Le massacre des Innocents ou comment réécrire l’histoire
The “Slaughter of the Innocents” committed by King Herod of Judea, is an event whose fame owes as much to the fascination generated by such an act of barbarism as to the functional role played by this episode in Christian literature by providing the date of birth of Jesus. The paper shows that this...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | fra |
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Presses universitaires de Caen
2024-12-01
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| Series: | Kentron |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/kentron/7584 |
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| Summary: | The “Slaughter of the Innocents” committed by King Herod of Judea, is an event whose fame owes as much to the fascination generated by such an act of barbarism as to the functional role played by this episode in Christian literature by providing the date of birth of Jesus. The paper shows that this massacre has no historical existence. This is demonstrated through an analysis of the sources themselves and their historical contextualization. We begin by examining the contradictions and textual manipulations to which the event has been subjected in Christian tradition. We then consider the historical framework of the Hellenistic kingdoms of the Near East, whose brutal dynastic practices lent credibility to the murder of children in Judea. Finally, the Greco-Roman cultural environment which transmitted this fiction in Antiquity turned it into a commonplace, amalgamating themes of various origins in accordance with the typical phenomenon of black legends. In modern times, these mechanisms have enabled the symbolic reinvestment by the collective memory of a massacre that never took place. |
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| ISSN: | 0765-0590 2264-1459 |