From the Maccabees to the Mishnah

by Shaye J.D. Cohen

Timeline

The relationship of Jews and Judaism to gentiles and gentile culture is a complex topic that consists of three distinct but interrelated themes: political (to what extent should the Jews submit to foreign domination?), cultural (to what extent should the Jews absorb gentile ideas and practices?), and social (to what extent should Jews mingle and interact with gentiles?).

The fall of Jerusalem and the triumph of Babylonia are the consequence not of sin and punishment but of immutable fate.

Let them support their conquerors and pray for the welfare of the countries in which they live (Jer. 29:5–7).

The religious persecution that accompanied this forced “hellenization” (on this term, see below) provoked Judah the Maccabee and his followers to rebel against the state. This was the Jews’ first departure from the Jeremianic political tradition, and it was prompted by the state’s first departure from a policy of religious toleration.

He was no longer fighting just for religious liberty, but also for political independence.

the state and dynasty that the Maccabees created never succeeded in garnering the support of all the Jews.

the war party of the rebellion against Epiphanes was far more united than the war party of the rebellion against Nero.

The rebellion of the Maccabees prevented Judaism from becoming just another local variation of Syrian Hellenism and thereby saved it from extinction. The war of 66–74 removed the institutional foundations of Judaism, brought tremendous destruction on the land of Israel and its inhabitants, and endangered the status of the Jews throughout the Roman Empire; it threatened the very survival of Judaism.

These Jews felt that the Romans had done nothing to justify a departure from the Jeremianic political tradition. Fighting against the Romans was foolish at best and sinful at worst.

the basic political stance of the Jews of both the land of Israel and the Diaspora was not rebellion but accommodation.

From biblical until modern times, Jews have seen themselves, and have been seen by others, as a distinct group.

one of the characteristic themes of Jewish thought throughout the ages is this sense of contrast between “us” and “them,”

The Greeks drew a similar distinction between “Hellenes,” the bearers of enlightened culture, and “barbarians,”

for all its vaunted intolerance, Judaism was open to converts and was an active participant in the cultural and social life of antiquity.

In contrast, the Jews of Judea lived in the mother country, spoke Hebrew and Aramaic, wrote literature in those languages, and struggled to observe their religion in all its rigor and keep it pure from foreign contagion.

not law-observant)

Where did the idea ever arise that Paul was not law observant? Certainly not from the book of Acts!

In this conception, “Judaism” and “Hellenism” are not antonyms, since by definition Judaism was part of Hellenism and Hellenism was part of Judaism.

It is a mistake to imagine that the land of Judea preserved a “pure” form of Judaism and that the Diaspora was the home of adulterated or diluted forms of Judaism.

The basic problem that confronted all the Jews of antiquity was how to preserve Jewish identity while living within Hellenistic culture.

King Solomon built the temple of God with the aid of Phoenician architects and on the standard plan of Syrian temples (1 Kgs. 5–7). The psalmist modeled some of his poems on Canaanite hymns to Baal (Ps. 29) and Egyptian hymns to Aton (Ps. 104). The author of Proverbs drew upon the wisdom of Amenemope (Prov. 22:17–23:11).

In the Second Temple period, the integration of the Jews in the Hellenistic world manifested itself in three areas: material culture, language, and philosophy and way of life.

The elders no longer sat at the gate as in preexilic times, but in the agora, or central plaza, of the city, an architectural feature unknown to the Hebrew Bible.

Hebrew was virtually unknown to Egyptian Jewry.

As far as we know, Greek was the exclusive language of literary expression for Diaspora Jewry.

The Maccabees arranged for the translation of 1 Maccabees from Hebrew into Greek (this translation survives; the Hebrew original has completely disappeared).

demonstrating the existence in Judea of a group of Jews who needed a Greek translation of the Bible,

As far as we know, however, Hebrew remained the primary language of literary expression.

The Qumran scrolls demonstrate that Hebrew was the original language of most of the works written in Judea between the period of the Maccabees and the destruction of the temple in 70 CE.

The same pattern continued into rabbinic times. The Mishnah and ancillary works were all written in Hebrew. To what extent Hebrew was a spoken language in Judea in Second Temple and rabbinic times remains a disputed q...

(Dan. 2–7, Tobit, and Enoch were written in Aramaic)

By the first century BCE, it was used for the translation and paraphrase of Scripture.

But usually the term “hellenization” involves more than just pots, pans, and language. It also involves a way of thought and a way of life.

in a society that revered philosophy they could not accept revelation,

“May the beauty of Japheth [= the Greeks] dwell in the tents of Shem [= the Jews].”

Adopting a page from Greek political theory, Judah the Maccabee had the people declare by acclamation that Hanukkah was to be celebrated annually in commemoration of the great victory over Epiphanes

How far could Judaism go in absorbing foreign ways and ideas before it was untrue to itself and lost its identity?

Hellenization was not to be confused with assimilation.

they refused to participate in practically all the communal events of gentile society.

Jews alone of all the peoples of antiquity were monotheists who believed in a jealous God.

“anti-Semitism” did not exist in antiquity. This term was coined in 1879 by a German writer who wished to bestow “scientific” respectability on the hatred of Jews by arguing that Jews and Germans belonged to different species of humanity (“races”).

they argued that climate, soil, and water determine both the physical and moral characteristics of nations.

When they accused the Jews of atheism, they were objecting to the fact that the Jews refused to worship the gods of the gentiles.

In sum, anti-Semitism did not exist in antiquity, but anti-Judaism did.

It was the age of philo-Judaism (love of Judaism) as well as anti-Judaism, of conversion to Judaism as well as hatred of Judaism.

In preexilic times, conversion to Judaism did not yet exist because birth is immutable.

The tribal structure was gone; the Jews who returned from Babylon to Judea were organized as clans, not tribes. Their ritual classification was “priest, Levite, and Israelite,” the classification that has endured in traditional Judaism to this day.

The Jews began to redefine themselves as a culture, a way of life, a religion, and it was Judaism, not the religion of preexilic Israel, that prohibited intermarriage but permitted conversion.

method for the admixture of gentiles. Ezra was still unfamiliar with the notion of “conversion,” but some of his contemporaries were discussing the idea.

One prophet declared that the resident aliens “will join them [the Israelites] and attach themselves to the house of Jacob” (Isa. 14:1); another even predicted that some gentiles would become priests and Levites (Isa. 66:21)!