Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World

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Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World Page 34

by Tim Whitmarsh


  2. Plutarch, Political Advice 813e.

  3. Integration: see for example C. Ando, Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000). Regional dynamics: T. Whitmarsh (ed.), Local Knowledge and Micro–Identities in the Imperial Greek World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), with pp. 1–10 on “glocalization.” Quotation: Minucius Felix, Octavius 6.1. Generally on the varieties of religion in the Roman Empire see M. Beard, J. North, and S. Price, Religions of Rome, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); J. B. Rives, Religion in the Roman Empire (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2007); J. Rüpke, From Jupiter to Christ: On the History of Religion in the Roman Imperial Period (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), especially 185–209. Networks: A. Collar, Religious Networks in the Roman Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).

  4. Apuleius, Apology 56. Generally on Apuleius see S. Harrison, Apuleius: A Latin Sophist (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).

  5. Mezentius: Vergil, Aeneid 10.786–907. On Roman theomachies see P. Chaudhari, The War with God: Theomachy in Roman Imperial Poetry (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014).

  6. Doxographic network: Aëtius, Tenets 1.7.1. Stereotypical accusations in Roman courts: C. Edwards, The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).

  7. Aemilianus as Christian: J. Walsh, “On Christian Atheism,” Vigiliae Christianae 45 (1991): 260; V. Hunink, “Apuleius, Pudentilla and Early Christianity,” Vigiliae Christianae 54 (2000): 88–91.

  8. Pliny, Natural History 2.5.

  9. Lucian, Demonax 11, 32, 37, 27; see 5 for the “man of Sinope” (i.e., Diogenes the Cynic). For other sayings attributed to him see D. M. Searby, “Non–Lucian Sources for Demonax. With a New Collection of ‘Fragments,’ ” Symbolae Osloenses 83 (2008): 120–47.

  10. Lucian the atheist: Suda, under Loukianos. Lucian’s European reception has been well studied: see, for example, C. Robinson, Lucian and His Influence in Europe (London: Duckworth, 1979); C. Lauvergnat-Gagnière, Lucien de Samosate et le lucianisme en France au XVIe siècle: Athéisme et polémique (Geneva: Droz, 1988); M. Baumbach, Lukian in Deutschland: Eine forschungs- und rezeptionsgeschichtliche Analyse vom Humanismus bis zur Gegenwart (Munich: Fink, 2002). More generally on Lucian: C. P. Jones, Culture and Society in Lucian (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986); R. B. Branham, Unruly Eloquence: Lucian and the Comedy of Traditions (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989).

  11. Christians and the “impaled sophist”: Lucian, Peregrinus 11–13.

  12. Lucian’s views on religion have been the subject of a number of discussions, none of them wholly satisfactory. The tendency has been to try to reconstruct a coherent religious attitude for the real Lucian behind the mask (a hopeless quest), rather than to explore his satirical strategies on their own terms. See M. Caster, Lucien et la pensée religieuse de son temps (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1937); O. Karavas, “ΝΗΦΕ ΚΑΙ ΜΕΜΝΗΣΟ ΑΠΙΣΤΕΙΝ (Hermot. 47): La religiosité de Lucien,” in A. Bartley, A Lucian for Our Times (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009), 137–44; M. Dickie, “Lucian’s Gods: Lucian’s Understanding of the Divine,” in J. N. Bremmer and A. Erskine (eds.), The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010), 348–61; F. Berdozzo, Götter, Mythen, Philosophen: Lukian und die paganen Göttervorstellungen seiner Zeit (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2011).

  13. Lucian, On Sacrifices 1, 2.

  14. Teapot: B. Russell, “Is there a god?,” in J. G. Slater and P. Köllner (eds.), The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell. Volume 11: Last Philosophical Testament, 1943–68 (London: Routledge, 1997), 547–48.

  15. Diogenes: Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 1.43. Charon: Lucian, Charon 11. On the Dialogues of the Dead see J. Relihan, “Vainglorious Menippus in Lucian’s Dialogues of the Dead,” Illinois Classical Studies 12 (1987): 185–206. On the Cynics and their views of religion see chapter 11, pp. 159–161.

  16. Lucian, On Sacrifices 15.

  17. Lucian, Timon 1–4, 7.

  18. Lucian, Zeus Refuted (quotation from 19): for the philosophical context of these arguments see P. Großlein, Untersuchungen zum Juppiter confutatus Lukians (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1998).

  19. Lucian, Zeus the Tragedian 35–53. Oenomaus of Gadara: J. Hammerstaedt, Die Orakelkritik des Kynikers Oenomaus (Frankfurt am Main: Athenäum, 1988); for the comment of Rabbi Abba ben Kahana see Genesis Rabbah 65:20, with C. Hezser, “Interfaces Between Rabbinic Literature and Graeco-Roman Philosophy,” in P. Schäfer and C. Hezser (eds.), The Talmud Yerushalmi and Graeco-Roman Culture (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000), 180. Another second-century critic of prophecy was Diogenianus the Epicurean (whose views are preserved by Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 4.3, 6.8): see J. Hammerstaedt, “Das Kriterium der Prolepsis beim Epikureer Diogenian,” Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 36 (1993): 24–32.

  20. Lucian, Zeus the Tragedian 18.

  21. For orientation on Plutarch see D. Russell, Plutarch (London: Duckworth, 1971).

  22. Theophrastus, Characters 16. Quotation: Plutarch, On Superstition 168d. Jews keeping to the Sabbath while the city was captured: 169c; old women: 165f–166a (where there may well be a further reference to Judaism: modern texts of Plutarch read “baptisms” [baptismous], but this is an emendation by the eighteenth-century English editor Richard Bentley from the transmitted “keeping to the Sabbath” [sabbatismous]). There is a thoughtful discussion of On Superstition and its relation to Plutarch’s thought at P. Van Nuffelen, Rethinking the Gods: Philosophical Readings of Religion in the Post-Hellenistic Period (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 65–71; see also H. Bowden, “Before Superstition and After: Theophrastus and Plutarch on Deisidaimonia,” Past and Present 199 (2008): 56–71.

  23. Atheism: Plutarch, On Superstition 170f.

  24. Niobe: Plutarch, On Superstition 170b–c. Plutarch explicitly discusses the Epicureans alongside the deisidaimones at It Is Not Possible to Live Pleasurably According to Epicurus 1186b–c.

  16. Christians, Heretics, and Other Atheists

  1. For a sparkling account of the emergence of Christianity see D. MacCulloch, A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years (London: Allen Lane, 2009). Conflicting accounts of Constantine’s vision: Lactantius, On the Deaths of the Persecuted 44.5 and Eusebius, Life of Constantine 1.28–30. For a readable and authoritative account of Constantine’s life and career see T. Barnes and R. Boxhall, Constantine: Dynasty, Religion and Power in the Later Roman Empire (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2014); see also N. Lenski, The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), with Lenski’s own chapter (“The Reign of Constantine,” 59–90) on Constantine’s reign. The Edict of Milan broadened an Edict of Tolerance that had already been issued by the eastern Augustus Galerius.

  2. Third race: Clement, Stromateis 6.5.41 (Clement is quoting an earlier text). In general on the question of the existence of anti-Christian law see T. Barnes, “Legislation Against the Christians,” Journal of Roman Studies 58 (1968): 32–50, concluding that such persecution as did occur was rooted in prejudice and not legislation. The so-called Decian persecution in 250 was in fact not targeted specifically at Christians: Decius’s concern rather was to ensure that all citizens sacrificed for the health of the empire (J. B. Rives, “The Decree of Decius and the Religion of Empire,” The Journal of Roman Studies 89 [1999]: 135–54). On the late-antique manufacture of martyr myth see L. Grig, Making Martyrs in Late Antiquity (London: Duckworth, 2004); and C. Moss, Ancient Christian Martyrdom: Diverse Practices, Theologies, and Traditions (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012) and The Myth of Persecution: How Early Christians Invented a Story of Martyrdom (New York: HarperOne, 2013).

  3. Indistinguishability of Christians and non-Christians (at least in North Africa): E. Rebillard, Christians and Their Many Identities in Late Antiquity (Ithaca, NY, and Londo
n: Cornell University Press, 2012), 67–68. That many attending Christian services also practiced other forms of worship is evident from the anxious instruction even of post-Constantinian church leaders like John Chrysostom and Augustine: see Rebillard, Christians and Their Many Identities, 74–75; and B. Sandwell, Religious Identity in Late Antiquity: Greeks, Jews and Christians in Antioch (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 82–90. Quotation: Edwards, “The Beginnings of Christianisation,” 142. Generally on the persistence of polytheist culture into the sixth century: G. Bowersock, Hellenism in Late Antiquity (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990); and A. Cameron, The Last Pagans of Rome (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). R. Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians in the Mediterranean World from the Second Century AD to the Conversion of Constantine (Harmondsworth, UK: Viking, 1986) offers a rich storehouse of information on the relationship between Christian and polytheist cults; see also C. P. Jones, Between Pagans and Christians (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014).

  4. Numbers of Christians: K. Hopkins, “Christian Number and Its Implications,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 6.2 (1998): 185–226. Hopkins’s figures for AD 200 have been thought by some too low: see, for example, Edwards, “The Beginnings of Christianisation,” 138.

  5. Emperor as chief priest: R. Gordon, “The Veil of Power: Emperors, Sacrificers and Benefactors,” in M. Beard and J. North (eds.), Pagan Priests: Religion and Power in the Ancient World (London: Duckworth, 1990), 201–31.

  6. Codex Theodosianus 16.1.2, 16.5.6; D. Hunt, “Christianising the Roman Empire: The Evidence of the Code,” in J. Harries and I. Wood (eds.), The Theodosian Code, 2nd ed. (London: Duckworth, 2010), 147.

  7. Heretics: 16.5 (Manichaeans are also mentioned here). Any crime: 16.5.40.1; Memory: 16.5.38. Apostates: 16.7. Jews: 16.8. “Pagans”: 16.10. Public debate: 16.4.2. On the reuse of anti-polytheist discourse against “heretics” see R. Flower, Emperors and Bishops in Late Roman Invective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013). Skepticism as regards implementation: A. Cameron, The Last Pagans of Rome (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 59–74.

  8. Revised meaning of atheos: see G. W. H. Lampe (ed.), A Patristic Greek Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), 44. Lampe does cite a few instances of the “classical” meaning, but the vast majority are of the new kind. The earliest Christian instance comes in a widely cited phrase at Ephesians 2:12 (attacking “atheists in the cosmos”). “Polytheist atheists”: for example “Sentences of Sextus” 599 (“A polytheist man is an atheist”), Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 7.19.8. Philo, On the Special Laws 1.345; On the Decalogue 91. War: Questions on Exodus 30 (the phrasing is taken from Demosthenes, On the Crown 262). Christian war on atheists: Eusebius, In Praise of Constantine 6.21; ps.-Chrysostom, On John the Theologian 614 (Migne). See also for example Eusebius Life of Constantine 3.3.1, On the Praise of Constantine 6.21, 7.6, 9.8. B. Shaw, Sacred Violence: African Christians and Sectarian Hatred in the Age of Augustine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011); on the rhetoric of sacred violence in late-antique Christianity and early Islam, see also T. Sizgorich, Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity: Militant Devotion in Christianity and Islam (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University Press, 2009).

  9. Accusations of atheism against Christians: J. Walsh, “On Christian Atheism,” Vigiliae Christianae, 45 (1991): 255–77; P. F. Beatrice, “L’accusation d’athéisme contre les chrétiens,” in M. Narcy and É. Rebillard (eds.), Hellénisme et christianisme (Villeneuve d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires de Septentron, 2004), 133–52. Eusebius on Licinius: Life of Constantine 2.5.1, 2.5.4. “Away with the atheists”: Martyrdom of Polycarp 9–10. Date of Polycarp’s martyrdom: P. Hartog, Polycarp and the New Testament (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002), 24–31. Many scholars date the text too to the second century, for no good reason that I know of. At Luke 23:18, the crowd cries out to Pilate to release Barabbas but aire Jesus (compare Acts 21:36, used by the crowd of Paul); in John, when Pilate tells the Jews that Jesus is their king, they reply aron, aron (19:15). Intertextuality in the Martyrdom of Polycarp: C. Moss, “Nailing Down and Tying Up: Lessons in Intertextual Impossibility from the Martyrdom of Polycarp,” Vigiliae Christianae 67 (2013): 117–36 (emphasizing that the text encourages parallels with Socrates as well as Jesus). One explicit second-century association of Christians with atheism is Lucian, Alexander or the False Prophet 25, but there, crucially, the Christians are being lumped in with Epicureans, who were certainly thought of as (philosophical) atheists. For a third-century accusation against Christians as atheoi who “secede from ancestral customs” see Porphyry, Against the Christians fragment 1; the phrasing may however be paraphrased rather than verbatim.

  10. Justin Martyr, First Apology 5–6. On such early imperial Christian appropriations (and condemnations) of Socrates see C. Taylor, “Socrates Under the Severans,” in S. Swain, S. Harrison, and J. Elsner (eds.), Severan Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 500–11. See also First Apology 4, where reference is made to the philosophers who “taught atheism” (atheotēs).

  11. Christian reuse of philosophical atheism: D. Palmer “Atheism, Apologetic and Negative Theology in the Greek Apologists of the Second Century,” Vigiliae Christianae 37 (1983): 234–59. Christian opposition to classical atheism: Theophilus, Against Autolycus 3.7. Clement: Exhortation to the Greeks 2.20–21. On the Christian reception of Euhemerism see R. P. C. Hanson, “Christian Attitudes to Pagan Religion,” Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt 2.23.2 (1980): 934–38; M. Winiarczyk, The Sacred History of Euhemerus of Messene (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2013), 148–52.

  A Note About the Author

  Tim Whitmarsh is the A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at the University of Cambridge. He has published widely on ancient literature, including Beyond the Second Sophistic: Adventures in Greek Postclassicism (University of California Press, 2013); Narrative and Identity in the Ancient Greek Novel: Returning Romance (Cambridge University Press, 2011); Ancient Greek Literature (Polity Press, 2004); and Greek Literature and the Roman Empire: The Politics of Imitation (Oxford University Press, 2001).

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  Table of Contents

  Other Titles

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Contents

  Dedication

  Preface

  A Dialogue

  Part One: Archaic Greece

  Chapter 1: Polytheistic Greece

  Chapter 2: Good Books

  Chapter 3: Battling the Gods

  Chapter 4: The Material Cosmos

  Part Two: Classical Athens

  Chapter 5: Cause and Effect

  Chapter 6: “Concerning the Gods, I Cannot Know”

  Chapter 7: Playing the Gods

  Chapter 8: Atheism on Trial

  Chapter 9: Plato and the Atheists

  Part Three: The Hellenistic Era

  Chapter 10: Gods and Kings

  Chapter 11: Philosophical Atheism

  Chapter 12: Epicurus Theomakhos

  Part Four: Rome

  Chapter 13: With Gods on Our Side

  Chapter 14: Virtual Networks

  Chapter 15: Imagine

  Chapter 16: Christians, Heretics, and Other Atheists

  Acknowledgments

  Notes

  A Note About the Author

 

 

 
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