IndexHellenism and Judaism(References are from Middle East bbliography) One of the consequences of Pax Romana was the expansion of Judaism as a religion and the inroads of Greek culture amongst the Jews. These developments facilitated later the spread of Christianity. It is important to understand that in those times it was possible for a person to be at the same time a Jew, a Greek, and a Roman because each of these designations was applicable to a different domain of human experience. (BL95, pp. 30-32) After the Babylonian exile a Jew was a person who followed the religion of Judaism (as it is in modern times) without having to speak Hebrew or live in the land of Israel. A Greek was someone who spoke Greek and, possibly, followed certain cultural customs. After Alexander's conquests It did not imply adherence to the religion of the Olympian deities and it never implied an affiliation with a state. Until the early 19th century there was no Greek state; there was an Athenian state, a Spartan state, a Theban state, etc but no Greek state. The Roman empire developed for the first time in history the concept of citizenship that could be acquired legally without any presumptions on ethnic origin. Thus someone could be a Jew by religion, a Greek by language, and a Roman by citizenship. (One famous person who was all three was Paul of Tarsus.) Not only the number of Greeks peaked during the Hellenistic period, so did the number of Jews. According to the article on Proselytes of the Encyclopedia Judaica [EJ2007, vol. 16, pp. 587-594] there was active proselytization in ancient times and even a case of "mass and forced conversion to Judaism of the Edomites by John Hyrcanus". Josephus has written that "the inhabitants of both Greek and barbarian cities evinced a great zeal for Judaism" (Contra Apion, 2:39 as quoted in Encyclopedia Judaica [ibid]). As a result Jews were far more numerous in proportion to the population than they are today. There are estimates that "Jews (were) one tenth of the population of the empire as a whole" [EJ2007, article on Europe, vol. 6, pp. 554-555] and in Greece and Asia Minor the proportion may have been as high as one fifth (according to the historian Salo W. Baron). The modern Jewish attitude towards proselytization is indeed negative [EJ2007, vol. 16, pp. 587-594] because, in contrast to polytheism, the new monotheistic religions "regarded abandonment of their faith and transfer to another religion as a capital offense" [EJ2007, vol. 16, pp. 587-594]. Bernard Lewis [BL95, p. 31-32] points out that Greeks, Jews, and Romans were able to have a large impact in history because each group allowed the inclusion of outsiders. The process for doing so may have been strenuous (learning the Greek language, undergoing conversion to Judaism, qualifying for Roman citizenship) but it was not an impossible task. A good place to appreciate the integration of Greek and Jewish culture is the Jewish Museum in Rome. The museum contains a large exhibit of ancient tombstones, all of them in Greek that are almost indistinguishable from Greek tombstones that can seen in museums in Athens. In a few cases one can see a depiction of a menorah, otherwise one must read the text to realize that they are Jewish Tombstones. For example, the word ΑΡΧΙΣΥΝΑΓΩΓΟΣ (head of the Synagogue) can be found often. Figure 1 shows an example of Greek-Jewish syncretism. The biggest monument to Greek-Jewish interaction is the translation of the Jewish Bible into Greek, the Septuagint. The name is derived from the Latin word for 70 because, supposedly, there were 70 translators. The translation was carried out in Alexandria in the 3rd century BCE by Jewish scholars who were, supposedly, convened by the Greek king of Egypt. The Septuagint played a major in Christianity and it is still used by the Greek Orthodox Church. Levine's book [LL98] is a good modern source for the interaction between Judaism and Hellenism and the following paragraphs rely on that book. Judaism faced several challenges in dealing with the outside world and the responses can be roughly classified as universalist or conservative. For example, Hillel was a universalist while Shammai was a conservative [ibid, pp. 103-106]. Also there was considerable variance in the architecture and decoration of Synagogues even in the same city [ibid, p. 170]. But the overall thrust was universalist and in tune with the world around. Such central Jewish customs as the Ketubah and the Seder were imports from the Hellenistic world. The ritual of the Seder (including the questions asked) is based on the form of a Greek symposium. The custom of the afikoman has also Greek roots. The word is a corruption of the Greek word αφοικομενοι meaning those who arrive and it refers to a boisterous conclusion of a Greek symposium. So the rabbis wrote "One does not conclude the Passover celebration with the afikoman", etc. [ibid, p. 122]. The word synagogue itself is of Greek origin (it means gathering). Levine makes a good case that women sat with the men in the ancient Synagogues [ibid, pp. 175-176], so the current separation in some Orthodox Synagogues is probably an "innovation" adopted from Christian practice. It seems that at the end of the fourth century CE Judaism was quite different than at the start of the Hellenistic period, late in the 4th century BCE. The start of the 5th century CE marks the establishment of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire and the severe persecution of all other religions started. Judaism seems to be the only one of these religions to survive with a significant number of members but it entered into a new phase. Levine points out that universalism was, naturally, opposed in times of trouble [ibid, pp. 103-104]. Therefore the Judaism that developed during the fifteen hundred years of persecutions had to be different from what it existed before the fifth century BCE. Additional Bibliography
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