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Re: orion Solinus, Dio, Pliny, M. Agrippa
Let me make clear that my statement that "This passage [in Strabo] appears
to represent the sum total that Posidonius wrote on the Jews" was meant to
refer to the Jews as a religious group. Specifically, there is no evidence
Posidonius knew of individual religious sects such as Pharisees, Sadducees, or
Essenes. His discussion of the Jews in the fragment at Strabo Geo. 16.2.35-39
is (a) literary and (b) discusses Judaism as a monolithic religion, not a
collection of sects.
In this fragment, Posidonius does appear to have relied exclusively on
Hecataeus. If Steven Goranson sees other sources behind this passage, he
should identify them and present his arguments. It is not enough to imagine
that Posidonius was an expert on the Jews and had made a special study of the
Essenes. Such assertions are not self-evident and require demonstration, and
are not supported by the existing fragmenta of Posidonius.
Russell Gmirkin