Freethought & Rationalism Archive

mountainman · 09-07-2010, 08:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stephan huller

So our list of Christian eunuchs now looks like this:

...[trimmed]...

15. Marcus Aurelius Prosenes from procurator of the wine-cellar under Commodus to chief chamberlain of Septimius Severus.

You will need to take Marcus Aurelius Prosenes off your list. The evidence by which you are adding him to a list of "known Christians" is extremely tenditious to say the least. At the basis of the ancient historical evidence in the case of this Marcus Aurelius Prosenes is an inscription.

When you go and have a look at this inscription, you will find the source of the hypothesis by which Marcus Aurelius Prosenes is being presumed "Christian". There is nothing in the inscription to connect Marcus Aurelius Prosenes with the christian religion at all. However, at a later date, someone added a phrase to the stone which went "welcomed before God".

It is a delusion to myopically believe that this phrase must have been ennunciated in the mind of a christian and not any other type of person. The phrase was added by a later hand for Christ's sake. There is nothing in the original inscription to Marcus Aurelius Prosenes to suggest that Marcus Aurelius Prosenes was anything other than your average Graeco-Roman manager of the gladiatorial games under Commodus.

Therefore I think you shoud remove
15. Marcus Aurelius Prosenes
from your list of **[EDIT]** christians.

Some further data ....

The Marcus Aurelius Prosenes Inscription in Rome

Quote:

A funerary inscription in Rome from the Severan period, to Prosenes, and a servant of emperor, is claimed to be christian. This inscription is said to be "less securely identified as Christian" for reasons which you are about to perceive:

The grave of Marcus Aurelius Prosenes--set up by several
of his own freedpersons (liberti)--reveals that this
imperial freedman had moved his way through the hierarchy
of imperial service, even holding several procuratorships
(senior positions of considerable influence) under Commodus.

Though nothing in the original inscription
suggests Christian identity,
one freedman named Ampelius
later inscribed on the stone
the fact that Prosenes was

"welcomed before God"

(receptus ad deum) on March 3, 217,
an expression which may best
be explained in terms of Christianity.

(ICUR VI 17246; cf. Mazzoleni 1999: 153).

Toto · 09-08-2010, 08:57 AM

Re: Marcus Aurelius Prosenes. "Welcomed before God" is a quote from 1 Tim 2. Do you have an alternate explanation?

mountainman · 09-09-2010, 04:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Re: Marcus Aurelius Prosenes. "Welcomed before God" is a quote from 1 Tim 2. Do you have an alternate explanation?

There appears to be at least another inscription in this epicgraphic database for the latin term "receptus ad deum" . I think there are probably more very similar, but I cannot point to them at present.

Quote:

There were found 2 inscriptions.

Publication: CIL 06, 08498 (p 3459, 3890) = ILCV 03332 = ICUR-06, 17246 (p 300) = D 01738 = EAOR-01, 00001 = AE 1999, 00144 = AE 2006, +00150
Province: Roma Place: Roma
Prosenes receptus ad deum V Non(as) [Ma]ias(?) Sa[me in Cephalle]nia(?) Praesente et Extricato II (!) / regrediens in urbe ab expeditionibus / scripsit Ampelius lib(ertus) // M(arco) Aurelio Augg(ustorum) lib(erto) Proseneti / a cubiculo Aug(usti) / proc(uratori) thesaurorum / proc(uratori) patrimoni(i) proc(uratori) / munerum proc(uratori) vinorum / ordinato a divo Commodo / in kastrense patrono piissimo / liberti bene merenti / sarcophagum de suo / adornaverunt

Publication: CIL 06, 31977 (p 4799) = ICUR-02, 04892 = ILCV +00107
Province: Roma Place: Roma
[Hic requi]escit Felix v(ir) c(larissimus) t[ribunus(?)] / [qui vixi]t annis LXI recep[tus ad deum(?)] / [3] Oct(obres) Basso et Anth[ioco conss(ulibus)]

I am not proficient in Latin, but this second one directly above mentions "receptus ad deum" and has this been cited as a christian inscription? I have not looked at the equivalent Greek term(s).

It is just as likley that the author of 1 Tim used a term (or expression) which was already part of the "gentile/"pagan"/Graeco-Roman" milieu.

Toto · 09-09-2010, 08:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

...
I am not proficient in Latin, but this second one directly above mentions "receptus ad deum" and has this been cited as a christian inscription? I have not looked at the equivalent Greek term(s).

It is just as likley that the author of 1 Tim used a term (or expression) which was already part of the "gentile/"pagan"/Graeco-Roman" milieu.

From Paul to Valentinus: Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries (or via: amazon.co.uk) by Peter Lampe, p. 331

Quote:

What Prosenes's freed persons did after the death of their patron is in many ways unusual.

Ampelius commissioned the second inscription that is peculiar. It is engraved on the top rim of the right small side of the sarcophagus over a figure of a griffin, that is, in an unusual place not intended for an inscription.

In Ampelius's inscription, Prosenes is designated as "taken back unto God" (receptus ad deum). this is not proof but one of the indications that Ampelius and Proscenes were Christians. "Receptus ad deum" was never used by pagans; but similar expressions are found in Christian inscriptions of a later period…

Please revise your online documents to reflect this, which get an unreasonably high google ranking on searches.

andrewcriddle · 09-09-2010, 10:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Quote:

Publication: CIL 06, 31977 (p 4799) = ICUR-02, 04892 = ILCV +00107
Province: Roma Place: Roma
[Hic requi]escit Felix v(ir) c(larissimus) t[ribunus(?)] / [qui vixi]t annis LXI recep[tus ad deum(?)] / [3] Oct(obres) Basso et Anth[ioco conss(ulibus)]

I am not proficient in Latin, but this second one directly above mentions "receptus ad deum" and has this been cited as a christian inscription? I have not looked at the equivalent Greek term(s).

It is just as likley that the author of 1 Tim used a term (or expression) which was already part of the "gentile/"pagan"/Graeco-Roman" milieu.

Bassus and Antiochus appear to have been consuls in CE 431 wiki/List_of_Roman_consuls

If so the inscription is presumably Christian.

Andrew Criddle

mountainman · 09-09-2010, 05:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

From Paul to Valentinus: Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries (or via: amazon.co.uk) by Peter Lampe, p. 331

Quote:

What Prosenes's freed persons did after the death of their patron is in many ways unusual.

Ampelius commissioned the second inscription that is peculiar. It is engraved on the top rim of the right small side of the sarcophagus over a figure of a griffin, that is, in an unusual place not intended for an inscription.

In Ampelius's inscription, Prosenes is designated as "taken back unto God" (receptus ad deum). this is not proof but one of the indications that Ampelius and Proscenes were Christians. "Receptus ad deum" was never used by pagans; but similar expressions are found in Christian inscriptions of a later period…

Please revise your online documents to reflect this, which get an unreasonably high google ranking on searches.

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

I am not proficient in Latin, but this second one directly above mentions "receptus ad deum" and has this been cited as a christian inscription? I have not looked at the equivalent Greek term(s).

It is just as likley that the author of 1 Tim used a term (or expression) which was already part of the "gentile/"pagan"/Graeco-Roman" milieu.

Bassus and Antiochus appear to have been consuls in CE 431 wiki/List_of_Roman_consuls

If so the inscription is presumably Christian.

Thanks Toto and Andrew,

There are separate issues here,

(1) Whether the phrase "Receptus ad deum" is distinctively Christian "ante pacem", and

(2) When this phrase was added by a later hand to the original Prosenes inscription.

In the first matter as I have stated above, a search needs to be first performed for the Greek terms since the NT was first written in Greek not Latin. This is not as simple as I had hoped.

In the second matter, do we know when the additional phrase was added to the inscription by a later hand and whether this could have been as late as the 5th century?

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09-08-2010, 08:57 AM	#2
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	Re: Marcus Aurelius Prosenes. "Welcomed before God" is a quote from 1 Tim 2. Do you have an alternate explanation?

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