>does anyone know a good book about "anti=semitism" in the pre-christian
>world? Now I'm fascinated.
I don't know of any, not that there aren't.
There are one or two derogatory references to Jews in Horace, in the Epistles, I think. He used a common Roman saying of "Let Apellus (sp?) the Jew believe it." The Romans thought the Jews were very superstitious, and would believe anything.
Also, a certain Celsus denounced Christians, sometime in the 1st or 2nd Century (I no longer recall). He was also repelled by Jews for some of their beliefs. He thought that their cosmology was a very poor version of Greek myth, especially Noah's flood compared to Deucalion's flood. He thought that logic was lacking in the Jewish holy books, and suggested their purification with Greek rationalism. And he was offended by the Jews's insistence that their God was the only real one.
His wrath was reserved for the Christians, however, as renegade Jews. He had contempt for the Jews, but accepted their religion because it was "national". Christians were beyond the pale.
Mind you, nobody knows what Celsus actually wrote. The slim volume I read supposed his beliefs from the writings of the Church Fathers who denounced him. That is not as bad as learning Marxism from the Dallas Morning News, but isn't good either.
Then, of course, there was the Roman soldier who showed his contempt for Jews by pissing in the Temple. I think this is in Josephus.
John K. Taber