Welcome to our book review site go-pdf.online!
You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
Tales of High Priests and Taxes
In the wake of the conquests of Alexander the Great, the ancient world of the Bible—the ancient Near East—came under Greek rule, and in the land of Israel, time-old traditions met Greek culture. But with the accession of King Antiochos IV, the soft power of culture was replaced with armed conflict, and soon the Jews rebelled against their imperial masters, as recorded in the Biblical books of the Maccabees. Whereas most scholars have dismissed the biblical accounts of religious persecution and cultural clash, Sylvie Honigman combines subtle literary analysis with deep historical insight to show how their testimony can be reconciled with modern historical analysis by conversing with the biblical authors, so to speak, in their own language to understand the ways they described their experiences. Honigman contends that these stories are not mere fantasies but genuine attempts to cope with the massacre that followed the rebellion by giving it new meaning. This reading also discloses fresh political and economic factors.
The Septuagint and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria
The Letter of Aristeas tells the story of how Ptolemy Philadelphus of Egypt commissioned seventy scholars to translate the Hebrew Bible into Greek. Long accepted as a straightforward historical account of a cultural enterprise in Ptolemaic Alexandria, the Letter nevertheless poses serious interpretative problems. Sylvie Honigman argues that the Letter should not be regarded as history, but as a charter myth for diaspora Judaism. She expounds its generic affinities with other works on Jewish history from Ptolemaic Alexandria, and argues that the process of translation was simultaneously a process of establishing an authoritative text, comparable to the work on the text of Homer being carried out by contemporary Greek scholars. The Letter of Aristeas is among the most intriguing literary productions of Ptolemaic Alexandria, and this is the first book-length study to be devoted to it.
Times of Transition
This multidisciplinary study takes a fresh look at Judean history and biblical literature in the late fourth and third centuries BCE. In a major reappraisal of this era, the contributions to this volume depict it as one in which critical changes took place. Until recently, the period from Alexander’s conquest in 332 BCE to the early years of Seleucid domination following Antiochus III’s conquest in 198 BCE was reputed to be poorly documented in material evidence and textual production, buttressing the view that the era from late Persian to Hasmonean times was one of seamless continuity. Biblical scholars believed that no literary activity belonged to the Hellenistic age, and archaeologis...
Comparing the Ptolemaic and Seleucid Empires
First comparative analysis of the role of local elites and populations in the formation of the two main Hellenistic empires.
Jewish and Christian Communal Identities in the Roman World
Jews and Christians under the Roman Empire shared a unique sense of community. Set apart from their civic and cultic surroundings, both groups resisted complete assimilation into the dominant political and social structures. However, Jewish communities differed from their Christian counterparts in their overall patterns of response to the surrounding challenges. They exhibit diverse levels of integration into the civic fabric of the cities of the Empire and display contrary attitudes towards the creation of trans-local communal networks. The variety of local case studies examined in this volume offers an integrated image of the multiple factors, both internal and external, which determined the role of communal identity in creating a sense of belonging among Jews and Christians under Imperial constraints.
Intolerance, Polemics, and Debate in Antiquity
In Intolerance, Polemics, and Debate in Antiquity scholars reflect on politico-cultural, philosophical, and religious forms of critical conversation in the ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, Graeco-Roman, and early-Islamic world. They enquire into the boundaries between debate, polemics, and intolerance, and address their manifestations in both philosophy and religion. This cross-cultural and inclusive approach shows that debate and polemics are not so different as often assumed, since polemics may also indicate that ultimate values are at stake. Polemics can also have a positive effect, stimulating further cultural development. Intolerance is more straightforwardly negative. Religious intolerance is often a justification for politics, but also elite rationalism can become totalitarian. The volume also highlights the importance of the fluency of minorities in the dominant discourses and of their ability to develop contrapuntal lines of thought within a common cultural discourse.
The Meaning of the Letter of Aristeas
Ekaterin Matusova offers a new approach to the old problems of interpretation of the "Letter of Aristeas".Chapter 1 deals with the question of the structure of the narrative. Matusova argues that at the time of Aristeas compositions of the kind of the Reworked Pentateuch, or Rewritten Bible were circulating in Egypt in parallel with the LXX and were a source of interpretations of the Hebrew text different from the LXX and of specific combinations of subjects popular in Second Temple Judaism. In particular, Matusova further argues that the leading principle of the composition of the Letter is that of the Reworked Deuteronomy, where subjects referring to the idea of following the Law among the...
The Middle Maccabees
A focused, interdisciplinary examination of a tumultuous, history-making era The Middle Maccabees lays out the charged, complicated beginnings of the independent Jewish state founded in the second century BCE. Contributors offer focused analyses of the archaeological, epigraphic, numismatic, and textual evidence, framed within a wider world of conflicts between the Ptolemies of Egypt, the Seleucids of Syria, and the Romans. The result is a holistic view of the Hasmonean rise to power that acknowledges broader political developments, evolving social responses, and the particularities of local history. Contributors include Uzi ‘Ad, Donald T. Ariel, Andrea M. Berlin, Efrat Bocher, Altay Coşk...
A Companion to Greco-Roman and Late Antique Egypt
An authoritative and multidisciplinary Companion to Egypt during the Greco‐Roman and Late Antique period With contributions from noted authorities in the field, A Companion to Greco-Roman and Late Antique Egypt offers a comprehensive resource that covers almost 1000 years of Egyptian history, starting with the liberation of Egypt from Persian rule by Alexander the Great in 332 BC and ending in AD 642, when Arab rule started in the Nile country. The Companion takes a largely sociological perspective and includes a section on life portraits at the end of each part. The theme of identity in a multicultural environment and a chapter on the quality of life of Egypt's inhabitants clearly illustr...
