Philosophical Protreptic and Conversion to Christianity in Gregory Thaumaturgus’s Address to Origen
Gregory Thaumaturgus’s Address to Origen has alternatively been read as a speech of thanksgiving (λόγος χαριστήριος), as a panegyric (πανηγυρικός), as a laudatory address (προσφωνητικός) or as a farewell speech (συντακτικός). The present paper offers a new approach to the genre of Gregory’s text by reading it as a protreptic (λόγος προτρεπτικός) addressed to a pagan audience. Such an approach sheds new light not only on the genre of the Address, but also on its content, structure, and intended audience. It also allows us to readdress the controversial issue of Gregory’s sparing use of specifically Christian terminology in his speech. After a short overview of the solutions proposed by various scholars to this question, I suggest that the avoidance of an explicit Christian vocabulary can be reasonably explained by taking into account the protreptic aim of this text.
INTRODUCTION
The Address to Origen was composed and delivered by a student of Origen in Caesarea of Palestine, most probably in 238 c.e. This student is traditionally identified with Gregory Thaumaturgus, future bishop of [End Page 381] Neocaesarea in Pontus. Gregory was born of pagan parents and, according to his own testimony in the Address, received an education in rhetoric, Latin language, and Roman law (§§ 56–60).1 He later became a student of Origen and spent five years at his school in Caesarea,2 studying Greek philosophy as well as Christian theology. The Address to Origen represents the written (and probably revised and elaborated)3 form of the speech he delivered in a great assembly before returning to his native land.4 The text is of great importance for the study of early Christianity as it contains, among other information, the most extensive description of Origen’s teaching activity in Caesarea.
Despite the large amount of literature already available on Gregory’s Address, there are still some important issues which require further investigation. One of these is that of the genre(s) to which the text in question can be assigned. As I will argue below, readdressing the question of the genre is important because it can help us better understand the structure, content, purposes, and intended audience of Gregory’s text. It is this issue which will be explored in the first part of this paper.
THE PROBLEM OF THE GENRE OF GREGORY’S ADDRESS TO ORIGEN
As is the case with many other ancient texts, the Address to Origen displays characteristics of more than one particular genre. Gregory refers twice to his speech as a λόγος χαριστήριος, a speech of thanksgiving (§§ 31 and 40), but in the manuscript tradition the text is considered to be a προσφωνητικός, that is, a laudatory address.5 The term προσφωνητικός is [End Page 382] most probably due to Pamphilus of Caesarea, the first editor of Gregory’s text.6 In the fourth century, Jerome considered the same text to be a πανηγυρικὸς εὐχαριστίας addressed to Origen by his student Theodore, qui postea Gregorius appellatus est, upon the return to his native land.7 Another reference to Gregory’s text is found in Socrates Scholasticus’s Ecclesiastical History 4.27: Socrates mentions a συστατικὸς λόγος Γρηγορίου εἰς Ὠριγένην,8 but the extant text seems to have been corrupted. Henri Valois, one of the first editors of Socrates’s Ecclesiastical History already suggested that it is more plausible to read συντακτικός (“farewell speech”) instead of συστατικός (“commendatory” or “introductory address”).9
The wide range of rhetorical terms used by ancient authors when referring to Gregory’s text is reflected in its modern editions and translations. In the editio princeps by Gerardus Vossius (1604) the text is entitled Εἰς Ὠριγένην προσφωνητικὸς καὶ πανηγυρικὸς λόγος / In Origenem prosphonetica ac panegyrica oratio, a title which not only follows the manuscript tradition, but also seems to take account of the testimony of Jerome, who, as mentioned above, had described Gregory’s speech as a πανηγυρικὸς εὐχαριστίας.10 As expected, this categorization was not universally accepted by subsequent editors. In his critical edition from 1894, Paul Koetschau asserted that Gregory’s text is essentially a speech of thanksgiving, not a panegyric, as Vossius and other editors had thought.11 Koetschau’s view seems to have been adopted, among others, by Henri Crouzel.12 Unfortunately, Crouzel provides little discussion of the genre [End Page 383] and limits himself to briefly arguing against the position of those who maintain that the text can be interpreted as a προσφωνητικός.13 More recently, in his English translation of Gregory’s text, Michael Slusser preferred to speak of an Address of Thanksgiving to Origen, and argued that “panegyric” is a term which does not correspond to the form and content of Gregory’s text.14
Apart from the editions and translations mentioned above, some studies directly tackle the problem of the genre of the Address. In an article published at the beginning of the past century, August Brinkmann argued that Gregory’s speech is an eloquent example of a λόγος συντακτικός, which follows closely the canons laid out in ancient rhetorical handbooks.15 It seems that Brinkmann’s reading has been largely accepted, since contemporary scholars refer quite often to Gregory’s text as a “farewell speech” addressed to Origen. By paying attention to the circumstances in which the discourse was delivered and by analyzing its overall composition and main themes, Laurent Pernot has also concluded that the text fits well within the genre of the λόγος συντακτικός.16 In a similar way, George A. Kennedy stated emphatically that Gregory’s Address is “the first true example of Christian epideictic oratory, one of the very few surviving speeches of the third century, and the only extant example of a Greek farewell speech.”17
New arguments in favor of Brinkmann’s interpretation have been brought up recently by Almut-Barbara Renger in an article in which she analyzes Gregory’s text in the light of the rhetorical topoi listed in the treatise On Epideictic Speeches attributed to Menander Rhetor.18 Renger points out the extent to which Gregory’s speech accords with the topics listed in Menander, and concludes that Gregory intended to write a farewell address following—even though only partially—the specific rhetorical conventions prevailing in his time. As Renger shows, Gregory’s speech seems to fit the [End Page 384] genre of the λόγος συντακτικός more closely than it does any of the other two genres, namely the λόγος χαριστήριος and the λόγος προσφωνητικός.19
Despite these intense debates, establishing the genre of Gregory’s text still remains an open question. In what follows, I do not aim to make a final judgment on the genre of the Address, but only to consider the extent to which this text can be assigned to the protreptic genre.20 Through such a reading, I will argue that Gregory’s text could be reasonably interpreted not only as a προσφωνητικός, χαριστήριος, πανηγυρικός, or συντακτικὸς λόγος, but also as a προτρεπτικός mainly addressed to well-educated pagans, with the intent of encouraging them to convert to the philosophy and way of life promoted in Origen’s school.
The Protreptic Character of the Address to Origen
In the past few decades, increasing scholarly attention has been devoted to ancient protreptic literature, with a particular interest in defining more precisely the features of this class of texts.21 Valuable research has also been done to assess the extent of the influence ancient philosophical protreptic had on early Christian literature. Many Christian writings, including Paul’s Letter to the Romans,22 Clement of Alexandria’s Protrepticus to [End Page 385] the Greeks,23 Cyprian of Carthage’s Ad Donatum,24 Basil’s homily On the Words “Give Heed to Thyself,”25 or Augustine’s Confessions,26 have been shown to possess protreptic features.
Surprisingly, little research of this kind has been done so far on the Address. Very few attempts have been made to point out the protreptic character of this text or to relate it to other works belonging to this genre. The protreptic purpose of the Address has been hinted at, but not discussed at any length by Michael Slusser, who has pointed out instead the protreptic nature of Gregory’s other work, the Metaphrase in Ecclesiastes. To Slusser, both the Address and the Metaphrase “describe the urgent need for conversion to philosophy.”27 Likewise, in his Italian translation of Gregory’s text, Marco Rizzi has indicated some important points of contact between the Address and the tradition of the protreptic genre, but his comments are scarce, brief, and general in nature.28 More recently, Olga Alieva has argued that Gregory’s Address represents “a necessary link between Classical Greek and Christian traditions of exhortation,” inasmuch as many of its protreptic motifs are to a great extent “inspired or even directly borrowed from Plato.”29 Alieva’s analysis is well argued and convincing but I think the parallels between the Address and the Greco-Roman protreptic literature are much more numerous than those she is drawing. In fact, Alieva limits her analysis to the paragraphs 73–92 of Gregory’s Address, insisting on what she calls “Origen’s protreptics to philosophy.” Thus, Alieva never explicitly states that Gregory’s Address was intended to fulfill a protreptic purpose and completely leaves out the [End Page 386] issue of its genre. It seems therefore that further explorations of the protreptic features of Gregory’s text are still desirable.30
If we accept that the aim of a protreptic is “to urge the reader to convert to a way of life, join a school, or accept a set of teachings as normative for the reader’s life,”31 it would not be difficult to see the Address as a text with protreptic purpose. I think there is sufficient evidence in the Address to argue that one of Gregory’s aims was to attract pagan intellectuals to the kind of philosophy taught in Origen’s school. This can be amply demonstrated by paying close attention to the structure, content, and stylistic features of Gregory’s text.
The Protreptic Structure of the Address
Structurally, the Address falls into two unequal sections, bounded by an exordium and a peroratio.32 The first section, corresponding to paragraphs 31–92, is mainly an autobiographical account in which Gregory describes his first encounter with Origen at Caesarea, and the way in which he was persuaded to enter Origen’s school. The second section (paragraphs 93–183) provides an extensive description of Origen’s teaching and personality. As we shall see below, both these sections contain elements which allow us to read the Address as a work designed to fulfill a protreptic function.
Let us first note that the ancient protreptic writings usually reveal a bipartite structure, corresponding to a negative and positive section, respectively.33 As David E. Aune has pointed out, in the negative section, consisting of a λόγος ἐλεγκτικός, the author of a protreptic focuses on “the critique of rival sources of knowledge, ways of living, or schools of thought which reject philosophy,” while in the positive section, consisting [End Page 387] of a λόγος ἐνδεικτικός, he states, praises, and defends “the truth claims of philosophical knowledge, schools of thought and ways of living” which are the subject of the protreptic.34 As the discussion below will make clear, Gregory’s Address reveals, at least at some levels, a similar structure.
Indeed, at a closer analysis, a great part of Gregory’s speech can be understood as a two-level argumentation process. At a first level, which is to be recognised in paragraphs 75–79 of the Address, Gregory’s discourse emphasizes the advantages of a life led by reason and dedicated to philosophy and self-knowledge, and denounces the errors of alternative ways of living. Thus, on the one hand, drawing on a presumable protreptic speech delivered by Origen, Gregory praises philosophy and argues that “the only ones truly to live the life which befits rational beings are those who strive to live uprightly, who know themselves first for who they are, and next what the genuine goods are which a person ought to pursue, and the truly bad things one must avoid.” (§ 75, trans. Slusser, FC 98:103) In stark contrast to these people are the ignorant ones who “have no knowledge of what they are and wander like brute beasts without any idea of what good and evil are or any desire to find out.” (§ 76, trans. Slusser, FC 98:103) These people, Gregory continues, rush after possessions, fame, popular acclaim, and physical attractiveness, regarding all these things as if they were good and neglecting the most important feature of a human being, namely reason (§ 77). Now, if the praise of philosophy and the recognition of its benefits for the human life can be seen as elements of a λόγος ἐνδεικτικός, the sharp criticism of those who live a life of pleasures and vanity, neglecting philosophy for other activities, can be interpreted as the second, necessary part of a protreptic, that is, as a λόγος ἐλεγκτικός. Gregory’s speech thus becomes an implicit invitation addressed to his audience to embrace a philosophical life. It seems likely that Gregory aimed at encouraging his auditors and presumable readers to pursue philosophy by turning them away from the false values such as the pursuit of wealth, fame, esteem of the others, and the like.
However, throughout his speech, Gregory is not aiming only at stating the value and importance of philosophy for a good and happy life; this is but a first part of a wider protreptic strategy, inasmuch as Gregory is also concerned with showing his auditors and readers which school of philosophy they should choose. As Mark D. Jordan has rightly stressed, the addressee of a protreptic “must be won at different levels—for the love of wisdom generally, for the choice of a particular school, for full [End Page 388] commitment to the rigors of an advanced discipline.”35 Therefore, moving toward a second level of his protreptic speech (corresponding roughly to paragraphs 93–183), Gregory tries to present Origen’s school as superior to any other philosophical school of his time and as the only valid way of acquiring self-knowledge, virtue, and union with God. He does this through a new λόγος ἐνδεικτικός in which the praise dedicated previously to philosophy is turned into a praise dedicated to his teacher, Origen. In doing so, his speech becomes an even more powerful exhortation to a highly spiritual and philosophical way of life. Moreover, true to the rhetorical guidelines concerning the structure of a protreptic, Gregory will pair again this λόγος ἐνδεικτικός with another λόγος ἐλεγκτικός, in which the previous critique against ignorant people, who utterly neglect philosophy, will be now developed into an artful and subtle critique against pagan philosophers. Through such a rhetorical strategy, Gregory tries to win over the auditors and the readers not only to philosophy in general, but, more precisely, to the one taught and lived by Origen.
In this second part of the Address, Gregory is mostly concerned to demonstrate that for his master philosophy was primarily a way of life. Origen did not teach his students how to act by providing them only standard definitions of different virtues, as the other philosophers (§§ 123–125) did. In Origen’s view, the precepts of philosophy had to be supported by action: “This man did not explain to us about virtues in that fashion, in words, but rather exhorted us to deeds, and he exhorted us even more by deeds than by what he said.” (§ 126, trans. Slusser, FC 98:112) By praising this sort of philosophy—not only taught, but also lived by Origen—Gregory sets forth a pattern of life which his auditors and readers are expected to strive for and imitate.
In order to emphasize the superiority of Origen’s philosophy over that of his pagan competitors, Gregory sketches an antithetical portrait of the “worldly philosophers” of his time. He deliberately employs the synkrisis or rhetorical comparison, which was a device well suited to a work of protreptic character.36 Unlike Origen, the other philosophers are “unable to transmit either prudence, in such a way that someone might do the works of prudence, or temperance, so that someone might actually choose what he has learned to choose,” because all these men in their philosophizing stop at words. (§§ 124 and 134, trans. Slusser, FC 98:112)
The elements of this comparison reveal more clearly that Gregory’s concern was not simply to expose Origen’s teaching method and way of [End Page 389] life, but to motivate the hearers to call into question the consistency of their own philosophical systems. It seems reasonable to suppose that this second negative part of the Address was intended to support the overall protreptic task Gregory was pursuing: through this λόγος ἐλεγκτικός he sought to persuade pagan intellectuals—auditors or presumably readers of his text—to abandon their inferior philosophy and adopt a superior one, namely that professed by Origen.
The discussion above allows us to assume that Gregory’s protreptic intent played a significant role in shaping the structure of his Address. The two λόγοι ἐλεγκτικοί paired with the two λόγοι ἐνδεικτικοί provide us with initial evidence of the protreptic purpose of the Address. However, apart from this rhetorical structure, which includes positive and negative sections, there is further evidence of Gregory’s use of the conventions of the genre of philosophical protreptic. I will explore it more thoroughly in the following section.
Protreptic Topoi in the Address
To be sure, Gregory’s frequent use of the verb προτρέπειν (§§ 78, 133, 135, 159, 160) and its synonym παρακαλεῖν (§ 126) can be seen as already indicating the protreptic character of the Address. More illustrative, however, are the terms describing opposed attitudes and types of behavior, by which Gregory tries to suggest to his audience which way of life to pursue and which to avoid. It is mostly about words designating “sleep” and “wakefulness,” “darkness” and “light,” “ignorance” and “knowledge,” which are frequently used in various protreptic writings to express, metaphorically, what Annemaré Kotzé called “the undesired and the desired attitude and activity of the addressee.”37 Such words are intended to guide the auditors and the readers towards the particular course of action or way of life advised in the protreptic.38 Illustrative in this sense are the antithetical word pairs found in paragraphs 75–76, such as “philosophy” and “ignorance” (φιλοσοφίαν / ἀμαθίαν), “those who love philosophy” and “all the ignorant” (τοὺς φιλοσοφίας ἐραστάς / πάντας τοὺς ἀμαθεῖς), “rational beings” and “irrational creatures” (λογικοῖς / ἄλογοι), “those who know themselves” [End Page 390] and “those who have no knowledge of what they are” (τοὺς … ἑαυτούς τε γινώσκοντας / ὅσοι … οὐδ’ αὐτὸ τοῦτο ὅπερ εἰσιν ἐγνωκότες).
A similar protreptic function may be assigned to Gregory’s use of the imagery of light and darkness: as he recounts, the day he first met Origen was “the first real day for me, the most precious of all days if I may say so, when first the true sun began to rise on me.” (§ 73, trans. Slusser, FC 98:102) The light of the true sun is certainly meant to signify, metaphorically, the true knowledge attainable in Origen’s school. By this sentence, Gregory suggests that his entire previous life was but one of wandering, errors, and ignorance. It was only after entering Origen’s school that he converted to a more reasonable way of life. Now, as he is going to leave that place, he already knows that “truly night in place of day, darkness rather than brilliant light” (νὺξ ὄντως ἐξ ἡμέρας, ἐκ δὲ λαμπροῦ φωτὸς σκότος) will await him (§ 194), since living in Origen’s school meant living in a place where the light of the sun was shining without ceasing (φῶς τὸ ἡλιακὸν καὶ τὸ διηνεκές —§ 196). It is important to note at this point that the imagery of light and darkness used in the Address has close parallels in other works of protreptic intent from both pagan and Christian literature. Worth mentioning are some passages in Lucian’s Nigrinus and Clement of Alexandria’s Protrepticus to the Greeks.39
Closely related to this topos is the sleeping and waking imagery. As Gregory says, those not trained in philosophy have the eyes of their mind squeezed shut (τυφλώττοντες τὸν νοῦν—§ 76). They pay no attention to reason (§ 77), being just like people sleeping, who need to be woken by the arguments of philosophy. It is exactly what Origen was doing with his students, inasmuch as his words were waking them up as if from sleep [End Page 391] (ἐξανιστῶντες ἡμᾶς ὥσπερ καθεύδοντας—§ 101).40 Like the imagery of light and darkness, that of sleeping and waking was a recurring topos in ancient protreptic literature. Parallels are found, for example, in Plato’s Clitophon and Clement’s Protrepticus.41
A close reading of the Address can also reveal a certain thematic similarity with other philosophical protreptics from Greco-Roman antiquity. For example, the praise of a life led by reason, which we find in Gregory’s text, seems to have parallels in some of the preserved fragments of Aristotle’s Protrepticus. As already seen, to Gregory, those who love philosophy (τοὺς φιλοσοφίας ἐραστάς) are the only ones who truly live the life which befits rational beings (ζῆν ὄντως τὸν λογικοῖς προσήκοντα βίον—§ 75), while those who do not philosophize seem to neglect the most distinctive and important feature of human nature, namely reason (λόγος—§ 77). In quite a similar way, Aristotle states in the Protrepticus that “reason is the superior part of the soul” (frg. 24 Düring), and notes that living a human life is not possible for anyone who does not possess thinking and knowing—οὐδὲ γὰρ ζῆν δυνατὸν ὡς ἀνθρώποις ἄνευ τούτων [scil. τοῦ φρονεῖν καὶ τοῦ γιγνώσκειν] (frg. 41 Düring). Therefore, Aristotle continues, “the man who thinks aright lives more, i.e. in a higher degree, than others,” and “he who reaches truth in the highest degree lives in the highest degree.” Consequently, we are told, “the perfect life must be ascribed to those who think and to those who possess philosophical insight” (frg. 85 Düring).42
Likewise, rejecting possessions (χρήματα), fame (δόξαι), popular acclaim (τιμαὶ ἀπὸ τῶν πολλῶν) and other false goods (see the Address § 76) was a topos widely used in works of protreptic intent from Greco-Roman philosophy. According to Aristotle, “for those who are ill-disposed in soul neither wealth (πλοῦτος) nor strength nor beauty is good” (Protr. frg. 4 Düring). Moreover, if one could see the human life in a clear light, he would realize that “strength, size, beauty are a laugh and of no worth,” and the [End Page 392] same judgment holds true for honors (τιμαί) and fame (δόξαι) (Protr. frgs. 104–105 Düring).43
The passages quoted above strongly suggest that even if we do not find in the Address clear traces of a direct influence of a particular philosophical protreptic, we nevertheless can recognize some points of similarity between Gregory’s text and this type of literature, both in terms of content and in terms of style of argumentation. Like classical authors of philosophical protreptics, Gregory points out the futility of the unreasoned life and reveals the value of philosophy in order to encourage his hearers and readers to make a life-changing choice by pursuing this activity.
I would also interpret as linked to a protreptic purpose two metaphors in Gregory’s text, namely that of the farmer and that of training wild horses. When describing Origen’s teaching method, Gregory is mentioning a propaedeutic stage which was thought necessary in order to prepare the new students for properly attending the disciplines included in the curriculum. In this context, Gregory compares Origen to a good farmer who wants to cultivate a field that is still untilled and has no good soil (§ 93).44 To be sure, the agricultural metaphor used here may have been inspired by the passage in Mark 4.3–8. However, it is important to note that using the agricultural imagery to describe the philosophical propaedeutic training was also a topos of ancient philosophy. I find it quite interesting that the same metaphor is attested in one of the surviving fragments of Cicero’s Hortensius. It is highly probable that in this dialogue Cicero was arguing that the liberal arts are a necessary preparatory stage for the study of philosophy, ut … segetes agricolae subigunt aratris multo ante quam serant.45 The fact that an almost identical image is found in Ennius’s Protrepticus,46 as well as in that of Iamblichus,47 allows us to consider this metaphor as a topos probably often used in ancient works of protreptic intent. [End Page 393]
The second metaphor—that of training wild horses—is used by Gregory when he describes the same first stage of Origen’s teaching. Young students are like young and wild horses, who veer off the road and run aimlessly every which way (§ 97). Such horses must be trained to obey the horseman, just as the soul must be prepared through propaedeutic teaching to acquire philosophy. Interestingly enough, a strikingly similar image is found, this time too, in a fragment from the above mentioned Hortensius.48 Equally worth noting, Clement of Alexandria uses the same image of the “stubborn horses” in his Protrepticus to the Greeks.49
I am aware that none of these topoi can be thought as a necessary element of a protreptic and that they may also occur in works of ancient literature without any protreptic purpose. However, one has to admit that they fit very well in a work whose purpose was to persuade the addressees of the importance of philosophy and to encourage them to embrace the doctrine and the way of life promoted in a certain school. Moreover, as I have tried to show, all these topoi show evident points of contact between the Address and other works of protreptic intent from Greco-Roman philosophy.
It can be reasonably argued that Gregory’s account of the conversion was also intended to sustain the protreptic purpose of the Address. Autobiography thus becomes an effective vehicle for providing an exemplum designed to persuade the auditors and readers to make a similar life-changing choice. As Annemaré Kotzé has argued, the very nature of protreptic makes the presence of exemplary conversion stories almost a sine qua non component of the genre.50 It is not by chance that, on many occasions, Gregory insists on describing his soul’s condition in the first days of his studying with Origen and the transformative power of the instruction provided by his master (see §§ 73, 97, 102, 109, 111, 118). His autobiographical narrative provides a description of how a soul can be transformed through philosophy. I thus argue that by describing his experience in Origen’s school, Gregory intended to provide an exemplum to be followed by potential converts. He was aiming not just to inform auditors and readers about what the conversion to Origen’s philosophy meant to him, but also to encourage them to change their way of thinking and acting. In doing so, he was pursuing a protreptic purpose. [End Page 394]
So far, scholars have provided little discussion on how Gregory’s preoccupation with his audience is manifested in the Address. I think the analysis above provides us with convincing evidence that Gregory has conceived of his audience as one which must be impressed, influenced, transformed, and converted. The Address was not just a rhetorical display, a “discours d’apparat,” as it was sometimes regarded in modern scholarship.51 It was also intended to provoke strong reactions in its auditors and readers, to win them over to the true philosophy taught and practiced in Origen’s school. It should be noted at this point that Gregory’s preoccupation with his audience is another argument for seeing the Address as protreptic. In his Protrepticus to the Greeks, Clement of Alexandria often displays a similar attitude toward his readers.52
Unfortunately, we know little about the pagan community of third-century Caesarea and its intellectual life.53 However, the numerous references to the pagan philosophers in the Address explicitly suggest that Gregory envisaged a readership extending beyond the circle of Origen’s students. Textual evidence indicates that pagan philosophers and their adherents constituted a great part of Gregory’s intended audience. He directly addresses pagan philosophers in § 127: “I plead with the contemporary philosophers, those I know and those about whom I have heard from others, and with other people, not to be hold blameworthy what we now say.” (trans. Slusser, FC 98:112) In many other passages Gregory uses similar expressions to designate them, such as “the whole [End Page 395] race of philosophers” (§ 115), “the other philosophers” (§§ 124, 134), “the worldly philosophers” (§ 129), etc. It is for these philosophers and their disciples that Gregory strives to present Origen’s school of philosophy as superior to any other of the time. There was in his speech a consciously assumed protreptic task, an implied exhortation for his audience to follow his example and be converted to the philosophy and way of life promoted in Origen’s school.
That Gregory envisaged for his text a mainly pagan audience was also argued by Rizzi, who highlights the “political dimension” of the Address. According to Rizzi, Gregory’s text was intended to convey a cultural and political message addressed to the intellectual and political elites of the time, with the aim of promoting Christianity. The description of Origen’s teaching as a unique combination of Christianity and classical Greek paideia could offer to Gregory’s contemporaries a paradigm of negotiation between Christianity and political reality. According to Rizzi, the Address could thus be interpreted as an “apology of Christianity.”54
In light of the discussion above it becomes clear that the Address to Origen displays certain characteristics of the ancient protreptic genre. Its rhetorical structure, as well as the motifs and the vocabulary employed allow us to speak of a relatively coherent and consistent λόγος προτρεπτικός, mainly addressed to the pagan intellectuals to encourage them to study and practice the philosophy taught by Origen. Further discussions regarding the genre of the Address should not overlook the protreptic features it displays. However, my analysis is not concerned only with the issue of the genre of Gregory’s text. It is my contention that by interpreting the Address as a protreptic it is possible to provide a new and reasonable answer to the disputed question regarding Gregory’s avoidance of specifically Christian terminology in his text. In the following I will turn to this important issue. [End Page 396]
WHY DID GREGORY AVOID SPECIFICALLY CHRISTIAN TERMINOLOGY IN HIS ADDRESS TO ORIGEN?
The question of the avoidance of specifically Christian terminology in Gregory’s Address has been the subject of much discussion and controversy in recent scholarly literature. Indeed, it is puzzling that we do not find in Gregory’s text any use of terms like “Jesus,” “Christ,” “church,” “incarnation,” “passion,” “resurrection,” etc., and this fact has justly raised the question: If the author of the Address is Gregory Thaumaturgus, future bishop of Neocaesarea, why does he use a language so deprived of Christian-specific terms?
Scholars have offered different answers to this much-debated question. Adolf Knauber argued that the author of this speech was not a Christian, neither when he entered Origen’s school, nor when he left it. According to Knauber, Origen’s school was not intended to provide advanced Christian teachings, but to attract and introduce educated pagans to a philosophically informed Christian worldview. Since Origen’s school offered, mainly, a philosophical curriculum, without any elaborate discussion of biblical theology, the scarcity of specific Christian terms which characterizes the Address is not due to the author’s deliberate choice: Gregory has faithfully described Origen’s school, which was similar in many ways to the pagan philosophical schools at that time.55
Knauber’s position was partially criticized, among others, by Henri Crouzel,56 Joseph W. Trigg,57 and Anders-Christian Jacobsen.58 According to Crouzel, there is no good reason to accept Knauber’s view that in his school at Caesarea Origen taught only young pagan intellectuals. On the contrary, it is more likely that among Origen’s students there were also young Christians. In addition, there is sufficient evidence in the Address that the curriculum followed by Gregory consisted not only of a philosophical training, but also of a Christian-biblical theology.59 If the Address is so [End Page 397] deprived of specific Christian terminology, it is because of the author’s deliberate choice to adapt his speech to the public he was addressing.60
In a similar way, Joseph Trigg has stated that the avoidance of specifically Christian content can be explained by the fact that Gregory was trying to adjust his speech to a public consisting not only of students from Origen’s school, but also of educated pagans. In avoiding Christian terminology, Gregory would have followed one of the precepts given by his teacher who recommended a constant “accommodation to the needs of hearers” by withholding information they would not have been able to receive and understand in a proper way.61 As Trigg points out, several times Origen showed himself to be a steward (οἰκονόμος), a guardian of the mysteries of God, and it is quite reasonable that Gregory was doing the same. Thus, Trigg concludes, “the most plausible reason for the peculiarity of his style is that Gregory, who imitated his teacher in so many ways, was himself ‘economizing.’ In a λόγος συντακτικός before a mixed audience of pagans and Christians he put into practice what he had learned, acting, like his teacher, as a steward of God’s mysteries. If he veils specifically Christian ideas from those who do not already know about them, it is a deliberate strategy.”62
More recently, Anders-Christian Jacobsen has proposed another solution to this much-disputed question. Jacobsen argues that we have good reasons to think that, in his school, Origen taught philosophy as well as theology. But if this is true, “why did Gregory speak so much about his philosophical education and so little about his education in Christian theology?”63 In trying to respond to this question, Jacobsen argues that “the reason why Gregory seems to be more concerned about the philosophical content of Origen’s teaching could very well be that what he found most impressing and praiseworthy in Origen’s school was that he included philosophical training as preparation for his theological teaching. This was not the case with all Christian teachers, but this was attractive for well-educated people like Gregory.”64 Much like Crouzel and Trigg, Jacobsen interprets Gregory’s scarce use of Christian language as a deliberate choice, motivated, though, by another reason than the concern to adapt his speech to the public he was addressing. To Jacobsen, Gregory would have insisted [End Page 398] on the philosophical education that he received because it was precisely this that had impressed him the most in Origen’s school.65
I find the answers provided by Crouzel, Trigg, and Jacobsen well-argued and persuasive, but I think, however, that the question of Gregory’s avoidance of a distinctively Christian vocabulary can be solved at least equally convincingly if we take into account the protreptic purpose of the Address. Crouzel and Trigg have rightly noted that Gregory’s avoidance of Christian terminology was due to his need to adapt the speech to the public he was addressing, but none of them has stated that this avoidance could be due to the protreptic task Gregory was pursuing. Thus, I agree with them in arguing that the avoidance of Christian theological concepts is due to a deliberate choice, but I think this choice could also have been motivated by another reason. Gregory was concerned with describing Origen’s school as a philosophical one, in many aspects similar to the Greek philosophical schools, precisely with the intent to make it more appealing to the well-educated pagans. It is highly possible that Gregory was well aware of the potential persuasive power of such a description of Origen’s school.
Similarly, I agree with Jacobsen in maintaining, contra Knauber, that there are no good reasons to deny the including of specific Christian elements in Origen’s teaching in Caesarea. However, I think the striking degree to which Gregory uses philosophical terminology is not due only to the fact that this was the part of Origen’s teaching which impressed him the most. He was expecting the philosophical coloring of his text to impress and appeal to a pagan audience. It was a device Gregory used to show his audience that only by entering Origen’s school they would have become able to commit themselves to the true philosophy.
Gregory’s scarce references to the Christian doctrine in the Address can also be explained if we assume, with Sophie Van der Meeren, that protreptic writings are introductory in nature and, therefore, characterized by a kind [End Page 399] of incompleteness.66 As a protreptic and introductory text, the Address does not provide the auditors and readers with an extensive explanation of the Christian doctrine and mysteries. One of Gregory’s main aims was to attract the pagan elite to Christianity and a first step toward the achievement of this goal was to encourage them to enter Origen’s school. The philosophy to which Gregory implicitly invites his auditors and readers is not an end in itself, but rather a means by which they might be led to a superior one—namely the Christian philosophy.67 Therefore, I argue that Gregory intentionally withheld Christian theological concepts from his Address: he chose to place in his speech protreptic elements rather than an explanation of the Christian doctrine.
The avoidance of specifically Christian terminology was, in fact, a characteristic of the Christian protreptic writings.68 The style and vocabulary of Gregory’s Address are in many respects similar to those used by Clement of Alexandria in his Protrepticus to the Greeks. As Miguel Herrero de Jáuregui has recently shown, Clement consciously tries to shape Christianity in Greek molds “to make it understandable and attractive to the Pagans.” He frequently uses metaphors and “builds bridges with the Greek tradition”; likewise, as part of Clement’s protreptic strategy, the name of Jesus is “mentioned very few times and with a careful preparation [End Page 400] in each occasion.”69 Similarly, if we see the Address as a protreptic whose intended audience was mainly composed of pagan intellectuals, we can get a reasonable explanation for Gregory’s avoidance of specifically Christian concepts. Like Clement, Gregory was well aware of the need to adapt his message to the intellectual patterns of his intended audience. Without this philosophical setting, his protreptic address could not have reached the audience in the most effective way.
CONCLUSION
The discussion above allows us to conclude that the Address to Origen can be reasonably read not only as an address of thanksgiving, as a panegyric, as a laudatory address, or as a farewell speech, but also as a protreptic text. I hope to have argued convincingly that Gregory’s Address includes a substantial set of protreptic features revealed by its rhetorical structure, traditional topoi, and style. One of the main purposes of Gregory’s speech was to turn the intellectual interests of a pagan elite towards the school of Origen, depicted mostly as a school of philosophy. If my reading is correct, investigations into the question of the genre of the Address such as those carried out by Pernot, Renger, and others should be enriched by paying attention to the protreptic character of this text. Such a reading also provides us with a new solution to the much-debated question of Gregory’s avoidance of specifically Christian terminology. As I have tried to argue, the scarce use of Christian concepts can be reasonably seen as a feature of a Christian protreptic work, designed to reach, mainly, a pagan audience. [End Page 401]
Constantin-Ionuț Mihai is a Researcher at the Department of Interdisciplinary Research in Social Sciences and Humanities, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iași, Romania
An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the Seminar für Alte Kirchenge-schichte, Patrologie und Christliche Archäologie, University of Münster, Germany, in January 2015, during a research grant supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). I am grateful to Professor Alfons Fürst and the other participants for their questions and comments that helped me improve the manuscript. I would also like to thank Florin Leonte, Sergiu Sava, and the two anonymous reviewers of JECS for their useful comments and suggestions on previous versions of this paper.
Footnotes
1. For Gregory’s text, I use the critical edition by Henri Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge: Remerciement à Origène suivi de la Lettre d’Origène à Grégoire, SC 148 (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1969). All translated passages of the Address are from Michael Slusser, trans., St. Gregory Thaumaturgus: Life and Works, FC 98 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1998).
2. Eusebius, HE 6.30 (Gustave Bardy, ed., Eusèbe de Césarée: Histoire ecclésiastique, SC 41 [Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1955], 133). See also the discussion in Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 20–21.
3. This is the assumption made by Marco Rizzi in Gregorio il Taumaturgo (?): Encomio di Origene, Letture cristiane del primo millennio 33 (Milan: Paoline, 2002), 19–37, 95.
4. See Jerome, Vir. ill. 65 (PL 23:711B).
5. See Peter Guyot and Richard Klein, eds. and trans., Gregor der Wundertäter: Oratio prosphonetica ac panegyrica in Origenem. Dankrede an Origenes, Fontes Christiani 24 (Freiburg: Herder, 1996), 12; Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 38. According to the definition provided by Menander Rhetor, the προσφωνητικὸς λόγος is “a speech of praise to a governor spoken by an individual. In treatment it is an encomium, but not a complete one, since it does not include all the elements of the encomium.” (D. A. Russell and N. G. Wilson, eds. and trans., Menander Rhetor [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981], 165).
6. Paul Koetschau, Des Gregorios Thaumaturgos Dankrede an Origenes, als Anhang der Brief von Origenes an Gregorios Thaumaturgos, Kirchen- und dogmengeschichtliche Quellenschriften 9 (Freiburg: Mohr Siebeck, 1894), xxvi.
7. Jerome, Vir. ill. 65 (PL 23:711B).
8. PG 67:536C.
9. Henri Valois, Annotationes in Librum quartum Historiae Ecclesiasticae Socratis Scholastici, in Socratis Scholastici et Hermiae Sozomeni Historia Ecclesiastica (1677), 56.
10. Cf. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 39.
11. Koetschau, Des Gregorios Thaumaturgos Dankrede an Origenes, xxvii: “Denn wir haben in ihr nicht einen ‘Panegyricus,’ wie Vossius und andere nach ihm gemeint haben, d. h. keine übertriebene Lobpreisung und Verherrlichung des Origenes durch Gregorios zu sehen, sondern vielmehr eine aus dem Gefühl warmer Dankbarkeit und treuer Anhänglichkeit entsprungene, durchaus wahrheitsgetreue Schilderung des schönen Verhältnisses zwischen jenem geistvollen und begeisternden Lehrer und seinem treuen und dankbaren Schüler.”
12. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 38–39.
13. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 38–39.
14. Slusser, “Introduction,” in Gregory Thaumaturgus: Life and Works, 16n67.
15. August Brinkmann, “Gregors des Thaumaturgen Panegyricus auf Origenes,” Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 56 (1901): 59: “In der That erfüllt die Rede durchaus die Anforderungen, welche die rhetorische Technik an den συντακτικός stellt.”
16. Laurent Pernot, La rhétorique de l’éloge dans le monde gréco-romain, vol. 2: Les valeurs, Collection des Études Augustiniennes, Série Antiquité 138 (Paris: Institut d’Études Augustiniennes, 1993), 789.
17. George A. Kennedy, Classical Rhetoric and Its Christian and Secular Tradition from Ancient to Modern Times (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1999), 160.
18. Almut-Barbara Renger, “Abschied eines Schülers vom Meister. Der sog. Panegyricus Gregors des Wundertäters auf Origenes: Λόγος χαριστήριος—λόγος προσφωνητικός—λόγος συντακτικός,” Philologus 156 (2012): 34–53.
19. Renger, “Abschied eines Schülers vom Meister,” 43–47.
20. I follow those scholars who see the logos protreptikos as a distinct classical genre that combines elements of both deliberative and epideictic rhetoric. See Anthony J. Guerra, Romans and the Apologetic Tradition: The Purpose, Genre and Audience of Paul’s Letter, Society for New Testament Studies, Monograph Series 81 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 3–8; George A. Kennedy, “The Genres of Rhetoric,” in Handbook of Classical Rhetoric in the Hellenistic Period (330 B.C.– A.D. 400), ed. Stanley E. Porter (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 46–47; Dirk M. Schenkeveld, “Philosophical Prose,” in Handbook of Classical Rhetoric, ed. Stanley E. Porter (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 204; Annemaré Kotzé, Augustine’s Confessions: Communicative Purpose and Audience, Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae, Texts and Studies of Early Christian Life and Language 71 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 52–65.
21. Recent contributions include those by Mark D. Jordan, “Ancient Philosophic Protreptic and the Problem of Persuasive Genres,” Rhetorica 4 (1986): 309–33; S. R. Slings, “Protreptic in Ancient Theories of Philosophical Literature,” in Greek Literary Theory after Aristotle, eds. J. G. J. Abbens, S. R. Slings, and I. Sluiter (Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1995), 173–92; Sophie Van der Meeren, “Le protreptique en philosophie: Essai de définition d’un genre,” Revue des études grecques 115 (2002): 591–621; James Henderson Collins II, Exhortations to Philosophy: The Protreptics of Plato, Isocrates, and Aristotle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 1–42.
22. David E. Aune, “Romans as a Logos Protreptikos in the Context of Ancient Religious and Philosophical Propaganda,” in Paulus und das antike Judentum, eds. Martin Hengel and Ulrich Heckel, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 58 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991), 91–124; Guerra, Romans and the Apologetic Tradition, 1–22.
23. Miguel Herrero de Jáuregui, “The Protrepticus of Clement of Alexandria: A Commentary,” (PhD diss., University of Bologna, 2008), available at http://amsdottorato.cib.unibo.it/1117.
24. Marian Szarmach, “Ad Donatum des heiligen Cyprian als rhetorischer Protreptik,” Eos 77 (1989): 289–97.
25. Olga Alieva, “Protreptic Motifs in St. Basil’s Homily On the Words ‘Give Heed to Thyself,’” in Studia Patristica: Papers Presented at the Sixteenth International Conference on Patristic Studies Held in Oxford, 2011, vol. 10, ed. Marcus Vinzent, SP 62 (Leuven: Peeters, 2013), 69–78.
26. Kotzé, Augustine’s Confessions.
27. Slusser, “Introduction,” in Gregory Thaumaturgus: Life and Works, 11.
28. Rizzi, Gregorio il Taumaturgo, 26n17, 136n2, 137n4, 172n57.
29. Olga Alieva, “Origen’s Protreptics to Philosophy: Testimony of Gregory Thaumaturgus in the Oratio Panegyrica VI,” in Origeniana Undecima: Origen and Origenism in the History of Western Thought, ed. Anders-Christian Jacobsen (Leuven: Peeters, 2016), 682.
30. I have also tackled the issue of the protreptic topoi found in Gregory’s Address in my “Elementi protrettici e biografici nell’Encomio di Origene attribuito a Gregorio il Taumaturgo,” Classica et Christiana 8 (2013): 215–27, on which I occasionally draw here.
31. Stanley K. Stowers, Letter Writing in Greco-Roman Antiquity, Library of Early Christianity 5 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 113.
32. Cf. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 40.
33. For more on this, see Paulus Hartlich, “De exhortationum a Graecis Romanisque scriptarum historia et indole,” Leipziger Studien zur classischen Philologie 11 (1889): 302–3; Jordan, “Ancient Philosophic Protreptic,” 317; Van der Meeren, “Le protreptique en philosophie,” 601; David E. Aune, The Westminster Dictionary of New Testament and Early Christian Literature and Rhetoric (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2003), 384.
34. Aune, “Romans as a Logos Protreptikos,” 101.
35. Jordan, “Ancient Philosophic Protreptic,” 309.
36. See Aune, “Romans as a Logos Protreptikos,” 115.
37. Kotzé, Augustine’s Confessions, 65.
38. Cf. Sophie Van der Meeren, Aristote: Exhortation à la philosophie, vol. 1: Le dossier grec. Introduction, traduction et commentaire (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2011), 223: “L’argumentation par les contraires dont l’un est à fuir, l’autre à rechercher, est fréquente dans les protreptiques, et tient à la double fonction de ce type de discours, consistant, d’une part, à écarter l’homme de ce qui le rabaisse, de l’autre, à l’orienter vers sa vraie nature ou son bien propre.”
39. Lucian, Nigr. 4: ἔχαιρον δ’ αὖ ὥσπερ ἐκ ζοφεροῦ τινος ἀέρος τοῦ βίου τοῦ πρόσθεν ἐς αἰθρίαν τε καὶ μέγα φῶς ἀναβλέπων (A. M. Harmon, ed., Lucian, vol. 1, LCL 14 [London: William Heinemann Ltd.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1961], 104); Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 1.2.3: τοὺς ἐν σκότει κυλινδουμένους (Claude Mondésert, ed., Clément d’Alexandrie: Le protreptique, SC 2bis [Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1949], 54; see also Protr. 11.114.1: τὴν ἄγνοιαν καὶ τὸ σκότος τὸ ἐμποδὼν ὡς ἀχλὺν ὄψεως καταγαγόντες τὸν ὄντως ὄντα θεὸν ἐποπτεύσωμεν (SC 2bis:182). Cf. Minucius Felix, Octavius 1.4: et cum discussa caligine de tenebrarum profundo in lucem sapientiae et veritatis emergerem (Gerald H. Rendall, ed., Minucius Felix: Octavius, LCL 250 [Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977], 314); Octavius 28.2: Et nos enim idem fuimus et eadem vobiscum quondam adhuc caeci et hebetes sentiebamus (LCL 250:400); Cyprian of Carthage, Ad Don. 3: Ego cum in tenebris atque in nocte caeca iacerem … vitae meae nescius … veritatis ac lucis alienus (Jean Molager, ed., Cyprien de Carthage: A Donat et La vertu de patience, SC 291 [Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1949], 80); see also Ad Don. 4: in expiatum pectus ac purum desuper se lumen infudit (SC 291:82, 84).
40. The same motif is found in paragraph 110 of the Address: ἐξεγείρων καὶ ἀνορθῶν.
41. Plato, Clit. 408C: προτρεπτικωτάτους τε ἡγοῦμαι (scil. τοὺς Σωκράτους λογικούς) καὶ ὠφελιμωτάτους, καὶ ἀτεχνῶς ὥσπερ καθεύδοντας ἐπεγείρειν ἡμᾶς (S. R. Slings, ed., Plato: Clitophon, Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 37 [Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004], 248–250); Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 10.103.2: θεὸς δὲ ὑμῖν ἀνανῆψαι δοῖη ποτὲ τοῦδε τοῦ ὕπνου (SC 2bis:171); Protr. 10.105.1: τυφλοὶ μὲν τὸν νοῦν, κωφοὶ δὲ τὴν σύνεσιν (SC 2bis:173).
42. English translations are from Ingemar Düring, ed. and trans., Aristotle’s Protrepticus: An Attempt at Reconstruction, Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 12 (Göteborg: Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis, 1961). Cf. Mihai, “Elementi protrettici,” 219.
43. The same topos is found in Cicero, Hort. frgs 67–76 (Alberto Grilli, ed., Marco Tullio Cicerone: Ortensio, Testi e manuali per l’insegnamento universitario del latino 112 [Pàtron Editore: Bologna, 2010]). Cf. Mihai, “Elementi protrettici,” 221.
44. Other variations of the same agricultural metaphor are used in paragraphs 93–96 of the Address.
45. Hort. frg. 91 Grilli.
46. Ennius, Protrepticus 31–33: Ubi videt avenam lolium crescere inter triticum / Selegit secernit aufert; sedulo ubi operam addidit, / Quoniam tanto studio seruit (I. Vahlen, ed., Ennianae Poesis reliquiae [Leipzig: Teubner, 1903], 218).
47. Iamblichus, Protr. 3, p. 10. 8–10: Καθάπερ χώρας μάλιστα ἐπιμελητέον τῷ τῆς ἀρίστης ἐπιτυχόντι, καὶ ψυχῆς, ὅπως τῆς φύσεως ἄξιον ἐνέγκηται τὸν καρπόν (H. Pistelli, ed., Iamblichi Protrepticus ad fidem codicis Florentini, Editio Stereotypa Editionis Primae [Stuttgart and Leipzig: Teubner, 1996]).
48. Hort. frg. 98 Grilli: ut igitur domitores equorum non verbera solum adhibent ad domandum, sed cibum etiam saepe substrahunt, <ut> fame debilitetur eculeorum nimis effrenata vis.
49. Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 10.89.3 (SC 2bis:158).
50. Kotzé, Augustine’s Confessions, 65.
51. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 12; Pierre Nautin, Origène: Sa vie et son oeuvre, Christianisme antique 1 (Paris: Beauchesne, 1977), 185.
52. Clement of Alexandria, Protr. 11.117.3: Τί δή σε προτρέπω; Σωθῆναί σε ἐπείγομαι (SC 2bis:186); cf. Protr. 12.123.2 (SC 2bis:193). On the author’s preoccupation with his audience as a characteristic feature of a protreptic, see Abraham J. Malherbe, Moral Exhortation: A Greco-Roman Sourcebook, Library of Early Christianity 4 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 121; Jordan, “Ancient Philosophic Protreptic,” 332–33; Kotzé, Augustine’s Confessions, 117.
53. See Lee I. Levine, Caesarea under Roman Rule, Studies in Judaism in Late Antiquity 7 (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 57–60; R. Jackson Painter, “Greco-Roman Religion in Caesarea Maritima,” in Religious Rivalries and Struggle for Success in Caesarea Maritima, ed. Terence L. Donaldson, Studies in Christianity and Judaism 8 (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2000), 105–25; Richard S. Ascough, “Christianity in Caesarea Maritima,” in Religious Rivalries, ed. Terence L. Donaldson, 153–79; Giancarlo Rinaldi, “Pagani e cristiani a Cesarea Marittima,” in Caesarea Maritima e la scuola origeniana. Multiculturalità, forme di competizione culturale e identità cristiana. Atti dell’XI Convegno del Grupo di Ricerca su Origene e la Tradizione Alessandrina (22–23 settembre 2011), ed. Osvalda Andrei, Supplementi Adamantius 3 (Brescia: Morcelliana, 2013), 25–94, esp. 57–72.
54. Marco Rizzi, “Il significato politico dell’Oratio panegyrica in Origenem attribuita a Gregorio il Taumaturgo,” in Origene e l’alessandrinismo cappadoce (III–IV secolo). Atti del V Convegno del Gruppo Italiano di Ricerca su Origene e la tradizione alessandrina (Bari, 20–22 settembre 2000), eds. Mario Girardi and Marcello Marin, Quaderni di Vetera Christianorum 28 (Bari: Edipuglia, 2002), 67–71. However, the pagan intellectuals were not the only intended audience of the Address. It seems that Gregory also had in mind Christians who were still skeptical about the usefulness of the classical Greek paideia. According to Eusebius, HE 6.19.11–14 (SC 41:116–117), Origen himself faced criticism from fellow Christians for his interest in Greek culture. Gregory’s account in the Address could thus advance a concrete example for these Christians of how the classical curriculum may serve as a propaedeutic to a higher, Christian education.
55. Adolf Knauber, “Das Anliegen der Schule des Origenes zu Cäsarea,” Münchener Theologische Zeitschrift 19 (1968): 182–203, esp. 197–200.
56. Henri Crouzel, “L’école d’Origène à Césarée: Postscriptum à une édition de Grégoire le Thaumaturge,” BLE 71 (1970): 15–27.
57. Joseph W. Trigg, “God’s Marvelous Oikonomia: Reflections of Origen’s Understanding of Divine and Human Pedagogy in the Address Ascribed to Gregory Thaumaturgus,” JECS 9 (2001): 30–33.
58. Anders-Christian Jacobsen, “Conversion to Christian Philosophy—the Case of Origen’s School in Caesarea,” Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum 16 (2012): 150–56.
59. Crouzel, “École d’Origène à Césarée,” 18–19. The same point is made by Eugenio Marotta, “I riflessi biblici nell’orazione ad Origene di Gregorio il Taumaturgo, VetC 10 (1973): 59–77, esp. 61–77.
60. Cf. Crouzel, Grégoire le Thaumaturge, 88.
61. Trigg, “God’s Marvelous Oikonomia,” 49.
62. Trigg, “God’s Marvelous Oikonomia,” 51–52.
63. Jacobsen, “Conversion to Christian Philosophy,” 155.
64. Jacobsen, “Conversion to Christian Philosophy,” 155–56.
65. The question of the large absence of specific Christian terms in the Address is also dealt with in passing by Winrich Löhr, “Christianity as Philosophy: Problems and Perspectives of an Ancient Intellectual Project,” VC 64 (2010): 167. Although he acknowledges the importance of this controversial issue (retained to be “a disturbing fact”), Löhr refrains from providing a solution and limits himself to simply indicating some possible reasons for this absence. He speaks of a mere “accident,” “a lack of theological interest,” “constrictions of the literary genre” (without specifying exactly of what genre) or “a necessary camouflage.” The topic is also discussed by Renger, “Abschied eines Schülers vom Meister,” 49, who argues that the scarce use of Christian terminology is due to the genre of Gregory’s text and the context in which it was delivered. According to Renger, the very nature of a λόγος συντακτικός would not have been appropriate for a discussion of Christian doctrines.
66. Van der Meeren, “Le protreptique en philosophie,” 598: “[Les protreptiques] sont introductifs et ne dévoilent pas le tout de la pratique à laquelle ils exhortent, mais renvoient à l’existence d’un cursus plus vaste, qu’ils n’exposent pas.” Cf. also Harvey Yunis, “The Protreptic Rhetoric of the Republic,” in The Cambridge Companion to Plato’s Republic, ed. G. R. F. Ferrari (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 4: “[P]rotreptic addresses the initial or preparatory stages of education. It aims to get education in virtue under way, to get the reader or auditor turned and moving in the right direction, and to make the acquisition of virtue an urgent priority.”
67. Cf. Jacobsen, “Conversion to Christian Philosophy,” 156.
68. See L. L. Welborn, “The Soteriology of Romans in Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 2: Faith, Fear, and Assimilation to God,” in Early Patristic Readings of Romans, eds. Katy L. Gaca and L. L. Welborn, Romans through History and Cultures (New York: T & T Clark, 2005), 69–70. For more discussion on this aspect, see G. J. M. Bartelink, “Einige Bemerkungen über die Meidung heidnischer oder christlicher Termini in dem frühchristlichen Sprachgebrauch,” VC 19 (1965): 193–209, esp. 199–203; Michel Spanneut, Le Stoïcisme des Pères de l’Église: De Clément de Rome à Clément d’Alexandrie, Patristica Sorbonensia 1 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1969), 74; Natalio Fernández Marcos, The Septuagint in Context: Introduction to the Greek Version of the Bible, trans. Wilfred G. E. Watson (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 345. See also Trigg, “God’s Marvelous Oikonomia,” 33, who notices the same technique in Athenagoras’s Plea, Clement of Alexandria’s Protrepticus to the Greeks, and Theophilus of Antioch’s To Autolycus.
69. Herrero de Jáuregui, The Protrepticus of Clement of Alexandria, 16–17.
