1. Philo of Alexandria, Against Flaccus, 20, 30 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Isidorus • Isidorus, as anti-Jewish adviser
Found in books: Dijkstra and Raschle (2020), Religious Violence in the Ancient World: From Classical Athens to Late Antiquity, 54; Schliesser et al. (2021), Alexandria: Hub of the Hellenistic World. 38, 149, 252; Van der Horst (2014), Studies in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity, 49, 50
| sup>
20 for they became executors of all the plans which they had devised, treating him like a mute person on the stage, as one who was only, by way of making up the show, inscribed with the title of authority, being themselves a lot of Dionysiuses, demagogues, and of Lampos, a pack of cavillers and word-splitters; and of Isidoruses, sowers of sedition, busy-bodies, devisers of evil, troublers of the state; for this is the name which has, at last, been given to them. 30 And then again his friends and companions came and stirred up the miserable Flaccus, inviting, and exciting, and stimulating him to feel the same envy with themselves; saying, "The arrival of this man to take upon him his government is equivalent to a deposition of yourself. He is invested with a greater dignity of honour and glory than you. He attracts all eyes towards himself when they see the array of sentinels and bodyguards around him adorned with silvered and gilded arms. ' None |
|
2. Philo of Alexandria, On The Embassy To Gaius, 67, 166, 355-367 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Isidorus • Isidorus, as anti-Jewish adviser
Found in books: Dijkstra and Raschle (2020), Religious Violence in the Ancient World: From Classical Athens to Late Antiquity, 54; Edwards (2023), In the Court of the Gentiles: Narrative, Exemplarity, and Scriptural Adaptation in the Court-Tales of Flavius Josephus, 144, 146, 148; Schliesser et al. (2021), Alexandria: Hub of the Hellenistic World. 149; Van der Horst (2014), Studies in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity, 51
| sup>
67 and then again, by a sudden change (for the multitude is very unstable in everything, in intentions, and words, and actions), men, disbelieving that one who but a little while before was merciful and humane could have become altered so entirely, for Gaius had been looked upon as affable, and sociable, and friendly, began to seek for excuses for him, and after some search they found such, saying with regard to his cousin and co-heir in the kingdom things such as these:
166 The greater portion of these men ere Egyptians, wicked, worthless men, who had imprinted the venom and evil disposition of their native asps and crocodiles on their own souls, and gave a faithful representation of them there. And the leader of the whole Egyptian troops, like the coryphaeus of a chorus, was a man of the name of Helicon, an accursed and infamous slave, who had been introduced into the imperial household to its ruin; for he had acquired a slight smattering of the encyclical sciences, by imitation of and rivalry with his former master, who gave him to Tiberius Caesar. 355 And while he was triumphing in these super-human appellations, the sycophant Isidorus, seeing the temper in which he was, said, "O master, you will hate with still juster vehemence these men whom you see before you and their fellow countrymen, if you are made acquainted with their disaffection and disloyalty towards yourself; for when all other men were offering up sacrifices of thanksgiving for your safety, these men alone refused to offer any sacrifice at all; and when I say, \'these men,\' I comprehend all the rest of the Jews." 356 And when we all cried out with one accord, "O Lord Gaius, we are falsely accused; for we did sacrifice, and we offered up entire hecatombs, the blood of which we poured in a libation upon the altar, and the flesh we did not carry to our homes to make a feast and banquet upon it, as it is the custom of some people to do, but we committed the victims entire to the sacred flame as a burnt offering: and we have done this three times already, and not once only; on the first occasion when you succeeded to the empire, and the second time when you recovered from that terrible disease with which all the habitable world was afflicted at the same time, and the third time we sacrificed in hope of your victory over the Germans." 357 "Grant," said he, "that all this is true, and that you did sacrifice; nevertheless you sacrificed to another god and not for my sake; and then what good did you do me? Moreover you did not sacrifice to me." Immediately a profound shuddering came upon us the first moment that we heard this expression, similar to that which overwhelmed us when we first came into his presence. 358 And while he was saying this he entered into the outer buildings, examining the chambers of the men and the chambers of the women, and the rooms on the ground floor, and all the apartments in the upper story, and blaming some points of their preparation as defective, and planning alterations and suggesting designs, and giving orders himself to make them more costly 359 and then we being driven about in this way followed him up and down through the whole place, being mocked and ridiculed by our adversaries like people at a play in the theatre; for indeed the whole matter was a kind of farce: the judge assumed the part of an accuser, and the accusers the part of an unjust judge, who look upon the defendants with an eye of hostility, and act in accordance with the nature of truth. ' "360 And when a judge invested with such mighty power begins to reproach the person who is on his trial before him it is necessary to be silent; for it is possible even to defend one's self in silence, and especially for people who are able to make no reply on any of the subjects which he was not investigating and desiring to understand, inasmuch as our laws and our customs restrained our tongues, and shut and sewed up our mouths. " '361 But when he had given some of his orders about the buildings, he then asked a very important and solemn question; "why is it that you abstain from eating pig\'s flesh?" And then again at this question such a violent laughter was raised by our adversaries, partly because they were really delighted, and partly as they wished to court the emperor out of flattery, and therefore wished to make it appear that this question was dictated by wit and uttered with grace, that some of the servants who were following him were indigt at their appearing to treat the emperor with so little respect, since it was not safe for his most intimate friends to do so much as smile at his words. 362 And when we made answer that, "different nations have different laws, and there are some things of which the use of forbidden both to us and to our adversaries;" and when some one said, "there are also many people who do not eat lamb\'s flesh which is the most tender of all meat," he laughed and said, "they are quite right, for it is not nice." 363 Being joked with and trifled with and ridiculed in this manner, we were in great perplexity; and at last he said in a rapid and peremptory manner, "I desire to know what principles of justice you recognise with regard to your constitution." 364 And when we began to reply to him and to explain it, he, as soon as he had a taste of our pleading on the principles of justice, and as soon as he perceived that our arguments were not contemptible, before we could bring forward the more important things which we had to say, cut us short and ran forward and burst into the principal building, and as soon as he had entered he commanded the windows which were around it to be filled up with the transparent pebbles very much resembling white crystal which do not hinder the light, but which keep out the wind and the heat of the sun. 365 Then proceeding on deliberately he asked in a more moderate tone, "What are you saying?" And when we began to connect our reply with what we had said before, he again ran on and went into another house, in which he had commanded some ancient and admirable pictures to be placed. 366 But when our pleadings on behalf of justice were thus broken up, and cut short, and interrupted, and crushed as one may almost say, we, being wearied and exhausted, and having no strength left in us, but being in continual expectation of nothing else than death, could not longer keep our hearts as they had been, but in our agony we took refuge in supplications to the one true God, praying him to check the wrath of this falsely called god. 3
67 And he took compassion on us, and turned his mind to pity. And he becoming pacified merely said, "These men do not appear to me to be wicked so much as unfortunate and foolish, in not believing that I have been endowed with the nature of God;" and so he dismissed us, and commanded us to depart. XLVI. ' None |
|
3. Josephus Flavius, Jewish Antiquities, 18.257-18.260 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Isidorus • Isidorus, as anti-Jewish adviser
Found in books: Edwards (2023), In the Court of the Gentiles: Narrative, Exemplarity, and Scriptural Adaptation in the Court-Tales of Flavius Josephus, 144, 147; Schliesser et al. (2021), Alexandria: Hub of the Hellenistic World. 149
sup>
18.257 Καὶ δὴ στάσεως ἐν ̓Αλεξανδρείᾳ γενομένης ̓Ιουδαίων τε οἳ ἐνοικοῦσι καὶ ̔Ελλήνων τρεῖς ἀφ' ἑκατέρας τῆς στάσεως πρεσβευταὶ αἱρεθέντες παρῆσαν ὡς τὸν Γάιον. καὶ ἦν γὰρ τῶν ̓Αλεξανδρέων πρέσβεων εἷς ̓Απίων, ὃς πολλὰ εἰς τοὺς ̓Ιουδαίους ἐβλασφήμησεν ἄλλα τε λέγων καὶ ὡς τῶν Καίσαρος τιμῶν περιορῷεν:" '18.258 πάντων γοῦν ὁπόσοι τῇ ̔Ρωμαίων ἀρχῇ ὑποτελεῖς εἶεν βωμοὺς τῷ Γαί̈ῳ καὶ νεὼς ἱδρυμένων τά τε ἄλλα πᾶσιν αὐτὸν ὥσπερ τοὺς θεοὺς δεχομένων, μόνους τούσδε ἄδοξον ἡγεῖσθαι ἀνδριᾶσι τιμᾶν καὶ ὅρκιον αὐτοῦ τὸ ὄνομα ποιεῖσθαι.' "18.259 πολλὰ δὲ καὶ χαλεπὰ ̓Απίωνος εἰρηκότος, ὑφ' ὧν ἀρθῆναι ἤλπιζεν τὸν Γάιον καὶ εἰκὸς ἦν, Φίλων ὁ προεστὼς τῶν ̓Ιουδαίων τῆς πρεσβείας, ἀνὴρ τὰ πάντα ἔνδοξος ̓Αλεξάνδρου τε τοῦ ἀλαβάρχου ἀδελφὸς ὢν καὶ φιλοσοφίας οὐκ ἄπειρος, οἷός τε ἦν ἐπ' ἀπολογίᾳ χωρεῖν τῶν κατηγορημένων. διακλείει δ' αὐτὸν Γάιος κελεύσας ἐκποδὼν ἀπελθεῖν," " None | sup>
18.257 1. There was now a tumult arisen at Alexandria, between the Jewish inhabitants and the Greeks; and three ambassadors were chosen out of each party that were at variance, who came to Caius. Now one of these ambassadors from the people of Alexandria was Apion, who uttered many blasphemies against the Jews; and, among other things that he said, he charged them with neglecting the honors that belonged to Caesar; 18.258 for that while all who were subject to the Roman empire built altars and temples to Caius, and in other regards universally received him as they received the gods, these Jews alone thought it a dishonorable thing for them to erect statues in honor of him, as well as to swear by his name. 18.259 Many of these severe things were said by Apion, by which he hoped to provoke Caius to anger at the Jews, as he was likely to be. But Philo, the principal of the Jewish embassage, a man eminent on all accounts, brother to Alexander the alabarch, and one not unskillful in philosophy, was ready to betake himself to make his defense against those accusations;' ' None |
|
