CONCERNING INTERPRETATION OF PRECEDENT TEXTS IN WORKS BY CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17072/2037-6681-2016-3-5-12Keywords:
Clement of Alexandria, Homer, Plutarch, Plato, licentia poetica (“poetic license”).Abstract
Interpreting and referring to well-known texts of Homer and other Greek authors, in some cases Clement of Alexandria notably transformed them. Taking into account the fact he knew ancient Greek literature very well and often cited precise quotes from the works he used, it is reasonable to assume those transformations were not accidental. Interpretations by Clement are presented both in the form of a radical correction of the original text or reevaluation of the characters and in the form of addition, a slight change and transposition of verses. Comparison of Clement’s liberty when handling pagan writings with earlier Christian writers’ more or less accurate rendering of words by classic poets allows us to see the development of Christian literature style: we can observe the transition from using verses from ancient poems as “evidence” against polytheism to turning them into exempla, literary background. Such treatment of sources likens Clement not to the apologists Tatian and Theophilos, not daring to remake well-known passages, but to Plato or Plutarch, who ventured to change text written by their precursors in order to create the desired impression of their own words. Thus, Clement appears to be the author who sought not factual accuracy in presentation of material (as it should be when writing of speech for the defense) but creation of a philosophical treatise, where deviation from quoted sources is allowable.References
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