Jews and Others
cis on the edge of the Syrian steppe, between Apamea and Beroea; this too
was part of that central Syrian zone which (so far at least) has produced no
Semitic-language documents dating earlier than the late Empire (when the
use of Syriac in Christian contexts spread westwards from the Euphrates).
But in his case too the temptation to see him as having been, in cast of mind,
‘‘half-oriental’’ has proved too strong to resist. Hence, it is suggested, the
Chaldaean Oracles(text to n. above) will have had a natural attraction for
him: ‘‘half-oriental, half-Hellenic—this kind of writing must have attracted
Iamblichus.’’^45
The work which is referred to here, Iamblichus’On the Egyptian Mys-
teries, duly deploys allusion to a wide range of non-Greek sources of wisdom:
the Chaldaean or wise men (sophoi)(who recur several times) or Egyptian
prophets, or to whole sacred races (ethnē), such as Assyrians and Egyptians,
whose languages the gods have marked out as fit for the expression of the
sacred.^46 What group Iamblichus will have intended to refer to as ‘‘Assyrian’’
is not immediately clear (text to n. above). It does not become much
clearer when we examine a (potentially) important passage early in the first
book: ‘‘We then, as regards the ancestral doctrines of theAssyrioi, will faith-
fully convey to you our opinion, and, as for our own, will clearly declare them
to you.’’^47 The passage clearly supports the idea, presented by a scholion, and
borrowed from Proclus, that the author of this work was Iamblichus, but
writing in the person of an Egyptian, Abammon.^48 For just before this the
text has referred, as noted above, to ‘‘thesophoiof the Chaldaeans and the
prophets of Egypt.’’ ‘‘Assyrioi’’ here will therefore mean ‘‘Chaldaeans.’’ Once
again, we are in the context of the deployment of various types, or represen-
tations, of alien wisdom. It will be no surprise, and does not need emphasis,
that the same motif appears also in Iamblichus’Lifeof Pythagoras, as it had in
Porphyry’s. But, if we are looking either for concrete evidence of knowledge
and use of non-Greek languages or literatures, or for explicit self-ascription
as a ‘‘Syrian,’’ or any other ethnic or cultural designation, we will not find
it here.
. So E. des Places,Jamblique: les mystères d’Égypte(), .
. Iamblichus, , ; , ; , ; , . See esp. , .
. Iamblichus, , .
. See H.-D. Saffrey, ‘‘Les livres IV à VII deDeMysteriisde Jamblique relus avec la lettre
de Porphyre à Anébon,’’ in H. J. Blumenthal and E. G. Clark, eds.,The Divine Iamblichus,
Philosopher and Man of Gods(), .