Paul, Founder of Churches: A Study in Light of the Evidence for the Role of "Founder-Figures" in the Hellinistic-Roman Period 3161507169, 9783161507168

Table of contents :
Cover
Prologue
Table of Contents
Abbreviations
Chapter 1: Introduction
1. On the Meaning of the Term “Founder”
2. The Problem of Comparing Paul with Hellenistic Founder-Figures
2.1. The Nature of the Traditional Consensus about Paul’s Apostolic Role
2.2. Rudolf Sohm and the Roots of the Traditional Consensus
Chapter 2: The Founder as Paradigm
1. The Beginnings of the Greek Understanding of the Founder
1.1. The Founder-figure in the Hellenistic-Roman Period
1.2. The Cultic Aspects of the Paradigm of the Founder-Figure
1.3. The Cult Founder
2. The Language of Foundation
2.1. The Founder as the Personal Selection of the Deity
2.2. The Founder’s Role in Establishing the Cult
2.3. The Founder and Tradition
3. The Narrative Form of the Greek Foundation-Legend
3.1. The Composition of the Legend of Battos, Founder of Cyrene
3.2. A Comparison with Non-Greek Foundation-Legends: Roman
3.3. A Comparison with Jewish Sources
3.4. The Greek Foundation-Legend and the Question of History
4. Summation
Chapter 3: The Role of the Founder According to Selected Texts: the Transferrals of the Cult of Sarapis to Delos and Opous
1. The Transfer of Native Cult and the Sequence from Private to “Public” Cult: the Case of the Delian Cult of Sarapis
1.1. The Text and Translation
1.2. The Form of the Text
1.3. The Structure of the Text
1.4. Commentary on the Text: The Cult and Tradition
1.4.1. The Cult of Sarapis and the Story of its Beginnings
1.4.2. The Complex Character of Sarapis
1.4.3. The Establishment of the Cult and the Theme of Validation
1.4.4. On the Original Transfer of the Cult to Delos
1.4.5. The Personal Selection of the Founder by the Deity
1.5. The Theme of Opposition to New Cults
1.5.1. The Bakchai and the Social Articulation of Difference
1.5.2. Local Opposition and the Victory of the Immigrant God
2. The Foundation-Legend of the Transfer of the Cult of Sarapis from Thessalonika to Opous
2.1. The Text and Translation
2.2. The Form and Occasion of the Text
2.3. Commentary on the Text
2.3.1. The Theme of the God’s Initiative in Cult Foundation
2.3.2. The Theme of the Continuity of Tradition
2.3.3. The Importance of the Divine Selection of the Founder
3. Summation
Chapter 4: The Role of the Founder-Figure as Cult Authority and Organizer
1. The Reformation of the House-Cult of Dionysios of Philadelphia
1.1. The Text and Translation
1.2. The Structure of the Text
1.3. Commentary on the Text
1.3.1. The Divine Selection of the Founder
1.3.2. The Circle of the Gods
1.3.3. Dionysios and the Influence of Hellenistic Philosophical Religion
1.4. The Founder’s Role in Organizing the Cult
1.5. Summation
2. The Attic Cult of Mēn Founded by Xanthos the Lykian Slave
2.1. The Text and Translation
2.2. The Structure of the Text
2.3. Commentary on the Text
2.4. Summation
Chapter 5: The Mysteries of Andania and the Enduring Legacy of the Founder
1. The Occasion of the Cult Bylaws of the Andanian Mysteries
1.1. The History of the Cult
1.2. The Text, Translation, and Structural Arrangement of the Bylaws
1.2.1. The Oath of the Sacred Men and Sacred Women
1.2.2. The Sacred Tradition of the Cult
1.2.3. The Regulations for Apparel and the Procession
1.2.4. Accommodations During the Mysteries
1.2.5. Disorderly Persons and Disciplinary Officers
1.2.6. Managing the Cult’s Money
1.2.7. Procurement and Preparation of Sacrificial Animals
1.2.8. Various Regulations
1.2.9. The Sacred Meal
1.2.10. The Management of the Facilities of the Mysteries
1.2.11. Administrative Matters
1.3. The Language of the Inscription
1.4. The Genre of the Text
2. Commentary on the Text
2.1. The Importance of Maintaining Tradition
2.2. Innovation within Tradition
2.3. The Relationship Between the Reformation of the Cult and the State
2.4. Mnasistratos as Founder-Figure
2.5. Summation
Chapter 6: Paul, Founder of Churches: A Comparison with Hellenistic-Roman Cult Practices
1. Paul as a Founder-Figure in Paul’s Own Letters
1.1. Paul and the Personal Call of the Deity
1.1.1. Paul’s Use of His Founder’s Status in Managing His Churches
1.1.2. The Significance of Paul’s Boasting about His Foundations
1.2. Paul as a Transferer of Cult
1.2.1. Paul and the Establishment of His Foundation’s Place in the History of Tradition
1.2.2. Paul and the Ordering of the Internal Life of His Communities
1.2.3. The Importance of Written Instructions as an Exercise of the Founder’s Authority
2. Paul’s Legacy as a Founder of Churches in Post-Pauline Sources
2.1. The Image of Paul in the Deutero-Pauline Material
2.2. Paul in the Acts of the Apostles, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Early Church Fathers
3. Returning to the Problem of Comparing Paul with Hellenistic Founder-Figures
Chapter 7: Epilogue
Bibliography
Ancient Authors Index
Modern Authors Index
Subject Index

Citation preview

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Herausgeber / Editor Jörg Frey (Zürich) Mitherausgeber / Associate Editors Friedrich Avemarie † (Marburg) Markus Bockmuehl (Oxford) James A. Kelhoffer (Uppsala) Hans-Josef Klauck (Chicago, IL)

292

James Constantine Hanges

Paul, Founder of Churches A Study in Light of the Evidence for the Role of “Founder-Figures” in the Hellenistic-Roman Period

Mohr Siebeck

James Constantine Hanges, born 1954; 1999 PhD, University of Chicago; since 2005 Associate Professor of Comparative Religion, Miami University, Ohio.

e-ISBN 978-3-16-152473-8 ISBN 978-3-16-150716-8 ISSN 0512-1604 (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament) Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2012  Mohr Siebeck Tübingen, Germany. www.mohr.de This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that permitted by copyright law) without the publisher’s written permission. This applies particularly to reproductions, translations, microfilms and storage and processing in electronic s­ ystems. The book was printed by Gulde-Druck in Tübingen on non-aging paper and bound by Buchbinderei Spinner in Ottersweier. Printed in Germany.

Prologue What follows braves redescribing Greco-Roman Antiquity, but a very small part of that whole, the earliest Christ cults founded by the apostle Paul in the Greek homelands. This study owes much to the ongoing discussions in the Society of Biblical Literature’s Greco-Roman Religions Section’s “Redescribing Panel,” coordinated by Gerhard van den Heever, University of South Africa. Professor van den Heever organized panels focused on rethinking, reimagining, and redescribing Greco-Roman Mediterranean Antiquity. These discussions have saturated my thinking about the best way to approach earliest Christianity, so much so that the present study emerges as itself a redescription of research I originally completed on the possibility of describing Paul as a founder in my 1999 University of Chicago dissertation under the guidance of Professor Hans Dieter Betz.1 The bulk of that research is present here, but supplemented by a potent theoretical discourse that, despite my intuitive assimilation of its fundamental premise, largely escaped my notice during the course of my original work. That discourse is most readily accessible in postcolonial studies and contemporary discussions of cultural encounter. This study describes the apostle Paul as a founder of cultic communities according to a traditional Greek model, the well-documented Greek cultural convention about the foundation of various types of cultural institutions, and argues that Paul’s understanding of his role and the foundational activities through which he established his congregations and subsequently managed them are expressions of this widely recognized Greek conception of the cultfounder. While it is common enough for both ancient and modern commentators to refer to Paul as a founder, few have offered to explain this attribution in terms of the ideas and actions it implies, especially in terms of his social context and that of his contemporaries. This study shows that Paul’s language, behavior, and expectations reflect the Greek pattern of cult foundation, and that he appropriated and employed the complex of ideas and actions with which this pattern was associated. To answer the question of just what foundation meant in Paul’s day, I begin by clarifying, within the broader parameters of the typological use of “found——————————— 1

The original research was stimulated by Betz’s study, “Transferring a Ritual: Paul’s Interpretation of Baptism in Romans 6,” in Paulinische Studien: Gesammelte Aufsätze 3 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1994), 240–71.

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er” in the history of religions, the defining characteristics of what is here argued to be a peculiarly ancient Greek understanding of the founder-figure identified in a complex of related terms, associated actions, and in the development of a specific narrative convention through which this complex was expressed.2 Consequently, the scope of this study extends from a survey of the concept of the founder of πο' λεις to contemporaries of Paul who transfer specific cults from one locale to another. Reviewing numerous examples of foundation-legends describing events supposedly from the Greek colonial period, I distill from these narratives the recurrent motifs that make up the distinctive Greek form of the foundation-legend. My strategic contention is that the complex of literary motifs, responsibilities, and prerogatives associated with the role of the founder of πο' λεις, and especially this complex’s distinctive narrative form in the foundation-legend, was transformed, or better reinscribed, during the late Classical and early Hellenistic periods into the principal model for the transferal and foundation of innovative, especially migrating cults. It is in this respect that my description necessarily requires framing in terms of what we know about the nature and impact of cultural encounters between migrants and resident, “native,” populations. Such encounters are never unidirectional expressions of cultural dominance, but are rather reciprocally dynamic and creative, constantly generating innovative cultural forms. The probative core of this study is its focus on a series of cult foundation inscriptions, providing editions of the Greek texts along with new translations, and detailed commentaries. The texts included are key texts in the history of Hellenistic religion. Some of these inscriptions have accumulated substantial bibliographies, while others are rarely treated in detail. However, even since the completion of my earlier research, none of these selections has been examined primarily in terms of their contribution to our understanding of the role and authority of the cult-founder. Consequently, the accompanying commentaries will hopefully be of interest not only to students of Paul, but to scholars of the Hellenistic world and especially those interested in Hellenistic religion.3 The presentation (including Greek texts, original translations, and commentaries) and analysis of these texts is, as I mentioned, the heart of this study. It is here that I confirm the interrelations of terms, tropes, concepts, actions, and genre that constitute the founder-figure complex. Most importantly this sec———————————

2 This section reflects my argument in “The Greek Foundation Legend: Its Form and Relation to History,” in SBLSP, ed. E.H. Lovering (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995), 494– 520. 3 The key texts include IG XI, 4 1299 (the so-called “Delian Aretalogy of Sarapis, turn of the 3rd to 2nd cc. B.C.E.); IG X, 2 255 (the cult transferal/foundation-legend of the cult of Sarapis in Opous, last decade of the 1st c. B.C.E.); SIG3 985 (the lex sacra and cult foundation inscription of Dionysios’ cult in Philadelphia, 2nd half of the 2nd c. B.C.E.); IG II, 2 1365 and 1366 (the foundation-legend and lex sacra of the cult of Mēn Tyrannos at Sounion, 2nd half of the 2nd c. C.E.); IG V, 1 1390 (the lex sacra of the re-founded cult Messenia known as the Andanian mysteries, 92 B.C.E.)

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tion of the study clearly demonstrates the propagandistic function of the foundation complex’s key element, the epiphanic personal call of the founder by the deity who commissions the founder to reform or to transfer the god’s cult to a new location. On the basis of this survey, I review the evidence for Paul’s foundational activities and demonstrate precisely how the apostle to the Gentiles models the Greek founder-figure complex in the establishment and management of his cultic communities. This complex can not only be identified in Paul’s understanding of, references to, and use of his personal call by Christ to found churches among Gentiles, but also in the way the apostle exercises authority over the communities he has founded. Paul’s reliance on divine visionary endorsement, his attempt to integrate his communities into the sacred history of Israel, and the strategies used against him by his opponents together resonate with specific characteristics of the Greek foundational model. With reference to earlier published work, I restate my hypothesis that Paul, like his contemporaries, probably instituted written community bylaws as a foundational pillar of his church management.4 Finally, I take my last step in the argument, and beyond Paul’s own letters and to identify the legacy of Paul as a traditional Greek founder-figure in the deutero-Pauline traditions to show that my understanding of Paul in these terms is not a modern imposition, but reflects the ancient understanding of the apostle’s role. My description of Paul carries important implications for the ongoing debate, in particular, between Protestant and Catholic theologians over the relationship between charisma and the institutional development of the church. Our first chapter, with a slight return at the end of chapter six, explores these implications, beginning with the famous Harnack-Sohm debate and following this theme to its contemporary expressions. Paul’s appropriation of the Greek foundational paradigm implies that the opposition at the heart of this post-Reformation debate is totally alien to the Pauline context, one in which the relationship between the spiritual world and institutional order is much more complicated than the stark dichotomy between charisma and routinization still proposed by participants in the modern debate suggests. In addition, I hope that this study helps to complicate, or problematize, the still all too common tendency among scholars to treat the study of Paul as a process of locating him within one cultural context as opposed to another, either Greek or Jewish, as if such categorical distinctions were not only fixed and clearly-defined, but in some sense mutually exclusive. By turning to contemporary culture studies, my investigation shows that the nature of “hellenization,” like all cultural encounters is far too complex to be digested by facile dichotomies; the description of Paul must be composed of tensions and contestations give birth to cultic and conceptual creativity, or to put it in current terms, hybridities. Modern culture studies have not only ruled out the ———————————

4 James Constantine Hanges, “1 Corinthians 4:6 and the Possibility of Written Bylaws in the Corinthian Church,” JBL 117 (1998): 275–98.

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possibility of cultural impermeability – the idea of fixed group boundaries or ethnic or religious purity. In terms of Judaism, Martin Hengel set the course in this direction a generation ago; contemporary culture studies demands that we follow Hengel’s realization to its inevitable conclusion.5 For this study, our theoretical perspective views all cultural encounter within the wider scope of repeated conquest and group displacement as both anisodynamic and reciprocal, with exercises in power being exchanged effectively between both the dominant and dominated groups. These encounters are not between strictly active and passive participants – as often conceived in the sexualized metaphor of penetrator and penetrated – but represent constant struggle, tension, contestation, assimilation, resistance, stereotyping and the projection of stereotypes, selective appropriation, reinscription through mimicry by the dominated group. What we perceive in such cultural encounters, especially in the cases we examine, including Paul’s, where the colonized immigrant relocates to an urban center, is the reciprocal interaction of competing articulations of difference as an instrument in the negotiation of identities. In the cases we shall be examining, we will see the articulation of difference projected on the minority, migrant other from with the value system of the dominant, in this case – to use a term of convenience – Greek culture. In resistance to this dominant projection, or stereotype, we shall also see the assimilation of this dominant complex of values, returned to confront the dominant gaze in the form of a mirror image – deceptively similar but profoundly different – in the service of a competing articulation of difference, one yet inescapably framed by the very stereotype it intends to usurp.6 This theoretical perspective conditions us to expect to find complexity and innovation, continuities and discontinuities bound up in creative new cultural forms, unprecedented but not disconnected to the surrounding cultural forces that shape and deconstruct all cultural forms – from which forces religion, as one of those cultural forms, is not exempt. In other words, Paul’s new cultural form, his ε’ κκλησι' αι and their belief and practice, has a history – a connectedness to the existing forms in which it took shape. Paul’s form is unique but ——————————— 5

Martin Hengel, Judaism and Hellenism Studies in the Encounter in Palestine During the Early Hellenistic Period, trans. John Bowden (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1974), originally published, Judentum und Hellenismus: Studien zu ihrer Begegnung unter besonderer Berücksichtigung Palästinas bis zur Mitte des 2. Jh. . Chr., WUNT 10 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1969). 6 On the theoretical issues in the formation of identity and the articulation of difference in an urban environment, see: Ernesto Laclau and Chantel Mouffe, Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics, English ed., Winston Moore and Paul Cammack (London: Verso, 1985); Ernesto Laclau, The Making of Political Identities, Phronesis (London; New York: Verso, 1994); Jane M. Jacobs, Edge of Empire: Postcolonialism and the City (London; New York: Routledge, 1998); Peter Marcuse, “The Partitioned City in History,” in Of States and Cities: The Partitioning of Urban Space, Peter Marcuse and Ronald van Kempen (New York; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 11– 35.

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only in the sense that all cultural forms – in our case, the infinitely varied religious configurations of Antiquity – can claim a certain “uniqueness,” but his form is not sui generis. This was and is the fundamental and unassailably enduring insight of the Religionsgeschichtliche Schule. Of course, the word, “unique,” spells trouble for many; if group boundaries are barely definable and ambiguous, easily trespassed or violated, how can we speak of the unique when speaking of cultural forms? The danger of deploying the term unique in the long history of Christian scholars studying Christianity in the context of a non-Christian cultural context are well known to us.7 Despite the dangers, the reality is that we do recognize difference, and especially differences that allow us to distinguish one thing from another – some differences are distinctive differences. Anthropologists have long inhabited the seemingly bizarre space where uniqueness and universality seem to coexist, a world in which individual features can be both unique in the sense that with respect to the cultural form or artifact under consideration there is nothing precisely – in every detail and in every relation, both internal and external – shared with another form, and yet comparison of these “unique” complexes can lead to conclusions about shared, even universal, characteristics of the human species. From this perspective, as counter-intuitive as it may seem, we can speak of a “relative uniqueness” of particular cultural forms and artifacts.8 The implications of our theoretical perspective extend to the fact that this is a comparative study, firmly committed to careful historical-critical analysis of primary sources, to a fair deployment of standard literary critical tools to develop a definition of the Greek narrative convention, the foundation-legend, and grounded in the ethnographic principle of respecting informants’ categories – thus my insistence on the Greek understanding of the foundational complex. But to be more specific to modern cultural studies, being on the lookout for cultural creativity carries with it a reimagining of the comparative enterprise, at least as it has been conceived by those whose primary concern is the politics of comparison – in other words, the use of comparison to rule out continuity, the application of criteria of similarity so stringent as to rule out the utility or any and all putative cultural parallels to Christian phenomena. Comparison deployed as a prophylactic against the contamination of Christianity by hellenistic influence is completely exposed in the light of contemporary culture studies. From this perspective such a comparative project simply misses the point. We no longer live in the world of essentialist definitions, ———————————

7 Jonathan Z. Smith, Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity, Chicago Studies in the History of Judaism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990). 8 E.g., a simply survey of articles published in major anthropology journals since 2005 reveals repeated references to “unique” cultural phenomena just in the titles of articles alone – articles not a few of which proceed from the description of the “unique” to comparative conclusions relevant to the broader description of the human species. For an earlier booklength example of this combination of foci, as its title implies see: James F. Hamill, EthnoLogic: The Anthropology of Human Reasoning (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1990).

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and thus cannot advance our studies by stubbornly defending definitions constructed of fixed and unique core elements. In terms of modern cultural studies, monothetic definitions – definitions that primarily exclude from the category – are simply not true to the ethnographic facts. Rather, we live in a polythetic world, a world of the “more or less,” not the “either/or” – a world in which identities are constantly negotiated, multiple and adaptable to each new situation. To fall back on a dated but still correct statement of the methodological situation, “[T]he first consequence of the adoption of polythetic classification in social anthropology is that comparative studies, whether morphological or functional or statistical, are rendered more daunting and perhaps even unfeasible. Yet polythetic classes are likely to accommodate better than monothetic the variegation of social phenomena.”9 Our focus in what follows on the connection between a characteristically Greek cultural presupposition and the self-understanding and ecclesiology of the apostle Paul clearly resonates with the recently revitalized interest in Paul’s embeddedness in a social environment dominated by Hellenistic culture. Yet, this study calls for a more complicated description of Paul as one whose life and understanding of his world is the response to, and product of, a range of cultural influences, of multiple layers of competing hegemonies, including but not limited to those impinging on him from the dominant group of Jesus followers, local civic officials, competing preachers of Christ, Greek intellectual and religious culture, and most comprehensively the Roman empire and Roman ideology. This study argues that Paul employed, often simultaneously, multiple sources in shaping his self-understanding and selfpresentation, he selectively appropriated that which was useful from the dominant groups and reinscribed it for his own purposes. And none of these appropriations were necessarily mutually exclusive. In this case, I argue that alongside his appropriation of images from the Jewish prophetic tradition, Paul also deployed a profoundly Greek complex of concepts and behaviors as the model for his missionary purposes and as the means through which to validate his role as apostle to the Gentiles. Before moving to the argument proper, I want to take time to make certain acknowledgements. I offer my deepest gratitude to Dr. Jörg Frey, WUNT series Editor, for including this study in such a prestigious series, and to Dr. Henning Ziebritzki, Editor for books in Theology, for his humbling patience during the extended period it took me to prepare this manuscript for publication. This volume would not have been possible without the encouragement of Clare K. Rothschild; to her I owe my most sincere thanks. I am also profoundly indebted to Steven Siebert and Nota Bene for the indispensable help I received in the production of the camera-ready pages of the manuscript. With respect to the intellectual history of this project, thanks must go first to Hans Dieter Betz (Emeritus, University of Chicago), my dissertation director, and ———————————

9 See: Rodney Needham, “Polythetic Classification: Convergence and Consequences,” Man 10, no. 3 (1975): 358.

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my readers, Arthur J. Droge (University of Toronto), and Elizabeth R. Gebhard (Emerita, University of Illinois, Chicago), who supervised the original research completed in 1999. The pertinent and comprehensive critique of the manuscript offered by participants in the 2011 SBL Greco-Roman Religions Section’s “Redescribing Greco-Roman Antiquity: Theorizing Cult Foundations” session has proven crucial to the final form of this work. I owe a hefty debt of gratitude to each of the panelists: Vaia Touna (University of Alberta), Heidi Wendt (Brown University), Chris de Wet (University of South Africa), and Heike Omerzu (Københavns Universitet). I want to thank my perennial dialog partners, Matt Jackson-McCabe (Cleveland State University), Christopher N. Mount (DePaul University), and Donald Dale Walker (Illinois Institute of Technology) for the running brain-storming session we have carried out through the years. My lasting gratitude also goes out to the participants in the various sessions of the Greco-Roman Religions Section of the Society of Biblical Literature, whose always provocative contributions have greased the gears of my thinking. The support of my faculty colleagues in the Department of Comparative Religion, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, compels my enduring gratitude for the ways in which they embody the productive power of the comparative process. As my new colleague, Rory Johnson, recently put it, “It’s the question that drives us.” So true. Indeed, this intellectual context provides a space in which area experts representing the breadth and depth of the myriads of religious worlds gather around shared questions – the stimulus is intoxicating and hopelessly addictive. Finally, I want to single out for special thanks a specific friend, my former Miami colleague, now at DePaul, Lisa J. M. Poirier, who patiently guided me through the daunting complexities of postcolonial theory and provoked my thinking about the contact zones of human encounter. In bringing this phase of research to a close, my hope is that what follows will prove stimulating and useful to my readers. June 2012

James Constantine Hanges

Table of Contents Prologue ........................................................................................................... V Abbreviations .............................................................................................. XVII Chapter 1: Introduction .................................................................................... 1 1. On the Meaning of the Term “Founder” ........................................ 2 2. The Problem of Comparing Paul with Hellenistic Founder-Figures ........................................................................... 18 2.1. The Nature of the Traditional Consensus about Paul’s Apostolic Role ...................................................................... 19 2.2. Rudolf Sohm and the Roots of the Traditional Consensus... 25 Chapter 2: The Founder as Paradigm: ........................................................... 47 1. The Beginnings of the Greek Understanding of the Founder ...... 48 1.1. The Founder-figure in the Hellenistic-Roman Period .......... 59 1.2. The Cultic Aspects of the Paradigm of the Founder-Figure . 61 1.3. The Cult Founder .................................................................. 63 2. The Language of Foundation ....................................................... 67 2.1. The Founder as the Personal Selection of the Deity ............. 69 2.2. The Founder’s Role in Establishing the Cult........................ 77 2.3. The Founder and Tradition ................................................... 78 3. The Narrative Form of the Greek Foundation-Legend ................ 80 3.1. The Composition of the Legend of Battos, Founder of Cyrene .............................................................................. 94 3.2. A Comparison with Non-Greek Foundation-Legends: Roman................................................................................. 101 3.3. A Comparison with Jewish Sources ................................... 105 3.4. The Greek Foundation-Legend and the Question of History ............................................................................ 129 4. Summation ................................................................................. 137

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Chapter 3: The Role of the Founder According to Selected Texts: the Transferrals of the Cult of Sarapis to Delos and Opous ...... 140 1. The Transfer of Native Cult and the Sequence from Private to “Public” Cult: the Case of the Delian Cult of Sarapis ........... 142 1.1. The Text and Translation.................................................... 144 1.2. The Form of the Text .......................................................... 148 1.3. The Structure of the Text .................................................... 151 1.4. Commentary on the Text: The Cult and Tradition ............ 158 1.4.1. The Cult of Sarapis and the Story of its Beginnings..................................................... 166 1.4.2. The Complex Character of Sarapis ........................ 181 1.4.3. The Establishment of the Cult and the Theme of Validation .......................................................... 186 1.4.4. On the Original Transfer of the Cult to Delos ........ 193 1.4.5. The Personal Selection of the Founder by the Deity ............................................................ 202 1.5. The Theme of Opposition to New Cults............................. 210 1.5.1. The Bakchai and the Social Articulation of Difference........................................................... 213 1.5.2. Local Opposition and the Victory of the Immigrant God ....................................................... 224 2. The Foundation-Legend of the Transfer of the Cult of Sarapis from Thessalonika to Opous ..................................... 248 2.1. The Text and Translation.................................................... 248 2.2. The Form and Occasion of the Text ................................... 250 2.3. Commentary on the Text .................................................... 254 2.3.1. The Theme of the God’s Initiative in Cult Foundation ............................................................. 254 2.3.2. The Theme of the Continuity of Tradition ............. 255 2.3.3. The Importance of the Divine Selection of the Founder.................................................................. 258 3. Summation ................................................................................. 259 Chapter 4: The Role of the Founder-Figure as Cult Authority and Organizer ................................................................................... 260 1. The Reformation of the House-Cult of Dionysios of Philadelphia ............................................................................... 260 1.1. The Text and Translation.................................................... 262 1.2. The Structure of the Text .................................................... 265

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1.3. Commentary on the Text .................................................... 267 1.3.1. The Divine Selection of the Founder ..................... 269 1.3.2. The Circle of the Gods ........................................... 274 1.3.3. Dionysios and the Influence of Hellenistic Philosophical Religion ........................................... 290 1.4. The Founder’s Role in Organizing the Cult ....................... 294 1.5. Summation .......................................................................... 303 2. The Attic Cult of Mēn Founded by Xanthos the Lykian Slave.. 304 2.1. The Text and Translation.................................................... 305 2.2. The Structure of the Text .................................................... 308 2.3. Commentary on the Text .................................................... 312 2.4. Summation .......................................................................... 316 Chapter 5: The Mysteries of Andania and the Enduring Legacy of the Founder ............................................................................ 317 1. The Occasion of the Cult Bylaws of the Andanian Mysteries ... 318 1.1. The History of the Cult ....................................................... 322 1.2. The Text, Translation, and Structural Arrangement of the Bylaws ...................................................................... 329 1.2.1. The Oath of the Sacred Men and Sacred Women .. 329 1.2.2. The Sacred Tradition of the Cult ............................ 330 1.2.3. The Regulations for Apparel and the Procession ... 332 1.2.4. Accommodations During the Mysteries ................. 337 1.2.5. Disorderly Persons and Disciplinary Officers ........ 338 1.2.6. Managing the Cult’s Money ................................... 339 1.2.7. Procurement and Preparation of Sacrificial Animals .................................................................. 342 1.2.8. Various Regulations ............................................... 344 1.2.9. The Sacred Meal ..................................................... 347 1.2.10. The Management of the Facilities of the Mysteries ...................................................... 348 1.2.11. Administrative Matters ........................................... 351 1.3. The Language of the Inscription ......................................... 354 1.4. The Genre of the Text ......................................................... 356 2. Commentary on the Text ........................................................... 360 2.1. The Importance of Maintaining Tradition .......................... 360 2.2. Innovation within Tradition ................................................ 362 2.3. The Relationship Between the Reformation of the Cult and the State ..................................................... 367 2.4. Mnasistratos as Founder-Figure ......................................... 373

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2.5. Summation .......................................................................... 375 Chapter 6: Paul, Founder of Churches: A Comparison with Hellenistic-Roman Cult Practices ...................................... 378 1. Paul as a Founder-Figure in Paul’s Own Letters ....................... 381 1.1. Paul and the Personal Call of the Deity .............................. 382 1.1.1. Paul’s Use of His Founder’s Status in Managing His Churches ..................................... 391 1.1.2. The Significance of Paul’s Boasting about His Foundations ............................................ 393 1.2. Paul as a Transferer of Cult ................................................ 397 1.2.1. Paul and the Establishment of His Foundation’s Place in the History of Tradition ............................ 400 1.2.2. Paul and the Ordering of the Internal Life of His Communities ............................................... 406 1.2.3. The Importance of Written Instructions as an Exercise of the Founder’s Authority ............. 416 2. Paul’s Legacy as a Founder of Churches in Post-Pauline Sources ....................................................................................... 433 2.1. The Image of Paul in the Deutero-Pauline Material ........... 434 2.2. Paul in the Acts of the Apostles, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Early Church Fathers ............................................. 442 3. Returning to the Problem of Comparing Paul with Hellenistic Founder-Figures ...................................................... 451 Epilogue: ....................................................................................................... 464 Bibliography: ................................................................................................ 476 Ancient Authors Index: ................................................................................. 525 Modern Authors Index: ................................................................................. 527 Subject Index: ............................................................................................... 537

Abbreviations Not all abbreviations used in this volume are explicitly listed below. Unlisted abbreviations for ancient sources and secondary literature follow Patrick H. Alexander, et al., The SBL Handbook of Style: For Ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, and Early Christian Studies (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 1999); for those not included therein, see IATG2. Unless included below, abbreviations of Epigraphica follow Greg H. R. Horsley and John A. L. Lee, eds. and comps., “A Preliminary Checklist of Abbreviations of Greek Epigraphic Volumes,” Epigraphica: Periodico Internazionale di Epigrafia 56 (1994): 129–69, and where updated follow the list of abbreviations used by the Packard Humanities Institute, Searchable Greek Inscriptions, online: http://epigraphy.packhum.org/inscriptions/main. Unless otherwise noted, all Greek literary texts are cited from those included in the Thesaurus linguae graecae: a Digital Library of Greek Literature (University of California, Irvine) http://www.tlg.uci.edu/about/. Social Science journal abbreviations follow the “Web of Science Journal Title Abbreviations List” [cited 17 October 2010], online: http://library.caltech.edu/reference/abbreviations/. Additional Classical Abbreviations conform to the Oxford Classical Dictionary, third edition, electronic edition, Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, eds. (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), http:/ /www.library.nlx.com/xtf/view?docId=ocd/ocd.00.xml;chunk.id=div.ocd.pmpreface.1;toc.depth=1;toc.id=div.ocd.pmpreface.1;brand=default&fragment_id=. Although not listed severally here, papyrological abbreviations are from the “Checklist of Editions of Greek, Latin, Demotic and Coptic Papyri, Ostraca and Tablets, edited by Joshua D. Sosin, Roger S. Bagnall, James Cowey, Mark Depauw, Terry G. Wilfong, and Klaas A. Worp [cited June 1, 2011], online: http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/papyrus/texts/clist.html. AARTTS AAT AB ABDict ’Αρχ. ’Εφ

American Academy of Religion Texts and Translations Series Atti della Accademia delle Scienze di Torino Anchor Bible Anchor Bible Dictionary ’Αρχαιολογικη` ’Εφημερι'ς

XVIII AGSJUC Agora

AGWG AJA AJAH AJP ANRW APJA AR ARA ARelG ABSA ARS AusBR BAGD

BCH BCHSup BDF

BET BJPsych BJRL BNTC BR BRS BullAAAS BZ CBQ CJ ConJ

Abbreviations

Arbeiten zur Geschichte des Spätjudentums und Urchristentums Benjamin D. Merritt and John S. Traill, ed., Inscriptions: the Athenian Councillors, Athenian Agora 15 (Princeton, NJ: American School of Classical Studies at Athens, 1974) Abhandlungen der königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttigen The American Journal of Archaeology The American Journal of Ancient History The American Journal of Philology Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römishen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung The Asian Pacific Journal of Anthropology Archiv für Religionswissenschaft Annual Review of Anthropology Archiv für Religionsgeschichte Annual of the British School at Athens Annual Review of Sociology Australian Biblical Review Walter Bauer, William F. Arndt, and F. Wilbur Gingrich, eds., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, 2nd ed., rev. Frederick W. Danker (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1979). Bulletin Correspondence hellénique Bulletin Correspondence hellénique Supplement Series Friedrich Blass and Albert Debrunner, A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, rev. and ed., Robert W. Funk (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1961). Beiträge zur Evangelischen Theologie British Journal of Psychology Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library Black’s New Testament Commentary Biblical Research Biblical Resource Series Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Biblische Zeitschrift Catholic Biblical Quarterly Classical Journal Conservative Judaism

Abbreviations

CMRDM CPSS CSR CR DielsVorsokr. EAD EDNT EKKNT ÉPRO ÉtBib EvQ FOTL FRLANT GGR GRBS HCS Hesperia HECSSA

HHS Hist. HNT HNTC HR HSCP HSM HThKNT HTR

XIX

Corpus Monumentorum religionis Dei Menis, Études préliminaires aux Religions orientales dans l’Empire romain 19, Eugene Lane, ed. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1971). Cambridge Philological Society Supplement Christian Scholars Review Critical Review Herman Diels and Wlather Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, griechisch und deutsch (Berling: Weidmann, 1972-1973). Exploration Archéologique de Délos Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament, Horst Balz and Gerhard Schneider, eds. (Grand Rapids, MI.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990), 3 volumes. Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament Études préliminaires aux religions orientales dans l’empire romain Études bibliques Evangelical Quarterly Forms of the Old Testament Literature Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments Martin P. Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen Religion, Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 5.2 (2nd ed.; Munchen: Beck, 1967). Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies Hellenistic Culture and Society Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens Handbook of Early Christianity: Social Science Approaches, Anthony J. Blasi, Jean Duhaime, and PaulAndré Tucotte, eds. (Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 2002). Harvard Historical Studies Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte Handbuch zum Neuen Testament Harper’s New Testament Commentaries History of Religions Harvard Studies in Classical Philology Harvard Semitic Monographs Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament. Harvard Theological Review

XX Hypomnemata IATG2

ICC IMT Int JAC JBL JEA JHS JNES JÖAI JR JRS JRH JSJ JSNT JSNTSup JSSR JTS KatAmastris KEKNT LaumStiftungen LNTS LBW LSCG

Abbreviations

Hypomnemata: Untersuchungen zur Antike und zu ihrem Nachleben Siegfried M. Schwertner, Internationales Abkürzungsverzeichnis für Theologie und Grenzgebiete: Zeitschriften, Serien, Lexika, Quellenwerke mit bibliographischen Angaben, 2nd ed. (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1992). International Critical Commentary Inschriften Mysia & Troas, Matthias Barth and Josef Stauber, eds. (Leopold Wenger Institut: Universität München, 1996). Interpretation Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum Journal of Biblical Literature Journal of Egyptian Archaeology Journal of Hellenic Studies Journal of Near Eastern Studies Jahreshefte des Österreichischen archäologischen Instituts Journal of Religion Journal of Roman Studies Journal of Religious History Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman Period. Journal for the Study of the New Testament Journal for the Study of the New Testament, Supplement Series Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion Journal of Theological Studies Christian Marek, Stadt, Ära und Territorium in PontusBithynia und Nord-Galatia, Istanbuler Forschungen 39 (Tübingen; E. Wasmuth, 1993). Kritisch-exegetischer Kommentar über das Neue Testament Bernhard Laum, Stiftungen in der griechischen und römischen Antike: ein Beitrag zur antiken Kulturgeschichte (Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1914) Library of New Testament Studies Philippe Le Bas and W. H. Waddington, Inscriptions grecques et latines recueillies en Asie Mineure, Subsidia epigraphica 2 (Hildesheim; New York: Georg Olms, 1972) Franciszek Sokolowski, Lois sacrées des cités grecques (Paris: E. de Boccard, 1969)

Abbreviations

MAMA

XXI

Monumenta Asiae Minoris Antiqua (London: Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies, 1928-1993, MAPS Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society MarbThS Marburger Theologische Studien MDAI Mitteilungen des Deutschen archäologischen Instituts NewDocs New Documents Illustrating Early Christianity: A Review of the Greek Inscriptions and Papyri, 9 vols. (North Ryde, Australia: Macquarie University, 1983-2002). NICNT New International Commentary on the New Testament NIGTC The New International Greek Testament Commentary NovTSup Supplements to Novum Testamentum NTAbh Neutestamentliche Abhandlungen NTD Das Neue Testament Deutsch Numen Numen: International Review for the History of Religions Petersen-Luschan, Eugen Adolf Hermann Petersen and Felix von Luschan, Reisen II Reisen in Lykien, Milyas und Kibyratis, vol II of Reisen im südwestlichen Kleinasien (Grundholzen: Codex, 1970, orig. publ. Vienna, 1889). PECS The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites, Richard Stillwell, ed. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1976). PHI The Packard Humanities Index, Searchable Greek Inscriptions Online: http://epigraphy.packhum.org/inscriptions/ ProcEGLBSMSBL Proceedings: Eastern Great Lakes Biblical Society and Midwestern Society of Biblical Literature PSB Princeton Seminary Bulletin PCPhilolS Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society PTMS Pittsburgh Theological Monograph Series RAC Reallexikon Für Antike und Christentum: Sachwörterbuch Zur Auseinandersetzung Des Christentums mit der Antiken Welt, ed. Theodor Klauser (Stuttgart: Anton Hiersemann, 1959-). RB Revue biblique RevExp Review and Expositor: A Baptist Theological Journal RGRW Religions in the Graeco-Roman World RHAW Routledge History of the Ancient World RHPhR Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuses Roscher, Lexikon Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher, et al, Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie (Hildesheim: G. Olms, 1965). Roussel, Pierre Roussel, Les cultes égyptiens à Délos du IIIe au 1er

XXII Cultes égyptiens SBLSBS SBLDS SBLSP SCJ SEG Segre, Iscr. di Cos SGRR SHR SIRIS SGGR SJLA SJT SNTSMS Sociol. Inq. SPB SR StTh SWFC

TAM TANZ TAPA TAPS Teubneriana ScriptGraeci TBA TDNT

ThEv THKNT

Abbreviations

siècle av. J.-C., Annales de l'Est, publiées par la Faculté des letteres de l'Université de Nancy 29e et 30e années (Paris and Nancy: Berger-Levrault, 1915–16. Society of Biblical Literature Sources for Biblical Study Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers, various editors Studies in Christianity and Judaism Supplementum epigraphicum Graecum (Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1923-). Mario Segre, Iscrizioni di Cos, Monografie della Scuola Archeologica di Atene e delle Missioni Italiane in Oriente 6.2 (Rome: Quasar, 2007) Studies in Greek and Roman Religion Studies in the History of Religions (supplement to Numen) Sylloge Inscriptionum religionis Isiacae et Sarapiacae, Ladislav Vidman, ed. (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1969) Studies in Greek and Roman Religion Studies in Judaism in Late Antiquity Scottish Journal of Theology Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series Sociological Inquiry Studia postbiblica Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses Studia Theologica Jacob Neusner, Ernest S. Frerichs, Peder Borgen, and Richard Horsley, eds., The Social World of Formative Christianity and Judaism: Essays in Tribute to Howard Clark Kee (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988) Tituli Asiae Minoris Texte und Arbeiten zum neutestamentlichen Zeitalter Transactions of the American Philological Association Transactions of the American Philosophical Society Bibliotheca Scriptorum graecorum et romanorum Teubneriana, Scriptores graeci Tübinger Beiträge zur Altertumswissenschaft Gerhard Kittel, ed., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1964) 10 volumes Theologica Evangelica Theologischer Handkommentar zum Neuen Testament

Abbreviations

TLG TS TSAJ VC WBC WUNT YFS ZNW ZEthnol ZPE ZTK

XXIII

Thesaurus Linguae Graecae, University of California (1999) Theological Studies Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum Vigiliae christianae Word Biblical Commentary Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Yale French Studies Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche Zeitschrift für Ethnologie Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche

Chapter 1

Introduction: Questions and Directions Scholars often assume that the apostle Paul “founded” churches, yet without defining what they mean by saying that Paul founded churches. Commentators commonly applying the term to Paul most often assume some particular, contemporary usage.1 Even in those cases where the term is used in the interpretation of Paul’s letters, we learn very little about the nature of “founding” in itself, although the fact that Paul is to be understood as a founder is taken as self-evident. For example, John C. Hurd confidently declares that “[t]here is no doubt that the church in Corinth was founded by Paul,” sufficient evidence for which he finds within Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians.2 In justifying his application of the term “founder” to Paul, Hurd cites passages which reveal Paul’s peculiar relationship to the Corinthians: e.g., Paul planted the Corinthian church (1 Cor 3:6); he was its skilled builder, the one who laid its only appropriate foundation (3:10); Paul became the Corinthians’ father, begetting them (ε’ γω` υ‘ μα^ ς ε’ γε' ννησα) through the message he preached (δια` του^ ευ’ αγγελι' ου) and which they received (4:15); the Corinthians are his workmanship, and thereby the seal of approval on his apostleship (9:1–2); Paul had ———————————

1 E.g., Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, Paul: A Critical Life (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1996) describes Paul’s founding visit to Corinth (109); includes the index entry, “foundation [of the church at Corinth] according to Acts,” referring to pp. 259–65; uses a chapter sub-heading, “The Founding of the Church” referring to Paul’s founding of the church in Ephesos (171–173). Despite details about Paul’s associates, their travels, and other circumstances, no definition of founder/foundation is given. A similar pattern is found in H. Koester, Introduction to the New Testament. 2 Vols. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1982), vol.2, History and Literature of Early Christianity, refers to churches “founded” by Paul (107–14), and to the “founding and consolidating” of churches which went unfinished (109). Although Koester does describe Paul as being solely responsible for “the survival of the churches which he had founded (112),” the specific elements which make up Paul’s foundational activities are not described, especially not in terms of contemporary patterns in the history of Greek religion. In fact, in most cases where commentators describe Paul as a founder, there appears to be no felt need to define the term historically. Dozens of other examples duplicating Murphy-O’Connor’s or Koester’s pattern might be offered. 2 John C. Hurd, The Origin of 1 Corinthians (New York: Seabury Press, 1965), 53; but contrast W. Schrage, Der Erste Brief an die Korinther, 3 vols., EKKNT Vol. 7.1 (Zürich: Benziger, 1991), 1:29–33, who, on the basis of the account in the Acts of the Apostles, an account which suggests the presence of Christians in Corinth prior to Paul’s arrival, denies that Paul’s claims to be the founder of the church in Corinth reflect reality.

2

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

personally baptized the first believers in the province of Achaea (16:15).3 Because no alternative definition is given in Hurd’s description, we are left to assume a common, non-technical definition of the word founder.

1. On the Meaning of the Term “Founder” To be fair in referring to the descriptions of New Testament scholars, it is appropriate that we take into consideration a long tradition in the study of religions of constructing technical definitions of the word founder – defining a typology – a tradition from the more general study of religion that assuredly informs students of Christian origins. Since Durkheim, founders have been understood as models for contemporary behavior and ritual practice. Their actions, or even the founders themselves, need not be historical realities; they are simply etiological devices which exist to explain the way things are in the present.4 With Van der Leeuw, the definition becomes more subtle, including those charismatic individuals whose personal religious experience of “Power” is so profound that they are driven to proclaim their “revelation” to others. The proclamation receives its form from the personality of the individual, at a crucial moment in history establishing a representation of that experience of power which thereafter continues to be communicated and developed.5 The focus of this understanding of the founder is on the experience of the individual communicated as revelation, and in the qualitative distinctiveness of the specific revelator. According to Van der Leeuw, “we can point to some human life and say: something is happening there: in this life Power [sic] appears.”6 The founder is then the saint, the archetype of the pious life, the mediator of revelation, the reformer, the theologian, and the philosopher. Van der Leeuw’s description continues to inform the discussion of the founder among historians of religion, as for example, in work of Frank Reynolds, where the word “founder” is applicable to almost any religious visionary.7 ———————————

3 Ibid, 52–53; cf. 242 where Hurd adds 1 Cor 4:14, Paul’s description of the Corinthians as his “dear children.” 4 Émile Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, trans. Joseph Swain (New York: The Free Press, 1965), 322–28. This understanding of founders is expanded in Mircea Eliade, The Myth of the Eternal Return or Cosmos and History, Bollingen Series 46 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974), 21–22. 5 Gerardus van der Leeuw, Religion in Essence and Manifestation (Harper Torchbooks/ The Library of Religion and Culture. New York: Harper & Row, 1963), 650–51 6 Religion, 665. 7 Professor Reynolds describes a “founder” as any one of the numerous sorts of “Sages or Prophets.” His explanation of these types earlier as “sacred persons whose vision of transcendence [calls] into question the reality and/or value of temporal existence and its social institutions,” finds little resonance with Greek founders, see: Frank Reynolds, “The Two

1. On the Meaning of the Word “Founder”

3

Inherent in such an application is the definitive characteristic of radicality.8 The founder embodies innovation, novelty, creativity; after all, has not Weber described for us the prophet as an agent of a religious breakthrough to a new level, a “purely individual bearer of charisma who by virtue of his mission proclaims a religious doctrine or divine commandment?”9 And is it not in that context that he goes on to speak of Jesus as such a charismatic prophet?10 Moreover, using such criteria to define our term could also lead us to speak of Jesus as the founder of Christian ritual traditions11; especially so since this understanding is expressed in Paul’s statement that the ritual tradition of the “Lord’s Supper,” which he passed on to the church at Corinth, was originally instituted by Jesus himself (1 Cor 11:23).12 In this sense, we must grant not ——————————— Wheels of Dhamma: A Study of Early Buddhism,” in The Two Wheels of Dhamma: Essays on the Theravada Tradition in India and Ceylon, ed. Bardwell L. Smith (Chambersburg: American Academy of Religion, 1972), 6–7, 14. 8 Reynolds’ analysis parallels religious founders with the radical, the individualsoteriological, the transcendent, i.e., the “religious ideal,’ while the developed traditions of the followers are paralleled with the less radical, and with a tendency toward greater alignment with traditional social structures, note the criticism of Reynolds’ view by A. R. Gualtieri, “Founders and Apostates: Radical Contradictions Between Soteriological Progams of the Founders of Great Religious Traditions and the Transformative Intentions of Devotees,” JAAR 61, no. 1 (1993): 103. 9 For his tripartite schema of forms of authority, see Max Weber, Theory of Social and Economic Organization, 1st American ed., A. M. Henderson and Talcott Parsons (New York: Oxford University Press, 1947); for this schema and his description of charisma, see also the anthology, Max Weber, On Charisma and Institution Building: Selected Papers, ed. and trans. S. N. Eisenstadt, Heritage of Sociology Series (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968), esp. chapters 5 and 6. 10 Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion, 4th rev. ed., trans. E. Fischoff (Boston: Beacon Press, 1963), 46–47. Weber also points out the central importance of the prophet’s “personal call,” which distinguishes the priest from the prophet and his claim to special validation because of this “call.” Here, Weber makes no clear distinction between founders of religion and prophets, except to associate the former with the introduction of completely new modes of deliverance or salvation. Therefore, the founder of religion is usually not from an invested class such as the priesthood. Also see on this common assessment of Jesus, Hans Dieter Betz, “The Birth of Christianity as a Hellenistic Religion: Three Theories of Origin,” JR 74 (1994): 1–25, especially pp. 1, 7–10. Of course, Betz’s article makes clear, it is also necessary to explain precisely of which Christianity one makes Jesus the founder, e.g., either a Christianity in some sense continuous with the Church or some “original” Christianity buried within the biblical text and, more often than not, consistent with some contemporary set of philosophical priorities (3–4). 11 Gerd Theissen and Merz Annette, The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide, trans. John Bowden (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), 433–37. 12 So the derivation of the innovative eucharistic meal from the historical Jesus’ last meal with his disciples in Hans-Josef Klauck, Herrenmahl und Hellenistischer Kult: eine religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zum Ersten Korintherbrief, NTAbh 15 (Münster: Aschendorff, 1982).

4

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

only that the founder-figure is a commonplace in the history of religions, but also that such a category properly applies to Jesus as the founder of unprecedented cultic rituals.13 Of course, the question which naturally arises in this context is whether we should consider the historical Jesus the true founder of Christianity.14 What is remarkable in this regard is that in response to the way we answer with respect to Jesus seems inevitably to determine the necessarily subsequent question regarding the validity of describing Paul as a religious founder-figure. On the one hand, if our answer is that Jesus was, in fact, the founder of a new religion, of what value is it then to speak of Paul as a founder? On the other hand, if we deny that Jesus is the founder of Christianity, are we then by default asserting that Paul is its founder?15 A derivative question is also important here. What is the role of Jesus, the risen Christ, in Paul’s understanding of his mission as founder of churches? Although the limits of my present task with respect to these questions will become clear, these are questions for which I shall, nevertheless, need to propose some answers as I draw together my final conclusions. With this in mind, one of the most important goals of the following chapters will be to define how I understand the term “founder,” as I use it to describe the apostle Paul. The expansive definition of the founder-figure that we find in the history of religions very well may, in due course, prove helpful to our description of the ———————————

13 In Christian tradition “holy men” are also called founders, as well as Jesus, the twelve apostles individually, or the apostle and his disciples (Wolfgang Speyer, “Gründer,” RAC 12 [1982], cols. 1146–52; see esp. cols 1147–8 for Jesus as the founder of Christianity. The problematic in the common practice of speaking of God in English as “creator [κτι'στης] of the cosmos,” but an apostle as “founder” [κτι'στης] of a church will be discussed later. Suffice it here to say that the evidence is clear that creation, as it is understood most often by Christian theologians, as the expression of creative word of God and not God’s actions, is a foreign concept imported into the semantics of the Greek κτι'στης and cognates). Speyer also describes the Christian founder in terms of personal qualities, “To this extent, the founder which is encountered in Christianity, and which corresponds to the Greek founderhero, can be understood as a copy of the religio-historical paradigm of the divine man.” (col. 1146; cf. also Van der Leeuw, Religion, 2.650–65; Hans Dieter Betz, “Gottmensch II,” RAC 12.90 (1982), cols. 234–312). 14 Obviously, one may recall C. H. Dodd’s famous conclusion, “In an historical view, the one evident outcome of the whole life and work of Jesus was the emergence of the church, a society which regarded itself as carrying on the distinctive vocation of Israel as the ‘people of God,’ and yet was quite clear that it was a new Israel, constituted by a ‘new covenant.’ It had taken shape, not about a platform or a creed, but about a personal attachment to Jesus himself,” Charles Harold Dodd, The Founder of Christianity (New York: Macmillan, 1970), 99 (Dodd’s italics); on the comparative question, see, e.g., David Noel Freedman and Michael J. McClymond, eds., The Rivers of Paradise: Moses, Buddha, Confucius, Jesus, and Muhammad as Religious Founders (Grand Rapids, Michigan: W. B. Eerdmans, 2001). 15 Gerd Lüdemann, Paul, the Founder of Christianity (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2002).

1. On the Meaning of the Word “Founder”

5

Hellenistic-Roman founder-figure – especially were I inclined to expand this investigation phenomenologically. My intention is, however, far more limited. For the Greeks of our period, the image of the founder depended, as we shall see, on revelation and charisma, and not on the generally assumed quality important to definitions like those of Van der Leeuw or Reynolds. While the quality of the individual’s piety and the proclamation of an experience of “power” can certainly be found in some Greek foundation-legends, these elements are customarily subordinated to a clearly definitive pattern. The concerns expressed in these stories might be seen as more practical – the revelatory vision a communication of cultic trivialities. These revelations communicate no new doctrines; they are not visions of a new transcendental reality. A Greek founder is a servant of his/her god, called to a specific action – the impetus of which is credited solely to the divine being – to the building of a sanctuary, to the translocation of a cult, or even to the founding of a city, itself a sacred act. And this fact, not the content of the founder’s or prophet’s message or experience, will serve for us as the specific and limited starting point of my investigation. My intent here is certainly not to discount the traditional typologies in any way, only to displace them a bit in order to make room for a culturallyspecific definition of “founder” consistent with the use of the term in a relatively limited time and space. In essence, I beg room for an ethnographic description of the founder in the midst of the modern and analytical. In other words, we might describe the Greek phenomena, in their relation to the definitions of the founder commonly used by the historian of religion, as the relationship of a particular species to its genus. In spite of the inherent limitations – at least for the task at hand – of the semantic assumptions found in contemporary scholarly discussions of the founder, modern commentators, in describing Paul as a founder-figure, are following a well-established pattern which can be found in the earliest accounts of the apostle’s career. Among the early Church Fathers, the apostles – among whom Paul was counted – are described as founders of churches.16 And as I will show in due course, this was certainly the under———————————

16 I will argue in due course that the conviction among the early Christian Church Fathers that Paul was a founder of churches, and, additionally, their assumptions that founding churches is a part of the apostolic task, and that it is directly related to the preaching of the gospel in a specific location, comes from Paul himself. Eusebius refers to Paul’s proclamation together with the founding of churches, “τοι^ς ε’ ξ ε’ θνω ^ ν κηρυ' σσων ο‘ Παυ^ λος του` ς ... τω ^ ν ε’ κκλησιω ^ ν καταβε' βλητο θεμελι'ους” (Hist. eccl., 3.4.1); citing Irenaeus, Haer. 3.1.3, Eusebius writes that Matthew wrote his Hebrew gospel while Peter and Paul were “ε’ ν ‘ Ρω' μη, ευ’ αγγελιζομε' νων και` θεμελιου' ντων τη` ν ε’ κκλησι'αν” (Hist. eccl. 5.8.2). The words used in these traditions are Paul’s, lifted directly from his letters. This text makes clear also the tradition that Peter and Paul together founded the Roman church; cf. Irenaeus, Haer. 3.4.1–3 (also 3.11.7), “τα` ς προ` ς αυ’ τω ^ ν ι‘ δρυθει'σας ... ε’ κκλησι'ας;” Hist. eccl., 2.25.6–7, citing Gaios’

6

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

standing of not only the author of the Acts of the Apostles, but other early Christian writers as well. To this point, I agree; those modern scholars, as well as their ancient counterparts, who describe Paul in this way are correct in thinking of him as a founder. Even so, we are left with a fundamental problem; although the language of the Church Fathers can be translated by contemporary terms such as “founder” or “Gründer,” this in no way insures that modern commentators mean by their terms what the Church Fathers understood by the terms they used. The latter inhabited a world where the use of foundational terms could still conjure the same images and associations it had for generations before them. Returning briefly to the descriptions of New Testament scholars, in a passage describing Paul’s authority over his churches, Wayne A. Meeks writes:17 By the very fact of writing as he does, Paul asserts his authority as an apostle and, to a lesser degree, the authority of the co-workers who join him in the formal letter openings. Apart from this implicit exercise of authority, he also makes explicit claims to personal authority in a variety of ways. First, he claims a unique personal relationship with the Corinthian groups, as their founder18...It is the right of the founder that he defends against the “superapostles,” whom he depicts as interlopers.19

Here again, while Meeks has introduced the term “founder” into a suggestive context, the actual nature of Paul’s role as founder – what he does and how he goes about it – remains vague. Nevertheless, Meeks’ description seems nonetheless to reflect his intuition that perhaps the term “founder” encapsulates a more potent range of ideas within Paul’s Greco-Roman cultural context than the modern word is capable of expressing. Meeks also suggests that Paul defends his claims to authority over the community on the basis of his role in ——————————— (Caius) written opinion (γνω' μης ε’ γγρα' φως) in a discussion with Proclus, a Montanist, in which he confidently states that he can point out the trophies of the apostles (τα` τρο' παια τω^ ν α’ ποστο' λων), i.e., the trophies of the founders (τω ^ ν ταυ' την ι‘ δρυσαμε' νων τη` ν ε’ κκλησι'αν), meaning Peter and Paul, as the context makes clear (also, Hist. eccl., 3.3.1–2). According to Dionysios, bishop of Corinth, Eusebius writes that both Peter and Paul were also founders of the Corinthian church, “...ει’ ς τη` ν η‘ μετε' ραν Κο' ρινθον φυτευ' σαντες,” here literally “planters, who plant a seedling, φυτει'α (Hist. eccl., 2.25.8; οι‘ φυτευ' σαντες can mean “parents,” as in Sophocles, Oed. tyr. 1007; Oed. col. 1377). In Eusebius’ passage, both Paul’s planting metaphor (1 Cor 3:6, “ε’ γω` ε’ φυ' τευσα”) and his parental metaphor are appropriated for exactly the same context (cf. Eusebius, Comm. Ps.. 23.1181.14–22). There is also the obscure tradition in the perhaps spurious longer version of Ignatius’ “Letter to the Magnesians” that attributes the founding of the church at Antioch in Syria to Peter and Paul (Epistulae interpolatae et epistulae suppositicae 3.10.2, TLG 1443). Paul is alone counted the founder of the church at Ephesos (Hist. eccl., 3.23.4; citing Irenaeus Haer. 3.6.1) and the churches in Asia (Hist. eccl., 2.18.9). 17 Wayne A. Meeks, The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983), 123. 18 Here Meeks cites 1 Cor 4:15, as Hurd had done earlier. 19 Meeks refers here to 2 Cor 10:12–18.

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establishing it; undoubtedly, if correct, this fact must rest on certain presuppositions about the nature of “founding” in the ancient Greco-Roman world. In my view, Meeks’ intuition is correct; what follows will show that Paul is operating – negotiating his identity, validating his new communities, and exercising authority – according to a cultural commonplace, a deeply embedded matrix of conceptualizations and practices, that owes its origin to Greek narratives about city-foundings, and survives the collapse of the colonial enterprises of the Greek πο' λεις in a form used to validate the foundation of innovative cultic institutions and groups. We can categorize this narrative commonplace – even paradigm – as Greek not only because of the ubiquity of the form in a wide range of Greek literary contexts, but because of its absence from other cultural contexts. Where we do in time find similar forms in, for example, Roman, Jewish, or the various immigrant contexts we shall discuss, it will prove obvious that these are clearly cases of appropriation of the Greek model. I shall argue that by his assimilation to, and to a certain degree his selective appropriation of, this pattern, Paul forces us to recognize not only the inescapably creative nature of cultural encounter,20 but also the unavoidable implication that his appropriation of the discourse of foundation reveals something of his mind to us, his understanding of the way such things ought to be done – in other words, his culturally embedded criteria for categorizing his foundations.21 To recognize that Paul’s living context is cultural encounter necessarily raises a methodological question, one which I shall argue can best be answered by turning to recent trends in cultural studies, and, to my mind, to the best expression of these studies, namely, the theoretical perspectives assumed by specific postcolonial critics. To be sure, this methodological choice will not be without controversy, but neither should it be dismissed as an attempt donner des airs intellectuel. The last decade has seen a crescendo of criticism directed at postcolonialism, especially as it is applied to worlds other than that of modern imperialism and colonialism; certainly, much of this criticism is deserved. To be candid, however, much more of the criticism is ——————————— 20

Especially in the case of migrating peoples, Homi Bhabha, The Location of Culture, reprint ed. (London; New York: Routledge, 2007), 2, 10–12; cf. also Jonathan Z. Smith, “Re: Corinthians,” in Relating Religion: Essays in the Study of Religions, by Jonathan Z. Smith (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2004), 340–61, esp. 345. 21 As it will become apparent in due course, I am in fundamental agreement with the recent comparative work of Richard Ascough, who has laid out the overwhelming weight of evidence showing that the emic categorization of early Christian groups was unequivocal inclusion among traditional Greco-Roman voluntary cult associations, Richard S. Ascough, Paul’s Macedonian Associations: The Social Context of Phillipians and 1 Thessalonians, WUNT, Series 2 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 2003); cf. also: Philip A. Harland, Associations, Synagogues, and Congregations: Claiming a Place in Ancient Mediterranean Society (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003).

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either largely superficial or simply misses the point.22 As much as these critics are correct to problematize the application of postcolonial criticism to the ancient Mediterranean world without well-considered deployment of Marxist economic theory and Freudian psychoanalysis,23 to that degree I hesitate to fully embrace the adjective, postcolonial, for the project before us. I want to undercut, at least a bit, the inevitable criticism provoked by any attempt to argue for a broad analogy between ancient conquering hegemonies and modern imperialism and colonialism by focusing on two fundamental but simple consistencies modern culture studies finds among people engaged in anisodynamic cultural encounters, a situation I find best illuminated by the discourse developed by Homi Bhabha. The first observation is that cultural encounter is a messy business engaged in, often against their will and better judgment, by members of multiple, even competing groups, affiliations, or ———————————

22 Exemplifying the superficiality, Russell Jacoby, “Marginal Returns: The Trouble with Postcolonial Theory,” Lingua Franca 5, no. 6 (1995): 30–37; on postcolonial critique’s applicability to the ancient Mediterranean given Marxist distinctions between modern capitalist imperialism and ancient colonialism, see John G. Taylor, “Colonial and Post-colonial Societies,” and “Colonialism,” in Tom Bottomore, ed., A Dictionary of Marxist Thought (Oxford: Blackwell Reference, 1983), 81–85; also, the critical comments of David Jobling in, Ralph Broadbent, Ivy George, David Jobling, and Luise Schottroff, “The Postcolonial Bible: Four Reviews,” JSNT 74 (1999): 117–18, criticizing postcolonial critics who assume the fundamental similarity of all imperialisms, and thus violate the principle that the mode of production determines all theory and praxis, insuring that any change in the mode of production entails a complete change in all theory and praxis. Thus, any attempt at comparison between the two formations would require a meticulous prerequisite translation project – something that has not been done prior to the identification of supposed analogies between the conquering hegemonies of the ancient Mediterranean world and modern imperialism and colonialism; cf. for objections on other grounds, see Irad Malkin, “Postcolonial Concepts and Ancient Greek Colonization,” Mod. Lang. Quart. 65, no. 3 (2004): 341–64. I disagree with Malkin’s interpretation of the centrality of “binary thinking” and “Christianconditioned interpretations” to postcolonial theory. While correct to insist on distinguishing Archaic period colonization from the aggressive empires of the Hellenistic through Roman periods, his application to the former period of Richard White’s “middle ground” process, with its presumption of relative power equivalency between encountering groups, actually argues persuasively for the propriety of applying postcolonial critique to the latter period; see Richard White, The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650–1815, Cambridge Studies in North American Indian History (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 23 In terms of the psychoanalytical approach to colonialism, see most notoriously and effectively, Frantz Fanon, Les Damnés de la Terre (Paris: François Maspero, 1982); Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self Under Colonialism (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983), ix–xii; on Fanon also see: Stuart Hall, “The After-Life of Frantz Fanon: Why Fanon? Why Now? Why Black Skin, White Masks?” in The Fact of Blackness: Frantz Fanon and Visual Representation, ed. Alan Read (London; Seattle: Institute of Contemporary Arts, Institute of International Visual Arts; Bay Press, 1996), 12–37, esp. 17; Bhabha, Location of Culture, 57–64; 127–130.

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communities, who project, mirror, mimic, and contest identities in contexts of asymmetrical aesthetic, economic, educational, epistemological, military, political, and cultic – what we would label religious – powers. The second observation is that the “lived” reality of anisodynamic cultural encounter shows that no group, affiliation, or community – either prior to the putative moment of encounter or after – is pure; none maintains an immutable essence, untouched by the other. In contexts characterized by waves of conquering others, creating a whirlpool of layers of lingering, multi=directional hegemonic currents, nothing is purely one thing or the other, but all things are new, always under negotiation, always in flux. No group, affiliation, or community can escape the vortex, at times flowing with the currents, at other times finding ways to swim upstream. Culture then can be thought of as both the change and the facilitator of change.24 Let me, at this point, clarify my terminology by borrowing the form, “postcolonial optic,” coined by Fernando Segovia, but not its content.25 The two observations I have identified here will serve as my theoretical starting point, and insofar as they are presupposed by culture critics across the ideological spectrum, these two propositions constitute my postcolonial optic. Of course, I admit that in the judgment of many I will appear to be “cherrypicking postcolonial theorists, hanging on to the term only by a thread.26 While I will be doing something generally akin to Segovia’s first dimension of his postcolonial optic, that is, analyzing my evidence in its context of production in terms of its author’s and audience’s experience as conquered and colonized, I will not be engaging in Segovia’s second and third dimensions, the two dimensions that Segovia’s critics would make the defining task of ——————————— 24

A point long realized by anthropologists; as Charles O. Frake famously described it, “[c]ulture does not provide a cognitive map, but rather a set of principles for map-making,” though not as explicit as some later formulae, the implication is clear that for Frake culture is about adaptation, negotiation, change, Language and Cultural Description, Language Science and National Development (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1980), 58. 25 See: Fernando F. Segovia, “Biblical Criticism and Postcolonial Studies: Toward a Postcolonial Optic,” in Decolonizing Biblical Studies: A View from the Margins, ed. Fernando F. Segovia (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000), 119–32. The first “dimension” of this optic is the analysis of the biblical texts in their broader “sociocultural contexts” in light of the constant factor of empire and colonialism as structural realities (125); the second dimension is the analysis of the modern readings and interpretations of the biblical texts in terms of their “broader sociocultural context in the West” (126); and the third dimension is the analysis of modern readers of the biblical texts in terms of their sociocultural contexts in a globalized world, in the context of imperialism and colonialism, especially as the effects of these powers linger; this is essentially the study of resistance (129). 26 Susan B. Abraham, “Critical Perspectives on Postcolonial Theory,” in The Colonized Apostle: Paul Through Postcolonial Eyes, ed. Christopher D. Stanley (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2011), 24–33.

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postcolonial criticism.27 In turning to the ancient world, I believe I can avoid the problems associated with analogies between social formations separated by millennia by limiting my optic to these two simple assumptions, which, at least according to my reading of the principal postcolonial theorists, are extractable from the vagaries of ongoing postcolonial debates, and possess – as all theory should – substantial predictive capacity. Understood in this limited sense, postcolonial theory, as I have distilled it in my two propositions, predicts that in a situation of cultural encounter characterized by the imposed, enduring domination of an established community by a foreign, militarily superior, and culturally aggressive society, the encounter will also be characterized by intense misunderstandings, innovative forms of collaboration and contestation, and an eruption of cultural creativity that produces a matrix of empowering, innovative cultural forms. These new cultural forms, despite what might appear prima facie to be a one-sided exercise of power by the conqueror over the impotent conquered,28 express the reciprocal and manifold reinscriptions of self- and group identities on the part of both the conquered and the conquerors.29 Such developments are especially characteristic when the imposing power is one whose imperialism is to a substan——————————— 27

E.g., see Gerald O. West, “Doing Postcolonial Biblical Interpretation @Home: Ten Years of (South) African Ambivalence,” Neotestamentica 42 (2008): 147–64, who has criticized Segovia’s delineation of the dimensions for placing the analysis of the biblical writers/texts in their ancient context as the first dimension, and thereby subordinating the most definitive aspects of postcolonial critique (the criticism of modern readings and the analysis of real, modern postcolonial readers) to that which is the least critical or important to the process. 28 Here I must admit to finding myself completely puzzled by Malkin’s oppositional description of White’s “middle ground” process over against postcolonial critique based on the assumption that the former prevents while the latter allows us to describe cultural encounters, “as if one culture poured itself from its own overflowing cups into the empty containers of the receiving culture; Malkin, “Postcolonial Concepts,” 358. On this point White and postcolonial theorists completely agree; the fallacy of assuming this kind of unidirectional flow of power is precisely the fallacy that postcolonial theory exposes. 29 Bhabha, Location of Culture, 2–3, 10, 41, 49–50. Bhabha, confirms my distillation of the core problem as follows, “For me, ‘post-colonial studies’ implies a two-way exchange – it’s not just an outside culture being imposed upon a colonial culture, but also the way colonies, despite their dis-empowerment and disadvantage, respond to that outside culture, and in many cases translate its imposition into acts of social insurgency and forms of cultural innovation,” from an interview published by Jeff Makos, “Rethinking Experience of Countries with Colonial Past,” in The University of Chicago Chronicle 14.12 (1995), cited March 14, 2011, online at http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/950216/bhabha.shtml. The reinscription process as it is visible in the conqueror is one of the principle realizations in Eric Gruen’s seminal re-description of Rome’s encounter with Greek east, The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome, 2 volumes (Berkeley; Los Angeles; London: University of California Press, 1984).

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tial degree an expression of its ideology. In the words of Ania Loomba, “Colonialism ... everywhere ... locked the original inhabitants and the newcomers into the most complex and traumatic relationships in human history.” Certainly, a reality for our period of study.30 While the contemporary discussion of postcolonial critique often appears bogged down in the nuances of Marxist theory, macroeconomics, globalizing capitalism, and the role of deconstruction in culture studies,31 recently an increasing number of ancient historians and scholars of religion are discovering the usefulness of these core elements of the theoretical perspective underlying postcolonial criticism of culture as encounter. Acknowledging the fact that there are important differences between modern European capitalistimperialism and colonialism and the imperialistic expansion of ancient powers such as Persia, Macedonia, and Rome, it is clear to me that the basic theoretical postcolonial assumptions about the nature of conqueror/conquered encounters illuminates this ancient Mediterranean world as well as our modern postcolonial world. It is important here, largely in response to well-known critiques of the term “postcolonial,”32 to say precisely what I mean by my use of it. For our purposes, postcolonial will refer to the enduring condition of postcoloniality, by which I mean the persistent yet evolving conditions of life for individuals and groups, both conquerors and conquered, in their ongoing encounter. I do not use the term in the simple temporal sense to mean the condition after colonialism has ended in some legal-political sense. Rather, I refer to the enduring situation of contestation, resistance, assimilation, reciprocal mirroring, and mimicry that frames life in a society characterized by such hegemonic imposition.33 My appreciation of insights from modern culture theory will show up throughout this study and I will have more to say about its role in my analysis along the way. However, at this point I want to explicitly acknowledge one final and fundamentally important implication of a postcolonial perspective; postcolonial critical theory, now vindicated by numerous test cases, rules out the simplistic idea of cultural purity – the impermeability, or fixity, of cultural ———————————

30 From her Colonialism/Postcolonialism, The New Critical Idiom (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), 2. As Loomba clearly recognizes that defined broadly as “the conquest and control of other people’s land and goods,” this is no less true for the imperial conquests and colonizations of the Hellenistic and Roman periods. 31 Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?” in Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, ed. Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg (Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1988), 271–313; Ibid, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1999), esp. chapter 1; also Loomba, Colonialism, 3–7. 32 See, e.g., the critical points of Anne McClintock, “The Angel of Progress: Pitfalls of the Term ‘Post-Colonialism’,” Social Text 31/32 (1992): 84–98. 33 Bhabha, Location of Culture, 3–5; Loomba, Colonialism, 7–13.

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boundaries – in situations of sustained encounter. In methodological terms, as we shall see in due course, postcolonial observations have pulled the rug out from under any theoretical or methodological justification for the, more often than not, apologetically-motivated demand that only unambiguously exact, rigidly-defined cultural parallels – in our case, especially religious forms – could possibly be used as evidence for external influence or cultural influence on Christianity; the effect being to effectively isolate Christianity and protect its “uniqueness” from the contamination of non-Christian religious ideas or practices.34 As Daniel Boyarin describes them, cultural boundaries are altogether too “fuzzy.”35 Yet, it is actually more complicated than simple “fuzziness” – as if individuals simply, almost unconsciously, float back and forth across some imagined but vaguely outlined cultural boundaries.36 The complexity lies in the indisputable fact that the churning cauldron of competing and enunciating forces in cultural encounter – the location where Homi Bhabha believes culture actually exits – breaks down all purities into negotiations, reinscriptions, and the constant production and reproduction of Bhabha’s now well-worn “third things” – cultural forms to which Lucian of Samosata might have aptly applied the adjective, πολυπρο' σωπα.37 In other words, the implication of postcolonial critique for the study of Christian origins is inescapable; Christianity, or more accurately, the cultural forms associated with it, can no longer be protected from the convulsive realties of cultural encounter. All attempts to do so are simply methodologically obsolete, if not embarrassingly obviously apologetic, strategies to insist that a selected difference is diagnostic and thereby sufficient to distinguish Christian phenomena from inclusion in a higher order category, particularly Greek or Roman genera. Given the demonstrated effectiveness of postcolonial theory in revealing the necessary reciprocal influence of groups in hegemonic or power-imbalanced cultural encounters of precisely the kind we find in the ——————————— 34

This being the very problem exposed so notoriously and effectively in Jonathan Z. Smith, Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity, CSJH (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990). 35 Dying for God: Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism, Figurae: Reading Medieval Culture (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999), 10. 36 Jonathan Z. Smith, “What a Difference a Difference Makes,” in “To See Ourselves as Others See Us”: Christians, Jews, “Others” in Late Antiquity, ed. Jacob Neusner and Ernest S. Frerichs (Chico, California: Scholars press, 1985), 3–48. 37 Nigr. 20, cf. Asin. 49; this is the essence of identity in situations of postcoloniality, some would argue in all situations, persons with many faces, like actors in the Greek theater who enter many times during a play, but wearing different masks in different scenes; cf. The sophist, Lycophron, in Aristotle, Rhet. 1405b 35; Josephus, B.J. 1.28.4. The ambiguity of the mask in Greek thought is clear in the fact that the most common word for the theatrical mask is either προ' σωπον or its cognate, προσωπει^ον, indicating simply the “face” put forward or presented to another, see Claude Calame, “Facing Otherness: The Tragic Mask in Ancient Greece,” HR 26, no. 2 (1986): 125–42, esp. 138.

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Hellenistic-Roman Mediterranean, the notion of the culturally sui generis becomes an absurdity.38 To return to the issue at hand, in calling Paul a “founder” Meeks continues a long-lived pattern, a commonplace among earlier Christian writers. As we saw earlier, it was one of the more important criteria of validation used by the Church Fathers to trace the origins of accepted practice and tradition through those ancient churches that could lay claim to apostolic foundation.39 In this context Paul is included as a founding apostle. Corinth, Philippi, and Thessalonika (all churches established by Paul) are held up as examples of apostolic churches that have preserved the very voice of their founder.40 The language used by some of these early writers, because it is drawn specifically from Paul’s own letters, illustrates that they understood their description of ——————————— 38

This denial should in no way be construed as negating innovation and creativity; these are the hallmark of cultural encounter, but they do not arise ex nihilo, i.e., we can describe new cultural forms as only relatively “unique,” a peculiar union of continuity and discontinuity. The basic realization that in our period no cultural form is actually “pure” has been openly acknowledged by the vast majority of scholars since the publication of Martin Hengel’s Judaism and Hellenism (1974). The discussion has certainly transcended the obvious notion that all Hellenistic and Roman period Judaism was hellenized, to embrace the realization that Judaism spanned a complex cultural spectrum, extremely difficult to categorize, see: e.g., D. Boyarin, Border Lines: The Partition of Judaeo-Christianity, Divinations (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), Matt Jackson-McCabe, ed., Jewish Christianity Reconsidered: Rethinking Ancient Groups and Texts (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007). My present point is that we can no longer simply demarcate lines of difference between, or trace supposedly explanatory genetic lines of descent from, earlier cultural strata. Instead, we must equip ourselves to recognize the creative power of encounter in the production of new cultural forms that may reveal lines of continuities with existing forms, but which expand the breadth of existing categories. 39 Apostolic succession entails necessarily the idea of apostolic foundation of the churches, Tertullian, Praescr. 20.4–8; 32.1–8; 361f; Irenaeus, Haer. 3.3.1; 5.21.1, here relying on what for him is empirically verifiable evidence in the form of the “bishops list.” Cf. Tertullian, Apol. 47.10; Praescr. 20–1, 30; Rufinus, Symb. 2; Prehn, “Ktistes,” RE 11.2.22 (1922), cols. 1149–50; Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine 1. Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 118–19. Harnack believed that all these stories are legendary, including those contained in Acts, and that many of the earliest communities were not founded by any one individual apostle. Rather he describes a development of the Christian communities, not their establishment in a single, dramatic action; see: The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries (Harper Torchbooks: The Cloister Library. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961), 350, 442,n. 2; Idem, History of Dogma, 7 vols., trans. N. Buchanan (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1905), 1:161–62; 2:67–70. 40 Tertullian, Praescr. 36; cf. Clement Alexandrinus, Strom. 1.1.11.1–12.3; cf. 7.16.95.3–4; Hippolytus, Haer. 1; Cyprian, Ep. 75.16, Opera Cypriani, ed. W. Hartel, CSEL 3.2 (1871), 810–827; Athanasius Alexandrinus, Apol. sec. 35.3.5–7; H. Ar. 36.1.5– 2.1; Syn. 5.3.4–7; Ep. Serap. 26:593, ll.43–47; Const. Ap. 2.28.11; cf. Ignatius’ idea of the unity of the presbyters and the apostles, Magn.6.1; Trall. 2.2, 3.3; Phld. 5.1; Smyrn. 8.1.

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Paul as a founding apostle to be his own self-understanding. For example, in 1 Cor 3:10 Paul describes his own activity in Corinth in the following way: “Κατα` τη` ν χα' ριν του^ θεου^ τη` ν δοθει^σα' ν μοι ω‘ ς σοφο` ς α’ ρχιτε' κτων θεμε' λιον ε» θηκα.” Eusebius, in a passage describing Paul’s role as founder, echoes Paul’s language in the phrase, “καταβε' βλητο θεμελι' ους.”41 In addition to his reference to laying a foundation, Paul describes the foundation laid as the foundation for a temple, albeit a spiritual one made up of the corporate members of the church – a building in which the spirit of the deity will dwell.42 Paul also says that he had been given an authority by the Lord for the purpose of building the church;43 Paul is both “father” and “mother” to his churches, having brought them to birth through the preaching of the gospel.44 In view of these preliminary considerations, it is not necessary nor especially profitable to critique any further the descriptive terminology of contemporary authors. Rather, I want to propose a specific target for the descriptive task that does lie at hand., namely, to discover what it meant for Paul to be described as a founder in his contemporary cultural context, and the connections this implied.45 Moreover, given the fact that the language Paul used to ———————————

41 Hist. eccl. 3.4.1. In 1 Cor. 3:10, the phrase του^ θεου^ is absent in P46, 81 (11th c. C.E.), 2495 (14th–15th cc. C.E.), a few additional minuscules, old Latin b and f, more than one Vulgate ms, and in Clement of Alexandria, Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (Stuttgart: United Bible Societies, 1975), 549; ε» θηκα is replaced by τε' θεικα in Sinaiticus (second corrector), Ephraemi (second corrector), Claromontanus (6th c. C.E.), Ψ Athous Lavrensis (8th/9th cc. C.E.), the Majority mss., and in Clement of Alexandria. 42 1 Cor 3:9c, θεου^ οι’ κοδομη' ε’ στε; 3:16, Ου’ κ οι»δατε ο« τι ναο` ς θεου^ ε’ στε και` το` πνευ^ μα του^ θεου^ οι’ κει^ ε’ ν υ‘ μι^ν. In Josephus, Ant. 11.79 we find the verb θεμελιου^ ν used for the building of the Jerusalem temple (cf. 1 Cor 3:10–17). 43 2 Cor 13:10, “... τη` ν ε’ χουσι'αν η‹ ν ο‘ κυ' ριος ε» δωκε' ν μοι ει’ ς οι’ κοδομη` ν και` ου’ κ ει’ ς καθαι'ρεσιν;” cf. 10:8 where the “building” is expressly related to the corporate group,“τη^ ς ε’ ξουσι'ας η‘ μω ^ ν η‹ ν ε» δωκεν ο’ κυ' ριος ει’ ς οι’ κοδομη` ν και` ου’ κ ει’ ς καθαι'ρεσιν υ‘ μω ^ ν ...” 44 1 Cor 4:14–15 has already been mentioned; see also, 2 Cor 6:13; 12:14, “ω‘ ς τε' κνοις λε' γω ... ’ Ιδου` τρι'τον του^ το ε‘ τοι'μως ε» χω ε’ λθει^ν προ` ς υ‘ μα^ς, και` ου’ καταναρκη' σω· ου’ γα` ρ ζητω ^ τα` υ‘ μω ^ ν α’ λλα` υ‘ μα^ς. ου’ γα` ρ ο’ φει'λει τα` τε' κνα τοι^ς γονευ^ σιν θησαυρι'ζειν α’ λλα` οι‘ γονει^ς τοι^ς τε' κνοις.” Also cf. 1 Thess 2:11, “... ε«να ε«καστον υ‘ μω ^ ν ω‘ ς πατη` ρ τε' κνα ε‘ αυτου^ παρακαλου^ ντες υ‘ μα^ς”; 2 Cor 11:2 where Paul, as the one who has betrothed the church to Christ, also plays on the father image; 1 Cor 4:21, Paul’s threat to come to the Corinthians with a rod of punishment also presupposes, at least in part, the same image. For the metaphor of motherhood see; 1 Cor 3:2, “... γα' λα υ‘ μα^ς ε’ πο' τισα ου’ βρω ^ μα”; Gal. 4:19, “τε' κνα μου, ου‹ ς πα' λιν ω’ δι'νω”; 1 Thess. 2:7, “α’ λλα` ε’ γενη' θημεν η» πιοι ε’ ν με' σω, υ‘ μω ^ ν, ω‘ ς ε’ α` ν τροφο` ς θα' λπη, τα` ε‘ αυτη^ ς τε' κνα.” We shall return to these statements, these self-descriptions, in the course of our study. 45 Unfortunately, of course, presupposing a modern connotation of the term founder leaves the nature of what Paul actually did in the course of “founding” an ε’ κκλησι'α unexplained. In other words, can we be certain that by using our modern word we are accurately giving expression to some part of Paul’s own understanding of his role, or even to some

1. On the Meaning of the Word “Founder”

15

describe his activities and his relationship to his churches can be picked up by later writers and interpreted, without explanation, in connection with terms known to belong to a well-recognized discourse of “founders and founding,” reaching my goal necessitates that I not limit the sources from which my description will be drawn to the Church Fathers, or to the post-Pauline documents of New Testament. These earliest interpreters of Paul provide us only with an initial hypothesis; their assumed understanding of the discourse of founding can only be exposed by looking at the broader social context and the long history of that discourse.46 In order to reach the expressed goal, we begin in chapter two by examining the history of the term κτι' στης, one of three traditional Greek technical terms for the founder-figure.47 I propose in chapter two that there is a well-known foundational paradigm in Greek culture, the roots of which may reach as deep as Homer, and are certainly strengthened by the role of the Delphic oracle in the Archaic period of Greek colonization (roughly 750–550 B.C.E). This paradigm has from the beginning cultic elements that continue to be definitive despite the history of political change in the fortunes of colonizing Greek πο' λεις. The chapter continues with a detailed description of the evidence for this paradigm and its generic components. At that point, I propose a narrative genre definition of the Greek foundation-legend – a narrative, or “mode of language behavior,” as Michael Toolan has recently called it, that preserves the stories of founders.48 Given this, I find this paradigm without parallel in Jewish tradition, and, in contradiction to certain fundamental Jewish perceptions, implying that Paul fixed on this concept through his familiarity with Hellenic cultural conventions. He produced the kind of creative cultural form predicted by our theoretical model, something explored fully in chapter four. I go on to demonstrate in chapter two that, continuing through Paul’s day, this foundational paradigm is regularly used as the model not only for the stories told about the activities of colonial founders (so well-known from the many πο' λις foundation-legends), but also for the very actions of those in particular who found cultic institutions of one sort or another. In other words, even though Jesus or Paul can be understood in terms of the meaning of the ——————————— conceivable, contemporary perception of his role, rather than reading into Paul’s practice our own imaginings? 46 For this general methodological principle, see: L. Michael White, “Visualizing the ‘Real’ World of Acts 16: Toward Construction of a Social Index,” in Social World of the First Christians: Essays in Honor of Wayne A. Meeks, ed. L. Michael White and O. Larry Yarbrough (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1995), 234–61. Of course, the need to define Paul’s foundational activity in terms of Hellenistic precedents was raised as a problem most recently by Hans Dieter Betz, “Transferring a Ritual,” 240–71. 47 The other two being, α’ ρχηγε' της and οι’ κιστη' ς, are discussed there in detail. 48 Michael Toolan, Narrative: A Critical Linguistic Introduction, 2nd ed., The Interface Series (London and New York: Routledge, 2001), viii.

16

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

word “founder” commonly assumed by modern scholars of religion, we shall discover that the concept of the founder-figure, as we encounter it within the Greek-speaking world of Paul’s day, communicated a cultural paradigm specific to historical developments within Greek society. Having described the nature of this foundational model and having established its continuing importance, I shall proceed in chapter three to begin a survey of specific epigraphical examples that demonstrate the enduring influence of this model on those who found cultic institutions or various sorts from the early Hellenistic period through the period of Paul’s church-founding mission. This survey is shaped by two foci. Our examples in the first section of chapter three emphasize the importance to the self-understanding of the founder, and to the public presentation of the cult, of the founder’s personal selection by a deity. These texts also demonstrate the importance of the integrity and venerability of the traditions that ground the cult’s place in the wider community. The irony of the presentation of this integrity and venerability is that it is no more stable than the very negotiating and contesting forces that characterize the cultural encounter in which these founder-figures are engaged, and what appears at first to be stability and continuity proves to be what Hobsbawm has now famously labeled “invented tradition” – an invention for which Paul himself was certainly responsible.49 The examples chosen in the next section of chapter three continue the emphasis on the priorities found in the previous examples, but move our focus to the nature of the individual founder’s responsibilities in establishing the character of the criteria of participation in the cult and managing the various difficulties which accompany this participation. With the completion of my description of the nature of this foundational model, establishing its continuing importance in Paul’s day through the survey of the epigraphical evidence, I shall shift our focus to Paul’s foundational activity. Starting from Paul’s own description of his call to preach the gospel to the non-Jews, I shall argue that Paul’s imagining of this call is better understood, despite its obvious dependence on prophetic precedents in Jewish tradition, not simply as the result of the pervasive influence of the Hellenistic paradigm of the founder – as if our description of Paul requires little more than locating him somewhere between or nearer one pole of the binary opposition, Jew or Greek – but, rather, my theoretical assumptions predict that Paul’s mission modus operandi is a hybridized innovation, a product of his assimilative, appropriative, and resistive struggle toward self- and group-definition in a world dominated by Greeks and Romans. In terms of the notion of resistance in cultural encounter, we shall see that Paul, like so many of his Hellenistic ——————————— 49

The seminal theoretical statement is found in, Eric Hobsbawm, “Introduction: Inventing Traditions,” in The Invention of Tradition, ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 1–14.

1. On the Meaning of the Word “Founder”

17

counterparts, understands fully the apologetic function of the model of the founder-figure and can appropriate it, or reinscribe himself in terms of it, to frame and defend his mission. Moreover, on the basis of chapter four’s comparison of Paul’s continuing role in the churches he founds and the Hellenistic evidence for the authoritative cultic role of the founder, I shall argue that Paul also shares with his Hellenistic counterparts an understanding of the founder’s responsibilities for the cultic community. In the end, I propose that Paul consciously appropriates a cultural pattern or model, well-known from Hellenistic religions, as a crucial element in his own understanding of his role as the founder of cultic communities (ε’ κκλησι' αι) devoted to the raised and exalted Christ. This model was not only well-suited to Paul’s understanding of his personal experience of divine commission, but was also more serviceable to his missionary and apologetic needs and purposes than available Jewish precedents. This last point, which will become evident in due course, helps to explain the polemic against Paul’s visionary experience in the traditions deriving from later, so-called “Jewish-Christian” circles. Ultimately, we can say that from the perspective of the history of Hellenistic religions, accepting certain qualifications rooted in Jewish monotheism, Paul appears to carry out the act of founding churches in much the same way those do who found sanctuaries and cultic associations on behalf of any of the migrating deities of the Hellenistic-Roman period. In other words, the witnesses of the post-Pauline era are correct in choosing to interpret the apostle’s relationship to the churches by using the technical terminology definitive of the Greek discourse of foundation and of the paradigm of the founder-figure. However, to say that Paul can be described in these terms for many scholars will raise a fundamental question – or perhaps more accurately a problem with fundamentals. The implications of my conclusion that Paul appropriates a foundational pattern shared by his Hellenistic-Roman contemporaries – a Greek cultural convention and narrative that, albeit one continually and creatively assimilated to and by Paul, helps us to read Paul’s self-redefinition, his concept of authority, and the nature of the communities he founded – too intimately weaves Paul into the fiber of the broader cultural matrix of his times. He is thus located not only in the world, but he becomes inextricably part of the world – an utterly complex and confused intermixture of cultural forms, with no purity, no stable or fixed cultural anchor, to be had.50 The so-called ———————————

50 On the porous and flexible nature of ethnic and group boundaries in terms of identification of difference, see Fredrick Barth, ed., Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Culture Difference, Little, Brown Series in Anthropology (Boston: Little, Brown, 1969), and the important collection assembled in Nathan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan, eds., Ethnicity: Theory and Experience (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975); on the contestation identities, see: George A. De Vos, “Ethnic Pluralism: Con-

18

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

Greco-Roman world ceases to be the mere background of the New Testament or early Christianity – the foil against which Christianity can be distinguished. Instead, the Greco-Roman world becomes the means, the form, the growth medium – το` βιοτρο' φον – and catalyst of Christianity’s very origin and development. Considered historically Christianity must be considered a product of the culturally complex, colonized, hybridizing Hellenistic period no less than the innovative, constantly evolving, migrating cult of Sarapis. Modern cultural studies prove that it cannot be otherwise; neither Paul’s churches nor Christianity as some aggregate form can be insulated from a putative surrounding culture; the formation of Christianity is culture – it is the encounter itself.51 To be fair, this theoretical perspective intrudes into a long intellectual history defined by those scholars, to take as an example but one aspect of the tradition, who would deny any connections between the concept of the Church and the common institutional patterns of Hellenistic culture.

2. The Problem of Comparing Paul with Hellenistic Founder-Figures The type of description I shall propose in the following chapters, especially where it touches on the origin and nature of Paul’s authority, will directly challenge a long-lived tradition in biblical scholarship that claims, often passionately, that neither Paul nor his churches can be characterized in any essential quality by patterns of organization or authority common to Hellenistic cults. While this view can take a variety of forms,52 the work of Hans von ——————————— flict and Accommodation,” in Ethnic Identity: Cultural Continuities and Change, ed. George A. De Vos and Lola Romanucci-Ross (Palo Alto, CA: Mayfield Publishing Co., 1975); Donald L. Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985). 51 It seems to me that this reality is implicit in the definitional process found in the New Testament itself, cf. Hans Dieter Betz, “Christianity as Religion: Paul’s Attempt at Definition in Romans,” JR 71, no. 3 (1991): 315–44; Ibid, “The Birth of Christianity as a Hellenistic Religion: Three Theories of Origin,” JR 74 (1994): 1–25 but see, Edwin A. Judge, “Did the Churches Compete with Cult-Groups?” in Early Christianity and Classical Culture: Comparative Studies in Honor of Abraham J. Malherbe, Ed. John T. Fitzgerald, Thomas H. Olbricht, and L. Michael White (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2003), 501–24. I will have some critical remarks about Judge’s critique when we come to the issue of defining Paul’s communities. 52 We will discuss the views of Rudolph Sohm in due course; here it is interesting in this regard to note the recent stinging critique of authority in the church by Graham Shaw, The Cost of Authority: Manipulation and Freedom in the New Testament (London: SCM Press, 1983). Shaw’s view is intriguing from our perspective because he clearly acknowledges that Paul exercises real authority over his churches, in fact, the heavy-handed and oppressive “authority of the founding father” (29). Shaw also recognizes, as we shall see in due course,

2. The Problem of Comparing Paul

19

Campenhausen provides an example of the way this understanding of the evidence most often expresses itself with respect to Paul’s career.53 Before I discuss the history of the debates, I must confess to finding myself in agreement with Jonathan Z. Smith’s devastating observation that after all the debate,54 regardless of the distance between the various combatants, even were we to give the benefit of our doubts to the intentions behind the comparisons these scholars have conducted, and were we even to acknowledge the precision with which they constructed the descriptions of their various comparanda, we still find only the pretentious shroud of historical objectivity and rigor hiding an entire enterprise that appears to be nothing less than a theologically-driven defense of the uniqueness of Christianity – a truth that, as we shall see, of all its participants Rudolf Sohm was alone sufficiently honest to admit. 2.1. The Nature of the Traditional Consensus about Paul’s Apostolic Role Stepping back to the history of the scholarship, relying on the work of Weber and van der Leeuw, von Campenhausen grounded his account in the assumption that in the development of social groups there arises inevitably a tension between the position a leader may attain in the group and the actual capabilities native to the individual. In other words, von Campenhausen begins with the presumption of a tension between institutional function and charisma, in his words, “In every culture and in all ages human society has known the tension between the position assigned to a man and the ability which the man’s own inner resources allow him to display.”55 Ideally, he believes a good leader will display a balanced tension between these two elements. However, with the earliest moments of the Church, von Campenhausen identifies in Christ’s followers the beginnings of a change in the balance between function and charisma once so ideally embodied in Jesus. The church of the apostles ——————————— the fact that a key ingredient of Paul’s management strategy is to remind his churches of their dependence on him as the founder who brought the gospel to them, (29–31, 36, 41). Yet, Shaw argues, the hierarchical exercise of authority, such as Paul tries to justify, is antithetical to the nature of Christianity. In Shaw’s view, Paul, in contrast to Jesus, represents the worst in illegitimate authority (see, 12–46). Setting aside for the moment the many problems with his analysis, Shaw has rightly seen the connection between Paul’s use of his founder’s status and his exercise of authority over his churches. 53 See his, Ecclesiastical Authority and Spiritual Power in the Church of the First Three Centuries, trans. J. A. Baker (London, Peabody MA: A & C Black, Hendrickson Press, 1969); orig. publ., Kirchliches Amt und geistliche Vollmacht [Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1953]); a summary article of which, “Apostolic Authority: What Form did it Take?” has been reprinted as recently as Searching Together 1 (1984), 17–20. Excerpted from his earlier work, it presents the essential points of this understanding of early Christian authority and organization, and serves as an example of the amount of currency this view has retained. 54 Smith, Drudgery Divine, passim. 55 Ecclesiastical Authority, 1.

20

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

becomes a group led by persons who, while sharing the same freedom with other members of the community, are nevertheless no longer equal to them.56 Even with the beginnings of such an imbalance, Paul’s authority, according to von Campenhausen, constitutes a unique approach to the issue of authority in the history of religions. Paul’s is not an authority based on the development of a “sacral relationship of spiritual authority and subordination.” That is to say, it does not rest on a formalized, legal structure of hierarchically related offices. In fact, argues von Campenhausen, Paul refuses such authority, or position of privilege, deferring to the fact of shared freedom in Christ through possession of the Spirit. Of course, the problem with von Campenhausen’s discovery of Paul’s innovation, at least from the perspective of modern discussions of authority in religion, is that it was no innovation at all. Where there is the physical power of coercion – the policing power of the state – authority does not really exist, only the exercise of the power to compel compliance. Where coercive power is absent, authority is always the result of a social negotiation, the product of a combination of personal charisma and the will of those impressed by it to grant its bearer their allegiance – to grant authority.57 Von Campenhausen explicitly denies that Paul’s role as the founder of the church in Corinth effects his relationship to the congregation in any way.58 ———————————

56 Von Campenhausen accepts the derivation of the apostolate from the Jewish institution of the ‫ׁשליח‬, which indicates that the essence of the apostles’ role is their being personally appointed and dispatched on a mission. He also recognizes that inherent in this appointment and mission to take the gospel to the world is the act of founding Christian communities. Apostleship is not, however, an office (a function), rather it is a grace (charisma). This is, for von Campenhausen, simply because each individual apostle receives this appointment “once for all,” Ecclesiastical Authority, 20–27. 57 Of course, von Campenhausen does not seriously deal with the rhetoric of eliciting, or negotiating for, authority, i.e., the persuasive strategies – of which Paul’s are clearly examples – used by those trying to elicit or solicit authority from others. And that is the key notion in a situation where authority is not linked to any physically coercive force (Paul’s situation vis-à-vis his converts); authority is something given by others to the figure who seeks to manipulate it; see Bruce Lincoln, Authority: Construction and Corrosion (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994), 1–13; aptly demonstrated for emerging religions, precisely the social form we shall be investigating, in James R. Lewis, Legitimating New Religions (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2003). Even those who argue for an objective, absolute form of revelatory authority are required, in fact – despite protestations to the contrary – to create it because despite their claims to its objectivity, their demand for its obviousness proves the very opposite, i.e., the “obvious” and “objective” authority of the revelation is neither, and must be created by persuasion; see as an example of the problem, Carl Ferdinand Howard Henry, God, Revelation and Authority (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1976). 58 Ecclesiastical Authority, 26–27. While he correctly links Paul’s authority over his churches with his personal call from God (31–36), von Campenhausen makes no substantive connection between Paul’s authority and his status as founder, despite von Campenhausen’s preceding acknowledgement that founding Christian communities is integral to the mission

2. The Problem of Comparing Paul

21

He goes on to state confidently that Paul can give no commands nor create a norm of behavior for the congregation which is to be obeyed without discussion. He is limited to the language of persuasion and exhortation, which means that the congregations he establishes must freely “recognize” his authority and his instructions as the word of God. Again, as we just observed, Paul’s strategy is not the unique cultural form that von Campenhausen imagined it to be, since in situations lacking lawful forms of physical coercion authority is garnered by no other means than through the free recognition of those who grant it. According to von Campenhausen, even in his stronglyworded response in 1 Corinthians 5 regarding a specific case of sexual sin, Paul refuses to allow his authority to constitute a source of “legal norms” in the church.59 Von Campenhausen’s recommendation is that we should understand Paul as the founder of a cultic community who stands opposed to the institution of anything in his churches that remotely resembles Hellenistic cultic or Jewish law – a founder opposed to leading, an obviously sui generis phenomenon, ——————————— of the apostle. The idea that whatever church order there was in earliest Christianity arose from the power of Paul’s theological ideas is common to this view. For E. Schweizer, who follows von Campenhausen at many points, the nature of Christianity and its doctrine of grace demands not only separation from Judaism but also an anti-institutional stance, in which there is no “law,” which includes formal church order (because law is hostile to prophecy), nor any room for distinction between clergy and laity. Jesus’ teaching rules out cultic orders, or “superior ranks” in a hierarchy, i.e., Roman Catholicism. Paul, it is assumed, must agree precisely with Jesus. The key to understanding the nature of the Church, accordingly, is the reality of freedom in the Spirit—the only ruling principle in the earliest church, Church Order in the New Testament, SBT (London: SCM Press, 1961), 14– 15, 28–29, 31–32, 44–45, 50, 99–100, 163–168, 182–183, 188, 210. 59 Ecclesiastical Authority, 46–51. More recent authors seem quite ready to ignore von Campenhausen’s pronouncement, to the contrary; e.g., Dale B. Martin confidently writes that “Paul demands that the church expel the man and turn him over to Satan, The Corinthian Body (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 168. Actually, says von Campenhausen, Paul’s judgment of the matter is simply the explication of the church’s own judgment which the members will confirm as Paul is present with the assembly in spirit. Von Campenhausen’s argument – unconvincing in my view, see A. Yarbro Collins, “The Function of ‘Excommunication’ in Paul,” HTR 73 [1980]: 251–63 – seems to run against the straight-forward reading of the passage when he concludes that Paul and the Corinthians are cooperatively judging the culprit at issue. There seems to be a common-sense problem with this view, i.e., if this were a cooperative judgment by the Corinthians and Paul, why do we have no indication that the Corinthians shared the founder’s concern by voluntarily informing Paul of the problem and then agreeing to implement whatever appropriate remedy Paul might recommend. Instead, the text gives us every indication that not only did the Corinthians involved in boasting about the crime not intend to inform Paul, they also failed even to recognize the situation as problematic, see: Robert W. Funk, “The Apostolic Parousia: Form and Significance,” in Christian History and Interpretation: Studies Presented to John Knox, ed. W. R. Farmer, C. F. D. Moule, and R. R. Niebuhr (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967), 249–68.

22

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

were it true. For von Campenhausen, not only are Paul and his fellow servants of Christ absolute equals, recognizing no distinctions among themselves with respect to their roles as proclaimers of the word, but Paul and his colleagues, in fact, never truly function as organizers of churches as institutions.60 Only the Holy Spirit provides a structure of complimentary giftedness to the community, and that only insofar as each member continues in submission to the voice of that spirit.61 Hindsight, recognizing the theological tendency of the times, leaves us unsurprised that these characteristics, as he has described them, prompt von Campenhausen to contrast Paul’s uniquely egalitarian η‘ ε’ ξουσι' α πνευματικη' with η‘ ε’ ξουσι' α ’ Ιουδαι¨κη' , what he sees as the “false zeal” of Judaizing Christians and their concerns for legalistic cultic rigor. Von Campenhausen goes further; Paul’s pattern not only distinguishes him from the Jewish pattern but from the concept of authority held by the Church Fathers. In fact, von Campenhausen writes, “[t]he emphasis on the special character and unique importance of the original apostolic office and testimony ... is completely post-Pauline.”62 Needless to say, in view of the chapters to follow, especially chapter two, it is impossible, especially given the theoretical perspective I hold, to accept this kind of assessment of Paul’s understanding of his apostolic authority. Von Campenhausen’s description of apostolic authority too clearly echoes the antiCatholic, anti-Judaizing language of Reformation theology, casting the problem of the study of early Christian organizational practices in terms of the rigid antithesis between law and grace.63 As we shall see in due course, nonCatholic scholars have, since the second half of the nineteenth-century, argued rather consistently that earliest Christianity is not compatible with traditional structures of authority.64 Of course, while von Campenhausen may be one of ———————————

60 It is interesting to note that the only point at which von Campenhausen acknowledges Paul’s role as founder in connection with the exercise of authority is in Paul’s response to interference in his churches from outsiders; he at least recognizes Paul’s territorialism, something to which we shall return (Ecclesiastical Authority, 44, 46). 61 Ecclesiastical Authority, 58, 68–69. 62 “Apostolic Authority,” 19–20. 63 E.g., the emphasis on freedom in Christ as the determinative factor in discussing Paul’s role as apostle; the references to the conflict between law and grace as the paradigm for equating Judaism and Catholicism as the opposite of early charismatic Christianity and Reformation theology; the emphasis on Paul’s denial of privilege and his equality with coworkers as indicative of the spiritual equality of all believers, cf. James T. Burtchaell, From Synagogue to Church: Public Services and Offices in the Earliest Christian Communities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 143–48. 64 It is quite amazing, in this regard, that in his recent, brief introduction to Paul’s understanding of the Church Hans Küng offers what, in its essentials, can only be described as a paraphrase of von Campenhausen’s assault on canon law and Catholic ecclesiology. Even when granting that Paul can exercise tremendous authority over his churches, Küng prefers

2. The Problem of Comparing Paul

23

the most often cited examples of this type of description of early Christianity, he is by no means its author. Rather, von Campenhausen, for the most part, accepts the fundamental elements of the description that were laid down much earlier by Rudolf Sohm, whose legacy we must consequently examine.65 To foreshadow a bit, before turning to this task, it is important to point out that I will argue in what follows – against both von Campenhausen and Sohm – that Paul does, in fact, ascribe a special character to his apostolate. Moreover, in my view, Paul did not create this understanding of the role of the apostle – his modus operandi is in no case sui generis. Rather, as I believe the evidence and my analysis will show, the special role of the apostle – a model of apostolic authority grounded in association with the resurrected Christ (1 Cor 9:1–2, the means, of course, disputed) – was already operative within the pre-Pauline Christian communities with which Paul was originally acquainted. Both the fact that Paul tries to find his place within this traditional understanding of apostleship, and the fact that his claims are rejected by an apparently not inconsequential number of members of the community proves that Paul and his critics among what he would call the “circumcised” devotees of Jesus share an assumption that there is a definitive category of apostle,66 and that it is an office worth possessing. To be sure, we must admit, given Paul’s vigorous defense, that there had to have been enough ambiguity about these criteria for Paul to believe they could accommodate his own experience, and yet ——————————— to portray Paul in terms of appeal, persuasion, and forgiveness; he and his converts represent an example of “democratic interplay,” not traditional authoritative structures, see: Great Christian Thinkers, trans. J. Bowden (New York: Continuum, 1994), 37–39. 65 The seminal aspect of Sohm’s work for our purpose is Die Geschichtlichen Grundlagen, vol. 1 of Kirchenrecht, Systematisches Handbuch der Deutschen Rechtswissenschaft 1 (Münich and Leipzig: Duncker & Humbolt, 1923); see also Wilhelm Maurer, “Die Auseinandersetzung zwischen Harnack und Sohm und die Begrundung eines evangelischen Kirchenrechtes,” KD 6, no. 3 (1960): 194–213; Antonio Maria Rouco Varela, “Die katholische Reaktion auf das ‘Kirchenrecht I’ Rudolf Sohms,” in Ius Sacrum: Klaus Morsdorf zum 60 Geburtstag Munchen, ed. Audomar Scheuermann and May Georg (Munchen: Ferdinand Schoningh, 1969); for the important distinction, despite common terminology, between Sohm and Weber on the issue of charisma, see David Norman Smith, “Faith, Reason, and Charisma: Rudolf Sohm, Max Weber, and the Theology of Grace,” Sociol. Inq. 68, no. 1 (1998): 32–60. 66 This holds true despite the fact that Paul and his critics disagree as to the qualifications and definition. Barrett makes the intriguing argument that Paul and Jerusalem understand the role of the apostle in two different ways. For the Jerusalem apostles their task remained more closely related to the Jewish model, where even the “sending” of an emissary remained an internal Jewish, administrative matter. For Paul, apostle is inherently missionary, i.e., the “sending-beyond” the boundaries of Judaism, Charles K. Barrett, “Shaliah and Apostle,” in Donum Gentilicium: New Testament Studies in Honour of David Daube, ed. Ernst Bammel, Charles K. Barrett, and William D. Davies (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), 88–102, esp. 100–102. Here it is important to keep in mind the way Paul formulates the agreement he reached with the pillars in Jerusalem; we shall see discuss this in detail in due course.

24

Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

enough certainty about the definition that in the mind of Paul’s opponents Paul was to be excluded. The nature of Paul’s apology for his claim to apostleship makes it impossible to accept that Paul developed a completely new definition of apostleship. I suggest, at most, that Paul assumes in large measure a pre-existing understanding of what qualifies an individual to be an apostle, and that he therefore attempts to present his own sense of his apostleship in a way that meets the accepted criteria. 67 Having stated this much, I want to go further and claim that what is actually distinctive about Paul’s selfunderstanding as an apostle is his creative reinscription of this role by assimilating it to the Greek paradigm of the cult founder-figure. To continue our foreshadowing, it should be clear that ultimately this issue turns on the question of the way in which Paul’s visionary experience is understood.68 In due course, I shall argue that the very fact that Paul chose to defend his claim to apostleship by referring to his vision of the risen Christ, presupposes that, at least in Paul’s mind, such a vision constituted one of, if not the defining element of the pre-existing formulation of the criteria of apostleship.69 Paul’s reminder to the Corinthians regarding his vision indicates that he is aware that the number of such appearances is already limited ——————————— 67

Cf. Francis H. Agnew, “The Origin of the NT Apostle-Concept: A Review of the Research,” JBL 105, no. 1 (1986): 75–96, reminds us (76–77, esp. n. 10), of course, that the NT use is not as narrow as some would like to claim, e.g., W. Schmithals, The Office of the Apostle in the Early Church, trans. J.E. Steely (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989), p. 88; or cf. more recently, the theologically tendentious article by R. D. Culver, “Apostles and the Apostolate in the New Testament,” BSac 134 (1977): 131–43. On the spectrum of meanings, see A. C. Clark, “Apostleship: Evidence from the New Testatment and Early Christian Literature,” VE 19 (1989): 49–82, who lists as particularly Christian uses, (1) witnesses to the risen Christ, (2) missionaries and church planters, and (3) appointed church delegates (62–63). According to Agnew, the general consensus seems to be that Greek patterns provide very little to the development of the Christian use of α’ πο' στολος (even the philosophical and religious traditions); the view that the Christian use is to be derived from the model of the Jewish ‫ׁשליח‬, once dominant, continues to be held by a substantial number of scholars (Agnew, “NT Apostle-Concept,” 79–85); another view which arose as a response to the Jewish model, argues that the source of the technical use of α’ πο' στολος lies in Christian experience (Agnew, “NT Apostle-Concept,” 77, 85–90). More recently, the Jewish model has been refined, now explaining the origin of the technical terms ‫ ׁשליח‬and α’ πο' στολος as an independent, Christian/Rabbinic co-occurrence resulting from the development of a Jewish “sending-convention” the roots of which can be found in the Hebrew bible, Ibid, 90–96, cf. Barrett, “Shaliah,” 88–102. 68 This will mean synthesizing what we learn about the Greek founder-paradigm in our next chapter, and my final chapter on Paul himself. 69 See 1 Cor 9:1–2. Of course, we naturally recall the older view of 1 Cor 9:1–2, which denies that Paul is offering here a list of qualifications of an apostle, see on this Kirsopp Lake and H. J. Cadbury, Additional Notes to the Commentary, vol. 5 of The Beginnings of Christianity, repr. ed., ed. F. J. Foakes-Jackson and K. Lake (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1979), 50f; cf. Harnack, Mission and Expansion of Christianity, 321–322.

2. The Problem of Comparing Paul

25

(1 Cor 15:1–9). In reality, the limiting of these visionary experiences to a small leadership circle is essential to the development of authoritative tradition, and Paul does recognize the importance of being counted a member of this fraternity.70 What is for us crucial to keep in mind is the fact that, as I will show subsequently, the personal call of the deity, by vision, dream, or oracle, is the long-established sine qua non of the Greek narrative genre of the foundation-legend and of the paradigm of the founder-figure, one which clearly served a legitimizing function in the founding of new cultic institutions, just as does Paul’s claim to a vision of the risen Christ. 2.2. Rudolf Sohm and the Roots of the Traditional Consensus With the reader’s pardon for the preceding, rather lengthy foreshadowing, we can now return to the issue of the roots of von Campenhausen’s understanding of Paul’s authority. His insistence on the uniqueness of the early Christian understanding of authority actually belongs to a wider debate over the appropriateness of the comparative study of Early Christianity. If I may be forgiven for reminding us of a well-worn story, the determinative and positive answer to the question proposed by the Religionsgeschichtliche Schule at the end of the nineteenth century, namely, that Christianity was, like any other religion, intimately embedded in a culturally much broader and temporally deeper history than scholars had acknowledged, immediately provoked a response from those who believed the new school’s comparative approach fundamentally threatened the uniqueness of Christianity.71 At best, scholars who reacted negatively to the studies produced by the new “historians of religions” were willing to grant little beyond the possibility that the understanding of the origins of Christianity might be enhanced by reference to the cultural history of Judaism or to the cultural phenomena of the Hellenistic-Roman period, but only as a foil for its revolutionary characteristics, especially its translocality and universality.72 ——————————— 70

On this issue, see: E. Pagels, “Visions, Appearances, and Apostolic Authority: Gnostic and Othodox Traditions,” in Gnosis: Festschrift Für Hans Jonas, ed. B. Aland (Göttigen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1978), 415–30, esp. 415–17. 71 See on the controversy, Werner Georg Kümmel, The New Testament: The History of the Investigation of Its Problems, trans. S. M. Gilmour and H. C. Kee (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1972), 206–25. For a brief survey of the intellectual combat, with a particular critique of the school’s view of Paul’s connections to Greek mysteries, see Marcel Simon, “The Religionsgeschichtliche Schule, Fifty Year Later,” RelS 11, no. 2 (1975): 135–44. It is interesting that American scholars needed an explanation of Religionsgeschichte, so much so that Troeltsch was solicited to offer one, see: Ernst Troeltsch, “The Dogmatics of the ‘Religionsgeschichtliche Schule’,” AJT 17, no. 1 (1913): 1–21. 72 See on the supposed “uniqueness” of Christianity’s translocality, Richard S. Ascough, “Translocal Relationships Among Voluntary Associations and Early Christianity,” JECS 5, no. 2 (1997): 223–41.

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Obviously, it is impossible in this context to think of dealing with the general problem, despite the fact that the question of the degree to which early Christianity can, or perhaps should, be explained in terms of Hellenistic cultural forms remains the throbbing thorn in the side of a sizeable number of scholars of early Christianity.73 In the present study, we will deal with this question only in terms of its relevance to the understanding of Paul’s authoritative role in his churches. With that limitation in place, the study of early Christian organizational structures represents a specific area in which the tension over the application of the comparative approach to the study of Christianity and its cultural contemporaries has been especially heated.74 Ernst Käsemann’s description of the history of the modern debate rests on Rudolph Sohm’s influential work, Kirchenrecht.75 In fact, many of the claims made by von Campenhausen are simply echoes of Sohm, who rejected out of hand the idea that the Christian church could be understood properly by comparing it to the common cultural practices of the day. For Sohm, “the Church” ———————————

73 Referring to its use of “vague approximations” and to its “virtual demise,” Brook W. R. Pearson, “Baptism and Initiation in the Cult of Isis and Sarapis,” in Baptism, the New Testament and the Church: Historical and Contemporary Studies in Honour of R. E. O. White, Stanley E. Porter and Anthony R. Cross, JSNTSup 171 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press Ltd, 1999), 42 takes for granted the putative demise of the Religionsgeschichtliche Schule and recounts this passing with obvious relish—an example of the assumption held by many conservative and apologetic Christian scholars. But as we shall see, rather like loggers who assume their work finished after felling a few individual trees while oblivious to the hundreds of square miles of forest surrounding them, conservative commentators who believe they have sheltered themselves and the believing communities they defend against assaults on the uniqueness of Christianity behind their demand for “exact” parallels/analogies must now inevitably and to their dismay recognize that modern culture studies, and especially postcolonial critique, has pulled the table completely out from under their methodological house of cards. The forest—the History of Religions School’s fundamental realization that all religions are culturally embedded, inextricable from the flow of social forces that shape culture, and therefore susceptible to change over time as are all cultural forms—still stands essentially unscathed. Whatever the failings of individual proposed analogies, the facts of cultural encounter ultimately vindicate the grand hypothesis that religions are historical phenomena in the full meaning of the term. 74 The most thorough recent overview of the debate is Burtchaell's, Synagogue to Church, which we noted earlier. 75 Ernst Käsemann, “Sentences of Holy Law in the New Testament,” in New Testament Questions of Today, trans. W. J. Montaque (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969), 66–81, esp. 66; also see: E. Nardoni, “Charism in the Early Church Since Rudolph Sohm: An Ecumenical Challenge,” TS 53 (1992): 646–62; Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, 87–94. The relevant volume for Sohm’s main arguments in this regard is his first volume of the Kirchenrecht, Grundlagen, 355, note 124 (1st ed. 1892). W. Lowrie, who essentially adopted Sohm’s position in toto, introduced Sohm to an English audience in, The Church and Its Organization in Primitive and Catholic Times: An Interpretation of Rudolf Sohm’s Kirchenrecht (New York: Longmans, Green, 1904), x.

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was completely unique. Of particular interest to the history of the debate, and to the nature of the problem as Sohm saw it, was the work of Edwin Hatch.76 Hatch began with a simple methodological assumption, i.e., if the earliest Christians were, in fact, hellenized to one degree or another – and this must be true for Paul’s converts – we should presume, “in the absence of positive evidence to the contrary,” that when they engage in activities common to their cultural context they do so in a manner analogous to that commonly used by their neighbors.77 Without question, Hatch intuitively realized a glimpse of what modern cultural studies would prove, namely, that seemingly new cultural forms, even and especially cultic or religious forms, are actually interactive, assimilative, hybridizing products – they are always enmeshed in webs of pre-existing cultural threads regardless of how innovative they may appear. Hatch correctly pointed out that the formation of cultic associations was a commonplace in the period of Christian origins, and that these formations clearly manifest characteristics similar to many found among the early Christian communities.78 It was these similarities, these threatening invariances, ———————————

76 The essentials of Hatch’s assessment of the conditions of authority within the earliest churches are found in his series of Bampton lectures, published under the title, Edwin Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches: Eight Lectures Delivered Before the University of Oxford, in 1880 (London; New York; Bombay: Longmans, Green and Co., 1901); see Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, 76–81. Sohm was certainly very familiar with Hatch’s work, as he makes clear from his first footnote. On the course of the debate, see: O. Linton, Das Problem der Urkirche in der Neuren Forschung: Eine Kritische Darstellung (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksells, 1932), 3–30; Maurer, “Auseinandersetzung,” 194–213; Kümmel, New Testament, 206–16; Nardoni, “Charism in the Early Church,” 646–62; most recently, Norman F. Josaitis, Edwin Hatch and Early Church Order, Recherches et Synthèses, Section d’Histoire 3 (Gembloux: Éditions j. Duculot, S. A., 1971). 77 Hatch, Organization, 17–19, 29–30, 86–87, 114. Biblical scholars as well as Classicists would take up the pursuit of the relationships between the earliest churches as religious communities and the Hellenistic-Roman forms of cultic organization, e.g., P. F. Foucart, Des associations religieuses chez les Grecs; Thiases, Eranes, Orgeons, avec le texte des inscriptions relatives a ces associations (Paris: Klincksieck, 1873), 125, 148, 170; C. F. G. Heinrici, Der Erste Brief an die Korinther, KEK 5 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1896), passim. Heinrici noted especially the parallels in social organization between Greek religious associations and the Pauline churches. In principle, or course, this methodological approach must be extended to include those who, in contrast to Hatch, focused their energies on parallels between Judaism and its organizational characteristics and the early churches. In either case the same presupposition holds true, i.e., parallels imply continuity. The difference is that for apologetic scholars, locating early church social forms in Judaism kept Christianity safely continuous with Jesus and the Hebrew bible traditions Christianity had already appropriated. 78 Increasingly, Hatch’s intuition is finding resonance among modern researchers, as seen in what might be called a “Toronto School,” represented by work such as: John S. Kloppenborg, “Collegia and Thiasoi: Issues in Function, Taxonomy and Membership,” in Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World, ed. John S. Kloppenborg and Stephen G. Wilson (London and New York: Routledge, 1996), 16–30; Richard S. Ascough, Paul’s

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that provoked the defenders of Christian uniqueness who sprang upon the weaker points of Hatch’s argument.79 To an unfortunate degree, Hatch had hung the weight of his argument on what he believed to be the parallel role of financial officers in cultic associations, examining, e.g., the office of ε’ πι' σκοπος in particular as relevant to the rise of the office of bishop.80 Hatch suspected that the ascendancy of the bishop in the church evolved from the cultural commonplace of elevating a president to the primary position of leadership in Greek voluntary, especially cultic, associations.81 In the Christian context, Hatch argued that this officer performed many duties for the association including oversight of the common treasury. In this situation, where the presiding officer also oversaw the common treasury, the result was that “[h]e (the bishop) thus became the centre round whom the vast system of Christian charity revolved.”82 Moreover, Hatch argued that the early Christians incorporated in their Christian vocabulary cultic language from their polytheistic past. Even if not precisely parallel, Hatch argued that at least the terms used by the Christians reflected Greek practice.83 Whether it was διακονι' α or οι’ κονομι' α, the analog ——————————— Macedonian Associations: The Social Context of Phillipians and 1 Thessalonians, WUNT 2.161 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 2003); Harland, Associations. 79 The opposition to Hatch took its stand on the grounds of church structure and terminology. A not insignificant number of scholars were willing to grant the influence of voluntary associations on early Christian communities, who were, nevertheless, unwilling to grant this influence more than a superficial impact; certainly, for them, that impact could not be shown for such distinctively Christian phenomena as baptism or the choice of titles for church officers (such as ε’ πι'σκοπος), as Hatch argued. The defining Christian practices could be rooted only in a non-Jewish context, e.g., see: Ernest George Hardy, Christianity and the Roman Government: A Study in Imperial Administration, Studies in Roman History, Repr. of the 1st Ed. (London and New York: G. Allen & Unwin; Macmillan, 1925); conceding a bit more, Edwin A. Judge, The Social Pattern of Christian Groups in the First Century: Some Prolegomena to the Study of New Testament Ideas of Social Obligation (London: Tyndale, 1960). See further John S. Kloppenborg, “Edwin Hatch, Churches and Collegia,” in Origins and Method: Toward a New Understanding of Judaism and Christianity: Essays in Honour of John C. Hurd, ed. Bradley H. McLean, JSOTSup 86 (Sheffield, England: JSOT Press, 1993), 212–38. 80 Hatch’s position is summarized nicely by Josaitis, Hatch, 35–42. 81 On the commonplace role or function of the president in Greek associations, see Hatch, Organization, 84–86, esp. p. 85, n. 2. Later, William Sanday, a student of Hatch, demonstrated his teacher’s terminological error, i.e., that the principle management officer of the Greek cult is the ε’ πιμελητη' ς, not the ε’ πι'σκοπος, see: W. Lowrie, The Church and Its Organization in Primitive and Catholic Times: An Interpretation of Rudolf Sohm’s Kirchenrecht (New York: Longmans, Green, 1904), 94–95; Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, 84. 82 Hatch, Organization, 36–41, esp. 41. 83 It was specifically against this argument that the first major assault was launched, Charles Gore, The Church and the Ministry: A Review of the Rev. E. Hatch’s Bampton Lectures, 2nd ed. (London: Rivingtons, 1882); cf. on the problem of terminology, Sohm,

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was clearly the type of services performed by members of Greek cultic associations, and encapsulated by the term λειτουργι' α.84 The New Testament, according to Hatch, clearly recognizes such offices (presbyters, deacons, and bishops). In the earliest days these officers shared many of the same functions within the community; only over time did the various functions become distinctive of various categories of service or office.85 It was always to Hatch, whether one agreed with him or not, that credit was given for the idea of the separate origin of presbyter and bishop, the former a carry over from Judaism, the latter borrowed from Greek patterns.86 According to Hatch, the ascendancy of a single bishop to primary authority over his peers reflects, not only the same pattern found in the single, presiding officer in Greek cult association, but actually takes place as an inevitable necessity in the face of the threat of heresy. The preservation of cultic tradition, something we shall see is one of the crucial responsibilities of the cultfounder, is naturally well-suited to the rise of a single, presiding officer.87 Hatch went on to argue that the terms used in the New Testament reflect this notion of presidency: terms such as η‘ γου' μενοι (Heb 13:7,17,24) or προι¨στα' μενοι (1 Thess 5:12). This terminology suggested, as Hatch read the evidence, the idea of submission to “constituted authority” (e. g., Heb 13:17; 1 Pet 5:5), and in this sense the use of these terms was not different in kind from that of their counterparts in Greek cult.88 Deviating slightly from the course set by Hatch toward the Greek voluntary associations, a change in course due in large part to the devastating attacks against his motivations and methods leveled by his critics, especially Gore,89 an important body of subsequent research has looked in other directions for ——————————— Grundlagen, 10. On Gore’s attack, see Josaitis, Hatch, chapter 4, and for a discussion of Hatch’s general defense, Ibid, 14, 24–27; 31–33, 37; Ellis Ieuan, “Edwin Hatch and the Relative Finality of Christ,” Theology 78, no. 663 (1975): 451–59. 84 Hatch, Organization, 42, 48–49. At one time, Hatch believed, all these functions were carried out by a single individual, or a single “class of officers” (p.48). 85 On Hatch’s argument for the ascendancy of the bishop, see Josaitis, Hatch, 47–52, who is nevertheless critical of Hatch for the methodological choice of looking outside the NT itself for models of organization, Ibid, 94–96. 86 André Michiels, L’Origine de l’Épiscopat. Étude sur la Fondation de l’Église, l’Oeuvre Des Apôtres et le Développement de l’Épiscopat Aux Deux Premiers Siècles (Louvain: University of Louvain, 1900), 134; Linton, Problem der Urkirche, 31–36. 87 Hatch, Organization, 90–100. The bishop’s office clearly solved a major problem for the early Christian groups by uniting the presiding office with control over the standard of apostolic teaching. 88 Hatch, Organization, 113–14. 89 An overview of this debate sympathetic to Hatch, note Kloppenborg, “Churches and Collegia,” 212–38. Kloppenborg and what I have called the “Toronto School” ably defend the model of the Greek voluntary association for understanding the organization of the early ε’ κκλησι'αι, see note 78 above.

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the origins of the composition of Paul’s ε’ κκλησι' αι, yet still within Greek cultural patterns.90 For example, some commentators have argued that Paul’s teaching, writing patterns, and concerns most accurately reflect those of the philosophers, and by extension they see Paul’s ε' κκλησι' αι as less like Greek voluntary associations, whether θι' ασος, ο’ γεω' ν, or ε» ρανος, than like philosophical associations or schools.91 Others have argued that none of the Greek ——————————— 90

For a convenient and thorough history of scholarship on this topic, see Richard A. Ascough, What Are They Saying About the Formation of Pauline Churches? WATSA (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1998). 91 The tradition of including early Christian archetypes among the philosophers is as old as Justin, but the modern, specific application of comparative study to Paul to show his affinities with then contemporary philosophers is certainly exemplified in Arthur Darby Nock, Conversion: The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1933); Conzelmann also draws the parallel fairly early, first connecting Paul with hellenized Jewish wisdom traditions, “Paulus und die Weisheit,” NTS 12, no. 3 (1966): 231–44, and then explicitly assuming there could be no Pauline tradition without a Pauline school, “Luke’s Place in the Development of Early Christianity,” in Studies in Luke-Acts: Essays Presented in Honor of Paul Schubert, ed. Leander E. Keck and J. Louis Martyn (Nashville: Abingdon, 1966), 298–316, but esp. 307–8. Despite assembling the weighty evidence for an emic categorization of the early ε’ κκλησι'αι as cultassociations, Wilken still concluded they were more like philosophical schools, Robert L. Wilken, “Collegia, Philosophical Schools, and Theology,” in Catacombs and Colosseum: Roman Empire as the Setting of Primitive Christianity, ed. Stephen Benko and John J. O’Rourke (Valley Forge, Pennsylvania: Judson Press, 1971), 268–91 and Idem, The Christians as the Romans Saw Them (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1984); Paul’s self-supporting trade was also used as an avenue to the philosophical parallels, Ronald F. Hock, “Paul’s Tentmaking and the Problem of His Social Class,” JBL 97, no. 4 (1978): 555–64; Idem, “The Workshop as a Social Setting for Paul’s Missionary Preaching,” CBQ 41, no. 3 (1979): 438–50; Idem, The Social Context of Paul’s Ministry: Tentmaking and Apostleship (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1980). Hock does not explicitly equate Paul’s ε’ κκλησι'αι with philosophical schools. Abraham J. Malherbe carries out the most thorough and consistent positive comparison through a number of important works, focusing on what he describes as “popular” forms of moral teaching and the “popular” philosophers who propagate it, among he counts Paul and his ε’ κκλησι'αι: Abraham J. Malherbe, Social Aspects of Early Christianity (Baton Rouge, Louisiana: Louisiana State University, 1977); Idem, Paul and the Thessalonians: The Philosophical Tradition of Pastoral Care (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987); Idem, Paul and the Popular Philosohpers (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989); Idem, “Hellenistic Moralists and the New Testament,” in ANRW Part 2, Principat, 26.1: 273–333. Like Wilken, Barton and Horsley admit to a substantial number of similarities between Paul’s ε’ κκλησι'αι and private cult associations, but ultimately conclude that the philosophical school offers the better analogy, S. C. Barton, and G. H. R. Horsley, “A Hellenistic Cult Group and the New Testament Churches,” JAC 24 (1981): 7– 41. More recently, the work of Troels Engberg-Pedersen has looked to the philosophical tradition, particularly linking the influence of Stoicism to the formation of Paul’s ε’ κκλησι'αι, in his essay, “Stoicism in Philippians,” (256–290) of an edited collection in which we also find Loveday Alexander proposing Galen of Pergamon’s critique of Judaism and Christianity as testimony to his inclusion of both in the category of philosophical school, “Paul

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models of voluntary association adequately serve the study of the early ε’ κκλησι' αι, and that the structures we find in Paul’s groups are derived from and modeled on the synagogue, Wayne Meeks being perhaps the most widelycited for this model.92 E. A. Judge presents an especially useful case in illustrating just how difficult the identification of a model can be.93 Early in his discussion of the need to carry out the sociology of early Christianity, he surveyed the evidence for voluntary associations, and concludes, as Wilken would later, that outsiders would have certainly seen the early ε’ κκλησι' αι as a kind of voluntary association, a θι' ασος, an ο’ ργεω' ν, or an ε» ρανος. Moreover, the members of the ε’ κκλησι' αι would have agreed with this categorization.94 However, his final decision is that the ε’ κκλησι' αι are actually not close to the voluntary cult association, but should be reckoned among the philosophical schools.95 Early in a recent essay, Judge makes a most puzzling statement, ——————————— and the Hellenistic Schools: The Evidence of Galen,” in Paul in His Hellenistic Context, ed. Troels Engberg-Pedersen (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995), 60–83. 92 See, of course, First Urban Christians, 75–84, esp. 80–81; in this chapter he gives us his famous four models, the household, the voluntary association, the synagogue, and the philosophical/rhetorical schools (75–84). Later, using the same four models, Meeks seems far less committed to a specific model, rather describing the early churches as partaking of each of the various models he mentions; Idem, The Moral World of the First Christians, The Library of Early Christianity (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1986), 108–23; further endorsement of the synagogue as the appropriate model can be found in Vincent P. Branick, The House Church in the Writings of Paul (Wilmington, Delaware: Michael Glazier, 1989); Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, passim, esp. 201–271, on my assessment of Burtchaell’s work, see James Constantine Hanges, review of From Synagogue to Church in CRBR 1994, ed. Eldon J. Epp (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996), 319–21; also Dieter Georgi, “The Early Church: Internal Jewish Migration or New Religion?” HTR 88, no. 1 (1995): 35–68. 93 Before discussing Judge in more detail below, I would also point out that such a careful scholar as Wayne Meeks has also found it a struggle to chose an appropriate category for the earliest ε’ κκλησι'αι; having first settled on the synagogue in First Urban Christians (see the previous note), he later turned his favor toward the private household, Wayne A. Meeks, “Breaking Away: Three New Testament Pictures of Christianity’s Separation from the Jewish Communities,” in “To See Ourselves as Others See Us”: Christians, Jews, “Others” in Late Antiquity, Ed. Jacob Neusner and Ernest. S. Frerichs, Scholars Press Studies in the Humanities (Chico, California: Scholars Press, 1985), 93–115. 94 Edwin A. Judge, The Social Pattern of Christian Groups in the First Century: Some Prolegomena to the Study of New Testament Ideas of Social Obligation (London: Tyndale, 1960), 45. 95 See Judge, “Did the Churches Compete with Cult-Groups?,” 501–24, reprinted under the same title but different editorship, as Early Christianity and Classical Culture: Comparative Studies in Honor of Abraham J. Malherbe, Ed. James R. Harrison, WUNT 229 (Tübignen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 501–24; I will cite pages according to the latter edition. Here, Judge attempts to distinguish the early ε’ κκλησι'αι from the θι'ασοι by playing with the semantic range of the word “community,” a term he defines only by glossing it as Gemeinde. He claims that the ε’ κκλησι'αι were “communities,” while the θι'ασοι were more cult than community; this to me seems a hollow distinction, since we have no evidence sug-

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“Historically, communities may entrench themselves in cult, but it is not cult that engenders community,” something that in the next paragraph he calls a fundamental distinction that gets blurred by our “ambiguous use of the word ‘religion.’”96 Throughout the essay, his consistent emphasis on the intellectual and moral focus of the Christian groups over against the “cultic” aspects of the Greek social forms, makes it clear that what Judge wants to distinguish is ritual from faith – actions, especially non-rational behaviors, from the mind as the seat of morality and reason.97 What is so puzzling about this statement is not only that it is both neither true nor a fundamental distinction, but that a scholar whose reputation has been built on his demand for the application of sociological methods to the historical description of early Christianity would make such an unequivocal statement that yet so profoundly contradicts basic sociological assumptions enduring from Durkheim to the present.98 ——————————— gesting that Paul’s groups spent more time assembled than members of a θι'ασος,might spend together, or that this assembled time was spent on anything less “cultic.” 96 “Compete with Cult Groups?” 598. 97 Paul’s groups are too intellectual. Were you to enter them you would assume you were in a debating society. They dare use cultic terminology only metaphorically, and they were never caught up in concerns about proper cultic procedure. Their meetings were like those of the philosophers, arguing new theological concepts and a “revolution in lifestyle.” In his characterization of the Greek cult associations, he writes, “Neither correct belief nor good behaviour was part of what we choose to call ‘religion’ in antiquity,” “Compete with Cult Groups?” 607–8, esp. 608. 98 Judge denies the importance of ritual in group formation and maintenance and denies that what appears in the NT to many scholars as Christian ritual behavior is what it appears to be. Émile Durkheim recognized as early as his doctoral thesis, De la Division du Travail social, 2nd ed., Bibliothèque de Philosophie contemporaine (Paris: F. Alcan, 1902), that psychology alone could not explain group formation, but that there are many causes for affiliation. By the time he wrote, Les Formes élémentaire de la Vie religieuse, le Systéme totémique en Australie, Travaux de l’Année Sociologique (Paris: F. Alcan, 1912), he argues that both the creation and the maintenance of society occurs through ritual, what David E. Greenwald has called the shared “organization of experience,” “Durkheim on Society, Thought and Ritual,” Sociol. Anal. 34, no. 3 (1973): 157–68, esp. 166, cf. earlier Henry J. Frundt, “Rite Involvement and Community Formation,” Sociol. Anal. 30, no. 2 (1969): 91– 107, arguing that group identity can be formed around ritual participation prior to the formation of social relations outside the ritual context. For more recent support from an extremely wide range of cultural studies, see e.g., Ian Clarke, “Ancestor Worship and Identity: Ritual, Interpretation, and Social Normalization in the Malaysian Chinese Community,” Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia 51, no. 2 (2000): 273–95; Richard Sosis, “‘Why Aren’t We All Hutterites?’: Costly Signaling Theory and Religious Behavior,” Human Nature 14, no. 2 (2003): 91–127, who follows the theory of William Irons who argues that religious behaviors are necessarily demanding on the ego, i.e., they cost the potential believer seriously precisely because membership demands clear distinction from nonmembership. Such costly rituals are the primary mechanism by which the true insider can be detected and proven: see William Irons, “In Our Own Self-Image: The Evolution of Morality, Deception, and Religion,” Skeptic 4, no. 2 (1996): 50–61; Idem, “Morality, Reli-

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To return to those who look to Greek associations as the comparanda for the early ε’ κκλησι' αι, in recent studies it is commonly pointed out that in one way or another, either as a positive embodiment of, or as an embodied alternative to, Greek associations of all types reflect or mirror the structures and organization of the πο' λις. Consequently, for those who recognize the parallel structures between πο' λις and θι' ασος, and who additionally categorize the ε’ κκλησι' α as a type of Greek association, it follows that ε’ κκλησι' α, like all species of the higher order category, would also possess πο' λις characteristics.99 For example, these scholars see the material sense of πολιτει' α in ε’ κκλησι' α, something overlooked or ignored by earlier investigations.100 The civic structures assumed by the formation of the ε’ κκλησι' αι are also recognized where the ε’ κκλησι' αι are understood by some to be standing in opposition to the existing πο' λις system.101 It is difficult to deny that among Greeks the term is clearly a political term fundamental to the definition of the πο' λις.102 Despite the vari——————————— gion, and Human Evolution,” in Religion & Science: History, Method, Dialogue, ed. W. Mark Richardson and Wesley J. Wildman (New York: Routledge, 1996), 375–99; “Morality as an Evolved Adaptation,” in Investigating the Biological Foundations of Human Morality, ed. James P. Hurd (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 1996), 1–34; “Morality, Religion, and Human Evolution,” in Religion & Science: History, Method, Dialogue, ed. W. Mark Richardson and Wesley J. Wildman (New York: Routledge, 1996), 375–99; “Religion as a Hardto-Fake Sign of Commitment,” in Evolution and the Capacity for Commitment, ed. Randolph M. Nesse, Russell Sage Foundation Series on Trust 3 (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2001), 292–309. 99 Meeks, First Urban Christians, 31, 134, but more recently and thoroughly, Harland, Associations. 100 See Harland, Associations, 106, for a survey of this view going back at least to JeanPierre Waltzing, Étude Historique sur les Corporations Professionnelles Chez les Romains Depuis les Origines Jusqu’à la Chute de l’Empire d’Occident, Mémoires Couronnés et Autres Mémoires Publiée par l’Académie Royale Des Sciences, Des Lettres et Des BeauxArts de Belgique 50 (Brussels: Hayez, 1895–1900), 2:184. On this issue and its relation to cult foundations, see: E. Peterson, Die Kirche Aus Juden und Heiden: Drei Vorlesungen, Bücherei der Salzburger Hochschulwochen 2 (Salzburg: A. Pustet, 1933), 19, note 19; cf. Tertullian’s use of curia, and Augustine’s civitas dei. Certainly, given the prevalence of our founder’s paradigm (see chapter 2, i.e., even “mother cities” had a founder’s cult), the image of the πο' λις always encapsulates the language and activity of founding, even in cultic foundations. 101 See e.g., Wendy Cotter, “Our Politeuma Is in Heaven: The Meaning of Phil. 3.17– 21,” in Origins and Method: Towards a New Understanding of Judaism and Christianity. Essays in Honour of John C. Hurd, ed. Bradley H. McLean, JSNTSup 86 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993), 92–104; for Paul’s ε’ κκλησι'αι as an “alternative society,” see Richard A. Horsley, “General Introduction,” in Paul and Empire: Religion and Power in Roman Imperial Society, ed. Richard A. Horsley (Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International, 1997), 1–8. 102 This is true even among contemporary conservative scholars, who generally follow Sohm in accounting for the early Christian use of ε’ κκλησι'α as a derivation from its use in the LXX, interpreted as a reference to the elect, worshiping community of Israel, e.g., P. T.

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ous comparative hypotheses, the emic fact remains, as we shall detail in due course; the earliest non-Christian witnesses to Christianity are entirely consistent in assuming that the local Christian groups are simply another variety of the ubiquitous voluntary, particularly cult-associations.103 From Sohm’s perspective, whether one relies on Greek or Jewish parallels, there is very little difference between these alternatives, since the Jewish synagogue is itself a product of Hellenism—certainly on this latter issue he was altogether correct.104 Others, while disagreeing with Sohm’s view that the antithesis between “law” and Christianity is absolute and allowed no exception, nevertheless accepted that this antithesis reflected the essential nature of the church which originally had no form of law. These granted, however, that because of necessity forms of institutionalization developed within Christianity, which when properly understood did not destroy the essence of the church but enabled it to survive.105 In the end, despite Sohm’s selfconfidence, his fundamental antithesis between law and Church did not, in its absolute form, carry the day. Most scholars rightly found it impossible to completely isolate Christianity from its cultural background, and continued, in greater or lesser measure, to describe the origins of the Church in terms of Greco-Roman culture and Judaism.106 Although rejected in its absolute form, Sohm’s insistence on an “essential” antinomism in earliest Christianity remained influential, reflecting apparently a deep-seated and persistent sense among European scholars of the fundamental uniqueness of Christianity—one that even found a place in Hatch’s work.107 ——————————— O’Brien, “Church,” in DPL, 123–31, esp. 123. Of course, the role of Jewish appropriation of Greek political terms in the negotiation of Jewish identity has yet to fully explored. 103 E.g., seen as a θι'ασος by Lucian, Pergr. 11, and by Celsus according to Origen, contra Celsum 3.23; Eusebius, Haer. eccl. 1.3.12, also 1.3.19; 10.1.8. 104 Grundlagen, 1:9. Hatch, in fact, looked to the synagogue community for the source of the presbytry among the Jewish-Christian communities, but to Greek eldership in the case of the Greek, non-Jewish churches (Organization, 56–81). 105 More recently, F. W. Maier, Paulus als Kirchengründer und Kirchlicher Organisator (Würzburg: Echter, 1961), has chosen to ignore Sohm, arguing for an essentially “common-sense” position that the earliest church, even when made up largely of Jews living among their own ethnic people, could not survive without organization. If this is so for Jewish believers, he argues, it is more so for non-Jewish converts, who not only leave behind older religious associations, but in fact leave behind most of their connections with their own communities. In this case, believers must have immediately available to them an alternative community, guided by a community order which can provide each member with a sense of place. In essence, Maier suggests that the notion of a “spiritual” authority alone without community structure is only a theoretical construct; it does not exist and cannot in reality (pp. 16–23; recall the theoretical principle that religious affiliation must demand costly ritual entrance and maintenance requirements, see note 98 above). 106 Kümmel, New Testament, 214–15; Josaitis, Hatch, 47–48. 107 Josaitis, Hatch, 31–35.

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Consequently, one of the enduring elements of Sohm’s work is the repeated scholarly description of the origin and nature of Paul’s apostolic authority as rooted in the kerygma and/or in the unique nature of the apostle’s appointment by Christ to preach this word. This tendency functions essentially to secure the uniqueness of earliest Christianity by making it fundamentally incomparable to any other entity, certainly to anything in Jewish and Hellenistic culture. In other words, according to Sohm and the scholars who have followed him, the very basis of Christian “authority” is what makes it entirely unique in the history of religions.108 Remarkably, a good example of the fundamental influence of Sohm’s defense of the uniqueness of Christianity in the Greco-Roman world can be found in the critique leveled against him by Adolf von Harnack, arguably Sohm’s most vigorous opponent.109 Harnack enters the picture with his publication of the Didache,110 to which Sohm often refers in his own work. Harnack infers from the nature of the Didache’s handling of apostles, prophets, and teachers that these functionaries are both charismatic and universal. As such they stand in direct contrast to the presbytry and diaconate, which are local and institutional.111 With respect to ———————————

108 Cf. Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, 81. This is especially clear when Hatch discusses the “equality” of believers with respect to their “cultic competence.” Here, the apriori seems to be the “priesthood of all believers.” Essentially, what Hatch appears to argue is that with respect to administrative and management functions, the churches appropriate structures from the culture, but when it comes to “spiritual” things, the churches stand apart from the culture. Only through a decline in the level of the spiritual competence of the average member did the spiritual functions necessarily become part of the responsibilities of the managing officers, e.g., the ministry of the Eucharist. There was originally, according to Hatch, no formal ordination to these cultic roles, just simple appointment. Originally, the “laying on of hands” carried with it no sense of bestowal of spiritual powers (Organization, 114–35). Of course, this distinction between administrative and spiritual functions is picked up and used by many subsequent commentators, especially, as we shall see in due course, by Adolf von Harnack. 109 See, e.g., Nardoni, “Charism in the Early Church,” 648; Burtchaell, Synagogue to Church, 82–87. 110 Adolf von Harnack, Lehre der Zwölf Apostel Nebst Untersuchungen Zur Ältesten Geschichte der Kirchenverfassung und Des Kirchenrechts, TUGAL 2 (Berlin: AkademieVerlag, 1991), esp. 103–10 111 I would argue that one of the most important attributes of apostleship for Sohm was independence; i.e., Paul exerted his authority by virtue of his charisma, independently from human institutions, including other apostles. This seems to be implicit in Sohm’s insistence that apostles are appointed to the Church as a unified whole, not to independent congregations, Grundlagen, 56–59, 65. This view is also crucial to von Campenhausen’s description, Ecclesiastical Authority, 33. As we shall see when we begin our comparative look at Paul, the difficulty with Sohm’s view is, first of all, that it runs counter to the evidence of Paul’s own description of the scope of his authority, and secondly, that it makes the apostle’s defense against interference in his churches and his stated operating principles incomprehensible.

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Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

the authority of the first group, Sohm was sympathetic to Harnack’s reading of the Didache; this authority was rooted in their proclamation of the word.112 Not only does this make apostolic authority binding on the entire Church, but also, as we have already pointed out, it makes the source of authority in early Christianity a unique phenomenon.113 In fact, as far as Harnack was concerned, the universal quality of apostolic authority was sufficient to qualify Christianity as completely unique. In his view there was no parallel for this in the surrounding cultures. Rather, apostolic authority, prophecy, and the teaching ministry arose in early Christianity on the basis of Christian theological presuppositions alone. A subtext of this assessment is, of course, the equally persistent presupposition that this kerygmatic grounding of Christianity is altogether rational, even the charism of prophecy partakes of the rational. By way of another, but brief, foreshadowing, I will also contest this notion as I have elsewhere; in my view, Paul’s impact on his audience of potential converts was more likely, based on the correlation between his own testimony and comparative cross-cultural analysis, an expression of the profoundly nonrational or ecstatic side of religion.114 In fact, I shall argue that Paul’s missionary pattern, his initial entrance into a new urban environment, and his manner of presentation conform in detail to the well-worn stereotype in Greek religion of the wandering cult expert. Returning to our previous line of thought, Sohm also agreed with Harnack that the Didache, because of its instructions regarding the treatment of wandering apostles, represented a period of developing mistrust of charismatics in the early Church – the beginnings of the legally institutionalized church.115 However, on one important point, Sohm’s disagreement with Harnack was fundamental; the latter accepted Hatch’s distinction between the local and the universal functions (i. e., between the local churches and the Church as a whole) as fundamental to his description. And it is with respect to the organization of the local congregations that Harnack was open to a comparison between ecclesiastical structure and Greco-Roman parallels. Moreover, he be———————————

112 Sohm, Grundlagen, 12, citing Harnack’s point that apostles are given to the Church at large, not appointed to individual communities, cf. Lowrie, Church and Its Organization, 99 with respect to Sohm’s view of Harnack’s study of the Didache. 113 Although this distinction between local and universal offices in the Church had already been made by Hatch, Harnack refuses to accept Hatch’s view that the organization of the Church could be adequately explained on the basis of non-Christian cultural patterns. 114 James Constantine Hanges, Christ, the Image of the Church: The Construction of a New Cosmology and the Rise of Christianity, Contexts and Consequences: New Studies in Religion and History (Aurora, Colorado: The Davies Group, 2006), 133–65; also see Christopher Mount, “1 Corinthians 11:3–16: Spirit Possession and Authority in a Non-Pauline Interpretation,” JBL 124, no. 2 (2005): 313–40; John Ashton, The Religion of Paul the Apostle (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2000). 115 Grundlagen, 44–45; Lowrie, Church and Its Organization, 99.

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37

lieved along with Hatch, that these administrative offices are early and necessary.116 Despite this, both Hatch and Harnack still presumed, in agreement with Sohm, that in its essence the ε’ κκλησι' α represented something uniquely charismatic and alien to humanly-instituted, legalistic structures. Despite this, Sohm reacted strongly to their bipartite description of the Church. In his view, there could not be two kinds of co-existent forms, one local and institutional and the other universal and charismatic.117 Sohm simply denied the independent existence of the local congregations; the earliest Christians, and Paul especially had no conception of the local church.118 In reality, Sohm believed that the local officers, e.g., the bishops, appropriated for themselves the authority once the exclusive privilege of the charismatics (the apostles, prophets, and teachers).119 The charismatic became subjected to the forms of legal constitution; this Sohm saw as the essence of Catholicism. What had started as a “free creation” of the Christian faith is overcome by a radical departure rooted in the degeneration of reliance on the Spirit.120 As far as Sohm was concerned, the idea that any type of authority could be “constituted,” i.e., be legal authority, within the Church was impossible.121 For example, Sohm denied that Paul exercised his authority over the communities he founded by virtue of anything other than his role as a teacher; he is the one who proclaims the authoritative “word of the Lord” to the churches: Das Wort Gottes ist die letzlich entscheidende Quelle für die Ordnung der Ekklesia. Darum kann die Ordnung der christlichen Versammlung nicht durch irgendwelchen Beschluß der Versammlung, etwa durch einen Selbstgesetzgebungsakt der Gemeinde, sondern nur im Wege der Lehre festgestellt werden. Diese Lehre aber ist Sache des Lehrbegabten, welcher kraft seines Charismas autoritär das Herrenwort und die aus demselben sich ergebenden Folgesätze verkündigt. In dieser Rolle treten die Apostel bei Ordnung ihrer Gemeinden auf, z. B. der

———————————

116 Harnack’s only explicit response to Sohm was an article, “Kirchliches Verfassung und Kirchliche Recht Im1. und 2. Jahrhundert,” RE 20 (1908): 508–46, re-published as The Constitution and Law of the Church in the First Two Centuries, ed. and trans. F. L. Pogson and H. D. A. Major (London: Williams & Norgate, 1910); on the controversy between Sohm and Harnack, see Maurer, “Auseinandersetzung,” 194–213. However, Harnack actually gives an assessment of the independence of the local church under the rule of its founder, see his excursus on church organization, Mission and Expansion of Christianity, 466–67. 117 Grundlagen, 4–12. 118 Grundlagen, 65–66. 119 It is precisely when the original charismatic authorities become weaker, and in a context where those closest to the departed charismatic are seen as the most worthy to distribute the Eucharist that the ascendancy of the bishop is to be understood, Grundlagen, 66–81. 120 Lowrie, Church and Its Organization, 11–12. 121 Here is where the real difference between Harnack and Sohm emerges; Harnack is unwilling to accept the absolute antithesis of the Church and recognized structures of authority, see, “Law of the Church,” 169–70.

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Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

Apostel Paulus. Er giebt in Fragen der Ordnung des Gemeindelebens bald ein Herrenwort, bald seine ‘Meinung,’ von der er aber in Anspruch nimmt, daß sie im Geiste des Herrenwortes ist.122

Fundamentally, as Sohm makes clear throughout, all the charismata are gifts of teaching, not offices vested with authority.123 Here we catch a glimpse of the source of another element crucial to von Campenhausen’s description of ecclesiastical authority, i.e., the concept of recognition. According to Sohm, although all order in the Church derives from the charism of teaching, it is only as the hearers of the Christian proclamation recognize it as the “Word of God” that the authority of the apostle is actualized.124 Moreover, while the authority enjoyed by the apostles was not a legal authority, but only an authority based on public recognition of charisma, this authority was universal, i.e., Paul’s authority was recognized throughout the universal Church.125 In this context, we see another theme familiar from von Campenhausen’s discussion of early Christian authority, one that is also rooted in the preached word; the unique message of the gospel provides the basis for an apostolic authority that is both independent from human legitimation and universally authoritative over all who believe in every local manifestation of the universal Church. Thus we arrive at what will serve even to the present as the definitive characteristics of Christian uniqueness — translocality and universality. For these scholars, what is characteristic of the Christian gospel is characteristic of the Church, the embodiment of the gospel, making both unique in history.126 Sohm’s proposition that the Church exists only as a universal whole was crucial to his argument and become a tradition passed down through the seminal work of those who followed him.127 This proposition is defended ulti——————————— 122

Grundlagen, 29; cf. Nardoni, “Charism in the Early Church,” 648. Grundlagen, 51–56. 124 Grundlagen, 29–38; 54–56. Lincoln on the construction of authority makes clear that what von Campenhausen and Sohm see as diagnostic of Paul cannot be unique, since recognition is universally characteristic of the construction of authority to Paul, Authority, 1–13. 125 Of course, this is obviously untrue, as Paul himself implies in 1 Cor. 9:2. As our review to this point has made obvious, the emphasis on the universal church as opposed to the local churches is a common theme for authors who describe Paul’s authority and his churches in the way Sohm has done: e.g., cf. Schweizer, Church Order, 188–91. 126 Ecclesiastical Authority, 31–36. For a rejection of the use of these two characteristics as diagnostic of early Christianity over against non-Christian social forms, see the arguments of Ascough, “Translocal Relationships,” 223–41. 127 For the endurance of this assumption, see: K. L. Schmidt, “ε’ κκλησι'α,” TDNT, 3:505; W. Schrage, “‘Ekklesia’ und ‘Synagoge.’ Zum Ursprung Des Urchristlichen ,” ZTK 60 (1963): 178–202; Gerhard Delling, “Merkmale der Kirche Nach dem NT,” Kirchen-begriffs NTS 13 (1966–67): 297–316; Klaus Berger, “Volksversammlung und Gemeinde Gottes. Zur Den Anfängen der Christlichen Verwendung von ‘Ekklesia’,” ZTK 63 (1976): 167–207; Robert J. Banks, Paul’s Idea of Community: The Early House Churches in Their Historical 123

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39

mately on the simple theological premise that there can exist logically only one body of Christ. However, from the historical perspective, Sohm makes his argument on the basis of a complimentary pair of observations: 1) Greek usage provides no significant evidence that ε’ κκλησι' α was used to refer to anything other than the assembly of free citizens of the πο' λις, and 2) that the LXX provides the obvious source for Early Christian usage.128 New Testament use of ε’ κκλησι' α can be misread, according to Sohm. Although the majority of occurrences refer to a local congregation or to congregations, Sohm finds sufficient decisive examples of texts which prove his argument.129 In his view, the fact that the word ε’ κκλησι' α is used in the NT for any and every gathering of Christians, regardless of number or location, can only mean that these specific references are manifestations of a universally existing whole.130 In this sense, NT usage clearly reflects the pattern Sohm identified in the LXX. The main difficulty with the notion of a comprehensive New Testament usage, problematized by the fact that ε’ κκλησι' α is largely a phenomenon of the epistles, Acts, and Revelation, was not an issue.131 In the same way for ——————————— Setting (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Press, 1980); Helmut Merklein, “Die Ekklesia Gottes. Der Kirchenbegriff bei Paulus und in Jerusalem,” in Studien zu Jesus Unde Paulus (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1987), 296–318; J. Roloff, “ε’ κκλησι'α,” EDNT, 1:410–15. 128 Grundlagen, 16–18. The post-World War II period began a change in the assumption of the traditional consensus about the semantic derivation of Christian usage of ε’ κκλησι'ς from the LXX, see John Y. Campbell, “The Origin and Meaning of the Christian Use of the Word EKKLESIA,” in Three New Testament Studies, (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1965), 41–54; Roy Bowen Ward, “Ekklesia: A Word Study,” ResQ 2, no. 4 (1958): 164–79; Stephen C. Neill, “Church: An Ecumenical Perspective: An Attempt at Definition,” Int 19, no. 2 (1965): 131–48. 129 Grundlagen, 18–19, esp. note 17 in which he cites apparent logia of Jesus (e. g., Matt. 16:18) and statements of Paul (e. g., 1 Cor. 12:25; 15:19; Gal. 1:13) which he interprets to speak of the one universal Church. Even to speak of an “Ortsgemeinde” is to use legal terminology in Sohm’s view (p. 19). Needless to say, these interpretations are not totally compelling. 130 Grundlagen, 19–20; Sohm’s proof text is Matt. 18:20. With respect to this last issue, Schmidt has argued that the word ε’ κκλησι'α is used in the NT both for the local assembling group of believers and also for the Church as a whole, the “universal Church.” The “Church” and the “congregation” (universal and particular); “ε’ κκλησι'α,” TDNT, 3:503. O. Linton agrees with this assessment, “Ekklesia,” RAC 4 (1959) col. 912; as also J. Roloff, EDNT, 1:412. However, in the Dictionary of Paul and His Letters, a clearly more conservative-evangelical reference work, Peter T. O’Brien lists occurrences of ε’ κκλησι'α that appear to encompass more than a specific local assembly, but which are noticeably devalued in his interpretation of the term, “Church,” 123–131. Of course, we are looking for Paul’s meaning, what he does with the term. 131 Of the 114 occurrences of the word in the NT, Paul uses it 46 times; the principle evidence for this usage is found in the adscripta of his letters (1 Cor 1:2; 2 Cor 1:1; Gal 1:2; 1 Thess 1:1; Phlm 2, in his secondary greeting to Philemon’s house church). It occurs in Matt 16:18 and 18:17, but not in Mark, Luke, or John, and is, outside of the Pauline and deutero-

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Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

Sohm, ε’ κκλησι' α here refers to the ideal of the unified, elect, worshiping community – the Israel of God – whether assembled or dispersed, as the people within which the power of God is active. In the history of scholarship, the most commonly endorsed theory proposes that the translators of the LXX deliberately chose – thereby bestowing a theological connotation on the term – to use ε’ κκλησι' α to translate the Hebrew ‫ קהל‬and not its near synonym, ‫עדה‬. Their intent was to isolate ε’ κκλησι' α from the national or political connotations of ‫ עדה‬and to use ε’ κκλησι' α to express only the idea of the community of Israel in its role as the cultic community of God. The primary biblical expression of which is the assembly of Israel at Sinai involved in the covenant process with Yahweh. As the primary scripture of the early Christians, this concept of the assembled cultic community provided the fundamental point of reference for their self-understanding. But, few, then or now, consider the possibility that the translators could have used the term in its common Greek sense.132 From this image the early Christians took over the term because they understood themselves to be the new “people of God.” In Sohm’s view, this people, wherever its members may be found individually, is always a single whole. The term cannot then refer primarily to individual churches, as do Greek cultic terms such as θι' ασος, ο’ ργεω' ν, or ε» ρανος.133 Of course, we cannot here rehearse the history of research on the origins of the early Christian understanding of ε’ κκλησι' α. It is sufficient for our purposes to point out that Sohm’s argument that the primary connotation of the word is the universal Church, though influential, fails to convincingly overcome certain major difficulties. First of all, the analysis of the actual use of ε’ κκλησι' α by LXX translators is too fluid to reflect any consistently applied theological criterion behind the translation of the Hebrew scriptures, and consequently disallows the use of any postulated criterion of this sort in defining the term as used, for example, in Paul’s letters.134 ——————————— Pauline letters, most common in Acts, see: Schmidt, TDNT, 3:504, Linton, RAC, col. 912. The usage of the word in the NT is uneven, however. Linton denies that this unequal distribution provides evidence for differing levels of the term’s importance in different Christian communities. Other than the qualifying geographical epithets, only those which modify the word in terms of the deity or Christ are used in the NT, e.g., ε’ κκλησι'α του^ θεου^ (Acts 20:28). 132 The history of the debate has revolved around two axes: 1) those scholars for whom the Christian ε’ κκλησι'α is primarily a Jewish concept, going back to the LXX translators’ practice of using it so regularly to translate the Hebrew bible’s ‫ ;קהל‬2) a variant of this theory, advocated by an increasing number of scholars, suggests that the term’s true origin is to be found in Palestinian Judaism, specifically among Jews holding apocalyptic perspectives, see: TDNT, 3:514; O’Brien, DPL, 129. 133 Grundlagen, 17–18. 134 Nevertheless, the fact that ε’ κκλησι'α never translates ‫ עדה‬is often used as evidence that the LXX translators were excising from ε’ κκλησι'α its national or political sense. As the assumed pattern for the NT, this characteristic would exclude any national or political con-

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However, even if we could accept the notion of a unified body of translation materials labelled LXX, we cannot accept without qualification the postulate that these translators were translating an historical idea of the “people of God” which was at home in the period when the Hebrew text was written. In other words, it cannot be assumed that what the LXX translators understood the word ε’ κκλησι' α to mean would have been the same thing that the Hebrew writer(s) understood by ‫קהל‬.135 In fact, it is precisely in the Hellenistic period, ——————————— notations from the definition of the Church, e.g., O’Brien, Dictionary of Paul, s. v., p. 124. Although it remains common to find the Church described as the “end-time” cultic community of God or even as the “new Israel,” the supposed selectivity of the LXX translators in their use of ε’ κκλησι'α is less consistent than it at first appears. Outside the Pentateuch, ε’ κκλησι'α translates ‫ קהל‬in the LXX only at 1 βας. 19:20=1 Sam. 19:20; Neh. 5:7; Ψ25:12=Ps. 26:12; and Ψ 67:27=Ps. 68:27, TDNT, 3:527. Moreover, in the LXX, ε’ κκλησι'α is used for non-religious assemblies. This is also the case in both the NT and for Jewish authors closer in time to the period of the NT. For example, the Qumranians can use ‫ עדה‬or ‫( קהל‬CD 7:20;10:4, 8;13:3;7:17;11:22). In 1 Macc 14:19 we find the curious phrase ε’ κκλησι'α τη^ ς α’ ποικι'ας referring to the exile community. This usage is consistent with the language of colonial foundations as we shall see in chap. 2. This usage is actually common among Jews of the Hellenistic-Roman period to describe the exilic community. In fact the Exodus tradition, as we have it in its final form, exhibits the definitive characteristics of the Hellenistic foundation-legend in precise details (again, see below, chap. 2). Consequently, as Schmidt rightly states, it is impossible to fix rigidly the semantic boundaries of the terms ‫ קהל‬and ‫ עדה‬as they appear in the Hebrew bible, TDNT, 3:527–528. The usage of the terms may turn simply on the source in which they are contained, e.g., in Josh, Judg, 1 and 2 Kgs, 1 and 2 Chr, Ezra, and Neh (and all of 1 Sam., excluding 19:20) ‫ קהל‬is always translated by ε’ κκλησι'α. In Gen, Exod, Lev, and Num, ‫ קהל‬is always συναγωγη' . ‫ עדה‬is never translated by ε’ κκλησι'α. Philo and Josephus, in general, carry on the same usage, Josephus’ usage is varied to a certain degree, sometimes referring to political, religious, or spontaneous gatherings (Ant. 4.45.309; Life 268; B.J. 1.4.654; 1.8.666). However, in this period the evolution of a technical term is already underway, TDNT, 3:529. Philo uses the unusual term, ε’ κκλησι'ας τη^ ς ι‘ ερα^ς (Deus. 111.5; Somn. 2.184.7, 187.2; Deus. 3; Migr. Abr. 69.4; cf. δια` τη^ ς θεοπρεπου^ ς ε’ κκλησι'ας, Aet. 13.2). Even so, in the end, Schmidt describes the ε’ κκλησι'α as the ‫ קהל‬of the Hebrew tradition. He maintains that the word comes into Christian usage to express the “people of God” concept inherent in the Hebrew understanding. 135 Important here is James Barr’s famous critique of this semantic error in The Semantics of Biblical Language (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), chapter 6, particularly focusing his criticism on the methodological acceptance by too many of the contributors to the TWNT of the etymological fallacy, i.e., the relevance of so-called Hebrew equivalents (pp. 148-149). He clearly demonstrates the fruitlessness of trying to derive the meanings of NT words from the Hebrew words for which they may be translations. He argues for a more adequate analysis of individual cases of usage at no less than the sentence level, i.e., the priority of context (p. 57). Note the comments of the well-known linguist, John Lyons, “A particular manifestation of the failure to respect the distinction of the diachronic and the synchronic in semantics is what might be called the etymological fallacy: the common belief that the meaning of words can be determined by investigating their origins. The etymology of a lexeme is, in principle, synchronically irrelevant, Semantics, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), 2:244, cf, p. 516.

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Chapter 1: Introduction: Questions and Directions

especially in the context of the Alexandrian Jewish community, from which such great contributions to the LXX are assumed to have come, that the entire Exodus experience and especially the career of Moses, began to be described in terms traditional among Greeks, specifically, as a traditional Greek foundation-legend. As I shall argue in due course, this suggests that for Alexandrian Jews the hellenizing of the Jewish scriptures was intentional, and that such cultural creativity is to be expected in a colonializing context. As they reinscribe themselves through this retelling, the Exodus community and the community of the wilderness ceases to be the mixed multitude being distilled into a nation, but the ε’ κκλησι' α for Philo, becomes an α’ ποικι' α, a colonial expedition oracularly initiated on its adventure by their god. Similar ways of describing the Exodus and Moses are found in other Hellenistic Jewish writers, especially Josephus; a fact which indicates a contemporary, hellenizing “trend” in the translation the traditional Jewish narratives.136 If it is the case, and the LXX as well represents an attempt to describe the Exodus traditions in Hellenistic terms, then by referring to the LXX as the key to understanding the meaning and motive for appropriation behind the early Christians’ use of ε’ κκλησι' α, we cannot claim to have discovered its roots in Jewish as opposed to Greek conceptual categories. Instead, the LXX brings us face to face with the postcolonial reality of the complex cultural forms that are produced in the midst of the tension between appropriation and resistance that characterizes the encounter of the dominated and the dominant.137 Moreover, the basic breakdown of the debate is complicated by nuances expressing questions regarding such issues as, for example, the degree to which the use of ε’ κκλησι' α functions as a terminological, polemical counterpoint to the Jewish commonplace, συναγωγη' , whether the use of ε’ κκλησι' α can be traced back to Jesus and his immediate circle or must be seen as a post-crucifixion phenome———————————

136 Linton points out in his article that in Philo ε’ κκλησι'α and πολιτει'α are often synonymous when used of the Jewish community (RAC, col. 911). Philo also uses ε’ κκλησι'α to refer to the Israelite community in the wilderness at Sinai. Here it is probable that Philo is re-defining the biblical events in terms of Hellenistic political categories, the events at Sinai are constitutive of the “people,” the cultic community. However, it is difficult to argue that this is in some way distinctive of the Jewish community since the foundation traditions of the Greeks usually emphasize the cultic-political unity of the newly-founded community and its “calling into existence” by a specific god (in most cases usually Apollo, see above, chap. 2, pp. 49–51, 54–55, 61, 63–64, 70–73, 79–80, 83, 96–99). In essence, Jews of the hellenistic period were trying to say that they are a people in the same way that their Greek neighbors understood their own citizenship. 137 This is precisely the point in postcolonial discussions of the “contact zone” of cultural encounter, see: David Carrasco, “Jaguar Christians: In the Contact Zone: Concealed Narratives in the Histories of Religions in the Americas,” in Beyond Primitivism: Indigenous Religious Traditions and Modernity, ed. Jacob Obafemi Kehinde Olupona (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 128–38, esp. 130–32; Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, 2nd ed. (London and New York: Routledge, 2008).

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non (perhaps even a usage found exclusively within the Gentile mission), or whether we can even speak of ε’ κκλησι' α as a technical term at all (i. e., that it never expresses any other meaning than a concrete reference to a specific gathering of individuals whether or not particularly cultic).138 While it is true that Paul can use ε’ κκλησι' α to refer to what must be described as the Church as a whole,139 we must still take seriously the fact that his most common use of the word is in references to local congregations.140 Yet, even assuming the proposition that ε’ κκλησι' α in Paul usually refers to the actual assembly of Christians, we must still be cautious in drawing conclusions. The problem is a complicated one. According to Linton, because they are mutually dependent, neither the use of ε’ κκλησι' α for the “local congregation,” nor its use to refer to the broader church can be more “original.”141 To be sure, Paul emphasizes clearly the sense of obligation toward the Jerusalem community which he expects to motivate the generosity of the Greek congregations under his jurisdiction (Rom 15:25–27). They are spiritually indebted to the original body of believers. Moreover, Paul feels a strong sense of obligation to this congregation because of the agreements made during his consultations with James, Kephas, and John (Gal 2:6–10).142 While ——————————— 138

With respect to the Christians’ rejection of the term synagogue, see: W. Schrage, “συναγωγη' , κτλ.,” TDNT, 7:798–852, esp. 829. J. Roloff believes that the term (specifically) comes into play after the “Easter events” as the self-designation of the primitive community because it expressed this community’s apocalyptic self-understanding that it is the elect community of God being called into existence in the last days before God’s final judgment; this implies, of course, a universal definition of the term. Roloff also sees a continuity between Jesus and the developing church with respect to the definition, based on Jesus’ own self-understanding that he had been commissioned by the God of Israel to assemble his restored, end-time community; a commission Jesus transferred to his disciples. According to Roloff, the assembly of the “end-time” congregation, even a re-defined congregation, remained the central element from Jesus to his successors, Die Kirche Im Neuen Testament, GNT 10 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994); cf. James Constantine Hanges, review of Roloff, JBL 114 (1995), 510–512. 139 His unqualified remark which places in parallel, Jews, Greeks, and the ε’ κκλησι'α του^ θεου^ does point beyond the local body as a simple assembly to a new people, i.e., to a newly-distinguished cultic community (1 Cor 10:32). 140 Few scholars at present would deny that the weight of his use of the term seems to indicate that the more important reality for Paul was the objective, local bodies of believers; O’Brien is a good example of this tendency, insisting that ε’ κκλησι'α must be understood in its most basic sense as the actual assembly of Christians in the act of assembling (DPL, 124). 141 Linton, RAC 4, cols. 912–914. Linton also argues that the fact that the “local” aspect of the term is the more common one, is of no real significance to the task of definition (col. 913). 142 This is clearly evident in the amount of effort Paul puts into the collection for the Jerusalem ε’ κκλησι'α; see: Dieter Georgi, Remembering the Poor: The History of the Collection for Jerusalem (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1992); orig. publ., Geschichte der Kolleket

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Paul certainly presupposes that all members of the Christian community are baptized into Christ’s death (Rom 6:3), it is not clear that Paul also presumes that Christians in all locations are baptized into a single “trans-local body,” as is often supposed. For example, the surrounding context of 1 Cor 12:13 assumes that Paul is here not referring to any “body” beyond the Corinthian body.143 Scholars of early Christianity generally presume that the idea of a worldwide organization of mutually recognized and obligated individual cultic communities, as we find it in the case of the early Christians, was unique in the Hellenistic-Roman world.144 Even what to some appears to be, perhaps, a close analog to this type of translocal recognition of unity, i.e., the translocality found in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses, apparently runs aground on Lucius’ statement that while he felt a shared faith at the Iseum in Rome, he nonetheless realized that he was still a stranger at this particular cult site.145 Having said this, we must be cautious when describing this situation.146 On the one hand, Sohm meant something more profound than the simple fact that Paul seems to have wanted each ε’ κκλησι' α, in whatever locale, to recognize a shared indebtedness for its origin to the god of the Jews and to his Christ, through the varied activities of specific, divinely appointed apostles.147 And yet, Sohm, and those who assume his perspective, deny that this unity can be described in terms of the substantial amount of transferred cult that we shall see in Paul’s foundational activities. In fact, as I shall argue below, much of what Paul establishes in founding an ε’ κκλησι' α clearly seems to function as cultic law.148 One of the things I should make clear from the beginning is that ——————————— des Paulus für Jerusalem [1965], who argues that the collection arises out of Paul’s recognition of the Jerusalem church’s eschatological role, and is driven by Paul’s desire to demonstrate the unity of confession of all the churches rooted in the original witness of the Jerusalem congregation (esp. 18–19, 33–42, 48, 52–54). Cf. also Betz, who describes the collection as an “act of gratitude towards the mother church in Jerusalem,” Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians; a Commentary on Paul’s Letter to the Churches in Galatia, Hermeneia (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979), 103. 143 Cf. Hans Conzelmann, A Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, trans. J.W. Leitch (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1975), 211–12. 144 This was a crucial point for Sohm, cf. Grundlagen, 66. 145 Lucius must be “re-initiated” in the new sanctuary. Christians could apparently move from congregation to congregation without the necessity of going through additional baptisms locally (Apuleius, Met. 11.26). 146 See on the fallacy of the assumption of the strict locality of Greco-Roman cults, Ascough, “Translocal Relationships,” 223–41. Ascough implies a shifting continuum of translocality, and usurps the use of translocality as a categorical distinction. 147 Roloff, EDNT, 1:412. 148 Here, although we cannot be certain about Paul’s knowledge of something of this sort, the so-called Apostolic Decree is understood by the author of canonical Acts as a cultic purity law, binding on all the Gentiles, and decreed by the ε’ κκλησι'α of the authoritative apostles in Jeruslaem (more on this in due course). Also, we should note that despite Käsemann’s general agreement with Sohm’s view, he concedes the presence of sacred law

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I am not concerned with distinguishing Paul, and by extension Christianity, from the non-Christian religions of the Greco-Roman world on the basis of some notion of the supremacy or priority of “belief” or “doctrine” over practice or ritual. Certainly, non-Christian cults assumed intricate complexes of beliefs about the divine and the interaction between the world of the gods and humans. In what has been said to this point, and in what follows, my point is only that in Paul’s case, as the founder of a cult devoted to a Jewish savior among Greeks who would have known little if anything about Judaism in general and messianic/apocalyptic Judaism in particular, the volume of formerly unknown concepts about the divine and afterlife salvation would have constituted a proportionally larger percentage of what must be learned than is likely in the case where an Athenian became a devotee of Asklepios or Pan, or even Isis or Sarapis. The transfer of this body of knowledge would have consumed a sizable portion of Paul’s foundational responsibilities, but that is not to make this anything more than a distinctive feature of Paul’s groups, not something that makes them structurally or fundamentally unique. Paul’s view seems to be more complicated than Sohm would allow. While he accords Jerusalem a certain preeminence,149 Paul demands an independence of mission that, as his defense will show, is defined territorially.150 This becomes clearly evident in any attempt to integrate Paul’s acknowledgement of the primacy of Jerusalem with his absolute rejection of Jerusalembased, external interference. One way of accounting for Paul’s conflict at this point is to assume that circumcision-advocating Jesus devotees claiming to be from Jerusalem not only assumed that these various local bodies were unified ——————————— (but not “canon law”) in the Christian communities, see “Sentences of Holy Law,” 6–81, esp. 66,70–72 (on 1 Cor 5:3). Käsemann’s category of “charismatic” or “divine” law, as that which God demands through the agency of charismatic men (78–79), sets up a false distinction, since, as we shall see in the case of Dionysios of Philadelphia, Zeus apparently does the same thing. 149 Here I disagree with assessments such as Georgi’s which explain away the authoritative role of the Jerusalem community and its leadership in situations like that which Paul describes in Gal 2, describing the relationship between Antioch (Paul) and Jerusalem in terms of equality and partnership; Remembering the Poor, 26, 30–33, 42, 53–54. Regardless of Paul’s own sense of his relationship to the “Pillars” in Jerusalem, we still must recognize that Gal 2:2–3 implies that Jerusalem holds the key to Paul’s recognition in the Church at large, otherwise he would not have felt the need to go to Jerusalem. Even if the anxiety implicit in 2:2c refers to the Galatians’ anxiety about the efficacy of Paul’s gospel and not his own (Betz, Galatians, 87–88), the key to the potential authority of Jerusalem remains, N.B., ου’ δε Τι'τος ... η’ ναγκα' σθη περιτμηθη^ ναι. Paul’s use of the example of Titus as evidence of his success in Jerusalem makes sense only if some group (the ψευδα' δελφοι, v. 4) demanded that Titus be circumcised, and if this demand was rejected because some authoritative person(s) who could have, theoretically, compelled Titus to be circumcised refused to accept the position of the circumcision party. 150 Something about which I shall comment further in due course.

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through their obligation to Jerusalem,151 but also that by virtue of this obligation, representatives from Jerusalem had the prerogative to enter Paul’s congregations and correct whatever errors they might encounter. In contrast, whatever loyalty or obligation Paul felt toward Jerusalem, he rejected emphatically the idea that Jerusalem could exercise this kind of universal authority. Consistently, throughout his defense of his mission and authority, Paul presupposes an independence of apostolate that ought not be violated. Again to reiterate, we have not attempted a thorough-going analysis of the history of the scholarship on the early Christian appropriation of ε’ κκλησι' α, or the nature of its origins. We have assumed that Paul takes up a pre-existing concept. Our primary focus remains Paul’s self-understanding of his own role as a founder of churches. My only concern here is to emphasize that the history of this debate is characterized by a tendency among a substantial number of scholars, usually under the influence of liberal Protestantism (and especially Sohm), to assume an absolute disassociation of the earliest churches from any type of organization or institutionalization, especially from any structures derived from Hellenism – the charismatic to the exclusion of the routinized. This assumption has, in turn, determined much of what has been said about the nature of Paul’s authority in the churches. In the chapters to follow I intend to show that our understanding of Paul as an apostle – as a founder of churches – can be profitably augmented by an appreciation of the Hellenistic paradigm of the founder-figure. Through this comparative study, one framed and guided by my sensitivity to postcolonial perspectives, I shall, in the end, be able to propose some answers to the questions broached in this chapter, and to suggest some directions for further study.

———————————

151 The notion of formalized deference and obligation to Jerusalem, as a sacred center, is certainly not a new idea within Judaism, see, e.g., Emile Schürer, The History of the Jewish People in Age of Jesus Christ, 4 vols., rev. G. Vermes, F. Millar, and M. Goodman (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1986), 3:118–119, 140, 147–149; H. J. Leon, The Jews of Ancient Rome, rev. ed. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Press, 1995), 10, 183, 245; Lester L. Grabbe, The Persian and Greek Periods (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1992), vol. 1 of Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian, 531, 538, both Diasporic and Palestinian. However, this type of relationship between a centralized cult and widely dispersed, but formally obligated communities is unparalleled in Hellenism.

Chapter 2

The Founder as Paradigm “Quam vero Graecia coloniam misit in Aeoliam, Ioniam, Asiam, Siciliam, Italiam sine Pythio aut Dodonaeo aut hammonis oraculo?”1 So asks Cicero early in his analysis of divination. A passing comment that when put in the context of other assumptions, e.g., his recollections of the comments of other great Romans serves to distinguish Romans from Greeks on the basis of criteria we probably ought not dismiss as superficial. Cicero distinguishes Greeks from Romans on two counts relevant to our study. First, he describes Greeks as having habitually relied on oracles to guide their colonial foundations.2 His second diagnostic distinction is that Greeks presume a single founder rather than corporate, or cooperative processes, when founding colonies.3 Not only are Cicero’s distinctions well-founded, as we shall see, but he also stands on solid ground in describing these distinctive traits as parts of a peculiarly Greek complex, not so much for the founding colonies – or, as we shall also see, for founding cults, as for imagining those foundations. While the value of the foundation-legend for the reconstruction of historical events may be very low, their value to the reconstruction of Greek ways of understanding their past as part of understanding themselves is truly immense. Whereas, someone like Osborne would discard the whole category of foundation from any discussion of the history of Greek migration, it is precisely the development of the category as a discourse about the past that is crucial to our purposes.4 ——————————— 1

Cicero, Div. I.1.3. This claim stands over against what is obvious to Cicero, i.e., that Romulus was both a recipient of a foundational oracle, an accomplished augur himself, and the single founder of Rome, Div. 1.2.3; cf. 1.47.107–108; 2.38.80; Rep. 2.2.5; 2.4.10–7.12; 2.9.15–16; Mary Beard, John A. North, and Simon R. F. Price, Volume I: A History, in Religions of Rome, 2 volumes (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 182–83. 3 Here, Rep. 2.1.2, he cites Scipio’s reference to Cato’s apparently habitual comment that the Roman commonwealth (“the manner of our citizenship,” “nostrae civitatis statum”) was superior to all others precisely because it was not the foundation of a single man – its lawgiver, but founded on the minds of many of more than a single generation (“ ... nostra autem res publica non unius esset ingenio, sed multorum, nec una hominis vita, sed aliquot constituta saeculis et aetatibus.”); cf. Rep. 2.21.37, Laelius again claiming that this was Cato’s assessment. 4 For the fundamental questioning of the connection between events and the imaginative construction of the past, a question I had raised in “Greek Foundation Legend,” 494–520; see also: Robin Osborne, “Early Greek Colonization?: The Nature of Greek Settlement in 2

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This founding protocol is deeply embedded in Greek history and selfdefinition. Its antiquity reaches from Homer to Paul’s day, from the model of the individual, heroic πο' λις-founder of archaic myth, to the paradigmatic narrative’s appropriation by those validating the founding of innovative cults, including Paul’s Christ cult. The following survey will reveal across this vast expanse of time a complex of related and enduring elements that characterize the model of the founder-figure.5 One caveat, while the issue of historicity is always important, as Irad Malkin’s focus on the things that actually happened makes plain, I shall focus my attention more on the question of why these narratives are constructed.6 For what purposes did Greeks formulate these legends as we find them with the consistent set of components they possess? By implication, whether we are indeed dealing here with unchanging tradition passed from generation to generation, or with a more contextually urgent narrative, the standard plot of which returns again and again, the faceless characters that populate it allow the narrative to be reinhabited, continually reformulated, and retold in the service of the similar but particular needs of each new community that tells such tales?

1. The Beginnings of the Greek Understanding of the Founder The adaptable mythology and malleable legends that shaped the present and created the past of the ancient Greeks certainly reveal a healthy share of char——————————— the West,” in Archaic Greece: New Approaches and New Evidence, ed. Nick Fisher and Hans Van Wees (London: Duckworth, 1998), 251–69; against, see: Irad Malkin, “‘Tradition’ in Herodotos: The Foundation of Cyrene,” in Herodotos and His World: Essays from a Conference in Memory of George Forrest, Peter Derow and Robert Parker (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 153–70. Note the methodological call to recognize the mythic character of the narrative and the historical possibilities in Marinella Corsano, “Sparte et Tarente: Le mythe de fondation d’une colonie,” RHR 196 (1979): 113–14. 5 Carol Dougherty, The Poetics of Colonization: From City to Text in Archaic Greece (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 4–5. 6 Malkin, Religion and Colonization, but also note more recently his use of historical realia to argue against the application of postcolonial criticism to Greek colonialism in his article, Irad Malkin, “Postcolonial Concepts and Ancient Greek Colonization,” MLQ 65, no. 3 (2004): 341–64; on such realia, see, e.g., George L. Cawkwell, “Early Colonisation,” CQ 42 (1992): 289–303,who breaks down by century a range of motivations from drought, to threats from Asia, to population control. For much of what follows in this chapter, cf. Hanges, “Greek Foundation Legend.” Cf. also: Richard P. Martin, “The Seven Sages as Performers of Wisdom,” in Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece, Carol Dougherty and Leslie Kurke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 108–28, who distinguishes our capacity to describe the way things actually took place (historicity) from “the way in which Greeks themselves thought things happened and pictured to themselves the ideal by which they then judged the real” (108); the Sitz im Leben for such an imagining, according to Martin, being found in ritual performance.

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acters whose exploits conform very well to categories commonly used by historians of religions such as the “culture hero” or “founder.”7 However, despite the convenience of such analytical constructions, when the Greeks used the word κτι' στης8 (“founder”) they usually had a specific paradigmatic figure in mind; this figure was the “founder of cities.”9 In the early period the ——————————— 7

E.g., Eliade, Eternal Return, 22, 27–28. See: Timothy J. Cornell, “Gründer,” RAC 12 (1982): cols. 1107–45, esp. col. 1112, where he explains that η‘ γεμω` ν, α’ ργηγε' της, and οι’ κιστη` ς can be understood as three separate designations or tasks associated with the same founder, who is often described by one and then by the other of these terms; also Prehn, “Ktistes,” in RE (1922) vol. 11.2.22 cols. 2083–2087. 9 This also applies when one of its synonymous terms is used (see n. 24), as presented, e.g., in the table provided by Wolfgang Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt: Studien zu einem politisch-religiösen Phänomen der griechischen Geschichte, Palingenesia: Monographien und Texte zur klassischen Altertumswissenschaft 20 (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1984), 346– 86. Leschhorn lists 49 historical personalities identified as founders from the Hellenistic period: 37 are called οι’ κιστη' ς only. Of those to whom more than 1 term is applied: 2 of 3 references to Perieres and Krataimenes (the founders of Zankle, 730–20 B.C.E.), and 4 of 8 references to Battos (the founder of Cyrene) use οι’ κιστη' ς; συνοικιστη' ς occurs once, α’ ρχηγε' της 3 times. 2 of 3 references to Miltiades (founder of Chersoneses, mid-6th c. B.C.E.) use οι’ κιστη' ς, and κτι'στης occurs once. Four of seven references to Hieron (founder of Aitna, 475 B.C.E.) use οι’ κιστη' ς (or the poetic form, οι’ κιστη' ρ), κτι'στωρ occurs twice and κτι'στης once. Only 2 persons are called κτι'στης exclusively, Lampon and Xenocritos (the founders of Thurii [Latin, Thurium], 443 B.C.E.). Two others, Euphron, founder of Sikyon, and Telesikles, founder of Thasos (680 B.C.E.) are called α’ ρχηγε' της exclusively. Thucydides uses only οι’ κιστη' ς for historical personalities. When referring to deities he uses α’ ρχηγε' της (to refer to Apollo in 6.3.1). In one instance he refers to Minos, usually expected to be treated as more than human, as οι’ κιστη' ς (1.1.4). But it is by no means clear that Thucydides would have understood Minos’ role in the Cyclades any differently than he does other historical figures. Callimachus is less systematic, using κτι'στης once to refer to an historical personality, using οι’ κιστη' ς 3 times. When referring to Apollo he uses οι’ κιστη' ς. Herodotos only uses οι’ κιστη' ς. In references to Alexander the Great as a founder, of 20 instances listed by Leschhorn, 12 are explicit uses of κτι'στης. Alexander is called οι’ κιστη' ς twice only. With respect to the Hellenistic kings, Leschhorn finds 16 of 24 references to founders which use κτι'στης. Only 6 other references to a Hellenistic king as founder use οι’ κιστη' ς. It appears that we can safely conclude that there is a clear difference between the references to historical personalities as founders, most of whom are not kings (though they may acquire kingship), and those references to Hellenistic kings. While most of the historical personalities are from the pre-Classical period, this cannot be the result of diachronic differences in the use of language, since many of these accounts come from the later, Hellenistic period. It is most likely that the preference for κτι'στης when referring to Hellenistic kings is based upon some perceived qualitative difference between the referents. Of 78 references to deities (Olympian), and those like Herakles and Asklepios who come to be included among the gods, Leschhorn’s list shows 54 occurrences of α’ ρχηγε' της (predominantly in reference to Apollo, Artemis, and Athena); 34 occurrences of κτι'στης (or equivalents) are found (the more usual term for Dionysos). Zeus is usually called α’ ρχηγε' της, but is also referred to as κτι'στης and οι’ κιστη' ς. Herakles, on the other hand, is called α’ ρχηγε' της 6 times but κττι'στης or equivalent 19 times. In the case of Romulus, the founder of Rome, he 8

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founder of cities was responsible for establishing the new community in all essential areas of social life. He was not a “creator” of the city, nor of the habitable space that foundational ritual defined. Rather, he was the instrument through which divine impetus organized space humans might inhabit, and we shall see that this notion of creating habitable space is fundamental to the meaning of κτι' στης and its cognates. A minimal list of his responsibilities is found in Odyssey 6.7–10: ε» νθεν α’ ναστη' σας α»γε Ναυσι'θοος θεοειδη' ς, ει“σεν δε` Σχερι'η, , ε‘ κα` ς α’ νδρω ^ ν α’ λφηστα' ων, α’ μφι` δε` τει^χος ε» λασσε, και` ε’ δει'ματο οι»κους, και` νηου` ς ποι'ησε θεω ^ ν, και` ε’ δα' σσατ’ α’ ρου' ρας.10

Some have considered Homer’s story of Tlepolemos to be paradigmatic for the foundational narrative (Il. 2.653–670).11 Yet it not only lacks many of the most common narrative elements; it also lacks any description of what the founder-figure actually does when founding a colony. In contrast, in the story of Nausithous, all of the basic elements of the founder’s task are reflected.12 ——————————— is called α’ ρχηγε' της once (Cassius Dio 56.5.4, 2nd–3rd cc. C.E.), but κτι'στης 4 times and οι’ κιστη' ς twice. Under the category of “remaining deities” (“Sonstige Gottheiten”), we find an interesting pattern. When referring to non-Olympian deities and mythic heroes, the most used term is κτι'στης, followed by οι’ κιστη' ς, (on κτι'στης and οι’ κιστη' ς, cf. SEG 42.797, cf. lemma 1846); here the term α’ ρχηγε' της is rare. 10 Unless otherwise noted, all translations are the author’s: From that place, the god-like Nausithous led [them] away, and in Scheria he settled [them], away from men who labor for their livelihood. He pressed forward the construction of a wall around the city, And he built houses, and constructed temples for the gods, And parceled out the farmland. 11 E.g., see Dougherty, Poetics of Colonization, who argues for the pattern, “crisis, Delphic consultation, colonial foundation, resolution” (8); Dougherty is likewise less concerned with the historical realities of Archaic colonization than she is with the imagining of these events, as cultural creations (and like Martin, sees these as performance pieces), distilled as a common topos, shaped by factors not necessarily related to the force that may have driven the early colonists to the sea, e.g., questions of purity, the contestation of legitimacy, and identity and the “familiarization of the unfamiliar” (4–6). Crisis often includes a murder (pp. 8–9, 14–18, 31–45, 120–128) that requires purification, as here in the story of Tlepolemos (Il.2.661–666), by Delphic Apollo, who, often through riddles, prescribes colonization as the purifying solution. 12 E.g., Tacitus introduces Ptolemy I Sōtēr (305–283/2 B.C.E.), as the founder of Alexandria’s Sarapis cult, engaged in the same activities attributed by Homer to Nausithous: “Aegyptiorum antistites sic memorant. Ptolemaeo regi, qui Macedonum primus Aegypti opes firmavit, cum Alexandriae recens conditae moenia templaque et religiones adderet,” Hist. 4.83.1–4; Text, Cornelius Tacitus, Cornelii Taciti Historiarum libri, trans. C. D. Fischer, Scriptorum classicorum bibliotheca Oxoniensis (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1911).

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Nausithous leads the people to the new space to be made part of the οι’ κουμε' νη – the site for the new community – and establishes the settlement there. He sees to its security by providing walls (l. 9), assuring the security of its domestic life, and inaugurating its cult.13 The founder is guide, general, city-planner, lawgiver, and transferrer of cult.14 It is crucial for our purposes that we never lose sight of the fact that the transfer of cult was, from the beginning, an integral element of the founder’s responsibilities. For example, referring to one of the best examples of the foundation legend,15 Callimachus tells us that Battos, the founder of the Theran colony of Cyrene, brought the cult of Apollo to his new dwelling place. In addition, as if to embody both continuity and novelty, the poet provides evidence in the same hymn that the Spartan festival of the Karneia was transferred to Cyrene, and was probably established in the new colony as a part of the founding activities and the ordering of the city’s cultic calendar.16 Apparently, then, if we are to judge by ———————————

13 Note the way Pindar’s Ol. 7 brings the story of Tlepolemos more into line with the common narrative by introducing the consultation of Delphi that commands he set sail and found a city (27–33). 14 See Ernst Schmidt, Kultübertragungen, RVV 8.2 (Gießen: Töpelmann, 1910); Dougherty, Poetics of Colonization, 18–24. In the context of the mythic heros of the Trojan cycle, according to Diodorus Siculus, Dardanus, founder of Troy, was also a “transferrer of rites,” transferring the mystery rites of the Great Mother from Samothrace to Phrygia (5.48.2–5). 15 Herodotos versions were derived from these types of narrative, see: David Asheri, Alan Lloyd, and Aldo Corcella, A Commentary on Herodotos Books I–IV, ed. Oswyn Murray and Moreno Alfonso, trans. Barbara Graziosi, et al. (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), 669. 16 Ap. 65–75, 85–87. The ancient Greeks, throughout their history, consistently presupposed that the founder of a πο' λις is by nature also the founder of its cults. Perhaps one of the clearest examples of the pervasive nature of this presupposition is its presence in Plato. In both his Resp. and Leg. Plato assumes that the task of founding a political community, whether a city-state or a colony, inherently involves the founding and organizing of cultic institutions. In Resp. 2.377–79, Plato has Socrates explain to his interlocutors that while among the first necessary legislative acts is the codification of laws governing the content of religious belief and speech, the city’s ritual regulations, on the other hand, are to be instituted in accordance with the directives of the Delphic oracle. Even though appeal must be made to Delphi, these regulation are the first order of business for Plato’s hypothetical founders. The submission to Delphi for cultic direction, as we will see in due course, is a well-documented custom, and is especially important for the κτι'σις. In both texts, Plato’s Socrates seems to simply assume that there should be no innovation in the institution of cultic practice; these are rites that Delphi must control. In addition, festivals and a festal calendar must be organized (Leg. 7.799a–b, cf. GGR, 2.67), the priesthood must be established (Leg. 6.759c–d; 12.947a–b). All such things are to done in accord with the Delphic oracle’s instructions and with commonly-established custom (Resp. 4.427; Leg. 5.738b–e). Therefore, we can assume that what Plato sees as necessary in the ordering of the religious life of the community is representative of common practice in the Greek city. In all this it is striking that, although his reasons are uniquely his own, Plato shares with Greeks generally the

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Homer’s references, the proper way to narrate the story of a city-founder was already well on its way becoming common knowledge – founding as social convention.17 There is a variety of terms used to describe the actions of founders in the foundation legends. The key noun, κτι' σις occurs in a very early fragment containing the titles of works about the foundations of cities, e.g., of Colophon (Κολοφω^ νος κτι' σις), of Elea in Italia (ο‘ ει’ ς ’ Ελε' αν τη^ ς ’ Ιταλι' ας α’ ποικισμο' ς).18 From this early period and continuing into Roman times, the verb κτι' ζειν served almost exclusively as a technical term for the process of founding a city.19 Thucydides sixth book is a wonderful example of the entire technical language and logistical elements that form the Greek image of city-founding (6.3.1–5.3).20 Inscriptional evidence from areas of Pauline activity like Asia Minor is clear; the most common meaning – the one semantic constant throughout our evidence – is that a κτι' στης is someone who establishes, sets up, or by fundamental reform founds the first form of some cultural institution or practice. Emperors were routinely credited with πο' λις-foundation, even of existing cities. As one example, a bilingual inscription from Aeolis in Asia ——————————— firm conviction that the proper ordering of religious practice is of paramount importance to the well-being of the state (Leg. 10.909d–910d). 17 A. J. Graham, Colony and Mother City in Ancient Greece (New York: Barnes & Nobles, 1964), 25. Thucydides says that in his day city-founding is still done “according to ancient custom” (1.24.2). 18 Xenophanes in Diogenes Laertius 9.20; FGrH 45 T1; 534T1; Diels-Kranz, 1, no. 21[11], p. 114; also cf. Hippys of Rhegion who wrote of the founding of Italia (κτι'σις ’ Ιταλι'ας, FGrH 554 T1); Apollonius Rhodius’ Καυ' νον κτι'σις, Κνι'δου κτι'σις, and Ναυκρα' τεως κτι'σις, in John Undershell Powell, Collectanea Alexandrina: Reliquiae minores Poetarum Graecarum Aetatis Ptolemaicae 323–146 A.c.: Epicorum, Elegiacorum, Lyricorum, Ethicorum, repr. ed (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), 5–6, notes 5–7; see below also, p. 88, n. 152 dealing with “Ktisis literature.” 19 LSJ, s.v. where only entries from Christian authors and the LXX use the gloss κτι'σις with the lofty term “creation/created thing,” a pattern of translation rooted more in Christian creation theology than in actual Greek usage, as we shall see when we come to Paul’s use of the term. By extension, κτι'σις and cognates can be used to refer to what we might otherwise consider “making” or “constructing,” but these examples are rare and debatable. 20 Thucydides reveals his preference for technical terms derived from οι’ κι'ζειν, occuring consistently through section 6.4.2. In 2.4–5 he turns to κτι'ζειν and cognates, but only infrequently; cf. Thucydides elsewhere: 1.7.1; 1.12.2 (foundations by exiles); 1.12.4.4–6; 1.101.1; 2.68.3; 3.58.5.9; 3.92.4.4–93.2.4; 4.102.3.3; 5.16.3; Hecataeus, Frag., in FGrH 3a.264, frag. 25, 112–20, 184–5, 506, 665; Aristodemus, Frag., in FGrH 2a.104F, frag. 1; Strabo 4.1.5; 5.2.4; 5.3.2; 7.4.7; 8.7.4; 11.13.6; 11.14.15; 12.3.14, 41; 12.4.7; 14.1.3; 14.6.3; 15.3.2; 17.3.12; Josephus Ant. 17.341; Vit. 37; BJ 1.417–18; 6.438; Diodorus Siculus, 4.2.6; 4.67.6; 4.79.5; 5.57.2; 5.83.4; 11.88.6; 12.36.4; 14.88.1; 31.39.1; 32.6.3; 37.11.1; Dio Chrysostum, Or. 39.8; Arrian, Bithynicorum frag. 63; Antoninus Liberalis, Met. 32.3; Pausanias, 3.1.3; 3.2.1; 7.6.2; 10.2.2; Eusebius, Onom. 156.26.

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Minor (34 C.E.) applies the epithet κτι' στης to Tiberius.21 One can also use the verb κτι' ζειν for the establishment of other things, e.g., in Josephus, the deity can “produce fearless souls.”22 One can also “found” cult institutions, altars, or a group of mystai – about the last item, more in due course.23 The founder of cities was so pervasive a paradigm that nearly every Greek city in the ancient world sponsored a civic cult in honor of its legendary or mythical founder.24 But the devotion of Greeks to the memory of their found———————————

21 A simple search of the online Packard Humanities Institutes (PHI) epigraphic database reveals dozens and dozens of examples from Asia Minor of κτι'στης used in its technical meaning for the founder of cities as an epithet for the emperors; of my sampling nearly seventy-five percent of which fit this type. I point out only a few: CIL 3.7076; cf. IKyme 20 = IGR 4.1739; SEG 36.1092 (Sardis, 4–54 C.E.) where Tiberius is called the founder of the city (... και` τη^ ς πο' λεως κτι'στης, ll. 9–10); also regularly an epithet of Hadrian, IErythr 513; IEph 3410; A. Salač, “Inscriptions de Kymé d’Eolide, de Phocée, de Tralles et de quelques autres villes d’Asie Mineure,” BCH (1927): 388–89, no. 10 from Phokaia. 22 ’ Ιουδαι'οις ο‘ κτι'σας ψυχα` ς θανα' του καταφρονου' σας (BJ 3.356). 23 E.g., an undated dedication from Pisidia (SEG 19.852) to Θεο` ς « Υψιστος (l. 1) mentions the founder, a certain [Μ]αρκι'ας ο‘ αυ’ το` ς κτι'στης, ll. 5–6, who also set up an incense burner (α’ νε' στησεν και` το` ν θυμιατι'στηρον, ll. 6–9) at his own expense. We have a κτι'στης and δημιουργο` ς of a βωμο' ς from Cilicia and Isauria in ICilicie 87 (= SEG 28.1255, 2nd c. C.E.); also ο‘ κτι'στης τω ^ ν ι‘ ερω` ν το' πων from Pontus, who is also credited with being ο‘ κτι'στης and α’ ρχιερυ' ς of Pontus, see: Marek, KatAmastris, 1985: 95 (Paphlagonia, 209 C.E.), also in BCH 13 (1889): 312, 320; IGR 3.90.1435; OGIS 531. We have examples of the phrase ο‘ κτι'στης του' του του^ ε» ργου for which the exact nature of that which is founded is unclear, see: Charlotte Roueché, ed. and comp., Aphrodisias in Late Antiquity: The Late Roman and Byzantine Inscriptions Including Texts from the Excavations at Aphrodisias Conducted by Kenan T. Erim, JRS Monographs 5 (London: Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies, 1989): 857 (Caria, undated, references in Charlotte Roueché, “Acclamations in the Later Roman Empire: New Evidence from Aphrodisias,” JRS 74 [1984]: 181– 99, 193, no. 15; SEG 34.1060; BE [1987] 466; AE [1984] 883; Roueché, Aphrodisias, no. 83.15. One can be called κτι'στης for setting up του` ς θερμου' ς (“hot waters,” or “hot meals”), PHI, MAMA 55 Phrygia; for other examples associating κτι'στης with verbs for setting up or establishing from Asia Minor, see: MAMA 10, App. 1.181.4 (Phrygia). 24 Note, e.g., again from Asia Minor, IEph 501, “«Ανδροκλον το` ν τη^ ς πο' λεως κτι'στην” (ll. 1–3). Founders approximate the status of the heroes in the ubiquity of cults established in their honor. Many cities claim foundation by heroes or demigods. Sometimes founders are eponymous to their foundations, cf. Stephanus, Ethnica 49.17–50.7; 209.3–5; here cities are regularly called κτι'σμα; e.g., Romulus in Livy, ab Urbe 1.6.3, cf. Strabo 4.1.4. From Ionia we have examples of founders who give their names to dynasties and to their governed people, e.g., the royal house of Miletus is called the Νηλει^δαι after the legendary founder, Neleus (Aristotle frag. 556; Parthenius, FGrH 496 F1; Plutarch, Mor. 253F). The Milesians themselves are called “the people of Neleus” (Callimachus, Iamb. frag. 191.76), see: Noel Robertson, “Melanthus, Codrus, Neleus, Causon: Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” GRBS 29 (1988): 201–61, esp. 231. Gela, a Dorian colony in southern Sicily (founded 690 B.C.E.), claimed foundation from, Λι'νδος and Μινω ', η (Cretans and Rhodians), Callimachus, Aet. 2.4.3.46–48; cf. Aet. 2.43.54–55, 73–83, every city in Sicily has a founder’s cult, see Callimachus, Callimachus, Vol. I: Fragmenta, ed. Rudolf Pfeiffer (Oxford: Clarendon

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ers and the relation of that cultic and narrative devotion to historical events is a matter of debate. The tradition among scholars until recently has echoed the ancient view; the cult of the founder does not exist only in legend or myth but is rooted firmly in the long history of colonization which characterized the dynamic relationships within and between the independent Greek city-states, and later, as well, the imperial powers of the Hellenistic period (i. e., from the pre-classical into the Roman period).25 In fact, it has been argued that the rise of the importance of the Delphic Oracle is a direct result of this intensive interest in colonization.26 For example, Plutarch tells us that: ——————————— Press, 1949), 44–55 for text and commentary. “The cult of the oikist was a nomos, universally practiced in Greek colonies,” according to Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 11; cf. Cornell, “Gründer,” cols. 1110, 1114, 1139-45; Prehn, “Ktistes,” col. 2084. Miltiades, son of Cypselus and the founder (οι’ κιστη' ς) of Chersonesos in Thrace (sixth-century B.C.E), was honored with cult sacrifices and games, see: Herodotos 6.34–38,103.4; Aelianus, VH 12.35; cf. SEG 43.516. 25 Malkin, “‘Tradition’ in Herodotos” throughout insists on the basic historicity of the founding narratives. Note the references to the founder of Rome in Appian, Νουμα^, Ταρκυνι'ου, ‘ Ερουι'ου Τυλλι'ου, και` Ταρκυνι'ου Λευκι'ου του^ Ταρκυνι'ου· του' των τω ^ ν ε‘ πτα` ε» ργα τε και` πρα' ξεις περιε' χει. »Ων ο‘ πρω ^ τος κτι'στης τε ‘ Ρω' μης και` οι’ κιστη` ς γεγονω' ς, α»ρξας τε πατρικω` ς μα^λλον η› τυραννικω ^ ς, ο« μως ε’ σφα' γη, η› ω‘ ς α»λλοι φασι'ν, η’ φανι'σθη (cited by Photius, Bibl., cod. 1–280, 57.21–29, Jacques-Paul Migne, ed. and comp., Patrologia Graeca, vol. 103 [Paris: Migne, 1860]). We can also find divine founders of Rome, »Ομνυμι το` ν Δι'α το` ν Καπετω' λιον και` τη` ν ‘ Εστι'αν τη^ ς ‘ Ρω' νης και` το` ν πατρω^, ον αυ’ τη^ ς »Αρην και` το` ν γενα' ρχην « Ηλιον και` τη` ν ευ’ εργε' τιν ζω', ων τε και` φυτω ^ ν Γη^ ν, ε» τι δε` του` ς κτι'στας γεγενημε' νους τη^ ς ‘ Ρω' μης η‘ μιθε' ους και` του` ς συναυξη' σαντας την η‘ γεμονι'αν αυ’ τη^ ς η« ρωας (Diodorus Siculus, 37.11.1). For Romans called “founder,” cf. Agrippa (IG XII, 2 171,203); Tiberius (IG XII, 2 206; Tacitus, Ann. 2.47; Dittenberger, OGIS 471; CIL 3.7096, “conditor”); Claudius (IGR 4.902, Lycia, 43–48 C.E.); Domitian (IPriene 229); there are many examples for Hadrian (see: Prehn, “Ktistes,” col. 2086). Cf. Livy, ab Urbe; where Romulus is described as founder of Rome (1.6.3–1.7.3). Here there is no personal selection of the founder by a deity similar to what we find in the Greek stories. The use of augury (1.6.4–1.7.3) may appear at first to serve as this type of selection, however the communication of a divine commission is absent here; the decision to found a city has already been made by the two brothers, the only question to be settled by augury is which brother will bequeath his name to the new community (1.7.3, cf. Per. 1.A). 26 Cf. Callimachus on colonization, “But following after Phoibos do men measure out the dimensions of cities, for Phoibos always delights in cities founded, And Phoibos himself constructs foundations ...” (LCL trans. A. W. Mair), Ap. 2.55–7. Apollo is often described as a founder and he is seen as the paradigmatic founder-figure (See: Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1112; Malkin, Ancient Greece, 18). No element in Greek religion played a more important part in founding colonies than the Delphic Oracle. Its presence in the foundation legends is a commonplace and characteristic (Graham, Colony and Mother City, 27). Not a single authentic oracle has been preserved from another site in the ancient world dealing with founding a colony despite Cicero’s mention of Zeus Ammon in Div. 1.1.2–3; also a similar example in Pausanias, 8.11.12; cf. Malkin, Ancient Greece, 17. Those who accept the historicity of this basic narrative also agree that Delphi was actively involved in the colonization process from the 8th c. B.C.E. The most significant evidence for this is the reference to

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... many things were communicated to them [to the founders of colonies], such as signs for recognizing places (το' πων σημει^α), the times for activities (πρα' ξεων καιροι'), the shrines of gods across the sea (θεω^ ν ι‘ ερα` διαποντι'ων), secret burial places of heroes (η‘ ρω' ων α’ πο' ρρητοι θη^ και), hard to find for men setting forth on a distant voyage from Greece. You all, of course, know about Teucer and Cretines and Gnesiochus and Phalanthus and many other leaders of expeditions who had to discover by evidential proofs (ε» δει τεκμη' ριοις α’ νευρει^ν) the suitable place of the settlement granted to each.27

Certainly, this passage reveals that Plutarch assumes a general knowledge of a large number of legendary, but no less real, founders. The passage refers, of course, to the content of many of the Pythia’s oracles to founder-figures. Plutarch’s last statement sums up one of the major tasks of the founder, i.e., to lead the colony to, and identify, the new location. This explains why the founder is also referred to by the terms, α’ ρχηγε' της and η‘ γεμω' ν. Plutarch’s description confirms the reality of a characteristic of Delphi’s guidance in colonizing enterprises; Apollo always gives clues, if not specific geographic information, about the location of the future colony.28 Thucydides makes it clear that in his day cities were still regularly dispatching embassies to Delphi to receive oracular guidance in preparation for colonial expeditions.29 With the rise of Theban hegemony and eventually the ——————————— the cult of Apollo Archēgetēs already attested for Naxos, the first colony founded in Sicily (734 B.C.E). See: Thucydides 6.3.1.2–3; Appian, BCiv. 5.109; for the theory of the rise of Delphi in importance largely because of its role in colonization, see, W. G. G. Forrest, “Colonisation and the Rise of Delphi,” Historia 6 (1957): 160–75; cf. Malkin, Ancient Greece, 19. 27 Plutarch, Mor. 407f–408a. It is clear from the context that the reference is to the kind of information routinely dispensed by the Delphic oracle to founders. E.g., the oracle gives specific geographical information in the case of the founding of Magnesia on the Maeander (Otto Kern, Die Gründungsgeschichte von Magnesia am Maiandros: Eine neue Urkunde erläutert [Berlin: Weidmann, 1894], ll.28–35; 48–51). The issuance of specific geographic instructions is characteristic of foundation oracles from Delphi. One example of the “proofs” given by Apollo by which the founder can recognize the appropriate location of the colony can be seen in the story of the founding of Thebes by Cadmos. The location of the settlement is indicated by a heifer chosen by Apollo’s prophecy (ε» νθα και` ε’ ννα' σθη πομπη^, βοο' ς, η« ν οι‘ ’Απο' λλων ω » πασε μαντοσυ' νη, σι προηγη' τειραν ο‘ δοι^ο, Apollonius Rhodius, Argon. 3.1175–1187, esp. 1181–82); cf. Callimachus, Ap. 65–96, a raven, sacred to Apollo, leads the founder of Cyrene to the site of the colony; cf. further, Pausanias, 4.34.8; 5.7.3; 7.3.2; 10.10.6–8 (here an atmospheric sign is given for locating the site of Lakedaimonian colony of Tarentum). 28 On the use of riddles, signs, and puzzles associated with locating the colonial site, see: Dougherty, Poetics of Colonization, 45–60. 29 Even Thucydides could not ignore the oracular element, 1.22.2; cf. FHG 219 (25); 3.92.5; Malkin, Ancient Greece, 26. Also recall our introductory reference to Cicero on Greek colonization (Div. 1.1.2–3). Clearly for Cicero, foundation without oracle is an impossibility – at least for the Greeks. Sometimes the solution to civil strife in a colony is the selection of the appropriate founder, e.g., the Thurian colony, in order to settle the strife between its rival factions, asks the Delphic Pythia to identify the true founder of the city; the

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development of Macedonian dominance in the affairs of the entire Greek world, the traditional practice of colonization became a lost option for the formerly independent cities.30 However, the established narrative pattern surrounding the city-founder was not abandoned, but key elements endured and continued to exert a paradigmatic power in Greek culture for what would be considered the appropriate behavior of new types of founders and the stories that would be told about them. Having suggested such continuity, it is precisely at the point of making such a claim that we must take a step back to consider the suspicions raised about the nature of these narratives by my earlier question: do foundation-legends have the consistent form and content they do because they preserve the actual foundational process as it was carried out originally by Greek colonists, or do they acquire their form and content as a response to the function such stories serve for the communities that use them?31 This question will shadow this study throughout, but by way of an initial exploration I want to turn to Walter Donlan’s brief but illustrative article in which he laid out what he took to be the historical sequence of development in the Roman story of Rome’s founding, in the form we finally see in Livy’s well-known version.32 Donlan wanted, of course, to answer a different question: why did the Romans so readily appropriate Greek narratives about the founding of their own city? 33 Donlan sketches the various elements of the narrative – the flight of the Trojan refugee, Aeneas, his descendants’ foundation of Alba Longa and the sequence of Alban kings, the story of the twins, Romulus and Remus, their conflict, and the eventual founding of the city – and traces their tradition-history. He concludes that the reason the Romans so willingly appropriated the Greek foundation-legend of Rome was because it met the Romans own needs. These needs included a remedy for the “cultural insecurity of the Roman intellectuals,” a remedy that accessed the “moral support of a ‘superior’ heritage ... genealogy and a heroic past” unavailable in the mundane stories of the founding of tiny Roman villages. According to Donlan, the Romans envied the “drama and dash” of the Greek myths, and “... could not help accepting an hellenocentric view of their own origins because there was no other dynamic interpretation available ... [that] satisfied the practical aims of establishing a coherent history ... [one which] accorded with an ——————————— oracle cleverly and diplomatically settles the dispute by demanding that Apollo himself be called κτι'στης, Diodorus Siculus, 12.35.1–3. 30 See: Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1121; Prehn, “Ktistes,” col. 2085. 31 See above, pp.47–48. 32 Walter Donlan, “The Foundation Legends of Rome: An Example of Dynamic Process,” CW 64, no. 4 (1970): 109–14. 33 Christina S. Kraus, “Forging a National Identity: Prose Literature Down to the Time of Augustus,” in Literature in the Roman World, ed. Oliver Taplin (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 27–51.

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expanding vision of their greatness ... [and] provided the psychological satisfaction of knowing that the state was founded in tragedy and suffering and high drama ... they responded to the inner need to symbolize that greatness ... the need for a heroic vision of exalted dimensions.”34 I want to clarify here that the question of whether or not, in this specific case, Donlan is correct is not nearly as important as what his hypothesis assumes – a cultural encounter characterized by an imbalance of power between communities with respect to a particular category of knowledge, the presumption of accommodation to and appropriation of dominant cultural forms, and the connection between that accommodation and appropriation by the culturally dominated and this community’s need for validation in terms dictated to it by the dominant culture.35 Though Donlan fails to follow the implications of his own hypothesis, these implications point us directly to the precise conditions of cultural encounter that postcolonial critique would predict, namely, that the “final” Roman narrative in Livy is the product not simply of accommodation to and appropriation of dominant Greek cultural forms – it is certainly that – but, as we should expect, the Roman foundation-legend is simultaneously the very contestation of those forms. To put it another way, the final Roman version is an act of cultural mimicry, a mirror image of the Greek form, seeming so similar yet subtly and fundamentally different.36 The contestation works in the following way: in Donlan’s scenario, Romulus derives from the eponymous ancestor of the Romans and therefore represents the native element in the story. Donlan accounts for Remus, on the ——————————— 34

“Foundation Legends,” 113. On the origin and development of the Roman foundation myth, see more recently: Jan N. Bremmer, “Romulus, Remus and the Foundation of Rome,” in Roman Myth and Mythography, Jan N. Bremmer and Nicholas M. Horsfall, eds., Bulletin Supplement 52 (London: Institute of Classical Studies, 1987), 25–48. 36 What Bhabha has called a “secret art of revenge” Location of Culture, 80, also 80–85; 121–130. The Roman appropriation of the dominant Greek forms effaces them in a manner not unrelated to the “invisibility” or “ellipsis” of the dominated in Bhabha’s terms, “... the effect of mimicry is camouflage,” (p. 121). Donlan’s Romans, and the Romans cultural critique predicts, appear in modern hindsight to have been the dominant power, but their own might measured by their increasing military expansion could not completely compensate for their sense of cultural ambiguity and their desire for identity, the occasion of what Bhabha calls “the ambivalence of mimicry (almost the same, but not quite” (p. 123). The Greek narratives were not innocent but inscriptions of Roman identity imposed by the culturally dominant as authoritative. The Romans appropriate these cultural forms as the means to contest them. Cf. Osterloh’s description of the Maccabean appropriation of Hellenic virtues and heroic models to reinscribe Jewish self-identity as the contestation of the dominant discourse: Kevin Lee Osterloh, “Judea, Rome and the Hellenistic Oikoumenê: Emulation and the Reinvention of Communal Identity,” in Heresy and Identity in Late Antiquity, ed. Eduard Iricinschi and Holger M. Zellentin, Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 119 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), esp. 177–79. 35

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other hand, in terms of Greek theories of the eponym, e.g., as a derivation from the Greek form, Hrōmē (‘ Ρω' μη).37 He can thus point forward in time to the explanation of Dionysios of Halicarnassus where the proposed eponymous ancestor has become the masculine Hrōmos (‘ Ρω' μος).38 Again I emphasize, the issue here is not whether Donlan’s hypothesis is correct but that it serves to raise the proper questions.39 Through it all, Donlan is only concerned to explain what benefits the Romans got from their appropriation of the Greek stories – the explanation of their wholesale take-over of the Greek accounts of Rome’s foundation. Yet, despite his clear and limited focus, Donlan again reveals what we should expect to find, namely, that despite the Romans’ massive appropriation of the dominant mythic tradition in the construction of their own story, in the form that Livy preserves it, the Romans, nevertheless, contested the authority of the Greek traditions they used.40 The story in Livy rejects, Hrōmos (by that time Remus), the eponym of the Greek tradition. As Donlan reminds us, the narrative kills Remus off to leave only Romulus – the one whom Donlan believes to be the native eponym – as the undisputed founder of the city.41 My fundamental point is that in this example we can discern a warning to be methodologically watchful. For our purposes, whether or not one agrees with Donlan’s hypothesis, the lesson is simple; we must expect similar creative innovations to appear as the natural cultural products of contested cultural encounters, those moments in which identities are inscribed and reinscribed, those moments when appropriation as mimicry serves as the medium of resistance. Existing cultural forms are fluid and can flow easily into new cultural concoctions. These new configurations are not necessarily unprecedented as if there is no continuity with previous streams, but they are innovations nonetheless, or to put it in Bhabha’s terms, they are “neither the one thing nor the other,” but a third thing.42 In our case, that resistance, expressed as re-inscription, takes the shape of a written narrative, a foundation-legend. Again as Bhabha observes, “[w]hat emerges between mimesis and mimicry is a writing, a mode of representation, that marginalizes the monumentality of history, quite simply mocks its power to be a model, ——————————— 37

Plutarch, Rom. 1.2.4. Ant. rom. 1.71.5.2–8. 39 Contrast Jaan Puhvel, “Remus et Frater,” HR 15 (1975): 146–57. 40 “The menace of mimicry is its double vision which in disclosing the ambivalence of colonial [here dominating] discourse also disrupts its authority,” Bhabha, Location of Culture, 126, Bhabha’s emphasis. 41 “Foundation Legends,” 111–12. But cf. Timothy J. Cornell, “Aeneas and the Twins: The Development of the Roman Foundation Legend,” Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 21 (1975): 1–32. 42 Location of Culture, 49. 38

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that power which supposedly makes it imitable.”43 In other words, according to modern cultural criticism, in an encounter like that between Romans and Greeks, we should not expect to find the Romans simply appropriating the dominant mythology, as if passively holding out their empty cultural cup to be filled by Greek cultural forms. Rather, we should predict their reshaping of the dominant narrative to make it distinct from existing Greek conceptions. The recognition of this function should widen our vision to predict that it is no less important when the group identity being contested and negotiated is a cultic one – when it is Paul and the contestation inherent in the group-identity construction of his ε’ κκλησι' αι. 1.1. The Founder-Figure in the Hellenistic-Roman Period The new Hellenistic monarchs, beginning with Alexander himself, founded cities in their own names as part of their imperial policies. Nevertheless, the descriptions of their actions consistently portray these monarchs in the same terms used for the paradigmatic founders of the past.44 Our evidence gives us no reason to suspect that the descriptions of their actions as founders reflect only the romanticism of their chroniclers and not the continuing power of the paradigm.45 In other words, regardless of the connection between history and narrative, the pattern expressed in the narrative by this period is firmly established and appears to determine the actions of those who desire to act as founder-figures. In the Hellenistic period, the impetus for the foundation of cities no longer came from the independent πο' λεις, as in earlier days, but from the supreme monarch. Hellenistic kings took on the role of founder, without, however, the actual personal involvement which characterized the earlier pattern.46 Instead, agents of the king serve as the administrative officials in ——————————— 43

Location of Culture, 127, Bhabha’s emphasis. Pausanias 7.5.1–3 describes Alexander as οι’ κιστη` ς of Smyrna by command of a dream-vision. Hellenistic monarchs founded cities, but essentially by giving old cities new names (Ammianus Marcellinus 14.8.5–6). Also see: above, note 9. 45 Cf. Diodorus Siculus’ description of the motivation of history (the stories of the founding deeds of great men, see p. 88, note 152 on “Ktisis Literature”). Diodorus believed that the honorable memory of ancient heroic figures and their great deeds provokes in contemporary men the desire to imitate such actions. For the rulers of the Hellenistic-Roman period, the founding, or refounding, of cities provided a means by which to evoke and appropriate a revered virtue of the heroic past. 46 Examples of kings who are called founders in the eastern Mediterranean include: Mithridates Eupator (ο‘ κτι'στης προσαγορευθει`ς κατε' στη του^ Πο' ντου κυ' ριος, Strabο, 12.3.41; cf. 13.1.28; Appιαν, Mith. 561); Antigonos as founder (κτι'σμα ’Αντιγο' νου, Strabο, 12.4.7); Teucer, founder of Salamina (Τευ^ κερος προσωρμι'σθη πρω ^ τον ο‘ κτι'σας Σαλαμι^να τη` ν ε’ ν Κυ' πρω, , Strabο, 14.6.3); Seleucus Nicator as city-founder (Σελευ' κου του^ Νικα' τορος κτι'σματα, Strabο, 16.2.4); Demetrios Poliorketes receives sacrifice as κτι'στης (Diodorus Siculus. 20.102.3; cf. Plutarch, Demetr. 53; Strabo, 9.436); Eumenes II (OGIS 301); Antiochus IV Epiphanes (OGIS 253, also cf. no. 358; Polybius, 8.14; Plutarch, Arat. 53; 44

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charge of foundations.47 Moreover, these Hellenistic foundations are often little more than the renaming of an existing city, accompanied perhaps by the institution of a Greek-styled constitution and the building of a gymnasium.48 The use of the word κτι' στης continued to be used to express the importance of the civic founder through the end of the Hellenistic period and into the Roman.49 Roman city-founders can, at times, be designated by Greek terms; Appian writes of Drusus, the founder of twelve cities, and also of the colonization of Africa under the principal leadership of Gracchus. Gracchus is given the task of establishing a colony in Libya by the Senate, and Appian calls Gracchus and his co-leader Flaccus, οι’ κισται' .50 Non-Greeks such as Josephus, whose familiarity with Greco-Roman culture is well-known, could describe non-Greeks as founders, e.g., Herod the Great is called κτι' στης.51 As ——————————— Pausanias 2.8.1); Pompeius (IG XII, 2 140/1, cf. 171, 203); Theophanes of Mytilene (“conditor,” Tacitus, Ann. 6.18). Although not a hellenistic king, the ancient founder of Cyrene, Battos, is known to Strabo from the hymn of Callimachus and is, by Strabo’s time, known to be the founder of the city and of the ruling dynasty (λε' γεται δε` η’ Κυρη' νη κτι'σμα Βα' ττου· προ' γονον δε` του^ τον ε‘ αυτου^ φα' σκει Καλλι'μαχος· ηυ’ ξη' θη δε` δια` τη` ν α’ ρετη` ν τη^ ς χω' ρας, Strabo, 17.3.21). 47 Cornell, “Gründer,” cols. 1129–30. 48 On the pattern under the Ptolemies, see: Katja Müller, Settlements of the Ptolemies: City Foundations and New Settlement in The Hellenistic World, Studia Hellenistica 43 (Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2006). For the Seleukid patterns, see: Getzel M. Cohen, The Seleucid Colonies: Studies in Founding, Administration and Organization, Historia 30 (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1978) and John D. Grainger, The Cities of Seleukid Syria (Oxford and New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press, 1990). 49 As we shall see in due course, where Romans tell foundation stories of the Greek type, they have followed Greek models (more on this in the section on the narrative genre, below). However, the Romans do not borrow Greek terminology. One Latin term for “founder” is auctor. Cicero uses the term to refer to the prime mover, maker, and creator (Cat. 1.27, cf. Quintilian, Inst. 12.10.18; 3.7.21). Dardanus is called “pater et auctor” (Virgil, Aen. 8.134); cf. Pomponius Mela 1.101 (40 C.E., an equivalent of conditor); Pliny, Nat. 22.5; Tacitus, Ann. 3.62; Ovid, Tr. 1.10.25. Of course, Livy’s usual terms are “condere, conditor” (ab Urbe 1.6.3–1.7.3; Per. 1.A). Another common Latin term translated “to found” is ducere (cf. Deduxisti coloniam Casilinum, quo Caesar ante deduxerat (referring to Marcus Antonius). The controversy at issue in this instance is of interest to our comparison with Paul (as we will see later) because it deals with the legality of trying to found a colony where one has already been founded (Phil. 2.40.102). There is no real Latin equivalent for κτι'στης or οι’ κιστη' ς (Cornell, “Gründer,” 1125). Romulus is described with many of the qualities and characteristics of the Greek founder (the early accounts, written under the influence of Greek models, follow the traditional Greek pattern); cf. Diokles in Plutarch, Rom. 3.1, 8.9; but cf. Cicero, Rep. 2.37; Polybius 6.10.14. 50 Appian, BCiv. 1.3.23–24; 2.3.23 (=13–17 of his Hist. rom.). 51 For Herod as founder in Josephus’ Antiquities, note: the ancient table of contents on AJ 16.4 (ω‘ ς α’ γω ^ νας η» γαγε πεντετηρικου` ς ‘ Ηρω' δης ε’ πι` τη^, Καισαρει'ας κτι'σει); Herod as founder of Tiberius in Galilee, Vit. 37.4 (παρελθω` ν ου” ν ει’ ς με' σσους διδα' σκειν ε’ πειρα^το το` πλη^ θος, ω‘ ς η‘ πο' λις α’ ει` τη^ ς Γαλιλαι'ας α»ρξειεν ε’ πι` γε τω ^ ν ‘ Ηρω' δου χρο' νων του^ τετρα' ρχου

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I have already mentioned, in the Roman period, in continuity with its use among the Hellenistic monarchs, the title of κτι' στης is bestowed upon Roman emperors in a manner reminiscent of Diadochi. Yet, change is noticeable in the relations between the image and realistic actions of the founder. According to Cornell, “In the Hellenistic and Roman period, the term κτι' στης lost all of its actual significance, although the corresponding idea of a great benefaction, of the founding of a city, was readily available.”52 The emperor was recognized by this term as the benefactor of the state, with the title essentially taking on an honorary character – one bestowed in gratitude.53 Despite this change, that is, the loss of any real opportunity for Greek colonizing or for the acquisition of personal reputation associated with it, important elements of the foundational paradigm endure, but concentrated in the service of a different set of foundational enterprises – the most common, the foundation of cultic institutions. 1.2. The Cultic Aspects of the Paradigm of the Founder-Figure The paradigm or model of the founder-figure was not limited in its influence to the political activities of monarchs. Because the language of foundation remained relevant to the formation of social groups (especially cultic associations of various sorts), because of the basic presuppositions it expressed about the nature of authority within these groups, and because of its value in legitimating their existence, foundation language continued to find expression in a variety of contexts. In this respect, it is important to recall that the founding of a city was not what we would understand as a simply secular act, one only concerned with political or economic issues. Rather, the founding of a πολι' ς was in large part a cultic act. Traditionally, on site, the founder took responsibility for the establishment of the necessary new sanctuaries,54 the establishment of cultic regulations, the creation of cultic calendars, the enlistment of civic officers with cultic responsibilities, etc.55 In this role the founder imitates the role of Apollo, becoming the mediator of religious practice, and the

——————————— και` κτι'στου γενομε' νου,..); Herod as founder and memorializer of his father, BJ 1.417 (και` γα` ρ τω ^, πατρι` μνημει^ον κατε' θηκεν πο' λιν, η‹ ε’ ν τω ^, καλλι'στω, τη^ ς Βασιλει'ας πεδι'ω, κτι'σας ποταμοι^ς τε και` δε' νδρεσιν πλουσι'αν ω’ νο' μασεν ’Αντιπατρι'δα ...). 52 Cornell, “Gründer,” 1144–45. 53 See above, p. 53, note 21. 54 B. D. Meritt, “Notes on Attic Decrees,” Hesperia 10 (1941): 301–37, esp. 319 regarding the Brea decree. 55 According to Malkin, religion “provided both the concrete and the symbolic framework of ‘foundation’ through the creation of sanctuaries, the establishment of cults, the transfer of sacred fire, the regulation of the sacred calendars, the setting up of altars,” etc., in Religion and Colonization, 1–2.

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exegete of sacred tradition;56 the founder carries on the activity of Apollo.57 Recalling earlier comments, we must carefully distinguish this kind of “founding” from the founding of a religion; the latter is not taking place here. The founder of cults is not the founder of a new religion, although adaptations in the traditions being relocated are inevitable in the new context. With respect to religious practice – and it is practice with which we are concerned here, not proper belief 58 – the Greek founder-figure is characterized in the narrative as a conservationist and not as a revisionist; the crucial issue in cult transferal is that proper practice be maintained.59 Nevertheless, according to our extant narratives the founder must deal pragmatically with the consequences of re-location. In exercising his role in terms of religious authority, the founder takes on the all-important task of recognizing the sacred amidst the profane by determining the community’s relationships to the sacred geographically. The relationship between sacred and ———————————

56 Lampon, the Athenian οι’ κιστη' ς of the Thourioi, is called “... an exegete of the foundation of the city.” (Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 27; cf. Aristides, Or. 27.5). 57 Plutarch, Mor. 407f–408a; Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 27. The colony, in its location or site, can be described as a “gift” from Apollo to the οι’ κιστη' ς (Ibid, p. 6). In this connection, Malkin points out the labelling of the colony as a tithe to Apollo (pp. 31–41), e.g., the Rhegion colony of southern Italy (founded 730 B.C.E.), see: G. Vallet and Villard F., “Les Dates de la Fondation de Megara Hyblaea et de Syracuse,” BCH 76 (1952): 289– 346; cf. FGrH 555 F9 = Strab. 6.257; cf. also: Dionysius Halicarnassus, Ant. Rom. 19.2; Diodorus Siculus, 8.23.2; IMagnMai no. 17; Ath. 4.173 = FHG 11fr. 198a/Conon, Narr. 29 = FGrH 26 F1 (29). As the servant of the god, the founder not only mediates religious practice from the god to the new community, he also serves as the transitional element between mother and daughter cities. In other words, because the Delphic oracle concerns potential realities and not existing communities, the oracular command cannot be given to the mothercity alone, or else the new community would never be anything but a possession of the mother-city. Neither could the oracle be given to colonists, future citizens of the city, who had yet to be selected and organized into an expedition. The oracular command must be a commission to an individual founder-figure who stands in between, linking the mother and the daughter cities while maintaining their independence from one another (Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 28). We should note here, the story of Numa. According to Livy’s summary of book 1 (Per. 1.A), Numa hands on traditional rites (tradere ... ritus sacrorum). The reformer wants to refocus the Roman’s priorities on religious matters and so he re-founds the city on the basis of law, builds a temple, sets the cultic calendar, appoints priests and establishes a new priestly order (the Vestal Virgins), establishes a yearly festival, and many other rites (1.19.1–1.21.5). All this is done to insure proper respect for ancestral ritual practice (patrios ritus) and to prevent pollution by the influence of foreign or novel practices. The story of Numa the reformer is also interesting in that Livy describes how Numa felt it necessary to pretend to carry on nocturnal conferences with the divine Egeria (simulat sibi cum Egeria congressus nocturnos esse, 1.9.5, cf. 1.21.3) in order to get advice on cultic matters. 58 Despite Plato’s concerns, see p. 51, note 16 above. 59 As we will see in due course, this means ritual execution “according to the customary practice of the homeland” (κατα` πα' τρια).

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profane space must be determined ad hoc in the specific environment of the new community by the founder according to his own pragmatic considerations.60 Irad Malkin believes that the founder himself decided where the sacred sites were to be located based on his own priorities, “not external religious criteria, but simply rational and functional guidelines of territorial organization and town-planning.”61 Malkin correctly recognizes that this cultic role of the founder is an innovation, a revolutionary concept in Greek religion brought into prominence solely in the context of and through the demands of colonization and foundational practice. 1.3. The Cult Founder The quest for a foundational pedigree will certainly continue throughout our period, as established cities re-narrate their past to serve the needs of their present. However, with noticeably more frequent evidence through the Hellenistic period, we can document an increasing appropriation of the use of the foundational paradigm. From the earlier dominance of the narrative of the city-founder to the common use of this established in the paradigm in narratives of cult foundation – an understandable inference from the religious character of the city-founder and his personal selection by his divine patron, Delphic Apollo. This divine connection, so deeply embedded in the history of Greek colonization, endured even while delphic-sanctioned colonial πο' λιςfoundation declined with the close of the Classical period. Appeal to Delphi ———————————

60 Malkin takes issue with Nilsson’s conclusion that for Greeks places were simply inherently sacred, and as a consequence a temple was raised on a site long recognized as sacred, countering that while this may explain the nature of the sacred space within the Greek homeland it cannot explain the location of sacred sites in newly settled colonies (Religion and Colonization, 10). Malkin’s qualification misses the larger issue, namely the formation of the sacred. He seems to accept Nilsson’s assumption that sacrality is inherent to the thing identified as sacred. While Eliade’s concept of the hierophany might be employed to lend support to Nilsson’s opinion (Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion, Bison Books reprint ed., trans. Rosemary Sheed [Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1996]), I understand Eliade’s conception to have more in common with the rather stringent Durkheimian formulation of the sacred, i.e., sacrality is always bestowed never inherent (some of Eliade’s modalities of the sacred can provoke attention by their very nature, e.g., most obviously the sky), and always bestowed by some ritual process, Émile Durkheim, Les formes élémentaires de la vie religieuse, le systéme totémique en Australie, Travaux de l’Année Sociologique (Paris: F. Alcan, 1912), 53–58; cf. Jonathan Z. Smith, “To Take Place,” in To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual, by Jonathan Z. Smith (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 96–117. 61 Religion and Colonization, 10. The founder must act independently in the new situation, evaluate the needs of the community according to the demands and possibilities of the new circumstances, and avoid the pressure to follow a prescribed model which is irrelevant to the present reality; as we shall see, this creativity is also characteristic of Paul’s pattern, but contrast Osborne, “Greek Colonization?” 261.

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for divine approval of religious innovation continued. This is certainly not to argue that all the fundamental thematic elements or motifs of the colonial narrative participate in this new function. It is nevertheless true that Delphi’s foundational tendencies continued to be expressed, and expanded to serve as the model for other deities who we find guiding their own migration to new locations – leading their own colonizing enterprises – during the HellenisticRoman period, thus preserving the traditional religious role of the πο' λιςfounder in a range of creative cultic forms. Whereas in earlier days, πο' λεις appealed to Delphic Apollo, α’ ρχηγε' της, for approval and guidance in their decisions about potential colonization, with increasing frequency, beginning in the Hellenistic period, cities and individuals call on Apollo wherever he can be accessed to approve the expansion and revision of existing cults, or the introduction of new cultic institutions.62 The cult of Asklepios provides perhaps the best early example of this developing tendency. The Delphic oracle issued recommendations for the foundation of new cult institutions for Asklepios,63 the most famous example of which is the transferal of Asklepios from Epidauros to Rome.64 Delphic sanction of the cult came in two forms: first Delphi – apparently very early on – confirmed the popular mythology that Apollo is the father of Asklepios, and also legitimated the claims of the Epidaurians to be the birthplace of the god.65 This kind of validation was crucial to the acceptance of Asklepios by major Greek cities. In addition, by the end of the fifth-century B.C.E. Asklepios had received a sacred precinct at Delphi.66 While the political or civic aspects of the πο' λις-founder ceased to be essential elements, the definitive importance of the paradigm to the social and religious institutions of the city, as well as to the self-understanding of its individuals, lived on in the respect accorded to ——————————— 62

With respect to oracular guidance for cultic reformation, cf. the Milesians who dispatch an embassy to Apollo at Ionian Didyma for consultation regarding modifications of their cult, LSAM 47 (228/23 B.C.E.). 63 Cf. the foundation of Demeter Eleusinia in Pheneüs by Naüs according to a Delphic oracle (Pausanias, 8.15.1–5), and the official invitation to Thracian Bendis after Athenian consultation of the Dodonian oracle, IG II, 2 1263. 64 Ovid, Met. 15.631–40. Of course, other versions of the story claim that the Romans consulted the Sibylline oracles for a solution to the plague of 292 B.C.E. rather than Delphi (cf. Valerius Maximus 1.8.2); IG IV, 2 121–22.33, ll. 9–12 (post 350 B.C.E.) contains the story of a certain Thersandros from Halieis, after whose healing by a sacred snake from the Asklepieion in Epidauros, the city of Halieis appealed to Delphi and was commanded to build a temple to the god on the spot of the healing. I shall return to Asklepios in due course. 65 Pausanias, 3.26.4; Hom. Hymn. Ap. 16.1.5. 66 E. J. Edelstein and L. Edelstein, Asclepius: A Collection and Interpretation of the Testimonies, Publications of the Institute of the History of Medicine: The Johns Hopkins University, Second Series: Texts and Documents 2 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1945), 120–21.

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those who found particular institutions. These include a growing number of those in the Hellenistic period who found new cult sites or organize cultic or festival societies.67 For example, Lucian of Samosata (Syr. D. 1.10.7) preserves the foundation legend of the famous temple of Hera of Hieropolis in Syria,68 completed dur———————————

67 E.g., we have evidence for a founder, who also named his a thiasos, after himself, the so-called thiasos of Menekleides; ε» μμεναι δε` τα` ν στα' [λ-]│λαν ταυ' ταν ι‘ ρα^ν τω^ Διονυ' σω τω ^ν θια│-σωτα^ν τω ^ ν Μενεκλει'δα, IKyme 30, ll. 4–6; cf. also the reference in Callimachus, Aet. 73–83 to a cult for an unknown founder, which included sacrifices (despite the fact that the god refused to name the proper founder, the cult continued to operate, cf. also: IG II, 2 1364, a 1st c. C.E. Attic shrine of Asklepios and Hygieia whose founder receives a share of the sacrifices, ll. 4–9); we also know of a founder of a group of mystai, “κτι'στης ει‘ ερω^ ν μυστω ^ ν,” from Melos, from which we should probably infer a new cult, Franz Poland, Geschichte des griechischen Vereinswesens, Preisschriften (Fürstlich Jablonowskische Gesellschaft zu Leipzig) 38 (Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1909), 37, B216, 1.4 (=IG XII, 3 1098); cf. B219a = C. Smith, “Inscriptions from Melos,” JHS 17 (1897): 14, no. 31, mentioning a hierophantēs of the mystai). There are also founders of altars, ω‘ ς α›ν θεα^, πρω ^ τοι κτι'σαιεν βωμο` ν ε’ ναργε' α, και` σεμνα` ν θε' μενοι πατρι' τε θυμο` ν ι’ α' ναιεν κο' ρα, τ’ ε’ γχειβρο' μω’, , Pindar, Ol. 7.42; Aristotle, the founder of a philosophy, “’Αριστοτε' λει τω ^, κτι'σαντι ταυ' την τη` ν φιλοφοφι'αν ...,” Dionysios Halicarnassus, Amm. 1.5; Asklepios as founder of the medical arts, Diodorus Siculus, 5.74.6. See: Cornell, “Gründer,” 1143–44. Cf. also, T. Flavius Severianus Neon, κτι'στης of the library he built to honor his father, SEG 43.950, 953 (Psidia), cf. SEG 41.1593. 68 It is important to note that with respect to the establishment of temples, certain other terms are preferred: specifically, ι‘ δρυ' ειν and οι’ κοδομει^ν. According to LSJ, s.v. «ιδρυμα, – ατος, the neuter form and the feminine noun «ιδρυσις can refer to the abstractions, “establishment, founding, foundation,” or to concrete referents, e.g., ‘ Ερμε' ω ι‘ δρυ' σεις (“statues of Hermes”); «ιδρυμα θεω^ ν (“shrine of the gods,” see: Edward L. Hicks and Charles T. Newton, eds. and comps., Ephesos, The Collection of Ancient Greek Inscriptions in the British Museum 3.2 [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1890], no. 482, also p. 294 = IEph 1a 24, B, ll. 11– 14, 162–64 B.C.E., cf. Strabo 4.1.4). These nouns can refer especially to temples. The verb expresses the same basic sense, “to set in place, to position.” Hence, to set in place a statue, to encamp an army, or, in the middle, to establish or found. However, the participle can be used to modify the noun κτι'σμα (κτι'σμα ι‘ δρυμε' νον, here referring to an Athenian colony called “9 Roads,” Strabo, 7.1.35). ‘Ιδρυ' ειν can occur in a variety of parallel constructions with very often apparently little clear distinction between the objects of the verbs, e.g., in telling the story of the founding of the temple of Melkart (Herakles) in Tyre, Herodotos argues that the temple was founded at the same time as the city (ι«ρον του^ θεου^ ι‘ δρυθη^ ναι ... α«μα Τυ' ρω, οι’ κιζομε' νη, , 2.44). However, the verb οι’ κι'ζειν is related to the noun οι’ κιστη` ς, which is clearly a designation of the πο' λις-founder, who, in the founding, settles a community into domestic life, part of which task must include the establishment of temples. The οικ-group of terms appear to more consistently encapsulate the idea of the settlement of people in homes. Therefore, while οι’ κοδομει^ν (and cognates) can be used for the construction of temples, ι‘ δρυ' ειν would not be used for the founding of a city. Also cf. ι‘ δρυ' σεις for the founding of temples, e.g., a temple in Egypt, “ι‘ δρυ' σασθαι δε` και` ι‘ ερο` ν τω ^ ν γονε' ων Διο' ς ” Hecataeus, Fragmenta, Jacoby edition, F 3a, 264, F frag. 25.117; SIRIS 355, ll. 3–4 (Soli, Cyprus, 3rd c. B.C.E., cf. also SIRIS 270, ll. 4–5); Plutarch, De Is. et Os. 360c (referring to

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ing the reign of Seleucus Nicator, king of Syria (312–282 B.C.E.), founded by Stratonice,69 his wife, the daughter of Demetrios Poliorketes.70 According to Lucian, there were statues of Stratonice and Kombabos (Syr. D. 20), the general sent to assist her, placed outside the temple (Syr. D. 40). Although Lucian is dealing with an historical foundation, his story, as so often in foundation-legends, moves into the realm of myth.71 The history of the cult rightly begins in the age of the great flood in the time of Deucalion (12–13). Lucian then traces a series of variants, coming to the one he believes to be more likely, i.e., that the original temple was built by the mythical Semiramis for her mother Decreto (14). Stratonice, the foundress of the present temple (το` ν δε` νυ^ ν ..., 17), becomes difficult to distinguish from her mythical Babylonian counterpart. Kombabos is also a figure reminiscent of Humbaba from the Gilgamesh story.72 Apparently, Stratonice steps into the role of Semiramis as foundress. Lucian’s tale reveals again how easily the foundation-legend can appropriate mythical or legendary elements in the quest for ancient and venerable origins. Also from the Hellenistic period we have inscriptional evidence for the transferal of the cult of Sarapis from Egypt to Delos. Although he is not called a κτι' στης, it is clear from his action of cult transfer (i. e., bringing with ——————————— Plato, Leg. 716a); ι‘ δρυ' ειν means to set up a god in a sanctuary, IPerg. 2.251, ll. 8–9 (referring to the Asklepieion); IG II, 2 4960a, l.9; Pausanias, 2.23.2–4 (Argos) and 6.21.4 (Elis); Aristides, Or. 23.15; Theophrastus, Char. 16.4 (a hero shrine). Also cf. variant compounds such as: ε’ νιδρυσα' μενος ναο' ν and its τε' μενος, Josephus, B.J. 1. 403 (the account of the founding of Baste); καθιδρυθησο' μενον ι‘ ερο' ν, Ant. 13.70; καθιδρυ' σατο ναο' ν, ε’ νιδρυ' σατο ... κτι'σμα/κτι'σις, and καθ’ η‹ ν «ιδρυται ο‘ του^ υ‘ ψι'στου θεου^ νεω` ς α«γιος, Philo, In Flacc. 46. The next most common word for building a temple is οι’ κοδομει^ν; cf. IG XII, 3 248/279, ll. 9, 28 (Anaphe, 2nd c. B.C.E.); Pausanias, 5.6.5 (referring to a temple built by Xenophon); 6.21.4; 10.34.6; 10.38.13 (Naupactus); also ε’ ποικοδομει^ν, Josephus, Ant. 11.79; cf. the Latin, condita ... templa, Arnobius, Adv. Nat. 7.44–48. 69 Actually, according to Lucian, the temple that now stands is not the original one attributed to the Babylonian queen, Semiramis. That temple was allowed to deteriorate over time. It is the second temple that he ascribes to the activity of Stratonice (cf. Syr. D. 14 and 17). There is mention of another cultic foundress (κτι'στρια), a Menodora from Sillyum, who was chief priestess of the Sebastoi, and additionally the priestess of both Demeter and of all the gods, hierophantēs of the ancestral gods, demiurge, gymnasiarch, and dekaprotos (IGR 3.801–2, undated). 70 Plutarch, Demetr. 38. 71 For Lucian the stories of foundings of laws and cults are mythologoumena (Syr.D. 16– 17); these are both the content of belief and the history of the cult. It is also interesting to note that in such mythologoumena the builders of the temple are called οι’ κισται'. 72 James B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, 2d ed (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1955), 97, tablet 3, Humbaba = Huwawa (Old Babylonian version) is a monster which Gilgamesh intends to fight. Cf. Ammianus Marcellinus 14.16.17; Robert A. Oden, Studies in Lucian’s De Syria Dea. 2d. Ed, HSM 15 (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1977), 36–41.

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him to Delos a small figure of the god that he set up in his rented quarters) that the founder of the cult of Sarapis on Delos, an Egyptian priest named Apollonios, would have been understood as a founder-figure.73 Referring to the early hellenistic period, but written in the first-century C.E., the accounts of Tacitus (Hist. 4.83) and Plutarch (De Is. et Os. 28 [361F–362A]) of the role of Ptolemy I Sōtēr (305–283/2 B.C.E.) in the establishment of the cult of Sarapis in Alexandria also reflect the paradigm of the founder. In Tacitus’ account Ptolemy is introduced as cult founder.74 Obviously, I have simply stated here my view that these examples perpetuate key aspects of the model of the founder-figure. In what follows I will show precisely what these key aspects are and why their presence suffices to demonstrate the continuity of the paradigm.

2. The Language of Foundation The language of foundation – the language used in the legends about foundations and founder-figures – is not so defined by a limited set of technical terms and expressions as it is a complex of themes and patterns within which a variety of terms may be used. For this reason, I will grant up front that it will prove rather difficult to connect each of the self-descriptive statements of the apostle Paul with specific linguistic parallels on the basis of which an account of his career in terms of the role of the founder-figure and the narrative genre of foundation-legends can be constructed.75 Certain foundational terms that are important in Greek foundation accounts are clearly absent from the Pauline letters, e.g., κτι' στης/κτι' ζειν. However, as I shall argue later, Paul does call the community he founds the καινη` κτι' σις in Gal. 6:15, which, despite the long theological tradition interpreting this phrase and its companion in 2 Cor 5:17 in light of a putative Pauline doctrine of “new creation,” nevertheless finds its most natural and essentially unanimous referent in non-biblical Greek

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73 Note, “ω ^ ν ι‘ ερε' ων,” ll. 2–3. The genealogy of the founding family is › ν Αι’ γυ' πτιος ε’ κ τω a prominent element of this text, emphasizing its importance in defining the nature of the cult itself; we will have more to say on this in the next chapter. According to the text, it becomes necessary to provide a suitable temple for the god, for whom it is not fitting to be housed in such a manner (ll. 12–18). Also cf. the transfer of the cult of Sarapis and Isis to Opous from Thessalonika (IG X, 2 255, 1st c. C.E., to be discussed in due course.) and the much-discussed reformation of a house cult in Philadelphia from perhaps the 1st c. B.C.E. (SIG3 985, also to be examined in due course). 74 See above, p. 50, note 12. 75 I will return in due course to the possibility of describing a particular narrative genre, or narrative pattern, specific to the Greek foundation-legend.

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in foundation discourse.76 Reminding ourselves of this simple fact does not negate the possibility that Paul is making some kind of “creation connotation,” but in light of Greek semantic domains and the ubiquity of κτι' σις in both literary and epigraphical examples, this reminder raises the question of whether or not any one but Paul would have understood this “new creation” meaning without significant explanation. My point here is simply that our comparison of Paul with his contemporaries is not a matter of strict or exact parallelism. Rather, my case will be made on the basis of a complex of shared patterns, both conceptual and behavioral, through examination of Paul’s selfdescriptive statements, as well as his actions and his arguments (as they can be determined from his own letters). I will identify certain patterns – namely, the recurrent deployment, especially by migrating cultic innovators, of the foundational paradigm we have been describing for the purpose of negotiating self and group identity and legitimizing new cultic formations – as evidence suggesting that these founders, including Paul, make use of this model not simply because it is such an embedded cultural convention that founders assimilate it naturally, but because they – at least to some degree – choose to deploy it. In other words, as postcolonial theory would predict, we must allow that beyond some concept of socializing determinism – a concept of the passive colonial – we can see in Paul’s use of the foundational paradigm a conscious actor. In other words, in negotiating his way through the hegemony of the Greek cultic world, Paul may be self-consciously acting the part of the founder as it was understood in the Hellenistic-Roman period. We can thus describe him as selectively appropriating for his own purposes a model of narrative and behavior that he believed would better enable him to accomplish his purposes. My claim of comparability, however, does not contradict my fundamental theoretical assumption that cultural contact is culturally productive. As I have already pointed out, Paul both shaped and was shaped by his constantly fluid cultural situatedness – it could not be otherwise. The cultural knowledge he brought to his new encounters was neither purely Jewish nor purely Greek, nor was it stable – modern culture studies can find no such stability in the cultural encounters we see actually taking place around us or in those in which we ourselves participate. Especially in those encounters defined by cultural power imbalances, even more particularly for those encounters experienced by populations migrating from colonized or conquered homelands into the homelands of their colonizers – Paul and his many contemporaries who transferred ——————————— 76 Public monuments throughout Asia Minor confirm this common almost exclusive denotation. Gal 6:15 will receive special attention in due course, it is sufficient here to point out that, in this instance, the context refers to a new condition of categorization, specifically to one’s group membership; the issue is essentially sociological. It is in contrast to the group membership (i.e., in Paul’s taxonomy, what we would call one’s ethnic identification) that the individual previously enjoyed that there now exists a “new foundation.” Our discussion of this instance will naturally reveal implications for the same phrase in 2 Cor 5:17.

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cults from their native homelands to Greek and Roman cities – innovation and cultural creativity are the rule. This does not mean complete discontinuity, but it does mean that we will fail to appreciate the reality of this cultural creativity if we limit our vision to precise genetic parallels. Focus on such comparative precision can no longer be used to undermine comparability or to protect Paul from immersion in the cultural processes going on around him. In these “contact zones,” following David Carrasco, creative production of innovative cultural forms take “place as an expression of ‘trans-culturation’ when dominated peoples select and invent from materials transmitted to them from both the dominant culture and their own indigenous traditions.” He goes on, “I am impressed with the theme of creative work, of translation and transculturation that takes place in the contact zone.”77 Granting these qualifications, it is nevertheless the case, that to deepen our understanding of the founder-figure, we must examine the language of foundation in terms of its most conspicuous theme, namely, the personal role of the individual founder as the instrument of his/her deity. This theme is the defining element of the Greek foundation-legend.78 While non-Greeks often tell origin stories of one sort or another which share certain motifs and themes found in the Greek foundation-legend (as we shall see in due course), it is the consistent emphasis on the individual founder and his/her selection by the deity for a specific task of founding which distinguishes the Greek form.79

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77 Carrasco, “Jaguar Christians,” 130, author’s emphasis. Carrasco directly addresses Historians of Religion, encouraging us to “give greater value to the creative possibilities of incomplete, open-ended contact zones,” again, Carrasco’s emphasis, p. 132, cf. Bhabha, Location of Culture, 56. I understand this to mean that we must not only allow for, but assume as our default expectation, the discovery of new forms, forms that while we may describe them as unique – but only relatively, we must understand that they cannot be disconnected from the conditions that obtained before the innovation emerged. For contact zones and transculturation, see: Pratt, Imperial Eyes, passim. 78 This was the ultimate and widely recognized conclusion of Schmidt’s monumental study, Kultübertragungen, 87–115. 79 Here we should recall the opening of this chapter on Cicero’s distinctions between Greek and Roman patterns, see above, p.47, notes 1–3; cf. Appian’s report of the founding of the Libyan colony by Gracchus and Flaccus, BCiv. 1.3.23–24). As we pointed out earlier, Cicero, nevertheless, must grant that in the earlier traditions regarding the founding period, Roman stories still connect divine guidance with an individual founder; Romulus, father of the city, (Romulus, parens urbis, Livy, ab Urbe 4.3.12; cf. 3.17.5; Rep. I.xli.64), founded the city according to oracular guidance (huius urbis parens Romulus ... auspicato urbam condidisse, Div. I.ii.3; cf. Rep. II.xxix.51). This may be the exception that proves the rule of distinction between Greek and Roman foundational practices, since Livy tells us that the question is not who will found the city at the request of the god; the decision to found the city has already been made without divine initiative. The only thing to be settled is which man, Romulus or Remus will give his name to the city (ab Urbe 1.6.4–1.7.3).

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2.1. The Founder as the Personal Selection of the Deity The will of the gods is the ultimate validation for innovation, and the Greek foundation-legend served, throughout its centuries-long Greek history, as the medium of divine revelatory impetus, gods acting through a language of personal commissioning. In many cases, this commissioning takes the form of a divine appearance; the god or his/her messenger appears to the founder, usually in a dream-vision, to instruct the chosen individual about the task.80 Some foundation narratives, of course, present variations on this theme. For example, a founder can be designated by a miraculously-provided sign to those desiring to promote a colonial expedition.81 However, we shall understand the diagnostic element for our purposes to be the founder’s personal selection by the deity to carry out a specific act of foundation or renewal. The Greek founder is one to whom the deity communicates a specific kind of information about a specific task. Through a representative or intermediary, the deity selects the individual.82 In the most common case, the god Apollo chooses his servant through the established oracle at Delphi. This personal selection is always the initiative of the god according to the legends,83 and may be augmented in the foundation narrative by a prominent emphasis on the background of the founder. Often the description of the founder takes on an heroic flavor. In any case, whatever the various motifs deployed, the core of the story remains the oracular selection of the founder by the deity for the purpose of founding something that the god wills be established or restructured. By way of examples, there is no better place to begin than with the story of Battos, the founder of the Theran colony at Cyrene in Libya. This legend is one of the oldest and most elaborate of its kind; the basic story is found in Herodotos 4.145–161, although his version appears to stand on traditions ———————————

80 Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt, 115; Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1129; Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 7, 23–27, 31; See also: Christian Habicht, Gottmenschentum und griechische Städte, Zetemata: Monographien Zur klassischen Altertumswissenschaft 14 (München: Beck, 1970); Elizabeth R. Gebhard, “The Gods in Transit: Narratives of Cult Transfer,” in Antiquity and Humanity: Essays on Ancient Religion and Philosophy Presented to Hans Dieter Betz on His 70th Birthday, ed. Adela Yarbro Collins and Margaret M. Mitchell (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 2001), 451–76. 81 E.g., the Dologkoi were given an oracular sign by Pythian Apollo which to identify the one who would lead them as founder (οι’ κιστη` ν ε’ πα' γεσθαι). The sign of the true founder would be the first man to show them hospitality; this was Miltiades, founder of Chersonnesos in Thrace, (6th c. B.C.E.), Herodotos 6.35. 82 The initiating contact between the deity and its subject, the chosen founder, need not always be direct, as it is described in the foundation-legend of Sarapis at Alexandria. But it is nonetheless the deity who selects the founder and, most importantly, the purpose for the divine selection is consistently focused on foundational, therefore inherently innovative, activity. 83 See Plutarch, De Pyth. or. 407f–408a.

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which are older and widely distributed.84 In all of its forms, the narrative portrays Battos receiving a personal call from Apollo to go to Libya and found a colony there. The founder is said to have gone to Delphi in order to inquire of the god about the prospect of finding a solution to his stammering problem. Instead of hearing what he expected, Battos is given a commission to go to Libya (4.155).85 Battos’ response restates the command (Λιβυ' ην α’ ποικι' ζειν), a task which he describes as, α’ δυ' νατα χρα^ς. There is no need to doubt that , founders, and the cities which sought to colonize, relied on Delphic guidance, not withstanding Thucydides’ observation that cities most often debated the issue of colonization and sought only Delphic approval of their final decision.86 However, we should keep in mind that the standardization of the basic form of the foundation-legend is not necessarily to be derived from historical practice, and – what may be even more crucial to keep in mind – patterns of foundational behavior may be derived from the standardization of the narrative form. As Elizabeth R. Gebhard rightly observes, this reciprocity between narrative and action is probably operative.87 The importance of Battos’ speech inadequacy lies in its function within the legend itself. Petitions to oracles regarding a range of personal problems, from physical disabilities, to personal familial troubles, to one’s legal status can be used as narrative devices to deflect questions about the individual motives behind the founder’s actions. The theme of the “surprised oikist” thus serves to heighten the perception that the deity is actually the instigator of ———————————

84 Herodotos distinguishes between the tale as told by the Cyreneans and as told by the Therans (4.154). Other accounts can be found in Pindar, e.g, the basic narrative appears in Pyth. 9 honors Telesicrates of Cyrene for wining the important hoplite race at the twentyeighth Pythian games in 477 B.C.E., while Pyth. 4 and 5, also including the legend, are dedicated to Arcesilaos IV, a descendant of Battos and winner of the Pythian chariot race in 462 B.C.E. In 4.87–90 Battos is called Aristoteles). The foundation is also included in Callimachus, Ap. 65–96, and in a fourth century B.C.E. inscription, SEG 9.3. On the interpretation of these sources see especially chapter 2 in Claude Calame, Myth and History in Ancient Greece: The Symbolic Creation of a Colony, English ed., trans. Daniel W. Berman (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2003). 85 Cf. also: Plutarch, De Pyth. or. 405b; Walter W. How and Joseph Wells, A Commentary on Herodotos in Two Volumes: With Introduction and Appendixes, repr. ed. (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 1:350–51; On the two basic traditions, see: Asheri, Lloyd, and Corcella, Commentary on Herodotos, , 669. It is also important to note that in both primary variants of the Battos legend (the Theran and Cyrenean), what Malkin (Religion and Colonization, 27) describes as the motif of the “surprised oikist” can be found, i.e., both Grinnos and Battos seek the counsel of Delphi on matters unrelated to colonization; the commission of the god is a complete surprise. 86 Thucydides 3.92.5; cf. Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 26. 87 Gebhard, “Gods in Transit,” 453. We should here recall my concerns about the connection between foundation narratives and founding practice, see above, pp. 47–48 and especially note 4.

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events.88 In the famous foundation inscription of Cyrene the initiative of Apollo is explicitly acknowledged, as the god is made the subject of the verb αυ’ τοματι' ζειν;89 i.e., Apollo is the one who, of his own volition, commands Battos and the Therans to colonize.90 Even so, the individual importance of Battos is not thereby ignored,91 e.g., as in Pindar’s victory hymn in honor of the founder’s royal descendant, Arcesilaos.92 Here, not only is Battos the ——————————— 88

Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt, 115; similarly in Herodotos 6.35; Pausanias 8.15.1–5; 10.38.13; Kern, Gründungsgeschichte, 11–15; 15–24; 26–35; 37–41; 43–51. The ubiquity of this pattern makes foundational the idea that the gods are the de facto founders of cities (Cornell, “Gründer,” cols. 1130–31, 33–35), true even when Greek writers tell the stories of others’ foundations, e.g., the divine founders of Rome,»Ομνυμι το` ν Δι'α το` ν Καπετω' λιον και` τη` ν ‘ Εστι'αν τη^ ς ‘ Ρω' μης και` το` ν πατρω^, ον αυ’ τη^ ς »Αρην και` το` ν γενα' ρχην « Ηλιον και` τη` ν ευ’ εργε' τιν ζω', ων τε και` φυτω ^ ν Γη^ ν, ε» τι δε` του` ς κτι'στας γεγενημε' νους τη^ ς ‘ Ρω' μης η‘ μιθε' ους και` του` ς συναυξη' σαντας τη` ν η‘ γεμονι'αν αυ’ τη^ ς η« ρωας (Diodorus Siculus 37.11.1 = Posidonius, Frag. 220); ευ» χομαι δη` τω ^, τε Διονυ' σω, τω ^, προπα' τορι τη^ σδε τη^ ς πο' λεως και` ^, κτι'σαντι τη` νδε τη` ν πο' λιν και` Διι` Πολιει^ και` ’Αθηνα^, και` ’Αφροδι'τη, Φιλι'α, και` ‘ Ηρακλει^ τω ‘Ομονοι'α, και` Νεμε' σει και` τοι^ς α»λλοις θεοι^ς (Dio Chrysostum Or. 39.8); cf. the founding of a city by Osiris, περι` »Οσιριν κτισθη^ ναι τα` ς Θη' βας (Hecataeus, FGrH, 3a, 264, frag. 25.115). 89 See, H. W. Parke, “A Note on αυ’ τοματι'ζω in Connexion with Prophecy,” JHS 82 (1962): 145–56. 90 See: SEG 9.3, l. 24; R. Meiggs and D. Lewis, eds., A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions to the End of the Fifth Century B.C., rev. ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1989), no. 5, 5–9. Apollo’s instigation is expressed in the first section of the decree, καθω` ς ’Απο' λλων ε» δωκε βα' ττωι και` τοι^ς Θηραι'οις ... κατοικι'ζασι Κυρα' ναν ... κατα` τα` ν ε’ πι'ταξιν τω ^ ^ ’Αρχαγε' τα (ll. 7–8). The importance of this theme to this kind of story ’Απο' λλωνος τω shows more vividly when we compare such accounts with those of Thucydides, who believes that, cities plant colonies for purely rational reasons (3.92). To be sure, as we have already granted, despite his reluctance to speak of divine oracles, Thucydides nevertheless describes the importance of Delphi to the process; it is “at the command of the god” that cities are founded (3.92.5; Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 26). Still, Thucydides’ preference is to describe the colonization process in rational terms, e.g., colonies can be established as a sign of the subjugation of an existing city to a stronger power for the sake of protection (e.g., the Trachians, from the nation of the Malians, turned to Sparta in a time of distress, being made a Spartan colony). Livy, too, explains Greek colonization without recourse to the supernatural. He describes the tales of the founding of Rome as coming to him in “old tales,” more like poetry than “sound historical record” (ab Urbe 1.4.6–1.6.3). In the story of Romulus and Remus and the she-wolf, Livy acknowledges its fantastic nature, and offers a rational account for the reference to the she-wolf (1.4.6–7). Romulus and Remus were not commanded by a deity to build Rome, instead Livy tells us that they were seized by an urge to found a new settlement on the spot where the two boys had been left to drown (1.6.3). Thucydides and Livy are aware of the common legend, but write their accounts in quite different ways. 91 Cf. Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt, 115, the legends emphasize the individual founder, while maintaining that Apollo is the principal actor. 92 See above pp. 70–71, n. 84.

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recipient of a commissioning oracle but the subject of ancient prophecy, an attempt to root the ruling line in the age of heroes, the invention of tradition for the purpose of legitimation: ε» νθα ποτε` χρυσε' ων Διο` ς αι’ ετω^ ν πα' ρεδρος, ου’ κ α’ ποδα' μου ’Απο' λλωνος τυχο' ντος, ι‘ ε' ρεα χρη^ σεν οι’ κιστη^ ρα Βα' ττον καρποφο' ρου Λιβυ' ας ... και` το` Μηδει'ας ε» πος α’ γκομι'σαι ε‘ βδο' μα, και` συ` ν δεκα' τα, γενεα^, ...93

As with Herodotos, we find, at a very early period in the history of the colony, presupposed in Pindar the oracular, personal call of the founder, the defining element of the Greek foundation-legend, grounding the foundation of Cyrene in divine initiative, complemented by a reference to the fulfillment of divine prophecy uttered in the heroic age.94 In the previously mentioned and widely discussed late third-century B.C.E. account of the transferal of the cult of Sarapis from Egypt to Delos the role of personal commission by the deity plays a crucial role – just as we might have predicted. The founder of the cult itself, Apollonios I, is not the focus of this particular foundation story. Instead, the innovation at issue is the foundation of the first Sarapieion,95 built by Apollonios II, the grandson of the cult’s founder.96 This grandson, once he had received the priesthood, was commanded by Sarapis in a dream to build an appropriate Sarapieion in which the ———————————

93 “And then, as Apollo happened to be close by, the priestess, seated beside the golden eagles of Zeus, by oracle pronounced Battos founder of fruitful Libya ... And the word spoken by Medea was fulfilled in the seventeenth generation ...” (referring to the establishment of the colony of Cyrene), Pyth. 4, ll.4–6 and 9–10. On πα' ρεδρος, note that LSJ cites this example for the adverbial use of the form. Later (ll. 53–4) Pindar again mentions the oracle to be given to Battos. 94 M. Labate, “L’iniziativa individuale nella colonizzazione greca come topos narrativo,” Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, classe di lettere e filosofia 3, no. 2 (1972): 91–104 draws the distinction between stories about colonization differently, distinguishing stories such as the Battos foundation-legend from those of key characters in Herodotos’ digression, like Thera and Arcesilaos because of the role of individual initiative. from the whole of my analysis, it is obvious that I do not find this taxonomy sufficiently helpful. 95 This is the spelling found in the inscription, Σαραπιει^ον, l. 14, and it is the traditional spelling for Delian inscriptions, see: IG XI, 4 1032, frag. b 1.6,15; IDelos 372.A.1.28; 409 A.1.15; 440 A.1.27 [restored],75, 84; 444 B.1.69,105; 446 B frag. a.1; 447.4; 460 frags. v1.14; t1.40; 456 A.1.2; 458.12; 461 A frag. b1.36; 1403 B col. 2.1.40; 1412.47; 1415.7; 1416 A col. 1.80; 1417 A col. 2.1.59, 142; B col. 1.1.86; 1442 A.1.34; B 2.57; 1452 A.1.55; SEG 35.881 A. 1/2 a,b. 96 The cult was established with an hereditary priesthood according to the claim made by the founder’s grandson (ll.7–8; 47–48).

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deity could dwell.97 As if to dispel suspicions of personal ambition, the god’s desire for a temple receives a history; Sarapis had appeared to command his temple’s construction first to Demetrios, the founder’s son, who’s untimely death preempted his fulfillment of the god’s wishes, so the task had to be completed by his son, Apollonios II.98 As with the other foundation oracles we have seen, the final one in the foundation narrative is given with specific instructions regarding the course of action to be followed by the templefounder, Apollonios II, and the precise location of the intended sanctuary. Oracular intervention again comes into play when Sarapis appears in a dreamvision to Apollonios II to assure the commissioned founder of victory against the Delian instigators of a legal action against Apollonios II for his construction of the sanctuary (ll. 76–80).99 Within the same cultic tradition, the later, developed legend of the foundation of the cult of Sarapis in Alexandria has, as its central theme, the appearance of a divine personage to Ptolemy I Sōtēr commanding him to carry out the cult-transfer of the image of the god to Alexandria. At nearly the same time that Tacitus (Hist. 4.83, 100–110 C.E.) and Plutarch (De Is. et Os. 28 [361F–362A], between 90 and 120 C.E.) were narrating this tale,100 an inscription was being published in Thessalonika recounting the transfer of the cult of Sarapis from this city to the Locrian city of Opous.101 In this case, Sarapis intrudes into the hostile relations between two political rivals (ll. 8–9), ordering the one (Xenainetos) to relate the god’s command to the other (Eurynomos of Opous) that the latter should receive (i. e., establish the worship of) the god and his sister, Isis (υ‘ ποδε' ξασθαι αυ’ το' ν τε και` τα` ν α’ δελφα` ν αυ’ του Ει”σιν, ll. 5–6).102 Again here as elsewhere in our survey the central, ———————————

97 ll.13–14, “ο‘ θεο' ς μοι ε’ χρημα' τισεν κατα` το` ν υ« πνον,” cf. also ll. 49–51. Note that here we have another example of a god prescribing in an oracle (a dream-vision in this case) the precise location for his own sanctuary (ll. 14–18: 55–59). 98 The complete text with commentary is presented in the next chapter. 99 Here, Sarapis is portrayed as describing the action of the protestors as a legal action aimed directly at him alone, cf. the similar presupposition expressed in Luke 10:16; Acts 5:38–39; 9:5; 26:14. The Christian writer also believes that opposition to the mission of the cult-group is actually opposition to the deity. As we shall see, the same assessment is voiced by the devotees of Dionysos in Euripides’ Bakchai. 100 For another example in Plutarch see: Mor. 263d–304f, esp. του^ δε` θεου^ φη' σαντος κτι'ζειν πο' λιν ... (294e). 101 A dream-vision is received by a certain Xenainetos (ε» δοξε καθ’ υ« πνον ε’ πιστα' ντα│ [παρ’ αυ’ ]το` ν Σα' ραπιν ..., IG X, 2 255, ll.3–4). For text and commentary, see: Reinhold Merkelbach, “Zwei Texte aus dem Sarapeum zu Thessalonike: Ein Missionswunder,” ZPE 10 (1973): 45–54, esp. 49–54. 102 In this case also we have another surprised founder. Due to the political rivalry between the two men, Xenainetos is confused about the first dream-vision. It takes another, identical appearance of Sarapis and the deposit of a promised letter to Eurynomos, his political rival, under his pillow to get Xenainetos moving (ll.6–11). According to L. Vidman, Isis

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organizing element in the foundation narrative is the epiphanic visitation of the deity to the founder commanding that the transfer/foundation be carried out. An important example of the role of the personal commission in a cult foundation is found in the inscription publishing the bylaws of a cult from Philadelphia.103 This text preserves the founder Dionysios’ commission from Zeus in a dream, “τα` δοθε' [ντα παραγγε' λμα-]│τα Διονυσι' ωι καθ’ υ« πνον (ll.3– 4) ... του' τ[ωι] δε' δωκεν ο‘ Ζευ` ς παραγγε' λ[ματα του` ς ...] (l. 12).” Dionysios had already been managing a private cult in his home which the deity was now commanding to be opened to non-household members.104 We continue to find the personal call of the founder by the deity in later cult foundation narratives. For example, we need only recall Lucian’s already-mentioned version of the foundation-legend of the temple of Hera/Juno in Hieropolis (Syr.D. 17–25).105 His tale describes how Stratonice became the foundress of the temple after receiving a command in a dream (ο» ναρ ε’ θεη' σατο) to build, or raise up, (ε’ γει^ραι) the temple in the holy city.106 We find the same narrative element prominently featured in foundation accounts contained in Pausanias’ notes. Drawing on traditions he claims deal with early fourth-century B.C.E. events, Pausanias recounts one of the most extensive, surviving foundation-legends, the story of the reformation of the

——————————— und Sarapis bei den Griechen und Römern: Epigraphische Studien zur Verbreitung und zu den Trägern des ägyptischen Kultes, RVV 29 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1970), the personal, private oracle is the norm in the cults of Isis and Sarapis (p. 28). 103 SIG3 985 (first century B.C.E.); the text, translation, and notes are found in S. C. Barton, and G. H. R. Horsley, “A Hellenistic Cult Group and the New Testament Churches,” JAC 24 (1981): 7–41. Also, in about the same period (92–91 B.C.E.), the reformer of the mysteries of Andania (discussed in detail below), Mnasistratos, seems to have been motivated by an oracular command (which survives in the so-called “Argive Oracle,” SIG3 735) to reform the cult by turning its management over to the Messenian state, obligating them to participation. 104 π[ρο' σοδον διδο' ν-]│τ’ ει’ ς το` ν ε’ αυτου^ οι”κον α’ νδρα' [σι και` γυναιξι`ν]│ε’ λευθε' ροις και` οι’ κε' ταις, ll.4–6, ... Διο` ς [γα` ρ ε’ ν του' τωι]│... ει’ σι`ν ι‘ δ[ρυμε' νοι βωμοι`.], ll. 6–11, cf. Diodorus Siculus’ description of a similar reform of the Samothracian mysteries by Iasion, brother of the founder, Dardanus. In this latter case, Iasion reforms the cult by opening the mysteries up to strangers, a significant innovation, with the result that the cult was elevated to widespread esteem (5.48.2–5). We shall deal with the Philadelphian example of Dionysios in detail below in chapter 4, and esp. with the question of the founder’s role in determining the criteria of membership. 105 See above, p. 75. 106 Though warned by Hera in the same dream not to do so, Stratonice disregarded the goddess’s command, and as promised was struck gravely ill. She then appeased Hera, and telling her husband, the King of the Syrians, of the goddess’s will, Stratonice set about building the temple (Syr. D. 19). The motif of the resistant founder is common to Greek foundation legends.

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political and cultic community of Messenia by the Theban general, Epaminondas.107 In the midst of Epaminondas’ difficulties in rebuilding the devastated cities of Messenia, an “ancient man” appeared to him in a dream-vision. The man had the appearance of a ι‘ εροφα' ντης, the characteristic priest of the Eleusinian mysteries.108 The oracular mediator promised Epaminondas victory and glory if he would restore their fatherland to the Messenians. According to Pausanias’ account, the same visitor appeared to Epiteles, a general of the allied Argive forces chosen by his people to re-found Messene. However, Epiteles was guided by the oracular dream-vision to dig between two specific trees where he would discover a brazen urn containing the tin scrolls on which the mysteries of Andania were inscribed. He followed the command, but instead of opening the urn himself, he delivered it to his supreme commander, Epaminondas, who then opened it revealing the sacred contents (4.26.6–27.8). Pausanias’ narrative, whether by his own device or as the form in which he received the legend, conforms Epaminondas to the expected founder’s tasks – both πο' λις-founder and cult founder. In the narrative, he fulfills the role of military commander in restoring the independence of the people, he carries out cultic duties through sacrifices and invocations to the gods, beseeching them to return again to their former homes, and he oversees the building of temples and the homes for the inhabitants (4.27.5–7). In all of this, the events are stimulated by the intervention of oracular messages. The founder is in ——————————— 107

Described by George L. Cawkwell as “one of the most illustrious of the Greeks, and one of the most obscure,” “Epaminondas and Thebes,” CQ 22, no. 2 (1972): 257, Epaminondas serves well the goal of the foundation-legend in linking the foundation in question to a venerable pedigree, on Epaminodas’ role in Messenian history, see: John Buckler, “The Theban Hegemony 371–362 B.C,” in HHS 98 (Cambridge: Harvard University press, 1980), 83–89;103–109; Mark Munn, “Thebes and Central Greece,” in The Greek World in the Fourth Century: From the Fall of the Athenian Empire to the Successors of Alexander, ed. Lawrence A. Tritle (London; New York: Routledge, 1997), 66–106. The Lakedaimonians controlled Messenia until the 79th Olympiad (464 B.C.E.) when revolt broke out (Pausanias 4.24.5). Final liberation did not come, however, until 371 when the Spartans were defeated by the Thebans at Leuctra, 108 As we will see below in the discussion of the Andanian mysteries, this link to Eleusis appears to serve as propaganda designed either to enhance the reputation of the Andanian cult (the example where the mysteries of the Great Goddess in Megalopolis are said to be a copy of those in Eleusis, Pausanias 8.31.7 cf. GGR, 2. 95–96), or to serve as propaganda for those who would wish to take credit for the cult, e.g., the clan of the Lycomidai of Phlya. Since Pausanias cites his relevant source for the link to the clan of the Lycomidai from an inscription he found in the clan’s sanctuary, this story seems to serve the latter purpose. In addition, it has been argued that this story belongs, in fact, to a more comprehensive program of Athenian propaganda designed to support Athen’s claim to be the “mother-city” of the Ionian colonization, see: Robertson, “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 252–59. We shall have more to say on this issue in due course, as we discuss the Andanian mysteries in more detail.

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need of the help of the gods in order to fulfill his role. The question, of course, is how much of this is Pausanias’ construction versus tradition taken from his sources.109 We shall return to the problems raised by Pausanias’ Messenian history when we turn to the Andanian mysteries in chapter five. 2.2. The Founder’s Role in Establishing the Cult The language of foundation also reflects an interesting but paradoxical set of themes. When the founder acts according to the will of the god, in one sense an institution which had never before existed comes into being. Foundation language reflects this not uncommonly in the description of the founder as father. In fact, “father” can occur as a designation alongside κτι' στης.110 In Imperial times, as we have already mentioned, the application of the term κτι' στης to the emperor was a commonplace. This is especially true for Hadrian.111 But it is also the case that the emperor could be called both “founder” and “father.” Hadrian, in fact, is called πα' τηρ και` κτι' στης in an inscription from Caria.112 Of course, this title serves an honorary purpose and does not reflect the kind of foundational activities usually associated with the founder-figure. However, it does reflect a certain image of the founder. For example, in the story narrated by Diodorus Siculus regarding the activities of Herakles, we are told that the hero appoints Iolaos (’ Ιο' λαος) as founder,113 in order to handle the details of the settlement of the colony in Sardinia (καθι' στημι, 4.30.1). Iolaos builds a gymnasium and sets up law courts. The gratitude of the citizens results in Iolaos being called “father” of the colony ———————————

109 On Pausanias’ creativity here, see: Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge, “Mnasistratos, the ‘Hierophant’ at Andania (IG 5.1.1390 and Syll.3 735),” in Myths, Martyrs, and Modernity: Studies in the History of Religions in Honour of Jan N. Bremmer, ed. Jitse Dijkstra, Justin Kroesen, and Yme Kuiper, Numen Book Series 127 (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010). 110 Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1144. Cf. Pindar Frag. 105a = Strabo 6.2.3, “πα' τερ, κτι'στορ.” We should keep this in mind when we speak of fictive kinship terms in early Christianity. Philip A. Harland has shown that the traditional assumption that early Christian groups are diagnostically distinctive from Greek associations by virtue of the former’s abundant use of fictive kinship terms is tendentious and no longer supportable from the evidence. Harland shows that Greek and Roman associations of various kinds use fictive kinship terms as part of their group identity construction, and referring to the founder as father is part of that identity defining complex, Dynamics of Identity in the World of the Early Christians (New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc., 2009), 63–96. 111 See above, p. 53, note 21; p. 54, note 25. 112 IMagnMai, 204, ll. 2–4, cf. SEG 27.809, ll. 6–7; cf. for an emperor, IKret 1.18, no. 17.ll. 5–8; IEph. no. 1007, ll. 6–9. Of course, in Greek Jewish sources, these terms are often applied to God, e.g., God is archegetes, founder, and father, in Philo Ebr. 42.4–5; cf. Virt. 179.1–6. 113 Note that here also, as we might have anticipated, Herakles is commanded κατα` το` ν χρησμο' ν to carry out the founding (Diodorus Siculus 4.29.4); delegation of the details of the task is seen in the pattern of the Diadochoi.

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(4.30.2), as if they referred to the father of the people, just as Cyrus is “father” to the Persians. This idea is also reflected in a comment made by Quintillian, as he mentions how a city may be praised; he writes: Laudantur autem urbes similiter atque homines. Nam pro parent est conditor,.. Cives illis ut hominibus liberi decori.114

Foundation language is, consequently, also a language of authority and prerogative. Founders have responsibility for the quality and success of their foundations. They also, by virtue of their initiative and responsibility, expect and receive authority over the community members and certain prerogatives in relation to their foundations.115 2.3. The Founder and Tradition The paradoxical element becomes apparent in that, despite the fact that the institutions established by founders have never existed before, and are, in their present contexts, innovations, the language of foundation is, nevertheless, a language of tradition. To return again to the foundation-legend of the cult of Sarapis on Delos, both the author and founder of the first Sarapieion and the cult’s poet-hymnist, Maiistas, emphasize the new cult’s venerable heritage. All things in the practice of the cult are done just as they had been done in the native land. The relocated cult has been brought from the sacred city of Memphis to Delos, and the immigrant god – so say his devotees – enjoys a positive relationship to the gods of the new land; in fact, all Olympos approves of Sarapis’ arrival.116 This text demonstrates the most common forms in which the language of tradition is used in the foundation-legends. One of the founder’s most important roles, according to the foundation-legends is to establish the new community’s place in history, in a way which connects it to ——————————— 114

“Cities are praised after the same fashion as men. The founder takes the place of the parents, ...Their citizens enhance their [illis] fame just as children bring honor to their parents,” Inst. 3.7.26, cf. Plautus Mostell. 118f (illis is ambiguous with respect to its antecedent; however, if the analogy is to hold, illis would properly refer to the founders of cities, and not just to the cities alone). Cf. also the comment made in Polybius’ comparative analysis of Aristotle’s and Timaeus’ accounts of the foundation legends of the Italian Locrians. In Hist. 12.9.3–4, he describes Timaeus’ report of the opening lines of a treaty between the mother city in mainland Greece and the colony which begins, “ω‘ ς γονευ^ σι προ` ς τε' κνα.” It is of little consequence to our point that Polybius discounts Timaeus version of events. It is important only to note the presupposition that colonists are thought of as the children of the mother-city, the city which also, in most cases, appoints the founder to rule over the new colony. 115 We will see in Paul’s case, that his authority over his churches is often rooted in his parental relationship to them. 116 IG XI, 4 1299, ll. 5, 35–36, and l.28, the gods are owed thanks for the victory of Sarapis.

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a worthy past (e. g., laying claim to a reservoir of traditions), while reinforcing its future independence (i. e., recognizing the community as an innovation). As a part of this effort to root the new institution of the founder the narrative may link him to ancestors from the heroic age, or describe him as the promised instrument in the fulfillment of ancient prophecy.117 James Whitley has shown that in the earliest period of Greek colonization, the establishment of hero-cults was intimately linked with political developments. For example, the establishment of a hero cult could be used to declare a community’s preemptive claim the their own territory against in-migration, and for other community’s a hero cult could be established to legitimate territorial expansion and the emergence of new political forms.118 The point we must keep in mind here is that the formation of links to the heroic past always serve present needs, needs at the time the narratives describing such connections and the institutions of the cults that embody them are constructed. We can easily hear in this context the echoes of the recently popularized phrase, “the invention of tradition,” about which we shall say more in due course, including suggestions for the refinement of the process to which it refers.119 Founders are often assimilated to heroic figures by means of certain mythical motifs. For example, the extraordinary or miraculous birth motif, or the motif of the physically impaired founder. Cornell calls the latter the “Motiv der ‘Schande des Gründers,’” citing the obvious characters of Battos of Cyrene (whose stammering problem we have already encountered120) and Myskellos, founder of Kroton, who was a “hunchback.”121 Elements of these ———————————

117 See above, pp. 53–59, 70, 72–73, 77; πο' λεις usually trace their founders to mythic heroes, see: W. M. Ramsay, “The Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia, Part II,” JHS 8 (1887): 461–519, esp. 478–79; cf. Calame, Myth and History, 50, Cyrenean Battos’ link to Medea; Osterloh, “Communal Identity,” 196–99, for a heroic founding link at Pergamon. 118 James Whitley, “Early States and Hero Cults,” JHS 108 (1988): 173–82. 119 The technical use of this phrase belongs, of course, to Hobsbawm, “Inventing Traditions.” 120 Plutarch, De Pyth. or. 405b; see above, p. 71. On the motif of the founder’s infirmity in the Battos story, see Asheri, Lloyd, and Corcella, Commentary on Herodotos, 680. 121 βραχυ' νωτος;” Myscellus also goes to Delphi, as Battos had done, regarding a totally unrelated concern (the possibility of having children), only to have Apollo respond with a command to found the city of Kroton, Diodorus Siculus, 18.1; “Gründer,” 1117. Obviously, Moses’ speech difficulties (Exod 4:10–17; 6:28–30) present a similar example of the disfunctional founder (more on Moses in due course). It is also interesting to note that Paul also claims to have been physically impaired at the point of encountering the Galatians, e.g., in Gal 4:12–14 he reminds the Galatians of their openness to him despite his infirmity; also recall his comments in 2 Cor 12:7–10 where the apostle speaks of his “thorn in the flesh.” His understanding of this affliction is certainly consistent with what we see in the Greek material, i.e., he believes that God has allowed him to be afflicted with the infirmity in order to prevent Paul from boasting over the abundance of revelations he has received. In other words, Paul’s weakness makes manifest the power of God working through him; the same could be said for these other founder-figures.

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motifs are commonly incorporated into the legends of πο' λις-founders. More often than not, the founder is given direct links by means of a genealogy, often accompanied by a geographically specific travel narrative, back to a specific heroic ancestor or ancestral family. If we return again to the story of Battos we see that his story begins, as we might expect, in the time of the heroes, with τω^ ν ε’ κ τη^ ς ’Αργου^ ς ε’ πιβατε' ων παι' δων παι^δες, who after having been driven off by some Pelasgians came subsequently to settle in Lakedaimonia (4.145).122 The descendants of these ancient heroes came to call themselves Minyae (4.145), and from their illustrious roots eventually comes the founder Battos.123 In the story of the founding and restoration of the mysteries of Andania, the cult is directly linked to the mysteries of Demeter at Eleusis.124 As we have already pointed out, the success of the cult of Asklepios and validation of his links to Epidauros required the sanction of Delphi and the oracle’s confirmation that Asklepios was indeed Apollo’s son.125 Here, as in the case of Sarapis, the acceptance of the new god draws strength from his acceptance by the old gods. In the case of Sarapis on Delos, this connection is explicitly made in the foundation legend published by the founder of a new cultic institution.

3. The Narrative Form of the Greek Foundation-Legend As I indicated in chapter one, the legends that come to be told about founderfigures and their foundation of important social institutions are culturally specific, i.e., they are determined by the same specifically Greek experience that ——————————— 122

Similarly, Appian begins the foundation story of Rome in the heroic age, describing Aeneas as a founder (πο' λιν ε» κτισε, Hist. rom. 1.1.9); his son Ascanius, continues the tradition by founding cities and settling colonists (το` ν λαο` ν μετω', κισεν, Hist. rom. 1.4.1). Cf. also Leukippos, the founder of Magnesia on the Maeander, who is given an appropriately heroic lineage in the foundation legend as a descendant of the family of Glaukos (Il. 6), ll. 36–43. Leukippos is here both κτι'στης and α’ ρχηγε' της. For the text and commentary on this element of the foundation legend see: Kern, Gründungsgeschichte, 1–19. 123 “... και` Βα' ττος ο‘ Πολυμνη' στου, ε’ ω` ν γε' νος Ευ’ φημι'δης τω ^ ν Μινυε' ων (4.150). The legend of Battos as founder of Cyrene is known to Strabo from the hymn of Callimachus, “λε' γεται δε` η‘ Κυρη' νη κτι'σμα Βα' ττου· προ' γονον δε` του^ τον ε‘ αυτου^ φα' σκει Καλλι'μαχος· ηυ’ ξη' θη δε` δια` τη` ν α’ ρετη` ν τη^ ς χω' ρας·” (17.3.21). Also note Callimachos, Hymn. Apoll. 65– 79, where the founder’s colonial group is linked to the generation of the heroes through the author’s description of it as the “ε«κτον γε' νος Οι’ διπο' δαο”; here also the personal call of the founder (ο’ ικιστη' ρ, l.67) is emphasized alongside the motivation of Apollo as founder of cities (also, Pindar, Pyth. 4.5–8; SEG 9.3, ll. 7–8), Sparta, Thera, and Cyrene are called the foundations of Apollo (ll. 74–75). 124 See the chapter below on the Andanian mystery cult for a full discussion. 125 See above, pp. 64–65.

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formed the paradigm of the colonial founder-figure.126 Having said this, it must be admitted that as a story about origins, the Greek foundation-legend shares many characteristics found in other origin stories told in other cultural contexts. We will look at some specific, comparative examples in due course, e.g., Hebrew etiological narratives often include heavenly visions. While at one level the foundation story, as an origin account, shares certain similarities with the etiological legend in that it explains how things have come to be the way they are at present, the Greek foundation narratives that concern us belong to that category of legend whose Sitz im Leben is to be located in polemic and apology.127 In broad terms, given what we know from studies about the discourse of group formation, one might respond that all etiological stories are in one way or another apologetic in that they are group-defining.128 In other words, groups develop these accounts primarily as self-validating propaganda.129 The basis for this type of apologetic is a widely-recognized, fundamental cultural commonplace in the ancient Mediterranean world, namely, the presupposition that the validity of any institution is a function of its ancient and venerable origins.130 As Leschhorn shows, the status of a city could be elevated to a greater degree by reaching back beyond the historical period and laying claim to a hero or a deity with whom the city could be connected. We have already seen that this could happen through an ancient visit, e.g., the visit of Hercules to Rome in Livy. In fact, cities with no previously———————————

126 In many cases, the narrative genre “legend” is inappropriate, since the story of the founder is altogether mythic and often a recent creation, entirely susceptible to the approach found in Hobsbawm, “Inventing Traditions”. 127 Many etiological stories simply explain the origin of a contemporary phenomenon, whether it be a physical feature of the environment, a people, or a particular social practice. This is especially true where the story is designed for the members of a political unity, and functions primarily within homogeneous culture, i.e., the etiological stories of what anthropologists sometimes label “natural societies,” see: Durkheim, Formes élémentaires, 215–16; Eliade, Patterns, 410–34. It is often difficult in Eliade’s system to define the point where myth as paradigm ends and myth as explanation begins. Even though his description of myth includes stories which explain why people do what they do in the present, for Eliade such stories are no more than one of the various kinds of story included under the genus of the origin myth, also cf. Mircea Eliade, Myth and Reality, by W. R. Trask (New York: Harper and Row, 1963), 5–8. 128 For a discussion of the various issues involved in the analysis of such discourse, see: William E. Arnal, “Doxa, Heresy, and Self-Construction: The Pauline Ekklesiai and the Boundaries of Urban Identities,” in Heresy and Identity in Late Antiquity, ed. Eduard Iricinschi and Holger M. Zellentin, TSAJ 119 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 52–53. 129 Even with Leschhorn, for whom there still lies behind the legendary “ein historischer Kern” going back to a real founding act, there is still much is fabricated in the foundationlegends for the purpose of justifying territorial claims (Gebietsanprüche) or clarifying certain present circumstances (Myth and Reality, 116). 130 We have already pointed out examples, and will throughout. The general connection to Hobsbawm’s conept of “invented tradition” is obvious, “Inventing Traditions,” 1–6.

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known, “historical” founder quite easily develop, as in the case of Magnesia on the Maeander, legends which retrieve a suitable character from myth.131 Of course, this presupposition also provides the possibility of using a foundation legend to discredit one’s rivals. We can see this clearly in the legend of Battos. The Therans and the Cyreneans tell different stories about the founder, Battos. In the Theran account, the tale told in the “mother-city,” Battos is pointed out as an alternative choice by the preferred founder, Grinnos, who feels too old for the task (4.150).132 In the islanders’ version, Battos is eventually appointed by the Therans themselves, not chosen by Apollo (4.153). The propagandistic value of the personal call of the god to the community of the founder becomes evident in the different way the story is told by the Cyreneans. In the Cyrenean story, the divine personal call of the founder is made prominent.133 Cornell observes that the theme of the gods, through their oracles, giving the founding assignment to the individual founder, is particularly characteristic of the local tradition and serves as an oracular legitimization of the state’s existence.134 Cyrene’s struggle for legitimacy and validation was waged through the formation of competing versions of the foundation-legend. Herodotos’ admission that the Cyreneans and Therans tell different versions of the foundation-legend of the Libyan colony clearly shows the polemical context which surrounds the telling of the tale. We also see similar undercurrents in the fourth-century example of the story found in a Cyrenean inscription, the so-called “Oath of the Founders.”135 Here the Therans from the mother-city have proposed a re-affirmation of rights supposedly granted to Theran immigrants who joined the Cyrenean colony. That the decree is necessary implies a certain ongoing tension between the two populations. In order to make their appeal more persuasive the Therans appeal to the foundation ——————————— 131

Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt, 117. See on the basic polemic between Cyrenaean emphasis on the primary role of Battos and the Theran devaluation of his role, Osborne, “Greek Colonization?” 254–55; Asheri, Lloyd, and Corcella, Commentary on Herodotos, 668–70, 682. There is also a tradition making Xionis of Sparta co-founder with Battos of Cyrene, Pausanias 3.14.3, see: Irad Malkin, Myth and Territory in the Spartan Mediterranean (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 82–83, 110. 133 Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1133. 134 Ibid, citing SEG 9 3.25f (4th c. B.C.E., the well-known foundation inscription from Cyrene); cf. Parke, “αυ’ τοματι'ζω,” 145–46, for the notion of the god’s initiative; Herodotos 6.139. The local tradition of Magnesia on the Maeander also focuses on the role of the founder, Leukippos, while other non-native traditions ignore him altogether, see, Kern, Gründungsgeschichte, 23. 135 On the questions raised by this stele, see: Françoise Létoublon, “Les récits de la fondation de Cyrène,” in Grecs et Romains aux prises avec l’histoire: réprësentations, récits et idéologie, vol. 1, ed. Guy Lachenaud and Dominique Longrée (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2003), 177–88. 132

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story, arguing that the equality of Therans and Cyreneans was intended and provided for in the original foundation oaths and decrees issued at the time of the original colonization.136 Our point here is not to offer any solution to the questions surrounding the antiquity of the traditions underlying the foundation narratives, but simply to point out the continuing reuse and undoubtedly creation of “traditions” in the service of present community needs throughout the history of both Cyrene and Thera. The narrative is the ground and means of the contestation of identity for these communities. A similar situation appears to lie behind the foundation-legend of Magnesia on the Maeander.137 In a text reflecting the received legend at the end of the third-century B.C.E., the role of the oracle of Delphi, Apollo’s selection of the founder (Leukippos), and the precise location of the colony in its present location are the prominent features. The text was a public document prominently displayed for every visitor to see. The Magnesians wanted to emphasize to the reader that the present location of the city is the original location founded by Leukippos under Apollo’s direction. Other traditions offer some explanation for the Magnesians’ need to make this point. In a version attributed to Parthenios, the Magnesians are said to have been lead by Leukippos originally to Ephesos instead of their present location. Both versions recognize a similar core (perhaps a kernel of historical truth) of the story, i.e., that the Magnesians are originally immigrants from Thessaly, who passed through Delphi to Crete, and then to Asia. However, the Magnesians’ pride of place among the cities of Asia Minor was their contention that they had been the first of the Greeks to colonize the area. As Kern rightly notes, the Magnesians would have ———————————

136 SEG 9.3; Meiggs and Lewis, Greek Historical Inscriptions, no. 5, 5–9; Graham, Colony and Mother City, 27, 40, 224–226. The second part of the decree (ll. 23–40) reviews the original founding document, cast as a resolution of the ε’ κκλησι'α of Thera, in which the guaranteed rights are implied. This report bears several similarities to the account in Herodotos which prompts Oliver to deny that the historian used an independent account of the tradition. He believes, contra Meiggs and Lewis, that Herodotos’ version is based on the Theran version of the legend, see: J. H. Oliver, “Herodotos Iv,153 and SEG IX 3,” GRBS 7 (1966): 25–29. There is also debate as to whether or not part of the text is actually the seventh-century foundation decree itself (Meiggs and Lewis, Greek Historical Inscriptions, 8). Malkin believes that Theran participation in the colony was actually continuous from the beginning, not a one-time event, Myth and Territory, 109–11. 137 Original publication: Kern, Gründungsgeschichte; a revised text appears in Otto Kern, ed. and comp., Die Inschriften von Magnesia am Maeander, gen. ed. Königliche Museen zu Berlin (Berlin: W. Spemann, 1900), 14–15, no. 17. Kern describes as selfevident the similarities between the story of Battos and the foundation-legend of Magnesia on the Maeander. He is also convinced, and I believe rightly so, that the sources of the later story are to be found in the same time period as the sources for Herodotos’ story. Since, as we have suggested above, Pindar seems to be independently aware of the essential elements of the foundation-legend of Cyrene, we must consider the possibility that these legends are already formulated in their basic content early in the 5th c. B.C.E.

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polemicized against any tradition that would transfer the founding events to another location already populated by Greeks.138 Returning once again to the story of the re-establishment of the Andanian Mysteries provides another important example of the resulting complexity when competing foundation-legends are given the time or the opportunity to coalesce. As Pausanias tells it, the story appears to bring together several strands of tradition, a characteristic of many foundation-legends.139 The story of Epiteles, and his discovery of the brazen urn, shows evidence of having been linked and subordinated to the figure of Epaminondas. Yet both of these figures are described as “founder.”140 It is arguable that the role of cultfounder has become attached to Epaminondas by virtue of his role as liberator, and that this is due to the formative power of the cultural model of the founder, even when, from the historical perspective, it is doubtful that events actually transpired as the legend describes.141 With respect to the development of the tradition, we find in the story of Epaminondas most of the elements which commonly tend to become a part of the foundation-legend. First of all, the group for whom the re-foundation is determinative (in this case, the ——————————— 138

Kern, Gründungsgeschichte, 22. Robertson’s recent analysis attempts to show that the Kauconians, descendants of the Kaucon mentioned as the first Athenian cult-expert to bring the mysteries of Demeter to Andania in Messenia, were understood as an early pre-Greek people living in the neighborhood of legendary king Nestor (Homer, Od. 3.366; cf. Herodotos 1.147.1;4.148.4). They are prominent in Ionia, and Hecataeus appears to be the earliest to draw the connection between this family and Athens as the mother-city of the Ionian colonies. Hecataeus apparently made the link on the basis of a similarity between the two cities’ (Athens and Triphylia) respective cults of Demeter. While Kaucon appears in Pausanias 4.15.8 as an Athenian, migrant cult-expert, Robertson thinks that Kaucon the hierophantēs (an explicit Eleusinian cultic parallel) was originally a cultic figure indigenous to Triphylia. The stories of the dream visions to Epiteles and to Epaminondas (see above, p. 76) were probably first told with reference to this Tryphilian, or local, “Kaucon-figure.” In essence, the story told by Pausanias, which links Kaucon with Eleusis is a very late development, arising long after Kaucon and his Kauconians had become associated in Athens with Eleusis, as in Hecataeus. However, there is no historical connection between Eleusis and Andania. The link to the Andanian cult is self-serving propaganda supporting the agenda of the Attic clan, Lycomidai, see: “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 239–45. 140 Epaminondas is called οι’ κιστη' ς in 9.14.5 and 15.6; οι’ κιστη` ς τη^ ς πο' λεως in 8.27.2; for Epiteles see: 4.26.7. 141 Again we could look to the story of Ptolemy I as we have seen it in Tacitus (above, pp. 67, 74). Here Tacitus has placed the king in the position of founder, and yet the historian avoids going so far as to claim that Ptolemy I is the actually “founder” of Alexandria by qualifying the king’s activities as additional (... cum Alexandriae recens conditae moinia templaque et religiones adderet, Hist. 4.83). In this case, while Ptolemy is given all the essential tasks of the founder, the claims of Alexander to the title are too great to be contradicted. Nevertheless, such elements fill out the expected image of the founder, and seem to become attached naturally to such founder-figures. 139

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Messenians) is found in dire straits. The Messenians are a dispersed people; having joined with the Athenians in the Peloponnesian War, they now find themselves suffering with the losing side. Divine intervention reaches them in the depths of this crisis. The Messenians are given the sign through the appearance of a divine figure that they will return from their dispersion (4.26.1–3). Divine guidance is again required when the Theban general finds himself in doubt as to where to found a secure city in Messenia (4.26.6). This motif is, of course, a variant of the theme of the ill-equipped or hesitant founder and another common element of the foundation-legend. In the divine commissioning-vision, the hero-founder is commanded to restore the Messenian homeland. At this point in the tradition received by Pausanias, a separate Argive tradition about Epiteles has probably been introduced.142 The tradition about Epaminondas ends with the reference to the wrath of the Dioskouroi, the sons of Zeus (4.26.6). The words of the divine messenger reveal to Epaminondas that the anger of the twin gods has ceased, and for this reason Messene can now be restored securely. The logical continuation of the story is only found later in 4.27 where the theme of the cause of the Dioskouroi’s wrath is picked up again and explained in a logical digression. The explanation is itself concluded by returning to the original topic of the general’s dream (4.27.3). The Epaminondas-tradition continues along this line, detailing the Theban’s strong inclination to found cities based on other oracular admonitions. The description of Epaminondas’ founding activities is very traditional, and in this form is complete and independent. However, the tradition of Epiteles cannot be ignored because it contains a most important element that is needed to fill out the foundation-legend. In the Epaminondas tradition the re-establishment of the cult is not made explicit, although historically the liberation of Messenia by the Thebans is the likely point at which the return of the refugees, including the priestly family, would have been possible. The Epiteles tradition, containing the dream-vision which results in the discovery of the τελετη` of the mysteries, has been worked into the story in a very skillful way; Epiteles retains his position as the discoverer of the brazen urn while remaining secondary to the figure of Epaminondas.143 Epiteles and Epaminondas share in the same dream-vision (the motif of the second, confirming oracle is also a characteristic element in the foundation———————————

142 On the possible correlation between Epiteles story and the so-called, “Argive Oracle” (SIG3 735, 92/91 B.C.E.), see Robertson, who believes it legendary, not earlier than the time of the Argive Oracle, and forming a part of the propaganda efforts in the early 1st c. B.C.E. legitimizing the reformation by Mnasistratos, the founder about whom we will have more to say in due course (“Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 241, 251–252). 143 Note that here we have some implied connections with Demeter worship, but not necessarily with the form of Demeter cult known at Eleusis, e.g., the reference in Pausanias 4.26.7 to Epiteles freeing the near-starved “old woman” (i. e., Demeter = the τελετη' ) from the bronze urn, cf. Robertson, “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 246–52.

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legend),144 but Epiteles is privy to the additional oracular command to retrieve the hidden urn. Yet, his action is effectively subordinated by his immediate return to Epaminondas, the founder, to whom he entrusts the as-yet-unopened vessel. He tells the Theban of his dream, but asks Epaminondas to be the first to open the urn. Of course, as any good founder-figure would, Epaminondas opens the urn only after the appropriate rites are performed. The Epitelestradition is closed by a clever assimilation which casts an Athenian named Kaucon (the original cultic expert who had transferred the mysteries to Andania from Eleusis generations before, 4.1.5) as the ι‘ εροφα' ντης who appears to both men (4.27.7–8).145 The elements of the Epiteles tradition are easily discerned; this Argive general, described as a founder of cities, at the impetus of the oracular appearance of Kaucon found the brazen urn containing the ancient mysteries and revealed them again to the people. As far as it goes, this foundation-legend is also complete in itself. It contains the dream-vision of the founder, the personal call, and the discovery of essential cultic elements. The founder is in effect “adopted” into the hereditary priesthood through the device of the private, oracular epiphany of the putative original founder, Kaucon. Apparently however, this tradition could not exist independently because it had to compete with the much more deeply entrenched memory (and no doubt historically accurate memory) that it was Epaminondas and the Thebans, not Epiteles, who actually restored Messenian independence and provided the security necessary for the renewal of the mysteries.146 Despite the fact that the tradition did not specifically attribute the refounding of the mysteries to Epaminondas, it nevertheless developed in a way that assumed, along with his other marvelous deeds, that the Theban general must have played a central role in this also. This example illustrates how persuasive and determinative the model of the founder-figure was in the framing of narratives about cultic innovators, and the degree to which the founder’s duties form a complex of expectations which tend toward fulfillment in the foundation-legends developing around him.147 ——————————— 144

On a second, or confirming vision see below, chap. 3, on the transfer of Sarapis to Opous. 145 Pausanias must have gotten the story of Caucon’s ancient visit to Andania from an Athenian source, which he has subsequently worked into the “pseudo-history” of Messenia, Robertson, “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 247. 146 See: Ludwig Ziehen, “Der Mysterienkult von Andania,” AR 24 (1926): 33; cf. GGR, 2.97–98; and similarly Robertson, “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” 252, Epaminondas’ dream was probably legendary since the time soon after his victories; it probably focused on the end of the Dioskouroi’s wrath at Messenia. Only later was it augmented with the story of Kaucon and linked to the story of Epiteles, at the time of the reformation of the cult under Mnasistratos. 147 In chapter 3, in connection with the foundation-legend surrounding Ptolemy I Sōtēr and the Alexandrian cult of Sarapis, we shall see evidence that legends of this type can appropriate famous persons of the past as founders in order to increase the prestige of the

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If we again focus on the way the cult transfer or founding is described in the case of the expanding cult of Sarapis, we can easily see this paradigm powerfully exercised its influence over the accompanying narratives. Recalling our earlier discussion, the descriptions by Tacitus and Plutarch of the founding of the cult in Alexandria, the story of the transfer of the cult from Thessalonika to Opous, and the account of the founding of the Sarapieion on Delos all share the same basic sequence of events and the essential elements by which we have characterized the foundation-legend. To be sure, we shall discuss the relationship of these accounts to the historical development of the Sarapis cult in detail in the next chapter. For now, I want to briefly foreshadow those conclusions by saying only that these accounts are shaped in such a consistent fashion less by the actual historical events of the founding than by the determinative influence of the narrative genre of the foundationlegend. One might conclude that this is certainly understandable in the case of Tacitus and Plutarch, whose narratives are separated from the events they describe by centuries. However, as we shall see, at least in the cases of the socalled Delian aretalogy of Sarapis, the cult bylaws of the Andanian mysteries by Mnasistratos of Messene, and likely the foundation inscription by Dionysios of Philadelphia, which stand in close relation to the historical events they intend to narrate, we have clear evidence in their similarities for the way the demands of what functions de facto as a genre conform the telling of the tale to the accepted pattern.148 But perhaps even more remarkable is the conformance to this paradigm of an individual’s description of his own actions and experiences that we find in the private letter of a certain Zoilos to a Ptolemaic official named Apollonios (257 B.C.E).149 Zoilos of Aspendos in Pamphylia writes to Apollonios in Alexandria about the command of Sarapis received by the former ordering the latter, Apollonios, to build a temple to the god in the Greek section of Zoilos’ town. Actually, Zoilos was to recruit Apollonios’ aid in the project. This command was given to Zoilos several times in dream-visions.150 Zoilos’ involved narrative describes how he had, at ——————————— institution’s origins, and thereby the institution’s present status. 148 See chapter 3. E.g., if we take the Thessalonian transfer story, the text includes all the essential elements of our proposed narrative genre: Sarapis appears to Xenainetos in a dream, the god commands the transfer of his cult to Opous, and the god’s divinely-aided reception by Eurynomos, Xenainetos’ political rival. 149 P.Cair.Zen. 59.034; see: Adolf G. Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East: The New Testament Illustrated by Recently Discovered Texts of the Graeco-Roman World, rev. ed., trans. Lionel R. M. Strachan (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1978), 152–61; GGR, 2.190; P. M. Fraser, “Two Studies on the Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” Opuscula Atheniensia 3, no. 7 (1960): 1–54, esp. 41–42. 150 ... το` ν Σα' ραπι'μ μοι χρημα[τι'ζει]ν πλε[ο]να' κι[ς]│ ε’ ν τοι^ς υ« πνοις, ο« πως α›ν διαπλευ' σω προ` ς σε` και` ε’ μφ[ανι'σω σοι το' ]νδε το` [ν]│ χρηματισμο` ν, ο« τι δει^ συντελεσθη^ ναι αυ’ τω^ ι [lacuna]│και` τε' μενος ε’ ν τη^ ι ‘ Ελληνικη^ ι προ` ς τω ^ ι λιμε' ν[ι] κα[ι`] ι‘ [ερε' α] ε’ πιστατει^ν κ[α]ι`│ ε’ πιβωμι'ζειν υ‘ πε`ρ υ‘ μω ^ ν (P.Cair.Zen. 59034, ll. 4b–7a); cf. the use of Zoilos by Sarapis to

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first, hesitated to carry out the divine command only to suffer illness. The account continues to explain how, at his sincere supplication, Sarapis agreed to heal him on the condition that he should fulfill his responsibility to the god (ll. 7–11). But Zoilos failed and a second time Sarapis visited illness upon him (ll. 15–17). Zoilos’ understanding of his own experiences appears to presuppose the paradigm of the founder-figure, and his narrative presupposes that the foundation-legend is the proper model according to which an individual in his circumstances should relate these experiences to Apollonios. While examples of legends in many respects similar to these can be documented for many societies of the ancient Mediterranean world, because of Greek societies’ specific colonial histories and the peculiar narrative pattern used to recount them, the foundation-legend became not only the preferred vehicle for the imagined past, but also, once acquiring such status as the presumed way these tale should be told, the script for the actions of would-be culture-innovators, especially cultic innovators, and the model for the validating stories they would tell about their actions. Before we look more closely at some comparative examples, I would preface our examination by the claim that while non-Greeks tell stories about their founder-figures, they do not normally tell these stories the way Greeks do.151 The foundation-legend was a recognized narrative genre among Greeks.152 For example, Plato has Socrates ——————————— reach Apollonios with the god’s use of Xenainetos to reach Eurynomos. 151 While the standard handbooks on Greek historiography and rhetoric are of limited value to the discussion of foundation-legends, it is often recognized without comment that the Greek form of foundation narrative influenced narrative developments among others, particularly the Romans, e.g., Stefan Rebenich, “Historical Prose,” in Handbook of Classical Rhetoric in the Hellenistic Period 330 B.C. – A. D. 400, ed. Stanley E. Porter, trans. R. McLean Wilson (Boston and Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, Inc., 2001), 309. 152 Ktisis Literature (“Ktisisliteratur”) writes Leschhorn (Gründer der Stadt, 116) constituted a substantial body of literature in which the native city of the respective author and its origins and founding were originally sung in epic form; Ewen Lyall Bowie, “Early Greek Elegy, Symposium and Public Festival,” JHS 106 (1986): 27–34 argues for a narrative genre of long narrative elegiac poems, similar to Homeric hexameter epic, devoted to the founding and history of cities, designed for public performance at festival competitions. Nothing of this original form has survived, yet elements do survive in Callimachus and these sources contribute to the background used by Pausanias and Strabo. The earliest example is probably a fragment of Xenophanes/Semonides, FGrH, 450 T1 (cf. 534 T1) preserved in Diogenes Laertius 9.20, which lists titles of works written about, e.g., the founding of Colophon (Κολοφω^ νος κτι'σις), the colonization of Elea in Italia (ο‘ ει’ ς ’ Ελε' αν τη^ ς ’ Ιταλι'ας α’ ποικισμο' ς). There are hints that perhaps Jews who were heavily influenced by Greek culture could have followed this pattern. We have, of course, the examples of Pseudo-Philo and his poem On Jerusalem (3rd–2nd cc. B.C.E.), mentioned in Eusebius, Praep.ev. 9.24 and 9.37.1–3 (depending on Alexander Polyhistor), and Theodotus’ On the Jews (2nd–1st cc. B.C.E., also in the same work by Eusebius, 9.22.1–11). However, this material is too fragmentary to argue that they contained any references to a foundation story. References to foundation-legends are found in Polybius 9.1.4; 12.26d; 34.1.3f where Timaios and Ephorus

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press the great Sophist Hippias about the sort of stories the Lakedaimonians enjoy hearing, to which Hippias responds: Socrates, [they enjoy hearing] about the genealogies of both heroes and people [in general], and about the settlements of colonies, how it was that the cities were founded in ancient times; in short, they would listen with pleasure to the whole story of ancient times, to the degree that I myself am compelled on their account to learn these things thoroughly and rehearse them over and over.153

Although we do not have a straightforward folk-definition of the genre, we do have references to some of its basic features, and several extended examples of the phenomenon from which to attempt a narrative genre definition. Before doing so, I would offer a word regarding just what we mean in this study by genre. I have no intention of imposing a strict genre definition based on moderns canons, but I rather want to describe the largely polythetic range of components – one yet distinguishable because of certain consistently recurrent components within the polythetic range of options – of a cultural commonplace, a narrative pattern clearly recognized by the ancient Greeks and non-Greeks (as Cicero so clearly shows us) as a Greek narrative pattern – one that crosses the generic boundaries of poetry and prose.154 As I have already suggested, the evidence seems to indicate that Greeks recognized, by traditional practice, κτι' σεις writers and the type of story they produced. With this in mind, by genre I mean something very specific and limited; viz., the cultural knowledge shared by Greeks, and those influenced by Greeks, regarding the proper way to tell a story about the founding of a city ——————————— are honored for their stories; Charon of Lampsakos, FGrH, 262 T1; Hellanikos of Lesbos, FGrH 4F 66f; Hippys of Rhegion, FGrH, 554 T1. Hippys of Rhegion wrote of the founding of Italy (κτι'σις ’ Ιταλι'ας), the founding of Kroton and the founder Myskellos; Dionysios of Chalkis, FHG 4, 393f; Apollonios of Rhodes in Powell, Collectanea Alexandrina, 5–6, nos. 5, 7. Diodorus Siculus (1.2.1) comments on this type of historical writing, believing that it is because of commemoration or remembrance (δια` τη` ν ε’ κ ταυ^ της [the recording of history and the great deeds of which it has been made] ε’ π’ α’ γαθω ^, μνη' μην) that men have been motivated to become founders of cities (οι‘ με`ν κτι'σται πο' λεων γενε' σθαι προεκλη' θησαν); also see, Albrecht Dihle, A History of Greek Literature from Homer to the Hellenistic Period, trans. Clare Krojzl (London and New York: Routledge, 1994), 21, 58. 153 Plato, Hipp. maj. 285d–e2; Περι` τω ” Σω' κρατες, τω ^ ν γενω^ ν, ω ^ ν τε η‘ ρω' ων και` τω^ ν α’ νθρω' πων, και` τω^ ν κατοικι'σεων, ω‘ ς το` α’ ρχαι^ον ε’ κτι'σθησαν αι‘ πο' λεις, συλλη' βδην πα' σης τη^ ς α’ ρχαιολογι'ας η« διστα α’ κροω ^ νται, ω « στ’ ε» γωγε δι’ αυ’ του` ς η’ να' γκασμαι ε’ κμεμαθηκε' ναι τε και` ε’ κμεμελετηκε' ναι πα' ντα τα` τοιαυ^ τα. That this intense preparation is presupposed by the character seems to suggest that the audience for such performances is rather demanding in their expectations, a reflection of a sophisticated knowledge of and familiarity with this type of story. 154 Rejecting the notion of a technical genre for κτι'σεις in favor of a range of strategies with various forms and perspectives, see: Walter T. Wilson, “Urban Legends: Acts 10:1– 11:18 and the Strategies of Greco-Roman Foundation Narratives,” JBL 120, no. 1 (2001): 77–99, esp. 77–80.

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or institution in order to enhance its prestige both within the founded community and among its neighbors and rivals. Therefore, for my present purpose, a genre classification can only refer to a historically, namely, culturallydetermined, narrative preference shared by Greek writers of κτι' σεις – foundation-legends – over a relatively long period of time, with amazing consistency in form, content, and function.155 In view of the recent skepticism among genre theorists regarding our inability to comprehend the texts in view as a single class, or to put it another way, the difficulty of constructing criteria of class which adequately exclude and include examples,156 we propose limiting more narrowly the scope of the class in question on the basis of more pragmatic criteria. The Greek evidence consistently reveals two foci. The first is the pattern of related story elements in the legend (its central narrative of the oracular selection of the founder, and the divine intervention of the deity to insure the completion of the task).157 The second is the function of the legend as validating propaganda.158 These two elements are the sine qua ———————————

155 This understanding of genre is rooted in anthropological discussion of culture theory which would presuppose that writing a story, just like giving the right greeting at a specific time of the day, is governed by shared cultural conventions. With regard to the use of this presupposition in literary criticism, see: Stanley Fish, Is There a Text in This Class?: The Authority of Interpretive Communities (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980), specifically chapter 14, “How to Recognize a Poem When You See One,” pp. 322–37, esp. pp. 332–35. Beyond our limited agreement with Fish on this point, he fails to consider sufficiently that both hearer and speaker share the same “interpretive unanimity.” His argument is overly dependent on emphasizing the theoretical possibility of the ignorant outsider whose presence complicates the semantic presuppositions of the native insider. Yet inside the culture, among those who share its conventions, the theoretically ignorant outsider is of little importance to the possibility of the speaker being understood by the listener(s). 156 See, e.g., Ralph Cohen, “History and Genre,” NLH 17 (1986): 205–18; J. P. Strelka, ed., Theories of Literary Genre (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1978). The most recent discussions among biblical scholars have not revolved around the theoretical problems regarding the possibility of genre-critical analysis of the sort found in literary-critical circles. Rather, presupposing the basic usefulness of genre distinctions for interpretation, those who, e.g., have dealt with the proper definition of the term “apocalyptic” literature, have debated the most effective approach toward the development of a genre definition, see John J. Collins, The Apocalyptic Imagination: An Introduction to the Jewish Matrix of Christianity (New York: Crossroad, 1989), 1–8. 157 For ancient Greek distinctions based on content see: F. Cairns, Generic Composition in Greek and Roman Poetry (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1972). 158 Perhaps one of the best examples of this function can be seen in the recent analysis of the Salutaris Dedication of Ephesos by G. MacLean Rogers, The Sacred Identity of Ephesos: Foundation Myths of a Roman City (London and New York: Routledge, 1991). Despite appearances in the title, Rogers describes this intricate prescription for the dispersal of funds to key persons and groups in the city and the endowment for the regular performance of an elaborate procession as ultimately a graphic and spatial representation of Ephesos’ Greek heritage and a celebration of the city’s identity as the dwelling place of Artemis. The entire procedure, including the very symbolic placement of the inscription

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non of the class.159 As to form, the original foundation-legends were probably, as we have mentioned, composed in epic meter.160 However, by the later times, the prose narrative is most prevalent, the great foundational poem of Maiistas of Delos being the exception that proves this rule – more in due course. My narrative genre definition focuses on what is essential to distinguish a Greek foundation-legend from other types of foundation stories and origin myths. It must be mentioned at this point that the foundation-legend has been considered from perspectives other than the one proposed here. As I have insisted, ours is a very distinct, and limited variant of the much broader class often labelled by specialists, aitia, or etiological myths. In his recent treatment, Robert Garland discusses the aition, which he also calls the “foundation legend,” in much broader terms than have been used in the present work.161 Garland’s genre definition is fundamentally content-based, i.e., his four types of aitia are distinguished on the basis of the subject matter, specifically the particular cause or occasion which explains the resulting cult or practice at issue.162 To repeat, this will be made clear as we look closely at the examples ——————————— recording the dedication in the theater precinct, is intended to be a statement of Ephesian self-definition. The financial allotments reproduce the hierarchy of relationships between groups within the city. The course of the procession begins and ends with the sanctuary of Artemis, and in a carefully planned course, begins its pass through the city with the most recent Roman sections, climaxing its course through a section of the city which clearly recalled and emphasized the city’s most venerable Greek foundation as a part of the Ionian migrations (the Koressian Gate, see esp. pp. 80–115); cf. for a similar propagandistic pattern in Pergamon, see: Biagio Virgilio, Gli Attalidi di Pergamo. fama, ereditá, memoria, Biblioteca di studi antichi. Pisa 70, Studi ellenista 5 (Pisa: Giardini, 1993). 159 This is, again clear from the distinctions made by Cicero between Greek and Roman practice, see above, pp 1, notes 1–3; 9 note 29. 160 See above, 88, n. 152. 161 Robert Garland, Introducing New Gods: The Politics of Athenian Religion (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), 152–70, esp. 154. Of course, as Garland’s assemblage of evidence makes clear, his definition is inadequate to the task of distinguishing between variant forms within the general category of etiological myth. Our criteria for distinguishing a genre of the foundation-legend are the structural patterns and constituent elements of these stories which remain constant regardless of the specific details of content relevant to the particular foundation in question. Therefore, we do not claim here to have proposed a genre definition covering all types of aitia. Our working genre-definition is derived from our analysis of specific and consistently recurring characteristics which determine the structure of a limited class of aitia, and which are shared diachronically with the genre of κτι'σεις literature recognized among the ancient Greeks. 162 Garland describes what he calls “four impulses” which, to varying degrees and in various combinations, drive the establishment of new cults and characterize the individual foundation-legends; (1) guilt over offense to a deity on the part of the founder, (2) gratitude for the aversion of disaster, (3) compulsion resulting from an epiphany or heroic action, and (4) community pride (Politics of Athenian Religion, 154). From our analysis, these four are certainly recurring motifs within foundation-legends, however, not all find a place in specifi-

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to be compared in due course. Although the Greek legend can accumulate a wide variety of motifs,163 and can appear in several literary forms, without the two specific elements mentioned just now it cannot be distinguished from other forms of aitia. Therefore, I would propose the following as a working definition of the narrative genre: the Greek foundation-legend is an account of the founding events of a city or social institution, originally produced to serve as validating propaganda within a polemical context not necessarily connected with an historic occasion of foundation, but one clearly related to the social circumstances of the community claiming the foundation, and which can be either a poetic or prosaic composition, the central theme of which is the divine selection of a specific founder (usually by name), through the direct appearance, the direct address, or the provision of an oracular sign by a god or divine intermediary, in order that the selected individual become the specific instrument commissioned to carry out the will of the deity by founding/reforming/transferring a specific institution in a new (perhaps unknown) location.

To reiterate, our genre definition is derived from analysis of specific and consistently recurring characteristics that determine the structure of a particular class of aitia, and which are shared diachronically with the genre of “κτι' σεις” literature recognized among the ancient Greeks.164 It is important to clarify here that I am distinguishing the parts from the whole in using a polythetic definition of the Greek foundation-legend. In other words, in my view, cultural forms are never simply the sum of their parts; the whole is something more. This means that whereas a story like Herodotos’ account of the cultic actions of Kleisthenes, tyrant of Sikyon (600–570 B.C.E.), contains certain elements found in κτι' σεις, their mere cooccurrence does not equal the whole that I would identify as the Greek foundation-legend. In this particular case, we have the story of a tyrant’s egotistical intolerance for any remnant of Argive heritage. His purgation included even the Homeric songs, so laced were they with praise of Argos, and to complete it, he petitioned Delphi’s permission to expel the cult of Adrastos, the ——————————— cally cultic propaganda, and only one, epiphany, should be considered determinative of the genre. According to Garland’s description, the crucial element of the god’s selection is of only limited importance. It is my contention that the cult foundation-legend is developed directly from the κτι'σεις of cities and colonies. Using Garland’s perspective I find no way of describing any historical antecedents for such a specific genre as that which we attempt to describe here. 163 Among which we could certainly include Garland’s “impulses,” e.g., the personal motivation of the founder. Yet the presence of an element of this sort is in no way necessary to the definition of the foundation-legend as we shall understand it. As I have said, we are dealing here with a polythetic definition, a more or less of the possible elements found in a whole characterized by the relationships between elements, not their mere presence. 164 This means for our purposes, that while an aition such as the story which explains the origin of the Eleusinian Demeter cult in the Hom.Hymn.Cer. reflects the pattern of elements we have described in defining the foundation-legend, the longer hymn itself (which Garland includes in his broad category) cannot, in our view, be defined as a foundation-legend.

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Argive hero. Though denied by the Pythia, who insulted him as a murderer, he arrogantly pursued his plan to humiliate Argos and its hero, importing from Thebes the cult of Melanippos, Adrastos’ arch-enemy. Kleisthenes went further, returning the Dionysiac dirges from the cult of Adrastos to Dionysos, and the rest of the cultic practice devoted to the hero to the newly-imported cult of Melanippos (Herodotos 5.67). Why, one might ask, is this not to be considered a κτι' σις, after all the story describes a transferal of cult to a new location by a single actor, one who even consulted an oracle on cultic matters? My answer is, again, that the co-occurrence of some of the parts does not equal the whole. Herodotos is not interested in the transfer of cult here, but in the arrogant, self-aggrandizing actions of a tyrant. The story is not about the divine impetus that validates cultic innovation, nor does the story function in the service of a cult group’s identity construction or its validation. It is simply a story, like any number of others, that contains similar components – not even the distinctive ones – found in the foundation-legends I have identified. In essence, Greeks can tell stories about founding things – even cities – without an epiphanic or oracular founder’s call, but, as far as our evidence goes, it appears that no Greek would call such a story a κτι' σις. To return to our genealogical proposal, in addition to the story of the founding of the cult of Sarapis at Alexandria by Ptolemy I, we could also cite the so-called Alexander Romance as an example of the connection between the foundation-legend of the polis and that used for a cultic foundation. It is not determinative for us that Ps.-Callisthenes’ account of the founding of Alexandria is totally unhistorical; it is clear that the author, an Alexandrian living around 300 B.C.E., is motivated by propagandistic concerns. Our author tells us that Alexander went to Siwa to question the oracle of ZeusAmmon about the location at which he should found his new city bearing his name.165 The oracle uses Homer’s Odyssey to indicate the island where Proteus lived (Pharos), not, however, in terms of the site of a city but as the spot wherein Alexander would find the cult site of Pluton-Aion166 There he orders the outlines of the city to be traced with meal. Alexander offers a foundation sacrifice, placing the meat on the altar only to have an eagle swoop down and carry the meat to another place in which an ancient altar is discovered with images of Persephone and an unrecognized deity. Alexander desires to learn the identity of both figures, and in a dream oracle as he is lying asleep on the very spot,167 the god reveals his true name in a code number; he is ———————————

165 1.30–33. It would be a city like all city foundations of the past that would necessarily include. its appropriate cults. 166 Both elements of this compound are commonly used to identify Sarapis, the deity so fundamentally tied to Alexandria and the Ptolemies. 167 I. e., the great king incubates, another example of an etiology of established cult practice included within a foundation-legend.

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Sarapis. The entire story assumes an almost inextricable connection between city foundation and cult foundation.168 Thus the paradigm easily remains attached to the latter after the former fades away. So we see, the divine commission to found a city or institution in a new location presumes that some element of cultic transferal is prescribed, usually the transfer of an image; this element becomes attached to the legacy of Alexander’s city in the story of the transfer of Sarapis’ image from Pontus to Alexandria by Alexander’s successor, Ptolemy.169 With respect to the structure of the story, as the foundation-legend of the Andanian Mysteries clearly shows, a single foundation-legend can often be incorporated into longer narratives, be combined with others into composite traditions, and usually incorporates a wide variety of legendary and mythic motifs in its account of the founder and the founding events.170 With reference to those cases where non-Greeks do tell similar stories, it is usually because they have been influenced by Hellenistic patterns or, in fact, because they have based their story on Greek models. To make this point more adequately, we shall return to the legend of Battos, using it as our point of reference. The central feature of the Greek foundation-legend, namely, the personal oracular selection of the founder by the deity as the definitive element around which is formed the fundamental structure of the story and which distinguishes this form of foundation-legend from those told by non-Greeks, stands out clearly in Herodotos’ narrative. 3.1. The Composition of the Legend of Battos, Founder of Cyrene In the context of his description of the Persian campaigns against the Hellespont and Libya, Herodotos interrupts the account of the latter, and at the mention of Libya, introduces the story of the founding of the colony at Cyrene. However, he does not immediately feel the need to spell out his intended scope. Instead, he begins in the heroic age, with the tales of the Argonauts, and the perils of their descendants,171 perils that characterize the ———————————

168 See: Reinhold. Merkelbach, Isis Regina - Zeus Sarapis: die griechisch-ägyptische Religion nach den Quellen dargestellt (Stuttgart and Leipzig: Teubner, 1995), 75–76. 169 This is, of course, one of the elements missing in the aition of the Eleusinian mysteries, which Garland includes in his category, see above, p. 91, note 161. 170 See above, pp. 83–86; the text will be treated in detail in due course. 171 In fact, Herodotos’ entire narrative span of history forms a repeating cycle of dislocations. Natives drive these unwanted, resident-alien descendants from Lemnos (4.145). They sail away only to invade the Lakedaimonians, who immediately question the presence of these uninvited guests. Calling themselves Minyans (Μινυ' αι), the invaders claim that it was only right that they should seek shelter in the land of their forefathers (a claim at which Herodotos reveals some skepticism). As Herodotos makes clear, the Argo is the tie that binds the Minyans to the children of Tyndareos; for the sake of this tie, the Lakedaimonians receive the invaders. The cycle repeats. The Minyans find no lasting home in Laconia. As

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impelling circumstances that drive the narrative toward colonization.172 These preliminaries establish, on the one hand, the important links with venerable tradition so crucial to the purpose of the legend. On the other hand, the description of the ancient tensions between the various groups incorporated in the subsequent history of colonization explains the source of the ongoing factional loyalties within the respective communities of Thera and Cyrene.173 The story now turns on the actions of the Theran founding-hero. Theras’ decision to lead the colony to the island which comes to bear his name is based on another mythical relationship, i.e., he is a descendant of Cadmos, and so are the inhabitants of the island.174 With the frequent occurrence of the genealogical connection to legendary figures from the heroic age, the importance placed on links of this type for purposes of group validation becomes more obvious. Theras intervened on behalf of the Minyans, who were seeking some form of escape from their increasingly hostile neighbors, and had some of them assigned to his colonial expedition. This remnant of outcasts becomes, essentially, a part of the colonial expedition’s mixed multitude.175 According to Herodotos, up to this point, that is up to the moment at which the Minyae and their Lakedaimonian comrades land on Thera, the two found——————————— they grow stronger and more demanding (4.146), the Lakedaimonians plot to kill them. This crisis furnishes the context for the introduction of a founder-figure, at this point, viz., Theras (the eponymous founder of Thera), who was already planning a colonial expedition. He desired to leave Sparta because of his own personal, political rivalries (4.147). It is Theras who includes a group of Minyans in his expedition, bringing them with him to Thera. 172 For the motif of the negative circumstances that lead to the expulsion of the founders (including murder and political rivalries), see: above p. 4, note 11; Carol Dougherty, “It’s Murder to Found a Colony,” in Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece: Cult, Performance, Politics, ed. Carol Dougherty and Leslie Kurke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 178–98. I do take exception to her application of Turner’s ritual model to the purification of the founder (p. 182), simply because Turner’s model of liminalization to reintegration describes the reintegration into the original community, albeit with a transformed status. In the foundation-legends, the founder is not reintegrated into the society from which he was liminalized; he is expelled, his society has purged him completely. One cannot be “reintegrated” into a totally different social group. 173 This will be further elaborated below in the description of the factional identifications of Grinnos and Battos which are spelled out according to the various purposes of the competing legends, see: Leschhorn, Gründer der Stadt, 116. The point which I will try to make is that the various forms of the legend reveal the primary propagandistic function played by the foundation-legend. The two communities respectfully identified with Thera (i. e., Grinnos) and with the Minyans (i. e., Battos) each use their version of the foundation-legend as a vehicle through which to validate their self-understanding or group-identity. 174 4.147–48. This is the same motivation for the Minyans’ choice of Laconia. 175 Here, of course, I allude to the biblical Exodus story. There would appear to be a similar idea contained there (Exod 12:38). The story of Theras’ rescue focuses on only a fraction of the Minyans, the majority are dismissed with a few words about another series of cities which they found in the Peloponnesos (4.148).

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ing traditions (the Lakedaimonian and the Theran) agree (4.150).176 For the remainder of the story, Herodotos distinguishes two traditions, a Theran and a Cyrenean.177 The Cyrenean version known to Herodotos in the 5th century, focuses on Battos and his expulsion or rejection by the Therans, but obviously, over time, the need for a strong relationship between Cyrene and Thera leads to the Cyrenean incorporation of elements of the Theran version in the retelling of the tale found in the 4th century stele recounting the “oath of the founders.”178 What Herodotos has narrated to this point has served to set the stage for the principal action which now begins with a descendant of Theras named Grinnos, king of Thera. Grinnos is therefore a Spartan and consequently represents those Therans who claim to be descendants of the original group of Spartan immigrants and founders. Grinnos’ lineage will be played off against that of Battos, the true focus of the foundation-legend, and the actual founder of Cyrene – at least according to common knowledge. Battos, as we will learn in the course of the tale, is a descendant of the Minyans. Grinnos, accompanied by Battos among others, is said to have visited Delphi to offer a hecatomb. Of course, the narrative history of Greek colonization assures that the audience imagined the specter of the Delphi who surprises suppliants with unwanted and unexpected commissions to found cities. And not to disappoint expectations, the oracular response given to Grinnos by the priestess contained the command to found a colony in Libya. Grinnos, aged as he was, certainly did not expect such a response from Apollo. In declining to accept the responsibility, the king indiscriminately suggested to the priestess that the command better suited one of his younger companions. The story makes Grinnos’ suggestion much more focused; as he suggested any one of his younger petitioners, he pointed to Battos. As we shall see in comparing the two versions of the foundation legend, the Therans wish to discount the importance of Battos, making him the second choice of the god.179 Nevertheless, he cannot be dismissed because he is the central figure in the foundation in all forms of the narrative tradition, and his role as οι’ κιστη' ς was long ———————————

176 Remembering Cornell’s comments on the origin of such traditions (see above, pp. 80–83), Herodotos here distinguishes a legend told in the mother-city, from the local legend, (i. e., the one told in the colony), the same distinction he makes later with respect to the legends told in Thera (the mother-city) and in Cyrene (the colony). 177 Cf. Lucian’s account of the traditions surrounding the foundation of the great temple of Aphrodite (Syr.D. 17), see above, pp. 65–66, 75. 178 See: Osborne, “Greek Colonization?” 254–55, who rightly warns that “... we have to recognise the political needs of the tellers as prime determinants” (256); also see: Robin Osborne, Jr., Greece in the Making, 1200–479 BC, RHAW (London and New York: Routledge, 1996), 8–17. 179 Osborne, Greece, 10–11.

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embodied in the Battiad dynasty of Cyrene – all common knowledge.180 The point here is the clarity with which the foundation-legend’s primary function in propaganda and self-validation shows through. The two communities, one identifying with the Lakedaimonians (Theras/Grinnos) and the other with the Minyans (Battos), use the medium of the foundation-legend to plead their respective positions. The party left Delphi, making no plans to obey the god because of the difficulty of the task (Libya was an unknown place to the Therans, 4.150). The theme of hesitation or disobedience is, as we have seen, a constantly recurring motif in foundation-legends, and serves a major propagandistic purpose. The founder’s hesitancy or outright refusal to obey provides the occasion to emphasize the initiative of the deity. The principle point of the legend is to validate the existence of the institution for which the legend has been generated. One of the means by which legitimacy is demonstrated is to show that the present institution exists because of the divine will; in this case, Cyrene exists because Apollo willed it so, and acted on his own behalf to see his will realized. Refusal to obey is an invitation to disaster. The same god who selects the founder also chastises the hesitant founder.181 As a result of Grinnos’ refusal, no rain fell on Thera for seven years. This threat drove the Therans to inquire of Delphi again. This too is a common theme; the insistent deity will not allow the chosen one to refuse to comply. A second, more threatening dream-vision often follows god-sent trouble in the foundation-legends. The priestess in this case reminded the Therans of their obligation to send forth a colony. Left with no options, the Therans begin their preparations for the expedition and send out spies to locate the site (4.151).182 Interestingly, from this point on Grinnos is never mentioned. The controversy in the competing traditions is not one over which founder is to be considered the true founder, as we have it in other complex traditions. Rather, the ——————————— 180

I suspect that the Theran version presupposes the Cyrenean in that the Theran narrative, although mentioning Grinnos as the original choice of Apollo as founder, never focused on a single founder-figure, interestingly, Grinnos plays no further role in the founding activities once they are undertaken in earnest by the Therans. Rather the Theran version emphasizes their own initiative and portrays Battos as an appointee of the city, a subtle nod to Theran claims on Cyrene. The question here is why the Therans should mention Battos at all? Obviously, Battos is the undeniable element in the tradition, as the fourth-century Theran proposal to the Cyreneans (SEG 9.3) admits. 181 Gebhard, “Gods in Transit,” 461. 182 If Stratonice, the foundress of the famous temple of Aphrodite mentioned earlier, failed to obey the oracular command of the god to found the temple, punishments (κακα' ) would befall her just as in the case of Grinnos. Unfortunately, Stratonice tells the dream to her husband only after she has ignored the command and become ill. Nicator, her husband, forces her to obey Hera and build the temple. She is to go, under the protection and guidance of Kombabos (an appointee of the king), and οι’ κοδομει^ν the temple. With her decision to obey the sickness leaves her (Syr.D. 19).

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competing foundation-legends known to Herodotos seem to reflect competition between to lineages within Theran society, those who claim Spartan descent versus those who descend from the Minyans, i.e., Grinnos versus Battos. As we have mentioned, the Theran version attempts to subordinate Battos’ role to Theran authority at significant points in the narrative. Not only is Grinnos deferral of leadership to Battos complicated by verbal ambiguity clarified only by his perhaps unconscious posture (4.150), but when the Therans actually decide to send the expedition to Libya, Battos is portrayed as the one designated by the Therans as their η‘ γεμω' ν and king, not as κτι' στης (4.153). This, says Herodotos, is what the Therans say about the colonization but the Cyreneans have their own version. In the Cyrenean account the narrative cycle predictably returns to origins; this time to the family lineage and circumstances of the birth of the founder – another common theme in the foundation-legends. Battos’ birth account, according the Cyrenean version, includes motifs common to many legends of founder-figures in a variety of cultural contexts.183 He is born to the daughter of a Cretan king who was abused by her stepmother. The jealous stepmother betrayed the girl to her own father’s wrath. Though the daughter’s name was Phronime (Φρονι' μη), “sensible” or “prudent,” she is accused by her stepmother of the very opposite, “lewdness” or “lustfulness” (μαχλοσυ' νη). Her father, deciding her deserving of death, deceitfully trapped a visiting Theran merchant, whose name Themison (Θεμι' σων) ironically means “dutiful, or he who acts rightly” into promising to throw Phronime overboard on his return voyage to Thera. However, “Dutiful,” complies only with the letter of the promise; after he threw the girl into the water (i. e., lowered her into the water by ropes), he quickly pulled her back to safety (4.154–55). Upon her arrival on Thera, Phronime is taken as the concubine of a notable Theran, Polymnestus (“Much Wooing”), a descendant of the Minyans. To these two was born the weakly and stammering Battos (4.154-5).184 All this, as the character names make obvious, is legendary.185 Our point here is that only the ——————————— 183

Recall those of Sargon the Great (ANET, 119), of Moses (Exod 1:8–2:10), of Cyrus the Great (Herodotos 1.107–130), and of Romulus and Remus (Livy, ab Urbe 1.4.3–7). In this respect, the foundation-legends can utilize motifs which are found in many other contexts. Motifs such as that of the physically deficient founder, as we have in Battos and others; or the fantastic birth and infancy stories of characters like Cyrus (esp. Herodotos 1.108– 112) or Romulus and Remus, can often embellish a foundation legend. The same is true where the inclusion of miraculous events and signs are presented. All of these are included in addition to the essential and definitive elements of the foundation story. 184 While Herodotos admits that Battos is the name known to the Therans and the Cyreneans, he doubts this, claiming that the original name was something different. The name Battos he links directly to the oracle of Delphi (4.155). It is interesting to note that Battos is known by the name Aristoteles in other traditions of the founding of Cyrene, see Pind. Pyth. 5, l. 116, cf. SEG 9.189.2, Θη' ρης ε’ κπεμφθει`ς Βα' ττος ’Αριστοτε' λης. 185 Osborne, “Greek Colonization?” 255; Idem, Greece, 12.

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Cyrenean legend is concerned about Battos’ genealogy; here he is the grandson of a Cretan king, and a descendant of the heroic Argonauts. In course of explaining his reason for doubting that Battos got his name because of his stuttering problem, Herodotos recounts the story of the Battos’ discomforting encounter with Apollo. As I pointed out earlier, Herodotos relates the common topos of redirection, namely, that Battos only went to Delphi to inquire about his vocal impediment, but instead of the expected answer the priestess relayed to him a personal commission from Apollo to found a colony in Libya. It is as Battos, a name chosen because it is the Libyan word for king, says Herodotos, that the Pythia prophetically addresses the founder. The stunned Battos responds with incredulity, and pleas for the source of the power to carry out the task. The pattern reprises the scene in the story of Grinnos, the surprised founder, and his hesitancy to accept the responsibility imposed by the god. However, in the Cyrenean version, Battos’ hesitation provides the opportunity for the introduction of one of the persistent foundational concepts, namely, the idea that Apollo is the true driving force behind the social innovation. Battos replies to the god’s command by describing the task as α’ δυ' νατα χρα^ς , (4.155.20), and asks, in the face of things, “where shall I get me the power or might of hand for it?”186 In point of fact, the things required by Apollo are impossible to complete; only through the intervention of the god himself can the task be accomplished. This theme has multi-faceted significance. On the one hand, it focuses the attention on the deity as instigator and founder. On the other hand, the fact that Apollo is to be seen as the true founder of the colony serves to glorify the institution and validate its existence. What is otherwise an obvious innovation is nothing less than a divine work. Who could argue against the will of the god? The events which follow parallel the Theran story: things go badly on Thera, and in a quest for a solution the city sends to Delphi for answers. Even so, there are at this point some subtle but important differences between the two versions. Whereas the Theran version claims that Grinnos refused to accept the responsibility thrust upon him by Apollo, and that this refusal resulted in distress for the island, the Cyrenean version implies that the Therans as a community refused to help – they impeded Battos’ efforts to carry out the will of Apollo.187 According to this scenario, the cause of the ———————————

186 Trans. Alfred D. Godly, trans., Herodotos, vol. 2 of Herodotos, Loeb Classical Library (London and New York: W. Heinemann and G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1921), 359. While Godly’s interpretation certainly captures the drama of Battos’ anxiety, the Greek is much more condensed, “τε' ω, δυνα' μι, κοι'η, χειρι';” (“by what power, by what sort of hand?” 4.155.20–21). 187 And being unaware of the cause of their problems, the Therans sent to inquire of Delphi concerning the evils which had come upon them. Consequently, the Pythia gave them the oracular reminder that to make things go better for themselves they must cooperate with Battos in founding Cyrene of Libya (4.156). The passage appears to presuppose that

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Theran problems was not the founder’s hesitancy but the Therans’ uncooperative attitude. With the newly-coerced Theran cooperation Battos can set sail for Libya. However, as we might expect in a foundation-legend, another setback to Battos’ attempt to carry out the god’s will occurs. In this case, Herodotos does not explain the cause, but the colonial expedition is forced to return to Thera, the metropolis. It is here, when the colonists approach the mother-city, that the symbolic final break with the past is forced upon Battos and his colonists. The Therans shoot projectiles at the returning ships to drive them back out to sea. With no alternative the colonists must set sail again for Libya, landing on the island of Platea, off the coast. This section also differs from the Theran version in significant ways. Perhaps most importantly, with respect to the Theran version’s claim that the colony which was sent out was representative of the whole populace of Thera.188 This presupposition lies at the root of the Theran decree that is included on the Cyrene foundation stela from the fourth-century B.C.E., the so-called “oath of the founders.” The issue, even by this latter time, still concerned the relationship between the descendants of the original colonists of Cyrene and the immigrants from Thera whose ancestors had remained in place. Both the Theran and the Cyrenean versions of the foundation report that the first landing in Libyan territory was on the island of Platea. Here according to the Cyrenean version, Battos kept the colony for two years. Platea, however, was not the location specified by the god. Again, the cycle of hesitation or disobedience furnishes the opportunity for the god to act on his own behalf. And so, Apollo sees to it that things go badly for the immigrants on this island. As a result, and as we have come to expect, they send an embassy to Delphi. In Herodotos’s case, the answer is predictable, “for in no way indeed would the god leave the colony alone until they should come to Libya itself.”189 The passage again restates the principle propagandistic point; founders (Battos) found colonies because of Apollo’s will and actions. To recall what we have continually emphasized, the prominence of the founder is a narrative characteristic of the community that understands itself to be the legacy of that specific founder. Here the differences stand out clearly between the two versions. In contrast to the Theran account, in the Cyrenean story, Battos is the focal point throughout; the original oracle comes directly to him (not to Grinnos, i.e., Battos is Apollo’s first choice). When trouble ——————————— the Therans up to this point were uncooperative and that this behavior had resulted in the misfortunes they were subsequently experiencing. 188 4.153 contains the well-known passage describing the Theran lottery; i.e., “The Therans resolved to send out men from their seven regions, taking by lot one of every pair of brothers ...” (LCL trans.). 189 4.157, the Greek reads, ου’ γα` ρ δη' σφεας α’ πι'ει ο‘ θεο` ς τη^ ς α’ ποικι'ης, πρι`ν δη` α’ πι'κωνται ε’ ς αυ’ τη` ν Λιβυ' ην.

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comes, the solution is not the appointment of Battos (as in the former version) but giving aid to Battos (4.156). The real actor is Apollo, who drives events through the founder of his choice. 3.2. A Comparison with Non-Greek Foundation-Legends: Roman We must admit that apparently all cultures tell stories about how the cultural forms they use came into existence, what we often call etiological myths being the common form. In this sense, Greeks share much with this cultural commonplace. Despite the cross-cultural continuity of such narratives, I have tried to establish the fact that there are diagnostic elements that distinguish the κτι' σις, the peculiar form of the Greek foundation-legend, from other comparable narratives. These distinctive elements stand out even more by comparing this form to stories about the establishment of institutions, including cultic institutions, from non-Greek contemporaries. For example, as the quotations endorsed by Cicero cited at the beginning of this chapter clearly show, while Roman authors certainly write about the foundation of cities, about culttransferals, and/or the establishment of new cult sites, they do not narrate these events in the same way Greeks do. One of the best known cult-transferals in Roman history is the transfer to Rome from Epidauros of the cult of the Greek healing god, Asklepios.190 The accounts of the transfer found in Valerius Maximus and in the anonymous work De Viris Illustribus share a certain consistency.191 Rome found itself in dire straits, enduring a devastating plague for which no solution could be found. The Romans finally decided to consult the Sibylline books for advice on a course of action. The oracle indicated that the plague could be ended when Asklepios is brought to Rome from his most famous sanctuary in Epidauros. An embassy was dispatched under the leadership of Quintus Ogulnius to transfer the necessary cultic objects and rites. Having made their request of the cooperative Epidaurians (Valerius’ version), the great snake, the epiphany of Asklepios, boards the Roman ship of its own accord. On the return trip to Rome, the snake jumps ship at Antium, only to visit the temple of Asklepios there, and then re-board for his final trip to the Tiber. Once in Rome itself, the snake, again willingly, leaves the ship to take up residence on the island where the new Asklepieion will be built. These basic details appear ———————————

190 The story is found in Ovid, Met. 15.622–744; Valerius Maximus 1.8.2; De Viris Illustribus 22.1–3; with references to the transferal in Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Ant. rom. 5.13.4; Strabo 12.5.3.; Livy, Per. 11 (cf. ab Urbe 11.1; Pliny the Elder, Nat. 29.1(8).16; Suetonius, Claud. 25.2; Cassius Dio 47.2.3; and Arnobius, Adv. Nat. 7.44–48. 191 According to Ernst Schmidt, Kultübertragungen, 31–84, this consistency is the result of the two versions sharing a common source, viz. Livy, Per. 11 (p. 35). The three versions agree in many places and never contradict one another. Schmidt does not see Ovid’s account as historically valuable to his purposes.

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to constitute a widely shared body of tradition current at the turn of the millennium, and also reflected in the minor witnesses regarding the sequence of events precipitating the dedication of the temple in 291 B.C.E.192 The role of oracular guidance is clearly present in this version of the events, but in a form distinctly Roman. And despite the reference to Quintus Ogulnius, we have no founder here, only a reference, and according to Cicero a truly Roman reference, to a delegation sent undoubtedly by at the behest of the Senate on behalf on the people of Rome. Ovid’s version of the story is, in comparison, quite outstanding. He begins with the myth of Asklepios itself – the story of Coronis’ son and how he came to Rome (15.622). In contrast to the versions previously discussed, Ovid narrates Rome’s appeal to Delphi, not the Sibylline Oracles, in hopes of finding a solution to the plague (15.630). Delphi is of course the natural resource for guidance in cultic transferal, as its role in the spread of Asklepios’ cult makes clear.193 The command to transfer Asklepios to Rome came from Apollo himself (15.640). The command, however, left the delegates at a loss, since they do not know where to find the god. The Romans decided to send an expedition to look for Asklepios, which finally lands on Epidaurian shores (15.643). The Romans make their request of the Epidaurians, but the Greeks are hesitant to give up their god (15.643–50). At this point, where success is uncertain, Ovid introduces something not found in other versions but something characteristically Greek, namely, Asklepios appeared to one of the Roman delegates in a dream-vision and assured him of success and of the god’s willingness to return to Rome (15.653–58). Following this, Ovid’s version shares with others the standard sequence of events beginning with the snake’s willing departure from the temple and embarkation. There is one significant difference; whereas the Livian versions all have the snake disembark at Antium in order to visit the Asklepieion there, according to Ovid the snake visited the temple of Apollo, the god’s father. Thus in Ovid’s view, the transfer of Asklepios to Rome is his initial visit to Italy. Ovid’s distinctive elements are not arbitrary. The dream-vision to the Roman delegate is set-up by the Epidaurian’s hesitation. It functions, as a climactic element in the story, in the same way such dream-visions might func———————————

192 The analysis of Schmidt, Kultübertragungen, is intended to delineate the sources and to reconstruct the historical probability of the events surrounding the transfer. He offers no literary analysis of the texts, and pays no attention to Ovid’s version at all. He concludes that Asklepios was not newly-introduced at the time of the plague, but that he had been known and worshiped in Italy for a considerable period. With the subsidence of the plague Asklepios was brought into the circle of state deities and given a temple, for whose dedication the foundation-legend was composed. The cult legend is, therefore, cult propaganda meant to justify the acceptance of a foreign deity into the city of Rome (see esp. 40–46). 193 See above, pp. 15, 47, 51, 54–55, 62–64, 70–72, 79–80, 83, 92, 96–101 for Delphi’s role in the dissemination of cults.

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tion in Greek foundation-legends, i.e., to emphasize the god’s action and his victory over opposition. However, it would be difficult to argue that Ovid’s account of the transferal of Asklepios proves that Romans wrote the same kind of foundation-legend Greeks do. For one thing, it is generally agreed that, despite his tremendous creativity and originality, Ovid has used Greek literary models, and has full command of Greek epic style and technique.194 Additionally, it must be pointed out that, despite the affinities of Ovid’s story to Greek legends, we have no founder-figure here either; the appearance of the god for reassurance, i.e., the appearance of the god as savior, is not the same type of epiphany as a divine commission (something never given to the Roman to whom Asklepios appears). This difference stands out more clearly when we compare Greek accounts of the transfer of Asklepios to new sites with the Roman examples. In the few Greek accounts that we have, Asklepios is always transferred by a specific individual, or is accepted as the result of the experience of a certain individual, often the result of healing. For example, the famous cult site and healing center of Pergamon was founded by Archias at the beginning of the fourthcentury B.C.E. out of gratitude for his healing, a healing which no doubt included a dream-vision during incubation that would have given specific directions or commands for the cure.195 Asklepios is known to have pre——————————— 194

See Brooks Otis, Ovid as Epic Poet, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 375–423, Append. “On the Sources Used by Ovid,” esp. 375–6;388–9;393– 94 (p. 376, “His general use of Callimachus is indubitable, ...” The Coronis story in Ovid comes from Callimachus’ Hecale, 385–89). The earlier work of Anton Zingerle, Ovidius und sein Verháltnis zu den Vorgängern und Gleichzeitigen römishcen Dichtern (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1967) is not helpful since it only concerns Ovid’s Latin parallels; also see: L. P. Wilkinson, “Greek Influence on the Poetry of Ovid,” in L’influence grecque sur la poésie latine de Catulle à Ovide: six exposés et discussions, ed. Jean Bayet, Entretiens sur l’Antiquité classique 2 (Bern: Vandœuvres-Genève, 1956), 223–56; A. J. Boyle, “Ovid and Greek Myth,” in The Cambridge Companion to Greek Mythology, ed. Roger D. Woodard (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 355–81 For examples of Ovid’s employment of Homeric models, see the two recent articles by Duncan F. Kennedy, “The Epistolary Mode and the First of Ovid’s Heroides,” CQ 34 (1984): 413–22, and Alison R. Sharrock, “Ars Amatoria 2, 123–42: Another Homeric Scene in Ovid,” Mnemosyne 40 (1987): 406–12, esp. 410–12, for the likelihood of additional Homeric dependencies. 195 Pausanias 2.26.8–9 tells us that Archias’ healing took place at Epidauros where the incubation facilities are well-known. On the transfer of the healing gods due to the gratitude of private individuals, see: Edelstein, Asclepius, 2:119. Pausanias is supplemented by IPerg. 2.251 (2nd c. B.C.E.) which presents the decree of the Boulē and the Dēmos regarding a proposal made by the strategoi to guarantee the perpetual (α«παντα χρο' νον, l.4) hereditary priesthood of Asklepios to the descendants of Archias, specifically to his son Asklepiades (ll, 9–10). This priest and those of his family to follow were to receive special honors and considerations: a crown (l.11); special portions of the sacrificial victims (ll. 12– 15); exemption from civic obligations (l.20); prime seats at the games (l.23); total control

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scribed the establishment of a new cult site for the cure of an ailment.196 We suspect similar gratitude in the case of cult’s transfer to Athens. IG II, 2 4960a, the oldest witness to the god Asklepios, describes the transfer of his image, the snake, to Athens on the chariot of Telemachos. There the new cult founder-figure placed the god in residence in the Eleusinian.197 Eventually, Asklepios, and not without controversy – about which more in due course – would be placed in his own facility on the slope of the Acropolis. To be sure, this is not the only tradition associated with the cult at Athens. According to the late source, was honored after death by the Athenians as Dexion (“the Receiver/Host”) for receiving the god into his own residence and raising an altar to Asklepios.198 Without question Sophocles was from the beginning associated with the god, as the oldest hymn to Asklepios from Athens is credited to the tragedian.199 As he envisions his ideal πο' λις, Plato, not surprisingly, thinks this type of foundation is unfortunately all too common: So let this law be laid down covering totally all these possibilities: cult rites shall not be established in private homes.200 Whenever anyone should have it in mind to offer sacrifice, let the

——————————— over the operation of the sanctuary (ll.24–29). 196 Cf. the foundation-legend of the sanctuary of Asklepios in Naupactus by Phalysius; here Asklepios, responds to Phalysius’ supplication for his eye by sending him to an intermediary, a poetess named Anyte, who possessed a sealed tablet given to her in a dreamvision. “Awaking” (actually a “waking vision”), she found the sealed tablet in her own hands. She went to Naupactus and requested that the nearly blind Phalysios remove the seal and read the contents; with hope Phalysios turned to look at the document, and was instantly healed. The opened tablet commanded him to give money to Anyte, facilitating the building of the sanctuary (Pausanias 10.38.13); cf. the nearly identical scenario facilitating the transfer of the Sarapis cult from Thessalonika to Opous through Xenainetos, a visitor to the Sarapieion in Thessalonika; the transfer of the cult from Epidauros to Sicyon by a woman named Nicagora, who brought back to the city a snake from Epidauros (i. e., the epiphany of Asklepios) on her mule-drawn wagon (Pausanias 2.10.3). 197 420 B.C.E., cf. Aristophanes, Plut. 620–21; Edelstein, Asclepius, 2:120, n. 4. 198 Etym. Magn. s. v. Δεξι'ων, Sophocles. We should recall the transfer of the cult of Sarapis to Delos in this context, see chapter 3 below. How this tradition relates to the fifthcentury tradition of the god’s arrival on the chariot of Telemachos is uncertain. Wilamowitz accepts without comment the report of the Etym. Magn. (see: Ulrich von WilamowitzMöllendorff, Der Glaube der Hellenen, 3rd ed. [Basel and Stuttgart: Schwabe & Co., 1959], 232–33; also: F. R. Walton, “A Problem in the Ichneutai of Sophocles,” HSCP 46 [1935]: 167–89, dealing with IG XI 1651. Sophocles mentions the god in Phil. 1329–34; 1437–38; Aristophanes, Plut. 633–747 also refers to the god in a long passage dealing with incubation in the Abaton of the Asklepieion; see: Edelstein, Asclepius, 1, nos. 92, 152, 42a. On all this see more recently, Garland, Introducing New Gods, 125–34. 199 IG II, 2 3.1, cf. Philostratos, Imag. 13; Plutarch, Num. 4.9; Non posse suavitor vivi secundum Epicurum 22.1103B. 200 “Cult rites” is Plato’s, ι‘ ερα' , which, can mean “sanctuaries” (cf. “shrines/temples,” Laws, LCL, trans. R. G. Bury [1926]), a translation justified by his later, ι‘ ερα` και` θεου` ς ου‘

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individual sacrifice at the public sacrifices, and put his offerings in the hands of the priests and priestesses, to whom the sacred responsibility for these things [has been entrusted]. And the sacrificer, and whoever wishes to accompany the sacrificer, can pray together. These things are the way they are for the following reason: To establish cultic rites and found sanctuaries for the gods is not easy, ideally requiring great consideration to carry out properly. Nevertheless, it is common practice both for women, and, in fact, for all the sick everywhere, and for those in danger and in dire straits, whatever they may be (and also [these same persons] whenever, on the contrary they receive.201 some good fortune), always to consecrate that which is presently at hand, to make a vow to offer sacrifices, and to promise to found temples to the gods, to the daimones, and to the children of the gods. And when, through both apparitions and visions, they are aroused by fear (since, moreover, many dreams are remembered, and a remedy for each one is sought after) to set up altars and establish cultic rites, they fill up every house and every village, even the empty spaces, and whatever location [where] such things happen (Leg. 10.909D–910A).202

It is clear that, whatever we make of Plato’s concerns in this passage, he presupposes that visionary experience plays a major role in the proliferation of cult institutions of various types. Plato, like the later Cicero, associates personal visionary experience with foundational activity. For Cicero this is distinctive of Greek foundations; for Plato it is an undesirable commonplace in his own society. 3.3. A Comparison with Jewish Sources Having established the defining characteristic of the Greek foundation-legend, as well as the ways in which this principle element is used by Roman writers to distinguish Greek patterns from their own, it is also important, given that our goal is to establish the apostle Paul’s social position, to examine the distinction between the Greek foundation-legend and comparable Jewish examples. This comparison is not new; Otto Eissfeldt, in his introduction to the Old Testament, suggests that cult foundation-legends be included in the variety of narratives cataloged for the Hebrew Bible. “Cult-foundations” in Israelite tradition also incorporated divine revelations to particular individuals. ——————————— ρ‘ α', διον ι‘ δρυ' εσθαι, ... (909E, see LSJ, s.v., 3.1). 201 The subject of the verb λα' βωνται can only be those categories of persons already mentioned. Therefore, the point is not that women, the sick, and the troubled found sanctuaries because of their negative circumstances, while other categories of persons found sanctuaries as a result of great blessings. Rather, the point is that these types of persons are the kind which in response to either good or bad fortune do such things. 202 This passage contains a comprehensive law offered by Plato’s Athenian as the appropriate solution for unacceptable religious belief and practice. For the Athenian, a character who has already demonstrated his commitment to traditional Greek religion, the role of the personal vision as motivation for the founding of cultic institutions is both widespread and destructive of true piety, see: R. F. Stalley, An Introduction to Plato’s Laws (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company, 1983), 166; Leo Strauss, The Argument and the Action of Plato’s Laws (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1975), 140–56.

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Granting the obvious, there are significant differences between the Jewish and Greek patterns to be considered. The occurrences in the Hebrew biblical texts are epiphanies of discovery, or of recognition, not narratives of divine calls to cult innovation or transfer. In other words, in the biblical examples, the individual encounters the divine at a peculiar location, and in recognition of the experience builds a sacrificial altar on the spot.203 While Robertson Smith once famously proclaimed that “[a]ll sanctuaries are consecrated by a theophany,” this claim actually spotlights the fact that encounters with the divine in the Hebrew bible differ significantly from the Greek pattern.204 For one thing, the deity does not command the individual to found a cult with its own ritual practice; the building of an altar is always the individual’s spontaneous response to the encounter.205 But more importantly, the Israelite experiences never involve cult-transferal. These consecrations are recognitions of spots, points on a map, where the epiphany occurs. This is not the Greek foundation model – here, it is the god who travels, not the wanderer who happens to lite upon the presence of the god. The Greek gods by Paul’s day were seasoned travelers, and for a growing number of non-Greek gods throughout the Hellenistic-Roman period traveling with their increasingly migrating worshipers would become an inescapable necessity. This fact alone makes it impossible to adequately describe the subsequent cultural encounters of this period without an appreciation for the insights of modern culture studies and post-colonial critique in particular. Of course, the most obvious Hebrew example which demands comparison with the Greek material is the story of the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt ———————————

203 These stories, what Eissfeldt calls ι‘ εροι` λο' γοι (following von Rad, p. 43), are, to be sure, etiological; they explain the origin of sacred places and their associated rituals and traditions, Otto Eissfeldt, The Old Testament: An Introduction Including the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, and Also the Works of Similar Type from Qumran: The History of the Formation of the Old Testament, trans. P. R. Ackroyd (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 43– 44; cf. Gerhard von Rad, The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays, trans. E. W. Trueman Dicken (London: SCM Press, 1984), 20–26;172–73; contrast Burke O. Long, The Problem of Etiological Narrative in the Old Testament, BZAW Vol. 108 (Berlin: Töpelmann, 1968); Brevard S. Childs, “Study of the Formula, ‘Until This Day’,” JBL 82 (1963): 279–92, esp. 290. We should distinguish at this point Moses’ encounter at the bush; here we have an encounter with an unrecognized deity and perhaps the implication of innovation (Exod. 3:1–15). 204 William Robertson Smith, Lectures on the Religion of the Semites: First Series, The Fundamental Institutions (Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889), 415. This quotation appears more recently in Eliade, Patterns, 370, who expands the axiom to include a range of other sacred things. 205 For Eliade the issue is a matter of divine “disclosure,” the sacred site is “based on a primeval revelation which disclosed the archetype of the sacred space in illo tempore,” from that point on it is simply a matter of copying the archetype with every new institution established, Patterns, 371–72.

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under the leadership of Moses. The Exodus story is amazingly similar to the Battos legend.206 And it must be admitted that as it stands, the story of Moses looks much more like a Greek foundation-legend than the Roman foundation traditions we have cited. This is simply because, in contrast to Roman examples, we have in the Exodus tradition a personal selection of the principal character (Moses) by the deity (Exod 3:1–15), a selection which certainly catches our principal off-guard, and produces serious hesitation on Moses’ part (4:1–13) – all this certainly analogous to what we have seen in the Greek foundation-legends. The story of Moses, as the story of Battos, begins in the time before the birth of the founder, here in a crisis setting among an oppressed people in need of deliverance.207 Like the Minyans in Lakedaimonia, the Hebrews were at first welcomed by the Egyptians, who, as the immigrants grew more numerous, felt threatened by their competition.208 The stage is prepared for the coming deliverer in Exod 1:15–22 with the surely expected tale of Moses’ extraordinary birth. Pharaoh’s murderous command, countered by the resistive and humorous deception of the midwives renders the common motif of the threat ——————————— 206 The connections between Herodotos and the Pentateuchal narratives have become, in contemporary scholarship, a subject of increasing concern for the interpretation of the Hebrew bible, e.g., Sara Mandell and David N. Freedman, The Relationship Between Herodotos’ History and Primary History, South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 60 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1993). However, Mandell and Freedman’s hypothesis of Herodotos’ dependence on the “Primary History” (pp. 159–172, 175) seems to me more than a little problematic, if for no other reasons than the likelihood that the authors have described similarities which have their origins in later editorial processes and not in a conscious effort by Herodotos (cf. pp. 172–174, 176–7), and the improbability of their suggestion that Herodotos had exposure to Jews sufficient to have been influenced by them while yet failing to mention Jews as a source. In order to connect Herodotos to Jews by means of the claimed visit to Elephantine (2.29–30), the authors conveniently void their original proposition that the real Herodotos never visited the places “the implied author” of the History claims to have visited (pp. 26–29, cf. 175). Needless to say this is a very weak link, and certainly not sufficient to claim that if one of the contemporaries (Ezra or Herodotos) is to be considered dependent on the other, it must be Herodotos who is dependent on Ezra. This is especially problematic when the authors preface the entire hypothetical exchange by placing it in a cultural context in which Jews and Greeks have probably been in contact (p. 159). As we have already suggested the legend of Battos appears to have been well-known in the early fifth-century and probably much earlier; the actual founding of the colony at Cyrene took place in the seventh-century B.C.E. For a counter-argument for Herodotos’ influence on the Primal History, see: Jan Wim Wesselius, The Origin of the History of Israel: Herodotus’s Histories as Blueprint for the First Books of the Bible, JSOTSup 345 (London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002). 207 Exod 1:1–2:23 locates the people in their distress and introduces the character of the deliverer. Cf. in the Battos story only the colonial, i.e., Cyrenean version of the legend, begins with Battos’ birth. Nevertheless, this is the legend told by the community devoted to the founder. 208 Exod 1:7–10; cf. Herodotos 4.146.

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to the infant deliverer. Here, cloaked in a story of the outwitting of the powerful by the humble, the Pharaoh’s command to kill the male offspring is subverted by the two Hebrew midwives.209 The deceptive king is here himself deceived. A command similar to the decree to drown the males in Exod 1:22 is also found in the story of Romulus and Remus.210 Similar to Cyrus the Great and Romulus and Remus, the birth of Moses is the birth of a truly extraordinary, quasi-divine child.211 And as in the cases of Cyrus and Romulus and Remus, the child that the king seeks to kill survives through the deceptions of others to become the king’s undoing.212 The narrative of the epiphany of the deity at the burning bush (Exod 3:2– 4:17), despite the phenomenological differences between epiphanies and oracles, certainly reminds us of the oracular selection of the founder in Greek tradition. Moses, like many of his Greek counterparts, is surprised by the divine appearance,213 and, in fact, does not know the deity with whom he is faced until the deity reveals himself.214 Moses, like Battos, expresses hesitation due to an impairment of speech.215 Also like his Greek counterparts, Moses is given a direct commission by his god.216 It is also possible to see Moses, just as many Greek founder-figures, as the expelled founder who yet represents the mother-city. While he stands outside the “city” when he receives his call, he ———————————

209 Heightened irony, names from abstractions alien to the low-born (Shiphrah ‫ׁשפרה‬ [“Beauty”], and Puah ‫“[ פועה‬Splendor”]), cf. Herodotos 4.154 for similar name-play. 210 Livy, ab Urbe 13. 211 His mother refuses to carry out the order to drown the promised deliverer because she looks upon the new-born and finds him “beautiful” (‫ ;)טוב‬cf. Josephus, Ant. 2.224, 232; Philo Virt. 1.9; 15, 17–18, 20–21; cf. 1.59. 212 Here as well, the later hero-sagas parallel the Moses story. The founding-hero passes through a reversal of status; for Cyrus (Herodotos 1.111–12) and Romulus and Remus (Livy ab Urbe 1.4.1–1.7.3), the reversal is from high to low and back, in Moses case it is from slave to member of the royal house. It is also interesting that once this reversal is established, Moses undergoes a more common type of reversal, from child of the royal house to exile, as a result of his murder of an Egyptian. For the origins of the abandoned child motif, and the relation between Moses’ birth story and Mesopotamian paradigms, see: Donald B. Redford, “The Literary Motif of the Exposed Child (Cf. Ex Ii 1–10),” Numen 14, no. 3 (1967): 209–28. 213 See above, pp. 71, 75–76, 79, 90, 96–99. 214 Cf. Josephus, Ant. 2.265–71. 215 Moses, the hesitant deliverer, is full of excuses, “Who am I that I should go ...” (Exod 3:11, cf. 3:13; 4:1); cf. Herodotos 4.150, 155). 216 In this instance we have an etiological element involved as well; i.e., Moses’ ignorance of the confronting deity provides the opportunity for an explanation of the origin of the name of Israel’s god, see Joseph Blenkinsopp, The Pentateuch: An Introduction to the First Five Books of the Bible, The Anchor Bible Reference Library (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 149, the final pronouncement “I am YHWH” (Exod 6:2–8) is the work of the Priestly writer. The same could be said for a number of etiological insertions, like the Passover story (Ibid, pp. 155–56).

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nevertheless comes from inside the royal house of Egypt. In an ironic way the story treats the Exodus as an expulsion from Egypt, not all that dissimilar from the expulsion of the Minyans from Lakedaimonia in the foundationlegend of Cyrene.217 As in this latter example, it is the deity who plays the active role in the deliverance, and facilitates the heroic acts of the deliverer.218 As early in the narrative as Exod 3:18 (cf. 5:3;8:27), the purpose of the deliverance of the people appears to be comparable to the Greek examples with particular respect to its cultic purpose. Here Moses explains to Pharaoh that the reason the Hebrews should be allowed to leave is so that they might go to a new location (“upon this mountain,” Exod 3:12) to worship their god.219 It is common knowledge that as Moses carries out his responsibilities to Yahweh, again like his Greek counterparts, he becomes the lawgiver, the cult organizer, and the architect of the social structure of the community he delivers. Although Moses himself does not come to father the priestly line, he is the one through whom the deity establishes the cultic system. Admittedly, the narrative seems hard-pressed on this issue; it does go to great lengths to explain the fact that the priesthood falls to Aaron, Moses’ brother, implying the perhaps normal expectation that this too should fall to Moses.220 In the course of leading the community, Moses must guide it through a failed attempt to acquire the new homeland (Exod 6:2–8), and through its confrontation with the hostility of native populations. Perhaps more to the point, just as we described for the Greek foundationlegends, the story of the Exodus appears to serve as validating propaganda. It certainly roots the origin of the nation in an act of a deity. In the series of plagues, the story dramatically demonstrates the supremacy of the god of Israel over the gods of Egypt (including the Pharaoh), and those of the nations dispatched during Israel’s journey to the land of Canaan.221 And from the ———————————

217 Moses the murderer (Exod 2:11–15), a crime that needs divine purification; also common in Greek colonial foundation-legends, see: Dougherty, “Found a Colony,” 178–98. 218 Exod 3:6–8, divine initiative; the deity now responds to the distress of the descendants of Abraham, recipients of the god’s promise of a homeland. The theme of Yahweh hearing the cries of the children of Israel introduces Moses’ epiphanic call (Exod 2:23–25; 3:7–10, 16–17; 6:2–8, and the notion of remembrance, i.e., Yahweh remembers his covenant with Abraham.) 219 Cf. 19:6 where it is the will of the deity that the people be a nation of priests and sacred to him. The Magnesians also considered themselves in a similar light in their foundation-legend, they are ι‘ ε' ροι to Apollo (IMagnMai 17). 220 This is a concern of the Priestly writer (e. g., see Exod 4:27), and it is also of concern to Josephus, who understands that to his Greek readers the fact that the line of Moses did not receive the hereditary priesthood needs to be explained; see: Blenkinsopp, The Pentateuch, 153; Frank Moore Cross, Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973), 185–215. 221 E.g. see: Ps 136:10–21; von Rad, Problem of the Hexateuch, 52; T. L. Thompson, “The Joseph and Moses Traditions,” in Israelite and Judean History, ed. J. H. Hayes and J.

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point of view of the priestly redactors, the story in its final form validates the apparatus of the cult and the Aaronid priesthood.222 Such elements as the “surprised oikist” motif, described earlier, the weak or disabled founder, the motif of unusual or mythical birth stories, the outwitting of the powerful by the humble, and others are common to “founding-hero sagas” from a variety of cultural contexts in the ancient world.223 From this perspective, the story of Moses resembles the latter, e.g., the narrative prepares the reader for the advent of the national hero through birth narratives, often containing motifs such as the threat to the hero’s birth by the very ruler he will eventually overturn. In Moses’ case, one Pharaoh provides the threat to his birth, while another, the son, becomes the Pharaoh against whom Moses stands as the deliverer of the Hebrews.224 Here then the actual selection of the founder is foreshadowed well before the epiphany scene in which the deliverer is selected by the deity.225 We must, however, keep in mind that despite the occurrence of similar elements, important differences between this narrative and the Greek foundation-legend are obvious. Even the presence of an epiphany in the story is by itself not sufficient grounds for including the story of Moses within the proposed narrative genre of the Greek foundation-legend. Not only do such epiphanies occur in a variety of narratives dealing with themes far removed from foundational activities,226 but the relationship ——————————— M. Miller (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1977), 170, 176–180. 222 See note 216 above. 223 Blenkinsopp, The Pentateuch, 147–48; George W. Coats, Genesis: With an Introduction to Narrative Literature, vol. 1, FOTL (Grand Rapids, MI.: Eerdmans, 1983), 5–7, the saga is closely connected by Coats with the hero, here specifically citing the Yahwist’s story of Moses. E.g., the threat to the birth of the founder, as we have already mentioned, occurs in both the stories of Cyrus and of Romulus and Remus. 224 Exod 1:15–22, cf. 2:23–25; 3:10. 225 In Exod 2:23–25 the people’s cry for relief is described as a petition which reaches up to the deity. The deity hears their plea and on the basis of prior relations with their ancestors decides to act. 226 This is especially clear in the Hebrew traditions, see, e.g., Norman C. Habel, “The Form and Significance of the Call Narratives,” ZAW 77, no. 3 (1965): 297–323. The vast majority of recorded epiphanies of the god Asklepios have nothing to do with foundation. With respect to the Cyrus story, while it might be true that in certain ways the story is comparable with Greek examples, it, in fact, illustrates clearly that the mere presence of shared elements or motifs does not constitute generic similarity. Dream-visions also occur in the legend of Cyrus, however, none of these demands that Cyrus act to fulfill the command of the deity to liberate Babylon. In fact, Cyrus’s single dream-vision (Herodotos 1.209) is of exactly the same type as those attributed to his evil grandfather, Astyages (1.107–108), i.e., both have a dream(s) in which usurpation of their throne is cryptically foreshadowed. In the so-called “Cyrus cylinder” (ANET, pp. 315–16), Cyrus is referred to as Marduk’s choice for the liberator of Babylon, and in the final, first person address, Cyrus claims to have reinstalled the ancestral gods to the city by command of Marduk. Nevertheless, there is no epiphany scene, and no description of the command of the deity.

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between included narrative elements and the overall function of the whole must be considered comparatively. We must, therefore, be cautious before identifying our examples on the basis of their deployment of similar motifs. With regard to this specific epiphany scene, we notice that Moses’ task is culturally-specific to Israelite tradition, namely, the singular deliverance of the people from bondage in Egypt.227 It could be argued, on the basis of traditional source-critical divisions of the text, that originally the story of the Exodus and the Sinai tradition were entirely independent narratives. Both of these would then also be independent from the conquest traditions.228 If these traditions were assembled into a continuing narrative at a later time – as the common consensus – then we should not suspect any necessary or original connection between the theme of the deliverance of the people at the Reed Sea and the nation-building associated with the Sinai-covenant traditions. Accordingly, the story of the Exodus would not be a story of national origins or colonization, but of national deliverance from oppression. It is the story of Yahweh’s saving act on behalf of his people;229 the wilderness travels and conquest of Canaan, though critically formative to the national identity, would ——————————— 227

This is, of course, not to deny that the Exodus a model for deliverance considered in other contexts, not only for Jews but for Christians later, see: Christine Downing, “How Can We Hope and Not Dream? Exodus as Metaphor: A Study in the Biblical Imagination,” JR 48, no. 1 (1968): 35–53, emphasizing the dialectic between the Exodus as an annually repeatable one-time event, or R. S. Sugirtharajah, Voices from the Margin: Interpreting the Bible in the Third World (London: SPCK, 1991). But deliverance, in whatever form, is a different tale; it is not a foundation narrative. 228 E.g., von Rad, Problem of the Hexateuch, 3–8,13–15,52–53,63–67; Martin Noth, A History of Pentateuchal Traditions, trans. Bernhard W. Anderson (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-hall Inc., 1972), 42–45, 60, 201–204; more recently, Rolf Rendtorff, The Old Testament: An Introduction, trans. J. Bowden (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1986), 12–14; the source-critical conclusions of von Rad and Noth that separated the Exodus from Sinai traditions, so commonly accepted not long ago, no longer dominate our understanding of this section of the Pentateuch. One effect of the earlier source-critical approach was to isolate originally independent pieces of tradition which were arguably older than the context in which they presently occur. The implication was the possibility that these smaller, older units provided, to a greater or lesser degree, some access to the earliest periods of Israelite history. Since Frederick V. Winnett’s ground-breaking article (“Re-Examining the Foundations,” JBL 84, no. 1 [1965]: 1–19), however, a growing number of scholars argue that rather than bits and pieces of earlier traditions which have been incorporated into a more recent framework, the Pentateuch actually presents us with the creative work of exilic, and probably post-exilic, revisors of tradition who have constructed the history of Israel to serve contemporary theological purposes. This is especially clear in the recent work of John Van Seters, In Search of History: Historiography in the Ancient World and the Origins of Biblical History (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1983), esp. 220–22, 359. 229 See: von Rad, Problem of Hexateuch, 7, 53; Noth, Pentateuchal Traditions, 47–51; Rendtorff, Old Testament, 10–11.

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nonetheless be consequent to this primary theme.230 The central theme of the Exodus tradition can be seen in summary in the admonition to pass on the traditional understanding of the significance of the Passover, “And when in time to come your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?,’ you will say to him, ‘By the might of his hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage’” (Exod 13:14–15) – an etiological narrative, or perhaps an invented tradition to support a ritual reinscribing the community?231 Even if we should accept the traditional source-critical analysis for Exodus 1–15, we cannot, however, on that account avoid the question of the significance of the text as it now stands.232 Whatever the developmental history of the text, at some time it was given the form it now retains. In this form the significance of Moses may well reflect an understanding which could truly be analogous to the Greek understanding of the founder-figure. In this case, assuming that this final version of the text is older than the Greek material, we ——————————— 230

Cf. Thompson, “Joseph and Moses,” 175–76. In the Jewish context, the exploits of the “founder/deliverer” incorporate an emphasis on self-sacrifice and empathy with the people. Moses’ career, as it appears in the story of the Exodus, is characterized by his (in addition to the deity’s) concern for the Hebrew people in bondage in Egypt. Moses’ act of murder is provoked by the unfair treatment of one of his over-burdened fellow Israelites (Exod 2:11–12; cf. 32:7–14). Although the god of Israel appears to be motivated by a desire to be worshiped in the place of his choosing (Exod 3:12; 5:1, 3; not unlike the motivations which underlie foundations initiated by Greek deities, as we have seen), in contrast to Apollo, Yahweh is driven, primarily by his compassion, to lead the people out of Egypt and honor his covenant with their ancestors (Exod 2:24–25; 3:7–10; 5:5). 232 Cf. George W. Coats, Moses: Heroic Man, Man of God, JSOTSup 57 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1988), 19. The evolving picture of the composition of the Pentateuch continues to at least an exilic, if not post exilic, terminus post quem for the final redaction, with various debates involving the dissolution of the Elohist into the Yahwist, see John Van Seters, Abraham in History and Tradition (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1975), or into at least what is left of the Yahwist, see Hans Heinrich Schmid, Der sogenannte Jahwist: Beobachrungen und Fragen zur Pentateuchforschung (Zurich: Theologischer Verlag, 1976), or even into the Deuteronomist, see Erhard Blum, Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1984); Van Seters, History and Tradition. Attempts to reclaim the Elohist in some form continue to appear, e.g., Robert K. Gnuse, “Redefining the Elohist,” JBL 119, no. 2 (2000): 201–20 Debate over the priority of one or the other of the Deuteronomic or Priestly redactions also defines the field, see on the whole, Rolf Rendtorff, Das Überlieferungsgeschichtliche Problem des Pentateuch, BZAW 147 (Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, 1977), with John Van Seters, Prologue to History: The Yahwist as Historian in Genesis (Louisville, Ky.: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1992) and Martin Rose, Deuteronomist und Jahwist: Untersuchungen zu den Berührungspunkten beider Literaturwerke, ATANT 67 (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 1981) prioritizing the Yahwist as the redactor of D, while others would assign this position to P, e.g., Blenkinsopp, The Pentateuch; also supporting the priestly antedating of J, Gordon J. Wenham, “The Priority of P,” VT 49, no. 2 (1999): 240–58. 231

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would have to concede that the Greek-style of foundation legend is not exclusive to Greeks. The possibilities are yet more complicated, however, if we take seriously recent developments in Pentateuchal studies which suggest that the final form of the text is a much later development than has been traditionally assumed. As we have mentioned, John Van Seters has, through several recent monographs, argued that, first of all, the source-critical divisions of the Pentateuch do not as surely as often supposed prove the existence of definable and contemporarily-independent documents which have been woven together to form the present narratives. As Van Seters describes the development of the Pentateuchal narratives, they reflect full-fledged compositional (therefore unitary) activity arising in an exilic or post-exilic context.233 Accepting this growing consensus, the question of dependency could, in fact, be turned on its head; familiarity with Herodotos, or with Greek legend-forms could lie behind the similarities we have mentioned between the Battos story and the story of Moses in the Exodus.234 We shall not attempt to deal with the implications of this possibility in this context. To be sure, we must grant that proposed any connections between Greek patterns and especially Herodotos remain interesting speculations. For now, it is sufficient to admit that the developmental history of the story of Moses and the Exodus, and the relevance of its comparison to Greek foundation-legends, is far too complicated to be decisive in the present comparative project. ——————————— 233

Therefore he rules out the possibility of using these reconstructed sources as evidence for more ancient periods in Israelite history. For Van Seters, none of the Pentateuchal legends really tells us anything at all about the earliest periods of Israel’s history. Instead, these narratives can be accounted for in terms of the appropriation of literary models for the presentation of post-exilic concerns draped in a shroud of antiquity, see most recently his John Van Seters, The Life of Moses: The Yahwist as Historian in Exodus-Numbers (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1994), 29–30, regarding the creative freedom of the Yahwist, pp. 126–7, 133–145; despite certain areas of disagreement, so also Mandell and Freedman, Herodotos’ History and Primary History, 139–40; but contrast Anthony F. Campbell and Mark A. O’Brien, Sources of the Pentateuch: Texts, Introductions, Annotations. (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993), 12–16. 234 Certainly we must grant that Herodotos’ story, as the occurrence of the same basic elements in Pindar suggest, is older than Herodotos. The founding of Cyrene is a seventhcentury foundation, and it is not unlikely that its legend grew up soon after its foundation and continued through recurring iterations to serve the needs of the Cyrenean community in changing situations; this is clearly implied by Calame’s comparative analysis of the various versions, Calame, Myth and History. While the form of the tradition described is different from our foundation-legend, Moshe Weinfeld has argued that there are similarities between the stories in Num. 32:34–42 and Greek colonization accounts in order to suggest that these stories do in fact contain kernels of historical information, see: “The Extent of the Promised Land – the Status of Transjordan,” in Das Land Israel in biblischer Zeit: JerusalemSymposium 1981 der Hebräischen Universität und der Georg-August-Universität, ed. Georg Strecker, GTA 25 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983), 59–75, esp. 61–65.

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Perhaps most importantly for our discussion is that even if we were to argue for the traditional position, i.e., to take the maximalist position and see the Exodus story as a product of a much earlier period, and thereby grant that the form of the story – as similar as it appears to them – predates the Greek examples and is clearly independent of them, we are still faced with one insurmountable difference between the two traditions. The Hebrew scriptural tradition itself does not understand the events of the Exodus in the same way Greeks understand the narrative pattern used to describe the founding of a colony or city. For the Hebrew tradition, the story of the epiphany to Moses is a one-time event. It does not become paradigmatic for the foundation of any other institution in the history of ancient Jewish experience. For the Jewish tellers of the tale, the story of the Exodus remains a story of deliverance.235 The Hebrews are liberated and escape to return to the land of their fathers’ sojournings and the land promised to them by Yahweh. While it can certainly be argued that the Exodus story is the story of the creation of a new nation – equating the establishment of the Mosaic covenant with the founding of the nation, the narrative goes to great lengths to connect the Hebrews in Egypt with a deeper past; the children of Abraham are rescued from oppression in a foreign land in order to receive the promises made by the deity to their patriarch.236 Moreover, if we return to consider the type of propaganda referred to in our preceding discussion, I suggest that the validating function in the Exodus example extends to a more fundamental level than in Greek foundationlegends. In other words, in the Exodus story the validation of the existence and glorification of an entire nation is at stake. It is, in this sense, more a “national epic” in the scope of the boundary criteria it establishes, the function of the entire covenant law; the story burns bridges rather than builds them. In contrast, while Greek foundation-legends certainly validate novel communities, the establishment of continuity with a named μητροπο' λις, and the tracing of venerable connections usually extending into what we often label “mythic” time is critical to the Greek foundation-legends.237 Battos binds continuity ——————————— 235

Cf. Deut 6:20–23 (cf. Deut 26:5b–9); Josh 24:2b–7a; 1 Sam 12:6–8; Ps 78:11–14, 42–54; 105:23–38; 135:8–9; 136:10–15. See Van Seters’ first chapter in Life of Moses, “Moses the Deliverer;” cf. Brevard S. Childs, The Book of Exodus: A Critical, Theological Commentary, OTL (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1974), 223. Moses’ role as a deliverer is made even more clear by its closest analogy in the Hebrew bible, the call of Gideon (Habel, “Call Narratives,” 305). Gideon’s story is clearly that of a national deliverer; he founds nothing. Van Seters suggests that it was, in fact, the Deuteronomic call of Gideon, together with the call of the prophet (e.g., Jeremiah), which served as the model for the Moses call-narrative (Life of Moses, 53–63). 236 For the dialectic between these two appreciations, see: Ronald Hendel, “The Exodus in Biblical Memory,” JBL 120, no. 4 (2001): 601–22. 237 E.g., the Cyrenean Karneia (Pindar, Pyth 9.71; cf. 5.80; Callimachus, Hymn. Apoll. 71–87), suggesting continuity with all Dorians (Thucydides 5.54.2; cf. Herodotos 6.106.3; 7.206.4;8.72.7), Malkin, Myth and Territory, 143–51; Jonathan M. Hall, Ethnic Identity in

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with discontinuity. In none of the Greek stories would Greek readers have understood the founder to have been selected by the god to found a new nation uniquely separated and distinct from others.238 Because of this, even if we should conclude that the Exodus story does in every essential respect belong to the same genre as the Greek-foundation legend, the Exodus story could never have become the paradigm for later Jewish writers describing other “foundings.”239 To reiterate, the Exodus tradition narrates a singular event – the primary symbol of national identity – and therefore, except as a metaphor in similar dire straits where the nation must again be delivered from destruction, unrepeatable. Indeed the appropriation of the rhetoric of the “Exodus” by the re-emerging, post-exilic community demonstrates clearly that fundamentally the Exodus served as a symbol of national deliverance, not as a foundation story.240 By the time of Paul, however, some Jewish retellings of the Exodus story reflect certain important developments in this traditional understanding of the story. Josephus can speak of the prophecies of Moses’ birth,241 make use of the mythical description of the newborn as self-evidently of extraordinary quality,242 and describe Moses as the στρατηγο' ς and η‘ γεμω' ν of the people.243 Moses is also the one who institutes the cult of the new community and writes its constitution and laws.244 To Greek-speaking readers, it would certainly appear that Josephus has followed the precedents commonly found in the Greek narrative tradition. The appropriation of both the terminology and what ——————————— Greek Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 38–39. 238 E.g, the Cyrenean traditions; Herodotos tells us that long after the initial founding of the colony, because the colony had not grown in population, Apollo encouraged all Greeks to sail to Cyrene and settle among the Cyreneans, who had invited the immigration (4.159). 239 This is fundamentally a descriptive distinction between the emic and the etic, i.e., the connections between elements is the carrier of meaning, not the appropriation of similar elements. 240 See esp. Deutero-Isaiah 43:16–17;519–11. 241 He describes a prophecy which comes from the Egyptian sacred scribes, telling of the birth of an Israelite who would shame the Egyptians but αυ’ ξη' σει δε` του` ς ’ Ισραηλι'τας...(Ant. 2.205, cf. 209). A prophecy is also described in the Battos tradition as we find it in Pind. Pyth. 4, ll. 4–6, 9–10 (Medea prophesying). 242 Ant. 2.224, 232; see above, pp. 98, 107–8, 110. 243 Ant. 2.268. This is the pair of titles given to Moses in his oracular commission at the burning bush. This is clearly consistent with what we find in the Greek legends. 244 He is παραγγει^λαι τω^, λαω ^, θυσι'αν, Ant. 2.311, cf. 3.222; he writes the constitution (πολιτει^α) and the laws (νο' μοι), 3.213. The plural noun, παραγγελι'αι, is a technical term in the context of the establishment of religious rites and regulations; e.g., τα` δοθε' [ντα παραγγε' λμα-] │τα ... του' τ[ωι] δε' δωκεν ο‘ Ζευ` ς παραγγε' λ[ματα ...], SIG3 985, ll.3–4, 12 (late 2nd–1st cc. B.C.E., Barton, “Hellenistic Cult Group,” 7;... και` παρε' σονται ε’ πι` τα` [ς]│ δοθει[σομ]ε' ναις αυ’ τοι^ς παραγγελι'ας ..., P.Lond. 2710, ll.11b–12a (69–58 B.C.E., on epigraphical grounds; see: C. Roberts, T. C. Skeat, and A. D. Nock, “The Cult of Zeus Hypsistos,” HTR 29 [1936]: 42).

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in the first-century C.E. would be its expected use, Greek-speaking readers surely pictured Josephus’ Moses taking on the familiar pose of the founder of the political community, assuming the responsibilities he is expected to fulfill in Hellenic culture; i.e., to lead the people in its journey to the new land, to lead the people in war against the native inhabitants (along the way, since Moses never actually enters Canaan), and to guide the people in the establishment of its state, and to institute its cult – all of this Moses accomplishes. Yet, we should be careful to note one significant difference in emphasis between Josephus’ story of Moses and the traditional Greek foundationlegend. While Josephus would not wish to avoid the divine call of Moses as deliverer at the burning bush (Ant. 2.264–276), in contrast to his Greek counterparts, Josephus consistently avoids the usual Greek language of divine revelation and oracle. God appears to Moses, to be sure, but these reports are offered with little embellishment. And certainly Moses is never called κτι' στης by Josephus. While we must acknowledge the use of the divine call of the founder, the diagnostic element of the Greek foundation-legend, we cannot ignore the relative de-emphasis on it in Josephus’ narrative. Moreover, for the establishment of no other Jewish institution does Josephus use the motif of the divine call of the founder. With Philo many of the same themes emerge. But here, with noticeably greater emphasis than in Josephus, Moses’ personal call by God is prominently illustrated by the role of oracle in Moses’ life.245 The circumstances of his life were directed by divine providence for the purpose of preparing him for his role as η‘ γεμω' ν.246 Moses is, of course, never called the founder of the people because in Philo’s mind that distinction belongs to Jacob.247 Philo’s preferred title for Moses is, not surprisingly, νομοθε' της τω^ ν ’ Ιουδαι' ων.248 Nevertheless, throughout his account of the Exodus, Philo consistently refers to Moses with the technical term, “η‘ γεμω` ν τη^ ς α’ ποικι' ας (commander of the ——————————— 245

As the commission account is being shared with Israel, it is described as a series of oracles, “μηνυ' ουσι του` ς χρησμου' ς” (Vit. 1.86.2–3; cf. the connection between Moses leadership and oracles in the verses that follow). 246 Cf. “ο‘ ... η‘ γεμω` ν τω ^ ν ‘ Εβραι'ων Μωυση^ ς ...,” Vit. 1.243.1. Indeed, from his birth, he re-ceived, “τροφη^ ς ... βασιλικη^ ς και` θεραπει'ας α’ ξιου' μενος ...” (“... being worthy of princely nourishment and nurture ...,” Ibid 1.20.1; his shepherding in the wilderness was preparation for his future leadership (η‘ γεμονι'α) of the people, Ibid 1.60.1-4; Moses as leader of all, (η‘ γεμω' ν), “having received the archonship and kinship (“... τη` ν α’ ρχη` ν και` βασιλει'αν λαβω` ν,” Ibid 1.148.1–2; cf. Ibid 1.86.1–87.1. 247 Jacob (implied by the context) ω › ν του^ συ' μπαντος ’ Ιουδαι'ων ε» θνους α’ ρχηγε' της (Vit. 1.7.4). The founders of the nation are those persons who came to Egypt because of famine in their homeland (1.34.1–2). Correspondingly, Esau, the brother of Jacob is called the α’ ρχηγε' της of the nations who opposed Israel on its migration to the promised homeland (1.242.3, Esau implied in the narrative context). 248 Vit. 1.1.1, although he can expand the list of titles later to include βασιλευ' ς, α’ ρχιερευ' ς, and προφη' της, 2.3.3.

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colonial expedition).”249 That Philo is consciously using the technical terminology of colonial foundation to describe the events of the Exodus is clear from his statement of its purpose; i.e., Moses led the nation from Egypt, “ου’ γα` ρ ε’ πι` πο' λεμον α’ λλ’ ει’ ς α’ ποικι' αν ε’ ξη,' εσαν.”250 Yet, despite the prominence of Moses’ individual exploits and qualities, Philo attributes (just as the writers of Greek foundation stories have done) the instigation of the colonization to the deity, “θεο` ν και` το` ν α’ ληθω^ ς η‘ γεμο' να τη^ ς α’ ποικι' ας.” 251 Thus, even in giving etiological priority to Israel’s god in the national epic, Philo certainly portrays the foundation of the new political community in the verbal and thematic colors that characterize the Greek foundation-legends. And although he, like Josephus and the early Christians,252 refrains from using the noun κτι' στης to ——————————— 249

This is the title with which he is commissioned at the epiphanic oracle of the burning bush (Vit. 1.71.4–5; God also bears this title for Philo, since he is, not unlike Apollo, the real leader of the colony, 1.255.4–6; also cf. 1.14.1, 193.5, 200.7, 236.1, 329.2–3. Strabo also describes Moses in terms which conform to the language of foundation, “και` α’ πη' γαγεν ε’ πι` το` ν το' πον, ο« που νυ^ ν ε’ στι το` ε’ ν τοι^ς ‘Ιεροσολυ' μοις κτι'σμα,” going on to describe how Moses handed down (παραδι'δωμι) an enlightened form of worship and ritual service (ι‘ εροποιι'α) to the new arrivals, establishing (ι‘ δρυ' ω) a proper seat of worship, and instituting the form of rule (α’ ρχη' , 16.2.35–37). 250 Vit. 1.170. The nation is colonizing a new land, “τη' ν χω' ραν ει’ ς η‹ ν α’ πω, κι'ζετο το' ε» θνος” (Vit. 1.220.1–2, α’ ποικι'α being the standard term for the designation of the colonial expedition, LSJ s.v., and so used throughout Philo; note that it was with the hope of an α’ ποικι'α, i.e., the promise of a colonial enterprise, that his detractors claimed Moses had deceived them into their own destruction in the wilderness, 1.195.4–7). 251 Vit. 1.255.6, cf. “Φοι'βω, δ’ ε‘ σπο' μενοι πο' λιας διεμετρη' σαντο α»νθρωποι· Φοι^βος γα` ρ α’ ει` πολι'εσσι φιληδει^ κτιζομε' νη, σ’, αυ’ το` ς δε` θεμει'λια Φοι^βος υ‘ φαι'νει.” (“But after Phoibos following do men measure the dimensions of cities, For Phoibos always takes pleasure in cities founded, And himself their foundations Phoibos designs ...” Callimachus, Hymn. Apoll. 55–57 (LCL trans. A. W. Mair). Also see, Cornell, “Gründer,” col. 1112; Malkin, Religion and Colonization, 18. 252 Eusebius provides an example of the way God comes to be viewed as κτι'στης, often associated with his role as “πατη` ρ, ... μοι οι’ κοδομη^ σαι ι‘ ερον τω ^, θεω^, , ο‹ ς το` ν ου’ ρανο` ν και` τη` ν γη` ν ε» κτισεν, ...” Praep. ev. 9.31.1.4–5 (in the ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ ΣΟΛΟΜΩΝΟΣ, here God is the creator of the universe, ο‘ Κτι'στης); God is father and founder of the universe, “... και` ο‘ τω^ ν ο« λων θεο` ς του^ με`ν υι‘ ου^ πατη` ρ, του^ δε` κο' σμου κτι'στης ...,” Eccl. theol. 1.10.1.5–2.1; “ω « σπερ Θεο` ς ποιητη` ς και` Θεο` ς δημιουργο` ς, και` Θεο` ς σωτη` ρ, και` Θεο` ς ευ’ εργε' της, και` Θεο` ς κριτη` ς, και` Θεο` ς πατη` ρ τω^ ν οι’ κτιρμω ^ ν, και` Θεο` ς πα' σης παρακλη' σεως ... ,” Ps. 23.1193.54– 57 (ευ’ εργε' της being an equivalent of κτι'στης); for the Christians, God alone is founder, “... τω ^ ν δε` λοιπω ^ ν α‘ πα' ντων θεο` ν και` κτι'στην και` κυ' ριον,” Eccl. theol. 1.8.2–3; God is “ο‘ τω ^ν ο« λων κτι'στης και` δημιουργο` ς και` ποιητη` ς δι'α του^ ‘ Υιου^ τα` πα' ντα συστησα' μενος ... ,” Ps 23.1036.11–13; see further: Praep. ev. 7.11.10; 13.13.62; Eccl. theol. 2.19.20. But also for Josephus, God is the one who created, “θεο` ς ο‘ κτι'σας,” B.J. 5.377.1; as already mentioned, Philo calls God Founder/Creator and Father of all, “τι' δ’ α»ν ει»η τω ^ ν ο» ντων α»ριστον η› θεο' ς; ου“ τα` ς τιμα` ς προσε' νειμαν τοι^ς ου’ θεοι^ς, ε’ κει'νους με`ν α’ ποσεμνυ' νοντες πλε' ον του^ μετρι'ου, του^ δε` ει’ ς α«παν οι‘ κενοι` φρενω^ ν ε’ κλαθο' μενοι. πα' ντας ου” ν, ο« σοι το` ν κτι'στην και` πατε' ρα του^ παντο` ς ει’ και` μη` ε’ ξ α’ ρχη^ ς σε' βειν η’ ξι'ωσαν α’ λλ’ υ« στερον μοναρχι'αν α’ ντι` πολυαρχι'ας α’ σπασα' μενοι ... ,” Virt. 179.1–6.

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refer to human beings, Philo’s description of the career of Moses appears to leave little doubt that Moses is a founder, as heroic as any in Greece. On the one hand, we might easily see this “re-casting” of the story as not unexpected given Philo’s sophisticated acquaintance with Greek culture. His might be described as an Interpretatio Graeca of the Exodus tradition, not an example of a native Hebrew story which might also belong to the genre of the Greek foundation-legend. On the other hand, however, one might argue, as Naomi Cohen has, that Philo, in appropriating Greek terms, has merely taken “recourse to the convenience of language.”253 Beyond mere convenience, when Jewish writers like Philo or Josephus employ Greek terms they have adapted them and given them “an idiosyncratic “Judeo-Greek” connotation. To quote her, “respecting words whose semantic range is not the same in the two languages, in the Septuagint it is normally the Greek word which acquired the Hebrew connotation rather than the reverse.”254 This Greek translation – or this bending of Greek to the service Hebrew concepts – was of course Philo’s scripture. Cohen surveys a short list of Greek words and describes their semantic redirection once incorporated into the “Judeo-Greek” lexicon. In each case, the Greek word is “adopted and adapted” to serve a utilitarian Jewish semantic need, “the need of thoroughly Hellenized Jews to define their Torah in Greek philosophic terminology.”255 The identification of this Jewish need implies that Cohen recognizes that the modes of negotiating minority or marginalized status in the face of a dominant culture include the use of the lexicon of the dominant by the dominated for semantically innovative and idiosyncratic purposes. However, it is also true that there is no “unidirectional” appropriation or adaptation of a dominant term by a minority writer or a minority community; the encounter is always accompanied by reciprocal effects.256 ———————————

253 Naomi G. Cohen, “Context and Connotation: Greek Words for Jewish Concepts in Philo,” in Shem in the Tents of Japhet: Essays on the Encounter of Judaism and Hellenism, ed. James L. Kugel, Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism 74 (Leiden; Boston; Köln: Brill, 2002), 33, here quoting approvingly the words of Harry Austryn Wolfson, Philo: Foundations of Religious Philosophy in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1947), 12–13. 254 Cohen, “Context and Connotation,” 33–34, quotation from p. 34. 255 “Context and Connotation,” 61, 35. 256 For example, in her approving use of Wolfson’s comments on the LXX use of Greek terms for the divine (θεο' ς, Κυ' ριος, παντοκρα' τωρ, υ« ψιστος), “Context and Connotation,” 33, Cohen fails to question whether in the process of taking on their “idiosyncratic” referent in the Jewish context, something crucial to the Hebrew Bible’s portrayal of god is lost for Greek-speaking Jews, i.e., the implications of the fact that the god of Israel has a personal name. Culture studies would presume that these dominant Greek terms are not used in a “one-way” adaptation, but that there is always reciprocal effect; the peculiarity of the god of Israel is now assimilated to an explicit notion of universality. Ought we ask the question

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Cohen’s description of the use of νομοθεσι' α brings her closer to what is suggested here, Philo feels the need to describe the Torah in Greek terms – as the “constitution of the Jewish people.”257 We need not look far for the true context. Alexandrian Jews did not enjoy citizenship, but desired it. In the dominant Greek discourse, terms for citizenship excluded Jews and the Jewish community from inclusion in the category. In the act of appropriating Greek terms for citizenship and constitution, Jewish writers attempted to expand the possible referents to include themselves. Here I disagree with Cohen. The appropriation of Greek political terms by Jewish writers does not necessarily imply that the meaning of the terms or the definition of the category has changed. Rather, such appropriation shows how Jewish writers understood the value system of the dominant hellenized society with respect to political institutions, and how much they wished to insert themselves into that value structure. The problem here is that she has defined the directionality of the semantic change wrongly. I see the use of Greek political termini technici by writers like Philo and Josephus as an act of resistance through mimicry, the appropriation of values held as exclusive to the self definition of the dominant being used to reinscribe the self-image of the dominated by denial. In other words, the Greeks projected stereotype of their “others,” in this case Alexandrian Jews, is an enunciation of difference. By their reinscriptive act, Philo and other Jews are saying to Greeks, “these values are no longer yours exclusively, they define us as well.” Philo, no less than Paul – as we shall see in due course – is located at the point of contact, the zone in which culture engaged.258 To intensify the degree of complexity, post-colonial critique would challenge us to see Philo as a locus of contestation, therefore a locus of cultural productivity, a locus in which his personal and group identification are being contested, as these are formulated in the perception of the dominant culture and projected upon him, a locus wherein he, as one embedded in such a continuous process, embodies various forms of resistance, mimicry, mirroring reversal, appropriation, and usurpation of the dominant cultural forms.259 This implies that we cannot ——————————— whether or not in the very act of capturing the Greek terms for the Jewish communities semantic needs, certain peculiarly Jewish connotations have been surrendered? 257 “Context and Connotation,” 35. 258 I make the distinction only to clarify that I see Bhabha’s description as deemphasizing the use of culture as a referent to something continually present to the individual inherited from some form of continual “groupness.” For him culture is a performative product, culture is a work in the moment of encounter, Location of Culture, 3, 10. In my view culture is both enacted in encounter, yet simultaneously with, and logically prior to, that moment a social function. 259 Bhabha, Location of Culture, 2, 42–43, 50–51. The recognition of Philo’s social situation as one of contestation is widely recognized, e.g., see William R. Schoedel, “Apologetic Literature and Ambassadorial Activities,” HTR 82, no. 1 (1989): 55–78, especially

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assume that only in the context of his embassy and the associated crisis did Philo engage in resistance and struggle, as the prolific Philo-scholar, David T. Runia, cautions, “In the analysis of the numerous texts in which Philo speaks of the city [Alexandria], it would be a mistake to try to compartmentalize his thought too much, i.e., to make a sharp distinction between historicalapologetic and exegetical philosophical modes of thinking.”260 Given the subtlety and profundity of social encounter revealed by culture studies, the luxury is no longer ours of trying to understand someone like Philo by simplistically calculating our answer to the question, “how hellenized was he?,” as if we could accurately measure the proportion of Greek to Jewish constituent ingredients in his make-up. In due course, we shall only begin to glimpse the exponentially greater complexity confronting our assessment of Paul made inescapable simply by virtue of the fact that the self-proclaimed apostle seems to be constantly on the move, perpetually crossing new social boundaries as he transfers the cult of Christ across the Mediterranean world. In the present case, we recognize Philo as an individual enmeshed in a persistent, life-long and community-long Alexandrian encounter who has appropriated elements most commonly associated with Greeks (the constituent elements of the foundational paradigm) and uses them to re-narrate, thus renegotiate, his own – his nation’s – origin story. He mimics categories, e.g., ο‘ α’ ρχηγε' της τη^ ς α’ ποικι' ας, that defined the self-image of the dominant community in order to usurp that image – one projected on Philo himself and other Jews for the sake marking distinction, but one with which Philo re-inscribes himself and his community to appear to the Greek viewer as a mirror-image – similar, but not quite.261 In Bhabha’s terms, Philo and the cultural forms he ——————————— Schoedel’s description of the Legatio before emperor Gaius as a “charade” in which the emperor cynically wanted only to ask the Jewish delegates why they denied themselves pork (351–57). Though the recognition of Philo’s contested social location is established, the need to read the Alexandrian Jew through the lens of post-colonial critique remains unfortunately a desideratum. 260 David T. Runia, “The Idea and the Reality of the City in the Thought of Philo of Alexandria,” JHI 61, no. 3 (2000): 362. We cannot simply divide his corpus into categories of works devoted to “defense and petition,” Schoedel, “Apologetic Literature,” 63, recognizing that the Alexandrian context provoked a wide range of resisting Jewish voices (64), rather, he and his entire cultural production need to seen as shaped by coloniality. 261 Louis H. Feldman, “Philo’s View of Moses’ Birth and Upbringing,” CBQ 64, no. 2 (2002): 258–81 provides a concise survey of the numerous points at which Philo’s narrative deviates from both the biblical and other Jewish accounts, consistently relating these to Philo’s and his community’s Alexandrian social-situatedness – these are the data that lie waiting for interpretation in terms of post-colonial critique. Feldman also realizes that when Philo comes to Moses, he does not employ allegory as he does in the interpretation of the lives of Joseph and Abraham, but turns to biography, suggesting that he wants to place Moses in the context of the great leaders of Greek biographies. Feldman answers the question of why Philo would appropriate all these Greek literary and philosophical priorities in

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produces in this continuous encounter represent the condition of hybridity, the intersection of class, ethnic boundaries, intellectual and historiographic convulsions – any of the numerous categorical et cetera that characterize such encounters, producing neither simply the one nor the other, but a third thing.262 Though the past is yet discernible, perhaps even continuous, in the present hybrid condition, what arises is not merely quantitatively different, but rather qualitatively new. Philo is certainly not alone; Jewish writers of this period often use foundation-terminology. On the one hand, as Greeks could make Apollo the true founder of the colony, so Philo could make the god of the Hebrew scriptures colonial leader (α’ ρχηγε' της), founder (κτι' στης), and Father, another example appropriation and resistance.263 At a very different level, Diaspora Jewish writers applied the word κτι' στης to the Jewish donor of a public precinct and its associated facilities (including a proseuche) on behalf of the Ptolemaic rulers.264 Jewish founders even retained certain privileges customarily retained by their Greek counterparts. For example, the founders mentioned in the famous Stobi synagogue inscription retained the rights of ownership of the facility, along with other special, guaranteed privileges.265 In a context of appropriation and resistance, we should certainly expect the production of such innovative cultural forms. But, in all these cases, there are no comparable foundation-legends – Jews have not appropriated this particular narrative genre. In those accounts where, based on our review of the Greek material, we might expect to find a similar, Jewish foundation-legend, we are disappointed. To take one example, Josephus’ account of the foundation of the Jewish mercenary colony in Phrygia by Antiochus III, obviously an ——————————— his biography of Moses, writing, “Philo’s account would seem to be a response to contemporary issues in his own days (280).” A response, at least, more accurately, a form of contestation; could it be otherwise? 262 The hybridity of negotiation between all the categories applied to Philo and his work is to Bhabha “a historical necessity,” Location of Culture, 41. 263 “του^ δε` παντο` ς ου’ κ α»ρα α’ ρχηγε' της ο‘ κτι'στης και` πατη` ρ αυ’ του^ ;” Ebr. 42.4–5. Here the force of α’ ρχηγε' της emphasizes the idea of instigation, i.e., it is God that instigates earthly events. This is similar to the idea we find in the attribution of this title to Apollo as motivator of colonial enterprises. 264 W. Horbury and D. Noy, eds., Jewish Inscriptions of Graeco-Roman Egypt with an Index of the Jewish Inscriptions of Egypt and Cyrenaica (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992), no. 155= Joseph G. Milne, ed. and comp., Greek Inscriptions, Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musee du Caire 18 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1905), no. 9296; cf. CIJ 2.1440. 265 CIJ 1.694, ll. 16–24; see, Hans Lietzmann, “Notizen,” ZNW 32 (1933): 94; Martin Hengel, “Die Synagogeninschrift von Stobi,” ZNW 57 (1966): 145–83; B. Lifshitz, Donateurs et fondateurs dans les synagogues juives: répertoire des dédicaces grecques relatives à la constitution et à la réfection des synagogues, CahRB 7 (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1967), 18– 19, no. 10.

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account where we might expect Greek-styled foundation language, reflects nothing of the narrative pattern we have described. In his letter to governor Zeuxis, Antiochus resolves to dispatch two-thousand Jewish families (AJ 12.148-49).266 The founder, or the “relocator,” was the agent of the king, with responsibilities for the building of new homes, land distribution, special exemptions, and the provision of grain until crops can be brought in (12.15152) – all the duties expected in the Greek model. Even Josephus’ use of the word ε» θνος indicates his understanding that this is the establishment of a political community (12.153). Nothing of the pattern we have seen in the Greek foundation-legends is present. Despite what appears to be a most appropriate occasion for a Greek-styled foundation-legend, there is no divine impetus or action of any kind involved here – no individual divinely called or divinely guided to carry out the innovation.267 Again, we return to emphasize our earlier claim about the distinctively Greek character of the foundational paradigm under discussion by noting that in Jewish texts – not primarily just the biblical texts – but the entire range of Hellenistic-Roman Jewish literature we have no examples of the use of a narrative similar to the Greek foundationlegend to legitimize cultic innovation, not even where we might full expect it to show itself. It is clear from the texts we have thus far examined, texts which deal with the founding of Jewish institutions, that whereas Jews can move into all parts of the world, their god does not instigate these foundings in the manner of Apollo. Apparently, the divinely appointed foundations have already been carried out in Jerusalem. In this respect, the founding of Onias’ temple in Leontopolis is of interest.268 Here we have another story of a priest leaving ———————————

266 Zeuxis was the στρατηγο' ς of Babylon, 220 B.C.E.; Polybius 5.45, later satrap of Lydia, 201 B.C.E., Ibid 16.1.8) 267 See Elias Bickerman, “Une question d’ authenticité les privilèges juifs,” in Studies in Jewish and Christian History, 2 vols., AGJU 9 (Leiden: Brill, 1980), 2:24–43. 268 Josephus identifies him as Onias “son of Simon,” therefore Onias III, and the High Priest (J.W. 7.423: cf. 1.30–33, this reference plus Ant. 12.387 contradict the founder’s identity in Ant. 7.287 and 13.62, identified there as a son of the same name, hence Onias IV, 13.62).” Schürer, History of the Jewish People, 3.1:145, n. 32, accepts the latter references as deliberate corrections and thereby more reliable, with the caveat, of course, that certainty is impossible. S. H. Steckoll, “The Qumran Sect in Relation to the Temple of Leontopolis,” RevQ 6 (1967): 56, disagrees, preferring Onias III, but the date (154 B.C.E., p. 55) Steckoll gives for the foundation of the temple is too late for this identification, unless Josephus’ correlation in B.J. 7.423 of the High Priest Onias’ (son of Simon = Onias III) departure for Egypt with the reign of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (164–162 B.C.E.) is an error. For the intractability of the problem, see: Robert Hayward, “The Jewish Temple at Leontopolis: A Reconstruction,” JJS 33 [1982]: 430 and Grabbe, The Persian and Greek Periods, 266–67). Also on the foundation of the temple itself, see: Ant. 12.387–88; 13.62–73, 283–87; 20.236; B.J. 1.33; 1.190; 7.421–36. The temple constructed at Leontopolis functioned continuously from approximately 160 B.C.E. to 73 C.E. Therefore, it was built during the reign of

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his homeland. However, in this case, his departure is due to an intrigue over the possession of the high-priestly office in his native city of Jerusalem.269 While there was apparently no transfer of cultic objects, there was, nevertheless, an expressed continuity with the ritual of the original temple in Jerusalem.270 In nearly every other way Onias is depicted carrying out the expected cultic tasks of a founder-figure, although he is never called κτι' στης.271 Moreover, the account provides no reference to a divine initiating command or to divine guidance over the enterprise. Neither the Jewish god nor his agent appears to Onias to request that a new cult site be established.272 Of course, this could easily be accounted for as the product of traces of Jewish traditions that were ambivalent to the temple itself, or to pious aversions to describing the foundation of an alternate cult site outside Jerusalem as the intention of God. According to Josephus, Onias does not actually build a temple but refurbishes (οι’ κοδομει^ν) an already existing one (Ant. 13.67).273 Yet, whatever the case may be, building or remodeling, the evidence from Greek innovations ——————————— Antiochus V Eupator (164–62 B.C.E.), after the restoration of Jerusalem’s temple, having a temenos wall of baked brick and sacred land (a “χω^ ρα”) to generate its income (Ant. 7.430); see: P. M. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), 1.280–81. 269 See the previous note on the problem of agreement in Josephus, who does say that the founder of the temple fled to Egypt because he had no chance of becoming High Priest in Jerusalem due to the influence of the Syrians (Ant. 12.387). He was readily accepted in Egypt by Ptolemy VI Philometer. For the problematic story of Onias III’s flight from his rivalry with Simon, the captain of the temple guard (2 Macc 4.23–24), see: James C. VanderKam, “The Jewish Temple at El,” in From Joshua to Caiaphas: High Priests After the Exile (Minneapolis; Assen: Fortress Press; Van Gorcum, 2004), 112–239. 270 Contra, Steckoll, distancing the temples of Leontopolis and Jerusalem due to archaeological evidence for different cult practices. Steckoll supports an argument for a genetic relationship between the founders of the Qumran sect and the cult at Leontopolis (“Qumran Sect,” passim). 271 It is interesting that in B.J. 7.423 Josephus describes the area in which the temple is located in common, foundational language, “το` ν ε’ ν τη^, ’Ονι'ου καλουμε' νη, νεω` ν ... τω ^ν ’ Ιουδαι'ων. η‘ δ’ ε’ στι`ν ε’ ν Αι’ γυ' πτω, και` δια` τοιαυ' την αι’ τι'αν ω’, κι'σθη τε και` τη` ν ε’ πι'κλησιν ε» λαβεν; ... the temple of the Jews in the [territory] which is called Onias. This [territory] is in Egypt and on this (the following) account it was colonized and received its name.” Cf. Philo In Flacc. 46 where Jews living outside Jerusalem are called colonists. It is interesting to note that Onias III can even be interpreted as a Greek ευ’ εργε' της in association with his role in Jerusalem, even representing “the earliest recorded trace of euergetism (associated with his role as α’ γορανο' μος of the city/temple) among Judean leadership of the Second Temple period,” Gregg Gardner, “Jewish Leadership and Hellenistic Civic Benefaction in the Second Century B.C.E,” JBL 126, no. 2 (2007): 329–32, but not as a Greek founder. 272 In Ant. 13.63, we find the closest thing to the use of the oracular guidance of the deity when, in the request to build the sanctuary, the possibility is related to the prophecy of Isa 19:19, “ε’ ν Αι’ γυ' πτω, οι’ κοδομηθη^ ναι ναο' ν.” On this see Schürer, History of the Jewish People, 3.1:48. 273 Ant. 13.67. Nevertheless, Josephus uses the word to describe the action.

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suggests quite clearly an equally presumed need for potent validation – either action would deserve no less than the protective cloak of a κτι' σις, the story of their origin in the initiative of a god. In this context, in contrast, a specific Jewish situation that demands no less validation than our Greek examples, the diagnostic Greek model is not adopted, despite the fact that technical terms of foundation abound. Not long after the founding of the temple of Leontopolis, related events in Palestine provide the background for another story which prompts comparison with the foundation accounts we have thus far presented, namely, the rise of the Hasmonean dynasty – in itself the stuff of foundation-legends. However, when we examine the account we discover emphases that are noticeably different from those which characterize the Greek foundation-legends. In 1 Macc, despite the importance of Judas Maccabeus to the events leading to Jewish independence,274 only Mattathias, his father, is credited with any sort of initiatory or founding action as an individual.275 Even when we come to the accounts of the reclamation of the temple, the actions described are taken by groups of persons working in concert. In the account of 2 Macc this is especially obvious: Judas and his men reclaim the temple (το` ... ι‘ ερο` ν ε’ κομι' σαντο και` τη` ν πο' λιν), they purify (καθαρι' σαντες) the temple and build (ποιει^ν) another altar, and they reinstate the sacrifices. In the Greek context, as we shall show in a later section, this type of “reformation of, or reinstitution” of a cult is usually described in the singular, as the work of a divinely called agent of the particular god or goddess who directs the process. Here, as in 1 Macc., all the restorative actions are the actions of a body of persons. Although in 1 Macc 4:41 we read that Judas καθαρι' ση, τα` α« για, embodying, as the military leader who has just recaptured a sacred stronghold compromised by Syrian sympathizers, both principal aspects of the founder’s role, Judas is described turning to the priests to actually carry out the task (cf. 5:1).276 Even the institution of the annual festival in honor of the restoration ———————————

274 The account reveals its essential understanding of Judas early on; he is, “Μακκαβαι^ος ι’ σχυρο` ς δυνα' μει ε’ κ νεο' τητος αυ’ του^ ” (2:66). In 9:21, 2 Sam 1:27 (adapted by being singularized) is applied to Judas as an epitaph, he is the fallen mighty one who saves Israel. 275 Mattathias is clearly the founder of the resistance movement. His anger is provoked by Israelite apostasy, not by the intervention or inspiration of the deity (1 Macc 2: 24–27; also Josephus, B.J. 1.36–37). 2 Macc 2:19, describes events concerning Judas, his brothers, the purification of the temple and reclamation of the altar, and the ε’ πιφα' νειαι from heaven on their behalf. Yet, we cannot infer that the focus of the story is on the individual liberator as the personal selectee of the deity; the signs from heaven are not analogous to the oracular selection characteristic of the Greek legends. Here they relate to the divine aid given the Maccabees’ military efforts. 276 The priests “ω’, κοδο' μησαν” (plural twice) repair the sanctuary and its sacred items (4:47–48). Even Judas’ speech to the troops avoids the focus on the individual acts of the founder, “α’ ναβω ^ μεν καθαρι'σαι τα` α«για και` ε’ γκαινι'σαι” (4:36). The use of the third plural, even in an exhortation, is not the language of foundation-legends but the language of the

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event is a cooperative decision (4:59). Judas is, to the extent of his military leadership, portrayed as the agent of restoration, but the way his role in the restoration is presented does not share the kinds of emphasis common to the Greek foundation-legend, especially with respect to the personal call. Although we find divine help mentioned in relation to military success,277 there is neither a divine call nor any prominence given to the agency of a single figure in accomplishing the will of the deity. As in the case of his father, Judas does not act at the instigation of the deity, but out of personal piety and patriotism. The closest we come to the theme of divine selection is the unique remark in 1 Macc 5:62 that Joseph and Azariah are defeated by the Gentiles because they are not of the family (from context, the Hasmonean family) to which the deliverance of Israel has been entrusted. Nevertheless, this idea seems to play only an ad hoc, etiological role at this point in the narrative to explain a Jewish military expedition which has ended in defeat.278 It is interesting to note the difference between the books of Maccabees and the account of Josephus in B.J. 1. 36–37. Josephus describes events in terms of the individual: Matthias (Ματθι' ας) is a priest who raises the resistance to Syrian (i. e., Greek) assaults on the Jerusalem cult; he receives the rule of the people, an α’ ρχη` which he bequeaths to his son Judas (1.37). Judas, once in control of the temple, alone το` ν τε χω^ ρον ε’ κα' θηρε, he refurnished the temple, ω’, κοδο' μησεν another altar, and re-initiated the sacrifices (an appropriate role for the son of a priest). Yet, even though Josephus uses singular verbs to describe the determinative actions of an important figure of his national history, he sees no need to cast his narrative in terms of a personal call from the deity. Another foundation from the Jewish context which should be mentioned at this point is the development of the Dead Sea community, and the role of the Teacher of Righteousness (‫ )מורה הצדק‬in its history.279 The documents pro——————————— patriot urging his fellows to act on behalf of the nation. 277 1 Macc 3: 19–22, 50–53; 4:11, 24–25, 30–33; 9:46; cf. 2 Macc 8:2–5, 23–24. 278 2 Macc 10:1 should also be pointed out in this regard because it contains the phrase, “του^ κυρι'ου προα' γοντος αυ’ του' ς,” to qualify the condition under which the reclamation of the temple occurs. However, it is Judas and his companions who act under the leadership of the Lord; this is not a real parallel to the personal divine call of the founder as described throughout the previous sections of this chapter. As Cicero observed, the Greeks focus on the single founder-figure; not on group decisions. 279 This is not the place to engage the question of whether or not the long-standing scholarly that sees a connection between the ancient literary references to the Essenes, the sectarian documents of the Dead Sea scrolls, and the site of Qumran needs to be reconsidered. It is sufficient to qualify my remarks as relevant only to the narrative relationship between the writers of the clearly sectarian documents and the Teacher of Righteousness, and the lack of any foundational narrative in any of the sources, including those external to the scrolls. For the debate over the authors’ identity and their relation to Qumran, a debate that is increasingly disentangling the connections that defined the consensus, see: Lawrence H. Schiffman,

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duced by the community itself, especially 1QS (the Rule of the Community,‫)סרך היחד‬, reveal the degree to which it operated as a self-governing (therefore) political, cultic community. Literary analysis of the community documents has shown that the group experienced its beginnings prior to the involvement of the Teacher of Righteousness.280 Although it is clear that this figure brings on a new phase in the history of the group, his role remains in many ways ambiguous. It is not clear what role if any can be attributed to him in the foundation of the Dead Sea community. J. Murphy-O’Connor’s literary analysis of 1QS leads to the conclusion that the Teacher of Righteousness should be credited with the establishment of the community in the desert, but not with the founding of the community itself.281 CD, however, clearly describes how the deity acts on behalf of a directionless and leaderless group by raising up the Teacher of Righteousness to bring guidance to it. The Commentary on Psalms 37 describes the divine role in the process: ‫כיא מיהו]ה מצעדי גבר כונ[נו בכול דרכו יחפץ כיא יפ]ול[ ל]וא‬ ‫יוטל כיא י]הוה סומך ידו[ פׁשרו על הכוהן מורה ה]צדק אׁשר‬ 282 ‫ד[בר בו אל לעמוד ו]אׁשר[ הכינו לבנות לו עדת‬

——————————— Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of Judaism, the Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1994); Idem, Qumran and Jerusalem: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the History of Judaism, Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature (Grand Rapids, Michigan; Cambridge, U. K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2010); Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature (Grand Rapids, Michigan; Cambridge, U. K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2002). 280 E.g., early in the history of scholarship, literary analysis of 1QS suggests to some that its oldest source material was produced in a period of the community’s history which predates the leadership of the Teacher of Righteousness, see; Alfred R. C. Leaney, The Rule of Qumran, and Its Meaning: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary, NTL (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1966). In the Damascus document (CD) we have the well-known passage which describes how, in the “Age of Wrath” (390 years after the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzer), a “root” sprang from Israel and Aaron (1:9–11). This root was not a single individual but a group of sincerely repentant Israelites who, despite their sincerity, carried on in blindness, searching for direction. Only after twenty years did the Teacher of Righteousness come on the scene to provide leadership. 281 “La genése littèraire de la règle de la communauté,” RB 76 (1969): 528–49. 282 DJD 5, 4Q171 iii 14–16: Beginning with the Lor[d, the steps of a man are set], in all his paths the Lord takes pleasure. Even [should he stumble, he will not fall down] because the L[ord is supporting his hand.] Its interpretation concerns the Priest, the Teacher of [Righteousness, he whom the Lord c]ommanded to take his stand And [he whom] the Lord established to build for him a congregation.

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That most of the evidence for the history of the group comes from its biblical commentaries reinforces the idea expressed above that the god of Israel is the instigator of the group’s existence; the community is the fulfillment of the words (the oracles) of the prophets.283 In this Jewish context, we find a community, which in the telling of its foundation story, ascribes divine initiative to the selection of its most important leader, but not an oracular, personal call. With that in mind, we should not over-estimate the isolation of this group from Hellenistic influence; the likelihood is very great that the authors of the sectarian tracts of the Dead Sea Scrolls are, as a group, another yet-to-be explored example of the innovative cultural production of contested cultural identity in a colonial context.284 Martin Hengel has described the Teacher of Righteousness not only in terms of charisma and the prophetic tradition, but in terms of Greek παιδει' α (1.224–225).285 The connections between the formation of the Dead Sea community and Hellenistic patterns certainly need further detailed exploration, especially in view of Hengel’s lengthy discussion in which he suggests that the closest parallels to the community of the Dead Sea, the Essenes, are to be found among the Hellenistic associations (1:243–45). From this perspective, the possibility of Hellenistic influence in the form of the Greek voluntary association (a social environment which in this period fostered the continuation of the language of foundation) makes it intriguing that the Teacher of Righteousness should be described as the instrument of the deity for the purpose of establishing a community which must relocate to a new home.286 Consequently, it might be argued that this interpretation of Psalm 37 just mentioned represents an example of the oracular selection of the founder charac———————————

283 The role of the prophetic tradition serves a somewhat analogous function in this regard to the function of the oracles of the gods in the Greek sources. Moreover, prophecy plays an important role in Greek foundation-legends as well. 284 Within two decades of the discovery and earliest theorizing about the community of the Dead Sea Scrolls, specific points of Hellenistic influence were being pointed out, e.g., Bruno W. Dombrowski, “‫ היחד‬In 1QS and το` κοινο' ν: An Instance of Early Greek and Jewish Synthesis,” HTR 59, no. 3 (1966): 298–307. 285 Judaism and Hellenism , 224–25 (the last point would certainly be anticipated in a colonial situation). Contrast H. Stegemann who dismisses the importance of the prophetic model in preference for the priestly, “The Teacher of Righteousness and Jesus: Two Types of Religious Leadership in Judaism at the Turn of the Era,” in Jewish Civilization in the Hellenistic-Roman Period, ed. Shemaryahu Talmon, JSPSup (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1991), 196–213, esp. 199–203, 206–207, 209–210. 286 In the Greek context, this is an instance of colonization, cf. the descriptions of the Jewish community of Leontopolis and Jews living in the Diaspora as a colonies, above pp. 116–122. Lawrence H. Schiffman has described one of the community rules of the group (CD) as a rule suited to the governance of a Jewish community living in the midst of nonJews, the kind of community rule suited to a colony outside Palestine, The Halakhah at Qumran, SJLA 16 (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 281.

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teristic of the Greek foundation-legends.287 Nevertheless, while a direct call from the deity could lie behind the interpretation of the commentary, hypothetically, none is actually mentioned. In actuality, we do not have a comparable foundation-legend here. Perhaps more importantly in any discussion of the Dead Sea Scrolls’ Teacher of Righteousness is the simple fact that the history of scholarship is not even settled not only with respect to his identity but with respect to his very historicity. We shall not spend time delving into the ongoing controversies. The problem can be illustrated in a simple review of fundamental shift in Ben Zion Wacholder’s understanding of the character. In a 1982 review of Barbara E. Thiering’s controversial book, Redating the Teacher of Righteousness,288 Wacholder foreshadowed his understanding of the Teacher of Righteousness that would appear in 1983.289 Wacholder argued that the consensus chronology that began with a Hasmonean ejection of the Teacher of Righteousness (under either Jonathan of Simon) and his leadership of the Essenes on their exodus eventually to Qumran was too late. He believed that the key was 11Q, Yadin’s Temple Scroll, for Wacholder more accurately the Torah Scroll for the new age expected by the community. For us the key is that Wacholder believed not only believed that the Teacher of Righteousness was an historical person, but that both he and his enemies could be identified; the Teacher of Righteousness was a student of Antigonos of Soko named Zadok (referring to CD 5:5). The “Liar” of the Scrolls was Simon the Just, and the “Wicked Priest” was Onias III. Yet, over the years, Wacholder became uncertain of this historical approach to interpreting the references to the Teacher of Righteousness, until publishing a rather radical change in his view. With the publication of two articles in 2000 and 2002, Wacholder removed the Teacher of Righteousness form the pages of history to the future eschatological hope of the community, a figure yet to come for the writers of the scrolls.290 Simply stated, my point here is that the texts provide very little that could be used to argue that the sectarian writers used a narrative pattern similar to the Greek ———————————

287 However, the interpretation of the traditional Psalm as a reference to the community is the same type of re-interpretation in which Christians engage in their attempt to see the figure of Jesus in terms of the same, Jewish prophetic tradition. 288 Barbara E. Thiering, Redating the Teacher of Righteousness, ANZSTR 1 (Sydney: Theological Explorations, 1979), Wacholder’s review appeared in JBL 101.1 (1982): 147– 148. 289 Ben Zion Wacholder, The Dawn of Qumran: The Sectarian Torah and the Teacher of Righteousness, Monographs of the Hebrew Union College 8 (Cincinnati, Ohio: Hebrew Union College Press, 1983). 290 See on this: Ben Zion Wacholder, “The Teacher of Righteousness is Alive, Awaiting the Messiah: ‫ האסף‬In CD as Allusion to the Sinaitic and Damascene Covenants,” HUCA 71 (2000): 75–92, and Ben Zion Wacholder, “The Righteous Teacher in the Pesherite Commentaries,” HUCA 73 (2002): 1–27.

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foundation-legend, and even if this could be argued convincingly, it would be easy to argue that this is another example of the cultural production of resistance by Jews in their encounter with Hellenism. Yet, the real problem is that there is no certainty regarding the narrative location of this figure; can he be located in history or only outside of it? These problems undercut any attempt to see a Jewish counterpart to the Greek pattern. Whatever the Jewish appropriation of Greek forms, Jewish writers, even those so familiar with Greek thought as Philo, consistently resist the notion that the divine call of Yahweh to select an individual to carry out religious innovation has happened more than once. 3.4. The Greek Foundation-Legend and the Question of History One final element needs comment. It should be obvious from the preceding pages of this chapter that despite Malkin’s protest that some correlation must be granted, as least, between elements of the classic foundation-legends and the history of Greek colonization, the function of these narratives was never simply to preserve historical events.291 Rather, the Greek foundation-legends function to serve the needs of the communities that tell and retell them. The greatest need in the examples surveyed to this point is legitimation, recognizing this function as validating propaganda raises the issue of historicity. Simply because we can identify a particular text as a foundation-legend does not mean that we have thereby anything to say necessarily about the historical events of which it purports to speak. Focusing specifically on the issue of the relationship between the foundation-legend and the historical events it claims to describe, in the cases of Zoilos, Apollonios II, Xenainetos of Opous, and Dionysios of Philadelphia, we have seen that personal actions and experiences can be cloaked in the language of oracle and divine intervention. While in these cases, no one would doubt that many of these individuals actually participated in the establishment of the cultic institutions with which they are associated, few would be satisfied with assuming that the foundation-legends that come to be told about them always gives us an accurate, historical picture of either the founding events or the founder’s motivations.292 As Eric Hobsbawm reminds us, “[t]raditions which appear or claim to be old are often quite recent in origin and sometimes invented.”293 To be sure, this statement does not license our total incredulity, but in our study, I would describe our narratives as examples of the first of Hobsbawm’s two categories, namely, traditions that are “actually invented” – traditions consciously constructed by an author for a specific occasion and purpose. I agree with ——————————— 291

“‘Tradition’ in Herodotus,” passim. Again we could simply refer to Robertson’s article, “Ritual Myth as Athenian History,” passim. 293 “Inventing Traditions,” 1. 292

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Hobsbawm’s view that invented traditions “seek to inculcate certain values and norms of behavior by repetition, which automatically implies continuity with the past. In fact, where possible, they normally attempt to establish continuity with a suitable past.”294 However, I do not agree with certain structural limits to Hobsbawm’s definition. First, I doubt that Hobsbawm can maintain his isolation of ritual (actions) from myth (foundation narratives) in his focus on invented traditions.295 Clearly, our texts are creative reinscriptions of identity, just as Hobsbawm’s ritual formations are, which just as clearly make use of not only stock motifs but recycled fragments of existing “traditions,” some of which may in fact preserve some forms of connections to historical persons and events. Granting these possibilities, in the history of scholarship dealing with our narratives, it has more often been the case that the information provided by the foundation-legends is granted an unwarranted degree of historical authority. By way of example, I would offer the case of the foundation-legend of the cult of Sarapis at Alexandria. It is common knowledge that from the beginning of the Hellenistic and into the Roman period, the cult of Sarapis continued generally to gain in popularity,296 to the point that Sarapis became “one of the most important gods of later antiquity.”297 Since the work of Wilckens, the consensus has been that Sarapis’ origin is to be traced to Osiris-Apis, the theriomorphic aspect of Osiris worshiped at Memphis.298 Of course, in contrast to Osiris, Sarapis appears in relatively recent history, certainly not in any indisputable fashion ———————————

294 “Inventing Traditions,” 1. As we shall see, this certainly pertains to the notion of τα` πα' τρια, “traditions of the homeland,” the mere idea of which will in most of our examples be far more important than any actually continuity with some set of practices in our immigrant cult’s the land of origin. 295 Here I must admit to being much more intrigued by Jonathan Z. Smith’s notion that myth and ritual often function in very similar ways, especially as he describes their functions in contexts of what he calls “situational incongruity,” see and compare the two essays: “A Pearl of Great Price and a Cargo of Yams: A Study in Situational Incongruity,” in Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown, Chicago Studies in the History of Judaism (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 90–101 and “The Bare Facts of Ritual,” in Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown, Chicago Studies in the History of Judaism (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 53–65. 296 Thomas Allan Brady, “The Reception of the Egyptian Cults by the Greeks (330–30 B.C.),” in Sarapis and Isis: Collected Essays (Chicago: Ares, 1978), 9–33; Fraser, “Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” 6–33, 41–49. 297 See: John E. Stambaugh, Sarapis Under the Early Ptolemies, ÉPRO 25 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1972), 1; cf. Wilhelm Hornbostel, Sarpis: Studien zur Überlieferungsgeschichte den Erscheinungsformen und Wandlungen der Gestalt eines Gottes, ÉPRO 32 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1973), 29. For qualifications, see Brady, “Reception of the Egyptian Cults,” 26–31; Fraser, “Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” 6–9. 298 Otto Weinreich, ed. and comp., Neue Urkunden zur Sarapis-Religion (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1919), 5; Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 248; Fraser, “Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” 1, n. 2; Stambaugh, Sarapis, 5.

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before the last decades of the fourth century B.C.E. To be sure, in this context, we shall not attempt to deal with the complicated issues surrounding the origins of Sarapis. Rather, in light of our preceding comments about the function of the foundation-legend and its relation to history, we shall limit our concern to the way scholars have used the foundation-legend of the cult of Sarapis at Alexandria for historical reconstruction. Each of the expected components are here. The story begins with an epiphany; Ptolemy I Sōtēr (323–283 B.C.E.) experienced a dream-vision in which the king is charged to relocate an image from Pontus to Alexandria. Of course, transferal of an image is a shorthand for the transfer of a cult.299 Consistent with the pattern of the foundation-legend, fulfillment of the divine visitor’s wishes promises increased fame and prosperity for Ptolemy’s kingdom.300 The king, however, did not immediately act. Instead, Ptolemy tried to find an explanation for the vision, turning to the Egyptian priests/dream-interpreters.301 Unfortunately, the dream-interpreters were not familiar with the geography described in the vision. Ptolemy then necessarily turned to Timotheos, a cultic expert whom he had earlier summoned from Athens to supervise cultic matters in Alexandria.302 Timotheos was able to discover, through sources familiar with the region of Pontus, that there was a city there called Sinope not far from which could be found a temple of Jupiter Dis.303 Once he decided to act, the king-founder of the new cult dispatched two men to retrieve the statue, a task completed successfully only with divine aid – again, in the foundation-legends, the god must be the will motivating and facilitating events. Scholarly evaluation of this story has significantly changed the way the history of Sarapis has generally come to be understood. The idea that Sarapis was the “creation” of Ptolemy I presently seems a very common one.304 This, ———————————

299 See above, pp. 75–76, 86, on the dream-vision of the Theban general, Epaminondas; Appian, Mith. 12. We have seen that the motif of the unrecognized divine messenger is also a common element. 300 Cf. P.Cair.Zen. 59.034, ll. 3–4, 19–20. 301 Here we have a reference to one of the important official functions in the cult of Sarapis, the ο’ νειροκρι'της (Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 269–70). 302 Otto Weinreich, “Timotheus,” in PW, cols. 1341–42; Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, Glaube, 2:336–38; cf. Arrian, Anab. 3.6.4; 7.17.2; GGR, 2.92–94. It is notable that Tacitus relates Timotheos to Sinope; he had served as a cultic expert there also; see: Arnobius, Adv. nat. 5.5; Pausanias 7.17.10–12; Brady, “Reception of the Egyptian Cults,” 10. 303 J. Gwyn Griffiths, Plutarch’s De Iside et Osiride: Edited with an Introduction, Translation and Commentary (Cambridge: University of Wales Press, 1970), 398. 304 Hornbostel, Sarpis, 18–19; however, contrast Stambaugh, Sarapis, 5, 10–13 (reviewed by J. G. Griffiths, CR 26.1 [1976], p. 141); cf. Reinhold Merkelbach, “Alexander im Serapeum,” APF 17 (1960): 108–9. Even Brady, who believed that Sarapis’ “pre-history” went back to Alexander’s time, used the word “created” to refer to the god, “Reception of the Egyptian Cults,” 9; but the notion has a long history, see also: Wilamowitz-Möllendorff,

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however, has not always been the case. Early in this century, Otto Weinreich assessed the impact that the discovery of the Delian aretalogy of Sarapis had on his formerly skeptical colleagues. He points out that prior to the discovery of the inscription, few scholars took seriously the accounts of Tacitus, Plutarch, and Clement (Protrepticus 4) because these reports were so clearly overgrown with legendary elements. Up to this time it was generally believed, on the basis of numismatic and inscriptional evidence, that Sarapis came on the scene only in the Imperial period.305 With the discovery of the Delian text, no doubt remained that the cult originated early in the Hellenistic period. Although, in itself, the Delian text says very little of relevance to the historical value of the foundation-legend found in Tacitus and Plutarch, a number of scholars pointed to the Delian inscription as validation of the historical value of the Alexandrian legend and proceeded to use the latter as definitive evidence for the reconstruction of Sarapis’ origins. Yet in spite of the enthusiasm over the historical possibilities of the aretalogy, as Fraser’s analysis clearly demonstrates, it appears to be impossible to maintain the historical value of both the literary and epigraphical sources for the origins of the cult; one or the other must be devalued, since each directs us to a different point of origin. The irony here is that the discovery of the Delian evidence, because it originates in a contact zone and functions in the contestation of identities on Delos, invokes the specter of its own reconsideration as evidence for the history of the cult. In fact, because of this consideration, we must look to colonized Egypt and the contestation of encounter there to consider Sarapis himself one of the creative hybridities of the encounter between Greeks and native Egyptians. For example, Fraser, in his important note on this issue, devalues the inscription from Delos, claiming that, on grounds that it is cultic propaganda, the Delian evidence must be taken with a grain of salt. “[I]t cannot be taken literally, since, as Nock, has pointed out, ‘it is clear that the worship introduced was not the original Memphian cult of Osorapis, but the Hellenised cult of Sarapis and Isis ... ’”306 The problem with this line of argument is that it assumes the unproven in presupposing that the worship of Osirapis could not have already evolved in Memphis into the worship of Sarapis and therefore that such a claim in the Delian text must be a spurious fabrication. Moreover, Fraser’s work has also removed any support for the common arguments upon which the “creation” hypothesis was often based, viz., that Ptolemy was moti——————————— Glaube, 2:336–38; also H. Brunner, “Sarapis,” RGG 5 (1961): 1369; C. Jouco Bleeker, “The Pattern of the Ancient Egyptian Culture,” Numen 11, no. 1 (1964): 75–82. 305 Neue Urkunden, 6; Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, Glaube, 2:336 recognized that Tacitus’ tradition-history included a reference to Timotheos, concluding that this foundation-legend cannot history but religious propaganda. 306 “Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” 3, n. 2.

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vated to create the cult of Sarapis in order to unify the populace, and the hypothesis that Ptolemaic imperialistic interests promoted the spread of the cult into areas outside Egypt.307 In essence, the political motivations generally assumed by the “creation hypothesis” find very little expression in the phenomena which the hypothesis predicts and upon which it depends. The irony in Fraser’s position is that while he devalues an apparent eyewitness account of the cult because it is propagandistic, he nevertheless does history on the basis of Tacitus’ account, which is clearly no less a foundationlegend than the Delian text, the primary function of which was cult propaganda. Fraser’s own account of Ptolemy’s creation of Sarapis is based entirely on the very late literary traditions found in Tacitus and Plutarch. This course leads to an additional irony, in the fact that, although used to reconstruct the “creation” of Sarapis, these texts are not about the “creation,” or origin, of the god; they actually describe only the transfer of his image, which, as we have seen from other examples, is a standard element in cult foundationlegends. Both Tacitus’ and Plutarch’s sources presuppose the existence of Sarapis.308 Understood first in its form and function as a foundation-legend, the Alexandrian story need not say anything at all about the “creation of Sarapis.” In fact, if we assume the most probable explanation on the basis of historical precedents, the story known to Tacitus is simply another example of a foundation-legend created to serve the needs of a “local” cult, i.e., the cult of Sarapis at Alexandria and the propagandistic goals of the religious community.309 Certainly, the Delian inscription demonstrates how cult propaganda functions within a polemical context. This text stakes a claim to a place for the cult in the community. The story’s role in the polemical context is clear; the public proclamation of the recent court victory as validation of Sarapis’

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“Cult of Sarapis in the Hellenistic World,” 2;17–9;20–3;26–7;31;46–9. There is still sufficient reason to argue that the origins of Sarapis do go back to Memphis, as Nock assumed despite his objection to crediting the Delian aretalogy with any historicity, see: Nock, Conversion, 33–47. However, even in denying the relevance of the Delian text, Nock realized correctly that Memphite origin of the Sarapis cult rested on the likelihood of early hellenization of the Memphis cult itself, see: Philippe Borgeaud and Youri Volokhine, “La formation de la légende de Sarapis: une approche transculturelle,” ARelG 2, no. 1 (2000): 37–76; but note Françoise Dunand and Christiane Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men in Egypt 3000 BCE to 395 CE, Dieux et hommes en Egypte, David Lorton (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2002), 214–21, who argue for a link to the Egyptian-Memphite deity Osor-Hapi, manifested as the Apis Bull, taken over consciously by Ptolemy I’s theologians for imperial purposes – an implicit grounds for inter-polis competition. 309 Stambaugh, Sarapis, 8–10. 308

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new temple only rubs salt into the still fresh wounds of Apollonios II’s opponents – a constant reminder of the divine humiliation of θεομα' χοι.310 In the case of the foundation-legend of the Alexandrian cult,311 it is likely that it developed in response to the claims of Memphis. Certainly the authors of the Delian text believed Egyptian (i. e., Memphite) origin to be one of their cult’s most important assets; they make no mention of the Alexandrian cult. Even Tacitus’ admitted that some traditions that derived the Alexandrian cult from Memphis were known to him, but he rejected them; this certainly hints at the possibility of a current polemical context – a rivalry between Alexandria and Memphis.312 This possibility needs to be explored in more detail than we can provide presently. Nevertheless, in view of the intriguing evidence for an original Memphite context for Sarapis, especially the very early evidence from Delos, it is simply more probable that the foundation-legend found in Tacitus, regardless of how it came to him, owes its origin to the conscious efforts of the founders of the Alexandrian Sarapieion as validating propaganda that pointedly undercuts any association of the Alexandrian cult with Memphis. The audacity alone in claiming that Sarapis, iconographically presumed to be Pluto – thus thoroughly hellenized, calls out to Ptolemy I for relocation from the distant and unrelated site of Sinope to Alexandria reeks of polemical disdain for what must have been Sarapis’ well-known connection with Osor-Hapi and the Apis bull of Memphis. The whole tale is a bold slight to Memphis – that Sarapis would call for his own transfer from Sinope as if Memphis figures in the equation not at all.313 We cannot leave our discussion of the function of the Greek foundationlegend without once again recalling the tendency for foundation-legends to attach the crucial founding activities to mythic, legendary, or famous histori——————————— 310

With the same stroke, this propaganda also enlivens the confidence of the faithful; the history of the private cult of Sarapis on Delos is a history of conflict, see: Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 92–93; Brady, “Reception of the Egyptian Cults,” 42. I will have more to say on this point in detail in due course. 311 Actually, the date of the foundation of the cult itself in Alexandria is unknown. Aside from the presumption that Ptolemy I must have founded it, there is little corroborating evidence. The dates which Eusebius gives are of course derived from the tradition found in Tacitus (Brady, “Reception of the Egyptian Cults,” 10). 312 Vidman argues that, with the spread of Sarapis into the Greco-Roman world, Memphis becomes more important outside of Egypt (Isis und Sarapis, 46); cf. Pausanias 1.18.4, Memphis is the most ancient cult site of Sarapis in Egypt (therefore the most venerable). For the general competition between the two cities see CAH 7, p. 115. 313 The form Σαραπει^ον is found in the inscriptional evidence for Egypt, e.g., PHI 216138, Graffites du Gebel Teir 14,I5 = SB 16.12892. Perhaps more pertinent is the evidence from the Memphite papyri; from nearly sixty examples, most coming from the κα' τοχοι living in the temple complex from the mid-3rd to mid-2nd cc. B.C.E., the standard form for the temple of Sarapis in Memphis is Σαραπιει^ον, e.g., P.Cair.Zen. 2.59149, l. 5 (256 B.C.E.); UPZ 1.2, l. 2 (163 B.C.E.).

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cal persons. This seems clear enough in the case of the Andanian Mysteries with the prominence given to the role of Epaminondas mentioned earlier. Presently, in the case of the foundation of the Sarapieion in Alexandria, we find the same tendency exemplified in this kind of propaganda. Clement of Alexandria, obviously conscious of how such tendencies work, cites in his argument against the rationality of idol-worship a certain Athenodorus who attributed the initiative to sculpt the famous image of Sarapis at Alexandria to the legendary twelfth-century B.C.E., Egyptian king, Sesostris (Protrepticus 4.48). In Clement’s view, Athenadorus made the attribution to Sesostris because he wished to make this image of Sarapis seem ancient and more venerable. Clement’s sensitivity to this tendency cannot simply be dismissed as Christian polemic. Rather, his strategy reflects an awareness of the prevalence of this tendency in the telling of such tales which consequently justifies his historical incredulity. Without additional evidence, and given what we know of the purpose and influence of the foundation-legend in cultic propaganda, we cannot be certain what role, if any, Ptolemy I, or his cultic advisers, actually played in the origin of the cult at Alexandria. On the one hand, it has long been recognized that the Ptolemies promoted the cult of Sarapis,314 and especially as the royal couple become identified with the divine couple, Sarapis and Isis.315 Nevertheless, it is also probable, based on the tendency we have just mentioned, that because Sarapis of Alexandria became so closely identified with the dynasty that the foundation-legend evolved to credit the cult’s foundation to the most appropriate recent hero, the founder of the Ptolemaic ruling house, in a narrative that firmly established the Alexandrian Sarapis’ independence from the ancient and more “Egyptian” sacred center of Memphis. Based on the previous survey, including our recognition of the reality of the phenomenon of “invented tradition,” especially including myth alongside ritual, to suggest that the foundation-legend of Ptolemy I’s introduction of the cult of Sarapis to Alexandria says little about the actual events it purports to narrate is to suggest the obvious. Our precedent found in the example of the Andanian Mysteries offers further supporting evidence. Pausanias’ account of the history behind the reestablishment of the mysteries is only part of the evidence we have for this cult. To be discussed in detail later, just as in the case of the Delian cult of Sarapis, we have inscriptional evidence for the Andanian Mysteries that lies closer by centuries to events that were crucial to the history

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314 Stambaugh, Sarapis, 11, “The evidence does not compel us to see Ptolemy I as anything more than a major patron of the cult, probably responsible for installing the Alexandrian statue.” 315 Dunand and Zivie-Coche, Gods and Men, 218, 221.

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of the cult and to the formation of Messenian identity; we refer to the famous lex sacra from 92–91 B.C.E (IG V, 1 1390).316 This text reflects the point in the history of the cult when the presiding member of the priestly family, Mnasistratos,317 turned the cult over to civic control. As we have already mentioned; the so-called Argive Oracle claims, in much the same way Apollonios II claimed earlier on Delos, that Mnasistratos was commanded by a god to initiate a change in the operation of the cult.318 Surely, this change was one of the most important in the history of the cult. Even so, Pausanias seems to be unaware of this event, or of Mnasistratos. The absence of such an important part of the cult’s history seems unlikely to have arisen through an editing of the cult’s history by its own officials, since the transfer of a cult from private to civic control is common enough.319 As for Pausanias, he does not avoid mentioning cultic experts who have benefited the cult at points in its history.320 The only rationale for arguing that Pausanias knew about this particular event and yet avoided mentioning it would have to be his own personal focus on the Greek character of the religious sites which he visited. The reorganization of the mysteries as a civic cult did occur only after the period of Roman domination had begun; in view of Pausanias’ agenda, it is not impossible that for him the essentially Greek history of the cult had ended long before the reforms of Mnasistratos.321 From the perspective of his quest to discover his own place in the continuity of Greek religious life, Pausanias may have considered Mnasistratos to be peripheral. Whatever his motives may have been, we must also keep in mind that there is reason to believe that Pausanias simply had access to a different account of the cult than that represented by the inscriptional evidence.322 ——————————— 316

See below for the text and commentary. See Otto Kern, “Mnasistratos, 1,” RE 30 (1932): cols. 2255–56; GGR, 2.96–97; cf. Ludwig Ziehen, “Zu den Mysterien von Andania,” Hermes 60 (1925): 338. 318 Nadine Deshours, “Les institutions civiques de Messène à l’époque hellénistique tardive,” ZPE 150 (2004): 136 skillfully uses the Andanian lex sacra to describe the civic institutions that served Messene during this period, but it is important not to lose sight of the distinction between their new role in the governance of this specific cult from any previous and analogous role the civic authorities played in other cults; what is marked in the Andanian lex sacra is an innovation in the cult’s history with no indication that the civic authorities, οι‘ α»ρχοντες, οι‘ συ' νεδροι, or ο‘ δα^μος (Doric spelling, of course), played any role in the privately-operated mysteries. 319 Cf. IMagnMai 99 (= LSAM 34). 320 E. g., Lycus and Methapos, 4.1.6–8; cf. GGR, 2.98. 321 Jaś Elsner, Art and the Roman Viewer: The Transformation of Art from the Pagan World to Christianity, Cambridge Studies in New Art History and Criticism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 127–55, esp. 149. 322 In all the traditions known to Pausanias, the mysteries celebrated at Andanian belong to the Great Goddesses (Demeter and Kore, 4.1.7). However, in the Andanian bylaws, the “Great Gods” of the mysteries are masculine, IG V, 1 1390, ll. 33–34; cf. Ziehen, “Der 317

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In the end, I would argue that the relationship between the earlier inscriptional witness for the Andanian cult and the account of Pausanias provides a rough analogy to the situation we face in evaluating the relative worth of the traditions found in Tacitus and Plutarch and the evidence from the Delian cult with regard to the question of the early history of the worship of Sarapis. Pausanias’ account is, like that of Tacitus, separated from the early inscriptional witness for the cult about which he writes by hundreds of years. However, while scholars have been cautious not to privilege Pausanias’ report in their descriptions of the Andanian Mysteries, the reliability of Tacitus’ account of the origin of the Alexandrian cult of Sarapis has too often been taken for granted. If we are to appreciate correctly the form and function of the foundation-legend, this assumption must be questioned.

4. Summation To this point, based on our survey of the Greek foundation traditions, we have identified a cultural paradigm according to which historical founder-figures, especially those who found cultic institutions, have portrayed the origin of their foundational activities in their personal, oracular selection by a god. Their appropriation of the story of their divine selection by a god presupposes its effectiveness not only for validating the innovative cult but also the role of the founder, which, as we also saw, necessarily entails taking responsibility for the development of the criteria for participation in the new institution. These criteria usually appear in the form of a lex sacra, the framework for which is often constructed of a foundation-legend recounting the cult’s miraculous origin. One of the most crucial of the founder’s responsibilities is the grounding of the new cult in a venerable stream of tradition, consequently establishing the appropriate traditions that comprise such an important part of the cult’s public presentation. I simply do not conceive of the formation of either self- or group identity as a passive process. The imposition of stereotypes on members of minority communities is never uncontested. Rather, identity is constantly negotiated and therefore involves active choices, or selective appropriation of dominant cultural forms and categories of value, on the part of members of the minority or dominated community intended to aid that negotiation. I assume, then, that the appropriation of the foundational paradigm by cultic innovators is the product of the interactive matrix of stereotyping and the resistive processes of mirroring and mimicry. Certainly, as we shall see in due course, Paul’s own defense of his apostleship throughout his various letters conforms to the common function of the ——————————— Mysterienkult,” 37–38; Otto Kern, Die Religion der Griechen, 3 vols. (Berlin: Weidmann, 1938), 3:189.

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foundation-legend’s definitive element (viz., the personal call of the founder by the god). The key point here is that Paul clearly uses this scenario as the principle evidence in his defense against critics who do not accept his innovative ministry. Since his appeal to his vision of Christ appears along with his earliest defense of his apostleship, it would seem that his awareness of the probability of controversy developed from his earliest days in the Church, and at least served in part as motivation for the apologetic strategy he used to validate his mission. We must keep in mind that from its beginnings, the Greek foundation-legend played host to a disturbing internal tension. From Dougherty’s scenario of the purification of the murderous founder to the hesitant founders of cults, the founder embodies a contradiction, a negative past that must become a positive present. The problem is that each founder also embodies change, and innovation that departs from the expected, the continuing. Thus, the founder is honored and given privileges over what is founded, not, however, for his personal ingenuity, but for his final, often grudging, obedience to the call of a god – a god who makes the founder captive to the divine will. Claiming that in our examples the foundation-legend proves the preferred defensive weapon in the battle for legitimacy being waged by cult innovators, and especially among those migrating from non-Greek homelands, does not mean that this strategy is always successful, but it is a viable answer to the questions raised by the dominant group’s stereotype. Our survey also suggests that the paradigm of the founder-figure, and especially the fundamental idea that the deity commissions the founder through a vision is not likely to have come to Paul through Jewish channels, since among Jews, after the Moses narrative, the pattern is non-repeatable. And even where we find Moses and the community of the Exodus described in Greek colonial terms, such versions of the national narrative are constructed by those who like Philo are most thoroughly familiar with Greek culture. In this regard, it is important to note Betz’s observation that in later criticism of the apostle, Jewish-Christians criticized Paul on precisely this point.323 From ———————————

323 Betz’s analysis of anti-Pauline opposition in the Pseudo-Clementine literature is apropos here; criticism of Paul’s vision comes from non-Pauline sources, the Pauline traditions treat the vision positively, or (as the author of canonical Acts has done) try to put a positive spin on the event by linking it with some form of tradition, see: Betz, Galatians, 39 on the charge against Paul in 2:17; also Appendix 3, 231–233. This is also an important point in connection with my argument that the paradigm of the founder-figure and the associated genre of the foundation-legend are not paralleled in Jewish traditions. The criticism found in the Kerygmata Petrou originates with Jews devoted to Jesus and to their understanding of Moses. Their fundamental criticism is directed against the proposition that God (and more specifically Jesus) would use such a means as an epiphany to express his will and to select Paul. In my view this controversy reflects more than a battle over “theological turf” between Jewish and Gentile Christians; it reflects a more fundamental difference in cultural presuppositions regarding the behavior of the deity.

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this perspective, the centrality of his visionary call is the subject of ridicule, and is cause enough to consider Paul a tool of Satan. It would appear then that the success of Paul’s attempt to justify his commission to go to the Gentiles by referring to a vision from God was determined by cultural presuppositions that allowed for continuing divine commission of cultic innovation, something that Jews seem reluctant to concede. I shall suggest in due course that Paul’s use of this defensive strategy appears to be directed primarily at his Greek converts, and only secondarily to his actual critics – perhaps an implicit admission that such a defense will be of little service against opponents closely associated with Jewish perspectives on his mission. As a person familiar with Greek cultural life, Paul must have known that before Greeks this defensive strategy stood on long-lived precedents. That he was correct to assume this is demonstrated, as we shall see, by the continued life of this strategy in later Gentile-Christian traditions, where it continued to serve its traditional apologetic purposes. However, within literary traditions often identified as Jewish-Christian we find, in contrast, little basis for a favorable disposition toward Paul’s strategy. This is very clear, for instance, in the consequent rejection of Paul’s revelation in sources like the Pseudo-Clementine literature (Homily 17.13–19). In the following chapters, with the aid of selected epigraphical evidence, we shall examine in greater detail the various roles and responsibilities associated with the Greek founder-figure. These texts will provide us with examples of the application of this cultural paradigm by both historical cultfounders as well as by the later cultic communities to the description of the origins of their innovative cultic institutions. We shall see when we come to Paul that, in addition to sharing the language and self-understanding of such founder-figures, the apostle assumes the paradigmatic, thus expected, foundational roles with respect to the ε’ κκλησι' αι he founds, and takes on a substantial number of the associated responsibilities.

Chapter 3

The Role of the Founder according to Selected Texts: The Transferals of the Cult of Sarapis to Delos and Opous With this chapter we begin our examination of selected texts from the Hellenistic-Roman period, presenting them with translations, limited critical notes, and commentary focusing especially on the role of the founder in the development and elaboration of cultic institutions. Our first selections will provide examples of the role of the personal call of the founder by the deity in the formation of cultic institutions, the role of the founder in establishing a defensible place in the world for the newly-created institution, and (in at least our first case) the role of the founder in the common struggle against opposition. Moving people, this is one of the diagnostic symptoms of the modern condition of coloniality – taken for granted is the movement of colonizers, or conquerors, from their homelands to what for them is the yet “to be defined,” the known but unknown. Yet just as definitive of the condition is the movement of the colonized from their conquered homelands to the homelands of their conquerors. In the modern colonial context, the contact zones have migrated to the front doors of the colonizers – Indians and Jamaicans migrating to Great Britain; Algerians and Vietnamese to France.1 In these terms, the situation in the Hellenistic period was similarly a time of moving people. Greeks and Macedonians had moved east and south to conquer foreign territory, but soon the conquered began to migrant into what were traditional Greek homelands. And along with these migrating peoples came their gods. The flow of migrants from Egypt into the Greek world carries our first text, IG XI, 4 1299, ——————————— 1

For the basic problems involved in this postcolonial movement, see, e.g., the concise survey in Frances Gouda’s review article, “Immigration and Identity Politics in a Postcolonial World: Review of Recalling the Indies: Colonial Culture & Postcolonial Identities,” APJA 9, no. 4 (2008): 363–71; cf. Paul A. Silverstein, “Immigrant Racialization and the New Savage Slot: Race, Migration, and Immigration in the New Europe,” ARA 34, no. 1 (2005): 363–84; Leo Lucassen, The Immigrant Threat: The Integration of Old and New Immigrants in Western Europe Since 1850, Studies of World Migrations (Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 2005), esp. 171–96; also the essays in Françoise Lionnet and Ronnie Scharfman, eds., Post/Colonial Conditions: Exiles, Migrations, and Nomadisms, 2 volumes, YFS 82–83 (New Haven, Conn.; London: Yale University Press, 1993); Michelle Keown, David Murphy, and James Procter, eds., Comparing Postcolonial Diasporas (Basingstoke, England; New York: Palgrave, 2009).

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representing the earliest cult of Sarapis on the island of Delos.2 This inscription, an appropriate choice because of its early date (sometime around the turn of the third to second century B.C.E.), preserves a substantial account of the migration of this Egyptian cult into a venerable and sacred Greek community. This feature alone makes this text an extremely important source of comparative material for the diffusion of other Hellenistic cults including Christianity. Our choice also provides an excellent example of both the types of changes that occur when cults are transplanted to a new environment, and of the role of the founder in determining the nature of these changes and their public presentation. With respect to Paul’s own mission, we shall see as our examination of these selected texts progresses that the foundation-legends and the leges sacrae3 published by Hellenistic cult groups provide ample evidence for the founder-figure’s continuing controlling influence over, recognized prerogatives within, and authority to determine all aspects of cultic life. On the basis of this evidence, it would actually be surprising to find that Paul did not exercise his authority in much the same manner as the founders we shall survey – establishing criteria for membership, instituting regulations for ritual, and choosing those who are to hold positions of authority among the initiates. ———————————

2 This small island, the so-called center of the Cyclades, according to the mythological tradition, was the birthplace of the children of Zeus and Leto, Apollo and his sister Artemis. As the Hymn. Hom. Apoll. makes clear, the island had from earliest times (perhaps the eighth-century) hosted both festival and games in honor of Apollo. The sanctuary of Delos was very famous and enjoyed the respect, not only of Greeks, but of the invading Persian fleet in 490 B.C.E. (Herodotos. 6.97, 118; on the sanctity of Delos to Greeks, see also: Robert Parker, Miasma: Pollution and Purification in Early Greek Religion [Oxford: Clarendon, 1983], 73, 277, 393). By 454, with the transfer of the treasury of the Delian league to Athens, the island became closely aligned with Athenian interests. The Athenians, in fact, built a new temple of Apollo on the island at the end of the fifth-century. Athenian influence increased in 378 when Athenian officials were put in charge of the island’s cults. This direct control continued until Athenian sea-power was crippled in 314. During the following century and a half, Delos enjoyed some independence, while the Hellenistic empires contended for control of the Aegean. Delos was a crucial center for Aegean trade, with a growing population of resident aliens from a wide variety of locations. It was probably during this period of independence that the cult of Sarapis was brought to the island (more on this below); see, William A. Laidlaw, A History of Delos (Oxford: Blackwell, 1933); for the Roman period especially, see: Nicholas K. Rauh, The Sacred Bonds of Commerce: Religion, Economy, and Trade Society at Hellenistic Roman Delos, 166–87 B.C. (Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1993). 3 ‘Ιερα` γρα' μματα is not the most appropriate category, since Greek cultic inscriptions rarely refer to the collection of regulations they contain by this term. Our designation is simply a scholarly category. The use of ι‘ ερα` γρα' μματα to refer to the edicts of Roman emperors is a late development, and the idea that written cultic regulations could be “sacred” is essentially the Jewish idea of “sacred scripture,” see: G. Schrenk, “ι‘ ερο' ς, κτλ...,” TDNT, 3:222–225; 227–229.

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One point should be made at the outset; because we are dealing with the earliest period of the Christian cults in the specific locations established by Paul, and because the Christians have not yet, to our knowledge, built sacred buildings as do some of the examples we shall examine, the absence of any text specifically resembling the traditional lex sacra (by which we mean a cultic inscription containing minutes and/or bylaws published by a cultic group for public inspection) cannot be cited as evidence that Paul did not establish something functionally similar for use by his groups. As we will see, there is nothing in Paul’s Hellenistic-Jewish background that would provide a basis in principle for refraining from such a practice. We know that Jews in the Diaspora certainly did publish such cultic texts for public inspection. My argument that Paul does, in fact, organize his churches in much the same way that other religious founders organize Greek-styled cult institutions devoted to a variety of deities, will find support if it can be convincingly shown that Paul takes responsibility for defining and structuring the groups he founds in ways that reflect the same needs and concerns addressed by his contemporaries, that he uses similar strategies for the same purposes, that Paul describes his relationship to the members of the groups he founds in similar terms, and that comparison with the evidence for the role of the founder-figure offers more probable explanations for heretofore obscure Pauline statements or practices. Most importantly, all of these processes function within a multi-layered colonial context that envelopes Paul, his converts, and every other of the many migrating religious actors we shall examine.

1. The Transfer of Native Cult and the Sequence from Private to “Public” Cult: the Case of the Delian Cult of Sarapis The so-called Delian Aretalogy of Sarapis is crucial to our description of the role of the cult founder-figure. It presents two editions of a cult foundationlegend used by an immigrant Egyptian family that appears to have arrived on Delos sometime around the end of the fourth- to the beginning of the thirdcentury B.C.E.. After presenting the text and my translation, we shall begin with a limited discussion of the development and spread of the worship of Sarapis, although in view of the scope of this history what follows will necessarily introduce only essential details of the cult’s history. It is sufficient to note at this point that by the time we encounter the Delian cult of Sarapis in this text,4 its history spans three generations of the immigrant founding ———————————

4 Following the ed. pr., Roussel, IG IX, 4 1299 = Δ062, most recently reexamined by Ian Moyer, “Notes on Re-Reading the Delian Aretalogy of Sarapis (IG XI.4 1299),” ZPE 166 (2008): 101–7; only variants relevant to our present task will be noted. Important editions include: Weinreich, Neue Urkunden, 31–33, with limited commentary; Helmut Engelmann,

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priestly family. Its authors have a story to tell that, bolstered by the accompanying aretalogy of Sarapis written by the cult’s poet, Maiistas,5 functions as an expression of cultic propaganda; as such, it speaks to both insider and outsider.6 ——————————— The Delian Aretalogy of Sarapis, trans. Ewald Osers, ÉPRO 44 (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 7–9, updating Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 71–75 (French translation, 76–78), and Weinreich, but criticized for providing little that is new, see: Robert A. Wild, Water in the Cultic Worship of Isis and Sarapis, ÉPRO 87 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981), Appendix 1, p. 171, n. 40 (see: J. G. Griffiths’ reveiw, JHS 96 [1976], 216–217); SIG3.663 contains only ll. 1–29; Vincenzo Longo, Aretalogie nel mondo greco 1: Epigrafi e papiri, Pubblicazioni dell’Istituto di filologia classica e medievale dell’Università di Genova 29 (Genova: Istituto di filologia classica e medievale, 1969), 106–16 no. 63, with commentary; Maria Totti, Ausgewählte Texte der Isis-und Sarapis-Religion, in Subsidia Epigraphica: Quellen und Abhandlungen zur griehischen Epigraphik 12 (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1985), 25–28; John Undershell Powell, Collectanea Alexandrina: Reliquiae minores Poetarum Graecarum Aetatis Ptolemaicae 323–146 A.c.: Epicorum, Elegiacorum, Lyricorum, Ethicorum, repr. ed (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), 69–71. Also, Adolf Wilhelm, “Zu dem Gedichte des Maiistas,” Symbolae Osloenses 13 (1934): 1–18 offers specific corrections, and an English translation is found in, Frederick W. Danker, Benefactor: Epigraphic Study of a Graeco-Roman and New Testament Semantic Field (St. Louis, Missouri: Clayton Publishing House, 1982), 186–91. Transcriptional symbols used follow the format of SEG. 5 A thanksgiving to the god for the victory (l. 28) concludes the prose account. The poet Maiistas (l. 29) is otherwise unknown, Engelmann, Delian Aretalogy, 25. L. Michael White, Building God’s House in the Roman World: Architectural Adaptation Among Pagans, Jes, and Christians, The ASOR Library of Biblical and Near Eastern Archaeology (Baltimore; London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990), 36 assumes that Maiistas is a priest, though not so designated in the text. On the formula, α’ ξι'ως του^ θεου^ , see: Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 76, for whom Maiistas is a aretalogue (p. 81, n. 81); also Engelmann; assumed to be Egyptian by Hiller, IG XII, 1 33; SIG3.663, n. 8 and Vidman, Isis und Sarapis, 36. Prima facie the name appears to be a Greek form of the Latin maiestas (if so, more likely the name would originate from the adjective, maiestus), i.e., “majesty” referring to a god, but also note the maiestas minuta, the charge of “treason” established by the lex Appuleia of 103 B.C.E., Saturninus 1; Cicero, Inv.Rhet. 2.17.53; Tacitus, Ann. 3.10–12. At the time our text was published, Roman influence on Delos is only beginning to gain importance, see: M. Lacroix, “Les étrangers a Delos pendant la periode de l’independance,” in Melanges Gustave Glotz (Paris: Les Presses Universitaires de France, 1932), 510–25. One can only speculate on whether or not Maiistas’ name is rooted in Roman influence. Even considering Delos’ period of independence (314–166 B.C.E.), the greatest influence on Delos was throughout Athens. Even after Rome exercises its power in the region, it chooses to place Delos back under Athenian control in 166 for the Delians’ support of Perseus of Macedon against Rome. To be sure, Rome is active on Delos: after 166 there is evidence for two guilds (κοινα' ) of Italian residents on Delos. By 69 B.C.E. Delos was a naval station, but before the end of the first century, Delos was in full decline; the trade routes had shifted changing the economic potential of the island, see: Laidlaw, History of Delos, 57–138; Rauh, Bonds of Commerce, 1–22. 6 This was designed as a public monument, a free-standing column, 125cm high, found in a courtyard, see: Roussel, Cultes égyptiens, 71–83; Engelmann, Delian Aretalogy, 1–2.

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1.1. The Text and Translation 1

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Text ο‘ ι‘ ερευ` ς ’Απολλω' νιος α’ νε' γραψεν κατα` προ' σταγμα του^ θεου^ · ο‘ γα` ρ πα' ππος η‘ μω ^ν ^ν ’Απολλω' νιος, ω › ν Αι’ γυ' πτιος ε’ κ τω ι‘ ερε' ων, το` ν θεο` ν ε» χων παρεγε' νετο ε’ ξ Αι’ γυ' πτου, θεραπευ' ων τε διετε' λει καθω` ς πα' τριον η” ν, ζω ^ σαι' τε δοκει^ ε» τη ε’ νεη' κοντα και` ε‘ πτα` . διαδεξαμε' νου δε` του^ πατρο' ς μου Δημητρι' ου α’ κολου' θως τε θεραπευ' οντος του` ς θε[ο]υ' ς, δια` δε` τη` ν ευ’ σε' βειαν ε’ στεφανω' θη υ‘ πο` του^ θεου^ ει’ κο' νι χαλκει^, η‹ α’ να' κειται ε’ ν τω ^ ι ναω ^ι του^ θεου^ · ε» τη δε` ε’ βι' ωσεν ε‘ ξη' κοντα και` ε« ν. παραλαβο' ντος δε' μου τα` ι‘ ερα` και` προσκαθημε' νου ται^ς θεραπει' αις ε’ πιμελω ^ ς, ο‘ θεο' ς μοι ε’ χρημα' τισεν κατα` το` ν υ« πνον, ο« τι Σαραπιει^ον δει^ αυ’ τω ^ ι α’ ναδειχθη^ ναι »ιδιον και` μη` ει”ναι ε’ ν μιςθωτοι^ς καθω` ς προ' τερον, ευ‘ ρη' σειν τε το' πον αυ’ το` ς ου“ δει^ ε‘ δρασθη^ ναι σημανει^ν τε το` ν το' πον. ο‹ και` ε’ γε' νετο. ο‘ γα` ρ το' πος ου“ τος η” ν κο' πρου μεστο' ς, ο‹ ς προεγε' γραπτο πωλου' μενος ε’ ν βιβλιδι' ωι ε’ ν τει^ διο' δωι τη^ ς α’ γορα^ ς· του^ δε` θεου^ βουλομε' νου συνετελε' σθη η‘ ω’ νη` κατεσσκευα' σθη τε το` ι‘ ρο` ν συντο' μως ε’ ν μησι`ν ε« ξ. α’ νθρω' πων δε' τινων

Translation The priest, Apollonios, publicly inscribed according to a command of the god [the following]: Our grandfather, Apollonios, being an Egyptian, a member of the priestly class, came from Egypt bearing the god with him, 5and as he served the cult, he carried out his duty according to native tradition. It is thought that he lived for ninety-seven years.

And having received the cultic responsibility from him, my father, Demetrios, following after him and performing the ritual duties for the gods, because of his piety was crowned by the god10 with a bronze image, which stands in the temple of the god. And he lived for sixty-one years.

And when I had received the sacred rites of the cult, and in the course of attending carefully to my cultic responsibilities, the god gave to me an oracle as I slept, [telling me] that it was necessary that 15a Sarapieion of his own be set up and that he no longer be housed in rented quarters as had been the case prior to that time; [and] that he himself would locate the place where this sacred precinct is to be established, and that he would signify the location. And so it happened. For there was this place full of sewage, which was 20posted for sale in a public notice in the entry of the Agora. With the god willing it so, the sale was finalized and the temple was prepared quickly in six months. But when some men joined in opposition to us and against the god, and brought 25a

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ε’ πισυνστα' ντων η‘ μι^ν τε και` τω ^ ι θεω ^ ι και` ε’ πενενκα' ντων κρι' σιν κατα` του^ ι‘ ερου^ και` ε’ μου^ δημοσι' αν, τι' χρη` παθει^ν η› α’ ποτει^σαι, ε’ πηνγει' λατο δ’ ε’ μοι` ο‘ θεο` ς κατα` το` ν υ« πνον ο« τι νικη' σομεν. του^ δ’ α’ γω ^ νος συντελεσθε' ντος και` νικησα' ντων η‘ μω ^ν α’ ξι' ως του^ θεου^ , ε’ παινου^ μεν του` ς θεου` ς α’ ξι' αν χα' ριν α’ ποδιδο' ντες. γρα' φει δε` και` Μαιι΅στας υ‘ πε` ρ του^ ι‘ ερου^ ει’ ς τη` ν υ‘ πο' θεσιν ταυ' την. μυρι' α και` θαμβητα` σε' θεν, πολυ' αινε Σα' ραπι, ε» ργα, τα` με` ν θει' ας α’ να` τυ' ρσιας Αι’ γυ' πτοιο ηυ» δηται, τα` δε` πα^ σαν α’ ν’‘ Ελλα' δα, σει^ο θ’ο‘ μευ' νου » Ισιδος· ε’ σθλοι^σιν δε` σαω' τορες αι’ ε` ν ε« πεσθε α’ νδρα' σιν οι‹ κατα` πα' ντα νο' ωι ο« σια φρονε' ουσιν. και` γα' ρ τ’α’ μφια' λει Δη' λωι α’ ρι' σημα τε' λεσσας τα’ πολλωνι' ου ι‘ ρα` και` ει’ ς με' γαν η» γαγες αι”νον. αυ’ το` ς δ’ οι‘ δηναια` πατη` ρ ε’ κο' μισσεν α’ π’αυ’ τη^ ς Με' μφιδος, ο‘ ππο' τε νηι¨` πολυζυ' γωι η» λυθεν α» στυ Φοι' βου· ε» νδον ε‘ ιω ^ ι δ’α’ ε' κων «ιδρυσε μελα' θρωι και' σε φι' λως θυε' σσιν α’ ρε' σσατο· το` μ με` ν α» ρ’αι’ ω' ν γηραιο` ν κατε' πεφνε, λι' πεν δ’ε’ ν σει^ο τερα' μνωι υι“α θυηπολε' εν Δημη' τριον, ω“ ι ε’ πι' πανχυ γη' θησαν θε' ραπες· του^ με` γ κλυ' ες ευ’ ξαμε' νοιο, ει’ κω` χαλκει΅ην νειω ^ ι θε' μεν ευ” δε` τε' λεσαι, ε» ννυχος ’Αντιπα' τροιο καθυπνω' οντι φαανθει`ς δεμνι' ωι η» νωγες τε' λεσαι χρε' ος. α’ λλ’ο« τε και` το` ν γηραλε' ον λι' πε μοι^ρα, πα' ¨ις γε με` ν ε’ σθλα` διδαχθει`ς

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civil action against the temple and me, an action carrying possible corporal punishment or fines, the god promised me in a dream [that] we would be victorious. And having gone through the trial and having won the victory [in a manner] worthy of the god, we began praising the gods, offering up appropriate gratitude. 29

And Maiistas also writes on behalf of the temple on the issue of this suit: Many and marvelous are your deeds, praiseworthy Sarapis, both the deeds which are recited along the sacred towers of Egypt, and those of your consort, Isis, performed throughout all Hellas! And as saviors, you always follow men who in all things consider carefully whatever is on their minds. 35

For you also carried out obvious marvels in sea-girt Delos, and you brought the cultic rites of Apollonios to great praise. But Father himself brought his ancient cultic objects from Memphis itself, when he came in a well-banded ship to the city of Phoibos. Under his own roof he reluctantly established your cult. 40

And he pleased you with burnt sacrifices offered with devotion. While time took the man, old [from the years], he nevertheless left, in your chamber, his own son, Demetrios, to perform the sacrifices, a man in whom at all times the servants [of the god] rejoiced. And you gave ear nightly to the father’s successor praying to place an honorary bronze statue in the temple and to do it well, appearing [to him], 45as he lay fast asleep in his bed, you urged [him] to fulfill this need. But when Fate abandoned this old man also, a young boy, one who was taught noble things by [his] father, greatly reverenced the cultic rites, and every day sang hymns of your great deeds, and

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ε’ κ πατρο` ς μεγα' λως σε' βεν ι‘ ερα' , πα^ ν δε` κατ’ η” μαρ σα` ς α’ ρετα` ς η» ειδεν, α’ ει` δ’ε’ λλι' σετο νειο` ν ο« ππηι σοι δει' μειεν α’ ριφραδε' ως κατα' λεξαι ε» ννυχος υ‘ πνω' οντι, διηνεκε` ς ο» φρα κε μι' μνοις σηκω ^ ι ε’ νιδρυθει`ς μηδ’ α» λλυδις α’ λλοδαπω ^ ι ε’ ν ου» δει ε’ νιχρι' μπτοιο. συ` δ’ε» φρασας α’ κλε' α χω ^ ρον ο» ντα πα' ρος και` α» σημον, α’ ει` πεπληθο' τα λυ' θρωι παντοι' ωι μετα` πολλο` ν ε» τι χρο' νον· ε’ ννυ' χιος γα` ρ ευ’ νη^ ι ε’ πιπρομολω` ν λε' γες· “ε» γρεο· βαι^νε δε` με' σσα παστα' δος α’ μφι` θυ' ρεθρα και` ει»σιδε γρα' μμα τυπωθε' ν τυτθη^ ς ε’ κ βυ' βλοιο το' σε φρονε' οντα διδα' ξει ο« ππηι μοι τε' μενος τευ' χηις και` ε’ πικλε' α νειο' ν.” αυ’ τα` ρ ο‹ θαμβη' σας α’ ναε' γρετο, βα` ς δε` μα' λ’ ω’ κυ' ς α’ σπσι' ως »ιδε γρα' μμα και` ω » πασεν α’ ργυραμοιβο` ν τιμη` ν ου“ κτε' αρ ε» σκε· σε' θεν θ’α« μα βουλομε' νοιο ρ‘ ηι¨δι' ως και` νειο` ς α’ ε' ξετο και` θυο' εντες βωμοι` και` τε' μενος, τετε' λεστο δε` πα' ντα μελα' θρωι ε« δρανα' τε κλισμοι' τε θεοκλη' τους ε’ πι` δαι^τας. και` το' τε δη' ρ‘ α κακοι^σι κακο` ς φθο' νος ε» νβαλε λυ' σσαν α’ νδρα' σιν οι« ρ‘ α δι' κηι α’ νεμωλι' ωι ε’ κλη' ¨ισσαν δοιω` σο` ν θερα' ποντα, κακο` ν δ’ε’ πι` θεσμο` ν ε» τευχον η› τι' χρη` παθε' ειν η› ε’ κ τι' να τι^σαι α’ μοιβη` ν θωη^ ς ε’ νγρα' ψαντα. κακω ^ ι θ’ υ‘ πο` δει' ματι πα^ σαν η’ ω ^ τε{ιν} νυ' κτας τε περι` κραδι' ην ε’ λε' λιζεν τα' ρβος θειοπο' λοιο. σε` δε` σταλα' ων α« μα δα' κρυ

always did he beseech you regarding a temple to tell him plainly, at night as he slept, 50in what place he should build for you; till at last, having been installed in [your] sacred precinct, you stand fast continually, no longer to depart your place of residence here for a strange place. But you revealed a place, formerly one of shame and without distinction, having been continually filled with every kind of defilement 55over the passage of time. For at night, approaching [him] in bed, you said, “Get up, and go into the middle of the colonnade which surrounds the entry [of the Agora] and look in at the written instructions tucked back slightly into the place [in the wall]. Careful study [of the document] will instruct you where you should prepare a temenos for me and a glorious temple.” 60

Then awe-struck he arose immediately. And with great haste he went; welcoming the sight of the text, he paid the banker the price for which the property was being offered for sale. By your will [Sarapis], at the same time, quickly arose both the temple and the altars for those making sacrifices; all 65the chairs in the hall were finished, as well as the couches, for those summoned by the god to the banquets.

And then it was indeed that evil jealousy cast madness upon evil men, the two who took him who served you to court on a charge full of air. And on the basis of an evil regulation they filed their charge, 70 a charge the result of which could be either a penalty of corporal punishment or fines. Oppressed by a wicked fear, terror day and night encircled your servant’s heart. But, as he let fall a tear, he approached you as a suppliant [and] begged you to watch out that no shameful penalty

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λι' σσετ’ α’ λεξη^ σαι μηδ’α’ κλε' α τευ^ ξαι α’ μοιβη` ν σω ^ ι ι‘ κε' τει, θανα' του δε` κακα` ς α’ πο` κη^ ρας ε’ ρυ^ ξαι. ου’ δε` συ` , παμνη' στοισιν ε’ φεσπο' μενος πραπι' δεσσι, λη' σαο του^ , νυ' χιος δε` μολω` ν ε’ πι` δε' μνια φωτο' ς ηυ» δησας· με' θες α» λγος α’ πο` φρενο' ς· ου» σε' τις α’ νδρο' ς ψη^ φος α’ ¨ιστω' σει, ε’ πει` ει’ ς με` τει' νεται αυ’ το' ν η« δε δι' κη, τη` ν ου» τις ε’ μευ^ περιω' σιον α» λλος α’ νη` ρ αυ’ δη' σει· συ` δε` μηκε' τι δα' μναο θυμο' ν. α’ λλ’ ο‘ πο' τε χρο' νος “ιξε δικασπο' λος, ε» γρετο ναοι^ς πα^ σα πο' λις και` πα' ντα πολυμμιγε' ω α« μα φυ^ λα ξει' νων ο» φρα δι' κης θεομη' τιδος ει’ σαι¨' οιεν. ε» νθα {σα} συ` κει^νο πε' λωρον ε’ ν α’ νδρα' σι θα' νβος ε» τευξας ση' τε α» λοχος· φω ^ τας γα` ρ α’ λιτρο