Aliens and Sojourners: Self as Other in Early Christianity

Diognetus critiqued non-Christians more sharply than Hebrews, however, by describing Christians as surpassing other Romans "in their capacity to live up to Roman ideals" (77). [...] Diognetus^s metaphor of the Christian in the world as the soul is in the body allowed the text to perpetuate the alien status of Christians, while maintaining that they were outstanding representatives of worldly Roman citizenship, Dunning's investigation of the Shepherd of Hermas in chapter 4 reveals another purpose for which Christians deployed the same topos.