Daniel Boyarin, Two Pharisees: Flavius Josephus and Paul the Apostle

Professor Daniel Boyarin (University of California, Berkeley) delivered a lecture at Pontificia Università Gregoriana on June 25, 2014, which is available on YouTube. Boyarin’s talk (beginning at 10:50) addresses nomos in Paul by way of a comparison with Josephus, discussing also the (in)applicability of the category of “Judaism”. It is followed by a panel discussion with Prof. Philipp G. Renczes (Cardinal Bea Center for Judaic Studies), Prof. Gabriele Boccaccini (University of Michigan), Prof. Romano Penna (Pontifical Lateran University) and Dr. Piero Stefani (BIBLIA and Pontifical Gregorian University). The talk was delivered in association with the Enoch Seminar.

Michael Bird has written … “Yet I remain unconvinced that it was Christianity that instigated the separation of cult from culture and then fostered the origin of ‘religion’ upon which the religion of Judaism was signified over and against Christianity and foistered upon Jews. Ioudaismos was considered a religio or a thrēskeia in the pre-Christian era long before Jesus, Paul, Luke, or John.” The number of errors in these sentences is perhaps exceeded by the number of words – but not by much. The author gives no references to support his claim, and this is not accidental…
– Daniel Boyarin (16:08-)

Update: Michael Bird replies.