The Birth of Christian History: Memory and Time from Mark to Luke-Acts 9780300165371

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The Birth of Christian History

the anch or yal e bibl e r ef e r e n c e l i b r a ry is a project of international and interfaith scope in which Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish scholars from many countries contribute individual volumes. The project is not sponsored by any ecclesiastical organization and is not intended to reflect any particular theological doctrine. The series is committed to producing volumes in the tradition established half a century ago by the founders of the Anchor Bible, William Foxwell Albright and David Noel Freedman. It aims to present the best contemporary scholarship in a way that is accessible not only to scholars but also to the educated nonspecialist. It is committed to work of sound philological and historical scholarship, supplemented by insight from modern methods, such as sociological and literary criticism. John J. Collins General Editor

the anchor yale bible reference library

The Birth of Christian History Memory and Time from Mark to Luke-Acts

eve-marie becker

new haven and AY B R L

london

“Anchor Yale Bible” and the Anchor Yale logo are registered trademarks of Yale University. Copyright ©  by Yale University. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections  and  of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publishers. Yale University Press books may be purchased in quantity for educational, business, or promotional use. For information, please e-mail sales.press@yale. edu (U.S. office) or [email protected] (U.K. office). Set in Adobe Caslon type by IDS Infotech, Ltd. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress Control Number:  ISBN: ---- (hardcover : alk. paper) A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z.- (Permanence of Paper).          

In memory of Gerhard Böcking (//; went missing in Romania in August ) and Marie Katharina Becker (//–//)

History is to the Greeks and consequently to the Romans an operation against Time the all-destroying in order to save the memory of events worth being remembered. —Arnaldo Momigliano ()

Contents

Preface, ix

. Transforming Memory into Literary Narratives about the Past,  . Shaping History in the st and nd Centuries CE in Its Literary Culture,  . Conceptualizing Time in Historiography, 

Epilogue,  List of Abbreviations,  Notes,  Bibliography,  Index of Ancient Sources,  Index of Subjects,  Index of Authors and People, 

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Preface

“The Birth of Christian History”—the topic of this monograph is twofold: it explores the diverse genres, types, and forms deployed in the literary traditions of Hellenistic-Roman and New Testament historiography. Historical writings are not merely sources for the reconstruction of ancient historical reality. More important, these writings shed light on the actual processes that give shape to social and cultural memory. An investigation into the literary history of early Roman Imperial period historiography therefore touches on four major points: First, a phenomenological approach to these period-specific texts allows me to reveal a variety of cultural, religious, and literary conventions and assumptions that underscore literary activity in the historywriting circles of the Hellenistic-Roman period. The research generates the sorts of overarching comparative insights that enable me not only to reconsider but also to situate and contextualize the earliest Christian literary culture. Second, I draw a line from Mark to Luke-Acts, whose idiosyncratic treatments of the beginnings of the gospel story mark the transformation from narrative memory to the full-fledged writing of history: this is the starting point of early Christian historiography. Third, I argue that the discourse on ancient history-writing is multidimensional. Not only was the historiography of the period a temporal and intellectual endeavor, but it was also a literary one: representations of the past were oriented toward the political, ethical, and religious purview(s) of the present. The literary act of writing history is by necessity also an interpretive one— Thucydides himself “stood on the edge of philosophy . . . [, and] he was no less concerned to convey the general truths he had discovered.”

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Preface

Fourth, because history-writing in the New Testament period is history-writing in the early Roman Imperial period, this monograph carefully outlines how Roman literary culture and political power impacted the ways in which historians, as literary authors, approached their work. In short, historians both acknowledged and subverted the Roman ideology of memoria-culture. In this respect, Mark and Luke-Acts are not so different from Flavius Josephus in their aim at literary acculturation. I will thus consider the Gospel of Mark and Luke-Acts as originating in the milieu of early Imperial historiography, and thereby operating as formative literature (Anfangsliteratur) in Christian historiography. This monograph seeks to show how the earliest Christian writings—dating back to the first and second centuries CE—have shaped “Christian” thinking and writing about history by conceptualizing memory, narrativizing the remembrance of the past, and transforming these remembrances of the past into the kind of prose that constitutes a history-based perception of time. This book is the result of almost fifteen years of research on the literary concept of ancient historiography, starting in  with my research-project Das Markus-Evangelium im Rahmen antiker Historiographie (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, ), and continuing with the volume I edited: Die antike Historiographie und die Anfänge der christlichen Geschichtsschreibung (Berlin/ New York: de Gruyter, ). Various presentations and guest lectureships (e.g., York University, Toronto; Lund University; Brown University, Providence; University of Erfurt) have since led to the publication of several articles and essays in the field of ancient historiography. During these years of research, my perspective on the phenomenon of history and the writing thereof during New Testament times has continued to evolve. Today, I am more aware of the existential dimensions implicated in studying history—either ancient or contemporary: “. . . as we grow older, more and more of our own past becomes history.” Keeping in touch with our individual past as well as with our cultural and literary heritage means studying that which has long since been defined as collective memory. Early Christian writings which transformed the memory of the past into historiographical accounts are a crucially significant, if not indeed predominant, path for reaching back to the very foundations of Western collective history. I shall conclude this brief introduction with some acknowledgments: I wish to thank Prof. John Collins (New Haven) for inviting me to write this monograph in the Yale Anchor Bible Reference Library series. I also have

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to thank various colleagues and friends who supported, inspired, and guided me during the time of conceptualizing and writing this book: emeritus professors Oda and Wolfgang Wischmeyer (Erlangen and Vienna), Andreas Mehl (Halle/Berlin), and Prof. Klaus-Peter Adam (Chicago). I would like to thank the Carlsberg-Foundation (Copenhagen) for giving me a generous grant in spring , which enabled me to organize research stays and participate in workshops in Jerusalem, Vienna, Erlangen, and Chicago. I would like to express special thanks to my students and colleagues—especially in Old Testament studies—at Aarhus University: In autumn  and beyond, they were more than once willing to reflect on and discuss my approach to the gospels as ancient historiography. In spring  I was invited, as a research fellow, to the Max Weber Center in Erfurt, where I was finally able to complete the first draft of this monograph. I am especially thankful to Prof. Jörg Rüpke (Erfurt) and the group of fellows and students for their inspiring responses to, comments on, and ideas about the manuscript. Finally, stud. theol. Rikke Hvarregaard Andersen (Aarhus), MDiv student Megan Hoewisch, and PhD student Zane McGee (both Atlanta) are to be thanked for carefully preparing the manuscript for publishing, and Heather Gold (Yale University Press) for doing a splendid job in supporting the project up to its publication date. My very last and deepest thanks go to Danielle Duperreault (Toronto), who not only revised this manuscript in terms of language and line-editing, but who always had a strong interest in proving and improving its arguments—knowing that “. . . In jeder Epoche muß versucht werden, die Überlieferung von neuem dem Konformismus abzugewinnen, der im Begriff steht, sie zu überwältigen. . . . Nur dem Geschichtsschreiber wohnt die Gabe bei, im Vergangenen den Funken der Hoffnung anzufachen, der davon durchdrungen ist. . . .” Eve-Marie Becker

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Memory into 1 Transforming Literary Narratives about the Past

Medial Mechanisms: Iconic, Oral, and Written Memory History-writing is the ultimate expression of memory in a literary culture. The general paradigm of memoria occurs in various academic fields, such as history, cultural studies, and sociology. Mnemonics is a crucial topic in ancient rhetoric (Quintilian, inst or .). Cicero speaks of a disciplina memoriae (fin .). Quintilian considers it an art (ars memoriae: ibid., ..). In the earliest Christian writings we likewise encounter a variety of expressions which outline the phenomenology of memory. Early Christian authors tend to maintain the concepts of memory which are constitutive for Israel’s history with God (Ps :; Dtn :ff.). In the New Testament writings, the concept of memory—which predates historywriting—is affiliated with a variety of contexts: ritual practices (e.g.,  Cor :f.; Lk :; Mk :), the memorization of Jesus’s teaching (e.g., Mt :; Mk :; John :), and certain events and experiences (e.g., Lk :;  Thess :). Processes of memorization are again affiliated to the notion of time. Kerygmatic formulas, for instance, not only serve the memory of Jesus’s eschatological teaching or the apostolic preaching, they also contribute to the correct perception of time: “The Lord is at hand” (Phil :); “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour” (Mt :). Memory also moves beyond the narrated story in that the protagonists themselves are presented as subjects or objects of memoria (e.g., Mk :). The Fourth Gospel shows an additional aspect of memorial culture as Jesus himself declares that love (ἀγάπη) is of memorial significance: individuals can maintain their association with Jesus by keeping his commands

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2 Transforming Memory

and exercising love ( John :–). A similar motif occurs in Pliny’s letterwriting in that he defines amicitia as a memorial practice (ep .). While maintaining continuity with both the Hebrew and Septuagint versions, the influence of Roman memorial culture is decisive in terms of how Christian groups organize their memoria. Before investigating the art of literary memory in earliest Christianity in a more detailed manner, we shall briefly compare the structural similarities between the earliest Christian concept of memorial culture(s) with the contemporaneous Roman project of memoria. The earliest Christian memorial culture does not stand alone. In order to develop, especially by literary means, it reiterates basic patterns that already circulate in its surrounding world. The earliest Christians unfortunately failed to articulate their own theory of literary memory, which adds a degree of complexity to the present study. In the early Principate, the Roman project of memorial culture was certainly most powerful. Still, in terms of literary technique, writers and historians from the st century BCE to the st and nd centuries CE such as Cicero (e.g., fin .f.) and Josephus (e.g., BJ .), rather than defining their own project, think back to their Greek-Hellenistic forerunners as actual prototypes.

A Roman Project and Its Patterns The earliest Christian culture(s) of memory and history develop in a world defined by Roman imperial power. This is not only true in political or military terms. Rome also defines the concept of memoria and its pattern for approaching and communicating the past. Not incidentally, the Romans understood memoria to have a close affinity with historia—a paradigm sustained in the works of Augustine. It is part of the Roman cultural tradition to preserve the past as memory in the present. In the early Empire this tradition became more powerful, challenging even the Greek-Hellenistic concept of memory. For purposes of clarification, the classical scholar Simon Price has compared the Greek approach to memory with that of Imperial Rome: The ancient Greeks tend to link the present to the past through practices of representation, whereas Romans are more proactive in that they memorialize people, duties, and deeds for posterity. The earliest Christian memorial strategies not only make use of the Israelite-Jewish concept of delivering and preserving, but also share—as I will argue—the objectives of the Roman project. Dieter Timpe has analyzed and described the rationale of the Roman memoria culture and developed a kind of evolutionary model:

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He distinguishes between prehistoric, classical, and late Republican forms of memoria. In the prehistoric form, sacrifices and rituals are remembered, and the res gestae are conceptualized individually and via families; in the classical form, public memoria further develops from private memoria; and in the late Republic, one can observe a discrepancy between the ambitions of the res publica and those of the individual—individual remembrance both distorts and poses a challenge to the memorial claims of Empire. With this model, Timpe points out how a culture of memory constructs its own history. The Roman conception of memory is particularly relevant to our discussion in two respects. First, the socio-intellectual situation of Christbelievers who generate and develop their memory is not so distinct from that of their Roman counterparts: like the Romans, Christians must have considered themselves to be successors of an already existing cultural cluster (Greeks; Jews). As the Romans implemented a retrojection of their own founding story to ancient times—indeed, partly in mythical terms (see, e.g., Livy)—Christians also attempted to antedate their point of religious origin by either relating it to the prophetic period (Mk :f.) or retrojecting their origin even prior to creation itself ( John :ff.; Phil :), that is, reaching back beyond the genesis narratives (Gen –). Second, Roman memorial culture is strongly determinative of Roman history-writing. Central patterns recur in the context of historia, such as the fame of the group or family and the memory of glorious deeds. Likewise, the idea of forgetting (damnatio memoriae) plays a prominent role in Roman historywriting, even though historians know that the suppression of memory always causes severe problems (Tacitus, ann ..f.). Various memorial patterns also appear in (prenarrative) historiographical texts, such as priest lists, lists of consuls, calendars, and exitus reports. Roman historiography gradually derives from various memorial practices. In earliest Christianity, similar patterns of memorial culture emerge: religious and ritual memory, kerygmatic formulas, the memory of crucial pragmata and/or people in exceptional positions and/or circumstances. The manipulation or suppression of memory—another well-known element of Roman history-writing—also played a crucial role (see Ps :). From the nd century CE onwards, these patterns of memory are transferred to a variety of written documents and/or literary texts, such as lists of bishops and reports on martyrdom. These texts are to be seen less as sources for than as products of an early Christian sense of history and historiography,

4 Transforming Memory

and can easily be situated in the intellectual framework of Roman memorial culture: both share the idea that history is constructed by means of communicating and delivering memoria to posterity. As in the Roman world, early Christian historiographical narratives are not simply the literary conservation of memory. Historiography and memory are always two sides of the same coin: pre-existing patterns and mechanisms of memorization tend to determine how history-writing comes into being; vice versa, history-writing elaborates the conception of memorial culture by means of a written narrative about the past. Written historiography certainly transforms political ideas and religious experiences, thereby setting its own narrative agenda and paving the way for socio-cultural change. Narrative historiography, moreover, initiates discursive truth claims (see Lk :; Lucian, Quomodo historia conscribenda sit/How to Write History) and thereby reveals itself to be a written discourse about the memory of the past which reflects and elaborates various strategies of social and cultural power.

Memory and History-Writing The current scholarly orientation toward memory and history is hardly a modern invention. Rather, it is rooted in antiquity itself. For the purposes of our investigation, two discursive strands are of particular relevance. First, according to what is discussed in historical studies, we need to reflect further on the difference between memoria and historia. I will argue that both projects of transmitting the past are to be seen as interrelated concepts; historia, however, takes precedence as the ultimate narrative mode of transmitting and representing the past. Second, we have to discuss how the memoria concept is adapted in New Testament studies: New Testament studies tend to limit the concept of memory to that of oral memory. Moreover, oral memory (also called oral tradition) is kept distinct from history as a literary endeavor. In light of the complete absence of any documented sources or data in the time period between Jesus’s lifetime and death (around  CE) and the rise of the written gospel (between  and  CE)—except Pauline letter-writing—oral memory functions as a sort of conceptual placeholder as it implies the continuity of tradition from actual event (the life of Jesus) to the writing stage. We will, instead, shift our focus from a framework of orality to one of literature and thus consider the gospel writings as literary memory that both presents and represents the memoria of the earliest Christians in literary terms. The gospel writings

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generate historia in a literary—and therefore interpretive—sense (see Chapters  and  below). The relation of memory to history-writing in the Greco-Roman world is complex. What marks the early Christian memorial culture as specifically distinct from its Greco-Roman counterpart is how literary memory and history are established as equivalent concepts. relating memory and history

In antiquity, memoria and historia are neither opposing categories nor identical concepts. Rather, they are interacting phenomena. Dionysius of Halicarnassus defines μνῆμαι κατὰ ἔθνη καὶ πόλεις as the actual goal of history-writing (Thucydides, ; ). Accordingly, ὑπομνήματα can be seen as (pre)historiographic material: Michel Foucault’s observation that the writing down of hypomnemata is an “important moment of subjectivization” supports the assertion that memorial culture is always guided by individual involvement. Also, ἀπομνημονεύματα in particular serve the biographical memory of prominent persons (see Xenophon). Processes of memorization precede the literary construction of history; historia itself, however, serves the cultural memory of past events and people so that historiography constitutes a substantial contribution to ancient memorial culture. It is significant that Augustine has defined historia as the memoria of human action (gen ad litt imp ). Eusebius also classifies his work as μνήμη τῆδε τῆς ἱστορίας (h e ..). From an ancient perspective, history and history-writing thus serve as script for storing and performing memory. In modern scholarly debate, history and memory as recollections of past events are seen as interrelated even though we can discuss to what extent both concepts also differ. It is primarily a communicative need that provokes both memorization and history-writing. In the long run, however, the historiographical account of past events becomes the most important mode of “social memory,” to the extent that it potentially impacts socio-political contexts. In Josephus, for instance, we see most clearly how various traditions of memory culture—biblical traditions (LXX) as well as the idea of contemporary bellum-history—are woven together by means of history-writing: Such a combination of similar sources and (narrative) traditions happens to a different degree in the Jewish War and the Antiquities. As such, the literary product of historiography serves specific social and political purposes, such as the rehabilitation of Jewish culture. As soon as memory is stored within a literary product, the necessary merging of fact and fiction so characteristic of narrative produces an environment

6 Transforming Memory

conducive to the dissemination of various ideologies. Memorial processes are thus most successfully and creatively developed by means of historywriting. The interdependence of memoria and historia swings both ways. We can suppose that the individual and particular ways in which memory is conceptualized will define whether and how the remembrance of the past will be transformed into history-writing. And, vice versa, the individual and particular literary forms of narrativizing the past may give us crucial insights into how processes of memorization have originated. To conclude, cultures of memory and history inform and determine one another. Having said this, we will revisit memory studies in the field of the New Testament. revisiting a concept in new testament studies

In New Testament exegesis, memory studies are of crucial importance, especially in the area of historical Jesus research. In recent years, scholars like James D. G. Dunn have extensively debated the question of how Jesus was remembered between  and about  CE, and how the recollection of these traditions was later incorporated in the gospel writings (ca.  to  CE). According to this approach, memory is the actual instrument for continuously transmitting oral traditions through time. Time is generally considered a factor of discontinuity. According to this school of thought, gospel writings appear more as later results of memorial processes, and less as promoters of early Christian memorial culture. We have to call this claim into question since, as I have argued, memoria and historia are interdependent. We thus need to see how gospel writings as literary memory act as media for and organizers of early Christian memorial processes. In other words, the gospels represent and develop crucial strategies of early Christian memorial culture(s). It is the literary concept of narrativizing the past that contributes to ancient memoria. Indeed, it is rightly agreed that the gospel writings are not only exceptional, but also among the best ancient examples of a literary culture of memory in the process of development. Doron Mendels goes so far as to claim that the gospels are the “strongest collective memory in human history . . ., remaining unchallenged for two thousand years.” In light of the importance placed upon the gospels as media for and organizers of collective memory, it is critical to consider their function as literary memory. An approach centered on literary memory will enable a better understanding of the varying aims of early Christian memorial culture.

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Memorial Strategies and Practices How historia and memoria interrelate becomes most evident when we consider the variety of ancient memorial media by means of which the recollection, representation, and communication of the past are organized. These media cultures include epigraphy, painting, archaeology, numismatics, and literature. We will discuss how these media rely on specific memorial strategies or modi memorandi, and we shall also see that the various memorial modes and strategies basically cooperate. To some extent, memorial strategies can also differ. The present study argues that history-writing is a crucial type of literary memory that supersedes oral narratives about the past in two respects: the perception of time and the genre of memory. Before pointing out the specifics of literary memory, I will begin with a few remarks on the general communicative purpose of ancient modi memorandi. Each mode of recollecting past subjects, objects, and events serves basic communicative needs. Memory, operating in diverse settings and within a variety of media, serves a general communicative purpose. The purpose of communication implies that all processes of memorizing the past per se stand at the intersection of oral transmission, iconographic visualization, written collection, and literary (re)production (see Jacques Le Goff ). Memorization remains in a constant state of transfer: Oral and visual memory can be transferred to literature; literary memory can be styled by visual images, and again be transferred to oral presentation. As we will see, history- and gospelwriting in particular participate in this constant process of transfer. visualizing memory

The term “visualization” is employed in a technical sense by scholars and describes a memorial strategy mediated in various material forms: visualization—originating from an eyewitness’s testimony—guides the construction of history (Peter Burke). Visualization also appears as iconography: the memory of the past is produced in sculptures, coinage, paintings, ancestral portraits, and (funerary) monuments. What all of them have in common is that they are available to the public. Paul Zanker has demonstrated most clearly how the portraits of emperors have contributed to the shaping of Roman collective memory. Visual memory is extremely powerful: the presence (or absence) of iconographic media can influence public opinion as well as social or collective memory. Even a funeral procession (pompa funebris) serves the representation of the past in a visual

8 Transforming Memory

mode. The ancients, in their theoretical reflections, defined memory based on visual representation: the well-known fabula of Simonides, for instance, describes a pugilist who, on the sole basis of visual remembrance, identifies the many guests killed by a collapsing triclinium during a feast (e.g., Quintilian, inst or ..ff.; cf. also Cicero, de orat ..–). Christ-believers quickly harnessed and developed the power of visual memory: in the time of the earliest Christians, the cross with an inscribed titulus (see Mk :parr.; John :), as a historical object, shaped its own symbol—the staurogram—and later on (th century) its own iconography. Visual memory easily travels between a variety of memorial modes, and thus exemplifies how memorial processes are in a constant state of transfer: the cross, in its literary context(s), becomes a pars-pro-toto theologumenon, or metonym (see, e.g.,  Cor :; :; Gal :: “the message of the cross”). As we see in Paul, the literary visualization of the cross definitely exceeds its representation in the medium of iconography. The cross (re)occurs, in its literary incarnation, as both metaphor and rhetorical tool. The cross thus functions as a useful literary device. Accordingly, Quintilian describes how a single word or sign (signum) that stands in for a complex thought or thing can act as a reminder of that complex thought or thing (inst or ..): an anchor, for instance, can function as a metonymic stand-in for seafaring (sit autem signum navigationis ut ancora). The cross similarly prompts the memory of Jesus’s violent death in a quasivisual mode; in the pagan world such a memory is soon satirized (see Lucian, Pereg ; ). Among Christ-believers, the symbol of the cross evokes imitation (“the way of the cross”), and thus is used for missionary propaganda. In other words, visual memory, via various types of media, ensures that the recollection of the past is kept in sight. Visual memory serves many functions. Visualization can provoke imitation, and it can serve various representative purposes, including not only the representation of political or administrative power, but also the partial visualization of ritual forms and practices. The public visibility of annales maximi certainly constitutes the visual form of a representation of memory. Visualization can just as easily be an expression of imagination. The memorization of epiphanies (theophanies; Christophanies)—as we find them in Mk  and , again in a literary setting—is the most relevant example. As we saw in the Simonides story, however, visualization also functions purely as a technique or vehicle of memorization. In oral as well as literary contexts, both metaphorical language and narrative support

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processes of memorization. Jesus’s parables (e.g., Mk parr.) proclaim and teach by means of a visual mode that they might more easily be remembered. These insights into the various modes of visualization are crucial when we investigate the conditions—either oral or written—from which the Jesus parables originated. As discussed above, memorial processes are in a state of transfer. The transition from orality to both literacy and literature is flexible; indeed, Jörg Rüpke questions whether the fasti as lists of consuls are literary sources to history-writing, or rather literary-like products of Roman historiography in their own right. In the example cited by Rüpke, we cannot draw a distinction between memory that is written (such as annals and fasti) and memory that is literary. Both types of memory precede history-writing. In the context of visualization, written and literary memory remains in a constant state of play. Calendars, which are primarily thought to be listings, often develop into literary products. Calendars are also subject to extensive processes of embellishment, such as illustration and/or calligraphy, which effectively transform these written artifacts into iconographic media. The calendar of Filocalus, our earliest Christian version of a Roman calendar, comes down to us as a mixture of oral memory, written data, literary fiction, and illustration (see Johannes Divjak/Wolfgang Wischmeyer). The many mechanisms of mediation ensure that elements of memorial culture are both iterative and simultaneous. According to Pierre Nora, memory spaces (Erinnerungsräume; Gedächtnisräume; lieux de mémoire) relate to collective historical memory. They provide memorial spaces where groups can gather and build a spatial identity. At the same time, they are themselves based on the experience of visual memory: Cicero describes how a visit to the Athenian academy evokes the memory of Plato more than reading his works (fin .–). The gardens which are close to the academy not only provoke the stirrings of memory, but even represent the Greek philosopher in persona (.: non memoriam solum mihi afferunt, sed ipsum videntur in conspectu meo ponere). Quintilian also happens to remark that memory is always bound to specific locales (inst or ..: iuvari memoriam signatis animo sedibus). And finally, ancient travel accounts (itineraries) or ethnographical reports provide visual narratives about places, foreign peoples, and spaces, and thus function as proxy memory space. We encounter similar phenomena in early Christian writings. The authors make it a point to remind readers of the local circumstances of religious experience (prophecy; see Rev ). Later memories of saints (Heiligenmemoria),

10 Transforming Memory

places, and landscapes consequently acquire more significance than the mere recollection of the past in that they stimulate the imagination and occasion an intense re-experiencing of religious phenomena. Against this background, certain aspects of narrative topography reveal their actual function and significance. Throughout the Markan Gospel, Galilee is the most important site of Jesus’s mission. For instance, in Mk –, Galilee remains crucial in the context of the passion narrative, even though the passion takes place in Jerusalem. The passage describes Galilee as a place of prediction of Christophany (:) and identification of discipleship (:), and therefore seems to stand in metonymically for re-experiencing Jesus’s presence. Galilee has been similarly conceptualized in post-Easter epiphanies (Mk ; Mt ; John ): “perceptions of and values attached to landscape encode values and fix memories to places that become sites of historical identity.” The visualization of memorial places—in both Galilee and Jerusalem (Golgotha)— contributes to the shaping of identity, in both collective and individual terms. ritual memory

Another aspect of memorial practice in earliest Christian times deserves special attention: the sphere of representing rituals, or what might be called ritual memory. The ritualization of prayers and sacrifices in ancient Israel falls into the category of ritual memory, as does the memory of the Eucharist—and possibly the Lord’s prayer—in early Christianity ( Cor :–; Mk :–parr.): even though the Eucharist tradition appears as paradosis in Paul and possibly as a narrative memoria in the context of the passion narrative (Mk –parr.), it is only transmitted to us in literary terms. In other words, the Eucharist is delivered as literary memory. In Paul it is contextualized by epistolary argumentation ( Cor ); in Mark and the Synoptics it is framed by the story of Jesus’s ministry in Jerusalem, and indeed marks the beginning of the passion events (Mk parr.). We can only speculate as to why the Gospel of John erases, or at best transforms, this particular tradition of the Eucharist (:–). The Johannine Gospel instead lays emphasis on the memorialization of a different ritual practice: the foot-washing (:–). We hypothesize that the Fourth Gospel manipulates memory in order to present a passion narrative that forgets about the Eucharist tradition—possibly in an attempt both to reject its Christology and to establish a counter-memory (see below). But how does the Synoptic passion narrative (Mk :ff.) frame and interpret the Eucharist tradition? Does it appear as a memorial “locus” for

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Jesus’s death, in analogy to Hellenistic-Roman commemoration of the dead (Totengedenkstiftung, as in Epicurus)? Interestingly, in all passion narratives it is not Jesus’s death as such that is the primary object of commemoration; rather, it is his suffering and the motif of the violent treatment of the just. The empty tomb stories (Mk :–parr.) also support the idea that literary memory is less focused on Jesus as the deceased. As such, the passion narratives distinguish themselves from other types of ancient memorial cultures which focus on and specifically serve the memory of the dead. In Mark’s time, the memory of Jesus’s mission in Jerusalem transforms the ritual memory of the Eucharist into a narrative account whose focus is the resurrected Christ. In Luke, the Eucharist functions as the setting for the recognition and identification of the risen Jesus (Lk :, ; see also :). By shaping a counter-memory in literary terms, the Fourth Gospel places itself in opposition to the Eucharist narrative ( John :–), and instead focuses on the depiction of a paradigmatic act (hypodeigma)—the foot-washing—that functions ritually to bind the community of Jesusbelievers together after Jesus’s return to his Father. Once ritual memory enters the sphere of literary memory, it acquires a new shape. As memorial culture is in a state of transfer and evolves over time, memory can be transformed and reshaped. The genre of memory changes over time—memory has to be created and recreated. Statues in temples are an excellent example of how visual memory changes over time. Statuary, for instance, serves not only the particular memory of whatever subject or object happens to be represented, but also the memory of the city as a specific geographical and social space. Memories are constantly being reshaped. The inscribed funerary stele of Abercius of Hierapolis (ca. nd century CE) exemplifies a transformation over time not only of genre but of memorial significance. The reception, in a late th-century CE manuscript entitled “Life of St. Abercius,” of the nd-century CE epitaph inscribed on the stele documents how the personal memory of an individual is transformed once it is incorporated into the larger framework of the memoria of a city in which it was housed: “The Life should be read as an attempt to reconcile the Hieropolitans with their own city, past and present.” We may assume, by analogy, that a variety of Jesus traditions—once inserted into a gospel account—have shifted their genre: in its earliest and probably shortest version, the crucifixion report as a “Geschichtsbericht” (Rudolf Bultmann: see Mk :b/–a) might have been memorized primarily as a biographical tale, in close analogy to exitus narratives. As

12 Transforming Memory

such it did promote the memory of Jesus. When included in the gospel account, however, the focus changes substantially. Now the memory of Jesus’s suffering and death is part of the more comprehensive literary memory of gospel writings—indeed, a memory of the beginnings of the gospel proclamation which includes a variety of stories about Jesus’s mission around Galilee and Jerusalem. In analogy to the narrative transformation of the passion story, other kinds of tradition may have been drastically reshaped when incorporated into the field of literary memory: the literary framing of the so-called controversy stories (e.g., Mk –) is another example of how apophthegmatic traditions have been transformed into narrative patterns when meeting the field of literary memory.

From Oral to Literary Memory Memory studies have paid much attention to the conditions under which memorization takes place in oral cultures. When it comes to the rise of epics rooted in oral tradition (especially Homer), the so-called episodic memory is seen as a “repository of scripts.” In a similar manner, in New Testament studies the investigation of memory is traditionally linked to the reconstruction of oral transmission processes. Memory is basically seen as a preliterate tool of transmission. Scholars debate not only to what extent Jesus traditions have historical substance but also if the transmission of these traditions follows present social or cultural needs. By doing so, memory studies are dealing with the basic issues of Formgeschichte and Traditionsgeschichte, and in one way or the other also try to reach back to the reconstruction of the historical Jesus. At the same time, some scholars (such as Werner H. Kelber) argue that there is a substantial shift going on in the history of the Synoptic tradition from an oral to a written gospel. This argument is based on the assumption that the “transition from orality to writing” itself is the dominant factor in the process of recollecting the past in the time of the earliest Christians. In light of this theoretical impasse, we have to define our methodological point of departure: since we have no way to access the stage of oral memory itself—with the exception of Papias of Hierapolis, we largely lack information detailing how the oral transmission of Jesus traditions relates to the overarching framework of the written gospels (see Eusebius, h e .)—we always need to begin our investigation into the processes of early Christian memorial culture(s) on the basis of literary memory.

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There are only a few general indicators—taken from literary, cultural, and social studies—explaining on one hand how memory is transformed from the oral to the written stage, and on the other, what role literary memory plays therein. Two insights into memorial strategies and practices are of particular relevance. First, the shift of genre: in the passion narrative the focus shifts from biographical to historiographical memory once the narrative does not stand alone but is inserted into the macro-structure of historiography. This is one of the most obvious examples of how memory is transformed over time. It is less the memorial material as such that changes than the genre of memory itself: from objects and persons to cities; from biographical to historiographical accounts. Second, sociology provides further insights into the intellectual agenda underlying oral and literary memory. These insights extend well beyond the somewhat positivist idea that orality reliably transmits the past, whereas literary memory is more skeptically understood as something that can be forged, rewritten, or altered. Rather, it has been argued here that oral memory above all differs from written and literary memorization in its conceptual approach to the past: while oral memory constantly makes the past present, literary memory is not limited by temporality. The manner in which we comprehend the past has important consequences for the perception of time: in its always already present (presentist) re-presentation of the past, oral memory implies a rather cyclic or static—that is, immobile—perception of time, whereas literary memory can provide a much more detailed (narrative) approach to diverse temporal settings and progressions. In other words, literary memory prepares for a distinctive perception of time in its temporal progress. As soon as historia—that is, the literary concept of memory—becomes a matter of both concern and interest, time and temporality—that is, the perception of past and present—become increasingly relevant. History as a prototypical narrative form of literary memory thus implies a more elaborate approach to time and temporality. The manner in which Tacitus accounts for the fire which destroyed Catulus’s Second Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in  CE exemplifies how temporal embedding and interpretation can affect an individual story unit (hist .f.): in order to recount the story, the Roman historian must first make reference to the history of the Capitoline temple as such, and then provide chronological structure which, of course, is presented in a literary account. In its “carefully crafted shape,” Tacitus’s account exceeds a simple narration of the actual

14 Transforming Memory

event in that his finished product provides an overall interpretation of Roman politics and history. A comparable distinction along temporal lines such as that between oral and literary memory appears in the gospel writings: the extended timeline in the narrative accounts of Matthew, Luke, and John (Mt –; Lk –; John ), the synchronistic elements (e.g., Lk :), and even the manipulative use of time that we find in the transfiguration scene (see Mk :–parr.) point to a highly developed literary conception of the gospel genre. Likewise, Mark’s timeline extends back not only to John the Baptist’s ministry (Mk :–), but also to the prophetic period (Mk :f.). Mark’s conception of literary memory generates a developed sense of time (tempus). This is why historia as literary memory via narrative outstrips the constraints of oral memory and reveals itself as the ultimate mode of memoria. result: the shape and character of literary memory

In the time of the earliest Christians, memory is at work via various modi memorandi. Within the st century CE, the gospel writings are both products of and contributions to an early culture of literary memory— Justin calls it “apostolic memory” (I apol ). The gospels deliver traditions and conceptualize memory in literary terms. Literary memory takes shape side by side with two significant transformative processes. First, as discussed above, the genre of memory shifts when transformed from the oral to the literary. Second, the perception of time and the manner in which it is approached vary from oral to written and literary memory. In oral transmission processes, the relevance of the material delivered always has to be approved ad hoc. Oral narratives of the past are limited in how they reflect timeline and chronology as much as they depict the temporal frame of the story. Literary memory, however, both enables and necessitates a more elaborate approach to temporality. We will return to this in Chapter . For now, we may conclude that the notion of temporality changes when memory is transformed from the oral to the literary, while memorial materials—that is, subjects, objects, and events as such—remain relatively stable despite memorial processes. Clear distinctions between oral and written memory are not sustainable, a view that is largely shared among historians. This also means, as I have pointed out elsewhere, that in ancient times the border between orality and literacy is continuously fluid and permeable. Every memorial process includes a shared notion of the past, be it subject, object, or event, that is communicated and visualized. However,

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while articulated in the present and delivered to future generations, the past shifts its genre and perception of time when it is transformed to literary media. In the time of the earliest Christians, the phenomenon of literary memory soon becomes the dominant mode of memorial practice. As a literary construct and product, the process of narrativization eliminates other forms and types of memory. For instance, the (written) memories of Jesus’s words (Q) and death (passion narrative), both of which may have circulated separately, have not come down to us. These two hypothetical texts are the supposed losers of early Christian memorial processes. Once appended to or incorporated in the gospel writings, both types of memory lose their particular memorial status. The shape of literary memory is in fact literature, in which memorial processes are both preserved and suppressed depending on the requirements of plot.

The Art of Religious and Literary Memory

The Gospels as Religious and Literary Memory As literary memory, the gospel writings share, maintain, and develop basic patterns of ancient memorial culture, in this case a strong visual dimension: Mark creates literary memory (Mk :) with the constant help of visual images (e.g., :, , ). While early Christian literary memory is the product of transformative processes, it nonetheless contributes to religious commemoration as pointed out in Diodorus Siculus: “For it is by such knowledge”—that is, writing and reading—“alone that the dead are carried in the memory of the living [οἱ μὲν τετελευτηκότες τοῖς ζῶσι διαμνημονεύονται] and that men widely separated in space hold converse through written communication with those who are at the furthest distance from them, as if they were at their side” (..). William V. Harris, who outlines modes of religious commemoration in antiquity, draws our attention in more detail to Diodorus (..–). Not only does the passage provide insights into ancient practices of (religious) commemoration, it also explains the specific role of literary memory in this process: In fact the lawgiver rated reading and writing above every other kind of learning, and with right good reason, for it is by means of them that most of the affairs of life and such as are most useful are concluded, like votes, letters, covenants, laws, and all other things which make the greatest contribution to life. What man, indeed, could compose a worthy laudation of the knowledge of letters? . . . and in the case of covenants in time of war between states

16 Transforming Memory or kings the firmest guarantee that such agreements will abide is provided by the unmistakable character of writing. Indeed, speaking generally, it is writing alone which preserves the cleverest sayings of men of wisdom and the oracles of the gods, as well as philosophy and all knowledge, and it is constantly handing them down to succeeding generations for the ages to come [παραδίδωσιν εἰς ἅπαντα τὸν αἰῶνα]. Consequently, while it is true that nature is the cause of life, the cause of the good life is the education which is based upon reading and writing.

As Diodorus points out, religious commemoration can mean “to dedicate something to a god, to publicize a religious calendar, to record prayers, to circulate prophecies, to record a magic spell, to curse someone, to transmit a secret story.” Simply put, religious memory primarily relates to issues of cult, rite, and myth; it is—as Diodorus emphasizes—best preserved in written form. The ultimate mode of religious commemoration is literary. The gospel writings contribute to religious as well as literary communication. They thus best reflect the rationale which underlies the intersection of ancient religious commemoration and literary memory. The gospels earn their reputation as the ultimate literary forms of memorial culture. As demonstrated by the following examples, almost every element in the gospel writings relating to religious commemoration is represented in literary form. The anointing at Bethany can indeed be interpreted as a dedicatory act (Mk :–), as Jesus himself declares the act to have memorial significance (:: μνημόσυνον). In the case of Mark and Luke-Acts, we encounter a variety of religious texts, such as prayers (e.g., Mk :–; Lk :–) and prophecies (Mk par. Lk ). Both, moreover, transmit secret stories (Mk :–par. Lk :–) which refer to epiphanies. The narrative of Jesus’s baptism (Mk :–par. Lk :–), also a ritual act, is partially mythologized in that a voice from heaven declares Jesus to be God’s son. And finally, the tradition of the Eucharist which is initiated by Jesus himself (Mk :–par. Lk :–) can be read as a ritual text; indeed, it exemplifies in a most impressive manner how ritual memory becomes literary memory. Besides transmitting ritual practices, the gospel writings also present elements of religious tradition in light of ethical and/or philosophical discourse. The debate about cleanliness in Mk :– or Lk :– is in fact anecdotally about the ethos of Christ-believers. Paul’s speech on the Areopagus can be understood as a preliminary attempt to reflect on theology in the realm of metaphysics (Acts :–), whereas the prologue of the

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Johannine Gospel ( John :–) constitutes an elaborate metaphysical— that is, speculative—foray into the realm of ontology in order to interpret the Jesus figure and its pre-existent status. There are various features of religious commemoration, then, put in a literary setting. The gospel writings contain narrative and rhetorical strategies of literary memory, including a rich semantics of memory (μιμνῄσκεσθαι κτλ.), and a variety of memorial forms and formulas. Various structural elements, moreover, promote the memorization of the gospel narrative itself: narrative repetitions of scenes and events (e.g., Mk :; :), as well as individuals and places which serve the better understanding and remembering of the gospel story as a whole (Lk :–). Memorization can even be seen as a literary strategy: it is Jesus himself who enforces memory (Mk :). And Peter represents quite impressively how the idea of commemoration is serious—it implies pain, sorrow, and failure (Mk :; :). A variety of literary forms—including apophthegma and chreia—are repetitive in formal terms. Each supports the notion that the gospel story is memorial. In an Oxyrhynchus papyrus—dating to the rd century CE—a chreia is even defined as having a specifically mnemonic function (PSI I.): “Why is the chreia a ‘reminiscence’? Because it is remembered so that it may be recited [ὅτι ἀπομνημονεύεται ἵνα λεχθῇ].” Later Christian authors also suggest thinking of apostolic traditions in terms of apomnemoneumata ( Justin Martyr,  apol .), or hypomnemata (Hegesippus; compare Eusebius, h e ..; ..). It is thus apparent that the gospels and Acts establish and develop their own concept of literary memory through semantic and structural means. Literary memory therefore lies at the intersection of objectives that are both religious and literary. The gospels and Luke-Acts contribute to an emerging literary memorial culture of Christ-believers—if not, to a large extent, actually producing that culture. Indeed, the gospel writings and Acts are not solely religious commemoration nor are they solely narrative accounts about religious commemoration. Their intent is first and foremost to proclaim and teach the gospel (Lk :–; John :f.). They correspondingly produce a literary account in which memorial processes are not simply transmitted, but rather reshaped and reinforced. As ancient religious literary memory that has a narrative and a proclamatory function, the gospel writings are a hybrid form. The intermingling of memory, proclamation, and historiographical narrative is evident in the Matthean Gospel: the resurrected Christ commissions his disciples to be missionaries and to baptize all nations “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the

18 Transforming Memory

Holy Spirit” (Mt :). The purpose of the book is thus threefold: () to portray Jesus as a powerful teacher (Mt :), () to preserve his teachings, and () to display the apostolic commission within a narrative account that is embedded in a historical setting, yet is addressed to contemporary readers. In its literary context, Mt :– is a good example of how the hybrid form of a gospel narrative works: a prior narrative—εἰς τὸ ὄρος refers back to the Sermon on the Mount (Mt –)—functions as a call to discipleship in the present (τηρεῖν πάντα ὅσα ἐνετειλάμην). It is Mark who, by sending the Easter witnesses back to Galilee—the place where the gospel story began—shapes the idea that the adaptation of the gospel requires commemoration that looks back to its origins. In the epiphany report that takes place in Emmaus (ch. ), Luke similarly draws parallels between prophetic predictions about the Christ (LXX) and earlier sections of his own narrative (Eucharist scene: Lk ). The evangelists themselves use literary memory as an exegetical tool which serves to identify Jesus as the risen Christ (v. f.). Memory provides a comprehensive understanding of the Christ-story as one pre-told in the Septuagint. As a consequence, and from the viewpoint of the writer, the Septuagint and the Lukan narrative share the same historiographical status. Memoria in earliest Christian literature thus acts as anamnesis as well as reminiscentia and commemoratio. The memorial mechanisms in the gospel writings and Acts establish a concept of literary memory, with a productive tension between religious commemoration and prehistoriographical narration. Literary memory refers to a communicative strategy. Accordingly, the needs of historicizing the memory of religious traditions are applied to a literary narrative which strikes a balance between narration and proclamation. The specifics of early Christian literary memory lie in the productive interplay of commemoration, proclamation, and literary depiction. This type of interplay is definitive of Christian memorial practice. We thus reconstruct and describe the early Christian shape of religious literary memory as follows: in order to spread the proclamation of the kerygma, or gospel (e.g.,  Cor :b–; Mk :), and to maintain communication between diverse communities ( Thess :; Col :) and their founding fathers (missionaries, or apostles; e.g.,  Cor :;  Cor :–), coworkers had to travel back and forth transporting news (e.g.,  Cor :;  Cor :; Phil :ff.) and literary texts ( Cor –; Phlm)—first in the form of letters, later in the form of gospel writings. Both types of literature—letters and gospels— spring from communicative needs and serve memorial purposes: they

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preserve and disseminate ritual memory, accounts of past events, and personal information. Early Christian literary memory thus serves to enable religious communication and proclamation as much as it does the concept of historiographical accounts. The gospel writings promote processes of religious commemoration among Jesus-followers and Christ-believers, as much as they extensively develop early Christian memorial culture by designing a specific type of literary memory.

Counter-Memory We will conclude our reflections on the early Christian shape of literary religious memory by once again taking into account the tension between continuity and discontinuity in memorial processes. While memorial materials (data, subjects, events) can be surprisingly stable, the earliest Christian memoriae underwent generic and temporal transformative processes while being transformed into literary memory and were also continuously impacted by what we might best call “counter-memory.” According to Michel Foucault, counter-memories are “discursive practices through which memories are continuously revised.” And, indeed, we observe in earliest Christianity that there are several στύλοι (Gal :) and ἀπόστολοι (see, e.g.,  Cor –), as well as different groups and communities in competition with one another (e.g., Gal :ff.). This element of competition is inscribed in the gospel writings, such as those of Matthew and Mark. Competition also had an impact on memorial processes and on the development of literary memory in a historiographical sense. Foucault argues that counter-memories challenge the concept of history-writing. Counter-memories “oppose and correspond to the three Platonic modalities of history. The first is parodic, directed against reality, and opposes the themes of history as reminiscence or recognition; the second is dissociative, directed against identity, and opposes history given as continuity or representative of a tradition; the third is sacrificial, directed against truth, and opposes history as knowledge.” The various goals of construing counter-memory have something in common: “They imply a use of history that severs its connection to memory . . ., and constructs a counter-memory—a transformation of history into a totally different form of time.” We can see most clearly how counter-memories come into being and work in case of the Eucharist tradition in its literary framing. If we apply Foucault’s insights, we may note how the Eucharist as a literary memory in

20 Transforming Memory

Mark (:–) is later transformed by Luke and John. Luke basically develops the Markan version. He repeats the eschatological prediction (:, ) so that it is emphasized as a contrast to the historical hour that has arrived and initiates the passion events (Lk :: ἐγένετο ἡ ὥρα). Luke explicitly states that Jesus himself defines the Eucharist as a memory (:: εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν). It is precisely this motif that is taken up again in Lk  (vv. –) when the Emmaus-disciples recognize the risen Jesus by the manner in which he prepares the meal—that is, by breaking the bread (see above). In Luke’s view, the Eucharist triggers a recognition of Jesus (ἐπιγινώσκειν) and thus sustains the aims of gospel-writing (Lk :: ἵνα ἐπιγνῷς). In a compositional sense, the Eucharist also represents continuity between Jesus’s ministry (Lk ), the Easter epiphanies (Lk ), and the later ritual practice of the Jerusalem community (Acts :). The Eucharist de facto functions as a hidden literary strategy of Luke-Acts. This observation also applies to Luke’s slight revision of the Markan Eucharist narrative: while Mark makes mention of two unnamed disciples sent to prepare the Passover meal (Mk :–; see also Mt :–), Luke specifies Peter and John (:–). As indicated earlier, John’s omission of the Eucharist tradition within the passion account (chs. ff.) seems to point to a manipulation of memory, as only a literary allusion to that tradition remains (ch. ). The example clearly reveals how counter-memories emerge and develop. In chapter —the Johannine version of the Last Supper scene—John instead presents a different type of ritual memory: the foot-washing. By omitting and replacing the ritual memory of the Eucharist (most likely derived from the Lukan account), John shapes a counter-memory. In his account, Jesus himself defines the foot-washing to be a ὑπόδειγμα ( John :). John rejects the Lukan idea of Jesus instituting anamnesis and instead presents Jesus as defining a hypodeigma which symbolizes diakonia (see Lk :–). John thereby explains and promotes the notion of the community rule (Mk :f.). By replacing an anamnesis story with a hypodeigma account, John effectively contradicts Luke’s decision to combine ritual literary memory and historiographical narrative: John both reflects on the relationship between history and memory as proposed by the Lukan Gospel concept and proposes revisions (:–; :). In the time of the earliest Christians, the transmission and transformation of literary memory are continually challenged by the dynamic power of counter-memory. In the example cited above, the Johannine writer questions whether to reproduce the existing outline defined by Mark and Luke, or to reshape it once again.

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Literary Memory and the Individual Taking their cue from Maurice Halbwachs, contemporary sociologists acknowledge that processes of (ancient) commemoration and cultural memory take place in a collective setting. Collective memory can refer to popular memory; it can also serve the construction of history as history seeks to extend beyond “lifespans of the individuals who constitute the group.” But how does memory—as a collective project—precede historywriting, which is an individual project? In contemporary sociology, a distinction is made between “individualistic and collectivistic culture concepts” that is inspired and informed by trauma studies. History-writing as literary memory is to be seen as a pattern of an individualistic culture concept: the Roman historian Tacitus is a paragon of the individual project of historywriting both then and now. Tacitus launched his career as a historian with Agricola,a biography which depicts his father-in-law’s political career under the shadow of Domitian. His second work, Germania, stems from an interest in ethnography, a historiographical subgenre to which Tacitus had recourse in the form of excurses in his later historiographical and biographical works. The Germania, in which Tacitus provides an idealized account of the German political stance (freedom), is a Sittenspiegel, or a refutation of Domitian propaganda (“Germania capta”). In his Histories, Tacitus finally turns to historiography that is topic-oriented. He also explores and develops, in his Annales, the possibilities inherent in annalistic history: the Annales begin with the Flavian period (– CE) and work their way back to the ab excessu divi Augusti, the period beginning with the emperorship of Tiberius (– CE) and concluding with the death of Nero ( CE). In his treatise Dialogus de oratoribus (date unknown), Tacitus displays an interest in rhetorical skills, one he shares with his former teacher Quintilian. The scope of Tacitus’s literary productivity makes it quite evident that he is not average. Indeed, he is exceptional among Roman scholars and historians. Tacitus successfully negotiates every type of Greco-Roman history-writing: “his supremacy results from a uniquely felicitous union of medium and message.” This is why Tacitus is considered “the greatest historian that the Roman world produced.” The quest to determine the individual role of the historian refers to the genre of history-writing. As opposed to other genres of Roman literature (e.g., novel, satire), history-writing allows us to identify precisely how Tacitus “interacts with, interprets, and manages the relations between his

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political biography, his literary career, and his social self.” Readers of Roman historiography do not “distinguish the voice that narrates the text from the voice of the person who produced it.” Roman reader response, so described, speaks to the expectation that history-writing is based on individual witness. Incidentally, these observations concerning the relationship of Tacitus to his body of work can easily be extended to other historians and their works. We are aware of the collective dimensions of memory. That literary memory as a cultural endeavor arose in close relation to historywriting, however, should give us pause for thought. Indeed, memory is always received, transmitted, and—as literary artifact—produced by individuals. It is the individual who by means of his authorial voice not only defines topics and temporal sequences, but also shapes both story and counter-memory. This insight has applications that are far-reaching in terms of our particular investigation. The field of cognitive or psychological studies has effectively mapped out the interplay between cognitive perception and memory. More to the point in regards to the individual historian is the claim that the “ability to retain and recollect a fact, event, or person” is always an element of “personal remembering.” The focus on individual memory has profound implications for our proposed approach to ancient (literary) culture(s)—indeed, its protagonists and its objects. The commemoration of prominent individuals is a popular feature in the cultural practices of ancient Greece and Rome: in the context of funeral rituals, individuals are as much objects as they are subjects of mourning. Ancient Greek epigraphy makes public and memorializes the individual’s (usually idealized) character. This inscribed memory of an individual’s character contributes to the collective memory-culture of its respective demos—like Athens—which has a specific profile. In the field of history-writing, the individual dimension of memorial processes is even more obvious. For the past , years, scholars have treated historians such as Tacitus or Thucydides as individual authors—while not denying that Tacitus follows in the footsteps of well-established literary traditions of history-writing, or that he composes the Year of the Four Emperors while in direct competition with a scholarly predecessor. These ancient historians represent cutting-edge scholarship in terms of the evolution of literary memory in the period in question, where commemoration is performed as a literary endeavor by individuals. However, as I will argue, the individual, ancient or otherwise, is constantly involved in processes of memorization. “In the Roman world memory was regarded as both individual and social;

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it was acknowledged that memory was a personal mental process, but that memory could also be a social or unifying act.” The same applies to early Christian memorial culture(s). Memory is thus not solely a collective cultural product but is also “the result of an individual’s relation to self and to the outside world.” Various factors predating the advent of individual historians such as Thucydides and Tacitus point to the individual character of memorial processes. First, it is the individual person or the specific event which is the object of memorization—we can therefore speak of exemplary memory as the principal characteristic of literary memory; second, autobiographical narratives are essentially memories (or memoirs) generated by individuals and speak to each individual’s particular experience of the past. This insight is crucial since autobiographical accounts are important pillars of cultural memory. Finally, and perhaps most obviously, it is the eyewitness, either in person or as an individualized literary device, who delivers individual experience as historical subject—thus, in historical as well as fictional terms it is an individual who witnesses even though he/she might be part of a group (see  Cor :f.). The individual is, in sum, both involved in and addressed by memorial processes. exemplary memory

Modern historians have shed scholarly light on the exemplary character of ancient history-writing (see Livy, praef ). In recent discourse, it is emphasized that exempla (παραδείγματα) serve various purposes: they occur in a rhetorical sense within speeches (see Il .–; .–; Herodotus, .–; .; .–); ancient historians also produce and combine a variety of exemplary stories within their respective narrative accounts. In a literary sense, the concept of exemplary memory corresponds to the episodic character of history-writing: the historian selects, orders, and interprets various events for his narrative depiction. However, the concept of exemplary memory is not entirely constrained by narrative or literary features and/or functions, but also has ethical and philosophical implications. The memory of exemplary events and persons implies paradigms, both positive and negative, which represent ethical values. We might even say: “Knowledge of history consists of knowledge of exempla, and successful characters imitate the good and avoid the bad. Wickedness or ineffectiveness is associated with ignorance of the exempla adduced by the narrator.”

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The concept of exemplary history definitely serves didactic ends (see Livy, praef –). The earliest Christian gospel narratives and Acts contain many similar or identical stories about exemplary events (healing stories; apophthegmata) and persons ( John the Baptist, Jesus, disciples, religious and political authorities, exemplary figures from Israel’s past) which stem from a common pool of memories of lived and narrated exempla. Against this background, the composition of summaries (e.g., Mk :–) appears to function as counter-strategy: summaries provide continuity and contiguity within the wider framework of narrative emplotment. Once exemplary memory is reshaped as exemplary history-writing, it produces an idiosyncratic perception of history. An exemplary approach to the past tends to be selective and thus implies the fragmentation of time and history; in anthropological terms, exemplary stories provide a locus of stability and continuity over time given the constant human experience of contingency. Exemplary memory, narrative, and history thus constitute the crucial tools of ancient Zeit- und Weltdeutung. The emergence of countermemories should come as no surprise, nor should the fact that countermemories take the form of exemplarity. Indeed, the more exemplary, the more convincing: counter-memories, as competitive exemplary modes of interpreting time and space, simultaneously call into question and reinforce the pre-existing exemplary narratives. autobiographical narratives

Autobiographical memory provides the basic source for and motivation behind autobiographical narrative. Autobiographical memory is a type of personal memory: it refers to “the way we tell others and ourselves the story of our lives.” Within the broad field of memorial culture(s), autobiographical memory and narrative play an important role: memorial processes have the ability to “resist dominant cultural frameworks” (see Jeff rey Prager). Individual authorial voices can indeed retell stories, thereby calling into question dominant literary memories. In the Apocalypse, the author John writes autobiographically and doubles as a prophetic figure (Rev ). The future, as defined by the Johannine author, necessitates a revised narrative about the past, such as the community history reflected in Rev –. To what extent do (auto)biographical truth-claims contradict historiographical truth-claims? In antiquity, we find a huge amount of political autobiographies and memoirs which reflect how individuals—like Augustus—wanted to

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legitimize and stabilize social, religious, and/or political power. The authorial aim of a writer such as Josephus—a Jewish-Roman intellectual and entrepreneur—is by contrast apologetic. The autobiographical narratives of early Christianity are limited to those of Paul (esp. Gal –) and, as already mentioned, the apocalyptic writer John (Rev ). Both authors leave behind their cultural framework—the Hellenistic-Jewish world of authorial anonymity—in order to redefine socio-religious authority. Both authors deliberately choose the form of letter-writing (see Rev –) in order to address a concrete audience. The letters of Paul and John exemplify how both memory and the concept of personal involvement in historical events are captured and developed in literary terms. In the context of early Christianity, literary attestations to personal involvement are in evidence as early as the st and nd centuries CE. First, literary letters must have been hugely successful, as scribes continued to adapt them to a variety of contexts. The phenomenon of early Christian epistolary pseudepigraphy ( and  Peter; James)—an inherited ancient scribal trope—should be considered an attempt to give authorial voices to individual authorities in addition to Paul. Epistolary pseudepigraphy profits from how, especially in the field of letter-writing, autobiographical and autofictional claims go hand in hand. Second, the early Christian tradition (Papias; Irenaeus; Eusebius) makes it a point to attribute each of the Four Gospels to individual authorial figures of the Christbelieving movement. The early church promotes the idea that the memory of Jesus and the gospel proclamation were transmitted by eyewitnesses. Indeed, Tertullian’s principal charge against Marcion’s version of the Lukan Gospel is its anonymity (adv Marc IV.): “Marcion . . . attaches to his gospel no author’s name . . . no recognition is due to a work which cannot lift up its head, which makes no show of courage, which gives no promise of credibility by having a fully descriptive title and the requisite indication of the author’s name” (IV..). By contrast, Tertullian has no problem whatsoever with the arrangement of varying narratives in the Four Gospels (IV..: narrationum dispositio variavit). In other words, Tertullian reads the gospel narratives as having known authors. The practice of identifying Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John as members of the inner circle of Jesusfollowers has an apologetic function: as Jesus-disciples (Matthew and John) or companions of Peter (Mark) and Paul (Luke), the four gospel writers are endowed with strong literary and theological claims of authenticity and authorization.

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Third, the literary strategy of individualization is already evident in the earliest Christian writings: conversion stories (e.g., Acts :ff.; Mk :ff.) appear as exemplary memory. The Markan story progresses as a result of the actions of individual protagonists. While the “crowd” (ὄχλος) functions as a counterpart to Jesus and his followers, the crowd in Mark :ff. is nonetheless personified as one unit. The crowd, in dialogue with the political authorities of Judea, acts as a foil to the actions of the main characters in the plot. The crowd’s highly ambiguous (e.g., Mk :; :ff.) response to the ministry of Jesus confirms that the gospel story depends on the commitment of individuals. The emphasis on agency is particularly evident within the framework of the passion story where individuals like Peter, Pontius Pilate, and others sustain the story line; Judas’s betrayal is depicted as an individual action (Mk :ff.parr.), even though in Luke and John it is initiated by Satanic power (Lk :; John :). At the level of narrative, exemplarity and individualization thus interrelate. This narrative concept of individualization seems to be a literary strategy of insiders who promote the gospel story, whereas outsiders such as Lucian prefer to write about Christ-believers as a collective (Pereg f.). Fourth, the autobiography genre also functions as a macro-structure or paradigmatic conceptualization for the articulation of one individual’s personal memory. In the th and th centuries, it is Augustine’s autobiography which has a strong impact on Christian literary culture: “Augustine read Paul’s life into his own by reading a ‘Life of Paul’ out of Pauline texts whose original reference is not always as self-evidently autobiographical as Augustine makes it.” In the case of Augustine, the conversion story genre establishes a unique type of Christian literary memory. Autobiographical memory is therefore not only significant in socio-political terms. The literary scholar Ansgar Nünning describes autobiography as a “paradigmatic genre of memory because of its close relation to the processes of individual remembrance and to the collective or cultural memory.” Autobiography is pivotal in terms of remembrance, as it reflects in nuce what literary memory is all about: even collective memory is based upon and constantly challenged by personal memory. In the Johannine Gospel this idea is programmatically worked out as a literary strategy. The “beloved disciple” and the writer(s) who authorize(s) the epilogues in :f. and :f. are individual witnesses whose memories are conceptualized (see also  John :ff.). To some extent, the so-called Johannine writings ( John;  John; Rev)—though originating from different authors—agree on the claim of being no less than autobiographical memory.

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eyewitness: autopsy, historical technique, and literary device

Without any doubt, memory and history are significant in collective terms in that they forge group identity. It is, however, the individual who—by communicating his/her memory—first initiates memorial processes and— later on as historian—defines the outline of historiographical accounts. In both instances—as initiator of memory and as a designer of history—the individual in his/her function as eyewitness plays a most important role: the individual guarantees the authenticity of memory and history. It is no accident that Luke begins his gospel narrative with a technical term indicating the transmission of tradition (Lk :: παραδίδωμι). Luke, moreover, describes his gospel as an eyewitness account (Lk :: αὐτόπται). This claim is historical as much as literary. Indeed, the question we must ask ourselves is: What are the implications of autopsy or eyewitnessing in the context of ancient literary memory? John Marincola points out that autopsy in history-writing can refer either to the historian’s methodology for the study and presentation of his materials, or to a theoretical dispute in the field of historiography concerning how events are troped as facts (see Thucydides, ..). On the basis of ancient accounts, autopsy in a literary sense, much like eyewitnessing, is more concept than historical occurrence. As a conceptual framework, autopsy can be both real and imagined in many different ways, such as historical involvement and emotional perception, techniques for historiographical research, or narrative types of literary depiction. Generally speaking, an eyewitness is the personal agent of autopsy—either as historical person involved in the historical events or as (later) protagonist of historiographical investigation (Polybius, ..). As such, the eyewitness, even as an informed contemporary (Moses I. Finley), is indeed the primary source for past events. Ancient discourse relating to the validity of autopsy, however, also suggests that eyewitness testimony was not entirely undisputed (see the various references on παρακολουθέω in Josephus). At this point, we need to consider whether or not eyewitness testimony in antiquity is historical. Does Luke in his prologue (Lk ) really presuppose a historical testimony? Or is the Lukan prologue rather a literary topos produced by the third-generation Christians as they reflected on beginnings (see Acts :;  John )? Either way, nowhere is the figuration of the eyewitness as indispensable a strategy of authentication as it is in the case of origins. This is true of both historiographical method and literary

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depiction. Can we distinguish eyewitness testimony from autopsy through investigating sources in and beyond Lk ? Is Luke an eyewitness in Acts, as implied by the so-called we-passages? And can we differentiate between Luke in Acts, where he depicts himself as eyewitness, and Luke in his gospel, where he clearly builds his autopsy on sources as eyewitnesstestimony? Generally speaking, eyewitness testimony and autopsy are only two among several types of historiographical sources including epigraphy, archives—occasionally the product of literary fiction—and other historiographical writings. However, the eyewitness as subject of autopsy or inquiry—in other words, qua persona—does have a special status (see Polybius, .). Is eyewitness testimony a valid source for the historical Jesus—as is frequently argued in New Testament studies? Even Martin Hengel remains extremely hesitant in this respect: “On the basis of the deepened, even radically changed Christological insight attained through Easter and the experience of the Spirit . . . an eye-witness could sketch a picture of Jesus that, according to our modern understanding,” no longer corresponds to historical reality. The dividing line between eyewitness testimony, source, and tradition is difficult to draw. Nowhere is this more evident than in  Cor , one of the earliest documents of Christian literary memory: Paul does not explicitly differentiate the paradosis (tradition) he has received (v. ff.) from his own eyewitness accounts (v. ). We are rather dealing here with literary memory, and we must presume a combination of both eyewitness testimony and the literary construction of traditions. Both types of material are—at least to some degree—literary constructions. Indeed, tradition and eyewitness testimony hang somewhere in the balance between accuracy and transformation. We may best describe these memorial strategies as “Spuren der Vergangenheit in der Gegenwart” (traces of the past in the present). Can we go so far as to claim that tradition is “finally nothing but deformed memory,” or even, as per Hobsbawm and Ranger, that it is “invented”? I will turn this question around and state that both early Christian traditions and eyewitness testimonies are only available to us through literary memory. We are far from being skeptical of sources and their validity: for (ancient) historians, sources always allow for a critical evaluation of memory and tradition. The historian’s evaluation of sources can have the character of autopsy. Not incidentally, the historiographical approach to and usage of (literary) sources varies already from Mark to Luke. Both authors must have felt themselves qualified to evaluate their materials. Michel de Certeau

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understands the writing of history as a process of permanent revision. It is finally the ancient historian himself as transmitter, investigator, and reviser of traditions and sources who makes use of autopsy as a methodological tool. For a historian to depict himself as an eyewitness does have rhetorical implications: in the ancient world, history-writing as literary memory under revision is nothing more than a product of individual construction and reconstruction. The claim for autopsy and eyewitnessing is an integral part of the literary discourse surrounding the narrative depiction of the past: the claim to eyewitnessing relates directly to the literary strategy of verification.

Educating, Entertaining, Evaluating: A 2nd-Century CE Perspective on Earliest Christian Memoria Early Christian literary activity begins in the st century CE: literary memory is shaped among Christ-believers, and the early Christian literary market opens its doors beginning with Pauline letter-writing. During the nd century, a variety of texts and traditions which both promote and counteract the earliest Christian concepts of literary memory begin to flood the Christian “book market.” The earliest formative texts— Pauline letters and gospels—are supplemented and imitated in various ways: They are—by several, often anonymous literary agents—copied, collected, edited, revised, interpreted, and marginalized or suppressed. The actual value and impact of the earliest Christian memorial literature become evident when we finally take a short look at its diverse, seemingly disparate reception history. During the nd century we meet a group of well-known post-apostolic figures and authors who receive and reproduce early Christian literary memory by various means: Papias of Hierapolis is the first to reflect upon the written gospel concept as being authorized by Mark and Matthew (see Eusebius, h e ..f.). Both Ignatius of Antioch—or the well-educated author who writes under his name—and Polycarp of Smyrna keep up the Christian epistolary style. It has also been argued that the account of Polycarp’s martyrdom is not only informed by passion narratives but is moreover styled as an imitatio Christi. Tatian, in his Diatessaron, produces a compilation of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John in what might be the first attempt to harmonize the various gospel accounts. The Johannine Gospel is of particular importance not only for Justin but also for Tatian, who

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speculates in philosophical terms about the concept of logos (see, e.g., or ad Graec .). Even Theophilus of Antioch applies a specific feature of the gospel story to an interpretation of his own life and fashions himself as a Johannine Thomas-figure ( John :; cf. ad Autol .; .). The fact that Theophilus makes interpretive use of early Christian literary memory is more intriguing than any speculation regarding how clever or orthodox he may or may not have been as a theologian. Rather than inventing Judaism, Justin Martyr attempts to characterize the outline of Christian thought in order to enable a more profound understanding of “scripture” than that put forward by philosophers (dial –). In order to give a clear profile of Christian thought, Justin notes the differences between Platonic and Stoic philosophy, and poetry and prose literature on the one hand, and the teachings of Christ on the other (II apol .). Whether or not Justin views the gospels—as he does the Septuagint—as “scripture” is irrelevant: he identifies various gospel writings as apostolic memory (I apol .; dial .) and thus explicitly supports the idea of gospels as literary memory. The majority of authors who stand behind the writings of the “Apostolic Fathers” or the “Apocryphal Texts,” however, remain anonymous. In one way or another, all authors refer back to the early Christian concept(s) of literary memory by accumulating or redefining it. Literary memory as such continues to impact later authors and texts. We can only make a few observations here. In the case of the Markan Gospel, we suppose a multifaceted history of reception that begins with a reshaping of Mark by Matthew and Luke. By the rd century, the Markan Gospel, as it appears in Papyrus  (Mk :–:), is more or less a fixed literary entity. Prior to the Markan Gospel attaining its fixed form, however, there is a great deal of “evidence for assuming that literary diversity and textual fluidity” are working hand in hand (see the Markan ending; “Secret Gospel of Mark”; etc.). Interestingly, it is clear that the Markan Gospel concept provoked a high degree of literary creativity, with the result that later authors felt inspired, for a variety of reasons, to add and/or produce varying narrative accounts in response. In this way and for the above-stated reasons, the gospel genre as such—that is, the narrative account of a literary memory that is initially designed by Mark—is constantly reshaped and redefined. The “Gospel of Peter” (PCair ) constitutes perhaps the most obvious example of how later texts provide a focalization strategy. On the one hand, GosPet either makes use of traditions that run parallel to the

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Synoptic material (cf. : and Mk :) or picks up certain motifs known from said traditions (Mk :par. and GosPet :). On the other hand, GosPet tends to epitomize the outline of the Markan Gospel in order to focus instead on the passion narrative: indeed, GosPet appends a variety of additional—partly legendary—material to the original outline, or concept, of the passion. The intense focus on the passion and Easter events in GosPet is illustrative of the crucial significance of these particular events for this later author, as he was attempting to make sense of early Christian literary memory. Consequently, to read GosPet alongside the later canonical gospels—especially Mark, Matthew, and Luke—implies that there is more at stake here than the mere issue of literary dependencies: the particular shape of GosPet in relation to the canonical gospels raises questions about how literary memory is perceived, transformed, and reorganized. In recent studies of the “Gospel of Thomas,” a similar argument has been made. While scholars for a long time tended to claim that GosThom had direct access to a variety of Synoptic traditions that could potentially lead us back to an early stage of Jesus-traditions, recent scholarship sees GosThom as a product of nd-century literary history that leans on the Synoptic gospels as literary concepts. Again, the shape of literary memory as designed by Mark and his early successors appears to provide later writers with the initial spark for selecting and presenting Jesus-traditions, regardless of resulting shifts in genre. Whether drawn directly from the Synoptic gospels or from a knowledge-base of secondary orality, GosThom definitely reorganizes the narrative concept of literary memory by creating a collection of sayings. Literary memory of the st century, formatted as literature, is clearly primed for a process of permanent rewriting—a process that continues until the end of the nd century. Indeed, Lucian of Samosata documents from the perspective of an observer and outsider how broad the range of literary activities in the Christian milieu really was. In his Peregrinus, which possibly reflects Ignatian memories, he states that Christians (Χριστιανοί) are known as much for their interpreting and explaining (ἐξηγεῖτο καὶ διεσάφει) as they are for composing books (Pereg ; πολλὰς δὲ αὐτὸς καὶ συνέγραφεν). Together with the celebration of “elaborate meals” (δεῖπνα ποικίλα), the ritual practice of Christians (Pereg ) involved the reading aloud of “sacred books” (λόγοι ἱεροί). Literary activity—even when embedded in a religious setting—is thus considered a constitutive factor of Christian community life. How then do we envisage and systematize the manifold processes by means of which the

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literary memorial culture of the earliest Christians is perceived and transformed in the nd century? We must account for an additional factor: the diversity of languages. Latin—and possibly also Syriac (e.g., Tatian)— becomes increasingly relevant as a language of Christian literature both during and after the nd century. In De finibus bonorum et malorum, Cicero explains how literature and language define each other and argues that one’s choice of either Latin or Greek has implications that extend well beyond the mere issue of translation: language choice rather indicates competition between various literary cultures and traditions (ff.). Thus, the function of early Christian literary memory in its diverse social, religious, and cultural settings is manifold. First, literary memory in early Christianity serves a didactic purpose. While the most pertinent example is found, of course, in Luke (:–), the link between literary memory and education extends over the much wider contemporary cultural scope of rhetorical theory (e.g., Quintilian, inst or .): “Memory is involved in every stage of education,” including parablelike teaching. Teresa Morgan describes how agricultural semantics generate education in parables told by Jesus or in Paul’s language: early Christian writings promote the “nurture of learning.” The gospel writings in fact also make reference to this semantic field (e.g., Mk parr.)—they share the interest of providing didactic narratives. Consequently, the so-called later-period apologists defend Christian memory for purposes that are specifically didactic. Second, the rewriting of literary memory serves the function of entertainment: in case of the apocryphal Acta literature (“Gospel of Nicodemus” and “Acts of Pilatus”), novelistic elements attempt to satisfy reader curiosity by supplementing or clarifying perceived gaps of knowledge or missing bits of information. Some more prominent examples include the description of Paul’s physiognomy (Acta Pauli :–) and the more detailed narrative account of Jesus’s resurrection (GosPet ff.). The authors of later texts often insinuate that their particular accounts are nearer to the mark—namely, more contemporaneous to Jesus—and claim to provide additional details by means of exclusive stories. This is certainly the case with a variety of the so-called Gnostic revelatory dialogues which aim to provide secret revelatory messages (see Nag Hammadi library). Finally, when referring back to early Christian literary memory, various authors and writings participate in contemporary discourses about (literal) power and authority. This applies to the implementation of personal as well as scribal types of authority: while GosPet promotes Peter as an authoritative

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figure (e.g., :, ), Marcion—the redactor and editor of the Lukan Gospel and a variety of Pauline letters—promotes a specific collection of early Christian writings. Gnostic writers such as Heracleon—author of the earliest and most comprehensive gospel commentary ( John)—lay the foundations for a form of textual reception adopted and further developed by Irenaeus, Tertullian, and others. Consequently, the struggle for power and authority which underlies all claims to canonicity and orthodoxy goes hand in hand with the emergence of textual quotation. It is specifically within this heated atmosphere of literary creativity and theological one-upmanship that claims of normativity and accusations of heresy were made. Insofar as early Christian literary memory becomes the object of textual quotation, it comes to be read as the canonical version of Christian memorial narratives.

History in the 1st 2 Shaping and 2nd Centuries CE in Its Literary Culture

Historiography as a Mirror of Hellenistic-Roman Literature: Investigating Literary Activity In the Hellenistic period, literature as a medium of literary composition becomes increasingly meaningful as a significant component of cultural discourse. According to Ernst Vogt, Hellenistic cultural discourse embraces a huge variety of literary texts and applies them to wide-ranging aspects of cultural life. Douglas Kidd has observed that while Aratus’s Phaenomena may date to the rd century BCE in terms of its production, this same text was transmitted and cited in manifold literary works dating well into the st century CE (see, e.g., Cicero, de orat .; Quintilian, inst or .). The work’s popularity extended even to the early Christian sphere (see Acts :). Kidd points out, as did Cicero before him, that the “higher purpose is literary rather than philosophical.” Diverse types of writings thus programmatically appear as literary texts: human productions written and literarily styled. Historiography, in the Hellenistic period, must consequently be seen as a literary phenomenon. Indeed, the Roman historian Arrian describes his ambition in terms of competing with predecessors who are specifically literary, thereby gaining an important place in what is essentially literary history (Alexandri Anabasis ..). Werner Dahlheim has recently gone so far as to claim that the historian in antiquity wrote not as a scientist, “but as a literary author.” It is precisely at the point of what is called literaricity—the literary style of history-writing—that a difference between modern and ancient notions of historical discourse comes to the fore.

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To the extent that history-writing is a literary phenomenon, and is indeed investigated as such in modern scholarship, the role of historiography, within the framework of Hellenistic literary culture, is by no means a minor one. The notion that history-writing is a narrativization of the past is, by contrast, a crucial theme which, as an element of cultural discourse, surfaces again and again, as indicated by the broad range of historiographical literature deriving from Greco-Roman and Hellenistic-Jewish milieus. History as it takes shape in history-writing is a predominant field of literary production and literary activity (Literaturszene): the interaction between all persons involved in the production and reception of literature in antiquity. While the term Literaturszene does not derive from antiquity itself, it is nonetheless a heuristically useful means by which to summarize how literature, including historiography, was both produced and received in antiquity. The interrelation of history-writing and literary culture will be observed especially by asking: What was the function of history-writing within the context of Hellenistic literary culture? The first step toward answering this question involves a definition of temporal borders: the time frame of the so-called Hellenistic age is envisaged on the basis of political events (ca. – BCE). The early Imperial period covers the time frame in which early Christian writings appear on the scene. In the everyday life of Hellenistic-Roman societies, the memorization and conceptualization of the past was common practice. Indeed, a significant number of historiographical methods and practices were developed at this time. Only “tiny splinters have come down to us.” Thanks to the work of Felix Jacoby, Carl R. Holladay, Hans Beck, Uwe Walter, and other editors, who have compiled these Greek, early Jewish, and Latin fragments, we now have access to all kinds of historiographical writers, in the broader sense of the term. Though piecemeal, our extant sources from this period attest to a culture whose underlying traditions of discussing and representing the past were rich and manifold. The conceptualization of the past by means of history-writing is a matter of key interest not only in terms of literary history but also in terms of Hellenistic-Roman cultural history. Hellenistic historiography is defined paradigmatically as a process of cultural and literary assimilation: while the Greek language continued to dominate literary production, the Greeks themselves were in contact with other, non-Greek traditions. Greek historiography, on the one hand, extends its enquiries to historical elements beyond those that are specifically Greek: Polybius writes universal history in which the focus is on Rome. On the

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other hand, the emergence of Latin historiography is marked, at least in part, by a fixation on Greek-Hellenistic history (e.g., Curtius Rufus). The Jewish historiography of the Hellenistic period functions as a particularly intriguing case study of the process of assimilation. Jewish historical narratives have their own topics. They are framed by a religious master narrative (e.g., the Pentateuch) which is related to Israel’s history and which, in turn, impacts the rise of early Christian historiography. That said, Hellenistic-Jewish historiography, such as that of Artapanus, finds certain resonances in the Hellenistic-Roman world; Artapanus is well documented in the works of the Greek compiler Alexander Polyhistor, who plays an important role in Roman cultural history: based on the writings of Suetonius, he even gave lectures in Rome (see De grammaticis et rhetoribus .). The developments in Jewish-Hellenistic historiography are of equal interest: not only do we come across an increased emphasis on the rewriting of biblical history, but narratives such as the Moses story are reinterpreted on the basis of contemporary historical and cultural conditions, as Jewish historians find them, for instance, in Egypt.  and  Maccabees exemplify the means by which contemporary political and historical events are interpreted based on biblical history. The rewriting of biblical traditions and the writing of contemporary history are always entangled. In addition, historians such as Josephus or even Justus of Tiberias, who write on topics that are specifically Jewish but related to world politics, simultaneously attempt to assimilate their style of writing and composition to Hellenistic-Roman culture— even though they may have had recourse to professional scribal help. The growing popularity of history-writing in Hellenistic-Roman culture stems from political causes. With Josephus the specifically political dimensions of history-writing come to the fore. Beginning with Alexander the Great, history-writing becomes increasingly focused on the lives of individual politicians. Biography—though initially kept distinct from historiography by the Greeks—garnered increasing importance as a literary feature of history-writing. Indeed, biographical literature—especially the microgenre of political biography—seems to develop as a characteristic form of historiography in the early Principate (e.g., Suetonius, Plutarch). With the rise of the Romans in the Mediterranean, however, new historiographical topics (Roman history) and trends (the Roman memoria tradition) emerge and spread. As of the late Roman Republican and early Imperial periods (second half of the st century CE), the Latin language establishes itself as a literary medium and begins to shape its own culture and audience

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(e.g., Sallust, Pliny, Tacitus). In both the late Roman Republic and the early Principate, the above-mentioned tendencies and characteristics of Hellenistic historiography are maintained. The plurality of approaches to dealing with the past mirrors the number of literary authors. While many historical accounts have not been handed down to us—Pliny the Elder’s Bellorum Germaniae libri, for instance, is lost—the form and content of these works are enormously varied. Authors such as Sallust and Tacitus have produced different kinds of literature which deal with diverse time frames. The diverse literary styles and genres through which past time events are conceptualized will be the subject of further enquiry. It will become evident that literary authors transform the past into a historical narrative by means of style and genre. For this reason genre criticism functions as a helpful tool for the analysis of history-writing. Literature and literary genres are parts of broader processes of cultural communication, which is framed by infra-structural and environmental means, including personal patronage. These factors—which can the better be studied the more material that has come down to us, as the case of Oxyrhynchus teaches us in late antiquity—are determinative of “literary activity.” Literary activity is defined as the literary culture in which historywriting as a literary concern had its intellectual and practical raison d’être. A few examples will serve to illustrate the de facto significance and implications, in the Hellenistic-Roman period, of the phrase “literary activity.” Horace emphasizes that literary authors wrote in support and on behalf of libraries (ep ..ff.). In CIL ., we encounter a variety of intriguing anecdotes about Pliny, who supported the building and running of a library in his hometown of Comum. Suetonius (De grammaticis et rhetoribus) is concerned that grammatical studies be implemented throughout the provinces. When Tacitus points out that Britain has been Romanized in cultural terms (Agr : eloquentia and humanitas), he confirms that the implementation of cultural communication in this period was both consistent and effective. Some extant graffiti indicate that Virgil was read and interpreted in Pompeii; indeed, it is due in part to the popularity of Virgil as an author that we are able to distinguish and assess varying types of literary reception: the popular (graffiti), the intellectual (in later authors and interpreters), and the didactic (the Vindolanda writing tablets). Each points to the successful dissemination of Virgil’s writings. The crucial interplay of authors and publishers, as discussed by Seneca (de ben ..), points to a growing market for books (Buchmarkt) from the st century BCE onward.

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Historiography is no longer produced only for a limited group of specialized readers (Fachpublikum), and historians such as Livy are more and more eager to obtain literary success (praef –). Literary production thus presupposes and shapes infrastructure such as cultural education and communication networks—infrastructures which are also determinative of the production and reception of history-writing as a specific mode of literary production.

Between Autopsy and Infrastructure: Libraries, Coworkers, and Literary Education History-writing is part of the broader literary environment whose infrastructural dimensions are outlined in the previous section. While presupposing the historian’s investigation by autopsy, history-writing also intersects with the needs of the literary field generally speaking: libraries, suppliers and producers of writing materials, and editors. Ancient historians themselves shed an intriguing light on the various technical aspects of literary production. As recounted by Suetonius, the rhetor, grammarian, and writer Lucius Ateius Praetextus (Philologus, d. after  BCE) assisted Gaius Sallustius and Asinius Pollio “when they undertook historical writing, the former with a compendium of all Roman history, so that he could cull from it what he wished, the latter with advice on style” (De grammaticis et rhetoribus .). Suetonius also provides an account of a certain Cornelius Epicadus, the “freed-man of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, the dictator, and his servant in the augural priesthood,” who “completed the final book of memoirs that Sulla had left unfinished at his death” (ibid., .ff.). Papias, who identified Mark’s Gospel-writing as a remembrance of Peter’s teaching (Eusebius, h e ..), also makes reference to how the production of the gospel was initiated. Polybius lays emphasis on the need for individual historians to do their own research (Histories .c.–; .e–). While library work—especially when it comes to a depiction of ancient history—is a necessity, even more crucial to the historian’s task is research in the field (..). Personal enquiry, even personal experience, are for Polybius the marks of a competent historian—this is especially relevant when writing “contemporary history.” Indeed, Polybius is actively engaged in a critique of his predecessors: Timaios, he writes, spent “the best part of fifty years in Athenian libraries (..d) and apparently admitted as much himself (.h.). This lack is the fundamental cause of all shortcomings”

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(.e). Polybius’s preoccupation with methodology unintentionally sheds light on the contemporaneous realities of library work and the importance of libraries to the historical task. Historians worked with specific types of historical, geographical, and ethnic information in their excursus, and they used libraries as valid sources of information. As regards the composition of early Christian historiographical accounts—the Gospels and Acts—the situation is somewhat different: the use of library materials is not self-evident. We should consider instead traditions that were either oral (miracle stories), preliterary sources (the passion narrative) in the sense that this tradition was written down in sections but not yet encapsulated in a comprehensive narrative, and scriptural traditions such as the Septuagint that were handed down to Mark and Luke by fellow Christians. The term autopsy in the context of early Christian historiography might signify that the authors had access to Jesus-followers and Jesus’s family, namely, eyewitnesses. Later additions to the gospel writings reflect a conception of autopsy that is interestingly in alignment with the significance of the term ἵστωρ/testis in the sense of “witness”: the epilogue ( John :ff.), probably a later addition to the Johannine Gospel, wields the motif of the eyewitness account (μαρτυρῶν) which serves to both legitimate and authorize. The motif is specifically reiterated in 1 John .– (καὶ αἱ χεῖρες ἡμῶν ἐψηλάφησαν): by the end of the st century CE, an explicit reference to the autopsy of witnesses is deemed a necessity. The term autopsy in this context does not imply a historically accurate investigation. Indeed, it is rather a literary feature that lays claim to liability, or accuracy. While the reference to autopsy in this context functions largely as a literary trope, the idea of autopsy occurs nonetheless. Autopsy may also have played a role in the composition of the earliest gospel (Mark) and Acts. Mark and Luke create travel accounts (itineraria), which suggests to the reader that the missionary activities of both Jesus (Mk :; Lk :ff.) and Paul (Acts ff.) are bound to concrete topographies. While we cannot prove that either Mark or Luke actually traveled to each locale in order to verify traditions in situ, we can at least assume that the authors were—more or less—familiar with local geography. The narrated events are tied to specific existing locales in Palestine and the Mediterranean, which gives the reader a chance to “autopsy,” albeit by proxy. The early Christian writings thus indirectly document that Polybius was, in fact, correct: there was indeed a certain tension between library-based research and autopsy. The tension is similar to that between retelling what

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was already written elsewhere and composing something new. The gospel writings are therefore composed more on the basis of a claimed autopsy than they are on that of library research. Indeed, the writings therein need not have been written in collaboration with libraries. It is precisely under these circumstances that we can begin to understand what Luke meant when he writes that he has investigated everything from the beginning (Lk :). We cannot overstate the significance and importance of libraries for the writing of history in antiquity. Thus, we have to take account of libraries as an intellectual factor of literary culture. Libraries not only stand for access to sources—that is, the materials used by historians—but also reflect the cultural standard of infrastructure. Libraries, as the mirrors of literary productivity, help us to identify the location of the intellectual centers of the st and nd centuries CE; accordingly, they have been the focus of recent research. The Hellenistic physician-philosopher Galen makes some intriguing remarks on the contemporaneous function and cultural significance of libraries. He writes in a treatise (Περὶ Ἀλυπίας, ) that a library is a place where not only reading but also “note-taking and copying” take place. Private libraries, as documented by Cicero, were either attested in a household context for the purpose of teaching, or, as Galen suggests, housed in storage facilities. These storehouses, or ἀποθῆκαι, may have functioned as prototypes for later public libraries such as that of Alexandria. The socio-political fact of a public library constitutes the city or geographical region within which it is housed as an important center of literary activity. In his Geographica, the Greek historian Strabo of Amaseia declares the city of Halicarnassus to be famous since it is the birthplace of famous authors such as Herodotus and Dionysius (../). Several new libraries were founded in the Hellenistic period in order to promote the life of the mind. Libraries are a part of the architectural infrastructure of Hellenistic cities. They also serve a political function in that the building of libraries is tied to conceptions of time and history: the shaping and conservation of collections of literature help to give cities and their populations a firm place within history. It is within the context of libraries as placeholders of communal and historical identity that the seriousness of the loss of books and libraries must be understood: the loss of a library signifies a sure decline of philosophical and literary traditions (Plutarch, Sulla ; Strabo, ..). We have different kinds of evidence in support of the idea that literary activity depends to a high degree on the infrastructure of libraries. In his

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overview of literary history, Quintilian indirectly hints at the origin of his sources: “there are other good writers too, but I am only sampling the various genres, not searching whole libraries” (inst or ..). It is possibly not a coincidence that Suetonius, in addition to being a historian, also worked as a librarian: according to an inscription recovered in Hippo, Suetonius was a studiis, a bybliothecis, ab epistulis (AE .). The roles of historian and librarian intersect again in the nd and rd centuries: the Christian historian Sextus Julius Africanus gains additional prominence once he is commissioned by Alexander Severus to institute the Pantheon library in Rome. Strabo depicted ancient topographies and collected local traditions in order to uncover information about literary activity. He provides important details relating to the production and reception of literature, particularly in Alexandria, Pergamon, Ephesus, and Rome—the intellectual centers of the Hellenistic-Roman world. It is from these four locales that intellectual life and literary productivity took their point of departure. Central sections of Luke’s depiction of the past in Acts take place in Asia Minor; we can assume that Luke was affiliated, even intermittently, with this intellectual milieu. What do we know about these libraries? How did they impact intellectual life and literary productivity, particularly the depiction of the past? Dinokrates built the city of Alexandria (../). Strabo provides the following description of the so-called Museion: “The Museum is also a part of the royal palaces; it has a public walk, an Exedra with seats, and a large house, in which is the common mess-hall of the men of learning who share the Museum. This group of men not only hold property in common [χρήματα κοινά], but also have a priest in charge of the Museum, who formerly was appointed by the kings, but is now appointed by Caesar” (../f.). The library, a place where pedagogies and education, religion, philology, and politics met and merged, was the intellectual heart of Alexandria—a city crucial for Hellenistic Judaism (see the letter of Aristeas). The city of Pergamon seems to have been built under the authority of Eumenes II (nd century BCE; see Strabo, ../), although his brother may have been charged with the construction of cultural environments. Strabo writes that Eumenes “built up the city and planted Nicephorium with a grove, and the other elder brother [Attalus?], from love of splendour, added sacred buildings and libraries and raised the settlement of Pergamum to what it is now” (../). The same source informs us that by the time Marcus Antonius gave this same library to Cleopatra (/ BCE), it boasted a collection of roughly , rolls (../–; see also Pliny, n h .). From

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Strabo (.f.) we get the impression that the transfer of libraries was an authoritative act (παρέδωκεν): From Scepsis came the Socratic philosophers Erastus and Coriscus and Neleus the son of Coriscus, this last a man who not only was a pupil of Aristotle and Theophrastus, but also inherited the library of Theophrastus, which included that of Aristotle. At any rate, Aristotle bequeathed [παρέδωκεν] his own library to Theophrastus, to whom he also left his school; and he is the first man, so far as I know, to have collected books and to have taught the kings in Egypt how to arrange a library [καὶ διδάξας τοὺς ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ βασιλέας βιβλιοθήκης σύνταξιν; ] Theophrastus bequeathed (παρέδωκεν) it to Neleus; and Neleus took it to Scepsis and bequeathed (παρέδωκεν) it to his heirs, ordinary people, who kept the books locked up and not even carefully stored. But when they heard how zealously the Attalid kings to whom the city was subject were searching for books to build up the library in Pergamum, they hid their books underground in a kind of trench. But much later, when the books had been damaged by moisture and moths, their descendants sold them to Apellicon of Teos for a large sum of money, both the books of Aristotle and those of Theophrastus. But Apellicon was a bibliophile rather than a philosopher [φιλόβιβλος μᾶλλον ἢ φιλόσοφος]; and therefore, seeking a restoration of the parts that had been eaten through, he made new copies of the text, filling up the gaps incorrectly, and published the books full of errors. The result was that the earlier school of Peripatetics who came after Theophrastus and had no books at all, with the exception of only a few, mostly exoteric works (. . . ἐξωτερικῶν), and were therefore able to philosophise about nothing in a practical way (. . . μηδὲν ἔχειν φιλοσοφεῖν πραγματικῶς), but only to talk bombast about commonplace propositions, whereas the later school, from the time the books in question appeared, though better able to philosophise and Aristotelise, were forced to call most of their statements probabilities, because of the large number of errors. Rome also contributed much to this; for, immediately after the death of Apellicon, Sulla, who had captured Athens, carried off Apellicon’s library to Rome, where Tyrannion the grammarian, who was fond of Aristotle, got it in his hands by paying court to the librarian, as did also certa[i]n booksellers who used bad copyists and would not collate the texts—a thing that also takes place in the case of the other books that are copied for selling, both here and at Alexandria.

The library in Pergamon was most likely not organized as a school, unlike the Museion in Alexandria. It was close to the temple of Athena, which housed a collection of various arts, especially portraits of famous writers (Strabo, ../; Pliny, n h .).

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The city of Ephesus housed the well-known library of Celsus, founded by Tiberius Iulius Celsus Polemaeanus, and later transformed into a mausoleum in his honor by his son, C. Iulius Aquila. The Celsus library was built between  and  CE. It was destroyed by fire in  CE. The site is particularly intriguing in terms of its interconnected functions: it is both a storehouse for the dissemination of literary traditions (a library) and a memory site—the tomb of Celsus is located just below the apsis. Additional sarcophagi, including that of the rhetor Dionysius, were recovered close by. The founding of the Celsus library has as its parallel the two libraries founded by Trajan (– CE) and built, in Rome, concurrently with the Forum Traiani. The libraries in Rome were also connected to the burial site of the emperor, as might be the case with Trajan’s column. Like their counterpart in Ephesus, the libraries in Rome functioned as both storehouses for scrolls and memorial sites. Literary activity in Rome is a special case due to a plurality of libraries; according to Galen, the Palatine, Templum Pacis, and Domus Pacis libraries date back to the time of Augustus. It was clearly the intention of Augustus to compete with Alexandria at this early stage. Moreover, Rome, as caput mundi, was home to many learned men and booksellers (Strabo, ../; ..f./). The learned men came to Rome from diverse provinces: “Among the other philosophers from Tarsus . . . are Plutiades and Diogenes, who were among those philosophers that went round from city to city and conducted schools in an able manner. . . . But it is Rome that is best able to tell us the number of learned men from this city; for it is full of Tarsians and Alexandrians. Such is Tarsus” (Strabo, ../). Rome functions as a case study on the convergence of infrastructure and intellectual life. In the st and nd centuries CE, Rome was a thriving center of learning. Suetonius counts more than  schools of rhetoric in Rome during this period (De grammaticis et rhetoribus .). History-writing was included as part of the school curriculum. It is not surprising, then, that for Luke a narrative account of events could easily serve a catechetic purpose (Lk :). As mentioned earlier, Suetonius had indicated geographical dynamics, stating that grammar (grammatica) “had made its way into the provinces too” (.). Indeed, Rutilius Rufus went to Smyrna (.–) even though Rome was the political and cultural center of the Imperium. While the provinces and Rome were intellectually interrelated, Roman authors nonetheless had a tendency to distinguish between different standards, traditions, and levels of modernity. Suetonius points out that in the provinces the “memory

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of the ancient authors was still alive and had not yet passed entirely away as it had in Rome” (.). Tacitus mentioned that his father-in-law Agricola was in charge of the education of the sons of princes in the provinces (Agr ). In the st and nd centuries CE, literary activity was thus conceptualized not only globally or imperially but also in its locally nuanced dimensions. While these conceptions are well known from the perspective of Roman authors, it is also the case for authors and intellectuals living outside Rome: Philo of Alexandria, Josephus, and Paul the Apostle (see his letter to the Romans) are good examples of the ways in which a local setting and provenance interfered with Roman imperial politics in the Mediterranean.

The Socio-Religious Environment and the Role of Audience In st- and nd-century CE literary criticism, the classification of literary genres—a topic shortly to be discussed—remains to a certain degree contingent since it is dependent on various cultural interests. Genre nonetheless provides orientation to both author and reader: readers recognize diverse literary genres because specific genres can be matched to specific occasions in which literary texts are performed. It is by their choice of literary genre that authors such as Ovid or Livy indicate precisely which target audience is being addressed, the particular literary tradition in which they choose to participate, and against which literary history their works should be critically evaluated. Tacitus “expressed the hope that his works would compare favourably with those of earlier historians and, perhaps providing a source of inspiration for posterity, would enjoy an honourable survival in the future” (ann ..). Thucydides also “writes ostensibly for posterity” (..), but this statement “does not quite deny the possibility of local, oral performance, perhaps of certain highly finished episodes.” That which is found to remain consistent in the works of Thucydides and Tacitus, however, might best be described as a general aspect of literacy: written texts per se cannot exclude future readers. Besides, literary texts are hardly limited to a recording function; they also generate literacy and literaricity. This observation agrees with the fact that reading audiences increased significantly in the early Imperial period. Tacitus even had occasion to encounter one of his readers during the visit of circus games in Rome (see Pliny, ep ..).

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The expansion and dissolution of boundaries regarding addressed readers must consequently impact the author’s literary ambitions and become part of the intentio auctoris. Dennis Pausch argues that from the st century BCE onward, historians had more of a tendency to address anonymous audiences. Sallust writes for a broad and largely nameless group of readers (Catil –; Bell Iug –), whereas Livy addresses an anonymous lector who is the de facto stand-in for an imagined audience. Livy developed a literary strategy of focalization and tension by which he was able to meet the needs and challenges of an expanded readership. The observations in Roman historiography regarding a growing reading public and its expectations toward authors and literary concepts help us to understand to what extent the gospel literature, itself addressed to a public that is not explicitly specified, is indebted to the literary trends of the early Imperial period. The gospel writers may also have had in mind a broad readership. The intended readership is obviously not directly related to the narrative in either a geographical or a temporal sense: the gospel writings contain several explanatory comments (Mk :, ) and narrative elements (Mk :; :) intended to provide information to a broad range of readers. Author, audience, and literary genre are interdependent phenomena whose dynamic interrelations resonate throughout literary history. By observing the literary genres by which authors approach and depict the past, we by no means engage in artificial systems of classification based on modern theories. Rather, we work to disclose elements of the intentio auctoris which underlie history-oriented writings and their audience(s): How did authors want their writings to be read and received by audiences, critics, and, possibly, posterity? Is there any ancient theory of history-writing available? The following section will first examine how history-writing was perceived in Hellenistic-Roman intellectual milieus, and will then consider the socio-religious environment of early Christianity. investigating hellenistic-roman audience(s)

The overarching interest in historiography goes well beyond the attempt to merely classify authors and literary types of writings. It involves the careful contextualization of history-writing as a substantive element of intellectual life in antiquity. As memorial literature, history-writing both contributes to and establishes an essential element of the cultural environment in ancient societies. Literacy in antiquity “was not simply a passive technical skill; it was itself a cultural creation and a creator of culture.” We can include historywriting within the framework of literacy since historiography in particular

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was a crucial “occupation of a cultural Roman”—at least since Augustus’s time (see Pliny, ep .; Juvenal, Sat .–; Quintilian, inst or .). History-writing constitutes a basic contribution to literary activity and is moreover an important field of rhetoric as it provides the orator with a variety of exempla (see Quintilian). Elements of history-writing, when deployed by historians and rhetoricians as literary or political tokens, also contributed to the shaping of social identity: the process of constructing memory has powerful implications for the manner in which contemporary life is both understood and legitimized. Memory can be constructed in such a way as to either maintain an affinity with current potentates (see Livy and Augustus) or keep them at a critical distance. The study of history, however, also serves to shape individual identity. As Quintilian shows elsewhere (.), the representation of the past enables a rhetorician to learn from the past and to make use of historical examples (exempla) that buttress the content of oratory. What do we know about the target audiences of ancient historians? At one point, Polybius makes mention of the audience as an “elite class among the Greeks” (..–). However, he also alludes to audiences on a broader scale: he interprets the fact that Romans had access to his book as a “guarantee of its accuracy” (..–). One contemporary historian points out that Polybius’s “opening statement about the usefulness of history [.–] could also apply to a more general audience of educated people. By calling attention to the calamities that other people have suffered, history teaches us all how to deal better with our own lives.” It would seem, then, that we are here confronted with a sort of double-audience: Greek elites constitute the primary group of readers, whereas Roman citizens, a second-tier audience, act as referees. As Romans, they have the opportunity to judge for themselves the accuracy of Polybius’s written thoughts on what is essentially Roman history. The reality of a distinct category of referee-readers informs our approach to sections of Mark and Luke-Acts which do not necessarily presuppose an audience with insider knowledge such as Jesusfollowers and Christ-believers. Strands of Mark and Luke-Acts target instead a second-tier readership made up of anyone from Palestinian Jews to Roman provincial governors. The point being made here is as follows: if it was indeed the intention of Mark and Luke to provide an account whose historical accuracy could withstand scrutiny, they must have conceptualized a core of external, non-Christian readers. Luke’s literary ambitions drive this point home (Lk :–; Acts :–).

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Within this same time frame, the question of reconstructing readership, particularly in the case of a historian such as Josephus, contributes to our understanding of the processes of acculturation: Josephus “wrote his finest work with a sophisticated Roman audience in view, one that was fully at home in elite discourse about politics and constitutions, and that had a taste for fine writing.” In its early stages, Roman history-writing was an elitist phenomenon. Josephus’s readership—consisting mainly of elite Romans—was therefore familiar with his literary writing. Historians such as Polybius and Josephus, as discussed above, wrote primarily for elite audiences. Mark and Luke, however, may have had different audiences in mind for their histories. Indeed, in a time when the social status of authors as well as readers was in the throes of dynamic change, neither author shapes an elitist narrative account but addresses instead an audience that is not specified in social terms—the audience could be on multiple levels. Especially in linguistic and narrative terms, each writer creates a selfexplanatory narrative that departs from “biblical history.” These writings do not require a reader with extensive political knowledge and furthermore do not presuppose audiences with either rhetorical or literary skills. Luke and Mark do not internally limit their writings but rather maintain literary accessibility in terms of potential readerships. Indeed, this accessibility might explain the subsequent success of Luke-Acts and the Markan Gospel concept. If we keep in mind the important role played by history-writing in establishing intellectual discourse in Hellenistic-Roman societies— certainly on an above-average level of social status and literary education— we may presume that the writings of Mark and Luke attained the status of literature and acquired an extensive reading public. The distinction between reading and listening—that is, between the processes of literary and oral reception—in these early stages of the Christian tradition should be approached with caution and discretion. As a general rule in antiquity, written texts maintained an oral status in the sense that they were not only read but also recited and performed in public. The transformation from the written to the oral is particularly well documented in early Christian literature: while the gospel is orally proclaimed ( Cor :ff.), letters are received both orally ( Thess :; Col :) and in their written form ( Cor :–). The tension between orality and literacy also appears in historiography, since “history” as the narrative about the past is received in an oral as well as a written sense (see also Cicero, fin .; .f.), a topic to which we shall now turn.

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Both the social and spatial contexts of literary production are of great importance to an investigation of literary activity. In terms of the social context of reception, Florence Dupont goes so far as to claim that a literary text only becomes literature through the process of being read: the “invention of literature . . . consists in exactly that: the writing of texts that not only demand to be read . . . but also place the reader in the position of being the subject of the speech act, rather than an instrument for the oral expression of a text.” The reading of literature constitutes an interaction between author and audience. This interaction becomes particularly evident when we investigate the practice of recitatio. While the phenomenon of the reception of literature by individual readers may have been on the increase, literature—including history-writing—continued to be published orally in a performative sense. In his th letter to Lucilius, the Stoic philosopher Seneca reveals valuable information regarding the extent to which Roman culture was influenced by history-writing. His letter reflects a discussion on the procedure of recitatio by which historiographical works, in st-century Rome, were presented to audiences: “A lecturer sometimes brings upon the platform a huge work of research, written in the tiniest hand and very closely folded; after reading off a large portion, he says: ‘I shall stop, if you wish;’ and a shout arises: ‘Read on, read on!’ from the lips of those who are anxious for the speaker to hold his peace then and there” (Recitator historiam ingentem attulit minutissime scriptam, artissime plictam, et magna parte perlecta “desinam” inquit “si vultis”: adclamatur “recita, recita” ab iis, qui illum ommutescere illic cupiunt). Recitatio in antiquity is thus a convention for the public reading of texts (see also Pliny, ep ..ff.). Recitation moreover constitutes publication. Indeed, the prohibition against the public recitation of literary works, imposed by Nero upon Lucan, a nephew of Seneca, signified the de facto end of Lucan’s career as a literary author. We find additional references to recitation in the letters of Pliny and in the biographies of Suetonius. Pliny writes that “Titinius Capito is giving a reading. . . . He is a splendid personality . . ., a patron of literature and admirer of literary men, whom he supports and helps in their careers. To many who are authors he is a haven of refuge and protection, while he is an example to all; it is in fact he who has restored and reformed literature itself when it was on the decline. He lends his house for public readings, and is wonderfully generous about attending those which are held elsewhere; at any rate he has never missed one of mine, provided that he was in Rome at the time” (Pliny, ep ..–).

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Pliny tells us something about the places where oral performances took place, namely, private houses. His account also provides information concerning patronage and the support of authors. Suetonius provides additional details regarding the publication of books: “I recall that his [Lucan’s] poems were even read in public, while they were published and offered for sale by editors lacking in taste, as well as by some who were painstaking and careful” (Suetonius, Lucan). Suetonius underscores two important factors for the publication of literary works: the editorial process up to and including the sale of books on the book market on the one hand, and the public or semipublic recitatio of literary works on the other. The examples cited above illustrate how various dimensions of history-writing in the st and nd centuries are to be set against the background of literary culture in which historiography was produced, performed, edited, sold, and circulated. Various studies have indicated that author, performer, publisher, and audience are related to one another not only within the process of textual reception, but also and especially in the context of oral performance (recitatio). The audience is moreover relevant both in social terms (social audience) and in regard to the production of literature. Audiences influence historywriting. David Konstan demonstrates that (semipublic) readings were interactive and that audiences were actively involved in the process of textual reception. In his treatise De audiendis poetis, Plutarch provides a comprehensive reflection on the interaction between literary texts and audiences. In the introduction to his Metamorphoses, Apuleius explicitly invites his readers to participate in the (re-)production of literature. The interaction between audience and text impacts authors as they compose their literary works: “An expectation of active participation on the part of the public—coming up with answers . . ., accounting for apparent inconsistencies in a text—conditioned the way authors and orators composed their works.” John Marincola gives a detailed analysis of the generic expectations by which Roman audience(s) reacted to history-writing. As I have summarized elsewhere, it is important to see that, in history-writing, topic and audience necessarily correspond: it is no coincidence that insofar as Roman elites controlled the past, Roman historiography was an elitist phenomenon. The recipients of the gospel writings were a correspondingly distinct group: it was made up of people who believed in the gospel (Mk :f.; Lk :ff.). It is possible, however, to draw an even finer distinction: as discussed earlier, the audience is dual, namely, the primary and secondary addressees

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(“referees”). The primary addressees can be further divided into Jesusfollowers and leaders of the Jesus movement(s), and a wider group of sympathetic readers. Dennis Pausch, in his discussion of biographical literature, suggests that different types of social and intellectual audiences can be ascribed both to diverse authors (e.g., Pliny, Gellius, Suetonius) and to various types and strategies of writing. Conceptual shifts within a certain type of writing might again point to a different kind of audience. The summary style of an author like Cornelius Nepos evokes a certain type of audience: a reader “who lacked the time, resources, or inclination to go through fuller narrative histories. Such a man might be a member of the new emperor-formed elite: lacking nobility of birth and the formal education that went with it.” The literary and stylistic differences which characterize early Christian historiographical writings essentially reflect different groups of readers and audiences. Marincola’s set of “generic expectations” is designed to interrogate historiographical texts on the following basis: what were the literary expectations of Roman audience(s), and how did these expectations both influence and counteract the process of history-writing? If we apply analogous considerations to the field of gospel literature, the following fact comes immediately to the fore: gospel literature is written in Koine Greek, a language that is not only the most widespread and commonly spoken, but is also that of the contemporaneous “dominant power.” The numerous available manuscripts for the Matthean Gospel indicate that gospel literature was copied and circulated early on; the text was clearly successfully dispersed. According to Mk :, readers would have expected a narrative affiliated to the gospel proclamation, that is, one derived from oral contexts ( Cor :) and relevant in soteriological terms (Rom :). The interpretive framework retrojects the gospel proclamation to the time of John the Baptist (Mk :), and even back to prophetic times (Mk :f.). As a result, the reader encounters, within the gospel story, both a kerygmatic and an informative (narratio) dimension which also contain special knowledge on the βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ. The gospel writings are not forthcoming when it comes to questions of authorization and address. Contrary to the Pauline letters, the gospel writings neither have a distinct group of addressees in mind nor explicitly identify apostolic authorship. We saw earlier, in the case of Sallust, how anonymity serves specifically to delimit, or enlarge, the group or audience. Gospel writings as literary productions, generally speaking, participate in ancient literary culture. Despite the fact that they

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derive from religious proclamation, the gospels are not to be understood exclusively as religious books. They are hybrid in form and purpose (see Chapter ). Having examined the overarching literary culture of the early Imperial period, a culture to which early Christian writings evidently belong, we will now correlate the gospel writings to the field of religious communication in order to determine more precisely to what extent and in what way early Christian depictions of the past were implicated in religion. How do religion and history-writing interact during the early Roman Imperial period? religious communication and history-writing

The gospels and Acts do not explicitly contribute to the ancient discourse on history and history-writing. Indeed, none of the early Christian texts articulate a precise conception of history (Geschichtsbegriff). With the exception of Gal :, the term historia—ἱστορία or ἱστορεῖν—does not occur in the New Testament. The gospel writings and Acts are instead primarily concerned with the Gospel of Jesus Christ (Mk :). Indeed, they seem to have been written primarily for religious purposes. As a consequence, the shape of early Christian literature relates to the religious setting of Christ-believers. We have already defined early Christian literature as religious literary memory (see Chapter ). How might we now best account for the relation of text to setting? Christian literacy, at its inception, springs from a religious milieu which it reflects, rather than constitutes, by means of narrative. In order to commemorate and communicate Christ-belief, the gospel literature frames aspects of myth, cult, and ethos in a (pre)historiographical narrative. Although these texts were used for gospel proclamation (Mk :; John ) and were read aloud in Christian assemblies ( Thess :), they are not initially the object of religious practice in either cult or worship, nor do they contribute as such to the founding of religious practices. Rather, they reflect and/or memorialize religious practices for purposes of religious and literary communication. Indeed, it is not until the close of the nd century CE that gospel writings and Pauline letters are interpreted as religious literature, by which we mean foundational Christian texts. Even though the fields of (literary) culture, politics, and religion interact constantly in and beyond the st century CE—as we know from Clifford Geertz’s concept of religion as a cultural system—we have to be clear when describing the initial purpose and function of history-writing. A detailed foray into

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the interrelated fields of literacy, religion, and history-writing in Roman culture will serve to contextualize these observations historically and to uncover how Roman historiography first of all reflects religion and religious practices—as the most telling episode from Livy’s History about the “importance of the religion of place” illustrates (..). In ancient Rome, the connection between religion and literacy (or religion and literature) is tenuous. The tenuousness is particularly true of history-writing (including biographical and antiquarian forms), which is a historical source and a literary depiction of religious activity, but which is nevertheless per definitionem not directly affiliated to matters of religious practice. Jason Davies has explained how and why the scope of historywriting extends well beyond the practice of Roman religion: “it is the norm for historiography (in stark contrast to epic and other poetry) to represent the human perspective—the experience and process of inference, with all its checks, balances, and potential errors.” Hartmut Zinser, on the other hand, has recently emphasized that Roman religion rarely refers to constitutive texts and that it is primarily based on cultic practice. Even though sacrifices were accompanied by verbal formulas such as prayers and invocations, the relevant formulas (indigitamenta) have not been handed down to us and never became part of a literary tradition. The absence of a literary tradition in Roman religion can indeed be explained in part as a deficit of textual transmission. The absence or at least scarcity of religious literature, however, also gestures toward the manner in which Roman religion in New Testament times functioned. Cicero writes that the cult stands at the center of Roman religion: religio id est cultus deorum (de nat deor .). He further explains that cultus consists of sacra, or sacrifice, and auspicia, or the investigation of god’s will (de nat deor .). Valerius Maximus offers a similar description of Roman religious practice: “Our ancestors decreed that fixed and customary ceremonies be managed through the science of Pontiffs, guidance for the good conduct of affairs through the observation of Augurs, Apollo’s prophecies through books of the seers [vatum libris], aversion of portents through Etruscan discipline” (.). Thus, the role of literacy and the written text in the field of Roman religious practice is limited, particularly in comparison to what we find in the Israelite-Jewish tradition of Torah observance, where there exists a pronounced overlap of religion and depictions of the past. By transforming ritual memory into literary memory, the earliest Christian authors basically follow in the footsteps of the Israelite-Jewish tradition. In Roman

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religious culture, literacy serves no more than a subsidiary function, which may explain why Greco-Roman authors could neither correctly perceive nor understand the proprium of Jewish religion, namely, its close relation to foundational literary texts. Indeed, the Greeks and Romans were themselves unfamiliar with this phenomenon. They instead had a tendency to designate Moses as a lawgiver or as a founder of religious practices. Even so, the interrelation of literacy and religion in Roman culture is complex. In his depiction of Roman religious customs and traditions, Valerius makes frequent references to literacy. In .., he mentions “seven Latin volumes concerning pontifical law” (in altera libri reconditi errant Latini septem de iure pontificium). Valerius refers here to the year  BCE, which marked the discovery of the putative remains of Numa Pompilius, who—according to tradition—had been the second king of Rome. Livy (..–) notes that two sarcophagi were found: one was thought to have contained Numa’s body and the other several books, including volumes on pontifical laws and Pythagorean philosophy, as Numa was reputed to have been a pupil of Pythagoras (see Ovid, Pont .). Even though the recovered writings were probably forgeries intended either to legitimate the institution of Greek philosophy in Rome or to reform Roman religion, the story provides crucial insights into the desirability for literary tradition in the field of Roman religion. Despite their complex transmission history, the Sibylline Books are generally considered to be affiliated to Greek and Roman religions. These literary texts were of definite significance to religious practice in ancient Rome and had, at this location, crucial importance early on. Valerius refers to them as “books of the seers” (.). In the above-mentioned paragraph from De natura deorum, Cicero makes it quite clear that sacra and auspicia are only two of three important elements for the populi Romani religio. He also refers to the praedictiones, which function to reconcile the immortal gods to humanity: the predictions are either taken from the interpretation of the Sibylline Books or from divination practiced by haruspices (.: si quid praedictionis causa ex portentis et monstris Sibyllae interpretes haruspicesve monuerunt). The depiction of the past included in Cicero’s account of praedictiones is particularly intriguing. It would seem that the conceptualization of the past functions to link religious practice to the shape of literature. Indeed, we have already seen how the Roman fasti— pontifical calendar-based lists—are the forerunners of historical narratives, just as lists of bishops prestructure Christian history-writing. More

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important, however, Cicero, by making reference to the Sibylline Books, provides a theoretical reflection on the link between religion and literature: he indicates that adequate cultic practice in the present is to a great degree dependent on the interpretation of the past. Simply put, the worship of the immortal gods is taken over from the ancestors (.: a maioribus). Roman religion, which strives to maintain cult, ceremony, and customs, is ultimately grounded in memorialization and the study of the past. Indeed, Jörg Rüpke describes as “ritual memory” the Roman recollection of “temple” and rituals. Cicero himself documents the extent to which religion influenced political affairs (see, e.g., .). While the production of literature, generally speaking, takes place outside the sphere of religious practice, our ancient authors reveal the extent to which religion and literacy—history-writing in particular—were interdependent in Roman culture. The interaction of religion and literacy also becomes evident when we look at how the prehistory of Rome, one that is represented in largely mythical terms, is conceptualized by historians (see Livy, Ovid, Virgil). We have established the importance, insofar as it related to religion, of the role played by both the study of history and the manner in which the past is conceptualized. We now turn to the literary representation of religion in Roman history-writing. While Jason Davies demonstrates that the scope of history-writing extends well beyond a concern with the practice of Roman religion, he also acknowledges that religion and history-writing are nonetheless interdependent: Historiography, the evocative representation of the human perspective in the past, was perfectly able to include both the intervention of the gods and human responses to the divine as part of its subject matter; it was also in a unique position to define what was ‘really’ Roman by its representation of religious practice and institutions. It could therefore be said to have acted as a guardian of those traditions: if the gods had been good to Rome, the historians were good to religion. As long as prodigies and interpretations were still being debated, the traditional religious life of the city was alive.

Additional literary tropes indicate the intersection of religion and history in Roman culture: authors legitimate their authority by means of an appeal to divine inspiration. Authors from Homer (Il .; Od .) and Hesiod (theogn ff.; –; –) to Ovid (met .) and Virgil (Aen .) attribute their literary output to the Muses. Indeed, the literary topos of inspiration gains popularity over time. Josephus grounds his

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authority as historian and author in supernatural dreams and inspiration (e.g., BJ .ff.; .ff.). It is no coincidence that Josephus considers prophecy to be the definitive approach to history-writing: because prophetic accounts of the coherence of Israelite history-writing (ἀναγραφαί) were divinely inspired, Josephus declares the prophets to be the most genuine of historians (see cAp .–). Intriguingly enough, the reverse is true in the writings of Valerius Maximus, for whom the trope of supranatural phenomena is not the primary focus of history-writing—he focuses on the presentation of human experiences, deeds, and sayings (see his preface). Roman historians sometimes inserted snippets of religion-based materials in their historical tomes. Livy and Velleius Paterculus (see the end of book ), for instance, include several prayers in their works. On a somewhat different note, a chance remark by Pliny in his personal correspondence draws a correlation on the grandest of scales between history-writing and religion: in his letter to Cornelius Minicianus, Pliny writes that merely to perceive the work of the patron Titinius Capito—author of Exitus illustrium virorum—is to perform “a religious duty” (Pliny, ep ..f.). While Roman religion has a tendency to resist literacy and the concept of literature, there are nonetheless several visible points of contact between religion and history-writing in Roman culture. It is against this background, specifically in the early Imperial period, that we will evaluate to what extent the gospel writings function as both religious communication and historiography. In the earliest stages of Christianity, the link between “religious communication” and “historiography” is forged in the field of literary memory. The gospel writings and Acts stem directly from a community considered distinct on religious grounds by non–Christ-believers (Acts :: “Nazarenes”; :: “Christians”; Epictetus, ..ff.: “Jews”; ..: “Galileans”) and Christ-believers (e.g., ἐκκλησία) alike. The relationship of Mark and Luke-Acts to religious literature stricto sensu is not as clear, for instance, as that of the Sibylline Books in the context of Roman religion (see above): religious texts are generally defined as such based on their “cultic use and the status given upon them” by the religious community. We do not have any evidence that either the gospel literature or Acts ever functioned in a cultic or liturgical setting until at least the second half of the nd century CE. The Patristic data, including Eusebius (h e ..-), might shed light on the actual use of, and audience for, the gospel, albeit in a much later period. It is difficult, however, to extrapolate historical

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information based on Patristic sources which are themselves mired in “literary conventions.” What, in fact, do we actually know about the audience(s) of Mark and Luke-Acts and its/their socio-religious setting prior to the beginning of the nd century? The question requires that we consider the issue from both an insider and outsider perspective. A group of Christ-believers originating in a Palestinian- or Hellenistic-Jewish diaspora milieu, such as Paul, initially spread out to the major cities of the Mediterranean (e.g., Antioch on the Orontes, Ephesus, Corinth), ultimately reaching Rome via Syria, Asia, and Greece (see also Suetonius, Claud .). A variety of passages in the New Testament indicate the significance of a belief in Christ from an insider perspective. In  Thess :f., Paul summarizes the content of his prior gospel proclamation in Thessalonica: “how you turned to God from idols, to serve a living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come.” The author of the Markan Gospel clearly takes for granted that Christological declarations are central to both gospel proclamation and gospel story (see Rom :); Peter’s confession that Jesus of Nazareth is “the Christ” (Mk :) effectively maps out Mark’s status as insider. The group of Christ-believers is early on identified as a specific religious movement. Epictetus might be considered as an early auctor adversus Christianos (see ..ff.; ..). Pliny’s th letter, an important source in terms of both history and literature, provides useful insights as to how Christ-believers were perceived by outsiders in the early nd century CE. The letter confirms the New Testament account of the origins of Christbelieving communities. The letter is addressed to Emperor Trajan; at this early date, Christians were perceived by the Romans as a distinct religious group. Indeed, Pliny describes the Christians as members of a superstitio, or “wretched cult” (ep ..), by which he means members of a political society (hetaeria ep ..). The politically nuanced term superstitio, which is addressed against others but which also serves Roman cultural selfdefinition, is not exceptional as a label for Christ-believers. The same invective, directed specifically against Christ-believers, occurs in the writings of Suetonius (Nero ) and Tacitus (ann ..). Christians, however, are not the only targets. Jews are also accused of superstitio (δε[ι]σιδαιμονία), as indicated in the writings of Josephus, Strabo, Quintilian, and Suetonius (geogr ./; inst or ..; Tiberius ). Tacitus also refers to Jewish religion as a superstitio (hist .; see also

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:; ann ..). In his excursus on the Jews, he accounts for Jewish superstitio from a historical point of view: the Seleucid king Antiochus “endeavoured to abolish Jewish superstition and to introduce Greek civilization” (rex Antiochus demere superstitionem et mores Greacorum dare adnisus), while the Hasmoneans “fostered the national superstition, for they had assumed the priesthood to support their civil authority” (superstitionem fovebant, quia honor sacerdotii firmamentum potentiae adsumebatur). Both groups—Jews and Christ-believers—are accused of superstitio. The distinction between Jews and Christ-believers is not always apparent to Roman authors (see Suetonius, Claud .). The accusation of superstitio is both literary topos and polemical stereotype; it is frequently deployed against religious groups which do not conform to the milieu of Greco-Roman religion. In Acts :, however, the stereotype is subverted: Paul describes the “men of Athens” to be κατὰ πάντα ὡς δεισιδαιμονεστέρους ὑμᾶς. But let us return to Pliny and his letter to the emperor, as it provides valuable insights into outsider perspectives on the religious and social activities of Christian assemblies. Pliny writes that within the formal trials (..: cognitio), some of the Christ-believers denied the charge and declared that the sum total of their guilt or error [vel culpae suae vel erroris] amounted to no more than this: they had met regularly before dawn on a fixed day to chant verses alternately among themselves in honour of Christ as if to a god [Christo quasi deo], and also to bind themselves by oath, not for any criminal purpose, but to abstain from theft, robbery and adultery, to commit no breach of trust and not to deny a deposit when called upon to restore it. After this ceremony it had been their custom [morem] to disperse and reassemble later to take food of an ordinary, harmless kind.

Similar remarks were formulated when describing Jewish customs, cults, and rites (e.g., Agatharchides of Cnidus [see Josephus, cAp .]; Tacitus, hist ..ff.; Plutarch, de superstitione ). Pliny’s account of the cultic activities of Christ-believers, however, extends beyond mere description. He interprets the movement of Christ-believers (Christiani) as a profession of faith in that Christ-believers refuse to do “reverence to your [the emperor’s] statue and the images of the gods” (..). In other words, belief in Christ generates specific behaviors in addition to cultic practices. Moreover, the movement of Christ-believers had political relevance for the Romans, particularly in light of Trajan’s prohibitions against the forming of associations or clubs (collegia) on the grounds that a company had the potential to

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transition to a “political club” (hetaeriae) and cause “political disturbances” (ep .). Romans clearly perceived Christians to be a distinct religious group. Christians neither participated in the day-to-day activities of Roman citizens nor adopted the customs associated with Greco-Roman religions. The distinctiveness of Christians was therefore, from a Roman perspective, significant in socio-political terms—even though religious (cultic) plurality had been on the increase since the st century BCE and posed an ongoing challenge to Roman-ness (romanitas, first mentioned in Tertullian, de pall ). Pliny does not mention that the Christiani were somehow bound to a fundamental set of religious writings. With the exception of the philosopher Celsus, the Greco-Roman authors also fail to mention the existence of foundational—or scriptural—texts in their depictions of Judaism and in their polemics against Jews. In terms of literary awareness, Moses is frequently mentioned, either in the guise of lawgiver (νομοθέτης) or as the founder of “new religious practices” (e.g., Tacitus, hist ..: novus ritus). Only much later, in the Christian era, is Moses considered to have authored (sacred) writings (e.g., those of Porphyry). The religious status of Jews and Christ-believers, in the period under discussion, is clearly dependent on the rites, cults, and group behaviors (ethos) which set them apart from Roman society: outsiders (non-Christians) do not define Christians on the basis of their relation to sacred writings. The only exception to that rule is Lucian’s depiction of Christians in Peregrinus (Pereg ). Indeed, the link between sacred text and Christian community, apart from a few exceptions, is rarely made explicit even in the Christian writings themselves. One such exception is the short note—πᾶσα γραφὴ θεόπνευστος—in  Tim :. For New Testament authors, of course, the term γραφή (always) points to the Septuagint. In fact, it is not until  CE, in the Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs, that an explicit statement is made that Christians have a tie to religious literature of their own. This text describes a company of Christians who confess their belief with reference to fundamental Christian texts—namely, the gospels and the Pauline letters—which they have in their possession. The Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs reflects the situation as it was at the end of the nd century CE; the New Testament writings had already achieved a precanonical status. A similar claim is documented in Marcion and the earliest papyrus manuscripts (e.g., P). We should keep in mind that the gospel writings and Acts, despite being primarily affiliated to a religious setting and religious

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memory, were neither composed nor read or considered as religious literature at the time of their inception in the sense of functioning as objects of religious practice, but rather point to the emergence of early Christian literary activity. From an outsider perspective, the Christiani were not defined in terms of their affinity to sacred, or foundational, texts. From inside the tradition, it is evident that Christ-believers identified with and adhered to the Septuagint. As much as depictions of the past in Mark and Luke-Acts are related to religion, these early Christian writings focus on communication and religious literary commemoration rather than on the shape of religious—or sacred—literature. This does not imply, however, that, in early Christian times, there was no production of literature. The gospel writings and Acts are not simply the products of collective communicative and/or commemorative practices. Indeed, while not conceptualized as religious literature, the gospel writings and Acts are de facto a kind of literature that is carefully designed by individual authors: the early Christian authors conceptualize, interpret, and construct the past in a literary sense as narrative. On the basis of these insights, we may now turn our attention to the field of generics.

Generics: Historiography as a Prose Narrative How do we define history-writing as designed by individual authors? We begin by recognizing, in greater detail, its literary and generic dimensions. Our objective in this section is to gain deeper insights into the literary genres, forms, and styles of ancient historiography, including those of early Christianity. Texts as diverse as Tacitus’s Annales, Josephus’s Bellum Judaicum, the Markan Gospel, and Rabbinic literature can be approached as sources. Historical sources are in turn used to reconstruct the history of the Roman Empire or, in our case, the history of Roman Palestine. The interpretive possibilities inherent in historiographical literature from the st and nd centuries CE, however, go far beyond a purely reconstructive paradigm. Indeed, reconstructing past “reality” is not our task. We will rather consider historiography as an important component in the field of ancient literary history. It is no accident that Velleius Paterculus, in his diversified excursus into literary history, treats history-writing as a subfield of literature proper. Velleius evaluates historians—as he does poets, rhetoricians, and philosophers—according to criteria that are specifically literary (.–).

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He defines Sallust as an imitator of Thucydides (..: semulumque Thucydidis Sallustium) and Livy as a successor of Sallust (..: consecutus Sallustium Livius). Quintilian, the compiler of a well-known list of historiographical authors, intriguingly points out that Roman history “need not yield the prize to the Greeks” (inst or ..). He holds historiography in such high literary regard (inst or ..–) that he identifies historywriting as the basic phenotype of prose. It is at this juncture that we encounter a phenomenon known as the genre debate. While the term genre is of modern derivation, the phenomenon of distinguishing between diverse types of literature was nonetheless well known in antiquity, beginning with Aristotle. Quintilian’s summary of texts and their authors (inst or ) is one of the oldest systematizations of literary texts according to genre. Quintilian’s reflection on literary history is contemporaneous with New Testament times. His list functions as the basis for a typology of history-writing from which we may determine what literary options exist for writers in terms of genre. Distinctions between epic, poetry, and prose were commonplace in antiquity. Suetonius’s awareness of these literary distinctions can be traced back to his Vita Vergili, where he notes that Virgil wrote the initial draft of the Aeneid in prose (prosa) prior to transforming it “into verse, one part after another” ().

Rise and Character of the Prose Style Toward the close of the Roman Republic and in the early years of the Principate—a period of time which directly predates the New Testament writings—we encounter a remarkable assortment of Roman authors, including Lucan, Virgil, Ovid, Cornelius Nepos, Livy, and Velleius Paterculus. These authors illustrate the spectrum of literary genres which were used to depict the memory of the past. The literary field which addresses and conceptualizes Roman history is a broad one: past-time events are represented by means of epic, poetry, as well as prose. Three of Rome’s most iconic writers—Virgil, Lucan, and Ovid— conceptualize the past through the genres of epic and poetry. Their literary output earned them a place not only in the literary canon, but also in the cultural memory of the Western world. Reception history is therefore key to understanding how these ancient writers who dealt with the past have been both perceived and interpreted over time. Remarkably enough, Otfrid of Weissenburg—a Germanic author writing in the th century

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CE—describes the above-mentioned triad of prophet-like authors (vates) as exemplifying the poetic depiction of the deeds of their ancestors (quod gentilium vates, ut Virgilius, Lucanus, Ovidius caeterique quam plurimi suorum facta decorarent lingua nativa). The impact of Virgil, Lucan, and Ovid on literary history extends well beyond the Middle Ages. Indeed, Dante Alighieri makes reference to this same group of outstanding ancient authors in his Divina commedia (..–). Otfrid’s effusive praise indicates not only that Virgil, Lucan, and Ovid are well known in this period, but also that they are understood to be both poets and historians. But how, precisely, did ancient Roman authors depict the Roman past? How did they gain their reputations and cultural standing? Virgil, the most popular of Roman authors, gives shape in his Aeneid to a historical epos rather than to a mythical text. He makes use of traditions on the Roman past deriving from Roman historians such as Cato and Dionysius of Halicarnassus. By creating an epic text, Virgil situates himself in a literary tradition initiated some centuries earlier by Homer and Hesiod. The historian Lucan also wrote an epos on the Roman civil war (De bello civili): “Bella per Emathios plus quam civilia campos / Iusque datum sceleri canimus” (.f.). What, then, are the literary specifics of epic literature? In terms of form, epic texts are closely related to poetry in that they are styled as hexameter. Indeed, Quintilian counts the writers of epic texts among the poets (inst or ..–). With regard to content, epic traffics in the realm of extraordinary people and events. The authors of epic texts have no interest whatsoever in ordinary, day-to-day life. Lucan, however, is an exception to the rule of epic writers. He prefers an immanent understanding of historical events. Lucan’s anomalous attempt at modernizing the epos genre finds neither forerunner nor successor among epic writers. The Lucianic corpus confirms that, in the period of the early Principate, a variety of literary genres were considered a valid means by which to encapsulate written accounts of human history. The elegiac author Ovid—a contemporary of Virgil and Lucan—depicts Roman feasts (Fasti) in poetic form. His accounts of Roman traditions are history-oriented. He transforms the cultural memories and traditions which were handed down to him—the Lucretia story (.–), for instance—into literature, or more specifically, poetry. In the three cases discussed above, are we encountering history? Can we refer to either Virgil, Lucan, or Ovid as a “historian”? The differences involved in the writing of history versus that of either epic or poetry are brought to the fore in contemporary Roman literary

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theory. The rhetorician Quintilian instructs his pupils in the correct use of both poetry and history for the purpose of oratory. The function of poetry or history in oratory, however, varies according to genre: “From the poets,” says Quintilian, “we can get inspiration in thought, sublimity in language, every kind of emotional effect, and appropriateness in character-drawing” (inst or ..). History, he continues, “is very close to the poets. In a sense it is a prose poem, and it is written to tell a story, not to prove a point. Moreover, it is wholly designed not for practical effect and present conflicts, but to preserve a memory for future generations and for the glory of its author’s talents” (inst or ..: proxima poetis . . . et scribitur ad narrandum, non ad probandum, totumque opus non ad actum rei pugnamque praesentem sed ad memoriam posteritatis et ingenii famam componitur). Quintilian points out the affinity of poetry and historiography in such a way that the discrepancy between both genres and that of oratory is made clear. The orator is in need of examples (exempla) which can be found in either historiography, oral entertainment (conscripta sunt historiis aut sermonibus), or the field of poetry (inst or ..). Elsewhere, however, Quintilian reveals an affinity between historiography and rhetoric: history-writing has significant material impact on the teaching of oratory. For Quintilian, history lies at the intersection of rhetoric and poetry: “There is indeed another use for history. . . . It derives from the knowledge of facts and parallels” (inst or ..: ex cognitione rerum exemplorumque). Unlike the primarily fictitious and fantastic subject matter of poetry, historiography addresses paradigmatic events (res). It is precisely this issue of “event” which defines and impacts the choice of literary genre which seems most appropriate to both oratory and historiography: that of prose. There is, indeed, a correlation between history-writing and oratory/ rhetoric. On the one hand, history provides examples (exempla) for the orator. These exempla are an element of ancient history-writing—they consequently have a specific impact on the perception of time and history. We will return to this question in greater depth in Chapter . At this juncture, only the rhetorical implications of history-writing need concern us. According to the Rhetorica ad Herennium, an exemplum is not a proof; rather, it helps in demonstrating what the author is going to say (..: exempla demonstratur id, quod dicimus, cuismodi sit). Based on Cicero’s use of the term, we might define the function of an exemplum as follows: “By an historical exemplum, I mean a specific reference to an individual, a group of individuals, or an event in the past which is intended to serve as a

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moral-didactic guide to conduct.” On the other hand, by embedding literary speeches in history-writing so as to include exempla, the historian must have recourse to rhetoric. John Marincola indicates that the “historical exemplum” is indeed grounded in rhetoric (both epideictic and deliberative; see also Quintilian, inst or ..). The exemplum in history-writing is judged less in terms of its historical accuracy than for its interpretive, or hermeneutical, dimension: “when a speaker brings forward an exemplum, he is, in a very important sense, interpreting a historical event as meaning something.” It is precisely its rhetorical styling that constitutes the narrative account as an interpretation and construction of history. In chapter  of Acts, Luke makes use of exempla within the framework of Stephen’s speech. Beyond Acts , Luke presents a variety of stories (e.g., miracles) which have an exemplary function for his narrative in the gospel as well as Acts. Indeed, already in Mark the episodic style functions in an exemplary fashion. Quintilian has two reasons for drawing attention to the relation between history and poetry. On the one hand, by clearly demarcating poetry from the writing of history, he hopes to clarify the distinction between fiction and events. On the other hand, he also lays emphasis on the didactic function of history, in that history is the material basis for the shaping and enriching of oratory. Suetonius similarly underscores the significance of historiographical works for the purpose of “debates” (De grammaticis et rhetoribus .: veteres controversiae . . . ex historiis trahebantur). Thus, history and oratory do intersect—albeit for the purpose of distinguishing one from the other. What are the implications of these conclusions for our approach to history-writing? Do we need to approach historiography primarily, or even exclusively, in terms of its rhetorical dimensions? The question reflects a recent historiographical trend in the field of classics and New Testament studies. Indeed, if we go back and forth in the history of ancient rhetoric, we encounter several statements considering the merits of using history for the purpose of studying oratory. Pliny, in particular, takes up Quintilian’s ideas on the close affinity between history and oratory. However, he lays additional stress on the extent to which history-writing is specifically a phenotype of prose: It is true that oratory and history have much in common. . . . Both employ narrative, but with a difference: oratory deals largely with the humble and trivial incidents of everyday life, history is concerned with profound truths and the glory of great deeds. . . . Oratory succeeds by its vigour and severity

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For Pliny, historiography is the highest form of prose. His definition also implies that prose is the most appropriate literary style for the writing of history. In sum, Pliny draws historiography and oratory in close relation. His objective in doing so, however, is to emphasize the appropriate literary style, in terms of genre, for writing history. We therefore cannot conclude that history-writing was in any way identical with rhetoric. Indeed, rhetoricians had a critical attitude toward historiography. While they may have relied on history-writing to provide the material basis for the composing of oratory (see also Quintilian, inst or ..; ..), rhetoricians are also a source of criticism—often extending beyond the merely literary—of both historians and historiography (inst or ..; ..f.; .., with what is perhaps an inaccurate reference to Cicero, de orat .). Their critical remarks are partly due to the fact that Roman history, unlike the rich tradition of Greek history-writing, was, in its inception, limited to the documentation of annales maximi or to the depiction of places, facts, and events (Cicero, de orat .–). Cicero even goes so far as to claim that Greek historians such as Herodotus and Thucydides were trained in rhetoric (de orat .f.). Cicero, however, also makes note of a significant difference between history and oratory. In De optimo genere oratorum, he writes: For it is one thing to set forth events in a historical narrative [res gestas narrando], and another to present arguments to either refute a charge or to clinch a case against an opponent. It is one thing to hold an auditor while telling a story, and another to arouse him. . . . For the orator whom we are seeking must treat cases in court in a style suitable to instruct, to delight, and to move. Therefore, if there shall ever be a man who professes to plead cases in court in the style of Thucydides, he will prove that he has not the faintest notion of what goes on in political and legal life [in re civili et forensi]. But if he is content to praise Thucydides, let him enter my vote beside his. (.f.)

It therefore becomes evident that history-writing and oratory differ in terms of both their Sitz im Leben and their intended audiences. Cicero, moreover, draws our attention to an even more elementary distinction: history takes the form of narrative, whereas oratory functions more as

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disputation. Despite the fact that they serve one another, history and oratory in fact converge only at the point of prose: history provides exempla whereas oratory teaches the rhetorical techniques necessary for the effective composition of speeches. History-writing and oratory represent different sets of literary skills and serve divergent ends in ancient culture and society. Each therefore needs to be investigated as an independent phenomenon. Only in this way can history and oratory be contextualized within the broader framework of ancient literary history (see, e.g., Quintilian, inst or ..ff.). We will now consider historiographical authors who structure the past neither as poetry nor as epic, but within the context of prose. Writers in the early Roman Imperial period such as Cornelius Nepos, Livy, and Velleius Paterculus all composed history-oriented prose narratives. The prose trend in Roman historiography was initiated by Fabius Pictor. Only after him can we truly claim that “a prose tradition had begun to take shape.” Historywriting is thus not only defined by its content—the narrative collection of memories and traditions and the depiction of past times—but also by its literary form. In the ancient world, at least since the time of Herodotus, history-writing relies on prose and does not conform per se to either poetry or epos. Narrative is best suited to the representation of facts and events, just as oratory provides the best form in which to present an argument. More specifically, history is the product of the conceptualization of memories and past-time events via the medium of prose. Genre, content, and pragmatics are closely interrelated. All the literary forms and genres of ancient literature serve specific interests. The same is probably true of Israelite-Jewish literature: the diverse forms of (pre)historiographical texts such as lists, annals, narrative accounts, and legends are put into prose form. Biography (vita) and history-writing are phenotypes of prose. But how are they related to one another? Are we dealing with macro- and microtypes of prose? Cornelius Nepos, one of the most famous authors of the st century BCE, is considered both the inventor of Roman biography and the forerunner of Plutarch in writing comparative lives. Nepos writes with awareness of his objectives. The praefatio to his Liber de excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium provides a theoretical reflection on his literary goals: Nepos expects his books to be read by many (plerosque). He also reveals his literary intentions. In the introduction to his biography on the Theban statesman and general Pelopidas (th century BCE), he formulates a preliminary distinction between history-writing stricto sensu—such as we find in the contemporary works of Livy and Velleius Paterculus—and

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biography: “Pelopidas, the Theban, is better known to historians than to the general public. I am in doubt how to give an account of his merits; for I fear that if I undertake to tell of his deeds, I shall seem to be writing a history rather than a biography” (..: si res explicare incipiam, ne non vitam eius enarrare, sed historiam videar scribere). While biography (vita) tends to focus on an individual’s character, attitude, and behavior, history-writing focuses on deeds (res). Nepos identified vita and historia as two different types or modes of depicting the past long before biography was established as a HellenisticRoman genre in the st and nd centuries CE (see Suetonius, Plutarch). Even at this early stage, he recognized that authorial intention was circumscribed by the expectations of the audience. He makes note of his regard both for “the weariness” and “the lack of information of my readers” (ibid.). Nepos’s style of biography-writing becomes evident when we consider his technique: while he repeatedly makes reference to historians such as Thucydides (..), the “material which he needed for his Greek subjects was available in the biographical literature of that country, such as the works of Antigonus of Carystus, Hermippus and Satyrus.” Nepos basically rewrites existing narrative accounts instead of conceptualizing the Greco-Roman past on his own. In order to determine more precisely how historiography and biography diverge in Hellenistic literature, we need to reconsider Polybius, who plays an important role in the formation of Hellenistic historiography. He acts as a transmitter by forging an explicit link between Classical Greek and Hellenistic-Roman historiography. Thucydides anchored his methodology in both autopsy and the critical evaluation of sources. It is Polybius who transmits Thucydidean ideas on history-writing to the age of Hellenism and into the future of historywriting (e.g., ..e). Polybius produced a written reflection on the various aims and functions of history-writing. For Polybius, historiography has to be “pragmatic” (..). It has to choose a form of representation that is subject-oriented and that is not based on either rhetoricizing or dramatizing elements (see ..). In the course of arguing against the Hellenistic historian Phylarchus, Polybius explains what he himself considers to be the objective of historywriting: For the object of tragedy is not the same as that of history but quite the opposite. The tragic poet should thrill and charm his audience for the moment by the verisimilitude of the words he puts into his characters’

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mouth, but it is the task of the historian to instruct and convince for all time serious students by the truth of the facts and the speeches he narrates, since in the one case it is the probable that takes precedence, even if it be untrue, the purpose being to create illusion in spectators, [while] in the other it is the truth, the purpose being to confer benefit on learners. (..ff.)

Polybius clearly holds the didactic function of history-writing in high esteem. His argumentation reveals that, for him, history-writing’s prime objective is to instruct people so that they themselves might make informed political and military decisions. Polybius also draws a preliminary distinction between history-writing in its narrower sense (micro-dimension) and historiography in its broader sense (macro-dimension). He thereby provides a more detailed account as to how such a distinction might correspond to the literary phenotypes of historiography and biography. In the Histories, Polybius includes a biographical excursus on the famous Greek statesman and general Philopoimen (hist .ff.), also known as the “last Greek” (ἔσχατος Ἑλλήνων: see, e.g., Plutarch, Philop .). Polybius begins this excursus with a positive evaluation of biographical literature: “It is indeed a strange thing that authors should narrate circumstantially the foundations of cities . . . while they pass over in silence the previous training and the objects of the men who directed the whole matter. . . . For inasmuch as it is more possible to emulate and to imitate living men than lifeless buildings, so much more important for the improvement of a reader is it to learn about the former” (hist ..f.). Interestingly enough, the above-cited statement—an ethical impetus for the writing of biographical literature— recurs in modern times. We refer to it as the Lebensorientierung of historians, after the work of Dilthey and Nietzsche. As a historian, Polybius, who is convinced that the “dignity of history” demands men like Odysseus (..), says: “we might surmise from this passage . . . that Polybius was thinking of himself as the Homeric champion of history writing.” Polybius is quite aware of the moral advantages afforded by the literary subgenre of biography, since biographies focus on individual lives. A few centuries later, in the biography Philopoimen, Plutarch picks up on the concept of ethics in biographical literature. Plutarch follows Polybius (e.g., Philop .) in his narrative, but emphasizes his own specific interests, namely, the depiction of Philopoimen’s character (Philop .). Plutarch deduces the quality of Philopoimen’s character based on the concrete facts of Philopoimen’s military involvement in the Greek resistance against Rome. Plutarch concludes (Philop .) that Philopoimen “not only seemed

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to be, but actually was, a most excellent man” (ὁ ἀνὴρ . . . ἄριστος). In the biography Alexander, Plutarch explains his methodological approach in greater detail. He explicitly states (e.g., Alex ) that he wishes to write about the past in the form of βίος since his intention is to portray the character of the human person (τὰ τῆς ψυχῆς σημεῖα) and to reveal ἀρετή and κακία. By the st and nd centuries CE, biography had become an eminent literary genre whose importance in the field of ancient history-writing was on the increase. We thus need to consider carefully what the writing of biography really means and implies, and how exactly it may be distinguished not only from history-writing, but also from gospel-writing (see below). Friedrich Leo once identified two basic types of ancient biography: the peripatetic and the Alexandrian. While subsequently criticized for its excessive neatness, Leo’s analysis is nonetheless useful as it identifies the type of biographical literature that can be subsumed to historiography in the broader sense. In terms of macro-genre the authors of these biographies are those nearest to New Testament times. Leo has categorized the works of Plutarch as peripatetic biography. Peripatetic biography is basically chronological. Plutarch, for example, tells the story of Philopoimen in chronological sequence. Indeed, the conclusion of Philopoimen is most telling of Plutarch’s chronological approach: the eponymous hero is old (.), sickly (.–), and, finally, as a prisoner, is forced to commit suicide (.–.). After reporting Philopoimen’s death (λόγος τῆς τελευτῆς), Plutarch provides additional information on Philopoimen’s cremation (.), burial (.), and the later honors decreed him by various cities (.–). The Alexandrian type of biography—exemplified in works such as the Lives of the Caesars by Suetonius—are arranged, according to Leo, topically and systematically. In his Augustus vita, Suetonius provides an illuminating conceptual map of the composition of his book: “Having given as it were a summary of his life [proposita vitae eius velut summa partes], I shall now take up its various phases one by one, not in chronological order, but by classes [neque per tempora sed per species exsequar], to make the account clearer and more intelligible” (Aug ). While Plutarch deploys biography in the service of challenging or even superseding the field of historiography, Suetonius is more interested in the specific conceptual function of biography as human exempla. The Plutarch/Suetonius divide is instructive in terms of the breadth of the literary ambitions of biographers in the nd century CE.

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Historiography as a Macro- and a Micro-Genre The classification of literary genres is a sensitive matter. We must be attentive to the fact that while Plutarch and Suetonius concentrated on biography, Tacitus worked to further history-writing. Authors of biographical literature tend to focus on individuals as exempla. The function of a biography is—as per Plutarch (Alex )—less to report on human acts (πράξεις) than to reveal character (ἦθος). Human virtue then makes itself manifest in ρῆμα and παιδία. Historians, by contrast, focus on deeds as events (πράξεις, facta, res); they focus on specific topics (e.g., Bellum Judaicum) or intervals of time (e.g., Civil War or Flavian Dynasty). Herein lies the basic, indeed the crucial, difference in authorial conceptualizations of the past. Hubert Cancik has convincingly argued that HellenisticRoman historiography is best approached as history-writing broadly speaking. Indeed, the phenomenon of depicting the past in HellenisticRoman times is widespread and manifold. We can detect a huge increase in literary forms and genres that deal with the past. In order to differentiate more precisely between the diverse types of ancient prose in which the cultural memory of the past was perceived and conceptualized as history, we will, in the following section, distinguish between historiography in the broader sense and historiography in the narrower sense. generic distinctions

Historiography in the broader sense (macro-dimension) functions as an umbrella term. It includes all prose texts dealing with past-time events in various literary forms and genres: biography, autobiography, ethnography, subject-oriented monograph, to name a few. Historiography in the narrower sense (micro-dimension) designates an “especially highly developed form of historiography” as defined by historians such as Thucydides, Polybius, Sallust, and Tacitus. Historiography in the narrow sense is distinct from biography. The above-cited authors share common ideas concerning not only the how of investigating and writing a proper history, but also the why. Their scientific approach to history-writing includes everything from the selection of appropriate subject matter all the way to the consideration of target audiences. Finally, it is in the context of narrow-sense history-writing that the historian himself testifies as to the accuracy of his investigation. The ancient authors themselves were already aware of the distinction between history-writing and biography. The awareness, from the point of

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view of history-writing, translates as a form of cautiousness: biography can serve to glorify its protagonist. Indeed, the production of biography increased in Hellenistic times with the emergence of the so-called court historians. By the time of the Roman Principate, biographical literature was a predominant—albeit often panegyric—form of history-writing. As such it became a “vehicle of historiography.” For Polybius, the crucial difference between biography and historiography lies in function: while biography, like encomium (ἐγκωμιαστικός), demands “a summary and somewhat exaggerated account” of individual achievement, history, which “distributes praise and blame impartially, demands a strictly true account and one which states the ground on which either praise or blame is based” (hist ..). While biography seeks to propagate the renown of select individuals, history seeks to recognize truth as it is revealed by sequences of historical events as they occur within a set period of time. The distinction between history-writing and biography thus has ethical implications. Not only were Roman authors aware that biography functioned as a phenotype—or subgenre—of historiography, they further developed and systematized these perceptions. In his letter to Novius Maximus, Pliny includes a type of obituary for his deceased contemporary Gaius Fannius. He therein extols Fannius’s literary acumen in the field of biography: “he was bringing out a history of the various fates of the people put to death or banished by Nero. His accuracy in research and pure Latin style [subtiles et diligentes] (which was midway between the discursive and historical [inter sermonem historiamque medios]) were evident in the three volumes he had already finished and he was all the more anxious to complete the series when he saw how eagerly the first books were read by a large public” (Pliny, ep ..). In terms of genre, biographical literature occupies the literary space between sermo and historia. Biography is therefore distinct from historiography. Pliny, however, goes a step further. In the process of reflecting on biographical literature, he alludes to the idea of subtypes functioning as “exitus” narratives: Just as biography is a subgenre of historiography, the literature of the exitus illustrium virorum (e.g., ep ..f.) might best be considered a subtype of biography. Therefore biography, like historiography, has an “inclusive character.” Pliny astutely identifies history as macro-genre, biography as one of its subgenres, and the exitus literature as a subtype of biography. It therefore seems reasonable to take up Cancik’s system of classification and to simply produce a more nuanced account (Table ). We can

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accept the fact that historiography in its broader sense, as prose, generates a variety of text types that deal with the past. Historiography encompasses a variety of literary subgenres, including ethnography, biography, and narrower-sense historiography. Based on the methodological conceptualizations of such eminent historians as Thucydides, Polybius, and Tacitus, we define only the latter—historiography in the narrow sense—as historywriting stricto sensu. Table : Overview of Historiography as a Macro- and a Micro-Genre Historiography in the broader sense (historiography as a “macro-genre”)

Historiography in the narrower sense (historiography as a “micro-genre”)

Includes, e.g., the micro- or subgenres of biography (e.g., exitus illustrium virorum; political biographies; philosophical biographies), autobiography, ethnography, topic-oriented monographs such as bellum literature and commentarii, and personcentered monographs such as gospel writings. Includes annals and histories.

gospel writings as person-centered narratives

How do we apply these classifications to Mark and Luke-Acts? We will begin with a phenomenological and descriptive approach. The gospel writings focus on events relating to the proclamation of the εὐαγγέλιον. These events took place in Roman Palestine within a relatively short period of time. Indeed, in the Markan Gospel, the events unfurl within the span of one year. Thus the gospel writings are to some degree contributions to local, or regional, history. Despite being embedded in a master narrative (see below), the gospels and Acts also constitute a new story, not only in terms of content, but also as regards their historiographical focus and their generic concept. These texts all depict the beginnings of the gospel proclamation in the style of continuous narrative. We find no literature comparable to the gospel writings in the ancient world in regard to either topic, time span, or micro-historical focus. As I have argued elsewhere, we might therefore speak of the gospel writings as a genre sui generis, particularly in terms of content. This claim, however, can only be maintained if we contextualize the gospels in the broad framework of ancient history-writing. The genre sui generis depiction is therefore not an exclusive one, but rather functions inclusively. Literary innovation, of course, is one side of the coin, but continuity is its other side: in terms of literary history, and like all pieces of

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literature, the gospels are the result of a productive tension between repetitio and creatio. The gospels, however, add a new subgenre to the field of historywriting, which means that their impact is also a genre-constructive one. In Acts, the gospel concept is applied to the field of missionary history. The emergence of the gospel genre makes a genuine contribution to ancient literary history. Its particular person-centered perspective broadens the already manifold field of historiographical literature produced during Hellenistic-Roman times. We can observe a similar process of literary expansion, for instance, in the field of Hellenistic-Roman epistolography, where new subgenres augment the already-existing macro-genres. The many genres originating in the Jewish literary milieu—the proliferation of apocalyptic literature (including Dan ,  Ezr,  and  Enoch) being the most obvious example—adds further support to the idea that literary innovation, in the Hellenistic period, was in the ascendant. From a Roman point of view, it is by no means unusual for the gospel writers to have created new types of literature. To give shape to new literary genres was rather a highly respected practice in Roman culture. Velleius Paterculus commends a certain Pomponius for having invented a new kind of literature. Velleius’s offhand remark echoes these wishes for literary innovation expressed by the so-called Neoterics, or by Horace in his famous letter to Augustus (ep .). Velleius, of course, cannot have had gospel writings in mind, but his enthusiasm for the dynamics involved in the shaping of new types of literary subgenres is unmistakable, as is his acknowledgment of the actual phenomenon. The gospel writers indeed productively challenge a well-established literary macro-genre, one that embraces diverse types of history-writing: the genre of historiography. From a macro-genre point of view, early Christian literature constitutes a genuine contribution to the broad field of HellenisticRoman literary culture. We can thus preliminarily conclude that the gospel writings correspond, in terms of genre or subgenre (“gospel”), to the category of history-writing in prose. Like biography, early Christian writings are a subgenre of historiography proper. The gospels are very unlike biography, however, in that they generically parallel biography. Indeed, the gospel writings presuppose an already established biography genre. This description by no means implies that the gospel writings should be read as historical accounts (bruta facta). Indeed, a reader’s expectation of historical accuracy guarantees a misreading of the narrative concept of Mark and Luke-Acts. The above-mentioned description serves as a classification of the gospel writings from the point of view of literary history. In literary parlance, the

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gospels are cognates of Greco-Roman biographies rather than actual biographies. That said, however, the gospels do share with ancient biographies the concept of focusing on a person. From Mk : onwards, Jesus is definitely the focal point of the narrative. The Markan Gospel therefore displays the features of a person-centered narrative. As mentioned earlier, however, not all ancient person-centered historiographical literature can be classified as biography. The early Jewish historiographer Artapanus (FGrHist ) composes person-centered narratives (Judaica and On the Jews) which are historiographical monographs rather than biographies: they focus on events and deeds rather than on the protagonist as such. In addition to the above-mentioned distinctions between historiography and biography which were based on a genre typology, we will now investigate how a person-centered concept works. The main question is: How does the depiction or treatment of a “person” within the framework of ancient history-writing differ from character portrayal in a βίος? These insights will finally help us to better understand how Luke-Acts succeeded Mark. How might we provide a more detailed account of person-centric historiography? Writing in , Ivo Bruns explored the conceptualization of personhood (Persönlichkeit) in ancient history-writing. His work explored the technical aspects of the configuration of persons. In the framework of history-writing, Bruns concluded that the process is a specifically literary one. Since Bruns’s publication, “major characters” and “minor characters” in historiographical writings—as distinct from biography—have been analyzed on the basis of literary technique. What results did Bruns reach? Contrary to contemporary literary theory, Bruns worked out a more concise typology: he distinguishes between a subjectivistic, or direct, depiction of characters such as we find in Polybius’s narrative Scipio (.–), and an indirect evaluation of characters, one that lies hidden within the narrative itself (e.g., Livy on Scipio: ..–). An indirect evaluation of character can be traced back to the writings of Thucydides. Its presentation consists of: () judgment by contemporaries, () impact on contemporaries and () the person’s attributed speech, or dicta. Bruns’s observations provide useful guidelines for analyzing the manner in which persons acting as protagonists, in the framework of history-writing, are presented. Interestingly enough, we find the same indirect evaluation of characters in the Markan Gospel: Mark’s narrative conforms to the configuration of persons in ancient history-writing. First, contemporaries who pass judgment on Jesus’s missionary activities are explicitly mentioned (e.g., Mk :–;

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:–; :). It is interesting to see that Jesus himself evokes judgment (Mk :–). The author of the Markan Gospel obviously intended his Jesus character to be represented as a person. Jesus’s identity, however, is only revealed in the tension between declaration (Mk :; :; :) and what—since the work of William Wrede ()—we call the “Messianic secret.” Mark the author portrays Jesus as a person who conceals his identity. Unlike the styling of persons in Hellenistic-Roman history-writing, Jesus is intentionally configured as a person whose real identity needs to be kept secret. We are dealing here with a narrative element that is typical of Mark. How might we best explain it? We can maintain that Mark’s concept of secrecy reflects the enigmatic discourse on secrecy and Christology among Jesus-followers and Christ-believers. Indeed, the indistinct role played by Elijah, as a literary typology for the Jesus-personification, exemplifies the uncertainty surrounding Christological discourse in Mark’s time. Against such a background, Mark’s concept of secrecy would only have had a preliminary literary function. The narrative of the Markan Gospel in fact counteracts strategies of secrecy. Indeed, as Werner H. Kelber has most convincingly argued, the Markan narrative ultimately serves to unveil the gospel proclamation. Second, the Markan concept of discipleship may be understood as one of the literary means by which Jesus’s impact on others is represented (e.g., Mk :). The miracle stories, for instance, include, at their close, the announcement of Jesus’s success (e.g., Mk :). There are various groups of people—sympathizers, disciples, and outside observers—toward whom Jesus’s impact becomes manifest. Even demons are directly affected by Jesus (e.g., Mk :). Finally, we find multiple dicta and speeches in the gospel narrative (Mk ; ). Jesus’s personhood is clearly in evidence in that he is the acting protagonist within a historiographical account. In the examples cited above, Mark depicts Jesus as a personality, namely, a person within his narrative. Mark’s conceptualization of personhood reflects similar strategies for depicting character in various strands of ancient history-writing. Bruns’s guidelines are useful in that they sensitize us to the various literary means by which persons are portrayed as agents, protagonists, or central figures in narrative contexts which are not biographical in nature. A person-centered historiographical narrative is dependent on the usage of distinct narrative and literary techniques. The Roman rhetorician, politician, and philosopher Cicero affords us a glimpse of additional elements, within the ancient literary psyche, considered to be constitutive

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for the perceiving and shaping of personhood. Cicero developed an interesting concept of persona—albeit for rhetorical purposes—particularly in its official, or political, function. He defines the attributes of a person as they are to be elaborated by the orator in a speech. In book  of De inventione, he writes: “We hold the following to be the attributes of persons [ac personis has res attributas putamus]: name, nature, manner of life, fortune, habit, feeling, interests, purposes, achievements, accidents, speeches made [nomen, naturam, victum, fortunam, habitum, affectionem, studia, consilia, facta, casus, orationes].” Remarkably enough, only one Ciceronian attribute is of particular relevance to the conceptualization of personhood in the gospel writings: that of “achievements, accidents, speeches” (facta . . . casus et orationes, ..). Generally speaking, ancient biographers sought to elaborate all the Ciceronian attributes, albeit with varying degrees of intensity. That the gospels limit themselves to the elaboration of one single attribute points to a pronounced lack of interest in conforming to the wellestablished literary genre of biography. That said, the attribute of “achievements, accidents, and speech” has a specific and noteworthy literary value: while the other attributes—name, nature, manner of life, fortune, habit, feeling, interests, purposes—are predetermined and innate, the attribute of “achievements, accidents, and speech” is the only one through which the protagonist himself or herself can establish his or her own personhood in a political sphere based on his or her own individual acts. The literary configuration of a person thus serves the narrative’s display of his or her official role, an idea that leads us back to Cicero. The attribute of “achievements, accidents, and speech” is a most relevant one for Cicero since it is the point at which a person’s own influence on how he or she is perceived becomes most apparent. Thus, a person can be distinctively set apart from others by the way he or she is perceived. The key to perception is that person’s attribute of deeds, words, and achievements. The gospel writers are consciously and precisely focused on this specific attribute in their literary conceptualization of the Jesus figure. They do so, however, in a literary genre apart from biography, since biographers are less interested in accounts of a person’s deeds and the impact of said deeds on history (see Plutarch, Alex) than they are in the evaluation of a person’s moral character. By depicting the sayings, deeds, and passion of Jesus as res, the gospel writers in fact reveal their intentionality: they depict the personhood of Jesus less in conformity to biography, and more in terms of historia. The Roman historian Valerius Maximus authored a prominent Tiberian-period

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handbook of historical exempla (Facta et dicta memorabilia) wherein he concentrates on “deeds and sayings worthy of memorial” (praef: facta simul ac dicta memoratu digna). It is clear that, from a historiographical point of view, the most relevant data to be both transmitted and remembered are “deeds and sayings.” The authors of the gospel writings pay precise attention to this issue, with the result that their depiction of the gospel story is person-centric. The gospels therefore reflect a historiographical rather than a biographical interest. The various stories (facta et dicta) collected within the gospel narratives function more as testimonia than as exempla. According to the Rhetorica ad Herennium, the gospels function as proof rather than explication (..). In Mark’s case, the narrative listing of various testimonia proves the argumentum as it is formulated in Mk :. The Markan book tells the story of the beginnings of the gospel proclamation. from mark to luke-acts: the shape of prosopography

If we proceed from the earliest gospel writing (Mark) directly to LukeActs, we begin to glimpse the multiple ways in which the Lukan text oversteps that of Mark. The author of Luke-Acts rearranges the material (materialiter) of the Markan Gospel outline, which results in an expansion of the temporal frame of the narrative (see Lk –; ). In regard to narrative expansions, Matthew and Luke converge. We might even identify the back-dating of the outline of the Markan text as the writing of history “forward into the past.” At the same time, the genealogical elements— Lk :ff. and Mt :ff.—serve a biographical and/or prosopographical purpose. The expansions of the person-centered Markan outline reflect subtle nuances that verge on biography. Luke’s handling of the narrative outline, in comparison with that of Mark, is much more oriented toward historiography. By identifying himself in the prefaces of Luke-Acts as a literary author, Luke effectively reflects on his own methodology. He moreover synchronizes, to a far greater and more programmatic extent than does Mark, the gospel narrative with political history (Lk :; :; :). Finally, Luke produces a second volume on the past: the Book of Acts. These literary innovations are precisely what characterize the texts as Lukan. They further serve to distinguish Luke from his contemporary Matthew, who is, together with Luke, the first user and interpreter of the Markan outline. While Matthew expands the outline of the gospel narrative as an account of the powerful teachings of Jesus (see Mt –), Luke’s contribution situates the gospel story within a framework of thinking and writing about

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history: itineraries/travel accounts play an important role in Luke’s Gospel (Lk :ff.). Luke-Acts most probably appeared as a two-volume work composed by one author, whom we call “Luke.” Each volume represents a separate time interval. The gospel narrative encompasses about three decades of Jesus’s life (birth, childhood, preaching activities, passion, and post-Easter epiphanies). The Book of Acts picks up at this point and concludes with Paul’s arrival in Rome as a prisoner. Luke’s two-volume approach to history-writing—the ascension story being a small narrative overlap which links both accounts—conforms to the history-writing standards of the Hellenistic-Roman period. The historiographical works of Tacitus (ann; hist) and Josephus (BJ; ant), both of whom were contemporaries of Luke, demonstrate a similar interest in historical topics and timeframes within diverse kinds of writings. In history-writing, temporal borders and narrative outline are mutually determinative. If we maintain—based, for instance, on the phenomenon of recurring scenes—that Luke-Acts is a literary unit, and if we also assume that a single author wrote both volumes, the question of chronology ultimately arises: Which book came first? Two scenarios are plausible. If Luke’s literary activities begin with the gospel narrative, his literary ambition might have been to improve on the work of Mark. He may have wanted to elevate the literary tone of the gospel concept. If this is indeed the case, how do we explain the Book of Acts? In response to either an early failure or a promising initial launch, Luke decided to write an additional volume (Acts) in order to either defend or expand his initial historiographical intentions. The temporal priority of the gospel is supported by the fact that, in the preface to Acts, “Luke” points back to an earlier narrative (Acts :). We need to consider, however, the interval of time between the composition of Luke and that of Acts. The doublet of an ascension story (Lk :–; Acts :–) includes narrative variations of time and place. These variations point to a literary reconsideration of that specific narrative element from a later standpoint. If, however, we assume that Acts was the initial composition, what would be the implications for an understanding of Luke and Acts as a literary unity? By giving shape to Acts, “Luke” would have intended to continue the process of history-writing as initiated by Mark. To begin with a narrative on the recent past is common practice in Hellenistic-Roman history-writing: Tacitus and Josephus wrote their volumes on contemporary

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history (hist; BJ) prior to continuing with a narrative on an earlier timeframe (ann; ant). Based on contemporaneous parallels, Luke may also have begun his literary career with the Book of Acts. If this is indeed the case, an alternative—even though hypothetical—explanation is needed to account for the fact that Acts begins with the ascension narrative: Luke was addressing readers who were already familiar with a version of the gospel story—probably that of Mark—whose narrative concludes with a specific event in time, namely, Easter morning. The Lukan writer would have conceptualized the Acts narrative so that it picks up exactly where the gospel narrative left off. The preface to Acts (:f.) would then simply be a later addition—following the joining together of Luke and Acts. Both chronological options are therefore equally plausible, and we cannot easily choose one over the other. The comparative approach does, however, provide some guidance: how do we determine relative chronology in the works of Tacitus and Josephus? In the case of Tacitus, we attribute an early date to the Historiae and a later date to the Annales based on the indications found in ann .. Tacitus makes an explicit reference, in this passage, to one of his earlier written accounts, stating that he has already sufficiently dealt with Domitian’s time (narratas libris, quibus res imperatoris Domitiani composui). The mention of Domitian is an explicit reference to the Historiae. Josephus similarly mentions, in the preface to his Antiquitates, an earlier narrative on the Jewish war against the Romans (ant ..). If we, thus, take Acts : (πρῶτον λόγον) as a serious as well as an original hint to the Lukan Gospel narrative, we might consider the gospel as Luke’s earlier writing. More important, however, is the question of defining literary genre with respect to the Lukan Gospel, to Acts, and, finally, to Luke-Acts as a literary unit. If we begin with the Lukan Gospel, we can define its literary genre along the lines of Mark. Luke basically works in line with the concept of a gospel narrative, albeit in a more sophisticated and elaborate manner. He contributes to the development of the gospel genre as a genre sui generis within the broader framework of historiography. As indicated earlier, he has added biographical elements to the narrative outline. The issue becomes more complex, however, if we attempt to define the literary genre of Acts. Scholars have made all sorts of suggestions, ranging from a historical monograph, apologetic (G. E. Sterling) or pragmatic historiography, a biography, a life of philosophers (C. H. Talbert), and a novel (R. I. Pervo) to a history of institutions (H. Cancik), a universal history (D. Dormeyer), or a “history of epochs” (M. Wolter). These

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manifold suggestions are problematic since they vary in regard to their scope: some focus on the Book of Acts only, and others presuppose an understanding of Luke-Acts as a comprehensive and uniform concept. Also in methodological terms, these suggestions cannot really be brought into comparison with one another; the scholars involved have a tendency to homogenize what are, in effect, distinct levels of literary analysis: aspects of textual pragmatics, literary style, rhetorical concept, and subject area. How might we best proceed from this point? There are recurring scenes in Luke-Acts (e.g., Lk :–; Acts :–). We consequently find a similar structure in both books. Luke, however, has developed the personcentrism and expanded the spatial organization of the Markan narrative. In so doing, he develops and redefines the narrative concept significantly. Before we explore the manner in which Luke reconceptualizes personcentrism within a spatial dimension, we need to reflect on methodology: our task is to define precisely what we mean by “person-centered” as it is made manifest in the Lukan narrative. The Lukan Gospel basically expands the person-centered concept of Mark by adding biographical elements. Can we thus best understand Acts “in light of the collected biography tradition”? In Acts, we find a more consistent “prosopographical structure” (to use the modern term). Indeed, Acts is shaped as prosopography, a subject to which we will now turn our attention. We tend to understand prosopography as a historical method that can be “applied to any period of history.” We also consider it to be a narrative concept, one that involves the organizing and intertwining of historical materials. As such, prosopography is more analytical than synthetic in nature. Our investigation into the literary outline of Acts does not understand Acts as a prosopographical source for early Christian history. On the contrary, we are more interested in how the author makes use of prosopography as a narrative tool or concept. In this, we differ from how prosopography was conceptualized by Theodor Mommsen in  (Prosopographia Imperii Romani [PIR]) and has since been worked out in various contributions to the field of ancient history and culture. Lawrence Stone informs our approach further: he explores prosopography both as a narrative concept and in terms of its methodological implications. Stone defines prosopography as “the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in history by means of a collective study of their lives.” He also provides a sketch of its political significance in modern times: “the purpose of prosopography is to make sense of political action, to

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help explain ideological or cultural change, to identify social reality, and to describe and to analyze with precision the structure of society and the degree and the nature of the movements within it.” For Stone and others, prosopography is much more than a collection of biographical data based on “onomastic evidence” in order to “establish . . . regional origins of individuals and . . . family connections . . . between individual and individual and between group and group.” Moreover, the process of relating individuals to one another in socio-cultural terms, and the working out of collective biographies, serve all fields of historically oriented studies. A prosopographical approach to history, however, has come under criticism for several reasons, not least the elitist nature of the sources. Is prosopography, therefore, a suitable approach for the study of ancient texts? While prosopographia is Neo-Latin, a “modern term for the study of individuals,” it has primarily been “associated with Roman history,” as Ronald Syme has most convincingly argued. In Roman Revolution, Syme explores Roman history via the sources which document the political change from republic to empire. He employs prosopography as an analytical tool for historical studies. The ancient historian does not make use of prosopography; it is the modern historian who investigates ancient history by means of the prosopographic method. Can we apply the “prosopographic method” to ancient authors? Can it inform Luke’s concept of history-writing in Acts, and if so, how? Luke’s prosopographical concept of history-writing in Acts becomes transparent only if we first delimit it from biography. Martin Dibelius points out that the Book of Acts displays almost no interest in Paul’s biography. Dibelius identifies in Acts four different types of information on Paul: () the brief notice of Paul’s presence at Stephen’s martyrdom (Acts :; :, ); () the commission stories and further information on subsequent events in Damascus and Jerusalem; () reports on missionary activities (chs. :–:); and () a few brief remarks on Paul’s voyage to Rome (chs. –). Luke’s principal interest in Paul, however, lies rather in the example he sets: Paul is obviously representative of the successful worldwide spread of the gospel (Acts :). According to Acts :, Paul is able to preach (κηρύσσω) the βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ and to teach (διδάσκω) the “things about Jesus Christ, the Lord” with frankness and without hindrance. At this point, Paul’s mission seems to be completed in its spatial dimension. In prosopographical theory, a distinction is made between biography and prosopography: the former investigates the exceptional, and the latter the “commonness.” Luke

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identifies the one “characteristic” shared by all figures of the narrative. Indeed, Acts is more reminiscent of prosopography than of biography: it is the commission of witnessing Christ (Acts :) that functions as the characteristic which unifies the literary figures. Luke, by making use of prosopography, elaborates on commonness in early Christian times. As a historian, Luke makes provisional use of a prosopographic screening. He provides narrative elements known from the field of prosopographical studies. As mentioned earlier, Luke initiates this technique of person-centrism in the gospel narrative: he gives parallel portrayals—a diptych—of the birth stories of John and Jesus (Lk –). Luke’s interest in comparative and collective biography exceeds the depiction of a single biography. In Acts, the prosopographical approach is implemented to an even greater extent. From a theoretical standpoint, Luke’s indebtedness to prosopography can be demonstrated in various ways: Luke makes use of onomastics, ethnicity, family relations, and networking. Luke displays a clear sensitivity towards onomastic elements: in Acts :, he dates and situates the changing name of Christ-believers from μαθηταί to Χριστιανοί. Luke situates the origin of the term Χριστιανοί in Antioch. He notes that its appearance is subsequent to the persecutions of Jesus-followers in Jerusalem (Acts –). We have to see these semantics in the context of Luke-Acts: the first four chapters of Acts provide insights into the gathering of Jesus-followers in Jerusalem. The semantic expression μαθητής, as it occurs already in Luke, refers to the global spreading of Jesus-followers in the early Imperial period. While the term μαθητής occurs in all gospel writings, Luke’s deployment of the term has a distinctly forward-looking sense. In Lk :, , μαθητής not only serves to identify the main group of disciples, but also implicates a larger cluster of Jesusfollowers. In the Book of Acts, the terms μαθητής and Christian are occasionally synonymous (see :; also :; :). Karl-Heinrich Rengstorf traced Luke’s use of the term μαθητής in Acts – back to the self-understanding of Palestinian Christians. Onomastic elements also become relevant in the portrayal of Paul: Luke knows about Paul’s change of name from Σαῦλος to Παῦλος (e.g., Acts :; :), which might indicate that a particular name was associated with the missionary figure of Paul. This would indeed correspond to Paul’s self-understanding, as is frequently made evident in his letters (see, e.g.,  Cor :; Gal :). Luke correspondingly deals with matters of ethnicity in that his work explores the “ethnic and regional origins of individuals.” In Acts :–,

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for instance, he reports on the conversion of an Ethiopian treasurer. In Acts :, he emphasizes that the very first European to be converted in Philippi in fact originates from another locale: Thyatira. The variety of ethnic and regional information again serves the spatial concept of history-writing. Luke demonstrates an overarching interest in family relations. His attention to this facet of prosopography can be observed on various narrative levels, particularly those relating to Paul and other apostolic figures. The reference to Paul’s nephew in Acts : is a case in point: Luke indicates how even families are involved when the conspiracy (ἐνέδρα: Acts :; :) against Paul began. Acts : not only strengthens Paul’s legal position in the context of trial, it also points to his civic rights as a Roman citizen. Luke identifies Paul as a legitimate member of Roman society. Moreover, Luke also provides the equivalent of a familial sketch of the early Christian movement: the close gathering of Jesus-followers in Jerusalem— frequently labeled Urkommunismus by New Testament scholars (Acts :– ; :–; :–)—actually reflects the sort of intimate communion of people typical of Roman family life (familia). In Acts , we read about Prisca and Aquila, a couple originally from Rome whose home in Corinth serves as a gathering point for Paul’s missionary activities. Family history is clearly a key element of prosopography. By extension, family history is of socio-political significance: “Conclusions about the origins and family connections of individuals then classically lead to inferences about their likely political sympathies and allegiances.” In Roman times, family history acquires historical importance: historical thought is developed on the basis of family traditions (gens). Although we cannot deduce political sympathies based on the family-like structures described in Acts (see my observations on the prosopographical method above), Luke’s concept of social communion nonetheless has geo-strategic implications. Especially, Luke’s idea of discipleship (see above) and witnessing (μαρτυρεῖν) includes, even in its earliest expression (Lk ), an expansive dimension: Luke takes the idea of local and communal gathering in Jerusalem and transforms it into a concept of global networking. Prosopography and “sociography” are related to each other. In recent scholarship, the idea of networking has become an important “adjunct to prosopography”—we may thus discuss to what extent this approach will inform genre studies. Prosopography concerns itself “with what the analysis of the sum of data about many individuals can tell us about the different

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types of connexion between them, and hence about how they operated within and upon the social, economic and other institutions of their time.” In more general terms, while prosopography involves the collection and intertwining of data and information, network analysis focuses on processes of social interaction where discourses of power take place. “Actors” have different kinds of “relations” to one another, including “contact, connection, or tie.” The social network can be defined as “a structure composed of a set of actors, some of whose members are connected by a set of one or more relations.” In more recent times, network theory has also been used to describe religious communication and innovation. Prior to applying network analysis to the Book of Acts, we need to address two questions relating to methodology. First, can we legitimately apply a modern theory to ancient texts? And does network analysis correspond to the reality of studying ancient texts? Adam M. Schor has recently applied elements of network analysis to the Christological discourses of Theodoret’s time. In his interpretation, Schor has convincingly worked out a way in which we might relate network theory to the study of religious milieus in antiquity. His thesis statement is as follows: “Theodoret’s coalition can be seen as a socio-doctrinal network, a shifting cluster of mostly clerics bound by friendship and theological agreement.” Since network theory “features methods for analyzing personal interactions” and “pictures society as a web of relationships, which can be categorized, mapped, and modeled” in a trans-historical sense, network analysis can be effectively applied to ancient societies, including those of the st century CE. Second, Schor analyzes how a socio-doctrinal network functions in situations of religious conflict. In other words, he makes analytical use of network theory. It is at this point that we encounter a discrepancy between an analytical and a conceptual application of theory. As I pointed out earlier in regard to prosopography, however, we can transform a theory that analyzes “historical reality” into one that unveils narrative strategy: how did ancient authors conceptualize and configure persons, groupings, and networks? In terms of Luke, it might be appropriate to explore the specifically literary means by which he shapes networking structures within Acts, which is, after all, a literary account. The application of SNA (social network analysis) to an interpretation of Acts thus follows the following heuristic framework: What narrative strategies embedded in Acts might an application of SNA bring to light? A number of elements in recent SNA discourse are of particular relevance to our investigation. By applying them to the

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Lukan accounts, we will explore the literary representation of early Christian community life along the lines of networking. First, social interaction is first of all considered in terms of structural relations which are “often more important for understanding observed behaviors than are such attributes as age, gender, values, and ideology.” Moreover, “social networks affect perceptions, beliefs, and actions through a variety of structural mechanisms that are socially constructed by relations among entities.” Structural relations are thus “viewed as dynamic processes.” When Luke describes social interaction among apostles and Jesus-followers—as we find it, for instance, in the account about the council at Jerusalem (Acts )—there exists a dynamic concept of structural relations, affecting actions or even beliefs: even according to Acts the outcome of this council is elementary for all future missionary activities (Acts :ff.), while according to Paul’s depiction the decisions made here are of crucial importance for Pauline missionary authority (Gal :–). The point of departure for Luke constituting these structural relations must be seen in Jesus’s initial commissioning (Acts ), which enforces a common spirit of social interaction that is qualified as “witnessing.” Second, in regard to the manifold implications of social relations, we learn to distinguish between “relational form” and “relational content”: “Contents are the interests, purposes, drives, or motives of individuals in an interaction, whereas forms are modes of interaction through which specific contents attain social reality.” It is useful then to suggest specifically a “typology of generic contents” by which relations are defined that have either a transactional, a communicative, an instrumental, a sentimental, or an authoritative purpose. We find examples for each of these contents in Acts. Network structures in Acts are not only displayed as social interaction, they are rather evaluated according to content and socio-religious function. In other words, Luke does not only refer to a network structure, he also qualifies it and makes it to be a crucial narrative pattern. Third, according to the micro- and macro-levels of SNA—moving from an egocentric to a dyadic network, to triadic relations, and finally to the analysis of the complete network on a macro-level—we can imagine that social networks are also displayed on diverse levels within a narrative account. On a micro-level, Luke’s narrative focuses in part on individuals like Peter (e.g., Acts :ff.), on sets of actors like Peter and John (e.g., Acts ; :ff.) or Luke and his patron Theophilus (Acts :–), and on larger groups consisting of community members or missionaries. On a macro-level, however, Luke

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composes a narrative where all groups of actors and activities—including Luke’s own literary ambition—are linked to one another. Luke accomplishes the literary shaping of the macro-level—the locus of all different aspects of social interaction—simply by composing the so-called we-passages. In this way, the narrative world of the author and the world of the protagonists of the story meet. Fourth, Stanley Wasserman and Katherine Faust suggest that we distinguish between “one-mode-networks” and “two-mode-networks” where either actors—people, subgroups, organizations—or events can constitute a network. We can accordingly investigate the various types of networks constituted by Luke—actors such as Paul and Peter, the initial Easter epiphany event, or Paul’s commissioning in Acts —and identify the kinds of literary strategies which underlie the reality of the narrative form. We will later see how Luke’s narrative concept of networking illuminates the spatial progress of the gospel proclamation. Early Christian networking is finally necessary to the launching of the worldwide oikumene (οἰκουμένη; see Acts :), in a literary as well as historical sense.

Topics, Concepts, and Literary Techniques of History-Writing In the discourse on ancient historiography and ancient historians, basic sets of questions are continuously debated. These include the role of rhetoric, the function of myth, the classification of true history, and the selfpresentation of the historian as a literary author. At the same time, there are new studies coming up either on individual historians such as Tacitus, or on more specific subjects of history-writing such as the concepts of speeches, topography, or timelines. These more recent studies are related to new kinds of theories, patterns, or methodologies that are used in the broader field of the humanities, including classics and archaeology, New Testament studies, literary sciences, linguistics, reception history, philosophy, and anthropology. The noetic impulse which underlies these patterns, generally speaking, is to contextualize and understand ancient historywriting, both as a precedent of our modern world and cultural identity and as a means to shed new light on how to interpret ancient authors based on our contemporary reading conditions and reading interests. We contextualize Mark and Luke-Acts within the broader Hellenistic-Roman world of history-writing by means of a comparative approach. More specifically,

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we screen Mark and Luke-Acts according to heuristics that have recently come to the fore in fields that contend with the study of ancient historywriting: classics and ancient history. Our investigation reads Mark and Luke-Acts in light of current research in ancient historiography, and thus seeks to build a bridge between New Testament studies, ancient history, and classics.

Event and Fiction Classifying Mark and Luke-Acts as historiographical literature—as we have indeed done—does not in any way imply that we either presume or investigate the historicity of early Christian narratives. Historiographical literature cannot be defined in terms of bruta facta. We are dealing here with literature, as Christoph Martin Wieland (–) clearly pointed out in his History of the Abderites (Geschichte der Abderiten). More specifically, we are dealing with ancient literature where the borders between fact and fiction are fluid. On the other hand, the depiction of fact and fiction, or res factae and res fictae, provokes a productive interaction that gives shape to a fictitious consistency (Hans Robert Jauss). This is particularly true of ancient historiographical literature, as Glen W. Bowersock has convincingly demonstrated. Many ancient authors were of the opinion that fiction both stimulated and challenged audiences (Plutarch, mor I.B). Augustine even believed that fiction conveyed deeper truth (quaest euang ..). The Gemma Augustea (– CE) exemplifies how, in Augustan times, history is constructed amid tension between event, myth, and fiction. We will thus avoid a confrontational approach that would set history and fiction apart on a compositional level, with the result that history excludes fictional elements and vice versa. Historiographical accounts per se are a narrative blend of factual and fictional elements, as historiographical epistemology in general is based on prefiguration, by which references to the past are affected and interpreted. But how precisely does history merge with fiction, ultimately intersecting at the site of history-writing? And where and how do we draw the line between history and fiction? First of all, history-writing has a factual dimension: history-writing as such only makes sense if it is based on the reporting of events which have caused change and motion. However, historical changes “do not take place simply because of structural conditions; they are set in motion as unpredictable and unique occurrences by individuals and individual action.” An

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awareness of the unpredictability and effects of human actions is apparent in both Herodotus and Thucydides (..). When Herodotus talks about the ἀπόδεξις ἱστορίης (hist, praef ), he presupposes the investigation of events caused by humans (τὰ γενόμενα ἐξ ἀνθρώπων), which he describes more specifically as ἔργα μεγάλα καὶ θωμαστά (ibid.). Contemporary philosophical discourse about history-writing can trace its way back to an ancient concept of event. And even though we consider the narrative and literary techniques of history-writing, especially in light of its performative purpose, we also need to take into account that history-writing takes its point of departure from the perception of factual or real events which differ from incidents: events are worth recording and depicting because they have some sort of noteworthy impact. The perception of incidents and events encoded in recollections, however, be they oral or written, is dependent on what a ἵστωρ/testis observes, whether by autopsy or inquiry, or what information happens to be preserved within a literary and/or historical source. It should be noted, however, that a factual event put forward by either a witness or a source is already the result of observation, construction, and interpretation. The historical construction of an event (micro- or macro-dimension) real event