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The Phoenix in Rabbinic Literature*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

M. R. Niehoff
M. R. Niehoff
Affiliation:
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
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Extract

Contact between cultures is a complex phenomenon that often involves accepting foreign ideas until these become new ways of self-expression. The case of the phoenix is of special interest, in this respect, because in antiquity it was associated with the sun temple at Heliopolis and miraculous forms of rebirth. The phoenix motif also appears in a variety of early Jewish and Christian writings, thus allowing for a comparative appreciation of its rabbinic reception. In light of these other intercultural encounters, it becomes clear that the rabbis were familiar with the details of the Hellenistic phoenix myths, and not only adapted the story to their own values but even enhanced its mythological dimension. In this way, the rabbis continued the Hellenistic practice of reactivating an ancient Egyptian myth. In contrast to the symbolic approach of early Christianity, the rabbis characteristically chose to accommodate the phoenix on a literal level, interpreting it mythopoeically, that is, by creating myth. Their interpretation of the phoenix moreover illuminates important, yet hitherto unnoticed aspects of rabbinic mythology.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 89 , Issue 3 , July 1996 , pp. 245 - 265
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1996

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References

1 For a survey of the ancient sources, see van den Broek, R., The Myth of the Phoenix According to Classical and Early Christian Sources (Leiden: Brill, 1972)Google Scholar.

2 Saul Lieberman established the notion of rabbinic receptiveness to Hellenism for this century, thus reviving a concept that had been generally accepted in the nineteenth century. See esp. Lieberman, Saul, Hellenism in Jewish Palestine (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1950)Google Scholar; idem, Greek in Jewish Palestine (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1942); and more recently also Harvey, Z. W., “Rabbinic Attitudes Toward Philosophy,” in Blumberg, Herman G., et al. , eds., “Open Thou Mine Eyes. …” Essays on Aggadah and Judaica Presented to Rabbi William G. Braude on His Eightieth Birthday and Dedicated to His Memory (Hoboken, NJ: Ktav, 1992) 83–101Google Scholar.

3 Hans Blumenberg called this type of myth “art myth” see Blumenberg, Hans, Work on Myth (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1985) 174–214Google Scholar.

4 Compare Dan Pagis, who deals in his study of the phoenix with a variety of rabbinic sources. He focuses, however, on such late and unusual works as the Alphabet of Ben Sira and Genesis Rabbati and evaluates rabbinic sources as an expression of the same, mostly symbolic idea found in Christian and modern literature. Pagis, Dan, “The Bird of Immortality: The Motif of the Phoenix in the Midrash and the Aggadah,” in The Hebrew Gymnasium in Jerusalem: Jubilee Book (Jerusalem: The Association of the Friends of the Hebrew Gymnasium in Jerusalem, 1962) 74–90 [Hebrew]Google Scholar.

5 See esp. Kimelman, Reuven, “Rabbi Yochanan and Origen on the Song of Songs: A Third Century Jewish-Christian Disputation” HTR 73 (1980) 567–95Google Scholar; and Segal, Alan F., The Other Judaisms of Late Antiquity (Providence: Brown University Press, 1987) 109–30.Google Scholar

6 Johann Gottfried Eichhorn introduced the notion of the myth to the academic study of the Hebrew Bible. Relying on Heyne's psychological-phenomenological investigations into classical mythology, he defined myth as a story with a historical kernel that expresses the primitive worldview of ancient peoples. See esp. his seminal study of Genesis: Gabler, D. Johann Philipp, ed., Johann Gottfried Eichhorns Urgeschichte (Altdorf and Nürnberg: Monath & Kussler, 1793)Google Scholar. See also Hartlich, Christian and Sachs, Walter, Der Ursprung des Mythosbegriffes in der modernen Bibelwissenschaft (Tübingen: Mohr, 1952)Google Scholar.

7 See esp. Gershom Scholem, “Kabbala und Mythos,” in idem, Zur Kabbala und ihrer Symbolik (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 1981) 117–58.

8 See Niehoff, M. R., “Zunz's Concept of Aggadah as an Expression of Jewish Spirituality,” Tarbiz 64 (1995) 423–59 [Hebrew]Google Scholar (the English version is forthcoming in Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook).

9 Max Grünbaum, Beiträge zur vergleichenden Mythologie aus der Haggadah, in idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Sprach-und Sagenkunde (ed. Felix Perles; Berlin: Calvary, 1901) 1–237. See also Goldziher's, Ignac youthful and somewhat fantastic book Mythology among the Hebrews (1877; New York: Cooper Square, 1967)Google Scholar.

0 See esp. Yehuda Liebes, “Der Natura Dei: On the Development of the Jewish Myth,” in idem, Studies in Jewish Myth and Jewish Messianism (New York: SUNY Press, 1993) 1–64.

11 See esp. Michael Fishbane, “‘The Holy One Sits and Roars’: Mythopoesis and the Midrashic Imagination,” in idem, ed., The Midrashic Imagination: Jewish Exegesis, Thought and History (New York: SUNY Press, 1993) 60–77; idem, “Arm of the Lord: Biblical Myth, Rabbinic Midrash and the Mystery of History,” in Samuel E. Balentine and John Barton, eds., Language, Theology, and the Bible: Essays in Honour of James Barr (Oxford: Clarendon, 1994) 271–92; Fishbane, Michael, “The ‘Measures’ of God's Glory in the Ancient Midrash” in Gruenwald, Ithamar, et al. , eds., Messiah and Christos: Studies in the Jewish Origins of Christianity Presented to David Flusser on the Occasion of His Seventy-Fifth Birthday (Tübingen: Mohr/Siebeck, 1993) 53–74Google Scholar.

12 See esp. Fishbane, “The Holy One Sits,’” 62–66.

13 See also Stern, David, “Imitatio Hominis: Anthropomorphism and the Character(s) of God,” Prooftexts 12 (1992) 151–74Google Scholar. Stern stresses the prevalence of anthropomorphism in the rabbinic sources and rightly interprets this phenomenon as an indication of the rabbis’ positive, prephilosophical attitude toward anthropomorphism. Stern nevertheless betrays a rationalistic tendency when separating the issue of anthropomorphism from mythology and insisting on the difference between anthropomorphic expressions (found in rabbinics) and anthropomorphic conceptions of God (not actually found in rabbinics).

14 Eikha Rabbah, proem 24.

15 b. Me. 59b.

16 Gen 1:26–27.

17 Gen. R. 8.5.

18 Ibid. For the gnostic background of this myth, see esp. Alexander Altmann, “The Gnostic Background of the Rabbinic Adam Legends,” in idem, Essays in Jewish Intellectual History (Hanover, NH: Brandeis University Press, 1981) 1–16. Compare Gruenwald, Ithamar, “The Problem of Anti-Gnostic Polemic in Rabbinic Literature,” in van den Broek, R. and Vermaseren, Maarten, eds., Studies in Gnosticism and Hellenistic Religions (Leiden: Brill, 1981) 171–89.Google Scholar

19 For this broader definition of myth, see esp. Kirk, Geoffrey S., Myth: Its Meaning and Functions in Ancient and Other Cultures (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970) 1–41Google Scholar.

20 Gen. R. 2.2.

21 Ibid. 3.6.

22 Regarding the move from a more historical orientation in scripture to a more mythological orientation in rabbinic literature, see also Yerushalmi, Yosef Haim, Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1982) 5–26Google Scholar.

23 See also Aptowitzer, Victor (“The Rewarding and Punishing of Animals and Inanimate Objects: On the Aggadic View of the World,” HUCA 3 [1926] 117–55)Google Scholar who stresses the personification of the animal world as a characteristic feature of the rabbis' more organic worldview. See also Beit-Arie, Malachi, “Perek Shira: Introduction and Critical Edition” (Ph.D. diss., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1966) 57–64Google Scholar.

24 For example, Prov 30:24–31; Num 22:23–24:25.

25 For example, Ps 74:12–17; Job 40:25–32.

26 Ps 74:14.

27 Isa 27:1. See also Levenson, Jon, Creation and the Persistence of Evil (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1988)Google Scholar.

28 Job 41:10–11.

29 b. B. Batra 74b.

30 Ibid. 75a.

31 Ibid. 74b.

32 Ibid.

33 Gen. R. 31.13.

34 Ibid.

35 I Clem. 25.1, based on the Greek text edited by Lightfoot, Joseph Barber, S. Clement of Rome: The Two Epistles to the Corinthians (London and Cambridge: Macmillan, 1869)Google Scholar.

36 Herodotus Hist. 2.73. The phoenix first appears in Hesiod Frag. 304, where only the bird's longevity is mentioned. Compare R. van den Broek, The Myth of the Phoenix, 76–145.

37 Pliny Hist. nat. 10.4.

38 See also Lloyd, Alan B., Herodotus: Book II. Introduction (Leiden: Brill, 1975) 61–76Google Scholar; idem, Herodotus: Book II. Commentary (Leiden: Brill, 1976) 89; Gould, John, Herodotus (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989) 19–41Google Scholar.

39 Note that Herodotus (Hist. 2.73) explicitly distances himself from the account by stressing that he does not believe the Egyptian reports.

40 Pliny Hist. nat. 10.5.

41 See esp. Herodotus Hist. 2.73; Pliny's introductory remarks on the phoenix in Nat. hist. 10.3; and Claudius Claudianus, “The Phoenix,” in idem, Shorter Poems (trans. Maurice Platnauer; LCL; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1956) 223–31.

42 I Clem. 26.1.

43 Ibid., 25.

44 For the date and historical background of the different Physiologus versions, see Lauchert, Friedrich, Geschlchte des Physiologus (1889; reprinted Geneva: Slatkine, 1974)Google Scholar.

45 The Greek text appears in Offermanns, Dieter, Der Physiologus nach den Handschriften G und M (Meisenheim: Hain, 1966) 38–41.Google Scholar

46 αὺτὸ πετεινόν (Ibid., 38.16).

47 John 10:18.

48 Tertullian Res. Carn. 1.13.

49 Ibid.

50 Compare the exegetical controversies between Christians and Jews on the Song of Songs. Both communities tended to associate the biblical lemma with the same theological topos, yet insisted that their religion was in this respect superior. See for example the interpretation of the expression “with the kisses of his mouth” (Cant 1:2), which is interpreted by both Jews and Christians as a reference to God's direct revelation to his community. While the rabbis insist that this revelation took place and reached its climax at Sinai (Cant. R. 1; 2.1–5), Origen claims that the only true and direct revelation of God took place in Christianity when God became flesh in Jesus (Comment, in Cant. Cant. 1.1).

51 Tertullian Res. Cam. 1.13.

52 Origen Cels. 4.98.

53 Rufinus, , A Commentary on the Apostle's Creed (trans. Kelly, J. N. D.; London: Longmans, 1955) 44.Google Scholar

54 Gen. R. 19.5.

55 For different views of Job 29:18, see esp. Driver, Samuel R. and Gray, George B., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Job (ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1958) 249–50Google Scholar. For a background of the Septuagint on Job, see also Orlinsky, Harry M., “Studies in the Septuagint of the Book of Job,” HUCA 28 (1957) 53–74Google Scholar.

56 Ps 50:11, 80:14.

57 Lewysohn, Ludwig, Die Zoologie des Talmuds (Frankfurt a.M.: n.p., 1858) 352–53.Google Scholar

58 Levy, Jacob, Wörterbuch über die Talmudim und die Midraschim (4 vols.; Berlin and Vienna: Harz, 1924) 1. 47–48.Google Scholar

59 Gen. R. 19.5.1 based my translations on the text of Albeck, Chanoch and Theodor's, Judah critical edition, Bereshit Rabba mit kritischem Apparat und Kommentar (Jerusalem: Wahrmann, 1965) 174 [Hebrew]Google Scholar; my italics.

60 Gen 3:6.

61 Job 29:18.

62 See esp. Claudian Phoenix 29 and Lactantius Phoenix in idem, L. Caeli Firmiani Lactantii Opera Omnia (3 vols.; eds. Samuel Brandt and George Laubermann; Vienna: Tempsley, 1890) 2. 141–43.

63 Lactantius Phoenix 2. 217.

64 For further examples and their respective cultural background, see R. van den Broek, The Myth of the Phoenix, 146–60.

65 Job 29:18.

66 Pliny Hist. nat. 10.4.

67 Ibid.

68 Gen. R. 19.4 (ed. Albeck) 172–73.

69 Gen 2:17.

70 Gen 3:6.

71 Bar. 6–8 (in Apocalypsis Baruchi Graece [ed. Picard, J.-C.; PVTG 2; Leiden: Brill, 1967] 87–90).Google Scholar

72 It is possible that the reference to the bird's excrement in the form of a worm reflects a misunderstood version of the phoenix's rebirth from the consumed remains of its predecessor.

73 Note also the reference to the phoenix's unusual size and red color by Ezekiel the Tragedian, the earliest-known evidence in Jewish sources. The phoenix is here part of an ideal description of the land of Israel which might suggest an allegorical interpretation of the exodus as a departure for paradisiacal conditions of longevity and abundance. See also Collins, John J., Between Athens and Jerusalem: Jewish Identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora (New York: Crossroads, 1983) 209–10.Google Scholar

74 My translation depends upon the critical edition of Margulies, Mordecai, Midrash Wayikra Rabbah: A Critical Edition Based on Manuscripts and Geniza Fragments with Variants and Notes 22.10 (2 vols.; New York and Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1993) 2. 822–23.Google Scholar

75 אוה ךוהט ףוע זיז הופוע ךוסיא החה.

76 Ps 50:11.

77 Job 39:26.

78 הזמו הזמ מעס יני מ המכ ונ שיש זיז ותוא אךוק המלו.

79 Lev. R. 22.10 (ed. Margulies) 2. 823.

80 b. B. Batra 73b.

81 Ibid.

82 Ibid.

83 Ibid.

84 Ps 50:11.