Elias Joseph Bickerman

Elias Bickerman (July 7, 1897 O.S. in Russia – August 31, 1981 in Jerusalem), also spelled as Bickermann or Bikerman, was a leading scholar of Greco-Roman history and the Hellenistic world.

Elias J Bickerman
BornJuly 1, 1897 O.S.
Kishinev, Russian Empire (modern Moldova)
DiedAugust 31, 1981 (aged 84)
Jerusalem
Occupation(s)Classicist, Ancient Historian, Jewish Historian

Biography

Bickerman was born in Kishinev, then part of the Russian Empire, to a secular Jewish family. He left Russia during the Bolshevik revolution and the Russian civil war for Germany, where he received education from German classicists and Hellenists.[1] Due to the rise of the Nazi Party to power and his Jewish heritage, he fled to France. He soon had to abandon that country as well after the Battle of France. Since 1942 he lived in the U.S.[2] His research interests extended to Judaism and some aspects of Iranian history.[1][3] For most of his career, he was Professor of Ancient History at Columbia University, New York.[4]

Work

Bickerman's scholarship of the Maccabean revolt was highly influential. Rather than the more traditionalist reading of an evil Seleucid king fighting a unified Jewish opposition, Bickerman emphasized that much of the conflict was in internal Jewish tensions in Judea of the era. He showed that the Hasmonean leadership were not as anti-Hellenist as often portrayed, at least after gaining a measure of autonomy. He also made strong cases for the authenticity of documents found in the book of 2 Maccabees, showing that they matched other Seleucid documents of the era, had correct titles, and were in general plausible.[1]

A partial list of books includes:

  • The God of the Maccabees (Berlin, 1937; English translation, 1979)
  • Institutions des Séleucides (Paris, 1938)
  • From Ezra to the Last of the Maccabees (New York, 1962)
  • Studies in Jewish and Christian History (3 volumes, Leiden, 1976–1986)
  • Religion and Politics in the Hellenistic and Roman Periods (Como, 1985)
  • The Jews in the Greek Age (Cambridge, Mass., 1990)

Footnotes and references
  1. Cohen, Shaye J. D. "Elias J Bickerman: An appreciation" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on March 4, 2016. Retrieved June 25, 2015.
  2. Baumgarten, Albert I. (2010). Elias Bickerman as a historian of the Jews : a twentieth century tale. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. ISBN 978-3-16-150171-5. OCLC 527702765.
  3. Smith, Morton (1983). "Elias J. Bickerman". Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research. 50: xv–xviii. JSTOR 3622685.
  4. "The Jews in the Greek Age — Elias J. Bickerman".
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