Journal of Biblical Literature - Society of Biblical Literature

Book Reviews
ish fixation with the Torah and with its detailed observance aroused an ancient anti-
Semitism that eventually led to Roman persecution. It also made new movements
within Judaism or theologically based criticism of Jewish cult and practice virtually
impossible. Hengel concludes that the struggle with Hellenism allowed Palestinian
Judaism to manifest its great dynamism and vitality, and that it also prepared the way for
the new force whose prophetic-eschatological impetus would burst through the too narrow
limits imposed by post-Hellenistic Judaism and issue in early Christianity.
The book is heavily documented and deserves careful study. While individual
points could be argued further, the main thesis is solidly established.
Kevin G. O’Connell, S.J.
At the time this review was written, O’Connell was at Weston College, Cambridge,
Massachusetts. He later went on to become president of Le Moyne College, Syracuse,
New York (1987-1993).
It could be said that thirty-five years ago a small revolution occurred, even if not as
monumental as the ancient one that it aimed to explain. The publication of Hengel’s
Judentum und Hellenismus ensured that the study of ancient Judaism, the later part of
the “Old Testament” period, the NT, and even rabbinic literature would never be quite
the same again. Few books have had such far-reaching consequences as this and have
affected so many fields. The work soon appeared in a second German edition (1973),
primarily supplemented with new data and literature to support the argument, and it
was this second edition that was translated into English (1974, from which quotations
and references are given here).
It can readily be admitted that many of the individual arguments are not new in
Hengel (so L. H. Feldman, “Hengel’s Judaism and Hellenism in Retrospect,” JBL 96
[1977]: 371), but they are supported by such a range of data, both old and new, synthesized
into a larger thesis on the nature of late Second Temple Judaism, and presented
with such vitality that it is hard not to admit that it is a groundbreaking study. Hengel
built on the foundations of J. G. Droysen (p. 2), in presenting Hellenism as a cultural
fusion of Greek and Oriental cultures in the wake of the conquests of Alexander the
Great. Prior to Droysen, “Hellenism” had denoted the Greek language as it was used in
antiquity by Aristotle and his pupils and in more modern times by J. Scaliger and his followers.
In many respects one could also say that Hengel, in tracing the origins of Christianity
back to the fusion of Judaism and Hellenism, is the heir of Marcel Simon’s Verus
Israel (1948). The latter aimed to show that the break between Judaism and the Greco-
Roman world was gradual and that the separation of church and synagogue was not as
abrupt as sometimes thought. Hengel, in a similar and yet distinct vein, traced the origins
of Christianity in the pre-Christian era through the hellenization of Judaism. For
Hengel, the “parting of the ways” is an issue of the partial rejection and then adoption of
Hellenism.
The wealth of supporting material and the complexity of the argument, both to be
expected from the author of Die Zeloten (1961), do not allow for a simple summary of
the book. Reviewers were deservedly appreciative of its importance (e.g., see O’Con-
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