Image of the Jews in Greek Literature: The Hellenistic Period.

From the library of Prof. Wolfgang Haase, long-time editor of ANRW and the International Journal of the Classical Tradition (IJCT). - Stamp on the top edge, barcode on the back, slightly rubbed, otherwise very good and clean. / Stempel auf dem Kopfschnitt, Barcode auf der R�ckseite, leicht berieben, sonst sehr gut und sauber. - This landmark contribution to ongoing debates about perceptions of the Jews in antiquity examines the attitudes of Greek writers of the Hellenistic period toward the Jewish people. Among the leading Greek intellectuals who devoted special attention to the Jews were Theophrastus (the successor of Aristotle), Hecataeus of Abdera (the father of �scientific� ethnography), Posidonius of Apamea (the dominant intellectual figure in the first century b.c.e.), and Apollonius Molon (probably the greatest rhetorician of the Hellenistic world). Bezalel Bar-Kochva examines the references of these writers and others to the Jews in light of their literary output and personal background; their religious, social, and political views; their literary and stylistic methods; ethnographic stereotypes current at the time; and more. This comprehensive approach sheds new light on the meaning and significance of the references to and the accounts of the Jewish people. In addition, the book exposes the origins of the ancient �blood libel� and illuminates the development of the legend about the existence of a sculpture of an ass in the �Holy of Holies� of the Jerusalem Temple. - BEZALEL BAR-KOCHVA is Jacob M. Alkow Professor of the History of the Jews in the Ancient World at Tel Aviv University, Israel, and the author of Pseudo Hecataeus �On the Jews�: Legitimizing the Jewish Diaspora (UC Press) and Judas Maccabaeus, among other books. ISBN 9780520253360