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The Letter of Aristeas says the first Ptolemy settled thirty thousand Jewish soldiers in garrisons across Egypt. 3 Maccabees also stresses this long Jewish loyalty to the Ptolemies, with a later king praising the Jews' fidelity to him and his ancestors.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Letter of Aristeas 1:13
Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
The number of those whom he transported from the country of the Jews to Egypt amounted to no less than a hundred thousand. Of these he armed thirty thousand picked men and settled them in garrisons in the country districts. (And even before this time large numbers of Jews had come into Egypt with the Persian, and in an earlier period still others had been sent to Egypt to help Psammetichus in his campaign against the king of the Ethiopians. But these were nothing like so numerous as the captives whom Ptolemy the son of Lagus transported.)
3 Maccabees 7:7
Deuterocanon
5 They brought them fettered in grievous chains as slaves, no, as traitors. Without enquiry or examination they endeavored to annihilate them. They buckled themselves with a savage cruelty, worse than Scythian custom. 6 For this cause we severely threatened them; yet, with the clemency which we usually extend to all men, we at length permitted them to live. Finding that the God of heaven cast a shield of protection over the Jews so as to preserve them, and that he fought for them as a father always fights for his sons, 7 and taking into consideration their constancy and fidelity toward us and toward our ancestors, we have, as we ought, acquitted them of every sort of charge. 8 We have dismissed them to their several homes, telling all men everywhere to do them no wrong, or unrighteously revile them about the past.
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Notes and References
“... (3) Finally, scholars have noted similarities between 3 Maccabees and the Letter of Aristeas. Anderson (1985a, 515-16) notes that both writings underscore the loyalty of the Jews to the Ptolemies. Conversely, in both 3 Maccabees and Aristeas a Ptolemaic ruler acknowledges the sovereignty of Israel’s God. Both stress the beauty of the temple and the distinctive religious practices of the Jews that set them apart from their Gentile neighbors. Both incorporate official documents. Again, Emmet (1913,157) has catalogued the linguistic parallels. See also Hadas (1949b) and Tracy (1928). The point of all these comparisons is not to establish direct literary dependence, which is seldom provable, but rather to demonstrate “that the authors belonged to the same milieu and in particular shared a common stock of knowledge of official Egyptian procedures and of the technical language of Egyptian royal decrees and letters” (Anderson 1985a, 516). [...] The Letter of Aristeas, as mentioned before, reports that Ptolemy I transported 100,000 Jews to Egypt and used 30,000 of the adult men to serve in military fortresses (Let. Aris. 12-14, 35-36). These services that were provided by earlier generations of Jews are frequently recalled by Philopator in 3 Maccabees (3:21; 5:31; 6:25; 7:7). ...”
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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