Josephus' Portrait of David

[arnoldo]

Josephus takes note of that very point.

[About An. 1076.] But David fell now into a very grievous sin: tho’ he were otherwise naturally a righteous and a religious man; and one that firmly observed the laws of our fathers. For when late in an evening he took a view round him from the roof of his royal palace, where he used to walk at that hour; he saw a woman washing her self in her own house. She was one of extraordinary beauty; and therein surpassed all other women. Her name was Bathsheba. So he was overcome by that woman’s beauty; and was not able to restrain his desires: but sent for her, and lay with her. Hereupon she conceived with child; and sent to the King, that he should contrive some way for concealing her sin. (For according to the laws of their fathers she, who had been guilty of adultery, ought to be put to death.)
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/a ... in_note_12

And when Nathan confronts David with a parable, David pronounced death upon the guilty party.

And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor.

The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds:

But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter.

And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man's lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.

And David's anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die. . .

. . .And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man.

[iskander]

King David , the peeping tom, overpowers the woman as if she were a spoil of war. Much later she tells him that she is pregnant as the result his savage behaviour. He decides to murder her husband who is a loyal officer in his army hoping to hide his dastardly deed . He then orders the commanding officer of the army to share his guilt in this a most vile crime. Nathan speaks privately only of a despicable robbery.


What evidence is there in this story of any existing rule of law , be it divine or secular?

[iskander]

Josephus takes note of that very point.

[About An. 1076.] But David fell now into a very grievous sin: tho’ he were otherwise naturally a righteous and a religious man; and one that firmly observed the laws of our fathers. For when late in an evening he took a view round him from the roof of his royal palace, where he used to walk at that hour; he saw a woman washing her self in her own house. She was one of extraordinary beauty; and therein surpassed all other women. Her name was Bathsheba. So he was overcome by that woman’s beauty; and was not able to restrain his desires: but sent for her, and lay with her. Hereupon she conceived with child; and sent to the King, that he should contrive some way for concealing her sin. (For according to the laws of their fathers she, who had been guilty of adultery, ought to be put to death.)
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/a ... in_note_12

And when Nathan confronts David with a parable, David pronounced death upon the guilty party.

And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor.

The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds:

But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter.

And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man's lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.

And David's anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die. . .

. . .And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man.

Leviticus 20:10 does not seem to apply in the case of king David .
Uriah was not a Jew . A non Jew had few rights .
committing adultery with the wife of his fellow: [Thus] excluding the wife of a non-Jew. [From here,] we learn that [the legal status of Jewish] marriage cannot be held by a non-Jew. — [Torath Kohanim 20:105; Sanh. 52b

Another reason is that Bathsheba was no longer married having got a conditional get (divorce) by her husband.

One reason for the death of Uriah is that he disobeyed an order of King David by not returning home when requested. Uriah was then a lawful execution.

[arnoldo]

There was probably other reasons why Josephus wanted to minimize David if the gospel stories were written contemporaneously.

Abstract
In the portrayal of David in his paraphrase of the Bible in the Antiquities, Josephus was confronted with a dilemma. On the one hand, as the beneficiary of so many gifts from the Romans, he could hardly praise David, who was the ancestor of the Messiah, and who ipso facto would lead a revolt against Rome and establish an independent state. On the other hand, David was a great folk hero, and his qualities of character could be used in answering the calumniators of the Jews. Josephus' solution was to adopt a compromise: thus he gives David a distinguished ancestry without stressing it unduly. He uses the figure of David to answer the denigrators of the Jews; he notes David's wealth to refute the canard that the Jews are beggars; he ascribes to him the cardinal virtues of wisdom, courage, temperance, justice, and piety to counteract the charges that the Jews were not original, that they were cowards, that they were immoderate, that they lacked humanity (a corollary of justice), and that they were impious. When David is elevated, it is not so much for his own sake as it is to increase the drama of the situation.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/23507841?se ... b_contents

I think footnote #4 is germane in context of other threads.

. . . Messiah concept is insignificant in most early rabbinic works; yet this may be due to the general eagerness of the rabbis not to provoke the Romans into abrogating the special privileges of the Jews. If so, Josephus would be in accord with this rabbinic trend: and this would be explained by his desires not to offend his Roman beneficiaries, since a Messiah, ispo facto, implies revolt against Rome. . .

I would add that any writings/discussion of a Messiah of the lineage of David would essentially be seen as sedition against the Hasmonean/Herodian archon(s) ruling Israel. Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place.

[neilgodfrey]

The Feldman article:

But. on the other hand. Josephus himself was descended from the Hasmonean kings rather than from the line of David; and, moreover, any reference to David as the ancestor of the Messiah* might well be considered by the Romans as encouraging revolt, since the Messiah was generally regarded as a political leader who would re-establish an independent Jewish state.3 . . . .

. . . .

Indeed, Josephus had to be careful to avoid the rabbinic picture of an eschatological David who, in the days to come (Sanhedrin 98b), will be the viceroy of the Messiah, who likewise will be named David, let alone of a David who will live forever (Midrash Psalms 5.52, 57 298, 75 340, 2 Avoth de-Rabbi Nathan 45.125).

Notice anything about the evidence the author cites in support of his assertions?

Look at footnote 3:

(3) For a summary of rabbinic views on the Messiah see (Gerald J. Blidstein, “Messiah in Rabbinic Thought." Encyclopaedia Judaica. Voi. 11 (Jerusalem: Macmillan. 1971). .1410-1412

That's doing history backwards. It is an invalid method. You can't take documents from two to three or four hundred years after an event as evidence of for the thinking and motivation of Josephus and textual analysis of his writings. That's just not kosher.

For some reason biblical studies likes to play by rules that no-one else recognises as having any justification at all.

[DCHindley]

For some reason biblical studies likes to play by rules that no-one else recognises as having any justification at all.

If Biblical criticism was compared to, say, eating establishments that dish out knowledge, it would come closest to a "Self Service" establishment. IMHO, the very infrastructure which trains and educates tomorrow's sacred Ministers, Pastors, and Priests (who comprise at least 80% of the students by graduate level, I would think), will skew the analysis by placing certain historical norms out of bounds so as not to tip the apple cart. Biblical critics, in general, have a vested interest in preserving the status quo WRT the critic's own preferred tradition. "You don't," they say, "bite the hand that feeds you!"

No matter how hard the critic tries NOT to let his/her traditional POV influence her/his critical evaluations, it does bleed through to some degree. This kind of built-in bias is not totally impenetrable to a modern historian or non-professional with similar historical interests. For the historian, it just adds a third dimension to his/her critical analysis.

It seems to come as a shock to some that not only do we have to establish facts (discerned from individual relics = width) and the significance of these facts (factors that affect the quality of the evidence being relayed = depth), but consider a third dimension as well, that of understanding and appreciating how historians of all eras create historical explanations or scenarios from older facts passed on as relics.

I'm using lots of nuanced technical blather talk there, but I am sure you and those-who-lurk get the gist.

DCH

[arnoldo]

The Feldman article:

But. on the other hand. Josephus himself was descended from the Hasmonean kings rather than from the line of David; and, moreover, any reference to David as the ancestor of the Messiah* might well be considered by the Romans as encouraging revolt, ]since the Messiah was generally regarded as a political leader who would re-establish an independent Jewish state.3 . . . .

. . . .

Indeed, Josephus had to be careful to avoid the rabbinic picture of an eschatological David who, in the days to come (Sanhedrin 98b), will be the viceroy of the Messiah, who likewise will be named David, let alone of a David who will live forever (Midrash Psalms 5.52, 57 298, 75 340, 2 Avoth de-Rabbi Nathan 45.125).

Notice anything about the evidence the author cites in support of his assertions?

Look at footnote 3:

(3) For a summary of rabbinic views on the Messiah see (Gerald J. Blidstein, “Messiah in Rabbinic Thought." Encyclopaedia Judaica. Voi. 11 (Jerusalem: Macmillan. 1971). .1410-1412

That's doing history backwards. It is an invalid method. You can't take documents from two to three or four hundred years after an event as evidence of for the thinking and motivation of Josephus and textual analysis of his writings. That's just not kosher.

For some reason biblical studies likes to play by rules that no-one else recognises as having any justification at all.

What you left out of the quote is the most interesting part (boxed in white below)!

But. on the other hand. Josephus himself was descended from the Hasmonean kings rather than from the line of David; and, moreover, any reference to David as the ancestor of the Messiah* might well be considered by the Romans as encouraging revolt, since the Messiah was generally regarded as a political leader who would re-establish an independent Jewish state.3 . . . .

We can therefore understand Josephus’ comment (Ant. 10.276), which is deliberately ambiguous, when he says that “Daniel also wrote about the empire of the Romans and that it [ambiguous} would be desolated by them” [ambiguous]. Similarly, in order not to offend the Romans, he cryptically (Ant. 10.210) says that he does not think it proper to explain the meaning of the stone in Daniel 2:34-35,45, “since I am expected to write what is past and done and not of what is to be.” The stone, as Marcus 4 (Ant 10.210) has commented, was regarded in ancient Jewish exegesis as a symbol of the Messiah who would put an end to the Roman Empire.

. . . .

Indeed, Josephus had to be careful to avoid the rabbinic picture of an eschatological David who, in the days to come (Sanhedrin 98b), will be the viceroy of the Messiah, who likewise will be named David, let alone of a David who will live forever (Midrash Psalms 5.52, 57 298, 75 340, 2 Avoth de-Rabbi Nathan 45.125)

Do you also disagree that the stone was a symbol of the Messiah (see bold above)?

[arnoldo]

For some reason biblical studies likes to play by rules that no-one else recognises as having any justification at all.

If Biblical criticism was compared to, say, eating establishments that dish out knowledge, it would come closest to a "Self Service" establishment. IMHO, the very infrastructure which trains and educates tomorrow's sacred Ministers, Pastors, and Priests (who comprise at least 80% of the students by graduate level, I would think), will skew the analysis by placing certain historical norms out of bounds so as not to tip the apple cart. Biblical critics, in general, have a vested interest in preserving the status quo WRT the critic's own preferred tradition. "You don't," they say, "bite the hand that feeds you!"

No matter how hard the critic tries NOT to let his/her traditional POV influence her/his critical evaluations, it does bleed through to some degree. This kind of built-in bias is not totally impenetrable to a modern historian or non-professional with similar historical interests. For the historian, it just adds a third dimension to his/her critical analysis.

It seems to come as a shock to some that not only do we have to establish facts (discerned from individual relics = width) and the significance of these facts (factors that affect the quality of the evidence being relayed = depth), but consider a third dimension as well, that of understanding and appreciating how historians of all eras create historical explanations or scenarios from older facts passed on as relics.

I'm using lots of nuanced technical blather talk there, but I am sure you and those-who-lurk get the gist.

DCH

I don't know what your saying since I dropped out of graduate school after gaining 15 credit hours. I did manage to take (and pass) Intro to Research so I vaguely remember some of the stuff the professors blathered about. Personally, I learned more about research from reading books like Magnus Zetterholm's The Formation of Christianity in Antioch: A Social-Scientific Approach to the Separation Between Judaism and Christianity London and New York: Routledge, 2003

[neilgodfrey]

Do you also disagree that the stone was a symbol of the Messiah (see bold above)?

I do not see that Marcus provides any evidence in support of his assertion that "the Jewish interpretation of it current in his day took it as a symbol of the Messiah or Messianic kingdom which would make an end of the Roman empire." Marcus simply states that as a fact with no supporting citation.

I can point to other research that indicates that the stone was understood to be the Maccabean kingdom destroying the fourth kingdom which was in fact the Seleucid, not Roman.

Josephus does not shy away from permitting his audience to read and discuss the prophecy in Daniel and in fact invites his Roman audience to read Daniel for themselves. That does not sound as though he is fearful of them learning whatever Jewish interpretations were extant.

What astounds me in much of the section of the article you quote (I did not comment on it originally since there is so much to comment on in the Feldman piece -- nearly 30 years old by the way, so perhaps, hopefully, Feldman himself would not like to repeat his argument today?) is all the mind-reading undertaken to suss out the meaning and intent of Josephus. It is all mind-reading.

There is no reason to think Josephus was fearful of breathing the word "messiah" to Romans (would they really understand the word anyway?). The only reason I can gather for such an oft-repeated claim is that it comports with Christian doctrine and expectations. There is absolutely nothing in Josephus that indicates any reluctance or timidity in relation to the word. Feldman's only source for his claim is clairvoyance.

[neilgodfrey]

As for the "Davidic" interest in the Second Temple era, by the way, notice the strong associations in the literature of David with suffering, penance, worship and praise. David himself was more Orphic than Military-Messianic in the religious texts of the day.