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Resuming my thread on Apollonius of Tyana.
/1 https://twitter.com/Robin_C_Douglas/status/1286702905056268288?s=20
/1 https://twitter.com/Robin_C_Douglas/status/1286702905056268288?s=20
From around the first century BC, the Pythagorean movement underwent a reinaissance. Pythagoras came to be seem as a kind of semi-divine figure - a master of teaching and doctrine who had given the other great Greek philosophers their ideas.
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Writers forged entire treatises in the name of Pythagoras and his early followers in order to tell the world what they really ought to have said. In the hands of the New Pythagoreans, Pythagoras and his legacy came to take on the appearance of a storehouse of wisdom on
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subject ranging across metaphysics, magic, music, mathematics and morality.
Into this context stepped a figure known as Apollonius, who came from Tyana in modern-day Turkey.
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Into this context stepped a figure known as Apollonius, who came from Tyana in modern-day Turkey.
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He appears to have lived in the first century AD. His rather meagre surviving writings reveal the recognisable outlines of a Pythagorean philosopher. He advocated an ascetic, virtuous lifestyle, and showed a particular disdain for worldly wealth.
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He reportedly wrote several works on philosophical and religious topics.
He seems to have acknowledged both the traditional gods of the Greek pantheon and a higher, transcendent godhead. He also seems to have opposed traditional ritual practices.
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He seems to have acknowledged both the traditional gods of the Greek pantheon and a higher, transcendent godhead. He also seems to have opposed traditional ritual practices.
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This surviving fragment from his works is particularly interesting:
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Our main source for Apollonius' life is a long biography written by one Philostratus (c.170 - c.245 AD), a Greek rhetorician who had connections with the imperial house. In particular, he was a personal friend of the Empress Julia Domna,
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who appears to have inspired him to write the book. He wrote several other works as well, both fiction and non-fiction, including an influential set of biographies of other rhetoricians.
It isn't quite clear where Philostratus got his information from.
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It isn't quite clear where Philostratus got his information from.
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He refers to a number of sources, in particular an earlier biography of Apollonius by a follower of his called Damis of Nineveh. But Damis' work has not survived, and we have no way of knowing how accurate it was or how close Philostratus kept to it.
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Some have suggested that Philostratus made it up.
On the whole, the Apollonius who comes through to us from Philostratus' biography has the feel of a fictional character. Philostratus' whole work is essentially novelistic. It is written in something of a rhetorical style,
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On the whole, the Apollonius who comes through to us from Philostratus' biography has the feel of a fictional character. Philostratus' whole work is essentially novelistic. It is written in something of a rhetorical style,
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and its atmosphere is curiously unreal. Anecdotal and digressive, it has the general feel of a romance composed for entertainment rather than a work of strong intellectual fibre. It is certainly not a philosophical treatise, although there are some references to Pythagorean
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concerns such as reincarnation, vegetarianism and numerology. Philostratus does not attribute any very profound or detailed teachings to his subject.
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Interestingly, Apollonius is presented by Philostratus not merely as a Pythagorean philosopher - though he certainly is that - but as a kind of semi-legendary hero. He is exemplary in virtue and wisdom. He has supernatural gifts, including powers of clairvoyance and healing.
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He is honoured even by the gods. He travels around the known world - Mesopotamia, Iran, India, Spain and Egypt - and converses with kings and emperors. In the final part of the book, he miraculously escapes from a trial before the evil Emperor Domitian.
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Interestingly, Pythagoras himself was also said to have travelled around exotic parts of the world while he was developing his teachings. It looks like Apollonius was mythologised and divinised in the same sort of way as Pythagoras.
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It is particularly interesting that the sentiments expressed by the real Apollonius in the quotation up the thread find little or no place in Philostratus' work. Far from discoursing on the ineffable Godhead and the uselessness of making sacrifices to it,
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Philostratus' Apollonius is depicted as cheerfully dispensing advice on traditional cultic practices.
Apollonius ended up gaining a certain notoriety as a kind of pagan equivalent to Jesus.
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Apollonius ended up gaining a certain notoriety as a kind of pagan equivalent to Jesus.
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Certain similarities between the two characters were seized upon both by ancient pagans and by Enlightenment rationalists. Christian writers, conversely, suggested that Apollonius was a satanic figure.
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There is little to be gained from pursuing this tired old quarrel. Apollonius and Jesus were both revered as holy men with supernatural powers - just like numerous other figures in history - but it is much more productive to study each of them in his own context
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than it is to pit them against each other in a game of religious polemic. Rabbi Jeshua of Nazareth is best viewed in a 1st century Palestinian Jewish context; and Apollonius is more interesting in his own right than as a tool for undermining his more famous counterpart.
/End
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