A Companion to Josephus

A Companion to Josephus presents a collection of readings from international scholars that explore the works of the first century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus.

• Represents the first single-volume collection of readings to focus on Josephus
• Covers a wide range of disciplinary approaches to the subject, including reception history
• Features contributions from 29 eminent scholars in the field from four continents
• Reveals important insights into the Jewish and Roman worlds at the moment when Christianity was gaining ground as a movement

Named Outstanding Academic Title of 2016 by Choice Magazine, a publication of the American Library Association

Notes on Contributors viii

List of Illustrations xii

Abbreviations xiv

Introduction 1
Honora Howell Chapman and Zuleika Rodgers

Part I Writings 11

1 Josephus’s Judean War 13
Steve Mason

2 Many Sources but a Single Author: Josephus’s Jewish Antiquities 36
Daniel R. Schwartz

3 Josephus’s Autobiography (Life of Josephus) 59
Steve Mason

4 Against Apion 75
John Barclay

Part II Josephus’s Literary Context 87

5 Josephus as a Roman Historian 89
Steve Mason

6 Josephus and Greek Imperial Literature 108
Eran Almagor

7 Josephus and the Bible 123
Paul Spilsbury

8 Josephus and Philo in Rome 135
Maren R. Niehoff

9 Josephus and the New Testament 147
Helen K. Bond

Part III Themes 159

10 Josephus and the Archaeology of Galilee 161
Zeev Weiss

11 Josephus as a Military Historian 199
Jonathan P. Roth

12 Josephus on Women 210
Tal Ilan

13 The Hasmoneans in Josephus 222
Erich S. Gruen

14 Herod the Great in Josephus 235
Jan Willem van Henten

15 The Herodian Temple in Josephus 247
David A. Kaden

16 Josephus and the Jewish Sects 261
Albert I. Baumgarten

17 Josephus and the Priesthood 273
James S. McLaren

18 Josephus and Halacha 282
David Nakman

19 Josephus and Rabbinic Literature 293
Richard Kalmin

Part 1V Transmission and Reception History 305

20 The Text of the Josephan Corpus: Principal Greek Manuscripts, Ancient Latin Translations, and the Indirect Tradition 307
Tommaso Leoni

21 The Ancient Latin Translations of Josephus 322
David B. Levenson and Thomas R. Martin

22 The Testimonium Flavianum 345
Alice Whealey

23 Josephus and Patristic Literature 356
Sabrina Inowlocki

24 The Christian Reception of Josephus in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages 368
Karen M. Kletter

25 Sefer Yosippon (Josippon) 382
Saskia Dönitz

26 The Slavonic Version of Josephus’s Jewish War 390
Kate Leeming

27 Josephus in Renaissance Italy 402
Silvia Castelli

28 A Note on English Translations of Josephus from Thomas Lodge to D. S. Margoliouth 414
Gohei Hata

29 From Masada to Jotapata: On Josephus in Twentieth]Century Hebrew Scholarship 419
Daniel R. Schwartz

30 Josephus Comicus in Monty Python’s Life of Brian and History of the World, Part 1 440
Honora Howell Chapman

Index 455

"The contributors to this truly magnificent collection of scholarship read like a who’s who in classics and religion academia............A wide variety of topics, an exhaustive bibliography, and fresh notions and research add to the immense value of this volume for both researchers and readers." (Choice Connect 2016)

"...this book is a right royal feast, and an essential purchase for anyone interested in what can be said about Flavius Josephus." (Dr. Michael Mates, United Nations of Roma Victrix Book Review)

Honora Howell Chapman is Professor of Classics and Humanities at California State University, Fresno. She is a former co-chair of the Josephus Seminar/Group of the Society of Biblical Literature and has published articles and book chapters on literary aspects of Josephus’s writings.

Zuleika Rodgers is Lecturer in Jewish Studies and Director of the Herzog Centre at Trinity College, University of Dublin. She was President of the British Association for Jewish Studies (2013–2014). Considered the most important historian of Jewish antiquity, the works of Flavius Josephus offer unparalleled insights into the world of Late Second Temple Judaism, the dawn of Christianity, and the early years of the Roman Empire. A Companion to Josephus presents a collection of readings that probe deeply into aspects relating to the four extant works of the first century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus. Featuring contributions from more than two dozen renowned international scholars specializing in Josephus and related studies, readings introduce the writings of Josephus, put them into historical contexts, explore their transmission and reception, and highlight contemporary scholarly approaches to two millennia of Josephan studies. Following an examination of the four individual texts and their manuscript tradition and situating the writings of Josephus among contemporaneous Greek, Roman, Jewish, and Christian works, a wide variety of themes are explored—the archaeology of Galilee, military history, the Jerusalem Temple, women, Jewish rulers, and more. Further readings follow the transmission and reception of the Josephan corpus along its remarkable journey from Late Antiquity through to the Medieval, early Modern, and Modern periods. In the first single-volume scholarly guide to Josephus, A Companion to Josephus sheds important new light into the writings of an eyewitness to a pivotal point in world history.