Live and Be Well: A Celebration of Yiddish Culture in America Book

Josephus was an important Jewish historian from the late 1st century. Four of his texts are extant. The Jewish War is a description of the disastrous Jewish rebellion of 66 AD. The second, The Antiquities of the Jews, is a summary of Jewish history from Genesis up to the outbreak of the war. This book contains Josephus' two minor works: an autobiography and Against Apion, a defense of Judaism against its Roman critics.

Personally, I don't find Josephus to be a gifted writer. His prose comes across as stuffy and laborious - although this is probably (in part) because his last major translator died in the 18th century. So for me, his texts sink or swim based off of their historical interest. The Autobiography largely fails this test. It was written, at least in part, as a defense against attacks from Justus of Tiberius. Josephus was an easy target after the failure of the Jewish rebellion, as he gave himself up to the Romans rather than commit suicide and became more or less an agent of the Empire. As a result, the bulk of the Autobiography is concerned with defending Josephus' conduct during his time as a general in Galilee. Most of the interesting bits were covered in The Jewish War, so if you've read that this is largely a rehash.

Against Apion looked more promising. I thought this might be an interesting defense against 1st century anti-Semitism. But for the first half it is mostly concerned with proving that Jewish culture is at least as old as Greek culture (mission accomplished, FWIW). It picks up a bit in the second half. A few Gentile rumors are deftly defused, including one eye-opener where the Jews would supposedly capture a Greek citizen, keep him in the temple to fatten him up for a year, then sacrifice him (even eating him!). Josephus skewers these myths with admirable sarcasm, and also turns the tables by exposing the ludicrousness of some of the Greco-Roman beliefs, including the exploits of one Zeus/Jupiter himself:

" [T]he chief of all their gods, and their first father himself, overlooks those goddesses whom he hath deluded and begotten with child, and suffers them to be kept in prison, or drowned in the sea. He is also so bound up by fate, that he cannot save his own offspring, nor can he bear their deaths without shedding of tears. These are fine things indeed! as are the rest that follow. Adulteries truly are so impudently looked on in heaven by the gods, that some of them have confessed they envied those that were found in the very act. And why should they not do so, when the eldest of them, who is their king also, hath not been able to restrain himself in the violence of his lust, from lying with his wife, so long as they might get into their bedchamber?"

/drops mic

But, for the most part, this is dedicated to showing that Judaism is an old belief system, and it's not going to scintillate the average reader.

Having gone through Josephus' whole corpus, the only text I'd recommend to general readers is The Jewish War, and even that I'd only recommend to readers specifically interested in 1st century history. Jewish Antiquities has some notable passages, but they are buried in a long, uninspired presentation of history that will put all but the most determined readers to sleep. That text is of great interest for historians as a primary source, but it's not particularly engaging. As for these minor works? If you've made it through the first two texts, and aren't completely sick of Josephus' style, they're worth a read. They are much shorter than his major works, and each have their interesting moments. But there's simply not a lot to recommend here. 2 stars.