Side-notes from Graeco-Roman and Hellenistic-Semitic literature to the notion ‘adopted as God's child’ (YIOθEΣIA)

Abstract

This article aims at showing that Paul's use of the expression ‘adoption as God's child’ contains connotations of which the background needs to be sought in the Graeco-Roman and Hellenistic-Semitic world. Seneca's tragedies Hercules Furens and Hercules Oetaeus, his satire of the emperor Claudius' deification in his Apocolocyntosis as well as the interpretation of the myths relating to Herakles by Diodorus Siculus are investigated. As far as documents in Latin are concerned, the word adoption appears in particular within the context of ensuring the continuation of the imperial dynasty of the Julius-Claudius family. In Hellenistic-Semitic literature a possible trajectory in the stories about Rachel and Ruth in the Septuagint and Jesus in the New Testament, with reference to Celsus' comparison of Jesus with Dionysos and Herakles, is considered. It is argued that it is not conceivable that converts from heathendom to Christianity would not have been aware of these parallels from Egypt, Greece and Latium.