List of arguments to date Mark after Hadrian

[Giuseppe]

I don't see anything here to imply that the erection of domestic altars was compulsory.

Isn't the cult of the emperor compulsory by definition (especially if made by subjected people)?

[andrewcriddle]

I don't see anything here to imply that the erection of domestic altars was compulsory.

Isn't the cult of the emperor compulsory by definition (especially if made by subjected people)?

Under some circumstances one could be required to venerate the Emperor or face unpleasant consequences.
It seems unlikely that one was required to have an altar in one's own home dedicated to the Emperor.
How would such a regulation be enforced?
Is there any example of a complaint about failure to comply with this supposed regulation?

Andrew Criddle

[Giuseppe]

It seems unlikely that one was required to have an altar in one's own home dedicated to the Emperor.

I agree, but if some people erected freely private altars to the emperor, at least a minimal implication is that a public act of cult of the emperor was officially required by the rest of the people, even if not under the form of a physical altar.

[dbz]

D. Clint Burnett of Boston College argued that the terminology of the apocalyptic section of 2 Thessalonians (esp. 2:4) matched known epigraphic and literary evidence of a widespread and well-known royal and imperial practice of seating statutes of reigning monarchs in the temples of greater gods, indeed at the right hand of the larger statue of that temple’s god. He made an excellent case for that; this was clearly the practice the author of 2 Thessalonians was conjuring.

---

Carrier (10 December 2018). “Adventures at the Society of Biblical Literature Conference, Part 3: Closing Out”. Richard Carrier Blogs.

It is possible to date 2 Thessalonians to the “Emperor Cult" being taken to new levels with Hadrian and the Divine! (Godfrey, Neil (28 May 2022). "Hadrian the God". Vridar. )

So when the author departed from his observation of current affairs and ventured to predict the future, he failed. And this failure, says Turmel, dates the composition of this epistle to the early months of 135 c.e.

---

Godfrey, Neil (31 May 2011). "Identifying the "Man of Sin" in 2 Thessalonians". Vridar.

[Jonas_Koenig]

Hey Neil and/or Giuseppe (I can't tell who originally wrote the point). Can you elaborate more on this claim? The "ideological portrayal of Pharisees is unhistorical but explicable in a post 135 rivαlry context given the paucity of evidence for rabbinic movement until then (the yavneh post 70 tradition notwithstanding)."

Do you think that the Yavneh generation is a later tradition that was not historical (or, if historical, extremely marginal at the time)? It seems more likely to me that the Rabbinic movement after 135 shares more continuity with what came before than the later Rabbis may have wanted to let on, and we should be suspicious of a dramatic discontinuity at 135. For example, R. Akiva was crucial in early Rabbinic traditions (which some may classify as "Pharisaic") and yet he was popular throughout the interwar period and was executed immediately after 135. It seems possible to me that Mark's portrait of the Pharisees is unhistorical in the 30s CE, like you say, but that the post-70s Rabbis make as good a candidate for his criticism as post-135.

Would be interested in your thoughts on this (or any sources you've found but not yet read).

[neilgodfrey]

It's "a fact". Hadrian revamped emperor worship to unprecedented levels in the Greek world. All homes were required to have a shrine to the emperor for offerings/sacrifices. https://vridar.org/2022/04/18/emperor-w ... evelation/ This was usually placed at the entrance of the house and as an imperial procession passed by people were expected to respond by attending to their household shrine. It was not easy to hide one's refusal to do so.

Can we have a primary source for this please ?
It seems prima-facie implausible.

Andrew Criddle

Anyone who travels through east and south Asia will not see it as implausible given that it is very difficult in various countries to find any house or business that lacks a shrine and/or photo of a member of the ruling family -- both inside the house/building and another outside at the entrance.

I took the information originally from page 130 of Kaiserkult in Kleinasien, available in archive.org -- translated:

With reason, it is to be noted that the consecration of the Athenian sanctuary of Zeus Olympus and the associated foundation of the institution of the Panhellenion also led to altars524 being erected in private houses525 to the reigning emperor Hadrian in the Greek-influenced east of the imperium Romanum. The geographical focus of the erection of these altars was obviously in the Greek motherland and in the western Asia Minor, i.e. in the Roman province of Asia.526 It is remarkable that the inscriptions carved on each of these altars have essentially the same wording: The reigning emperor Hadrian is given the title ‘Ολύμπιος [=Olympos] and worshipped as σωτήρ καί κτίστης [=Saviour Founder]. The regularity of the form of the altar inscriptions, expressed in the parallelism of wording and phrasing, and the large number of altars erected “imply the official nature of the occasion on which the altars were dedicated to Hadrian Olympios, Savior, and Founder“. In view of the Ολύμπιος title attached to Hadrian in these inscriptions, it is difficult to deny a connection between the content of the corresponding altars and the statues of the emperor erected in the temenos of the Athenian sanctuary of the Ζευς ‘Ολύμπιος, on the bases of which the Όλύμπιος title is also found within the imperial titulature. Therefore, the occasion that led to the erection of the house altars dedicated to Hadrian can be assumed to be the consecration of the Ζεύς Όλύμπιος sanctuary in Athens or an event closely related to this consecration, such as the founding of the institution of the Πανελλήνιον.

I'm sorry, I don't see anything here to imply that the erection of domestic altars was compulsory.

Andrew Criddle

I thought you'd follow through on the context and footnotes!

There is no carved inscription, at least not that I know of but I have not been able to access all the references, ordering the establishment of household shrines. What we have is a dramatic escalation of emperor worship on an unprecedented scale with Hadrian's establishment of the Panhellion. The numbers of shrines and statues mushroomed among Panhellenic city states, including household shrines with the uniform inscription as per the quote above. Such evidence points to a decree or decrees requiring such displays throughout the Panhellion cities -- and the maps demonstrate just how prolific these statues and shrines are in the relevant areas. (Comparisons are drawn with other periods of the ancient Greek world.)

[neilgodfrey]

What is significant is the uniqueness of Hadrian's cult. It was quite unlike anything that had preceded it -- at least since Augustus. Hadrian was uniquely worshiped as god alone in temples whereas it had always been the custom for emperors to be worshiped "alongside" a god in the god's temple. The source I pointed to in archive.org includes maps illustrating the extent of what was going on under Hadrian. That there was a profusion of household shrines, all bearing the same or virtually the same inscription in honour of Hadrian, points to a central authorization or decree of some kind.

We are not talking about every city in the Greek world but those that were part of the Panhellion, a revival of Greek states under the patronage of Hadrian.

Hadrian's travels were about unifying the empire. His treatment of the Jews in Judea probably should be seen in that context -- his own cult was a standard focus for all cities throughout the empire as a demonstration of their belonging to the Roman world and by treating the Judeans the same as other peoples in this respect he probably felt he was doing what was necessary given that many Judeans did honour Hadrian and were willing to be part and parcel of the Roman culture, and earlier apparent messianic uprisings under Trajan had seen severe repression, even virtual Jewish depopulation, according to the evidence, in much of Egypt at least.

[andrewcriddle]

It's "a fact". Hadrian revamped emperor worship to unprecedented levels in the Greek world. All homes were required to have a shrine to the emperor for offerings/sacrifices. https://vridar.org/2022/04/18/emperor-w ... evelation/ This was usually placed at the entrance of the house and as an imperial procession passed by people were expected to respond by attending to their household shrine. It was not easy to hide one's refusal to do so.

Can we have a primary source for this please ?
It seems prima-facie implausible.

Andrew Criddle

Anyone who travels through east and south Asia will not see it as implausible given that it is very difficult in various countries to find any house or business that lacks a shrine and/or photo of a member of the ruling family -- both inside the house/building and another outside at the entrance.

I took the information originally from page 130 of Kaiserkult in Kleinasien, available in archive.org -- translated:

With reason, it is to be noted that the consecration of the Athenian sanctuary of Zeus Olympus and the associated foundation of the institution of the Panhellenion also led to altars524 being erected in private houses525 to the reigning emperor Hadrian in the Greek-influenced east of the imperium Romanum. The geographical focus of the erection of these altars was obviously in the Greek motherland and in the western Asia Minor, i.e. in the Roman province of Asia.526 It is remarkable that the inscriptions carved on each of these altars have essentially the same wording: The reigning emperor Hadrian is given the title ‘Ολύμπιος [=Olympos] and worshipped as σωτήρ καί κτίστης [=Saviour Founder]. The regularity of the form of the altar inscriptions, expressed in the parallelism of wording and phrasing, and the large number of altars erected “imply the official nature of the occasion on which the altars were dedicated to Hadrian Olympios, Savior, and Founder“. In view of the Ολύμπιος title attached to Hadrian in these inscriptions, it is difficult to deny a connection between the content of the corresponding altars and the statues of the emperor erected in the temenos of the Athenian sanctuary of the Ζευς ‘Ολύμπιος, on the bases of which the Όλύμπιος title is also found within the imperial titulature. Therefore, the occasion that led to the erection of the house altars dedicated to Hadrian can be assumed to be the consecration of the Ζεύς Όλύμπιος sanctuary in Athens or an event closely related to this consecration, such as the founding of the institution of the Πανελλήνιον.

I'm sorry, I don't see anything here to imply that the erection of domestic altars was compulsory.

Andrew Criddle

I thought you'd follow through on the context and footnotes!

There is no carved inscription, at least not that I know of but I have not been able to access all the references, ordering the establishment of household shrines. What we have is a dramatic escalation of emperor worship on an unprecedented scale with Hadrian's establishment of the Panhellion. The numbers of shrines and statues mushroomed among Panhellenic city states, including household shrines with the uniform inscription as per the quote above. Such evidence points to a decree or decrees requiring such displays throughout the Panhellion cities -- and the maps demonstrate just how prolific these statues and shrines are in the relevant areas. (Comparisons are drawn with other periods of the ancient Greek world.)

The uniformity surely merely implies that manufacturers of imperial shrines had some formal or informal guidelines to work with. This is only what you would expect. In the modern world there are clear guidelines for the manufacture of flags, banners, articles of clothing etc which promote some agenda or other. This does not imply that people are required to possess such articles, merely that if they do, they will be of a certain specification. The people with household altars to Hadrian were not making them themselves, they were buying them from a craftsman who was working in accordance with more or less official guidelines. I don't see any implication that householders were required to make such purchases.

Andrew Criddle

[neilgodfrey]

The uniformity surely merely implies that manufacturers of imperial shrines had some formal or informal guidelines to work with. This is only what you would expect. In the modern world there are clear guidelines for the manufacture of flags, banners, articles of clothing etc which promote some agenda or other. This does not imply that people are required to possess such articles, merely that if they do, they will be of a certain specification. The people with household altars to Hadrian were not making them themselves, they were buying them from a craftsman who was working in accordance with more or less official guidelines. I don't see any implication that householders were required to make such purchases.

Andrew Criddle

You have responded to just one part of what I wrote. That part was in connection with other data and needs to be interpreted in that context. If I merely said that the text was uniform in one city or region you would have a point.

We have evidence for a mushrooming of statues of an emperor at a particular time and region. We have evidence that the imperial cult was being officially spread throughout that region at that time -- at a level unprecedented in Roman history up to that time. We can imagine that the populations left evidence that they, too, as private persons, were so wrapped up in this cult that they, too, joined in, voluntarily, with their own imperial shrines -- but we know they would have had to ask permission to do so if they were not officially commanded to set them up. Can we imagine being a Christian in such an environment? We would attract as much notice as a "Christmas free zone" in a pub on Christmas eve.

A city could not just set up a shrine for emperor worship. Permission had to be sought from the emperor -- unless it was commanded by the emperor. Someone had to authorize the statuary and inscriptions that were constructed.

It's about probability given what we know of the emperor cult and how people generally behave in certain circumstances.

[neilgodfrey]

The uniformity surely merely implies that manufacturers of imperial shrines had some formal or informal guidelines to work with.

Andrew Criddle

S. R. F. Price sees a little more than "mere" convenience for the masons. In Rituals and Power, p. 112:

The involvement of the whole community was also expressed by the regulation that householders should sacrifice on altars outside their houses as the procession passed.74 This practice, which was followed in the Hellenistic period for cults both of gods and of rulers, may also be detected in the imperial cult. Long series of small imperial altars have been found at Athens, Sparta, Miletus, Mytilene and Pergamum. In any given city the series of altars is relatively uniform in its dedication, but diverse in its actual details of design and execution, and this is only explicable on the assumption that the city passed a decree instructing all citizens to provide their own altars.

More detail is given by Veyne, Paul. “Les Honneurs Posthumes de Flavia Domitilla et Les Dédicaces Grecques et Latines.” Latomus 21, no. 1 (1962): 49–98. I said earlier we have no explicit inscription indicating the compulsory nature of the shrines for Hadrian but I don't know all the sources and Veyne does cite inscriptions in another time that point to the compulsory nature of the decree:

Mais leur grand nombre et l'uniformité de leur libellé prouvent, comme l'a dit Kolbe Í1), une décision collective : c'est un culte domestique organisé par la cité. Un décret hellénistique de Magnésie du Méandre (2) permet de comprendre, je crois, comment les choses se sont passées. Au deuxième siècle avant notre ère cette cité institue une fête annuelle d'Artémis Leucophryènè, et le décret prévoit qu'à cette occasion « chacun des habitants, selon ses ressources, offrira un sacrifice devant sa porte sur un autel qu'il y dressera» ; et que « ce sera une pieuse chose que ceux qui possèdent une maison ou une boutique élèvent, dans la mesure de leurs moyens, un autel devant la porte (...) où sera gravée l'inscription suivante : [autel) ď Artemis Leucophryene ; si quelqu'un ne le fait pas, il n'aura pas à s'en féliciter». Pareillement Athènes, Sparte ou Pergame ont dû prendre des décrets en l'honneur de l'empereur où les epicleseis de Conservateur, Fondateur de la ville et Zeus Eleutherios lui étaient décernées (ou plutôt « reconnues ») (3) et où il était vivement conseillé aux habitants d'élever au prince bienfaiteur de la cité des autels portant l'inscription que l'on sait. Ce culte domestique du souverain est souvent (4) un aspect du culte des évergètes : à My tilène Trajan ou Hadrien sont adorés comme l'avaient été Pompée, conservateur de la ville, et l'évergète Théophane. Où s'élevaient ces autels ? Les plus petits devaient être conservés dans la demeure ; à Pergame l'un d'eux a été trouvé dans la maison du consul Attalos. (p. 74)

=

But their large number and the uniformity of their wording prove, as Kolbe has said (1), a collective decision: it is a domestic cult organized by the city. A Hellenistic decree of Magnesia of the Meander (2) makes it possible to understand, I believe, how things happened. In the second century BC this city established an annual feast of Artemis Leucophryènè, and the decree provides that on this occasion "each of the inhabitants, according to his resources, will offer a sacrifice in front of his door on an altar that he will erect there" ; and that “it will be a pious thing that those who have a house or a shop raise, within the limits of their means, an altar before the door (...) on which will be engraved the following inscription: [altar] ď Artemis Leucophryene ; if someone does not do it, he will not have to congratulate himself”. Similarly Athens, Sparta or Pergamon had to issue decrees in honor of the emperor where the epicleseis of Curator, Founder of the city and Zeus Eleutherios were awarded to him (or rather "recognized") (3) and where he was strongly advised the inhabitants to raise to the prince benefactor of the city altars bearing the inscription that we know. This domestic cult of the sovereign is often (4) an aspect of the cult of the euergetes: at My tilène Trajan or Hadrian are adored as had been Pompey, curator of the city, and the euergetes Theophanes. Where were these altars? The smaller ones were to be kept in the house; at Pergamon one of them was found in the house of Consul Attalos. (p.74)

Price cites other works as well.