Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 3,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (earthquake, clouds, wind, dew, rain, meteorits): Text and notes (Cambridge, 1940)

328 The relation of rain to Zeus

who seems to be preserving a Cappadocian oral tradition of the same event. Accordingly
Harnack constructs the following stemma:

Letter of M. Aurelius to the Senate Melitenian tradition

Zonaras

Nikephoros

Apollinarios, who was bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia and probably wrote only one 0
two years after the event, Tertullian, who composed his apologeticus in 197 A. D., and
Dion, an exact contemporary of Tertullian, are independent of each other, but all thi'ee
go back to a genuine letter of the emperor to the Senate—a document used by the authoi
of the extant forged letter. Tertullian implies that this genuine letter, perhaps ironicall} 1
spoke of the prayers of the Christian soldiers as having brought down the rain (apoL 5 a
nos e contrario edimus protectorem, si litterae M. Aurelii gravissimi imperatoris requirantvu,
quibus illam Germanicam sitim Christianorum forte militum precationibus impetrato imb"
discussam contestatur). Christians of the east soon quoted the letter, putting their 0W11
construction upon it, and Dion half-polemically retorts with the, story of the rnag

si-

Arnouphis. Later writers refer to the prayers of the emperor himself. Petersen's hypo''16,
of the scene on the column as misconceived both by pagans and by Christians is
acceptable ('die Uberlieferung, wie sie Apollinaris, Tertullian und Dio bieten, kann n ^
auf die bildliche Darstellung zuriickgefiihrt werden'). We are forced to admit ■
historicity of the thirst which brought the Roman army into dire straits, the sudden r ^
effected by a rain-storm, the prayers of the Twelfth Legion, the Christianity of par
that Legion, the letter of the emperor, and its mention of the prayers of the Twelfth LeS'°^

L. D(uchesne) ' Le miracle de la Legion Fulminante' in the Bulletin critique 1894^ ,
476 and P. H. Grisar 'II prodigio della legio fulminata e la Colonna di Marco Au«e
in La Civilta Cattolica 1895 i. 202 ff. are in substantial agreement with Harnack.^ ^

A. von Domaszewski 'Das Regenwunder der Marc Aurel-Saule' in the RheW> ^
1894 xlix. 612—619 would completely discredit the Christian tradition. He lloldS]Jrst,
Petersen that the column shows, not the rescue of the Roman army from death by ^ ^
but the bursting of a thunderstorm. He notes that the column places this storm a •
beginning of the war, whereas the Christian tradition places its marvel at the close , ^
that all the legions had the lightning on their shields and the eagle on their staPten(js
simply as a symbol of Iupiter Optimus Maximus, protector of the army- He co ^
that Apollinaris was no contemporary of M. Aurelius, but as like as not was Lus ^
himself (!); that during the war with the Marcomanni the legio XII fitlmtn{(Qta
stationed in Melitene to guard the crossing of the Euphrates; and that, to Ju Jj^jjy
sepulchral inscriptions of s. iii, no Christians would have been likely to enlist vo ^ ^^jp
in the Roman army. Finally, he accepts Petersen's conclusions with regard to
of the whole legend. ^ /<5^ a's°

K. Weizsacker Einleitung zu der akad. Preisverteilung, Tiibingtn 0. Nov.