In the following, I shall explore the significance of sleep as a device or rather as an interface that might be examined as a promotor of religious contact.1 Concluding from the emphasis that had been laid on the overall importance of dynamic situations of contact for the study of religion in the previous chapters, it might come as a surprise that in this final chapter, I set my sights on the case for putting the contact of religious traditions to sleep. The eminence of sleep seems counter-intuitive as the possibilities of contacting anything while sleeping seem considerably reduced from a mundane perspective. However, to me, sleep as a form of being that is described as being devoid of content is, in fact, a more promising candidate for comparison than the presumed content of sleep, namely dreams. Though dreams are one of the most common means of reaching the divine sphere, I shall argue that sleep is clearly a more suitable way of getting into contact with another religious tradition.
1 Tertullian and the Question of Religious Contact
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus (c.160âc.212 CE), a resident of Roman Carthage, is best seen as a product of religious contact situations, as well as a promotor and designer of them. Little is known about his biography apart from allusions in his own writings.2 Consequently, clichés abound concerning him and his thinking. Tertullianâs image is characterized by various charges laid at his head, including rigorism, ethical radicalism, misogyny (Tu es diaboli ianuaââYou are the devilâs gateway.â De cultu feminarum I.1.2.),3 obscurantism, and even of âbeing of a dark mind and a dark languageâ.4 The most persistent prejudice against him, however, is âhis reputation as the enemy of argument and the apostle of unreason,â the idea that Tertullian is the main promotor of the sacrificium intellectus.5 If there is any good in these clichés, it is probably the fact that they should prevent us from expecting more from Tertullianâs writings than an object language expression of a situation of religious contact. His writings work as an intellectual incident, a case of an object language author trying to develop a suitable metalanguage to deal with a challenging situation.
It may well be the case that his geographic position in the flourishing harbor, trade hub, and metropolis of Carthage6 located in a marginal province striving for more independence (Northern Africa), contributed significantly to his theoretical position.7 Archaeological evidence concerning the size and the density of the population suggests â[t]he impression we are left with is one of extensive overcrowding.â8 Any kind of contact, thus, must have happened under the conditions of this spatial closeness. Above all, his place of living was doubtlessly religiously fertile. In retrospect, Carthage, a center of cultural and religious encounters even before the advent of Christianity, can be described as the center of North African Christianity.9 It was the birthplace of the cult of martyrs and the veneration of relics, and the location of numerous councils.10 It was also a city congested with gods: âIt was impossible to live in a Greco-Roman city without living with its gods.â11 Tertullian both had to and, in fact, did cope with this situation in a particular manner.12
As some authors argue, it was above all Hellenistic philosophy that provided the main challenge for the emerging Christianity, not least because of political reasons. For example, Platonism and Stoicism were perceived as an ideology of and for the ruling (Herrschaftsideologie), which Christianity since Paul has claimed to have nothing to do with.13
Therefore, throughout Tertullianâs lifetime and within his space of living, opponents and challenges were not lacking in number. In sum, Tertullianâs major motivation as a religious writer can be described as his challenging contact situation. As Eric Osborn put it, âMost thinkers write under the stimulus of controversy, and Tertullian was fortunate to have many opponents to make him think. He denied the existence of eirenic theology. Confrontation was a fact of life and the only way to maturity (Marc. 2.29.4). Life and thought for a Heraclitean (PP 211, 212) were adversarial (Marc. 1.25.6). [porro nihil sime aemulatione decurret quod sine adversario non erit].â14 Whether Tertullian considered himself happy in his challenging situation or whether the after-world may be considered lucky that it made him think in this way is a matter of debate. However, the very fact of object language evidence of the preeminent importance of confrontation makes Tertullian a worthy subject to turn to.
Usually, Tertullian is described as a Christian author writing in the Latin tongue. In fact, he is often considered to be the first such figure, the first Latin theologian to establish Latin Christianity as such.15 Scholarship has debated his profession extensively. In many of his writings, he appears to be a cunning jurist as well as an excellent orator, willing to take the time to read the medicinal and philosophical literature of his time and, not least, performing the role of a teacher (having changed the toga for the pallium).16 Though he sharply articulated his protest against classical education and separated âAthensâ categorically from âJerusalemâ and indeed âAcademiaâ from the âChurch,â17 he is also considered to be a great master of style, one of the âSecond Sophisticsâ.18 He became notorious for the line, âI believe because it is absurdâ (credo quia absurdum), an expression that is not to be found in his writings in this form.19 The correct quotations are credibile est, quia ineptum est and certum est, quia impossibile est.20 Moreover, he willingly separated Christianity from scientific knowledge and progress, declaring We have no need for curiosity since Jesus Christ, nor for inquiry since the Gospel. Despite that, he is nevertheless a serious intellectual. He is an intellectual in his ready employment of the intellectual mode to outbid an opponent and in his intellectually founded arguments for simplicity.21 Tertullian wrote a large number of texts, thirty-one of which are preserved, alongside some additional fragments of other works. He dealt intensely with widespread topics relating to the theme of Christian existence in a multicultural, mostly antagonistic, if not hostile, environment.22 As Tertullian put it, âEvery day we stand siege; every day we are betrayed; above all in our gatherings and our assemblies we are surprisedâ (Cotidie obsidemur, cotidie prodimur, in ipsis plurimum coetibus et congregationibus nostris opprimimur).23
Around 197 CE, Tertullian converted to Christianity and almost immediately started to write and publish in its defense and promotion, most famously in his Apology. An important motivation was his aim to achieve the status of a religio licita for Christianity, a status that Judaism had been granted by the Roman state.24 Judaism, perceived as an institutionalized entity, thus became a foil that Tertullian could compare his own true faith to and thereby model it after.25 He considered the Roman government of his time to be favored by divine providence, given the prosperous and peaceful state of the empire under Septimius Severus, Caracalla, and Geta.26 Nevertheless, he also denounced the realm of Caesar as the realm of the devil, so the notion of a Christian Caesar to him is an contradictio in adjecto.27 âTertullian is evidently convinced that one can only be either emperor or Christian. [â¦] The only possible explanation may well be the intimate interweaving of civil society and its institutions, especially of the emperorâs office (as âsupreme pontiffâ (pontifex maximus) of the official cult), with idolatry.â28 As well as his apostasy from the philosophy of Athens, â[h]is apostasy from Romanitas is complete.â29
Most of his earlier works are devoted to apologetic purposes. In his Apologeticum, Tertullian aims to prove that persecution of Christians is illegal and that Christians do not constitute an illegal association.30 He also wrote diverse polemics against Gnostics and heterodox Christian teachings, above all, against Marcion.31 He was an early writer of anti-Jewish polemics, inaugurating the tradition of the Adversus Judaeos writings with his own treatise of the same name.32 Perhaps it is a correct impression of his that he had to fight at all possible fronts that shaped the particular form of his writings and his personalityâalthough perhaps it is rather the other way around.33
In any case, although deeply engaged in the challenges of religious contact, Tertullian himself is a good example of the fact that the contacting parts in situations of religious contact are far from being solid and unchanging entities.34 The situation was very much in flux and allowed more internal and external tension than later doctrine would permit. Tertullian became evermore critical of official Christianity over the course of his life. Around 205 CE, Tertullian possibly joined and certainly shaped a âcharismaticâ movement that was later declared heretical, named the New Prophecy by Tertullian and later as Montanism, after its founder, the charismatic and prophet Montanus, possibly a former Priest of Kybele.35 Augustine, who counted Tertullian among the heretics, further reports that Tertullian left the Montanists in order to found a sect of his own, the Tertullianists.36
Tertullianâs ethical rigidity, already present in his more âorthodoxâ writings, seems to have found a more fertile environment in the New Prophecy/Montanist movement.37 For example, he argued for the veiling of women (De virginibus velandis), condemned theatres, and held a second marriage after the death of one partner to be adultery.38 He also held any attempt to flee should a Christian face martyrdom to be forbidden.39 Martyrdom, to him, is the ultimate proof that someone belongs to the apostolic church and a guarantee of the spread of Christianity: âWe multiply whenever we are mown down by you; the blood of Christians is seed.â40 Hence, he envisages an absolute duty to be prepared for martyrdom.41 His rigidity with regard to the original sin of idolatry seems to have led him into the pitfalls of impracticability, excluding Christians from many occupations of everyday life.42 To him, being a Christian and doing wrong are mutually exclusive, so any mistake in life conduct expels the wrongdoer from the Christian community, which, in turn, tends to become very small indeed.43 Though he was in many regards âan intellectual Genghis Khan,â44 he was not considered worthy of honor as a church father. His teachings, nevertheless, had a great impact on âorthodoxâ Christian literature of late antiquity, both with regard to its content, for example, his theology of the Trinity45 and his particular Christology and its linguistic form and language. For some scholars, he is the âfirst theologian of the Westâ, the founder of Western Catholicism before Augustine.46
The example of Tertullian and his ambivalent status shows that in a situation of polemical contact, it is not âChristianityâ that meets âJudaismâ, or âOrthodoxyâ meeting âMontanismâ, but rather certain persons deploying and shaping the language games that take place in talking to each other. This can be the case even if the persons themselves might not be considered as belonging to the religion they represent, either latterly or during the situation itself. Religious belonging is a matter of ascription, including self-ascription, ascription by others, and ascription by others not present at the timeâamong them later scholars. As a consequence, one might argue that a situation of contact triggers a situation of meta-stability: the assertions of each side are stable only in the contact situation itself but could later develop into stable teachings or even dogma.47 In the case of Adversus Iudaeos one could argue that Tertullian himself suggests that Christian theology from the very beginning has been marked by the struggle with Judaism, thus introducing both sides as such. It is the later tradition of religious contact that then burdens the mutual relationship.48 Tertullianâs own rigidity, separating him from âorthodoxâ Christianity and posing a permanent contestation to it, might be understood as a significant expression of this process toward stability in the context of a dynamic and yet undecided religious situation.49 In Tertullianâs writings, the place of contact turns into a problematic location, where the borderline between the Christian community and pagan society is manifested as rigorist ethics on the brink of turning into rigid, dogmatic teachings.50
2 Contact and Language
Tertullianâs language is of particular significance. His ability to coin striking phrases, acclaimed and repudiated by the world-after alike, has won him some notoriety. He himself made good use of his skills: âThough often remembered for something he never said, Tertullian did contribute a few bold lines to his own caricature.â51 However, these bold lines display their rhetorical-argumentative potential in an open discussion, dependent on a certain time and place, rather than in a scholarly treatise.52 The fact, however, that his writings emerge only occasionally does not render them opportunistic. Rather, his context and opponents provided good opportunities for self-reflection and, thus, are a vital part of the theoretical outcome of his considerations, above all with regard to object language shaping metalanguage to deal with the contingent other in a contingent situation of contact.53 Both contentwise and with regard to form, Tertullianâs language was shaped in a polemical context that clearly differs from the quiet study of a reclusive thinker. His language was rather the outcome and medium of a situation of contact.54
As it is quite common in situations of religious contact, the âreactive theologianâ (Cooper) Tertullian reacts to the challenge of the religious other by means of a reflection on and elaboration of language.55 It is his particular use of the Latin language that draws attention to Tertullian.56 He deals with language problems on diverse levels: firstly, he is an attentive critic of the careless everyday use of language. Out of habit, Christians still use pagan language, especially with regard to cursesâby jove! Mehercule! Here, Tertullian clearly religiosifies the everyday use of language in the context of his work against idolatry De idolatria.57 Above all, as a translator or mediator of Greek into Latin, he also contemplates meta-communicative issues, debating the nature of a suitable language to address a larger public. Writing on diverse topics of practical interest, he is able to establish a network of intertextual references in his work, thus achieving striking argumentative unity.58 In recognizing the informative possibilities of publishing readable texts, he may be considered as Christianityâs first major publicist. In doing so, he (thirdly) establishes a new vocabulary by metaschematically turning pagan language against itself. âMost of his words were not new, but the way he arranged them was. He purified a dialect by framing a vocabulary which enabled him to challenge the opponents of his kind of Christianity.â59
Thus, Tertullian is a major source of reference for the thesis that religious contact triggers notion-building. The Tertullian use of language is mainly two-directional with regard to both matter and audience; he aims to formulate adequately as well as effectively.60 This includes the introduction of new words if necessary. One scholar even found that Tertullian has coined no less than 982 new words in the Latin language.61 However, Tertullianâs inventiveness is not limited to words alone; it also comprises condensed slogans or formulae. The striking epithet âmother churchâ, coined by Tertullian, hypostatized a simple gathering of people into a meaningful community.62 Tertullianâs most famous invention in this regard is the introduction and theoretical establishment of the notion of Trinitas, being the formula for the relationship of Godâs majesty as the one God and its explication due to his will for the sake of mankind, sending out the Son and the Spirit âlike the rays of the sunââthus differentiated, but not being separate from their origin.63 His line âone nature, three personsâ established the orthodox viewpoint on the matter and served as a reference point in future discussions.
However, Tertullian also uses language as an instrument of contact. To achieve his aims as a publicist, he mobilizes all kinds of formal devices with virtuoso skill,64 such as aggressive polemics, coarse exaggeration, fine irony,65 and sophisticated allusions that require a common classical education as a basis for understanding. The Apologeticum, for instance, is closely related to the Apology of Socrates, his idea of the paraclete therein the counterpart of the daemon of Socrates.66
A special case in Tertullianâs linguistic creativity with regard to the invention or reinvention of notions is his practice of giving names to his subjects of theological consideration, regarding both phenomena to demarcate himself against and phenomena considered to be in accordance with the âtrueâ teachingâNew Prophecy, Praxeas, for instance.67 Brent T. Shaw describes Tertullianâs praxis as follows: âThe writings of Tertullian, the pre-eminent Christian ideologue in the Africa of his age, a stern Catonian moralizer, are focused on his struggles with the enemies of true belief. The names that he provides for them are a guide to identifying the most dangerous of these hostiles as they were perceived at the time.â68 Therefore, linguistic baptism or branding of this sort is a particular means to deal with challenging situations of contact, both through identification and for establishing possible linguistic control of challenging phenomena. This is achieved above all by the introduction of certain âgroupsâ that future elements might be subsumed to and treated in an inclusive and generalizing manner. Baptism, in this sense, establishes a necessary relation between name and bearer(s), inaugurating a stable relationship or tradition of brands that may be used in synchronic and diachronic consideration.69
Metaschematism is another important linguistic device employed by Tertullian to deal with a situation of contact after Paulâs manner. Here, Tertullian uses the linguistic forms and schemes of his opponents to infiltrate and convert their content and, in sequence, also themselves.70 Metaschematism is a way to deal with schemata in a situation of contactâthat is, it is a mode of processing. As the Greek notion schema may be translated as âclothingâ or âtraditional costumeâ, the idea of metaschematism in a situation of contact might be explained metaphorically: to dress oneself in another oneâs (linguistic) garments, thus performing a stylistic transformation of a given proposition. In Greek philosophy, the notion of metaschematism denotes a general process of re-formation. As used by Paul in his letters, the notion indicates the rhetorical reformulation of an assertion by stylistic means, thus changing the meaning of sentences by the replacement of words: see 1 Cor. 4,6: And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes. By doing so, that is, by âwearingâ oneâs counterpartâs semantic garments or habitual forms, one might hide oneâs true convictions within the context of another, possibly more powerful discourse. At the same time, however, by doing so, one might force oneâs counterpart to follow the implications of his own rhetorical structureâthough this might denote the opposite, or at least something profoundly different from what the counterpart, in fact, intended to express, now promoting the aims of the metaschematizory gambit.71
3 On Sleep as an Interface of Religion
There is a rich literature on the phenomenon of dreams, not least in religious studies. However, much less effort has been spent on examining and comparing object language reflections on the precondition of dreams and on sleep itself. This may not be very surprising, for it is not the existence of such a phenomenon that is in question, but the definition of sleep in scholarly metalanguage remains challenging due to its basic features.
Nevertheless, sleep as the condition and form or frame for dreams is a more promising candidate for a fruitful comparison than dreams themselves. Dreams are only reachable via description, and hence, they depend upon the vocabulary, narratives, and iconology of the tradition in which they are situated. This comparative eminence is precisely because sleep is not so easily grasped linguistically.
The advantage of examining sleep for the purpose of comparison is not primarily rooted in the fact that sleeping is an anthropological constant. Though supposedly âradically otherâ to each other, all human beings, in fact, do sleep. There is another considerable advantage in examining the phenomenon of sleep: its âblank spaceâ character, which can be found in object language descriptions.72 In early mythical writings, such as in Homer and Hesiod, sleep is only considered through the use of negations: sleeping is to be without experience of the senses, without knowledge of space and time, and without will.73 To Aristotle, sleep was basically a privation of being awake, an imprisonment of the common senses.74 As a negation or imprisonment of all means of recognition, sleep introduces a blank space to the process of life. However, as a blank space, the establishment of a relationship to the otherâs ideas becomes easier, as the blank space structure is the same for both sidesâand that is precisely because of its essential lack of content. Due to their manifold cultural preconditions, a comparison of the content of sleep dreams is much more complicated. Such an attempt is basically doomed to fail, as the scholar themself knows, having experienced the purgatory of deconstructivism and postcolonial studies.
To give an example, let me briefly consider the phenomenon of secrets and secrecy in this context. It is often argued that a secret or the practice of secrecy prevents contact between different groups due to the fact that its content, by definition, cannot be revealed: the secret must necessarily remain a blank space. This may be true as a social strategy, but in many other cases, above all in cases of religious contact, secrets and practices of secrecy function in the opposite way. Herodotus, in his report on Egyptian mysteries, manages to explain them to his Greek readers by relating the Egyptian to the Greek mysteries that are, as he puts it, known to be unknown. Hence, there are blank spaces that are important for the practice of mystery in both Egypt and Greece. Having established such an interface of knowledge, he is able to relate the framings of the blank space to each other, thus coming up with a strategy that was later called the interpretatio graeca. Blank space structures in object language explanations are, therefore, promotors of religious contact rather than obstacles.75
The same structure can be found in explications of the phenomenon of sleep. Sleep is considered to be a blank space that has to be filled with content, that is, dreams. Sleeping as such is often explained with reference to the status of non-being, such as relating sleep to death, as in the twin brothers Hypnos and Thanatos in Greek mythology, with Hypnos lacking any significant cultic relevance. Beginning with fragments of Heraclitus up to Joseph Fouchéâs radical reformation of funeral practices in 1793âinstead of elaborated gravestones, only a small sign with the motto La mort est un éternel sommeil was allowedâthe relationship of death and sleep as a metaphorical interrelation has prevailed, even over the long durée of the European cultural history.76
As such, it is an important structural feature of sleep that it is part of an interrelated contrast: being associated with death, it opposes life, although it is essentially related to it and is not entirely separate from it. Heraclitus, who provided Tertullian with his central cosmological idea of the interplay of opposites,77 put it in this way: âIt is one and the same thing to be living and dead, awake and asleep, young and old. The former aspect in each case becomes the latter, and the latter becomes the former by sudden unexpected reversal.â78 This kind of interrelated contrast can be considered as an example of the transcendence-immanence distinction.
4 On Sleep and Contact in Tertullianâs De Anima
The relevant source for exploring Tertullianâs opinions about the phenomenon of sleep is his treatise De anima, said to be the first Christian psychology advanced from a systematic perspective.79 The enthusiasm about this claim, however, at least for apologists for a pure Christianity, should be slightly disturbed by the fact that the first âChristianâ psychology can be considered as nothing but a Christianized pagan psychology, as it is in both form and content heavily dependent on Soranus of Ephesusâ (c.98âc.138 CE) medical treatise on the soul
Following the title of his work, from the very start, the relationship between considerations of sleep and the paramount subject of the soul is obvious, and given the extant traditions of discussing this phenomenon, the context of De anima is predictable. As in his other writings, Tertullian in De anima aims at defining the place of Christianity in a world that mainly consists of contact situations, situations that allow for comparison as, for example, in his Apologeticum: âFor we are no Brahmans, naked sages of India, forest-dwellers, exiles from life.â84
It is highly significant that Tertullian introduces the subject of sleep while discussing the ideas of other authors. From the beginning, his considerations, therefore, are framed by the context of religious contact, which forces him to develop his own ideas on the phenomenon in question most clearly and sharply, distinguishing them from other concepts unsuitable for his Christian agenda. To a certain degree, Tertullian presents a perhaps philosophical or cultural contact situation as a religious one, introducing the concept of divine revelation (ultimate truth) to a philosophical discussion. In doing so, he dismisses the ideas of others as invalid sophistications, often turning to empirical counterarguments to do so.85 Tertullian insists on the necessity of truth in the operations of the human mind. As Eva Schulz-Flügel has stated, Tertullian makes use of a theology of linkage (Theologie der Anknüpfung), appealing to familiar modes of thought held by his addressees when trying to convey the basics of Christian beliefs.86
However, it is philosophers he has to deal with: âI shall evidently have mostly to contend with the philosophersâ87 as he puts it in the first sentence of his book. Tertullian, here, explicitly follows Paul: âThe apostle, so far back as his own time, foresaw, indeed, that philosophy would do violent injury to the truth.â88 As he remarks ironically, philosophers do so because of a feeling of profound indignation connected to the unrespectable origin of the Christian teachings: âThe fault, I suppose, of the divine doctrine lies in its springing from Judea rather than from Greece. Christ made a mistake, too, in sending forth fishermen to preach, rather than the sophist.â89 After all, it is here that an apologist can claim most honor in matters of faith, possibly culminating in the highest honor of martyrdom.90 So, given Tertullianâs supposedly stern opposition to philosophical thinking, his overall task is clear: âWhatever noxious vapours [â¦] exhaled from philosophy, obscure the clear and wholesome atmosphere of truth, it will be for Christians to clear away [â¦].â91 Hence, for Tertullian, his major opponent producing intellectual air pollution is Plato, with whom he felt most heretical opinions originated and who thus became a (self-service) shop for spices for heretics (Platonem omnium hereticorum condimentarium factum).92 At the very end of his treatise, he proudly claims to have encountered no less than âevery human opinion concerning the soul, and tried its character by the teaching of (our holy faith),â93 thus shaping the Christian position by means of comparison and evaluation of ideas, and making it acceptable for those readers acquainted with all, or at least some, of the human opinions Tertullian is talking about.
This is all the truer for his thoughts on sleep, expounded at length in Chapter 43 of De Anima. As no chapter of De Anima lacks polemical discussions, this chapter is the manifest expression of a challenge as well. Here, Tertullian alludes to an impressive amount of knowledge on the subject of sleep. However, this knowledge is not simply displayed but used with a certain polemical intention. As Leslie Dossey has shown, the positive account of sleep in Tertullian is an expression of an antagonistic situation of contact in the form of an actual opposition over the interpretation of the phenomenon observed between Greek and Latin authors.94 The Greek authors, here, represented the predominant philosophical and, as a consequence, theological current of this debate in advancing a largely negative assessment of sleep. In contrast, âmany of the western church fathers, rooted in a Roman more than Greek intellectual heritage, retained a positive attitude toward sleep in late antiquity.â95 Where the Greek philosophers abhorred the pejorative image of sleep as the inactivity of the rational soul, âRoman-basedâ authors, such as Tertullian, Lactantius, and Augustine, considered sleep to be the welcome inactivity of the body.96 This attitude had practical consequences insofar that â[w]estern monastic rules such as the Rule of Benedict were more generous in their regulations about sleep than their eastern equivalents.â97
Tertullian explicitly refers to the Greek authors who laid down the basis for the predominant âGreekâ thought about sleep. However, he does so in a tone of critique, briskly condensing the opinions of others into a single sentence:
The Stoics affirm sleep to be âa temporary suspension of the activity of the senses;â the Epicureans define it as an intermission of the animal spirit; Anaxagoras and Xenophanes as a weariness of the same; Empedocles and Parmenides as a cooling down thereof; Strato as a separation of the (Soulâs) connatural spirit; Democritus as the soulâs indigence; Aristotle as the interruption of the heat around the heart.98
Much brainwork here is condensed into simple assertions that are simply listed without explanatory context, and these simple assertions are easily refuted by Tertullian by means of everyday experience:
As for myself, I can safely say that I have never slept in such a way as to discover even a single one of these conditions.99
Through this sarcastic remark, the overall tone of Tertullianâs examination is set. He makes ostentious use of pragmatic observations and decidedly rational and ânaturalâ explanations. The main thing he seeks to prevent is any association of sleep with supernatural events or explanations, as he makes uncompromisingly clear in the very beginning of his considerations:
Now sleep is certainly not a supernatural thing, as some philosophers will have it be, when thy suppose it to be the result of causes which appear to be above nature.100
Having said this, he easily disposes of the explanations of sleep given by the philosophers: sleep removes weariness and refreshes; it in fact warms the body instead of cooling it. Given the undoubtable fact for Tertullian that the soul is immortal, indivisible, and always active, as opposed to the body, there can be no intermission of an animal spirit, an indigence of the spirit, or a separation from the soulâs connatural spirit.101 In conclusion, Tertullian claims that sleep does not belong to the sphere of the soul but rather belongs exclusively to the natural sphere of the body:
It is indeed on the body, which is subject to mortality, and on the body alone, that sleep graciously bestows a cessation from work.102
But souls do not sleep even when men are alive: it is indeed the business of bodies to sleep, to which also belongs death itself, no less than its mirror and counterfeit sleep.103
Thus, sleep is associated with nature and mortality in the sense that the body is, by definition, natural and mortal. Accordingly, sleep can only be considered a natural phenomenon. To a Christian, however, all natural things follow a certain rationale as they were created. Natural phenomena can be explained rationally by the Creatorâs plan and without reference to supernatural causes. Therefore, it is Christianity that fulfills the needs of the rational soul.104 Sleep is a thoroughly reasonable arrangement, showing the immanence of Godâs ratio in the world.105 To deny sleep as a marker of a late antique philosopher, such as Pythagoras or later on, Proclus, in turn, shows the incommensurability of philosophy and being a Christian.106 Above all, it is evident that sleep is of essential importance to life.
Since, then, sleep is indispensable to our life, and health, and succor, there can be nothing pertaining to it which is not reasonable, and which is not natural. [â¦] [S]leep is perfectly natural.107
Thus, the (first) Christian theologian Tertullian naturalized and, in consequence, rationalized sleep so that to him, sleep as such cannot be described as an example of the transcendent. But given the rigidity by which Tertullian separates sleep from a region that is commonly associated with religion, the transcendent or the supernatural, how can the phenomenon of sleep be of any importance for a treatise concerned with a religious purpose?
Sleep is important with regard to the process of transcending. To Tertullian, sleep cannot be described as a supernatural incident but rather as a natural sign or an image. In his naturalistic conception, the human being is preconditioned by the priority of sleep toward all natural functions of the body. Tertullian draws this conclusion with regard to creation as it is reported in Scripture:
It is certain that, from the very beginning of his nature, man was impressed with these instincts (of sleep). If you receive your instructions from God, (you will find) that the fountain of the human race, Adam, had a taste of drowsiness before having a draught of repose; slept before he labored, or even before he ate, nay, even before he spoke; in order that men may see that sleep is a natural feature and function, and one which has actually precedence over all the natural faculties.108
To explain the precedence of sleep over all natural functions, Tertullian refers back to the Christocentric lecture of the Scripture, relating the Old Testament to the New, and explaining the natural phenomenon of sleep as the very image of the equally natural phenomenon of death:
For as Adam was a figure of Christ, Adamâs sleep shadowed out the death of Christ, who was to sleep a mortal slumber [â¦] This is why sleep is so salutary, so rational, and is actually formed into the model of that death which is common to the race of man.109
The rationale of sleep is to function as a reminder of the naturally indispensable: to present the status of non-being in a visible and recurring manner. As an ever-present image of death, it defies all the feeble explanations of the philosophers:
God, indeed, has willed [â¦] to set before us, in a manner fully and more completely than Platoâs example, by daily recurrence the outlines of manâs state, especially concerning the beginning and the termination thereof; thus stretching out the hand to help our faith more readily by types and parables, not in words only, but also in things. He accordingly sets before your view the human body stricken by the friendly power of slumber, prostrated by the kindly necessity of repose immoveable in position, just as it lay previous to life, and just as it will lie after life is past.110
As a mirror of death, sleep, which functions as a marker for non-being, becomes a sign of another life after resurrection. It is important to note that, using sleep as an image, the religious surplus of the phenomenon is not associated with the person actually sleeping but with the person (and this may include the sleeper as well) observing the phenomenon of sleep. Sleep, as such, does not connect to the divine sphere, but reflection on sleep does. For it is to those witnessing the processes of awakening from sleep that a religious lesson is taught:
Accordingly, when the body shakes off its slumber, it asserts before your eye the resurrection of the dead by its own resumption of its natural functions.111
Examining the natural phenomenon of sleep, Tertullian describes a process of transcending by employing the levels of the TID: sleep to the observer (formal transcendence) becomes a sign (basic transcendence) for the resurrection of the dead (specified transcendence).112 This function as a reminder of death and a sign of resurrection must be both the natural reason and the reasonable nature of sleep, according to Tertullian (Haec est somni et ratio naturalis et natura rationalis). For
If you only regard it as the image of death, you initiate faith, you nourish hope, you learn watchfulness, even while you sleep.113
Hence, what is the relationship between Tertullianâs actual thoughts on sleep and the topic of religious contact? Sleep as such does not belong to religious language play, but the rational description of it as a manifest bodily sign does, according to Tertullian. What matters here is the phenomenology of sleep, i.e., the description of the basic phenomenon. Interestingly, Tertullian describes sleep via reference to another philosophical position, thus at the same time manifesting a situation of contact and a theology of linkage. He explicitly joins sides with the philosophical position of Aristotle, which described the phenomenon via negation (privation). The blank space of sleep resembles the blank space of death. Having abolished every alternative philosophical view on the phenomenon, he states:
Our only resource, indeed, is to agree with the Stoics, by determining the soul to be a temporary suspension of the activity of the senses, procuring rest for the body only, not for the soul also.114
In sleep, there is no sense activity for purposes of rest, and, as such, sleep is without content provided by bodily functions. Sleep suspends the activity of the senses. Moreover, as Tertullian is of the opinion that the bodyâs functions, such as affections, temperaments, and sense perception, determine mental capacities, even thought (mind animus as subordinated to anima) lacks its indispensable basis for action during sleep.115 No experience or intelligence is possible without the senses of the body.116 The mediating function of the senses is excluded in sleep, giving room for an immediate experience with the Divine.
As a blank space in this sense, a space is provided, in which the restless soul might be confronted with dreams, which are, according to Tertullian, mostly sent by demons.117 However in some cases, dreams can also be sent by God himself, as in the case of the unfortunate Nebuchadnezzar.118 So, ultimately, it is the blank space that enables the contact to the transcendent.
Later in De Anima (Chapter 45), Tertullian coins the notion of ecstasy (ecstasis) for this process, denoting the soulâs power to act without actual effect on the body and independently from its mental instrument (animus). The soul is shown to be directional, displaying a vectorial capacity and a corresponding movement caused by God. Rotman, having introduced the notion of a-mentia (âunmindednessâ) for this process, explains it as follows: âTertullian defines the soul as a means of connecting between men and God, which is actually what his treatise is all about. The soul is the bearer of the proofs of Christian faith, not books or knowledge.â Tertullian shows âthat to encounter and to know God is not a process of the senses-mind-soul mechanism, but an encounter of the soul in a state of amentia.â119 So, sleep is not ecstasy but may be combined with it, as dreams are incidents of sleep, their natural precondition. Natural and rational sleep provides the natural connection for an ecstatic experience, as it provides a free space for an event that takes place within another sphere. It allows the human being to be overpowered by a higher force.120
In conclusion, to a certain degree, sleep may be counted among the tertia comperationis, at least in the present object language case. Here, it performs the salient function of a key concept as it opens up a perspective, allowing a new view in the study of the history of religion and its dynamics. To Tertullian, it is sleep that allows comparison between traditions, for it is here that the never-resting soul may come under the influence of demonic forces, as in divinatory dreams of pagan environment, or access the ecstatic possibility of contacting the (truly) divine sphere. Sleep is the form that relates the Christian interpreter to other traditions and allows addressing dreams as demonic or divine.
An earlier version of this chapter was presented on the Käte Hamburger Kolleg (KHK) workshop âSleep in Classical, Late and Eastern Antiquity. A Comparative Inquiryâ, 26 and 27 September 2017, organized by Eva Kocziszky.
For a discussion of the biographical traces in Tertullianâs writings, see Henrike Maria Zilling, Tertullian. Untertan Gottes und des Kaisers (Paderborn: Schöningh, 2004), 21â82.
On the context of this phrase, see F. Forrester Church, âSex and Salvation in Tertullian,â The Harvard Theological Review 68 (1973): 83â101. Of course, the phrase is likely to draw attention of feminist critique, for instance, see Donna-Marie Cooper. Her thesis mentions an important contact-related general point about Tertullianâs utterances, not only with regard to his misogynist slogans: âThe problem with feminist scholarsâ readings of the âDevilâs gatewayâ passage is that they have used this one passage as the hermeneutical key with which to read Tertullian as a whole. In so doing they treat Tertullian like a systematic theologian and fail to take into account the wider context of De cultu feminarum, whilst also ignoring other relevant passages throughout his corpus. However, on many topics Tertullian is not a systematic theologian. [â¦] In his treatises Tertullian writes as an orator, reacting to various controversies which had arisen, with the intention of winning an argument or persuading his audience to follow a particular course of action. As a skilled orator, Tertullian employed techniques from ancient rhetoric in order to make his case more persuasive. [â¦] I argue that, in order to understand the meaning behind a certain passage, it is necessary to understand the rhetorical context of that passage.â Donna-Marie Cooper, âWas Tertullian a Misogynist? A re-examination of this charge based on a rhetorical analysis of Tertullianâs workâ (PhD Diss., University of Exeter, September 2012), 5â6.
See Eva Schulz-Flügel, âTertullian. Theologie als Recht,â in Theologen der christlichen Antike, ed. Wilhelm Geerlings (Darmstadt: WBG, 2002), 13.
Eric Osborn, Tertullian, first theologian of the West (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 27.
See Geoffrey D. Dunn, âJews and Christians in Tertullianâs Carthage,â in Texts and the Material World: Essays in Honor of Graeme Clarke, eds. Elizabeth Minchin and Heather Jackson (Uppsala: Astrom, 2017), 255.
See Christel Butterweck, ââTertullian, Quintus Septimus Florensââ in Metzler Lexikon christlicher Denker, ed. Markus Vinzent (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2000), 670.
Dunn, âJews and Christians in Tertullianâs Carthage,â 256.
See Maureen A. Tilley, âNorth Africa,â in The Cambridge History of Christianity. Vol. 1: Origins to Constantine, eds. Margaret M. Mitchell and Frances M. Young (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 382â384.
Regina Hauses, âEinleitung,â in Tertullian, Adversos Iudaeos/Gegen die Juden, trans. and intro by Regina Hauses (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 24.
Paula Fredriksen and Orded Irshai, âInclude Me Out: Tertullian, the Rabbis, and the Graeco-Roman City,â in Lâidentité à travers lâéthique. Nouvelles perspectives sur la formation des identités collectives dans le monde gréco-romain, eds. K. Berthelot, R. Naiweld, and D. Stökl Ben Ezra (Turnhout: Brepols, 2015), 117.
âGiven how the gods saturated ancient urban time and space, this attempt at separation took considerable effort, self-consciousness, and discipline.â Fredriksen and Irshai, âInclude Me Out,â 121.
See Günther Mensching, âVom Apostel Paulus zu Tertullian und Augustinus. Zum Gegensatz von Philosophie und Glauben im römischen Reich,â in Herausforderung durch Religion? Begegnungen der Philosophie mit Religionen im Mittelalter und Renaissance, ed. Gerhard Krieger. Contradictio 11 (Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2011), 103â105.
Osborn, Tertullian, 246.
âLâopinion de Tertullien est interessante, non seulement parce quâil a beaucoup parlé de ces questions éminement practiques, mais encore parce quâil est le premier à en parler beaucoup.â Charles Guignebert, Tertullien. Ãtudes sur ses sentiments à lâègard de lâempire et la société civile (Paris: Leroux, 1901), 491.
By doing so, Tertullian performs a quite literal act of metaschematism for the sake of religious transfer. He not only not metaphorically wears the opponentâs garments in order to subvert and challenge his claims, in this case, pagan philosophers, but Tertullian fills the form of the philosopher and uses it to propagate his Christian ideas. On the role of the pallium in contemporary discourse, see Arthur P. Urbano, ââDressing a Christianâ: The Philosopherâs Mantle as Signifier of Pedagogical and Moral Authority,â Studia Patristica LXII (2013): 221: âIn styling himself a philosopher by his dress, Tertullian does not identify himself as a Stoic or Cynic, as a second-century audience might have expected. Instead, he publicly declares himself a philosopher of Christianity, âthe divine sect and disciplineâ. He concludes his speech by praising the pallium, identifying it as the robe of the Christian philosopher: âA better philosophy has deigned you worthy, from the moment you began dressing a Christian.ââ
âWhat has Athens to do with Jerusalem, or the Academy with the Church?,â âQuid ergo Athenis et Hierosolymis? quid academiae et ecclesiae?,â Tertullian, De praescriptione haereticorum VII.
Christoph Markschies, âTertullian,â in Personenlexikon Religion und Theologie, ed. Martin Greschat (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht (UTB), 1998), 471.
On the invention and attribution of this line to Tertullian, see Peter Harrison, ââI Believe Because Its Absurdâ: The Enlightenment Invention of Tertullianâs Credo,â Church History 86 (2017): 339â364.
Tertullian, De carne Christi liber, c. 5,4â5: âCruxifixus est Dei Filius: non pudet, quia pudendum est. Et mortuus est Dei Filius: prorsus credible est, quia ineptum est. Et sepultus resurrexit, certum est, quia impossibile est.â
On Tertullianâs âlust for simplicityâ, as supported by superlatives and persisting throughout his work, see Osborn, Tertullian, 1 f; Von Campenhausen suggests that the need to outbid opponents in radicalism and consequence ultimately led him to heretical Montanism. Hans von Campenhausen, Lateinische Kirchenväter, (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1978), 31.
See the first literary document of African Christianity, the Acta Scillitanorum. Wiebke Bähnk, Von der Notwendigkeit des Leidens. Die Theologie des Martyriums bei Tertullian, (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2001), 28 f.). Tertullianâs writings, Bähnk states â[â¦] spiegeln [â¦] ein Klima grundsätzlicher Gefährdung durch repressives Verhalten der Magistrate, durch Angriffe seitens des Volkes und Denunziationen bei den Behörden wider [â¦]â (ibid., 37).
Tertullian, Apology. De Spectaculis, with and English Translation by T.R. Glover and Minucius Felix, Octavius with and English Translation by Gerald H. Rendall (Cambridge, MA/London: Harvard University Press, 1931), 38â39.
Thus making, as Dunn put it, the struggle of Jews and Christians âa struggle of legitimacy not a struggle for survival,â Dunn, âJews and Christians in Tertullianâs Carthage,â 263. On the problematics of the notion of religio licita, see Görge K. Hasselhoff and Meret Strothmann, âReligio licita. Rom und die Juden,â in âReligio licitaâ. Rom und die Juden, eds. Görge K. Hasselhoff and Meret Strohtmann. Studia Judaica 84 (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2017).
See Apology, 21.1.: âBut now that we have stated that this school rests on the very ancient books of the Jewsâthis school which most people know to be rather modern, as dating from the reign of Tiberius,âa fact we ourselves admitâperhaps some question may be raised as to the standing of the school, on the ground that, under cover of a very famous religion (and one certainly permitted by law), the school insinuates quietly certain claims of its own; because (waiving all question as to age) as regards forbidden food, sacred days, the âbodilyâ seal, or common designation, we have nothing to do with the Jews, as should surely be the case, if we were servants of the same God.â Tertullian, Apology, 103.
On Tertullianâs stance towards the emperors and their cult as dependent on his notion of majesty see Tobias Georges, âTertullianâs Criticism of the Emperorâs Cult in the Apologeticum,â in Emperors and the DivineâRome and its Influence, ed. Maijastina Kahlos. Collegium 20 (Helsinki: Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, 2016), 90: âThe emperorsâ position as âsecondâ after God is what Tertullian, in apol. 35.5 then called the secunda maiestas. With this term, his stress on maiestas and on the distinction between God and man coincided, and it illustrates how Tertullian could, at one and the same time, strictly criticize the emperorsâ cult and emphasize his reverence for the emperors.â
Charles Norris Cochrane, Christianity and classical Culture. A Study of thought and action from Augustus to Augustine (London/Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 1957), 155, 113, 213. Compare also Richard Klein, Tertullian und das römische Reich (Heidelberg: Winter, 1968), 39, 44. Klein points out that Tertullian never polemicizes against the Roman state as such, only against its connection to pagan gods. According to him, Tertullian might well have imagined a Christian emperor, Christ himself (ibid., 46â47).
Adolf Martin Ritter, âChurch and State up to c. 300 CE,â in The Cambridge History of Christianity. Vol. 1: Origins to Constantine, eds. Margaret M. Mitchell and Frances M. Young (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2006), 532â533.
Cochrane, Christianity and classical Culture, 213.
See Tertullian, Apology, 171: âShould not this school have been classed among tolerated associations, when it commits no such actions as are commonly feared from unlawful associations? For, unless I am mistaken, the reason for prohibiting associations clearly lay in forethought for the public orderâto save the State from being torn into parties, a thing very likely to disturb election assemblies, public gatherings, local senates, meetings, even the public games, with the clashing and rivalry of partisans, especially since men had begun to reckon on their violence as a source of revenue, offering it for sale at a price. We, however, whom all the flames of glory and dignity leave cold, have no need to combine; nothing is more foreign to us than the State. One sate we know, of which all are citizensâthe universe.â
Harnack repeatedly praises Tertullianâs care with regard to Marcionâs text. See Adolf von Harnack, Marcion. Neue Studien zu Marcion (Darmstadt: WBG, 1996), 43â56. For Harnack, Tertullianâs writing against Marcion deserves âhighest respectâ as an original, and is in fact, his best work (ibid., 328â332). Harnack argues that Tertullian attacks Marcion by means of an examination of language, i.e. as a philologist, trying to prove that Marcion distorted the original text of the Scripture (Ibid., 331).
Tertullianâs authorship of parts of the text has been contested in scholarship, while some scholars, however, have also stressed Tertullianâs closeness to certain Jewish traditions as his writings show some âaffinity between Tertullianâs arguments and the rabbis.â Though the evidence may be circumstantial, it, nevertheless âsuggests that Tertullian may have availed himself of the scholarship of the Jewish teachers in Carthage during the time he was seeking to rebut Marcionâs heresy, and, if one takes a representative group of Tertullianâs Montanist works, one can demonstrate Tertullianâs acquaintance with Jewish thought.â J. Massingberd Ford, âWas Montanism a Jewish-Christian Heresy?,â Journal of Ecclesiastical History 17 (1966): 155. Ford considers De anima in particular to provide evidence of consonance between Jewish ideas on the soul and Tertullianâs thought (ibid., 156), above all, with regard to the line âDeliquit, opinor, divina doctrina ex Judaea quam ex Graecia oriensâ (De anima III.3). On the immediate cause of his text, see Shaw who warns: âIt is one matter to understand the theological and historical dimension of a treatise like Tertullianâs Against the Jews, but quite another to understand the actual working out of hatreds in the neighborhoods of his own Carthage.â Brent D. Shaw, Sacred Violence. African Christians and Sectarian Hatred in the age of Augustine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 269; on the case in question see ibid., 269â270.
See Zillingâs concluding characterization of his personality: âAus Tertullians Sicht greifen von allen Seiten feindliche Mächte das Christentum an, wobei nicht nur das Apologeticum an einen Kriegsschauplatz denken läÃt, sondern auch die antihäretischen, katechetischen und montanistischen Schriften diesen Eindruck erwecken: In einem groÃen Rundumschlag wird die Vielfalt philosophischen Denkens als Ursprung der Häresie abqualifiziert und als Bedrohung der einzigen Wahrheit, der doctrina Christiana, hingestellt, und immer wieder werden mit schneidender Polemik Widersprüche zwischen Lehre und Lebenswirklichkeit heidnischer Denker angegriffen. GroÃe Teile von Tertullians Schriften konzentrieren sich darauf, gegnerische Einwände zu entkräften. Dabei verzichtet Tertullian nicht auf advokatische Polemik und Gehässigkeit, so daà der Eindruck des argumentativen Ãbereifers entsteht. [â¦] Tertullians Wahrnehmung des von auÃen bedrohten Christentums und der von innen heraus durch Häresien gefährdeten christlichen Lehre begründen offenbar die Vehemenz und den Eifer, mit dem er die Sache vorträgt, der er Gehör verschaffen will. Hier offenbart sich ein Zug in seiner Persönlichkeit, der am besten als eine an Fanatismus grenzende Ãberspanntheit beschrieben wird und sich vor allem in seinen überzogenen ethisch-moralischen Forderungen artikuliert.â Zilling, Tertullian, 207.
See Klein, Tertullian und das Römische Reich, 68: âEs gibt hier im Ganzen keinen unüberwindlichen Gegensatz. Mannigfache Brücken bieten sich angesichts der Divergenz im Lager der Heiden (und auch der Christen) zur Verständigung an. [â¦] Möglich wurde dies aber erst dadurch, daà beide Parteien keine monolithischen Blöcke darstellten.â
On the problem of Tertullianâs Montanist defection, see Osborn, Tertullian, 176â177.
Zilling comments: âUngewià ist indes, welche Verbindung tatsächlich zwischen Tertullian und den Tertullianisten, abgesehen vom Namen, bestand. Augustinus und der Praedestinatus erheben lediglich den Anspruch, es zu wissen.â Zilling, Tertullian, 26.
It is not at all clear that the New Prophecy movement was excluded from the âofficialâ church in Tertullianâs lifetime. It seems that at this point of time emerging Christianity was able to endure certain tensions, rather than cleanse itself through separation. This viewpoint also helps to prevent oneself from the assumption of two Tertullians, the orthodox champion and the heretic. â[â¦] even Tertullianâs latest works are âorthodoxâ in later theological terms, and are important to the emergence of that orthodoxy, despite also showing the clear influence of the New Prophecy. For that matter, the idea of a transformation from orthodox theologian to heretical polemicist depends on the view that there were two quite separate churches or groupings, âCatholicâ and âMontanist,â across whose distinct borders one could clearly and definitively move. It seems far more likely that there was profound contention among and within a network of small communities at Carthage, rather than a clear âschismâ between two.â Andrew Brian McGowan, âTertullian and the âHereticalâ Origin of âOrthodoxâ Trinity,â Journal of Early Christian Studies 14 (2006), 438.
On Tertullianâs Montanism as a consequence of his rigidity, see Bernhard Lohse, Askese und Mönchtum in der Antike und in der alten Kirche (München/Wien: Oldenbourg, 1969), 145â148.
Bähnk, Von der Notwendigkeit des Leidens, 176.
Plures efficimur quotiens metimur a vobis; semen est sanguis Christianorum. Apol. 50,13. Tertullian, Apology, 226â227.
On North Africa as particularly prominent place within Christian martyr cults, see Bähnk, Von der Notwendigkeit des Leidens, 9. On martyrdom as a duty of obedience see ibid., 125.
See E.R. Dodds, Heiden und Christen in einem Zeitalter der Angst (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1985), 101.
See Christine Mühlenkamp, âNicht wie die Heidenâ. Studien zur Grenze zwischen christlicher Gemeinde und paganer Gesellschaft in vorkonstantinischer Zeit (Münster: Aschendorff, 2008), 125.
Osborn, Tertullian, 255.
See Osborn, Tertullian, 116.
See the title of Osbornâs book, although Osborn himself states more precisely: âThe importance of Tertullian for cultural history is immense, and he may rightly be called the âfirst theologian of the West,â provided this does not limit his influence to the West or obscure his massive debt to Irenaeus.â Osborn, Tertullian, 7.
See chapter on Dynamics and Stability.
See Regina Hauses, âEinleitung,â 19.
See Fredriksen and Irshai, âInclude Me Out,â 122 on the case of Carthage: âTertullian witnesses to multiple Christian sects in the city: Valentinians, Marcionites, Cainites, Montanists, and, of course, his own church. The boundaries were not always clear; indeed, Tertullianâs polemical rhetoric strives to erect such borders and to patrol them. Carthage had no one single Christian church.â
Mühlenkamp, âNicht wie die Heidenâ, 38.
Church, âSex and Salvation in Tertullian,â 83.
In consequence, Tertullianâs polemical encounters are concrete rather than abstract: âDenn er verwendete die stoische Tradition ebenso wie die antike Kulturtradition überhaupt eklektizistisch, immer mit Blick auf den Kontext und den konkreten Gegner, den es zu besiegen gilt.â Petr Kitzler, âNihil enim anima si non corpus: Tertullian und die Körperlichkeit der Seele,â Wiener Studien 122 (2009): 169.
See Zillig, Tertullian, 44: âDas verzweifelte Ringen gegen vielgestaltige Feinde ist, da es alle seine Schriften durchzieht, bezeichnend für Tertullian. Ein weiterer Aspekt kommt hinzu: Tertullian erfährt in seiner literarischen Auseinandersetzung mit den Gegnern beständig Bestätigung der eigenen Glaubensüberzeugungen.â Compare on the self-reflexive aspect involved in polemical situations of contact Guy G. Stroumsa, âFrom anti-Judaism to antisemitism in Early Christianity?â in Contra Iudeos. Ancient and Medieval Polemics between Christians and Jews, eds. O. Limor and G.G. Stroumsa (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1996), 18: âPolemics, then is the literary reflection of the conflictual relationship between competing religious groups. But it serves multiple purposes. It does not intend only, or even mainly, to convince and convert, but also to strengthen the faith, or the self-confidence, of those who are already converted. Polemics, indeed, serves as a major tool in group-identity building and affirming.â
Accordingly, as Donna-Marie Cooper puts it, Tertullian is not a systematic theologian but a â[â¦] âreactiveâ theologian, responding to a particular controversy and in order to win an argument. For example, one should not look in De baptismo and expect to find a systematic treatment of the sacrament of baptism. Rather, Tertullian wrote this treatise in response to a Cainite heresy which had denied the necessity of baptism for salvation. [â¦] [U]nderstanding Tertullianâs purpose and motivation in writing a particular treatise is crucial if one is to have an accurate understanding of the meaning of a certain passage within the treatise.â Cooper, âWas Tertullian a Misogynist?,â 9.
See chapter on Language in Contact; see also Görge Hasselhoff and Knut Martin Stünkel, âIntroduction: The Emergence of Religious Language in Situations of Contact,â in Transcending Words. The Language of Religious Contacts Between Buddhists, Christians, Jews, and Muslims in Premodern Times, eds. Görge Hasselhoff and Knut Martin Stünkel (Bochum: Winkler, 2015).
Schulz-Flügel, âTertullian,â 13. See also von Campenhausenâs enthusiastic opinion on Tertullianâs language: âAber was ist das für ein Latein, das Tertullian auf einmal zu schreiben wagt! Etwas derartiges war auf dem literarischen Felde bis dahin unerhört. In Tertullians Schriften stoÃen wir auf die lebendige Sprache der damaligen Christen, das Latein der werdenden lateinischen Kirche, eine Sprache, in der es dementsprechend von Lehnwörtern und Neubildungen wimmelt, um die neuen Dinge und Vorstellungen des christlichen Alltags zu bezeichnen, und zugleich bis ins Grammatische hinein die wirklich gesprochene Sprache der Gesellschaft und des Volkes Karthagos, das Tertullian kennt, beobachtet und sucht. Vor allem aber: es ist die eigene Sprache Tertullians, Ausdruck seiner gewalttätigen Gestaltungskraft, die nicht unerprobt läÃt, um das neue, selbstgesteckte Ziel zu erreichen.â von Campenhausen, Lateinische Kirchenväter, 15.
âDie heidnisch geprägte Alltagssprache ist nach seinem [i.e. Tertullianâs, KMS] Urteil faktisch ein Medium, über das die Christenâwenn auch meist unbewuÃtâständig mit der konkurrierenden heidnischen Religion verbunden sind. Damit ist die Sprache auch ein Schauplatz der Konfrontation zwischen Christentum und Heidentum. Tertullian fordert seine Mitchristen auf, im Umgang mit der eigenen Sprache wachsam zu sein, um nicht aus schlechter Gewohnheit oder aus Furchtsamkeit in verbale Idolatrie zu verfallen.â Mühlenkamp, âNicht wie die Heidenâ, 109.
Mühlenkamp, âNicht wie die Heidenâ, 19.
Osborn, Tertullian, XIII.
See C.J. Classen, âDer Stil Tertullians. Beobachtungen zum âApologeticumâ,â Voces 3 (1992): 98: âBald spürbar, bald weniger spürbar durch christliche Besonderheiten bedingt, bald deutlich von griechischem Sprachgebrauch abhängig, bald völlig oder fast völlig unabhängig von ihm zeigen die bisher behandelten Wörter, daà Tertullian stets bemüht ist, den jeweiligen Gegenstand angemessen und zugleich wirkungsvoll zu formulieren, und sich dabei nicht scheut, neue Wörter, auch Hapax Legomena, zu bilden oder übliche Wörter mit neuen Bedeutungen zu verwenden.â
See Gert Haendler, Von Tertullian bis zu Ambrosius. Die Kirche im Abendland vom Ende des 2. bis zum Ende des 4. Jahrhunderts (Kirchengeschichte in Einzeldarstellungen I/3) (Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1981), 22.
See Tilley, âNorth Africa,â 394.
Butterweck, âTertullian,â 672â673.
Tertullianâs style, as Moreschini puts it, is âindeed is baroque and ornate in nature and aims to strike the reader by means of the overabundance of rhetorical devices,â thus gaining Tertullian the title of a âChristian Sophistâ. Claudio Moreschini, âTertullianâs Adversos Marcionem and Middleplatonism,â ZAC 21 (2017): 144â145.
See the famous line measuring the manifold unificatory potential of hatred for the Christians from Apologeticum 40: âSi Tiberis ascendit in moenia, si Nilus non ascendit in arva, si caelum stetit, si terra movit, si fames, si lues, statim Christianos ad leonem! adelamatur. Tantos ad unum?âââIf the Tiber reaches the walls, if the Nile does not rise to the fields, if the sky doesnât move or the earth does, if there is famine, if there is plague, the cry is at once: âThe Christians to the lion!â What, all of them to one lion?â Tertullian, Apology, 182â183.
Cochrane, Christianity and Classical Culture, 415. On Tertullianâs ambivalent and context- dependent use of Socrates, see Lucia Saudelli, âLe Socrate de Tertullien,â Revue dâétudes augustiniennes et patristiques 59 (2013): 49: âLâétude comparative des divers témoignages révèle que lâattitude de Tertullien à lâégard de Socrate est ambiguë et opportuniste, tantôt apparemmentâmais pas en réalitéâfavorable et tantôt explicitement hostile au philosophe, en fonction des besoins particuliers de sa cause.â Socratesâ demon, however, serves as a negative foil of Tertullianâs ideas about the Paraclete: âContrairement aux auteurs qui soulignaient les résultats positifs de lâintervention divine dans la vie du philosophe, Tertullien veut montrer que Socrate, comme tous ceux qui nâont pas embrassé la vérité chrétienne, a été manipulé par les forces du mal du début à la fin de son existence. Le démon de Socrate nâest pour le chrétien quâun des esprits maléfiques dont Satan est le souverain.â Ibid. 42. In sum, âTertullien fait de Socrate la victime paradigmatique de lâaction dâun démon malfaisant.â Ibid., 43.
On the name of Praxeas as used in Tertullianâs treatise Against Praxeas see McGowan, âTertullian and the âHereticalâ Origin of âOrthodoxâ Trinity,â 441: âThe purpose of Against Praxeas is to oppose the theology of a teacher otherwise unknown by that name at least, perhaps to be identified with the Roman bishop Callistus. Yet the historical Praxeas is distant in space and time; despite the personalized nature of the charges made against him, his ârealâ identity is somewhat beside the point, and his persona functions in this text as a representative figure or rhetorical device through which local issues and persons can be addressed.â
Shaw, Sacred Violence, 307.
See Saul A. Kripke, Naming and Necessity (Oxford: Blackwell, 1980). See chapter on Retrospection.
See the corresponding description in Kitzler, âNihil enim anima si non corpus,â 169: âDie Kulturtradition, deren Angehöriger er selbst ist und deren er sich nie ganz entledigen kann, benützt er zugleich als Mittel, in christliches Glaubensgut intellektuell einzudringen und dieses zu festigen, er redefiniert die Tradition gewissermaÃen in christlichen Begriffen, passt sie an die Bedürfnisse der neuen Religion an131 und trägtâum es mit einer Formulierung aus der klassischen Arbeit von Jean-Claude Fredouille auszudrückenâzu ihrer endgültigen âKonversionâ bei.â
See Knut Martin Stünkel, âBiblical Metaschematism as a Device for Religious Transfer. Paulâs Communicative Strategy in a Situation of Religious Contact,â Entangled Religions 2 (2015).
See chapter on Secret.
See H. Homann, âSchlaf,â in Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, vol. 8 RâSc, eds. Joachim Ritter and Karlfried Gründer (Darmstadt: WBG, 1992), 1296.
Homann, âSchlaf,â 1297.
See chapter on Secret.
See Thomas Macho, âSchlafen, Träumen,â in Wörterbuch der philosophischen Metaphern, ed. Ralf Konersmann (Darmstadt: WBG 2007, 325â326).
See Osborn, Tertullian, 67, 103: âHeraclitus [â¦] is closer to him than other ancient philosophers. There is nothing wrong with antithesis provided they are kept within one God.â Osborn even speaks of âTertullianâs Heraclitean God,â who produces change (ibid., 110), and of âTertullianâs persistent Heraclitean optimism that nothing perishes except in order to be saved (ânihil deperit nisi in salutemâ).â Ibid., 216.
See Heraklit, âFragmente und Zeugnisse,â in Die Vorsokratiker. Vol. 1: Thales/Anaximander/ Anaximenes/Pythagoras und die Pythagoreer/Xenophanes/Heraklit, ed. M. Laura Gemelli Marciano (Düsseldorf: Artemis & Winkler, 2007), 305 (DK 22 B 88).
See Gerhard Esser, Die Seelenlehre Tertullians (Paderborn: Schöningh, 1893), 232.
See Heinrich Karpp, âSorans vier Bücher
With regard to the belief in creation (Schöpfungsglaube), Karpp states: âEr [Tertullian, KMS] weicht von Soran darin ab, daà er die Seele aus dem Hauche Gottes entstanden sein läÃt, deshalb ihre Unsterblichkeit und die Herleitung aller Seelen aus einer einzigen lehrt, vielleicht auch in der Annahme des freien Willens. Der Schöpfungsglaube ist also die grundlegende und eigentlich einzige Abweichung von der Vorlage. Hier stehen bewuÃtes Christentum und literarische Abhängigkeit vom Heidentum nebeneinander.â Karpp, âSorans vier Bücher
See Petr Kitzler, âEx uno homine tota haec animarum redundantia. Ursprung, Entstehung und Weitergabe der individuellen Seele nach Tertullian,â Vigiliae Christianae 64 (2010), 364â365: âTertullians Hauptanliegen bestand nicht darin, eine kohärente christliche Seelenlehre zu entwickeln, seine Ziele waren anscheinend auch diesmal polemisch. Es handelt sich um Tertullians oft einseitige Antwort auf die Seelenlehre oder ihre einzelnen Aspekte, wie sie die heidnische Philosophie präsentierte und von ihr ausgehende Vertreter verschiedener christlicher Häresien des zweiten und dritten Jahrhunderts.â
See Kitzler, âNihil enim anima si non corpus,â 146.
âNeque enim Brachmanae aut Indorum gymnosohistae sumus, silvicolae et exules vitae.â Apol. 42.1. Tertullian, Apology, 190â191.
To Karpp, this is prefigured in Tertullianâs sources. See Karpp, âSorans vier Bücher
Schulz-Flügel, âTertullian,â 30.
J.H. Waszink, Quinti Septimi Florentis Tertulliani De anima, edited with introduction and commentary by J. Waszink (Leiden: Brill 2010, 1). [De anima] All following translations from the Latin by Peter Holmes.
De anima, 4.
De anima, 5. On Tertullianâs ambivalent use of the notion âSophistâ, see Moreschini, âTertullianâs Adversos Marcionem and Middleplatonism,â 142â143.
See Mensching, âVom Apostel Paulus zu Tertullian und Augustinus,â 107: âEs charakterisiert die Auseinandersetzungen in dieser Zeit, in der das Christentum noch nicht römische Staatsreligion war und im Gegenteil Verfolgungen ausgesetzt war, dass die Philosophie als die Apologie eben des Staates angesehen wurde, der die Christen verfolgte. Wer das Martyrium erlitt, war in den Augen der Apologeten somitâzugespitzt ausgedrücktâein Opfer der Philosophie, die den heidnischen Staat stützte.â
De anima, 5.
De anima, 31.
De anima, 79â80.
See Leslie Dossey, âWatchful Greeks and Lazy Romans: Disciplining Sleep in Late Antiquity,â Journal of Early Christian Studies 21 (2013).
Dossey, âWatchful Greeks and Lazy Romans,â 211.
See Dossey, âWatchful Greeks and Lazy Romans,â 226.
Dossey, âWatchful Greeks and Lazy Romans,â 211. âThis belief that sleep deprivation hindered oneâs ability to turn the spirit toward God is strikingly different from the promotion of sleep asceticism in Greek monastic texts. Here it was the lack of sleep that was a danger to the mind.â Interestingly, this positive attitude of sleep can be found in Celsus as well. Ibid., 233.
De anima, 58. The scholarly list of opinions as well as the idea that sleep is a natural phenomenon is to be found in Soranus; see Karpp, âSorans vier Bücher
De anima, 58.
De anima, 58.
On Tertullianâs body/soul dualism see Eliezer Gonzales, âAnthropologies of Continuity: The Body and Soul in Tertullian, Perpetua, and Early Christianity,â Journal of Early Christian Studies 21 (2013): 483â484. On the evolving âdecided oppositionâ of body and soul in formative Christianity see Jan Bremmer, âDie Karriere der Seele. Vom antiken Griechenland zum modernen Europa,â in Der ganze Mensch. Zur Anthropologie der Antike und ihrer europäischen Nachgeschichte, ed. Bernd Janowski (Berlin: Akademie, 2012).
De anima, 59. According to J. Massingberd Ford, the idea that the soul does not sleep corresponds to a similar idea in the midrash to Deuteronomy (Deut. R., II. 37). See Ford, âWas Montanism a Jewish-Christian Heresy?,â 156.
De anima, 78.
Esser, Die Seelenlehre Tertullians, 11. See ibid., 19: Quippe res Die ratio, quia Deus omnium conditor nihil non ratione tractari intelligique voluit (De poen. 1).
Esser, Die Seelenlehre Tertullians, 161.
See Dossey, âWatchful Greeks and Lazy Romans,â 222.
De anima, 59â60.
De anima, 60.
De anima, 60.
De anima, 60.
De anima, 61.
See chapter on the Transcendance/Immanence Distinction.
De anima, 61.
De anima, 59. On the influence of Stoic philosophy on Tertullianâs account of the soul, see Esser, Die Seelenlehre Tertullians, 65â73, 111â113. Moreschini, however, stresses the influence of Middle Platonism on Tertullianâs work in general, sometimes rather at the expense of Stoicism. See Moreschini, âTertullianâs Adversos Marcionem and Middleplatonism,â 157.
See Youval Rotman, âReconstructing Late Antique Psychology: Reversion, Conversion and Introversion of the Soul,â Journal for Late Antique Religion and Culture 10 (2016): 19.
Rotman, âReconstructing Late Antique Psychology,â 20.
De anima, 65. As Bähnk points out, Tertullian does not attribute visions or prophetic gifts to martyrs as a proof of their special status. Bähnk, Von der Notwendigkeit des Leidens, 165â166.
On dreams see his cynical account of Empedocles: âBut the fact is, Empedocles, who used to dream that he was a god, and on that account, I suppose, disdained to have it thought that he had ever before been merely some hero, declares in so many words: âI once was Thamnus, and a fish.â Why not rather a melon, seeing that he was such a fool; or a cameleon, for his inflated brag? It was, no doubt, as a fish (and a queer one too!) that he escaped the corruption of some obscure grave, when he preferred being roasted by a plunge into Aetna; after which accomplishment there was and end for ever to his
Rotman, âReconstructing Late Antique Psychology,â 20, 22.
Esser, Die Seelenlehre Tertullians, 138. There are other blank spaces that attract creative speculation and the possible comparison of religious traditions. Referring to Gershom Scholemâs remark on the fertile Jewish disagreement concerning eschatological detail, Nicholas Constas describes the âinviting lacunaâ of the middle state of the soul, the state between death and resurrection, often referred to as a kind of sleep, that motivated âendless conjectures and speculationsâ by Patristic and Byzantine theologians. Concluding, Constas describes the particular form of attraction the transcending lacuna displays: âThe Byzantines had no âsystemâ around the last things. Eschatology remained for them an open horizon within theology, an openness perhaps intended to draw experience and thought toward that which lies beyond the bounds of the world of space and time. Perhaps the very inaccessibility of the last things rendered them all the more actual and compelling; a ferment in the present order.â Nicholas Constas, ââTo Sleep, Perchance to Dreamâ: The Middle State of Souls in Patristic and Byzantine Literature,â Dumbarton Oaks Papers 55 (2001): 119â120, 124.