Rabbis and Sasanian Kings in Dialogue
Rabbis and Sasanian Kings in Dialogue
The Talmud includes around two dozen passages about the Arsacid or Sasanian monarchs Ardawan IV, Shapur I, Shapur II, Yazdegird I, and Peroz. This chapter researches the Talmudic texts that describe the rabbis and Persian kings in dialogue with one another. Although the sage-king dialogues do not contain direct citations from Middle Persian sources, they nevertheless were influenced by the Sasanian Empire’s historiography and propaganda about the deeds of these monarchs. As this chapter shows, the Persian context affects the way in which the Talmud depicts the monarchs as symbols of authority.
Keywords: Ardawan IV, Shapur I, Shapur II, Yazdegird I, Sasanian kings, Middle Persian historiography, Sasanian propaganda
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