Romans + Christianity

[Theodosius the Great]

Hi Dan,

Hmm..I wouldn't say Christianity started to diverge in different directions that early - I would place it several decades later and only in some places, but again we're talking about degrees.

Do you also plan on reading Philo in addition to Josephus ?

oh and I have no idea who that actor is, Ill have to wikipedia him !

The only reason I asked was because of the last line I read in your signature (under your name) :lol:

[sicarii sam]

ive read some of philo. I found it interesting that his brother I think was a governor in palestine.

Most of my reading of philo was investigating his concept of the Logos and its integration by John as Christ the Logos. That is a theological debate though !

The hellenization of christianity is a whole other pandora's box. :roll:

[Theodosius the Great]

Hi Travis,

Getting back to what you said earlier ....

There are three probable conclusions.

1. Constantine was cynically gaming the religious sentiments of the age. Either he was a believer in Sol Invictus or Christianity and was exploiting the other for political benefit, or he didn't believe in any of them and was exploiting both.

2. Constantine was a syncretist, combining features of both systems in his own personal beliefs, a common feature of the Late Antique era that Christians opposed but Pagans accepted without any qualms. Many heretical Christian sects accepted syncretistic beliefs. At this point in Christianity no councils had been convened to dissuade this practice.

3. He was a sincere Christian that adopted the visual vocabulary of the Late Empire, which at this time of his cultural milieu, including the cult of Sol Invictus. This is adaptation and appropriation and not syncretism. The pagan features of his reign are merely the trappings of empire and power, not religious profession and many of the era understood that. Many images of Christ at this time are modeled on the images of pagan gods or emperors. This does not imply syncretism or confusion on the part of Christians but rather a difficulty in expressing themselves in visual terms without a native vocabulary. Many Christian writers had huge problems with pagan imagery in Christian contexts yet its evidence is manifold.

For the record, I believe in number three. However, I would have to admit that the evidence supports the other two, especially number one, equally. I believe he was a sincere believer, but if I had to, I wouldn't bet the farm on it.

I too voted for three and Vortigern voted for two.

When you say there's evidence to support two and one, I think we should formulate our opinions based on the period before the battle of the Milvian Bridge rather than on Constantine's actions afterwards because he commited himself to the Christian cause before he even became Augustus of the West.

The main reason I don't subscribe to one or, to a lesser extent, two is because it seems that you have to presuppose that Christianity was a large minority or on the cusp of becoming the dominant religion - both of which I'm highly dubious about. Although I believe a Christian would inevitably become Emperor since some were in the upper echelons of the political hierarchy, I don't think the time was ripe for it to have occured at the time of Constantine - it could've taken several more decades at the very least. That fact that it happened when it did may have been due to sheer chance or, more likely, to a miracle - to my way of thinking. For the moment, assuming the vision Constantine observed at the Milvian Bridge is just pure fiction, why gamble everything on making overtures to a (presumably) tiny religious minority ? Where is there room for political shrewdness, as Vortigern believes ?



Theo

[tlclark]

Wow.

This thread is so far-ranging and quick moving I can hardly keep up.

First all of Philo's works are available online:

http://www.torreys.org/bible/philopag.html

My 2-cent take on Philo. A great thinker, but his impact on Christian thought is highly overrated. If you want to know more than that you'll have to read my dissertation and that only focuses on his impact on cosmology or Christology.

On Constantine,

The debate hinges on whether or not Christians were significant. There are two ways that Christians could have been significant.

1.) They were large in numbers all over the empire

there are some that suggest that 50% of the population was Christian. I don't know that I believe that. It also is irrelevant. The ability of the populace to influence the empire is overrated. It's not a democracy people. Even during the Byzantine period where MOST of the people were Christian their ability to influence state affairs was pretty limited. They could riot and they could...riot. And as often as not they rioted not over state affairs but chariot races! So even if there were a large group, which is tennuous, I'm not sure what advantage it would give Constantine to court this group. I know that today we have this great appreciation of democracy and involvement, but it's not a given that a society really care about their gov't. In fact the norm is that if your rulers are personally bothering you, you could put up with a lot.

It seems that the senate was largely still pagan, as were most of the old patrician families (if the diptych of the Nicomachi and Symmachi is any indication). By the fourth C. the Senate was important but of far less political potency. So where are the Christians?

2.) There were significant numbers of Christians in positions of power.

This is far more likely in my opinion and seems to suggest what tipped off the Diocletian purges. Christians had risen to significant levels of power all across the Roman Empire. Much of the welfare and civil magistricies were manned by Christians. Both Frend and Brown suggest that Christians had begun to operate as a state within a state. One of the interesting things that Brown recognizes is that the church had largely assimilated the court system by the seventh C. this process may have been underway in 4th.

In all likelihood, IF Constantine is pandering he is pandering to the mid-level middle class bureaucrats and civil servants and then there's the other possibility, the military, but that's why we started this thread, isn't it.

Great Thread everyone!!

Travis

[tlclark]

Wow! My Laudes jumped 7 points recently! Don't know who you are but thanks!!

Travis

PS - If this is one of those "donatives" supplied by our emperor Jasper, thanks to him too!!

[sicarii sam]

Hey, Mr. Clark or Dr. Clark ? You are just the man Im looking for on the subject of philo and the hellenization of christianity. In recent months, I had a lengthy dialouge with an individual on a religious forum that was a Modalist or Oneness adherent. Much of our conversation revolved around the Logos concept and whether John adapted it to Christ, even if it was a Cousin of Philo's concept. He vehemently denied any such correlation. I reasoned that there had to be some cross pollination of ideas given the similarities.

Is there any way to access your dissertation ? Ive found some online articles but nothing in depth to really define the relationship, if there was any, to any conclusive decision.

Im basically an armchair buff on these subjects as I stopped with the BA. Id love to see what you have to say on the subject. my email is [email protected] if you can assist. Thank you.

[sicarii sam]

I also wondered if your studies were at UPENN. an old professor of mine, DR. Struck went there to teach 5-6 years ago. He was a big influence on me. He wasnt much into roman studies. But his style and approach to prefection made me proverbially drop to my knees for mercy on more than one occasion.

[tlclark]

Hey, Mr. Clark or Dr. Clark ?

Mr. Clark.

"Dr. Clark" will be after December (hopefully!)

You are just the man Im looking for on the subject of philo and the hellenization of christianity.

I doubt it, but fire away!

In recnt months, I had a lengthy dialouge with an individual on a religious forum that was a Modalist or Oneness adherent. Much of our conversation revolved around the Logos concept and whether John adapted it to Christ, even if it was a Cousin of Philo's concept. He vehemently denied any such correlation. I reasoned that there had to be some cross pollination of ideas given the similarities.

Two issues:

1.) Did Philo express a modalist idea in his concept of diety?
2.) Did this influence the author of John?

The answer to the first one I can say definitely maybe.

I'm being cute of course, but what I've discovered is that when we talk about Philo there isn't much "there" there. Here is my overly gross generalization of Philo, but it will help.

Philo is quoted as the source for thousands of Christological, Neoplatonic and Jewish ideas. The problem with this is that Philo is a huge mish-mash. Philo will introduce not one, not two but several possible explanations for one piece of scripture. Often he will state a preferance for one theory over the other, other times he does not.

For example, in my case, Philo is given credit for Cosmas' cosmology. When you look into it, Philo tosses off one line, as a possible idea, just speculating, and then spends the rest of the section elaborating on another theory that is the exact antithesis of Cosmas' proposition! This is the "source" in many scholars views of Cosmas' theories.

It all depends on how you want to weight each statement by Philo. If you want to go looking for a hellenized judaic source chance are you can find it in Philo, but what did Philo mean? And how much weight did he give to it.

This isn't a criticism of Philo. Philo knew what he was doing, he can write anyway he wants. He is often typed as a philosopher but in reality he was more of an academecian or a historian, he surveys the various texts, Greek, Hebrew whatever and postulates the possibilities. People have been trying to get a single coherent theory out of Philo for years. I think that is an abuse of Philo. He is typed as the "go-to" guy for a hellenized Neoplatonic Jew, but I really don't think he would categorize himself that way. I think he would think he was pretty orthodox frankly. Of course what does an "orthodox" jew mean in the first century anyway? The rabbinical school that established what we call "orthodox" didn't exist until the 5th C. And guess what...they read Philo too, heck they preserved Philo.

BTW - the whole Hellenized/Non-hellenized Jew dichotomy is bunk -IMO and that wall will come crashing down on this sooner or later. It's largely an invention of modern scholarship. The tensions/divisions visible in the historical were far more political than philosophical or cultural. There simply weren't groups of Jews going aroud thinking of themselves as "hellenized" Jews, anymore than Japanese think of themselves as "westernized".

Back to topic...

I'm not sure what a modalist concept would mean in Philo's thinking and we have to be careful that we are not reading things into Philo.

Whether that has any correlation to John is debatable.

Is there any way to access your dissertation ? Ive found some online articles but nothing in depth to really define the relationship, if there was any, to any conclusive decision.

No, but that's because it's not finished yet. :wink: but it wouldn't help you either, I deal with Cosmas' Christology and how it relates to his cosmology which everyone credits to Philo, which is just not true. Your topic is a dissertation in itself.

Anyway, I reread the above rant and it occurs to me that it may be true, but it's also utterly worthless. I really should dive into Philo and start looking for something constructive to build on, but that would take more effort than I can muster at the moment.

Sorry.

Travis

[tlclark]

I also wondered if your studies were at UPENN. an old professor of mine, DR. Struck went there to teach 5-6 years ago. He was a big influence on me. He wasnt much into roman studies. But his style and approach to prefection made me proverbially drop to my knees for mercy on more than one occasion.

Nope! I'm at Temple. We have our own psycho teachers.

:wink:

Travis

[sicarii sam]

Yeah, it is a complicated subject full of assumptions and guesses. The individual in question utterly rejected the idea of the Logos in John being the Person of christ. IE, a 'seperate' being than God. The creative force of God. And accuses the first apologists of using Hellenistic concepts to define the Godhead rather than a monotheistic Jewish OT model. Basically that trinitarians are guilty of polytheism which I think is really refuted by every creed. The 3 share the same essesnce of divinity in unity.

I dont hold to many relgious dogma's. Dont attend church but am very interested in the evolution of christianity and the History of doctrine rather than the doctrine being right or wrong. BLAH !!!!! I engaged simply out of curiosity in what I considered a novel interp. But I found that it had some history before orthodoxy stamped it out.

I suppose my best guess at things is that we dont know what influence hellenistic thought really effected christian writers, especially 'John'. Since we arent sure the apostle wrote it. Origen in my opinion and others but not all, was the first 'type' of systematic theology. Eventually booted out as a heretic, I think theologians use his system today.

I agree with what you said about Hellenistic judaism.....What exactly does that mean ?? Judaism seems to me a very non monolithic movement even in palestine with the various sects diverging on pivotal doctrines.

Im afraid Ill always be a spectator with this because, I have family and cannot relocate to an area with a good graduate program in early christianity. To those who have pursued that dream, I salute you !!!!! Dan

[Restitvtvs]

This fresco of Jesus Christ & Apostles (The Last Supper?) is said to be from the Roman catacomb of Saint Domatilla, and to date from the 4th century.

Notes: The Roman's earlier images of Jesus were of a well-shaven man, rather than bearded.

Additional information about this fresco would be appreciated.

820 pixels wide! I downloaded it some years ago, do not have the source link, but I did record the few item details (above) into the filename when saving it. Posted here only for educational purposes.

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[Theodosius the Great]

Nice example, William.

A senatorial banquet. I've seen a similar fresco from the Catacombs which simply shows a pagan feast. These are further examples of Travis' explanation of Christians adopting familiar pagan imagery to convey a Christian message or event. Another fresco from the Catacombs simply shows a Shepperd to symbolize Christ (as opposed to actually showing a Jewish Rabbi.)

The first images of him are purely symbolic imagery using contemporary Roman garb and fashion. I wonder when a bearded (Semitic) Christ first makes an appearance in Christian art.



Theo

[Restitvtvs]

I wonder when a bearded (Semitic) Christ first makes an appearance in Christian art.

Theo

According to a Wikipedia article ([url:2xfl0dym]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Images_of_Jesus[/url]): both the younger, beardless and the older, bearded images were used as far back as the late 3rd or early 4th century, but the bearded image later dominated.

The first truly Semitic-looking [Western European] portayal of Jesus Christ *may* have been painted by Rembrandt in the 17th century. ([url:2xfl0dym]http://www.oceansbridge.com/art/customer/product.php?productid=29456&cat=&page=13&maincat=R[/url]).

[Restitvtvs]

The young, beardless Roman sculpture of Jesus Christ, from the catacomb of Saint St Callistus (Calllixtus), carved during the 3rd or 4th century?

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[Theodosius the Great]

The young, beardless Roman sculpture of Jesus Christ, from the catacomb of Saint St Callistus

Wow, I was unaware of any statuary representations of Christ that existed before Constantine. Maybe it does date after Constantine - perhaps the catacombs were still used as burial places ? Either way, it must have belonged to a wealthy Christian.

The first truly Semitic-looking Christ image(s) *may* have been painted by Rembrandt in the 17th century.

I really doubt it was that late because I've seen Byzantine icons that show a bearded Christ with a swarthy complexion (unless those are modern). Our Art Historian, Travis, would know the answer to this.