Draft talk:Negev in biblical times

Maccabees and Romans

Older historians regularly cited Avi-Yonah, who claimed that Idumaea was indeed conquered. Today, this is no longer done. To my knowledge, no one has explicitly refuted Avi-Yonah, but I would prefer not to mention it at all, since Avi-Yonah is pure fantasy.

How A.-Y. imagines the conquest of Idumaea can be seen here. The cited passages report only that Maresha and Adoraim were conquered. All other marked places are fiction:

1. That Beersheba belonged to Judaea is derived from the fact that the same was true for Malhata. That this was true for Malhata is derived from JosAnt 18:6:2 147, where, however, it is explicitly mentioned as "Malhata in Idumaea".
2. "Orda" is taken by A.-Y. as "Jorda[n]", allegedly with Maisler and against Thomsen, who wanted to read "Arad". Maisler's paper has nothing to do at all with (J)orda, but deals with an Amarna letter listing gifts. Thomsen does not want to read "Arad" either, but "Jarda", after correctly deriving from the relevant passage in Josephus (JosBel 3:3 51) that the place in question lay explicitly in the east of southern Judaea, which A.-Y. simply ignores and locates it on the very western edge of his assumed Judah.
3. Most egregious is A.-Y.'s treatment of Adoraim. As mentioned, like Maresha, Adoraim was conquered by the Judeans according to Josephus. A.-Y. first takes from a Zenon papyrus that Adoraim was supposedly the district capital of an assumed "Eastern Idumaea". The papyrus in question, however, only states that 6 salted fish were delivered to Adoraim. Second: In Josephus, there are two lists of cities that Pompey or Gabinius took from the Maccabees and Judaea and returned to their original inhabitants. One list includes Adoraim, stating explicitly that Adoraim did not continue to belong to Judaea. In the other list, among other differences, Adoraim is not mentioned, but Dora (=Dor). Thus, A.-Y. also wants to read "Dora" instead of "Adora" in the first list without any evidence and thereafter assume, "that at least Eastern Idumaea - including Hebron with the tombs of the Patriarchs - remained with Judaea". Third, in another city list listing district capitals of Judaea, he similarly wants to read adorois for gadarois), and so in the end, he edited Adoraim out of one list, into the other list, invented a Maccabean "Eastern Idumaea," and made it into a Judaean district with Adoraim as its capital. This is not a plausible text reconstruction, but malicious alternative history with a transparent ideological motive - "at least to keep Hebron with the tombs of the Patriarchs in Judah". --DaWalda (talk) 13:30, 22 May 2024 (UTC)