Josephus was one of the good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Wikipedia's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Jewish history, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Jewish history on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Jewish historyWikipedia:WikiProject Jewish historyTemplate:WikiProject Jewish historyJewish history-related
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Judaism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Judaism-related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.JudaismWikipedia:WikiProject JudaismTemplate:WikiProject JudaismJudaism
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome, a group of contributors interested in Wikipedia's articles on classics. If you would like to join the WikiProject or learn how to contribute, please see our project page. If you need assistance from a classicist, please see our talk page.Classical Greece and RomeWikipedia:WikiProject Classical Greece and RomeTemplate:WikiProject Classical Greece and RomeClassical Greece and Rome
This article is within the scope of the Military history WikiProject. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks. To use this banner, please see the full instructions.Military historyWikipedia:WikiProject Military historyTemplate:WikiProject Military historymilitary history
This article has been checked against the following criteria for B-class status:
This article is within the scope of WikiProject History, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the subject of History on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HistoryWikipedia:WikiProject HistoryTemplate:WikiProject Historyhistory
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Ancient Near East, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of ancient Near East–related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Ancient Near EastWikipedia:WikiProject Ancient Near EastTemplate:WikiProject Ancient Near EastAncient Near East
This article is within the scope of the WikiProject Phoenicia, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of Phoenicia. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.PhoeniciaWikipedia:WikiProject PhoeniciaTemplate:WikiProject PhoeniciaPhoenicia
This article quotes Nitsa Ben Ari as a source for claiming that Josephus’ works were banned because he was considered a traitor. Ben Ari’s piece has almost nothing to do w Josephus but is rather focused on translation in Hebrew literature. She herself would make no claims to expertise in the subject of Josephus and merely quotes another secondary (if not tertiary) source regarding these bannings giving no dates names or places. Ben Ari is so oblivious to the history of Josephus and his reception that the two lines she gives to mentioning Josephus she mistakenly believes that his work was written in Latin. Ben Ari writes “His Latin historical reports of rebellion against the Romans…had been banned by those scholars who dealt with Jewish history for many generations and in spite of its more or less legitimate place in world history, hundreds of years passed before it could be accepted by early Jewish historiography as anything but the biased, fraudulent testimony of a traitor, let alone be translated into Hebrew.” Not only does Ben Ari not realize that Josephus wrote first in Aramaic and then in Greek but she fails to realize that the translation of Josephus into Hebrew was only an issue in the 20th century! And if Josephus’ traitorous nature had been such a popular notion in centuries after his death it truly is a wonder how the Yosippon commonly attributed to Josephus became one of the most popular Jewish book from the Middke ages well into the modern period. How Ben Artsi’s article on Hebrew translation became a valid source for the history of Jewish attitude to Josephus is beyond me. The author of this article is heavily clouded by negative attitudes to Josephus which were developed among Zionists living in British Palestine and then Israel. Although Josephus was a controversial figure in earlier Jewish scholarship, I have not yet seen evidence of even awareness of Josephus until the very late Middle Ages nor am I aware of widespread bans on his works HaggaiZechariah (talk) 20:22, 29 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ben Ari is a scholar. I don't see anything wrong with the source. Of course, if she has received rebuttals, those can be put in the article to contrast. It seems you are new. Please note that wikipedia is WP:NOTFORUM. The talk page is not a place to discuss the truth of the matter from scholarship, but to present what sources have to say on the topic. Ramos1990 (talk) 23:39, 29 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ben Ari has not done any work directly related to Josephus nor has she written directly on the reception of his work. She does not reveal any of her sources as to the banning of reading Josephus. her only footnote is about the reception go the work of Jost in the early1800s. Most translation into Hebrew began in the 20th century, and yet she conflates controversy about translating Josephus into Hebrew with "centuries". That being said, I am new here and I am very frustrated with what is being presented as fact and do not know how to challenge these here. 2601:644:401:5640:3C8E:B6BF:9B17:3E31 (talk) 00:22, 30 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I hear you. In wikipedia we go by what reliable sources say. She is an academic the paper in question is from a peer-reviewed journal so it meets the criteria of WP:RS. Reliable sources are not about if what a source says is true, it has to do with publication oversight. If she is very wrong, I am sure she would have been challenged by another scholar on it. Do you have another reliable source that challenges her view? Say a book or research paper? That would help. Ramos1990 (talk) 07:09, 30 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Since Ben Artsi’s field is history of translation maybe a sub field of comparative literature, I highly doubt that anyone made objections to her assertions about Jewish bans regarding Josephus in Latin. If these assertions were part of a scholarly essay about the history of the reception of Josephus’ work then I believe it would be subject to much greater scrutiny by experts in the field. It is frustrating that she provides no reference to her sources. Supporting my belief, is that the Jewish Encyclopedia 1906 entry on Josephus, makes no mention of Jewish sources that consider Josephus to be a traitor nor mention the banning of his work, though it does discuss problematic issues of his biography and work. This absence does not prove my point but does lend credence to the idea that Josephus became much more problematic as Jewish nationalism rose in the twentieth century. Before this time, the reigning Jewish point of view was from the Babylonian Talmud which basically took Josephus’ point of view: the Jewish Revolt was run by thugs who perpetuated more violence upon their fellow Jews than upon the Romans. And that the Temple was not destroyed so much by Rome as by the gratuitous hatred between Jews. I think this is essential piece in understanding the relationship between Josephus and his fellow Jews that is woefully absent in this Wikipedia article. Moreover because the Babylonian Talmud is so sympathetic to Josephus (both refer to the Jewish zealots as “thugs”), it placed aspects of his life into the lives of the founding rabbis. Once Josephus’ own life became more widely known to Jews more than fifteen hundred years later, religious Jews could not accept aspects of Josephus’ biography because it seemed to be taken from the stories of the rabbis! Ironically the rabbinic homage to Josephus ultimately made it difficult for religious Jews to accept Josephus in his own words. And so for Talmudic Jews, Josephus is not so much a traitor, but someone who lifted the story of the great rabbi who snuck out of the Jerusalem siege, met up with the Roman general Vespasian, told him he would become emperor, and received permission to found the first yeshiva, Yavneh. So even if Ben Artsi is citing some reality of rabbinic bans on reading Josephus, it may have nothing to do with him being considered a traitor but rather because Josephus’ narrative contradicts the Talmudic narrative if only because his story is in fact the origins of the Talmudic narrative about the Jerusalem siege. I wish I knew the appropriate place for this discussion on Wikipedia. HaggaiZechariah (talk) 23:47, 30 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ok so the only source you found was from 1906? Is there a more recent one? Or what part of Ben Artsi's paper is very obviously wrong? Quotes? Ramos1990 (talk) 00:08, 31 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I only see a small section form her paper on Josephus and it refers to his works as "Latin" works. Obviously this is wrong. But the context of the paragraph is also not so clear. I would say feel free to remove this source. I am sure there are more extensive treatment of Josephus in Jewish historiography in say the Blackwell Companion to Josephus. Ramos1990 (talk) 03:00, 31 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The article you are referring me to is actually an article about the Yossipon, a very popular book among Jews throughout putatively by Josephus. Even though it’s origins lay w a certain Pseudo Hegesippus, an anonymous author who freely added to a translation of some Josephus works, the Yosippon gives lie to the belief that Josephus was not read by Jews because he was considered a traitor. The Yossipon was one of the most popular books among Jews in the Middle Ages up through the modern period and was thought by Jews to have been penned by Josephus. The Yosippon does not tell the story of Josephus’ life among Roman emperors but that still reveals that Jewish objections to Josephus were not based on some blanket rejection of Josephus from any traditional or religious authority. The true Latin translations of Josephus happened something like five hundred years later than the creation of the Yosippon. As I indicated, determining the nature of Jewish reaction to the Latin translation of Josephus requires some very refined research. But I remain skeptical of anything in this article which takes as doctrine that “Jews” considered Josephus a “traitor”—- a groundless assertion when talking before the 19th century. At one point in the Wikipedia article the author actually claims that Jewish attitudes “softened “ in the twentieth century. Quite the opposite, Josephus only became generally controversial with both the availability of his work in many languages and the rise of Jewish nationalism in the 20th century. Until the twentieth century most Jews read the Yosippon and had no idea that Josephus surrendered to the Romans. HaggaiZechariah (talk) 23:41, 31 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I honestly don't really understand the relevance of putting an (unattested) Hebrew name in the lede for a man who is alwayd called Josephus or a derivative in every language except for Modern Hebrew (where they just do it to be extra), but that's secondary.
My main concern here is the total irrelevance of a modern Israeli Hebrew transliteration. Given that Hebrew was still a living natural language until circa the fourth century AD and was (famously) pronounced with dental fricatives then, the lede should at the least say Yosef ben Mattithyahu.
However, c.f. the standard used in several articles concerning rabbis and the few other historical figures from this period with known Hebrew names (and indeed nearly every historical figure from the period with an anglicizable name), I really think we should just anglicize the name to Joseph ben Mattathias. Discuss.
(In either case, I've taken the liberty of amending the unvocalized Hebrew text יוסף בן מתתיהו to יוֹסֵף בֵּן מַתִּתְיָהוּ, with the appropriate Tiberian vowels.) Kyoto Grand (talk) 00:06, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"In Josephus & Jesus New Evidence for the One Called Christ, T.C. Schmidt authenticates Josephus’s authorship of the Testimonium Flavianum and then reveals a startling observation: Josephus was directly familiar with those who put Jesus on trial. Consequently, Josephus would have had access to highly reliable information. (Source) https://academic.oup.com/book/60034"
level-4 vital article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
