VI—
Oracles and Apocalypse
The Chaldaean Oracles were not the only occult writings that Synesius read and exploited in his own work. We have already seen that Hypatia's father, Theon, wrote "commentaries on the books of Hermes Trismegistus and Orpheus."[143] Given Theon's astronomical interests, we may probably assume that these were astrological Hermetica rather than the better-known philosophical corpus.[144] If Theon commented on Hermetic writings we can hardly doubt that Hypatia and, through her, Synesius had some knowledge of them. It is true that Synesius nowhere directly quotes them, but with the exception of Iamblichus's De mysteriis , written under the pseudonym of an Egyptian priest, in general "the Neoplatonists paid little attention to the Hermetica."[145] They were not after all of much philosophical interest,[146] at they could not compete as inspired books with the Chaldaean Oracles. But at Dion 51B Synesius
[143] Malalas, p. 343B = p. 186 Aus.
[144] So Nock in Nock and Festugière 1945–54, IV.148, no. 2; Fowden 1986, 178. On the other hand, according to Festugière (1950, 4), "ce devaient être des logoi philosophiques (car on ne peut guère songer à des ouvrages dastrologie[*] ) et il est important de noter que, dès le IV siècle, ceux-ci servaient de 'textbook' dans les écoles." On astrological Hermetica (not yet published as a corpus) see Festugière 1950, 89f.; they are widely quoted by astrological writers (e.g., Firmicus Maternus, Paul of Alexandria, the Anonymus of 379) before or within the lifetime of Theon.
[145] W. Scott, Hermetica , vol. 1 (1924), 95–96.
[146] "Few leading intellectuals, either Christian or pagan, took the philosophical Hermetica seriously as doctrinal statements . . . . Even Iamblichus treats the Hermetica as important not so much for their own sake as because they were part of the Egyptian foundations of theurgy" (Fowden 1986, 200–201).
gives a list of four sages: Amous (presumably Amoun, the founder of Nitrian monasticism),[147] Antony (the first hermit), Zoroaster, and Hermes.[148] Writers of the age often associated Zoroaster with Hermes Trismegistus,[149] and there can be no doubt that this is the Hermes to whom Synesius here alludes. Paradoxically enough, it was the Christians who paid most attention to the Hermetica in late fourth- and early fifth-century Alexandria. Not doubting that Trismegistus, like Orpheus and the Sibyl, was a genuine prophet who lived many centuries before Christ, men like Didymus the Blind,[150] who died in 398, and above all Cyril, patriarch of Alexandria from 412 to 444,[151] eagerly exploited oracles and prophecies that they interpreted as foretelling Christianity.[152] This attitude continued to prevail after their rediscovery in the Renaissance. It was because they were still being exploited by Cardinal Baronio as pagan foreshadowings of divine revelation that the Protestant Casaubon sought to demolish their credentials.[153] Among secular (not necessarily pagan) writers of Synesius's day the astrologer Paul of Alexandria might be mentioned.[154] In such an atmosphere, and given his own enthusiasm for both philosophy and Egyptiana, it would be surprising if Synesius had not shared this interest.
Above all, his thoughts are sure to have turned to the Hermetica when searching for Egyptian color for a myth set in the age of Osiris.[155]
[147] See the discussion in Treu 1958, 78–79, 90–91. Fowden (1986, 179; cf. 32 n. 115) identifies Ammon with the apocryphal king Ammon who appears as interlocutor in a number of Hermetic dialogues (cf. Nock and Festugière 1945–54 on Corpus Hermeticum 16, 11.228).
[148] Hermes regularly appears in such lists of sages in late antique writers: for a selection, see Fowden 1986, 28. The conjunction of these four names seems less surprising after the discovery of the Nag Hammadi texts, which have revealed both Zoroastrian and Hermetic texts in a library that evidently belonged to a distant disciple of Amoun and Antony.
[149] J. Bidez and F. Cumont, Les mages hellénises: Zoroastre, Ostanès et Hystaspe dapres[*] la tradition grecque (Paris 1938), II.34–35, 86, 243. See too Fowden 1986, 202–3. A passage of Psellus links Zoroaster and "Ammous the Egyptian" (Bidez-Cumont, II.140). If Synesius were really the author of the commentary on Ps.-Democritus discussed above, we might have expected him to name Ostanes here rather than Zoroaster: cf. Bidez-Cumont, I.202.
[150] Fowden 1986, 179–80; the testimonia are quoted in extenso by W. Scott and A. S. Ferguson, Hermetica (Oxford 1924–36), IV. 168–76.
[151] Fowden 1986, 180–82; Scott-Ferguson, IV.191–227.
[152] Among Latin writers, both Lactantius (R. M. Ogilvie, The Library of Lactantius [Oxford 1978], 33–36; Fowden 1986, 209–10) and Augustine (Fowden, 209–10) interpreted the prophecy in the Perfect Discourse as predicting the victory of Christianity.
[153] As well brought out by Grafton 1983, 78–93.
[154] W. Gundel, RE 18.4 (1949): 2376, on the late fourth-century date; on Hermetic influence, Festugière 1950, 105, 112.
[155] Vollenweider (1985a, 168) briefly suggests some Hermetic influence on De providentia , but he is more concerned with Synesius's philosophical sources and does not con-sider the apocalyptic tradition. Fowden (CP 80 [1985]: 284) briefly suggests Hermetic influences for Hymn 9 (1).
After all, Hermes did play a part in the drama of Osiris.[156] The typical Hermetic dialogue consists of Hermes communicating arcane wisdom to his son Tat or Asclepius or King Ammon. In another series, known as the Kore kosmou , Isis instructs her son Horus, and we have a fragment from what was presumably another series in which, as in Synesius, it is Osiris himself who is instructed, by "the great Agathodaimon."[157] The subject matter is normally the nature of the universe, the soul, or the gods, and there is frequent emphasis on the need for secrecy and silence.[158] In a passage of the Kore kosmou reminiscent of Synesius's account of Osiris's benefits to mankind, Isis describes to Horus how God "bestowed on the earth for a little time your great father Osiris and the great goddess Isis" and how they "filled human life with that which is divine . . . consecrated temples and instituted sacrifices . . . and gave to mortal men the boons of food and shelter.[159] A fascinating chapter by Festugière quotes scores of examples from occult writings of this motif of the sage instructing the king, who is often also his son.[160]
The same motif can also be found in less arcane genres: for example, in panegyric Claudian portrays Theodosius lecturing Honorius on the dies of kingship.[161] The traditional motifs of Greek kingship literature appear with many and striking similarities in this speech and in Synesius's De regno and are stitched more subtly into the narrative fabric of De providentia . But Synesius had no reason to repeat a discussion of the practical aspects of rulership.[162] The military motifs, in particular, would have been inappropriate for the real-life civilian counterpart of his
[156] Hermes' part is somewhat understated by Plutarch: see Boylan 1922,11–48.
[157] Frag. 31 Scott = IV.137–38 Nock-Festugière (from Cyril Adv. Jul., PG 76.588A). On Agathodaimon, who plays a large role in the magic papyri and other occult writings, see Ganschinietz, RE Suppl. 3 (1918): 37–59; Festugière in Nock and Festugière 1945–54,1, p. 135 n. 75, and III, clxvf.; W. Fauth, Kl.Pauly 1:121–22. There are also alchemical tracts that purport to be the instructions Isis gave Horus before he set out to depose Typhos:
Berthelot and Ruelle 1888, 28f., 33f.
[158] Festugière 1950, 354.
[159] Stob. Exc . 23.64–65,1.490–92 Scott. Civilization (generally featuring agriculture, religion, and law) as the gift of the gods was a Greek commonplace, well represented in Greek Egyptiana too: compare, for example, Plut. De Is. et Os. 356A–B and Diod. 1.17.1f., where, as in Synesius, the benefactions are reported in narrative.
[160] Festugière 1950, 324–54. To this dossier may now be added the new Hermetic dialogue found at Nag Hammadi, apparently called The Ogdoad Reveals the Ennead (cod. VI. 6). The ps.-Synesian alchemical tract too might loosely be described as a Hermetic dialogue, since it quotes Hermes and communicates the skills of the craft to a disciple.
[161] IV Cons.Hon. 320–52.
[162] He does repeat the motifs concerning statues of Hermes and the Sphinx (101C; cf. De regno 7B–C) but focuses on their mystical significance.
Osiris. Moreover, he wanted at some point to set forth the philosophical underpinning of his tale, the operation of divine Providence. What better place than artistically incorporated as a speech of one of his characters, especially from the old king to the new at the moment of their transition, Osiris's initiation, incorporating warnings that Osiris later ignores to his cost? The setting nicely corresponds to the Hermetic pattern Festugière calls the traditio mystica . Like Horus in the Kore kosmou[163] Synesius's Osiris is given secret information about the nature of kingly souls and the role of gods and demons respectively in human affairs.
Hermetic treatises too share the designation Synesius applies to his work, a "sacred tale."[164] Generally reminiscent of the Egyptian Hermes himself is the uncertainty whether the old king is man or god, and the portrayal of him as above all things a sage. More specifically, in Kore kosmou 6 Isis describes how, having passed his arcane wisdom on to his son Tat,[165] Hermes ascended to the stars to attend on the gods, just as the old king does in De providentia 102D.[166] We have already shown that Synesius drew on other traditions that also contain these elements, but their coincidence here also fits in with more profoundly significant Hermetic details.
In general we may be sure that it was not so much the doctrines of the Hermetica that attracted Synesius as the Egyptian setting. But there is one particular Hermetic text that had a deeper influence on De providentia : the prophecy of doom and destruction for Egypt in sections 24–26 of the Perfect Discourse , of which we have only fragments in the original Greek but a complete, if rather free, Latin translation known as Asclepius and now an earlier and more accurate version of sections 21–29 in Coptic.[167]
But it makes little sense to discuss this prophecy without first con-
[163] Stob. Exc. 24 (I.495f. Scott = IV.52f. Nock-Festugière).
[164] Fowden 1986, 158, and pp. 267–68 above.
[165] 1.459 Scott = IV.2 Nock-Festugière.
[166] Fowden characterizes Hermes as "a mortal who receives revelations from the divine world and eventually himself achieves immortality . . . but remains among men in order to unveil to them the secrets of the divine world" (1986, 28; for a more detailed account, see Festugière in Nock and Festugière 1945–54, III.cxxxviff.). On the ambiguous status of the Egyptian kings generally, cf. Hdt. 2.144; Diod. 1.90.3; Plut. De Is. el Os. 354B;
PI. Plt . 290D–E; Griffiths 1965, 156f. Divinization is also a goal of Chaldaean theurgy. Unlike the Hermetic revelations, the arcana revealed to Osiris in De providentia have to do with his management of human affairs as the gods' agent on earth, according to a Neoplatonic scheme of Providence.
[167] For the Latin text and Greek fragments. Nock and Festugière 1945–54, 11.259–401 (Scott's willful transpositions and alterations render his text virtually unusable); for the Coptic translation, J.-P. Mahé, Hermés en Haute-Egypte , vol.2 (Quebec 1982), with elaborate introduction and commentary.
sidering an earlier text that inspired it and perhaps Synesius too, the so-called Oracle of the Potter. This curious prophecy, itself inspired by the earlier Oracle of the Lamb and ultimately the Twelfth Dynasty Oracle of Neferty,[168] purports to have been given to Pharaoh Amenophis but is evidently Ptolemaic since what it prophesies is the departure of the Greeks from Egypt and the restoration of the old capital of Memphis.[169] It has a number of points in common with De providentia : the Greeks are described as foreigners, they are followers of Typhos, and they have interfered with the religion of the Egyptians. The Potter prophesies every sort of destruction for Egypt until Isis installs a new king, that is to say, Horus, under whom all will be well again. While the Egyptian author looks forward to the day when the Greeks will be gone, like Synesius, he is not clear how it will happen. Indeed by the second and third centuries A.D. , the date of all extant versions of the Potter's Oracle, the idea of a native king who would drive out the Romans was inconceivable. By then, as Ludwig Koenen put it, "readers must have understood the oracle in apocalyptic terms."
The prophecy in the Perfect Discourse , probably of the third century,[170] is clearly in the same tradition,[171] with one or two differences of emphasis. Hermes foretells a time of great tribulations, once again caused by foreign invaders. The term used in the Latin version is alienigenae , but the Coptic reveals what must have stood in the Greek original,
[168] On the Oracle of the Lamb, see most recently J. G. Griffiths, in Apocalypticism , ed.). Assmann (1983), 285–87; L. Koenen, Codex Manichaicus Coloniensis , ed. L. Cirillo and A. Roselli (Cosenza 1986), 315–17. On the Jewish apocalyptic from Egypt, see J. J. Collins, The Sibylline Oracles of Egyptian Judaism (Missoula, Mont. 1974). On the Twelfth Dynasty Oracle, see ). B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts , 3d ed. (Princeton 1969), 444–46; Assmann, Apocalypticism , 357–61 ("Vorbild für alle späteren politischen Chaosbeschreib-ungen bis hin zum Töpferorakel"); Koenen 1986, 314–15.
[169] All three papyri of the Oracle are edited together by L. Koenen in ZPE 2 (1968): 178–209, with later corrections and additions in ZPE 3 (1968): 137; 13 (1974): 313–19; 54 (1984): 9–13; see too J. G. Griffiths and J. Assmann in Apocalypticism (1983), 287–90 and 362–64; and Koenen in Cod.Man.Co!., 317f.; the fullest recent discussion, stressing both its Egyptian roots and its influence on the Perfect Discourse , is F. Dunand in Lapocalyptique[*] (Paris 1977), 41–67.
[170] This very passage is quoted by Lactantius, as underlined by Fowden 1986, 38–39. It follows that the reference to proscription of the old cults cannot (as usually supposed) allude to the antipagan legislation of Theodosius (so rightly Fowden). Scott (1924, 1:66–76) argued that the writer was alluding to the brief Palmyrene occupation of Egypt in 268–73, on which see further n. 192 below.
[171] As underlined in the various discussions cited by Fowden 1986, 38; see especially Dunand 1977, 57–60; and Koenen 1986, 318.
phasis falls much more strongly on religion: the piety of the Egyptians will have been in vain; the invaders will proscribe and persecute their faith. There is no mention of Typhos;[173] instead it is some "evil angels" (like Synesius's demons) who will occupy Egypt once the old gods have gone.[174] The invaders are identified as "Scythian or Indian or someone of that sort, that is to say, from the neighborhood of Barbary."[175] Once again, the prophet's purpose is eschatological. This is the "old age of the world"; when all the destruction is over, out of his great goodness God "will restore the world to its former beauty."
The reason no one has perceived the relevance of these earlier apocalyptic prophecies to Synesius before is because no one has perceived that De providentia is itself cast in the form of an apocalypse. And this is because no one has taken seriously enough Synesius's explicit statement that the original conception of the work extended only to book 1. In its original form De providentia closed on the climax of an apocalyptic prophecy.
At 114C a god appears to the rustic stranger and tells him that "not years but months make up the allotted time during which the scepters of Egypt will lift up the claws of the wild beasts and hold down the crests of the sacred birds." The philosopher recognizes this as a prophecy "engraved on obelisks and sacred precincts" (a traditional device for claiming authority for prophecies and magical spells),[176] and the god "gives him a key to the time." Then follows the sequence of post eventum prophecies of the Gothic massacre already examined. The portentous, riddling language skillfully imitates the style of apocalyptic.
It would in any case be a reasonable assumption that Synesius was familiar with the main themes of apocalypse. But there is in addition a curious allusion in the letter he wrote his brother just before leaving Cyrene on his visit to Athens: "Many people here, both priests and lay-
[175] "inhabitabit Aegyptum Scythes aut Indus aut aliquis talis, id est vicina barbaria." On the final phrase, missing in the Coptic, see further n. 192.
men, are concocting various visions (
De providentia 96A suggests knowledge of the Testament of Solomon , a mildly apocalyptic work that is at the same time a veritable textbook of magic and demonology.[180] At 114C the god starts straight off with wild beasts' claws, unmistakably evoking the brazen claws of the fourth and most terrifying beast in the Book of Daniel.[181] The "fiery missiles and thunderbolts" of 115A resemble the natural cataclysms of apocalyptic more closely than the comet of April 400 to which they actually refer.[182] And while standard invective tactics compare Goths to Giants (114D),[183] giants are also standard denizens of apocalyptic.[184] It is also characteristic of the genre that the prophet announces how long it will be before his prophecy is fulfilled. In contrast to the Lamb's 900 years, Synesius's god reassuringly promises that Typhos will fall before the year is out.
Like a typical apocalypse, the entire final section of book 1 is presented in the form of a revelation to the narrator by a god, concluding, as apocalypses often do, with a riddle: all will be well when Horus allies himself with the wolf instead of the lion. Modern scholars have ex-
[177] See further appendix 3.
[178] So Liebeschuetz 1985b, 149.
[180] Cameron, Long, Sherry 1988, 55–56; on apocalyptic elements in the Test. Sol. , see C. C. McCown, The Testament of Solomon (Leipzig 1922), 49–50; for a history of the Testament 's development and circulation, see E. Schürer, History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ , rev. G. Vermes, F. Millar, and M. Goodman, vol. 3.1 (1986), 372–79.
[181] Dan. 7.7 and 19.
[182] For meteorological predictions (comets, thunderbolts, etc.) see J. H. Charlesworth, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha , vol. 1 (1983), 293 (Enoch), and 345–46 (Sib.Or. 2).
[183] So, for example, Claudian during these same years: Cameron 1970a, 468.
[184] Charlesworth 1983, 106 n. i (4 Esra, Gospel of Eve, 2 Enoch).
pended much ingenuity in the attempt to decipher this riddle. It should by now be clear that Synesius's purpose was to present his readers with an enigma that they could not solve. In the Egyptian context, it went without saying that every apocalyptic deliverer was identified as Horus.
By the mere fact of setting his myth in the remote past, Synesius automatically created the potential for apocalyptic prophecy. It was, after all, standard apocalyptic technique for the writer to retroject post eventum prophecies from contemporary events into a much earlier dramatic date. Even before the final chapter of book 1 unnamed gods warn Osiris of his brother's evil intentions; the prophecy was clearly destined to be fulfilled before the book is finished. Indeed, much of the structure and technique of book 1 conforms closely to an apocalypse.
Of course, since Synesius made no secret of the fact that he was the author, no contemporary reader was likely to be deceived into believing that the prophecies he incorporates were genuinely written in the age of Osiris, covering events of about A.D. 400. Synesius's purpose was political rather than apocalyptic: he wanted to suggest that Typhos's regime would soon collapse, in the near rather than the remote future. At the time he wrote there had already been encouraging signs, most notably the massacre, but naturally he did not know when and how the final moment would come. He skillfully erected a series of apocalyptic revelations, all but the last stage already fulfilled in fact.
It is not surprising that he should also have adapted specific motifs from two such familiar specimens of the Egyptian tradition as the Oracle of the Potter and the Hermetic prophecy in the Perfect Discourse .[185] Hermes prophesies troubles that spring from the destruction and persecution of Egyptian religion. This emphasis, already present in the Potter,[186] is matched exactly by Synesius's emphasis on the attempt of his own foreigners, the Goths, to pervert the religion of the Egyptians. This is the very first "sign" the god gives the rustic stranger: "When those who are now in power attempt to tamper with our religious rituals as well, then expect the Giants"—by this he meant the aliens—"soon to be driven out, themselves their own avenging Furies (
[185] It is open to question how many of his listeners and readers in Constantinople picked up these allusions.
[186] And also in the Jewish oracle adapted from the Potter's Oracle, Corp. Pap. Jud. III.520, where Koenen's restorations on the basis of the Potter (Gnomon 40 [1968]: 256) are confirmed by a new version on an unpublished Oxyrhynchus papyrus (information from Koenen).
Potter better than the actual circumstances of the Gothic massacre: "They will destroy themselves, for they are followers of Typhos."[187] After receiving the prophecy, the rustic philosopher "pondered how these things could happen, but it seemed beyond his powers to understand" (115B). He is at once enlightened: "Not long after there arose a false piece of religious observance . . . something ancient law bars from the cities, shutting the impiety outside the gates" (115B). Of course this false observance refers to Gaïnas's request for an Arian church, which was turned down and did not play any direct part in the events that led to the massacre. But Synesius nonetheless brilliantly exploits this providentially "impious" act of his foreigners to shape his narrative in conformity with the apocalyptic tradition.
There may be one more example of this apocalyptic shaping. The Hermetic prophecy suggests that the impious foreigners might be Scythians. Synesius's foreigners are also Scythians. There is a puzzle here that has not so far attracted attention. Like Hermes, Synesius uses the imprecise
But Synesius does not disguise his Goths with an Egyptianizing
[187] P 28 and P 50, ed. Koenen 1968a, 204–5. Since the Potter can no longer hold out the promise of a native deliverer, he feebly concludes with the assertion that the Greeks will bring about their own downfall, presumably by internal conflicts. Obviously Synesius cannot hold out any comparable promise, though the opening chapter of book 2 does make much of the alleged panic of the Goths before the massacre.
[188] E.g., 108D, 109D, 110C, 117D, 118B–D, 119D, 120B, 122B, in both books.
[189] It is the invariable term in Themistius and Zosimus, for example, two writers who have occasion to refer often to Goths. See Wolfram 1988, 28; cf. 11.
[190] De Is. et Os . 356B, 366C.
[191] J. J. Collins, The Sibylline Oracles of Egyptian Judaism (Missoula, Mont. 1974), 79–80: their "geographical remoteness . . . made them particularly apt for the role of eschatological enemies who would come from the ends of the earth."
name; alone of his dramatis personae they are simply introduced from history into the myth. We can hardly assume mere inadvertence. Nor can it have been anxiety that his readers would miss the point, since the key is supplied early on at 108B, where the "general of the foreigners" who "had a house in the royal city" was away, "waging an unsuccessful war against a rebellious band of their own people." With so precise an allusion to Gaïnas, the identification of the "foreigners" was clearly established.
Why was Synesius so reluctant to fit his Goths to his Egyptian context? The answer is perhaps to be found in the Hermetic prophecy. Its suggestion that the invading foreigners might be Scythians legitimated the ethnic for Synesius's own purposes. We may never know why the unknown author of the Oracle picked this name;[192] at the time it must have seemed an improbable prediction that Scythians would conquer Egypt. And yet this is precisely what happened in A.D. 400, at least as transposed into Synesius's allegory. Thus the fashionable literary style for Goths was transformed into an elegant apocalyptic double entendre, hinting at Armageddon.
Book 1 of De providentia is an ambitious and sophisticated piece of work. Synesius indirectly signals its artistry in the preface, when he marks its original limits. The cobbling on of book 2 has obscured the craftsmanship and coherence of the whole. For example, it would be
easy to assume that the subtitle On Providence referred to the obvious divine intervention alleged in the massacre and trial of book 2. But in fact Providence is a far more important concept in book 1. Indeed it is central to the book, underpinning every stage of the narrative, from the descent of Osiris as the gods' agent for the care of the material world to their attempt to warn him against the destructive powers of matter embodied in Typhos to the rustic philosopher's expectation of Horus, who will come to repair Osiris's failure and renew his mission. This carefully developed system reconciles the transcendentalism of the Neoplatonic divine hierarchy with affirmation of the forces that hold the whole together, even to the farthest reaches of matter. It also skillfully exploits the data of the myth in terms that can reasonably be applied to contemporary politics. The whole is decked out with Egyptian coloring that lends it a harmonious and authentic tone; and it is framed in an apocalyptic structure that epitomizes both Egyptian traditions and political expectations. Echoes of the political oratory of Dio Chrysostom point the relevance of the allegory to contemporary affairs.
Book 2 in contrast banalizes Providence or at any rate introduces problems into the philosophical system so carefully elaborated in book 1. It also violates the myth and the apocalyptic expectations it naturally aroused. Those same circumstances that at the end of book 1 Synesius had found merely promising, he now was obliged to proclaim the ultimate vindication, the direct result of divine intervention. He had to fall back on the framework of panegyric, glossing over Osiris's failure with fulsome appeals to the impenetrability of mystery.