The Jewish Historian Flavius Josephus: A Biographical Investigation

language the work that he has previously composed for the “Upper Barbarians” in his mother
tongue i.e. Aramaic, and in fact, he is doing this because he considers it foolish that the
Parthians, Babylonians, the remotest Arabians, the Jews beyond the Euphrates and the
Adiabenians should be informed about the beginning of the Jewish-Roman War, its course and
its end, by means of his work, while the Greeks and Romans, in so far as they had not
participated in the fighting themselves, had no possibility of acquainting themselves with this
war (1.6). Thus Josephus is not writing for those who fought in the war and is therefore taking
into consideration neither the Jews in Palestine nor the combatants on the enemy side;
besides, his Aramaic presentation was to be valid for the entire Orient – by no means only for
the Jews [living] there like Hölscher (col. 1942, note), for instance, thinks: because the Jews are
no barbarians –, and his Greek [presentation was to be valid] for the Graeco-Roman world. 44
The Aramaic book cannot have been recorded until after the termination of the [126] Jewish
War, which is narrated as far as its conclusion; just at that time Josephus moved to Rome, as is
well known. Thus the Aramaic work has nothing to do with our ὑπόμνημα; but at this point the
question certainly must be posed: what should it indicate when in the first half of the 70s, a
Jewish writer in Rome, who was paid by the emperor and presented with a mansion, composed
a work in the Aramaic language, which was intended for the far Orient.
This is understandable only if Josephus intended to make an impact on the Orient by
means of his presentation, in the service of imperial politics. Josephus dealt with the history of
the Parthians in detail (Ant. 18.39 - 54; 96 - 105; 20.17 - 96) and on this occasion he recounts that
King Izates, who had converted to Judaism, tried to talk Bardanes, the king of the Parthians,
out of the thought of the possibility of a successful war against Rome (Ant. 20.71); in so doing
he referred to the strength of Rome’s troops and her good luck in the same way that Agrippa
does in his famous address [directed] to the Jews (War 2.345 ff.; above all 373). Surely this entire
44 The idea expressed by Täubler (Hermes 51, 1916, page 211 ff.) that the so-called references in
Josephus’ Antiquities were in truth referring to the – lost – Aramaic original of the War, is not
worth discussing already in light of the fact that, with his Antiquities as with his War, Josephus
was addressing himself to an audience who understood Greek, whereas of course no person in
Rome or Greece knew of Josephus’ Aramaic book, which he τοῖς ἄνω βαρβάροις ἀvέπεμψεν, nor
could they read it. – Incidentally, when Täubler (loc. cit. page 226 ff.) makes me out to be an
adherent of the anonymity hypothesis, then he has incurred an oversight here; at that time I
already stressed that I consider the purely external transfer of the formula from the source to
be implausible, and Destinon’s hypothesis rests on this.
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