The influence of Greek ideas and usages upon the Christian churchHatch, Edwin
Philosophy
The influence of Greek ideas and usages upon the Christian church
Hatch, Edwin
Church history -- Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600; Philosophy -- History; Philosophy, Ancient; Theology, Doctrinal
[151] προσωποποιΐα, for which see Theon. _Progymnasmata_, c. 10, ed.
Spengel, vol. ii. 115: Quintil. 3. 8. 49; 9. 2. 29. The word ὑποκρίνεσθαι
was sometimes applied, e.g. Philostr. _V.S._ 1. 21. 5, of Scopelianus,
whose action in subjects taken from the Persian wars was so vehement that
a partizan of one of his rivals accused him of beating a tambourine,
“Yes, I do,” he said; “but my tambourine is the shield of Ajax.”
[152] “They made their voice sweet with musical cadences, and modulations
of tone, and echoed resonances:” Plut. _de aud._ 7, p. 41. So at Rome
Favorinus is said to have “charmed even those who did not know Greek by
the sound of his voice, and the significance of his look, and the cadence
of his sentences:” Philostr. _V. S._ 1. 7, p. 208.
[153] _Orat._ lix.
[154] Rohde, pp. 336 sqq.
[155] This trained habit of composing in different styles is of
importance in relation to Christian as well as to non-Christian
literature. A good study of the latter is afforded by Arrian, whose
“chameleon-like style” (Kaibel, _Dionysios von Halikarnass und die
Sophistik_, Hermes, Bd. xx. 1875, p. 508) imitates Thucydides, Herodotus,
and Xenophon, by turns.
[156] Philostratus, V. S. 1. P. 202, τὴν ἀρχαίαν σοφιστικὴν _ῥητορικὴν_
ἡγεῖσθαι χρὴ _φιλοσοφοῦσαν_. διαλέγεται μὲν γὰρ ὑπὲρ ὧν οἱ φιλοσοφοῦντες
ἃ δὲ ἐκεῖνοι τὰς ἐρωτήσεις ὑποκαθήμενοι καὶ τὰ σμικρὰ τῶν ζητουμένων
προβιβάζοντες οὔπω φασὶ γιγνώσκειν ταῦτα ὁ παλαιὸς σοφιστὴς ὡς εἰδὼς
λέγει: _ib._ p. 4, σοφιστὰς δὲ οἱ παλαιοὶ ἐπωνόμαζον οὐ μόνον τῶν ῥητόρων
τοὺς ὑπερφωνοῦντάς τε καὶ λαμπρούς, ἀλλὰ καὶ _τῶν φιλοσόφων τοὺς ξὺν
εὐροίᾳ ἑρμηνεύοντας_.
[157] On the distinction, see Kayser’s preface to his editions of
Philostratus, p. vii.
[158] Philostratus, _V. S._ 2. 3, p. 245, says that the famous sophist
Aristocles lived the earlier part of his life as a Peripatetic
philosopher, “squalid and unkempt and ill-clothed,” but that when he
passed into the ranks of the sophists he brushed off his squalor,
and brought luxury and the pleasures of music into his life. On the
philosopher’s dress, see below, Lecture VI. p. 151.
[159] Epictetus, _Diss._ 3. 21. 6; 3. 23. 6, 23, 28: so Pliny, _Epist._
3. 18 (of invitations to recitations), “non per codicillos (cards of
invitation), non per libellos (programmes, probably containing extracts),
sed ‘si commodum esset,’ et ‘si valde vacaret’ admoniti.” Cf. Lucian,
_Hermotimus_, 11, where a sophist is represented as hanging up a
notice-board over his gateway, “No lecture to-day.”
[160] Philostratus, _V.S._ 2. 10. 5, says that the enthusiasm at Rome
about the sophist Adrian was such that when his messenger (τοῦ τῆς
ἀκροάσεως ἀγγέλου) appeared on the scene with a notice of lecture, the
people rose up, whether from the senate or the circus, and flocked to the
Athenæum to hear him. Synesius, _Dio_ (in Dio Chrys. ed. Dind, vol. ii.
342), speaks of θυροκοπήσαντα καὶ ἐπαγγείλαντα τοῖς ἐv ἄστες μειρακίοις
ἀκρόαμα ἐπιδέξιον.
[161] _Orat._ 23, p. 360, ed. Dind.
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