Rome and the East
the possibility is of course incompatible with the much better attested claim
that she had leanings towards Judaism. This in its turn, though it has little
positive support (see above), is not impossible. There is fairly substantial evi-
dence for a Jewish community in Palmyra.^149 Her possible favour to Judaism
combined with the nature of Paul’s doctrinesmayexplain how the story of
their connection arose. But we can also discount the version of Theodoret
and Chrysostom, that the desire to please Zenobia was thecauseof Paul’s
lapse into heresy. Paul was already accused of heresy in about , Zenobia
only became prominent (so far as we know) after the death of her husband in
/, and the Palmyrenes perhaps entered Antioch only in . At the most
then, her patronage of Paul may have begun in the period after the synod,
when Paul clung on obstinately in the church house.^150 We cannot actually
disprove the third version of the story, that of Filastrius, that Paul influenced
Zenobia in the direction of Judaism.
What then of Paul’s procuratorship? A closer look will show it to be a
fantasy. The whole sense of the passage in the synodal letter is that Paul as
bishop modelled his style and public appearances after those of imperial offi-
cials—‘‘wishingtobecalledducenariusrather than bishop,’’ ‘‘arrangingforhimselfa
tribunal and high throne’’ (probably modelled on a governor’s tribunal and
seat, though even normal bishops had something of the sort),^151 ‘‘having a
secretum,andcalling it that, like worldly rulers’’ (the reference must be to what
is normally called thesecretariumof a governor, the audience chamber where
a number of attested trials of martyrs took place).^152 Everything that is said
of the improper activities of Paul relates to the life of the Christian con-
gregation—extorting money fromthe brethren, making theservice of Goda
source of profit, organizing spectaclesin the assemblies of the church, insulting
other than the family of Odenathus, until the s; see Schlumberger,Bull. d’Ét. Or.
(–): .
. See E. Peterson,ΕΙΣΘΕΟΣ(), –; Frey,Corp.Ins.Jud. II, pp. –.
. So, in effect, Loofs (n. ), .
. Boththronosandbēmaare attested for both civil and ecclesiastical authorities; see
E. Stommel, ‘‘Bischofsstuhl und Hoher Thron,’’Jahrb. f. Ant. u. Chr. (): . And note
that very similarpodiaare found at Dura in the Christian building and in the palace of the
Dux; see C. H. Kraeling,The Excavations at Dura-Europos, Final ReportVIII, :The Christian
Building(), –. But note L. Robert,HellenicaIV (), –, on the theme of the
governor’sthronosandbēmain Greek epigrams.
. Note the trial of the Scillitan martyrs, ‘‘in thesecretarium, in Carthage’’; of Crispina
‘‘in the colony of Thebestina, in thesecretarium, when Anulinus the proconsul was (holding
court) at the tribunal’’; of Cyprian, ‘‘Carthagine in secretario,’’ R. Knopf, G. Krüger, and
G. Ruhbach,Ausgewählte Martyrakten^4 (), , , . Cf.RE, s.v. ‘‘Secretarium.’’