Dr. Guy Maclean Rogers

And there's a section of it which deals a second time with the revolt. And toward the end of that, he decided that he needed to do what a lot of people, a lot of American generals do anyway, to write his life story, which was made as a kind of an addendum to the antiquities. And one of the tricky parts of reconstructing what really happened is that

There are some contradictions between his account of what went on, especially in the North during the war, in the life as compared to the war. And then finally, in the late 90s, He wrote another work, which was another defense of Judaism and Jews and their traditions, kind of against the slurs of this Greek intellectual called Appian.

There are some contradictions between his account of what went on, especially in the North during the war, in the life as compared to the war. And then finally, in the late 90s, He wrote another work, which was another defense of Judaism and Jews and their traditions, kind of against the slurs of this Greek intellectual called Appian.

There are some contradictions between his account of what went on, especially in the North during the war, in the life as compared to the war. And then finally, in the late 90s, He wrote another work, which was another defense of Judaism and Jews and their traditions, kind of against the slurs of this Greek intellectual called Appian.

And again, there are kind of valuable pieces of information in that work as well. So we have to try to stitch everything together from those multiple sources written by Josephus. There also are accounts, shorter accounts in Greco-Roman sources like Suetonius and Tacitus and a third century Roman historian, Cassius Dio. And then there are coins and archaeological artifacts and inscriptions.

And again, there are kind of valuable pieces of information in that work as well. So we have to try to stitch everything together from those multiple sources written by Josephus. There also are accounts, shorter accounts in Greco-Roman sources like Suetonius and Tacitus and a third century Roman historian, Cassius Dio. And then there are coins and archaeological artifacts and inscriptions.

And again, there are kind of valuable pieces of information in that work as well. So we have to try to stitch everything together from those multiple sources written by Josephus. There also are accounts, shorter accounts in Greco-Roman sources like Suetonius and Tacitus and a third century Roman historian, Cassius Dio. And then there are coins and archaeological artifacts and inscriptions.

And I just want to put a plug in for the epigraphical sources, which have been put together in an unbelievably... professional and useful corpus by a group of scholars in Israel and outside of Israel, which have English translations of all the Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, and other language inscriptions throughout antiquity. So we have a lot of sources.

And I just want to put a plug in for the epigraphical sources, which have been put together in an unbelievably... professional and useful corpus by a group of scholars in Israel and outside of Israel, which have English translations of all the Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, and other language inscriptions throughout antiquity. So we have a lot of sources.

And I just want to put a plug in for the epigraphical sources, which have been put together in an unbelievably... professional and useful corpus by a group of scholars in Israel and outside of Israel, which have English translations of all the Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, and other language inscriptions throughout antiquity. So we have a lot of sources.

The trick is always is making sense of them.

The trick is always is making sense of them.

The trick is always is making sense of them.

Yeah, no, that's actually exactly right. In the case of the analogy between Thucydides and Josephus, it's probably not quite as strong because Thucydides failed to relieve a city that was under siege for the Athenians, whereas Josephus, after the siege and conquest of Jotapeta, where he was kind of the presiding general on the Jewish side,

Yeah, no, that's actually exactly right. In the case of the analogy between Thucydides and Josephus, it's probably not quite as strong because Thucydides failed to relieve a city that was under siege for the Athenians, whereas Josephus, after the siege and conquest of Jotapeta, where he was kind of the presiding general on the Jewish side,

Yeah, no, that's actually exactly right. In the case of the analogy between Thucydides and Josephus, it's probably not quite as strong because Thucydides failed to relieve a city that was under siege for the Athenians, whereas Josephus, after the siege and conquest of Jotapeta, where he was kind of the presiding general on the Jewish side,

He surrendered and he went over to the Roman side and actually accompanied Titus to the siege of Jerusalem in seven days. So you're 100% correct. There are problems with working with Josephus' text, which are, I think, almost unique in antiquity.

He surrendered and he went over to the Roman side and actually accompanied Titus to the siege of Jerusalem in seven days. So you're 100% correct. There are problems with working with Josephus' text, which are, I think, almost unique in antiquity.

He surrendered and he went over to the Roman side and actually accompanied Titus to the siege of Jerusalem in seven days. So you're 100% correct. There are problems with working with Josephus' text, which are, I think, almost unique in antiquity.

And on that, also a colleague of mine, a very good Josephus scholar named Steve Mason has kind of brought out some of the rhetorical issues in Josephus' text. And then finally, very quickly, you know, Josephus has a sort of Deuteronomic view of history, which is essentially that God determines how everything is going to come out.