Dmitrij Bumazhnov: Killing a Bull with God’s Name. Some Consideration about Literary Relationships among the Actus Silvestri and the Toledot Yeshu

In the Latin version of the Actus Silvestri and in a Syriac source connected with it, a public religious disputation between the pope of Rome Silvester and a group of rabbis is settled by a kind of ordeal: rabbi Zambri kills a fierce bull by whispering God’s holy name in its ear and challenges Silvester to repeat the miracle. In response to this, Silvester proposes Zambri’s making the bull alive by means of the same name. After rabbi’s failure to do so, Silvester brings the dead bull to life with help of Jesus’ name. The purpose of the paper is to discuss Christian, Jewish and pagan parallels to the ordeal and to make some considerations concerning literary relationships among the Actus Silvestri and the Sefer Toledot Yeshu on the basis of this presentation.