*Min*a hanei milei?
I think the problem of double-euphimism is stronger.
I think if you study all the uses of min you'd see that that, but I agree the first is stronger.
What do you think, anyway?
Bad news for us? :-O
How would the author(s) of the medrash have expected any Jewish person to know who they were talking about?
I guess he assumed that originally it was perfectly clear what (who) it was talking about. Philo was not unknown to the Jews; he only became forgotten in the space of time. Once ph-y-l-w-n no longer made sense because no one knew who Philo was or what was intended, it may have been simply corrected to p-l-w-n-y.
>Bad news for us? :-O
Pretty much, yeah. :p
Where is Philo mentioned by Jewish sources prior to De Rossi?
We find him trying to get Jewish children to stop learning Torah (B. Hagigah 15b), reporting Jews who tried to minimize their hillul shabbat which was required by Roman decree (Jer. Hagigah ch. II). These depictions portray him as one who collaborated with the Romans.
That doesn't sound like a description of Philo at all! Do we have any indication that Philo despised the study of Torah? He certainly spend a large amount of time interpreting many biblical passages himself!
some guy- that was Acher.
Oh, sorry, I misread that badly. I will go to sleep now, since obviously my brain went to sleep several hours ago.
In Talmudic literature, Min does not refer only to heretics, but rather to any sect or group that had beliefs or practices that differed from Pharisaic Judaism.
The Mishna Yadayim 4:8 records a discussion between a Galilean Min and the Pharisees, concerning "writing the name of the ruler in a document." This Min was most probably one of the Galilean Zealots, who opposed Roman rule for religous reasons. They definitely were not heretics, as they were "frummer" than the more pragmatic Pharisees.
(See G. Allon's piece on B'shem Hameforash in his Mechkarim)
Kesiva VeChasima Tovah!
In that case wouldn't you expect at least some MSS variation in the name? The Finkelstein edition of Sifre doesn't show any there.
And a ksive vekhsime toyve, by the way.
Here's a thought. We now know that "Bar Kokhba" and "Bar Koziva" were both nicknames for the man whose real name was Bar Kosiba. The second nickname was what might be called a dysphemism, and apparently arose after the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt: "Rabbi used to expound, 'There shall step forth a star (kokhav) out of Jacob' (Num. 24:17). Read not 'kokhav' but 'kozav' (lie)" (Eikhah Rabbati 2:4). Maybe "peloni" is not a mistaken reading for Philo, but an intentional (and clever) dysphemism given to him by someone who did not admire his approach.
Well, obviously it was a tentative theory; a guess, if you will.
But I think his point was that at a very early date it was corrected to the normal form peloni, so it wouldn't be reflected in any mss. We don't have any mss as old as when Jews know who Philo was.
Like Andy said above, Philo isn't mentioned by Jewish sources (I think) before Meor Enayim. We Jews just forgot about him. He wasn't rabbinic. He wrote in Greek. The Christians took him.
But a very long time ago Jews must have known about him; when he was alive and for some time afterwards. But at some point he disappeared from whatever place he held in the collective memory of the Jews, just as most of Hellenic Judaism did. I guess R. Finkelstein thought it possible that this originally was about him. Once no one could have known that anymore it would have been simple to just snip a yod from the second letter and put it at the end. Clearly no Jew could have imagined that the word wasn't פלוני like all the thousands of other instances in rabbinic literature.
He does raise a good point. Who is פלוני?
A kesiva vehasima tova to you too. Have a sweet year!
Dan, interesting point. But what would the insult be? Merely to change his name to essentially read "Nameless?"
If so, that would seem a little tepid to me. But of course that itself is an interesting thing, because clearly someone who learned "חכמת ישראל" isn't quite so terrible as other Jews gone astray.
In fact, there may be a modern parallel. There are times when certain rabbinic figures are condemned in publich pashkevilin but are not named, because they are respected for their learning. Marc Shapiro gave an example of a scathing criticism of Saul Lieberman which didn't name him, presumably out of a certain measure of respect.
Unlike the Slifkin ban, when Nosson Kamenetzky's book Making of a Godol was banned he wasn't mentioned by name.
I take your point, but "peloni" may not be so tepid after all. It has been pointed out that the "Peloni Almoni" who declines to marry Ruth may be so called as a pejorative for failing to fulfill his duty. And you're gonna love this: the Spanish equivalent of Peloni, in the sense of "John Doe," is "Fulano." What would Mozeson say? :-)
Philo was not unknown to the Jews; he only became forgotten in the space of time.
S, what is your basis for this statement? I agree that Philo was very prominent in Alexandria, and perhaps in the Hellenized portions of the Jewish community. As a Hellenized Jew, and someone familiar with the upper strata of Roman society Josephus would have been aware of Philo, but what about the Pharisees?
mozeson, right. how about this - 'almoni' and 'anomie'.
coincidence?
yes.
You're right. I have no idea really if its tepid. We can often tell from context the manners and mores of cultures different from our own, but not always. It's possible that calling someone peloni was a devastating insult. But I like my peshat better, since we do see that anonymity is sometimes given as cover for basically respected people viewed as gone astray. :) (Even though if L. Finkelstein is right, then it would not have been deliberately changed and even though he might be wrong to begin with and it has nothing to do with Philo!)
Re. Mozeson--I wonder if he has already siezed on that. I think his book only lists English words, but he claims that all language from "Chinese to Iriqois" comes from Hebrew!
BTW, someone once told me that he believed that peloni comes from Pliny. I reminded him to familiarize himself with Tanakh before branching into the role of Greek and Roman cultural influences on Judaism!
>S, what is your basis for this statement? I agree that Philo was very prominent in Alexandria, and perhaps in the Hellenized portions of the Jewish community. As a Hellenized Jew, and someone familiar with the upper strata of Roman society Josephus would have been aware of Philo, but what about the Pharisees?
They would have been familiar as well. First of all, they were a lot more "Hellenized" (deliberately quoted) then you'd otherwise think. Read Saul Lieberman's books (available combined from the JTS web store).
Secondly, Josephus essentially was a Pharisee himself, at least that is what he thought. He was cosmopolitan, but so were plenty of tannaim, who were political leaders as well as spiritual ones.
Thirdly, echoes of the Hellenic Judaism are found in rabbnic literature. For example, quite a bit is remembred about the glory of the Alexandria synogogue. There are discussions of the Septuagint, not all negative. There is of course thousands of Greek words, references to Homer etc.
Philo supposedly influenced the opening of John (the Word/ Logos), which means that his ideas were in Palestine during that time.
Philo was a big gun, so I think its safe to assume that rabbis knew who he was and some even knew his teaching.
Oh, I get it, Fred. That last anonymous is you, isn't it? Don't sell yourself short, we all still respect you. Ketiva va-hatima tova.
Dr Belkin's lifework was devoted to showing the affinities between Philo and Midrash. his book on bereshit is always sold at the yu seforim sale
Belkin does show many affinities between them; however it may be that Philo was influenced by Palestinian traditions, not vice-versa. BTW, why is Belkin's book so expensive (even at the sale)? I did see however that the late David Flusser posits a concomittant influence on rabbinic traditions by Philo; he offers no evidence however, he just thinks it likely based largely on the Hellenization of Jews even in Palestine as demonstrated, as previously stated, by Lieberman and others(like M. Hengel).
Sorry. After reading Fred's last comment, I see that I added nothing of substance with my previous comment (except for my complaint about the cost of Belkin's book).
fulano is actually quite realistic — Spanish does have a heavy Arabic influence, after all.
Olé!
How much did the Rabbis of that era know about Philo? Perhaps the פלוני of the Gemara is a euphemism (like אחר) for some other (infrequently named) apikores?
How about a much simpler emendation -kiflaim, yud for vav and nun/yod for mem. This fits much better into the context of speaking "double;, torah and devarim bateilim.
Jordan, we have no idea. Josephus knew him. Rabbinic literature is silent about Philo--unless Louis Finkelstein is right about this (or the one or two other possible mentions his article raises). As I said earlier there is no reason to assume he was unknown to rabbis. On the contrary, it may be more plausible that he was known to them, or some of them, than that he was not known at all.
פלוני in this midrash could be a euphemism for someone besides Philo, but if so we have no idea who it is. Finkelstein's argument is that if it refers to someone we do know of then no one fits the bill better than Philo; if so it wouldn't be a euphemism, rather a textual corruption.
Avakesh, very interesting idea!
There is a manuscript of the Sifre which has "beteilim" instead of "keploni". Also, Pseudo-Raabad says that "ploni" is Menashe and references Bavli Sanhedrin 98b (PR seems to have been gores "plon" without the final yud which could also be read as "philon").Lieberman discusses this a bit in his review of Finkelstein's Sifre and gives other examples where Chazal wrote "ploni" when they did not want to name the individual. And of course I forgot that the Chronicles of Yerahmiel (c.12th century) mention Philo from where it appears in the mss. of Yossippon.
>I forgot that the Chronicles of Yerahmiel (c.12th century) mention Philo from where it appears in the mss. of Yossippon.
What does he call him?
If I understand correctly, he is first called Yedidyah(u) by Meor Enayim.
I think he calls him "filo" w/o a "nun".AFAIK the name Yedidyah was made up by ME as a translation of the Greek.
That's the impression I am under as well.
I had first heard this idea from Dr. Louis Feldman in class, who felt it was ridiculous
Do you remember what he said?
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