Jews among Greeks and Romans
Miriam Pucci Ben Zeev
The relations of Jews with Greeks and Romans during the Second Temple
period were complex. On the one hand, a variety of source materials in-
cluding inscriptions, papyri, and formal documents quoted by Josephus
show that Jews were thoroughly integrated into the economic, social, and
political life of Hellenistic cities, that they embraced several aspects of
Greco-Roman culture, that they enjoyed certain rights and privileges per-
taining to the practice of their ancestral customs and laws, and that they
even attracted the admiration of non-Jewish sympathizers, adherents, and
converts. On the other hand, these same sources indicate that Jews fre-
quently encountered competition, resentment, and even overt hostility
from their non-Jewish neighbors and at times ran afoul of their Greek and
Roman overlords. They also suggest that Jewish rights were neither perma-
nent nor inherently stable. Greek and Roman rulers could rescind those
rights or simply choose not to enforce them. When the government did in-
tervene in support of the Jews, oftentimes little was done to solve the un-
derlying problems. On a few occasions, direct intervention actually exacer-
bated the problems, not least when rulers sided with the Greeks against the
Jews.
At the root of these sometimes tense relations was Jewish exclusiveness
or separatism: Jews not only formed their own communities and practiced
a measure of political autonomy, but they refused to participate in the
cults of the patron deities of Greek cities. Precisely because religion was an
integral part of civic identity in the Greco-Roman world, Jewish
nonparticipation was felt keenly. Jewish monotheism and aniconism led to
pagan accusations of atheism and misanthropy. As a result, Jewish life in
the Greco-Roman world was somewhat precarious even as it flourished.367EERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
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