Theology for the Masses

Conversations in Theology and its interaction with Culture

Overview of the Acts of Thecla

Monday we finished looking at the Thecla Cult in early Christianity.  Today we will take stock of the actual text itself before looking at the tides of rhetoric it employed.

The textual tradition of the Acts of Thecla effectively co-opted and modified established patterns rhetoric for its own ends. We will explore one of these pre-existing rhetoric patterns that the tradition drew from, the Roman romance novel.¹ 

As mentioned earlier, the Acts of Thecla is a second century account of a female disciple of Paul’s, Thecla.It was included along with Third Corinthians in the Acts of Paul. The relation between the Acts of Paul and the Acts of Thecla is uncertain. It is possible that the Acts of Thecla was originally crafted independent from the Acts of Paul and later inserted. This is evidenced by the shift in protagonist and its ability to stand on its own as an independent work. Some scholars, such as Goodspeed and Davis, assert the opposite, that the Acts of Thecla was originally crafted as a part of the Acts of Paul and later separated.²  They point to the rather abrupt beginning of the Acts of Thecla. The lack of a proper introduction implies that the work piggy-backed on the introduction of the Acts of Paul and signifies a common point of creation. Even if the Acts of Thecla was originally a part of the Acts of Paul, the Acts of Thecla became separated relatively quickly.³ For our purposes, the relationship between the two works is largely irreverent because we our analysis will privilege the oral tradition that served as a source for either the Acts of Thecla or the Acts of Thecla portion of the Acts of Paul.

The Acts of Thecla begins with Paul as the primary protagonist and moves Thecla from her Roman household toward her eventual discipleship.⁴ The work opens in Asia Minor. Paul is traveling to Iconium, present day Konya, after fleeing Antioch. At this point in the Acts of Paul, Paul had previously been outside of Rome. This disjointment of the narrative of the Acts of Paul suggests that the Acts of Thecla is a separate work which was inserted into the Acts of Paul. The flight from Antioch in chapter 1 of the Acts of Thecla most likely refers to the tradition in the canonical Acts of the Apostles where Saul and Barnabas are run out of Antioch Pisidia in chapter 13 and their next destination is Iconium, where they are consequently run out of town in chapter 14. This suggests one of two things, either that the author of the Acts of Thecla was familiar with the Acts of the Apostles or that these two accounts are multiple attestations of the historicity of the events.

Understanding the Narrative

In some senses the text is a variant of the Roman romance novel and in others a complete reversal. Roman romance novels were reproductions of the Roman civic ideal. They “[encoded] marriage as a theme signifying both domestic and imperial harmony.”⁵  Cooper argues that romantic novels illustrate “concerns about the social consequences of imperiled marriage – dynastic strife and social instability.”⁶  The Roman romance novels elevate marriage by elevating its role in the narrative and connect it to the maintenance of civic values.⁷   Cooper frames the genre in terms of defending the city and the state from social dissolution by means of reinforcing social norms. This includes the defense of marriage; the ancient romance novel “may have been perceived as an attempt to stabilize a founding instituting of the social order by calling attention to its charms.”⁸  In order to accomplish this task, the text must rely on strict constructions of gender roles which mirror serve to bolster the established gender roles.

If this is one of the functions of Romance novels in antiquity, the Acts of Thecla utilizes this rhetoric tool, but modifies it for its own ends. As we explore the rhetoric in the narrative, we will find a constant theme of rejection. The assumed feminine is rejected though Thecla’s move into action; the assumed masculine is rejected through Paul’s move into passivity; and the community’s ideological opponents, Roman societal norms, are rejected through Thecla’s deliverance from their attacks.

Friday, we will be taking a look at the first story arc of the Acts of Thecla and see how all of this is working.

1. Melissa Aubin, "Reversing Romance? The Acts of Thecla and the Ancient Novel," in Ancient Fiction and Early Christian Narrative, ed. J. Bradley Chance Ronald F. Hock, and Judith Perkins (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998), 258. [↩]
2. Kate Cooper and Catherine Fales Cooper, The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late Antiquity (Harvard University Press, 1996), 28. [↩]
3. Aubin, "Reversing Romance? The Acts of Thecla and the Ancient Novel," 259. [↩]
4. Cooper and Cooper, The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late Antiquity, 37. [↩]
5. MacDonald, The Legend and the Apostle: The Battle for Paul in Story and Canon 14.#38@14} MacDonald dates the Acts of Paul, which contains the Acts of Thecla between 150-190 CE. Given that the Acts of Thecla was an independent tradition (if not an independent text) that was merged with the Acts of Paul, it was likely crystallized at an earlier date. [↩]
6. Edgar Johnson Goodspeed, "The Acts of Paul and Thecla," The Biblical World 17, no. 3 (1901): 185. and Davis, The Cult of St. Thecla: An Introduction to Women’s Piety in Late Antiquity, 7. [↩]
7. Bart D. Ehrman, The New Testament and Other Early Christian Writings: A Reader (Oxford University Press, USA, 2003), 278. [↩]
8. When describing the events in the narrative, items in quotes reflect the translation of the Acts of Thecla as reproduced in "The Acts of Thecla.". [↩]

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