malavasi2015 - diodore of tarsus' treatise against the manichaeans - a new fragment

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VigiliaeChristianae

Diodore of Tarsus’ Treatise Against the Manichaeans: A New Fragment

Giulio MalavasiUniversità degli Studi di Padova

[email protected]

Abstract

Diodore of Tarsus’ treatise Against the Manichaeans is well attested in ancient sources. However, modern scholars believe that it is completely lost. This assumption is only partially correct, for there exists a short unpublished fragment, which will be edited hereinafter for the first time. The fragment, reported in the Clavis Patrum Graecorum, is quoted in an anonymous florilegium of codex Vatopedi 236, entitled ‘Against those who say that human souls pre-exist bodies’. Following the research undertaken by Pedersen and DelCogliano, I will contextualize Diodore’s writing within the Antiochene tradition of anti-Manichaean writings.

Keywords

Diodore of Tarsus – Manichaeism – Codex Vatopedi 236 – Antiochene tradition – Greek philosophy

Diodore was bishop of Tarsus in the fourth century (ca. 330-390)1 and teacher of Theodore of Mopsuestia and John Chrysostom. One of the main topics of modern research on Diodore concerns his relationship with the Christology developed by Theodore and Nestorius. Diodore’s work fundamentally bears witness to what is considered the classic form of Antiochene Christology, a

1 On Diodore’s life and works see R. Abramowski, ‘Untersuchungen zu Diodor von Tarsus’, in Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 30 (1931), pp. 234-262 and A. Palmieri, ‘Diodoro di Tarso: sua vita e sue gesta’, in Bessarione 13 (1916), pp. 188-197.

297Diodore of Tarsus’ Treatise Against the Manichaeans

vigiliae christianae 69 (2015) 296-304

Logos-Anthropos Christology.2 In the course of his life-time, Diodore com-posed many works, exegetical and dogmatic, but due to the Christological disputes of the fifth and sixth centuries, which led to the condemnation of Nestorianism,3 almost all of his literary production has been lost. In fact, only one work has come down to us which can be considered complete, his Commentary on Psalms.4 Diodore’s exegetical work has attracted the interest of many modern scholars because it provides a clear example of the Antiochene exegetical method.5 Diodore is best known for his contributions to Christology and exegesis, but it may help to gain a more complete understanding of his theological profile to consider that his interests also included polemic against dualist heresies such as Manichaeism. This latter concern, Diodore’s anti-heretical struggle, and in particular his polemic against Manichaeism, is the focus of this paper.

2 Against this thesis A. Grillmeier, Gesù il Cristo nella fede della Chiesa: dall’era apostolica al concilio di Calcedonia (451), Italian translation, second volume, Paideia, 1982, pp. 658-670. According to Grillmeier, Diodore supports a Logos-sarx Christology. Against this reconstruc-tion, F.A. Sullivan, The Christology of Theodore of Mopsuestia, Pontifica Università Gregoriana, 1956, pp. 172-196 and R.A. Greer, ‘The Antiochene Christology of Diodore of Tarsus’, in Journal of Theological Studies 17 (1966), pp. 327-341. Both believe that Diodore is an exponent of the Logos-anthropos Christology. A recent article focuses on the critics of Diodore against the Christology of Apollinarius of Laodicea: C.A. Beeley, ‘The early Christological controversy: Apollinarius, Diodore, and Gregory Nazianzen’, in Vigiliae Christianae 65 (2011), pp. 376-407.

3 For a recent edition and translation of all the works of Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia quoted in the theological disputes from the Council of Ephesus (431) until the Second Council of Constantinople (553) see J. Behr, The Case against Diodore and Theodore, Oxford University Press, 2011.

4 Diodori Tarsiensis Commentarii in Psalmos: Commentarii in Psalmos I-L, ed. J. Olivier, Corpus Christianorum Series Graeca 6, Turnhout, Brepols-Leuven, University Press, 1980. A mod-ern English translation in R.C. Hill, Diodore of Tarsus: Commentary of Psalms 1-51, Society of Biblical Literature, 2005.

5 R.C. Hill, ‘Psalm 41 (42): A Classic Text for Antiochene Spirituality’, in Irish Theological Quarterly 68 (2003), pp 25-33; J.J. O’Keefe, ‘ “A Letter that Killeth”: Toward a Reassessment of Antiochene Exegesis, or Diodore, Theodore, and Theodoret on the Psalms’, in Journal of Early Christian Studies 8 (2000), pp. 83-104; G. Rinaldi, ‘Diodoro di Tarso, Antiochia e le ragioni della polemica antiallegorista’, in Augustinianum 33 (1993), pp. 407-430; M. Simonetti, Lettera e/o allegoria: un contributo alla storia dell’esegesi patristica, Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum, 1985, pp. 160-164; M. Simonetti, ‘Interpretazione delle rubriche e destinazi-one dei salmi nei Commentarii in Psalmos di Diodoro’, in Annali di Storia dell’esegesi 2 (1985), pp. 79-92.

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We are informed about Diodore’s anti-Manichaean activity by several sources. The first, in chronological order, is Theodoret of Cyrus. In the first book of the Haereticarum fabularum compendium, Theodoret writes that:

The best advocates of piety, Titus and Diodore, wrote against Mani’s impiety, Titus as shepherd of the church of Bostra, Diodore as ruler of the Cilicians’ metropolis. But George the Laodicean too wrote against this impiety. Admittedly he was a leading figure of the heresy of Arius, but trained in philosophical knowledge. As too was the Phoenician Eusebius, mentioned above.6

Diodore’s treatise is connected by Theodoret to the other Antiochene writers: Diodore himself, Titus of Bostra,7 George of Laodicea8 and Eusebius of Emesa.9 These are the anti-Manichaean predecessors used by Theodoret for refuting Manichaeism. It is interesting to note that Titus and Diodore are named together as the first among these and they are both labelled as ‘the best advocates of piety’.10

The Ecclesiastical History of Barhadbesabba Arbaia, written in the sixth cen-tury, reports the work against the Manichaeans of the bishop of Tarsus. The author complains that only four books of Diodore are available in his time, while Diodore wrote eighty volumes. He mentions a book against Anomaeans,

6 Κατὰ δὲ τῆς τοῦ Μάνεντος δυσσεβείας συνέγραψαν οἰ ἄριστοι τῆς εὐσεβείας συνήγοροι, Τίτος καὶ Διόδωρος, ὁ μὲν τὴν Βοστρηνῶν ἐκκλησίαν ποιμάνας, ὁ δὲ τὴν Κιλίκων ἰθύνας μητρόπολιν. Συνέγραψε δὲ καὶ ὁ Λαοδικεὺς Γεώργιος, ἀνὴρ τῆς μὲν Ἀρείου προστατεύων αἱρέσεως, τοῖς δὲ φιλοσόφοις ἐντεθραμμένος μαθήμασι. Πρὸς δὲ τούτοις καὶ ὁ Φοίνιξ Εὐσέβιος, οὗ καὶ πρόσθεν ἐμνήσθημεν, Haereticarum Fabularum compendium i. 26, Patrologia Graeca, vol. 83, col. 381B.

7 Critical edition: Titi Bostrensis Contra Manichaeos libri 4: graece et syriace, ed. A. Roman, T. Schmidt, P.H. Poirier, E. Cregheur, J. Declerck, ccsg 82, Turnhout, Brepols, 2013.

8 His anti-Manichaean work is lost, the surviving parts of its contents have been studied by N.A. Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof in Defense of God: a study of Titus of Bostra’s Contra Manichaeos, the work’s sources, aims and relation to its contemporary theology, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2004, pp. 137-140; and by M. DelCogliano, ‘The literary corpus of George of Laodicea’, in Vigiliae Christianae 65 (2011), pp. 150-169, esp. 155-161. For biographical details concerning George see M. DelCogliano, ‘The Death of George of Laodicea’, in Journal of Theological Studies 60 (2009), pp. 181-190, and M. DelCogliano, ‘George of Laodicea: A Historical Reassessment’, in Journal of Ecclesiastical History 62 (2011), pp. 667-692.

9 It is not clear what is the anti-Manichaean work written by Eusebius of Emesa because none of his treatises explicitly refers to Manichaeism. Probably, Theodoret refers to Eusebius of Emesa’s De arbitrio voluntate Pauli et Domini passione. For a detailed discus-sion see Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 134-137.

10 For the connection of these four authors see Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 137-138.



a work on Providence, one against the Chaldeans and, finally, the work against Manichaeism that is composed, according to Barhadbesabba Arbaia, of three books.11

The next source is Photius. Codex 85 of his Bibliotheca is dedicated to the presentation of the work Against the Manichaeans written by Heraclianus, bishop of Chalcedon. About the author, we know nothing more than the account left by Photius. In his work Heraclianus has reported all the anti- Manichaean books that he had read:

He also gives a list of those who wrote against the Manichaean impiety before him: Hegemonius, who wrote out the disputation of Archelaus against Mani; Titus, who was supposed to be an opponent of the Manichaeans, whereas he rather attacked the writings of Addas; George of Laodicea, who uses nearly the same arguments as Titus against the impious heresy; Serapion, bishop of Thmuis; lastly, Diodore, who wrote twenty-five books against the Manichaeans.12

The last author mentioned is Diodore of Tarsus: his treatise, made up of 25 books, is divided into two parts: “In the first seven of which he imagines that he is refuting the Living Gospel of Mani, instead of the work of Addas named Modion, as is really the case”,13 “In the remaining books he explains and clears up the meaning of certain passages in the Scriptures which the Manichaeans were in the habit of appropriating to support their own views”.14

11 Barhadbesabba Arbaya, La première partie de l’Histoire de Barhadbesabba ‘Arbaïa; texte syriaque édité et traduit par F. Nau, Patrologia Orientalis 23, Paris, Librairie de Paris, 1932, p. 315.

12 Καταλέγει καὶ ὅσοι πρὸ αὐτοῦ κατὰ τῆς τοῦ Μανιχαίου συνέγραψαν ἀθεότητος, Ἡγεμόνιόν τε τὸν τὰς Ἀρχελάου πρὸς αὐτὸν ἀντιλογίας ἀναγράψαντα, καὶ Τίτον ὃς ἔδοξε μὲν κατὰ Μανιχαίων γράψαι, ἔγραψε δὲ μᾶλλον κατὰ τῶν Ἄδδου συγγραμμάτων, ἔτι δὲ καὶ τὸν Λαοδικέα Γεώργιον, τοῖς αὐτοῖς σχεδὸν οἷς ὁ Τίτος κατὰ τῆς ἀσεβείας κεχρημένον ἐπιχειρήμασι, καὶ Σεραπίωνα τὸν τῆς Θμουέως ἐπίσκοπον, καὶ τὸν Διόδωρον ἐν κ καὶ ε βιβλίοις τὸν κατὰ Μανιχαίων ἀγῶνα ἀγωνισάμενον, Photius, Bibliotheca, ed. Henry, Les Belles Lettres, Paris, 1962, 5 vol. Here vol. ii, pp. 9-10. Henceforth abbreviated as Henry.

13 Διὰ μὲν τῶν πρώτων βιβλίων ἑπτὰ οἴεται μὲν τὸ τοῦ Μανιχαίου ζῶν εὐαγγέλιον ἀνατρέπειν [ . . ], ἀλλὰ ἀνατρέπει τὸ ὑπὸ Ἄδδα γεγραμμένον, ὃ καλεῖται Μόδιον, Henry, vol. ii, p. 9.

14 Διὰ δὲ τῶν ἐφεξῆς τὴν τῶν γραφικῶν ῥητῶν, ἃ οἱ Μανιχαῖοι ἐξοικειοῦνται πρὸς τὸ σφίσι βεβουλημένον, ἀνακαθαίρει χρῆσιν καὶ διασαφεῖ, Henry, vol. ii, p. 9.

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The Chronicle of Seert, an Arabic source, mentions Diodore’s anti-Man-ichaean treatise which is composed of three books.15 The section dedicated to Diodore of Tarsus ends with a quotation from a letter of Theodoret of Cyrus in which he blames Cyril of Alexandria’s charges against Diodore and his disciple Theodore of Mopsuestia. In this quotation it is possible to read another refer-ence to Diodore’s anti-Manichaean activity.16

Finally, we should mention two ancient catalogues of books: one in Syriac, the catalogue of Abdiso, and one in Greek, the Lexicon of Suidas. Abdiso sim-ply reports the title of Diodore’s works,17 while it is missing in the Diodore-catalogue of Suidas.18 This could mean that there was not much knowledge of this treatise in the Byzantine Empire.

It is evident that Photius disagrees with the Eastern sources on the number of books of Diodore’s treatise: twenty-five for Photius, three for Barhadbesabba Arbaia and the Chronicle of Seert. This could be explained in two ways: either the Syriac version is limited to the first three books, or some redactor has pub-lished the work in three books instead of twenty-five, or vice versa.19 Since the work is ‘lost’, we cannot decide which one of these options is preferable.

The common opinion among modern scholars is that this treatise of Diodore of Tarsus is completely lost. Samuel Lieu writes: “Hence Diodorus of Tarsus, who thought he was directing his treatise, which is now lost, against the Living Gospel of Mani, was in fact attacking a work of Adda called Modius”.20 Pedersen agrees with the latter: “It refers to no fewer than two vanished texts (George’s and Diodore’s)”.21 In 2011 DelCogliano, summarizing what remains of the literary corpus of George of Laodicea, states: “Diodore’s lost Manichaean writing”.22

15 Histoire nestorienne: chronique de Séert. Première partie, (ii), ed. A. Scher, Patrologia Orientalis 5.2, 1910, Paris, Librairie de Paris, 1910, p. 276.

16 Histoire nestorienne: chronique de Séert, p. 278.17 G.S. Assemani, Bibliotheca orientalis Clementino-Vaticana, in qua manuscriptos codices syr-

iacos, arabicos, persicos, turcicos, hebraicos, samaritanos, armenicos, æthiopicos, Graecos, ægyptiacos, ibericos & malabaricos, iii, Pars prima de scriptoribus syris nestorianis, Typis Sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide, Rome, 29. 6.

18 Suidae Lexicon, ed. Ada Adler. Pars ii Δ-Θ. Editio stereotypa editionis primae (mcmxxxi). Sammlung wissenschaflicher Commentare. Lexicographi Graeci, i, Stuttgart, 103.1-23.

19 See Abramowski, Untersuchungen”, pp. 245-246.20 S.N.C. Lieu, Manichaeism in the Late Roman Empire and Medieval China, 1992, p. 91.21 Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, p. 418.22 DelCogliano, ‘The literary corpus’, p. 159. The opinion is also shared by other scholars such

as N. Baker-Brian, Manichaeism in the Later Roman Empire: a Study of Augustine’s Contra Adimantum, Lewiston-Queenstone-Lampeter, The Edwin Mellen Press, 2009, p. 160;



The statements of these scholars are fundamentally correct, but my impres-sion is that a bibliographic information, published in the supplement of the Clavis Patrum Graecorum, has not been taken into consideration. The bib-liographic information 3823,23 under the name of Diodore of Tarsus, men-tions the existence of an unpublished fragment of the work Against the Manichaeans in a florilegium of the Athonite codex Vatopedi 236. A brief but detailed description of this codex was published in 1973 by De Santos Otero.24 The codex was written some time in the 11th or 12th century. It consists of two sections, written at different times. Section one extends from fols. 1-126, section two from fols. 127-311. It is interesting to note that codex Vatopedi 236 contains other anti Manichaean writings, namely the Contra Manichaeos by Serapion of Thmuis (fols. 38r-59v)25 and a section of Titus of Bostra’s polemical work against Manichaeism (fols. 59v-95v).26 In the first part of codex Vatopedi 236 there is, also, an anonymous treatise (fols. 113r-126v): Πρὸς τοὺς λέγοντας τάς ψυχὰς τῶν ἀνθρωπίνων προυπάρκειν σωμάτων. De Santos Otero has suggested that the authorship could be assigned to Theodore Abu-Qurra. Our florilegium comes after some short treatises of Theodore Abu-Qurra, from folio 95v to 113r. In this florilegium only authors who lived before the seventh century are quoted,27 and this corresponds with the life of Theodore Abu-Qurra (eigth to ninth cen-tury). Of course, this is only a suggestion. What is needed is a thorough study of this work.28 This extended florilegium contains the sole extant fragment of Diodore’s Against the Manichaeans, which to our knowledge has not been pre-viously edited in print, and which reads as follows:29

J.A. Van den Berg, Biblical argument in Manichaean missionary practice: the case of Adimantus and Augustine, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2010, pp. 46 and 178.

23 Clavis Patrum Graecorum: supplementum, ed. M. Geerard and J. Noret, Brepols-Turnhout, 1998, p. 220.

24 A. De Santos Otero, ‘Der Codex Vatopedi 236’, in Kleronomia 5 (1973), pp. 315-326.25 Critical edition by R.P. Casey, Serapion of Thmuis against the Manichees, Harward

Theological Studies xv, Cambridge, 1931.26 Regarding Titus’s and Serapion’s anti Manichaean works see also R.P. Casey, ‘The text of

the Anti-manichaean Writings of Titus of Bostra and Serapion of Thmuis’, in The Harvard Theological Review 21 (1928), pp. 97-111.

27 For a detailed list of the authors quoted see De Santos Otero, ‘Der Codex Vatopedi 236’, pp. 322-323.

28 A. De Santos Otero, ‘Dos capitulos ineditos del original griego de Ireneo de Lyon (Adversus Haereses ii, 50-51) en el codice Vatopedi 236’, in Emerita 41 (1973), pp. 479-489, esp. p. 483.

29 I thank dr. Maria Conterno and prof. Pierre Augustine for having procured a copy of the manuscript at issue and prof. Luciano Bossina for the help provided in its reading.

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Διοδώρου ἐπισκόπου Ταρσοῦ ἐκ τῆς κατὰ μανιχαίων βίβλου πρώτης λόγος ζὅτι γὰρ ἡ ψυχὴ συνεκτίσθη τῷ σώματι καὶ τῆς διὰ σώματος γνώσεως οὐδὲν

ἔχει πλέον αὐτάρχως ἤδη προειρήκαμεν τῶν ἑλληνικῶν λήρων μικρὰ φροντίσαντες καὶ τοῦ τῆς λήθης πόματος καταγελάστων ῥημάτων ἀπορίας μυθικῶν παρακαλὺμματι.

Of Diodore, bishop of Tarsus, from the first book Against the Manichaeans, discourse seven.

That indeed the soul was created together with the body, and that it has nothing more than the bodily knowledge, we have already demon-strated sufficiently, briefly considering the trifles of the Greeks and the ridiculous explanations regarding the drink of Lethe which are meant to cover up any embarrassment about mythical tales.

This fragment is the only trace of the treatise Against the Manichaeans of Diodore. From the information of the compiler we know that the few surviving lines belong to the seventh discourse of the first book. It is likely, therefore, that this fragment belongs to the first part of the work in which Diodore, accord-ing to the report of Photius, argues directly against the Modion of Adda. The question of its authenticity is difficult to answer as there are no other extant fragments of this work. Nonetheless there are indirect proofs in favor of its authenticity. First, although there exists no complete study of this florilegium, it seems that its author is faithful in citing lost works. De Santos Otero states that the author, whoever he is, has at his disposal an extensive library from which he directly quotes his sources with accuracy.30 Wolfgang Bienert has edited some fragments of Dionysius and Peter of Alexandria from this flori-legium: some of them were previously known, others unknown. Bienert dem-onstrates the authenticity of every fragment quoted in this work.31 I myself am also working on another fragment of this florilegium (folio 122r) concerning a quotation from the Greek version of Augustine’s De Gestis Pelagii 3, 10.32 Even in this case, despite some abbreviations, the compiler was faithful. Nonetheless, the final decision about the author’s faithfulness should be suspended until a complete edition and analysis of the florilegium have been carried out.

30 De Santos Otero, ‘Dos capitulos inéditos’, p. 483.31 W. Bienert, ‘Neue Fragmente des Dionysius und des Petrus von Alexandrien aus Cod.

Vatop. 236’, in Kleronomia 5 (1973), pp. 308-314. See also W. Bienert, ‘Zu den neuen Petrusfragmenten aus Cod. Vatop. 236’, in Kleronomia 6 (1974), pp. 237-241.

32 See B. Altaner, ‘Augustinus in der griechischen Kirche bis auf Photius’, in Historisches Jahrbuch 71 (1951), pp. 37-76, esp. pp. 52-55.



A second indirect proof of its authenticity regards the content of the frag-ment. It is not particularly interesting from the point of view of the history of Manichaeism, nor from that of the orthodox Christian polemic against it:33 Diodore fights the doctrine of the pre-existence of souls and indicates its ori-gin in Greek philosophy. The drink of forgetfulness is an explicit reference to the myth of Er, in which Plato, in the tenth book of the Republic, explains how souls incarnate and reincarnate in human bodies. But it is precisely this reference to Greek philosophy which is particularly relevant. As Pedersen34 and DelCogliano35 have shown, philosophical demonstration is part of the Antiochene tradition against the Manichaeans. In the first two books of his Contra Manichaeos Titus of Bostra argues on philosophical grounds against the doctrine of Adda.36 The work of George of Laodicea, thanks to the cultural education of this author, has probably the same philosophical background. Next to the previous quotation from Theodoret’s Haereticarum Fabularum Compendium, even Philostorgius’s Ecclesiastical History confirms that: “George, who was of Alexandrinian origin and had practiced the philosophical way of life and who was bishop of Laodicea in Syria”.37 Furthermore, according to Photius, George used the same arguments as Titus.38 It is difficult to assess on the basis of a single fragment the quality and quantity of philosophical con-tent in Diodore’s original work. Nonetheless all these references to philosophy in anti-Manichaean works written in the Antiochene region could explain, at least partially, why in the anti-Manichaean treatise of Diodore there appears to be a direct attack to Platonic philosophy.

Perhaps it is possible to formulate another hypothesis. The Bishop of Bostra does not take an explicit position against the pre-existence of souls39 but a Syriac statement taken from Titus’s work against the Manichaeans (iv, 19), edited and translated by Pedersen, rails against Plato’s doctrine of reincarna-tion, directly connected in the same myth of Er to the pre-existence of souls:

33 Lieu, Manichaeism in the Later Roman Empire, pp. 192-218 and Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 129-146.

34 Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 137-142 and pp. 417-419.35 DelCogliano, The literary corpus, pp. 158-161.36 For a detailed analysis of the first two books see Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 17-33.37 Γεώργιος δέ, Ἀλεξανδρεὺς μὲν τὸ γένος καὶ τῶν ἐκ φιλοσοφίας ὁρμωμένων, τῆς δὲ κατὰ

Συρίαν Λαοδικείας ἐπιστατῶν, Philostorgius, Historia Ecclesiastica viii, 17. Critical edi-tion: Philostorgius, Kirchengeschichte: mit dem Leben des Lucian von Antiochien und den Fragmenten eines arianischen Historiographen, ed. J. Bidez and F. Winkelmann, gcs 21, Berlin, Akademie Verlag, 1972, p. 115.

38 See note 12.39 Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 297-319.

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“But Plato taught, more and more in error, with a clear term the transmigra-tion of souls”.40 It seems to suggest, at least partially, the existence of links and reciprocal influences in the anti-Manichaean literature produced in Antioch: namely the presence of philosophical argumentation against the Platonic psy-chology in the anti-Manichaean literature.

Both hypotheses should be formulated with a certain degree of caution since we are dealing with a completely lost text (George of Laodicea), a frag-ment (Diodore of Tarsus), a work difficult to identify (Eusebius of Emesa) and only one complete treatise (Titus of Bostra). Nonetheless, the edition of this fragment can help to better understand the role of a fourth-century bishop like Diodore of Tarsus and the Antiochene reaction against Manichaeism.

40 Pedersen, Demonstrative Proof, pp. 468-469.

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malavasi2015 - diodore of tarsus' treatise against the manichaeans - a new fragment

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