View source for Joseph Ben-Gorion


Joseph Ben-Gorion <ref name="term_46581" />
<p> (also called Josippon), is the name of the reputed author of the celebrated [[Hebrew]] chronicle '''''סֵפֶר''''' '''''יוֹסַיפוֹן''''' , ''The Book Of Josippon,'' or '''''הָעַבֵרַי''''' '''''יוֹסַיפוֹן''''' , the Hebrew Josippon, a work which, by the statement of the author, is placed in the sera of Christ, for he says of himself that he is "the priest of Jerusalem" (and this can refer only to the celebrated [[Jewish]] historian Flavius [[Josephus]] [q.v.]), and furthermore that he was appointed governor of the whole Jewish nation by Titus; and from the days of Saadia (A.D. 950) up to our own time it was quoted both by Jewish and [[Christian]] writers as a genuine work of Josephus. Of late, however, critical inquiry has determined the work to be a production of the Middle Ages. The conjecture is that the author was a Jew, and that he flourished about the 9th or 10th century. Zunz, in the Zeitschrift. f. Wissenschaft. d. Judenth. (Berl. 1822, p. 300 sq.), asserted that [[Joseph]] ben-Gorion flourished in the 9th century, and that his work must since his day have undergone frequent emendations and alterations. Later Zunz (in his notes on [[Benjamin]] of Tudela, ed. Asher, 1841, 2, 246) changed his opinion somewhat, and regarded Joseph as "the [Hebrew] translator and editor of Josephus," and assigns him to "the middle of the latter half of the 10th century," and says of him that his accounts of several nations of his time are as important as his orthography of [[Italian]] towns is remarkable." To the same period Steinschneider (Jewish Liter., London, 1857, p. 77) also assigns the work, but he believes the author to have been a native. of Northern Italy, and considers the chronicle "the Hebrew edition of the Latin Hegesippus," and "an offshoot from the fully developed [[Midrash]] of [[Arabian]] and Latin literature." A still more modern critic, the celebrated Jewish historian Gr '''''Ä''''' tz (Gesch. d. Juden, 5, 281, and note 4 in the Appendix of the same volume), holds that the Jewish book, which he also assigns to the 10th century, is simply a translation of an Arabic book of Maccabees, entitled History of the [[Maccabees]] of Joseph ben-Gorion (of which parts were published in the Polyglots, Paris, 1645; Lend. 1657) under the title of the Arabic book of Maccabees, and which is extant in two MSS. in the Bodleian library (Uri ''Catalogue,'' Nos. 782, 829), made by a skilful Italian Jew, who enriched it with many original additions. His reason for assigning it to the earlier part of the 10th century is that Danash b.-Tanaim (who flourished about 955) knew the work and spoke of parts of it (comp. Milman's Gibbon, [[Decline]] and Fall of the Roman Empire, 2, 6, note). </p> <p> But as to the chronicle itself. It consists of six books. It begins its record with Adam; explains the genealogical table in [[Genesis]] 11; then passes on to the history of Rome, Babylon, Cyrus, and the fall of Babylon; resumes again the history of the Jews; describes the times of Daniel, Zerubbabel, Esther, etc.; gives an account of [[Alexander]] the Great, his connection, his exploits, and expeditions of his successors; and then continues the history of the Jews; of Heliodorus's assault on the Temple; the translation of the O.T. into Greek; the deeds of the Maccabees; the events of the Herodians; and the last war which terminated in the destruction of the [[Temple]] by Titus. The authorities quoted in this remarkable book are: </p> <p> '''1.''' [[Nicolaus]] the Damascene; </p> <p> '''2.''' [[Strabo]] of Cappadocia; </p> <p> '''3.''' Titus Livius; </p> <p> '''4.''' Togthas of Jerusalem; </p> <p> '''5.''' Porophius of Rome; </p> <p> '''6.''' The history of Alexander, written in the year of his death by Magi; </p> <p> '''7.''' The book of the antediluvian patriarch [[Cainan]] b.-Enos; </p> <p> '''8.''' Books of the Greeks, Medians, Persians, and Macedonians; </p> <p> '''9.''' [[Epistle]] of Alexander to [[Aristotle]] about the wonders of India; </p> <p> '''10.''' Treaties of alliance of the Romans: </p> <p> '''11.''' Cicero, who was in the [[Holy]] of Holies of the Temple during the reign of Pompey; </p> <p> '''12.''' The intercalary years of [[Julius]] Caesar, composed for the [[Nazarites]] and Greeks; '''13.''' The chronicles of the Roman emperors; '''14.''' The constitutional diploma which [[Vespasian]] venerated so highly that he kissed every page of it; </p> <p> '''15''' ''.'' The [[Alexandrian]] [[Library]] with its 995 volumes; </p> <p> '''16.''' Jewish histories which are lost;. and, </p> <p> '''17.''' The national traditions which have been translated orally. </p> <p> The first printed edition of this work appeared in Mantua, 1476-1479, with a preface by [[Abraham]] ben-Salmon Conato. A reprint of this edition (the text vitiated), with a Latin version by M '''''Ü''''' nster, was published at Basle, 1541. There appeared an edition from a MS. containing a somewhat different version of the work, and divided into ninety-seven chapters, edited by Tam Ibn-Jachja ben-David (Constantinople, 1510). New editions of it were published in Venice, 1544; Cracow, 1589; Frankfort-on-the- Main, 1689; Amsterdam, 1723; Prague, 1784; Zolkiew, 1805; Vilna, 1819. It was partly translated into Arabic by Zechariah ben-Said el-Temeni about 1223, and into English by Peter Morwyng (Lond. 1558, 1561, 1575, 1579, 1602). There are two other Latin translations, besides the one by M '''''Ü''''' nster, 1541; one was made by the learned English Orientalist, John Gagnier (Oxford, 1716), and one by Breithaupt; the last has also the Hebrew text and elaborate notes, and will always continue to be the student's edition. There are German translations by [[Michael]] Adam (Zurich, 1546), Moses b.- Bezaliel (Prague, 1607), Abraham ben-Mordecai Cohen (Amsterdam, 1661), and Seligmann Reis (Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1707). Compare, besides the authorities already cited, Zunz, Die Gottesdienstlichen Vortr '''''Ä''''' ge der Juden (Berlin, 1832), p. 146-154; Delitzsch, [[Zur]] Geschichte der j '''''Ü''''' dischen Poesie (Leipzig, 1836), p. 37-40; Carmoly in Jost's Annalen (Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1839), 1. 149 sq.; Milman, Hist. of the Jews, 3, 131; F '''''Ü''''' rst, Bibliotheca Judaica, 2, 111-114; Steinschneider, Catalogus Libr. Uebr. in Bibliotheca Bodleiana, 1547-1552; Kitto, Bibl. Cyclopoedia, s.v. </p> <p> Joseph ben-Isaac Kimchi. </p> <p> (See Kizchi). </p> <p> Joseph ben-Satia. </p> <p> (See Saadia). </p>

== References ==
<references>
<ref name="term_46581"> [https://bibleportal.com/encyclopedia/cyclopedia-of-biblical-theological-and-ecclesiastical-literature/joseph+ben-gorion Joseph Ben-Gorion from Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature]</ref>
</references>