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Universal Salvation in Late Antiquity: Porphyry of Tyre and the Pagan-Christian Debate

Online ISBN:
9780190202415
Print ISBN:
9780190202392
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Book

Universal Salvation in Late Antiquity: Porphyry of Tyre and the Pagan-Christian Debate

Michael Bland Simmons
Michael Bland Simmons

Distinguished Research Professor, Department of History

Distinguished Research Professor, Department of History, Auburn University Montgomery
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Published online:
18 June 2015
Published in print:
1 June 2015
Online ISBN:
9780190202415
Print ISBN:
9780190202392
Publisher:
Oxford University Press

Abstract

This book explores the background to the effort of the Neoplatonist philosopher Porphyry (c.A.D. 232–305) to devise a system of universal salvation as a means of countering the Christian soteriological challenge, and the Christian reactions to this, notably from Eusebius of Caesarea. The main arguments are that Christianity received an enormous boost, despite efforts at suppression, from the economic, social, and political troubles, including famines and plagues, of the “Third Century Crisis,” and that Porphyry’s efforts to counter it on an intellectual level, though provoking indignant responses from Christian opponents, Lactantius, Arnobius, and Eusebius, proved futile, as Hellenic religion and philosophy were simply not equipped to provide a universal way of salvation which could attract the masses.

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