Applications are invited to participate in this workshop, to be held in Oxford, at
the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies at Yarnton Manor, on
January 7-8, 2013.
Please submit your application in English, with a short CV and an abstract (not
more than 500 words) of a research paper to be discussed in the workshop, to
the Registrar of the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies
(
registrar@ochjs.ac.uk), by Friday 14 September 2012.
Bursaries to cover travel expenses and accommodation will be available for
selected participants. Please indicate in your application whether you would
like to be considered for a bursary, including an estimate of your travel
expenses.
The workshop will be devoted to discussion of the research papers, which will
be circulated to all participants in advance.
Applicants will be informed of the result of their applications on or before
Friday 21 September 2012.
The workshop will be the first in a series, as part of a project on the reception of
Josephus in Jewish culture from the 18
th century to the present. This project, which is
funded by the AHRC, focuses on the ways in which Jews since the middle of the
eighteenth century have built on earlier uses of Josephus’ writings for their own
purposes, examining the reasons for fluctuations of interest over time and in different
places and seeking to understand how such preferences were influenced by
contemporary issues and how they in turn affected them. The project also looks at
the impact of non-Jewish scholarship on Jewish interpretations of Josephus, and the
extent to which Jewish attitudes to Josephus were affected by responses to the
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historian as a controversial participant in complex political events and as a moral
agent.
In this first workshop, on the reception of Josephus by Jews and Christians before
1750, we hope that the participants will help us to identify the issues in Josephus’
writings which played a key role in the reception of his work in ancient and medieval
times, investigating which themes are specific to specific periods or types of literature
(including translations and adaptations into other languages, notably Latin and
Hebrew) and which remained relevant in later centuries; the reasons why early
modern scholars (both Jewish and Christian) were attracted to Josephus’ writings,
and how their approach differed from earlier reception of Josephus; and the role
played by Josephus in the popular imagination of Jews and Christians throughout
this period.
Topics suitable for paper proposals for the workshop include the Testimonium
Flavianum, patristic uses of Josephus, rabbinic references to Josephus in late
antiquity, the manuscript tradition, Josippon, Azariah de’Rossi, uses of Josephus by
Christian humanists in the early modern period, chronography, early printed editions,
illustrations and artistic representations, and vernacular translations.
Further workshops will address the Jewish reception of Josephus in the 18
th and 19th
centuries in Western Europe (June 17-18, 2013); the Jewish reception of Josephus
in the 19
th and early 20th centuries in Eastern Europe (January 6-7, 2014); and the
Jewish reception of Josephus in the 20
th and 21st centuries (June 16-17, 2014).
We plan to publish a selection of the studies discussed at the four workshops in a
volume, to share the results of the project and to help to define the agenda for future
research.
To apply, and for further information about participation in the workshop and
about bursaries, please contact the Registrar of the Oxford Centre for Hebrew
and Jewish Studies (
registrar@ochjs.ac.uk) before 14 September 2012.
Martin Goodman, Tessa Rajak, Andrea Schatz
