Against the Christians

Patristic Studies

Gerald Bray
General Editor

Vol. 1

PETER LANG
New York • Washington, D.C./Baltimore • Boston • Bern
Frankfurt am Main • Berlin • Brussels • Vienna • Canterbury
 Jeffrey W. Hargis

Against the Christians

The Rise of Early

Anti-Christian Polemic

PETERUNG
New York • Washington, D.C./Baltimorc • Boston • Bern
Frankfurt am Main • Berlin • Brussels • Vienna • Canterbury
 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hargis, Jeffrey W.
Against the Christians: the rise
of early anti-Christian polemic I Jeffrey W. Hargis.
p. em.- (Patristic studies; vol. 1)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Christianity-Controversial literature. 2. Philosophy, Ancient. 3. Rome-
Religion. 4. Christianity and other religions-Roman. 5. Church
history-Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600. I. Title. II. Series:
Patristic studies (Peter Lang Publishing); vol. 1.
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Hargis, Jeffrey W.:
Against the Christians: the rise
of early anti-christian polemic I Jeffrey W. Hargis.
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 To Gerard S. Sloyan

Teacher, Mentor, Friend

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 Acknowledgments

For making this work possible, I extend gratitude and honor first to
Merilyn, my wife. Her love, support and confidence in me were
invaluable and cannot be adequately acknowledged.
Many thanks are also due to my instructors at Temple Univer-
sity, whose encouragement and direction made this project a reality.
Special thanks go to Dr. Gerard Sloyan, without whose wisdom and
practical assistance this book would not have been written. Thanks
to Dr. Vasiliki Limberis for reminding me that ancient texts were not
written in a historical or cultural vacuum and for encouraging the
creative aspect of historical study. Dr. Robert Wright's practical in-
struction in the "how to" of scholarship was invaluable, as were his
extraordinarily high standards for precision in both thinking and
writing.
Acknowledgment and thanks go to my friend and colleague,
Dr. M. James Sawyer of Western Seminary, whose many valuable
contributions to the writing of this book go far beyond his thorough
review of the manuscript.

Quotations from Against the Galileans are reprinted by permis-

sion of the publishers and the Loeb Classical Library from JULIAN:
VOLUME III translated by W.C. Wright, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1923.
Quotations from City of God are reproduced by permission of
Penguin Books Ltd. from Augustine, City of God, pp. 421, 886-888,
translated by Henry Bettenson, Penguin Classics, London, 1972.
Translation copyright© Henry Bettenson, 1972; introduction copy-
right© John O'Meara, 1984.
Quotations from Contra Celsum are reprinted by permission of
Cambridge University Press from Origen: Contra Celsum, translated
by Henry Chadwick, Cambridge University Press, 1953.
This page intentionally left blank
 Table of Contents

1 Defining the Christian "Other": From Persecution

to Polemic 1

2 Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 17

3 Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 41

4 Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 63

5 Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 91

6 Julian and the Bounded God 107

7 Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide 129

Notes 139

Select Bibliography 155

Index 167
This page intentionally left blank
 1

Defining the Christian "Other":

From Persecution to Polemic

The fact that Christianity emerged within the cultural milieu of Ro-
man Hellenism is no longer a matter of debate in the scholarship of
early Christianity or of late antiquity. Gone are the days in which
scholars viewed the advance of Christianity as a fledgling faith wres-
tling its way into power from the outside, replacing in the process a
dying Hellenism or a corrupt paganism while introducing a radi-
cally new world view into the Mediterranean basin. Instead, a set of
continuities is now assumed in the study of early Christianity, con-
tinuity both with Judaism (particularly in the realm of New
Testament studies) and with Grceco-Roman culture. The patristic
conception of Christians as a "third race," distinct from both Jews
and pagans, has been effectively replaced by the consensus that
Christianity evolved more naturally from its Jewish and Hellenistic
ancestry, a domestic model rather than a religious import. The even-
tual triumph of Christianity was at least partially a result of, not
simply an alternative to, developments occurring within pagan cul-
ture and religion from the first to the fourth centuries CE. The growth
of the church and the Christianization of the Roman Empire did not
constitute a foreign invasion, but rather the emergence of a natu-
rally-born child to maturity.
The implications of this emergence are still being worked out.
One of the earlier aspects of Christianity to be identified as a child of
Hellenism was its conscious (and sometimes not-so-conscious) adop-
tion of Platonist philosophical categories; one of the more recent, its
adoption of Grceco-Roman rhetoric. By introducing sociological
methodologies unfamiliar to most scholars of early Christianity,
Rodney Starkl has added a new dimension to the project. Explain-
ing the rise of Christianity has become a project approached with
renewed vigor at the close of the twentieth century.
One of the relatively unexplored regions relating to this project
2 Against the Christians

consists of the corpus of early anti-Christian literature. This corpus

includes the polemic writings of an otherwise unknown author
named Celsus in the late second or early third century CE, of the
Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry in about 270, and of the last pa-
gan emperor Julian in 362-363. As scholars seek to document the
gestation of Christianity within its Grreco-Roman womb, this litera-
ture presents a special set of problems. The anti-Christian treatises,
like virtually all polemic literature, sought to accentuate the differ-
ences between the polemicists and their opponents while minimizing
the similarities. Of course, it is in the very nature of polemic inter-
change that the differences between opposing sides become
exaggerated and their similarities downplayed. Just listen to the
rhetoric of any ideologically-conscious candidate for office, for ex-
ample, or read the fund-raising literature of political organizations
attempting to frighten their constituencies with the specter of a right-
or left-wing takeover. The genre of polemic emphasizes and often
exaggerates difference, sometimes to humorous extremes. However,
the boundaries between pagan and Christian were not always as
clear as the polemicists portrayed them. The boundaries could be
manipulated by either side according to the needs of the rhetorical
moment. This fact offers opportunities as well as obstacles to the
scholar investigating the relationship between the Christian child
and its pagan parent.
At the same time, it must be noted that the pagan literature is
not uniform in its emphasis on difference. This observation assists
us somewhat in tracing the development of the polemicists' rhetori-
cal strategies over time. As we will see, the rhetoric of difference in
Celsus' True Doctrine is particularly exaggerated, a fact lost on many
interpreters who seek to reconstruct the church of the late second
century by way of Celsus' polemic. In contrast, the anti-Christian
works of Porphyry and Julian actually display a conscious accep-
tance of some elements of Christianity, even as they use these very
elements in a strategy of attack and not as points to be conceded to
their opponents. The specifics of this strategy will be observed as
we proceed; suffice it to say for now that in each polemic work, even
that of Celsus, there are identifiable congruences between pagan and
Christian thought. These congruences undermine the rhetoric of
difference that is otherwise intrinsic to the genre; thus even the type
of literature that most demanded a rhetoric of radical difference could
Defining the Christian "Other" 3

not maintain such a rhetoric completely. This fact should alert us to

investigate more seriously the religious, cultural and intellectual
proximity of the Christian and pagan universes.
To be sure, this proximity is more clearly visible from the Chris-
tian side; Christian apologists had a greater stake in a rhetoric of
similarity than did their pagan opponents. A common apologetic
strategy, to which Tatian and Tertullian were prominent exceptions,
was to downplay at many points the differences between their own
beliefs and those of their persecutors. The tendency since Justin for
Christians to claim Plato as their philosophical ancestor was only
one of the more well-known apologetic tactics. At times it was also
advantageous to present Christ as similar to pagan gods and heroes
in order to present him as a reasonable object of worship. Naturally,
the apologists spelled out the unique aspects of their faith with de-
termination even as they condemned polytheism. Often, however,
Christian writers found it in their interest to emphasize similarity
with the surrounding culture and with pagan religion, especially
when they were under the threat of persecution.
The pagan polemicists had no such interest. For them the attri-
bution of "otherness" was standard practice; Celsus' work, for
example, exaggerates Christian difference to such a degree that his
critique provides at times only a caricature of his opponents. But
although the construction of rhetorical boundaries between Chris-
tianity and paganism was a vital element in the anti-Christian literary
project, the three polemicists did not always use the same building
materials. Thus it is interesting to see Porphyry and Julian, in con-
trast to Celsus, occasionally adopting and signaling agreement with
specific elements of Christian belief. This characteristic, out of place
as it appears in the genre of polemic, reveals many of the points of
contact between Christian and pagan thought. More precisely, these
elements of agreement enable us to glimpse, however imperfectly, a
few of the threads of understanding that the two sides shared in an
often bitter debate. These threads, were we able to weave them to-
gether again in their totality, would allow us to view the tapestry of
the world view common to both pagan and Christian in late antiq-
uity.
Even if such a reconstruction were possible, it would be beyond
the purpose of this book; the goals of this study are much more mod-
est. This book examines the extant pagan anti-Christian polemic
4 Against the Christians

literature with a view toward discovering the strategies by which

the polemicists attempted to marginalize a religious opponent
steadily increasing in numbers, sophistication and power. In the
process it identifies and describes the polemic boundaries between
pagan and Christian as the authors constructed them, boundaries
which shifted significantly between the time of Celsus and the reign
of Julian. It is the construction of these boundaries, with their vary-
ing degrees of ambiguity and fluidity, that enable us to detect the
rhetorical strategies that the pagan polemicists employed against
their Christian opponents.
Although the anti-Christian literature reveals some common
assumptions the two sides shared, it goes without saying that the
differences between pagans and Christians were profound and that
both polemic and apologetic were grounded in substantial disagree-
ment on a vast array of issues. It is, in fact, such wide-ranging conflict
that allows us to see the occasional rhetorical and substantive
convergences in the first place.
Take for example the familiar battle line between Christian mono-
theism and pagan polytheism. What may at first glance be regarded
as a clear disagreement between the Christian "one" and the pagan
"many" was much more ambiguous than it might seem. In the first
place, a pagan "monotheism" had existed long before Christians be-
gan to make an issue of the oneness of the divine; the concept was
still undergoing significant development over the time period cov-
ered in this study. It is therefore possible to view the polemic over
this issue not as a fundamental disagreement on the number of gods
but as a series of attempts to define the shape of the monotheism
that ultimately was to emerge from the struggle. Further, the fact
that Christians worshiped Jesus in addition to God the Father made
Christian monotheism an ambiguous issue indeed. While such am-
biguity eventually followed the church into the fourth-century
councils, it was also an issue in its earlier apologetic. The deity of
Jesus made it necessary for Christians to defend themselves against
the charge of inconsistency from pagan opponents who pointed to
their worship of at least two divine beings. Defining the mathemat-
ics of Christian monotheism was not only a problem for the later
conciliar age, it was an early apologetic task of the first order.
A further examination of the polemic reveals more concrete im-
plications of the pagans' rejection of Christian monotheism. One of
Defining the Christian "Other" 5

these implications, perhaps obscured by Western cultural distance

from agrarian society, was a profound disagreement over the con-
trol of natural forces. Greek and Roman and other polytheisms
allocated the management of the natural universe to the care of spe-
cific deities most suited to carry out their functions for the benefit of
humanity. How, then, could the Christian God, distant as he was
from the day to day contingencies of human survival, perform the
lifegiving functions traditionally assigned to the gods of nature? It
is possible that Christian evangelists were developing an apologetic
response to this issue as early as the first century.

In the past, [God] let all nations go their own way. Yet he has not left
himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain
from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of
food and fills your hearts with joy.2

The early pagan objection to Christian monotheism was not simply

a dispute over heavenly mathematics. It was more fundamentally
an argument concerning the relationship of deity to nature and of
the provision for human needs. It was an objection that Christian
apologists took seriously.
In this excursus on monotheism we must also remember that
Christians by and large accepted the actual existence of the gods.
They relegated them, of course, to the category of evil "daemons"
that were not worthy of worship. But it would have been difficult
for Christians to deny outright the reality of those beings that virtu-
ally everyone (true atheists, if there were any, excepted) believed
were real. Once we understand the ambiguities involved in an is-
sue so fundamental to pagan-Christian discourse as monotheism,
we may shift our focus from the explicit rhetoric of difference to the
identification of more subtle but nonetheless common interests. The
situation was not unlike that of a married couple arguing over the
placement of the living room furniture: no matter how vehement
the argument, the disagreement stems from the fact of common
ownership. The real issue is one of control; so it was with the reli-
gious, cultural and philosophical "furniture" of Roman Hellenism.
For our purposes, what is important is that the disagreement be-
tween pagans and Christians on many issues was substantial enough
to make the objects of such common ownership easily visible, as
6 Against the Christians

well as the struggle for their control.

The most important and wide-ranging issue separating Chris-
tians and pagans was the Christian insistence on worshiping one
God at the expense of all others. The pagan objection to Christian
exclusivism was actually a field of objections clustered about a com-
mon core, a theological center with implications far beyond the
mathematics of monotheism. "Exclusivism" refers to more than sim-
ply the worship of the God of Israel and not the traditional deities of
the Mediterranean basin. The term includes its practical manifesta-
tions as well, including elements of social and political exclusivism;
it is here assumed that exclusivism had (and continues to have) con-
sequences outside the realm of theology and that these are a valid
subject of treatment in the literature of anti-Christian polemic. It is
in this varied field with its consequences both philosophical and
practical that this study focuses its attention, for the purpose of iden-
tifying those common elements for which pagans and Christians
fought for control.
Another example shows how these elements illuminate the is-
sue of exclusivism. The fact that the story of Jesus included
ingredients not uncommon in pagan myths-a dying and rising de-
ity, for instance, and the working of miracles-brought differing
responses from pagans and Christians. To pagan critics, these areas
of overlap undermined the Christian claim to exclusivism. If both
Christ and Asclepius performed healing miracles, why must the
worship of Christ preclude the worship of his rival? Besides, they
argued, since Asclepius was clearly superior to Christ, the Christian
demand for the exclusive worship of an "inferior deity" was ridicu-
lous. Christians, on the other hand, while acknowledging the
parallels between their religion and paganism, were forced to argue
the reasons their deity was superior to pagan rivals. Such parallels
accentuated, rather than submerged, the issue of Christian
exclusivism. At the same time they identify for us an important
point of contact between Christianity and paganism: the resonance,
common to both sides of the debate, of a resurrected healer.
Such points of contact often produced friction. Perhaps nowhere
was more heat produced than in the attempt of Christian intellectu-
als, especially from the turn of the third century onward, to position
themselves as the legitimate heirs of Hellenistic culture and the Greek
philosophical tradition. All three of the critics discussed in this study
Defining the Christian "Other" 7

objected to this effort to one degree or another. While they insisted

that the witness of both reason and antiquity argued against Chris-
tian monotheistic exclusivism, Christians used both to bolster their
claim to possess the only true religion. This conflict formed a pro-
found undercurrent to quite a large portion of the anti-Christian
polemic, a current that more than occasionally broke the surface in
explicit argument.
Nor were these issues restricted to the polemic literature. Chris-
tian exclusivism and the opposition to it were expressed in social,
religious and philosophical contexts. These contexts changed dra-
matically during the period of our study, from the late second century
to 363 CE. In the time of Celsus, Christianity was a struggling mi-
nority sect declaring its independence from Judaism, enduring
persecution from both the populace and the state, and asserting it-
self as the rightful heir of both Judaism and Hellenistic culture. By
the time of Julian, Christianity had become the imperially favored
religion of the Roman Empire; within a generation afterwards, all
pagan religious practices would be formally banned. It is to be ex-
pected that the anti-Christian polemic changed in important ways
over the course of the nearly two centuries in question. For example,
it is reasonable to expect a trend in the literature reflecting the growth
of Christianity within society, specifically a movement from the criti-
cism of Christian social exclusiveness to a protest against the
dominance of Christian political power. Other trends are rhetorical
in nature, reflecting changes in the critics' polemic strategy as the
balance of religious and social power shifted in favor of their oppo-
nents. It is primarily these rhetorical trends, situated as they are in
the shifting milieu of pagan-Christian relations, that constitute the
subject of this book.
Our examination of pagan anti-Christian polemic has its origins
in recent developments in patristic scholarship. The study of the
growth of Christianity has shifted in recent years to the field of rheto-
ric, specifically the role of rhetoric in communicating Christian beliefs
to the pagan world. Averil Cameron3 in particular has traced the
development of a "totalizing discourse" by which the Christian
message became a complete worldview, a view that has been de-
fined elsewhere as "a comprehensive interpretation of reality which
subsumed or excluded other interpretations."4 Using symbolic lan-
guage, especially but not exclusively that of the Bible, the rhetoric of
8 Against the Christians

the church became a totalizing discourse that attempted to elimi-

nate ambiguity or dissent. The development of this discourse was
one of a number of factors to which the rise of Christianity can be
attributed.
But what of the pagan rhetoric against Christianity during the
same period? Thus far the study of the rhetorical dimensions of the
pagan-Christian conflict has focused on the Christian side, particu-
larly the strategies by which Christian writers engaged their pagan
counterparts and their surrounding culture. This book initiates a
modest move toward the examination of the opposing pagan dis-
course. Specifically, this study addresses a series of questions: What
rhetorical strategies did the pagan polemicists employ against their
Christian opponents? Did they, like the Christians, create a "totaliz-
ing discourse" that radically excluded all Christian claims from
consideration? Or, given our brief discussion of the" common prop-
erty" shared by the two sides, was such a discourse even possible?
Or were other strategies operative by which pagans attempted to
marginalize their opponents while acknowledging their often am-
biguous boundaries?
The answers to these questions are necessarily complex. As we
have mentioned briefly, the pagan polemicists did not employ a
unified rhetorical strategy; in more than one instance contradictory
arguments are to be found between them. The fact that the period
under examination covers nearly two centuries complicates our task
by introducing a shifting field of inquiry. The Christianity of Julian's
day differed greatly from that of the time of Celsus; incidentally, the
failure to recognize this fact has hindered many an otherwise help-
ful comparison of Celsus' and Julian's polemic treatises. Their efforts
to marginalize the Christians as well as the strategies they used to
that end had to evolve, if for no other reason than that both Chris-
tianity and paganism underwent profound changes between the end
of the second century and the middle of the fourth.
Even over the course of the second century, before the introduc-
tion of Celsus' polemic, Christianity was being transformed from
an obscure offshoot of Judaism to a powerful religion in its own
right. The expansion of the new religion involved dramatic changes.
The process of self-definition vis-a-vis Judaism, for example, was at
least as old as the "council of Jerusalem" in the middle of the first
century. This process was accelerated by two Jewish revolts in 66-
Defining the Christian "Other" 9

70 and 132-135 CE, and by the middle of the second century Marcion
was declaring Christianity independent in every way from its Jew-
ish parent. On other fronts, the Montanist movement or "New
Prophecy" raised serious questions regarding the continuation of
divine revelation after the apostolic period. Throughout the empire
the influence of gnosticism blossomed into the development of full-
fledged schools of gnostic Christianity.
At the same time that these changes were taking place, the gen-
eral public's knowledge of Christianity was growing. In the first
decades of the second century, Pliny the Younger, governor of
Bithynia-Pontus, appeared to know little or nothing about the strange
religion whose adherents were being brought before his court. By
the waning years of the same century, however, Christianity was
gaining converts in large numbers, and the Latin apologist Tertullian
could exclaim in about 197:

Men cry that the city is filled with Christians; they are in the country, in
the villages, on the islands; men and women, of every age, of every state
and rank of life, are transferring to this group, and this they lament as if it
were some personal injury.S

Whether or not Tertullian was exaggerating for effect is arguable.

In any event, there seems to have been a notable difference between
Christianity's relative obscurity in the early second century and the
concern its growth had sparked at century's end. Such concern prob-
ably precipitated the writing of Celsus' anti-Christian treatise, the
first of the three examined in this study. For this reason it is impor-
tant to document the pagan understanding of, and opposition to,
Christianity before the age of the polemicists.
With the exception of Nero's local action against Christians in
Rome and a possible period of persecution under Domitian in the
90s CE, Christians enjoyed relative peace during the first century.
Largely ignored by government officials, they were able to practice
their religion in obscurity. By the early years of the second century,
however, Christians were known well enough to be generally hated.
For example, Tacitus' remark that Christians were viewed as odium
hunzani generis was written fifty years after the Christians had been
accused of setting great fire in Rome; it is likely that the historian
was merely reflecting the prejudice of his own time. It is also likely,
10 Against the Christians

however, that the Christians' perceived hatred of humankind had

indeed been sufficient for Nero to affix blame credibly. Their refusal
to worship the gods would have been easily interpreted by outsid-
ers as a tendency toward anarchy and even violence, especially since
the gods were believed to be preservers of the peace.
Such popular opinion eventually led to the practice of informants
turning Christians over to the local authorities. Perhaps representa-
tive of this practice in the early second century was the steady stream
of Christians brought before the court of Pliny the Younger between
111 and 113 CE. Judging from his correspondence with the emperor
Trajan on the matter, the governor himself seemed to know little or
nothing about the people or the religion he was expected to judge.
That a high Roman official, eighty years after the beginning of the
Christian movement, should have to write to the emperor for guid-
ance is indicative of the obscurity in which the religion had been
able to operate up to this time. Now, however, the provincials of
northern Asia Minor were bringing members of the troublesome
group to the governor's attention and demanding action against
them. Although Pliny executed some of these adherents to Chris-
tianity primarily for their obstinate behavior at his court, he also
punished them for their refusal to conform to a basic standard of
loyalty, that of offering incense to the images of the gods and of the
emperor. It is quite possible that the scene was being repeated else-
where in the empire.
An interesting statement of Pliny in the correspondence suggests
that there may have been more to the accusations than meets the
eye. According to his letter to the emperor, the very fact that he was
conducting investigations of accused Christians "caused the charges
to be more widespread and varied"; that is, more accusations sur-
faced when people heard that the governor was actively involved.
One anonymous informant went so far as to publish a list of Chris-
tians as well as others who were merely suspected of being such, a
list that Pliny apparently used to make a number of arrests. Many
of the suspects denied the charge on the spot, although they admit-
ted that they had once been adherents to Christianity.

Others who were named by the informer said that they were Christians
and then denied it; they were once but then ceased to be, some three years
ago, some many years ago and some even twenty years ago.6
Defining the Christian "Other" 11

Why would the informants have made accusations against

people who had forsaken Christianity and resumed worshiping the
traditional gods two decades earlier (possibly as a result of
Domitian's persecution)? Surely such people would not have fallen
under immediate suspicion. It is possible that in these cases the
accusation of "Christian" was employed as a "smear tactic," a tool
of harassment against personal or political enemies. It is not diffi-
cult to imagine the anonymous informer including on his list the
names of people he wanted to see brought before the authorities,
whether they were Christians or not; if participation in Christianity
tainted the victim's past, all the better. In any event, it is clear that in
Asia Minor in the early second century the mere suspicion of being
a Christian was grounds for accusation and harassment.
The contradiction in Trajan' s reply to Pliny is curious. "They
must not be sought out but if they are denounced and convicted
they must be punished," adding that anonymous accusations have
no place in criminal proceedings. How could it have been possible
to reject anonymous accusations, yet act on them when they oc-
curred? It is partially this lack of clarity that somewhat hampers
our understanding of the motivations and procedures with regard
to the persecutions of the second century.
What we can determine with at least some degree of certainty is
that for the most part, persecutions in this period were not ordered
by imperial edict; instead, they arose out of popular resentment to-
ward the Christians. Although local magistrates and provincial
governors allowed, encouraged, and sometimes instigated the per-
secutions, the anti-Christian action of the second century was
frequently attributable to popular hatred. On the other hand, the
anonymous list handed over to Pliny's court seems to have been
produced only after official investigations had already begun; the
governor did not specify what initial action had been taken by gov-
ernment officials. It may have been a similar series of anonymous
accusations, possibly first introduced before a city council. It is also
possible that the governor himself took the initiative. The former
seems more likely, as Pliny wrote to the emperor for guidance only
after the investigations were already underway. The driving force
behind the harassment and execution of Christians appears to have
originated in public resentment expressed to local officials.
During the decades following Pliny's governorship in 113, such
12 Against the Christians

accusations of a general nature developed into more specific propa-

ganda. Stories circulated accusing Christians of various kinds of
sexual immorality; charges of promiscuous intercourse and incest
were commonly made against the Christians, charges that Christian
apologists spent significant energy refuting. By mid-century, the
rumors were coalescing into the often-repeated charges that indis-
criminate sexual activity and cannibalism were being practiced at
secret Christian gatherings. Cornelius Pronto (100-166 CE), the tu-
tor of Marcus Aurelius, described the acts in which Christians were
reportedly involved in lurid detail, denouncing in an oration the
Christian movement and their supposedly bizarre practices in the
decade of the 160s.
By the 170s, Christians were perceived as a serious threat to the
public good. Perhaps partially in response to orations such as
Pronto's, the period from about 150 to the late 170s witnessed anum-
ber of local mob actions against Christians, actions that may be
characterized collectively as a widespread persecution. During this
period Polycarp died at Smyrna, Sagaris in Laodicea, Carpus and
Papylas at Pergamum. The summer of 180 saw groups of Chris-
tians executed at Madaura and Scilli in North Africa. Christians
were being massacred in cities throughout the empire. Although
the lynchings were supported and ultimately carried out by local
government officials, the impetus seems to have come from the popu-
lar level. Not only had Christianity grown in numbers, it had grown
in unpopularity to the point where groups of concerned citizens were
motivated to take matters into their own hands.
The best-preserved example of a persecution initiated by the
public and not by the legal system is that of the martyrs of Vienne
and Lyons in Gaul, preserved by Eusebius in Book V of his Ecclesias-
tical History.? The outbreak seems to have been a cooperative effort
between local magistrates, the people, and the provincial governor.
The actual bringing of charges, however, was preceded by public
harassments such as exclusion from public baths and assemblies.
When the Christians finally appeared before the governor, the popu-
lar accusations of sexual immorality and cannibalism took center
stage.
Curiously, this particular narrative lacks the inquisition scenes
so common in other, later martyrologies; instead, the bulk of the
narrative has to do with torture. Especially noteworthy is the ab-
Defining the Christian "Other" 13

sence of sacrifice to the emperor or the gods as an issue; either the

Christians were not ordered to perform sacrifice or the writer thought
it an irrelevant fact to report. The only involvement of the emperor
was to order that Christians who were Roman citizens were to be
beheaded instead of tortured, and that those who recanted were to
be released. Evidence of the public nature of the episode appears in
the fact that the governor dispatched a Roman citizen to the beasts
and other tortures instead of beheading him, a violation of both the
emperor's direct order and Roman custom. Such a violation is an
important indicator of (local) official willingness to placate the crowd.
What dominates the actual charges in this narrative, both before
and during the torture accounts, are the accusations of immorality
described earlier. The tortures are introduced with charges reminis-
cent of Pronto's speech, accusations that the Christians are guilty of
"feasts of Thyestes, and the incests of Oedipus." The last words on
the lips of the Christians are denials of the charges of cannibalism,
not their refusal to worship the gods. Declared one victim while
being roasted alive, "Lo, this is to devour men, what you are doing.
But as to us, we neither devour men nor commit any other evil."
Likewise the martyrdom of Polycarp in Smyrna seems to have
been initiated by mob action, although there are some significant
differences from the account of the martyrs of Gaul. The primary
charge against Polycarp and the church at Smyrna was that of athe-
ism, while during the proceedings at Lyons the accusations of
immorality were more prevalent. The general tenor of the charges
at Smyrna were made clear at Polycarp's sentencing: "This is the
teacher of Asia, the father of the Christians, and the overthrower of
our gods, he who has been teaching many not to sacrifice, or to wor-
ship the gods."
During the trial, the proconsul advised Polycarp to "swear by
the genius of Caesar." This fact, however, need not indicate that the
proceedings were conducted in accordance with any imperial de-
cree, since Pliny had used a similar procedure even before consulting
Trajan:

Those who denied that they are or were Christians I have dismissed, when
they invoked the gods (following my example) and made offering of frank-
incense and wine to your image (which I have commanded to be brought
there together with the images of the gods for this purpose) and further-
14 Against the Christians

more cursed Christ. It is said that those who are really Christians cannot
be forced to do any of these things.8

The death of Polycarp at Smyrna, like that of many Christians at

Lyons, was instigated by a mob with the active cooperation of the
authorities, with no decree having been promulgated by the em-
peror. Popular (and sometimes official, in the case of Pronto)
propaganda seems to have been the driving force in the rise of the
persecutions, propaganda that focused on the accusations of immo-
rality and atheism.
The fact that several Christian apologists found it necessary to
refute these charges in the 170s illustrates the degree to which the
tales of immorality were taking hold in the popular imagination.
The three accusations made against the Christians at Lyons are also
found in the apology of Athenagoras as specific charges. "Three
things are alleged against us: atheism, Thyestean feasts, Oedipean
intercourse." 9 The accusations were repeated in the treatise of the
Christian apologist Theophilus, who in the decade of the 180s re-
ferred to the accusers as those who alleged

that our wives are the common property of all and live in promiscuity,
that we have intercourse with our own sisters, and-most godless and
savage of all-that we partake of human flesh.lO

The charges of immorality and atheism were widespread and deeply

felt. The public discourse through which pagans of all classes ex-
pressed their disgust with Christians was a "totalizing discourse"
of the first order. Enemies of the gods, of the state, and of the people,
Christians were considered unacceptable in every way, while the
propaganda and rumors served the purpose of marginalizing the
Christians as completely as possible. The boundaries between pa-
gan and Christian were, at least on the surface, as clear as they would
ever be.
Then, for reasons unknown to us, the rumors seem to have
stopped. The charges of immorality virtually disappear from the
apologetic literature and the martyrologies. The public lynchings
ceased as well. Although persecution persisted through the turn of
the third century, Christians gained a measure of tolerance after the
savagery of the late 170s. The physician Galen could say that at
Defining the Christian "Other" 15

least some Christians "have attained a pitch not inferior to that of

genuine philosophers."ll
Summarizing the treatment of Christians throughout most of the
second century, we observe that most of the opposition to Chris-
tianity was popular in nature; there would be no philosophical
rejoinder until Celsus. Emperors provided little guidance, much
less imperial decrees, for handling Christian offenders; Trajan' s policy
forbidding public officials to hunt down Christians seems to have
been consistently followed. Informers, not police, were responsible
for turning in Christians, and officials conducted trials only when
the public initiated such action. Although Christians such as
Polycarp were commanded to offer sacrifice to the emperor, this was
meant only to separate the "obstinate" Christians from those who
could be made to apostatize. Public opinion consisted largely of
rumors about strange and immoral behavior in Christian gather-
ings. What else could explain the fact that they gathered in secret
and refused to participate in respectable forms of worship? Although
the general population undoubtedly knew some basic truths about
Christians-that they refused to worship other gods, for example,
or that their religion originated with a Jew named Jesus-pagan re-
action was dominated by the belief that Christians were involved in
bizarre and immoral behavior. There was little if any informed public
opinion about Christianity during this period. The most important
objections to Christianity were social, not philosophical. Systematic
reflection by outsiders would not appear until Celsus near the turn
of the third century, some time after the wave of public persecutions
had crested.
Celsus' literary reply to Christianity was a symptom of the
progress his opponents had made over the previous hundred years;
when Christianity was little more than a secretive sect of Judaism,
there had been no need for philosophical opposition. By the time
Celsus and the other polemicists began their attack, however, their
enemy had become a force to be reckoned with. The Christianity of
the late second century and following was characterized by increas-
ing intellectual sophistication, self-conscious separation from its
Jewish parent, and a growing sense of mission. Perhaps most threat-
ening of all to their pagan respondents, Christian thinkers were
beginning to assert ownership of the cultural and intellectual prop-
erty of their pagan opponents. This process would culminate with
16 Against the Christians

the Christians laying claim to the Greek and Roman classical past
and, beginning with Constantine in the fourth century, to the em-
pire itself. These claims would not go uncontested.
 2

Celsus and the "Revolt

Against the Community"

The late 170s was a time of crisis for Christianity; the last half of the
decade had seen the most violent of the persecutions of the second
century. But by decade's end, the public and sometimes illegal ex-
ecutions had ended; there would be no more mob-inspired
persecutions for the next seventy years. Although rumors of Chris-
tian cannibalism and incest still circulated, they were no longer the
staple of anti-Christian propaganda. The proliferation of Christian
apologetic seems to have subsided as well. Some of the apologies
had been addressed directly to Marcus Aurelius, the "philosopher-
emperor," perhaps in the hope that an emperor with a philosophic
cast of mind would be sympathetic to their pleas for toleration. His
death in 180 may have removed any hope for such toleration, much
less official recognition; as it happened, he had not at all been sym-
pathetic to the Christians' plight. The only reference that the
Christians received in his Meditations was an inconsequential note
about the irrationality of their martyr instinct.
Even though the uglier rumors subsided, persecution contin-
ued. In place of the shouting mob, local magistrates conducted
official proceedings under more carefully controlled conditions. At
Scilli near Carthage in 180, for example, the trial of a dozen Chris-
tians was a relatively quiet affair. The proconsul Vigellius Saturninus
engaged in patient debate with the accused, affirmed that "we too
are a religious people," and gave the prisoners thirty days to change
their minds.l Gone was the public spectacle only three years after
its climax in Gaul; perhaps the excesses there had led the philoso-
pher on the throne to impose moderation and legality upon the
proceedings. Or perhaps the apologists' protests had reached the
emperor after all.
Marcus Aurelius died in 180. His young son Commodus proved
by all accounts to be a tyrant, and his assassination in 192 marked
18 Against the Christians

the end of the Antonine dynasty. An England-born soldier named

Septimius Severus emerged as his successor after spending four years
eliminating other contenders for the throne. The Severan dynasty
which resulted continued until235; during this time of prosperity
the church enjoyed dramatic growth. Although sporadic persecu-
tions continued through the reign of Severus until about 212, his
successors over the next two decades extended unprecedented tol-
eration to Christians and even entertained a few of them, including
Origen, at court. Christians were rapidly becoming integrated into
the larger society.
This integration resulted in a tension within the church: to what
degree were Christians supposed to keep themselves pure, sepa-
rated from the "pollution" of the world? Whatever the drawbacks
of belonging to a small, persecuted minority, the boundaries had
always been clear. Now these boundaries were becoming more
ambiguous, and the resulting tension was manifesting itself in anum-
ber of ways. As early as the middle of the second century the
Montanist movement, or New Prophecy as it is often called, was
recalling Christians to a higher level of moral perfection. Although
the movement indicates a divergence in ethical expectations within
the church, more was at stake than issues of private morality. In
North Africa, Tertullian felt compelled to argue against Christian
participation in public amusements of any kind, such as the theater
and games.

We should have no connection with the things which we abjure, whether

in deed or word, whether by looking on them or looking forward to them;
but do we not abjure and rescind that baptismal pledge, when we cease to
bear its testimony? Does it then remain to apply to the heathen them-
selves[?] Let them tell us, then, whether it is right in Christians to frequent
the show. Why, the rejection of these amusements is the chief sign to them
that a man has adopted the Christian faith.2

According to Tertullian, pagans understood that the renuncia-

tion of public amusements was a natural consequence of becoming
a Christian. Nor was it only a matter of abstinence from the sexual
or violent themes that were sometimes a part of these events. There
were normally religious overtones as well, since the various games
were commonly dedicated to particular deities. But with the in-
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 19

crease in conversions to Christianity in the late second century, Chris-

tian integration into society included attendance at the games,
although they continued to stay away from the more overt "idola-
try" of the religious festivals. Whether this change is attributable to
Christians' partial capitulation to pagan criticism or to other factors,
the formerly small, isolated sect was starting to feel its way into the
larger world. Tertullian's protest against Christian participation, as
well as the fact that he became a Montanist himself later in life, is
clear evidence that the time of Christian isolation had come to an
end.
And yet the church as an institution had not emerged as a pub-
licly acceptable entity by the year 200. The first large buildings
dedicated to Christian worship were still several decades off. Chris-
tian Platonism was only now beginning to emerge in the writings of
Clement of Alexandria, a philosophical project that would be con-
tinued by his successor Origen. At the turn of the third century the
threat of persecution was still very real. Although individual Chris-
tians might decide to participate in some public events, the
institutional church was still regarded as a dangerous and subver-
sive "secret society."

Such was the precarious position in which Christians found

themselves, and into which the first important literary attack, writ-
ten by an otherwise unknown author named Celsus, was launched.
His work was entitled 'AA.T]8fls A6yos (traditionally rendered True
Doctrine) and is known only as it is quoted in Origen's refutation,
contra Celsum. The True Doctrine was the first serious literary attack
on Christianity; while several pagan authors of the second century
had mentioned the Christians, Celsus' work was the first systematic
treatise written against them.
Celsus' True Doctrine also represents an important transition in
the substance of the accusations that pagans made against the church.
Whereas earlier attacks had focused upon the crimes of immorality
that Christians were alleged to have committed, Celsus' work
marked the beginning of an era of philosophical attacks combined
with reasoned refutation of the Christian scriptures. Of course, the
critic did not abandon the practical issue of Christianity's offenses
against society. To Celsus, Christians were a danger to the security
of the state, a menace to orderly society, and an innovation that threat-
20 Against the Christians

ened traditional values. For the most part, however, Celsus was an
informed polemicist, in general not relying on scandalous stories
circulating about either Jews or Christians.3 Instead, reporting from
what appears to have been his own research, he concentrated his
polemic largely on what he actually knew about the religion.
What was new, however, was a sustained philosophical and logi-
cal attack on the belief system, mythology, practices and sacred
writings of Christianity. With this attack Celsus forged new weap-
ons in the polemic war, weapons that later anti-Christian writers
such as Porphyry and Julian would use with vigor. Not all of Celsus'
objections were equally lasting, however; his arguments against
Christian anti-social behavior, for example, were fading in the gen-
eration after Celsus. By the time Origen answered his polemic in
about 248 CE, the arguments against Christian social exclusivism
were largely irrelevant. Origen noted that some of his opponent's
arguments had become obsolete in the interval between the writing
of the True Doctrine and Origen's own apologetic reply. Celsus' philo-
sophical arguments, however, would persist for centuries.4 Celsus,
then, represents a bridge between two styles of attack: the earlier
objections based upon allegations of immorality and scandalous con-
duct, and the reasoned philosophical attack. The former were already
losing their force by the time Celsus wrote the True Doctrine, while
the latter was on the ascendancy.
To facilitate any investigation into the context of Celsus' work, a
discussion of the date of his writing is in order. Such a discussion is
necessary for two reasons. First, there is a broad consensus for the
date of the True Doctrine that is based upon very slender evidence.
For the last century and a half, the date has coalesced around the
decade of the 170s, with a date of 178 cited most often. This consen-
sus has remained remarkably firm, given the tenuous nature of the
evidence. Second, and more important, it is necessary to establish
the historical context for Celsus' polemic, a context that is vital for
understanding his rhetorical strategy. Hence a brief excursus on the
dating of Celsus is appropriate.
There are precisely three statements recorded in contra Celsum
that scholars have used to date Celsus' True Doctrine.
1. Origen's statement that Celsus "has already been dead a long
time,''S relative to the date of Origen's refutation in about 248.
2. Celsus' reference to the active persecution of Christians at the
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 21

time he wrote.6
3. Celsus' reference to "those who now reign over us."7
Let us examine the arguments for dating based on these state-
ments. The first piece of evidence, that Celsus was dead "a long
time" by 248, is subjective enough to allow for wide disagreement.
We will set it aside for the moment. The second reference, alluding
to persecutions occurring at the time of writing, is generally taken
to coincide with the martyrdoms at Vienne and Lyons in 177 and the
Scillitan martyrs of 180. Most scholars take the third clue, the refer-
ence to "those who now reign over us," as a literal reference to
multiple rulers and so date Celsus' work to the coregency of Marcus
Aurelius and his son Commodus in the years 177-180. Thus
Chadwick assigns the True Doctrine "on balance" to the years 177-
180 in the introduction to his translation of contra Celsum.B The great
majority of scholars over the past century have agreed; a review of
more recent church histories shows most commentators assuming a
more exact date of 178.
However, there are reasons to advocate a later date for Celsus'
polemic than the eighth decade of the second century, and espe-
cially later than the year 178. With regard to the third argument
above, Celsus' use of the plural in reference to rulers need not refer
to a joint imperium; he may have used the plural in a more general
sense.9 The rhetorical context of Celsus' statement regarding "those
who now reign over us" supports such a general meaning, and be-
cause of the importance of this passage in discussions of Celsus'
date it deserves to be quoted in full. This is especially true since
references to the context have been notably absent in the literature.

It is quite intolerable of you [Christians] to say that if those who now

reign over us were persuaded by you and taken prisoner, you would per-
suade those who reign after them, and then others, if they too are taken
prisoner, and others after them until, when all who are persuaded by you
are taken prisoner, there will be a ruler who, being a sensible man and
foreseeing what is happening, will utterly destroy you before you destroy
him first.IO

In the first place, if Celsus' first reference to a plurality of rulers

is to be taken literally, it follows that he likewise meant for the sub-
sequent "rulers" in the argument to reign together literally as well.
22 Against the Christians

It seems unlikely, however, that Celsus would assume that joint

reigns were to continue as a permanent feature of imperial rule in
the future, especially given their rarity in the history of the empire
before 177. In addition, although it has been arguedll that the word
"now" (vuv) rules out a general interpretation of "rulers," it must
be observed that Celsus' argument involves a hypothetical sequence
of "rulers," the later ones contrasted with those who rule "now."
The vuv need not be taken to refer to actual conditions at the time of
writing, since the word and its associated phrase are functioning
within the framework of a hypothetical argument. Therefore the
reference to a plurality of rulers need not refer to an actual coregency
at the time of writing.12
With regard to argument 2 above, the widespread persecutions
of the late second and early third centuries under Septimius Severus
(193-211) are at least as likely a candidate for an era of active perse-
cution as are those of 177-178. To this later period, for example,
belong the Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas as well as Tertullian' s
Apology, in which he protested the conduct of trials against Chris-
tians. Thus there is more than one possibility for assigning an "era"
of persecutions to which Celsus refers.
Rejecting traditional interpretations of the evidence merely re-
opens the question. There are other available clues, however. More
important than the individual arguments stated above is the fact, so
frequently observed by students of contra Celsurn, that Celsus was
an informed critic of Christianity, not succumbing to the false charges
of cannibalism and ritual intercourse so prevalent during the popu-
lar anti-Christian outbursts of the 170s. These charges were the
central issues mentioned in the accounts of the martyrdoms at Vienne
and Lyons and, along with the charge of atheism, were important
issues in the Christian apologetic strategy of the same period.
Although the time around 178 marks the very height of these
accusations, such charges are wholly absent from the True Doctrine.
If Celsus was writing in 178, he would have been a rare exception
indeed. However, is it not at least as reasonable to view Celsus as
reflecting the more informed understanding of a later generation,
and not writing as the sole enlightened exception during the apex
of pagan misunderstanding? Celsus' reasoned responses to philo-
sophical errors in Christian doctrine are quite out of step with the
spirit of the 170s.
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 23

There are also some ancillary issues that may be addressed by

recourse to a later date. For example, some have raised the question
as to why Christian apologists did not answer Celsus' work imme-
diately. If Celsus penned the True Doctrine in the late 170s, why was
there not a Christian response until Origen's reply in 248, seventy
years later?l3 Complicating this question is the fact that by the turn
of the third century there were Christian minds more than adequate
to meet the challenge that Celsus posed, apologists such as Tertullian
of Carthage and Clement of Alexandria. Assigning a date for Celsus
in the opening years of the third century, while perhaps not answer-
ing this question conclusively, at least closes the gap between
challenge and response. In addition, there is no reason Origen's
statement (argument 1 mentioned earlier) that Celsus "has already
been dead a long time" would not allow a date around the turn of
the third century, forty to fifty years before Origen's response in 248,
as easily as it would allow a date in the 170s. Finally, it is also con-
ceivable that Celsus' complaints in the True Doctrine against Christian
proselytizing roughly correspond in time with a possible decree14
of Septimius Severus in about 201 or 202 CE outlawing conversion
to either Judaism or Christianity.
To be sure, a date near the turn of the third century is by no
means secure. Our understanding of the dynamics of popular re-
sentment for both the 170s and the following decades is certainly
imperfect. The later date does not fully answer the question regard-
ing the long response time of the church to Celsus' challenge. The
link with Septimius Severus' decree, which is controverted as to au-
thenticity, is tenuous. In addition, although we find most of the
charges of immorality expressed in the last half of the decade of the
170s, they were not completely extinguished by the end of the sec-
ond century; Tertullian was still defending the church against them
in about 197.
On balance, though, it is at least as plausible to suggest a date of
composition around the turn of the third century as it is to settle on
the year 178. The failure of Celsus to capitalize upon the rumors so
characteristic of popular resentment, combined with the fact that
his criticisms appear to have been directed against a religious threat
of increasing seriousness requiring a sustained intellectual response,
bring us to break with scholarly consensus and offer a date of about
200 CE, plus or minus a decade, for the writing of the True Doctrine.
24 Against the Christians

The dating of Celsus is not simply a matter of academic nicety.

Placing his polemic (or any ancient writing, for that matter) into its
historical context is normally essential for its interpretation. In this
case, since the Christianity of the year 178 was in many ways differ-
ent from that of around 200, a somewhat different opponent served
as a target for pagan criticism. The passage of twenty years affected
the objectives for which an anti-Christian treatise might have been
written, as well as the specific strategies this particular critic used to
launch his attack. These strategies are especially important to us as
we compare Celsus to his successors.

Celsus' criticism was not only the first treatise to be written

against Christianity, it represents the first known use of consciously
Platonic categories to refute various aspects of Christian doctrine
and mythology. At the same time, as philosophically oriented as
parts of Celsus' criticism were, the social aspects of Christianity con-
stituted a significant element of his argument. According to Origen,
the issue of Christian social exclusivism constituted the opening salvo
of the True Doctrine.

Celsus' first main point in his desire to attack Christianity is that the Chris-
tians secretly make associations with one another contrary to the laws,
because societies which are public are allowed by the laws, but secret so-
cieties are illegal. ... After this he says that Christians perform their rites
and teach their doctrines in secret, and they do this with good reason to
escape the death penalty that hangs over them.l5

Furthermore, according to Celsus, Christians were still worshiping

in private homes and were not attending the festivals dedicated to
the gods. Their social exclusivism was not, however, simply a mat-
ter of social passivity. Christians did not carry on their proselytizing
activities in the normal venues for philosophical discussion; instead,
Christian evangelists worked from house to house, preaching to chil-
dren, women and slaves. Although Christians had begun to press
the boundaries between church and society, they were far from be-
ing fully integrated into that society.
Celsus' observation that Christians worshiped in secret was not
merely a note on their meeting habits; it was a statement that Chris-
tianity was outlawed and should continue as such. "Secret societies"
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 25

of various types were indeed illegal, as Pliny's correspondence to

Trajan indicates, in which it was related that the emperor banned all
such associations or hetaeria. While some writers have objected that
Christian gatherings were not actually illegal at the time Celsus
wrote, his reference to the death penalty is fairly clear; Origen's fail-
ure to contradict the statement adds weight to Celsus' observation.
On the other hand, it is not the illegality of Christian assembly that
is Celsus' main thrust here, although it may well have been illegal at
the time, but the fact that Christians were meeting in secret at all.
Celsus' complaint against "secret associations" implies that Chris-
tians were a group of subversives that were a threat to societal order.
Apparently, the fact that a number of Christians were attending
some public functions by this time was insufficient to satisfy Celsus
that they were truly on their way to becoming part of the larger
culture. To be an acceptable member of society meant participating
in the cults of the gods who kept society peaceful and stable. Rejec-
tion of the gods was, by definition, a rejection of society. But there
was more to Celsus' admoniton than a desire for Christians to be-
come more fully integrated into society; there were theological stakes
as well.

This is what [Celsus] says: God is surely common to all men. He is both
good and in need of nothing, and without envy. What, then, prevents
people particularly devoted to [him] from partaking of the public feasts?
... This is what he says: If these idols are nothing, why is it terrible to take
part in the high festival? And if they are daemons of some sort, obviously
these too belong to God, and we ought to believe them and sacrifice to
them according to the laws, and pray to them that they may be kindly
disposed.l6

The theological thrust of Celsus' argument allows us a glimpse

into the genesis of a debate between pagans and Christians con-
cerning the nature of God. In the immediate context this debate
touched upon two theological subpoints, namely God's universal-
ity and impassibility. The first point, that "God is surely common to
all men," was a direct attack upon Christian exclusivism, implying
that the supreme deity could not be the possession of a single group,
or even of a single nation. God was "common to all," that is, acces-
sible to people of all nations, whether pagan, Jew or Christian. In
26 Against the Christians

addition, Celsus' statement regarding the daemons that "these too

belong to God" implied that all religious activity honored the su-
preme deity, whether intended directly for that deity or indirectly
through the lesser gods. Since this was the case, Christians should
have nothing to fear from participating in pagan worship, no mat-
ter what nation, pantheon, or religious tradition was involved. Since
Christians claimed to worship the supreme deity, pagan religious
activities ought to be a perfectly acceptable means of doing so.
Here, then, are the social implications of the theological issue: if
God is supreme and thus KOL v6s to all, then all people have the same
access to this deity through the intermediary agency of the gods.
Celsus' objection that God was universal or "common" was theo-
logical in nature, but social in its application. It was therefore
unreasonable for Christians to separate themselves socially andre-
ligiously-in short, to behave in a socially exclusive manner. Here
we glimpse Celsus' linkage between Christian social and theologi-
cal exclusivism, as well as the ways in which the objections to both
kinds interact with each other in the course of the polemic.
Celsus' second theological argument in the passage quoted above
begins with divine impassibility: if the supreme God can experience
neither need nor envy, how can the worship of the daemons offend
him? According to Celsus, Christian monotheism should not stand
in the way of participating in the feasts. The critic presented an
apparently insoluble dilemma: either the daemons were non-exis-
tent, in which case the feasts were harmless, or they belonged to the
supreme God, in which case they were worthy of worship. Either
way, Christian worship of the gods could not offend a God inca-
pable of jealousy. What is missing from Celsus' logic, of course, is
the third option argued elsewhere by Origen: that the daemons did
indeed exist, but that they were in fact evil and not worthy of wor-
ship at all. First found in Justin Martyr, the Christian apologist of
the middle of the second century, this early Christian argument as-
serted that the Greek and Roman gods were in reality "wicked and
impious demons."
Celsus' argument regarding the gods was, of course, based on
the criticism that Christians were abstaining from public festivals
dedicated to the gods. But what we are witnessing in the exchange
from Justin to Celsus to Origen was more than a battle over the sta-
tus of Christian social participation; it was ultimately a conflict over
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 27

the nature of God. In Celsus' context the conflict was twofold, as it

touched upon both the status of subordinate ~eings and the impas-
sibility of God. First, as we mentioned in the first chapter, the
existence of the gods was not a matter of debate. Christians accepted
their reality, provided that they were to be seen as nothing more
than wicked spirits; pagans and Christians alike accepted the fact of
a supernatural realm filled with spiritual beings in direct contact
with humanity and the physical world. Second, Celsus complained
that jealousy on the part of the Christians' God violated the gener-
ally held idea that God was incapable of emotion. This complaint
constituted a powerful argument for the very reason that the Chris-
tians believed it too; divine impassibility was not a doctrine that
Christians were inclined to reject. Celsus' polemic against Christian
social exclusivism reveals important points of contact between the
pagan and Christian theological universes, connections that would
accompany Christianity on its march toward dominance over the
Late Antique world.
A final objection of Celsus that dealt with the social aspects of
Christian exclusivism concerned proselytizing. In an extended quo-
tation preserved by Origen, Celsus complained harshly against the
Christian practice of using the promises of Christianity to lure chil-
dren away from their families. Such a charge of inciting children to
leave home and despise their parents would have been extremely
serious, reminiscent of the charge leveled at Socrates that he was
corrupting the youth of Athens. The structure of the Roman family
would have added further gravity to Celsus' charges. The father
possessed absolute authority in the home, and an invitation to de-
spise the father and to rebel against his authority would have been
viewed as a serious breach of social norms. It may be conjectured
that the charge of inciting familial rebellion also served as a rhetori-
cal parallel to the other accusations of rebellion so frequently made
against the Christians and which are prominent in Celsus' treatise.
Just as Christians were rebels from approved religions, from gov-
ernmental authority, and from established tradition, they were also
rebels against that most ancient of social structures, the family.
Thus far we have examined several dimensions of Celsus' ob-
jection to Christian social exclusivism, such as the secrecy of Christian
worship, the failure of Christians to attend public events, and the
undermining of pagan homes in order to make converts. How true
28 Against the Christians

were these objections? Were his characterizations based on the ac-

tual condition of the church at the time? Although this is a study of
Celsus' rhetoric and not primarily of Christian social history, com-
paring his objections to what we know of the historical situation
will assist us in evaluating the rhetoric.
We have argued previously that at the time Celsus wrote the
True Doctrine, around the turn of the third century, Christianity was
in the middle of a decades-long process of emerging from relative
social isolation into the mainstream of Grreco-Roman society.
Tertullian's complaint against Christians who attended public events
appeared about this time. The number of converts was increasing,
and not only from the lower classes. Although the church was far
from attaining social acceptability, it was no longer huddled in the
dark corners of society. Nor was this only the case at the end of the
second century. Even in the earlier account of the Gallic martyr-
doms of 178, pagan persecutors excluded Christians from baths,
markets and other public gathering places before actually excercising
violence against them. Therefore Christians were not withdrawn
completely from society; on the contrary, pagans sometimes imposed
social isolation upon them as a prelude to persecution. This being
the case, Celsus' characterization of Christians as radically isolated
and anti-social sounds one-sided at least. His presentation is mildly
anachronistic, perhaps several decades too late to be fully accurate,
yet containing just enough truth to avoid sounding completely im-
plausible. In short, considering the situation of the church at the
time, Celsus' objection to Christian social exclusivism has the ring
of propaganda to it.17
Why would Celsus have misrepresented the church in this man-
ner? Why, during the very era that Christians were struggling with
the issues involved in integrating themselves into the larger society,
did Celsus paint a picture of radical social withdrawal? There are
several good reasons, not least of all the fact that the critic was en-
gaged in polemic discourse, not impartial reporting. Pagans had
successfully characterized the Christians as "haters of humanity"
for as much as a century by this time, and there was no reason to
stop using the familiar rhetoric now. Besides, the fact that Chris-
tianity still had neither official nor popular sanction made it as
suspect as ever to many. In addition, the church had not yet reached
the status it would enjoy by the middle of the third century, a status
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 29

which would include the amassing of substantial wealth, the con-

struction of church buildings, and a sustained intellectual tradition.
Celsus' rhetoric of Christian separatism was still partially true; after
all, half-truths make the best propaganda.
There may have been another reason for Celsus to engage in an
overstatement of Christian social exclusivism, a reason that will re-
quire some discussion of a possible change in official policy toward
the Christians. There was a substantial difference between the pub-
lic expression of anti-Christian fury in 177-8 which included the
illegal execution of Roman citizens and the controlled, legal pros-
ecution of Christians at the court at Scilli in 180. It is possible that
there was a formal move on the part of the government to take con-
trol of anti-Christian action during this period. As much of a threat
as Christians posed to order, the threat of unrestrained public pas-
sion was just as great, even if directed against a public enemy.
Perhaps the empire, anxious to preserve order, moved to take con-
trol of all anti-Christian action; persecutions would now be initiated
only by imperial order and by local magistrates, not by the public.
Perhaps Marcus Aurelius made the decision before embarking on a
two-year campaign against the Germans on the Danube in 178. Such
a scenario, if correct, means that the state's acquisition of the pre-
rogative of persecuting Christians-it had always possessed the
actual power, as Nero had demonstrated a century earlier, but had
rarely exercised it-removed from the populace the right to initiate
violence against the church. Whether or not an actual decree to this
effect can ever be demonstrated, the martyrdoms in Gaul were the
last to occur at the instigation of a mob for many decades. The era
of public persecutions had for all practical purposes ended.
It is suggested that the establishment of state control over the
right to persecute enabled the church to exert a presence in society
previously impossible because of public pressure. Although the
prosecution of Christians still occurred, such action was now largely
in the hands of the government. As it happened, most local officials
initiated persecution only when ordered by imperial edict, such as
the persecution of Decius in the middle of the third century, or when
Christians engaged in visible demonstrations of disloyalty to the
state or other disruptive activities. Otherwise, Christians were by
and large left alone. The church was free to determine its own course
with regard to social integration, a process that was well underway
30 Against the Christians

by the year 200.

By the time Celsus wrote the True Doctrine, the church was be-
ginning to emerge into the mainstream of pagan society. This
emergence, itself a cause of friction and division within the church,
was now a cause of alarm for pagans, and was perhaps the reason
Celsus took up the challenge of refuting Christianity in the first place.
His characterization of his opponents as a small isolationist sect was
in large part a reaction against the growth of the church and its so-
cial integration, and as such was a propagandistic half-truth; not
only would such a description be false by the time Origen replied to
the critique several decades later, it was not wholly true in Celsus'
own day. Since the critic feared the potential for harm that Chris-
tianity represented to Roman society, he was concerned to preserve
that society from the religion's influence. Seeing the cultural threat,
Celsus' task was to put the genie back into the bottle.
His rhetorical solution was thus a totalizing discourse of radical
exclusion. According to Celsus, Christian social exclusivism, a con-
sequence of exclusive monotheism, marked the Christians off as
enemies of society, the state, and the family. Nowhere in this aspect
of the polemic did Celsus consciously yield that there might bear-
eas of overlap between Christianity and paganism; Christianity was
completely "other," an outside threat diametrically opposed to the
social order. However, Celsus' attempt to reinforce the barriers be-
tween Christian and pagan was occurring at the very time that
Christians in the real world were succesfully tearing them down.
Thus far we have primarily examined Celsus' criticism of Chris-
tian social exclusivism. More prominent in the True Doctrine as a
rhetorical device, however, is his use of Judaism as a weapon against
the Christians. There are several reasons for examining such a use
of Judaism in the polemic. In the first place, the literature itself de-
mands such an examination; the appearance of Jews and Judaism is
not an inconsequential element in the anti-Christian writings. Since
even a cursory reading of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian reveals that
Judaism dominates the discourse to an overwhelming degree, it is
surprising that most scholarship concerning our three critics gives
short shrift to the Jewish issue. IS The relationship of Christianity to
Judaism was not only of great theological concern to Christian in-
terpreters of the Hebrew Bible, it was a primary focus of pagan
observers of Christianity.
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 31

Second, Christianity and Judaism represented the two exclusive

universalisms of the Roman Empire. In this respect they stood side
by side as targets of pagan criticism, giving us insight into how this
common element influenced the polemic. For example, was Juda-
ism more acceptable to the critics than Christianity? Or were both
religions equally criticized? How did the two religions fare in the
anti-Christian polemic when compared to each other? The treat-
ment of Judaism and Christianity allows us to detect the specific
rhetorical strategies by which the pagan critics differentiated, or
failed to differentiate, the two.
These strategies differed among our polemicists, leading to the
final reason the examination of the Jewish factor is important for
this book. The rhetorical treatment of the Jews compared to that of
the Christians provides an important measuring device for study-
ing changes in the polemic strategies employed over the period
covered in this study, particularly between Celsus and Julian. These
changes are dependent in some degree upon differences in histori-
cal context, and it is to the situation at the turn of the third century
that we now turn.

During the time of Celsus, the church was still struggling with
its identity with respect to Judaism. This internal conflict began as
early as the Council of Jerusalem, recorded in Acts 15 and which
resolved the status of Gentile converts with respect to Torah. The
practical issues of circumcision and ethics are reflected in the New
Testament, particularly in the epistle of Paul to the Galatians and
the epistle of James. By the middle of the second century, Marcion
asserted not only that the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament
were incompatible, but that the Gods presented in each Testament
were completely different from each other. According to Marcion,
the jealous, vengeful God of the Jews was not to be confused with
the loving Father of Jesus Christ. Although the larger catholic church
condemned Marcion, his movement and the issues that brought it
into being forced the church to grapple significantly with its rela-
tionship to Judaism and to its Jewish origins.
There is also some evidence that the struggle was not entirely
internal to the church, but that Christians and Jews were engaged in
disputation during the early church period. Debate seems to have
been joined early over issues such as circumcision, Sabbath obser-
32 Against the Christians

vance, and the proper interpretation of the scriptures. The surviv-

ing disputation literature, which extends into the Middle Ages, is
entirely of Christian origin. As a result the genre has come under
particular scrutiny in recent years, particularly as it came to serve
an anti-Jewish agenda.19 Justin's Dialogue with Trypho, written in
the middle of the second century, is in many ways prototypical of
later (and probably fictional) "dialogues." However, Justin's Dia-
logue does bear some marks of authenticity, such as the statement
that the Jew Trypho was a refugee from the Bar Cochba revolt. In
addition, Trypho did not convert to Christianity at the end of the
Dialogue, while the baptism of Jewish opponents is a trademark of
later works. In the second century at least, if Justin's account is in
any way typical of the situation, there was some level of active dis-
cussion between Jews and Christians.20
Celsus claimed to be a witness to these disputations. Basing his
polemic for the most part not upon rumor but on observation and
investigation, the critic understood what the two religious groups
had in common: one God, the Bible of the Jews, and the refusal to
recognize the validity of pagan religions. He also recognized what
divided them, such as Torah observance and the status of Jesus.
Whether or not Celsus' characterization of these "dialogues" has
any basis in events he actually witnessed, his description gives us at
least his own impression of Jewish-Christian argument.

After this [Celsus] continues as usual by laughing at the race of Jews and
Christians, comparing them all to a cluster of bats or ants coming out of a
nest, or frogs holding council round a marsh, or worms assembling in
some filthy corner, disagreeing with one another about which of them are
the worse sinners.21

At this juncture Celsus is merely engaging in name-calling. What

is important to note at the outset, however, is his equal rhetorical
treatment of Jews and Christians, a trend that continues throughout
the True Doctrine. This treatment retains particular importance as
we compare Celsus' polemic with that of his successors.
First, however, it is necessary to discuss in general terms some
of the issues involved in the use of Judaism in the pagan anti-Chris-
tian literature. The fact that Christianity had its origins in Judaism
provided a large amount of polemic material for pagan critics. As
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 33

we have seen briefly, Celsus exploited long-standing disagreements

between Jews and Christians in order to characterize both as engag-
ing in meaningless and self-defeating argument.
However, just as important as the polemicists' use of Judaism
was how they used it. For the critics, Judaism was useful as a
"weapon" against their Christian opponents, a two-edged sword
that could be wielded in both directions. In the first place, there had
been a long history of pagan-Jewish antagonism during the Helle-
nistic period, culminating in two Jewish revolts against Roman rule
in 66-70 and 132-135 CE. Much of this hostility seems to have been
transferred to the Christians, especially over the course of the sec-
ond century, for many of the same reasons. Christians, like Jews,
were hostile to "idolatry" and thus were viewed as hostile to society
and as a threat to the state. It has been noted that the composition of
pagan anti-Jewish polemic ceased altogether in the middle of the
second century,22 possibly coinciding with the growth of Christian-
ity during this period.
However, particularly in the case of Celsus, there was more than
a simple transference of old anti-Jewish arguments to the Christians.
The pagan field of vision did not merely shift from one object to the
next. On the contrary, although anti-Jewish polemic literature per se
ceased, pagans continued to utilize anti-Jewish argument in their
criticism of Christianity; they linked Christians with Jews in a form
of "guilt by association." Whenever the Jews came under criticism
in anti-Christian polemic, it was argued further that the Christians
were equally objectionable because of their Jewish origins. Simi-
larly, when a particular aspect of Christianity came under pagan
attack, the fact that that characteristic existed also in Judaism made
the criticism more effective. Thus we observe the persistence of anti-
Jewish polemic, only for a different purpose-as a weapon against
the Christians.
The second way in which pagan critics used Judaism against
their Christian opponents was to contrast Christian belief or prac-
tice with something positive the critic saw in Judaism. Julian was
the most proficient practitioner of this tactic. Specifically, the cer-
emonial requirements of Jewish law and particularly the biblical
requirement for blood sacrifices were examples of what was best in
Judaism that the Christians left behind. However, a pagan critic's
acceptance of a particular Jewish belief or practice was not neces-
34 Against the Christians

sary for this tactic to be effective. Regardless of whether or not any-

thing specific in Judaism was worthy of praise, Christians were
culpable for abandoning their religious heritage. The very act of
disregarding a traditional belief, no matter how strange or objec-
tionable it might have seemed to the pagan polemicist, was itself an
act of sacrilege.
It is true that the criticism of Judaism in the polemic was only a
secondary goal, since Christianity was the real target. However, it
is equally important to understand that the pagan critics differed
from one another in their use of Judaism against the Christians. These
differences are important. As we observe the development of the
use of Judaism in the anti-Christian literature, we witness substan-
tial changes from Celsus to Julian. Celsus' treatment of the Jews
was overwhelmingly negative, while Julian favored the Jews both
in his anti-Christian literature and in his political actions. This dif-
ference in the treatment of Judaism provides an important indication
of the shift in the rhetorical treatment of Christianity between the
turn of the third century and the time of the last pagan emperor in
362-363.
A substantial portion of Celsus' anti-Christian polemic is anti-
Jewish; his strategy of associating his opponents with a generally
despised religious and ethnic minority constitutes an important ele-
ment of the overall attack. Thus nearly his entire treatment of
Judaism in the True Doctrine uses the tactic of "guilt by association,"
the first of the two strategies described above. When, for example,
he refers to Christian teaching as "originally barbarian,"23 he hopes
to demonstrate by association that Christianity is as "barbaric" as
Judaism. Like parent, so to speak, like child. By adding that "the
Greeks are better able to judge the value of what the barbarians have
discovered," Celsus places the construct of the "civilized" Greeks in
the rhetorical position of power, thus appropriating the cultural au-
thority to evaluate both Christianity and Judaism.
The inferiority of both Jewish and Christian origins remains a
prominent theme throughout the True Doctrine, particularly in the
context of Celsus' attack on the personalities of Moses and Jesus.
While the polemicist on more than one occasion refers to Moses as a
"sorcerer," he also applies the same epithet to Jesus. At one point he
uses the term with reference to the Christians themselves. Moses
and Jesus thus belonged to the same class of undesirables, while
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 35

their followers share their despised status. Celsus also applies other
associations between Moses and Jesus and their followers; promi-
nent throughout his polemic are the recurring themes of deceiver
and deceived, charlatans leading the illiterate and uncultured, sor-
cerer and followers. In addition, the Jews, according to Celsus, were
originally renegades from Egypt, while Christians were likewise ren-
egades from Judaism.

In his next remarks Celsus imagines that the Jews were Egyptian by race,
and left Egypt after revolting against the Egyptian community and de-
spising the religious customs of Egypt. He says that what they did to the
Egyptians they suffered in turn through those who followed Jesus and
believed him to be the Christ; in both instances a revolt against the com-
munity led to the introduction of new ideas.24

According to Celsus, Jews and Christians shared the same group

characteristics and therefore deserved to be condemned together,
whether with respect to their origins or in the present.
Celsus also criticized the Bible, particularly the Hebrew Scrip-
tures, in an effort to attack the myths and doctrines of both Jews and
Christians. We have previously noted Celsus' objection to God's
jealousy as part of an attack on Christian social exclusivism; he also
ridiculed similar presentations of God in the scriptures as indicat-
ing that God was a vindictive and arbitrary deity. In addition,
according to Celsus, the Hebrew Bible was filled with immoral be-
havior on the part of God's people, while God himself was weak,
since he was unable to control Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
In these and many other ways, the polemicist presented Jewish and
Christian beliefs and writings as irrational and immoral.
In addition to these direct criticisms of Judaism are what may be
considered indirect efforts to marginalize the Jews rhetorically. The-
matic in Celsus' writing-as well as the inspiration for the title of
his treatise-is a "true doctrine" held by the wisest of nations and
individuals, a teaching that incorporated the most ancient religious
myths and philosophical wisdom. Significantly, according to Origen,
Celsus did not include the Jews among the "wisest nations" that
possessed this doctrine, nor did he include Moses in his list of the
wisest men. Origen's response makes it clear that he noticed the
omission in his own text of the True Doctrine.
36 Against the Christians

Thinking that between many of the nations there is an affinity in that they
hold the same doctrine, Celsus names all the nations which he supposes
to have held this doctrine originally. But for some unknown reason he
misrepresents the Jews alone, and does not include their race in the list
with the others .... And he would not speak of the Jews as being a very
wise nation on a par with the Egyptians, Assyrians, Indians, Persians,
Odrysians, Samothracians, and Eleusinians.25

The "unknown reason" to which Origen refers is obvious enough

from what we know of Celsus' strategy. Associating the Christians
with the Jews was central to Celsus' polemic project; his strategy
throughout the True Doctrine was to represent the Jews as a con-
temptible people with questionable origins and an irrational religion
in order to attack the Christians, their spiritual offspring. Including
the Jews and Moses in a discussion of the wisest nations and people
would have seriously undermined this strategy.
One final aspect of Celsus' rhetoric of Judaism deserves addi-
tional examination. We have summarized his use of the Jews and
Judaism to provide a polemic association with his real opponent,
the Christians. There is, however, a lengthy section of the True Doc-
trine that reveals an interesting aspect of his strategy. As well-stocked
as Celsus' polemic arsenal was, there seems to have been a source of
anti-Christian material that he consciously neglected to employ, that
of Jewish anti-Christian argument.
We know from Justin's Dialogue with Trypho that there were dif-
ferences of opinion between Jews and Christians regarding the
interpretation of certain passages of the Hebrew Bible, particularly
those that Christians held to be messianic in reference. In addition
to providing the Christian interpretation of these passages, Justin's
work provides several specific instances of Jewish refutation. One
of the more well-known christological interpretations that Justin
mentions is that of Isaiah 7:14, which Christians used to refer to the
virgin birth of Christ. Jews had apparently argued against the Chris-
tian translation of the Hebrew i1~';l)i1 as "the virgin." In the Dialogue
Justin tells his Jewish opponent that

you and your teachers venture to affirm that in the prophecy of Isaiah it is
not said, "Behold, the virgin shall conceive," but, "Behold, the young
woman shall conceive, and bear a son" ... I shall endeavor to discuss shortly
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 37

this point in opposition to you ... _26

Thus the argument was current as early as the middle of the second
century and probably available to Celsus. Given the relatively large
amount of space Celsus seems to have used in the True Doctrine to
refute the idea of a virgin birth,27 the straightforward argument that
Christians were misinterpreting this passage of scripture is curiously
absent from the polemic. That the omission was not a textual acci-
dent is shown by the fact that Origen, presumably working with the
full text of Celsus' treatise, felt compelled to supply the argument
for his opponent!
The same observations can be made for other Christian inter-
pretations of the Hebrew Bible. These interpretations included the
use of the first person plural in the Genesis account of creation ("Let
us make man in our image, in our likeness ... "), which Justin used
to argue that God the Father was speaking to the preincarnate
Christ.28 Justin also indicated that the opening line of Psalm 110,
"The Lord said to my Lord" -interpreted messianically in Acts 2:34--
was interpreted by Jews to mean that God was speaking to King
Hezekiah.29
There are two possible explanations for the fact that Celsus did
not employ existing Jewish arguments against Christian interpreta-
tions of prophecy. In the first place, it is quite possible that Celsus
was unaware of these Jewish objections. Such unawareness would
be understandable. His understanding of his opponent, while cer-
tainly more complete than any of the other pagan writers who
mentioned Christianity in the first two centuries, was of course im-
perfect. At one point in his polemic, however, Celsus used a tale
known from the Talmud that Jesus was the illegitimate son of Mary
and a Roman soldier named Pantera,30 demonstrating that Celsus
had access to at least this element of Jewish anti-Christian material.
More important is the fact that Celsus himself claims to have been
acquainted with a particular Jewish-Christian dialogue, no longer
extant, entitled The Discussion Between Jason and Papiscus. Thus Celsus
was not wholly ignorant of Jewish arguments against Christianity.
The second reason Celsus may not have used Jewish sources is
that he did not wish to do so. While Celsus was indeed familiar
with at least some Jewish arguments against Christianity, it would
not have served his rhetorical purpose to use them. Whether his
38 Against the Christians

non-use of Jewish arguments represents a deliberate suppression

on Celsus' part or merely a selective choosing of sources for anti-
Christian argumentation is largely irrelevant. Celsus presumably
had available to him the Jewish side of the argument through Justin's
Dialogue with Trypho, yet these arguments are completely absent from
his polemic. While Justin's work spent a great deal of energy pre-
senting the Christian interpretation of prophecy as well as various
Jewish arguments against these interpretations, Celsus omitted al-
together these potentially useful sources of anti-Christian material.
Such an omission from the True Doctrine was entirely compatible
with his rhetorical strategy of associating, not distinguishing, Chris-
tianity and Judaism.
Evidence for this omission appears in two sections of contra
Celswn. The first section comprises a substantial portion of the True
Doctrine and is composed of Celsus offering his arguments through
the literary figure of a Jew. This device is used two ways. In Book 1
of contra Celsum the Jew argues directly with Jesus,31 while in the
entirety of Book 2 he argues with a Jew who has become a Chris-
tian.32 Most of the time in this section, Celsus' use of the Jew as a
mouthpiece against the Christians is curious in that he presents a
number of arguments ill-suited for a Jew to make. He remarks to
Jesus, for example, that there is nothing special about Jesus' blood,
since it was not "Ichor such as flows in the veins of the blessed gods."
The Jew proceeds to compare the story of Jesus' virgin birth to the
divine births of Perseus, Amphion, Aeacus and Minos, although he
hastens to add parenthetically that he does not believe these myths
either. To refute the claim of Jesus' resurrection the Jew produces a
lengthy list of characters from Greek history and mythology who
claimed to have risen from the dead. That the arguments are clearly
non-Jewish is exemplified by his curious statement that since Jesus
was a practicing Jew he could not have been the son of God. Had
Celsus at any time been inclined to use anti-Christian arguments
from Jewish sources, it would have been in this section; what he
puts in the mouth of the Jewish figure, however, is extremely odd,
especially as the statements are at times anti-Jewish.
The second section of contra Celsum that suggests evidence for a
deliberate omission of Jewish argument consists of a rather straight-
forward complaint against the exclusivism of Jewish prophecy, a
section that constitutes a substantial portion of Book 7 of Origen's
Celsus and the "Revolt Against the Community" 39

refutation. Here Celsus attacks both the prophetic literary genre of

the Hebrew Bible and what he describes as contemporary oral pro-
phetic utterances. While his subject is both predictive prophecy and
the prophecy of proclamation, Celsus' primary purpose is to criti-
cize Christian reliance on predictive prophecies from the Hebrew
Bible. Four such specific arguments may be detected in this section:
the argument against the exclusivism of Jewish prophecy, especially
in light of "approved" oracles such as that of Apollo at Delphi; a
mockery of the style of oral prophecy that Celsus alleges was com-
mon in the eastern Mediterranean; a series of arguments against
anti-philosophical readings of prophecy that Christians used to sub-
stantiate their claims that Jesus was the predicted Messiah; and the
argument that the teachings of Moses and Jesus contradict each other,
thus invalidating one or both. It is an appropriate time in the True
Doctrine for Celsus to introduce Jewish refutations of Christian mes-
sianic interpretations of prophecy. This is particularly the case in
contra Celsum 7.12-15, in which he attacks irrational Christian inter-
pretations of predictive prophecy. Such Jewish refutations are,
however, completely absent. Nor does the fragmentary state of
Celsus' text explain their absence; Origen, with the text of the True
Doctrine before him, also notes the lack.33
While Origen speculated that Celsus' omission was due to his
inability to refute the strength of predictive prophecies about Christ,
another explanation is more likely. Celsus' use of Judaism through-
out the True Doctrine was almost entirely a strategy of Christian" guilt
by association," not a strategy of contrast with Judaism. Had he
used Jewish arguments to refute Christian interpretations of scrip-
ture, he would have run the risk of giving Judaism favorable
treatment. Even when a Jewish interpretation would have bolstered
his anti-Christian argument considerably, Celsus neglected it. This
neglect is particularly significant since Celsus had access to other
Jewish arguments against Christianity,34 as indicated by his use of
the Panter a story and by his knowledge of written Jewish-Christian
dialogue. Since he apparently researched Jewish arguments against
Christianity in preparation for writing his polemic treatise, he had
an opportunity to use other Jewish counterarguments to the Chris-
tian use of the Hebrew Bible.
Thus Celsus' failure to capitalize upon the existence of Jewish
anti-Christian argumentation was related to his rhetorical strategy
40 Against the Christians

with respect to Judaism; the polemicist was more concerned to as-

sociate than to distinguish Christianity and Judaism. Pointing out
differences between Jewish and Christian interpretations of the same
prophetic passages would have undermined his rhetorical strategy
of association; giving credence to the Jewish interpretations of scrip-
ture over the Christian ones would have worked against this strategy
as well. Although such information was available to him he seems
to have deliberately ignored it in order to preserve his more impor-
tant and long-term goal, namely to discredit the Christians entirely
by discrediting the religious tradition from which they originated.
Thus far, we can safely characterize Celsus' rhetorical strategy
as a totalizing discourse, one that allowed no legitimacy to his op-
ponents. So important was this strategy that he was even willing to
ignore significant sources of anti-Christian argument when the use
of those sources would have come into conflict with his larger rhe-
torical purpose. Celsus admitted no common ground between
paganism and Christianity; although we have detected in his theo-
logical arguments several elements of common belief, these elements
are incidental to, not part of, his polemic approach.
Celsus' strategy emerged within a historical context in which
Christianity was making significant progress in its integration with
society, an integration that Tertullian was protesting even while
Celsus was denying its existence. To be sure, the Christian rejection
of the gods would prove an enduring boundary, even if aspects of
Christianity had some elements in common with pagan mythology,
as we will see in the next chapter. One aspect of Christian integra-
tion that would become ever more controversial, however, was the
attempt on the part of Christians from the time of Justin, decades
before the writing of the True Doctrine, to appropriate Hellenistic
philosophy. What, then, would be the Celsus' treatment of his op-
ponents from a philosophical perspective? How would Celsus, a
Platonist, counter the Christian tendency to employ Plato as an ally
of their own?
 3

Celsus, Plato, and the Gods

One of the observations frequently made in the study of early Chris-

tianity is the wealth of syncretism between Christianity and pagan
religion and culture. Naturally, Christianity "borrowed" greatly from
its Greek and Roman surroundings, not a surprising observation
given their common religious genetics. The ubiquitous presence of
the gods gradually metamorphosed into the shrines of the saints;
aspects of pagan religious art and the prophetic tradition were trans-
formed for Christian use.l Only a short step was required, for
example, for the third-century Egyptians who compiled the Her-
metic writings (or, more accurately, their intellectual successors) to
embrace Christianity:

The Hermetist, when he became a Christian, would not have so very much
to unlearn. . . . He had been accustomed to aspire towards union with
God, and to hold that "to hate one's body" is the first step on the way to
the fulfilment of that aspiration; and when we come upon him, a little
later on, transformed into a Christian hermit in the Egyptian desert, we
find that he is still of the same opinion.2

While most scholars observe the influence of paganism upon Chris-

tianity, a few have noted that "influence" was a two-way street, and
that Christianity may have had at least as great an impact upon late
paganism as the other way around.3
In any event, these observations are made largely by contempo-
rary scholars. Occasionally, however, ancient commentators also
noticed such parallels between Christianity and paganism. Celsus
is a case in point. His observations, however, were not for the pur-
pose of detecting "influence" in one direction or another. Rather,
Celsus used these parallels as a weapon to attack his opponents,
specifically to undermine Christian claims to exclusivism.
These "points of contact" appear frequently in Celsus' polemic
as he compared Christianity with pagan religions in a number of
42 Against the Christians

areas. Eschatology provided important parallels; Celsus argued that

the Christian doctrines of resurrection, heaven, and eternal punish-
ment had counterparts in other religions. Jesus was like other pious
men who had suffered nobly. The Christian refusal to worship im-
ages was similar to the iconoclasm observed in other cultures. In
addition to providing parallels to accepted Greek and Roman be-
liefs, Celsus sometimes placed Christianity on the same level as other
religious belief systems that he despised. His observation that the
"barbaric" Scythians refused, like Christians, to worship images was
not intended to compliment Christianity, but rather to provide the
same kind of negative association that he used with regard to Juda-
ism. For the most part, Celsus' comparisons served the purpose of
exposing Christian teaching as unoriginal. If a doctrine or myth is
similar to those belonging to other philosophies or religions, how
can it claim to be the only valid one? Contrary to the claims of Chris-
tians about their uniqueness, Christianity was just another religion.
Its claims to exclusivism were therefore unfounded and unreason-
able.
Celsus' comparison of pagan and Christian ethics served the
same purpose, as he refuted the common Christian apologetic argu-
ment that their ethical requirements and behavior were superior to
those of the pagans. This argument was based upon the Christian
adoption of the general features of the Jewish moral code as well as
the teachings of Jesus, which had made ethical living a high priority
for Christians; they were not slow to point out the differences they
perceived between themselves and their pagan counterparts. From
at least the middle of the first century CE, Christians characterized
the "Gentiles" as being ruled by unrestrained sensuality:

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live
as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in
their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the
ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost
all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to in-
dulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more. You,
however, did not come to know Christ that way....4

Later Christian writers argued against the immorality of pagan myth

and philosophy. The Greek philosophers, they asserted, not the
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 43

Christians, were guilty of advocating cannibalism. The gods of pa-

gan mythology routinely engaged in outrageous sexual behavior.
How could pagans, whose sacred texts were full of such "abomina-
tions," accuse Christians of immorality? More than one apologist
was willing to put Christian morality to the test, demanding that
Christians be tried for actual crimes instead of merely claiming to
be Christians. Justin had demanded of his pagan opponents "that
the actions of all those denounced to you be judged, so that who-
ever is convicted may be punished as an offender, not as a Christian."S
Celsus criticized such an attitude on the part of the Christians
by pointing out parallels with Greek philosophical ethics.

Let us see also how [Celsus] thinks he can criticize our ethical teaching on
the grounds that it is commonplace and in comparison with other phi-
losophers contains no teaching that is impressive or new.6

Jesus' injunction to turn the other cheek, for example, was no differ-
ent from the teaching of Socrates, while Christian "humility" was
actually a corruption of Plato's ethics. Celsus' charge that Christian
ethical teaching was "commonplace" was a direct rebuttal of his
opponents' claim to possess a superior ethical system.
However, Celsus' rebuttal must be viewed not just from a theo-
retical viewpoint. The critic was not involved primarily in a debating
game with Christians over ethical proof-texts from Plato and Jesus.
Christian preachers were using their offer of a better way to live as
an evangelizing strategy. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the
fact that these evangelists were "invading" homes, convincing
women and children to leave home and to come live with them, was
highly disturbing to Celsus, especially as they were exhorting chil-
dren

... that they must not pay any attention to their father and school-teach-
ers, but must obey them; they say that these talk nonsense and have no
understanding, and that in reality they neither know nor are able to do
anything good, but are taken up with mere empty chatter. But they alone,
they say, know the right way to live, and if the children would believe
them, they would become happy and make their home happy as well?

According to Celsus, an important argument of Christian evange-

44 Against the Christians

lists was their superior ethical teaching; they taught that pagan fa-
thers and teachers were not only ignorant but incapable of doing
good at all. Christianity promised a new and better way to live for
those who would reject their inferior authority figures; happiness
for the convert depended upon accepting a better way of life from
the Christian teacher. Thus Celsus' argument against the unique-
ness of Christian ethical teaching was intended in part to counter
the claims of Christian evangelists. If Christian teaching could be
exposed as nothing more than what was taught by the philosophers,
or even as mere common decency, these claims could be undermined
more effectively.
A final set of important parallels between Christian and pagan
in the True Doctrine consists of Celsus' comparison of Jesus with other
gods and heroes of Greek mythology. Such comparisons were not
unique to Celsus. Part of the Christian apologetic strategy, since at
least the time of Justin, was to argue that Christianity was, in some
ways, not unusual at all. By comparing Jesus to familiar supernatu-
ral figures, Christians attempted to deflect criticism from the fact
that they rejected other gods, and possibly to win acceptance. Justin
in his First Apology argued the reasonableness of the crucifixion from
the fact that many sons of Jupiter also suffered .

. . .Aesculapius, who, though himself a healer of diseases, was struck by a

thunderbolt and ascended into heaven; Bacchus, who was torn to pieces;
Hercules, who rushed into the flames of the funeral pyre to escape his
sufferings ... 8

Neither were Justin's comparisons limited to the death of Jesus and

other divine figures. In the same way that Jesus was the Word of
God, so also "Mercury is the angelic word of God"; like Perseus,
Jesus was born of a virgin; like Asclepius, Jesus healed the lame, the
paralytic, and the blind.
To be sure, the positive comparisons of Jesus to the gods make
up only a minority of the references to the gods in Christian apolo-
getic literature. For the most part the apologists of the second century
and later criticized the immorality contained in the Greek and Ro-
man myths, made sport of the Egyptian veneration of animals, and
condemned the debauchery that occasionally characterized pagan
worship. Christians adamantly rejected the gods, their myths, and
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 45

the worship associated with them in no uncertain terms. Justin's

tactic of positive comparison was simply an alternative way in which
criticism could be deflected from the Christian worship of Jesus.
Although Celsus used the same type of comparisons, his mo-
tives, as we have stated, were quite different. A lengthy section9 of
contra Celsum has Origen and Celsus battling over the comparison
of Jesus to other gods and heroes. Celsus listed and discussed nu-
merous divine and human figures, such as Heracles, Dionysus and
Asclepius, the last of whom was revered as a god since he both healed
people and foretold the future. The purpose of this line of reason-
ing is clear: to demonstrate that Jesus was not unique among divine
figures. Not only was Jesus similar to gods such as Asclepius, he
was actually inferior; Asclepius' appearances after his death were
clearer, longer-lasting, and witnessed by more people than those of
the phantasmal Jesus. Celsus' argument attacked the uniqueness of
Jesus by asserting that, even if he really did perform miracles and
rise from the dead, he had plenty of other divine company. Although
both Celsus and Justin compared Jesus to divine gods and heroes,
Celsus' strategy served a different purpose from that of the apolo-
gist: to undermine Christian exclusivism by denying the uniqueness
of his opponents' mythology.
That this was indeed Celsus' strategy is further evidenced by
his comparison of Jesus with human figures such as Aristeas the
Proconnesian, who vanished suddenly and reappeared; Abaris the
Hyperborean, who carried an arrow throughout the world without
stopping to eat; and Cleomedes the Astypalean, who locked himself
inside a chest and disappeared when the chest was broken open.lO
Since these men did not come to be revered as gods even though
they performed amazing feats, why should Jesus be worshiped af-
ter his alleged resurrection? Celsus trumped the argument of Christ's
uniqueness by locating him as merely one among others. Thus
Celsus attacked the uniqueness of Jesus on two fronts. In the first
place, Jesus had divine company and was therefore not one of a kind,
even if he really did perform miracles and rise from the dead. Sec-
ond, Jesus had much more human company, those who were not
considered worthy of worship, although they too performed fantas-
tic deeds.
In this way Celsus argued that Christianity's claims to exclu-
sivism, as reflected in the person of Jesus, were illegitimate. Since
46 Against the Christians

Christ was not unique, he did not deserve to be treated as a unique

being at the expense of other gods and heroes. It would be going
too far to suggest that a non-exclusive Jesus would have nullified all
of the criticism leveled at Christianity; the crucifixion alone provided
an enormous amount of polemic fodder for Celsus and other oppo-
nents. We can, however, draw the conclusion that the uniqueness of
the central figure of Christian mythology was an important target
for Celsus' attack. Both pagans and Christians used arguments that
denied the uniqueness of Jesus, albeit for different reasons. For Jus-
tin and other apologists, the comparison was meant to win
respectability for the fledgling faith. In the case of Celsus, it had the
aim of undermining the uniqueness, and thus the exclusiveness, of
the religion he founded.
It may be asked whether, given Celsus' tendency to discredit
every facet of Christianity, such a strategy was wise. Was Celsus
falling into Justin's trap? In a way, the answer is "yes." Placing
Jesus in company with the popular god of healing, for example, could
have had the unintended effect of legitimizing the worship of the
very man whose legitimacy he was attempting to deny. Celsus' de-
velopment of such points of contact between Christian and pagan
mythology may have served the polemic in the short term as an
argument against Christian exclusivism, as was clearly his intent.
However, this particular aspect of the True Doctrine illustrates one of
the dangers inherent in attacking exclusivism: the risk of exposing
more similarities between polemicist and opponent than was help-
ful for the larger strategy of the totalizing discourse.
Nor was this danger limited to the area of Christian mythology.
Celsus' tactic of criticizing Christian exclusivism also targeted the
larger issue of Christian revelation as found in the Bible. After all,
could not the teachings of Christianity be found in the many belief
systems already available? While we have already sampled this
method of attack with regard to Christian ethical teaching, Celsus
used it against the very concept of Christian revelation. Whatever
claims they might have to the manifestation of divine truth, they
were only partaking in what had already been revealed to the an-
cients long ago:

[I]f a divine spirit came down from God to foretell the divine truths, this
may be the spirit which declares these doctrines; indeed, it was because
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 47

men of ancient times were touched by this spirit that they proclaimed
many excellent doctrines.ll

Perhaps Celsus had no way of knowing that this statement would

have been welcomed by many of his Christian opponents. That God
had revealed truth to the rest of the world as well as to the Chris-
tians-primarily through Plato-made perfect sense to the majority
of Christian writers from Justin in the second century to Eusebius in
the fourth and beyond. They would continue to build intellectual
bridges to pagan philosophy and religious belief, bridges which in
the long term would contribute to the growing acceptance of Chris-
tianity.
The spirit of Neoplatonic thought in the third and fourth centu-
ries would seek and welcome such bridges in its attempt to unify
the disparate strands of philosophical and religious teaching in the
empire. By demonstrating that there were important points of con-
tact between Christianity and paganism, Celsus may unwittingly
have contributed to Christianity's intellectual and religious accept-
ability. Although he himself did not blaze the trail leading to
Christian assimilation into the conceptual environment of late an-
tique paganism, he unknowingly stumbled upon the same path on
his own way to a different destination.

Of the conceptual property that Christians shared with their

pagan neighbors, the Platonist philosophical tradition was the most
far-reaching in terms of the theological development of Christian-
ity. However, long before the councils of the fourth and later
centuries would take up Platonic philosophical categories in order
to define particular aspects of the faith, Plato was being used in both
the polemic and apologetic venues of pagan-Christian interaction.
On the apologetic side, Justin had begun the project of Christian
Platonism on a limited scale in the middle of the second century. By
the early third century, Clement of Alexandria was engaged in a
full-scale effort to reconcile the teachings of Christianity with Greece-
Roman philosophy.
On the pagan side, philosophical considerations constitute an
important element of Celsus' anti-Christian polemic. Their inclu-
sion in the True Doctrine seems to have been designed to meet several
goals. In the first place, it was necessary simply to refute publicly
48 Against the Christians

the claims of the Christians that their beliefs were worthy of accep-
tance. Further, Christian evangelists and apologists had insisted from
the beginning that their faith was a plausible alternative to pagan
religion; by 200 CE, however, they were presenting Christianity no
longer as merely an alternative but as the logical culmination of
Hellenistic philosophy and culture. Of course, the presentation of
Christian teaching simultaneously as an alternative to the dominant
world view and as its purest manifestation represents a profound
contradiction, at least on the surface; it was a contradiction that Julian
exploited relentlessly. However, it is the latter assertion, the at-
tempted merging of Christian with pagan philosophical belief, that
appears to have alarmed Celsus the most. To Celsus, the Christian
blurring of the boundaries between their own doctrines and Grreco-
Roman thought was an intellectually intolerable exercise. He viewed
his opponents' presentation of Platonism in Christian dress as a thinly
disguised refutation of the most basic premises of common sense as
well as philosophy. Thus a major element of Celsus' critique was an
attempt to re-establish the boundaries between Christian "barbar-
ism" and pagan thought.
The numerous attempts on the part of Celsus and his successors
to establish and maintain these boundaries constituted such an im-
portant component of anti-Christian polemic that they are
indispensable to any study of the literature. They formed a great
deal of the intellectual battlefield during the third and fourth centu-
ries; pagan critics would by and large attempt to marginalize
Christianity by denying its aspiration to become a "philosophical
sect." That Celsus was waging this battle near the beginning of the
process and Julian after it was largely completed gives us valuable
insight into the development of this important aspect of pagan-Chris-
tian relations. Here we address three areas of Christian belief that
are philosophically important in the True Doctrine: the incarnation
of Christ, the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, and Christian
epistemology.
The incarnation of Christ was the element of Christian theology
that Celsus attacked most fiercely; his argument against the doc-
trine was based upon what was assumed by virtually all the
philosophical schools of the Greek world. The absolute transcen-
dence of the ultimate deity had been central to Greek philosophy
since Plato. Conversely, the inferiority of the material universe to
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 49

the unseen divine world was a given; matter occupied the lowest
level of both reality and goodness in the metaphysical hierarchy.
Thus to Celsus, a Platonist, the idea of the incarnation represented
an unthinkable move on the part of God from the realm of blessed-
ness to that of corruption.

Furthermore, [Celsus] says, let us take up the argument again with fur-
ther proofs. I have nothing new to say, but only ancient doctrines. God is
good and beautiful and happy, and exists in the most beautiful state. If
then He comes down to men, He must undergo change, a change from
good to bad, from beautiful to shameful, from happiness to misfortune,
and from what is best to what is most wicked.12

While various aspects of philosophical theology had undergone

changes over the previous centuries,B Celsus' summary of the "an-
cient doctrines" regarding the separation between God and the
physical world of the senses was an important and commonly held
theological assumption. The incarnation represented to Celsus a
violation of the gulf between a transcendent deity and the inferior
material world.
On the other hand, Christian apologists had argued that the in-
carnation was entirely reasonable since pagan myths were full of
interaction between gods and the world. However, Christians did
not claim to be associated ultimately with a deity on the level of
Greek mythology; they claimed to be worshiping the supreme deity
itself. Christians made no apologies for their belief that the object of
their worship was the transcendent Platonic deity, even though, as
discussed previously, they argued at the same time for the accep-
tance of their religion on the basis of the similarities between Jesus
and the lower gods.
This theological double standard was not lost on Celsus or any
of the other critics of Christianity. Christian apologists were not
going to get away with disguising exclusivist monotheism as con-
ventional mythology, even for the sake of argument. They could
not have it both ways, trying on the one hand to win acceptability
for Christianity by comparing Jesus to Asclepius while claiming on
the other that their God was the supreme deity of Platonic philoso-
phy. For Celsus, the incarnation provided the focal point of this
contradiction and thus an important point of attack. The supreme
50 Against the Christians

deity of the Christians violated all the known rules of the universe
by becoming matter; as far as Celsus was concerned, an incarnated
supreme God was an oxymoron. The incarnation provided an im-
portant area in which Celsus attempted to draw a clear boundary
between Christian teaching and Platonic thought.
The Christian belief in the resurrection of the body provided a
second such area. Like the incarnation, the idea of a physical resur-
rection flew in the face of Platonic theology, which held that the
material world occupied the lowest level of the divine hierarchy;
physical resurrection, as opposed to the immortality of the soul, was
not only repugnant but also theologically impossible. After calling
Christian (and Jewish) hopes for a bodily resurrection "the hope of
worms," Celsus went on to assert the contradiction that the idea of
resurrection provided to any rational concept of deity.

But, indeed, neither can God do what is shameful nor does He desire what
is contrary to nature .... As for the flesh, which is full of things which it is
not even nice to mention, God would neither desire nor be able to make it
everlasting contrary to reason. For He Himself is the reason of everything
that exists; therefore He is not able to do anything contrary to reason or to
His own character.14

God's character included, naturally, the separation from matter. Any

doctrine of a bodily resurrection, therefore, was anti-philosophical
as well as impossible, Christian appeals to God's omnipotence not-
withstanding. Besides the philosophical objection, the logical
problem was equally popular with critics: what if a person died at
sea, and his body then eaten by fish who were later eaten by birds?
And what if the birds were later eaten by other people? How could
such a person possibly undergo a physical resurrection? Arguments
of this type augmented the philosophical objections to the Christian
and Jewish belief in the resurrection.
As it happens, Origen, himself a Christian Platonist, had his own
problems with the doctrine of the resurrection. For largely the same
reasons as Celsus, he would resist the idea of a literal physical resto-
ration of the body. Although the church eventually rejected this
capitulation to Platonism, his stance on the issue reveals just how
far some Christians were willing to go in order to present Christian-
ity as philosophically plausible. Celsus, on the other hand, by
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 51

presenting his opponents' view in its traditional form-the literal

resurrection of the physical body-attempted to draw as sharp a
distinction as possible between "common sense" Platonism and
Christianity.
Celsus was also critical of Christian epistemology, the third ma-
jor philosophical area to which he gave his attention. The specific
ways by which God could be known varied through the develop-
ment of Platonic philosophy, from Plato's own intellectual approach
to the mystical union with the One advanced by Plotinus, the founder
of Neoplatonism in the third century CE. One aspect that the differ-
ent approaches to God had in common was their claim to be difficult,
and thus their restriction to the philosophical elite. Whether God
was to be comprehended by reason or by ascetic mysticism, the con-
ception of God's separateness from the material world virtually
mandated such a difficulty-the inadequacy of human knowledge
and language to apprehend the divine.lS
Although Celsus accused Christians of holding to a non-Platonic
theology, it has been observed more recently that some early Chris-
tian teaching did indeed include Platonic descriptions of God,
particularly in the Johannine literature.16 References to God's invis-
ibility are not infrequent in the Bible and were standard fare in early
Christian theology. God's knowability, however, was quite another
matter. Many of the Johannine statements affirming God's absolute
transcendence are conditioned by affirmations that God can indeed
be known, experienced, and loved, particularly through the inter-
mediary agency of Jesus: "No one has ever seen God, but God the
One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known"
(John 1:18). "No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another,
God lives in us and his love is made complete in us" {1 John 4:12).
Platonic, perhaps, in ontological transcendence, but not in accessi-
bility.
Nonetheless, Celsus alleged that the Christian way of knowing
God relied primarily upon the senses and not on the spirit.

Celsus again speaks as follows: "Again, too, they will say: 'How are they
to know God unless they lay hold of him by sense-perception?'" He then
gives an answer to this question, saying: "This utterance is not that of a
man or of the soul, but of the flesh. Nevertheless let them listen to me, if
so cowardly and carnal a race are able to understand anything. If you
52 Against the Christians

shut your eyes to the world of sense and look up with the mind, if you
turn away from the flesh and raise the eyes of the soul, only so will you
seeGod.1 7

Celsus' epistemological dualism attempted to strike a blow at the

Christian knowledge of God by attributing such "knowledge" to
the flesh rather than to the superior faculties of the mind and spirit.
After all, the Christian faith depended ultimately upon the reports
given by the apostles who claimed to have seen him. Had Celsus
been familiar with the Johannine epistles, 1 John 1:1 would have
provided especially useful material against which to argue.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have
seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched-
this we proclaim concerning the Word of Life.

In any event, according to Celsus, Jesus' perception of God at his

baptism and the reports of Jesus' post-resurrection appearances were
equally invalid, since they were most likely the product of halluci-
nation or magical apparition.18
Christian epistemology was thus inferior to the Platonic ideal of
"raising the eyes of the soul" in order to see God. Later, quoting
Plato's Timaeus, Celsus argued that knowing God is extremely diffi-
cult, even for the wisest of philosophers: "Now to find the Maker
and father of this universe is difficult, and after finding him it is
impossible to declare him to all men." Surely, if the knowledge of
God was difficult for the wisest of people, it would be impossible
for the "carnal race" of Christians. Celsus concluded that not only
was it impossible for Christians to comprehend God, it would be
difficult for them even to follow his argument on the matter.
Such "ignorance" on the part of his opponents is a common
theme in the True Doctrine. Celsus frequently translated the theme
into the charge that Christians were uneducated and of low social
class. According to the polemicist, Christians were only able to con-
vince slaves, women and children of their doctrines; they consciously
shunned the wise and sought only foolish and ignorant people to
add to their numbers. It seems clear that Celsus was familiar with
at least a paraphrase of Paul's rhetoric in the first chapter of 1 Corinth-
ians 1:
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 53

Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher
of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For
since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know
him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to
save those who believe .... For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's
wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.19

Christians claimed that the knowledge of God was not only simple,
but, according to Paul, actually in opposition to philosophical wis-
dom.
Celsus took this line of Pauline rhetoric-which was originally
an argument for the superiority of God's wisdom to that of the
world-and transformed it into a polemic weapon against the "ig-
norance and foolishness" of the Christians. Celsus' line of argument,
however, was not merely intended to score polemic points against
Christians by relegating them to the lower social classes. Embed-
ded in the fabric of his overall criticism of Christian ignorance is an
important epistemological argument. Since it is difficult for even
the wise to know God, he argued, how much more difficult-in-
deed, impossible-must it be for Christians? Celsus found ridiculous
the Christian claim that only faith, not rational argument, was re-
quired for the knowledge of God. This approach violated Platonic
sensibilities regarding apprehension of the One. Such Christian anti-
intellectualism, combined with the alleged ignorance and social
status of Christians, was enough to dismiss out of hand their claim
to be a cult of the highest God. According to Celsus, it was ludi-
crous to claim that barbarians (such as the Jews), the lower class
(such as the Christians), and the fideistic approach of Christian evan-
gelists could apprehend what only the wisest philosophers could
even begin to grasp.
Such an epistemological inversion on the part of the Christians
was not only counterintuitive but philosophically offensive to Celsus.
His characterization of Christians as occupying the lowest strata of
society served more than merely a polemic function. The social is-
sue was important not only for the sake of rhetoric, but also because
Platonic epistemology allowed the knowledge of God only for the
wisest. His argument thus served both rhetorical and theological
functions, based as it was in Platonic "elite" epistemology. Celsus
was attempting to marginalize Christianity, both socially and philo-
54 Against the Christians

sophically, a task of no small importance since Christianity was

making inroads among the upper classes at the time he wrote the
True Doctrine.

Celsus' distinctions between Christian doctrine and Greek phi-

losophy would have been intended primarily for the elite among
his readers. He himself said as much, particularly when polemicizing
against those whom he characterized as his lesser-educated oppo-
nents. Of course, his arguments were not meant to be read only by
philosophers; the time-honored question as to the reconstitution of
scattered human remains at the resurrection was popular anti-Chris-
tian fare. For the most part, however, the philosophical criticisms
we have examined thus far would have been most intelligible to the
more educated.
Celsus' defense of polytheism, however, would have been un-
derstandable both to the elite and to the general public. Everyone
from agricultural laborer to court philosopher was involved in the
worship of the gods to one degree or another. The festivals of the
gods were important social occasions. Every Roman home honored
its genius, as well as its lares and penates as guardians of home and
pantry respectively. The philosophical elite, while privately (and
occasionally publicly) criticizing the more outrageous elements of
Greek and Roman mythology, would not have dreamed of neglect-
ing civic cult. Thus Celsus' attack on Christian exclusive monotheism
would have been relevant for a broad audience.
But the gods of antiquity were not merely beings to be worshiped
with the appropriate public and private ceremonies. The gods per-
meated the universe, infusing the physical world with life and
mediating between the realms of matter and spirit. To Plutarch in
the second century CE, ignoring these "daemons" could lead only
to chaos, just as if the air were removed from the space between the
earth and the moon .

. . .just in the same way those who refuse to leave us the race of demigods
[8at~L6vc.JV] make the relations of gods and men remote and alien by do-
ing away with the "interpretive and ministering nature" as Plato has called
it, or else they force us to a disorderly confusion of all things, in which we
bring the god into men's emotions and activities, drawing him down to
our needs .... 20
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 55

The "ministering spirits" provided not only cosmological order

but also the necessities of human life. Ignoring these lower gods
was a supreme act of ingratitude, according to Celsus, with poten-
tially disastrous results if they were not kept satisfied.

But whenever [Christians] eat food, and drink wine, and taste fruits, and
drink even water itself, and breathe even the very air, are they not receiv-
ing each of these from certain daemons, among whom the administration
of each of these has been divided? ... Either we ought not to live at all
anywhere on earth and not to enter this life, or, if we do enter this life
under these conditions, we ought to give thanks to the daemons who have
been allotted control over earthly things, and render to them firstfruits
and prayers as long as we live that we may obtain their goodwill towards
us.21

At the same time, however, it was not sufficient for Celsus sim-
ply to affirm the validity of traditional polytheism; he employed
other theological tools already in circulation. There existed, for ex-
ample, a pagan "monotheism," confined for the most part to
philosophical circles. At least since Plato, it had become necessary
to work out the relationship between the supreme being of philo-
sophical construct and the many gods of the Gr~co-Roman
pantheon; the same problem would arise for the gods of the various
nations that would eventually be subsumed under the Roman Em-
pire.22 Celsus' challenge was to critique Christian monotheistic
exclusivism while simultaneously preserving the basic concept of
philosophical "monotheism." His solution was that the various gods
were responsible for the differing operations of the universe at the
behest of the One.

And whatever there may be in the universe, whether the work of God, or
of angels, or of other daemons or heroes, do not all these things keep a
law given by the greatest God? And has there not been appointed over
each particular thing a being who has been thought worthy to be allotted
power? Would not a man, therefore, who worships God rightly worship
the being who has obtained authority from him?23

For Celsus, the worship of the gods was necessary not only in order
to keep the blessings of the physical universe flowing to humanity;
56 Against the Christians

the proper veneration of those deities was the correct way to wor-
ship the supreme God as well. More specific benefits were available
to devotees of particular gods; healing, children, or protection from
danger might be bestowed by deities who received adequate ven-
eration from a worshiper.24 The gods served as agents of the supreme
God, operating the mechanisms of the physical world and preserv-
ing harmony in nature. They were worthy of worship according to
the traditions handed down from one's ancestors.
But Celsus did not stop with affirming a theoretical relationship
of the many to the One. The supreme deity could be accessed (im-
perfectly, of course) through some of the avenues afforded by popular
religion; in this he was in agreement with other writers of his era.
With the emergence of a large empire had come an impetus to unify
the disparate strands of particular national religions, on a popular
as well as philosophical level. One such attempt in the realm of
popular religion was made in the second century by LuciusApuleius
in his story The Golden Ass. In this tale the protagonist, who has
been turned into a donkey, receives a vision of the Egyptian god-
dess Isis on the beach near the Greek port city of Cenchreae. In the
vision, the goddess assumes sweeping power and authority.

I am she that is the natural mother of all things, mistress and governess of
all the elements, the initial progeny of worlds, chief of the powers divine,
queen of all that are in hell, the principal of them that dwell in heaven,
manifested alone and under one form of all the gods and goddesses. At
my will the planets of the sky, the wholesome winds of the seas, and the
lamentable silences of hell be disposed; my name, my divinity is adored
throughout all the world, in divers manners, in variable customs, and by
many narries.25

Isis makes two remarkable claims for herself here. The first is uni-
versal supremacy over all the powers of the universe. While not
explicitly stating her supreme status in terms of Platonic monothe-
ism, the goddess claims a broad range of powers and a high status
of rulership that more than hints at universal supremacy. The sec-
ond notable trait is that she claims to be worshiped "in divers
manners, in variable customs, and by many names." Isis asserts
that at least some of the gods and goddesses of the different nations
are in reality to be identified with a particular deity, namely herself.
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 57

Apuleius is, of course, doing more than writing a fanciful tale

about a man turned into a donkey and then restored by the power
of Isis. The story is an undisguised attempt to advocate the cult of
Isis by demonstrating her power, mercy and universality. It also
appears to have been an attempt to reconcile on a popular level the
notion of a transcendent deity with the varieties of pagan religion
practiced by the people. It has been argued that Apuleius was heavily
indebted to Plutarch, particularly his work On Isis and Osiris, which
attempted to reconcile Platonist monotheism with popular religion
by asserting the ultimate compatibility of Isis worship with
Platonism. 26
Even if Celsus himself was not a devotee of Isis, he would have
been sympathetic to the claims of Apuleius' "universally pluralis-
tic" goddess. Although she claimed to be the supreme deity, she
did not deny the existence or the value of the other gods. She even
welcomed the adoration she received through these gods through-
out the world, even though such adoration was not directed
specifically to her. All belief systems were valid because they ulti-
mately pointed to her, whether or not this fact was universally
realized. In the same way, Celsus was not alone in holding that
differing belief systems could be valid; the greatest authority, after
all, was the witness of antiquity. One of Celsus' contemporaries,
Numenius of Apamea, had a respect for ancient national religions, a
respect that led him to contemplate the unity the religions of the
world might have in common. According to Numenius, all reli-
gions contained truth since they came ultimately from the same
source.

But when one has spoken upon this point, and sealed it by the testimonies
of Plato, it will be necessary to go back and connect it with the precepts of
Pythagoras, and to appeal to the nations of good repute, bringing for-
ward their rites and doctrines, and their institutions which are formed in
agreement with those of Plato, all that the Brachmans, and Jews, and Magi,
and Egyptians arranged.27

For Celsus, there was nothing inherently wrong with monothe-

ism-an inclusive monotheism, at any rate-since many nations,
particularly the oldest and wisest, possessed the concept as it was
embedded in their national myths. In agreement with Apuleius and
58 Against the Christians

Numenius, Celsus asserted that the supreme deity could be called

by any of the names ascribed to him by the various nations, since
the existence of such a God had been universally perceived from
antiquity. Thus Zeus could be called Zen, Adonai, Sabaoth, the Egyp-
tian Amoun, or even the Scythian Papaeus. This assertion, however,
was more than a statement about what the divinity ought to be
named. It was a theological statement that informed what Celsus
called the "true doctrine," the fact that "There is an ancient doctrine
which has existed from the beginning, which has always been main-
tained by the wisest nations and cities and wise men."28 While the
content of the "true doctrine" cannot be completely reconstructed
from Origen's recapitulation of Celsus' teaching,29 what seems to
have been important to Celsus was that such a teaching dated from
earliest antiquity and was common to many nations (not including,
of course, the Jews, contra Numenius).
Naturally, for Celsus, the existence of such a "true doctrine" in
no way detracted from the necessity of worshiping the traditional
gods. Even a devotee of Isis would have participated in domestic
cult and the festivals of the civic deities. The bottom line for Celsus
was that the lesser gods ought not to be neglected, regardless of
what "ultimate" truth might actually be with regard to the identity
of a supreme God.
Complementing Celsus' belief in a "universal polytheism" was
his doctrine that the supreme God had assigned "overseers" to the
nations, deities that came to be identified with the various geographic
regions and ethnic groups and that were responsible for their wel-
fare. Such a theology accomplished several purposes. In the first
place, it explained the variations in religious practice among the na-
tions, since each nation's gods had differing requirements for
worship. At the same time, this construction perpetuated the ethi-
cal imperative that everyone ought to follow the traditions of their
ancestors, since the various nations and peoples were still under the
oversight of the gods that were originally appointed over them .

. . .it is probable that from the beginning the different parts of the earth
were allotted to different overseers, and are governed in this way by hav-
ing been divided between certain authorities. In fact, the practices done
by each nation are right when they are done in the way that pleases the
overseers; and it is impious to abandon the customs which have existed in
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 59

each locality from the beginning.30

The polemic context of Celsus' theology was, of course, his asser-

tion that everyone should worship the gods, particularly those of
one's own nation. That the Christians were guilty of apostasy-not
only from Judaism but from the ancestral religions of their respec-
tive Gentile nations-is a prominent theme in the True Doctrine; the
teaching regarding the national divine overseers gave Celsus the
theological justification he needed for calling the Christians back to
their religious roots. At the same time, it also offered the critic a
way to meet his objective discussed earlier, namely to attack the ex-
clusive Christian version of monotheism while preserving at the
same time a Platonic universalism.
By presenting Christianity as incompatible with either popular
polytheism or Platonic monotheism-or, in this case, a combination
of both-Celsus attempted rhetorically to marginalize Christianity
out of existence. According to Celsus, although Plato and the gods
could coexist peacefully, it was impossible to integrate Christian
teaching into any valid theological system, whether philosophical
or popular. That a Greek writer in the Severan age of the Roman
empire found himself defending basic polytheism is not inconse-
quential, perhaps an indicator of the underlying strength of Christian
exclusive monotheism.

Celsus wrote the True Doctrine at a time during which Christian-

ity was undergoing profound changes. It was transforming itself
from a state of relative isolation to a level of social and intellectual
integration with pagan culture. A high conversion rate was break-
ing down the barriers between church and society. The church was
continuing to define itself in relation to Judaism, a process acceler-
ated by two Jewish revolts and the Marcionite movement. Clement
of Alexandria was beginning the process of marrying Christian the-
ology with Greek philosophy. And even though persecution
continued in varying degrees for the next hundred years, the third
century witnessed the growth of Christianity into a major religious
force.
Such was the Christianity with which Celsus grappled. It was a
complex and growing, not to mention divided, organism. For this
reason it is important to look critically at Celsus' representation of
60 Against the Christians

his opponents in order to describe his rhetorical strategy. Some as-

pects of the polemic of the True Doctrine appear somewhat strained.
These include Celsus' characterization of Christianity as a secretive,
isolated offshoot of Judaism, as well as his caricature of Christians
as ignorant, foolish and unphilosophical. Scholars have normally
characterized Celsus as a learned critic of Christianity, and there is
little doubt that he researched his opponent with some care. Al-
though his actual knowledge of the Bible seems to have been limited,
especially compared with that of Porphyry and Julian, his criticism
of Christianity was in large measure based on observation and care-
ful reflection. However, scholarship on Celsus has historically tended
to treat him as an impartial observer, perhaps forgetting that his was
a polemic work intended for rhetorical effect, not a record for church
historians of a later era. For this reason he is sometimes read
uncritically as his excerpts in Origen's contra Celsum are mined for
historical information regarding the early church.
A better model for interpreting Celsus' attack on Christianity
takes into account his polemic context. The church near the turn of
the third century was emerging from its isolation with vigor; ru-
mors of immoral behavior were no longer sufficient to oppose it. A
new strategy was therefore necessary, one that Celsus applied so
successfully that such a mind as Origen's was needed to refute it a
half century later. Christianity presented such an overwhelming
threat to Celsus and the world he valued that a written work was
required to refute the church's claims, ridicule its beliefs, and
marginalize its adherents. For this reason, Celsus adopted a rhe-
torical stance designed to erect an impenetrable rhetorical boundary
between Christianity and paganism, between the church and soci-
ety, a fenced enclosure within which he could isolate and display
his opponents in an exaggerated fashion. His totalizing discourse
allowed no positive characterizations of Christianity; even the simi-
larities between Jesus and Asclepius and the other gods were
intended to accentuate the irrationality of Christian exclusivism.
Celsus was inaccurate, but with good reason. His presentation of
Christianity as "huddled in a corner" was a reaction to the fact that
Christians had begun to emerge from that corner in force.
At the same time, although Celsus' critique lacked the accusa-
tions of sexual immorality and cannibalism that characterized the
previous decades, it retained something important in common with
Celsus, Plato, and the Gods 61

the shouts of the crowds at the amphitheaters of Lyons and Vienne.

The True Doctrine contains no hint that Christianity was tolerable in
any form, whether social, mythical or doctrinal; Celsus' goal, like
that of the crowd, was the elimination of Christianity altogether. In
this respect, although his criticism was more philosophical in tone
and content than previous critiques had been, he nonetheless car-
ried the banner for the early phase in the pagan criticism of
Christianity, a phase characterized by a totalizing discourse of un-
conditional rejection.
In spite of Christianity's moves toward cultural integration,
Celsus denied his opponents, or any aspect of their belief system,
any measure of intellectual or theological legitimacy. Regardless of
the prevailing philosophical and religious impetus (as well as his
own tendency) to unite all religious belief into a "unified" theology,
Celsus resisted the trend when it came to the Jews and Christians.
Although he was not ready to surrender any ground of legitimacy
to either his opponents or their Jewish spiritual ancestors, the cur-
rents of universalism were already gaining strength by the time
Celsus put down his pen. The rhetorical boundary that both he and
Tertullian were attempting to construct between Christianity and
pagan theology was already being eroded by 200 CE; Clement of
Alexandria in particular was identifying in very specific terms the
similarities between the Christian faith and the "truth-loving Plato."
The boundary would disintegrate further over the next hundred
years; by the time of Constantine it would be barely recognizable.
This page intentionally left blank
 4

Porphyry and the Polemic

of Universalism

Celsus' criticisms went unanswered until about 248 CE, when Origen
composed contra Celsum at the request of his friend Ambrose. By
that time, however, the relationship between Christians and the
dominant pagan culture had undergone enormous changes. Gone
for good were the lingering rumors of cannibalism and ritual sex. If
a wave of conversions had indeed occurred in the late second and
early third centuries, their children and grandchildren were now
swelling the ranks of the church. A few of these, Origen himself
among them, were enjoying access to the imperial court. According
to the philosopher Porphyry, whose criticism of Christianity is the
subject of this chapter, Origen was also at one time a colleague of
Plotinus, the founder of Neoplatonism. To be sure, only the Chris-
tian elite possessed such philosophical sophistication; the greater
part of the church still consisted of the uneducated, and Celsus' criti-
cism of the Christian underclass maintained some degree of validity
through the third century. However, Christians had not only begun
the process of appropriating Greek philosophy for themselves, they
were also making converts among the upper classes. Over the course
of the third century the church was becoming a more respectable, as
well as permanent, fixture in Roman society.
From the perspective of many pagans, such respectability de-
manded new forms of opposition; in their view Christianity had
become a serious problem to the empire. Popular resentment was
expressed in 249 with anti-Christian riots in Alexandria, the first in
many decades. An edict of the emperor Decius in 250 requiring
everyone in the empire to sacrifice to the gods precipitated the first
persecution of Christianity that was both imperially directed and
widely enforced. Large numbers of Christians sacrificed, and many
were killed before Decius died in battle against the Goths in 251.
In about 270, new literary opposition to Christianity appeared
64 Against the Christians

from the Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry of Tyre (c. 233-c. 305).

His knowledge of Christianity, especially his familiarity with the
Bible, was much greater than that of Celsus. At the same time, the
target of his polemic had become a more formidable presence than
Celsus' opponents had been. As a result, some of Porphyry's argu-
ments demonstrate an acceptance of, or at least resignation to, the
permanent presence of Christianity, with an accompanying shift in
rhetorical strategy. Before we proceed, however, a more detailed
look at the context of the third century is in order.

During the late second and early third centuries the empire en-
joyed relative peace under the Severan dynasty (193-235). Massive
building projects were completed during this period. The imperial
court was a place of intellectual and religious exchange, a phenom-
enon associated particularly with Julia Damna, the wife of emperor
Septimius Severus and daughter of the Syrian high priest of the Baal
of Emesa.
Christians continued to suffer sporadic persecution through the
first decade of the third century; despite, or perhaps because of, the
growth of the church during this period, many regarded Christian-
ity as a threat of increasing seriousness. However, there are a number
of differences between the persecutions of this period and those of a
generation earlier. The accusations of outrageous immorality, namely
the charges of cannibalism and ritual intercourse, are not found in
the surviving literature. Instead, the accounts of the martyrdoms
contain more prominently the charges that the Christians had aban-
doned the gods and that they refused to perform sacrifice to them
on behalf of the emperor.
One aspect of the persecutions of the early third century, how-
ever, testifies to the fact that the Christian presence had been accepted
as a permanent fact of life. In many of the martyrologies the victims
were new converts, while most church leaders seem to have been
left alone. In Alexandria, for example, several students of Origen
were executed during the reign of Septimius Severus, while Origen
himself lived until 254, when he died from the torture he had un-
dergone during the later persecution of Decius. The reason converts
were singled out may have been the decree that Septimius Severus
is reported to have issued forbidding conversion to either Judaism
or Christianity. Such a decree (if genuine) reveals that although con-
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 65

version was prohibited, the actual existence of Christianity had be-

come an accepted reality by the early years of the third century.
The two decades that followed the Severan persecution were
relatively peaceful for the church; in fact, much of the written evi-
dence suggests that the imperial courts were actually becoming
sympathetic to Christians. Whether or not is it true, as the writer of
the Augustan History reports, that the emperor Alexander Severus
(222-235) kept statues of Orpheus, Abraham and Christ in his pri-
vate chapel,l the fact that such a rumor could be sustained attests to
a greater acceptability for Christianity than would have been
dreamed of under Marcus Aurelius. In any event, the emperor's
mother Julia Mamaea held discussions with Origen at Alexandria,
another indication that Christian beliefs were at least receiving a
hearing at the highest levels.
The death of Alexander Severus in 235 marked the beginning of
a nearly total dissolution of the Roman Empire. Incursions from
barbarians threatened normally safe urban areas, including Athens.
Invasions by the newly-revived Persian Empire under Sapor I
brought chaos to the eastern parts of the empire. A series of plagues,
famines, natural disasters and short-lived soldier-emperors made
life more precarious than at any time in the history of the empire;
the fifth-century pagan historian Zosimus was not exaggerating
when he declared that "the entire Roman Empire [was] reeling in
the direction of ultimate annihilation."2
In this threatening environment scapegoats were sought and
found in the Christians. In such an atmosphere of crisis, the percep-
tion that the gods had abandoned the empire fed public animosity
toward the Christians. Even the reign of an emperor sympathetic to
Christianity, Philip the Arab (244-249), only delayed the inevitable
outbreak of official action.
Such action was taken by Decius, emperor from 249 to 251. In
an unprecedented move for unprecedented times, he ordered ev-
eryone in the empire to sacrifice to the gods of Rome. Nor were
Christian leaders spared as they had been under Severus. Fabian,
bishop of Rome, fell to the decree, as did Alexander at Jerusalem
and Babylas at Antioch. Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, was cap-
tured by authorities but was later rescued by Christians; in Carthage,
Cyprian went into hiding. This time, the motives for the persecu-
tion were unmistakable; the disasters of the third century were
66 Against the Christians

blamed, if not on the Christians, then upon the failure of the popu-
lation to adhere to the traditional gods. That the Christians were a
major cause of this neglect was lost on no one.
Large numbers of Christians sacrificed to the gods of Rome; sev-
eral decades of relative peace had brought many into the church
who were unprepared for martyrdom. If Dionysius' account of
events at Alexandria is representative of the situation throughout
the empire, the persecution produced many apostates as well as
martyrs.

All, indeed, were greatly alarmed, and many of the more eminent imme-
diately gave way to [the edicts requiring sacrifice] ... others were brought
by their acquaintance, and when called by name, they approached the
impure and unholy sacrifices. But, pale and trembling, as if they were not
to sacrifice, but themselves to be the victims of the sacrifices to the idols,
they were jeered by many of the surrounding multitude, and were obvi-
ously equally afraid to die and to offer the sacrifice. But some advanced
with greater readiness to the altars, and boldly asserted that they had never
before been Christians.3

The church's success in gaining converts had outrun the success of

discipline. Large amounts of church property were also confiscated,
a sign that the wealth of the church had increased dramatically since
the beginning of the century. Thus the Decian persecution is in some
ways an indicator of the success that Christianity had enjoyed in the
decades since the early Severan age.
The persecution was short-lived, however, as the emperor him-
self was killed in battle in 251. A few years later, in 257, the emperor
Valerian launched sporadic persecutions; Decius' edict had not
changed the basic perception linking the Christians with the disas-
ters befalling the empire. The Christians had neglected the gods,
and therefore the gods had neglected the empire. One magistrate,
Aemilianus the deputy prefect of Egypt, went to the heart of the
matter during the interrogation of bishop Dionysius: "But who pre-
vents you from worshipping this one God, if he is a god, together
with those that are the natural gods?"4 Christian exclusivism, ex-
pressed in their refusal to give proper honor to the gods, brought
Christians into direct conflict with the state.
The collapse of the empire was arrested during the reign of
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 67

Aurelian (270-275). His rule witnessed what may be rightly called

the restoration of the empire, with the emperor himself known as
the "restorer of the world." The Goths were beaten back from their
incursions into the Italian peninsula and Greece, the earlier bound-
aries of the empire largely restored. Only Dacia was given up
permanently, while an independent state that had arisen in Gaul
was reabsorbed into the empire. In the east, Aurelian brought down
Queen Zenobia of Palmyra in Syria, who had declared independence
and had also conquered Egypt. Aurelian' s reign was cut short when
soldiers assassinated him in 275.
Decius and Valerian had failed to destroy Christianity, and the
religion continued to gain converts and prestige during the dark
years of the middle of the third century. The church's success in
gaining converts and acquiring property has already been men-
tioned. Further evidence that Christianity had won a degree of
acceptance was the affair of Paul of Samosata, bishop of Antioch
(261-272). Called by other eastern bishops to account for his belief
that the Logos had descended upon the person of Jesus rather than
Jesus having been the Logos from conception, Paul was eventually
condemned by a church council in 268. His removal from office was
delayed, however, as long as Queen Zenobia held the city. When
Aurelian captured Antioch in 272, the bishops took their case to the
emperor, who decreed that the bishopric would be retained by
"whom the Christian bishops of Italy and Rome should write."S
Paul's subsequent removal was thus indirectly a result of an impe-
rial decision.
While Aurelian's intervention in the controversy over the bish-
ops is sometimes attested as a forerunner to Byzantine imperial
involvement in doctrinal issues, it is better not to imply such a pre-
cedent from this event. For Aurelian, what was at issue was the
restoration of church property to its rightful owners, not the settle-
ment of a doctrinal dispute. More important to observe from this
affair is that Christianity had been accepted by now as a permanent
presence. The fact that a decision of bishops was accepted by an
emperor who was not a Christian sympathizer is an even greater
indication of pagan (or at least imperial) resignation to the presence
of the church. The existence of Christianity, once precarious, was
now permanent.
A final development should be summarized before proceeding
68 Against the Christians

to Porphyry's polemic. In addition to reunifying the empire and

restoring its territorial integrity, Aurelian undertook sweeping reli-
gious reforms. Important for the purposes of this study is what these
reforms indicate about developments in the religious environment
over the course of the third century, the substance of which devel-
opments are also reflected in Porphyry's writings.
Early in his reign Aurelian instituted a cult of the Sun in Rome6
as an attempt to unify the religion of the empire after a lengthy pe-
riod of chaos. Part of this unification involved a strengthening of
the imperial cult as well; he was the first Roman emperor to pro-
claim his own divinity on official documents. His institution of the
solar cult, however, represented the first major attempt to assimi-
late the disparate gods of the various parts of the empire under the
authority of a single deity, Sol Invictus (The Unconquered Sun). While
Franz Cumont's claim7 thatAurelian's reforms constituted the death
blow to traditional paganism is exaggerated, the rise of the solar
cult was a key development in the general trend toward syncretism
during the third century.
This syncretism on the imperial level occurred simultaneously
with the career of the Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry of Tyre,
who articulated similar beliefs and who wrote Against the Christians
in the same year as Aurelian's accession to the throne. What the
emperor would attempt officially was already au courant in intellec-
tual circles, at least on the abstract level. As we will observe,
Porphyry's anti-Christian work gives us tantalizing if incomplete
clues to a religious world view that could have, at least theoreti-
cally, even included elements of Christianity.

In 270 CE Porphyry wrote an extensive polemic against Chris-

tianity in fifteen books. What little remains is preserved exclusively
in the works of later Christian authors. Many of Porphyry's criti-
cisms of the Christians and their faith were anticipated by Celsus
decades before. Like Celsus, Porphyry ridiculed the Christian be-
liefs in the incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus, for
largely the same reasons as his predecessor. To Porphyry as to Celsus,
the doctrine of hell was equally offensive; quoting the saying of Jesus,
"With what measure you mete, it shall be measured to you again,"
Porphyry protested that the Christian teaching regarding eternal
punishment for relatively limited sins did not fit Jesus' own fair cri-
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 69

terion for judgment.

One area in which Porphyry exceeded Celsus, however, was in
his knowledge of the Christian scriptures. Celsus appears to have
had little familiarity with either the Jewish or Christian sacred writ-
ings; while he seemed familiar enough with many Christian beliefs
and practices, he used very little of the Bible in his True Doctrine.
Porphyry, on the other hand, was intimately familiar with the Bible
of the Christians. In fact, of the 97 fragments that Adolf von Harnack
assigned to the text of Against the Christians, about three-fourths deal
directly or indirectly with the biblical text. It is perhaps this famil-
iarity that led the fifth-century church historian Socrates to believe
that Porphyry had at one time been a Christian. Porphyry's exper-
tise in textual matters is also indicated by his evaluation of some of
the gnostic writings:

Many of the Christians of this period ... exhibited also Revelations bear-
ing the names of Zoroaster, Zostrianus, Nicotheus, Allogenes, Mesus, and
others of that order. . . . I myself have shown on many counts that the
Zoroastrian volume is spurious and modern, concocted by the sectaries in
order to pretend that the doctrines they had embraced were those of the
ancient sage.B

As for the texts of non-gnostic Christians, Porphyry argued that the

biblical book of Daniel was "spurious and modern" as well. In an
attempt to undermine Christian claims concerning the value of their
predictive prophecies, he assigned the writing of Daniel to the reign
of Antioch us Epiphanes, four centuries later than the traditional date
of the sixth century BC£.9
While Porphyry's attacks on Daniel have received the most schol-
arly attention, the majority of his surviving criticisms of the Bible
deal with the New Testament. His primary aim was to undermine
the credibility of the New Testament by attacking the writers of the
four gospels, the apostle Paul and his writings, and the apostles as a
group. In addition, his attack on the apostles parallels in some re-
spects Celsus' attack on Jesus. According to Porphyry the disciples
of Jesus were deceitful magicians who tricked their hearers, espe-
cially women and the poor, for personal gain. "Rustic men and
paupers, because they had nothing, worked certain wonders with
magic arts. There is nothing to boast about in performing won-
70 Against the Christians

ders."lO Like the Jesus of Celsus' True Doctrine, the disciples were
cowardly and weak. With regard to their preaching and their re-
ports of Jesus' life they were nothing more than sophists, plagiarists
and storytellers. It is for this reason that the Christian scriptures,
according to Porphyry, were unreliable and contradictory.
However, Porphyry had concerns other than attacking Chris-
tianity for its own sake. Unlike many philosophers, Porphyry was a
religious man, devoted to popular cult as well as philosophy. His-
torically, the philosophical tradition had in many ways been
unsympathetic to the religious beliefs and practices of most people.
In Porphyry, however, we find a unique fusion of religious and philo-
sophical passions. His work Philosophy from Oracles was designed,
as the title indicates, to demonstrate the compatibility between the
Greek philosophical tradition and the approved oracles of the Medi-
terranean world.
With regard to his work Against the Christians, Timothy Barnes
has suggestedll that Porphyry wrote it in the era of 300-305 CE as a
propagandistic effort to support the Great Persecution of 303-311,
although our study accepts the more commonly held date of 270.12
While it is possible that the uncovering of contradictions in the Chris-
tian scriptures-the primary constituents of the extant portions of
Porphyry's work-might serve political interests, what remains of
Against the Christians appears to be more a criticism of texts than
substantive attacks on a religion threatening to overwhelm the em-
pire. To whatever degree the two issues can be legitimately
separated, Porphyry's concerns were more religious than political.
They were also more religious than philosophical in orientation.
Whereas it is true, as noted earlier, that Porphyry showed concerns
similar to those of Celsus, what survives of Porphyry's work is not
nearly so philosophically oriented as that of his predecessor. In fact,
Porphyry's assault on Christianity appears philosophically weak in
comparison to Celsus' True Doctrine. Even though he criticized such
doctrines as the resurrection of the dead, the majority of what sur-
vives of Against the Christians treats difficulties and contradictions
in the Christian scriptures, not arguments that the religion was philo-
sophically objectionable.
Porphyry's relative lack of an explicitly Platonist point of depar-
ture is only one of a number of differences between his work and
that of Celsus. A further examination of these differences will assist
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 71

us in tracing not only the development of anti-Christian arguments

in general over the course of the third century, but also the develop-
ment of the opposition to Christian exclusivism. We have mentioned
briefly a few of these differences, such as Porphyry's greater knowl-
edge of the New Testament. Some of the major remaining differences
reflect the progress of the church in society during the intervening
period; others are a result of a better-informed opponent in the per-
son of Porphyry of Tyre.
Perhaps the most apparent difference between the works of the
two critics is Porphyry's complete lack of reference to Christian so-
cial exclusivism. This lack is a result of the increased diffusion of
Christians into the larger society; by the middle of the third century
Christians occupied positions in the army and in the upper echelons
of society, including the imperial court. Gone for good were the
days of the "secret society" that Celsus had criticized. Christians
were meeting in the open, driven underground only during times
of persecution; the construction of church buildings in the third cen-
tury attests both the growing wealth and increasing public presence
of Christians. The discovery at Dura Europos of the earliest known
church building, dating from about 232 CE, indicates that Chris-
tianity enjoyed a measure of tolerance and wealth during the reign
of Alexander Severus.
Lacking also in Porphyry's polemic is the criticism of Judaism
so prevalent in Celsus' work. Celsus' treatment of Judaism and the
Jewish scriptures had served the purpose of linking the Christians
in an unfavorable manner with the "irrational" and "antisocial" re-
ligion that gave them birth; by attacking Judaism he thus attacked
Christianity. Porphyry's discussions of the Hebrew Bible, on the
other hand, did not generally criticize Judaism per se. Instead, his
treatment of the Jewish scriptures was designed primarily to refute
specifically Christian interpretations. While it is true that Porphyry
sometimes attacked the Hebrew Bible, more typical of his polemic
was his criticism of Christian allegorical interpretations of it, par-
ticularly on the part of Origen. Porphyry commented that Christian
interpreters,

ambitious rather to find some solution to the absurdities of the Jewish

writings, instead of abandoning them, have turned their minds to exposi-
tions, inconsistent with themselves, and inapplicable to the writings ... 13
72 Against the Christians

Porphyry was more concerned with Christian "mishandling" of the

Hebrew Bible than with discrediting the Jewish writings themselves.
As alluded to earlier, another important development in Against
the Christians is that Porphyry had a far better command of the New
Testament than did Celsus. Although scholars often characterize
Celsus as an informed opponent of Christianity, his knowledge of
the Gospels was at times erroneous, seemingly based more on ru-
mor than upon actual study. His understanding of the epistles was
vague at best. There are few references to Pauline material, for in-
stance, in the True Doctrine, and there is no mention of Paul in his
work. 14 His literary successor Porphyry, however, seems to have
read the Gospels and even the rest of the New Testament with some
care. His detailed refutation of contradictions between Gospel ac-
counts, for example, as well as his arguments against specific
teachings of Jesus and Paul reveal an opponent of Christianity much
more familiar with Christian writings than was Celsus.
Finally, perhaps the most intriguing element of Porphyry's work
is the philosopher's assertion that, according to a prophetic oracle,
the gods had elevated Jesus to the status of one of the immortals.
While this development will be discussed in more detail later, it will
suffice for the moment to observe that while Celsus' treatment of
Jesus was exclusively negative, Porphyry attributed both immortal-
ity and piety to the founder of Christianity. And while it is true that
the philosopher criticized some of the sayings of Jesus recorded in
the Gospels, it is also true that for the first time he drew distinctions
between the teachings and character of Jesus and those of his dis-
ciples. Not only is this attempt to distinguish the person of Jesus
from the movement he inspired fascinating in its own right, but Jesus'
elevation by an opponent has important implications for both our
discussion of Christian exclusivism and Porphyry's rhetorical strat-
egy.
Naturally, there are similarities as well as differences between
Celsus' anti -Christian arguments and those of Porphyry. Since both
critics shared the presuppositions of Platonic philosophy, both con-
demned the Christian teaching of the resurrection; although
Porphyry attributed immortality to Jesus, such a status was based
upon a personal eschatology of the disembodied soul in a blessed
state, not a physical resurrection. In addition, both critics attacked
the disciples of Jesus as presented in the New Testament, calling
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 73

them simpletons or deceivers or both. Celsus and Porphyry both

attributed to the Christians a reliance upon blind faith and intransi-
gence when it came to listening to reason.
On the whole, however, the differences between Celsus and Por-
phyry are more apparent than their similarities. Some of these
differences are a result of the improved position of Christianity by
the second half of the third century. Others stem from a difference
in emphasis between the two writers, especially Porphyry's con-
centration on New Testament inconsistencies. In addition, there is a
nearly complete lack of philosophical sophistication on the part of
Porphyry, whereas many of Celsus' arguments are buttressed by
Platonic arguments.
As may be expected, their treatments of Christian exclusivism
differed markedly as well. While it was noted previously that Celsus
offered no organized philosophical resistance to exclusivism per se,
he at least touched upon those social and theological aspects of
exclusivism that he found offensive. Porphyry's objections to the
idea are less explicit still. On the other hand, a few examples of his
anti-Christian polemic will enable us to gain some insight into the
state of the objection, especially when it is placed in the context of
philosophical and political moves toward religious syncretism in
the third century. The first specific element of Porphyry's critique
discussed here has to do with Christianity's appearance in relatively
recent time; if it is the only true religion, what happened to all the
people who lived before the time of Jesus? The second element of
interest is Porphyry's search for a "universal way" of salvation that
would be applicable for all people at all times. Third, as we have
briefly mentioned, Porphyry described Christ as having been pious
as well as elevated to immortal status. We will observe their impli-
cations for our study as we treat each of these developments in turn.

One specific element of Christian teaching made the religion

particularly vulnerable to objections against exclusivism. This char-
acteristic was that its central myth occurred at a particular geographic
location and at a specific time that could be dated through historical
records. The incarnation of the Christian deity and his crucifixion
and resurrection, according to Christian teaching, happened in Pal-
estine during the reigns of Augustus and Tiberius. This assertion
was susceptible to the question of why Christ came so late, thus
74 Against the Christians

depriving of salvation all the people who lived before him. How
could Christians claim that their faith was universal when its very
origin in time and space prevented people in some times and places
from embracing it?
Thus the historical nature of the Christian myth exposed Chris-
tians to a particular criticism that Porphyry discussed at length in
Against the Christians. The combination of historicity with exclu-
sivism raised a difficult problem for Christian apologists: if salvation
is through Christ alone, why was salvation not available to those
who lived before his coming? The converse of this question posed
an equal difficulty: if the God of the Christians intended salvation
to be universal, why did he wait so long in history before sending
Jesus to proclaim it and make it possible? It is just such a combina-
tion of historically limited revelation and an exclusive claim to
salvation, especially when coupled with a cultural value that revered
what was ancient and despised innovation, that placed a virtually
unanswerable criticism in the armory of anti-Christian critics.
Porphyry was quite aware of the problem and capitalized upon
it. One fragment of his argument, found in one of Augustine's
epistles, summarizes the issue.

If Christ says he is the way, the grace, and the truth, and He places in
Himself alone the approach of believing souls to Him, what did the men
of so many centuries before Christ do? ... What, [Porphyry] says, became
of the innumerable souls, who were entirely guiltless, if He, in whom they
could believe had not yet lent His presence to men? The world, also, as
well as Rome, was devoted to the religious rites of its temples. Why, he
says, did He who is called the Savior, hide Himself for so many ages? But,
he says, let them not say that the human race was saved by the ancient
Jewish law, since the Jewish law appeared and flourished in a small part
of Syria, a long time after, and still later made its way into the Italian lands,
after the reign of Gaius Caesar, or probably during his reign. What, then,
became of the souls of Romans or Latins who were deprived of the grace
of Christ not yet come until the time of the Caesars?15

Besides the primary question of the lateness of Christ's coming,

two other points in Porphyry's argument are relevant to our discus-
sion. In the first place, he recognized that this problem could exist
only in the context of Christian exclusivism: " ... and He places in
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 75

Himself alone the approach of believing souls to Him." Other reli-

gions such as Mithraism and the cult of Isis were making claims to
universality at the same time as Christianity; they were not, how-
ever, demanding exclusive allegiance. Only Christianity was saddled
with the problem of explaining its deity's inaction to save people of
former generations. Christianity's positive refusal to recognize ei-
ther the worship of other gods or the efficacy of other ways of
salvation-in other words, exclusivism-was not shared by the other
universal religions. The question of why Jesus came so recently af-
ter so much human history had passed was, therefore, a refutation
of the exclusive claims of Christians.
Second, Porphyry anticipated-or, more likely, responded to-
the argument of Christian apologists that Judaism had been the
ancient precursor to their religion. Christians had long asserted the
legitimacy of their faith by arguing that it was in fact ancient and
that they were the true heirs of the Jewish religion. In any event, an
appeal to the antiquity of Judaism was unconvincing to Porphyry,
since Judaism had the same problem as Christianity in that its ori-
gin was localized in space and time.
This particular objection to Christian exclusivism had plagued
Christians for two centuries. While Porphyry's argument had been
expressed before, a discussion of the Christian answer is of some
relevance to our discussion. As early as the middle of the first cen-
tury, Paul referred to the moral responsibility of those who did not
have the Jewish law (Romans 2:14-15) as well as the problem of
those who had lived from Adam to Moses (Romans 5:13-14). Pagan
opponents seem to have raised the question as early as the the middle
of the second century. Justin Martyr responded to pagans who com-
plained that "we affirm that Christ was born one hundred and fifty
years ago under Quirenius ... and should accuse us as if [we said]
all men born before the time of Christ were not accountable for their
actions ... " Justin's creative response was that there had been many
"Christians" who lived before the time of Christ-as long as they
had lived ~ccu AO"fOU, in accordance with the dictates of the univer-
sal Logos given to all humanity.16
In later writers, however, a curious contradiction can be detected
in the Christian discussion of the origins of their faith. While most
apologists were asserting the antiquity of Christianity,17 others made
no apology for the fact that Christ appeared during the reign of
76 Against the Christians

Augustus at the beginning of the Roman Empire. Could the timing

of Jesus' coming have been mere coincidence? Some Christians be-
lieved not. As early as the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161-180 CE)
the bishop Melito of Sardis said as much to the emperor.

The philosophy which we profess, first indeed, flourished among the bar-
barians, but afterwards, when it grew up, also among the nations under
your government; under the glorious reign of Augustus your ancestor, it
became, especially to your reign, an auspicious blessing. For since that
time, the Roman power has grown in greatness and splendour. Whose
desired successor you have become, and will be, together with your son,
if you preserve that philosophy which has been nurtured with the em-
pire, which commenced its existence with Augustus ...18

Thus Christianity, according to Melito, was responsible for the pros-

perity of the empire. It is no accident that we find this fragment
preserved by Eusebius of Caesarea, whose fourth-century political
theology would echo and build significantly upon that of Melito.
Origen offered another reason for Christianity's appearance
during the reign of Augustus. Instead of asserting that Christianity
had brought peace to the empire, he theorized that God had brought
peace to the empire in order to prepare the world for the propaga-
tion of the gospel. Later, Eusebius would also speculate that God
had arranged the uniting of the world under Augustus for the fur-
therance of the gospel; it was no coincidence that "[Jesus'] wonderful
sojourn among men synchronized with Rome's attainment of the
acme of power."19 At this earlier date (between 314 and 318 for his
Proof of the Gospel just quoted) in Eusebius' career, however, his po-
litical theology had not yet been developed. With his Life of
Constantine would come the more explicit political theology of the
Roman state in which Christianity and Empire were one; it would
be God himself who had appointed Constantine sole ruler of the
empire. The connection between the emperor's faith and his rule
over the world would become explicit, as Constantine "was the first
to proclaim to all the sole sovereignty of God, so he himself, as sole
sovereign of the Roman world, extended his authority over the whole
human race."20
In 270, however, Eusebius' political theory was still in the fu-
ture. On the other hand, a Christian view of the relationship between
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 77

Christianity and the Roman state had been developing since Melito
in the second century, and in Porphyry's own lifetime Origen had
articulated his apologetic for the simultaneous birth of church and
empire. It is uncertain whether Porphyry had read any of the rel-
evant works of Origen, or specifically whether he was aware of this
particular apologetic. That he indeed knew of at least some Chris-
tian responses to the criticism is clear from his protest against the
argument that salvation had come through Judaism in a more dis-
tant past than the coming of Christ. But the Christians' argument
that would become the foundation of the Byzantine state, namely
the convergence of church and empire, was developing apparently
unnoticed by their pagan opponents. As an argument against Chris-
tian exclusivism, Porphyry's objection to the late coming of Christ
was logically coherent. However, it was largely a repetition of anti-
Christian argument from the second and perhaps even the first
centuries; the Christian response, on the other hand, was proceed-
ing inexorably into the fourth century, into the political exclusivism
of Constantine and his successors.

Porphyry's objection had been advanced for over a century: that

the appearance of the Christian faith in recent time and literal space
rendered illogical its claims to universal theological exclusivism. Did
such an objection, however, preclude the very possibility of a single
and universally valid way of salvation? Could there be, even if
Christianity was not the vehicle to provide it, a system of religious
cult or philosophical wisdom that transcended the boundaries of
nationality and localized cultic practice? This question and
Porphyry's answer to it impinge directly upon the critique of uni-
versalist Christianity. Porphyry's interaction with Christian
exclusivism would be informed in large measure, as it was for Celsus,
by the polemicist's view of the ultimate nature of religion, particu-
larly the ultimate unity of otherwise diverse religious beliefs and
practices.
It is clear that at some point in his career Porphyry answered
affirmatively the question of a universal way of salvation, appli-
cable to all peoples and times. According to Augustine, in whose
works many of Porphyry's fragments are found, Porphyry was cer-
tain that such a way existed, although its particulars were as yet
unknown:
78 Against the Christians

Now Porphyry says-towards the end of his first book On the Return of the
Soul-that no doctrine has yet been established to form the teaching of a
philosophical sect, which offers a universal way for the liberation of the
soul; no such way has been produced by any philosophy (in the truest
sense of the word), or by the moral teaching and disciplines of the Indi-
ans, or by the magical spells of the Chaldeans, or in any other way, and
that this universal way had never been brought to his knowledge in his
study of history. He admits without any doubt that such a way exists, but
confesses that it had never come to his notice.21

Assuming the veracity of Augustine's (admittedly hostile) report of

Porphyry's writing, the result of Porphyry's own search for a uni-
versal salvation led to two conclusions. In the first place, such a
system had never been synthesized. That is, a universally valid way
of salvation was not to be found in any of the currently existing
philosophical systems or religious cults, no matter how ancient or
sophisticated; nor would conventional polytheism in itself qualify.
Second, he was positive that such a way nevertheless existed, even
if it could not currently be identified.
It may be asked how he conceived of such a universalism. Since
it did not exist in the form of any of the available cults or philoso-
phies, whether national or local, what kind of "existence" did this
universal way have for Porphyry if it had never been found? We
are not particularly assisted by the final point of Augustine's ac-
count, namely that Porphyry himself, although he believed that a
person could be mystically united with the One (and even claimed
to have attained such a union once, at the age of sixty-eight22 ), be-
lieved that although such a way existed, he had never discovered it.
If he had once found individual "liberation," how could he say that
he had not found a universal way? That is, if Porphyry experienced
"salvation," how could he claim that he had not found "a universal
way for the liberation of the soul"? Even if Porphyry wrote On the
Return of the Soul before his own experience of union, his master
Plotinus' experience would have informed him that salvation was
indeed possible. Unfortunately, his own statement on the subject is
limited; more context is required. Thus to make any attempt to un-
derstand his belief it will be necessary briefly to summarize Platonic
theology as it had developed by the time of Porphyry.
Plato's theory of the Forms or Ideas postulated a "world" of
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 79

unseen entities beyond the realm of sense perception, entities that

gave unity and meaning to the physical world. Chief among the
Forms was the Form of the Good, the ultimate principle and the
source of all the other Forms. A later period of philosophical reflec-
tion commonly known as Middle Platonism (from the first century
BCE to the third century CE) is not easily described, since no singu-
lar interpretation of Plato prevailed.23 What was more or less
common among the Middle Platonists was the concept of the Forms
belonging to a metaphysical hierarchy and as thoughts of the Good.24
Neoplatonism, a system of Platonic interpretation fathered by
Plotinus (204-270 CE), made several crucial moves with regard to
the ultimate principle. First, the One was ultimately transcendent,
radically separate from the Middle Platonic hierarchy of being. In
addition Plotinus ascribed a radical simplicity to the One, beyond
even the simplicity of numerical unity. This simplicity of ultimate
reality was related to its transcendence; it was distinct from all else
in that it did not partake of the complexity that was inherent in the
lower levels of reality.25 Finally, the One was not apprehended ulti-
mately by the intellect, but rather by mystical experience. While
classical Platonism had stressed knowledge of the divine in terms of
dialectic reasoning, Plotinus believed that a mystical union with the
One was a necessary step subsequent to apprehension by philosophi-
cal reasoning.26
Porphyry, too, believed in the mystical union, reporting that he
himself had attained it once. On the other hand, it must be remem-
bered that he was no philosophical elitist. He was a religious man
who sincerely believed in traditional forms of religious expression;
his work Philosophy from Oracles was, after all, an attempt to recon-
cile Platonic philosophy with what he considered to be the best of
the popular religious tradition. It would seem probable that it was
just such a combination of religious and philosophical interests that
influenced Porphyry to postulate a universal system including, but
not restricted to, the Neoplatonic mystical union.
So we are left with the question: in what terms did Porphyry
conceive of a "universal way for the liberation of the soul"? As
mentioned earlier, he denied that such a way existed in any known
philosophical sect or in any religious tradition, nor had it ever ex-
isted in such a form. However, Porphyry seems to have affirmed
his belief "without any doubt that such a way exists." And indeed,
80 Against the Christians

the fact that Plotinus (and later, Porphyry himself) had experienced
mystical union was enough evidence for him that the potential for
individual salvation actually existed.
The contradiction between Porphyry's belief in the existence of
a true universalism and his observation that such a universalism
did not exist in any known form is real enough; unfortunately, our
direct knowledge of Porphyry's universalism is limited. From
Augustine's description, it seems to have been primarily apophatic
in nature; we know what it was not, but little regarding what it was.
This observation, plus the fragmentary state of the evidence and the
fact that our knowledge of it comes primarily from Augustine, his
later Christian opponent, renders our understanding of Porphyry
problematic on this issue. We are assisted by a general understand-
ing of some of his concerns, namely a desire to preserve traditional
religion, as well as a commitment to the Neoplatonic metaphysics
of Plotinus.
With this in mind, we may nonetheless cautiously and tenta-
tively characterize Porphyry's "universalism" as an undiscovered
theoretical construct whose object was the transcendent One that
was beyond being and beyond the predication of attributes. Al-
though this universalism provided "liberation" for the individual,
perhaps in the form of the mystical experience enjoyed by adepts
such as Plotinus, it transcended known philosophical categories; oth-
erwise, the experience as he understood it would itself have
constituted the "universal way." It is the very universalism of his
understanding that is most problematic; if it was not subsumed un-
der the teachings of Platonic philosophy and the interpretations of
Plotinus in particular, what could possibly have provided the frame-
work for such a system?
Perhaps the key is to be found in Porphyry's sympathy with
traditional religious practice. Recall that Porphyry attempted to rec-
oncile popular religion, in particular the respected oracles of the
Mediterranean world, to Neoplatonic philosophy. Such a reconcili-
ation of interests suggests that his enthusiasm for the unity of
traditional religion and philosophy constituted at least one signifi-
cant element of his "universal way." Philosophy alone, including
the mystical union as Porphyry understood it, may have been too
restricted to the elite for him to consider it truly universal, while on
the other hand the traditional religious practices of the nations were
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 81

too diffuse and varied to qualify. It is possible that Porphyry's idea

of universal salvation included the best elements of the realms of
both philosophy and religion. While the specifics-if Porphyry ever
articulated any-must remain unknown to us, it is likely in any event
that the universalism of which he was so certain "existed" only as
an ideal, an ideal he never realized.
Porphyry's belief in the existence of a true universalism was simi-
lar in some respects to that of Celsus. There was, however, an
important difference between the understandings of the two critics.
Celsus' universal way was, practically speaking, merely an exten-
sion of polytheism, of the national and local religious diversity that
currently existed. By worshiping the gods, Celsus asserted, one
worshiped the supreme deity. And even if such a God were to be
specifically worshiped, he would in reality be nothing more than
the supreme deity of each of the nations-Zeus, Jupiter, and so forth.
Porphyry, on the other hand, believed that a particular universal
religious system actually existed, or at least had the potential to ex-
ist, above and beyond (but perhaps including) known religious
expression. No one of the variety of current religious beliefs served
the purpose. Unlike Celsus, Porphyry did not settle upon the eclec-
tic acceptance of all forms of worship as valid and as ultimately
serving the supreme deity.
The difference between the two writers on this issue is impor-
tant. Celsus' theory of a universal religion was in reality nothing
more than a defense of conventional polytheism; no pagan who ac-
cepted Celsus' universalism would have had to change anything
about the way he or she honored the gods. In other words, the real-
ization that the worship of the gods ultimately benefited the supreme
deity would have been nothing more than that-a simple realiza-
tion. Porphyry, on the other hand, took seriously the problem that a
universally valid religious system might actually exist outside the
variety of religious expression available in the third century, beyond
either a theoretical implication of conventional polytheism or in the
religious traditions of other nations. As much as Porphyry was a
proponent of traditional religious expression, when it came to a uni-
versal religion he was a seeker, not a defender of existing religion as
was Celsus.
From Celsus to Porphyry, then, we observe a significant shift
away from a universalism based upon existing cultic and philosophi-
82 Against the Christians

cal variety and toward a true universalism that transcended local

variations in belief and practice. However, whether and how much
this difference is a reflection of an actual trend over the course of the
third century is difficult to determine based only upon the writings
of the two critics. Was Porphyry merely an important exception to
an otherwise relatively unchanged religious scene, or were there
other measurable developments of which Porphyry's universalism
was a symptom? To what degree is the change detectable during
this period in other venues such as popular religious belief and im-
perial cult?
As it happens, there is evidence that the universalizing trend
detected from Celsus to Porphyry was indeed evident in other ar-
eas. On the level of imperial religious policy, this trend reached a
watershed about the same time that Porphyry was writing Against
the Christians. As we have mentioned briefly, the emperor Aurelian,
in the process of restoring the empire from the perilous conditions
prevalent in the middle of the third century, made an attempt to
unify religious belief throughout the Roman world. In 274 the em-
peror built a temple to the sun god Sol Invictus in Rome, and the
Senate declared the deity the official god of the empire.27 Signifi-
cantly, the statues of other gods were brought into the new temple,
symbolizing the supreme and syncretistic nature of the cult of Sol.
In addition, such a religion had the virtue of being independent of
the cult of the emperor; "It probably seemed decreasingly meaning-
ful to offer divine honors to the ephemeral rulers spawned by the
crisis of the mid-third century."28 Even if individual emperors should
come and go, Sollnvictus would remain.
In light of the near-disintegration of the empire, Aurelian's reli-
gious reform was an attempt to facilitate recovery by re-establishing
some form of identity for the broken empire. Sun-worship was al-
ready popular in the east and had also become popular among the
army; Aurelian took steps to ensure that the new cult would also be
acceptable to Roman sensibilities. Having achieved political and
territorial unity, he now sought to establish religious unity as well.
Aurelian' s solar cult had religious precursors; a temple of the Sun
had existed in Rome since at least the late republic. Elagabalus (218-
222), the young emperor from Emesa who was the hereditary priest
of the Syrian sun-god, had made an earlier attempt to elevate this
deity to supremacy over all other Roman gods. Though his efforts
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 83

shocked the Romans and the emperor was killed as a result,

Aurelian' s efforts would be accepted fifty years later.
Of course, "syncretism" was not a phenomenon limited to the
third century CE. The Roman Jupiter and the Greek Zeus had been
identified with each other centuries before, as had Poseidon and
Neptune, Mercury and Hermes, and a host of other greater and lesser
gods of Greece and Rome as well as other nations. In many ways,
the syncretism we are observing from the Isis of Plutarch and
Apuleius to the cult of Sol Invictus was a continuation of a centuries-
long process of such integration. Thus Porphyry's search for a
unifying soteriology was only one manifestation of an ongoing phe-
nomenon with religious, political and philosophical dimensions.
"Foreign" religions had already been openly embraced by the Semitic
Severan dynasty in the early third century. In 212 the emperor
Caracalla had declared virtually all free males to be Roman citizens;
this move was perhaps the first widely visible sign of a unifying
process that would gain inertia through the third century. Aurelian' s
institution of the cult of Sol Invictus as a universal religion was "an
important stage in the prehistory of the Christian doctrine of em-
pire forged by Constantine and formulated by Eusebius: one god,
one empire, one emperor."29
This discussion has attempted to establish a philosophical and
religious context for the pagan treatment of Christian exclusivism
in the latter half of the third century. Porphyry's search for a unify-
ing religious system, in addition to the actual establishment of an
empire-wide solar cult, serve as indicators of the syncretistic ten-
dencies operating in the decade of the 270s.

These tendencies had consequences for the opposition to Chris-

tianity. Specifically, they allowed pagans to look at some aspects of
the Christian religion in a manner that would have been impossible
at the time Celsus wrote his True Doctrine. Things had changed since
the turn of the century. The growing acceptability of foreign reli-
gions and Aurelian's solar cult constituted some of the more visible
manifestations of these changes. For Porphyry the anti-Christian
polemicist, even Christianity could in some small way be accom-
modated in this environment. According to Augustine, such
accommodation took the form of allowing Christ a status greater
than the "sorcerer" of Celsus' polemic:
84 Against the Christians

What I am going to say may certainly appear startling to some. I mean

the fact that the gods have pronounced Christ to have been extremely
devout, and have said that he has become immortal, and that they men-
tion him in terms of commendation; whereas the Christians, by their
account, are polluted and contaminated and entangled in error; and there
are many other such slanders they issue against them.30

Quick as the critic was to distinguish the "contamination" of the

followers of Christ from the piety of Christ himself, Porphyry none-
theless made a critical move. Up to this time, Jesus had been roundly
condemned as a magician and a deceiver; Justin had alluded to such
accusations even before Celsus. Porphyry's approach of honoring
Jesus as an "extremely devout" immortal, on the other hand, re-
veals the lengths to which he was willing to go in order to incorporate
all forms of religious belief. If indeed Jesus' commendation was
uttered by a respected oracle, then the shift was not Porphyry's alone;
it was also occurring elsewhere in the religious universe.
Such willingness to pronounce Christ devout was in no way a
capitulation to the Christians. On the contrary, the commendation
of Jesus fell squarely within the bounds of Grreco-Roman religious
tradition; the oracle did not accept the immortality of Jesus on Chris-
tian terms. In the first place, Porphyry's exaltation of Jesus was a
tacit denial of Christ's bodily resurrection; belief in immortality
among the Greeks was generally limited to the continuing existence
after death of the disembodied soul.31 As we will see, the oracle of
Hecate emphasized the separation of Jesus' soul from his body; while
the utterance did not directly refute the Christian doctrine of physi-
cal resurrection, the implication was clear.
In addition, the utterance of the oracle stood firmly within a cen-
turies-old Greek tradition. Oracular declarations, particularly those
of the oracle at Delphi, were often, although not always, a prerequi-
site for elevating a deceased human being to immortal status.32
People so honored were usually regarded as "heroes," not as a tech-
nical designation, but because in the earliest form of the practice
those who were thus honored had served their polis in a special way,
either as a lawgiver or in a military capacity. People were later im-
mortalized for other reasons, such as outstanding virtue or piety;
Roman emperors (except for those whose memories were posthu-
mously condemned) routinely received deification after their deaths.
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 85

Other people were sometimes honored for their special relationship

to a god, such as Sophocles, who introduced the worship of Asclepius
to Athens.
Thus the pronouncement of immortal status upon Jesus for be-
ing "extremely devout" was not in itself unusual, especially since it
was given on oracular authority. In fact, such authority may be con-
sidered an attempt by Porphyry to claim the traditional right of the
oracles to pronounce immortality, in direct opposition to the author-
ity claimed by Christians for their scriptures. In this way, having
secured the proper traditional authority for immortality, Jesus could
be "domesticated" for pagan veneration. If Jesus was going to be
included in the realm of the blessed, it would be on pagan terms.
Thus Porphyry granted Jesus the status of a hero while at the
same time condemning the Christians as "polluted and contami-
nated and entangled in error." This condemnation of the Christians
is significant. If he was willing to move toward the acceptance of
Jesus as a pious immortal, why did he single out Jesus' followers for
criticism? Part of the answer lies in the fact that they considered
him not merely a pious man, but as God.

On the other hand, to those who asked whether Christ was God, Hecate
replied, "You know that the immortal soul goes on its way after it leaves
the body; whereas when it is cut off from wisdom it wanders for ever.
That soul [of Jesus] belongs to a man of outstanding piety; this they wor-
ship because truth is a stranger to them.''33

The oracle of Hecate did not stop here. It was necessary, if one
was to assign Jesus a place among the immortals, to explain there-
lationship between him and his followers. To this end the oracle
described the place of Christians in the divinely ordered universe.

Thus Hecate said that [Jesus] was a most devout man, and that his soul,
like the souls of other devout men, was endowed after death with the
immortality it deserved; and that the Christians in their ignorance wor-
ship this soul. ... That is why they were hated by the gods, because, not
being fated to know God or to receive gifts from the gods, they were given
by this man the fatal gift of entanglement in error. For all that, he himself
was devout, and, like other devout men, passed into heaven. And so you
shall not slander him, but pity the insanity of men. From him comes for
them a ready peril of headlong disaster....
86 Against the Christians

Uninstructed and ungodly natures, however, to which fate has not granted
the gifts of the gods and the knowledge of immortal Jupiter, have not
listened to the gods and to inspired men; and so they have rejected all the
gods ... 34

The exclusive nature of their worship was the true cause of the Chris-
tians' "insanity," and the "insane" Christians had received the" gift"
of error from the gods. Their god Jesus, while himself devout, pre-
sided nonetheless over a divinely categorized company of fools. The
Christians themselves were no longer divorced from theological re-
ality as they had been in Celsus' totalizing discourse, but were now
assigned a place, no matter how abhorrent their beliefs, within the
religious cosmos.
Significantly, Christianity was now, in a limited and theoretical
way at least, integrated into Porphyry's religious understanding.
To be sure, he still regarded Christians as ignorant and impious;
their beliefs were still objectionable, their rejection of the gods intol-
erable and worthy of punishment. Their presence, however, had
come to be accepted as an irreversible fact of life; their exclusivism,
as objectionable as it remained, was accepted as well. Not that this
characteristic of Christianity was at all" acceptable" in any way; Por-
phyry still referred to their rejection of the gods as erroneous and
insane. Only now, Christian "insanity" in the form of religious
exclusivism had achieved its own theological standing.

Dramatic changes had occurred between the writing of the True

Doctrine of Celsus and the critique of Porphyry. For the empire, the
golden age of the Severi had succumbed to two generations of chaos.
The church, meanwhile, had experienced steady growth in both num-
bers and respectability, the persecution of Decius notwithstanding.
By the year 270 Christianity had become a permanent and powerful
presence in the Mediterranean world. Having grown in numbers,
organization and philosophical sophistication, the church was no
longer in a precarious position with its survival on the line.
As a result of the staying power and growth of Christianity, pa-
gan critics faced a curious situation, namely, how to integrate a
persistent exclusive universalism into the "pluralistic" religious life
of the empire. Porphyry's (and the oracles') bestowal of immortal
status upon Jesus was wholly in step with the spirit of the middle to
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 87

late third century. It also represented a resignation to the perma-

nence of the church. Earlier, Celsus had expressed the desire that
Christians would somehow return to their senses; Porphyry enter-
tained no such hope. According to Porphyry, in agreement with
Celsus, Christians were certainly deluded. Only now, Christian" de-
lusion" was a permanent part of the religious landscape.
How could the person of Jesus have been made acceptable to
Porphyry's oracles? Even though Jesus was condemned, according
to Porphyry, by "right-thinking judges," he found a place nonethe-
less in the critic's hall of pious immortals. Thus a significant change
took place between Celsus' and Porphyry's descriptions of Christ.
To Celsus, Jesus had been nothing more than a deceiver and a magi-
cian. Of course, not everything Porphyry said about Jesus was
positive either. He complained that Jesus seemed ignorant of physi-
cal digestive processes in Matthew 15:17££. Porphyry also pointed
out that, in John 7, Jesus went to the Feast of Tabernacles after tell-
ing his brothers that he would be staying home. On the other hand,
Porphyry's accusations of an occasionally ignorant or fickle Jesus
were relatively tame compared with Celsus' portrayal of Christ.
What could be the explanation of this shift toward a relative toler-
ance of Christ, though not of Christians?
For Porphyry, it appears that his favorable regard of Christ was
a result of his own desire to assimilate as many elements of existing
religious belief as possible into his philosophy. Early in his career,
at least, Porphyry believed the Jewish God to have been a powerful
deity who governed the created universe as well as other gods. His
Philosophy from Oracles reports an oracle of Apollo that declared,

in God, the begetter and the king before all things, at whom heaven
trembles, and earth and sea and the hidden depths of the underworld and
the very divinities shudder in dread; their law is the Father whom the
holy Hebrews greatly honour.35

Judaism and the Jewish deity had come into favor at last. This seems
to have been as true for the Severan dynasty in the opening decades
of the third century as it was for Porphyry, if the Augustan History
can be trusted regarding the pro-Jewish leanings of the Severans.
"Foreign" religions were no longer the threat they once posed. Like-
wise, Porphyry's oracles concerning Jesus may reflect a growing
88 Against the Christians

tolerance of the Jewish elements of Christianity.

For those who followed Christ, however, Porphyry had no sym-
pathy. Jesus served only as a "patron saint of fools"; Christians were,
as far as Porphyry was concerned, cut off entirely from the piety
that characterized the immortalized Jesus. Augustine's interpreta-
tion of this move was probably close to the mark when he observed
that the oracles' praise of Christ was an aid, not an obstacle, to
Porphyry's criticism of Christians, and that

Their intention is that when a man has believed both praise and slander
they may turn him into an admirer of Christ, but an admirer who has no
wish to become a Christian ... one who acknowledges Christ only as a
man, not as God also.36

If Augustine's interpretation of Porphyry is correct-and there

is little reason to reject his conclusion, given what we know from
Porphyry's own statements-a good pagan could admire Christ
without converting to Christianity, and certainly without worship-
ing him as the supreme God. Such an attitude of acceptance was a
repudiation of the Christian idea that other gods were not worthy
of worship. Porphyry's assertion that it should be possible to ad-
mire Christ and not become a Christian was essentially an argument
against Christian exclusivism; by including Christ in the company
of the immortals, Porphyry made the ingenious move of promoting
Jesus from the low esteem in which he had previously been held
while simultaneously barring him from exclusive status. While it
would eventually fail, his experiment with a non-exclusive Chris-
tianity marks an important step in the pagan polemic against
Christian exclusivism.
It is also an indicator of the gradual convergence between Chris-
tian belief and what pagans were now able to find acceptable. The
fact that a traditional pagan oracle affirmed the piety and immortal-
ity of Jesus a mere two decades after the Decian persecution is no
small development. Other ideas that Porphyry expressed in his
polemic also point to convergences in the pagan-Christian universe.
His universalistic beliefs, in whatever specific ways he may have
actually held them, were not at all foreign to Christian thinkers. Even
some Christians admitted the possibility of salvation outside of the
Christian gospel in the context of explaining the fate of those who
Porphyry and the Polemic of Universalism 89

lived before Christ. Although Christianity was nowhere to be found

within pagan religon, it was to be found in Plato. At least some
aspects of Christian doctrine were thus "universal" in the sense that
they were available outside of the special revelation of the gospel.
Other convergences can also be detected in the pagan-Christian
interchange of this period. In the context of Porphyry's objection
and the apologetic response regarding the question of Christ's late
appearance, we found Christians arguing that the coming of Jesus
during the reign of Augustus was fortunate for both the empire and
the faith. By connecting the welfare of the state with the correct
form of worship, Christians shared more in common with persecu-
tors such as Decius and with their polemic opponents than they
perhaps realized. Finally, we have mentioned Porphyry's passion
to unite both Platonic philosophy and popular religion into a coher-
ent system; such was also the desire of Christian philosophers from
Justin to Origen and beyond. Christianity would eventually claim
the process of union, as well as the philosophical tradition on which
it rested, as its own. It was a claim that Julian would resist vehe-
mently.

From Celsus to Porphyry, the issue of social exclusivism had

disappeared; Christians had become as fully integrated as their re-
jection of the gods would allow. At the same time, the religious
syncretism of the Severi and, later, of Aurelian provided a markedly
different context for Christianity than had existed at the time of
Celsus. Political and philosophical trends were moving in the di-
rection of universalism and syncretism; Porphyry's own quest for a
single religious solution paralleled Aurelian's universalizing cult of
Sol Invictus.
Both the new syncretistic environment and the growing influ-
ence of the Christian church demanded new strategies in
anti-Christian polemic. The genius of Porphyry's approach was his
attempt at limited assimilation. Could Christ, if not the religion he
inspired, be presented as a member of the larger family of Mediter-
ranean belief systems? Porphyry seems to have believed so. His
legitimation of Jesus added an element of acceptability to Christian-
ity that would not have been possible a hundred years earlier. Such
legitimation represents a shift over the course of the third century
from Celsus' totalizing discourse of exclusion to a more flexible rheto-
90 Against the Christians

ric of assimilation. However, it is important to understand that this

shift represents not an acceptance of Christian exclusivism (or even
of Christianity) but rather another way of rejecting it. His tactic
differed from that of Celsus by drawing the boundary, not so much
between Christianity and paganism, but between Christianity and
Christ. This movement of the rhetorical boundaries, necessitated
by both the success of the church and universalizing tendencies
within paganism, would be continued in new and perhaps more
important ways by the last pagan emperor.
 5

Julian the Apostate and

the Politics of Hellenism

Of our anti-Christian polemicists thus far, Celsus is unknown to us

other than as the author of the True Doctrine, while Porphyry was a
philosopher from the Neoplatonic school of Plotinus. With the em-
peror Julian (331/2-363 CE), tagged by early Christian historians as
"the Apostate" and the last pagan ruler of the Roman Empire, we
encounter not only the final important critic of Christianity, but per-
haps the most fascinating personality of late antiquity.l That our
final critic was the last pagan emperor gives us a unique perspec-
tive not only into the development of anti-Christian polemic but
also into the last decades of pagan power before its own marginal-
ization, at least as a political force, by Christianity toward the end of
the fourth century.
The facts of Julian's life are well known from his own writings
as well as those of several historians of the period. The son of
Constantine's half brother, Julian was five years old when Constan-
tine died in 337. A few months after the emperor's death a purge of
many members of Constantine's family, likely initiated by his old-
est son Constantius, reduced the chances of an immediate political
challenge to the sons of Constantine. Julian's father was killed, as
well as at least eight other members of the imperial family; Julian
was spared on account of his youth. That Julian later blamed
Constantius for the murder of his family is plain enough from his
later writings.2
Julian spent his boyhood in relatively luxurious exile. During
his education he learned to appreciate the Greek classics as well as
Christian texts, an appreciation that would later translate into legis-
lation when as emperor he prohibited Christians from teaching the
classics. While the date of his "conversion" to paganism has been
debated, Julian's own writings seem to point to a date of 350 or 351.
In any event, he concealed his pagan leanings for several years, ex-
92 Against the Christians

cept in the presence of a few close pagan friends. Outwardly, how-

ever, he continued to practice Christianity; only later, after he was
made Augustus, did he dare proclaim his paganism openly.
In 355 Constantius, engaged in the East against the Persians,
appointed Julian as Caesar and sent him to Gaul to counter the grow-
ing barbarian incursions there. Julian's successes won him favor
with the soldiers; when, in early 360, Constantius ordered some of
Julian's troops to march east to augment his Persian campaign, the
soldiers revolted against the order. Instead they proclaimed Julian
as Augustus in Paris.3 While Julian led his army eastward for a final
confrontation with his cousin, Constantius died of natural causes.
Civil war thus averted, Julian entered Constantinople unopposed
in December 361. By that time he had publicly declared his alle-
giance to paganism, having openly performed pagan sacrifice on
his march to the capital.

I worship the gods openly, and the whole mass of the troops who are
returning with me worship the gods. . . . The gods command me to re-
store their worship in its utmost purity, and I obey them, yes, and with a
good will. 4

Julian remained in the capital for only six months, then moved
eastward once again to continue the still-pressing Persian war. He
wintered in Syrian Antioch, during which time he managed on a
number of counts to incur the contempt of the primarily Christian
citizens of that city. His attempts to alleviate a food shortage there
merely exacerbated the problem, while his attempts to restore pa-
gan cult were met with indifference even among the pagan
population. In the spring of 363 he marched toward the Persian
capital; after initially overcoming strong resistance, his army failed
to take the city. On June 26, 363, during the retreat out of Mesopo-
tamia, Julian was struck down by an enemy spear and died during
the night. The leaderless troops elevated a Christian soldier named
Jovian to the rank of Augustus, thus ending pagan rule.

Like Celsus and Porphyry, Julian wrote an anti-Christian trea-

tise, entitled Against the Galileans, its substance preserved in a
fifth-century refutation by Cyril of Alexandria. Naturally, appear-
ing as they did after three centuries of pagan-Christian conflict, some
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 93

of Julian's arguments against Christianity built upon those we have

already encountered. Although many have compared his polemic
work with those of Celsus and Porphyry, the detailed comparison
remains to be written; scholars have noted generally and correctly
that while Julian probably used some of the material from Porphyry's
Against the Christians, the tone of his attack harkens back to Celsus'
True Doctrine.s While it is true that Julian did use some of the earlier
arguments, a closer examination reveals that he significantly shifted
their focus and expanded them to serve a purpose not envisioned
(or at least not articulated) by either Celsus or Porphyry.
While Julian's arguments were in many cases similar, their ideo-
logical motivations and specific lines of reasoning underwent
substantial development since their introduction by the earlier po-
lemicists. It is argued in this and the following chapter that Julian's
contributions to these older arguments reveal the primary theme of
Against the Galileans and of his anti-Christian program generally.
Although the polemic is an anti-Christian literary work in the tradi-
tion of Celsus and Porphyry, its main thrust was an apologetic for
traditional Hellenistic culture, termed here the "Hellenistic apology."
That Julian was an apologist for Hellenism is not a matter of
controversy. In particular, the work of Polymnia Athanassiadi-
Fowden on Julian's Hellenism has highlighted the emperor's
ideology and motivations. What is less understood, however, is the
relationship between his ideology and his anti-Christian polemic.
Athanassiadi-Fowden's insight6 that Against the Galileans was the
clearest declaration of Julian's Hellenistic ideal requires further dem-
onstration and discussion; the comparison of Julian's critique of
Christianity with those of Celsus and Porphyry still carries the mo-
mentum in the study of his polemic work. This present study
synthesizes further these two aspects of the study of Julian. In addi-
tion, as we will see, Julian's Hellenistic apology was directed in large
measure against the Christian appropriation of Hellenism; an ex-
amination of Julian's agenda displays the open confrontation
between pagans and Christians over the cultural and intellectual
property of the Roman Empire-a conflict every bit as important as
their struggle for political power.
A further aspect of Julian's work concerns elements of the objec-
tion to Christian exclusivism. Some of these elements, identified in
previous chapters and modified by Julian, form the framework, if
94 Against the Christians

not the basis, of Julian's Hellenistic apology. Finally, it is argued

that Julian's approach, like Porphyry's, was largely a rhetoric of as-
similation. As similar as Julian's tone and content are to those of
Celsus, Against the Galileans employed a strategy of marginalization
closer to that of Porphyry.
Before proceeding it will be necessary to place the life and reign
of Julian in a broader historical context. Nearly a century passed
between Porphyry's Against the Christians and the time of Julian's
ascent to the throne; during this period enormous changes swept
both church and empire. Christianity endured the Great Persecu-
tion at the turn of the fourth century and passed from an illegal
religion to, with the help of the first Christian emperor Constantine
and his successors, the official religion of the Roman Empire.

The decade after the emperor Aurelian's assassination in 275 CE

failed to produce a stable mechanism either for identifying candi-
dates for the purple or for the imperial succession. Diocletian, who
rose to power in 284, initiated an innovative attempt to provide both.
His plan was to appoint an Augustus junior to himself with whom
he would share the responsibility of rule. Each Augustus would be
assisted by an appointed Caesar, an arrangement that would effec-
tively divide the management of the empire into four parts and
provide for succession when an Augustus died. The First Tetrarchy
consisted of Diocletian and Maximian as Augusti in east and west
respectively, while their respective Caesars were Galerius and
Constantius Chlorus. In an unprecedented move, possibly designed
to test the stability of the system, the two Augusti abdicated in 305.
Their juniors were raised to the rank of Augustus, while two new
Caesars were appointed, Maximin Daia in the East and Severus in
the West, thus constituting the Second Tetrarchy.
The tetrarchic system was in theory based on individual merit,
independent of the uncertainties of birth and the whim of the army,
and was intended to bring stability to the often chaotic conditions
surrounding the death of a ruler. However, the system failed to
quell the dynastic ambitions of Maxentius, the son of Maximian,
and Constantine, the son of Constantius Chlorus. The crisis fueled
by these ambitions was precipitated only a year after the institution
of the Second Tetrarchy. Upon Constantius' death in 306 the sol-
diers in Britain hailed Constantine as Augustus, bothering neither
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 95

with the lower office of Caesar nor with the constitutional rights of
Severus, the legitimate Caesar in the West. Not to be outdone,
Maxentius had himself proclaimed Augustus, while Severus like-
wise received promotion. The resulting civil wars introduced an
era of instability reminiscent of the middle of the third century. Less
than fifteen years after its inception, the system of the tetrarchy was
dead. The experiment had failed.
At the same time, the early fourth century saw a renewal of the
persecution of Christians, often called the "Great Persecution."
Diocletian7 initiated the action by issuing a series of anti-Christian
decrees in 303 and 304. The first was limited to the removal of the
privileges of high-ranking Christians and to the destruction of church
buildings and scriptures; with the final edict all Christians were re-
quired to offer sacrifices to the gods. Although a large number of
Christians were maimed and killed, many capitulated. The perse-
cution continued until 311 when, just before his death, Galerius
issued an edict of tolerance. After only six months' respite, how-
ever, his successor Maximinus in late 311 renewed the persecution.
Meanwhile in the West, Constantine consolidated his power.
Maximian had come out of retirement to join his son Maxentius,
eliminating Severus in 307. Galerius appointed his comrade Licinius
as Augustus in the Balkans. Constantine eliminated Maxentius in
312; his victory was significant in that it served as the occasion for
Constantine's embrace of Christianity. The night before meeting
Maxentius in battle Constantine had a dream (or saw a visionS) in-
structing him to place the chi-rho monogram on his soldiers' shields,
symbolizing the protection of the Christian God. After obeying what
he considered to be a sign from God, he defeated Maxentius at the
Milvian Bridge outside Rome. Over the next six years a series of
civil wars eliminated all but Constantine in the West and Licinius in
the East. Only six years after the dissolution of the Tetrarchy,
Constantine was sole ruler in the West.
Shortly afterward, Constantine and Licinius issued a joint state-
ment guaranteeing to everyone the freedom of worship, effectively
ending the persecution of Christians in their domains. Maximinus
in the East, just prior to his own defeat by Licinius, had issued a
decree of toleration for Christians, perhaps in an attempt to win the
favor of the same God who had helped Constantine. The Great Per-
secution was over, and the empire was divided between Licinius
96 Against the Christians

and Constantine. Eventually, however, the two Augusti came to

blows, and in 324 Constantine defeated Licinius at Chrysopolis near
the Bosporus. Constantine rernianed in power until his death in
337, the first sole ruler of the Roman Empire since Diocletian insti-
tuted the Tetrarchy.

In the decades following Constantine's victory at the Milvian

Bridge, Christianity moved from persecution to toleration, then even-
tually became the official religion of the state. It was in this
environment that Julian was born and raised, as the balance of power
shifted from paganism to the church. Thus an understanding of the
five decades from Constantine's dream to Julian's accession are cru-
cial to any investigation of the emperor Julian. In order to evaluate
his criticism of Christianity adequately, it is necessary to trace the
relationship between Christians and pagans over the course of the
fourth century. It was only a lifetime between Constantine's victory
in 312 and the edict of Theodosius I in 380 outlawing all forms of
pagan worship, public and private. The reigns of Constantine and
his sons, particularly Constantius, provide key landmarks in the de-
velopment of the Christian state that Julian was ultimately powerless
to prevent.
Constantine's victory over Maxentius was only the beginning of
a process that would bring Christianity into a position of political
and cultural dominance over the course of the fourth century. Much
ink has been spilled tracing the development of the emperor's per-
sonal religious beliefs in an attempt to determine the relationship
between his faith and his policies.9 Our interest here, however, is
not to try to examine the emperor's "sincerity" as a Christian, but
rather to survey those aspects of his reign that give us insight into
the official or "visible" elements of transition from a pagan to a Chris-
tian society.
Some of these elements were immediate. The newly Christian
emperor favored Christianity with tax exemptions and grants for
the repair and construction of churches. He gave jurisdiction to bish-
ops for some types of court cases such as the manumission of slaves.
Legal charges against bishops were not to be tried before secular
courts but rather by the church. Bishops travelling to and from
church councils were allowed to use the public post, the system of
official transportation normally reserved for imperial business. In
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 97

some respects Constantine was doing nothing new by granting these

privileges; as pontifex maximus, or high priest, Roman emperors since
Augustus had exercised such rights in matters of religion.lO
Other aspects of Constantine's Christian policies indicate a
gradual improvement of Christianity's status from the time of his
victory over Maxentius. Some of the best evidence comes to us
through his coinage. Pagan symbols continued to be represented,
Sol Invictus in particular, at least until 321, a full decade after his
embrace of Christianity.ll This continuation of Sol indicates either
that Constantine did not know that the Christian God was to be
worshiped exclusively, or that he was familiar with the exclusivism
of Christianity but was reluctant to alienate the pagan majority in
order to placate a minority religion. The latter is more likely. It is
highly improbable that any informed person could have been igno-
rant of Christian exclusivism, the one characteristic that set it apart
from pagan religion.l2 The numismatic evidence, while indicating
a gradual decline in the use of pagan inscriptions, suggests a period
characterized by an official policy of co-existence for pagan and
Christian in Constantine's imperial symbolism.
This co-existence was also visible in a number of other venues.
For example, pagans as well as the Christian historian Eusebius were
present at Constantine's court. The panegyric that a pagan orator
delivered on behalf of Constantine after the defeat of Maxentius13
named the gods not at all; over two decades later, Eusebius in his
Tricennial Oration failed to name Christ.l4 The speeches were am-
biguous enough regarding the identity of the deity to satisfy both
(or, more likely, neither) Christians and pagans.
One of the more important pieces of evidence for the ambiguity
of Constantine's religious policy consists of the accounts of the build-
ing and dedication of the new capital at Byzantium, which he
renamed Constantinople. IS Although his moving of the capital has
been viewed16 as an opportunity for him to create a Christian politi-
cal center independent of the ensconced paganism of Rome,
Constantinople was anything but "purely Christian." Constantine
built a temple to Tyche, the guardian of the city, and to Rhea, an
ancient "mother of the gods" whom the city of Byzantium had hon-
ored for centuries. A statue of Tyche accompanied the Christian
emperor's own image in the Forum.I? There is thus much evidence
for a "syncretistic transition" from a pagan to a Christian empire, at
98 Against the Christians

least in the official symbolism.

On the other hand, there is some evidence that Constantine en-
gaged in the active repression of paganism, at least later in his reign.
Unfortunately most of our evidence comes from Eusebius, who
clearly exaggerated the issue at some points. For example, his as-
sertion that Constantine outlawed all sacrifice and image worship
was wishful thinking. His claim that the emperor banned the wor-
ship of statues in Constantinople is contradicted by what we know
about the syncretistic nature of the new capital as discussed above .IS
On the other hand, other references to the destruction of individual
temples are probably correct; Constantine did indeed raze some
pagan temples in order to replace them with Christian churches.
These reports point to a selective destruction of pagan structures
only when their existence interfered with Christian holy sites; there
was no wholesale destruction of temples as Eusebius and other early
Christian historians asserted.
In addition, legislation preserved from Constantine's reign took
steps to outlaw certain forms of pagan religious practice. For ex-
ample, the emperor banned soothsaying in private homes. The
public practice, however, was still permitted; in fact, Constantine
expressly ordered that soothsayers be consulted whenever lightning
struck the imperial palace or other public buildings.l9 He proscribed
magic deemed to be harmful to persons while allowing magic de-
signed for healing or for agriculture. Such measures were politically
safe. Few pagans would have objected to the outlawing of harmful
magic, while even many pagans viewed private soothsaying as po-
tentially subversive.
Constantine's steps against paganism were thus incremental,
representing a shift from an apparent tolerance of pagan cult in the
first decade of his reign to the beginnings of repression later on. An
early letter of Constantine reveals the ambiguity that existed early
in his reign, a combination of political toleration and personal intol-
erance.

For it is one thing voluntarily to undertake the conflict for immortality,

another to compel others to do so from fear of punishment. ... We should
indeed have earnestly recommended such removal [of pagan rites] to all
men, were it not that the rebellious spirit of those wicked errors still con-
tinues obstinately fixed in the minds of some, so as to discourage the hope
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 99

of any general restoration of mankind to the ways of truth.20

On the surface, Constantine advocated tolerance for pagan cult, at

least early in his reign. But it is clear that paganism was to give way,
occasionally by force, when the interests of the twq religions col-
lided. Such collisions were to increase in both frequency and
magnitude during the rule of his sons.
Of the sons of Constantine, the eldest, Constantine II, died in
340, only three years after his father; Constans' death in 350 left
Constantius as sole ruler. All three sons carried out further steps in
the repression of paganism, particularly Constantius. He finally
outlawed pagan sacrifice upon pain of death; he ordered pagan
temples closed in 346. Whether and how widely these edicts were
enforced is subject to debate, but it is certain that Constantius was
substantially more eager than his father to suppress pagan cult. Dur-
ing his reign there were popular Christian actions against pagans as
well. In Cappadocian Caesarea, Christian mobs destroyed the
temples of Zeus and Apollo; Julian later punished the same city for
having the audacity to raze the temple of Tyche during his own reign.
Julian's purge of Constantius' court upon his arrival in Constan-
tinople would include those who had been "fattened on the robbery
of temples"21 during the reign of Constantius.
Paganism was far from disappearing outright, however. Legis-
lation alone could not destroy paganism any more than it had been
able to eliminate Christianity in previous centuries. Constantius'
ban on sacrifices was only partially enforced, as public sacrifices
continued to be offered on occasion.22 In this mixed environment
the repression begun under Constantine and accelerated under
Constantius would form an important aspect of Julian's hostile stance
towards the Christians.

It was this that shook him to the core, as he saw their temples in ruins,
their ritual banned, their altars overturned, their sacrifices suppressed,
their priests sent packing and their property divided up between a crew
of rascals.23

It was a situation that Julian believed he could reverse. Whether he

could have stopped, or at least significantly slowed, the Christian
tide had he lived longer is one of the most intriguing questions of
100 Against the Christians

the historiography of late antiquity.

We treat Julian in this study as an opponent of Christianity, and
rightly so. He was, however, more than a critic; the emperor envi-
sioned himself first and foremost as a restorer of religion. Whatever
may be said about the sincerity of his uncle Constantine's faith in
the Christian God, Julian's passionate belief in the gods is unques-
tioned. His anti-Christian stance must therefore be viewed in the
context of his fervent paganism. After recounting briefly Julian's
actions with respect to the church, we consider in this chapter two
aspects of his reign that illustrate his attempt to restore paganism:
his attempt to establish an organized form of pagan worship and
his edict forbidding Christians to teach Greek literature.
In order to restore paganism to what he considered its proper
place in society, Julian had to reverse the considerable advances the
church had made in the previous fifty years. To this end he removed
Christian clerics' exemption from public service; he reduced the lav-
ish state subsidies the church had enjoyed, while pagan temples and
priesthoods enjoyed imperial favor once again. His attitude toward
the church establishment is revealed by his response to the lynching
of the bishop of Alexandria by a pagan mob early in his reign; he
took no action against the murderers, but merely chastised the citi-
zenry in a letter for their conduct. Although no persecutor of
Christians himself,24 Julian appears not to have objected to anti-Chris-
tian violence when it occurred.
He understood, however, that the gains Christianity had made
could not be undone overnight, and that merely favoring paganism
would not accomplish his goal of religious restoration. The church
was well-organized and growing steadily in popularity. In order to
counter the strengths of the Christians, Julian attempted to reform
pagan cult to establish what might be called a "pagan church" with
Helios the sun-god as its central deity, using elements fromAurelian's
cult of Sol Invictus. The new organization fielded a hierarchy of
priests and a system of Neoplatonic doctrine, developed in part by
Julian himself in the form of two treatises, Hymn to King Helios and
Hymn to the Mother of the Gods. The new religious establishment also
instituted a program of benevolence to the poor in order to counter
the charitable activities of the Christians. He demanded high stan-
dards of conduct from pagan priests in opposition to what he
considered the hypocritical behavior of Christian clerics. In short,
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 101

the new state cult was to have many of the strengths of Christianity
without its liabilities.
Julian's attempt to establish an alternative state religion never
quite crystallized, partly because of his own untimely death. It may
be legitimately asked whether the effort could have succeeded at
all, given the strength of the church and the "artificial" nature of his
reforms. His genius, however, was his recognition that a mere res-
toration of cult practice, funding, and architecture would have failed
to win the hearts of ordinary people. At the very least Julian under-
stood that nostalgia alone would not restore the religion he so highly
valued, since he grasped many of the elements that attracted people
to Christianity in the first place.25
One of the elements that had allowed Christianity to claim le-
gitimacy over the course of the third and fourth centuries, especially
among the upper classes, was its appropriation of Greek philoso-
phy. We have discussed this process in earlier chapters; Justin had
begun joining Christian theology to philosophy in the second cen-
tury, a marriage consummated in the third century by Clement of
Alexandria and especially by Origen. Tertullian's challenge, "What
indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there be-
tween the Academy and the Church ?"26 was answered by the church
very much in the positive. The Christian appropriation of Platonism
and Hellenistic literature continued apace through the fourth cen-
tury to the point where an educated Christian was also a good
Platonist. That Julian, still outwardly a Christian but a pagan at
heart, could enjoy the company of the Christian theologian Basil as
a classmate at the Athenian academy was a sign of how far the inte-
gration of the Christian and Hellenistic universes had proceeded.
Julian protested this integration as well as the resulting prestige
that Christianity enjoyed. As far as he was concerned, the Chris-
tians' "theft" of the Hellenistic literary tradition was illegitimate;
Christianity, by its rejection the gods, was opposed to everything
the literature represented. Since pagan literature was inextricably
linked to pagan religion, he considered the Christian use of such
literature to be fundamentally dishonest.
Julian exposed this "dishonesty" on several levels. In the first
place, the anthropomorphic biblical presentation of God had led
Christians to the practice of allegory, which was to Julian an illegiti-
mate method of "Hellenizing" the scriptures. Each biblical
102 Against the Christians

representation of the divine was "full of blasphemy against God,

unless the phrase contains some occult and mysterious sense, which
indeed I can suppose."27 Of greater significance to Julian, however,
was the ethical issue, an issue that was of central importance in his
attempted restoration of paganism. Christianity was, in his view,
an essentially impious and immoral religion, filled with hypocriti-
cal pretenders and political opportunists. The fact that Christians
were such an immoral lot, he reasoned, must have been their pur-
pose for appropriating Greek literature; even Christians understood
that these writings were a better source of moral instruction than
the Bible. "If the reading of your own scriptures is sufficient for
you, why do you nibble at the learning of the Hellenes?"28 For Julian,
Hellenistic literature was a means to piety and great deeds, while
the writings of the Jews and Christians were incapable of producing
moral goodness. It was therefore the moral bankruptcy of the Chris-
tians, according to the critic, that led them to seek the "higher
ground" of Greek literature.
In June 362, Julian took action designed to separate Christianity
decisively from the Hellenistic literary tradition. He issued an edict
specifying qualifications and procedures for the appointment of
teachers; they" must excel first in character, then in eloquence." They
were to be appointed by city councils with final approval by the
emperor himself. Although the actual decree did not specifically
bar Christians from teaching, Julian later clarified in a letter that this
is exactly what he intended.29 He believed that if he could divorce
Christianity from the Hellenistic tradition, at least among the upper
classes, he could tum back the clock on some of the progress the
church had made over the previous century.
Predictably, Christians were outraged. A version of the Bible
was immediately produced which rendered the Gospels into Socratic
dialogue and much of the Hebrew Bible into Greek verse. Even the
pagan historian Amrnianus thought that Julian had gone too far:
"But this one thing was inhumane, and ought to be buried in eternal
silence, that he forbade teachers of rhetoric and literature to practice
their profession, if they were followers of the Christian religion."30
But whatever the judgment of pagan or Christian historians, the
emperor's proclamation was absolutely consistent with his values.
To Julian, Christianity and Hellenism were diametrically opposed
on the cultural as well as the religious field of battle; the defense of
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 103

Hellenism as a way of life would form the central thesis of his cri-
tique of Christianity.

Julian's opposition to Christianity, legal as well as literary, was

multi-faceted. As emperor his intention was to check and ultimately
reverse the progress the church had made under the reign of Constan-
tine and his sons. This concern is reflected not only in his polemic
works but also in his decrees, both against the church and in favor
of traditional paganism. Julian did not live long enough to take full
advantage of the propaganda possibilities of coinage, on which he
sported the philosopher's beard. He was not only a political figure,
however; he also considered himself a philosopher, and it was in
this role that he wrote Against the Galileans as well as other works.
His extant literary output, unmatched by any other emperor, gives
us a great deal of insight into the conservative wing of paganism
during the decades in which that same paganism was being swept
away.
However, the anti-Christian arguments of Against the Galileans
cannot be examined in a literary vacuum. To a degree unparalleled
for a Roman emperor, we have both his writings and a more than
adequate record of his administration. It is the proper function of
history in such cases to reconstruct the whole person and not merely
his literature, which we have done in part by discussing his relevant
legislation. We view Julian's arguments against the Christians in
the context of what may rightly be characterized as his overriding
concern: his passion for the greatness of Greek culture, the Hellenis-
tic apology. Julian's defense of Hellenism formed the core of his
attack on the Christians in both the literary and political arenas; in
Against the Galileans, his original contributions to the argument
against Christian exclusivism constitute much of the rhetorical am-
munition. It is in this context that, like Porphyry, Julian employed a
strategy of assimilation in order to exercise rhetorical control over
his opponents.
Before proceeding to his polemic, it is necessary to establish a
rhetorical context for Julian's arguments by examining his prede-
cessors Celsus and Porphyry. This has been done in large measure
in the preceding chapters. However, the state of scholarship on
Julian's place within the history of anti-Christian polemic is inad-
equate, a fact that requires a somewhat more detailed comparison
104 Against the Christians

of the three critics than has been attempted before.

To do so requires that we establish a connection between the
emperor and the anti-Christian polemic tradition, three centuries
old by the time Julian ascended the throne. In some ways, as we
have mentioned briefly, Julian's criticism of Christianity shared im-
portant features with those of Celsus and Porphyry. Christians, after
all, had been under attack from various segments of the pagan world
since the the church began; it is to be expected that after three centu-
ries most of the major arguments would have been developed.
Harnack's essentially correct if exaggerated remark that "Even to-
day Porphyry remains unanswered"31 testifies not so much to the
genius of Porphyry's critique as to the permanence of the basic is-
sues he raised, issues that reappear in Julian's treatise.
It is this endurance of the fundamentals of pagan anti-Christian
polemic that scholars have tended to confuse with a lack of original-
ity on Julian's part. Some have found no original thought at all in
Julian's work, implying that he merely copied the arguments of his
predecessors. Many are content to observe that there are a number
of parallels between Julian and Celsus in particular and that Julian's
arguments are much closer in tone and content to Celsus than to
Porphyry. Typical is one scholar's characterization of Against the
Galileans as "a disappointing book," "repetitive and woolly, unable
to distinguish between the fundamental and the trivial" and lack-
ing sustained argument.32 Another writer's characterization of his
work as being little more than "classical common sense" with its
specifics traceable to Celsus33 is incomplete and reflects a failure to
examine Julian's work adequately. Julian was indeed the heir to
three centuries of anti-Christian thought, and as such should be ex-
pected to use many of the same elements of the earlier polemic. But
it is simply not true that "Julian's arguments against the Christian
doctrine do not greatly differ from those used in the second century
by Celsus, and by Porphyry in the third."34
That a comprehensive comparison of Against the Galileans with
the works of Celsus and Porphyry has yet to be written should give
pause when making such evaluations, as should the fact that Julian
was the first to criticize Christianity after having himself been raised
as a Christian. It is unknown to what extent Julian actually used the
writings of Celsus and Porphyry, but it can be safely assumed that,
given the impact Porphyry's Against the Christians was alleged to
Julian the Apostate and the Politics of Hellenism 105

have made on Christians of the late third and early fourth centuries,
Julian was probably familiar with its arguments. His use of Celsus'
work is less certain, given its greater age; if, however, Julian was
familiar with Christian apologetics, he would have had some expo-
sure to Celsus' arguments as well. In any event, the issue of Julian's
having actually used either of these works is largely irrelevant. The
foundations of anti-Christian polemic, laid in large part by Celsus,
continued to be built upon for the next two centuries. And while
Julian's work is comparable to those of his predecessors on several
points, his particular contribution to the anti-Christian project has
not been adequately assessed.
The point of this excursus on scholarship regarding Julian is that
understanding the differences between his anti-Christian arguments
and those of Celsus and Porphyry is crucial to grasping Julian's par-
ticular polemic strategy. This strategy may be observed in part by
comparing specific lines of reasoning in Against the Galileans with
those same arguments as his predecessors employed them. Julian
was in many ways an original thinker when it came to criticizing his
Christian opponents; and while this chapter has placed him in his
historical context, our task in the next chapter will be to locate him
within a particular literary context-as the culmination of the pa-
gan anti-Christian rhetorical tradition.
This page intentionally left blank
 6

Julian and the Bounded God

To do justice to Julian's polemic work against the Christians would

take much more discussion than can be accomplished here. Instead,
this chapter locates him within the established anti-Christian rhe-
torical tradition by examining three of his specific arguments, all of
which had already been articulated in earlier form by his predeces-
sors Celsus and Porphyry. The first argument concerns the general
use of Judaism as a "weapon" in pagan anti-Christian polemic.
Julian's criticism of the Jewish origins of Christianity signals an im-
portant change of attitude towards Judaism, especially when
compared with that of Celsus. As we will see, Julian's criticism of
Judaism was carefully nuanced in such a way as to target specifi-
cally the Jewish literary tradition in order to defend the Hellenistic,
a nuance that will also represent a central element in his rhetoric of
assimilation.
The second argument we consider refers back to the pagan the-
ology, articulated by Celsus, of divine overseers for each nation.
Julian coalesced the doctrine into a powerful exposure of the con-
tradiction within Christianity between the universal and the
particular, between God's status as the guardian of a particular
people and that of supreme deity. The third argument, known
through Justin and used explicitly by Porphyry, is that Christ's late
coming consigned the vast majority of the human race to eternal
condemnation. Julian's specific usage of, and contributions to, these
arguments enabled him to establish a polemic boundary between
Christianity and Hellenistic culture, a boundary crucial to his de-
fense of the latter.
The importance of these three points is that, taken together, they
reveal as the organizing principle of Julian's polemic his apologia for
the cultural and religious aspects of Hellenism. Like Celsus, he es-
tablished rhetorical boundaries between Christianity and Hellenism.
On the other hand, like Porphyry, he accepted portions of Christian
belief in order to draw boundaries within Christianity itself. By us-
108 Against the Christians

ing the works of Celsus and Porphyry as bases for comparison, we

can examine Julian's specific contributions to what were otherwise
well-worn lines of anti-Christian argument.

The pagan objection that Christians were in reality apostates from

Judaism was prominent in Celsus' True Doctrine. The fact that Chris-
tians-both those who were Jews originally and those who had
converted from paganism-had left the religion of their ancestors
was an important weapon in Celsus' polemic and was evidence that
Christians were an impious lot. That this particular accusation served
as standard anti-Christian fare is evident by its appearance in all
three of the critics examined in this study. Julian made much use of
it, while Porphyry had complained that Christians rejected the sac-
rifices and temple worship of the Jewish law, even though their own
scriptures required it.
At the same time, it must be remembered that pagan polemi-
cists used Judaism as a "two-edged sword" against the Christians.
In the first place, whatever the critics disapproved of in Judaism or
in the Hebrew Bible they also charged against the Christians. On
the other hand, they condemned Christians for departing from what-
ever was laudable in Judaism, such as its antiquity or its sacrificial
system. Thus when pagans used Judaism to criticize Christianity
the sword could cut in either direction, either in the manner of" guilt
by association" with elements of Judaism that the critic found objec-
tionable, or in the form of contrasting the practices of the renegade
Christians with the praiseworthy Jewish practices they left behind.
The persistence of these arguments makes it natural that they should
appear in Julian's polemic. And they do; in Against the Galileans the
sword indeed swings in both directions.
However, the issue becomes more complex when we compare
Julian's rhetoric with that of the earlier polemicists since we possess
additional material from which to evaluate his attitude toward Jews
and Judaism. We have no such information for Celsus, as he is known
only through Origen's quotations of the True Doctrine; although we
have more literary sources for Porphyry, it is still difficult to charac-
terize clearly his stance toward the Jews. Our more comprehensive
knowledge of Julian allows us to evaluate his actions as well as his
words; by studying his overall view of Judaism we are able to evalu-
ate his use of Judaism in his anti-Christian polemic.
Julian and the Bounded God 109

It would be helpful at this point to place our study of Julian and

the Jews in the context of earlier scholarship on this issue. Julian
has been variously called a sincere Jewish sympathizer and an op-
portunist with no love at all for the Jews. A century ago, Michael
Adler remarked that the history of of Judaism under more rulers
like Julian "would have been considerably brighter, illumined by
the warm glow of a generous tolerance and intelligent sympathy."l
Most other commentators have rightly assigned more Realpolitik to
Julian's motives; Yohanan Lewy, for example, noted that his hatred
of Christians, more than his love for Jews, motivated his project (dis-
cussed below) of rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem.2 John G.
Gager's balanced treatment of Julian's own mixed statements re-
garding the Jews concludes that, like other Neoplatonists, the
emperor was "genuinely attracted to certain aspects" of Judaism.3
Because of the sometimes equivocal nature of the these state-
ments of Julian, we would do well to heed David Rokeah' s warning
regarding the contextualization of Jewish-Christian-pagan polemic.

Since Judaism served the pagans and Christians alike as a weapon for the
purpose of their ideological conflict, we witness the modification of their
attitudes towards Judaism and Jewish traditions in keeping with the in-
terests of the parties concerned, even when this involved the relaxation of
formerly firm positions, or the offering of mutually contradictory explica-
tions.4

Even this statement requires qualification, however. While Rokeah' s

observation keeps us from reading too dogmatically those statements
regarding the Jews that appear in a polemic context, it is also pos-
sible to oversimplify "the interests of the parties concerned." Since
pagan polemicists did not share identical interests, Julian's use of
Judaism was much different from that of Celsus and even of Por-
phyry. The manner in which they used Judaism differed greatly
according to the historical and political contexts of the critics as well
as the particular rhetorical strategies they chose to employ.
Thus the importance, in the case of Julian, of considering his
specific actions toward the Jews in addition to his polemic. These
actions indicate that he generally favored them, in policy if not al-
ways : n genuine respect. For example, he abolished special taxes
that ~arlier emperors had levied against the Jews. His most dra-
110 Against the Christians

matic move, though, was to authorize the rebuilding of the Jewish

temple. Having learned during a meeting with Jewish leaders in
Antioch that they were permitted to perform animal sacrifice only
at the temple at Jerusalem, destroyed during the first Jewish revolt
in 70 CE, he gave permission and funding for the Jews to begin re-
building the temple on its former site. The motivations for Julian's
decision are still being debated, just as they were in the fourth and
fifth centuries.s While his enthusiasm for blood sacrifice was cer-
tainly one reason, other Christian writers of the period pointed to a
desire on the part of Julian to disprove the Christian teaching about
the eternal desolation of the temple. Although most treatments of
the problem have emphasized his religious motivations, one biog-
rapher has pointed out possible political motivations for the project:
Julian realized that the Jews had supported the rival Persians in the
past and that he should court this substantial Eastern minority.6 His
elimination of the tax that the Jews had paid to the Jewish patriar-
chy was perhaps intended as a prelude to an eventual transfer of
power within Judaism from the patriarchate to what would become
a new temple establishment. In any event, construction was begun,
but an earthquake and fire hindered the work, and the project was
eventually abandoned.
His actions, especially the attempt to rebuild the temple, have
generated disagreement regarding Julian's attitude toward the Jews.
Did he merely exploit them for his anti-Christian purposes or did
he genuinely favor them? As we have indicated, it is difficult to
answer such a question based on his writings alone; his references
to Judaism do not serve as trustworthy indicators when polemic
ends are in view. The same caution applies in interpreting his ac-
tions with regard to the Jews, embroiled as he was in a hostile
relationship with the church. In the end, it is probably unwise to
separate too rigorously the options of genuine regard and political
exploitation. Julian was, after all, raised as a Christian and there-
fore received Christian teaching about the Jews, little of it positive.
As an adult, the idealistic pagan and enemy of Christianity may have
had some genuine admiration for Jewish law. The most likely de-
scription of his view of Judaism is that, while Judaism served as a
customary and effective stick with which to beat the Christians, there
were at the same time elements of Judaism that resonated positively
with him, such as its antiquity and the fact that its scriptures re-
Julian and the Bounded God 111

quired blood sacrifice. Although there is no doubt that he viewed

Judaism as inferior to paganism, he nonetheless had some kind of
actual regard for the Jews-especially, of course, when they served
his anti-Christian policies and polemic.
With this somewhat ambivalent characterization in hand we are
now in a position to examine the role the Jews played in his anti-
Christian polemic, particularly as this role related to the Hellenistic
apology. Julian, like his predecessors, accused the Christians of be-
ing duplicitous in their claim to have their origins in Judaism while
at the same time rejecting everything important about the Jewish
religion such as Sabbath observance, circumcision, and kashrut. Simi-
lar to the way in which Celsus accused the Christians of being Jewish
apostates, Julian noted their abandonment of both Judaism and Hel-
lenism, asking why they were

neither Hellenes nor Jews, but belong to the sect of the Galileans, why
they preferred the belief of the Jews to ours; and what, further, can be the
reason why they do not even adhere to the Jewish beliefs but have
abandoned them also and followed a way of their own. For they have not
accepted a single admirable or important doctrine of those that are held
either by us Hellenes or by the Hebrews who derived them from Moses .. ?

Like both Celsus and Porphyry before him, Julian criticized the Chris-
tians for leaving their Jewish roots. There is an important difference,
however, between Julian's treatment of this issue and that of his pre-
decessors, especially Celsus. For Celsus, the Christians' guilt in
leaving Judaism lay solely in the fact that they had abandoned an
ancestral religion; there was nothing inherently favorable about Ju-
daism that the Christians could be blamed for leaving behind. Jewish
monotheism and exclusivism were detestable to Celsus; his charac-
terization of Moses and the Exodus as a flight of renegade Egyptians,
while reinforcing the theme of apostasy, served to accentuate his
criticism of the Jews as a barbarian race. According to Celsus, the
only redeeming quality that Judaism possessed was its antiquity.
Julian, on the other hand, whatever his motivations might have
been regarding the temple project, had a more favorable outlook on
the Jews than had Celsus. To be sure, he was critical of some aspects
of Judaism. For example, a major portion of the extant fragments of
Against the Galileans is devoted to criticizing the Jewish doctrine of
112 Against the Christians

creation, comparing it unfavorably to the Platonic version in the

Timaeus. But as we will see, this was no random selection of Jewish
targets to attack, as Celsus' polemic largely was. For the most part,
Julian criticized the Christians for abandoning their Jewish ances-
try, separating his opponents from a generally favorable Judaism.
Even while driving a wedge between Christians and their Jew-
ish origins, Julian did allow one explicit connection between the two
religions. Importantly, the only aspect of Judaism which Julian ex-
plicitly credited Christianity with having retained was its theological
exclusivism. Even on this point, however, Julian asserted that Juda-
ism in its original state had not been so exclusive. According to
Julian, even exclusivism was a later addition to Judaism, implying
that an original"pure Judaism" allowed for the existence of the gods.
His translation of Exodus 22:28, "Thou shalt not revile the gods," as
well as the Genesis 6 account of the "sons of God" provided biblical
evidence for both their existence and their exalted nature. Impor-
tant also was Julian's claim that, with the exception of exclusivism,
there was actually little difference between a pagan and a Jew, since

the Jews agree with the Gentiles, except that they believe in only one God.
That is indeed peculiar to them and strange to us; since all the rest we
have in a manner in common with them-temples, sanctuaries, altars,
purifications, and certain precepts. For as to these we differ from one
another either not at all or in trivial matters.8

Julian, then, was no indiscriminate critic of Judaism, striking out

at the Jews with hopes of landing some blows on the Christians in
the process. Instead, he sought to demonstrate at the expense of
Christianity the relative reasonableness of the religion they left be-
hind. He praised the Jews for their dietary laws and sacrifice,
although he clearly believed that Judaism was inferior to paganism.
He accused Christians of misusing Jewish prophecy and failing to
keep many aspects of Jewish law. The crime of the Christians, then,
was to abandon the praiseworthy practices of both Jews and Hellenes
in order to embrace the worship of "the corpse" and "many wretched
men,"9 namely Jesus and the saints. His use of Judaism as a weapon
of anti-Christian polemic differed greatly from that of Celsus in that,
for the most part, the emperor used a strategy of Christian contrast
with Judaism instead of a strategy of association.
Julian and the Bounded God 113

When Julian did explicitly use the latter approach, it was quite
specific and limited to the Christian appropriation of a "non-authen-
tic" Jewish exclusivism. In addition to this explicit use, however,
there is an important way in which Julian formed an implicit link
between Christianity and Judaism. Besides his attack on Jewish and
Christian exclusivism, he devoted a large portion of Against the
GalileanslO to a critique of the Genesis account of creation, a criticism
that is at least an implicit attack on Judaism. Although asserting at
one point that theological exclusivism was the only aspect of Juda-
ism that Christianity retained, the creation account provided Julian
with an additional means of associating Christianity with Judaism.
However, this attack on the Jewish doctrine of creation is quite
circumspect; it does not take the form of conventional anti-Jewish
polemic. Specifically, Julian criticized the Jewish mythology with-
out criticizing the Jews. Why is this the case? Why did he not merely
attack the Jewish doctrine of creation, label it as philosophically un-
sophisticated and logically incoherent, and then attribute those faults
to the beliefs of Jews and Christians alike? After all, such an ap-
proach would have been standard procedure for Celsus. In the first
place, Julian's more guarded approach was consistent with his gen-
erally favorable regard of Judaism. In the process of criticizing an
important aspect of Jewish belief, Julian refused to turn the critique
into a round of anti-Jewish polemic, even as the opportunity pre-
sented itself. More important still, the purpose of Against the Galileans
required a much more sophisticated tactic than that of "guilt by as-
sociation." In his polemic work Julian was attempting to defend
Hellenism, a purpose that was at least as important to him as his
critique of Christianity.
How did his criticism of the creation account serve this purpose?
Julian's point-by-point comparison of the biblical creation story with
Plato's account of creation in the Timaeus was intended to demon-
strate above all that the Hellenistic account provided satisfactory
answers to a number of important theological questions, while the
Genesis account did not. For example, according to Julian, since
Genesis does not explain the origin of matter, it is evident that God
merely used pre-existing material for the process of creation, leav-
ing unexplained the origin of the matter with which God worked.
In addition the Bible, although admitting in several passages that
the gods do in fact exist, does not give an account of their origin.
114 Against the Christians

Therefore, according to Julian, the scriptures are incomplete and in-

consistent, omitting as they do several important aspects of the origin
of the universe. The Platonic account in the Timaeus, on the other
hand, explains the origin of both the material universe and the gods.
Julian's immediate objective in making these comparisons is clear.
The creation account in the Timaeus, characterized by clarity, consis-
tency and a full explanation of reality, is superior to the biblical
account, which is ambiguous, self-contradictory and lacking infor-
mation. But there was a larger object in view. Julian was doing
more than comparing two accounts of creation, although that was
the immediate problem, "in order that we may compare Plato's ac-
count of that generation [of the universe] with that of Moses." His
more important goal was the comparison of two composers of lit-
erature, Moses and Plato.

For in this way it will appear who was the nobler and who was more
worthy of intercourse with God, Plato who paid homage to images, or he
of whom the Scripture says that God spake with him mouth to mouth.ll

Thus Julian's comparison of the rival accounts of creation was not

simply an argument for the existence of the gods, nor was it even
primarily a philosophical argument for the Hellenistic over the
Mosaic accounts of creation. It was more than anything an argu-
ment for the superiority of Greek literature over its Hebrew
counterpart, of Plato over Moses, the so-called "worshiper of idols"
over the one with whom God talked "mouth to mouth"-the latter
expression probably a dig at Jewish and Christian anthropomor-
phism. For Julian, the comparison was every bit as much a literary
contest as it was a philosophical and theological one.
Julian was therefore accomplishing more with this argument than
simply an attack on a Jewish creation myth that he found objection-
able. He was above all engaged in the defense of the cultural
construct of Hellenism. This culture consisted of several specific
elements. It included Greek literature, Greek philosophy as en-
shrined in the writings of Plato and his interpreters, polytheistic
religion (it was no accident that Julian referred to Plato as "the idola-
ter," since the emperor considered polytheism an integral part of
Platonism), and the accomplishments of Roman government. This
argument regarding the doctrine of creation is in many ways repre-
Julian and the Bounded God 115

sentative of Julian's apologetic approach throughout Against the

Galileans. Although the attack on the Genesis account of creation
was indirectly an argument against Christian theology, it is more
properly to be interpreted as an apologetic for Greek literature and
the associated culture that Christianity threatened.
Julian's discussion carries another important implication, namely
that he was employing a new strategy on an old polemic battlefield.
Previously, Celsus had held up Jewish myth as an object of ridicule,
as so barbaric and incredible that Jews and Christians alike had to
make illegitimate use of allegory in order to make them intelligible.
Celsus' purpose had been to demonstrate that Christians, because
of their Jewish origins, were as worthy of ridicule and rejection as
the Jews. Julian's treatment of Jewish creation myth, however, had
a more specific purpose than merely to attack Christianity at the
expense of Judaism. He selected the Genesis creation account and
other targets with care and precision in order to accomplish specific
rhetorical objectives. Since Julian's positive attitude toward Juda-
ism prevented him from broadly associating Jews and Christians as
a single group of undesirables, Judaism served a polemic purpose
substantially different from that of Celsus, a difference missed by
virtually all interpreters of the emperor Julian. And while the Hel-
lenistic apology was the primary focus of Julian's use of Judaism, he
deployed in the process a rhetorical strategy of assimilation-a de-
ployment we will examine more closely in the following section.

Celsus in the True Doctrine had argued that, instead of choosing

which deities were worthy of worship, everyone should revere the
gods of their ancestors. His objection was essentially ethical in na-
ture. Abandoning one's traditional gods was to Celsus the greatest
form of impiety, even if that traditional religion was Judaism. But
he also offered a theological justification for this ethical imperative,
namely that each nation was possessed of certain divine "overseers"
appointed by the supreme deity, each one responsible for the well-
being and governance of its particular nation and ethnic group. In
fact the entire earth, Celsus maintained, had been divided from the
beginning among the various deities. Therefore all Christians,
whether they had been converted from Judaism or paganism, were
guilty of transgressing the boundaries of their ancestral religions,
established by the gods of the various peoples of the empire. Ac-
116 Against the Christians

cording to Celsus, then, the impiety of the Christians consisted pri-

marily of abandoning the deities that had been originally assigned
for their governance.
But although there was a theological dimension to Celsus' argu-
ment, the thrust of his appeal was ultimately ethical. It was not
until Julian that the objection shifted from a violation of Grreco-Ro-
man piety to the status of a fundamental contradiction within
Christian theology. This contradiction, according to Julian, was that
the Christian God held two "offices" at the same time: that of su-
preme God and that of a national deity.
This tension had formed a deep and lasting current within Chris-
tian theology from the very beginning of the church. The God of the
Christians was in fact the deity of a particular people, namely the
Jews. The larger church never abandoned this aspect of its origin.
The Christians, however, advanced at the same time the claim that
this deity was the supreme God, the creator of the universe and of
all the nations of the world. Since Justin Martyr they had been iden-
tifying their God with the supreme Platonic principle as well. The
Christians were thus putting forth two seemingly irreconcilable
claims: that their God was on the one hand universal, but on the
other hand national and local, a theological claim they shared with
the Jews.12
There was no escaping the tension for the simple reason that
Christianity could not make a complete break with its Jewish heri-
tage. Marcion and the movement he founded in the middle of the
second century had made such an attempt. His condemnation by
the larger church demonstrated that Christianity would not sepa-
rate itself completely from its Jewish roots. One consequence of this
decision, however, was that the church's Jewish origin became a stan-
dard component of the pagan criticism of Christianity. Part of this
criticism lay in the fact that Christians, although claiming to be the
spiritual heirs of Judaism, by and large did not obey certain impor-
tant requirements of the Jewish law; they did not circumcise, observe
the Sabbath or keep kosher. To be sure, there were still Christians,
particularly in the eastern part of the empire, whom John Chrysostom
would chastise at the end of the fourth century for observing Jewish
practices and holidays.

The festivals of the wretched and miserable Jews which follow one after
Julian and the Bounded God 117

another in succession-Trumpets, Booths, the Fasts-are about to take

place. And many who belong to us and say that they believe in our teach-
ing, attend their festivals, and even share in their celebrations and join in
their fasts. It is this evil practice I now wish to drive from the church.13

In general, however, issues of religious practice tended to sepa-

rate rather than unite Jews and Christians. The church's closest link
to Judaism was the Hebrew Bible, and it was these scriptures that
pagan critics seized upon to attack the Christian theology of God.
Although portraying God as the universal creator, the Jewish scrip-
tures that the Christians had adopted clearly presented this same
God as a tribal deity. Furthermore, to most pagans this deity seemed
unreasonably exclusive, ordering the destruction of other temples
and their gods and forbidding his followers to accommodate them-
selves to the customs of other peoples. Thus in the view of many
pagans the God of the Jews and the Christians was not only the
deity of a minority people but a xenophobe to boot. How, they asked,
could such traits be attributed to the God who ostensibly created all
the peoples of the world?
This tension was not lost on Julian. Like Celsus earlier, he ob-
jected that the anthropomorphic, jealous God of the Jews and
Christians could not be identified with the Platonic One that the
Christians claimed was theirs. Human traits such as anger and petty
jealousy were inadmissible in speaking about such a God. Celsus
had focused mainly upon divine jealousy as an ethical problem; it
seemed from his perspective to be the cause of the Christians' impi-
ous exclusivism. Julian's primary focus, on the other hand, was
geographical and ethnic.

Now I will only point out that Moses himself and the prophets who came
after him and Jesus the Nazarene, yes and Paul also, who surpassed all
the magicians and charlatans of every place and every time, assert that he
is the God of Israel alone and of Judaea, and that the Jews are his chosen
people.l 4

According to Julian, the Jewish and Christian scriptures themselves

disqualified God from the status of universal deity. Both God's
choosing of Israel in the Hebrew Bible and the incarnation of that
same God in the New Testament were purely local phenomena, in-
118 Against the Christians

compatible with the greatness and universality of the supreme di-

vinity postulated by the Greeks and Romans. It was inconceivable
to Julian that a truly cosmic deity could be confined to a specific
locality and people, a fact that led Julian to call the Christians
"Galileans." 15
In the extant anti-Christian polemic, this contradiction between
the universal and the particular is unique to Julian. However, he
did not stop with merely observing the existence of the difficulty in
Christian theology, a difficulty whose tension had been at least an
instinctive component of church life since the time of Marcion.
Julian's more important contribution was that he integrated the par-
ticular criticism into a larger element of pagan belief, namely the
theology of the national overseers discussed earlier; and further, that
he demonstrated this integration from the Hebrew Bible itself.
Julian argued that the Bible's own characterization of God as a
local (and hence insignificant) deity-" the God of Israel alone," as
he put it-made this God ineligible for consideration as the supreme
deity. For instance, in Julian's critique of the story of the tower of
Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) he observed that the God of the Bible super-
intended the division of languages among humanity. However,
Julian continued, are there not much greater differences among the
nations than merely that of language? Important cultural and even
physical differences divide the human race by their respective na-
tionalities. Especially significant and noteworthy are variations in
"national personality"; the Germans, Julian argued, are naturally
warlike while the Romans are "inclined to political life and hu-
mane."16 Since differences in language constitute an insignificant
element in the division of the nations, the deity who confounded
the languages at Babel actually performed a very minor act indeed.

If the immediate creator of the universe be he who is proclaimed by Moses,

then we hold nobler beliefs concerning him, inasmuch as we consider him
to be the master of all things in general. .. "17

According to Julian, the Jews and Christians worshiped a far more

insignificant god than either the supreme deity of Platonism or the
major deities of the Grreco-Roman pantheon. The God of the Chris-
tians was nothing more than a local overseer.
For this reason, Julian considered complete nonsense the Chris-
Julian and the Bounded God 119

tian idea that the God of the Jews should also be the God of the
gentiles. Paul practiced such double talk when he exclaimed, "Is
God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of
Gentiles too ... " (Romans 3:29). Julian considered that this deity,
while worthy of some degree of honor, was not worthy of elevation
to such exalted status.

But if Moses first pays honour to a sectional god, and then makes the
lordship of the whole universe contrast with his power, then it is better to
believe as we do, and to recognise the God of the All, though not without
apprehending also the God of Moses; this is better, I say, than to honour
one who has been assigned the lordship over a very small portion, in-
stead of the creator of all things.18

Thus the god of the Christians, according to Julian, was not only a
mere local god but a petty usurper as well. Originally given lord-
ship over an insignificant area of the world and over a particular
people, this deity had wrongfully been assigned a higher office.
Although worthy of some limited amount of honor, his worshipers
had granted to him that which was not rightly his, namely the sta-
tus of creator of the universe and supreme being.
We are now in a position to summarize Julian's treatment of the
Christian doctrine of God. In Against the Galileans he laid bare what
he considered the fundamental contradiction in Jewish and Chris-
tian theology, that the deity of these two religions was at the same
time universal and particular. Although hinted at by Celsus, it was
Julian who explicitly pointed out the issue with all its implications.
As the Jewish and Christian scriptures themselves testify, God chose
the nation of the Jews to be his very own; his laws and benefits were
for the Jews alone. Even the New Testament doctrine of the incar-
nation revealed a God limited in time and space. How could it be
possible for the same deity to claim to be the sovereign of all peoples
and the creator of the world?
Not satisfied simply to point out the theological tension, Julian
took sides in the issue, firmly declaring the God of the Jews and
Christians to be nothing more than a regional god. To Julian, this
was as true for Judaism as it was for Christianity; "[The Jews'] car-
dinal error is that they have raised to the status of supreme and only
God a divinity who was merely of local and national importance."19
120 Against the Christians

Julian's central point in employing the theology of national over-

seers was that the Jewish and Christian God was exactly that: a
national deity and nothing more. In Against the Galileans, he at-
tempted to put the divine usurper back in his place.
However, there was more to Julian's argument than a desire to
demote Israel's God. The theology of the national overseers and its
implications for God provided a vehicle for Julian's larger project,
which was to draw the distinction between Christian and Hellene.
This distinction was being blurred by the Christian appropriation
of Hellenistic literature, an appropriation that Julian viewed as ille-
gitimate and ultimately harmful to Grreco-Roman culture. The
Christian violation of "divine boundaries" represented by the pro-
motion of the Jewish God to supreme status was more than a
theological issue for Julian. More important, it was a threat to the
Hellenism he was attempting to restore. In other words, the wor-
ship of a supreme deity who was fundamentally opposed to
Hellenistic culture in every way could have nothing but devastat-
ing consequences for that same culture. Thus the metaphor of
"usurpation" applies to the cultural as well as theological realm, the
illegitimate Christian appropriation of Hellenistic literature acting
as a parallel problem to the illegitimate elevation of a local deity to
supreme status. In this same vein it would not be pressing the im-
age too far to remember that Julian viewed himself as the divinely
appointed restorer of religion, using his imperial power to put down
a cultural as well as theological rebellion.
But even if Julian's concern was to put the Jewish and Christian
deity in his place, such a place was nonetheless a legitimate one in
the emperor's religious world view. Contrary to Celsus' anti-Jew-
ish strategy, Julian's theology of defining the God of the Christians
as an ethnic and local deity served the purpose of further legitimiz-
ing Judaism. Celsus had previously employed the tactic of
dismissing the Jews altogether in his attempt to marginalize the
Christians; he had made no attempt to offer theological significance
to the Jewish God. Julian, on the other hand, retained a place for the
God of the Bible in the form of an ethnic religion. It was a limited
place to be sure, but no more limited than that of other local or eth-
nic deities. Furthermore, and perhaps more important, he managed
to integrate theologically the God of Judaism into the broader uni-
verse of Grreco-Roman religion. For example, Julian's interpretation
Julian and the Bounded God 121

of the Tower of Babel story allowed the Jewish God a mythical place
in universal human history, namely the division of humanity into
different language groups. A minor role, of course, but the critic
was nevertheless attempting to establish a place for Judaism in the
larger household of universal paganism. With this perspective, we
may interpret Julian's claim that Judaism was not originally an ex-
clusive religion as a clearly marked entrance through which the Jews
could enter. It was an attempt at theological assimilation, punctu-
ated in the concrete by his decree authorizing the rebuilding of the
temple in Jerusalem. At the same time, such a strategy of assimila-
tion allows a satisfying integration of both his actions and his writings
with regard to his attitude toward Judaism. His positive regard for
the Jews carried with it a theological price tag: a non-exclusive Ju-
daism, its deity absorbed into the pagan pantheon.
This examination of Julian's rhetorical strategy also allows us to
propose a new theory as to his motivations for undertaking the
project of rebuilding the temple. We may view his authorization for
the rebuilding as a political manifestation of his overall anti-Chris-
tian strategy, especially if we postulate a measure of consistency
between his anti-Christian rhetoric and his policies; after all, consis-
tency is usually a characteristic of idealists such as Julian. While the
rebuilding has historically been viewed as an attempt to prove false
the Christian teaching regarding the eternal desolation of the temple,
a much more ambitious motive is suggested here. It must be re-
membered that the God who was to be worshiped at the restored
temple was not only the God of the Jews, but the God of the Chris-
tians as well, since they were in fact one and the same deity. For
Julian, the temple project would have done much more than merely
contradict an obscure Christian prophecy. It would also have ac-
complished more than simply allow the Jews to offer blood sacrifices
in an authorized location. Of course, both of these issues were prob-
ably concerns of the emperor. However, by directing the rebuilding
of the temple in Jerusalem, Julian was trying to restore the Christian
God to his original (and far less significant) place. "Restricting" the
Christians' deity to a particular location would have been a power-
ful tool by which to undermine their claims to universality and
exclusivism. Once the temple was built and in operation, how would
the Christians be able to claim that their God, even now receiving
animal sacrifices in an insignificant Judean town, was the universal
122 Against the Christians

supreme deity? At the same time, it is difficult to dismiss the visual

effect of a restored Jewish temple only a few hundred yards from
the venerated Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.
In addition, having sacrifices offered there for the benefit of a
pagan state would have ultimately served the purpose of "domesti-
cating" the God of the Christians for pagan use. Although the
sacrifices would have been performed by a restored Jewish priest-
hood, Julian's motives were clear in this regard: blood sacrifices were
to be offered, wherever possible, to powerful deities-including the
God of the Jews and Christians-in the interests of the Roman Em-
pire. What greater victory could Julian have achieved over the
Christians than by making their religion nothing more than another
local cult in the service of a pagan state? Whether or not such an
arrangement would have had any lasting consequences for the
church or its growth, the symbolic effect would have been just what
the emperor ordered.
This suggestion of Julian's motive for the temple project emerges
from the discussion regarding his attitude toward the Jews, a dis-
cussion with two implications for our study. In the first place, it
highlights and clarifies the polemicist's use of the Jews as a weapon
against the Christians. As stated previously, the standard approach
to the pagan use of Judaism in anti-Christian polemic has been ei-
ther a rhetoric of Christian association with an objectionable Judaism
or one of contrast with the religion they abandoned. Julian's ap-
proach, when viewed in both its literary and political contexts, is
significantly more complex and nuanced than either of these op-
tions. It is the subtlety of Julian's consciously crafted strategy with
respect to the Jews, combined with the failure of most interpreters
to integrate this strategy into the emperor's larger project of the Hel-
lenistic apology, that has led students of Julian to disagree regarding
his motivations.
Second, our discussion of Julian and the Jews helps us to locate
the emperor in the development of anti-Christian polemic over the
nearly two centuries covered by this study. Julian's favor toward
Judaism constituted a central element of his rhetorical strategy of
assimilation. His acceptance of Judaism, the God of the Jews and
Christians, and several aspects of the biblical ceremonial law pro-
vide evidence of a strategy designed to marginalize Christianity by
incorporating elements favorable to Julian. Naturally, this accep-
Julian and the Bounded God 123

tance was conditioned on a reconstruction of Judaism that made it

more friendly to paganism. We may compare this phenomenon in
Julian's polemic with Porphyry's favorable regard for Jesus as an
immortal, which was a tactic designed to exercise control over the
person of Jesus by "domesticating" him for pagan use. Julian's in-
corporation of the Jews and Judaism within the boundaries of pagan
discourse followed a similar strategy of assimilating the Jewish ele-
ments of Christian theology in order to exercise control over them.
Because of the Christians' dominant political position, the elimina-
tion of Christianity was no longer an option, even in a rhetorical
sense; the target of Julian's polemic and politics was an enemy whose
position was to be carefully manipulated, not destroyed. At least,
not yet.

This manipulation included the deployment of traditional anti-

Christian arguments by new and more effective means. We have
examined two of these so far, namely the Christian association with
Judaism and the theology of the divine overseers, with their impli-
cations for Julian's ideological agenda. The third involves the
objection to Christianity's recent origin. By the time Julian acquired
the purple, Christianity had been on the scene for more than three
centuries. Relative to most of the other religions of the Mediterra-
nean basin, however, it was still as much a newcomer as it had been
when Celsus accused it of being an "innovative" sect. That Chris-
tians were still having to defend themselves from this charge at the
turn of the fourth century is evident from the apologetic of Eusebius,
who found it necessary to assert that Christianity was in fact the
most ancient of all religions. Since even the patriarchs of the He-
brew Bible, he maintained, engaged in the pure worship of the one
God, "they therefore shared the name of Christ with us."20
The recent origin of Christianity provided more than an oppor-
tunity for pagans to charge Christians with religious innovation,
important as that accusation was with respect to the value system of
antiquity. As discussed earlier, the church's recent origin coupled
with its claim to exclusivity posed a special problem: what was the
fate of those who lived before the coming of Christ? If Jesus is the
only way to God, why was this way not revealed long before? The
question was particularly aimed at Christian exclusivism, since a
religion that did not make the exclusive claim would not have been
124 Against the Christians

open to this kind of critique. As noted previously, the objection had

been raised as early as the time of Justin Martyr and was articulated
by Porphyry. The objection to the logical problem of an exclusive
revelation limited to recent time was powerful and persistent.
However, it is not until Julian that we find this specific argu-
ment integrated with the tension between Christian (and Jewish)
theological universalism and ethnic particularism, a target of con-
tradiction that Julian believed demonstrable from both testaments
of the Bible. According to Julian, the fact that the Christian revela-
tion was localized in geography and ethnicity was at least as
problematic as the fact that Christ had come only recently in time.

And finally God sent unto [the Jews] Jesus also, but unto us no prophet,
no oil of anointing, no teacher, no herald to announce his love for man
which should one day, though late, reach even unto us also. Nay he even
looked on for myriads, or if you prefer, for thousands of years, while men
in extreme ignorance served idols, as you call them, from where the sun
rises to where he sets, yes and from North to South, save only that little
tribe which less than two thousand years before had settled in one part of
Palestine. For if he is the God of all of us alike, and the creator of all, why
did he neglect us?21

On the surface, this argument is no more than a repetition of the

argument of Porphyry and others before him. The God of the entire
world allowed that same world to live in error before the coming of
Christ, an argument that invalidated the Christian claim to exclu-
sivity. Importantly, however, Julian added the issue of the limitation
of God's revelation to Palestine and the Jews. Julian exposed the
tension not only between Christian exclusivism and the temporal
nature of the revelation, but also between Christian universalism
and the localization of God's revelation to Israel and the Jews alone.
He thus juxtaposed the classic objection to Christianity's recent ad-
vent with the contradiction he articulated between the universal and
particular in Judaism and Christianity.
Unlike Porphyry, however, Julian was not content merely to ex-
pose the contradiction and allow the resulting tension to carry the
weight of the argument. Julian provided an answer, one that is not
surprising given what we have discovered thus far, namely that the
God of the Jews and Christians was in fact merely a local deity:
Julian and the Bounded God 125

Wherefore it is natural to think that the God of the Hebrews was not the
begetter of the whole universe with lordship over the whole, but rather,
as I said before, that he is confined within limits, and that since his empire
has bounds we must conceive of him as only one of the crowd of other
gods.22

According to Julian, then, the recent arrival of the Christian faith,

coupled with the fact that this arrival was limited to Palestine and
the Jews, must force the thinking person to accept that the God of
the Christians was not the supreme creator of the universe. By re-
formulating the earlier argument of Porphyry into a choice between
accepting the Christian God as the "begetter of the whole universe"
and accepting him as nothing more than the God of the Jews, Julian
rejected Christian universalism by choosing the latter.
Importantly, Julian affirmed at the same time the "bounds" of
God's empire, a meager empire at that, consisting only of the "little
tribe" of the Jews. Using the argument against the late arrival of
Christ, Julian painted a picture of a God limited in time in much the
same way that, as we observed in the previous section, he limited
God with regard to geography and ethnicity. According to Julian, a
deity who reveals himself only at particular times to a particular
nationality cannot be the supreme God. By placing rhetorical con-
trols-temporal, geographic, and ethnic-on the boundaries of
Christian theology, Julian separated the Christian and Jewish God
from the supreme God of the universe, a division that was a crucial
component of the Hellenistic apology.

We may now observe how Julian exploited this division. Basing

many of his arguments upon those that Celsus and Porphyry had
used earlier, Julian expanded and altered them in order to establish
a rhetorical boundary between Christianity and Hellenism. Because
of Julian's passion for Hellenistic culture, it is not surprising that a
large section of Against the Galileans contrasts the achievements of
that culture with those of the Jews. The Hellenistic world, accord-
ing to Julian, perfected science and philosophy from their Egyptian
and Babylonian origins; the Greeks themselves developed law, while
the Romans perfected government. For the purpose of healing the
bodies and souls of people, the gods gave Asclepius to humanity as
"the greatest of the gifts of Helios and Zeus,"23 a reminder that pa-
126 Against the Christians

gan religion could not be separated from the greatness of Hellenis-

tic culture. Julian contrasted all these achievements and gifts of the
gods with the achievements of the Jews: "But what great gift of this
sort do the Hebrews boast of as bestowed on them by God, the He-
brews who have persuaded you [Christians] to desert to them?" 24
Julian proceded to argue that the Jews had never had a great
empire or culture. They had, he noted, very rarely lived as a free
nation over the previous two thousand years. Julian argued that
the Jews had never matched the Greeks and Romans in the admin-
istration of cities, their courts of law, or in their learning; that the
wisdom of Solomon was nothing to boast about, especially since the
king himself had been a fool; that the Jews produced no Hippocrates
as a physician, no Alexander as a general. In every possible cat-
egory by which one can measure the greatness of a civilization,
according to Julian, the Jewish culture was inferior to the Hellenis-
tic.
Again, however, Julian's criticism of Judaism served a larger
purpose in the polemic; grasping his rhetorical use of the Jewish
people is crucial to understanding the Hellenistic apology. It is im-
portant to remember that Julian's polemic was not primarily an attack
on Jewish cultural and political achievements, but rather more fun-
damentally a comparison of the God of the Christians with the gods
of the Hellenistic world. While their God "bestowed on the He-
brews nothing considerable or of great value," other nations were
reaping the benefits given to them by their gods. The achievements
of Hellenistic culture argued for the superiority of the pagan gods
against the God of the Christians.
To be sure, the emperor was critical of Jewish culture, and for
this reason it has been argued that Julian could not have been a friend
of the Jews. Whatever positive remarks he might have made about
them, it is argued, must be seen in light of their anti-Christian pur-
pose. For example, Julian's overtures toward the Jews in the
attempted rebuilding of the Jerusalem temple were based not upon
any admiration or sympathy for the Jewish people but out of spite
for the Christians. While this observation is correct to a certain ex-
tent, it must be remembered that Julian's criticism of the Jews in
Against the Galileans was every bit as conditioned by his anti-Chris-
tian agenda as was his project of rebuilding the temple. In other
words, if Julian's pro-Jewish temple project cannot be taken at face
Julian and the Bounded God 127

value in the context of anti-Christian politics, then neither can his

anti-Jewish remarks be interpreted at face value in the parallel con-
text of anti-Christian polemic. Thus his remarks belittling Jewish
cultural achievements are to be seen as first and foremost an anti-
Christian polemic device; they are not in themselves indicative of a
negative attitude toward the Jewish people. A surface reading yields
little more than a decontextualized exercise in Roman anti-Judaism.
Julian's comparison of Hellenistic with Jewish achievements is
neither primarily anti-Jewish nor merely incidental to his criticism
of Christianity. Rather, it constitutes the rhetorical climax of his anti-
Christian polemic. The comparison served to form a polemic
boundary between Hellenism and what Julian believed was an in-
ferior culture; he accomplished the apology for Hellenism by
marginalizing the alternative. Julian was a man steeped in history
and in classical literature, proud of Roman might and of Greek cul-
ture and desperately afraid for the fate of both. It was the gods who
were responsible for the greatness of Hellenistic civilization; it was
Christian exclusivism, manifested in the form of a local Palestinian
usurper, that was responsible for its decline.
At the same time, we see in Julian's criticism of the "inferior
culture" of the Jews and Christians a rhetorical approach based on a
strategy of assimilation. He did not universally exclude the Jews, as
did Celsus; on the contrary, he welcomed them into the fold of GrCEco-
Roman paganism. To Julian, Judaism represented those aspects of
Christianity that could safely be assimilated: confined to a particu-
lar people and location, stripped of both universalism and
exclusivism, affiliated with an inferior culture, its god reduced to
his proper place in the pantheon. In this way Julian could
marginalize his opponent, putting Christianity in its rightful place.
The season of Celsus' totalizing discourse had ended long ago.
Julian's discourse of assimilation, based as it was upon new politi-
cal realities, was perhaps the most effective anti-Christian rhetorical
strategy the times could have offered.
This page intentionally left blank
 7

Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide

This book has been a study of boundaries. Boundaries are what

separate "them" from "us" in the discourse of everyday living as
well as ritual, of prejudice as well as reason, of rumor as well as
intellectual exchange. In the first three centuries of the church, Chris-
tian exclusivism was an important element in all of these contexts.
In many ways exclusivism represents the boundary par excel-
lence. A dividing line defined largely by negation, Christian
exclusivism was easily identifiable in the "pluralistic" religious world
of the Mediterranean basin. It took on many forms, the most obvi-
ous of which, at least until the end of the second century, was social;
theological exclusivism was merely the impetus for its more visible
manifestations. The Christians' refusal to participate in civic and
domestic cult made them stand out prominently. From the pagan
perspective, meetings held in secret, strange rites, and other "bound-
ary markers" simply accentuated the differences. Before Celsus,
social exclusivism was the primary pagan objection to Christianity;
expressed in terms of accusations of gross immorality, these charges
constituted "boundary reinforcements" from the pagan side, pro-
paganda whose purpose was to strengthen the characterization of
Christians as radically "other."
Beginning with Celsus, however, theological and philosophical
considerations began to assume a more important role. Discussions
regarding the reality and providential activity of the gods, the na-
ture of the supreme deity, issues of epistemology, and the relationship
of Christianity to Judaism, to name a few, took center stage from the
beginning of the third century onward. Together, these and other
theoretical concerns formed a conceptual core for the criticisms of
all three of our polemicists.
If Christian theology was responsible for creating and maintain-
ing the boundary, the goal of the pagan polemicists was to control
its shape, dimensions and strength. In our examination of Celsus,
Porphyry and Julian, we detect two major strategies to that end.
130 Against the Christians

The first was to emphasize the differences between Christianity and

paganism; such was the approach of Celsus. In the True Doctrine we
find a totalizing discourse in which no aspect of Christianity was
acceptable; Celsus condemned the Christians from every possible
perspective. Christianity's social values were incompatible with
those of pagan culture; Christian doctrine contradicted Platonic phi-
losophy; Christian origins were objectionable because they were
Jewish. Jesus, the apostles, the Bible, Christian preaching and wor-
ship all came under Celsus' attack without nuance.
As we examined his arguments against Christianity, particularly
those touching on Christian exclusivism, we discovered that al-
though Celsus believed in a kind of "pagan universalism," such a
belief unequivocally excluded both Judaism and Christianity. In ad-
dition, his consistent association of Christianity with Judaism in a
negative manner revealed his desire to marginalize both. The rhe-
torical boundaries he constructed were firm, leaving as few points
of contact as possible between Christianity and the values of main-
stream pagan culture. Christians and their doctrines were as distant
from the "true doctrine" as Celsus could conceive.
Such a strategy makes sense when we consider the world view
of the Grc:eco-Roman intellectual. Christianity represented the per-
fect rhetorical counterpoint to the values of Roman society. When
speaking to an audience that considers itself pious, philosophical
and traditional, what better strategy to marginalize your opponents
than to characterize them as impious, unphilosophical and innova-
tive? Of course, this strategy did not originate with Celsus. The
characterization of Christians as anti-social and impious atheists goes
back at least to the early second century and probably before. To
take another example, it has been arguedl that the rhetoric of canni-
balism was a historical stereotype, and that the accusation as applied
to the Christians had much in common with the alleged cannibal-
ism of a number of disruptive persons and movements throughout
the ancient Mediterranean world. This particular accusation, as well
as those of ritual infanticide and indiscriminate sex, was an expres-
sion of the fear of societal dissolution and cultural collapse. These
charges provide examples prior to Celsus of a rhetorical marginal-
ization of Christianity using the stark representation of boundaries.
What Celsus had in common with such earlier accusations was
the strategy of representing Christians as completely "other." The
Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide 131

fact that he did not employ the charges of cannibalism does not mean
that his strategy of marginalization was any different. Instead, he
crafted the strategy in other language, primarily that of Platonic
philosophical assumptions and standard Grceco-Roman piety.
The observation that pagans represented Christianity and their
beliefs in complete opposition to pagan values is not a matter of
controversy. What is new in our approach is determining the basis
and strategy of the rhetoric. Historically, readers of the pagan crit-
ics have assumed that they were largely correct, that Christianity
was indeed wholly different from the other religions of the Mediter-
ranean. On the other hand, a critical approach to the polemicists
leads to a deconstruction of sorts with regard to the literature. By
characterizing Christians and their doctrines as "other," pagan crit-
ics were not accurately describing the situation; rather, they were
attempting to shore up the crumbling walls between Christianity
and paganism. What Averil Cameron has observed with regard to
Christian writers was just as true for their pagan counterparts.

Indeed, the prominence of the notion of the difference between Christian

and pagan expression in the work of the Christian writers themselves is
to be read as a rhetorical device and a symptom of adjustment rather than
as a description of a real situation?

There was a significant amount of tension between Celsus' strategy

of radical exclusion and the reality of Christian social and intellec-
tual integration at the turn of the third century. Thus Celsus' motive
was at least as much to create and sustain such difference rhetori-
cally as it was to accentuate actual differences between paganism
and Christianity.
We have observed the strategy of creating rhetorical difference,
then, as the first approach the pagan critics used to control the bound-
ary between Christianity and paganism. We have also presented it
as the dominant approach of Celsus and of the accusations that pre-
ceded him in the second century. The second strategy the polemicists
used was to identify areas of similarity between Christianity and
paganism in order to attack Christian exclusivism. As stated in the
first chapter of this book, this later strategy of finding and exploit-
ing points of contact was by no means a concession to Christianity;
a rhetoric of exclusion is not the only possible way to marginalize
132 Against the Christians

an opponent. Instead of distinctly separating every facet of Chris-

tianity from the realm of acceptability, the strategy of assimilation
drew boundaries within Christianity itself by noting and accentuat-
ing contradictions in Christian belief.
We witnessed this approach in the polemic of both Porphyry
and Julian. When the oracles of Apollo and Hecate, according to
Porphyry, admitted the soul of Jesus into the company of immortal
heroes, it did more than simply change the pagan representation of
Jesus from the deceiver and magician of Celsus' polemic to the sta-
tus of semi-divine being. Porphyry's oracular pronouncements, by
characterizing Christ as a pious individual, attempted to create a
rhetorical division between Jesus and the Christians who worshiped
him. This was not a step toward the approval of Christianity on the
part of Porphyry or anyone else. Instead, by shifting the boundary
from a location between paganism and Christianity to a location
within the Christian belief system, Porphyry continued to deny his
opponents any claim to legitimacy. The act of assimilating an ele-
ment of Christian belief into paganism was an attempt to manage
the contours of the pagan-Christian relationship to the disadvan-
tage of the Christians; in this case, to separate Christians from the
Christ they worshiped. The same broad strategy holds true for
Julian's polemic, particularly his rhetorical assimilation of Judaism
within the family of Grceco-Roman paganism. Both in his anti-Chris-
tian rhetoric and in his policies, his aim was to assimilate his
opponents' deity into the pagan universe. By creating a place for
the Jewish and Christian God that would be acceptable to pagans,
Julian was trying to strike a blow to Christian uniqueness, theologi-
cal exclusivism, and ultimately Christian political power.
Thus in the polemic of Porphyry and Julian we see a rhetori-
cal-and, in the case of Julian's temple project, political-strategy
of assimilation. These later critics marginalized Christianity by in-
corporating those aspects that would be acceptable to pagan
sensibilities and by constructing and identifying contradictions and
inconsistencies within Christianity itself. Whether by Porphyry's
universalism that would include Christ while excluding the Chris-
tians or by Julian's state religion that would ultimately make the
Christian God a minor deity in a greater paganism, the rhetorical
shift represents a substantive change of strategy from that of Celsus
in the attempt to marginalize Christianity.
Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide 133

When and why did this change take place? If it is at all possible
to date such a shift, it is evident that it occurred between the writing
of Celsus and that of Porphyry, that is, between about 200 and 270
CE. It was during this time that monumental changes took place
within both Christianity and paganism. In addition to experiencing
dramatic numerical growth, Christianity began, at the turn of the
century, appropriating seriously the heritage of Grceco-Roman cul-
ture. While this appropriation occurred in the area of philosophical
theology, it also happened on a popular level as converts to Chris-
tianity brought their pagan culture with them into the church.
Paganism meanwhile continued its centuries-old process of consoli-
dation and syncretism, a process that would eventually find ways
of consciously incorporating elements of Christian thought. The
convergence of these factors made possible a degree of rhetorical
assimilation that would probably have been unthinkable before the
early third century of the Common Era.

The shift from a totalizing discourse to a rhetoric of assimilation

is in some ways symptomatic of the similarities between paganism
and Christianity, the "common property" held by both sides as dis-
cussed in Chapter One. Through the course of this book we have
touched on specific examples of these similarities, from Celsus' par-
allels between Asclepius and Jesus (even in the context of a totalizing
discourse) to Porphyry's "Hellenization" of Christ and Julian's "do-
mestication" of the Jewish and Christian God. These examples
indicate discrete points of correspondence between pagan and Chris-
tian, points that pagan critics used in their attempt to marginalize
their opponents.
But the importance of similarity between paganism and Chris-
tianity goes beyond the identification of specific examples. The larger
issue of similarity lies at the heart of the pagan-Christian conflict
and the ultimate inability of pagans to marginalize their opponents
successfully. Our present task is to discuss the relationship between
the issue of similarity and the strategies of pagan opposition.
One way this relationship can be viewed is by comparing the
pagans' anti-Christian polemic and persecution with the pagan treat-
ment of the Jews. Why was it the case that the pagan reaction to
Christianity was significantly more violent than the response to Ju-
daism? Although the Jews had many of the same "objectionable"
134 Against the Christians

characteristics as the Christians, they were not subjected to the same

level of antagonism. For example, the five "objectionable" charac-
teristics of Judaism catalogued in one study3-" origins, strangeness,
religion and ritual, exclusiveness and proselytizing"-were largely
applicable to Christianity as well. This being the case, why did the
Christians pose a greater perceived threat to the empire and to soci-
ety than did the Jews? While a comprehensive answer to this
question is not the primary object of this study,4 some of the sugges-
tions offered here will at least partially explain the more violent
attempts to marginalize Christianity as well as the rhetorical strate-
gies involved.
The key to understanding the difference in the pagan reaction to
Christianity vis-a-vis Judaism is recognizing the success the pagans
generally enjoyed in their efforts to marginalize the Jews to the fringes
of Gr~co-Roman society. If the effective marginalization of ami-
nority group is a necessary step in removing their potential threat to
the dominant society, pagans were relatively successful with regard
to the Jews. Christianity, on the other hand, was never successfully
marginalized, despite attempts on the part of both the pagan critics
and the state.
Why did the pagans succeed in marginalizing one group and
not the other? In the first place, the Jews represented a distinct eth-
nic minority within the empire. Whether or not an official"Jewish
charter" granting them special status ever actually existed,5 such
ethnic and national identification worked to their advantage since
the Romans historically tolerated the religions of the peoples they
conquered. Thus Judaism as a religious practice was connected, as
far as pagans were concerned, with a specific nationality. And while
the status of the Jews as ethnic minority did not prevent their being
an object of suspicion and scorn, it did, for the most part, maintain
the peace with Rome and prevent large-scale religious persecution. 6
Christians, on the other hand, could not be marginalized in this
manner since they eventually came to represent an ethnic cross-sec-
tion of the empire. Gentile Christians were not, nationally or
ethnically, "other," a fact that made it more difficult to construct a
convenient social boundary around them. As a consciously trans-
ethnic universalism, Christianity was able to transcend national
identity although it lost in the process the protection that such iden-
tity afforded the Jews. We see this problem exploited most clearly
Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide 135

in Celsus' theology of divine overseers for each nation. Without a

national deity, Christians had no god at all, a construct that exposed
them to the charge of atheism.
If the first difference between Jews and Christians was the in-
trinsic difference of ethnicity, the second was an accident of history.
There appear to have been significant differences in the intellectual
environment of Judaism of the first century CE and that of the fourth
century, differences that sharpen the contrast between Judaism and
Christianity in terms of pagan efforts to marginalize them. In the
first century we witness an active exchange between Judaism and
Hellenistic culture and philosophy. Philo of Alexandria was able to
flourish in such an environment, creating a fusion of Jewish and
Greek thought, and allegorizing the Hebrew Bible to make it ac-
ceptable to Hellenistic sensibilities. However, particularly after the
revolts of 70 and 135 CE, this interaction was less vigorous. Over
the course of the next few centuries, Judaism consolidated its teach-
ings in a less Hellenized manner and was transformed into what
would become "normative" Rabbinic Judaism; Philo's project of Hel-
lenization would not be taken up again until the Middle Ages?
Christian intellectuals, on the other hand, aggressively promoted
the integration of their theology with Hellenistic culture and learn-
ing from the last quarter of the second century onward. Nor was
this a phenomenon limited to philosophical circles; the movement
included the appropriation of Grceco-Roman piety as well.
Tertullian's efforts to insulate Christian morality from pagan influ-
ence were unsuccessful in the long term; his own conversion to the
more ethically rigorous Montanist movement about the beginning
of the third century is symptomatic of a larger convergence occur-
ring between Christian and pagan culture. Although the monastic
movement would later provide a vehicle for stricter morality and
asceticism, it would be primarily an option for the Christian "spiri-
tual elite" and not for the masses. For most Christians, then, the
bridge from pagan virtue to Christian morality was neither long nor
difficult to cross, while Christian intellectual activity ensured the
Christian-ization of Hellenism as well as the Hellenization of Chris-
tianity. Thus the cultural boundary between pagans and Christians,
relatively firm in the first and second centuries, collapsed over the
course of the third.
Therefore Christianity was resistant to marginalization for all
136 Against the Christians

the reasons that Judaism was not: Christians were ethnically repre-
sentative of the population of the empire, while from the late second
century onward they successfully assimilated themselves into
Grceco-Roman culture. These ethnic, behavioral and intellectual
characteristics served to minimize, rather than accentuate, the dif-
ferences between Christianity and the dominant society. The
Christians' assimilation of pagan culture made them much more
difficult to marginalize than the Jews had ever been.
Thus in many ways it is the difficulty caused by similarity, not
by difference, that constitutes one of the keys to understanding the
pagan opposition to Christianity. Because of these similarities Chris-
tianity could not be marginalized except by force, which was in fact
applied with varying intensity and effect until shortly after
Constantine began eliminating the distinction between church and
empire.
The observation that Christianity's similarities to paganism made
the religion more difficult to marginalize suggests that the pagan
critics were at least as concerned with the similarities between Chris-
tianity and paganism as they were with Christianity as a religion
characterized by difference. This is especially the case as the con-
ceptual "bridges" between Christianity and paganism shortened
significantly over the course of the third and fourth centuries. The
major difference between Celsus and the later critics was the way in
which they handled the similarities. The tactic of Celsus was to deny
them outright and to exaggerate Christianity as "other"; Porphyry
and Julian exploited the similarities in a rhetorical strategy of as-
similation. Although differing in approach, both tactics were driven
by the need to exercise some measure of control over the public im-
age of Christianity; after all, the wolf in sheep's clothing is much
more dangerous than the wolf that looks like a wolf.
By the end of the third century the only remaining boundary of
any substance was Christian exclusivism. As a result, this charac-
teristic served as the focus for pagan polemicists in their attempt to
push Christianity out of the mainstream into which it had infiltrated;
it was Christian exclusivism that, so to speak, made the wolf a wolf.
The problem became for the critics: how is it possible to push Chris-
tianity out to the margins of Grceco-Roman society, isolating it to a
point where it will no longer be dangerous? Their answer lay largely
in controlling the boundary of Christian exclusivism. Exposing, at-
Negotiating the Pagan-Christian Divide 137

tacking, and manipulating this boundary became, in the end, their

only hope. The pagan polemicists' efforts to control the boundary
and the differing strategies they employed to that end has been the
subject of this book. Paradoxically, it is the very attempt to manipu-
late this boundary that reveals many of the points of contact between
Christianity and paganism, particularly as the polemic evolved from
a totalizing discourse to a strategy of assimilation.
Christianity succeeded in part because it was able to assimilate
in many ways to Grceco-Roman culture and religion. One of the
primary tasks of the critics was to counter this advance by attacking
and controlling the boundary of Christian exclusivism. In the end,
of course, they were not successful. Why they failed, and why as a
result the Roman Empire made the transition from a "pluralistic"
paganism to an exclusive universalism, is the logical next question-
a question beyond the scope of this book.

Early in this study we remarked that Christianity emerged from

Jewish and pagan parents. As a result, the traditional construction
of the "boundary" between paganism and Christianity is itself open
to question; after all, other traditional designations in the study of
Christian antiquity are also coming under increasing scrutiny. These
include the bifurcation of" orthodoxy" and "heresy" during the pre-
conciliar period,B as well as that of "Judaism" and "Christianity"
during the first century, particularly before 70 CE.9 It is possible
that the traditional presentation of Christianity as completely dif-
ferent from paganismlD is simply a residue from the history of
Christian scholarship. Historians from Eusebius to the twentieth
century have focused on the theme of "conflict," even as this study
has. Whether the rise of Christianity has been presented as a con-
test between the kingdom of God and the power of Satan, a conflict
between Christianity and classical culture,n or between the church
and pagan religion, scholars have traditionally preserved a more or
less firm distinction between the opponents. However, this differ-
entiation is becoming increasingly ambiguous.
Even the category of "exclusivism" may not have been the firm
and paradigmatic boundary between Christianity and paganism that
this book has postulated. After all, a vast number of Christians sac-
rificed to the gods at the order of Decius, a demonstration of the
weakness of the Christian side of the boundary. We have noted
138 Against the Christians

Constantine's own ambiguous relationship to the exclusivist require-

ments of his new faith, an ambiguity that was at least tacitly accepted
by the church leadership of his time. Christians could be, when
conditions called for it, tolerant of breaches in the barrier.
Nor did such breaches end with Constantine. Paganism contin-
ued as a social and intellectual force for at least two more centuries
in the east, while in the wes~ Germanic, Celtic and other paganisms
continued as viable alternatives to Christianity long after the col-
lapse of Roman rule.12 In such an environment it was sometimes
necessary for Christian evangelists to employ pagan means for Chris-
tian ends. Early in the fifth century the Christian Paulinus of Nola
penned the praises of animal sacrifice at the tomb of Saint Felix,
appropriating a traditional pagan rite for the purpose of converting
rural Italians to Christianity.13 As the demands of conversion less-
ened, so did the strength of Christian exclusivism. Augustine's
rebuke to North African Christians is revealing in this regard: "Let
no man say, 'I go indeed to the idols, I consult possessed ones and
fortune-tellers: yet I abandon not God's Church; I am a Catholic."'14
By the fifth century, at least, the boundary had become permeable
indeed.
Thus if exclusivism formed the boundary par excellence between
Christians and pagans, it was nevertheless a boundary that was sus-
ceptible to manipulation by Christians and pagans alike for various
ends. The parameters of Christian exclusivism, traditionally as-
sumed to be an immovable barrier, were in fact open to negotiation
from both sides. It is these negotiations that provide some of the
most intriguing information available regarding the world view com-
mon to pagans and Christians in late antiquity.
 Notes

CHAPTER 1

1. Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity (Princeton, NJ: Princeton

University Press, 1996).
2. Acts 14:16-17.
3. Averil Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire: The De-
velopment ofChristian Discourse (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1991).
4. Theodore S. de Bruyn, "Ambivalence Within a 'Totalizing Dis-
course': Augustine's Sermons on the Sack of Rome," Journal of
Early Christian Studies 1/4 (1993): 406.
5. Tertullian Apology, trans. Rudolph Arbesmann, Emily Joseph
Daly, and Edwin A. Quain, Fathers of the Church, Volume 10
(New York: Fathers of the Church, Inc., 1950) 1.7.
6. Pliny the Younger Epistles, 2 volumes, trans. William Melmoth,
LCLedition (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1915,
repr. 1940) 10.96.
7. Eusebius Ecclesiastical History, trans. Christian Frederick Cruse
(New York: T. Mason & G. Lane, 1839; reprint, Grand Rapids:
Baker Book House, 1991) 5.1.
8. Pliny the Younger Epistle 10.96.
9. Athenagoras A Plea for the Christians, trans. B. P. Pratten, ANF
collection, Volume 2 (Edinburgh: T &T Clark, 1885; reprint, Grand
Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1989) 3.
10. Theophilus of Antioch To Autolycus, trans. Robert M. Grant (Ox-
ford: Clarendon Press, 1970) 3.4.
11. Galen, Arabic fragment, quoted in Stephen Benko, "Pagan Criti-
cism of Christianity During the First Two Centuries A.D.,"
Aufstieg und Niedergang der romischen Welt (ANRW) 11-23.2, ed.
H. Temporini and W. Haase (Berlin, 1980), 1099.

CHAPTER2

1. Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs, in H. Musurillo, ed., The Acts of the

Christian Martyrs (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), 86-89.
140 Against the Christians

2. Tertullian On the Shows, trans. S. Thelwall, ANF collection, Vol-

ume 3 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1885; reprint, Grand Rapids: Wm.
B. Eerdmans, 1989) 24.
3. Harold Remus, "Outside/Inside: Celsus on Jewish and Chris-
tian Nomoi," in Jacob Neusner et al., eds., Religion, Literature and
Society in Ancient Israel (Lanham, MD: University Press of
America, 1987), 136-7.
4. For an attempt to trace Celsus' arguments through later pagan
writers see Georg Loesche, "Haben die spateren Neuplatonischen
Polemiker gegen das Christenthum das Werk des Celsus
benutzt?" Zeitschrift fiir wissenschaftliche Theologie 27 (1883): 257-
302.
5. Origen contra Celsum, in Origen: Contra Celsum, trans. Henry
Chadwick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1953) pref-
ace 4.
6. Ibid. 8.69.
7. Ibid. 8.71.
8. Chadwick, Origen: Contra Celsum, xxviii.
9. So argued by J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers, part II, vol-
ume 1 (New York: Macmillan, 1889-1890, repr. Grand Rapids:
Baker Book House, 1981), 530-1, although he advocated a date
in the reign of Antoninus Pius (138-161 CE).
10. contra Celsum 8.71.
11. Chadwick, Origen: Contra Celsum, xxvii.
12. Some of the limitations of contra Celsum 8.71 in dating the True
Doctrine are rightly pointed out by H.-U. Rosenbaum, "Zur
Datierung von Celsus' AAH8Hl: AOrOl:," Vigiliae Christianae
26 (1972): 102-111.
13. Robert J. Hauck, "Omnes Contra Celsum?" The Second Century
5/4 (1986): 211-212.
14. The genuineness of this decree is still being debated. Against its
authenticity see T. D. Barnes, "Legislation Against the Chris-
tians," Journal of Roman Studies 58 (1968): 40-41. For arguments
in favor, as well as a good summary of the issues surrounding
the debate, see W. H. C. Frend, "Open Questions Concerning
Christians and the Roman Empire in the Age of the Severi," Jour-
nal of Theological Studies 25 (1974): 333-351.
15. contra Celsum 1.1, 1.3.
16. Ibid. 8.21, 24.
Notes 141

17. Many church historians take Celsus' presentation at face value.

See for example W. H. C. Frend, The Rise of Christianity (Phila-
delphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 178; Robert L. Wilken, The Christians
as the Romans Saw Them (New Haven, CT: Yale University, 1984),
117-125; Henry Chadwick, The Early Church (London: Penguin
Books, 1967), 54-55, 68.
18. To my knowledge there is no book-length treatment of the sub-
ject in English. The best presentations are found in David Rokeah,
Jews, Pagans and Christians in Conflict (Jerusalem: Magnes Press,
1982) and in his 1968 doctoral dissertation at Hebrew Univer-
sity, titled ,Pi in"~~i~ "ili~-.,~~)~~i1 Oi~~i~::l ~",ii1"i1
Oi~~"~i" iO"P~ (The Jews in the Pagan-Christian Polemic from its
Beginnings to the Emperor Julian).
19. George Foot Moore's theory that the Jewish figure in the litera-
ture was nothing more than" a man of straw" ("Christian Writers
on Judaism," Harvard Theological Review 14/3 [1921]: 198) has
been echoed more recently by Rosemary Radford Ruether, Faith
and Fratricide: The Theological Roots of Anti-Semitism (Minneapo-
lis: Seabury, 1974), 120.
20. The existence of some kind of dialogue in the pre-Constantinian
era is gaining increasing acceptance. Harnack assumed virtu-
ally no contact between the church and synagogue by the middle
of the second century (Die Altercatio Simonis Judaei et Theophili
christiani, nebst Untersuchungen iiber die anti-jiidische Polemik in
der alten Kirche [Berlin, 1883]). More recently it has been argued
that contact continued at varying levels, and that the continua-
tion of the disputation literature into the Middle Ages is at least
as much due to the vitality of Jewish resistance to Christianity as
to the need for continuing Christian self-definition; see Marcel
Simon, Verus Israel: A Study in the Relations Between Christians
and Jews in the Roman Empire (135-425), trans. H. McKeating (Ox-
ford: Oxford University Press, 1986), 138-146, and Amos B.
Hulen, "The 'Dialogues with the Jews' as Sources for the Early
Jewish Argument Against Christianity," Journal of Biblical Litera-
ture 51 (1932): 58-70. At the same time it has become clear that
the pre-Constantinian dialogues and adversus Judaeos literature
were written with a pagan audience in the background; see Erwin
R. Goodenough, The Theology of Justin Martyr (Jena: Verlag
Frommannsche Buchhandlung, 1923; reprint, Amsterdam: Philo
142 Against the Christians

Press, 1968); Jon Nilson, "To Whom is Justin's 'Dialogue with

Trypho' Addressed?" Theological Studies 38/3 (1977): 538-546; and
Harold Remus, "Justin Martyr's Argument with Judaism," in
Stephen G. Wilson, ed., Anti-Judaism in Early Christianity, Vol-
ume 2 (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1986),
59-80.
21. contra Celsum 4.23.
22. David Rokeah, "The Jews in the Pagan-Christian Polemic from
its Beginnings to the Emperor Julian," Immanuel2 (1973): 62-63.
23. contra Celsum 1.2.
24. Ibid. 3.5.
25. Ibid. 1.14.
26. Justin Dialogue with Trypho, trans. M. Dods, ANF collection, Vol.
1 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1885; reprint, Grand Rapids, MI: Wm.
B. Eerdmans, 1989) 43.
27. contra Celsum 1.28-39.
28. Justin Dialogue with Trypho 62.
29. Ibid. 83.
30. contra Celsum 1.32.
31. Ibid. 1.28-71.
32. Ibid. 2.1-79.
33. Ibid. 1.49.
34. It has been suggested that Celsus wrote the True Doctrine as a
direct response to Justin's apologetic writings (Carl Andresen,
Logos und Nomos: Die Polemik des Kelsos wider das Christen tum [Ber-
lin: AKG 30, 1955]). Celsus' dependence on Justin is still being
disputed; see Gary T. Burke, "Celsus and Justin: Carl Andresen
Revisited," Zeitschrift fiir die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 76/
1-2 {1985): 107-116.

CHAPTER3

1. Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (New York: Alfred A.

Knopf, 1987), 674-681.
2. Walter Scott, introduction to Hermetica, Volume 1 (Boulder, CO:
Hermes House, 1982; reprint, Boston: Shambhala Publications,
1985), 14.
3. G. W. Bowersock, Hellenism in Late Antiquity (Ann Arbor: Uni-
versity of Michigan Press, 1990), 26-27.
Notes 143

4. Ephesians 4:17-20.
5. Justin First Apology, trans. Thomas B. Falls (New York: Christian
Heritage, Inc., 1948) 7.
6. contra Celsum 1.4. The rhetoric of "newness" is curious here.
Given the respect for antiquity so prevalent in both pagan and
Christian authors, it is somewhat surprising to see Celsus argue
that something belonging to Christian teaching is not an innova-
tion.
7. Ibid. 3.55.
8. Justin First Apology 21.
9. contra Celsum 3.22-43.
10. Ibid. 3.26-33.
11. Ibid. 7.51.
12. Ibid. 4.14.
13. For a discussion of the development of Platonist theology see
John Peter Kenney, Mystical Monotheism: A Study in Ancient Pla-
tonic Theology (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England,
1991).
14. contra Celsum 5.14.
15. R. T. Wallis, "The Spiritual Importance of Not Knowing," in Clas-
sical Mediterranean Spirituality: Egyptian, Greek, Roman, ed. A. H.
Armstrong (New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 1986),
460-480.
16. John Whittaker, "Plutarch, Platonism, and Christianity," in
Neoplatonism and Early Christian Thought: Essays in Honour of A.
H. Armstrong, ed. H. J. Blumenthal and R. A. Markus (London:
Variorum Publications, 1981), 50.
17. contra Celsum 7.36.
18. See the helpful discussion by Robert J. Hauck, '"They Saw What
They Said They Saw': Sense Knowledge in Early Christian Po-
lemic," Harvard Theological Review 81/3 (1988): 239-249.
19. 1 Corinthians 1:20-21, 25.
20. Plutarch On the Obsolescence of Oracles, trans. Frank Cole Babbitt,
Plutarch's Moralia, Volume 5, LCL edition (Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University Press, 1957) 416.
21. contra Celsum 8.28, 33.
22. Garth Fowden, Empire to Commonwealth: Consequences of Mono-
theism in Late Antiquity (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,
1993), 38-39.
144 Against the Christians

23. contra Celsum 7.70.

24. Robert M. Grant, Gods and the One God (Philadelphia: West-
minster Press, 1986), 54.
25. Lucius Apuleius The Golden Ass, trans. J. Arthur Hanson, LCL
edition (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1989) 11.5.
26. P. G. Walsh, "Apuleius and Plutarch," in Neoplatonism and Early
Christian Thought, 21-23.
27. Numenius of Apamea, quoted by Eusebius Preparation for the
Gospel, trans. Edwin Hamilton Gifford (Grand Rapids: Baker
Book House, 1981) 9.7.
28. contra Celsum 1.14, 5.41.
29. Chadwick's conclusion that the "true doctrine" includes Platonic
ethics, a belief in eternal bliss, and iconoclasm (Origen Contra
Celsum xx-xxi) is insufficiently supported. Although Celsus in-
cludes these beliefs in his discussion of parallels to Christianity,
his intent in this context is to demonstrate the unoriginality of
Christianity, not to describe the content of the "true doctrine."
30. contra Celsum 5.25.

CHAPTER4

1. Augustan History, Severus Alexander 29 .2, trans. David Magie, LCL

edition (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1921; reprint
1953). Like many other ancient sources, the Augustan History is
"generally damned and generally used" (J. Bidez, "Literature
and Philosophy in the Eastern Half of the Empire," inS. S. Cook,
et al., eds., The Cambridge Ancient History, Volume 12: The Imperial
Crisis and Recovery, A.D. 193-324 [Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1939; reprint 1961], 598); although the report of the
statues in Alexander Severus' chapel is usually treated with great
skepticism, there is no adequate reason to dismiss the story out
of hand.
2. Zosimus Historia Nova, trans. James J. Buchanan and Harold T.
Davis (San Antonio, Texas: Trinity University Press, 1967) 1.37.
3. Eusebius Ecclesiastical History 6.41.
4. Ibid. 7.11.
5. Ibid. 7.30.
6. Aurelian's action may rightfully be considered a revitalization
of an existing cult. The pre-existence of indigenous sun wor-
Notes 145

ship in Rome and the previous attempt by the emperor

Elagabalus in 218 to introduce the Syrian solar cult there are dis-
cussed in detail by Gaston H. Halsberghe, The Cult of Sol Invictus
(Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1972). The relevant details are discussed later
in this chapter.
7. Franz Cumont, Oriental Religions in the Roman Empire (New York:
Dover Publications, 1911, repr. 1956), 205.
8. Porphyry Life of Plotinus, in Plotinus The Enneads, ed. and trans.
Stephen MacKenna, 1-20 (London: Faber and Faber Ltd., 1956)
16.
9. Jerome Commentary in Daniel, prologue, in Corpus Christianorum,
Series Latina, Volume 75A, ed. M. Adriaen and F. Glorie (Turnholti:
Typographi Brepols Editores Pontificii, 1964). For further dis-
cussion seeP. M. Casey, "Porphyry and the Origin of the Book of
Daniel," Journal of Theological Studies 27/1 (1976): 15-33.
10. Preserved by Jerome Homily on Psalm 81, in The Homilies of St.
Jerome, Volume 1, trans. Marie Liguori Ewald (Washington, D.C.:
The Catholic University Press, 1966).
11. T. D. Barnes, "Porphyry Against the Christians: Date and the At-
tribution of Fragments," Journal of Theological Studies 24 (1973):
424-442.
12. See the defense of the composition date of 270 by Brian Croke,
"The Era of Porphyry's Anti-Christian Polemic," Journal of Reli-
gious History 13/1 (1984): 1-14.
13. Preserved by Eusebius Ecclesiastical History 6.19.
14. There is a possible reference to the subject matter of 1 Corinthians
1:18-2:16 in contra Celsum 1.9; a portion of Galatians 6:14 appears
in contra Celsum 5.65; a misquote of 1 Corinthians 3:19 appears
in contra Celsum 6.12. For a much more generous assessment of
Celsus' knowledge of the New Testament see John Patrick, The
Apology of Origen in Reply to Celsus: A Chapter in the History of
Apologetics (Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1892), 86-
100.
15. Preserved by Augustine Epistle 102.2, trans. Wilfrid Parsons
(Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press,
1964).
16. Justin First Apology 46.
17. Julius Africanus, for example, claimed in the third century with
obvious pride that Moses antedated "Prometheus, Io, Europa,
146 Against the Christians

the Sparti, the abduction of Proserpine, their mysteries, their leg-

islations, the deeds of Dionysus, Perseus, the Argonauts, the
Centaurs, the Minotaur, the affairs of Troy, the labours of Her-
cules, the return of the Heraclidae, the Ionian migration and the
Olympiads." Fragment of Julius Africanus Chronology, preserved
in Georgi us Syncellus, trans. unknown, ANF collection, Volume
6 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1885; reprint, Grand Rapids: Wm. B.
Eerdmans, 1989), 134.
18. Melito of Sardis, quoted by Eusebius Ecclesiastical History 4.26.
19. Eusebius Proof of the Gospel, trans. W. J. Farrar (London: S.P.C.K.,
1920; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1981) 3.7.7.
20. Eusebius Life of Constantine 2.19, trans. Ernest C. Richardson,
NPNF Collection, Second Series, Volume 1, ed. Philip Schaff and
Henry Wace (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1890; reprint, Grand Rap-
ids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1979).
21. Augustine City of God, trans. Henry Bettenson (London: Penguin
Books, 1984) 10.32.
22. Porphyry Life of Plotinus 23.
23. For a detailed treatment of the Platonists of this period see J. M.
Dillon, The Middle Platonists: A Study of Platonism 80 B.C. to A.D.
220 (London: Gerald Duckworth and Company, 1977).
24. John Peter Kenney, "Monotheistic and Polytheistic Elements in
Classical Mediterranean Spirituality," in Classical Mediterranean
Spirituality, 284-285.
25. Kenney, Mystical Monotheism, 101-2.
26. Frederick Copleston, A History of Philosophy, Volume 1 (Westmin-
ster, MD: Newman Press, 1946; reprint, New York: Doubleday,
1985), 470-472.
27. See the discussion in The Cambridge Ancient History, 309, as well
as Halsberghe, The Cult of Sol Invictus, 139.
28. Fowden, Empire to Commonwealth, 51.
29. Ibid.
30. Preserved by Augustine City of God 19.23.
31. With the exception of the Stoics, who rejected the continued ex-
istence of the individual soul after death; see Clifford Herschel
Moore, Ancient Beliefs in the Immortality of the Soul (New York:
Cooper Square Publishers, 1963), 39-42.
32. See Lewis Richard Farnell, Greek Hero Cults and Ideas of Immortal-
ity (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1921), 370.
Notes 147

33. Preserved by Augustine City of God 19.23.

34. Ibid.
35. Ibid. For further observations on the relationship of Neoplatonic
thought to Jewish theology see Gager, "The Dialogue of Pagan-
ism with Judaism," 104-109.
36. Preserved by Augustine City of God 19.23.

CHAPTERS

1. There are a number of biographies of the last pagan emperor of

Rome. One of the older standards is J. Bidez, La Vie de l'Empereur
Julien (Paris: Societe d'edition "Les Belles Lettres," 1930, repr.
1965). The two relatively recent "classics" in English are by Rob-
ert Browning, The Emperor Julian (London: Weidenfeld and
Nicolson, 1975) and G. W. Bowersock, Julian the Apostate (Cam-
bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978). Two more recent
biographies have concentrated on the issues of Julian's philoso-
phy and religious beliefs and their influence upon his political
actions. Most influential is Polymnia Athanassiadi-Fowden,
Julian and Hellenism: An Intellectual Biography (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1981), a thoughtful work that characterizes Julian's reli-
gious life and politics as informed by Neoplatonist monotheism.
The debate opened by Athanassiadi-Fowden about the emperor's
ideology and motivations has been joined by Rowland Smith,
Julian's Gods: Religion and Philosophy in the Thought and Action of
Julian the Apostate (London: Routledge, 1995), who takes the po-
sition that Julian was more a traditional polytheist than a
Neoplatonic philosopher.
2. Julian Letter to the Athenians 2:249. Citations from Julian's works
will henceforth be referenced by volume and page number from
the Loeb edition of The Works of the Emperor Julian, trans. Wilmer
Cave Wright (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1923,
reprinted 1961).
3. Whether Julian actively participated in his acclamation has been
a matter of debate. The most thorough investigation of the
sources is that of Bowersock, Julian the Apostate, 46-54, who ar-
gues from the various accounts Julian's complicity in the soldiers'
action.
4. Julian Epistle 8, 3:25.
148 Against the Christians

5. See for example Anthony Meredith, "Porphyry and Julian

Against the Christians," ANRW II-23.2, 1147-8; Diana Bowder,
The Age of Constantine and Julian (New York: Harper & Row Pub-
lishers, 1978), 110; Giuseppe Ricciotti, Julian the Apostate, trans.
M. Joseph Costelloe (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Company,
1960), 232.
6. Athanassiadi-Fowden, Julian and Hellenism, 161.
7. Historians have traditionally singled out Diocletian as the insti-
gator of the Great Persecution, although Lactantius (the primary
source for the persecution) reports that Galerius was the driving
force (On the Deaths of the Persecutors, trans. Mary Francis
McDonald, Fathers of the Church, Volume 54 [Washington, D.C.:
Catholic University of America Press, 1965] 9-11). It has been
argued against Lactantius that Diocletian was in fact the author
of the persecution, and that Lactantius' attribution of the anti-
Christian decrees to Galerius was an apologetic convention
designed to demonstrate that only "bad emperors" persecuted
Christians (P. S. Davies, "The Origin and Purpose of the Perse-
cution of AD 303," Journal of Theological Studies 40/1 [1989]:
66-94).
8. There are two accounts of the story. Lactantius' account of the
dream in On the Deaths of the Persecutors 44 is the earlier and
probably more reliable version. Eusebius' more extraordinary
account of a vision in the sky with a cross surrounded by the
words "By This Conquer" dates from after Constantine's death
and is found in the Life of Constantine 1.28.
9. The literature on Constantine's conversion and his subsequent
Christian beliefs is exceptionally vast. Ever since Jacob
Burckhardt characterized Constantine as a political opportunist
wholly disinterested in matters of personal religion (The Age of
Constantine the Great, trans. Moses Hadas [New York: Pantheon
Books, 1949]), the debate surrounding the emperor's motives and
personal religious beliefs has raged unabated. While Paul
Keresztes' Constantine: A Great Christian Monarch and Apostle
(Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1981) is an extremely traditional view
of Constantine's sincerity and Christian piety, most modern
scholars have taken various positions in the middle. A. H. M.
Jones in Constantine and the Conversion of Europe (New York:
Macmillan, 1949) retains the theme of political opportunism but
Notes 149

characterizes the emperor's religion as a personal pact with his

protector deity. An emperor confused about his religious iden-
tity is presented by J. H. W. G. Liebeschuetz in Continuity and
Change in Roman Religion (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979). Other
moderating views are presented by Timothy Barnes in
Constantine and Eusebius (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-
sity Press, 1981) and by Michael Grant in The Emperor Constantine
(London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1993), who argue that
Constantine's religious" conversion" was indeed a genuine psy-
chological experience and that his subsequent reign reflected a
view of himself as the supreme deity's representative on earth.
10. Especially useful for understanding Constantine's continuity
with his predecessors is Liebeschuetz, Continuity and Change in
Roman Religion.
11. Constantine's father seems to have favored the Sun as the deity
of choice on his coinage in the West.
12. Thus Bowder's remark that "For some years Constantine seems
to have had no idea that adherence to Christianity automatically
excluded any pagan attachment" seems quite incredible (The Age
of Constantine and Julian, 80).
13. Latin Panegyric 12.2, in XII Panegyrici Latini, trans. and ed. R. A.
B. Mynors (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964).
14. For a discussion of the ambiguities in the panegyric of Con-
stantine see H. A. Drake, In Praise of Constantine: A Historical Study
and New Translation of Eusebius' Tricennial Orations (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1975).
15. For a useful summary of the dedication of the city see Vasiliki
Limberis, Divine Heiress: The Virgin Mary and the Creation of Chris-
tian Constantinople (London: Routledge, 1994), 7-29.
16. In late antiquity, Zosimus Nova Historia 2.30; more recently, Timo-
thy Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 222.
17. The account of the pagan elements in the founding of Constan-
tinople is found in the seventh-century Chronicon Paschale by John
Malalas, trans. Michael Whitby and Mary Whitby (Liverpool:
Liverpool University Press, 1989). Timothy Barnes' dismissal of
the Chronicon 's pagan elements as "later legend" (Constantine and
Eusebius,222) is problematic since the Chronicon was written in a
Christian Byzantine empire in which accounts of Constantine
are more likely to have been Christianized, not paganized.
150 Against the Christians

18. Such a false statement makes rhetorical sense if the Life of

Constantine was written more for the benefit of Constantine's
sons than as a historical record, and thus for the purpose of indi-
cating what the ideal Christian monarch ought to do-in this case,
rid the capital of pagan worship altogether.
19. Theodosian Code, ed. Clyde Pharr (Princeton: Princeton Univer-
sity Press, 1952) 9.16.1-2, 16.10.1-2.
20. Eusebius Life of Constantine 2.60.
21. Ammianus Marcellinus Res Gestae, trans. J. C. Rolfe, LCL edi-
tion, 3 volumes (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1939, repr. 1964) 22.4.3.
22. Ibid. 19.10.4.
23. Libanius Oration, trans. A. F. Norman, LCL edition (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969) 18.23.
24. The scholarly consensus is that Julian had no desire to make
martyrs; the minority view that the emperor leaned more heavily
toward outright persecution is expressed by Bowersock, Julian
the Apostate. For a useful discussion of the issues relevant to
whether or not Julian ought to be considered a persecutor see
Smith, Julian's Gods, 207-218.
25. Julian's religious program was an enigma to an earlier genera-
tion of scholars who otherwise considered the emperor a
"rationalist" on a crusade against Christian "superstition."
Harold Mattingly's evaluation is instructive in this regard: "Julian
himself boasted of being a philosopher, but his philosophy was
shot through with religious mysticism centered round the wor-
ship of the Sun-god. In his attacks on the Christian faith he deals
some shrewd blows; but it is not unfair to say that, when he
expounds his own mysticism, he is no less exposed to rationalis-
tic attack" (Christianity in the Roman Empire [New York: W. W.
Norton & Company, 1967), 68). What such an evaluation fails to
consider is that sun worship was highly compatible with fourth
century Greek philosophy. Julian's "rationalism" is the product
of the nineteenth and twentieth, not the fourth, century of the
Common Era. Julian was in many ways a man of his times.
26. Tertullian Prescription Against Heretics, trans. Peter Holmes, ANF
collection, Volume 3 (Edinburgh: T& T Clark, 1885; reprint, Grand
Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1989) 7.
27. Preserved by Socrates Scholasticus Ecclesiastical History, trans.
Notes 151

A. C. Zenos, NPNF collection, Volume 2, Second Series, ed. Philip

Schaff and Henry Wace (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1890; reprint,
Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1979) 3.23. Julian conveniently
overlooked the fact that philosophers had been allegorizing the
Greek myths for centuries.
28. Julian Against the Galileans 3:385.
29. Julian Epistle 36,3:117-123.
30. Ammianus Res Gestae 22.10.7.
31. Adolf von Harnack, The Mission and Expansion ofChristianity in
the First Three Centuries, trans. James Moffatt, 3 volumes (Lon-
don: Williams & Norgate, 1908), 1:505.
32. Browning, The Emperor Julian, 175.
33. Cochrane, Christianity and Classical Culture, 266-7.
34. Wilmer Cave Wright, introduction to The Works of the Emperor
Julian, 3:314.

CHAPTER6

1. Michael Adler, "The Emperor Julian and the Jews," Jewish Quar-
terly Review 5 (1893): 615. Although veering too far in the direction
of Julian as sympathizer, the article is otherwise an excellent sur-
vey of the texts relating to the relationship between Julian and
the Jews.
2. Yohanan Lewy, "Julian the Apostate and the Rebuilding of the
Temple," in The Jerusalem Cathedra: Studies in the History, Archae-
ology, Geography and Ethnography of the Land of Israel, ed. Lee I.
Levine (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi Institute, 1983}, 70-96.
3. John G. Gager, "The Dialogue of Paganism with Judaism: Bar
Cochba to Julian," Hebrew Union College Annual44 (1973): 101.
4. David Rokeah, "The Concept of the 'Election of Israel' in the
Pagan-Christian Polemic of the Roman Empire," Immanuel 11
(1980): 63.
5. For a summary of early Christian responses to the rebuilding
and other aspects of the project see Richard A. Freund, "Which
Christians, Pagans and Jews? Varying Responses to Julian's At-
tempt to Rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem in the Fourth Century
CE," Journal of Religious Studies 18 (1992): 67-93.
6. Athanassiadi-Fowden, Julian and Hellenism, 164.
7. Julian Against the Galileans 3:321.
152 Against the Christians

8. Ibid. 3:407.
9. Ibid. 3:375-377.
10. Ibid. 3:329-341.
11. Ibid. 3:331.
12. For a discussion of the implications of this tension in Judaism
for the study of Christian origins see Daniel Boyarin, A Radical
Jew: Paul and the Politics of Identity (Berkeley: University of Cali-
fornia Press, 1994), 39-40,57-85.
13. John Chrysostom Homily 1 Against the Jews, trans. Wayne A.
Meeks and Robert L. Wilken, in Wayne A. Meeks and Robert L.
Wilken, eds., Jews and Christians in Antioch in the First Four Cen-
turies of the Common Era (Missoula, Montana: Scholars Press, 1978)
1. See also the discussion by Wolfram Kinzig, '"Non-Separa-
tion': Closeness and Co-operation between Jews and Christians
in the Fourth Century," Vigiliae Christianae 45 (1991): 27-53.
14. Julian Against the Galileans 3:341.
15. Julian's use of the term is commonly understood by scholars to
indicate the social and geographic obscurity of Christian origins
(see for example Ricciotti, Julian the Apostate, 231, as well as
Bowder, The Age of Constantine and Julian, 110). While this may
be true, the importance of geographical limitation inherent in the
term should not be lost. This point is properly understood by
Athanassiadi-Fowden, who recognizes that Julian used the term
to deny the Christians' claim to universality (Julian and Helle-
nism, 161, note 2).
16. Julian Against the Galileans 3:347.
17. Ibid. 3:359.
18. Ibid.
19. Marcel Simon, Vents Israel, 112.
20. Eusebius Proof of the Gospel1.5.
21. Julian Against the Galileans 3:343-5.
22. Ibid. 3:345.
23. Ibid. 3:375.
24. Ibid.

CHAPTER?

1. Andrew McGowan, "Eating People: Accusations of Cannibal-

ism Against Christians in the Second Century," Journal of Early
Notes 153

Christian Studies 2/3 (1994): 413-442.

2. Averil Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire, 7.
3. Jerry L. Daniel," Anti-Semitism in the Hellenistic-Roman Period,"
Journal of Biblical Literature 98/1 (1979): 47.
4. The comparison of pagan actions against Jews and Christians is
addressed from the standpoint of Roman law by Simeon L. Guter-
man, Religious Toleration and Persecution in Ancient Rome (London:
Aiglon Press, 1951).
5. See the discussion by Tessa Rajak, "Was There a Roman Charter
for the Jews?" Journal of Religious Studies 74 (1984): 107-123.
6. That the Romans crushed two major Jewish revolts does not con-
stitute a "persecution" but rather a military action.
7. Robert M. Seltzer, Jewish People, Jewish Thought: The Jewish People
in History (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1980),
213. The traditional paradigm of Jewish "isolation" has come
under scrutiny, however; see the discussion by Ephraim E.
Urbach, "Self-Isolation or Self-Affirmation in Judaism in the First
Three Centuries: Theory and Practice," in E. P. Sanders, ed., Jew-
ish and Christian Self-Definition (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1981),
269-298.
8. See especially Walter Bauer, Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Chris-
tianity (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971).
9. Thus the growing literature on the "separation" of Judaism and
Christianity; see for example David Flusser, "The Jewish Chris-
tian Schism," Immanuel 16 (1983): 32-49; Anthony J. Saldarini,
"Jews and Christians in the First Two Centuries: The Changing
Paradigm," Shofar 10/2 (1992): 16-34; Steven T. Katz, "Issues in
the Separation of Judaism and Christianity After 70 C.E.: ARe-
consideration," Journal of Biblical Literature 103/1 (1984): 43-76.
10. "[M]odern scholarship has too often worked within a set of
simple binary oppositions: Christian versus pagan." Cameron,
Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire, 21.
11. Or "Christian claims as opposed to Classicism"; Cochrane, Chris-
tianity and Classical Culture, vi.
12. See Richard Fletcher's excellent treatment of the "boundary prob-
lems" involved in "Christianizing" the barbarians in The
Barbarian Conversion from Paganism to Christianity (New York:
Henry Holt and Company, 1997).
13. Dennis Trout, "Christianizing the Nolan Countryside: Animal
154 Against the Christians

Sacrifice at the Tomb of St. Felix," Journal of Early Christian Stud-

ies 3/3 (1995): 281-298.
14. Augustine Exposition of Psalm 89, trans. A Cleveland Coxe, NPNF
Collection, Series 1, Volume 8, ed. Philip Schaff (Edinburgh: T& T
Clark, 1888; reprint, Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1983) 41.
 Select Bibliography

Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs. In The Acts of the Christian Martyrs, translated
and edited by H. Musurillo, 86-89. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972.
Adler, M.A. "The Emperor Julian and the Jews." Jewish Quarterly Review
5 (1893): 591-651.
Ammianus Marcellinus. Res Gestae. Translated by J. C. Rolfe, 3 vols. Loeb
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Past and Present 27 (1964): 23-27.
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Clarendon Press, 1966.
Simon, Marcel. Verus Israel: A Study in the Relations Between Christians and
Jews in the Roman Empire (135-425). Translated by H. McKeating. Ox-
ford: Oxford University Press, 1986.
Smith, Rowland. Julian's Gods: Religion and Philosophy in the Thought and
Action of Julian the Apostate. London: Routledge, 1995.
Socrates Scholasticus. Ecclesiastical History. Translated by A. C. Zenos. In
The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. 2, edited by Philip
Schaff and Henry Wace, 1-178. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1890; reprint,
Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1979.
Sordi, Marta. The Christians and the Roman Empire. Translated by Annabel
Bedini. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1986.
Sozomen. Ecclesiastical History. Translated by Chester D. Hartranft. In The
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Schaff and Henry Wace, 239-427. Edinburgh: T &T Clark, 1890; reprint,
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Stotzel, Amold. "Warum Christus so spat erschein-die apologetische
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geschichte 92/2-3 (1981): 147-160.
Tacitus. Annals. Translated by John Jackson. Loeb Classical Library. Cam-
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Tertullian. Ad Nationes. Translated by Peter Holmes. In The Ante-Nicene
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Theophilus. To Autolycus. Translated by Robert M. Grant. Oxford:
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Urbach, Ephraim E. "Self-Isolation or Self-Affirmation in Judaism in the

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Davis. San Antonio, Texas: Trinity University Press, 1967.
 Index

Abraham, 65 Athenagoras, 14
Adam, 75 Athens,2~65,85, 101
Aemilianus, 66 Augustan History, 65, 87
Against the Christians. See Porphyry, Augustine, 74, 77-78, 88, 138
Against the Christians Augustus (Caesar), 76, 89, 97
Against the Galileans. See Julian, Augustus (imperial office), 92, 94-
Against the Galileans 96
Alexander the Great, 126 Aurelian, 67-68, 82-83, 89, 94, 100
Alexander Severus, 65, 71 Balkans, 95
Alexandria, 19, 23,63-66,100 barbarians, 34, 53, 65, 111
allegory, 101, 115 Basil, 101
Ammianus, 102 Bible. See scriptures
anthropomorphism, 101, 114, 117 Bithynia, 9
Antioch, 67, 92, 110 Bosporus, 96
Antiochus Epiphanes, 69 boundaries, rhetorical, 2-4, 48, 50,
antiquity, as cultural value, 7, 74-75, 60-61,90,107,127,129-132
108, 110, 123 Britain, 94
Antonine dynasty, 18 Byzantium, 97
Apollo, 39, 87, 99, 132 cannibalism, 12-14, 17, 22, 43, 60,
apologetic, 4, 14, 17, 22-23, 75-77, 63-64, 130
115; and Christian morality, 42- Caesar (imperial office), 13, 92, 94-
43; and pagan gods, 5, 44--46, 95
49; and similarity to paganism, Caesarea (Cappadocia), 99
3, 44--46 Cameron, Averil, 7, 131
apostasy, 111; from Judaism, 59, 108, Caracalla, 83
111, 122; from paganism, 59, Carpus, 12
108, 111 Carthage, 17, 23, 65
Apuleius, 56-57, 83 Celsus, 1,17-64,65-66,72,86,93-
Asclepius, 6, 44-46, 49, 60, 83, 125, 94, 106-107, 109-110, 131-133;
133 and the Bible, 74; date of his
assimilation, rhetoric of. See work, 20-24, 135; as an
rhetorical strategy informed critic, 20, 22, 32, 62;
Athanassiadi-Fowden, Polymnia, 93 interpretation of polemic, 2, 62;
atheism, atheists, 5, 13-14, 130, 135 use of Judaism, 31-40,44, 115;
168 Against the Christians

rhetorical strategy, 41, 48, 62- creation, 37, 112-115

64; social criticism, 24-31; as Cumont, Franz, 68
source of later arguments, 70- Cyprian, 65
71; universalism of, 59-61, 63 Cyril of Alexandria, 92
Cenchreae, 56 Dacia, 67
Chadwick, Henry, 21 daemons,5,26,54-56
Christ. See Jesus Daniel, book of, 69
Christianity: conversion to, 23, 63, Danube,29
67; and philosophy, 1, 3, 6-7, Decius,29,63--67,86,88-89, 137
48-49,63,101,116-117, 133; Delphi, 39,84
recent appearance of, 73-77, 89, Dialogue with Trypho, 32, 36-38
107, 123--125; relationship to difference, rhetoric of. See rhetori-
Judaism, 1, 7-9, 15, 30-32, 75, cal strategy, of difference
111, 115-119, 129-130, 133-136; Diocletian, 94-95
relationship to paganism, 1-8, Dionysius, 66
27,30,41-50,60,88-89,96-103, Dionysus, 45
130-139; and Roman Empire, 7, disciples of Jesus, 52, 69-70, 72-73
29-30,63-67, 75-77,89,95;and Discussion Between Jason and
society, 18-19, 24-25, 28-30, 59- Papiscus, 37
61,63-67,71,96-99, 129; divinity: of emperors, 84; of Jesus,
success of, 1, 100, 137 44-46, 132; of people, 84-85
Chrysopolis, 96 Domitian, 9,11
Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 122 Dura Europos, 71
Clement of Alexandria, 19, 23, 47, Egypt, Egyptians, 35-36,41, 44,56-
59, 61, 101 58,66-67,111,125
coinage, 97, 103 Elagabalus, 82
Commodus, 17, 21 Emesa, 64, 82
Constans, 99 epistemology, 48, 51-53, 129
Constantine, 16, 61, 76-77, 83, 91, eschatology, 42, 72
94-100, 103, 136, 138 Eusebius, 12, 47, 76, 83, 97-98, 123,
Constantine II, 99 137
Constantinople, 92, 97-98 exclusivism, 31, 97, 113; ambiguity
Constantius Chlorus, 94 as a boundary, 137-138;
Constantius II, 91-92,96, 99 defined, 6; pagan objection to,
contra Celsum. See Origen, and 6-7,41-42,45-46,66,73--77,83,
contra Celsum 88, 117, 124, 129-132; political,
conversion, 23, 28, 59, 63-65, 88, 91, 77; of prophecy, 38; social, 7,
115,133 24-30, 35, 71, 89, 129; theologi-
Index 169

cal, 25, 129, 132 Hippocrates, 126

Felix, Saint, 138 Hymn to King Helios, 100
Fronto, Cornelius, 12-14 Hymn to the Mother of the Gods, 100
Gaius Caesar, 74 immorality: as accusation against
Galen, 14 Christians, 12-15, 17, 20, 22, 60,
Galerius, 94-95 63-64, 102, 129-131; as accusa-
Gaul, 67, 92; persecution in, 12-13, tion against pagans, 42-44
17,21-22,28-29,61 impassibility, 25-26
Germans, 29, 118 imperial cult, 82
Gnostics, Gnosticism, 9, 69 incarnation, 48-50, 68, 117
gods, 10, 38, 41, 43, 44-46, 85-86, incest, 12, 17
126; images of, 10, 42, 97; as informants, 10-11, 15
national overseers, 58-59, 107, insanity, 85-86
115-118, 123, 135; and nature, 5, Isis, 56-58, 75, 83
55-56; origin of, 113-114; as Jerusalem, 8, 31, 65, 101, 121-122,
preservers of peace, 10; and 126
public events, 18, 24-26, 28, 54, Jesus,65,67,75-76,97, 117, 123-124;
58; as subordinate to God, 26- Christian worship of, 4, 6, 45,
27, 56-59; worship of, 10, 13, 85, 88, 112, 132; comparison
26,54-56,59,66,81,92 with gods, 3, 38, 44-46, 49, 60,
Goths, 63, 67 133; crucifixion, 44, 68, 73;
Great Persecution, 70, 95 ethics of, 42-44; as founder of
Harnack, Adolf von, 69, 104 Christianity, 15; immortalized
Hebrew Bible, 30,35-37,39,71-72, by pagan oracle, 72-73, 83-88,
108 123, 132; as magician and
Hecate, 84-85, 132 sorcerer, 34-35, 83-84, 87, 132;
Helios, 100, 125 resurrection of, 6, 45, 68, 73, 84
Hellenism, 1, 5-7, 48, 107, 111, 113- "Jewish charter," 134
115, 120, 135; Christian Jewish Law, 31-32, 75, 110-111, 116
appropriation of, 15-16, 93, Jewish scriptures. See Hebrew Bible
101-102 Johannine literature, 52
Hellenistic apology, 93-94, 103, 111, John Chrysostom, 116
115, 125-127 Jovian, 92
Heracles, 45 Judaism: in anti-Christian polemic,
Hermes, 83 30-40,58,71-72, 107-123;
heroes, 84 arguments against Christianity,
hetaeria, 25 36-40; conversion to, 23; as
Hezekiah, 37 ethnic minority, 134-136;
170 Against the Christians

relationship to Christianity (see 31, 59, 116, 118

Christianity, relationship to Marcus Aurelius, 12, 17, 21, 29, 65,
Judaism) 76; and Christian apologetic,
Julia Domna, 64 17; mention of Christians, 17
Julia Mamaea, 65 marginalization, 4, 8, 35, 53,59-60,
Julian, 2-4, 20, 30, 48, 60,91-127, 94,120,127,130-136
129, 132; Against the Galileans, Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas,
92-94, 103-105, 113, 119-120; 22
against Christian teachers, 91, Maxentius, 94-97
102-103; comparison with Maximian, 94-95
Celsus and Porphyry, 8, 31, 92- Maximin Daia, 94
94, 103-105, 107-108, 111, 123, Maxirninus, 95
125, 132-133; and Hellenism, Melito of Sardis, 76
93-94, 103, 114-115, 125-127; Mercury, 44, 83
interpretation of, 103-105, 109- Mesopotamia, 92
110, 115; and the Jews, 33-34, Middle Platonism, 79
107-115, 121-122, 125-127; life Milvian Bridge, battle of, 95
of, 91-92; and "pagan church," miracles, 6
100-101; rhetorical strategy, Mithraism, 75
105, 107, 115; temple project, monotheism, 111; Christian,4-5, 26,
109-110, 121-122, 126, 132 30,54,59;pagan,4,55-59
Julius Africanus, 145 n. 17 Montanism, 9, 18-19, 135
Jupiter, 44, 81, 83, 86 Moses,34-35,39, 75,111,114,117-
Justin Martyr, 3, 26,44-46,75, 84, 119
107, 124; and Christian mythology, 113-115; Christian, 46;
morality, 43; and Jewish- pagan,6,38,42-46,54
Christian dialogue, 32, 36--38; Neoplatonism, 47, 51, 63-64, 68, 79-
and Platonism, 47, 89, 101, 116 81, 91, 100, 109
Lactantius, 148 nn. 7, 8 Neptune,83
Laodicea, 12 Nero,9-10, 29
Licinius, 95-96 New Testament, 31, 69-73, 119
Life of Constantine, 76 Numenius, 57-58
Lyons, 12,14,21-22 Old Testament. See Hebrew Bible
Madaura, 12 On the Return of the Soul, 78
magic: disciples and, 69-70; Jesus oracle,70,72,80,84-85,87-88, 132
and,84,8~pagan,98 Origen, 18-19,26, 60,63-65, 71, 76;
manumission, 96 and Christian philosophy, 50,
Marcion, Marcionite movement, 9, 89, 101; and contra Celsum, 19-
Index 171

21,23,27,30,35-39,45,60,63, Porphyry, 2-3, 20, 30, 60, 63-90, 91-

108 92, 103-104, 107-108, 132-133;
Orpheus, 65 Against the Christians, 68-72, 82,
overseers. See gods, as national 93, 104; comparison to Celsus,
overseers 68-73,81-83,86-87,89;
Palestine, 124 criticism of Jesus, 87; on the
Pantera, 37, 39 book of Daniel, 69; on immor-
Papylus, 12 tality of Jesus, 72-73, 83-88,
Paris, 92 123, 132; and Judaism, 71-72;
Paul, apostle, 31, 52-53, 69, 72, 75, use of philosophy, 72-73;
117, 119 rhetorical strategy, 72; univer-
Paul of Samosata, 67 salism of, 77-82
Paulinus of Nola, 138 Poseidon, 83
Pergamum, 12 Proof of the Gospel, 76
persecution, 3, 9, 11, 17-19, 20-22, propaganda,12, 14,17,28-30
59,64,96, 100, 133-134; prophecy, 38-39, 41, 121
imperial, 63, 65--66, 70, 95; proselytizing, 24, 27, 43-44, 134
popular, 10-15,22,28-29, 100 providence, 5
Perseus, 44 rebellion, as characteristic of
Persia, Persians, 65, 92, 110 Christians, 27
Philip the Arab, 65 resurrection: of the dead, 42, 50-51,
Philo, 135 54,70,72;ofJesus,6,45-46,68,
philosophy, 71, 114; Christian 84
appropriation of, 1, 6-7, 15-16, revelation, 46-47
19,40,47-49,59,61,63,89, 101, Rhea, 97
116-117, 133; pagan use against rhetorical strategy, 24, 109; of
Christians, 24, 47-54, 72-73, assimilation, 3, 89-90, 94, 103,
124; and universalism, 78-82 107, 115, 121-123, 127, 131-133,
Philosophy from Oracles, 70, 79, 87 136-137;changesin,2-3,7-9,
Plato,3,40,43,47-48,51-52,55,57, 31,34,64,87,89,132-133, 137;
61,78-79,89,113-114 of difference, 2-3, 30, 39-40,
Pliny the Younger, 9-12, 25 59--61, 130-131
Plotinus, 51, 63, 79-80, 91 Rome,9,65--68,74,82,95
Plutarch, 57, 83 sacrifice, 10, 13, 15, 25, 64--66, 92, 95,
political theology, 76 98-99, 108, 110-111, 121-122,
Polycarp, 12-15 137-138
polytheism, 3-5, 54-59, 81, 114 Sagaris, 12
pontifex maximus, 97 Sapor I, 65
172 Against the Christians

Saturninus, Vigellius, 17 9, 22-24; and Christian

Scilli, 12, 17, 21, 29 morality, 18-19, 28, 135
scriptures, 19-20,69-70,85,95,101- tetrarchy, 94-96
102, 108, 113-114, 117, 119, 130 Theodosius I, 96
Scythians, 42, 58 Theophilus, 14
Septimius Severus, 18, 22-23, 64 "third race," Christians as, 1
Severan dynasty, 18, 59, 64, 83, 87, Timaeus, 52, 112-114
89 Torah. See Jewish Law
Severus (4th-century Caesar), 94-95 totalizing discourse, 7-8, 14, 30, 40,
Smyrna, 12-14 46, 60, 86, 89, 127, 130-131, 133,
sociology, and success of Christian- 137
ity, 1 Tower of Babel, 118, 121
Socrates (Greek philosopher), 27,43 Trajan, 10-11, 13, 15, 25
Socrates (church historian), 69 Tricennial Oration, 97
Sol Invictus, 68, 82-83, 89, 97, 100 Tyche,97
Solomon, 126 universalism: Christian, 31, 74, 89,
soothsaying, 98 116-120, 121, 124, 134; Jewish,
Sophocles, 85 31,116,124, 127;pagan,56-59,
Stark, Rodney, 1 61,73, 75-83,89-90,130,132
syncretism, 68, 74, 82-83, 89, 97, 133 Valerian, 66-67
Syria, 67, 74, 82, 92 Vienne, 12, 21-22
Tacitus, 9 virgin birth, 36-38
Talmud,37 Zen, 58
Tatian, 3 Zenobia, 67
temple: Jewish, 109-111, 121-122, Zeus,58,81,83,99, 125
126, 132;pagan,98-100, 112 Zoroaster, 69
Tertullian, 40, 61, 101; apologetic, 3, Zosimus, 65
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This page intentionally left blank
Against the Christians examines the anti-Christian
polemic works of Celsus, Porphyry, and Julian the
Apostate. The first book to analyze the phenomenon of
early anti-Christian literature in depth, it chooses the
critics' objection to Christian exclusivism as its starting
point. The evolution in the polemic, from a rhetoric of
radical distinction to one of "rhetorical assimilation,"
reveals a sophisticated attempt to expose contradictions
and inconsistencies within Christianity, while at the same
time reflecting the process of fusion between Christian-
ity and the culture of late antiquity.