Jewish identity and hellenism in the fragmentary jewish writings in greek

Abstract

The Fragmentary Jewish Writings in Greek represent a rich seam of material that has been little studied up to the present. What these writers show is evidence of Jews at home in the Greek world. One of the questions that seems to have been debated endlessly is how Jews saw themselves under Greek rule. One might wonder why this should be?surely the question of identity would have been asked when the rulers were Persian or Babylonian or Assyrian. But the oft-unstated assumption seems to be that Greek rule was somehow different from any that had preceded it. Given this assumption, the question of Hellenism must also be included in any discussion of Jewish identity of this period. This chapter considers both these questions?of (1) Jewish identity and (2) the Jews and Hellenism?in the Fragmentary Jewish Writings in Greek, with particular attention to Demetrius, Artapanus, Ezekiel the Tragedian, Eupolemus, and Aristobulus. Keywords: Aristobulus; Artapanus; Demetrius; Eupolemus; Ezekiel the Tragedian; Greek; Hellenism; Jewish Identity; Jewish Writings