Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity: Part 1, Palestine 330 BCE-200 CE

Abstract

Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity: Part 1, Palestine 330 BCE-200 CE, by Tal Ilan. TSAJ 91. Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002. Pp. xxvi + 484. euro159.00 (hardcover). ISBN 3161476468. Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity is a more than welcome reference tool for the scholar of ancient Judaism and a superb addition to the literature on Judaism in the crucial period of its formation. The real scope of this lexicon becomes evident when the reader is informed that it took twenty years to collect the data; this shows not only the extensive nature of any such a project but also the enormous number of available primary sources related to Judaism in late antiquity. This lexicon replaces other onomastica or shorter collections, such as the names of female synagogue leaders, as well as the scattered information in Zunz's nineteenth-century work on Jewish names and the slim pickings in articles, dictionaries, and notes, which we, the scholars of ancient Judaism, have relied upon for so many years. The book under review is designated as volume 1; however, only by reading through the personalized Entstehungsgeschichte or elaborate birth narrative of the book, from a seminar paper to the present volume, are we informed that the second volume is a desideratum. In her lexicon of Jewish names, definitions of Jewishness are painstakingly avoided; Ilan takes the more inclusive approach of listing the names of those people who have some Jewish background, function, or identity, including non-halakic Jews. Ilan thus avoids the pitfalls of uncertain backgrounds or patronyms. Useful statistics provide information about the occurrences of names in different languages as well as the division of the population according to languages. We gather from these tables the surprising fact that Greek and Semitic-Hebrew names occur with similar frequency, which is another piece of evidence that emphasizes the profound influence of Greco-Roman culture upon Judaism. Additionally, the data collected by Ilan point to the rich and extremely diverse cultural identification of the Jewish population in the Land of Israel in this time period. The sources utilized to compile the lexicon and the statistical data are impressive: Ilan searched apocrypha, pseudepigrapha, Josephus, Greek and Roman historians, as well as rabbinic sources and inscriptional evidence found in the rich material cultural artifacts from this time period. The names are in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Aramaic, Coptic, Persian, and several other languages; for example, Ilan refers to the possible Egyptian origins of several names, such as Ani (pp. 361-62) and Totefet (p. 385). The names are systematically categorized as either male or female, as biblical or relating to the above-mentioned linguistic and cultural groups. Rarely do we encounter names that are used for both males and females, as, for example, the Persian name Pazatas, which refers either to the daughter of R. Hiyya or to an Amora. Similarly, a name could change its gender specification from a Persian male name to a Semitic name of a queen (e.g., Sadain). If we focus on a familiar Hebrew name, Jacob, we find forty-five different males with this name who made it into Hebrew literature or inscriptions, such as on an ostracon from Masada. The eighty-nine footnotes to these forty-five people named Jacob include several short discussions of agreements or disagreements with other scholars. There are eighty women with the name Mariam, among them Maria, as found in the NT. …