by Herod the Great (37–34 B.C.) at Jerusalem, but in the work of city-building this dynasty showed itself active. Sebaste (the old Samaria), Caesarea, Antipatris were built by Herod the Great, Tiberias by Herod Antipas (4 B.C.-A.D. 39). The reclaiming of the wild district of Hauran for civilization and Hellenistic life was due in the first instance to the house of Herod (Schürer, Gesch. d. jüd. Volk. 3rd ed., ii. p. 12 f.). In Syria, too, Hellenism under the Romans advanced upon new ground. Palmyra, of which we hear nothing before Roman times, is a notable instance.
As to the effect of this network of Greek cities upon the aboriginal population of Syria, we do not find here the same disappearance of native languages and racial characteristics as in Asia Minor. Still less was this the case in Mesopotamia, where a strong native element in such Greek culture in Syria. a city as Edessa is indicated by its epithet μιξοβάρβαρος. The old cults naturally went on, and at Carrhae (Harran) even survived the establishment of Christianity. The lower classes at Antioch, and no doubt in the cities generally, were in speech Aramaic or bilingual; we find Aramaic popular nicknames of the later Seleucids (K. O. Müller, Antiq. Ant. p. 29). The villages, of course, spoke Aramaic. The richer natives, on the other hand, those who made their way into the educated classes of the towns, and attained official position, would become Hellenized in language and manners, and the “Syrian Code” shows how far the social structure was modified by the Hellenic tradition (Mitteis, Reichsrecht und Volksrecht in den öst. Provinzen des röm. Kaiserreichs, 1891; Arnold Meyer, Jesu Muttersprache, 1896). Of the Syrians who made their mark in Greek literature, some were of native blood, e.g. Lucian of Samosata.
One may notice the great part taken by natives of the Phoenician cities in the history of later Greek philosophy, and in the poetic movement of the last century B.C., which led to fresh cultivation of the epigram. Greek, in fact, held the field as the language of literature and polite society. Possibly at places like Edessa, which for some 350 years (till A.D. 216) was under a dynasty of native princes, Aramaic was cultivated as a literary language. There was a Syriac-speaking church here as early as the 2nd century, and with the spread of Christianity Syriac asserted itself against Greek. The Syriac literature which we possess is all Christian.
But where Greek gave place to Syriac, Hellenism was not thereby effaced. It was to some extent the passing over of the Hellenic tradition into a new medium. We must remember the marked Hellenic elements in Christian theology. The earliest Syriac work which we possess, the book “On Fate,” produced in the circle of the heretic Bardaisan or Bardesanes (end of the 2nd century), largely follows Greek models. There was an extensive translation of Greek works into Syriac during the next centuries, handbooks of philosophy and science for the most part. The version of Homer into Syriac verses made in the 8th century has perished, all but a few lines (R. Duval, La Litt. syriaque, 1900, p. 325).
(v.) The relation of the Jews to Hellenism in the first century and a half of Macedonian rule is very obscure, since the statements made by later writers like Josephus, as to the visit of Alexander to Jerusalem or the privileges conferred upon the Jews in the new Macedonian realms are justly The Jews. suspected of being fiction. It has been maintained that Greek influence is to be traced in parts of the Old Testament assigned to this period, as, for instance, the Book of Proverbs; but even in the case of Ecclesiastes, the canonical writing whose affinity with Greek thought is closest, the coincidence of idea need not necessarily prove a Greek source. The one solid fact in this connexion is the translation of the Jewish Law into Greek in the 3rd century B.C., implying a Jewish Diaspora at Alexandria, so far Hellenized as to have forgotten the speech of Palestine. Early in the 2nd century B.C. we see that the priestly aristocracy of Jerusalem had, like the well-to-do classes everywhere in Syria, been carried away by the Hellenistic current, its strength being evidenced no less by the intensity of the conservative opposition embodied in the party of the “Pious” (Assideans, Ḥasīdīm).
Under Antiochus IV. Epiphanes (176–165) the Hellenistic aristocracy contrived to get Jerusalem converted into a Greek city; the gymnasium appeared, and Greek dress became fashionable with the young men. But when Antiochus, owing to political developments, interfered violently at Jerusalem, the conservative opposition carried the nation with them. The revolt under the Hasmonaean family (Judas Maccabaeus and his brethren) followed, ending in 143–142 in the establishment of an independent Jewish state under a Hasmonaean prince. But whilst the old Hellenistic party had been crushed the Hasmonaean state was of the nature of a compromise. The Mosaic Law was respected, but Hellenism still found an entrance in various forms. The first Hasmonaean “king,” Aristobulus I. (104–103), was known to the Greeks as Phil-hellen. He and all later kings of the dynasty bear Greek names as well as Hebrew ones, and after Jannaeus Alexander (103–76) the Greek legends are common on the coins beside the Hebrew. Herod, who supplanted the Hasmonaean dynasty (37–34 B.C.) made, outside Judaea, a display of Phil-hellenism, building new Greek cities and temples, or bestowing gifts upon the older ones of fame. His court, at the same time, welcomed Greek men of letters like Nicolaus of Damascus. Even in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, he erected a theatre and an amphitheatre. We have already noticed the work done by the Herodian dynasty in furthering Hellenism in Syria (see Schürer, Gesch. des jüdisch. Volkes, vols. i. and ii.). Meanwhile a great part of the Jewish people was living dispersed among the cities of the Greek world, speaking Greek as their mother-tongue, and absorbing Greek influences in much larger measure than their brethren of Palestine. These are the Jews whom we find contrasted as “Hellenists” with the “Hebrews” in Acts. They still kept in touch with the mother-city, and indeed we hear of special synagogues in Jerusalem in which the Hellenists temporarily resident there gathered (Acts vi. 9). A large Jewish literature in Greek had grown up since the translation of the Law in the 3rd century. Beside the other canonical books of the Old Testament, translated in many cases with modifications or additions, it included translations of other Hebrew books (Ecclesiasticus, Judith, &c.), works composed originally in Greek but imitating to some extent the Hebraic style (like Wisdom), works modelled more closely on the Greek literary tradition, either historical, like 2 Maccabees, or philosophical, like the productions of the Alexandrian school, represented for us by Aristobulus and Philo, in which style and thought are almost wholly Greek and the reference to the Old Testament a mere pretext; or Greek poems on Jewish subjects, like the epic of the elder Philo and Ezechiel’s tragedy, Exagogē. It included also a number of forgeries, circulated under the names of famous Greek authors, verses fathered upon Aeschylus or Sophocles, or books like the false Hecataeus, or above all the pretended prophecies of ancient Sibyls in epic verse. These frauds were all contrived for the heathen public, as a means of propaganda, calculated to inspire them with respect for Jewish antiquity or turn them from idols to God.
For Jewish Hellenism see Schürer, op. cit. iii.; Susemihl, Gesch. der griech. Lit. in der Alexandrinerzeit, ii. 601 f.; Willrich, Juden und Griechen (1895), Judaica (1900); Hastings’ Dict. of the Bible, art. “Greece”; Encyclop. Biblica, art. “Hellenism”; Pauly-Wissowa, art. “Aristobulus (15)”; also the work of P. Wendland cited above.
Through the Hellenistic Jews, Greek influences reached Jerusalem itself, though their effect upon the Aramaic-speaking Rabbinical schools was naturally not so pronounced. The large number of Greek words, however, in the language of the Mishnah and the Talmud is a significant phenomenon. The attitude of the Rabbinic doctors to a Greek education does not seem to have been hostile till the time of Hadrian. The sect of the Essenes probably shows an intermingling of the Greek with other lines of tradition among the Jews of Palestine.
See Schürer ii. 42-67, 583; S. Krauss, Griech. u. latein. Lehnwörter im Talmud (1898); Jewish Encyclopedia, art. “Greek Language.”
