This project builds on the observations of Begg and Feldman by examining how Josephus ensures prophetic accuracy in his account of 2 Kings 3 in Antiquities 9.3.29-44. It examines the questions of Josephus’s source material for this account and the significant issues in the biblical account Elisha’s prophecy of victory before tracing the steps that Josephus takes to ensure its accuracy in Antiquities for his audience. Josephus slightly alters his Hebrew source in order to allow for the campaign’s final retreat and strengthens the connection between 2 Kings 3 with 1 Kings 22:1-40 by adding the concepts of true and false prophecy and rendering Elisha’s address to Joram in 2 Kings 3:13 as sarcasm. These steps, designed to persuade his audience to believe his apologetic account of Jewish history, allow Josephus to preserve the connection between prophecy and history that he makes throughout Antiquities.
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Christopher T. Begg, “The ‘Classical Prophets’ in Josephus’ Antiquities,” in “The Place Is Too Small for Us”: The Israelite Prophets in Recent Scholarship, ed. Robert P. Gordon, Sources for Biblical and Theological Study 5 (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1995), 547-62 at 561. Ferda has also noted this relationship: Tucker S. Ferda, “Jeremiah 7 and Flavius Josephus on the First Jewish War,” jsj 44 (2013): 158-73, esp. 159.
Begg, “The ‘Classical Prophets’ in Josephus’s Antiquities,” 551-54.
Ibid., 560.
Ibid., 399.
Ibid., 394.
Begg, “Filling in the Blanks,” 107; Etienne Nodet, “The Text of 1-2 Kings Used by Josephus,” in The Books of Kings: Sources, Composition, Historiography, and Reception, ed. André Lemaire, Baruch Halpern, and Matthew Joel Adams, VTSup 129 (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 41-66, esp. 50.
Jesse C. Long Jr. and Mark Sneed, “ ‘Yahweh Has Given These Three Kings into the Hand of Moab’: A Socio-Literary Reading of 2 Kings 3,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert H. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, lhbots 378 (London: T&T Clark, 2004), 253-75, esp. 261.
Long and Sneed, “ ‘Yahweh Has Given These Three Kings into the Hand of Moab,’ ” 261.
Morschauser, “A ‘Diagnostic’ Note on the ‘Great Wrath upon Israel’ in 2 Kings 3,” 300-301.
Robert B. Chisholm Jr., “Israel’s Retreat and the Failure of Prophecy in 2 Kings 3,” Bib 92 (2011): 70-80, esp. 72.
Berlyn, “The Wrath of Moab,” 222; Terrance E. Fretheim, First and Second Kings, wbc (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1999), 142; A.D.H. Mayes, Deuteronomy, ncb (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979), 296.
Jonathan Klawans, Josephus and the Theologies of Ancient Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 3; Edwin M. Yamauchi, “Josephus and the Scriptures,” Fides et Historia 13 (1980): 42-63, esp. 45. Begg, “Filling in the Blanks,” 96.
Louis H. Feldman, “Josephus’ Portrait of Elisha,” NovT 36 (1994): 1-28, esp. 3.
Chisholm, “Israel’s Retreat and the Failure of Prophecy in 2 Kings 3,” 72.
Sprinkle, “2 Kings 3,” 253; John R. Bartlett, “The ‘United’ Campaign Against Moab in 2 Kings 3:4-27,” in Midian, Moab and Edom: The History and Archaeology of Late Bronze and Iron Age Jordan and North-West Arabia, ed. John F.A. Sawyer and David J.A. Clines, lhbots 24 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1983), 135-46, esp. 135; Chisholm, “Israel’s Retreat and the Failure of Prophecy in 2 Kings 3,” 76; Long, “Elisha’s Deceptive Prophecy in 2 Kings 3,” 170; Erasmus Gass, “Topographical Considerations and Redaction Criticism in 2 Kings 3,” jbl 128 (2009): 65-84, esp. 81.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
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This project builds on the observations of Begg and Feldman by examining how Josephus ensures prophetic accuracy in his account of 2 Kings 3 in Antiquities 9.3.29-44. It examines the questions of Josephus’s source material for this account and the significant issues in the biblical account Elisha’s prophecy of victory before tracing the steps that Josephus takes to ensure its accuracy in Antiquities for his audience. Josephus slightly alters his Hebrew source in order to allow for the campaign’s final retreat and strengthens the connection between 2 Kings 3 with 1 Kings 22:1-40 by adding the concepts of true and false prophecy and rendering Elisha’s address to Joram in 2 Kings 3:13 as sarcasm. These steps, designed to persuade his audience to believe his apologetic account of Jewish history, allow Josephus to preserve the connection between prophecy and history that he makes throughout Antiquities.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 322 | 54 | 10 |
Full Text Views | 272 | 6 | 0 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 99 | 14 | 1 |