Josephus’ Judaean War and the Historiography of (De)humanization

In his preface to the Judaean War, Josephus draws attention to and then defends his emotional involvement in the subject matter (πάθος; συμφορά, 1.9) and affirms that authorial emotion does not necessarily compromise historical objectivity and impartiality (ἀκρίβεια, 1.9) even if it seems to counter the rules of history (τὸν τῆς ἱστορίας νόμον). His visceral writing bears witness to his superb, systematic deployment of enargeia throughout the work, most famously in his extended treatment of the fall of Jerusalem, which lucidly drives home the horrors of siege and total war.

In this paper, I argue that Josephus’ sustained engagement with Classical historiographic conventions and Classical rhetorical theory and style (including technical concepts like ekphrasis/enargeia which interested first-century theorists like Quintilian and Aelius Theon) are part of a concerted political, historiographical, and cultural program. Josephus’ display of mastery over core aspects of elite education establishes him as an authoritative and reliable source who is fluent in the literary and cultural vernacular of educated Romans. This framing is in service of my second and most important point. Turning to the siege of Jerusalem, I offer a close reading of a harrowing, even if ‘regular’, episode: Judaeans – including noncombatants – driven by famine and desperation to forage for food beyond the walls, are captured on Titus’ orders and crucified in a grotesque spectacle. Josephus’ depiction of this event, with its focus on perspective, emotions, and spectacle, underscores the contested nature of such punitive sights, and is designed to prepare us for interpreting the narrative (anti)climax: the Flavian triumph in Rome, which once again instrumentalizes the abused bodies of Judaean captives to vaunt, humiliate, and dehumanize.

I propose that Josephus’ affective history is strategically calculated to rally the sympathy of a politically, geographically, and ethnically diverse and ‘international’ imperial audience. His vivid, enargeiac style should thus be understood as a technique for writing across culture and for humanizing his people. It is a response to hostile, Romano-centric literary propaganda, but especially to triumphalist Flavian monumental iconography, social media, and mass entertainment (the triumph itself; gladiatorial games; celebratory ‘Judaea Capta’ coins, and beyond), which narrativized this war. Josephus’ text thus articulates a complicated negotiation that simultaneously reflects but also writes back against reductive Flavian propaganda by illustrating the Judaean Revolt not as the singular violence of a uniquely intransigent horde of terrorists, but as a story of civil war and military uprising familiar to Roman elites in the Italian center as well as to a ‘global’ Romanized audience throughout the empire – both of whom may have experienced the civil wars of 69-70 or Roman domination and conquest. It also raises perennial questions about the power – and limits – of emotional, sympathetic representation to humanize those whom colonial violence vilifies, misrepresents, and seeks to degrade.