218 CHAPTER EIGHTat least partly internalized the Deuteronomic insistence on the uniqueness of
the temple of Jerusalem.
Not all the Jewish residents of Hellenistic Egypt had done so, however.
Apart fro mthose who offered sacrifices at the Oniad te mple in Heliopolis
(who may have argued that their activities were not a violation of the Torah
butmerelyanemergencymeasure,necessitatedbythedefilementoftheJeru-
salem temple by Antiochus IV and/or the Hasmoneans), some self-described
Jews made offerings to “the (anonymous Jewish? temple’s?) god” at a temple
of Pan.^8 How numerous such Jews were, and how widespread theproseuche ́
was, it is impossible to know.
Theotherimplicationofthetermisthatatsomeearlyperiodinthehistory
of the institution in Egypt, prayer and not Torah study or reading—or for that
matterperiodicassemblyforbasicallysecularpurposes—wastheactivitymost
closely associated with it.^9 Only in the first century can we be certain that
Torah reading became a regular activity in at least some prayer houses or
synagogues, since it is mentioned by Philo, Josephus inAgainst Apion,in
the Acts of the Apostles, and in a dedicatory inscription fro ma first-century
synagogue in Jerusale m(see below).^10
The construction of the Hellenistic Egyptian prayer houses was usually a
group project, so the inscriptions claim. Generally, they read something like,
“The Ioudaioi in Village X made thisproseuche ́for the Most High God on
behalf of King Y and Queen Z.” A few commemorate gifts by individuals. In
(^8) Horbury-Noy, nos. 121–24. In Onias’s letter to the king and queen, quoted by Josephus, the
priest expresses his disapproval of the multiplicity of “temples” built by the Egyptian Jews and
claims that his temple will replace them (Ant13.64–68). The argument sounds Deuteronomic
butcontinuesbyobserving thatthemultiplicityoftemplesiswrong becauseitdisunitestheJews.
Inanycase,thetemplesarepresumablyprayerhouses,andOnias’sletteraforgery;seeG.Bohak,
“Joseph and Aseneth’ and the Jewish Temple in Heliopolis,” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton, 1994), pp.
73; 120–24.
(^9) ContrastthepuzzlingcommentsofJ.Me ́le`zeModrzejewski,The Jews of Egypt(Philadelphia:
JewishPublicationSociety,1995),pp.95–96,basedonLevine,“SecondTempleSynagogue.”See
alsoLevine,“FromCommunityCenterto‘Lesser Sanctuary’:TheFurnishingsandInteriorofthe
Ancient Synagogue,”Cathedra60 (1991): 36–84 (cf.Ancient Synagogue, pp. 124–59, 291–356):
thetitlesummarizestheargument.Onthesignificanceofthetermproseuche,andtheimportance
of prayer as opposed to Torah reading, see Hengel, “Proseuche und Synagoge,” p. 162.
(^10) In fact, prayer is scarcely mentioned in sources of the first century (except in the Dead Sea
Scrolls and in Pseudo-Philo,Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum11.8), which has led some scholars
to conclude that it did not occur in the synagogues then. This silence is intriguing, but I a mnot
sureitsimplicationscanbepressed.Forrecentdiscussionsofthisissue,seeR.Langer,“Revisiting
EarlyRabbinicLiturgy:TheRecentContributionsof EzraFleischer”,Prooftexts19(1999):179–
94;P.vanderHorst,“WastheSynagogueaPlaceofSabbathWorshipbefore70CE?”inS.Fine,
ed.,Jews, Christians, and Polytheists in the Ancient Synagogue: Cultural Interaction during the
Greco-Roman Period(London:Routledge,1999),pp.18–43.VanderHorstalsoofferscompelling
criticis mof H. C. Kee’s view that there were no synagogues in Palestine before 70, and of H.
McKay’s view that Jews did not conduct communal worship on the Sabbath before 200C.E.;
Levine,Ancient Synagogue,pp. 124–59,deemphasizesprayerbutdoesnot denythatitoccurred.