The Jewish Historian Flavius Josephus: A Biographical Investigation

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principle. But what does Josephus make out of this? First he follows Strabo and has Aristobulus revolt behind Pompey’s back, and then following the War he sends him to Dium! But what more was to happen here now? The rift that occurred there according to the War had already been recounted [in the version] based on Strabo! So Dium is mentioned without rhyme or reason in the Antiquities; Josephus was not successful in unifying the two sources in this passage either. [157] The researcher has the following at his disposal as independent sources: 1. War 1.131 - 132; 2. Theophanes available as reflected in Diodorus 40.2 and – conveyed by Strabo – in the additions Ant. 38 - 43 and 46 - 47, not including Josephus’ reinterpretations addressed above, 3. the quotation from Strabo in Ant. 35 - 36. Theophanes thereby distinguishes himself from Nicolaus, who was used in the War, by greater thoroughness and by an unbiased judgment in Jewish matters; on the other hand he is strongly influenced by the sentiments in Pompey’s headquarters (cf. above). When we compare the presentation of modern works of history to these findings then their views are in general to be judged more favourably here than in the preceding paragraphs; since, as we saw, they in fact draw primarily upon the Antiquities, which reworks the valuable products of Theophanes - Strabo precisely here, thus it follows as an inevitable consequence that the modern historian unknowingly used the best available source as a basis here. But everything that Josephus read into the sources on his own because of his bias must be removed here as well. Thus Ewald (page 521) and Bertholet (page 25) should not have recounted that the 200 Jewish noblemen had acted at Antipater’s instigation; this assertion was contrived by Josephus; and when Wellhausen (page 293) thinks that Pompey did not appear to have any further concern for the legation of the neutral party, then this assertion cannot be proven since we hear about this legation only through an additional source [Nebenquelle] that is no longer quoted later on. Indeed, within the report about the negotiations itself in section 43 Josephus swings over to his reinterpretations derived from the War. On the other hand, Aristobulus’ revolt behind Pompey’s back has not been considered sufficiently: in this [incident] one has not referred to the excellent source from Ant. 47, which has just been poorly exploited by Josephus. Instead of this the opinion was held, following Nicolas (War 132) who is quite biased here, that the “arrogant” Aristobulus deserted Pompey without any reason, (in Quaestiones Strabonianae (Leipziger Studien 11.229 ff.). 138
this sense, for example, Schürer, Wellhausen, Wilcken). In contrast, I [shall] identify the main facts from the preceding [discussion]: Pompey gathers his troops from their winter quarters and marches towards [158] Damascus (Ant. 38 - 40 = War 131a). Hyrcanus, Aristobulus and the Jews appear there among other legations (Ant. 34). They all bring along gifts, among which the golden grapevine of Aristobulus was still seen by Strabo (Ant. 35 - 36). Pompey listens to the three parties (Ant. 41 - 43), but postpones his ruling until the completion of the Nabataean campaign during which he wishes to remain unburdened by other problems. While Pompey advances from Dium towards the east, Aristobulus stays put with the task of securing the [army’s] base. But he does not remain true to his task, thereby forcing Pompey to interrupt his combat against the Nabataeans and to turn against the rebellious Aristobulus. 5. Pompey’s fight against Aristobulus War 133 - 140 = Ant. 48 - 56 Even a superficial glance shows that the Antiquities provides nothing other than a liberal transcription of the War, only a few small details had to be altered in a significant way. The desire to eliminate his earlier partisanship for Antipater was indeed crucial for Josephus while he composed the Antiquities; consequently, in the preceding section he has removed the beginning of Pompey’s fight against Aristobulus from the dispute over the Jewish throne so that Pompey’s attitude towards Aristobulus could in no way be construed as if the Romans had taken up the side of Hyrcanus - Antipater as a result. This endeavour of Josephus continued to have an effect here as well. In War 133 Josephus had reported that Pompey began his military action against Aristobulus out of anger, “since Hyrcanus also begged him to [do] this many times.” In Ant. 48 this explanatory statement has been logically deleted, thereby preventing the impression that Pompey stood behind Hyrcanus and Antipater. These same reasons induced Josephus to not transfer the statement of section 136 “as the brother (Hyrcanus) requested this” into Ant. 50 - 51: Pompey was not to be influenced by Hyrcanus and Antipater. The assertion that Aristobulus had the intention of defying Pompey in order to precipitate a decisive struggle in the “manner of despots” (War 135) could no longer be used in future because in [159] the corresponding passage (section 132) of the Antiquities (cf. page 147) this trait had also been eliminated from Aristobulus’ nature, from which one could after all infer a 139
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RICHARD LAQUEUR THE JEWISH HISTORIA
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Table of Contents Chapter I. Joseph
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dealing with Josephus’ life has e
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(cod. 33) as having occurred in the
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lines together with the statement a
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life, the author refers to the [7]
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Had the Roman emperors, or whomever
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written better than all others, why
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argument (345 - 353) deals with the
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(Life 337), the unnamed author does
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suppose that they appear to be the
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in the Life that he had presented h
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2. Josephus and Epaphroditus The di
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public only for the sake of Epaphro
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It is already clear according to th
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Josephus had not dedicated his firs
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us the answer. It was he who pushed
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We also understand, however, that J
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the intervening words “when I arr
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32 - 42 and 64 ff. therefore do not
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have become aware of this problem,
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nothing. The best proof of this, be
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Ἰοῦστος καὶ ... συν
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the same fate as the other segments
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author inserts the reason for which
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presentation of the War did not yet
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complement — must appear the asse
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circumstances, he withholds the plu
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attack of the Dabarittans different
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with the War — in contrast, in 13
Page 61 and 62:
sent to Josephus’ house from the
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went away, even though displeased,
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extremely severe action against thi
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137 - 145: by the use of these the
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sections in comparison with War I,
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can now also determine when this ad
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τοῦ σώματος ἕνεκα
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Thus far things are quite clear. Bu
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the Life contains the earlier view.
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Life 99 and War 622 correspond to e
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[Josephus’] following of Tarichea
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wherever the Tiberians are spoken o
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Now that matters and their developm
Page 87 and 88: source is not necessarily the bette
Page 89 and 90: conducting the war against Rome. Ev
Page 91 and 92: set up “for future security”: h
Page 93 and 94: the old administrative report [in]
Page 95 and 96: they sent off the legation”; yet
Page 97 and 98: hold? It is understandable that Jos
Page 99 and 100: same situation as [the one] that Jo
Page 101 and 102: confront John with hostility. This
Page 103 and 104: threaten with death anyone who woul
Page 105 and 106: on the contrary, it follows as a co
Page 107 and 108: idea of the war κατ’ ἐξοχ
Page 109 and 110: ather the conflict between the Roma
Page 111 and 112: language the work that he has previ
Page 113 and 114: the Greek language, would thereby b
Page 115 and 116: ff.) - to the point of falsifying f
Page 117 and 118: about the distant past, the War the
Page 119 and 120: asic concept, to all Hellenistic ri
Page 121 and 122: in the original version signifies:
Page 123 and 124: Antiquities it is without rhyme or
Page 125 and 126: But how then is one to explain Hyrc
Page 127 and 128: Hyrcanus proposed to him; because t
Page 129 and 130: demand, which he considered to be b
Page 131 and 132: esult. Diodorus (frg. 40.2) reports
Page 133 and 134: acquire citizenship again, so to sp
Page 135 and 136: [153] First we learn that the Jews
Page 137: first comes to Damascus and then go
Page 141 and 142: which derive without exception from
Page 143 and 144: he truly sang the praises of Jewish
Page 145 and 146: safety [away] from Mithridates. Thi
Page 147 and 148: a result, contrary to his expectati
Page 149 and 150: confirmed by Caesar’s decree [quo
Page 151 and 152: following the narratives discussed
Page 153 and 154: [174] Furthermore, in War 211 Sextu
Page 155 and 156: Antiquities from the outset, which
Page 157 and 158: the expansion as well. The sentence
Page 159 and 160: portrayal [of Josephus’ developme
Page 161 and 162: Sanhedrin has not been transmitted
Page 163 and 164: this fact, to be sure, but devalues
Page 165 and 166: other side of the Jordan. Malichus
Page 167 and 168: talents. And yet this cannot be cor
Page 169 and 170: the Antiquities, which shine with J
Page 171 and 172: also responsible for this, Josephus
Page 173 and 174: information about Herod’s executi
Page 175 and 176: other than such reworkings as we ha
Page 177 and 178: Silo by Antigonus only for one mont
Page 179 and 180: Machairas’ true intention, that h
Page 181 and 182: has been consulted here as well, as
Page 183 and 184: [Leidenschaft ] straight through Le
Page 185 and 186: corrected accordingly. 16. The conq
Page 187 and 188: supplementary source [Zusatzquelle]
Page 189 and 190:
Herodians, yet he still blames the
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War here as well; 79 however, it is
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convictions to the fore with full i
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War by means of a variety of materi
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and how it was amplified by Josephu
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een a historical work with document
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Certainly it is not the pride of a
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they provide the material from whic
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Certainly we are not all influenced
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appreciating the inner development
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we owe an excellent treatment of th
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abandoned (cf. pages 33 ff. and 270
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that within the same work the state
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At any rate, with Josephus we have
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authority of the government in Jeru
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obbers that ultimately tipped the p
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he wished to cover something up and
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viewing the Great War as a [single]
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provided to have Agrippa [257] gran
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exchange he placed their books on t
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Josephus after all, had died when J
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sense as well: Josephus makes excus
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So the year 100 drew near; after th
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family’s past and to incorporate
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authenticity of his genealogy in hi
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een almost obsolete; for soon after
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“received the truth with pleasure
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cause to bend before the Christians
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The Jewish Historian Flavius Josephus: A Biographical Investigation

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