Emperor Julian and Polemical Exemplarity in Against the Galileans

This article treats several fragments from Emperor Julian's Against the Galileans that mention the ancient Jewish king Solomon and John the Evangelist. Analysis of Julian's brief treatment of these two characters reveals several features about Julian's wider argumentation in Against the Galileans: his sophisticated engagement with Christian Scriptures, including attempts to get behind the text to its compositional context (a new strategy in the history of anti-Christian writing); the theological criterion at the center of his criticisms, right worship; and his charges about the serial nature of Christian apostasy. By tracing how Julian uses characters from Christian texts to advance these arguments, this article also contributes to growing interest in uses of exempla in ancient writing

Ancient history · Biblical studies · Emperor · Theology · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Classics · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy