Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

. How Hellenized Was Galilee?
FROM THE GOSPELS TO JESUS §9.6
This is obviously the other side of the same coin. The question arises from the
same data noted in posing the first question, summed up now in the ancient description
of Galilee as 'Galilee of the nations/Gentiles' . 188 In the light of this description
and the corollary of Galilean syncretism, Walter Grundmann could
even and infamously argue: 'Galilee was Gentile' and 'Jesus was no Jew'. 189 The
issue with regard to Jesus is reinforced by the presence of two cities in lower Galilee,
Sepphoris and Tiberias, (re)established by Herod Antipas within Jesus' lifetime
as administrative centres. From the model of the Hellenistic cities of the
Decapolis and the Mediterranean coast it becomes possible to argue that the Galilean
cities were themselves 'Hellenistic' in character and culture. 190 A further
inference readily drawn is that Sepphoris would have attracted villagers from the
locality for trade and social outings 191 and that the youthful Jesus would have
(regularly?) visited Sepphoris, only two hours distant (5 km) from Nazareth by
foot, perhaps even as a young carpenter assisting in the construction of its theatre.
192 Sepphoris was also a natural stopping place on the trade route from Tiberias
to Ptolemais on the coast; so the potential for still wider influence on a
young Galilean can readily be imagined. 193 A final layer of presupposition frequently
added in the last decade or so is that the attitudes and principles of Cynic
philosophy must have been familiar in such an urbanized culture, 194 no doubt in-
188. Isa. 9.1; 1 Mace. 5.15; Matt. 4.15.
189. W. Grundmann, Jesus der Galiläer und das Judentum (Leipzig: Wigand, 1941)
166-75.
190. 'Galilee was ... an epitome of Hellenistic culture on the eve of the Roman era';
'the Hellenistic ethos known to have prevailed in Galilee' (Mack, Myth 66, 73-74); 'a pervasive
Hellenistic environment' ('Q and a Cynic-Like Jesus' 26 n. 9); 'semipagan Galilee ... despised
by the ethnically pure Judeans living to the south', 'a largely pagan environment' (Funk, Honest
to Jesus 33, 189).
191. 'People from the surrounding area probably also flocked to Sepphoris on such occasions,
either to attend the theater or to hawk their wares' (E. M. Meyers, 'Roman Sepphoris in
Light of New Archeological Evidence and Recent Research', in L. I. Levine, ed., The Galilee in
Late Antiquity [New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992] 321-38 [here 333]).
192. R. A. Batey, Jesus and the Forgotten City: New Light on Sepphoris and the Urban
World of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991): 'it requires no very daring flight of the imagination
to picture the youthful Jesus seeking and finding employment in the neighboring city of
Sepphoris' (70); 'The stage on which he acted out his ministry was cosmopolitan and sophisticated
and his understanding of urban life more relevant than previously imagined' (103).
193. E. M. Meyers and J. F. Strange, Archaeology, the Rabbis and Early Christianity
(Nashville: Abingdon, 1981) 43; Crossan, Historical Jesus 17-19.
194. Three Cynic teachers are associated with Transjordan Gadara: Menippus (third
century BCE), but he learned and taught his Cynicism elsewhere; Meleager (first century BCE)
who flourished in Tyre; and Oenomaus (early second century CE).
298