A moderator made this call. The reason is on the moderation log.
Palestine was the region's Greek name 600 years before Hadrian, and Jewish writers used it
The claim
“On top of the fact that the whole region was called Palestine so that might have been confusing, the name comes from the ancient enemies of the Jews, the Philistines. Rome renamed Judea Syria Palaestina when they conquered and destroyed the Jewish homeland, to negate the land's Jewish identity. So that is not really a suitable name for a Jewish state.”Made by C.S. Friedman (public figure, Science fiction and fantasy novelist).
Where it was posted: Quora, in an answer to "Was the country of Israel always going to be Israel? My mother told me she'd thought the name of the new country would be either Palestine or Zion and the name Israel came as a surprise. She was late 20s at the time, had a degree and was well-read."
What the evidence shows
Accurate as far as it goes; the omitted context changes its meaning.
Rome didn’t invent the name. Herodotus was writing about “the district of Syria called Palaistine” around 450 BCE. That’s six hundred years before Hadrian. Aristotle used it. Ovid used it. Pliny used it. Plutarch used it. The Egyptians were writing “Peleset” around 1150 BCE. The Assyrians were writing Palashtu from about 800 BCE. Your own Bible calls the place Peleshet. So the name is roughly thirteen hundred years older than the Roman you’re blaming for it.
Josephus. Jewish priest. Fought Rome. Wrote “the Syrians that live in Palestine” and put his own people among them. In the first century. Roughly forty years before Hadrian renamed anything. Philo did the same.
Also, the Septuagint, translated by Jews around 250 BCE, calls the Philistines Phylistiim. A completely different word from Palaistine.
Rome never renamed anything “Filistina.” The province was Syria Palaestina. “Filistina” is the Arabic form, which shows up about five hundred years later. Her answer now says Syria Palaestina; the comments under it from five years ago quote the “Filistina” line she first wrote.
As for the motive, most historians do read the renaming as punitive. Except Cassius Dio, the main source for the entire revolt, never gives a motive, the date isn’t certain, some place the merger around 129 which is before the revolt even started, and the earliest hard evidence is a military diploma from 139. The “sever the Jewish connection” reading is disputed in the actual scholarship.
Professor David Jacobson has argued in print that Palaistine comes from the Greek palaistes, wrestler, because Israel means “he who wrestles with God.”
First published in my Quora debunk archive.
Evidence
Book 1, 105; book 2, 104; book 7, 89: "the part of Syria called Palestine", about 600 years before Hadrian.
Book 1, 168-171: Josephus reads Herodotus's "Syrians of Palestine" as his own people.
Book 69, 12-14: the revolt and its end, with no word on renaming the province or why.
The case that Palaistine echoes the Greek palaistes, "wrestler", and so Israel.
Review
0 endorse, 0 challenge. Upheld at 3+ endorsements outnumbering challenges 2 to 1, after 24 hours open.
Sign in or create an account to review this debunk.
Debates
No debate on this debunk yet.