Systematically reading Jewish exegesis in light of Homeric scholarship, this book argues that more than 2000 years ago Alexandrian Jews developed critical and literary methods of Bible interpretation ...which are still extremely relevant today. Maren R. Niehoff provides a detailed analysis of Alexandrian Bible interpretation, from the second century BCE through newly discovered fragments to the exegetical work done by Philo. Niehoff shows that Alexandrian Jews responded in a great variety of ways to the Homeric scholarship developed at the Museum. Some Jewish scholars used the methods of their Greek colleagues to investigate whether their Scripture contained myths shared by other nations, while others insisted that significant differences existed between Judaism and other cultures. This book is vital for any student of ancient Judaism, early Christianity and Hellenistic culture.
This article offers a new and distinctly Roman perspective on Trypho the Jew in Justin's Dialogue. While generations of scholars have debated whether Trypho was a historical Jew, who engaged in a ...real dialogue with Justin, or rather a literary construct invented by the author for Christian readers, I apply post-colonial theory and argue that Justin constructed Trypho for a Roman audience, whether "pagan" or Christian. Trypho highlights by his Otherness the Roman character of Christianity and thus helps to position the new religion firmly at the center of the empire. The article offers a close reading of Trypho's prominent features, namely 1) his circumcision, which is analyzed in the context of Antonius Pius's new legislation on this Jewish rite following the Bar Kokhba Revolt, 2) Trypho's insistence on ethnicity and exclusivism, which is evaluated in view of Roman stereotypes concerning Jewish xenophobia, and 3) his recourse to detailed Bible exegesis, which is interpreted in view of Roman philosophers' disdain for exegesis as a spiritually sterile activity. On all these accounts Trypho the Jew emerges as deviant and rather more Greek than Roman. He and Marcion the "Gnostic" are relegated to the eastern provinces of the empire and serve as mirror images of what Justin considers as authentic, authoritative, and distinctly Roman Christianity.
Philo was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who left behind one of the richest bodies of work from antiquity, yet his personality and intellectual development have remained a riddle. Maren Niehoff ...presents the first biography of Philo, arguing that his trip to Rome in 38 CE was a turning point in his life. There he was exposed not only to new political circumstances but also to a new cultural and philosophical environment.Following the pogrom in Alexandria, Philo became active as the head of the Jewish embassy to Emperor Gaius and as an intellectual in the capital of the empire, responding to the challenges of his time and creatively reconstructing his identity, though always maintaining pride in the Jewish tradition. Philo's trajectory from Alexandria to Rome and his enthusiastic adoption of new modes of thought made him a key figure in the complex negotiation between East and West.
This article offers a close reading of a gloss in
B 106 of Origenes’
, which has in the past only been analyzed for its reference to the Patriarch. This article focuses on the Jewish scholar ...described in the gloss and analyzes his method of identifying Moses as the author of ten anonymous Psalms in view of Alexandrian scholarship. As Origen could only have communicated with his Jewish contemporary in Greek, the gloss provides unique insights into Hellenistic Judaism in 3d century Caesarea, which turns out to be well connected to Alexandrian methods of scholarship, available in late Antiquity in numerous intellectual centers of the Eastern Mediterranean, including Caesarea and Gadara. Moreover, the article points to conduits of communication between the Jewish Hellenistic scholar and rabbinic literature, where his conclusions resurface.
This article proposes to read all the fragments that Origen identified as belonging to the section of “Celsus’s Jew” in The True Doctrine as deriving from a written document composed by an ...Alexandrian Jew in the mid-second century. The author of these fragments emerges as an educated and highly scholarly writer with an Alexandrian background, who was alarmed by the situation of the Jewish community following a significant spread of Christianity, which was accompanied by separatist theology. The anonymous Jewish author thus produced the first literary critique of the Gospels, which is of significant value for our understanding of the “parting of the ways.” Moreover, I suggest that these fragments should be interpreted in light of both earlier forms of Alexandrian Judaism as well as the Letter of Barnabas.
Philo of Alexandria shares Paul's Jewish Diaspora background and his use of the lxx. He also addressed Roman audiences just a decade or two before Paul wrote his Letter to the Romans. He thus enables ...us to analyze Paul's approach to Psalms from a rigorous historical perspective, which highlights both their phenomenological similarities and Paul's innovations on the path to develop a spiritual notion of Scripture.
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BFBNIB, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NMLJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
Philons Schrift De Migratione Abrahami ist ein allegorischer Kommentar zu Gen 12. Der Auszug Abrahams aus seiner chaldäischen Heimat wird von Philon allegorisch auf den Auszug der Seele aus der ...Sinnenwelt und ihre Rückkehr zu Gott gedeutet. Die vorliegende Ausgabe bietet neben einer ausführlichen Einführung in Leben und Denken des alexandrinischen Religionsphilosophen den Text mit Übersetzung und erläuternden Anmerkungen. Kommentierende Essays aus unterschiedlichen Fachperspektiven ordnen die Schrift in den Kontext des zeitgenössischen Judentums sowohl in Alexandria wie im palästinischen Mutterland ein, würdigen Philon als Vertreter des kaiserzeitlichen Platonismus und machen mit der Gotteserkenntnis und philosophisch gedeuteten Exilserfahrungen zwei zentrale Topoi der Schrift zum Thema. Vergleichende Untersuchungen zur Figur des Abraham im Neuen Testament und in Thomas Manns Joseph und seine Brüder runden den Band ab.
Plutarch achievement as a biographer has often been appreciated as a highly innovative development of ancient Aristotelian models. His famous portrayal of characters is indeed remarkable and clearly ...superior to the rather more schematic presentation of national heroes by Nepos, who has sometimes been drawn into the discussion as Plutarch's closest predecessor. In this article Niehoff would like to introduce Philo of Alexandria as a significant precursor, who has been largely overlooked thus far, probably because he dealt with Biblical rather than Greco-Roman heroes, despite this difference in their choice of protagonists, Philo and Plutarch relied on strikingly similar notions of biography, using anecdotes to illuminate character and stressing the moral lesson to be learnt from each life.
Paul and Philo on the Psalms Niehoff, Maren R
Novum Testamentum,
09/2020, Letnik:
62, Številka:
4
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Abstract
Philo of Alexandria shares Paul's Jewish Diaspora background and his use of the LXX. He also addressed Roman audiences just a decade or two before Paul wrote his Letter to the Romans. He ...thus enables us to analyze Paul's approach to Psalms from a rigorous historical perspective, which highlights both their phenomenological similarities and Paul's innovations on the path to develop a spiritual notion of Scripture.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
BFBNIB, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NMLJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
Abstract
This article investigates the development of commentary culture in the Land of Israel from an Alexandrian perspective. While both the rabbis and the exegetes at Qumran developed forms of ...systematic commentary, they differ in important respects. I argue that there are significant similarities between rabbinic exegesis and the commentary culture of Alexandria, both Homeric and biblical, while Qumranic exegesis can be characterized as prophetic. The Alexandrians and the rabbis explained their canonical text from within itself and appreciated it as a literary work. This implies that a human author with a distinct style is assumed and that problems of contradictions as well as verisimilitude are explicitly addressed. The particular form of rabbinic exegesis, which is novel in the Land of Israel, thus seems to have resulted from a lively engagement with Hellenistic culture. In Qumran, on the other hand, prophetic forms of commentary were prevalent. The exegete does not inquire into the biblical text from within itself, but assumes prophetic authority, which enables him to reveal the "secrets" of the text and gain direct access to God's wisdom. Biblical lemmata are directly applied to contemporary events, while textual problems or literary questions are not explicitly addressed.
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Dostopno za:
BFBNIB, DOBA, INZLJ, IZUM, KILJ, NMLJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
