Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in Early Christian Polemics (143 page)

49.
See den Boeft and Bremmer in note 39.

50.
Musurillo,
Acts of the Christian Martyrs
. He includes twenty-eight of the accounts that he considers “the most reliable” or at least “extremely important and instructive”; p. xii.

51.
Pre-Decian Acts
. Bisbee’s approach involves ascertaining whether some kind of (actual) historical commentarius lies behind each of the respective Acts.

52.
There have occasionally been scholars who have wanted to claim that the famous persecution in Lyons and Vienne in the days of Marcus Aurelius was made up by an imaginative Christian author out of whole cloth. See, for example, James Westfall Thompson, “The Alleged Persecution of the Christians at Lyons in 177,”
AJT
16 (1912): 359–84. The article was savaged by Harnack,
TLZ
3 (1913): 74–77; and M. Paul Allard,
Revue des questions historiques
(1913): 53–67. Thompson attempted a lengthy and rather defensive response in
AJT
17 (1913), 249–58. I will not provide an analysis here because, even though the account contains first-person narrative, it is not clear to me that this is an authorial ploy. Winrich Löhr, “Der Brief der Gemeinden von Lyon und Vienne (Eusebius, h.e. V, 1–2(4)),”
Oecumenica et patristica
, 1989, pp. 135–149, argues that the letter was not forged, but that it does contain literary elements to combine fact with fiction, in particular in an attempt to theologize the conflict as one between God and Satan, to stress the opposition to Montanism, and to create literary tension and drama and to highlight the character of those martyred, over against those who caved in.

53.
“On the Origin of the Soul,” 1.12. Translation of Peter Holmes and Robert E. Wallis,
NPNF
, first series, vol. 5.

54.
See, recently, J. N. Bremmer, “Perpetua and Her Diary: Authenticity, Family, and Visions,” in W. Ameling, ed.,
Märtyrer und Märtyrerakten
(Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2002), pp. 77–120.

55.
Thomas J. Heffernan, “Philology and Authorship in the
Passio Sanctorum Perpetuae et Felicitatis,” Traditio
50 (1995): 315–25.

56.
Ibid., p. 320.

57.
Ibid., p. 322.

58.
See, for example, Ross Kraemer and Shira L. Lander, “Perpetua and Felicitas,” in Philip Esler, ed.,
The Early Christian World
, vol. 2, Routledge Worlds Series (London: Taylor & Francis, 2000), pp. 1048–65, who assert that there are “myriad” problems in the account, although they mention only a few. In particular, they note that the only contemporaneous evidence for Perpetua outside the Passio is Tertullian, who mentions her in passing and without referring to either a text or a commemoration; it is not, in fact, until the fourth century that text and commemoration are secured, starting with the liturgical Calendar of Rome in 354 and the comments of Augustine. Most striking are the parallels evidenced between the specifics of the Passio and the “prophecy” of Joel 2:28–29 (cf. Acts 2:17–18), where sons and daughters are said to prophesy, the spirit is poured out, the young see visions, and the old dream dreams.

59.
Musurillo,
Christian Martyrs
, p. xxix. For a recent study, which deals with some of the problems of the eyewitness claims and the possibility that the account preserves some historical information, see E. Leigh Gibson, “Jewish Antagonism or Christian Polemic: The Case of the Martyrdom of Pionius,”
JECS
9 (2001) 339–58.

60.
Translation taken from Musurillo,
Christian Martyrs
.

61.
Ibid., xxxv.

62.
Translations taken from ibid.

63.
Thus ibid., p. xxxv.

64.
Apostolic Fathers
, 2.2, 383–90.

65.
As admitted by Bisbee,
Pre-Decian Acts
, pp. 146–49.

66.
For these arguments, see Lightfoot and Bisbee, as cited in notes 64 and 41.

67.
Translation taken from Bisbee,
Pre-Decian Acts
.

68.
Translation of John J. Collins, “Sybilline Oracles,” in James H. Charlesworth, ed.,
OTP
, vol. 1 (New York: Doubleday, 1983).

69.
See John J. Collins, “The Development of the Sibylline Tradition,”
ANRW
II.20.1 (1987): 421–59 and esp. H. W. Parke,
Sibyls and Sibylline Prophecy
, on which the following précis depends.

70.
The textual tradition is complex. For this and all other “introduction” issues involving dating, redaction, and structure, see Collins, “Development.”

71.
“Sibylline Oracles,” p. 332.

72.
Komposition und Entstehungszeit der Oracula Sibyllina
(Leipzig, J. C. Hinrichs, 190), pp. 38–46.

73.
Collins, pp. 315–16.

74.
Sodom represents Jerusalem in Rev. 11:8.

75.
Collins, “Sibylline Oracles,” pp. 408–9.

76.
John G. Gager, “Some Attempts to Label the Oracula Sibyllina Book 7,”
HTR
65 (1972): 91–97.

77.
See pp. 34–35.

78.
Translation of M. Dods,
ANF
, vol. 2.

79.
Translation of E. H. Blakeney,
Firmiani Lactantii Epitome Institutionum Divinarum/Lactantius’ Epitome of the Divine Institutes
(London: SPCK, 1950), 123.

80.
Translation of Collins, “Sybilline Oracles,” p. 322.

81.
Translation of Henry Bettenson,
St Augustine, Concerning the City of God Against the Pagans
(Pengain Books, 1972), 788–89. All subsequent quotations of this work will come from this edition.

82.
Bard Thompson, “Patristic Use of the Sibylline Oracles,”
RR
16 (1952): 115–36.

83.
Translation of H. Chadwick,
Contra Celsum
, p. 440.

84.
Translation of William Fletcher in
ANF
, vol. 7.

85.
On the authenticity of the speech, see Hal Drake,
Constantine and the Bishops: The Politics of Intolerance
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002), p. 293:

Its authenticity questioned during an earlier period of hypercriticism (during which scholars freely dismissed whole passages for not conforming to what their science told them the emperor should have said), it then became cautiously admitted as a representative piece of fourth-century propaganda, though still held unlikely to be Constantine’s own. Recent scholars have been more willing to concede authenticity, although the enthusiastic identification of parallels in other writers such as Lactantius was beginning to sound like yet another search for alternative authors until T. D. Barnes came to the sensible conclusion that words delivered by the emperor, no matter who wrote them, could safely be considered to be the emperor’s own.

I owe this reference to Maria Doerfler.

86.
Translation of Ernest C. Richardson,
NPNF
, Second Series, vol. 1.

87.
For other examples, including Diocletian’s appeal to the oracle of Didyma (Eusebius,
de vita Const
. 2.50–51; Lactantius,
De mort. pers
., 11.7), see Speyer,
Literarische Fälschung
, pp. 250–51.

88.
Translation of Thomas Halton,
Saint Jerome: On Illustrious Men
(FC 100; Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1999), pp. 20–22.

89.
Translation mine.

90.
Alfons Fürst et al.,
Der apokryphe Briefwechsel zwischen Seneca und Paulus
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006), pp. 6–7.

91.
A more precise date was unsuccessfully attempted by Édmond Liénard, who notes that there are many parallels between the correspondence and the letters of the Roman senator Quintus Aurelius Symmachus (345–402
CE)
. Liénard argues, then, that the letters were written just a few years before Jerome attests to their existence. “Sur la Correspondance Apocryphe de Sénèque et de Saint-Paul,”
RBPH
11 (1932): 5–23. Fürst has demonstrated the problem with this line of argumentation: the letters, in fact, have numerous points of contact and parallels with a good number of other fourth-century letter writers as well, and simply conform in many ways to the rhetorical conventions of the time (
Der apocryphe Briefwechsel
, pp. 7–8).

92.
See Lightfoot,
Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians
2nd ed. (London: Macmillan, 1869), pp. 268–331.

93.
Translations taken from Elliott,
Apocryphal New Testament
.

94.
There exists some evidence that highly trained pagan authors generally considered Paul’s letters a bit barbaric. See Zahn,
Geschichte
2, 2, 620–21; Harnack
Geschichte
, 1, 763–65; E. Bickel,
Lehrbuch der Geschichte der römischen Literatur
2nd ed. (Heidelberg: C. Winter, 1961), 15.226–27.

95.
Thus, most recently, Pervo,
The Making of Paul
, p. 112.

96.
“His epistolis non video quid fingi possit frigidius aut ineptius,”
Epistola
2092.

97.
“Jamais plus maladroit faussaire n’a fait plus sottement parler d’aussi grands esprits.” G. Boissier, “Le Christianisme de Sénèque,”
Revue des deux mondes
92 (1871): 43. I owe this reference to my student Pablo Molina.

98.
“Die auffällige Eigenheit des Briefwechsels zwischen Seneca und Paulus ist die, dass es in ihm offenbar gar nicht um Inhalte geht, sondern um die Namen der Korrespondenten und nur um diese”; Fürst,
Der apokryphe Briefwechsel
, p. 11.

99.
L. D. Reynolds and H. G. Wilson,
Scribes and Scholars
(Oxford: Clarendon, 1991), 142.

100.
“et tamen quisquis fuit auctor, hoc egit ut nobis persuaderet Senecam fuisse Christianum.”

101.
Philippians
, p. 271.

102.
See Ilaria Ramelli, “L’epistolario apocrifo Seneca-san Paolo: alcune osservazioni,”
VetChr
34 (1997): 299–310.

103.
Adolf von Harnack,
Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius
, vol. 1 (Lepizig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1893), p. 765; see also Theodore Zahn,
Geschichte des neutestamentlichen Kanons
II/2 (Leipzig: A. Deichert, 1892), p. 621.

104.
Fürst,
Der apokryphe Briefwechsel
, p. 17.

105.
Claude Barlow,
Epistolae Senecae ad Paulum et Pauli ad Senecam (quae vocantur
) (Horn, Austria: F. Berger, 1938).

106.
“Der Brief des Hohenpriesters Annas an den Philosophen Seneca—eine jüdisch-apologetische Missionsschrift (Viertes Jahrhundert?),” in
Anecdota Novissima: Texte des vierten bis sechzehnten Jahrhunderts
. (Stuttgart: Anton Hiersemann, 1984), pp. 1–9.

107.
“Da nicht auszuschließen ist, daß entweder dem christlichen Verfasser der Seneca-Paulus-Briefe die Annas-Epistel oder dem jüdischen Autor jene fiktive Korrespondenz bekannt war, kann eine der beiden Fiktionen ein Gegenzug gegen den Versuch der anderen Seite sein, den Philosophen in Verbindung mit einem Repräsentanten ihrers Glaubens erscheinen zu lassen. Wägt man den Inhalt ab, so dürfte die Priorität bei dem Annas-Brief liegen, was für seine Entstehung im IV. Jahrhundert sprechen würde”; P. 5.

108.
Wolfgang Wischmeyer, “Die Epistula Anne ad Senecam: Eine jüdische Missionsschrift des lateinischen Bereichs,” in
Juden und Christen in der Antike
, ed. J. Van Amersfoort and J. van Oort (Kampen: Kok, 1990), pp. 72–93; Arnaldo Momigliano, “The New Letter by ‘Anna’ to ‘Seneca’”
Athenaeum
n.s. 63.1–2 (1985): 217–19. For Momigliano, the author of the letter was indeed a Jew. But, he points out, even though the incipit mentions Seneca, the letter itself is addressed to fratres. The name Seneca is therefore a “secondary interpolation” possibly made by a Jewish editor; the edited form of the letter then became the incentive for a somewhat later Christian writer to forge the correspondence of Paul and Seneca.

109.
A. Hilhorst notes that there are some Jewish inscriptions in Latin that survive, but they almost never demonstrate any literary pretensions. “The
Epistola Anne ad Senecam:
Jewish or Christian?” in G. J. M. Bartelink et al., ed.,
Eulogia
. Festschrift A. A. R. Bastiansen (Steenbrugge: Abbatia S. Petri, 1991), pp. 147–61.

110.
P. 161. It should be noted that this argument could be circumvented if it were shown that the letter is a Latin translation of a Greek original; but there appears to be no evidence that this is the case.

111.
Die sogenannte ‘Epistula Anne ad Senecam
’ (Torun: Wydawn, Uniwersytetu Mikolaja Kopernika, 2001).

112.
On his style, see note 94 above.

113.
Stefan Krauter, “Was ist ‘schlechte’ Pseudepigraphie? Mittel, Wirkung und Intention von Pseudepigraphie in den Epistolae Senecae ad Paulum et Pauli ad Senecam,” in Jörg Frey et al., eds.,
Pseudepigraphie und Verfasserfiktion
, pp. 765–85

114.
Der Text ist gebastelt aus Konventionen und Phrasen, wie sie in der spätantiken Epistolographie gang und gäbe sind. Mit diesen schlichten Mitteln, garniert mit einigen famosen Einfällen, erzeugt der Autor den einzigen Eindruck, der offenbar vermittelt werden soll, dass nämlich Seneca und Paulus Freunde gewesen sein sollen.... Die Briefe wollen nichts weiter, als mittels der gewählten Gattung demonstrieren, dass Seneca und Paulus miteinander Kontakt hatten”;
Der apocryphe Briefwechsel
, pp. 3, 12.

115.
See p. 523 above.

I
have come to the end of my study and can now summarize my findings in a few words. I will then conclude by examining the one major issue I have not yet addressed at any length. Throughout the study we have seen that forgery was widely considered a form of literary deceit. But we have not considered the ethics of the practice. In the early Christian tradition, were there circumstances in which literary deceit may have been considered acceptable? That is to say, how would forgery have been evaluated in early Christianity as a moral, or immoral, practice?