Knowing The Divine And Divine Knowledge In Greco-Roman Religion -- By: Eckhard J. Schnabel

Journal: Tyndale Bulletin
Volume: TYNBUL 68:2 (NA 2017)
Article: Knowing The Divine And Divine Knowledge In Greco-Roman Religion
Author: Eckhard J. Schnabel


Knowing The Divine And Divine Knowledge In Greco-Roman Religion

Eckhard J. Schnabel

([email protected])

Summary

In his 2007 Tyndale Biblical Theology lecture, Brian Rosner has shown that the notion of being known by God is an important, albeit neglected, theme in the Old and New Testament. He explored the three relation notions of belonging to God, being loved or chosen by God, and being a child or son of God. After a concise survey of relevant biblical data in the Old and New Testament, he described the value of ‘being known by God’ in terms of warning, humility, comfort, and security. The following paper explores Greek and Roman religious texts with a view to establishing whether the notion of ‘being known by God’ surfaces in the context in which the early Christian movement engaged in missionary work, seeking to win polytheists for faith in the one true God and in Jesus Messiah. New Testament scholars do not seem to have explored the subject of the Greek and Roman gods ‘knowing’ human beings. Similar to Rosner’s biblical theological essay, which surveyed texts without in-depth discussion of exegetical details and historical context, the following essay is wide-ranging, considering primary texts written over a large span of time, from Homer’s epics (which continued to be read in the first century), the Homeric Hymns, Xenophanes’ fragments, Callimachus’ Hymn to Demeter, Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus, Hesiod’s Theogony, Cicero’s De natura deorum, and Plutarch’s religious texts to the Greek Hymns in the Furley/Bremer collection and the Lydian confession inscriptions.

1. The Difficulty Of Knowing The Gods

That the gods are difficult to know is repeatedly stated in Homer’s epics.1 Odysseus did not know the identity of the (river-) god to whom he prayed for help: he addresses the god with the words ‘Listen, sire, whoever you are’ (κλῦθι, ἄναξ, ὅτις ἐσσι; Od. 5:445). Similarly, his son Telemachos did not know who was the god that arrived in the guise of a human being and departed as a bird (the reader knows that it is Athena): he addresses the god with the words, ‘Listen to me, you God that came to me yesterday’ (κλῦθί μευ, ὃ χθιζὸς θεὸς ἤλυθες ἡμέτερον; Od. 2:262). Xenophanes of Colophon (sixth century BC) writes:

No man knows, or ever will know, the truth about the gods (τὸ μὲν οὖν σαφὲς οὔτις ἀνὴρ ἴδεν, οὐδέ τις ...

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