The Strange Humility Displayed on the Coins of Agrippa II

[beowulf]

Were the Idumeans forcibly converted? This short video presents the Jewish view.

Rabbi Berel Wein, 5000 years of Jewish history, one video clip at a time
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsPZGdQG ... 7766E8EC2E

That would be a modern Jewish POV of a Rabbi. Josephus says that after the Idumeans accepted circumcision and observance of Jewish law, "they were hereafter considered to be Jews." I do not see Josephus questioning their commitment. In fact, they became allied with the Zealot party during the 1st century rebellion against Rome, suggesting their faith was in some ways was "zealous" or why would the Zealots invite them into the city. The plan was discovered before they arrived and the High Priests closed the city gates, fearing their fanaticism more than any impurity in their Jewish credentials. See Jewish War book 4.

This, BTW, is the setting in which the chief priest Jesus, next in rank to Ananus, gave his speech on the temple wall to try and dissuade the Idumeans from pushing the conflict beyond the point where the Jewish people could sue for peace terms with the Romans. This rebuff of their offer to help their brothers pursue the revolution pretty much pissed them off. The Zealots made a sortie and managed to open the gates, and the Zealots and Idumeans rounded up and killed all the members of the high priestly aristocracy they could find, including Ananus and Jesus, flinging their dead bodies over the city wall into the valley of Gehenna and forbade anyone to try to bury them. FWIW, the execution of Ananus and ignoble treatment of his dead body is the event that Josephus said was the cause of the eventual destruction of the city, something which Origen somehow twisted around to mean he meant James the brother of Jesus in Ant 20:200.

There were some Jews, though, such as the Hasmonean prince Antigonus, who considered Herod a "half-Jew" (ἡμιιουδαίῳ, Ant 14:403) and thus unfit to be king of the Judeans. Naturally, Antigonus felt the kingship should rightfully be his on account of him being "out of the [Judean] kind," (ἐκ τοῦ γένους).

But then there was Agrippa I. Per Schürer, "at the Feast of Tabernacles in a.d. 41, according to the old custom, he read the Book of Deuteronomy, and in the passage, "Thou mayest not set a stranger over thee that is not thy brother" (Deut. xvii. 15), he burst forth in tears, because be felt himself referred to in it. Then cried out the people to him, "Be not grieved, Agrippa! Thou art our brother! Thou art our brother!" (1890, First Div, Book II, pg 157). The source given is Mishna, Sota vii. 8. Neusner's translation has:

Agrippa the King stood up and received it [the scroll of the Law] and read it standing up [instead of sitting down to read it as was usual], and sages praised him on that account. And when he came to the verse, You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother (Dt. 17:15), his tears ran down from his eyes. They said to him, “Do not be afraid, Agrippa, you are our brother, you are our brother, you are our brother!”

So I guess a lot of the negative connotation in the term Idumean is due to polemics, not a matter of Jewish law, in which converst are to be treated as full Jews.

DCH

Agrippa burst into tears when he came to the word “foreigner” because
“Talmud - Mas. Kiddushin 70b
At this stage his opponent said to Rab Judah, ‘You call me a slave, — I who am descended from the royal house of the Hasmoneans!’ — ‘Thus said Samuel,’ he retorted: ‘Whoever says: "I am descended from the house of the Hasmoneans is a slave.’2

(2) Because the dynasty was wiped out by Herod, who, in spite of ascending the throne, was always regarded by the
Jew's as an Idumean slave. He, to exalt his children, called them Hasmoneans, v. B.B. 3b.”


King Agrippa was comforted during an important state ceremony by a diplomatic officer: don’t be afraid...

[A_Nony_Mouse]

Then this post of yours, however long, is not a response to anything I have posted.

Ahem ... I was responding to the following post (the first from you in this thread):

Celebrating the victory over the Judeans in coinage sounds exactly like what a Herodian would do.

Go to War of the Jews by Josephus. The Judeans conquered the Idumaeans and forced them on pain of death or banishment to adopt the rituals and taboos of their Yahu cult. The Herods were Idumaeans. Their involvement with the Judean tyrants and "religion" was not voluntary.

When reading Josephus ignore every assumption you might have from the Septuagint as none of them apply to the real history recounted by Josephus. The Judeans even conquered and forced the Galileans to adopt the Yahu cult. Whatever story the NT is telling it is in a backdrop of the conquest and forced conversion and rule by the tyrant priests of Yahu. Obviously Jesus would have hated them. Jesus was a Galilean.

What the heck do you think folks have been asking you to flesh out for about 3 pages?

DCH

Since you found one line to quote from me you certainly know the line from you I was replying to, the one where you said you do not read what I post which included gratuitous derogatory description of what I write.

[steve43]

You [DCH] need to learn to separate the facts which I use from the theory I have developed to explain more of the facts than any other theory I can find. By facts of course I mean evidence not argumentation or what someone says about a fact. I am only interested in the fact itself.

So, I need to be able to separate "facts" from your fiction? I didn't even know you had a theory, mainly because I don't read your weird ass posts.

(JOE Ant 13:255, 257-258) 255 ... After this [Hyrcanus I] took Samega, and the neighbouring places; and, besides these, Shechem and Gerizim, and the nation of the Cutheans, ... 257 Hyrcanus took also Dora and Marissa, cities of Idumea, and subdued all the Idumeans; and permitted them to stay in that country, if they would submit to circumcision, and make use of the laws of the Jews; 258 and they were so desirous of living in the country of their forefathers, that they submitted to the right of circumcision, and of the rest of the Jewish ways of living; at which time, therefore, this befell them, that they were hereafter considered to be Jews.

(JOS Ant 13:257-258) 255 ... καὶ Σαμόγαν καὶ τὰ πλησίον εὐθὺς αἱρεῖ Σίκιμά τε πρὸς τούτοις καὶ Γαριζεὶν τό τε Κουθαίων γένος ... 257 Ὑρκανὸς δὲ καὶ τῆς Ἰδουμαίας αἱρεῖ πόλεις Ἄδωρα καὶ Μάρισαν καὶ ἅπαντας τοὺς Ἰδουμαίους ὑπὸ χεῖρα ποιησάμενος ἐπέτρεψεν αὐτοῖς μένειν ἐν τῇ χώρᾳ εἰ περιτέμνοιντο τὰ αἰδοῖα καὶ τοῖς Ἰουδαίων νόμοις χρήσασθαι θέλοιεν 258 οἱ δὲ πόθῳ τῆς πατρίου γῆς καὶ τὴν περιτομὴν καὶ τὴν ἄλλην τοῦ βίου δίαιταν ὑπέμειναν τὴν αὐτὴν Ἰουδαίοις ποιήσασθαι κἀκείνοις αὐτοῖς χρόνος ὑπῆρχεν ὥστε εἶναι τὸ λοιπὸν Ἰουδαίους

Emil Schürer, A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ (First Division, Vol 1, 1890, pp. 279-280) Without troubling himself about [weak Syrian king] Demetrius II, he [Aristobulus I] began to seize upon considerable districts in the neighbourhood of Judea, to the east, to the north, and to the south. First of all he marched into the land east of the Jordan, and conquered Medaba after a six months' siege. Then he turned to the north, took Shechem and Mount Gerizim, subdued the Samaritans, and destroyed their temple. Finally, he went south, took the Idumean cities Adora and Marissa, and compelled the Idumeans to submit to circumcision, and to receive the Jewish law.

(JOE Ant 13:318-319) 318 [Aristobulus I] made war against Iturea, and added a great part of it to Judea, and compelled the inhabitants, if they would continue in that country, to be circumcised, and to live according to the Jewish laws. 319 ... Strabo bears witness, in the name of Timagenes; who says thus:--"This man [Aristobulus] was a person of candour, and very serviceable to the Jews; for he [successfully] added a country to them, and obtained a part of the nation of the Itureans for them, and bound them to them by the bond of their circumcision."

(JOS Ant 13:318-319) 318 δ᾽ ἐπισπένδω τοὐμὸν αἷμα τοῖς μιαιφονηθεῖσιν ταῦτ᾽ εἰπὼν ἐπαποθνήσκει τοῖς λόγοις βασιλεύσας ἐνιαυτόν χρηματίσας μὲν Φιλέλλην πολλὰ δ᾽ εὐεργετήσας τὴν πατρίδα πολεμήσας Ἰτουραίους καὶ πολλὴν αὐτῶν τῆς χώρας τῇ Ἰουδαίᾳ προσκτησάμενος ἀναγκάσας τε τοὺς ἐνοικοῦντας εἰ βούλονται μένειν ἐν τῇ χώρᾳ περιτέμνεσθαι καὶ κατὰ τοὺς Ἰουδαίων νόμους ζῆν 319 ... καὶ Στράβων ἐκ τοῦ Τιμαγένους ὀνόματος λέγων οὕτως ἐπιεικής τε ἐγένετο οὗτος ὁ ἀνὴρ καὶ πολλὰ τοῖς Ἰουδαίοις χρήσιμος χώραν τε γὰρ αὐτοῖς προσεκτήσατο καὶ τὸ μέρος τοῦ τῶν Ἰτουραίων ἔθνους ᾠκειώσατο δεσμῷ συνάψας τῇ τῶν αἰδοίων περιτομῇ

Emil Schürer, A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ (First Division, Vol 1, 1890, pp. 293-294)[Aristobulus I] undertook a military expedition against the Itureans, conquered a large portion of their land, united that to Judea, and compelled the inhabitants to allow themselves to be circumcised and to live according to the Jewish law. The Itureans had their residence in Lebanon. As Josephus does not say that Aristobulus subdued "the Itureans," but only that he conquered a large portion of their country and judaized it and as Galilee had not hitherto belonged to the territory of the Jewish high priest, the conquests even of John Hyrcanus extending northwards only as far as Samaria and Scythopolis and as, yet again, the population of Galilee had been up to that time more Gentile than Jewish,—the conjecture has good grounds that the portion conquered by Aristobulus was mainly Galilee, and that the actual judaizing of Galilee was first carried out by him. In any case, he extended the Jewish power farther northward, as Hyrcanus had toward the south.

IMHO, Schürer has read a lot of his own opinions into the accounts of Josephus. However, the first quotation from Josephus says Hyrcanus I took Shechem (the Greek city) and Gerizim (the holy mountain of the Samaritans) before subjugating Idumea. Since he had not totally taken all Idumean territory, just two strongholds, but offered peace terms on condition that they accept Jewish law and circumcision, and they accepted this more or less willingly as they never reneged on the deal, it sounds as though they already were practicing their own form of circumcision and may have even practiced many tenets of the Law of the Jews. When his son Aristobulus I, probably completing plans laid out by Hyrcanus before his death, seized control of a large tract of land formerly controlled by the Iturean kingdom (with the capital in Chalcis), he offered them the same deal. That the Romans had appointed Herodian princes as the king of Chalcis (the former capital of the Iturean kingdom) suggests that they were significantly Judaized long after the one year reign of Aristobulus, so again, a more or less formal annexation of people with similar traditions and practices to Judeans.

If you research both Idumea and Iturea, you will find that both were regions marginalized by the Nabateans (Idumea) or Syria (Iturea). The inhabitants of both regions were commonly considered "Arabs" by the Greeks due to their semi-nomadic populations, although the Nabatean "Arabs" didn't think much of their Idumean subjects, and the Damascenes reached out to Nabatea for leadership rather than accept Iturean rulers when the Syrian kingdom collapsed into civil war in 85 BCE. Strabo's source, preserved only in Josephus, seems to attribute entirely to a sweet talking Aristobulus what occurred under Hyrcanus and only completed by Aristobulus.

Your favored simplistic theory turns these assimilations of peoples with similar traditions into "forced" conversions.

DCH

Most non-Greek areas shared a common language back then, Aramaic. So thatcertainly was a unifying factor.

But Josephus states that the Idumeans and by extension the Naboteans worshiped a deity called "Koze" prior to their conversion.

Presumably that would be a big difference, especially when the Jews functioned under a strict Theocracy that Tacitus compared to slavery (Tacitus Histories V 4-5).

And the level of pain involved in an adult circumcision is very high and not to be discounted.

When the Romans subjugated an area, in contrast, all they wanted was booty and taxes paid- without any trouble from the people.

"Forced" I think would be a very appropriate word.

[beowulf]

Most non-Greek areas shared a common language back then, Aramaic. So thatcertainly was a unifying factor.

But Josephus states that the Idumeans and by extension the Naboteans worshiped a deity called "Koze" prior to their conversion.

Presumably that would be a big difference, especially when the Jews functioned under a strict Theocracy that Tacitus compared to slavery (Tacitus Histories V 4-5).

And the level of pain involved in an adult circumcision is very high and not to be discounted.

When the Romans subjugated an area, in contrast, all they wanted was booty and taxes paid- without any trouble from the people.

"Forced" I think would be a very appropriate word.

Yes, the Idumeans were forcibly converted and Costobarus appear to have resented the imposition very much.

Josephus: Antiquities

"XV.7.9. Costobarus was an Idumean by birth, and one of principal dignity among them, and one whose ancestors had been priests to the Koze, whom the Idumeans had [formerly] esteemed as a god; but after Hyrcanus had made a change in their political government, and made them receive the Jewish customs and law,... and [costobarus] did not think fit to obey what Herod, as their ruler, commanded him, or that the Idumeans should make use of the Jewish customs, or be subject to them. He therefore sent to Cleopatra, and informed her that the Idumeans had been always under his progenitors and that for the same reason it was but just that she should desire that country for him of Antony, for that he was ready to transfer his friendship to her"

[DCHindley]

Most non-Greek areas shared a common language back then, Aramaic. So that certainly was a unifying factor. But Josephus states that the Idumeans and by extension the Nab[a]teans worshiped a deity called "Koze" prior to their conversion. Presumably that would be a big difference, especially when the Jews functioned under a strict Theocracy that Tacitus compared to slavery (Tacitus Histories V 4-5).

And the level of pain involved in an adult circumcision is very high and not to be discounted. When the Romans subjugated an area, in contrast, all they wanted was booty and taxes paid- without any trouble from the people.

"Forced" I think would be a very appropriate word [for what the Jews required of the Idumeans].

Yes, there is a story about an Idumean, Costobar, who offered to sell out Herod, who had appointed him governor of Idumea and Gaza in consequence of the death of his uncle, the former governor of Idumea, supposedly in resistance to being "made [to] receive [μεταστήσαντος, verb participle aorist active genitive masculine singular, Liddell Scott Jones, A. causal, in pres. and impf., fut. and aor. 1, place in another way, change ... introduce a new polity] the Jewish customs and laws" by Hyrcanus I.

I'll agree that Josephus was suggesting that the "change" Hyrcanus I imposed on the citizens of Idumea could have been for the better or worse (see the LSJ entry at Perseus.com for the verb μεθίστημι in its entirety), but he also takes pains to explain that this Costobar was very ambitious and willing to entertain anything in exchange for personal gain. This is, after all, what he told Cleopatra, hoping she would get Mark Antony to ask for Idumea (she had already done this successfully with Jericho and other large and very profitable estates in and around Herod's kingdom), in hopes of being appointed king of Idumea if Herod were to die from the grief fueled illness he experienced after he executed Mariamne.

In fact, the primary Nabatean god, "Dushara (Dhu-Šarā 'the one of the Shara [Mountains]') ... may be none other than Qos." ["Toward a New Synthesis of the God of Edom & Yahweh" in Antiguo Oriente, vol 7, 2009, p 259, 260]

The view of the Edomite deity [whose name is from the semetic word for "bow"] that currently prevails in the field is that Qos, like Yahweh and the Canaanite Baal, was probably a local manifestation of the ancient Near Eastern storm-deity, specifically Hadad (Adad), who is often depicted as playing two major roles: warrior and bringer of fertility. [p. 260]

The institution of Herod as the king of the Jews by Rome in 40 BC. marked a unique development in the history of Judah and Edom. Herod was the son of Antipater, an Idumean official, and a Nabatean noblewoman named Cypros.87 This is indicative of the unification of the Idumeans and Judeans to a much greater extent than they had experienced in the past. However, the example of Kostabaros demonstrates that Qos/Koze was still revered among some Idumeans even in the midst of the partial assimilation of the religion of the Idumeans to Judaism. The Idumeans either accepted the religion of the Jews, or more likely, blended the worship of Yahweh with Koze. Though this cannot be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, if there is any validity to the postulates put forth in this essay, then it is extremely interesting to consider the syncretistic blending of two deities, now distinct, but who were once worshipped together. [p 273-274]

Apparently some Idumeans in the time of Hyrcanus I fled to Egypt rather than accept Judean custom and law. If you want to say "forced" I will not stop you.

However, don't forget that Herod was himself of Idumean extraction, and if he too felt that Judean custom and law [τὰ Ἰουδαίων ἔθη καὶ νόμιμα] were unbearable, he could have done something about it, at least for the Idumean people. I say that the Idumeans, whether they formerly worshipped Qos (the God of the storm) or not, probably circumcised their children and held dietary customs in common with the Judeans (no pork, drain meat of all blood, etc).

DCH

[beowulf]

Yom Tov, Hycarnus rides again
ESTHER / ΕΣΘΗΡ 8:17

17 κατὰ πόλιν καὶ χώραν, οὗ ἂν ἐξετέθη τὸ πρόσταγμα, οὗ ἂν ἐξετέθη τὸ ἔκθεμα, χαρὰ καὶ εὐφροσύνη τοῖς ᾿Ιουδαίοις, κώθων καὶ εὐφροσύνη. καὶ πολλοὶ τῶν ἐθνῶν περιετέμνοντο καὶ ἰουδάϊζον διὰ τὸν φόβον τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων
17 in every city and province wherever the ordinance was published: wherever the proclamation took place, the Jews had joy and gladness, feasting and mirth: and many of the Gentiles were circumcised, and became Jews, for fear of the Jews.
http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-te ... =20&page=8


Ptolemy’s On Herod the King, as cited by Shaye J. D. Cohen in , The Beginnings of Jewishness
The Idumeans were “compelled to be circumcised”

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=cvWq ... 22&f=false

Singing In The Rain - Singing In The Rain (Gene Kelly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1ZYhVpdXbQ

[DCHindley]

Yom Tov, Hycarnus rides again
ESTHER / ΕΣΘΗΡ 8:17

17 κατὰ πόλιν καὶ χώραν, οὗ ἂν ἐξετέθη τὸ πρόσταγμα, οὗ ἂν ἐξετέθη τὸ ἔκθεμα, χαρὰ καὶ εὐφροσύνη τοῖς ᾿Ιουδαίοις, κώθων καὶ εὐφροσύνη. καὶ πολλοὶ τῶν ἐθνῶν περιετέμνοντο καὶ ἰουδάϊζον διὰ τὸν φόβον τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων
17 in every city and province wherever the ordinance was published: wherever the proclamation took place, the Jews had joy and gladness, feasting and mirth: and many of the Gentiles were circumcised, and became Jews, for fear of the Jews.
http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-te ... =20&page=8

That is supposed to be in the Persian period, in a more or less fictional romance story, not the 2nd century BCE.

Ptolemy’s On Herod the King, as cited by Shaye J. D. Cohen in , The Beginnings of Jewishness
The Idumeans were “compelled to be circumcised”

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=cvWq ... 22&f=false

He is pointing out that the accounts of Strabo, Ptolemy and Josephus do not agree in every detail. When it somes to circumcision, though, he says:

[115] ... Josephus says that circumcision was a new practice introduced to the Idumaeans and Ituraeans by the Judaeans. Ptolemy confirms this statement for the Idumaeans. But both sources are probably wrong on this point, because in all likelihood the Idumaeans and Ituraeans practiced circumcision long before they came into contact with the Judaeans. Herodotus writes that “the Syrians in Palestine” practice circumcision; Josephus argues that Herodotus can only have meant the Jews, but there is no reason to accept this narrow interpretation. The Judaeans will have been only one among various Syrian peoples that practiced circumcision. A verse in Jeremiah seems to imply that the Edomites as well as various other neighboring peoples were circumcised like the Judaeans. Many ancient texts state that the Arabs practiced circumcision; the Ituraeans were Arabs, and we may presume that they followed the practice of their kinsmen. ...

[116] I tentatively offer the following conjectural reconstruction, which at least has the merit of accounting for all the available evidence. Seeing the growing power of the Hasmonean state, the rural Idumaeans sought an alliance with the Judaeans. Perhaps they were seeking to make the best of the inevitable; perhaps they wanted allies to protect [117] them from exploitation by die Hellenized cities; perhaps they felt a real sympathy with the anti-Seleucid and anti-Hellenistic posture of the Maccabees; perhaps they realized the political, economic, and military advantages that would accrue to them as a result of joining a larger and more prosperous state. Like the Judaeans they had practiced circumcision for centuries, and it was a relatively simple matter to declare their loyalty to the God of the Jews and to his laws (Strabo). After the Maccabees attacked and captured Adora and Marisa, the two cities of Idumaea, they offered the citizens a choice between expulsion and incorporation into the Judaean state. Since these cities were strongly Hellenized, many of their citizens, as in pre-Maccabcan Jerusalem, no longer practiced circumcision although they were still loyal to their ancestral god Koz. Some of the citizens accepted circumcision (Josephus), but many chose instead to flee to Egypt (papyrological evidence). Ptolemy’s claim that the Idumaeans were compelled to be circumcised and to adopt Jewish laws is a simplified account of w hat these urban Idumaeans experienced. As a result of all this, the Idumaeans joined the Judaeans (Strabo), have continued to be Judaeans (Josephus), and were called Judaeans (Ptolemy).

You stop reading when you think you have found what you want to prove, but I keep going on to find the context.

Singing In The Rain - Singing In The Rain (Gene Kelly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1ZYhVpdXbQ

A great nation rules by placing itself in a lowly position like the rivers that flow into the low
regions of ocean.
Hence, people will naturally be faithful to their country.
Mother nature always stays calm and quiet to overcome the unrest.
It takes the lowly position to be in peace.
Thus, if a great nation can lower itself to deal with a smaller nation,
Then it shall win the heart of the people.
And the smaller nation will willingly merge with the great nation.
And if the smaller nation can lower itself to deal with the great nation,
Then it shall win the trust and be accommodated as a part of the great nation.
Therefore, be it to take a lowly position to win over or to take a lowly position to be
accommodated;
The great nation only wishes to unite and shelter all the people,
While the small nation only wishes to be a part of the nation to serve it.
Now that both are granted with what they wish for,
It is only natural for the “Great” to put itself in a lowly position.

DCH

[beowulf]

There is always another opinion when trying to find what happened in the remote past.


The forced conversion of the Idumeans has very strong support in the Talmud, among ancient historians, it is accepted by contemporary Jewish historians and is indirectly supported in the Bible , Esther, where the conquering Judaism results in circumcisions of unwilling gentiles. Esther describes in Persia the life of the conquering Hycarnus in Idumea
Yom tov is the happy day of Mordochai in Esther and the feast of Purim.


Have a nice day in China


Singing In The Rain - Singing In The Rain (Gene Kelly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1ZYhVpdXbQ