Apocalypse of Paul

</noinclude>thumb|right|upright=1.25|A 7th century Iranian codex containing a Syriac version, from [[St. Joseph's Cathedral, Tehran]]

The Apocalypse of Paul (, literally "Revelation of Paul"; more commonly known in the Latin tradition as the or ) is a fourth-century non-canonical apocalypse and part of the New Testament apocrypha. The full original Greek version of the Apocalypse of Paul is lost, although fragmentary versions still exist. Using later versions and translations, the text has been reconstructed, notably from Latin and Syriac translations of the work.

The text, which is pseudepigraphal, purports to present a detailed account of a vision of Heaven and Hell experienced by Paul the Apostle. While the work was not accepted among Church leaders, it was quite commonly read in the Middle Ages and helped to shape the beliefs of many Christians concerning the nature of the afterlife. Numerous surviving manuscripts in many languages attest to its popularity. In particular, Dante likely was familiar with the work, and it influenced The Divine Comedy.

According to the Apocalypse, Christians will be judged immediately after their death and sent to either heaven or hell based on a report of their deeds from a guardian angel. Monastics such as monks and ascetics receive special attention, with the possibility of both much better and much worse fates than the average Christian based on whether they kept the correct theology, kept to their appointed fasts, practiced what they preached, and so on. At the end of the text, Paul or the Virgin Mary (depending on the manuscript) manages to persuade God to give everyone in Hell a day off every Sunday.

Authorship and date

thumb|upright=1.3|The Roman Empire around 400 AD. The author was a Greek-speaking Christian, suggesting an origin in the eastern half of the Empire; scholars suggest [[Roman Egypt as likely. The reign of Emperor Theodosius I saw Christianity's stature greatly burnished, with it becoming the state religion of the Empire in 380.

The author of the Apocalypse of Paul was probably Egyptian. Some scholars such as Emiliano Fiori have argued that it was more specifically composed at a Pachomian monastery in Egypt, although other scholars think the evidence is insufficient. The text had to exist by 415, as Augustine of Hippo makes a disparaging comment about it in his Tractates on the Gospel of John.

Earlier influences

The author seems to be familiar with the "Book of the Watchers" in the Book of Enoch, the Apocalypse of Zephaniah, and the Apocalypse of Peter as influences on the work. Nevertheless, the accounts of Heaven and Hell in the Apocalypse of Paul differ from its predecessors in some major ways. The Apocalypse of Peter was written during a period when Christians were a minority struggling to gain adherents, and tensions with pagans and Jews were a major issue. The Apocalypse of Paul was written much later when Christianity had become the accepted and majority religion of the Roman Empire. As such, much of its focus is not on external issues, but rather issues internal to Christianity. More devout and ascetic Christians will be rewarded additionally in heaven beyond what is given to more passive Christians; Christians who err in some manner, whether by heresy, or a failure to uphold ascetic vows, will be condemned to hell. The text gives little to no discussion to non-Christians, seemingly considering them irrelevant; its Hell is one of punishment for faulty Christians.

As a work written in Greek, the author was likely influenced by the general cultural milieu of Hellenistic philosophy of the era. The world's structure as described seemingly implies that heaven is across a vast ocean at the edges of the world, and similar ideas are seen in other Greek works. More generally, fantastic tales involving Greek gods were often set across the seas as places where difficult-to-verify wild tales could occur, such as the works of Homer (the Odyssey), Plato's Timaeus (featuring the story of Atlantis), and the 2nd-century Lucian of Samosata's satirical A True Story. The Apocalypse of Paul can be seen as something of a Christian update to the trope, although it is far more confident in the truth of its revelations than the less-certain stance of the Greek predecessor works.

The author was likely familiar with the Pauline epistles, most clearly 2 Corinthians due to its mention of someone visiting the third heaven, but also other letters of Paul. Some of the ideas, such as Paul's idea of a purified "body" (soma) for the righteous, clearly influence the Apocalypse. However, the Apocalypse of Paul's theology does not always entirely align with the 1st-century epistles, notably its angelology. Paul's work says nothing of angels being custodians of souls in the afterlife, and indicates instead that believers will be the future judges of angels themselves. The Apocalypse of Paul's names for angels were likely influenced by the Apocalypse of Peter, including Temeluchus and the tartaruchi.

Content

The text is primarily focused on a detailed account of Heaven and Hell. The chapters of the Latin manuscript of the text found in Paris are roughly organized as: Paul does find some dwelling in the City already, such as the Biblical prophets of Judaism and the patriarchs of the twelve tribes. Outside the city are wailing ascetics who were too proud of their asceticism, and are forced to wait for entry until Christ returns and their pride is appropriately chastened. The city itself is subdivided into twelve layers divided by twelve walls with twelve gates, with things becoming continually better and better the closer to the center inhabitants get. Those who deny themselves physical pleasure in the mortal world are rewarded wildly in the afterlife with better places in the City of Christ, closer to the center. There is an Ethiopic version of the work which features the Virgin Mary in the place of Paul the Apostle, as the receiver of the vision, known as the "Apocalypse of the Virgin".

The lost Greek original was translated into Latin as the Visio Pauli, and was widely copied, with extensive variation coming into the tradition as the text was adapted to suit different historical and cultural contexts; by the eleventh century, there were perhaps three main independent editions of the text. From these diverse Latin texts, many subsequent vernacular versions were translated, into most European languages, prominently including German and Czech.

Reception and influence

Ancient writers are generally hostile to the Apocalypse. Augustine called it a fraud that the true church does not accept; Sozomen wrote he investigated it personally and also found it inauthentic; and the 6th-century Gelasian Decree lists it as an apocryphal writing to be rejected. Samuel Anetsi denounces the Armenian version as the work of heretics. Despite this, the Visio Pauli maintained its popularity, hence the large numbers of copies, especially Latin ones. Its importance was great in the 8th–15th centuries. It was one of the most influential sources of medieval thought on the nature of the afterlife.

The Apocalypse was part of an adjustment in how Christians thought about the Last Judgment. In earlier works such as the Apocalypse of John (better known as the Book of Revelation) and the Apocalypse of Peter, the Second Coming of Christ was thought to be imminent, and the judgment of all souls would happen then. The Apocalypse of Paul's conception of a particular judgment where individual Christians are judged immediately after their death would prove more popular and enduring; Anthony Hilhorst writes that this change "explains [the Apocalypse of Paul]'s twelve centuries of success in the Christian world". Dante mentions the visit of the "Chosen Vessel" to Hell, presumably a reference to Paul's earlier trip. The Legend of the Purgatory of St. Patrick seems to draw from the Apocalypse of Paul, which itself then influenced the works of Geoffrey Chaucer.

Translations

Selected modern English translations of the Latin Paris manuscript of the Apocalypse of Paul (the most studied manuscript) can be found in:

(Duensing made the original translation to German; Santos Otero made the 1989 update to the German translation; Wilson made the translation from German to English)
(an update of the 1924 M. R. James translation, removing archaic phrasings)

Translations of other manuscripts can be found in:

(Greek text)
(Syriac text)
(Coptic text)
(Latin Arnhem manuscript, Middle German version, other Latin texts)

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Lenka Jiroušková, Die Visio Pauli: Wege und Wandlungen einer orientalischen Apokryphe im lateinischen Mittelalter unter Einschluß der alttschechischen und deutschsprachigen Textzeugen (Leiden, Brill, 2006) (Mittellateinische Studien und Texte, 34).-->

Notes

References

External links

, translation by M. R. James in the 1924 book The Apocryphal New Testament
"Apocalypse of Paul", overview and bibliography by Stephen C. E. Hopkins. NASSCAL: e-Clavis: Christian Apocrypha.
Bibliography on the Apocalypse of Paul, by Eileen Gardiner