Introduction

The purpose of this chapter is to review the history of research on the Epistle of James and to locate the present study with respect to both past and current scholarly investigations. First, we shall discuss some of the historical, theological, and literary problems surrounding James, and the ways in which scholarship dealt with these issues up to the publication of Martin Dibelius' commentary. Second, because Dibelius' conclusions have dominated Jamesian scholarship for more than seventy years and remain today the most influential assessment of James, we shall focus on his research. We shall concentrate on his use of the so-called “genre,” paraenesis. Finally, we shall build on this previous scholarship as we look at more recent research which suggests rhetorical criticism as a promising method for the investigation and interpretation of James.

The Epistle of James as a problem

The history of research on the Epistle of James reveals that it is not a popular document; it is in fact maligned and neglected (Adamson, 1989, p. x; Davids, 1982, p. 1; L. T. Johnson, 1986, p. 453; Laws, 1980, pp. 1–2; and Popkes, 1986, p. 9). When James is studied, it is seldom read on its own terms (L. T. Johnson, 1985, pp. 166–69, 178–79).

INTRODUCTION TO THE PROBLEM

The term ‘Jewish Christianity’, in German ‘Judenchristentum’, was current in the eighteenth century, but was brought to prominence by Ferdinand Christian Baur. He used it to describe what he took to be an important phenomenon within the Christianity of the first two centuries ce. On this at least most scholars can agree. But here perhaps agreement can be said to cease, for, in spite of a history of investigation stretching back to the early 1830s, many questions relating to Jewish Christianity, its history, origins and social and religious profile, remain matters of controversy.

There are a number of reasons for the confused state of scholarship on this question. First, insofar as we know, no one in the ancient Church or synagogue referred to themselves, or were referred to, as Jewish Christians. This gives rise to a number of problems, not least that of defining the term. Secondly, we have to contend with the inadequacy of the relevant primary sources. These are few in number, and nearly all written by those who were opposed to Jewish Christians, and had an incomplete and/or confused knowledge of what Jewish Christians might have thought. Those apparently written by Jewish Christians are often preserved in fragmentary form (this particularly applies to the Jewish Christian Gospels), and in complex corpora like the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies and Recognitions, which present literary-critical problems of an almost insurmountable kind. Moreover, while we may be in a position to know what some Christians thought about Jewish Christians and how they described them, we appear to be much less well informed about what Jews thought about Jewish Christians.

The widely held hypothesis that the Dead Sea Scrolls contain the views of Essene sectarians who had hidden them away for safe keeping c.ce 68 was first formulated in the infancy of Qumran studies, when only seven scrolls had been discovered. The identification of the site known as Khirbet (Kh) Qumran as a desert monastery or headquarters of the sect, proposed in the wake of the excavation of the site in the early 1950s, similarly met with widespread scholarly agreement. These two hypotheses have served as basic axioms for most Qumran researchers in their quest for a historical explanation of the manuscripts.

The case in favour of these hypotheses, and consequent historical conclusions, have been put forward in many publications since 1948 (see chapters 15 and 24). The accumulated evidence now pointing, on the contrary, to the Jerusalem origin of the scrolls and their composition by various sects, parties and individuals in pre-Tannaitic Judaism is presented here and the bearing of the scrolls on Judaism in this period is accordingly reconsidered.

THE STATE OF THE MANUSCRIPTS

The term generally applied to Hebrew scripts (square or cursive) employed by copyists of literary texts is ‘Hebrew book hand’, while that given to scripts used to write legal instruments, letters and other autographs is ‘Hebrew documentary hand’. These terms apply not only to the Qumran scrolls, but also to the texts comprising the two other important Hebrew manuscript discoveries of modern times: those of the Bar Kokhba period discovered in Wadi Murabba'at and Nahal geber (second century ce) and those of mediaeval times found in the Synagogue of the Palestinians of Fustat-Misr, known collectively as the Cairo Genizah (primarily ninth to thirteenth centuries).

Let us begin with a frank avowal not only of the incompleteness of our evidence from the Jewish side, but also of its one-sidedness. Tannaitic sources reflect the pietistic leadership of the scribes and sages, successors of the pharisees. It should not be assumed that the rabbinic views were enthusiastically endorsed by the entire community; indeed, as regards their minutiae, at the periphery of the community perhaps no more than lip service was given. Alternative religious groupings (e.g. Qumran, the Jewish Christians), occasionally disapprobated in the Mishnah, were either disappearing fast, or were in process of disassociating themselves from (or being extruded by) the main Jewish community. The ‘Am ha-’ares – scholastically unreachable common folk – were regarded by the rabbis with a barely tolerant contempt, reminiscent of fifth-century Greek attitudes to ‘the masses’ as contrasted to ‘gentlefolk’. One need not doubt that emotional ties and an inarticulate sense of ethnic identity linked them with more obviously practising Jewish circles, but their ethnicity was without self-consciousness, and they probably described themselves in Palestine – as in the Diaspora all Jews were described – as ‘Judaeans’ (yehudim, Aramaic yehuda'e): a term not thus used in rabbinic literature, where an individual Jew is called (an) Israel (ite). The great suffering of Jews in Palestine, Egypt and Cyrenaica, in the wars and revolts against Rome will have made it difficult or impossible for Jews to ignore the reality of Jewish–Gentile distinctions, even when, as individuals, they may have wished to play them down or attempt to overcome them by assimilative integration in the gentile world.

The Essenes formed a third religious group among the Jews of Palestine, after the Pharisees and Sadducees. They existed from the middle of the second century bce up to the time of the first Jewish uprising against the Romans. Until recently our knowledge of them was derived entirely from Philo, Josephus and Pliny the Elder, all of whom wrote as outsiders. Now, however, the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered from 1947 onwards (the Qumran manuscripts) have provided us with what might be regarded as authentic Essene documents – though the name itself never occurs in them (for discussion see chapters 24–5, below). Both sources complement each other: the classical authors are particularly important for factual information such as dates, places and the way of life of the Essenes, while the Qumran texts also reveal the theological foundations of their singular faith.

FACTUAL INFORMATION

SOURCES

The Alexandrian Jewish philosopher Philo (15/10 bce–ce 45) in his treatise ‘Every good man is free’ and in a subsequent ‘Apology for the Jews’ depicts the Essenes as an example of a truly free and righteous existence. These two accounts bear a close resemblance to one another linguistically and also in context, not least because the author saw his own Platonic and Stoic ideals realized in the life of the Essenes. Flavius Josephus (ce 37–100), who claimed to have belonged to all the different Jewish religious factions in his youth, including the Essenes, offers us a more detailed account of this latter sect than any other author, in his work on The Jewish War. He also mentions them frequently in brief remarks and anecdotes in his main work Antiquities of the Jews.

The synagogue has been and is one of the most important Jewish institutions, the spiritual, cultural and religious centre of any Jewish community. It fulfilled a multitude of functions in antiquity, of which the most important, besides those of prayer and worship, was the teaching of the Law. It was where the Jews assembled to pray and to hear on the Sabbath the weekly reading and interpretation of the Torah; it was where their children gathered to receive instruction from their teachers; it was where they could get advice on everyday questions concerning the observance of the commandments; it was where problems of the Halakah were discussed and resolved, and so on.

In addition to these religious functions, the synagogue also had an entirely secular role. It was where announcements were made that concerned the community; it acted as a kind of ‘lost property office’; it was the place where legal witnesses could be found. In other words, the synagogue fulfilled the functions of a secular as well as a religious centre, and of a civil administration. In addition, there was its role of providing accommodation for visitors, especially in the synagogues of minority Jewish communities (Landsmannschaften), and in the Diaspora.

We find numerous references to synagogues and their functions in Philo, Josephus, the New Testament and rabbinic literature. Archaeological finds have also substantially enriched our knowledge of synagogues. Above all, in the last eighty years a wide-ranging literature has dealt with the different aspects of synagogues, from the explanation of individual words in synagogue inscriptions to monographs treating their origin and all the problems related to their study.

The period under discussion coincides roughly with what is usually called the Early Roman or Herodian period. While the former term is quite accurate and somewhat neutral, the latter is rather more appropriate. Our period bears the sharp imprint of Herod and his dynastic successors, who ruled the country from 37 bce onward. Unlike many periods bearing the names of a monarch, but actually owing very little to him (e.g. ‘Edwardian’), many of the features of the Herodian period were indeed shaped by Herod himself – the greatest builder in the history of Palestine and one of the outstanding builders of all antiquity. Herod introduced new styles and building methods into the country and built on a monumental scale and to an unparalleled extent: cities, fortresses, palaces, a large harbour and the most magnificent building ever to be built in Palestine, the Jerusalem temple complex. Many of these monuments which were preserved because of their size or sacred character (e.g. the Temple Mount, the Cave of Machpelah) or because of their location in desert areas, where the remoteness and climate ensured their survival (e.g. Masada) have given us a better knowledge of the Herodian period than of any other period in the history of the country.

The beginning of modern research into this period was ushered in by the explorations of the American scholar Edward Robinson who, as early as 1838, noted in Jerusalem the skewback of an Herodian arch, now bearing his name, and correctly identified remains of the ‘Third Wall’ as well as the sites of Masada, Herodion and others. The Frenchman F. de Saulcy was the first to excavate in Jerusalem, clearing the so-called Tombs of the Kings in 1854, and in 1864 the British Charles Wilson began his series of soundings around the Temple Mount, thus initiating the modern scientific approach. Archaeological activity has hardly stopped ever since.

THE EVIDENCE

Two things of great historical importance certainly happened in Palestine during the first century ce. A Galilean miracle-man formed a group of followers which survived his crucifixion and became Christianity. A Jewish revolt led to the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, and so put an end to most powers of the priests and determined the development of Judaism as a religion without influential priesthood or public sacrifices.

While we are reasonably certain that these events occurred, their backgrounds and details are uncertain because of the inadequacy of sources and the ingenuity of scholars. For Jesus we are almost entirely dependent on the devotional utterances of Paul (c. 50) and the hagiographic accounts of the gospels (c. 75–100). Both Paul and the gospels preserve earlier material, but in such ways that the original elements and their dates, forms, and contents are uncertain. For the history of the country, the revolt and its immediate consequences we are similarly dependent on Josephus whose sources for most of this century were chiefly hearsay, his notes, and his memories – none of these reliable. Besides, he distorted them all to serve various motives (some of them discussed below) and his War was thoroughly edited (and many passages, especially the speeches, were written) by secretaries assigned to him by Titus. Josephus claims that Titus also signed the War and ordered it published (Vita 363, written after Titus was dead).

Titus', and perhaps Vespasian's, initial sponsorship of the War is commonly thought a consequence of the desire to prevent the big Jewish populations of Mesopotamia and Adiabene from trying to intervene in Palestine or using their influence to secure a Parthian invasion.

The importance of archaeological finds in enhancing our knowledge of the past is never more clearly demonstrated than in the late Hellenistic and Roman periods. The information from literary sources relating to this period is limited, and while the archaeological material is likewise far from abundant, it nevertheless contributes significantly to our understanding of specific Jewish communities.

The archaeological data from this period are diverse and include synagogue and funerary remains, as well as inscriptions, artistic representations, and small finds (glass, pottery, lamps, coins, medallions and amulets). The geography of these finds is equally diverse; material has been uncovered from the eastern frontiers of the Empire (Dura Europos) to the Bosporan kingdom, Delos, Asia Minor, Italy, North Africa and Egypt. Most remains from this period relate to the synagogue or proseuche (lit., house of prayer). A number of ancient Diaspora communities, particularly those of Alexandria and Egypt, have provided us with a significant amount of material regarding this Hellenistic and early Roman institution. Epigraphical evidence hails from as early as the third century bce, papyrological and archaeological data from the second century bce on-ward, and literary sources from the first century ce. Together they afford an intriguing, if only partial, picture of the role and status of this institution throughout the Hellenistic–Roman Diaspora.

The external appearance and internal organization of the synagogue bore some significant differences in various regions. The names by which communities referred to the synagogue may well reflect diverse perceptions of the institution and its place in society.

THE SOURCES

Any attempt at a theoretical reconstruction of Herod's Temple must be based on the available literary sources as well as the evidence produced by archaeology. The two main literary sources which we have are Flavius Josephus' descriptions of the Temple as given in Ant.xv.380–425 and Bell.v.184–227 as well as several additional references to its history given by Josephus and, secondly, the various descriptions recorded in the Mishnah, especially that given in m. Mid. which contains a general description of the Temple and m. Tamid,i:1–3. In addition, several New Testament passages mention the beauty of Herod's building (Mark 13:1; Luke 21:5), while ‘Solomon's Portico’ is mentioned in John 10:23.

Research in the vicinity of the Temple itself, especially the work of the last hundred years, has been limited to the outer walls of the Temple Mount. Owing to the existence of Muslim shrines on the Mount, no excavations were ever carried out there. Sir Charles Warren pioneered scientific investigation of the Temple area, and his publication, describing work carried out during the years 1867–70, is still considered a prime source, a ‘text-book’ on the subject. More recent studies, however, have added to Warren's architectural discoveries and have yielded many new finds which help us to gain a clearer conception of daily life in the Temple.

THE HISTORY OF THE TEMPLE

The building of the Temple began either in Herod's eighteenth regnal year (Ant. xv. 380ff) or in the fifteenth (Bell. i.401), with the former date seemingly the more probable, that is, 20/19 bce. The work continued for nine and a half years (Ant. xv.420 –1), with the construction of the outer walls and porticoes taking eight years and the building of the Temple itself a year and a half.

PALESTINE UNDER POMPEY AND CAESAR; JOHN HYRCANUS II, HIGH PRIEST

The end of the Seleucid dynasty and the reduction of Syria to a Roman province were among the consequences of Pompey's victory over Tigranes of Armenia (66 bce). The political and territorial reorganization of the whole region (all the more necessary as the Roman power was now coming into direct contact with the Parthian empire) was bound to involve the Hasmonaean kingdom too. Here, after the death of Queen Alexandra Salome (67 bce), a dynastic struggle had broken out openly between her two sons, Hyrcanus (II) and Aristobulus (II), and this also drew in, in various ways, the different Jewish politico-religious groups and regional interests. The intervention on Hyrcanus' side of the Nabataean King Aretas, procured by Antipater governor of Idumaea with the promise of territorial compensation, had brought about the expulsion of Aristobulus in 65 bce. Roman interference in the affairs of the kingdom, undertaken at first by Pompey's Quaestor M. Aemilius Scaurus (65–64 bce) and the legate A. Gabinius, then by Pompey himself in 63 bce, was accepted more or less willingly by the two contenders, who vied for the favour and support of their new masters, with alternating results, by means which included valuable gifts. Before Pompey at Damascus the two rivals argued their cases: Hyrcanus, supported by Antipater and numerous prominent personages, relied on the rights of dynastic legality and accused Aristobulus of fomenting piracy and attacks on neighbouring peoples. Aristobulus maintained that his brother was incapable of governing.

During the period of the second temple (520 bce to ce 70) Judaism remained loyal to the past while sowing seeds for the future. It continued to maintain the temple, the priesthood, and the sacrificial cult, the legacies of the religion of pre-exilic Israel, but it also invented an institution of a completely different type, the synagogue. After the destruction of the second temple in ce 70, the synagogue gradually assumed a larger and larger role in Jewish society and consciousness. The synagogue is an enduring contribution of the second temple period to the history of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The origin of the synagogue is unknown, and, without a new discovery equal in magnitude to the Dead Sea scrolls, unknowable. The widely accepted theory that the synagogue originated in the sixth century bce during the Babylonian exile as a replacement for the Jerusalem temple seems plausible and attractive but is unsubstantiated and overly simplistic. Unsubstantiated, because it is not supported by a single ancient source. Overly simplistic, because it assigns to a single time and place the origin of a most complex institution. The earliest extant reference to a synagogue is an inscription from Upper Egypt from the third century bce which uses the term proseuche, ‘prayer(-house)’. The earliest known Judaean synagogue is the building erected in Jerusalem by one Theodotus in the first century bce or ce ‘for the reading of the law and the teaching of the commandments’, not, apparently, for the recitation of prayer. Ancient synagogues also served as assembly halls or community centres, much as the temple itself often did.

Rome's acquisition of a territorial empire in the eastern Mediterranean between the mid second and the mid first century bce put all the numerous Diaspora communities of Greece, the Aegean islands, Crete, Cyprus, Asia Minor, Syria, and Cyrenaica under her rule. The annexation of Egypt in 30 bce, closing the only gap in the ring of provinces bordering the Mediterranean, brought into the empire what was probably the largest of all Diaspora communities at the time, that of Alexandria, as well as many smaller Jewish settlements up-country in Egypt. In the west the Jewish community in Rome, apparently dating back at least to the mid second century, was dramatically enlarged in 62 bce when Pompey returned from eastern campaigns which had included the capture of Jerusalem with thousands of Jewish prisoners-of-war, who were sold into slavery after walking in his triumphal procession and later, on regaining their freedom by manumission, settled permanently in the city.

With the annexation of the province of Judaea in ce 6, all Jews except the Babylonian Diaspora were under Roman rule. The pax Romana and the improvements in communications which followed the expansion of Roman power throughout the Mediterranean world facilitated movement and the development of Diaspora communities in Italy and the western provinces. No date or origin can be assigned to the numerous settlements eventually known in the west, and some may have been founded as a result of the dispersal of Palestinian Jews after the revolts of ce 66–70 and 132–5, but it is reasonable to conjecture that many, such as the settlement in Puteoli attested in 4 bce, went back to the late republic or early empire and originated in voluntary emigration and the lure of trade and commerce.

There has been a veritable explosion of archaeological activity in Israel since the 1967 war. With the temporary acquisition of new lands major new surveys were conducted in Sinai, the Golan Heights, and in Judaea and Samaria. Most of the results of these activities have been published internally within the structure of the Israel Antiquities Authority and informally in Hebrew, though several surveys have been published in English. The serious student of Palestinian archaeology can make much of this material providing she or he has access to the original files of the Antiquities Authority, where all reports are deposited and recorded.

The Israel Antiquities Authority and its museums publish a schedule of archaeological sites in its gazetteer, Yalqut Ha-pirsumim. The schedule is a legal document used by the Authority to declare archaeological sites subject to protection against destruction by such things as vandalism or building or agricultural projects.

The present list, published on 18 May 1964, is mainly the Hebrew translation of ‘The Provisional Schedule of Historical Sites and Monuments’ first published in The Palestine Official Gazette on 15 June 1929, and then updated on 24 November 1944, by the British Mandatary government. Containing only the names of sites within the so-called Green Line – that is, within the pre-1967 borders of Israel – the list has been corrected and repeatedly updated since its original publication and is now available on computer as a database at the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Because it records the history of site names since the survey of the Palestine Exploration Fund in the nineteenth century, this publication can be very helpful for site identification.

GNOTICISM

Jewish elements in gnosticism: the problem defined

It should be obvious even from a cursory reading of Gnostic literature that there are Jewish elements in Gnosticism. These elements are of many different kinds, and may be classified in many different ways, but for our present purposes it will be sufficient to distinguish two broad categories – biblical and non-biblical. To the first category belong the quotations from, or allusions to, the Old Testament in the Gnostic texts. (For convenience we may include here also much Gnostic exegesis of the Old Testament.) Into the second category may be put all those Gnostic ideas, motifs, literary genres, technical terms and formulae which have been paralleled more or less convincingly in post-biblical Jewish literature. It is important to realize that the significance of an element will vary according to the category into which it falls. The Jewishness of elements in category one is not, in the last analysis, open to question. We may speculate on how Old Testament materials found their way into Gnosticism (whether through Christianity, pre-Christian Jewish Gnosticism, or by direct borrowing from Judaism), but that they are Jewish can hardly be disputed. The Jewishness of elements in category two, on the other hand, is often problematic. We are dealing here in the first instance with parallelism, and that creates a host of problems. We must establish that the parallelism we perceive is real and significant – in itself no small task. Then we must face the question of origins: who has borrowed from whom? There is a tendency for scholars to assume that in cases of parallelism Gnosticism is indebted to Judaism.

DEFINING APOCALYPTIC

Much of the material in the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha dealt with in chapter 12 in volume ii is concerned with what is referred to as apocalyptic. This is an aspect of Judaism over which there has been much dispute as to its interpretation and significance, and it is appropriate at this point in the history to attempt to assess it. This is not because, as has sometimes been erroneously asserted, apocalyptic became a spent force after the Roman period: it continued, and broke out with volcanic intensity in the Sabbatianism of the seventeenth century and is still alive. An assessment is necessary here for another reason. The increasingly dominant Rabbinic form of Judaism, which gained ascendancy after the collapse of the revolts against Rome in the first century, overshadowed apocalyptic, sometimes aggressively rejected it and often came to regard concentration upon it as a menace. Perhaps particularly under the vast influence of the great work of G. F. Moore, who had reacted against what he considered an over-concentration on apocalyptic to the neglect of Rabbinic sources, the view became common that, like Seventh Day Adventism, for example, within contemporary Christianity, apocalyptic belonged to the fringes of Judaism. As a result it was urged that apocalyptic materials should not be taken as representative of essential Judaism: this distinction was reserved for more strictly Rabbinic sources.

This view was contested by W. D. Davies and others who rejected any sharp distinction between Pharisaic or Rabbinic Judaism and apocalyptic. And in recent years there has been renewed interest in apocalyptic and in its place in Jewish and Christian theology.

Whereas Judaism represents a highly distinctive phenomenon, especially in the history of religions, in several phases of its evolution it was exposed to outside influences. Already in earlier eras the geographical position of Syria and Palestine meant that the area was very open to commercial and cultural penetration from the direction of both Mesopotamia and Egypt, and of this there is abundant archaeological evidence. The early Israelite experience of Egypt is reflected in the traditions concerning Abraham's sojourn in that country and Joseph's splendid career there, however shadowy the historical background may seem, as well as in the much more fundamental impact of the tradition concerning Moses and the Exodus. Judaism belongs to a period of increasingly intimate contacts with other peoples. During the Persian period Jewish soldiers served their Persian masters in many areas, and their garrison at Elephantine on Egypt's southern border has well illustrated the tendencies which were apparent in the Diaspora. When Persian power yielded to Alexander and his successors, an era of quickened converse between nations ensued; and under Rome and Byzantium the process gathered still further momentum.

SOME EQYPTIAN RELIGIOUS CONCEPTS

It was in religion that Egypt exercised her most potent attraction. For close on three thousand years the religion of Pharaonic Egypt was preeminently a national religion. Theologically it was firmly linked to kingship, for each Pharaoh was in life equated with the national god Horus, while in death he became Osiris, the father of Horus; he was also called the son of Rê.

THE SOURCES

Unlike the Pharisees and the Essenes, the Sadducees left no writings. Some scholars have thought to discover a Sadducaean tendency in First Maccabees, but it certainly cannot be considered a Sadducaean book. All the texts on the Sadducees at our disposal were written by their opponents or, at the least, by outsiders. They are necessarily selective and tendentious. Our main witness is Flavius Josephus who, being a scion of a high-ranking priestly family, might be expected to be close to the Sadducees or, at the least, to have inside information about them. He says that in his youth he tested the Sadducaean teaching and way of life, but his writings betray no special knowledge of them. He speaks of the Sadducees almost exclusively in connection with the other groups of the Judaism of his time.

The New Testament provides the earliest references to the Sadducees, in the Gospel of Mark. This gospel frequently names them among the opponents of Jesus, but it does not develop a coherent picture of them. For the New Testament, the Sadducees are entirely secondary to the Pharisees, who are represented as the main group of Judaism and the only important opponents of Jesus.

The Rabbinic sources frequently mention the Sadducees. But these texts have to be used with extreme caution: one has to discard those texts in which the term Sadducees replaces an original mín (which had to be removed because of Church censorship); only a few Tannaitic texts remain, and even they are not fully reliable historically; later texts display no specific knowledge of the historical Sadducees and offer clichés without revealing new information that can be trusted.

LIFE

Few scholars have been neutral in their judgement of the life of Josephus. In the nineteenth century there was an almost unanimous condemnation of him by Jews and Christians alike, a major exception being the Jewish scholar Hamburger, who regarded Josephus' own steadfast adherence to Judaism and his able literary defence of its tenets as providing sufficient ground for pardoning his supposed wrongs to the Jewish people.

Aside from Josephus' own autobiography and the references to his career in the Jewish War, the sources for his life are slight. Among pagan writers Suetonius (Vespasian 5.6), Appian (fragment 17) and Dio Cassius (lxvi.1) mention Josephus' prediction that Vespasian would become emperor; and Porphyry (De abstinentia et esu animalium iv.11) cites Josephus' discussion of the three philosophical schools. Perhaps the silence of the Talmud about him is due to the fact that he was an ‘outsider’, though Brüll has attempted to find a hidden reference to him in a minor Talmudic tractate (Der. Er. Rab. 5, Pirke Ben Azzai 3) which mentions a visit of several sages to a nameless (to be sure, pagan) philosopher in Rome seeking his intercession with the Emperor Domitian.

We know nothing of Josephus' life until the age of fourteen, when, according to Josephus (Vita 8), the chief priests and leaders of the city of Jerusalem constantly resorted to him for information concerning the laws. This is, however, a traditional motif in biographies, as we see, for example, in Luke 2:46–7.