(printed p. 21 — Book I)
This is the chief controversy about which Johannes Drusius disputes with me. In my Harmony of the Maccabees, I had said that three sects are asserted by Josephus Gorionides, and I had cited two Hebrew editions: the Basel edition, book 4, chapter 6, and the Cracow edition, book 4, chapter 29, page 28.
Drusius, however, says: “The mind of Gorionides escaped you; he commemorates there only two sects, one of the Sadducees, whose side the Samaritans followed, and another of the Hasidaeans, or Pharisees, whom the people followed.” To attribute this meaning to the son of Gorion, first he criticizes my Latin rendering of the Hebrew words from that chapter 29, on pages 27, 28, 46, and 63; then he constructs two arguments for himself. One is that the people did not follow the Essenes, but the Pharisees. The other is that the Pharisees were first among the Jews.
I, on the contrary, shall first set the Hebrew words, together with my translation and his, before the reader’s eyes; then I shall prove that my view is more consistent both with Gorionides himself and with the truth. The words of Gorionides, then, are: Vehachesidim lebaddam him haham haholech acherehem lechelek acher.
[margin: Serarius, Harmony of the Maccabees, fols. 706 and 708. Cracow edition, p. 28.]
(printed p. 22)
My translation of these words in the cited passage of the Maccabees, page 708, was this: “And the Hasidaeans, separated from those,” that is, from the Pharisees and Sadducees already enumerated, “with the people who followed them, constitute another sect.” Drusius’s translation, on page 46, is this: “And those pious men, or Hasidaeans, alone with the people who followed them, are the other party.”
II. Drusius’s Accusation and Serarius’s Defense
What, then, does Drusius blame in my translation? This, of course: that I translated lebaddam as “separated from those,” when it should have been translated “alone.” “Serarius,” he says on page 7 in his preface, “was misled, as it seems, by the particle lebaddam, not rightly understood.” But as far as the sense is concerned, surely both amount to the same thing. For those who are alone are separated from others. And in any discourse, if mention has previously been made of several groups, and afterwards some people not previously named are named, and these are said to do something “alone,” do they not do that very thing separated from those who were named before?
The kinds of those who philosophize are the Physicists, who examine nature; the Dialecticians, who consider how one thing is rightly or wrongly inferred from another; and the Ethicists alone discuss vices and virtues and shape human morals. What is meant here by “the Ethicists alone”? Surely the Ethicists separated from the others already named? The Ethicists, I say, apart from those same others?
In Hebrew and Greek, Genesis 21:28 speaks of lambs “alone”; our old translator expressed this thus: “Abraham set seven lambs of the flock apart.”
[margin: Drusius’s accusation. Serarius’s defense.]
(printed p. 23)
And in verse 29 Abimelech said: “What do those seven lambs mean, which you have set apart?” In Genesis 43:32: “Set on bread.” When it had been set on, Joseph sat apart, and his brothers apart, and the Egyptians also, who ate with him, sat apart before him. And in 2 Samuel 10:8, the army of the Ammonites against David consisted of the Ammonites themselves and of hired Syrians. The former drew up their battle line at the gate of their city; the latter, separated from them, drew up theirs in the field. What the Hebrew and Greek say the Syrians did “alone,” our translator renders thus: “The Syrians of Zoba, Rehob, Ishtob, and Maachah were apart in the field.”
But since the Innovators often prefer the new wine of new versions to the old wine of the old translator, I cite their most recent translators of these passages, Junius and Tremellius, who render thus: “Abraham had set seven ewe-lambs of the flock apart. Therefore Abimelech said to Abraham, ‘What mean these seven ewe-lambs here, which you have set apart?’ Set on food; and they set it before him apart, and before them apart. But before the Egyptians eating with him, apart. The Ammonites went out and drew up their battle line at the entrance of the gate; but the Syrians of Zobah, Rehob, and the men of Tob and Maachah were apart in the field.”
If, therefore, I had translated, “And the Hasidaeans apart from those,” that is, from the Pharisees and Sadducees already counted, “constitute another sect,” would I have erred? But how, I ask, do “the Hasidaeans apart from those” and “the Hasidaeans separated from those” differ?
(printed p. 24)
Therefore those things which Drusius throws at me on pages 27 and 28 - “you did not understand Gorionides’s words”; “you translated badly”; “you are pleasantly mistaken about the particle lebaddam”; and similar things - can they not more truly be thrown back at him?
Moreover, Gorionides had previously set down two sects clearly, namely those of the Pharisees and Sadducees, and then afterwards he proceeds as follows: “And the Hasidaeans lebaddam, with the people who went after them, are another part.” Does this not mark a third sect clearly enough? To keep the example already given above: if someone had enumerated those two kinds of philosophers, the Physicists and Dialecticians, and the same person immediately added, “And the Ethicists lebaddam, with their hearers, are another kind,” would it be obscure to anyone that a third part of those who philosophize is being constituted here?
Nor can we rightly understand by the Hasidaeans, as Drusius invents, the Pharisees in these words of Gorionides, just as in the example above we cannot understand the Physicists by the Ethicists. Gorionides himself supplies a good argument for confirming this very matter, and indeed in this very chapter about which the dispute turns. For when he wanted the Pharisees to be understood by “the wise men of Israel,” he carefully gave that notice and explained it once and again. To follow the new division of his chapter made by Drusius, in number 3 he says: “The king sat at table with the wise men. These are the Pharisees.” And immediately in number 4: “The king said to the wise men, that is, to the Pharisees.” Why, then, in a similar way, did he not say, “And the Hasidaeans, these are the Pharisees,” or “the Hasidaeans, that is, the Pharisees”?
(printed p. 25)
For although Drusius uses these two ways of speaking, in the Hebrew there is only one phrase, hemmah happeruschim. Why, then, I ask, did Gorionides not use this or any similar explanation? Why not even once, either in this chapter or in any neighboring chapter? Indeed, why not in the whole work, which nevertheless consists of a good five long books in the Basel edition and six in the Cracow edition?
Could anyone have had more doubt about who the wise men of Israel were than about who the Hasidaeans were? Behold, even among us today the former is entirely beyond doubt, while the latter is still in doubt, unless perhaps, as they say, for the sake of a lawsuit Drusius has sown disputes for Serarius about a thing that is thoroughly clear. Yet for the sake of peace and concord I call him not to the tribunal of the praetors, but to the arbitration of those whom he himself chose, and for this one reason also.
Either Gorionides wants there to be only two sects of the Jews, or he does not. If he does, he fights with Josephus Flavius; if he does not, he fights with you. Or, if Drusius prefers this to be explained a little more fully, I say this: either Gorionides asserts three sects of the Jews; or he names only two, but does not deny a third; or he names only two and at the same time denies a third. If the first, Gorionides is on my side. If the second, he is not against me. If the third, he is indeed against me; but on my side against him stands the other Josephus, cited above in chapter 3.
Yet for my part I would not wish such great men to be committed to war with one another, to quarrel, and to fight, nor, if he is wise, should Drusius wish it for his own part.
[margin: Josephus and Gorionides agree with each other.]
(printed p. 26)
Rather, let both of us confess what the matter is: these two Josephuses agree perfectly with one another on this question; each names and counts three sects, and neither contradicts the other. This is more consistent both with the text of Gorionides himself, as I have so far proved, and with the authority of the authors.