Resumen de Novellas for Diverting Jewish Urban Businessmen or Channels of Priestly Knowledge: redefining Judean Short Stories of Hellenistic Times
The Jewish literary production of Hellenistic and early imperial times includes a substantial number of short narratives displaying novelistic features. Most of these texts are in Greek, with novelistic trends also appearing in Hebrew and Aramaic works (Esther, Daniel). While this stylistic shift is undeniable, the present article questions the social and cultural implications that a number of scholars seek to read into it. Because of their shared stylistic innovations, these works are often treated as a homogeneous group, regardless of whether or not they were eventually included in the biblical canon (the Septuagint), and contrasted with the traditional narrative genres represented in the Hebrew biblical corpus. The transition to the novelistic is further taken to indicate a shift in the social context in which these works were produced, and correlatively, in their social function. Thus, in contrast with the earlier narrative literature written by temple scribes, these early novels supposedly emerged in the urban environment, where they catered to the tastes of a wider segment of the Jewish population. Furthermore, it is alleged that like their Greek counterparts, the Jewish novels had no institutionalized social use but were performed or read purely for entertainment, explaining the prominent thematization of eroticism, chastity, and marriage.
