— Russell Gmirkin, Plato and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible, p. 238
I took the bait and the following post is an outcome: Weinfeld’s points of comparison between the biblical narrative and the Aeneid. Weinfeld’s proposed explanations for the similarities follow.
But first, a note for those who would dismiss the relevance of any such comparison on the basis that Virgil’s famous epic clearly postdates the biblical narrative and is far from likely influenced by anything in the Pentateuch:
It should be clear, first of all, that the Aeneas legend and the stories associated with it are quite ancient and may be traced back — as the various paintings on archaeological artifacts show — to the seventh century B.C.E. That these stories actually belong to the genre of “foundation stories” about foundations of cities by single heroes has been noted by F. B. Schmid, who surveyed the foundation legend of the Greeks, and observed that the Aeneid epic was patterned after them.[39] (Weinfeld 1993, pp. 16f)
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A Man Leaving a Great Civilization and Charged with a Universal Mission |
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| Aeneas leaves the famous city of Troy
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Abraham leaves the great civilization of Mesopotamia, Ur of the Chaldaeans
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| with his wife, father and son — Creusa, Anchises and Ascanius | with his wife and father — Sarah and Terah |
| in order to establish a new nation | in order to establish a new nation |
| Virgil calls Aeneas “Pater” (2:2) | Abraham was known as the father of the nation |
| Aeneas delays in Carthage | Abraham delays in Aram |
| which later becomes Rome’s great enemy | which later becomes Israel’s enemy |
| “An important theme in the Aeneid is the tension between Rome and Carthage. There is a danger that Aeneas will marry Dido, the queen of Carthage, and thus that the message of Latium could fail; the gods of Aeneas, therefore, work to bring the hero back on track toward Rome.
“Mercury, the messenger of the gods, is sent by Jupiter to warn Aeneas not to forget the promise that his mother, Venus, had held out for him, and to urge him to sail at once to his destined land (4:219–37). “After Aeneas’s delay, Mercury is sent to him again, this time in a dream, and warns him once more to leave Carthage (4:554–70).”
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“A similar situation may be discerned in the Jacob stories. There is the danger that Jacob will stay in Aram Naharaim, where he journeyed to flee from his brother Esau and to marry Laban’s daughters. Had he stayed, he would have abandoned his mission to the promised land.
“Therefore, Jacob is called to return to his native land, and the call is made, as in the Aeneid, twice: the first time through direct revelation (v. 4) “and the second time through revelation by dream (v. 11).”
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| “Although in the final stage of Genesis (ch. 31) Jacob is said to leave Aram because of his quarrel with Laban, an older stratum (Elohistic?) in the chapter (vv. 10, 12a, 13) creates the impression that the affluence of Jacob (vv. 10, 12a; cf. 30:43) might have caused him to stay in Aram, necessitating the divine call to return to Canaan.” | |
| Finally, his son Ascanius reaches Lavinium, and later his son gets to Alba-Longa. His descendants reach Rome, which is destined to rule the world. | He reaches Canaan, the Land of promise, out of which his descendants will rule other peoples. |
| Weinfeld points out that the traditions of Aeneas were applied during the time of Augustus to the Roman Empire so that Aeneas became not only the father of Rome itself but also a prefiguration of the ruler of the entire world. The prophecy of Poseidon in the Iliad 20:307 that Aeneas will rule over the Trojans, (cf. Homeric Hymns, AD Venerem 3:196–97), is indeed recorded (reinterpreted) in an oracle in Aen. 3:97–98 saying that the house of Aeneas shall rule “over all lands”: hic domus Aeneae cunctis dominabitur oris. | Weinfeld believed the story of Abraham originated during the time of King David and served to justify Israel’s aspirations to “rule … an empire, stretching from the Euphrates to the River of Egypt (Gen. 15:18).”
(I would add that Paul interpreted the promises given to Abraham as indicating that the entire world would belong to his heirs.) |
| “In both cases we have examples of an ethnic tradition later developed into an imperial ideology;
“in both, we are presented with a divine promise given to the father of a nation who later becomes a messenger for a world mission.” |
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Continue reading “Comparing the Rome’s and Israel’s Foundation Stories, Aeneas and Abraham”