Roman Persecutions of Christians

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Roman Persecutions of Christians

• Causes and Motivations

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Mosaics ad bestias (Zliten mosaic)
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Roman Views on Christians
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Punishments were also inflicted on the
Christians, a sect professing a new and
mischievous religious belief.Suetonius, Nero,
16
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Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most
exquisite tortures on a class hated for their
abominations, called Christians by the populace.
Christus, from whom the name had its origin,
suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of
Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators,
Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous
superstition, thus checked for the moment, again
broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of
the evil, but even in Rome, where all things
hideous and shameful from every part of the
world find their center and become
popular.Tacitus, Annals, 15.44
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We too are religious, and our religion is
simple, and we swear by the Genius of our lord
the emperor, and we pray for his welfare, as you
also ought to do.

• Vigellius Saturninus, proconsul of Africa in 180
  CE, to the Scillitan martyrs

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The Christians were seen as religious fanatics,
self-righteous outsiders, arrogant innovators,
who thought that only their beliefs were true.
However, Roman belief in divine providence, in
the necessity of religious observance for the
well-being of society, and in the efficacy of
traditional rites and practices, was no less
sincere than the beliefs of the
Christians.Robert Wilken, Christians As The
Romans Saw Them
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The Major Persecutions
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Chronology of the Persecutions

• Neronian Persecution and the Great Fire of 64 CE
  (July 18-26) Christians as Scapegoats (see
  Tacitus, Annales, 15.44.3-8 Suetonius, Nero,
  16.2)
• Uncertain Policy Trajan and Pliny, 112 CE (see
  Pliny the Younger, Letters, 10.96-97)
  
• Second Century CE Sporadic Pogroms under
  Antoninus Pius (138-161) and Marcus Aurelius
  (161-180)
  

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The Great Persecutions

• The Decian Persecution (249-251) emperor Decius
  orders Christians to renounce their faith and
  restore pax deorum
  
• Persecution under Valerian, 257-259 relative
  tolerance from 260-303
  
• The Great Persecution of 303-311 under Diocletian
  (284-305) and Galerius (293-311)

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The Roman Government and Persecution of Christians

• Inconsistent, Ill-Defined, Sporadic

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Dear TrajanIt is my regular practice, my
lord, to refer to you all matters about which I
am in doubt for who can better guide me in my
hesitation or instruct me in my ignorance? I have
never dealt with investigations about Christians,
and therefore I dont know what is usually
punished or investigated, or to what
extent.Pliny, governor of Bithynia, 111 CE
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Dear PlinyIt is not possible to establish a
general law which will provide a fixed standard.
However, these people are not to be searched out.
If they should be brought before you and proved
guilty, they must be punished, with this proviso,
however, that anyone who denies that he is a
Christian and proves this by his action, that is,
by worshipping our gods, even if he has been
suspected in the past, should obtain pardon
because of his repentance.Pliny the Younger,
Letters, 10.96-97
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It is important to remember that the standard
procedure in punishing Christians was
accusatory and not inquisitorial a governor
would not normally take action until a formal
denunciation (delatio nominis) was issued by a
delator, a man who was prepared not merely to
inform but actually to conduct the prosecution in
person, and to take the risk of being himself
arraigned on a charge of calumnia, malicious
prosecution, if he failed to make out a
sufficient case. De Ste Croix, Why Persecuted
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In reality, persecution went on automatically,
if sporadically, whoever the emperor might be
and until the third century at any rate it is
better not to think of persecutions primarily in
terms of emperors. It was the provincial governor
in each case who played the more significant
roleand even his attitude might be less
important than what I must call public opinion.
If the state of local feeling was such that no
one particularly wanted to take upon himself the
onus of prosecuting Christians, very few
governors would have any desire to instigate a
persecution. De Ste Croix, Why Persecuted
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The Charge against Christians

• The Name and the Crimes (nomen et flagitia)
• Piety in the Roman Empire (pietas et communitas)
  civic religion. Tertullian (ca. 200 CE),
  Apologetica 10.1 You dont worship the gods,
  and you dont offer sacrifice to the emperor.
• Legal Formalities cognitio extra ordinem
  (extraordinary cases for criminal, not civil,
  law).

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Unfortunately, the official publication of
imperial constitutiones seems to have been an
extremely inefficient and haphazard process, and
a conscientious governor might often find himself
in great perplexity as to what the law was. De
Ste Croix, Why Persecuted
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under the cognitio process no foundation was
necessary, other than a prosecutor, a charge of
Christianity, and a governor willing to punish on
that chargeDe Ste Croix, Why Persecuted
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The Glory of Martyrdom

• Christianus/a sum (I am a Christian)
• Voluntary Martyrdom (Eusebius Lives of the
  Christian Martyrs)
  
• Ignatius (early 2nd century CE), Letter to Rome,
  4.1-2, 5.2-3 Come fire and cross and encounters
  with beasts, incisions and dissections, wrenching
  of bones, hacking of limbs, crushing of whole
  body.
• Precedents for Martyrdom in Judaism (Maccabees I,
  IV)
  
• The Emulation of Christ (imitatio Christi)

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Why Persecute Christians?

• Exclusivity
• Anti-Social Behavior
• Christian/Jewish Conflicts
• Christian/Pagan Conflicts
• The Pagan Charge of Atheism Grass Roots Pogroms
• Political Subversion

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Christians might also be suspectin the eyes of
some governors, because they worshipped a man who
had admittedly been crucified by a governor of
Judaea, as a political criminal, who thought of
himself as king of the Jews. Their loyalty to
the state, whatever they might say, could well
appear doubtful, if only because they refused
even to swear an oath by the emperors Geniusone
of their books spoke with bitter hatred of
Romethe secrecy of their rites might well seem a
cover for political conspiracy, or at any rate
anti-social behavior. A governor who had such
considerations in mind when trying Christians
mightfind them guilty of maiestas
(treason).De Ste Croix, Why Persecuted?