Abstract

Scholia from the Byzantine era on Lucian of Samosata era are unusually abundant and unusually prodigal in invective. Hostility was inspired not only by the Peregrinus, in which Lucian ridicules the Church and its martyrs, but by dialogues which were read as oblique assaults on Christianity because they slighted all belief in providence and regard for things divine. Most assaults are bombastic rather than eloquent, and deaf to Lucian's humour; Arethas, a younger contemporary of Photius, attempts without success to outdo the satirist in wit and in philosophy. Photius himself, however, hints that his lampoons on pagan credulity might supply a Christian arsenal, and the author of the spurious Philopseudes comes closer to Lucian's manner than any of the scholiasts, initially in defence of monotheism, and then for some partisan object which continues to afford matter for debate