Andrew Scholtz (Binghamton University (SUNY))
Why would anyone pray to see a neighbor crushed under the rubble of his house? Why cherish the memory of witnessing that neighbor beating his wife? Why petition one’s city to put one to death? For a speaker in Libanius, it is because one is agonizingly and incurably envious of a neighbor’s financial windfall, but how does that explain the speaker’s strikingly negative self-characterization? I argue that in Libanius’ rarely discussed Thirtieth Declamation, the speaker’s aim is, ultimately, to persuade the city to seize said neighbor’s property. But the speech does more, for it serves as an essay in the rhetoric of envy attribution, a little noticed feature of ancient rhetorical practice. Attributing envy to its speaker, the speech becomes a vehicle for Libanius to explore the mindset of, and to attack, the figure of the malicious rival.
In this imaginary speech, the speaker asks the city to sanction his suicide, ostensibly, to cure him of his envy. Yet his plea, as in other examples of “self-denunciation” (prosangelia, Russell 1983, 35–37), masks a deeper aim, here, to persuade the city to seize his neighbor’s property, and with a view to curbing that neighbor’s allegedly profligate ways and subversive potential (30.51, 68–70; cf. Libanius Declamation 12, on which, Russell 1996, 82). We do, however, sense a yet deeper level of argument when we reflect on the speaker’s delineation of his own character. Take, for instance, his envy admission, always oblique though never in doubt. To admit to an envious nature (phusin, 30.4) is, to my knowledge, unparalleled in ancient Greek literature, and no surprise. Envy, once disclosed to the world, brought shame and social stigma to the envier (30.4; Scholtz 2021, 353–354). Although our speaker tries to “spin” this admission in his favor (30.2–3, 46–47), other revelations undermine the attempt, especially those suggesting violent tendencies (30.20, 26) along with a disagreeable meddlesomeness (30.20; cf. polupragmosunē in Plutarch Moralia 518c).
Why, then, all this unsympathetic self-characterization? On the one hand, it demonstrates the rhetoric of envy attribution; indeed, as self-characterization highlighting the speaker’s ethical deficiencies (cf. Swist 2017, 442–448), it makes it all the more real for Libanius’ students. Aristotle teaches us the importance of emotion to characterization, and character to persuasion (Rhetoric 1377b16–1390b13). Envy attribution, which seeks to undermine an opponent’s case in Lysias (24.1–4) and in a second-century CE papyrus archive (Bryen 2009), makes sense of an actor’s words and deeds as malicious and self-interested (Eidinow 2015, 71–163). There is, though, more to Libanius’ speech than rhetorical demonstration. Reflecting, as do other declamations, “anxieties about contemporary events” and the declaimer’s own situation (Swist 2017, 432, 446–448 ), Libanius’ Thirtieth Declamation paints a damning portrait of the malicious rival willing to stop at nothing to derail another’s success, a familiar figure in the literary tradition (e.g., Aelius Aristides Hieroi logoi 337; Cassius Dio 52.2.2, 52.26.4), and one playing a prominent role in the rhetorician’s personal story (Van Hoof 2014, 44, 52).