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Peaceful Pluralism; the Durene Mithraeum, Synagogue, and Christian Building," Journal Vol: Journal Issue: Journal Year: 2011 Article Pages: 189-199

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Peaceful Pluralism; the Durene Mithraeum, Synagogue, and Christian Building, r 10/29/2014 LionMail Mail - ILL RequestTN 538887 uoN f\A A I L Abigail E. Reiss <[email protected]> ',"c:() L U tv\ B I;\ ILL Request TN 538887 1 message Columbia University Libraries ILL/Lending <ill- Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 11:37 [email protected]> AM To: [email protected] Columbia University ILL Request for Copy Borrowing Library: RBN TN #: 538887 ILL #: 134510316 Lending String: *ZCU,PUL,COO,PAU,BXM,AUM,T JC,WEL,IQU,MBB,SNN,SNN Aging Date: 20141028 Call Number: DS99.D8 D87 2011g Location: Avery Notes: Journal Title: Dura-Europos ; crossroads of antiquity / Pub: Chestnut Hill, Mass. ; McMullen Museum 0 Article Author: Patricia Deleeuw Article Title: A Peaceful Pluralism; The Durene Mithraeum, Synagogue, and Christian Building," Journal Vol: Journal Issue: Journal Year: 2011 Article Pages: 189-199 ***ARTICLE OR CANCELLATION NOTICE MUST BE RECEIVED IN ILL (307 BUTLER) WITHIN TWO BUSINESS DAYS. THANKS FOR YOUR COOPERATION.**** Please contact 212-854-3542 or email [email protected] with any questions. Columbia University Interlibrary Loan 307 Butler Library 535 W. 114th Street New York, NY 10027 https://mail.google.com/mail/ulOl?ui=2&ik=c8034d1164&vi ew= pt&search= inbox&th= 1495cdSdb48f4b5f&si m I= 1495cdSdb48f4b5f 1/1 ~~~Lc- D> ~3 "D~~ D~1 dD\\) This publication is issued in conjunction with the exhibition Dura-Europos: Crossroads of Antiquity, org, niz d by the YaleUniversity Art ellery and the McMullen Museum ofArt, Boston College. McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College February 5-June 5, 2011 Organized by the Yale University Art Gallery and the McMullen Museum of Art, Bast n 011 g , Dura-Europo: rotsro d of A"liquity ha been curated by Lisa R. Brody (Yale University Art Gallery) and Gail L. Hoffman (B t n liege, las i s Dep rtm I1t)with supp rt fr0111 the National Endowment for the Arts, Boston College, and the Patrons of the McMullen Mu urn, Additi nal supp rt w pr vidcd by th Newton College class of 1965. NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS Copyright © 2011 by the McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, Mass. 02467. Library of Congress Control Number: 2010942145 ISBN: 9781892850164 Distributed by the University of Chicago Press Exhibition design: Diana Larsen , Object photography: Rich House and Anthony De Camillo , t Additional photography: Jessica Smolinski r Copy editing: Margaret Neeley ± + Book design: John McCoy r• r ; t , THIS PUBLICATION IS FUNDED IN PART BY , THE PEGGY SIMONS MEMORIAL PUBLICATIONS FUND •· t f ---------------------, PATRICIA A PEACEFUL PLURALISM: THE DURENE MITHRA UM, SYNAGOGUE, AND CHRISTIAN BUlL IN On a bluff overlooking the Euphrates River, the town ofDura-Europos was founded in th f urth ntury BCE by Macedonian Greeks to defend the caravan route between Antioch and Seleucia. Alth ugh th it is now barren and forbidding, there is some evidence that at the time of the town's flourishing, fr m th late-second century BCE to its defeat and destruction by Sasanians in 256/257 CE, the area urr undo ing the town was a fertile agricultural center. It was at the same time a military garri on and a enter £ r trade and politics in the Parthian Empire. 1 Macedonian, Seleucid, Parthian, Roman, Sa anian, reek, atin, Persian-Dura-Europos was a place where people of various ethnicities, languages, culture, and religi ns, lived, worked, and worshipped, as far as we know, peacefully. The excavations of Dura conducted in the 1920s and 1930s revealed a town dotted with r ligi u it , as would have been true, most likely, of all Greco-Roman settlements of its size and complexity. Th fir t inhabitants of Dura worshipped at the temples of Artemis-Nanaia and of Atargatis and Hadad built near th town's Agora (see plan, p. 15).2 Thus, our earliest evidence of Durene religion demonstrates the tend en y oflocal Semitic gods to adopt the names and attributes of deities of the dominant Greek culture. th r temples would follow as people with different ethnicities and cultures came to Dura and built home and places where they might speak to their own gods; temples dedicated to the Palmyrene Gods, to the local g d Aphlad, to Zeus Kyrios, to Artemis Azzanathkona, to Zeus-Theos, and to the Semitic Gad, a guardian g d, were erected in Dura in the first and second centuries CE.3 In the mid-second century CE, the armies of Rome came to Dura, and it was a Roman colony and military garrison from the late-second century until the town's destruction by the armies of the a anian Persians in 256. The Roman army built its camp and governor's palace in Dura northwest of the original Greek and Parthian settlements, separated from them by a low wall. During the time of Roman occupation, three houses in Dura were adapted by their owners to become centers of worship for Judaism, Chri tiarrity, and the mystery cult ofMithras. The architecture and decoration of the ensuing Synagogue, Hou e Chur h, and Mithraeum are some of our most important witnesses to those religions." The history of Christianity in its first centuries often is written using the metaphor of birth; from it jewish origins and Greco-Roman intellectual and political milieu, Christianity emerges and grow to inde- 1 0 A Peaceful Pluralism: the Durene Mithraeum, Synagogue, and hristian Building 1 1 -----.,~-------------------------------------- p ndence. Adopting the metaphor invites the hi torian to vi w th arlyJ II m v m nt' d vel prnenr a recognize the Messiah in their midst. 12 on formedbybirthstrugglestobreakfreeofit moth r().5 v nwith ut th In u.g fbirth.th hi tory Other early Christian writers justified Christianity against paganism. In his Apology, Ari tide m k f the relationship between Christianity, Judai rn, and the van u pa an r Ii i n f h fir t nturie CE the "Greeks" and the "Egyptians" for having created many gods, male and female, who suffer from th w r t i written usually as one of antagonism and nvalry.s It i true, f ur ,that hri ti niry w n t viewed deficits of character, murder, incest, adultery, as do humans. 13The best-known Christian apologi t sg in t alway with favor by the Roman authoritie or the pe pl th Y rul d, nd f, LJ w r fJ u w re ome- the pagans is the theologian Origen, who wrote in Alexandria in the early third century. Inhi w rkAgail1 t tun victim of persecution. One of the earlie t authenti de ripti n f th me rtyrd m fa hri tian Celsus, Origen takes on the pagan Celsus, the author of a treatise attacking both Judaism and hri tianiry. bi ho~ m the mid-second c~ntury in Smyrna (a city on th A gean a tin wb tin w Turk y) d ribe Among Ongens many complaints about Celsus' treatment of Christianity is Celsus' claim that hri tianity the arre t and death of the bishop Polycarp a in tigat d by a m b. wh n P Jy arp kn I d th t h ' hri "th h cnow a e t is "unreasonable"-like the beliefin a number of superstitions he lists, among them that ofMithra .A rd- a II nan, ,t e w ole mass of gentiles and Jews liVing in myrna ri d ut in unr train and with a ing to Celsus, superstitions like Mithraism and Christianity are led by wicked men who convin imp! gr at hout, ThISISthe teacher of Asia, the father of th hri tian ,th d tr y r f ur people to believe in their false teachings without explanation, Origen responds by arguing that lu'i tianity A picture of the religiOUS life of the Greco-Roman world ftll c.., ttL '. tu ' . d . 11 I' . or IU n n parnte u II1g offers complex and sophisticated ideas to its learned adherents while providing a sound moral cod f, r th or y t le eVIdence ofhterary sources indeed would higlilight antag ill' m am tl ' Ii . .'. ' ng 1 varl u r J u group. betterment oflife to those unable to devote themselves to the study of Christian philosophy. 14 Ju tin Mar- tOIles of the persecutIOn of Christians by Roman goverrun ntal auth riti fr m tll mid-fir t thr ugh the tyr, in another apologetic work, his First Apology, claims that the "wicked devils" who adhere to the ult f early fo~rth century captivated subsequent generation of Chri tian and haped ili ir writing f the early Churchs hIstory Although we kn h h . Mithras have imitated the actions commanded by Jesus of his followersj like Christians, follower fMithra " now ow t at suc persecutIOn wer m t ften I al and poradic the accounts 0f the herOIsm of the m t th d d ' eat and drink with prescribed prayers during their ritual, though it is bread and water rather than win in aliCI . f In I ar yrs eypro uce were Ource ofprid ,identity,andent rtainmentfor which they partake.ls a tl ln~ fulans' t lese accounts, Christians are captured, tortured, and put t death f, r ili rim fathei m , ley re se dto sacnfi ce to the gods of the G R ' ' Although the apologetiC literature of the first centuries CE is often polemical, replete with deri ive and ' I' . reco- oman state, Or f anl1lbali m ami und r tanding that tllelr secret re IgIOuSntual invited.8 , mocking language and tone, what is revealed clearly in these texts is the familiarity of the autllor with th One of the most prevalent literary genres d db h beliefs and rituals of their opponents.
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