Re: Current State of Samaritan Studies (Hexateuch)
Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2022 1:28 pm
It seems like we're in a time warp in this thread. I move on to new subjects and you go back to old ones. I just demonstrated that Josephus used On the Jews written by Pseudo-Hecataeus also the likely author of the Letter of Aristeas. Yes these are 'fake' histories. But Pseudo-Hecataeus's existence 150 - 90 BCE raises implications for Gmirkin's theory as well. Pseudo-Hecataeus an Alexandrian Jew is:
1. writing a little over a hundred years after the supposed 'invention' of the Pentateuch according to Gmirkin and
2. trying to demonstrate that Samaritans weren't recognized as 'real Jews' by Alexander
3. not knowing or ignoring the 'actual' recent (i.e. third century) origins of the Pentateuch the author 'decides' to 'acknowledge' the Samaritans were using the Pentateuch already in the Persian period (along with the Jews)
One can be a liar, there are many in antiquity, but to 'credit' the Samaritans with already regulating their lives with sabbatical years makes no sense as part of his agenda.
Your line of reasoning seems to be that because Pseudo-Hecataeus is 'untrustworthy' he isn't a witness to basic 'facts' like whether Jews and Samaritans were only using the Pentateuch recently. This is absurd. Originally you were saying Josephus 'can't be trusted.' Now we've moved on to Josephus's use of a source from the 2nd century BCE. The fact that this Alexandrian Jew from the second century BCE is an apologist should make us DOUBT much of his testimony. But whether or not Jews and Samaritans were using the Pentateuch a century earlier? This is really 'jeopardized' by the fact he's an apologist?
This reminds me of your efforts to undermine Ehrman because of a footnote here or there. "All of Ehrman's writings, his opinions, his scholarship can be ignored because ... of some inaccurate footnotes. This is what you do. But this isn't what most people do. It certainly isn't a sound historical methodology. You can't ignore a source from a hundred or so years from the alleged 'invention' of the Pentateuch in his home city of Alexandria. No we don't accept what the Letter to Aristeas says uncritically. Nor the apologetic 'history' contained in On the Jews. But as to the question whether the Alexandrian Jew Pseudo-Hecataeus knew or didn't know whether the Pentateuch was 'invented' a hundred years earlier in Alexandria this can't possibly be true. He certainly knew details relating to the community of his grandfather or great grandfather. Again that doesn't mean that the Letter of Aristeas isn't a pious 'fake' history. But surely that's one end of the spectrum. If the author is a 'conservative Jew' fighting to exclude Samaritans from association or attaining the same rights as 'Jews' surely he can't be this fanatical knowing that the Pentateuch is another pious fraud invented by his grandparents and great grandparents and their associates.
Let's even take another step back. You'd have to believe that in 120 or 110 BCE you have this sort of anti-Samaritan sentiment in the same 'Jewish community' that produced the Torah 250 CEish. Really? So 125 years earlier Jews and Samaritans eagerly received the Pentateuch from Alexandria. In a generation - let's say 80 or so years before Pseudo-Hecataeus's birth the practices associated with this 'Alexandrian text' get established at Gerizim and Jerusalem. You're telling me that in another 80 years you have a 'conservative Alexandrian Jew' trying to belittle the Samaritan community but at the same time, in spite of their illegitimacy, they were adhering to the laws of Moses since the Persian period? Then layer upon this already tight timeframe (a) Deuteronomy being written by another or others than those who wrote the first four books of the Pentateuch and (b) the addition of Joshua, now the Samaritan-Jewish schism is necessarily pushed back to the second century BCE the same era Pseudo-Hecataeus wrote. Impossible. This is just silly.
1. writing a little over a hundred years after the supposed 'invention' of the Pentateuch according to Gmirkin and
2. trying to demonstrate that Samaritans weren't recognized as 'real Jews' by Alexander
3. not knowing or ignoring the 'actual' recent (i.e. third century) origins of the Pentateuch the author 'decides' to 'acknowledge' the Samaritans were using the Pentateuch already in the Persian period (along with the Jews)
One can be a liar, there are many in antiquity, but to 'credit' the Samaritans with already regulating their lives with sabbatical years makes no sense as part of his agenda.
Your line of reasoning seems to be that because Pseudo-Hecataeus is 'untrustworthy' he isn't a witness to basic 'facts' like whether Jews and Samaritans were only using the Pentateuch recently. This is absurd. Originally you were saying Josephus 'can't be trusted.' Now we've moved on to Josephus's use of a source from the 2nd century BCE. The fact that this Alexandrian Jew from the second century BCE is an apologist should make us DOUBT much of his testimony. But whether or not Jews and Samaritans were using the Pentateuch a century earlier? This is really 'jeopardized' by the fact he's an apologist?
This reminds me of your efforts to undermine Ehrman because of a footnote here or there. "All of Ehrman's writings, his opinions, his scholarship can be ignored because ... of some inaccurate footnotes. This is what you do. But this isn't what most people do. It certainly isn't a sound historical methodology. You can't ignore a source from a hundred or so years from the alleged 'invention' of the Pentateuch in his home city of Alexandria. No we don't accept what the Letter to Aristeas says uncritically. Nor the apologetic 'history' contained in On the Jews. But as to the question whether the Alexandrian Jew Pseudo-Hecataeus knew or didn't know whether the Pentateuch was 'invented' a hundred years earlier in Alexandria this can't possibly be true. He certainly knew details relating to the community of his grandfather or great grandfather. Again that doesn't mean that the Letter of Aristeas isn't a pious 'fake' history. But surely that's one end of the spectrum. If the author is a 'conservative Jew' fighting to exclude Samaritans from association or attaining the same rights as 'Jews' surely he can't be this fanatical knowing that the Pentateuch is another pious fraud invented by his grandparents and great grandparents and their associates.
Let's even take another step back. You'd have to believe that in 120 or 110 BCE you have this sort of anti-Samaritan sentiment in the same 'Jewish community' that produced the Torah 250 CEish. Really? So 125 years earlier Jews and Samaritans eagerly received the Pentateuch from Alexandria. In a generation - let's say 80 or so years before Pseudo-Hecataeus's birth the practices associated with this 'Alexandrian text' get established at Gerizim and Jerusalem. You're telling me that in another 80 years you have a 'conservative Alexandrian Jew' trying to belittle the Samaritan community but at the same time, in spite of their illegitimacy, they were adhering to the laws of Moses since the Persian period? Then layer upon this already tight timeframe (a) Deuteronomy being written by another or others than those who wrote the first four books of the Pentateuch and (b) the addition of Joshua, now the Samaritan-Jewish schism is necessarily pushed back to the second century BCE the same era Pseudo-Hecataeus wrote. Impossible. This is just silly.