Mark Jay Mirsky

A Collection of Ancient Novels Plumbs Antiquity and Proselytizes for Piety

Ancient Jewish Novels: An Anthology Edited and Translated by Lawrence M. Wills Oxford University Press, 320 pages, $24.95. * * *| In “Joseph and Aseneth,” a “purer than thou” Joseph, the biblical patriarch and newly appointed regent of Egypt, meets the “holier than thou” Aseneth, virginal daughter of Pharaoh’s chief counselor. Aseneth — “more beautiful…