Peter Kirby

I started thinking about this recently. Herodotus tells us a lot about the world in which the Hebrews would have lived, but does he actually refer to them?

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Peter Kirby

Ben C Smith

Herodotus may be referring to the Jews when he mentions the Syrians of Palestine who learned the practice of circumcision from the Egyptians (Histories 2.104). I do not know whether he elsewhere mentions them more explicitly than that.

Ben.

neilgodfrey

Not really. He knows nothing of any past glories their literature speaks of. The peoples of Palestine appear to be nothing more than another Persian colony with no past history worth the mention. This is entirely consistent with the archaeological evidence we have of the area. It is also consistent with the view that Judah began its life as a new colony from the Persian era onwards, its dominant socio-economic class having been deported into the area about a century or so before Herodotus. And of special interest for "us" is that this is also consistent wth the argument that the biblical literature was still in its formative stages at this time, and was not to see its final form and cultural status till the time of the Maccabees or thereafter. (Some even argue that the Primary History of Israel -- Genesis to 2 Kings -- is modelled on the Histories of Herodotus.)

Neil Godfrey

http://vridar.wordpress.com

Peter Kirby

Astonishing. So, when do the minimalists make their movie? :grin:

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Peter Kirby

Ben C Smith

I can just see it, all Cecil B. DeMille style. 3-2-1, so-and-so presents The Real History of Ancient Israel, the music builds to a crescendo, and bam. The screen goes black for an hour and a half. Cut (eventually) to a few scattered pottery fragments on a tell. End credits.

Ben.

neilgodfrey

Yup. That has been the power of the biblical myth of Israel, with the original inhabitants being a non-people, god-ordained for extermination, the epitome of all that is likely to destroy the people of god if ever recognized as anything but the pagan sinner underclass. If it ain't biblical Israel in the land then the land is in tohu and bohu, waste and desolate, by definition.

Neil Godfrey

http://vridar.wordpress.com

neilgodfrey

why not use this thread as an excuse to get started on preparing a few notes on a book i read ages ago, "The Origin of the History of Israel: Herodotus's Histories as Blueprint for the First Books of the Bible" by Jan-Wim Wesselius (2002). I still have questions about the thesis, so am not presenting this as "how it IS", but just for interest's sake, my own as much as anyone else's.

One interesting comparison made is an examination of how Virgil has based his Aeneid not on a one-to-one correspondence of Homer but on a deep study of the structure of Homer's Odyssey. He plays with and rearranges Homer as he emulates the Homeric hero, with his Aeneas surpassing Odysseus at key points (e.g. in the place where Odysseus is shipwrecked Aeneas, at the same place, manages to keep his ship afloat, etc.) Many of us are familiar with this discussion from MacDonald's studies on Mark et al. (I understand his studies have gained little traction in circles here but I'm not getting into that one here.) Similarly, while the following notes may be a mistake in some way (they do not present the evidence or arguments for the comparisons) -- they are based on an apparent understanding and playing with the structure of the Histories -- there is not a simpe a-b-c//a1-b1=c1 correspondence.

Book 1 of Herodotus opens with mythical and legendary origins of the history that is to follow (Paris, Priam, stories of Croesus and miracles surrounding Cyrus...); Genesis opens with the more mythical and legendary stories of Israel (giants, Adam, god and angels popping down to earth to interact with humans...). There do appear to be interesting syzygies and mirrorings in some of the genealogies and their key markers (Cyarxares/Abraham; Astyages/Isaac; Cyrus/Joseph, Xerxes/Moses among others).

Books 2-6 of Histories discuss the "History"; while Books 7-9 (Judges-Samuel-Kings) of cover the "history" of Israel.

Books 7-9 of Histories cover the "Great Campaign" of Xerxes across the sea and on to conquer Greece; Books 2-6 of Primary History (Exodus-Joshua) cover a "Great Campaign" of Israel from exodus to the promised land.

Book 2 of Histories seems an odd digression from the historical narrative as the author embarks on a detailed ethnographic discussion of Egypt; compare the legal and ritual digressions from the narrative in the Primary History.

And just as Herodotus will offer 2 contradictory versions of events side by side without expressing preference for either, so the Primary History also is known to present contradictory versions side by side (albeit without any narrative voice comment at all).

And there's also the overall theme, that of the power of the divinities to direct the affairs of mankind, and the tragedy of the human players who so often fall into hubris or rebellion; and the uncertain conclusions leaving it up the readers to wonder "which way will we choose to go from here?"

There's also lots of other little (and some bigger) interesting correspondences (e.g. the miracles at Parnassus and Sinai, and a link to several of these in the OT category on my blog -- linked below) but I have also compiled a vast correspondence of literary tropes between the Hellenistic Argonautica and both the OT and NT gospels that I hope to show one day soonish too.

Biblical studies are much more interesting in my view when studied within the broader context of their contemporaneous literary world.

But as I said at the beginning, I have not presented any argument here: doing nothing more than tossing out some of the areas I found of interest. That 4 letter word "minimalist" has already appeared -- most "mnml"-ists that I have read, admittedly some years ago now, would, I think, dispute Wesselius's conclusions. The discussion and debate are still in very early days only.


Neil Godfrey

http://vridar.wordpress.com