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Konstruktion von Alterität – exemplarisch aufgezeigt an Tacitus, „Historiae“ 5, 2–10

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Hild C.

Linguistische Treffen in Wrocław

2021

issue 19

91-105

People perceive everything that is unknown from their point of view as foreign. This circumstance can also be observed with religions, world views and faith practices. Strangeness can generate curiosity, which expresses itself in interreligious dialogues, for example, but can also lead to reservations, which in the worst case can develop into hatred and discrimination. The perception of foreignness is based on a subjective perception. However, foreignness or alterity can also be constructed to serve possible manipulative purposes. An example of this with regard to people of other faiths is the so-called “Jewish excursus” within the “Historiae”, one of Tacitus’ main works, which is also the most detailed ethnographic report on Judaism by a Roman author. The article asks, firstly, with which perceptions the Roman historian looks at Judaism and how he structures them in terms of content and form, and secondly, which emphases he sets in the construction of Jewish ethnicity and how he shapes it with a view to alterity. As a basis for the analysis, the passages relevant to the perceptions are listed in Latin and German in the appendix and given consecutive numbers. It becomes clear that Tacitus directs his perceptions of Judaism, which from his perspective was of a different faith, to different areas, for example cult practice, faith, physique, portraying them for the most part in strongly misanthropic colours and thus constructing Jewish ethnicity as alterity. This digression was repeatedly used as “historical evidence” to polemicise against Jews until modern times. Tacitus’ motives, however, are not to be associated with anti-Semitism – as has often been done in the research literature – but are rooted, on the one hand, in the valorisation of an enemy of war in order to justify its unusually successful resistance against Roman troops, and, on the other hand, in the warning to the Roman against proselytism. By way of example, it becomes clear that forms of expression of subjective perception of people of other faiths inevitably construct alterity, which is fanned out into different perceptions.

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1 Linguistische Treffen in Wrocław

1 Hild C.

1 2021

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Konstruktion von Alterität – exemplarisch aufgezeigt an Tacitus, „Historiae“ 5, 2–10