, 188 § 60 187 § 62 184, 188 § 64 184, 188 § 65 184–185, 188, 189 § 66 34, 185 § 67 52 § 68 188–189 § 69 189 § 70 53, 189 § 71 34, 185 § 72 187 § 73 34, 190, 191, 192 §§ 73–82 54, 189–190, 456 § 74 192 § 75 190–191 § 76 192 § 77 52, 247 §§ 77–78 52 § 78 52, 191, 247 § 79 156, 191, 192 § 80 53, 192–193, 342, 428 § 81 181, 192, 193, 315, 322, 452 § 82 36, 377 §§ 82–120 34 § 83 54, 73, 119, 193–194, 195, 196, 231, 235, 430

486

Index of Ancient Sources

§ 83a 54 §§ 83–87 193 §§ 83–111 229 §§ 83–120 35, 37, 52, 54, 193, 195, 196, 256 §§ 83–171 193 § 84 124, 194, 197, 199, 205, 215 §§ 84–87 54, 193 § 85 197 § 86 194–195, 199 § 87 195, 199–200, 206 § 88 53, 201, 203 §§ 88–89 202 §§ 88–90 34 §§ 88–91 54, 200 § 89 201, 203, 208 § 90 201, 202, 203 § 91 119, 203 § 92 53, 206 §§ 92–95 54, 204 § 93 204, 206 § 95 204, 206 § 96 119, 211 §§ 96–99 38, 52, 54, 107, 207, 295 § 97 151, 208, 210, 211–212, 295 § 98 108, 120, 207–208, 209, 212–213 § 99 208, 213 § 100 119, 214, 215, 217 §§ 100–104 54, 213–214 § 101 217 § 102 217–218 § 103 205, 218 § 104 214–215, 218 §§ 104–105 54 § 105 220–221, 223, 230 §§ 105–106 219 § 106 221 § 107 21, 53, 222, 225–226, 230 §§ 107–111 52, 54, 221–222, 223 § 108 224, 226, 385, 415 §§ 108–111 231 § 109 73, 222, 223 § 110 226

§ 111 223, 226–227 § 112 230, 430 §§ 112–118 54, 227–228, 112 § 113 151, 228, 230, 231–232 § 114 230, 232 § 115 228, 231, 232 § 116 228–229, 230, 232–233 § 117 229, 233 § 118 229 § 119 234, 235 §§ 119–120 233–234 §§ 119–121 54 § 120 73, 147, 234, 235, 308, 430 § 121 60, 108, 120, 175, 244–245, 421, 438 §§ 121–123 438 §§ 121–127 54, 236, 256 §§ 121–171 34, 35 § 122 40, 218, 226, 236–237, 237, 238, 245, 348, 370, 372, 415 § 123 237 § 124 237, 428, 456 § 125 237, 240, 245, 428, 429 § 126 456 §§ 126–127 241 § 127 237, 241 § 128 107, 108, 246–247, 255, 288, 293,309 §§ 128–133 54, 246 §§ 128–171 16, 51, 54, 220, 246, 248, 251 § 129 108, 247, 252, 255, 269 § 130 253, 256, 269, 289 §§ 130–133 258 §§ 130–152 289 § 131 247–248, 256, 313 § 132 247, 345, 361 § 133 108, 247, 248, 254, 256 § 134 257, 258, 259, 265, 268 §§ 134–138 287 §§ 134–139 54, 256–257 § 135 265 §§ 135–136 68 § 136 247, 257, 265–266, 300 § 137 257, 265, 266, 312 § 138 67, 68, 251, 265, 266

Index of Ancient Sources § 139 68, 253, 257, 258, 259, 264, 265, 266, 267, 271, 313, 375, 383 § 140 67, 109, 253, 265, 267, 268, 270, 370 §§ 140–143 54, 259, 266–267 § 141 253, 288, 309, 345, 375 § 142 251, 258, 267, 269, 271 § 143 147, 271, 283, 305 § 144 58, 155, 255, 269, 272, 275, 277, 278, 281, 288 §§ 144–157 54, 271–272 § 145 272, 288–289 § 146 272 § 147 108, 272–273, 289 § 148 273, 283, 313 § 149 279, 309 § 150 53, 148, 273, 279, 309 §§ 150–151 309 § 151 273, 285 § 152 68, 266, 273–274, 283, 286, 289 § 153 274, 279 § 154 290 § 155 38, 53, 107, 182, 274, 291, 291–292, 296, 399, 453 §§ 155–157 299 § 156 274 §§ 156–157 253 § 157 274, 288, 294, 300 § 158 108, 255, 292, 293, 296, 298, 299, 308, 309, 323, 453 §§ 158–160 54, 292, 305 § 159 148, 292–293, 297, 298, 299, 300 § 160 293, 299, 301–302, 362 § 161 149, 303, 306, 308–309 §§ 161–171 54, 302–303 § 162 255, 293, 303, 306, 309 §§ 163–168 278 § 164 247, 303 § 165 309 §§ 165–167 281 § 166 53, 304, 306, 311, 341, 342, 415 § 167 304, 311

487

§ 168 182, 266, 291, 304, 306, 307, 311–312, 453 §§ 168–170 69 § 169 304, 306, 307, 312 § 170 274, 304–305, 312–313, 402 § 171 60, 69, 305, 308, 321, 430, 433 § 172 36, 375, 377 §§ 172–186 55, 313–314, 339 §§ 172–187 34 § 173 315, 321–322 § 175 315, 317, 321, 322, 414 § 176 108, 120, 315–316, 322–323, 324, 377 § 177 52, 149, 265, 295, 316, 323 § 178 323 § 179 318, 324 § 180 108, 324–325, 451 § 181 316, 319, 325–326 §§ 181–185 70 § 182 24, 53, 316, 319, 326, 414 § 183 316 §§ 183–184 319 § 184 53, 138, 316–317, 319, 326–327, 339, 451 § 185 327 § 186 53, 132, 352, 402, 422 § 187 349–350 §§ 187–188 339, 357 §§ 187–202 55, 335–337 §§ 187–292 55, 237 §§ 187–300 52, 55, 335 § 188 337, 343, 360, 361, 408 §§ 188–291 34 § 189 337–338, 341, 345, 348, 350, 377, 396 § 190 53, 338, 342, 343, 350, 358, 361, 385, 396, 403, 404, 406, 407 § 191 322, 338, 363, 402, 408 §§ 191–192 343 § 192 130, 147, 350, 359, 360, 361, 453 § 193 130, 338, 344, 350, 415, 425 §§ 193–194 424

488

Index of Ancient Sources

§ 194 254, 338, 344, 345, 350, 371, 381 § 195 345 § 196 130, 138, 346, 350–351, 361, 390 § 197 130, 346, 361, 369, 407, 425 § 198 338–339, 351 § 199 347 § 200 147, 348 § 201 116, 351–352, 375, 431, 434 § 202 352, 365, 402 § 203 365, 366 §§ 203–220 55, 352–354 § 204 357 § 205 354, 363, 374, 385, 407 § 206 355, 358, 361 § 207 355, 359, 380, 407, 408 § 208 355, 360, 385, 404 § 209 360, 364, 415 § 210 104, 360, 361, 365, 375, 385, 396, 407 § 211 355, 361, 369, 370, 402, 408, 415 § 212 350, 362, 365–366, 415 § 213 355 §§ 213–216 362 § 214 355–356 § 215 104, 348, 356 § 216 356, 363, 366, 372, 381 § 217 357, 366, 418 §§ 217–219 363 § 218 370, 371, 406 § 219 356, 409 § 220 352, 356–357, 365, 366 § 221 366, 369, 377 §§ 221–235 55, 367–368 § 222 226, 393, 415 § 222–223 369 § 223 59, 371, 385, 415 § 224 368–369, 370–371, 377, 426 § 225 371, 374, 377, 396, 404 § 226 369, 371, 377, 385, 406, 418 § 227 369, 372, 377, 381, 389 § 228 58, 372, 381, 417, 425 § 229 104, 371, 374, 377, 378 § 230 371, 406, 418

§§ 230–231 374 § 231 369, 377, 378, 415 § 232 378, 398, 405 §§ 232–233 374–375 § 233 369, 408 § 234 371, 375, 377, 406, 418 § 235 431 § 236 253, 365, 366, 380 §§ 236–247 55, 378–379 § 237 59, 381, 384, 386, 390, 393, 415 § 238 379, 381, 384, 389 § 239 379–380, 381, 382, 384 § 240 382, 416 §§ 241–242 383–384, 386 § 242 380, 386 § 243 381, 384 § 244 384–385, 389, 416 § 245 385, 403, 404, 406, 407, 415 § 246 380, 386, 403, 406, 415, 418 §§ 246–247 385 § 247 380 § 248 138, 253, 346, 388, 389, 390, 399 §§ 248–261 55, 387–388 § 249 389, 390–392, 397, 399, 404 § 250 389, 392, 399, 408 §§ 250–251 392–394 § 252 253, 389, 394–395, 396, 402, 404 § 253 389, 399, 417 §§ 253–254 395 § 254 389 § 255 104, 254, 389, 390, 396, 397, 403, 404 § 256 393, 396–397, 415 § 257 389, 391, 397–398, 404, 419 § 258 389, 390, 418 §§ 258–259 385, 398, 417 § 259 407 § 260 356, 380 §§ 260–261 398 § 261 389–390, 402 § 262 366, 401, 406, 408 §§ 262–263 402

Index of Ancient Sources §§ 262–274 55, 400–401 § 263 408, 419 § 264 403, 406, 408, 418 § 265 360, 403–404, 406, 408 § 266 350, 404 § 267 399, 401, 404–405, 408–409 § 268 253, 405 § 269 402, 406, 410, 418 § 270 148, 401, 403, 406, 418 § 271 403, 406 § 272 124, 371, 377, 407, 418, 421 § 273 385, 403, 410, 419 §§ 273–274 407 § 274 401–402 § 275 412 §§ 275–276 415 §§ 275–292 55, 410–412 § 276 371, 412 § 277 385, 412 §§ 277–278 415–416 § 278 178 § 279 378, 413, 416–419, 422 § 280 419, 421, 422–423 §§ 280–281 418–419 § 281 355, 413, 421 § 282 406, 419, 423 § 283 41, 242, 334, 413, 419–420, 423, 432 § 284 59, 393, 413–414 §§ 284–285 420 § 285 407 § 286 365, 414, 423, 433 §§ 286–287 420–421 § 288 414 §§ 288–290 421 § 290 360, 371, 404, 423–424 § 291 403 §§ 291–292 421–422 § 292 414, 428 §§ 292–305 34 § 293 422, 424 § 294 132, 365 § 295 430, 433 §§ 295–296 431 §§ 295–300 55, 429, 431

489

§ 296 108, 109, 433 §§ 296–300 45 § 297 322, 365, 433 §§ 297–300 24, 119, 432 § 298 430 §§ 298–299 41 § 299 322 § 300 60, 430 § 301 434, 439 §§ 301–307 55, 433–434 §§ 301–316 72 § 302 108, 435, 440 § 303 439, 440 §§ 303–304 440 § 304 434, 440 § 305 36, 107, 242, 243, 346, 434, 435, 436, 440 §§ 305–306 138 § 306 346, 440 §§ 306–307 34, 35, 36 § 307 72, 120, 434–435, 436 § 308 242, 443, 449, 451 §§ 308–311 168 §§ 308–316 55, 439, 441 §§ 308–321 34 § 310 67, 137, 327, 405, 438, 448, 449, 451 §§ 310–317 34 § 311 147, 441, 444, 447, 452 § 312 313, 442, 446 § 313 108, 155, 452 § 314 442, 452, 453 § 314–316 146 § 315 148, 452 § 316 291, 453 § 317 52, 55, 72, 265, 454, 456 §§ 317–322 55, 453–454 § 318 454 § 319 454 § 319–§ 32 454–455 § 320 454, 456 § 321 178, 456 § 322 16, 34, 43, 45, 46, 48, 49, 55, 101, 102, 266, 430, 457, 458

490

Index of Ancient Sources

Pseudo-Philo, Biblical Antiquities 25:9–13 287

Testament of Levi 8:2 423

Dead Sea Scrolls 1QPsb 213 1QS 6.16–23 286 8.21 286 2QExodb 213 4QApocJer C (4Q385a) 18.5 199

4QIsac 213 4QpIsaa (4Q161) ii.21 196 4Q522 9 ii.5 199 8HevXIIgr (Minor Prophets Scroll) 213, 323 Temple Scroll 197, 334, 335 col. 56 334

Rabbinic Literature b. Shabbat 31a 359 Pirke Avoth

2.14 359 4.1 369

Other Jewish Writings Aristeas the Exegete/Historian On the Jews 18–19 Ezekiel the Tragedian, Exagogue frag. 16 152 Josephus Against Apion 1.22(17) 206 1.176–183 269 1.179–181 239 1.186–189 126 1.189 315 1.195 233 1.198 197, 198, 199, 220, 231 1.208–212 126 2.26 325 2.44 160 2.170–171 36 Antiquities 1.129 170 3 36 3.163–171 212 3.178 212 3.216–218 209

5.238–245 218 8 197 8.3 197 8.95–98 197, 198 12 6, 15, 33, 36 12.4–7 126 12.9 33 12.11–118 30 12.15 121 12.23 139 12.25 140 12.28 140 12.43 102 12.56 170 12.57 170 12.57–59 179 12.85 36 12.86 315 12.91 318 12.93 325 12.99 351 12.99–101 36 12.100 15

Index of Ancient Sources 12.101 434 12.106 36 12.109 452 12.210 349 12.252 215 13.67 168 13.358–364 232 14.116–117 325 15 197 15.396–402 197 15.403 215 15.411–416 198 18.91 215 Jewish War 1.75 215 5.159 221 6.311 296 6.422–426 203 Philo of Alexandria Embassy to Gaius 157 156 Every Good Man is Free 141 420 Life of Moses 1.188–190 152 2.2 108 2.25 108 2.25–44 6 2.26–27 162 2.31 108 2.35 435 2.38 108 2.38–40 278 2.41 324 2.41–42 451 2.47 108 2.51 108 2.290 108 On Abraham 61 291 68 291 257–260 346 On the Contemplative Life 8–9 263 25 296

On the Creation of the World 7 254 20 254 21 254 23 343 78 291 165 393 On the Decalogue 52 256 76–80 263 On Drunkenness 177 420 On Flight and Finding 183–184 152 On Husbandry 35–36 420 On Joseph 83 253 On the Migration of Abraham 89–91 284 On Noah’s Work as a Planter 126 375 On the Posterity of Cain 158 263 165 263 On Rewards and Punishments 1 296 Special Laws 1.69–70 203 2.146 263 4 284 4.107 287 4.117 289 4.123–124 416 Philo the Epic Poet On Jerusalem 202 Ps.-Hecataeus On the Jews 40, 102, 154 Pseudo-Phocylides 19 398 55–96 381 59–69 370 69 59 70–75 371 76 59 98 370

491

492

Index of Ancient Sources

118–120 385 190–193 287 Sibylline Oracles 3.29–34 259, 263 3.36–38 263 3.185–186 287

3.547–548 3.591–593 3.601–607 5.390–391 5.393 287

259 440 259 287

Christian Apocrypha and Other Christian Sources Augustine of Hippo City of God 6 Clement of Alexandria Stromateis 1.15.75.2 269 1.22.150 29 1.22.150.1 29 Epiphanius of Salamis On Weights and Measures 114 2–17 164 3 6 9 170 Epistle of Barnabas 10 284 10:8 309 10:11 288 Eusebius of Caesarea Church History 5.8.11 ff. 164 Preparation for the Gospel 2.2 259 8 34 8.2 34

8.2–5 6, 30 8.3 34 8.4 34 8.5 34 9 15, 30 9.25 102 9.35 201, 221 9.37 201, 202 9.38 6, 15, 30, 34 10.2 312 12.1 150 13.12 29, 254 13.12.1 ff. 250, 282 13.12.3–8 376 13.12.7 130 Irenaeus Against All Heresies 3.21.2 164 Origen in Psalmos 213 Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions 8:25 309

Greek and Latin Sources Aeschines On the Embassy 2.6 105 Alchiphron Epistles/Letters 240 4.18.9 240 4.18.10 240 18.4–9 119

Apuleius Metamorphoses 11.23 447 Aristophanes The Birds 45 Equites 185 107

Index of Ancient Sources Aristotle Athenian Constitution 226 16 224 Politics 1.13 (1260a) 393 3 370 3.13 (1277a) 382 7 40, 196, 205 7.4 (1326a 29–33) 205, 223 7.11 (1330b) 216 7.3–4 (1330b 1–12) 202 Nicomachean Ethics 40, 378 1105b–1107a 239 1109a 226 1127b 358 1139a–1145a 256 1140a 380–381 1140b 381 On Dreams 2 301 3 301, 362 On the Generation of Animals 3.6.2 (756b–757a) 310 5.1 300–301 On the Pythagoreans 281 On Sleep and Sleeplessness 2 301 Rhetoric 1.4.13 (1360a) 105, 106 2.3.13 (1380b) 105 Arrian Anabasis Preface 358 4.11–12 317 Athenaeus Deipnosophists 328 196 320 196–203 179 199 191 202 191 264 105 Chronicle Concerning Antiochus and the Sin Temple 318 Cicero De Divinatione 1.45 363

De natura deorum 1.43 262 2.17 276–277 De Republica 6.10 363 Cleanthes Hymn to Zeus 139, 269 Corpus Hermeticum VI.5 104 Diodorus Siculus Bibliotheca Historica 1 40 1.12.2 129 1.31.6 230 1.46 151 1.70 358 1.70.5 321 1.70.6 340, 371 1.86.1 262 1.90.4 430 2.35.3 230 2.35–42 230 2.49.2 232 2.55–60 195 3.10 230 3.12 234 3.61.6 129 5 259 5.41.2 230 5.41.4–6 232 5.41.4–42.2 231 5.41–46 195, 197 5.43.2–3 230 6 259 17.16.4 328 19.80–85 126 20.113 126 40 40, 151, 218 40.3 216 40.3.4 153 Diogenes Laertius Lives of the Philosophers 115 1.36 359 1.95 116 2.112 116 2.140 351

493

494

Index of Ancient Sources

2.142 116 4.3 116 5.1.20 373 5.31 397 5.78 112 6.99 116 7.185 105 10.16 105 Epictetus Enchiridion 17 364 31 359 Galen 17.1.607–608 118 Hecataeus of Abdera Aegyptiaca 39, 151, 154, 155, 218 Herodas Mimes 225 Herodotus Histories 1.30 107 2 109 2.65–70 262 2.77.1 109 2.152 138 2.161 138 2.168 232 3.107–113 232 7.16.B.2 363 Hesiod Theogony 465 139 479 139 Works and Days 106–201 234 252 361 Hierocles Commentary on Pythagoras, Golden Verses 310 Homer Iliad 118 18 179 Odyssey 118 Iamblichus Proptrepticus 21 281

Isocrates To Demonicus 36 416 To Nicocles 424 2.21 374 3.61 359 Johannes Tzetzes Prolegomena to Aristophanes 113–115 Lucian True Histories 1.25–26 45 Menander Frag. 218 K 253 Frag. 549.1 378 Orphic Fragments 164 130 Ovid Metamorphosis 9.322–323 309 Pausanius Description of Greece 5.12.4 198 Philostratus Life of Apollonius of Tyana 3.12–13 447 Photius Bibliotheca 151 Physiologus 21 309 Pittacus of Milene Frag. 10.3 359 Plato Charmides 157A 381 Crito 422 Laws 715E 274 745B 196 745D 152 875D 416 Phaedo 67B 60 82C 60 82D 60

Index of Ancient Sources Republic 376B 60 488A–E 394 Statesman 294A 382 Symposium 327 Plutarch Isis and Osiris 71 262 74 309 Moralia 189D 330 1095C 421 On the Contradictions of the Stoics 22 290 Sayings of Kings and Commanders 189d 419 Symposium of the Seven Wise Men 332 Polybius Histories 1.14.4 390 5.11.6 360 5.10.1 423 5.81 136 15.25 136 15.32 136 Porphyry De Abstinentia 2.26 269 Posidippus 3.22–23 180 Seneca Letter 85 to Lucilius 24 384 Sextus Empiricus Adversos Grammaticos 252 44

Sophocles Frag. 622 103 Frag. 779 103 Strabo Geography 17.792 435 Tacitus Annals 6.19 311 Histories 4.83–84 119 5.12.1 201 Theocritus Idylls 17.112–116 364 17.128 174 Theognis 35–36 253 Theon Progymnasmata 118.1.7 179 Theophrastus Characters 370 Thucydides 1.1.1 45 1.21.1 45 1.22.3–4 45 1.22.4 45 4.40 107 5.112.2 344 Virgil Aeneid 8 262 Xenophon Cyropaedia 372 4.1.2 139 7.2.28 139 Memorabilia 3.2 418

Papyri and Inscriptions Adoulis Inscription 154 BGU 6.1247 194 6.1282/C.Pap.Jud. 46 171

8.1772 137 10.2009 171 CIJ 1440 168

495

496

Index of Ancient Sources

CPJ 50 173 284 173 365 173 374 173 412 173 428 173 471 173 512 173 Inscr. 1440 168 Inscr. 1530A 173 C.Ord.Ptol. 21 391 22 (P. Rainer 24,552) 42, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 140 l. 13 133 l. 14 132 41 24 43 24 50 24 52 168 52.16 160 53.213–214 227 58.5 395 60 25, 160 60.12 159 63.2 159 64.2 144 76 24 82 24

Hefzibah Inscription l. 14 22 ll. 14–15 22 OGI 532.15–16 410 P.Cair.Zen 59003.5 140 59034.19 417 P.Gradewitz 1 133 P.Lond. 1.23 iv I 143 P.Mich. 1.6 26 P.Oxy 1007 213 3522 213 P.Petri 2.27 233 P.Polit.Jud. 8 448 P.Revenue Laws 391 Priene Inscription 34 l. 11 324 PSI 4:406, 18–19 140 P.Tebt. 1.79.52 137 5.213–214 227 P.TorChoach 11 137 12.8.12 311 12.8.32 311 SB 4.7461, 10–11 26 5.8033 194 UPZ 1.1 194 2.224, fr. 3.7 137

Index of Modern Authors Adams, Samuel L. 371 Adams, Sean A. 47 Aitken, James K. 176, 244 Alexander, Loveday 47, 49 Anderson, H. 61 Andrews, Herbert T. 62, 107, 141, 144, 163, 169, 182, 184, 188, 211, 215, 219, 256, 270, 288, 290, 302, 308, 309, 313, 323, 326, 349, 351, 356, 365, 366, 399, 415, 422, 423, 438, 440, 451

Borchardt, Francis 6, 291, 324, 444, 445, 453 Borgen, Peder 284 Boyd-Taylor, Cameron 12, 71 Braund, Susanna 395 Bremmer, Jan N. 349 Bringmann, Klaus 343, 385 Brutti, Maria 103 Burkert, Walter 260, 311 Buth, Randall 108, 112, 121 Byron, John 132

Bagnall, Roger 17, 118, 131, 139, 154, 187, 188, 192, 232 Baltussen, Han 405, 406 Barbu, Daniel 195, 253 Barclay, John M. G. 63, 70, 248, 277, 284, 427 Bar-Kochva, Bezalel 40, 126, 137, 151, 154, 155, 163, 215–216, 225, 226 Barney, Rachel 56 Barthélemy, Dominique 10 Beavis, M. A. L. 258 Benner, Allen Rogers 240 Bernstein, Moshe J. 291 Berquist, Birgitta 320 Berthelot, Katell 28, 263, 276, 281, 284, 290, 310, 311, 330 Bhabha, Homi 427 Bickerman, Elias 8, 21, 22–23, 24–26, 27, 28, 102, 112, 132, 136, 137, 159, 216, 225, 226, 325 Billows, Richard A. 382 Bingen, Jean 391 Birnbaum, Ellen 249, 276, 347 Boccaccini, Gabriele 7, 60 Boehm, F. 310 Bohak, Gideon 261

Camp, Claudia V. 357 Campbell, Duncan B. 217 Carbonaro, Paul 234 Clarysse, Willy 67, 251 Clermont-Ganneau, C. 199 Cobet, C. G. 454 Cohen, Getzel M. 229 Cohen, Naomi 171–173 Cohen, Shaye J. D. 105, 106 Cohn, L. 337, 338, 369, 390 Colish, Marcia L. 347, 384 Collins, Adela Yarbro 29, 30, 282 Collins, John J. 66, 249, 250, 251, 263, 264, 307, 448 Collins, Nina 8, 30, 112, 113–116, 325 Cooper, Frederick 320 Copenhaver, Brian V. 104 Crawford, Sidnie White 298 Dacier, M. 310, 311 Dawson, David 281–282 Dean, James Elder 170 de Crom, Dries 104, 238, 242, 427 Derow, Peter 131, 154 Diels, H. 310 Di Lella, Alexander A. 416

498

Index of Modern Authors

Dinsmoor, William Bell 186, 188 Dittenberger, Wilhelm 326, 410 Doering, Lutz 46–47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 101, 104, 108, 109, 159, 167, 168, 175 Doran, Robert 18, 19, 49, 155 Dorival, Gilles 10 Dunbabin, Katherine M. D. 320 Emmet, Cyril W. 61, 62 Falkner, Thomas 364 Feldman, Louis H. 275 Feldmeier, Reinhard 249, 269, 282 Fernández Marcos, Natalio 9 Février, J.-G. 35–37, 39, 55, 207, 248, 307, 333, 440 Fidler, David R. 310 Finkel, Irving 318 Foraboschi, Daniele 172 Forbes, Francis H. 240 Fraser, P. M. 17, 23, 113, 118, 227, 259, 317, 325, 435 Frede, Michael 129 Fried, Lisbeth S. 209, 210 Fuks, Alexander 171, 173, 405 Gabbert, Janice J. 325 Gager, John G. 152, 218, 239, 275 Goldstein, Jonathan A. 65, 234, 244 Gomperz, T. 430 Gonda, J. 333 Goodenough, E. R. 329, 339, 346, 382, 417 Gooding, D. W. 64, 146, 147 Goodwin, Gordon 7 Gow, A. S. F. 174 Grabbe, Lester L. 448, 449 Graetz, H. 311 Grant, Frederick C. 260 Gray, Vivienne 372 Green, Peter 225 Gribetz, Sarit Kattan 300, 301 Gruen, Erich S. 44, 50, 66, 68, 102, 103, 107, 113, 117, 127, 128, 132, 134, 139, 145, 160, 180, 186, 191, 195,

205, 215, 226, 231, 235, 239, 240, 248, 250, 258, 268, 276, 306, 307, 308, 312, 318, 320, 321, 341, 344, 346, 348, 352, 358, 359, 361, 363, 364, 369, 370, 371, 375, 391, 394, 396, 397, 402, 404, 405, 407, 414, 421, 422, 426, 431, 437, 442, 455, 457 Gulick, C. B. 180 Guthrie, Kenneth Sylvan 310, 311 Guthrie, W. K. C. 311 Hacham, Noah 56, 57, 59 Hadas, Moses 4, 7, 18, 21–22, 28, 38, 43–44, 52, 101, 102, 105, 108, 111, 124, 126, 130, 136, 141, 142, 143, 145, 163, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 175, 177, 184, 187, 188, 190, 192, 194, 197, 198, 201, 206, 207, 211, 215, 217, 220, 223, 224, 225, 226, 231, 232, 235, 241, 242, 245, 249, 250, 255, 256, 257, 260, 267, 268, 270, 272, 279, 288, 290, 295, 302, 307, 308, 309, 311, 313, 315, 316, 320, 322, 323, 326, 327, 333, 338, 340, 344, 345, 347, 349, 351, 355, 356, 358, 359, 361, 362, 365, 366, 369, 370, 372, 373, 375, 377, 383, 386, 389, 390, 395, 396, 397, 398, 399, 401, 403, 404, 406, 408, 413, 414, 415, 416, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422, 423, 424, 432, 437, 440, 442, 446, 448, 451, 452, 454, 457 Hart, J. H. A. 60 Hayward, C. T. R. 202, 206, 209, 213 Head, Peter M. 176 Heath, John 262 Hewitt, J. W. 382 Himmelfarb, Martha 216 Hock, Ronald F. 52, 249 Hody, Humphrey 6, 7, 8, 11 Hölbl, Gunther 28 Holladay, Carl R. 18, 29, 30, 113, 126, 130, 150, 152, 154, 155, 202, 250, 254, 312, 376, 438

Index of Modern Authors Honigman, Sylvie 4, 8, 9, 14, 16, 17, 20, 35, 37, 44–45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 54, 55, 56, 57, 67, 70, 71, 73, 101, 116, 119, 126, 131, 145, 146, 148, 149, 150, 152, 163, 171, 173, 174, 176–177, 179, 195–196, 197, 201, 202, 205, 216, 219, 223, 226, 229–230, 238, 249, 250, 251, 259, 263, 290, 361, 427, 431, 432, 436, 438, 447, 448, 449, 457 Howard, George 65, 234, 275 Hunter, Richard 45, 51, 118, 174 Ilan, Tal 171, 173, 174 Isserlin, B. S. J. 173 Jaeger, Werner 110, 237, 244 Jay, Jeff 420 Jedan, Christopher 371 Jellicoe, Sidney 7, 16, 21, 30, 35, 64 Johnson, Sara Raup 9, 44, 61, 62, 65, 117 Joosten, Jan 152 Kahle, Paul 22, 64, 146, 147, 447, 448 Kalimtzis, Kostas 395 Kamesar, Adam 312, 457 Kasher, Aryeh 391, 405 Kennedy, George A. 49, 51, 52, 179 Kenney, John Peter 128 Kiessling, Emil 172 Kim, Chan-Hie 159 Klijn, A. F. J. 65 Koenen, Ludwig 340 Kovelman, Arkady 56, 57, 127, 130, 289 Kratz, Reinhard 40, 151 Kraus-Reggiani, Clara 4 Landau, Y. 23 Langslow, D. S. 46, 47 Lee, John A. L. 214 Lenger, Marie-Thérèse 23, 131, 145, 159, 160, 168, 227, 395 Lesquier, Jean 162 Lewis, J. J. 59, 343, 370

499

Liebesny, Herbert 131 Loader, William 286, 287 Long, A. A. 416 Lüderitz, Gert 450 Lumbroso, G. 185 Macurdy, Grace H. 175 Mahaffey, J. P. 229, 454 Manning, Joseph G. 409 Marcus, Ralph 442 Mason, Steve 105 Mazzinghi, Luca 149 McDonald, Lee Martin 291 McKechnie, Paul 56, 57 Meecham, Henry 3, 5, 28, 37, 39, 46, 60, 61, 102, 105, 107, 108, 111, 124, 130, 136, 143, 144, 163, 169, 177, 182, 194, 195, 215, 219, 220, 253, 270, 274, 288, 309, 347, 348, 358, 359, 377, 378, 406, 408, 415, 416, 446, 456 Meisner, Norbert 328, 329, 332, 339, 363, 373, 374 Mendels, Doron 334, 340 Mendelssohn, Ludwig 31, 111, 125, 143, 195, 214, 222, 223, 237, 316, 354, 355, 368, 380, 388, 390, 401, 402, 413, 414, 430 Miller, Patricia Cox 363 Mlakowsky, Alexander 232 Modrzejewski, Joseph Mélèze 10 Momigliano, Arnaldo 137, 163 Moore, Carey A. 139 Moore, Stewart 23, 24–26, 28, 59, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 73, 154, 158, 244, 251, 258, 261, 264, 266, 269, 275, 278, 305, 307, 351, 373, 383, 384, 386, 391, 392, 405, 409 More, Jonathan 126, 425, 428 Morgan, Teresa 42, 49 Morris, Sarah 320 Most, Glenn W. 280, 282, 395 Moyer, Ian S. 109, 262 Mulder, Otto 217 Murphy, Catherine M. 357 Murray, Oswyn 18–19, 28, 30, 37, 39,

500

Index of Modern Authors

41, 42, 43, 45, 52, 64, 131, 205, 221, 262, 263, 320, 327–328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 339, 342, 345, 350, 351, 360, 366, 403, 404, 405, 419, 422, 423, 424, 425, 427, 428 Najman, Hindy 58, 69, 162, 277, 278 Newman, Judith H. 138 Niehoff, Maren R. 17, 146–148, 150, 312, 436, 437 Nielson, Thomas Heine 392 Obbink, Dirk 280 O’Neil, Edward N. 52, 249 Orlinsky, Harry M. 72, 442–443, 448, 450 Osann, F. 114 Parsons, Edward A. 113, 115, 119 Pease, Arthur Stanley 262 Peirano, Irene 10, 11, 42 Pelletier, André 4, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 44, 52, 100, 102, 104, 105, 108, 111, 114, 117, 124, 125, 130, 136, 142, 143, 145, 157, 163, 164, 166, 167, 175, 177, 178, 182, 184, 185, 188, 189, 190, 191, 193, 194, 195, 202, 203, 207–208, 211, 212, 214, 222, 229, 235, 237, 246, 247, 248, 253, 255, 257, 265, 267, 268, 270, 272, 273, 274, 288, 290, 293, 295, 298, 302, 303, 304, 305, 308, 309, 311, 313, 315, 316, 320, 321, 323, 324, 325, 326, 337, 338, 339, 349, 351, 354, 355, 356, 360, 365, 366, 368, 369, 372, 373, 374, 379, 380, 386, 388, 389, 395, 399, 401, 410, 412, 413, 414, 419, 422, 430, 434, 435, 436, 442, 448, 454, 455 Penner Jeremy 138 Peters, Emil 310 Pierce, Chad 108, 112, 121 Pietersma, Albert 12, 13, 71 Pomeroy, Sarah B. 393 Porton, Bezalel 127 Preisigke, F. 171, 173

Rajak, Tessa 8, 9, 10, 46, 47, 112, 116, 240 Rappaport, Uri 22 Raurell, Frederic 4 Redpath, H. A. 219 Reinhartz, Adele 106 Rhodes, James N. 252, 255, 279, 283 Rhodes, P. J. 131, 224 Rice, E. E. 180, 191 Rigsby, Richard O. 165 Riessler, P. 4 Ritter, Bradley 448, 449–450 Romano, David Gilman 203 Rostovtzeff, M. I. 141 Sacks, Kenneth S. 230 Samuel, A. E. 340, 395 Sanders, James A. 291 Schäfer, Peter 239, 275 Schard, Simon 30, 31, 194, 293 Schiffman, Lawrence H. 197, 296 Schmidt, Moritz 31, 124, 125, 158, 178, 190, 194, 204, 214, 247, 274, 304, 315, 337, 356, 389, 413, 414 Schmidt, Werner 18, 23, 24–26, 28, 125, 132, 134–136, 140, 143, 144, 159, 167, 168 Schürer, Emil 137 Schwartz, Daniel R. 49, 139 Scott, Ian W. 155, 265, 293, 296, 323, 383, 447, 452 Shutt, R. J. H. 108, 164, 175, 188, 192, 194, 206, 211, 235, 245, 255, 270, 288, 295, 302, 308, 309, 313, 326, 337, 349, 365, 366, 377, 399, 422 Siegert, Folker 255, 256, 270 Skehan, Patrick W. 416 Smith, Nicholas D. 393 Sollenberger, Michael G. 115–116 Spelman, Elizabeth V. 393 Sprague, Rosamund Kent 301 Stanley, Thomas 310 Sterling, Gregory E. 131 Stern, Menachem 40, 151, 155, 239, 252, 269, 446 Strootman, Rolf 165

Index of Modern Authors

501

Struve, C. L. 380, 389, 412 Swete, H. B. 4, 222 Szalc, Aleksandra 333

Vincent, H. 28, 201, 215 Vives, Luis 6 Vossius, Isaac 7

Tarn, W. W. 325, 333, 351 Taubenschlag, Raphael 311 Taylor, Joan A. 393 Tcherikover, Victor 58, 63, 65, 171, 173, 196, 260, 275, 276, 405 Thackeray, H. St. John 4, 10, 16, 31, 32, 33, 100, 107, 124, 144, 154, 163, 166, 167, 184, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 193, 204, 207, 211, 214, 219, 220, 222, 227, 228, 229, 256, 257, 267, 272, 273, 274, 288, 290, 293, 303, 304, 305, 308, 309, 313, 315, 316, 323, 326, 339, 349, 351, 354, 355, 356, 357, 365, 366, 368, 369, 379, 380, 388, 389, 390, 399, 401, 403, 412, 413, 414, 430, 434, 442, 451, 454 Thompson, Dorothy J. 67, 251 Toury, Gideon 11, 12, 14, 150 Tov, Emanuel 213, 323 Tracy Stephen V. 118 Tracy, Sterling 60 Tramontano, Raffaele 3, 4, 19, 28, 31, 32, 100, 167, 184, 194, 232, 253, 257, 267, 270, 273, 287, 288, 298, 319, 325, 326, 337, 341, 342, 344, 347, 349, 359, 362, 365, 371, 373, 385, 389, 397, 398, 401, 402, 403, 404, 410, 415, 422, 446, 451, 455, 458 Trebilco, Paul 449 Tromp, Johannes 260

Walter, Nikolaus 29, 30 Walters, P. (Katz) 211 Wasserstein, Abraham 6, 63, 113, 114, 164, 169, 324, 436 Wasserstein, David J. 6, 63, 113, 114, 164, 169, 324, 436 Webb, Ruth 51, 179, 223 Wendel, C. 175 Wendland, Paul 31, 100, 124, 143, 170, 184, 190, 191, 194, 214, 222, 229, 232, 237, 246, 247, 257, 267, 274, 290, 316, 337, 338, 355, 356, 357, 368, 369, 380, 388, 389, 413, 414, 430, 454 West, M. L. 260 Westermann, William 131, 132, 133, 140 Wevers, John William 211 White, John Lee 144, 159 Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U. von 100, 222 Wilcken, Ulrich 131, 315, 432 Wilhelm, A. 124 Wilson, Walter T. 59, 343, 381 Wooden, R. Glenn 215 Wright, Benjamin G. 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 63, 69, 70, 71, 107, 117, 120, 132–134, 148, 149, 150, 162, 169, 212, 217, 238, 244, 252, 270, 277, 278, 293, 295, 298, 357, 427, 428, 431, 436, 438, 455, 456 Yardeni, Ada 127

Ulrich, Eugene 291 Vanderhooft, David S. 323 VanderKam, James C. 102, 103 van der Kooij, Arie 9, 243, 436, 437 van der Speck, R. J. 318 Van ’t Dack, E. 23, 24, 26–27, 136, 137 Veltri, Giuseppe 444

Zeitlin, Solomon 322 Zuckerman, Constantine 450 Zuntz, Gunther 41, 44, 46, 64, 100, 104, 111, 120, 146, 147, 148, 316, 328, 331–332, 334, 337, 338, 344, 369, 375, 380, 397, 417, 418, 419, 424, 425, 426, 434