Cover not available
Part of
Humour in the Beginning: Religion, humour and laughter in formative stages of Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Judaism
Edited by Roald Dijkstra and Paul van der Velde
[Topics in Humor Research 10] 2022
► pp. 82–92

The smile of the martyr

| Aix-Marseille University

A martyr smiling while interrogated or tortured is a topos of Early Christian martyrological literature. It is also present in stories on Jewish martyrs in the rabbinic literature. Authors of Acta and Passiones often oppose the laughter of the pagan crowd to the smile of the Christian martyr. The Greek word μειδιᾶν (‘to smile’) and γελᾶν (‘to laugh’) suppose different emotional attitudes as well as different facial expressions. This article aims to show how Christian authors use this opposition and propose the martyr’s smile as the final strategy of resistance against violence and as an ideal paradigm of Christian behaviour.

Keywords: smile, laughter, Early Christianity, martyrdom, martyr acts and passions, rabbi Akiva, violence
Article outline
  • Martyrdom as religious body practice
  • The smiling martyr
  • Stoic smile and eschatological smile
  • Smile versus laughter
  • Martyr’s jokes
  • Notes
  • Bibliography
Published online: 27 October 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/thr.10.08lan
References

Bibliography

Boulhol, P.
forthcoming) Répertoire de lieux communs et thèmes récurrents de l'hagiographie grecque et latine (IIe siècle – 1500) .
Boyarin, D.
(1999) Dying for God. Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism. Stanford: Stanford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ceccarelli, F.
(1988) Sorriso e riso. Saggio di antropologia biosociale. Torino: Einaudi.Google Scholar
Cozzo, A.
(2018) Riso e sorriso e altri saggi sulla nonviolenza nella Grecia antica. Milano: Mimesis.Google Scholar
Curtius, R.
(1939) Scherz und Ernst in mittelalterlicher Dichtung. Romanische Forschungen, 53/1, 1–26.Google Scholar
Fallada, H.
(1947) Jeder stirbt für sich allein. Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag.Google Scholar
Ferguson, B.
(2014) The Pleasure of Martyrdom. Mirabilia, 18, 116–136.Google Scholar
Giannarelli, E.
(2001) Anche i cristiani sapevano ridere. Ironia e humour dei santi. In S. Bianchetti et al. (Eds.), POIKILMA. Studi in onore di Michele R. Cataudella in occasione del 60° compleanno (pp.517–531). La Spezia: Agorà.Google Scholar
Graeber, D.
(2015) The Utopia of Rules. On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy. Brooklyn: Melville House.Google Scholar
Halliwell, S.
(2008) Greek Laughter. A Study of Cultural Psychology from Homer to Early Christianity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kelley, N.
(2006) Philosophy as Training for Death: Reading the Ancient Christian Martyr Acts as Spiritual Exercises. Church History, 75 (4), 723–747. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mandel, P.
(2014) Was Rabbi Aqiva a Martyr? Palestinian and Babylonian Influences in the Development of a Legend. In R. Nikolsky & T. Ilan (Eds.), Rabbinic Traditions between Palestine and Babylonia (pp.306–353). Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Morgan, J. R.
(1991) Reader and audiences in the Aithiopika of Heliodoros. In H. Hofmann (Ed.), Groningen Colloquia on the Novel, vol. 4 (pp.85–103). Groningen: Egbert Forsten.Google Scholar
Musurillo, H.
(1972) The Acts of the Christian Martyrs. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Ottenheijm, E.
(2017) Martyrdom as a Contested Practice in Rabbinic Judaism. In B. Becking, A.-M. Korte & L. van Liere (Eds.), Contesting Religious Identities. Transformations, Disseminations and Mediations (pp.219–239). Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Stroumsa, G.
(2004) Christ's Laughter: Docetic Origins Reconsidered. Journal of Early Christian Studies, 12, 267–288. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zellentin, H.
(2018) Typology and the Transfiguration of Rabbi Akiva (Pesiqta de Rav Kahana 4:7 and BT Menahot 29b). Jewish Studies Quarterly, 25 (3), 239–268. DOI logoGoogle Scholar