Christians in Conversation

Abstract

Abstract Christians in Conversation: A Guide to Late Antique Dialogues in Greek and Syriac deals with a particular form of writing by Christians in late antiquity, the prose dialogue. To study late antique dialogues means to recognize that the dialogue form, notably employed by Plato and Aristotle, did not exhaust itself with the philosophical schools of Classical and Hellenistic Greece, but emerged transformed and reinvigorated in the religiously diverse world of late antiquity. The Christians’ use of the dialogue form within religious debate resulted in a burgeoning activity of composition of prose dialogues, which often opposed a Christian and a Jew, a Christian and a pagan, a Christian and a Manichaean, an Orthodox and a heretic, or, later, a Christian and a Muslim. The present work offers the first comprehensive analysis of Christian dialogues in Greek and in Syriac from the earliest examples in the second century up to the end of the sixth century. It shows that several Christian authors chose the dialogue form to convey fundamental theological views, and argues that dialogues were intended as tools of opinion formation in late antique society, thus opening up this vast strand of literature to the interests of the cultural and intellectual historians. Most Christian dialogues are little studied, and often in isolation, but they vividly evoke the religious debates of the time, and embody the cultural conventions and refinements that late antique men and women expected from such debates.