This is the study of an anonymous ancient work, usually called Joseph and Aseneth, which narrates the transformation of the daughter of an Egyptian priest into an acceptable spouse for the biblical Joseph, whose marriage to Aseneth is given brief notice in Genesis. Kraemer takes issue with the scholarly consensus that the tale is a Jewish conversion story composed no later than the early second century C.E. Instead, she dates it to the third or fourth century C.E., and argues that, although no definitive answer is presently possible, it may well be a Christian account. This critique also raises larger issues about the dating and identification of many similar writings, known as pseudepigrapha. Kraemer reads its account of Aseneth's interactions with an angelic double of Joseph in the context of ancient accounts of encounters with powerful divine beings, including the sun god Helios, and of Neoplatonic ideas about the fate of souls. When Aseneth Met Joseph demonstrates the centrality of ideas about gender in the representation of Aseneth and, by extension, offers implications for broader concerns about gender in Late Antiquity.

This is the study of an anonymous ancient work, usually called Joseph and Aseneth, which narrates the transformation of the daughter of an Egyptian priest into an acceptable spouse for the biblical Joseph, whose marriage to Aseneth is given brief notice in Genesis. Kraemer takes issue with the scholarly consensus that the tale is a Jewish conversion story composed no later than the early second century C.E. Instead, she dates it to the third or fourth century C.E., and argues that, although no definitive answer is presently possible, it may well be a Christian account. This critique also raises larger issues about the dating and identification of many similar writings, known as pseudepigrapha. Kraemer reads its account of Aseneth's interactions with an angelic double of Joseph in the context of ancient accounts of encounters with powerful divine beings, including the sun god Helios, and of Neoplatonic ideas about the fate of souls. When Aseneth Met Joseph demonstrates the centrality of ideas about gender in the representation of Aseneth and, by extension, offers implications for broader concerns about gender in Late Antiquity.

This is a study of an anonymous ancient work (surviving in shorter and longer versions) conventionally titled Joseph and Aseneth, but here simply designated as Aseneth. Composed in Greek, the text narrates the transformation of the daughter of an Egyptian priest into an acceptable spouse for the biblical Joseph (whose marriage to this woman is given brief notice in Genesis). Relatively unknown outside of scholarly circles, this story is remarkable for its focus on a female character and for its apparent absence of overt misogyny. This unusual tale has traditionally been viewed as a Jewish conversion story composed no later than the second century C.E. Through a detailed examination of the texts, however, Ross Kraemer arrives at conclusions that disagree with previous findings with respect not only to questions of date, provenance, identity, geographic origin, and textual relationships, but also to many matters of interpretation. She argues that the tale is as likely to beChristian as it is to be Jewish. She also contends that it was written at least a quarter of a century later than previously believed. She shows that the tale's account of Aseneth's interactions with an angelic being is heavily influenced by ancient portraits of the magical adjuration of powerful divine beings, including that of the sun god, Helios, and by Neoplatonic ideas about the fate of the souls. Kraemer demonstrates the centrality of ideas about gender in the representation of Aseneth,and goes on to explicate the story's implications, within the context of constructs of and concerns about gender in Late Antiquity.

First published in 1984, this study is now revised and updated to take into account the best of recent scholarship."--BOOK JACKET.

Examines the nature of the changes that transformed the Christian world from the fourth to the end of the sixth century.

The story of Joseph and Aseneth is a fascinating expansion of the narrative in Genesis of Joseph in Egypt, and in particular, of his marriage to the daughter of an Egyptian priest. This study examines the portrayal of Aseneth’s transformation in the text, focusing on three perspectives. How did Aseneth’s encounter with Joseph and her subsequent transformation affect various aspects of her identity in the narrative? In what ways do the portrayals of Aseneth, her transformation, and her abode relate to select metaphors and other symbolic features depicted in the Septuagint, the Hebrew Bible, and the Pseudepigrapha? And, how do the ritualized components through which Aseneth’s transformation occurred function in the narrative, and why are they perceived as effective? In order to shed light on these facets of Joseph and Aseneth, the author draws on the contemporary approaches of intersectionality, conceptual blending, intertextual blending, and the cognitive theory of rituals, using these theoretical frameworks to explore and illuminate the complexity of Aseneth’s transformation.