Galilee-Jerusalem Relations According to Josephus'Life

Abstract

Josephus'Liferaises many important literary and historical questions that are not easily resolved. This may explain why, for the most part, it has been ignored by New Testament scholars, despite the fact that it is the only extant writing from the first century that bears directly on Galilean life and culture and was written by somebody with immediate experience of that location. Its tendentious character has been ably exposed by Shaye Cohen's study,Josephus in Galilee and Rome. His Vita and Development as an Historian, Leiden, Brill, 1979. Yet it can still yield invaluable information on social relations within the province, provided we approach it in the proper critical fashion, framing our questions carefully and being attentive to the presuppositions of the author.