JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

heresy of the Sadducees developed. He was the first to reject
the prophets, deny belief in resurrection, angels, and the last
judgment. According to the Pseudo-Clementines (third century
C.E.), Dositheos and Simon Magus were pupils of John
the Baptist. The Samaritans, awaiting a prophet predicted by
Moses, had been prevented by the depravity of Dusis from
believing in the prophetic mission of Jesus. Origen (second
and third centuries C.E.) mentions Dositheos several times.
After the time of Jesus, Dositheos tried to convince the Samaritans
that he was the messiah prophesied by Moses, and
he succeeded in winning some of them over. Then he adds
that these are the Dositheans, still extant in his time, who own
scriptures of Dositheos and recount myths about him that he
had never died and was still alive somewhere. Similar to the
above is the account of Eusebius (third and fourth centuries
C.E.), who states that Dositheos appeared after Jesus’ time and
was acknowledged by the Samaritans as a prophet like Moses.
Epiphanius (fourth century C.E.) gives a report resembling
that of Abu al-Fatḥ in some basic points about Dusis and his
sect. According to him, the Dositheans were a Samaritan sect;
kept circumcision, the laws of the Sabbath, and the Pentateuch;
refrained from eating meat; venerated abstinence; and
believed in resurrection. Dositheos was of Jewish origin and
had retired to a cave. However, out of an exaggerated desire
to gain knowledge, he fasted so that at last he died of starvation.
Eulogius (seventh century C.E.) tells of two rival Samaritan
parties, one believing that the expected prophet of Deuteronomy
18:15 was *Joshua son of Nun, the other claiming
that it was someone called Dosthes or Dositheos, who was a
disciple of Simon Magus, cast blame on the prophets and the
patriarch Judah, left scriptures, and did not believe in resurrection.
Even from this scanty material, it becomes obvious
that the Dosithean sect must have had considerable influence
in the beginning of the common era or even before it. It
seems quite plausible that several subsects branched off from
an original major sect in the course of time. This may account
for the double report of the Samaritan chronicles, including
that of the seven subsects, and the discrepancies found in patristic
and Islamic sources.
Bibliography: J.A. Montgomery, Samaritans (1907; repr.
1968), 253–64; K. Kohler, in: American Journal of Theology, 15 (1911),
404–35; T. Caldwell, in: Kairos: Zeitschrift fuer Religionswissenschaft
und Theologie, 4 (1962), 105–17; J. Macdonald, Theology of the Samaritans
(1964), index; B. Lifshitz, in: RB, 72 (1965), 98–107; A.D. Crown,
in: Essays in Honour of G.W. Thatcher (1966), 63–83; idem, in: Antichthon,
1 (1967), 70–85; Z. Ben-Ḥayyim, Ivrit ve-Aramit Nusaḥ Shomeron,
3 pt. 2 (1967), 17–18; H.A. Kippenberg, Garizim und Synagoge
(1971) 122–37. TEXTS: E. Vilmar (ed.), Abulfathi Annales Samaritani…
(1865), lxxi–lxxiii, 82–83, 151–7, 159–64 (Arabic, with Latin notes and
introduction); E.N. Adler and M. Seligsohn (eds.), Une nouvelle Chronique
Samaritaine (1903), 37, 64–67; P. Koetschau (ed.), Origines, in:
Die griechischen christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten Jahrhunderte, 2
(1899), 108, lines 25–28; E. Preuschen (ed.), Origines, ibid., 10 (1903),
251, lines 15–19; H. Grossmann (ed.), Eusebius, ibid., 11 (1904), 33,
lines 24–27; K. Holl (ed.), Epiphanius, ibid., 25 (1915), 205, 206, lines
11–13; B. Rehm (ed.), Pseudo-Clementines, ibid., 51 (1965), 39, lines
dutch literature
9–19; E. Kroymann, Pseudo-Tertullian, in: Corpus Scriptorum ecclesiasticorum
Latinorum, 47 (1906), 213, lines 4–8; J. Bowman, Transcript
of the Original Text of the Samaritan Chronicle Tolidah (1957),
18a (Heb., with Eng. notes).
[Ayala Loewenstamm]
DUTCH LITERATURE.
Influence of the Bible
The arrival, on October 27, 2004, of the Nieuwe Bijbelvertaling,
a completely new translation into Dutch of the Bible and
the Christian Apocrypha, initiated a fierce debate in Dutch
literary circles. At the core was the major influence of the
Bible on Dutch culture and linguistics. Many participants in
the discussion lamented the sometimes radical choices the
translators had made to rephrase the biblical stories into a
modern vernacular. They stated their desire to protect the language
and imagery of the Statenbijbel, the official translation
of the Bible which was commissioned by the Dutch Reformed
Church in the early 17th century. It was completed during the
years 1627–37. Similar to its English-language counterpart, the
King James Version, the Statenbijbel has enriched the Dutch
language with countless beautiful and poetic similes, expressions,
and metaphors, most of which are still in use in present-day
Dutch.
The original Statenbijbel translation project was one high
point in the cultural revolution that brought Calvinism and
Humanism to Holland. The Eighty Years’ War (1568–1648)
led to a new and powerful interest in the Bible as a source of
inspiration for a national Dutch identity, which was at that
time beginning to assert itself. In a famous poem which later
became the Dutch national anthem, “Wilhelmus van Nassouwe,”
Prince William of Orange was compared to David,
king of Israel. The war against Spain was likened to Israel’s
war against her enemies. Among the many poetic adaptations
of the Psalms composed in these times were those of authors
such as Philips van Marnix van Sint Aldegonde (1540–1588),
and the poets Pieter Corneliszoon Hooft (1581–1647) and Constantijn
Huygens (1596–1678).
Humanists and Reformers promoted the study of Hebrew
in the Low Countries during the 16th century, particularly
in such circles as that of the humanist Antwerp printer
Christophe *Plantin (1514–1589), who at one time was obliged
to move to Leiden. During the 15th century, biblical drama
flourished in the many chambers of rhetoric (Rederijkerskamers)
and later poets such as Carel van Mander (1548–1606)
and Dirck Volkertszon Coornhert (1522–1590) wrote a number
of biblical plays. Outstanding among these authors was Joost
van den Vondel, who wrote Joseph in Dothan (1640), Joseph in
Egypten (1640), Salomon (1648), Jephta (1659), Samson (1660),
and Adam in Ballingschap (“Adam in Exile,” 1664). The last
work can be compared to *Milton’s Paradise Lost.
After the 17th century there was a sharp decline in interest
in biblical subjects. In the late 18th century, Willem Bilderdijk
wrote some biblical poetry, while Arnold Hoogvliet
composed an epic entitled Abraham de Aartsvader (“Abraham
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