The Argument Concerning Animal Sacrifice

No one has yet analysed Adversus nationes 7 to see if there is any connection between Arnobius' argument concerning animal sacrifice and Porphyry's philosophical doctrines on the same subject found in his Abstinentia. This is what this chapter sets out to do. Porphyry's disqualification of Christ as the via universalis animae liberandae, and his attempt to offer such a way to the non-philosopher, appears to have been a principal reason why Arnobius has attempted to prove that Christ is the only via salutis animae universalis. The latter has also apparently taken Porphyry's criticism of the faith just as seriously as Eusebius did in the PE and DE. And like Eusebius, he can use the same argument not only to ‘prove’ that Christianity is the only way of universal salvation for the soul, but also to provide evidence clearly demonstrating the fact that everything about Graeco–Roman religious culture is a lie.

Argument (complex analysis) · Art · Christianity · Criticism · Doctrine · Epistemology · Faith · Literature · Principal (computer security) · Sacrifice · Soul · Subject (documents) · Theology · Augustinian Studies and Theology · Classical Antiquity Studies · Computer Science · Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies · Medicine · Philosophy

• Sacrifice in late Roman art

  Open Access•Jaś Elsner•Greek and Roman Animal Sacrifice•2012

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