Format:
1 online resource (280 pages)
Edition:
1st ed.
ISBN:
9780520928435
Series Statement:
Hellenistic Culture and Society Ser v.43
Content:
In this thoughtful and penetrating study, Sara Raup Johnson investigates the creation of historical fictions in a wide range of Hellenistic Jewish texts. Surveying so-called Jewish novels, including the Letter of Aristeas, 2 Maccabees, Esther, Daniel, Judith, Tobit, Josephus's account of Alexander's visit to Jerusalem and of the Tobiads, Artapanus, and Joseph and Aseneth, she demonstrates that the use of historical fiction in these texts does not constitute a uniform genre. Instead it cuts across all boundaries of language, provenance, genre, and even purpose. Johnson argues that each author uses historical fiction to construct a particular model of Hellenistic Jewish identity through the reinvention of the past. The models of identity differ, but all seek to explore relations between Jews and the wider non-Jewish world. The author goes on to present a focal in-depth analysis of one text, Third Maccabees. Maintaining that this is a late Hellenistic, not a Roman, work Johnson traces important themes in Third Maccabees within a broader literary context. She evaluates the evidence for the authorship, audience, and purpose of the work and analyzes the historicity of the persecution described in the narrative. Illustrating how the author reinvents history in order to construct his own model for life in the diaspora, Johnson weighs the attitudes and stances, from defiance to assimilation, of this crucial period.
Content:
Intro -- CONTENTS -- PREFACE -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- PART I. HISTORICAL FICTIONS AND HELLENISTIC JEWISH IDENTITY -- 1. JEWS AT COURT -- 2. JOSEPHUS -- 3. PATRIARCHAL FICTIONS -- PART II. THIRD MACCABEES: A CASE STUDY -- 4. DATE, LITERARY CONTEXT, AUTHORSHIP, AND AUDIENCE -- 5. HISTORICITY AND HISTORICAL AMBIVALENCE -- CONCLUSION -- BIBLIOGRAPHY -- INDEX -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- V -- W -- X -- Y -- Z.
Note:
Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources
Additional Edition:
ISBN 9780520233072
Additional Edition:
Erscheint auch als Druck-Ausgabe ISBN 9780520233072
Additional Edition:
Print version Historical Fictions and Hellenistic Jewish Identity : Third Maccabees in Its Cultural Context
Language:
English
URL:
https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kxp/detail.action?docID=227298
URL:
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