Religio-Philosophical Discourses in the Mediterranean World: From Plato, through Jesus, to Late Antiquity

428 Pages·2017·2.4 MB·English

by  Anders Klostergaard Petersen

Religio-PhilosophicalDiscoursesintheMediterraneanWorld
Ancient Philosophy & Religion
Editedby
GeorgeBoys-Stones(UniversityofDurham)
GeorgevanKooten(UniversityofGroningen)
AdvisoryBoard
GáborBetegh(Cambridge)
TroelsEngberg-Pedersen(Copenhagen)
ReinhardFeldmeier(Göttingen)
JensHalfwassen(Heidelberg)
MatyášHavrda(Prague)
PhilippeHoffmann(ÉcolePratiquedesHautesÉtudes,Paris)
GeorgeKaramanolis(Vienna)
AndersKlostergaardPetersen(Aarhus)
DavidKonstan(NewYorkUniversity)
WinrichLöhr(Heidelberg)
JohnMagee(Toronto)
MarenNiehoff(HebrewUniversityofJerusalem)
IlariaRamelli(Milan)
GretchenReydams-Schils(NotreDame,USA)
LautaroRoigLanzillotta(Groningen)
GregoryE.Sterling(Yale)
IlincaTanaseanu-Döbler(Göttingen)
ShaulTor(King’sCollegeLondon)
RobbertvandenBerg(Leiden)
PeterVanNuffelen(Ghent)
Volume1
Thetitlespublishedinthisseriesarelistedatbrill.com/aphr
Religio-Philosophical Discourses
in the Mediterranean World
FromPlato,throughJesus,toLateAntiquity
Editedby
AndersKlostergaardPetersen
GeorgevanKooten
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Contents
NotesonContributors vii
Introduction:TheReligionandPhilosophyDebateinaNewKey 1
Part1
Plato
Plato’sPhilosophy–WhyNotJustPlatonicReligion? 9
AndersKlostergaardPetersen
PlatonicPiety:‘PuttingHumptyDumptyTogetherAgain’ 37
FrisbeeSheffield
TheRealEuthyphroProblem,Solved 63
NicholasDenyer
Religion,Philosophy,andtheDemonsinBetween 73
LarsAlbinus
Part2
ExplorationsinanEmergingCommonDiscourse
PhilosophicalTracesintheSibyllineOracles 103
HelenVanNoorden
PhilosophyandReligionandTheirInteractionsin4Maccabees 126
AndersKlostergaardPetersen
TheRapprochementofReligionandPhilosophyinAncientConsolation:
Seneca,Paul,andBeyond 159
ChristophJedan
vi Contents
Part3
PlacingJesusamongthePhilosophers
JesusamongthePhilosophers:TheCynicConnectionExploredand
Affirmed,withaNoteonPhilo’sJewish-CynicPhilosophy 187
BernhardLang
TheLastDaysofSocratesandChrist:Euthyphro,Apology,Crito,and
PhaedoReadinCounterpointwithJohn’sGospel 219
GeorgevanKooten
CriticismofVerbosityinAncientPhilosophicalandEarlyChristian
Writings:Jesus’Critiqueofthe‘Polylogia’ofPaganPrayers(Matthew6:7)
initsGraeco-RomanContext 244
DanielePevarello
Part4
ReconsideringEarlyPagan-ChristianRelations
ChristiansAccordingtoSecond-CenturyPhilosophers 279
SimonGathercole
Epictetus’ViewsonChristians:AClosedCaseRevisited 306
NikoHuttunen
Plotinus,Origenes,andAmmoniusonthe‘King’ 323
HaroldTarrant
Neo-PlatonicReadingsofEmbodiedDivinePresence:Iamblichusand
Julian 338
IlincaTanaseanu-Döbler
IndexofAncientSources 375
IndexofModernAuthors 396
IndexofSubjects 398
Notes on Contributors
LarsAlbinus
AssociateProfessorof Philosophyof Religion,Schoolof CultureandSociety,
DepartmentoftheStudyofReligion,UniversityofAarhus
NicholasDenyer
Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Classics and Fellow and Senior Lecturer in
PhilosophyatTrinityCollege,UniversityofCambridge
SimonGathercole
Reader in New Testament Studies in the Faculty of Divinity and Fellow at
FitzwilliamCollege,UniversityofCambridge
NikoHuttunen
Research Fellow in Early Christianity, Faculty of Theology, University of
Helsinki
ChristophJedan
ProfessorofPhilosophyofReligion&Ethics,FacultyofTheologyandReligious
Studies,UniversityofGroningen
AndersKlostergaardPetersen
Professor in Early Christianity and Judaism, School of Culture and Society,
DepartmentfortheStudyofReligion,UniversityofAarhus
BernhardLang
ProfessorEmeritusofOldTestamentStudies,PaderbornUniversity
DanielePevarello
AssistantProfessorinEarlyChristianity,Departmentof ReligionsandTheol-
ogy,TrinityCollege,Dublin
FrisbeeSheffield
College Lecturer in Philosophy and Bye-Fellow, Girton College, University of
Cambridge
viii NotesonContributors
IlincaTanaseanu-Döbler
ProfessorfortheStudyof Religion,Facultyof Philosophy,Georg-AugustUni-
versity,Göttingen
HaroldTarrant
ProfessorEmeritusinClassics,UniversityofNewcastle,Australia
GeorgevanKooten
ProfessorofNewTestament&EarlyChristianity,FacultyofTheologyandRe-
ligiousStudies,UniversityofGroningen
HelenVanNoorden
Lecturer in Classics and Wrigley Fellow, Girton College, University of Cam-
bridge
Introduction:The Religion and Philosophy Debate
in a New Key
AndersKlostergaardPetersenandGeorgevanKooten
In recent years we have witnessed an increased interest in the relationship
between philosophy and religion in early Christianity, not least with regard
to the presence of philosophical notions and ideas in the texts of the New
Testament.1Fromaroundtheturnofthethirdmillennium,classicistsandhis-
torians of ancient philosophy have likewise begun to focus on the topic of
religion in the context of ancient philosophy.2 In some ways the interest of
NewTestamentscholarsinancientGraeco-Romanphilosophyanditspoten-
tial influence on early Christian texts was a resumption of an older German
tradition,datingbacktothebeginningofthetwentiethcentury,exploringthe
interactionsbetweenphilosophyandreligionrelatingtotheformationofearly
Christianity.Thismovementpartlygrewoutof dissatisfactionwithvonHar-
nack’s exemption of early Christianity from its Graeco-Roman setting, as he
believedthatearlyChristianitywasonlyeventually–andwithnegativeimpli-
cations–forcedtoembracethisculturalcontext.Atthesametime,thisinter-
estwasalsoforgedasareactionagainsttheHistoryofReligionsSchoolandits
declaredinterestinthe‘mumbo-jumbo’religionof theilliteratemasses.This
movement,however,waseclipsedbythestrong,persistentpenchantforthink-
ing of philosophy and religion in dichotomous terms. Bultmann, a student
of Wilhelm Heitmüller, a leading representative of the History of Religions
1 See,forinstance,theinfluentialworksbyAbrahamJ.Malherbe:TheCynicEpistles:AStudy
Edition (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1977); Moral Exhortation: A Graeco-Roman Source-
book(LibraryofEarlyChristianity4;Philadelphia,PA:WestminsterPress,1987);“Hellenis-
ticMoralistsandtheNewTestament,”inAufstiegundNiedergangderrömischenWeltII.26.1
(ed. HumbertoTemporini; NewYork/Berlin: De Gruyter, 1992), 267–333; Stanley K. Stow-
ers,ARereadingofRomans:Justice,JewsandGentiles(Cambridge,MA:YaleUniversityPress,
1995);andthevariousbooksbyTroelsEngberg-Pedersen,notablyhisCosmologyandSelfin
theApostlePaul:TheMaterialSpirit (Oxford:OxfordUniversityPress,2010)andJohnand
Philosophy:ANewReadingoftheFourthGospel(OUP,2017).
2 MarkL.McPherran,TheReligionofSocrates(UniversityPark,PA:PennsylvaniaStateUniver-
sityPress,1996);DavidSedley,“TheIdealofGodlikeness,”inPlato2.Ethics,Politics,Religion,
andtheSoul(ed.GailFine;OxfordReadingsinPhilosophy;Oxford:OxfordUniversityPress,
1999),309–28.
© KoninklijkeBrillNV,Leiden,2017 | DOI10.1163/9789004323131_002
2 Introduction
School, similarly repudiated philosophical influence on early Christianity by
turningtognosticmaterialinordertoreconstructthereligiousbasisofforma-
tiveChristianity–inBultmann’sunderstanding,Gnosticismwasamovement
entirelyindependentof theGraeco-Romanworldingeneralandphilosophy
inparticular.
Inthe1970sthingsbegantochangeintwodirections.In1967MartinHen-
gelpublishedthefirstGermaneditionofJudaismandHellenism,butitwasnot
untiltheappearanceof theEnglishtranslationin1974thathismainthesisof
earlyJudaism’scomprehensiveandprofoundengagementwiththeHellenistic
worldcametoexertconsiderableinfluence(London:SCMPress).Subsequent
to this book, nobody could ignore Graeco-Roman philosophy as a source of
influence on Jewish and, thereby, also early Christian thought. At the same
time, in the field of classics, John Dillon for the first time drew up the pre-
suppositionsof apotentiallycontextualstudyof theNewTestamentwithhis
sketch of the history and development of Middle Platonism.3 Slightly later,
MarkMcPherranturnedtothereligiousnatureof SocraticandPlatonicphi-
losophyoverandagainstasceptical,profoundlyaporeticandirreligiouspor-
trayalofSocrates,representedamongothersbytheinfluentialGregoryVlastos.
DavidSedleyinhisturnrediscoveredtheessenceof Plato’sethicsasbeingof
apartlyreligiousnatureinitsorientationtowardsgodlikeness.
These two independent scholarly trajectories, however, have never fully
converged. For that reason we decided to organise two colloquia in order to
bringscholarsfromthefieldsconcerned(NewTestamentscholars,classicists,
and historians of ancient philosophy) together in order to examine the po-
tentialforengagingindialogueabouttheintertwinementof ancientGraeco-
Romanphilosophyandreligion(hereconfinedtoGraeco-Roman,Jewish,and
Christianreligion).Thesuccessof suchaconvergencecaneasilybehindered
by a retrojection of anachronistic, purportedly Enlightenment bifurcations,
suchasrationalityvs.irrationality,reasonvs.faith,knowledgevs.revelation,
or even within religion between religion proper (that is, reasoned religion)
and magic, etc. These antitheses are upheld by both theologians and schol-
arsof thehumanitiesaswellasinpopularthought.Theformeroftenwishto
maintain the distinctiveness of their religion and tread the footsteps of the
anti-intellectualist Tertullian, who accentuated the incompatibility between
AthensandJerusalem,philosophyandreligionbyfamouslyexclaiming,“What
hasAthenstodoJerusalem?”Thelatterfrequentlymirrorphilosophers’repug-
3 TheMiddlePlatonists:80B.C.toA.D.220 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1977; 2nd,
revisededition1996).