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Interpretatio Ivdaica in the Achaemenid Period

2023; Brill; Volume: 14; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.30965/21967954-bja10039

2196-7954

Gad Barnea,

Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies

Abstract The Yahwistic community at Elephantine, whose document record covers almost the entire fifth century BCE , conserves the most direct, vibrant and authentic witness of Achaemenid-era Yahwism. This article focuses on the process of interpretatio iudaica through interactions with neighboring and reigning cults: Egyptian, Levantine and Achaemenid-Zoroastrian ( AZ ), comparing it to other Yahwistic settlements of its time. It shows that these communities behaved as normative citizens of the polytheistic/henotheistic world surrounding them. In what is an expected process of interpretatio of their day and age, they were in full dialogue with the philosophical/theological views and innovations of the cultures surrounding them. They translated their deity/ies with “host deities” when they came into contact with other cultures. Significantly, living in an Achaemenid imperial context, A h uramazdā was translated with Yhw, and following Artaxerxes II ’s reform, a new Yahwistic triad translated both the new AZ triad as well as the local Egyptian triad.