Globalization and the “Hellenization” of Jews in the Second Temple Period

Abstract

The phrase “Hellenistic Judaism” often assumes an underlying picture of the relationship between “Judaism” and “Hellenism” as self-contained cultural containers. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Philip Alexander, Gregory Sterling, and Erich Gruen argued against such an assumption, and their work moved towards developing theories of globalization, which regard cultures as porous and dynamic. Beginning from the insights of these three scholars, I argue that globalization theory has advantages for the study of Jews in the Hellenistic Mediterranean oikoumenē, which moves beyond static notions of Judaism and Hellenism and prompts questions of whether Hellenization works as an analytical category. In order to illustrate the case, I examine three Jewish writers—the author of the Letter of Aristeas, the sage Joshua Ben Sira, and his translator/grandson—and how their knowledge and use of Greek language and sources demonstrates both the homogenizing and disjunctive aspects of globalization in the Hellenistic period.