Jan Stenger
The title of this chapter implies three premises, which on closer consideration prove highly problematic. First, the idea of an encounter between Greek literature and Christianity is based on the assumption that it is possible to draw a sharp line between culture and religion as two inherently separated domains. Yet it is open to debate whether any person of Greek antiquity would have perceived religious allegiance in terms that have nothing to do with the culture in which the various cults were practiced. Secondly, to speak of an encounter means to posit an intrinsic opposition, or at least a clear-cut distinction, between two sufficiently independent entities, Greek culture and Christian faith, even if only to argue for an intermixing between them. Such a model imagines Christianity as a distinct cultural tradition seeking to take root in an alien environment. This notion, however, tends to overlook that Christianity originated within Greco-Roman society and grew up in a Hellenized context. In a certain sense, early Christians themselves contributed to this view, since they fashioned themselves as a distinct race, an ethnos, thus emphasizing otherness and difference. Thirdly, the title might give the impression that there was a single interaction between two uniform entities, as if it were feasible to discern the one Christian attitude to a monolithic Greek literature. Yet we should consider whether during the course of the Imperial age several encounters of Greek texts and Christian readers and authors took place, reflecting a variety of approaches, individual ideas and mutual influences. Nevertheless, it is legitimate to retain the term “encounter” if we are aware that it has a metaphorical nature and represents a broad spectrum of interactions.
This chapter therefore aims to clarify which effects the encounters of Greek literature with Christianity caused or, more specifically, the ways in which Christians adopted, or rejected, certain kinds of literary forms and conventions, further the extent to which they engaged in the discourse of literature surrounding them. This might lead to a more nuanced description of the relationship, which neither overstates distinctive features nor ignores the common characteristics that existed from the outset. Such an approach may enable us to discern the dynamic processes and the tensions which ultimately resulted in a transformed image of both Greek literature and ancient Christianity.
From its very beginnings, early Christianity was situated at the crossroads of two venerable and highly developed cultures, Judaism and Hellenism respectively. This combination of different traditions was reflected both in the community’s religious practice and its relationship to literature. From its Jewish ancestry, Christianity inherited not only a body of fundamental Scriptures, which transmitted the word of God, to be supplemented in the course of centuries by genuinely Christian writings, but also the reading and exegesis of Scripture as the heart of religious activity. Texts achieved a central place in the communities since they taught the correct belief and the right way of life according to Christ’s teaching. Thus, the believers sought authoritative truth in the writings and, simultaneously, guidance on a valuable conduct of life. This emphasis on literature set Christianity apart from Greco-Roman religion, which rested on the observation of obligations owed to the gods, but not on the development of doctrine. It was, however, by the same characteristic that Christianity resembled another important institution of Classical culture, namely the Hellenistic schools. For in the Greek tradition the educational system as dominated by rhetoric and philosophy focused on literature as a means of conveying moral principles and philosophical insight.
Considering the vital importance of texts and the school-like character of early Christianity, it comes as no surprise that its representatives soon devised genres which they considered useful for teaching belief and the Christian life. To preserve and disseminate the deeds and words of Christ, the earliest authors developed a literary form that concentrated on the person of the teacher, depicting Jesus’ sayings, his life and his death. These accounts, written down (in chronological order) by Mark, Matthew, Luke and John, bear close similarities to other biographies of antiquity, yet also show significant differences. Whereas previous scholarship emphasized the oral and unliterary nature of the Gospels, more recent analyses have established a high degree of correlation between features of the Gospels and those noted in the Hellenistic vita, especially in the Lives of philosophers. Among the similarities are the medium-length size, the chronological structure and the selection of topics and motifs, which indicate a shared family resemblance. The style and the social setting of the Gospels are, however, more popular than most of the Lives. Noting the common features, scholars discuss not only the question of the literary genre of the Gospels but also its possible origins from ancient literary forms. A matter of debate is whether Mark wrote in the genre of the vita deliberately or whether he just fell into a natural biographical pattern; generally speaking, the analogies raise the issue of the setting of the Gospel within contemporary culture and of the level of the evangelists’ literary awareness. What seems to be clear, though, is that Matthew and Luke attempted to improve Mark’s style and to expand and develop his work to bring it into greater conformity with the conventions of the Hellenistic vita. This observation might allow the inference that both must have been aware of the similarity between Mark and the Lives, thus being familiar with contemporary literary discourse.
Alongside the Gospels, early Christian teaching was dominated by the form of the letter, which also displays features found in its Classical counterparts. Of the writings contained in our New Testament, the great majority present themselves as letters, the most famous of which are the fourteen traditionally attributed to Paul. In the Hellenistic world, letters were a common instrument of communication for a variety of purposes, ranging from business concerns to literary exchange between intellectuals. This flexible pattern even allowed for giving philosophical exhortation and advice or treating doctrines, whether ethical or cosmological, so that letters might function as short treatises. The integration of these forms into the letter was facilitated by their respective resemblance to modes of oral instruction. Their suitability for various aims made epistles also a valuable tool for the contact between Christian teachers and individuals or, more often, congregations and other groups. Form and function of the letters accordingly are very heterogeneous, and occasionally the pattern of the epistle serves as a frame for works of different genres. As to their relationship to the Hellenistic tradition of letter writing, Christian writers adopted some external features, in particular fixed formulas, which are found at the beginning and the end of the letter. Paul, who with his apostolic letters created the model for the later Christian epistles, took over such generic conventions but modified them significantly to adapt them to Christian needs. For instance, he closes his letters with a blessing in place of the customary “Farewell.” Thus, in a similar way as the Gospels, the early letters, though departing from contemporary pagan texts through distinctive features, are after all rooted in the world of Greek literature.
The same consideration holds for a body of writings that is labeled apocryphal. These, although very popular, never found the way into the officially received, authoritative writings during the formative period of the New Testament canon (late second to mid-fourth century). A number of these texts, presented in a narrative mode, deal like the canonical Gospels primarily with the life and teaching of Jesus. Alongside the apocryphal gospels mention must be made especially of a group of works which relate the missionary activities of individual apostles, generally culminating in the apostle’s martyrdom. While they invite comparison with the Acts of the Apostles, in that they give historical accounts of the early followers of Jesus, the apocrypha also betray a relationship to a secular genre that one might not expect as a model for religious writings. Although the Acts, stemming from the second and third centuries, convey and commend the beliefs and commitments of popular Christianity, in other words, perform a teaching function, they are meant to entertain and edify their reader even more than to instruct him. The reason for this is that they display characteristics familiar from the ancient novel, which flourished roughly in the same period. The most obvious parallels are the focus on the fate of individuals and the lively depiction of wonders and other unexpected events that advance the action. Despite the affinities with the Hellenistic romances one should note a contrast in style and content. Whereas apocryphal Acts have several narrative elements in common, including the important role of travels and the representation of gender and sexuality, they lack any plot in the strict sense, highlighting instead the works of saving power and showing a vital interest in martyrdom. Therefore, the relationship of the Christian “novelistic” literature to the Hellenistic novels is more complex than recognized by earlier scholarship, which understood the apocryphal Acts simply as expressions of Christianity in the form of a Classical genre. More accurately, the texts can be described as an antitype of the novels, inverting and undermining their ideology, thus challenging the traditional values of romantic love and the civic order of the Greek world.
What emerges from our brief overview of three popular forms of writing, Gospels, letters and apocryphal Acts, is that Christian literature shows analogies to various established genres, but does not conform precisely to any of them. Rather, the accounts of the deeds of Jesus and his followers and Paul’s epistles make a creative use of generic conventions of contemporary writings, adapting them to the framework of Christian belief and thus transforming them for new purposes. Consequently, although the authors seem to have been acquainted with the conditions of literary production, it remains a controversial issue how close the affinity to Classical culture was and, furthermore, whether it is possible at all to classify Christian writings according to the established matrix of Classical genres. In addition to the coexistence of similarities and divergences or the combination of different generic elements in one single text, it is important to note that there are also works which, only loosely related to Greek parallels, arise from other traditions, most notably the prominent literary type of the apocalypse, a record of visions and revelations. Dealing with ultimate mysteries, the character of the divine realm and the course of cosmic history, the apocalypses stem from Jewish roots, thus entering Greek literature as a new “genre.” Accordingly, literary norms as shaped by Classical expectations cannot account for all the features we encounter in Christian texts of the first centuries.
As the early Christians took an ambivalent stance towards the literary discourse of their time, so their attitude to the current cultural code, rhetoric, was informed by ambiguity. In spite of the school-like character of the Church, several of its representatives displayed serious reservations about the shared high culture of the Hellenistic world. Since the original Christians were, as the Bible had documented, people of low origin, unaffected by any higher education, there seemed to be no need to employ the means of Classical rhetoric in preaching; quite the reverse, polished eloquence was often suspected to be opposed to correct belief and simple truth. In a broader perspective, Christian authors expressed a feeling of cultural alienation, claiming that the believers constituted a distinguished community, a “third race”, which lived among their fellow citizens as if they were strangers, set apart by purity of life (Epistle to Diognetus 5).
Yet at the same time, educated Christians deliberately began to exploit the instruments of Classical learning for their own religious purposes. This is documented by a paschal homily of Melito of Sardis (died c. 180), discovered in the twentieth century, which has fundamentally changed our understanding of the development of early Christian literature. Embellished with chiasms, antitheses, paradoxes, and alliterations, the sermon couches its discussion of Passover in the elaborate, rhythmical prose called “Asianic,” in which contemporary orators of the Second Sophistic, such as Aelius Aristides, dressed their rhetorical displays to enchant a learned audience. From these affinities it can be inferred that already in the Antonine age at least some preachers were willing to adjust their language and literary form to the standards of high culture so that they might also attract the educated, who expected serious thoughts to be expressed in an elaborate manner.
The matter was further complicated by the other branch of Classical education, philosophy, the more so as the schools, also addressing questions of ethics and theology, could be regarded as direct competitors to Christianity. In discussing the encounter with Hellenistic philosophy it has to be borne in mind that also in this domain Judaism had set a precedent, since its theology was from the beginning an object of reflection and investigation and, furthermore, in the Diaspora Judaism itself had been largely Hellenized. In line with this ongoing intercultural exchange, the earliest Christians, living in a Jewish environment, appear to have been markedly influenced by Hellenism. This can be illustrated with the New Testament writings, which occasionally relate explicit encounters between philosophers and Christians. Paul himself not only discussed his faith with the philosophers in Athens (Acts 17:18), but also warned against their deceitful teachings (Col. 2.8). According to these passages, he perceived the schools as rivals so that he attempted to replace their doctrines with a new “Christian philosophy.”
Later on, in the second century, the Apologists more overtly used the intellectual instruments of philosophy in order to present and defend their belief. One of them, Iustinus, or Justin Martyr (died 165), devoted his life to the search for the “true philosophy,” which, after an encounter with the philosophical schools, he eventually found in the Christian faith. In his view Christianity was superior to any kind of philosophy because it was proclaimed by the divine Logos, whereas the philosophers had only the abstract force of human reason. Consequently, Justin declared that all that is true in philosophy has to be considered the gift of God, thus claiming the insights of the philosophers for the Jewish–Christian tradition. Justin’s reinterpretation, then, not only suggested that a thinker like Socrates could be understood as a Christian before Christ, but also argued that Plato’s thoughts ultimately derived from the prophets of the Old Testament, as stated in his First Apology:
That you may learn that it was from our teachers – we mean the account given through the prophets – that Plato took his statement that God, having converted matter which was shapeless, created the world, hear the very words spoken through Moses, who was the first prophet and of greater antiquity than the Greek writers.
(1. Apol. 59)
Following this line of argument some authors of the second century began to make a marked distinction between pagan philosophy and Christian faith in that they insisted that all cultural achievements of the Greeks actually belonged to the Jews or to barbarians. According to them, the truth as proclaimed by Scripture and transmitted to Christianity was older than the entire Greek culture.
Altogether, Christian thinking and teaching of the early decades was characterized by ambivalence towards the literature and culture of the surrounding world. On the one hand, the first Christian writers adopted genres and conformed to generic conventions, thereby expounding their message in the linguistic and literary code which was current in their days. To what degree they had received a higher education and had been trained in eloquence is, however, difficult to assess, because a general awareness of literary training permeated much more widely throughout society than just the formal teaching. On the other hand, in spite of the use of rhetorical and philosophical means, the writings of Christian authors reveal unease with, or at times an outright rejection of, the intellectual accomplishments of the Greeks. Thus, in the Christian engagement with Greek literature and learning we observe a variety of attitudes, which reflect not only the individual cultural background of the authors, but also document the possibilities of self-positioning in the interaction between Judaism, Hellenism, and emerging Christianity.
When we turn to the third century, the relationship between Christianity and Greek literature, though showing obvious continuities, undergoes a significant development, which was to pave the way for a more intimate mutual exchange. While Christian texts gradually entered Greek literary discourse from the fringes in the first two centuries, in the following decades they were becoming altogether more embedded in the cultural and linguistic worlds around them, and their genres reflect that process. As a result, Christian authors were increasingly adopting the techniques of the surrounding educated culture, and operating in a sophisticated literary world.
A striking example of the increasing orientation towards mainstream culture lies in the adoption of the methods of Hellenistic textual and literary criticism in commenting upon the books of Scripture. The outstanding representative of this strategy of appropriation is Origen (c. 185–254), an intellectual and prolific writer, who, after teaching in his home town of Alexandria, moved to Caesarea in Palestine, where he founded a school. Origen employed, for the first time in Christian literature, the traditional forms of Greek scholarship, including critical edition, commentary, and scientific treatise, to display his immense erudition and make it available for future generations. In his commentaries he used the methods and wrote in the terms of the textual criticism and exegetic literature developed by the Alexandrian school of philology for establishing the authenticity of ancient texts and illuminating their meaning. In order to set his interpretation on solid foundations, he conceived and prepared the Hexapla, an elaborate instrument for textual criticism of the Hebrew Scriptures. This gigantic scholarly work, which has not come down to us, presented six versions of the Old Testament scriptures side by side in parallel columns and was the basis for Origen’s exegesis. Although grounded in the philological tradition, the learned activities of Origen differed in crucial ways from those of his pagan colleagues. What made his case peculiar was the nature of the texts on which he applied his interpretative tools. Whereas the Hellenistic grammatical tradition was decidedly Greek, largely ignoring foreign writings and traditions, he focused on a barbarian literature, composed in a non-Greek language, Hebrew. This intercultural synthesis of Greek approaches to learning with non-Greek material is characteristic of Origen’s intellect. Hence, in the emergence of a formal biblical scholarship in the third century we encounter the same range of conformity with and departure from Classical patterns as already observed in literary production.
Further, Origen not only practiced biblical scholarship, but also reflected on the hermeneutical principles that guided his activity. His theory presupposes that there are three senses of Scripture: the literal, the moral, and the spiritual. Since alongside passages that are quite straightforward Scripture contains material which cannot be understood literally (e.g. metaphors and impossibilities), the reader is called upon to seek a deeper, hidden meaning in the text. The hermeneutical task is to employ different levels of interpretation corresponding to the three senses. Origen’s chief interest was devoted to discerning the hidden, spiritual meaning of Scripture, for which purpose he applied the allegorical method developed in the philosophers’ dealings with Homer’s poems and especially with their anthropomorphic gods. Following in the footsteps of previous literary critics he conceived an elaborated theory of meaning-production through texts and the recovery of meaning by the interpreter. In doing so, Origen drew attention to the textual and literary dimension of the Bible, thereby aligning Scripture with the works of Hellenic literature.
It comes as no surprise that Christians simultaneously began to express ideas not only on their own writings and the literary forms they used, but also on Classical texts. These two aspects are documented in the work of Origen’s teacher, Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–220, cf. Hose, this volume, ch. 21, pp. 334), in particular in his miscellaneous Stromateis, literally “patchwork.” In this compendium in eight books, in order to prove that Christian thought is congruent with the best of philosophy, Clement assembled and quoted a wide range of Greek sources, mainly criticizing their views. Despite his aim of revealing the superiority of Christianity, his evaluation of Greek culture appears in general more positive than that of other Christians of his time. This attitude reflects Clement’s intention to address likewise educated believers and the intelligent pagan (Clem. Al. Strom. 7.1.1.1), hence audiences who expected a certain cultural level of an author who wished to be taken seriously.
Moreover, Clement showed himself a conscious writer in that at the beginning of the Stromateis he discussed, as pagan authors had done before him, issues of genre and form and, in addition, the relationship between himself and his readers. While the text gives the impression of aimlessness, there is, as Clement claims, an underlying plan, which follows Greek models. He explains further why he has chosen this form and method, namely to conceal the truth from those who are not worthy of it. When elaborating on his teaching methods and the interaction between text and audience, Clement justifies his reception of Hellenic education, as the following passage illustrates:
Like farmers who irrigate the land before, so we also water with the fresh stream of Greek learning what in it is earthy so that it may receive the spiritual seed thrown into it and may be capable of easily nourishing it. The Stromateis will contain the truth mixed together with the doctrines of philosophy, or rather veiled and concealed, as the edible part of the nut by the shell. For, in my opinion, it is fitting that the seeds of truth are kept exclusively for the farmers of faith.
(1.1.17.4–18.1)
The opening section of Clement’s longest and most important surviving work, as well as further remarks scattered throughout the text, shows us a Christian intellectual who consciously and carefully adopts the contemporary standards of literary discourse for his religious purposes. Fully aware of the conventions of the Classics, he decides to conform to them and to present his thoughts in the stylistic garment of the by then dominant Second Sophistic so that his work is able to participate in the ongoing intellectual debates.
The stance Clement and his disciple Origen took towards high culture also informed their encounter with pagan philosophy, which, as already hinted, was neatly connected to questions of literary presentation. Since the times of the pre-Socratics, philosophers had devised or adapted a variety of types to convey their doctrines to the best possible effect, ranging from didactic poetry to written dialogue to epistle. On this reservoir of philosophical modes of writing Clement and Origen drew as they set out to explain their belief. The former in his Protrepticus applied a pattern that philosophers from Socrates on had deployed to encourage readers to adopt their way of life. Yet, now this common genre, used for example by Aristotle and Cicero, served to argue polemically against Greek philosophy, advocating instead Christianity as the true philosophical existence, even though Clement made extensive use in it of Greek literature. Origen’s treatise On First Principles also bears a close resemblance to a branch of philosophical writing as it closely follows the standard format treating “physics,” that is, the relation of God to the created world.
The reception of pagan philosophy by Clement and Origen went, however, far beyond the adaptation of external features of teaching for Christian ends. Rather, they relied heavily on methods of philosophical argument and reasoning established by the Hellenistic schools. Furthermore, the educational programs of both thinkers betray their indebtedness to pagan predecessors, even where they deliberately depart from them. At Alexandria, Origen led his school not so much in the manner of a catechetical institution. Instead he implemented there a complete circle of studies such as was familiar from the traditional education system, yet devoted to a Christian philosophy. The impression of the curriculum as derived from Greek antecedents is at least what Origen’s pupil, Gregory Thaumaturgus (c. 213–270) outlines in his farewell address to his teacher. According to him, it comprised a propaedeutic in the dialectics of the Socratic manner, studies in the natural sciences, morals and finally theology, which consisted of two stages, first interpretation and commentary on the most important Greek philosophers, then reading of Scripture, explained by Origen (In Origenem 7–15). In adjusting Christian teaching to the classical methods Origen was obviously influenced by the cultural climate of Alexandria, where Greek paideia and Jewish tradition had fruitfully combined for a long period.
The impact of philosophical culture was not confined, though, to the external shape of Origen’s theological school. Rather, his entire way of thinking owed much to the intellectual environment, in particular to Platonism. It is safe to say that the Platonic tradition provided the intellectual framework for his view on the world and on Christian faith, even to the extent that his critics called into question whether he was a Christian or a Platonist. The pagan philosopher Porphyry has given us a revealing, if tendentious, picture of how Origen dressed his Christianity in a Classical guise:
But Origen, having been educated as a Greek in Greek literature, rushed headlong into barbarian recklessness. And carrying over the skill in learning he hawked it about, living his life as a Christian and against the laws, but in his opinions of the world and of the divine being like a Greek and laying Greek teachings under strange fables. For he was continually studying Plato …
(Euseb. Hist. eccl. 6.19.7–8)
It should, however, be emphasized here that Origen, though clearly indebted to Plato’s thoughts, does not intend to turn Christianity into a philosophical school among others. Quite the reverse, he leaves no doubt that Hellenic philosophy, however precious and useful, has to be purified from its pagan, and therefore dangerous, entailments so that it might serve as propaedeutic studies for Christianity. With Christian religion being the highest form of philosophy, Classical culture is reduced to a subservient role.
The course of the third century witnessed a marked change in the relationship between Christianity and the surrounding literary world. While the earliest Christian authors, though not totally detached from the trends of contemporary culture, had no literary ambitions, later writers such as Clement and Origen not only received a higher education and were “Hellenized” to a certain extent, but also were ready to conform to the conventions of literary discourse. On the one hand, the willingness to adopt the dominant code manifested itself in the intensive use of concrete techniques and methods of literary criticism and philosophy; on the other hand, their writings reflect a sophisticated literary awareness, documented by the deliberate choice of certain genres and by comments on issues of composition and reading. Furthermore, the reception of philosophy, particularly Platonism, resulted in the emergence of an actual Christian philosophy well prepared to enter controversial debates with pagan opponents. Altogether, these developments point to the fact that Christianity embraced the cultural environment to a higher degree than before.
The next stage in the emergence of a Greek Christian literature was reached with the era of the Roman emperor Constantine and the consequences his politics had for late Antique society. After the final attempt to eradicate Christianity at the beginning of the fourth century, the situation was completely reversed when, under Constantine, the Church became tolerated and gained the emperor’s patronage. These measures brought about the spread of belief throughout the Empire, involving the gradual Christianization of the imperial aristocracy and eventually the suppression of the traditional cults. Consequently, more members of the well-off families embraced Christian faith, which profoundly influenced the ways in which Christian authors represented doctrines and ideas on religious practice. More precisely, as Christianity permeated the elite, who had been brought up for generations according to the inherited cultural norms, it seemed inevitable to reconsider the value of the literary heritage within the new religious framework and to clarify the stance on education. For similar reasons, the amount of works produced by Christian writers increased considerably, and novel types were devised to address new audiences.
The issue of how to deal with Classical culture remained a cause for misgivings. Inevitably, by virtue of the continuing Christianization of all ranks of society, the believers were faced with serious questions of self-definition and identity, the more so as not every convert adopted the new faith out of religious feelings, let alone was willing to abandon his entrenched habits. In particular those who had grown up in the traditional culture had to reconcile their education with their belief if they did not want to break with their intellectual framework and the entire way of life. This dilemma vexed, for example, the Greek spokesman of the Christian Roman Empire under Constantine, the Church Father Eusebius of Caesarea (c. 260–339). In his constant struggle to defend his religion against learned critics and in his discussion of the three sources of religious identity – Judaism, Hellenism, and Christian tradition – Eusebius seeks to define and negotiate boundaries and to establish a self-definition that might integrate different cultural traits. Even though he stresses the superiority of faith, he refuses to relinquish the best of philosophy and literature to the pagans. In his view, Christian identity lies across ethnic categories so that Hellenic civilization also belongs to the cultural heritage of Christianity (Praeparatio Evangelica 1.5.10).
That Classical literature and learning were of vital importance for the self-fashioning of the educated faithful became evident when the last pagan emperor, Julian the “Apostate,” himself brought up as a Christian, endeavored to exclude Christians from the whole of Greek culture. In order to deprive them of the advantages of education, in particular of political influence, he issued an edict that tied literature and culture on the one hand and pagan religion on the other hand inextricably together, or rather identified them as one. This measure posed a severe threat to all, such as the Cappadocian bishop Gregory Nazianzen (c. 329–390), who testified by their lives to the synthesis of Greek culture and Christian faith. Thus, the emperor’s teaching law reinforced once more the need for Christian intellectuals to define their own position with regard to the Classics. Gregory, a productive author and a skilled rhetorician, launched a harsh attack against Julian’s policy, even though only after the emperor’s death. In his oration against the Apostate he sarcastically pointed out the absurdity of Julian’s conception of education: “Is it only to you that Hellenizein belongs? … Is it only to you that Attikizein belongs? … Is it only to you that poetry belongs?” (Oration 4.107–8) Since in Gregory’s view culture and literature were disconnected from any religious adherence, no community could lay claim to them. What Gregory in his desire to integrate the heritage of Hellenism into a Christian identity downplayed, however, was that a great deal of the Classical literature put forward ideas which were not easy to reconcile with Christian dogma, a point that Julian had deliberately picked out for his attack.
Not all believers of the Greek-speaking world subscribed to Gregory’s appreciation of learning. The fourth century saw the rise to great popularity of the monastic movement, advocating a conduct of life that was markedly different from that of the urban elite. Alongside the spread of monastic culture in the Roman East, a new, popular literary form emerged to become one of the preeminent genres in the following centuries. Hagiography promoted the new role model, depicting the lives of the saints with vivid details, extolling their miracles, and culminating in the death of the saint and his continued activity. The particular shape of the narration was mainly influenced by two factors. First, the Lives of the saints, giving an account of a life from its beginnings to the end, displayed similarities to secular biographies, first and foremost to those of the philosophers. Secondly, however, the nature of the saint’s Life was more deeply affected by the evolving cult of the saint or martyr. The most influential exemplar was the Life of Antony by his contemporary, the bishop of Alexandria, Athanasius (ca. 298–373). What is worth mentioning is that the author decided to make the lack of schooling a sign of the holiness of the Egyptian monk. Athanasius portrays Antony as uneducated and illiterate, a prophet taught by God alone, yet an accomplished philosopher. The most evident passages on Antony’s “natural” wisdom are the stories of his three encounters with pagan philosophers, which reveal that, despite his lack of education, the monk’s intelligence surpasses the human and therefore futile logic. In all debates, though, Antony himself argues like a paragon of the traditional schools. Paradoxically, the authors of the Lives conformed to pagan literary conventions and methods of classical education, but only to expose secular erudition as unnecessary or even detrimental for Christian faith and conduct. In doing so they again raised the question of how Christian truth, being a revelation handed down to simple fishermen, could meet the standards of the intellectual elite. A rustic, illiterate monk, living in the desert, hardly was a model for urban Christians, not to mention for well-educated bishops.
The ambivalence towards Classical culture was felt and explicitly noticed by such Christian intellectuals who, after having received an education in the schools, came into contact with different forms of Christian existence, especially with monasticism and asceticism. Their conscious and unconscious tensions are evidenced best by the three Cappadocian Fathers, Basil of Caesarea (330–379), his brother Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335–385), and Gregory Nazianzen, as well as by the somewhat younger John Chrysostom (c. 349–407), all born into Christian families. As seen above with Gregory Nazianzen, they exemplified in their own lives that faith and Classical education could come together, but also that this relationship constantly caused qualms. The central problem was of how to deal with literature, which lay at the heart of traditional schooling.
A pragmatic solution to this problem was suggested by Basil’s famous Address to Young Men. The treatise does not reject pagan literature altogether, but emphasizes the need to distinguish in it what is morally useful and compatible with belief and what is harmful. Thus, the relevance and value of pagan literary works depend on the “correct use” (chrêsis) that the reader makes of them guided by Christian morality. By this measure Basil defends the benefits of secular education so that future Church leaders could function as effectively as other educated people. A different answer was given by Chrysostom, who himself turned from pagan to Christian masters, in his treatise Concerning the Education of Children. Although he does not deny the advantages of secular schooling for members of the upper classes, he puts reading and discussing the Bible center stage. Chrysostom even gives detailed advice on how to present Biblical narratives so that they are simultaneously attractive reading and edifying to the children. Basil’s and Chrysostom’s attempts to grapple with the relation of Christianity to pagan literature both document the awareness that the imperial society, though gradually Christianized, could not dispense with Classical literature and learning, unless it were cut off from its cultural heritage. On the other hand, as a consequence of the religious changes, the persistent cultural norms had to be adapted to and integrated into a Christian framework.
Basil’s and Chrysostom’s reflections on the value of literature bear witness to a phenomenon that can be discerned in the literary production of several late antique Christians. As they considered issues of style and effects on the reader, so they discussed in their own works the genres and stylistic shape they chose, or their ideas of the relation between author and audience. Occasionally, they present themselves not only as self-conscious literati, but also express pride of their literary accomplishments. A case in point is Eusebius who wanted to let his readers know that with his seminal Church History he had devised a new genre without any exact predecessor in the history of literature.
Being the first to enter upon the subject I am attempting to traverse as it were a lonely and unused path. I pray that I may have God as my guide and the power of the Lord as my aid, since I am unable to find even the bare footsteps of those who have traveled the same way before me, except in brief remarks, in which some in one way, others in another, have transmitted to us particular accounts of the times they lived in.
(Euseb. Hist. eccl. 1.1.3)
This bold claim was justified, since historians of Classical antiquity, for reasons of rhetorical elegance, had avoided incorporating documentary evidence such as letters or edicts in the original into their account. Eusebius, on the contrary, made ample use of direct quotations while dismissing long speeches and the adorned style typical of historiography.
Of particular interest in this respect are the writings of the Cappadocians, which throughout attest to their authors’ high erudition. Gregory of Nyssa, himself active as a teacher of rhetoric in his early career, is not only a classicist in style, influenced by the Second Sophistic, and in this comparable to contemporary rhetoricians like Libanius, but also pays much attention to matters of literary form. He explains in his prefaces which genre he is going to use and what the appropriate style or length is in a particular context, or when it may be suitable to combine two genres in a special case. There is always discernable a deliberate planning in his choice of the various forms for different purposes, whether treatise, sermon, dialogue, or letter. Similar observations hold for Gregory Nazianzen, who aspired to create a veritable Christian literature to rival at least the contemporary pagan literature. To this end he embellished his homilies and letters with a vast number of allusions to and quotations of Homer, the tragic poets, Pindar and Plato, as was the practice among erudite writers. In addition, Gregory sought to offer worthwhile products of every type, thereby demonstrating that Christian literature was able to compete with the Classical authors in the whole spectrum of literary activity. Besides his numerous homilies, treatises and letters he left behind a massive body of more than 300 poems close to 18,000 verses, mostly written after his retirement in the 380s. In these poems, which cover a broad range of subjects from autobiography to dogma, Gregory several times points out the choice of verse, for instance by claiming that he employs it for the benefit of the young, in particular those who take pleasure in literature, to furnish them with a kind of sweet medicine (Poem 2.1.39.37–41). Furthermore, he demonstrates his poetical skill by making use of a great variety of forms familiar from Classical poetry, including hymns and didactic poems in hexameters, epigrams and occasional poems in elegiacs, and invectives in iambics.
In Synesius of Cyrene (c. 373–414), a further example of the presence of highly educated literary stylists in the episcopate, we see that Christian intellectuals not only had full command of the instruments and registers of Classical literature, but were not even afraid to express thoughts that owed less to Christian faith than to Greek culture. As a member of the provincial elite and a disciple of the Neoplatonist philosopher Hypatia, Synesius agreed to take over the see of his home town only when he was granted permission to retain his philosophical tenets, which notably deviated from Christian dogma. This particular intellectual stance, the syncretism of Neoplatonism, Classical culture, and Christian faith, is clearly documented by his nine hymns, the external features of which (e.g., meter and the Doric dialect) betray in every aspect the poet’s great erudition. Never meant to serve in liturgy but purely literary pieces, the hymns speak of the Trinity and of Christ in philosophical terms, not so much in theological ones. Furthermore, Jesus is depicted as a divine hero, a new Hercules, performing similar actions as his mythological counterpart. It is by this intellectual ease of switching between cultural codes and conventions that in the fifth century Nonnus of Panopolis composed epics both of the god Dionysus and of Jesus. His impressive oeuvre consists of a hexameter poem on the life and deeds of the wine-god in 48 books, the largest surviving epic from antiquity, and of a poetical paraphrase of John’s Gospel. Nonnus’ Dionysiaca illustrate best that mythology still was an indispensable component of education and that Christianization did not make any difference in this regard.
In the period commonly referred to as the “Golden Age” of Patristic literature the decisive change took place in the interaction between Christian writing and the surrounding Greek culture. The more Christianity made its way into the heart of Imperial society, the less sustainable became the view that it formed an alternative society with an alternative culture and an alternative literature. Christian authors, although they continued to feel unease with the concomitants of Greek education and literature and, in addition, were highly conscious of these tensions, showed a greater willingness to make the Classical tradition an integral part of their own cultural heritage and a cornerstone of their self-definition. Appreciation of literary accomplishments or philosophical argumentation, it is true, was still far from being taken for granted, but, since Christianity was no longer considered a religion of the lower classes, it was inevitable to address issues of faith and conduct according to the conventions of the current discourse. As Christianity gradually diffused into all areas of life, while the pagan cults ceased, Christian literature eventually became coextensive with Greek literature, capable also of treating purely secular themes or even secularized mythology.
After centuries of continued encounter or coexistence of Christianity and Greek literature, the appearance of both was finally transformed, due to the shifting attitudes of the faithful towards the Hellenic world. Roughly speaking, three stages can be distinguished, though they do not strictly succeed one another: rejection, selective use, and coextension. From the outset, Christianity was at the interface of different cultures or cultural environments, moving forward from the periphery of Greek culture to the center. During this process, Christian literature was gradually transformed by its embracing Classical education, while on the other hand it had a strong impact on Greek literature (e.g., genres, themes, social setting, functions) until it superseded, or rather became coextensive with it. Accordingly, this process was not a one-way relationship of Classical influence on Christian writing or vice versa. Rather, it can be regarded as a complex interplay of rejection, appropriation, transformation, enrichment and replacement, a development we may term “osmosis.” In the end, Greek literature assumed a different shape or character than it had before its encounter with Christianity. More generally speaking, we can observe how deeply religious (and socio-political) changes affect the system of literature. In conclusion, the framework in which Greek literature was embedded changed by virtue of the rise of Christianity.
A comprehensive account of Christian Greek literature is given by the collection of Young, Ayres and Louth 2004. Part VI of Harvey and Hunter 2008 provides excellent surveys of recent research on the important Christian literary genres. Basic information on Greek Christian authors and their works can be found in the historical overview of Moreschini and Norelli 2005. Also helpful are the various entries in the lexica of Döpp and Geerlings 2000, and of Aune 2003. For detailed discussion of the relationship between the Gospels and biographical texts see Burridge 2004. The collection of essays in Hock et al. 1998 compares the New Testament writings and the apocryphal Acts with the form and content of ancient fiction. The articles in Edwards et al. 1999 examine the origins and purposes of apologetic literature in the first four centuries. Cameron 1998 is an excellent introduction to the literary culture of late antiquity shared by pagans and Christians, whereas Brown 1992 focuses on the dominance of rhetoric. For the general history of ancient Christianity see Chadwick 2001.