An Imaginary Trio

Front matter

Yaacov Shavit An Imaginary Trio

Yaacov Shavit An Imaginary Trio

King Solomon, Jesus, and Aristotle

Chapter One Biographies Correspond — 15

Chapter Two Solomon and Jesus—Two Sons of God, and of David? —— 32 Pagan polemic — 39 The Sages’ polemic — 40 Christian polemic — 43 Medieval Jewish Polemic —— 47 The Broken Dynasty: Solomon and Jesus—two sons of David? — 49

Chapter Three Solomon—His Actions and Books: Prefiguration, Typology, and His Teachings — 56 The Queen of Sheba’s Visit as a Typological Event — 64

The Theological and Allegorical Interpretations of Solomon’s

Books — 65

The Song of Songs — 67

Proverbs — 71

Chapter Four The Divine Presence and a Heavenly Voice Come to Solomon’s Aid—On Sin, Repentance, and Absolution — 76

Heaven comes to Solomon’s Aid — 84

Chapter Five “How is Jesus Greater than Solomon?” Solomon and Jesus as Magicians (Healers and Exorcists) — 96

Magic and Occultism — 96

Magic and Healing — 98

The Riddle of Solomon’s Ring — 109

Vill —— Contents

Chapter Six Miracles and Wonders: Magic, Satan, and Demons —— 119 Sorcerers and Magicians — 122 Satan and Demons —— 127 Asmodeus and the Demons Build the Temple — 131

Chapter Seven Solomon’s Wisdom—From Hermes to Aristotle — 136 Solomon’s Wisdom according to the Sages — 143 Solomon’s Wisdom in the Middle Ages — 145 Solomon’s Wisdom in Christian Literature — 149 Jesus’ Wisdom — 151 From Thoth-Hermes to Aristotle — 153 Solomon and Aristotle — 159 Wisdom versus Wit — 168

Chapter Eight Solomon, Aristoteles Judaicus, and the Invention of a Pseudo- Solomonic Library — 172

The Invention of a Pseudo-Solomonic Library — 185 Afterword — 191

Acknowledgements

The research and writing of this book took place over a long, frequently interrupted, period. My original idea was to write about King Solomon as a timeless legend and myth in various cultures. Yet the more headway I made in the vast amount of source materials, the less I could avoid acknowledging that this was a Sisyphean task. The abundance of sources and the extensive research literature that has emerged over the last century or so regarding diverse aspects of the figure of Solomon led me to relinquish my original plan and to limit its scope. This book, then, is not intended to retell even a small portion of the legendary traditions about Solomon.’ Instead, it focuses on those places and instances where his (imaginary) legendary biography intersects with those of Jesus Christ and of Aristotle, the Greek philosopher. Solomon is the axis around which this trio revolves and is the thread that binds it together. The book is based on the premise that there exists a correspondence, both overt and implied, between these three biographies—a correspondence that has taken shape within a vast, multifaceted field of texts for more than two thousand years.

First and foremost my thanks goes to Chaya Naor for her endeavor in translating the first version of the book. Throughout my years of research and writing, particularly in the final stages, I have been fortunate to receive assistance, insights, and input—both gentle and stern—from colleagues and friends. I am very grateful to all of the following: Professor Sara Klein-Braslavy, Professor Yuval Rotman, Dr. Yuval Haruvi, Dr. Maya Shabat (Pinhas), Dr. Yuval Rubovitch, Itamar Levin, Dr. Maoz Cahana, Professor David Katz, Razia Geselson and Jean- Luc Allouche (to whom I am grateful for his generous and indispensable help), and to Michal Engel and Carl Yonker for improving the final version.

Without the nearly daily assistance of Avital Ginat and Irit Halavy, I could not have brought the idea of this book to fruition.

I owe a Special debt of gratitude to Professor Manfred Oeming of Heidelberg University for the fruitful months during which he hosted me at the Wissenschaftlich-Theologisches Seminar and introduced me to the statues of Solomon

1 See Faerber (1902); George Salzberger (1907, 1912); Seymour (1924); Legends of the Jews, by Ginzberg (1909), which as of 2003 has come out in six editions; and Bialik and Ravnitzky (1931-1934), which since its second edition has been the most popular and influential collection of Talmudic legends (taken largely from the Babylonian Talmud) in modern Hebrew culture. I should also mention here the most bizarre book on this subject, by the radical American author Moncure D. Conway (1832-1907): Solomon and Solomonic Literature, 1899; see review by Tyler (1990).

8 OpenAccess. © 2020 Yaacov Shavit, published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110677263-001

X — Acknowledgements and Jesus at the Strasbourg Cathedral. My gratitude is also due—not for the first time—to Professor Giinter Stemberger:

An 902 NII am pana "a iv

(“My fruit is better than gold, even fine gold. And my yield than choice silver”, Proverbs 8:19)

Finally, but in truth first and foremost, this book could not have been written without Zohar, who once again has accompanied me along the entire journey, every up and down. Of such a partner Solomon must have thought when he wrote:

man man PAY

(“she is more precious than jewels”, Proverbs 31:10).

Early versions of several chapters of this book have appeared in the Culture and Literature supplement of the newspaper Ha’aretz; in the book Books and Libraries published by the Zalman Shazar publishing house, Jerusalem; and in the Festschrift in honor of Professor Peter Schafer (thanks to Dr. Reimund Leicht, one of its editors, for his important comments). Those chapters appear here in expanded and supplemented form.

The book is dedicated to the memory of Tamar Dror.

Fig. 1 South portal of Notre-Dame de Strasbourg, Christ and King Solomon by Jean Vallastre, photo by Jean-Marc Pascolo, © Wikimedia Commons.

Introduction

Two statues stand on either side of the south transept portal of the Strasbourg Cathedral, one personifying the Church in the figure of the triumphant Ecclesia, the other representing Judaism as the humiliated Synagoga. Between the two sits King Solomon on his throne, the sword of “Solomon’s judgment” resting on his knee’; above him, Jesus holds an orb, symbolizing his cosmic status as the arbiter on the day of the Last Judgment.’ This is apparently the only work of art placed in the public sphere that brings Solomon and Jesus together.” It presents the Christian side of what I will call the “encounter” or “correspondence” between these two figures, who are linked by a diversity of connections and contexts.” Their “correspondence” is, of course, an imaginary one. Even if we accept the idea that Solomon and Jesus, and not merely Aristotle, were, in fact, historical figures—or at least that their biographies contain a historical core—that core has over time given birth to a vast assortment of myths and legendary traditions, and it is within these myths and legends that the correspondence takes form.

2 This is the sword mentioned in 1 Kings 3:24-25: “So the king said, ‘Bring me a sword’, and they brought a sword before the king. The king said, ‘Divide the living boy in two; then give half to the one, and half to the other’”.

3 See Rowe (2008, pp. 179-202), especially p. 182, according to which the image “alludes to the divine regulation of heaven and earth” and the figures depicting Ecclesia and Synagoga appear in many European cathedrals, but those of Solomon and Jesus are unique to Strasbourg. Three responses to an article I published in the “Culture and Literature” supplement of the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz on December 24, 2010, added several details about the cathedral and the statues. Dr. Margo Stroumza-Ozan wrote that the cathedral had been built in two major stages. The first took place in the 1230s and included the eastern portal, across from which was the yard that served as a public court; Solomon and Jesus served to underscore the authority of the local judges. Ruth Almog wrote that the creator of the statues may have been the builder-sculptor Sabina von Steinbach, the daughter of the architect and main builder of the cathedral. In the seventeenth century the originals were replaced by copies. In art, the sinful Temple often symbolized the Synagoga. See Pinson (1996, pp. 147-174).

4 The two appear in a painting of “The Descent of Christ into Hell” (Descensus Christi ad Infernos) from Byzantium c. 700. See Trumbower (2001), as well as paintings from the eighth century and later.

5 Two more figures could, in theory, be added to the trio. The first is Hermes Trismegistus, a legendary and perhaps mythical figure. It was said of Solomon that he had “all signs of a perfect Hermetist”. See Ebeling (2007); Idel (1988, pp. 59-76), the quotation is from p. 129. The second is the neo-Pythagorean philosopher and miracle worker, Apollonius of Tyana. The Ars Notoria refers to him as the friend and successor of Solomon (see in chapters five and seven). There is little substance to the “parallels” drawn between Apollonius and Jesus, but what is important for my purposes is that neither does the Christian literature express any need to reject that comparison.

8 OpenAccess. © 2020 Yaacov Shavit, published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110677263-002

The correspondence between Solomon and Jesus, or perhaps more accurately between Jesus and Solomon, is part of a long-standing correspondence between Christianity and Judaism, at times direct and at times less so: In some cases both Christianity and Judaism are addressed clearly, while they constitute a latent presence in others. Here it is necessary to warn against the trap of overanalysis, in which nearly every biographical account of Solomon and Jesus is interpreted as a trove of concealed parallels or contrasts between the two and between the ideas they represent.°

What do Solomon, the biblical king, and Jesus, the Christian messiah, have in common with the Greek philosopher? What have the three to do with one another? They lived, after all, in periods far removed from one another: Solomon in the tenth century B.C.E., Aristotle in the fourth century B.C.E., and Jesus in the first century of the common era. While Jesus was familiar with Solomon’s biblical biography, he apparently never heard of Aristotle; the latter knew nothing of the existence of King Solomon and was, necessarily, unaware of Jesus.

The response to this rhetorical question is that centuries of legendary biographical traditions have joined the three figures in an imaginary trio; creative imagination has woven links and correlations. The correspondence this book will describe exists within a broader cultural field wherein the three figures— and the correspondence between them—express, represent, and symbolize a vast range of phenomena in human existence and culture.

The principal figure in this trio is King Solomon, not only because he antecedes the others but mainly because of his multifaceted image, replete with contradictions. Both earthly and atemporal, he is trans-cultural in status and function, assuming complex and disparate roles within Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. However, why was Solomon granted so rich an afterlife in such diverse cultures? Is it due to a deep-seated tendency in the ancient world to credit new ideas to figures from the distant past, anchoring new views in prisca sapientia (ancient knowledge)? In such a context, might Solomon have been the most appropriate—or even the sole—biblical figure to serve that function? Or did his fame spread because the eventful episodes that characterized his long life, the biblical

6 See Brezis (2018). I will not delve into the subject here and will only note that the theory on the subject of a “hidden debate” on the part of the Sages is an example of how radical modern interpretations impose themselves on ancient texts, and that it is unclear why it would have been necessary to conduct such a veiled debate, when its audience or readers would have been unlikely to discern it.

accounts of his virtues and actions, and, of course, the books he was said to have written inspired and fueled the creative imagination, making Solomon a complex figure—and, as such, accessible and available for various purposes? I have no precise answer to the question; it would require a Solomon, the wisest man, to settle.

Solomon’s biblical biography expanded and proliferated beginning in the Hellenist and Roman periods, evolving into a plethora of legendary traditions that traveled from culture to culture and across literary traditions. He was cast in myriad roles, as an ideal king, exemplum, symbol, topos; he was, at the same time, a judge of great wisdom and justice, a sage of all sages, a magus of all magi’; a prophet,’ a great builder,’ an artist, a poet, and a philosopher; a miracle worker, a fool, and a beggar"; a man to whom God revealed himself twice in a dream’; a sinner and a penitent; the prolific author of far more than the Song of Songs, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes; and a man active in realms both earthly and supernatural, “not only king in this world, but in the next world as well”.?? The course of his life was likened to that of the moon, waxing full and subsequently waning, and came to represent various existential, theological, and moral questions, as well as the blurred boundaries between philosophy and faith, magic, and natural philosophy.

8 Sotah 45b; Seder olam rabbah 17.

10 In romances of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries there is mention of the term L’Uevre Salemon; the term represents the technique of engraving material like gold, attesting to the popularity of the term and to an assumption that Solomon himself engaged in that craft, based on the Vulgate translation of Song of Songs 3:10: “King Solomon made himself a chariot of wood of Lebanon. He made the pillars thereof of silver. The bottom thereof of gold, the covering of it purple”, (Ferculum fecit sibi rex Salomon de lignis Libani; columnas ejus fecit argenteas, reclinatorium aureum, ascensum purpureum). See West (1954, pp. 176-182).

11 Fleg (1959, p. 8). Fleg writes that Solomon was “alternately a wise man, or a fool, prince or beggar, philosopher, master of the demons or their dupe, at once the pattern of faith and humility, and a monster of impiety and arrogance; warrior, tyrant, or apostle of peace, in whom already the justice of the Messiah is incarnate”. And to all these, one can add that the legendary Solomon was a philosopher, the author of many books, a great builder, a just judge, an alchemist, astrologer, horseman, and more.

12 1 Kings 5:5-15, 9:2-9, and parallels in 1 Chronicles 29. Origen stressed that as these revelations occurred in a dream, they were different than the communication between Jesus and God. See Young (2007, p. 134).

13 From the Second Targum to the Book of Esther, a collection of midrashim in Aramaic evidently from the eighth century. See Grossfeld (1994). For a modern German translation see Ego (1996, pp. 59-137).

The Hebrew Bible does not present Solomon purely as an exemplar, but also as one who sinned and led others to sin, his reign simultaneously a golden age and a prelude to a schism within the nation. Hence the ambivalent attitude towards Solomon in Jewish and Christian cultures, and why his biography has long been the subject of a theological and philosophical debate touching on issues of sin, punishment, and atonement. The Solomon depicted in aggadic Midrashim, in Christology, in sermons, and in theology differs from the Solomon of occult literature and various genres of “secular” literature. One may well refer to him in the plural; he was a “Solomon for all seasons”. Yet it seems to me that the widespread attempt to find hidden meaning in every Solomonic verse, and deliberate inter-textuality in every sentence, is often excessive. At least some of the Midrashim, legends, and folklore about him are simply an outcome of Lust zum fabulieren—that is, the urge to amuse and be amused, which discovered in Solomon an unparalleled protagonist.

The correspondence between Jesus and Solomon apparently grew out of the story about the Queen of Sheba —who came from the “uttermost parts of the earth to Jerusalem to hear the wisdom of Solomon and behold, something greater than Solomon is here”. The “something greater than Solomon” is Jesus, who is also, in the people’s appeals to him as a healer of the sick and exorcist of devils, referred to as “the son of David”. Perhaps this is the origin of Jesus’ description as “the true Solomon” by Athanasius (c. 296-373), the bishop of Alexandria known as the “father of orthodoxy”, in his work Expositiones in Psalmos.” Origen (c. 185-254) wrote in the prologue to his Commentary on the Song of Songs that “It is, I think, unquestionable that Solomon is in many respects a type of Christ” (typos Christi)"; others offered similar sentiments.” The Solomon-Christ typology—that is, the Christian predilection to view the figure of Solomon through the lens of Jesus, and even more so vice versa—made Solomon a vital figure in the Christian polemic; this predilection was rooted in the fact that Christianity, like Second-Temple Judaism, was a text-based religion and, like Judaism,

15 Hanig (1998). See also Perkins (1998).

17 The Dominican friar Lorens of Orleans, who served in French royal court, wrote in Somme le Roi (The Book of Vices and Virtues, 1270), a book intended to help prepare penitents for confession: “These are the seven streams of the holy life that the true Solomon teaches us”.

drew upon the same inexhaustible wellspring'*—the Bible, which in Christianity came to be termed the Old Testament—as a sacred textual authority.” This exegetical reading of the Bible played an important role in the shaping and self-definition of both rabbinical Judaism*° and nascent Christianity, a process during which the boundaries between the two were delineated. On the Christian side, that process involved the appropriation of the Bible, with an argument that the role of Judaism was obsolete once Jews completed their historical task of passing the Bible to the Christians. Jews had once been, in the words of Augustine of Hippo, custodes librorum nostrorum (“custodians of our books”); that task was now accomplished. Christianity regarded itself as a “new covenant”, deprecating its predecessor: “And what is obsolete and growing old will soon disappear”.”! But in order to be “new”, Christianity had to imbue the Old Testament with new meaning, for Christianity’s newness was only partial. Its God was the biblical God, and its cosmogony and history derived from the holy scriptures of the Jews—in other words, from the Old Testament. Hence the new religion turned to polemics and apologetics” to legitimize the use it made of that heritage. In the apologetics of the bishop Ambrose (c. 339-397) of Milan, for example, Christianity is depicted as having received “the clothing of the Old Testament”, including “the royal Davidic clothing” and that of King Solomon; it was given to the Christians, who “would know how to use the garment they had received, since the Jewish people kept it without using it and did not know its proper adornments. This clothing was lying in shadow, cast off and forgotten [...] The Christian people put it on, and it shone brightly”.”? In truth, Christianity borrowed far more than a garment from the Bible and from Jewish culture of the Second Temple period: it absorbed and assimilated ideas, symbols, and rituals. As a “new” religion, it needed to construct and furnish a social and cultural structure, and to do so it borrowed many elements, primarily from Judaism, from which it had emerged and which it knew very well.” Thus, while Judaism

18 The New Testament contains about a thousand quotations from the Hebrew Bible.

19 Paul writes to Timothy: “Until I arrive, give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhorting, to teaching...” (1 Tim. 4:13).

20 There is such an abundance of research literature on this subject that I will mention here only one recently published book: The Invention of Judaism: Torah and Jewish Identity from Deuteronomy to Paul (Collins 2017).

21 Hebrews 8:13.

22 On the difference between polemic, dispute, and debate, see Rokeah (1982, pp. 9-10).

23 De Jacob et Vita beata, 2,9,2 (“On Jacob and the Happy Life”). In Saint Ambrose (1972). 24 On this matter, too, the research literature is far too abundant to cite more than a small portion of it. And so, I mention only one book from which I learned a great deal: Biblical Exegesis and the Formation of Christian Culture (Young 2002).

was reshaping its world in the aftermath of the destruction of the Second Temple, it found that the Bible had been “appropriated” by others, and responded by creating and developing its ways of reading the text.” While the Church Fathers and their successors unreservedly accepted the Bible’s historical accuracy and added few details of their own to Solomon’s biography, the Jewish Sages frequently made additions to biblical lore (thus “confirming” the Christian polemic that “the Talmud nefariously deviated from the Bible and competed with it”.”° Rabbinic Judaism did not adhere to the “letter” in the literal sense of the word but instead saw “well beyond the veil of the letter”—partly in response to Christian exegesis and commentaries. The two camps contended over true “ownership” of the Bible and over which of them interpreted it correctly. This was a polemic at once overt and covert; it could not have existed if both sides had not held firmly to their belief in the sanctity and authority (exousia) of the Bible and were not both using similar strategies of intertextuality and post-factum argument in order to prove their case. In other words, each camp brandished supposedly overwhelming proof for its claim in the form of quotations from the Holy Scriptures. For the Christian side, it was essential to prove that the decisive evidence of Jesus’ gospel, the demonstratio evangelica, existed in the Old Testament, while the Jewish side rejected such alleged evidence and even mocked it. Pagan philosophers, as we shall see,” also contested these narratives—both Christian and Jewish—but the Jewish disagreement was the greater challenge for Christianity throughout the ages.

The parallel development and historical relationship between Judaism and Christianity over the first centuries C.E. are well-known; I have nothing new to add here. My interest lies instead in the roles that Solomon was assigned in both Jewish and Christian traditions as part of the “correspondence” between them,” and in how and why the conflict of Jesus contra Solomon arose in Christianity. This conflict was waged both orally and in writing; Justin Martyr (c. 100 - 165),”? for example, wrote that “select [Jewish] messengers” went forth from Jerusalem to denounce the Christians.” Works such as Justin’s Dialogue with Try-

26 On this, see inter alia Yuval (2008) and Cohen (1999, pp. 59-60).

27 In Athens, Paul was challenged by several philosophers from the Epicurean and Stoic schools but persuaded only a few in the audience (Acts 17).

29 Justin Martyr (2003).

30 Acts 15 speaks of “certain individuals [who] came down from Judea”.

phon and The Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila,” probably from the second century or later, are “dialogues” in which a Christian speaker defeats his Jewish interlocutor (Aquila is eventually baptized into Christianity).”” Other early polemic works included the Epistle to Diognetus (c. 120 —-200) and the Epistle of Barnabas (between 70 - 200), as well as homilies by the Church fathers such as Tertullian’s (c. 120-160)” Answer to the Jews, John Chrysostom’s Homilies Against the Jews (387-389), and various works by Augustine of Hippo (354-430).** Horbury writes that these “seem to reflect genuine debate, and hence genuine common ground between Jews and Christians.” In some of these writings, particularly in the dialogues I have mentioned, Solomon and the books attributed to him play a major role.*

In contrast, we have no Jewish polemical works at all from the first centuries C.E., nor any echoes of sermons that may have been delivered in synagogues. Instead, the Jewish response and counter-biography of Jesus appears both within the text and between the lines of the literature of the Sages,” and, more explicitly, in later works against Christianity such as Toldot Yeshu (The Life of Jesus)’ and Sefer Nestor haKomer (The Polemic of Nestor the Priest).?? Jewish literature openly sparred with the Christian historical narrative and Christology from the eleventh century onward. This literature included The Kuzari by Judah Halevi (c. 1040 -1080), Sefer Bitul Ikarei haNotzrim by R. Hasdai Crescas of the fifteenth century,*° Sefer Behinat haDat by R. Elijah Delmedigo (1490),** Clipeus et Gladius

31 Varner (2004); The Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila (1986). Also see Kraft (2009) and Lahey (2001).

32 Of the vast literature on this subject, see Lucas (1993 [1910]); Parkes (1934); A. L. Williams (1935); Limor and Stroumsa (1966); Rosenthal (1960); Lasker (1997, 2017, 2019); V. Martin (1995). 33 Tränkle (1964). To prove his claim that the Christians had taken over from the Jews as the people of God, he cites Zechariah 1:3 “Return to me, says the LORD of hosts”.

36 The fact that there is hardly any mention of Jews in Historia Ecclesiastica (Rokeah 1982, p. 71) does not mean that the “Jewish question”, in contrast to the “pagan question”, was not an important item on the Christian “agenda” in the first centuries.

38 Regarding this book, apparently written between the third and fifth centuries and translated into several languages, see Deutsch (1997) and Schafer, Meerson, and Deutsch (2011). For a scholarly edition of all these versions, see Meerson and Schäfer (2014). Also see Limor (1998a). 39 Originally written in Arabic in the ninth century under the title Qissat Mujadalat al-Usquf; the Hebrew version appeared prior to 1170. About the book and its author, see Chapter Two. 40 Crescas (c. 1340-1412) was the rabbi of the Jewish community of Saragossa; the book was translated into Hebrew from Arabic by Joseph ben Shem Tov in 1451. See Hasdai Crescas (1990). 41 Delmedigo (1984).

by Judah Arye of Modena (1571-1648),“? and others. The polemic continued even after Christianity became the victorious religion and no longer needed to compete with Judaism; even then, the homiletic interpretation of the Bible persisted in order to vindicate “Christian truth” (veritas Christiana). Many explanations have been offered for Christianity’s continued dependence on the Bible even after it ceased to be merely a persecuted sect and, having established a separate identity, developed into a universal religion; there is no need for me here to repeat those explanations and theories. For our purposes, what matters is that Christianity’s adherence to the allegorical mode of reading the Bible made Solomon a cardinal figure in the Christian imagination.

It should be noted that the different characterizations of Solomon (and Jesus) are not merely a product of the Christian-Jewish conflict, but also of controversies and trends internal to both rabbinical Judaism and Christianity (controversies which, in the latter case, did not end with the Council of Nicaea). Nor was each religion’s attitude towards Solomon and Jesus always, or necessarily, a response to their characterizations in the other religion, or a result of the influence of those characterizations. As we shall see, Solomon and the events and writings attributed to him inspired a cornucopia of interpretation and allegorization. His reign was perceived as both a positive and a negative exemplum, and the idea of Jesus’ prefiguration in Solomon aroused substantial internal tension and controversy among both Jews and Christians.

Such dialogues and polemics were not conducted solely between Jews and Christians, but also between pagans and Christians. This latter type continued for about three hundred years; we know of it mainly from the surviving account in Eusebius’s Praeparatio Evangelica of the writings of the “pagan” philosophers, which do not necessarily reflect the nature of the response of the general pagan public to Christianity. Celsus, Porphyry, and the emperor Julian were apparently well-versed in the Bible and in Christian writings (just as some of the Church Fathers were knowledgeable about anti-Christian writings). They also criticized the Old Testament, as it formed the basis for Christian claims, and exposed what they saw as the contradictions in both the Bible and the Christian interpretations thereof, including Christianity’s interpretation of the figure of Solomon.

Within the broad trans-cultural space of Christianity Jesus gained immortality, as well as a totally different status than that of Solomon. The New Testament attrib-

42 Arye Yehuda of Modena (1960).

utes several identities to him. He is the “son of Enos, son of Seth, son of Adam, son of God”; the “Rabbi, the Cosmic Christ, the Son of man, the Bridegroom of the Soul, the Universal man”.“* But he is also a teacher of morals, a miracle worker, and an expeller of demons. Canonical Christian literature did not embroider Jesus’ biography with additional acts or exploits beyond those related in the New Testament; what additions did develop emerged in the Apocryphal and pseudo-Apocryphal literature and in folk literature. At the same time, Christianity was familiar with Jesus’ counter-biography in rabbinic literature and with the name by which he is known there (Jesus ben Pantera); there are reactions to the rabbinical approach in Tertullian’s De Spectaculis, as well as in works by Justin Martyr and others. In later generations, Christians knew of it from works such as Toldot Yeshu (The Life of Jesus), which we encountered briefly above and to which I shall return. The Christian polemic was directed against the Talmud, which it perceived as id est doctrina. Article 26 of the Articuli litterarum Pappe, a series of charges against Judaism written in 1239 by the convert Nicolas Donin and presented to Pope Gregory IX, is a reaction to Sanhedrin 43a, in which Christ’s mother is said to have conceived Jesus “while whoring with a man they called Pandera”; Donin’s charge led to the burning of the Talmud in Paris in 1242. Others, such as the Benedictine monk Petrus Cluniacensis (Petrus of Cluny) in Contra perfidum Iudaeorum (1146) and Petrus Comestor (?-1178) in his Historia Scholastica, which has been dubbed “the Medieval popular Bible”, reacted in a similar manner.

How and why did a correspondence emerge between Aristotle and Solomon—or, to be more accurate, between Solomon and Aristotle—and how did Jesus enter the mix?”

In the Middle Ages, Aristotle gained the status of the most learned and wisest man of all time—the very personification of all human knowledge. Did he, therefore, take Solomon’s place as the “sage of all sages”? The answer may be found in a Jewish legendary tradition wherein Solomon was magister omnium physicorum (master of all natural things), his wisdom encompassing all branches