‘This is the Word of the Lord’

Abstract

This chapter examines cases where authors use prosōpopoeia to puts words in the mouth of Christ—either revoicing speeches which are found in the gospels, or inventing completely new ones. It first studies various interpretations of the Sermon of the Mount which read it rhetorically, commenting on the setting, on the effect of Christ’s words (pathos and persuasion), and the way his words reveal his character (ethos and integrity). Next, it examines speeches invented for Christ in hagiographies, where he takes on the character of the president of the games, preparing martyrs for and standing by them in their ‘victory’—that is, their deaths in the arena. Prosōpopoeia can complement our usual sources of Christology: the use of prosōpopoeia as invented speech appropriate to a character one can draw conclusions about how certain authors viewed Christ. It also raises questions about how appropriate it was for an author to imitate Christ.