Monday, May 7, 2018

Who told author of Judith of Holofernes’ drinking habits?


Image result for holofernes gets drunk


 

by
 

Damien F. Mackey
 

 

“… Judith replied; ‘this is the happiest day of my life’. But even then Judith ate and drank only what her slave had prepared. Holofernes was so charmed by her that he drank more wine than he had ever drunk at one time in his whole life”.

 
Judith 12:18-19

 

 

Very few persons would have been physically present at Holofernes’ last banquet to have witnessed just how much wine the commander-in-chief drank at the time.

For, according to Judith 12:10-12:

 

On the fourth day of Judith's stay in the camp, Holofernes gave a banquet for his highest ranking officers, but he did not invite any of the officers who were on duty. He said to Bagoas, the eunuch who was in charge of his personal affairs, ‘Go and persuade the Hebrew woman, who is in your care, to come to my tent to eat and drink with us. It would be a shame to pass up an opportunity to make love to a woman like that. If I don't try to seduce her, she will laugh at me’.

 

There was assuredly the chief eunuch, Bagoas, and Judith herself - probably her maid (“slave”) - and perhaps a handful of Assyrians.

But who, amongst these, could have informed the author of the Book of Judith - who I accept to have been the high priest Joakim/Eliakim - that the amount of wine consumed by Holofernes then was “more wine than he had ever drunk at one time in his whole life”?

Bagoas, a “eunuch who was in charge of his personal affairs”, may have known Holofernes well enough to have made such a judgment about his life-long drinking habits. But neither he, nor any other of the Assyrians (presuming any of them even knew) would likely have passed on this information to a high priest of the enemy.

They all had fled, many of the Assyrians having been killed (Judith 15:5):

 

… [the Israelite soldiers] all attacked the Assyrians and chased them as far as Choba, slaughtering them as they went. Even the people of Jerusalem and others living in the mountains joined the attack when the messengers told them what had happened in the Assyrian camp. The people of the regions of Gilead and Galilee blocked the path of the retreating Assyrians and inflicted heavy losses on them. They pursued them as far as the region around Damascus.

 

Obviously Judith was the key eyewitness who would have been able to have passed on to her fellow Bethulians - upon her triumphant return to the camp - an account of what had happened during that private banquet. But she could not have known about the life-long drinking habits of Holofernes. She knew about the commander-in-chief only through word of mouth (11:8): ‘We have heard how wise and clever you are. The whole world knows that you are the most competent, skilled, and accomplished general in the whole Assyrian Empire’.

 

Music to his ears, no doubt.

 

Only one person could have informed the high priest-author of the drinking habits of Holofernes (who may not normally have been a heavy drinker). That was Achior (the Ahikar of the book of Tobit), who was the actual tutor of Holofernes according to my:

 

"Nadin" (Nadab) of Tobit is the "Holofernes" of Judith

 


 

Cf. Tobit 14:10: Remember what Nadin did to Ahikar his own uncle who had brought him up. He tried to kill Ahikar and forced him to go into hiding …’.

 

By the time Holofernes had entered upon his banquet, Achior was within the walls of the city of Bethulia distilling to the Jews inside information about the Assyrians. Thus Judith had told Holofernes (11:9-10): ‘Achior was rescued by the men of Bethulia, and has told us what he said at your war council. Please, sir, do not dismiss lightly what Achior told you, but take it seriously, because it is true. No one can harm or conquer our people unless they sin against their God’.

 

And later, when (15:8): “The High Priest Joakim and the Council of Israel came from Jerusalem to see for themselves what great things the Lord had done for his people and to meet Judith and congratulate her”, Joakim could have concluded from the combined information supplied him by Judith and Achior how much Holofernes had drunk at the banquet (Judith), and that Holofernes had never drunk that much in his life before (Achior).

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