Athenagoras's Embassy : A Literary Fiction

Abstract

In his 1989 article entitled “Apologetic Literature and Ambassadorial Activities,” William R. Schoedel considers “aspects of the form of apologetic literature in the early church and Judaism.” More specifically, he attempts to discover possible models for the literary character of the Christian apologies, and in particular the Embassy of Athenagoras, in the various kinds of addresses that ambassadors delivered before the emperor when presenting appeals and requests. Examples of such addresses include the ambassadorial speech discussed by the third-century rhetorician Menander Rhetor, the legal oration as exemplified by Philostratus in his treatment of the trial of Apollonius of Tyana, and the imperial libellus or petition. Schoedel draws two clear conclusions from this investigation. The first is that the literary form of Athenagoras's Embassy is an “apologetically grounded petition,” that is, a “mixed form that as such appears to have no real precedent in the Greco-Roman literary tradition.” The second is that “there is good reason to think that [it] was written to be presented to the emperor or delivered before him.” The present article will explore the ideas and arguments that led Schoedel to each of his conclusions and will offer an alternative interpretation of the evidence in each case.

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