The benefactor's account-book: The rhetoric of gift reciprocation according to seneca and paul

Abstract

According to Seneca, a cardinal rule of benefaction is that the donor of a gift ought never to call attention to the fact that a gift has been given; it humiliates the donee and shames the donor. In reminding Philemon that he 'owes' Paul for the latter's mediation of the gift of salvation (Phlm 19), Paul breaks Seneca's rule. Both Seneca's 'virtuous' advice and Paul's 'shameful' breach of etiquette, however, are explicable as strategies calculated to maximize their access to valued goods and services-whether honor or the services of a wealthier man's slave-inflected by vastly different economic situations. © 2013 Cambridge University Press.