Jewish Fictional Letters from Hellenistic Egypt: The Epistle of Aristeas and Related Literature

The Greek text Epistle of Aristeas is a Jewish work of the late Hellenistic period that recounts the origins of the Septuagint. Long recognized as a literary fiction, the Epistle of Aristeas has been variously dated from the third century BCE to the first century CE. As a result, its epistolary features, and especially those in which the putative author, Aristeas, addresses his brother and correspondent, Philocrates, have largely been ignored. In light of more recent scholarship on epistolary literature in the Greco-Roman world, however, this volume presents for the first time a complete Greek text and English Translation with introduction, notes, and commentary of the Epistle of Aristeas with key testimonia from Philo, Josephus, and Eusebius, as well as other related examples of Jewish fictional letters from the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha.

Table of Contacts
The Social Reality of Fictional Letters

1. The Epistle of Aristeas
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Genre and Form: An Outline with Epistolary Features
1.3. Greek Text and English Translation with Annotations

2. The Early Reception of the Epistle of Aristeas
2.1. Philo of Alexandria’s Version of the Legend
2.2. Josephus’s Paraphrase of the Epistle to Aristeas
2.3. Related Jewish Testimonia: Aristeas, Demetrius, and Hecataeus
2.4. The Aristeas Legend in Early Christian Writers

3. .Related Epistolary Literature
3.1. 2 Maccabees: The Letters
3.2. Eupolemus: The Solomonic Correspondence
3.3. Additions to Greek Esther: The Letters
3.4. 3 Maccabees: The Letters
3.5. Jewish Inscriptions and Papyri from Ptolemaic Egypt

Appendix: The Ptolemaic Rulers of Egypt