Against Apion

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Prepared by David Reed haradda@aol.com or davidr@inconnect.com

Against Apion.(1)

by Flavius Josephus

Translated by William Whiston

BOOK 1.

1. I Suppose that by my books of the Antiquity of the Jews, most
excellent Epaphroditus, (2) have made it evident to those who
peruse them, that our Jewish nation is of very great antiquity,
and had a distinct subsistence of its own originally; as also, I
have therein declared how we came to inhabit this country wherein
we now live. Those Antiquities contain the history of five
thousand years, and are taken out of our sacred books, but are
translated by me into the Greek tongue. However, since I observe
a considerable number of people giving ear to the reproaches that
are laid against us by those who bear ill-will to us, and will
not believe what I have written concerning the antiquity of our
nation, while they take it for a plain sign that our nation is of
a late date, because they are not so much as vouchsafed a bare
mention by the most famous historiographers among the Grecians. I
therefore have thought myself under an obligation to write
somewhat briefly about these subjects, in order to convict those
that reproach us of spite and voluntary falsehood, and to correct
the ignorance of others, and withal to instruct all those who are
desirous of knowing the truth of what great antiquity we really
are. As for the witnesses whom I shall produce for the proof of
what I say, they shall be such as are esteemed to be of the
greatest reputation for truth, and the most skillful in the
knowledge of all antiquity by the Greeks themselves. I will also
show, that those who have written so reproachfully and falsely
about us are to be convicted by what they have written themselves
to the contrary. I shall also endeavor to give an account of the
reasons why it hath so happened, that there have not been a great
number of Greeks who have made mention of our nation in their
histories. I will, however, bring those Grecians to light who
have not omitted such our history, for the sake of those that
either do not know them, or pretend not to know them already.

2. And now, in the first place, I cannot but greatly wonder at
those men, who suppose that we must attend to none but Grecians,
when we are inquiring about the most ancient facts, and must
inform ourselves of their truth from them only, while we must not
believe ourselves nor other men; for I am convinced that the very
reverse is the truth of the case. I mean this, - if we will not
be led by vain opinions, but will make inquiry after truth from
facts themselves; for they will find that almost all which
concerns the Greeks happened not long ago; nay, one may say, is
of yesterday only. I speak of the building of their cities, the
inventions of their arts, and the description of their laws; and
as for their care about the writing down of their histories, it
is very near the last thing they set about. However, they
acknowledge themselves so far, that they were the Egyptians, the
Chaldeans, and the Phoenicians (for I will not now reckon
ourselves among them) that have preserved the memorials of the
most ancient and most lasting traditions of mankind; for almost
all these nations inhabit such countries as are least subject to
destruction from the world about them; and these also have taken
especial care to have nothing omitted of what was [remarkably]
done among them; but their history was esteemed sacred, and put
into public tables, as written by men of the greatest wisdom they
had among them. But as for the place where the Grecians inhabit,
ten thousand destructions have overtaken it, and blotted out the
memory of former actions; so that they were ever beginning a new
way of living, and supposed that every one of them was the origin
of their new state. It was also late, and with difficulty, that
they came to know the letters they now use; for those who would
advance their use of these letters to the greatest antiquity
pretend that they learned them from the Phoenicians and from
Cadmus; yet is nobody able to demonstrate that they have any
writing preserved from that time, neither in their temples, nor
in any other public monuments. This appears, because the time
when those lived who went to the Trojan war, so many years
afterward, is in great doubt, and great inquiry is made, whether
the Greeks used their letters at that time; and the most
prevailing opinion, and that nearest the truth, is, that their
present way of using those letters was unknown at that time.
However, there is not any writing which the Greeks agree to he
genuine among them ancienter than Homer's Poems, who must plainly
he confessed later than the siege of Troy; nay, the report goes,
that even he did not leave his poems in writing, but that their
memory was preserved in songs, and they were put together
afterward, and that this is the reason of such a number of
variations as are found in them. (3) As for those who set
themselves about writing their histories, I mean such as Cadmus
of Miletus, and Acusilaus of Argos, and any others that may be
mentioned as succeeding Acusilaus, they lived but a little while
before the Persian expedition into Greece. But then for those
that first introduced philosophy, and the consideration of things
celestial and divine among them, such as Pherceydes the Syrian,
and Pythagoras, and Thales, all with one consent agree, that they
learned what they knew of the Egyptians and Chaldeans, and wrote
but little And these are the things which are supposed to be the
oldest of all among the Greeks; and they have much ado to believe
that the writings ascribed to those men are genuine.

3. How can it then be other than an absurd thing, for the Greeks
to be so proud, and to vaunt themselves to be the only people
that are acquainted with antiquity, and that have delivered the
true accounts of those early times after an accurate manner? Nay,
who is there that cannot easily gather from the Greek writers
themselves, that they knew but little on any good foundation when
they set to write, but rather wrote their histories from their
own conjectures? Accordingly, they confute one another in their
own books to purpose, and are not ashamed. to give us the most
contradictory accounts of the same things; and I should spend my
time to little purpose, if I should pretend to teach the Greeks
that which they know better than I already, what a great
disagreement there is between Hellanicus and Acusilaus about
their genealogies; in how many eases Acusilaus corrects Hesiod:
or after what manner Ephorus demonstrates Hellanicus to have told
lies in the greatest part of his history; as does Timeus in like
manner as to Ephorus, and the succeeding writers do to Timeus,
and all the later writers do to Herodotus (3) nor could Timeus
agree with Antiochus and Philistius, or with Callias, about the
Sicilian History, no more than do the several writers of the
Athide follow one another about the Athenian affairs; nor do the
historians the like, that wrote the Argolics, about the affairs
of the Argives. And now what need I say any more about particular
cities and smaller places, while in the most approved writers of
the expedition of the Persians, and of the actions which were
therein performed, there are so great differences? Nay,
Thucydides himself is accused of some as writing what is false,
although he seems to have given us the exactest history of the
affairs of his own time. (4)

4. As for the occasions of so great disagreement of theirs, there
may be assigned many that are very probable, if any have a mind
to make an inquiry about them; but I ascribe these contradictions
chiefly to two causes, which I will now mention, and still think
what I shall mention in the first place to be the principal of
all. For if we remember that in the beginning the Greeks had
taken no care to have public records of their several
transactions preserved, this must for certain have afforded those
that would afterward write about those ancient transactions the
opportunity of making mistakes, and the power of making lies
also; for this original recording of such ancient transactions
hath not only been neglected by the other states of Greece, but
even among the Athenians themselves also, who pretend to be
Aborigines, and to have applied themselves to learning, there are
no such records extant; nay, they say themselves that the laws of
Draco concerning murders, which are now extant in writing, are
the most ancient of their public records; which Draco yet lived
but a little before the tyrant Pisistratus. (5) For as to the
Arcadians, who make such boasts of their antiquity, what need I
speak of them in particular, since it was still later before they
got their letters, and learned them, and that with difficulty
also. (6)

5. There must therefore naturally arise great differences among
writers, when they had no original records to lay for their
foundation, which might at once inform those who had an
inclination to learn, and contradict those that would tell lies.
However, we are to suppose a second occasion besides the former
of these contradictions; it is this: That those who were the most
zealous to write history were not solicitous for the discovery of
truth, although it was very easy for them always to make such a
profession; but their business was to demonstrate that they could
write well, and make an impression upon mankind thereby; and in
what manner of writing they thought they were able to exceed
others, to that did they apply themselves, Some of them betook
themselves to the writing of fabulous narrations; some of them
endeavored to please the cities or the kings, by writing in their
commendation; others of them fell to finding faults with
transactions, or with the writers of such transactions, and
thought to make a great figure by so doing. And indeed these do
what is of all things the most contrary to true history; for it
is the great character of true history that all concerned therein
both speak and write the same things; while these men, by writing
differently about the same things, think they shall be believed
to write with the greatest regard to truth. We therefore [who are
Jews] must yield to the Grecian writers as to language and
eloquence of composition; but then we shall give them no such
preference as to the verity of ancient history, and least of all
as to that part which concerns the affairs of our own several
countries.

6. As to the care of writing down the records from the earliest
antiquity among the Egyptians and Babylonians; that the priests
were intrusted therewith, and employed a philosophical concern
about it; that they were the Chaldean priests that did so among
the Babylonians; and that the Phoenicians, who were mingled among
the Greeks, did especially make use of their letters, both for
the common affairs of life, and for the delivering down the
history of common transactions, I think I may omit any proof,
because all men allow it so to be. But now as to our forefathers,
that they took no less care about writing such records, (for I
will not say they took greater care than the others I spoke of,)
and that they committed that matter to their high priests and to
their prophets, and that these records have been written all
along down to our own times with the utmost accuracy; nay, if it
be not too bold for me to say it, our history will be so written
hereafter; - I shall endeavor briefly to inform you.

7. For our forefathers did not only appoint the best of these
priests, and those that attended upon the Divine worship, for
that design from the beginning, but made provision that the stock
of the priests should continue unmixed and pure; for he who is
partaker of the priesthood must propagate of a wife of the same
nation, without having any regard to money, or any other
dignities; but he is to make a scrutiny, and take his wife's
genealogy from the ancient tables, and procure many witnesses to
it. (7) And this is our practice not only in Judea, but
wheresoever any body of men of our nation do live; and even there
an exact catalogue of our priests' marriages is kept; I mean at
Egypt and at Babylon, or in any other place of the rest of the
habitable earth, whithersoever our priests are scattered; for
they send to Jerusalem the ancient names of their parents in
writing, as well as those of their remoter ancestors, and signify
who are the witnesses also. But if any war falls out, such as
have fallen out a great many of them already, when Antiochus
Epiphanes made an invasion upon our country, as also when Pompey
the Great and Quintilius Varus did so also, and principally in
the wars that have happened in our own times, those priests that
survive them compose new tables of genealogy out of the old
records, and examine the circumstances of the women that remain;
for still they do not admit of those that have been captives, as
suspecting that they had conversation with some foreigners. But
what is the strongest argument of our exact management in this
matter is what I am now going to say, that we have the names of
our high priests from father to son set down in our records for
the interval of two thousand years; and if any of these have been
transgressors of these rules, they are prohibited to present
themselves at the altar, or to be partakers of any other of our
purifications; and this is justly, or rather necessarily done,
because every one is not permitted of his own accord to be a
writer, nor is there any disagreement in what is written; they
being only prophets that have written the original and earliest
accounts of things as they learned them of God himself by
inspiration; and others have written what hath happened in their
own times, and that in a very distinct manner also.

8. For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us,
disagreeing from and contradicting one another, [as the Greeks
have,] but only twenty-two books, (8) which contain the records
of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine;
and of them five belong to Moses, which contain his laws and the
traditions of the origin of mankind till his death. This interval
of time was little short of three thousand years; but as to the
time from the death of Moses till the reign of Artaxerxes king of
Persia, who reigned after Xerxes, the prophets, who were after
Moses, wrote down what was done in their times in thirteen books.
The remaining four books contain hymns to God, and precepts for
the conduct of human life. It is true, our history hath been
written since Artaxerxes very particularly, but hath not been
esteemed of the like authority with the former by our
forefathers, because there hath not been an exact succession of
prophets since that time; and how firmly we have given credit to
these books of our own nation is evident by what we do; for
during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so
bold as either to add any thing to them, to take any thing from
them, or to make any change in them; but it is become natural to
all Jews immediately, and from their very birth, to esteem these
books to contain Divine doctrines, and to persist in them, and,
if occasion be willingly to die for them. For it is no new thing
for our captives, many of them in number, and frequently in time,
to be seen to endure racks and deaths of all kinds upon the
theatres, that they may not be obliged to say one word against
our laws and the records that contain them; whereas there are
none at all among the Greeks who would undergo the least harm on
that account, no, nor in case all the writings that are among
them were to be destroyed; for they take them to be such
discourses as are framed agreeably to the inclinations of those
that write them; and they have justly the same opinion of the
ancient writers, since they see some of the present generation
bold enough to write about such affairs, wherein they were not
present, nor had concern enough to inform themselves about them
from those that knew them; examples of which may be had in this
late war of ours, where some persons have written histories, and
published them, without having been in the places concerned, or
having been near them when the actions were done; but these men
put a few things together by hearsay, and insolently abuse the
world, and call these writings by the name of Histories.

9. As for myself, I have composed a true history of that whole
war, and of all the particulars that occurred therein, as having
been concerned in all its transactions; for I acted as general of
those among us that are named Galileans, as long as it was
possible for us to make any opposition. I was then seized on by
the Romans, and became a captive. Vespasian also and Titus had me
kept under a guard, and forced me to attend them continually. At
the first I was put into bonds, but was set at liberty afterward,
and sent to accompany Titus when he came from Alexandria to the
siege of Jerusalem; during which time there was nothing done
which escaped my knowledge; for what happened in the Roman camp I
saw, and wrote down carefully; and what informations the
deserters brought [out of the city], I was the only man that
understood them. Afterward I got leisure at Rome; and when all my
materials were prepared for that work, I made use of some persons
to assist me in learning the Greek tongue, and by these means I
composed the history of those transactions. And I was so well
assured of the truth of what I related, that I first of all
appealed to those that had the supreme command in that war,
Vespasian and Titus, as witnesses for me, for to them I presented
those books first of all, and after them to many of the Romans
who had been in the war. I also sold them to many of our own men
who understood the Greek philosophy; among whom were Julius
Archelaus, Herod [king of Chalcis], a person of great gravity,
and king Agrippa himself, a person that deserved the greatest
admiration. Now all these men bore their testimony to me, that I
had the strictest regard to truth; who yet would not have
dissembled the matter, nor been silent, if I, out of ignorance,
or out of favor to any side, either had given false colors to
actions, or omitted any of them.

10. There have been indeed some bad men, who have attempted to
calumniate my history, and took it to be a kind of scholastic
performance for the exercise of young men. A strange sort of
accusation and calumny this! since every one that undertakes to
deliver the history of actions truly ought to know them
accurately himself in the first place, as either having been
concerned in them himself, or been informed of them by such as
knew them. Now both these methods of knowledge I may very
properly pretend to in the composition of both my works; for, as
I said, I have translated the Antiquities out of our sacred
books; which I easily could do, since I was a priest by my birth,
and have studied that philosophy which is contained in those
writings: and for the History of the War, I wrote it as having
been an actor myself in many of its transactions, an eye-witness
in the greatest part of the rest, and was not unacquainted with
any thing whatsoever that was either said or done in it. How
impudent then must those deserve to be esteemed that undertake to
contradict me about the true state of those affairs! who,
although they pretend to have made use of both the emperors' own
memoirs, yet could not they he acquainted with our affairs who
fought against them.

11. This digression I have been obliged to make out of necessity,
as being desirous to expose the vanity of those that profess to
write histories; and I suppose I have sufficiently declared that
this custom of transmitting down the histories of ancient times
hath been better preserved by those nations which are called
Barbarians, than by the Greeks themselves. I am now willing, in
the next place, to say a few things to those that endeavor to
prove that our constitution is but of late time, for this reason,
as they pretend, that the Greek writers have said nothing about
us; after which I shall produce testimonies for our antiquity out
of the writings of foreigners; I shall also demonstrate that such
as cast reproaches upon our nation do it very unjustly.

12. As for ourselves, therefore, we neither inhabit a maritime
country, nor do we delight in merchandise, nor in such a mixture
with other men as arises from it; but the cities we dwell in are
remote from the sea, and having a fruitful country for our
habitation, we take pains in cultivating that only. Our principal
care of all is this, to educate our children well; and we think
it to be the most necessary business of our whole life to observe
the laws that have been given us, and to keep those rules of
piety that have been delivered down to us. Since, therefore,
besides what we have already taken notice of, we have had a
peculiar way of living of our own, there was no occasion offered
us in ancient ages for intermixing among the Greeks, as they had
for mixing among the Egyptians, by their intercourse of exporting
and importing their several goods; as they also mixed with the
Phoenicians, who lived by the sea-side, by means of their love of
lucre in trade and merchandise. Nor did our forefathers betake
themselves, as did some others, to robbery; nor did they, in
order to gain more wealth, fall into foreign wars, although our
country contained many ten thousands of men of courage sufficient
for that purpose. For this reason it was that the Phoenicians
themselves came soon by trading and navigation to be known to the
Grecians, and by their means the Egyptians became known to the
Grecians also, as did all those people whence the Phoenicians in
long voyages over the seas carried wares to the Grecians. The
Medes also and the Persians, when they were lords of Asia, became
well known to them; and this was especially true of the Persians,
who led their armies as far as the other continent [Europe]. The
Thracians were also known to them by the nearness of their
countries, and the Scythians by the means of those that sailed to
Pontus; for it was so in general that all maritime nations, and
those that inhabited near the eastern or western seas, became
most known to those that were desirous to be writers; but such as
had their habitations further from the sea were for the most part
unknown to them which things appear to have happened as to Europe
also, where the city of Rome, that hath this long time been
possessed of so much power, and hath performed such great actions
in war, is yet never mentioned by Herodotus, nor by Thucydides,
nor by any one of their contemporaries; and it was very late, and
with great difficulty, that the Romans became known to the
Greeks. Nay, those that were reckoned the most exact historians
(and Ephorus for one) were so very ignorant of the Gauls and the
Spaniards, that he supposed the Spaniards, who inhabit so great a
part of the western regions of the earth, to be no more than one
city. Those historians also have ventured to describe such
customs as were made use of by them, which they never had either
done or said; and the reason why these writers did not know the
truth of their affairs was this, that they had not any commerce
together; but the reason why they wrote such falsities was this,
that they had a mind to appear to know things which others had
not known. How can it then be any wonder, if our nation was no
more known to many of the Greeks, nor had given them any occasion
to mention them in their writings, while they were so remote from
the sea, and had a conduct of life so peculiar to themselves?

13. Let us now put the case, therefore, that we made use of this
argument concerning the Grecians, in order to prove that their
nation was not ancient, because nothing is said of them in our
records: would not they laugh at us all, and probably give the
same reasons for our silence that I have now alleged, and would
produce their neighbor nations as witnesses to their own
antiquity? Now the very same thing will I endeavor to do; for I
will bring the Egyptians and the Phoenicians as my principal
witnesses, because nobody can complain Of their testimony as
false, on account that they are known to have borne the greatest
ill-will towards us; I mean this as to the Egyptians in general
all of them, while of the Phoenicians it is known the Tyrians
have been most of all in the same ill disposition towards us: yet
do I confess that I cannot say the same of the Chaldeans, since
our first leaders and ancestors were derived from them; and they
do make mention of us Jews in their records, on account of the
kindred there is between us. Now when I shall have made my
assertions good, so far as concerns the others, I will
demonstrate that some of the Greek writers have made mention of
us Jews also, that those who envy us may not have even this
pretense for contradicting what I have said about our nation.

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