INTRODUCTION1.To what extent the Jews of the present day or those of earlier times may be considered racially pure, depends upon what criteria of race are adopted. At present there is no general agreement among ethnologists on this subject. The historical data are very uncertain. At all events absolute racial unity of the Jews of the Dispersion cannot be maintained. The facts of their vigorous propaganda and their extensive slave-property are too well attested. But it is wholly impossible to determine how far the admixture went. 2.The best edition of Philo is the still unfinished one which is being prepared by two German scholars, Wendland and Cohen. In this the Apologia has not yet appeared. Earlier editions are those of Mangey (1742) and Holtze (1851). Philo’s works were translated into English by C. D. Yonge (Bohn’s Library, London, 1854). 3.In Greek the two commonest editions of Josephus’ works are those of Niese (1887-1895) and of Naber (1896). Neither completely satisfies all the demands that may be made for the adequate presentation of the text. The old English translation of W. Whiston, so widely circulated both in England and America, is very inaccurate. The revision of this translation by A. R. Shilleto (1889-1890) has only slightly improved it. 4.The references to the Jews in the inscriptions and papyri have not, as yet, been collected. Mr. Seymour de Ricci planned a collection of the Greek and Latin inscriptions to be called Corpus Inscriptionum Judaicarum. This Corpus was, at least partly, in manuscript form in 1912, but no part has been published. Mr. de Ricci’s article on “Inscriptions” in the Jewish Encyclopedia, and Johannes Oehler, Epigraphische BeitrÄge zur Geschichte des Judentums (Monatsschrift f. Gesch. u. Wiss. d. Jud. 1909, xvii. 292-302, 443-452, 524-538) give a practically complete collection. Chapter I |