Semites, Iranians, Greeks and Romans: Studies in Their Interactions (review)

Jonathan Goldstein is best known among scholars of the Bible, early Judaism and nascent Christianity for his books on 1 and 2 Maccabees in the Anchor Bible series. In this volume of collected essays and reviews he provides a panorama of his other writings and research over a period of 23 years, ranging from 1966 to 1988. The eleven articles reveal the author's wide range of interests and expertise, and are divided into two main sections.

Part One is aptly entitled "Intercultural Borrowing," and contains five essays, two of which deal with intertestamental history. "Jewish Acceptance and Rejection of Hellenism" proposes that the Jews of Palestine were initially not hostile to Hellenism, but came to reject many of its traits as a result of their experiences in the "critical period" (i.e., the oppressive rule of Antiochus IV). In "Tales of the Tobiads," Goldstein examines the problems and apparent contradictions in Josephus' account of Joseph the Tobiad and his son Hyrcanus in Book xii of the Antiquities. In the remaining three essays of this section, the town of Dura-Europos on the Euphrates features prominently. "The Central Composition of the West Wall of the Synagogue of Dura-Europos" deals with the synagogue's religious, historical and architectural significance, while "The Syriac Bill of Sale from Dura-Europos" examines P. Dura 28, one of the oldest Syriac papyri (243 CE). Goldstein furnishes an annotated transliteration and translation of the text, a brief synopsis of its grammar and orthography, and a detailed commentary. In "Review of Goodenough," the author evaluates vols. IX-XII of Erwin R. Goodenough's renowned Jewish Symbols in the Greco-Roman Period, making frequent reference to the Dura synagogue. According to Goldstein, Goodenough's "solid achievement" in the twelve volumes of Jewish Symbols was his comprehensive collection of a vast body of figured remains, which can be ascribed only to Jews, and his demonstration that these contain a limited number of motifs, some from Jewish sources and other clearly pagan in origin.

Part Two, "Religious Resistance to Foreign Rule," contains the remaining six essays, one of which is "Uruk Prophecy," where Goldstein deals with a fragmentary tablet discovered at Uruk in 1969. This text belongs to a genre of Babylonian literature for which he proposes the term "present-future prophecy," in preference to "Akkadian prophecy" (A. K. Grayson & W. G. Lambert) or "Akkadian apocalypse" (W. W. Hallo). Specific intertestamental books are the subject of three more essays, one of which is self-explanatory: "The Testament of Moses: Its Content, Its Origin, and Its Attestation in Josephus." In "The Date of the Book of Jubilees," the author argues that Jubilees was most probably written between 169 and 167 BCE. This contrasts with the dates proposed by R. H. Cares (late in the reign of John Hyrcanus I [134-104 BCE]) and James VanderKam (between 161 [pace Goldstein] and 140 BCE). In the "Apocryphal Book of Baruch," Goldstein concludes that Baruch was translated into Greek from a Hebrew original which was composed by a single author in 163 BCE, during the reign of Antiochus V.

The remaining two items focus on the books of Maccabees with which the author is so familiar. In his "Review of Doran's Temple Propaganda," Goldstein examines Robert Doran's proposals regarding the purpose and character of 2 Maccabees. He agrees with several theses: for instance, that the Abridged History (2 Macc 3:1-15:39) should be viewed in the wider context of ancient Greek historiography, and fits the pattern of ancient tales depicting how a god miraculously defends his temple and his chosen territory. However, Goldstein is more critical of other aspects of Doran's book: for example, his treatment of the prefixed letters in 2 Maccabees ( 1:1-10a and 1:10b-2:18). The final essay in the collection is entitled "How the Authors in I and II Maccabees Treated the 'Messianic' Promises." In response to the series of disasters...