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The conclusion compares concisely how the different narrative textures and particularities of the tales of Hermas, Thecla, and Aseneth generate discrete representations of conversion. It also offers a compressed summary of some of the gender-laden elements in these conversion stories: virginity, celibacy, masculinity, self-mastery and desire. Each story offers a distinctive development of the thematic of desire, restraint, and conversion.

This chapter revisits the fictional story of Thecla of Iconium, a virgin who accepts Paul’s teachings of celibacy and asceticism and is ultimately authorized by Paul to “go forth and teach the word of God.” After summarizing and analyzing contemporary debates about the Acts of Thecla, Kraemer concludes that as in Justin Martyr’s Apology (with which Thecla may have some indeterminate connection), Christians are shown to be the true bearers of morality and piety, as demonstrated in their women, who index the presence or absence of these qualities in ancient social groups. Gender reversal is central to the text’s critique. Christian women exemplify masculine morality and piety: Christian men are deficient and elite polytheist men are the least virtuous, in all senses. Analyzing Tertullian’s opposition to women in positions of authority over men, and his defamation of the story of Thecla in particular as support for such views, Kraemer argues that positioning Thecla as a teacher authorized by Paul himself is part of real ancient Christian debates over the ability of women to assume offices and authority ordinarily constructed as masculine.

The focus of this chapter is the figure of Thecla, a female character who has seen significant scholarly attention in recent years. How does the textual transmission of the second-century Acts of Paul and Thecla come to rewrite and refashion the figure of Thecla? And how does Thecla come to be associated with books in literature and art? These questions are at the forefront of the chapter.

The chapter offers a close analysis of The Acts of Paul and Thecla, tracing how desire, restraint, and narrative transformation intersect with depictions of virginity, maternity, and masculinity. Select comparisons are made to the Greek romances Daphnis and Chloe and Leucippe and Clitophon as well as to The Acts of Peter and The Acts of Andrew. In Thecla’s fast-paced tale with minimal interiority, desire destabilizes the protagonist and propels conversion: social reidentification, ritual act, changes in language, changes in the self. Self-restraint and resurrection (companion values in this narrative) are not the antidotes to Thecla’s desire, but its objects. The reading is also informed by selections from several literary interpreters, including Judith Butler and Julia Kristeva, as they draw from psychoanalytic views of desire’s displacements, movements and returns.

Chapter three is an intensive study of one of the Apocryphal Acts of the apostles, namely, the second‐century Acts of Paul, which includes a long section about Thecla, a female companion of Paul from Iconium in Asia Minor. Thecla is probably a fictional character, but her story can tell us much about Christian attitudes toward rescue for the dead. On the night before she is to become a martyr for her Christian faith, Thecla utters a prayer for the dead pagan Falconilla, the daughter of Thecla's newly acquired pagan friend Tryphaena. Falconilla had appeared to her mother in a dream to request a transfer to the “place of the righteous,” and Thecla accomplishes this with her prayer.

The eighth and final chapter briefly surveys the history of posthumous salvation after Augustine. Central is a story told about Pope Gregory the Great (sixth century), who supposedly uttered a prayer for the salvation of the pagan Roman emperor Trajan, who had lived in the second century. In Eastern Orthodoxy, this prayer is often combined with that of Thecla for Falconilla as two examples of God's mercy even upon dead pagans. In the west, because of Augustine's influence, the story is retold to include the resurrection of the body of Trajan, since without physical baptism, no one who lived after Christ can be saved.

Scholars have long questioned whether the Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles, which feature prominent female characters, could have been written by or for women. This chapter argues against such a claim on the basis of the physical features of the textual remains—on papyri and parchment—of these books: the features of handwriting, quality of papyrus and parchment, and so forth show that the readers for these texts were not qualitatively different from reader of other texts in early Christianity.

Although mentioned in the New Testament as one of the cities visited by the Apostle Paul, the ancient city of Iconium is more famous today because of its Muslim mosques, its theological schools, and its connection with the great Sufi mystic known as Mevlana. Considered by many to be Turkey’s most religious city, modern Konya (ancient Iconium) is an intriguing place to visit because of its rich religious and architectural history. Known today as Konya, Iconium is located in south-central Turkey, approximately 170 miles south of Ankara. Situated in the Anatolian steppe, Iconium is one of the oldest cities in Turkey. Archaeological evidence indicates that the site of Iconium was occupied at least as early as the 3rd millennium B.C.E. During the 2nd millennium, the Hittites controlled the area. After the Hittite empire was destroyed, eventually the Phrygians gained control of the region and established a town at the site of Iconium. The Lydians took control of Iconium at the beginning of the 7th century, and then the following century the Persians ruled the area. When Alexander the Great defeated the Persians in the 4th century, Iconium became a part of Alexander’s empire. After Alexander’s death, Iconium was controlled by the Seleucids and then by the Pergamene rulers. In 129 B.C.E., four years after the Pergamene kingdom was bequeathed to Rome, Iconium was made a part of the Roman province of Asia. During the Roman period, Iconium was the seat of an archbishop and the location of an early church council (in 235). The city prospered under the Romans and also during the Byzantine time. From the 7th to the 9th centuries Iconium, like most of the towns and cities in the region, suffered from Arab raids. The Seljuk Turks unsuccessfully attacked the city in 1069, but by the next century they had taken control of the city, which they called Konya. As the capital of the Seljuk sultanate of Rum, Konya enjoyed a period of economic and cultural prosperity. Several of the mosques, mausoleums, and theological schools that can be seen in Konya today date from this period.

This book suggests that the phrase “apophatic bodies” disrupts the conventional binary of transcendence and materiality. In this chapter, this disruption is examined by focusing on ancient Christian representations of the bodies of the saints. In so doing, it addresses a particular problematic in late ancient Christianity that developed in the course of the burgeoning of the cult of the saints in the fourth and fifth centuries. In the light of such images, the chapter argues that late ancient hagiography accomplished the transformation of the literal body into a deeper truth. Holy bodies like Saint Thecla's are epiphanies of transfiguration that occupy a signifying space between transcendence and immanence; and just as they avoid idolizing the material, so they also deconstruct naive or insipid notions of spiritual presence in the world. Theophanic and human at the same time, the subtle embodiments of late ancient hagiography were supremely indirect, and in that indirectness lies their unsaying, their sidestepping; in short, these subtle embodiments are the hagiographical version of apophasis.

This chapter argues that Thecla’s modesty and her leadership reflect the cultural conventions of the time. Thecla exhibits conventional gendered virtues like modesty, chastity, and piety. The establishment of her virtue early in the story provides a basis for her later leadership. Her later actions do not depart from standards of women’s virtue, but reflect conventions of women’s leadership. These practices are also reflected in the characters of Theolceia and Tryphaena, who play important roles in the plot of the story. Although Thecla remains unmarried, the story does not necessarily forbid marriage. Many early readers were likely to see Thecla as an exemplar of virtues that were cultivated by married and unmarried believers alike.

The notion that sexuality in the Greek and Roman periods was predicated on a social-sexual hierarchy that casts relationships in the binary terms of active penetrator and passive, penetrated object has been both influential and controversial over the last 30 years. Both the articulation of this hierarchy and its critique have been haunted by various gendered and identitarian investments, leading to several theoretical and historical impasses. Relatedly, contemporary theories of sexuality—including Freud and Lacan—almost universally imagine penetrative or traumatic wounding as primary models for sex and relational encounters at large. This chapter offers up the Acts of Paul and Thecla—a second century text that has also been associated with martyrdom literature—as an intervention into the continuing predominance of penetrative models as a grid for understanding erotic relations. It reads Thecla’s story (and some of the author’s own resonant personal experiences) as an archive of erotic experiences that fall just outside the grid of legible experiences.

Augustus’s prioritization of family life to promote his own masculinity resulted in a simultaneous emphasis on motherhood in the Roman world. Not only did motherhood advertise a man’s masculine purposing of his woman/wife, but it was also a legitimate path to increased agency for free(d) women. Situated in this context, New Testament and other early Christian traditions offer varying constructions of “feminine virtue,” some of which prioritize or assume motherhood and others of which downplay or even reject it. This chapter examines these themes in the Pastoral Epistles, New Testament household codes (Col 3:18–4:3; Eph 5:21–6:9; 1 Pet 2:9–3:12), the Acts of Thecla, Acts of Andrew, and the Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas. In their sustained wrestling with and formations of Christian gender(s), these writings present salvation as masculinization for all followers of Christ, but they disagree on whether motherhood should be a part of this process.

This chapter offers a close reading of a fifth-century work of hagiography, called The Life and Miracles of Thekla. The chapter analyzes the work from the point of view of the geographical orientation of specific miracles Thekla is said to have worked. The geographical imagination of the author arranges the miracles in concentric circles based upon his local knowledge of the region. This close reading is a practical example of using “cartographical thinking” to understand late antique literature. The chapter then proposes some more general conclusions about how the Miracles of Thekla intersects with broader trends in literary geography in Late Antiquity.

Although overshadowed in the New Testament by a different Antioch (Antioch on the Orontes), Antioch of Pisidia was an important city during Hellenistic and Roman times. Archaeological excavations have uncovered the remains of a thriving city, complete with theater, baths, temples, stadium, nymphaeum, paved streets, and aqueduct. Augustus had a copy of his famous Res Gestae, the list of his accomplishments, inscribed on his sanctuary in the city. Several cities in the ancient world were called Antioch, named for various members of the Seleucid dynasty who bore the name of Antiochus. Antioch of Pisidia was located approximately 0.5 mile northeast of the modern town of Yalvaç and 22 miles southwest of Akşehir. (Pisidia was a mountainous region in the south-central section of Asia Minor.) Antioch was actually not a part of the Pisidian region but lay just north of Pisidia in the region of Phrygia. The city was sometimes called Pisidian Antioch (see Acts 13:14), meaning “Antioch near Pisidia,” as a way of distinguishing it from other cities named Antioch. When the Romans established the province of Galatia in 25 B.C.E., Antioch became a part of Galatia. In 295 C.E. the Romans redivided the area, creating the province of Pisidia, with Antioch as its capital. Antioch is situated on the southern foothills of the Sultan Mountains, on the northwest side of the Yalvaç River (ancient Anthius River). The city was spread over seven small hills, reminiscent of the seven hills of Rome, a similarity that was not lost on the Romans, who divided the city into seven districts, one on each of the seven hills. Backed up to the Sultan Mountains, Antioch enjoyed good natural defenses. Strategically located, the city was important both militarily and commercially. The land around Antioch was fertile, producing a variety of fruit and grains. Although a precise date cannot be determined, the city of Antioch was founded in the first half of the 3rd century B.C.E. by the one of the Seleucid rulers, either Seleucus I, Antiochus I, or Antiochus II. The Seleucids established several cities in the region, including Apollonia, Seleucia (Seleucia Sidera), and Laodicea Catacecaumene.

At one time one of the most important cities in Lycia, Myra almost has passed into obscurity. In addition to some interesting tombs and a theater, the most enduring legacy of ancient Myra is the tradition that developed around its most famous resident and bishop, St. Nicholas, who was the historical person behind the legend of Santa Claus. Popular etymology explained the name of the city as being derived from the Greek word for myrrh, an aromatic spice, but this is unlikely. Myra was a city in the Lycian region of Anatolia, along the Mediterranean coast approximately 85 miles southeast of modern Antalya. The ruins of ancient Myra lie about a mile north of Demre (or Kale), a small town along highway 400, the coastal road. Signs in the town point the way to Myra. The ancient city was considered a port city, even though it was about 3.5 miles from the coast. Its port was actually Andriace, but the name Myra often included the city proper and its port at Andriace. Thus, for example, when Acts 27:5 states that the ship carrying Paul landed at Myra, the actual port would likely have been Andriace. Whether Paul and the others with him went to Myra after disembarking from the ship is not known. The Myrus, or Andracus, River (Demre Çayï) flowed past the city on its way to the Mediterranean. Settled probably as early as the 5th century B.C.E., Myra became one of the leading cities of the Lycian League by the 2nd century B.C.E. Myra was one of the six most important members of the league, which consisted of twenty-three cities. As such, it was entitled to three votes in the league (the maximum allowed). In spite of its importance, the city does not seem to have played a major role in ancient history. During Roman times the city apparently enjoyed good relations with Rome. Augustus (and after him, Tiberius as well) was honored by the people of Myra by their bestowing on him the title of “imperator of land and sea, benefactor and savior of the whole universe.”

Scholars have argued that the later church “domesticated” Thecla, muting her power as it shut down leadership options for women. Instead, this chapter argues that Thecla remains powerful in the later traditions, although some writers also convey her modesty. The chapter surveys portraits of Thecla in literature and art, with special attention to four, those of Tertullian, Methodius, Ambrose, and Pseudo-Basil. Thecla serves a variety of purposes, but she remains a powerful figure and an exemplar of active discipleship. These ancient interpreters see no contradiction between Thecla’s story and 1 Timothy, but instead present Thecla as a disciple of Paul. Thecla’s popularity is not limited to unmarried believers. Her devotees include men and women, and married and unmarried people.

The conclusion summarizes the argument of the book with an eye to how the same approach may be applied to other early Christian texts. The interpretation of Thecla suggests a different way of understanding women’s leadership in the early church. Although women were broadly constrained by the inequities of their culture, both married and unmarried women took on leadership roles and exerted social influence. Like women in the culture at large, Christian women were not free to do whatever they pleased. However, social norms encouraged women to exercise leadership, even as they were exhorted to modesty. Virtuous women’s leadership and influence exist within and across various Christian subgroups rather than demarcating boundaries between them.