Between motherland and fatherland: Diaspora, pilgrimage and the spiritualization of sacrifice in Philo of Alexandria

Abstract

The concept of "diaspora" is used so frequently in the discourse of Jewish studies that to invoke it seems nearly cliché.Scholars of Jewish history have long been occupied with the project of unpacking the complexity of Jewish diasporic identity.And yet this very feature of Jewish experience that has for decades been taken for granted as a basic fact in the study of Judaism and Jewish culture, has of late received a good deal of attention in scholarly circles outside Jewish studies. 2 "Diaspora" has emerged as a category of critical analysis that is embraced and applied not just to the case of the Jews, but to other dispersed populations as well.In the inaugural issue of the journal Diapsora: A Journal of Transnational Studies, its editor Khachig Tölölyan wrote in 1991 that "diasporas are the exemplary communities of the transnational movement" and noted that diaspora now can be used to talk about a whole host of border-crossing identities: immigrant, expatriate, refugee, guest-worker, exile community, overseas community, ethnic community.3 In that same volume, William Safran noted that 1 Betsy Halpern-Amaru was my teacher and mentor at Vassar College.I learned my �rst words of Hebrew in her courses, where she also introduced me to the work of Philo and the rich world of Jewish antiquity.It is with great admiration and profound gratitude that I dedicate this essay to her. 2 Within Jewish studies, there are a few scholars whose work is concerned with bridging contemporary diaspora studies and Jewish studies.Some notable examples are Henry Goldschmidt, "Crown Heights is the Center of the World": Reterritorializing a Jewish Diaspora," Diaspora 9:1 (2000): 83-106; Jonathan Boyarin and Daniel Boyarin, Powers of Diaspora: Two Essays on the Relevance of Jewish Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2002); Alanna Cooper, "Conceptualizing Diaspora: Tales of Jewish Travelers in search of the Lost Tribes," AJS Review 30:1 (2006): 95-117; ibid., "Reconsidering the Tale of Rabbi Yosef Maman and the Bukharan Jewish Diaspora," Jewish Social Studies 10:2 (2004): 80-115.Particularly relevant to the present study is John M. G. Barclay, Negotiating Diaspora: Jewish Strategies in the Roman Empire (London and New York:

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