The Jewish Historian Flavius Josephus: A Biographical Investigation

written better than all others, why did you not publish your work during the lifetime of
Vespasian, Titus, Agrippa and his relatives ἀνδρῶν τῆς Ἑλληνικῆς παιδείας ἐπὶ πλεῖστον
ἡκόντων?” If Josephus, who in this context wishes to provide evidence only for the factual
inadequacies of Justus’ work, adds such a statement, then this can be explained only in that
Justus himself had claimed to be writing for people [12] who possessed those characteristics
with which the above mentioned are endowed according to Josephus, i.e. Greek παιδεία.
But if Justus said that, as far as he was concerned, he had with intense effort
accomplished a better work than all competitors by virtue of his Greek rhetorical education,
then he hereby intends above all to emphasize the external form of his work. In this sense he
also did envisage his readers as δεινότατος συγγραφέων (Life 340). The term δεινός is familiar
to every ancient researcher from the Greek rhetorical discipline who would apply it with
various nuances. In this context Justus probably did not have the particular stylistic category
of δεινότης in mind; rather he used the word in Dionysius’ sense in order to designate the
uniform mastery of all possible and existing kinds of style. After all this, it is certain that
Justus, in his introduction, commended his work as a stylistic accomplishment exactly like the
historians who, according to Livy (preface 2), wished to appeal to their ars scribendi or wished
to demonstrate τὴν λόγων δεινότητα (Josephus, Ant. preface 2).
In the literary activity of antiquity, later works always had an advantage over the
earlier; one need but consider how the older Roman annalistic tradition was lost after the
publication of Livy’s works. In this particular case it also happened that Josephus’ work was
harshly attacked by Justus, and indeed in a particularly vulnerable passage. Therefore if
Josephus wanted to avert the unfavourable consequences that threatened his War, then he had
to defend himself or, better yet, destroy the opponent. Thanks to the development of journals
that facilitate scholarly literature, it is customary for us in such cases, to write a separate, selfcontained,
negative judgment of the work. In Antiquity – and I would like to see this mostly
overlooked fact carefully considered – a corresponding means of publishing one’s opinion was
not available to the author, and so he was forced to voice his own position by whatever
opportunity that presented itself.
Of course it was not that easy for Josephus to refute the attacks of his opponent: if
Justus, boastful [13] of his mastery of Greek education, proudly looked down upon the bad
stylists who had dealt with the Jewish War before him, nonetheless Josephus had to openly
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