leveled at the Judean nation from a variety of sources. In the first place, he
gathers and critiques three related “Egyptian” accounts of the expulsion
from Egypt of a diseased/polluted people, variously connected with
Judean origins. Josephus first cites and refutes Manetho’s legend of a pol-
luted mass of Egyptians, banished to Avaris, but aided by invading
“Solymites” in their sacrilegious ravaging of Egypt (1.227-87); his extended
critique (1.252-87) is a model of ancient literary criticism. He then com-
pares and contrasts the parallel accounts in Chaeremon (1.288-303) and
Lysimachus (1.304-20), pointing out inconsistencies or absurdities in (his
abbreviated versions of ) their stories.
Book 2 then raises the vitriolic tone of the treatise with an extended
discussion of hostile comments made about Judeans by the Alexandrian
scholar, Apion (2.1-144). Apion had made mischievous comments on
Judean origins that Josephus briefly refutes (2.8-32), but he had also given
an extended account of Judean history in Egypt from Alexander onward,
painting the Judeans as a rebellious element in the population, hostile both
to the Ptolemies and to the Romans. Josephus provides a lengthy riposte to
this version of history (2.33-78), with particular focus on relations with
Romans, since Apion, a prominent figure during and after the Alexandrian
riots of 38c.e., had clearly cast aspersions on the loyalty and legal/political
claims of Alexandrian Jews. A third part of Josephus’s response (2.79-114)
answers Apion’s slurs on Judean cult and culture — that Judeans wor-
shipped in their temple the head of an ass; that they conducted an annual
ritual slaughter of a Greek, with a cannibalistic feast and an oath of hostility
against Greeks; that their miserable history showed their insignificance and
religious impiety; and that their food laws and practice of circumcision
proved their “barbarian” character. Josephus’s rhetoric here rises to its
greatest heights in counter-invective, climaxing in a passage gloating over
Apion’s miserable death (2.141-44). Throughout he makes great play on
Apion’s “Egyptian” ethnicity, exploiting Greek and Roman stereotypes
about that supposedly unstable people with their absurd animal cults.
The refutation of slanders continues through the rest of book 2, but in
a different mode (2.145-286, considered by some a separate and third part
of the treatise). Starting from the attacks on Judean culture by Apollonius
Molon, Josephus provides a positive description of Moses’s legislation and
the structure of his constitution (2.151-89), emphasizing the unity of word
and action, and the superior understanding of the nature, rule, and provi-
dence of God (“theocracy”) offered by Moses. He then gives a summary of
select laws (2.190-218), focusing on the Temple, on sexual/family laws, and310steve mason, james s. mclaren, and john m. g. barclayEERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
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