A Rake’s Progress: William Whiston Reads Josephus

William Whiston’s translation of The Genuine Works of Flavius Josephus (1737) became the most popular edition of Josephus’s works in the English-speaking world—remaining so for well over two hundred and fifty years, with more than three hundred editions printed. Despite its importance, however, Whiston’s biographers accorded scant attention to it—perhaps because research into the early modern reception of Josephus had scarcely begun. My article seeks to assess the protracted and eccentric manner by which Whiston became Josephus’s champion, and how his idiosyncratic reading of the Jewish historian served Whiston’s mission to restore “primitive Christianity” to its former glory.