Jews and Others
been translated into Greek, or of elements of non-Greek wisdom which had
already been the object of literary representation within Greek culture.
Here Porphyry does indeed turn in succession to the lessons to be drawn,
in relation to the eating or sacrifice of animals, from a number of non-Greek
cultures (, : ‘‘turning to the other races [ethnē]’’). But in each case, as be-
comes quite clear, he is using representations of the relevant belief systems
which were already current in Greek. What he records of Egyptian customs
comes, as he states explicitly, from the Stoic writer of the first century..,
Chaeremon.^37 For Jewish customs and beliefs, including reports of the Phar-
isees, Sadducees, and Essenes, he turns to Josephus, referring to the seven
booksoftheJewishWarand the twenty of theAntiquities.^38 He then comes to
the customs of theSyroi, to whom he attributes an original abstention from
living things, and hence from sacrifice, tempered later by the adoption of
sacrifice to avert evils, but still accompanied by avoidance of eating meat. It
might naturally be supposed that, here above all, he would draw on authen-
tic indigenous information, or at the very least represent himself as so doing.
But in fact his sources are given as ‘‘Neanthes the Cyzicene’’ and ‘‘Asclepiades
the Cyprian,’’ from whom he quotes a story about Pygmalion, a Phoenician
king of Cyprus.^39 This section then ends with a quotation from Menander.
From there Porphyry continues to Persian customs, deriving his informa-
tion from ‘‘Euboulos who wrote an account of Mithras in many books’’; this
report seems to be the only evidence for the writer concerned, who may be-
long to the Antonine period.^40 Finally, Porphyry moves to the Indians, and
to the two sects (haireseis) of the naked philosophers (gymnosophistai) among
them, the Brachmanes and the Samanaioi, referring, as we saw above (text
to n. ), to ‘‘Bardesanes a Babylonian.’’^41 As we saw also, he does not betray
any explicit awareness of the fact that Bardesanes’ works had been written in
Syriac.
Three features therefore stand out in Porphyry’s use of foreign cultures,
and especially ‘‘oriental’’ ones. Firstly, as it seems, his sources were works
which had either been composed in Greek or had already been translated
from some other language; secondly, he deploys a wide variety of non-Greek
.De abst. , . The exposition covers chaps. –.
.De abst. , –.
.De abst. , . For the problems in identifying Neanthes, see R. Laqueur, s.v.
‘‘Neanthes,’’RE XVI, cols. –, and Jacoby,FGrH, no. , F. (early third cen-
tury..), distinguishing him from a later Neanthes,FGrH, no. . Asclepiades (FGrH,
no. ) is quoted only here.
.De abst.,.REVI, cols. –, s.v. ‘‘Eubulos’’ ().
.De abst. , –.