Book of Judith is not a ‘conflation’
by Damien F. Mackey “... Judith is replete with conflated details drawn from at least five centuries of real history ...”. A reader The Book of Judith, in its present form, lends itself to - and has been located to - various historical epochs. It appears as a conflation. To follow a reader’s quote, “... Judith is replete with conflated details drawn from at least five centuries of real history ...”. It is seemingly such an historical potpourri that modern scholars tend to relegate it to the category of ‘pious fiction’, saying that it opposes holy Israel (represented by the Simeonite heroine “Judith”) to all of the traditional enemies with whom ‘she’ ever had to contend. [1]. The very first verse of the book introduces us to a Babylonian-named king, “Nebuchadnezzar”, ruling from the Assyrian capital of “Nineveh”, at war with a Chaldean-named ki