The History of Religions School Today: Essays on the New Testament and Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts 3161534360, 9783161534362

Table of contents :
Cover
Acknowledgments
Table of Contents
Abbreviations and References
Clare K. Rothschild: Introduction
I. Introduction
II. History of Religions School
III. Some Objections
IV. Present Volume
V. Conclusion
Part One: New Testament
Paul
Mark Reasoner: Paul’s God of Peace in Canonical and Political Perspectives
I. God Grants Peace Together with Righteousness
II. False Prophets Who Proclaim Peace Bring Divine Judgment on Themselves
III. The Theology of Imperial Peace in the Early Principate
IV. 1 Thessalonians 5:23
V. Philippians 4:9
VI. Two Objections
VII. Romans 10:15
VIII. Romans 15:33
IX. Romans 16:20
X. The Canonical Legacy of Paul’s God of Peace
XI. Conclusion
Robert Matthew Calhoun: Romans 1:18–32 among Ancient Accounts of the Origin of Religion
I. Introduction
II. Ancient Accounts of the Primordial Origin of Religion
1. The basic theories: Prodicus, Democritus and Critias
2. Philosophical elaboration of the theories: Cleanthes and Lucretius
3. Historiographic and ethnographic accounts: Hecataeus and Euhemerus
4. Rhetorical and epistolary applications: Dio Chrysostom and ‘Anacharsis’
5. Wisdom 13–15 on the origin of pagan polytheism
6. Summation
III. Paul’s Account in Rom 1:18–32
1. Sub-proposition (1:18–19a)
2. Divine self-manifestation and human response (1:19b–23)
3. Punishment of the heart (1:24–27)
4. The punishment of the mind (1:28–31) and conclusion (1:32)
IV. Conclusions
Meira Z. Kensky: The “Hymnic” Conclusion to Romans 11
I. Introduction
II. Romans 11:33–36
III. Linguistic and Structural Elements
IV. Scriptural Allusions
V. Wisdom and Apocalyptic in Romans 9–11
Deutero-Pauline Literature
Jeffrey R. Asher: Missiles, Demagogues, and the Devil: The Rhetoric of Slander in Ephesians 6:16
I. The Rhetoric of Slander
II. The Devil as a Πονηρός
III. Weapons of Shame
IV. The Fiery Bolts of the Gods
V. Shields, Missiles, and the Shame of the Devil
VI. Conclusion
Gospels/Acts
Laurie Brink: Going the Extra Mile: Reading Matt 5:41 Literally and Metaphorically
I. Introduction
II. Matt 5:41 interpreted as Ἀγγαρεία
1. Reading Ἀγγαρεύω Literally
2. The Roman Practice and Abuse of Ἀγγαρεία
3. Ἀγγαρεία in Israel
4. Ἀγγαρεία as Extortion
III. Matt 5:41 Interpreted as Extortion
1. Resisting Retaliation: The Fifth Antithesis
2. Who Is the Antagonist of Matt 5:38–42?
IV. Matt 5:41 Interpreted as Fulfilling the Law
V. Conclusion
David G. Monaco: The Rhetoric of Narrative in Acts 8:26–40: Ramifications of the Baptism of the Ethiopian Eunuch for the Author of Luke-Acts
I. Introduction
II. Rhetorical Analysis of the Pericope
III. How Does the Text Fit in the Book of Acts?
IV. Conclusion
Apocalypse
Paul B. Duff: The Scroll, the Temple, and the Great City: The Crisis in the Asian Assemblies and the Interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13
I. Introduction
II. The Scroll Narrative (10:1–11)
III. The Mighty Angel
IV. The Scroll
V. The Consumption of the Scroll
VI. The Temple and Witness Narrative
VII. Jerusalem as “Sodom” and “Egypt”
VIII. The Inhabitants of Jerusalem
IX. Resolving the Ambiguity
X. The Crisis Addressed by John
XI. An Episode within a Narrative or a Story within a Story?
XII. Reading the Interlude against the Background of John’s Struggle for Legitimacy in the Divided Communities
XIII. Concluding Remarks
Jewish Christianity
Matt Jackson-McCabe: Orthodoxy, Heresy, and Jewish Christianity: Reflections on Categories in Edwin Broadhead’s Jewish Ways of Following Jesus
I.
II.
III.
IV.
Jeffrey A. Trumbower: Christians, Sabbateans, and the Dead Sea Sect: A Comparative Case Study in Jewish Sectarian Logic
Part Two: Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts
Clare K. Rothschild: Παιδεία as Solution to Stasis in 1 Clement
I. Proof-texts & Commentary
II. Proof-texts
III. Authorial Commentary
IV. Conclusion
Matthijs den Dulk and Andrew M. Langford: Polycarp and Polemo: Christianity at the Center of the Second Sophistic
I. Introduction
II. The Talented Mr. Polemo
III. Polycarp and Polemo
IV. The Martyrdom of Polycarp and the Second Sophistic
1. (Re)Constructing Ancient Masculinities
2. (Old) Age
3. Prosōpon
4. Hand movement
5. Gaze
6. Witticisms and Improvisation
7. Arranging an Address, Proposing a Theme
8. The Father and Teacher of Asia
V. Concluding Remarks
Annette Bourland Huizenga: On Choosing a Wet-Nurse: Physical, Cultural and Moral Credentials
I. Myia to Phyllis
II. Physical Credentials
III. Cultural Credentials
IV. Moral Credentials
Justin R. Howell: Lucian’s Hermotimus: A Fictive Dialogue with Marcus Aurelius
I. Hermotimus as Marcus Aurelius
1. The Name and Age of Hermotimus
2. Hermotimus as Philosopher-King
II. An Appeal for Marcus to Reign as Civilis Princeps
III. A Concluding Proposal: The Cynicism of the Hermotimus
Thomas R. Blanton IV: De caelo patrocinium: The Economy of Divine Patronage in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses
I. Introduction
II. Roman Patronage: An Overview
III. The Economy of the Offering in Apuleius of Madauros’ Metamorphoses
IV. Conclusions
Bibliography
List of Contributors
Indices
References
Hebrew Bible/Septuagint
Old Testament Pseudepigrapha
Dead Sea Scrolls
Rabbinic Literature
New Testament
Apostolic Fathers and Other Early Christian Literature
Other Ancient Authors and Texts
Modern Authors
Subjects

Citation preview

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Herausgeber / Editor Jörg Frey (Zürich) Mitherausgeber / Associate Editors Markus Bockmuehl (Oxford) · James A. Kelhoffer (Uppsala) Hans-Josef Klauck (Chicago, IL) · Tobias Nicklas (Regensburg) J. Ross Wagner (Durham, NC)

340

The History of Religions School Today Essays on the New Testament and Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts

Edited by

Thomas R. Blanton IV Robert Matthew Calhoun Clare K. Rothschild

Mohr Siebeck

Thomas R. Blanton IV, born 1968; 1991 BA (Psychology) University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; 1994 M.T.S. Duke Divinity School; 2006 Ph.D. (Biblical Studies) Divinity School, The University of Chicago; currently teaches at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. Robert Matthew Calhoun, born 1971; The University of Chicago. Humanities Division, Department of New Testament and Early Christian Literature; Ph.D. 2011. Clare K. Rothschild, born 1964; 1986 BA University of California, Berkeley 1992 MTS Harvard University; 2003 PhD University of Chicago; currently Associate Professor of Theology at Lewis University, Romeoville, IL.

e -ISBN PDF 978-3-16-153437-9 ISBN 978-3-16-153436-2 ISSN 0512-1604 (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament) Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie; detailed bibliographic data is available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2014  by 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 systems. The book was typeset by Martin Fischer in Tübingen, printed by Gulde-Druck in Tübingen on non-aging paper and bound by Buchbinderei Spinner in Ottersweier. Printed in Germany.

With sincere gratitude to our mentor and friend,

Hans Dieter Betz

Acknowledgments The manuscript was collaboratively edited and prepared by myself, Clare K. Rothschild, Robert Matthew Calhoun, and Thomas R. Blanton IV between September 2013 and March 2014.We received excellent direction and feedback on aspects of this work from the authors and others. We wish to thank Dean Margaret M. Mitchell for her encouragement to take up the project and to express utmost gratitude to Dr. Henning Ziebritzki and Jörg Frey at Mohr Siebeck for their interest in the manuscript and for its recommendation to the WUNT series. In his book, Consilience: The Unity of All Knowledge (Knopf, 1998) evolutionary biologist Edward O. Wilson argues that one grand scheme explains and unites everything that human beings know and can know. The author describes his initial captivation by this idea as Ionian enchantment. He explains the experience in Chapter 1 of the book as follows: Preferring a search for objective reality over revelation is another way of satisfying religious hunger. It is an endeavor almost as old as civilization and intertwined with traditional religion, but it follows a very different course – a stoic’s creed, an acquired taste, a guidebook to adventure plotted across rough terrain. It aims to save the spirit, not by surrender but by liberation of the human mind. Its central tenet, as Einstein knew, is the unification of knowledge. When we have unified enough certain knowledge, we will understand who we are and why we are here. If those committed to the quest fail, they will be forgiven. When lost, they will find another way. The moral imperative of humanism is the endeavor alone, whether successful or not, provided the effort is honorable and failure memorable. The ancient Greeks expressed the idea in a myth of vaulting ambition. Daedalus escapes from Crete with his son Icarus on wings he has fashioned from feathers and wax. Ignoring the warnings of his father, Icarus flies toward the sun, whereupon his wings come apart and he falls into the sea. That is the end of Icarus in the myth. But we are left to wonder: Was he just a foolish boy? Did he pay the price for hubris, for pride in sight of the gods? I like to think that on the contrary his daring represents a saving human grace. And so the great astrophysicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar could pay tribute to the spirit of his mentor, Sir Arthur Eddington, by saying: Let us see how high we can fly before the sun melts the wax in our wings.

To my mind, Wilson’s expression of the almost religious enchantment of scientific discovery captures well the humanistic, daring spirit of honorable challenge and wonder Betz fosters among students at Chicago. This volume is dedicated with utmost admiration and respect to our mentor and friend, Professor Hans Dieter Betz (Shailer Mathews Professor Emeritus of New Testament in the Divin-

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Acknowledgments

ity School, the Department of New Testament and Early Christian Literature, and the Committee on the Ancient Mediterranean World) in the hope that it fosters dialogue of the things discussed. Clare K. Rothschild (for the Editors)

Chicago, April 1, 2014

Table of Contents Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VII Abbreviations and References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XI Clare K. Rothschild Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Part One: New Testament Paul Mark Reasoner Paul’s God of Peace in Canonical and Political Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Robert Matthew Calhoun Romans 1:18–32 among Ancient Accounts of the Origin of Religion . . . . . . 27 Meira Z. Kensky The “Hymnic” Conclusion to Romans 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Deutero-Pauline Literature Jeffrey R. Asher Missiles, Demagogues, and the Devil: The Rhetoric of Slander in Ephesians 6:16 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Gospels/Acts Laurie Brink Going the Extra Mile: Reading Matt 5:41 Literally and Metaphorically . . . . 111 David G. Monaco The Rhetoric of Narrative in Acts 8:26–40: Ramifications of the Baptism of the Ethiopian Eunuch for the Author of Luke-Acts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

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Apocalypse Paul B. Duff The Scroll, the Temple, and the Great City: The Crisis in the Asian Assemblies and the Interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Jewish Christianity Matt Jackson-McCabe Orthodoxy, Heresy, and Jewish Christianity: Reflections on Categories in Edwin Broadhead’s Jewish Ways of Following Jesus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Jeffrey A. Trumbower Christians, Sabbateans, and the Dead Sea Sect: A Comparative Case Study in Jewish Sectarian Logic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185

Part Two: Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts Clare K. Rothschild Παιδεία as Solution to Stasis in 1 Clement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199 Matthijs den Dulk and Andrew M. Langford Polycarp and Polemo: Christianity at the Center of the Second Sophistic . . 211 Annette Bourland Huizenga On Choosing a Wet-Nurse: Physical, Cultural and Moral Credentials . . . . . 241 Justin R. Howell Lucian’s Hermotimus: A Fictive Dialogue with Marcus Aurelius . . . . . . . . . 253 Thomas R. Blanton IV De caelo patrocinium: The Economy of Divine Patronage in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297 List of Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325 Indices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Modern Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

327 327 355 364

Abbreviations and References AB ABD ABG AC AJP AncSoc ANRW ANTC ATANT BDAG BDF BHT BibInt BMC BTB Budé BZNW CA CC CBQ CJ CP CQ DK EC ExpTim FRLANT GNS GR GRBS

Anchor Bible David Noel Freedman, ed., Anchor Bible Dictionary (6 vols.; New York: Doubleday, 1992) Arbeiten zur Bibel und ihrer Geschichte L’Antiquité Classique American Journal of Philology Ancient Society H. Temporini and W. Haase, ed., Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1972–) Abingdon New Testament Commentaries Abhandlungen zur Theologie des Alten und Neuen Testaments W. Bauer, F. W. Danker, W. F. Arndt, and F. W. Gingrich, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (3rd ed.; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999) F. Blass, A. Debrunner, and R. W. Funk, A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961) Beiträge zur historischen Theologie Biblical Interpretation R.S. Poole, B.V. Head, P. Gardner et al., eds., A Catalogue of the Greek Coins in the British Museum (London: Woodfall and Kinder, 1873–1929) Biblical Theology Bulletin Collection des universités de France, publiée sous le patronage de l’Association Guillaume Bude Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft Classical Antiquity Continental Commentaries Catholic Biblical Quarterly Classical Journal Classical Philology Classical Quarterly Hermann Diels and Walther Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (3 vols.; Zürich: Weidmann, 1974–75) Early Christianity Expository Times Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments Good News Studies Greece and Rome Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies

XII HBT HDR Hermeneia HNT HNTC HSCP HTR IBC ICC ILS

Abbreviations and References

Horizons in Biblical Theology Harvard Dissertations in Religion Hermeneia: A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible Handbuch zum Neuen Testament Harper’s New Testament Commentaries Harvard Studies in Classical Philology Harvard Theological Review Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching International Critical Commentary Hermann Dessau, ed., Inscriptiones latinae selectae (Berlin: Weidmann, 1892–1916) Int Interpretation JEA Journal of Egyptian Archaeology JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JECS Journal of Early Christian Studies JETS Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society JHS Journal of Hellenic Studies JQR Jewish Quarterly Review JR Journal of Religion JRE Journal of Religious Ethics JRS Journal of Roman Studies JSNT Journal for the Study of the New Testament JSNTSup Journal for the Study of the New Testament: Supplement Series JSS Journal of Semitic Studies JTS Journal of Theological Studies KEK Kritisch-exegetischer Kommentar über das Neue Testament LCL Loeb Classical Library LSJ H. G. Liddell, R. Scott, and H. S. Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon (9th ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996) MH Museum helveticum MNTC Moffatt New Testament Commentary NICNT New International Commentary on the New Testament NIGTC New International Greek Testament Commentary NTA Wilhelm Schneemelcher, ed., New Testament Apocrypha (trans. R. McL. Wilson; 2 vols.; rev. ed.; Cambridge: J. Clarke; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1991–92) NTD Das Neue Testament Deutsch NTS New Testament Studies NovT Novum Testamentum NovTSup Novum Testamentum Supplements OCD S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth, ed., The Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rd ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996) OGIS W. Dittenberger, ed., Orientis graeci inscriptiones selectae (2 vols.; Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1903–5) OLD P. G. W.  Glare, ed., Oxford Latin Dictionary (2nd ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) OTL Old Testament Library

Abbreviations and References

OTP

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J. H. Charlesworth, ed., Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (2 vols.; Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1983–85) Phil Philologus RE Georg Wissowa, et al., ed. Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft (München: Alfred Druckenmüller Verlag, 1980) RTR Reformed Theological Review SBLDS Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series SBLSBS Society of Biblical Literature Sources for Biblical Study SBLTT Society of Biblical Literature Texts and Translations SBLWGRW Society of Biblical Literature Writings from the Greco-Roman World SCHNT Studia ad corpus hellenisticum Novi Testamenti SNTSMS Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series SP Sacra Pagina Spec Speculum SQAW Schriften und Quellen der Alten Welt ST Studia theologica STAC Studien und Text zu Antike und Christentum SUNT Studien zur Umwelt des Neuen Testaments SVF H. F. A. von Arnim, ed., Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta (4 vols.; Leipzig: Teubner, 1903–24) TAPA Transactions of the American Philological Association TAPhS Transactions of the American Philosophical Society TDNT G. Kittel and G. Friedrich, ed., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (trans. G. W. Bromiley; 10 vols.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964–76) TDOT G. J. Botterwick and H. Ringgren, ed., Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (trans. J. T. Willis, G. W. Bromiley and D. E. Green; 8 vols.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974–) TRE G. Kraus and G. Müller, ed., Theologische Realenzyklopädie (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1976–) TUGAL Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur VC Vigiliae christianae WBC Word Biblical Commentary WUNT Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament ZNW Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche ZPE Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik

Introduction Clare K. Rothschild I. Introduction The present volume offers a glimpse at just one albeit thriving expression of the distinguished religionsgeschichtliche Schule begun circa 1884 at the University of Göttingen in Germany. Today applications of this approach to biblical texts made famous on the New Testament side by scholars like A. Eichhorn, W. Bousset, J. Weiß, W. Wrede, and others are diverse. Scholars young and old, liberal and conservative, all over the world ply this comparative method in the interest of biblical interpretation. German scholars convene over the topic regularly. The new publication, Reflections on the Early Christian History of Religion, is just one manifestation of this ongoing dialogue.1 In North America, no one would dispute that the University of Chicago has long been a hub of this type of scholarly investigation. Although a number of Chicago faculty over the last century have indulged façets of the history of religions approach, undoubtedly the most touted in this regard is Hans Dieter Betz. If best known for his work on the implications of ancient rhetoric for New Testament interpretation, five volumes of collected essays, plus important books and monographs, demonstrate his vital commitment to exploring early Christian literature from so-called history of religions’ viewpoints.2 Not only did Betz pursue this line of inquiry in his own research, but – in almost forty years of teaching – he trained numerous students to do so. Two outstanding Festschrift volumes sample the industry.3 As contributors to the 1  Cilliers Breytenbach and Jörg Frey, ed., Reflections on the Early Christian History of Religion/ Erwägungen zur frühchristlichen Religionsgeschichte (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2013). 2 For a comprehensive bibliography of the works of Hans Dieter Betz, see Antiquity and Humanity: Essays on Ancient Religion and Philosophy (ed. A. Y. Collins and M. M. Mitchell; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001), 501–12. Since 2001, Betz’s work has continued unabated and additional volumes have appeared: Gottesbegegnung und Menschwerdung: Zur religionsgeschichtlichen und theologischen Bedeutung der ‘Mithrasliturgie’ (PGM IV.475–820) (Hans Lietzmann Vorlesungen 6; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2001); The “Mithras Liturgy”: Text, Translation, and Commentary (STAC 18; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003); Paulinische Theologie und Religionsgeschichte: Gesammelte Aufsätze V (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009). 3 Festschrift #1 = Ancient and Modern Perspectives on the Bible and Culture: Essays in Honor of

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present volume note, however, these impressive works were published while Betz was still teaching. They do not, therefore, include the last cohort Betz trained. What is more, although the approach has remained essentially intact for more than a century (a testament to its enduring value), it has never been without rivals and opponents. Recently, attacks have flared warranting a response. The present volume attempts to address these two desiderata. It is neither a Festschrift per se, nor a volume dedicated solely to method. Rather, it is a collection of essays in which a handful of Betz’s most recent ‘generation’ of students plies the history of religions school together with other historical-critical methods as a means of not necessarily discussing, but demonstrating various ways in which it is being used and adapted. No single adaptation is identical to another. As we will see, however, a few distinct themes are traceable throughout the studies.

II. History of Religions School It might be helpful to begin by clarifying what the history of religions school is, particularly vis-à-vis the so-called historical-critical method. Although the two are sometimes indiscriminately referred to as one and the same, the history of religions school’s approach to the interpretation of biblical texts is only one in a group of critical approaches to biblical texts often referred to today by the umbrella term, ‘historical-critical method(s).’ Somewhat ironically, the history of religions school approach originated as a reaction to literary approaches such as source and form criticism now appreciated alongside it. Furthermore, as Gerald Seelig has shown, today the “history of religions school” is variously understood. Sometimes it refers to a highly dogmatic way of reconstructing the history of a religion. Gerd Lüdemann and others in Göttingen undertake such work.4 The term “new history of religions school” has been applied to the work of Martin Hengel, Larry Hurtado,5 and others – rather different from the work of Lüdemann and others in Göttingen. The methods Hans Dieter Betz uses and teaches offer yet another iteration of the history of religions school today.6 Since definitions of the method are slippery, the position this volume represents is explained next. Hans Dieter Betz (ed. Adela Yarbro Collins; Scholars Press Homage Series; Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars, 1998); Festschrift #2 = Antiquity and Humanity (see n. 1). 4  Gerald Seelig, Religionsgeschichtliche Methode in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart: Studien zur Geschichte und Methode des religionsgeschichtlichen Vergleichs in der neutestamentlichen Wissenschaft (ABG 7; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2001), 151–76. 5 Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003). 6 See Jörg Frey, “Eine neue religionsgeschichtliche Perspektive: Larry W. Hurtados ‘Lord Jesus Christ’ und die Herausbildung der frühen Christologie,” in Breytenbach and Frey, Reflections on the Early Christian History of Religion, 117–70.

Introduction

3

First and foremost, religionsgeschichtliche Schule implies that Christianity, with an emphasis on Christian religion or cult (as opposed to doctrine), is the object of pioneering research devoid, to the extent possible, of dogmatic presuppositions, and specifying presuppositions that cannot be suspended. Its primary interest is historical phenomena that developed over time within a variety of concrete Christian communities usefully compared to other roughly contemporaneous religious and non-religious groups. Among such groups, practitioners of this method typically assume a level of syncretism. The canon is not privileged in terms of its representation of the early Christian communities. Literary criticism and tradition history – active demurrals of the original school (as noted above) – is almost always incorporated in contemporary applications. Frequently, but not always, connections to dimensions of the field of Classics are made.

III. Some Objections All of these approaches – frequently dubbed ‘historical-critical’ – have been the subject of recent public attack. While objections to historical-critical scholarship are by no means uniform, postmodern challengers object unanimously to the following ideas: (a) textual meaning as an ideal; (b) primacy of the authorial voice in interpretation; (c) commitment to the concept or concepts of truth; and (d) the history under investigation as ancient and not our own (personal or collective).7 A general accusation is that anyone utilizing a form of comparative interpretation is guilty of naive optimism. Walter Grundmann, Martin Hengel, Jörg Frey, et alii have been criticized.8 History itself is considered a byproduct of the nationalist and colonialist age. To purify the scholarly discourse, the idea is that it must be purged of any and all elements of nationalism and colonialism. To be sure, in every generation, the academy must vigilantly guard against the effects of larger ideological discourses on its work. In this work, many regard scholars such as Rudolf Bultmann and Martin Hengel as earning high marks. Bultmann’s critical application of form criticism to the Synoptic Gospels and Hengel’s seminal investigation of Judaism vis-à-vis Hellenism are lauded for breathtaking diversity, deep immersion in the widest possible range of primary sources, and incisive critical acumen.9 Distinguished scholars including feminists and poststructuralists such as Elisabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza and Elizabeth Clark 7 George Aichele, Peter Miscall and Richard Walsh, “An Elephant in the Room: HistoricalCritical and Postmodern Interpretations of the Bible,” JBL 128 (2009): 383–404. 8 Todd Penner and Davina C. Lopez, “Homelessness as a Way Home: A Methodological Reflection and Proposal,” in Holy Land as Homeland? Models for Constructing the Historic Landscapes of Jesus (ed. Keith W. Whitelam; Sheffield, England: Sheffield-Phoenix Press, 2011) 151–76. 9 “A New Introduction,” in Wilhelm Bousset, Kyrios Christos: A History of the Belief in Christ from the Beginnings of Christianity to Irenaeus (trans. J. E. Steeley; repr.; Waco: Baylor University

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praise the liberation historical criticism brought. Together these men and women have, in their own individual ways, built upon the progress made by previous scholars. This point is lost on opponents advocating the demolition of the old foundation to lay a new (non‑) foundation of scholarly discourse.10 As Margaret Mitchell argues (and exemplifies) in her book on Paul’s art of hermeneutical interpretation in 1 Corinthians,11 continuity exists between ancient scholars and post-Renaissance inquiries into Christian origins. Contemporary historicalcritical scholarship is positioned in a grand arch of historical scholarship and, to this grand arch, self-assessment and criticism are integral. The landmark works of Albert Schweitzer on the historical Jesus (1906, 1910) and E. P. Sanders on Paul (1977) are cases in point. Both argue that existing scholarship fails to examine itself adequately. William Baird’s History of New Testament Research12 (or other similar works) often accurately situates historical-critical scholarship in an unflattering light.13 Thankfully, movements objecting to historical criticism(s) did not sweep the guild of Biblical Studies rendering older methods obsolete, as they did in departments of literature across North America in the 1990’s.14 Rather, historical methods have continued in force across a full spectrum of international scholarship. As a result, the study of the New Testament and early Christian literature is Press, 2013), v–xix; L. W. Hurtado, “Martin Hengel’s Impact on English-Speaking Scholarship,” ExpTim 120 (2008): 70–76. 10 See John J. Collins, The Bible After Babel: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005). 11  Paul, the Corinthians and the Birth of Christian Hermeneutics (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 12  History of New Testament Research (3 vols.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992–2013). Note esp. the third volume, a survey “from C. H. Dodd to Hans Dieter Betz.” 13 On the other hand, objections to postmodern approaches to biblical studies often include the following: (a) Postmodern scholars are only interested in biography: talking about themselves; they are not interested in other, ancient, historical people or groups. (b) Historical-critical methods are perfectly suitable tools for answering the kinds of questions historians ask. (c) Likewise, post-methodologies are not helpful for answering the kinds of questions we want to ask. (d) Postmodern approaches to biblical studies lack philological rigor. (e) Postmodern approaches to biblical studies reflect naiveté concerning both philosophy and literary criticism. 14  The group includes very respectable, critically trained scholars such as Michael C. Legaspi, the recipient of a Templeton Prize for Theological Promise. Recently, he published, The Death of Scripture and the Rise of Biblical Studies (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2010). In Great Britain, the Templeton Foundation and Oxford University Press are powerful financial backers of this trend. In North America, Fortress is a major champion of the approach. The following Fortress publications participate in the discussion: Yvonne Sherwood and Stephen Moore,  The Invention of the Biblical Scholar  (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2011); Joseph Marchal, ed., Studying Paul’s Letters: Contemporary Perspectives and Methods (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012); and Christopher Stanley, The Colonized Apostle: Paul in Postcolonial Eyes (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2011). Prior publications, such as Hector Avalos, The End of Biblical Studies  (New York: Prometheus Books, 2007) and Jonathan Sheehan, The Enlightenment Bible: Translation, Scholarship, Culture (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005) have also played important roles in this conversation.

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largely unaffected by the method-exhaustion that literature and other neighboring fields experience today. At a time when scholars of Islam, such as Gabriel Said Reynolds,15 influenced by the venerable tradition in Biblical Studies, are making significant inroads into questions about the Qur’an and life of Muhammad, scholars of early Christianity should hardly move away from, but seek to sharpen the methods, questions, and conclusions they pioneered.

IV. Present Volume This collection of papers represents practitioners of the history of religions and historical-critical approaches to the study of early Christianity at work. The volume has five parts: Paul, Deutero-Pauline letters, Gospels / Acts, Jewish Christianity, and Related Ancient Mediterranean texts.

New Testament Paul As one would expect given Betz’s rich legacy to Pauline studies, four of this volume’s essays are dedicated to Paul and deutero-Pauline letters. The first essay, “Paul’s God of Peace in Canonical and Political Perspectives,” by Mark Reasoner (Marian University) considers Paul’s phrase “God of peace” which occurs four times in the undisputed letters. The phrase is not attested in the lxx, and only rarely occurs in the pseudepigrapha. Reasoner asks why Paul uses the expression “God of peace.” Similar expressions in 1 Cor 14:33 and 2 Cor 13:11 demonstrate that such phrases can be used as slogans for the domestic politics of church life. Paul’s phrase “God of peace” appearing near the end of 1 Thessalonians, Philippians, and Romans, however, combines Paul’s reading and interpretation of scripture with his exposure to political propaganda celebrating Roman peace. In “Romans 1:18–32 among Ancient Accounts of the Origin of Religion,” Robert Matthew Calhoun (Houston, Tex.) sets out to explain the remarkably obscure beginning of Paul’s argument in Romans (i. e., 1:18–32). According to Calhoun, what Paul wants the passage to do is sufficiently plain: he designs it to serve as the foundation for his contention that all humanity stands condemned before the eschatological tribunal, an argument that reaches its climax in 3:9–20. Problems accumulate, however, when one tries to explain how 1:18–32 contributes to this goal. In this essay, Calhoun argues that Paul is constructing an account of the foundation of pagan polytheism. Paul’s narrative of the invention of (bad) reli15 The Emergence of Islam (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012); idem, The Qur

ān and Its Biblical Subtext (London: Routledge, 2010); idem, A Muslim Theologian in the Sectarian Milieu: Abd al-Jabbār and the ‘Critique of Christian Origins’ (Leiden: Brill, 2004); A. J. Droge, The Qur’an: A New Annotated Translation (Sheffield and Bristol: Equinox, 2013).

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gion also explains the origin of the gospel, since it identifies the historical reasons for why God needs to intervene to save humanity in the first place. Meira Z. Kensky (Coe College) also addresses Paul’s letter to the Romans. In her essay, entitled “The Hymnic Conclusion to Romans 11,” Kensky observes that Paul’s faith, as described in his undisputed letters, often strikes students as unwavering and absolute – grounded in certainty and complete trust, not only in God and a divine plan, but in Paul himself and Paul’s own confidence and certainty. This type of faith strikes students as unrealistic – a trust that contravenes the natural human tendency to doubt. Early Christian texts witness to the problem of doubt on a significant scale in the post-apostolic period. Christians suffer “shipwreck in the faith” (1 Tim 1:19) and are swept away by “youthful passions” (2 Tim 2:22). The problem of apostasy looms large in Hebrews, The Shepherd of Hermas, 2 Baruch, 2 Peter, 2 Timothy, and James. According to Kensky, at many points throughout his epistolary corpus, Paul anticipates this future problem of doubt. In this essay, Kensky focuses on a crucial moment in Romans in which Paul builds into his teaching how future Christ followers can effectively treat the repercussions of widespread doubt in their communities. Deutero-Pauline Letters In his essay entitled, “Missiles, Demagogues, and the Devil: The Rhetoric of Slander in Ephesians 6:16,” Jeff Asher (Georgetown College) argues that, whereas the translation of Eph 6:16 is fairly straightforward, its interpretation is not. Although it is common practice to read this verse in light of parallels with the Jewish scripture and certain literature from Qumran on the one hand and parallels with Hellenistic moral philosophy on the other, Asher examines this passage in the context of ancient rhetorical invective and the social values informing that invective. The essay, thus, argues that what is important is not what the missiles represent, but the fact that only a worthless scoundrel (πονηρός) uses missile weapons (βέλη). In addition to the title of the adversary as a πονηρός Asher draws on the conventions of slander in the Greco-Roman world, the shameful, ineffective nature of missile weapons, the association of missile weapons with women and barbarians, and more to demonstrate how the author uses invective to position the Devil in the cosmic hierarchy. Gospels and Acts Laurie Brink (Catholic Theological Union) takes up yet another important aspect of Betz’s work, the interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount. Her essay, “Going the Extra Mile: Reading Matthew 5:41 Literally and Metaphorically” argues that, thanks to Matthew’s use of the verb ἀγγαρεύω, the Roman practice known as ἀγγαρεία is exclusively cited as the backdrop against which Jesus’ imperative to go the extra mile (Matt 5:41) is read. A review of the inscriptional and literary evidence concerning ἀγγαρεία demonstrates, however, that the official practice

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concerned the transportation of goods not the wanton pressing of individuals into forced labor. Freed from a strictly imperial context, Matt 5:41 might more accurately be interpreted as an example of extortion – compelling the services of another. The Matthean Jesus advises that those disciples who are compelled to go a mile must actually go further. Set in the antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount, the extra mile logion offers an example of fulfilling the Law (Matt 5:17) by exceeding it. Read in this light, it bolsters Jesus’ accusation that the scribes and Pharisees neglect the laws they compel others to uphold. David G. Monaco (Pontifical College Josephinum) develops the themes of rhetoric and mission from Betz’s rich corpus of publications. In his essay, “The Rhetoric of Narrative in Acts 8:26–40: Ramifications of the Baptism of the Ethiopian Eunuch for the Author of Luke-Acts,” Monaco argues that Philip’s baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch presents the reader with a powerful text of liberation. The author uses this story to advise the early community – most notably its Hellenistic Jewish element – of how they should respond to persecution: refusing to retreat. Given that the preceding chapter of Acts chronicles Stephen’s death by stoning and persecution against the church in Jerusalem, Monaco suggests that, with the tale of the Ethiopian eunuch, the two episodes together offer proof of the famed final version of the quotation often attributed to Tertullian, that “the blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians.” The Apocalypse In his essay, “The Scroll, the Temple, and the Great City: The Crisis in the Asian Assemblies and the Interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13” Paul B. Duff (The George Washington University) addresses the designation of 10:1–11:13 as an interlude or parenthesis. A variety of puzzles are associated with the interlude. Of these, perhaps the most difficult has to do with its intrusive character. In this exploratory essay, Duff queries the relationship of the interlude the rest of the book. Specifically, he asks about its placement between the sounding of the sixth and seventh trumpets. Consisting of two distinct stories, Duff examines each of the narratives in turn, highlighting various interpretive problems, and looking briefly at the crisis in John’s communities that the seer was attempting to address. Jewish Christianity Nearly fifty years ago, Hans Dieter Betz offered critical remarks on Georg Strecker’s republication of Walter Bauer’s Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum. Fundamentally appreciative of both Bauer’s thesis and Strecker’s correctives, Betz wished to push the discussion forward by highlighting broader, “still unresolved” problems for Christian origins. In the essay entitled, “Orthodoxy, Heresy, and Jewish Christianity: Reflections on Categories in Edwin Broadhead’s Jewish Ways of Following Jesus,” Matt Jackson-McCabe (Cleveland State University) takes a slightly different tack toward the same goal. Rather than

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revisiting a classic study, he focuses on an important new one. Edwin Broadhead’s recent monograph, Jewish Ways of Following Jesus: Redrawing the Religious Map of Antiquity (WUNT 266; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010) seriously engages the series of interrelated issues that Betz once highlighted. Betz’s examination of classic studies in the 1960s and early 1990s identified problems of scholarship; Jackson-McCabe’s study helps us to see where the issues stand today. Jeffrey A. Trumbower’s essay (Saint Michael’s College), “Christians, Sabbateans, and the Dead Sea Sect: A Comparative Case Study in Jewish Sectarian Logic,” compares Christianity and Sabbateanism in their earliest manifestations. Like Jainism and Buddhism, Christianity and Sabbateanism are two species comprising a single genus, namely, Jewish messianic movements that spawn durable new religions. Of all the Jewish messiahs over the centuries, only two, Jesus of Nazareth (ca. 4 b.c.e.– ca. 30 c.e.) and Sabbatai Tsvi (1626–1676), left a legacy of new religious communities that ultimately diverge from their Jewish roots to form a new religion. Analyzing how that process unfolded in each case raises questions not arising from the examination of either one in isolation. Further comparison with the Dead Sea sect – although it neither spawned a new religion nor focused on the arrival of a messiah – illuminates aspects of Jewish sectarian logic across time and space. Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts The final five essays in the volume take up the important history of religions school theme exemplified at length in Betz’s career of treating non-canonical, Christian and other texts, on their own terms, in addition to using them as vehicles of comparison for early Christian literature. In “Παιδεία as Solution to Stasis in First Clement,” I argue that although leading French historian of the mid-twentieth century, H. I. Marrou describes 1 Clem. 21:8 (“Let our children receive the παιδεία in Christ”) as the beginning of a long trajectory of Christian education, the point to be adjudicated in 1 Clement is the restoration of peace from στάσις. Παιδεία, the recommended solution, does not, therefore, refer to “education” per se, but “punishment” in the form of voluntary exile, a life sentence for which there is no second chance. Since παιδεία is a categorical punishment exclusive of viable pedagogical benefits, I argue that 1 Clem. 21:8 should be dissociated from the trajectory with which Marrou associates it. In the co-written piece entitled, “Polycarp and Polemo: Christianity at the Center of the Second Sophistic,” Matthijs den Dulk and Andrew M.Langford (University of Chicago) explore Smyrna, and in particular, Polycarp, the early Christian figure most intimately associated with this city. Bringing the literary and Christian elements of late ancient Smyrnean society into conversation they examine the Martyrdom of Polycarp in light of the Second Sophistic. Comparison with Polycarp’s contemporary Polemo, a fellow Smyrnean demonstrates how Polycarp’s martyrdom engages both the language and narrative patterns of bib-

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lical texts and conventions, values, as well as expectations characteristic of the Second Sophistic as well. Annette Bourland Huizenga (University of Dubuque Theological Seminary) addresses the topic of wet-nurses in antiquity. Her essay, entitled “On Choosing A Wet-Nurse: Physical, Cultural, and Moral Credentials,” examines a pseudonymous document rarely brought into conversation with early Christian literature: the neo-Pythagorean letter labeled, ‘Myia to Phyllis.’ Composed sometime in the second century C. E., this short letter purports to be from Myia, the renowned daughter of Pythagoras and his wife Theano. It is addressed to Phyllis, an otherwise unknown female recipient. The stated epistolary occasion is advice about caring for a newborn, in particular, the hiring of a wet-nurse. The letter communicates, in the friendly tone and plain style of paraenetic texts, recommendations about this ordinary life situation and in so doing reveals moral conventions for treating women in this role. Picking up on Betz’s specific, early interest in Lucian of Samosata, in his essay, “Lucian’s Hermotimus: A Fictive Dialogue with Marcus Aurelius,” Justin Howell (University of Chicago) argues that the Hermotimus – Lucian’s fictive dialogue with Marcus Aurelius about how to present himself as a ruler – suggests Lucian is neither an enemy nor a sycophant, but an individual earnestly attempting, albeit through satire, to offer the emperor constructive criticism about wise and effective leadership. On Howell’s reading, scholars alleging Lucian was antagonistic toward Rome and those suggesting he sought to flatter the emperor must take the Hermotimus, his longest dialogue, into closer account as a subtle yet forceful charge by a Roman citizen with genuine interest in the good of the state. The last essay, “De caelo patrocinium: The Economy of Divine Patronage in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses” by Thomas R. Blanton IV (Lutheran School of Theology) aims to delineate social functions of the “economy of the offering” in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses, a text Blanton understands as distinctly shaped by the Roman patronage system. Reliant mutatis mutandis upon the sociological theories of Pierre Bourdieu, Blanton attempts to demonstrate how they serve as useful heuristic devices for understanding ancient religions.

V. Conclusion In conclusion, the editors of this volume wish to issue our readers an invitation. We invite you to explore permutations of the history of religions school as practiced today by students and admirers of one of its most significant contemporary proponents. Given the flurry of recent attacks on the method’s quaint or naive notions of knowledge and truth, we welcome you to interact with recent samples of a tradition of scholarship that has continuously, for more than a century, maintained its commitment to understanding past human phenomena

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(of which religion is an amazingly revealing prism) and consider whether such demanding work still matters. From our perspective, insofar as the tradition is based on knowledge, it never falls out of scholarly vogue. This is not to say that the limitations of what can be known – ably demonstrated in fields of research from physics to philosophy – should not be admitted, accepted, and embraced. It is, nevertheless, still inherently desirable to let the chorus of voices – those of the texts and their scores of interpreters – speak for themselves to the extent possible, allowing them to serve as facilitators, even broadcasters of the foreign and the familiar, the unique and the universal. Do such messages constitute truth? The aim is not truth, but understanding. Painstaking sensitivity to context – to ancient language, history, art, and other aspects of culture and society and to the ways new religious phenomena simultaneously inherit and transform existing traditions – fosters a fuller comprehension of our subjects and ourselves. Such a priority, we think, unites the collection of essays offered in this volume.

Part One: New Testament

Paul’s God of Peace in Canonical and Political Perspectives Mark Reasoner Paul’s phrase “God of peace” occurs four times in the uncontested letters, usually in blessings at the end of letters.1 The phrase is not attested in the lxx, and only rarely occurs in the pseudepigrapha, most notably in T. Dan 5:2.2 Why would Paul use the expression “God of peace” for the God he worshipped? Very similar expressions in 1 Cor 14:33 and 2 Cor 13:11 show that “God of peace” can be used not directly as a political slogan against the Romans, but rather as a slogan for what one could call the domestic politics of church life. But Paul’s phrase “God of peace” that appears near the end of 1 Thessalonians, Philippians and Romans is a hidden transcript resulting from the intersection of his scripture reading and his exposure to political propaganda celebrating the Roman peace.

I. God Grants Peace Together with Righteousness Paul’s scriptures, including perhaps his favorite scripture – Isaiah – make it clear that the God of Israel brings peace along with righteousness. Thus we read in lxx Isa 9:5b–6 how God will bring both of these virtues: ἐγὼ γὰρ ἄξω εἰρήνην ἐπὶ τοὺς ἄρχοντας, εἰρήνην καὶ ὑγίειαν αὐτῷ. μεγάλη ἡ ἀρχὴ αὐτοῦ, καὶ τῆς εἰρήνης αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν ὅριον ἐπὶ τὸν θρόνον Δαυιδ καὶ τὴν βασιλείαν αὐτοῦ κατορθῶσαι αὐτὴν καὶ ἀντιλαβέσθαι αὐτῆς ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ καὶ ἐν κρίματι ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν καὶ εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα χρόνον·

1 1 Thess 5:23; Phil 4:9; Rom 15:33, 16:20. In 2 Cor 13:11 he uses “God of love and peace” and in 1 Cor 14:33 Paul says that God is not one of disorder but of peace. Cf. 2 Thess 3:16; Col 3:15; Heb 13:20 for similar titles. 2 ἀλήθειαν φθέγγεσθε ἕκαστος πρὸς τὸν πλησίον αὐτοῦ καὶ οὐ μὴ ἐμπέσητε εἰς μῆνιν καὶ ταραχάς, ἀλλ’ ἔσεσθε ἐν εἰρήνῃ ἔχοντες τὸν θεὸν τῆς εἰρήνης καὶ οὐ μὴ κατισχύσει ὑμῶν πόλεμος. “Each one of you should speak truth with his companion and not fall into wrath and discord, but be in peace, staying close to the God of peace, and your cause will not fail.” (This and all unattributed translations that follow in this essay are mine.)

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For I will bring peace on the rulers, peace and health for him. Great will be his rule, and for the throne of David there will be no limit of his peace, and his kingdom will accomplish it and take hold of it in righteousness and in judgment from now and to eternity.

Righteousness and peace also occur together in lxx Isa 32:17: “And peace will be the effects of righteousness, then righteousness will lay hold of rest, and they will live in confidence forever,” καὶ ἔσται τὰ ἔργα τῆς δικαιοσύνης εἰρήνη, καὶ κρατήσει ἡ δικαιοσύνη ἀνάπαυσιν, καὶ πεποιθότες ἕως τοῦ αἰῶνος. If Paul is interested in one or two of his letters in the condition of divine righteousness, on the basis of his scripture he is also interested in the condition of peace.3

II. False Prophets Who Proclaim Peace Bring Divine Judgment on Themselves The prophet Jeremiah announces God’s judgment on those who make false proclamations of peace. Thus we read in lxx Jer 6:14–15: καὶ ἰῶντο τὸ σύντριμμα τοῦ λαοῦ μου ἐξουθενοῦντες καὶ λέγοντες Εἰρήνη εἰρήνη· καὶ ποῦ ἐστιν εἰρήνη; κατῃσχύνθησαν, ὅτι ἐξελίποσαν· καὶ οὐδ᾽ ὧς καταισχυνόμενοι κατῃσχύνθησαν καὶ τὴν ἀτιμίαν αὐτῶν οὐκ ἔγνωσαν. διὰ τοῦτο πεσοῦνται ἐν τῇ πτώσει αὐτῶν καὶ ἐν καιρῷ ἐπισκοπῆς αὐτῶν ἀπολοῦνται, εἶπεν κύριος. And the affliction of my people shall be healed; those who are scornful and are saying ‘Peace, peace, yet where is peace?’ will have been shamed because they failed, nor will these shamed ones feel ashamed and their dishonor they will not understand, because they will collapse in their fall and be destroyed in the time of their visitation, says the Lord.

Similarly, lxx Jer 14:13–16 records God’s plan to judge the false prophets who prophesy that God is bringing truth and peace. καὶ εἶπα ῏Ω κύριε, ἰδοὺ οἱ προφῆται αὐτῶν προφητεύουσιν καὶ λέγουσιν Οὐκ ὄψεσθε μάχαιραν, οὐδὲ λιμὸς ἔσται ἐν ὑμῖν, ὅτι ἀλήθειαν καὶ εἰρήνην δώσω ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς καὶ ἐν τῷ τόπῳ τούτῳ. καὶ εἶπεν κύριος πρός με Ψευδῆ οἱ προφῆται προφητεύουσιν ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου, οὐκ ἀπέστειλα αὐτοὺς καὶ οὐκ ἐνετειλάμην αὐτοῖς καὶ οὐκ ἐλάλησα πρὸς αὐτούς· ὅτι ὁράσεις ψευδεῖς καὶ μαντείας καὶ οἰωνίσματα καὶ προαιρέσεις καρδίας αὐτῶν αὐτοὶ προφητεύουσιν ὑμῖν. διὰ τοῦτο τάδε λέγει κύριος περὶ τῶν προφητῶν τῶν προφητευόντων ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου ψευδῆ, καὶ ἐγὼ οὐκ ἀπέστειλα αὐτούς, οἳ λέγουσιν Μάχαιρα καὶ λιμὸς οὐκ ἔσται ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ταύτης ᾿Εν θανάτῳ νοσερῷ ἀποθανοῦνται, καὶ ἐν λιμῷ ­συντελεσθήσονται οἱ προφῆται· καὶ ὁ λαός, οἷς αὐτοὶ προφητεύουσιν αὐτοῖς, καὶ ἔσονται ἐρριμμένοι ἐν ταῖς διόδοις Ιερουσαλημ ἀπὸ προσώπου μαχαίρας καὶ τοῦ λιμοῦ, καὶ οὐκ ἔσται ὁ θάπτων αὐτούς, καὶ αἱ γυναῖκες αὐτῶν καὶ οἱ υἱοὶ αὐτῶν καὶ αἱ θυγατέρες αὐτῶν· καὶ ἐκχεῶ ἐπ᾽ αὐτοὺς τὰ κακὰ αὐτῶν. And I said, “O Lord, behold their prophets prophesy and say, ‘You will not see the sword, nor will there be famine among you, because I will grant truth and peace on the land and in this place.’” And the Lord said to me, “Falsely the prophets prophesy in my name; I did 3 Other

texts in lxx Isaiah that link peace and righteousness are Isa 45:7–8, 60:17.

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not send them, nor did I command them, nor have I spoken to them. Because they see lies and oracles and omens, and the plans of their heart they prophesy to you. Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who are prophesying falsely in my name, though I did not send them, who say, ‘There will be no sword or famine on this land’ – by a sickly death they will die and the prophets will come to their end by famine, and the people to whom they are prophesying – they also will be torn apart in the streets of Jerusalem by the edge of the sword and by famine, and there will be no one to bury them and their wives and their sons and their daughters, when I pour out their evils on them.”

False hope in peace is considered blasphemous by the servants of the God of Israel, who alone can bring peace. More texts from Paul’s scriptures will be cited when we move to examine the specific texts where he uses “God of peace,” but we have just surveyed enough to show that there is a critical mass of peace theologizing occurring in Paul’s scriptures. We move now to the imperial theology of peace.

III. The Theology of Imperial Peace in the Early Principate In his ANRW article, “The Cult of Virtues and Roman Imperial Ideology,” J. Rufus Fears rightly finds the Roman cult of virtues rooted in Greek theology. Virtues such as Eirene, Pistis, Eunomia, Philanthropia, Philostorgia, and Dikaiosyne played a fundamental role in the ideological structure of Hellenistic monarchies.  … It was into this ideological heritage that the Roman republic entered, and the cult of Virtues represented a primary conduit by which Roman leadership sought to channel and to utilize this religio-political vocabulary.4

The Romans had deified Concordia and Salus by the end of fourth century b.c.e. and by 200 b.c.e. (Hannibalic War) Victoria, Fortuna, Libertas, Honos, Fides, and Spes all had homes within the Roman cult of virtues.5 Εἰρήνη was recognized as divine already in Hesiod. Within the Roman cult of virtues, the pax Augusta comes into its own in the early years of the Principate. Inheriting his uncle’s mission to bring peace to the world, Augustus clearly communicated this mission to his propagandists. The poets Ovid, Tibullus and Virgil were all on board with this perspective on Augustus’ reign.6 The first verb in Anchises’ commission of Roman “arts” to Aeneas is “to pacify.”7 The Augus4 J. Rufus Fears, “The Cult of Virtues,” ANRW 2.17.2:850. The virtues mentioned in this quota-

tion are: peace, faith, well-ordered law, benevolence, affection, and justice. 5  Ibid., 830. The virtues mentioned are: social concord, health, victory, fortune, liberty, honor, faith, and hope. 6 Ovid, Fast. 1.711–12; Tibullus, Eleg. 1.10.69–70; Virgil, Ecl. 4, Aen. 6.851–3. I am indebted to Klaus Haacker, The Theology of Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 117 for these references. 7 Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento / (hae tibi erunt artes), pacique imponere morem, / parcere subiectis et debellare superbos (Virgil, Aen. 6.851–53); “Roman, remember by

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tan peace was an official theologoumenon of the Roman senate at least by 13 b.c.e when Augustus returned from founding the Pax Augusta colony in Gaul, and this virtue was deified within the Roman cult of virtues shortly thereafter. The altar of the Augustan peace was constituted on July 4 in the year 13 b.c.e. and dedicated less than four years later at the end of the month of Janus (January 30, also Livia’s birthday) in the year 9.8 Fears notes that “Pax Augusta thus proclaimed the profound association existing between Augustus and that divine power which produced pax: the godhead Pax performing her function within the sphere of Augustus’ activity.”9 I do not claim that Pax was the most celebrated and worshipped of the virtues. The most popular were Victoria and Fortuna, and next comes Concordia and Salus, according to Fears’s reading of the evidence.10 Still, there is plenty of evidence from inscriptions, numismatics and literary texts that the deified virtue Pax was universally announced as integral to the Roman εὐαγγελία. When we focus on the Roman cult of virtues during Paul’s lifetime, we learn that Pax was given renewed emphasis under Nero. Unconcerned with the New Testament, Stefan Weinstock has noted how Nero renewed Augustus’ peace language. He notes how the arch decreed by the Senate in 58 and erected in 62 shows Nero accompanied by Victoria and Pax, an image probably celebrated in the coinage of the time.11 This has been picked up by Klaus Haacker, who though not focusing on Paul’s phrase “God of peace,” finds both the concern for pacifying the gods’ anger in Roman religion and the Roman peace propaganda of Nero to be points of departure for Paul’s language about God in Romans.12 Haacker’s latter point alone concerns us here. He hints that Nero’s return to the Augustan peace language was perhaps due to Nero’s disinterest in military campaigns.13 Since Nero did not plan great conquests, he chose to sell his reign as one of true and final peace. The poet Calpurnius cooperated well with this platform.14 Besides Haacker, Crossan’s and Reed’s In Search of Paul also describes the Roman peace propaganda and argues for how Paul sought “peace through justice” as an your strength to rule/Earth’s peoples – for your arts are to be these: / to pacify, to impose the rule of law, / to spare the conquered, battle down the proud” (trans. per Robert Fitzgerald, The Aeneid [New York: Vintage, 1990], 6.1152–54).  8  Stefan Weinstock, “Pax and the ‘Ara Pacis,’” JRS 50 (1960): 48.  9  Fears, “Cult,” 887. 10 Ibid., 935. 11  Weinstock, “Pax,” 51, citing Tacitus, Ann. 13.41.5; 15.18.1 on the arch; Harold Mattingly, Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum Vol. I: Augustus to Vitellius (London: British Museum, 1923), 234–5, 265; J. Liegle, “Architekturbilder auf antiken Münzen,” Die Antike 12 (1936): 218–9, figure 19. 12 Haacker, Theology, 116–19. 13 Ibid., 117. But we must remember that war-making Caesars, such as Julius and his nephew Augustus, could use peace language as well. 14 Calpurnius, Ecl. 1.46–67.

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answer to the Roman “peace through victory.”15 While they do not single out the title “God of peace” nor consider the rival model of Bruce Winter’s Seek the Welfare of the City, Crossan and Reed’s book is useful in highlighting the religiopolitical realities of the Principate and their inevitable challenge to and influence on Pauline theology. There is a discrepancy between the scriptures’ descriptions of peace in the land and the Roman claim to have achieved eternal peace. Isa 66:12 reads: Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold, I shall turn peace towards them as a river and the glory of the nations as overflowing torrents. Their children shall be carried on the shoulders and comforted on the knees. As a mother comforts someone, so I shall comfort you and in Jerusalem you will be comforted. And you will see and your heart will be sealed and your bones will rise like a weed and the hand of the κύριος will be known to those who worship him and he will threaten the disobedient.

Paul, attempting to find his gospel in his scriptures and then communicate this gospel to the nations, had to contend with the Roman gospel of peace among the nations. If Tacitus can quote the British chieftain Calgacus as saying, “To plunder, butcher, steal, these things they misname empire: they make a desolation and they call it peace,” auferre trucidare rapere falsis nominibus imperium, atque ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant, it is probable that Paul, with his scriptures’ peace language informing him, would similarly acknowledge the massive discrepancy between his scriptures’ descriptions of peace in the land and the Roman claim to have achieved eternal peace.16 We turn now to an examination of the four Pauline texts that use the phrase, “God of peace.”

IV. 1 Thessalonians 5:23 As capital of the Roman province of Macedonia, Thessalonica was heavily invested in the imperial cult. Following the lead of Hendrix, Donfried notes how the worship of a Caesar as divine begins in Thessalonica during the lifetime of Julius Caesar, and how the city seemed to prioritize the imperial cult always by listing “the priest and agonothete of the Imperator” first in lists of priesthoods in the city.17 In the material evidence available for our understanding of first century Thessalonica, the most important god in the city is clearly Lord Caesar.

15  John Dominic Crossan and Jonathan L. Reed, In Search of Paul (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco: 2004), 74. 16 Tacitus, Agr. 30; translation per Richard Cassidy, Christians and Roman Rule in the New Testament (New York: Crossroad, 2001), 16. 17 Karl Paul Donfried, “The Cults of Thessalonica” in idem, Paul, Thessalonica, and Early Christianity (London: T & T Clark, 2004), 37–8, following Holland L. Hendrix, Thessalonicans Honor Romans (Th.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1984), 312.

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The “God of peace” in the 1 Thess 5:23 blessing follows closely on Paul’s echo of Jer 6:14 against the Roman slogan of peace and security (1 Thess 5:3). Though the interpretation of 1 Thess 5:3 as a reaction to a political slogan is not unanimous, the use of other loaded political words throughout 1 Thessalonians makes this probable.18 This phrase itself follows what Donfried has labeled “three heavily loaded political terms” from the immediately preceding context in 1 Thess 4:15–17 – ἀπάντησις, κύριος and παρουσία.19 Two of these terms are repeated in the “God of peace” benediction in 5:23. Paul’s remark in 5:3 about εἰρήνη καὶ ἀσφάλεια sets the reader up for the politically charged benediction that will follow in 5:23. I will not offer Nero’s coin with the SECURITAS AUGUSTI inscription as directly behind the “peace and security” phrase, for it was minted after the Pisonian conspiracy, well after 1 Thessalonians was written.20 Wengst offers an inscription from Syria as evidence of the pax et securitas theme.21 Crossan and Reed offer photographs of an altar at Praeneste whose two sides celebrate the Securitas and Pax of Augustus.22 While Rigaux and Malherbe do not mention this parallel for 1 Thess 5:23, it seems to me that the Paphlagonian oath, especially its lines quoted next, is evidence that the benediction in 5:23 is a not-so-hidden transcript that deconstructs a Roman oath of loyalty to Caesar.23 18  Other explanations include eschatological complacency (Franz Lamb, Eschatologische Verkündigung und Lebensgestaltung nach Paulus [Regensburg: Pustet, 1973], 133; Stephen Smalley, “The Delay of the Parousia,” JBL 83 (1964): 49–52; Robert Jewett, The Thessalonian Correspondence (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986), 171) and gnostic complacency (Walter Schmithals, Paul and the Gnostics [trans. J. E. Steely; Nashville: Abingdon, 1962], 128–318; and Wolfgang Harnisch, Eschatologische Existenz: Ein exegetischer Beitrag zum Sachanliegen von 1. Thessalonischer 4,15–5,11 [FRLANT 110; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1973], 52–158. Citations of this secondary literature as examples of these views are from Hendrix, “Archaeology and Eschatology,” 110. Other “hidden transcripts” that Donfried finds in 1 Thessalonians include waiting for the divi filius Jesus in 1:10 and the statement in 2:12 that God is calling the Thessalonian church members “into his own kingdom” (“The Assembly of the Thessalonians,” in Paul, Thessalonica, and Early Christianity, 144). 19  Donfried, “Cults,” 34. 20  Dupondius of Nero, BMC I, 241; see discussion by Fears, “Cult,” 895 and photograph, plate VI no. 32. 21  Klaus Wengst, Pax Romana and the Peace of Jesus Christ (trans. John Bowden; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987), 19: “The Lord Marcus Flavius Bonus, the most illustrious Comes and Dux of the first legion, has ruled over us in peace and given constant peace and security to travellers and to the people” (OGIS 613). See also Velleius Paterculus II.103–4: the hope Tiberius brought was “perpetuae securitatis aeternitatisque Romani imperii”; “the security and eternity of perpetual Roman rule.” 22  Crossan and Reed, In Search of Paul, 166. 23 Cf. B. Rigaux, Saint Paul: Les Épitres aux Thessaloniciens (Paris: Gabalda, 1956), 594–600; Abraham J. Malherbe, The Letters to the Thessalonians (AB 32b; New York: Doubleday, 2000), 337–9. The Paphlagonian oath was first used for New Testament research by E. A. Judge, who cites it in “The Decrees of Caesar at Thessalonica,” RTR 30 (1971), 6 as evidence for the historicity of the account in Acts 17, in which it is municipal rather than imperial authorities who prosecute Paul. Donfried, “Cults,” 33 then cites the oath when repeating Judge’s argument.

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… ὑπέρ τε τῶν τ[ούτοις] || διαφερόντων μήτε σώματος φείσεσθ[αι μή]τε ψυχῆς μήτε βίου μήτε τέκνον, ἀλ[λὰ παν] | τὶ τρόπωι ὑπὲρ τῶ[ν] ἐκείνοις ἀνηκό[ντων] | πάντα κίνδυνον ὑπομενεῖν … … and for their interests I will spare neither body nor soul nor life nor children, but will endure every peril for their cause …

Paul prays that the God of peace sanctify the Thessalonians completely and preserve their τὸ πνεῦμα καὶ ἡ ψυχὴ καὶ τὸ σῶμα ἀμέμπτως ἐν τῇ παρουσία τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ΄Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ (“spirit and soul and body blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ”). Exact verbal parallels are only the words ψυχή and σῶμα. But the three objects of preservation in this benediction match what those provincials taking the Paphlagonian oath, attested in 3 b.c.e., promised not to spare in others who were disloyal to Caesar.24 Though geographically separate from Macedonia, the end of the inscription in which this oath is found says that it was used in all the Augustan shrines of that area. We may conclude that people in the Roman capital of Macedonia would know of an oath of loyalty to the Caesar and his family. I am therefore specifying that the oath of loyalty to Caesar functioned as one of the dividing lines in the “intergroup conflict” that Todd Still has already located behind the apocalyptic language of 1 Thessalonians.25 In 1 Thessalonians, Jesus, the son of God who rivals Caesar the son of God, is depicted as the one who saves those who risk body, soul and life by not swearing allegiance to Caesar from the divine wrath coming on those who serve in the Lord Caesar’s reign of “peace and security” (1:9–10; 5:3–9).

V. Philippians 4:9 The use of “God of peace” in Philippians 4:9 does not appear as closely related to the imperial cult as its use in 1 Thessalonians 5. Still, the whole letter of Philippians is framed by the success of Paul’s εὐαγγέλιον despite his imprisonment within an imperial system that only legitimates the emperor’s εὐαγγελία.26 The language of the Christ hymn in Philippians 2 includes direct contradictions to 24 OGIS 532; ILS 8781; Ehrenberg and Jones no. 315; translation by A. H. M. Jones, A History of Rome through the Fifth Century, Vol. 2: The Empire (New York: Walker and Co., 1970), no. 9. This oath of allegiance to Caesar, with which many provincials would be familiar, must also be taken as evidence for the reading of ἐν παντὶ τρόπῳ in the benediction at 2 Thess 3:16 instead of the well attested variant of ἐν παντὶ τόπῳ. The Paphlagonian oath was first used for New Testament research by E. A. Judge, who cites it in “The Decrees of Caesar at Thessalonica,” RTR 30 (1971): 6 as evidence for the historicity of the account in Acts 17, in which it is municipal rather than imperial authorities who prosecute Paul. Donfried, “Cults,” 33 then cites the oath when repeating Judge’s argument. 25 Todd D. Still, Conflict at Thessalonica: A Pauline Church and Its Neighbors (JSNTSup 183; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 200. 26 Crossan and Reed, In Search of Paul, 166–67.

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the politically correct theology of the empire and Paul’s reference to “God of peace” in 4:9 follows his counter-imperial statement in Phil 3:20–21 that “our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation to be conformed to his body of glory by the power he has to subject everything to himself.” In that statement at the end of Philippians 3, Paul wants to assert that κύριος Jesus is the only savior, the savior who comes from heaven, in accord with the God of Israel’s words in lxx Isa 45:21b: ἐγὼ ὁ θεός καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν ἄλλος πλὴν ἐμοῦ δίκαιος καὶ σωτὴρ οὐκ ἔστιν πάρεξ ἐμοῦ. When Paul’s words in Philippians are aligned with these words from a section of Isaiah that Paul knows well, we can see that calling Jesus the “savior” who is able to subject everything to himself is a direct contradiction to the ubiquitous acclamations of the emperor as “savior” or “savior of the world.” This is the only reference to Paul’s scriptures that I have identified to date as worthwhile for an investigation of this section of Philippians. What Paul does with the references to “peace” in chapter 4 seems to be his own reworking of an attested criticism of the Roman peace found in the Greco-Roman world, with less connection to Paul’s scriptures than what we shall see in Romans. Paul’s words in Phil 4:5b–9 begin with the proclamation that the κύριος is near. There follows a meditation on how God – is this god the same as the κύριος and as “the God of peace”? – will do what Pax Augusta cannot do, bring peace to heart and mind. We should not let the paraklēsis label that some have affixed to this passage obscure how Paul uses a topos also found in the Stoic critique of the Roman peace here.27 In a parallel noted by C. Spicq, Epictetus specifically compares the peace that Caesar brings with peace of mind. Look! The emperor appears to bestow great peace to us, because there are no longer wars nor conflicts nor great robber gangs, nor pirates; instead at all times we can journey by land or sail from east to west. He cannot bestow peace for us from fever, from shipwreck, from fire or from earthquake or from the thunderbolt, can he? How about from love? He is unable. From grief? From jealousy? He is unable, categorically, from any of these. But the philosophers’ teaching takes upon itself to bestow peace from these things. Now what does it speak? “When you pay attention to me, people, wherever you happen to be, whatever you happen to be doing, you will not be grieved, you will not become angry, you will not be stressed, you will not be hindered, but you will go through life unaffected and free from all these. If someone experiences this peace, announced not by the emperor – it is impossible for him to announce this – but announced by God through reason, it will be sufficient, when he is by himself, considering and meditating: “Now no evil can occur to me, there is no one who is a thief toward me, there is no earthquake for me; all is filled with peace; all is stillness, every path, every city, every co-traveler, bystander, partner, will bring no harm.”28

Troels Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and the Stoics (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 2000), 108–9, who offers no parallels for the “God of peace.” 28 Ceslas Spicq, Theological Lexicon of the New Testament (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1994), s. v. εἰρηνεύω (432–33, n. 40); Epictetus, Diss. 3.13.9–13. 27 Cf.

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Paul gives this topos a christological focus (ὁ κύριος ἐγγύς), and offers a rival god to the Pax Augusta, his own θεὸς τῆς εἰρήνης (4:5b, 9c). Corroborating evidence for the political lens we are using here in Phil 4:5–9 comes from Peter Oakes’s observation that the call in Phil 4:9a for the Philippians’ imitation of reports about Paul’s life mirrors 1:30 where similar language is directly tied to the same ἀγών that Paul and his readers share.29 If the Philippians share in Paul’s ἀγών with the empire, then God’s peace guarding their hearts and minds (4:7) and the blessing of the God of peace’s presence (4:9) make sense as direct correctives to the Roman doctrine of peace.

VI. Two Objections Before we come to the texts from Romans, it would be useful to consider two objections here. First, what about the cases, so ably identified by Bruce Winter, where it appears that the New Testament expects its readers to be generous, upstanding citizens who contribute to the imperial program? And wouldn’t Paul need to seek the peace of Rome on the analogy of lxx Jer 36:1–7, which tells the Babylonian diaspora to build houses and seek Babylon’s peace, since its peace is their peace? There are cases where Winter may stretch his evidence, as for example the doing of “good” and receiving “praise” in Rom 13:3 as necessarily implying benefaction.30 There are other contexts where Winter admits that Paul’s advice is countercultural.31 It is most probable that the apocalyptic missionary, Paul, did not think he had time and resources to construct a network of cells whose first purpose was to overthrow the Empire. The παρουσία of the true κύριος would accomplish that. Paul expects that the outward behavior of his churches will be decent and in conformity with general standards of morality (Rom 12:17b; 14:16). But in his use of language, Paul shows his loyalty to the God of his scriptures, who alone brings peace. And even Paul’s scriptures, whose line about “seeking the welfare of the city” Winter has so emphasized, cannot be harmonized with the idolatrous discourse about the Pax Augusta. Second, if “God of peace” is some sort of hidden transcript, why has no one noticed this before? Why has it taken us this long to miss this association? Why does Delling in his comprehensive treatment of the “God of peace” title categorize it as a liturgical formula?32 Many have contrasted the Roman peace with 29 Peter Oakes, Philippians: From People to Letter (SNTSMS 110; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 106. 30 Bruce W. Winter, Seek the Welfare of the City: Christians As Benefactors and Citizens (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 25–40. 31 Ibid., 105–21, 165–77. 32 G. Delling, “Die Bezeichnung ‘Gott des Friedens’ und ähnliche Wendungen in den Paulusbriefen,” in Jesus und Paulus: Festschrift für Werner Georg Kümmel zum 70. Geburtstag (ed. E. E. Ellis and E. Grässer; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1975), 76–84.

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Paul’s gospel of peace.33 But we are only beginning to discover all the places that religion was embedded in the political institutions and language of the early Empire. We are slow to find the religious significance of the political language of the Principate because of the apologetic for Rome that Luke-Acts, 1 Clement, some church fathers, and Constantine communicated to the church.34 This paper is attempting to pluck the low hanging fruit that so far has been missed in others’ able comparisons of the Roman gospels of peace with Paul’s gospel of peace.

VII. Romans 10:15 As we move to Romans, it is worth noting that my thesis might clarify why Paul omits εὐαγγελιζομένου ἀκοὴν εἰρήνης in his quotation of Isa 52:7 in Romans 10:15.35 Wagner is certainly right that Paul’s omission allows him to change the quotation from a lone messenger announcing the ἀκοὴν εἰρήνης to a plural number who announce the ἀκοὴ διὰ ῥήματος Χριστοῦ.36 But part of the picture is also political: Paul would not want his εὐαγγέλιον to be confused with the εὐαγγελία εἰρήνης proclaimed by Roman messengers celebrating imperial victories.

VIII. Romans 15:33 Paul’s benediction in Romans 15:33 may simply be an innocuous (i. e., not politically charged) use of the phrase, as found for example in 2 Corinthians 13:11. However, we must note several phenomena in the preceding context that leave this blessing as a possible candidate for a hidden, political transcript. In 14:17, Paul has said that the kingdom of God is not food and drink, possibly a caricature of some Romans’ lifestyles, but iustitia (note that this term was not applied to government in 13:1–7 which is criticized with the faint praise of being merely εἰς τὸ ἀγαθόν), pax and hilaritas in the Holy Spirit. Then, after concluding the catena of scripture quotations with the ἔθνη hoping in the Davidic king, Paul offers a blessing using “God of hope.”37 Since Paul has already made the offhand critique of the Roman cult of hope that hope that is seen is not hope (Rom 8:24b) and since language and iconography from this cult of Pax Romana; Crossan and Reed, In Search of Paul.  For the positive view of Luke-Acts and 1 Clement toward the Roman empire, see Wengst, Pax Romana, 89–118. On Constantine’s use of the Roman theology of Victory, see J. Rufus Fears, “The Theology of Victory at Rome: Approaches and Problems,” in ANRW 2.17.2:822–4. 35 An equivalent of this phrase is found in the second hand of ‫א‬, D, F, G, Ψ, Byzantine, Latin and Syriac witnesses. 36 J. Ross Wagner, Heralds of the Good News: Isaiah and Paul “in Concert” in the Letter to the Romans (NovTSup 101; Leiden: Brill, 2002), 173. 37 Rom 15:12 quoting lxx Isa 11:10; Rom 15:13. 33 Wengst, 34

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hope abounded in the early empire, it is very possible that “the God of hope” is Paul’s answer to the hope propaganda of Rome.38 In the one letter in which we have two occurrences of “God of peace,” we also encounter “God of hope” in a blessing, perhaps evidence of Paul’s knowledge of the Roman scene where a temple to the deity Spes had been restored at Tiberius’ initiative and dedicated by Tiberius’ popular adopted son Germanicus.39 Since this cult of Spes was primarily concerned with the succession of the imperial line, Paul’s epithets God of hope and God of peace, used for a total of three times in the final two chapters of Romans, seem to be a pointed jab at the imperial line.40 Besides Neil Elliott’s chapters on Iustitia, Clementia and Pietas, more work needs to be done by students of Paul’s letter to the Romans on the Roman cult of virtues, including continued reflection on Spes and Fides.41 When we read the travel plans that follow in Romans 15, the full circle of the εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ Χριστοῦ followed by plans to reach Spain are most definitely threats to the secure circle of the Augustan peace. The circle of the ἔθνη from which the redeemed come in lxx Isa 60:4–5 provides Paul with a vision that people from a full circle of the ἔθνη will respond to his gospel. And such a coin inscription as that which occurred in Nero’s reign, probably from after Romans was written, illustrates the full circle implicit in the claims of the imperial peace program. The coin depicts the closed doors of the temple of Ianus and is completely ringed with letters in the long inscription: IANVM CLVSIT PACE P. R. TERRA MARIQVE PARTA (“After having procured peace for the Roman people by land and by sea he closed the door”).42 Paul’s extensive traveling through the lands where his gospel has successfully been established then does invest his “God of peace” in 15:33 with political resonance.

IX. Romans 16:20 After the greetings, where Paul shows that he knows many in the churches of Rome and of strife among them, Paul mentions the obedience of his readers in 38 See the evidence cited in M. E. Clark, “Images and Concepts of Hope in the Imperial Cult,” in SBL Seminar Papers 1982 (ed. H. R. Kent; Chico, Ca.: Scholars Press, 1982), 39–43, and James R. Harrison, Paul’s Language of Grace in Its Graeco-Roman Context (WUNT 2.172; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 230, n. 71, who remarks at the widespread “peace” and “hope” terminology in Romans. The deity hope played a special role in ensuring progeny for the emperor. Claudius minted a coin in the year 41 inscribed with SPES. 39 Tacitus, Ann. 2.49. 40 For the cult of Spes as focused on imperial succession, see Nicholas Purcell, “Spes,” OCD 1434; Fears, “Cult,” 861–3 41 Cf. Neil Elliott, The Arrogance of Nations: Reading Romans in the Shadow of Empire (Paul in Critical Contexts; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008), 59–141. 42 BMC I, 209. Trans. per Seth W. Stevenson, A Dictionary of Roman Coins (London: B. A. Seaby Ltd., 1964), 594.

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16:19. This is perhaps an allusion to the obedience of the ἔθνη that Paul has audaciously wrested as his apostolic goal from the universally accepted vocation of the Roman emperor. In the following verse we have the promise, “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.” Readers for generations have correctly noted how this promise seems to participate in the exegetical trajectory that begins with God’s curse on the serpent in Gen 3:15 through Ps 91:13 and on to Rev 20:2, 10.43 But when we also note that the image of a winged Pax holding a staff over a horizontal snake was common in imperial propaganda, a new dissonance enters into this benedictory promise. J. Rufus Fears discusses the imagery and is certain that the staff over the snake is a sign of Salus, or health.44 The juxtaposition of peace and health is well attested even in Jewish scriptures and early Christian literature, as Ridgeway has shown.45 Stefan Weinstock states that Claudius issued aurei and denarii with this image almost annually. He suggested that the image may have been a numismatic copy of the Κλαυδιακὴ Εἰρήνη Σεβαστή, the statue built in Alexandria to honor Claudius as the incarnation of pax that he asked to be moved to Rome.46 I do not suggest that Paul had just walked by the newly reconstructed Asklēpion in Corinth with Claudian coins like this one in his purse, when he dictated his “God of peace” benediction with its “Satan” as a play on words of the Latin, Salus.47 But the imagery of Pax and Salus was public material. And it is significant that Paul’s only use throughout all letters attributed to him of the word “crush” in this blessing is a verb the prophets use for the destruction of Babylon (LXX Isa 14:4–5; LXX Jer 35:2). Perhaps Paul is choosing to identify the force behind the Salus pictured by imperial and popular theology with imagery from the Asklepios religion as an enemy, a “satan,” and perhaps Paul’s verb does carry echoes of the divine promise of judgment on Babylon. Still, the transcript is hidden. Phoebe, who carried the letter, and Erastus, whose greetings were sent with the letter, perhaps compromised with the imperial program by virtue of the wealth that they enjoyed, might not catch the hook in this closing greeting. But for those beaten down by the Pax Augusta and for those who knew who crushed whom in Isaiah and Jeremiah, the promise bubbles with political vigor. Just as Pss. Sol. 2:29 uses Pompey’s epithet Magnus (“the great”) in its depiction of God – “I will be lord of land and sea, and he recognized 43  The dragon in Revelation 20 has of course been interpreted politically. Note how the activity of the dragon as leading the world astray (Rev 12:9) is already applied to Rome in Revelation 18:23 (David Aune, Revelation 6–16 [3 vols.; WBC 52a–c; Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1997–98], 2:698). 44  Fears, “Cult,” 894. The aureus pictured in Fears’s article is no. 28 of plate VI, BMC I, 165. 45 John K. Ridgway, “Let Your Peace Come upon It”: Healing and Peace in Matthew 10:1–15 (Bern: Peter Lang, 1999), 170–209. 46 Weinstock, “Pax,” 50. 47 Jerome Murphy O’Connor says that the Asklepion in Corinth was restored around 44 c.e. (St. Paul’s Corinth: Texts and Archaeology [GNS 6; Wilmington, Del.: Michael Glazier, 1983], 162).

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not that it is God who is great” – so Paul is correcting the Roman propaganda by applying one of its terms to the God of Israel instead.48

X. The Canonical Legacy of Paul’s God of Peace The “God of peace” terminology extends outside the Pauline corpus in the New Testament. Besides 2 Thess 3:16, we also see God of peace used in a benediction in Heb 13:20. This letter’s probable origin in Rome and the way it uses Virgil’s Aeneid in its Christology make it probable that its author is subverting Roman peace propaganda in this benediction.49

XI. Conclusion The prophets in Paul’s scriptures offer oracles that are profoundly political, since they start from the presupposition that the God of Israel promised land to the people and an enduring house to David. These promises were not completely fulfilled in the centuries when the prophets were prophesying and when their writings were being fixed in the Hebrew and Greek canons of the Jewish scriptures. Since these prophets include the contrast between falsely proclaimed and true peace, they open a window for those who read them to assess the peace claims of governing authorities in their own, later times as well. While it may be easy to read the “God of peace” language at the end of some Pauline letters as routine formulae used in farewells, both Paul’s canon of scripture and the public discourse of the first century Mediterranean world provide ample grounds for investigating the ideological edge in this language. Such investigation yields the probable result that Paul’s peace language is a direct challenge, informed by his scriptures, to the peace discourse of the Roman Empire. According to Paul, the God of Israel, not the pax Romana, is the God of peace.50  For the identification of Pompey as the unnamed “sinner” (2:1) who is the subject of Pss. Sol. 2, see R. B. Wright, “Psalms of Solomon: A New Translation and Introduction,” in OTP 2:640–41, 651–53. 49  Consider Heb 13:14, 24 and the letter’s canonically unprecedented christology: a pious and obedient son makes purification for his people while founding a city for them. Preparation is already made for the benediction by the identification of Melchizedek’s title: βασιλεὺς Σαλήμ, ὅ ἐστιν Βασιλεὺς εἰρήνης (Heb 7:2). See Mark Reasoner, “Divine Sons: Aeneas and Jesus in Hebrews,” in Reading Religions in the Ancient World: Essays Presented to Robert McQueen Grant on His 90th Birthday (ed. David E. Aune and Robin Darling Young; NovTSup 125; Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2007), 149–175. 50 An earlier version of this paper was first presented on November 22, 2004 in the Pauline Epistles Section of the Society of Biblical Literature’s annual meeting in San Antonio, Texas. It is a privilege to be able to offer this paper in appreciation and honor of my Doktorvater, Hans Dieter Betz. 48

Romans 1:18–32 among Ancient Accounts of the Origin of Religion Robert Matthew Calhoun I. Introduction Paul’s argument in Romans has in 1:18–32 a remarkably obscure beginning. What he wants the passage to do is sufficiently plain: he designs it to serve as the foundation for his contention that all humanity stands condemned before the eschatological tribunal, an argument that reaches its climax in 3:9–20. The problems begin to accumulate when one tries to explain how 1:18–32 contributes to the achievement of this goal. Readers commonly perceive Paul to be projecting a scenario that has repeated itself throughout history, a “vicious cycle.”1 This interpretation prompts 1 The present article goes back almost sixteen years to a two-quarter seminar taught by Prof. Betz on Romans. He encouraged me to explore Paul’s explanations of the origins of human culpability in 1:18–32 and 5:12–21. I have had occasion to present portions of it in several venues: the Greco-Roman Religions section at the SBL (November 2003); the Early Christian Studies Workshop at the University of Chicago (December 2003); and the Graduate Research Colloquium at Pepperdine University (March 2004). I am pleased at long last to present the research in Prof. Betz’s honor. All translations are mine unless otherwise noted. The commentaries overwhelmingly support the interpretation of the passage as a recurring cycle, e. g., C. K. Barrett (A Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans [HNTC; New York: Harper & Row, 1957], 37): “In contemporary pagan society this revolt [i. e., humanity’s refusal to give glory or thanks] is manifested in idolatry. A vicious cycle operates: denying the knowledge of God they have, men plunge further and further into unbelief. The result is that they are ignorant of God, and of themselves they cannot know him; yet their ignorance is culpable ignorance, for it is rooted in rebellion. Their idolatrous minds and practices are themselves a punishment from God.” See also C. H. Dodd, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans (MNTC; New York: Harper, 1932), 24; William Sanday and Arthur C. Headlam, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (3rd ed; ICC; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1898), 49–51; Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 123; C. E. B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (2 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1975–79), 1:104–35. Käsemann’s comments pull in two different directions. Regarding v. 18, he writes: “The text says that God’s wrath falls as a curse from heaven on despisers of the first commandment. This applies not merely with reference to ‘primal revelation’ … but continually, if people have to do with the true God, even though this becomes apocalyptically clear with the gospel. The Gentile, too, as Paul sees it, has already had continued dealings with the true God. For his reality is incessantly experienced creatureliness and to that extent it is reality before God” (Commentary on Romans [ed. and trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980],

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some very difficult questions, however. How can the apostle be asserting that all (Gentile) persons, or generations, or cultures,2 experience a moment when they accurately perceive the truth about God as the author of creation,3 then suppress that knowledge and worship idols instead, then suffer the exact penalties which he outlines in vv. 24–32, particularly the misdirection of sexual passions toward those of one’s own gender? His description of pagan polytheistic cultures as utterly saturated in moral depravity is transparently false and unfair.4 Is this truly how he launches the full sweep of his argument in Romans – with distortions that must have been as obvious to his addressees as they are to contemporary readers? The problems have led some scholars to suggest that the passage is part of an interpolation,5 or that Paul borrows it from a “Hellenistic Jewish homily,”6 or even 42–43). A little later (at 47) he places greater emphasis on the “primal”: “For the apostle, history is governed by the primal sin of rebellion against the Creator, which finds repeated and universal expression. It is thus governed by the wrath of God, which throws the creature back on itself, corresponding to its own will, and abandons it to the world.” 2  On the question of whom Paul is talking about, cf. the opposing views of H. P. Owen (“The Scope of Natural Revelation in Romans i and Acts xvii,” NTS 5 [1959]: 133–43, 141), “… we must suppose Paul to mean that every idolator at some time, or times, has a measure of insight into God’s θειότης, and that every idolator, instead of letting the insight grow, suppresses it”; and Richard B. Hays (“Relations Natural and Unnatural: A Response to John Boswell’s Exegesis of Romans 1,” JRE 14 [1986]: 184–215, 200), “… [Paul] is offering an apocalyptic ‘long view’ which indicts fallen humanity as a whole. Certainly Paul does not think that each and every pagan Gentile has made a personal decision at some point … to renounce the God of Israel and to worship idols instead!” 3  This premise has been a major area of contention among scholars, insofar as one can construe Paul to be endorsing a concept of ‘natural theology’ or ‘natural revelation.’ James Barr extensively documents and rigorously evaluates the positions of this debate in his Biblical Faith and Natural Theology (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994). 4 See esp. the cogent remarks of Barr (Biblical Faith, 73–74): “But in spite of the large borrowings made from Hellenistic philosophy and its terminology, the argument suffers in the last resort from a narrow prejudice, in that it seems totally unable to see that any idolator might be a person of intellectual ability and indeed possess any sense of morals at all. … There are therefore some substantial gaps, to put it mildly, between the Hellenistic-Jewish anti-idolatrous rhetoric that Paul inherited and applied, and the realities of life in the Greco-Roman world.” E. P. Sanders (Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983], 125) remarks: “Paul’s case for universal sinfulness, as it is stated in Rom. 1:18–2:29, is not convincing: it is internally inconsistent and it rests on gross exaggeration.” Cf. also Leander Keck, “Romans 1:18–23,” Int 40 (1986): 402–6, 403, who refers to Paul’s “complete lack of objectivity and empathy.” 5   J. C. O’Neill, Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1975), 40–56; William O. Walker, Interpolations in the Pauline Letters (JSNTSup 213; London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 166–89. 6  E. P. Sanders has persuasively shown that Paul reasons from solution to plight; he is not arguing against the law or Judaism per se, but for the gospel. And yet, Sanders can find no place for 1:18–2:29 in Paul’s thinking on the law, describing the passage as “homiletical material from Diaspora Judaism” which Paul alters “only in insubstantial ways,” such that “the treatment of the law in chapter 2 cannot be harmonized with any of the diverse things which Paul says elsewhere” (Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People, 123). Sanders largely bypasses 1:18–32 in his discussion. He identifies several inconsistencies both within 1:18–2:29, and in comparison with Paul’s statements elsewhere. For example, “the Gentiles are condemned universally and in sweeping

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that he is retelling the story of Eden.7 Others cite it as an illustration of his general tendency toward incoherence and logical fallacy.8 The confusion about 1:18–32 derives partially from ambiguity regarding the time-frame that Paul has in mind. Verse 18 has a main verb in the present tense (ἀποκαλύπτεται), as does the first clause of v. 19 (ἐστίν). The next clause shifts to the aorist (ἐφανέρωσεν), then back to the present (καθορᾶται), and then to aorists for the remainder of the passage until v. 32 (εἰσίν, ποιοῦσιν, συνευδοκοῦσιν). The interpretation outlined above perceives the verbs in the present tense to govern the aorists.9 I shall in this essay advocate a different view, one that terms in 1:18–32, while in 2:15–16, 28 Paul entertains the possibility that some will be saved by works” (123–24). He also points to the “exaggerated character” of Paul’s statements, and to the fact that “the description of Jewish character is unparalleled” (124). Sanders concludes that the passage does not represent a Christian attack on a Jewish view, but an “inner-Jewish debate on whether or not knowledge necessarily leads to right action” (128); “[t]he conclusion which would naturally follow from chapter 2 is ‘repent and obey the law from the bottom of your heart, so that you will be a true Jew’” (129). 7 Morna Hooker, “Adam in Romans I,” NTS 6 (1959–60): 297–306, and eadem, “A Further Note on Romans I,” NTS 13 (1966–67): 181–83. Hooker’s analysis has many helpful insights, but her contention that Paul retells Genesis 2–3 has persuaded only a few (C. K. Barrett, From First Adam to Last [New York: Scribner, 1961], 17–19; cautiously, A. J. M. Wedderburn, “Adam in Paul’s Letter to the Romans,” in Studia Biblica 1978, III: Papers on Paul and Other New Testament Authors [ed. E. A. Livingstone; JSNTSup 3; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1980], 413–30, 413–14; James D. G.  Dunn, Romans [WBC 38a–b; Dallas: Word Books, 1988], 1:53). Rom 1:18–32 certainly involves Genesis 1–3, borrowing diction and, very significantly, the basic concept of God as ὁ κτίσας. A similar pattern of divine beneficence → human ingratitude or rejection → divine punishment recurs throughout the hb, and does not need to have come solely from the story of Eden. The pattern indeed appears in concise form in another passage to which Paul alludes in 1:23, lxx Ps 105:19–23. Finally, idolatry and sexual immoralities are nowhere to be found in Genesis 2–3, Hooker’s forced reading (see esp. “Adam in Romans 1,” 300–1) notwithstanding. See also the criticisms of Wedderburn, “Adam in Paul’s Letter to the Romans,” 415–19; and of Stanley K. Stowers, A Rereading of Romans: Justice, Jews, and Gentiles (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), 86–88. 8  See Sanders’ remarks in n. 4 above; Heikki Räisänen, Paul and the Law (WUNT 25; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1983), esp. 97–101. 9  Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Romans: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AB 33; New York: Doubleday, 1993), 282: “Some commentators … think that, because Paul uses the pres. tense in vv 18–20 and the aor. tense in vv 21–31, he is not referring in the latter to pagans of his own day, but to pagans of old; that he may be sketching the stages through which humanity passed from primitive monotheism to contemporary idolatry. But the contrast between vv 18–20 and vv 21–31 is too strongly drawn in such an interpretation …. The aorists are to be understood as gnomic; they express what pagans of all times have done ….” On the gnomic aorist, see BDF 171, § 333; Herbert Weir Smyth, Greek Grammar (repr.; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984) (hereafter cited as “Smyth”), 431–32, § 1931: “The aorist may express a general truth. The aorist simply states a past occurrence and leaves the reader to draw the inference from a concrete case that what has occurred is typical of what often occurs.” Fitzmyer’s classification of the aorists as gnomic is not persuasive. The proper place for such aorists are γνῶμαι, maxims; examples appear in Jesus’ parables and Aesop’s fables (see BDF for refs., esp. Mark 4:3–8). One tells a story, which is not attached to any finite historical circumstances, in order to convey a truth. Paul, in contrast, has the actions of real people in view. These actions

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a few scholars have proposed but never extensively explored,10 that the verbs in the present tense point to events that continue to occur, and the aorists to events not just of the past but of the primordial past. Paul is constructing an account of the foundation of pagan polytheism by an early generation of humanity, and the continuing implications of that event for subsequent generations. His narrative of the invention of (bad) religion would thus also explain the origin of the gospel, since it identifies the historical reasons for why God needs to intervene to save humanity in the first place. The origin of religion was an active area of speculation among some ancient Greek and Roman authors.11 It occasionally arises in connection with a more general inquiry into the first discoveries of various technologies that make human life possible or comfortable.12 Authors also treat the origin of religion separately. form the basis of the indictment in 1:18, identifying the reason why the wrath of God is revealed, and thus do not constitute Paul’s elaboration of general truths or principles. 10 I discuss these other scholars at the beginning of § III below. 11  At this point I must justify my use of the term ‘religion.’ The ancient Greeks and Romans did not have a conception of ‘religion’ identical to any of the modern ideas associated with the term. It thus carries with it the acute danger of anachronism, insofar as one might take it to imply a system, with a more or less consistent set of doctrines. One can readily see this danger in the infelicitous applications of it in derivative terms like ‘mystery religions’ (on this point, see Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987], 3–4), or ‘the Gnostic religion,’ as if these were discrete systems operating alongside or in competition with the more dominant ‘religion.’ Further problems arise when one tries to distinguish it from ‘magic’ (see e. g., Hans Dieter Betz, “Magic and Mystery in the Greek Magical Papyri,” in idem, Hellenismus und Urchristentum: Gesammelte Aufsätze I [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1990], 209–29, esp. 209–16, and the literature cited therein; Fritz Graf, Magic in the Ancient World [trans. Franklin Philip; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997], 8–19). The Greek language offers a wide array of words that describe phenomena which modern people associate with ‘religion.’ First, we have εὐσέβεια, “piety,” with its cognate verb (εὐ)σέβεσθαι (σεβάζεσθαι) “to fear, revere, worship,” and its opposite, ἀσέβεια, “impiety.” Other terms include λατρεία (λατρεύειν), “service, worship”; θρησκεία (θρησκεύειν), “worship”; εὐλάβεια (εὐλαβεῖσθαι), “awe, reverence”; and δεισιδαιμονία (δεισιδαιμονεῖν), “fear of the gods,” although this becomes associated with “superstition.” A ἱερεύς, “priest,” works in a ἱερόν, “temple,” facilitating τὰ δρώμενα, “rites,” εὐχαί, “prayers,” and θυσίαι, “sacrifices.” (For futher discussion of many of these terms, see Walter Burkert, Greek Religion [trans. John Raffan; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985], ch. 2, “Ritual and Sanctuary,” 54–118, esp. 84–109.) The mystery cults (μυστήρια) have their own set of terms associated with their rites (Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, 7–9). Many of these words will, of course, be familiar to readers of the nt, alongside others which I have not mentioned. However, it will become clear in the subsequent essay that, while the Greeks did not have a comprehensive label like ‘religion,’ they understood the diverse terms and the phenomena to which they refer to belong together, as essentially relating to the same general matter. I shall thus use ‘religion’ to cover the broad territory of piety (the posture of worshipful gratitude that is properly due to the gods), the ritual practices that express that piety (festivals, prayer, sacrifices, etc.), and the general theological perspectives that inform piety and ritual (who the gods are, what their individual responsibilities and spheres of authority are, and what kind of rituals are appropriate to each), often expressed in myths. 12 For a helpful collection of the ancient sources on primitivism, see Arthur O. Lovejoy and George Boas, Primitivism and Related Ideas in Antiquity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1935); see also the study by Thomas Cole, Democritus and the Sources of Greek Anthropology (repr.; APA Monograph Series 25; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990).

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These authors pose several questions, some of which are historical. Under what circumstances did the earliest humans first worship the gods? What did the earliest forms of piety look like? How did these evolve into familiar religious customs? Other questions are epistemological. How did humans learn about the gods in the first place? Did they pass down to later generations correct notions of the divine? Were their ritual expressions of piety proper? Was the invention of religion good or bad, a pinnacle of human achievement or a devastating error? A brief survey of a few such accounts shall reveal a variety of answers to these questions, and shall help to place Paul’s account in its literary and intellectual contexts.

II. Ancient Accounts of the Primordial Origin of Religion Because the question of the origin of religion arises in diverse contexts, scholars have had numerous opportunities to discuss it, although it has not (as far as I know) received a full independent treatment. Thus it is necessary, if I shall assert Paul’s participation in the conversation, to establish its existence and parameters. First, I identify the basic theories which emerge in the fifth century b.c.e. (II.1). I then group the sources according to kind: philosophy (II.2), historiography and ethnography (II.3), and speeches and letters (II.4). Finally, I examine the appearance of the topic in a Jewish wisdom text, upon which many assert or assume Paul’s dependence in Rom 1:18–32, Wisdom 13–15 (II.5), followed by some summary observations (II.6).

1. The basic theories: Prodicus, Democritus and Critias Investigations of the origin of religion have their roots in pre-Socratic and sophistic critiques of traditional religion, including mythical accounts of the origin of human beings and their early converse with the gods.13 The authors generally express strong skepticism that people have the right ideas about the divine,14 13 Greek myths of human cultural origins often feature Prometheus. Hesiod (Op. 535–37) attributes to him the customs of sacrifice, as well as the use of fire (Op. 561–67; Theog. 47–58). Note also Plato, Protag. 320c–22d, where Prometheus gives humanity ἡ ἔντυχος σοφία σὺν πυρί, having stolen these from Hephaestus and Athena, but he fails to steal ἡ πολιτικὴ σοφία from Zeus. Regarding the theological dimensions of pre-Socratic philosophical ideas, see Werner Jaeger, The Theology of the Early Greek Philosophers (repr.; Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1980), esp. ch. 10, “Theories of Nature and the Origin of Religion”; Burkert, Greek Religion, 305–11. 14 Cf. Protagoras’ expression of doubt in the first line of his book on the gods (DK 80 B 4, 2:265): “Regarding the gods, I am unable to know, neither that they do not exist nor what sort some are in form; for the hindrances to knowing are many: the uncertainty, and the life of the human, since it is brief,” περὶ μὲν θεῶν οὐκ ἔχω εἰδέναι, οὔθ᾽ ὡς οὐκ εἰσίν οὔθ᾽ ὁποῖοί τινες ἰδέαν· πολλὰ γὰρ τὰ κωλύοντα εἰδέναι ἥ τ’ ἀδηλότης καὶ βραχὺς ὢν ὁ βίος τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. Burkert (Greek Religion, 466, n. 13) wryly states: “it is a mystery what else he could have written to fill a book on gods after such a beginning.” Jaeger (Theology, 189) points out: “He is backing away from the whole previous philosophical treatment of the problem of the Divine, by denying

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or that the myths convey anything true,15 or that rituals of the sort commonly practiced are what the gods really want.16 Pre-Socratic ideas about the divine, if true, elicit the question of how the myths, rituals and, more generally, religious ideas came into existence in the first place. Three thinkers, Prodicus of Ceos (v b.c.e.), Democritus of Abdera (v–iv b.c.e.), and Critias of Athens (v b.c.e.), propose six influential theories that address the origin of religion from a rationalist perspective.17 Theory 1 (T1). Prodicus asserts that the ancients deified the natural pheno­ mena that sustain life, and necessities like bread and wine, and worshipped them from a sense of gratitude.18 The worship of the things themselves under their new that there is anything certain about it.” Thus, “he must have been satisfied with a lesser degree of certainty” and “he would hardly do more than apply the standard of human opinion.” 15 Some of the pre-Socratics explicitly reject the idea of anthropomorphic gods. Xenophanes, e. g., asserts (DK 21 B 23, 1:135): “There is one god, greatest among gods and humans; he is similar to mortals neither in body nor mind,” εἷς θεός, ἔν τε θεοῖσι καὶ ἀνθρώποισι μέγιστος, | οὔτι δέμας θνητοῖσιν ὁμοίιος οὐδὲ νόημα. The natural corollary of this position is that traditional ideas about the gods are wrong (DK 21 B 11, 1:132): “Homer and Hesiod both attributed to the gods all things which are disgraceful and reproach before humans: stealing, seducing, and tricking each other,” πάντα θεοῖσ᾽ ἀνέθηκαν  Ὅμηρος θ᾽  Ἡσίοδός τε, | ὅσσα παρ᾽ ἀνθρώποισιν ὀνείδεα καὶ ψόγος ἐστίν, | κλέπτειν μοιχεύειν τε καὶ ἀλλήλους ἀπατεύειν (cf. idem, DK 21 B 14, 15 and 16). Burkert (Greek Religion, 309) notes: “The break with religion is accomplished. Xenophanes’ criticism of Homeric religion could not be outdone, and it was never refuted. Even Christians had nothing to add.” 16 E. g. Heraclitus, who scornfully observes (DK 22 B 5, 1:151–52): “Those who are polluted [with blood] have themselves purified by other blood, as if someone who walked into mud may be cleansed with mud. And he would seem to be raving if one of his fellow humans were to notice him doing such a thing! And they are praying to these statues, as if someone were having a chat with houses, because he does not understand anything about the gods and heroes, who they are.” καθαίρονται δ᾽ ἄλλῳ αἵματι μιαινόμενοι οἷον εἴ τις εἰς πηλὸν ἐμβὰς πηλῷ ἀπονίζοιτο. μαίνεσθαι δ᾽ ἂν δοκοίη, εἴ τις αὐτὸν ἀνθρώπων ἐπιφράσαιτο οὕτω ποιέοντα. καὶ τοῖς ἀγάλμασι δὲ τουτέοισι εὔχονται, ὁκοῖον εἴ τις δόμασι λεσχηνεύοιτο, οὔ τι γινώσκων θεοὺς οὐδ᾽ ἥρωας οἵτινές εἰσι. (See also idem, 22 B 14, 15, 1:154–55.) Empedocles, who abhors the sacrifice of animals and the eating of meat, briefly describes the sacrificial customs of primordial humanity in their worship of Κύπρις βασίλεα (DK 31 B 128, 1:363): “Her they were appeasing with reverent statues, with painted figures of animals, and artfully contrived perfumes, with sacrifices of unmixed myrrh and of fragrant frankincense, throwing to the ground libations of yellow honeys. But the altar was not soaked with unmixed [v.l. “unspeakable”] murders of bulls ….” τὴν οἵ γ᾽ εὐσεβέεσσιν ἀγάλμασιν ἱλάσκοντο | γράπτοῖς τε ζῴοισι μύροισι τε δαιδαλεόδμοις | σμύρνης τ᾽ ἀκρήτου θυσίαις λιβάνου τε θυώδους | ξανθῶν τε σπονδὰς μελίτων ῥίπτοντες ἐς οὖδας· | ταύρων δ᾽ ἀκρήτοισι [v.l. ἀρρήτοισι] φόνοις οὐ δεύετο βωμός …. 17  For different presentations of these theories, see Cicero, Nat. d. 1.118–21; A. B. Drachmann, Atheism in Pagan Antiquity (repr.; Chicago: Ares, 1977), 41–48; Martin Nilsson, “The Origin of Belief among the Greeks in the Divinity of the Heavenly Bodies,” HTR 33 (1940): 1–8; Burkert, Greek Religion, 313–15; Jaeger, Theology, 179–90; Jaap Mansfeld, “Theology,” in The Cambridge History of Hellenistic Philosophy (ed. Keimpe Algra, Jonathan Barnes, Jaap Mansfeld and Martin Schofield; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). Marek Winiarczyk (The Sacred History of Euhemerus of Messene [Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 312; trans. Witold Zbirohowski-Kościa; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013], 47–48) concisely addresses the theories as sources available to Euhemerus. 18 DK 84 B 5, 2:317 = Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.18: “Prodicus of Ceos says the ancients reckoned sun, moon, rivers, wells, and generally all the things which aid our lives to be gods, on

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names evolved into cults dedicated to the gods responsible for them.19 Prodicus thus posits a theory of the deification of goods and beneficial natural phenomena. Theory 2 (T2). Democritus proposes that the emotion of fear, not gratitude, prompted ancient humans to devise religion, particularly their terror of thunderstorms and alarming celestial or meteorological events.20 This theory implies that humans invent the gods as causes of such events in order to avert their anger. So, Democritus propounds a theory of the creation of the gods to account for fearinspiring natural phenomena. Theory 3 (T3). Democritus offers another explanation associated with nature, that the regular rotation of the seasons prompted the first acts of piety.21 T3 is account of the aid of which they are the source, just as the Egyptians reckoned the Nile. For this reason bread was reckoned as Demeter, wine Dionysus, water Poseidon, fire Hephaestus, and each thing for which they were already grateful.” Πρόδικος ὁ Κεῖος ἥλιον, φησί, καὶ σελήνην καὶ ποταμοὺς καὶ κρήνας καὶ καθόλου πάντα τὰ ὠφελοῦντα τὸν βίον ἡμῶν οἱ παλαιοὶ θεοὺς ἐνόμισαν διὰ τὴν ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν ὠφέλειαν, καθάπερ Αἰγύπτιοι τὸν Νεῖλον, καὶ διὰ τοῦτο τὸν μὲν ἄρτον Δήμητραν νομισθῆναι, τὸν δὲ οἶνον Διόνυσον, τὸ δὲ ὕδωρ Ποσειδῶνα, τὸ δὲ πῦρ  Ἥφαιστον καὶ ἤδη τῶν εὐχαριστούντων ἕκαστον. Cf. Plato, Crat. 397c–d. Note also a fragment of Philodemus, Piet. (P.Herc. 1428, fr. 19, lines 12–19, text and transl. per Albert Henrichs, “Two Doxographical Notes: Democritus and Prodicus on Religion,” HSCP 80 (1970): 93–123, 107–8): “[Prodicus] maintains that the gods of popular belief do not exist and that he does not recognize them, but that primitive man, [out of admiration, deified] the fruits of the earth and virtually everything that contributed to his subsistence …,” … [ {σιτον} ὑ]πὸ [τ]ῶν | ἀνθρώπων νομιζο‑ | μένους θεοὺς οὔτ᾽ εἶ‑ | ναί φησιν οὔτ᾽ εἰδέ‑ | ναι, τοὺς δὲ καρποὺς | καὶ πάνθ᾽ ὅλως τὰ χρή‑ | σιμα πρ[ὸς τ]ὸν βίον | τοὺς ἀρ[χαίο]υς ἀγα‑ … (see also Henrichs’ discussion, ibid. 108–15; idem, “The Atheism of Prodicus,” Cronache Ercolanesi 6 [1978]: 15–21; and “The Sophists and Hellenistic Religion: Prodicus as the Spiritual Father of the Isis Aretalogies,” HSCP 88 [1984]: 139–58). 19  So also Henrichs, “Sophists and Hellenistic Religion,” 141: “Prodicus thus envisaged the origins of religious beliefs as man’s progress from a primitive to a more advanced stage of deification, or from material to personal gods.” 20 DK 68 A 75, 2:102–3 = Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.24: “For ancient humans, when they saw incidents in the atmosphere, like thunders and lightnings, thunderbolts and conjunctions of stars, and eclipses of sun and moon, began to fear the gods, since they supposed them to be the causes of such things.” ὁρῶντες γάρ … τὰ ἐν τοῖς μετεώροις παθήματα οἱ παλαιοὶ τῶν ἀνθρώπων καθάπερ βροντὰς καὶ ἀστραπὰς κεραυνούς τε καὶ ἄστρων συνόδους ἡλίου τε καὶ σελήνης ἐκλείψεις ἐδειματοῦντο θεοὺς οἰόμενοι τούτων αἰτίους εἶναι. 21  Philodemus, Piet., P.Herc. 1428, fr. 16: “… [that] … summer …, winter, spring, autumn, and all such phenomena come from on high, heaven-sent; that not surprisingly, therefore, they recognized and worshipped the agent behind these occurrences …” και[ | θέρος εν … [ ..... ] | χε[ι]μὼν καὶ ἔ[αρ καὶ] | μεθόπωρον [κ]αὶ πά[ν‑] | τα ταῦτα ἄνθεν δι‑ | ειπετῆ γενεται· *δι‑ | ὸ δὴ καὶ τὸ ἐξεργα‑ | ζόμενον γνόντας | σέβεσθαι … (text and transl. per Henrichs, “Two Doxographical Notes,” 96; see also Henrichs’ discussion and confirmation that this testimonium belongs to Democritus, ibid. 97–106). Jaeger (Theology, 183) calls attention to another fragment of Democritus (DK 68 B 30, 2:151, trans. per Jaeger): “Some of the wise men lifted their hands towards that place which we Hellenes call the abode of Air, and said that Zeus holds converse with himself about all things, and gives and takes away, and he is king of all,” τῶν λογίων ἀνθρώπων ὀλίγοι ἀνατείναντες τὰς χείρας ἐνταῦθα, ὃν νῦν ἠέρα καλέομεν οἱ  Ἕλληνες· πάντα, μυθέεται (?) καὶ πάνθ᾽ οὗτος οἶδε καὶ διδοῖ καὶ ἀφαιρέεται καὶ βασιλεὺς οὗτος τῶν πάντων. This explanation dovetails nicely with T3: the predicates listed are suitable if Zeus is in fact the force behind the observable order of the cosmos.

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thus a theory that the observable order in nature must have a cause superior to it.22 At this point one should note a significant difference between T1 on the one hand and T2 and T3 on the other, relating to the notion of cause (αἴτιοι, τὸ ἐργαζόμενον) in the latter, while the former involves the direct deification of natural phenomena. Theory 4 (T4). Prodicus also suggests that the inventors of important technologies received divine honors and cults.23 This theory accounts for how people have anthropomorphic ideas of the gods and connect them with technological advances that benefit life. T4 is thus a theory of the ascription of divine honors to human inventors of civilizing technologies. Theory 5 (T5). In addition to his two theories involving nature, Democritus attributes the notion of the gods to images (εἴδωλα) of frightening figures that can talk and predict the future. The ancients mistook them for gods and incorrectly attributed immortality to them.24 Democritus accounts not only for how humans 22 Diogenes of Apollonia states this theory in a negative form (text and trans. per Kirk/Raven 440, § 601 = DK 64 B 3, 2:60): “For, he says, it would not be possible without intelligence for it [sc. the underlying substance] so to be divided up that it has measures of all things – of winter and summer and night and day and rains and winds and fair weather,” οὐ γὰρ ἄν, φησίν, οἷόν τε ἦν οὕτω δεδάσθαι ἄνευ νοήσιος ὥστε πάντων μέτρα ἔχειν, χειμῶνός τε καὶ θέρους καὶ νυκτὸς καὶ ἡμέρας καὶ ὑετῶν καὶ ἀνέμων καὶ εὐδιῶν. 23 Philodemus, Piet., P.Herc. 1428 cols. ii 28 to iii 13: “But it is clear that Persaeus truly abolishes and obscures divinity, or knows nothing about it, when he says in his “On the Gods” that the things written about it by Prodicus do not seem implausible, that the things which nourish and help have been regarded and honored first as gods, and, after these, the persons who invented foods or shelters or other crafts, like Demeter and Dionysus and the Dioscouri.” Περσα[ῖος δὲ] δῆλός ἐστιν [ἀναιρῶν] ὄντω[ς κ]α[ί ἀφανί]ζων τὸ δαιμόνιον ἢ μηθὲν ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ γινώσκων, ὅταν ἐν τῶι Περὶ θεῶν μὴ [ἀπ]ίθανα λέγηι φαίνεσθαι τὰ περὶ 〈τοῦ〉 τὰ τρέφοντα καὶ ὠφελοῦντα θεοὺς νενομίσθαι καὶ τετειμῆσθ[αι] πρῶτον ὑπὸ [Προ]δίκου γεγραμμένα, μ[ε]τὰ δὲ ταῦτα τοὺ[ς εὑρ]όντας ἢ τροφὰς ἢ [σ]κέπας ἢ τὰς ἄλλας τέχνας ὡς Δήμητρα καὶ Δι[όνυσον] καὶ τοὺ[ς Διοσκούρ]ου[ς … (text per Henrichs, “Two Doxographical Notes,” 116; transl. mine; for further discussion see ibid., 116–23). Note also Diodorus Siculus’ (5.4.3–7) connection of the delivery of wheat by Demeter and Core with the foundation of various festivals and the Eleusinian rites in Athens, and similar festivals in Sicily. Later in the text (5.5.2–3), Diodorus attributes two other acts of εὐεργεσία to Demeter, instruction regarding how to prepare food from wheat, and the introduction of laws (hence her epithet θεσμοφόρος). 24  DK 68 B 166, 2:178 = Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.19: “Democritus says that certain images come near to humans, and of these some are productive of good and others of harm, whence also he [i. e., Democritus] was in the habit of praying to experience fortunate images; and that these are great and enormous and indeed hard to destroy, but they are not immortal; and that they indicate future events beforehand to humans when they are beheld and when they emit sounds. Wherefore the ancients, when they received the impressions of these very things, conjectured them to be god, since god, who has an immortal nature, is nothing other than these [images].” Δημόκριτος δὲ εἴδωλά τινά φησιν ἐμπελάζειν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις καὶ τούτων τὰ μὲν εἶναι ἀγαθοποιὰ τὰ δὲ κακοποιά· ἔνθεν καὶ εὔχετο εὐλόγχων τυχεῖν εἰδώλων. εἶναι δὲ ταῦτα μεγάλα τε καὶ ὑπερφυῆ καὶ δύσφθαρτα μέν, οὐκ ἄφθαρτα δέ, προσημαίνειν τε τὰ μέλλοντα τοῖς ἀνθρώποις θεωρούμενα καὶ φωνὰς ἀφιέντα. ὅθεν τούτων αὐτῶν φαντασίαν λαβόντες οἱ παλαιοὶ ὑπενόησαν εἶναι θεόν, μηδενὸς ἄλλου παρὰ ταῦτα ὄντος θεοῦ [τοῦ] ἄφθαρτον φύσιν ἔχοντος.

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came to have a concept of the gods, but also for particular attributes. T5 is thus a theory of the mistaken attribution of divinity to the ‘images.’ Theory 6 (T6). Critias of Athens posits the invention of religion by an early legislator. Civic legislation sufficed to deter people from the open commission of injustices, but a deterrent was needed to prevent crimes committed in secret. This person thus devised the idea of watchful and vengeful gods.25 Like Democritus in T5, Critias seeks to explain the provision of divine attributes, and he very nearly completes the list: immortality, the ability to observe and comprehend human intent, and the right and responsibility to avenge the commission of any hidden crimes. His inventor further reinforces these ideas by placing the gods’ home in the heavens and by identifying them as the causes of nature’s terrors and blessings (i. e., T1–3 above).26 T6 is thus a theory of deliberate deception for the promotion of fear toward the attainment of some other (beneficial) purpose. Since only testimonia and fragmentary quotations remain to relay these theories to us, direct access to whatever arguments their authors might have advanced to support their claims is lacking. We can, however, infer their reasoning process: starting with the assumption that humans created the gods (and not the other 25 DK 88 B 25, 2:386–389, lines 15–26 = Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.54: “… at that time, it seems to me that some man, crafty and wise in thought, first invented the fear of gods for mortals, so that a kind of terror might be upon the wicked, whether they act or speak or think something secretly. Thus, henceforth he introduced the divine, how it is a daemon thriving in imperishable life, both hearing and seeing with mind, both understanding very much and heeding these things, and bearing a divine nature, who hears everything said among mortals and shall have the power to see everything done. And if you silently wish for some wicked thing, this fact shall not escape the gods’ notice, for it is very possible for them to think. Saying such words, he introduced the most pleasing of teachings, concealing the truth with a false account.” τηνικαῦτά μοι δοκεῖ | πυκνός τις καὶ σοφὸς γνώμην ἀνήρ | δέος θνητοῖσιν ἐξευρεῖν, ὅπως | εἴη τι δεῖμα τοῖς κακοῖσι, κἂν λάθραι | πράσσωσιν ἢ λέγωσιν ἢ φρονῶσί . | ἐντεῦθεν οὖν τὸ θεῖον εἰσηγήσατο, | ὡς ἔστι δαίμων ἀφθίτωι θάλλων βίωι, | νόωι τ᾽ ἀκούων καὶ βλέπων, φρονῶν τ᾽ ἄγαν | προσέχων τε ταῦτα, καὶ φύσιν θείαν φορῶν, | ὃς πᾶν τὸ λεχθὲν ἐν βροτοῖς ἀκούεται, | δρώμενον δὲ πᾶν ἰδεῖν δυνήσεται. | ἐὰν δὲ σὺν σιγῆι τι βουλεύηις κακόν, | τοῦτ᾽ οὐχὶ λήσει τοὺς θεοὺς· τὸ γὰρ φρονοῦν | ἔνεστι. τούσδε τοὺς λόγους λέγων | διδαγμάτων ἥδιστον εἰσηγήσατο | ψευδεῖ καλύψας τὴν ἀλήθειαν λόγωι. 26  Ibid., lines 27–38: “And he was asserting that the gods abide there, where he could with his speech frighten humans most, namely whence he knew terrors are for mortals and advantages for miserable life: from the revolution above where he observed flashes of lightning and terrifying blasts of thunder, and the starry body of heaven, the lovely embroidery of the wise maker Time; whence also the red-hot iron of a star approaches [meteors? comets?], and the moist rainstorm comes down to earth. And he erected such fears around humans through which this man well caused the daemon to dwell, by his account, also in a suitable domain, and doused lawlessness with laws.” ναίειν δ᾽ ἔφασκε τοὺς θεοὺς ἐνταυθ᾽, ἵνα | μάλιστ᾽ ἂν ἐξέπληξεν ἀνθρώπους λέγων, | ὅθεν περ ἔγνω τοὺς φόβους ὄντας βροτοῖς | καὶ τὰς ὀνήσεις τῶι ταλαιπώρωι βίωι, | ἐκ τῆς ὕπερθε περιφορᾶς, ἵν᾽ ἀστραπάς | κατεῖδεν οὔσας, δεινὰ δὲ κτυπήματα | βροντῆς, τό τ᾽ ἀστερωπὸν οὐρανοῦ δέμας, | Χρόνου καλὸν ποίκιλμα τέκτονος σοφοῦ, | ὅθεν τε λαμπρὸς ἀστέρος στείχει μύδρος | ὅ θ᾽ ὑγρὸς εἰς γῆν ὄμβρος ἐκπορεύεται. | τοίους δὲ περιέστησεν ἀνθρώποις φόβους, | δι᾽ οὓς καλῶς τε τῶι λόγωι κατώικισεν | τὸν δαίμον(α) οὗ〈τος〉 κἀν πρέπον­τι χωρίωι, | τὴν ἀνομίαν τε τοῖς νόμοις κατέσβεσεν.

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way around), the manifestations of religion as experienced in normal life should furnish the clues for a reconstruction of their ultimate origins. T1 takes gratitude as a point of departure. The ancients thus invent the gods, giving them provinces in the natural world to govern and cults specific to each, as contexts for expression of thankfulness. T2 follows the same logic, but replaces gratitude with fear. T6 meanwhile reasons backwards from the obvious role of the fear of the gods in civil society, borrowing support from T1–3. T4 accounts for the gods’ human forms and personalities, as well as the connection between certain cults and technologies.27 T5 also draws upon existing notions of divine attributes. From the ability of the images to predict the future, one might additionally infer that Democritus wants to explain the phenomena of prophetic dreams, divination, or oracular precognition.28 Taken as a group, the theories explain not only a general concept of the divine and religion as a whole, but also particular cults, rituals, and the distinct characteristics of the gods and goddesses. They all in the end share a negative evaluation of the veracity of traditional ideas about the gods and of whatever claims individual cults may have had about their own foundations.

2. Philosophical elaboration of the theories: Cleanthes and Lucretius In spite of the skepticism that motivated their initial formulation, some philosophers turn the basic theories toward demonstrations that the inherited notions of the divine are essentially valid if properly corrected. The ideas of the Stoic Cleanthes of Assus (iv–iii b.c.e.) illustrate this transformation. He eloquently articulates his own philosophical piety in his Hymn to Zeus, in which he dresses the god in traditional garb in a manner that enhances his role as sustainer, su27 Cf. Themistius, Or. 30 (DK 84 B 5, 2:317): “Already we are drawing near to initiations, and we shall combine with our arguments the wisdom of Prodicus, who attaches every sacred practice of humans, both mysteries and initiations, to the benefits of farming, reckoning the conception of the gods to have come to humans thence and answering for every piety,” πλησιάζομεν ἤδη ταῖς τελεταῖς καὶ τὴν Προδίκου σοφίαν τοῖς λόγοις ἐγκαταμίξομεν, ὃς ἱερουργίαν πᾶσαν ἀνθρώπου καὶ μυστήρια καὶ τελετὰς τῶν γεωργίας καλῶν ἐξάπτει, νομίζων καὶ θεῶν ἔννοιαν ἐντεῦθεν εἰς ἀνθρώπους ἐλθεῖν καὶ πᾶσαν εὐσέβειαν ἐγγυώμενος. 28  Aristotle, according to Sextus Empiricus (Math. 9.20–21), declares two causes for the conception of the gods (ἔννοιαν θεῶν ἔλεγε γεγονέναι ἐν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις). The second is a variation of T3, while the first seems to adapt T5: “But [the conception came about] from occurrances concerning the soul, on account of its inspirations which happen in periods of sleep, and divinations. For whenever, he says, the soul is by itself while sleeping, it divines both its nature which takes back its special property and foretells the future. And such is [the soul] also when it is separated from bodies at death.” Some examples from the Iliad follow. “Therefore, from these things, he says, humans arrived at a conception that there is something divine, a thing in itself similar to the soul and most capable of knowledge of all things.” ἀλλ᾽ ἀπὸ μὲν τῶν περὶ τὴν ψυχὴν συμβαινόντων διὰ τοὺς ἐν τοῖς ὑπνοῖς γινομένους ταύτης ἐνθουσιασμοὺς καὶ τὰς μαντείας, ὅταν γάρ, φησίν, ἐν τῷ ὑπνοῦν καθ᾽ ἑαυτὴν γένηται ἡ ψυχή, τότε τὴν ἴδιον ἀπολαβοῦντα φύσιν προμαντεύεταί τε καὶ προαγορεύει τὰ μέλλοντα. τοιαύτη δέ ἐστι καὶ ἐν τῷ κατὰ τὸν θάνατον χωρίζεσθαι τῶν σωμάτων. … ἐκ τούτων οὖν, φησίν, ὑπενόησαν οἱ ἄνθρωποι εἶναί τι θεῖον, τὸ καθ᾽ ἑαυτὸ ἐοικὸς τῇ ψυχῇ καὶ πάντων ἐπιστημονικώτατον.

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preme governor and legislator of the cosmos.29 Humans should submit to his governance and offer him the worship which is his proper due.30 In a different context, Cleanthes brings the theories of the origin of religion into play. Cicero substantially preserves Cleanthes’ arguments in Nat. d. 2.12–15, putting them in the mouth of his Stoic spokesman, Quintus Lucilius Balbus. We learn from this source that Cleanthes propounds four causes of how all people everywhere have a concept of the divine. This is, of course, a question logically prior to that of where religion comes from: knowledge of the gods necessarily precedes piety and any actions that express it.31 Cicero’s rendition of Cleanthes’ causes furthermore does not pose the question of whether the gods really exist. He focuses instead on how humans know. He thus provides an important witness to how philosophers move the basic theories toward what becomes the long and fruitful tradition of natural theology. Cicero begins with a short prologue in 2.12–13, describing the knowledge of the divine as “inborn” (innatum est) and practically “carved in the mind” (in animo quasi insculptum).32 Innate and inferred knowledge are not the same 29 The traditional garb includes the “double-edged, fiery, ever-living thunderbolt” (ἀμφήκη, πυρόεντα, ἀειζώοντα κεραυνόν, Hymn 10). Cleanthes also calls him by the epithets “all-giver, cloud-veiled, lightning-lit” (πάνδωρε, καλαινεφές, ἀργικέραυνε, 32). Otherwise, the text describes Zeus’ governance of the cosmos in distinctly philosophical terms. On the hymn generally, see esp. Johan C. Thom, Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus: Text, Translation and Commentary (STAC 33; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005); Elizabeth Asmis, “Lucretius’ Venus and Stoic Zeus,” Hermes 110 (1982): 458–70; eadem, “Myth and Philosophy in Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus,” GRBS 47 (2007): 413–29. 30  The petition of the Hymn pleads with Zeus to rescue humans from their self-destructive ignorance, “so that, having been honored by you, we may repay you with honor by perpetually singing hymns to your works, as befits the one who is mortal, for neither is there any greater gift for mortals nor for gods than to sing hymns perpetually to your common law in justice,” ὀφρ᾽ ἂν τιμηθέντες ἀμειβώμεθά σε τιμῇ, | ὑμνοῦντες τὰ σὰ ἔργα διηνεκές, ὡς ἐπέοικε | θνητὸν ἐόντ᾽, ἐπεὶ οὔτε βροτοῖς γέρας ἄλλο τι μεῖξον, | οὔτε θεοῖς, ἢ κοινὸν ἀεὶ νόμον ἐν δικῇ ὑμνεῖν, 36–39). 31  These two questions remain closely aligned. Already in the basic theories, the questions of the origin of the concept of the divine and its relation to the foundation of religion are inextricably linked; the invention of the gods necessarily leads to religion. The myth of human origins in Plato’s Protagoras illustrates this linkage further. The first thing that the first humans do – even before taking care of other basic necessities – is to build altars and offer worship (322a): “And since the human had a share of the divine portion, he, alone of the animals, first recognized the gods because of his kinship with god, and he began to work on setting up both altars and statues of the gods; then, he quickly began to divide sound and words by skill, and he began to invent domiciles, clothes, shoes, beds and foods from the earth,” ἐπειδὴ δὲ ὁ ἄνθρωπος θείας μετέσχε μοίρας, πρῶτον μὲν διὰ τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ συγγένειαν ζῴων μόνον θεοὺς ἐνόμισε, καὶ ἐπεχείρει βωμούς τε ἱδρύεσθαι καὶ ἀγάλματα θεῶν· ἔπειτα φωνὴν καὶ ὀνόματα ταχὺ διηρθρώσατο τῇ τέχνῃ, καὶ οἰκήσεις καὶ ἐσθῆτας καὶ ὑποδέσεις καὶ στρωμνὰς καὶ τὰς ἐκ γῆς τροφὰς ηὕρετο. Also, Sextus Empiricus treats the two questions together and without meaningful distinction in his overview of theories of “how we obtained a conception of god” (πῶς … ἔννοιαν ἐλάβομεν θεοῦ, 9.12) in Math. book 9. 32 In this passage, Cicero also names Cleanthes as his source: “In like manner the chief point stands firm among all people of all nations; moreover it has become innate for all and carved into the mind that the gods exist. What sort they might be is various – no one denies that they exist.

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thing, however, unless the inference occurred so far back in time that it has become instinctive.33 Presumably the traces of such inferences which have matured into instincts reveal themselves in the myths and practices of traditional religion; each cause thus has its corresponding piety. The first, then, arises “from the presentiment of future things” (quae orta esset ex praesensione rerum futurarum).34 Lucilius refers back to the foregoing context (Nat. d. 2.7–12),35 wherein he identifies people famous for their precognitive abilities, and gives examples of Roman divination rituals and of the dire consequences of the failure to heed them. The second cause is “that which we had obtained from the magnitude of advantages which are observed by means of the temperence of the weather, the fecundity of the earth, and the wealth of other manifold advantages” (alteram quam ceperimus ex magnitudine commodorum, quae percipiuntur caeli temperatione fecunditate terrarum aliarumque commoditatum complurium copia, Nat. d. 2.13) (T1). Everything which humankind needs to survive in the Mediterranean depends in some way or other from the cooperation of nature. Fertility cults as contexts for the expression of gratitude for nature’s bounty and the solicitation of favorable farming conditions immediately spring to mind.36 Nature’s more violent and capricious face constitutes Cleanthes’ third cause (T2).37 Terrifying natural disIndeed our Cleanthes has said concerning the causes [for this] that four notions of the gods were formed in the human mind.” Itaque inter omnis omnium gentium summa constat; omnibus enim innatum est et in animo quasi insculptum esse deos. quales sint varium est, esse nemo negat. Cleanthes quidem noster quattuor de causis dixit in animis hominum informatas deorum esse notiones. 33  Cf. Nat d. 2.5. 34  Nat. d. 2.13: “He asserted the first, regarding which I spoke a moment ago, which had arisen from the presentiment of future things,” primam posuit eam de qua modo dixi, quae orta esset ex praesensione rerum futurarum. 35 Nat. d. 2.8 has special relevance here: “By the ruin of these men [who did not heed the warnings obtained by divination] it is possible that the Republic be understood as having been enlarged by the governances of those who submitted to religious rites [religionibus]. And if we wish to compare our [customs] with outside [customs, nostra cum externis], we are found either as equals or even as inferior in other matters, [but] in religion – in the cult of the gods – superior by far.” quorum exitio intellegi potest eorum imperiis rem publicam amplificatam qui religionibus paruisent. et si conferre volumus nostra cum externis, ceteris rebus aut pares aut etiam inferiones reperiemur, religione id est cultu deorum multo superiores. The gods therefore love the Romans best because of their attentiveness to their cultic obligations, as shown by the ever-increasing power of the Republic. Cicero thus adduces positive and negative proofs of the power of rituals of divination. It seems unlikely that Cleanthes would illustrate his first cause with such characteristically Roman examples and religious vanity, but he probably draws upon the ample parallel customs of divination and the consultation of oracles among the Greeks (see Burkert, Greek Religion, 109–18). Cf. Xenophon, Mem. 1.4.15. 36  If Cleanthes cites examples for this cause, he may refer to the Eleusinian mysteries or the Thesmophoria, regarding which see Burkert, Greek Religion, 242–46, 285–90. Cf. also Nat. d. 1.4. 37 Nat. d. 2.14: “The third is that which causes terror in [human] minds by thunderbolts, tempests, clouds, snows, hails, deserts, pestilence, earthquakes, and often by the grinding noises and rockfalls and raindrops as if of blood, next by slides or sudden clefts of earth, next by monstrosities of people and cattle contrary to nature, next by shooting stars of heaven which have been seen, next by such stars which the Greeks call “comets” and our [people call] cincinnatae

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turbances promote the search for their causes, and thus people infer the existence of wrathful divine actors. The items on his list of disasters easily connect with the provinces of particular deities: gods of the sky for bad weather and celestial portents; of fertility for birth defects; and of the underworld for earthquakes and the explosions of volcanoes. Rituals designed to soothe the wrath that these portents signify also stand in view. The final cause, and the “greatest,” relates to the observable regularities of nature, in particular of celestial bodies (T3).38 Lucilius continues with a hypothetical example of someone walking into a public institution and observing the systematic conduct of the persons present.39 One could not imagine such order to be accidental, and the same holds true for the heavenly bodies and the seasons. The universe reflects both a design and an agent who keeps the whole thing in motion. This cause receives the label of “greatest” because it closely aligns with Cleanthes’ own philosophical piety. While the first three causes deliver to humanity the notion that the gods exist, only the fourth reaches to the heart of the matter and opens the way to authentic piety.

[“hairy stars”], which recently in the Octavian war were harbingers of great calamities, next by a doubled sun [i. e., an eclipse], which (as I heard from my father) had happened at the time of the consulships of Tuditanus and Aquilius, indeed a year in which the second sun, Publius Africanus, was put out. Since they were terrified by these things, people suspected that a certain celestial and divine power exists.” tertiam quae terreret animos fulminibus tempestatibus nimbis nivibus grandinibus vastitate pestilentia terrae motibus et saepe fremitibus lapideisque imbribus et guttis imbrium quasi cruentis, tum labibus aut repentinis terrarum hiatibus tum praeter naturam hominum pecudumque portentis, tum facibus visis caelestibus tum stellis is quas Graeci κομήτας nostri cincinnatas vocant, quae nuper bello Octaviano magnarum fuerunt calamitatum praenuntiae, tum sole geminato, quod ut e patre audivi Tuditano et Aquilio consulibus evenerat, quo quidem anno P. Africanus sol alter extinctus est, quibus exterriti homines vim quandam esse caelestem et divinam suspicati sunt. 38  Nat. d. 2.15: “The fourth cause, and certainly the greatest, is the even motion revolution of the sky: the distinction, utility, beauty, and order of sun, moon and stars. The aspect of these things sufficiently indicates that they are not accidental.” quartam causam esse eamque vel maximam aequabilitatem motus conversionem caeli, solis lunae siderumque omnium distinctionem utilitatem pulchritudinem ordinem, quarum rerum aspectus ipse satis indicaret non esse ea fortuita. 39  Nat. d. 2.15: “Just as, if someone goes into some home, or to the gymnasium, or to the forum, when he sees the rationality, the manner, the discipline of all matters, he is not able to determine that they happen without cause, but he perceives that someone exists who superintends and to whom it is obedient. Rather, how much more by means of such great movements and changes, as in the orderings of many and such great matters, in which vast and infinite antiquity has ever in no way proved false, he would conclude [that] it is necessary that the movement of so great a nature be governed by some mind.” ut, si quis in domum aliquam aut in gymnasium aut in forum venerit, cum videat omnium rerum rationem modum disciplinam, non possit ea sine causa fieri iudicare, sed esse aliquem intellegat qui praesit et cui pareatur, multo magis in tantis motionibus tantisque vicissitudinibus, tam multarum rerum atque tantarum ordinibus, in quibus nihil umquam inmensa et infinita vetustas mentita sit, statuat necesse est ab aliqua mente tantos naturae motus gubernari. Sextus Empiricus rehearses similar arguments at Math. 9.26–27.

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The Epicurean Titus Lucretius Carus (i b.c.e.) in his poem De rerum natura refutes arguments like those of Cleanthes.40 The relevant passage, 5.1161–1240, is part of a vast history of human culture, itself part of a natural history. Religious practices take their place among the basic technological inventions of primordial humanity. Lucretius begins in 5.1161–68 with a preamble to introduce his topic, the present-day universality of “established rites” (sollemnia sacra), declaring that “it is not difficult to impart the reason” for these phenomena (non ita difficilest rationem reddere verbis).41 His first explanation draws upon Epicurean theology, which in turn adapts Democritus’ idea of the εἴδωλα (T5): either while awake or in dreams, primordial humanity encountered the gods, who impress themselves as images on the mind, and who live in a state of perpetual blessedness but have no interest in human affairs.42 Persons of such beauty and obvious nobility, early humans reasoned, must also be immortal and in possession of surpassing power. Lucretius does not assert that the discernment of these gods automatically produced dread and worship. With the initial epistemic moment ancient humans instead enter the first of a sequence of developmental stages. Because they could 40 Lucretius has much to say elsewhere in his poem about the real nature of the gods and correct piety, and his opening invocation in book 1 recalls Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus in a manner which encourages the idea that he models his Venus in response to Stoic Zeus, as Elizabeth Asmis (“Lucretius’ Venus and Stoic Zeus”) has argued. 41  “Now what cause has spread the divine powers of the gods through great peoples and has filled the cities with altars and has caused established rites to be undertaken, which rites now blossom in great states and locales whence also a dread now has been insinuated into mortals which builds new shrines of the gods all over the orb of the Earth and compels [them] to ce­ lebrate festal days, it is not not difficult to impart the reason with words.” nunc quae causa deum per magnas numina gentis | pervulgarit et ararum compleverit urbis | suscipiendaque curarit sollemnia sacra, | quae nunc in magnis florent sacra rebu’ locisque, | unde etiam nunc est mortalibus insitus horror | qui delubra deum nova toto suscitat orbi | terrarum et festis cogit celebrare diebus, | non ita difficilest rationem reddere verbis. 42  Rer. nat. 5.1169–82: “For surely at that very time mortal generations used to see with wakeful mind the surpassing aspects of gods, and more in dreams [their] marvelous abundance of body. Therefore to these [gods] they were assigning the power of sense because they were seen to move their limbs and to emit haughty sounds in accordance with [their] brilliant aspect and ample power. And they were giving [them] eternal life, because always their aspects were furnished [thus] and their appearance was constant, and yet especially because they were supposing that persons perceived [as having] such great strength could not be overcome rashly, by any power. And they were therefore supposing that [they] stood out by far in their prosperities, because the fear of death in no way was distressing to any one of them, and because likewise in dreams they were seeing that they effected many and marvelous things, and none suffered hardship thereafter with respect to themselves.” quippe etenim iam tum divom mortalia saecla | egregias animo facies vigilante videbant, | et magis in somnis mirando corporis auctu. | his igitur sensum tribuebant propterea quod | membra movere videbantur vocesque superbas | mittere pro facie praeclara et viribus amplis. | aeternamque dabant vitam, quia semper eorum | suppeditabatur facies et forma manebat, | et tamen omnino quod tantis viribus auctos | non temere ulla vi convinci posse putabant. | fortuntisque ideo longe praestare putabant, | quod mortis timor haud quemquam vexaret eorum, | et simul in somnis quia multa et mira videbant | efficere et nullum capere ipsos inde laborem. Cf. Rer. nat. 5.147–48, and Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.25. Regarding Epicurean thinking about the composition of the gods’ bodies, see Cicero, Nat. d. 1.49–50.

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not figure out the causes of the regular rotation of heaven and of the seasons (T3), “they held as a refuge for themselves that they hand over all things to the gods, and they made it that all things are directed by their nod.”43 They also link these gods whom they saw in dreams with unexplainable astronomical events to resolve their confusion (T3), leading in turn to another mistaken inference: since sun, moon and stars exist in the sky, along with alarming meteorological disturbances like storms and lightning (T2), the gods must live up there among the heavenly bodies (T6).44 Lucretius does not rigidly separate the awe of nature’s beauty and regularity from the fearful reaction to its threats, but he does maintain enough of a distinction to turn the tables on Cleanthes’ “greatest cause.” Philosophical piety – worship of the gods as nature’s stewards – is not the pinnacle of human piety, but rather one of the first stumbling steps of a catastrophic fall into error. Lucretius then laments the consequences of primordial humanity’s faulty reasoning,45 affording him the opportunity to introduce the next stage in the process, the creation of rituals for the aversion of divine wrath: Neither is it any piety to be seen always veiled, to turn toward a stone [i. e. a cult image], to approach the altars of every god; nor is it piety to fall prostrate to the ground and extend palms before the gods’ sanctuaries, nor to spatter altars with the blood of animals, nor to bind vows with vows; rather piety is to be able to examine all things with greatly soothed mind.46

Lucretius shifts back to a contemporary time-frame here in order to underscore what the ancients passed down as an odious inheritance for later generations. His  Rer. nat. 5.1183–87: “Moreover they were discovering that the modes of heaven and the various seasons of the year turned in fixed order, nor were they able to recognize the causes by which it was occurring. Therefore they held as a refuge for themselves that they hand over all things to the gods and they made it that all things are directed by their nod.” praeterea caeli rationes ordine certo | et varia annorum cernebant tempora verti, | nec poterant quibus id fieret congnoscere causis. | ergo perfugium sibi habebant omnia divis | tradere et illorum nutu facere omnia flecti. 44  Rer. nat. 5.1188–93: “And in heaven they locate the gods’ residence and sanctuaries, because it is perceived that the night and moon revolve through heaven; the moon, the day and the night, and the austere constellations of night, and wandering comets of heaven, and flames which hasten, clouds, sun, rainstorms, snow, winds, thunderbolts, hailstorms, and quick clamors and great murmurings of [nature’s] threats.” in caeloque deum sedis et templa locarunt, | per caelum volvi quia nox et luna videtur, | luna dies et nox et noctis signa severa | noctivagaeque faces caeli flammaeque volantes, | nubila sol imbres nix venti fulmina grando | et rapidi fremitus et murmura magna minarum. 45 Rer. nat. 5.1194–97: “Wretched human race, since it ascribed to the gods such great events, and added bitter rages! Then what great lamentations these very ones produced for themselves, and for us what great wounds, what tears for our descendants!” o genus infelix humanum, talia divis | cum tribuit facta atque iras adiunxit acerbas! | quantos tum gemitus ipsi sibi, quantaque nobis | volnera, quas lacrimas peperere minoribu’ nostris! 46 Rer. nat. 5.1198–1203: nec pietas ullast velatum saepe videri | vertier ad lapidem atque omnis accedere ad aras | nec procumbere humi prostratum et pandere palmas | ante deum delubra nec aras sanguine multo | spargere quadrupedum nec votis nectere vota, | sed mage pacata posse omnia mente tueri. 43

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definition of piety might strike one as strange: if the gods have nothing to do with the operations of nature, why would studying “all things with greatly soothed mind” be appropriate piety? Instead of clarifying his meaning, he returns to the process of decline, elaborating further the consequences of the contemplation of heaven with a mindset fearful of “an immense power of the gods over us.”47 He reinforces his point with three examples. First is the terror inspired by thunder: even a king cowers in fear of retribution for his acts of hybris in the midst of such storms (5.1218–25). Second, the pious prayers and vows of an admiral cannot save him or his fleet from the hurricane (5.1226–35). The third, the violence of an earthquake (5.1236–37), prompts Lucretius to ask the question which concludes the passage: “What marvel is it if mortal generations scorn themselves and set aside great and wonderous abilities as powers of the gods in such events, which they govern in their entirety?” (quid mirum si se temnunt mortalia saecla | atque potestates magnas mirasque relinquunt | in rebus viris divum, quae cuncta gubernent? 5.1238–40) The note of sympathy conforms to Lucretius’ expressions of admiration for Epicurus, the savior who set humans free from the crushing heel of their own delusional piety.48 Some areas of similarity and difference in Cleanthes’ and Lucretius’ explanations have now emerged. On the topic of nature’s theophanic role, Cleanthes approaches it from the angles of its benevolence toward humanity (T1), its beauty and order (T3), and its fear-inspiring violence (T2). These causes, along with the precognition of the future, have corresponding forms of piety: humans took note of these phenomena and structured their reactions of gratitude, fear, and awe with religious rituals. Lucretius skips any discussion of nature’s benevolence, but turns his critical eye toward fear and awe as the wellsprings of misplaced piety. Also, whereas Cleanthes posits each of his causes separately from each other, Lucretius organizes them into a sequence: theophanic encounters with the real gods combine with confusion about the causes of nature’s observable order, then 47  Rer. nat. 5.1204–17: “For when we admire the celestial spaces of the great cosmos above, and the aether affixed with gleaming stars, and the paths of sun and moon come to mind, then into breasts oppressed by other misfortunes that care begins also to raise an awakened head, that perhaps there is an immense authority of the gods over us, which turns the bright constellations in various motion. For a lack of reason tests an uncertain mind [regarding] what the generative origin of the world was, and likewise what the end might be, until [which time] the walls of the world are able to bear this toil of restless motion; or they, forever gifted with perpetual safety, are able by divine influence to disdain the robust powers of immense eternity as they glide on the path of eternity.” nam cum suspicimus magni caelestia mundi | templa super stellisque micantibus aethera fixum, | et venit in mentem solis lunaeque viarum, | tunc aliis oppressa malis in pectora cura | illa quoque expergefactum caput erigere infit, | nequae forte deum nobis immensa potestas | sit, vario motu quae candida sidera verset; | temptat enim dubiam mentem rationis egestas, | ecquaenam fuerit mundi genitalis origo, | et simul ecqaue sit finis, quoad moenia mundi | solliciti motus hunc possint ferre laborem, | an divinitus aeterna donata salute | perpetuo possint aevi labentia tractu | immensi validas aevi contemnere viris. 48 See, e. g., Rer. nat. 1.62–79.

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with reactions of terror, then with the development of rituals. The philosophical piety of Cleanthes in no way stands above the more ordinary head-covering, altar-spattering, groveling type. The invocation of Venus in his poem’s opening (1.1–43) might seem to equivocate this denial. The literary character of the passage is clear, insofar as Lucretius addresses her as the muse who inspires his composition. She also personifies the forces of love and attraction; she “alone governs the nature of all things” (rerum naturam sola gubernas), although she does not demand any propitiation (1.44–49). Lucretius is replacing Cleanthes’ forceful, authoritative Zeus with a joyous Venus, while ensuring that she does not become the object of a new philosophical piety.49 At a strategic level, however, the arguments of both authors align: both build upon the earlier theories, using historical induction to trace the origins of religious ideas and practices. Nature remains an important catalyst in this process. Both seek to correct erroneous notions that have derived from humanity’s early encounter with nature, while the theological premises of their respective schools determine how sharply they wield the razor of rational explanation. In sum, they remain firmly in the tradition established by Democritus, Prodicus, and Critias.

3. Historiographic and ethnographic accounts: Hecataeus and Euhemerus Cleanthes and Lucretius additionally stay within the framework of the earlier theorists in their approach to the subject at an abstract level. None of them attempts to pin down the precise historical circumstances surrounding the invention of religion. Even Critias, who conveys his hypothesis within a concise narrative, leaves the identities of the sly inventor and of his polis unspecified. The philosophers seem unwilling to speculate further without reliable sources. Myths and rituals contain traces which can, with careful analysis, yield a general sense of the truth, but not specific data. What if, however, one could ‘find’ sources that antedate the myths, confirm the veracity of the theories on the table, and fill in the gaps with definite information? The pursuit of answers to this question draws discussion of the origin of religion into the fields of historiography and ethnography. Hecataeus of Abdera (iv b.c.e.) and his younger contemporary Euhemerus of Messene (iv–iii b.c.e.) stand out as influential representatives of this move. Hecataeus’ work on Egypt, epitomized in the first book of Diodorus Siculus’ Biblioteca historica,50 claims to find the required sources among the Egyptian 49  “Cleanthes’ Zeus, and Stoic Zeus in general, is the omnipotent god who imposes his will upon the world by force; Lucretius’ Venus is likewise omnipotent, but her supremacy is achieved by the allurements of pleasure” (Asmis, “Lucretius’ Venus and Stoic Zeus,” 463; cf. also ibid. 468–69). 50 Building upon the arguments of Jacoby, Oswyn Murray (“Hecataeus of Abdera and Pharaonic Kingship,” JEA 56 [1970]: 141–71) argues persuasively that Hecataeus is Diodorus’ main source, although not his only one (note the table of interpolations at 146). Scholars have

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priests, whose records extend back to humanity’s dawn.51 He can then present Egypt both as the cradle of human civilization and as uniquely responsible for the foundation of neighboring cultures through colonization and military campaigns. The Egyptians were also the first, according to Hecataeus, to infer the existence of the gods from nature, and to worship the sun (Osiris), the moon (Isis), and the elements (T1, 3).52 Aside from these celestial divinities, a second group of terrestrial divinities arose, namely the early kings and queens of Egypt, who initially received divine honors foremost for their intelligence (σύνεσις) and beneficence (εὐεργεσία).53 This hypothesis clearly adapts Prodicus’ theory of deified inventors (T4): the text credits these kings and queens with a wide array of discoveries.54 In 1.17 the narrative turns to Osiris’ great military campaign (στρατεία), which Hecataeus attributes to his beneficence and love of glory ( Ὄσιριν … εὐεργετὸν ὄντα καὶ φιλόδοξον).55 He and his companions journeyed debated whether Hecataeus influenced Euhemerus – and even whether he is really responsible for the ideas which Diodorus relays in his name (see Cole, Democritus, 153–3, and Winiarczyk, Sacred History, 64–66, e. g.). 51 On Hecataeus’ priestly sources, see Murray, “Hecataeus of Abdera,” 151–52. Hecataeus explicitly attributes the theories of the origins of the gods to the Egyptians themselves (“they say”). It is possible that Prodicus’, Democritus’ and Critias’ theories had already exerted influence upon the Hellenistic Egyptian priests’ thinking about their myths, especially given the existence of multiple tombs of Osiris’ dismembered corpse; see Diodorus, 1.21.5–11 (cf. 1.22.2 on the burial of Isis), Plutarch, Is. Os. 18, 358a–b; 21, 359c–d. 52 Diodorus, 1.11.1: “And then, [the Egyptians say] that humans throughout Egypt, when in antiquity they were born, upon looking up at the cosmos and being amazed and marveling at the nature of the universe, understood there to be two gods, eternal and first, the sun and the moon, whom the one they named Osiris and the other Isis,” τοὺς δ᾽ οὖν κατ᾽ Αἴγυπτον ἀνθρώπους τὸ παλαιὸν γενομένους, ἀναβλέψαντας εἰς τὸν κόσμον καὶ τὴν τῶν ὅλων φύσιν καταπλαγέντας τε καὶ θαυμάσαντας, ὑπολαβεῖν εἶναι δύο θεοὺς ἀιδίους τε καὶ πρώτους, τόν τε ἥλιον καὶ τὴν σελήνην, ὧν τὸν μὲν  Ὄσιριν, τὴν δὲ  Ἶσιν ὀνομάσαι. The text goes on to explain the meanings of the gods’ Egyptian names and to link Osiris with Dionysus in Greek mythology (1.11.2–4). The deification of the elements (τὸ πνεῦμα, τὸ πῦρ, τὸ ξηρόν, τὸ ὑγρόν, τὸ ἀερῶδες) is discussed in 1.11.5–6, as well as their linkages with Greek deities in 1.12 (respectively Zeus, Hephaestus, Demeter, Ocean, and Athena). 53  Diodorus, 1.13.1: “Different from these [gods], they say that there came to be terrestrial ones, who started as mortals, but who, because of their intelligence and their beneficence shared with humanity, have achieved immortality,” ἄλλους δ᾽ ἐκ τούτων ἐπιγείους γενέσθαι φασίν, ὑπάρξαντας μὲν θνητούς, διὰ δὲ σύνεσιν καὶ κοινὴν ἀνθρώπων εὐεργεσίαν τετευχότας τῆς ἀθανασίας. Cf. the critical comments of Plutarch, Is. Os. 22–23, 359d–360b. 54  These are captured in short narrative episodes. For example, Hephaestus, the first king, earns that title when he happens upon a lightning-struck tree and thus discovers the utility of fire (Diodorus, 1.13.3). Also, Osiris and Isis make a number of agricultural discoveries that lead to the abolition of cannibalism (1.14.1; cf. 1.15.6–8 and Plutarch, Is. Os. 13, 356a–b). Note esp. the summary of the inventions of Hermes in 1.16. 55 Murray (“Hecataeus of Abdera,” 149–50) argues that 1.17.1 to 1.20.6 are interpolated into Hecataeus’ account from some other source by Diodorus. This is, of course, possible. The point that leads me to demur is the emphasis on εὐεργεσία both in 1.13.1 (as a justification for the deification of kings) and throughout the narrative of Osiris’ campaign (1.17.2, 18.2, Osiris’ inclusion of agricultural specialists in his retinue; 18.4–5, his inclusion of Satyrs to teach music and

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throughout Africa, the Near East and the Mediterranean basin civilizing the savages and spreading their newly discovered technologies far and wide. Upon his return to Egypt with gifts from his travels, his subjects worshipped him as a god.56 A number of explanations of Greek myths and religious customs appear intermittently to confirm the notion that Greek culture derives from that of the Egyptians.57 Hecataeus therefore weaves together a generally coherent (albeit speculative) historical account from his priestly sources, well-known Egyptian and Greek myths, and the rationalist theories of the origin of religion. He also modifies Prodicus’ contribution considerably: the deified inventors were not only persons of extraordinary ingenuity, but specifically the kings and queens of Egypt, whose personal prowess and quality of governance, characterized by εὐεργεσία, contribute to the desires of their subjects to honor them alongside the heavenly gods. The idea has an obvious home in Hellenistic Egypt (Ptolemy I was Hecataeus’ patron) during a time when the Greeks first adopted ruler-cults. One may easily perceive a message from the author to his royal patron and other human recipients of divine honors, namely that εὐεργεσία should be a prominent feature of their own governance. Euhemerus utilizes a very similar strategy to that of Hecataeus in his book  Ἱερὰ ἀναγραφή,58 again mediated to us through Diodorus, by way of Eusebius.59 The author, a friend of Cassander, tells of his travels to Arabia on a diplomatic embassy, and his voyage from the eastern coast into the open ocean. He happens upon dance; 19.5, teaching the Ethiopians to build dikes; 20.4, the invention of beer), not just in the heading (1.17.1) and conclusion (1.20.5–6). 56  Diodorus, 1.20.5–6: “And when he returned to Egypt, he brought with him from everywhere the most excellent gifts; and because of the greatness of his acts of beneficence, he before all received immortality by general agreement and honor equal to the celestial gods. After these events, when he passed from humans to the gods, he obtained sacrifices and the most illustrious honors from Isis and Hermes. And they both made known rites of initiation and introduced many things in mysteries, magnifying the power of the god.” ἐπανελθόντα δ᾽ εἰς τὴν Αἴγυπτον συναποκοσμίσαι δῶρά τε πανταχόθεν τὰ κράτιστα καὶ διὰ τὸ μέγεθος τῶν εὐεργεσιῶν συμπεφωνημένην λαβεῖν παρὰ πᾶσι τὴν ἀθανασίαν καὶ τὴν ἴσην τοῖς οὐρανίοις τιμήν. μετὰ δὲ ταῦτ᾽ ἐξ ἀνθρώπων εἰς θεοὺς μεταστάντα τυχεῖν ὑπὸ  Ἴσιδος καὶ  Ἑρμοῦ θυσιῶν καὶ τῶν ἄλλων τῶν ἐπιφανεστάτων τιμῶν. τούτους δὲ καὶ τελετὰς καταδεῖξαι καὶ πολλὰ μυστικῶς εἰσηγήσασθαι, μεγαλύνοντας τοῦ θεοῦ τὴν δύναμιν. 57  For example, Osiris’ retinue and the administration which he appointed to govern in his absence have many familiar names. For the latter, Isis rules with Hermes as counselor (1.17.2), with Heracles acting as general (1.17.3). For the former, he brings along his brother Apollo (1.17.3–5), his sons Anubis and Macedon, and Pan (1.18.1–2). 58  Below I use the edition of Marek Winiarczyk, Euhemeri Messenii reliquiae (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1991). For an overview of the available data on Euhemerus’ life, see Winiarczyk, Sacred History, 1–11. 59 The ancient sources offer a couple of general summaries of his theology, mentioning the deification of kings and of natural phenomena (Sextus Empiricus, Math. 9.17 = Winiarczyk, fr. 27; Diodorus, 6.1.1–2 = Winiarczyk, fr. 25). Some also describe him as an atheist and enemy of traditional religion (Cicero, Nat. d. 1.118–19 = Winiarczyk, fr. 14; Plurarch, Is. Os. 23 = Winiarczyk, fr. 15).

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an archipelago, of which the chief island is Panchaea.60 He discovers there a place of idyllic bliss and a people who enjoy a society that Plato could easily admire.61 A temple dedicated to Zeus preserves a golden stele which narrates the mortal careers of the Cretan kings Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus;62 here again we have the source that fills in the gaps. Euhemerus learns from it that Uranus, an avid stargazer as well as a fair and benevolent ruler, first established the cults of the “celestial gods” (οἱ οὐράνιοι θεοί).63 When Zeus ascends the throne after his father Cronus, he embarks upon a tour of conquest.64 Ultimately he leads some of his people to Panchaea, where he erects a shrine in honor of his grandfather Uranus.65 We thus 60 Diodorus, 6.1.4–5 = Winiarczyk, fr. 3. Especially interesting is the description of the Panchaeans as “surpassing in piety, and giving honor to the gods with the most magnificent sacrifices and remarkable votive offerings, both gold and silver,” εὐσεβείᾳ διαφέροντας καὶ τοὺς θεοὺς τιμῶντας μεγαλοπρεπεστάταις θυσίαις καὶ ἀναθήμασιν ἀξιολόγοις ἀργυροῖς τε καὶ χρυσοῖς. 61  Diodorus, 5.41–46 (Winiarczyk places this text in an appendix) relays an outline of the geography, economics, religion and political constitution of the Panchaea. W. Edward Brown (“Some Hellenistic Utopias,” Classical Weekly 48.5 [1955]: 57–62) calls attention to a “certain family resemblance” between Panchaea and the ideal society of Plato’s Republic, “with the place of the philosopher-king being directly taken from the privileged class of priests. Community of property in Panchaea, however, seems to have extended to all classes” (ibid., 60). 62  Diodorus, 6.1.6–7 = Winiarczyk, fr. 36: “And upon this [island], on an exceedingly high hill, there is a temple of Zeus of the Three Tribes, which was established by him during the time when he ruled over all the world, while he was still of human kind. In this temple is a golden stele, on which there are the deeds of Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus written summarily in Panchaean letters.” εἶναι δ᾿ ἐν αὐτῇ κατά τινα λόφον ὑψηλὸν καθ᾿ ὑπερβολὴν ἱερὸν Διὸς Τριφυλίου, καθιδρυμένον ὑπ᾿ αὐτοῦ καθ᾿ ὃν καιρὸν ἐβασίλευσε τῆς οἰκουμένης ἁπάσης ἔτι κατὰ ἀνθρώπους ὤν. ἐν τούτῳ τῷ ἱερῷ στήλην εἶναι χρυσῆν, ἐν ᾗ τοῖς Παγχαίοις γράμμασιν ὑπάρχειν γεγραμμένας τάς τε Οὐρανοῦ καὶ Κρόνου καὶ Διὸς πράξεις κεφαλαιωδῶς. 63  Diodorus, 6.1.8–9 = Winiarczyk, fr. 49: “And after these things it says first that Uranus had been a king, an equitable and benevolent man, and knowledgeable about the movement of the stars. He was the first to give honor to the celestial gods with sacrifices; thus he was called Uranus. He had sons by his wife Hestia, Titan and Cronus, and daughters Rhea and Demeter.” μετὰ ταῦτά φησι πρῶτον Οὐρανὸν γεγονέναι βασιλέα, ἐπιεικῆ τινα ἄνδρα καὶ εὐεργετικὸν καὶ τῆς τῶν ἄστρων κινήσεως ἐπιστήμονα, ὃν καὶ πρῶτον θυσίαις τιμῆσαι τοὺς οὐρανίους θεούς· διὸ καὶ Οὐρανὸν προσαγορευθῆναι. υἱοὺς δὲ αὐτῷ γενέσθαι ἀπὸ γυναικὸς  Ἑστίας Τιτᾶνα καὶ Κρόνον, θυγατέρας δὲ  Ῥέαν καὶ Δήμητρα. Diodorus, 6.1.9 (frs. 53 and 60) completes the genealogy with the children of Cronus (Zeus, Hera, and Poseidon by Rhea – Hades is pointedly absent) and of Zeus (the Curetes by Hera; Persephone by Demeter; and Athena by Themis). 64  Diodorus, 6.1.10 = Winiarczyk, frs. 61, 63: “And he, when he came to Babylon, was the guest of Bel, and after that, when he arrived at the island of Panchaea that lies in the ocean, he established an altar of his own ancestor Uranus. From there he went through Syria to the prince at that time, Cassius, from whom comes the name of Mt. Cassius. And when he went to Cilicia he conquered in battle the Cilician regional governor. And after he had come to most other nations, he was honored in the presence of all and was called a god.” ἐλθόντα δὲ εἰς Βαβυλῶνα ἐπιξενωθῆναι Βήλῳ, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα εἰς τὴν Παγχαίαν νῆσον πρὸς τῷ ὠκεανῷ κειμένην παραγενόμενον Οὐρανοῦ τοῦ ἰδίου προπάτορος βωμὸν ἱδρύσασθαι. κἀκεῖθεν διὰ Συρίας ἐλθεῖν πρὸς τὸν τότε δυνάστην Κάσσιον, ἐξ οὗ τὸ Κάσσιον ὄρος· ἐλθόντα δὲ εἰς Κιλικίαν πολέμῳ νικῆσαι Κίλικα τοπάρχην. καὶ ἄλλα δὲ πλεῖσται ἔθνη ἐπελθόντα παρὰ πᾶσιν τιμηθῆναι καὶ θεὸν ἀναγορευθῆναι. 65 According to Diodorus, 5.46.3, the Panchaeans migrated there from Crete during the conquests of Zeus, thereby establishing the linguistic and cultural relationship between them and the Greeks.

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have ‘historical’ explanations of both the deification of natural phenomena (T1) and the worship of the Greek gods, particularly Zeus (T4). The myths portray him as part of a dynastic succession, as a conqueror, as benevolent towards humans, and as a king; Euhemerus has accounted for each of these elements. Does Euhemerus intend for his narrative to be taken as an actual experience?66 Does he want his readers to believe in a real Panchaea, temple and stele? Or is he telling a story to frame dramatically a truth which he, in a more philosophical setting, might claim to have inferred? He locates Panchaea at the perimeter of the world, a sort of eastern analogue to the Pillars of Hercules or the land of the Hyperboreans.67 His descriptions of the land and its political institutions seem designed to participate in the tradition of mythopoesis about such places, but with a philosophicalutopian angle.68 He thus composes a transparently fanciful ethnography that, in a more or less serious way, utilizes his Panchaeans to explore philosophical and theological questions.

4. Rhetorical and epistolary applications: Dio Chrysostom and ‘Anacharsis’ As the origin of religion is becoming established as an area of inquiry in philosophical and historiographic contexts, it branches further into other kinds of literature – speeches and letters – primarily as a means of achieving other objectives. Such rhetorical applications of the topic are already anticipated in the sources discussed so far, since the philosophers and historiographers never pursue the question entirely for its own sake: the former use it in order to support their broader theological arguments, and the latter project ideal models of royal governance and social organization meant to influence the newly established Hellenistic monarchies. Dio of Prusa (i–ii c.e.) furnishes an illuminating illustration in his Olympian oration (Or. 12), a prose hymn to Zeus in a popular-philosophical mode, delivered before Phidias’ famous statue of the god on Olympus. After a preface that 66  Interpreters (e. g., Herbert Jennings Rose and Simon Hornblower, “Euhemerus,” OCD 547; John Ferguson, Utopias of the Classical World [Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975], 104) incline toward descriptions of the work as a “romance,” “novel,” or “historical fiction” (cf., James S. Romm, The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought: Geography, Exploration, and Fiction [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992], 172–214, esp. 196–202). However Euhemerus himself may have regarded his own composition, he strives for a high degree of historical plausibility through the provision of realistic details: Panchaean society is harmonious and relatively homogeneous, but still requires soldiers; it preserves the most ancient traditions about the gods, but their religious practices do not partake of the outrageously miraculous; they trade in spices with the Arabian mainland, and thus have regular contact with outsiders. They belong to a culture of greater antiquity and knowledge than those further west, with more sensible methods of social organization; but they remain people (‘like you and me’) nonetheless. 67 On this topic see Romm, Edges of the Earth, passim. 68 Ferguson (Utopias in the Classical World, 102–10) in his sketch of Euhemerus’ political context argues that the hierarchical society of Panchaea functions as the instrument of his social critique.

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expresses amazement that an audience has gathered to hear a philosopher such as him (1–16),69 and briefly recounts his recent visit to the frontier territory of the Danube (16–20),70 Dio begins the speech’s proper προοίμιον (21–26) by musing about whether he should continue with the description of the lands and people that he saw, or set forth a hymn to the god’s nature and power.71 The introduction continues with an invocation (23–24),72 and, after Dio touches upon the artistry of Phidias and the inspiration that Homer provided for it (25–26), he frames the scope of the inquiry that his hymn will pursue: Or should we consider with greater care regarding these same matters, both the poems and the votive offerings [i. e., Phidias’ statue of Zeus], and, simply, if there is some such thing 69 Dio does this by likening himself to an owl, whom other birds supposedly like to gather around, in spite of the plumage of the peacock (the sophist) and the song of the nightingale (the poet). He then briefly narrates the fable of Aesop that explains the reason why birds are attracted to owls, and extends the metaphor to philosophers. Hans Dieter Betz (“Paraenesis and the Concept of God according to Oratio XII (Olympikos) of Dio of Prusa,” in idem, Paulinische Theologie und Religionsgeschichte: Gesammelte Aufsätze V [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009], 134–54, 139) compares this section with the “fool’s speech” of Paul in 2 Cor 10–13, referring to parallels “too many to be treated in this paper” (n. 23). 70  Hans-Josef Klauck (Dion von Prusa: Olympische Rede oder Über die erste Erkenntnis Gottes [SAPERE 2; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2000], 28) analyzes the rhetorical disposition differently. He perceives 1–15 as the προλαλία, 16–20 as the προοίμιον, and 21–26 as the διήγησις. It seems to me instead that the first two sections together form the προλαλία, explaining to his audience how he came to stand before them and as a method of working his way toward the real topics at hand. The προοίμιον then begins in 21, where Dio makes a transition from the visit to the Danube to his current location, signals his intention to present a prose hymn, and summons the Muses with an ἐπίκλησις. Also, Klauck’s identification of 21–26, as the διήγησις of the speech does not strike me as suitable – in spite of the fact that it relays a narrative – because its purpose is not to convey in a clear, concise, and plausible manner an account of the relevant background facts upon which a subsequent argument would depend, as the rhetorical theory instructs (for references to the sources, see Robert Matthew Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions of the Gospel in Romans 1 [WUNT 2.316; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011], 49–51; for a familiar example from the nt, see Gal 1:12–2:14 and Betz, Galatians: A Commentary on Paul’s Letter to the Churches of Galatia [Hermeneia: Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979], 16–18, 57–112). 71  Or. 12.21–22: “So, which is more delightful and more timely for you, either [to continue talking about my travels], or rather to seize upon the both older and greater account regarding this god before whom we now are – for he is, of course, both the common king and ruler of humans and gods, as well as lord and father, but yet the master of peace and war, as it first seemed to the knowledgeable and wise poets – [to see] if somehow we may become adequate to hymn both his nature and his power in a speech that is brief and lacking in worth if we address just these same topics?” πότερον οὖν ἥδιον ὑμῖν καὶ μᾶλλον ἐν καιρῷ … ἢ μᾶλλον ἅψασθαι τῆς πρεσβυτέρας τε καὶ μείζονος ἱστορίας περὶ τοῦδε τοῦ θεοῦ, παρ᾽ ᾧ νῦν ἐσμεν – οὗτος γὰρ δὴ κοινὸς ἀνθρώπων καὶ θεῶν βασιλεύς τε καὶ ἄρχων καὶ πρύτανις καὶ πατήρ, ἔτι δὲ εἰρήνης καὶ πολέμου ταμίας, ὡς τοῖς πρότερον ἐμπείροις καὶ σοφοῖς ποηταῖς ἔδοξεν – ἐάν πως ἱκανοὶ γενώμεθα τήν τε φύσιν αὐτοῦ καὶ τὴν δύναμιν ὑμνῆσαι λόγῳ βραχεῖ καὶ ἀποδέοντι τῆς ἀξίας, αὐτά που ταῦτα λεγοντες; 72 Klauck (Dion von Prusa, 28) rightly calls this invocation indirect. Dio quotes Hesiod’s invocation of the Muses in Works and Days; he thus does not call upon the god directly, as is common in poetic hymns, but reaches towards the Muses for inspiration.

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which fashions and transforms, somehow or other, the human notion of the god, as if [we were considering the questions] in the discourse of a philosopher?73

This question has the position and function, although not the normal form, of a πρόθεσις, which declares in brief compass the point which the speaker sets out to prove.74 Dio thereby labels his hymn as a philosophical inquiry into the poets’ (and Phidias’) roles in communicating the nature and power of the god. He initially explains that the innate and universal concept of the divine derives from humanity’s primordial condition of proximity to the god himself (27–39). The first humans marvelled at the complexity of nature (T3) and its beneficence toward them in the infancy of their species (T1).75 At one point in his exposition, Dio wields the metaphor of initiation: the celestial bodies and the seasons serve as “mystagogues” (μυσταγωγοί) who reveal the true nature of the god and seal the initiand’s devotion to him, as they perform their elaborate dance around 73 Or. 12.26: ἢ καὶ περὶ αὐτῶν τούτων σκεπτέον ἡμῖν ἐπιμελέστερον, τῶν τε ποιημάτων καὶ ἀναθημάτων καὶ ἀτεχνῶς εἴ τι τοιουτότροπόν ἐστι τὴν ἀνθρωπίνην περὶ τοῦ δαιμονίου δόξαν ἁμῃγέπῃ πλάττον καὶ ἀνατυποῦν, ἅτε ἐν φιλοσόφου διατριβῇ τὰ νῦν; D. A. Russell inserts here in his edition a long passage, placed in the mss after § 17. Other editors position it variously (for discussion, see Russell, ed., Dio Chrysostom: Orations VII, XII, and XXXVI [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992], 176), while J. W. Cohoon excises it altogether (Cohoon, ed. and trans., Dio Chrysostom (LCL; London: William Heinemann; New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1932–51). My perception of this question as having the function of a πρόθεσις leads me to doubt the correctness of Russell’s text-critical decision here. 74 Both Klauck (Dion von Prusa, 28) and Betz (“Paraenesis and the Concept of God,” 135–36) agree that this passage is the πρόθεσις of Dio’s speech. Regarding the position and function of the πρόθεσις in ancient rhetorical theory, see Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 51–55, esp. 54, n. 47. 75  Dio’s argument here begins in 27 with an assertion that the subsequent sections confirm, and that deserves full quotation: “Now then, regarding the nature of the gods in general and especially of the commander of all things, first and chiefly the notion and concept, held in common by the entire human race, likewise by the Greeks as well as the barbarians, compulsory and innate in every rational being, which comes about according to nature apart from mortal instructor and mystagogue without deception, has become ascendent because of his kinship to them and the many testimonies of the truth, which did not allow the oldest and most ancient people to sleep and be neglectful,” περὶ δὴ θεῶν τῆς τε καθόλου φύσεως καὶ μάλιστα τοῦ πάντων ἡγεμόνος πρῶτον μὲν καὶ ἐν πρώτοις δόξα καὶ ἐπίνοια κοινὴ τοῦ ξύμπαντος ἀνθρωπίνου γένους, ὁμοίως μὲν  Ἑλλήνων, ὁμοίως δὲ βαρβάρων, ἀναγκαία καὶ ἔμφυτος ἐν παντὶ τῷ λογικῷ γινομένη κατὰ φύσιν ἄνευ θνητοῦ διδασκάλου καὶ μυσταγωγοῦ χωρὶς ἀπάτης κεκράτηκε, διά τε τὴν ξυγγένειαν τὴν πρὸς αὐτοὺς καὶ πολλὰ μαρτυρία τἀληθοῦς οὐκ ἐῶντα κατανυστάξαι καὶ ἀμελῆσαι τοὺς πρεσβυτάτους καὶ παλαιοτάτους. Dio next embarks on a description of these ancient people, who live close to the god and receive intelligence from him as they bask in the glow of the celestial lights, listen to the sounds of wind and water and animals, and devise language (28–29). He briefly narrates their survival first on the soil, then upon fruits and the air itself (30–31). As a result, they could not help but marvel at and love the god (32, οὐκ ἐδύναντο μὴ θαυμάζειν καὶ ἀγαπᾶν τὸ δαιμόνιον). Next follows an extended metaphor (33–34), and a digression on how even plants and animals recognize the god, which makes Epicurean theology all the more absurd (35–37). Then, after apologizing for wandering off the topic (38), Dio summarizes (39): “For we say simply that the concept which is innate in all humans is the first wellspring of the notion and apprehension about the divine,” τῆς γὰρ περὶ τὸ θεῖον δόξης καὶ ὑπολήψεως πρώτην μὲν ἀτεχνῶς πηγὴν ἐλέγομεν τὴν ἔμφυτον ἅπασιν ἀνθρώποις ἐπίνοιαν.

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the world in a manner similar to what occurs in the rite of enthronement (θρονισμός, 33–34; T3). Dio is obviously drawing upon the theories of Prodicus and Democritus as Cleanthes applies them, to support rather than to criticize religion, as the pointed digression on Epicurean atheism (36–37) further confirms.76 Now that he has established the innate concept of the divine, he turns to the acquired (ἐπίκτητος), which reinforces its counterpart and stems not from the activity of the god but that of humans, namely poetry, laws, cult-images, and philosophy (40–47).77 Dio is here adapting another significant development in the discussions of the origin of religion which focus upon theological epistemology, the theologia tripertita as scholars often label it:78 humans obtain a knowledge of the divine from three sources, reason (λόγος) or nature (φύσις), myth (μῦθος), and law (νόμος).79 Dio adds a fourth item to the list, the artistry of those who create cult-images. Indeed, he devotes the remainder of the speech to the sculptor’s position alongside poet, legislator and philosopher by adopting the persona of Phidias in a mock defense of how he fittingly discloses the god’s nature with his craft (49–83). Also, like Cleanthes, he focuses on one aspect of the question, how humans have a concept of the divine in the first place. He simply assumes that his audience would understand that primordial humanity expressed their love and admiration with religious practices. The promotion of such practices is precisely what the poets, legislators, philosophers and artists provide to subsequent generations. Whether through persuasion or coercion, they urge obedience to the innate impulse. The pseudepigraphic corpus of letters attributed to the Scythian sage Anacharsis contains an example of the appropriation of the origin of religion in an epistolary context.80 In the ninth letter, ‘Anacharsis’ addresses the Lydian king Croesus 76 He tempers his endorsement of traditional religion with critical remarks at a couple of points in his speech. For example, the poets and legislators hit the mark sometimes, but at others they miss it (40, τὰ μὲν ὀρθῶς καὶ ξυμφώνως ἐξηγουμένων ποιητῶν καὶ νομοθετῶν τῇ τε ἀληθείᾳ καὶ ταῖς ἐννοίαις, τῶν δὲ ἀποπλανωμένων ἔν τισιν). See also 62. 77 Dio’s exposition on law and poetry is in 40–43 and on cult-images in 44–46. He offers only a short remark on philosophy at the end of 47, probably because he frames the speech as a philosophical inquiry. 78 For bibliography and discussion, see Klauck, Dio von Prusa, 186–192. 79 The presence of νόμος on this list may indicate the influence of Critias’ clever inventor (T6) upon the ones who first devised the theologia tripertita, although the role of law differs in each theory. Critias perceives religion in its invention as compensating for a deficiency in the law, namely its unenforceability in the absence of witnesses. The theologia, in contrast, highlights the law’s support of the observance of traditional rites, in some cases making them compulsory. Dio mentions this point specifically in 40: “Of the foregoing apprehension, let us say that there is a voluntary and a hortatory kind on the one hand, and a compulsory and commanded kind on the other,” τῆς δὲ τοιαύτης ὑπολήψεως τὴν μέν τινα ἑκουσίαν καὶ παραμυθητικὴν φῶμεν, τὴν δὲ ἀναγκαίαν καὶ προστακτικήν. 80 If there was an actual ‘historical’ Anacharsis, he would have lived in the sixth century b.c.e. (Franz Heinrich Reuters, Die Briefe des Anacharsis: Griechisch und Deutsch [SQAW 14; Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1963], 2–3; cf. Jan Fredrik Kindstrand, Anacharsis: The Legend and the Apo-

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on a topic dear to the latter’s heart, wealth. The sage diagnoses the problem in the opening sections of the letter: it is not wealth per se, but the entire premise of private property as encoded in Greek religious ideas.81 ‘Anacharsis’ essentially accuses the Greeks of pinning their own faults on the gods because of their “self-interest” (ἰδιοπραγία) and ignorance of common property (κοινονίαν  … οὐδεμίαν χρήματος ἐπιστάμενοι) in the assignment of provinces to specific deities. He then moves to set the record straight: Well, let us consider how this notion bears out. They were wanting all the gods to have honor before humanity, and all to be the givers of good things and the averters of evil things. But the earth was the common property of the gods, the common property also of humanity in ancient times. But in time they transgressed by designating the things held in common by all as separate sacred precincts for the gods.82

He thus identifies a motive, which would seem perfectly reasonable: the ancients wanted to honor the gods. This desire had its basis in a false premise (πάντας ἀγαθῶν δοτῆρας καὶ κακῶν ἀποτρόπους ὑπάρχειν), however, which in turn resulted in the violation of their common property (κοινὸν κτῆμα), the invention of temples (τεμένη). The sage describes this event as a transgression (παρηνόμησαν) that provoked severe divine retribution: phthegmata [Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Studia Graeca Upsaliensia 16; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1981), § 1.2, “Anacharsis as a Historical Figure,” 6–16). Reuters dates Letters 1–9 between 300 and 250 b.c.e. on philological grounds: “Anacharsis is kein Attizist. Seine Sprache is die Koine, wie sie sich zu Beginn des Hellenismus herausbildete” (Briefe, 4). The disagreements among interpreters stem from how to use the testimony in Herodotus (book 4) and the other extant (and much later) sources to reconstruct his biography, and from the connection of the letters to Cynicism. Reuters and Richard P. Martin [“The Scythian Accent: Anacharsis and the Cynics,” in The Cynics: The Cynic Movement and Its Legacy (ed. R. Bracht Branham and MarieOdile Goulet-Cazé; Hellenistic Culture and Society 23; Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996], 136–55) argue that the letters represent “Cynic propaganda.” Kindstrand (Anacharsis, 79–80, 82 and passim) in contrast argues that the similarities of the letters to Cynic ideas “may to some extent be explained by the subject matter, and a positive view of the simple life was not confined to the Cynics” (82). 81  Ep. 9.1: “The poets among the Greeks, when they distributed the cosmos in their story to the sibling children of Cronus, bestowed to one the portion of heaven, to another the sea, and to the third the underworld. This is because of the self-interest of the Greeks. For, since they know no sharing of property, they attribute their own wickedness to the gods. But nevertheless they left aside the earth as excepted and common to all.” οἱ ἐν  Ἕλλησι ποιηταὶ λόγῳ κόσμον διανέμοντες Κρόνου παισὶν ἀδελφοῖς λῆξιν τῷ μὲν οὐρανοῦ, τῷ δὲ θαλάττης, τρίτῳ δὲ ζόφου προσέθεσαν. τοῦτο μὲν ἰδιοπραγίας  Ἑλληνικῆς. κοινωνίαν γὰρ οὐδεμίαν χρήματος ἐπιστάμενοι τὸ ἑαυτῶν κακὸν θεοῖς προσένειμαν. γῆν δὲ ὅμως ἐξαίρετον καὶ οὗτοι κοινὴν ἅπασιν ὑπελείποντο. I am taking ἰδιοπραγίας  Ἑλληνικῆς as a genitive of cause (Smyth 330–31, §§ 1405–9), although it could be a genitive of source: “this is of Greek self-interest” = “this comes from Greek selfinterest” (ibid., 331–32, §§ 1410–11). 82 Ep. 9.2: φέρε τοῦτο πῇ ποτε φέρει τὸ νόημα φροντίσωμεν. πάντας ἐβούλοντο θεοὺς τιμὰς πρὸς ἀνθρώπων ἔχειν καὶ πάντας ἀγαθῶν δοτῆρας καὶ κακῶν ἀποτρόπους ὑπάρχειν. κοινὸν δὲ θεῶν κτῆμα γῆ, κοινὸν καὶ ἀνθρώπων τὸ πάλαι ἦν. χρόνῳ δὲ παρηνόμησαν, ἴδια ἐπονομάζοντες τεμένη θεοῖς τὰ πάντων κοινά.

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But the gods gave back to humanity strife, luxury, and mean-spiritedness as fitting gifts in return for these things. From these things, as they blended and separated, all [else] began to produce evils for all mortals: plowings, sowings, minings, wars. For although they bring in many times as many crops, they obtain little for themselves; and by embellishing with artifices they have invented short-lived decadence. And, by pursuing in various ways the ornaments of the earth, they have created marvelous things for themselves. They parade around as most blessed the one who invented some little thing. And they are ignorant because they childishly deceive themselves. For, after they esteemed nothing too highly for the toil [involved in acquiring it], they then admire the toil itself.83

The principle at work is that of the punishment fitting the crime.84 The first tier of afflictions returned to humans for their impiety attacks them directly with vices: penchants for squabbling (ἔρις), for pleasure (ἡδονή), and for mean-spiritedness (μικροψυχία). These work in tandem to produce a second tier, the invention of the technologies of agriculture (ἄροτοι, σπόροι), of mining (μεταλλεῖαι), and of war (πόλεμοι)  – in other words, methods of seizing wealth from the earth and from each other. Acquisitiveness also promoted toil to acquire pleasures. Meanwhile, humanity’s priorities shifted from sharing to hoarding, and to ornamentation and contrivance. The partial rejection of κοινωνία in the creation of τεμένη caused its total obliteration. This narrative also boldly underscores a point that other accounts generally leave at the level of implication: the ancient foundation of religion has ramifications not simply for those primarily responsible, but for their descendants as well.85 The afflictions that the gods return to the transgressors continue to trouble all peoples – except for the Scythians, who still enjoy humanity’s original bliss. The argument here broadly resembles 83  Ep. 9.2: θεοὶ δὲ ἀντὶ τούτων δῶρα πρέποντα ἀντεδωρήσαντο ἔριν καὶ ἡδονὴν καὶ μικροψυχίαν ἀνθρώποις· ἀπὸ τούτων μιγνυμένων τε καὶ διακρινομένων τὰ πάντα ἔφυ κακὰ τοῖς πᾶσι θνητοῖς· ἄροτοι, σπόροι, μεταλλεῖαι, πόλεμοι. καρπούς τε γὰρ ἐπεισενεγκόντες πολλαπλασίους ἀποφέρονται μικρά, τέχναις τε ποικίλλοντες ὀλιγόβιον εὕρηνται τρύφην. γῆς τε χρώματα διαφόρως μαστεύοντες θαῦμα πεποίηνται. τόν τε πρῶτον εὑρόντα τὸ ὀλίγον τοῦτο μακαριστότατον ἄγουσι. καὶ οὐκ ἴσασι παίδων τρόπον ἑαυτοὺς ἐξαπατῶντες. πόνῳ γὰρ τὸ μηδὲν ἐκτιμήσαντες, ἔπειτα τὸν πόνον αὐτὸν θαυμάζουσι. 84 Like Paul in Rom 1:18–32, the author reinforces the justice of the penalty with instances of παρονομασία, here with the repetition of the stem δωρ-. Humans suppose that the gods are “the givers of good things and the averters of evil things” (ἀγαθῶν δοτῆρας καὶ κακῶν ἀποτρόπους ὑπάρχειν), but what they “gave back” (ἀντεδωρήσαντο) as “fitting gifts” (δῶρα πρέποντα) are not benefits but afflictions. 85 The tenses of the verbs facilitate this point. The finite verbs initially are aorists (προσέθησαν, προσένειμαν), pointing back to the time of the poets and beyond to the primordial Greeks. Next we have imperfects of description (Smyth 425, § 1898) or customary action (ibid., 424, § 1893) that explain the general circumstances (ὑπελείποντο, ἐβούλοντο) that lead in turn to definitive events (παρηνόμησαν, ἀντεδωρήσαντο). The next verb is an inchoative imperfect (ἔφυ), marking the beginning of a process that results in current conditions (ἀποφέρονται, εὕρηνται, πεποίηνται, ἄγουσι, ἴσασι). On the one hand, these verbs in the primary tenses are governed by the earlier secondary tenses, insofar as they refer to what the gods set in motion against the transgressors. On the other hand, they refer to behaviors that one need only to look around to see still happening.

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Epicurus’ critique of religion: it is not simply one sickness among many. It is the very wellspring of human misery. And yet, the overall purpose of the letter is not theological but ethical;86 it urges its readers to abandon greed and to conceive of the world as something for both gods and humans to share. One can overcome the odious burden put upon humans by their foolish ancestors by returning to the primordial conditions which they lost because of divine retribution.

5. Wisdom 13–15 on the origin of pagan polytheism Finally, we need to examine how philosophical, historiographic, and rhetorical discussions of the origin of religion impact Hellenistic Jewish thought and argument on the subject. The Pentateuch, of course, addresses not only the origin of the Israelites but also of their special relationship with their God and the rituals that honor him; it thus relays, among other things, a ‘cult-foundation narrative.’ Genesis alights upon the first sacrifices offered to God (by Cain and Abel in 4:1–7) as part of its primordial history (chs. 1–11), but otherwise the text does not deal explicitly with the origin of polytheism or idolatry.87 Hellenistic Jewish authors register an awareness of the discussions about religious origins occurring among the Greeks, however.88 Wisdom of Solomon 13–15 neatly captures the reception of these discussions, fitting them into its arguments for the superiority of Jewish religion.89 In chapters 13 and 14, ‘Solomon’ castigates polytheism 86 The author argues against greed and hedonism with metaphors and an anecdote. In 9.3 he declares that wealth and fields cannot “purchase wisdom,” which he supports by a likening of wealth / hedonism to sickness, for which one calls a doctor. He then employs a slavery / freedom metaphor, and that of a fire burning in the forest. Next he tells a story of an event which he witnessed: a ship which hit a reef because of the weight of its cargo is left behind in grief by the merchants who own it. Robbers later come along, transfer the cargo to their own ship, and then discover that they, too, are now stuck. Finally, he describes the utopia of Scythia. In assessing the significance of his primordial account, one must realize that he balances it with exhortation (supported by analogy and anecdote) designed to free his readers from the moral sickness of wealth and all the concomitant κακά. 87  1 Enoch 7–8 takes some steps toward emending this gap. The text explains that the fallen angels, once they had taken human wives for themselves, began to teach them various technologies, including “magical medicine, incantations, the cutting of roots” (7:1). The next chapter attributes particular skills to angels by name: “Amasras taught incantations; and Armaros the resolving of incantations; and Baraqiyal astrology, and Kokarer’el (the knowledge of) the signs, and Tam’el taught the seeing of the stars, and Asder’el taught the course of the moon as well as the deception of man” (8:3) (trans. per OTP 1:16; for the text as preserved at Qumran, see Florentino García Martínez and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, ed. & trans., The Dead Sea Scrolls: Study Edition [2 vols.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans; Leiden: Brill, 1997–98], 1:400–3). 88  Some certainly know the works of Hecataeus, since authors forge accounts the history of Judaism in his name. See OTP 2:905–18; Carl Holladay, Fragments from Hellenistic Jewish Authors, Volume 1 (SBLTT 20; Chico: Scholars Press, 1983), 277–335. 89 Interpreters tend to locate the work in Hellenistic or Roman Alexandria, somewhere between iii b.c.e. and i c.e. (prior, in any case, to the destruction of Jerusalem’s temple in 70). David Winston (The Wisdom of Solomon: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary [AB 43; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1979], 20–25) dates the work to the reign of Caligula

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from three points of view: (1) the misconstrual of natural phenomena as divinities (13:1–9); (2) the absurdity of the worship of images (13:10–14:11); and (3) the origin of mystery and civic cults, and their relationship with immorality (14:12–31). Chapter 15 contrasts idolatrous behavior with the faithfulness of Israel (15:1–5), maligns the manufacturers of idols further (15:6–13), and describes Egyptian idolatry as especially depraved (15:14–19).90 I shall focus here upon 13:1–9 and 14:12–31, wherein the critical negativity of the six basic theories reaches an apex.91 As in Lucretius’ poem, ‘Solomon’ dispenses first with the more philosophically oriented forms of piety, in order to cut the best ground out from under pagan polytheism (13:1–9).92 ‘Solomon’ invokes the worship of the elements and the stars as the prime illustration of humanity’s innate foolishness (μάταιοι μὲν γὰρ πάντες ἄνθρωποι φύσει, οἷς παρῆν θεοῦ ἀγνωσία, v. 1). Although he does not mark the time-frame as primordial,93 his description of their mistake unambiguously reveals his utilization of the natural theories of Prodicus and Democritus (T1, 3), as popularized by subsequent authors. The error occurred because of cognitive weakness. The beauty, power, nobility, and majesty of the universe daz(37–41 c.e.), since this period saw a great deal of tumult and transition for Alexandrian Jews. See also John J. Collins, Jewish Wisdom in the Hellenistic Age (OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1997), 178–79; Lester L. Grabbe, The Wisdom of Solomon (Guides to Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 87–90. 90 For further discussion of the structure of Wisdom 13–15, see Alec J. Lucas, “Distinct Portraits and Parallel Development of the Knowledge of God in Romans 1:18–32 and Wisdom of Solomon 13–15,” in Christian Body, Christian Self (ed. Clare K. Rothschild and Trevor W. Thompson; WUNT 284; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011), 61–82, 66–67. 91  Because the text of Wisdom is readily available in Rahlfs’ pocket edition of the lxx, and in order to conserve space, I omit quotations of the Greek text below. 92 “13:1 For all humans are indeed vain by nature, those for whom the ignorance of God was present. And from good things which were observed they were not able to know the one who exists, nor did they, by attending to the works, recognize the craftsman. 2 But whether fire, wind, swift air, the circle of the stars, running water, or the luminaries of heaven, the princes of the cosmos, they regarded as gods. 3 If they, delighting in the beauty of these, were apprehending them to be gods, let them know by how much more than these the master is better, for the author of beauty created them. 4 And if they were astonished by power and operation, let them understand from them by how much more the one who fashioned them is powerful. 5 For from the majesty and beauty of created things their originator is analogously observed. 6 But nevertheless the blame is small on these people, for perhaps even they are led astray as they were seeking God and wanting to discover him. 7 For, as they are being turned around by his works, they investigate and are convinced by sight, because what they see is beautiful. 8 But, again, they are not pardonable: 9 for if they were able to know so much – in order that they may be able to calculate the age – how did they not discover their master more quickly?” The phrase ἐν … τοῖς ἔργοις αὐτοῦ ἀναστρεφόμενοι in v. 7 can tolerate a couple of interpretations. The verb ἀναστρέφειν basically means “to turn upside down,” “to invert,” or “to upset” (LSJ 122, s. v.). My rendering above takes this to mean that the works are creating confusion with their beauty, and thus interfering with well-intentioned investigations. It could also, based on the formation of the word (although LSJ does not mention it), perhaps mean “to turn upwards,” i. e., to attend carefully to the movements of the celestial bodies as a method of investigation. 93 Note, however, the aorists and imperfects throughout.

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zled the mind, in spite of the fact that the minds in question belonged to scholars: careful observers of celestial and terrestrial bodies who were seeking information about the divine (θεὸν ζητοῦντες καὶ θέλοντες εὑρεῖν, v. 6) and who were able to “calculate the age” (στοχάσασθαι τὸν αἰῶνα, v. 9), probably a reference to astro­ logy, the province of the learned priests of Babylon and Egypt.94 The author may also have the researches of contemporary philosophers in view as well. Some had indeed accomplished what he expressly denies, the inference of a being that created the universe, established its order, and is identical with neither the whole nor any single part of it. If ‘Solomon’ is aware of this fact, he implies that such thinkers could not entirely break free of their ancestors’ initial error. Nature’s confusion of weak human minds continues unabated. The following section, 13:10–14:11, addresses the origin of religion only indirectly, but in 14:12–31 the subject again returns to the front, this time adapting T4 in a harsh inversion of its applications in Hecataeus and Euhemerus. ‘Solomon’ also follows a pattern that we see in the ninth letter of ‘Anacharsis,’ since he links the foundation of religion with the proliferation of immorality and misery: “For,” he says in the thesis of this section, “the origin of fornication is the contrivance of idols, and their invention is the corruption of life” (ἀρχὴ γὰρ πορνείας ἐπίνοια εἰδώλων, | εὕρεσις δὲ αὐτῶν φθορὰ ζωῆς, 14:12). After elaborating this theme for a couple of lines,95 he begins to make his case, first with an account of the origin of mystery cults (14:15–16).96 Gratitude for bread or wine, or for those who discovered them, did not prompt the creation of the first mystery cult, but the grief of a father for his son, who suffered an untimely death. This theory may initially seem improbable, but it gains strength when one considers the prominence of cults of the dead in Greece and Egypt,97 and the fact that mystery cults sometimes addressed one’s disposition after death. The aggrieved father  Στοχάσασθαι τὸν αἰῶνα could mean “to infer the universe,” as Winston (Wisdom of Solomon, 256–57) argues. It could also refer to Aion, a god who evidently had mysteries in Alexandria in Greco-Roman times (ibid., 257; Aion also appears regularly in the Greek magical papyri as a divinity). I perceive αἰών in this context as temporal, based on the emphasis which the stars and luminaries (as πρυτάνεις κόσμου) receive in 13:2.  Ἴσχυσαν εἰδέναι frames this section, appearing first in 13:1 and then in 13:9. The author therefore does not deny that his subjects’ investigations have produced real knowledge (as opposed to the knowledge they should have acquired) and he seems to have a substantive body of knowledge in mind: astrological calculations. 95  14:13–14: “For they [i. e., εἴδωλα] existed neither from the beginning nor will they exist forever. For they came into the world by human conceit, and because of this their end was planned to be cut short.” 96  “For a father, wasted with untimely grief, by making an image of the child who was prematurely taken, honored the then-dead human now as a god, and he transmitted mysteries and rites of initiation to those under his control. Then, in time, the impious custom as it gained strength was kept as law.” 97 For Greece, see Burkert, Greek Religion, 190–215. For Egypt, see John Baines, Leonard H. Lesko and David P. Silverman, Religion in Ancient Egypt: Gods, Myths, and Personal Practice (ed. Byron E. Schafer: Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 44–52 and 55–57, discussing funerary deities and the availability of the afterlife. 94

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went further, however, than merely revering his dead son’s memory: he created an image (εἰκών) of him, an obvious affront to Jewish religious sensibilities, and organized a mystery cult around him. With the passage of time custom (ἔθος) became law (νόμος). The second example addresses the origin of civic cults in the deification of kings: 14:17 And, by the decrees of tyrants, carvings began to be worshipped, those whom people were unable to honor in person because they lived far away. Having fashioned a likeness of the distant visage they made a visible image of the honored king, in order that they may flatter the absent one as if present through their effort. 18 And the ambition of the craftsman provoked the ignorant to diligence of worship. 19 For he, wishing to please quickly the one who had power, was forcing his likeness to beauty with craft. 20 And the multitude, attracted because of the charm of his labor, now reckoned the honored human (just a short while before) as an object of worship. 21 And this became a trap for life, because humans, having become enslaved by misfortune or by tyranny, conferred the unsharable name on stones and sticks.

The main difference between this account and those of Hecataeus and Euheme­ rus lies in the ascription of motive. The author pointedly ignores any pretense of pious gratitude for royal philanthropy, and replaces it with tyrannical ambition, flattery, and deception. The worship of images also remains the central act of impiety, the transfer of divine honor from its proper object to idols. But the author has departed the territory of human foolishness that resulted in the worship of natural phenomena; wickedness has now amplified the initial error egregiously, compounding oppression and misery. Next, ‘Solomon’ expounds the results, finally joining the narrated events with fornication and the corruption of life: 14:22 Then, to have been deceived about the knowledge of God did not suffice, but also while living in a great war from their ignorance they call such wicked acts “peace.” 23 For, whether they conduct filicidal initiations or secret mysteries, or the raving processions of strange rites, 24 they yet keep neither pure lives nor marriages. But one person, ambushing another, kills him; or corrupting another by adultery, causes him pain. 25 All things are in a state of chaos: blood and murder, theft and deceit, ruin, infidelity, upheaval, oath-breaking, 26 the confusion about what things are good, the forgetting of gratitude, the pollution of lives, the exchange of birth-status,98 the disorder of marriages, adultery, and licentiousness. 27 For the worship of nameless idols is the origin and cause and end of all evil. 28 For they either rave while carousing, or they prophesy falsehoods, or they live unjustly, or they break oaths quickly. 29 For because they have placed their trust in lifeless idols, because they swore wickedly, they do not expect to be injured. 30 In both cases just retributions will accompany them, because they pondered wickedly about God in their devotion to idols; and they swore unjustly, scorning piety with deceit. 31 For not the power of those who swear but justice for those who sin ever goes out against the transgression of the unjust!

98 Winston (Wisdom of Solomon, 280) is probably right to understand γενέσεως ἀναλλαγή to refer to same-sex relations, or, as he renders it, the “interchange of sex roles.”

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The author initially targets religious observances associated with mysteries, including orgiastic celebrations and (implausibly) filicide, which lead to corrupted lives and violated marital vows. The following line implies that these behaviors are habit-forming: participants leave the ceremonies to ambush the unwary or to seduce others’ spouses. He next identifies idolatry as “the origin and cause and end of all evil” (παντὸς ἀρχὴ κακοῦ καὶ αἰτία καὶ πέρας), elaborating with a more extensive list concluding with oath-breaking. Swearing falsely plays a prominent role in the remainder of the passage alongside idolatry, and reveals the logic at work here. God, as the guarantor of justice (including oaths sworn on divine retribution), must punish cases of oath-breaking. But because the wicked swear by gods that are false, they perhaps imagine that nobody exists to enforce the oath; or perhaps that gods whose rites include adultery and murder do not concern themselves with those who violate their oaths. To put this in the context of idolatry itself, the problem is not that God jealously demands worship for himself and rages when he does not receive it. Rather, justice demands that gratitude and worship for the benefits and beauty of creation go to the person responsible for them. One must bestow the title ‘God’ where it belongs. The failure to do so results in the ignorant or wicked utilizing worship toward self-aggrandizing or corrupt ends. But not, ‘Solomon’ declares, without accountability.

6. Summation It will prove helpful prior to turning to Rom 1:18–32 to synthesize some observations about the ancient discussions of the origin of religion discussed above. (1) From a literary standpoint, they do not comprise a ‘genre’ in a formal sense; they appear in a wide variety of contexts  – philosophical poetry and prose, historiography and ethnography, oratory, and letters – and serve the unique purposes of their authors. (2) We have also seen that the six basic theories, especially those of Prodicus and Democritus (T1–4), dominate subsequent considerations of the question, although notable revisions and developments occur. Overall, a rationalistic approach holds all the accounts together, combined with a critical evaluation of traditional religion, from Cleanthes’ and Dio’s mild condescension at one end of the spectrum to Lucretius’ and Wisdom’s vigorous attacks at the other. (3) Nature regularly appears throughout as a mediator of information about the divine (T1–3), even when other theories are invoked. The acquired data may indeed be good or bad, helpful or misleading. Humans may or may not interpret what they learn from nature correctly. The accounts also tend to regard the careful observation of nature as the highest impulse toward piety and a means of correcting the misconceptions enshrined by the ancients in traditional religion. Even Lucretius views the serene contemplation of the cosmos as the proper form of pietas. Finally, (4) the theories and narrative accounts explain not only the circumstances in which the concepts of the divine solidify and religious

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rites emerge, but also how these phenomena become entrenched in all human cultures. Explicitly or implicitly, they posit that the invention of religion marks a monumental turning point in human history toward contemporary civilization. The more negative accounts intensify the event’s importance by attaching the first appearance of other social phenomena to it: Lucretius, a delusional mindset that promotes fear and pointless rituals to soothe it; ‘Anacharsis,’ the deprivation of the primordial κοινωνία of the earth by divine punishment, and the miseries which flow from acquisitiveness; and ‘Solomon,’ the widespread dissemination of immorality, especially fornication and oath-breaking. In conclusion, the features which unite these accounts include a posture of skepticism toward traditional religion, the derivation of myths and rituals in the actions of humans and not gods, and a rationalistic historical outlook.99

III. Paul’s Account in Rom 1:18–32 At various points in the history of scholarship, interpreters have raised the possibility that Paul delivers in Rom 1:18–32 an account of the primordial origin of religion. Paul Althaus in his commentary (19599), like most others, believes Paul to be outlining events that recur throughout history, but in an excursus titled 99 Interpreters of Rom 1:18–32 often assert Paul’s dependence upon Wisdom 13–15 or a similar Hellenistic Jewish text (e. g., Dodd, Romans, 27: “There is a long passage, [Wisdom] chaps. xiii.–xiv., dealing with this subject. Paul follows the line of thought so closely that our present passage might be taken as a summary of it”). Aside from the fact that Paul does not indicate his awareness of Wisdom with discernable allusions in wording (see Sanday and Headlam, Romans, 51–52), the accounts offered by them deviate significantly. The most important deviation lies in the starting-points of their accounts, as Lucas (“Distinct Portraits,” 72–73) points out: Wisdom begins with human ignorance, while Paul begins with human knowledge. Their mutual invocation of nature to explain how people have a concept of the divine is, as we have seen, a commonplace of the whole discussion. Another major area of similarity – the co-emergence of religion and vice – appears also in the ninth letter of ‘Anacharsis.’ Indeed, Paul’s logic more closely resembles that of ‘Anacharsis,’ since both attribute the linkage to divine revenge for impiety. ‘Solomon,’ in contrast, blames idolatry itself, as inevitably leading to broken marriages and oaths, in addition to murder and other criminal acts. Paul might indeed be aware of Wisdom. This possibility should not lead one to dismiss or minimize his independent engagement with the various theories of the origin of religion as mediated to him from both Greco-Roman and Hellenistic Jewish sources. Paul enters the debate with his own appropriation of the existing theories, which he aims toward his specific argumentative objective: to show that the primordial invention of polytheism left deep wounds on the minds and hearts of all humans, which in turn resulted in comprehensive human culpability before the eschatological divine tribunal. One of my objectives in setting forth the accounts as I have above is to show the dissemination of the basic theories beyond the province of philosophy from which they spring. Paul does not need to have read any of the authors discussed above – nor does his audience of Roman Christians – in order to have encountered the basic theories. The most probable means of exposure was oratory of a popular-philosophical variety, heard either at festivals (a most suitable context for speeches on religious topics), or the public squares in the form of diatribes.

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“Ur-Offenbarung und Ur-Schuld,”100 he coordinates this reading with the premise that Paul is dealing also with the primordial foundation of pagan polytheism: Paulus will die Geschichte der Menschheit erzählen. Er redet von der Entstehung des Heidentums als vergangenem Geschehen. Die nachfolgenden Geschlechter und die Einzelnen sind durch diese Ur-Geschichte ein für alle Mal bestimmt. Die Schuld steht am Anfange. Aber alle sind schludig. Nicht nur, weil die Menschheit als Ganzheit zu erfallen ist, in der die Ersten für alle und alle in und mit den Ersten handeln. Sondern für Paulus widerholt sich die Gesamtgeschichte immer wieder in jedem Geschlechte, ja in den Einzelnen.101

Althaus goes on to explain that the present tenses in vv. 19–20 extend the primordial scenario to every subsequent generation and person. Hans Dieter Betz (1991) offers a succinct reading of Rom 1:18–32 as an account of the origin of “a primal religion on earth  … depending on Greek theories of the origin of religion, theories probably transmitted through Hellenistic Judaism.”102 Stanley K. Stowers (1994) relates the passage to ancient discussions of the origins of culture, particularly ones which perceive the march of history as a decline from humanity’s original state of bliss. He astutely notes the parallels between 1:18–32 and [Anacharsis], Ep. 9, as well as Seneca’s Ep. 90.103 Dale B. Martin (1995) suggests Paul’s presupposition of a “Jewish mythological narrative about the origin of idolatry.”104 When other commentators mention these authors’ suggestions (which is rare), they do so dismissively.105 But once an examination of the ancient sources on the origin of religion has occurred, a strong provisional impression 100  Althaus, Der Brief an die Römer (9th ed.; NTD 6; Göttingen: Vandenhoecht & Ruprecht, 1959), 18–19. 101  Althaus, an die Römer, 18. 102  Betz, “Christianity as Religion: Paul’s Attempt at Definition in Romans,” in idem, Paulinische Studien: Gesammelte Aufsätze III (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1994), 206–39, 216–18; the quotation is from 216. 103  Stowers, Rereading of Romans, 85–100, esp. 97–100. Stowers is certainly right to point to the connections between 1:18–32 and primitivist accounts of the origin of culture. As noted earlier, the origin of religion certainly has a place in the broader question of cultural origins, and occasionally the former arises in the context of the latter, although, as I have shown above, it exists independently from the point of its inception in the theories of Prodicus, Democritus, and Critias. The accounts of the origin of religion thus provide a more precise comparative field. 104  Martin, “Heterosexism and the Interpretation of Romans 1:18–32,” BibInt 3 (1995): 332– 55, 332. He continues: “Since the first chapters of Genesis do not explicitly recount the beginnings of idolatry and polytheism, Jews in Paul’s day had filled in the missing data in different ways. Although accounts differ from one another, all of them place the beginnings of idolatry and polytheism at some point after the time of Adam: rabbinic sources variously ascribe the invention of idolatry to Kenan, Enosh (the son of Seth), or the people of Enosh’s generation.” 105   E. g., Käsemann, Romans, 42; Moo, Romans, 98. Robert Jewett (Romans: A Commentary [ed. Eldon Jay Epp; asst. Roy D. Kotansky; Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007], 156–57) strangely says: “The shift from present tense verbs in vv. 18–20 to aorist verbs in vv. 21–23 signals a turn to the representatives of an archaic past who turned away from the truth and imposed a grim future upon their descendants.” Next, he cites Fitzmyer’s invocation of the gnomic aorist (designed to refute a primordial time-frame; see n. 9 above), and proceeds to make no interpretive use of this insight in the remainder of his analysis.

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that Paul is contributing an account of his own becomes difficult to avoid. He explains how humans acquired a concept of the divine, including key attributes, deploying creation as a source of information about God; he identifies the kind of religion founded, namely a polytheism with both anthropomorphic and theriomorphic deities involving the use of cultic images; and, he has a definite opinion on the question of whether the foundation of religion was a good or bad turn in human history. I thus seek in the present section to apply this provisional impression to interpretation of the passage, in order to explain how Paul composes his account and how he applies it in his argument. Some accounts treat the origin of religion abstractly, while others use narratives. If one approaches Rom 1:18–32 with this in mind, one can see that it relays a very concise narrative as well. How, then, does this narrative relate to what comes before it in the introduction (προοίμιον, 1:1–15) and thesis (πρόθεσις, 1:16–17), and after in the rest of the letter? In other words, can one correlate the position and function of 1:18–32 with the ancient rhetorical theory on how to organize a composition (τάξις)? It turns out that one can. In a speech the narrative (διήγησις) sets forth the background facts relevant to the thesis and proofs (πίστεις), and it often sits either immediately before or after the thesis.106 The theorists also help with compehension of the style: many identify three “virtues” or “excellences” (ἀρεταί) of a διήγησις: clarity, conciseness and plausibility (σαφήνεια, συντομία, πιθανότης).107 Paul utilizes the theories of the origin of religion to achieve all three stylistic objectives, especially conciseness. The passage has six structural components: (1) the announcement of the sub-proposition (1:18–19a) for the first stage of the argument (1:18–3:20), the demonstration of universal human culpability before the eschatological divine tribunal; (2) God’s installation of creation with revelatory capacity, id est, the ability to deliver an accurate concept of the divine (1:19b–20); (3) the botched reception of the concept by the human mind, which in turn misinformed the heart’s worship, causing the foundation of pagan polytheism (1:21–23); (4) the punishment of the heart by misdirection of the desires (1:24–27), with a recapitulation in v. 25 to underscore the justice of the penalty; (5) the punishment of the mind through the deprivation of moral reasoning (1:28–31); and (6) a conclusion that explains the entrenchment of immorality up to and beyond Paul’s present day (1:32). His account thus merges the theories of the origin of religion with anthropological premises: the ancestors bequeath to their descendants broken hearts and minds, 106  See David E. Aune’s table of the five‑ or six-part arrangement schemes (The Westminster Dictionary of New Testament and Early Christian Literature and Rhetoric [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003), 64, s. v. “Arrangement”). I quote Dionysius’ (Lys. 17) and Anonymous Seguerianus’ (Rhet. 161–66) observations on an orator’s freedom in the placement of the πρόθεσις relative to the διήγησις at Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 53, nn. 43–44. 107 See Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 49–55, 64–67, for discussion of the sources on the virtues of the διήγησις.

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such that the origin of religion becomes the origin of comprehensive human condemnation. It is essential to recognize at the outset that he does not have either Gentiles or Jews specifically in view.108 The events that he narrates occurred long before God’s election of Abraham. The law and the covenant established at Sinai cannot, as Paul later argues in Romans 2–3, correct the flaws in the heart and mind handed down to all humans by their foolish ancestors.

1. Sub-proposition (1:18–19a) 18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven upon every impiety and injustice of humans who suppress the truth in injustice, 19 since that which is knowable about God is manifest among them.109

Paul structures v. 18 in a very similar manner to v. 17, although the significance of this observation has prompted some debate. A desire to keep divine justice (δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ) rigidly separated from divine wrath (ὀργὴ θεοῦ) leads some to read the conjunction γάρ in v. 18 adversatively – as if it were δέ or ἀλλά.110 I argue elsewhere that δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ in v. 17 fully encompasses divine justice: both the positive and the negative, the rewarding and the punitive, in the context of the eschatological trial.111 God’s justice is indeed both the problem and the solution at the same level of universality. The first stage of Paul’s argument in 1:18–3:20, which has 1:19b–32 as its διήγησις, seeks to demonstrate that no human can escape condemnation. The gospel, he later declares, empowers acquittal without violation of the integrity of divine justice (3:26, εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτὸν δίκαιον καὶ δικαιοῦντα τὸν ἐκ πίστεως  Ἰησοῦ). While the main proposition of Romans in 1:16–17 gives a functional definition of the gospel with an abbreviated proof, v. 18 issues an indictment, and names the specific charges: impiety (ἀσέβεια, offenses committed against God) and injustice (ἀδικία, offenses committed against fellow humans).112 Some major shifts in emphasis also occur between the abbrealso Cranfield, Romans, 1:105–6. (Romans, 149) detects Paul’s use of some rhetorical figures in v. 19, especially the alliterative repetition of the α-privative and the apparent redundancy of ἀδικία (πλεονασμός). He also mentions ἰσόκωλον (“three lines of 13 syllables apiece,” although this seems less likely), and ὁμοιοτέλευτον in the genitive plural endings (“thus producing the following rhyme” with ἀνθρώπων and κατεχόντων concluding their lines). 110 So Käsemann, Romans, 35 (“Verses 17 and 18 are deliberate antithetical parallels”); Fitzmyer, Romans, 277; Dunn, Romans, 1:54 (but cf. 1:70); Dodd, Romans, 18. Several other maintain the more normal meaning of γάρ as “for”: Cranfield, Romans, 1:106–8; Barrett, Romans, 33; Jewett, Romans, 151–52. 111 Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 157–68. 112 Curiously, there is reluctance among some interpreters to let ἀδικία and ἀσέβεια retain their (essentially legal) meanings of “injustice” and “impiety.” For example, Käsemann flatly denies that they refer to “religious and moral offenses”: “Both are comprised, as a kind of hendiadys, in ἀδικία, which as in 3:5 obviously stands opposed to the righteousness of God and for this reason can be associated with ἀσέβεια …. Conversely, ἀδικία protects against understanding ἀσέβεια in a purely cultic sense” (Romans, 38). See also Fitzmyer, Romans, 278; Cranfield, 108 See

109 Jewett

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viated proof in v. 17 and the sub-proposition qua indictment in v. 18. The gospel in the former is God’s power of salvation because it reveals God’s justice from faith to faith (from the faith of the proclaimer to the faith of those who receive it),113 fulfilling the oracle in Hab 2:4. In the latter, the gospel confronts humanity with the dire consequences of impiety and injustice: it is a message from heaven that discloses why salvation is required.114 Acquittal can come from no other source, not even God’s own Torah. So, how did this state of affairs come to pass? And who are the culprits? What is the “truth” that they “suppressed”?115 What do their “impiety” and “injustice” concretely entail? Verse 19 identifies the “truth” in view as “that which is knowable about God” (τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ) which is “manifest” (φανερόν). Τὸ γνωστόν places a limitation on how much γνῶσις humans have,116 but Paul plainly asserts their possession of a true concept of the divine, that is, (1) that God exists with predicates differentiating him from humans and anything else within creation, and (2) that he demands εὐσέβεια and δικαιοσύνη. These knowable facts remain continuously available, implying continuous suppression as well. How then did humans acquire this knowledge and how did they respond when they received it?

2. Divine self-manifestation and human response (1:19b–23) 19 For God manifested it to them.117 20 For his invisible aspects from the time of the world’s creation are perceived, being understood by the things made, both his eternal Romans, 1:111–12; Moo, Romans, 102–3. While I disagree with those who see each word as covering half of the Ten Commandments (the Torah has not yet entered the picture), I see no reason to collapse the two into one another and to obliterate their distinct meanings (so too Jewett, Romans, 52). 113 For arguments in support of this analysis, see Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 169–87. 114  So also Cranfield, Romans, 1:109–10: “ὀργὴ θεοῦ is also being revealed in the gospel, that is, in the ongoing proclamation of the gospel.” 115  Käsemann (Romans, 38) is probably right to call attention to the sinister connotations that κατέχειν carries with it by virtue of its common usage in binding spells (defixiones) and other curses. See Faraone, “The Agonistic Context of Early Greek Binding Spells,” in Magika Hiera: Ancient Greek Magic and Religion (ed. idem and Dirk Obbink; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 3–32, 4–10 on binding formulae, also 25, n. 27. The suppression might thus acquire the force of a curse cast by the primordial humans against their descendants. 116  The other option for rendering τὸ γνωστόν is “known” (BDAG 204, s. v., “that which is known about God”). This reading may receive some support from γνόντες τὸν θεόν in v. 21. The two options in this context may amount to the same result, with “known” emphasizing the transmission of real knowledge with no commitment to its completeness, and “knowable” restricting the amount of knowledge obtainable through creation. 117 Some commentators overemphasize the significance of Paul’s shift from ἀποκαλύπτεσθαι to φανερόν and φανεροῦν (e. g., Fitzmyer, Romans, 273, 279–80). The two verbs are virtually synonymous, although each carries a distinct resonance. In ἀποκαλύπτεσθαι, revelation happens by “uncovering” something hidden (LSJ 201, s. v.); in φανεροῦν, the object is in plain view because the subject put it there (BDAG 1048, s. v.), without any implication of it initially having been hidden.

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power and divinity, with the result that they are without defense, 21 since, although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or give thanks, but were made futile in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened. 22 Asserting themselves to be wise, they were made fools, 23 and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the likeness of an image of a mortal human, of birds, of quadropeds, and of reptiles.

Paul fits his entire account of the origin of religion into these five verses, so that he can devote the rest of the narrative to its catastrophic consequences. Some ancient rhetorical theorists in their treatments of conciseness divide it into methods of style (λέξις) and of content (γνώμη, πρᾶγμα).118 Regarding the latter, they advise the omission of details which one can presuppose the audience to know already in order to maintain a sharp focus on the relevant facts. The basic theories, particularly those of Prodicus and Democritus, furnish Paul with the tools to achieve brevity, as well as clarity and plausibility, since he deploys them as if they hold irrefutable authority. T3, the inference of a more powerful creator from the complexities, beauty and regularity of nature, obviously informs vv. 19b–20, but with some adaptations. Paul stresses God’s intent: the process he describes is not some passive by-product, but a direct manifestation of τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ. He installs creation with theophanic capacity at the level of its design at its initial execution. Another revision relates to the language of creation (κτίσις) rather than nature (φύσις), in the temporal clause ἀπὸ κτίσεως κόσμου,119 and in the dative of means τοῖς ποιήμασιν. The concept of the divine transmitted to the human mind covers God’s attributes which Paul labels as invisible (τὰ ἀόρατα), namely his power (δύναμις) and divinity (θειότης) which are eternal (ἀΐδιος).120 These two attributes presumably cover not only the existence of God as creator, but also other abilities and attributes which make him vastly superior to humans or any other organism within the created order.121 Finally, Paul underscores the method of acquisition of the concept, observation (καθορᾶται) supported by cognition (νοούμενα). Therefore, God intended a process of (a) creation’s delivery of a concept of the divine; (b) acquisition of the concept by the human mind; and (c) the invention of pious religion addressing the attributes displayed by him in his creation of the cosmos. The present tense of καθορᾶται indicates that creation is still sending its messages, while ἀπὸ κτίσεως κόσμου introduces the primordial time-frame of the rest of the narrative. Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions, 47–48, 65–67.  Interpreters generally agree that this phrase is temporal, e. g., Barrett, Romans, 35; Sanday and Headlam, Romans, 42–43; Fitzmyer, Romans, 280; Cranfield, Romans, 1:114; Jewett, Romans, 155. 120 Burkert, Greek Religion, 307: “Its divinity exists, in true Greek fashion, in its eternity and power.” I would argue that ἀίδιος, like αὐτοῦ, belongs with δύναμις and θειότης; regarding a single adjective construing with two nouns, see Smyth 274, § 1030. 121 Sanday and Headlam (Romans, 43) may be right in their assertion that “δύναμις is a single attribute, θειότης is a summary term for those other attributes which constitute Divinity.” 118 See 119

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Unfortunately, Paul continues, God’s purpose did not come to fruition, as the result clause in v. 20 already declares (εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτοὺς ἀναπολογήτους).122 Despite the successful delivery of the concept (γνόντες τὸν θεόν), a grave error occurred, the failure to return to God the piety owed to him, to “glorify him as God and give thanks.”123 The breakdown occurred in the διαλογισμοί which rendered the ancestors vain.124 These διαλογισμοί probably refer to their minds’ “reasonings” based upon the information they received, but it could also mean “arguments,” debates between them on the best way forward.125 The second half of v. 21 introduces the anthropological concept of “heart” into the picture. The mind, the part of the human initially engaged in perception of and cognition about τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ, and failing in its reasonings, misinformed the heart, the part of the human that feels gratitude and offers worship.126 The next two verses elaborate both elements, explaining why the mind failed (intellectual arrogance, φάσκοντες εἶναι σοφοὶ ἐμωράνθησαν), and identiftying the objects of the heart’s worship. The invention of religion involved the deification of both humans and several kinds of animals. Paul does not specify why this happened. Once again, he depends on his readers to furnish the information from their own knowledge as a strategy of brevity of content. The theories of Prodicus must be in play. In imagining their gods to have the shapes of animals, the ancients were in effect deifying the benefits which those animals afford or represent, and for which they were grateful (T1).127 Individual humans received divine honors 122  Interpreters tend to overlook (or ignore) the legal character of ἀναπολόγητος (an exception is Jewett, Romans, 156) with the result that the forensic-eschatological meaning of ὀργὴ θεοῦ diminishes. The narrative which follows accounts for the origin of the universal threat insofar as it explains the principle of justice that stimulates wrath and does not merely illustrate its operations in history. 123 On gratitude as a component of piety, see the literature cited by Jewett, Romans, 157–58. 124  The verb ματαιοῦν here is one of the verbal links between Rom 1:18–32 and Wisdom 13–15 (13:1) that have led some to assert Paul’s dependence on the latter. The margin of the NA27 ad loc. points to a couple of other relevant passages, namely Jer 2:5 (τάδε λέγει κύριος Τί εὕροσαν οἱ πατέρες ὑμῶν ἐν ἐμοὶ πλημμέλημα, ὅτι ἀπέστησαν μάκραν ἀπ᾽ ἐμοῦ καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν ὀπίσω τῶν ματαίων καὶ ἐματαιώθησαν) and lxx Ps 93:11 (κύριος γινώσκει τοὺς διαλογισμοὺς τῶν ἀνθρώπων ὅτι εἰσὶν μάταιος, see also Jewett, Romans, 158). The second presents a much more compelling parallel than Wisdom 13:1, an ‘echo’ that enhances the biblical style of the narrative; see regarding 1:23 below. 125  LSJ 402, s. v. II, III; BDAG 232–33, s. v., 1, 3. 126  On the heart as the part of the human that offers worship and gives thanks, cf. Eph 5:19–20 (λαλοῦντες ἑαυτοῖς [ἐν] ψαλμοῖς καὶ ὕμνοις καὶ ᾠδαῖς πνευματικαῖς, ᾄδοντες καὶ ψάλλοντες τῇ καρδίᾳ ὑμῶν τῷ κυρίῳ, εὐχαριστοῦντες πάντοτε ὑπὲρ πάντων ἐν ὀνόματι τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν  Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τῷ θεῷ καὶ πατρί); Col 3:16 (ψαλμοῖς ὕμνοις ᾠδαῖς πνευματικαῖς ἐν [τῇ] χάριτι ᾄδοντες ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ὑμῶν τῷ θεῷ). Note also Rom 5:5, where ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ θεοῦ ἐκκέχυται ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ἡμῶν διὰ πνεύματος ἁγίου τοῦ δοθέντος ἡμῖν, and Gal 4:6, where ἐξαπέστειλεν ὁ θεὸς τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ εἰς τὰς καρδίας ἡμῶν κρᾶζον, Αββα ὁ πατήρ. Finally, Marcus Aurelius, 2.3.3: ἀλλὰ ἵλεως, ἀληθῶς, καὶ ἀπὸ καρδίας εὐχάριστος τοῖς θεοῖς. 127 Some readers detect in v. 23 a dig at Egyptian religion in particular, as in Wisdom 15:14– 19, e. g. Käsemann, Romans, 45–46. If so, I would regard Paul to be invoking the premise that

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because of their helpful inventions or royal εὐεργεσία (T4). Paul pointedly omits the deification of the celestial bodies and meteorological phenomena that one might expect from the utilization of T3 in vv. 19b–20, with the implication that the ancestors gave their animalistic and humanistic deities power over the sun, the moon, the stars, the elements, and the seasons. He instead concentrates more intently on the act which exacerbates their impiety: they created cult-images, and thereby exchanged of divine glory for “the likeness of an image.” Paul additionally uses several strategies of brevity of style (λέξις) in v. 23 in order to load it with dense meaning. First, his wording simultaneously evokes Gen 1:26 and lxx Ps 105:19–20.128 He deploys these echoes to import not content, as scholars sometimes suppose, but concepts from these texts. From Gen 1:26, he draws the idea of God’s creation of the human in his “image” and “likeness,”129 and thereby he criticizes the primordial ancestors for their worship of an artificially created “likeness of an image,” something two steps removed from the real God.130 From lxx Ps 105:19–20, he captures the notion of idolatry as the “exchange of glory,” an action of which the Israelites were guilty when they worshipped the golden calf at Mt. Horeb.131 These echoes enrich Paul’s account with the texture of recognizable biblical diction and with the sense that it conforms to principles familiar from the scriptures. Second, Paul maximizes the semantic possibilities of the “glory of God.” On the one hand, the genitive is possessive. God has “glory” by virtue of his θειότης, “glory” which the ancient humans themselves had (and could thus exchange) by virtue of their descent from Adam, and something about which they learned earlier in the narrative (the δόξα of the creator necessarily surpasses that of his creation, T3).132 On the other hand, “glory,” in the sense of “praise,” is something the ancestors should have given to God but did not (οὐχ ὡς θεὸν ἐδόξασαν ἢ ηὐχαρίστησαν); the genitive is thus also objective.133 Finally, the contrast of immortal God and mortal creature (ἄφθαρτος, φθαρτός) picks up another aspect of nature’s revelation. An obvious corrolary of God’s ἀΐδιος δύναμις καὶ θειότης is his immortality. The ancestors knew enough ancient Egypt was the cradle of human civilization, and remains the culture which preserves the oldest traditions, as argued by Hecataeus. Dressing the first acts of human polytheism in Egyptian garb would thus boost the credibility of Paul’s account. 128 Fitzmyer (Romans, 283) also calls attention to Deut 4:16–18, and Käsemann (Romans, 45) to Jer 2:11. 129 Gen 1:26: καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός, ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν καὶ ὁμοίωσιν, καὶ ἀρχέτωσαν τῶν ἰχθύων τῆς θαλάσσης καὶ τῶν πετεινῶν τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ τῶν κτηνῶν καὶ πάσης τῆς γῆς καὶ πάντων τῶν ἑρπετῶν τῶν ἑρπόντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. 130 Hooker, “Adam in Romans 1,” 303–4. 131 Ps lxx 105:19–20: καὶ ἐποίησαν μόσχον ἐν Χωρηβ καὶ προσεκύνησαν τῷ γλυπτῷ· καὶ ἠλλάξαντο τὴν δόξαν αὐτῶν ἐν ὁμοιώματι μόσχου ἔσθοντος χόρτον. 132 Cf. the possessive genitive with δόξα in Rom 3:7, εἰ δὲ ἡ ἀλήθεια τοῦ θεοῦ ἐν τῷ ἐμῷ ψεύσματι ἐπερίσσευσεν εἰς τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ, τί ἔτι κἀγὼ ὡς ἁμαρτωλὸς κρίνομαι; Hooker, “Adam in Romans 1,” 305. 133 Cf. Rom 2:7, 10, where δόξα is one of the rewards at the eschatological trial.

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to predicate immortality to the gods in their concept of the divine; they were, however, too stupid to bestow the attribute where it belonged and instead made gods out of images of mortal creatures. Therefore, Paul deploys several strategies of brevity, both in content and style, in his account of the origin of pagan polytheism, in conformity with the rhetorical theorists’ advice that a διήγησις should be concise. His ability to presuppose his readers’ knowledge of the basic theories, particularly of the role of nature in conveying information about the divine to the human mind, permits him to skip several steps in the narrative’s logical flow. He can thus direct attention to his primary points, that God intented to use his κτίσις and τὰ ποιήματα as theophanic instruments toward the foundation of pious religion; and, that vanity and arrogance caused the mind to misconstrue the theophany, leading to the misplacement of the heart’s worship and the foundation of impious religion. Paul has so far told only the first part of the story, however. These events have permanent and universal consequences, and he is concerned foremost with them. The mind and heart now become the targets of divine wrath, and the means of punishing the ancestors for their impious invention.

3. Punishment of the heart (1:24–27) 1:24 Therefore, God handed them over by means of the desires of their hearts into impurity, in order that their bodies were dishonored among them 25 who exchanged the truth of God with the falsehood, and revered and worshipped the creation instead of the creator, who is blessed forever, amen. 26 For this reason God handed them over to dishonorable passions, for their females exchanged the natural usage for one contrary to nature, 27 and likewise also the males, forsaking the natural usage of the female, were enflamed with their yearning for one another, males with males producing shame, and receiving in themselves the penalty which was necessary for their deception.

The next phase of the narrative features several interpretive problems. First, the structure of the passage requires explanation, since the repetition of παρέδωκεν has led many exegetes to perceive two distinct instances of “handing over.”134 The strongest argument against this perception and in favor of seeing a single “handing over,” emerges from the role of the heart throughout, as I shall elaborate below. In my analysis, v. 24 announces the punishment of the heart; v. 25 recapitulates the first phase of the narrative; and vv. 26–27 set forth the tangible manifestations of ἀκαθαρσία that lead to ἀτιμάζεσθαι τὰ σώματα αὐτῶν. 134   E. g., Käsemann, Romans, 44 (vv. 22–24, 25–27, 28–31); Moo, Romans, 96 (vv. 21–24, 25–26a, 26b–31; he gives a different breakdown at 107: vv. 22–24; 25–27; 28–31); cf. Lucas, “Distinct Portraits,” 64–65 (vv. 22–23, 24–25, 26–27, 28–32). Dunn (Romans, 1:53), endorsed by Fitzmyer (Romans, 276), perceives the structure differently (vv. 19–23, sin against the truth of God; vv. 24–27, sin against nature; vv. 28–32, sin against other human beings). First, one should note that the language of “sin” is utterly absent in this passage. Second, Dunn’s account neglects the feature of causality – of action and reaction – that makes it a narrative.

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Second, the passage makes it clear that the heart is not just the part of the human that feels gratitude and offers worship. It is also, more generally, the seat of human emotion, hosting desires (ἐπιθυμίαι), passions (πάθη), and yearning (ὄρεξις) – in short, sexual impulses. This observation helps to explain the role of the recapitulation in v. 25. Like ‘Anacharsis,’ Paul applies the principle of the penalty fitting the crime.135 God punished the ancestors using the desires of their hearts because of how they used their hearts earlier: ἐσεβάσθησαν καὶ ἐλάτρευσαν τῇ κτίσει παρὰ τὸν κτίσαντα. The recapitulation furthermore underlines the parity of crime and penalty by initially describing the offense as the “exchange” of the “truth of God for a lie” (μετήλλαξαν τὴν ἀλήθειαν τοῦ θεοῦ ἐν τῷ ψεύδει). Paul is addressing the durability of religious traditions. Once the ancestors established pagan polytheism and the veneration of images, they became a permanent feature of human culture. He has now elaborated the suppression of truth in v. 18: the invention of impious religion interferes with any future recovery of the truth from creation’s continuing revelation of τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ. The justice of the penalty receives even further reinforcement from the repetition of language and ideas. The ancestors “exchanged” (ἤλλαξαν, μετήλλαξαν) the glory of God for images and the truth for a lie; so also the women “exchanged” the “natural usage” for one “against nature” (αἵ τε γὰρ θήλειαι αὐτῶν μετήλλαξαν τὴν φυσικὴν χρῆσιν εἰς τὴν παρὰ φύσιν). They failed to “glorify” God (οὐχ ὡς θεὸν ἐδόξασαν); he caused their bodies to be “dishonored” (ἀτιμάζεσθαι), and they suffer “dishonorable passions” (πάθη ἀτιμίας) and “shame” (ἀσχημοσύνη). All of this revolves around the heart, initially the culprit and finally the victim. Third, some ancient and modern interpreters weaken the force of παρέδωκεν in vv. 24 and 26, characterizing it in terms of permission, of allowing people to do what they want anyway.136 On the contrary, God’s wrath is not a passive force in the narrative. It does not step out of the way of human desires but actively and purposefully contorts them.137 Prior to the punishment, the ancestors must 135 This idea has a home in Hellenistic Judaism as well. Käsemann (Romans, 43) cites Wisdom 11:16 (δι᾽ ὧν τις ἁμαρτάνει, διὰ τούτων κολάζεται), T. Gad 5:9–10 (“For God brought on me a disease of the liver …. For by whatever human capacity anyone transgresses, by that he is also chastised,” trans. per OTP 1:815), and Jub. 4:32 (“Therefore it is ordained in the heavenly tables: ‘With the same weapons with which a man kills his fellow he shall be killed, just as he wounded him, thus shall they do to him,’” trans. per OTP 2:64). (Käsemann also cites 1QS 4:11–12, but this does not strike me as a suitable parallel.) 136 Cranfield, Romans, 1:120–21; Dunn, Romans, 1:62–63. Käsemann (Romans, 47) has it right: “Moral perversion is the result of God’s wrath, not the reason for it.” See also Sanday and Headlam, Romans, 45. Moo (Romans, 110–11) takes a middle line: on the one hand, “[c]learly [Paul] cannot be saying that God impelled people to sin”; on the other hand, “God does not simply let the boat go – he gives it a push downstream.” 137 Jewett (Romans, 166–68), depending on the research of Wiard Popkes (Christus Traditus: Eine Untersuchung zum Begriff der Dahingebe im Neuen Testament [ATANT 49; Zürich: Zwingli, 1967], 83–85), argues against reading ἐν ταῖς ἐπιθυμίαις τῶν καρδιῶν αὐτῶν as instrumental, as I perceive it: “When παρέδωκεν is followed by the dative and then by an εἰς clause indicating the purpose, it is a technical expression for the police or courts in turning someone over to official

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have recognized ἡ φυσικὴ χρῆσις, and been fully aware that any deviation from it brings dishonor and shame. God’s punitive action would have no force if its targets were not doing what they knew to be wrong. This point raises another important presupposition: the knowledge of right and wrong, which Paul later describes as φύσει τὰ τοῦ νόμου ποιεῖν (2:14), is apparently part of τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ, id est, that God is just and demands conformity to the right. Regarding the style of 1:24–27, one immediately notices a relaxation of the brevity exhibited in vv. 19b–23. I have already mentioned the repetitions. Paul also could easily have fit most of vv. 26–27 into a much shorter period. The final participial phrase in v. 27 hammers home the justice of the punishment, even its necessity: τὴν ἀντιμισθίαν ἣν ἔδει τῆς πλάνης αὐτῶν ἐν ἑαυτοῖς ἀπολαμβάνοντες. This recapitulation of the recapitulation in v. 25 takes up the theme of the invention of impious religion as the falsification of truth, a deception. The contrast between the βραχυλογία in vv. 19b–23 and the μακρολογία in vv. 24–27, which will continue through vv. 28–31, unambiguously reveals Paul’s priority of utilizing the origin of pagan polytheism to explain something else, the pervasiveness

custody for the purpose of punishment.” Therefore, the prepositional phrase indicates “the custody into which sinful humans are delivered as a consequence of their suppression of the truth. They are … handed over to the control of their own desires.” Παραδιδόναι indeed regularly appears with the dative of indirect object, referring to the person into whose custody the direct object is delivered (e. g., Matt 5:25 par. Luke 12:58; Matt 27:2), and Paul’s letters have an exact instance of this, as Jewett notes, in 1 Cor 5:5: παραδοῦναι τὸν τοιοῦτον τῷ σατανᾷ εἰς ὄλεθρον τῆς σαρκός. There are two problems with Jewett’s analysis. First, neither BDAG (326–30, s. v.), nor LSJ (551–52, s. v.), nor Smyth (376–77, § 1687) mention the use of an ἐν-phrase as a substitute for a simple dative of indirect object. (BAGD 261, s. v., IV.4a, mentions some instances of ἐν standing “for the ordinary dative,” but the cases cited do not include indirect objects.) BDF (118, § 220) notes that “occasionally ἐν appears also to stand for the customary dat. proper,” but weakens this assertion by providing viable alternatives, e. g., Gal 1:16: “ἀποκαλύψαι τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ ἐν ἐμοί ‘to me’ (cf. 12) or ‘in my case’ (‘in me’ i. e. ‘in my spirit’ would be unnatural).” (BDF misrepresents the text here; the point is not that God revealed his Son to Paul, but that he intended to reveal the Son with him, by means of him.) Even if one can identify clear instances of an ἐν-phrase replacing the dative of indirect object, one must regard them as unusual. The second problem is that sometimes παραδιδόναι εἰς occurs without a dative, with the prepositional phrase indicating the punishment (Matt 10:21, εἰς θανατόν; 24:9, εἰς θλῖψιν; Acts 8:3, εἰς φυλακήν; 2 Cor 4:11, εἰς θανατόν), or the person (Matt 10:7, εἰς συνέδρια; Acts 21:11, εἰς χεῖρας ἐθνῶν, using the rhetorical figure συνεκδοχή) and in one instance both (Luke 21:12, εἰς τὰς συναγωγὰς καὶ τὰς φυλακάς). In Rom 1:24, both εἰς ἀκαθαρσίαν and the genitive articular infinitive clause that follows indicate the punishment, God’s purpose in handing “them” over. Given that Paul is aware of how to construct the “technical expression” properly, it is difficult to ascertain why he would use a prepositional phrase with ἐν to indicate the expected indirect object. It would be better to perceive him to use the prepositional phrase to avoid confusion: he does not want the phrase understood to refer to an indirect object, but to the instrument or means by which the punishment occurs. Jewett’s reading and mine largely end up in the same place, with human beings imprisoned by their bent desires. The desires are not, however, inherently bent; they have a normal function of stimulating ‘natural’ sexuality among other things, and only become an inescapable prison when God contorts them toward inappropriate objects.

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of immorality. The expansive language simultaneously amplifies the severity of the penalty against the heart and its absolute fairness.

4. The punishment of the mind (1:28–31) and conclusion (1:32) 1:28 And just as they did not discern it to be worthwhile to have God in knowledge, God handed them over to an undiscerning mind, to commit improprieties, 29 having become filled with every injustice, evil, avarice, wickedness; full of envy, murder, strife, treachery, bad character; slanderers, 30 libelers, God-haters, abusers, boasters, imposters; inventors of wicked deeds; disobeyers of parents; 31 senseless, faithless, loveless, merciless. 32 They, although they knew the just principle of God that the ones who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do them but also approve of those who practice them.

Now that Paul has narrated the penalty against the heart and the first emergence of sexual immorality, he returns to the mind and the proliferation of social immorality. This part of the narrative begins with another recapitulation, this time of 1:19b–23 (καὶ καθὼς οὐκ ἐδοκίμασαν τὸν θεὸν ἔχειν ἐν ἐπιγνώσει), followed by the pronouncement of the punishment that mirrors the crime (παρέδωκεν αὐτοὺς ὁ θεὸς εἰς ἀδόκιμον νοῦν, ποιεῖν τὰ μὴ καθήκοντα), with the δοκιμ‑ stem as the link between the two. Stated simply, God deprived the primordial ancestors of their capacity of ethical reasoning. The conclusion in v. 32 stresses that they recognized (ἐπιγνόντες) the consequence of immoral action according to “the just principle of God” (τὸ δικαίωμα τοῦ θεοῦ): death. But this knowledge can no longer constrain them; they become “filled” (πεπληρωμένους) and “full” (μεστοὺς) of the worst vices. The last clause of the passage, ἀλλὰ καὶ συνευδοκοῦσιν τοῖς πράσσουσιν, refers to the entrenchment of immorality. On the one hand, the clause declares how deeply into a depraved mindset the ancestors descended. On the other hand, with the reversion to the present tense the clause explains how the indulgence of vice obtains the force of custom (ἔθος) if not law (νόμος). Unlike Gal 5:19–21, the list in vv. 19–21 is not strictly of vices but of kinds of people of whom the vices become characteristic. Paul organizes the list into six sequences: (1) πεπληρωμένους πάσῃ ἀδικίᾳ πονηρίᾳ πλεονεξίᾳ κακίᾳ (2) μεστοὺς φθόνου φόνου ἔριδος δόλου κακοηθείας (3) ψιθυριστὰς καταλάλους θεοστυγεῖς (4) ὑβριστὰς ὑπερηφάνους ἀλαζόνας (5) ἐφευρετὰς κακῶν, γονεῦσιν ἀπειθεῖς (6) ἀσυνέτους ἀσυνθέτους ἀστόργους ἀνελεήμονας

Paul utilizes a complex array of rhetorical figures here, although he does not use any single one in such a manner that would render the whole trite. He instead aims for a grand style in order to underscore the entrenchment of social immorality that occurs as a result of God handing the ancestors over εἰς ἀδόκιμον νοῦν.138 138 Cf.

the rhetorical analysis of Jewett, Romans, 165.

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The first to note, since it impacts the structure, is ἰσόκωλον, parity in the numbers of syllables in successive clauses. The first sequence has 23; the second 16; the third 12; the fourth 12; the fifth 12; and the sixth 17; we thus have a pattern of a-b-c-cc-b. The internal breaks within this list facilitate oral performance also, since each sequence comfortably fits into a single breath. One might attribute the instances of ὁμοιοτέλευτον, repetitions in the endings of words, to syntax (ὁμοιόπτωτον): the accusative masculine plurals (‑ους, ‑ας, ‑εις) have like endings because they all agree with αὐτούς in v. 28. However, the repetitions of ‑ίᾳ in the first sequence, of ‑ου in the second, and the artful alternation of words in all three declensions until the final sequence’s three contiguous instances of second declensions, are certainly carefully arranged for auditory impact. One may say the same of the alliterations: π‑ in the first sequence; φ‑ in the second; ὑ‑ in the fourth; and ἀ‑ in the sixth.  Ἀσύνδετον, the absence of conjunctions, yields an impression of a barrage of the sort that might cause modern readers to feel as though they are being shot at with an automatic rifle. Finally, one can observe similarities in the listed items in a few of the sequences. For example, the vices in the first are general: ἀδικία, πονηρία, πλεονεξία and κακία together cover all of the subsequently listed items. The fourth lists several vices of speech. The fifth holds special interest, because it points back to the invention in the foregoing narrative as the first of many κακά devised. Disobedience to parents is an act of impiety according to the ancient definitions. This colon also features χιασμός, with the accusatives on the outside and their modifiers in the center. The sixth sequence negatively identifies virtues they lacked with alpha-privatives. This passage hardly represents the first time in Romans 1 that Paul simultaneously uses multiple rhetorical figures and tropes; he does the same in his two definitions of the gospel (1:2–4; 16–17).

IV. Conclusions Paul thus portrays the primordial origin of religion as a catastrophic event both in its substance and in the consequences that extend forward from it. As in the other accounts, he reasons inductively from observable phenomena: from widespread sexual and social immorality, to the failure of the human heart and mind to operate properly because of the punitive action of divine wrath, to the cause of divine wrath in the failure of the mind that perceives and reasons about the divine to inform the heart correctly about the proper object of worship. Paul thus explains the premises and practices of contemporary pagan polytheism across its full historical spectrum, including the deification of both humans and animals and the use of cult-images in worship. His narrative does not fully develop all of the steps from the formation of the concept of the divine to the establishment of religious customs. Instead, he relies upon his audience to furnish those steps from their own knowledge of similar theoretical and narrative accounts, to rec-

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ognize the kinds of arguments upon which he depends to fashion his own version of the story. This decision may seem to sacrifice the virtue of clarity to that of brevity, but he obeys the advice of the theorists insofar as he does not belabor aspects of the story of which he can assume his audience to be aware. Paul’s main purpose, however, is not simply to propound his own theory of the origin of religion but to explain how its consequences radiate outward, infecting all human cultures and individuals henceforth. The initial invention of idolatry proceeds through infinite variations to become an insurmountable obstacle to the reappropriation of nature’s revelation and a fresh start. More serious is God’s infliction of injury to the heart and mind, which the ancients likewise pass to their descendants as congenital defects. These two parts of the human can no longer function according to their design, a point that Paul does not state explicitly but that his subsequent argument presupposes. In the wake of the operations of divine wrath, the heart – even if the mind manages to correct the false concept of the divine  – cannot offer truly pious worship. And, although not everyone experiences sexual urges toward his or her own gender, the desires remain bent, and sexual irregularities are pervasive as a result. Faulty ethical reasoning, too, still promotes the commission and idiotic celebration of injustices. Even revealed knowledge – recognition of the right through the law and desire to obey, as in Romans 7, for instance – cannot fix the underlying problem of the corrupted mind. The overall outcome of the origin of religion is therefore the culpability of every human before the divine tribunal for the crimes of ἀδικία and ἀσέβεια. God’s wrath overshadows human history from primordium to eschaton. A problem of such comprehensive magnitude would require a solution of equal scope, which God has furnished through the gospel of his resurrected Son. Embracing it with faith not only reverses the verdict of guilt, but also resuscitates the heart and mind, enabling true piety and restoring ethical reasoning and behavior. As Paul says in Rom 12:1–2, bodies become presented as “living sacrifices, holy, pleasing to God” as a “logical worship” (παραστῆσαι τὰ σώματα ὑμῶν θυσίαν ζῶσαν ἁγίαν εὐάρεστον τῷ θεῷ, τὴν λογικὴν λατρείαν ὑμῶν); and one is to “be transformed by the renewal of the mind in order that you discern what the will of God is, the good and pleasing and perfect” (μεταμορφοῦσθε τῇ ἀνακαινώσει τοῦ νοός εἰς τὸ δοκιμάζειν ὑμᾶς τί τὸ θέλημα τοῦ θεοῦ, τὸ ἀγαθὸν καὶ εὐάρεστον καὶ τέλειον). At this point, the role of 1:18–32 within the overall argument of Romans begins to come into focus. The narrative grounds Paul’s claim of the universal scope of the gospel (“for everyone who believes, both the Jew first and the Greek,” 1:16) by introducing the relevant facts for his assertion of comprehensive condemnation at the eschatotological trial: the deeds of the primordial ancestors have bequeathed to all subsequent generations broken hearts and minds. The passage identifies the reason for God’s intervention on humanity’s behalf with the gospel. It functions, therefore, as the διήγησις specifically for Rom 1:18–3:20, although it remains at the beginning of the argument as the opposite pole to the

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liberation and healing that Christ’s death and resurrection achieves. The letter to the Romans includes, however, other diagnoses and derivations of the human predicament, most notably in 5:12–21, where Adam’s transgression releases the forces of ἁμαρτία and θάνατος into the cosmos. Paul does not explain how this event relates logically to 1:18–32; he does not blame Adam’s transgression or the influence of ἁμαρτία for the invention of idolatry. The former must temporally precede the latter, but he leaves it to his audience to draw any conclusions on how the two relate. Elsewhere in chapters 5–8 the flesh (σάρξ), presumably the material which sin and death manipulate in order to exert their control, opposes the mind and interferes with the ability to do what is right. Although these different derivations are difficult to systematize, Paul introduces them for the purpose of showing how the gospel solves the problem and opens the way toward reconciliation between God and humanity.

The “Hymnic” Conclusion to Romans 11 Meira Z. Kensky Oh the depth of riches and wisdom and knowledge of God: How unfathomable are his judgments and incomprehensible his paths. For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or became his counselor? Or who offered previously to him, and will be repaid by him? For all things are from him and through him and for him: To him be the glory forever, Amen.

I. Introduction When teaching the letters of Paul, I often see that many of my students are frustrated with Paul’s seeming expectation of a faith that is unwavering and absolute; a faith that is grounded in certainty and complete trust, not only in God and a divine plan, but in Paul himself, and Paul’s own confidence and certainty. For many of them, this type of faith seems, frankly, unrealistic, and almost inhuman – a faith that seems to contravene the human tendency to question, examine, to be skeptical, to waver, to doubt. We know that the early Christian community faced these problems on a significant scale in the period of post-apostolic memory. We hear of people who have, as a result of a lack of conscience, suffered “shipwreck in the faith” (1 Tim 1:19), and of people who may be swept away by “youthful passions” (2 Tim 2:22). The problem of apostasy looms large in Hebrews, in The Shepherd of Hermas, in 2 Baruch, in 2 Peter, and in all these cases seems not only to be a result of devious and manipulative teachers, i. e., of external factors, but also as a result of internal factors, such as lack of confidence, concerns about the reliability of the message, and doubt.1 The author of 2 Timothy talks of a time when people “will not be able to endure the sound teaching, but feeling an itch in their ear, will heap up teachers for themselves according to their own desires” (2 Tim 4:3). Here the inability to endure the sound teaching does not arise with false teachers, but from their own itchy ears, perhaps a metaphor for internal nig1 For discussion, see Stephen G. Wilson, Leaving the Fold: Apostates and Defectors in Antiquity (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004), 74–78.

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gling doubts that they cannot shake. The reality of doubt and the need for security were among the most profound problems faced by early Christian authors. The knowledge that their audiences may be experiencing doubt looms large in the minds of these New Testament writers. The author of James is profoundly aware the problem of doubt, opening his epistle with the following words of warning: If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, never doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed, for let that man not think that he will receive anything from the Lord, double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. (Jas 1:5–8).

In this especially lyrical passage we see James attempting to steer his readers away from falling into the trap of doubt and insecurity, which produces instability. Is it conceivable that Paul has failed to take into account this human predilection towards doubt when composing his epistles? Is he expecting his nascent communities to be able to transcend their humanity so completely, to be able completely to eradicate their questioning, when he has overwhelming evidence that they are often willing to question him at every turn? The answer to these questions is undoubtedly no. At many points throughout his epistolary corpus, Paul anticipates the problem of doubt, demonstrating acute awareness of this potential source of distress and trouble. In this essay I will de­ monstrate that at a crucial moment in the Letter to the Romans, Paul anticipates the reactions and needs of his readers and builds them into his teaching. Paul is no neophyte to the study of the human condition, and his writings display this beautifully.

II. Romans 11:33–36 Rom 11:33–36 forms the concluding passage of the longer section of chapters 9–11, a difficult and dense section that deals with salvation history and the identity of God’s elect Israel. After the troubling description of the human condition that dominates Romans 7, and the consequent need for the Holy Spirit that is the subject of Romans 8, Paul turns to the question of Israel. In Romans 9–11 we see Paul attempting to explain how it can be that the people of Israel were chosen by God, yet have not accepted Christ.2 Paul argues that the word of God to Abraham has not failed – Israel are still Abraham’s descendents – but rather the identity 2  Heikki Raïsänen argues that we can see in this section that Paul takes seriously the fundamental tenets that a) God’s word to Israel cannot fail; and b) Israel seems to have rejected God’s messiah, which denies them eschatological salvation. Raïsänen further argues that “Paul’s moving wrestling in chs. 9–11 suggests … that he is in the process of making sense of his own experience in Galatia (and in Corinth), which had been filled with controversy.” Räisänen, “Torn Between Two Loyalties: Romans 9–11 and Paul’s Conflicting Convictions,” in The Nordic Paul (ed. Lars Aejmelaeus and Antti Mustakallio; London: Continuum, 2008), 19–39, 24.

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of the people Israel has been reestablished. Not all Israelites are truly a part of Israel (9:6); it is the children of the promise, not the children of the flesh, who are to be counted as descendants (9:8).3 God has placed a stumbling block in Zion (9:32–33) that has led historical Israel astray, and so the Gentiles have become God’s elect, attaining righteousness (9:30). In the future, however, both Jew and Greek will be justified (10:12; 11:26), for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable (11:29).4 In Rom 11:33–36, Paul concludes with a hymn that praises God’s wisdom and knowledge and ends with a doxology that affirms God as the root and sustainer of the cosmos.5 Paul develops his argument for Romans 9–11 by making use of a number of Scriptural verses from what are traditionally considered wisdom and prophetic texts (Isaiah, Job, Hosea, and Psalms) and reinterpreting these sapiential texts in the new apocalyptic context, revealing a mystery to his readers (11:25–27). The juxtaposition of wisdom and apocalyptic traditions, a sapiential hymn next to an apocalyptic mystery, has provided the impetus for a re-examination of the relationship between the two genres of literature as they appear in Paul’s writings. The issue is of particular import because this passage comes at a crucial juncture in the text, forming the conclusion not only to Romans 9–11 but also to the main kerygmatic section of Romans as a whole, and also acting as a segue between the kerygma and the exhortation of chapters 12–15. In what follows I will examine the nature of the hymn and how it functions within Romans 9–11, paying special attention to the effects and purpose of Paul’s juxtaposition of this hymn with the revelation of a mystery in Rom 11:25–27.

III. Linguistic and Structural Elements Scholars such as Eduard Norden6 and Günther Bornkamm7 have identified Romans 11:33–36 as a hymn, pointing to particular elements of its style, language,  Cf. Gal 6:16.  The question of the relationship between Paul’s assertions in Romans 9 and those in Romans 11 is legitimate and ongoing. Raïsanen argues that Paul is fundamentally inconsistent here, particularly in terms of the conception of Israel in 9:6 and that in 11:1–2. Raïsanen, “Torn Between Two Loyalties,” 29. In addition, though Paul stresses the irrevocability of God’s word and calling, the use of the extended metaphor of the olive tree in Romans 11:17–24 strongly implies that just as easily as one can be “grafted in” to the tree, one can be “grafted off.” 5  Robert Jewett argues that this section of Romans makes up the crucial third proof in Paul’s argument concerning the gospel, and so 11:33–36 “provides an eloquent conclusion for the third proof,” which centers on “the triumph of divine righteousness.” Jewett, Romans: A Commentary (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 715. 6 Eduard Norden, Agnostos Theos (Leipzig: Teubner, 1913), 240–250. 7 Günther Bornkamm, “The Praise of God,” in idem, Early Christian Experience (trans. Paul Hammer; New York: Harper and Row, 1969), 105–111. 3 4

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and composition. Norden suggests that the passage is best read in a ‘strophic arrangement’of nine lines:8 Oh the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God: How unsearchable are his judgments    and unfathomable his paths. For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or became his counselor? Or who offered previously to him,    and will be repaid by him? For all things are from him and through him and for him: To him be the glory forever, Amen.

By seeing the passage in this manner a triadic structure becomes visible. In the first three lines, Paul praises the depths and inscrutability of God’s wisdom, while takes the next four lines to ask three rhetorical questions that emphasize the same qualities. In the final two lines, Paul concludes with a doxology that confesses the majesty and scope of God’s sovereignty. The form of the first line is also triadic, and is similar to the classic Stoic description of nature such as found in Marcus Aurelius (ἔκ σου πάντα, ἔν σοι πάντα, εἴς σε πάντα).9 In addition to this triadic structure, Bornkamm has proposed that the three rhetorical questions correspond to the three attributes extolled in verse 33 (riches, wisdom, and knowledge), but in reverse order.10 The first question, ‘who has known the mind of the Lord,’ refers to God’s knowledge, while the second (‘who became his counselor?’) to God’s wisdom, and the third (‘who has offered previously to him, or will be repaid by him?’) refers back to God’s riches. Johnson illustrates this chiastic structure with a helpful chart: πλούτου (v. 33a) σοφίας   " γνώσεως   " ἔγνω (v.  34a) σύμβουλος (v. 34b) προέδωκεν (v. 35a)11

Johnson, The Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions in Romans 9–11 (SBLDS 109; Atlanta, Ga: Scholars Press, 1989), 164. Jewett notes that the 26th and 27th editions of the Nestle-Aland place the words “and wisdom and knowledge of God” in a separate line, resulting in ten total, and reflecting a general acceptance of the hymnic nature of these verses. Jewett, Romans, 713.  9 Norden, Agnostos Theos, 240 n. 1, as reprinted in Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 171. 10 Bornkamm, “Praise of God,” 107–108. 11 Johnson, Function of Wisdom and Apocalyptic Traditions, 165.  8 E. Elizabeth

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The chiastic and triadic structure of the passage indicates its careful and poetic composition, which supports Norden and Bornkamm’s identification of these three lines as a hymn, possibly used in the context of worship.12 The question then turns to the origin of the hymn, and whether it is original to Paul. Joseph Fitzmyer suggests that “there is no reason to think that Paul has borrowed this hymnic composition from some source  … he has composed it himself after the manner of contemporary hymns of praise.”13 However, Johnson and others present a cogent argument against Pauline composition and in favor of traditional origin, arguing that “the abundance of non-Pauline language and vocabulary used in unfamiliar ways, the intricacy of the hymn’s structure, the religious and cultural plurality of the apparent sources of its parts, and the existence of several remarkably similar compositions with similar functions in contemporary Jewish literature combine to tip the scales in favor of traditional origin.”14 Johnson’s argument about vocabulary is well established. The hymn contains vocabulary which is not common to Paul, including four words which only appear once in the Pauline corpus (ἀνεξεραύνητα [11:33], ἀνεξιχνίαστοι [11:33], σύμβουλος [11:34], προέδωκεν [11:35]). These four words are at the heart of the entire hymn, and thus form the building blocks and the deep structure of the hymn itself. The hymn is conceived in these words, and the fact that they are not known to us as part of Paul’s usual vocabulary means that either Paul chose them carefully and deliberately, or that the hymn is of alternate origin. Ἀνεξεραύνητα, deriving from the verb ἐξεραύνειν (to investigate, to search out) is a hapax legomenon in the New Testament as a whole, though ἐξεραύνειν

12 Bornkmann (“The Praise of God,” 105) is convinced that this is the original context, but reconstruction of the earliest Christian worship is tendentious, and Arland Hultgren has noted that there is nothing about this unit of text that is even distinctly Christian. Hultgren in general is cautious about even calling it a hymn, preferring to think of it instead as a “poetic composition.” Hultgren, Paul’s Letter to the Romans: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011), 430. 13  Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Romans: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AB 33; New York: Doubleday, 1993), 633. Other scholars who conclude that Paul was the author of this hymn include Ernst Käsemann, Commentary on Romans (trans. G. W. Bromily; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980), 318; C. E. B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (2 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: Clark, 1975–79), 2:589; Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 740. James D. G. Dunn take a fairly neutral stand on the issue, admitting that “the style is Jewish through and through” but arguing that “there is nothing to show whether the passage was taken over by Paul from a pre-formed Jewish or Jewish-Christian hymn. But there is no reason why he should not have composed it himself, using familiar phrases, texts, and formulae.” Dunn, Romans (2 vols.; WBC 38a–b; Dallas: Word Books, 1988), 2:698. 14 Johnson, “The Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions in Romans 9–11: Rethinking the Questions,” SBL Seminar Papers, 1995 (ed. David J. Lull; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995), 352, n. 3. Cf. also Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 164–174; Reinhard Deichgräber, Gotteshymnus und Christhymnus in der frühen Christenheit (SUNT 5; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1967), 62–63.

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appears in 1 Peter 1:10 as well as in several lxx Psalms.15 The term, which also appears in Greek authors such as Heraclitus, seems to be part of the vocabulary of scholarly and philosophical inquiry, and can thus be considered sapiential. Here, Paul (or the author of the hymn) uses the word in a theological context: God’s judgments are unable to be searched by man because the means available to man are insufficient. God’s judgments far surpass the limitations of human inquiry. Likewise, the second Pauline hapax, ἀνεξιχνίαστος (beyond tracing out, unsearchable), only appears once more in the New Testament (Eph 3:8), where it refers to the unsearchable riches of Christ. Its lxx referents, Job 5:9 and Job 9:10, are of particular import because this hymn, alongside Romans 9–11 as a whole, is punctuated with allusions to and quotations from Wisdom literature, particularly from the book of Job. In Job 5:9, Eliphaz the Temenite, attempting to make sense of Job’s suffering, urges Job not to question his affliction but rather to seek God, saying: Οὐ μὴν δὲ ἀλλὰ ἐγὼ δεηθήσομαι κυρίου, κύριον δὲ τὸν πάντων δεσπότην ἐπικαλέσομαι, τὸν ποιοῦντα μεγάλα καὶ ἀνεξιανίαστα, ἔνδοξά τε καὶ ἐξαίσια …(Job 5:8–9)

In Job’s response to his three friends, he confesses the power and omniscience of God: “ὁ ποιῶν μεγάλα καὶ ἀνεξιχνίαστα, ἔνδοξά τε καὶ ἐξαίσια, ὧν οὐκ ἔστιν ἀριθμός” (Job 9:10). In addition to this linguistic referent, this last quotation in Job serves as the introduction for two rhetorical questions that are similar to the types of questions asked in Romans: “ἐάν ἀπαλλάξῃ, τίς ἀποστρέψει; ἤ τίς ἐρεῖ αὐτῷ, τί ἐποίησας;” (Job 9:12). While in Romans the question rejoices at the inability of man to search out God’s ways, here Job despairs at God’s power to inflict great blows to man at will, for man is only able to plead for mercy. This is parallel to Rom 11:33–36, where the hymn in Romans follows Paul’s extolling of the great mercy of God. The use of ἀνεξιχνίαστος here in connection with its context is a likely allusion to the Job passage. Rather than being a lament, however, the hymn resituates Job’s lament as a thanksgiving. Johnson’s second consideration for her argument that the hymn is not of Pauline origin is the similarity of Rom 11:33–36 to other hymns found in the corpus of Hellenistic Jewish literature. Johnson sees parallels with two Qumran Hodayot,16 1 En. 93:11–14, and especially 2 Bar. 14:8–9: O Lord, my Lord, who can understand your judgment? Or who can explore the depth of your way? Or who can discern the majesty of your path? Or who can discern your incomprehensible counsel? Or who of those who are born has ever discovered the beginning and end of your wisdom?17 15 lxx Ps. 63(64):7; see especially lxx Ps 118(119):2: μακάριοι οἱ ἐξερευνῶντες τὰ μαρτύρια αὐτοῦ, ἐν ὅλη καρδίᾳ ἐκζητήσουσιν αὐτόν. 16 1QH 7:26–33 and 1QH 10:3–7. Cf Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 170. 17 Trans. A. F. J. Klijn, “2 (Syriac Apocalypse of ) Baruch,” OTP 1:615–652.

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Like in Job 9:10, Baruch here is engaged in a sort of lament that he cannot understand the workings of God’s mind. Once again this is seemingly contrary to Paul’s intent in Rom 11:33–36. However, as Johnson rightly points out, 2 Bar. 14:8–9 foreshadows the hymn of praise that Baruch answers after he receives his revelation: Who can equal your goodness, O Lord? For it is incomprehensible. Or who can fathom your grace which is without end? Or who can understand your intelligence? Or who can narrate the thoughts of your spirit? Or who of those born can hope to arrive at these things, apart from those to whom you are merciful and gracious? (2 Bar. 75:1–5)

Since Baruch has been privy to a revelation, he has become aware of the scope of God’s might, and opens his mouth in praise of God. Thus Johnson is right in emphasizing that not only is this hymn composed in a similar vein to Rom 11:33–36, but that the function of the hymn is also similar. Just as Baruch sings to God after receiving a revelation, so too does Paul sing to God after recounting a mystery (Rom 11:25–27). In addition, the theme of mercy is consistent among not only these two texts but to Job 9 as well. Baruch emphasizes that the only ones who can hope to recount the thoughts of God’s spirit are those to whom God has shown mercy, Job appeals to God’s mercy (Job 9:15), and Paul’s hymn in Rom 11:33–36 comes right after he has established why God has shown mercy to the Gentiles and will once again show mercy to the Israelites (Rom 11:28–32). Johnson’s arguments for traditional origin are compelling, but they are not sufficient to rule out Pauline origin entirely. Paul is certainly capable of using distinct vocabulary as well as combining Jewish and Stoic sources together in his own poetic compositions. In other words, the fact that there is “religious and cultural plurality of the apparent sources of its parts” is not a weighty argument against Pauline authorship, because Paul, in addition to being influenced by both apocalyptic and wisdom traditions, is also a product of both a Jewish and a Greek world. The use of rhetorical questions can just as easily be attributed to Paul’s familiarity with Jewish literature and need not be considered proof of pre-Pauline origin.18 Additionally, Robert Jewett has argued that it is also possible that the frame of the hymn, verses 11:33 and 11:36, are of pre-Pauline origin, but that Paul 18  A cogent discussion of the methodological problems with identifying any material as “prePauline” can be found in Robert Matthew Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions of the Gospel in Romans 1 (WUNT 2.316; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011), 92–106. Focusing on Rom 1:2–4, Calhoun argues that arguments regarding Paul’s use of “traditional material” are often tendentious, as they can often rely on circular argumentation and not take into account Paul’s abilities to modify his own style, syntax, and vocabulary to suit the epistolary occasion and the mood he is trying to evoke. Calhoun prefers a more cautious approach to the identification of material as “pre-Pauline” or “traditional,” arguing that we should ask ourselves whether “the hypothesis of the quotation of a pre-Pauline formula best account[s] for the more cogent of the ‘observations,’ or can one offer a simpler and less speculative solution?” Calhoun, Paul’s Definitions of the Gospel, 93.

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himself has added the three scriptural citations in vv. 34–35, “transforming the original hymn into a suitable climax for the third proof.”19 Jewett sees evidence of this in the use of transitional devices to introduce the quotations rather than “standard formulas such as ‘as it is written,’ in the way the verses are carefully chosen to recall themes from earlier in 9–11, and in the fact that “removal of the citations produces a hymn in the style of ellipsis that concentrates entirely on God.”20 While Jewett’s claims are somewhat unverifiable, this argument would account for both the traditional elements and the seemingly unusual vocabulary present in these verses. Regardless, whether or not Paul originally authored the hymn, there can be no doubt that he carefully selected it and adapted it to his own purposes to the point where the hymn has become his own by its careful incorporation into the text. Paul’s inclusion of the hymn here forms a fitting conclusion to Romans 9–11, and to the main kerygmatic section of Romans (1:16–11:36) as a whole.21

IV. Scriptural Allusions Throughout all of Romans 9–11 Paul makes use of several biblical verses, both through explicit quotation (i. e. Hos 2:25 and 2:1 at Rom 9:25–26; Isa 28:16 and 10:11 at Rom 9:33) and implicit allusion.22 In order to provide scriptural proof for his arguments, Paul weaves together a pastiche of quotations, often merging two or three different quotations from the same source into one continuous proof text.23 This hymn engages in the same strategy. Romans 11:33–36 contains both implicit allusions and explicit quotations to several biblical texts. As I have already noted, Paul’s use of ἀνεξιχνίαστος in 11:33 recalls both Job 5:9 and 9:10 and implicitly alludes to Job’s arguments in these texts. Similarly, ἀνεξεραύνητος in 11:33 may also recall the use of ἐξεραύνειν in the lxx Psalms and Jer 17:9, though this allusion is not as strong. The three rhetorical questions Romans, 714. Romans, 713. 21 So Fitzmyer: “This hymn also forms the conclusion to the whole of the doctrinal section of Romans (1:16–11:36). For not only God’s dealings with Israel are unsearchable and manifest his uprightness to his chosen people, but all God’s dealings with humanity are so. No one holds God in his debt.” Fitzmyer, Romans, 633. Likewise cf. Paolo Iovino, “‘The Only Wise God’ in the Letter to the Romans: Connections with the Book of Wisdom,” in The Book of Wisdom in Modern Research (ed. Angelo Passaro and Giuseppe Bellia; New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2005), 283–306, 294. 22 Detailed investigation into Paul’s methods of scriptural argumentation in Romans 9–11 can be found in James Aegeson, “Scripture and Structure in the Development of the Argument in Romans 9–11,” CBQ 48 (1986): 265–289. 23 See above; see also Rom 3:10–18, and more adjacently Rom 11:7–10, where Paul merges quotations from Deut 29:3 and Isa 29:10 before moving into a composite quotation from Pss 68:23 and 35:8. 19 Jewett, 20 Jewett,

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found in 11:34–35 are more suggestive of specific biblical verses. Paul’s question in 11:34 is a direct quotation of the first part of Isa 40:13 (τίς ἔγνω νοῦν κυρίου, καὶ τίς αὐτοῦ σύμβουλος ἐγένετο, ὃς συμβιβᾷ αὐτόν;). Though Paul does not continue with the rest of the questions of Isa 40:14 (nor the last section of 40:13), he does keep to the same style of questioning, beginning his next question in 11:35 with the interrogative ἢ τίς, as the Isaiah text also continues.24 It is difficult to identify a precise scriptural quotation in verse 35. Traditionally the verse is thought to be a quotation from Job 41:3,25 but it does not reflect the verse as it appears in the lxx nor the mt. A. T. Hanson argues that the most similar verse to Rom 11:35 is found in the Targum of Job: “Who has been beforehand with me in the works of creation, that I have to pay him back? Is not everything under the heaven mine?”26 Hanson argues that Isa 40:13 and Job 41:3 were often interpreted together in Rabbinic literature, which may explain why Romans 11:35 is thought to be a quotation of Job 41:3. This may also suggest an earlier text of Job 41:3 that corresponds better to our verse at hand. Romans 11:36 does not seem to be an allusion or quotation of any particular scriptural verse, though similar doxologies can be found throughout Hellenistic Jewish literature,27 and Norden and Bornkamm have noted the Stoic origin of the tripartite affirmation of God’s sovereignty. Romans 11:33–36, therefore, employs sapiential and biblical language while recalling traditional Jewish Wisdom texts.

V. Wisdom and Apocalyptic in Romans 9–11 In Romans 9–11, Paul argues that God’s word has not failed, and the Israelites will eventually be saved along with the Gentiles. He structures his argument by beginning with an introductory passage in which Paul laments his people’s fate and wishes he could be cut off for their sake (Rom 9:3–5). This introductory passage ends with a doxology, and taken together with Rom 11:33–36 forms the frame of chapters 9–11 as a whole. In these three chapters, Paul goes from lamenting the current state of the Israelites to rejoicing over their certain fate, for all of Israel will be saved, as “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29). 24  For further discussion of Isaiah in particular, see Shiu-Lun Shum, Paul’s Use of Isaiah in Romans (WUNT 2.156; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002); on this passage, 245–247. 25  So David Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt in Paul,” in Faith and History: Essays in Honor of Paul W. Meyer (ed. John T. Carroll, Charles H. Cosgrove, and E. Elizabeth Johnson; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990), 208–222, 215–216. 26 A. T. Hanson, The New Interpretation of Scripture (London: SPCK, 1980), 85, as quoted in Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 167. 27 Johnson points to 4 Macc 18:24 and Pr Man 15 in particular, but one need not look farther than Rom 16:27 to find parallels. This theologoumenon is also found in also 1 Cor 8:6, Col 1:16, Heb 2:10, and Acts 17:28, though not in the form of a doxology.

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The echoes of Job and the similarities to the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch are noteworthy not just for the linguistic and structural understanding of the passage, but also because they bring up generic questions about the relationship of wisdom and apocalyptic traditions. Paul develops the argument of chapters 9–11 by consistent reference to wisdom traditions and questions, but he adapts these traditions in a new eschatological context. He uses the tools of scholarly inquiry, which have a home in both Hellenistic Judaism and the Greek philosophical schools, in order to move towards the revelation of a mystery in Rom 11:25–32. The mystery itself is structured in a traditional apocalyptic periodization, as “a hardening has come upon part of Israel until the full number of the Gentiles have come in” (Rom 11:25). The argument of Romans 9–11 is thus set up by explicating the past, present, and future of Israel, the children of both the flesh and the promise. It is this mystery which paves the way for hymnic conclusion, in which the tools of scholarly inquiry are pronounced inadequate to comprehend and reach the mind of God, and to understand his judgments and paths. As in 2 Baruch, Paul has been privy to a revelation, and he passes it on to the community at Rome. The revelation of the mystery allows for the hymnic rejoicing. The lament of 9:1–5 is thus reversed, and the readers can rejoice alongside Paul. In a sense, then, Paul has subverted the sapiential language of the hymn. Rather than moving people away from trying to understand God, the placement of the hymn after the mystery invites the reader to seek God, and to attempt to come closer to understanding God’s ways. While no one can fully know the mind of God, readers can move a little closer by hearing Paul’s words and listening to Paul’s revelation of the mystery. The rhetorical questions of the hymn, and their emphasis on the fact that no one has counseled God, and God owes no one a debt, do not move the reader away from searching for understanding of God’s ways; rather, they invite the reader to listen more fully to the mystery, and to rejoice, knowing that they are closer to knowing the paths of God than they were before, for they know that God is consistent, and they have been led to this conclusion by Paul’s exegesis and careful recall of the books of the Hebrew Bible. It is the rhetorical questions themselves which invite the readers into the conversation. Discussing Romans 11 as a whole, particularly the questions of 11:12 and 11:26, Charles Cosgrove reminds us of a classical use of a rhetorical question, to “initiate a moment of co-deliberation with one’s audience.”28 Paul invites his audience to question their own assumptions about God and the fate of Israel (11:12), bringing them in to the conversation and to active seeking. Cosgrove further notes the suspense (sustentatio) that is created by such questions, and that “Quintilian observes that the sequel, which resolves such a suspense, can take one of two forms: it may confirm an expectation raised by the moment of 28 Charles Cosgrove, Elusive Israel: The Puzzle of Election in Romans (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1999), 26.

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co-deliberation, or it may bring a surprise (a παράδοξον).”29 Applying Cosgrove’s analysis to the questions of the hymn suggests that the audience is invited to consider the limitations of the human intellect in understanding the unsearchable and inscrutable God. But even by inviting the reader to question, Paul asks the reader to take their abilities to question seriously, celebrating the possibility of approaching God while at the same time understanding that questioning can only take them so far. Rather than lead the audience to a place of sorrow and despair, this lack of understanding on the contrary can lead to joy and praise – God is capable of resolving the paradoxical situation of Israel. This juxtaposition of traditions from wisdom and apocalyptic within one systematic argument has led scholars such as Johnson to reinvestigate the relationship of the two genres as a whole. Johnson examined the texts of 1 Enoch, 4 Ezra, Qumran literature, 2 Baruch, and the Wisdom of Solomon, asking each text five questions: “Where is wisdom located? Who has access to wisdom? What is the means of access? What is the content of wisdom? What is the potential for meaningful life before the eschaton?”30 Interrogating the texts in this manner, Johnson concluded that “the more an apocalyptic author employs traditional wisdom language and motifs, the more he sees potential for meaningful human life before the eschaton. Similarly, the more transcendent is God’s wisdom, the more it is hidden in heavenly mysteries, the more the author locates hope for meaningful life in the disjunctive future.”31 Johnson moves from these conclusions to a claim which she herself later retracts. Attempting to explain the function of the two traditions as they coexist in the text, Johnson argues that “the intersections of apocalyptic and wisdom traditions in Romans 9–11 afford Paul the means of maintaining a theological tension between God’s faithfulness and God’s impartiality, a tension he never resolves because it is constitutive of the character of God.”32 Johnson has erred here because she identified God’s faithfulness and impartiality as representing two distinct traditions, where in fact both wisdom and apocalyptic literature extol both God’s faithfulness and impartiality.33 29 Cosgrove,

Elusive Israel, 33.

30 Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 207. Cf. also the chart in Johnson

“Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions,” 355. 31 Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 207. 32 Johnson, Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions, 175. 33 Johnson does not admit her error as such, in fact she denies it, writing “the problem with my conclusion about the function of apocalyptic and wisdom traditions in Romans 9–11 is not that it wrongly assigns individual conceptual features to literary traditions. The problem is that I make two separate cases for what Paul argues and how Paul argues and then wrongly claim that the former is determined by the latter.” Johnson, “Function of Apocalyptic and Wisdom Traditions,” 356. I disagree with Johnson’s analysis of her own work. Johnson has made no such argument of necessity; she does not claim that Paul’s merging of wisdom and apocalyptic traditions causes his argument to take the shape that it does. She has, however, while attempting to avoid modern scholarly distinctions that she finds spurious, still resorted to thinking in those same distinctions when forming her conclusions.

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There is a more serious problem with Johnson’s methodology, in that her argument does not take into account the occasion(s) of Paul’s letter to the Romans, and thus she cannot understand Paul’s heuresis for Romans 9–11 or for the letter as a whole. Without an analysis of Paul’s heuresis, an explication of his lexis and taxis is not a sufficient method for determining the reason behind Paul’s merging of the two traditions, or even for understanding the precise manifestation of that merge. Alongside this issue, Johnson focuses her analysis on the imagined reality of the text and of the author of the text itself. Since she does not examine the occasion of the letter, she also does not take into account the role of Paul’s readers in the argument itself. Paul has analyzed the situation in the Roman churches and has composed his argument with the opinions and concerns of his readers in mind. This undoubtedly had an effect on the structure and content of his argument. In a penetrating article, Wayne Meeks senses a greater issue of confidence that is at stake for Paul’s readers, writing: the function of chaps. 9–11 is thus not to continue but to disrupt the smooth assurances of confidence that have capped the whole argument of chaps. 1–8. The reader is not to be allowed to think that confidence depends on knowing just how God will act in the future …. Now the paradigmatic challenge to a confidence that would depend on our knowing has to be faced: the trick that God has placed on Israel. For if Christians are to accept Paul’s assurance that ‘nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God,’ they must face the fact that the Jews have rested upon exactly the same assurance, and the radicality of Paul’s claims throughout the letter so far has undermined that assurance.34

It is Paul’s duty in Romans 9–11 to explain to his community that the word of God has not failed and God has not rejected Israel even though it is the Gentiles who have currently been shown mercy and grace. He must do this while still leaving room for the human reality of doubt and lack of confidence which goes along with trusting in a divine plan and in an all-powerful God, a trust which seems difficult in light of the seeming contradiction between God’s promises to Israel and the realities of Israel’s refusal to accept the gospel. Seen in this light, the rhetorical questions and praise of God in 11:33–36 point the reader to an undeniable and constant truth (no one can know the mind of God) while celebrating the very existence of divine knowledge, wealth, and wisdom. Paul brings his readers closer to this knowledge through a revelation, inspiring joy and confidence, but not certainty. It is no accident that throughout chapters 9–11 Paul reinterprets and adapts traditional Wisdom texts for his readers, texts which seek to answer and ask questions about the nature of divine reasoning and the place of man in the universe. In particular, one hears repeated echoes of the book of Job throughout these three 34 Wayne A. Meeks, “On Trusting an Unpredictable God: A Hermeneutical Meditation on Romans 9–11,” in Carroll, Cosgrove and Johnson, Faith and History, 105–24.

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chapters and in our closing hymn.35 Perhaps nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible do we find this question of man’s role in a divinely ordained universe so rawly exposed. When confronted with absolute debasement and despair, Job refuses to compromise his position as he is faced with arguments from his friends who extol God’s consistency and insist that Job would not be punished in this way unless he had transgressed the law. The readers, being privy to Job 1–2, know that it is precisely because Job is impeccable that he is being faced with this ultimate text. The readers know that there has been an intrusion into the divine plan, a divinely warranted intrusion, but an intrusion nonetheless. Job does not know this, but he realizes that he has not done anything to warrant such punishment. Neither his confidence in God nor his confidence in himself is shaken, but he cannot accept his friends’ rational explications for his punishment. The situation of Job represents a concrete example of man being faced with an unknown divine plan, a plan that cannot be deduced by the law or by tradition. The resolution of the book of Job is the voice from the whirlwind, whose questions to Job reveal the inability of man to comprehend the inner workings of the universe. Only the voice of God, again intruding into the known universe, can bring confidence and surety. Paul’s echoes of Job throughout his corpus are of the utmost significance for an understanding of Paul’s conception of some forms of doubt as “compatible with Christian faith”.36 In an article that was originally conceived as part of a broader project on “Good Uncertainty”,37 David Hay argued that throughout his writings, Paul made specific use of the book of Job “to show fellow believers that their faith needs to contain room for doubt.”38 Defining doubt as “conscious uncertainty or awareness of unanswered questions,” Hay demonstrates this Pauline strategy by pointing, for example, to Paul’s specific use of Job 5:13 at 1 Cor 3:19–20, and broader allusions to Job in 1 Corinthians 1–4 as a whole.39 Hay sees this same strategy at work in Rom 11:33–36, in particular in the quotation of Job 41:3 at 11:35 which “provides a warrant for the basic doubt about human righteousness that undergirds Romans as a whole.”40 Hay argues that in Romans 11:33–36, Paul deliberately leaves room for doubt – not the type of doubt which acts as a barricade to faith, and not doubt regarding Paul’s “fundamental certitudes about salvation,”41 but doubt nonetheless. Paul needs his readers to recognize that there are aspects of God and God’s plan 35  Speaking about the allusions to Job, Dunn suggests that “the whole central section of the hymn may well have been originally inspired by meditation on that profound work.” (Dunn, Romans 2:703). 36  Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt in Paul,” 209. 37 I am grateful to Mary Hay for generously offering me access to the unpublished notes and drafts of this work. 38 Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt,” 209. 39 Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt,” 210–214. 40 Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt,” 216. 41 Hay, “Job and the Problem of Doubt,” 216.

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for history that must remain mysterious and beyond the capabilities of human comprehension. His readers will not fully be able to connect the dots of Israel’s eventual salvation, and truthfully Paul cannot as well. He asks them for trust, but trust does not require a relinquishing of all tendencies to question. It does not require people to become blind to themselves. On the contrary, what it does is invite people to step back and examine the situation, including their own role in it, in a new way. As Hay explains: Part of what he wants the Roman Christians to understand is the advantage of doubting their doubts. Gentile Christians are tempted to doubt that the Jews will be saved (11:17– 19). They should reconsider. That all is not plain before his eyes on this matter is suggested by the fact that Paul writes 9:6–11:24. He cannot simply ‘solve’ the matter by announcing his ‘revelation’ about the future (11:25–27). All the torturous argumentation of Romans 9–11 reflects not simply riddles that he wants the Roman Christians to ponder but ones with which he has struggled.42

Hay’s notes suggest that he saw the longer section of Romans 9–11 as a Pauline model for how to deal with doubt: dialectically examining and presenting several answers, building on the righteousness and freedom of God, the sin of the Jews, the preaching experience of the churches, God’s promises to the Patriarchs, and his own belief that God’s love for Israel is irrevocable, and ultimately concluding with a recognition of the mysterious and incomprehensible. This grappling and recognition allows his readers to question, wonder, and examine without being overcome by skepticism and extreme doubt, the type of doubt that might lead to itchy ears and shipwreck in the faith. It invites the readers to train their lenses on themselves and their own premises, as well as keeping their gaze upward to God.43 Paul understands the dilemma of the Roman community in trying to come to terms with a situation that is new and rapidly changing, a situation that does not seem to conform to a known reality. Paul is asking his readers for faith: faith that they will not stumble over the same stone as the Israelites, faith that God will not abandon them. He forces his readers to confront the reality that God has shown mercy on them rather than the Israelites, though this seems to be an inconsistency on the part of God. The echoes of Job and of Wisdom literature place the reader within a historical community of questioners. Paul leaves room for the reader to question, to doubt, while rejoicing in the consolation that ultimately 42 Hay,

“Job and the Problem of Doubt,” 217.  In addition to the echoes of Job, the echoes of Isaiah also add to and compliment this message. Paul’s quotation of Isa 40:13 lxx at Rom 11:34 brings in an entire Isaianic discourse of defending God in the face of Israelites who are doubting God’s goodness and faithfulness, his justice. By quoting Isaiah here, Paul may be reminding his audience about the perils of allowing one’s natural doubts to become outright accusation. J. Ross Wagner demonstrates Paul’s “deep indebtedness to the language and thought of Isaiah” not just in Romans 11 but throughout Romans. Cf. J. Ross Wagner, Heralds of the Good News: Isaiah and Paul “in Concert” in the Letter to the Romans (NovTSup 101; Leiden: Brill, 2002), 301. 43

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God’s ways and judgments are unsearchable, unquestionable. It is this doubt that will sustain the Roman churches and provide them with humility, reminding them to rejoice and pray for God’s mercy and justification. Rom 11:33–36 occurs at a culminating moment for Paul and his argument. The reader’s doubt and need for guidance, which Paul accepts and encourages in Romans 9–11, pave the way for the ethical exhortation of the concluding chapters of the epistle. Paul takes the emotional situation and discomfort of his readers seriously, and provides them with enough of a mystery to sustain them while still being conscious of their own limitations. In this way Johnson is correct, and there is a tension represented here, but it is not a tension that is “constitutive of the character of God,” rather, it is constitutive of the human situation. Paul’s merging of wisdom and apocalyptic traditions here reflects his understanding of the situation faced by his readers. They are questioning, and they need to find knowledge, but their human skills are inadequate to comprehend the character of God. Only through revelation and faith can the bridge between God and man be approached, though never crossed. The hymn speaks in the language of both traditions, for Paul knows that only through both knowledge and the faith that comes from the absence of knowledge can man rejoice and find consolation.

Missiles, Demagogues, and the Devil The Rhetoric of Slander in Ephesians 6:16 Jeffrey R. Asher This paper seeks to interpret Eph 6:16 in light of the ancient topoi of rhetorical invective and to explore how this invective relates to the larger argument of the epistle to the Ephesians.1 The translation of Eph 6:16 is fairly straightforward. As part of a much larger sentence that begins with the imperative “στῆτε” in 6:14, verse 16 explains how this “standing” is accomplished and therefore can be translated as follows: “above / in all this, by taking up the shield of faithfulness (πίστις) with which you will be able to quench / extinguish all the burning missiles / arrows (βέλη) of the wicked one (πονηρός).”2 Although the translation is fairly straightforward, its interpretation is not. It has been a common practice among New Testament scholars to read this verse in the context of practical and dogmatic theology. In my examination of the secondary literature, I discovered that it is largely read in light of parallels with the Old Testament and Qumran on the one hand or of parallels with Hellenistic moral philosophy on the other.3 1 In it with a great pleasure that I dedicate this essay to my mentor, Professor Hans Dieter Betz. He is arguably the founder of modern rhetorical criticism in Biblical studies, especially with his monumental commentary on Paul’s letter to the Galatians, and this essay is intended to make a small contribution in honor of that legacy. An earlier version of this paper was presented as the McCandless Lecture at Regent’s Park College, Oxford University, June, 2013. 2 There is a textual variant for the initial preposition: ἐν or ἐπί. It is unclear whether the instrumental dative of association or the instrumental dative of measure is authentic. This prepositional phrase is followed by a participle of means, expanding on the imperative στῆτε in Eph 6:14. 3 Rudolf Schnackenburg, The Epistle to the Ephesians: A Commentary (trans. Helen Heron; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1991), 278, cites Gen 15:1; Pss 5:12, 18:2, 30, 28:7, 32:20, and 18:35 for God serving as the shield of his people, as does Markus Barth, Ephesians: Translation and Commentary (2 vols.; AB; Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1974), 2:772, who cites Zech 12:8 and Psalm 18 with the comment that it is “most likely that OT imagery was in Paul’s mind.” Barth goes on to indicate that the divine shield was also connected with the fiery shafts in Ps 7:10, 13. Most commentators agree: Margaret Y. MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians (SP 17; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2000), 346; Thomas R. Yoder Neufeld, Put on the Armour of God: The Divine Warrior from Isaiah to Ephesians (JSNTSup 140; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 140; Andrew T. Lincoln, Ephesians (WBC 42; Dallas: Word, 1990), 450; Heinrich Schlier, Der Brief an die Epheser: Ein Kommentar (Düsseldorf: Patmos, 1957), 297; and Ernest Best, A

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These parallels are then marshaled to interpret the arrows or missile weapons (βέλη) along the lines of inner temptations to sin, generic types of moral assaults, slanderous speech, and even doctrinal attacks.4 The shield, in turn, is connected to faith but generally only in a propositional or cognitive / emotional sense. The adjective describing the adversary, the πονηρός, is almost always translated without comment and in such a way as to limit its meaning to that of moral evil. In contrast, this paper will present an alternative way of reading Eph 6:16 by examining the verse in the context of ancient rhetorical invective and of the ancient social values that informed that invective. It aims to show that what is important is not what the missiles represent, but the fact that a worthless scoundrel (a πονηρός) uses missile weapons (βέλη). In other words, I am suggesting that the verse encodes the social value of a πονηρός as an undesirable and the martial values of missile weapons as shameful, contemptible, and even cowardly. Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Ephesians (ICC; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1998), 600. The same can be said for parallels with the Qumran material: Frederick F. Bruce, The Epistles to the Colossians, to Philemon, and to the Ephesians (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1984), 409 (fiery missiles: 1QH II, 25–26, 29); Schnackenburg, Epistle to the Ephesians, 279 (fiery missiles: 1QM XVIII, 1); Barth, Ephesians, 2:774, who notes that they probably stem from a common apocalyptic source and that Ephesians is probably not directly dependent on any Qumran documents; Pheme Perkins, Ephesians (ANTC; Nashville: Abingdon, 1997), 147, who notes that the “closest parallel” is 1QH X, 23–36; Schlier, Der Brief an die Epheser, 297; and Neufeld, Put on the Armour of God, 140. For parallels with moral philosophy, see Charles H. Talbert, Ephesians and Colossians (Paideia Commentaries on the New Testament; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2007), 162. 4  “Spiritual warfare” is a common descriptive phrase for the collection of metaphors found in Eph 6:10–17 (see Talbert, Ephesians and Colossians, 159), and it is a popular interpretive paradigm in devotional literature (John Bunyan, with a preface by Alexander Whyte, The Holy War Made by Shaddai upon Diabolus for the Regaining of the Metropolis of the World: Or, the Losing and Taking Again of the Town of Mansoul [London: Oliphont, Anderson, and Ferrier, 1894]; William Gurnall, with a biographical introduction by J. C. Ryle, The Christian in Complete Armor: A Treatise of the Saints’ War against the Devil [London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1964]; and David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Christian Warfare: An Exposition of Ephesians 6:10 to 13 [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977]). Lincoln says that “Here the burning arrows represent every type of assault devised by the evil one, not just temptation to impure or unloving conduct but false teaching, persecution, doubt, and despair” (Ephesians, 450). Schnackenburg (Epistle to the Ephesians, 279) relates them to the “devil’s unstoppable temptations” but “forbids our thinking merely of inner temptations” but include “disruptions of faith, enticements of any kind.” Barth says that they are not desires or lust but “external threats,” i. e. “persecution or assimilation” (Ephesians, 2:774). Abbott says they are a “suitable figure for fierce temptations” (Thomas Kingsmill Abbott, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistles to the Ephesians and to the Colossians [ICC 52; New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1897], 186). For the missiles representing verbal attacks based on Prov 26:18 and 1QH X, 23–26, see MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, 346. There is a long history of using martial metaphors to describe the conflict between the rational and appetitive parts of the soul in the philosophical tradition (see Seneca, Ep. 97, 74.19–21, 82.5; Epictetus, Diatr. 3.24.21–37; Aristides, Or. 23.34; Philo, Leg. 3.14, Ebr. 75–76; and 4 Macc 13:16 where the metaphors encode rational self-control). In general, the philosophical life was often seen as analogous to military service (see Abraham Malherbe, “Antisthenes and Odysseus, and Paul at War,” in idem, Paul and the Popular Philosophers [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989], 91–119; and Barth, Ephesians, 2:790).

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Consequently, my main objective is to show that by drawing on conventions of slander in the Greco-Roman world, the author of Ephesians creates a caricature of the Devil as a πονηρός who uses missile weapons to position him appropriately in the social, moral, and cosmic architecture of his universe. As evidence of my thesis, I will make five points: (1) the author draws on the conventions of slander in the Greco-Roman world in his description of the Devil as a πονηρός who uses missile weapons; (2) the title of the adversary as a πονηρός is derived from a demagogic topos and carries negative social, personal, and moral connotations; (3) missile weapons were believed to be shameful because of their ineffectiveness, their conflict with close-order battle, and their association with women and barbarians; (4) the “burning” condition of the missiles metaphorically connects the πονηρός-label and the missiles to the Devil; and (5) the author uses this invective language to diminish the stature of the Devil and to position him appropriately in his cosmic hierarchy.

I. The Rhetoric of Slander The first order of business is to recognize that Eph 6:16 contains classical invective language and subsequently to understand how this invective works. Invective or slanderous speech (oratio invectiva) was a common feature of Greek and Roman literature and speech from the epics of Homer to the rhetorical handbooks of late antiquity.5 The poems of Homer are filled with insults and verbal abuse as the warriors compete for honor not only in physical combat, but also in verbal sparring.6 While invective was subsequently more broadly used, it was no less popular.7 Nevertheless, even though invective has a long history, the evidence suggests that many popular conventions of rhetorical invective were derived from the vituperative invective of Old Comedy that proliferated in the late fifth century b.c.e., beginning with the death of Pericles, continuing through the Oligarchic Revolutions in 411 and 404 b.c.e., and culminating the early fourth century b.c.e.8 The principal objects of scorn for many of these comedies are 5 In rhetoric, invective is paired with encomium as one of the two principle features of the conventions of praise and blame: the Latin vituperatio and laus, and the Greek ψόγος and ἔπαινος. 6 Many of the conventions of later invective are already present in the speeches in Homer. In particular, see the speeches of Thersites (Il. 2.214–242) and Melanthius (Od. 17.217–232). 7 For a general account, see Thomas Conley, Toward a Rhetoric of Insult (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009). 8 On the development of the topoi of invective out of Old Comedy, see C. Moulton, “The Lyric of Insult and Abuse in Aristophanes,” MH 36 (1979): 23–47; Severin Koster, Die Invektive in der griechischen und römischen Literatur (Beiträge zur klassischen Philologie 99; Meisenheim am Glan: Hain, 1980), 72–76; Wilhelm Süss, Ethos: Studien zur älteren griechischen Rhetorik (Leipzig and Berlin: Teubner, 1910; repr., Aalen: Scientia, 1975), 245–67.

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the demagogues, a popular set of political leaders who rose to power following the death of Pericles. Although the Equites of Aristophanes is our only extant example of what has been labeled “demagogue comedy,” there were many others, such as those of Plato Comicus, and Aristophanes sees himself as the father of this sub-genre.9 In these performances, it is clear that Aristophanes thinks that the wrong people are exercising political power in Athens. Unlike the old aristocracy, these new politicians do not possess wealth and status on the basis of ancestral lands and kinship but on mercantile profits gleaned from sales in the agora.10 These comic playwrights depicted the political structure of democratic Athens as a binary system of the χρηστοί (the “good ones”) and the πονηροί (the “rogues”). The χρηστοί were the landed aristocracy who were benefactors of the πόλις. The πονηροί were the wealthy merchants whose screeching voices and flattering speeches in the assembly echoed the cries of the lamp and vegetable sellers in the marketplace. They seized the wealth of the πόλις and its noble citizens to distribute it to the commoners for political power.11 They promoted a shift from ἰσονομία, where the aristocracy presided over the balance of rights, to δημοκρατία, where the fickle and unpredictable mob exercised power. Although there were various prohibitions against slander in Athenian law from the time of Solon and extending into the fourth century b.c.e., the com-

 9 For the phrase “demagogue comedy,” see David Rosenbloom, “From Ponêros to Pharmakos: Theater, Social Drama and Revolution at Athens, 428–404 BCE,” CA 21 (2002): 287. Ari­sto­ phanes, Nub. 549–59. 10  For the rise of the demagogues in the late fifth century Athenian politics, see Matthew R. Christ, The Bad Citizen in Classical Athens (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); idem, “Imagining Bad Citizenship in Classical Athens: Aristophanes’ Ecclesiazusae,” in Kakos: Badness and Anti-Value in Classical Antiquity (ed. Ineke Sluiter and Ralph Mark Rosen; Leiden: Brill, 2008), 169–83; W. Robert Connor, The New Politicians of Fifth Century Athens (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971); Nick Fisher, “The Bad Boyfriend, the Flatterer and the Sykophant: Related Forms of the Kakos in Democratic Athens,” in Sluiter and Rosen; Kakos, 185–231; M. I. Finley, “Athenian Demagogues,” in Studies in Ancient Society (ed. Moses I. Finley; London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1974), 1–25; David Rosenbloom, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi: The Ostracism of Hyperbolos and the Struggle for Hegemony in Athens after the Death of Perikles, Part I,” TAPA 134 (2004): 55–105; idem, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi: The Ostracism of Hyperbolos and the Struggle for Hegemony in Athens after the Death of Perikles, Part II,” TAPA 134 (2004): 323–58; idem, “Scripting Revolution: Democracy and its Discontents in Late Fifth-Century Drama,” in Crisis on Stage: Tragedy and Comedy in Late Fifth-Century Athens (ed. Bernhard Zimmermann and Andreas Markantonatos; Trends in Classics, Supplementary Series 13; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2011), 405–41; Alan Sommerstein, “Platon, Eupolis and the ‘Demagogue-Comedy,’” in The Rivals of Aristophanes: Studies in Athenian Old Comedy (ed. D. Harvey and J. Wilkins; London: Duckworth and the Classical Press of Wales, 2000), 437–51; and Ian Storey, Eupolis: Poet of Old Comedy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). The wealth of these merchants of the agora made them “indistinguishable from slaves and metics, whose wealth had to take these forms” (Rosenbloom, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi, Part I,” 59). 11 See especially Aristophanes, Eq. 215–219 with respect to the sausage seller who has the voice of the agora and Rosenbloom, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi: Part I,” 60–62.

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edies were largely exempt from these prescriptions.12 These comedies are filled with anti-demagogic slander. Various attempts have been made to catalogue the comic invective (διαβολή), and we will not try to replicate those studies.13 Rather, we will simply focus on some of the anti-demagogic insults to illustrate the extent and character of the rhetoric. These demagogues are described as flatterers, false accusers, and male prostitutes.14 They are cowards who throw away their shields while fleeing from battle and parasites who prey on the polis.15 They are illegitimate and foreigners who cannot speak proper Greek or possess mothers who speak the broken Greek of barbarians. They are slaves, sons of slaves, or bear the names of slaves.16 Some of the invective is subtle, such as associating a 12  Decrees against slander in comedy were passed in 440 b.c.e. and again in 414 b.c.e. but were almost immediately repealed. For the laws pertaining to comedy in fifth and fourth centuries b.c.e. Athens, see Douglas M. MacDowell, The Law in Classical Athens (Aspects of Greek and Roman Life; Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1978), 126–9, especially 128. 13 Süss, Ethos, 245–67; Koster, Die Invektive, 2; and Andrea Rotstein, “Critias’ Invective against Archilochus,” CP 102 (2007): 145–6. 14  Flatterers (κόλακες), false accusers (συκοφάνται), and male prostitutes (πόρνοι and εὐρύπρωκτοι). See especially Nick Fisher, “The Bad Boyfriend, the Flatterer and the Sykophant,” 185–231. Along the same lines, Cicero later describes his political adversaries as male prostitutes with the label os impurum “impure mouth,” which was associated with gluttony and oral sex. It was especially effective as an insult against the elite because it attributed to them non-aristocratic behavior (see Valentina Arena, “Roman Oratorical Invective,” in A Companion to Roman Rhetoric [ed. William Dominik and Jon Hall; Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2007], 156–7). 15 The two terms are δειλός (coward) and ῥίψασπις (shield-thrower). Cleonymus was the brunt of mockery in Aristophanes’ comedies as a coward who apparently threw away his shield while fleeing during the battle of Delium. On this see Aristophanes, Nub. 353–354, 670–680; Vesp. 592–593, 822–823; and especially Av. 289–290, 1473–1481 where he describes the Cleonymus tree “which ‘in winter sheds its shields’” (Hans van Wees, Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities [London: Duckworth, 2004], 194). The son of Cleonymus also sings the songs of Archilochus on leaving one’s shield on the battlefield (Aristophanes, Pax 673–678, 1295–1304). The seriousness of throwing away one’s shield as a crime and the gravity of a false accusation of such an act are illustrated in the case against Theomnestos in the fourth century b.c.e. (Lysias, 10.6–9 [Against Theomnestos]). As a parasite, Cleonymus is also depicted as a glutton who frequents and plunders the tables of the Chrestoi (Aristophanes, Ach. 88, 844; Eq. 956–958, 1290–1299; and Av. 289). For the invective language of the parasite, see especially T. Whitmarsh, “The Politics and Poetics of Parasitism: Athenaeus on Parasites and Flatterers,” in Athenaeus and His World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire (ed. D. Braund and J. Wilkins; Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000), 304–15. See also a recent study of the image of the parasite in 2 Corinthians: L. L. Welborn, “Paul’s Caricature of His Chief Rival As a Pompous Parasite in 2 Corinthians 11:20,” JSNT 32 (2009): 39–56. 16  Illegitimacy, the inability to speak proper Greek, and slave labels are related topoi. For example, Cleon in Aristophanes’ Equites is described as a Paphlagonian and as a slave. In Plato Comicus’ Hyperbolus, Hyperbolus is described as Lydian, as a slave, and as one who cannot speak proper Greek (frgs. 182, 185, and 203 in Poetae comici graeci [ed. Rudolf Kassel and Colin Austin; Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1983], hereafter abbreviated K.-A.). On the inability to speak Greek as well as the slanderous accusation that one’s parents could not speak Greek, see Aristophanes, Ran. 678–682, 1504, 1532–1534 (describing the Thracian mother of Cleophon); and Plato Comicus, K.-A. 601 (describing Cleon’s mother as speaking a barbarian dialect). Frequently, the demagogues are “named” by using their first name followed by an occupational label (Cleon as a hide-seller or tanner [Aristophanes, Eq. 136]; Eucrates as a hemp-seller [Eq.,

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well-known rogue, like Archilochus, with one of the demagogues.17 In addition to labels, slanderous metaphors are present, especially the animal epithets of dogs and swine, which were understood as uncomplimentary and insulting.18 While comedic invective played a significant role in the ultimate political demise of the demagogues, the lasting influence of the comedic slander was in the contribution it made to the formation of the topoi of invective. In the fourth century b.c.e., comic invective was transferred to the law courts and to the composition of history and made a significant impact on developments in rhetorical invective in the Hellenistic world.19 The influence continued 132]; and Euripides’ mother as a vegetable seller [Thesm. 383–388] and “raised among the herbs” [Thesm. 455–456, Ach. 457, 473–479, Eq. 19, Ran. 840]). The impact of the invective describing Euripides as the son of a vegetable seller is lasting as is evidenced in the repeated descriptions of Euripides as the son of a vegetable seller in various late “Lives” (βίοι). On this, see David Kawalko Roselli, “Vegetable-Hawking Mom and Fortunate Son: Euripides, Tragic Style, and Reception,” Phoenix 59 (2005): 8. Along the same lines, the topos of the “abusive market women” and their association with the demagogues is common in Aristophanes (pp. 11–12). In contrast, Athenian citizens were addressed using their first name followed by a patronymic or demonymic label, labels inappropriate for slaves since they possess no kinship bonds with the polis or the demes. Later in the fourth century b.c.e., forensic rhetoric embraced accusations of barbarian parentage or barbarian descent against an opponent as a way of discrediting them in a legal setting (see especially Demosthenes, Eub. 57.18). On this subject, see especially: Susan Lape, Race and Citizen Identity in the Classical Athenian Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 64–71 for fifth century b.c.e. invective topoi and pp. 71–88 for similar invectives in fourth century b.c.e. forensic rhetoric. Eponymies, a form of rhetorical invective established in fifth century b.c.e. comedy, become a common form of invective in later rhetoric (see Koster, Die Invektive, 79 and Nancy Worman, Abusive Mouths in Classical Athens [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008], 255–7. J. Uria, “Personal Names and Invective in Cicero,” in What’s in a Name? The Significance of Proper Names in Classical Latin Literature [ed. J. Booth and R. Maltby; Swansea, Wales: Classical Press of Wales, 2006] 13–31). 17 Rotstein, “Critias’ Invective against Archilochus,” 139–54. 18 Rotstein argues that Critias used the name Archilochus to represent the demagogues of Athens and suggests that the name Archilochus was sufficient in itself to serve as an effective insult (ibid., 149). Along the same lines, Tyndareus in Euripides, Orest. (903–909), a foreign born politician, and Menelaus (536–537, 608–629), a poneros, represent the demagogues. Perhaps the label “Babylon” in Revelation 17–18 encodes more than simply a symbol of an ancient adversary, but also functions as a strong invective. For the invective of animal metaphors, see J. D. Sadler, “Metaphor and Metonymy,” CJ 76 (1980/1): 157–60, and for older, pre-democratic animal invective, see Deborah Steiner, “Slander’s Bite: Nemean 7.102–5 and the Language of Invective,” JHS 121 (2001): 154–8; and Margaret Graver, “Dog-Helen and Homeric Insult,” CA 14 (1995): 41–61. 19  For fourth century rhetorical invective, see P. E. Easterling, “Actors and Voices: Reading between the Lines in Aeschines and Demosthenes,” in Performance Culture and Athenian Democracy (ed. Simon Goldhill and Robin Osborne; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 154–66; P. Harding, “Rhetoric and Politics in Fourth-Century Athens,” Phoenix 41 (1987): 25–39; idem, “Comedy and Rhetoric,” in Persuasion: Greek Rhetoric in Action (ed. I. Worthington; London: Routledge, 1994), 196–221; and Nancy Worman, “Insult and Oral Excess in the Disputes between Aeschines and Demosthenes,” AJP 125 (2004): 1–25. Theopompus Historicus and Ephorus were students in the fourth-century rhetorical school of Isocrates, and this rhetorical training significantly influenced their historical writing, especially in the use of the invective topoi gleaned from Old Comedy (see especially Frances Pownall, Lessons from the Past: The Moral Use of History in Fourth-Century Prose [Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004],

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into the Greco-Roman world, impacting Greek literature and rhetoric.20 Sophia Xenophontos notes that Plutarch often draws his stock characters from comedy in his parallel lives, which she labels as “comic invective.”21 The topos of the “flatterer” is also found in Plutarch’s moral essays, such as Quomodo adulator ab amico internoscatur (How to Tell a Flatterer from a Friend), in philosophical polemic, and in the comedic effect of slander in Lucian’s satires.22 The early Christians also robustly drew on the invective rhetoric that had evolved from the fifth century b.c.e., and the topoi of invective were key features in ancient pedagogy (προγυμνάσματα) and in the rhetorical and stylistic handbooks.23 Finally, 133–4, 148, 157, 178–9). For Alexandrian demagogic rhetoric, see Robert W. Smith, The Art of Rhetoric in Alexandria: Its Theory and Practice in the Ancient World (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974). 20 For the influence of Greek rhetorical invective on the later Greco-Roman world, see T. Whitmarsh, “Politics and Poetics of Parasitism,” 304–15; idem, “The Sincerest Form of Imitation: Plutarch on Flattery,” in Greeks on Greekness: Viewing the Greek Past under the Roman Empire (ed. D. Konstan and S. Said; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 93–111. 21  Sophia Xenophontos, “Comedy in Plutarch’s Lives,” GRBS 52 (2012): 603–31 (quotation from p. 603). Plutarch depicts Galba as a demagogue (Galb. 11) as well as Gaius Gracchus (Ti. C. Gracch. 5.3, 6.4, 9.4, 12.1–4). 22  For philosophical invective against competing schools of thought that possesses parallels with fifth century comedic invective, see especially Dio Chrysostom, Or. 4.33–38; 11.14; 12.12; 23.11; 32.30; 33.4–5; 54.1; 55.7; 70.10; 78.27; Plutarch, De Stoicorum repugnantiis, Stoicos absurdiora poetis dicere, Non posse suaviter vivi secundum Epicurum, and Adversus Colotem. For Lucian’s satires, see Eunuchus, where he lampoons two Peripatetics, and Vitarum auctio, De morte Peregrini, and Alexander (Pseudomantis). For mockery in satire, see Ralph M. Rosen, Making Mockery: The Poetics of Ancient Satire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). Martin notes that one of the most persistent rhetorical topoi to emerge from fifth century b.c.e. comedy is that of the flatterer, specifically the image of the popular politician adapting himself to his audience and the political situation (Dale Martin, Slavery as Salvation: The Metaphor of Slavery in Pauline Christianity [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990], 92). Although Martin does demonstrate that this rhetorical topos can have positive connotations, such as its use by Antisthenes and Paul, the majority of the evidence that he cites classifies it as invective (see especially pp. 86–116). Whitman argued that the word πονηρός is sometimes used “tongue-incheek” as a rogue (Cedric H. Whitman, Aristophanes and the Comic Hero [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964], 131–2). Ian Storey, “Bad Language in Aristophanes,” in Sluiter and Rosen, Kakos, 131, is not convinced. 23  For the early Christian use of invective and its relation to the invective originating in ancient comedy, see especially Dale B. Martin, Slavery as Salvation, 108–14; and Luke Timothy Johnson, “The New Testament’s Anti-Jewish Slander and the Conventions of Ancient Polemic,” JBL 108 (1989): 419–41. Bert Harrill explores the invective label of the “man-stealer” in 1 Timothy (J. Albert Harrill, “The Vice of Slave Dealers in Greco-Roman Society: The Use of a Topos in 1 Timothy 1:10,” JBL 118 [1999]: 97–122). Invective or ψόγος was one of the principle exercises in ancient pedagogy. See Aphthonius, Progymnasmata (9, 40–41) whose section on invective is constructed as the opposite of encomium. For the four extant Progymnasmata texts of Theon, Ps-Hermogenes, Aphthonius the Sophist, and Nicolaus the Sophist, see George A. Kennedy, ed., Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric (SBLWGRW 10; Leiden: Brill, 2003); and Craig A. Gibson, ed. and trans., Libanius’s Progymnasmata: Model Exercises in Greek Prose Composition and Rhetoric (SBLWGRW 27; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2008), 267–319. For the rhetorical handbooks, see Smith, Art of Rhetoric in Alexandria; Rhetorica ad Herennium 3.10–15, which lists three categories of invective (cf. Arena, “Roman

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Valentina Arena in her work on Latin invective demonstrates that there is a close connection between Roman oratorical invective and the conventions of slander in comedy and poetry.24

II. The Devil as a Πονηρός Clearly, comedic invective drew much of its inspiration from early Greek poetry, and together they made significant contributions to the creation of the rhetorical topoi of slander in Greek and Latin literature and rhetoric until the end of the ancient world. For our purposes, however, two specific comedic insults merit special attention: the “worthless rogue” (πονηρός) and the “archer” (τοξότης). In the Archaic era, the word πονηρός, which is rooted in the word πόνος (work, toil, or labor), is a social construct that refers to common laborers. This connection is demonstrated by an anonymous scholium on Aristotle’s Ethica nichomachea (3.7) that cites Hesiod who claimed that Alcmene labeled Heracles as a πονηρός because of his labors.25 Although the word refers to a laborer, even before the fifth century it carried negative connotations in the aristocratic value system of early Greece, that is, an aristocratic prejudice against the poor. The designation of someone as poor and a laborer encodes much more than one’s financial status, but also the moral, social, and even physical attributes of the person.26 Labor was not only associated with poverty, but also with a lack of beauty, strength, courage, and proper posture. It indicated an inability to speak well and moral turpitude.27 Oratorical Invective,” 149); and Malcolm Heath, Hermogenes, “On Issues”: Strategies of Argument in Later Greek Rhetoric (Oxford: Clarendon, 1995). 24 Arena, “Roman Oratorical Invective,” 156–7. Like the Greek rhetoricians, Cicero drew from the stock characters of comedy, in this case Terence and Plautus, to attack his political enemies (Graver, “Dog-Helen and Homeric Insult,” 604). For the classification of Latin invective topoi, see especially Anna A. Novokhatko, ed., The Invectives of Sallust and Cicero: Critical Edition with Introduction, Translation, and Commentary (Sozomena 6; Studies in the Recovery of Ancient Texts 6; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2009), 12–26. 25  “And, they say, Hesiod is sufficient to prove that the word ponēros (bad) has the same sense as ‘laborious’ or ‘ill-fated’; For in the Great Eoiae he presents Alcmene as saying to Heracles: ‘My son, truly Zeus your father begot you to be the most toilful [πονηρότατον] as the most excellent …’; and again ‘The Fates (made) you the most toilful and the most excellent …’” (Hesiod, The Great Eoiae, frg. 2; Evelyn-White, LCL). Similarly, see Theognis, 274, in which Heracles is described as a πονηρός because of his labors, and Homer, Epigr. 14.20, which is an epigram involving potters, and which speaks of destroying their wares as ἔργα πονηρά. 26  For the meaning of πονηρός, see Rosenbloom, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi: Part I,” 59–66. 27  πονηρός is the antithesis of courage: in Aristophanes, Thesm. 832–839, a women who gives birth to a δειλòν καì πονηρòν ἄνδρα (“a cowardly and worthless man”) should have her hair cropped and sit behind the mother who has given birth to a τòν ἀνδρεῖον (“a brave man”), that is, an aristocrat. Rosenbloom, “Ponêroi vs. Chrêstoi: Part II,” 333, describes a πονηρός of Old Comedy as follows: “The poneros is an outsider of low birth and inadequate education, a cheat and a parasite, hated by the gods; he has no right to wealth, honor, or leadership; rather he deserves to be branded, humiliated, and punished.” See also Storey, “Bad Language in Aris-

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The πονηρός is to be found in the same lexical group as the “bad ones” (κακοί) and the antithesis of the “wealthy ones” (πλούσιοι) and the “beautiful and the good” (καλοὶ κἀγαθοί). Although Homer does not use the word, Thersites is the quintessential πονηρός (Il. 2.211–77). He is an unskilled speaker, poor, ugly, lame, bow-legged, stooped-shouldered, with a pointed head, sparsely covered with wool-like hair, and has the poor taste of daring to speak in an assembly of his betters. He clearly deserved the sound beating that Odysseus gave him and the ensuing mockery of the Argives. Since it is impossible to separate one’s social status from one’s personal conduct and physical attributes, these common laborers of inferior social status were expected to act in dishonorable and immoral ways. In late fifth century b.c.e. comedy, a number of the demagogues are labeled as πονηροί.28 It is also used generically for those who practice sycophancy, rhetoric, politics, and forensic prosecution.29 In fact, this is the primary way in which the comedy writers label the demagogues, which serves not only as a collective label under which they can subsume the other negative epithets, but also as the antithesis of the landed aristocracy, the χρηστοί.30 One, however, needs to be very careful and not confuse invective caricatures with reality. Invective works by describing adversaries with insulting language as a means of discrediting them. The demagogues may have acquired their wealth from the markets rather than from aristocratic land holdings, but they were hardly poor, certainly were not manual laborers, doubtlessly were not slaves, and probably were not foreign born. They were rhetorically portrayed as individuals of low status who were elevated to positions of power that were above their station and due solely to their pandering and flattering of the masses. The label of a πονηρός is thus a biting, tophanes,” 119–41. Jennifer Tolbert Roberts, Athens on Trial: The Antidemocratic Tradition in Western Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 6, notes that Aristotle sought to exclude the poor from political participation, making the ownership of property a prerequisite for political participation and arguing that the πονηροί did not have the leisure necessary for the attainment of goodness. The classes of “mechanics and shopkeepers lead lives that are ‘ignoble and inimical to goodness’ (Politics 1328b–29a).” In fact, one of the primary features of demo­ cracy for Aristotle was the political hegemony of the working poor (Josiah Ober, “Conditions for Athenian Democracy,” in The Making and Unmaking of Democracy: Lessons from History and World Politics [ed. Theodore K. Rabb and Ezra N. Suleiman; New York: Routledge, 2003], 4). Citing the so-called “Old Oligarch” (Pseudo-Xenophon, Constitution of the Athenians), Roberts explains the difference between the aristocracy and the πονηροί: “Everywhere, he explains, the aristocracy (beltistoi) are characterized by the minimum of licentiousness and iniquity and a maximum of sensitivity to what is good, whereas ‘in the people on the other hand we find a very high degree of ignorance, disorder, and vileness; for poverty more and more leads them in the direction of bad morals, thus also the absence of education and in the case of some persons the ignorance which is due to the want of money’ (1.5)” (Athens on Trial, 54). 28 Cleon / Paphlagon, the sausage-seller (Aristophanes, Eq. 337, 181, 186), Ariphrades (Eq. 1281), Hyperbolus (Pax 684), Agyrrhius (Eccl. 185), and Cleigenes (Ran. 710). 29 Sycophancy (Aristophanes, Plut. 920, 939), rhetoric (Ach. 99), politics (Ran. 1456, Eccl. 177), and forensic prosecution (frg. 424). 30 Walter Donlan, “Social Vocabulary and Its Relationship to Political Propaganda in FifthCentury Athens,” Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura Classica 27 (1978): 95–111.

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vituperative epithet that is designed to discredit the demagogues and put them in their appropriate place with respect to the aristocratic oligarchs. Obviously, when the label πονηρός left the social and political context of fifth century b.c.e. Athens, the word evolved to meet changing social, political, and ideological contexts in which it was used. Nevertheless, the connotations of social inferiority, disease, physical imperfections, lack of intelligence, and an inability to speak well continued through the fourth century b.c.e. and into the Hellenistic and Roman worlds.31 Harder notes that “In the Hell[enistic] Period the general use of πονηρός does not change much.”32 The third edition of the Bauer-Danker lexicon (BDAG) notes that, as an adjective relating to “humans or transcendent beings,” the word primarily refers “to being morally or socially worthless.” In the Septuagint, the word describes worthless individuals who fail to adhere to the requirements of the Torah.33 Josephus labeled Jesus of Tiberius and John of Gischala as πονηροί and Herod as a demagogue.34 All three cases are pure invective. In early Christian literature, the word carries the social and moral connotations of inferiority and is used to describe disease (Matt 6:23; Luke 11:34), a proclivity to immorality, and low social status (Matt 12:34), especially with respect to those who do not live according to the prescriptions of the covenant.35 In Ephesians, the word is used twice to describe a day (5:16, 6:13), which may have eschatological connotations, and once to describe the Devil himself, an epithet found commonly in the Matthean and Johannine traditions.36 It is during the Hellenistic period that the word came to be applied to lower gods (as a πονηρὸς δαίμων).37 Unsurprisingly, this is a common motif in Second Temple Judaism where the word is frequently used to describe spirits and gods 31  BDAG. The aristocratic disgust of the poor laborers is creatively captured by Theophrastus in his Characteres in which the Oligarch lambasts the “tribe of demagogues” (Char. 26.4–6). 32 Günther Harder, “πονηρός, k.t.l.,” TDNT 6:548. 33 Ibid., 6:549–51. 34 Josephus, Vita 9.40; 21.102; and 27.134. 35 The association of the word with disease is not surprising. Rosenbloom argues that since someone who practices πονηρία is “outside the city’s moral economy, he is a target for ritual violence,” alluding to the later oligarchic revolutions. In fact, he sees demagogic comedy as playing a theatrical and ritual role in the purging of the pollution of the demagogues from the polis. The quotations are from Rosenbloom, “From Ponêros to Pharmakos,” 329. He argues that the catharsis of the polis of these pollutants (demagogues) is accomplished theatrically in the comedies and concretely in the oligarchic revolutions. He notes that in the Hippocratic corpus, the word πονηρός is used to describe “every sort of diseased condition and sign of disease, linking the term specifically with a lack of purification or purity” (p. 329). 36 The “evil day” may be an allusion to the “last days,” which are characterized by the dominance of cosmic and terrestrial rogues – the times of eschatological woe in which evil predominates and rules the land. For the use of πονηρός to describe the Devil, see especially 1 John 2:13, 14; 5:18; perhaps 3:12; and John 17:15. See also Matt 13:19; perhaps 5:11; 6:13; 13:38; and Did. 10:5. 37 Harder notes that there are Roman inscriptions in the second century that use this phrase and that it is also present in Porphyry, Philos. orac. 2.164b (TDNT 6:548, n. 14). The term is applied to Asmodeus in Tob 3:8.

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(δαίμονες).38 The Judeans used it to refer to inferior and lower status gods who opposed their God and whose influence created physical and moral damage to humans through pollution and sin. This is one of the most frequent uses of πονηρός in the New Testament, especially of the Devil. By referring to the Devil as πονηρός in Eph 6:16, the author is creating a vituperative rhetorical image of the Devil as physically inferior, of low status, immoral, a poor speaker, and unintelligent. He also is a coward who lacks the appropriate aristocratic virtues of strength and courage. He refuses to advance to the Gentiles in Christ and experience the impact of shields and swords. Rather, like a barbarian and a woman, he crouches at a safe distance unleashing his fiery bolts.

III. Weapons of Shame While the label of an archer is not as common as that of the πονηρός in ancient vituperation, it is no less slanderous. In Aristophanes’ comedies, Euathlus, the son of Kephisodemos, one of the principal sycophants among the demagogues, is labeled as an archer (τοξότης). Such a label carried the connotations of the patrilineage of a commoner or a foreigner and, in the case of Athens, even of a slave.39 In fact, Aristophanes, Ach. 707–711 labels him specifically as an “archer” who is associated with slaves, and in fragment 424 (from the Holkades) he is a knavish archer and co-prosecutor (πονηρὸς τοξότης συνήγορος). In addition, Scythian archers, who were slaves and foreigners, were stock characters in the Thesmophoriazusae.40 To associate a demagogue with such weapons was a scathing insult. The “archer” as a slanderous insult has a robust social and literary history in ancient Greece beginning with the diminishment of archery in Homer and reaching its apex of derogation in the late fifth century b.c.e. where it was associated with cowardice, foreigners, weakness, and effeminacy. Since the poems present complex assessments of the value and heroic worth of archery in warfare, it is difficult to draw any firm historical conclusions about the use of archery in Homer.41 On the one hand, as a weapon of skill, it was valued, was the cause of TDNT 6:553. Fisher, “The Bad Boyfriend, the Flatterer and the Sykophant,” 200. 40 “Suda (quoting also Pl. Com. fr. 102 KA and Crat. fr. 82 KA) report that Euathlus was a ponêros rhêtôr, euruprôktos, lalos, of low birth, which was why Aristophanes called him an archer, as if he were a slave (hupêretês)” (Fisher, “The Bad Boyfriend, the Flatterer and the Sykophant,” 201). In this case, the label of an archer is pure invective and is designed to associate him with low-birth; Euathlus was a prominent lawyer, an associate of Cleonymus, and a student of Protagoras. 41 The Homeric poems provide different descriptions of the bows themselves, ranging from Bronze Age to Iron Age weaponry and from simple, recurved bows to elaborate composite bows. The poems also provide conflicting accounts of the tactics of the archers, ranging from descriptions of archers mixed with the front ranks to descriptions of crouching archers deployed behind 38 Harder, 39 See

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the death of many warriors, and was the subject of competition. On the other hand, the bow was considered a weapon of lesser heroic value than those of the close-fighters. Given the general battle descriptions in Homer, the bow was apparently a common weapon on the battlefield, and a number of individuals and even tribes were known for their skill with bows.42 It was also an event at the funeral games of Patroclus (Il. 23.850–883). At other times, archery is considered a weapon of diminished heroic worth and the subject of an insult. Archers are often an object of verbal abuse, especially when compared with the close-fighters, and the very nature of their craft prevented the archers from participating in martial rituals that would grant them honor and fame (κλέος). They are never described as advancing to finish off their victims or stripping the armor from those whom they killed. As with the Lokrians, they lack helmets, shields, and ash spears and thus could not “endure close combat.”43 Archers are associated with deceit and fire their weapons while kneeling, a gesture of weakness and cowardice.44 The most famous insult is that of Diomedes against Paris and is worth quoting in full (Il. 11.385–396): the front ranks. For Homer on archers in general, see Hans van Wees, “Kings in Combat: Battles and Heroes in the Iliad,” CQ 38 (1988): 11, n. 36. Lendon notes that archery was “a heroic arête in its own right,” (Lendon, Soldiers and Ghosts, 48). He notes that there is a sort of logic in the epic but that this logic later could not be translated into the reality of the hoplite battle of the fifth century (p. 48). For the different types of bows, see Caroline Sutherland, “Archery in the Homeric Epics,” Classics Ireland 8 (2001): 111. For the different tactics, see Il. 13.714–721 where the Lokrian archers shoot over the heads of those in the front ranks (Hans van Wees, “Homeric Way of War: The Iliad and the Hoplite Phalanx, I,” GR 41 [1994]: 5). 42  For general references to arrows: see Il. 3.79–80; 8.513–515; 11.191; 13.361, 772–778; and 15.313–319. Il. 16.773 contains the phrase “many winged arrows that lept from the bow string” (Murray, LCL), alluding to the widespread presence of archers on the field of battle. Teukros is said to be the best among the Achaeans in archery (Il. 8.266–334; 13.313–314; 15.462), and Pandaros successfully shot with an arrow one of the “best” among the Achaeans – Diomedes (Il. 5.103) and wins κλέος by doing so (see the description of his κλέος by Menelaus in Il. 4.196–197). Glaukos was wounded by Teukros’ arrow and hid himself to avoid the humility of Teukros’ boasts (Il. 12.387–389, 390–391). In the later Homeric cycle, Achilles himself is killed by an arrow from Paris (see Gregory Nagy, The Best of the Achaeans: Concepts of the Hero in Archaic Greek Poetry [Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1979], 484). Two figures especially are depicted as skilled with a bow: Paris and Odysseus, as were various tribes: Phthions (Il. 2.719–720, 773–775; Od. 8.219–220); Paionians (Il 2.848); and Lokrians (Il. 13.714–721). 43  For the verbal abuse of archers, see Il. 2.604; 4.242; 8.173; 11.380, 385–390; and 13.50, 262–263. For the lack of despoiling their kills or finishing off their victims, see Il. 5.204–216; 11.385–395 (Hans van Wees, “The Development of the Hoplite Phalanx: Iconography and Reality in the Seventh Century,” in War and Violence in Ancient Greece [ed. Hans van Wees; London: Duckworth, 2000], 163, n. 55). On the Lokrians, see Richard Stoll Shannon, The Arms of Achilles and Homeric Compositional Technique (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 59. 44 For “standing” as a gesture of strength and crouching as one of weakness and deception, see Jeffrey R. Asher, “An Unworthy Foe: Heroic  Ἔθη, Trickery, and an Insult in Eph 6:11,” JBL 130 (2011): 735–6. See also Il. 40.144; 43.318; and 44.415. For the crouching archer, see Sutherland, “Archery in the Homeric Epics,” 112: with respect to Odysseus (citing Od. 22.3–4) and for Apollo kneeling to fire his bow (citing Il.1.47–48).

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Then not at all frightened strong Diomedes answered him: “You archer, foul fighter, lovely in your locks, eyer of young girls. If you were to make trial of me in strong combat with weapons your bow would do you no good at all, nor your close showered arrows. Now you have scratched the flat of my foot, and even boast of this. I care no more than if a witless child or a woman had struck me; this is the blank weapon of a useless man, no fighter. But if one is struck by me only a little, that is far different, the stroke is a sharp thing and suddenly lays him lifeless, and that man’s wife goes with cheeks torn in lamentation, and his children are fatherless, while he staining the soil with his red blood rots away, and there are more birds than women swarming about him.” (Lattimore)45

Although no firm historical conclusions regarding the status and use of archery can be drawn from the Homeric poems, the artistic depictions create a clearer image. Hans van Wees notes that there is a diminishment in the value of archers from the Geometric to the Archaic eras and again from the Archaic to the Classical periods. He argues that in Geometric art, archers occur much more frequently than they do in the Iliad, and the Homeric poems more closely correspond to what we find in the Archaic vases.46 In addition, the Geometric pottery depicts the archers as standing whereas they are crouching behind the heavy infantry in the Archaic era.47 He concludes that in the Geometric era missile warriors were perfectly acceptable, but “in the Iliad archers, though no less numerous, stay largely in the background and are treated as second rate warriors.”48 This, however, does not mean that they are absent from the battlefield. Rather, because of the diminished value with which they were held, they were simply removed from the 45  On this passage, see Lendon, Soldiers and Ghosts, 34. Hall, however, argues that this passage is likely an interpolation since the word τοξότης is a hapax legomenon in Homer (Edith Hall, Inventing the Barbarian: Greek Self-Definition through Tragedy [Oxford Classical Monographs; Oxford: Clarendon, 1989], 42). Hall’s interpretation, however, is predicated on a view of ancient Greek ethnography that has recently and effectively been challenged (Joseph Skinner, The Invention of Greek Ethnography: From Homer to Herodotus [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012]). As Sutherland notes, this is not the only time Paris fell short of the heroic ideal; “his ‘stealing’ of Helen and all her possessions and his shooting of Achilles from behind are both outside the heroic code of hospitality (xenia) and justice (dike).” She also says, “Those that used the bow were considered inferior to those that did not: i. e. Meriones to Idomeneus, Teukros to his brother Aias, and Paris to his brother Hektor” (Sutherland, “Archery in the Homeric Epics,” 117 and 116, respectively). 46 31.8 % of the warriors in Geometric art and only 10.2 % of the warriors in Homer are archers; 7.7 % of the warriors are archers in the Proto-Corinthian vases (Hans van Wees, “The Homeric Way of War: The ‘Iliad’ and the Hoplite Phalanx, II,” GR 41 [1994]: 144–5). 47 Van Wees notes that the squatting archer reflects the open and fluid nature of archaic warfare, where missile troops would squat behind the armored soldiers and shoot over the heads or move through to discharge their weapons. The “squatting archer” in not found in Greek iconography before the seventh century and disappears after 500 b.c.e. Before the seventh century, archers “stand” and are fighting independently (van Wees, “Development of the Hoplite Phalanx,” 152, 154). 48 Idem, “Homeric Way of War, II,” 148.

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narratives.49 He notes that there are two important vectors in the development of Greek warfare: the move from missile weapons to hand-to-hand fighting and the move from mixed, open formations to close-order formations. Up to the end of the sixth century b.c.e., the Greek formations were mixed ones, with cavalry, missile warriors, and heavy infantry intermingling, and even the heavy infantry typically carried two spears of which one was used as a missile weapon.50 No later than the fifth century b.c.e., these missile fighters were removed from the ranks of the heavy infantry (that is, the phalanx). In addition to the diminishment of archery in the Archaic era, the Persian Wars had an additional impact on the devaluation of missile weapons. As a result of the conflicts between the Hellenes and Persians in the fifth century b.c.e., missile weapons, especially the bow, became the weapons of slaves, women, and barbarians.51 The depiction of Scythian archers in Greek art became a dominate image following the Persian Wars and reflected their prejudice against the foreigners. Archery thus became a “universal object of disdain in Greek literature” because bows do not require courage and are the weapons of the poor and barbarians, as is reflected in such works as Euripides’ Heracles furens and Sophocles’

and idem, Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities, 170.  Archilochus writes in frg. 139.6 of the “‘the thud of the javelins’” (δοῦπον ἀκόντων). Van Wees argues that this phrase simply expresses “battle” testifying to the prevalence of javelin throwing in the time of Archilochus (“The Development of the Hoplite Phalanx,” 147). Lendon notes that archers were mingled with the heavy infantry until the late sixth century b.c.e., and the heavy infantry were still using javelins as late as the first quarter of the fifth century (Soldiers and Ghosts, 48). 51  For the feminine images of the Persians in Greek art, see Edith Hall, “Asia Unmanned: Images of Victory in Classical Athens,” in War and Society in the Greek World (ed. John Rich and Graham Shipley; Leicester-Nottingham Studies in Ancient Society 4; London: Routledge, 1993), 108–33. She discusses the feminine images of the Persians especially in Aeschylus’ Persae. See also M. Vos, Scythian Archers in Attic Vase Paintings (Groningen: J. B. Wolters, 1963); and François Lissarrague, “The Athenian Image of the Foreigner,” in Greeks and Barbarians (ed. Thomas Harrison; New York: Routledge, 2002), 101–24. Looking at Attic pottery of the sixth and fifth centuries b.c.e., he notes that Greeks are depicted as hoplites and that barbarians are identified with their dress and weaponry, which he argues singles them out for contempt: cowardly individuals who are afraid of close-order battle. This is especially the case during and after the Persian Wars. Askold I. Ivantchik, “‘Scythian’ Archers on Archaic Attic Vases: Problems of Interpretation,” Ancient Civilizations from Scythia to Siberia 12 (2006): 197–271, argues that the Scythian dress was an iconographic symbol for a second ranked person (when compared to a hoplite). This especially applied to the period 530–490 b.c.e. Afterwards, it became an ethnic identifier of Persians as archers, not Scythians. See also idem, “Who Were the ‘Scythian’ Archers on Archaic Attic Vases?” in Scythians and Greeks: Cultural Interactions in Scythia, Athens and the Early Roman Empire (Sixth Century BC – First Century AD) (ed. D. Braund; Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2005), 100–113; Edith Hall, “The Archer Scene in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae,” Philologus 133 (1989): 38–54; François Lissarrague, L’Autre Guerrier: Archers, Peltastes, Cavaliers dans L’Imagerie Attique (Paris: Éditions La Découverte, 1990); and D. Braund, “In Search of the Creator of Athens’ Scythian Archer-Police: Speusis and the ‘Eurymedon Vase,’” ZPE 156 (2006): 109–13. 49 Ibid., 50

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Ajax.52 This does not mean that the Greeks did not use archers. The Athenians used archers quite effectively against the Persians at Plataea (Herodotus, Hist. 9.21–22), and the armies probably always had their contingents of the ‘poor’ who could not afford armor and were thus capable of fighting with “little more than stones.”53 Nevertheless, the historians and poets almost completely edit the non-hoplites out of their battle descriptions of Marathon, Thermopylae, and Plataea, describing the battles using heroic motifs and promoting the values of close-order battle.54 In addition to describing archers as cowardly and effeminate and associating the craft with barbarians, many of the battle descriptions emphasize the ineffectiveness of missile weapons against heavily armored infantry. This dismissal of missile weapons occurs as early as Homer but becomes far more pronounced following the Persian Wars. For example, in Il. 11.386–395, Diomedes mocks and slanders Paris for the ineffectiveness of his archery. Later, Archilochus (frg. 3) claimed that once the “mills of Ares” began to grind (hand-to-hand combat), the bows “will no longer be stretched forth.”55 Tyrtaeus advises the Spartan warriors not to stand beyond the range of missiles because they have their shields.56 During the many wars of the Greeks, heavy infantry are described as charging successfully against archers. According to Xenophon at Cunaxa in 401 b.c.e., the Persians, realizing their weapons’ ineffectiveness, fled before the Greeks came within missile range.57 Aeschylus’ Persae was written to recognize the effectiveness of the spear against the ineffective Persian bow, reflecting the victory in 490 b.c.e. of the Greeks at Marathon. At Plataea, the Persians rained arrows on the massed Spartan hoplites with very little effect.58 Not only in literature is the ineffectiveness of the bow emphasized, but also in art. For example, on a Classical Corinthian perfume bottle, there is a scene of Heracles fighting the Amazons. 52 The quotation is from Victor Davis Hanson, The Western Way of War: Infantry Battle in Classical Greece (2nd ed.; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 15. He cites as evidence Euripides, Herc. fur. 157–163, Aeschylus, Pers. 226–280, 725, 813, and 1601–1603. 53 Van Wees, Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities, 59–60. For the presence of the poor “stone throwers” see p. 64. A stone thrower was a label of disrespect and reflected low status  – a λευστήρ. The Delphic Oracle uses this term as a reference to Cleisthenes (Herodotus, Hist. 5.67–68). See Daniel Ogden, “Cleisthenes of Sicyon, Λευστήρ,” CQ 43 (1993): 353–63. 54 See van Wees, Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities, 180–3. 55 J. K. Anderson, “Hoplite Weapons and Offensive Arms,” in Hoplites: The Ancient Greek Battle Experience (ed. Victor Davis Hanson; New York: Routledge, 1993), 17. 56 Tyrtaeus, frg. 11 (Stobaeus, Ecl. [ΠΕΡΙ ΠΟΛΕΜΟΥ] 4.9.16 [Wachsmuth and Hense]). 57 For Marathon, see Herodotus, Hist. 6.112; for Plataea, see 9.70; and for Cunaxa, see Xenophon, Anab. 1.17–20. Anderson claims that Persian bows were incapable of penetrating Greek armor, including their shields (“Hoplite Weapons,” 21). Only on rare occasions were hand-held missiles able to penetrate shields: for example, those of the Carduchi in Xenophon, Anab. 4.2.28. 58 There were ninety-one dead according to Herodotus, Hist. 9.70. The Spartans had delayed their attack because their seer was unable to get a favorable reading from the σφάγιον (divination by a mantis).

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Heracles is depicted as a hoplite (by this time he has lost his Archaic era bow), and an Amazon warrior is depicted as an archer whose arrows have fallen ineffectually to the ground. This depiction not only contrasted close-order warfare with missile weapons,59 but also provided the artist’s assessment of the lack of value and effectiveness of arrows. In a world of honor and shame, simply fighting is not enough; the warrior must also be successful at fighting. Given the success of the Parthian mounted archers against Crassus’ legions at the battle of Carrhae in 53 b.c.e. and that of the Athenian missile fighters and peltasts at Sphacteria during the Peloponnesian War, some of these boasts about the ineffectiveness of missile weapons probably reflect more wish than reality. This wish may stem from the Greeks’ absolute revulsion of the thought of dying at the hand of an archer or missile fighter. The shame in using bows or any kind of missile weapon lay in the fact that anyone, even a woman or barbarian, could wield them. Pyrrhus suffered an ignoble death while besieging a city when a tile thrown by an Argive woman struck him on the head (Plutarch, Pyrrh. 34.1–3). According to Plutarch, the Spartans forbade the storming of walls because they feared that they could be killed by a woman hurling some sort of projectile off the wall (Plutarch, Apoph. lac., Mor. 228d–e).60 After the battle of Sphacteria where Athenian light armed warriors and archers had defeated a contingent of Spartans, the archers were condemned by the Spartans because of their inability to distinguish the brave from the coward and thus ruin “the competition in excellences that combat is supposed to be.”61 In Euripides’ Heracles furens, a debate takes place involving the value of archery versus close-order battle. The primary defense of archery lies in the fact that it is “safer,” which is a Euripidean admission that archery was almost universally understood as unheroic.62 Callicrates at the battle of Plataea who was “mortally wounded by an arrow, said, as his life was ebbing away, ‘I am not troubled because I must die, but because my death comes at the hands of a womanish archer, and before I have accomplished anything.’”63 The evidence thus strongly suggests that, while missile weapons continued to be used in warfare among the Greeks, these weapons were held in extremely low esteem. Much of the deprecation lies not in the value of the weapons per se, but rather in the low social and honorific value that this competitive culture placed on archery as a means of conducting warfare. It was associated with people of the 59 Van

Wees, “Development of the Hoplite Phalanx,” 143.  See also Plutarch, Apoph. lac., Mor. 215d, 221f, and 230c, where walled cities were understood as the habitat of women. In Mor. 210e–f, the Spartan hoplites are the walls of the city. They have no need of walls of stone. 61 Lendon, Soldiers and Ghosts, 47, citing Thucydides 7.226–227. 62 Lendon, Soldiers and Ghosts, 47. A similar assessment can be found is Sophocles, Aj. 1120–1123. 63 Quotation from LCL: Plutarch, Apoph. lac., Mor. 234e; See also Plutarch, Arist., Mor. 329c and Herodotus, Hist. 9.72. 60

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lowest social order who could not afford proper weapons and was considered the weapon of mercenaries, of women, and especially of barbarians.64 The Peloponnesian War witnessed an increase in the use of missile weapons, and this continued into the fourth century and the Hellenistic world. Nevertheless, Greek idealists looked back nostalgically at a time in which ‘men fought as men’ with courage and heroic virtue in close-order battle. Polybius (13.3.1–8) claimed that in the past the Greeks did not use ruses and agreed not to use missile weapons but “considered only hand-to-hand, pitched battle to be truly decisive.”65 A Spartan is said to have lamented when he saw a catapult that “bravery is no more” (Plutarch, Apoph. lac., Mor. 191e). Strabo (Geogr. 10.1.2) even records an inscription on an Amarynthium pillar in which, during the Lelantine War between Chalchis and Eretria, a treaty was reached that “forbids the use of long distance missiles.” While some argue that the inscription reflects earlier practices, Wheeler claims that it is an invention of the fourth century historian, Ephorus to protest the development of the catapult.66 The diminishment of archery, however, had concrete as well as nostalgic continuance. In Rome, archers were drawn from peripheral nations who were considered specialists in the art and were part of the auxilia.67 In fact, the impact was felt as late as the Middle Ages where the diminishment of archery, especially of crossbows, reflected the values of aristocratic Europeans and their prejudice against the poor.68 64 Hanson, Western Way of War, 15. See also idem, Wars of the Ancient Greeks (Smithsonian History of Warfare; London: Smithsonian Books in conjunction with Cassell, 2004), 22. For the bow as a weapon of mercenaries, see Xenophon, Cyr. 2.1.16–18 and Lendon, Soldiers and Ghosts, 55. 65  Trans. Peter Krentz, “Deception in Archaic and Classical Greek Warfare,” in van Wees, War and Violence, 168. 66 Wheeler thinks that the text is not genuine and originated with Ephorus in the fourth century (Everett L. Wheeler, “Ephorus and the Prohibition of Missiles,” TAPA 117 [1987]: 157–82). Walter Donlan, “Archilochus, Strabo and the Lelantine War,” TAPA 101 (1970): 131–42, argues that the texts at issue are Archilochus, frg. 3, which is cited by Plutarch, Thes. 5.1–4, and Strabo, Geogr. 10.1.12. He argues that the connection made between these two texts, with Archilochus providing the motivation (chivalry) for banning missile weapons in Strabo, is incorrect. There is nothing to connect the two. The Strabo inscription is not an agreement to ban missile weapons but a note that at one time they stopped using missile weapons. Van Wees claims that if it is genuine, it probably could not have occurred earlier than the mid-sixth century b.c.e. (Greek Warfare: Myths and Reality, 287, n. 13). Hanson, The Western Way of War, 16, on the other hand, views the prohibition of Strabo involving missile weapons as an authentic one of the Lelantine War. 67 See F. E. Adcock, Roman Art of War under the Republic (Martin Classical Lectures 8; Cambridge: W. Heffer & Sons, 1980), 25–26; and Adrian Keith Goldsworthy, Roman Army at War: 100 BC–AD 200 (Oxford Classical Monographs; Oxford: Clarendon, 1996), 19. 68 See Jim Bradbury, The Medieval Archer (New York: St. Martin, 1985). He notes the following: “The bow was seen as a weapon not proper to Christians and gentlemen” (p. 1); the archer was “portrayed as a coward” (p. 3); “the bow was seen as the weapon of the lowly, of peasants and mercenaries, of citizen militias” (p. 7); and for the lowly social status of archers, see pp. 171–9. On this, see also A. J. Hatto, “Archery and Chivalry: A Noble Prejudice,” Modern Language Review 35 (1940): 40–54; and more recently Rodney Stark, God’s Battalions: The Case

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It is probably no accident that the Gentiles in Christ in Eph 6:16 are depicted as heavily armored infantry preparing for close-order battle and that the Devil is depicted as a πονηρός and an archer. The βέλη or missiles are deployed by a worthless rogue, a πονηρός, and are expected to be ineffective against the shield of faithfulness. By taking up the shield, the Gentiles in Christ will be able to extinguish all the fiery missiles of the πονηρός, thus rendering them ineffective.

IV. The Fiery Bolts of the Gods Unlike the term πονηρός, the perfect passive participle “burning” (τὰ πεπυρωμένα) has attracted significant discussion in the secondary literature. The discussions, however, have focused on how the shield might extinguish fiery missiles, the fear and panic that fiery missiles could cause among infantry, and more commonly as a way of intensifying the theological assessment of the missiles as representing temptations.69 In addition, some have even speculated that it is an allusion to poison arrows, a suggestion that is appealing but without internal for the Crusades (New York: Harper One, 2009), 73, who indicates that the use of crossbows was shameful during the time of the Crusades. The prejudice against archers is found in literature: for example, Don Quixote laments the catapult as a weapon of cowards: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, The Adventures of Don Quixote (trans. J. M. Cohen; Harmondworth Penguin, 1950), 344–5 (book reference: part 1, chapter 38); and in official Church edicts: from Canon 29: “We prohibit under anathema [i. e. excommunication] that the murderous art of crossbowmen and archers, which is hateful to God, to be employed against Christians and Catholics from now on” (quoted from Michael J. Walsh, Warriors of the Lord: The Military Orders of Christendom [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003], 27). The Second Lateran Council of 1123 c.e. restricted the use of the bow as a way of prohibiting some people from participating in war – “an alliance between the church and the knightly class” (John Kelsay, “Just War and Legal Restraints,” in The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Violence [ed. Mark Juergensmeyer, Margo Kitts, and Michael Jerryson; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013], 308). 69  For the use of water soaked shields to deal with fiery missile weapons, see Barth, Ephesians, 2:771–3, who cites Josephus, B. J. 3.173 and Lincoln, Ephesians, 450, who cites Thucydides 2.75.5. These passages should have deflected the observation of Schnackenburg who claims that the shield’s ability to extinguish the fiery missiles is unrealistic (Epistle to the Ephesians, 279). Surprisingly, others note the fear, panic, and dangers created when a soldier throws away his shield, which would then expose him to spear thrusts, citing Thucydides, 2.75 and Livy, 21.8. See Bruce, Colossians and Ephesians, 408; Perkins, Ephesians, 147; Best, Ephesians, 601; Joseph Armitage Robinson, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians: A Revised Text and Translation with Exposition and Notes (London: MacMillan, 1903), 215; Lincoln, Ephesians, 450; and MacDonald, Ephesians and Colossians, 346. Barth claims that the reference is not to temptation or lust (i. e. internal), but to external: “persecution or assimilation imposed upon them by religious, cultural, political forces in their environment” (Ephesians, 774). Lincoln, Ephesians, 450, sees it more broadly as alluding to just about anything the Devil could throw at a believer. The allegorical interpretation is derived essentially from the church fathers. Chrysostom, Hom. Eph. 24.6.14–17 refers to the fiery darts as “temptations and perverse desires” (Mark J. Edwards, ed., Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament VIII, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians [Downers Grove, Ill.: Intervarsity, 1999], 211). See also Origen, Hom. Exod. 1.5; Or. 30.3; and Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 10.4.58 (specifically the πάθη).

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support.70 There have also been a number of studies on the use of fire weapons, especially in archery and with catapults, but these do not provide much insight into the use of the verbal adjective in Ephesians 6.71 On the other hand, Lang argues that the motif of burning arrows indicates a dualistic conflict between the forces of light and those of “Belial.”72 This observation resonates with the Classical and Archaic Greek motif of fiery arrows as the weapons of the gods, specifically lightning bolts or rays of the sun, which are related to divine governance.73 If this is the case, and I think it is, the author of Ephesians is drawing on traditional images of the gods exercising power over humans. The author may be alluding to the association of fiery missiles with the gods in two ways: (1) as a πονηρός because he brings illness and death (like Apollo in the Iliad), and (2) as an allusion to cosmic governance (like Zeus who uses lightning bolts to rule the cosmos). Hesiod (Theog. 708) refers to the shafts of Zeus (κῆλα δίος), which are his thunderbolts. The Iliad uses similar language (12.280) and also refers to the “stinging” arrows of Apollo in Il. 1.50–53.74 Similarly, if the burning missiles 70 This theory is rightly rejected by Robinson, Ephesians, 387; and Abbott, Ephesians, 186. Using poison on arrows is found in Greek literature as early as Homer, and was especially used by Odysseus: Od. 1.260–262 (van Wees, “Homeric Way of War, II,” 134, 150, n. 63). See especially John Scott, “The Use of Poisoned Arrows in the Odyssey,” CJ 19 (1924): 240–1. Straw argues that the poisoned arrows formerly associated with Heracles and his killing of the Hydra were reassigned to Odysseus (Od. 1.260–264; Jenny Strauss Clay, The Wrath of Athena: Gods and Men in the Odyssey [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983], 95). For the poison arrows that Heracles used to kill the Hydra, see Sophocles, Trach. 574, 714–718; and Euripides, Herc. fur. 422. 71  See especially Adrienne Mayor, Greek Fire, Poison Arrows, and Scorpion Bombs: Biological and Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World (Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Duckworth, 2003). For the use of catapults in general, see E. W. Marsden, Greek and Roman Artillery: Historical Development (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969); and Paul Bentley Kern, Ancient Siege Warfare (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999). Our sources consist primarily of didactic handbooks: Heron of Byzantium, the author of two tenth century c.e. manuals on siege warfare – Parangelmata Poliorcetica and the Geodesia; a fourth-century b.c.e. treatise by Aeneas Tacticus, Poliorcetica; Hero of Alexandria first century c.e.; Biton’s third centuries b.c.e. treatise on non-torsion catapults for Attalus (possible Attalus I of Pergamum); third century b.c.e. Philon of Byzantium: four extant works Belopoeica, Poliorcetica, Parasceuastica, and Pneumaticacirca; and first century b.c.e. Vitruvius, De architectura 10. 72  Friedrich Lang, “πυρόω,” TDNT 6:950; this contrast is analogous to 1QH II, 25. 73  See Friedrich Hauck, “βέλος,” TDNT 1:608–9, who notes that βέλος is used in certain myths to describe lightning (citing Herodotus, Hist. 4.79; Pindar, Nem. 10.15); the rays of the sun (Aeschylus, Cho. 286); and the rays of the moon or fire (Hippolytus, Haer. 531). In addition, he notes that there are numerous references to the classical and archaic gods using arrows as a weapon: Zeus, Apollo, Artemis, Aphrodite, and Eros. See especially Homer where the gods fire arrows at humans and cause death and pestilence: Il. 1.145; 24.758 and possession: Euripides, Med. 628, and Aeschylus, Prom. 649. For the use of the classical image of Zeus’ thunderbolt to represent divine governance in Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus, see Johan Carl Thom, Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus: Text, Translation, and Commentary (STAC 33; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005), 22, which is a common icon and literary motif (see p. 73, n. 158 and n. 161 for references); on the epithet πυρόεντα to describe the thunderbolt of Zeus, see p. 77. 74 There is also somewhat of a conundrum in the Homeric poems regarding the gods and archery. It is an honorable weapon among the gods but often a dishonorable one among humans.

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are metaphors of divine governance, the Devil in Ephesians is attempting to exercise power. This power, however, is far beyond his capacity or authority and is thus labeled as a πονηρός. He is caricatured as a worthless rogue who elevates himself well beyond his station and uses the dishonorable weapons of barbarians and women.

V. Shields, Missiles, and the Shame of the Devil The author of Ephesians cannot in a meaningful way be described as a monotheist. The word monotheism assumes a taxonomy of religion that is inappropriate for the first century c.e. Rather, the cosmic economy of Ephesians consists of numerous divine beings engaged in various tasks, related in different ways, and located in different places. There are “rulers,” “authorities,” “cosmic powers,” and a “pneumatic contingent of evil” (Eph 1:21, 6:12). Specifically, the Devil or διάβολος (4:27) claims special status and position as “the ruler” (2:2).75 Like many of the gods of the ancient Mediterranean world, these beings of the heavens form clans that possess kinship bonds (πᾶσα πατριὰ ἐν οὐρανοῖς, 3:15). These beings (or gods, if you will), inhabit the regions of the air (2:2) and the heavenlies (3:10) and exercise influence over and are revered by τὰ ἔθνη or the Gentiles (2:2). In Apollo and Artemis commonly bear the epithet of an archer. Sutherland suggests that the diminishment of archery among humans may be predicated on the view that to “influence events from afar” is the purview of the gods and is thus an attempt to usurp the activities of the gods. She may be correct, but there is little direct evidence in Homer, and the evidence is completely lacking in later texts even as the deprecation of archers intensified (Sutherland, “Archery in the Homeric Epics,” 111, 117–8). Nevertheless, no such dilemma existed among the Judeans or later Christians. David M. Pritchard, “The Fractured Imaginary: Popular Thinking on Citizen Soldiers and Warfare in Fifth Century Athens,” Ph.D. diss., Macquarie University, 1999, notes that the most explicit statement about the low evaluation of archers in Athenian literature is found in Euripides Heracles furens by the character Lykus. Lykus is a tyrant who is trying to murder the sons of Heracles and refuses to spare them on the basis of the valor of their father since Heracles was not a hoplite but an archer (lines 140–156). Pritchard notes that Lykus is giving an “unjustified evaluation of this hero” since they generally did not criticize the gods for using bows, only humans. “Remarkably, however, Athenian public appear to have been loath to apply this negative evaluation of bowmen in general to the gods and the heroes who were traditionally associated with archery” (p. 109). He cites as examples Heracles (p. 108), Apollo, and even Philoctetes (p. 109). For a different view, see Richard Hamilton, “Slings and Arrows: The Debate with Lycus in the Heracles,” TAPA 115 (1985): 19–25. In the case of Apollo and Zeus, the fiery bolts are associated with μῆνις (vengefulness or implacable anger). See Leonard Muellner, The Anger of Achilles: Mẽnis in Greek Epic (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996), 101–2. 75  The author of Ephesians uses a variety of terms to describe these beings: ἀρχή, ἐξουσία, δύναμις, κυριότης, κοσμοκράτωρ τοῦ σκότους τούτου, τὰ πνευματικὰ τῆς πονηρίας, and διάβολος (Eph 1:21, 4:27, 6:11, and 6:12). Κοσμοκράτωρ, which is a hapax legomenon in the New Testament, refers to certain cosmic gods, such as planetary bodies or the στοιχεῖα (see Bruce, Colossians, Philemon, and Ephesians, 405; Schnackenburg, Ephesians, 273–4; Michaelis, TDNT 3:914; and J. Y. Lee, “Interpreting the Demonic Powers in Paul’s Thought,” NovT 12 [1970]: 54–69). See also the Wis 8:2, 18:2.

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this way, the “Paul” of Ephesians, which is likely a pseudonym, is not unlike the historical Paul who acknowledged the existence of the other gods but refused to assign them the honorific label of θέος, a title which he reserves exclusively for the God of the Judeans (1 Cor 8:5–6). These lesser gods (δαιμόνια) are associated with the cults of the pagans (1 Cor 10:14–22). The author, however, is not principally interested in these divine or quasi-divine adversaries. Rather, his focus is on the Gentiles in Christ (the encoded readers), the benefactions that they have received from God, and their obligations in light of these benefactions. In doing so, he introduces a new story or μῦθος to his Gentile audience. God raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the heavenlies to rule over the cosmos (Eph 1:19–21). This act of God subordinated all of the gods of the cosmos to the rule and authority of His Messiah. This has already occurred with the resurrection of Christ and will be fully implemented in the age to come. As part of this process, these Gentiles have undergone a radical ethnic transformation, an ethnogenesis if you will, changing from Gentiles without Christ to Gentiles in Christ.76 In their former identity, they were alienated from God, His covenant, the promise, and the Judeans. They were uncircumcised (2:11), controlled by their passions, without hope, atheists (ἄθεοι), and wicked (2:2).77 They lived under the influence of another god and possessed a kinship bond (ἐν τοῖς υἱοῖς) with this πνεῦμα who influenced them to be disobedient (2:2).78 Their “former identity” is described as one of “futility of mind,” darkened understanding, estranged from the life of God, impure, and subject to the passions of sex and greed. For this behavior, they would have received eschatological punishment (5:6). The Gentile readers’ identity, however, is not static. Their old status was associated with their “flesh” and was characterized as without Christ in the world (2:12). This is completely reversed in 2:13 in that they “have been brought close by means of the blood of Christ.”79 Also, their allegiance to their former gods has been severed. In 2:12 they were strangers to the covenants of promise, but in 3:6 they now co-share in the promise. They were alienated from God but now possess a kinship bond with God as His sons (1:5).80 An equally strong statement of the reversal of their former identity as Gentiles is found in 4:17 in which they are advised to no longer live as the Gentiles live. 76  Jeffrey R. Asher, “Ethnogenesis and the Gentiles in Ephesians” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the SBL, Chicago, Ill., November 18, 2012). 77 This is a description that possesses a familiar ring to other Judean constructions of the Gentiles. 78  Presumably, this is a lesser god according to the way the author would construct his cosmic hierarchy: “the ruler of the power of the air” (2:2). 79 For the instrumental dative in Ephesians, see Talbert, Ephesians and Colossians, 35–40. 80 As Fredriksen makes clear regarding Pauline notions of adoption (Paula Fredriksen, “Judaizing the Nations: The Ritual Demands of Paul’s Gospel,” NTS 56 [2010]: 244), the Gentiles were not adopted into Israel since Paul is insistent on maintaining their separate identity as Gentiles. While they do not establish kinship bonds with the Judeans, they are adopted as God’s sons.

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This highlights an essential part of this ethnic transformation; they must embrace a new set of ethnic customs and mores. In 4:1–16, the author constructs an elaborate foundation μῦθος in which, on the basis of Psalm 68, Christ distributed gifts. These gifts consisted of appointing founder figures to facilitate unity with the Judeans and to enable the Gentiles in Christ to abandon their old customs and habits and to acquire new ones that are compatible with the Torah. In other words, they must be transformed from disobedient to obedient and from unfaithfulness to faithfulness. This entails not only moral customs (4:17–5:20), but also social ones, especially as they relate to the household (5:21–6:9). These social relations within the household have been reconstructed in Christ and are now informed by the Torah.81 This is the essential function of the ethnic transformation of the Gentiles in Christ that is encoded in the metaphor of the shield in Eph 6:16: faithfulness. By taking up the shield of faithfulness (πίστις), they will be able to engage the ruler of the air, the Devil. In other words, by embracing these new social and moral customs, which entail faithfulness to God, they can participate in the unfolding cosmic drama in which the rulers and powers of the cosmos will be exposed as weak and ineffectual and will ultimately be assigned their proper place of degradation in the cosmic economy of God. The metaphors in Eph 6:16 thus encode essential components of the larger argument of the letter.

VI. Conclusion M. I. Finley notes that in Homer’s world a person’s heroic worth was determined by “whom he fought, how he fought, and how he fared.”82 By that calculation, the Devil does not measure up. He is a worthless scoundrel who uses fiery missile weapons that ultimately are ineffective against the shield of faithfulness of the Gentiles in Christ. Although the Devil rules the region of the air, presumably the realm between the moon and the surface of the earth, and over the non-Judean tribes of the earth, he is not worthy of functioning in even that capacity, and at some point in the future will be struck down. The author of Ephesians describes the real stature of the Devil in vivid and evocative language. By drawing on the conventions of slander in the Greco-Roman world, he rhetorically puts the Devil in his place in the cosmic economy. He caricatures him as nothing more than a worthless rogue who does not possess the courage and strength to engage with the Gentiles in Christ in close-combat, but rather like a woman or a barbarian shamefully crouches at a distance, unleashing his ineffectual missiles. Daniel K. Darko, No Longer Living As the Gentiles (London: T & T Clark, 2008), 106, 130; and Timothy G. Gombis, “A Radically New Humanity: The Function of the Haustafel in Ephesians,” JETS 48 (2005): 317–30. 82 Moses I. Finley, The World of Odysseus (2nd ed.; New York: Penguin, 1979), 118. 81 Contra

Going the Extra Mile Reading Matt 5:41 Literally and Metaphorically1 Laurie Brink I. Introduction Within the Sermon on the Mount, the command to go the extra mile is part of a series of dominical sayings, presented as “‘advanced’ teaching for those who have already become disciples.”2 Following the Beatitudes (5:1–11) and two parables (5:12–16), Jesus turns to questions about the Law and the Prophets. He assures his disciples that his intent is not to abolish (καταλῦσαι) the Law, but to fulfill (πληρῶσαι) it (5:17).3 He proposes six reinterpretations of Scripture that address murder (vv. 21–26), adultery (vv. 27–30), divorce (vv. 31–32), the taking of oaths (vv. 33–37), retaliation (vv. 38–42), and treatment of the enemy (vv. 43–48). In order to enter the kingdom of heaven, the disciples are to possess righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees (5:20), whom Matthew critiques as the very purveyors of inadequate interpretations (15:4; 16:12; 23:15). 1  Going the extra mile has entered into common parlance to refer to any additional effort extended beyond what is required. Certainly his extensive bibliography testifies that Hans Dieter Betz has extended monumental scholarly effort on behalf of the discipline. What is less noticed, but no less noteworthy, is the extra mile he has gone on behalf of his students, this one in particular. During the long travail of researching and writing my dissertation, Hans Dieter Betz offered encouragement but more importantly, he offered scholarly insights. One of those insights concerned the extra mile logion in Matt 5:41 and its absence in Luke. This article brings those insights into conversation with Betz’ commentary on the Sermon on the Mount (Hermeneia, Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 1995), and my own research in Roman military practices. 2  After going up the mountain, Jesus sits down and his disciples come to him (5:1). “In Matthew’s view, the SM was not intended to be the personal instruction of only the four disciples addressed, but of all disciples,” (Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 81). 3  “The term ‘fulfill’ is well chosen because it describes a process of legal interpretation in which individual laws are interpreted in such a way that they are made to fit given situations or cases and to facilitate justice” (Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 179). Davies and Allison argue that πληρόω is best interpreted as meaning that Jesus “fulfills” or “completes” the law “by bringing a new law which transcends the old,” but this fulfilment is eschatological: “the telos which the Torah anticipated, namely, the Messiah, has come and revealed the law’s definitive meaning” (W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Jr., Matthew [3 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1988], 1:486).

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Owing to Matthew’s use of the verb ἀγγαρεύω, the Roman practice known as angareia is exclusively cited as the backdrop against which to read Jesus’ imperative to go the extra mile (Matt 5:41).4 However, a review of the inscriptional and literary evidence on ἀγγαρεία demonstrates that the official practice concerned the transportation of goods and not the wanton impressing of individuals into labor. The term later came to refer to any forced service, not necessarily at the behest of the Romans. Matt 5:41 might more accurately be interpreted as a response to extortion or διάσεισμα. The Matthean Jesus advises that those disciples who are compelled to go a mile must actually go further. Set within the antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount, this verse serves as a metaphorical example of fulfilling the Law (Matt 5:17) by exceeding it. Read in this light, the extra mile logion stands in opposition to the scribes and Pharisees whom Jesus accuses of compelling others to carry the Law that they themselves neglect (Matt 23:4). The following sections will investigate Matt 5:41 as an example of official angareia, as an act of extortion, and as a metaphor for fulfilling the Law and the Prophets, by attending to the historical context, the literary setting and the pericope’s narrative function within the Gospel of Matthew.

II. Matt 5:41 interpreted as  Ἀγγαρεία The successful administration of the Roman provinces required a reliable mode of transport for official communiques, personnel, and supplies. Augustus developed a system based on the eastern model (Suetonius, Aug. 49.5–50), created by Cyrus, who wanted to assure access to information across the breadth of his empire (Xenophon, Cyr. 8.6.17). The Persian loan word, ἄγγαρος, or letter bearer, referred to mounted royal messengers stationed as regular intervals. Since these riders had the right to compel persons or their pack animals into service for the king, the action became known as ἀγγαρεύειν in Greek and angariare in Latin. The term referred to the requirement to provide supplies for the imperial post, officials, and the military. Papyri attest that in Roman Egypt one was appointed to a liturgical office with the responsibility of providing such transport services.5  See discussion below.  A second century document lists the names of persons responsible for providing supplies for an upcoming official visit by the Prefect of Egypt, L. Valerius Proclus. The lengthy document was compiled by the town clerks of Hermopolis. “The list was evidently a permanent one, which had to be modified for any particular occasion by the provision of substitutes for those who were (1) excused by virtue of special warrants, (2) engaged in the performance of other public duties, as tax-collectors, corn commissioners, embankment inspectors, and the like, (3) dead (II. 5–7),” (F. G. Kenyon and H. I. Bell, Greek Papyri in the British Museum, vol. III [London: British Museum, 1907], 112). The Geneva Papyrus inv. no. 242 records an early third century oath to provide faithful service. The name is missing but enough of the papyrus remains to reconstruct the following: “for the duty of providing the animal-and-wagon teams for the auspicious visit of 4 5

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Angareia is paired with hospitium (Dig. 50.4.18), where both providing supplies and offering hospitality are public responsibilities (Dig. 50.5.11).

1. Reading  Ἀγγαρεύω Literally Most commentaries explain Matt 5:41 in reference to this practice of ἀγγαρεία, which they presume “consisted in carrying baggage from one place to another” based on their reading of the text in question.6 Luz explains that ἀγγαρεύω refers to “services compelled by the army or by officials, services such as carrying equipment or escorting, but also providing provisions and finally any kind of compulsory work, even that demanded through others.”7 In reference to the carrying of equipment and escorting, he cites Rostowzew,8 Mitteis and Wilcken.9 The work of Mitteis and Wilcken is a collection of papyri dated from the late first to fourth century. The pages which Luz cites concern the leasing of property and seem to have no direct relation to the practice of ἀγγαρεία. In his article, Rostowzew states that the action referred to in Matt 5:41 occurs when a soldier makes a peasant carry his pack to the next village. Without recourse to inscriptional or literary evidence, he adds: Wir begegnen also einer allgemeinen Pflicht, welche auf der Bevölkerung selbst bezw, auf den ihr gehörenden Tieren lastete und darin bestand, daß Beamte, Soldaten und ähnl, das Recht hatten, die Kraft der an der Straße wohnenden Bevölkerung für das Tragen ihres Gepäcks in Anspruch zu nehmen.10

Likewise Davies and Allison place the verse within a Roman imperial context. Matt 5:41 “presumably envisions a situation in which civilians are compelled by Roman soldiers to do their bidding and carry their equipment (cf. Mk 15:21).”11 Other scholars follow suit, though seldom cite any source.12 Reading Matt 5:41 the illustrious Prefect Subatianus Aquila in the current nineteenth year, swear by the Fortune of our lords the Emperors Severus, Antoninus, and Geta Pii Augusti that I will at once undertake the above-indicated service and will publicly discharge it so as to incur blame in no particular, or may I be liable to (the consequences of ) my oath” (Naphtali Lewis, “Leitourgia Papyri: Documents on Compulsory Public Service in Egypt under Roman Rule,” TAPhS 53 [1963]: 1–39, here 27).  6  Daniel J. Harrington, S. J. Matthew (SP; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1991), 89. Luz concludes, “Most probably one is to think here of guidance on the way, perhaps in unsafe areas or for carrying one’s baggage” (Ulrich Luz, Matthew 1–7 [Hermeneia; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007], 273).  7 Luz, Matthew 1–7, 272–273.  8  Michail Rostowzew, “Angariae,” Klio 6 (1906): 249–258.  9  Ludwig Mitteis and Ulrich Wilcken, Grundzüge und Chrestomathie der Papyruskunde (4 vols.; Leipzig: Teubner, 1912) 1/1:372–80. 10 Rostowzew, “Angariae,” 258. 11 Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:547. 12 Schweizer writes, “In the third example, we are dealing with the legal right enjoyed by the Roman occupation forces to compel a Jew to go along as a guide or porter” (The Good News According to Matthew [trans. David E. Green; Atlanta: John Knox, 1975], 130). Schnackenburg’s

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exclusively against the backdrop of the Roman oppression, Manson proposes the verse exemplifies Matt 22:17. “The first mile renders to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; the second mile, by meeting opposition with kindness, renders to God the things that are God’s.”13 The presumption that the extra mile logion refers to the official Roman practice underlies various explanations for its absence in the Gospel of Luke. Marshall contends that “Luke may have omitted this because it applied to the conditions of Roman occupation in Palestine (23:26) and was less relevant to his readers.”14 Or Luke may have redacted the verse “because he lived either in a senatorial province or in Rome, where forced service was not required since no troops were stationed there.”15 Limiting the context of Matt 5:41 based on a literal reading of ἀγγαρεύω has unnecessarily narrowed the possibilities of interpretation, and affected how verse 41 is understood within its literary context. Investigating contemporaneous evidence shows that the action which Jesus describes is not typical of official angareia.

2. The Roman Practice and Abuse of  Ἀγγαρεία Though no papyrological and inscriptional evidence describe the use of a civilian to accompany an official for one mile, the evidence does describe that abuses of the system abounded. Dated to the early reign of Tiberius, an inscription addressing the community at Sagalassus, Pisidia, set the limits for requisitioned goods and impressed services according to the rank and status of the one making the request.16 Written in Latin and Greek, it is the earliest imperial inscription found comment is similar: “The third example refers to forced service of the kind frequently imposed by Roman soldiers on the population in the Palestine of that day (cf. Matt. 27:32),” (The Gospel of Matthew [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002], 61). Warren Carter reads Matt 5:41 in light of Matthew’s presumed context of Antioch, where three or four legions were stationed that “consumed a significant amount of local production through taxes and requisitions of people’s energy and resources (see Matt 5:41),” (Matthew: Storyteller, Interpreter, Evangelist [Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2004], 68). 13  T. W. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus (London: SCM Press, 1949), 160. 14  I. Howard Marshall, The Gospel of Luke: A Commentary on the Greek Text (NIGTC 3; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), 260. 15  Luz, Matthew 1–7, 271. The presumption that Luke lived in a senatorial province or Rome is mentioned by Luz only in passing, and the evidence for his comment is not given. As with the actual audience of Luke-Acts, we have no historical evidence that identifies either the author of the Gospel or the provenance for its origin. But the idea that no troops would have been stationed in senatorial provinces or in Rome is inaccurate. While Augustus did divide the subjected territories according to their need for military oversight, both imperial and senatorial provinces had military troops. Legions were ordinarily not stationed in senatorial provinces, but governors could request detachments (Tacitus, Hist. 2.58). On the stationing of auxiliary units in senatorial provinces, see E. Ritterling, “Military Forces in the Senatorial Provinces,” JRS 17 (1927): 28. 16 Stephen Mitchell, “Requisitioned Transport in the Roman Empire: A New Inscription from Pisidia,” JRS 66 (1976): 106–131.

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that details the regulations for the provision of transport. The local community had to provide up to ten wagons or as many mules for officials passing through the city’s territory. In return, the owner was to receive ten asses per schoenum (a unit of distance) for a wagon and four asses per schoenum for a mule. If a mule was not available, two donkeys could be substituted. Access to this service was limited to the procurator, military personnel with provincial authorization, and military personnel passing through from other provinces. A senator was entitled to the maximum amount, while a member of the equestrian order could use up to three wagons or three mules. A centurion was entitled to one wagon or three mules or six donkeys. The edict also addressed hospitality for those eligible for transport services. Members of the provincial’s staff, those on military service from other provinces, freedmen and slaves of the imperial house were to be quartered without payment. The edict clarifies several aspects of ἀγγαρεία. First, requisitioning of local transportation required payment, though likely less than market-value. Second, limits were set for the distance that one was obliged to travel. The residents of Sagalassus had to provide transport as far north Conana (35 kilometers) and southwest to Cormasa (55 kilometers), likely the breadth of its territory. Third, rank determined the number of wagons and pack animals one could requisition. Finally, the edict clearly states that ἀγγαρεία is reserved for official business only. The Sagalassus inscription sets limits and regulations for the impressment of services, precisely because the system was being abused. An edict of Germanicus, written in 19 c.e., forbids the forced seizure of boats, animals and lodging unless by order of the imperial secretary, so as to assure a fair distribution and adequate payment for services. The edict also forbids the commandeering of pack animals by those traveling through the city. Germanicus’ language is unambiguous: this is robbery (τοῦτο γὰρ ἤδη ὁμολογουμένης ληστείας ἐστὶν ἔργον).17 The edict does not state who the culprits are, but generally, soldiers were often cited. A few years later, the Prefect L. Aemilius Rectus announced that soldiers, police, or those working in his administration who extort or use force for gain would be punished (P. London 1171, verso).18 Only holders of a diploma from the prefect himself could requisition transportation and supplies, for which suitable remuneration was to be given.19 An edict of Vergilius Capito, issued at Alexandria on December 7, 48 c.e., seeks to end the inappropriate “padding of the expense accounts” by military 17 See A. S. Hunt and C. C. Edgar, Select Papyri (3 vols.; LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963), 2:76. 18 The papyrus is dated to 42 c.e. (see F. G. Kenyon, et al., Greek Papyri in the British Museum III [London: Oxford University Press, 1907], 105–7; and S. R. Llewelyn, New Documents Illustrating Early Christianity; Volume 7 [North Ryde, N. S. W. Australia: Macquarie University, 1994], 66–67). 19 Ranon Katzoff, “Sources of Law in Roman Egypt: The Role of the Prefect,” ANRW 2.13:807– 844, here 811.

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officers, suggesting that the corrupt practices of soldiers extended beyond their abuse of the right of angareia and hospitium: “Although civilian officials as well as military personnel were involved in these abuses, it is probably that the latter, whether because they were armed or because they were more often on the road, were the chief offenders.”20 The frequency of such requisitions and the impressment of pack animals into service by traveling Roman soldiers necessitated continual imperial intervention.21 Josephus reported that a decree of Demetrius forbade the requisition of animals belonging to the Jews (A. J. 13.52). “It is surely significant that in our documentary evidence from outside Egypt far more attention is given to this issue than to that of direct taxation in cash or kind.”22 Third century Jewish sources indicate that the abuses perpetrated by the Roman army did not lessen in peacetime.23 The abuses of the official practice of angareia and the activities of extortion which claimed the same title were variously portrayed in literature. Epictetus is often cited as an example of the potential violence involved in the commandeering of pack animals. In comparing the body to a pack animal, Epictetus wrote: “and if [a poor loaded-down donkey] be commandeered (ἀγγαρεία) and a soldier lay hold of it, let it go, do not resist or grumble. If you do, you will get a beating and lose your little donkey just the same” (Arrian, Epict. Diss. 4.1.79 [Oldfather, LCL]). Writing at the end of the first century, Apuleius narrates just such a scene in Book 9 of Metamorphoses. A gardener is returning home when he encounters a tall man whose dress and manner reveal him to be a soldier from the legion (9.39). The soldier gruffly asks in Latin where the gardener is taking the donkey. Not knowing the language, the gardener continues past the soldier. Unable to contain himself, the soldier strikes the gardener with his staff. The abused gardener explains that he does not know Latin, so the soldier responds in Greek. When the soldier discovers that the donkey is being taken to the next city, he attempts to confiscate it in order to transport the commander’s baggage. Calling the soldier commilito, the gardener tries to dissuade the requisition of his animal. The soldier turns his staff intending to strike the gardener again. In self-defense, the gardener attacks the soldier first, pummeling him with his fists, elbows, teeth, and even a rock from the road (9.40). The soldier, unable to move, continues to threaten that when he does get up, he will cut the gardener to pieces. Quickly, the 20 Naphtali

Lewis, “On Official Corruption in Roman Egypt: The Edict of Vergilius Capito,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 98 (1954): 153–158, here 153. 21  W. H. C. Frend, “A Third-Century Inscription Relating to Angareia in Phrygia,” JRS 46 (1956): 49. 22 Fergus Millar, “The World of the Golden Ass,” JRS 71 (1981): 63–75, here 68. 23 Benjamin Isaac, “The Roman Army in Judaea: Police Duties and Taxation,” in Roman Frontier Studies (ed. V. A. Maxfield and M. I. Dobson; Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1991), 458– 61. The later Roman period saw a continual decline in military discipline which accompanied increased extortion of the peasantry.

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gardener moves his sword from his reach. But the gardener is only momentarily victorious. The scene ends with the soldier again in possession of his sword and now leaving town with his commandeered donkey, loaded high with baggage. When the soldier arrives at his destination, he is quartered in the house of the town councilor. After selling the donkey and pocketing the proceeds, he continues to his next assignment. As the evidence indicates, ἀγγαρεία refers to the requisitioning of transportation and supplies for traveling members of the staff of the prefect or soldiers with legitimate orders. Any other impressment of provincials for gain was robbery or extortion, both of which Epictetus and Apuleius describe vividly.

3.  Ἀγγαρεία in Israel Long before Cyrus developed his elaborate relay using ἀγγάροι, rulers impressed the citizenry into forced labor. Israel was no exception. As the prophet Samuel warns, it is the right of a king to seize one’s slaves and the best of the cattle and donkeys, in order to put them to the king’s own work (1 Sam 8:16). The Talmud indicates that royal levies of pack animals were to be expected. Moses was permitted to requisition animals from the Moabites, but not from the Ammonites (b. B. Qam. 38b). When an animal was taken, it was not returned until another replaced it, but the owner could follow along to retrieve his property (b. B. Me i a 78b). Samson declared that during his years of judging Israel, he never ordered anyone to carry his staff from one place to another (So ah 10a). Rabbis were not exempt from impressed labor. Rabbi Zeira explains that he was once forced (‫ )באנגריא‬to haul a myrtle tree to the palace (y. Ber. 1.2d).24 And rabbis themselves, or their disciples, could requisition services when needed, but scholars of the law could not be impressed into the service of another (b. Ned. 32a). Despite this, b. Yoma 35b tells the story of R. Eleazar b. Harsom who was accosted by his own disciples, who did not recognize him. They seized him (‫ )אנגריא‬to serve their rabbi. He had to pay them for his own release. As the Talmudic evidence suggests, “the rabbis, when in need, were entitled to have their particular type of aristocracy recognized in the same way (as rulers). That is why we find impressment exercised on the part of disciples of rabbis, in their master’s interest.”25 proposes that the use of the term angareia in y. Ber. 1.2d serves as a subtle critique of Roman domination. “The motifs of myrtle, Satan, and angareia all seem to be employed to create the sub-text within this narrative. In other words, the talmudic discourse discloses a hidden transcript that, within a discussion of rabbinic prayer, focuses on contextual references to the surrounding culture related to Roman domination and cultic practice” (Tracy Ames, “Compositional Complexity in the Palestinian Talmud Aggadah, Tractate Berakhot,” [Ph.D. diss., University of British Columbia, 2012], 107–113). 25 J. Duncan M. Derrett, “The Law in the New Testament: The Palm Sunday Colt,” NovT 13 (1971): 241–258, here 244. 24 Ames

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4.  Ἀγγαρεία as Extortion As essential to understanding the “extra mile” logion within its Matthean context, Fiebig took up Deissmann’s question: Welches aramäische Wort ist wohl Mt 5,41 durch ἀγγαρεύω wiedergegeben?26 Reviewing Talmudic literature, he discovered that the Greek ἀγγαρεύω is transliterated as ‫אנגריא‬. The Hebrew ‫( אנס‬to compel or constrain) is also used. On both occasions, the terms can refer to requisitioned transport or any forced labor.27 From his analysis of the literature, Fiebig concluded that ἀγγαρεύω generally means “to compel.” This is a more accurate reading of the verb as presented in Matt 27:32. Simon is compelled by the soldiers to carry Jesus’ cross, but the action does not depict the practice of licit ἀγγαρεία. As Derrett aptly demonstrates, the only example of actual ἀγγαρεία in the New Testament occurs when Jesus sends his disciples to commandeer the donkey in Mark 11:1–7//Matt 20:29–34//Luke 19:29–38//John 12:12–15.28 Greater attention to the available evidence led Deissmann to conclude: The usage of the verb in the Synoptists and Josephus falls into a more distinct historical connection: the word, originally applied only to a Persian institution, had gained a more general sense as early as the third century B. C. This sense, of course, was itself a technical one at first, as can be seen from the papyrus and the inscription as well as from Josephus, but the word must have become so familiar that the Evangelists could use it quite generally for to compel.29

Likewise Horsley finds that ἀγγαρεύω does not necessarily imply an official imperial context. “The documentary examples illustrate well how the word is ‘officialese’, and carries no pejorative connotation as the NT passages (Mt. 5.41; 27.32 = Mk. 15.21) could be misinterpreted as implying.”30 Since Matt 5:41 has consistently been read against the backdrop of the official Roman practice of angareia, some commentators surmise “the verse implies hostility toward the Roman occupying power.”31 However, the activity detailed in the verse – that of being compelled to walk a mile – does not fit the description of the actual practice. As inscriptional evidence attests, ἀγγαρεία referred to the official use of vehicles and beasts of burden for the legitimate transport of baggage over specified distances, and for such services owners were to be paid. Contrary to Hans Dieter Betz, the evidence does not attest that such service was 26  Paul Fiebig, “ Ἀγγαρεύω,” ZNW 18 (1917–1918): 64–72, here 64. Fiebig is citing Adolf Deissmann, Bibelstudien (Marburg: N. G. Elwert, 1895), 81. 27  Ibid., 65. 28  Derrett, “The Law in the New Testament,” 241–258. 29 Adolf Deissmann, Bible Studies (trans. Alexander Grieve; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1901), 87. Against Schweizer who held that “The term translated as ‘force’ is a technical word for requisitioning by civil or military authorities,” Schweizer, Good News According to Matthew, 130). 30  G. H. R.  Horsley, New Documents Illustrating Early Christianity, vol. 2 (North Ryde, Aust.: Macquarie University, 1982), 77. 31 Luz, Matthew 1–7, 273.

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gratuitous or that all impressment was legal.32 However, in a Jewish context, kings and royal officials could commandeer animals (1 Sam 8:17), and Talmudic literature records that rabbis were afforded the same right (b. Yoma 35b). In either case, no payment was made for the service. Though none of the literary, inscriptional, or Talmudic materials describe the action of walking with another for such a short distance, that hasn’t stopped scholars from presuming such a law existed. “There is, so far as I can tell, no surviving Roman law limiting angareia to one mile, but scholars have almost universally inferred from the word of the text (correctly I believe) that some such rule was in force.”33 Apuleius’ depiction of the gardener’s encounter with the soldier is the closest literary example, but as clearly evident from the scene, the soldier is extorting the gardener and not acting with an official diploma. The action depicted in Matt 5:41 more closely resembles extortion, where a provincial is forced into an activity with no hope of remuneration. The perpetrators of such extortion could be Roman officials or soldiers. It was not unheard of that Jewish authorities would commandeer an individual or his or her pack animal. In either scenario, the perpetrator was in a role of authority. Since ἀγγαρεία can refer either to official requisitioning of transport or to an act of extortion, an analysis of the literary setting in which Matt 5:41 is placed will help determine which definition is most probable.

III. Matt 5:41 Interpreted as Extortion In Matt 5:21–37, Jesus addresses legislation about murder, adultery, divorce, and perjury, in order to correct misinterpretations of the Law and the Prophets. Though often referred to as “antitheses,” these statements do not contradict the Scripture cited, but rather amplify it.34 They are not antithetical to the Law, whose every ἰῶτα and κεραία will not pass until it comes to be (5:18). What is at issue is not an abrogation of the Law, but a refutation of its transmission. Jesus

32 Betz writes, “Some persons could legally compel others to render services gratuitously, and the victim of such a despicable request was legally obliged to comply” (Sermon on the Mount, 291). 33 Walter Wink, “Beyond Just War and Pacifism,” in War and Its Discontents: Pacifism and Quietism in the Abrahamic Traditions (ed. J. Patout Burns; Washington, D. C.: Georgetown University Press, 1996), 102–121, 119, n 21. 34 “The sayings are traditionally called ‘the Antitheses.’ But this designation seems to imply that after stoutly affirming the Law in 5:17–20, Jesus contradicts it. We’ll see on the contrary that he escalates it. He takes the Law up to the goal toward which it was already headed, so that we should stop calling these sayings ‘the Antitheses’ and perhaps start calling them ‘the Culminations’” (Robert H. Gundry, Commentary on the New Testament [Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2010], 18).

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proposes six reinterpretations of Scripture that begin with a version of ἠκούσατε ὅτι ἐρρέθη (5:21, 27, 31, 33, 38, 43). The implication is that the inadequate doctrine has passed through many hands before it has reached the present hearers. … In other words, the SM introduces here a critical difference between what God has in fact said and what the tradition claims God has said.35

The first part of the antithesis presents either the incorrect interpretation (5:21, 33, 43) or the Scripture quotation itself (5:27, 31, 38). The second part is introduced by ἐγὼ δὲ λέγω ὑμῖν (5:22, 28, 32, 34, 39, 44) and offers the accurate interpretation.36 In 5:21–48, Jesus presents a series of reinterpretations, culminating with the love of one’s enemy.37 Since elements of the third (v. 32), fifth (vv. 39b–42) and sixth (vv. 44 –48) antithesis find parallels in Luke (16:18; 6:29–30; 6:27, 32–36) scholars have debated whether the antithetical format of Matthew is traditional or redactional.38 A detailed analysis of the fifth antithesis and its Lucan parallel led Guelich to conclude that Matthew had modified a tradition common to both evangelists. “Matthew has separated the tradition of Q. He removed what was an integral element of the composition tradition (cf. Luke 6:29 f.) from its setting and placed it before the love command.… Therefore, the antithetical format of the three Antitheses sharing traditional parallels with Q material (vv. 31 f., 38 ff., 43 ff.) is the product of Matthew’s redaction and not the tradition.”39 Matthew strategically situated his Q material within a framework of Torah interpretation. The evangelist’s purposeful redaction of 5:38–42 is readily evident when compared to parallel verses in Luke 6:29–30. Though sharing a common source, Matthew and Luke created decidedly different literary frameworks in which they set a series of dominical sayings. The Matthean pericope illustrates the law of retribution (Matt 5:38) in light of the command to love one’s enemies (Matt 5:44), though each command stands at the opening of different antitheses.40 Jesus tells his disciples to offer no resistance to the evil one, and in fact, to respond with generosity even if struck or sued or solicited. The Lucan pericope begins with the command to love one’s enemy, and there is no mention of the law of retribution. In Luke, the enemies whom the disciples are called to love are those who verbally abuse (hate, curse, revile, Luke 6:27–28) and physically attack them (strike, steal, Luke 6:29–30). Betz is correct when he notes: Sermon on the Mount, 208.  Ibid. 37  “This commandment, central as it was not only for early Christian theology but also for the teaching of the historical Jesus, sums up all of the antitheses” (Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 204). 38 R. Guelich, “The Antitheses of Matthew V. 21–48: Traditional and / or Redactional?” NTS 22 (1976): 444–457; here 446). 39 Ibid., 450. 40 The ius talionis opens the fifth antitheses (Matt 5:38–42), and the command to love one’s enemy is at the beginning of the sixth antithesis (Matt 5:43–48). 35 Betz, 36

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These differences and similarities exclude a simple literary takeover of either the SM or the SP in the composition of the other, either by way of reduction or expansion, and they argue in effect for separate redactional elaborations of a traditional illustration by both the SM and the SP.41

1. Resisting Retaliation: The Fifth Antithesis After directing the disciples that their “yes” and “no” are to be decisive (Matt 5:33–37), Jesus now turns to the biblical warrant for limited retaliation (Exod 21:24; Lev 24:20; Deut 19:21). He demands radical submission and meekness in the face of injustice: μὴ ἀντιστῆναι τῷ πονηρῷ (Matt 5:39a). As Betz notes, such a response is not to recommend an attitude of resignation and defeatism concerning evil or a principled self-surrender to all kinds of villains. Rather, what is commanded is not nonviolence in general but desistance from retaliation in specific instances. The difference is that such desistance is in effect a positive method of fighting evil and helping justice prevail. This method corresponds to the “intent” of the ius talionis and is thus an adequate way to fulfill the Torah prescription.42

Jesus outlines five situations in which the disciple is to desist from retaliation: when struck, when sued, when impressed into service, when asked for alms, and when asked for a loan (vv. 38–42). Whereas the introduction (v. 38–39a) addresses a plural you, vv. 39b–42 concern the individual, σύ. In the first (v. 39b) and third (v. 41) situation the assailant is identified by the relative pronoun, ὅστις. Participles (τῷ θέλοντί σοι κριθῆναι, v. 40; τῷ αἰτοῦντί σε and τὸν θέλοντα ἀπὸ σοῦ δανίσασθαι, v. 42) identify the perpetrators in the other three. As would be expected in a series of commands, the verbs are in the imperative with one prohibitive subjective appearing in v. 42. Matt 5:38–39a begins with the Scripture that advocates a limited retaliation for injustice done, but Jesus commands the disciple to offer no resistance to the evil one. The verses that follow present a series of actions to which a disciple is to respond with non-retaliation, and are paralleled in Luke 6:29–30. Matt 5:39b–42 depicts three different settings: a violent personal insult, a scene from debtor’s court, and an encounter with a beggar or someone in need of a loan. The Matthean verses decrease in severity, moving from a violent slap in verse 39b to a request for aid in verse 42.43 The first example to which a disciple is to respond with non-retaliation is a personal affront. Matt 5:39b envisions an individual being struck on the right Sermon on the Mount, 289. 284. 43 “The relationship between the sentences is anticlimactic and accumulative, beginning with the violent slap on the cheek and then decreasing the violence to a mere petition in the final sentence,” (Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 275). 41 Betz,

42 Ibid.,

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cheek. Matthew’s use of ὅστις suggests that the disciple is not to distinguish his or her assailant, and therefore respond differently according to rank or status. The issue is not that a master hits his slave or the oppressor hits the oppressed, nor is it the renunciation of one’s rights to legal retribution for insults, nor is it the blows the disciples receive during their mission (‘as heretics’). It is rather any violent confrontation that may happen in everyday life.44

Matthew’s ῥαπίζει (to strike with an open hand, BDAG 903) is less forceful than the verb τύπτω (to inflict a blow, beat, BDAG 1020) found in Luke’s parallel (6:29). The same verb will describe the actions of those in the house of the high priest who strike Jesus during his trial (Matt 26:67). Matthew specifies the right cheek (τὴν δεξιὰν σιαγόνα), perhaps to emphasize the degree of insult.45 The addition of the word, “right,” may also be for rhetorical effect.46 The scene changes in the next verses. Matt 5:40 presents a court setting where one is sued for his or her personal clothing (χιτών).47 Mosaic Law prevented the taking of one’s outer cloak (ἱμάτιον), since this served as his or her covering at night (Exod 22:25–26). The Matthean defendant is to offer willingly his or her cloak, despite the Law. Luz proposes that this saying is not to be taken literally. “Here the hyperbolic formulation is clear, since a man whose shirt and cloak were also taken in a trial would be naked. Verse 40 cannot be demanding that.”48 In Matthew’s fifth antithesis, he includes an additional verse absent in Luke:49 καὶ ὅστις σε ἀγγαρεύσει μίλιον ἕν, ὕπαγε μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ δύο (Matt 5:41).50 Both the  Luz, Matthew 1–7, 272.  To strike the right cheek, one would use the left hand or the back of the right hand, either of which would be considered a grave insult (Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:543–40). 46  “The slap on the right cheek – the addition of ‘right’ may come from the evangelist – is not what would ordinarily happen, since one either must be left-handed or hit with the back of the hand. It may indicate an especially strong insult. It is more probable, however, that he instinctively mentioned which cheek for rhetorical reasons” (Luz, Matthew 1–7, 272). 47  The verb, ἀντιστῆναι, in Matt 5:39a, may come from Isa 50:8 “where the expression has to do with verbal resistance in a court of law,” (Robert Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Handbook for a Mixed Church under Persecution [2nd ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994], 94), indicating that both v. 39b and v. 40 should be envisioned within the setting of a court. 48  Luz, Matthew 1–7, 272. 49  Though Luke 6:29–30 shares with Matt 5:39b–42 the command to offer the other cheek and to give unstintingly (whether of one’s clothing or one’s possessions), the reference to walking an additional mile is missing. Three possibilities can explain the lacuna: the logion was absent from Luke’s sources, the logion is a Matthean redaction, or if present in his sources, the logion was deleted by Luke. Betz argues that since differences between the Sermon on the Mount and the Sermon on the Plain result from two different presynoptic versions of Q, the extra mile logion of Matthew was simply absent in QLuke (Sermon on the Mount, 44). The Critical Edition of Q reconstructs Matt 5:41 as Q 6:29–30/Matt 5:41, labeling it as probable but uncertain (John Kloppenborg, et al., The Critical Edition of Q [Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000], 62). If the logion did not appear in either Q or the evangelists’ versions, it may belong to the redactional hand of the author, who deftly created the antithetical format (R. Guelich, “The Antitheses of Matthew V. 21–48,” 450). The final option is that Jesus’ statement about going the extra mile did appear in the version of Q available to Luke, but the evangelist chose to delete it, perhaps for 44 45

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Didache and Justin Martyr include variations. Did. 1:4 agrees with Matt 5:41, except it begins ἐὰν ἀγγαρεύῃ σέ τις. Justin’s change is more striking.51 The one impressed into service is not told to go (ὑπάγω), but to follow (ἀκολουθέω). Justin may envision a person following behind a commandeered pack animal. Matt 5:41, Did. 1:4, and Justin, Apol. 1.16.2 use the Persian loan word, ἀγγαρεύω, to mean “to press into service.” The same verb is used again in Matt 27:32 / / Mark 15:21 in which Simon of Cyrene is forced by the soldiers to carry the cross. In Matt 5:41, Jesus commands the disciple to go an extra mile. Μίλιον, a loan word from the Latin mille, is a New Testament hapax legomenon. Verse 41 is structured to parallel v. 39b: ὅστις + σε + verb + object + verb.52 Gundry argues that Matthew created 5:41 to parallel “do not resist the evil person,” in order to maintain symmetry and parallelism in the fifth antithesis.53 The final situation envisions a beggar (Matt 5:42a // Luke 6:30a). As Luz notes, the Matthean scene is no longer a situation of force (vv. 39b–41), but of charity.54 The disciple is envisioned not as a victim in this scenario, but as a benefactor. Matthew has deliberately structured v. 42 so as to parallel v. 40 (τῷ + participle + σοί / σέ + main verb),55 in order to incorporate a general admonition on giving. Nonetheless, the verse lacks “the exaggeration that is characteristic of vv. 39b–41.”56 While scholars remark on the hyperbolic and rhetorical aspects of the scenarios found in vv. 39b–42, they continue to read v. 41 literally. ’Aγγαρεύω is presumed to refer to the Roman practice. The oppressor is a Roman soldier who compels the disciple to carry his pack for the next mile. However, a provincial could not refuse the legitimate requisitioning of services. And though unpopular, the practice was not meant to oppress the peasantry, but to meet the needs of the state. Reading ἀγγαρεία within its Roman context makes little sense within the literary setting of a discussion on the interpretation of limited retaliation, since the imagined soldier – if acting officially – has done nothing wrong. But if ἀγγαρεύω, as Fiebig and Horsley note, is not “officialese,” but simply means to “compel,” then Jesus is depicting a scene of extortion, to which he is commanding the disciple to go even further. Read within its literary context, literary artistry (B. H. Streeter, The Four Gospels: A Study of Origins, Treating of the Manuscript Tradition, Sources, Authorship, & Dates [London: Macmillan, 1924], 548; Joseph Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke I–IX [AB; New York: Doubleday, 1981], 92), or political expediency (Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:547). 50 Variants offer slightly different readings: ἐὰν ἐγγαρεύσῃ is found in ‫( א‬Δ 33 892* pc). D it cl vg sys add ετι αλλα before δυο, while lat syc and Irenaeuslat add αλλα only (Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:546, n. 60). 51 Justin, Apol. 1.16.2: Παντὶ δὲ ἀγγαρεύοντί σε μίλιον ἀκολούθησον δύο. 52 Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:547. 53 Gundry, Matthew, 94. 54 Luz, Matthew 1–7, 275. 55 Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:547. 56 Luz, Matthew 1–7, 275.

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v. 41 now stands parallel to vv. 39, 40, 42. If the disciple is slapped, sued, extorted, or solicited from, he or she is to respond not with limited retaliation, but with desistance.

2. Who Is the Antagonist of Matt 5:38–42? Who is the ὅστις to whom a disciple is to respond with magnanimity? The Matthean Jesus challenges his disciples to desist in retaliation, but the perpetrator goes unnamed. Since the dominical sayings are set within the antithetical framework that proposes a reinterpretation of the Law, the question is not who is the oppressor? But who advocates an interpretation of the Law that Jesus critiques? Jesus’ citation of “an eye for an eye” doesn’t concern the biblical context but the legal principal. As with the other antitheses, the problem that necessitates a reinterpretation by Jesus is that the Torah citations are being interpreted literally.57 The true antagonists of Matt 5:39–42 are not those who slap, sue, impress, or beg from the disciples. Rather, they are those who have interpreted the Law literally. In so doing, they have let legalism supplant justice. According to the SM, the “literal” interpretation is mistaken because it is incompatible with the “intent” of the Torah. If the Torah represents “justice” (δικαιοσύνη), and if the teaching of Jesus based on the Torah leads to greater justice, then retaliation cannot be part of the Torah. Retaliation would simply lead to greater injustice. Within the framework of the SM, retaliation is certainly contrary to Lev 19:18 (SM/Matt 5:43), the command to love one’s neighbor. Ethically, retaliation is precisely what the Golden Rule (SM/Matt 7:12) seeks to overcome. Consequently, there is no way to justify the “literal” understanding of the ius talionis as leading to the fulfillment of the Torah.58

As with the other antitheses, the central theme of Matt 5:38–42 is the correct interpretation of Torah, an interpretation that leads to justice, and therefore truly fulfills the Law. Matt 5:41 is more accurately interpreted in light of this literary context. If ἀγγαρεύω means to compel or to extort services from another, and is no longer limited to an official Roman practice, what type of extortion might we understand the disciple is not only to endure but to go beyond? Are we to read this extortion as an actual occurrence, or might Matthew intend it metaphorically?

IV. Matt 5:41 Interpreted as Fulfilling the Law The logion can be read more generally as referring to any forced and not legallysanctioned activity, as the Talmudic literature demonstrates. Therefore, Jesus is recommending a response to extortion, rather than to the legitimate com57 Betz,

58 Ibid.,

Sermon on the Mount, 278. 282.

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mandeering of services. Betz is correct when he notes, “one must understand the command to go the “extra mile” in analogy to the previous examples (vss. 39b, 40).”59 Thus, within the literary context, extortion more readily exemplifies the activities of ὁ πονηρός (Matt 5:39a) than legal albeit unpopular Roman requisition. Verse 41 not only parallels verse 39b grammatically but if ἀγγαρεύω is understood as unspecified coercion, both the verses depict an abusive situation. In each verse, the actual offender is not specified nor the reason given for the original action. Here Matthew is not interested in the perpetrator, but in the victim. In response to personal violence and coercion, the disciple is not only to refrain from retaliation, but also to resist evil. In light of the rabbinic literature, Matt 5:41 could depict a practice among rabbis or their disciples of compelling others to accompany them or carry their baggage. The verse now resonates with Matt 23:4. Jesus criticizes the scribes and Pharisees: δεσμεύουσιν δὲ φορτία βαρέα [καὶ δυσβάστακτα] καὶ ἐπιτιθέασιν ἐπὶ τοὺς ὤμους τῶν ἀνθρώπων, αὐτοὶ δὲ τῷ δακτύλῳ αὐτῶν οὐ θέλουσιν κινῆσαι αὐτά. Most scholars read this verse metaphorically. “‘To bind burdens’ is to be interpreted figuratively. The verb ‘to bind, to tie’ (δεσμεύω) is intended to make one think of binding sheaves and bundles rather than ‘binding” (δέω) in the sense of doctrine or of the legal decisions of the rabbis as in 16:19; 18:18.”60 The image is thus of one carrying a heavy load on one’s back. Within its context, Matt 23:4 is part of critique of Jewish religious leaders who though they sit in the chair of Moses (Matt 23:1) they do not follow the very teachings that they themselves espouse. Kingsbury sees the conflict between Jesus and the religious authorities in Matthew as central to the story’s plot.61 But Powell acknowledges: “In saying that the scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, Jesus may be simply acknowledging the powerful social and religious position that they occupy in a world where most people are illiterate and copies of the Torah are not plentiful.”62 Since the scribes and Pharisees know the Torah, Jesus advises his disciples to listen to them when they relay the word of Scripture itself.63 But it is their interpretation – both their teaching and their practice – that he condemns. Jesus’ statement πάντα οὖν ὅσα ἐὰν εἴπωσιν ὑμῖν ποιήσατε καὶ τηρεῖτε (Matt 23:3) appears to contradict his earlier rejection of the scribes and Pharisees’ interpretation of the Law (16:12).64 But it is their behavior that Jesus critiques. Their dress is designed to draw attention to themselves (Matt 23:5). They love Sermon on the Mount, 292.  Luz, Matthew 1–7, 102. 61  Jack Dean Kingsbury, “The Developing Conflict between Jesus and the Jewish Leaders in Matthew’s Gospel: A Literary-Critical Study,” CBQ 49 (1987): 57. 62 Mark Allan Powell, “Do and Keep What Moses Says (Matthew 23:2–7),” JBL 114 (1995): 419 –435, here 432. 63 Powell, 432. 64 Luz answers the evident contradiction by reading v. 3a as a rhetorical preparation for v. 3b. “Thus we can paraphrase: As far as I am concerned you can do everything the scribes and 59 Betz, 60

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seats of honor at banquets and synagogues (Matt 23:6) and love the title of “rabbi” (Matt 23:7). The unflattering portrait is of a pretentious religious leader, one who would, no doubt, also avail himself of the “right” to impress another into service. Thus, placing heavy burdens upon the shoulders of others may be read literally and metaphorically. In Matt 5:41, the disciple is commanded to go the extra mile when impressed into service. If read metaphorically in light of the literary setting, Jesus is directing the disciple to not only adhere to the dictates of the Law as presented by the scribes and Pharisees, but to exceed them. When Matt 5:41 is read in conjunction with Matt 23:4, those impressing the disciples into service are the religious leaders, who bind the heavy burdens, while not living up to the very demands that they place upon others. Far from being a response to Roman oppression, Matt 5:41 stands as a critique of the religious leaders who though they sit on the chair of Moses do not fulfill the Law. By exceeding the demands of the Torah as interpreted by the religious authorities, the disciples’ righteousness will exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees (5:20).

V. Conclusion This article investigated three related questions that affect the interpretation of Matt 5:41: What is the action being depicted? Who is the antagonist? How does the pericope function with its narrative framework? Reading literally, most scholars presume that the Roman practice of ἀγγαρεία is the backdrop against which to interpret the verse. A review of the evidence of Roman imperial impressment distinguished the licit and illicit parameters of such activity. Biblical and Talmudic literature attest that ἀγγαρεία was also practiced in Israel, and suffered from the same tendency toward abuse. The Matthean Jesus offers no specifics in his command to go the extra mile. Neither the reason for the impressment nor the perpetrator are named. However, the limited description of the action depicted does not resemble the official practice. As the contemporaneous literary sources revealed, the forced action which Jesus references is more akin to διάσεισμα than licit ἀγγαρεία, and could be perpetrated by those in authority, whether Roman or Jewish. When Matt 5:41 is read as referencing an act of extortion, the next question becomes by whom? Is Matthew’s audience to imagine a Roman soldier extorting a provincial (as most commentators propose)? Or is this an example of a Jewish religious leader impressing a fellow Jew? The answer requires interpreting the verse within its literary setting. Matt 5:41 is found within the fifth antithesis, Pharisees say; that is not so bad. However, the main thing is that you do not do what they do” (Matthew 1–7, 101).

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which concerns the correct interpretation of the ius talionis. Matt 5:38–42 proposes various scenarios to which a disciple is to respond with magnanimity, rather than retaliation. A close reading reveals that the situations presented were not necessarily to be understood literally. Finally, if Matt 5:41 is read as referencing extortion, how does it function within its narrative context? Jesus addresses his disciples in the correct interpretation of the Law, endeavoring to demonstrate how one fulfills the Law and the Prophets, and obtains righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, the absent antagonists in all the antitheses. Matt 5:41 can be interpreted as a metaphorical example of fulfilling the Law by exceeding its demands, as extorted by others. As such it can stand in sharp contrast to the religious practices of the scribes and Pharisees, who bind impossibly heavy burdens upon others, and, in Matthew’s opinion, fail to lift a finger to help move them.

The Rhetoric of Narrative in Acts 8:26–40 Ramifications of the Baptism of the Ethiopian Eunuch for the Author of Luke-Acts1 David G. Monaco I. Introduction In the introduction to his work Narrative as Rhetoric, James Phelan discusses the multileveled narratives of the short story “Magic” by Katherine Anne Porter. He notes: In saying that “Magic” is a narrative of rhetoric, I want to call attention, first, to the rhetorical dimensions of the maid’s action: she is telling a particular story to a particular audience in a particular situation for, presumably, a particular purpose. I want to call attention, second, to the parallel between the maid’s actions and Porter’s: the particular story that Porter is telling is the maid’s telling of Ninette’s story. In analyzing these parallel acts of telling, I want to focus on teller, technique, story, situation, audience, and purpose: all the elements that help determine the shape and effect of the story.2

Phelan, over the course of the book, develops, through a variety of examples, the idea that there is a rhetorical effect to narrative literature. In a later article on the same basic theme appearing in the journal Pedagogy, while discussing his own teaching approach to literature, he speaks of a “multilayered” experience of literature that tends to involve “at the very least our cognitive abilities, our ethical values, and our emotions,” that despite differences in how various readers experience a text, there is “considerable overlap,” and finally that moving “from a strictly 1 It is a singular privilege to be able to present this work in honor of Professor Hans Dieter Betz. I consider myself very fortunate to have taken classes with Professor Betz during the course of my doctoral studies at the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. While a rhetorical critical approach to the Scriptures may be more commonly considered with respect to the epistolary literature of the New Testament, I am grateful for the way in which Professor Betz enabled me to begin to ask myself questions about how even the narrative portions of the Bible have a rhetorical effect. I have long been intrigued by this particular pericope in Acts, and it was while taking a class with Professor Betz, that I began to look at it in a new way that helped to make its richness open up to me all the more. I hereby respectfully dedicate the present contribution to him. 2 James Phelan, Narrative as Rhetoric (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1996), 4.

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empirical claim to a more epistemological one, readers are capable of having similar experiences of the same text.”3 In the New Testament, the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch is a singular example of the accuracy of his insights. There is much that is happening in the story itself, but there is far more that is happening behind and beneath the story, and the author of Acts would seem to be using the story to make a persuasive argument for an inclusive, as opposed to an exclusive, emphasis on the part of the early Christian community. Both are legitimate and time-honored perspectives within the biblical tradition that our author has inherited, but the rhetoric of the Acts story pushes the reader / hearer to engage his / her cognitive abilities, ethical values, and emotions in order to opt for the former over the latter. The baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch by the evangelist Philip is a multifaceted gem on the part of the author of Luke-Acts. It presents the reader of the Acts of the Apostles with a powerful text of liberation, fulfillment of promise, and boundary-breaking. Coming as the conclusion of the eighth chapter of Acts, the author uses it to show how the early community, most notably its Hellenistic Jewish element,4 responds to persecution, death, and potential defeat not by retreating into itself, but by moving forward into mission. Given that the preceding chapter chronicles the death by stoning of one member of the community and is followed by a persecution against and dispersal of the church in Jerusalem at the start of chapter 8, in this sense alone, one might see it as proof of the famed final version of the quote so often attributed to Tertullian: “The blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians.”5 The author uses the text to present the reader with elements that are designed to point him / her back again and again to the idea that the hand of God is guiding and directing the primitive Christian community. While there are points of the story that might prove confusing, most notably the issue of mission to the Gentiles, the story is, nonetheless, woven into the fabric of Luke-Acts in a way in which those problems are not overwhelming, and it is replete with motifs that lead the reader to come to the conclusion that it is God who directs the Church toward the fulfillment of her mission. In the final analysis, the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch demonstrates how Luke intends that the Church take a stand in favor of the universality of salvation. He works, through this narrative, to persuade his community to a fundamental stance of inclusivity as opposed to exclusivity, to make the choice not to close in upon itself, but rather, to move forward and remain faithful to the charge of the risen Christ presented just a few 3 James Phelan, “Teaching Narrative as Rhetoric: The Example of Time’s Arrow,” Pedagogy 10 (2009): 217–28, 218. 4 Martin Hengel, Zur urchristlichen Geschichtsschreibung (Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag, 1979), 65. 5 This precise wording is, ironically, not accurate, although it strikes me that it gets at exactly what Tertullian was trying to say. The actual wording of the quote taken from his Apologeticum, chapter 50, is semen est sanguis Christianorum.

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brief chapters earlier at the very beginning of his second volume, to bring that message of salvation and openness even “as far as the end of the earth.”

II. Rhetorical Analysis of the Pericope Our text is neither a speech nor a letter. Were it of a forensic or an epistolary nature, it would lend itself much more naturally to rhetorical analysis. Instead, we have the narrative of the conversion of an unnamed person in the wilderness at an unnamed location by an itinerant evangelist who, while not unimportant, is certainly not as major a player in Acts as, for example, Peter, Paul, or James. He comes on the scene in the sixth chapter, is active in the eighth chapter where we meet him, and then does not return until the twenty-first chapter. Nonetheless, when one considers Luke-Acts as a whole, it is evident that the author is using the passage to make certain important statements to his implied audience. As Phelan’s work makes clear, there is a rhetoric to narrative, and a rhetorical analysis of this particular pericope will help to answer questions concerning the author’s purpose both in the inclusion of and the crafting of the story and will give insight into the stance that he wishes his community to adopt for the future. Most exegetes would seem to understand the limits of the text as verses 26 through 40, as is the case in this present analysis. It is, however, noteworthy that Dionisio Mínguez, in a 1976 article which appeared in Biblica, begins not with verse 26, but rather with verse 25. This functions as an important part of the structural analysis of the passage that he proposes. In Mínguez’ schema, verse 25 forms an inclusion with verse 40 based on the repetition of certain key words. In this regard, he points out the following: εἰς  Ἱεροσόλυμα, πολλάς κώμας, and εὐηγγελίζοντο in verse 25 and (in reverse order) εὐηγγελίζετο, πόλεις πάσας, and εἰς Καισάρειαν in verse 40.6 Robert F. O’Toole judges that he “rightly indicates that the same ideas or Greek words stand at the beginning and end of the pericope.”7 Such clear repetition is always an important indicator in the delimitation of any biblical text. Nonetheless, it would seem that despite the use of the same terms, there is better reason to consider verse 26 as the beginning of our passage and to view the use of these key words from a different perspective. The verbs in verse 25, διαμαρτυράμενοι, λαλήσαντες, ὑπέστρεφον, and εὐηγγελίζοντο all appear in the plural and have as their subjects the apostles Peter and John, who were introduced in verse 14. In verse 26, there is an immediate change in number (to the singular), grammatical subject (ἄγγελος κυρίου), and main character of 6 Dionisio Mínguez, “Hechos 8,25–40: Análisis estructural del relato,” Bib 57 (1976): 168–91,

171. 7 Robert F. O’Toole, “Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch (Acts VIII 25–40),” JSNT 17 (1983): 25–34, 27.

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the story (Philip), who is the object of the angel’s imperatives. These indications, along with the change in theme from the story of the apostles’ encounter with Simon the magician to Philip’s encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch, would lead to the conclusion that verse 26 marks a break and may be regarded as the beginning of our (new) pericope. As to the close of the passage, perhaps Ellen J. Christiansen’s characterization of verse 25 “als allgemeine Reisebemerkung,”8 may give us some insight into verse 40 as well, explaining the character of the verse and hence, its similarity to verse 25. While I would not wish to deny the possibility that a chiastic structure such as that which Mínguez and O’Toole (with some variation) propose,9 I would suggest, rather, that the genius of the author of Luke-Acts may very well be shown in the way in which he stitches the pericope of the Ethiopian eunuch to its surrounding context by the repetition of terms in the closing verses of the two stories concerning the Hellenistic mission of chapter 8. As a final note regarding the conclusion of the pericope, there is no confusion between 8:40 and 9:1 as there might be in verses 25 and 26. The break between 8:40 and 9:1 is abundantly clear from the standpoints of personality (ὁ δὲ Σαῦλος), story theme (the conversion of Paul), and geography (a northward journey from Jerusalem to Damascus). In a chapter entitled “Christ as the Savior of the Disadvantaged” in his work The Unity of Luke’s Theology, O’Toole also addresses the theological theme of the universal nature of salvation.10 It is my contention that the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch is, from a rhetorical perspective, a piece of Luke’s argumentation supporting in fact both of those themes, more specifically the theme of universality, of an inclusive vision towards all, but also (despite the eunuch’s privileged position as a treasurer for the queen) that of the disadvantaged. In verse 27, there is the description εὐνοῦχος δυνάστης. The juxtaposition of these terms is particularly important, given that the term εὐνοῦχος could refer simply to a high official. That this man is a physical eunuch and not merely a high official is an important dimension of the pericope, as will be seen below. That the term itself is qualified by the word δυνάστης indicates that the author of Acts does, in fact, intend the former to be taken literally.11 In the New Testament, the term εὐνοῦχος appears in only two places, here in Acts 8:26–40, and in Matthew 19:12, both as a noun and in the verbal form  Ellen J. Christiansen, “Taufe als Initiation in der Apostelgeschichte,” ST 40 (1986): 55–79,

 8

67.

 9  Cord H. Lindijer, for example, speaks of a “kind of horseshoe” structure in Acts 8:26–40 that parallels that of Luke 24:9–35. Lindijer, “Two Creative Encounters in the Work of Luke: Luke xxiv 13–35 and Acts viii 26–40,” in Miscellanea Neotestamentica (ed. Tjitze Baarda, Albertus F. J. Klijn, and Willem C. van Unnik; JSNTSup 48; Leiden: Brill, 1978), 77–85, 80–81. 10 Robert F. O’Toole, The Unity of Luke’s Theology (Wilmington, Va.: Michael Glazier, 1984), 112–113. 11 Ben Witherington, The Acts of the Apostles: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988), 296.

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εὐνουχίζω. The context is during the course of a dispute between Jesus and the Pharisees concerning divorce. In the verse, there are, effectively, three categories of eunuchs listed by Jesus. The first, those born as such, i. e. with some type of defect, and the second, those who have been castrated, conform to traditional rabbinic teaching concerning eunuchs. The third category, those who have made themselves such for the sake of the Kingdom of God, would appear to be the point of the discourse, but in this case, Jesus is speaking not of actual eunuchs, but rather of those who choose to abstain from a good for the sake of what they see as greater.12 In each case, though, the Greek εὐνοῦχος is meant to be taken literally, in the third, so that Jesus may use that phrase to make a metaphorical point. In the Septuagint, the Greek word εὐνοῦχος is used to translate the Hebrew ‫סִָריס‬. It is in this sense that the term εὐνοῦχος could be ambiguous in our context. The ‫ סִָריס‬is clearly a physical eunuch in texts such as Isaiah 56, Esther 2, and Isa 39:7 par. 2 Kgs 20:18.13 Benjamin Kedar-Kopfstein suggests that there are texts such as Jer 38:7 and 2 Kgs 23:11 that, though less clear, actually do refer to castrated men, as is shown by the qualifications involved with their names, but that there are also cases in which the term ‫ סִָריס‬refers not to a physical eunuch, but rather merely to a court official, a clear example being Jer 34:19.14 This assertion is borne out by the fact that the Septuagint translators render the plural ‫ ַהסִָריסִים‬not with the term εὐνοῦχος, but rather with the term δυνάστης.15 Another such text is indicated by Johannes Schneider who notes, for example, that “In 2 K. 25:19, the ‫ סִָריס‬is a man with a military commission.”16 This type of ambiguity is shown, for example in the text of Genesis in the Joseph narrative, where Joseph is sold to Potiphar, who is described in Genesis 37:36 and 39:1 as a ‫ סִָריס‬of Pharoah.17 The fact that he is married would seem to lead to the conclusion that the term, in this case, refers to an official rather than a eunuch. Nonetheless, the Septuagint translates the term as εὐνοῦχος, and this is picked up, for example, in Philo of Alexandria in his Legum allegoriae 3.236, where he uses allegory to explain how it is possible for a eunuch to have a wife. Again, in our text, the addition of the second term in the description of our εὐνοῦχος δυνάστης demonstrates that for the author of Luke-Acts, the Ethiopian is both a physical eunuch and a court official. In order to demonstrate this assertion, let us turn to the two descriptions of our royal treasurer from verse 27, namely, the terms ἀνὴρ Αἰθίοψ and εὐνοῦχος δυνάστης. 12 William David Davies and Dale C. Allison, Jr., The Gospel According to Saint Matthew (3 vols.; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1997), 3:21–23. 13 Benjamin Kedar-Kopfstein, “‫ סִָריס‬saris,” TDOT 10:344–50, 348. 14 Ibid., 349. 15 Ironically, the Vulgate sticks to the use of the term eunuchus for its translation. 16 Johannes Schneider, “εὐνοῦχος, εὐνουχίζω,” TDNT 2:765–68, 766. 17 Ibid., 766. Stating that “the ‫ סִָריס‬does not have to be a eunuch,” Schneider mentions Gen 39:1 along with Hermann Gunkel’s assertion that the term is redactional in this verse.

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What is the force of the term ἀνὴρ Αἰθίοψ in our text? The designation “Ethiopian” marks this man as coming from the kingdom of Nubia, which, at the time of the composition of Luke-Acts, was of great interest both politically and in the realms of the fantastic.18 Literally, the words may be simply translated as “an Ethiopian man,” but said description carries much more with it for the author of Acts and for his time than we may realize in our present context. Ethiopia was not the nation that bears that name in this day and age, but rather the kingdom of Nubia, a substantial power in ancient times, whose capital was the city of Meroe, and is part of today’s Sudan.19 The designation “Ethiopia” for this land goes back in the west to the time of Herodotus.20 According to Robert C. Tannehill, given the descriptions of Ethiopians by Herodotus and other ancient authors, the words ἀνὴρ Αἰθίοψ would be such that “people of the ancient Mediterranean world would assume that he was black,”21 and it is especially noteworthy that popular interest in Ethiopia was high just prior to the time in which the Acts of the Apostles was written, due to a then famous expedition sent there by Nero in 61 to 63 c.e.22 Far more important to the author of Acts and to his original audience than the fact that the man comes from this famous and powerful place and hence, as its treasurer, would be a fairly important man, is the geographical significance to the ancient world of this land called Ethiopia. As Tannehill points out, “The conviction that the Ethiopians lived at the ends of the earth is well documented in ancient literature.”23 With this idea in mind, one cannot help thinking back to the final words of the risen Lord in Acts 1:8, immediately prior to his ascension: “And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and as far as the end of the earth.” The final phrase of Acts 1:8, ἕως ἐσχάτου τῆς γῆς, is a powerful indication of the universality of which authors such as O’Toole speak, but as Tannehill states: Although Acts follows a number of geographical advances in the spread of the mission, it is not able to report that preachers of the word have reached the end of the earth. Because this goal remains important, an anticipatory scene is substituted. Philip baptizes an Ethiopian who is passing through Judea. Philip initiates the mission not only to Samaria but also to the end of the earth.24  Hans Conzelmann, Die Apostelgeschichte (2d ed.; HNT 7; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1972),

18

63.

Acts of the Apostles, 295.  Erich Dinkler, “Philippus und der ΑΝΗΡ ΑΙΘΙΟΨ (Apg 8,26–40): Historische und geographische Bemerkungen zum Missionsablauf nach Lukas,” in Jesus und Paulus (ed. Edward Earle Ellis and Erich Gräßer; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975), 85–95, 90. 21 Robert C. Tannehill, The Narrative Unity of Luke–Acts (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990), 109. 22 Frederick F. Bruce, “Philip and the Ethiopian,” JSS 34 (1989): 377–86, 380. 23 Tannehill, Narrative Unity, 109. 24 Ibid., 109. 19 Witherington, 20

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From the standpoint of rhetoric, Luke’s description of our ἀνὴρ Αἰθίοψ is a signal to his readership that the charge of the risen Lord is taken up in the evangelization of this man by Philip and serves as evidence of the validity of his theological perspective regarding the universality of salvation and the stance of inclusivity that he wishes his community to adopt. Ethiopia, the Greek name (Αἰθιοπία) for the Hebrew Cush (‫ )ּכּוׁש‬and Ethiopians, the Greek (Αἰθίοπες) for the Hebrew Cushites (‫)ּכּוׁשִים‬, in fact, are mentioned a number of times in the Bible in varied contexts. While there are texts in which Ethiopia is not mentioned in a positive sense, for example, the oracle of Zeph 2:12, in many cases in the Hebrew Bible, the reference is in a distinctly positive manner. In the third chapter of Zephaniah, verse 10 “from across the rivers of Cush / Ethiopia, my worshipers, my scattered ones will bear my offering,” would appear to be just such a text. Amos 9:7 is another positive prophetic text that makes mention of Ethiopians, and Ps 68:32 speaks of Cush/Ethiopia “hurry(ing) its hands to God.” Num 12:1 speaks of Moses’ marriage to a Cushite woman. Finally, there is the example of Ebed-melech, the servant of Zedekiah, who rescues Jeremiah from the cistern and is the recipient of an oracle of rescue after the fall of Jerusalem in 39:15–18 “because you trusted in me.” In the Acts passage, the image of the Ethiopian eunuch is decidedly positive from his first appearance pondering the Scriptures until his departure “rejoicing.” While there are texts in which the foreigner, in the above examples, the Ethiopian in particular, is presented in a positive manner, there are other texts in which that is not the case. One example is Deuteronomy chapter 7, where, regarding the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, verse 2 speaks of putting them under the ban and says “do not make a covenant with them, and do not show them favor.” Another text is Deut 23:4–9. The passage permanently excludes the Ammonite and the Moabite from the assembly of the Lord, and while reminding the community that the Edomite is their “brother” and that they sojourned in the land of Egypt, both the Edomite and the Egyptian must wait until the third generation to enter the assembly of the Lord. Ezra 9:1–10:44 is another key example in which the returned exiles send away both their foreign wives and children. While to our modern sensibilities, this passage (and the others) may be quite problematic, it is important to recognize a key benefit therein, namely the preservation of the community in the face of hardship and difficulty as opposed to peoples listed, e. g. in Ezra 9:1 (“Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians, and Amorites”), virtually all of whom have since disappeared from the stage of history.25 25 There are, of course, many examples in the Hebrew Bible in which this sense of separation is not operative or that would seem to function as possible correctives. Above and beyond individual passages, two such extended examples are the books of Ruth and Jonah. In the first instance, the fact that Ruth is a Moabite woman who becomes a faithful Yahwist would seem to clearly contradict Deuteronomy 23. In the second case, the reader, with even a cursory knowl-

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Further proof that this emphasis on universality is present in the text is the way in which the story unfolds itself. The encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch is not simply left to chance, but is, rather, presented as the will of God whose hand is evident at every turn. The pericope opens with a command from an ἄγγελος κυρίου which sets the table for the entire passage by making the reader immediately aware that what is to follow will happen not because of some mere whim on the part of Philip or some chance encounter. Rather, the author makes it clear that there is a supernatural component directing the entire succeeding pericope.26 This emphasis helps to make it clear to the reader that the author’s rhetorical strategy needs to be taken all the more seriously. Philip is sent forth into the wilderness into an unnamed place, where this time τὸ πνεῦμα directs Philip to “attach himself ” to the carriage of the Ethiopian. Even if verses 32 through 34 are arguably, as Gerd Lüdemann holds, a complete redaction on the part of Luke,27 the fact that the man is presented as reading from one of the Servant Hymns in the book of Isaiah is especially significant. Hans Conzelmann sees little difference between the Spirit’s commands to Philip here and that of the angel in v. 26.28 Lüdemann too sees this in a similar vein as a “luk. Variation für aggelos kyriou.”29 Again, the issue is that of divine direction rather than an arbitrary choice made on the part of Philip, another indication to the discerning reader that he / she need pay particular attention to the points that the author is making in the course of the story. Verse 30 reads: προσδραμὼν δὲ ὁ Φίλιππος ἤκουσεν αὐτοῦ ἀναγινώσκοντος  Ἠσαΐαν τὸν προφήτην. The idea of Philip running makes sense when taken in context with the type of carriage in which the eunuch would have been traveling. The ἅρμα would have been some sort of carriage that, due to its slow pace, would be conducive to the reading that the eunuch was doing at the time.30 On his approach, Philip would have heard the eunuch reading, since in antiquity, it was almost a universal practice to read aloud.31 Rick Strelan develops the idea of Philip’s running as a parallel to what one finds in the stories of the Hebrew Bible prophets, particularly the tale of Elijah, with divine aid, outrunning Ahab’s chariot in 1 Kgs 18:46.32 Once again, the attentive reader edge of Israelite and Judean history, can sympathize with Jonah’s anger, given the Lord’s compassion on Nineveh. Nonetheless, that would seem to put the reader in the interesting position of taking sides either with Jonah or with God. In both cases, the message regarding an attitude of inclusivity and an expansive vision regarding the foreigner is clear. 26 Ernst Haenchen, Die Apostelgeschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1961), 259. 27 Gerd Lüdemann, Das frühe Christentum nach den Traditionen der Apostelgeschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1987), 109. 28 Conzelmann, Apostelgeschichte, 63. 29 Lüdemann, Frühe Christentum, 108. 30 Haenchen, Apostelgeschichte, 260. 31 Witherington, Acts of the Apostles, 297. 32 Rick Strelan, “The Running Prophet (Acts 8:30),” NovT 43 (2001): 31–38.

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finds that he / she must take notice and will find him / herself called to take the author all the more seriously. The passage that the eunuch is reading is Isaiah 53:7–8, and as Ben Witherington points out, “Though this song is not directly cited all that frequently in the NT, it is clear from various texts that it had a considerable influence on early Christian thinking about Jesus (cf. John 12:38; Rom 10:16; 1 Pet 2:21–25).”33 The quote from the Scriptures not only serves as further evidence of the hand of God in this passage, but the text itself is one which the reader cannot help but see as fulfilled not only in Jesus himself, but lived out in the struggles of his followers as presented in the book of Acts.34 The force of this quote is possibly strengthened by the way in which it fits in the passage. As with Mínguez and O’Toole (cf. above), Witherington too finds evidence of a chiastic structure to the passage and sees it as centered around verses 32–35, which is precisely where this quote appears.35 In verse 39, we read that the πνεῦμα κυρίου ἥρπασεν τὸν Φίλιππον, a phrase that Conzelmann sees as a stylistically appropriate conclusion which signals to Old Testament parallels in 2 Kgs 2:16 and Ezek 11:2436 in which the prophets Elijah and Ezekiel, respectively, were transported in a mysterious fashion by the Spirit, just as Philip is here. Witherington sees the πνεῦμα κυρίου bringing the episode to an end in a manner that is reminiscent of Old Testament stories such as those surrounding Elijah and Elisha.37 We turn back now to the phrase εὐνοῦχος δυνάστης. As stated above, this designation serves to continue the Lukan argument for an inclusive vision concerning the universality of salvation as well as evidencing Christ as the Savior of the disadvantaged. Let us examine this latter assertion. In some sense, it is difficult to consider the Ethiopian eunuch a disadvantaged person. His high position in the government of his nation, the fact that he is educated, can afford to have both a carriage and a scroll of the prophet Isaiah hardly qualify him as a disadvantaged person, but the fact that he is a physical eunuch, as demonstrated above, certainly changes that picture. Since, thankfully, our present age is far removed from this horrific practice of earlier times, it may be helpful here to discuss the position of a eunuch in the time in which Luke-Acts was written. Hans-Josef Klauck is instructive in this regard. He demonstrates well how, as in our specific case, a eunuch could exemplify both a person of high status, obviously important for Luke, who would wish to demonstrate that Christianity is acceptable to even the highest levels of society,38 and Acts of the Apostles, 298. P. Moessner, “The ‘Script’ of the Scriptures in Acts: suffering as God’s ‘plan’ (βουλή) for the world for the ‘release of sins,’” in History, Literature, and Society in the Book of Acts (ed. Ben Witherington; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 218–50, 231. 35 Witherington, Acts of the Apostles, 292. 36 Conzelmann, Apostelgeschichte, 64. 37 Witherington, Acts of the Apostles, 291. 38 Ibid., 295. 33 Witherington, 34 David

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a truly disadvantaged person. Klauck notes that, “Zwar konnten Eunuchen an Fürsten‑ und Königshöfen und aus naheliegenden Gründen besonders am Hof von Herrscherinnen zu hohen Stellungen aufsteigen, aber selbst das bewahrte sie nicht vor Diskriminierung und Spott. Ihr weichliches Aussehen und ihre Stimme wurden belächelt.”39 F. Scott Spencer, noting the antagonism of the time towards eunuchs states that, “The account of a eunuch’s conversion, baptism, and incorporation into the Christian community would have been regarded as a radical transgression of prevailing cultural boundaries.”40 Hence, the story serves as evidence of Luke’s concern for the disadvantaged. In a focal manner, this εὐνοῦχος δυνάστης serves the author of Acts as an exemplification of the universality of the Christian message. He appears on the scene as a person who is returning from worship in Jerusalem and reading the Jewish Scriptures, presumably in Greek translation. In the next section, we will turn to what this may mean for the early Christian mission, but here, it is important to note the position of a eunuch in Judaism. In verse 36, the eunuch makes an observation and asks a question: ἰδοὺ ὕδωρ, τί κωλύει με βαπτισθῆναι; The way in which the Ethiopian eunuch draws attention to the presence of water is such that there are no specifics given. The author of Acts, in this verse again shows no concern here for any precise geographical indication to the story.41 Frederick F. Bruce discusses the theory that the question then posed may be some type of baptismal formulary from the early Church. He points out the argument that the verb κωλύω appears in the Cornelius story in Acts 10 as well and is also used by Jesus in rebuking his disciples who tried to keep people from bringing their children to him in Mark 10. He argues that the word is used, though, in different ways in these examples and concludes regarding a possible liturgical usage that, “A verdict of non liquet is the very most that can be brought in on this suggestion.”42 Regarding the question, though, the reader attentive to the tradition of Deuteronomy can, in fact, give more than one answer to the man. With respect to the eunuch, the Hebrew of Deut 23:2 states emphatically that, “One wounded by crushing [i. e. his testicles] and cut off of (his) penis will not enter into the assembly of YHWH.” The Greek is not much different, “One crushed [i. e. his testicles] and cut off [i. e. his penis] will not enter (the) assembly of (the) Lord.” In Lev 21:20, an Aaronide descendant with crushed testicles is prohibited from priestly service, while in Lev 22:24, such a condition makes an animal invalid as a sacrificial offering. It seems hardly accidental that the author of Acts has the eunuch reading from Isaiah. It is precisely in that prophetic book that one reads 39 Hans-Josef Klauck, Magie und Heidentum in der Apostelgeschichte des Lukas (Stuttgart: Verlag Katholisches Bibelwerk GmbH, 1996), 36. 40 F. Scott Spencer, “The Ethiopian Eunuch and His Bible: A Social-Science Analysis,” BTB 22 (1992): 155–65, 157. 41 Haenchen, Apostelgeschichte, 262. 42 Bruce, “Philip and the Ethiopian,” 383–84.

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concerning the eunuch in 56:3–5, “And let the eunuch not say, ‘Behold, I am a withered tree.’ For thus says YHWH, ‘To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths and choose what I delight in, and hold fast to my covenant, I will give to them in my house and in my walls a monument and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give to him an everlasting name which will not be cut off.’” Above and beyond the treatment of eunuchs in the Hebrew Bible, in Jewish tradition, as mentioned above with respect to Matt 19:12, the rabbis speak of two types of eunuchs, those born as such and those who were made such by others. Schneider points out that for the rabbis, the teaching on Lev 22:24 is extended such that it “is taken to be a general prohibition of castration.”43 Moving from the general to the more specific, as opposed to what is known from cultic practice in Asia Minor such as the cult of Cybele, Kedar-Kopfstein notes that “the OT rejects any self-mutilation within cultic ecstasy (1 K. 18:28), and nowhere mentions religious emasculation, not even in connection with foreign cults (unless Dt. 23:2 [Eng. v. 1] is referring to such).”44 Philo and Josephus both reflect a negative attitude toward eunuchs in their writings. Philo, in Spec. 1.325, a text that clearly refers to Deuteronomy 23, makes the unfortunate link between the eunuch and those “worthless ones” excluded in advance from the “holy assembly.”45 Spencer notes that in his A. J. 4.290–291, “Insensitive to the fact that many eunuchs were made eunuchs against their will, Josephus assumed a malevolent intent on the part of all eunuchs to oppose the created order, on the level of ‘infanticides who … have destroyed the means of procreation.’”46 In the acceptance of the Ethiopian eunuch within the folds of Christianity by admitting him to baptism, the author of Luke-Acts shows how Philip, through the guidance of God, has essentially refused to answer the eunuch’s question, τί κωλύει με βαπτισθῆναι; with the citation of Deuteronomy 23 either as regards his status as eunuch or as foreigner. He has, rather, responded out of the context of universality and inclusivity contained in the book of the prophet whose message the eunuch had been pondering, and he has shown the openness of the message of Jesus to all persons regardless of their status or lack thereof. As in the case of the ethnic origin of this man, so too in his unfortunate personal situation, the author of Luke-Acts takes this episode and crafts it in such a way that his theological perspective is borne out. The word goes forth “as far as the end of the earth,” offered to all peoples despite whatever personal limitations or obstacles they may face. The word is truly universal in the fullest sense of the term. 43  Schneider, “εὐνοῦχος,” TDNT 2:767. Josephus reflects this idea in A. J. 4.291 when he states that “it is not allowed to either make eunuchs (of) men nor of other living creatures.” 44 Kedar-Kopfstein, “‫ סִָריס‬saris,” TDOT 10:347. 45 He presents this exclusion as a way of avoiding the tendency for the μοχθηροί to “stream in besides” with the crowd in assemblies. The term μοχθηρός, while literally “suffering hardship” or “wretched,” is used in a moral sense as “wicked” or “evil.” 46 Spencer, “Ethiopian Eunuch and His Bible,” 157.

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III. How Does the Text Fit in the Book of Acts? We now turn to the placement of the pericope within the book of Acts and also, by extension, within the complex of Luke-Acts. It seems clear that in the story of the Ethiopian eunuch, we are dealing with some sort of Hellenistic source material to which Luke had access.47 The eighth chapter of Acts begins with the immediate aftermath of the death of Stephen and the dispersal of the early community outside of Jerusalem (verses 1–4), recounts the work of Philip in Samaria (verses 5–13), is followed by the arrival of Peter and John and the confrontation with Simon the magician (verses 14–25), and ends with the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch (verses 26–40). As regards our pericope, Lüdemann feels that the original story without the redactional hand of Luke would have been a fairly simple notice about Philip having met and baptized an Ethiopian eunuch.48 Whatever actually did take place in the event itself, Klauck feels that some sensational singular event of conversion by Philip would have been the impetus that led to the shaping of this traditional story from Hellenistic Jewish-Christian circles.49 The text of Acts of the Apostles 8:26–40 is woven into the fabric of Luke-Acts at this particular point for some reason. Charles Kingsley Barrett looks at this from a practical standpoint. He sees the inclusion of the story here, “because this was the point at which he was dealing with Philip.”50 However, given the above analysis, Witherington’s assertion seems more likely. He feels that Luke would have been following the principal of arrangement of ancient Hellenistic history by geography and ethnicity, and sees Acts 8 as the perfect example of this.51 This certainly does ring true, as the places mentioned in the course of the forty verses are (in order): Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and Ethiopia, the proverbial “end of the earth,” certainly not by accident the exact same sequence as the risen Lord’s charge in Acts 1:8. In addition to this, one must also consider both the obvious parallels with the Emmaus narrative in Luke 24:13–35 and the question of the beginning of the Gentile mission and story of the baptism of Cornelius in Acts 10:1–11:18. In each case, we see the genius of the author at work. O’Toole offers a concise summary of the parallels with the Emmaus story in six steps. These are as follows: (1) the disciples are joined on the road by Jesus in Luke 24, the Ethiopian eunuch by Philip; (2) both the characters in Luke 24 and the Ethiopian eunuch show an ignorance of the Scriptures, which both Jesus and Philip use to show how his death and resurrection is the fulfillment of the Scriptures; (3) Jesus disappears after the breaking of the bread, the Eucharist, 47 Bruce,

“Philip and the Ethiopian,” 377. Frühe Christentum, 110. 49 Klauck, Magie und Heidentum, 35–36. 50 Charles Kingsley Barrett, The Acts of the Apostles (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1994), 426. 51 Witherington, Acts of the Apostles, 290. 48 Lüdemann,

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and Philip is carried off by the Spirit of the Lord after the baptism of the eunuch; (4) in the Emmaus story, the mystery about Jesus’ person relates to the breaking of the bread and in Acts 8, to baptism; (5) in both cases, it is suggested that the risen Christ reveals himself to those who seek him; and (6) the conclusion is exhilarating: “Was not our heart burning within us as he was speaking to us on the road, as he was opening the Scriptures to us?” (Luke 24:32) and “he was going his way rejoicing” (Acts 8:39).52 These parallels are too strong to be mere chance, and it is striking that Luke uses them to present to his readership some insight into two rites of the early church, baptism and Eucharist, while in neither case giving precise details about how this was done. Just as the relation of the story of the Ethiopian eunuch with the Cornelius episode will demonstrate how the story fits into the book of Acts alone, the above parallel to the Emmaus story shows how it fits into the complex of Luke-Acts. We turn now to the relationship between our pericope and that of the baptism of Cornelius and his household. It is clear in the Acts of the Apostles that Luke sees Peter as the originator of the mission to the Gentiles, precisely through the Cornelius story. The most clear indicator is Acts 15:7, when during the council of Jerusalem, we read, “And after much debate, Peter, rising up said to them, ‘Men, brothers, you know that from the early days, God chose among you that through my mouth the Gentiles hear the word of the gospel and believe.’” The relation of this phrase to Gal 2:7–8, “But on the other hand, seeing that I was entrusted (with) the Gospel (to) the uncircumcised, just as Peter (to) the circumcised, for the one who worked through Peter in mission (to) the circumcised, also through me among the Gentiles” is beyond the scope of this analysis, but it may certainly be said that the author of Acts makes it clear that for him, Peter is the initiator of this mission. How then, does one understand the presence of the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch in this light? Bruce speaks of the tension between the official view of the Jerusalem church and that of the Hellenists, for whom our passage is the start of the Gentile mission, reconciling the problem with the idea that what Philip did was as an itinerant evangelist, rather than as leader of the Apostles, hence it was not an action that could commit the entire community as could that of Peter.53 Ernst Haenchen discusses the fact that there is even greater evidence of divine direction in the Cornelius episode, and that ultimately, while our passage was the first conversion of a Gentile for the Hellenists, Luke could not accept it as such, given the importance of the apostles in his eyes.54 How does Luke deal with this tension? The answer has slowly unraveled in the above analyses. While in the Cornelius story, it is clearly the baptism of a 52 O’Toole,

“Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch,” 32. “Philip and the Ethiopian,” 377. 54 Haenchen, Apostelgeschichte, 265. 53 Bruce,

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Gentile, the story of the Ethiopian eunuch is purposely kept much more vague. Luke leaves a great deal of our passage ambiguous. In verse 26, for example, κατὰ μεσημβρίαν is somewhat ambiguous. The expression can mean either “about midday” or “toward the south.” There are good reasons to accept either reading,55 but given that the next words indicate direction, I would opt for the latter meaning along with Haenchen56 and Friedrich Blass and Albert Debrunner,57 who take this as a directional indication. This type of lack of clarity regarding precise details in the passage seems to be the norm, as will be seen below. This will serve a key purpose for the author of Luke-Acts, namely to avoid confusion regarding the import of the baptism of Cornelius and his household. The phrase continues in a vague manner: ἐπὶ τὴν ὁδὸν τὴν καταβαίνουσαν ἀπὸ  Ἰερουσαλὴμ εἰς Γάζαν, αὕτη ἐστὶν ἔρημος. As always, more so than simply pointing out the direction from Jerusalem to Gaza, from a theological perspective, one “goes down” from Jerusalem. Above and beyond this traditional indication, there is both a difficulty with the latter part of the phrase, αὕτη ἐστὶν ἔρημος, and there are motifs evident in the entire phrase as Luke constructs it. Bruce notes that the phrase αὕτη ἐστὶν ἔρημος could either qualify the road, τὴν ὁδὸν, or Γάζαν, the older of two cities with the same name which had been destroyed in 96 b.c.e. by Alexander Jannaeus and was in ruins, hence referred to as “deserted.” He opts for the former over the latter.58 Barrett helps to put the lack of any clear indication into perspective when he notes that “the student of Acts must use maps, but in doing so must remember that he will be better informed than Luke was.”59 Perhaps Erich Dinkler deals with the ambiguity best when, taking into account the important motifs of the phrase, he states, “Die Begegnung auf einsamer Straße und die ,Wüste‘ gehören zur Typologie des Heiligen.”60 Cornelius is clearly “baptized in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 10:48) after “the Holy Spirit fell on all the ones hearing the word” (Acts 10:44), whereas in our story, there is nothing said about the baptism other than that it was performed by Philip. In verse 38 the statement καὶ ἐβάπτισεν αὐτόν is very direct and unelaborated. This fits nicely with the lack of clarity as regards geography indicated in both verse 26 and verse 36. In the story of the Ethiopian eunuch, the only indication about the reception of the Holy Spirit is in a variant of verse 39 that is clearly secondary.61 Unlike the text of Acts 10:1–11:18, which is replete  Cf. Barrett, Acts of the Apostles, 422–23 and Conzelmann, Apostelgeschichte, 63. Apostelgeschichte, 259–60. 57  BDF, 133. 58  Bruce, “Philip and the Ethiopian,” 378. 59 Barrett, Acts of the Apostles, 423. 60 Dinkler, “Philippus und der ΑΝΗΡ ΑΙΘΙΟΨ,” 94. 61 In the midst of the phrase πνεῦμα κυρίου ἥρπασεν τὸν Φίλιππον, there is an addition reading πνεῦμα [αγιον επεπεσεν επι τον ευνουχον, αγγελος δε] κυρίου ἥρπασεν τὸν Φίλιππον. The difficulty with this verse is that it is attested in Codex Alexandrinus, which, though of uneven value, is of the highest level as a textual witness outside of the Gospels (cf. Barbara Aland and 55

56 Haenchen,

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with geographical indications and specifically names the convert Cornelius, the same cannot be said of our passage. Luke would appear to try to remain as vague as possible so as not to confuse his designation of either the first Gentile convert or the initiator of the Gentile mission. A final indication in support of this assertion was also developed in the foregoing analyses. The Ethiopian man is, in fact, a physical eunuch. This is a point made clearly by Luke not merely by using the term εὐνοῦχος in the story, but, as noted above, by qualifying it with δυνάστης. While one may argue that Deut 23:2 makes it impossible for the man to ever be a proselyte in the formal sense of the term, something which would presumably have been evident to the early Jewish-Christian community, the above treatment of Isa 56:3–5 and the fact that the eunuch is reading Isaiah in the narrative demonstrate that this was likely not such a hard and fast rule in the mind of the author of Luke-Acts who opts for the more inclusive, expansive strand of biblical tradition as a model for the future he envisions for his Christian community. This shows that the Ethiopian eunuch may likely have been viewed by our author more within the ambient of Judaism than the clearly Gentile Cornelius, hence another way in which Luke keeps the ancient reader from making any wrong conclusions regarding the start of the mission to the Gentiles. Further support for this conclusion is offered by Edward Ullendorff, who, despite noting the paucity of direct evidence and the limited value of Hebrew Bible references such as Jer 44:1, Isa 18:1–2, and Zeph 3:10, considers it “reasonable to suppose that Jews had penetrated as far as Upper Egypt, Nubia, and possibly beyond.”62 The fact that the Ethiopian eunuch is reading from a scroll of Isaiah would demonstrate that for the author of Luke-Acts, the influence of the traditions of Judaism had, in fact, penetrated that region of the world and that, with the baptism of this man, so would Christianity.

IV. Conclusion The story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch is a delightful tale of a God-fearing foreigner, linked in his own heart to the biblical traditions of the Jewish people, who comes to understand that very faith in terms of the Christ-event with the help of the divinely-directed evangelist Philip. It is a fine example of the way in Kurt Aland, The Text of the New Testament [trans. Erroll F. Rhodes; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989], 109). Nonetheless, it would seem that the preponderance of the evidence supports the shorter text, since it is attested as such in other manuscripts of the same weight in Acts as Codex Alexandrinus, and it both makes the post-baptismal gift of the Holy Spirit explicit and conforms better with verse 26, where the angel of the Lord is the one who commands Philip (cf. Bruce Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament [New York: American Bible Society, 1994], 316). 62 Edward Ullendorff, Ethiopia and the Bible (London: The British Academy, 1968), 15–16.

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which the author of Luke-Acts has taken a preexisting tradition and used his own skill to make it fit perfectly into his work, weaving it not only into the fabric of his second volume, but also providing us with links and parallels that show it to be an intrinsic part of the two volume work as a whole. The author has used his rhetorical genius to make an argument via this fascinating story that, given the possibility of taking either an inclusive or an exclusive view towards this individual and, by extension, any other “outsider,” the community should opt for the former over the latter. The divine guidance of Philip evident throughout the course of the narrative is meant to drive home to the discerning reader that this is the will of God. The biblical tradition inherited by our author evidences two legitimate standpoints regarding the choice for inclusivity or exclusivity. This is shown in the person of our unnamed Ethiopian subject. As both eunuch and foreigner, there are texts that are open to him, and there are texts that are not. The question that he poses to Philip, τί κωλύει με βαπτισθῆναι; can actually have more than one answer if one follows a more exclusive vision. The benefit of such a standpoint, as noted above, is to maintain and safeguard the community. Choosing a more inclusive stance, also very much a part of the tradition, can pose a risk in that it calls people to open themselves to the uncertain and unfamiliar, but it is a risk that the author clearly sees as worth the effort. Having done so, the answer to the man’s question is “nothing,” and the action is performed. The rhetoric of this narrative is to provide a blueprint for the future of Luke’s community. As a good historian, Luke uses it to demonstrate the literal faithfulness of the fledgling Christian community to the command of the risen Lord to be his witnesses “as far as the end of the earth.” As a good rhetorician, he uses it to demonstrate to his readership that salvation in Christ is truly universal, both in the widest sense of the term, to the “end of the earth,” and in the most narrow sense, to each and every individual regardless of race, origin, social status, or physical defect.

The Scroll, the Temple, and the Great City The Crisis in the Asian Assemblies and the Interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 Paul B. Duff I. Introduction The text of Revelation 10:1–11:13 is typically described as an “interlude” or a “parenthesis.” It describes, first, the descent of a heavenly figure who carries a scroll that is, at the end of the scene, consumed by the seer. Next, the interlude narrates a command to John to measure the temple (except the outer court). Following that, the text depicts two witnesses who prophesy for a time and are then killed by a beast rising out of the abyss. After lying unburied in the streets of “the great city” – a city described as Sodom, Egypt, and the place “where their Lord was crucified” – the witnesses are raised from the dead and taken to heaven. At the same time, a great earthquake strikes the city, destroying most of it. The interlude ends with the city’s survivors giving glory to the God of heaven.1 There are a variety of puzzles associated with the interlude.2 Of these, perhaps the most difficult has to do with its intrusive character. How is this narrative related to the rest of the book? Why does it appear where it does (i. e., between the sounding of the sixth and seventh trumpets in that larger story).3 Typically, the 1 I understand the end of the interlude to be 11:13. Although many would include 11:14 in the interlude, it does not fit well there. As a number of scholars have pointed out, it would work better immediately before the beginning of the interlude, after 9:21. See, for example, Jürgen Roloff, The Revelation of John (CC; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 134–35; David E. Aune, Revelation (3 vols.; WBC 52a–c; Nashville: Thomas Nelson; Dallas: Word, 1997–98), 2:630. 2 Jürgen Roloff has, with some justification, claimed that this passage is “by far, the most difficult part of the whole book” (Revelation, 122). 3 The Book of Revelation contains a number of other intrusions besides the interlude of 10:1–11:13. A similar disruptive interlude appears in chapter 7, between the opening of the sixth and seventh seal. There, a vision of 144,000 from the twelve tribes of Israel dramatically interrupts the flow of the narrative in which it is embedded. Any causal relationship between the action of chapter 7 and the story in which it is embedded (i. e., the opening of the seven seals) seems contrived. Other examples of intrusive textual units include the vision of the unnamed woman in the wilderness (chapter 12), the vision of the whore named “Babylon” (17:1–18), and the vision of the rider on the white horse (19:11–16). Aune has identified 12 of these units. See

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intrusion of the interlude is explained by suggesting, first, that its sudden appearance slows down the surrounding narrative – a narrative moving at breakneck speed – and, second, that it serves to refocus the attention of the readers on to the situation of the ἐκκλησία.4 While not incorrect, such reasoning does not adequately explain the relationship of the interlude to the rest of the book. Nor does it take fully into account the internal situation faced by John. I suggest that once that internal situation is understood, we can make some progress toward answering the difficult questions surrounding the interlude’s interpretation. The interlude consists of two distinct stories, one focused on the seer eating a scroll and the other on measuring the temple and the fate of two unnamed witnesses (Rev 10:1–11:13).5 For the sake of convenience, I will refer to the first as “the scroll narrative” and the second as “the temple and witness narrative.” We will examine each of these narratives in turn, highlighting various interpretive his Revelation, 1:cxix. Various proposals have been put forth to explain how these seemingly independent, and often intrusive, narratives came into being. The most compelling of the suggestions posits that a number of independent apocalyptic documents were composed by John over a considerable period of time. John eventually edited and combined these various units to form the narrative of the Book of Revelation. On the various suggestions, see Aune, Revelation, 1:cxxi. 4  Cf. M. Eugene Boring, Revelation (IBC; Louisville: John Knox, 1989), 139. It should be noted here that the temporal setting of this interlude is also enigmatic as we will see below. But time is not only problematic here but also elsewhere in the Book of Revelation. Sometimes it appears to progress linearly. However, at other times it appears to fold back on itself or leap inexplicably forward. Although there are many examples, the three that follow should illustrate the point. First, in Rev 20:7–8, Satan gathers the nations to battle against the saints. In the previous chapter, however, the divine warrior seems to have already won that war (19:11–21). Second, in 21:27, the seer indicates that “no one who practices abomination or falsehood” will enter the nowdescended heavenly Jerusalem. However, in the previous chapter, all such people had already been thrown into the lake of fire (20:15). Finally, Rev 14:1–13 presents such a hopeless jumble of past, present, and future actions in a single episode that the reader cannot help but be perplexed. For a chart cataloguing the variety of tenses in 14:1–13, see Harry O. Maier, Apocalypse Revealed: The Book of Revelation After Christendom (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002), 144–46. Because of the games that John plays with time, the reader cannot always determine what is happening when. Does this scene recapitulate previously narrated scenes? Or does it fit chronologically between the sixth and seventh trumpets? The former option is suggested by R. J. McKelvey (“The Millennium and the Second Coming,” in Studies in the Book of Revelation [ed. Steve Moyise; Edinburg: T & T Clark, 2001], 92). The idea that some scenes in the book recapitulate others goes back at least as far as Victorinus of Pettau. The question of time is particularly difficult in the Book of Revelation’s three septets (seals, trumpets, and bowls), particularly since there are so many parallels in the latter two groups. On the possibility of recapitulation or repetition in the Book of Revelation, see Adela Yarbro Collins, The Combat Myth in the Book of Revelation (HDR 9; Missoula: Scholars Press, 1976), 32–45; Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Revelation: Vision of a Just World (Proclamation Commentaries; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 33; Charles Homer Giblin, “Recapitulation and the Literary Coherence of John’s Apocalypse,” CBQ 56 (1994): 81–95; and Aune, Revelation, 1:xci–xciii; David L. Barr, Tales of the End: A Narrative Commentary on the Book of Revelation (The Storytellers Bible 1; Santa Rosa, Calif.: Polebridge, 1998), 94; idem, “The Story John Told: Reading Revelation for Its Plot,” in Reading the Book of Revelation: A Resource for Students (ed. idem; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003), 21. 5 However, as we will see below, “the temple and witness narrative” was likely two independent stories that have been tied together.

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problems, particularly concerning the identification of each narrative’s various characters and elements. Following that, we will briefly look at the crisis in John’s communities that the seer was attempting to address. Finally, an interpretation of the interlude and its rhetorical function will be proposed.

II. The Scroll Narrative (10:1–11) The scroll narrative itself can be broken down into four different units. The first describes a mighty angel (ἄγγελον ἰσχυρόν) who descends from heaven with an unsealed scroll (βιβλαρίδιον) in his hand.6 The angel is depicted as clothed in a cloud (περιβεβλημένον νεφέλην) with a rainbow (ἶρις) over his head; his face is like the sun and his legs (literally, feet: οἱ πόδες) are likened to pillars of fire (10:1). After his descent, the mighty angel sets his right foot on the sea, his left on the land, and cries out in a great voice, a voice like the roaring of a lion (10:2–3). Of all the figures mentioned thus far in the Book of Revelation, this is one of the most impressive.7 The second part of the narrative features seven thunders (10:3b–4). Following the shout of the mighty angel (and likely in response to it), seven thunders sound (10:3b). While the seer prepares to write what the thunders had communicated, a heavenly voice commands him not to write down the message but to seal it up (10:4). Curiously, this is the only place in the entire Book of Revelation where the content of a heavenly message is not communicated.8 The third part of the narrative centers on an oath given by the mighty angel (10:5–7). Following the report of the seven thunders, the angel raises his right hand and swears by the deity – described as the one “who lives for ever and ever, who created heaven and what is in it, the earth and what is in it, and the sea and what is in it” – that time is running out (χρόνος οὐκέτι ἔσται) (10:5–6). The angel further announces – in one of the few places in this interlude that acknowledges the larger narrative into which it has been set – that once the seventh angel blows his trumpet, “the secret plan of God (τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θεοῦ) will be completed” (ἐτελέσθη) (10:7). Finally, in a clear allusion to Ezek 2:8–3:3, the seer is commanded to take the scroll from the mighty angel and eat it, a command that he immediately fulfills (10:8–10). As was the case with Ezekiel, the scroll tasted sweet in the seer’s mouth. But, unlike the experience of that earlier prophet, the scroll produces 6 As Aune points out, the term ἠνεῳγμένον should not be understood to mean that the scroll was unrolled but rather that it had been unsealed (Revelation, 2:558). 7 Frederick David Mazzaferri labels this figure “the most exalted and impressive angel in [the] entire book” (The Genre of the Book of Revelation from a Source-Critical Perspective [BZNW 54; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1989], 265). 8 Aune, Revelation, 2:559.

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bitterness in John’s stomach. Ultimately, John is instructed to prophesy “about (or possibly “against,” ἐπί) many peoples and nations and languages and kings” (10:11).9 In the three sections that follow, we will examine some of the problems that one encounters when trying to interpret the scroll narrative. The first focuses on the mighty angel’s identity.

III. The Mighty Angel The identity of the mighty angel (ἄγγελος ἰσχυρός) of chapter 10 has long puzzled scholars. While the reader has encountered many different angelic figures in the book up to this point in the narrative, none has been described with the kind of impressive language that John uses for this figure (e. g., “clothed with a cloud,” having “a rainbow over his head,” the placement of his right foot on the sea and his left on the earth).10 Obviously, the description that John supplies for this angel highlights the figure’s importance. Only one other “mighty angel” has appeared earlier in the book, in the throne room scene of 5:2.11 However, as the text of 10:1 itself indicates, this mighty angel is probably not to be identified with that earlier figure; rather, it represents “another” mighty angel.12 In certain respects, the angel’s appearance calls to mind that of the deity. The cloud in which he is clothed, for instance, reminds the reader of imagery associated with YHWH, the storm deity.13 The mention of the rainbow (ἶρις) likewise suggests the deity for it points directly back to Rev 4:3, where a rainbow surrounds the throne of God.14 Clouds and rainbows are often identified with theophanies in Hellenistic literature as is the sun and fire, elements likewise included in the description of the mighty angel’s face and legs (10:1).15  It is also possible that ἐπί should be understood as indicating that John should prophesy “to many peoples and nations and languages and kings.” On this meaning, see Richard Bauckham, The Climax of Prophecy: Studies on the Book of Revelation (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1993), 264. 10  This is one of the few places where the clothing of an angel is described. The other places are 15:6 and 19:14 (Mazzaferri, Genre, 265). 11  A third mighty angel, who hurls a great millstone into the sea, appears in 18:21. 12  James L. Resseguie, The Revelation of John: A Narrative Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), 152. 13  For YHWH as the storm God, see Job 37; Ps 18:7–15; Zech 10:1 (Boring, Revelation, 139). It has also been suggested that the cloud imagery was intended to call to mind the cloud that led the Israelites through the wilderness after their escape from Egypt (Mazzaferri, Genre, 265). The description of the angel’s legs as pillars of fire could also refer to the same journey (Resseguie, Revelation, 152.). 14 It may also indirectly point to Gen 9:13 and 16 as well as Ezek 1:28. In both of those places a bow (τόξον) is associated with the deity. 15 For examples of the use of these various elements in Hellenistic literature, see Aune, Revelation, 2:557. A numbers of scholars have also suggested that the angel is intended to represent a theophany of a kind, a theophany in which the angel is to be identified with the divine “angel of the Lord” (a figure that we see in the Hebrew Scriptures), the deity visible on earth. Furthermore  9

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Although a number of the elements used to describe the mighty angel call to mind the figure of the deity, some of them also liken this figure to the Son of Man (i. e., the risen Jesus) described at the beginning of the Book of Revelation. For instance the mighty angel’s face in 10:1 is said to be ὡς ὁ ἥλιος and in 1:16, the face of the Son of Man is depicted as “shining like the sun at full strength” (ὡς ὁ ἥλιος ἐν τῇ δυνάμει αὐτοῦ).16 In addition, each figure’s legs / feet are described as brilliant. Those of the Son of Man are compared to burnished bronze (1:15) while those of the mighty angel in chapter 10 are likened to pillars of fire (10:1). Furthermore, the author connects both characters to a lion. The mighty angel’s cry in 10:3 sounds like the roar of a lion while in 5:5, the seer is told that the lion from the tribe of Judah will open the scroll.17 Finally, despite the above-mentioned connection of clouds to the deity in the Hebrew Scriptures, the description of the figure as “descending from heaven clothed with a cloud” could also suggests the figure of the Son of Man. This is especially apparent in Rev 14:14 where the Son of Man is depicted sitting on a white cloud.18 But, perhaps more importantly, the Son of Man figure in Dan 7:13 is described as “coming with the clouds of heaven.”19 Obviously, the ambiguity of the mighty angel’s description presents problems for this figure’s identification.

IV. The Scroll The scroll’s identity has also eluded interpreters. Is the scroll of chapter 10 to be identified with the scroll that appears in chapter 5? Or is it a different scroll? On the one hand, the scroll of the earlier chapter is labeled differently than the scroll of the interlude: in the earlier passage, the scroll is called a βιβλίον while in chapter 10 the term βιβλαρίδιον is employed.20 Furthermore, in 10:2 βιβλαρίδιον lacks a definite article. This suggests that it should not be identified with the previously such scholars have suggested that, from John’s perspective, the angel of the Lord is Christ. See Heinrich Kraft, Die Offenbarung Des Johannes (HNT 16a; Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1974), 147; G. K.  Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 525. 16  Cf. also Dan 10:6. 17  Beale, Revelation, 522–27. 18  Many have noted, however, that the context of 14:14 suggests that the Son of Man figure in 14:14 is problematic. It may refer to an angelic being rather that the risen Jesus. See, for example, Aune, Revelation 2:841. 19  Cf. 4 Ezra 13:3 and the synoptic gospels (e. g., Mark 13:26; Matt 24:20: Luke 21:22). 20 While βιβλαρίδιον is a true diminutive, the status of βιβλίον as a true or a faded diminutive in the Book of Revelation is disputed. The appearance of βιβλίον in 10:8 as a reference to the scroll of 10:2 suggests that it functions here in the former sense (which would make it a synonym for βιβλαρίδιον). Unfortunately, however, we cannot be sure that βιβλίον in 10:8 is the original reading; βιβλαρίδιον, βιβλιδάριον, and βιβλάριον are also attested in the manuscripts. See Aune, Revelation, 2:558.

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mentioned βιβλίον of 5:2.21 On the other hand, there are enough similarities between the books that some have suggested that they should be identified with one another.22 These similarities include allusions to Ezekiel 2–3 in both passages, the seeming connection of each scroll to a Son of Man figure (assuming, of course, that the mighty angel represents that figure), and the scroll’s association with the destinies of “peoples, nations, and languages.”23 Since problems plague either possibility, any conclusion drawn about the identity of the βιβλαρίδιον must be tentative. The problem of identifying the scroll in the interlude, like the problem of the identity of the mighty angel again raises the question of the author’s purpose in inserting such ambiguous elements into the narrative of the interlude.

V. The Consumption of the Scroll A third enigma in this narrative has to do with the seer’s consumption of the so-called “little scroll” (βιβλαρίδιον). The episode focused on the scroll is, as mentioned above, clearly modeled on Ezek 2:8–3:3. There Ezekiel is commissioned by the deity to prophesy to the people of Judah. Because of the allusion to Ezekiel in 10:8–10, it seems reasonable to identify the command to the seer that he eat the scroll as a kind of commissioning. However, this identification is also problematic because the seer had already been commissioned earlier in the book (1:11, 19). Consequently, it is unclear if or how this commissioning fits into John’s larger narrative. Obviously, the problem of John’s commissioning is also related to the problem of the identity of the scroll. If the βιβλαρίδιον is understood as the same scroll as the βιβλίον of chapter 5, then the seer’s consumption of that scroll is puzzling since he has already heard what the βιβλαρίδιον contains. Since he has already appropriated the contents of the scroll (by hearing them), there would be no reason for him to eat the scroll so that he could prophesy. On the other hand, if the scroll of the interlude is understood to be a different scroll than that of Revelation 5, then that conclusion also raises problems. While some have argued that Revelation, 2:571. who believe the scroll in chapter 10 is to be identified with that in chapter 5 include J. P. M. Sweet, Revelation (Westminster Pelican Commentaries; Philadelphia: Westminster, 1979), 176; Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 243–54; Beale, Revelation, 526–28; Resseguie, Revelation, 153. Included among those who see the scroll of chapter 10 as a different scroll include R. H.  Charles, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Revelation of St. John (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1920), 260; Ernst Lohmeyer, Die Offenbarung des Johannes (HNT 16; Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1970), 87; Eduard Lohse, Die Offenbarung des Johannes Übersetzt und Erklärt (NTD 11; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1993),  63; Kraft, Offenbarung,  147; Aune, Revelation, 2:571–75. 23 Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy,  243–57; Beale, Revelation,  527. It should be noted that while 5:9 refers to “tribes,” 10:11 refers to “kings.” 21 Aune,

22 Those

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the contents of the βιβλίον of chapter 5 predicted the events of 6:1–8:5 while the contents of the βιβλαρίδιον apply only to the events described in 11:1–13, there is nothing in the text to specifically support such a conclusion.24 As we can see, there are a number of interpretive problems in the scroll narrative. One focuses on the identity of a character (i. e., the mighty angel), another on one of the story’s elements (i. e., the scroll). Still another difficulty has to do with redundancy (i. e., another commissioning of the seer). It is important to note that all of these problems are to some extent caused by our attempts to interpret this story in the larger context of the Book of Revelation’s narrative. When we turn to the temple and witness narrative, we also encounter significant interpretive difficulties. These difficulties, however, raise somewhat different questions that do those in the scroll narrative.

VI. The Temple and Witness Narrative The temple and witness narrative consists of two originally independent stories (11:1–2 and 11:3–13) that have been loosely tied together by the seer.25 The first focuses on the temple and its plot is relatively simple. The seer is instructed (presumably by the deity) to measure the temple, the altar, and those worshipping in it but not the outer court (τὴν αὐλὴν τὴν ἔξωθεν τοῦ ναοῦ). The outer court, we are told, is to be given over to the nations/gentiles for forty–two months (11:1–2). The same fate awaits the holy city where the temple is situated. The plot of the second story is much more detailed. The witnesses are authorized to prophesy for 1,260 days, during which time, they are inviolable (11:3–6).26 After they finish prophesying, they are killed by the beast who arises from the abyss (11:7) and their corpses lie in the street of the “great city,” identified in the text as “Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified” (11:8). In that “great city,” the corpses of the witnesses are watched by some “from among the peoples and tribes and languages and nations” and they are also refused burial, presumably by the same group (11:9). Meanwhile, in the verse that follows, those described as “the inhabitants of the earth” celebrate the death of the witnesses (11:10). After three and a half days, the witnesses are raised from the dead, an event that causes great fear to fall on those watching (11:11). The witnesses then ascend to heaven “on a cloud,” observed by their enemies (11:12). At the same time (ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ 24  Among those who argue that the contents of the “little scroll” predict events described beginning in chapter 11, see Charles, Revelation, 260; Lohmeyer, Offenbarung, 87. 25 It is worth noting that the second story, that of the witnesses, does not take the form of a vision. See Aune, Revelation, 2:585. 26 The identification of the two witnesses with the two olive trees and lampstands is puzzling. The reference to the olive trees seems to allude to Zechariah 4 which also mentions two olive trees. But Zechariah 4 mentions seven lampstands as does Revelation 1.

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ὥρᾳ), there is a great earthquake that destroys a tenth of the city and kills 7,000 (11:13a). Those not killed by the earthquake are overcome with fear and “give glory to the God of heaven” (11:13b). One element, time, loosely ties the temple and the witness stories together. The significant period of time is identical although described differently in each story. The temple story mentions forty-two months (11:2) while the story of the witnesses indicates a time of 1,260 days.27 For John, this amount of time, derived from Dan 7:25 and 12:7, represents the duration of the beast’s reign.28 The spatial referent in each of the stories is perhaps also the same. Both stories may point to Jerusalem as the location of the action. In the first story, the seer mentions “the holy city” (11:3) and the second refers to “the great city,” where “their Lord was crucified” (11:8). While the former reference (to the holy city) unequivocally points to Jerusalem, the latter identification is somewhat problematic, as we will see.

VII. Jerusalem as “Sodom” and “Egypt” A particularly difficult problem of identity in the temple and witness narrative appears in the episode focused on the witnesses (11:3–13). More specifically, as mentioned above, it concerns the identity of “the great city” where the corpses of the witnesses lie unburied after having been slain by the beast. According to John, the great city is, “prophetically (πνευματικῶς) called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified” (11:8). Although the final phrase of 11:8 (ὅπου καὶ ὁ κύριος αὐτῶν ἐσταυρώθη) seems to point unambiguously to the city of Jerusalem, nevertheless, elsewhere in the Book of Revelation, the designation “great city” is applied exclusively to “Babylon” (i. e., Rome, cf. 16:19; 17:18; 18:10, 16, 18, 19, 21). The labels “Sodom” and “Egypt” likewise seem to correspond more appropriately to John’s description of “Babylon” than Jerusalem. Sodom’s fate (Gen 19:1–29) anticipates the end held in store for “Babylon” in the Book of Revelation (chapters 17 and 18). Egypt’s status too, as the enemy of Israel, also parallels “Babylon’s” enmity toward οἱ ἅγιοι (cf. 13:7; 16:6; 17:6; 18:24). Based on such evidence, a few scholars have argued that the “great city” mentioned here must represent Rome. Most, however, have remained unconvinced of this identification because of the connection that the author has established between Jerusalem and the crucifixion.29 Others have attempted to resolve the 27 Cf.

Rev 12:6, 12:14; and 13:5. Revelation, 279. 29 For “the great city” as Jerusalem, see Wilhelm Bousset, Die Offenbarung de Johannes (KEK 16; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1906), 312; Lohmeyer, Offenbarung, 93; Henry Barclay Swete, The Apocalypse of John: The Greek Text with Introduction, Notes, and Indices (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1954), 137–38; Kraft, Offenbarung, 158; Aune, Revelation, 2:619. For “the great 28 Charles,

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ambiguity surrounding the identification of “the great city” here by suggesting that, although John points to Jerusalem in this vision, he really means the entirety of the world’s godless cities.30 But this solution is also unsatisfactory for it – like the suggestion that “the great city” stands for Rome – does not sufficiently explain why John appends to the label the specific reference to Jesus’s crucifixion. A better solution would be to see Jerusalem as “the great city,” particularly because of the mention of the fate of that city in the previous story, the story about the measuring of the temple (11:1–2). There Jerusalem is described as “the holy city” but the reader also hears the prediction that it will be trampled by the nations / gentiles for forty-two months. Jerusalem therefore, the paradigmatic godly place in 11:1–3, has now come to resemble “the great city” (John’s preferred label for Rome) because it has been overrun by the nations / gentiles (a prediction that the story of the witnesses presumes to have already happened). But John also labels the great city “Sodom,” the “unholy” city of the past, and “Egypt,” the ancient enemy of Israel. In the temple and witness narrative therefore we can see that John blends the godly with the ungodly. It is important to note that John’s description of Jerusalem in this narrative resembles the language of some of the prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures. Isaiah, for example, specifically labels Jerusalem “Sodom” when he prophesies to the city’s leaders: “Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom!” (Isa 1:10; cf. Mart. Ascen. Isa. 3:10).31 But, despite this negative label, Isaiah, later in the same passage, predicts the city’s rehabilitation: Therefore says the Sovereign, the Lord of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel: Ah, I will pour out my wrath on my enemies, and avenge myself on my foes! I will turn my hand against you; I will smelt away your dross as with lye and remove all your alloy. city” as Rome, see Julius Wellhausen, Analyse der Offenbarung Johannes (Berlin: Weidmann, 1907),  16; Johannes Munck, Petrus und Paulus in der Offenbarung Johannes (Copenhagen: Rosenskilde og Bagger, 1950), 30–35; and John W. Marshall, Parables of War: Reading John’s Jewish Apocalypse (Studies in Christianity and Judaism; Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier, 2001), 163–65. 30  E. g. J. Ramsey Michaels, Revelation (IVP New Testament Commentary 20; Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1997),  141–42; Boring, Revelation,  145; Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 172. 31  Ezekiel too, compares Jerusalem to Sodom. Although he does not label Jerusalem herself “Sodom,” nevertheless he claims that the two are kin, sisters to be precise. He says of Jerusalem, “your elder sister is Samaria, who lived with her daughters to the north of you; and your younger sister, who lived to the south of you, is Sodom with her daughters” (16:46). Jeremiah also says of his prophetic contemporaries, “all of them have become like Sodom to me” (23:14). John is likewise not the first prophet to draw a comparison between the holy land and Egypt. We see a similar comparison in Amos, in 4:10, where the prophet suggests that God has treated Israel like Egypt, presumably because Israel has behaved in the manner of the Egyptians.

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And I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterwards you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed by justice, and those in her who repent, by righteousness (Isa 1:24–27).

In this passage, the enemies upon whom the deity will pour out his wrath are internal enemies, enemies within Jerusalem. Once God has smelted away the dross of the city, Jerusalem will be transformed. We will see below that John thinks of Jerusalem in the temple and witness narrative in a similar way. For now, however, we need to turn our attention to John’s description of Jerusalem’s inhabitants.

VIII. The Inhabitants of Jerusalem The identity of the inhabitants of Jerusalem presents another significant problem for the interpreter. Rev 11:9 describes those inhabitants as ἐκ τῶν λαῶν καὶ φυλῶν καὶ γλωσσῶν καὶ ἐθνῶν (“some from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations”). From the context of Rev 11:9, this group clearly represents enemies of the slain witnesses, for it is they who prevent the corpses of the witnesses from being buried. Nevertheless, there is something very curious about this particular description of the city’s inhabitants. The same fourfold description appears in a number of places in the Apocalypse (5:9; 7:9; 11:9; 13:7; and 14:6).32 Sometimes the list includes the preposition ἐκ used in a partitive manner (5:9; 7:9; 11:9), and sometimes it does not (13:7 and 14:6). When the list appears without the preposition, it seems to mean all people, that is the entirety of the earth’s population.33 32 In each of these locations, the same four elements (i. e., φυλή, λαός, γλῶσσα, ἔθνος) consistently appear together. They always appear polysyndetically (i. e., with καί separating each of the elements) but, curiously, the four different elements never occur in the same order. It is likely that John’s list represents a variation of the three-element list of “peoples, tribes, and languages” that appears in a number of places in the book of Daniel (3:4, 7, 29; 5:19; 6:25; and 7:14). John expands the three-element list by adding ἔθνη (“nations”). The elements in the fourfold lxx list at Dan 3:4 (ἔθνη καὶ χῶραι, λαοὶ καὶ γλῶσσαι) differs from John’s list only in that Daniel uses χῶραι in place of which John substitutes φυλαί (Aune, Revelation, 1:361). It is also worth noting that, besides the above-mentioned appearances of this fourfold population, there also exists two variations, one at 10:11 and the other at 17:15. In both of these variants, the term “tribe” (φυλή) is replaced by another term, in 10:11 by “kings” and in 17:15 by “multitudes” (ὄχλοι). 33 Rev 13:7 describes the authority of the beast “over every tribe and people and language and nation,” including – as the same verse indicates – the “saints.” In 14:6, the catalogue is also used in a neutral way to describe those for whom the gospel is proclaimed, specifically, “those who live on earth”: “Then I saw another angel flying in mid-heaven, with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth – to every nation and tribe and language and people.” In addition, variants of the list (without ἐκ) appear in 10:11 and 17:15. They also seem to describe all the peoples of the earth, the saved and the unsaved.

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But, when the preposition is included, the list points to the saved (i. e., in every passage except this one). We first see John’s use of this fourfold list with the preposition ἐκ in the hymn of the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders in 5:9–10. Addressing the lamb, the creatures and elders chant: You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slaughtered and by your blood you ransomed for God those from every tribe and language and people and nation (ἐκ πάσης φυλῆς καὶ γλώσσης καὶ λαοῦ καὶ ἔθνους); you have made them to be a kingdom and priests serving our God, and they will reign on earth.

Here the group “from every tribe and language and people and nation” obviously represents οἱ ἅγιοι for the line immediately prior describes them as those who have been ransomed by the lamb’s blood and the line that follows marks them as “a kingdom and priests serving God.” A few chapters later, in Rev 7:9, the fourfold description is likewise used in reference to the redeemed. In this case, it labels those standing before the throne of God and the lamb: After this I looked and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from all nations and tribes and peoples and languages (ἐκ παντὸς ἔθνους καὶ φυλῶν καὶ λαῶν καὶ γλωσσῶν), standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (7:9–10).

Here, as in the earlier passage (5:9–10), this fourfold group obviously represents the subset of humanity that has been redeemed. Remarkably, as noted above, John’s mention of the “peoples and tribes and languages and nations” in his vision about the witnesses (specifically in 11:9) is likewise preceded by the preposition ἐκ. We would therefore expect it to represent the saved. But it does not seem to function that way here for in 11:9, this group prevents the burial of the witnesses’ corpses. Therefore, the label for the population of “the peoples and tribes and languages and nations” in this place (11:9) is unique. Here and only here in the Book of Revelation, the label appears to point to an evil group. This is very curious. Why would John have identified this group with a positive label in this particular place? In order to answer that question, we need to look at this group of people in 11:9 in conjunction with another population, a population described in the verse that immediately follows. In Rev 11:10, John mentions a group labeled “the inhabitants of the earth” (οἱ κατοικοῦντες ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς): “… and the inhabitants of the earth will gloat over [the corpses of the witnesses] and celebrate and exchange presents, because these two prophets had been a torment to the inhabitants of the earth.” The label, “inhabit-

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ants of the earth,” used twice in 11:10, appears elsewhere in Revelation (ten times) where it is used consistently to describe an evil population.34 The “inhabitants of the earth,” for example, are described as intoxicated with the wine of Babylon’s fornication in 17:2. Their names, according to 17:8, are not written in the book of life.35 An important question regarding the witness story in Revelation 11 is: do “the inhabitants of the earth” mentioned in 11:10 correspond to the group described in the previous verse, that is, “some from among the peoples and tribes and languages and nations?” Or does the latter group represent a different population? Since John here as elsewhere portrays “the inhabitants of the earth” (11:10) as evil and “those from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations” in a somewhat ambiguous manner in 11:19 (i. e., as an evil population with a positive label), I suggest that in the temple and witness narrative, they stand for two different groups. The group described as “the inhabitants of the earth” represents the majority of the earth’s population, that is to say, those who are active, willing, and even enthusiastic participants in the beast’s wickedness (as evidenced by their celebrating and exchanging gifts at the death of the witnesses). On the other hand, those “from among (ἐκ) the peoples and tribes and languages and nations,” the group inhabiting “the great city” Jerusalem, seem to represent a somewhat less evil assemblage. They are obviously complicit in the humiliation of the witnesses – in that they do not allow their corpses to be buried – but they are not portrayed as celebrating the witnesses’ demise. John therefore seems to cast the inhabitants of Jerusalem as evil but not too evil, as allies with the beast (in that they tolerate the beast’s evil), but not participants in that evil in the same way as the “inhabitants of the earth.” But, from John’s perspective, their equivocal stance cannot last. The ambiguity of their position must be resolved in one way or another and by the end of the temple and witness narrative, the ambiguity surrounding the inhabitants of Jerusalem will indeed be resolved. As we will see, this resolution will provide us with a clue about how to interpret the entirety of the interlude. 34 Rev 3:10; 6:10; 8:13; 11:10 (twice); 13:8, 14 (twice); 17:2, 8. Note that 17:2 presents a slight stylistic variation (οἱ κατοικοῦντες τῆν γῆν). A slightly different description (τῆν γῆν καὶ τοὺς ἐν αὐτῇ κατοικοῦντας) also appears in 13:12 but carries the same negative meaning. Equivalent to this group is also “the whole world” (οἰκουμένη ὅλη at 3:10; 12:9; and 16:14 and ὅλη ἡ γῆ at 13:3). See Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 239. 35 One could conceivably argue for a more neutral meaning in 3:10, where the Son of Man promises to keep the faithful from “the hour of trial (τῆς ὥρας τοῦ πειρασμοῦ) that is about to come on the inhabitants of the earth.” Here it is at least conceivable that some of the latter group could be vindicated by the testing. However, as Aune points out, the fact that the phrase τῆς ὥρας τοῦ πειρασμοῦ is articular suggests that this phrase represents a familiar expected eschatological event rather than “testing” of the believers. In other words, here it stands for something that will be inflicted on the evil “inhabitants of the earth” from which the faithful Philadelphians will be protected (Aune, Revelation, 1:239–40).

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IX. Resolving the Ambiguity As mentioned above, the narrative depicts the resolution of this ambiguity (as well as that of “the holy city”/“great city”) in the final verse of the interlude (11:13). According to that verse, at the same time (ἐκ ἐκείνῃ τῇ ὥρᾳ) that the resurrected witnesses ascend to heaven, a great earthquake shakes the city, destroys a tenth of it, and kills 7,000 people. Those who remain (presumably 63,000) are rightfully terrified and, as a result of that fear, they “[give] glory to the God of heaven.” The phrase διδόναι δόξαν τῷ θεῷ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ that appears here signifies repentance, as many have recognized.36 Curiously, this is the only instance of repentance that we see anywhere in the book of Revelation. The vision of the repentance of the majority of the Jerusalemites in 11:13 recalls what we have already seen foretold in Isaiah 1: God will pour out his wrath on his enemies in Sodom/Jerusalem (1:24); the city will, as a result, have its dross smelted away (Isa 1:25); and Zion and her repentant inhabitants will be redeemed (1:27). I suggest that, just as Isaiah anticipated redemption for Jerusalem (“Sodom”) and her inhabitants, so too John’s vision in 11:1–13 expects something similar: “Sodom,” “the great city” will once again become the “holy city” as it was earlier described, before it was trampled by the nations / gentiles (11:2). The resolution of the ambiguity, with the destruction of some of the Jerusalemites and the salvation of the others (the majority), suggests a strategy for tying the various pieces of the interlude together and understanding John’s reason for its placement in the larger narrative.37 Curiously, the restoration of Jerusalem at the end of the interlude shows an interesting correspondence to the conclusion of the Book of Revelation itself. At the end of the Apocalypse, a restored Jerusalem also appears, although in the latter case it descends from heaven. Furthermore, the corresponding endings suggest another narrative similarity between the plot of the book and that of the interlude. At the beginning of each of the narratives (i. e., the Book of Revelation itself and the interlude or 10:1–11:13), we see a commissioning scene. Is it possible that the Book of Revelation and the interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 represent parallel narratives? Before we explore that possibility, we will first address briefly the historical situation faced by the author of the Book of Revelation.

36  E. g., G. B.  Caird, The Revelation of St. John the Divine (HNTC; New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 140; Sweet, Revelation, 106–9; Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, The Book of Revelation: Justice and Judgement (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985), 79; Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 273–83; and Aune, Revelation, 1:629. 37 The salvation of Jerusalem in 11:13 obviously refers not to the restoration of the Palestinian city; instead, it points to John’s hope for the ἐκκλησία. We will address this below.

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X. The Crisis Addressed by John Almost all scholars acknowledge a crisis lying behind the Book of Revelation. Unfortunately, there is not consensus about the nature of the crisis. Indeed, the question of the nature of the crisis is complicated by the issue of the dating of the Apocalypse. For instance, those who suggest an early date for the work (ca. 70 c.e.) usually argue that the Neronian persecution in Rome or persecution in the wake of the Roman-Jewish war represents the Sitz im Leben of the work.38 Those arguing for the more traditional Domitianic date typically postulate a more localized persecution or perhaps a perceived crisis arising from accumulated trauma.39 I suggest that the best way of approaching the experience of the various communities is to leave aside the question of the book’s date and instead focus on the messages to the seven communities found in Revelation 2 and 3, for these messages present us with a window into the situation of the various communities.40 A close look at the messages reveals no persuasive evidence for persecution, either localized or empire-wide. Those few pieces of evidence that could be said to point to persecution are at best equivocal. For example, the death of the witness Antipas at Pergamum is described as an event that clearly happened in the past and perhaps the relatively distant past. While the message to Smyrna raises the subject of persecution, it is predicted as a future event. It is clearly not described as a present reality.41 Due to the lack of evidence, therefore, there is no reason to assume persecution as the motivation for John to write the Apocalypse. Nevertheless, although there is no reliable evidence for persecution, it would be unwise to presume that no crisis at all underlay the Book of Revelation.42 Indeed, a close examination of the messages in chapters 2 and 3 of the Apocalypse indicates instead that an internal crisis had divided several of the communities. 38 E. g., J. Christian Wilson, “The Problem of the Domitianic Date of Revelation,” NTS  39 (1993): 507–605; Christopher Rowland, The Open Heaven: A Study of Apocalyptic in Judaism and Early Christianity (London: SPCK, 1982), 403–12; idem, Revelation (Epworth Commentaries; London: Epworth, 1993); Marshall, Parables of War. 39 For some kind of persecution lying behind Revelation, see, for example John M. Court, Myth and History in the Book of Revelation (Atlanta: John Knox, 1979), 66–67; Schüssler Fiorenza, Book of Revelation, 7–9; Colin J. Hemer, The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia in Their Local Settings (JSNTSup 11; Sheffield: JSOT, 1986), 9–10. Adela Yarbro Collins made an important contribution to this question by suggesting that, although there was no significant persecution at the time, the community perceived great hostility directed at it. See her Crisis and Catharsis: The Power of the Apocalypse (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1984). 40 While these messages are sometimes referred to as letters, there is little in them to support this label. For a discussion of the genre of the messages, see Aune, Revelation, 1:124–30. 41 It should be noted that there is no reason to suspect that John would have had inside knowledge about the future plans of would-be persecutors. 42 This has been suggested by Leonard L. Thompson, The Book of Revelation: Apocalypse and Empire (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990).

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The messages to the communities at Ephesus, Pergamum, Thyatira, and Sardis all indicate a division in those assemblies. In particular, the assembly at Thyatira seems to have been split between supporters of John and a prophet that the author derisively labels “Jezebel.” “Jezebel,” it seems – perhaps under the influence of Pauline Christianity  – was more tolerant of some accommodation to pagan society than was John.43 Furthermore, the issues of concern outlined in the Pergamum message are the same as those mentioned in the message to Thyatira. Unfortunately, the other two messages mentioned speak of divisions in the community with either obscure language (Ephesus) or they remain silent about the reason for the division (Sardis).44 Regardless, the messages to the seven communities clearly indicate that the crisis that lay behind the Book of Revelation was not focused on persecution but rather was internal. John’s focus on “Jezebel” in the message to Thyatira – the message that stands at the center of chapters 2 and 3 (the fourth of seven messages), the message that is the longest and by far the most detailed – suggests that the crisis also centered on the leadership of the communities. John, it seems, was battling to retain his diminishing influence in the face of the challenge to it by the prophet “Jezebel.” While other rivals may have arisen in the various communities, it is more likely that “Jezebel’s” influence was John’s primary concern.45 The message to the community at Thyatira can provide us with a good idea of the situation not only in that divided assembly but in the others as well. The Thyatira message indicates the presence of three separate groups in that community. First, of course, are John’s supporters. They are mentioned in Rev 2:24 as “those who have not held [“Jezebel’s”] teaching, those who do not know the deep things of Satan.” The second group constitutes the supporters of “Jezebel.” This group, noted in 2:23, is referred to as her “children.” John’s hostility  The “crimes” that “Jezebel” was accused of promoting were εἰδωλόθυτα and πορνεία. Paul in 1 Corinthians seems to be (at least theoretically) open to the position of those who eat εἰδωλόθυτα, recognizing that pagan deities have no real existence (cf. 1 Cor 8:1–6). The term πορνεία is possibly a reference to intermarriage with non-believers (see David Frankfurter, “Jews or Not? Reconstructing the ‘Other’ in Rev 2:9/3:9,” HTR 94 (2001): 403–25; Paul B. Duff, Who Rides the Beast? Prophetic Rivalry and the Rhetoric of Crisis in the Churches of the Apocalypse [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001], 56). The notion of intermarriage also appears in 1 Corinthians 7. We know that 1 Corinthians was circulating toward the end of the first century (cf. 1 Clement and the letters of Ignatius of Antioch). Is it possible that “Jezebel’s” position was based upon her knowledge of Paul’s letter? 44 The communities at Smyrna and Philadelphia are not split but rather appear to have remained firmly in John’s camp. This is apparent because, unlike in the messages to the other five churches, in the messages to Smyrna and Philadelphia, the Son of Man has directed no threats against them. The situation in Laodicea is unclear. The complaint articulated against the members of this congregation is that they are neither hot nor cold but lukewarm. This could indicate that they have not firmly taken John’s side or that of accommodationists like “Jezebel.” However, we cannot be sure. For more on the situation in the communities, see Duff, Who Rides, 31–60. 45 It has been suggested, for example, that there was another rival prophet in Pergamum whom John labels “Balaam.” However, this seems unlikely to me. See Duff, Who Rides, 146, n. 28. 43

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towards them is demonstrated by the fate that the risen Jesus anticipates for them: they will be struck dead (2:23). Although the last group is barely visible in the message, it likely makes up a significant percentage of the assembly and it almost certainly represents the primary audience of John’s address. We can label this group the invisible majority.46 This is the population that “commits adultery” with “Jezebel.” The metaphor is apt. They belong to John (at least in his mind) but they “flirt” with “Jezebel’s” ideas. This invisible majority likely accepts John as a prophet but they tolerate the prophet “Jezebel” as well. It is only this group that John believes he can sway.47 He has certainly given up on “Jezebel” (although at one time he apparently had hope for her, 2:21) and her children (2:23).48 I suggest that we assume the same three-fold division in most if not all of the split communities. Although we cannot be sure that it was “Jezebel” herself who represented a threat to John in all of those communities, nevertheless, it is likely that the accommodationist stance that we see in her message underlay the community divisions. While the mix of John’s supporters and those of “Jezebel” (or someone like her) probably varied in the different communities, from John’s standpoint, those who had not yet taken sides (i. e., the invisible majority) were key.49 John could not win them over to his side unless they rejected “Jezebel” (or other accommodationist leaders) and her / their attitude toward pagan society. In sum, from John’s perspective, his own status as a prophet has been threatened by “Jezebel” (or perhaps other leaders with a similar outlook). Such leaders advocated a less polarized view of the world than did the seer. The importance that John places on his status as a true prophet therefore cannot be underestimated and it is against this background that the interlude of 10:1–11:13 must be viewed.50 However, before we begin our interpretation, we will return to the possibility, mentioned above, that the Book of Revelation as a whole and the interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 represent parallel narratives.

XI. An Episode within a Narrative or a Story within a Story? The interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 appears to the reader to be an episode that fits into a larger narrative. In one sense, such a statement could hardly be called into question. But, in another sense, this way of understanding the interlude gives rise to significant interpretive problems. This is because we cannot easily make sense  Duff, Who Rides, 58–59. that the call for repentance in the message to Thyatira is specifically directed at them. 48 Duff, Who Rides, 58–59. 49 For example, Sardis seems to have been heavily weighted towards the accommodationist position while Pergamum and Thyatira more likely had a significant number of supporters in each camp. 50 Note John’s claim that “Jezebel” merely “calls herself a prophet” (2:20). 46

47 Note

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of the interlude as an episode that is causally or temporally related to the larger narrative into which it is set. To some extent the author encourages us to read the interlude as an episode in the larger narrative by placing a few connections within the interlude that seem to tie it to larger story.51 But, despite the presence of these few links, an easy integration of the interlude within the larger narrative remains problematic.52 Indeed, the questions of identification mentioned earlier – particularly in the scroll narrative – make it difficult for the reader to interpret the interlude as having any temporal or causal relationship to the larger story. Problems surrounding the identity of “the mighty angel,” for example, prevent the reader from easily incorporating this character within the larger narrative of the Book. The mighty angel does not look like any of the other angels encountered heretofore in the Apocalypse. Rather, it bears some resemblance to both the deity and the Son of Man. Ultimately, however, there are problems with identifying this angel with either of these figures or with any other characters in the larger narrative.53 The same issue holds for the interlude’s scroll. Assuming its identity with the scroll that appeared in chapter 5 presents interpretive problems. However, as we have seen, other problems emerge when we try to understand the scroll of the interlude as a different scroll from that of chapter 5. Finally, the redundancy of John’s commission likewise contributes to the problem of integrating the interlude into the larger narrative. I suggest, as a result of such problems, that we consider the interlude more as a story within a story rather than as one episode that fits within the larger narrative. An analogy, while not precise, may help explain this distinction. The story of Cupid and Psyche within Apuleius’s novel, The Metamorphoses, clearly functions as 51  The obvious connection is the reference to the angel blowing the seventh trumpet in 10:7 although other possible connections could also suggest that the interlude is part of a larger narrative. For example, in 10:1, the seer views another mighty angel and in 10:11, the seer is instructed to prophesy again. Some other seeming connections are less certain and indeed at times problematic. In 11:4, the witnesses are described as lampstands and olive trees. The comment about the lampstands seems to go back to the reference to lampstands in 1:20 but in the earlier passage, seven lampstands represent the seven churches. In 11:4, two lampstands represent two witnesses. Furthermore, there is no other symbolic use of the olive trees in Revelation. In 11:7, the beast from the abyss appears, a beast that will enter the story later (cf. 17:8 and possibly 13:1, although the latter is anarthrous, suggesting that it is being introduced for the first time). However, in the interlude, the term θηρίον is preceded by a definite article. That suggests that beast has already been introduced (Klaus Berger, Die Auferstehung des Propheten und die Erhöhung des Menschensohnes: Traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zur Deutung des Geschicks Jesu in früchristlichen Texten [SUNT 13; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1976], 23; Aune, Revelation, 2:616). 52 It is likely that the interlude represents the combination of various (originally separate) visions that were put together and then, in the course of the composition of the Book of Revelation, incorporated into the narrative (see above, note 3). 53 Richard Bauckham has made the ingenious suggestion that the mighty angel is the angel mentioned by John at the beginning of the book, in Rev 1:1 (Climax of Prophecy, 253–57). Yet, despite the attractiveness of the suggestion, one wonders if John’s readers would have solved the puzzle of the angel’s identity in the way that Bauckham suggests.

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such a story within a story. An obvious connection exists between the embedded story and the narrative of the novel but the connection is not causal or temporal but rather thematic.54 The interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13, I suggest, functions similarly; it is a story that is related to the larger story of the Book of Revelation but it is not necessarily causally or temporally related. It is rather thematically related. It is important to note, however, that the relationship between the interlude and the rest of the Book of Revelation differs somewhat from the relationship of Cupid and Psyche to the larger narrative in The Metamorphoses. Unlike the narratives in Apuleius’s work, the two Johannine narratives (i. e., the larger narrative of the work and the narrative of the interlude) share some of the same characters. By means of these characters (e. g., “those from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations,” “the inhabitants of the earth,” and “Jerusalem”), the stories gain meaning in relation to one another.55 Both stories – i. e., that of the interlude and that of the Book of Revelation as a whole – have similar narrative trajectories. Indeed, to some degree, they run in parallel. We have already examined the scroll narrative and the temple and witness narrative independently. In the section that follows, we will briefly examine those stories together as a unified narrative. Furthermore, we will examine the unified narrative against the background of John’s struggle to maintain his influence in the various Asian communities.

XII. Reading the Interlude against the Background of John’s Struggle for Legitimacy in the Divided Communities When we examine the interlude both as a story within a story and against the background of John’s struggle, some of the problems of interpretation disappear. Others, however, remain. For example, the problem of the identity of the mighty angel who appears in the first half of the interlude is not solved. Nevertheless, determining the identity of this figure becomes much less urgent because the reader is no longer forced to understand the angel’s identity causally or temporally in

54  My proposal is to some extent dependent on David L. Barr’s work on the Book of Revelation. In his narrative commentary on the Book of Revelation, Barr suggests that the Book of Revelation is made up of different but related stories and compares their function to a number of different stories within the early twentieth-century O. Henry story, “Roads of Destiny.” The connections among the various narratives in the “Roads of Destiny,” Barr points out, are thematic rather than causal or temporal (Tales,  10–16). Barr’s methodological proposal is significant, particularly his suggestion that a particular story within the Book of Revelation need not have strong causal or temporal links with the rest of the narrative in order to be meaningful. 55 For example, if the reader did not understand the function of “those from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations” in the rest of Revelation, he or she could not see the uniqueness of the label in Rev 11:9.

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terms of the larger narrative. Whoever the angel is, it is clear that the figure comes from the divine realm. In the image of the mighty angel the readers sees: … the images of God, Christ, Spirit/angel collapse into each other. The ultimate revealer is God, who defines and represents himself in Christ and communicates with the prophet by means of the angel. Although the figures are kept somewhat distinct, the imagery overlaps in such a way that God/Christ/angel are all presented to the mind’s eye by the one picture.56

Read from this different perspective, the emphasis shifts slightly away from the figure of the mighty angel (and the puzzle of the angel’s identity) and turns instead toward the seer. With less emphasis on the angel, the seer’s commission comes into sharper focus. The importance of the seer’s role in the interlude is further enhanced by the message of the seven thunders. As the narrative illustrates, John is privy to heavenly information unavailable to any other human being. Such knowledge clearly enhances his status as a prophet. If the narrative need not necessarily be understood as temporally or causally related to the story in which it is embedded (i. e., the larger narrative of the book), other problems likewise recede. For example, the redundancy of John’s call and the question of the relationship of the scroll in chapter 10 to the scroll in chapter 5 cease to be issues. Instead, as mentioned above, the commissioning of the seer is highlighted. As in Ezekiel 2 and 3 – a passage to which this episode obviously alludes – the little scroll of the interlude represents the divine revelation that is made directly available to the seer. By consuming the scroll, John appropriates those secrets and, in turn, implicitly promises to relate them to his human audience. While John never here explicitly claims the title “prophet,” the impressive narrative of chapter 10 communicates to his readers that, like Ezekiel, the revered divine spokesperson of the past, he too has been commissioned “to prophesy” to the people (10:11). While the first half of the interlude focuses on John and his prophetic commission, the latter part turns to the situation of the community (although as 11:3–6 shows, the notion of prophecy still looms large). In this second half of the interlude, our attention is first focused on the temple (11:1–2): the seer is given a measuring rod (κάλαμος) and told to measure it, its altar, and the people worshipping in it. There is little doubt that this story, like the commissioning scene immediately prior, was intended to call to mind a similar episode in the Book of Ezekiel (Ezek 40:3–42:20).57 While the act of measuring can mean various things in the Hebrew Bible, including judgment (2 Sam 8:2; 2 Kgs 21:13; Isa 34:11; Lam 2:8; Amos 7:7–9), restoration (Jer 31:38–40; Zech 1:16; 2:12), or proRevelation, 139. in that earlier text, the prophet Ezekiel witnesses the measuring of the temple by an angelic figure (“a man whose appearance shone like bronze”), in the Book of Revelation, John is told to measure it himself. Curiously, the reader is not told whether or not John completes this action. 56 Boring, 57 While

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tection (2 Sam 8:2b; Isa 28:16–17; Jer 31:38–40; Ezek 40:2; 41:13; 42:20; 43:13; Zech 1:16), the act in Rev 11:1–2 signifies something a bit different. While, on the one hand, the measuring of the temple suggests protection or preservation,58 the action also sets the temple apart as sacred space, space claimed by the deity.59 Of course, as many have acknowledged, the temple here should not be understood literally.60 Rather, the temple itself, its altar, and the people worshipping in it represent the community of believers (i. e., οἱ ἅγιοι) who have been set apart by the deity.61 They have been claimed as those who belong to him.62 To say it another way, the seer’s act of measuring the temple lays out the borders of the community of those who are truly faithful within John’s assemblies.63 Outside the temple lay the city, labeled by John “the holy city.” John’s reference to the “holy city,” as we have already seen, obviously points to Jerusalem. But, according to the narrative in 11:1–2, that “holy city” is to be overrun, “trampled” by “the nations / gentiles” (τὰ ἔθνη). Here, τὰ ἔθνη clearly represents “the other,” those who represent the enemies of God and “the saints.”64 Presumably, when τὰ ἔθνη enter and trample the “holy city,” it becomes part of the realm of the ungodly. This juxtaposition of the temple filled with the faithful and surrounded by the city overrun by the nations / gentiles presents the readers with the kind of dualistic scenario that typifies apocalyptic discourse.65 Blurring the dualistic division between the holy temple and the city, however, is the temple’s outer court (τὴν αὐλὴν τὴν ἔξωθεν). It is at one and the same time both part of the temple and not part of it. On the one hand – assuming that by the outer courtyard John means the Court of the Gentiles – it could be viewed as 58  See, for example, Charles, Revelation,  275; Lohmeyer, Offenbarung,  89; Kraft, Offenbarung, 152; Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 269; Aune, Revelation, 2:597. 59 Cf. Resseguie, Revelation, 160. 60 A number of scholars, beginning with Julius Wellhausen (Analyse, 15) have argued that behind this story lay an oracle, likely of Zealot origin, that told of the inviolability of the temple and that circulated during the Jewish revolt. See also Bousset, Offenbarung, 324–30; Charles, Revelation, 1:270–73. 61   E. g., Charles, Revelation, 276–77; Lohse, Offenbarung, 64; Caird, Revelation, 132; Sweet, Revelation, 182–84; Boring, Revelation, 143; Bauckham, Climax of Prophecy, 272; Aune, Revelation, 1:596–98. It is worth noting that elsewhere in Revelation, John also connects “the saints” with the temple. In 3:12, for example, he promises that the faithful members of the Philadelphian community that they will be made “a pillar in the temple of my God.” Likewise the “new Jerusalem” portrayed in chapters 21 and 22 represents not only a place but also a people, specifically, the community of the saints. On this idea, see in particular, Robert H. Gundry, “The New Jerusalem: People as Place, Not Place as People,” NovT 29 (1987): 254–64. 62  Cf. Boring, Revelation, 143. 63  I am indebted to Katherine Z. Keller for her help with this section. 64 John’s reference to the “trampling” of the holy city (πατήσουσιν) calls to mind Luke 21:24 where Jesus predicts, “Jerusalem will be trampled (πατουμένη) by the gentiles, until the times of the gentiles are fulfilled.” John, of course, is not dependant on Luke but rather both Rev 11:2 and Luke 21:24 are likely dependant on Zech 12:3 (lxx), where the prophet predicts that Jerusalem will be made as “a stone trampled (καταπατοῦμενον) by all the gentiles.” 65 Cf. Zech 14:1–21.

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standing apart from the temple. Anyone (non-Jews included) would have access to it. But, on the other hand, the outer court was also set apart from the rest of the city; it stood as a part of the temple complex. If the temple itself represents the faithful, then it would make sense to understand the other spaces mentioned in this scene (i. e., the outer courtyard and the city itself) as standing for other populations. But what would the overrun “holy city” represent? What about the overrun courtyard? Given our understanding of the situation faced by John in his communities, we can tie the holy city and the outer court of the temple to the various populations in John’s communities. The overrun city in this part of the narrative would therefore represent the accommodationists: Jezebel and her “children” in Thyatira, those “who hold to the teaching of Balaam” in Pergamum, and comparable assimilationists in the other divided cities. However, it is important to note that, despite the assimilationist tendencies of people like “Jezebel,” John’s opponents are still identified with the holy city because they remain within the assembly of believers. They are not themselves identified with the unholy nations / gentiles; rather they are overcome by them. On the other hand, the outer courtyard – the liminal space that is both part of the temple and part of the city – represents those who stand in between John and accommodationists like “Jezebel.” In the case of the assembly at Thyatira, the outer courtyard would represent “those who commit adultery with [‘Jezebel’]” (i. e., that group that we earlier labeled the invisible majority). The part of the vision focused on the witnesses (11:3–13) also has to do with various elements within John’s community. The two witnesses, for example, represent John and the faithful (i. e., the communities in Smyrna and Philadelphia as well as those in the other communities who have rejected the assimilationists like “Jezebel”). As such, they rightly anticipate persecution, death, and humiliation.66 In the end, however, as the vision will show, they will be vindicated by the deity. The fact that these characters prophesy calls to mind John’s role as one previously commissioned by the mighty angel for that activity (10:8–10). While the witnesses represent John and the faithful, both the city of Jerusalem and its inhabitants in this part of the interlude point to another population. Jerusalem in this portion of the interlude is no longer depicted as the holy city as it was earlier (11:2) because it has been trampled by the nations / gentiles (i. e., the enemies of the deity).67 Rather, it is now labeled “Sodom” and “Egypt.” 66  The term μάρτυς is obviously a significant term for John. Besides here, we also see it in 1:5; 2:13; 3:14; and 17:6. 67 Obviously, Jerusalem still functions as a positive symbol for John. Indeed, his treatment of Jerusalem here is, in many ways, characteristic of how other “insiders” (like Isaiah) had characterized that city. First, the idea that Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem and the two witnesses were killed there can easily be understood to reflect the Jewish notion that true prophets were killed in Jerusalem. Such prophets, according to tradition, include Isaiah, Uriah, and Zechariah the

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As such, it represents the accommodationists in the Asian assemblies, those like “Jezebel” and her followers (i. e., her “children”). But it also includes those who have not totally rejected “Jezebel” and her kind, the “invisible majority” (i. e., those who had committed adultery with “Jezebel” in Thyatira, represented by the outer court of the temple in 11:2). The city likewise represents the “fence-sitters” in the assemblies of the other divided cities and probably the majority of the assembly at Laodicea, the community described as neither cold nor hot (3:15). Despite the negative labels that John attaches to Jerusalem, he nevertheless considers the city, or at least a portion of it, ultimately redeemable. This will become clear at the end of the vision (11:13). John’s hope that some will ultimately be saved explains why he gives the inhabitants of Jerusalem (i. e., the non-faithful part of the ἐκκλησία) a positive label (“those from among the peoples and tribes and languages and nations”) and distinguishes them from “the inhabitants of the earth,” the outsiders (i. e., the nations / gentiles mentioned in 11:2) who are not members of the ἐκκλησία. While John anticipates that some in the ἐκκλησία will be saved, he also expects that others, like his assimilationist rival “Jezebel” and her “children,” will be destroyed by the deity’s wrath.68 Indeed, we witness their symbolic destruction in the earthquake that follows (Rev 11:13).69 This unredeemable group (cf. 2:21, 23) makes up the tenth of the city that is destroyed (i. e., the 7,000 killed in the earthquake). Presumably, it is the invisible majority – people like those in Thyatira who merely tolerate both “Jezebel” and John – who comprise the remainder of the Jerusalemites, the 63,000 who will repent and “give glory to the God of heaven.” As a result of their repentance, John’s communities will be restored to their purity. Jerusalem-as-Sodom will be no more. Rather, like that city described in Isaiah 1, it will be purified of its dross and will become a “city of righteousness.” The restored Jerusalem that appears in Rev 11:13, where “those from among the peoples and tribes and languages and nations” have repented, foreshadows (and to some extent, equals) the heavenly Jerusalem that will appear at the conclusion of the Book (Revelation 21–22).

XIII. Concluding Remarks The interlude of Rev 10:1–11:13 presents the reader with significant problems of interpretation. The difficulties result from our normal strategy of reading the son of Jehoiada. Josephus mentions some unnamed prophets killed there (A. J. 10.38). For these and other references in ancient literature, see Aune, Revelation, 2:620–21. 68 Cf. the threat in Rev 2:23. 69 Note the lethal fates that are expected for Jezebel and her “children.” Her children will be killed and Jezebel will waste away in a lingering death. For “Jezebel’s” fate as a lethal one, see Duff, Who Rides, 146, n. 32.

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interlude as one episode that is related temporally and causally to the larger narrative of the book. However, if we approach the narrative of the interlude as a story within a story, that is to say as a text that is not necessarily related causally or temporally to the narrative into which it is embedded, many of the interpretive problems disappear. Instead, the interlude appears as a story that runs parallel to the larger narrative of the book. Each narrative begins with the seer’s commissioning and each ends with a restored Jerusalem. Although the narrative of the interlude need not be seen as temporally dependant on the larger narrative of the book, nevertheless the two narratives clearly overlap in one place. The interlude is embedded between the sixth and seventh trumpet blast of the Apocalypse’s larger narrative and, within the interlude itself, the mighty angel claims that, “in the days when the seventh angel is to blow his trumpet, the mystery of God will be fulfilled, as he announced to his servants the prophets.” In other words, both narratives place the community at the same time vis-à-vis the end. But from that same point, each stretches back to a different commissioning scene and each reaches forward to a related but somewhat different end. Each narrative also contains a somewhat different focus. On the one hand, the beginning of the interlude strongly emphasizes the seer’s commission as a prophet while the beginning of the larger narrative of the Apocalypse focuses on the messages to the churches and John’s vision of the heavenly throne room. On the other hand, while the opening of the seals and the trumpet blasts of the larger narrative of the Apocalypse emphasize the horrors that await the earth and the unbelievers on it, the latter part of the interlude focuses on what will be experienced by those within the Asian assemblies. Over against the horrors depicted in the larger narrative, the interlude offers a message of hope and a chance for redemption for those in the Asian ἐκκλησίαι. Those in communities who have not yet chosen sides are implicitly challenged to do so now for, as the mighty angel has announced, “time has run out” (χρόνος οὐκέτι ἔσται).

Orthodoxy, Heresy, and Jewish Christianity Reflections on Categories in Edwin Broadhead’s Jewish Ways of Following Jesus Matt Jackson-McCabe I. Nearly fifty years ago, Hans Dieter Betz offered “Some critical remarks on Georg Strecker’s republication of Walter Bauer’s Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum.”1 Strecker’s most notable contribution to his re-issue of Bauer’s classic was an extensive appendix “On the Problem of Jewish Christianity.”2 This appendix was meant to fill a lacuna in Bauer’s pioneering study that was, in retrospect, not a little surprising. For it was precisely here, as Strecker put it, that “the generalization drawn by the ecclesiastically approved view of history” regarding the historical primacy of orthodoxy – that is, the apologetic historiographical paradigm at which Bauer’s study had taken aim – “would be most clearly open to refutation”: Jewish Christianity … stands at the beginning of the development of church history, so that it is not the gentile Christian ‘ecclesiastical doctrine’ that represents what is primary, but rather a Jewish Christian theology. This fact was forgotten quite early in the heresiological tradition  … [Jewish Christians] were deprecated as an insignificant minority by comparison with the ‘great church’. Thus implicitly the idea of apostasy from the ecclesiastical doctrine was also applied to them.3 1  Hans Dieter Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy in Primitive Christianity: Some critical remarks on Georg Strecker’s republication of Walter Bauer’s Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum,” Int 19 (1965): 299–311. 2  Walter Bauer and Georg Strecker, Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum (BHT 10; Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1964), 245–87; cf. Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 300–302. An English edition of the book, edited by Robert A. Kraft and Gerhard Krodel, appeared in 1971 under the title Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress). This edition included a substantial revision, by Kraft, of Strecker’s second appendix on the book’s critical reception, now including among other things the reception of Strecker’s edition, and not least by Betz; see Orthodoxy and Heresy, 308–9. Here and elsewhere I cite the Sigler Press Reprint Edition [1996] of the English translation. 3 Strecker-Bauer, Orthodoxy, 241–42.

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Noting that modern historical treatments of groups like the Ebionites “have for the most part followed the older pattern of ecclesiastical historiography without contradiction,” Strecker set out to bolster – and in some respects, to correct – Bauer’s thesis where such groups were concerned. While fundamentally appreciative of both Bauer’s thesis and Strecker’s corrective, Betz wished to push still further. Bauer, he said, “did not apply his thesis extensively enough to the New Testament,” particularly where Paul and his opponents in Galatians and elsewhere were concerned.4 Nor did Strecker himself yet “make clear enough that we have to reformulate Bauer’s thesis, especially in the case of the question of ‘orthodoxy and heresy’ in the New Testament itself.”5 “Bauer’s problem,” Betz pointed out, is ultimately “identical with the problem of the origin of early Christian theology” itself.6 What is more, the fact that “quite diverse forms of early Christianity” are evident “from the very beginning” in Paul’s letters, “none of which is per se orthodox or heretical,” requires us to rethink our most fundamental interpretive categories and the historical assumptions about origins that attend them. ‘Orthodoxy’ in these terms is simply the final stage of a syncretistic process which after adaptations, influences, modifications, and the like, comes to a kind of ‘establishment’. In the case of gnosticism, for example, we should not expect any kind of ‘pure’ gnosticism at the beginning. Rather, we should expect a new syncretistic phenomenon at the beginning which might show some peculiar characteristics. Only after this phenomenon has gone through a process does it lead to what might be called ‘orthodox’ gnosticism. This is equally true for terms like ‘Judaism’, ‘apocalypticism’, and so forth.7

“The Christian faith,” Betz concludes in a memorable line, “did not exist in the beginning. In the beginning there existed merely the ‘heretical’ Jew, Jesus of Nazareth.”8 In hindsight, one can see within these perceptive comments the seeds of much that was to come over the course of Betz’s academic career. One recurring theme within his remarkably wide-ranging publications was precisely this matter of “Jewish Christianity” in the New Testament. His now-classic commentary on Galatians was written with a quite explicit concern to clarify “the theology of

4  Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 306, and further 306–8 for Betz’s perceptive critique of Bauer’s treatment of Paul. 5 Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 303. 6  Ibid., here registering agreement with the move made by Rudolf Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament (2 vols.; trans. K. Grobel; New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1955), 2:127–42. 7 Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 310. 8 Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 311. It is not entirely clear whether Betz intends an allusion to the statement by Bultmann cited at the outset of the essay: “In the beginning, faith is the term which distinguishes the Christian congregation from Jews and the heathen, not orthodoxy” (Theology of the New Testament, 2:135; cf. Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 300). The juxtaposition is in any event provocative.

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the anti-Pauline opposition” reflected within Paul’s letter.9 Critical awareness of the challenges of doing so on the basis of the less-than-sympathetic witness of Paul led to the identification of other New Testament texts that might give more direct access to the type of thinking they exemplified: first in an essay on 2 Cor 6:14–7:1,10 and ultimately in his monumental commentary on the Sermon on the Mount and Sermon on the Plain.11 The issue of orthodoxy and heresy in the New Testament was revisited in light of this ongoing research in 1985 for the Theologische Realenzyklopädie and again in 1992 for the Anchor Bible Dictionary.12 The broader problem of the implications of Bauer’s thesis, so reformulated, for conceptualizing the nature and origins of Christianity itself was revisited13 – and re-stated with particular sharpness – in a 1991 article re-examining yet another classic study: “Wellhausen’s Dictum ‘Jesus was not a Christian, but a Jew’ in Light of Present Scholarship.”14 While once again fundamentally appreciative of Wellhausen’s basic point,15 Betz nonetheless offered a characteristically perceptive critique regarding new and still unresolved historical issues created by Wellhausen’s re-classification of Jesus as a Jew. In the first place there was the “[s]trange, and to some extent inconsistent” claim by Wellhausen that Jesus was nonetheless “more than Jewish”; that (to quote Wellhausen) “what is un-Jewish in him, what is human, is more characteristic than what is Jewish.”16 Particularly when coupled with “Wellhausen’s failure to take Jewish Christianity into account,” the result was a Jesus who appears strangely isolated from his historical context: “Detached from Judaism as well as from Christianity, Jesus appears to have existed in a world all of his own.”17 What is more, Betz notes, the general problem of the meaning  9  Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979), xvi. When Betz points out that “[t]here is no real reason to believe that these anti-Paulinists were morally dishonest or theologically deficient” (Galatians, 7), one perhaps hears echoes of Bauer; compare, e. g., Orthodoxy and Heresy, xxiii–xxiv. 10 “2 Cor 6:14–7:1: An Anti-Pauline Fragment?” JBL 92 (1973): 88–108. 11 The Sermon on the Mount: A Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, Including the Sermon on the Plain (Matthew 5:3–7:27 and Luke 6:20–49) (ed. Adela Yarbro Collins; Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995). 12 “Häresie, I. Im Neuen Testament,” TRE 14:313–18; “Heresy and Orthodoxy in the NT,” ABD 3:144–47. 13 In “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” Betz frames the problem both in historical terms of origins (300 [quoted above]) and in theological terms of “what the essence of the Christian faith is,” arguing that the two are inextricably linked (311). 14 “Wellhausen’s Dictum ‘Jesus was not a Christian, but a Jew’ in Light of Present Scholarship,” ST 45 (1991): 83–110. 15 Betz, “Wellhausen’s Dictum,” 98: “In the present situation of New Testament scholarship concerning the historical Jesus, Wellhausen’s famous dictum still stands: Indeed, Jesus was not a Christian, but a Jew.” 16 Betz, “Wellhausen’s Dictum,” 86–87, quoting the first edition of Julius Wellhausen, Einleitung in die drei ersten Evangelien (Berlin: Georg Reimer, 1905), 114. 17 Ibid., 103, n. 8. Nor, Betz notes, did this problem end with Wellhausen: “In the following decades, the publication of books on Jesus as one who was not fully part of either Judaism or

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and use of the term “Christianity” raised by Wellhausen has implications that go beyond simply the historical Jesus: “Since the Sermon on the Mount does not contain any Christian christology but remains within Judaism, the question of how the Sermon on the Mount can be understood as Christian is the same as that of the historical Jesus.”18 Common to the work of Bauer and Wellhausen was a critical consideration of the interpretive, historical work done by the seemingly simple act of naming. Betz’s appreciative and yet critical reviews of these classic works were intended to push the discussion forward by highlighting the broader and “still unresolved” problems they created for conceptualizing Christian origins.19 After Bauer and Wellhausen, how does one chart in properly historical terms the evolution that led from “the ‘heretical’ Jew, Jesus of Nazareth” to (among other things) Christianity? In honor of my former teacher, in what follows I will take a slightly different tack toward the same goal. Rather than revisiting a classic study, I will focus on an important new one. Edwin Broadhead’s Jewish Ways of Following Jesus: Redrawing the Religious Map of Antiquity represents the most recent and most extensive monograph attempting to engage seriously and systematically with the series of interrelated issues highlighted by Betz in the wake of Bauer and Wellhausen.20 If Betz’s re-examination of their classic studies in the 1960s and early 1990s, respectively, served to identify continuing problems of subsequent scholarship, consideration of this recent study should help us to see where the issues stand now, decades further on.

II. Jewish Ways of Following Jesus begins not in first-century Galilee or Jerusalem, but in 21st century Melbourne, Australia, at a monument commemorating the continent’s earliest British settlers. These settlers, we are told, justified their occupation by means of a legal fiction: they decreed that there were no prior claims on the land despite tens of thousands of years of aboriginal presence. It was not until the 1990s, Broadhead tells us in his Epilogue, that at “the simple request Christianity became a tradition in itself ” – a tradition whose resultant emphasis on a “unique” Jesus, Betz observes, “looks suspiciously similar to the position Jesus Christ occupies in dogmatic christology” (ibid., 99); cf. 103, n. 8: “This picture cannot claim historical veracity, but it does, paradoxically, reflect some sort of secular christology.” On the premise of “uniqueness” see further ibid., 100–101. 18 Ibid., 96; cf. 101. 19 This purpose is stated explicitly in Betz, “Wellhausen’s Dictum,” 83, and applies equally well to the article on Bauer-Strecker. 20 Edwin Broadhead, Jewish Ways of Following Jesus: Redrawing the Religious Map of Antiquity (WUNT 266; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010).

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of one individual,” this ruling was reversed, and a note added to the monument acknowledging this historical revision.21 Broadhead conceives of his project in Jewish Ways of Following Jesus very much in terms of the story of this monument, and on several levels. First and most provocative is the juxtaposition of Jewish and Christian historiography to British colonial strategy. In much the same way as the British settlers, Broadhead says, the orthodox Christians and rabbis of late antiquity “imposed their dominance upon the religious map of their own time” by means of “[a]n ideological form of terra nullius.”22 In a manner recalling Bauer, he points out that these orthodox, like other historically triumphant groups, constructed “grand narratives” that asserted their own “primal status” by either entirely “read[ing] their victims out of existence” or “incorporat[ing] them into the identity and history of the victor[s]” themselves.23 A further implied comparison results at least in part from this rhetorical strategy, namely, the limitations of what can now be said about the dominated and displaced themselves. If, according to Broadhead, the extant evidence for the indigenous Australians is such that “their origin, identity, and history cannot be precisely described,” campfire remains and middens testify at least to the fact of their existence.24 His understanding of the prospects for recovering what he will call “Jewish Christianity” is not altogether different. Here too the remains of such groups amount to little more than “historical markers”: hostile reports from adversaries and other “echoes, after-effects, implications, and unexplained gaps” in the evidence. Thus “[t]he self-concept of Jewish Christianity is not available in any unmediated way to modern scholarship, and there is little prospect for a comprehensive synthesis of the evidence that survives.”25 In the end, then, Broadhead’s book is meant to serve essentially as the equivalent of the addendum made to the Melbourne settlers’ monument. “Our task here,” he writes, “is to add a critical note to the monuments that define both Christianity and Judaism – to acknowledge that the ancient landscape included the story of Jewish followers of Jesus.26 In its role as memorial acknowledgment, the project’s basic goal seems at first glance to be quite modest insofar as it seeks simply to demonstrate the existence of such groups: This study seeks to isolate and to collect these historical markers. At a minimum, such historical data can lay to rest any assertion that Jewish Christianity did not exist or that it

21 Ibid.,

393. ix. 23 Compare Jewish Ways, 9 and 47. 24 Ibid., ix. 25 Ibid., 2. 26 Ibid., ix. 22 Ibid.,

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did not matter … While it should be clear that Jewish Christianity existed, the attempt to describe fully how it existed is an ongoing challenge.27

Given, however, that no one – not even the early heresiologists – actually denied that such groups existed, the more critical point would seem to be overturning any notion that they “did not matter.” As he puts it elsewhere: This investigation pursues the hypothesis that groups in antiquity who were characterized by Jewish ways of following Jesus may be vastly under-represented, misrepresented, and undervalued in the ancient sources and in modern scholarship.28

Beneath this seemingly simple premise, in fact, is a highly ambitious intention to effect a major paradigm shift in the study of antiquity: If historical markers for the continuing vitality of Jewish Christianity can be isolated, then a different religious and social map of the first four centuries is required, and a different understanding of the development of primitive Christianity and rabbinic Judaism must emerge.29

Specifically, Broadhead intends to disrupt traditional assumptions  – Jewish, Christian, and scholarly – regarding “an early and decisive parting of the ways between Judaism and Christianity” by calling attention to groups for whom Judaism and Christianity were not mutually exclusive alternatives.30 In a sense, then, the basic goal of Broadhead’s book is not altogether different from that of Strecker’s appendix to Bauer: to subvert the ideological historiographies of antiquity’s “orthodox” winners by drawing attention to “Jewish Christianity.” More specifically, Broadhead’s resultant “memorial” will insist  – contrary to the traditional narratives – that Jewish Christianity (in some sense) “mattered”; that it should (in some sense) be “valued.”31 To this end, and beyond Strecker, it will present a systematic and comprehensive collection of evidence intending to demonstrate the ongoing existence and vitality of Jewish Christianity throughout antiquity, with special attention to its significance for the so-called “parting of the ways” between Judaism and Christianity. The book is structured accordingly. After an initial section addressing past scholarship (ch. 1) and the methodological issues involved both in defining “Jewish Christianity” (ch. 2) and in historical reconstruction (ch. 3), the great bulk of the study (chs. 4–15) proceeds to its central task of identifying “historical markers.” The data is divided into three categories. “Points of Origin,” which is to say 27 Ibid.,

2–3. 28. 29 Ibid., ix–x. 30 Cf. Jewish Ways, x and 2. The shift from “the grand narratives” of late antique orthodox Christians and rabbis on p. ix to “scholarly presumptions” on p. x is apparently to be understood in light of the enduring influence of these ideological historiographies on critical scholarship; see further Jewish Ways, 353–74. 31 Compare the quotations from Jewish Ways, 2–3 and 28 cited in the previous paragraph. 28 Ibid.,

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the Jewish character of Jesus, the earliest communities of his followers, and the earliest Christian literature are examined in Part Two; “Patristic Representations” in Part Three; and a hodge-podge of “Other Evidence” – namely “Texts Ascribed to Jewish Christians” (ch. 12), “Rabbinic Evidence” (ch. 13), and “Archeological Evidence” (ch. 14)  – in Part Four. The final section presents a brief review of scholarship on the so-called “parting of the ways,” and a still briefer critique of the whole model in light of the “historical markers” that have been assembled (ch. 15). A final chapter presents a general review of the book’s basic findings (ch. 16). The many details of this impressively wide-ranging study obviously cannot all be examined here.32 My present concern at any rate is limited to its broader implications for the problems highlighted by Betz regarding the conceptualization of Jesus and his early followers in relation to Judaism on one hand and Christianity on the other – or, as Broadhead’s subtitle puts it, for “Redrawing the Religious Map of Antiquity” now that the traditional orthodox picture has been rendered problematic. To this end I will focus particularly on the key category around which Broadhead’s new map is being drawn: “Jewish Christianity.” While long central to the critical reconstruction of early Christianity, this category has itself become increasingly subject to critical consideration in recent years.33 To what extent does appeal to it actually move us to a clearer understanding of the historical processes attending the development from Jesus the Jew to a Christianity distinct from Judaism?

III. It should be noted at the outset that this question of categories is more my own concern than Broadhead’s, at least where the particular term “Jewish Christianity” is concerned. While his study includes the requisite chapter on the classic problem of defining that category,34 he is quite clear that he considers the issue to be, if not exactly beside the point, only of secondary interest. Wary of “a type of scholarly paralysis” that he perceives to occur when the question of definition 32 It would be fruitful to compare Broadhead’s detailed results to those of Oskar Skarsaune and Reidar Hvalvik, ed., Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early Centuries (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2007), which follows a broadly similar outline. The character of the latter as an edited collection, however, significantly complicates such comparisons. 33 See Matt Jackson-McCabe, “What’s in a Name? The Problem of ‘Jewish Christianity,’ ” in Jewish Christianity Reconsidered: Rethinking Ancient Groups and Texts (ed. idem; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 7–37, esp. 27–37; James Carleton Paget, “The Definition of the Terms Jewish Christian and Jewish Christianity in the History of Research,” in Skarsaune and Hvalvik, Jewish Believers in Jesus, 22–52; a revised version of which is found in idem, Jews, Christians and Jewish Christians in Antiquity (WUNT 251; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 289–324; Daniel Boyarin, “Rethinking Jewish Christianity: An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category (to which is Appended a Correction of my Border Lines),” JQR 99 (2009): 7–36. 34 Jewish Ways, 28–58.

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takes “priority over the task of recovering and reconstructing evidence,” Broadhead in any event cites the inherent limitations of “labels” to “accurately define or describe … groups.”35 He thus makes it clear from the start that “critical collection, reconstruction, and analysis of the ancient evidence” “will take priority over the continuing debate about what to call such groups.”36 I find this stance puzzling, particularly within a work that is fundamentally concerned with “redrawing maps.” Implicit in the entire project is an acknowledgement that there is a crucial distinction to be made between historical data and historical reconstruction; that “map,” as J. Z. Smith has put it in another context, “is not territory.”37 I take it that “maps” in this sense are nothing other than the analytical constructs an interpreter creates to organize and re-present the data of the “landscape.” They represent, in other words, little more than labels and definitions, however inherently limited. Far from a potential distraction from the task of “collection, reconstruction, and analysis,” then, issues of naming and defining lie at the very heart of it. More puzzling still are indications that the central category around which this new map would be drawn was chosen largely in deference to scholarly tradition – the very tradition, that is, that Broadhead otherwise intends to subvert. “While other descriptions have been suggested in recent scholarship,” he says, “I have retained the label Jewish Christianity in an effort to sustain clarity and to retain continuity with some three centuries of critical scholarship.”38 The crucial question, of course, is whether using the analytical constructs generated by ideological interpreters past is actually compatible with achieving historical clarity. Both the relative indifference to the question of categories and the concern for continuity with past scholarship sit rather uneasily with Broadhead’s own methodological remarks in the key chapter on definition, where the formulation of categories is understood to be the end of the interpretive process: The final task [after recovering and describing the evidence] is to name that which has been described. The process is, of course, a circular one: scholars must know what it is they are looking for, but only the evidence itself can define the phenomenon … A defining description of Jewish Christianity should be the product of such explorations, but such descriptions are also subject to further revision. The naming of the phenomenon can be seen as the final, though perhaps not the most important, consequence of such inquiry.39

The process envisioned here seems not altogether different from what Smith, identifying the pay-off of comparative study, calls “redescription and rectifica Ibid., 28; cf. 1. 1. 37 See the title essay in Jonathan Z. Smith, Map is Not Territory (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1978), 289–309. 38 Jewish Ways, 1; cf. 28: “the label Jewish Christianity will be retained here, despite its limitations, in an effort to engage both the ancient evidence and the modern history of research.” 39 Jewish Ways, 55. 35

36 Ibid.,

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tion”: the critical analysis of data in light of one’s categories, and the critical analysis of one’s categories in light of data.40 Broadhead’s own treatment of the category “heresy” is quite instructive in this respect. There is perhaps no other category with a longer, richer history of use for classifying the groups that he is concerned to memorialize than this one. And yet here Broadhead opts quite deliberately for discontinuity with the history of interpretation as a result of his findings. Indeed, the prologue indicates that he considers the rejection of this particular act of naming to be among the central consequence of his study: As far as it is possible, this study seeks to clarify historical markers for the presence of Jewish Christianity in various places, in different times, and in diverse modes. The presence of such markers would challenge a variety of scholarly presumptions … [including the idea] that surviving groups of Jewish Christians are to be understood, with various Church Fathers, as heretics.41

Traditional or not, the category “heresy” is jettisoned in the interest of historical clarity. I cannot seem to find any clear explanation as to how exactly his findings will challenge the use of this category. I take it, though, that it has something to do with the use to which the term is put within what Broadhead aptly describes as the patristic “rhetoric of dismissal.” For the orthodox Fathers, classifying something as “heresy” meant marking it as a secondary, merely human deviation from the sacred original they claimed to represent uniquely themselves.42 In Broadhead’s interesting comparison, it was “[a]n ideological form of terra nullius” and thus an integral part of “the process of achieving dominance.”43 The continued use of such a label would thus seem to run counter to the stated purpose of Broadhead’s project: not simply a reminder that such groups existed, but an insistence that they “mattered.” Building a memorial to a “heresy” would scarcely achieve the desired effect, no matter how early and widespread it could be shown to have been. To name, in this instance, is itself to map. Replacing the traditional label with one signaling a different interpretation, then, will be no less crucial to Broadhead’s cartographical strategy than it was to that of the orthodox Fathers. If this issue of the category “heresy” serves to underscore my point regarding the significance of naming as interpretive act, it also highlights the fact that 40  Jonathan Z. Smith, “The ‘End’ of Comparison: Redescription and Rectification,” in A Magic Still Dwells: Comparative Religion in the Postmodern Age (ed. K. C. Patton and B. C. Ray; Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 237–41. 41  See Jewish Ways ix–x. The other scholarly presumptions challenged are less taxonomic than historical, namely: “that there was an early and decisive parting of the ways between Judaism and Christianity”; and “that Jewish Christianity quickly subsided in the face of an emerging orthodoxy of Gentile Christianity.” 42 Ibid., 243; thus the Fathers’ tendency, noted by Broadhead, to associate heresies with particular named figures. 43 Cf. Jewish Ways, ix.

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historians of religion need to be very conscious of the fact that some names were created to function within a very different game than the one we understand ourselves to be playing. In this connection I will confess that I do not see how a historical demonstration of the existence of a group – or even of the early and widespread existence of varieties of such a group – can, of itself, challenge in any way that group’s normative classification as “heresy.” After all, the heresiologists themselves did not deny the existence of such groups, even within the apostolic era.44 While the orthodoxy/heresy paradigm certainly implies a particular “map” of history, the land from which heretics are being evacuated is less a historical time and place than a mythic realm of authoritative origins. It is thus entirely unclear to me how any historical reconstruction, as such, can ever address this normative, theological issue. While I, too, find the category “heresy” to be problematic for historical reconstruction, it is precisely because its normative, theological force proceeds from assumptions that are incompatible with historical methodology. My objection thus stands in principle, regardless of any particular historical findings. The category “Jewish Christianity” was forged, even if at a much later time, in the same crucible that gave us “heresy.”45 Nearly three hundred years ago, John Toland presented his own pointed rejoinder to the orthodox Christian dismissal of groups like Ebionites and Nazarenes as mere heresy. The substance of his account differed little from that of his patristic sources, with one primary exception: what the Fathers called “heresy,” he called “original Christianity.” This act of naming, as the centerpiece of his strategy, was no less ideologically motivated for him than for his competitors. Indeed, it was intended precisely to turn the tables on them: not only did classifying such groups as “Christianity” authorize them as legitimate forms of religion, the modifier “Jewish” served to assert their “primal status” while marginalizing Trinitarian orthodoxy as a secondary, “gentile” development. The category “Jewish Christianity,” in short, was designed for use in the same competitive arena that gave us “heresy”: an ecclesiastical competition for the legitimizing authority that comes with the title “original Christianity.” While subsequent deployment of the term by the likes of Thomas Morgan, F. C. Baur and others have reversed its specific force, such reversals have themselves scarcely been innocent of this larger apologetic agenda.46 44 Cerinthus

is assumed to be a contemporary of the apostle John in a story told by Irenaeus (Haer. 3.3.4); cf. Eusebius’s claim (Hist. eccl. 3.27.1) that the Ebionites had their name bestowed upon them by the first Christians (οἱ πρῶτοι). 45 For what follows see Matt Jackson-McCabe “The Invention of Jewish Christianity in John Toland’s Nazarenus,” in The Rediscovery of Jewish Christianity: From Toland to Baur (ed. F. Stanley Jones; History of Biblical Studies 5; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 67–90. 46 On Morgan in particular, who very much anticipates Baur, see Matt Jackson-McCabe, “‘Jewish Christianity’ and ‘Christian Deism’ in Thomas Morgan’s The Moral Philosopher,” in Jones, The Rediscovery of Jewish Christianity, 105–22.

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The question I would anticipate at this point is this: Even granting that this has been the traditional usage of “Jewish Christianity,” why can’t historians of religion simply take it over and redefine it as a useful term for their own historical purposes? Of course we can. And we could do precisely the same for “heresy” as well, by making it very clear and explicit that we intend to use it merely as a handy, descriptive term for groups other than those that came to be considered “orthodox.” But we must also consider the fact that words do not function in a vacuum. Centuries of a pointedly different usage has arguably left the term “heresy” so laden with theological and historical assumptions as to make it more trouble than it is worth for historical reconstruction. The question, then, is whether the same obtains for the similarly loaded term “Jewish Christianity.” Does this analytical construct, like “heresy,” carry too much freight to be of use for historical analysis? Or unlike “heresy,” does it bring so much descriptive clarity to the data that we would do better to refine it than to replace it in our attempt to draw a more historically useful map of religious antiquity? If the term can serve apologetically, as with Toland, to assert the legitimacy and authenticity of groups previously dismissed as “heretical,” what work does it do for historians of religion?

IV. The question of the historical utility of the term “Jewish Christianity” finds special relevance in the context in which Broadhead places his own project: an increasing scholarly dissatisfaction with the traditional “parting of the ways” model.47 In a very constructive turn reminiscent of Betz’s comments on the category “orthodoxy,”48 Broadhead suggests that we reconceptualize this period of antiquity as a “forming of the ways” rather than a “parting” of them.49 I find this change of terminology very helpful. Where the latter image suggests some final separation of two already distinct “ways,” the former emphasizes the invention of the very “ways” themselves as part of ongoing processes of social differentiation and identity construction. By moving us away from tacit assumptions regarding “Judaism” and “Christianity” as stable, ontological givens toward a more prop47  The literature on this problem is multi-faceted and immense. For a helpful entrée into the recent discussion see the essays collected in Adam H. Becker and Annette Yoshiko Reed, eds., The Ways that Never Parted: Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007). 48  Betz, “Orthodoxy and Heresy,” 310 (quoted above). 49  E. g., Jewish Ways, 389–90: “The process of ebb and flow observed in the first four centuries of the common era is more accurately described as a forming of the ways … This process of the forming of the ways is more like a dialogue in which there is no terminal point … This religious and social transformation observed throughout the first four centuries of the common era is indicative of the process of social identification and social location: it is an ongoing part of the forming and reforming of the ways.”

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erly historical approach to them as ever-evolving social inventions of collective identity, this terminology encourages us to ask a set of questions that are far from obvious within the old model. Under what circumstances does interest in Jesus become implicated in the invention of new forms of group identity? How did the various groups who made this move conceive of themselves in relation to other cultural options? From whom, exactly, did a given group intend to differentiate itself? Under what circumstances do some begin to invent “Christianity” as a form of collective identity in order to differentiate themselves from Jews per se? Seen in this light, my basic question is this: Does “Jewish Christianity,” an analytical construct thoroughly embedded in the old paradigm, help us answer these questions? Or does it once again, by re-introducing a primordial “Christianity,” distract us from even asking them? Much would seem to depend on what exactly is meant by the term “Christian­ ity.”50 Like most scholars over the history of attempts to define “Jewish Christianity,” Broadhead’s primary concern in formulating his own definition is specifying what, exactly, “Jewish” signals in this context. He finds this to be a particularly complex problem, essentially because this is a contested term of identity as opposed to a simple historical given.51 While recognizing that Christianity is no less contested, he nonetheless considers its definition to be a much simpler matter.52 This state of affairs is reflected in his definition of “Jewish Christianity” as “persons and groups in antiquity whose historical profile suggests they both follow Jesus and maintain their Jewishness and that they do so as a continuation of God’s covenant with Israel.”53 The ambiguity of the key phrase “maintaining Jewishness” seems to reflect the fact that the “Jewish” in “Jewish Christianity” is precisely the claim to an identity that is itself not easily defined (at least historically). Notably, the term “Christianity” does not translate a similarly open-ended “maintaining Christian-ness,” but is identified with a particular form of behavior, namely “following Jesus.” How exactly is this form of behavior understood to relate to “Christianity” as identity claim? Are these in fact the same thing? Broadhead’s own subsequent analysis suggests that the matter is much more complex than this definition might seem on the face of it to suggest. We must 50 Cf.

Jackson-McCabe, “What’s in a Name,” 13–27. esp. Jewish Ways, 47–50. 52  E. g., Jewish Ways, 46: “The difficulties of defining Jewish Christianity are common to much of the religious landscape of antiquity. The more difficult side of this equation, however, is presented by the complexity of what it means to be Jewish”; cf. 50: “While the boundaries of Christianity have no ethnic component and are more definable, the boundaries of Jewishness and the process of maintaining Jewishness are more complex.” As the latter comment suggests, the difference is apparently the ethnic dimension of “Jew.” Why contested identities that don’t happen to include an ethnic component are any less messy on that account is not immediately obvious. 53 Jewish Ways, 1 and repeatedly (sometimes with slight variation) throughout the book; cf. esp. 56–57; also (among others) 80, 124, 128, 161, 250, 253, 353, 375. 51 See

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assume in the first place that “following Jesus” is meant in a figurative sense; Broadhead does not seem to want to class as “Christianity,” for example, the various crowds that, according to the gospels, literally “followed” Jesus during his lifetime (e. g., Matt 8:1; 19:2; 20:29; John 6:2; etc.). Elsewhere it becomes clear that Broadhead is indeed using “following Jesus” as a circumlocution for something much more specific, namely, participation in a particular form of discourse about him: to “find in Jesus the definitive connection to God.”54 But this still does not address the issue of identity. On the contrary, it only serves to highlight the problem, particularly if we are to find any continuity between Jesus and his earliest followers in this respect. Indeed, according to Broadhead’s reconstruction, the historical Jesus was already participating in just such a discourse about himself: Jesus understood himself as the distinct voice announcing the arrival of God’s Reign; one’s response to Jesus validated one’s standing before God … his message demands a response, and this response is final … Jesus believed his call and his teaching … now set the standard for holiness.”55

Strikingly, however, Broadhead – of course, writing post-Wellhausen – is nonetheless reluctant to classify the religion of Jesus himself in terms of “Christianity” in the interest of the historical clarity of his map: “The religious map of antiquity looks quite different when Jesus is separated out from Christianity and resituated as a historical figure wholly within the variegated framework of 1st century Judaism.”56 If one finds here yet another tacit recognition of the powerful interpretive work done by the simple act of naming, the fundamental questions are only raised more strongly. If the category “Christianity” is a positive hindrance for a historical understanding of Jesus despite the presence of such a discourse, why is it not the same for those “followers” who shared his beliefs? What is the critical yet unspoken difference between him and them that makes appeal to “Christianity” misleading in one case but positively illuminating in the other? How are we to understand the relationship between the articulation of a particular kind of discourse to the creation of a form of social identity called “Christianity”? Such questions are raised still more sharply as Broadhead himself subsequently expresses similar misgivings about whether even some who “follow Jesus” in his sense should be considered Christians: The earliest tradents of the Sayings Tradition [Q] are probably not Christians, and it may be misleading to even refer to them as Jewish Christians. They appear to be Jews who follow Jesus and, like him, expect the imminent restoration and revitalizaton of Israel. It is prob54 Jewish Ways, 53. This use of “following Jesus” as a circumlocution for a more restrictive form of allegiance to Jesus is reminiscent of the gospel literature itself, where “following” frequently becomes tantamount to (some particular manner of) discipleship; see, e. g., Mark 1:17–18, 20 and esp. 8:34–38 and 10:28–31. 55 Jewish Ways, 75. 56 Ibid., 79.

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ably only in its later stages or among its settled tradents, reflected in the Gospel of Matthew and in the Didache, that this community can be understood as Jewish Christians.57

The distinction effectively drawn here between “Christians”  – even “Jewish Christians” – and “Jews who follow Jesus” is quite surprising given the book’s emphatically repeated definition of Jewish Christianity.58 The implication is that some criterion other than “following Jesus” even in Broadhead’s more restrictive sense is required if the term Christianity is to be more than historically misleading. Judging from a footnote found earlier in the discussion, the criterion in mind here is simply a still more specific form of discourse, namely one that identifies Jesus particularly as “the Christ.”59 Why this apparently significant criterion was not included in the book’s general definition of Jewish Christianity is not clear.60 Even if this, rather than “following Jesus,” had been identified as the central criterion for defining “Christianity” from the outset, however, the broader problem would remain. It is still far from obvious how utilization of a (Jewish) messianic discourse relates to the invention of Christianity as a collective identity. The issue is glossed in the simple act of translating one term, “messianism” into another, “Christianity.” What is more, by invoking in this context a term that has been used for nearly two millennia precisely to differentiate followers of Jesus from Judaism, it seems inevitably to invite the very sort of misunderstanding that Broadhead is rightly concerned to dispel. In discussing the “transitory” nature of identities, he makes a point of emphasizing that just as they can be invented, so too can they become extinct. Among other things, this can happen when historically “[t]riumphant groups” either “read their victims out of existence or … incorporate them into the [victor’s own] identity and history.”61 If the early heresiologists employed the former strategy in their construction of a history that moved from primal orthodoxy to deviant heresy, in the end one can’t help but wonder whether this study, by making the term “Jewish Christianity” the centerpiece of its corrective memorial, has not itself unintentionally perpetuated the latter. “The religious map of antiquity” does indeed look “quite different when Jesus is separated out from Christianity.”62 How much more so if the same was to be done with those of  Ibid., 158.  See above, n. 53. 59 Cf. Jewish Ways 139, n. 37: “Technically speaking, it may not be correct to speak of these tradents [of the synoptic “Sayings Tradition”] as Jewish Christians, since Jesus is never described as the Christ in this material. They are, however, Jews who follow Jesus.” 60 Nor is it obvious how identifying someone as “Christ” – i. e., “messiah” – is to be understood in relation to finding him to be “the definitive connection to God.” Are these assumed to be somehow interrelated or entirely separate criteria? If R. Aqiba declared Bar Kokhba to be “messiah,” does that mean he found him to be “the definitive connection to God”? 61 Jewish Ways, 47. 62 Jewish Ways, 79. 57 58

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his followers who, as much as Jesus himself, apparently had no notion that they were anything other than Jews. Jewish Ways of Following Jesus gives us much to consider as we continue to try to reconceptualize the historical origins of Christianity in the wake of Bauer and Wellhausen. Its suggested replacement of the “parting of the ways” model of early Jewish-Christian relations with a “forming of the ways” is a potentially helpful reminder that Christianity itself, viewed historically rather than through its own apologetic rhetoric, is not a primordial given but a social creation. This welcome move invites new questions that might yet help us to better understand the complex social realities attending the historical developments that led from Jesus the Jew to Christianity. At the same time, fundamental problems surrounding the book’s own central category, “Jewish Christianity,” suggest that there is still much work to be done. The broad historical problems Betz recognized as major consequences of the work of Bauer and Wellhausen remain very much with us today.

Christians, Sabbateans, and the Dead Sea Sect A Comparative Case Study in Jewish Sectarian Logic Jeffrey A. Trumbower Studying the New Testament with Hans Dieter Betz at the University of Chicago was always an adventure in context and comparison. In addition to “Galatians” and “Matthew,” Betz himself taught courses like “Corpus Hermeticum” and “Greek Magical Papyri,” while his colleagues also did their best to ensure that students did not study their favored subjects in isolation, but always in profound conversation with the entire world of religious phenomena, past and present. This essay is written in that spirit, with deep appreciation for the education I received.1 One key to creating a productive model of comparative religion is to choose wisely the entities for comparison. Sometimes it is most instructive to choose religious phenomena from radically different times and places, juxtaposing traditions that few people would think of to study together. This is an especially effective technique if one’s principal aim is the exploration of our common humanity. Concepts like “myth,” “ritual,” or “sacred scripture” dominate such comparisons, helping the scholar to categorize and recognize patterns among widely disparate traditions. Another route, the one I will pursue in this essay, is to study different species of the same genus, borrowing a metaphor from biology. An example might be early Jainism and early Buddhism, since both contain different expressions of rebellion against dominant religious paradigms in India during the first millennium b.c.e. Comparing them can lead to a deeper understanding of the options taken and not taken in each one. Two objects of my comparison for this essay are Christianity and Sabbateanism in their earliest manifestations. Like Jainism and Buddhism, they are two species that comprise a genus, that genus being Jewish messianic movements that spawned durable new religions. Of all the Jewish messiahs over the centuries, only two, Jesus of Nazareth (ca. 4 b.c.e.– ca. 30 c.e.) and Sabbatai Tsvi (1626–1676), left a legacy of new religious communities that ultimately diverged 1 I am grateful to J. Albert Harrill (who also studied with Prof. Betz) for his insightful comments on the first draft of this essay.

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from their Jewish roots to form a new religion.2 Analyzing how that process unfolded in each case raises intriguing questions and provides insights that might not arise from studying just one in isolation. Another Jewish movement of a similar nature, namely the ancient Dead Sea sect, will be added to the mix to illuminate aspects of Jewish sectarian logic across time and space, even though this movement did not spawn a new religion and was not focused on a messiah who had arrived. The phenomenon of Sabbatai Tsvi (1626–1676) and his movement is widely known among scholars of religion and among Jews, particularly since the groundbreaking 20th century work by Gershom Scholem and his successors.3 Scholem himself recognized that early Sabbatean “‘tropological’ homilies, explaining the savior’s tragic mystery, bear a striking resemblance to those advanced by the early Christians.”4 While it is rare that scholars of early Christianity write about Sabbateans, the ground was prepared by W. D. Davies in a 1976 essay that began life as an address to the Society of Biblical Literature.5 The present essay may be seen as a supplement to that one, exploring facets that Davies did not cover. Each movement’s context was of course unique: the Roman Empire was not the Ottoman Empire or early modern Europe, the social and political situation of Jews in each context was starkly different, and Second-Temple Jewish options for religious expression were not the same as the Kabbalistic speculations and convictions that formed the foundations of Sabbatean theology. The nature of our sources is also different, much more extensive and varied in the case of the Sabbateans than the early Christians. While for Christianity in the first century we only have literature written by insiders of various stripes, surviving accounts about Sabbateans in their first decades encompass believers, skeptics, hostile critics, and neutral observers. In addition, the 17th-century messiah and his followers were certainly aware of many aspects of Jesus and his movement. Moshe Idel, differing from Scholem on this point, documents cases where Christian theological ideas about the nature of Jesus appear to have influenced what some Sabbateans (including the messiah himself) had to say about the nature of Sabbatai Tsvi.6  For a history of the continuing Sabbatean religion in the 19th and 20th centuries, see Marc David Baer, The Dönme: Jewish Converts, Muslim Revolutionaries, and Secular Turks (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010). In recent decades, belief in Menachem Schneerson as messiah has been yet another occasion for much creative interpretation and disagreement among Jews, this time within the Lubavitch movement, particularly after the Rebbe’s death in 1994. See Simon Dein, Lubavitcher Messianism: What Really Happens When Prophecy Fails? (London: Bloomsbury, 2012). Unlike Chrsitianity and Sabbateanism, this latest messianic movement has not (yet, anyway) spawned a new religion diverging from its Jewish roots. 3 Gershom Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah (trans. R. J. Zwi Werblowsky ; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973). 4 Scholem, Sabbatai, 856. 5 W. D. Davies, “From Schweitzer to Scholem: Reflections on Sabbatai Svi,” JBL 95 (1976): 529–58. 6 Moshe Idel, Messianic Mystics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 205–206. 2

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This is not to say that all Christology focused on Sabbatai Tsvi is based in Christology focused on Jesus; far from it. But the entanglement is such that it is impossible to speculate about what might have developed in Sabbateanism if there had been no Jesus-centered precedents. For this reason, this essay will not focus on Christological themes in either movement. Instead, it will examine how the Jews in each movement understood and re-interpreted their sacred tradition with respect to their scriptures and salvation history in light of God’s new activity in the world. In these realms, I think the evidence shows that while Christian ideas may have had some influence on the Sabbateans, the bulk of the phenomena cannot be attributed to that influence. I will endeavor to show that a particular type of Jewish sectarian logic took hold in both movements independently. This notion of a Jewish sectarian logic may be corroborated by developments in the Dead Sea sect where appropriate, since the Sabbateans certainly knew nothing about them, and their connections to the early Christians are unknown and tenuous at best. One last consideration before getting to specific examples: the title of this essay speaks of Jewish sectarian logic, but the meaning of the term “sect” in a Jewish context is not at all self-evident. Why should the early Christians, the Dead Sea community, and the Sabbateans be considered “sects,” while other Jewish groups, like the Pharisees or Sadducees or modern Reform Jews, should not? E. P. Sanders has formulated a useful distinction between “sect” and “party” that will serve well here. He adduces textual evidence to the effect that the Rabbis, heirs to the legacy of the Pharisees, did not consider themselves to be the ‘true Israel’ and everyone else to be outside the covenant.7 In Rabbinic thinking, the unlearned “am haaretz” (people of the land) were still part of Israel, just in need of instruction and correction. By contrast, the covenanters at Qumran did adopt an exclusionary attitude, seeing themselves and only themselves as the ‘true Israel,’ and therefore, they should be called a “sect.” The Pharisees were a party, analogous to a modern political party, but they were not a sect.8 Interestingly, Sanders does not go on here to categorize early Christians as either party or sect, but using Sanders’ own definition I would argue that the earliest Christians for whom we have evidence constituted a Jewish sect. They were certainly more open to the world (particularly the Gentile world) than the Qumran sectarians were, but in terms of their ideology, Paul and many other early Christians saw themselves as the ‘true’ Israel to the exclusion of the rest of their fellow Jews, at least in the present moment before the return of Jesus. Before Sabbatai Tsvi’s unexpected and shocking apostasy to Islam in the fall of 1666, it is not appropriate to use the term “sect” to describe Sabbateanism, because it was indeed a movement that encompassed the whole of Jewry, both in ideology and actual fact. But after the apostasy and subsequent 7 E. P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977). 8 Sanders, Paul, 267 and 425.

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disillusionment on the part of the majority, the believing remnant soon achieved sectarian status with an ideology to match. So to get at the concept of Jewish sectarian logic, I will start with the Damascus Covenant from Qumran, because certain interpretive elements appear there that will recur in both the Jesus-movement and the Sabbatean movement. One key goal of the Damascus Covenant is to show how throughout Israel’s history, the chosen people have been divided along the lines of righteous and wicked, with most of the people most of the time being wicked: And [the patriarchs’] sons in Egypt walked in the stubbornness of their hearts, conspiring against the commandments of God and each of them doing that which seemed right in his own eyes. … the first members of the Covenant sinned and were delivered up to the sword, because they forsook the Covenant of God and chose their own will … But with the remnant which held fast to the commandments of God he made His Covenant with Israel forever, revealing to them the hidden things in which all Israel had gone astray. (CD III 5–13)9

The author goes on to equate the righteous of the Exodus and later generations with the sectarian community of his own day via interpretation of Ezek 44:15: The Priests, the Levites, and the sons of Zadok who kept the charge of my sanctuary when the children of Israel strayed from me, they shall offer me fat and blood (Ezek 44:15). The Priests are the converts of Israel who departed from the land of Judah, and (the Levites are) those who joined them. The sons of Zadok are the elect of Israel, the men called by name who shall stand at the end of days … According to the Covenant which God made with the forefathers, forgiving their sins, so shall He forgive their sins also. (CD III 21– IV 10).10

Notice that the righteous were not sinless; they were wicked and needed to have their sins forgiven. This is true of the Qumran sectarians as well as the righteous among earlier generations. But once forgiven they form the true Israel, and only they have the true understanding of the nation’s sacred history and scriptures. Many early Christian texts manifest a similar attitude: prominent among them are Stephen’s speech in the Book of Acts, and the Epistle of Barnabas, albeit with different nuances of interpretation. Luke, through his character Stephen, aligns Jesus’ Jewish opponents with all sorts of wrongdoers from Israel’s history, prominent among them the generation that rejected Moses during the Golden Calf incident (Acts 7:39–41). He charges Stephen’s Jewish audience with being a “stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do. Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers” (Acts

 9 Translation by Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (London: Penguin Press, 2011), 131. 10 Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 131–32.

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7:51–52).11 Compare CD VII.17, which mentions “… the Books of the Prophets, whose sayings Israel despised.”12 Luke, of course, knows of many Jews who made the right decision (Peter, Stephen himself, the converted priests of Acts 6:7), and some who dramatically switched sides (Paul), but when looking at the sacred history, he finds clear antecedents for opposition to the new activity of God in the world, similar to the interpretation of the Damascus Covenant author. Barnabas makes a more totalizing assertion about the Exodus generation through the Golden Calf incident: “But they permanently lost [the covenant] in this way, when Moses had just received it … when they turned back to idols, they lost it” (Barn. 4:7–8).13 Barnabas repeats the charge of Jewish persecution and killing of the prophets (5:11). For Barnabas, righteous Jews were few and far between, certainly including the patriarchs, Moses, and the prophets (8:4 and 14:1–4), but not much beyond them. In these ways, both the Qumran sectarians and many early Christians understood Israel’s sacred history to have been one of struggle between the righteous and wicked, those for God and those against him, anticipating the struggle between believers and non-believers in the writers’ own time. Paul exhibits this sort of interpretation of the sacred history is in his allegory of Hagar, Sarah and their respective sons: “just as at that time the child who was born of the flesh persecuted the child who was born according to the Spirit, so it is also now” (Gal 4:29). Paul here acknowledges Jewish opposition to the Jesusmovement (he used to be part of it), and he sees it anticipated in Ishmael’s persecution of Isaac, a trope found not in the Hebrew scriptures, but attested in some later Jewish interpretation.14 But unlike Stephen’s speech and Barnabas, Paul does not use the Exodus / Wilderness generation in this way. In 1 Cor 10:1–13, the errors of that generation are recounted as errors that Christians should avoid, but Paul does not make an equation between those wicked Jews of the past and those who oppose Christians in his own day. Among 17th-century Sabbateans one also finds an attempt to locate the division between the sect and other Jews within the sacred history. Baruch of Arezzo (Italy) was an early biographer of Sabbetai Tsvi, composing his Memorial to the Children of Israel in Hebrew with numerous Italian words shortly after his messiah’s death. As David J. Halperin characterizes his work: As a window into the minds and hearts of the simple believers in Sabbetai Zevi in the years after his death – hungry for the straightforward redemption that was once promised them, respectful but unswayed by the theological subtleties and heretical paradoxes of 11 Biblical quotations in this essay, unless otherwise noted, are from the New Revised Standard Version. 12 Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 135. 13 Translation by Bart Ehrman, The Apostolic Fathers Volume II (LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), 23. 14 Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979), 250.

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Nathan of Gaza, ever disappointed yet dogged in their faith, Baruch’s composition has no equal.15

In his Memorial, Baruch quotes Nathan of Gaza connecting the Jews who oppose the Sabbateans with the “mixed rabble” of Exod 12:38. These people, who were part of the Exodus from Rameses to Succoth, are understood by Baruch to be false or pseudo-Jews, anticipating the messiah’s opponents: “For there can be no doubt that anyone who speaks out against him is possessor of a soul inherited from the ‘mixed rabble.’”16 As Halperin summarizes it: This ‘rabble,’ according to rabbinic tradition, accompanied the true Israelites out of Egypt and were responsible for their sins in the Wilderness, including the worship of the Golden Calf. According to the kabbalists, they are the originators of the souls of the ungodly Jews of the present time.17

Building on this rich interpretive legacy, Nathan and Baruch equates the “rabble” with those ungodly Jews who will not at least suspend judgment about the messiahship of Sabbatai Tsvi after his apostasy to Islam. They “have inherited an evil soul, plentifully imbued with the Serpent’s filth.”18 Similar to the Dead Sea Sect and various early Christians, but quite independent of them and based on a different passage of scripture, Baruch has found in the sacred history of his nation a place where the division between his own sect and other Jews is anticipated in the past. This impulse to locate the struggle between the new sect and other Jews within episodes from the sacred history appears to be a feature of Jewish sectarian logic. Another feature, closely related, is the reading of scripture in such a way that only the insiders can understand its true meaning, while other Jews cannot or will not see it. The Damascus Covenant has its share of this attitude: see, for example, CD VI.7 and VII.18, where the advent of the true “Interpreter of the Law” is foretold by scripture. But one finds its fullest expression in the surviving pesharim (commentaries) from Qumran on various biblical books. Quoting the most complete and famous of these, the Habakkuk Pesher: And God told Habakkuk to write down that which would happen to the final generation, but He did not make known to him when time would come to an end. And as for that which He said, That he who reads may read it speedily (Hab 2:2): interpreted this concerns the Teacher of Righteousness, to whom God made known all the mysteries of the words of His servants the Prophets (1QpHab VII.1–5).19

15 David J. Halperin, Sabbatai Zevi: Testimonies to a Fallen Messiah (Oxford and Portland, Or.: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2007), 23. 16 Halperin, Sabbatai, 64. 17 Halperin, Sabbatai, 64–65. 18 Halperin, Sabbatai, 65. 19 Vermes, Dead Sea Scrolls, 512.

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Only those who hearken to the Teacher of Righteousness (members of the sect) can understand the mysteries of the prophets, because God has revealed those mysteries to him in a special way. As we see throughout the pesharim, those mysteries have to do with the founding and subsequent history of the sect, justifying its existence, explaining why events in the life of the sect have unfolded in the way they have. No New Testament passage crystallizes this type of Jewish sectarian logic better than the Road to Emmaus episode in the Gospel of Luke. Even if the author of Luke / Acts was a Gentile, his account of the early history of the Jesus movement is shot through with argumentation that makes sense in the context of innerJewish debate on the validity of Jesus and the supposed new activity of God in the world. In a manner extraordinarily similar to the function of the Teacher of Righteousness in the Habakkuk pesher, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, [the risen Jesus] interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures” (Luke 24:27). The principal unexpected and shocking event to explain from the scriptures, as shown in Luke 24:20–21 and 24:26, was the suffering and crucifixion of Jesus. Such usage of the scriptures is so common in early Christian literature that it is not necessary to adduce additional examples in a volume dedicated to a renowned New Testament scholar prepared by his students. True to form, one finds this type of sectarian argumentation from scripture throughout the Sabbatean literature, both on the part of the believers and on the part of opponents who ridiculed their exegesis. According to the biography of Sabbatai Tsvi written after his death by his devoted follower Abraham Cuenque: It happened one day that Sabbatai Zevi returned from Egypt with his wife. As he entered Gaza, the prophet Nathan cried out with a loud voice: “This is the savior of Israel, the messiah of the God of Jacob! Apart from him, Israel has no redeemer whatever! Every prophecy of every prophet was spoken about him!”20

This proclamation supposedly occurred before the messiah himself was fully aware of his own messianic identity. But in the months and years to follow, finding hidden references in the scriptures to Sabbatai Tsvi, his mission and movement, became an important task among believers, particularly after his apostasy to Islam.21 “Sacred scriptures” for the Sabbateans could include the Zohar, and an eyewitness account of events in Adrianople in 1671 called The Najara Chronicle has the messiah himself quoting the Zohar to justify why apostasy to Islam is acceptable for him and some of his followers: “This may be compared to a king who rejoices at his wedding, and all the people rejoice with him. He sees one man in chains. He commands that man to be released, so all may be joyful” (Zohar ii.207b). “Here is my interpretation,” [Sabbatai] said. “You are like people enchained, for you sit in this place and you are fasting. Yet you shall go forth from these 20 Halperin, 21 Scholem,

Sabbatai, 164. Sabbatai, 802–803.

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chains, for anyone who wishes to put on the turban may do so. And anyone who does not so desire, I will send him forth in safety, just as he entered.”22

No less an authority than the Zohar may be interpreted to allow apostasy. It is no surprise that non-Sabbatean Jews criticized Sabbatean exegesis of the scriptures, in a manner reminiscent of the Jewish opponents of early Christian exegesis (see John 8:56–59, Acts 7:54, 1 Thess 2:16, Justin, Dial. 28.1, 32.1). Joseph Halevi, an anti-Sabbatean who wrote letters to his fellow critic Jacob Sasportas (a learned Hamburg rabbi) in 1667, shortly after the apostasy, says, “The third faction [of Sabbatean believers] finds sacred mysteries, too numerous to count, in the apostasy. It is part of the divine plan: he must enter among the ‘shells’ [Hal­ perin interprets these as ‘demonic powers’] in order to make himself their master, and he therefore wears them as his garment.”23 Throughout his letters Halevi contemptuously refers to believers as “idiots,” “simpletons,” “imbeciles” and the like.24 He feels he has been vindicated in his skepticism and his non-Sabbatean interpretation of scripture by the messiah’s clear outward failure. Isaiah 53, the “Suffering Servant” passage, played a vitally important role in explaining the messiah’s sufferings in both Christianity and Sabbateanism. It is quoted explicitly and applied to Jesus in Acts 8:26–40, and it figures prominently in the exegesis of Nathan of Gaza and Abraham Cardozo, two of the Sabbatean movement’s most important theologians. Scholem thought the use of Isaiah 53 was a natural outgrowth of the Sabbateans’ Judaism, and therefore was not necessarily dependent on the Christian antecedent.25 Halperin points out, however, that Cardozo was raised as a Christian for the first twenty-one years of his life in a Marrano family of the Iberian peninsula, changing his name from Miguel to Abraham only after re-settling in Venice and adopting his ancestral Judaism.26 Both he and Nathan wrestled extensively with how Jesus and other messianic figures fit into the drama of salvation centered around Sabbatai Tsvi. They do not use Isaiah 53 in the quite the same way that Christians did, and they even differ from one another; the details are beyond the scope of this essay, but I agree with Idel that an awareness of Christian interpretation is likely.27 This makes their use of Isaiah 53 no less fascinating, of course. It speaks to a common theme in Jewish sectarian logic that can be corroborated in the Dead Sea sect: if the founder or a member of the sect is being persecuted, it must be that persecution is a mysterious part of God’s plan. The Thanksgiving Hymns from Qumran manifest Sabbatai, 138. Sabbatai, 116. 24 Halperin, Sabbatai, 102–123. 25 Scholem, Sabbatai, 805. 26 David J. Halperin, Abraham Miguel Cardozo: Selected Writings (New York and Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist, 2001), xxx. See also Bruce Rosenstock, “Abraham Miguel Cardoso’s Messianism: A Reappraisal,” AJS Review 23 (1998): 63–104. 27 Idel, Messianic Mystics, 205–206. 22 Halperin, 23 Halperin,

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this idea, as the hymnist asserts confidently to God, “Because of you they have threatened my life, so that you may be glorified in the judgment of the wicked and manifest your strength through me before mortal beings, for by your kindness (Hebrew: esed) do I stand” (1QH X.25–27).28 The hymnist’s last statement emphasizing God’s kindness encapsulates another feature of Jewish sectarian logic evident in the Dead Sea sect, Christianity, and Sabbateanism: the notion that a new opportunity at forgiveness has arisen with the advent of the sect, and the sect is also empowered to judge, so right-thinking Jews need to heed the call to accept God’s offer. The Qumran hymnist continually insists that the he was among the sinners before the dramatic action by God that put him on the right path: “I thank you, Lord, that you have redeemed my life from the pit … And a perverted spirit you have purified from great sin that it might take its place with the host of the holy ones and enter into community with the congregation of the children of heaven” (1QH XI.20–23).29 Other Jews have clearly joined him in a redeemed community: “Those who walk in the way of your heart listen to me, and they marshal themselves before you in the Council of the holy ones.” (1QH XII.25–26).30 This is not quite a clarion call to repentance, since this text appears to be written for insiders; outsiders are described as intransigent throughout. But it is certainly the case that outsiders did sometimes join the sect (witness the rules for new members in the Community Rule, 1QS columns V and VI especially), in which case they were understood to have repented and been forgiven. Among early Christians, perhaps Paul’s depiction of pre-Christian existence found in Romans 7 is the best example of this profound attitude of gratefulness for having been lifted out of sin into a new state with God’s new activity in the world. It is God’s doing; on one’s own, like the Qumran hymnist, the Christian could never have accomplished it. Romans 7 culminates in Paul’s exclamation, “Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Rom 7:24–25).31 Early opponents of the Sabbateans after the apostasy ridiculed the promise of transformation and forgiveness the sect offered to those who believed. Joseph Halevi, writing to Jacob Sasportas in late 1666, states: 28 Eileen M. Schuller and Carol A. Newsome, The Hodayot (Thanksgiving Psalms): A Study Edition of 1QHa (Williston, Vt.: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 35. 29 Shuller and Newsome, Hodayot, 37. 30 Schuller and Newsome, Hodayot, 41. 31 The debates over the interpretation of Romans 7 are beyond the scope of this essay; suffice to say that whether Paul is speaking in the character-voice of a hypothetical Gentile or in some way talking about himself, he is depicting new Christian existence as a transformation away from sin, understood as a cosmic force. The proper attitude for God’s mercy in this regard is thankfulness, as it is in 1QH. See the summary of views in Robert Jewett, Romans (Hermeneia: Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2006), 441–45 and 472–73.

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For they had put their trust in the letters that had been arriving from many different places, promising them that every true believer is assured of the next world. Their prophet of Gaza had written that the messiah is able to justify even the most abandoned sinner, and has sovereign power to bring even his infamous executed predecessor [i. e., Jesus] into a blessed afterlife. He has by the same token power to damn even the purest saint.32

Lest one think that this is simply the exaggeration and distortion of a hostile critic, it is based on a widely circulated letter of Nathan of Gaza from the previous year (before the apostasy), announcing the power that Sabbetai Tsvi had to pronounce forgiveness and condemnation.33 All of this is reminiscent of those statements attributed to Jesus in Matthew, first to Peter and then to the community at large, “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven” (Matt 16:19 and 18:18). According to the Q tradition and Paul, at the end times, believers in Jesus will “sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel” (Matt 19:28, Luke 22:30) or “will judge the world (and) … angels” (1 Cor 6:2–3). Thus, all three Jewish sects compared here saw a new locus of God’s forgiving activity and judgment centered upon the sect. The obvious corollary in each case was that all Jews should get with the program and join the sect, since only the sect represented the true Judaism. As a matter of historical fact, of course, none of the Jews in these sects realized their dream of widespread embrace by their fellow Jews. At one point the Sabbateans came close, since before the apostasy messianic fervor centered around Sabbatai Tsvi had reached a fever pitch throughout Europe and the Ottoman Empire. The rabbinic court in the messiah’s hometown of Izmir even declared a fast day to be a feast in December 1665, a reversal that Halperin reads as “tantamount to an official declaration that the Messiah had come.”34 Even Jacob Sasportas later remembered having been a bit unsure himself when he received this news, musing that if he didn’t join in with those believing in the messiah, the “worthless brats” who did “may indeed become the Messiah’s ministers and deputies, while I am set to cleaning the manure out of his stables.”35 There is evidence of violence perpetrated by the messiah and his followers against Jewish unbelievers in those heady days when the messianic drama seemed to be unfolding according to plan.36 Before the apostasy, therefore, as I stated above, it is not appropriate to use the term “sect” to describe Sabbateanism. But once it became a sect and most of the one-time adherents turned away, that didn’t mean that the faithful remnant completely gave up on their fellow Jews. The same is true of the  Halperin, Sabbatai, 107. Sabbatai, 107, n. 26. For more on Nathan’s letter, its survival and its interpretation, see Scholem, Sabbatai, 271–272, and Matt Goldish, The Sabbatean Prophets (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004), 76–81. 34 Halperin, Cardozo, 50. 35 Halperin, Cardozo, 50. 36 Halperin, Cardozo, 50–51. 32

33 Halperin,

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Dead Sea sect and the early Christians: even when the prospect of convincing other Jews looked bleak, members of each sect tempered their condemnation of unbelievers with an unwavering faith that in the end God would reveal the sect to be the true Judaism, and many or all Jews would see it somehow. All three groups maintained a tension between the eschatological destruction of God’s enemies (including unbelieving Jews) and the salvation of all or at least part of the Jewish nation at large, which had been God’s purpose all along. Among the Dead Sea Scrolls, this idea of a large-scale eschatological inclusion of hitherto non-sectarian Jews in the ways of the sect is manifest in the document known as 1QSa (a.k.a. 1Q28a). The text begins thus: This is the Rule for all the congregation of Israel in the last days, when they shall join [the Community to wa]lk according to the law of the sons of Zadok the Priests and the men of their Covenant who have turned aside [from the] way of the people, the men of His Council who keep His Covenant in the midst of iniquity, offering expiation [for the Land]. When they come, they shall summon them all, the little children and the women also, and they shall read into their [ears a]ll the precepts of the Covenant and shall expound to them all their statutes that they may no longer stray in their [errors].37

The author of this text is confident that so many Jews will join his sect in the end-times that he needs to create a manual of sorts for how to instruct them and incorporate them into the community. The apostle Paul famously wrestles with Jewish unbelief in Romans 9–11. After seeming to relegate many to destruction (Rom 9:22–29), Paul moves through the notion of temporary unbelief for the purpose of saving Gentiles (11:11), culminating in Paul’s disclosure of a mystery: all Israel will ultimately be saved (11:26), perhaps even all humanity (11:32).38 The sect will triumph and be vindicated when God reveals decisively to all, including the currently unbelieving Jews, the truth of the message that Paul has been proclaiming. Scholem describes a similar impulse in the writings of Sabbatean theologian Israel Hazzan in the late 1670s, after the messiah’s death in exile. Hazzan thought that Sabbatai Tsvi would soon return from the dead to be made manifest to all the world as messiah, at which time many Jews who had left the faith after the apostasy could be restored as long as they understood their errors. In addition, as Scholem summarizes it, “The large number of undecided and bewildered Jews … who were neither believers nor opponents, would be reconciled to the messiah by the prophet Elijah.”39 Hazzan, however, stops short of Paul’s more universal-

Dead Sea Scrolls, 159. more on the universalist implications of these Pauline passages, see Jeffrey A. Trumbower, Rescue for the Dead: The Posthumous Salvation of Non-Christians in Early Christianity (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 39–40. 39 Scholem, Sabbatai, 869. 37 Vermes, 38 For

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istic view in Romans 11, when Hazzan condemns to destruction those Jews who “pretended to be believers … but subsequently showed their true colors.”40 This essay has documented some common elements of thought found in the Dead Sea sect, among early Christians, and in the early Sabbatean movement of the 17th century. Among these are 1) a location of the struggle between the sect and other Jews within Israel’s past, correctly interpreted, 2) a reading of scripture such that only the members of the sect can understand its true meaning, 3) a new opportunity at forgiveness along with judgment pronounced by the sect, 4) hostility toward the sect and / or its founder interpreted as a part of God’s mysterious plan, and 5) eschatological vindication of the sect in a way that encompasses more Jews within it on a large scale. Each sect was unique in countless ways, and this essay should in no way be interpreted as an attempt to collapse all distinctions or minimize differences. Nor should the five themes above be seen as an exhaustive list of common elements. In addition, different individuals within each of these sects held differing views on the issues described. But seeing similar themes recur in all three groups can point the way toward a deeper understanding and appreciation of each movement.

40 Scholem,

Sabbatai, 869.

Part Two: Related Ancient Mediterranean Texts

Παιδεία as Solution to Stasis in 1 Clement Clare K. Rothschild Leading French historian of the mid-twentieth century, Henri Irénée Marrou once wrote: The expression “Christian education” – ἐν Χριστῷ παιδεία – was first used in about A. D. 96 by St. Clement of Rome. Before that date St. Paul had been concerned with the way parents should bring up their children. This has in fact always been one of Christianity’s main preoccupations.

The first mention of ‘Christian education’ to which Marrou refers is found in 1 Clem. 21:8: “Let our children receive the παιδεία in Christ” (Τὰ τέκνα ἡμῶν τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ παιδείας μεταλαμβανέτωσαν) (cf. 21:6; 62:3). While Marrou may be correct that a few early Christian authors were preoccupied with the raising of children (cf. Eph 6:4; Col 3:21; Heb 12:5, 7–11), the question for this paper is whether he is correct in placing 1 Clem. 21:8 at the beginning of such a catechetical trajectory. 1 Clement is a deliberative letter modeled (in more than one regard) on 1 Corinthians.1 Characteristic of this epistolary subgenre, 1 Clement exhorts its audience to a specific course of future action by demonstrating that such an action will be to their advantage as well as, perhaps, just, honorable, and / or praiseworthy.2 In 1 Clement, the point to be adjudicated is, like 1 Corinthians, the restoration of peace from στάσις.3 Παιδεία is the recommended solution. Παιδεία does not, however, refer to “education” per se, but “punishment” in the form of 1 Margaret M. Mitchell writes: “1 Clement 47.1–3, probably the first reference to 1 Corinthians recorded, says of it … This author knows only one letter (47.1), and surely knows all of 1 Corinthians as he cites it richly and thoroughly. Most importantly, to argue against a later generation of Corinthian factionalists he employs the terms and topoi for unity from throughout 1 Corinthians appropriately in his own appeal for cessation of factions, showing how well he understood and appreciated his precursor’s argument” (Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation: An Exegetical Investigation of the Language and Composition of 1 Corinthians [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1992], 17). 2 Mitchell, Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation, 25–26. 3 Deliberative argumentation is characterized by a focus on the future, a determined set of appeals esp. τὸ συμφέρον (“what is advantageous”) (cf. 1 Clem. 1:1), proof by example (παράδειγμα) and an appropriate subject, especially factionalism and concord (Mitchell, Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation, 23).

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voluntary exile. Παιδεία as punishment is for the author of 1 Clement a Jewish pedagogical technique, garnering support in the form of scriptural proof-texts. Among Christian traditions prior to 1 Clement, Paul appropriates παιδεία as punishment in 1 Cor 11:32 and 2 Cor 6:9.4 Although παιδεία rarely refers to exclusively punitive measures in Greek traditions – because “discipline” is a feature of most ancient pedagogy,5 the two are hardly mutually exclusive. Hans Conzelmann characterizes as false attempts to distinguish between the two concepts in 1 Corinthians because education and punishment are seamlessly intertwined in Jewish wisdom literature.6 However, that “the two are one” in Jewish wisdom does not necessarily imply that Paul does not recognize a distinction and appropriate the concept in only one or the other sense depending on what he wishes to argue. Context is naturally crucial and thus, it is the argument of this brief essay that παιδεία in 1 Clement connotes a purpose of punishment as opposed to education, dissociating 1 Clem. 21:8 in particular from the trajectory with which Marrou connects it.7 Insofar as all Christian punishment has a restorative goal in the eschaton, the instructional sense never entirely recedes. This essay, however, draws a contrast of broader strokes to emphasize that by demanding the ouster of certain presbyters 1 Clement issues a life sentence for which, this side of eternity, there is no second chance.

I. Proof-texts & Commentary Of 17 occurrences of the παιδ‑ stem (παιδεία [7]; παιδεύω [9]; παιδίον [1]) in 1 Clement (excluding 2, παιδίσκη [6:2; 60:2]), few if any connote education exclusive of punishment. Although Werner Jaeger argues that occurrences of παιδεία in 1 Clement suggest the author understood Christian culture on ana­logy with Greek culture,8 he admits that: “in the passages in chapter 56 that are taken from the Old Testament, παιδεία has the limited meaning of the Hebrew term for 4 Cf. 2 Tim 2:25 “correcting opponents”; Heb 12:7 parents “discipline” (euphemism?) their children; Luke 23:22 “flogged.” 5 Cf. disciplinary character of the Law as παιδαγωγός in Gal 3:23–4:7. 6 Phenomenon is a resent in Graeco-Roman context too. See Stanley Frederick Bonner, Education in Ancient Rome: From the Elder Cato to the Younger Pliny (New York: Routledge, 1977), 126–45. 7 With reference to 1 Cor 11:32, Conzelmann argues that “education” vs. “punishment” is a false distinction: “It should not be asked whether education or chastening is meant. In the Wisdom tradition the two are one, even if according to the particular circumstances the one element or the other can come to the fore” (1 Corinthians [repr. Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975], 203, n. 117). While this may be true of Jewish texts, it is yet unclear the extent to which early Christian literature implies education without chastening or whether in these texts, too, “the two are one.” 8 Werner Jaeger, Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture (3 vols.; New York: Oxford University Press, 1945 [2nd ed.], 1943, 1944).

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chastisement”9 – that is, Clement10 selected passages in the OT explicitly connoting punishment. In response to Jaeger, Holt Graham points out that Clement also uses the expression to refer to “chastisement” at 56:2, 16, and 57:1 – passages representing the author’s own words. The last passage is particularly crucial because it contains the letter’s most concise enunciation of the solution to the epistolary problem (cf. 54:2). Graham comments on Jaeger’s analysis: “It is true that in 59:3 ἐπαίδευσας means ‘taught’ and in 62:3 Clement speaks of ‘the oracles of the teaching of God (τὰ λόγια τῆς παιδείας τοῦ θεοῦ),’11 but this is not enough to show that Clement had a conception of Christian παιδεία.”12 Reliance on 1 Corinthians13 may elucidate Clement’s usage. Although Paul refers to a παιδαγωγός in 1 Cor 4:15 and Gal 3:24, 25 and to a παιδευτής in Rom 2:20, the only occurrences of the verb παιδεύειν in Paul’s undisputed letters are in 1 Cor 11:32 and 2 Cor 6:9, both explicitly denoting punishment.14 In 1 Cor 11:32, Paul speaks about παιδεία as a consequence of the Lord’s judgment: “But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world” (κρινόμενοι δὲ ὑπὸ κυρίου παιδευόμεθα, ἵνα μὴ σὺν τῷ κόσμῳ κατακριθῶμεν). In 1 Cor 5:3, Paul depicts himself as judge: “For though absent in body, I am present in spirit; and as if present I have already pronounced judgment in the name of the Lord Jesus on the man who has done such a thing” (ἐγὼ μὲν γάρ, ἀπὼν τῷ σώματι παρὼν δὲ τῷ πνεύματι, ἤδη κέκρικα ὡς παρὼν τὸν οὕτως τοῦτο κατεργασάμενον). Παιδεία as punitive most likely arises in 1 Clement in this Pauline spirit of judgment, perhaps based on the author’s self-understanding as rightful interpreter of the Pauline or at least ‘Corinthian’ tradition.

 9 Jaeger, Paideia, 117. Ngram viewer demonstrates a sharp decline in occurrences of “chastisement” from 1800 to 2000 (https://books.google.com/ngrams, last accessed 3/2/14). 10 The name Clement is used for convenience and without bias as to the actual name of the author of this letter. 11 Furthermore, τὰ λόγια τῆς παιδείας τοῦ θεοῦ might also reflect chastisement, a divine threat. 12 Robert M. Grant and Holt H. Graham, The Apostolic Fathers: Vol. 2, First and Second Clement (New York: Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1965), 89. Supporting his point, Graham cites C. W. Mackauer’s review of Jaeger in JR 43 (1963): 156–57 (here: 157). 13 Donald Alfred Hagner, The Use of the Old and New Testaments in Clement of Rome (­NovTSup 34; Leiden: Brill, 1973), 168; 1 Clement, however, lacks verbal parallels to the institution of the Eucharist. 14 παιδεία, Eph 6:4, 2 Tim 3:16, Heb 12:5, 7, 8, 11; παιδεύειν, Luke 23:16, Acts 7:22, 22:3; 1 Cor 11:32, 2 Cor 6:9, 1 Tim 1:20, 2 Tim 2:25, Tit 2:12, Heb 12:6, 7, 10, Rev 3:19; παιδευτής, Rom 2:20, Heb 12:9.

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II. Proof-texts The 17 παιδ‑ stem words in 1 Clement occur in proof-texts and authorial commentary. The next section addresses 11 occurrences.15 As suggested in the comment by Jaeger above, six proof-texts in 1 Clement specify παιδεία as “punishment”16 all but two deriving from the Jewish Psalter.17 (1) Citing Isa 53:5 (lxx), 1 Clem. 16:5 records: “But he was wounded because of our sins and weakened because of our lawless acts. The παιδεία that brought us peace came upon him. By his bruising we were healed” (1 Clem. 16:5).18 The theme of this passage is vicarious suffering. The Babylonian exile suggests to Israel that God has rejected her. The prophet’s message is that Israel has not been rejected; she has suffered as a servant, God’s way of not impeding but restoring his relationship with his people. The parallels (i. e., “wound” = “bruising”) connote corporal punishment. The point of the citation is 1 Clement is that παιδεία as exile is a recipe for peace. It is expressed succinctly in the formula: παιδεία εἰρήνης. Peace is presented as a virtual certainty, should 1 Clement’s opponent accept “exile” (the author’s explicit recommendation to his opponent in 54:2) as Israel once did. (2) Citing Ps 50:17–20 (lxx 49:17–20), 1 Clem. 35:8 records: “For you despised discipline and cast my commands behind you. If you saw a robber, you ran along with him; and you joined forces with adulterers.”19 Subsequent verses refer to the enemy as rebuffing the notion that God punishes lawlessness: God may be silent at the moment, the psalmist warns, but one day he will destroy the lawless and  The single occurrence of παιδίον is not relevant to the argument.

15

16 The proof-texts are as follows: (1) Isa 53:1–12 (1 Clem. 16:5); (2) Ps 50:16–23 (1 Clem. 35:8);

(3) Ps 118:18 (1 Clem. 56:3); (4) Prov 3:12 (1 Clem. 56:4); (5) Ps 141:5 (1 Clem. 56:5); and Ps 118:114 (cf. Jud 9:11) (1 Clem. 59:3). 17 Cf. 22:15 (rod of discipline); 23:13–14 (rod); 29:15 (rod); 10:17 (instruction / reproof); 12:1 (discipline / reproof); 13:1, 18, 24 (withholding rod = hating son); 15:32; Hebrews 12:4–11 (discipline = peace). The Greek word, παιδεία was used initially (sixth to fourth centuries b.c.e.) to refer to “education.” However, in Jewish tradition in the Septuagint παιδεία most often translated musar, referring primarily to correction. In Proverbs, musar carries the idea of general teaching, verbal (3:11; 5:12; 10:17), and physical correction (13:24; 22:15; 23:13). However, apart from Proverbs, it refers primarily to chastening and correction (Jer 2:30; 5:3; Hos 5:2; Isa 53:5). In ECL, παιδεία refers to general education (Acts 7:22; 22:3; Titus 2:12; 2 Tim 3:16). It also refers to physical correction in 1 Tim 1:20. 18 Αὐτὸς δὲ ἐτραυματίσθη διὰ τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἡμῶν καὶ μεμαλάκισται διὰ τὰς ἀνομίας ἡμῶν· παιδεία εἰρήνης ἡμῶν ἐπ’ αὐτόν, τῷ μώλωπι αὐτοῦ ἡμεῖς ἰάθημεν. The lxx version of this passage swaps τὰς ἁμαρτίας and τὰς ἀνομίας; otherwise the passage is identical. 19 Σὺ δὲ ἐμίσησας παιδείαν καὶ ἐξέβαλες τοὺς λόγους μου εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω. Εἰ ἐθεώρεις κλέπτην, συνέτρεχες αὐτῷ, καὶ μετὰ μοιχῶν τὴν μερίδα σου ἐτίθεις. Τὸ στόμα σου ἐπλεόνασεν κακίαν, καὶ ἡ γλῶσσά σου περιέπλεκεν δολιότητα. Καθήμενος κατὰ τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ σου κατελάλεις, καὶ κατὰ τοῦ υἱοῦ τῆς μητρός σου ἐτίθεις σκάνδαλον (1 Clem. 35:8). The rebuke is identical in the lxx the context of which is wicked people deliberately violating more than one of God’s principal covenant laws.

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they will be without hope of escape. The point in 1 Clement is the same as the psalm: namely that the opponent’s actions represent premeditated breaches of God’s law and his punishment for these infractions will not be delayed forever. (3–6) Introduction. The additional four of six occurrences of παιδεία occurring in scriptural proof-texts in 1 Clem. 56:2–5 are parts of a themed florilegium (1 Clement has 14 themed florilegia in total).20 The theme of this florilegium is παιδεία. The first occurrence of the word παιδεία in this florilegium arises in an authorial comment. The next three cite Psalm 118, Proverbs 3, and Psalm 141. The authorial comment commencing the florilegium sets forth the theme of the punishment. The passage then builds to a pitch climaxing with the most concise and bold solution to the epistolary occasion (57:1; cf. 54:2).21 1 Clem. 56:2 records: “We should welcome παιδεία; no one should be upset by it, loved ones. It is good and supremely useful to rebuke one another, for this binds us to the will of God.”22 The point of this statement is self-evident: discipline may at times be harsh or threatening, but it is nevertheless eminently useful for ensuring adherence to God’s will. Heb 12:10–11 offers much the same message: “For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he [God] disciplines us to our advantage, in order that we may share his holiness. Now, all discipline always seems painful rather than pleasant as it is happening, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”23 (3) V. 3 cites Ps 118:18 (117:18 lxx): “For thus says the holy command: ‘The Lord disciplined me harshly but did not hand me over to death.’”24 This passage bolsters the previous one, the point being that although punishment may arouse fear and upset, it will not kill you. The formula “unto death” (cf. 2 Cor 6:9) implies corporal punishment. (4) Citing Prov 3:12,25 v. 4 argues that punitive measures are evidence of the Lord’s love and acceptance: “For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and whips and Graham, The Apostolic Fathers, 2:10–13. describes the crucial role of this verse as follows: “The practical solution for the Corinthian problem is therefore to be found either in the voluntary exile of those who created it (chs. 54–55) or in their obedience to the presbyters (54:2) and repentance (chs. 51–52)” (Grant and Graham, The Apostolic Fathers, 2:90; cf. 1 Clem. 54:1–4). 22  Ἀναλάβωμεν παιδείαν, ἐφ’ ᾗ οὐδεὶς ὀφείλει ἀγανακτεῖν, ἀγαπητοί.  Ἡ νουθέτησις, ἣν ποιούμεθα εἰς ἀλλήλους, καλή ἐστιν καὶ ὑπεράγαν ὠφέλιμος· κολλᾷ γὰρ ἡμᾶς τῷ θελήματι τοῦ θεοῦ. Cf. Paul’s use of νουθετεῖν (“rebuke”), 1 Cor 4:14. 23 οἱ μὲν γὰρ πρὸς ὀλίγας ἡμέρας κατὰ τὸ δοκοῦν αὐτοῖς ἐπαίδευον, ὁ δὲ ἐπὶ τὸ συμφέρον εἰς τὸ μεταλαβεῖν τῆς ἁγιότητος αὐτοῦ. Πᾶσα δὲ παιδεία πρὸς μὲν τὸ παρὸν οὐ δοκεῖ χαρᾶς εἶναι ἀλλὰ λύπης, ὕστερον δὲ καρπὸν εἰρηνικὸν τοῖς δι’ αὐτῆς γεγυμνασμένοις ἀποδίδωσιν δικαιοσύνης. Imperfects suggest that the disciplining action continues. 24 Οὕτως γάρ φησιν ὁ ἅγιος λόγος· «Παιδεύων ἐπαίδευσέν με ὁ κύριος, καὶ τῷ θανάτῳ οὐ παρέδωκέν με.» LXX version (Ps 117:18) is identical. 25 lxx version is identical. 20 Grant

21 Graham

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every son he recognizes as heir.”26 Here we see a positive incentive to accept corporal punishment: it serves to validate a child’s status as heir. (5) Citing Ps 141:5 (140:5 lxx), v. 5 records: “For the one who is upright will discipline me in his mercy, and he will put me to shame. But may the oil of a sinner not anoint my head.”27 The lxx version of this passage is slightly different from the one Clement cites possibly indicating redaction. Not only is the citation formula, γάρ, φησίν absent, but the lxx has the plural form, ἁμαρτωλῶν in place of 1 Clement’s (H L S C, pl. in A) singular, ἁμαρτωλοῦ.28 Clement may have deliberately modified the passage to address a specific opponent. The type of punishment represented in the passage is unclear.  Ἐν ἐλέει (“in mercy”) and ἐλέγχω (“to put to shame”) can suggest either sarkic or non-sarkic discipline. (6) The sixth and last occurrence of παιδεία in scriptural proof-texts is part of a closing prayer in chapter 59. The passage alludes to a wide range of Jewish and Christian scriptures. V. 3 alone may cite more than nine different passages.29 Although the reference to παιδεία is not part of a known citation itself, it is included here because it summarizes the point of the citations. The strength of this case relies on the meaning of παιδεία in the foregoing passages: Open the eyes of our heart, that we may recognize you as … the one who multiplies the nations upon the earth and who, from them all, has chosen those who love you through Jesus Christ, your beloved child, through whom you have disciplined, sanctified, and honored us (τὸν πληθύνοντα ἔθνη ἐπὶ γῆς καὶ ἐκ πάντων ἐκλεξάμενον τοὺς ἀγαπῶντάς σε διὰ  Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ ἠγαπημένου παιδός σου, δι’ οὗ ἡμᾶς ἐπαίδευσας, ἡγίασας, ἐτίμησας).30

In this case, παιδεία (i. e., ἐπαίδευσας) is one of three components in a triadic formula with “sanctity” (ἡγίασας) and “honor” (ἐτίμησας). The logic of the passage works as follows: Jesus is to God, as Christian disciples are to Jesus. Therefore, just as Jesus was punished, sanctified, and honored by God, Christ-followers will be punished, sanctified, and honored by Christ. The father-son relationship may suggest, as it frequently does, that corporal punishment is in view. Clement is warning his opponents that they should expect to be punished if they wish to be honored; that is, true imitatio Christi involves punishment.

  « Ὃν γὰρ ἀγαπᾷ κύριος, παιδεύει· μαστιγοῖ δὲ πάντα υἱόν, ὃν παραδέχεται.»  Παιδεύσει με δίκαιος ἐν ἐλέει καὶ ἐλέγξει με, ἔλαιον δὲ ἁμαρτωλοῦ μὴ λιπανάτω τὴν κεφαλήν μου, ὅτι ἔτι καὶ ἡ προσευχή μου ἐν ταῖς εὐδοκίαις αὐτῶν. 28  The mss are uncertain. Hebrew translated into English (nrsv): “Let the righteous strike me; let the faithful correct me. Never let the oil of the wicked anoint my head.” 29 From the Jewish scriptures the possibilities include: Isa 57:15, Isa 13:11, Ps 32:10, Job 5:11, 1 Sam 2:7, Deut 32:39, Num 16:22, 27:16, and Dan 3:31 and from Christian writings, Eph 1:18 and Luke 1:53. 30 This asymmetric string of verbs has interesting interpretive possibilities, e. g., that God by discipline sanctifies; and by sanctifying, glorifies. This may be an overtranslation, but the place of παιδεία in this series seems illogical on its surface, inviting speculation. 26 27

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III. Authorial Commentary Together with the one authorial comment discussed above (1 Clem. 56:2), four additional authorial comments in 1 Clement raise the issue of παιδεία.31 (1) 1 Clem. 21:6 refers to παιδεία twice: Let us revere the Lord Jesus Christ, whose blood was given for us; we should respect our predecessors;32 we should honor the presbyters;33 we should discipline the new leaders34 with the παιδεία of the fear of God; and we should correct our women toward the good.35

As elsewhere, this comment argues that a breach has taken place in the succession of high offices within the Corinthian church. Unspecified new leaders have broken the precedent set by: (1) Jesus Christ  – who is revered, (2) predecessors  – who are respected, and (3) current presbyters  – who are honored. The νέοι (“new leaders”)36 must, therefore, be disciplined. In this verse, παιδεία has no synonymous or ascending parallel to clarify its specific meaning. “Correct” (the recommendation concerning women) might possess parallel meaning, but it might also refer to a distinct, unrelated action. The comment is thus unclear as to the corporality of the punishment. (2) 1 Clem. 21:8 is the passage with which this brief essay began  – Marrou characterizing it as the first mention of ‘Christian education’: “Let our children receive the παιδεία in Christ” (Τὰ τέκνα ἡμῶν τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ παιδείας μεταλαμβανέτωσαν). Although it is true that some early Christian writers were preoccupied with the raising of children (cf. Eph 6:4; Col 3:21; Heb 12:5, 7–11), such a reference in 1 Clem. 21:8 is ambiguous. To begin with, the few references to children here and elsewhere in 1 Clement connote adults. Although it might seem natural that the progression in this passage – Jesus, predecessors, presbyters, new usurping leaders, and women – would conclude with literal children, at least the following observations weigh against this conclusion. To begin with, there are no other literal references to children in 1 Clement. Παῖς occurs only four times in 1 Clement, three times referring to Jesus, the (adult) child of God (cf. 59:2, 3, 4).37 Τέκνον occurs a total of three times in this text – once in the passage under discussion and twice in citations of scripture: 1 Clem. 22:1, (Ps 33:11, “[adult] audience of the psalm”) and 1 Clem. 56:14, (Job 31  The four comments specifying παιδεία as “punishment” are: (1) 1 Clem. 21:6 (2x); (2) 1 Clem. 56:16 (3x); (3) 1 Clem. 57:1; and (4) 1 Clem. 62:3. Each is treated in turn above. 32 Cf. 1 Clem. 1:3; 5:7; 32:2; 37:2, 3; 51:5; 55:1; 60:4. 33  Cf. 1 Clem. 1:3; 3:3; 44:5; 47:6; 54:2; 55:4; 57:1. 34  Cf. 1 Clem. 1:3; 3:3. 35 Τὸν κύριον  Ἰησοῦν Χριστόν, οὗ τὸ αἷμα ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἐδόθη, ἐντραπῶμεν, τοὺς προηγουμένους ἡμῶν αἰδεσθῶμεν, τοὺς πρεσβυτέρους τιμήσωμεν, τοὺς νέους παιδεύσωμεν τὴν παιδείαν τοῦ φόβου τοῦ θεοῦ, τὰς γυναῖκας ἡμῶν ἐπὶ τὸ ἀγαθὸν διορθωσώμεθα· 36 Not with Ehrman: “youth” (LCL). 37 Occurrence of παῖς in 39:4 is a citation from Job 4:17 referring to “servants.” Παιδίον occurs only one time in 16:3 describing the suffering servant as a child in Isa 53:2.

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5:25, “descendants”). While it is true that the passage under discussion (i. e., 1 Clem. 21:8) is the only occurrence of τέκνον in Clement’s own words, 1 Clem. 1:6 (also the author’s words) possesses a very similar progression excluding children (rulers, older men, young men, wives). This suggests that 21:8 is not the last item in the series, but begins a new thought. This interpretation is supported by the observation that subsequent references to addressees connote adults: 1 Clem. 22:1, Δεῦτε, τέκνα (“Children!”) (citing Ps 34:11–17) and 1 Clem. 23:4, ὦ ἀνόητοι (“Fools!”) (citing an unknown source; cf. 2 Clem. 11:2–3). These passages imply that the children referred to in 21:8 are not a separate puerile subset of the Corinthian congregation. Rather, “children” refers collectively to the author’s opponents: the last two items in the series, both νέοι (“new leaders”) and “wives” (21:6). What is more, the advice Clement gives the “children” in 21:8 – including humility (τί ταπεινοφροσύνη), pure love (τί ἀγάπη ἁγνὴ), the fear of God (ὁ φόβος αὐτοῦ), holy conduct (ὁσίως ἀναστρεφομένους), and clear understanding (ἐν καθαρᾷ διανοίᾳ) – matches advice he gives his opponents elsewhere in the text. In fact, the message directed to new leaders in 21:6: “We should punish our young leaders in the reverential fear of God (τοὺς νέους παιδεύσωμεν τὴν παιδείαν τοῦ φόβου τοῦ θεοῦ)” is essentially repeated in 22:1, a proof-text characterized as Christ’s confirmation38 of the teaching: “Come children I will teach you the reverential awe of the Lord (Δεῦτε, τέκνα, ἀκούσατέ μου, φόβον κυρίου διδάξω ὑμᾶς).”39 The adult rank of these children is further emphasized in 23:1 by reference to God – rather than adult parents – as father, the one who rewards reverential awe (contrast, e. g., Col 3:21; Eph 6:4). Naturally, such use of “children” to refer to adult members of the congregation imitates Pauline style in the Corinthian correspondence and elsewhere (e. g., 1 Cor 4:14; 2 Cor 6:13, 12:14; cf. Rom 8:16, 17, 21; Gal 4:19). By referring to the adult members of the congregation as children, Clement may even assume Paul’s paternal authority over this congregation insofar as Paul referred to himself as father over the children in Corinth (1 Cor 4:15). That being said, if we set aside for a moment the precise nature of the “children,” we note that they are exhorted to “receive” the παιδεία ἐν Χριστῷ. The prepositional phrase ἐν Χριστῷ is probably adjectival, although adverbial usage does not imply a significantly different meaning.40 The two subsequent verbs of instruction in this passage and the next – μαθητεύω (21:8b) and διδάξω (22:1) – parallel the phrase μεταλαμβάνω … παιδεία (“to receive”)41 in 21:8a, denoting instructional content. Punishment is not an explicit component of the instruction, 38 Note

that the punishment “in Christ” (21:8) is confirmed by the faith “in Christ” (22:1). ETs: Ehrman (LCL). 40 Cf. 1 Clem. 1:2, “piety in Christ”; 47:6 “conduct in Christ.” 41 LSJ, s. v. μεταλαμβάνω, II “receive in succession” or “afterwards.” The prefix μετα‑ may emphasize unholy usurpation of opponents, i. e., rightful succession. 39 Both

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although instructional topics include “the strength of humility” and “the power of pure love” – deliberate paradoxes essentially exhorting the addressees to concede defeat. However, the section’s final statement issues a warning:  Ἐρευνητὴς γάρ ἐστιν ἐννοιῶν καὶ ἐνθυμήσεων· οὗ ἡ πνοὴ αὐτοῦ ἐν ἡμῖν ἐστίν, καὶ ὅταν θέλῃ, ἀνελεῖ αὐτήν (21:9). That is, failure to act on the advice given will result in capital punishment. It seems, therefore, that when παιδεία does not necessarily imply punishment, it is added. (3) 1 Clem. 56:16. This passage refers to παιδεία three times: You see, loved ones, what a great protection42 there is for those who are disciplined by the master. For since he is a good father, he disciplines us, that through his holy discipline we may receive mercy.43

This passage summarizes the theme of Jewish proverbial wisdom,44 represented by the florilegium immediately preceding it. The reference to “master” and “father” picks up on the father-son paradigm of many of the Jewish instructional sayings cited. The theme that punishment brings mercy closely resembles 1 Cor 5:5, 11:32, Rom 11:32, and perhaps 2 Cor 6:9. Within the people of God as Paul configures it, punishment is not retributive in a sense of strict divine justice but directed toward maturation, self-discipline, repentance, and change. (4) 1 Clem. 57:1. As noted, 1 Clement is a deliberative letter modeled on 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians is even named as its source and authority (47:1). Holt H. Graham divides the letter into four sections.45 The practical solution to the Corinthian problem is put forward in what Graham regards as the letter’s third section. This solution, framed as recommendations, is covered in 1 Clem. 51–58. In chapters 51–53, proof-texts from the Hebrew Bible demonstrate that God punishes hardness of heart but forgives anyone who confesses. As an exemplum of the recommended behavior, 1 Clem. 53 alludes to the golden calf episode, highlighting how Moses asks God to forgive the people for worshiping the golden calf. Although Moses does not share the people’s blame for wrongdoing, he tells God that if God refuses to grant forgiveness to the people he is willing to perish with them (1 Clem. 53). The Corinthian leaders, 1 Clement warns, ought to imitate Moses’s humility (1 Clem. 54) by voluntarily exiling themselves. Other 42   Ὑπερασπισμός is a hapax legomenon in David’s royal thanksgiving for victory psalm (lxx Ps 17:36). 43 Βλέπετε, ἀγαπητοί, πόσος ὑπερασπισμός ἐστιν τοῖς παιδευομένοις ὑπὸ τοῦ δεσπότου· πατὴρ γὰρ ἀγαθὸς ὢν παιδεύει εἰς τὸ ἐλεηθῆναι ἡμᾶς διὰ τῆς ὁσίας παιδείας αὐτοῦ. 44  E. g., Prov 3:12, 12:1, 25:28; Acts 17:11. 45 Part One (1:1–3:4) describes the epistolary situation: the previous golden age of Corinth has given way to present distressing circumstances or στάσις. Part Two (4:1–39:9) discusses the nature of the Christian life, in particular the evil consequences of jealousy and the necessity of humble obedience leading to repentance. In Part Three (40:1–61:3), the author proposes a solution for the problem at hand. Part Four (62:1–65:2) summarizes the contents of the letter, offers advice to the group in general, and concludes with a prayer of benediction.

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examples of the innocent willingness to die with or on behalf of a guilty group are enumerated next in 1 Clem. 55 – including pagan rulers, other Christians, and women from the Jewish scriptures. In 1 Clem. 56:16, the author qua Roman church recommends punishment for the new leader-usurpers to the bishopric. It is exile, referred to as God’s holy παιδεία (cf. 1 Clem. 57; 54:2). 1 Clem. 57:1 articulates the precise recommendation. Therefore, you (all) who laid the foundation of the faction be subject to the presbyters and accept punishment leading to confession by bending the knees of your heart ( Ὑμεῖς οὖν οἱ τὴν καταβολὴν τῆς στάσεως ποιήσαντες ὑποτάγητε τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις καὶ παιδεύθητε εἰς μετάνοιαν κάμψαντες τὰ γόνατα τῆς καρδίας ὑμῶν).46

The final phrase, κάμψαντες τὰ γόνατα τῆς καρδίας ὑμῶν, construes corporal punishment (“bending knees”) as a metaphor for psychological penalty (“knees of your heart”). Although, as we have seen, the greatest proportion of 1 Clement’s proof-texts and authorial comments connote physical punishment, here at the most succinct statement of the author’s sentence against his opponent, corporal punishment is a metaphor for a psychological and/or spiritual penalty. The summary nature of this passage may suggest it is a hermeneutical principle applicable across the entire text. Related metaphors scattered throughout 1 Clement suggest this interpretation: “tablets of your hearts” (2:8), “the eyes of our hearts” (36:2), “the eyes of our soul” (19:3), and “the eyes of our heart” (59:3) (cf. “a crushed spirit,” “a crushed and humbled heart,” 18:17; even perhaps, “eyes of the Lord,” 22:6). (5) 1 Clem. 62:3. This passage concludes the letter with the following report: And we were all the more happy to bring these things to mind [or: send along the following reminder], since we knew full well that we were writing to faithful and highly

46 Cf. 1 Pet 5:5. The expression “bend the knees of my heart” is also attested in the Prayer of Manasseh (Pr. Man. 11). For the Greek text of the prayer see Alfred Rahlfs, Psalmi cum Odis (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975). David A. deSilva writes: “The petition for forgiveness (vv. 11–13) begins with a beautiful image of humility of heart: ‘I bend the knee of my heart.’ This stands in marked contrast with the hubris that Manasseh displayed in his earlier disregard for God’s prohibition of idolatry. Another acknowledgement of sin, ‘I have sinned, O Lord, I have sinned,’ is poetically balanced by the supplication ‘Forgive me, O Lord, forgive me’ (vv. 12–13). The petition concludes by identifying God as the ‘God of those who repent’ (v. 13), which is an original way of describing God, a fine counterpoint to the ‘God of the righteous’ (v. 8) and an expression of the conviction that the God of all does not cease to be God of those who fail to walk in God’s way. As their Creator and as the One who stands ready to forgive and restore those who humble themselves and turn aside from sinful ways, God remains ‘their God’” (Introducing the Apocrypha: Message, Context, and Significance [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2002], 299). Although, with deSilva, “knees of my heart” might simply be a beautiful metaphor, it might also reflect the common ancient practice of corporal punishment (cf. Ovid, Fast. 2.305): A grove below the Esquiline Hill, untouched /…/When they had gathered there, husbands and wives / Bowed their knees, alike, in supplication/… the wives / Offered their backs, to be beaten by thongs from its hide (ET: A. S. Kline, LCL 2004).

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respectable men, who have stooped over to examine closely47 God’s disciplinary commandments.48

These verses attempt to capture the addressee’s good will in hopes that the recommended action can and will be taken. This gesture of respect involves expertise in the Jewish scriptures49 not in general, but with respect to τὰ λόγια τῆς παιδείας τοῦ θεοῦ, “God’s disciplinary commandments,” in particular. The referent of this legal category is, unfortunately, uncertain but may refer to Jewish proverbial wisdom, even Proverbs specifically. The congregation is exhorted to discipline the usurping authorities in accordance with the Scriptures.

IV. Conclusion In conclusion, three formulations of παιδεία are identifiable in ancient Greek literature: instruction, punishment, and some combination of the two.50 Although much of 1 Clement might be said to reflect instructional exhortation in this text, παιδεία more or less universally connotes disciplinary measures recommended for stamping out the crisis the deliberative letter was written to solve. This use of the word παιδεία is rhetorically strategic insofar as its first meaning, “instruction” frames a damning exile sentence as no-nonsense, restorative advice; advice behind which, since 1 Cor 11:32 and 2 Cor 6:9 refer to παιδεία as punishment, Paul’s authority hovers. To be sure, proof-texts from the Jewish scriptures in 1 Clement imply corporal punishment. Yet the author’s most succinct response to the epistolary occasion, “bow the knees of your heart” (57:1) transforms corporality for the present context into a metaphor for psychic pain. Such allegorizing references may be related to the double nature of exile: a fate known to inflict damaging corporal and psychological effects. 47 BDAG 274, s. v. ἐγκύπτω (cf. LSJ s. v. κύπτω + ἐν) A.1. “bend forward, stoop”; A.2. “Hang the head in shame.” 1 Clem. 40:1; 45:2; 53:1. See Craig Evans, “A Note on ΕΓΚΥΠΤΕΙΝ in 1 Clement,” VC 38 (1984): 200–201. In Ps 9:31 (lxx 10:10) this verb describes the action of an enemy: “κύψει καὶ πεσεῖται ἐν τῷ αὐτὸν κατακυριεῦσαι τῶν πενήτων …” (“He will stoop and crouch when he has mastered the poor”). In 1 Clement the word may be a double entendre, as in the English verb, “to stoop”: “one stoops to study carefully (i. e., get a closer look)” / “one stoops in humility (or: bows down)” or even “one stoops to the level of another viewed as lower than oneself (i. e., condescends).” To repeatedly insist that the opponents have “studied the scriptures carefully and thus will understand” – when in fact the writer clearly believes they do not – represents hyperbole with ironic intent. 48 καὶ ταῦτα τοσούτῳ ἥδιον ὑπεμνήσαμεν, ἐπειδὴ σαφῶς ᾔδειμεν γράφειν ἡμᾶς ἀνδράσιν πιστοῖς καὶ ἐλλογιμωτάτοις καὶ ἐγκεκυφόσιν εἰς τὰ λόγια τῆς παιδείας τοῦ θεοῦ. Cf.  35:8. Ὑπεμνήσαμεν might be a reference to the text itself, i. e., ὑπόμνημα or ὑπόμνησις as ‘written reminder’ or ‘memorandum.’ Cf. 2 Tim 1:5; 2 Pet 1:13, 3:1. Λόγια may refer to “statements” or perhaps to “oracles” as in scriptural passages collectively relating to paideia. 49 See n. 47 above. 50 Apart from the fact that all punitive measures are in some measure instructional.

Polycarp and Polemo Christianity at the Center of the Second Sophistic1 Matthijs den Dulk and Andrew M. Langford I. Introduction Smyrna, on the west coast of Asia Minor, was a center of early Christian activity from the late first century onward to at least the early third century. The Seer of the Apocalypse was told to write to (the ἄγγελος of) the ἐκκλησία of Smyrna (Rev 1:11, 2:8), Ignatius wrote a letter to the Smyrneans, and from Smyrna he sent his letters to Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles, and Rome.2 The Acts of John, the Acts of Paul, ad Diognetum, and the Martyrdom of Pionius may have been composed in Smyrna as well.3 The apostle John visited Smyrna according to Acts of John 55–57,4 and 1 It is our great pleasure to offer this paper in honor of Prof. Hans Dieter Betz, one of whose most important and lasting contributions to early Christian scholarship has been to take seriously the rhetorical culture in which the early Christians developed their ideas and literature. We hope this study will be a modest contribution to this crucial intellectual project. We are deeply grateful to Profs. Jaś Elsner, Kendra Eshleman, Michael Holmes, Margaret Mitchell, Candida Moss, and Trevor Thompson for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this essay. 2 Ignatius, Eph. 21.1; Mag. 15.1; Trall. 1.1, 12.1, 13.1; Rom. 10.1. On recent challenges to the authenticity of the letters of Ignatius, see Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy (London: Continuum, 2007), 95–143. 3  Smyrna has been suggested as the place of composition for both the Acts of John and the Acts of Paul, as noted by Hans-Josef Klauck, The Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles: An Introduction (trans. Brian McNeil; Waco: Baylor, 2008), 50. If Charles Hill (From the Lost Teaching of Polycarp: Identifying Irenaeus’ Apostolic Presbyter and the Author of Ad Diognetum [WUNT 186; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006]) and Pier Franco Beatrice are right (“Der Presbyter des Irenäus, Polykarp von Smyrna und der Brief an Diognet,” in Pléroma Salus Carnis [ed. Eugenio RomeroPose; Compostellanum: Santiago de Compostela, 1990], 179–202) in arguing that ad Diognetum was composed by Polycarp, Smyrna would be the likely provenance of that document as well. Cf. also the well-known suggestion of von Campenhausen that the Pastoral Epistles were composed by or under the influence of Polycarp (“Polykarp von Smyrna und die Pastoralbriefe,” in idem, Aus der Frühzeit des Christentums [Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1963], 197–252). 4 In a scene that reflects Christian awareness of the rivalry between Ephesus and Smyrna (cf. n. 11), the people of Smyrna send messengers asking John to come and preach to them as well, on the grounds that God “commanded you not to be fond of dwelling in one place” (διετάξατό σοι μὴ ἐμφιλοχωρεῖν ἐν ἑνὶ τόπῳ [Acts John 55]). For a discussion of the link between John and Polycarp and the Christian participation in the ongoing rivalry between Smyrna and Ephesus,

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Irenaeus lived in Smyrna as a boy.5 In a later tradition, even Paul made his way to Smyrna.6 The early Christian figure most intimately associated with the city, however, is Polycarp, the ἐπίσκοπος of the local church (Mart. Pol. 16.2).7 Polycarp participated in the burgeoning epistolary culture of the early Christian movement, evidence of which are the letter he received from Ignatius and the one he sent to the Philippians.8 He also famously died in Smyrna, an event immortalized in the Martyrdom of Polycarp. Smyrna was not, however, only a center of early Christianity, but also of the phenomenon commonly known as the Second Sophistic.9 The city is arguably the most prominent in Philostratus’ Vitae sophistarum (Vit. soph.), the work on which we depend for much of our knowledge about the Second Sophistic. According to Philostratus, Smyrna “sacrifices most of all cities to the sophists’ see Frederick W. Weidmann, Polycarp and John: The Harris Fragments and Their Challenge to the Literary Tradition (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1999), 125–47. 5  In Haer. 3.3.4 and the Letter to Florinus (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 5.20.4–8), Irenaeus claims that he was among Polycarp’s audience in his youth (cf. Hist. eccl. 4.14.3–4, 5.5.8; Mart. Pol. 2.2). 6 Vit. Pol. 1–2. The fourth century dating of the Life of Polycarp by J. B. Lightfoot (The Apostolic Fathers: Clement, Ignatius, and Polycarp [repr., Peabody: Hendrickson, 1989], 2.3:423–31) is not undisputed. Recently, a third century dating has been championed by Alistair StewartSykes, The Life of Polycarp: An Anonymous Vita From Third-Century Smyrna (Sydney: St. Paul’s, 2002). See further Weidmann, Polycarp and John, 6 (esp. n. 25); Paul Hartog, Polycarp’s Epistle to the Philippians and the Martyrdom of Polycarp: Introduction, Text, and Commentary (Oxford Apostolic Fathers; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 5–7. Paul is also located in Smyrna in a Coptic fragment of the Acts of Paul (see NTA 2:263). 7  Irenaeus states that Polycarp was appointed by “the apostles” (Haer. 3.3.4, Hist. eccl. 4.14.3). Tertullian maintains that the apostle John installed Polycarp as bishop of Smyrna (Praescr. 32). 8  Polycarp is mentioned in several other second-century letters, see Ignatius, Eph. 21.1, Mag. 15.1, Eusebius Hist. eccl. 5.20.4–7 (Irenaeus’ Letter to Florinus) and 5.24.4 (Polycrates’ Letter to Victor). 9  For a brief overview of various scholarly conceptualizations of the “Second Sophistic” (a historical period, a literary Zeitgeist or an “imperial-Greek habit of oratorical declamation”), see Tim Whitmarsh, The Second Sophistic (New Surveys in the Classics 35; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 3–22, and most recently, his reflections in Beyond the Second Sophistic: Adventures in Postclassicism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013) where he argues that the elite discourses of Hellenocentrism so frequently equated with the Second Sophistic should “be seen as local and tactical rather than as absolute paradigms of the spirit of the age” (1–7, here 3). See also Graham Anderson, “The Second Sophistic: Some Problems of Perspective” in Antonine Literature (ed. D. A. Russell; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), 91–110. The current debate continues the discussion that arose almost immediately after scholars began paying serious attention to the Second Sophistic, with G. W. Bowersock (Greek Sophists in the Roman Empire [Oxford: Clarendon, 1969]) focusing on the declamatory aspects of the Second Sophistic, and Ewen Bowie (“Greeks and their Past in the Second Sophistic,” Past & Present 46 [1970]: 3–41) arguing for a broader conceptualization that encompasses the antiquarianism and revivalism in religion and the arts that was characteristic of the period. Cf. Jaś Elsner, “A Protean Corpus,” in Philostratus (ed. Ewen Bowie and Jaś Elsner; Greek Culture in the Roman World; Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 9, 17–18, with Bowersock’s rejoinder in JHS 131 (2011): 198. The present essay focuses on contemporary oratorical culture, which is an integral aspect of the Second Sophistic in any of the various conceptual models.

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Muses”10 (θύουσα μάλιστα δὴ πόλεων ταῖς τῶν σοφιστῶν Μούσαις [Vit. soph. 613]).11 The first sophist of the common era who properly belonged to the Second Sophistic according to Philostratus (Vit. soph. 511), was Nicetes of Smyrna (late 1st century c.e.).12 Nicetes was the predecessor of Scopelianus of Clazomenae, who in turn was the teacher of the most important sophist in Smyrna’s history: M. Antonius Polemo, one of the two most prominent characters in the whole of Philostratus’ Vit. soph. Herodes Atticus, the other exceptionally important figure in the Vit. soph., traveled to Smyrna to hear Polemo, whom he regarded as his teacher (Vit. soph. 537, 539, 564). Remarkably, the sophistic and early Christian elements of late ancient Smyrnean society have rarely been brought into conversation.13 With the exception of a handful of scattered comments in the secondary literature, the Martyrdom of Polycarp, which will be the focus of the present study, has not 10 All translations are our own, unless otherwise noted. The text of Philostratus’ Vit. soph. follows that of C. L. Kayser, Flavii Philostrati opera, vol. 2. (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871; repr. Hildesheim: Olms, 1964); Mart. Pol. is cited according to Dehandschutter’s edition (“An Updated Edition of the Martyrdom of Polycarp” in Polycarpiana: Studies on Martyrdom and Persecution in Early Christianity: Collected Essays by Boudewijn Dehandschutter [ed. J. Leemans; Leuven: Peeters, 2007], 1–22). 11 Ephesus comes close as the “second city” of the Second Sophistic, and the rivalry between the two is reflected intermittently in Vit. soph. (e. g., 531, 605). 12 Nicetes’ dates are not known exactly, but he taught Greek rhetoric to Pliny the Younger while the latter was a teenager in Rome (Ep. 6.6.3) around 79 c.e. (so Ewen Bowie, “Nicetes [2]” in Brill’s New Pauly [Leiden: Brill, 2006], 9:717). Tacitus’ disparaging comparison of Nicetes with Aeschines and Demosthenes in Dialogus 15.3 has been taken to mean that he “is not rated highly in Tacitus” by P. G. Walsh, Pliny the Younger: Complete Letters (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 335. Walsh perhaps follows A. N. Sherwin-White: “Nicetes was not greatly approved by Tacitus, or even by Greek opinion, including that of Pliny’s pet Isaeus,” (The Letters of Pliny: A Historical and Social Commentary [Oxford: Clarendon, 1966], 362). But this assessment fails to take into account the argumentative strategy of the Dialogus. In fact, Nicetes represents for Tacitus the best of the Greek orators of Asia; it just so happens that in the argument of the Dialogus, his contemporaries, both Latin and Greek, pale woefully in comparison with the former glory of 4th century b.c.e. Athenian orators (or, in the case of the Romans, the age of Cicero). 13  There is still a general lack of attention given to the intersection of early Christian literature and the Second Sophistic. Laurent Pernot’s remark from 2002 still rings true: “La plupart des histoires du christianisme n’évoquent pas la sophistique, et, inversement, la plupart des ouvrages classiques sur la sophistique laissent de côté le christianisme” (“Christianisme et Sophistique” in Papers on Rhetoric IV [ed. Lucia Calboli Montefusco; Rome: Herder Editrice, 2002], 245–62, 246). There are, however, some hopeful recent developments. See, e. g., Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch and the Second Sophistic: A Study of an Early Christian Transformation of Pagan Culture (STAC 36; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006); Judith Perkins, Roman Imperial Identities in the Early Christian Era (Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies; London and New York: Routledge, 2009); Jason König, Greek Literature in the Roman Empire (Classical World Series; London: Bristol Classical Press, 2009); Laura S. Nasrallah, Christian Responses to Roman Art and Architecture: The Second-Century Church Amid the Spaces of Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Kendra Eshleman, Social World of Intellectuals: Sophists, Philosophers, and Christians (Greek Culture in the Roman World Series; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).

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been examined in light of the Second Sophistic. This essay seeks to demonstrate the rich interpretive payoff of such an examination, and proceeds in particular through a comparison with Polycarp’s most illustrious Smyrnean contemporary, the famed sophist Polemo, who lived from c. 88–144 c.e.14 Polycarp died sometime between 155 and 167 at which point he was at least 86 years old (Mart. Pol. 9.3).15 In terms of geographical and temporal proximity to Polycarp, we could therefore not ask for a better figure for comparison than Polemo. As we will show in more detail below, Polemo was the quintessential man of his age and a towering figure of Smyrnean society. The depiction of his life by Philostratus provides us with a window into the local intellectual and cultural world precisely at the time of Polycarp. Our approach also draws upon recent work that focuses more specifically on the oft-studied issue of intertextuality and Martyrdom of Polycarp. Candida Moss has argued that identifying and/or eliminating (biblical) intertexts that informed the composition of the Martyrdom is complicated by, among other factors, the possibility that the author may, in addition to such texts, be working with “interpretive traditions, cultural tropes, and non-Christian exemplars.”16 In line with this sensible observation, we will argue that at a number of points the narrative depiction of Polycarp’s martyrdom is informed by the language and narrative patterns of biblical texts while simultaneously engaging in an idealized negotiation with the conventions, values, and expectations characteristic of the Second Sophistic. Indeed, exploring the presence of this studied negotiation of Christian fidelity vis-à-vis the various aspects of elite Smyrnean sophistic culture yields insights into the depiction of Polycarp hitherto unappreciated by scholarship on the Martyrdom. After demonstrating the importance of Polemo and noting a few general points of comparison, we shall focus on a number of key moments in Mart. Pol. 9–12 which we contend can be appreciated much more fully in light of the particular cultural conventions and expectations of the Second Sophistic. 14 D. A. Russell, “Polemon (4), Marcus Antionus,” in OCD. Grant M. Boswell (“Marcus Antonius Polemo,” in Classical Rhetorics and Rhetoricians: Critical Studies and Sources [ed. Michelle Ballif and Michael G. Moran; Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2005], 286) gives c. 90–146. Cf. Vit. soph. 543: “when he died he was about (περί) fifty-six years old.” 15 For an overview of the long and complicated history of scholarship on the date of Polycarp’s martyrdom, see Boudewijn Dehandschutter, “The Martyrium Polycarpi: A Century of Research,” ANRW 27.1:497–504; repr. in idem, Polycarpiana, and a new supplement to this essay in the same volume, “Research on the Martyrdom of Polycarp: 1990–2005,” 85–92. See also n. 32 below. 16 Candida R. Moss, “Nailing Down and Tying Up: Lessons in Intertextual Impossibility from the Martyrdom of Polycarp” VC 67 (2013): 117–36, 135. Scholars have long compared the depiction of the life and death of Polycarp to that of Socrates (see Moss, “Nailing Down and Tying Up,” 129–32 for discussion), the Maccabean martyrs, Jesus, and even the gymnosophists (see Kozlowski, “Polycarp as a Christian Gymnosophist,” in Studia Patristica, Vol. LI [ed. Allen Brent; Leuven: Peeters, 2011], 15–22).

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II. The Talented Mr. Polemo For our knowledge of Polemo’s life we rely primarily on Philostratus, who wrote in the first half of the third century.17 Apart from Philostratus’ Vit. soph. the only literary sources we possess are an Arabic translation of Polemo’s Physiognomy, a Greek paraphrase of that work by Adamantius dated to ca. 300, and an anonymous Latin treatise (ca. 400) that is greatly indebted to Polemo’s Physiognomy.18 Only two of his declamations survive.19 These sources offer us only glimpses of Polemo’s life; by and large we must depend on Philostratus’ depiction of Polemo. The reliability of Philostratus has been the subject of some debate, but epigraphical studies have done much to improve scholarly opinion of his accuracy in reporting the traditions available to him.20 Indeed, in the specific case of Polemo there is epigraphical evidence that corroborates aspects of Philostratus’ portrayal.21 Polemo was more than a “virtuoso rhetor with a big public reputation.”22 Polemo represented the city before three emperors (Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius) and through his mediation Hadrian was swayed from his former preference  See below, n. 32.

17

18 For texts, translations, and full discussion see the edition edited by Simon Swain, Seeing the

Face, Seeing the Soul: Polemon’s Physiognomy from Classical Antiquity to Medieval Islam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). For a discussion of physiognomy in the Roman Empire, and especially during the Second Sophistic, see Tamsyn Barton, Power and Knowledge: Astrology, Physiognomics, and Medicine Under the Roman Empire (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994), 95–132 and Elizabeth C. Evans, Physiognomics in the Ancient World (TAPA n.s. 59, pt. 5; Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1969). The standard collection of physiognomical treatises is the Teubner edition of Richard Foerster, Scriptores Physiognomonici Graeci et Latini (2 vols.; Leipzig: Teubner, 1893). Bruce J. Malina and Jerome H. Neyrey, Portraits of Paul: An Archaeology of Ancient Personality (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996), 100–152, discuss physiognomy in relation to early Christian literature. 19  For text, translation, and commentary, see William W. Reader with the collaboration of Anthony J. Chvala-Smith, The Severed Hand and the Upright Corpse: The Declamations of Marcus Antonius Polemo (SBLTT 42, Greco-Roman Religion 12; Atlanta: Scholar’s Press, 1996). 20  On this question, see C. P. Jones, “The Reliability of Philostratus,” in Approaches to the Second Sophistic: Papers Presented at the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Philological Association (ed. G. W. Bowersock; University Park, Pa.:American Philological Association, 1974), 11–16; Simon Swain, “The Reliability of Philostratus’s ‘Lives of the Sophists,’” CA 10 (1991): 148–163; Bernadette Puech, Orateurs et sophistes grecs dans les inscriptions d’époque impériale (Textes et Traditions 4; Paris: Libraire Philosophique J. Vrin, 2002); Graham Anderson, Philostratus: Biography and Belles Lettres in the Third Century A. D. (London and Dover, N. H.: Croom Helm, 1986), 175–97. Other important, more general studies of Philostratus include Bowie and Elsner, Philostratus; Alain Billault, L’Universe de Philostrate (Collection Latomus 252; Bruxelles: Latomus, 2000); Jaap-Jan Flinterman, Power, Paideia & Pythagoreanism: Greek Identity, Conceptions of the Relationship between Philosophers and Monarchs and Political Ideas in Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius (Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1995). 21 Peuch, Orateurs et sophistes grecs, 396–406. 22 Bowersock’s influential definition of the sophist of the Second Sophistic (Greek Sophists in the Roman Empire [Oxford: Clarendon, 1969], 13). On Bowersock’s and other scholars’ conceptualization of the Second Sophistic, cf. note 9 above.

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for Ephesus and donated ten million drachmai to Smyrna.23 This stunning donation funded a corn-market, the “most spectacular” gymnasium in all of Asia, and a massive imperial temple (Vit. soph. 531).24 This donation contributed greatly to Smyrna’s flourishing in the second century until the earthquake of 178 c.e.25 Polemo’s connection with the imperial house most likely resulted in a priesthood at the imperial temple in the wake of Hadrian’s conferral of the much-envied second neōkoria of Smyrna in 124 c.e.26 Polemo also worked as a civic stratēgos and was among the leading politicians of Smyrna. Philostratus notes that Polemo was influential in establishing a harmonious government in Smyrna (Vit. soph. 531). Polemo’s prominence was such that when Hadrian finally completed the Olympieion in Athens in early 129 c.e., a project that had been underway for several hundred years, it was Polemo who was invited to give the oration at the sacrifice to consecrate the temple (Vit. soph. 533). As Grant Boswell notes: “This invitation gave Polemo pride of place among the Sophists of the day.”27 The numismatic evidence also indicates Polemo’s prestige. In addition to being named with Hadrian and the Empress Sabina on several coins,28 Polemo’s name appears on a medallion along with Hadrian’s favorite Antinoos, to whom Polemo had dedicated a statue shortly after Antinoos’ untimely death in 130.29 Furthermore, in a letter to Fronto, Marcus Aurelius gave a (critical) review of Polemo’s oratory but nonetheless referred to him as “a man of such great fame” (tantae gloriae vir 23 On the effect of Hadrian’s benefaction upon the social status of Polemo and the city of Smyrna, see Mary T. Boatwright, Hadrian and the Cities of the Roman Empire (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 157–62. 24  The temple that Philostratus describes was “probably the neocoros temple that Hadrian proposed and the senate ratified for Smyrna … The temple was apparently dedicated originally to Zeus Akraios … In Smyrna Hadrian was identified with Zeus” (Boatwright, Hadrian, 160). For a mid-second century description of Smyrna, see Aelius Aristides, Or. 17. Charles A. Behr conjecturally dates this oration to 156 c.e. See P. Aelius Aristides: The Complete Works: Volume II: Orations XVII–LIII (trans. Charles A. Behr; Leiden: Brill, 1981), 356, n. 1. 25  Cecil John Cadoux, Ancient Smyrna: A History of the City from the Earliest Times to 324 A. D. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1938), 279–84. Soon after the devastating earthquake, Aelius Aristides championed the Smyrnean cause before Marcus Aurelius and was influential in securing funding for its restoration (Vit. soph. 582). Several speeches of Aristides concern Smyrna (Or. 17), the earthquake (Or. 18–19) and its restoration (Or. 20–21). 26  Maud W. Gleason, Making Men: Sophists and Self-presentation in Ancient Rome (Prince­ ton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 23. Cadoux, Ancient Smyrna, 257 notes that “Twice Neokoros” became a frequent self-designation for the city alongside “Hadriana Smyrna.” 27 Boswell, “Marcus Antonius Polemo,” 289. 28  Cadoux, Ancient Smyrna, 259–60. See A Catalogue of the Greek Coins in the British Museum: Vol. 14, Ionia (ed. Reginald Stuart Poole; Bologna: A. Forni, 1963), 277–78. For a recent study that looks at the early Christian response to the cult of Antinoos, see Trevor W. Thompson, “Provenance of ΠΙΣΤΙΣ:
Celsus and Origen on Belief in Antinoos and Jesus,” in Credible, Incredible: The Miraculous in the Ancient Mediterranean (ed. Tobias Nicklas and Janet E. Spittler; WUNT 1/321; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck), 143–72. 29 Sebastian Heath, “A Box Mirror Made from Two Antinous Medallions of Smyrna,” American Journal of Numismatics 18 (2nd ser.) (2006): 63–74.

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[Ad M. Caes. 2.5]).30 In Philostratus’ words, Smyrna’s citizens “placed on the head of Polemo all the local honorary wreaths, having voted the most enviable local distinctions to him and his family.”31 In brief, Polemo was considered to be “the best man” (ἄριστος ἀνήρ) of Smyrna (Vit. soph. 534).

III. Polycarp and Polemo A direct literary relationship between Mart. Pol. and Vit. soph. is not likely. The dating of both texts is debated and there is no clear evidence that either author was aware of the other.32 There is also no direct evidence that Polycarp and Po30 On Marcus Aurelius’ criticism and the question of whether he would later change his mind about Polemo, see Michel P. J. van den Hout, A Commentary on the Letters of M. Cornelius Fronto (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 77–78. Cf. also the two epigrams of Ammianus that mention Polemo, Anth. Pal. 11.180 and 11.181. 31  Πάντας τοὺς οἴκοι στεφάνους ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ Πολέμωνος κεφαλὴν συνήνεγκαν, αὐτῷ τε ψηφισάμενοι καὶ γένει τὰ οἴκοι ζηλωτά (Vit. soph. 530). 32 Vit. soph. was likely composed in Athens, where Philostratus spent his final years, between 237/238 (if dedicated to Gordian I, as argued by Ivars Avotins, “The Date and the Recipient of the ‘Vitae Sophistarum’ of Philostratus,” Hermes 106 [1978]: 242–247) and 242/243 (if dedicated to Gordian III, as argued by C. P. Jones, “Philostratus and the Gordiani,” Mediterraneo antico 5 [2002]: 759–767). We may surmise that Philostratus’ work on the illustrious sophists of Smyrna and elsewhere, once published, would not have taken long to reach that center of sophistic activity. Philostratus himself probably visited Smyrna. As Rife notes, he “must have spent considerable time in … Smyrna, where he notes graves” (“The Deaths of the Sophists: Philostratean Biography and Elite Funerary Practices” in Bowie and Elsner, Philostratus, 100–29, 104). While it may be the case that Philostratus wrote his Vita Apollonii in part in reaction to the rising tide of Christianity (see, e. g., Simon Swain, “Defending Hellenism: Philostratus, In Honour of Apollonius,” in Apologetics in the Roman Empire: Pagans, Jews, and Christians [ed. M. J. Edwards, et al.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999], 157–96), there is no reason to think that he was aware of Mart. Pol. But did the author of Mart. Pol. know of Vit. soph.? The dating of Mart. Pol. is even more hotly debated than that of Vit. soph. Many scholars date the text to just after Polycarp’s death, including Lightfoot, Barnes, Musurillo, Schoedel, Bisbee, Buschmann, and Dehandschutter. Others push the date into the reign of Marcus Aurelius (ca. 177) to allow for the rise of Montanism (Grégoire and Orgels). For discussion, see Bart Ehrman, Apostolic Fathers (LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), 362. In 1990 Silvia Ronchey (Indagine sul martirio di San Policarpo: Critica storica e fortuna agiografica di un caso giudiziario in Asia Minore [Nuovi studi storici 6; Rome: Istituto Italiano per il Medio Evo, 1990]), argued for a late third century date (260–280 c.e.), but her arguments were largely rejected (cf. reviews by T. D.  Barnes, JTS 43 [1992]: 237–38; Dennis Trout, Spec 68 [1993]: 251–53; and Jan den Boeft and Jan Bremmer, “Notiunculae Martyrologicae V,” VC 49 [1995]: 146–64, esp. 146–51). Most recently, Candida Moss has made the case for an early third century date (though she allows for the possibility that the text was redacted in the 4th century), and considers it “possible, even probable, that the author of Mart. Pol. had some form of literary material at his disposal” (574). She concludes her article by saying that “While it is possible that the text is a deeply theological second-century version of events, a number of elements – the rhetorical use of first-person reports, the legal incongruities, the Biblical parallelism, the use of the term ‘Catholic Church’, the behavior of Quintus, the apologia for the absence of relics, the inventio-styled epilogues, the concern about the status of the martyrs, and the lack of early witnesses to the account – suggest

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lemo knew one another. It is rather improbable, however, that Polycarp and the author of Mart. Pol.33 did not know of M. Antonius Polemo.34 Polemo was an enormously important figure in Smyrnean society in the second century, and his legacy undoubtedly persisted into the third century.35 This is abundantly attested by the literary monument of Philostratus’ Vit. soph. and the inscriptions,36 putative burial sites37 and a statue (ἄγαλμα).38 Polemo’s reputation and Smyrna’s status as sophistic city par excellence suggest that the death of Polycarp and its depiction in Mart. Pol. may be illuminated by examining the cultural phenomena of the Second Sophistic in general, and the life of Polemo in particular. We are not the first to associate the traditions of Polycarp and Polemo. The author of the Martyrdom of Pionius reported that Pionius was arrested on the that the text was composed later, perhaps in the first half of [the] third century” (“On the Dating of Polycarp: Rethinking the Place of the Martyrdom of Polycarp in the History of Christianity,” EC 1 [2010]: 539–74, here 573–4). Moss’s dating has been accepted by Bart Ehrman, Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in Early Christian Polemics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 497–502. On balance the argument for a later date (early third century or perhaps even later) seems to us the most likely, but the resolution of this question is ultimately of limited consequence for the argument advanced in the present paper since we do not posit literary dependency one way or the other. 33 The letter is ostensibly written by the “ekklēsia of God sojourning at Smyrna” (Mart. Pol. prescr.), and at several points a collective “we” emerges as the author (e. g., 1.1; 2.1; 9.1; 15.1–2; 17.2–3; 18.2; 20.1). Moss, “Dating of Polycarp,” 544–47 argues that at several points in the narrative the strategic use of the first person is meant to simulate eyewitness testimony and thereby authenticate miraculous accounts. Michael W. Holmes has recently revived the argument that Marcion of Smyrna (Mart. Pol. 20.1) is the “primary author of the letter” in “Recovering a ‘Lost’ Author: Marcion of Smyrna,” HBT 31 (2009): 111–122. 34  Thomas Witulski (Die Johannesoffenbarung und Kaiser Hadrian: Studien zur Datierung der neutestamentlichen Apokalypse [FRLANT 221; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007], 219–237) has argued that the “beast rising up from the earth” (Rev 13:11) is a reference to M. Antonius Polemo. If he is right, this would suggest that Polemo was a reasonably well-known figure in Christian circles of western Asia Minor. Cf. Robert M. Royalty’s comment that sophists such as Nicetes, Scopelian and Polemo “could have been known by reputation to the Christian audience of Revelation” (The Streets of Heaven: The Ideology of Wealth in the Apocalypse of John [Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1998], 113). 35  Even beyond that, his legacy continued to exert influence on pagan and Christian orators, including Gregory of Nazianzen, see R. R. Ruether, Gregory of Nazianzus: Rhetor and Philosopher (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), 20; Marie-Henriette Quet, “Le sophiste M. Antonius Polémon de Laodicée, éminente personnalité politique de l’Asie romaine du II siècle,” in Les élites et leurs facettes: Les élites locales dans le monde hellénistique et romain (ed. M. Cébeillac-Gervasoni, et al.; Rome and Clairmont-Ferrand: École française de Rome; Presses universitaires Blaise-Pascal, 2003), 401–33. 36  Three extant inscriptions mention Polemo, two from Smyrna and one from Pergamum. See Puech, Orateurs et sophistes grecs, 396–406. 37 Philostratus knew of at least three alleged burial sites for Polemo in Smyrna: the garden of the Temple of Virtue, a small temple not far from the sea beneath a statue of Polemo, and the courtyard of his house, also beneath a (bronze) statue (Vit. soph. 543). On these options, see Rife, “The Deaths of the Sophists.” The actual burial site, Philostratus maintains, was not in Smyrna, but in Polemo’s native Laodicea (ibid.). 38 Vit. soph. 543.

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anniversary of Polycarp’s martyrdom (Mart. Pion. 2.1; Mart. Pol. 21). The person who arrested him was named Polemo and was a relative of the famous M. Antonius Polemo.39 The later Polemo was a temple warden (ὁ νεώκορος), and the temple of which he was warden was “ohne Zweifel der von dem berühmten Sophisten dem Kaiser Hadrian geweihte.”40 The arrest of a disciple of Polycarp and purported copyist of the text commemorating Polycarp’s martyrdom (Mart. Pol. 22.3) on the anniversary of that event by a direct descendant of Polemo, the νεώκορος of “Polemo’s temple,” makes it all but certain that Polycarp and Polemo were associated by the author of Mart. Pion.41 When juxtaposing Polemo and Polycarp, the comparison is necessarily almost entirely restricted to literary sources, in particular to Vit. soph. and Mart. Pol. Apart from a few general points, it is virtually impossible to determine to what extent these literary depictions match the historical personae of Polemo and Polycarp. Reading the traditions about both men side by side reveals a number of instances that demonstrate their very different ways of inhabiting the same world. Of first importance, perhaps, are the great disparities in the depictions of how the two contemporaries were treated by the Smyrnean civic community. Whereas the Smyrneans accorded Polemo all possible honors,42 they loudly called for Polycarp’s death (Mart. Pol. 12.2–3). Philostratus emphasizes Polemo’s sense of entitlement and his elite status, and some of his examples reveal a sharp contrast 39 Philostratus states that “the house of Polemo died with Polemo” (Vit. soph. 544) and he considers only Hermocrates, the great-grandson of Polemo, to be worthy of account (cf. Vit. soph. 608–612). The reality, however, was quite a bit more complicated, as may be seen even from Vit. soph. itself. Philostratus elsewhere notes that “even now many of consular rank belong to Polemo’s family” (ἡ μὲν δὴ τοῦ Πολέμωνος οἰκία πολλοὶ ὕπατοι καὶ ἔτι [Vit. soph. 530]). This is one of a number of points where there is some tension in Philostratus’ account of Polemo (cf. nn. 42 and 43 below). The family of M. Antonius Polemo remained quite important in Smyrnean society (see Peter Thonemann, The Maeander Valley: A Historical Geography from Antiquity to Byzantium [Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011], 214–17). Even if they may not have amounted to much individually, they inherited various rights and privileges. Cf. Vit. soph. 611, where Hermocrates says: “Crowns, exemptions, maintenance at the public expense, the purple and the priesthood our (great-?)-grandfather handed down to his descendants” (στεφάνους μὲν [ἔφη] καὶ ἀτελείας καὶ σιτήσεις καὶ πορφύραν καὶ τὸ ἱερᾶσθαι ὁ πάππος ἡμῖν τοῖς ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ παρέδωκεν). 40  Willy Stegemann, “Polemon (7),” RE 21.2:1288. 41  A late third century dating for Mart. Pion. is supported by T. D. Barnes, “Pre-Decian Acta Martyrum,” JTS 19 (1968): 528–31; Herbert Musurillo, The Acts of the Christian Martyrs (Oxford: Clarendon, 1972), xxviii–xix; Jan den Boeft and Jan Bremmer, “Notiunculae Martyrologicae III: Some Observations on the Martyria of Polycarp and Pionius,” VC 39 (1985): 122; Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (New York: Knopf, 1987), 460–68; Louis Robert, Le martyre de Pionios prêtre de Smyrne (ed. G. W. Bowersock and C. P. Jones; Washington, D. C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1994). For important cautionary remarks, see E. Leigh Gibson, “Jewish Antagonism or Christian Polemic: The Case of the  Martyrdom of Pionius,” JECS 9 (2001): 342–347. 42 Although cf. Vit. soph. 533, where Philostratus reports that the Smyrneans once accused Polemo of having privately spent much of the money granted to the city by the Emperor.

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with the depiction of Polycarp’s behavior. According to Philostratus, Polemo was not shy about his status and wealth and at times displayed extraordinary arrogance.43 When the future emperor and then proconsul Antoninus Pius had taken up impromptu residence in Polemo’s home (Vit. soph. 534), which was the “best house in Smyrna” (οἰκία ὡς ἀρίστη τῶν κατὰ τὴν Σμύρναν), Polemo “forced Antoninus to move to another house” (συνηνάγκασε  Ἀντωνῖνον ἐς ἑτέραν οἰκίαν μετασκευάσασθαι). By contrast, Polycarp was moved to another house not once but twice, and to modest farms at that (ἀγρίδιον [Mart. Pol. 5.1, 6.1]). Not only was he moved from one house to another, but he even welcomed the intruders in his home and offered them extraordinary hospitality (Mart. Pol. 7.2). Polemo travelled in a Phrygian or Gallic chariot with silver-bridled horses at the head of a long train of baggage-animals, many horses and slaves, and various breeds of hunting dogs.44 At least part of the expenses of this were probably paid for, because Polemo was granted libera legatio by Trajan (Vit. soph. 532). By contrast, Polycarp once caught a free ride on a chariot as well, but was unceremoniously kicked to the curb by its owners (Mart. Pol. 8.3). Philostratus suggests in various ways that Polemo, like Mart. Pol.’s Polycarp, had a special relationship with the divine. He states that Polemo claimed that he did not speak “without divine aid” (μὴ ἀθεεί [Vit. soph. 533, cf. Mart. Pol. 9.2, where the Christians are labeled ἄθεοι]) at the consecration of the temple of Olympian Zeus at Athens. Years later, the sophist Hippodromus of Thessaly was praised by “the Greeks,” who “compared him to some degree even with Polemo” (καί που καὶ τῷ Πολέμωνι ὁμοιούντων αὐτόν), evidently a very high form of praise. Hippodromus responded: “Why do you liken me to immortals?” (τί μ’ ἀθανάτοισιν ἐΐσκεις;). With this response, Philostratus comments, Hippodromus did not “deprive Polemo of being considered a divine man” (τὸν Πολέμωνα ἀφελόμενος τὸ νομίζεσθαι θεῖον ἄνδρα [Vit. soph. 616]). According to Philostratus, then, at least in later generations, Polemo was considered a theios anēr and one of the “immortals.” Polycarp is similarly depicted as a “godly” man (θεοπρεπής [Mart. Pol. 7.3]), a characterization demonstrated when he submits himself to the will and foreknowledge of God in his willingness to be martyred (Mart. Pol. 14.2). Polycarp’s religiosity would, of course, have been considered to 43  “For indeed, Polemo was so arrogant that he conversed with cities as their superior, with emperors as one not inferior to them, and with the gods as his equals” (ὑπέρφρων γὰρ δὴ οὕτω τι ὁ Πολέμων, ὡς πόλεσι μὲν ἀπὸ τοῦ προὔχοντος, δυνασταῖς δὲ ἀπὸ τοῦ μὴ ὑφειμένου, θεοῖς δὲ ἀπὸ τοῦ ἴσου διαλέγεσθαι [Vit. soph. 535]). Cf. later in 535 for his witty repost to the deity Asclepius, and his casual expectation of extraordinary speaker’s fees in 538. However, Philostratus also notes instances where Polemo appeared more modest (e. g., Vit. soph. 536). 44 Philostratus mentions that the sophist Adrian the Phoenician similarly traveled to his lectures in a carriage with silver-mounted bridles (ἀργυροχάλινον ὄχημα [Vit. soph. 587]). Pliny the Elder (Nat. 34.162–3) was outraged by the luxurious adornment of carriages that was considered stylish in his day. See Simon Swain, “Polemon’s Physiognomy,” in idem, Seeing the Face, 159, n. 130.

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be quite at odds with that of Polemo. Indeed, it seems likely that atheism is the implicit charge against Polycarp in Mart. Pol. 9.2, since the proconsul wishes him to disassociate himself from “the atheists,” i. e., the Christians, by affirming that “Caesar is Lord” (κύριος καῖσαρ [8.2]).45 Polemo’s reputation as an immortal brings us to another interesting intersection with Mart. Pol.: the narrative focus on their noble, protracted, and voluntary deaths.46 While he wasn’t burned alive like Polycarp, Polemo also preferred an extended and dramatic way of dying: he was buried alive, choosing to die by starvation in order to be free of his excruciating rheumatism (Vit. soph. 537; cf. 540).47 The depictions of these deaths in Mart. Pol. and Vit soph. are both designed to illustrate the character of the protagonists. The extended narration of the successive attempts to kill Polycarp once he has bid the proconsul to get on with it (cf. ἀλλὰ τί βραδύνεις; φέρε ὃ βούλει [Mart. Pol. 11.2]) provides a platform for three further and successively longer utterances by Polycarp (12.3, 13.3, 14.1–3). The fire, of course, ultimately failed to kill Polycarp and he was finally executed by a Roman centurion with a ξιφίδιον (16.1).48 This execution conformed to the recommendations of Polemo, who thought the worst offenders, including “sacrilegious persons” (ἱερόσυλοι), deserved “a judge with a sword” (ξίφος [Vit. soph. 532]).49 45 See, e. g., Hartog, Polycarp’s Epistle, 282, 297. Leonard L. Thompson, “The Martyrdom of Polycarp: Death in the Roman Games,” JR 82 (2002): 44–46 argues that the charge of atheism against Polycarp suggested not only denial of the Roman deities but an implicit rejection of the pax deorum and therefore an insidious threat to the “political fabric” of the Roman empire. For a discussion of the religious diversity of Smyrna (and Sardis), see Richard S. Ascough, “GrecoRoman Religions in Sardis and Smyrna,” in Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Sardis and Smyrna (ed. idem; Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2005), 40–52. 46 Noble death was also a topic on which Polemo gave public discourses. Two declamations (μελέται) of Polemo have been preserved in which he deals with the heroic deaths of Cynegrius and Callimachus at the Battle of Marathon. Reader (The Severed Hand, 39–40) suggests that while the valor of the heroes Cynegrius and Callimachus were standard topics of declamation (cf. Aristides, Or. 13.88; Lucian, Jupp. trag. 32; Libanius, Decl. 11.1.2.; 14.1.14; 19.1.13), Polemo’s particular contribution was his bombastic emphasis on the miraculous by having the severed hands and the upright corpse continue fighting. 47  George A. Kennedy (A New History of Classical Rhetoric [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994], 238) is no doubt justified in seeing this as “the most bizarre anecdote in Lives of the Sophists.” The Suda (s. v. Πολέμων [Π 1889]) says of Polemo: “He died at fifty-six years of age, having put himself in the tomb and starved himself to death because he was afflicted by arthritis.” Cited by Rife, “Deaths of the Sophists,” 125, n. 82. Rife comments that “The tone of the whole episode teeters between despair and absurdity” (126). 48  The Eusebian text reads ξίφος at this point (cf. Mart. Pol. 2.4, where some manuscripts have ξίφη). Sara Parvis notes that it “is easy to imagine Eusebius changing the first [ξιφίδιον] to the second [ξίφος] in the interests of plausibility” (“The Martyrdom of Polycarp,” in The Writings of the Apostolic Fathers [ed. P. Foster; London: T & T Clark, 2007], 134). The blazing fire around Polycarp (Mart. Pol. 15.1) would have made the use of a dagger ill-advised. 49 Weidmann also notes this connection with Polemo (Polycarp and John, 75) with reference to the Coptic Harris Fragments on Polycarp (63r l.5).

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Polemo is depicted by Philostratus as likewise speechifying until the very last moment, effectively becoming his own funeral orator.50 As he was being sealed into the tomb, he exclaimed to those setting the stone in place, “Bring it! Bring it! May not the sun see me silent!” (ἔπαγε, ἔπαγε, μὴ γὰρ ἴδοι με σιωπῶντα ἥλιος) and to his wailing friends, “Give me a body, and I shall declaim!” (δότε μοι σῶμα καὶ μελετήσομαι [Vit. soph. 544]). Polemo could not bring himself to relinquish the honor of the funerary oration to someone else, but defiantly continued declaiming at his own grave, and even beyond. For, Philostratus mentions, even after death his written declamations continued to persuade Antoninus Pius, as though he had “returned to life” (cf. ἀναβεβιωκέναι, Vit. soph. 539–540). Polycarp and Polemo both generated a fair deal of controversy after their deaths. In both cases there is evidence of competing claims for their bodily remains. In the case of Polycarp, the “evil one,” “the Jews” and the local authorities conspire to keep the corpse out of the hands of the Christians (Mart. Pol. 17.2). Philostratus reports that in the case of Polemo, several places were claimed to house his bodily remains, one of which was a small temple containing a statue of Polemo (Vit. soph. 543). Polemo’s enduring importance after death is matched by Polycarp (cf. Mart. Pol. 18.2–3), albeit for very different reasons. These examples suggest that it is possible to see in Mart. Pol. the negotiation of Polycarp’s image vis-à-vis the sophistic elite of Smyrna. He is depicted as a man who shares a number of cultural commitments with contemporaries such as Polemo, but in many other respects contrasts sharply with them. It is worth noting that Polemo represented many of the various aspects of Smyrnean society with which Polycarp came into conflict. Polemo represented not only the rhetorical and cultural world of Smyrna, but was also directly involved in both the imperial cult (cf. the question “why is it such a bad thing to say ‘Caesar is Lord’?” [8.2] and the demand that Polycarp swear by the genius of the emperor [9.2, 10.1]) and the provincial administrative apparatus. In that connection it is remarkable that the names of the police officer (εἰρήναρχος) Herodes and his father Nicetes (Mart. Pol. 6.2, 8.2, 17.2, 21.1) are also the names of famous sophists of the time who lived and/or worked in Smyrna,51 and that the proconsul Statius Quadratus 50 Cf. Lucian, Peregr. 32: ἀπῆλθον μακρὰ χαίρειν φράσας θανατιῶντι σοφιστῇ τὸν ἐπιτάφιον ἑαυτοῦ πρὸ τελευτῆς διεξιόντι (“I departed after bidding a lengthy farewell to the suicidal sophist, who was delivering his own funeral oration before his death.”). It is perhaps worth noting that several similarities have been observed between Polycarp and Peregrinus. See Hartog, Polycarp’s Epistle, 177–8, 213; Kozlowksi, “Polycarp as a Christian Gymnosophist,” 20–21. 51 On the sophists Nicetes and Herodes, see above p. 213. Lightfoot (Apostolic Fathers 2.3:374) and Randell (“The Date of S. Polycarp’s Martyrdom,” in Studia Biblica: Essays in Biblical Archaeology and Criticism and Kindred Subjects, Vol. 1 [ed. S. R. Driver; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1885], 175–207, 197) already noted a possible connection with the famous Smyrnean sophist by the name of Nicetes. It would not be unusual for a sophist to be an εἰρήναρχος; Aelius Aristides states that “In those times there was sent to the governors from each city each year the names of the ten leading men. The governor had to examine these and appoint one, whomever he approved, from each group, as police commissioner” (ἐπέμπετο τοῖς ἡγεμόσι κατ’ ἐκείνους

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(Mart. Pol. 21) was himself a sophist who merited inclusion in Philostratus’ Vit soph.52 These names constitute an example of the robust allusiveness of Mart. Pol., for while “Herodes” would certainly call to mind Herod Antipas for the reader familiar with the Lukan passion narrative,53 for the reader aware of contemporary Smyrnean culture the names Nicetes and Herodes resonate with the well-known sophists who bore the same names.54 Either association underscores the essentially adversarial role of these individuals to Polycarp in Mart. Pol., but they generate, or rather implicitly invite the reader, to a multi-layered reading of the narrative. The many resonances with the passion of Jesus in the canoniτοὺς χρόνους ἀφ’ ἑκάστης πόλεως ἑκάστου ἔτους ὀνόματα δέκα ἀνδρῶν τῶν πρώτων. ταῦτα ἔδει σκεψάμενον τὸν ἡγεμόνα ἕνα ὃν προκρίνειεν ἐξ ἁπάντων καθιστάναι φύλακα τῆς εἰρήνης, Sacred Tales 4.72 [ed. Jebb 338], tr. Behr). Behr notes: “The name of the office was εἰρηνάρχης, which Aristides avoids as not an Attic word” (Complete Works 2:439, n. 124). Aristides himself was nominated to be the police officer of the Mysian town Hadriani (4.72). 52 This is assuming that the proconsul Quadratus of Mart. Pol. is the same as Κοδρατίων ὁ ὕπατος, the sophist in the style of Favorinus discussed in Vit. soph. 576. The “orator Quadratus” who became governor mentioned by Aelius Aristides (Sacred Tales 4.63) may well be the same person. See Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers 2.3:368–69; Bowersock, Greek Sophists, 84–85; Robert M. Grant, Greek Apologists of the Second Century (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1988), 53; Hill, Lost Teaching, 129; Hartog, Polycarp’s Epistle, 329; John Behr, Irenaeus: Identifying Christianity (Christian Theology in Context; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 59. Cf. Mart. Pion., where Polemo and a series of others, one of whom was a reputed orator (17.1), attempt to persuade Pionius to sacrifice, just as Polycarp before him was urged. Laurent Pernot reads the confrontation between Pionius and Polemo and the orator Rufinus as a direct example of Pionius’ participation in and challenge to the rhetorical culture of the Second Sophistic (“Saint Pionios, Martyr et Orateur” in Du héros païen au saint chrétien: Actes du colloque, Strasbourg, 1er–2 décembre 1995 [ed. Laurent Pernot and Gérard Freyburger; Paris: Institut d’études augustiniennes, 2007], 120–1). See also Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians, 465–79. 53  David E. Aune (“Martyrdom of Polycarp,” in The Westminster Dictionary of New Testament and Early Christian Literature and Rhetoric [Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2003], 296) gives a representative list of the many similarities between the New Testament passion narratives and Mart. Pol., though more could be adduced: (1) Polycarp enters Smyrna on a donkey (Mart. Pol. 8.1; cf. Mark 11:1–10; Matt 21:1–11; Luke 19:28–36), (2) prays for the churches (Mart. Pol. 5.1; cf. John 17:1–26 where Jesus prays for the disciples), (3) is betrayed by two servants of his own household after torture (Mart. Pol. 6.1–2; cf. Mark 14:10–11, 44–46; Matt 26:14–16, 47–50; Luke 22:3–6, 47–49; John 18:2–5), (4) hosts a final meal (Mart. Pol. 7.2; cf. Mark 14:22–25; Matt 26:26–29; Luke 22:15–20), (5) prays before arrest (Mart. Pol. 7.2–3; Mark 14:32–43; Matt 26:26–46; Luke 22:40–46; John 17:1–26), (6) is interrogated by Herod (Mart. Pol. 8.2–3; cf. Luke 23:6–12), (7) is interrogated by governor/Pilate (Mart. Pol. 9.1–11.2; cf. Mark 15:1–15; Matt 27:11–14; Luke 23:2–7; John 18:28–19:11), (8) Jews call for his death (Mart. Pol. 12.2–13.1; cf. John 19.12–16; Matt 27:16–23; Mark 15:9–15; Luke 23:20–24), (9) Polycarp arrested on Friday, executed on Sabbath (Mart. Pol. 7.1, 8.1), Jesus crucified on Friday (Luke 23:54; John 19:31), (10) bones/body taken for burial (Mart. Pol. 18.2–3; Matt 27:57–61). Cf. Hartog, Polycarp’s Epistle, 205–6. 54 Rather than identifying Mart. Pol.’s Herodes and Nicetes with their Philostratean namesakes, we suggest that the author chose these names because of their cultural resonances. Cf. J. Albert Harrill’s observation that many of the names of the heroes and heroines in martyr acts are symbolical (“The Domestic Enemy: A Moral Polarity of Household Slaves in Early Christian Apologies and Martyrdoms,” in Early Christian Families in Context: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue [ed. David L. Balch and Carolyn Osiek; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003], 231–54, 251).

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cal gospels that scholars have observed do not constitute the sole or exclusive context in which to situate the narration of Polycarp’s death. The author of Mart. Pol. is negotiating a complex set of motifs and traditions, some of which may be appreciated by appeal to the influence of earlier Christian literature, while others are to be explored with recourse to other contexts, such as contemporary rhetorical practices.

IV. The Martyrdom of Polycarp and the Second Sophistic Moving beyond these general comparative observations, we now turn to a more in-depth analysis of a number of key moments in the trial scene of Polycarp in the stadium (Mart. Pol. 9–12). It is here, when Polycarp enters the public stage, that we would expect to see the particular conventions, expectations and values of the Second Sophistic most immediately reflected in the narrative.

1. (Re)Constructing Ancient Masculinities After scraping his shin but turning towards the stadium “as though having suffered nothing” (ὡς οὐδὲν πεπονθώς [8.3]),55 Polycarp enters and is exhorted by a divine voice: “Be strong, Polycarp, and be a man!” (ἴσχυε, Πολύκαρπε, καὶ ἀνδρίζου [Mart. Pol. 9.1]). The exhortation directly invokes the divine injunction to many biblical heroes,56 but restricting our interpretation to the scriptural  Polycarp’s injury of his shin serves both to demonstrate the rash compulsiveness of Herod and his father Nicetes and to demonstrate Polycarp’s manly disdain for pain. The comparison of characters in martyrologies is often used to assert the true masculinity of the martyrs (Stephanie L. Cobb, Dying to Be Men: Gender and Language in Early Christian Martyr Texts [New York: Columbia University Press, 2008], 80–91). The capacity to endure pain in martyrdom becomes a frequently employed topos (ibid., 65–66), though distinctions may be made as to how it is achieved: supernatural assistance, trance-like oblivion, transformation of pain into pleasure, pain’s effect nullified, etc. Cf. also the Gosp. Pet. 10 which describes Jesus as silent during his crucifixion, “as though having no pain” (ὡς μηδὲν πόνον ἔχων), and Acts 28:5, where Paul, after being bitten by a viper, shook it into the fire and “suffered no harm” (ἔπαθεν οὐδὲν κακόν), cited by Buschmann, Martyrium Polycarpi, 189. The equation of disdain for death and pain with virtue and manliness is demonstrated by Cicero’s Tusc. 2.18.43: “Therefore there ought to be use made of these [i. e., ‘contempt of death and pain’; mortis dolorisque contemptio] if we wish to be full possessors of virtue, or rather if we wish to be men, since from ‘men’ is the name ‘virtue’ derived” (Utendum est igitur his, si virtutis compotes vel potius si viri volumus esse, quoniam a viris virtus nomen est mutuata). The connection between vir and virtus has a counterpart in the etymological play on woman (mulier) and softness (mollier) in Lactantius, Opif. 12.16–17. See Colleen M. Conway, Behold the Man: Jesus and Greco-Roman Masculinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 23. 56 The joining of ἀνδρίζεσθαι and ἰσχύειν in the imperative mood occurs with some regularity in the lxx: Deut 31:6, 7; Josh 1:6, 7, 9, 18, 9:25; 1 Chr 22:13, 28:20; 2 Chr 32:7; 1 Macc 2:64; Dan 10:19. Cf. also 1 Cor 16:13 where ἀνδρίζεσθε is conjoined with κραταιοῦσθε. The “voice coming out of heaven” (φωνὴ ἐξ οὐρανοῦ ἐγένετο) also invokes a biblical motif (Matt 3:17; Mark 1:11; Luke 3:22; John 12:28; Acts 11:9; 2 Pet 1:18; Rev 10:4, 8, 11:12, 14:2, 13, 18:4). 55

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background would be to miss much of its import in the present context. As Maud Gleason in particular has shown, demonstrating and evaluating masculinity was a central preoccupation of the elite during this period.57 Perhaps more than any other sophist, Polemo contributed to the explicit discourse on masculinity. Polemo’s Physiognomy contains a number of sections devoted to the visual interrogation and interpretations of the signs of masculinity and femininity.58 Polemo earnestly exhorts his readers “not to ignore all that I have commanded you regarding the physiognomical scrutiny of the signs of masculinity and femininity,”59 and urges the would-be physiognomist to observe carefully “the gaze, the movement, the voice, and then measure up one part with the other until you come to know where resides precedence (of one over the other).” This careful if inexact calculus is crucially important given the generally opposite valuation of femininity and masculinity in Polemo’s world: I will summarize for you the subject of masculinity and the significance of femininity. The male is the more powerful of these, bolder, less shameful, with a greater tendency to truth and loyalty, more strong-minded, more desirous of honour, and more reverent. The female is the opposite of that kind of nature. She has little boldness, much cunning, and bitter outlook. She hides her thoughts, is contrary, tyrannical, loves quarrelling, and is tough and strong.60

Making Men.  On distinguishing between the masculine and the feminine in the Physiognomy, see Leiden ch. 2 for an extended discussion, but the contrast of various members of the body with those of women occurs throughout (e. g., Leiden ch. 26: “If you see the nose is straight and central with the forehead, praise its owner, and judge for him power, good thinking, and knowledge. The opposite of this nose is similar to the noses of women, and by reason of that judge for it lack of experience and knowledge”; ch. 28: “If there is much flesh on the face, it indicates that he does the deeds of women. Cf. also chs. 27, 40, 49, 50, 61). Cf. the discussion of the construction and derision of the androgynos in Polemo’s Physiognomy by Swain, “Polemo’s Physiognomy,” 187–97. 59  Leiden ch. 2. The translation from the Arabic is that of Roberty Hoyland, “A New Edition and Translation of the Leiden Polemon,” in Swain, Seeing the Face, 329–464, 393. For a discussion of the complex textual history of this text, see Antonella Ghersetti with Simon Swain, “Polemon’s Physiognomy in the Arabic Tradition” in Swain, Seeing the Face, 309–325. The diverse sources of Polemo’s Physiognomy are concisely discussed in the appendix to Leofranc HolfordStrevens, “Aulus Gellius: The Non-Visual Portraitist,” in Portraits: Biographical Representation in the Greek and Latin Literature of the Roman Empire (ed. Mark Edwards and Simon Swain; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 113–16. 60 Leiden ch. 2. This strong dichotomy is in its general outline by no means unique to Polemo, and the idea of females as essentially failed, underbaked, or inverted males was prevalent. Diana M. Swancutt (“Still Before Sexuality: ‘Greek’ Androgyny, the Roman Imperial Politics of Masculinity and the Roman Invention of the Tribas,” in Mapping Gender in Ancient Religious Discourses [ed. Todd C. Penner and Caroline Vander Stichele; Leiden: Brill, 2007], 21) nicely summarizes the point: “Pre-modern Westerners ranked bodies on a hierarchical gender spectrum of relative physical perfection (masculinity); relegated females, as the most imperfect male-bodies, to the bottom of that spectrum; and recognized the existence of ‘middling’ androgynous bodies that possessed masculine and less-perfectly masculine (that is, feminine) physical attributes.” 57 Gleason, 58

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For Polemo and his contemporaries, femininity and masculinity were not stable concepts.61 Since it could be measured by the “gaze, movement, and voice” of the subject, gender was to a considerable degree a matter of performance. It was something that needed to be consciously and actively cultivated. Among the primary opportunities for the performance of masculinity were sophistic declamations, especially prevalent in Smyrna, the sophistic capital of the Roman Empire. The divine command to “be a man” makes excellent sense in that context. It was essential for the sophist to exhibit true masculinity in his oratorical performance. This notion was not revolutionary: rhetorical excellence had long been associated with the culturally and politically gendered idealization of the “real man,” with the Roman statesman being one particularly prominent example of such an ideal.62 As the “manly” art of speechmaking became a very prevalent and highly visible phenomenon during the Second Sophistic, the concern with masculinity became a virtual obsession among the performing elite and their audiences. Masculinity was demonstrated by the rhetorical form and content of a speech, as may be illustrated with an anecdote about Herodes Atticus. When marveled at (θαυμάζεσθαι) for the “forceful flow63 of his speech” (ἡ φορὰ τοῦ λόγου), Herodes said, “Read the declamation of Polemo, and you shall know a real man”64 (τὴν Πολέμωνος … μελέτην ἀνάγνωτε καὶ εἴσεσθε ἄνδρα).65 At least equally important, however, was the appearance and deportment of the orator. There is no better illustration of this than the rivalry between two famous intellectuals of Polycarp’s day: Polemo and Favorinus.66

61  Conway describes the possibility of “gender slippage” as a result of the one-sex conceptualization of sexuality and bodies: “If women were not different in kind, but simply a lesser, incomplete version of men, what was there to keep men from sliding down the axis into the female realm?” (Behold the Man, 18). Cf. Dale B. Martin, The Corinthian Body (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 25–34. 62 According to Quintilian (Inst. 12.1.1), Cato defined the orator as vir bonus dicendi peritus, “a man skilled at speaking.” Erik Gunderson demonstrates the resonance of the term vir with a brief lexicographical comment: “In Latin, a vir is an adult male. But the same word also signifies a man who is a husband or a soldier. Thus, in ‘pregnant’ uses, a man in Latin is a real man, a manly man. The term also designates a position of authority and responsibility: the adult is enfranchised while the child (or slave) is not; the man rules his wife in the household; the soldier is the defender of the safety of the state. In short, the term evokes more than mere gender.” See his “Discovering the Body in Roman Oratory,” in Parchments of Gender: Deciphering the Bodies of Antiquity (ed. Maria Wyke; Oxford: Clarendon Press and Oxford University Press, 1998), 170; idem, Staging Masculinity: The Rhetoric of Performance in the Roman World (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000). 63 LSJ, s. v. φορά A.II.5. 64 For the sense of “a man indeed,” see LSJ, s. v. ἀνήρ A.IV. Cf. n. 62 on the comparable connotations of vir in Latin. 65 Vit. soph. 539. 66 Narrated by Philostratus, Vit. soph. 490–91. Polemo, without naming him, excoriates Favorinus in his Physiognomy at Leiden, ch. 1, A20.

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In this famous and lengthy quarrel, Polemo derided the ostensible effeminacy of Favorinus with acerbic vitriol.67 Philostratus tells us that Favorinus, for his part, engaged the battle of definitions with equal enthusiasm.68 Direct evidence for Polemo’s polemical use of masculinity comes from the Physiognomy in a thinly-veiled reference to the eunuch Favorinus, a man “born without testicles.” Polemo excoriates Favorinus’ effeminacy in the harshest terms: His neck was similar to the neck of a woman, and likewise all the rest of his limbs, and all his extremities were moist, and he would not walk erect, and his limbs and members flaccid. He would take great care of himself and his abundant hair, and he would apply medicaments to his body afterwards. (He would give in) to every cause that incited a passion for desire and sexual intercourse. He had a voice resembling the voice of women and slim lips.69

Keenly aware of the importance of appearance and deportment when appearing in public, Polemo took great care in how he presented himself. Philostratus describes the stage-craft (σκηνή)70 that Polemo employed during his declamations. Relying on a letter from Herodes to Varus, Philostratus gives a vivid description of Polemo’s self-presentation: Now he would come forward for declamations with a face serene and confident, and he always came carried in a litter, since his joints were already ruined [i. e., arthritic]. And he would reflect on the proposed themes, not in public, but rather when he had withdrawn from the crowd for a brief moment. His utterance was clear and taut, and such a marvelous sound71 rang forth from his tongue! (Vit. soph. 537)72

Philostratus emphasizes Polemo’s face, his mode of transport, his capacity for ex tempore declamation, and the quality of his voice. He goes on to describe how Polemo would dramatically leap to his feet at the most exciting parts of his declamation, would round out a period with a smile on his face to indicate how easy it 67 Not all were so harsh in their assessment of Favorinus. See Leofranc Holford-Strevens’s discussion of the different depictions of this sophist by Polemo, Lucian, Philostratus, and Aulus Gellius (“Aulus Gellius: The Non-Visual Portraitist,” 93–116). 68 See Gleason, Making Men, 131–158, esp. 138–145. 69 Leiden, ch. 1, A20. Attacking effeminacy in a male rival was a standard feature of invective. Terms such as κίναιδος and ἀνδρόγυνος were particularly important in sexualized character assassination. See Jennifer Knust, Abandoned to Lust: Sexual Slander and Ancient Christianity [New York: Columbia University Press, 2006], 35–37). 70 According to W. C. Wright, σκηνή includes all of the “ ‘theatrical properties’ of the sophist; his voice, expression, smile, dress, and any mannerism of diction or delivery.” See Philostratus and Eunapius: The Lives of the Sophists (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1921), 574. Polemo’s σκηνή is the object of imitation for Ptolemy Naucratis, who prefers to imitate Polemo’s style rather than that of his own teacher, Herodes Atticus (Vit. soph. 595). 71 Cf. Vit. soph. 564, 612. 72 Παρῄει μὲν ἐς τὰς ἐπιδείξεις διακεχυμένῳ τῷ προσώπῳ καὶ τεθαρρηκότι, φοράδην δὲ ἐσεφοίτα διεφθορότων αὐτῷ ἤδη τῶν ἄρθρων. καὶ τὰς ὑποθέσεις οὐκ ἐς τὸ κοινὸν ἐπεσκοπεῖτο, ἀλλ’ ἐξιὼν τοῦ ὁμίλου βραχὺν καιρόν. φθέγμα δὲ ἦν αὐτῷ λαμπρὸν καὶ ἐπίτονον καὶ κρότος θαυμάσιος οἷος ἀπεκτύπει τῆς γλώττης.

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was for him, and would stamp his foot just like the horse in Homer.73 The walk of a sophist was as important as his talk,74 and so it is somewhat ironic that Polemo attacked Favorinus for the inability to walk erect in light of the fact that his own arthritis made it difficult for him to embody the masculine opposite of Favorinus’ effeminacy. However, it is particularly noteworthy in that connection that when Polemo enters the theater he is able to stand and even jump up and down. His performance is not ultimately hampered even by his physical debilitations. Voice, gaze, walk, deportment and clothing were thus all part of the checklist for scrutiny by an audience that had been habituated to analyze the projection of masculine or feminine characteristics. Close adherence to the conventions, norms and expectations of what an ideal performance looked like was essential for the intellectual attempting to make a manly appearance in public. Thus, when Polycarp enters the stadium, the command to be a man is not just an injunction to face his trial and death in a manly fashion, but also to present himself as a “real man” in his public appearance before the proconsul and the assembled audience.75 We contend that the way the author of Mart. Pol. depicts this scene contributes to the image of Polycarp as a real man, namely one who is aware of and conforms to contemporary expectations about such performances. Once Polycarp has entered the stadium, the narrative focuses on Polycarp’s appearance and deportment (9.2). The narrator draws attention to his age (ἡλικία, also in 7.2), his face (ἐμβριθεῖ τῷ προσώπῳ, also in 12.1), his hand movement (ἐπισείσας αὐτοῖς τὴν χεῖρα) and his gaze (εἰς πάντα τὸν ὄχλον τὸν ἐν τῷ σταδίῳ ἀνόμων ἐθνῶν ἐμβλέψας and ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν). The attention paid to Polycarp’s appearance precisely at the point in the narrative where he enters the public stage must be understood in light of contemporary sophistic conventions.

2. (Old) Age While this is not the first time his advanced age has been noted (see 7.2–376), part of its function in Mart. Pol. 9 is to contribute to the author’s depiction of Polycarp 73 Il. 6.507. The allusion is to the simile drawn for Paris who, fully armored, hastens laughing to battle, like a well-fed horse who breaks his halter and runs stamping on the plain to bathe in the river. The rhetorical handbooks give advice on the appropriate use of stamping one’s feet. See Cicero, De or. 3.59.220; Quintilian, Inst. 11.3.128. 74 See Anthony Corbeill’s chapter “Political Movement: Walking and Ideology in Republican Rome,” in Nature Embodied: Gesture in Ancient Rome (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), 107–139; Gleason, Making Men, 60–62. 75 This exhortation has been described as a foundational link in the martyrological tradition between martyrdom and masculinized athleticism and militarism (Elizabeth A. Castelli, Martyrdom and Memory: Early Christian Culture Making [New York: Columbia University Press, 2004], 62) and as the logical counter-balance to the “debasing and feminizing” that public execution necessarily implied (Knust, Abandoned to Lust, 108). To our knowledge nobody has situated it in the context of the declamatory culture of the Second Sophistic. 76  Ἡλικία is used in Mart. Pol. 3.1 with reference to the noble Germanicus. Does it refer to youth or his old age in that case? Lightfoot, Lake, and Grant have “youth,” Holmes has “youthful-

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in line with conventional notions of the ideal orator.77 Philostratus claims that while fifty-six, which was the (approximate) age at which Polemo reportedly died, is the beginning of “old age” (γῆρας) for other professions, it “still counts as youthfulness for the sophist, because this professional skill, as it grows older, yields wisdom” (σοφιστῇ δὲ νεότης ἔτι, γηράσκουσα γὰρ ἥδε ἡ ἐπιστήμη σοφίαν ἀρτύνει, Vit. soph. 543). Along the same lines, Plutarch includes grey hair (πολιά) among the characteristic of the ideal orator.78 It is no coincidence, then, that the author of Mart. Pol. draws attention to Polycarp’s advanced age precisely at the point that Polycarp is about to address the crowd. It is clear that Polycarp’s age was supposed to impress the audience. Polycarp’s ἡλικία and his “composure” (τὸ εὐσταθές, Mart. Pol. 7.2)79 causes those arresting him to marvel (θαυμάζω) at “such an old man” (τοιοῦτος πρεσβύτης ἀνήρ). Similarly, Polycarp’s lengthy prayer astonishes (ἐκπλήττεσθαι) those listening, with the result that many repent that they had come against “such a god-like old man” (τοιοῦτος θεοπρεπὴς πρεσβύτης, Mart. Pol. 7.3). Both verbs that express the amazement of the onlookers are regularly used in descriptions of crowds during the Second Sophistic.80 Old age and the infirmities that accompanied it could be associated with a decline

ness” and Ehrman has “age,” which is perhaps intentionally ambiguous. It is also worth noting that Holmes translates the exhortation as indirect discourse, while Ehrman uses direct discourse (thus leaving αὐτοῦ untranslated).  Ἡλικία in 4 Macc 8:20 clearly refers to old age. That it is also clearly “old age” for Polycarp is supported by his claim to have served his master for 86 years (9.3) and the fact that he is called an “old man” (πρεσβύτης) at 7.2 and 7.3. 77  A man as old as Polycarp would have been a relatively rare sight in the Roman Empire. See John M. G. Barclay, “There is Neither Old Nor Young? Early Christianity and Ancient Ideologies of Age,” NTS 53 (2007): 225–41, 228. Barclay is rightly cautious about quantifying the demography of ancient societies, but is content to cite the estimates of T. Parkin, Demography and Roman Society (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1992) that indicates that only 4.03 % of the population would have lived beyond the age of 65. The figures listed in (Ps‑)Lucian’s Macrobii, which gives a learned overview of famous men who lived exceptionally long lives (μακρόβιοι), are all eighty years or older. The octogenarians are cited for the benefit of the addressee, Quintillus, who is to learn from their examples (cf. διδασκαλία τις ἐκ παραδειγμάτων) that “it is they who have paid special attention to both body and mind who have reached a most advanced old age with complete health” (οἱ μάλιστα ἑαυτῶν ἐπιμέλειαν ποιησάμενοι κατά τε σῶμα καὶ κατὰ ψυχήν, οὗτοι δὴ εἰς μακρότατον γῆρας ἦλθον σὺν ὑγιείᾳ παντελεῖ [Macr. 2]). 78  Rect. rat. aud. 41c. Polycarp’s gray hair (πολιά) is mentioned in 13.2, if we follow Eusebius’ text, Lightfoot, and the epitome Bios kai Martyrion in ms. BHG 1562. 79  BDAG glosses εὐσταθής as “calmness, composure,” while LSJ has “steadfastness, tranquility.” Buschmann, Martyrium Polycarpi, 183, understands the term to reinforce the depiction of Polycarp’s ὑπομονή, and thus to serve as polemic against the Montanists’ haste to be martyred. On the narrative level, however, its coupling with the term ἡλικία indicates that it serves primarily to depict Polycarp’s stately bearing. 80 Heinrich von Staden, “Galen and the ‘Second Sophistic’,” in Aristotle and After (ed. Richard Sorabji; Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies Sup. 58; London: University of London Press, 1997), 33–54, 51, notes that θαυμάζεσθαι (Cf. Mart. Pol. 2.2, 3.2, 5.1, 7.2, 15.1, 16.1, 2) and ἐκπλήσσεσθαι (Cf. Mart. Pol. 7.3) are “the dominant affective terms” to describe audiences at sophistic displays.

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in masculinity.81 The author of Mart. Pol. indicates in various ways, however, that this was by no means the case for Polycarp.82 Not only does Polycarp not fall down, shaken by the threats made against him (cf. ὥστε οὐ μόνον μὴ συμπεσεῖν ταραχθέντα), but on the contrary he astonishes the proconsul (ἀλλὰ τοὐναντίον τὸν ἀνθύπατον ἐκστῆναι, 12.1) with his firm resolve.83 We may compare Philostratus’ description of Polemo as one suffering from arthritis to such a degree that he had to be transported in a litter, yet “stamping his foot just like the horse in Homer” during his public performances. In both cases, their physical limitations did not diminish their manly performance.

3. Prosōpon The author of Mart. Pol. also draws attention to Polycarp’s facial expression. The face was an important site for theoretical reflection in the Second Sophistic. Polemo, in his Physiognomy, understands the face and the eyes to give the physiognomist the capacity to discern the character of an individual.84 The focus on 81  See Cobb, Dying to Be Men, 76–80. Mary B. Skinner, “Ego mulier: The Construction of Male Sexuality in Catullus,” Helios 20 (1993): 107–30, 111 notes that any loss of vigor due to old age or infirmity could weaken the predominant feature of masculinity, control of oneself and others, and thus be perceived to have a feminizing effect. The reason for this perception is likely due to the association of virility with bodily heat and the drying and cooling of the body with its opposites, whether an overly moist and cool body (female) or a dried out and cool body (an elderly man). See Kyle Harper, From Shame to Sin: The Christian Transformation of Sexual Immorality in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013), 33. 82  Demonstrating the paradoxical virility and manliness of elderly martyrs as a persuasive strategy in 4 Macc is discussed by Stephen D. Moore and Janice Capel Anderson, “Taking it Like a Man: Masculinity in 4 Maccabees,” JBL 117 (1998): 249–73. 83 Cf. the entirely opposite effect that Philiscus the Thessalian’s performance had on Caracalla. Philostratus (Vit. soph. 623) states that he gave offence by his gait (βάδισμα), stance (στάσις), attire (στολή), voice (φωνή), and language (γλῶττα). 84  See Polemo’s discussion of the face and its parts in Leiden ch. 1, A5–23 (eyes), ch. 30, B30 (head), ch. 23, B21–2 (neck), ch. 28, B25 (face), ch. 24, B23 (chin), ch. 25, B26 (mouth and lips), ch. 26, B25 (nose), ch. 27, B26 (forehead and eyebrows), ch. 28, B27 (cheeks), and ch. 29, B29 (ears), ch. 40–1, B37 (hair); Jaś Elsner, “Physiognomics: Art and Text,” in Swain, Seeing the Face, points out that Polemo fails to comment much on teeth, tongue, or eyelashes. Plutarch, in his treatise Peri dysōpias, “Concerning Shamefacedeness,” discusses the “face” as the location at which an individual exhibits their state of soul. To be shamefaced is tantamount to effeminacy and impotence for Plutarch, as is being out of control of oneself (Peri dysōpias 529F; see Swain, “Polemon’s Physiognomy,” 138–44). He defines δυσωπία, “shamefacedness,” as “an excess of shame” and offers some comments which demonstrate the link between facial expression and cognitive/emotive status perceived by one prominent representative of the Second Sophistic. “This is why it is called by the name dysopia, meaning ‘being put out of countenance’, because in this condition, the face (prosōpon somehow displays confusion and debility at the same time as the mind” (Mor. 528E–F). The translation is that of Donald Russell, Plutarch: Selected Essays and Dialogues (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1993). See Swain, “Polemon’s Physiognomy,” 141. Furthermore, in his essay περὶ ἀοργησίας, Plutarch notes that anger puffs and distends the face in an unseemly manner (Mor. 456C).

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Polycarp’s πρόσωπον85 is therefore instructive, especially since it is emphasized in the dramatic depiction of his clever refusal to capitulate to the wishes of the proconsul. The description of Polycarp’s face as “serious” lends further weight to the moment, and is at home in some of Philostratus’ descriptions of the sophists. In Vit. soph. 528, Philostratus notes that “the character of his brows and the gravity of his face revealed Marcus to be a sophist” (τὸ δὲ τῶν ὀφρύων ἦθος καὶ ἡ τοῦ προσώπου σύννοια σοφιστὴν ἐδήλου τὸν Μάρκον). The word describing Polycarp’s face, “ἐμβριθής,” occurs in Vit. soph. 595, where one Athenodorus of Aenus is described as the most illustrious of his city and as being “serious in character” (ἐμβριθὴς δὲ καὶ τὸ ἦθος γενόμενος). It was a characteristic befitting a sophist.86 As we saw in Vit. soph. 537, Polemo had a πρόσωπον that was both “relaxed” (διακεχυμένον) and “confident” (τεθαρρηκός). We may compare this to the depiction of Polycarp’s face, which is first described as “serious” but then as full of “grace” (χάρις).87 The depictions of the facial expressions of both Polycarp and Polemo are meant to convey that they are men in control, both of themselves and of their situation.

4. Hand movement Polycarp’s extending of his hand (χείρ) towards the crowd before he begins speaking (9.2) is also entirely appropriate in the world of the Second Sophistic. The proper use of the hand in oratory is an emphasis in the rhetorical manuals,88 and drew sharp scrutiny during this rhetoric-obsessed era.89 For instance, while  Emphasis is also placed on Polycarp’s face by Ignatius when he says that he glories exceedingly since he was considered worthy of seeing Polycarp’s “blameless face” (ὑπερδοξάζω, καταξιωθεὶς τοῦ προσώπου σου τοῦ ἀμώμου [Ignatius, Pol. 1.1]). A similar expression is used by Ignatius to describe the faces of the Romans whom he addresses (ἐπέτυχον ἰδεῖν ὑμῶν τὰ ἀξιόθεα πρόσωπα [Rom. 1.1]). 86  Further examples include Philostratus’ description of a speech delivered by Demostratus against Herodes Atticus. Philostratus writes, “Now its style of characterization is singular, for the serious manner (τὸ ἐμβριθές) persists from the opening sentences to the end of the speech, but the styles of expression are manifold and on the one hand unlike each other, but on the other worthy of a speech” (Vit. soph. 563). Philostratus extols Dio of Prusa and says: “The character of his philosophy was, moreover, neither vulgar nor ironic, but at times severe (ἐμβριθῶς), and at other times employed, seasoned as it were, with gentleness” (Vit. soph. 487). 87  Mart. Pol. 12.1. 88  [Cicero], Rhet. Her. 3.15.26–27; Cicero, De or. 3.59.220; Quintilian, Inst. 11.3.84–124. Important studies of oratorical gestures include Gregory S. Aldrete, Gestures and Acclamations in Ancient Rome (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999); Corbeill, Nature Embodied; Fritz Graf, ‘‘Gesture and Conventions: The Gestures of Roman Actors and Orators,’’ in A Cultural History of Gesture (ed. Jan Bremmer and Herman Roodenburg; Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), 36–58; Jon Hall, “Cicero and Quintilian on the Oratorical Use of Hand Gestures,” CQ 54 (2004): 143–60. 89 Cf., e. g., the important role that hand gestures play in the evaluation that Aulus Gellius gives of Hortensius, whose actor-like mannerisms earned him ridicule in spite of his oratorical prowess. “In the same way Q. Hortensius, more distinguished than nearly all the orators of his day (except for M. Tullius), because he dressed with great refinement of appearance and 85

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Polemo was presiding at the Olympic games at Smyrna, a tragic actor from the contests once pointed to the ground as he said the words “O Zeus,” and then lifted his hand as he finished the phrase, “and Earth!” Polemo expelled him at once, saying, “This man committed a solecism with his hand” (οὗτος τῇ χειρὶ ἐσολοίκισεν [Vit. soph. 541–42]).90 Philostratus approvingly records how Polemo himself stretched out his hands before delivering a repartee to a certain Varrus: “Polemo jumped up, and holding out his hands (ὑποσχὼν τὼ χεῖρε), said: “Varrus, bring your summons!” (Vit. soph. 541). Another example is found in Philostratus’ account of Lucius. When he learned that Marcus Aurelius attended the classes of Sextus the Boeotian philosopher, “having raised his hand to heaven (ἐξάρας τὴν χεῖρα ἐς τὸν οὐρανόν), he said: ‘O Zeus! The Emperor of the Romans is already growing old, but goes to school with tablet in tow, while my Emperor Alexander died at thirty-two!’” (Vit. soph. 557). Depicting the proper coordination of hand movement with a dramatic pronouncement such as Polycarp’s thus accords nicely with the depiction of Polycarp’s rhetorical poise. The specific gesture that Polycarp makes is described with the phrase ἐπισείειν τὴν χεῖρα, which indicates assent.91 It would seem then that ἐπισείειν τὴν χεῖρα is not a semantically insignificant variant of the more common phrase κατασείειν τὴν χεῖρα,92 but is chosen specifically because it accompanies Polycarp’s wry statement of assent to clothed himself with great consideration and exactness, and when in motion his hands were exceedingly expressive and always gesturing, was assailed with aspersions and shameful reprimands, and many things were said to him, as though to a comic actor, even during cases and judicial harangues.” (Ad eundem modum Q. Hortensius omnibus ferme oratoribus aetatis suae, nisi M. Tullio, clarior, quod multa munditia et circumspecte compositeque indutus et amictus esset manusque eius inter agendum forent argutae admodum et gestuosae, maledictis compellationibusque probris iactatus est multaeque in eum, quasi in histrionem, in ipsis causis atque iudiciis dicta sunt [Noct. Att., 1.5.2]). 90  A law of homology and symmetry governed rhetorical performance. Just as the face and body should be in accord with the text of the speech, so should the hands (Quintilian, Inst. 11.3.67, 106, 122; see Erik Gunderson, “Discovering the Body in Roman Oratory,” 180). 91  LSJ, s. v. ἐπισείω: “ἐ. τὴν χεῖρα, in token of assent or applause”; see also Martin Korenjak, Publikum und Redner: Ihre Interaktion in der sophistischen Rhetorik der Kaiserzeit (Zetemata 104; Munich: Beck, 2000), 89–90. The evidence is mainly derived from Lucian (Dom. 2; Bis acc. 28; Rhet. praec. 22; Pro imag. 4). Assent is of course more commonly expressed by the audience and not by the orator, but gestures of approval were not restricted to the public; Quintilian’s list of about twenty hand gestures (Inst. 11.3.84–124) includes two gestures that conveyed the orator’s approval or agreement (cf. adprobantibus … decorus [11.3.101], adsentatur [11.3.102]). 92 This phrase is often used for the gesture that signaled the audience to be quiet so that the orator could commence his speech (e. g., Acts 12:17: κατασείσας δὲ αὐτοῖς τῇ χειρὶ σιγᾶν; Acts 21:40: κατέσεισεν τῇ χειρὶ τῷ λαῷ· πολλῆς δὲ σιγῆς γενομένης; Josephus, A. J. 8.275: τῇ χειρὶ κατασείσας τὸ πλῆθος καὶ τὸν  Ἱεροβόαμον ἀκοῦσαι πρῶτον αὐτοῦ μεθ’ ἡσυχίας ἠξίωσε. γενομένης δὲ σιωπῆς …; Vita Aesopi 87 [Vita W]: τὴν χεῖρα τῷ ὄχλῳ κατασείσας ᾔτησεν ἡσυχίαν, σιγῆς δὲ γενομένης ἔφη …; Acts Andr. 10: κατέσεισεν αὐτοὺς τῇ χειρὶ σιγᾶν καὶ στὰς ἐπί τινος ὑψηλοῦ τόπου ἤμελλεν ἀνοίγειν τὸ στόμα; Heliodorus, Aethiopica 10: τὴν χεῖρα προτείνας καὶ κατασείων πρὸς ἡσυχίαν τὸ κλυδώνιον τοῦ δήμου κατέστελλε … καὶ « Ὦ παρόντες» ἔλεγεν …).

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the proconsul’s declaration: “Away with the atheists!” It is thus not only Polycarp’s words which effect an ironic capitulation to and transformation of the proconsul’s demand, but also the gesture he makes with his hand.

5. Gaze The emphatic gaze of Polycarp, directed first at the crowd (εἰς πάντα τὸν ὄχλον τὸν ἐν τῷ σταδίῳ ἀνόμων ἐθνῶν ἐμβλέψας) and then to heaven (ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν) would also not have been uncommon in contemporary Smyrna. A moment of staring off before commencing the speech was entirely conventional as it offered the speaker a moment to concentrate and gather his thoughts.93 Philostratus reports that it was customary for Polemo to do so: “Now he, as was his custom, having fixed his gaze upon the thoughts already at hand, launched himself into the speech …” (Vit. soph. 533).94 Such a concentrated gaze was seen as essential for the extempore speaker. As Philostratus puts it in Vit. soph. 528 with respect to Marcus of Byzantium: “he was always training himself in the methods that prepare one for ex tempore speaking. This was evident from the steady gaze of his eyes …” (τοῦτο ἐδηλοῦτο μὲν τῇ τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν στάσει). The gaze could introduce a short remark as well as a long speech. When Herodes Atticus was asked by Marcus Aurelius what he thought of Polemo, “having fixed his gaze (στήσας τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς), Herodes said: ‘On all sides the sound of swiftfooted horses falls on mine ears’” (ὁ  Ἡρώδης “ἵππων μ’” ἔφη “ὠκυπόδων ἀμφὶ κτύπος οὔατα βάλλει …” [Vit. soph. 539]). Admittedly, the phrase ἱστάναι τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς is not used in Mart. Pol. and while the verb βλέπω occurs in comparable situations in Philostratus (cf. Vit. soph. 540, 572, and 626), the language used here in Mart. Pol. is undeniably scriptural. The phrase ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν occurs four times in the New Testament (Matt 14:19; Mark 6:41; 7:34; Luke 9:16), but in light of Polycarp’s simultaneous groaning, this is most likely an allusion to Mark 7:34, where ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν is followed by ἐστέναξεν (“he groaned”).95 To the  Another interpretive option for the gaze of Polycarp is provided by Thompson, “Martyrdom of Polycarp,” 41. He cites Pliny the Elder’s comment (Nat. 11.54.144) on gladiators about to go into combat: “In the training-school of the Emperor Gaius there were 20,000 gladiators, among whom there were only two that did not blink when faced by some threat of danger and were consequently unconquerable” (trans. Rackham, LCL). Pliny, however, highlights the absence of blinking in order to suggest the steely-eyed stare of these exceptional gladiators rather than a steady gaze like Mart. Pol. depicts. Given the immediate context, where Polycarp’s gaze along with his hand gesture precedes his speech, the sophistic context is in our view more directly pertinent. 94  Ὁ δέ, ὥσπερ εἰώθει, στήσας τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς ἐπὶ τὰς ἤδη παρισταμένας ἐννοίας ἐπαφῆκεν ἑαυτὸν τῷ λόγῳ … 95 This example is not considered by Michael W. Holmes in an article that reaches largely negative conclusions about the possibility of identifying particular Gospels as specific intertexts for Mart. Pol. (“The Martyrdom of Polycarp and the New Testament Passion Narratives,” in 93

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best of our knowledge, there is no mention of “groaning” in descriptions of oratorical displays from the period of the Second Sophistic.96 Once more, then, we see how various factors condition the ways in which scriptural intertexts operate in Mart. Pol. Linguistic proximity suggests the gospel quality of Polycarp’s gaze, but on the narrative level, the context of the story in Scripture (in this case, the healing of a deaf man with a speech impediment in Mark 7) does not seem to play a role, and instead the contemporary cultural context lends prevalence to the sophistic significance of the gaze. Polycarp’s gaze is simultaneously biblical and sophistic; verbally it resonates with the gospel narratives, but its placement in the narrative sequence in Mart. Pol. conforms to contemporary sophistic convention.

6. Witticisms and Improvisation When Polycarp finally opens his mouth, he utters just three words. Together they form a clever act of disobedience against the proconsul’s order to denounce the Christians and constitute one of the most dramatic moments of the Martyrdom: Swear by the genius of Caesar, repent! Say, “Away with the atheists!” But Polycarp, when he had looked with a stern face (ἐμβριθεῖ τῷ προσώπῳ) at the whole crowd of lawless gentiles in the stadium and motioned to them with his hand (ἐπισείσας αὐτοῖς τὴν χεῖρα), after groaning and looking up into heaven, said, “Away with the atheists!” (αἶρε τοὺς ἀθέους).97

Here we see Polycarp refuse the command to “repent” in slow, escalating prose, drawn out by the piling up of prepositional phrases and circumstantial participles Trajectories through the New Testament and the Apostolic Fathers [ed. Andrew F. Gregory and C. M. Tuckett; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005], 407–32). 96 In light of the marked lack of a grumble or groan from any of the Smyrnean martyrs in Mart. Pol. 2 (μήτε γρύξαι μήτε στενάξαι τινὰ αὐτῶν), Polycarp’s groan would seem to be incongruent with the indifference to pain expected of the martyr. Indeed, Polycarp’s self-composure had already been highlighted at 5.1 (οὐχ ἐταράχθη) and 8.3 (ὡς οὐδὲν πεπονθώς). The solution to the problem lies in Mark 7:34. There, Jesus, dealing with a deaf-mute, “having looked into heaven, groaned, and said to him: ‘Ephphatha’ which means, ‘be opened’ (ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν ἐστέναξεν καὶ λέγει αὐτῷ· εφφαθα, ὅ ἐστιν διανοίχθητι). Though at first glance complicating the depiction of Polycarp as unflinchingly resolute in the face of temptation and death, this allusion both links Polycarp with Jesus and asserts Polycarp’s defiance of the “lawless gentiles” (ἄνομα ἔθνη, cf. ἄνομος as a designator for gentiles in Acts 2:23, 1 Cor 9:21) in its new context. Polycarp is not groaning in the face of torture, but rather exhibiting, with stern visage and accusing hand, his deep connection to God as he mimics Jesus by looking to heaven and groaning. This allusion thus yields a seamless fusion between Polycarp as self-possessed orator who looks to his audience and motions with his hand and Polycarp as imitator Christi who groans (στενάξας), not at the sensory impairments of one man but at the moral impairments of many, and looks to heaven (ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν) to indicate the addressee worthy of the blasphemy-turned-prayer of retribution: Αἶρε τοὺς ἀθέους. 97  Ὄμοσον τὴν καίσαρος τύχην, μετανόησον, εἰπέ· αἶρε τοὺς ἀθέους. ὁ δὲ Πολύκαρπος ἐμβριθεῖ τῷ προσώπῳ εἰς πάντα τὸν ὄχλον τὸν ἐν τῷ σταδίῳ ἀνόμων ἐθνῶν ἐμβλέψας καὶ ἐπισείσας αὐτοῖς τὴν χεῖρα, στενάξας τε καὶ ἀναβλέψας εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν εἶπεν· αἶρε τοὺς ἀθέους (Mart. Pol. 9.2).

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which distance the subject from the verb, climaxing in a thunderous rejection of “the atheists.” The successive movements of Polycarp draw the reader into a visualization of the dramatic moment, the significance of which we can now more fully appreciate. Polycarp looks to the crowd (ἐμβλέψας), indicates his assent with a gesture (ἐπισείσας … τὴν χεῖρα), groans (στενάξας), lifts his gaze (ἀναβλέψας), and only then does he speak (εἶπεν). Polycarp’s deftly turns on its head the command of the proconsul to say “Away with the atheists!” (9.2), which not only indicates a man of wit who can think on his feet to stymie the godless commands of the proconsul, but also a man of gravitas and rhetorical polish. Such improvisational skills were highly valued during the Second Sophistic. Philostratus frequently comments on his subjects’ ability or inability to improvise ([αὐτο]σχεδιάζειν).98 A sure sign of sophistic competence was the ability to improvise an entire speech on a topic suggested by the audience.99 Briefer off-the-cuff statements were also highly valued. Philostratus often recounts the brief repartees that his sophistic heroes gave to a question or remark. In the case of Polemo, Philostratus devoted an entire section to such responses (Vit. soph. 540–42, cf. 535). He introduces it as follows: “Now, since the things said by illustrious men are worthy of mention, not only those said in seriousness but also in jest, I shall record also the witticisms (ἀστεϊσμοί) of Polemo, so that not even these should appear to have been neglected.”100 Polycarp’s response to the proconsul fits this category. Polycarp’s ἀστεϊσμός pivots on the ambiguity (ἀμφιβολία) of a word (i.e., ἄθεος), a ploy found in at least one of the witticisms that Philostratus records (Vit. soph. 483).101 Such responses could be very brief. In fact, the most prominent and extensively narrated example of Polemo’s witticisms is rather similar in form to Polycarp’s “Away with the atheists!”: “Varrus, bring your summons!” This example has already been cited because of Polemo’s hand gesture before uttering this statement. The other example cited in that connection also introduced an ἀστεϊσμός (Lucius on Marcus Aurelius’ studies), and we have also already cited an ἀστεϊσμός by Herodes Atticus that was preceded by a “fixed gaze.” Evidently, the sequence of gazing off and/or lifting one’s hand(s) before making a brief, clever repartee was a commonplace in sophistic declamation.

soph. 482, 484, 485, 492, 509, 521, 527, 528, 536.  For instance, the sophist Alexander, having heard the theme (ἡ ὑπόθεσις) proposed by the audience, pauses for a brief moment (καιρὸς βραχύς), and then launches into his speech (Vit. soph. 572). 100  Ἐπεὶ δὲ ἀνδρῶν ἐλλογίμων ἀξιομνημόνευτα οὐ μόνον τὰ μετὰ σπουδῆς λεχθέντα, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὰ ἐν ταῖς παιδιαῖς, ἀναγράψω καὶ τοὺς ἀστεισμοὺς τοῦ Πολέμωνος, ὡς μηδὲ οὗτοι παραλελειμμένοι φαίνοιντο. 101 Hermocrates of Phocaea, a great-grandson of Polemo, was also highly regarded for his use of ἀμφιβολίαι (Vit. soph. 608).  98  E. g.,Vit.  99

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7. Arranging an Address, Proposing a Theme When the proconsul persists with his pleas that Polycarp swear by the genius of Caesar, Polycarp responds: “If you vainly suppose that I will swear by the Genius of Caesar, as you say, and pretend not to know who I am, hear [me] plainly: I am a Christian. Now if you want to learn the teaching of Christianity, appoint a day and give me a hearing” (Mart. Pol. 10.1).102 As Charles Hill notes: “This is spoken much as if he were a Smyrnaean sophist arranging for a public declamation.”103 Indeed, Philostratus provides a number of instances where the sophist and his audience negotiate the day and theme of a public address (e. g., Vit. soph. 537 [Polemo], 583 [Aelius Aristides]).104 Perhaps most comparable to Polycarp’s case is Heliodorus before Caracalla: “‘O Emperor,” said he, ‘appoint a time for me to give a display of declamation.’” To which Caracalla responded: “I give you a hearing now … speak on the following theme …” (Vit. soph. 626).105 In light of these similarities, the differences are all the more striking. Polycarp is not interested in taking up the theme that the proconsul would wish: a plea for his own life. Rather, his proposed theme is the λόγος τοῦ Χριστιανισμοῦ (10.1). Moreover, Polycarp refuses the proconsul’s demand that he “persuade the people” (πεῖσον τὸν δῆμον, 10.2). Polycarp retorts that they are “not worthy of a defense being made to them” (ἐκείνους δὲ οὐκ ἀξίους ἡγοῦμαι τοῦ ἀπολογεῖσθαι αὐτοῖς). This is likely due to the fact that the crowd is depicted as tumultuous and filled with rage in Mart. Pol. (e. g., 8.3, 12.2).106 Earlier, Herodes, Nicetes, and the proconsul had failed to persuade (πείθειν) Polycarp (8.2–9.2). If we are correct in our earlier suggestion that the author of Mart. Pol. is making a play on the names of famous Smyrnean sophists this would be rather ironic as the ability to persuade was widely regarded as the very definition of rhetoric.107 Polycarp is depicted as an unflappable martyr who will not be swayed from his set purpose. Earlier in Mart. Pol., the proconsul had failed to persuade “the most noble Germanicus” (3.1), but he did succeed with 102 Εἰ κενοδοξεῖς ἵνα ὀμόσω τὴν Καίσαρος τύχην, ὡς σὺ λέγεις, προσποιεῖ δὲ ἀγνοεῖν με τίς εἰμι, μετὰ παρρησίας ἄκουε· Χριστιανός εἰμι. εἰ δὲ θέλεις τὸν τοῦ Χριστιανισμοῦ μαθεῖν λόγον, δὸς ἡμέραν καὶ ἄκουσον. 103 Lost Teaching, 129. 104 On the proposal of a theme (προβάλλειν/διδόναι ὑπόθεσιν), cf. also Vit. soph. 529. 105 ὦ βασιλεῦ, ἔφη ἀνάθες μοι καιρὸν ἐς ἐπίδειξιν μελέτης, καὶ ὁ βασιλεὺς ἀκροῶμαι, εἶπε καὶ λέγε ἐς τόδε … 106 Thompson suggests that the crowd that would have stayed during the intermission between the morning animal hunts and the afternoon gladiatorial battles for the execution of condemned criminals like Polycarp instead of taking a lunch break would have been an especially vicious and bloodthirsty lot (“Martyrdom of Polycarp,” 33–34). 107 Cf., e. g., Aristotle, Rhet. 1355b: ἔστω δὴ ἡ ῥητορικὴ δύναμις περὶ ἕκαστον τοῦ θεωρῆσαι τὸ ἐνδεχόμενον πιθανόν; Philodemus, Rhet. 2 col i.26 (ed. Longo, 47): τό τε διὰ [λόγου] | ῥητορικοῦ πειθεῖν [τ]έ|λ[ο]ς ἐστι τῆς ῥ[ητορ]ικ[ῆ]ς; Sextus Empiricus, Matt. 2.61–62. See further, Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979), 54–55.

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the would-be voluntary martyr Quintus (4.1). The juxtaposition of Quintus and Germanicus, and later, Polycarp, serves to legitimize the theological position of those who endure temptation and resist persuasion. Indeed, Stephanie Cobb has argued that in the martyr acts the capacity to resist persuasion is an essential component in the creation of a “manly” and courageous Christian identity.108 The persuasive efforts of trained speakers hold no sway over the heroes of the faith.

8. The Father and Teacher of Asia When the proconsul’s attempts have all failed and Polycarp sticks to his Christian confession, the “entire crowd” begins to shout: “This is the teacher of Asia,109 the father of the Christians, the destroyer of our gods, who teaches many not to sacrifice nor worship” (12.2). As G. W. Bowersock has noted, “The words ‘teacher’ (διδάσκαλος) and ‘father’ (πατήρ) were precisely the words that were used of the great sophists … The term ‘father’ for a particularly respected teacher was conspicuous in the age of the great sophists.”110 The language used to refer to Polycarp is indeed also employed in reference to sophists. During much of Polycarp’s life the words “teacher of Asia” and “father” would have been most appropriate for Polemo. Indeed, Herodes Atticus, when he met Polemo, addressed him as “father” (ὦ πάτερ [Vit. soph. 537]).111 That such language is now used with reference to Polycarp suggest that the crowd regards him as the Christian version of a figure like Polemo. Polycarp is thus (ironically?) identified with the honorific language frequently associated with sophists.

V. Concluding Remarks This essay started out with the assertion that early Christianity at Smyrna must be studied with the conventions of the Second Sophistic in mind given the prominence of Smyrna on the sophistic landscape. We have argued that in the specific case of Mart. Pol. a compelling interpretation of several aspects of the text neces Cobb, Dying to Be Men, 72–76.  Dehandschutter’s edition reads ἀσεβείας instead of  Ἀσίας, following all witnesses except for Eusebius and codices Kosinitza and Mosquensis. Hartog concurs and argues that “ ‘the teacher of impiety’ should probably be the preferred reading, because it fits the context much better, forming a parallel with the derogatory labels of the ‘father of the Christians’ and ‘the destroyer of our gods’” (Polycarp’s Epistle, 304). The “better fit” could, however, just as well be construed as an argument in the opposite direction, since it implies that “teacher of Asia” is the lectio difficilior, and therefore preferable. 110 Martyrdom and Rome (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 44. 111 Polemo himself referred to Timocrates as “the father of my eloquence” (cf. πατέρα καλῶν αὐτὸν τῆς ἑαυτοῦ γλώττης, Vit. soph. 536). 108 109

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sitates contextualization in the sophistic world of late ancient Smyrna, a world into which the literature about and by Polemo offers us unique insight. In particular, the depiction of Polycarp’s presence in the stadium, his interaction with the crowd, and his conversation with the proconsul are all significantly indebted to contemporary sophistic conventions. We have also argued that the readers of Mart. Pol. were almost certainly aware of Polemo and his legacy, and that the depiction of Polycarp’s actions in the public arena was likely measured against the standards set by Polemo and other sophists of his ilk. While not all readers of Mart. Pol. would have necessarily participated directly in the intense, elite “culture of observation and evaluation among Polemo’s peers,”112 we think it very likely that they could not help but compare aspects of the portrait of Polycarp on the public stage to the appearances of his famous sophistic contemporaries. Juxtaposing Polemo and Polycarp reveals a number of interesting points of intersection. In addition to the points mentioned above, we observe that both men embody and represent the ideals of their respective communities and function as their ambassadors. Polemo’s advocacy and oratory boosted Smyrna’s cultural, economic and political status, and Polycarp was of similar importance to the Christian ekklēsia. Not only is there the obvious significance which Polycarp’s presence and death lends to the (Smyrnean) church, but also his mediatorial role, illustrated by his constant intercession for the worldwide ekklēsia (Mart. Pol. 5.1, 7.3). Crucially important also is Polycarp’s role as the one who “put an end to the persecution as though having placed a seal upon it through his martyrdom” (Mart. Pol. 1.1). Polycarp as depicted in Mart. Pol. thus stands as an intercessory figure for the Christian community, both bearing witness to the imperial powers that be and to the one divine power with which rests ultimate control of Polycarp’s fate. Thus, both Polemo and Polycarp are depicted as exemplary figures. Vit. soph. and Mart. Pol. are at pains to demonstrate, albeit in diverse ways, how both men supersede their fellow citizens (in Polycarp’s case this is especially evident in relation to the crowd in the stadium), outstrip their own physical limitations, prevail over the Roman authorities, have a special relation with the divine, and are in some ways even superior to death. The overall comparison does not suggest a clear-cut case of opposition to or adoption of broader cultural conventions. We have argued that in many respects Polycarp acts as a sophist in the 112 Simon Swain, “Polemon’s Physiognomy,” 125. The existence of the physiognomic manual was one among several indications of this reality. Swain notes that “Second-sophistic society was full of rules – behavioral, linguistic, political. It was in the interest of all members of the elite that these rules should be maintained. This need produced a culture of mutual inspection and evaluation” (131). This in turn led, as G. W. Bowersock (Greek Sophists, 100) notes, to some vociferous quarrels and rivalries, some of which mirror intra-city political factions, such as the controversies that swirled around Herodes at Athens, while others represent inter-city rivalries, such as between Polemo (representing Smyrna) and Favorinus (representing Ephesus).

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Mart. Pol., but there are also many ways in which he does not fit the image of the contemporary sophist. Polycarp is not only a “prominent teacher but also a distinguished martyr” (διδάσκαλος … ἐπίσημος ἀλλὰ καὶ μάρτυς ἔξοχος [Mart. Pol. 19.1]). As such, the figure of Polycarp is made to stand in opposition to the imperial cult and the persecution of Christians at the hands of the Roman elite. In this manner his resistance to the authorities, his suffering, and his death are meant to evoke the life and death of Jesus. His is a “martyrdom according to the gospel” (τὸ κατὰ τὸ εὐαγγέλιον μαρτύριον [1.1; 19.1]). At some moments where his actions do not fit Second Sophistic conventions (e. g., when he groans), we have noted that the inconsistency originated out of the multiplicity of cultural contexts afforded, among other things, by the interest to simultaneously depict Polycarp as an imitator Christi and to cast him in a role that would have been readily recognizable by those accustomed to the rhetorical world of the Second Sophistic. The divine (and scriptural) command to “be a man,” for instance, has distinctive import when placed right before a public performance in a sophistic city where traditional ideals of masculinity were both buttressed and reshaped on the rhetor’s rostrum as well as in the stadium. Mart. Pol., then, evinces a complicated negotiation between scriptural traditions, budding Christian identity, and the conventions and expectations of the Second Sophistic culture of contemporary Smyrna. All of this raises, finally, the question of why Polycarp’s appearance in the stadium is described as in some respects matching that of contemporary sophists. Barring the unlikely possibility that the overlap was accidental, or the unverifiable possibility that the depiction captures the historical Polycarp’s own adaptation of sophistic mannerisms, it seems most likely that the parallels are intentional. The author of Mart. Pol. is pursuing a literary goal by carefully noting Polycarp’s appearance, deportment, gesture, and mode of expression. This suggestion is further substantiated by observing the inclusion of other features, such as the discussion of determining a date for a hearing and the audience’s cries of “father” and “teacher.” At the same time, Polycarp refuses to engage in the central task of the sophist (addressing the crowd113), clashes deeply with the local (sophistic) elite, and pays the ultimate price for his refusal to conform to Roman demands. We suggest that the author of Mart. Pol. seeks to present an image of Polycarp as a figure who had the nobility and bearing of the cultural elite, yet who sought to 113 Keith Hopwood (“Smyrna: Sophists Between Greece and Rome,” in Athenaeus and His World: Reading Greek Culture in the Roman Empire [ed. David Braund and John Wilkins; Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2000], 239) sees a parallel with Nicetes of Smyrna here: “Like Nicetes … (Polycarp) refused to appear before the demos …” Polycarp’s refusal to address the crowd during his appearance in front of them is not quite comparable, however, to Nicetes’ failure to appear before the crowd often (οὐκ ἐθάμιζεν ἐς τὸν δῆμον [Vit. soph. 511]). Not addressing the crowd on a regular basis was an oddity; refusing to address the crowd at all suggests a clear break with the habitus of the sophist.

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subvert elite values at the same time by hewing closely to the vision of martyrdom God had given him.114

114 The effort to demonstrate deep familiarity with certain aspects of paideia only to ultimately reject said aspects is by no means unique to Mart. Pol. in second and third century literature. We are unable to explore this question here in any detail, but similar tensions are apparent in the negotiations of authors such as Justin, Tatian, and Hippolytus with contemporary philosophical and rhetorical culture. The common motif of a “conversion” from rhetoric to philosophy (most famously attested in connection with Dio Chrysostom, Plutarch and Lucian) may to some extent be explained as originating out of the same concern to demonstrate familiarity with what one (at least nominally) rejects.

On Choosing a Wet-Nurse Physical, Cultural and Moral Credentials* Annette Bourland Huizenga For many centuries and in diverse cultures, human families have utilized the services of women acting as wet-nurses, that is, women employed to breast-feed infants who are not their own biological children.1 While not at all common in modern industrialized countries, wet-nursing was a widespread practice in the ancient Mediterranean world, including the times and places under the rule of the Roman Empire. Information about wet-nursing can be gleaned from a variety of sources: Greek and Latin inscriptions,2 private letters,3 legal contracts and

* It was Hans Dieter Betz, in a Divinity School course on the book of Acts, who first triggered my interest in ancient philosophers and their teachings. My later research into moral philosophical ideals for women has benefited from his edited volume Plutarch’s Ethical Writings and Early Christian Literature (SCHNT 4; Leiden: Brill, 1978). In addition, my life has been enriched by the ways in which Professor Betz combines his meticulous scholarship with a generous attention to students and colleagues and with a deep concern for issues in the contemporary world. 1  A brief survey of the practice of wet-nursing can be found in G. Hill, et al., “The Medical and Demographic Importance of Wet-Nursing,” Canadian Bulletin of Medical History / Bulletin canadiene d’histoire de médicine, 4 (1987): 183–92. A longer study comes from Valerie A. Fildes, Breasts, Bottles, and Babies: A History of Infant Feeding (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1986). 2  See Bradley, Discovering the Roman Family: Studies in Roman Social History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 14–20, for a discussion of some representative Latin inscriptions. Sandra R. Joshel examines dedicatory epitaphs to and by nurses in “Nurturing the Master’s Child: Slavery and the Roman Child-Nurse,” Signs 14:1 (Autumn 1986): 3–22. 3  P. W. Pestman, A New Papyrological Primer (2nd ed.; Leiden and New York: Brill, 1994) includes P.Mich. 3.202 (105 c.e.), a letter where one Valeria writes to persuade another woman to serve as a wet-nurse. Roger S. Bagnall and Raffaella Cribiore translate and discuss P.Mich. 3.202 as well as P.Lond. 3.951 verso (250–300 c.e.), a letter from a woman urging her son-in-law to hire a wet-nurse for her daughter who has just given birth (Women’s Letters from Ancient Egypt, 300 BC–AD 800 [Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2006], 76–77, 265–66, 359–60). Lefkowitz and Fant include an excerpt from P.Lond. 3.951 verso in Women’s Life in Greece and Rome: A Sourcebook in Translation (1st ed. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982; 2nd ed., 1992), 188 (#252).

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receipts,4 medical writings,5 and texts of philosophical advice.6 Over thirty years of scholarly study of wet-nursing in Roman society has led to these conclusions: Philosophical writers and other elite male authors express a strong preference that mothers nurse their own children.7 This custom is idealized as a self-giving sacrifice on the part of the mother, which nurtures a loving connection between mother and child, as well as advancing the social and moral development of the child. In contrast, hiring a wet-nurse was fraught with uncertainty because of her probable lower-status, and the likelihood she would present questionable habits, barbarous speech, and general lack of virtue. Consequently, authors convey serious suspicions about a wet-nurse’s considerable influence over a growing child, 4 As examples, B. G. U. 4.1107 (dated 13 b.c.e.) involves an agreement for the services of a wet-nurse for an exposed baby (a 16-month commitment), while P.Oxy. 1.37 (49 c.e.) reports a trial of a wet-nurse whose charge died while in her care (found in Pestman, New Papyrological Primer). Vol. 1 of Select Papyri: Private Affairs (trans. A. S. Hunt and C. C. Edgar; LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1932–34) includes the already-mentioned B. G. U. 4.1107, along with P.Oxy. 91 (187 c.e.), a receipt of wages signed by a slave-owner whose female slave nursed a baby girl for another woman. Archaeologist A. Abou Aly lists other legal documents about wet-nurses in the endnotes of “The Wet Nurse: A Study in Ancient Medicine and Greek Papyri,” Vesalius: acta internationals historiae medicinae, II:2 (1996): 86–97. 5 Fildes has assembled helpful tables from the medical sources in Breasts, Bottles, and Babies, 60–68. 6  On these sources, see Suzanne Dixon, The Roman Mother (Norman: Oklahoma University Press, 1988), 114–115, 120–126; as well as A. E. Hanson, “Your Mother Nursed You with Bile: Anger in Babies and Small Children,” in Ancient Anger: Perspectives from Homer to Galen (ed. Susanna Braund and Glenn W. Most; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 185–207. Philip L. Tite analyzes ancient medical, philosophical and literary comments about wet-nursing in “Nurslings, Milk and Moral Development in the Greco-Roman Context: A Reappraisal of the Paraenetic Utilization of Metaphor in 1 Peter 2:1–3,” JSNT 31 (2009): 378–86. 7 In support of maternal breast-feeding, Soranus states succinctly: “… For it is better, other things being equal, for the infant to be nourished with mother’s milk,” ἄμεινον γὰρ τῶν ἄλλων ἐπ’ ἴσης ἐχόντων τῷ μητρῴῳ γάλακτι τρέφεσθαι τὸ νήπιον, Gyn. 2.18.4. Likewise Plutarch (or Ps.-Plutarch) claims: “It is necessary, as I would say, for mothers to feed their children and to sustain them from their own breasts. For they will nourish them more affectionately and through more care, since they love their children from within and as it is said, from the fingernails. … And also nature makes clear that it is necessary for mothers to nurse and to nourish the children they have borne; for this reason (nature) has provided the nourishment of milk for every animal that gives birth,” δεῖ δέ, ὡς ἐγὼ ἂν φαίην, αὐτας τὰς μητέρας τὰ τέκνα τρέφειν καὶ τούτοις τοὺς μαστοὺς ὑπέχειν· συμπαθέστερόν τε γὰρ θρέψουσι καὶ διὰ πλείνος ἐπιμελείας, ὡς ἂν ἒνδοθεν καὶ τὸ δὴ λεγόμενον ἐξ ὀνύχων ἀγαπῶσαι τὰ τέκνα. … δηλοῖ δὲ καὶ ἡ φύσις ὅτι δεῖ τὰς μητέρας ἃ γεγεννήκασιν αὐτὰς τιτθεύειν καὶ τρέφειν· διὰ γὰρ τοῦτο παντὶ ζῴῳ τεκόντι τὴν ἐκ τοῦ γάλακτος τροφὴν ἐχορήεσε, Lib. ed. 3c (5). See also Juvenal, Sat. 6.592–4; Plutarch, Cons. ux. 609e.; and Favorinus (in Aulius Gellius, Noct. att. 12.1). Tacitus compares the Roman custom of wet-nursing unfavorably to the Germanic practice: “Each child is nurtured by its own mother’s breasts. They are not handed over to slaves and nurses,” Germ. 20 (tr. Dixon). Lefkowitz and Fant cite a Latin inscription: “Of Graxia Alexandria, distinguished for her virtue and fidelity. She nursed her children with her own breasts. Her husband Pudens the emperor’s freedman [dedicated this monument] as a reward to her. She lived 24 years, 3 months, 16 days” (Women’s Life in Greece and Rome, 188 [#251]). Nursing mothers are also represented in funerary art and in depictions of goddesses; see Dixon, The Roman Mother, 105–108.

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including speculating about what kinds of personality characteristics might be literally transmitted through her milk. In reality, however, the practice was widespread throughout the Empire and not just among higher-status families.8 Wet-nurses might be slaves whose owners, in effect, sold their milk,9 or they might be freed or free women wanting to earn money and supplies for themselves. They might take an infant into their own home, as a sort of foster mother, or they might join the infant’s family household. Of course, some families employed a female slave who was already a member of their oikos. The nurslings might themselves be freeborn or slave. The expectation seems to be that children would be weaned sometime between the ages of two and three years old. If a wet-nurse had joined the household, then she often stayed on as a child-minder for older children.10 Texts by physicians show less concern for the supposed moral issues, but focus instead on examining and promoting the health of both the wet-nurse and the infant.11 They give instructions for the nursing routines, but also for other aspects of infant care such as bathing, clothing, and discipline of children. From memorial and dedicatory inscriptions, it seems that some children developed a lifelong affection for their nurses who remained as child-minders beyond the nursing period.12 Adult children even manumitted some slave-nurses in honor of their service. Inscriptional evidence for the feelings and opinions of the nurses about their work is less certain. Sandra R. Joshel speaks to “… the possibility that the nurse had a different understanding of her position within the relationship … [and] that nursing was a job which in most cases [she] had no choice about performing.”13 How much ambivalence and / or affection a wetnurse felt for her charges must have varied considerably. Such written sources addressing the employment of wet-nurses give expression to the conflicting attitudes present in the culture, manifesting the competing ideological, social, and practical issues surrounding the nurturing of infants as well as the apparent anxieties about high infant and maternal mortality rates.

 8 See Bradley, Discovering the Roman Family, 13, 17–19; and Dixon, The Roman Family, 128–29, 146.  9 As Jennifer A. Glancy comments: “Human milk was a valuable commodity in the ancient world” (Slavery in Early Christianity [Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006], 18). 10 Bradley, Discovering the Roman Family, 25–27; Dixon, Roman Mother, 145–49. 11 The Sushruta Samhita (a medical text in Sanskrit from the third-fourth century b.c.e.) gives much similar advice about the wet-nurse: “She should be of middle stature, neither too old nor too young (middle-aged), of sound health, of good character (not irascible or easily excitable)… She should be of respectable parentage and consequently possessed of many good qualities, with an exuberance of milk in her breasts, and not in the habit of doing anything that degrades women in life” (vol. 2, ch. X). 12 See Joshel, “Nurturing the Master’s Child,” 19–20. 13 Ibid., 21.

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I. Myia to Phyllis From this textual environment there emerges a pseudonymous document that has only rarely been examined by historians of children and childcare in imperial Rome: the neo-Pythagorean letter labeled Myia to Phyllis.14 Dated to the second century c.e., this short letter purports to be from Myia, the renowned daughter of Pythagoras and his wife Theano, and is addressed to Phyllis, an otherwise unknown female recipient.15 The stated epistolary occasion is that Phyllis has just given birth, and Myia thinks she needs advice about caring for a newborn, in particular, hiring a wet-nurse. The letter at hand communicates in the friendly tone and plain style,16 wholly characteristic of paraenetic texts wherein an author seeks to advise an associate about an ordinary life situation. Myia to Phyllis. Greetings. Now that you have become a mother of children, I advise [παραινεῖν] you as follows: choose for yourself a wet-nurse17who is most well-disposed and clean, and, what is more, modest and not inclined to sleep nor indeed to strong drink. For this is the kind of woman who might be judged best for raising free children – if, that is, she has nutritious milk and is not an easy conquest for bedding down with a man. A great help in this is that for her whole life she is first and primarily directed to their upbringing by nursing them well. For she will do everything well at the appropriate time. She will offer the breast and suckling and nourishment not whenever it crosses her mind, but with some forethought, for that is 14 The critical edition of this letter is found in Alfons Städele, Die Briefe des Pythagoras und der Pythagoreer (Beiträge zur klassischen Philologie 115; Meisenheim am Glan: Anton Hain, 1980). Stadele’s Greek text is reprinted in my Moral Education for Women in the Pastoral and Pythagorean Letters: Philosophers of the Household (NovTSup 147; Leiden: Brill, 2013), 378–79. In the scholarship on wet-nursing, the only discussion of Myia to Phyllis that I have found is in Valerie A. Fildes, Breasts, Bottles, and Babies, 23. An English translation of the letter is found in Lefkowitz and Fant, Women’s Life, 187–88. 15  Her name means “foliage,” and is derived from φύλλον, for “leaf.” The most famous “Phyllis” is the mythological daughter of King Sithon of Thrace, but there are no allusions to this or any other “Phyllis” in the letter itself. 16  As advocated by (Ps‑)Demetrius’ On Style. “Plain” is the translation of ἰσχνότης in Eloc. 223 and 235. See the discussion of On Style in Klauck, Ancient Letters and the New Testament: A Guide to Context and Exegesis (asst. Daniel P. Bailey; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 2006), 184–88. Aside from the fact that the letter has many Doricized spellings, the Greek is not particularly complex in syntax or vocabulary. 17  The word used here is τίτθαν, while τροφή is commonly used for a “child-minder.” For a brief discussion of the differences, see Louise Pratt, “The Old Women of Ancient Greece and the Homeric Hymn to Demeter,” TAPA 130 (2000): 46). However, the distinction is not universally maintained: “In some cases, it seems that a woman who began as a wet nurse (tittheus) remained in the house after menopause, when she came to serve a more ambiguous but also more elevated position as a trophos” (ibid., 46, and n. 7). Furthermore, Pestman’s examples of Hellenistic and Roman papyrus documents regarding services and wages of a wet-nurse use τροφ-cognates (The New Papyrological Primer, ## 13, 17, 26); the same is true of two papyri (## 16 and 79) printed in Select Papyri, Private Affairs. Cf. also Keith Bradley investigation of the inscriptional evidence on the nutrix (Latin for “wet-nurse”) in Discovering the Roman Family, ch. 2: “The Social Role of the Nurse in the Roman World.”

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how she will lead the infant to health. Let her not succumb whenever she herself wishes to sleep, but whenever the newborn has a desire of rest; for she will offer no little relief to the child. But let a nurse never be inclined to anger nor talkative nor indifferent in the selection of food, but be orderly and sōphrōn; if it is possible, let her not be a barbarian, but a Greek. It is best for the newborn to be directed to sleep in this way, even if he is nicely full of milk, for such sustenance should be sweet and easily digestible for the young ones; but if there is any other [sustenance], she must give the most simple. But she18 must completely abstain from wine because it is so strong, or just give19 a scant quantity mixed into the evening milk. Do not make baths frequent, for occasional and temperate baths are a better practice. For the same reasons, suitable air also ought to have an equal proportion20 of heat and cold, and for the house not to be too drafty nor too stifling. Nor is it suitable for water to be either harsh or alluring to the taste, nor for the bedding to be rough, but it ought to wrap closely, accommodating the body. For in all these things, nature desires what suits it, but not what is extravagant. So then, for now it is not useless to write down these things for you, inasmuch as good expectation comes from nursing that accords with this guideline. But, with God’s help, we will again convey approved and suitable reminders concerning the raising of the child.

Unlike many other ancient sources, this pseudonymous author does not moralize about the disadvantages or dire consequences of hiring a wet-nurse; rather, he (or she) appears to assume the obvious necessity of a wet-nurse. The author does, however, delineate the credentials this woman ought to possess, and outlines her tasks as well, so that the epistolary contents touch upon many of the elements of the discourse about the nursing and tending of infants. For purposes of comparing Myia to Phyllis with other texts, I have arranged these “credentials” into three categories: physical, cultural, and moral.

II. Physical Credentials Soranus describes in detail the biological characteristics of a suitable wet-nurse as a healthy woman, not too old or too young, having a large frame, and mediumsized breasts (Gyn. 2.18–20). Furthermore, she should exercise regularly and eat nourishing foods. Of course, the wet-nurse would have given birth recently herself, preferably within the last 2 to 3 months. A woman like this would produce the best kind of milk: sweet, white, and smooth in texture, being neither

18 From the end of the sentence, it seems clear that it is the infant who must be kept away from wine. However, the middle/passive infinitive ἀπέχεσθαι with the genitive can mean “hold oneself off a thing, abstain or desist from it,” LSJ, s. v. ἀπέχω. Then the directive would be aimed at the wet-nurse, as I have translated it. 19 This refers to mixing wine with the evening milk (τᾶ κράσει δείελον γαλακτῶδες), indicating that some milk is given to infants by some means other than the breast. 20 A neo-Pythagorean influence might be seen in this concern for “equal proportion” (συμμετρίαν) of various physical elements.

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too watery nor too thick, as he describes it (Gyn. 2.20).21 Soranus (and others) used a “nail test” to check the milk’s thickness (Gyn. 2.22–23).22 The consistency was determined by placing a drop of milk on a fingernail. If the drop retained its form, instead of running off the nail, then that was considered an appropriate kind of milk. It is worth considering: under what circumstances would the new mother or someone in her family follow Soranus’ advice, and actually examine the wetnurse’s breasts and milk? Would this physical examination be applied only to enslaved women? Or would free women likewise be subject to this assessment? Joshel makes the insightful observation that “although Soranus does not specify a slave nurse, his instructions for selection and treatment resemble the judicious purchase and use of property – of an object for one’s control.”23 Certainly, any woman seeking to be hired wants to better her financial circumstances, and is, therefore, in an inferior social position24 and subordinated to those employing her services. Without mentioning a physical examination of the wet-nurse, Myia to Phyllis recommends only that her milk should be “nutritious,” and that she give some attention to her own diet. Perhaps the extreme brevity of this advice is best explained by the fact that our letter is framed as an intimate communication between ordinary women, rather than as a medical text for study as written by Soranus. Since Myia to Phyllis also assumes that the wet-nurse will live in the household, with the new mother being present to supervise much of the infant care, this wet-nurse is not thought of as someone else’s slave (although she might already be a family slave). Furthermore, the letter foresees a close partnership between mother and wet-nurse in caring for the infant, with both of them abiding by the same child-minding principles.

III. Cultural Credentials Several authors highlight one cultural credential: the wet-nurse ought to be Greek, or Greek-speaking.25 This focus on excellence in Greek-ness springs from the concern that freeborn children must be prepared for the paideia process of 21  For some reason, Soranus (Gyn. 2.20) believed that the “first milk” was unsuitable for the newborn because it was too thick. 22  Soranus also advises checking the color, smell, and taste of the milk, Gyn. 2.23–24. 23  “Nurturing the Master’s Child,” 8. 24 Bradley’s study shows that “… free nurses seem to have been women from the lower reaches of society who probably needed to take work whenever it was available” (“Sexual Regulations in Wet-Nursing Contracts from Roman Egypt,” Klio 62.2 (1980): 323. 25 Plutarch, Educ. 5 (who goes on to state that enslaved child-minders and pedagogues must also be Greek and able to speak the language well, Educ. 5–6); Soranus, Gyn. 2.19; Tacitus, Dial. 29; Quintilian, Inst. 1.4.

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education from their earliest years. As Quintilian states: “It is [the wet-nurses] that the child will hear first; it is their words that he will try to form by imitation. We are by nature most tenacious of what we have imbibed in our infant years … Let the child not be accustomed, therefore, even while he is yet an infant, to phraseology which must be unlearned.”26 Obviously, Quintilian has in mind the Roman objective of rhetorical training for young men of higher status. Moreover, this standard for a wet-nurse’s ethnicity and language becomes intertwined with her social status. Favorinus is highly critical of wet-nursing because the woman’s milk would be “alien and degenerate” to the infant, “especially [as he says] if the person you use to supply the milk is either a slave or of servile origin and, as is often the case, from a foreign and barbarian nation …”27 It is not simply language acquisition that is at stake here, but other inferior attitudes and habits that the child might adopt. This is made entirely clear by Tacitus: “But in our day we entrust the infant to a little Greek servant-girl who is attended by one or two, commonly the worst of all the slaves, creatures utterly unfit for any important work. Their stories and their prejudices from the very first fill the child’s tender and uninstructed mind.”28 Tacitus uses the Greek appellation disapprovingly, implying an un-Roman quality and linking it to the supposed harmful and strange influence of slaves. That slaves, and many women as well, are viewed as potentially emotionally unstable and susceptible to extreme religious responses is reflected in this statement by Soranus: “… the wet-nurse should not be superstitious and prone to ecstatic states so that she may not expose the infant to danger when led astray by fallacious reasoning, sometimes even trembling like mad.”29 Here we find ambivalence toward women, and in particular those of lower status: they may be necessary to the raising of a child, but even their female nature,30  Inst. 1.5, LCL, tr. J. E. Butler. Cicero too mentions the long-term developmental effects of close contact with a wet-nurse: “our souls contain within them innate seeds of the virtues. If they were allowed to develop, nature herself would carry them through to a flourishing existence, bust as it is, as soon as we are brought forth into the world and raised up at birth, straightway we are caught up in a never-ending whorl of evil practice and the worst possible principles, so that we seem to have drunk in error virtually with our nurse’s milk. Indeed, by the time we are passed on in due course to our parents, then handed over to our teachers, we are so immersed in different kinds of error that truth gives way to specious rationalization and nature herself to the views of the world,” Tusc. 3.1.2, cited in Dixon, The Roman Mother, 115. 27  Favorinus, quoted in Aulius Gellius, Noct. att. 12.17, tr. M. Fant. 28 Dial. 29; tr. Church and Brodribb. 29  Gyn. 2.19, tr. O. Temkin. 30  The stereotype that slaves would influence the child with “stories and prejudices” is similarly applied by ancient authors to women as a gender, because women are perceived by them as less rational by nature and more prone to emotional excess. In the New Testament, this is reflected in 1 Tim 4:7 and 2 Tim 2:3:6–7. Ancient stereotypes of women as predisposed to hysteria as well as sexual immorality are discussed in Margaret Y. MacDonald, Early Christian Women and Pagan Opinion: The Power of the Hysterical Woman (New York; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), esp. 120–126. 26

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compounded by what Favorinus calls “servile origin,” raises doubts about their suitability for the task of wet-nursing. In contrast, Myia to Phyllis is devoid of all such polemics. On reading this letter, one is impressed instead by the calm tone and sheer ordinariness with which it presents the entire process of hiring a wet-nurse and nurturing the infant. Even though the newborn is included in the category of “free children,”31 the social status of the wet-nurse remains undefined. In fact, the credential of her being “Greek” is even qualified: “if it is possible, let her not be a barbarian, but a Greek” (δυνατῶν δὲ ὄντων μὴ Βάρβαρος ἀλλὰ  Ἑλληνίς). It is as if the presumed author of the letter intends to reduce the anxieties of the new mother, recognizing that infant care is difficult enough without insisting on probably-unreachable standards. Such thoughtfulness for the mother may also be seen in the last sentence, where the author explains that she has said all that is necessary for the present. Her advice for dealing with older children will come later, as the child grows: “But, with God’s help, we will again convey approved and suitable reminders concerning the raising of the child.” This last sentence exhibits the very essence of ancient paraenesis when it promises to provide “encouraging reminders of what readers already know and have accomplished, and reasons for recommended behavior.”32 In such a letter we would not expect to find censure or diatribal elements such as vocative address or strongly-worded rhetorical questions directed by the sender to the recipient.33 Yet, given the strong opinions and intense emotions surrounding maternal nursing and infant care, this author remains remarkably calm and soothing.

IV. Moral Credentials The category of “moral credentials” includes all the modifiers that describe a woman’s personal qualities as well as specific ways in which she ought to conduct herself. Soranus emphasizes these particular traits: she must be “sōphrōn, sympathetic, not bad-tempered, Greek, clean” (σώφρονα, συμπαθῆ καὶ ἀόργιστον,  Ἑλληνίδα, καθάριον, Gyn. 2.19). Taking these terms one at a time, Soranus then explains how each may be evaluated. Four of these five attributes are also used in the first paragraph of Myia to Phyllis: clean (καθάριον), not angry (μήτ’ ὀργίλα), sōphrōn (σώφρων), and Greek ( Ἑλληνίς), but they appear in a different  The author calls them ἐλευθέρως παῖδας in the Doricized Greek of the letter.

31

32 Stanley Kent Stowers, Letter Writing in Greco-Roman Antiquity (Philadelphia: Westminster,

1986), 96. See also Pseudo-Libanius who describes paraenesis as that which “does not allow an opposing statement” (Epist. 5). 33 Stowers delineates the elements of ancient diatribe in his comprehensive analysis of GrecoRoman literature in The Diatribe and Paul’s Letter to the Romans (SBLDS 57; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1981).

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syntax and with the addition of several other characteristics.34 Thus, the Gynecology is not dependent upon Myia to Phyllis, nor vice versa; instead, these credentials are simply part and parcel of the dominant cultural discourse. Certainly the evocation of the feminine virtue of sophrosyne is so stereotypical that its absence would be surprising. This attribute is believed to be crucial for a high-quality relationship between the wet-nurse and the infant. The ideals posited for a suitable wet-nurse are not just static concepts that exist within the female soul. Rather, the interior virtues must be demonstrated outwardly in certain approved behaviors.35 There is no identifying mark more important for a virtuous woman than her visible demonstration of sophrosyne. As is well-documented, among Greek and Roman sources sophrosyne is seen as the source and apex of moral excellence for free women, more so than for men, and in a different way.36 While masculine sophrosyne has a range of meanings involving self-control and rational behavior, sophrosyne displayed by women signals primarily that they are sexually faithful to their own husband.37 Yet in the view of the Gynecology as well as in the extant legal contracts, all wet-nurses are supposed to display this virtue at an even higher level: by means of complete sexual abstinence. [The wet-nurse should be] self-controlled so as to abstain from coitus, drinking, lewdness, and any other such pleasure and incontinence [σώφρονα δὲ πρὸς τὸ σθνουσίας ἀπέχεσθαι καὶ μέθης καὶ λαγνείας καὶ τῆς ἄλλης ἡδονῆς καὶ ἀκρασίας]. For coitus cools the affection towards the nursling by the diversion of sexual pleasure and moreover spoils and diminishes the milk or suppresses it entirely by stimulating menstrual catharsis through the uterus or by bringing about conception.38

Although Soranus cites “medical” reasons along with a touch of moralizing to support his claim, the outcome is that a wet-nurse’s sophrosyne is confirmed by  Additional credentials are: “most well-disposed” (ἐπιταδειοτάταν); “modest and not inclined to sleep nor indeed to strong drink” (αἰδήμονα καὶ μὴ ὕπνῳ προσοικειουμέναν μηδὲ μὴν μέθᾳ); “not talkative” (μήτε πρόγλωσσος); “not indifferent in the selection of food” (μήτε ἐν ταῖς τῶν σιτίων λήψεσιν ἀδιάφορος); and, “orderly” (τεταγμένα). 35  I have analyzed this aspect of moral development using two other neo-Pythagorean texts, Melissa to Kleareta and the discourse On the Sophrosyne of a Woman attributed to Phintys, in “Epitomizing Virtue: Clothing the Christian Woman’s Body,” in Christian Body, Christian Self: Concepts of Early Christian Personhood (ed. Clare K. Rothschild and Trevor W. Thompson; WUNT 284; Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011). 36  See Helen F. North, Sophrosyne: Self-Knowledge and Self-Restraint in Greek Literature (Cornell Studies in Classical Philology 35; Ithaca, N. Y.: Cornell University Press, 1966), as well as North’s essay, “The Mare, the Vixen, and the Bee: Sophrosyne as the Virtue of Women in Antiquity,” Illinois Classical Studies 2 (1977): 35–48. I summarize and extend North’s analyses of this virtue in Moral Education for Women, 203–213. 37 See also my essay “Women’s Sōphrosynē in the Pythagorean Letters.” In Women and Gender in Ancient Religion: Interdisciplinary Approaches (ed. Stephen Ahearne-Kroll and James A. Kelhoffer; WUNT 263; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010). 38 Translation by O. Temkin, in Lefkowitz and Fant, Women’s Life in Greece and Rome, http:// www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/wlgr/wlgr-medicine380.shtml. 34

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her sexual abstinence as well as her abstemiousness toward drinking alcohol and other pleasures. These ideals are echoed in Myia to Phyllis, which advises that the wet-nurse be “not inclined to sleep nor indeed to strong drink … [and] not an easy conquest for bedding down with a man.” The sexual standard for a wet-nurse in Myia to Phyllis speaks more euphemistically than these other sources: she “ is not an easy conquest for bedding down with a man” (ταῖς πρὸς ἄνδρα κοίταις εὐνίκατος). Mary Lefkowitz offers a valid alternative translation: the wet-nurse is “not easily persuaded to sleep with her husband.”39 Whether with a man or a husband, the expectation that she will abstain from sexual intercourse remains operational in these sources. Although it seems unrealistic, and even uncivilized, to monitor the wet-nurse’s sexual activities, especially if she took the infant into her own home, this prerequisite of abstinence is widespread in the Roman sources. Keith Bradley analyzes such “sexual regulation” of wet-nurses found in papyrus contracts and receipts, which “contain stringent penalty clauses against any breach of agreement.” In such legal documents, the moral philosophical ideal of feminine sophrosyne is likewise made even more rigorous than usual. Bradley comments: “even for the minimum interval [of two years of nursing] this seems to call for a great degree of self-control in the private lives of nurses …”40 He considers: are we to imagine that free women who took up wet-nursing remained abstinent in their personal relationships for this long? For free women, Bradley notes, “a not inconsiderable burden was imposed on wet-nurses and their male partners, since their choice lay between interrupting normal relationships and risking a source of income.”41 Furthermore, I wonder how these women handled the social expectations for female moral behavior in addition to these concerns for their finances and their personal / sexual relationships. Bradley also asks, how would sexual abstinence affect the quasi-marital relationship of a female slave who worked as a wet-nurse? In reality, wouldn’t she be under even greater scrutiny by her slaveholder during the duration of the contract? Since slaves could not legally marry in any case, how could an enslaved woman be obliged to demonstrate the sort of sophrosyne which required marital fidelity? In addition, the sexual availability of slaves meant that they had no legal control over their own bodies,42 so that an enslaved wet-nurse would have no consistent means of ensuring her sexual abstinence, and therefore, no reliable way to embody feminine sophrosyne. This dishonorable social status leads Carolyn Osiek and Margaret Y. MacDonald to state: “To the female slave therefore, honor, whether of character or of behavior, cannot be ascribed. The female slave can lay no claim to chastity or shame, both of which have no meaning. In the ofand Fant, Women’s Life, 187–88. Regulations,” 322. 41 Ibid., 324. 42 Glancy, Slavery in Early Christianity, 50–57. 39 Lefkowitz 40 “Sexual

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ficial view, she cannot have sensitivity toward chastity.”43 Yet that is exactly what Soranus and Myia to Phyllis expect: “sensitivity toward chastity,” and, in fact, the even greater achievement of sexual abstinence. Consequently, this highly-valued moral credential must simply have seemed unattainable for enslaved women. However, we may presume a sort of trickle-down form of virtue-aspirations for various women (and men) of lower status. From epitaphs we know that many adopted the terminology of the elites in describing their relationships as husband and wife, although not allowed to marry under the law.44 The same is true of their stated estimation of the character of the memorialized woman as loving her husband, having devoted herself to family and home, “working in wool,”45 and being sōphrōn. Whatever a woman’s station in life as perceived by the elites, she could still seek to display certain attributes of feminine morality. Those who knew her best could testify to this virtue, expressing themselves in the ideals of their culture. The New Testament teachings on women’s moral development, in particular those found in the Pastoral Letters, provide more evidence that persons of various statuses were supposed to at least attempt to live by the highest standards of the society. Such early Christian texts are not addressed to those of elite standing in the Roman Empire, but to persons of diverse social statuses (e. g., Jew and Greek, slave and free, men and women). Stating that the social roles prescribed in the Pastorals were “an ideal almost impossible to strictly follow” in reality, Elsa Tamez claims Nevertheless, it is important to take into account that those domestic codes or norms did not go out of existence; on the contrary, they were internalized also by the non-elite, even by the poor. The codes always appeared as profound cultural values and as a model to follow … [I]n the First Letter of Timothy these values were affirmed and applied to all the families of different social strata.46 43 Carolyn Osiek and Margaret Y. MacDonald, with Janet H. Tulloch, A Woman’s Place: House Churches in Earliest Christianity (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), 97. 44 As shown by Dale B. Martin, “Slave Families and Slaves in Families,” in Early Christian Families in Context: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue (ed. David L. Balch and Carolyn Osiek; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 207–230. 45 Lena Larsson Lovén analyses how this label served as a feminine virtue during the Augustan Age (“Lanam fecit: Woolworking and Female Virtue,” in Aspects of Women in Antiquity: Proceedings of the First Nordic Symposium on Women’s Lives in Antiquity [ed. Lena Larsson Lovén and Agneta Strömberg; Jonsered: P. Åströms Förlag, 1998], 85–95). Women of “low social standing” served as wool-spinners (ibid., 92). 46 Struggles for Power In Early Christianity (Maryknoll, N. Y.: Orbis Books, 2007), 34. Tamez further asserts: “Patriarchal ideology penetrated the whole of society and all social sectors. Even when the lower sectors were unable to reach the ideal because of their condition, it was assumed to be natural and logical. We see in inscriptions with epitaphs of people who were not from the elite but for some reason (commercial or another reason) had sufficient money to be able to dedicate an epitaph to a loved woman, that the praises of a mother or a wife are imbued with patriarchal ideology” (ibid., 30).

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I envision a similar kind of process in which the moral credentials for elite women are affirmed and applied to lower-status wet-nurses, who already knew of and perhaps aspired to represent these virtues. This way, the letter Myia to Phyllis epitomizes not only the Greco-Roman discourse about choosing a wet-nurse, but also signifies how that discourse might act upon the lives of the women who take on this nurturing role. To reiterate, according to the Gynecology and Myia to Phyllis, “working women” such as wet-nurses are expected to demonstrate the same feminine virtues as those women wealthy enough to hire a surrogate nurse. Potentially, any woman could display sophrosyne, especially in the form of chaste sexuality. Any woman could learn self-control, and refrain from drinking alcohol, from too much talking, and from angry emotional outbursts.47 Perhaps there was some lesser grade of sophrosyne that was recognized as more appropriate for freed or enslaved women, a possibility that these texts do not clarify for us. Even so, the intense cultural affirmation of feminine sophrosyne appears to extend to women of lower social levels, especially to women taking on various child-minding roles. When any new mother read and reflected on the advice of Myia to Phyllis about hiring a wet-nurse, she too was reminded to demonstrate feminine virtue. As a result, this paraenetic letter accomplishes two goals: it describes the job qualifications for the wet-nurse while it reinforces the expectation that all women must continually exhibit sophrosyne in their social interactions. The good moral character of the wet-nurse supports and reflects upon the good moral character of the mother and helps to define the moral training performed by the mother on behalf of her infant child. The sōphrōn behavior of both women also serves as an example for the children, whether male or female. Furthermore, just as the virtue (or immorality) of the materfamilias confers honor (or shame) on the reputation of the entire household, so the personal conduct of the wet-nurse produces positive promotion or negative exposure for the household. The activities of the two women intertwine, whether in the area of childcare where they must agree on the proper methods of nurturing or in the realm of moral goodness where they must display the qualities of feminine sophrosyne. This is why the family must employ a wet-nurse of superior physical, cultural, and moral qualities: every aspect of her person contributes to the proper nurture and moral development of their “free children.”

47 To change her “dialect” from barbarian to Greek would be more difficult, as Myia to Phyllis seems to acknowledge.

Lucian’s Hermotimus A Fictive Dialogue with Marcus Aurelius Justin R. Howell In his Lukian von Samosata und das Neue Testament, Hans Dieter Betz calls our attention to one feature of Lucian’s paraenesis that has profound importance for the ongoing discussion about Lucian’s attitude toward the Roman emperors and his more general stance on the empire.1 Betz comments upon one example within the Lucianic corpus where the satirist creates a kind of Fürstenspiegel that reflects the vices of a tyrant.2 And in another instance, Betz observes that the so-called “mirror for princes” that Lucian displays reflects the virtues of an ideal king.3 Was Lucian interested in commending the character traits of actual rulers of his day and invested in reproving their faults?4 It is typically held that when Lucian refers directly to Marcus Aurelius, he does so only in passing and in works where  I wish to express my appreciation to Professor Betz for his publications on Lucian as an observer of early Christianity (“Lukian von Samosata und das Christentum,” NovT 3 [1959]: 226–37) and on the relatedness of Lucian’s oeuvre to the writings of the New Testament (Lukian von Samosata und das Neue Testament: Religionsgeschichtliche und paränetische Parallelen, ein Beitrag zum Corpus Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti [TUGAL 76; Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1961]), as well as for his time spent in conversing about these and other matters, where there also Lucianic wit and wisdom are always present. In Lucian’s words, καὶ μὴν καὶ οἱ παῖδες ὀπώρας προσέφερον αὐτῷ πατέρα ὀνομάζοντες (Demon. 63). 2 Betz, Lukian, 189; commenting on the catalog of vices in Phal. 2.6:  Ὁ μὲν οὖν τἀναντία μοι ἐγνωκώς, καθάπερ ἐκ τοῦ  Ἀκράγαντος ἄρτι καταπεπλευκώς, σφαγάς τινας καὶ βίας καὶ ἁρπαγὰς καὶ ἀπαγωγὰς ἐτραγῴδει τοῦ τυράννου μόνον οὐκ αὐτόπτης γεγενῆσθαι λέγων, ὃν ἴσμεν οὐδ’ ἄχρι τοῦ πλοίου ἀποδεδημηκότα. 3  Betz, Lukian, 209; on the catalog of virtues in Phal. 1.3: φιλανθρωπίᾳ γὰρ καὶ πρᾳότητι καὶ τῷ ἡμέρῳ κἀξ ἰσοτιμίας θαυμασίως ἐγὼ ἤλπιζον ἐς τὸ πείθεσθαι προσάξεσθαι τούτους. The viewer who looks into such a mirror is not unlike the spectator of pantomimic dancing whom Lucian describes in Salt. 81: ἕκαστος τῶν ὁρώντων γνωρίζῃ τὰ αὑτοῦ, μᾶλλον δὲ ὥσπερ ἐν κατόπτρῳ τῷ ὀρχηστῇ ἑαυτὸν βλέπῃ καὶ ἃ πάσχειν αὐτὸς καὶ ἃ ποιεῖν εἴωθεν· τότε γὰρ οὐδὲ κατέχειν ἑαυτοὺς οἱ ἄνθρωποι ὑφ’ ἡδονῆς δύνανται, ἀλλ’ ἀθρόοι πρὸς τὸν ἔπαινον ἐκχέονται, τὰς τῆς ἑαυτοῦ ψυχῆς ἕκαστος εἰκόνας ὁρῶντες καὶ αὑτοὺς γνωρίζοντες. 4 Within the Phalaris, the strongest indication that Lucian is indeed writing for the sake of “all kings and all rulers” appears in Phal. 2.11: Περὶ μὲν οὖν ὧν βουλευόμεθα, ταῦτά ἐστιν, οὐ Φ ­ άλαρις τύραννος εἷς οὐδ’ ὁ ταῦρος οὗτος οὐδὲ χαλκὸς μόνον, ἀλλὰ πάντες βασιλεῖς καὶ πάντες δυνάσται, ὅσοι νῦν χρῶνται τῷ ἱερῷ, καὶ χρυσὸς καὶ ἄργυρος καὶ ὅσα ἄλλα τίμια, πολλάκις ἀνατεθησόμενα τῷ θεῷ. All translations of ancient sources in this essay are mine. 1

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imperial politics is not his chief concern.5 Even those scholars who have argued that Lucian is “anti-Roman” have been unable to decipher any extensive invective against the emperors.6 Barry Baldwin’s work on the subject of Lucian and Rome has led him to conclude that the satirist was “inclined to speak softly of emperors and dignitaries” and even that he “carefully avoided” identifying “any particular princeps” as a target of his criticisms.7 Other scholars contend that Lucian engages in flattery when he expects his writing might have an audience among Roman authorities. Michel Dubuisson, for instance, holds that Lucian partly made his way as an intellectual by favoring the power of the emperors.8 This position is largely dependent upon the long-held view that in some of his writings Lucian attempts to flatter the court of Lucius Verus.9 These latter arguments alone, however, might mislead one to conclude that Lucian was exclusively sycophantic when directing his writing 5  See, e. g., Ind. 22; Alex. 48; Eunuch. 3; and Apol. 11, 13. Lucian himself realized that his readers might detect some discrepancy in his attitude on Rome and its rulers, as we see in his Apology, which he writes while occupying an administrative post in Egypt (171–175 c.e.) and of course after his earlier work, On Salaried Posts in Great Houses, where he argues vehemently against becoming “enslaved” to wealthy patrons. As Alain Billault remarks, with the Apology “Lucien se justifie d’avoir accepté ce poste” (“Lucien, Lucius Verus et Marc Aurèle,” in Lucian of Samosata, Greek Writer and Roman Citizen [ed. Francesca Mestre and Pilar Gómez; Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2010], 145–59, here 155). Cf. Billault’s further claim: “Lucien fait donc à plusieurs reprises l’éloge de Marc Aurèle et lui prodigue toutes les marques de respect qui lui sont dues. L’Apologie ne fait pas exception à la règle” (ibid., 157). 6  This position was argued chiefly by Aurelio Peretti (Luciano: Un intellettuale greco contro Roma [Florence: Nuova Italia, 1946]) and subsequently affirmed, e. g., by Barry Baldwin (“Lucian as Social Satirist,” CQ 11 [1961]: 199–208, esp. 207–208) and Mario Pinto (“Fatti e figure della storia romana nelle opere di Luciano,” Vichiana 3 [1974]: 227–38). Cf. Jonas Palm, Rom, Römertum und Imperium in der griechischen Literatur der Kaiserzeit (Acta Regiae Societatis Humaniorum Litterarum Lundensis 57; Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1959), 44–56; and Jennifer Hall, Lucian’s Satire (New York: Arno Press, 1981), 221–51. 7  Barry Baldwin, Studies in Lucian (Toronto: Hakkert, 1973), 18, 23–24. Here Baldwin offers a corrective to his earlier view (argued in “Lucian as Social Satirist”) that Lucian was anti-Roman (Studies, 107). 8  Quoting a passage from Dio Chrysostom (Or. 46.3), Dubuisson states, “l’ascension sociale d’un intellectuel, dans le monde romain, dépendait essentiellement de deux facteurs: sa compétence, bien entendu, mais aussi la faveur du pouvoir et en particulier des empereurs (ἀπὸ παιδείας καὶ παρὰ τῶν αὐτοκρατόρων). Lucien fit, lui aussi, son chemin de cette manière; et si, ne bénéficiant pas, comme d’autres, de bonnes relations personnelles avec un empereur, il dut se contenter d’une place relativement modeste dans l’ordre romain, il n’en était pas moins trop conscient de tout ce qu’il devait à celui-ci pour songer un seul instant à s’en faire l’adversaire” (“Lucien et Rome,” AncSoc 15–17 [1984–86]: 185–207, here 207). 9  See, e. g., D. S. Robertson, “The Authenticity and Date of Lucian De Saltatione,” in Essays and Studies Presented to William Ridgeway (ed. E. C. Quiggin; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1913), 180–85; Hall, Lucian’s Satire, 20–24, 384; C. P. Jones, Culture and Society in Lucian (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1986), 68–77; Simon Swain, Hellenism and Empire: Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World AD 50–250 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), 312–29, esp. 312–15, 322; and Billault, “Lucien, Lucius Verus et Marc Aurèle,” 145–59, esp. 146–55.

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toward emperors. Their observations are nonetheless important, because they acknowledge that Lucian’s references to Roman authorities are not merely, as J. Bompaire suggested, “un petit nombre d’allusions” and “insignifiantes.”10 That there are moments when Lucian appears to aim some of his paraenesis at rulers calls for a reevaluation of whether Lucian ever criticizes the Roman political powers of his day, and if so, an analysis showing how he might present such criticisms. In this essay, I shall contend that Lucian’s Hermotimus is a fictive dialogue between himself and the emperor Marcus Aurelius. Throughout the work, Lucian has largely concealed the target of his paraenesis, but he does provide enough subtle clues for readers to appreciate his argument. Composed in the year 161 c.e. – the same year Marcus became emperor – Lucian calls into question why Marcus had chosen to identify as a philosopher of the Stoic school as opposed to one of the others. Lucian ultimately argues that Marcus should abandon his pursuits to become a Stoic philosopher-king and reign as a civilis princeps. Such a ruler does not lead a life of royalty, but rather that of a commoner. Lucian’s appeal, however, is not for Marcus to give up the philosophical life in favor of the commoner’s life. For he presupposes that to live philosophically is to live as a citizen among equals. My thesis – that in the Hermotimus Lucian fictively dialogues with Marcus about how to present himself as a ruler – suggests that Lucian is neither an enemy nor a sycophant of the emperor, but rather one who attempts through his satire to offer indirect yet constructive criticism for the benefit of the empire. Scholars purporting that Lucian was antagonistic toward Rome and those who suggest that he sought an audience with the emperors merely to flatter them must take into account that his longest dialogue is a subtle yet forceful charge, which displays his stance as a member of the empire invested in its governing capacities.11

10 J. Bompaire, Lucien Écrivain: Imitation et Création (Paris: Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises d’Athènes et de Rome, 1958), 500. More recently, Albrecht Dihle claims: “There seems to have been virtually nothing which did not qualify as a target for Lucian’s satire: the only exception being the state, its institutions and officials, and above all the Emperor. We may well surmise that Lucian was purposefully avoiding any risks by avoiding the subject” (Greek and Latin Literature of the Roman Empire: From Augustus to Justinian [London and New York: Routledge, 1994], 240). See also, however, Tim Whitmarsh’s analysis on how Rome often becomes an object of satire throughout the Lucianic corpus (Greek Literature and the Roman Empire: The Politics of Imitation [Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2001], 247–94). 11 Steven D. Smith comes to a similar conclusion in his study on imperial expansion in Lucian’s True Story: “Lucian’s lying representation of the world illustrates literature’s use in the expansion and intellectual maintenance of empire. Though there is much humor in the text, the role of imperial collaborator is assumed not without serious consideration of the costs and responsibilities of empire” (“Lucian’s True Story and the Ethics of Empire,” in A Lucian for Our Times [ed. Adam Bartley; Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2009], 79–91, here 91).

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I. Hermotimus as Marcus Aurelius Over three centuries ago, Henry Dodwell posited that through the persona of Hermotimus Lucian intended to deride Marcus Aurelius. Dodwell made this suggestion primarily on the basis that Lucian portrays Hermotimus as a figure devoted to the study of Stoic philosophy even in his old age and who at the end of the dialogue trades in the garb of a philosopher for that of a princeps.12 Dodwell’s objective, however, was not to offer a thorough analysis of the Hermotimus; and thus his proposal occupies hardly more than a single page in its published form of 1703. Moreover, he does not support his bold claim with the most persuasive proofs, and his reading of the dialogue eventually disappears from the history of scholarship. We see the reception of his position, for example, only momentarily in Reitz’s edition, which first appeared in 1743, and then again when Wilhelm Schmid in 1891 argued for a rather late dating of the Hermotimus – claiming that Lucian could not have written this work before the death of Marcus (180 c.e.), for such a satirical enterprise, he suggested, would have been hopeless and perhaps even dangerous.13 What neither Dodwell nor his readers recognized, however, is that the strongest piece of evidence showing that the dialogue is actually directed toward a ruler is the fact that Lycinus attempts to persuade Hermotimus to assume the life of an ἰδιώτης, “a commoner.” Readers of the dialogue observe that Lycinus is currently and that Hermotimus is no longer an ἰδιώτης when Lycinus requests that Hermotimus answer his question ὁποῖος τότε ἦσθα ἰδιώτης καὶ κατὰ τὸν νῦν ἐμέ, “as the commoner you then were and as I am now” (Hermot. 15).14 This transi12  Dodwell states: Stoicum Hermotimum facit Lucianus, ut fuit Marcus: Sexagenarium illum facit, majoremque natu, quam fuerit Marcus (Geographiae Veteris Scriptores Graeci Minores: Cum Interpretatione Latina, Dissertationibus, ac Annotationibus, vol. 2 [ed. John Hudson; Oxford: e Theatro Sheldoniano, 1703], 64). Quoting Hermot. 86 (τάχα δὲ καὶ πορφυρίδα μεταμφιάσομαι, ὡς εἰδεῖεν ἅπαντες ὅτι μηκέτι μοι τῶν λήρων ἐκείνων μέτεστιν), Dodwell comments: Sed quod conversus tandem Hermotimus, pallium Philosophicum exuit, induitque purpuram; hoc certe eo spectabat, ut similiter Philosophi personam Marcus exueret, indueretque illam, quam Respublica contulerat personam Principis (ibid.). Cf. Christopher Robinson, who argues that, except for Alexander and Peregrinus, the “pamphlets” of Lucian “contain not one shred of evidence to suggest that their central figures – the master of rhetoric, the book-collector and the carping critic – need to be identified with living persons at all” (Lucian and His Influence in Europe [Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1979], 57); and Graham Anderson’s more convincing analysis on “contemporary targets” throughout the Lucianic corpus (“Lucian: Tradition versus Reality,” in ANRW II.34.2:1422–47, esp. 1430–39). 13 Johan Frederik Reitz, ed., Luciani Samosatensis Opera: Graece et Latine (Amsterdam: J. Wetstenii, 1743), LIX–LX; and Wilhelm Schmid, “Bemerkungen über Lucians Leben und Schriften,” Phil 50 (1891): 297–319, here 310. 14 Lycinus also excludes Hermotimus from the class of ἰδιῶται when he later describes the rustic uncle as “a mere commoner [ἰδιώτης] in comparison to your kind [τὰ ὑμέτερα]” (81). Based on Lycinus’ earlier argument, which the uncle here affirms, the phrase τὰ ὑμέτερα does not signify “you philosophers,” as K. Kilburn (Lucian VI [LCL; Cambridge.: Harvard University Press, 1959], 407) translates, but rather “you ruling types.”

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tion from commoner to king appears also in The Downward Journey, where the philosopher Cyniscus refers to the tyrant Megapenthes as having been an ἰδιώτης before he began to rule (Cat. 26).15 Although Lucian does at times use ἰδιώτης to designate a person who is uneducated, in the Hermotimus Lycinus clarifies that he is not compelling Hermotimus to give up the study of philosophy (Hermot. 52).16 His argument is rather based upon a different use of the term ἰδιώτης – one that identifies a person’s social class and not necessarily lack of education. As we see often throughout his corpus, Lucian places human individuals in two broad social classes, rulers and ἰδιῶται.17 Based on this division, ἰδιῶται is simply another way of designating the members of the δῆμος.18 The question therefore arises, if Lycinus does not wish Hermotimus to stop studying philosophy, then why does he otherwise issue an appeal for this philosopher to lead the life of a common person? For it is clear that Lucian regards philosophers already in the class of commoners. In the Icaromenippus, for example, Menippus recounts that from the sky he was able to observe the deeds of both kings and ἰδιῶται. And among these commoners he includes Hermodorus the Epicurean, Agathocles the Stoic, Clinias the orator, and Herophilus the Cynic (Icar. 16).19 Therefore, if Hermotimus represented just any non-ruling Stoic, Lycinus would scarcely urge him to begin living as a 15  Earlier Megapenthes bids Destiny to make him an ἰδιώτης (Cat. 13). See also the Saturnalia, where Cronus explains that his ἡ πᾶσα βασιλεία lasts for seven days and that at the end of this period he immediately becomes an ἰδιώτης (Sat. 2). And later in this dialogue, Cronus distinguishes the previous period of his τὸ πλουτεῖν καὶ βασιλεύειν from his present state of καθῆσθαι ἰδιωτεύοντα (Sat. 27). Cf. Plutarch, Comp. Lyc. Num. 1.1–2: τῶν δὲ ἰδίᾳ ἑκατέρου καλῶν πρῶτόν ἐστι Νομᾷ μὲν ἡ παράληψις τῆς βασιλείας, Λυκούργῳ δὲ ἡ παράδοσις. ὁ μὲν γὰρ οὐκ αἰτῶν ἔλαβεν, ὁ δὲ ἔχων ἀπέδωκε. καὶ τὸν μὲν ἕτεροι κύριον αὑτῶν κατέστησαν ἰδιώτην καὶ ξένον ὄντα, ὁ δὲ αὐτὸς αὑτὸν ἰδιώτην ἐκ βασιλέως ἐποίησε. 16 For ἰδιώτης meaning “untrained” or “uneducated” in Lucian, see, e. g., Abdic. 13, 23, 26; Peregr. 13, 18; Fug. 21; Philops. 9; and Luct. 2. This usage appears also in Vit. auct. 27, where after having just auctioned off a number of philosophers, Hermes invites the buyers to come back tomorrow, when they will be selling οἱ ἰδιῶται καὶ βάναυσοι καὶ ἀγοραῖοι βίοι. Cf. Musonius Rufus 9 (Lutz 70); Epictetus, Diatr. 3.7.1; 3.15.13; 3.16.1–16; 3.19.1–6; and Acts 4.13. See also A. A.  Long, Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2002), 109–12. 17  One of Lucian’s fictional Cynics prescribes reviling all, καὶ βασιλεῖς καὶ ἰδιῶται (Vit. auct. 10). Among the Cretans, Lucian states, οὐχ οἱ ἰδιῶται μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ οἱ βασιλικώτεροι became dancers (Salt. 8). Lycinus remarks that sickness and fever do not distinguish a βασιλεύς from οἱ ἰδιῶται (Nav. 40). Lucian explains that in his role as an administrator of Egypt, his salary is οὐκ ἰδιωτικός, ἀλλὰ παρὰ τοῦ βασιλέως (Apol. 12). Lycinus observes that Panthea’s life at court, as the emperor’s mistress, is beyond that of ἰδιωτικὴ τύχη (Imag. 2). Josephus (B. J. 1.44, 209) and Dio Chrysostom (Or. 2.12; 3.42; 4.97), e. g., also make this distinction between rulers and ἰδιῶται. 18  See, e. g., Men. 17, where οἱ ἰδιῶται νεκρῶν is synonymous to ὁ δῆμος τῶν νεκρῶν, which appears in a context showing how dead kings no longer hold the honors and riches of their earthly lives. 19 See also A True Story, where the storyteller and his companions observe πολλοὶ μὲν βασιλεῖς receiving punishments, πολλοὶ δὲ καὶ ἰδιῶται. Among the ἰδιῶται are Ctesias and Herodotus (Ver. hist. 2.31).

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commoner. It becomes even more evident throughout the dialogue, I shall show, that Hermotimus must represent one in a position of ruling power, and Marcus Aurelius in particular.

1. The Name and Age of Hermotimus That Lucian’s fictive conversation partner represents Marcus Aurelius must account for two seeming contradictions: (1) the fact that Lucian calls this character Hermotimus rather than a name that more closely resembles that of the emperor; (2) and the age of Hermotimus as twenty years older than Marcus. It is certain that throughout his satire Lucian will often give to characters names that signal attributes of their personalities and the respective roles they play. For instance, in On Salaried Posts in Great Houses, Lucian names his addressee Timocles (Τιμοκλῆς), “famed for honorarium” (2, 13, 42), since he advises this fictive persona not to submit to the patronage of the Roman elite and the paid and seemingly honorable positions in their households.20 While it is clear that Lucian identifies himself with the Hellenized form of his name, Lycinus (Λυκῖνος), in the Hermotimus as well as in other dialogues, precisely why he chose the name Hermotimus ( Ἑρμότιμος) for his conversation partner is more complicated.21 The best clues that Lucian provides for the significance of this name appear in two instances within the dialogue. In the first, Lycinus discloses that Hermotimus has derived his name from the god Hermes: νὴ τὸν  Ἑρμῆν, ὦ  Ἑρμότιμε, αὐτὸν οὗ ἐπώνυμος ὢν τυγχάνεις, “By Hermes, O Hermotimus, after whom you are

20 See esp. Merc. cond. 13, 19, 26–27, 33, as well as the names Megapenthes (Μεγαπένθης), the tyrant who causes “great sorrow” (Cat. 8–13, 25–29), and Lexiphanes (Λεξιφάνης), “the word flaunter,” whose pretentious use of Attic diction ironically creates more confusion than eloquence (Lex. 1, 3, 14–18, 25). In Theon’s instruction on ἐγκώμιον, he explains that to create or apply such a name is clever (e. g., Δημοσθένης ὅτι ἦν τὸ τοῦ δήμου σθένος) as long as the name is not πάνυ φορτικὸν καὶ καταγέλαστον, “extremely vulgar and ridiculous” (Prog. 9 [Patillon 76 = Spengel 111]). Lucian of course is seldom concerned about avoiding the latter, even when writing ἐγκώμιον (e. g., The Fly). 21 Lucian discloses his own personality and style of composition, e. g., when Lycinus asks Hermotimus to allow him “to be silly” (ληρεῖν, Hermot. 63). He uses Lycinus for himself also in Lexiphanes; The Carousal, or The Lapiths; Essays in Portraiture; Essays in Portraiture Defended; The Dance; The Eunuch; A Conversation with Hesiod; and The Ship, or The Wishes. On this phenomenon in Lucian, see, e. g., Jacques Schwartz, Biographie de Lucien de Samosate (Collection Latomus 83; Bruxelles: Latomus, 1965), 92; Jones, Culture and Society, 8; and Karen Ní-Mheallaigh, who states, “Lucian exploits the intriguing middle-ground between the poles of referential and fictional writing by attributing to his principal personae names that flaunt the possibility of identity with the author, but deny the certainty or completeness of this connection” (“The Game of the Name: Onymity and the Contract of Reading in Lucian,” in Lucian of Samosata, Greek Writer and Roman Citizen [ed. Francesca Mestre and Pilar Gómez; Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2010], 121–32, here 129).

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named” (Hermot. 13).22 And in the second instance – which appears in a passage that is central to the point Lucian makes with the dialogue – Lycinus states: αὖθις γὰρ ἐρήσομαι – ὅτῳ ἂν πρώτῳ ἐντύχῃς, τούτῳ ἕψῃ καὶ συμφιλοσοφήσεις κἀκεῖνος ἕρμαιον ποιήσεταί σε; “For I will ask you again – will you follow the first person you happen to meet, and will you become his partner in philosophy, and will he make you into a godsend?” (52). As Lycinus here inquires about which philosophical teacher Hermotimus will choose, Lucian plays upon the name  Ἑρμότιμος with the noun ἕρμαιον, which here means that Hermotimus has the potential of becoming ἕρμαιον, “a godsend” or, more specifically, “a gift” from the god Hermes.23 Lucian, however, suspends until the end of the dialogue the answer as to whether Hermotimus – the alleged τιμή, “gift,” of  Ἑρμῆς – will actually live up to his name.24 The outcome depends largely upon whom Hermotimus chooses to make (ποιεῖν) him into the ἕρμαιον he has yet to become. 22 If Hermes was an important patron deity to Marcus at the time he became emperor, then the name Hermotimus would for Lucian have an additional layer of meaning. Yet the only evidence that Hermes had a special place in the pantheon of Marcus appears later in his emperorship. The rain miracle recorded by Cassius Dio purports that Hermes came to Marcus’ aid: καὶ γάρ τοι λόγος ἔχει  Ἀρνοῦφίν τινα μάγον Αἰγύπτιον συνόντα τῷ Μάρκῳ ἄλλους τέ τινας δαίμονας καὶ τὸν  Ἑρμῆν τὸν ἀέριον ὅτι μάλιστα μαγγανείαις τισὶν ἐπικαλέσασθαι καὶ δι’ αὐτῶν τὸν ὄμβρον ἐπισπάσασθαι (71.8.4). See also Julian’s comments about the relationship between Hermes and Marcus: Καὶ ὁ  Ἑρμῆς βλέψας εἰς τὸν Μάρκον· Σοὶ δέ, εἶπεν, ὦ Βῆρε, τί κάλλιστον ἐδόκει τοῦ βίου τέλος εἶναι; καὶ ὃς ἠρέμα καὶ σωφρόνως· Τὸ μιμεῖσθαι, ἔφη, τοὺς θεούς.  Ἔδοξε μὲν οὖν εὐθέως ἡ ἀπόκρισις οὐκ ἀγεννής, ἀλλὰ καὶ τοῦ παντὸς ἀξία.  Ἀλλὰ καὶ ὁ  Ἑρμῆς οὐκ ἐβούλετο πολυπραγμονεῖν, πεπεισμένος ὅτι πάντα ὁ Μάρκος ἀκολούθως ἐρεῖ (Ceas. 34 = 333b–c). Coins from the year 173 contain the image of Marcus on the obverse and Hermes on the reverse; and the emperor seems to have built a temple for the god at that time. See, e. g., Anthony Richard Birley, Marcus Aurelius: A Biography (London: Routledge, 2002), 173; and especially the comprehensive treatment by Péter Kovács, Marcus Aurelius’ Rain Miracle and the Marcomannic Wars (Mnemosyne Supp. 308; Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2009). 23 On Lucian’s broader usage of ἕρμαιον, see Char. 12; Ind. 1; Somn. 9; and Dial. meretr. 7.1. Cf. Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. 1.28.3: βλέψας οὖν ὁ βάρβαρος ἐς τὸν πλησίον “ἕρμαιον” ἔφη “θεῶν τις ἄγει τουτονὶ τὸν ἄνδρα ἐνταῦθα, ἀγαθὸς γὰρ ξυγγενόμενος ἀγαθῷ πολλῷ βελτίω τὸν βασιλέα ἡμῖν ἀποφανεῖ καὶ σωφρονέστερον καὶ ἡδίω, ταυτὶ γὰρ διαφαίνεται τοῦ ἀνδρός.” ἐσέθεον οὖν εὐαγγελιζόμενοι πᾶσιν, ὅτι ἀνὴρ ἐπὶ ταῖς βασιλέως θύραις ἑστήκοι σοφός τε καὶ  Ἕλλην καὶ ξύμβουλος ἀγαθός. 24  Lucian uses the name Hermotimus in only two other works. In one of the Dialogues of the Courtesans, the name functions as a term of endearment, as does the name of his alleged lover, Melitta (4.2–3). That is to say,  Ἑρμότιμος is the “Godsend” of Melitta, just as Μέλιττα is Hermotimus’ “Honeybee” (cf. Γλυκέριον, “Sweetie,” in Dial. meretr. 1). Thus: Μέλιττα φιλεῖ  Ἑρμότιμον, καὶ μικρὸν αὖθις ὑποκάτω,  Ὁ ναύκληρος  Ἑρμότιμος φιλεῖ Μέλιτταν (4.3). That Melitta’s Hermotimus is a ναύκληρος, “shipowner,” points to his financial success, and therefore to Melitta’s as well. Cf. Dial. meretr. 2.1, 2; 7.1; 12.1. See also The Ship, or the Wishes, where the treasure-seeking shipowner Adimantus (15) prays to Hermes and applies to the god the epithet ὁ κερδῷος, “the bringer of profit” (18, 25; cf. Tim. 41). In the other work where Lucian uses the name Hermotimus, there is no lexical or metaphorical significance. For Lucian simply invokes the tradition about Hermotimus of Clazomenae, whom he compares to a fly, because the souls of both the fly and Hermotimus are wont to leave their respective bodies and then return (Musc. laud. 7). On the tradition about Hermotimus of Clazomenae, see, e. g., Plutarch, Mor. 592c–d; and Diogenes Laertius 8.5. Although Dodwell claimed that Lucian presents Marcus in persona

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Accordingly, the question about whether Hermotimus will be made into a ἕρμαιον is intentionally ambiguous vis-à-vis the referent of πρῶτος and οὗτος and ἐκεῖνος (52). On one level, Lycinus questions whether Hermotimus has made the right choice in attaching himself to the first (πρῶτος) teacher he met without evaluating whether others were equally or perhaps even better qualified. Yet on another level, from the reader’s perspective, the first (πρῶτος) teacher Hermotimus meets (ἐντυγχάνειν, 50, 52, 86) is none other than Lycinus – the one Hermotimus encountered at the beginning of the dialogue and the one who now, whether Hermotimus realizes it, is instructing him about how best to live philosophically. The life of an ἰδιώτης is after all the one that Lycinus already assumes; and therefore he is the one best qualified for making Hermotimus into a ἕρμαιον. The name Hermotimus thus in the end proves to be an ironic designation for this character. For Hermotimus concludes that he will not take up the philosophical life Lycinus is proposing and furthermore that if he ever again meets (ἐντυγχάνειν) another philosopher like him, he will do everything he can to avoid such a person (86). Therefore, by using Hermotimus as a satirical name for the emperor, Lucian first of all hangs in the balance the question about what type of ruler Marcus will become. Because Marcus had already devoted himself to the study of philosophy, he was at least showing much more promise than some of his predecessors.25 For Lucian, however, Marcus would become “a godsend” to the empire only if he, as philosopher and king, also presented himself as an equal to citizens within the empire. Although the comedic finale of the dialogue indicates that Marcus will not assume such a role, only time would tell the true outcome of this question, as Lucian and his contemporaries would observe his rule in subsequent years. It should not surprise us that Lucian avoids using the actual name and age of Marcus in a dialogue where he parodies and even challenges that emperor’s roles and pursuits. As we know from the ancient rhetorical handbooks, orators and writers from this period were taught how to figure (σχηματίζειν) their criticisms Hermotimi Clazomenii (Geographiae Veteris Scriptores Graeci Minores, 2.64), he does not provide sufficient evidence from within the dialogue for making this particular connection. Similarly, Peter von Möllendorff attempts to relate Hermotimus of Clazomenae and the teaching about the transmigration of souls, which his name carries, to the Pythagorean philosophy that Lynicus invokes in Hermot. 48 (Lukian: Hermotimos oder Lohnt es sich, Philosophie zu studieren? [Texte zur Forschung 74; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2000], 170, note 95); but even there the evidence is lacking. Cf. Jupp. trag. 33, where Lucian similarly plays upon the name  Ἑρμῆς by conjoining it with ἀγοραῖος, which there introduces into the dialogue the rhetorician  Ἑρμαγόρας. 25 Nero, Vespasian, and Domitian, much less than consulting with philosophers, had them exiled from Rome. See, e. g., Tim Whitmarsh, “Reading Power in Roman Greece: The Paideia of Dio Chrysostom,” in Pedagogy and Power: Rhetorics of Classical Learning (ed. Yun Lee Too and Niall Livingstone; Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 192–213, esp. 200–201.

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against those in positions of power, so that their speech was at the same time forceful and covert – a type of figured speech called ἔμφασις, “covert allusion.”26 Thus in a dialogue where a fictitious character serves as a stand-in for an actual ruler, one would expect this character to possess traits similar enough to identify the target of invective (however subtle), yet distinct enough that the author would not undergo punishment for treason.27 Relating how Herodes Atticus behaved when standing before Marcus’ tribunal, Philostratus shows that only an insane or untrained individual would neglect to use such covert allusions when addressing an emperor’s misdeeds: “For he came and brought accusations against the emperor; and he did not even figure [σχηματίζειν] his speech, though it seems like a man trained in such rhetoric would have controlled his anger” (Vit. soph. 561). Fronto praises even Marcus for using rhetorical figures (σχήματα) in his speeches to the senate – explaining that though he spoke briefly and indirectly, his words remained 26 On figured speech, see Demetrius, Eloc. 287–95; Quintilian, Inst. 9.2.65–92; PseudoDionysius of Halicarnassus, Ars Rhet. 8–9 (Περὶ ἐσχηματισμένων α and β in Usener and Radermacher, eds., Dionysii Halicarnasei quae exstant, vol. 6 [Stuttgart: Teubner, 1965], 295–358); Apsines, περὶ τῶν ἐσχηματισμένων προβλημάτων (Spengel and Hammer, eds., Rhetores Graeci, vol. 1 [Leipzig: Teubner, 1894], 330–39 = Patillon, ed., Apsinès, Art rhétorique: Problèmes à faux-semblant [Paris: Belles Lettres, 2001], 112–21); Hermogenes, Inv. 4.13 (Invention and Method: Two Rhetorical Treatises from the Hermogenic Corpus [trans. George Kennedy; SBLWGRW 15; Boston and Leiden: Brill, 2005], 187–96); and the analyses by Frederick Ahl, “The Art of Safe Criticism in Greece and Rome,” AJP 105 (1984): 174–208; Pierre Chiron, “Le logos eskhèmatisménos, ou discours figuré,” in La parole polémique (ed. Gilles Declercq, Michel Murat, and Jacqueline Dangel; Colloques, congrès et conférences Époque moderne et contemporaine 11; Paris: Honoré Champion, 2003), 223–54; and Bé Breij, “Oratio figurata,” in Historisches Wörterbuch der Rhetorik (ed. Gert Ueding; Berlin and Boston: Walter de Gruyter, 2012), 10:781–87. For examples of how this rhetorical style is applied, see Shadi Bartsch, Actors in the Audience: Theatricality and Doublespeak from Nero to Hadrian (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1994), 63–97; Hans-Josef Klauck, “Des Kaisers schöne Stimme: Herrscherkritik in Apg 12,20–23,” in idem, Religion und Gesellschaft im frühen Christentum (WUNT 152; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 251–67, esp. 265–66; Steve Mason, “Figured Speech and Irony in T. Flavius Josephus,” in Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome (ed. Jonathan Edmondson, Steve Mason, and James Rives; Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 243–88; Justin R. Howell, “The Imperial Authority and Benefaction of Centurions and Acts 10.34–43: A Response to C. Kavin Rowe,” JSNT 31 (2008): 25–51, esp. 39–44; and Dylan Sailor, Writing and Empire in Tacitus (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 23–24, 264–68. 27 According to Roman law, one could receive punishments for dicta, “things said,” as well as for scripta, “things written” (Dig. 48.19.16). Tacitus, e. g., contrasts the reigns of Domitian and Trajan by describing the latter as “a time when it is permitted to feel what you wish and to say what you feel” (Hist. 1.1). Cassius Dio similarly remarks about Trajan: “To accusations he gave no regard, to anger he was no slave” (68.6.4). And as Epictetus relates, many appear to have been relishing in their newly acquired freedom of speech under Trajan: “Do people ever stop reviling Caesar? What then? Does not Zeus know about this? Do they not report to Caesar what is said? What then does he do? He knows that if he punishes all who revile him, he will not have anyone to rule” (Diatr. 3.4.7–8).

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forceful and did not stir up the city toward violence (Ad M. Ant. Imp. et invicem 1.2.6; LCL 2.40).28 Like a number of his contemporaries, Lucian knew the importance of writing and speaking indirectly when his target was one who had the power to mete out punishments for unwanted reproach.29 The danger of openly criticizing such a person is reflected in the Hermotimus when Lycinus hesitates to speak frankly with his dialogue partner and even asks whether it will suffice for him to criticize the teacher of Hermotimus without mentioning his name (ἄνευ τοῦ ὀνόματος, Hermot. 9). While Lycinus acknowledges that he ought to speak the truth without holding back (με δεῖ μηδὲν ὀκνήσαντα εἰπεῖν τἀληθές), he remains wary even though Hermotimus assures him that he is safe and that others will not hear him (8). As Lycinus later elucidates, although truthful dialogue is characterized by freedom of speech (μετὰ παρρησίας διαλέγεσθαι), the truth is also at times unpleasant to hear and therefore dangerous (51).30 Here Lucian reflects the suppression of his own παρρησία. It is in such cases that ἔμφασις becomes useful for conveying one’s points of criticism and at the same time for escaping any possible repercussions.31 28 As Fronto had explained to Marcus in a letter many years earlier, irony (εἰρωνεία) is an important figure to use in order to persuade and at the same time remain forceful when issuing a critique. Socrates, he explains, “certainly had as much cruelty and force as the Cynic Diogenes displayed in his ravings. But he surely saw that it is easier to appease the dispositions of people in part, and of youth in particular, by friendly and affable speech than to conquer them by a sharp and vehement tone” (Ad M. Caes. et invicem 3.16.2; LCL 1.102). The editions of Fronto’s correspondence cited here are those of M. P. J. van den Hout, M. Cornelii Frontonis: Epistulae (Leiden: Brill, 1954); and C. R. Haines, The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto (2 vols.; LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1919). 29 In his description of covert allusion, Demetrius indicates its popularity among his contemporaries when he claims that the rhetors used it “with comedic effect” (γελοίως, Eloc. 287). Quintilian also attests to the wide-spread use of this type of figured speech and states that it was even taught in the schools (Inst. 9.2.65, 67, 81). For Lucian’s own comments on σχήματα, more broadly speaking, see Hist. 44, 48. On σχήματα and irony (Quintilian, Inst. 9.2.65; and Demetrius, Eloc. 5.291) in Lucian, see Bompaire, Lucien Écrivain, 591–93. 30  Lucian assumes that to prevent παρρησία is also to conceal ἀλήθεια. See, e. g., Hist. 41, 61; Lex. 17; Abdic. 7; Pseudol. 4; Dial. mort. 21.3–4; and esp. Jupp. conf. 5: καὶ πρὸς τῶν Μοιρῶν καὶ τῆς Εἱμαρμένης μὴ τραχέως μηδὲ πρὸς ὀργὴν ἀκούσῃς μου τἀληθῆ μετὰ παρρησίας λέγοντος. 31  See Apsines: κατὰ ἔμφασιν δέ ἐστιν, ὅταν λέγειν μὴ δυνάμενοι τῷ κεκωλῦσθαι καὶ παρρησίαν μὴ ἔχειν ἐν σχήματι ἄλλης ἀξιώσεως ἐμφαίνωμεν κατὰ τὴν σύνθεσιν τοῦ λόγου (Spengel and Hammer, 330 = Patillon, 112); and Hermogenes: Κατὰ ἔμφασιν δέ ἐστιν, ὅταν λέγειν μὴ δυνάμενοι διὰ τὸ κεκωλῦσθαι καὶ παρρησίαν μὴ ἔχειν (Inv. 4.13). Ahl states, “isegorie, ‘equality of speech,’ and what the Greeks more generally called parrhesia, ‘the right to say everything,’ is for most of us, as it was for Herodotus, ‘the first requisite of a state.’ Repression of ‘equality of speech’ is normally associated with tyrannical regimes, with ideological or religious absolutism” (“Art of Safe Criticism,” 174). And similarly, Chiron remarks: “On a, avec la théorie du discours figuré, l’un des principaux modes de survie d’une rhétorique argumentative compatible avec un univers politique où la liberté d’expression a disparu” (“Le logos eskhèmatisménos,” 252). Julian, e. g., praises Constantius for granting the privileges of both ἰσηγορία and παρρησία (Or. 1.17b). Cf. Libanius, who commends the council of the city of Antioch for not hindering freedom of

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Later in the dialogue, the story Lycinus relates about Gelo of Syracuse is a fitting example showing, on one end of the spectrum, the person who is overly cautious against speaking freely and, on the other, the audacious critic. And not insignificantly, this is the same infamous Gelo whom Demetrius advises to invoke as an example when censuring a ruler through covert allusion (Eloc. 292). This tyrant, Lycinus explains, had chronic halitosis, and no one dared “to reprove” (ἐλέγχειν) him until a foreign woman informed him about his condition. When Gelo then storms to his wife complaining that she had never told him about his breath, she pleads for a pardon on the grounds that she had never lived with another man and therefore supposed that all men had bad breath (Hermot. 34). This example serves as an analog for the fictive occasion of the dialogue in its entirety. On a surface level, the illustration shows that association with only one philosophical sect results in a limited and narrow perception of philosophy. Yet Lucian also wants to convey that the ruler he is addressing throughout the Hermotimus will likely not be criticized for his sole devotion to Stoicism and that it takes a foreigner like himself to have the spine to call into question what he regards as parochial philosophical pursuits. Even though some openly censured Marcus (e. g., Cassius Dio, 71.32.3), and seemingly without paying any consequences, Lucian is writing at the beginning of the emperor’s reign and perhaps when his tolerance for criticism was difficult to gauge.32 Vincenzo Longo is correct to date the Hermotimus to the period in Lucian’s career when he was about forty years of age, the same age as Lycinus in the dialogue (Hermot. 13, 17).33 This date would be circa 161, the same year Marcus became emperor. The conclusion of the dialogue, where Hermotimus decides to speech among its members: εἰπεῖν δὲ οὐ τοῖς μὲν ἔξεστιν, οἱ δὲ κεκώλυνται, ἀλλὰ κοινὴ μὲν παρρησία (Or. 11.145). 32 Cf. Lucian, Peregr. 18:  Ἐκεῖθεν δὲ οὕτω παρεσκευασμένος ἐπὶ  Ἰταλίας ἔπλευσεν καὶ ἀποβὰς τῆς νεὼς εὐθὺς ἐλοιδορεῖτο πᾶσι, καὶ μάλιστα τῷ βασιλεῖ, πρᾳότατον αὐτὸν καὶ ἡμερώτατον εἰδώς, ὥστε ἀσφαλῶς ἐτόλμα· ἐκείνῳ γάρ, ὡς εἰκός, ὀλίγον ἔμελεν τῶν βλασφημιῶν καὶ οὐκ ἠξίου τὴν φιλοσοφίαν ὑποδυόμενόν τινα κολάζειν ἐπὶ ῥήμασι καὶ μάλιστα τέχνην τινὰ τὸ λοιδορεῖσθαι πεποιημένον. It is difficult to determine which emperor Lucian refers to here – perhaps Antoninus Pius (so Baldwin, Studies in Lucian, 23) or Marcus (so Bompaire, Lucien Écrivain, 512). If Marcus is in view, Lucian (writing after 165 c.e.) has apparently learned that Marcus was known not to punish revilers as past emperors had. In this scene, however, Lucian is not as interested in the identity of the emperor as much as he is in the character of Peregrinus. Even though the latter had joined the ranks of Musonius, Dio, and Epictetus (Peregr. 18), he had done so not because he was a philosopher of equal mettle. Ironically, he rather became famous as a result of the kind of reckless behavior displayed by the emperors who exiled these philosophers. 33 Vincenzo Longo, Luciano e l’“Ermotimo” (Istituto di Filologia Classica e Medioevale 18; Genova: Università di Genova, 1964), 9–12. See also Hall, Lucian’s Satire, 13–14, 33; and especially Heinz-Günther Nesselrath’s summary of the various attempts to date the Hermotimus (“Kaiserzeitlicher Skeptizismus in platonischem Gewand: Lukians ‘Hermotimos’,” in ANRW II.36.5:3451–82, here 3454–57). Although in The Double Indictment Lucian explains that, “at about the age of forty,” he no longer created the type of epideictic material that he calls τυράννων κατηγορίαι καὶ ἀριστέων ἔπαινοι, “accusations of tyrants and praises of princes” (Bis acc. 32), the synthetic genre consisting of comedy and dialogue that he claims to have substituted in the place

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put aside his philosopher’s cloak and to begin wearing purple (Hermot. 86), also points to this period. In a letter written to Marcus early in his reign, Fronto uses imagery identical to Lucian’s when he compels the emperor to accept the reality of putting on the purple cloak instead of the philosopher’s mantle, even though he may have attained the wisdom of Cleanthes or Zeno (De eloquentia 2.14; LCL 2:62–64).34 Although Lucian and Marcus were nearly the same age, Lucian casts Hermotimus as a sixty-year-old man (Hermot. 2, 13, 77), on the one hand, in order to parody, through hyperbole, the fact that Marcus continued to study philosophy at a point in life when it was controversial to do so and, on the other, to conceal Marcus as the primary target of his criticism. This particular hyperbolic detail of Marcus’ veiled portrait is thus one aspect of Lucian’s covert allusion. As the author of Rhetorica ad Herrenium explains, hyperbole is one of the vehicles of significatio (4.53.67), which is this author’s term for ἔμφασις.35 Lucian alludes to what would have been the actual age of Marcus in the year 161 when he has Hermotimus admit that he was τετταρακοντούτης σχεδόν, “about forty,” at the time he began his study of philosophy (Hermot. 13).36 The strongest allusion to the forty-year-old Marcus, however, comes when Lycinus, referring to a time twenty years past, identifies his interlocutor as  Ἑρμότιμος, ἀνὴρ συνετός, ἔτη τότε γεγονὼς τετταράκοντα, “Hermotimus, an intelligent man, who at that time was forty years old” (Hermot. 17). This reference to past time works on two levels. In dialogue time, and literally speaking, Lycinus refers to the age of Hermotimus twenty years ago. But in historical time, and on a metaphorical level – where Lycinus and Hermotimus represent Lucian and Marof such oratory (34; cf. Prom. Es. 1–7) and that he displays throughout his corpus is not without its deliberative qualities, with regard to the ethics of kingship in particular. 34 See similar discussion in another letter from Fronto to Marcus (Ad M. Caes. et invicem 1.9.3; LCL 1:120). Cf. Möllendorff ’s argument that for Hermotimus to begin wearing purple upon adopting his new ideology is ironic comedy in the tradition of Aristophanes’ Nubes (Lukian: Hermotimos, 201–18). 35 It is clear that, from the perspective of some ancient rhetoricians, hyperbole is often useful for its humorous effects (e. g., Rhet. Her. 1.6.10; Quintilian, Inst. 8.6.74; Longinus, Subl. 38; and Demetrius, Eloc. 124–27). Where the rhetorical theorists sometimes differ, however, is to what extent hyperboles are statements that are impossible and to what extent the exaggerations may fall within the realm of possibility. While Demetrius, e. g., limits hyperboles to extreme impossibilities, the author of De sublimitate warns against taking the trope too far toward the unbelievable. “The best hyperboles,” this author claims, “are those that belie that they actually are hyperboles” (38). Cf. Lucian’s own advice against over-hyperbolizing within the historical genre (Hist. 8, 13, 20); and his claim that those who offer genuine praise do not use excessive hyperboles (Pro imag. 21). See also Aristotle, Rhet. 3.11.15–16 = 1413a–b; Anaximenes, Rhet. Alex. 11 = 1430b; Rhet. Her. 4.33.44; Seneca, Ben. 7.23.1–2; Quintilian, Inst. 8.6.67–76; Demetrius, Eloc. 52, 124–27, 148, 161–62, 282–83, 285; and Hermogenes, Prog. 4 (Rabe 9). 36 Fronto, writing to Marcus in the year 143, says that at age twenty-two he himself “had hardly touched any of the ancient texts” (Ad M. Caes. et invicem 1.9.4; LCL 1.122). That Fronto affirms Marcus as a twenty-two-year-old student, however, may assume that not everyone considered this pursuit socially acceptable.

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cus, respectively – Lucian supplies information for his readers that Marcus was forty-years old “at that time” (τότε), that is, when Lucian composed this work.37 In this vein, the immediately subsequent statement that τοῖς ἰδιώταις ἐπίστευσεν, “he believed commoners” (17), conveys an irony correspondent to that of the dialogue’s conclusion: Marcus adhered to the statements of ἰδιῶται in giving preference to Stoicism, but in the end he refuses himself to live as an ἰδιώτης. Furthermore, that some would sneer at an older man for attending the lectures of a philosopher is evidenced in the letter of Seneca where he seeks to dismantle the viewpoint that would lead one to make such a derisive accusation. Seneca expounds at length upon the proverb, “As long as you live, you must learn how to live” (Ep. 76.3).38 The scandal around the emperor’s study of philosophy at an older age is presupposed in Dio Cassius’ account that Marcus was “not ashamed or hesitant to resort to [φοιτᾶν] a teacher” (71.1.2). According to Philostratus, Marcus was even taunted by a certain Lucius for studying philosophy as an older man. Shortly after Lucius had arrived in Rome, he encountered Marcus and asked him where he was going and to what end. Marcus replied: “Learning is good even for one who is growing old. I am going to Sextus the philosopher to learn what I do not yet know.” As Philostratus narrates, Lucius responded by raising his hand to heaven and saying, “O Zeus! The emperor of the Romans, though already growing old, hangs a tablet around himself and resorts to [φοιτᾶν] a teacher. But my emperor Alexander died when he was thirty-two!”39 In parallel fashion, Lycinus compares Hermotimus to Alexander as he inquires about why he has not completed his course of study after twenty years. Alexander was able to take Aornos by force in only a few days, he explains. Hermotimus contests that innumerable Alexanders could not reach the pinnacle of virtue in such a short time (Hermot. 4–5); and thus this is the reason he continues “resorting to [φοιτᾶν] the teachers,” even after twenty years (2). A similar accusation against the emperor’s study of philosophy is preserved in a tradition purporting that Avidius Cassius had mocked Marcus by calling him  As Lucian makes clear in Imag. 23, he writes τοῖς τε νῦν οὖσι καὶ τοῖς ἐν ὑστέρῳ ἐσομένοις, “not only for those in the present, but also for those who will live later.” 38  Tamdiu discendum est, quemadmodum vivas, quamdiu vivas. Similarly, Seneca explains in Ep. 15.5 that mental exercise is hindered neither by hot or cold weather nor by old age (senectus); and in Ep. 36.4 he claims that it is appropriate for persons of any age to study. 39  Ἐσπούδαζε μὲν ὁ αὐτοκράτωρ Μάρκος περὶ Σέξτον τὸν ἐκ Βοιωτίας φιλόσοφον, θαμίζων αὐτῷ καὶ φοιτῶν ἐπὶ θύρας, ἄρτι δὲ ἥκων ἐς τὴν  Ῥώμην ὁ Λούκιος ἤρετο τὸν αὐτοκράτορα προιόντα, ποῖ βαδίζοι καὶ ἐφ’ ὅ τι, καὶ ὁ Μάρκος “καλὸν” ἔφη “καὶ γηράσκοντι τὸ μανθάνειν· εἶμι δὴ πρὸς Σέξτον τὸν φιλόσοφον μαθησόμενος, ἃ οὔπω οἶδα.” καὶ ὁ Λούκιος ἐξάρας τὴν χεῖρα ἐς τὸν οὐρανὸν “ὦ Ζεῦ,” ἔφη “ὁ  Ῥωμαίων βασιλεὺς γηράσκων ἤδη δέλτον ἐξαψάμενος ἐς διδασκάλου φοιτᾷ, ὁ δὲ ἐμὸς βασιλεὺς  Ἀλέξανδρος δύο καὶ τριάκοντα ἐτῶν ἀπέθανεν” (Vit. soph. 557). Schmid was likewise intrigued by this parallel and consequently used it as evidence for his late dating of the Hermotimus – when Marcus would have actually been about sixty years of age, at his death in 180 (“Lucians Leben und Schriften,” 310). 37

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“a philosophizing little old woman [anicula]” (Script. hist. Aug. 6.1.8).40 It was on the basis of this very insult that Dodwell claimed Lucian, in taking the side of Cassius against Marcus, composed his Hermotimus.41 While it is not impossible for Lucian to have known about Cassius’ reproach, if indeed the tradition carries some truth, the other testimonia showing similar criticisms against Marcus attest to a much more widely held opinion about the emperor’s philosophical studies and thus one Lucian could have arrived at independent of any one particular insult. Nevertheless, there is another subtle point of similarity between Cassius’ alleged statement and Lucian’s depiction of Hermotimus. On the one hand, Cassius’ insult is aimed at Marcus’ ongoing philosophical pursuits as an older man. Yet on the other, the diminutive aspect of anicula is likely a personal attack upon the bodily health and appearance of Marcus  – who was said, by Dio Cassius for instance, to have been physically decrepit because of much time spent in study.42 Correspondingly, Philostratus describes a letter that Marcus had written to Herodes Atticus where the emperor had discussed, among other topics, his “bodily weakness” (ἡ τοῦ σώματος ἀσθένεια, Vit. soph. 562). Lucian likewise refers to this detail about Marcus when Lycinus informs Hermotimus that he has seen him studying philosophy for some twenty years with such diligence that he is ὠχρὸς ἀεὶ ὑπὸ φροντίδων καὶ τὸ σῶμα κατεσκληκώς, “always pale and physically dried-up from thinking” (Hermot. 2).43

2. Hermotimus as Philosopher-King Lucian makes clear at an early point in the dialogue that it is to the teachings of Stoicism that his fictive conversation partner devotes his contemplative hours  The tradition comes from a spurious letter in which Lucius Verus writes to Marcus in order to inform him that Cassius is displaying treasonous behavior and possibly aims to revolt. The letter appears in the editions by Ernestus Hohl, Scriptores Historiae Augustae (Leipzig: Teubner, 1965), 1:86; David Magie, Scriptores Historiae Augustae (3 vols.; LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1921–32), 1:234; and Haines, Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto, 2:308. 41  Dodwell states: Scripsit autem, ut suspicor, in gratiam Avidii Cassii, ut studium Philosophiae, quo flagrabat Marcus, viro Principe indignum ostenderet. Sic Marcum Cassius anum Philosopham appellaverat (Geographiae Veteris Scriptores Graeci Minores, 2:64). 42  Dio relates, αὐτὸς μὲν γὰρ ἀσθενὴς ἦν τῷ σώματι καὶ τὰ πολλὰ λόγοις ἐσχόλαζε (71.1.2); and also, ἐκ δ’ οὖν τῆς πολλῆς ἀσχολίας τε καὶ ἀσκήσεως ἀσθενέστατον τὸ σῶμα ἔσχε, καίτοι τοσαύτῃ εὐεξίᾳ ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς χρησάμενος ὥστε καὶ ὁπλομαχεῖν καὶ σῦς ἀγρίους ἐν θήρᾳ καταβάλλειν ἀπὸ ἵππου, τάς τε ἐπιστολὰς τὰς πλείστας οὐ μόνον ἐν τῇ πρώτῃ ἡλικίᾳ ἀλλὰ καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα αὐτοχειρίᾳ τοῖς πάνυ φίλοις γράφειν. οὐ μέντοι καὶ ἐπαξίως ἑαυτοῦ εὐδαιμόνησεν· οὔτε γὰρ τὸ σῶμα ἔρρωτο, καὶ κακοῖς πλείστοις παρὰ πᾶσαν ὡς εἰπεῖν τὴν ἡγεμονίαν περιέπεσεν (71.36.1–3). 43 Cf. Hermot. 6: οὐ γὰρ δὴ σέ γε εἰκὸς ἐπὶ τῷ ἀδήλῳ, εἰ βιώσῃ μέχρι πρὸς τὴν ἀρετήν, τοσούτους πόνους ἀνέχεσθαι καὶ ταλαιπωρεῖν νύκτωρ καὶ μεθ’ ἡμέραν οὐκ εἰδότα εἴ σε πλησίον ἤδη τοῦ ἄκρου γενόμενον τὸ χρεὼν ἐπιστὰν κατασπάσει λαβόμενον τοῦ ποδὸς ἐξ ἀτελοῦς τῆς ἐλπίδος. 40

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(Hermot. 11–12, 14). That Hermotimus is a Stoic, coupled with the inference that he is also a ruler, are the most striking evidences that Lucian aims this work at Marcus Aurelius.44 Lucian parodies the emperor’s aspirations to become the ideal composite of philosopher and king when he has Hermotimus explain to Lycinus why he had chosen to become a Stoic. Such a philosopher, Hermotimus states, is μόνος βασιλεύς, μόνος πλούσιος, μόνος σοφὸς καὶ συνόλως ἅπαντα, “the only king, the only rich man, the only wise man, and everything in one” (Hermot. 16). This notion that a philosopher would desire to become the only king Lucian reiterates in the story about the nephew who seeks to learn Stoicism so that, he states, οὐδὲν κωλύσει με μόνον πλούσιον μόνον βασιλέα εἶναι, τοὺς δὲ ἄλλους ἀνδράποδα καὶ καθάρματα νομίζεσθαι ὡς πρὸς ἐμέ, “nothing will hinder me from being the only rich man, the only king, and others considered slaves and outcasts in comparison to me” (81). By having Hermotimus the Stoic aspire to become a king, Lucian points to the Stoic paradox that acclaims the kingship of the sage.45 Yet the version of this teaching that Hermotimus expresses and the nephew echoes misrepresents the Stoic position and furthermore reveals his hegemonic ambitions. This doctrine was important to the Stoics not because it enabled the sage to attain supremacy over others, but rather because it expressed the autonomy of the sage.46 The 44  Even though Marcus never calls himself a Stoic in his Meditations, it is clear that Stoic teachers and ideas had a profound impact upon him from an early age. See Elizabeth Asmis, “The Stoicism of Marcus Aurelius,” ANRW II.36.3:2228–52. The evidences Asmis cites showing Marcus’ early interest in Stoicism include his dedication to Rusticus, one of his Stoic teachers, where he thanks him for sending the memoirs of Epictetus (Med. 1.7) and a letter to Fronto (Ad M. Caes. 4.13; LCL 1:216–18), which Marcus writes at age twenty-five (146–147 c.e.) and there, as Asmis states, “excuses himself for not having done his writing assignment for Fronto: the books of the Stoic Ariston occupied him instead” (ibid., 2232). 45 Cf. the statement Lucian has Hermes declare about the Stoic in Vit. auct. 20: μόνος οὗτος σοφός, μόνος καλός, μόνος δίκαιος ἀνδρεῖος βασιλεὺς ῥήτωρ πλούσιος νομοθέτης καὶ τὰ ἄλλα ὁπόσα ἐστίν. 46  The early Stoics were not monarchists and were even opposed to the idea of a political ruler. See W. W.  Tarn, Alexander the Great (2 vols.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1948), 2:424–26. Tarn argues against J. Kaerst (Studien zur Entwicklung und theoretische Begrundung der Monarchie im Altertum [Munich: Oldenbourg, 1898], 67), who held that the Stoics viewed kingship as the ideal form of government. More recently, Andrew Erskine (The Hellenistic Stoa: Political Thought and Action [Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990], 73–74) observes that although the Stoics clearly conceived of an ideal king and held that only a sage could be such a figure, this “claim effectively condemned all contemporary kings.” As he explains: “What the Stoics present is not the idealisation of the king, but the idealisation of the wise man.” Furthermore, in “the Hellenistic context it would have been difficult to avoid the question of how a king should behave, but to propose that the wise man will be the only true king is not to show a preference for monarchy; it merely asserts that the wise man will have the qualities appropriate to a true king, whether he is in practice a king or not (Stobaeus, Ecl. 2.102.13–15, SVF 3.615).” This early Stoic position is an amendment to Plato’s philosopher-king as presented in the Republic. See the response to Erskine by Paul A. Vander Waerdt, “Politics and Philosophy in Stoicism,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 9 (1991): 185–211. Cf. Seneca, Ep. 33.4, 7, 10; Ot. 8.1–4; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.29.9; and Plutarch, Mor. 1033e, 1043b–c, 1060b.

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Stoics taught not that the sage is the only king, but rather that only the sage is a king – as Arius Didymus states, μόνον εἶναι τὸν σοφὸν βασιλέα τε καὶ βασιλικόν, “only the sage is a king and kingly” (11m).47 There may after all be multiple sages who alone are kings.48 Moreover, according to Cicero, the desire to become solus princeps, “the only king,” is a passion characteristic of an unjust ruler who fails to preserve any sense of equality (Off. 1.64). Seeking to become the only king directly counters Lucian’s point that Marcus identify as an ἰδιώτης and thus as an equal to citizens within the empire. A further implication of this doctrine about the kingship of the sage, as it appears in the Hermotimus, is that Marcus had given preference to the Stoic school because its teachings justify his ambitions to make the Roman emperorship into a philosopher-kingship, where Marcus would indeed be the only reigning sage. It is clear that Marcus himself viewed Plato’s philosopher-king as the ideal ruler – even though he realized that such a model was more likely to remain a dream rather than become a reality. As he reminds himself: “Stop expecting Plato’s Respublica. But be content if even the smallest advance is made” (Med. 9.29). Furthermore, one of Fronto’s letters to Marcus, from the year 163, illustrates how Marcus was viewed as both king and philosopher already early in his reign. In the letter, Fronto mentions Marcus’ twin sons Lucius Aurelius Commodus and Antonius Geminus, who were born in 161. In order to convey how the twins together represented the dual status of their father, Fronto states that he saw one son “holding well a piece of white bread, as a kingly child, but the other son a piece of black bread, as is quite natural for a philosopher’s son” (M. Ant. Imp. et invicem 1.3.2; LCL 2:120). I suggest that Lucian reinforces his veiled portrait of Marcus as a Stoic philosopher-king through the final sentence Lycinus utters in the dialogue: νῦν δὲ ἐπεὶ τὰ Στωϊκῶν προετίμησας, πρὸς τὴν Στοὰν ἀποτετάσθαι ὁ λόγος ἔδοξεν οὐδὲν ἐξαίρετον πρὸς αὐτὴν ἔχων. “As it stands, because you have given preference to the teachings of the Stoics, my argument seems to have made allusion against the Stoa, although it has nothing in particular against it” (85). Even though Lycinus here denies that he intends to single out the Stoics, through this denial he actually 47 The edition cited here is that by Arthur J. Pomeroy, ed., Arius Didymus: Epitome of Stoic Ethics (SBLTT 44 Graeco-Roman 14; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1999), 88. See also Cicero: regem, dictatorem, divitem solum esse sapientem (Fin. 4.7); Musonius Rufus: ἐγὼ μὲν οἶμαι τὸν βασιλέα τὸν ἀγαθὸν εὐθὺς καὶ φιλόσοφον ἐξ ἀνάγκης εἶναι καὶ τόν γε φιλόσοφον εὐθὺς καὶ βασιλικὸν εἶναι (8 [Lutz, 64]); and Plutarch: ἀλλ’ αὐτὸς ὁ Χρύσιππος ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ περὶ Βίων βασιλείαν τε τὸν σοφὸν ἑκουσίως ἀναδέχεσθαι λέγει χρηματιζόμενον ἀπ’ αὐτῆς, κἂν αὐτὸς βασιλεύειν μὴ δύνηται, συμβιώσεται βασιλεῖ καὶ στρατεύσεται μετὰ βασιλέως (Mor. 1043b–c). Cf. Seneca, Ep. 108.13; as well as Seneca’s charge to Nero in Clem. 2.5.2–7.5. 48 See, e. g., Cicero: sapientes solos reges, solos divites, solos formosos (Acad. pr. 2.136); Plutarch: τοὺς μόνους βασιλεῖς καὶ μόνους πλουσίους καὶ καλοὺς αὐτῶν καὶ πολίτας καὶ δικαστὰς μόνους (Mor. 1060b); and Diogenes Laertius: οὐ μόνον δ’ ἐλευθέρους εἶναι τοὺς σοφούς, ἀλλὰ καὶ βασιλέας, τῆς βασιλείας οὔσης ἀρχῆς ἀνυπευθύνου, ἥτις περὶ μόνους ἂν τοὺς σοφοὺς συσταίη (7.122).

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calls attention to the Stoics and thereby issues another innuendo at Marcus, the emperor who undeniably had shown special favor toward Stoicism. The expression ἀποτετάσθαι πρός in Lycinus’ final sentence is crucial for understanding Lucian’s rhetorical strategy in making covert allusions against Marcus throughout the Hermotimus. In its more frequent usage, ἀποτείνειν has the literal meaning “to stretch out” (e. g., Hermot. 11, 70). And the expression ἀποτείνειν πρός, as Lucian uses it, literally means “to stretch out toward” one in speech or “to make allusion against.” This meaning becomes all the more apparent from a passage in the Nigrinus, where the convert tells his companion about an anonymous wealthy individual who had gone to Athens and expected to impress the Athenians with his supposed happiness. Yet in the eyes of the Athenians, the convert explains, “the fellow seemed to be unfortunate, and they set out to educate him, not bitterly, nor outrightly forbidding him to live as he wished in a free city. But whenever he was annoying in the schools and the baths by causing congestion with his slaves and crowding those who were present, someone would say quietly under his breath, pretending to go unnoticed, as though not making an allusion against that man [πρὸς αὐτὸν ἐκεῖνον ἀποτείνειν], ‘He is afraid of dying while taking a bath. And yet profound peace resides in the bath-house. There is then no need for an army!’ And he, overhearing this, was meanwhile receiving instruction.”49 In a similar fashion, Lucian intends through the Hermotimus to offer indirect instruction to the emperor. Lycinus’ final claim that he does not wish to wage an argument against the Stoa is thus apposite and truthful in light of the foregoing dialogue. For the dialogue is not an argument against the Stoics as they are represented by Hermotimus as much as it is a challenge made to Hermotimus, who happens to identify as a Stoic. Although Lycinus can openly say that he does not make allusion against the Stoa and that he has nothing against it, Lucian cannot say the same about Marcus, for Lucian does allude to him and indeed does have something against how he chooses to present himself as the emperor.  Τοῖς δ’ ἄρα δυστυχεῖν ἐδόκει τὸ ἀνθρώπιον, καὶ παιδεύειν ἐπεχείρουν αὐτὸν οὐ πικρῶς οὐδ’ ἄντικρυς ἀπαγορεύοντες ἐν ἐλευθέρᾳ τῇ πόλει καθ’ ὅντινα τρόπον βούλεται μὴ βιοῦν· ἀλλ’ ἐπεὶ κἀν τοῖς γυμνασίοις καὶ λουτροῖς ὀχληρὸς ἦν θλίβων τοῖς οἰκέταις καὶ στενοχωρῶν τοὺς ἀπαντῶντας, ἡσυχῇ τις ἂν ὑπεφθέγξατο προσποιούμενος λανθάνειν, ὥσπερ οὐ πρὸς αὐτὸν ἐκεῖνον ἀποτείνων, Δέδοικε μὴ παραπόληται μεταξὺ λουόμενος· καὶ μὴν εἰρήνη γε μακρὰ κατέχει τὸ βαλανεῖον· οὐδὲν οὖν δεῖ στρατοπέδου. ὁ δὲ ἀκούων ἃ ἦν μεταξὺ ἐπαιδεύετο (Nigr. 13). Heinz-Günther Nesselrath analyzes the juxtaposition between Rome and Athens, which we see in the Nigrinus. He concludes that “neither Rome nor Athens are without flaws in Lucian’s descriptions; but while Rome is simply too big to be reformed by intellectual Greek activity, the flaws of Athens can be remedied” (“A Tale of Two Cities – Lucian on Athens and Rome,” in A Lucian for our Times [ed. Adam Bartley; Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2009], 121–35, here 135). Cf. Fabio Berdozzo, Götter, Mythen, Philosophen: Lukian and die paganen Göttervorstellungen seiner Zeit (Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte 106; Berlin and Boston: Walter de Gruyter, 2011), 226–28. 49

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II. An Appeal for Marcus to Reign as Civilis Princeps Lucian sets forth his model ἰδιώτης through the character and speech of Lycinus. When Lycinus compels Hermotimus to answer his question in the manner of a common citizen (Hermot. 15), we see one of Lucian’s many attempts throughout the dialogue to teach Marcus to identify with the citizens of the empire. From Lucian’s perspective, the ruler who assumes the station of an ἰδιώτης marks himself as an equal to non-ruling citizens. Thus when Lycinus launches his investigation into philosophical virtue, he speaks ἰδιωτικῶς, “as a commoner” (Hermot. 21) – as one envisioning an idealized πόλις, whose wise and virtuous inhabitants live together as fellow citizens (ξυμπολιτεύειν, 22). Important in his description is that good order (εὐνομία) and freedom (ἐλευθερία) coexist with equality (ἰσότης). For whoever becomes a citizen in this state (ἐμπολιτεύειν), Lycinus explains, is ἰσότιμος ἅπασι· τὸ δὲ χείρων ἢ κρείττων ἢ εὐπατρίδης ἢ ἀγεννὴς ἢ δοῦλος ἢ ἐλεύθερος οὐδὲ ὅλως εἶναι ἢ λέγεσθαι ἐν τῇ πόλει, “of equal rank to all. And there is not a single trace or mention of inferior or superior, noble or ignoble, or slave or free in the state” (24). In this context, Lucian offers an appeal for Marcus to consider and conduct himself as a common citizen also through the speech of Hermotimus, when he asks, οὐκ ἄξιον ἅπαντας ἐπιθυμεῖν πολίτας γίγνεσθαι τῆς τοιαύτης πόλεως, “is it not right for all persons to desire to become citizens of such a state” (23), which implies that even rulers must aim toward virtuous and egalitarian citizenship. The notion that rulers are included among the ἅπαντες he then reinforces in the final clause of the question, εἰ μέλλουσιν ἀφικόμενοι ἐγγραφήσεσθαι καὶ αὐτοὶ καὶ μεθέξειν τῆς πολιτείας, “if upon arriving even they are going to be enrolled and share in the citizenship” (23). The καὶ αὐτοί in this question – which points indirectly to rulers  – would perhaps be unnoticably subtle if Lucian did not subsequently have Hermotimus specify himself with καὶ αὐτός when he asks whether Lycinus sees ὡς οὐ μάτην οὐδὲ περὶ μικρῶν κάμνω πολίτης ἐπιθυμῶν γενέσθαι καὶ αὐτὸς οὕτω καλῆς καὶ εὐδαίμονος πόλεως, “how it is not futile or for something insignificant if even I work and set my desires upon becoming a citizen of a state so beautiful and blessed” (25). Thus even though Hermotimus does not come to realize the implications of Lycinus’ argument in actions, he affirms it at least in words. The ideal of a king who reigns as an ἰδιώτης was a prevalent topic during the period of Roman domination.50 Marcus himself claims that he learned from the 50 Andrew Wallace-Hadrill shows that the social standing of the civilis princeps is as the title suggests – neither a common citizen nor an autocratic ruler, but somewhere between the two. He concludes that the attempt by Roman emperors to identify as common citizens “was enacted in all seriousness, because it served to articulate certain deeper truths that, for a period, mattered to the society over which these emperors ruled: the continuity with the republican past; the dependence of the emperor on the consent of the upper orders; but above all the use of the

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gods how “to humble himself as close as possible to the commoner [ἰδιώτης], and not on account of this to have more humility or carelessness toward the affairs that must be accomplished authoritatively in behalf of the empire” (Med. 1.17.3; cf. 4.3–4).51 We know from Cassius Dio that Marcus, as a young man, was known to dress ἰδιωτικῶς, “as a commoner,” even when it did not befit his rank (71.35.4). And Marcus reflects time and again upon the virtue of a simple wardrobe (Med. 1.7; 1.16.8; 4.30; 6.30.2; 9.36).52 Marcus thought the most effective ruler was one who assumed the station of a common citizen while at the same time maintaining his duties to the empire. He reminds himself not to “assume the disposition of a Caesar” and to keep himself “simple, good, guileless, noble, unadorned, a friend of justice, god-fearing, gracious, affectionate, and responsible toward obligations” (Med. 6.30.1). He is grateful to have learned from his mother how to “lead a simple life, far from the rich person’s way of living” (Med. 1.3) and regards such an existence as a lifelong pursuit (Med. 4.26, 37; 5.9; 9.37). As Marcus views it, that an emperor would live as a commoner does not deny that he also identify as a philosopher. In full agreement with Lucian, the philosopher in Marcus’ view is a common person. As he writes to himself, “simple and modest is the work of philosophy. Stop leading me away into pretentiousness” (Med. 9.29). Pliny also praises the traits of the civilis princeps when he commends Trajan for deeming himself subject to the law no less as emperor than when he was consul (Pan. 65.1–3; cf. Suetonius, Aug. 56). He furthermore reminds him about the brevity and vulnerability of life for emperors (principes) and common persons (ceteri homines) alike – even when the former consider themselves equal to the gods (Pan. 78.2). In a similar vein, Suetonius counts it a virtue that Vespasian “never hid his former obscurity, but often even displayed it” (Vesp. 12). He commends Augustus in like manner for communing even with commoners (plebs), for casting his vote as one of the people, and for always avoiding the title dominus (Aug. 53–56). Tiberius also, he claims, rejected this appellation as well as other titles (Tib. 26–27) and conducted his life in a manner that was “almost lowlier than that of a private citizen [privatus]” (Tib. 26.1). He extols both of these emperors as well for preventing statues of themselves from becoming too ubiquitous throughout the empire – in the case of Augustus, for melting down the silver statues of himself social structure of a city-state to organize and unify the disparate people of the empire” (“Civilis Princeps: Between Citizen and King,” JRS 72 [1982]: 32–48, here 48). 51  See especially Klaus Rosen, “Marc Aurel und das Ideal des civilis princeps,” in Stimuli: Exegese und ihre Hermeneutik in Antike und Christentum: Festschrift für Ernst Dassmann (ed. Georg Schöllgen and Clemens Scholten; JAC 23; Münster: Aschendorff, 1996), 154–60. 52 Cf. Josephus, B. J. 1.387; and Dio Chrysostom, Or. 4.66, where Diogenes compels Alexander to throw off his current outfit – consisting of “a ridiculous diadem” (διάδημα καταγέλαστον)  – and take up the garment typically worn by slaves and the poor (ἐξωμίς). See also Wallace-Hadrill’s discussion on simplicity of dress among emperors (“Civilis Princeps,” 39) as well as the precedent for this phenomenon among Greek rulers (ibid., 44).

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that had been erected in Rome (Aug. 52), and Tiberius, for prohibiting statues and busts to appear without his permission and for allowing them never to be placed among those of the gods (Tib. 26). Correspondingly, Lucian perceives that because a citizen king presents himself as an equal among the people, such a ruler must not insist upon his own divinity. Lucian displays this virtue in The Dialogues of the Dead, for instance, when Hannibal contrasts himself with Alexander and points to his own feats as those accomplished without θεὸς εἶναι προσποιούμενος, “pretending to be a god” (Dial. mort. 25.2). Hannibal asserts that he rather led his country ἐπ’ ἴσης, “as an equal,” and gave himself up as an ἰδιώτης (25.3). Although Lucian does acknowledge the social advantages of the imperial cult (Apol. 13), its theology he regards as empty. The act of giving obeisance to a ruler he limits to an external display of rendering honor that has no real or internal justification.53 And he is especially disapproving of rulers who aspire to become gods prior to death.54 Yet he does not fail to satirize those seeking to achieve apotheosis after death either. One compatibility between Roman imperial ideology and Stoicism that Lucian plays upon in the Hermotimus is that both the emperor and the Stoic sage attain to apotheosis. That Hermotimus, in representing both of these roles, aspires ἀναπέτεσθαι ἐς τοὺς θεοὺς, “to fly up to the gods” (Hermot. 7), shows that he is far from viewing himself as an equal to others.55 To the contrary, upon reaching the heights, he will “look upon others as ants” (5).56 In his response, Lycinus then   See, e. g., Gall. 24, where Pythagoras, reincarnated as a rooster, recounts his former life as a wealthy ruler whom the people worshiped and considered a god. Here Lucian trivializes the cult as the rooster confesses that he pardoned his subjects for their folly and pitied himself for being the same as large colossi (μεγάλοι κολοσσοί) – beautiful and ornate on the outside, but within full of bars, bolts, nails that have been driven through, studs, wedges, pitch, and clay, not to mention the multitude of mice and rats that sometimes live as citizens (ἐμπολιτεύειν) inside them. Cf. Lycinus’ remark in Hermot. 71 about the ambition to become κολοσσιαῖος τὸ μέγεθος, “colossal in size.” 54  Through Menippus, Lucian identifies those who recognize the deification of humans as μάταιοι (Dial. mort. 10.1). Menippus rebukes Croesus and Sardanapalus for προσκυνεῖσθαι ἀξιοῦντες, “expecting to be worshiped” (Dial. mort. 3.2). The barbarians who fought against Alexander only thought he was a god (Dial. mort. 12.1). Accordingly, Philip chides Alexander about the fact that when he died all recognized his dead corpse to be the same as all bodies (12.5). See also Men. 12. 55  See also The Ship, or the Wishes, where Timolaus – realizing the pressures of riches, kingdoms, and rule (Nav. 41) – expresses his desire for a set of rings that would give him marvelous powers to overcome human limitations. One ring, he explains, would enable him alone to fly above the earth and view distant lands (Nav. 42, 44). Another would function like the ring of Gyges (Nav. 42), a reference to the story Plato relates about the shepherd and ancestor of Gyges who discovered a ring that enabled him to become invisible and ultimately to usurp the throne of Lydia (Resp. 359d–360b; cf. 612b). Cf. Cicero, Off. 3.38–39, 78. 56 See also Icar. 19: εἰ δέ σοι μικρὸν δοκεῖ τὸ παράδειγμα, τὸ ἀνθρώπους εἰκάσαι τῇ μυρμήκων πολιτείᾳ, τοὺς παλαιοὺς μύθους ἐπίσκεψαι τῶν Θετταλῶν· εὑρήσεις γὰρ τοὺς Μυρμιδόνας, τὸ μαχιμώτατον φῦλον, ἐκ μυρμήκων ἄνδρας γεγονότας. Cf. the conclusion, where Menippus, after 53

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points to the inequality that such mentality promotes: “how small you are making us, not even the size of Pygmies, but rather creeping flat upon the surface of the earth! As we would only expect, your thoughts are already on high and up above; but we who make up the rabble and are crawling along the ground will pray even to you along with the gods, once you are beyond the clouds and have ascended to where you have long been hastening.”57 This correspondence between Stoic doctrine and imperial ideology on the point of deification is also satirized in the Apocolocyntosis attributed to Seneca. There it is proposed that Claudius become a Stoic god in particular, largely because he longs to achieve divine status: “He wants to be a god. Is it not enough that he has a temple in Britain, that now barbarians worship and pray to him as a god?”58 Furthermore, that Claudius in this work has a special affinity toward Heracles is no coincidence (Apoc. 7, 9), since the latter is the archetypal manbecome-god who reigns supreme over the passions. Lucian similarly has Heracles serve as paradigmatic for Hermotimus and his aims to achieve godhood. Heracles on the one hand models the sage who, in the metaphorical mountain-climb toward the ἄκρα, “peak,” of virtue, strips himself of externals such as πλοῦτος καὶ δόξα καὶ ἡδοναί, “wealth and glory and pleasures” (7–9).59 Yet on the other, Lucian pairs the ascent of Heracles (7–8) with that of Alexander (4–5) and thereby invokes the long-standing tradition among Greek kings to claim Heraclean lineage.60 The emperor Trajan was also known to have had special regard for that hero, which is reflected not only on coins bearing the image of Heracles during his reign, but also in Dio Chrysostom’s First Oration on Kingship.61 Dio relates in a comparable way how Heracles (Or. 1.49–84) his descent, claims that he will tell the Stoics about what he experienced in the sky (Icar. 34). On apotheosis in Lucian, see also Betz, Lukian, 124–30, 167–68; and R. Bracht Branham, Unruly Eloquence: Lucian and the Comedy of Traditions (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1989), 186–87. 57   Ἡλίκους ἡμᾶς ἀποφαίνεις οὐδὲ κατὰ τοὺς Πυγμαίους ἐκείνους, ἀλλὰ χαμαιπετεῖς παντάπασιν ἐν χρῷ τῆς γῆς. εἰκότως – ὑψηλὰ γὰρ ἤδη φρονεῖς καὶ ἄνωθεν· ἡμεῖς δὴ ὁ συρφετὸς καὶ ὅσοι χαμαὶ ἐρχόμενοι ἐσμέν, μετὰ τῶν θεῶν καὶ ὑμᾶς προσευξόμεθα ὑπερνεφέλους γενομένους καὶ ἀνελθόντας οἷ πάλαι σπεύδετε (Hermot. 5). 58  Deus fieri vult: parum est quod templum in Britannia habet, quod hunc barbari colunt et ut deum orant (Apoc. 8). 59  See also Pisc. 46, where these three items serve as a test to determine who is ὁ τῷ θαλλῷ στεφόμενος, “the one to be crowned with olive” (cf. Hermot. 68). As Betz comments, “Die Philosophie ersieht χρυσίον καὶ δόξαν καὶ ἡδονήν aus, um die Philosophen zu erproben” (Lukian, 188, 191–92). 60  Cf. Seneca, Ben. 1.13.1–3. As Walter Burkert explains, Heracles is “the prototype of the ruler who by virtue of his divine legitimation acts in an irresistible way for the good of mankind and finds his fulfilment among the gods; thus Alexander stamped the image of Heracles on his coins” (Greek Religion [trans. John Raffan; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985], 211). 61 See C. P. Jones, The Roman World of Dio Chrysostom (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1978), 116–19. As Jones adds, Heracles also “became the emblem of a new legion, the Second Traiana, probably raised for the first Dacian war” (ibid., 117).

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models the climb toward the virtuous and βασίλειος ἄκρα, “kingly peak” (1.67), and how he resists the tyrannical cravings for wealth, glory, and luxury (1.79–80; cf. 1.21, 23, 65). For both Dio and Lucian, however, the question about whether their intended targets will attain to virtue depends upon the ἡγεμών, “guide,” each emperor chooses to follow. According to Dio, only λόγος is “the unfailing and perfect guide [ἡγεμών] and helper” (Or. 1.8; cf. 1.84), which is why in this oration Hermes, the god of λόγος, serves as guide to Heracles (1.65–83).62 The implication is that the very λόγος Dio delivers is a message of divine origin and that he intends to show Trajan the proper path, just as Hermes revealed it to Heracles. In the Hermotimus, Lycinus and Hermotimus agree that ἡγεμών ὁ ἄριστος, “the best guide,” is the one who leads the way to the πόλις where all inhabitants are equal (Hermot. 25–28). Yet they disagree on which guide is best qualified for reaching this virtuous state. Hermotimus is convinced that the Stoics are the most competent guides (29), while Lycinus himself is the one who truly models for Hermotimus the right path toward virtuous kingship and thus is the more able representative of Hermes (47). Although Hermotimus has based his decision to study Stoicism upon the opinions of ἰδιῶται, in doing so he is merely following the most popular school (16) rather than reaching his conclusion through dialectic (68–69). Through this point, Lucian insinuates that Marcus has identified as a Stoic simply for political purposes and not necessarily because Stoicism is the most virtuous of the schools. As Lucian presents it, although the ideal ruler will present himself as a common citizen, he must also not lack discretion and authority and thereby cater to every desire expressed by the general populace. While the ideal philosopher and ruler should assume the social station of ἰδιῶται, not all ἰδιῶται are the philosophers or rulers qualified to govern a realm. One who follows common opinion, Lycinus conveys, is more like a sheep than a shepherd (68, 73).63 Twice in the Hermotimus Lucian pairs the metaphor of tending sheep with the imagery of leading one by the nose and thereby indicates that the seemingly powerful is under the control of the seemingly powerless (68, 73).64 Lucian uses the expression τῆς ῥινὸς ἕλκεσθαι, “to be led by the nose,” also in The Ignorant Book Collector, where he makes the point that the collector is modeling himself after βασιλεῖς in order to gain the favor of the currently reigning βασιλεύς, namely, Marcus (Ind. 20–23). Yet in emulating kings, just as those kings desire 62 Cf. Hermes and his duties pertaining to λόγος in Lucian (e. g., Prom. 5–6; Gall. 2; Herc. 4; Pseudol. 24; Dial. d. 4.1; and Bis acc. 8, 10, 12). 63 Cf. Seneca, Vit. beat. 1.3. According to Philo, kings resemble sheep more than shepherds because they are led by their passions (Prob. 31). On the commonplace metaphor of the ruler as shepherd, see, e. g., Homer, Il. 2.243; Plato, Pol. 267a–e; Resp. 345c–e, 440d; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 1.13, 17, 28; 2.6; 3.41; 4.43–45; and Epictetus, Diatr. 3.22.35. 64 Cf. Hera’s statement to Zeus in Dial. d. 9.3: Σοῦ μὲν καὶ πάνυ οὗτός γε δεσπότης ἐστὶ καὶ ἄγει σε καὶ φέρει τῆς ῥινός, φασίν, ἕλκων, καὶ σὺ ἕπῃ αὐτῷ ἔνθα ἂν ἡγῆταί σοι.

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to win the praise of their subjects and are thus under their power, so the collector is controlled by his toadies and is thus “led by the nose.” Lucian compares the collector to Pyrrhus of Epirus, an actual king, as well as to false kings – the Pseudo-Alexander, the Pseudo-Philip, and the Pseudo-Nero (20), which here implies that the collector is aspiring to become a Pseudo-Marcus. As Lucian explains, the obvious reason for the collector’s passion about books is that he believes the emperor, “a wise man who highly values education,” will learn about the collector’s many books and that the collector “will in a moment’s time benefit from him in every way” (22).65 By showing that Hermotimus is similarly liable to falling under the sway of others rather than relying upon the δύναμις καὶ τέχνη of dialectic (Hermot. 68), Lucian questions not only whether Marcus is a capable Stoic; inferred is also the danger that Marcus will in other situations conform to the opinion of the majority simply to win their approval, as he has done in giving preference to Stoicism. Indeed, Hermotimus is at a quandary when Lycinus seeks to convince him not to formulate his judgments on the basis of what is praiseworthy in the eyes of the οἱ πολλοί (53). One who is controlled by the masses, Lycinus explains, is like κάλαμος τις ἐπ’ ὄχθῃ παραποταμίᾳ πεφυκὼς καὶ πρὸς πᾶν τὸ πνέον καμπτόμενος, “a reed growing on the bank of a river, bending at every gust of wind” (68). Thus just as the ideal citizen king would not demand his subjects to bow before him in worship (προσκυνεῖν, Dial. mort. 25.3), the opposite is also true – such a ruler does not and cannot bend to every wish of the people. The metaphor that likens kingly power to a reed in the wind is one that appears also in some early Jewish and Christian authors. Yet they apply the comparison in a much more hostile sense than does Lucian and generally use it in the attempt to undercut the power of their opposing rulers. The poetic persona in lxx Psalm 82:12–14, for instance, defies those ἄρχοντες who wished to take possession of the sanctuary and calls upon the deity to make them ὡς καλάμην κατὰ πρόσωπον ἀνέμου, “like a reed in the wind.” Similarly, the author of 3 Maccabees invokes the image to describe the divine punishment inflicted upon Ptolemy – claiming that God ἔνθεν καὶ ἔνθεν κραδάνας αὐτὸν ὡς κάλαμον ὑπὸ ἀνέμου, “swung him from side to side like a reed by the wind” (2:22).66

65 Within this same context of The Ignorant Book Collector, Lucian includes an example of a free-speaking old foreign woman who relates the truth to Pyrrhus (Ind. 21), which corresponds closely to the foreign woman who speaks openly to the tyrant Gelo about his bad breath (Hermot. 34). 66 For the author of 3 Maccabees, only God is king, as Simon the high priest prays: Κύριε κύριε, βασιλεῦ τῶν οὐρανῶν καὶ δέσποτα πάσης κτίσεως, ἅγιε ἐν ἁγίοις, μόναρχε, παντοκράτωρ, πρόσχες ἡμῖν καταπονουμένοις ὑπὸ ἀνοσίου καὶ βεβήλου θράσει καὶ σθένει πεφρυαγμένου (3 Macc 2:2).

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The evangelists Matthew and Luke also invoke the metaphor when they contrast John the Baptist with those who inhabit royal palaces.67 As both evangelists show, even though John lives in the outdoor wilderness, he is not κάλαμος ὑπὸ ἀνέμου σαλευόμενος, “a reed shaken by the wind” (Matt 11:7 par. Luke 7:24) – which here points to the irony that those indoors, in the softness of kingly attire and luxury, are actually the ones who shake in the wind.68 Within the Lukan narrative, Herod Agrippa I is the ruler who most clearly dons the kind of ἐσθὴς βασιλική, “royal clothing” (Acts 12:21), that stands in contrast to John’s assumed simplicity.69 Agrippa’s downfall, Luke shows, is his desire to attain δόξα (12:23) among the people he rules, which manifests itself not only in his outward appearance, but also in his heedless aim to please his subjects (12:3) and his being likened to a god (12:22) – traits that are similar to those of Hermotimus, at least insofar as he conforms to popular opinion, decides to wear the purple garments that distinguish him from others, and aspires to becoming deified as a way to assert his superiority over others even in death.70

III. A Concluding Proposal: The Cynicism of the Hermotimus Each Fürstenspiegel that Betz identifies in other contexts within the Lucianic corpus represents one feature of what he calls “kynisch-stoischer Paränese.”71 I wish to conclude this study by first of all affirming the Stoic quality of such ethical ex Matt 11:8: ἰδοὺ οἱ τὰ μαλακὰ φοροῦντες ἐν τοῖς οἴκοις τῶν βασιλέων εἰσίν. Luke 7:25: ἰδοὺ οἱ ἐν ἱματισμῷ ἐνδόξῳ καὶ τρυφῇ ὑπάρχοντες ἐν τοῖς βασιλείοις εἰσίν. 68  That the reed is pliable is an indication of its being “soft” (μαλακός, Matt 11:8 par. Luke 7:25). The metaphor appears in the Problemata of Alexander of Aphrodisias when he compares the physicality of babies and adults. On account of “the softness” (τὸ μαλακόν) of their bodies, he explains, infants are usually unharmed when falling to the ground. Yet adult males often injure themselves, because their strong and hard bodies resist an even greater δύναμις (Prob. 1.120; J. L.  Ideler, ed. Physici et medici Graeci minores, vol. 1 [Berlin: Reimer, 1841; repr., Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1963], 3–80). Cf. Aesop’s fables (A. Hausrath and H. Hunger, eds., Corpus fabularum Aesopicarum [Leipzig: Teubner, 1970]) known as: “The Oak and the Reed” (71); “The Trees and the Reed” (239.1); and “The Reed and the Olive Tree” (239.2), which all make the point that the flexibility of the reed (in contrast to the stiffness of trees) is actually a strength – that is, the ability to recognize a greater power and the need to yield in order to avoid defeat. 69  Cf. μαλακὰ ἱμάτια and ἱματισμὸς ἔνδοξος (Luke 7:25) and the description of the rich man who clothed himself in πορφύρα καὶ βύσσος (16:19). See also Mark 1:6: καὶ ἦν ὁ  Ἰωάννης ἐνδεδυμένος τρίχας καμήλου καὶ ζώνην δερματίνην περὶ τὴν ὀσφὺν αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἐσθίων ἀκρίδας καὶ μέλι ἄγριον. 70  On the political significance behind the people’s acclamation that Herod had θεοῦ φωνή (Acts 12:22), see Klauck, “Des Kaisers schöne Stimme,” 251–67. 71 Lukian, 183–203, esp. 194. As Betz explains in his analysis, the listing of sins into vice catalogs is only one among many ways that such paraenesis may manifest itself. Cf. also his comments on Lucian as a critic of wealthy Romans, both rulers and the uncrowned rich. He states: “Sieht man aufs Ganze, so ist die Betrachtung des Reichtums und der Reichen vorwiegend die der stoisch-kynischen Diatribenethik” (Lukian, 194–99, here 198). 67

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hortation within the Hermotimus. It is clear enough that Lucian is drawing upon topoi from the Stoic tradition as he presents this dialogue. Whereas Hermotimus is the most obvious advocate for Stoicism, Lycinus is also especially savvy about the tenets of this philosophical school and invokes their commonplaces in order to get the upper hand on Hermotimus. Yet I contend that in addition to the forceful stream of Stoicism running within the Hermotimus, the dialogue also contains some key features of Cynic philosophy and diatribe – which indeed supports the “kynisch-stoischer” union that Betz notices more broadly throughout Lucian’s works. It is true that within the Hermotimus Lucian does not explicitly name those philosophers he considers most successful in leading the common life. He also refuses to associate himself with any one sect of philosophy. He does, however, provide some clues within the dialogue that the Cynics most closely represent the philosophical ideal that he puts forth.72 First of all, even though Hermotimus initially claims that he cannot complete his studies in Stoicism in such a short time (5), he eventually becomes thankful to Lycinus for discovering for them σύντομός τις αὕτη καὶ ἀρίστη ὁδός, “such a morally excellent shortcut” (69).73 This statement – and the larger theme within which it functions in the dialogue  – closely corresponds to the well-attested hallmark that Cynicism is σύντομος ἐπ’ ἀρετὴν ὁδός, “a shortcut to virtue” (Dio72 Contra M. J. Edwards, who concludes: “If Lycinus were to make common cause with any school in the Hermotimus, he would call himself a Sceptic” (“Lucian and the Rhetoric of Philosophy: The Hermotimus,” AC 62 [1993]: 195–202, here 202). With Edwards, see also Longo, Luciano, 34–36; Nesselrath, “Kaiserzeitlicher Skeptizismus,” 3451–82; Mauro Bonazzi, “Luciano e lo scetticismo del suo tempo,” in Lucian of Samosata, Greek Writer and Roman Citizen (ed. Francesca Mestre and Pilar Gómez; Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2010), 37–48; and Baudouin Decharneux, “Lucien doit-il être rangé dans la boîte des philosophes sceptiques?,” in ibid., 63–71. While there is undoubtedly a number of similarities between Cynicism and Scepticism – which may indeed account for some of the confusion about Lucian’s own philosophical perspective – the evidence within the Hermotimus tips the scale more toward Cynicism. Lucian displays his own Cynic scepticism, which is not necessarily Scepticism, e. g., in Zeus Catechized. On the relationship between the Cynics and Sceptics, see, e. g., Menahem Luz, “Cynics as Allies of Scepticism,” in Scepticism: Inter-Disciplinary Approaches. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium of Philosophy and Inter-Disciplinary Research, September 27–31, 1988 (Athens: The Ministry of Culture, 1990), 101–14. On Lucian and Cynicism, see, e. g., Jacob Bernays, Lucian und die Kyniker (Berlin: W. Hertz, 1879); M. Caster, Lucien et la pensée religieuse de son temps (Paris: Societe d’édition “Les Belles lettres,” 1937), 68–84; James A. Francis, Subversive Virtue: Asceticism and Authority in the Second-Century Pagan World (University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), 53–81; and Heinz-Günther Nesselrath, “Lucien et le Cynisme,” AC 67 (1998): 121–35. 73 Thus Lycinus is himself the seer who reveals the shortcut for selecting the best philosophy, as he earlier states: νῦν δὲ μάντεως οἶμαι δεήσει σοι κἀνταῦθα πρὸς τὴν αἵρεσιν τῶν κρειττόνων, εἰ μὴ ἀνέχῃ τὴν διατριβὴν ὡς ἀκριβῶς ἑλέσθαι, αὐτὸς ἅπαντα καὶ ὅλον ἕκαστον κατανοήσας. ἐπίτομος γὰρ αὕτη γένοιτ’ ἄν, οὐκ ἔχουσα περιπλοκὰς οὐδ’ ἀναβολάς, εἰ μεταστειλάμενος τὸν μάντιν ἀκούσας τῶν κεφαλαίων ἁπάντων σφαγιάζοιο ἐφ’ ἑκάστοις ἀπαλλάξει γάρ σε ὁ θεὸς μυρίων πραγμάτων δείξας ἐν τῷ τοῦ ἱερείου ἥπατι ἅτινά σοι αἱρετέον (Hermot. 56).

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genes Laertius, 6.104; 7.121).74 In light of this maxim, ἀρίστη in this passage of the Hermotimus is thus a clever play upon ἀρετή – that is, Lycinus has discovered for them a shortcut that is “morally excellent.” Other noticeable Cynic characteristics of the Hermotimus appear when the reader reaches the end of the dialogue and then recollects how and where this initial encounter between Hermotimus and Lycinus occurred. In the final sentence of the work, Hermotimus states: φιλοσόφῳ δὲ εἰς τὸ λοιπὸν κἂν ἄκων ποτὲ ὁδῷ βαδίζων ἐντύχω, οὕτως ἐκτραπήσομαι καὶ περιστήσομαι ὥσπερ τοὺς λυττῶντας τῶν κυνῶν. “If ever in the future, while going down the road, I accidentally meet a philosopher, I will turn around and avoid him just as I would rabid dogs” (86).75 This remark about running upon a philosopher while going down the road is a motif we know especially from the Cynic tradition, since these philosophers were known to stand on street corners and “bark” their exhortations at passersby. One passage that provides some insightful parallels to this theme appears in Origen’s Contra Celsum where he refutes Celsus’ charge that Christians put on displays in the market-places and thereby attract a following not from among “intelligent men,” but rather “young people and a crowd of slaves and a throng of unintelligent people.” This accusation leads Origen to compare the Christians to Cynic philosophers, since the latter are known also for “conversing in public with those they happen to meet” and thus do not deliver their exhortations exclusively to educated audiences.76 These philosophers rather, Origen remarks, “call out from 74  See also Pseudo-Crates, Ep. 16 (Abraham J. Malherbe, ed., The Cynic Epistles: A Study Edition [SBLSBS 12; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1977], 66); Pseudo-Diogenes, Ep. 44 (Malherbe, 174); Plutarch, οἱ Κυνικοὶ λέγουσι ‘σύντονον ὁμοῦ καὶ σύντομον εὑρηκέναι πορείαν ἐπ’ ἀρετήν·’(Mor. 759d); Galen, καὶ γὰρ καὶ οὗτοι σύντομον ἐπ’ ἀρετὴν ὁδὸν εἶναί φασι τὸ σφέτερον ἐπιτήδευμα. τινὲς δ’ αὐτῶν ἐλέγχοντες οὐκ ἐπ’ ἀρετήν, ἀλλὰ δι’ ἀρετῆς ἐπ’ εὐδαιμονίαν ὁδὸν εἶναι φάσκουσι τὴν Κυνικὴν φιλοσοφίαν. ἀλλ’ ἕτεροί γ’ ἀληθέστερον αὐτῶν ἀποφαινόμενοι σύντομον ἐπ’ ἀλαζονείαν ὁδὸν εἶναί φασι δι ἀμαθῆ τῶν τοιούτων ἀνθρώπων τόλμαν (De animi cuiuslibet peccatorum dignotione et curatione 3.12; de Boer 49 = Kühn 5.71); and Julian, τὴν σύντομον φασὶν ὁδὸν καὶ σύντονον ἐπὶ τὴν ἀρετὴν · ὄφελον καὶ ὑμεῖς τὴν μακρὰν ἐπορεύεσθε· ῥᾷον ἂν δι’ ἐκείνης ἤλθετε. οὐκ ἴστε ὅτι μεγάλας ἔχουσιν αἱ σύντομοι τὰς χαλεπότητας; (Or. 7.225c; cf. Or. 7.226b–c, 235d). Notably, σύντομος in Hermot. 69 is a hapax legomenon in Lucian. He typically prefers ἐπίτομος (e. g., Hermot. 56), as when parodying this Cynic aphorism in Vit. auct. 11: ἐπίτομος αὕτη σοι πρὸς δόξαν ἡ ὁδός. 75  Cf. ὁδῷ βαδίζων ἐντύχω with Lucian, Merc. cond. 25: ὁ δὲ ἐπιβάλλων ἐνίοτέ σοι τὴν χεῖρα, ὅ τι ἂν τύχῃ ληρεῖ, τοῖς ἐντυγχάνουσιν ἐπιδεικνύμενος ὡς οὐδὲ ὁδῷ βαδίζων ἀμελής ἐστι τῶν Μουσῶν, ἀλλ’ εἰς καλὸν τὴν ἐν τῷ περιπάτῳ διατίθεται σχολήν. This passage from a treatise where Lucian advises against submitting to the patronage of the Roman elite is an especially insightful parallel to the dialogue where Lucian satirizes the most powerful figure among the Roman elite. 76 As Hans Dieter Betz explains, “it is clear that such comparison of Christian missionaries and preachers with Cynics was a stereotypical anti-Christian propaganda tool, used then also by Christian themselves against ‘heretics’ like Marcion, the Encratites, and the so-called Apotactites in fourth-century Asia Minor” (“Jesus and the Cynics: Survey and Analysis of a Hypothesis,” JR 74 [1994]: 453–75, here 460; also appears in idem, Antike und Christentum: Gesammelte Aufsätze IV [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1998], 32–56, here 40).

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the street corners and gather their hearers” and furthermore “direct their speech even at common people” (Contr. Cel. 3.50).77 The parallels between this passage in Contra Celsum and the larger argument within the Hermotimus (and especially its conclusion) are lexical as well. Where Origen describes the chance encounter with παρατυγχάνειν, Lucian uses ἐντυγχάνειν (Hermot. 86). For Origen the meeting place is the τρίοδος, and for Lucian the ὁδός (1, 86).78 And most importantly, Origen explains that the Cynics teach even οἱ ἰδιωτικοὶ δῆμοι, and Lucian at the outset has Hermotimus express concerns about avoiding the crowd of οἱ ἰδιῶται (1). Origen’s point that the Cynics regularly converse with uneducated persons is also helpful for appreciating how Lucian is playing upon the term ἰδιώτης. What is comedic about the ending of the Hermotimus is the full disclosure that Lycinus is indeed talking with “an uneducated person” but not with “a commoner.” Thus as an uneducated philosopher (which adds another layer of meaning as to why he continues to study in his old age), Hermotimus misunderstands Lycinus’ use of the term ἰδιώτης as well as his argument as a whole. Lycinus means that Hermotimus should not flaunt his royalty. And Hermotimus puts on purple. Lycinus means that Hermotimus should continue studying philosophy. And Hermotimus vows to study no more. Thus just when Hermotimus claims to understand and shows potential in assuming the common life of a philosopher and king and even gives thanks for his encounter with Lycinus, his final statement reveals that he will take the opposite course of action.79 Showing these parallels between Contra Celsum and the Hermotimus is not to suggest that Origen is influenced by Lucian on this point, but rather that each author knows independently the particular venue, as it were, where the Cynics performed their diatribe and their aim to address persons regardless of class or education.80 The chance meeting between Alexander of Macedon and Diogenes of Sinope is the most well-known example, even though in this case it is Al77  According to Galen, however, the Cynics he had observed were not always true to this practice: εἶθ’ ὅταν ἡμῶν ἀπαλλαχθῶσιν, οὐκ ἀξιοῦσι διαλέγεσθαι τοῖς ἐπιτυγχάνουσιν ἀνθρώποις, αἰπόλοις καὶ βουκόλοις καὶ σκαπανεῦσι καὶ θερισταῖς, ὅτι μὴ παρακολουθοῦσιν, ὥς φασι, τοῖς λεγομένοις ἀγύμναστοι περὶ λόγους ὄντες (De animi cuiuslibet peccatorum dignotione et curatione 3.13; de Boer 49 = Kühn 5.71–72). 78  See also Suetonius, Vesp. 13, where the Cynic Demetrius and Vespasian meet in itinere. 79  As Branham explains: Plato “argues that the principal emotional effect evoked by comedy (laughter) is inextricably tied to the Schadenfreude (phthonos) felt at the exposure of another’s failure to achieve self-knowledge. Hence, the essential quality of the comic character (to geloion) is a form of “vice” (ponēria or kakia), namely, self-ignorance in one impotent to avenge himself when laughed at” (Unruly Eloquence, 48). 80 It has, however, been shown by Margaret M. Mitchell that Celsus was dependent upon Lucian (“Origen, Celsus and Lucian on the ‘Dénouement of the Drama’ of the Gospels,” in Reading Religions in the Ancient World: Essays Presented to Robert McQueen Grant on his 90th Birthday [ed. David E. Aune and Robin Darling Young; NovTSup 125; Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2007], 215–36, esp. 232–36).

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exander who initiates the conversation. As Dio Chrysostom imagined it in his Fourth Oration on Kingship, this encounter resulted in a lengthy dialogue that is rhetorically analogous to the one in the Hermotimus. Just as Hermotimus and Lycinus represent Marcus and Lucian, respectively, in Dio’s oration Alexander and Diogenes serve as stand-ins for Trajan and Dio. And where Dio argues that his Cynic lifestyle is ironically more kingly than that of Trajan, Lucian’s point is that his fictive persona within the dialogue displays more attributes of the citizen king than Marcus’ does. Thus when Hermotimus concludes that if he ever in the future meets a philosopher on the road he will flee as if running from rabid dogs (κύνες), what Lucian means to convey is that Hermotimus will in the future attempt to avoid all encounters with Cynics (κυνικοί, cf. 14, 18), such as Lycinus. Lucian also concludes The Lover of Lies (40) and the Nigrinus (38) with this metaphor about rabid dogs. I suggest that in each of these three dialogues the metaphor refers to a conversion (either potential or realized) to some brand of Cynicism (either genuine or false).81 And as in the Hermotimus, in the other two works the identification of the philosopher as a Cynic is not immediately obvious. In The Lover of Lies, the character Eucrates is an anti-Cynic (i. e., an ironic “Good Crates”) who habitually tells falsehoods that correspond to his feigned Cynicism. Rather than living as a homeless beggar, indifferent to the pains of death, Eucrates owns a house adorned with statuary and reclines upon his couch reading Plato in order to assuage his grief over his deceased wife. Thereupon his wife appears to him briefly and then disappears when “an accursed little dog under his couch, a Maltese, barked” (Philops. 27). Lucian uses the Maltese dog as a satirical mascot for the Cynics also in The Carousal, or the Lapiths, where another ironic Cynic, Alcidamas, is ridiculed when others call him as “a little Maltese dog” (Symp. 19). Similarly, in On Salaried Posts in Great Houses, Lucian jokes that the Stoic Thesmopolis had become a Cynic convert because he attends to “a little dog,” which he qualifies as “a Maltese” (Merc. cond. 34).82 Whereas the conversion at the end of The Lover of Lies is to a false Cynicism, at the conclusion of the Nigrinus the bite of the rabid dogs has a more positive outcome. Even though Lucian plainly casts Nigrinus as a Platonist (Nigr. 2, 18), some scholars have rightly pointed out that the philosophical outlook of Nigrinus 81  See also Dial. mort. 7.2, where Menippus tells Tantalus that because he fears thirst rather than water (cf. Dips. 4–6, 9), he is τοὐναντίον τοῖς ὑπὸ τῶν λυττώντων κυνῶν δεδηγμένοις, “the opposite of those bitten by rabid dogs,” which is a play upon Menippus’ Cynicism and thus a clever way of saying that in at least that regard he and Tantalus are quite different. In this sense, Tantalus is more similar to the Stoics, who would seek a cure for their madness by drinking hellebore. Cf. Hermotimus’ concluding statement that he will drink hellebore to the point of becoming senseless – for the opposite reason that Chrysippus drank hellebore (Hermot. 86; cf. Vit. auct. 23). 82 Lucian is clear about applying the designation κύνες to the Cynics: ἀμέλει κύων αὐτῷ καὶ τὸ ὄνομα (Vit. auct. 7). See also, e. g., Peregr. 26, Fug. 16, and Dial. mort. 20.13.

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is Cynic to the core.83 Nigrinus’ Platonist exterior is thus similar to that of Eucrates, which in each case is a humorous play upon the rivalry between Platonism and Cynicism – the one acted out most often by Plato and Diogenes.84 On the whole, however, Nigrinus is much truer to the Cynic message than is Eucrates. For Nigrinus advocates shameless poverty and owning only a single garment (14), and he ridicules the wealthy for their extravagance, such as their elaborate meals, jewelry, flashy hair, purple garments, and other displays of honor (13, 17, 21–25, 30–34). Nigrinus also shuns charging fees to students of philosophy (25–26), as Lycinus similarly does in the Hermotimus.85 The conclusion to the Nigrinus – where the companion alludes to his conversion to the Cynic lifestyle by describing it as a contagious μανία, “madness” (38) – is thus in keeping with the heart of the dialogue, which praises “the simplicity of life” (τὸ καθαρὸν τῆς διαίτης, 12).86 It is such a lifestyle that Lucian in the Hermotimus exhorts Marcus to take up when he appeals that he live the common life (βίος κοινός) and conduct himself as a fellow citizen with (συμπολιτεύειν) the οἱ πολλοί (Hermot. 84, cf. 22).87 Although the metaphor of the rabid dogs is the same in both the Hermotimus and the Nigrinus, the results of the philosophical diatribe in the two are starkly

83 As Hall states, “If Lucian did not tell us that Nigrinus was a Platonist (2), we would never have guessed” (Lucian’s Satire, 157–65, here 157). H. A. S. Tarrant observes that Nigrinus “is not the Platonic scholar, but the philosopher-preacher” (“Alcinous, Albinus, Nigrinus,” Antichthon 19 [1985]: 87–95, here 91). And as Matthias Baltes and Marie-Luise Lakmann claim, “certainly this lecture tends to be more akin to the thought of the Cynics than the Platonists” (“Nigrinus,” in Brill’s New Pauly, 9:753). 84  See, e. g., Pisc. 23, where Plato asks Diogenes to put aside their differences for once and speak in behalf of what they hold in common, Φιλοσοφία. See also Diogenes Laertius, 6.24–26, 40–41, 53, 58, 67; R. Bracht Branham, “Defacing the Currency: Diogenes’ Rhetoric and the Invention of Cynicism,” in The Cynics: The Cynic Movement in Antiquity and Its Legacy (ed. R. Bracht Branham and Marie-Odile Goulet-Cazé; Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1996), 81–104, here 88; and Margarethe Billerbeck, “The Ideal Cynic from Epictetus to Julian,” in ibid., 205–21, here 219. 85   See, e. g., Hermot. 9–10, 80. Although this charge appears frequently throughout the Lucianic corpus and is otherwise not exclusive to Cynicism, it does cohere with the avowed poverty of the Cynic lifestyle. See, e. g., Icar. 5; Jupp. conf. 13; Jupp. trag. 27. Cf. Athenaeus, Deipn. 3.113d–e. 86  On this topic, Professor Betz once recommended to me from his shelf, Rüdiger Vischer, Das einfache Leben: Wort‑ und motivgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu einem Wertbegriff der antiken Literatur (Studienhefte zur Altertumswissenschaft 11; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1965). See pp. 75–83 for discussion about “Einfachheit als Programm der Kyniker.” 87 The point is that he lead a simple life, yet contrary to pure Cynicism, without withdrawing from politics. Lucian may not have known about Marcus’ own admiration for the Cynics (e. g., Med. 2.15; 8.3; 11.6.2). Asmis (“Stoicism of Marcus Aurelius,” ANRW II.36.3:2245) states: “Although it is not open to Marcus to practice the Cynics’ way of life, he seeks to emulate their simplicity and unpretentiousness even as emperor. He reminds himself that even at court it is possible to live well (5.16).”

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different.88 In the former, Hermotimus aims to escape the bite, whereas in the latter the companion has already been bitten.89 That Lucian casts Lycinus as a Cynic is not to allege that Lucian himself actually lived or identified as a Cynic.90 At the same time, Lucian claims that he had long been a student of Demonax (Demon. 1) – a figure he describes as something of a hybrid between Socrates and Diogenes of Sinope (5) and furthermore the best philosopher he knows there is (2).91 That Lucian chooses to praise Demonax rather than to highlight his faults is rather telling on the question about what Lucian regards as the philosophical ideal. The driving argument throughout the Hermotimus that extols the common and simple life, spoken from the mouth of a fictive Cynic, is Lucian’s attempt to infect Marcus with the same madness that possessed him.

88 Cf. The Dance, where in comparison to the Hermotimus, the roles between the Cynic, whom he there calls Crato, and Lycinus, are reversed. After Crato’s first lines contain sharp invective against persons who enjoy pantomimic dancing, Lycinus responds: Παπαῖ, ὦ Κράτων, ὡς κάρχαρόν τινα ἔλυσας ἐφ’ ἡμᾶς τὸν σαυτοῦ κύνα (4). Rather than a conversion to some form of Cynicism, in The Dance it is the Cynic himself who becomes converted (85). 89 As the convert in the Nigrinus says, φιλοσόφων ἀκούοντες οὐ πάντες ἔνθεοι καὶ τραυματίαι ἀπίασιν, ἀλλ’ οἷς ὑπῆν τι ἐν τῇ φύσει φιλοσοφίας συγγενές (37). Lucian’s point at the end of the Hermotimus is not that Lycinus successfully persuades Hermotimus to adopt his way of life. The change (μεταβάλλειν, 86) Hermotimus claims he will now make is rather the exact opposite of what Lycinus had been proposing. Contra Edwards, who holds that throughout the Hermotimus, the rhetoric “which was once used to initiate conversion to philosophy is in Lucian’s hands the means by which the conversion is undone” (“Lucian and the Rhetoric of Philosophy,” 199). Although Hubert Cancik is correct to point out the parallels between the endings of the Nigrinus and the Hermotimus, he too overlooks exactly what Lycinus attempts to dissuade Hermotimus from assuming and what he tries to persuade him to adopt (“Lucian on Conversion: Remarks on Lucian’s Dialogue Nigrinos,” in Ancient and Modern Perspectives on the Bible and Culture: Essays in Honor of Hans Dieter Betz [ed. Adela Yarbro Collins; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998], 26–48, esp. 38–40). 90  A true Cynic would scarcely serve the empire as one of its administrators, for instance. As we read in his Apology, this position earned Lucian considerable wages (12–13), not unlike the payment he received as a rhetorician at an earlier period in his life (15). 91 Lucian is, however, highly critical of persons such as Proteus and his associates, whom he regards as untrue to philosophy, much less to Cynicism (e. g., Peregr. 26, 37; Fug. 3–4, 11, 14–16, 20). Alongside his admiration for Demonax must also be placed the fact that Lucian views his own writings within the tradition stemming from Menippus (Pisc. 26) – the Cynic who enjoyed laughing while at the same time barking and biting (Bis acc. 33).

De caelo patrocinium The Economy of Divine Patronage in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses Thomas R. Blanton IV I. Introduction French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu points to a common frame of reference in which the terms “spiritual” and “material” exist in a relationship of diametric opposition.1 Other terms parallel the basic opposition, nuancing the dyad on the basis of their correlation with it: soul and body, heaven and earth, sublime and base, sacred and profane.2 Standing as they do in a relationship of polarity and opposition, modern thought has tended to portray the two realms as fundamentally unrelated, each operating independently according to its own set of rules. Religions of the Greco-Roman world – to state the contrast in its sharpest form – typically held the opposite view: the spiritual and the material, the soul and the body, the heavenly and earthly stood united in a relation of mutual dependence and interaction.3 In fact, systems of exchange flourished, based on the premise that spiritual and material resources existed in a relation of exchangeability.4 As  Bourdieu, “The Economy of Symbolic Goods” and “Appendix: Remarks on the Economy of the Church” in Practical Reason: On the Theory of Action (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998; ET of Raisons Pratiques: Sur la théorie de l’action [Paris: Seuil, 1994]), 92–123, 124–26. 2  Here I assume a methodology influenced by the structuralism of Claude Lévi-Strauss. The basic structuralist framework has been elaborated and shorn of its ahistorical aspects by theorists such as Bruce Lincoln in, for example, Discourse and the Construction of Society: Comparative Studies of Myth, Ritual, and Classification (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989); idem, Gods and Demons, Priests and Scholars: Critical Explorations in the History of Religions (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2012); and Catherine Bell in, for example, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992). 3 The contrasts broadly portrayed here were nuanced differently by the various philosophical schools. Stoicism, for example, understood the soul/body dichotomy to be a difference, not so much of kind as of degree: both originating from the same substratum, soul was simply a less condensed form of matter (cf. Nemesius, 81.6–10: “The soul, then, is a body” [σῶμα ἄρα ἡ ψυχή]). In Galen’s view, “spirit” (πνεῦμα) was composed of air and fire, mixed with a little moisture (Plac. 5.3.8). See the texts and discussion in A. A. Long and D. N. Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers (2 vols.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 1:268–89; 2:265–87. 4 On reciprocal exchange posited between humans and divine beings as “unseen partners,” see Walter Burkert, Creation of the Sacred: Tracks of Biology in Early Religions (Cambridge and 1

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material goods judged to be of approximately equal value could be exchanged for one another, ancient Mediterranean religions posited that resources from the heavenly or spiritual realm could, under the proper circumstances, be brought into a relationship of exchange with earthly, material resources. Hans Dieter Betz notes how Paul of Tarsus’ collection of funds to be distributed to the early Christian assembly in Jerusalem was grounded in the logic of do ut des, “I give in order that you might give” – a logic which Paul, following traditions established earlier in Greek religion, took to apply to relations between humans and gods.5 Consequently, transactions between the heavenly and the earthly fell under the broad category of gift exchange.6 Economies based on the supposition that the spiritual and the material, the heavenly and the earthly, could be exchanged in the form of gifts, Bourdieu has labeled “economies of the offering” or, more broadly, “economies of symbolic goods.”7 Based on a study of Catholic bishops in his native France, Bourdieu writes that economies of the offering characteristically construe donations of material goods (including money and labor services) as acts of self-sacrifice to a transcendent deity understood as providing salvation to a faithful “clientele.”8 Analogies to the economy of the offering are typical of Greco-Roman religions  – one need only point to the ubiquity of sacrifices and votive offerings dedicated at temples. However, when comparing Greco-Roman economies of the offering to that of modern French Catholicism, one must reckon with culturally specific modes of exchange. The aim of the present study is to delineate the economic and social functions of the “economy of the offering” as presented in the Metamorphoses, in its specific form shaped not least by the ideology and practice of Roman patronage. As a corollary, the study hopes to demonstrate that sociological models such as that developed by Bourdieu can serve useful heuristic functions for the study of antique religions, provided those models are appropriately nuanced and adapted to the ancient cultural contexts to which they are applied.9 London: Harvard University Press, 1996), 129–55. The medieval Buddhist exchange system shaped by the ideas of merit and karma is in some respects comparable; see Michael J. Walsh, Sacred Economies: Buddhist Monasticism and Territoriality in Medieval China (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010). 5 2 Corinthians 8 and 9: A Commentary on Two Administrative Letters of the Apostle Paul (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985), 109–17. 6 Seneca indicates that it is the gods who have given humans both life and breath (Ben. 2.30.1–2). Cleanthes attributes the gift of human speech to Zeus, who is addressed in line 32 as πάνδωρε, the “giver of all.” For text, translation, and commentary, see Johan C. Thom, Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus (STAC 33; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005). 7 Practical Reason, 92–123 (114). 8 Practical Reason, 124–6. 9 Note the unease with the use of modern sociological models in the study of early Christianity registered, for example, in Susan R. Garrett, “Sociology (Early Christianity),” ABD 6:89–99, 90. It is important to note that the sociological model is not here taken as a template to be slav-

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During the second century c.e., when the satirist Apuleius of Madauros wrote his picaresque novel, Metamorphoses, or, The Golden Ass, among various modes of gift exchange, two of the most salient were ritualized friendship and patronage, and it is the latter that provides the dominant model that inflected his literary portrayal of the economy of the offering. We will return at a later stage of the argument to analyze the economy of the offering portrayed in the Metamorphoses. As a preliminary to that analysis, however, a closer look at the culturally specific form of gift exchange that informs Apuleius’ conceptions must be undertaken, that of Roman patronage.

II. Roman Patronage: An Overview Throughout the Roman imperial period, the model of gift exchange known as patronage (patrocinium) structured economic, political, and social relations.10 Emperors styled themselves patrons of the republic, offering lavish donations in the form of building projects, public entertainment, and the distribution of comestibles.11 Senior senators, acting as patrons, provided the political authority and prestige necessary to ensure the advancement of junior aristocrats.12 Wealthy ishly followed (and it is therein that the danger lies in the use of such models), but as an invitation to the properly historical enterprise of comparison, in an attempt to delineate that which is particular and culturally specific with regard to the object of enquiry. On the use of comparative methods, see Bruce Lincoln (with Cristiano Grottanelli), “Theses on Comparison” in Bruce Lincoln, Gods and Demon, Priests and Scholars: Critical Explorations in the History of Religions (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2012), 120–30; Jonathan Z. Smith, “In Comparison a Magic Dwells” in idem, Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1982); idem, “What a Difference a Difference Makes” and “Close Encounters of Diverse Kinds” in idem, Relating Religion: Essays in the Study of Religion (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 251–302 and 303–22, respectively. 10  For discussions of Roman patronage, see Paul Veyne, Le Pain et le cirque: sociologie historique d’un pluralisme politique (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1976; abridged ET Bread and Circuses: Historical Sociology and Political Pluralism (trans. Brian Pierce; London and New York: Penguin Press, 1990); Richard P. Saller, Personal Patronage Under the Early Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982); S. N. Eisenstadt and L. Roniger, Patrons, Clients, and Friends: Interpersonal Relations and the Structure of Trust in Society (Cambridge, London, and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984); Peter Garnsey and Richard Saller, The Roman Empire: Economy, Society, and Culture (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987), 148–59; Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, ed., Patronage in Ancient Society (London and New York: Routledge, 1989); Filipo Canali De Rossi, Il ruolo dei patroni nelle relazioni politische fra il mondo greco e Roma in età repubblicana ed augustea (Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 159; München and Leipzig: Saur, 2001). 11 The Res Gestae provides a good example of an emperor’s attempt to portray himself as a tireless public benefactor; Latin text and English translation may be found in P. A. Brunt and J. M.  Moore, eds., Res Gestae Divi Augusti: The Achievements of the Divine Augustus (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1967). 12 Saller, “Patronage and Friendship in Early Imperial Rome: Making the Distinction,” in Wallace-Hadrill, Patronage in Ancient Society, 49–62, esp. 60–61.

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individuals hosted banquets, gave gifts, and provided wages to socially inferior parties, who were labeled clients (clientes).13 Based as it was on the differential distribution of wealth and political power, the relationship between patron and client was inherently asymmetrical.14 Lacking the economic or political resources to reciprocate the donations of their patrons in kind, clients responded by providing the linguistic resources at their disposal  – publicly praising their patrons for their magnanimity  – or through offering services of labor: attending the patron’s retinue, voting for him in elections, or performing menial tasks on his behalf. The patron-client relationship was based on a form of reciprocal gift exchange: in exchange for patronal gifts involving economic or political support, the clientele provided services calculated to boost the honor and prestige of the patron.15 The norms of the patronage system are spelled out by Seneca the Younger in his famous treatise, De beneficiis, “On Benefactions” and, to a lesser extent, in Cicero’s De officiis, “On Duties,” and De amicitia, “On Friendship.”16 Patronal grants of material goods or political support could be termed beneficia, “benefits,” or officia, “services” or “favors.” The proper response to such benefaction was gratitude (gratia) and, if possible, gifts in return, either in the form of material goods or, more often, labor services.17 Labor services most often included the morning salutation (salutatio), in which clients accompanied their patrons on walks outside the patron’s estate, or appearing as part of the patron’s retinue at public events (togatorum comitatus).18 Such service (ministerium or officium) could, at the hand of a satirist such as Lucian, be mocked as a form of slavery.19 According to patronal ideology, however, such individuals functioned 13  See, for example, the humorous accounts of Trimalchio’s banquet in Petronius, Satyrica 27–78 and Lucian’s “On Salaried Posts in Great Houses” (A. M. Harmon, ed., Lucian, vol. 3 [New York: Putnam and London: Heinemann, 1921], 412–81). 14 Saller, Personal Patronage, 1–10. 15 Saller, Personal Patronage, 14, states: “In all the relevant literature, the reciprocal nature of the exchange is emphasized. An amicus in receipt of a favor was expected to return it at an appropriate time and to show gratitude. Nothing was baser than an ingratus amicus, and ingratitude was seen as a just cause for the breaking off of amicitia.” 16 Friendship and patronage are often distinguished in that friendship entails a relationship between individuals of approximately equal economic and social standing, whereas patronage entails a relationship between socio-economic unequals. While technically this is correct, Richard Saller shows that patrons often euphemized their relations with inferiors as “friendship” (“Patronage and Friendship,” 49–62). Cicero’s treatise includes both relations between equals and unequals under the rubric of “friendship.” 17 Ben. 2.35.3–5: “So we declare that he who receives a benefit in a kindly spirit has repaid it by gratitude, yet, nevertheless, we leave him in debt – still bound to repay gratitude even after he has repaid it. … I do not put you off – you may pay with what [material goods] you have!” Unless noted otherwise, translations of Seneca’s De beneficiis are those of John W. Basore, Seneca: Moral Essays, vol. 3 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press; London: Heinemann, 1964). 18 On the morning salutation, see Ernst Badian, OCD, s. v. “salutatio.” 19 Merc. cond. 1, 23–5. Compare Ben. 3.5.2: “Listen to the words of petitioners. No one of them fails to say that the memory of the benefit will live forever in his heart; no one of them

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not as slaves, but  – euphemistically  – as “companions and friends.”20 Diligent service and obedience to the patron could win his favor (gratia) and goodwill (voluntas or benevolentia), which would likely result in further benefaction. The client was expected to give praise (laus) and offer thanks (gratia) to the patron. So normalized was the expectation of gratitude that clients could often be said, using the language of the marketplace, to owe a “debt” of gratitude.21 At other times, gratitude was transformed from external display into an internal emotional state in which the “memory of the benefit lives forever in the heart” of the client.22 In a statement euphemizing the patron-client relationship as “friendship,”23 Seneca writes: “We must look for a friend, not in a reception hall, but in the heart (in pectore); there must he be admitted, there retained, and enshrined in affection” (in sensus recondendus).24 The system of patronage was able to mobilize both labor and sentiment; it shaped not only political systems, but also the psyches of those whose lives it encompassed. At times, patrons could give gifts that neither the most diligent service nor the most fervent emotional attachment could hope to repay. Such gifts threatened to crush the donee, resulting either in bitterness and hostility toward the patron,25 or, at the opposite pole, a lifelong commitment to the donor.26 Not all exchanges were accomplished directly between patrons and their clients. The system often involved the mediation of “brokers,” who stood between the powerful and those who would make requests of them. Pliny the Younger, for example, often mediated between the emperor Trajan and those who aspired to hold office.27 The elements of the patronage system shape the presentation of the relationship fails to declare himself your submissive and devoted slave, and, if he can find any more abject language in which to express his obligation, he uses it.” 20 The fictitious addressee whom Lucian hopes to dissuade from seeking to be maintained in the household of a patron describes patrons as “friends” (φίλοι) of their clients (Merc. cond. 3). In § 20 of the same text, clients are said to have the privilege of “being seen around him (i. e., the patron) seeming to be companions and friends” (ὁρᾶσθαι περὶ αὐτὸν ἑταίρους καὶ φίλους εἶναι δοκοῦντας). 21 On the language of “gift-debt,” see Suzanne Dixon, “The Meaning of Gift and Debt in the Roman Elite,” Echos du monde classique/Classical Views 37.12 (1993): 451–64. 22 Ben. 3.5.2. 23 The immediate context (Ben. 6.34.1–5) entails a discussion of patronal retinues and the division of clients into categories, amicos primos and secundos. See Saller, “Patronage and Friendship,” 49–62, on the avoidance of the use of the term cliens, which carried the stigma of social inferiority. 24 Ben. 6.34.5. 25 Ben. 3.1.1: “[S]ometimes, not merely after having received benefits, but because we have received them, we consider the givers our worst enemies.” 26 Ben. 2.24.4: “I shall never be able to repay you with my gratitude, but, at any rate, I shall not cease from declaring everywhere that I am unable to repay it.” 27 On Pliny’s role as patronage broker, see Saller, Personal Patronage, 35, 51, 75–76; on brokerage in general, see 48–51. The role of brokers is elaborated in Jeremy Boissevain, Friends of Friends: Networks, Manipulators, and Coalitions (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1974).

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between goddess and suppliant in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses, as an examination of the novel reveals.

III. The Economy of the Offering in Apuleius of Madauros’ Metamorphoses Apuleius’ picaresque novel, The Metamorphoses, or The Golden Ass, features a protagonist, Lucius, who as the result of misplaced zeal to learn the secrets of the magical arts,28 inadvertently transforms himself, in the words of A.-J. Festugière, “into that hideous, lascivious, and ridiculous animal despised by antiquity  – an ass.”29 The bulk of the Metamorphoses consists of tales of Lucius’ suffering, brought about by a blind and cruel Fortune, while in this form (7.16; 7.17; 7.25; 8.24; 11.15).30 The denouement occurs in book 11, where Lucius, after having immersed himself in the Aegean by Corinth’s port-city, Cenchreae, becomes witness to an epiphany of the goddess Isis, who appears in lunar form (11.1). After Lucius performs the appropriate ablutions and invokes the aid of the goddess, Isis assumes her human biform and, through a dream, delivers notice of his impending deliverance. He is instructed to eat roses from the hand of an Isiac priest during a procession of the navigium Isidis, the ritual inauguration of the season of maritime travel on March 5.31 The subsequent transformation of Lucius from asinine to human form, orchestrated by Isis, is described in terms familiar from Seneca’s account of gift giving. The transformative action itself, along with other benefits construed as being within the purview of Isis to grant, is described as a benefaction (beneficium), the proper response to which is gratitude (gratia), expressed through praise of the  Joseph G. DeFilippo discusses the centrality of Lucius’ curiositas in the narrative, a term which he defines not merely as the desire to know something which one does not yet know, but “that quality of soul which is the cause of meddlesome behavior and which itself consists in the meddlesome hindrance of the rational faculty by one’s appetites and desires” (“Curiositas and the Platonism of Apuleius’ Golden Ass,” AJP 111 [1990]: 471–92, 489). 29  André-Jean Festugière, Personal Religion among the Greeks (Sather Classical Lectures 26; Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1954), 68. For a brief overview of the role of the ass in Greco-Roman literature, see Janet Spittler, Animals in the Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles: The Wild Kingdom of Early Christian Literature (WUNT 2.247; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 211–15. 30 In book 11, Isis both overcomes and replaces Fortune as the divine power orchestrating events in Lucius’ life (cf. Festugière, Personal Religion, 72–77). Susan B. Matheson indicates that the Roman goddess Fortuna was conflated with the Greek Tyche, so that “in the Roman West the two became virtually synonymous” (“An Obsession with Fortune: Tyche in Greek and Roman Art,” Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin [1994]: 18–33, 23). 31 On the navigium Isidis, see Reinhold Merkelbach, Isisfeste in griechisch-römischer Zeit: Daten und Riten (Mesenheim an Glan: Verlag Anton Hain, 1963), 39–41, and the imaginative, but still useful, discussion of R. E. Witt, Isis in the Ancient World (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1971), 165–84. 28

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benefactress and, if possible, a counter-gift of economic value. Variations on this basic pattern recur in the three major episodes narrating Lucius’ dealings with Isis and later, with her brother-husband, Osiris.32 These include the restoration of Lucius’ human form and his initiation into the mysteries of Isis (11.6–19), his initiation into the mysteries of Osiris (11.21–26), and his initiation into the mysteries of both Isis and Osiris (11.27–30).33 In the first of these three episodes, Apuleius repeatedly describes Isis’ transformation of Lucius from asinine to human form in terms borrowed from the Roman patronage system. Isis, in accordance with her goodwill (volentia; 11:9) orchestrates the restoration of Lucius’ human form as an act of heavenly patronage (de caelo patrocinium; 11.16). The transformation itself is described as a benefaction (beneficium; 11.6, 12, 13, 18), the proper response to which is gratitude (gratia; 11.14). As significant as Apuleius’ use of the language of patronage in this context is the system of exchanges that he describes. Gratitude is not the only thing expected of Lucius in return for Isis’ intervention; he is required to devote the services of his labor to the goddess. During her nocturnal appearance to Lucius, Isis remarks: “You will clearly remember and keep forever sealed deep in your heart the fact that your life’s course is pledged to me until your last breath. Nor is it unjust that you should owe all the time you have to live (totum debere quod vives) to her by whose benefit (beneficium) you return to the world of men” (11.6).34 Lucius is to “take on the voluntary yoke of service” (ministerii iugum subi voluntarium); he is to become the goddess’ slave (deae servire; 11.15). Apuleius construes the value of Lucius’ labor as acceptable recompense for Isis’ restoration of his human form.35 Consequently, Lucius reports: “I rented a house within the temple precinct and set up a temporary home there. Attached to the service of the goddess (deae ministeriis) in a lay capacity as yet, I was an inseparable companion 32 On

the brother-husband relationship, see Witt, Isis, 36–45.

33 Festugière views the second initiation as that into the mysteries of Osiris and the third, into

those of Isis (Personal Religion, 71, 160, n. 15); Griffiths views the second initiation as one into the mysteries of Osiris and the third, into those of Isis and Osiris (Isis-Book, 337). 34 Translations of the Metamorphoses are those of J. Arthur Hanson, Apuleius: Metamorphoses (2 vols.; LCL; Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1989). 35 Seneca notes the difficulty in determining the value that should be assigned to a gift, as the value depends on the circumstances in which it was given: “A gift has been made by someone with a large sum of money, but the giver was rich, and he was not likely to feel the sacrifice; the same gift was made by another, but the giver was likely to lose the whole of his patrimony. The sum given is the same, but the benefit is not the same” (Ben. 3.8.2). And again: “Who will match these [unequal benefits given in disparate situations] one against another? Who will weigh them in the balance? The decision is difficult when it is concerned, not with the thing, but with the significance of the thing” (Ben. 3.8.3). In Seneca’s view, humans ought to stand in a constant attitude of gratitude toward the gods: “If a man denies that he has received from the gods the gift of life that he begs from them every day, to whom will he be indebted for his preservation, to whom for the breath that he draws? Whoever, therefore, teaches men to be grateful, pleads the cause both of men and of the gods” (Ben. 2.30.1–2).

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of the priests and a constant worshipper of the great deity” (numinis magni cultor inseparabilis; 11.19). The reciprocal principle governing this episode is clear: a benefit provided by the goddess requires repayment in the form of a counter-gift. In exchange for the restoration of his human life, Lucius owes the remainder of that life to the goddess, whose service he must voluntarily enter. The benefit rendered is doubly symbolic, in that it is mediated by the power of the fictive character of Isis, and in that the transformation of Lucius from the form of an ass to that of a human metaphorically expresses a general pattern in which an individual’s social praxis is altered as the result of adherence to the precepts of a religious group.36 Lucius, formerly governed by appetitive desires for food, sex, and magical lore (2.6–7, 16–17; 3.19–25; 6.31; 10.15–16) is, as the result of the goddess’ intervention, “liberated” from such pursuits (11.6, 15). Lucius’ metamorphosis is granted an exchange value equal to that of his service for the duration of his natural life. Lucius is granted his life; therefore he owes it. Recalling images of the Graces, depicted as dancing in a ring with hands interlinked, Seneca indicates that benefaction “has most beauty if it is continuous and maintains an uninterrupted succession.”37 With the giving of the counter-gift, roles are reversed, as giver becomes receiver and receiver, giver: this is the dance of the Graces. Lucius’ service, construed as counter-gift for Isis’ miraculous restoration of his human form, itself calls for a return, as indicated in the following discourse set on the lips of Isis: Moreover [as the result of your dedication] you will live in happiness, you will live in glory, under my guardianship. And when you have completed your life’s span and travel down to the dead, there too, even in the hemisphere under the earth, you will find me, whom you see now, shining among the shades of Acheron and holding court in the deep recesses of the Styx, and while you dwell in the Elysian fields you will often entreat me as one who is well-disposed toward you (tibi propitiam frequens adorabis). But if by assiduous obedience (sedulis obsequiis), worshipful service (religiosis ministeriis), and determined celibacy (tenacibus castimoniis) you win the favour of my godhead (numen nostrum promerueris), you will know that I – and I alone – can even prolong your life beyond the limits determined by your fate (ultra statuta fato tua spatia vitam … prorogare mihi tantum licere; 11.6).

36  Thomas N. Habinek rightly objects to models of religious “conversion” that privilege internal, psychological states, and pay insufficient attention to the issues of social praxis and group affiliation that characterize anthropological discussions of the phenomenon. See “Lucius’ Rite of Passage,” in Studi sul romanzo antico (ed. Don Fowler; Materiali e discussioni per l’analisi dei testi classici 25; Pisa: Giardini, 1990), 49–69. Keith Bradley argues that, in view of the problems involved with applying William James’ and A. D. Nock’s “classical” definitions of “conversion” to the polytheistic religious environment of an Apuleius, the term “conversion” is inapplicable to the changes depicted in the Metamorphoses (“Contending with Conversion: Reflections on the Reformation of Lucius the Ass,” Phoenix 52.3–4 [1998]: 315–34). 37 Ben. 1.3.4–5.

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The gift of Isis’ miraculous transformation of Lucius is requited by the latter’s service, which, in turn, is requited by the promise of an ameliorated afterlife and the prolongation of his natural life. Apuleius describes a system in which Lucius’ human labor and Isis’ symbolic goods (i. e., the promises of an ameliorated afterlife and a prolonged terrestrial life) exist in a relationship of exchangeability: the one is viewed as acceptable recompense for the other. The material and the spiritual “dance” together as partners in a patronage relationship. In the second episode (11.20–26), which describes Lucius’ initiation into the mysteries of Isis,38 monetary assets play an important role in Apuleius’ narrative. Lucius experiences a prophetic dream that elicits an attitude of eager expectation: “After this event I became even more eagerly attentive to my constant ministry of service (frequentabam ministerium), in the belief that my present blessings (praesentibus pignerata) were a guarantee of future benefits” (spe future beneficiis; 11.21). The hope of future benefactions from Isis motivates Lucius to devote himself more assiduously to the goddess’ service. The benefaction with which Lucius is concerned consists in large part of his imminent initiation into the mysteries of Isis, for which he is prepared to expend a significant sum of money, the exact amount to be determined by Isis herself (11.22). The burden of this expense was to be borne by the initiate. On the morning following a nocturnal initiation,39 Lucius was presented for view in the guise of the solar deity Osiris, holding a torch and wearing a radiate crown.40 After the viewing, Lucius, reborn, celebrated a banquet with his fellow initiates to mark the occasion (celebravi natalem sacrorum).41 38  On mystery initiations, see Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1987); Marvin W. Meyer, The Ancient Mysteries: A Sourcebook: Sacred Texts of the Mystery Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean World (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1987); Sarah Iles Johnston, “Mysteries” in eadem, ed., Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 2004), 98–111; Luther H. Martin, Hellenistic Religions: An Introduction (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 58–89; Hugh Bowden, Mystery Cults of the Ancient World (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2010). On the mysteries of Isis and Osiris, see Hans-Josef Klauck, The Religious Context of Early Christianity: A Guide to Graeco-Roman Religions (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003), 128–39; Bowden, Mystery Cults, 156–80. 39  Lucius describes the ceremony by invoking the much-discussed Isaic symbolon: “I came to the boundaries of death and, having tread the threshold of Proserpina, I travelled through all the elements and returned. In the middle of the night I saw the sun flashing with bright light. I came face to face with the gods below and the gods above and paid reverence to them from close at hand.” The symbolon likely summarizes mythic events that were enacted by the initiate and other participants during the ceremony. Discussions are found in Klauck, Religious Context, 136–38; Meyer, Ancient Mysteries, 158–59; Griffiths, Isis-Book, 294–308. 40 Griffiths comments on the passage: “There are clearly signs that in the Graeco-Roman era solar symbolism became popular in Osirian contexts. … [A]fter a ceremony which depicts the visit of the sun-god to the Osirian realm of the dead, the triumph over death is fittingly symbolized by an Osiris-figure with solar attributes. An identification with the god is therefore present” (Isis-Book, 315). 41 In 11.16 and 11.21, the term renatus, “reborn,” is used to describe one who has been initi-

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Lucius construes the initiation as an Isiac benefaction: “Afterwards I remained there for a few days, enjoying the ineffable pleasure of the holy image, pledged to her by her unrepayable favour (irremunerabili beneficio). Finally, however, on the goddess’ instructions I discharged my debt of gratitude (gratis persolutis) – if not in full, at least humbly, to the best of my ability (pro meo modulo) – and began preparations for my return home” (11.24). The initiation is declared an “unrepayable favor.” The favor obligates Lucius to make a return, but, as he is a man of meager inheritance, an effort must be made to discharge the debt along non-monetary lines, as the following excerpt from his prayer indicates: My talent is too feeble to speak your praises and my inheritance too meagre (tenuis patrimonio) to bring you sacrifices. The fulness of my voice is inadequate to express what I feel about your majesty. … I shall therefore take care to do the only thing that a devout but poor man (religiosus … sed pauper) can: I shall store your divine countenance and sacred godhead (divinos tuos vultus numenque) in the secret places of my heart (intra pectoris mei secreta conditum), forever guarding it (perpetuo custodiens) and picturing it to myself (11.25).

Two possible avenues of repayment for Isis’ benefaction are raised, only to be dismissed: sacrifices are beyond Lucius’ means, and public praise is said to exceed his linguistic resources. (The latter statement is ironic, as the prayer echoes aretalogies to Isis.)42 In lieu of adequate economic or linguistic resources, Lucius’ response is to “store Isis’ divine countenance and sacred godhead in the secret places of his heart, forever guarding it and picturing it to himself.” Seneca explains the reciprocal principle involved: “We must look for a friend,43 not in a reception hall, but in the heart (in pectore); there must he be admitted, there retained, and enshrined in affection (in sensus recondendus). Teach a man this – and you show gratitude!” (gratus es; Ben. 6.34.5). Affection for a benefactor, expressed by internalizing his or her image, constitutes gratitude. Lucius’ affection constitutes a counter-gift.44 ated into Isis’ mysteries (cf. Griffiths, Isis-Book, 317–18). The theme of rebirth is prominent also in Corpus Hermeticum 13, a text to which I was introduced in a 1997 graduate seminar on Hermetic Literature at the University of Chicago Divinity School taught by Prof. Hans Dieter Betz. For texts, French translations, and commentary on the corpus, see A. D. Nock and A. J.  Festugière, eds., Hermès Trismégiste: Corpus Hermeticum (Budé; 4 vols.; Paris: Belles Lettres, 1945–54). On birth imagery as a standard feature of rites of passage, see Moyer V. Hubbard, New Creation in Paul’s Letters and Thought (SNTSMS 119; Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 81–82. 42 Lucius prays: “[Y]ou protect men on sea and on land, and you drive away the storm-winds of life and stretch forth your rescuing hand, with which you unwind the threads of the Fates. … You rotate the earth, light the sun, rule the universe” (Met. 11.25). Compare the Isis aretalogies from Kyme (Gail Corrington Streete, “An Isis Aretalogy from Kyme,” in Religions of Late Antiquity in Practice [ed. Richard Valantasis; Princeton Readings in Religion; Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2000], 369–83), Philae (Louis V. Zabkar, Hymns to Isis in Her Temple at Philae [Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 1988], 135–60), and Maroneia (Yves Grandjean, Une nouvelle arétalogie à Maronée [Leiden: Brill, 1975]). 43 “Friendship” here euphemizes the patron-client relationship; see n. 16 above. 44 Seneca comments on the importance of memory in returning gratitude: “And yet nothing

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But it was not only Isis who was entitled to a counter-gift. The priest Mithras, who had officiated at the initiation, was also entitled to a repayment for his role as broker of the benefits of Isis. Like the benefactors themselves, those who mediated between patrons and clients were also entitled to a repayment from the client.45 Lucius expresses his gratitude to Mithras, functioning as a broker of divine patronage, as follows: I embraced the priest Mithras, who was now also a father to me. Clinging to his neck and kissing him many times, I asked his pardon because I was unable to reward him as he deserved for his great benefactions (condigne tantis beneficiis munerari nequirem) toward me. Then, after a long delay for lengthy expressions of gratitude (gratiarum gerendarum sermone prolixo), I finally departed (11.25–26).

Lucius’ evident embarrassment at resorting to non-economic forms of gift-return indicates that economic goods constitute the preferred medium of exchange. In lieu of that, an exemplary show of gratia, consisting of kisses and extended thanksgiving, must suffice. After his initiation in Corinth, Lucius travelled to Rome to attend the shrine of Isis in the Campus Martius. Under the influence of oracular dreams and advice from fellow initiates of Isis, Lucius came to realize that he had not yet been initiated into the mysteries of Osiris (11.16–27). At the god’s insistence, and with the aid of one Asinius Marcellus, pastophor of the cult of Osiris, arrangements for the initiation were made. One formidable obstacle, however, stood in the way: Lucius lacked the funds to cover the ceremony’s expenses. The cost of travelling to and living in Rome had depleted Lucius’ “modest inheritance” (viriculas patrimonii), reducing him to poverty (paupertatis; 11.28). At the insistence of a no less imposing figure than Osiris himself, Lucius is persuaded literally to sell the clothing from his back to “scrape together” (corradere) a sum sufficient to cover the initiation expenses. Lucius’ modest investment, however, pays off: he is (paradoxically) “illumined by the nocturnal mysteries of the foremost god,” whereupon he takes a position in the cult of Osiris, the assets of which “afforded the greatest comfort for my stay abroad in Rome” (11.28). At the same time, ought to be made more manifest than that services rendered to us linger in our memory (memoria), but the memory must be constantly renewed (reficienda est); for only the man who remembers is able to repay gratitude (referre potest gratiam), and he who remembers does thereby repay it” (Ben. 2.24.1). Festugière portrays Lucius’ actions as disinterested: “Lucius’ contemplation has no end beyond itself. He asks nothing. His whole happiness consists of gazing upon his Beloved” (Personal Religion, 83). He overlooks Apuleius’ notice that Lucius’ adoration constituted an attempt to “discharge a debt of gratitude” (gratis persolvere) for a benefit previously given (11.24). 45 Boissevain defines the patronage broker, or “social broker,” as one who “places people in touch with each other either directly or indirectly for profit. … He thus occupies a strategic place in a network of social relations” (Friends of Friends, 148–49). Seneca advises against the use of patronage brokers, as they dilute the gratitude owed the gift-giver: gratitude ought to be served “‘without,’ as they say, ‘any deduction’” (sine ulla, quod aiunt, deductione; Ben. 2.4.3 [trans. of the author]).

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Lucius’ profits from forensic oration were “nourished by the breeze of favouring Success” (faventis Eventus; 11.28) – a success purportedly orchestrated by Isis and Osiris (11.30). By initiation into the mysteries of this pair, Lucius overcomes the cruel fortune that he had formerly endured (cf. 11.15), not least by the enhanced access to monetary goods that this initiation made available. Fortune, however, still held surprises in store for Lucius. Shortly after his initiation into the mysteries of Osiris, Lucius is bidden “by unexpected and thoroughly astonishing commands from the gods” to undergo a third initiation. Apuleius describes a third initiation into the “kindred cults” of Isis and Osiris as an anomaly, a “new and unheard-of design of the gods” (11.29).46 Speculating on the causes of this anomaly, Lucius considers the possibility of malfeasance: “‘Doubtless,’ I thought, ‘both priests calculated wrongly, or at least incompletely, in my case.’ And, by Hercules, I even began to have misgivings about their good faith” (de fide … eorum; 11.29). Lucius questions the Osirian priests’ fides, a term that may connote diligence in meeting one’s obligations, or may refer more specifically to creditworthiness.47 The use of this double entendre raises the specter of priestly malfeasance. Lucius suspects that he is being played for a fool: how many times would he be asked to pay for a product that he had already purchased? Lucius’ misgivings are allayed when “a gracious image instructed [him] in a nocturnal prophecy ” (instruxit nocturna divinatione clemens imago; 11.29). The “gracious image,” presumably a reference to the high priest who had appeared to Lucius in a dream in 11.20,48 calms his misgivings, pointing to the enhanced prestige and future, divine benefits that accrue from multiple initiations: “exult, rather, in the fact that you will experience three times what is scarcely permitted to others even once, and from that number you should rightly consider yourself to be forever blessed” (semper beatum). With the help of his priest,49 he began to make preparations for the ceremony: I procured the equipment for my initiation without stint, meeting the expenses (collatis) more in accordance with religious zeal (ex studio pietatis) than with the measure of my assets (mensura rerum mearum). Yet, by Hercules, I felt no regret for my labor (laborem) 46 A temple of Isis and Serapis (i. e., Osiris-Apis) was constructed on the Campus Martius in Rome during the first century c.e. (see Mary Beard, John North, and Simon Price, Religions of Rome [2 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998], 264–65). Arthur Darby Nock (Conversion: The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo [London, New York, and Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1933], 147) notes, “the gods were related but the initiations different.” In 11.26, the cult of Osiris is described as a “kindred cult” (germana religio) to that of Isis. See also Griffiths (Isis-Book, 330–31, 336) on the relationship. 47 OLD, s. v. “fides.” 48 Griffiths indicates that the “image” may be construed as that of the high priest, based on the parallel in 11.20. It cannot refer to either Isis or Osiris, since the “great gods” are referred to in the third person (Isis-Book, 339). 49 Presumably, a reference to Asinius Marcellus.

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and expense (sumptuum): after all, through the bountiful provision of the gods (liberali deum providentia) I was comfortably provided for by the income (stipendiis) I earned as a lawyer (11.30).

Reassured by the promise of a future in which he would be “forever blessed,” a symbolic good which connotes the promised extension of his natural life, as well as the blessed afterlife promised in 11.6, Lucius is willing yet again to expend both personal labor (labor) and material assets (sumptus). Lucius was only returning a favor, as Isis and Osiris had fanned the breezes of Success so that he had gained a comfortable income arguing in the courts. Religious symbolic goods, including the promise of an extended natural life and a pleasant afterlife, are treated as exchangeable with material assets and human labor. Apuleius portrays Lucius, the priests, and even Isis and Osiris as united in a system of ongoing, reciprocal interactions. This is Seneca’s “ring of the graces,” in which the various parties give, and in return receive. In addition to the symbolic goods of the promise of lengthened natural life and ameliorated afterlife, Lucius gains economic prosperity from his legal practice and from his election as pastophor (i. e., a low-level priest; 11.30),50 while Isis and Osiris gain a devotee whose life is dedicated to their service. The cult of Isis-Osiris gains, in addition to his sizeable donations of money, Lucius’ long-term labor potential, his shaven pate advertising his affiliation with the pastophori. As the result of reciprocal interaction, long-term relations of mutual obligation are established between Lucius, the Isaiac-Osirian cultus, and, on a symbolic level, the goddess and god themselves.

IV. Conclusions Although Bourdieu developed his concept of the “economy of the offering” with reference to modern French Catholicism, the same basic pattern appears in iterations of Greco-Roman religion as well, as evidenced by Apuleius’ Metamorphoses. The analysis of the Metamorphoses, however, requires that Bourdieu’s model be adapted by recontextualizing it within a milieu significantly shaped by the language and practices of Roman patronage. In the economy of the offering posited by Apuleius, “spiritual goods,” including a more blessed afterlife in the Elysian Fields, are viewed as recompensable – to a limited extent – by labor services and material goods. In contrast with Bourdieu’s Catholic model, however, the Apuleian savior is not male, but female, not Christ, but Isis, and the locus of 50 Ladislav Vidman summarizes the function of the pastophorus: “Die Statue des Gottes wurde in den Festzügen von den niederen Priestern, den Pastophoren, getragen” (Isis und Sarapis bei den Griechen und Römern: Epigraphische Studien zur Verbreitung und zu den Trägern des ägyptischen Kultes [Religionsgeschichtliche Versuche und Vorarbeiten 29; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1970], 61). For a discussion of the information pertaining to this office, see Griffiths, Isis-Book, 265–66; 342–45.

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the beatific afterlife is not heavenly, but chthonic. Patronal ideology, absent from Bourdieu’s model, dominates Apuleius’. According to both models, however, benefits imagined to proceed from a culturally posited transcendent deity or deities motivate, in the earthly realm, the exchange of goods and services. In the economy of the offering portrayed by Apuleius, the gulf separating the spiritual from the material, soul from body, heaven from earth, sacred from profane is practically overcome, the dyadic units bound together as partners in a system of patronal exchange. But it is not only goods and services that may be mobilized within this economy of the offering; even sentiment and affect play a role within the system of exchange. Prolonged reflection on the image of the benefactor stored in the heart of the client elicits spontaneous displays of affection toward the patron or patronage broker. The sentiment of gratitude and the displays of affection that accompany it forge durable bonds between those engaged in the dance of giftgiving and reciprocation. These bonds ensure the continuation, over time, of the system that generates such responses in its participants. As with Seneca’s image of the dancing Graces, the sequence of gift and countergift does not allow for a completion of the cycle. Each counter-gift constitutes a renewed act of gift-giving that elicits gratitude, a feeling of indebtedness, and the need for future “repayment” in the form of an additional gift. More than a system based on the exchange of goods, the symbolic economy described in the Metamorphoses both constructs and perpetuates a durable set of social and affective relations: it creates and sustains communities under the aegis of a goddess or god. The goddess or god offer benefactions which, the system postulates, retain a material exchange value measurable in terms of money, labor services, the linguistic resources of praise and thanksgiving, strong affective attachments, and public displays embodying such affects (hugs, kisses, joyful tears, etc.), all of which may serve to reciprocate non-material, symbolic benefactions. In the absence of the non-material benefits posited by the system, reciprocal transmissions of money, labor time, and so on would, lacking a raison d’être, undoubtedly fail to take place. Thus, Apuleius describes an economy in which symbolic goods play an integral part. For Apuleius, such reciprocal interactions provide the conditions under which the religious cultus, with all its material needs, is both established and perpetuated.

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List of Contributors Jeffrey R. Asher, Professor of Religion, Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky. Thomas R. Blanton IV, Visiting Professor in New Testament Studies, The Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. Laurie Brink, O. P., Associate Professor of New Testament Studies, Catholic Theological Union, Chicago, Illinois. Robert Matthew Calhoun, independent researcher based in Houston, Texas. Paul B. Duff, Professor of Religion, The George Washington University, Washington, D. C. Matthijs den Dulk, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Chicago Divinity School, Chicago, Illinois. Justin R. Howell, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Chicago Divinity School, Chicago, Illinois. Annette Bourland Huizenga, Assistant Professor of New Testament, University of Dubuque Theological Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa. Matt Jackson-McCabe, Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Comparative Religion, Cleveland State University, Cleveland, Ohio. Meira Ziva Kensky, Assistant Professor of Religion, Coe College, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Andrew M. Langford, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Chicago Divinity School, Chicago, Illinois. David G. Monaco, C. P., Associate Professor of Sacred Scripture, Pontifical College Josephinum, Columbus, Ohio. Mark Reasoner, Associate Professor of Theology, Marian University, Indianapolis, Indiana. Clare K. Rothschild, Associate Professor of Scripture Studies, Lewis University, Romeoville, Illinois. Jeffrey A. Trumbower, Professor of Religious Studies, St. Michael’s College, Colchester, Vermont.

Index of References Hebrew Bible/Septuagint Genesis 1–11 53 1–3 29, 53 1:26 65 2–3 29 3:15 24 4:1–7 53 9:13 148 9:16 148 15:1 89 19:1–29 152 37:36 133 39:1 133 Exodus 12:38 190 21:24 121 22:25–26 122 Leviticus 19:18 124 21:20 138 22:24 138, 139 24:20 121 Numbers 12:1 135 16:22 204 27:16 204 Deuteronomy 4:16–18 65 7:2 135 19:21 121 23 135, 139 23:2 138, 139, 143 23:4–9 135

29:3 80 31:6 224 31:7 224 32:39 204 Joshua 1:6 224 1:7 224 1:9 224 1:18 224 9:25 224 Judges 9:11 202 1 Samuel 2:7 204 8:16 117 8:17 119 2 Samuel 8:2

163, 164

1 Kings 18:28 139 18:46 136 2 Kings 2:16 137 20:18 133 21:13 163 23:11 133 25:19 133 1 Chronicles 22:13 224 28:20 224

328 2 Chronicles 32:7 224 Ezra 9:1–10:44 135 9:1 135 Esther 2 133 Job 1–2 85 4:17 205 5:8–9 78 5:9 80 5:11 204 5:13 85 5:25 205–6 9:10 78, 79, 80 9:12 78 9:15 79 37 148 41:3 81, 85 Psalms 5:12 89 7:10 89 7:13 89 9:31 209 10:10 lxx 209 17:36 lxx 207 18 89 18:2 89 18:7–15 148 18:30 89 18:35 89 28:7 89 32:10 204 32:20 89 33:11 205 34:11–17 206 35:8 81 49:17–20 lxx 202 50:16–23 202 50:17–20 202 63:7 lxx 78 64:7 78 68 110

Index of References

68:23 81 68:32 135 82:12–14 lxx 275 91:13 24 93:11 lxx 64 105:19–23 lxx 29 105:19–20 lxx 65 117:18 lxx 203 118 203 118:2 lxx 78 118:18 202, 203 118:114 202 119:2 78 140:5 lxx 204 141 203 141:5 202, 204 Proverbs 3 203 3:11 202 3:12 202, 203, 207 5:12 202 10:17 202 12:1 207 13:24 202 22:15 202 23:13 202 25:28 207 26:18 90 Isaiah 1 157, 166 1:10 153 1:24–27 153–54 1:24 157 1:25 157 1:27 157 9:5–6 13–14 10:11 80 11:10 22 13:11 204 14:4–5 24 18:1–2 143 28:16–17 164 28:16 80 29:10 80 32:17 14 34:11 163

Index of References

39:7 133 40:13–14 81 40:13 lxx 81 40:14 81 45:7–8 14 45:21 20 52:7 22 53 192 53:1–12 202 53:2 205 53:5 202 53:7–8 137 56 133 56:3–5 139, 143 57:15 204 60:4–5 lxx 23 60:17 14 66:12 17 Jeremiah 2:5 64 2:11 65 2:30 202 5:3 202 6:14–15 14, 18 14:13–16 14–15 17:9 81 31:38–40 163, 164 34:19 133 35:2 lxx 24 36:1–7 lxx 21 38:7 133 39:15–18 135 44:1 143 Lamentations 2:8 163 Ezekiel 1:28 148 2–3 150, 163 2:8–3:3 147, 150 11:24 137 16:46 153 23:14 153 40:2 164 40:3–42:20 163 41:13 164

42:20 164 43:13 164 44:15 188 Daniel 3:4 154 3:7 154 3:29 154 3:31 204 5:19 154 6:25 154 7:13 149 7:14 154 7:25 152 10:6 149 10:19 224 12:7 152 Hosea 2:1 80 2:25 80 5:2 202 Amos 4:10 153 7:7–9 163 9:7 135 Habakkuk 2:2 190 2:4 62 Zephaniah 2:12 135 3:10 135, 143 Zechariah 1:16 163, 164 2:12 163 4 151 10:1 148 12:3 lxx 164 12:8 89 14:1–21 164 1 Maccabees 2:64 224

329

330

Index of References

3 Maccabees 2:2 275 2:22 275

Wisdom of Solomon 8:2 108 11:16 67 13–15 31, 53–57, 64 13 53 13:1–9 54–55 13:1 64 13:10–14:11 55 14 53 14:12–31 54–57 15:14–19 64 18:2 108

4 Maccabees 8:20 229 13:16 81 18:24 81 Tobit 3:8 98

Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 2 Baruch 14:8–9 78–79

Prayer of Manasseh 8 208 11–13 208 11 208 12–13 208 13 208 15 81

1 Enoch 7–8 53 7:1 53 8:3 53 93:11–14 78

Psalms of Solomon 2:29 24–25

4 Ezra 13:3 149

Testament of Dan 5:2 13

Jubilees 4:32 67 Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah 3:10 153

Testament of Gad 5:9–10 67

Dead Sea Scrolls CD III, 5–13 III, 21–IV, 10 VI, 7 VII, 17 VII, 18

188 188 190 189 190

1QH 7:26–33 78

10:3–7 78 II, 25–26 90 II, 25 107 II, 29 90 X, 23–26 90 X, 25–27 193 XI, 20–23 193 XII, 25–26 193

331

Index of References

1QM XVIII, 1

90

1QpHab VII, 1–5

1QS 4:11–12 67 V–VI 193

190

1QSa 195

Rabbinic Literature y. Ber 1.2d 117

b. Ned. 32a 117

b. B. Me i‘a 78b 117

So ah 10a 117

b. B. Qam. 38b 117

b. Yoma 35b

117, 119

New Testament Matthew 3:17 224 5–7 6–7 5:1–11 111 5:1 111 5:11 98 5:12–16 111 5:17–20 118 5:17 111, 112 5:18 118 5:20 111, 126 5:21–37 118 5:21–26 111 5:21 120 5:22 120 5:25 68 5:27–30 111 5:27 120 5:28 120 5:31–32 111 5:31 120 5:32 120 5:33–37 111, 121 5:33 120 5:34 120

5:38–42 111, 120, 121, 124, 127 5:38–39 121 5:38 120 5:39–42 120, 121, 122, 123, 124 5:39–41 123 5:39 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125 5:40 121, 122, 123, 124, 125 5:41 6–7, 111–27 5:42 121, 123, 124 5:43–48 111, 120 5:43 120, 124 5:44–48 120 5:44 120 6:13 98 6:23 98 7:12 124 8:1 181 10:1–15 24 10:7 68 10:21 68 11:7 276 11:8 276 12:34 98 13:19 98

332 13:38 98 14:19 233 15:4 111 15:21 113 16:12 111, 125 16:19 125, 194 18:18 125, 194 19:2 181 19:12 132, 139 19:28 194 20:29–34 118 20:29 181 21:1–11 223 22:17 114 23:1 125 23:3 125 23:4 112, 125, 126 23:5 125 23:6 126 23:7 126 23:15 111 23:26 114 24:9 68 24:20 149 26:14–16 223 26:26–46 223 26:26–29 223 26:47–50 223 26:67 122 27:2 68 27:11–14 223 27:16–23 223 27:32 114, 118, 123 27:57–61 223 Mark 1:6 276 1:11 224 1:17–18 181 1:20 181 4:3–8 29 6:41 233 7 234 7:34 233, 234 8:34–38 181 10 138 10:28–31 181 11:1–10 223

Index of References

11:1–7 118 13:26 149 14:10–11 223 14:22–25 223 14:32–43 223 14:44–46 223 15:1–15 223 15:9–15 223 15:21 118, 123 Luke 1:53 204 3:22 224 6:27–28 120 6:27 120 6:29–30 120, 121, 122 6:29 122 6:30 123 6:32–36 120 7:24 276 7:25 276 9:16 233 11:34 98 12:58 68 16:18 120 16:19 276 19:28–36 223 19:29–38 118 21:12 68 21:22 149 21:24 164 22:3–6 223 22:15–20 223 22:30 194 22:40–46 223 22:47–49 223 23:2–7 223 23:6–12 223 23:16 201 23:20–24 223 23:22 200 23:26 114 23:54 223 24 140 24:9–35 132 24:13–35 140 24:20–21 191 24:20 149

Index of References

24:26 191 24:27 191 24:32 141 John 6:2 181 8:56–59 192 12:12–15 118 12:28 225 12:38 137 17:1–26 223 17:15 98 18:2–5 223 18:28–19:11 223 19:12–16 223 19:31 223 Acts 1:8 134 2:23 234 4:13 257 6 131 6:7 189 7 7 7:22 201, 202 7:39–41 188 7:51–52 188–89 7:54 192 8 130, 132, 140, 141 8:1–4 140 8:3 68 8:5–13 140 8:14–25 140 8:14 131 8:25 131, 132 8:26–40 7, 129–44, 192 8:26 131, 132, 136, 142, 143 8:27 133 8:32–35 137 8:32–34 136 8:36 138, 142 8:38 142 8:39 137, 141, 142 8:40 131, 132 9:1 132 10 138 10:1–11:18 140, 142 10:44 142

10:48 142 11:9 225 12:17 232 12:21 276 12:22 276 12:23 276 15:7 141 17 18, 19 17:11 207 17:28 81 21:11 68 21:40 232 22:3 201, 202 28:5 224 Romans 1–8 84 1:2–4 70, 79 1:1–15 60 1:16–11:36 80 1:16–17 60, 61, 70 1:16 71 1:17 61, 62 1:18–3:20 60, 61, 71 1:18–2:29 28 1:18–32 5–6, 27–31, 52, 57–72 1:18–19 60, 61–62 1:18 61, 62, 67 1:19–32 61 1:19–23 66 1:19–20 59, 60, 65 1:19 61, 62 1:20 64 1:21–24 66 1:21–23 60 1:21 64 1:22–24 66 1:22–23 66 1:23 64, 65 1:24–27 60, 66–69 1:24–25 66 1:24 66, 67, 68 1:25–27 66 1:25–26 66 1:25 66, 67 1:26–31 66 1:26–27 66 1:26 67

333

334

Index of References

1:28–32 66 1:28–31 60, 66, 68, 69–70 1:28 70 1:29–23 62–66, 68 1:32 60, 69 2–3 61 2:1–9 28 2:7 65 2:10 65 2:14 68 2:15–16 29 2:20 201 2:28 29 3:5 61 3:7 65 3:9–20 5, 27 3:10–18 80 3:26 61 5–8 72 5:5 64 5:12–21 27, 72 7 71, 74, 193 7:24–25 193 8 74 8:16 206 8:17 206 8:21 206 8:24 22, 24 9–11 74–75, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 86, 87, 195 9 75 9:1–5 82 9:3–5 81, 82 9:6–11:24 86 9:6 75 9:8 75 9:22–29 195 9:25–26 80 9:30 75 9:32–33 75 9:33 80 10:12 75 10:15 22 10:16 137 11 75, 82 11:1–2 75 11:7–10 80 11:11 195

11:12 82 11:17–24 75 11:17–19 86 11:25–32 82 11:25–27 75, 79, 86 11:25 82 11:26 75, 82, 195 11:28–32 79 11:29 75, 81 11:32 195, 207 11:33–36 6, 73–87 11:33 75, 79, 80 11:34–35 80, 81 11:34 81, 86 11:35 81, 85 11:36 79, 81 12–15 75 12:1–2 71 12:17 21 13:1–7 22 13:3 21 14:16 21 14:17 22 15 23 15:12–13 22 15:33 13, 22–23 16:20 13, 23–25 16:27 81 1 Corinthians 1–4 85 3:19–20 85 4:14 203, 206 4:15 201, 206 5:3 201 5:5 68, 207 6:2–3 194 7 159 8:1–6 159 8:5–6 109 8:6 81 9:21 234 10:1–13 189 10:14–22 109 11:32 200, 201, 207, 209 14:33 5, 13 16:13 225

Index of References

2 Corinthians 4:11 68 6:9 200, 201, 203, 207, 209 6:13 206 6:14–7:1 171 10–13 48 12:14 206 13:11 5, 13, 22 Galatians 1:12–2:14 48 1:16 68 2:7–8 141 3:23–4:7 200 3:24–25 201 4:6 64 4:19 206 4:29 189 5:19–21 69 6:16 75 Ephesians 1:5 109 1:18 204 1:19–21 109 1:21 108 2:2 108, 109 2:11 109 2:12 109 2:13 109 3:8 78 3:10 108 3:15 108 4:1–16 110 4:17–5:20 110 4:17 109 4:27 108 5:6 109 5:16 98 5:19–20 64 5:21–6:9 110 6 107 6:4 199, 201, 205, 206 6:10–17 90 6:11 108 6:12 108 6:13 98

6:14 89 6:16 6, 89–110 Philippians 1:30 21 2:5–11 19–20 3:20–21 20 4:5–9 20–21 4:9 13, 19–21 Colossians 1:16 81 3:15 13 3:16 64 3:21 199, 205, 206 1 Thessalonians 1:9–10 19 1:10 18 2:12 18 2:16 192 4:15–17 18 5:3–9 19 5:3 18 5:23 13, 17–19 2 Thessalonians 3:16 13, 19, 25 1 Timothy 1:19 6, 73 1:20 201, 202 4:7 247 2 Timothy 1:5 209 2:22 6, 73 2:25 200, 201 3:6–7 247 3:16 201, 202 4:3 73–74 Titus 2:12 202 Hebrews 2:10 81 7:2 25

335

336 12:4–11 202 12:5 199, 201, 205 12:6 201 12:7–11 199, 205 12:7 200, 201 12:8 201 12:9 201 12:10–11 203 12:10 201 12:11 201 13:14 25 13:20 13, 25 13:24 25 James 1:5–8 74 1 Peter 1:10 78 2:21–25 137 5:5 208 2 Peter 1:13 209 1:18 224 3:1 209 1 John 2:13–14 98 3:12 98 5:18 98 Revelation 1 151 1:1 161 1:5 164, 165 1:11 150, 208 1:15 149 1:16 149 1:19 150 1:20 160 2–3 158, 159 2:8 211 2:13 165 2:20 160 2:21 160, 166 2:23 159, 160, 166 2:24 159

Index of References

3:10 156 3:12 164 3:14 165 3:15 166 3:19 201 4:3 148 5 149, 150, 151, 161, 163 5:2 148, 150 5:5 149 5:9–10 155 5:9 150, 154 6:1–8:5 151 6:10 156 7 145 7:9–10 155 7:9 154, 155 8:13 156 9:21 145 10:1–11:13 7, 145–67 10 148, 149, 150, 163 10:1–11 147–48 10:1 147, 148, 149, 161 10:2–3 147 10:2 149 10:3–4 147 10:3 147, 149 10:4 147, 224 10:5–7 147 10:5–6 147 10:7 147, 161 10:8–10 147, 150, 165 10:8 149, 224 10:11 148, 150, 154, 161, 163 11 156 11:1–13 151, 157 11:1–3 153 11:1–2 151, 153, 163, 164 11:2 152, 157, 164, 165, 166 11:3–13 151, 152, 165 11:3–6 151, 163 11:3 152 11:4 161 11:7 151, 161 11:8 151, 152 11:9 151, 154, 155, 162 11:10 151, 155, 156 11:11 151 11:12 151, 224

Index of References

11:13 145, 152, 157, 166 11:14 145 11:19 156 12 145 12:6 152 12:9 24, 156 12:14 152 13:1 161 13:3 156 13:5 152 13:7 152, 154 13:8 156 13:11 218 13:12 156 13:14 156 14:1–13 146 14:2 224 14:6 154 14:13 224 14:14 149 15:6 148 16:6 152 16:14 156 16:19 152

17–18 94, 152 17:1–18 145 17:2 156 17:6 152, 165 17:8 156, 161 17:15 154 17:18 152 18:4 224 18:10 152 18:16 152 18:18 152 18:19 152 18:21 148, 152 18:23 24 18:24 152 19:4 148 19:11–21 146 19:11–16 145 20:2 24 20:7–8 146 20:10 24 20:15 146 21–22 164, 166 21:27 146

Apostolic Fathers and Other Early Christian Literature Acts of John 55–57 211 55 211 Barnabas 4:7–8 189 5:11 189 8:4 189 14:1–4 189 1 Clement 1:1–3:4 207 1:1 199 1:2 206 1:3 205 1:6 206 2:8 208 3:3 205 4:1–39:9 207

5:7 205 6:2 200 10:17 202 12:1 202 13:1 202 13:8 202 13:24 202 15:32 202 16:3 205 16:5 202 18:17 208 19:3 208 21:6 199, 205, 206 21:8 8, 199–209 21:9 207 22:1 205, 206 22:6 208 22:15 202 23:1 206

337

338

Index of References

23:4 206 23:13–14 202 29:15 202 32:2 205 35:8 202, 209 36:2 208 37:2 205 37:3 205 39:4 205 40:1–61:3 207 40:1 209 44:5 205 45:2 209 47:1–3 199 47:1 199, 207 47:6 205, 206 51–58 207 51–53 207 51–52 203 51:5 205 53 207 53:1 209 54–55 203 54 207 54:1–4 203 54:2 201, 202, 203, 205, 208 55 208 55:1 205 55:4 205 56 200 56:2–5 203–4 56:2 201, 203, 205 56:3 201, 202, 203 56:4 202, 203 56:5 202, 204 56:14 205 56:16 201, 205, 207, 208 57 208 57:1 201, 203, 205, 207, 208, 209 59 204 59:2 205 59:3 201, 202, 204, 205, 208 59:4 205 60:2 200 60:4 205 62:1–65:2 207 62:3 199, 201, 205, 208–9

2 Clement 11:23 206 Didache 1:4 123 10:5 98 Gospel of Peter 10 224 Ignatius of Antioch Eph. 21.1 211, 212 Mag. 15.1

211, 212

Pol. 1.1 231 Rom. 1.1 231 10.1 211 Trall. 1.1 211 12.1 211 13.1 211 Life of Polycarp 1–2 212 Martyrdom of Pionius 2.1 219 17.1 223 Martyrdom of Polycarp prescr. 218 1.1 218, 238, 239 2 234 2.1 218 2.2 212, 229 2.4 221 3.1 228, 236 3.2 229 4.1 237 5.1 220, 223, 229, 234, 238 6.1–2 223

Index of References

6.1 220 6.2 222 7.1 223 7.2–3 223, 228 7.2 220, 223, 228, 229 7.3 220, 229, 238 8.1 223 8.2–9.2 236 8.2–3 223 8.2 221, 222 8.3 220, 224, 234, 236 9–12 214, 224–37 9 228 9.1–11.2 223 9.1 218, 224 9.2 220, 221, 222, 228, 231, 234 9.3 214, 229 10.1 222, 236 10.2 236 11.2 221 12.1 228, 230, 231

12.2–13.1 223 12.2–3 219 12.2 236, 237 12.3 221 13.2 229 13.3 221 14.1–3 221 14.1–2 220 15.1–2 218 15.1 221, 229 16.1 221, 229 16.2 212, 229 17.2–3 218 17.2 222 18.2–3 222, 223 18.2 218 19.1 239 20.1 218 21 219, 223 21.1 222 22.3 219

Other Ancient Authors and Texts Coins BMC I, 209 BMC I, 241

23 18

Incriptions ILS 8781 OGIS 532 OGIS 613

18–19 18–19 18

Papyri BGU 4.1107 P.Lond. 1171 P.Lond. 3.951 P.Mich. 3.202 P.Oxy. 1.37 P.Oxy. 91

242 115 241 241 242 242

Aelius Aristides Or. 4.63 223 4.72 223

13.88 221 17 216 18 216 19 216 20 216 21 216 23.34 90 Aeschylus Cho. 286 107 Pers. 226–80 103 725 103 813 103 1601–3 103 Prom. 649 107

339

340

Index of References

Aesop Fab. 71 276 239.1 276 239.2 276 Vitae 87 W

232

Alexander of Aphrodisias Prob. 1.120 276 Ammianus Anth. pal. 11.180–81 217 [Anacharsis] Ep. 9

50–53, 55, 58, 59, 67

Anaximines Rhet. Alex. 11, 1430b

264

Anonymous Seguerianus Rhet. 161–66 60 Aphthonius Progymn. 9 95 40–41 95 Apsines De fig. Spengel/Hammer 330–39 261 Spengel/Hammer 330 262 Apuleius Metam. 2.6–7 290 2.16–17 290 3.19–25 290 6.31 290 7.16 288 7.17 288 7.25 288

8.24 288 9.39 116, 117, 119 9.40 116, 117, 119 10.15–16 290 11.1 288 11.6–19 289 11.6 289, 290, 295 11.9 289 11.12 289 11.13 289 11.14 289 11.15 288, 289, 290, 294 11.16–27 293 11.16 289, 291 11.18 289 11.19 290 11.20–26 291 11.20 294 11.21–26 289 11.21 291 11.22 291 11.24 292, 293 11.25–26 293 11.25 292 11.26 294 11.27–30 289 11.28 293, 294 11.29 294 11.30 294–95 Archilochus fr. 3 fr. 139.6

103, 105 102

Aristophanes fr. 424

97, 99

Ach. 88 93 99 97 457 94 473–79 94 707–11 99 844 93 Av. 289–90 93 1473–81 93

341

Index of References

Eccl. 177 97 185 97

Aristotle Nic. eth. 3.7 96

Eq. 19 94 132 93–94 136 93 181 97 186 97 215–19 92 337 97 956–58 93 1290–99 93 1281 97

Pol. 1328b–29a 97

Nub. 353–54 93 549–59 92 670–80 93 Pax 673–78 93 684 97 1295–1304 93 Plut. 920 97 939 97 Ran. 678–82 93 710 97 840 94 1456 97 1504 93 1532–34 93 Thesm. 383–88 94 455–56 94 832–39 96 Vesp. 592–93 93 822–23 93

Rhet. 1355b 236 1413a–b 264 Arius Didymus 11m 268 Athenaeus Deipn. 3.113d–e 281 Augustan History Script. hist. Aug. 6.1.8 266 Aulus Gellius Noct. att. 1.5.2 231–32 12.1 242 12.17 247 Calpurnius Ecl. 1.46–67 16 Cassius Dio 68.6.4 261 71.1.2 265, 266 71.8.4 259 71.32.3 263 71.35.4 271 71.36.1–3 266 Cicero Acad. pr. 2.136 268 De or. 3.59.220

228, 231

342 Fin. 4.7 268 Nat. d. 1.4 38 1.49–50 40 1.118–21 32 1.118–19 45 2.5 38 2.7–12 38 2.12–15 37–39 Off. 1.64 268 3.38–39 272 3.78 272 [Rhet. Her.] 1.6.10 264 3.10–15 95 3.15.26–27 231 4.33.34 264 4.53.67 264 Tusc. 2.18.43 224 3.1.2 247 Cleanthes Hymn to Zeus 10 37 32 37, 284 36–39 37 Critias DK 88 B 25 (2:386–89) 35 [Crates] Ep. 16 278 Demetrius Eloc. 38 264 52 264 124–27 264 148 264

Index of References

161–62 264 223 244 235 244 282–83 264 285 264 287–95 261 287 262 291 262 292 263 Democritus DK 68 A 75 (2:102–3) 33 B 30 (2:151) 33 B 166 (2:178) 34 See also s. v. Philodemus, Piet. Demosthenes Or. 57.18 94 Digesta 48.19.16 261 50.4.18 113 50.5.11 113 Dio Chrysostom Or. 1.8 274 1.13 274 1.17 274 1.21 274 1.23 274 1.28 274 1.49–84 273 1.65–83 274 1.65 274 1.67 274 1.79–80 274 1.84 274 2.6 274 2.12 257 3.41 274 3.42 257 4.33–38 95 4.43–45 274 4.66 271 4.97 257

343

Index of References

11.14 95 12 passim 47–50 12.12 95 23.11 95 32.30 95 33.4–5 95 46.3 254 54.1 95 55.7 95 70.10 95 78.27 95 Diodorus Siculus 1.11–12 44–45 1.13.1 44 1.13.3 44 1.14.1 44 1.15.6–8 44 1.17.1–20.6 44 1.17.2 44, 45 1.17.3 45 1.18.1–2 45 1.18.2 44 1.18.4–5 44 1.20.5–6 45 1.21.5–11 44 1.22.2 44 5.4.3–7 34 5.5.2–3 34 5.41–46 46 5.46.3 46 6.1 45–47 Diogenes of Apollonia DK 64 B 3 (2:60) 34 Diogenes Laertius 6.24–26 281 6.40–41 281 6.53 281 6.58 281 6.67 281 6.104 278 7.121 278 7.122 268 8.5 259

[Diogenes of Sinope] Ep. 44 278 Dionysius of Halicarnassus Lys. 7 60 [Rhet.] 8–9 261 Empedocles DK 31 B 128 (1:363)

32

Epictetus (Arrian) Diatr. 1.29.9 267 3.4.7–8 261 3.7.1 257 3.13.9–13 20 3.15.13 257 3.16.1–16 257 3.19.1–6 257 3.22.35 274 3.24.21–37 90 4.1.79 116 Euhemerus See s. v. Diodorus Siculus books 5–6 Euripides Herc. fur. 140–56 108 157–63 103 422 107 Med. 628 107 Orest. 536–37 94 608–29 94 903–9 94 Eusebius Hist. eccl. 3.27.1 178 4.14.3–4 212

344

Index of References

Prog. 4 (Rabe 9)

4.14.3 212 5.5.8 212 5.20.4–8 212 5.24.4 212 10.4.58 106 Fronto Ad M. Ant. Imp. et invincem 1.2.6 262 1.3.2 268 3.16.2 262 Ad M. Caes. 1.9.3 264 1.9.4 264 2.5 216–17 4.13 267 Eloqu. 2.14 264 Galen De an. cui. pecc. 3.12 (Kühn 5.71) 278 3.13 (Kühn 5.71–72) 279 Plac. 5.3.8 283 Hecataeus of Abdera See s. v. Didorus Siculus book 1 Heliodorus Aeth. 10 232 Heraclitus DK 22 B 5 (1:151–52) B 14–15 (1:154–55)

32 32

Hermetic literature C. H. 13 292 Hermogenes Inv. 4.13

261, 262

264

Herodotus 4 51 4.79 107 5.67–68 103 6.112 103 9.21–22 103 9.70 103 9.72 104 Hesiod Great Eoiae fr. 2

96

Op. 535–37 31 561–67 31 Theog. 47–58 31 708 107 Hippolytus Haer. 531 107 Homer Epig. 14.20 96 Il. 1.47–48 100 1.50–53 107 1.145 107 2.211–77 97 2.214–42 91 2.243 274 2.604 100 2.719–20 100 2.773–75 100 2.848 100 3.79–80 100 4.196–97 100 4.242 100 5.103 100 5.204–16 100

345

Index of References

6.507 228 8.173 100 8.266–334 100 8.513–15 100 11.191 100 11.380 100 11.385–96 100 11.385–90 100 11.386–95 103 12.280 107 12.385–96 101 12.387–89 100 12.390–91 100 13.50 100 13.262–63 100 13.313–19 100 13.313–14 100 13.361 100 13.714–21 100 13.772–78 100 15.462 100 16.773 100 23.850–83 100 24.758 107 40.144 100 43.318 100 44.415 100

10.38 166 13.52 116

Od. 1.260–64 107 1.260–62 107 8.219–20 100 17.217–32 91 22.3–4 100

Dial. 28.1 192 32.1 192

Irenaeus Haer. 3.3.4

178, 212

John Chrysostom Hom. Eph. 24.6.14–17 106 Josephus A. J. 4.290–91 139 8.275 232

B. J. 1.44 257 1.209 257 1.387 271 3.173 106 Vita 9.40 98 21.102 98 27.134 98 Julian Caes. 34, 333b–c

259

Or. 1.17b 262 7.225c 278 7.226b–c 278 7.235d 278 Justin Martyr Apol. 1.16.2 123

Juvenal Sat. 6.592–94 242 Lactantius Opif. 12.16–17 224 Libanius Decl. 11.1.2 221 14.1.14 221 19.1.13 221 Or. 11.145 262–63

346

Index of References

[Epist.] 5 248

5 282 63 253

Livy 21.8 106

Dial. d. 4.1 274 9.3 274

Longinus Subl. 38 264 Lucian Abdic. 7 262 13 257 23 257 26 257 Alex. 48 254 Apol. 11 254 12–13 282 12 257 13 254, 272 15 282

Dial. meretr. 1 259 2.1 259 2.2 259 4.2–3 259 4.3 259 7.1 259 12.1 259 Dial. mort. 3.2 272 7.2 280 10.1 272 12.1 272 12.5 272 20.13 280 21.3–4 262 25.2 272 25.3 272, 275

Bis acc. 8 274 10 274 12 274 28 232 32 263 33 282

Dips. 4–6 280 9 280 11–16 282

Cat. 8–13 258 13 257 25–29 258 26 257

Eunuch. 3 254

Char. 12 259 Demon. 1 282 2 282

Dom. 2 232

Fug. 3–4 282 11 282 14–16 282 16 280 20 282 21 257

Index of References

Gall. 2 274 24 272 Herc. 4 274 Hermot. 1 279 2 264, 265, 266 4–5 265 5 272, 273, 277 6 266 7–9 273 7–8 273 7 272 8 262 9–10 281 9 262 11–12 267 11 269 13 259, 263, 264 14 267, 280 15 256, 270 16 267, 274 17 263, 264, 265 18 280 20 275 21 270 22 270, 275, 281 23 270 24 270 25–28 274 25 270 29 274 34 263, 275 47 274 48 260 50 260 51 262 52 257, 259, 260 53 275 56 277, 278 63 258 68–69 274 68 273, 274, 275 69 277, 278 70 269

347

71 272 73 274 77 264 80 281 81 267 84 281 85 268, 269 86 256, 260, 264, 278, 279, 280, 282 Hist. 8 264 13 264 20 264 41 262 44 262 48 262 61 262 Icar. 5 281 16 257 19 272 34 273 Imag. 2 257 23 265 Ind. 1 259 20–23 274 21 275 22 254 Jupp. conf. 5 262 13 281 Jupp. trag. 27 281 32 221 33 260 Lex. 1 258 3 258 14–18 258

348

Index of References

17 262 25 258

37 282 38 280, 281

Luct. 2 257

Peregr. 13 257 18 257, 263 26 280, 282 32 222 37 282

[Macr.] 2 229 Men. 12 272 17 257 Merc. cond. 1 286 2 258 13 258 19 258 23–25 286 25 278 26–27 258 33 258 34 280 42 258 Musc. laud. 7 259 Nav. 15 259 18 259 25 259 40 257 41 272 42 272 44 272 Nigr. 2 280 12 281 13 269, 281 14 281 17 281 18 280 21–25 281 25–26 281 30–34 281

Phal. 1.3 253 2.6 253 2.11 253 Philops. 9 257 27 280 40 280 Pisc. 23 281 26 282 46 273 Pro imag. 4 232 21 264 Prom. es. 1–7 264 5–6 274 Pseudol. 4 262 24 274 Rhet. praec. 22 232 Salt. 4 282 8 257 81 253 85 282 Sat. 27 257

Index of References

Somn. 9 259 Symp. 19 280

9.29 268, 271 9.36 271 9.37 271 11.6.2 281

Tim. 41 259

Musonius Rufus 8 268 9 257

Ver. hist. 2.31 257

Nemesius 81.6–10 283

Vit. auct. 7 280 10 257 11 278 20 267 23 280 27 257

Origen Cels. 3.50 278–79

Lucretius Rer. nat. 1.1–43 43 1.44–49 43 1.62–79 42 5.147–48 40 5.1161–1240 40–42 Lysias Or. 10.6–9 93 Marcus Aurelius 1.3 271 1.7 267, 271 1.16.8 271 1.17.3 271 2.3.3 64 2.15 281 4.3–4 271 4.26 271 4.30 271 4.37 271 5.9 271 5.16 281 6.30.1 271 6.30.2 271 8.3 281

Hom. Exod. 1.5 106 Or. 30.3 106 Ovid Fast. 1.711–12 15 2.305 208 Petronius Sat. 27–78 286 Philo of Alexandria Ebr. 75–76 90 Leg. 3.14 90 3.236 133 Prob. 31 274 Spec. 1.325 139 Philodemus Piet. (P.Herc. 1428) cols. ii 28–iii 13 34

349

350

Index of References

fr. 16 33 fr. 19, ll. 12–19 33 Rhet. 2, col. i.26

236

Philostratus Vit. Apoll. 1.28.3 259 Vit. soph. 482 235 483 235 484 235 485 234 487 231 490–91 226 492 235 509 235 511 213, 239 521 235 527 235 528 231, 233, 235 529 236 530 217, 219 531 213, 216 532 220, 221 533 216, 219, 220, 223 534 217, 220 535 220, 235 536 220, 235, 237 537 213, 221, 227, 231, 236, 237 538 220 539–40 222 539 213, 226, 233 540–42 235 540 221, 233 541–42 232 541 232 543 214, 218, 222, 229 544 219, 222 557 232, 265 561 261 562 266 563 231 564 213, 227 572 233, 235

576 223 582 216 583 236 587 220 595 227, 231 605 213 608–12 219 608 235 611 219 612 227 613 213 616 220 623 230 626 233, 236 Pindar Nem. 10.15 107 Plato Crat. 397c–d 33 Pol. 267a–e 274 Protag. 320c–22d 31 322a 37 Resp. 345c–e 274 359d–60b 272 440d 274 612b 272 Plato Comicus fr. 182 fr. 185 fr. 203 fr. 601

93 93 93 93

Pliny the Elder Nat. 11.54.144 233 34.162–63 220

Index of References

Pliny the Younger Ep. 6.6.3 213

1033e 267 1043b–c 267, 268 1060b 267, 268

Pan. 65.1–3 271 78.2 271

Pyrrh. 34.1–3 104

Plutarch Apoph. lac. 191e 105 210e–f 104 215d 104 221f 104 228d–e 104 230c 104 234e 104 Arist. 329c 104 Cohib. ira 456c 231 Comp. Lyc. Num. 1.1–2 257 Cons. ux. 609e 242 Galb. 11 95 Is. Os. 13, 356a–b 44 18, 358a–b 44 21, 359c–d 44 22–23, 359d–60b 44 23 45 Lib. ed. 3c 242 5–6 246 5 246 Mor. 592c–d 259 759d 278

Rect. rad. aud. 41c 229 Thes. 5.1–4 105 Ti. C. Gracch. 5.3 95 6.4 95 9.4 95 12.1–4 95 Vit. pud. 528e–f 230 529f 230 Polemo Physiognomy (Leiden) 1 (A5–23) 230 1 (A20) 226, 227 2 225 23 (B21–22) 230 24 (B23) 230 25 (B26) 230 26 225 26 (B25) 230 27 225 27 (B26) 230 28 225 28 (B27) 230 29 (B29) 230 30 (B30) 230 40–41 (B37) 230 40 225 49 225 50 225 61 225 Polybius 13.3.1–8 105

351

352

Index of References

Porphyry Philos. orac. 2.164b 98 Prodicus DK 84 B 5 (2:317) 32–33, 36 See also s. v. Philodemus, Piet. Protagoras DK 80 B 4 (2:265)

31

Pythagorean literature Melissa to Kleareta 249 Myia to Phyllis 244–52 Sophrosyne of a Woman 249 Quintilian Inst. 1.4 246 1.5 247 8.6.67–76 264 8.6.74 264 9.2.65–92 261 9.2.65 262 9.2.67 262 9.2.81 262 11.3.84–124 231, 232 11.3.67 232 11.3.101 232 11.3.102 232 11.3.106 232 11.3.122 232 11.3.128 228 12.1.1 226 Seneca Apoc. 7 273 8 273 9 273 Ben. 1.3.4–5 290 1.13.1–3 273 2.4.3 293 2.24.1 293

2.24.4 287 2.30.1–2 284, 289 2.35.3–5 286 3.1.1 287 3.5.2 286, 287 3.8.2 289 3.8.3 289 6.34.1–5 287 6.34.5 287, 292 7.23.1–2 264 Clem. 2.5.2–7.5 268 Ep. 15.5 265 33.4 267 33.7 267 33.10 267 36.4 265 74.19–21 90 76.3 265 82.5 90 90 59 97 90 108.13 268 Vit. beat. 1.3 274 Sextus Empiricus Math. 2.61–62 236 9.12 37 9.17 45 9.18 32–33 9.19 34 9.20–21 36 9.24 33 9.25 40 9.26–27 39 9.54 35 Sophocles Aj. 1120–23 104

353

Index of References

Trach. 574 107 714–18 107

Dial. 15.3 213 29 246, 247

Soranus Gyn. 2.18–20 245 2.18.4 242 2.19 246, 247, 248 2.20 246 2.22–23 246 2.23–24 246

Germ. 20 242

Stobaeus Ecl. 2.102.13–15 267 4.9.16 103 Strabo Geogr. 10.1.2 105 10.1.12 105 Suetonius Aug. 49.5–50 112 52 272 53–56 271 56 271 Tib. 26–27 271 26 272 26.1 271 Vesp. 12 271 13 279 Tacitus Agr. 30 17 Ann. 2.49 23 13.41.5 16 15.18.1 16

Hist. 1.1 261 2.58 114 Tertullian Apol. 50 130 Praescr. 32 212 Themistius Or. 30 36 Theognis 274 96 Theon Prog. 9 258 Theophrastus Char. 26.4–6 98 Thucydides 2.75.5 106 7.226–27 104 Tibullus Eleg. 1.10.69–70 15 Tyrtaeus fr. 11

103

Velleius Paterculus II.103–4 18

354

Index of References

Virgil Aen. 6.851–53 15–16 Ecl. 4 15 Vitruvius De architectura 10 107 Xenophanes DK 21 B 11 (1:132) B 14–16 B 23 (1:135)

32 32 32

Xenophon Anab. 1.17–20 103 4.2.28 103 [Ath.] 1.5 97 Cyr. 2.1.16–18 105 8.6.17 112 Mem. 1.4.15 38

Index of Modern Authors Abbott, Thomas Kingsmill  90, 107 Abou Aly, Amal  242 Adcock, F. E.  105 Aegeson, James  80 Aejmelaeus, Lars  75 Ahearne-Kroll, Stephen  249 Ahl, Frederick  261, 262 Aichele, George  3 Aland, Barbara  142 Aland, Kurt  143 Aldrete, Gregory S.  231 Algra, Keimpe  32 Allison, Jr., Dale C.  111, 113, 122, 123, 133 Althaus, Paul  58, 59 Ames, Tracy  117 Anderson, Graham  212, 215, 256 Anderson, J. K.  103 Anderson, Janice Capel  230 Arena, Valentina  93, 95, 96 Ascough, Richard S.  221 Asher, Jeffrey R.  6, 100, 109 Asmis, Elizabeth  37, 40, 43, 267, 281 Aune, David E.  24, 25, 60, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 154, 156, 157, 158, 161, 164, 166, 223, 279 Austin, Colin  93 Avalos, Hector  4 Avotins, Ivars  217 Baarda, Tjitze  132 Badian, Ernst  286 Baer, Marc David  186 Bagnall, Roger S.  241 Baines, John  55 Baird, William  4 Bailey, Daniel P.  244 Balch, David L.  223, 251 Baldwin, Barry  254, 263

Ballif, Michelle  214 Baltes, Matthias  281 Barclay, John M. G.  229 Barnes, Jonathan  32 Barnes, T. D.  217, 219 Barr, David L.  146, 162 Barr, James  28 Barrett, C. K.  27, 29, 61, 63, 140, 142 Barth, Markus  89, 90, 106 Bartley, Adam  255, 269 Barton, Tamsyn  215 Bartsch, Shadi  261 Basore, John W.  286 Bauckham, Richard  148, 150, 153, 156, 157, 161, 164 Bauer, Walter  7, 98, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 183 Baur, F. C.  178 Beale, G. K.  149, 150 Beard, Mary  294 Beatrice, Pier Franco  211 Becker, Adam H.  179 Behr, Charles A.  216, 223 Behr, John  223 Bell, Catherine  283 Bell, H. I.  112 Bellia, Giuseppe  80 Berdozzo, Fabio  269 Berger, Klaus  161 Bernays, Jacob  277 Best, Ernest  89–90, 106 Betz, Hans Dieter  VII, 1–10, 25, 27, 30, 48, 49, 59, 89, 111, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 124, 125, 129, 169, 170, 171, 172, 175, 179, 183, 185, 189, 211, 236, 241, 253, 273, 276, 277, 278, 281, 284, 292 Billault, Alain  215, 254 Billerbeck, Margarethe  281 Birley, Anthony Richard  259

356

Index of Modern Authors

Bisbee, G. A.  217 Blanton, IV, Thomas R.  VII, 9 Blass, Friedrich  142 Boas, George  30 Boeft, Jan den  217, 219 Boer, Wilko de  278, 279 Boissevain, Jeremy  287, 293 Bompaire, J.  255, 262, 263 Bonazzi, Mauro  277 Bonner, Stanley Frederick  200 Booth, J.  94 Boring, M. Eugene  146, 148, 153, 163, 164 Bornkamm, Günther  75, 76, 77, 81 Boswell, Grant M.  214, 216 Boswell, John  28 Bourdieu, Pierre  9, 283, 284, 295, 296 Bousset, Wilhelm  1, 3, 152, 164 Bowden, Hugh  291 Bowden, John  18 Bowersock, G. W.  212, 215, 219, 223, 237, 238 Bowie, Ewen  212, 213, 215, 217 Boyarin, Daniel  175 Bradbury, Jim  105 Bradley, Keith R.  241, 243, 244, 246, 250, 290 Branham, R. Bracht  51, 273, 279, 281 Braund, David  93, 102, 239 Braund, Susanna  242 Breij, Bé  261 Bremmer, Jan  217, 219, 231 Brent, Allen  211, 213, 214 Breytenbach, Cilliers  1 Brink, Laurie  6, 7 Broadhead, Edwin  7, 8, 169–83 Brodribb, William Jackson  247 Bromiley, Geoffrey W.  27 Brown, W. Edward  46 Bruce, Frederick F.  90, 106, 108, 134, 138, 140, 141, 142 Brunt, P. A.  285 Bultmann, Rudolf  3, 170 Bunyan, John  90 Burkert, Walter  30, 31, 32, 38, 55, 63, 273, 283–84, 291 Burns, J. Patout  119 Buschmann, Gerd  217, 224, 229

Cadoux, Cecil John  216 Caird, G. B.  157, 164 Calhoun, Robert Matthew  VII, 5, 48, 49, 60, 61, 62, 63, 79 Campenhausen, Hans von  211 Cancik, Hubert  213, 282 Carroll, John T.  81, 84 Carter, Warren  114 Cassidy, Richard  17 Castelli, Elizabeth A.  228 Caster, Marcel  277 Cébeillac-Gervasoni, M.  218 Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de  106 Charles, R. H.  150, 151, 152, 164 Chiron, Pierre  261, 262 Christ, Matthew R.  92 Christiansen, Ellen J.  132 Church, Alfred John  247 Chvala-Smith, Anthony  215 Clark, Elizabeth  3–4 Clark, M. E.  23 Clay, Jenny Strauss  107 Cobb, Stephanie L.  224, 230, 237 Cohen, J. M.  106 Cohoon, J. W.  49 Cole, Thomas  30, 44 Collins, Adela Yarbro  1, 2, 146, 158, 171, 282 Collins, John J.  4, 54 Conley, Thomas  91 Connor, W. Robert  92 Conway, Colleen M.  224, 226 Conzelmann, Hans  134, 136, 137, 142, 200 Corbeill, Anthony  228, 231 Cosgrove, Charles H.  81, 82, 83, 84 Court, John M.  158 Cranfield, C. E. B.  27, 61, 62, 63, 67, 77 Cribiore, Raffaella  241 Crossan, John Dominic  16, 17, 18, 19, 22 Dangel, Jacqueline  261 Danker, Frederick  98 Davies, W. D.  111, 113, 122, 123, 133, 186 De Rossi, Filipo Canali  285 Debrunner, Albert  142 Decharneux, Baudouin  277 Declercq, Gilles  261

Index of Modern Authors

DeFilippo, Joseph G.  288 Dehandschutter, Boudewijn  213, 214, 217, 237 Deichgräber, Reinhard  77 Dein, Simon  186 Deissmann, Adolf  118 Delling, G.  21 Derrett, J. Duncan M.  117, 118 DeSilva, David A.  208 Dihle, Albrecht  255 Dinkler, Erich  134, 142 Dixon, Suzanne  242, 243, 247, 287 Dobson, M. I.  116 Dodd, C. H.  4, 27, 58, 61 Dodwell, Henry  256, 259, 266 Dominik, William  93 Donfried, Karl P.  17, 18, 19 Donlan, Walter  97, 105 Drachmann, A. B.  32 Driver, S. R.  222 Droge, Arthur J.  5 Dubuisson, Michel  254 Duff, Paul B.  7, 159, 160, 166 Dulk, Matthijs den  8 Dunn, James D. G.  29, 61, 66, 67, 77, 85 Easterling, P. E.  94 Edgar, C. C.  115, 242 Edmondson, Jonathan  261 Edwards, M. J.  277, 282 Edwards, Mark J.  106, 217, 225 Ehrman, Bart  189, 205, 206, 217, 218, 229 Eichhorn, E.  1 Eisenstadt, S. N.  285 Elliott, Neil  23 Ellis, Edward Earle  21, 134 Elsner, Jaś  211, 212, 215, 217, 230 Engberg-Pedersen, Troels  20 Epp, Eldon Jay  59 Erskine, Andrew  267 Eshleman, Kendra  211, 213 Evans, Craig  209 Evans, Elizabeth C.  215 Evelyn-White, Hugh G.  96 Fant, Maureen B.  241, 242, 244, 247, 249, 250 Faraone, Christopher A.  62

357

Fears, J. Rufus  15, 16, 18, 22, 23, 24 Ferguson, John  47 Festugière, André-Jean  288, 289, 292, 293 Fiebig, Paul  118, 123 Fildes, Valerie A.  241, 242, 244 Finley, Moses I.  92, 110 Fisher, Nick  92, 93, 99 Fitzgerald, Robert  16 Fitzmyer, Joseph A.  29, 59, 61, 62, 63, 65, 66, 77, 80, 123 Flinterman, Jaap-Jan  215 Foerster, Richard  215 Foster, Paul  221 Fowler, Don  290 Francis, James A.  277 Frankfurter, David  159 Fredriksen, Paula  109 Frend, W. H. C.  116 Frey, Jörg  vii, 1, 2, 3 Freyburger, Gérard  223 García Martínez, Florentino  53 Garnsey, Peter  285 Garrett, Susan R.  284 Ghersetti, Antonella  225 Giblin, Charles Homer  146 Gibson, Craig A.  95 Gibson, E. Leigh  219 Glancy, Jennifer A.  243, 250 Gleason, Maud W.  216, 225, 227, 228 Goldhill, Simon  94 Goldish, Matt  194 Goldsworthy, Adrian Keith  105 Gómez, Pilar  254, 258, 277 Goulet-Cazé, Marie Odile  51, 281 Grabbe, Lester L.  54 Graf, Fritz  30, 231 Graham, Holt H.  201, 203, 207 Grandjean, Yves  292 Grant, Robert M.  201, 203, 223, 228 Grässer, Erich  21, 134 Graver, Margaret  94, 96 Green, David E.  113 Grégoire, Henri  217 Gregory, Andrew F.  234 Grieve, Alexander  118 Griffiths, J. Gwyn  289, 291, 292, 294, 295 Grobel, Kendrick  170

358

Index of Modern Authors

Grottanelli, Christiano  285 Grundmann, Walter  3 Guelich, R.  120, 122 Gunderson, Erik  226, 232 Gundry, Robert H.  119, 122, 123, 164 Gunkel, Hermann  133 Gurnall, William  90 Haacker, Klaus  15, 16 Habinek, Thomas N.  290 Haenchen, Ernst  136, 138, 141, 142 Hagner, Donald Alfred  201 Haines, C. R.  262, 266 Hall, Edith  101, 102 Hall, Jennifer  254, 263, 281 Hall, Jon  93, 231 Halperin, David J.  189–90, 191–92, 194 Hamilton, Richard  108 Hammer, C.  261, 262 Hammer, Paul  75 Hanson, A. E.  242 Hanson, A. T.  81 Hanson, J. Arthur  289 Hanson, Victor Davis  103, 105 Harder, Günther  98, 99 Harding, P.  94 Harmon, A. M.  286 Harnisch, Wolfgang  18 Harper, Kyle  230 Harrill, J. Albert  95, 185, 223 Harrison, James R.  23 Harrison, Thomas  102 Hartog, Paul  212, 221, 222, 223, 237 Harvey, D.  92 Hatto, A. J.  105 Hauck, Friedrich  107 Hausrath, A.  276 Hay, David  81, 85, 86 Hay, Mary  85 Hays, Richard B.  28 Headlam, Arthur C.  27, 58, 63, 67 Heath, Malcolm  96 Heath, Sebastian  216 Hemer, Colin J.  158 Hendrix, Holland L.  17, 18 Hengel, Martin  2, 3, 4, 130 Henrichs, Albert  33, 34 Henry, O.  162

Heron, Helen  89 Hill, Charles  211, 223, 236 Hill, G.  241 Hohl, Ernst  266 Holford-Strevens, Leofranc  225, 227 Holladay, Carl  53 Holmes, Michael W.  211, 218, 228, 229, 233–34 Hooker, Morna  29, 65 Hopwood, Keith  239 Hornblower, Simon  47 Horsley, G. H. R.  118, 123 Hout, Michel P. J. van den  217, 262 Howell, Justin  9, 261 Hoyland, Robert  225 Hudson, John  256 Huizenga, Annette Bourland  9, 244, 249 Hultgren, Arland  77 Hubbard, Moyer V.  292 Hunger, H.  276 Hunt, A. S.  115, 242 Hurtado, Larry  2, 4 Hvalvik, Reidar  175 Idel, Moshe  186, 192 Iovino, Paolo  80 Isaac, Benjamin  116 Ivantchik, Askold I.  102 Jackson-McCabe, Matt  7, 8, 175, 178, 180 Jaeger, Werner  31, 32, 33, 200, 201, 202 James, William  290 Jebb, Samuel  223 Jerryson, Michael  106 Jewett, Robert  18, 59, 61, 62, 63, 64, 67, 68, 69, 75, 76, 79, 80, 193 Johnson, E. Elizabeth  76, 77, 78, 79, 81, 83, 84, 87 Johnson, Luke Timothy  95 Johnston, Sarah Iles  291 Jones, A. H. M.  19 Jones, Christopher P.  215, 217, 219, 254, 258, 273 Jones, F. Stanley  178 Joshel, Sandra R.  241, 243, 246 Judge, E. A.  18, 19 Juergensmeyer, Mark  106

Index of Modern Authors

Kaerst, J.  267 Käsemann, Ernst  27, 28, 59, 61, 62, 64, 65, 66, 67, 76, 77 Kassel, Rudolf  93 Katzoff, Ranon  115 Kayser, C. L.  213 Keck, Leander  28 Kedar-Kopfstein, Benjamin  133, 139 Kelhoffer, James A.  249 Keller, Katherine Z.  164 Kelsay, John  106 Kennedy, George A.  95, 221, 261 Kensky, Meira Z.  6 Kent, H. R.  23 Kenyon, F. G.  112, 115 Kern, Paul Bentley  107 Kilburn, K.  256 Kindstrand, Jan Fredrik  50, 51 Kingsbury, Jack Dean  125 Kitts, Margo  106 Klauck, Hans-Josef  48, 49, 50, 137, 138, 140, 211, 244, 261, 276, 291 Klijn, A. F. J.  78, 132 Kline, A. S.  208 Kloppenborg, John  122 Knust, Jennifer  227, 228 König, Jason  213 Konstan, D.  95 Korenjak, Martin  232 Koster, Severin  91, 93, 94 Kotansky, Roy D.  59 Kovács, Péter  259 Kozlowsky, Jan  214, 222 Kraft, Heinrich  149, 150, 152, 164 Kraft, Robert A.  169 Krentz, Peter  105 Krodel, Gerhard  169 Kühn, C. G.  278, 279 Lake, Kirsopp  229 Lakmann, Marie-Luise  281 Lamb, Franz  18 Lane Fox, Robin  219, 223 Lang, Friedrich  107 Langford, Andrew  8, 9 Lape, Susan  94 Lattimore, Richard  101 Lee, J. Y.  108

359

Leemans, J.  213 Lefkowitz, Mary R.  241, 242, 244, 249, 250 Legaspi, Michael C.  4 Lendon, J. E.  100, 101, 102, 104, 105 Lesko, Leonard H.  55 Lévi-Strauss, Claude  283 Lewis, Napthali  113, 116 Lightfoot, J. B.  212, 217, 222, 223, 228, 229 Lincoln, Andrew T.  89, 90, 106 Lincoln, Bruce  283, 285 Lindijer, Cord H.  132 Lissarague, François  102 Livingstone, E. A.  29 Livingstone, Niall  260 Llewelyn, S. R.  115 Lloyd-Jones, David Martyn  90 Lohmeyer, Ernst  150, 151, 152, 164 Lohse, Eduard  150, 164 Long, Anthony A.  257, 283 Longo, Vincenzo  236, 263, 277 Lopez, Davina C.  3 Lovejoy, Arthur O.  30 Lovén, Lena Larsson  251 Lucas, Alec J.  54, 58, 66 Lüdemann, Gerd  2, 136, 140 Lutz, Cora  257, 268 Luz, Menahem  277 Luz, Ulrich  113, 114, 118, 122, 123, 125 MacDonald, Margaret Y  89, 90, 106, 247, 250–51 MacDowell, Douglas M.  93 Mackauer, C. W.  201 Magie, David  266 Maier, Harry O.  146 Malherbe, Abraham J.  18, 90, 278 Malina, Bruce J.  215 Maltby, R.  94 Mansfeld, Jaap  32 Manson, T. W.  114 Marchal, Joseph  4 Markantonatos, Andreas  92 Marrou, Henri Irénée  8, 199, 200, 205 Marsden, E. W.  107 Marshall, John W.  153, 158 Marshall, I. Howard  114 Martin, Dale B.  59, 95, 226, 251

360

Index of Modern Authors

Martin, Luther H.  291 Martin, Richard P.  51 Mason, Steve  261 Matheson, Susan B.  288 Maxfield, V. A.  116 Mayor, Adrienne  107 Mazzaferri, Frederick David  147, 148 McKelvey, R. J.  146 McNeil, Brian  211 Meeks, Wayne A.  84 Mestre, Francesca  254, 258, 277 Metzger, Bruce M.  143 Merkelbach, Reinhold  288 Meyer, Marvin W.  291 Michaelis, Wilhelm  108 Michaels, J. Ramsay  153 Millar, Fergus  116 Mínguez, Dionisio  131, 132, 137 Miscall, Peter  3 Mitchell, Margaret M.  vii, 1, 4, 199, 211, 279 Mitchell, Stephen  114 Mitteis, Ludwig  113 Moessner, David P.  137 Möllendorff, Peter von  260, 264 Monaco, David G.  7 Montefusco, Lucia Calboli  213 Moo, Douglas J.  27, 59, 62, 66, 67, 77 Moore, J. M.  285 Moore, Stephen D.  4, 230 Moran, Michael G.  214 Morgan, Thomas  178 Moss, Candida  211, 214, 217–18 Most, Glenn W.  242 Moulton, C.  91 Moyise, Steve  146 Muellner, Leonard  108 Munck, Johannes  153 Murat, Michel  261 Murray, A. T.  100 Murray, Oswyn  43, 44 Mustakallio, Antti  74 Musurillo, Herbert  217, 219 Nagy, Gregory  100 Nasrallah, Laura S.  213 Nesselrath, Heinz-Günther  263, 269, 277 Neufeld, Thomas R. Yoder  89, 90

Newsome, Carol A.  193 Neyrey, Jerome H.  215 Ní-Mheallaigh, Karen  258 Nicklas, Tobias  216 Nilsson, Martin  32 Nock, Arthur Darby  290, 292, 294 Norden, Eduard  75, 76, 77, 81 North, Helen F.  249 North, John  294 Novokhatko, Anna A.  96 Oakes, Peter  21 Ober, Josiah  97 Obbink, Dirk  62 O’Connor, Jerome Murphy  24 Ogden, Daniel  103 O’Neill, J. C.  28 Orgels, Paul  217 Osiek, Carolyn  223, 250–51 O’Toole, Robert F.  131, 132, 134, 137, 140, 141 Osborne, Robin  94 Owen, H. P.  28 Paget, James Carleton  175 Palm, Jonas  254 Parkin, T.  229 Parvis, Sara  221 Passaro, Angelo  80 Patillon, Michel  258, 261, 262 Patton, K. C.  177 Penner, Todd  3, 225 Peretti, Aurelio  254 Perkins, Judith  213 Perkins, Pheme  90, 106 Pernot, Laurent  213, 223 Pestman, P. W.  241, 242, 244 Phelan, James  129, 130, 131 Philip, Franklin  30 Pierce, Brian  285 Pinto, Mario  254 Pomeroy, Arthur J.  268 Poole, Reginald Stuart  216 Popkes, Wiard  67 Porter, Katherine Anne  129 Powell, Mark Allan  125 Pownall, Frances  94–95 Pratt, Louise  244

Index of Modern Authors

Price, Simon  294 Pritchard, David M.  108 Puech, Bernadette  215, 218 Purcell, Nicholas  23 Quet, Marie-Henriette  218 Quiggin, E. C.  254 Rabb, Theodore K.  97 Rabe, Hugo  264 Radermacher, L.  261 Raffan, John  30, 273 Rahlfs, Alfred  54, 208 Räisänen, Heikki  29, 74, 75 Randell, Thomas  222 Ray, B. C.  177 Reader, William W.  215, 221 Reasoner, Mark  5, 25 Reed, Annette Yoshiko  179 Reed, Jonathan L.  16, 17, 18, 19, 22 Reitz, Johan Frederik  256 Resseguie, James L.  148, 150, 164 Reuters, Franz Heinrich  50, 51 Reynolds, Gabriel Said  5 Rhodes, Erroll F.  143 Rich, John  102 Ridgeway, John K.  24 Rife, J. L.  217, 218, 221 Rigaux, B.  18 Ritterling, E.  114 Rives, James  261 Robert, Louis  219 Roberts, Jennifer Tolbert  97 Robertson, D. S.  254 Robinson, Christopher  256 Robinson, Joseph Armitage  106, 107 Roloff, Jürgen  145 Romero-Pose, Eugenio  211 Romm, James S.  47 Ronchy, Silvia  217 Roniger, L.  285 Roodenburg, Herman  231 Rose, Herbert Jennings  47 Roselli, David Kawalko  94 Rosen, Klaus  271 Rosen, Ralph Mark  92, 95 Rosenbloom, David  92, 96, 98 Rosenstock, Bruce  192

361

Rostowzew, Michail  113 Rothschild, Clare K.  vii, 54, 249 Rotstein, Andrea  93, 94 Rowe, C. Kavin  261 Rowland, Christopher  158 Royalty, Robert M.  218 Ruether, R. R.  218 Russell, D. A.  49, 212, 214, 230 Ryle, J. C.  90 Sadler, J. D.  94 Said, S.  95 Saller, Richard P.  285, 286, 287 Sanday, William  27, 58, 63, 67 Sanders, E. P.  4, 28, 29, 187 Schafer, Byron E.  55 Schlier, Heinrich  89, 90 Schmid, Wilhelm  256, 265 Schmithals, Walter  18 Schnackenburg, Rudolf  89, 90, 106, 108, 113–14 Schneerson, Menachem  186 Schneider, Johannes  133, 139 Schoedel, William R.  217 Schofield, Martin  32 Scholem, Gershom  186, 191, 192, 194, 195, 196 Schöllgen, Georg  271 Scholten, Clemens  271 Schuller, Eileen M.  193 Schüssler Fiorenza, Elizabeth  4, 146, 157, 158 Schwartz, Jacques  258 Schweitzer, Albert  4 Schweizer, Eduard  113, 118 Scott, John  107 Sedley, David N.  283 Seelig, Gerald  2 Shannon, Richard Stoll  100 Sheehan, Jonathan  4 Sherwin-White, A. N.  213 Sherwood, Yvonne  4 Shipley, Graham  102 Shum, Shiu-Lun  81 Silverman, David P.  55 Skarsaune, Oskar  175 Skinner, Joseph  101 Skinner, Mary B.  230

362

Index of Modern Authors

Sluiter, Ineke  92, 95 Smalley, Stephen  18 Smith, Jonathan Z.  176, 177, 285 Smith, Robert W.  95 Smith, Steven D.  255 Smyth, Herbert Weir  29, 51, 52, 63, 68 Sommerstein, Alan  92 Sorabji, Richard  229 Spencer, F. Scott  138, 139 Spengel, Leonhard von  258, 261, 262 Spicq, Ceslas  20 Spittler, Janet E.  216, 288 Städele, Alfons  244 Staden, Heinrich von  229 Stanley, Christopher  4 Stark, Rodney  105–6 Steely, J. E.  3, 18 Steiner, Deborah  94 Stegemann, Willy  219 Stevenson, Seth W.  23 Stewart-Sykes, Alistair  212 Still, Todd D.  19 Storey, Ian  92, 95, 96–97 Stowers, Stanley K.  29, 59, 248 Strecker, Georg  7, 169, 170, 172, 174 Streete, Gail Corrington  292 Streeter, B. H.  123 Strelan, Rick  136 Strömberg, Agneta  251 Suleiman, Ezra N.  97 Süss, Wilhelm  91, 93 Sutherland, Caroline  100, 101, 108 Swain, Simon  215, 217, 220, 225, 230, 238, 254 Swancutt, Diana M.  225 Sweet, J. P. M.  150, 157, 164 Swete, Henry Barclay  152 Talbert, Charles H.  90, 109 Tamez, Elsa  251 Tannehill, Robert C.  134 Tarn, W. W.  267 Tarrant, H. A. S.  281 Temkin, O.  247, 249 Thom, Johan C.  37, 107, 284 Thompson, Leonard L.  158, 221, 233, 236 Thompson, Trevor W.  54, 211, 216, 249 Thonemann, Peter  219

Tigchelaar, Eibert J. C.  53 Tite, Philip L.  242 Toland, John  178, 179 Too, Yun Lee  260 Trout, Dennis  217 Trumbower, Jeffrey A.  8, 195 Tuckett, Christopher M.  234 Tulloch, Janet H.  251 Ueding, Gert  261 Ullendorff, Edward  143 Unnik, Willem C. van  132 Uria, J.  94 Usener, H.  261 Valantasis, Richard  292 Vander Stichele, Caroline  225 Vander Waerdt, Paul A.  267 Vermes, Geza  188, 189, 190, 195 Veyne, Paul  285 Vidman, Ladislav  295 Vischer, Rüdiger  281 Vos, M.  102 Wagner, J. Ross  22, 86 Walker, William O.  28 Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew  270–71, 285 Walsh, Michael J.  106, 284 Walsh, P. G.  213 Walsh, Richard  3 Wedderburn, A. J. M.  29 Wees, Hans van  93, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 107 Weidmann, Frederick W.  212, 221 Weinstock, Stefan  16, 24 Weiß, Johannes  1 Welborn, L. L.  93 Wellhausen, Julius  153, 164, 171, 181, 183 Wengst, Klaus  18, 22 Werblowsky, R. J. Zwi  186 Wheeler, Everett C.  105 Whitelam, Keith W.  3 Whitman, Cedric H.  95 Whitmarsh, Tim  93, 95, 212, 255, 260 Whyte, Alexander  90 Wilcken, Ulrich  113 Wilkens, J.  92, 93, 239 Wilson, Edward O.  VII

Index of Modern Authors

Wilson, J. Christian  158 Wilson, Stephen G.  73 Winiarczyk, Marek  32, 44, 45, 46 Wink, Walter  119 Winston, David  53, 55, 56 Winter, Bruce W.  17, 21 Witherington, Ben  132, 134, 136, 137, 140 Witt, R. E.  288, 289 Witulski, Thomas  218 Worman, Nancy  94 Worthington, I.  94 Wrede, W.  1

Wright, R. B.  25 Wright, W. C.  227 Wyke, Maria  226 Xenophontos, Sophia  95 Young, Robin Darling  25, 279 Zabkar, Louis V.  292 Zbirohowski-Kościa, Witold  32 Ziebritzki, Henning  VII Zimmermann, Bernhard  92

363

Subject Index Abraham  61, 74 Adultery  56, 57, 111, 119, 160, 165, 166, 202 Age 264–65 – adulthood, adult  205, 206, 226, 243, 276 – childhood, child  17, 52, 55, 82, 101, 135, 138, 189, 195, 199, 204, 205, 206, 226, 241–52, 268 – infancy, infant  241–52, 276 – old age, old person  228–30, 265–66, 275 – youth  6, 73, 205, 212, 228, 229, 262 Agriculture  36, 38, 44, 52 Alexandria  24, 53, 54, 95, 115 Alms 121 Amazon  103, 104 Anger, wrath – divine  16, 19, 27, 28, 30, 39, 41, 61, 64, 66, 67, 70, 71, 153–54, 157, 166 – human  13, 136, 230, 245, 261 Animal  32, 37, 41, 42, 65, 70, 94, 112, 115, 117, 119, 123, 138, 236, 242, 288 – ass, donkey, mule  115, 116, 117, 118, 223, 288, 289, 290 – bird  48, 63, 101 – bull  32, 38, 117 – dog  94, 220, 278, 280, 281, 282 – dragon 24 – horse  145, 220, 228, 230, 233 – lamb 155 – lion  147, 149 – nightingale 48 – owl 48 – peacock 48 – pig 94 – quadruped 63 – reptile 63 – rooster 272

– serpent  24, 190 – sheep 274 Anointment 204 Antioch  114, 262 Apocalyptic  19, 21, 27, 28, 75, 79, 81, 82, 83, 87, 90, 145–67, 170 Apologetics  22, 169, 178, 179, 183, 217 Apostasy  6, 73, 169, 187, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195 Apostle  28, 131, 132, 141, 178, 195, 211, 212 – Paul  4, 5–6, 13–25, 27–72, 73–87, 89–110, 131, 132, 159, 170–71, 187, 189, 193, 194, 195, 199, 200, 201, 203, 206, 207, 209, 212, 224, 284 – see also s. v. disciple Aretalogy 292 Art – painting 32 – pottery, vase  101, 102, 103 – sculpture  24, 32, 37, 47, 48, 216, 218, 222, 271, 272, 280 Ascension  46, 49, 134, 151, 157, 273 Athens  34, 92, 93, 98, 99, 216, 217, 220, 238, 269 Babylon  21, 24, 46, 55, 94, 145, 152, 156, 202 Baptism  7, 129–44 Barbarian  6, 49, 91, 93, 94, 99, 102, 103, 104, 105, 108, 110, 242, 245, 247, 248, 252, 272, 273 Bath  228, 243, 245, 269 Benediction  18, 19, 22–23, 24, 25, 207 Benefaction  21, 29, 34, 44–47, 49, 56, 65, 109, 123, 216, 284, 285, 286, 287, 288, 289, 292, 293, 295, 296 Betrayal  188, 223

Subject Index

Biography (‘Lives’)  51, 94, 95, 189, 191, 211–240 Birth  36, 96, 241, 242, 244, 245, 247, 292 Bishop  208, 212, 284 Body  19, 20, 32, 40, 116, 193, 201, 222, 223, 227, 229, 230, 232, 245, 283, 296 – blood  7, 32, 38, 41, 56, 101, 109, 118, 130, 155, 205, 236 – bones  17, 223 – breast(s)  42, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 246 – eye(s)  204, 208, 230, 233–34 – face  147, 148, 149, 225, 227, 228, 230–31, 232, 233 – fingernail  242, 246 – flesh see s. v. – foot (feet)  24, 101, 147, 148, 149, 228, 230, 235 – forehead 225 – genitals  138, 227 – hair  96, 97, 227, 229, 230, 281 – hand(s) 230–33 – head  42, 43, 97, 100, 101, 104, 147, 148, 204, 209, 217, 230 – heart see s. v. – legs  147, 148, 149 – mind see s. v. – nose  225, 230, 274, 275 – palm(s) 41 – soul see s. v. – spirit see s. v. – uterus 249 Boldness 225 – see also s. v. parrhesia, s. v. rhetoric Britain 273 Burial  44, 151, 155, 223 Castration  133, 139 – see also s. v. eunuch Cenchreae 288 Character  69, 83, 87, 95, 96, 98, 99, 175, 221, 230, 231, 243, 250, 251, 252, 253 Charity 123 Christology 187 – “Son of Man”  149, 150, 156, 159 – Trinity 178 Circumcision  109, 141, 188

365

Citizenship  9, 20, 92, 94, 105, 117, 217, 255, 260, 268, 270, 271, 272, 274, 275, 280, 281 Clothing  37, 122, 147, 148, 149, 155, 192, 219, 228, 231, 243, 264, 271, 276, 279, 281, 293 Conflict  8, 13, 19, 20, 91, 102, 107, 125, 222 Contract (legal)  241, 249, 250 Conversion  131, 132, 138, 140, 141, 143, 188, 189, 240, 269, 280, 281, 282, 290 Corinth  24, 74, 101, 103, 199, 203, 205, 206, 207, 288, 293 Covenant  61, 98, 109, 135, 139, 180, 187, 188, 189, 195, 202 Crete  vii, 46, 257 Crucifixion  145, 151, 152, 153, 165, 188, 191, 223, 224 – cross  118, 123 Custom  31, 32, 38, 45, 52, 55, 56, 68, 69, 70, 110, 233, 242 Damascus  132, 188, 189, 190 Deception  39, 49, 52, 53, 56, 66, 68, 100, 105 Death  7, 15, 36, 40, 44, 55, 69, 72, 91, 92, 100, 104, 107, 130, 140, 151, 152, 154, 155, 156, 158, 165, 166, 186, 189, 191, 193, 195, 203, 212, 214, 216, 217, 218, 219, 221, 223, 224, 228, 229, 232, 234, 237, 238, 239, 242, 256, 265, 272, 276, 280, 291 Definition  2, 42, 61, 70, 119, 163, 173, 175–76, 177, 179, 180, 182, 187, 215, 226, 227, 230, 236, 248, 288, 290, 293 Desire  45, 51, 60, 61, 66, 67, 68, 71, 73, 90, 106, 192, 227, 245, 267, 268, 270, 272, 274, 276, 288, 290 Devotion  49, 56, 191, 251, 256, 260, 287, 289, 291, 295 Dialect – Attic  223, 258 – barbarian  93, 252 – Doric  244, 248 Disciple  7, 111, 112, 117, 120, 121, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 181, 204, 219 – James, Lord’s brother  131 – John, son of Zebedee  131, 140, 212

366

Subject Index

– Peter  131, 140, 141, 189, 194 – Philip the Evangelist  7, 129–44 – Twelve  118, 138, 140, 223 Divination  36, 38 Divine being – Aion 55 – angel(s)  53, 132, 136, 143, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 161, 163, 165, 167, 194 – Anubis 45 – Aphrodite, Venus  40, 43, 107 – Apollo  45, 100, 107 – Ares 103 – Artemis  107, 108 – Asclepius 220 – Athena  31, 44, 46 – The Beast  145, 151, 152, 154, 156, 161, 218 – Bel 46 – Belial 107 – Cronus  46, 51, 257 – Cupid, Eros  107, 161, 162 – Curetes 46 – Cybele 139 – Demeter  33, 34, 44, 46 – Destiny 257 – The Devil  6, 89–110 – Dionysus  33, 34, 44 – Dioscouri 34 – Elements  44–45, 54–55 – Fates  96, 292 – Graces  290, 295, 296 – Hades 46 – Hephaestus  31, 33, 44 – Hera  46, 274 – Heracles  45, 96, 103, 104, 107, 108, 273, 274, 294 – Hermes  44–45, 257, 258–59, 267, 274 – Hestia 46 – Isis  44, 45, 288–95 – Macedon 45 – Muses  43, 48, 212–13 – Ocean 44 – Osiris  44–45, 289, 291, 293, 294, 295 – Pan 45 – Persephone  34, 46 – Poseidon  33, 46 – Prometheus 31 – Psyche  161, 162

– Rhea 46 – Satan  24, 117, 146, 159 – Tantalus 280 – Themis 46 – Virtue(s) (cult of)  15–17, 22–23, 218 – Concord (concordia)  15, 16 – Faith (fides)  15, 23 – Fortune (fortuna)  15, 16, 113, 288, 294 – Freedom (libertas) 15 – Health (salus)  15, 24 – Honor (honos) 15 – Hope (spes)  15, 23 – Peace (pax) 15–17 – Victory (victoria)  15, 16 – Uranus 46 – Zeus  31, 33, 36–37, 40, 43, 44, 46–50, 96, 107, 108, 216, 220, 232, 261, 265, 274, 284 Divorce  111, 119, 133 Doubt  6, 31, 73–74, 84–90 Doxology  75, 76, 81 Dream  36, 40, 41, 288, 291, 293, 294 Economics  9, 46, 108, 110, 111–27, 283–96 – debt  80, 82, 121, 286, 287, 292, 293, 296 – employment  241, 243, 246, 250, 252, 286 – extortion  7, 111–27 – investment 293 – labor  7, 52, 56, 96, 97, 98, 112, 118, 284, 286, 287, 289, 291, 294, 295, 296 – money  97, 219, 243, 251, 259, 284, 289, 291, 295, 296 – poverty  96, 97, 98, 102, 103, 105, 116, 209, 251, 271, 281, 292, 293 – property, assets, ‘goods’  7, 46, 51–53, 97, 112, 113, 114, 117, 246, 284, 286, 291, 293, 294, 295, 296 – reciprocal exchange  155, 283, 286, 290, 292, 295, 296 – requisition (angareia) 111–27 – tax  112, 114, 116 – wealth  24, 51, 52, 53, 84, 92, 96, 97, 220, 252, 254, 257, 269, 272, 273, 274, 276, 281, 285–86 Ecstasy  139, 247

Subject Index

Education  8, 73–74, 95, 96, 97, 137, 199–209, 240, 246–47, 257, 269, 275, 278, 279 Egypt  33, 43–45, 54, 55, 64, 65, 112, 116, 135, 143, 145, 148, 151, 152, 153, 165, 188, 190, 191, 254, 257 Ephesus  159, 211, 213, 216, 238 Equality  38, 220, 255, 260, 262, 268, 270, 271, 272–73, 274, 286 Eschatology  18, 27, 64, 71, 74, 82, 83, 98, 111, 195, 196, 200 – afterlife  55, 194, 290, 291, 295 – catabasis 290 – divine trial  5, 27, 58, 60, 61, 65, 71, 194 – Elysian Fields  290, 295 – resurrection  72, 77, 109, 130, 140, 141, 149, 151, 195 – transmigration 260 Ethics, morality  6, 9, 21, 28, 50–53, 60, 61, 67, 69, 71, 87, 89, 90, 91, 96, 98, 99, 110, 124, 129, 130, 139, 171, 231, 234, 241–52, 255, 264, 276, 277, 278 – paraenesis  9, 244–45, 248, 252, 253, 255, 276 – see also s. v. vice, virtue Ethiopia, Cush  7, 45, 129–44 Ethnicity  102, 109–10, 139, 140, 246–48 Ethnography  31, 43–47, 57, 101 Eucharist  140, 141, 201 Eunuch  7, 129–44, 227 Evangelism  22–23, 86, 131, 134, 141, 143, 211, 278 Exile  8, 135, 195, 200, 202, 203, 208, 209, 260, 263 Exodus  65, 188, 189, 190, 207 Expiation 195 Faith (belief, fidelity, trust) – divine 83 – human  6, 15, 33, 47, 54, 56, 61, 62, 69, 71, 73, 74, 84, 85, 86, 87, 89, 90, 106, 110, 112, 130, 135, 141, 143, 144, 154, 156, 164, 165, 166, 170, 171, 181, 186, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 204, 206, 208, 214, 225, 237, 242, 247, 249, 250, 265, 284, 291, 294 – see also s. v. divine beings

367

Family  19, 192, 217, 219, 241, 243, 246, 251 Fate  81, 82, 96, 146, 150, 151, 152, 153, 160, 166, 209, 238, 290, 292 Fear  30, 33, 35, 36, 40, 41, 42, 58, 104, 106, 143, 151, 152, 157, 203, 205, 206, 271, 280 Flesh  72, 75, 109, 189, 225 Forgiveness  188, 193, 194, 196, 207, 208, 293 Fornication  55, 56, 58, 156 Freedom  53, 60, 86, 270 – free persons  20, 243, 244, 246, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 269, 270 – freed persons  42, 55, 115, 221, 242, 243, 252 – of speech  261, 262, 263, 275 Friendship  285, 286, 287, 292 – friend  45, 78, 85, 222, 271, 287, 292 Fulfillment  7, 62, 111, 112, 121, 124, 126, 127, 130, 137, 139, 140, 147, 164, 167 Galilee 172 Gaza  142, 191, 194 Gaze  86, 225, 226, 233–35 Gender  28, 71, 225, 226, 247 – femininity  66–69, 102, 225, 226, 227, 228, 230, 241–52 – masculinity  66–69, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 230, 237, 239, 249 Gentile  27, 28, 61, 75, 79, 81, 82, 84, 86, 99, 106, 108, 109, 110, 130, 140, 141, 142, 143, 151, 153, 157, 164, 165, 166, 169, 177, 178, 187, 191, 193, 195, 234 Geography  19, 46, 132, 134, 138, 140, 142–43 Gift  37, 42, 45, 52, 75, 81, 110, 143, 156, 259, 283–96 Gladiator  223, 236 Glory  17, 20, 27, 44, 63, 65, 67, 73, 76, 145, 152, 157, 166, 213, 273, 274, 290 Gospel  6, 17, 22, 23, 27, 28, 30, 61, 62, 70, 71, 72, 75, 84, 141, 154, 234, 239 – texts see s. v. index of passages Grace  79, 84, 231, 271, 294 Gratitude  27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 36, 38, 42, 55, 56, 57, 63, 64, 67, 78, 192–93, 207,

368

Subject Index

267, 277, 279, 286, 287, 288, 289, 292, 293, 296 Greed  53, 109 Greek  15, 30, 31, 38, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 51, 52, 53, 59, 63, 71, 75, 78, 79, 82, 91, 93, 95, 96, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 107, 135, 200, 209, 212, 213, 215, 220, 245, 246, 247, 248, 249, 251, 252, 262, 269, 271, 273, 284, 288 Groan  233, 234, 239 Gymnasium  39, 216 Hagar 189 Happiness, joy  43, 83, 84, 191, 269, 290, 293, 296 Heart  15, 17, 20, 21, 29, 51, 58, 60, 61–72, 141, 143, 188, 189, 193, 204, 207, 208, 209, 286, 287, 289, 292, 296 ‘Heresy’  7–8, 169–83 – Apotactites 278 – Ebionites 178 – Encratites 278 – Gnosis, Gnosticism  18, 30, 170 – Marcion 278 – Montanism 229 – Nazarenes 178 Hermetica  185, 292 Hermopolis 112 Historiography  30, 43–47, 53, 57, 169, 170, 174 Holiness  71, 139, 151, 152, 153, 157, 164, 165, 181, 193, 203, 204, 206, 207, 208, 292 – Holy Spirit  88, 136, 137, 141, 142, 143, 163, 188, 189 Honey  32, 259 Honor  24, 34, 37, 44, 45, 46, 51, 53, 55, 56, 64, 66, 67, 68, 91, 96, 97, 100, 104, 107, 108, 109, 126, 199, 204, 205, 216–17, 219, 225, 237, 250, 252, 257, 258, 272, 273, 281, 286 Hospitality  101, 113, 115, 116, 220 Humility  87, 100, 206, 207, 208, 209, 271 Impiety  30, 52, 61, 62, 65, 70, 237 Infidelity  56, 69 Injustice  35, 56, 61, 62, 69, 71, 108, 121, 124, 268, 289

Intercession 238 Interpolation  28–29, 43, 44, 101 Intertextuality  214, 233, 234 – see also s. v. allusion, s. v. rhetoric Ishmael 189 Israel  13, 15, 20, 25, 28, 53, 54, 65, 74, 75, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 86, 109, 117, 126, 136, 145, 148, 150, 152, 153, 180, 181, 188, 189, 190, 191, 194, 195, 196, 202 Islam  5, 187, 190, 191 Jerusalem  7, 15, 17, 53, 130, 132, 134, 135, 138, 140, 141, 142, 146, 152, 153, 154, 156, 157, 162, 164, 165, 166, 167, 172, 284 Jew(ish)  6, 7, 8, 24, 25, 28, 29, 31, 54, 56, 58, 59, 61, 71, 75, 77, 79, 81, 84, 86, 113, 116, 119, 125, 126, 138, 139, 143, 158, 164, 165, 169–83, 185–96, 200, 202, 204, 207, 208, 209, 222, 223, 251, 275 – Dead Sea sectarians see s. v. Qumran – Jewish Christians  77, 140, 143, 169–83 – Pharisees  7, 59, 81, 111, 112, 125, 126, 127, 133, 139, 173, 175, 187, 192, 194 – Rabbis  117, 119, 125, 174, 187, 190 – Sabbateans  8, 185–96 – Sadducees 187 – Scribes  7, 111, 112, 125, 126, 127 – Zealots 164 John the Baptist  276 Judah  149, 150, 188 Judaism  28, 53, 98, 138, 143, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 177, 179, 181, 182, 192, 194, 195 – Hellenistic Judaism  7, 28, 53, 58, 59, 67, 78, 81, 82, 130 Judgment – divine  13–15, 24, 73, 76, 78, 82, 87, 163, 193, 194, 201 – human  117, 154, 163, 194, 196, 201, 221, 225, 244, 275, 284 Justice, righteousness – divine attribute  56, 61, 62, 75, 86, 190, 191, 207 – human attribute  15, 75, 85, 101, 111, 126, 127, 154, 166, 188, 189, 190, 191, 203, 204, 208

Subject Index

– principle  13–14, 16, 37, 52, 57, 60, 64, 67, 68, 111, 121, 124, 127, 154, 166 Kabbala  186, 190, 191 Kindness  114, 193, 286 King, emperor – Alexander the Great  232, 265, 272, 273, 280 – Alexander Jannaeus  142 – Antoninus Pius  113, 215, 220, 222, 263 – Attalus I  107 – Augustus  15, 16, 18, 112, 114, 271, 285 – Caligula 53 – Caracalla 236 – Cassander 45 – Claudius  23, 24, 273 – Constantine 22 – Constantius 262 – Cyrus  112, 117 – Domitian  158, 260, 261 – Germanicus  23, 115 – Geta 113 – Gyges 272 – Hadrian  215, 216, 219 – Hannibal  15, 272 – Herod the Great  98 – Herod Agrippa  276 – Herod Antipas  223 – Julian  259, 262, 278 – Julius Caesar  16, 17 – Lucius Verus  254, 266 – Marcus Aurelius  9, 64, 76, 216, 217, 231, 232, 233, 235, 253–82 – Nero  16, 18, 23, 134, 158, 260, 268, 275 – Pharaoh(s) 133 – Philip II  272, 275 – Ptolemy I Soter  45 – Ptolemy IV Philopator  275 – Severus 113 – Tiberius  18, 23, 114, 271, 272 – Trajan  215, 220, 261, 271, 273, 274, 280, 287 – Vespasian  260, 271, 279 Laodicea  159, 166, 218 Law  15, 16, 34, 35, 37, 50, 55, 56, 69, 202, 232 – Athenian  92, 93, 94

369

– ius talionis  111, 120, 121, 127 – lawsuit, trial  121–22, 221 – Roman  111–27, 250, 261, 271 – Torah  7, 28, 29, 61, 62, 71, 85, 98, 110, 111, 112, 117, 119–21, 122, 124, 125, 126, 127, 138–39, 190, 200, 202, 203 Leadership  9, 15 – leaders  92, 96, 125, 126, 141, 153, 159, 160, 205, 206, 207, 208 Levite 188 Love – divine  13, 38, 43, 84, 86, 203, 204 – human  20, 49, 50, 120, 124, 125–26, 203, 204, 206, 207, 225, 242, 251, 259, 293 Lydia  50, 93, 272 Macedonia  17, 19 Madness  261, 280, 281, 282 Magic see s. v. religion Magnesia 211 Marriage  9, 46, 56, 57, 58, 101, 133, 135, 159, 191, 208, 226, 242, 244, 249, 250, 251, 263, 280, 289 Martyrdom  7, 8, 130, 211–240 Medicine  53, 242, 245–50 Mercy  78, 79, 84, 86, 87, 193, 204, 207 Messianism  8, 182, 185–96 Metals – bronze  149, 163, 218 – gold  46, 65, 188, 189, 190, 207 – iron 35 – silver  46, 271 Methodology – form criticism  2, 3, 77–80 – feminist criticism  3 – historical criticism  1–5, passim – postmodernism  3–5, 9–10 – redaction criticism  120, 121 – sociological criticism  283–96 – source criticism  2, 122, 140, 144 – text criticism see s. v. textual variation Milk 242–49 Mind  20, 21, 27, 32, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 55, 60–72, 73, 74, 76, 79, 82, 109, 163, 189, 225, 229, 230, 240, 247 – cognition  35, 41, 54–55, 60, 61, 63, 64, 69, 71, 84, 230, 247

370

Subject Index

– observation  35, 38, 54–55, 61, 225, 257, 279 Modesty  244, 249 Moses  117, 125, 126, 135, 188, 189, 191, 207 Murder  32, 56, 57, 58, 69, 106, 108, 111, 119, 188 Mystery (cult) see s. v. religion Mystery (prophetic) see s. v. prophecy Name  14–15, 25, 32–33, 44, 46, 53, 56, 93, 94, 112–13, 124, 126, 131, 133, 135, 139, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 156, 166, 176–78, 188, 192, 201, 216, 219, 222, 223, 224, 230, 236, 244, 258–62 Nature, natural phenomena  27–72, 242, 245, 247 – air  33, 49, 54, 108, 109, 110, 245, 283 – cloud  37, 38, 41, 147, 148, 149, 151, 273 – comet  35, 38, 41 – earth, land  14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 23, 24, 25, 33–35, 37, 38, 40, 47, 48, 51, 52, 58, 59, 92, 97, 98, 134, 135, 147, 148, 151, 153, 154, 155, 156, 162, 166, 167, 172, 187, 188, 194, 195, 204, 218, 232, 257, 272, 273, 283, 284, 290, 292, 296 – earthquake  20, 39, 42, 145, 152, 157, 166, 216 – eclipse  33, 39 – fire  20, 31, 33, 44, 53, 54, 107, 146, 147, 148, 149, 221, 224, 283 – hail(storm)  38, 41 – heaven(s), sky  20, 27, 33, 35, 38, 39, 41, 42, 45, 51, 54, 61, 62, 67, 81, 83, 108, 109, 111, 145, 146, 147, 149, 151, 152, 154, 157, 163, 166, 167, 193, 194, 224, 232, 233, 234, 257, 265, 273, 283, 284, 289, 296 – hurricane 42 – moon  32, 33, 39, 41, 42, 44, 53, 65, 107, 110, 288 – rain(storm)  34, 35, 38, 41, 259 – rainbow  147, 148 – river  17, 32, 135, 228, 275 – sea  23, 24, 51, 74, 147, 148, 218, 292 – seasons  33, 39, 41, 49, 65, 288 – snow  38, 41 – stars 33, 38–39, 41, 42, 46, 53–55, 65

– storm, tempest  38, 39, 41, 42, 148, 292 – sun  32, 33, 39, 41, 42, 44, 65, 107, 147, 148, 149, 222, 291, 292 – thunder(storm), lightning  20, 33, 35, 37, 38, 41, 42, 107, 147, 163 – wind  34, 41, 49, 54, 85, 275, 276, 292 Oath, vow  18–19, 41–42, 46, 56–58, 111, 112, 113, 147, 222, 234, 236, 237 – Paphlagonian 18–19 Obedience  23, 24, 29, 50, 69, 70, 71, 203, 207, 234, 287, 290 Oracle  15, 25, 36, 38, 62, 103, 135, 164, 201, 209 – Delphi 103 Orthodoxy  7–8, 169–83 Pain  56, 203, 209, 224, 234, 238, 280, 285 Parable  29, 111 Passion(s)  6, 28, 66, 67, 73, 109, 223, 268, 273, 274, 275 Patriarchy 251 – Patriarchs  86, 188, 189 Patronage  9, 45, 254, 278, 283–96 Peace  5, 8, 13–25, 48, 56, 116, 199, 202, 203, 269 – pax Augusta  15–16, 18, 20, 21 – pax deorum 221 – pax Romana 25 Pergamum  107, 158, 159, 160, 165, 218 Pericles  91, 92 Perjury 119 Persecution  7, 90, 106, 130, 145, 158, 159, 165, 188, 189, 192, 238, 239 Persia  102, 103, 112, 118, 123 Philadelphia  156, 159, 164, 165 Philippi  21, 212 Philosophy  4, 6, 10, 20, 28, 31, 36–43, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 53, 54, 55, 57, 58, 78, 82, 89, 90, 95, 231, 232, 240, 241, 242, 250, 253–82, 283 – Cynic  50–51, 257, 262, 276–82 – Epicurean  40–43, 49–50, 53, 257 – Platonic  280, 281 – Pre-Socratic 31–36 – Pythagorean 260 – Neo-Pythagorean  9, 244–45, 249 – Sceptic 277

Subject Index

– Stoic  20, 36–39, 43, 76, 79, 81, 255, 256, 257, 263, 266, 267, 268, 269, 272, 273, 274, 275, 276–77, 280, 283 Physiognomy  215, 225, 227, 230–31, 238 Pleasure  43, 52, 224, 249, 250, 292 Politics  3–5, 13–25, 35–36, 46, 47, 91–99, 106, 123, 134, 186, 187, 216, 221, 226, 238, 254, 255, 267, 274, 276, 281, 285, 286, 287 Praise  21, 65, 75, 76, 77, 79, 83, 84, 91, 199, 220, 225, 251, 261, 262, 263, 264, 271, 275, 281, 282, 287, 288, 292, 296 Presybyter  200, 203, 205, 208, 211 Prophecy  24, 36, 56, 291, 294 – Christian 145–67 – Israelite  14–15, 24–25, 75, 111, 112, 117, 119, 127, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 165, 188, 189, 190, 191, 195, 202 – ‘mystery’  75, 79, 82, 83, 86, 87, 167, 186, 190, 191, 192, 195, 196 Prostitution 93 Providence  130, 136, 137 Prudence (sophrosyne)  245, 248, 249, 250, 251, 252 Punishment  8, 27, 29, 52, 57, 58, 60, 66–71, 85, 96, 109, 115, 199–209, 257, 261, 262, 263, 275 Pythagoras 272 Q (Sayings Source)  120, 122 Qumran, Dead Sea Sect  6, 8, 53, 78, 83, 89, 90, 185–96 Qur’an 5 Redemption  23, 154, 155, 157, 166, 167, 189, 191, 193 Religion  passim – altar  16, 18, 32, 37, 40, 41, 43, 46, 151, 163, 164 – ancestor worship  55–56 – apotheosis  272, 273, 276 – atheism  45, 90, 109, 221, 233, 234–35 – definition 30 – ‘divine man’ (theios aner) 220 – gods see s. v. divine beings – hymn  6, 19–20, 21, 36–37, 40, 47, 48–50, 73–87, 136, 155, 192–93

371

– idolatry  21, 27, 28, 29, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 65, 71, 72, 159, 189, 190, 208 – imperial or royal cult  17–19, 22–23, 43–47, 222, 239, 272 – impiety  52, 55, 56, 58, 61, 62, 65, 66, 67, 68, 70, 237 – magic  30, 53, 55, 132, 140, 185, 288, 290 – mystery cults, initiation  30, 36, 38, 45, 49–50, 54, 55–56, 289–95 – Cybele  139 – Eleusis  48, 52 – Isis  289–95 – Osiris  289–95 – myth  30, 31, 32, 37, 38, 43, 44, 45, 47, 48, 50, 59, 107, 178, 185, 244, 291 – origin of religion  27–72 – piety  25, 30, 31, 33, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 46, 54, 56, 57, 63, 64, 66, 71, 206 – prayer  19, 30, 32, 34, 37, 42, 87, 117, 204, 207, 208, 223, 229, 234, 259, 273, 275, 292 – priest(hood)  17, 30, 44, 45, 46, 55, 122, 138, 155, 188, 189, 195, 216, 219, 275, 288, 290, 293, 294, 295 – ritual, rite  30, 31, 32, 36, 38, 39, 41, 42, 43, 53, 58, 98, 100, 185, 285, 288 – sacrifice  30, 31, 32, 41, 43, 45, 46, 53, 71, 212, 216, 223, 237, 242, 284, 289, 292 – superstition  30, 247 – syncretism  3, 170 – temple, shrine  7, 19, 23, 30, 40, 46, 47, 51, 53, 145–67, 216, 218, 219, 220, 222, 259, 273, 284, 289, 293, 294 – theophany, epiphany  42, 63, 66, 148, 288 – votive offerings  46, 48, 284 – see also s. v. theology Remnant  188, 194 Repentance  29, 154, 157, 160, 166, 193, 203, 207, 208, 234 Retaliation  111, 121, 123, 124, 125, 127 Revelation  27, 28, 30, 49, 60, 61–62, 65, 67, 68, 71, 75, 79, 82, 84, 85, 86, 87, 111, 141, 163, 188, 191, 195, 274, 277 – see also s. v. theophany, s. v. religion

372

Subject Index

Reverence  30, 66, 108, 163, 205, 206, 225, 291 Rhetoric  1, 6, 7, 28, 47–53, 60, 61, 63, 66, 68, 69, 70, 76, 78, 79, 80, 82, 84, 89–110, 122, 123, 124, 125, 129–44, 147, 173, 177, 183, 209, 211, 213, 215, 217, 222, 223, 224, 226, 239, 240, 247, 248, 256, 260, 261, 262, 264, 269, 277, 280, 281, 282 – ambiguity 235 – figure, trope  61, 68, 69, 70, 260–62, 264 – allegory, symbolism  94, 106, 133, 161, 162, 164, 165, 166, 189, 209, 223, 290 – alliteration  61, 70 – allusion  24, 29, 58, 65–66, 78–81, 85, 98, 106, 107, 147, 150, 151, 163, 204, 207, 228, 233, 234, 255, 261–64, 269, 281 – antithesis  61, 119, 120, 121–24, 126 – asyndeton 70 – chiasmus  70, 76–77, 137 – emphasis 261–64 – hendiadys 61 – homoioptoton 70 – homoioteleuton  61, 70 – hyperbole  122, 123, 209, 264 – imagery  24, 89, 148, 163, 264, 274, 292 – inclusio 131 – irony  209, 231, 233, 236, 237, 260, 262, 264, 265, 276, 280, 292 – isegoria 262 – isocolon  61, 70 – metaphor  6, 48, 49, 53, 73, 75, 90, 91, 94, 107–8, 110, 111–27, 133, 160, 185, 209, 259, 264, 273, 274, 275, 276, 280, 281, 290 – parenthesis  7, 145 – paronomasia 52 – parrhesia  262, 263 – pleonasmus  61, 151 – polysyndeton 154 – rhetorical question  76, 78–79, 80, 82–84, 248 – synecdoche 68 – hypothesis 235–37 – paideia see s. v. education

– parts of a speech – confirmatio 60 – narratio  48, 60, 61, 66, 71 – prolalia  48 – prooemium 60 – propositio  49, 60 – progymnasmata 95 – Second Sophistic  8–9, 211–40 – species – deliberative  199, 207, 209, 264 –  advantage (sympheron) 199 –  example (paradeigma)  199, 207 – epideictic  263 –  encomium 91, 222 – invective, polemic  91, 95, 227, 229, 261 – forensic  94, 97, 131, 294 – other types/forms –  advice 241–52 –  consolation 20 – declamation  212, 215, 221, 222, 226, 227, 228, 235, 236–37 – dialogue  9, 193, 253–82 – diatribe  58, 248, 276, 277, 279, 281 –  ex tempore oration  233–35 –  fable 29, 48, 276 – flattery  9, 56, 92, 93, 95, 99, 254, 255 –  florilegium 203 –  homily 28, 186 –  letter see index of passages –  list 112 –  maxim 29, 278 – narrative  5, 7, 8, 30, 43, 44, 47, 48, 52, 53, 57, 59, 60, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 69, 70, 71, 102, 112, 117, 126, 127, 129–44, 145–67, 214, 221, 223, 224, 228, 229, 243, 276, 288, 291 – paradox  207, 230, 267, 293 – satire  9, 95, 253–82 –  slander 8, 89–110 –  witticism 234–35 – topos  20–21, 89, 91, 93, 94, 95, 96, 199, 224, 277 – ‘works’ of the orator – invention  84 – arrangement  48–50, 60, 84 – style  244

Subject Index

– brevity  63, 64, 65, 66, 68, 71, 235, 246 – plain style  9, 244 – delivery  227 – gesture  231–33, 235, 239 Robbery  20, 53, 115, 117, 202 Rome – city  23, 24, 25, 82, 114, 152, 153, 158, 211, 213, 260, 265, 269, 272, 293, 294 – empire  7, 9, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 105, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 118, 126, 158, 186, 216, 221, 225, 226, 229, 238, 241, 243, 244, 251, 253–55, 260, 268, 270, 271, 272, 273, 282, 285 – republic 270 Sabbath  139, 223 Salvation  6, 19, 29, 30, 42, 62, 74, 81, 85, 86, 130, 131, 132, 135, 137, 144, 154, 155, 157, 166, 187, 192, 195, 284 Samaria  134, 140, 153 Sanskrit 243 Sarah 189 Sardis  159, 160, 221 Scribe  111, 125, 127 Scroll 7, 137, 143, 145–67 Scythia  50–53, 99, 102 Self-discipline, control  90, 207, 230, 249, 250, 252 Sexuality  28, 29, 56, 60, 66–69, 70, 71, 93, 109, 226, 227, 247, 248–51, 290 – abstinence, celibacy  249, 250, 251, 252, 290 – coitus  249, 250 Shame  6, 14, 66, 67, 68, 90, 91, 99, 104, 106, 108, 110, 204, 209, 225, 230, 232, 250, 252, 265, 281 Simon Magus  132, 140 Sin  25, 28, 56, 66, 68, 72, 86, 90, 99, 137, 188, 190, 193, 194, 204, 208 Slavery (servant)  53, 56, 92, 93, 94, 97, 99, 102, 115, 117, 122, 205, 220, 223, 226, 242, 243, 246, 247, 250, 251, 252, 254, 261, 269, 270, 271, 278, 286, 287, 289 – manumission 243 – see also s. v. freedom Sleep  36, 49, 244, 245, 249, 250 Smyrna  22, 159, 158, 165, 211–40

373

Sobriety  249, 250, 252 Socrates  214, 262, 282 Sodom  145, 151, 152, 153, 157, 165, 166 Soul  19, 36, 90, 190, 208, 230, 247, 249, 259, 260, 283, 288, 296 Sparta  103, 104, 105 Spirit – divine  22, 74, 79, 90, 98, 136, 137, 141, 142, 143, 163, 188, 189, 212, 283, 284, 291, 295, 296 – human  19, 68, 193, 201, 208 – see also s. v. holiness Temptation  86, 90, 106, 234, 237 Textual variation  22, 89, 149 – nt manuscripts (Greek) – ‫ א‬123 – A  142–43 – D  123 – Δ  123 – nt versions – Old Latin  123 – Syriac  123 – Vulgate  123 – in 1 Clem. 204 – in Mart. Pol.  229, 237 – in Dio, Or. 12  49 Theater  97, 227, 228 – comedy  91, 92, 93, 94, 97, 98, 232, 263, 264, 279 – tragedy 232 Theft  20, 56 Theology  15, 16, 17, 20, 22, 24, 28, 30, 31, 37, 40, 43, 45, 47, 49, 50, 53, 78, 81, 83, 103, 106, 120, 132, 135, 139, 142, 169, 170, 171, 178, 179, 186, 189, 192, 195, 218, 237, 272 – theologia tripertita 50 Thessalonica 31 Thrace  94, 244 Thyatira  159, 160, 165, 166 Torture  223, 234 Tralles 211 Transportation  7, 112, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 137, 227, 230 Treason  261, 266

374

Subject Index

Truth  3, 9, 10, 13, 14, 28, 29, 30, 35, 43, 47, 49, 59, 61, 62, 66, 67, 68, 84, 195, 225, 247, 262, 270, 275 Tyranny  70, 108, 225, 253, 257, 258, 263, 274, 275 Universalism  24, 28, 40, 49, 58, 60, 61, 64, 66, 71, 102, 104, 130, 132, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 144, 195–96 Vice, immorality  29, 47, 52–53, 54–58, 60–72, 97, 98, 99, 247, 252, 253, 276, 279 Violence  38, 42, 98, 116, 121, 122, 125, 194, 262 Virtue  15, 16, 23, 27, 60, 70, 71, 99, 105, 224, 242, 249, 251, 252, 265, 270, 271, 272, 273, 274, 277, 278 Warfare, military  15, 16, 20, 39, 44, 52, 56, 89–110, 111, 112, 114, 115, 116, 118, 133, 146, 158 – archer  96, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108 – armor  100, 101, 103, 106, 242 – army  103, 113, 116, 269

– arrow  89, 90, 100, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107 – battle  16, 60, 91, 93, 99, 100, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 146, 221, 228, 236 – catapult  105, 106, 107 – cavalry 102 – crossbow  105, 106 – hoplite  100, 102, 103, 104, 108 – infantry  101, 102, 103, 106 – javelin 102 – legion  18, 104, 114, 116, 287 – phalanx 102 – shield  89, 90, 93, 99, 100, 103, 106, 108, 110 – soldier  61, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 123, 136, 226 – spear  100, 102, 103, 106 – sword  14, 15, 99, 117, 188, 221 – warrior  91, 100, 101, 102, 104, 146 Wet-nurse  9, 241–52 Wine 245 Wisdom  36, 73, 74, 75, 76, 83, 84, 207, 229, 264 – literature  31, 53–57, 58, 64, 78, 79, 81, 82, 83, 84, 86, 87, 200, 209