Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 7, No. 3, 2008, Page 31
3 I also have seen this location spelled as Abonutichus, but I follow the spelling given by Jones (1986,
133ff). A request by Alexander may have been the reason why the city changes its name to Ionopolis
(i.e., ―city of the Ionians,‖ who are Eastern Greens who settle Asia Minor) some time after 169 (see
Alex., 58), but now it goes by the name Ineboli. It is a Turkish port town on the Black Sea. A rather
bleak description of the citty around the time of Alexander and Lucian appears in Fox (1986, 241-
242).
4 Readers who wish to check other translations of Lucian‘s account should realize that the 1905
version by Fowler and Fowler omits two crucial paragraphs (41 and 42), presumably because they
wish to spare readers from the unsavory sexual content in them.
5 Pythagoras (ca. 580-500 B.C.) is a famous Greek philosopher and mathematician. He founds a
religious society in Croton (Crotone or Crotona in southern Italy), and his followers devote themselves
to arithmetic (Coxon 1949, 751).
6 While I am unable to pin down the attitude of men in Asia Minor who had been prostitutes in their
youth, perhaps an earlier Greek attitude is instructive. Indeed, introduction of Greek ideas about male
prostitution into a discussion of Lucian‘s world is appropriate because ―the area which we now call Asia
Minor and the Middle East had been, since the conquests of Alexander the Great and under his
successors, a Greek-speaking society, at least in its upper classes, and dominated by Greek cultural
ideals and traditions‖ (Costa 2005, vii). One scholar who writes on attitudes in Athens indicates that ―a
citizen who could be proven to have acted as a male whore in his youth – who could, that is, be
proven to have accepted money for his sexual favors and even to have enjoyed being penetrated –
was forever barred from public service and from speaking in the Assembly‖ (Hooper 1999, 9 see
Bloch, 2001, 187). Surely, Lucian does not include this information as a compliment about the man or
his character. If this prostitution allegation were to have been true, then one only can wonder if his
early sexual activity has any influence on his adult sexual relations with teenage boys, most
particularly his ―using them offensively in every way‖ (Alex., 41, 42 see Bloch 2001, 193).
7 On ―tablets, or (later) books, written in heaven,‖ which ―were said to contain either the predestined
fate of mankind, or the record of the earthly actions of men,‖ see MacDermot (1971, 146-147, 187).
8 Because of the prominent place that serpents played in various religions in the ancient world around
Asia Minor, a classical scholar concludes, ―when, therefore, Alexander [of Abonuteichos] produced his
new god in serpent form…, he was following a time-honoured tradition‖ (Rose 1949). Specifically, the
identification of Apollo and his son, Asciepius, as healing gods has an ancient history in Greece, as do
serpents as their symbols. For an old but still interesting discussion of these points, see Jayne (1925,
240-303).
9 Apparently, other ‗magicians‘ during this period use cranes‘ windpipes for similar purposes (Jones
1986, 137).
10 According to Lucian, another oracle of the period charges ―two obols for each prediction‖ while
Alexander charges ―a drachma and two obols‖ (Alex., 19, 23). Calculating that there are six obols to a
drachma (see Harmon [trans.] 1925, 243 n.3), Alexander is charging eight ibols per oracle—four times
higher than the other seer. Since a day-laborer receives about four obols a day (Harmon [trans.]
1925, 206-207 n.1), he is charging twice the daily wage for his ‗services.‘ Also keep in mind that
Alexander ―collected up to seventy or eighty thousand [drachmas] a year, as people were so avid they
handed in ten or fifteen questions each at a time‖ (Alex., 23).
11 Jones (1986, 140) estimates that Alexander‘s annual income likely is ―ample to maintain a hundred
or so persons in comfort.‖
12 As Pamela Gordon indicates, second century Epicureans ―did not need to quote any particular
Epicurean text to protest against the revival [of oracles] Epicurus‘ teachings about the nature of
divinity and the Epicurean belief that all phenomena can be explained rationally were enough‖ (Gordon
1996, 115). In essence, the gods exist, but in their divine realm they are ―‘sundered and separated
from our world of care. Free from all grief, free from danger, lacking naught that we could give, it is
neither won by our well-doing nor angered when we do ill‘‖ [Lucretius, On the Nature of Things (II,
646 ff.), quoted in Farrington 1967, 177]. Also indicative of Epicureans‘ attitude toward worship of
gods in this era is the message chiseled in a huge stone text as a gift by Diogenes to the citizens of
Oenoanda in southwestern Asia Minor. A recovered portion of it warns that citizens must ―‘realize what
3 I also have seen this location spelled as Abonutichus, but I follow the spelling given by Jones (1986,
133ff). A request by Alexander may have been the reason why the city changes its name to Ionopolis
(i.e., ―city of the Ionians,‖ who are Eastern Greens who settle Asia Minor) some time after 169 (see
Alex., 58), but now it goes by the name Ineboli. It is a Turkish port town on the Black Sea. A rather
bleak description of the citty around the time of Alexander and Lucian appears in Fox (1986, 241-
242).
4 Readers who wish to check other translations of Lucian‘s account should realize that the 1905
version by Fowler and Fowler omits two crucial paragraphs (41 and 42), presumably because they
wish to spare readers from the unsavory sexual content in them.
5 Pythagoras (ca. 580-500 B.C.) is a famous Greek philosopher and mathematician. He founds a
religious society in Croton (Crotone or Crotona in southern Italy), and his followers devote themselves
to arithmetic (Coxon 1949, 751).
6 While I am unable to pin down the attitude of men in Asia Minor who had been prostitutes in their
youth, perhaps an earlier Greek attitude is instructive. Indeed, introduction of Greek ideas about male
prostitution into a discussion of Lucian‘s world is appropriate because ―the area which we now call Asia
Minor and the Middle East had been, since the conquests of Alexander the Great and under his
successors, a Greek-speaking society, at least in its upper classes, and dominated by Greek cultural
ideals and traditions‖ (Costa 2005, vii). One scholar who writes on attitudes in Athens indicates that ―a
citizen who could be proven to have acted as a male whore in his youth – who could, that is, be
proven to have accepted money for his sexual favors and even to have enjoyed being penetrated –
was forever barred from public service and from speaking in the Assembly‖ (Hooper 1999, 9 see
Bloch, 2001, 187). Surely, Lucian does not include this information as a compliment about the man or
his character. If this prostitution allegation were to have been true, then one only can wonder if his
early sexual activity has any influence on his adult sexual relations with teenage boys, most
particularly his ―using them offensively in every way‖ (Alex., 41, 42 see Bloch 2001, 193).
7 On ―tablets, or (later) books, written in heaven,‖ which ―were said to contain either the predestined
fate of mankind, or the record of the earthly actions of men,‖ see MacDermot (1971, 146-147, 187).
8 Because of the prominent place that serpents played in various religions in the ancient world around
Asia Minor, a classical scholar concludes, ―when, therefore, Alexander [of Abonuteichos] produced his
new god in serpent form…, he was following a time-honoured tradition‖ (Rose 1949). Specifically, the
identification of Apollo and his son, Asciepius, as healing gods has an ancient history in Greece, as do
serpents as their symbols. For an old but still interesting discussion of these points, see Jayne (1925,
240-303).
9 Apparently, other ‗magicians‘ during this period use cranes‘ windpipes for similar purposes (Jones
1986, 137).
10 According to Lucian, another oracle of the period charges ―two obols for each prediction‖ while
Alexander charges ―a drachma and two obols‖ (Alex., 19, 23). Calculating that there are six obols to a
drachma (see Harmon [trans.] 1925, 243 n.3), Alexander is charging eight ibols per oracle—four times
higher than the other seer. Since a day-laborer receives about four obols a day (Harmon [trans.]
1925, 206-207 n.1), he is charging twice the daily wage for his ‗services.‘ Also keep in mind that
Alexander ―collected up to seventy or eighty thousand [drachmas] a year, as people were so avid they
handed in ten or fifteen questions each at a time‖ (Alex., 23).
11 Jones (1986, 140) estimates that Alexander‘s annual income likely is ―ample to maintain a hundred
or so persons in comfort.‖
12 As Pamela Gordon indicates, second century Epicureans ―did not need to quote any particular
Epicurean text to protest against the revival [of oracles] Epicurus‘ teachings about the nature of
divinity and the Epicurean belief that all phenomena can be explained rationally were enough‖ (Gordon
1996, 115). In essence, the gods exist, but in their divine realm they are ―‘sundered and separated
from our world of care. Free from all grief, free from danger, lacking naught that we could give, it is
neither won by our well-doing nor angered when we do ill‘‖ [Lucretius, On the Nature of Things (II,
646 ff.), quoted in Farrington 1967, 177]. Also indicative of Epicureans‘ attitude toward worship of
gods in this era is the message chiseled in a huge stone text as a gift by Diogenes to the citizens of
Oenoanda in southwestern Asia Minor. A recovered portion of it warns that citizens must ―‘realize what
