Stromateis Book Five. There Were (Now Lost) Books Which Identified the Greeks Borrowed from Judaism

[Secret Alias]

And by Aristobulus, who lived in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, who is mentioned by the composer of the epitome of the books of the Maccabees, there were abundant books to show that the Peripatetic philosophy was derived from the law of Moses and from the other prophets. 5.14.97.7 Ἀριστοβούλῳ δὲ τῷ κατὰ Πτολεμαῖον γεγονότι τὸν Φιλομήτορα, οὗ μέμνηται ὁ συνταξάμενος τὴν τῶν Μακκαβαϊκῶν ἐπιτομήν, βιβλία γέγονεν ἱκανά, δι' ὧν ἀποδείκνυσι τὴν Περιπατητικὴν φιλοσοφίαν ἔκ τε τοῦ κατὰ Μωυσέα νόμου καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἠρτῆσθαι προφητῶν.

Why can't Gmirkin, in a history replete with anti-Jewish literature, find one ancient author who supports his contentions?

That's the part I don't get. Celsus doesn't manage to pick up one ancient book which says Judaism is a fake "library borrowing" from Alexandria? Not one person in all of antiquity. They can find stories of Jews sacrificing Gentile children in their temple but no mention of visits to the library? He can accuse Christianity of borrowing extensively from Plato ... but not the Jews? How is that possible?

[Leucius Charinus]

And by Aristobulus, who lived in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, who is mentioned by the composer of the epitome of the books of the Maccabees, there were abundant books to show that the Peripatetic philosophy was derived from the law of Moses and from the other prophets.

So the source is a post Maccabean epitomist (late 2nd/1st century BCE) living within or looking into a Torah observant society in which everything (including Peripatetic philosophy) was derived from the law of Moses. To be expected.

Why can't Gmirkin, in a history replete with anti-Jewish literature, find one ancient author who supports his contentions?

Why can't Gmirkin's detractors find one ancient author or archeology mentioning the existence of the Torah before c.274 BCE? Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?

[StephenGoranson]

LC, what is *your* interpretation of (pre-274) Hecataeus of Abdera?

[Secret Alias]

Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?

Why can't any books of Plato be found before the 3rd century CE? Are we to assume that he was invented too in the third century? What's with this childish notion that the date we discover things is when they were made? As I've noted before there is a Protogoras-like obsession in modernity with "we" being the center of reality and history, the limits of knowledge. The reason books don't survive from before second century BCE has to do with the physical limits of paper when exposed to the evidence. What would have happened if the Qumran material didn't survive? What would be our earliest evidence for Judaism? I think you're mad you couldn't include Judaism in Constantine's inventing workshops.

[austendw]

Why can't Gmirkin's detractors find one ancient author or archeology mentioning the existence of the Torah before c.274 BCE? Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?

I can't speak for all Gmirkin detractors, but only myself, and I'll try and answer your question from my point of view.

But first can I ask you a question? What precisely is the earliest date that an ancient author mentions the existence of the Torah? I may be wrong, but I think it may actually be a lot later than 274BCE. In which case Gmirkin's date of 273BCE might itself be considered too early. (And unless I'm mistaken, I think that Philippe Wajdenbaum dates the composition of the Pentateuch to the 2nd century, possibly up to 100 years later than Gmirkin).

As to "Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?", my answer would be that it wasn't until this time that the Pentateuch, as a complete, finished collection/anthology of 5 books (reduced from a previous collection of 6 books) became adopted as the authoritative law/canon/scripture. Up until then, the various books - not necessarily yet completed, not necessarily collected and edited together, or perhaps only partially collected in smaller/different formats - had no special "the seal of approval", may even have been written by and valued by different groups of Judahites and Samaritans, but not by all, so could claim no authority over all of them. Some "specialist" segments of the Pentateuch (eg some purity determinations, the dimensions of the tabernacle) may have only been known to certain sections of society - the scribal elites and priests - and were not universally diseminated. Other segments may only have been known as myths and tales and tales, in competition with other stories (eg Patriarchal origins vs. Egyptian origins) either with higher status, until someone sorted out how to accommodate both. Only when everything had been edited together to someone's satisfaction, and given the stamp of someone's approval, did the books come to be diseminated (via the new institution of the synagogue perhaps) and the practice of the laws were taken up, and then had an impact upon the archaeological record.*

And this, would also explain why we can't find "one ancient author... mentioning the existence of the Torah before..." well, whenever. Before it was authoritative, there is little reason to expect that other Judean & Samaritan writers needed to have made mention of them. And it may indeed have been later still before the authority of the Pentateuch, came to be paramount to the "identity" of Judeans. It may be that, already begining to be authoritative in the later 3rd century, it wasn't until the Hasmoneans in the 2nd century that Torah-adherence became a matter of importance and a seen as a matter of social cohension. So much is still unknown about all this and remains difficult to explain with any degree of certaintly.

Just to make it clear... I am not suggesting that the Pentateuch as such was completed at a particularly early date (though I do think that Gmirkin's 273BCE exactly is simply far too precise). I believe that the final redaction may well have been completed as later than Gmirkin suggests (because, ironically, I am far less convinced in the reliability of the Letter of Aristeas to tell us anything about the history of the LXX than he does). But certainly am convinced that the text of the Pentateuch reveals more about its own origins than it tells, and that careful reading shows that it is a collection of different voices, written at different times (though I am agnostic about absolute dates) and only gradually became consolidated into the Pentateuch (or Pentateuchs) known to the Greeks, Masoretes,Samaritans and the DSS scribes. It really isn't the dating that makes me a Gmirkin "detractor" but the notion that the material almost all came from Plato, Manetho etc and was devised, written, compiled within a very short period (272-273) and then immediately translated into Greek. Gmirkin, it strikes me, takes a lot of heterogenous evidence and shoehorns it into a single model (ie "adapted from Plato et al in the Alexandrian Library") where I think that the material suggest more varied origins... some more in tune with Greek thought than others; some parts maybe directly aware of Greek texts, but others some possessing only a familial relationship to Greek thought etc etc.

So... that's my answer.

*Digression: The archaeological finds that determine that the Pentateuchal laws were bring practiced is actually as much a lucky break as the discovery of Dead Sea Scrolls etc. Though I confess I still haven't read Yonatan Adlers book and am basing this on other essays and reports on his work (so I may need to revise or completely junk what I say below), the two strongest indicators of the law being practiced are (a) the prevalence of the Mivkaot (ritual purifying pools) and (b) the increased use of chalkstone vessels. It is important to rememeber, however that nowhere in the Pentateuch are there laws which (a) insist on full body immersion/give instructions on how to construct a mikva, or (b) particularly mandate the use of stone vessels.

The rules of Leviticus 15 say that people "must wash their clothes and bathe with water" and that's all, and if people did that and no more, they would have made zero impact on the archaeology. The decision to construct special pools with steps is a significant development of the Pentateuchal instructions, which Yarden speculates derived rom and was a reaction to the hip bath which became common in the Hellenistic period. This development of the purity law necessarily only appeared during the Hellenistic period and wouldn't have made appeared at any other time. Might people have been washing in water (eg a river or pool) before that period? Perhaps, yes; perhaps, no. Could archaeology tell anything about that either way? No.

As to chalkstone, this is also a development of Pentateuchal law. Leviticus 15:12 sipulates that "A clay pot that the man touches must be broken, and any wooden article is to be rinsed with water." It seems that someone reasoned that since stoneware wasn't mentioned, it must've been immune from purity regulations. As it needed neither to be broken or cleansed it became a vessel of choice - it was simply very convenient. But that too is a "lucky" development that made it visible to archaeology. If people had though it was better to play it safe and treat stone like wood, its unlikely that chalkstone would have been so popular and could have provided little evidence for the practice of purity laws.

[Secret Alias]

Did the Jews and the Samaritans in the Persian period have the authority to compel people to obey their law?

[DCHindley]

Did the Jews and the Samaritans in the Persian period have the authority to compel people to obey their law?

IIRC, from reading R. Jacob Neusner's History of the Jews of Babylonia vol 1, that both the Persians and later the Parthians pretty much let the local subjects worship in the custom they have adopted. As for Jews, they pretty much had a free hand. We know far more about Jews in Partian times that in Persian times, but each settlement operated like a tribal council who even adopted positions within Parthian military, with their soldiers learning to make the famous rearward firing of a bow while standing on the back of a galloping horse. Various regional Jewish military and religious leaders fell in and fell out of favor of the Parthian ruler but he sees no systematic persecution or oppression of Jews.

From reading Fabian Udoh, the Romans had a similar policy as well. It did not hurt that Herod the Great had earned several important concessions for Jews under the Romans. Right to refuse military conscription at all levels, freedom to congregate en-mass for weekly worship, rights to operate local courts to govern Jews who lived in cities (Jews were not granted full citizenship rights in the Polis or Roman town), and the right to send money gifts to Jerusalem.

Jews were far less likely to adopt Roman ways or join their militaries than in Babylonia, but there were notable exceptions. However, in Egypt the Judeans had for years the reputation for being fierce and reliable fighters when organized into self-governing military units, and many kings had used them as mercenaries.

Herod, of course, had his own military operating partly as Jewish units which used Greek terminology but was clearly influenced by Roman practices, which he led to brilliant successes in battle for the Roman factionsde jure. He was also an innovative tax collector who changed the tax structure away from agriculture which pressed on the peasant sector to tolls on imports making their way to Rome from the exotic east. He was about the only subject king who never minted a silver coin. I believe he made a concession to get the minting rights to a discontinued but beloved silver coin of Tyre to be the official coin of a Judean temple state.

I don't think that Jews of Babylonia cared to enforce their ways on others, but they may have I am not aware of.

From Josephus's account of the Judean War, some rebel factions wanted to do much like some of the Hasmoneans and force compliance as a condition to remain in an area the Judeans controlled (Idumeans, Itureans who occupied some of Galilee). Josephus would like us to believe that the more reasoned position would be to let them be and offer them protection.

All this cooperation and such, in both Roman and Parthian empires, pretty much crumbled away in the 3rd century CE, especially during some of the Roman-Partian wars in Asia Minor and into Mesopotamia. Maybe I am remembering the era wrong, but I seem to recall early to mid 3rd century as the turn of the tide, after which Jews/Judeans were out of favor in both empires.

DCH

[andrewcriddle]

Why can't Gmirkin's detractors find one ancient author or archeology mentioning the existence of the Torah before c.274 BCE? Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?

I can't speak for all Gmirkin detractors, but only myself, and I'll try and answer your question from my point of view.

But first can I ask you a question? What precisely is the earliest date that an ancient author mentions the existence of the Torah? I may be wrong, but I think it may actually be a lot later than 274BCE. In which case Gmirkin's date of 273BCE might itself be considered too early. (And unless I'm mistaken, I think that Philippe Wajdenbaum dates the composition of the Pentateuch to the 2nd century, possibly up to 100 years later than Gmirkin).

It may depend on what you make of Hecataeus (c 300 BCE)
See Diodorus Siculus

Since we are about to give an account of the war against the Jews, we consider it appropriate, before we proceed further, in the first place to relate the origin of this nation, and their customs. In ancient times a great plague occurred in Egypt, and many ascribed the cause of it to the gods, who were offended with them. For since the multitudes of strangers of different nationalities, who lived there, made use of their foreign rites in religious ceremonies and sacrifices, the ancient manner of worshipping the gods, practised by the ancestors of the Egyptians, had been quite lost and forgotten. 2 Therefore the native inhabitants concluded that, unless all the foreigners were driven out, they would never be free from their miseries. All the foreigners were forthwith expelled, and the most valiant and noble among them, under some notable leaders, were brought to Greece and other places, as some relate; the most famous of their leaders were Danaus and Cadmus. But the majority of the people descended into a country not far from Egypt, which is now called Judaea and at that time was altogether uninhabited.

3 The leader of this colony was one Moses, a very wise and valiant man, who, after he had possessed himself of the country, amongst other cities, built that now most famous city, Jerusalem, and the temple there, which is so greatly revered among them. He instituted the holy rites and ceremonies with which they worship God; and made laws for the methodical government of the state. He also divided the people into twelve tribes, which he regarded as the most perfect number; because it corresponds to the twelve months within a whole year. 4 He made no representation or image of gods, because he considered that nothing of a human shape was applicable to God; but that heaven, which surrounds the earth, was the only God, and that all things were in its power. But he so arranged the rites and ceremonies of the sacrifices, and the manner and nature of their customs, as that they should be wholly different from all other nations; for, as a result of the expulsion of his people, he introduced a most inhuman and unsociable manner of life. He also picked out the most accomplished men, who were best fitted to rule and govern the whole nation, and he appointed them to be priests, whose duty was continually to attend in the temple, and employ themselves in the public worship and service of God. 5 He also made them judges, for the decision of the most serious cases, and committed to their care the preservation of their laws and customs. Therefore they say that the Jews have never had any king; but that the leadership of the people has always been entrusted to a priest, who excels all the rest in prudence and virtue. They call him the chief priest, and they regard him as the messenger and interpreter of the mind and commands of God. 6 And they say that he, in all their public assemblies and other meetings, discloses what has been commanded; and the Jews are so compliant in these matters, that forthwith they prostrate themselves upon the ground, and adore him as the high priest, who has interpreted to them the will of God. At the end of the laws this is added: "This is what Moses has heard from God and proclaims to the Jews." This lawgiver also laid down many excellent rules and instructions for military affairs, in which he trained the youth to be brave and steadfast, and to endure all miseries and hardships. 7 Moreover, he undertook many wars against the neighbouring nations, and gained much territory by force of arms, which he gave as allotments to his countrymen, in such a way as that everyone shared alike, except the priests, who had a larger portion than the rest; so that, because they had a larger income, they might continually attend upon the public worship of God without interruption. Neither was it lawful for any man to sell his allotment, lest, by the greed of those that bought the allotments, the others might be made poor and oppressed, and so the nation might suffer a shortage of manpower.

8 He also ordered the inhabitants to be careful in rearing their children, who are brought up with very little expense; and by that means the Jewish nation has always been very populous. As to their marriages and funerals, he instituted customs far different from all other people. But under the empires which rose up in later ages, especially during the rule of the Persians, and in the time of the Macedonians, who overthrew the Persians, through intermingling with foreign nations, many of the traditional customs among the Jews were altered . . . This is what Hecataeus of (?) Abdera has related about the Jews.

Gmirkin has a detailed and original interpretation of Hecataeus, but at face value it seems to testify to the existence of some version of the Laws of Moses.

Andrew Criddle

[Leucius Charinus]

Why can't Gmirkin's detractors find one ancient author or archeology mentioning the existence of the Torah before c.274 BCE? Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?

I can't speak for all Gmirkin detractors, but only myself, and I'll try and answer your question from my point of view.

But first can I ask you a question? What precisely is the earliest date that an ancient author mentions the existence of the Torah? I may be wrong, but I think it may actually be a lot later than 274BCE. In which case Gmirkin's date of 273BCE might itself be considered too early. (And unless I'm mistaken, I think that Philippe Wajdenbaum dates the composition of the Pentateuch to the 2nd century, possibly up to 100 years later than Gmirkin).

IDK the earliest date that an ancient author mentions the existence of the Torah. AFAIK this may relate to whatever date is attributed to the letter of Aristeas and that in some cases could be later than the physical fragments C14 dated in the DSS.

I agree that the composition of the Pentateuch could be later than the Gmirkin date. Often I regard the Gmirkin date as the earliest possible date that the raw materials (identified by Gmirkin - Plato, Berossus, Manetho et al) all became available in the Greek language at the library of Alexandria.

As to "Why can't any archeological evidence for societal Torah observance be found prior to the early 2nd / late 3rd century BCE?", my answer would be that it wasn't until this time that the Pentateuch, as a complete, finished collection/anthology of 5 books (reduced from a previous collection of 6 books) became adopted as the authoritative law/canon/scripture. Up until then, the various books - not necessarily yet completed, not necessarily collected and edited together, or perhaps only partially collected in smaller/different formats - had no special "the seal of approval", may even have been written by and valued by different groups of Judahites and Samaritans, but not by all, so could claim no authority over all of them. Some "specialist" segments of the Pentateuch (eg some purity determinations, the dimensions of the tabernacle) may have only been known to certain sections of society - the scribal elites and priests - and were not universally diseminated. Other segments may only have been known as myths and tales and tales, in competition with other stories (eg Patriarchal origins vs. Egyptian origins) either with higher status, until someone sorted out how to accommodate both. Only when everything had been edited together to someone's satisfaction, and given the stamp of someone's approval, did the books come to be diseminated (via the new institution of the synagogue perhaps) and the practice of the laws were taken up, and then had an impact upon the archaeological record.*

I'd agree with all this.

And this, would also explain why we can't find "one ancient author... mentioning the existence of the Torah before..." well, whenever. Before it was authoritative, there is little reason to expect that other Judean & Samaritan writers needed to have made mention of them. And it may indeed have been later still before the authority of the Pentateuch, came to be paramount to the "identity" of Judeans. It may be that, already begining to be authoritative in the later 3rd century, it wasn't until the Hasmoneans in the 2nd century that Torah-adherence became a matter of importance and a seen as a matter of social cohension. So much is still unknown about all this and remains difficult to explain with any degree of certainty.

Yes I'd agree with this as well. In order that such archeological evidence to appear it would require a top down regime pushing the Torah into the populace. This seems to implicate the Hasmoneans in the 2nd century BCE. It may also indicate that such a power struggle resulted in the clash between the Jews and the Samaritans that ended with the destruction of the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim c.110 BCE.

Just to make it clear... I am not suggesting that the Pentateuch as such was completed at a particularly early date (though I do think that Gmirkin's 273BCE exactly is simply far too precise). I believe that the final redaction may well have been completed as later than Gmirkin suggests (because, ironically, I am far less convinced in the reliability of the Letter of Aristeas to tell us anything about the history of the LXX than he does). But certainly am convinced that the text of the Pentateuch reveals more about its own origins than it tells, and that careful reading shows that it is a collection of different voices, written at different times (though I am agnostic about absolute dates) and only gradually became consolidated into the Pentateuch (or Pentateuchs) known to the Greeks, Masoretes,Samaritans and the DSS scribes. It really isn't the dating that makes me a Gmirkin "detractor" but the notion that the material almost all came from Plato, Manetho etc and was devised, written, compiled within a very short period (272-273) and then immediately translated into Greek. Gmirkin, it strikes me, takes a lot of heterogenous evidence and shoehorns it into a single model (ie "adapted from Plato et al in the Alexandrian Library") where I think that the material suggest more varied origins... some more in tune with Greek thought than others; some parts maybe directly aware of Greek texts, but others some possessing only a familial relationship to Greek thought etc etc.

I'd be inclined to view the library of Alexandria as a purposeful Greek collection. Apart from what I've written above, Gmirkin's book "Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible" provides some compelling arguments that the LXX / Hebrew Bible drew upon the Greek laws found in Plato. I have not read this book but the reviews and summaries indicate that Gmirkin has made a detailed study of the law codes from all the various sources available i the ancient world around that time period.

I do agree that there can be no certainty in all these theories (including the Documentary Hypothesis, Gmirkin, Adler, et al) but there is a form of consilience emerging that the composition of the Torah was later rather than earlier.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consilience

[Leucius Charinus]

LC, what is *your* interpretation of (pre-274) Hecataeus of Abdera?

I don't have one but am aware of Gmirkin's:

Ptolemy II Philadelphus (or his agents) had heard of a rumored ancient body of Mosaic laws governing the Jews, based on a fictional foundation story of the colonization of Judea from Egypt in the Aegyptiaca written for the Ptolemies by Hecataeus of Abdera ca. 315 BCE. This was the first mention in any language of a figure called Moses, who was said to have been an Egyptian who led a colonizing expedition, founded Jerusalem and its temple, and established its constitution and laws.