Apollonius of Tyana (; Dzielska pp. 19–50.) was a Greek philosopher and religious leader from the town of Tyana, Cappadocia in Roman Anatolia, who spent his life travelling and teaching in the Middle East, North Africa and India. He is a central figure in Neopythagoreanism and was one of the most famous "miracle workers" of his day.
His exceptional personality and his mystical way of life, which was regarded as exemplary, impressed his contemporaries and had a lasting cultural influence. Numerous legends surrounding him and accounts of his life are contained in the extensive Life of Apollonius. Many of the ancient legends of Apollonius consist of numerous reports about miracles that he was said to have performed as a wandering sage with his lifelong companion Damis.
He was tried for allegedly having used magic as a means of conspiring against the emperor; after his conviction and subsequent death-penalty, his followers believed he underwent heavenly ascension. Most modern scholars of antiquity agree that Apollonius existed historically.
Life dates Apollonius was born into a respected and wealthy aristocratic Greek household. His primary biographer, Philostratus the Elder (), places him , however, the Roman historian Cassius Dio () writes that Apollonius was in his 40s or 50s in the 90s AD, from which the scholar Maria Dzielska gives a birth year of about AD 40.
Sources The earliest and by far the most detailed source is the Life of Apollonius of Tyana, a lengthy, novelistic biography written by the sophist Philostratus at the request of empress Julia Domna, wife of Septimius Severus. She died in AD 217, and he completed it after her death, probably in the 220s or 230s AD. Philostratus's account shaped the image of Apollonius for posterity. To some extent it is a valuable source because it contains data from older writings that were available to Philostratus but disappeared later on. Among these works are an excerpt (preserved by Eusebius) from On Sacrifices, and certain alleged letters of Apollonius. The sage may have actually written some of these works, along with the no-longer extant Life of Pythagoras.Dzielska pp. 138–146. At least two biographical sources that Philostratus used are lost: a book by the imperial secretary Maximus describing Apollonius's activities in Maximus's home city of Aegaeae in Aeolis and a biography by a certain Moiragenes. There also survives, separately from the life by Philostratus, a collection of letters of Apollonius, but at least some of these seem to be spurious.For discussion see Bowie, pp. 1676–1678.
One of the essential sources Philostratus claimed to know are the "memoirs" (or "diary") of Damis, an acolyte and companion of Apollonius. Some scholars claim that the notebooks of Damis were an invention of Philostratus,Among others, E. L. Bowie. (1978). Apollonius of Tyana: Tradition and Reality (ANRW 2, no. 16, 2) pp. 1663-1667. while others think it could have been a real book forged by someone else and naively used by Philostratus.Jaap-Jan Flinterman: Power, Paideia and Pythagoreanism, Amsterdam 1995, pp. 79–88; Dzielska pp. 12–13, 19–49, 141 Philostratus describes Apollonius as a wandering teacher of philosophy and miracle-worker who was mainly active in Greece and Asia Minor but also traveled to Italy, Spain, and North Africa, and even to Mesopotamia, India, and Ethiopia. In particular, he tells lengthy stories of Apollonius entering the city of Rome in disregard of emperor Nero's ban on philosophers, and later on being summoned, as a defendant, to the court of Domitian, where he defied the emperor in blunt terms. He had allegedly been accused of conspiring against the emperor, performing human sacrifice, and predicting a plague by means of magic. Philostratus implies that upon his death, Apollonius of Tyana entered heaven.Philostratus, Life of Apollonius 8.30-31.
How much of this can be accepted as historical truth depends largely on the extent to which modern scholars trust Philostratus, and in particular on whether they believe in the reality of Damis. Some of these scholars contend that Apollonius never came to Western Europe and was virtually unknown there until the 3rd century AD, when Empress Julia Domna, who was herself from the province of Syria, decided to popularize him and his teachings in Rome.Dzielska pp. 83–85, 186–192. For that purpose, so these same scholars believe, she commissioned Philostratus to write the biography, in which Apollonius is exalted as a fearless sage with supernatural powers, even greater than Pythagoras. This view of Julia Domna's role in the making of the Apollonius legend gets some support from the fact that her son Caracalla worshipped him,Cassius Dio 78.18.4; see on this Dzielska pp. 56, 59–60. and her grandnephew emperor Severus Alexander may have done so as well.Historia Augusta, Vita Alexandri 29.2; the credibility of this information is doubted by Dzielska p. 174.
Apollonius was also a well-known figure in the Islamic world, being referred to by the name Balinus.Martin Plessner: Balinus, in: The Encyclopaedia of Islam, vol. 1, Leiden 1960, pp. 994-995; ; Dzielska pp. 112-123.
Biography Historical facts With the exception of the Adana Inscription from the 3rd or 4th century AD,C. P. Jones, An Epigram on Apollonius of Tyana, The Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 100, Centenary Issue (1980), pp. 190-194 little can be derived from sources other than Philostratus.
The Adana Inscription has been translated by C.P. Jones as: "This man, named after Apollo, and shining forth from Tyana, extinguished the faults of men. The tomb in Tyana (received) his body, but in truth, heaven received him so that he might drive out the pains of men (or: drive pains from among men)." It is thought to have been brought from Cilicia, perhaps Aegae (Cilicia). However, Miroslav Marcovich translates part of the text as: "Sure enough, Apollonius was born in Tyana, but the full truth is that he was a heaven-sent sage and healer, a new Pythagoras."Miroslav Marcovich, The Epigram on Apollonius of Tyana, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Bd. 45 (1982), pp. 263-265
According to James Francis, "the most that can be said ... is that Apollonius appears to have been a wandering ascetic/philosopher/wonderworker of a type common to the eastern part of the early empire." p. 419. What we can safely assume is that he was indeed a Pythagorean and as such, in conformity with the Pythagorean tradition, opposed animal sacrifice and lived on a frugal, strictly vegetarian diet.Johannes Haussleiter: Der Vegetarismus in der Antike, Berlin 1935, pp. 299–312. A minimalist view is that he spent his entire life in the cities of his native Asia Minor (Turkey) and of northern Syria, in particular his home town of Tyana, Ephesus, Aegae and Antioch,Dzielska pp. 51–79. though the letters suggest wider travels, and there seems no reason to deny that, like many wandering philosophers, he at least visited Rome. As for his philosophical convictions, we have an interesting, probably authentic fragment of one of his writings (On sacrifices), in which he expresses his view that God, who is the most beautiful being, cannot be influenced by prayers or sacrifices and has no wish to be worshipped by humans, but can be reached by a spiritual procedure involving nous (intellect), because he himself is pure nous, and nous is the greatest faculty of humankind.Dzielska pp. 139–141.
Miracles Philostratus implies on one occasion that Apollonius had extra-sensory perception (book VIII, chapter XXVI). When emperor Domitian was murdered on 18 September AD 96, Apollonius was said to have witnessed the event in Ephesus "about midday" on the day it happened in Rome, and told those present, "Take heart, gentlemen, for the tyrant has been slain this day ...". Both Philostratus and renowned historian Cassius Dio report this incident, probably on the basis of an oral tradition.Cassius Dio 67.18.1 Both state that the philosopher welcomed the deed as praiseworthy tyrannicide.Cassius Dio 67.18; Philostratus, Vita Apollonii 8.26–27. See also Dzielska pp. 30–32, 41.
Journey to India Philostratus devoted two-and-a-half of the eight books of his Life of Apollonius (1.19–3.58) to the description of a journey of his hero to India. It's possible that the sage of Tyana indeed traveled to India, and it's also "entirely plausible" that he was attributed with this journey even before Philostratus.
According to Philostratus' Life, en route to the Far East, Apollonius reached Hierapolis Bambyce (Manbij) in Syria (not Nineveh, as some scholars believed), where he met Damis, a native of that city who became his lifelong companion. Pythagoras, whom the Neo-Pythagoreans regarded as an exemplary sage, was believed to have traveled to India. Hence such a feat made Apollonius look like a good Pythagorean who spared no pains in his efforts to discover the sources of oriental piety and wisdom. As some details in Philostratus' account of the Indian adventure seem incompatible with known facts, modern scholars are inclined to dismiss the whole story as a fanciful fabrication, but not all of them rule out the possibility that the Tyanean actually did visit India.Graham Anderson: Philostratus, London 1986, pp. 199–215; Flinterman pp. 86–87, 101–106. Philostratus has him meet Phraotes, the Indo-Parthian king of Taxila, a city located in northern Ancient India in what is now northern Pakistan, around AD 46. And the description that Philostratus provides of Taxila comports with modern archaeological excavations at the ancient site.John Marshall, A Guide to Taxila, 4th edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960, pp. 28-30, 69, and 88-89.
What seemed to be independent evidence showing that Apollonius was known in India has now been proven a forgery. In two Sanskrit texts quoted by Sanskritist Vidhushekhara Bhattacharya in 1943Bhattacharya, The Āgamaśātra of Gaudapāda (University of Calcutta Press) 1943 (reprint Delhi 1989). he appears as "Apalūnya", in one of them together with Damis (called "Damīśa"), it is claimed that Apollonius and Damis were Western yogis, who later on were converted to the correct Advaita philosophy.Bhattacharya (1943) 1989, pp. LXXII–LXXV. Some have believed that these Indian sources derived their information from a Sanskrit translation of Philostratus' work (which would have been a most uncommon and amazing occurrence), or even considered the possibility that it was really an independent confirmation of the historicity of the journey to India.The Cambridge History of Classical Literature, vol. 1, ed. P. E. Easterling and B. M. W. Knox, Cambridge 1985, p. 657; Dzielska p. 29; Anderson p. 173; Flinterman p. 80 n. 113. Only in 1995 were the passages in the Sanskrit texts proven to be interpolations by a late 19th-century forger.Simon Swain: "Apollonius in Wonderland", in: Ethics and Rhetoric, ed. Doreen Innes, Oxford 1995, pp. 251–54.
Writings Several writings and many letters have been ascribed to Apollonius, but some of them are lost; others have only been preserved in parts or fragments of disputed authenticity. Porphyry and Iamblichus refer to a biography of Pythagoras by Apollonius, which has not survived; it is also mentioned in the Suda.Flinterman pp. 76–79; Dzielska pp. 130–134. Apollonius wrote a treatise, On sacrifices, of which only a short, probably authentic fragment has come down to us.Dzielska pp. 129–130, 136–141, 145–149.