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CyYPRIAN’s AD DONATUM AS A MYSTAGOGIC PROTREPTICUS THIRD PART: PROTREPTIC In a recent study,?? Enno Edzard Popkes observes that what Cyprian says about baptism in Ad Donatum fits well with his later baptismal theology. Stylistically, however, Ad Donatum differs from what Cyprian teaches later as a bishop. Popkes explains this. In Ad Donatum, he contends, Cyprian is still much closer to what he heard as catechumen and to what he experienced when he was baptized.”? Furthermore, Cyprian as a bishop teaches for certain types of given pastoral reasons, whereas Cyprian in Ad Donatum follows literary intentions. They may partially be called autobiographical, as Popkes suggests, but we have to take into account that Cyprian clearly focuses on his conversion, which culminates in his baptism. This is a parallel not only to Augustine’s Confessions, but also to many other early Christian apologies. In this genre, in fact, as Jakob Engberg shows,” the author at least mentions his own conversion and thus encourages his audience to follow him. Donatus is certainly a synecdochic addressee. The intended one, of course, is every reader. Nevertheless, Cyprian clearly concentrates on this encouragement. So Ad Donatum could be classified as a protrepticus, as Marian Szarmach suggests.”° His objections, however, of superficiality (290: “Dieses Werk ist im Hinblick auf den Inhalt oberflächlich”) and of rhetorical conventionality (esp. 294-295), as well as older interpretations ofthe work as ahintto aclumsy neophyte,”° disregard the subtlety of Cyprian’s writing. Ad Donatum is a careful mystagogy, as we have discussed above, not a baptismal catechesis, and we may not expect dogmatic completeness. And although, as Szarmach stresses, Cyprian makes use of rhetorical commonplaces, Ad Donatum, seen as a protrepticus, remains a very purposeful composition. I will try to illustrate this on the basis of two observations. The first one concerns the audience, the second one concerns the way in which Cyprian communicates with Donatus, who represents the audience. As to the audience, Cyprian’s writing is very reader-oriented. In addition to the artful prose, with its rhetorical stylization and elaborate rhythm, the subtle allusions to the classics also suggest an audience that obviously belongs to the well-educated upper class. Also, two other aspects indicate the social status of the intended audience: ?? Popkes, Tauftheologie, 1053-1054. ® Popkes, Tauftheologie, 1053. 4 Engberg, Education. Szarmach, Protreptik. Presented and persuasively refuted by Gassman, Conversion, 248-256. 25 26 +4] » Daréczi-Sepsi-Vassänyi_Initiation_155x240.indb 41 6 2020.06.15. 11:04:11
