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Bell & Howell information and Learning Company 300 North Zeeb Road P.O. Box 1346 ‘Ann Arbor, Mi 48106-1346‘The Johns Hopkins University Abstract ECCLESIAL VIRGINITY: A CULTURAL ANALYSIS OF ROMAN ORIGINS by Lindsay J. Thompson Status Questionis This dissertation reintroduces a question, somewhat disregarded or discounted in Fecent years, regarding: the link between the Vestals and early Christian consecrated virgins. In a political interpretation of the ancient Roman virginity cult, this study demonstrates that female virginity was understood by both Christian and nonChristian Romans as a symbolic analogue of the securely intact body politic. Research Procedure ancl Methods This study employs disciplinary tools of philology, anthropology, history, and sexuality and gender studies in a critical analysis and interpretation of ancient texts Scholarly literature in theese disciplines was reviewed to identify useful models of inquiry and analysis for addressing questions of sexuality, virginity and gender in Roman myth, ritual, and social practice. The modest but substantial body of scholarship on the Vestals (Worlsford, Wissowa, Beard, Douglas, Comell, Staples) was examined, as was the literature on ancient virginity and female sexuality (Sissa, Dean-Jones, Rousselle, Joshel) The more prolific scholarship on early Christian virginity (Elm, Power, d"Izamay, ) and sexuality (Brown, Clark, Martin) was also examined. Key word searches were conductedon ancient Christian and classical texts to identify references to consecrated virginity. From these sources, a corpus of primary texts was defined and analyzed in detail to discern common themes and patterns. Results The analysis of texts and social context validates the hypothesis of cultural continuity, establishing a clear pattern of assumptions, inferences, and direct statements indicating the political character and significance of virginity among Christian and traditional pre-Christian Romans. The texts clearly indicate the political understanding of virginity held by ancient Romans themselves, both Christians and nonChristians. Conclusions Based on these findings, the study concludes that there is a direct link between the \Vestals and early Christian virgins based on their utility as a symbol of the civic body. Furthermore, the study concludes that the virginity cult was particularly useful to Nicene Christians in establishing its institutional identity and dominance as the privileged, authentic form of Christianity in the years following the conversion of Constantine.~~ rofessor Giulia Sissa Dissertation Advisor Department of Classics Professor Matthew Roller Dissertation Second Advisor Department of Classics Professor Toby Ditz Dissertation Reader Department of History Professor Anthony Pagden Disseratation Reader Department of History Professor William Connolly Dissertation Reader Department of Political ScienceFor Philip Francis Murphy imitor quod traxiChapter 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Title and Section Headings Introduction Nicene Ecclesiology Virginity and the Formation of the Nicene Church ‘The Intent and Focus of this Study Contributions of this Study to Contemporary Scholarship Theory and Methods History as Ethnography Human Experience and Cultural Structures of Meaning Power and Body Politics Gender and Culture Material Culture Summary Roman Civic Religion Roman Marriage, Family Life, and Gender Relations Roman Civile Identity: Romanitas Roman Religion Summary Roman Virginity and the Vestal Cult Vestal Mythology Vestal Rituals Ritual Patterns of the crimen incesti Interpreting Vestal Virginity vi Page 16 16 2 35 41 425 Early Ecclesial Virginity 154 Jewish Cultural Roots 157 The Founding Vision 162 Roman Foundations of Ecclesial Culture 172 ‘The Female Body and the Identity of the Early Ecclesial Culture 184 Early Christian Martyrs 191 Early Christian Women Virgins 203 6 Nicene Virginity 238 The Roman Founders of the Nicene Church 242 Ambrose 247 Jerome 287 Augustine 312 Roman Patterns of Nicene Ecclesial Virginity 330 7 Conclusions 333 Summary Findings 334 Summary Conclusions 342 Bibliography 345 Curriculum Vitae 361LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page Figure 1. Vedic sacred fires 80 Figure 2. Vestal Cult area in the Forum 7 viiiChapter 1 Introduction It is often said that one picture is worth a thousand words. As a “picture” of ecclesial culture, virginity speaks a language as compelling and familiar to the modern Christian world as it is mysterious and archaic.' Many Christians sing the popular John Wesley hymn about the Church as the bride of Christ, “from Heaven He came and sought her to be his only Bride; with his own blood He bought her, and for her life He died.”™ They recite creeds declaring their belief that Jesus’ mother was a virgin when he was born and the Roman Catholic Church asserts her perpetual virginity. The Catholic Church also retains consecrated virginity and celibate priesthood as the comerstones of apostolic religious life and priestly ministry. Contemporary Church documents still project virginity as a living ecclesial symbol The image of ecclesial virginity speaks from the depth of its distant Roman origins in the Vestal cult. Imbued with divine significance, Vestal virginity spoke in ' Recognizing that virginity is a living symbolic language among other Christian communions, the primary referent ecclesial body in this project is the Roman Catholic Church in which the meaning of cecclesial virginity is far more contested and its practice remains embedded in institutional structures. 1ancient Roman culture with a distinctly political voice that defined human purpose, power, and relationships according to categories and boundaries. Internally, the image of virginity sacralized the social order of Roman gender and class arrangements. Externally, it sacralized Roman political and military dominance of other peoples. Typically, the origins of ecclesial virginity have been traced to the New Testament, the Hebrew scriptures, patristic texts, and even Greek philosophy without reference to the Roman myth and ritual structures that were soil and substance in which Nicene ecclesiology developed. It is well understood that the Nicene church incorporated into its identity a sacrificial notion of purity encompassing belief (orthodoxy) and practice (asceticism) that placed a very high value on renunciation. Thus, renouncing false gods, beliefs, and human attachments of sexual love, family life, and property became an enduring element of Christian identity. Protestant churches have long since abandoned clerical celibacy and consecrated virginity as fundamental or privileged ecclesial practices, though many of them join Roman Catholics in retaining the mythic Nicene symbolism of the church as the virgin bride of Christ? 7 Text by John Wesley, public domain. : For example, in Lumen Gentium, the dogmatic constitution on the church developed by the Roman Catholic bishops of the world in 1964, the church is described as “the spotless spouse of the spotless lamb,” citing The Book of the Apocalypse (19.7, 21.2, 22.17) of the New Testament. Another New Testament source for this imagery is in Ephesians 5. The use of spousal imagery for the church is based in turn on New Testament imagery of the church as the body of Christ (Gospel of John 15, Corinthians 10, and Romans 12). The Old Testament book of Hosea employs spousal imagery, although in a radically different topos of the unfaithful wife and the longsuffering, forgiving husband. Of the many of the Latin and Greek Fathers employing spousal imagery for Christ and the church, Ambrose of Milan (De 2