From Haimorrhoousa to Veronica? The Weaving Imagery in the Homeric Centos Anna Lefteratou Κύριε, ἡ ἐν πολλαῖς ἁµαρτίαις περιπεσοῦσα γυνή, τὴν σὴν αἰσθοµένη θεότητα, µυροφόρου ἀναλαβοῦσα τάξιν, ὀδυροµένη µύρα σοι, πρὸ τοῦ ἐνταφιασµοῦ κοµίζει. Οἴµοι! λέγουσα, ὅτι νύξ µοι, ὑπάρχει, οἶστρος ἀκολασίας, ζοφώδης τε καὶ ἀσέληνος, ἔρως τῆς ἁµαρτίας. O Lord, the woman who had fallen into many sins perceived Thy divine nature, taking upon herself the duty of a myrrh-bearer, weeping, brings you myrrh before your burial, saying: “Woe is me! For with me is darkness, the sting of licentiousness, murky and moonless the lust of sin.” Cassiane, Hymn, 9th cent.1 I N THE SIXTH BOOK of the Iliad, Hector famously tells Andromache she should stop worrying about the outcome of the war and mind her female business, “her distaff and her loom, and order her handmaids” (490–493). The obedient Andromache goes to her chambers where she weaves a beauti- ful purple double cloak for Hector and orders her handmaids to prepare a hot bath for him. But her work is interrupted by the cries of the onlookers on the walls of the city who witness Hector’s death at the hands of Achilles. Andromache arrives on the wall only to see Hector’s corpse being dragged behind Achilles’ chariot. Her cloak will become a shroud for her dead beloved and the hot bath turns into ritual cleansing at the end of the poem.2 As early as Homer, women, mortal and god- 1 W. Christ and M. Paranikas, Anthologia Graeca Carminorum Christianorum (Leipzig 1871) 104. 2 Hom. Il. 2.440–444. M. C. Pantelia, “Spinning and Weaving: Ideas of Domestic Order in Homer,” AJP 114 (1993) 493–501, at 497, observes that ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 2017 Anna Lefteratou 1086 FROM HAIMORRHOOUSA TO VERONICA? desses, weave, non-stop, not only clothes but also tales; and together with the fabric they braid the flesh, entangling thus human reproduction with textile production.3 It is therefore not surprising that the Woman with the Issue of Blood, the Haimorrhoousa, in the Homeric Centos (HC) is also depicted as someone skilled at the loom. That said, in Recentio I of the HC, and only in this one, the Haimorrhoousa is explicitly presented as weaving a purple cloth with lines borrowed verbatim from the famous Andromache episode. In the shorter versions this detail does not appear, although the woman’s skill in weaving is praised. Despite this typical characterization of an epic female figure, the poem’s insistence on the weaving metaphors in this episode may well sound conspicuous. Given the later medieval ___ the cloth Andromache weaves and Hector’s shroud are both purple. See also N. Yamagata, “Clothing and Identity in Homer: The Case of Penel- ope’s Web,” Mnemosyne 58 (2005) 539–546, esp. 543. 3 C. Segal, “Andromache’s Anagnorisis: Formulaic Artistry in Il. 22.437– 476,” HSCP 75 (1971) 33–57, and J. Grethlein, “The Poetics of the Bath in the Iliad,” HSCP 103 (2007) 25–49, on the episode and its dramatic irony; on women, esp. Penelope and weaving/narrating, see I. Papadopoulou- Belmehdi, Le chant de Pénélope: Poétique du tissage féminin dans l’Odyssée (Paris 1994); M. A. Katz, Penelope’s Renown: Meaning and Indeterminacy in the Odyssey (Princeton 1991); B. Clayton, A Penelopean Poetics: Reweaving the Feminine in Homer’s Odyssey (Oxford 2004). For the body as embroidery in classical lit- erature see J. Scheid and J. Svenbro (eds.), The Craft of Zeus: Myths of Weaving and Fabric (Cambridge [Mass.] 1996). The monumental work on the begin- nings of weaving in antiquity is E. J. W. Barber, Prehistoric Textiles: The Development of Cloth in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages (Princeton 1991). For the theme of weaving having a first place among female epic poets see J. M. Downes, The Female Homer. An Exploration of Women’s Epic Poetry (Newark 2010); K. S. Kruger, Weaving the Word: The Metaphorics of Weaving and Female Textual Production (London 2001); A. Bergren, Weaving Truth: Essays on Language and the Female in Greek Thought (Cambridge [Mass.] 2008); H. Harich-Schwarzbauer (ed.), Weben und Gewebe in der Antike (Oxford 2015). For the reception of the cento of another poetess in terms of the weaving metaphor see S. Schottenius-Cullhed, Proba the Prophet (Leiden 2016), esp. 100–102, 108, on Proba’s reception in the Renaissance as the product of the opposition of needle and pen, and “Reading Textual Patchwork,” in Weben und Gewebe 234–244. ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 ANNA LEFTERATOU 1087 associations of the Haimorrhoousa with Veronica and her cloth, can I HC represent an early stage in the development of the legend? And, if this is so, what would be the role in it of the traditional epic spinning metaphors? In what follows, I first examine one of the early associations of the Haimorrhoousa of the Gospels with the epic theme of weaving. I discuss briefly the transformation of the Haimorrho- ousa’s legend into that of Veronica and then I concentrate on the passage from the Gospels which is the main source of I HC. Secondly I discuss the relevant episode in I HC and the weaving metaphors that abound in the passage. My reading follows closely the poetic text as it unfolds and reveals its complex intertextual debt to both epic and Christian sources as well as their late antique interpretation. This paper aims to show how the Homeric Centos may help us understand the early stage of the merging of Greek myths and Christian legends and how the particular tale about the Haimorrhoousa and her loom may encourage discussion of gendered poetics in late antiquity and support the attribution of I HC to a woman. If I am cor- rect, this poetess could not have been other than Eudocia, a philosopher’s daughter who became the wife of Theodosius II, and probably the redactor of the first edition of the HC, the longest one.4 4 Together with some MSS. of various versions of the HC, an epigram attributed to a female author is transmitted, and it is attributed to Eudocia Athenaïs: R. Schembra, Homerocentones (Turnhout 2007) cxxxiii–cxlii. The various collections of centos are alternatively attributed to: Patricius, a con- temporary of Eudocia of whom we know nothing besides an epigram with his name that seems to be slightly earlier than the HC, see A.-L. Rey, Centons homériques (Paris 1998) 39–40; Eudocia Athenaïs, Rey 41–56; a philosopher Optimus, mentioned in some MSS. but otherwise unknown, Rey 56; and a certain Cosmas of Jerusalem, a contemporary of John Damascene in the 8th century, Rey 58–59. Yet, as Schembra argues (cxliii), only Patricius and Eudocia are transmitted as authors and inventors of the centos. For Eudocia and the authorship of the centos see also A.-L. Rey, “Homerocentra et littérature apocryphe chrétienne: quels rapports?” Apocrypha 7 (1996) 123– 134; R. Schembra, La prima redazione dei centoni omerici (Alessandria 2006) ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 1088 FROM HAIMORRHOOUSA TO VERONICA? The Haimorrhoousa legend and its visual imprint One of the most popular medieval Christian legends tells how Veronica, the pious woman who was identified with the Woman with the Haimorrhage of the Gospels,5 came to hold the Mandylion, the veil with the face of Jesus: on the way to Calvary, the now healed Haimorrhoousa wiped away Jesus’ sweat with her cloth, resulting in Jesus’ image being imprinted onto it. This image was of particular importance in that it was acheiropoieton,6 not created by human hands (non manufactum), and thus received special veneration. This precious relic, the vera icon, the true image of the Lord, eventually became one of the ‘Holy Faces’ in circulation during medieval times, in both East and West. Yet Veronica’s legend is not the only aetiology of the ‘Sudarium’ or ‘Sindone’ or ‘Mandylion’ but one of the competing narratives that emerged in late antiquity and were revisited throughout the Middle Ages. For the time frame that concerns us here, mid 4th to mid 5th centuries,7 the most pop- ular legend in the East was that of King Abgar, whom Jesus healed from a distance by sending him an oral response and/or a letter and/or a portrait. This is the so-called ‘Image of Edessa’ that was taken to Constantinople in 944 and then, after the Crusades, to the West, where its popularity increased together with, and eventually was obscured by, the Veronica ___ cxxxiii–cxlii. For the centos in the context of late antique poetry see G. Agosti, “Greek Poetry in Late Antique Alexandria: Between Culture and Religion,” in L. A. Guichard and J. G. Alonso (eds.), The Alexandrian Tra- dition (Bern 2014) 287–312. 5 Mt 9:20–22, Mk 5:25–34, Lk 8:43–48. 6 The word first appears in Mk 14:58: “I will destroy this temple, con- structed by humans, and within three days I will build another, one not made by humans (ἀχειροποίητον).” 7 E. Kitzinger, “The Cult of Images in the Age before Iconoclasm,” DOP 8 (1954) 83–150, at 94, argues that it is “possible that the turn of the fourth century also witnessed symptoms and expressions of a belief in magic powers.” For the fourth century see also P. Brown, “A Dark-Age Crisis: Aspects of the Iconoclastic Controversy,” EHR 88 (1973) 1–34. ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 ANNA LEFTERATOU 1089 legend.8 The iconogenetic potential of this tale that grows from word into image is manifest: the oral reply of Jesus was eventually turned into a written letter, then transformed into a painting by human hands, and eventually into the acheiropoieton mandylion, an image of the unfathomed.9 However, there is an earlier tradition that links a woman, the Haimorrhoousa of the Gospels, with an image of Jesus, albeit not on a cloth but with a statue complex, and which is also reported by Eusebius:10 τὴν γὰρ αἱµορροοῦσαν ἐκ Πανεάδος ἔλεγον ὁρµᾶσθαι, τόν τε οἶκον αὐτῆς ἐπὶ τῆς πόλεως δείκνυσθαι, καὶ τῆς ὑπὸ τοῦ Σωτῆρος εἰς αὐτὴν εὐεργεσίας θαυµαστὰ τρόπαια παραµένειν. ἑστάναι γὰρ ἐφ’ ὑψηλοῦ λίθου πρὸς µὲν ταῖς πύλαις τοῦ αὐτῆς οἴκου γυναικὸς ἐκτύπωµα χάλκεον, ἐπὶ γόνυ κεκλιµένον, καὶ τε- ταµέναις ἐπὶ τὸ πρόσθεν ταῖς χερσίν, ἱκετευούσῃ ἐοικός· τούτου 8 For the term see E. Sidgwick, From Flow to Face: The Haemorrhoisa Motif (Leuven 2015) 246–248. The Edessa tale appears as early as the early fourth century: Eus. HE 1.13.1–20. However, Egeria in the fourth century does not mention the image although she records the legend of Addai. The first mention of the Image (not an acheiropoieton but a painting) appears in an early fifth century text called Doctrina Addai written in Syriac and translated into many languages, for which see A. Desreumaux, in F. Bovon and P. Geoltrain (eds.), Ecrits apocryphes chrétiens I (Paris 1997) 1480. The acheiropoie- ton mandylion appears in Evagrius Schol. (d. ca. 600) HE 4.27. The sources of the story can be found in E. von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legenden (Leipzig 1899) 200–213; see M. Guscin, The Image of Edessa (Leiden 2009) 141–144, for the first mention of King Abgar; for the Nachleben of the legend see Av. Cameron, “The History of the Image of Edessa: The Telling of a Story,” Harvard Ukrainian Studies 7 (1983) 80–94. 9 For the term ‘iconogenetic’ as “the moment of an image’s creation, of its emanation from matter or its awakening,” see Sidgwick, From Flow to Face 246–248. Sidgwick further associates the iconogenetic nature of the Hai- morrhoousa image with the fantasy of touch and of incarnation, namely the touch that brings salvation. 10 In Luc., PG 24.541 (cf. HE 7.18.2). A discussion of the woman’s faith is also in Eus. Dem.Ev. 3.4.23. Eusebius PG 24.541D and Asterius of Amaseia (d. ca. 425) Hom.Jair. (p.79 Datema) say that the statue was destroyed by Maximinus whereas Philostorgius says Julian (HE 7.3, PG 65.540B). Joh. Mal. Chron. 10.12 also mentions the statue. ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 1090 FROM HAIMORRHOOUSA TO VERONICA? δὲ ἀντικρὺ ἄλλο τῆς αὐτῆς ὕλης ἀνδρὸς ὄρθιον σχῆµα, δι- πλοΐδα κοσµίως περιβεβληµένον, καὶ τὴν χεῖρα τῇ γυναικὶ προ- τεῖνον· οὗ παρὰ τοῖς ποσὶν ἐπὶ τῇ στήλῃ ξένον τι βοτάνης εἶδος φυέν, ὃ, µέχρι τοῦ κρασπέδου τῆς τοῦ χαλκοῦ διπλοΐδος ἀνιόν, ἀλεξιφάρµακόν τι παντοίων νοσηµάτων τυγχάνει. They were saying that the woman with the issue of blood originated from Paneas, and that it is possible to show her house in the city, and that there still remains evidence of the Saviour’s kindness to her. For (they say) there is a bronze relief that stands on a high stone next to the doors of the house that represents a woman, on bent knee and her hands stretched before her, like a suppliant. And opposite this one there is another in the same material, a standing figure of a man, clothed decently with a double-folded cloak, and stretching his hand towards the woman. Next to his feet on the relief grows a strange kind of herb, which climbs up to the edge of the hem of the bronze double-folded cloak, a panacea that happens to be a remedy every sort of illness. Eusebius says that the Haimorrhoousa originated from Paneas (Caesarea Philippi) and that after being healed she ordered this complex bronze image to be placed in front of her house. The description is important in that it mirrors precisely the visual representations of the Haimorrhoousa that we find in the cata- combs and throughout late antiquity on sarcophagi and, later, on fertility amulets.11 This evidence shows that the tale of the 11 For the visual representations see von Dobschütz, Christusbilder 200– 213; B. Baert, “Who touched my clothes?: The Healing of the Woman with the Haimorrhage in Early Medieval Visual Culture,” Antwerp Royal Museum Annual (2009) 1–50; and Sidgwick, From Flow to Face. Nonetheless, in some cases the bleeding woman and Martha or Mary crouching at Jesus’ feet (Jn 11:32) are conflated, e.g. A. M. Ernst, Martha from the Margins: The Authority of Martha in Early Christian Tradition (Leiden 2009) 59–61; but Ernst does not mention the Paneas complex that would have been important for the visualization of the scene. The Haimorrhoousa has also been identified with Martha, Lazarus’ sister, as in Ambrose PL 17.698, dum largum sanguinis fluxum siccat in Martha; and other women, see L. Kusters, “Who is she? On the Identity of the Haemorrhaging Woman and her Wirkungsgeschichte,” Antwerp Royal Museum Annual (2009) 99–133. ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 ANNA LEFTERATOU 1091 miraculous healing had an iconogenetic potential similar to that of the Abgar legend: just as Abgar believed from a dis- tance, the woman in the Gospels believes without even pre- senting herself formally to Jesus;12 and just as Abgar’s beliefs were concretised in the visual form of an oral response/ letter/painting, the silent belief of the woman took the form of a metal relief that blurs the realms of art and reality.13 In Eusebius’ text emphasis is given to Jesus’ double cloak which he wears solemnly, διπλοΐδα κοσµίως περιβεβληµένος, the cloth, precisely, that transmits the healing. Furthermore, the strange plant that grows near the hem also becomes part of the image and mirrors the ‘original’ position of the woman in the legend as it too touches Jesus’ sculpted hem. Moreover, because it be- comes a panacea it also partakes of the real world by mediating between scripture, image, cloth, and healing-miracle. Thus as early as Eusebius the cloth and its artistic representation were endowed with a particular visual and miraculous power both as tales and as representations. The earliest association of the Haimorrhoousa with a matron called Berenice is found in Macarius Magnes’ Apocriticus (ca. 400?), according to whom the woman dedicated a sculpture in memory of being healed, although the story this time is situated in Edessa and not Paneas.14 Another association of the Hai- 12 Cf. Mk 5:34, “Daughter, your faith has made you well”; and the exegesis in John Chrys. In Matt., PG 58.507, “for never before had they been coming in this manner, pulling him (Jesus) into their houses, and seeking the touch of his hand, and his oral commandments (προστάγµατα διὰ ῥηµάτων) … but the Haimorrhoousa taught everybody true philosophy.” 13 Sidgwick, From Flow to Face 255: “iconogenetically speaking, the stone or the rock as the archetypical medium of an image paradigm … was eventually supplanted by the cloth or textile that mediates the vera icon. It is not clear whether the plant was depicted on the sculpture or grew on the ground. The issue would have been a sensitive one as the whole complex was meant to oppose similar classical images. 14 Apocriticus 1.6 (ed. U. Volp): “then Berenice, the matron of a famous city and an honored ruler of the great city of Edessa, was cleansed of the streams of impure blood and healed quickly of an awful woe … (Jesus made ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 1092 FROM HAIMORRHOOUSA TO VERONICA? morrhoousa with Berenice appears in the apocryphal Acta Pilati A, which circulated widely from the fourth century on15 and whose influence is important elsewhere in I HC.16 This time the woman comes to testify that Jesus’ was her healer indeed, with- out any mention of the image.17 None of these Berenices are depicted as possessing a veil or a cloth with the vera icon, and we have only mentions of statues, dedicated by the matron in Paneas or by the one in Edessa.18 In fact, we need to wait seven centuries or so before a clear mention of the Veronica legend appears.19 Had Eudocia (d. 460), or another author of the first ___ a miracle) that is up to now praised in song in Mesopotamia, rather throughout the whole world, this great cure; and the woman died after having sculpted the story piously in bronze (τὴν ἱστορίαν σεµνῶς ἀπο- χαλκεύσασα), as if the deed happened just now, not long ago.” 15 Acta Pilati, Greek A, 7.1 (239 Tischendorf): “And a woman called Bere- nice crying out from a distance said, ‘I had an issue of blood and I touched the hem of his garment, and the issue of blood, which had lasted twelve years, ceased’” (transl. J. K. Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament [Oxford 1993]). 16 For the Homeric Centos and Berenice’s role in apocryphal literature, especially the Acta Pilati A, see Schembra, La prima redazione 543–549, 560– 566, and K. O. Sandnes, The Gospel according to Homer and Virgil: Cento and Canon (Leiden 2011) 217–220. Cf. B. P. Sowers, “Thecla Desexualised: The St. Justina Legend and the Reception of the Christian Apocrypha in Late Antiquity,” in L. M. McDonald and J. H. Charlesworth (eds.), “Non- canonical” Religious Texts in Early Judaism and Early Christianity (London 2012) 222–238, for the reception of apocryphal literature in Eudocia’s paraphrase of Mart. Cyprian. 17 See also Baert, Antwerp Royal Museum Annual (2009) 39: “the plant keeps alive the earlier event in the inert matter of the bronze and transfers its remedial qualities to the statue.” 18 A marginal mention of Berenice, among the women who visit Jesus’ tomb, is found in the 5th-century Coptic Book of the Resurrection of Christ by Bartholomew 8, but we do not know whether it was translated into Greek: J.- D. Kaestli, in Ecrits apocryphes chrétiens 302. 19 It is not until the 13th century that the Mandylion of Edessa found its way to the West in the guise of Veronica’s cloth: supposedly after the sack of Constantinople in 1204 the Mandylion was transported either to Rome or to Paris, giving rise to many more veronicas. See G. Wolf, “From Mandylion ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 ANNA LEFTERATOU 1093 half of the fifth century, any of these elements of the legend at hand, this might have been the tale of the miraculous statue, and maybe an early identification of the Haimorrhoisa with a matron named Berenice. But most importantly, an early fifth century poet would have had at hand the canonical version of the miracle as it is narrated in the Gospels and its late antique exegesis, to which we now turn. The Haimorrhoousa in the Gospels As opposed to the complex medieval legend, the Synoptic Gospels describe the scene with fewer dramatic details. A woman who suffered from uncontrolled bleeding approached Jesus, touched the hem of his cloak, and was healed. In the longer Markan account (5:25–34): καὶ γυνὴ οὖσα ἐν ῥύσει αἵµατος δώδεκα ἔτη καὶ πολλὰ παθοῦσα ὑπὸ πολλῶν ἰατρῶν καὶ δαπανήσασα τὰ παρ’ αὐτῆς πάντα καὶ µηδὲν ὠφεληθεῖσα ἀλλὰ µᾶλλον εἰς τὸ χεῖρον ἐλθοῦσα, ἀκούσασα περὶ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ, ἐλθοῦσα ἐν τῷ ὄχλῳ ὄπισθεν ἥψατο τοῦ ἱµατίου αὐτοῦ· ἔλεγεν γὰρ ὅτι ἐὰν ἅψωµαι κἂν τῶν ἱµατίων αὐτοῦ σωθήσοµαι. καὶ εὐθὺς ἐξηράνθη ἡ πηγὴ τοῦ αἵµατος αὐτῆς, καὶ ἔγνω τῷ σώµατι ὅτι ἴαται ἀπὸ τῆς µάστιγος. καὶ εὐθὺς ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐπιγνοὺς ἐν ἑαυτῷ τὴν ἐξ αὐτοῦ δύναµιν ἐξελθοῦσαν ἐπιστραφεὶς ἐν τῷ ὄχλῳ ἔλεγεν· τίς µου ἥψατο τῶν ἱµατίων; καὶ ἔλεγον αὐτῷ οἱ µαθηταὶ αὐτοῦ· βλέπεις τὸν ὄχλον συνθλίβοντά σε, καὶ λέγεις· τίς µου ἥψατο; καὶ περιεβλέπετο ἰδεῖν τὴν τοῦτο ποιήσασαν. ἡ δὲ γυνὴ φοβηθεῖσα καὶ τρέµουσα, εἰδυῖα ὃ γέγονεν αὐτῇ, ἦλθεν καὶ προσέπεσεν αὐτῷ καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ πᾶσαν τὴν ἀλήθειαν. ὁ δὲ εἶπεν αὐτῇ· θυγάτηρ, ἡ πίστις σου σέσωκέν σε· ὕπαγε εἰς εἰρήνην, καὶ ἴσθι ὑγιὴς ἀπὸ τῆς µάστιγός σου. Now there was a woman who had been suffering from chronic bleeding for twelve years. Although she had endured a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all of her money, she had not been helped at all, but rather grew worse. ___ to Veronica,” in H. Kessler and G. Wolf (eds.), The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation (Bologna 1998) 153–179, and Guscin, The Image of Edessa 200. ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119 1094 FROM HAIMORRHOOUSA TO VERONICA? Since she had heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his robe, because she had been saying, “If I can just touch his robe, I will get well.” Her bleeding stopped at once, and she felt in her body that she was healed from her illness. Immediately Jesus became aware that power had gone out of him. So he turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?” His disciples asked him, “You see the crowd jostling you, and yet you ask, ‘Who touched me?’” But he kept looking around to see the woman who had done this. So the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came forward fearfully, fell down trembling in front of him, and told him the whole truth. He told her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed from your illness.” (Internat. Standard transl.) Mark is important for the HC since this version illustrates best the emotions of the participants and the social milieu in which the miracle takes place.20 The story is told with slight variations in the other Gospels, yet all the Synoptics associate this tale with that of the resurrection of Jaïrus’ daughter, who in Lk 8:42 happens to be twelve years of age. The link between the two cures is observed as early as Origen (d. 254) and the later commentators on Luke, who focus on the allegorical potential of the passage: the daughter of the High Priest and the polluted woman illustrate the pollution of the Jewish beliefs before Jesus’ arrival.21 Kuryluk shows that the two episodes are 20 In Mk 5:25–34 374 words, Lk 8:43–48 280 words, Mt 9:20–22 138 words. According V. K. Robbins, “The Woman who Touhed Jesus’ Gar- ment: Socio-rhetorical Analysis of the Synoptic Accounts,” NTS 33 (1987) 502–515, Mark, supposedly source of the Synoptics, emphasizes emotions and actions as the woman moves from the world of physicians to Jesus; Luke by contrast focuses on the public nature of the healing and her declaration of faith; while Matthew emphasizes her inner reasoning. 21 Orig. In Luc. fr.125 Rauer: “but she was gushing forth blood endlessly and suffered from the ‘blood-red sin’” (the passage is repeated in Cyr. Alex. Comm. in Luc., PG 72.637). This echoes Is 1:18, “If your sins are as scarlet (ἁµαρτίαι ὑµῶν ὡς φοινικοῦν), as snow they shall be white.” On the illness of the woman as φοινικὴν ἁµαρτίαν cf. Greg. Naz. Or. 40.33, PG 36.405B, “you were gushing forth the blood-red sin (τὴν φοινικὴν ἁµαρτίαν).” ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017) 1085–1119