Table Of ContentJewish and Christian Communal Identities in the Roman World
Ancient Judaism and
Early Christianity
Arbeiten zur Geschichte des antiken Judentums
und des Urchristentums
Founding Editor
Martin Hengel † (Tübingen)
Executive Editors
Cilliers Breytenbach (Berlin)
Martin Goodman (Oxford)
Editorial Board
Lutz Doering (Münster) – Pieter W. van der Horst (Utrecht)
Tal Ilan (Berlin) – Judith Lieu (Cambridge)
Tessa Rajak (Reading/Oxford ) – Daniel R. Schwartz ( Jerusalem)
Seth Schwartz (New York)
VOLUME 94
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/ajec
Jewish and Christian Communal
Identities in the Roman World
Edited by
Yair Furstenberg
LEIDEN | BOSTON
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Furstenberg, Yair, editor.
Title: Jewish and Christian communal identities in the Roman world / edited
by Yair Furstenberg.
Description: Boston : Brill, 2016. | Series: Ancient Judaism and early
Christianity, ISSN 1871-6636 ; Volume 94 | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016015133 (print) | LCCN 2016016483 (ebook) | ISBN
9789004321212 (hardback : alk. paper) | ISBN 9789004321694 (E-book)
Subjects: LCSH: Identification (Religion)—History—To 1500. | Identity
(Psychology)—Religious aspects—History. | Jews—Identity—History—To
1500. | Judaism—History—Talmudic period, 10–425. | Identity
(Psychology)—Religious aspects—Christianity. | Church history—Primitive
and early church, ca. 30-600. | Civilization, Greco-Roman.
Classification: LCC BL53.J49 2016 (print) | LCC BL53 (ebook) | DDC
305.6/70937—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016015133
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issn 1871-6636
isbn 978-90-04-32121-2 (hardback)
isbn 978-90-04-32169-4 (e-book)
Copyright 2016 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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Contents
Preface vii
Abbreviations viii
List of Contributors xii
Introduction: The Shared Dimensions of Jewish and Christian Communal
Identities 1
Yair Furstenberg
Part I
Imperial Perspectives
The Ptolemaic and Roman Definitions of Social Categories and the
Evolution of Judean Communal Identity in Egypt 25
Sylvie Honigman
The Roman State and Jewish Diaspora Communities in the Antonine
Age 75
Martin Goodman
Part II
Community and the City
Civic Identity and Christ Groups 87
John S. Kloppenborg
Organized Charity in the Ancient World: Pagan, Jewish, Christian 116
Pieter W. van der Horst
The Fourth Book of Maccabees in a Multi-Cultural City 134
Tessa Rajak
vi Contents
Part III
Varieties of Communal Identities
Rome and Alexandria: Why was there no Jewish Politeuma in Rome? 153
Daniel R. Schwartz
From Text to Community: Methodological Problems of Reconstructing
Communities behind Texts 167
Jörg Frey
Lycaonian Christianity under Roman Rule and their Jewish-Christian
Tradition 185
Cilliers Breytenbach
Part IV
Community and Continuity
The Jewish Community in Egypt before and after 117 CE in Light of Old and
New Papyri 203
Tal Ilan
Jewish Communities in the Roman Diaspora: Why Salo Baron Still
Matters? 225
Seth Schwartz
“You are a Chosen Stock . . .”: The Use of Israel Epithets for the Addressees
in First Peter 243
Lutz Doering
Author Index 277
General Index 282
Preface
This volume presents revised versions of lectures given in October 2013 at
a Jerusalem symposium on Jewish and Christian Communal Identities in
Antiquity. The Hebrew University’s Scholion Center for Interdisciplinary
Research in the Humanities and Jewish studies together with the editorial board
of Brill’s Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity series kindly co- sponsored the
symposium in memory of our colleague Friedrich Avemarie. His sudden pass-
ing, in the process of preparing the symposium, has been ever since a great
loss to our scholarly community and to the study of Jewish and Christian inter-
relations in antiquity. I would like to thank all of the participants in the sym-
posium, who devoted much time and effort both to the symposium itself and
to the preparation of their papers for publication. I also wish to thank John
Kloppenborg and Tessa Rajak who could not participate in the conference but
were glad to add their contributions to the volume and complement the issues
addressed herein.
The director of Scholion and AJEC editorial board member, Daniel R.
Schwartz, initiated the collaboration between the two parties, and entrusted
me, as a postdoctoral Mandel fellow at the Scholion center, to choose the
topic, organize the conference and edit this volume. I wish to express my most
sincere gratitude to him for the two blissful years I enjoyed at Scholion and
for giving me the opportunity to enhance the study of communal identity in
Antiquity through the association with this wonderful community of scholars,
who jointly created this volume. The production of the conference was a most
pleasant experience thanks to the skilled guidance and management of Maya
Sherman, the Administrative Director Scholion has been blessed with, and to
the assistance of her devoted staff. Special thanks goes to Yonatan Gan-Or for
all the effort put into ensuring a successful symposium.
I wish to extend my thanks to the executive editors of this series for their
support in carrying out the work on the volume. Cilliers Breytenbach has gen-
erously hosted me in the Theology Faculty at the Humboldt University and I
had the benefit of enjoying the wise consultation of Martin Goodman all along
the way. I am extremely grateful to the two devoted editors of the Brill Biblical
Studies, Mattie Kupier followed by Tessa Schild, for their excellent treatment
of the manuscript from its earliest stages of production to its final publication.
Yair Furstenberg
Jerusalem, January 2016
Abbreviations
AB Anchor Bible
ABD Anchor Bible Dictionary. Edited by D. N. Freedman. 6 vols. New York:
Doubleday, 1992
AEMÖ Archaeologisch-epigraphische Mittheilungen aus Oesterreich-Ungarn
AGAJU Arbeiten zur Geschichte des antiken Judentums und des
Urchristentums
AM Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts. Athenische
Abteilung. Berlin: Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, 1896–
ANF Ante-Nicene Fathers. Edited by Alexander Roberts and James
Donaldson, with A. Cleveland Coxe. 1885–1896. 10 vols. Repr. Grand
Rapids, 1969–1973
ANRW Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur
Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Part 2, Principat. Edited by
Hildegard Temporini and Wolfgang Haase. Berlin and New York,
1974–
ANTC Abington New Testament Commentary
AsSeign Assemblées du Seigneur
BBB Bonner biblische Beiträge
BCH Bulletin de correspondance hellénique
BDAG A Greek English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early
Christian Literature, Walter Bauer and Fredrick William Danker, 3rd
edition, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957
BDR Grammatik des Neutestamentlichen Griechisch. Friedrich Blass
and Albert Debrunner. Revised by Friedrich Rehkopf; Göttingen:
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979
BE Bullétin épigraphique
BECNT Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament
BETL Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium
BGU Aegyptische urkunden aus den königlichen (later Sttatlichen) museen
zu berlin griechische urkunden. Berlin: Weidmann, 1895–
BIS Biblical Interpretation Series
BNTC Black’s New Testament Commentary
BTS Biblisch-theologische Schwerpunkte
BZNW Beihefte zur Zeitschrift fur die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft
und die Kunde der Alteren Kirche
CBET Contributions to Biblical Exegesis and Theology
CBNT Commentaire biblique: Nouveau Testament
Abbreviations ix
CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly
CBR Currents in Biblical Research
CIG Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum
CIIP Corpus Inscriptionum Iudaeae/Palaestinae. Edited by H. M. Cotton.
Berlin : Walter de Gruyter, 2010–
CIJ Corpus Inscriptionum Judaicarum
CIL Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum
CJZC Corpus Jüdischer Zeugnisse aus der Cyrenaika. Edited by G. Lüdertiz.
Wiesbaden : L.Reichert, 1983
CPJ Corpus Papyrorum Judaicorum. Ed. V. A. Tcherikover, A. Fuks and
M. Stern. 3 vols. Cambridge, Mass., 1957–1964
CRAI Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et
Belles-Lettres
CRIPEL Cahier de Recherches de l’Institut de Papyrologie et d’Égyptologie de
Lille
DACL Dictionnaire d’archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie
DGE Dialectorum Graecarum Exempla Epigraphica Potiora. Eduard
Schwyzer. Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1923
DJD Discoveries in the Judaean Desert
DNP Der Neue Pauly
ECAM Early Christianity in Asia Minor
EDNT Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament
EJ Encyclopedia Judaica
EKK Evangelisch-Katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament
ETAM Ergänzungsbände zu den Tituli Asiae Minoris
ExpT Expository Times
FGH Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker. Edited by Felix Jacoby.
5 vols. Berlin: Weidmann, 1923–1999
FRLANT Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen
Testaments
GLAJJ Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism. Edited by Menachem
Stern. 3 vols. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities,
1974–1984
GNT Grundrisse zum Neuen Testament
HTK Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament
HTR Harvard Theological Review
ICC International Critical Commentary
IG Inscriptiones Graecae
IJO Inscriptiones Judaicae Orientis
IK Inschriften griechischer Städte aus Kleinasien
