Viewing Jerusalem in the Letter of Aristeas: Aesthetics, Experience, and Empire

Abstract

This article examines the narrator’s viewing of Jerusalem and Judea, the Jerusalem Temple, and the high priest’s performance of the liturgy in the Letter of Aristeas (§§83–120). The first section considers the aesthetics that Aristeas views as operative in Jerusalem and demonstrates how his art-critical analysis of Jewish objects reveals them to follow Greek aesthetics more closely than Alexandrian artworks, which instead bespeak imperial excess. The second section proposes that, although he may appear to be on a military reconnaissance, the Letter highlights Aristeas’ experience of witnessing and being overwhelmed by the high priest Eleazar performing the liturgy. In concluding, it suggests that Aristeas’ mind-altering experience of viewing the liturgy in Jerusalem has great import for the narrative of the Torah’s translation into Greek. Telling the story of a Jewish translation involves a Greek transformation.