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CHRISTIANS IN CONVERSATION
OXFORD STUDIES IN LATE ANTIQUITY
Series Editor
Ralph Mathisen
Late Antiquity has unified what in the past were disparate disciplinary,
chronological, and geographical areas of study. Welcoming a wide array of
methodological approaches, this book series provides a venue for the finest new
scholarship on the period, ranging from the later Roman Empire to the Byzantine,
Sasanid, early Islamic, and early Carolingian worlds.
Disciplining Christians
Correction and Community in Augustine’s Letters
Jennifer V. Ebbeler
Sacred Stimulus
Jerusalem in the Visual Christianization of Rome
Galit Noga-Banai
Christians in Conversation
A Guide to Late Antique Dialogues in Greek and Syriac
Alberto Rigolio
Christians in Conversation
A Guide to Late Antique Dialogues
in Greek and Syriac
Alberto Rigolio
1
1
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Acknowledgments ix
List of Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
Structure of the Work 2
Dialogue and Christianity 8
Dialogues and Late Antiquity 12
The Dialogue Form and Rhetorical Training 16
The Dialogue Form and Erotapokriseis 22
Toward a Comprehensive Approach? 24
A Formal Typology 32
Conclusion 37
v
vi Contents
ix
x Acknowledgments
Dolganov, Mark Edwards, Scott Johnson, Christopher Jones, Anna Jouravel, Chloë
Kitzinger, Charlie Kuper, Dawn LaValle, Yannis Papadogiannakis, Antonio Rigo,
Jeremy Schott, Agostino Soldati, Yumi Suzuki, Sébastien Morlet, Alberto Quiroga
Puertas, Susan Stewart, Peter Van Nuffelen, Matthijs Wibier, and the anonymous
reviewers for Oxford University Press. It was a great pleasure to work with Stefan
Vranka, Emily Zogbi, and the capable staff at the Press; and thanks also go to
James Disley, Rajesh Kathamuthu, and Leslie Safford for their painstaking edi-
torial work, and to Pam Scholefield for the compilation of the general index. My
greatest debt is to Averil Cameron, without whom this project would have never
seen the light; she believed in it from its inception and offered help and inspiration
with a degree of dedication that has been truly extraordinary. The book is dedi-
cated to you, Luigina, Alessandro, Claudio, Filippo, and Alice, for your encourage-
ment, support, and inspiration over the years; your passion and enthusiasm have
taught me more than words can express.
Abbreviations
xi
xii Abbreviations
PLRE Jones, A.H.M., Martindale, J.R., and Morris, J. et al., eds. The
Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire. 3 vols. Cambridge
1971–92.
P.Oxy. The Oxyrhynchus Papyri.
Quasten Quasten, J., and di Berardino, A. Patrology. 4 vols. Utrecht
1953–86.
RAC Klauser, T., Dassmann, E., and Schöllgen, G., eds. Reallexikon
für Antike und Christentum. Stuttgart 1950–.
SC Sources Chrétiennes.
Schreckenberg Schreckenberg, H. Die christlichen Adversus-Judaeos-Texte
und ihr literarisches und historisches Umfeld (1.–11. Jh.).
Frankfurt 1999.
Introduction
I
nstances of dialogue are common in early Christian literature. We
have dialogues embedded within different literary genres, such as hagiography,
historiography, or fictional narratives;1 dialogue poems (and dispute poems),
especially common in Syriac literature;2 and texts written in the form of ques-
tions and answers, also known as erotapokriseis.3 Yet we also have a conspicuous
corpus of self-standing texts written in prose that claim to report, or to simulate,
real-life conversations between two or more speakers, primarily about religious,
philosophical, or biographical subjects, and often placed within an elaborate his-
torical or fictitious setting. Christian dialogues address themes such as the nature
of the soul, the resurrection of the body, and the function of fate in relation to free
will, as well as various Christological and exegetical subjects. The role of these
texts in the study of the culture of late antiquity, particularly on issues such as
religious debate, rhetorical culture, and literate education more broadly, is only
gradually being recognized. The most commonly known Christian dialogues in-
clude Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho, Methodius’ Symposium, and Gregory
of Nyssa’s Dialogue on the Soul and the Resurrection, while many more remain
still unfamiliar to the most.
1. Remarkable examples of dialogues embedded in other literary works are found in Ps.-Clementine literature,
in the Acts of Philip, and in the Syriac History of Mar Qardagh, for which see Walker 2006. Instances of dialogue
are common in martyr acts, in which the most dramatic parts often take the form of dialogue; some of the simpler
martyr acts may even be mostly made up by exchanges among speakers, such as the Latin Martyrdom of Justin.
Dialogues can also be used as introduction to other works, as in Theophylact Simocatta’s History: see Ieraci Bio
2006:32–35 and Whitby and Whitby 1986:3–5.
2. For Syriac dispute poems, which some distinguish from dialogue poems, see the fundamental work of Brock
1991 (with recent discussion in Mengozzi 2015), who provides an overview of their form and contents, and traces
the links with Ancient Mesopotamian literature and Biblical themes. For these texts, see also Krueger 2003, Frank
2005, Harvey 2005, Mengozzi and Ricossa 2013, Brock 2016, and Butts 2017; while Ruani 2016 is now fundamental
for the literature of controversy in Syriac. For a discussion of the links between dialogue poems and prose dialogues,
see Brock 1983 and 2016, Cameron 1991a, and Frenkel 2016.
3. More on the links between erotapokriseis and prose dialogues follows below. Notable examples of erota-
pokriseis include Eusebius of Caesarea’s Gospel Questions and Solutions (Zamagni 2008 and 2016) and Ps.-Caesarius’
Quaestiones et responsiones (mid-sixth century; Papadogiannakis 2008, 2011, and 2013a). For the most recent work
see Bussières 2004 and 2013, Efthymiadis 2017, Papadogiannakis 2006 and 2013a, Zamagni 2004, and, especially
helpful for Syriac, Ter Haar Romeny 2004.
1
2 Christians in Conversation
7. For Eulogius of Alexandria, see Roosen 2015. Major questions concerning the composition of dialogues
after the sixth century touch upon the developments of the Byzantine dialogue (the dialogues by Theophylact
Simocatta and Germanus I of Constantinople are not treated in the present work) and the issue of the relationship
between late antique dialogues and Islamic kalām, for which see Cook 1980 and Daiber 2012. For later dialogues,
see Cameron 1996, Cameron and Hoyland 2011, Cameron 2016a, and Cameron and Gaul 2017. For the Syriac, see
Tannous 2008 and Roggema 2016. For the dialogue form in the early Islamic period, see Bertaina 2011.
8. A comprehensive overview of the Latin dialogues can be found in Schmidt 1977, who lists forty-three Latin
dialogues composed before the beginning of the seventh century (sixteen of them authored by Augustine, with
several others misattributed to him); see also Cooper and Dal Santo 2008, Whelan 2017, and Kuper 2017. For Latin
dialogues from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, see Cardelle de Hartmann 2007. For the surge of interest
in Greek dialogues during the last decade, see, for instance, the publications by Andrist, Cameron, LaValle, and
Morlet, as well as Bracht 2017, Dubel and Gotteland 2015, Föllinger and Müller 2013, and Goldhill 2008a.
9. See entry 5.
4 Christians in Conversation
in dialogue form; nor do we have, despite the flourishing of religious debate in the
Sasanian empire during the sixth century, any Eastern Syriac dialogue composed
before the turn of the seventh century).10 Overall, Syriac offers an extremely rich,
and little explored, corpus of controversial and apologetic literature in various
forms that needs to be related to its Greek and Latin counterparts and to be effec-
tively integrated into the cultural history of the late antique world.11
Because of the preliminary state of research on this strand of literature, I have
addressed the dialogues in systematic fashion and structured each entry into
standardized headings (author, full title, original language, date of composi-
tion, modern editions, modern translations, summary, discussion of scholarship,
and a selected bibliography for further study). Dialogues that survive only in
part or in abridged form, but that still provide enough information about the
original text, have been treated as autonomous entries—these include Aristo of
Pella’s Disputatio Iasonis et Papisci and Gaius Romanus’ Dialogue against Proclus.
Conversely, lost dialogues by known authors are mentioned within the full
entries of other surviving dialogues by the same author, as in the case of Origen;
in order to help navigate the material, an index of dialogues and related litera-
ture, arranged alphabetically by author, is found in the end of the book. In a few
instances, given the complexity of the textual tradition or the fragmentary state of
particular dialogues, I have followed past scholarship by incorporating different
texts into one entry, as in the cases of Apollinarius of Laodicea’s lost dialogues,
the anonymous Two Macedonian Dialogues, and Ps.-Athanasius’ Five Dialogues
on the Trinity. I have made an effort to make the list as comprehensive as possible;
but in light of the pervasiveness of dialogue writing in the period in question, the
possibility that additional dialogues will be found cannot be excluded.12
A few texts that display important similarities with our dialogues have not
been included for reasons of form, in that they cannot be considered dialogues,
or chronology, in that they are later than the end of the sixth century. Even though
the author reported some of the exchanges among the speakers, Theodore of
Mopsuestia’s Disputatio cum Macedonianis (CPG 3857; surviving only in Syriac
10. For Simeon, see the entry in Brock et al. 2011, and Walker 2006:175–77; for Babai the Great, see Brock
2011:215–17; and for the debating culture in the Sasanian empire, see Walker 2006. In his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical
Writers (ed. Assemani 1728), ῾Abdīšō῾ Bar Brīkā of Nisibis made reference to some of the texts written (presumably
in dialogue form) by East Syriac authors from the fifth century onward and against religious opponents such as
Jews, Manichaeans, Zoroastrian, and other Christian groups. Although it remains uncertain whether all these were
structured as prose dialogues, the titles include Mari the Persian (fl. mid-fifth century), Against the Magi in Nisibis;
Īšō῾yahb I of Arzon (d. 595), Disputation against a Heretic Bishop; and Nathaniel of Širzor (d. 618), Disputations
against the Severians, Manichaeans, Cantāye, and Māndrāye. See Walker 2006:169–70, and Griffith 1981:170 for the
use of the dialogue form within religious controversy according to the witness of the East Syrian bishop Bar Bahlūl
(tenth century).
11. Ruani 2016.
12. For instance, further analysis is needed of the Syriac manuscripts BL Add. 7199 (= Rosen and Forshall
1838:lviii.4 and 6, with Wright 1870:appendix A), which contains a Dialogue on Calamities Sent by God and a
Dialogue on the Resurrection, and BL Add. 14533 (= Wright 1870:dccclix.55), which contains a Dialogue on Heresies,
but see Ter Haar Romeny 2004:160–63.
Introduction 5
13. The text is edited and translated into French in Nau 1913:633–67; see Voss 1970:17n20; the question should
be asked, however, about the possible intervention of the translator.
14. Isidore of Pelusium, Ep. 3.397 (PG 78.1036; CPG 5557); Isidore argues that it is best to mix moderation and
reproach. I owe this reference to Christopher Jones.
15. Severus of Antioch, Ep. 6.1 (ed. Brooks 1902:1.1.3–12; English trans. Brooks 1902:2.1.3–11; CPG 7070).
16. Walker 2006, which contains an English translation; Payne 2016.
17. The Cologne Mani Codex (ed. and trans. Cameron and Dewey 1979, 80.6–93.23) contains extracts of dialogic
exchanges between Mani and senior Elcesaites, including passages from a “synod of presbyters” that had been set up
against him (89.6–7); see Lim 1995:70–108. Payne 2016:219 links Mani’s Šābuhragān, the account of Manichaean re-
ligion and cosmology that Mani dedicated to Shapur I, with the practice of disputation on religious matters within the
Sasanian court. However, even though the cosmological account in the Šābuhragān includes some dialogic exchanges
among Xradešahr (standing for Christ), the “sinners,” and the “religious ones,” the text itself does not take the dia-
logue form and has not been included here (for the surviving text, originally written in middle Persian, see the edition
and English translation in MacKenzie 1979 and 1980; see also the Encyclopaedia Iranica, s.v.).
18. Van Gaans 2013 for an overview; BeDuhn 2009; ed. Monceaux 1924.
19. Notable examples of textual reuse are the anonymous Dialogue with Adamantius, which makes use
of Methodius’ On Free Will and Aglaophon or On the Resurrection, the Ps.-Athanasian Two Dialogues against the
Macedonians, which reuse one of the authentically Macedonian Two Macedonian Dialogues, and the inclusion of
material perhaps derived from Aristo of Pella’s Disputatio Iasonis et Papisci in the composition of Ps.-Athanasius’
Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei, the Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila, and the Latin Dialogue of Simon and Theophilus
(attributed to Evagrius; the text and English translation can be found in Varner 2004). Important overlaps in format
and language have also been found between the Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei and a number of Ps.-Athanasian
dialogues, but in these cases the degree of similarity is not enough to prove direct textual dependence beyond their
originating in similar cultural milieux (Andrist 2005:106–21; the Ps.-Athanasian dialogues that shows overlaps with
the Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei are the Disputatio contra Arium, the Five Dialogues on the Trinity, and the Two
Dialogues against the Macedonians, to which can be added the anonymous Dialexis Montanistae et Orthodoxi). Other
dialogues appear to make use of literature that was not originally written in dialogue form, such as Hegemonius’
Acta Archelai (which makes use of authentic Manichaean literature) and Macarius Magnes’ Apocriticus (which pos-
sibly depends on Porphyry’s Against Christians). Others, such as Gregory of Nyssa’s Dialogue on the Soul and the
Resurrection and Against Fate, and the anonymous Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila, suggest a link with other literary
genres such as hagiography, epistolography, or catechetical literature, as is discussed in each entry.
6 Christians in Conversation
now possible to rely on a firmer chronology for several texts than might have
been only few years ago, as is discussed in the relevant entries, while it has also
become clear that some dialogues of uncertain chronology are now unlikely to
fit the time frame of the present work. These are the anonymous Dialogica poly-
morpha antiiudaica (CPG 7796; previously known as Dialogus Papisci et Philonis
Iudaeorum cum Monacho), whose most ancient nucleus dates to the second half
of the seventh century and was expanded during the following decades, as shown
by a remarkably fluid textual tradition;20 the fragmentary Dialogus de S. Trinitate
inter Judaeum et Christianum by Jerome of Jerusalem (CPG 7815), for which
Patrick Andrist suggests a chronology between the end of the seventh and the be-
ginning of the eighth centuries;21 the Dialogue of the Monk and Recluse Moschos
Concerning the Holy Icons (of dubious chronology but likely later than the sixth
century);22 and Ps.-Gregentius’ Dialexis (CPG 7009), for which both the seventh
century and the tenth century were suggested.23
The Greek and Syriac dialogues treated in the present work are thus the fol-
lowing ones (the question mark indicates dubious authorship):24
20. Andrist et al. 2013; Aulisa and Schiano 2005:310–26, which contains edition and Italian translation.
21. The surviving text can be found in PG 40:848–60 and 865 (the latter fragment is also edited in Kotter
1969:3: 194 III 125); see Andrist 2017 and Fields 2012.
22. Editio princeps and English translation in Alexakis 1998. While the editor opts for the second third of the
fifth century (Alexakis 1998:210), a later chronology is suggested in Brubaker and Haldon 2011:143n269.
23. Cameron 2014:51–54 for a seventh-century chronology very possibly with later expansions; Berger
2006:100–9, which includes edition and English translation, for the tenth century.
24. Instead of proposing new titles, I refer to the dialogues as they are commonly referred to in modern schol-
arship, whether in Latin or in English. Similarly, for the names of the authors, I use the form that is more commonly
found in contemporary scholarship, despite the inconsistencies, for instance “Diodorus of Tarsus,” but “Theodore of
Mopsuestia.”
Introduction 7
54. John bar Aphthonia, Conversation with the Syrian Orthodox under
Justinian (CPG 7486; Syriac)
55. John the Grammarian of Caesarea, Disputatio cum Manichaeo (CPG 6862)
56. Anon., Dialogus cum Iudaeis (CPG 7803)
57. Anon., Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila (CPG 7794)
58. Paul of Nisibis, Conversation with Caesar (CPG 6897)
59. Anon., Religious Conversation at the Sasanian Court (CPG 6968)
60. Anastasius of Antioch, Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Tritheite
(CPG 6958)
The question presents itself whether, and, if so, in what ways, the extensive use
of the dialogue form by Christian authors should inform our understanding of
the historical transformations of debate on matters of religion and philosophy in
late antique society. In particular, a central issue of discussion among scholars
has been whether early Christians engaged in genuine dialogue on religious and
philosophical issues, and how their practices differed from their non-Christian
contemporaries and predecessors. Was there room for discussion and disagree-
ment in matters of Christian faith? Did the search for Christian orthodoxy bring
about the end of open dialogue on religious and philosophical matters? In what
respects did debate in late antiquity differ from debate in classical antiquity?
Whereas Socratic dialogues developed in conjunction with Athenian democracy,
where dialogue was a crucial part of the political process, Christian dialogues
were often written by Christian authors who became notorious for their censo-
rious attitudes toward opposing views on matters of faith. Christian dialogues
have been used to answer some of these questions.25
An influential view was that of Rudolf Hirzel, who in his 1895 classic work
on ancient and modern dialogue argued that the rise of Christianity entailed the
demise of the ancient dialogue as a literary form. Hirzel put forward an opposi-
tional understanding of classical dialogues and Christian dialogues; he implied
that the intellectual openness of dialogue in ancient Greece, as is reflected in the
classical dialogue form, should provide the benchmark for measuring dialogue
and debate in other societies. In this respect, early Christianity appeared to fall
short of the openness of dialogue in classical Athens. Nonetheless, one problem-
atic aspect of Hirzel’s account (as shown by Sandrine Dubel) was Hirzel’s debt to
Diogenes Laertius in his understanding of classical dialogue (see especially D.L.
3.48), and, in particular, to Diogenes’ view of Plato as the author who brought the
dialogue form to perfection. By centering on Plato, Hirzel’s work ended up down-
playing the overall diversity of the dialogue form already in antiquity and tended
25. Lim 1995 and 1995a; an overview on the issue can be found in Van Nuffelen 2014.
Introduction 9
26. Hirzel 1895:2.380 with Lim 2008:151–52; Dubel 2015. Studies emphasizing the various forms that dialogue
took in antiquity are found in Föllinger and Müller 2013, and Dubel and Gotteland 2015; for the dialogue as a genre
polymorphe see Dubel 2015:12.
27. Hoffmann 1966.
28. Hoffmann 1966:160–62; Bardy 1957 divides Christian dialogues into apologetic, theological, biographic,
and Biblical.
10 Christians in Conversation
29. Voss 1970:39, 364, and passim; Voss 1970:351 for the Theophrastus.
30. Among recent publications on this issue see, for instance, Gerson 2000a, Zachhuber 2019, and the forth-
coming volume by Slaveva-Griffin and Ramelli, which proposes to see the study of philosophy and the study of
religion in late antiquity as two ends of a spectrum, each being the byproduct of specialized interests. See also Hadot
1995 for ancient philosophy as a way of life.
31. See Cameron 2014:47–48, 2013, and 1994.
Introduction 11
example, instances of dialogue in the Talmud have been explained in the con-
text of the rabbis’ competition with other elites in late antiquity (these dialogues
assured the rabbinic readers that the rabbis would be able to face challenges
from the outside), or as reflecting the rabbis’ very own anxieties by displacing
problematic internal opinions onto the voices of fictional “others;” or, again, as
the rabbis’ imaginary attempts to participate in broader conversations taking
place outside their doors, such as the religious debates of Christians.35 At the
same time, however, such and similar concerns for identity and authority in
the Talmud have not precluded its study under the lens of literary criticism, an
aspect that is increasingly being the subject of scholarly analysis; indebted to
Mikhail Bakhtin, Daniel Boyarin proposes approaching the Talmud in terms of
intertextuality and as an example of Menippean literature.36
When studied in their historical context, the surviving Christian dialogues add
to the picture of a society that thrived on religious debate and invested con-
spicuously in the search for, and articulation of, religious orthodoxy.37 Several
Christian authors adopted and transformed the dialogue form to suit the new
needs of religious debate and, as the present work shows, the vast majority of
Christian dialogues are best understood as designed as tools of persuasion in
the context of historical religious controversies and theological debates. Several
influential Christian authors (in addition to several minor and anonymous ones)
did indeed write dialogues, and chose the dialogue form as the primary vehicle
for argument and apologetic on issues they saw as crucial. Notable examples in-
clude Diodorus of Tarsus, who, in all likelihood, wrote his dialogues (presumably
against Arian doctrine) on occasion of his exile to Armenia under the Arian
persecution by Valens, and John Chrysostom, who chose the dialogue form to
rebuff accusations about his refusal to be ordained as well as a canon to appraise,
and possibly accuse, particular members of the clergy in Antioch. In the context
of the Nestorian controversy, Cyril of Alexandria wrote dialogues to attack and
35. Respectively Kalmin 1994, Hayes 1998, and Bar-Asher Siegal 2018; Kattan Gribetz and Vidas 2012;
Boyarin 2008.
36. Boyarin 2009; Labendz 2013; the 2012 issues 19.2 and 19.3 of the Jewish Studies Quarterly contain a rich
selection of articles on instances of dialogue in the Talmud.
37. Cameron 2014, 1991, and 1991a; Cameron and Hoyland 2011; Déroche 2012:537–38; Lim 2001, 1995, and
1995a; Van Nuffelen 2014; Tannous 2013 for the seventh century; Bertaina 2011 for the Middle East in the early
Islamic period; McLynn 1992 on the fourth century for a diminution of earlier views on the role of violence in re-
ligious controversy; see, for instance, the first imperial edict confirming the Council of Chalcedon (promulgated
in 452; ACO 2.2.113–14 and 2.1.479–80, trans. Price and Gaddis 2005:3.128–30, esp. 128n82) and included in the
Codex Justinianus (1.1.4, ed. and trans. Frier et al. 2016:1.18–19) that forbade any “clergyman or member of the im-
perial service, or any person of any status, [. . .] to lecture on the Christian faith before crowds assembled to listen
[. . .]. For whoever strives to revisit and publicly discuss questions already decided and correctly settled, insults the
judgment of the Most Holy Synod [. . .]. If a clergyman, therefore, dares to discuss religion in public, he shall be
expelled from the community of the clergy [. . .].”
Introduction 13
38. Van Nuffelen 2016 and 2014; Cameron 2014, esp. 36–38.
39. See the discussion in Morlet 2013:40.
40. See the relevant entries.
14 Christians in Conversation
historical event for which accounts of both parties survive. Here, each account
provides a strongly slanted picture, passing over embarrassing developments
in the debate and emphasizing others.41 In addition, although stenographic ac-
counts of actual debates did exist (see, for instance, the entry on Origen), these
could easily undergo a substantial editing process to the point of falsifying the
actual debate. Origen lamented the publication and circulation by one of his
opponents of the record of a debate with him that—he alleges—had in fact
never even taken place! Conversely, the identification of the speakers by using
generic labels such as “Orthodox” or “Montanist” may not be sufficient to con-
clude that a particular text was not linked to a real debate, for this terminology
could easily be added during the editing process. Despite these difficulties, as
argued by Van Nuffelen, both fictional dialogues and records of debates can
contribute, in different ways, to the study of the debating culture of the period,
and, in his view, historical debates and fictitious dialogues should be taken as
the two ends of a continuum; following up on this, Robin Whelan makes a con-
vincing case for the role that invented dialogues played in the perpetuation of
religious debate. These dialogues propagated the idea that orthodoxy would be
recognized as the correct and rational doctrine in the context of a debate; they
both reflected and helped create a distinctive culture of religious debate in late
antiquity.42
Especially helpful insights into the link between surviving dialogues and
real debates have been developed by modern scholarship on Christian anti-
Jewish literature, also known as adversus Iudaeos literature. This vast strand of
texts against Judaism took a variety of forms, including not only orations and
treatises, but also dialogues opposing Christian and Jewish speakers, and it is
the subject of a long-standing tradition of scholarship.43 As shown by Vincent
Déroche, Judaism continued to be a serious contestant with Christianity in the
period under analysis, and real debates between Christians and Jews are well
documented.44 Scholars now agree that adversus Iudaeos dialogues are not to
be taken as stenographic transcriptions of real debates, but they may nonethe-
less contain more or less distorted echoes of historical debates and real con-
frontations with contemporary Judaism. In Déroche’s view, adversus Iudaeos
dialogues, and adversus Iudaeos literature more broadly, “may be intended to
serve many functions or to reach many audiences at the same time.”45
Different aims may in fact have guided the authors, editors, and compilers
of adversus Iudaeos texts. Andreas Külzer draws attention to the possibility that
dialogues adversus Iudaeos could be used by Christians as preparatory texts
for actual debates with Jews on the ground,46 and a sixth-century anecdote re-
ported by John Moschus linking the composition of adversus Iudaeos texts by
Cosmas the Lawyer with actual debates seems to support this scenario.47 That
dialogues adversus Iudaeos could be used as instructional texts within Christian
catechetical teaching is another hypothesis, and the form of a dialogue with a
Jew on the Old Testament could be an effective didactic tool for the presen-
tation of Christian tenets. Andrist adumbrates the possibility that certain dia-
logues without prologue or narrative voice such as the Ps.-Athanasian Dialogus
Athanasii et Zacchaei might have been intended to be performed or publicly
read, and indeed an ancient reference to the public reading of a dialogue comes
from Cyril of Alexandria.48 Recent cases have been made for a catechetical
purpose of the Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei and the Dialogue of Timothy
and Aquila.49
The scenarios and questions that academic work carried out on adversus
Iudaeos dialogues has raised can thus inform the study of Christian dialogues
more broadly, not least because of the similarities that adversus Iudaeos dialogues
display with dialogues against pagan, Manichaean, or other heterodox groups.50
All surviving adversus Iudaeos dialogues from late antiquity are written from a
Christian perspective and may not allow us to identify an authentically Jewish
voice more easily than do dialogues directed against other heterodox groups.
Also, the juxtaposition, overlap, or even identification of the terms “Jews” and
“heretics” were common in early Christian literature, and may strike us more
than they did the ancients, given the more generic meaning of αἵρεσις as “sect,
group” in Greek than in modern languages. In addition, subjects discussed in
adversus Iudaeos dialogues can have strong Christological relevance, suggesting
that they were part of conversations that took place among Christians in a sim-
ilar way as other “anti-heretical” dialogues. This consideration applies, for in-
stance, to the extremely popular Actus Silvestri, which, although set as a debate
between pope Sylvester and several Jews, center on anti-Arian issues internal to
Christianity. Conversely, the earliest surviving example of anti-Christian Jewish
46. Külzer 1999:88–92, and see Pretty 1997:20–23 for a similar argument in relation to the anti-heretical
Dialogue with Adamantius and Coyle 2007 for the anti-Manichaean Acta Archelai.
47. John Moschus, Pratum spirituale 172 (PG 87.3:3040C–41A) with Andrist 2009:240–42.
48. For performance or public readings of dialogues see Andrist 2017:55–56 and the entries on Cyril’s Seven
Dialogues on the Trinity and on Aeneas of Gaza. For the theatron and issues of performance in Byzantium see
Marciniak 2007.
49. Morlet 2018; Andrist 2013.
50. For work on adversus Iudaeos dialogues see Morlet 2013 and Cameron 2003. See the introduction and ar-
ticles in Becker and Yoshiko Reed 2003 for some of the issues involved in the study of adversus Iudaeos literature in
its historical setting.
16 Christians in Conversation
polemic dates from as late as the ninth century, The Polemic of Nestor the Priest;
this text has been called a disputation, whereas, before that, a prominent text was
the parodic anti-Gospel known as Toledot Yeshu in its manifold versions.51
Within his work on an adversus Iudaeos dialogue, the anonymous Dialogue
of Timothy and Aquila, Yannis Papadogiannakis argues that both real debates
on the ground and their literary representations as texts were primarily meant
to persuade their audiences and readers, and suggests that one of the reasons
for the enormous diffusion of the dialogue form may lie exactly in its particular
format. The format of a dialogue enables its speakers (in case of a real debate) or
its author (in case of a text written in dialogue form) to make use of several rhe-
torical techniques that a plain speech or a monologue would not allow. Through
these techniques and devices, the speakers in a dialogue (or the author of a text
in dialogue form) could also appeal to the emotions of the audiences (or read-
ers), which could be aroused, for instance, in order to sanction inappropriate
behavior or wrong belief. Not rarely do the authors of extant dialogues make
use of shame, which is usually represented as a speaker’s silence, to indicate the
defeat of a particular party in the conversation.52 In this respect, Christian dia-
logues shed light on the cultural requirements that were expected of late antique
leaders; the rhetorical devices and techniques that their authors employed help
indicate the complexities of the cultural equipment of an educated person of the
time, at the same time creating similar expectations in the readers’ minds.
51. Newman 2018; see Lasker and Stroumsa 1996 for The Polemic of Nestor the Priest and Meerson and Shäfer
2014 for the Toledot Yeshu.
52. Papadogiannakis 2018a; Lim 1995:85–86.
53. C. Conybeare, BMCR 2014.08.24 review of Cameron 2014; see also Conybeare 2006:35–41.
54. For the former see, e.g., Aelius Aristides, Or. 32.25 on the grammarian Alexander of Cotiaion, and for the
latter see Aelius Theon’s Progymnasmata, with Pernot 2008:301–5.
Introduction 17
55. Considerations on the style of a dialogue can be found in Demetrius, On Style 19–21 and 223–35. The
Ps.-Hermogenic treatise from the imperial period known as On Method of Forceful Speaking, chap. 36, includes
dialogue among the literature composed “by a double method” (διά τινος διπλῆς μεθόδου; here it includes also
public speaking, comedy, tragedy, and symposiastic dialogues), and more precisely (ed. and trans. Rabe and
Kennedy 2005:262–65), “[i]n a dialogue (διάλογος) the combination is that of ethical (ἠθικοὶ λόγοι) and inves-
tigative speeches (ζητητικοί). Whenever you intermingle conversation and inquiry, the ethical speeches that are
interspersed refresh the mind, and when one is refreshed, the inquiry is brought in, like the tension and relaxing of
an instrument.”
56. Ford 2008:44 and 41–42.
57. Isoc. Panath. 26; and Ant. 45 (trans. Ford 2008:41): οὕς ἀντιλογικοὺς καλοῦσιν.
58. Lim 1995:33–37 and 132; Laborderie 1978:27–40; Marrou 1956:83–84. Compare Plato, Republic 539B
(trans. Reeve 2004:235): [Socrates speaking] “And isn’t it one very effective precaution not to let them taste argu-
ment while they are young? I mean, I don’t suppose it has escaped your notice that when young people get their
first taste of argument, they misuse it as if it were playing a game, always using it for disputation. They imitate those
who have refuted them by refuting others themselves, and, like puppies, enjoy dragging and tearing with argument
anyone within reach.”
59. Ford 2010.
60. Cribiore 2001; Pernot 2008 emphasizes the variance within canonical rhetorical exercises and the possi-
bility that other exercises are unknown to us because are not included in the handbooks that have survived.
18 Christians in Conversation
diverse kind and soon became standardized, but, however, they did not include
the composition of dialogues as such. Nonetheless an isolated reference to dia-
logue comes from the handbook of rhetoric by Aelius Theon (first century CE),
which allowed the possibility of using the dialogue form (89.30: διαλογικῶς)
within an actual progymnasma, the “narration” (διήγημα). Theon also provided
an example of a “narration” in dialogue form to his readers, and this short dia-
logue, which is plainly narrative, features two characters “one teaching, the other
learning.”61 Accordingly, Theon’s students must have been exposed to the pos-
sibility of using the dialogue form in their public speeches; among late antique
dialogues, a strongly narrative text that adopts a comparable format may be iden-
tified in John Chrysostom’s On the Priesthood.
Two other references to dialogue come, instead, from Latin handbooks of
rhetoric, and add another facet to the complex relation between professional
rhetoric and the dialogue form. One finds that the Rhetorica ad Herennium
(c. 80 BCE) has a section on a rhetorical device known as sermocinatio, “con-
versation, dialogue, ethopoiia,” which “consists in putting in the mouth of some
person language in keeping with his character” (4.55).62 The text goes on by pro-
viding two examples of sermocinatio, one of which, interestingly, takes the form
of a dialogue (4.65). In his analysis of the treatise, Gualtiero Calboli argues that,
here, sermocinatio is best understood as the translation of the Greek διάλογος; it
indicates the characterization, within a speech, of a particular person through a
fictitious dialogue.63
Quintilian too made reference to this device, the sermocinatio, in his treat-
ment of a closely related rhetorical device, which he identified as προσωποποιΐα,
“impersonation.” According to Quintilian, when in a rhetorical setting, by means
of impersonation “we display the inner thoughts of our adversaries as though
they were talking with themselves (but we shall only carry conviction if we rep-
resent them as uttering what they may reasonably be supposed to have had in
their minds); or without sacrifice of credibility we may introduce conversations
between ourselves and others, or of others among themselves, and put words of ad-
vice, reproach, complaint, praise, or pity into the mouths of appropriate person.”64
In addition, Quintilian also wrote that
61. Aelius Theon, Progymnasmata 89.30–90.18 (trans. Kennedy 2003:39–40): “If we wish to use a dialogue
form, we shall suppose some people talking with each other about what has been done, and one teaching, the other
learning, about the occurrences; for example, ῾Often in the past it occurred to me to ask you about what happened
to the Thebans and Plataeans at Plataea, and I would gladly hear now if this is a good opportunity for you to give
a narrative account.’ [. . .] In the same way we shall continue asking and answering in accordance with the rules of
dialogue.”
62. Rhetorica ad Herennium 4.55 (trans. Caplan in Henderson 1954).
63. Calboli 1993:420n277 and 424n290.
64. Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 9.2.30 (trans. Butler 1922). Italics added.
Introduction 19
65. Kennedy 2003; Hunger 1978:1.108–16 contains a systematic overview of ethopoiiai up to later Byzantine
literature (and see Hunger 1978:1.119–20 for a reference to dialogue within the Byzantine rhetorical tradition); con-
versely, for a discussion of rhetorical questions see [Longinus], On the Sublime 18.
66. Kennedy 2003; Gibson 2008.
67. Origen, Contra Celsum 1.28.7– 8 (trans. Chadwick 1953:28): Μετὰ ταῦτα προσωποποιεῖ Ἰουδαῖον
αὐτῷ διαλεγόμενον τῷ Ἰησοῦ καὶ ἐλέγχοντα αὐτὸν περὶ πολλῶν [. . .].
68. Origen, Contra Celsum 1.28.1–2 (trans. Chadwick 1953:27): τρόπον τινὰ μιμησάμενος ἓν ῥήτορος εἰσαγόμενον
παιδίον.
69. Carleton Paget 2017 for a recent case in favor of the authenticity of Celsus’ Jew; see entries 1 and 2, by
Aristo of Pella and Justin Martyr.
20 Christians in Conversation
the anonymous Dialogus cum Iudaeis (entry 56), includes short dialogues with
characters from the Old Testament that are clearly fictitious; and additional links
between Christian dialogues and professional rhetoric come from Latin texts.70 In
this respect, the study of the rhetorical techniques deployed in the Apocriticus by
Macarius Magnes (entry 21) has been particularly fruitful, for this text includes
textbook examples from late antique rhetorical school curricula. The Apocriticus
reports ethopoiiai in the character of Christ, and instances of amplificatio and of
chreiai, which were the staple of rhetorical training; also, the author paid attention
to style, showing particular care for clauses and phrase units.71
Another group of writers, and one notorious for its internal quarrels, made
use of the dialogue form in the rhetorical realm during the earlier part of the time
frame addressed here. These writers are several Greek imperial authors trained
in rhetoric and, in particular, those associated with the Second Sophistic move-
ment.72 An important author of dialogues was Plutarch, whose Moralia contain
seventeen dialogues—Plutarch used dialogue as a literary form for ethical, re-
ligious, and philosophical discussion, and especially favored it for discussing
theoretical issues of higher complexity or abstraction.73 Dio Chrysostom used
the dialogue form in a conspicuous subgroup of his works and speeches, and
most notably the narrative Borysthenitic and the dramatic Charidemus (Or. 36
and 30). Some of his dialogues may date from his exile, but others may well have
been spoken (Or. 2 and 4).74 Lucian, another prolific author of dialogues, had a
bearded personification of Dialogue accuse him of lowering the level of the dia-
logue form from the heights of Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy to that of a
flexible form suitable for satire, comedy, and several diverse purposes (Bis Acc.
33–34), as Byzantine authors later had the chance to appreciate.75
The same dialogue, Lucian’s Bis accusatus sive tribunalia, is also meant to lam-
poon the tribunal setting of the time and stands as a reminder that late Roman
legal practice may well have left traces in the format of extant dialogues. The set-
ting of the Bis accusatus is that of a trial in which speakers pronounce opposing
speeches—and professional rhetoricians trained in this exercise at school through
the equivalent progymnasmata, κατασκευή “confirmation” and ἀνασκευή “refu-
tation.” Conversely, documentary reports of Roman court proceedings, which,
from the first century CE, often take the dialogue form, have been subject of
increasing scholarly attention but still await to be related to dialogue literature;
70. See, for instance, the preface of Vigilius, Dialogue against the Arians, Sabellians, and Photinians (late fifth
century; trans. Whelan 2017:23–24), which explains his choice to introduce imaginary heretical speakers.
71. Schott and Edwards 2015:54–59; Goulet 2003:164–176.
72. Bowersock 1969:89–100 for their professional quarrels.
73. Kechagia-Ovseiko 2017.
74. The surviving corpus by Dio Chrysostom contains several pieces in the dialogue form. See Menchelli 2016
for an overview and the relationship with Platonic and Ps.-Platonic models. See Jones 1978:115 for the possibility of
a public reading of Or. 2 and 4.
75. Saïd 2015; Jones 1986:13.
Introduction 21
it remains to be established, for instance, whether court practice may have influ-
enced the composition of Mark the Monk’s Disputatio cum Causidico (entry 40),
in which the role of the opposing speaker is played by a “renowned lawyer.”76
Among other Second Sophistic authors, Galen is likely to have written dialogues
with polemical intent that are unfortunately lost, while Philostratus wrote at least
two works in dialogue form, the Heroicus and the Nero.77
An instance of dialogue from the setting of a school of rhetoric comes from
the sophist Himerius (mid-fourth century), who used the dialogue form in one
of his speeches delivered at a school occasion (Or. 10). In the preface to the
speech, he explained his choice of the dialogue form by emphasizing the philo-
sophical dignity of the dialogue in a way that retraced Lucian’s characterization
of it in the Bis accusatus. By employing the dialogue form (εἰς σχῆμα διαλόγου),
Himerius also claimed he was making the (relatively) new genre of the propemp-
tic oration “seem older,” and pointed to the advantages of dialogue, including
“relief from monotony, arrangement of the material, also elegance and a dra-
matic flavor throughout.”78 In sum, an overview of dialogue literature in Greek
shows that dialogue, linked to rhetorical school practices, was a form available to
imperial-period authors and rhetoricians like Lucian and Himerius, who, though
fully aware of the dialogue form’s ancient associations with philosophy, did not
hesitate to employ it in rhetorical settings and to apply its force to less conven-
tional dominions.79
76. Palme 2014; Coles 1966; ongoing work by Anna Dolganov; see also, for the later period, the use of direct
speech in the legal papyri from Petra, e.g., P.Petra IV.39 (ed. Arjava et al. 2011).
77. For Galen see his Libr.Propr. 11 = 19.44 Kühn with Hirzel 1895:364. For the Heroicus see Rusten and König
2014 and for the Nero see Bowie 2009:31. Photius, Bibl. cod. 161, mentioned Sopater of Apamea as an author of
dialogues.
78. Penella 2007:112–14; Himerius, Or. 10 (trans. Penella 2007:113–14): “The treatment we give to common
themes is what makes them our own. Thus it is possible through the art of rhetoric to make propemptic orations seem
older, even if they are a recent custom. And that is just what I have done. For I have put the present theme into the
form of a dialogue without compromising the business at hand or destroying the dignity that is owed to the dialogue
form. Although my discourse happens to be ethical, nonetheless in the manner of Plato I latch onto physical and the-
ological considerations, mixing these with the ethical material. And since Plato hides his more divine discussions in
myth, one should observe whether I emulated him in this. As for the other qualities of dialogues—I mean relief from
monotony, arrangement of the material and interludes, also elegance and a dramatic flavor throughout—the written
version of the oration will show better [than anything I might say here] whether or not I succeed in achieving those
qualities. Dialogues begin with a rather plain style so that the nature of diction may produce a sense of simplicity;
then in what follows they become elevated [in style] as the action progresses. Those whose ears have been prepared
by rhetorical training to listen to orations may judge whether or not I have followed this pattern.”
79. There is little in modern scholarship contrasting dialogues by imperial authors and Christian dialogues;
for a view that downplays a direct influence see Beatrice 1983. Mention should also be made of other non-Christian
dialogues from our period, which include texts from the Hermetic corpus (ed. and trans. Scott 1924; see Moreschini
2013 and Fowden 1986) and by isolated Platonist philosophers. In the second century Numenius of Apamea cast
his main work On the Good in dialogue form (ed. Des Places 1973, esp. fr. 3a and 4; Edwards 2011:118 suggests
that Numenius derived both subject and mode of argument from the Platonic corpus), while the Tablet of Cebes
(first or second century CE) provides an example of an instructional dialogue possibly drawing on Stoic and Cynic
material (see Seddon 2005). During the third century, Porphyry, who had used the question-and-answer format in
his teaching (as can be assumed from the form of his commentary on Aristotle’s Categories, trans. Strange 2012; see
Porphyry VP 13 and Dillon 1990:8–9, while see Crawford 2013:158n25 for the possibility that the terminology used
by Cyril of Alexandria to describe the form of the Seven Dialogues on the Trinity is as that employed by Porphyry in
22 Christians in Conversation
It would not be possible to make justice to late antique dialogues without refer-
ring to another popular strand of literature—the one taking the form of questions
and answers. Literature arranged as questions and answers was widely produced
in the ancient world, and, in Greek, these texts are often referred to as erotapokri-
seis, the term that later Byzantine grammarians used to designate them. Given
its flexibility and the room that it gave for later addition, this was an eminently
versatile form, frequently used in the discussion of philosophical issues (a no-
table example are the pseudo-Aristotelian Problemata), but also in the exegesis
of holy texts, in instruction in a variety of fields, and, more broadly, in the or-
ganization of knowledge in subjects as disparate as medicine, grammar, philos-
ophy, or law. During late antiquity, Christians, Jews, Manichaeans, and Muslims
all wrote question-and-answer literature, and produced a large (and still under-
studied) body of texts that should be understood not just in the context of school
and instructional practice, but also more broadly within the culture of conver-
sation, dispute, and religious debate of the period; these collections reflect issues
that were subject of discussion outside the texts themselves. Among Christians,
erotapokriseis were often associated to Scriptural exegesis, but soon their scope
expanded and they were increasingly adopted in catechesis, instruction, and
apologetic more broadly. An apologetic character is visible, for instance, in the
Quaestiones et responsiones ad orthodoxos (wrongly attributed to Justin Martyr;
CPG 6285), which included objections against Christianity that ultimately go
back to anti-Christian texts by Celsus, Porphyry, and Julian, and were intended
to attack the doctrines of pagans, Jews, and heterodox Christians.80
There are important links between erotapokriseis and dialogues, and, on some
occasions, the two forms may even seem to fade into each other during our pe-
riod. Among the earliest texts that, although usually ascribed to erotapokriseis
literature, nonetheless present features often found in dialogues are the revela-
tion dialogues of Gnostic literature. These texts feature Jesus in conversation with
describing the form of his commentary on Categories), may well have authored a symposiastic dialogue set at the
house of his teacher, Longinus (see Eusebius of Caesarea, PE 10.30 with König 2012:139 and Hirzel 1895:2.361–62).
At the beginning of the fourth century, Dexippus wrote a commentary on Aristotle’s Categories in the form of a
dramatic dialogue featuring himself and his student Seleucus (Dillon 1990; Männlein-Robert 2006:88–90). The
relationship between the two speakers in the dialogue is instructional, but the author indulged in some literary
flourishes and quotations of Hesiod and Pindar, and there are a few lively exchanges. At least two instances of dia-
logue are found in c. third-or fourth-century alchemic texts, one by Comarius the Philosopher and another featur-
ing Cleopatra the Alchemist as a speaker (Ieraci Bio 2006:34n65). Conversely, Priscian of Lydia’s Answers to King
Khosroes of Persia, which record the responses to Chosroes I’s questions on philosophy and sciences by the Athenian
philosophers who took refuge at his court in 531 following the closure of the Academy, does not take the form a
dialogue (Huby et al. 2016); see also Olympiodorus’ take on Socratic dialogue and on the necessity of Socratic phi-
losophy to be learned Socratically (Renaud and Tarrant 2015:192–93).
80. Efthymiadis 2017; Papadogiannakis 2011, 2013a, and forthcoming; Oikonomopoulou 2013; Cameron
1991a and 1994; Rinaldi 1989 for apologetics in eratopokriseis literature; Bardy 1932 for an overview on the form in
Scriptural exegesis.
Introduction 23
one or more of his disciples, and their exchanges, in a clearly instructional rela-
tionship, are mostly set in post-resurrectional settings, as their narrative frame
usually indicates. Jesus bestows esoteric wisdom and clearly plays the role of a
teacher, but, as Michael Kaler argues, the prominent narrative component and
the conversational nature of these texts may strike the reader as a feature of dia-
logue.81 The Dialogus Anatolii, a similarly instructional compilation ascribed to
Anatolius, professor of law in Berytus under Justinian, features a teacher instruct-
ing a pupil and is likely to reflect the use of question-and-answer forms in legal
education.82 The 258 questions making up another instance of erotapokriseis, the
Quaestiones et responsiones (mid-sixth century) that circulated under the name of
Caesarius, brother of Gregory of Nazianzus, are likewise embedded in a contin-
uous dialogue in which the persona of the author-teacher answers the questions
of disciples who are sitting in front of him, possibly in the setting of a monastery.
The speakers of the Quaestiones et responsiones do not have any particular char-
acterization, but, on one occasion, the teacher is made to end a response abruptly,
since the interlocutors have to leave in order to attend the liturgy.83
The difficulty of drawing a line between dialogue and erotapokriseis is per-
haps best instantiated by Leontius of Byzantium’s Solutions to the Arguments
Proposed by Severus (entry 51), in which the speakers do not have a specific char-
acterization, being identified only by their doctrinal affiliation as Orthodox and
Acephalian, and, as the conversation proceeds, they become simply devices for
presenting arguments and counterarguments. Two other dialogues that adopt,
in one or more of their subsections, question-and-answer forms are Mark the
Monk’s Disputatio cum Causidico and John of Apamea’s Four Dialogues with
Eusebius and Eutropius (entries 40 and 42 respectively). Other dialogues that do
not take the question-and-answer form nonetheless feature the primary and the
secondary speakers in a teacher-pupil relationship similar to that of erotapokri-
seis: the instructional nature of these texts indicates particular pedagogic concerns
behind their composition and circulation, and it does not necessarily preclude
an apologetic character in their subject matter, as is shown by the dialogues by
Cyril of Alexandria and by the Syriac Book of the Laws of the Countries.84 These
strongly instructional dialogues tend to be more common in the earlier period,
such as Gregory the Wonderworker’s Dialogue on the Impassibility and Passibility
81. These texts are found in the Nag Hammadi library, in the codex Askewianus (the Pistis Sophia), and in the
codex Brucianus 96 (the Books of Jeu). See Rudolph 1968, who associated them to erotapokriseis literature; Perkins
1980; Koester 1990:173–200; Filoramo 1994; Moreschini 1.141–45 and 169–77; Morlet 2013:25; Moreschini 2013;
Piovanelli 2013; Evans 2015; the second volume of Burke and Landau 2016, currently in preparation, deals with
a number of these texts. Kaler 2013 emphasizes the presence of a frame narrative and their artistic features, and
pushes against direct links between these texts and erotapokriseis literature; he also notices that the very behavior of
the disciples is discussed in the text, as in the case of the Book of the Laws of the Countries.
82. Schönbauer 1933; Schulz 1961:414; Pieler 1978:390; Wibier 2014.
83. Papadogiannakis 2011:271 and 281, and 2013:32–33.
84. Camplani 2016.
24 Christians in Conversation
of God and Gregory of Nyssa’s Dialogue on the Soul and the Resurrection, or in
Syriac, such as The Book of the Laws of the Countries and the dialogues by John of
Apamea. Other instructional dialogues are the Erostrophus, the Ps.-Athanasian
Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei, and Palladius’ Dialogue on the Life of John
Chrysostom, though in a different way, in that narration is the predominant form.
In all of these cases, the instructional relationship between the speakers under-
mines a truly dialogic exchange.85
In addition to the occasional similarity in form, however, erotapokriseis and
dialogues should be put in relation to each other because of their common con-
tents and of the intellectual processes that they both represent. Both erotapokri-
seis and dialogues may cover the same topics and may aim at solving the same
disputed issues dealing with Christian religion; at the same time, erotapokriseis
literature offered problems or zetemata that could be reformatted and reworked in
the form of more or less elaborated dialogues. In both erotapokriseis and dialogues
aporiai are raised, debated, and solved; and this is especially clear in a work such
as Macarius Magnes’ dialogue Apocriticus (entry 21), as Yannis Papadogiannis
shows. This dialogue features the main speaker, a Christian, in the process of
responding to a barrage of elaborated aporiai and objections to Christianity of the
same sort found in Ps.-Justin’s Quaestiones et responsiones ad orthodoxos; these
collections of zetemata or problemata “almost certainly functioned as disputatious
arguments and exercises in debate as well as a means of instruction”; and the list
of objections by the pagan speaker are conveniently provided at the beginning of
each book of the Apocriticus in the form of an index of questions.86
85. Compare Arist. SE 2 (165B1–7); Goldhill 2008a:5 argues that “catechism and other question-and-answer
structures are not in any significant sense a dialogue”; Cameron 2014:36. For an assessment on links between
question-and-answer literature and dialogue based on non-Christian texts see Oikonomopoulou 2013. Authors
who wrote both dialogues and question-and-answer literature include Philo of Alexandria (if the fragmentary
De providentia was indeed a dialogue as according to Voss 1970:185n47; see Eusebius of Caesarea, PE 6.13–14),
Plutarch (Kechagia-Ovseiko 2017), and possibly Porphyry (see n70 of this Introduction).
86. Papadogiannakis 2006:99–100 and forthcoming.
87. Van Nuffelen 2014.
Introduction 25
addressed here include dialogues based on historical debates, dialogues that pur-
port to record real conversations for which no corroborating evidence survives,
dialogues that are expressly fictitious, and dialogues that are clearly fanciful pieces
of literature, such as the anonymous Actus Silvestri, the Religious Conversation at
the Sasanian Court, and (at least to some extent) the Ps.-Athanasian Disputatio
contra Arium, with its conversion of Arius that could hardly have been taken at
face value by ancient readers.88 The fictional, and occasionally even the fanciful,
is present in Christian dialogues, whose authors did not hesitate to recreate the
speech of long-dead patristic authorities or heresiarchs such as Athanasius and
Arius; these texts offer abundant material for the elaboration of a theory of fiction
in late antiquity and Byzantium.89
Averil Cameron advocates the suitability of literary analysis for the study of
Christian dialogues and the need to investigate their rhetoric. Kate Cooper and
Matthew Dal Santo point out the invention of “new modes of dialogue” and the
revision of old ones. Claudio Moreschini writes of a revitalization and transfor-
mation of the dialogue form among Christians from the fourth century onward,
after the early experiments by Justin and Methodius that did not radically de-
part from the imitation of existing traditions, notably the Platonic one.90 The
use of Biblical citations, of patristic florilegia, and of legalistic proofs gradually
became a characteristic common to most Christian dialogues, thus pointing
to an increasing formalization of the argumentative strategies they employed,
a tendency that became especially evident in the fifth century with the dia-
logues by Cyril of Alexandria, Theodotus of Ancyra, Nestorius, and Theodoret
of Cyrrhus. Another formal feature that is likely to have become common to
Christian dialogues (and with important implications for their circulation out-
side learned circles) was the systematic indication of the change of speaker on
the manuscripts. While the readers of ancient dialogues had only a colon, which
was sometimes combined with a paragraphus or a stroke in the margin, to in-
dicate the change of speaker, at least some of the authors of Christian dialogues
intended to make reading easier by indicating the speakers’ names (whether
in full or in truncated form) next to the text, as is explained in the prologues
of Theodoret of Cyrrhus’ Eranistes, Leontius of Byzantium’s Dialogus contra
Aphthartodocetas, and Anastasius of Antioch’s Dialogue between an Orthodox
and a Tritheite.91
88. See, however, in entry 24 the caveats on the edited text of the Disputatio contra Arium, which is in need of
a new edition.
89. For the study of fanciful dialogues and for the need for its integration within the study of early Christianity
see Cameron 2015; for work on fictional literature in Byzantium see the articles in Roilos 2014.
90. Cameron 2016a and 2014; Cooper and Dal Santo 2008; Moreschini 2.15–16.
91. Cameron 2014:47–49 and 1994. For the discussion of the indication of speakers see also the entries on
Origen and the Adamantius with Wilson 1970 and Lim 1991. For the minimal indications of speakers in ancient
dialogues see Andrieu 1954:288–97.
26 Christians in Conversation
In addition, Moreschini remarks that “the aim was to say in the form of di-
alogue what might otherwise be said in the form of a treatise or a letter”; he
argues that from the fourth century onward the dialogue acquired various kinds
and functions that were often combined. For this reason, to attempt a classifi-
cation of dialogues, as Hoffmann had attempted, proves a remarkably complex
issue. Grouping Christian dialogues according to their subject matter (for in-
stance “adversus Iudaeos,” “anti-heretical,” “philosophical,”92 or “biographical”
dialogues) runs the risk of failing to do full justice to the overall similarities of
the texts and of overlooking important aspects of their form, rhetoric, and ar-
gumentative structures that are necessary to explain the huge diffusion of these
texts and offer important insights into the culture of the period. Given their in-
ternal variety, however, to produce a comprehensive and definitive classification
of Christian dialogues can be a frustrating exercise; it may be a salutary reminder
that a similar exercise of classification, even if limited to Plato’s dialogues, has
already revealed its problematic nature to both modern and ancient scholars, in-
cluding Thrasyllus, Albinus, Diogenes Laertius, and the anonymous author of the
Prolegomena to Platonic Philosophy.93
Dialogues classified as “philosophical” or “anti-heretical” often deal with
Christian doctrinal or exegetical matters, and the heretical voice that they in-
clude may at times be merely functional to the treatment of their subject.
Dialogues that have been studied as instances of adversus Iudaeos literature may
depend on earlier texts and be related to other strands of literature; this con-
sideration applies to the Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei, which shares its format
and common sources with other Ps.-Athanasian dialogues, and the Dialogue of
Timothy and Aquila, which was very likely informed by existing catechetical liter-
ature.94 Nor are the transmitted titles of great help in this exercise of classification,
since the nomenclature is not consistent, and manuscripts vary in their identifi-
cation of dialogues with terms such as ἀντιβολή, ἀντιλογία, διάλεκτος, διάλεξις,
διάλογος, διάλογος ἱστορικός, ζήτησις, and λόγος; in modern translation these
texts are often referred to as dialogues, disputations, conversations, or debates.95
For the sake of simplicity, all such texts are referred to here as “dialogues,” while
the term “debate” is used to refer to the setting (real or imagined) that can be
implied in a dialogue, and the term “disputation” is normally avoided in that it
92. By “philosophical” or “Christian philosophical,” Hoffmann 1966:105–59 meant, for example, dialogues by
Methodius and Gregory of Nyssa.
93. D.L. 3.48–50; for the contrasting arrangements of Plato’s dialogues by Thrasyllus (d. 36 CE), by Albinus
(mid-second century CE, ed. and trans. Fowler 2016), and by the anonymous author of the Prolegomena to Plato
Philosophy (sixth century CE, chap. 10, ed. and trans. Westerink 1962) see Dillon 1977:305–6; Long 2008; Boys-
Stones 2018:55–56.
94. Andrist 2017:43–48, 2013a, and 2005:106–21 for the Dialogus Athanasii et Zacchaei and Morlet 2018 for
the Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila.
95. Conversely, for the nomenclature of Socratic dialogues (which likewise did not have specific nomenclature
and were normally referred to simply as λόγοι) see Ford 2008:34–39 and Albinus, Introductio 2 (ed. Nüsser 1991:30
and Hermann 1853:6.147–48; a new edition and English translation are in Fowler 2016).
Introduction 27
tends to imply a formal and scholastic character. It is not excluded, however, that
systematic work on terminology will yield results, as did Michael Trapp’s analysis
of the dialexis form employed by Maximus of Tyre and Papadogiannakis’ study of
its later use, by Theodoret of Cyrrhus, to address pagan criticism to Christianity.96
At the same time, it should be emphasized that existing literary traditions
are detectable in a number of surviving dialogues. Platonic elements, such
as Platonic language or the emphasis on ethopoiia and the use of a polished
style, are salient features of some dialogues.97 These elements affect dialogues
in different degrees, and particularly the earlier ones, but their identification as
Platonic can at times be controversial.98 Other similarities with Platonic mod-
els include the characterization of the speakers through imagery derived from
Plato, as in Methodius’ On Leprosy or Gregory of Nyssa’s Dialogue on the Soul
and the Resurrection, or the presence of an introductory dialogue as a scene-
setting device (as in Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho and Methodius’
Aglaophon), which has been linked to the structure of Plato’s Protagoras and
Republic. Voss goes further and sees the influence, among Christian authors,
of the Introduction to Plato’s dialogues by the Platonist Albinus (second cen-
tury CE): Albinus described the main speakers in Platonic dialogues as having
fixed traits, and this view might have determined, for instance, the character-
ization of the two main speakers in Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho as a
philosopher and a sophist.99 Gregory the Wonderworker, whose dialogue On
the Impassibility and Passibility of God shows the influence of Platonic imagery,
went as far as to describe his own instruction by Origen through a comparison
of a conversation with Socrates; yet this stands out as an early and isolated in-
stance among Christian authors of dialogues.100
The dialogues by three authors living between the end of the fifth and the be-
ginning of the sixth century are unusual in that they show a remarkable Platonic
influence. Aeneas of Gaza and Zacharias of Mytilene, both associated to the School
of Gaza, wrote dialogues that opposed aspects of Neoplatonism; although they vary
in their expected readerships and in the extent to which they embrace the Platonic
tradition (as is discussed in each entry), the dialogues by both authors are plainly
and vocally Christian. Conversely, the Christian character of another Platonizing
dialogue, the anonymous (or Menas’) On Political Science, is more lukewarm; it
96. Maximus of Tyre’s dialexeis blended the philosophical (and dialectic) element with the informal discourse
and repertoire of the orator; they brought together a tradition of study and instruction with a tradition of entertain-
ment and play. Trapp 1997:xl–xli and 1997a:1971–75; Papadogiannakis 2012:119–40 (esp. 122–23).
97. Basil of Caesarea, in Ep. 135 (discussed in entry 18), identified these two aspects as Platonic. On the na-
ture of Socratic dialogues see Ford 2008.
98. For an assessment of the Christian dialogue form that downplays the significance of Platonic models see
Horner 2001:66–93, though it focuses on Justin Martyr.
99. See entry 2. Albinus, Introductio 2 (ed. Nüsser 1991:30 and Hermann 1853:6.147–48; a new edition and
English translation are in Fowler 2016 and Boys-Stones 2018); for Albinus see also Ford 2008:34n21 and Dillon
1977:267–306, esp. 304–6.
100. See entry 8 for discussion.
28 Christians in Conversation
has been suggested that this text reveals a genuine interest in Platonic philosophy
by its author, presumably a representative of the senatorial elite under Justinian.101
Anthony Kaldellis draws attention to the Platonist sympathies by writers living
under the reign of Justinian, such as Procopius, Agathias, and John Lydus, and
possibly in opposition to the regime, but he also writes of the development of a
Christian classicizing culture during the fifth and sixth centuries, whether under-
stood as a turn to the classics within Christian culture, or as a continuation of clas-
sical culture, only by Christians. These dialogues may be understood against this
particular background.102
Scholars have also sought the influence of Aristotle’s dialogues on Christian
dialogues (and, in turn, the influence of Cicero’s dialogues on the Latin ones), but
this tradition has been more difficult to trace.103 The search is complicated be-
cause, unlike Plato’s dialogues, Aristotle’s ones are almost entirely lost; yet Basil of
Caesarea’s Ep. 135 shows that he knew about the dialogues by Aristotle and by his
successor Theophrastus. Some see the influence of Aristotle’s dialogues in the use
of an authorial preface before the beginning of the dialogue proper, as is attested,
for instance, in the dialogues by Cyril of Alexandria and Leontius of Byzantium.
Another feature of Aristotelian dialogues was probably the presence, as one of the
speakers, of the author (or, alternatively, of a main speaker representing the point
of view of the author) who led the conversation and spoke for longer sections,
while, in a format somewhat similar to a lecture, the minor speakers intervened
only occasionally, and more rarely than in the dialogues by Plato.104 Overall, how-
ever, the impact of Aristotle on Christian dialogues seems less conspicuous than
that of Plato; also, knowledge of Aristotelian philosophy was generally scarce in
patristic authors, and, although familiarity with Aristotelian logic, often limited
to the Categories, was not uncommon, explicit references to this tradition were
easily associated with heresy in our period.105 Among Christian dialogues, Ps.-
Athanasius’ Two Dialogues against the Macedonians and Anastasius of Antioch’s
Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Tritheite openly express hostility against the
use of Aristotelian logic in the field of Christian Trinitarian theology (and against
the use of the Categories in particular in the Two Dialogues).
A different consideration should be made about dialogues with biographical
subjects. In the present work, this typology is represented by Palladius’ Dialogue
on the Life of John Chrysostom and Zacharias of Mytilene’s Life of Severus, while
Latin instances include the almost contemporary Sulpicius Severus’ Gallus or
101. See O’Meara 2002, Bell 2009, and entry 49 for discussion.
102. Kaldellis 2007:173–87 and 2007:177n6 for bibliography.
103. Heyden 2009b:128n52; Perrone 1980:417n15; Bardy 1957:941–42; Waszink 1947; Laurenti 1987 and 2003
on Aristotle’s dialogues. Cicero is often considered one of our best sources for Aristotelian dialogues: see Ad Fam.
1.9.23 with Kennedy 1972:208–9 and Fantham 2004; Ad Att. 4.16.2 for the use of prologues; and Ad Att. 13.19.4 with
Beard 1986 for the choice of the speakers.
104. Schorn 2004:35; Laurenti 2003 and 1987:1.67.
105. Cameron 2014:47n47 for references; for Syriac see Watt 2016; King 2013; Lim 1995:130–133 and 231–32.
Introduction 29
Dialogues on the Virtues of St. Martin (c. 404), and, less than two centuries later,
Gregory the Great’s Dialogues (its second book deals with the life of St. Benedict).106
As was stunningly shown by a papyrological find from Oxyrhynchus, the use of
the dialogue form in biography was not a late antique innovation, but may well
have had precedents in the Peripatetic tradition. P.Oxy. 1176 contains a large pas-
sage from a Life of Euripides in dialogue form authored by the Peripatetic Satyrus
of Callatis (late third century BCE), and shows that Satyrus employed the dia-
logue form for a collection of biographies that originally included also the lives
of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.107 From the text that survives, it appears
that Satyrus’ dialogue on the life of Euripides featured one main speaker who
spoke for longer sections and two minor speakers who intervened only occasion-
ally, presumably in some sort of instructional relationship that has been linked to
the format of Aristotle’s dialogues.108 Cicero’s Cato, unfortunately lost, is likely to
have been another instance of this tradition of biography in dialogue form, and
Sulpicius Severus made it abundantly clear in his biographical dialogue Gallus
that Cicero was one, if not the main one, of his literary models.109 It should be
pointed out, however, that strong apologetic concerns guided the authors of both
the biographical dialogues addressed here, Palladius and Zacharias of Mytilene,
as is noted in their entries (31 and 48 respectively).
Another strand within ancient dialogue was that of symposiastic literature,
which adopted the dialogue form and is sometimes described as a subgenre of the
philosophical dialogue. The archetypes of the genre were Plato’s and Xenophon’s
Symposia, but later Greek practitioners include Plutarch, Lucian, Athenaeus, and
Julian; and Macrobius stands out as a Latin example.110 Methodius’ Symposium
is an instance of Christian symposiastic literature in Greek, and has been linked
to Julian’s Caesars within a “third wave” of symposiastic literature in the late im-
perial period. That Methodius’ Symposium remained an isolated example among
Christian authors can be explained through the fact that the social context and
traditional aristocratic feasting implied by the symposium was an obstacle to
the development of such literature among Christians. In fact, the symposiastic
106. Sulpicius’ dialogue is edited by Fontaine and Dupré 2006 and translated into English by Peebles 1949:161–
251; see also Stancliffe 1983; Gregory’s dialogues are edited by De Vogüé and Antin 1978 and translated into English
by Zimmermann 1959; see also Dal Santo 2012.
107. P.Oxy. 1176 (ed. Hunt 1912, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri 9:124–82), more recently edited and translated into
German by Schorn 2004; an Italian translation is available in Arrighetti 1964. For the biographic nature of this dia-
logue and the use of the dialogue form in ancient biography with discussion of earlier scholarship see Momigliano
1993:80 and 115.
108. Schorn 2004:31–36 for the nature of Satyrus’ dialogue.
109. Stancliffe 1983:104–7; Jones 1970; Momigliano 1993:80n116.
110. An isolated reference to the tradition of symposiastic dialogue is found in a rhetorical treatise of the
imperial period from the Hermogenic corpus (Ps.-Hermogenes, On Method of Forceful Speaking 36, ed. and trans.
Rabe and Kennedy 2005:262–65). Here, the symposiastic dialogue is described as “a combination of serious and
humourous in regard both to persons and actions” (πλοκὴ σπουδαῖα καὶ γελοῖα καὶ πρόσωπα καὶ πράγματα) and
the models are Plato and Xenophon; see LaValle 2017.
30 Christians in Conversation
For assuredly your quick wit realizes this—that those philosophers outside
the faith who wrote dialogues, Aristotle and Theophrastus for instance,
at once grappled with the facts themselves, because they realized their
111. König 2008 and 2012. For Julian and Methodius see LaValle 2017 and 2017a and Quiroga Puertas 2017.
For the second-century grammarian Herodianus and the fragments of his work entitled Symposium see Dickey
2014:341 and Hirzel 1895:2.350-52. Jerome, De vir. ill. 80, wrote that he could read a text entitled Symposium by
Lactantius (now lost), “which he wrote as a young man” (quod adolescentulus scripsit). For comparison, see the crit-
icism regarding the setting of the Greek symposium in Philo, De vita contemplativa 57–63; and Schwartz 2008.
112. See the relevant entries.
113. Boys-Stones 2018:55–56.
Introduction 31
own lack of the literary graces of Plato. But Plato with the power of his
eloquence at one and the same time both attacks opinions and ridicules
the persons who represent them, attacking the rashness and recklessness
of Thrasymachus, the levity and conceit of Hippias, and the boastfulness
and pompousness of Protagoras. But whenever he introduces indefinite
characters into his dialogues, he uses his interlocutors merely for the sake
of giving clarity to his subject matter, and brings nothing else from the
characters into the arguments; as he did in the Laws.
So it is necessary also for us [Christians], who do not set out to write
for worldly honour but propose to bequeath to the brethren admonitions
on edifying subjects, if we introduce a character already well known to
the world for rashness of conduct, to weave something derived from the
quality of the character into the text, if it is at all incumbent upon us to
censure men who neglect their duties. But if the material brought into the
dialogue is indefinite, digressions against persons break its unity and tend
to no useful end. (Ep. 135.1.10–2.10; trans. Deferrari 1950, modified)
“the ancient Greek philosophers (οἱ πάλαι τῶν Ἑλλήνων σοφοί) [. . .], who offered
their books to a well-educated audience for whom life consisted in discussion”;
Theodoret wanted his “work to be easily intelligible and profitable for readers
unacquainted with verbal disputation,” and he therefore placed the names of the
speakers in the left margin of the text so as to render the change of speaker even
more noticeable.117 Similarly, Leontius of Byzantium saw in the dialogue form the
most appropriate format to address and correct objections from his opponents.118
The choice of writing in dialogue form was intentional and calculated, and, in the
views of these authors, necessary to achieve their aim of persuasion.
A Formal Typology
Boniface two years later was mortally wounded in a fight with the
Bulgarians in the Rhodope Mountains. Mourtzouphlos was soon
taken prisoner and hurled headlong from the column of Theodosius,
thus fulfilling a local prophecy relative to the column, that it should
witness the destruction of some perfidious ruler.
It is not within our scope to narrate the history of the Latin empire
thus established. For fifty-seven years it maintained a precarious
existence, and finally fell again into the hands of the Greeks, who
had constantly menaced it from their opposing capital of Nicæa
(1264).
The most serious consequence of the capture of Constantinople by
the Latins was the new hope and opportunity imparted to the Turks.
The Greeks, with all their weaknesses, had for generations been a
buffer between Islam and Europe. The empire had stood like a wall
across the great highway of the Asiatic incursion. If the Greeks had
been generally the losers in the struggle, they had maintained
sufficient power to occupy the arms of their contestants, leaving the
Christians of the West free to prey upon the Moslems of Syria and
adjacent countries. Now all was changed in this respect. The war of
Latins with Greeks engrossed, and largely used up, the power of
both as against their common enemy. Though the capital had fallen,
the Greek everywhere was still the sworn enemy of the Latin.
In the meantime the Moslems were compacting and extending their
military power. They were growing in multitude by the migration of
new swarms from the original hive in the farther East. They were
destined to become too strong for Christendom to resist, to move
steadily on to their own conquest of Constantinople, and even to
knock at the gate of Vienna. The words of Edward Pears are
undoubtedly warranted: “The crime of the fourth crusade handed
over Constantinople and the Balkan peninsula to six centuries of
barbarism.”
CHAPTER XXXIX.
BETWEEN THE FOURTH AND FIFTH CRUSADES
—CONDITION OF EAST AND WEST—THE
CHILDREN’S CRUSADE.