something new, and the New Testament idea of a mutually commit-
ted interaction between God and humanity. In Recognitions, the
Pauline phraseepignosis aletheias/agnitio veritatisbecomes a concep-
tual infrastructure that is able to embed the three components. At the
same time, the end result is more than the sum of its parts since the
upward recognition is strongly moved by the recognizee and results
in the remarkable change in the recognizer. This recognition is very
different from philosophical insight and remains reserved for simple
minds; in this sense, it is a genuinely religious recognition.
In addition to this vertical interaction,Recognitionscontains a rich
variety of horizontal interpersonal recognitions. They belong to a
rather clumsy dramatic plot but are nevertheless historically signifi-
cant as witnesses of the encounter between Aristotelian traditions and
Christianity. I cannot describe them in detail but give one example.
The very last horizontal recognition of the work (Rec.10, 53–10, 67)
concerns the encounter between Clement and his father Faustinianus.
While Clement listens to the teaching of the apostle Peter, his lost
father comes in. The sorcery of Simon Magus has transformed the
father’s face into the face of Simon. Clement is horrified, but people
can recognize Faustinianus from his voice. Peter sees the real face of
Faustinianus through the sorcery and commands the relatives to
respect his father in spite of the new face (Rec.10, 53–10, 57). Peter
then sends Faustinianus to make a confession to the people of
Antioch in the role of Simon, telling them to follow the apostle
Peter and shun from the false teachings of Simon. Faustinianus
does this, and the listeners who suppose him to be Simon Magus
rebuke the teaching of the sorcerer. After this, Faustinianus receives
his own face back (Rec.10, 60–7).
In spite of its poor literary quality, this and other similar stories are
remarkable for the overall history of recognition. The idea of chan-
ging faces relates playfully to the change of identity that takes place in
conversion. The father had not listened to Peter’s warning not to
speak with Simon (Rec.10, 58); thus the sorcerer was able to change
his identity. On the other hand, holy people like Peter could never-
theless see his real face, and even all the others could still recognize his
voice (cf. John 10 discussed above). The false identity was then turned
against the trickster. In the overall plot ofRecognitions, the vertical
religious recognition is the basis of changes in horizontal recognition.
As this overall plot works rather clumsily, I illustrate it with this one
example only.
The Latin Traditions 53