The Jewish Annotated New Testament (146 page)

Evidence from non-rabbinic environments is more difficult to construe. Outsiders such as Epictetus (midfirst to mid-second century CE) (Arrian,
Dissertations of Epictetus
2.19–21 [early- to mid-second century CE]) believed that proselytes became
Ioudaioi
. Certain of the Dead Sea Scrolls, however (e.g., 4QFlor; 11QSTemple), indicate that proselytes were distinguished from Israelites and were either forbidden to enter the Temple or allowed to pass only as far as the outer court. This evidence from Qumran, alongside an inscription from the Temple Mount barring entrance to the “foreign born” and a dispute between Simon and Agrippa reported by Josephus (
Ant
. 19.332–34), has led some to suppose that certain priestly circles believed native
Ioudaioi
should be distinguished from proselytes when it came to participation in sacrificial worship. Philo calls for legal equality for proselytes and praises their resolve, but he never says they become
Ioudaioi
(e.g.,
Life of Moses
1.147;
Virtues
102–3). Josephus, on the other hand, does use the term
Ioudaios
when reporting the conversion of Queen Helena of Adiabene (
Ant
. 20.2–4), and the book of Judith says that Achior the Ammonite “joined the house of Israel” (Jdt 14.10). Thus, whether a proselyte was considered a full-fledged
Ioudaios
seems to have depended on the proselyte in question and the perspective of the observer.

The rise in the importance of conversion may be significant because it could point to a transformation in the meaning of the term
Ioudaios
, which in turn explains its traditional translation into English. Since conversion is understood to be a
religious
act, in which a change in belief prompts modifications in lifestyle, there must have arisen at least by the second century BCE a distinct cultural and religious aspect to the word
Ioudaios
. Many correlate this development to a parallel shift in the Greek term
Hellēn
, “Hellene,” which in the centuries after Alexander came to signify not only a resident or descendant from Greece, but also anyone committed to Greek culture, thus
Hellenismos
or “Hellenism.”
Ioudaios
likewise came to describe anyone devoted to the beliefs and practices of the
Ioudaioi: Ioudaïsmos
or “Judaism.” Since the English word “Jew” captures this religious aspect better than “Judean” does, translators since the emergence of modern English in the sixteenth century have preferred it as a rendering of
Ioudaios
whenever the religious connotation is primary, reserving “Judean” only for those cases in which context demands specific emphasis on the ethno-geographic sense. When an author refers only to the
Ioudaioi
inhabiting Judea, for example, a translator would choose “Judean” instead of “Jew” (e.g.,
Ant
. 11.173).

In recent years, some scholars have argued that translating
Ioudaios
with two terms—“Jew” for the religious connotation and “Judean” for the ethno-geographic one—is anachronistic. Only after the development of Christianity, these scholars maintain, did it become viable to speak of religion or religious identity as a discrete realm of human experience, separable from ethnicity or place of origin. What we understand to be “religion”— belief in God(s), customs associated with the worship of that God, and so on—was thought by the ancients to be integral to one’s ethno-geographic affiliation. The term
Ioudaios
designated a person who was from or whose ancestors were from Judea, and for that reason worshiped the God of Judea. It was thoroughly an ethno-geographic term and thus, according to this scholarly view, should always be translated “Judean.” Likewise,
Ioudaïsmos
should not be rendered as “Judaism,” which conveys anachronistically the notion of a discrete religion, but rather as “Judeanism,” “Judeanness,” “Judean ways,” or some other expression that captures the basic connection of the term to the land of Judea and its people. Conversion, on this view, was not a change in religion as we might understand it, but the adoption of beliefs, laws, and customs of another
ethnos
. Proselytes did not accept “Judaism,” a religion, but rather the conventions of the people inhabiting Judea. Only in the wake of the rabbis is it possible to speak of
Ioudaioi
with the religious terms “Jew” and “Judaism,” although it should be noted that rabbinic literature employs the Hebrew and Aramaic equivalents of “Jew” and “Judaism” sparingly, preferring the ancient self-designation “Israel.”

Other scholars oppose the change in translation, insisting that
Ioudaios
indeed possesses a uniquely religious connotation in antiquity, which at times prevails over its ethno-geographic counterpart. They point to Acts 2, for example, which states that the
Ioudaioi
gathered in Jerusalem at Pentecost derive from “every nation (Gk
ethnos
) under heaven,” and subsequently identifies them with explicit ethno-geographic labels: Parthian, Elamite, Cretan, Arab, and so on. This makes
Ioudaios
look more like a religious label, “Jew” rather than “Judean,” in the modern sense. So, too, when Josephus refers to a certain Atomos as “a
Ioudaios
, but a Cyprian by birth” (
Ant
. 20.142), the former sounds like the designation of a religious identity, the latter his ethnicity or place of origin.

The issue of how to translate
Ioudaios
is not entirely academic. It holds ramifications for contemporary Jewish identity and Jewish-Christian relations as well. Translators of the term, particularly in New Testament texts, often justify their choice with moral as well as intellectual arguments. Some advocates for “Judean” claim that applying the term “Jew” to the
Ioudaioi
of antiquity is incorrect not only because it anachronistically attributes to them a uniquely religious identity, but also because it might lead to anti-Jewish prejudice: readers may associate today’s Jews with the
Ioudaioi
of the New Testament, who are described as being “from … the devil” (Jn 8.44) or of having “killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets” (1 Thess 2.15). The word “Judean” disassociates contemporary Jews from such harsh rebukes in the New Testament and makes it more difficult for anti-Judaism to find a scriptural foothold.

Those who prefer “Jew” say just the opposite. Purging “Jews” from New Testament texts by replacing them with “Judeans,” even if well intentioned, too eerily resembles the efforts of outspoken anti-Semites, both past and present, who have tried to erase the Jewish origins of Jesus and Christianity. Much European scholarship in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries held that since Jesus was from Galilee, rather than Judea, he was not a Jew but a Galilean. This trend climaxed in Nazi propaganda, which depicted Jesus as a racial Aryan who opposed Judaism vigorously. Jesus and Christianity were thus entirely free of Jewish taint.

The removal of the word “Jews” from ancient texts also undermines the Jews’ own sense of continuity. Jews traditionally do not trace their roots only as far as the rabbinic period, as if this were the time when they ceased being ethno-geographic Judeans and became religious Jews. Rather, they understand themselves to be the latest link in an unbroken chain of tradition originating in the age of the Tanakh; and, with several obvious exceptions, such as Temple sacrifice and pilgrimage to Jerusalem for Passover, Shavuot (Weeks/Pentecost), and Sukkot (Booths), the characteristic practices of ancient
Ioudaioi
are still those kept by observant Jews today: Sabbath, circumcision, festivals, dietary laws, and so on. By the first century CE one could add to that list the veneration of the Torah, participation in synagogues, and the like. To suggest by way of terminology that contemporary Jews differ essentially from ancient Judeans disregards these crucial similarities. Moreover, even today the term “Jew” is not bereft of ethno-geographic content. Many Jews pray regularly for a return to the land of Israel and/or the rebuilding of the Temple, pray facing Jerusalem, send their children there on “Birthright” trips, and conclude the Passover Seder with the proclamation, “Next year in Jerusalem.” They also reckon their identity according to birth and routinely speak of “peoplehood.” In this respect, “Jew” might capture the connection between the ancient
Ioudaios
and his or her ancestral homeland just as well as “Judean.”

In the end, then, it is prudent to be circumspect when reading in translation any ancient Greek text that mentions “Jews” or “Judeans.” Underlying both terms is the Greek
Ioudaios
, and the translator’s preference invariably reflects certain aims and assumptions.

JEWISH MOVEMENTS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT PERIOD

Daniel R. Schwartz

The development of Judaism from the fourth century BCE through the period covered by the New Testament (the first and second centuries CE) is a complex story that is still not fully understood. When early Judaism emerges from the fourth and third centuries BCE, which are hardly documented, into the second, the sources—now much more abundant—frequently refer to groups of Jews that bear distinct names and seem, therefore, to have had their own identities. Such groups as the
Asidaioi
(“pious people, religious ones”) mentioned in 1 Macc 7.13 and 2 Macc 14.6, and the three schools of thought or “philosophies” (Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes) that Josephus (
Ant
. 13.171) says existed around the middle of the second century BCE, are sometimes termed “sects” by modern scholars, since none of the groups represents a majority or near-majority of Jews living at the time.

More evidence about these groups was supplied by the discovery, beginning in 1947, of a sectarian settlement and scrolls at Qumran, near the Dead Sea. These testify to a separatist group that called itself “the
Ya
ḥ
ad
” (“togetherness”) and referred to rival groups by such biblical sobriquets as “Ephraim,” “Manasseh,” and “Seekers of Smooth Things” (cf. Isa 30.10). Probably those names refer to the Sadducees and the Pharisees, condemning the former as if they were comparable to the northerners (Ephraim, Manasseh) who rebelled from the Davidic kingdom and set up a rival cult (1 Kings 12.25–33), and condemning the latter as if they held overly lenient and self-serving positions on Jewish law. The latter identification is especially attractive on the assumption that the denunciation of the “Seekers of Smooth Things” [
doreshei
ḥ
alaqot
] was meant to mock a Pharisaic self-understanding as
doreshei halakhot
, “those who seek [to follow or determine]
halakhot
(religious laws).” The Qumran
Ya
ḥ
ad
itself is apparently to be identified as those by Josephus and others called Essenes. Pliny, a Roman scholar of the first century, refers to an Essene settlement near the Dead Sea, thus offering strong support for that identification, although some controversy about it still persists.

The New Testament books do not mention the Essenes, but the Gospels and Acts refer to Pharisees and Sadducees and Paul, in one of his epistles (Phil 3.5), claims that he himself was a Pharisee. Moreover, the New Testament books additionally testify to the circles that formed around John the Baptist and Jesus, as well as some others (e.g., Acts 5.36–37; see “Messianic Movements,” p.
530
), and they also supply some references to yet another type of group—anti-Roman rebels known as Sicarii (Acts 21.38; see also 5.37). That Latin name means “dagger-men” and thus designates them as terrorists, reflecting a Roman point of view; Josephus (
Ant
. 18.9), who denounces the Sicarii for their violence and role in bringing about the final rebellion and destruction of the Temple, nonetheless terms them a “fourth philosophy” alongside his main trio of Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes.

The various testimonies to these groups, to which we may add the later evidence of rabbinic literature (see “Messianic Movements,” p.
530
), are sporadic and often tantalizingly brief or ambiguous. Moreover, even when they do furnish seemingly useful information it may reflect the interests and views of the ancient writers at least as much as those of the groups described. Thus, when speaking about the Pharisees and Sadducees, Luke focuses on their respective belief and disbelief concerning resurrection (Lk 20.27–40; Acts 23.6–8). This corresponds so well to the interests of the Christian historian that we may wonder how central that issue was for those two sects themselves, which also differed on many other more practical and immediate issues. Similarly, we may suspect that Josephus skewed his account of the Essenes to encourage Roman readers to view them with admiration as disciplinarians in their own image; his explanations that the Essenes were celibate because they thought women could not be faithful (
J.W
. 2.121), or because they thought marriage only led to quarrels (
Ant
. 18.21), may have more to do with his own experiences with women, which included two divorces (
Life
415, 426), than with the Essenes’ own considerations. In any case, most of our sources were written by outsiders and, even apart from their biases, they may not have been well informed about other groups. The following is an attempt, despite these difficulties, to summarize what we know about these sects and to suggest that we understand them all as responding to the fundamental issue that all Jews had to address in the Hellenistic and Roman periods: Could, and should, being Jewish remain natural, a product of one’s birth—something most appropriate to life in Judea? Or was it, rather, to be something undertaken deliberately—an orientation more appropriate to a diaspora situation?