If Actually Dead

"Where did the Sage withdraw to, where did he disappear? After his many miracles, the renown of his teaching which spread to so many countries, he suddenly hid himself and nobody knew for certain what happened to him (nor did anybody ever see his grave). Some reported that he died at Ephesus. But Damis does not record that in his memoir. Damis says nothing about the death of Apollonios. Others said that he disappeared at Lindos. Or maybe the story is true about his assumption in Crete, at the ancient sanctuary of Diktynna. But then again we have that miraculous, that supernatural apparition of his before a young student at Tyana. Maybe the time has not yet come for him to return and show himself to the world again; or maybe, transfigured, he moves among us unrecognized—. But he will come again as he was, teaching the ways of truth; and then of course he will bring back the worship of our gods and our elegant Hellenic rites." These were the musings of one of the few pagans, one of the very few still left, as he sat in his shabby room just after reading Philostratos' On Apollonios of Tyana. But even he—a trivial and cowardly man— played the Christian in public and went to church. It was the time when Justin, known as the elder, reigned in total piety, and Alexandria, a godly city, detested pitiful idolators.