Simeon the Righteous meets Alexander the Great | Through Rabbinic Eyes | Prof. Amram Tropper

“A Great King like Yourself should Bow Down before this Jew?”
In 332 BCE Alexander the Great conquered Tyre and Gaza, and, according to Josephus Flavius, Alexander also met the Jewish high priest Jaddua at that time. The rabbis tell a rather different version of this encounter. By focusing on some key differences between the parallel accounts, we hope to show how the rabbis enlisted a biblical literary model as they molded the legend of Alexander anew in line with a distinctive political ideology.
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The rabbinic sages of late antiquity produced the vast and kaleidoscopic corpus we call rabbinic literature. This literature reveals that the rabbis were jurists and educators, storytellers and biblical interpreters, but not historians. While the rabbis inherited the Hebrew Bible and much lore from the Second Temple period, they did not aspire to examine the historical credibility of their traditions of the past or to corroborate their traditions with independent sources. Instead, the rabbis reworked their traditions, making them relevant and meaningful to their audiences. In this lecture series, we will spotlight the rabbis’ literary creativity, seeking to reveal the varied sources and literary materials which inspired the rabbinic authors as they composed stories about the time of the Second Temple. Focusing on four fascinating narratives, we will explore the Second Temple period through rabbinic eyes.
Prof. Amram Tropper, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Jewish History at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
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