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  • The Specter of the Jews: Emperor Julian and the Rhetoric of Ethnicity in Syrian Antioch by Ari Finkelstein
  • Michael Hanaghan
Ari Finkelstein The Specter of the Jews: Emperor Julian and the Rhetoric of Ethnicity in Syrian Antioch Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2018 Pp. xvii + 251. $95.00.

On page 2, Finkelstein asks "[W]hy, prior to February 363 … had [Julian] never used the term Ioudaios in any of his writings, and then suddenly, in the space of three months, Jews appear in five works and are present in at least an additional two letters no longer extent?" The political historian may well answer that prior to 363 the Jews were not relevant to Julian until he realized that he could pit their religion against Christianity. In the wake of Finkelstein's argument that Judaic thought influenced Julian's unique form of paganism, such an answer falls a little flatter, but one need not pick between a political and religious reading of Julian's use of Judaism. Indeed, on more than one occasion, Finkelstein has a foot in both camps, and his work is all the stronger for this synthesis. [End Page 669]

The Specter of the Jews has seven chapters in addition to an introduction and conclusion. The first two provide important context for the five that follow by outlining Julian's program of Hellenization and the topographical, cultural, intellectual, and religious milieu of Antioch in the early 360s, where Julian centered this program. The next four examine Julian's approach to the Jews' ethnography, sacrifice, priesthood, and the position of the Jewish God in Julian's pantheon. The seventh and the concluding chapters return their focus to Antioch, respectively examining how Julian tried to control the use of space in the city along religious grounds and offering a view of Antioch after Julian.

Overall the book makes a clear and largely convincing argument which scholars who work on Julianic thought and the role of the Jews and Judaism in the later Roman Empire will need to take into account. Finkelstein should be commended for handling a wide range of often complex material with a deft touch. The conclusions to each chapter are lucid and succinct, and function well to bring together the argument of each chapter and prepare the reader for those that follow. The rest of this review will focus on criticisms, but none of these are sufficient, on their own or in sum, to undermine the overall assessment offered above.

Van Nuffelen has clearly shown that Julian's Letter to Arsacius contained significant forgeries. Even though Finkelstein acknowledges as much (94), he still attempts to claim that the forged letter reflects an authentic letter, and that the latter can be accessed by reading the former. This is highly problematic, not least because elements of the letter, which cannot be definitively proven to have been forged, cannot be shown to be otherwise, and so, given the many forgeries in that letter, they must be put aside.

At numerous points Finkelstein claims that "no Christian had ever commented on Deuteronomy 18.3" prior to Julian's reign (e.g., 26). In this respect Origen's thirty-seventh homily on Luke and ninth homily on Exodus, both preserved in Rufinus's Latin translation, deserve to be mentioned even if neither is deemed to be a likely source for Julian's exegesis of that line.

Finkelstein repeatedly claims that Julian aimed his Contra Galileos "at Hellenes as much as at Christians," but the evidence for this is insufficient to support this claim. At times Finkelstein is dismissive towards Ammianus, or otherwise misinterprets the point of Ammianus's claims. For example, at page 43 Finkelstein discusses the surprise that Ammianus expresses at 22.12.7 that all and sundry were allowed to interpret the entrails of one of Julian's sacrifices. This does not stem from the legality of the practice, but from Julian's preparedness to listen to all manner of interpretations, even from those untrained in the practice of divination. The misplacement of Ammianus's emphasis is not helped by Finkelstein's lack of familiarity with scholarship on Ammianus, especially the Brill commentary series, which is...

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