»C-i-*>f<' I^ivf theft Books [ fai the- fat^ruhng if or. CoUege in- i*% Celo^" ltK£g»S CHEISTIANITY' AND THE ROMAN GOVEENMENT CHEISTIMITY AND THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT A STUDY IN IMPERIAL ADMINISTRATION BY E. G. HAEDY, M.A. TORMEHLT FELLOW OF JESUS OOLLEQE, OXFOIiD LONDON LONGMANS, GKEEN, AND CO. AND NEW YOKK : 15 EAST 16«" STREET 1894 All Tights reserved PREFACE The origin of this little book, which is written from the point of view of Eoman rather than of Christian history, may be explained in a few words. It was suggested by, and owes its existence to, an article by Professor Mommsen in the ' Historische Zeitschrift ' of 1890, entitled, Der Religions/revel nach roniischem Recht. The criticism of Professor Mayor and others on the insufficient and too hastily written essay on Pliny and the Christians in my edition of ' Pliny's Correspondence with Trajan ' had led me to go into the subject with more thoroughness than I had hitherto given to it ; and I was already convinced that on two points at least — viz. the importance of the Neronian persecution, and the connexion of Pliny's action in Bithynia with the government atti tude towards collegia — I had followed quite erroneous views. It was Mommsen's article, however, which first seemed to give a clear and consistent account of the principles which underlay the action of the imperial government, not only towards the Christians, vi PREFACE but towards foreign religions of all kinds, and I deter mined by means of the clue furnished by it to attempt an historical resume of the relations between Chris tianity and the Eoman government during the first two centuries. I had been working at the literature of the subject and collecting materials for nearly a year and a half when Professor Eamsay's lectures on the Christian communities of Asia Minor were announced and delivered. As it was understood that these lectures were to be published, I put aside my own work, feeling that the ground was covered by his book, and intend ing, if possible, to make use of my materials in review ing his lectures when they appeared. Subsequently, however, wishing to make somewhat more use than this would have allowed of my own work, such as it was, I altered my mind and reverted to my former intention, in the hope that there would be found sufficient difference in scope, method and arrange ment to justify the existence of my little book side by side with, though at a respectful distance from, Professor Eamsay's. To say that I have produced it quite independently of ' The Church in the Eoman Empire ' is impossible, and would be ungracious, because no one could read the book, as I have done with care, without being indebted to it in innumerable ways. Still it is to Mommsen's article that I am bound to acknowledge my chief indebtedness, and I am not conscious PREFACE vii at my treatment of the subject is in any essential spect different from what it would have been if had written it before Professor Eamsay's book ipeared. In addition to Mommsen's article, already alluded , I have found most assistance from the following oks : K. J. Neumann, ' Der romische Staat und 3 aUgemeine Kirche;' C. Franklin Arnold, 'Die jronische Christenverfolgung ' and ' Studien zur jschichte der Plinianischen Christenverfolgung ; ' rerbeck, ' Studien zur Geschichte der alten Kirche ; ' !im, ' Eom und das Christenthum ; ' Lightfoot, ]he Apostolic Fathers ; ' Friedlander, ' Sittenge- [lichte Eoms,' vol. iii., 'Die religiosen Zustande;' irquardt, ' Staatsverwaltung,' vol. iii., ' Das Sacral- sen ; ' W. Liebenam, ' Zur Geschichte und Or- nisation des romischen Vereinswesens ; ' Schiirer, )ie Gemeindeverfassung der Juden in Eom in der dserzeit.' E. G. H. OxFOBD : January 25, 1894. CONTENTS SECTION I The ATiiTtTDE of the Republic towakds Fobeion Cdlts, 1-17 PAGE Statement of the problem and its difficulty . . .1 The nature of the Roman toleration only to be discovered by looking at its treatment of religions generally . . 3 The Roman religion national and political . . 4 Foreign gods brought to Rome 5 Foreign cults gradually adopted, such as those of Cvbele and Bellona 6 Other cults not authorised ... .... 7 Instances of interference by government with foreign cults limited to Roman citizens 8 Increasing laxity in this respect, instanced in cult of Magna Mater 9 State action exemplified in Bacchanalian conspiracy . . .10 InsufBeiency of national religion and need for something more emotional 13 Treatment of Isis cult 14 Practical policy of the government 15 X CONTENTS SECTION II The Tbbaiment of Judaism, 18-37 PAGE Attitude towards religion in the provinces 18 Problems presented by monotheism 19 Wide extension of the Jewish race 20 Its political position 21 Semi-political unity of the Jews and their readiness to sacrifice this for religious toleration 22 Privileges and immunities granted to the Jews . . . .23 Motives of the government 25 Different treatment of Jews at Rome and in the provinces . . 26 Action of Augustus and Tiberius 26 Of Claudius 28 Possible danger of the Roman policy towards the Jews . . 29 Consequences of the destruction of Jerusalem . . . .31 Arrangement of Vespasian : the religio licita , . . .32 Hatred and dislike of the Jews .33 Summary of the limitations to Roman toleration . . .35 SECTION III First Appeaeasce or Chbistiakity in the Eastern Pbovinpes, 38-53 A new problem presented by the non-nationality and universality of Christianity .38 Christianity at first regarded as a Jewish sect . . 39 The gospel first preached to Jews .... 39 Persecution on the part of the Jews 40 Roman government at flrst looked on Christians as Jews and protected them 41 Origin and growth of the name ' Christiani ' . . . .42 Political charges made by Jews against Christians . . .42 Gradual distinction between Jews and Christians . . 44 Growing unpopularity of the Christians ... 44 CONTENTS XI Christianity a social revolution . Persecution by Gentiles in the Acts . Disintegrating tendency of Christianity Opposition between Church and world Rumours of flagitia at Christian meetings Summary of the evidence up to Nero . PAGE . 45 . 49 . 50 . 51 . 52 . 53 SECTION IV Christianity in Rome under Neeo, 54-77 First collision of government with Christianity in Rome The community in Rome probably Gentile-Christian . First traces of Christianity in Rome . Paul in Rome Nero's action as reported l)y Tacitus . Difficulties in the account : view of Schiller Objections to his view Merivale's view : objections to it Reasons for thinking the account of Tacitus correct Course which the trial took .... The punishment of the Christians Evidence pf Clemens Romanus .... Of Melito and Suetonius ' Odium generis humani : ' what it implied The whole matter one of police administration . The Neronian victims punished as Christians . 5455 5658 59 606162636570 71 72737477 SECTION V ^^^ Chbistianity under the Flavian Empebobs, 78-101 Influence of the Neronian trials on the provinces . . .78 Jews and Christians distinguished from one another . . .79 Was the Flavian policy different ? Professor Ramsay's view . 80 Objeotions to it 81 xii CONTENTS page The Christians potentially outlaws and brigands since Nero . 82 Policy of Titus as evidenced by Sulpicius Severus . . .83 The persecution of Christians a standing one, but spasmodic . 84 Access of severity under Domitian 85 Evidence of Dio Cassius, of Suetonius, of Eusebius . . .86 Christianity of Flavius Clemens, Domitilla, and Acilius Glabrio 87 Course probably taken by the trials 88 The accused usually punished qua ' Christiani ' ... 89 Influence of the popular hatred 91 Grounds on which Christians could be executed . . . .91 Religious fanaticism greater in the provinces . . . .92 Test probably established under Domitian to identify the Chris tians 93 The imperial cult 94 More generally enforced under Domitian 95 Evidence of persecution in the Apocalypse . . . .96 The imperial cult used only as a test 98 No imperial policy as yet towards Christians . . . .99 The matter left to discretion of provincial governors . . . 100 Christianity a criminal offence in virtue of its obstinatio . . 101 SECTION VI Trajan and the Cheistuns, 102-124 Fortunate preservation of Pliny's letter 102 Christianity in Bithynia 103 Mission of Pliny : his correspondence with Trajan . . . 104 Course first taken by Pliny IO7 Probably based on precedents in accordance with the Neronian principle lOs Fresh cases of a more complicated kind IO9 Suspicions of flagitia : further investigations made by Pliny . lio Reason why Trajan is consulted HI Pliny's questions involve a reconsideration of the whole matter . 112 Trajan's rescript l, ^ CONTENTS xiii PAGE Its meaning 115 Opposite interpretations of it , 116 TertuUian's criticism 117 Outward respect to the state worship expected of all . . . 118 The Christians alone refused it 119 Not considered a practical danger, and toleration the rule . . 120 Except when popular hatred was too strong .... 121 Origen's statement as to small number of victims . . . 122 Trajan's rescript primarily local and not an edict either of pro scription or toleration . ....... 122 Probable source of the accusations in Bithynia .... 123 SECTION VII Persecution foe the Name, 125-140 Date at which the ' nomen ' alone was punished Professor Ramsay's view discussed .... Were those condemned for the name m maiestaUs ? Grounds on which the Christians might be punished . The policy of Trajan's rescript continued through the second century Evidence of the Apologists The Christians still punished for the name Recantation followed by pardon The Christians not sought out Persecution due to popular hatred .... The emperors themselves generally inclined to indulgence 125126 127 128130 131 133 134 137 138 139 SECTION VIU Attitude of Hadriau, Pius, and Marcus Aubblius, 141-167 Rescript of Hadrian 141 Letters of Antoninus Pius to cities in Greece .... 145 Persecution under Marcus Aurelius 146 Neumann's view : objections to it 146 xiv CONTENTS PAGE Consideration of the evidence 148 Probably no change of policy under Marcus Aurelius . . 152 Contrast drawn by Professor Ramsay between emperors of first and second centuries 154 The government as yet had no. steady policy .... 155 No systematic persecutions 156 Professor Ramsay antedates the Christian organisation . . 157 Number of Christians probably small 158 Beginnings of intercommunication between Churches . . 160 Interchange of letters 161 Christian unity still ideal and not dangerous to the government. 162 Beginnings of closer organisation 163 The CathoUo Church 164 Meeting of synods 164 Changing character of government action under Severus and Maximin 165 Systematic persecution first under Decius 166 General results 167 SECTION IX CHEISTLiNITY IN ITS RELATION TO CoLLEOIA, 168-195 How did Christianity avoid the laws against collegia ? . . 168 The Lex lulia . . . , 16g Licences required for collegia 169 Trajan's suspicion of collegia 170 Resemblances between Christian- communities and. coHejia . 171 Inscriptions show that many collegia must have been unlicensed 172 Reasons for hostility to collegia not equally strong in all cases . 174 Political danger of collegia in republican times .... I74 Opportunist policy of the empire 17g Practical impossibility of enforcing the Lex lulia . . . 177 Policy of emperors and governors varied 178 Collegia put down if political danger was suspected , . . 179 Collegia opificum, and collegia sodalicia I80 CONTENTS XV PAGE Collegia funeraticia or tenuiorum 182 Possibility, in spite of the law, for Christian communities to exist uninterfered with 183 Certain features about Christianity which might call down inter ference 185 The Agapae 185 Action of Bithynian Christians in giving up the Agapae . . 187 Possibly the same was done elsewhere 188 Evidence that Christians were sometimes regarded as members of a collegium illicitum 189 Tertullian represents the Christians as a collegium tenuiorum , 190 Probably recognised as such by the state . . . . 191 But this did not affect their general position in the empire . 194 Appendix on two ' Acta Maetyeum ' .... 196-208 CHEISTIANITY AND THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT I THE ATTITUDE OF THE REPUBLIC TOWAEDS FOREIGN CULTS The poUcy of the Eoman government towards tbo Christians is involved in not a few difficulties, and though many attemptshave been made to give a consist ent explanation of the facts which from various sources are supphed to us, none of them can be said to have met with universal acceptance. This is, perhaps, to a certain extent inevitable. Oar information, such as it is, comes to us from one of two sources — from Eoman writers or from Christian — and while it is almost im possible not to presuppose a certain amount of bias on both sides, there is this further and special obstacle to our arrival at the truth : that while the heathen writers in the too few and too brief notices which have come down to us treat the matter as one of only a passing and superficial interest, our Christian B 2 CHRISTIANITY AND authorities, on the other hand, are men of one idea, to whom Christianity is the one important feature in the history of the time. Add to this that neither on the one side nor the other is there any consecutive account of the spread and fate of Christianity, either in Eome or other parts of the empire, but rather isolated notices which seem to assume on the part of the reader knowledge which we at least, separated from the facts by so many centuries, do not possess. Finally, even assuming that by the synthesis of scattered notices, by inference from indirect evidence, and by the weighing of probabilities with the aid of whatever critical apparatus is at our disposal, we can make to a certain extent continuous what we find disjointed, there still remains the fact that the evi dence on which we have ultimately relied is on the one side tainted with the hatred, contempt, and mis trust which the unintelligible and therefore unpar donable ' obstinacy ' of the Christians produced in the heathen mind, and on the other with the pas sionate sense of injustice which rankled in and un doubtedly warped the minds of the Christian writers.' How is the treatment to which the Christians were subjected during the first two centuries (for to that period we shall confine ourselves) consistent with the toleration with which the Eoman govern ment in religious matters has generally been credited ? ' The tone adopted by the writer of the Apocalypse is a ease in point. Professor Ramsay argues from the extreme bitterness of the Apocalypse that the persecutions of the first century must "have been severer tlian those of the second. His argument is noticed below on p. 96, note 2. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 3 Was this toleration less complete than we have been used to suppose ? or has the extent, severity, and meaning of the persecutions been, as Gibbon was the first to suggest, exaggerated or misrepresented ? ' It is the great merit of Mommsen's . article in the ' Historische Zeitschrift ' ^ — an article whieh has laid the foundation for a more systematic treatment of the subject — to have pointed out that neither the one question nor the other can be fairly considered as long as we confine ourselves to the case of the Christians alone. Their treatment was only a part — no doubt as time went on always tending to be the most important part — of the general policy of the Eoman government in those matters where religious, social, and political interests touched and overlapped. Christianity was not the only foreign cult with which- the government had to deal; it was not the only foreign cult with which it had to interfere ; and while it may be possible, perhaps, at the outset to define generally the Eoman policy in religious matters, such a definition will carry us a very little way — partly because of the growing indifference to the national religion which was insensibly reflected in the action of the government, but mainly because a ' religious policy ' tended more and more to become an abstrae* tion, the concrete embodiments of which were modified by diverse political and social considerations, which were never the same in any two cases. In order, therefore, to form a well-grounded judgment on the ' See Gibbon's two famous chapters xv. and xvi. ' Vol. Ixiv. 1890, Der Beligionsfrevel nach rOmischem- liecht. B 2 4 CHRISTIANITY AND treatment of Christianity, we have not only to discover from the often conflicting and uncertain evidence what that treatment was, but to connect it generally, if possible, .with any underlying principles of Eoman policy, and to show how these were or may have been modified by political and social circumstances,' really or apparently involved in the nature of Christianity as it developed through the empire, or in the conditions amid which the Eoman empire itself had coalesced, and on which its stability seemed to depend. . The Eoman religion was essentially and before all [things a national religion ; its object was primarily,. mot the honour of the gods, but the safety of the state, pf which the goodwill of the gods was supposed to be, the necessary condition.' Its observance was there fore the duty of every citizen, and was an even more necessary part of patriotism than service in the army, because the sin of a single recusant might call down. the anger of the neglected gods on the whole state. It was, therefore, in early times the duty of the, executive to enforce on citizens the observance of the national rehgion, and, if necessary, to punish its neglect. But the simple state of things which the. principle so stated implies was of no long duration. The mission of the Eoman state was a mission of conquest, and each fresh conquest, whether within, Italy or without, opened out new mercantile com munications with foreign nations. Foreigners fromI, all quarters came to Eome, and with them necessarily I See Boissier, XiO lieligion Bomaine, vol. i. p. 10 seq. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 5 came their gods; and henceforward Eoman policy was the outcome of two principles ; different, indeed, but not essentially opposed, the exclusiveness of a national religion, modified, though by no means destroyed, by the comprehensiveness which is inherent in all polytheism. It is, as we should expect, the latter principle which is the most patent and easy to trace. Gradually the number of deities included in the national religion increased as the Eoman citizenship was extended over Italy and as com munication with the Greek nation became closer and more continuous. What were originally foreign cults could always be incorporated by the executive — who, however, would never take action without the support of a senatorial decree ' — in the national worship, and so come under the general superintendence of the pontifices as ' sacra populi Eomani ; ' the only dis tinction between these ' dii novensiles,' ^ as they were called, and the ' dii indigetes ' being that the former, unless they were identified under another name with one of the old deities, were not allowed within the pomerium. In this way were gradually adopted into the Eoman state worship not only such Italian deities ' Tert. Apol. 5 : ' Vetus erat decretum ne quis deus ab imperatore conseoraretur, nisi a senatu probatus ; ' and 13, ' Status dei ouiusque in senatus aestimatione pendebat.' ^ Arnobius, iii. 38 : ' Cincius numina peregrina novitate ex ipsa appellata pronuntiat ; nam solere Bomanos religiones urbium supera- tarum partim privatim per familias spargere, partim publice oonsecrare, ao ne aliquid deorum multitudine aut ignorantia praeteriretur, brevitatis et coinpendii causa uno pariter nomine -"inctos novensiles invocari.' Cf. Liv. viii. 9. 6 CHRISTIANITY AND as Juno Eegina from Veil,' or Diana from Aricia, but Apollo,^ Aesculapius,^ Ceres,^ Dis, and— to a great extent through the influence of the Sibylline books ' -^almost all the Hellenic gods ; so that long before .the unification of Italy it was true ' cunctas caeri- monias Italicis in oppidis et numinum effigies iuris atque imperii Eomani esse.' " Nor were Greek and Italian cults alone thus received and recognised by the state. The same procedure was adopted as early as 204 B.C. in reference to the Oriental cult of Cybele, whose image, symbolised in a sacred stone, was, in accordance with the directions of the Sibylline books, brought to Eome from Pessinus in Galatia ; and, in consequence apparently of her identification with the ItaUan Magna Mater, was ultimately placed in a temple within the pomerium on the Palatine itself.' Similarly, in the course of the Mithridatic wars, the worship of the Cappadocian goddess, centring round Comana, was introduced into Eome and identified with the Italian deity Bellona.* Manifestly this ' Liv. V. 21 : ' Te simul, Juno regina, quae nunc Veios colis, preoof, ut nos victores in nostram, tuamque mox futuram, urbem sequare.' ' Liv. iv. 25 and 29 ; cf. xxv. 12. ' Val. Max. i. 8, 2 : ' Cura sacerdotum inspectis Sibylliuis libria inimadvertit non aliter pristinam recuperari salubritatem posse, quam si ab Epidauro Aesculapius esset aceersitus.' Liv. x. 47. * Val. Max. i. 1, 1 ; Dionys. 6, 17 ; Tac. Ann. 2, 49 ; Cic. pro Balb. 24, 55. ' Marquardt, Staatsverw, iii. pp. 42, 52, and 358. ' Tac. Ann. iii. 71. ' Liv. xxix. 10 and 14 : xxxvi. 36. . ' Plut. Sull. 9 : Aeyerai 8e juerck Toiis vttvovs airif 2i/X\a (pavrivoi Bshv %v Tifuia-i 'Pa/jLotoi iropi Ko-B-ToBiKa-i/ fiofliii'Ttj, elfre $)j 2€\^,y,)y ava-av eire 'ABrivav the "Epv;i. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 7 enlargement of the state worship was due to political considerations ; the narrower circle of ' dii indigetes ' no longer satisfied a population so varied and hetero geneous as that of Eome was fast becoming. And in the case of an Oriental cult, like that of Cybele, it naturally seemed more advisable, by recognising it as part of the state cult, to place it under the control of the government, represented by the pontifices, and so to sanction its restricted observance by the whole citizen body, rather than, by allowing free scope within a limited number of the population to a wor ship characterised in its native form by a certain sensuousness and extravagance, to run the risk of a general corruption of religion or morality. But in a population so large and so mixed as that of Eome in the last century of the republic other strange and unfamiliar cults could not but creep in, not recognised by the government, and so beyond the control of the pontifices. With regard to these, the state policy seems to have been, in the main one_pf watchful toleration. So far as the public morality wasTiot endangered,' and so far as Eoman citizens were not led to neglect or to violate the national wor ship, these cults were not interfered with. Nor was this a mere laisser-faire procedure, at any rate at first. The government knew its own strength ; the executive magistrates were armed with a very wide police authority, which enabled them to step in at once, with or without the support of the senate, whenever ' Serv. ad Aen. iv. 303 : ' Sacra Nyctelia quae populus Romanus excluBJt causa turpitudinis.' 8 CHRISTIANITY AND public order or public moraUty or public religion seemed in any way endangered. As might be expected the occasions for this interference were not wanting. As early as 425 b.c. the aediles, in consequence of the invasion of new sacrificial rites, are ordered to take care ' ne qui nisi Eomani dii neu quo alio more quam patrio colerentur.' ' In 213 b.c. the anxieties of the Hannibalic war had made both men and women more inclined to have recourse to strange and foreign rites„and Eoman citizens in the publicity of the Forum and the Capitol had not shrunk from celebrating non- national modes of worship. So open a scandal imperatively called for the interference of the govern ment ; the executive were censured by the senate, and the praetor at the command of the same body issued an edict, 'ne quis in publico sacrove loco novo aut externo ritu sacrificaret.' ^ That many other instances of the same sort occurred we may be quite certain, though few of them are recorded. ' How often,' asks Postumius in 188 b.c, ' in the time of our fathers and grandfathers were instructions given to the magis trates ut sacra externa fieri vetarent ? ' ' In all these cases it is probably safe with Mommsen to assume that ' Liv. iv. 30 : ' Nee corpora modo adf ecta tabo sed animos quoqne multiplex religio et pleraque externa invasit : novos ritus sacriflcandi vatioinando inferentibus in domos quibus quaestui sunt capti supersti- tione animi : donee publicus iam pudor ad primores civitatis pervenit cernentes in omnibus vicis sacelUsque peregrina atque insolita pia- cula pacis deum exposcendae.' ^ Id. xxv. 1 : ' Tanta rehgio, et ea magna ex parte externa, civi- tatem incessit, ut aut homines aut dii repente alii viderentur f aoti, ' &c. ' Id, xxxix. 16 : ' Quoties hoc patrum avorumque aetate nego- tium est magistratibus datum, ut sacra externa fieri vetarent, sacrid THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 9 the particular point which called for interference on the part of the government was not the celebration of the foreign cult in itself, but the participation in it of Eoman citizens or its intrusion within the limits of the pomerium. But even on this point the vigilance of the magistrates tended to become relaxed. Even in the use of an adopted cult like that of the Magna Mater this tendency towards greater laxity in course of time declared itself. The cult was at first placed under strict regulations : the priests who con ducted the worship were Phrygians, and though a procession with some of the national rites, such as the blowing of trumpets and the clashing of cymbals, was allowed to pass through the city, the worship was stripped of its most extravagant features, and above all Eoman citizens were forbidden by decree of the senate personally to participate in the ministrations of the cult.' Dionysius writes, indeed, as if these restrictions were still observed in the time of ficulos vatesque foro, circo, urbe prohiberent, vatioinos libros con- quirerent comburerentque, omnem disciplinam sacriflcandi, praeter- quam more Romano abolerent ? ludioabant enim prudentissimi viri omnis divini humanique iuris nihE aeque dissolvendae religionis esse quam ubi non patrio sed externo ritu sacriflcaretur.' ' Dionys. ii. 19 : Kal h irdyTav fiaKiffTa eyccye rcdaujua/ca Kaiirtp fivpiav '6a-(ov els t^v ttSKiv d\7i\v66T(t}v 4&VQJv oTs ttoW^ avdytcrj a4^eiv Tohs iraTpious 8eovs to7s olKoQev vo/xifiois, ovBevhs eis Cv^ov i\ii\v8e ray ^eviKtay iiriTTjBevfuiTtMiv 7] irSXis ^TjfJLoa-it^, & iroWais ijS-jj (rvve^Tj -TraSety • AXXck Kal ei rtva KOTcfc -xpyifflioijs ^'Keitr-qytiyeTO tepk, toIs lauT^s aina Tifia yofilfiois, &traa-ay iK^dWovffa repdpeiay fivBiK^y, &air€p ra ttjs 'iSalas Upd. 6va-ias fiey yhp avT^ Kal ayuyas ^yova-tv dra tray' eras ot ffrpaTTjyol Kara robs 'Poj/iaiatv y6fiovs ' ieparaiSk avrrj? ay^p 4»p^f /fai yvyij ^puyla' Kal Trepidyovffiy &vh tV ir6\tv otrot fiTjrpayvpTovyres, Qtrnep aifTo7s ^ffos, TVTTOvs T€ irepiKeififyoi to7s a-r-fiBetrt, Kal KarauKotifieyoi trpds ray 10 CHRISTUNITY AND Augustus. If so, it was perhaps in consequence of the Augustan religious reformation ; but more pro bably he is describing a state of things which had long since passed away. At any rate it did ultimately pass away. We know from inscriptions that the archigallus or chief priest of Cybele was usually a Eoman,' and qertainly the cult was celebrated under the empire with much, if not all, of its Oriental enthusiasm." Livy's account of the Bacchanalian conspiracy ^ puts into the clearest light both the action of the government in cases where public moraUty or public security seemed to be endangered by foreign cults, and also the extent to which such cults might spread even among Eoman citizens without attracting the attention of the government. These Bacchic rites, of undoubtedly Oriental origin, and for centuries common enough in Greece and Asia Minor, were apparently introduced into Etruria by a Greek adventurer, and from there spread with extreme rapidity both in Italy eirofieyuy to fiTjrp^a p.c\rt KaX rvfiiraya Kporovvrss. '-Poifiatay Be r&y avOiyevaiv oihe firirpayvprwy ris oSre KaTav\ov^syos iropeverai Sio rrjs 'tr6\€tos irotKl\Tjy kySeBvKiis ffTo\^v otire opyid^uy tJjv 6idy rois ^pvyiots opyiaa-fiois kotA y6fioy Kal y^ii^iafia fiovKTJs. ovrcas eij\a^ws ^ n6Kis ?y€i Trpds T& oi/K 4iri-xtiipLa eBr] irepl 0eay. ' See 0. I, L, vi. 2183, and other inscriptions collected by Marquardt, p. 369. ^ See especially the description in Apuleius, Met. viii. 27 ; also Mart. ii. 84, 3-4 ; Stat. Theb, x. 170 foil. ; Seneca, Agam. 687 foil. : ' Non, nisi molles imitata viros Tristis laceret braehia tecum Quae turritae turba parent! Pectora rauco concita buxo Furit, ut Phrygium lugeat Attin.' ' Liv. xxxix. 8 foil. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 11 and Eome. At first women only were admitted into the diaa-oi, or secret associations, which formed the basis of the cult : the initiation took place by day, and the meetings were only held three times a year. But all this was now changed : men were initiated as well as women ; the initiated were to be under twenty years of age. Meetings were held five times in every month, and took place under the secrecy of night. The inevitable enormities did not fail to follow, and the Bacchic associations became hotbeds not only of moral corruption, but of civil crimes, such as forgery • and murder, and even of political conspiracy. Acci-k dent brought this state of things to the notice of the government. The consul whose duty it was to take action laid the whole matter before the senate ; an extraordinary investigation was held, and the cult was put down throughout Italy with energy and prompti tude. More than 7,000 men and women were found to be implicated, and of these more than half were executed, while Bacchic associations were forbidden for the future. That political and moral rather than purely religious considerations guided the govern ment action in this matter is clear from the whole account of Livy, and is proved by a saving clause in the senatorial decree abolishing the cult, to the effect that. if individuals deemed it incumbent on them to celebrate any Bacchic rites, they might do so on obtaining a licence from the praetor urbamis, so long as no more than five persons, two men and three women, met together for the purpose. ' ^ ' See S. C. de Baochanalibus, in Brun's Pontes Iuris Bom, Ant. 12 CHRISTUNITY AND This event took place in 188 b.c. A hundred years later the government would have found it perhaps a less easy matter to put down so effectually an intrusive Oriental cult. At least the history of the Isis cult and the attitude of the government towards it tend to favour this supposition. By the last century of the republic popular belief in the national religion was very greatly undermined. The very tole ration which characterised it might easily lead to indifferentism ; its frequent resort to new modes of worship, especially in times of public danger and anxiety, was in itself a confession of insufficiency and weakness.' The upper classes, permeated with the sceptical philosophy of Greece, hardly took the trouble ^to keep up a decent appearance of belief : ^ popular poets scoffed openly at the established religion. More important still was the avowedly political cha racter of the religion ; it was a state religion, but the state was an oligarchy, and therefore the religion established and supported by the govern ment tended to become a party religion — a religion of the minority — which, if indifferent to its own p. 146 : ' Sacra in oquoltod (occulto) ne quisquam fecise velet ; neve in poplicod neve in preivatod neve extrad urbem sacra quisquam fecise velet, nisei pr. urbanum adieset, isque de seuatuos sententiad . „ . . jousiset.' Cf. Liv. xxxix. 18 ad fin. ' So, on the occasion of a plague in 395 B.C., Dionysius says (x. 53) : Kal iroKKb, iysuTeplaSri 'Pa^iaiois ovk Syra iy ?9ei irepl rl/jias ray BeSiy imrTiSeiiiara oiiK evTrpeirrj, Dio Cass. Frag, 24, 1 (Bekk) : oi 'PapiaiOi voWas fi-dxas p,axe(rdf-eyoi Kal TroWa Kal iraBiyres KaX Spda-avres ray /ley Trarplay Upav' wMydpTitrav. rphsSh rii IcxiKct ws Kal eirapKetrovrd aipiaiy Sip/iTiaav : also the passages in Livy already cited, iv. 30 and xxv. 1. 2 Cic. De Nat. Dear. ii. 3, 9. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 13; supporters, was worse than indifferent to the masses and the subject classes. Eeasons of a more subjec tive kind, and therefore more difficult to trace, came, there is no doubt, in time to be among the attractions towards Oriental cults. The national religion made\ little appeal to individuals ; it was a state cult, and( individuals were no longer bound up in the state, as J they had been in ' the brave days of old.' There was more scope for personal interests and personal aspira tions; greater subjectivity of feeling; and in pro portion as this developed the less satisfying the old religion was felt to be, with its rigid ceremony and its unemotional character. But it was precisely bere that the Oriental religions exercised their paramount influence. Mysterious rites of initiation, sensuous musie, a worship crowded with symbolism no less awe-inspiring that it was imperfectly or not at all, understood ; and above all a system of expiatory and purificatory rites, in which there was enough of asceticism to satisfy the craving for something per sonal in religion and enough of licence to attract the crowd in its non-religious moods, all these things made the population of Eome peculiarly susceptible to the influence of cults like the Egyptian.' At what date the worshipjjiIgi8_ffia,s first introduced into Eome is uncertain, probably early in the last century of the republic. At any rate we know that a collegiwm^of pastophori — the priests who presided at ' See on this, Keim, Bom vnd das Christenthum, p 9 foil., and for the bibliography of the subject see Marquardt, Staatsverw. iii. pp. 80-1. 14 CHRISTIANITY AND' her worship^was established in the time of Sulla.' The cult, however, was not a licensed one; it was peculiarly un-Eoman in its character ; it attracted a large number of citizens ; it intruded itself on the very Capitol,^ and above all it was believed to sanction grave immoralities. On account of all these reasons fwe find repeated action taken by the government. yin 58 B.C. the cult was excluded from the Capitol by 'the consuls of the year ; ' five years later the private shrines were ordered by the senate to be destroyed ; ¦• in 50 B.C. the temples of Isis and Serapis were destroyed, not without some manifestation of popular feeling ; * two years later we find the same thing happening again, this time in consequence of action taken by the augurs.^ So far there had been a con sistent attempt, clearly not very successful, on the part of the government to put down this cult. But in ' Apnl. Met. xi. 17 : ' Coetu pastophorum quod sacrosaucti coUegii nomen est. . . . Collegium vetustissimum et sub illis SuUae tempori- bus couditum.' Cf. Diodor. Sic. i. 29. - C. I. L, i. 1034. Suet. Dom. 1. Tac. Sist. iii, 74. ' Tert. Apol, 6 : ' Serapidem et Isidem . . . Capitolio prohibitos, id est curia Deorum pulsos, Piso et Gabinius consules . . . abdi- caverant.' * Dio Cass. xl. 47 : tojs yap vaobs aiiTov o6s jS(^ tikes iireiroiiiyTO KaBeKeiy ry ^ouKij ^So^ey * ou yap 5^ tows Beoiis rovrovs en-i iroXv 4y6/Aioav, Kol 8ti ye (to! e^eiiiicriaev, Siare Kal Sij/.iao'.'f aiirois irifieaiai I^m tou vjifiT^piov aas iSpvaavro. > Val. Max. i. 3, 3 : ' L. Aemilius Paulus, consul cum senatus Isidis et Serapis fana diruenda censuisset, eaque nemo opificum attingere auderet, posita praetexta securim arripuit templique eius foribus infixit.' ' Dio Cass- xiii. 26 : eSo^e yyii/J.ri rav fuiyreuy irdura aSfiij to re iKelvTis [Isis] Ka! ri Toi5 Sepd-riSos T€/ierf'v\da-a€iy, iy als Kal avro7s ^5tj vvv irapayyeXAa /xov ra6rp tt) dJiKavBpwTr'if e-meiKearepov Xp7\ffBai Kal ju^ Tas rav &KKav iBvay ZeiiriSai^ovlas i^ovBeyi^eiy, robs iStovs Se vSpLOvs tpvKdira-etv. * Hor. Sat. i. 9, 69 ; Ovid, Ars Am. i. 415 ; Pers. v. 179 ; Juvl xiv. 97, &o. ' Tac. Ann, xi. 15. 23 CHRISTIANITY AND of the Temple in Jerusalem, which was appropriated by certain Jewish adventurers, took decisive measures 1 against the communities in Eome.' That the religion itself wa£_for thejimeput down, those who refused to give up their profane rites being banished from Italy, seems clear from the accounts of Suetonius and Tacitus. But it is no less clear that the main brunt of the repression fell upon those who were Eoman citizens. Of these no less than 4,000 were compul- Eorily enlisted in the army — since as Eoman citizens, and so no longer politically Jews, they lost their right of exemption — and sent to Sardinia to put down the brigandage there. The repression was only tem- ./porary : according to Philo, indeed, ft was due to lEe personal influence of Sejanus ; ' and under ifilaudigB •the Jews in Eome were again very numerous. Under that emperor we hear again of their expulsion from the city, perhaps in consequence of disputes with the Christians,^ though Dio Cassius says that, as they were too numerous to be expelled, Claudius simply put in force against them the regulations forbidding ' Tac. Ann. ii. 85 : ' Actum et de sacris Aegyptiis ludaicisque pellendis : factumque Patrum consultum, ut quatuor milia libertini generis, ea superstitione infecta, quis idonea aetas, in insulam Sardioiam veherentur, coeroendis iUic latronibus, et, si ob gra-vitatem caeli interissent, vile damnum : ceteri cederent ItaUa, nisi certam ante diem profanes ritus exuissent.' Cf . Suet. Tib. 36. Josephus, Ant. lud. xviii. 3, 4, describes the whole affair : Ti;3c- pios KeKeiei iray rb 'lovSaiKby rrjs 'Pcifiris aTreXaBijvai, K.r.K, ' Philo, Adv. Flacc. ad init., andiey. ad Caium,Tp, 1015; Mang.- 569. ^ Suet. Claud. 25 : ' ludaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultn- antes Eoma expulit.' Cf. Acts xviii. 2. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 29 unlicensed collegia.^ But whatever form the repres sion took it was clearly due to some temporary cause. It was getting to be against the spirit of the age to expect that a Jew, from the mere fact of being manu mitted, should put off his national rehgion and con form to the established cult. Tiberius and Claudius may have deemed it advisable for the moment to assert the state's right to such compliance, but in the absence of some distinctly political or social danger the national religion had no longer sufficient hold on the public mind, and was no longer suffi ciently the care of the government, to justify any per manent reversal of the Augustan policy, or to place the Jews in a position less favourable than that of the worshippers of Isis. There was, however, as Mommsen points out,' always a distinction between the Eoman policy towards the Jews in the East and in the West. In the former they were a political factor of which account had to be taken ; in the latter they were immigrants to be tolerated at the most, but not encouraged. Nor is it possible to deny that in his policy towards the Jews of the Diaspora Augustus had admitted principles which might, in conceivable circumstances, prove a danger to the empire. The ind^gfijice shown to their rigid monotheism in ' Dio Cass. Ix. 6 : rovs re 'lovBalovs irXeoydo-avras adBts, Sxrre XaXeiras &>' Sveu rapaxrjs im roS Sx^"" ff'pa" rrjs iriKeas elpxBijyai, piiK i^lXaae p-ey, r^ Se 55) irarplip y6fup 0iip xP'^f-^"'"'^ inehevffe /i^ -ffvyaBpotCea-Bat. ¦' Bom. Oesch. v. p. 499. 80 CHRISTUNITY AND exempting them from the imperial cult, intended as it was to be a bond of unity in and allegiance to the empire, was in itself, perhaps, from the imperial point of view, a doubtful step ; but the national and political unity, such as it was, granted to this dis persed race, really on the ground of this religious recusancy, was still more in contradiction both to the imperial and municipal policy which the government fin other cases adopted. It was the recognition, on how- Jever small a scale, of a State within the State. The ill-considered attempt of Caligula to force the im perial cult, contrary to all these expressly granted privileges, first on the synagogues of Alexandria, and finally to place his statue in the central Temple of Jerusalem,' proved, to a certain extent, the wisdom of the Augustan policy, to which, as we have seen, Claudius at once reverted ; but the political difficulties were greater, and it is doubtful whether the cata strophe of the Jewish war at the end of Nero's reign could by any possibility have been permanently avoided. Ever since Judaea was made into a pro vince, and the Jews were brought into direct contact with the Eoman officials, procurators, military officers, and tax-gatherers, in spite of every wish on the part of the Eoman government to avoid causes of eolhsion, these proved less and less able to be avoided. Indi vidual cases of misgovernment on the one hand were met by an increasing tendency on the part of the Jewish authorities to play into the hands of the extreme party, and when the war broke out it was ' PhUo, Leg. ad Caium, p. 1019 ; Mang. 573, 6poy Se ro7s iTrovS-fiTrore oSaiv 'lovSa'ois iirePa\e, Sio Spaxf^hs eKaarov KeXevaas iva iray eras els ri KaTrerdXioy (ffipeiy, Stavep irp&repov els r6y ev 'lepoiroKifiois veioy. Dio Cass. Ixvi. 7 : Kal eV iKelvov SiSpax/iov irdxB-i) robs rh TrdrpiS auray I6r) vepurreWovras ra KainraXiip Ait Kar' eras airoipipeiv. Suet. Dom. 12 : ' Praeter oeteros ludaicus fiscus acerbissime actus est, ad quem deferebantur qui vel improfessi ludaicam viverent vitam vel dis imulata origine imposita genti tributa non pependissent.' Tert. Apol. 18 : ' Sed et ludaei palam lectitant ; vectigahs libertas vulgo aditur sabbatis omnibus.' Juv. iii. 15. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 33 an easy means of preventing, if it wished, Eoman citizens from becoming proselytes. Under this arrange ment Jews by birth were not as such bound to pay the tax, but only if they attended the synagogues and were therefore Jews by religion. On the other hand, proselytes, whether Eoman citizens or others who had obtained the licence, were entitled to all the religious privileges of the Jews, though apparently both classes might in private, and as long as they were not members of a synagogue, practise Jewish manners ('vita ludaica') without, by registration, making themselves liable to the tax.' But though the war had not caused any repression of the Jewish rehgion, which, as Tertulhan flays, was ' certe licita,'" it had very strongly increased the feel ing of antipathy to the Jews entertained in a less degree even before by the educated classes at Eome. Tacitus is the best representative of this feeling, to which, however, expression is given clearly enough by Juvenal,^ Quintilian," and Pliny.^ According to Tacitus " it is a ' gens taeterrima ' — ' proiectissima ad ' So I interpret the passage of Suetonius, Dom, 12, cited above. ' Tert. Apol. 21. ¦ Juv. xiv. 100 : ' Eomanas autem soliti oontemnere leges, ludaioum edisount et servant ac metuunt ius, Tradidit arcane quodounque volumine Moyses.' * Quint. Instil. Or. iii. 7, 21 : ' Est et couditoribus urbium infame contraxisse aliquam pernioiosam ceteris gentem, qualis est primus ludaicae superstitionis auctor.' • Plin. H. N. xiii. 4 : ' Gens contumelia numinum insignis.' • Tac. Hist. v. 2-5 : ' Profana illio omnia quae apud nos sacra : rursum concessa apud illos quae nobis incesta. . . . Cetera inatituta 84 CHRISTIANITY AND libidinem ' — characterised by an ' hostile odium ' to wards all outside its own circle, teaching its converts ' contemnere deos, exuere patriam, parentes liberos fratres vilia habere.' That in spite of this very strong feeling — a feeling which must inevitably have been heightened by the internecine war under Trajan, and by the frightful atrocities perpetrated by the Jews in Cyprus and other places ' — the toleration extended to the Jews should still have been maintained, so that even so late as the beginning of the third century we find Callistus banished to Sardinia for disturbing a Jewish congregation at Eome," while it is expressly affirmed in the Theodosian Code, ' ludaeorum sectam nulla lege prohibitam satis constat,' ^ is a sufficiently remarkable circumstance, and would seem, at any rate, to justify the general assertion that in religious matters the Eoman government was both forbearing and tolerant. But before we pass on to consider its dealings with the second monotheistic religion with which it came into contact — Christianity — it will, perhaps, be well just to sum up the limitations to this toleration which we have seen to constitute its practical or working sinistra foeda pravitate valuere. Nam pessimus quisque spretis rehgionibus patriis tributa et stipes illuc gerebant : unde auotae ludaeorum res, et quia apud ipsos fides obstinata, misericordia in promptu, sed adversus alios omnes hostile odium, . . . Transgressi in morem eorum ideni usurpant, nee quidquam prius imbuuutur quam contemuere deos, exuere patriam, parentes liberos fratres vilio.- habere.' ' Euseb H. E, iv. 2 ; Dio Cass, Ixviii. 38 ; Oros. vii. 12. ° Hippolstus, Philpsoph, ix. 12. ' Cod, Thcod, xvi, 8, 9. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 35 policy towards foreign cults. In the first place, then, putting on one side the received cults which thus became parts of the national worship, foreignreligions were tolerated in so far as they did not injure the national and estabhshed worship. Strictly, and at first, this would mean that aliens but not, Eoman citizens might participate in them. But a rigid en forcement of this principle was practically impossible and it became so far modified as to permit Eoman citizens to participate in these cults in so far as tbey were not thereby prevented from showing due honour to the national gods — in other words, in so far as the toleration was reciprocal. In the course of time, and under the empire — or, as Mommsen puts it, ' unter dem die alten Ordnungen verflachenden und zer- riittenden Eegiment der Casaren und ihrer Beamten ' — even this condition was in certain cases overlooked, and no doubt many Eoman citizens were Jews or even Christians without drawing down upon them selves, in fact, any State interference. If the question had been a purely religious one the government policy would have been summed up in what has been said. But it was not. It was a characteristic of many of the immigrant rehgions, especially of those of an Oriental origin, to foster and encourage gross im moralities. No doubt in this connexion any hne drawn between what might be permitted and what not was an arbitrary one, but still the existence of such a line was always tacitly recognised, not only in the policy of the government, but even, if we may use such a term of such times, in the moral sense of the D 2 36 CHRISTUNITY AND community ; and, as we have seen, the government occasionally, sometimes with, sometimes without the support of popular feeling, took decisive action and put down a cult on the score of its immorahty. More important still was the potential interference of the government with foreign religions from political con siderations. Long after religious belief had practically disappeared, the national religion was upheld as the emblem or symbol of the political supremacy of Eome. It is of little importance for the present ques tion whether we loo'k to Eome or Italy with their sphere of state-recognised deities whose cults were under the ultimate superintendence of the pontifex maximus^who himself, under the empire, was always the executive head of the state — or to the provinces, where, by the institution of Augustus, the imperial cult — ^the worship of ' Eome and Augustus ' — was to provide some kind of rehgious unity for the empire, as the representation and symbol of its political cohe sion.' In the one case as in the other, viewed in its severest Hght, religious recusancy was tantamount '; potentially to pohtical disaffection. Not by any means that in all cases it was actually so regarded. That would depend on a number of circumstances, collective and individual, local and imperial. Some times opposite considerations might have to be 'balanced against one another, as, e.gf., when it seemed a smaller political danger to condone and even to sanction the religious recusancy of the Jews — which, J ' See an article in the Eiiglish Historical Beviiw, No. 18, on the ftovinoial Concilia,' p. 226 foil. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 37 based as it was on the narrow limits of an obscure nationality, seemed incapable of any appreciable development — rather than to risk a general conflagra tion of religion and national hatred in all the great cities of the East by interfering with the religious freedom and its semi-political consequences among the scattered but important Jewish communities. But because an aggressive and morose monotheism, resting on a narrow national basis, was tolerated by the government, aU the circumstances of the case being taken into account, it by no means necessarily followed that an aggressive monotheism, equally exclu sive and equally indifferent to the political obedience which was implied in religious conformity, and at the same time claiming to overstep all limits of nationality, and without disguise aiming at a uni versality which the Eoman empire was prevented by the history of all its mstitutions from conceiving apart from political consequences — it by no means followed that such a religion would receive the same treatment from the state. 38 CHEISTUNITY AND III PIEST APPBABANOE OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE EASTERN PROVINCES Historically Christianity originated as an offshoot from Judaism, and it is probably an undisputed fact that to all outside the Jewish communities, perhaps at first even to the Jews themselves outside Judaea, Christianity was regarded merely as a Jewish sect. It is no less certain that the first spread of Chris tianity was aided and conditioned by the extent and number of the Jewish communities scattered over the provinces of Syria and Asia Minor. That the earliest converts in Jerusalem, rising with extreme rapidity from 120 ' to 3,000,^ and then to 5,000'— the large number being accounted for by the fact that multi tudes of Jews from all parts of the empire happened to be at Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost * — still continued to worship in the Temple is expressly attested.' The fact that Stephen was brought before the Sanhedrim * proves that in the eyes of that body he was a recusant Jew, over whom, therefore, they had ' Acts i. 15. ^ Acts ii. 41. » Acts iv. 4 * Acts ii. 5-11. ' Acts. ii. 46. « Acts vii. I'A THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 3 Acts xxv. 8. s Acts xvii. 7. THE ROMAN GOVEENMENT 43 that the same thing took place in other cities, where the Jews were at once indignant at the rise of the new atpecris and jealous of the extension of its mem bership to the heathen ? If this was so, we can well understand that, though the Christians were still, and would be for years to come, taken by the Eoman officials for a Jewish sect, and as such protected from riotous behaviour on the part of their co-religionists and privileged in their own religious worship, yet the way was being prepared more and more for the thorough discrimination between them, which, when ever it began, was, as all agree, an accomplished fact at the beginning of the second century. What" of COTirse~liaturally aided This" discrimination was the really wider line of separatiQn which, apart from any views on the subject, either by Jews or Eomans, gradually came to mark off the Christians from the Jewish bodies. If the earliest members of the Chris tian communities were probably in almost all cases Jewish, it is no less true that at a very early date the tendency of Christianity to sever itself from all national limitation was begun. At Antioch in Pisidia Paul announced his intention of turning to the Gentiles ' — a declaration made still more emphatically in Mace donia,^ and before long the Gentile Christians became, there is no doubt, the preponderating element in all the Christian Churches both in the East and in the West. At first, indeed, the heathen, and especially ' Acts xiii. 47. ^ Acts xviii. 6: rb aX/ia v/iav iirl tV Kei(>aA7)i' in&y KoSapbs iyti' anh rov yvy tis rh eBvrj tropeiffofiat. 44 CHBISTIANITY AND the Greek population, were far from hostile to the new religion. If the Jewish monotheism, morose, and in certain aspects repellent, as it seemed, nevertheless attracted numerous proselytes from the Hellenistic cities,' Christianity, with its wider appeals to humanity, was even more likely to do this. Professor Eamsay with perfect justification emphasises the point that Paul, almost from the first, clearly conceived of Christianity as the universal religion, the limits of which were to be co-extensive with the Eoman empire, and that it was with this idea in his mind that he chose out, especially in his missionary journeys, the centres not only of Greek civilisation, but of the Eoman organisation and government.^ That he did do this, from whatever motive, is indisputable, and amid the general decay of the old religions the mis sionaries of the new found the masses not altogether indisposed to give them a favourable hearing, whilst even the more educated classes, though seldom con verts, regarded them at any rate at first with no stronger feeling than a somewhat sceptical curiosity. f But this favourable or neutral attitude was not destined to be permanent ; by the beginning^ of the second century it had generally given way to an intense and often violeiit" hatred, and the cTiaSgeT^ 'whenever it came about — and it probably came about gradually — was due to several causes, the beginnings of some of which we are able to trace at this earlier ' Tacitus, Hist. v. 5 : ' Nam pessimus quisque spretis religionibus patriis tributa et stipes illuo gerebant.' * Th& Church in the Boman Empire, pp. 56, 57. Cf. also p. 147. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 45 period and in our chief authority for it — the Acts of the Apostles. That the unpopularity of the Christians was caused by purely religious animosities is of all suppositions the least likely. As Professor Eamsay says, 'the ordinary pagan did not care two straws whether his neighbour worshipped twenty gods or twenty-one.' ' But Christianity constituted a social revolution even more than a rehgious one, or rather its social (to received ideas they seemed anti-social) effects were far more patent and striking than the religious ideas which produced them. And it was this divergence from the social hfe in its widest sense around them, often amounting to an aggressive interference with the estabhshed conditions of society, with trade interests, with family life, with popular amusements, with every day religious observances, with the lax but conven tional morality of the time, which gave to Christianity an appearance of misanthropy, of an odium genens humani, which in time was more than repaid by the general execration of paganism. It is important to look, if we can, at the early Christians from the heathen point of view, and above all to avoid any idealisation of the primitive communities. We may grant at once that in matters of morality, and especially in the relations of the sexes, the Christians were far superior to the populations in whose midst they lived. But it would be a mistake to suppose that it was the loftier elements of Christianity which most strongly attracted converts, or that conversion introduced them neces- ' Op. cit. p. 130. 46 CHEISTLANITY AND sarily into a higher plane of life or enlightenment. To a great extent it was the tendency to level distinctions of property or differences of social life, the hopes it held out of a shortly coming Saviour, and the idea of a future beyond the grave, in which compensation would be made for the inequalities of the present — which drew the lower classes to Christianity. We cannot judge of the ordinary Christian of Corinth or Antioch, or Ephesus, or Eome, from the leaders and teachers of the sect. The Christians of the Eastern provinces shared the characteristics of the Oriental population ; they were not less fanatical or less ignorant, or less excitable, or less credulous. In the eyes, of their fellow-citizens there was nothing about them to justify what seemed the extravagant claims they made on behalf of their religion. They were fanatical, exclusive, and intolerant, and for a religion which, so to speak, to Gentile eyes had nothing to show for itself, no stately temples, no famous shrines, no imposing priesthood, no impressive ceremonial. But it was not so much as religious enthusiasts that the Christians attracted popular attention. Their fanaticism took certain apparently anti-social form^. which, there can be little doubt, made them the Nihihsts of the day. In the first place the very belief — and in the first century it was a vivid one — of the approaching end of the world and the second - coming of Christ involved a restless expectation and in some respects a recklessness of action which were quite inconsistent with the ordinary duties, domestic, social, or political, of an orderly subject of the empire. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 47 Then, again, the communistic ideas of the sect must have interfered, often in a very exasperating way, witii social and family relations. The mere fact that mem-* hers of a family were induced to leave their relations, to desert the religion of their fathers and to join these' enthusiasts, was in itself enough to cause heart-burn ing and rancour ; but to see part of the family property appropriated to the common Christain funds must greatly have embittered these feelings, and inspired the moneyed classes of society at any rate with hatred and apprehension. Again, there was a manifest dis inclination on the part of the Christians to marriage and the duties and obligations of married life. This in connexion with the comparatively large number of female converts must often have led to episodes like that in the history of Paul and Thekla, where a maiden of good social standing is induced to refuse the marriage arranged by her parents. Nor did cases of this kind appear accidental and occasional : they rather followed from the maxims of the Founder of the sect — maxims which, imperfectly understood, and obeyed in the letter rather than the spirit, were no doubt constantly in the mouths of his followers. ' It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven.' ' Think not that I am come to give peace on the earth. I tell you nay, but rather division.' ' If any man cometh unto me and hateth not his father and mother, and wife and children and brother . . . he cannot be my disciple.' ' The sons of this world marry and are given in marriage, but they that are 48 CHEISTUNITY AND accounted worthy to attain unto that world and the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.' These and other ' hard sayings ' put into practice without discrimination or qualifica tion were tantamount, so far as they extended, to an upheaval of existing social relations, and might well seem to lay the Christians open to the charge of turn ing the world upside down. Only less intolerable than this disregard of the pri mary rights and obligations of social and family life was the absolute refusal of the Christians to join in any religiousTestivalTliO^ppearln the courts where airoath hadlo be taken, to illuminate their doors at festivals, to join in the amusements of the amphitheatre; their un willingness, if not refusal, to serve in the army, and their aversion to all civic duties and offices. It was this apparently * hostile odium ' towards all outsiders which had made the Jews so generally unpopular as they were, and in explaining the hatred felt for the Christians we must remember that, as Mommsen says, ' der Hass der Massen von den Juden auf die Christen sich iibertrug.' ' The Christians to a certain extent, apart from any characteristics of their own, inherited, as a Jewish sect or aipsa-is, the aversion with which the Jews were regarded. As has, however, already been said, the intense animosity of the second century was only of gradual growth, and it no doubt grew with the growth of Christianity. Things quite unimportant, when the communities were small and insignificant, would be looked at with very different eyes as the number of ' Histor. Zeitschr. p. 418. Cf. Expositor, July 1893, p. 2. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 49 converts increased. In the Acts there are only two instances recorded in which there was any manifesta tion of popular feehng against the Christians on the part of the heathen, and in both cases the reason '¦ was the same — interference with trade relations, , pecuniary loss or the fear of it from the existence of Christianity. At Philippi the occasion of the tumult was a trivial one : the sympathy of the crowd with a few individuals whose hope of gain from the prophecies of a mad soothsayer was disappointed by Paul's action in healing her. Naturally the accusation before the duoviri of the colonia took a somewhat different form, viz. that the apostles were setting forth customs which it was not lawful for Eoman citizens to receive ;' but that the magistrates did not treat this accusation seriously and only took action at all to appease the mob is clear from their order to release the prisoners without further formality next morning. The affair at Ephesus is a better instance still. Here the work men who made the silver shrines presented by her worshippers to Artemis, instigated by Demetrius, the head of their guild, took fright at the increasing number of the Christians, not only in Ephesus but throughout the province of Asia, which threatened, by interfering with the worship of the goddess, to injure their trade.^ The matter was not on this occasion brought before either the municipal or the state ' Acts xvi. 20 : Koi itpo p. 238. . » P- 233. F 2 68 CHRISTUNITY AND fore, that some of those first arrested (not of course necessarily all) furnished the government with the names of those Christians who had so far escaped notice. Possibly they were induced to do this by torture, but more probably the explanation is to be found in the Epistle of Clement to the Corinthian Church, who, clearly alluding to the Neronian per secution, gives it as an instance of the evils arising from strife and jealousy.' There were therefore per haps divisions among the Christians at Eome, as there were at Corinth, and so high did this sectarian spirit run that one party was even willing to de nounce the other to the government. The number of Christians who were arrested and put upon their trial by this means was a considerable one, though ' ingens multitude ' is no doubt a rhetorical exaggera tion. The turn, however, -which the trial took — a trial conducted in all probabihty before the praefectus urbi — is the most important part of the whole incident. The Christians had originally been singled out, not as members of a ' religio illicita,' but as a set of men, ^bnoxious to the populace, on whom Nero sought to 4^1 vert from himself the charge of incendiarism. In the course of the trial the proofs of incendiarism must necessarily to a great extent have broken down, but at the same time a good deal of information would be elicited about the sect, whieh would answer the pur pose of the government just as well ; and whieh would imply a disposition, a state of mind, of which incen- ' See the passage quoted on p. 71. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 69 diarism would be a natural result. It would come out, in the first place, that the sect held nocturnal meetings, and the very simplicity of the early Chris tian worship would have the appearance of mystery and secrecy to the ordinary heathen mind. Then there would be stories which, if we are to believe Tacitus, were akeady^abroad of the OlSnroSswi p^L^sts and the ©vsa-rsia Ssittvu : these would, no doubt, be repeated and exaggerated ; the stories of child-murder in particular falling in with the current notions .about magic and witchcraft,' would give some colour to an accusation under that head, while, more important still, the social attitude of the Christians would have at any rate become clear to the government — from one point of view, their isolation and aloofness from all the pohtical and religious interests of the city ; from another, their aggressive and proselytising zeaL Iso lated members of the sect would be found in almost every large /amiZm of slaves ; Caesar's own household would be found not to have escaped the taint,^ and while no doubt the noble and the rich would be con spicuous by their absence, among the lower classes, and especially the servile population, Christianity, with its utter disregard of nationality, would be found a not unimportant element. To crown all, that characteristic of the religion which seemed to Pliny in itself deserving of the severest punishment, its obstinatio in the face of interference or repression, the obligation 'to obey God rather than men,'' would ' Cic. in VatiM. vi. 14 ; Hor. Epod. 5 ; Juv. vi. 522. =¦ Philipp. iv. ad fin. ' Acts v. 29. 70 CHRISTIANITY AND seem to involve an opposition to the omnipotence of the Eoman government, which might contain the seeds of real political danger. All_these things combined were deemed sufficient to ggcuxaja. conviction, not so mucE~on the definite charge of incefl4iarism.„aa_aL- what Tacitus describes as ' odium generis-humafti. ' ' — -a^der charge, which might include or might easily be taken to involve the narrower^ one. That insinua tions of magic and witchcraft played, as Arnold sug gests,^ an important part in these trials seems at least possible. The term ' malefica,' used by Suetonius of the new religion, often has this special sense, and it deserves notice that in the Justinian code ' magicians are described as ' inimici generis humani.' The result of the trials was naturally the execu tion of the criminals, and here again the fact must not be passed over — though I think it is possible to make too much of it — that the mode of punishment was that prescribed for those convicted of magic : ' Qui sacra impia nocturnave ut quem obtruncarent, defigerent, obligarent, fecerint facciendave curaverint aut crucibus suffiguntur aut bestiis obiciuntur. . . . Magicae artis conscios summo supplicio adfici placuit. ' ' Odium generis humani ' is explained by Holtzmann as ' volliger Mangel an aUer humanen und politischen Bildung ; ' by Schiller {Comment, philolog. in hon. Mommsen. p. 26) as ' Exolusi- vitat gegen Andersglaubige ; ' by Arnold, much more suggestively, as ' priucipieller Widerstand gegen die romische Staatsomnipotenz,' p. 23. 2 Arnold, pp. 65, 66. " Cod. Just. ix. tit. 18 : ' [Magi] humani generis inimici credendi sunt.' THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 71 id est bestiis obici aut crucibus suffigi : ipsi autem magi vivi exuruntur.' ' Our conclusion therefore is that the account given by Tacitus is both credible in ' itself and consistent with all that we are able to infer concerning the Christians at this time. It remains to be added that it receives independent confirmation from other sources. Clement, whose Epistle from Eome to the Church at Corinth is with much proba bility assigned to the end of Domitian's reign, speaks of a troXv trXfjOos whose deaths were connected with the martyrdom of the great apostles Peter and Paul. He mentions particularly the female victims, and describes their punishment in words which at once suggest the ludibria of Tacitus : TouTots toIs avSpaa-iv oiiTtos tro\iTSvv vaaxera &is v ia-(j)ayp.svcov Sia rov Xoyov rov 6sov Kal Sia rf)v p,aprvplav r)v sl-)(ov : ' and, slSov ri]v yvvaiKa p,sdvova-av iK rov a"p,aros rcav dyicov Kal iK rov aXp-aros rmv fiaprvpav 'Irjcrov : ¦* while it is equally clear that the immediate occasion of the execution alluded to was the refusal to worship the emperor : ' Cited in Euseb. H. E. iii. 18 : ouSe yhp irph ttoXXov xp^vov eapaSri \ri i7roKoAin|/is] aXXa ffxeShy iirl rrjs ri/ierepas yeveas nphs rai reXei rris AopLeriavov apxvs. '' Prof. Eamsay {Expositor, July 1893, p. 16) argues from the vehement language of the Apocalypse as compared -with the moderate tone of the Apologists of the second century, that the policy of the first century emperors was essentially more severe towards the Chris tians than that of those in the second. Mommsen speaks of the "^complaints uttered in the Apocalypse.' Prof. Ramsay says that ' the Apocalypse is not a complaint but a vision of triumph over a cruel and bitter but impotent adversary.' Does he not suggest the answer to his own argument ? The intense, exaggerated, visionary tone of the Apocalypse is common to all the productions, mostly Jewish, of the same kind, and while we may accept any historical statements to be found in it, we must discount the general tone of denunciation. On the other hand, if the writer of the Apocalypse over stated the case, the Apologists by the very nature of their task were likely to employ a studied moderation which perhaps understated and mitigated the facts, though there are passages in Tertullian of intense, if repressed, bitterness, which, making allowance for the poetical imagery of the Apocalypse, might almost be compared with the tone of that work. To this it may be added that the Apocalyptic writer thought he was -writing on the eve of the second coming of Christ ; whereas the Apologists were trying to secure some tolerable locus standi for the Christians in an empire of which they no longer looked for a speedy end. ^ vi. 9 ; cf. also xx. 4 , ' xvii. 6. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT . 97 Kai iSoOr) avrfi Sovvai trvsiip^a rrj sIkovi rov Orjpiov iva Kai XaXrjo-T} rj sIkcov rov Orjpiov Kal rroi-rjar] wa ocroi iav firj rrpoaKwrjaaia-lv rfj siKOVi rov Oripiov drro- Kravd&cTiv.^ And, again, siSov .... rds yfrvy^ds rS)v TTSTTsXsKia-p.svav Sid rr/v p,aprvplav 'Yrjo-ov Kal Sid rov Xoyov rov dsov Kal o'lrivss ov TrpoasKvvtjaav rh Srjpiov oiiSs rfjv slKova avrov : ^ while we have the name of one martyr — Antipas — at Pergamus, the seat of the imperial cult at that time, os dwsKrdvOr} trap' vp,iv oirov 6 'Zaravds KaroiKsi,^ That it was the rule at the time, or thought to be so by the writer, for all the provincials to worship the emperor's image appears from another passage — rrpoa-KWija-ovaiv avrov rrdvrss oi KaroiKovvrss strl rrjs yijs.'^ It ap pears from these passages that a number of Chris tians were executed in Asia during Domitian's reign :< a circumstance probably alluded to in the Maprv- piov ^lyvariov^ — r&v iroXX&v iirl Aop^sriavov Si6Spa evapiBpLtyroi inrep rrfs XptffTiavav ei/ffefieias reBvijKafri, No doubt the number of those punished short of death may have been greater ; cf . Tert. Apol. 12 : 'In metalla damnamur ... in insulas relegamur.' 122 CHEISTUNITY AND importance of which, it seems to me, it is impossible to explain away — that the victims up to his own time were few and far between, could not have been made. It has been already said that the importance of Trajan's rescript may easily be exaggerated. It was originally a rescript to the particular governor of a particular province, and as such had directly no wider application,' though we cannot doubt that the course which Trajan recommended in Bithynia he would also wish to be pursued in other provinces. In all probability, indeed, Pliny was not the only governor who consulted Trajan on the subject : the collection and publication of Pliny's letters has pre served this particular rescript, which may well have been only one among many, just as the persecution in Bithynia almost certainly had its counterpart in other provinces. To speak of Trajan's letter, therefore, as an edict either of proscription or toleration is a complete mis conception of the facts. Undoubtedly, however, though a recommendation given under particular cir cumstances, it may safely be regarded as an index of the imperial policy. Before passing from this correspondence, one or two smaller points must be noticed. In a former publication I expressed the view that Pliny punished ' Professor Mayor makes the somewhat astonishing assertion that ' the corpus iuris and Haenel's collection have no meaning except by virtue of the supposition ' that rescripts to particular governors had a general apphcation throughout the empire. See Class, Bev. iv. 120 ad fin. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 123 the Christians as members of a collegium illicitum.^ The bearing of the law regarding collegia upon the Christian communities will need some discussion further on, but I am certainly convinced that Pro fessor Eamsay is right in denying all connexion between the application either of the general law about collegia, or Pliny's edict about hetaeriae and the prosecstion of the Bithynian Christians. Pliny would have enforced his own edict without any need to consult the emperor, and Trajan would cer tainly have shown no forbearance, toleration, or indulgence to the Christians if he had regarded them as members of a collegium or hetaeria. Another point regards the source from which the original charges before Pliny's tribunal and the sub sequent anonymous accusation-list proceeded. The latter in particular points to some special and per sonal motives of malevolence and ill-will. A possible explanation of this is suggested by the last paragraph of Pliny's letter, when he says that already as the result of the measures he had taken, the temples hitherto deserted were again becoming visited by worshippers, ceremonies long since discontinued were resumed, and the fodder of the sacrificial victims was once more finding purchasers. Here, as at Ephesus, special trades depended on the local cults : Christianity threatened and injured these by di minishing the number of their worshippers, and this special cause of hatred added to the general ill-odour in which the Christians everywhere stood — an ill- ' Pliny's Correspondence with Trajan, pp. 61, 243. 124 CHRISTUNITY AND odour which, Mommsen has pointed out, was partly an inheritance from their original Jewish ante cedents — caused one of those temporary manifesta tions of popular feeling which were usually the cause ''of any. decided or severe action on the part of the governors. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 125 VII PERSECUTION FOE THE NAME It appears conclusively, both from the letter of Pliny and the rescript of Trajan, that the Christians could be punished for the nomen alone, or the mere profession of Christianity, apart from the specifica tion or proof of definite crimes. Professor Eamsay thinks that this was the case only from about 80 a.d. To me it seems that it might have happened at any time since I 64 a.d., and since writing the preceding pages I have seen that Mommsen and Professor Sanday both take the same view.' Professor Eam say,, as I understand, proposes to show from the Pastoral Epistles, assumed as belonging to a date earlier than 80 a.d., that the Christians were before that time condemned on the ground of specific charges.^ Surely this, even granting the early date of the Epistles, will be far from conclusive of the question. If the whole matter was one for the police administration of the empire, the proceedings in par ticular cases would be essentially vague, and would ' Mommsen in the Expositor, July 1893, pp. 5, 6 ; Prof. Sanday in the Expositor for June 1893. '' Expositor, .July 1893, p. 31. 126 CHRISTIANITY AND admit of many variations from and modifications of anything like an established precedent. The Neronian trials at Eome no doubt furnished such a precedent, and in them, while probably several specific charges came into consideration, the condemnation was not on the ground of any of them, but of a summary of them all amount- ' ing to ' odium generis humani : ' in other words, the Christians were condemned for what was involved in the name or profession of their sect. Provincial governors could take the same course, and no doubt some of them did, 1 Peter, if we assume its early date, being evidence for it.' But, on the other hand, it was quite within their discretion to inquire into and punish specific charges, and in the early days, when Christianity was still a strange and unfamiliar appearance, they would be likely to do this, and any cases which Professor Eamsay may adduce out of the Pastoral Epistles would belong to this category. In deed, this uncertainty of procedure, though more likely to occur in the early relations between govern ment and Christianity, was apparently a character istic of it all through. Tertullian complains that the whole matter was ' confessio nominis non examinatio I criminis,' ^ and yet he also says ' sacrilegii et maies tatis rei convenimur,' ' and maiestas was surely as specific a charge as could be made. But the language of TertuUian suggests a more important question than that of the precise date at which the 'nomen ipsum' became punishable— a ' Especially 1 Peter iv. 15, quoted on p. 80. '' Tert. Apol, 2. » Ibid, 10. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 127 question which, as far as I can judge, Mommsen's utterances both in the ' Historische Zeitschrift ' and in the ' Expositor ' still leave a little uncertain — viz. whether those who were punished as ' rei maiestatis ' were or^were not punished for the name^ To all appearance Mommsen answers this question in the affirmative. In the earlier article, after speaking of the conception of the Christian belief as in itself a capital crime, and quoting such well-known passages as 1 Peter iv. 15, and Just. ' Apol.' i. 11 in support of it, he goes on to say that this conception could not have depended on the edict of this or that particular emperor, but must have been grounded in the essence of the Eoman criminal law, and we can see from TertuUian — i.e. in the passage about maiestas — how it was juristically to be explained.' Still more plainly in the ' Expositor :' ^ ' The Christian atheism, the negation of the national gods, was the contempt of the " dii publici populi Eomani," in itself high treason, or, as the Christians express it . . . the mere Christian name, the testimony of such atheism, constituted a crime in the eyes of the law.' It seems to follow from this that when Christians were condemned as Chris tians Sid ro 6vop,a, on account of the 'nomen ipsum,' they were punished as ' rei maiestatis.' If Mommsen" affirms this, that the mere confession ' Christianus sum ' was tantamount to a conviction under the ' lex majestatis,' I do not know who could venture to con tradict him ; but one would have supposed that no one^ ' Histor. ZeitscJir. p. 396. » July 1893, 128 CHRISTUNITY AND ^ could be convicted of a definite_iggal_joffence like 1 maiestas without regular procedure and definite evi- ^dence, the absence of which is just what Tertullian and others complain of in the ordinary Christian trials. Again it is just the absence of these points which characterises what Mommsen in the 'His torische Zeitschrift ' ' describes as by far the most common form of state repression in religious matters, the magisterial coercitio or general police administra tion. From this a considerable discretionary power on the part of the magistrate was inseparable, and as soon as ever Christianity was recognised as involving something less than absolute obedience to the state, it is quite conceivable — and the procedure of Pliny is a conclusive case in point — that the confession ' Chris tianus sum,' if persisted in, could be followed by a capital sentence. It is possible that I have misunder stood Mommsen's meaning, and found a difficulty where none exists, but at any rate it seems to me that there were at least three, and possibly four, ways in which Christianity might be visited with capital punishment : (1) On the ground of the obstinatio which charac terised all Christians as such : the refusal to worship the state gods, the disobedience to the state authority. This rendered all Christians outlaws — ' hostes publici ' — liable to summary punishment at the hands of the police authorities, either in Eome or the provinces. This was punishment for the name only, and under ' pp. 410 foil. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 129 this head by far the majority of cases of persecution feU.' (2) The rfefusal to worship the state gods, which from the first point of view was obstinatio, from another was dOsorrjs, and this, involving as it did contempt for the ' dii publici populi Eomani,' though apparently not originally falling under it, could be, and in some cases certainly was, brought under the head of maiestas. This is the ' crimen laesae Eomanae religionis,' the ' irreligiositatis elogium ' of Tertullian,^ , and it is quite possible that recourse was had to this more formal procedure oftener in TertuUian's time than in Pliny's, and in the western more than in the eastern provinces. (3) The refusal to worship the emperor might be taken, not simply as a proof of Christianity, as in the Bithynian cases, but as violating the maiestas of the emperor. That is what TertuUian describes as ' secundus titulus laesae augustioris maiestatis.' ' (4) The Christians might in certain cases be pro ceeded against as homicides, or incesti, or magicians. Those cases, however, would certainly be rare, such charges being usually rather thrown in informally to create a prejudice against the Christians than put forward as substantial accusations.'' ' It was, beyond controversy, under this head that the action of Pliny would fall. '' Mommsen, Hist. Zeitschr. p. 396 ; Tert. Apol. 24. ' Tert. Apol. 28 and 10 : ' Deos, inquitis, non colitis, et pro im peratoribus sacrificia non impenditis.' ¦* Tert. Apol. 2 : ' Quando si de aliquo nocente cognoscitis non statim confesso eo nomen homicidae vel sacrilegi vel incesti vel K 130 CHRISTIANITY AND If the rescript of Trajan is not important as lay ing down a new or imperial policy with regard to the Christians, it nevertheless furnishes us with the first authentic evidence as to the view taken of Christi anity by the supreme government. Trajan clearly did not regard the religion as a political danger within the range of practical politics : he does not forbid prosecution — he, in fact, in certain cases au thorises it — but he evidently wishes to confine it within the narrowest limits consistent with the peace of the province, the governor undoubtedly having a very great discretionary power allowed him, since he could always invite accusations, though he could not initiate them. Eusebius seems very correctly to sum up the situation when he says ' that those who wished to injure the Christians had no more difficulty in finding excuses than before ; that sometimes the populace, sometimes particular governors, contrived means of attacking them, though these attacks were always partial, confined to particular provinces, and not open and public prosecutions. There seems good publici hostis (ut de nostris elogiis loquar) .contenti sitis ad pronun- tiandum, nisi et consequentia exigatis.' Cf, c. 4: ' Incestus sum, cur non requirunt ? infanticida, cur non extorquent ? in deos, in Caesares aliquid committo, cur non audior, qui habeo quo purger ? ' Cf. Athenag, Sux>plic. 3 : Tp(a iiruprifii^ovaiv ijuiv iyKXi^nara, hBe6rr\Ta, ©veo-rtta Seiirya, OiSnroSeiovs p.i^eis. ^ Euseb. H. E. iii. 33 : ou yevofievov iroaas p.ey roO StaypLov o-jSeo"- Brjyai r^v a-jreiX^v a-s Kal g« rov dvsra^o/isvovs irphs Aapuraalovs Kal irphs @etT iyopta rov vloii rov Beov . . . offot ... ^tt* i^ovrriav hxBevres i^erdaSita^av Kal ovk ripyijaayro k. r. X. Athenagoras, ii. 3 : koI yhp ob irphs rrjs vpierepas SiKaioffivTjS robs pi.ev dXXovs, airlav Xa^6vras aSiKijixaray fi^ irporepov fl iXeyxBrjvai KoXd(eaBai, i^' r]iJ.iiv Se ptei^ov iirx^eiv rh Svofia ray iirl tj S'lkti ixiyxav. Tert. Apol. 2 : ' Denique quid de tabella reoitatis ilium Christianum, cur non et homioidam ? ' 44 ; ' Aut cum Christiani suo titulo offeruntur.' THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 135 Justin says : ' idv fisv ns ra>v Karr)yopovp,sva)v s^apvos ysv7]rai, ry a)vy fir] slvai (pijaas, dcjiisrs avrov, dis fjirjSsv iXsyx^siv s-^^ovrss afxaprdvovra. In the per secution at Lugdunum under M. Aurelius, perhaps in consequence of the incriminating evidence of slaves with regard to the ©vsa-rsia Sslirva and OiSitroSsioi pilosis, the governor took a different course, and those who denied their religion were shut up in prison.^ This action, however, was due to the arbitrary con duct of an unusually hostile governor, and was not sanctioned by the emperor, whose rescript was to the effect that those who persisted were to be put to death, while those who recanted should be released.' In most cases, indeed, the governors were not only willing but anxious to avoid harsh measures against the Christians by obtaining a recantation from them. We have already seen that by Pliny's time the cus tom had grown up of giving the Christians three chances of abjuring their religion before executing punishment, and this before long developed into the regular practice of torturing the accused in order to force from them, not the confession of their religion, but the denial of it. ' Ceteris negantibus,' says Ter tullian, ' adhibetis tormenta ad confitendum, solis ' Justin. Apol. i. 4. Cf. Orig. Contra Cels. ii. 13 : Xpianavol Se fi6yoL pLexpt reXevratas hvairvorjs virh rav SiKatrray iirirpeTroyraL i^op-o- ffdpLevot rhy XpiariavirrpXiy KoX Karh ra Kotvh %Bt] Bvaavres Kal opi6ffayres oIkoi yeyeaBai Kal Qrjv i,KiySivas. ^ Euseb. H. E. v. 1, 33 : ol yhp Karh r^v irpdrviv aiXXiiyj/ty ^apvot yeySfieyoi avyeKXeioyro koX abrol Kal p.ere7xov rav Seiyav, ovSe yhp iv ra Katp^ roiirtp SiXe7 yeveaBai, THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 139 of this time resulted i^ imOsasms rav Kara troXsis Srjp,a)v.^ Similarly in the ' Acta ' of Polycarp the pro consul urges the martyr, ' Satisfac populo.' ^ ' Quotiens etiam,' asks TertuUian, 'praeteritis vobis suo iure nOs inimicum vulgus invadit lapidibus et incendiis ? ' ' and, again, ' Nee uUi magis depostulatores Chris tianorum quam vulgus,'* and still more definitely, ' De qua iniquitate saevitiae non modo caecum hoc vulgus exsultat et insultat, sed et quidam vestrum, quibus favor vulgi de iniquitate captatur, gloriantur.' ^ TertuUian's evidence on this point is, indeed, summed up in his address to the provincial governors as ' boni praesides, mehores multo apud populum si Ulis Chris tianos immolaveritis.' ^ (5) The emperors themselves, when appealed to by the governors, were^more inclined to check than to encourage persecution, though their policy in this was purely utUitarian, based on no sort of approval of or sympathy with the Christians, to whose execu tion they assented without scruple whenever the ' Euseb. H. E. v. 5, prooem. 1. * Acta Polycarpi, Euinart, p. 31. Cf. Euseb. H, E. iv. 15, 6 : t^ irav irXrtBos hiroBa^i^atTav r%s avSpeias rhy BeopiXri p.apripa Kal tV KaB6Xov rov yeyovs rS>v Xpurnavay aper^v hBpdus iiri^oay &p(a(TBai ' alpe robs aOeovs ; ' and 26 : irav rh irXrjBos ray iBvay re Kal 'lovSaiav irphs r7}v ^p.ipvay KaroiKoitvrav . . . pieydXri rjiuvy i^6a . . . ovr6s itrriv d rijs 'Aaias StSdffKaXos, 6 irar^p ruv Xpiffriavav, o ray Tjfierepuv Beav KaBatperiiS. » Tert. Apol. 37. ' Ibid. 35. ' Ibid, 49. Cf. Justin. Apol, ii. 3, who says that Crescens, the philosopher, accused the Christians as &Beoi Kal aae$e7s , . . irphs Xdpiy Kal 7]S6y7iy ray iroXXuy ray ireirXavijpievuv raCra irpdrray, • Tert. Apol. 50. 140 CHEISTIANITY AND advantages of such a course seemed to preponderate, but simply on the supposition that the Christians were harmless and somewhat contemptible enthusiasts^ of whose obstinatio it was hardly worth while to take notice, while the disturbances caused by popular out breaks against them were not consistent with the good order of the empire. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT VHI ATTITUDE OF BADEIAN, PIUS, AND MAKCU3 AURELIUS This certainly seems to have been the attitude of Hadrian in his rescript to Minucius Fundanus, pro- \ consul of Asia, in about 124 a.d.. the full text of which I append below in a note,' Asia was un doubtedly the province in which the Christian diffi culty was most urgeni and most p^raiifentTlIere ' The rescript is found in Greek appended to Justin's First Apology, and in Eusebius H. E, iv. 9, and in Latin iu Euflnus' translation of Eusebius. As Eusebius expressly states that Justin gives the Latin version (H, E. iii. 8, 7), Bishop Lightfoot, with much probability, supposes that Euflnus did not translate it into Latin but substituted the original rescript. ' Accepi literas ad me scriptas a decessore tuo, Sereno Graniano, clarissimo viro, et non placet mihi relationem silentio praeterire, ne et inuoxii perturbentur, et calumniatoribus latrociuandi tribuatur occasio. Itaque si evidenter provinciales huio petitioni suae adesse voleut adversum Christianos, ut pro tribunal! eos in ahquo arguant, hoc eis exequi non prohibeo : precibus autem in hoc solis et adelamationibus uti eis non permitto. Etenim multo aequius est, si quis volet accusare, te oognoscere de obiectis. Si quis igitur acousat et probat, adversus legem quicquam agere memoratos homines pro merito peocatorum etiam supplicia statues. Illud mehercule magnopere curabis ut si quis calumniae gratia quemquam horum postulaverit reum, in hunc pro sui nequitia suppliciis severioribus vindices.' 140 CHRISTIANITY AND advantfly_jhe__jQhriatians were most numerous, the buljjulace most hostile, an^^cculBTS^'fnoir'Wentiful ; 'nere, too, all thejocSTcon^i^ons most repugnant to anSTmost impatient of Christian ideas of morality were mosr|^n^m^d:OTd;:mHt3^1lima§3r tainly, sometimes in one city, sometimes in another, persecution niust have been almost continnoua and permanent. The proconsuls may have observed, and probably they did so, the principle of Trajan, not to search out offenders, but this in a province so full of sycophants, sophists, and delatores, was but scant pro tection.' And not only were real Christians brought before the tribunal of the proconsul. In a case where so [ittle had to be substantiated, where the mere ' nomen Christiani ' was the gist, nay the whole, of the charge, ffliere was every inducement to make a trade of this 3ort of delation, to accuse or to threaten with accusa tion those who were not Christians, and then to exact money for letting proceedings drop. That non-Chris tians were sometimes accused we know from Pliny's letter ; that attempts to extort money were sometimes made we know from a case already alluded to as mentioned by TertuUian.^ But clearly such un principled conduct, besides running counter to the spirit of the times, destroyed whatever value there was in the police repression of Christianity, and intro duced a spirit of terrorism into the province. It was, I conceive, in some such circumstances as these, that Licinius Silvanus Granianus, the proconsul, con- ' Mommsen, BSm. Oesch, v. 333 foil. ' See p. 138, note 1. THE EOMAN GOVEENilENT 143 suited Hadrian, who sent the well-known rescript, for the genuineness of which Mommsen has authoritatively pronounced, to his successor, Minucius Fundanus.' The general object of the rescript is clearly enough stated at the outset, ' ne et innoxii perturbentur, et calumniatoribus latrociuandi tribuatur occasio.' Toi prevent this, the emperor lays it down that accusers are not to be allowed to make use of any mob-influence against the Christians, and that they must do more ' than prove the ' nomen Christiani ' — they must prove that the accused have acted against the law : ' si quis ' igitur accusat et probat, adversus legem quicquid agere memoratos homines, pro merito peccatorum etiam supplicia statues ; ' while, finally, accusers who failed to make good their charges were to be themselves severely punished. It seems to me that this rescript was intended, as indeed it naturally would be, for the special circumstances of Asia : it does not in any way, as I interpret it, rescind the decision of Trajan that the ' nomen ' was a crime, but to avoid any mis carriage of justice, such as, with a summary procedure,! a large number of accused, a hostile pressure exer cised by the mob, might very easily occur, it lays down more stringent conditions for the proof of punishable crime. It is possible, as Professor Eamsay says,^ that there is a studied vagueness in this rescript. ' Licinius Silvanus Granianus was consul in 106 A.r>., C. Minucius Eundanus in 107 a.d. (Klein, Fasti Consulares, p. 56), and according to Waddington {Pastes Asiatiques, p. 197 sq.) they would naturally have reached the proconsulship of Asia about 123-4 aud 124-5 respectively. ^ p. 323. 144 CHRISTIANITY AND I doubt whether this would be reflected in the actions depending on it.' The dOsorifs of the Christians as well as their refusal to worship the emperor could, as has already been shown, be brought under the law of maiestas, and it was no doubt to this procedure, in which more definite proof was required and a stricter investigation pursued, that Hadrian's rescript pointed. Though intended primarily for Asia, it may quite possibly have had some influence on the governors of other provinces. It was of course always possible for the Christians to be accused and convicted of maiestas. Justin Martyr affirms that they were accused as ddsoi and das/Ssis,^ and Tertullian in a passage al ready referred to speaks of them as ' rei maiestatis.' Punishment for the name only, as there is abundant evidence to show, was executed after Hadrian's rescript just as much as before, but it is quite pos sible that it gave a certain stimulus towards the employment of the more definite and regular legal procedure.' ' The suspicions cast upon this rescript by Keim {Rom und das Christenthum, p. 553), Overbeck {Studien zur Oeschichte der alten Kirche,-p. 134),Aub6 {Persicutions de V EgUse, p. 261), and Baur {Die drei ersten Jahrhunderte, p. 442) are met once for all by Mommsen, who declares that its ' grandiose Verdachtigung der beste Beweise ist wie wenig sich die Neueren in den Standpunkt der romischen Eegierung dem Christenthum gegeniiber zu finden vermogen.' ' Note that ao-e'/Seio is technically maiestas and not sacrilegium. ' Hadrian's own liberalism and freedom from prejudice in religious matters are exemplified in the story told of him by Lam- pridius {'Vit. Alex. Sev. 43) : ' Christo templum facere voluit, eumque inter deos recipere, quod et Hadrianus cogitasse fertur, qui templa in omnibus civitatibus sine simulacris iusserat fleri quae hodieque THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 145 Under Antoninus Pius there is reason, a,s Bishop Lightfoot has shown,' to believe that there was by no means that complete peace to the Church which Sulpicius Severus ascribes to his reign,^ and the cases of Ptolemaeus and Lucius, executed at Eome by the praefectus urbi, Lolhus Urbicus, cannot have been unknown to the emperor,' whUe the martyrdom of Polycarp at Smyrna is proved by the exhaustive arguments of M. Waddington to have belonged to this reign.* But if we are to believe the evidence of Melito, as quoted by Eusebius, he, like Hadrian, ; discouraged the riotous behaviour of the mob, send- ,' ing letters to the authorities at Larissae, Thessa lonica, and Athens, and to all the Hellenes (a term which is understood by Professor Eamsay as includ ing Greek cities like Smyrna on the Aegean coast), forbidding any such conduct.* With regard to M. Aurelius, the case is somewhat more doubtful, and ne is usuaiiv considered a severe^ persecutor of the Christians, and, indeed, the conirasr "Between his reign in this respect and that of his degenerate son and successor, Commodus, has partly idcirco quia non habent numina dicuntur Hadriani, quae ille ad hoc parasse dioebatur : sed prohibitus est ab iis qui consulentes sacra reppererant omnes Christianos futures si id fecisset et templa reliqua deserenda.' Tertullian calls him ' omnium curiositatum explorator,' Apol. 5 ; of. Dio Cass. Ixix. 5 and 11. ' Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, Part II. vol. i. p. 493. ' Sulp. Sev. Chron. ii. 31, 32. ' Justin, Apol. ii. 2. ' Waddington's arguments are summarised by Lightfoot, Apo stolic Fathers, Part II. vol. i. p. 639 foil. 5 See p. 132, note 4. L 146 CHRISTUNITY AND led to the general inference that the better "the emperor, the greater his severity towards the Chris- ftSCHS^; It certainly cannof be denied ihat the Chris- ' tianswere persecuted, and with some severity, in several different parts of the empire during this reign, but I cannot think that there is any evidence which justifies Neumann ' in ascribing to the emperor a new policy different from, and severer than, that of Trajan, or which can lead us to suppose that the persecutions, such as they were, arose from imperial initiative rather than from the general circumstances of the time and local conditions. In the first place, it must be remembered that as time went on, the practice increased among the Christians of recording the -deaths or sufferings of their members — a practice which^ when the Churches were less organised, and the consciousness of a common history less pro nounced, had either not been commenced or was less completely carried out. Hence we should expect that, quite apart from the actual frequency of persecutions, the number of those recorded would tend to become greater.. In the next, place, we entirely fail in the records belonging to this reign to find evidence for anything hke a general persecution. The evidence of Melito proves a certain amount of persecution in Asia ; ^ the martyrdom of Justin shows that the Christians in Eome were stUl liable to be brought before the jurisdiction of the praefectus urbi, while it is known that a number of Christians from the city ' p. 28 foil. ' Euseb. H, E, iv. 26, 5. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 147 or Italy were condemned to the mines of Sardinia.' The letter of the Churches of Lugdunum and Vienna to those in Asia and Phrygia^ furnishes authentic evidence for a severe, though not widespread, perse cution in Gaul ; and, finally, the first Christian blood was shed in this • reign in the province of Africa at Medaura,' whUe the martyrdoms at Scili, in the same province, though occurring a few months after the death of M. Aurelius, must stUl be virtually- ascribed to his reign.* What strikes us, however, most in this list, is neither the extent of the persecutions (which would surely have been much greater if they had resulted from any dehberate policy) nor the number' of the victims (which even at Lugdunum apparently did not exceed forty-eight) * but rather the fact that instances of coUision between Christianity and the government l are now- found in the Western as well as the Eastern' provinces. This, however, would more naturally be ascribed to the recent growth of Christianity in those parts, and the consequent excitement of the populace against it, than to a -new policy on the part of the government. As to the earliest rise of the religion in the Western provinces, we are unfortunately very ' Hipjioiyt. Haer, ix. 12 : pierh xp^'oy Se erepav eKe7 ivrav paprv- puy, ri MapKla . . , irpoaKaXeaap,eyii rbv ptaxapiov OUtKropa , . . ^piira, rives ehv iv SapSovtc} puipripes, ^ Euseb. H, E. v. 1. ' Augu^tin. Epist, xv. aid xvi. Cf. Tert. ad Scap. 3 : ' Vigellius Saturninus qui primus hie gladium in nos egit.' ¦• The date is now fixed to the year 180 a.d. See Lightfoot, p. 508, and Neumann, p. 284;' ' Gregory of Tours, OloT. Mart, 49. L 2 148 CHEISTUNITY AND imperfectly acquainted, but that Christianity could be described in Lugdunum as Kaivq ns Oprja-Ksla ' more than 100 years after the Neronian persecution in Eome seems to point either to a late introduction or to a late extension. That there was, to a certain extent, under M. Aurelius, and not without his own approval and per haps his own initiation, a reactionary tendency to- . wards a stricter observance of the national rehgion in the face of desperate wars with barbarians, and the widespread horrors of a devastating pestilence, is no doubt true, and this might easUy cause more frequent cases of collision in the provinces between either the populace or the governors on the one side and Christianity on the other. As Tertullian in a memor able passage points out, it was just such calamities which occasioned the unreasoning cry ' Christianos ad leones.' ^ But this fact by itself is far from con stituting M. Aurelius as a persecutor of the Christians, . and stUl further from assisting Neumann's theory that the persecution in his reign resulted from certain definite rescripts, primarily aimed at Christianity, and seriously modifying the general toleration of the previous reigns. Modestinus, no doubt, reports a rescript of the emperor : ' ' Si quis ahquid fecerit quo leves hominum animi superstitione numinis terrentur, huiusmodi homines in insulam relegari ; ' while Paulus lays down the rule, ' qui novas seetas vel ratione incognitas religiones inducunt ex quibus animi ' Euseb. H E.w.l " Tertull. Apol. 40. Din. xlviii. 19, 30. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 149 hominum moveantur, honestiores deportantur, humi liores capite puniuntur.' ' To the effect of these rescripts, only the former of which has any direct connexion with M. Aurelius, Neumann ascribes the persecutions in this reign, and in particular that (of which we have the fullest information) at Lugdunum." On several grounds this seems to be an entirely mis taken view. In the first case the rescript, as Momm- * sen points out, was merely the precise expression — caUed forth probably by some particular and local circumstances — of a duty imposed by self-defence upon every efficient government.' It had no direct refer ence to the Christians, though it might of course be applied to them if necessary, but its retention in the ' Digest ' under the Christian emperors is a proof of its general and not particular application. Nor was there the slightest need of a rescript of this kind. If there was any reason to deal more severely with the Christians, there was a summary police jurisdiction which could at any moment be applied to them, by which the mere establishment of their Christianity could be followed by capital punishment. As Christians, they were in theory in the position of outlaws : it was only necessary to discard the some what illogical toleration which usuaUy prevaUed, and to bring practice into accord with theory, and a general persecution of the Christians as such was possible. To have punished them merely as the causes of public excitement, when they might have ' Paul. Sent. v. 21, 2. '' p. 29. » Hist. Zeitschr. p. 400. 150 CHEISTUNITY AND been treated as ' hostes publici,' would have been a step backward rather than forward. Nor do the records which remain of the . persecu tions support Neumann's theory. No doubt at Lug- ydunum the immediate occasion of the persecution was an outbreak of popular hatred and fury ; but we have seen reason to suppose that this, so far from being exceptional or needing the explanation of a special rescript, was what in the Eastern provinces had happened again and again, the reasons for the popular hatred, as well as its intensity, varying in different cases and localities. When the accused were brought before the legate, there was no question of particular charges; there was no accusation of ddsorrjs or da-sj3sia, not a word to imply that the charge was disturbance of the public peace. In fact, no question was asked except whether they were Christians,' and the account says explicitly that no other charge was made against them.^ Finally, the punishments inflicted on those condemned were not those specified in the rescript — -relegatio, deportatio, or decapitation — but in the majority of cases exposure to wild beasts.' There seems, therefore, no reason to suppose that the persecutions at Lugdunum were due to any increased severity on the part of the central government. The ' Euseb. H, E. v. 1, 10 : d\Act p,6vov rovro irvBofieyov ei Kol avrhs eir} Xpiartavbs, rov Se Xa/xirpordrri tpayfj tpLoXoyiiaavros, ayeX-fjipBrj Kal avrhs eis rhy KXijpov ruv p.apriipuy. ' Euseb. H. E. v. 1, 33 : dXV oi p.ey inoXoyovvres h Kal ijaav, fTvveKXeiovro us XpLO-riavol, p.7iSep.ias &XXtis avro7s alrias iiri^epofieyris. ' Euseb. H. E. v. 1, 47 : Kal oo-oi fiev iS6Kovy iroXirelav 'Pap.aiav iaxriKeyai roirav lnrerep,ve rhs Kep.eBd irore brrh ruy trvKorpdvrav acparrSpievot, which shows that accusations were made according to Trajan's rescript. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 153 of Hadrian than that of Trajan, by which popular acclamations were forbidden to be taken as formal accusations. Another proof that in this reign the Christians were hunted out is often found in the state ment of Celsus : vpiSiv Ss Kav trXavdrai ris sn Xav- Odvcov dXXd ^r/rslrai Trpos davdrov Siktjv.^ But in addition to the uncertainty as to the exact date of Celsus, the statement seems altogether too vague and too general to warrant the conclusion which Professor Eamsay draws from it. Finally with regard to the ' Acta Justini ' (which, by the way, belong to quite the beginning of the reign, whereas the harsher policy of Aurelius is usually ascribed to the end of it), I cannot agree with Professor Eamsay that the implication is in favour of the criminals being searched out rather than accused. If the tradition mentioned by Eusebius is untrustworthy, that Justin's death was due to the accusation of Crescens the philosopher," at least we should expect that any searching out of the Christians, especially in Eome, would have resulted in the death of more than one or two individuals. It seems, therefore, that the prosecutions under M. Aurelius were essentially of the same description as those under his predecessors. He has no hesitation in ordering the execution of those who when accused refused to recant ; but on the other hand, like previous emperors, he seems to have discouraged the severity of provincial governors as at Lugdunum, as well as the eagerness and greed of informers. TertuUian, who . does not hesitate to call him a ' protector ' " Orig. Contra Cels. viii. 69. " Euseb. H, E. iv. 16, 7, 8. 154 CHRISTIANITY AND rather than a 'debellator Christianorum,' says de finitely enough : ' qui sicut non palam ab eiusmodi hominibus poenam dimovit ita alio modo palam dis- persit, adiecta etiam accusatoribus damnatione.'' The view taken above as to the attitude of the emperors towards the Christians differs to a certain extent from that of Professor Eamsay, who thinks that there was a definite and hostile policy towards the Christians from the time of the Flavian emperors ; that they were recognised as a dangerous element in the state, and that no mere pressure of popular feeling could affect the action of a strong government like the Eoman. He, however, at the same time admits ' that a wider and more generous policy was adopted, though in a very hesitating and tentative way, by the second century emperors, who did not fear the current of the times as the older empire had done.' " I think we hardly have the material for drawing any such contrast between the emperors of the first and second century in their attitude towards the Christians. It is true that in the case of the Flavian emperors we have no evidence of any action on their part tending to check the severity of persecution, as we have in the case of Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius, but, on the other hand, we are equally (except perhaps in the case of Domitian) without positive evidence that they directly encouraged or instituted persecution. It seems to me that the empire, in the sense of the central government, was all this time without a permanent or steady policy towards the Christians : it had not yet ' Tert. Apol. 5. * Expositor, July 1892, p. 15. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 155 made up its mind. It was of course aware of the general hatred against the sect; it was aware that Christianity was at variance with some of the essential features of Eoman society ; it was aware of the sus picions or reports of gross immorality practised at/ midnight meetings ; it knew the intolerant and exclu-| sive attitude of the sect towards the national religion] and it did not shut its eyes to the fact that thia obstinatio constituted logically potential disobedience] or disloyalty to the state. This principle was asserted{ and occasionally acted upon from the first ; but a, j policy implies something more than occasional action,) and this was wanting throughout the first two cen-| turies. If the emperors had made up their minds that Christianity was a political danger, they would have developed a policy and the treatment of the Christians would have been very different from what it was ; there would have been a serious attempt to put the new religion down ; the persecutions would have been general and continuous, and the imperial edicts clear and precise. We should not have found Pliny at the close of what Professor Eamsay thinks was the severer period, in any uncertainty about the , course to be pursued, and, above all, we should not : have found Trajan deciding ' conquirendi non sunt.' The emperors clearly did not think Christianity, in spite of the logical results of its principles, a practical danger to be reckoned with by the state, \ and in consequence their attitude towards it was not j definite but opportunist. It differed at different times ' and in different provinces, sometimes even in different 156 CHRiSTUNirr and parts of the same province, and sometimes peace and tranquillity would be best consulted by protecting the Christians against the hatred of the populace, some times by practically sacrificing them to it ; but the whole question was as yet not an imperial concern — ' neque enim in universum aliquid quod quasi certam formam habeat constitui potest ' ' — it formed part of the police administration of each provincial legate and proconsul to whose discretion in the ordinary course of things the treatment of the Christians was left. No doubt tolerably frequent appeals were from time to time made to the emperors for their advice in particular cases. We cannot believe that the letter of Pliny was an isolated case, and we know from Lactantius that a collection was made in the seventh book ' De Officio Proconsulis ' of the various rescripts issued by the emperors against the Christians." The list would have been an invaluable one, but we can hardly doubt that all these rescripts, like that of Trajan, had reference primarily to particular localities and circumstances, and that while Christianity was recognised as a penal offence, there was no general edict of proscription and no encouragement of a systematic persecution. I cannot help thinking, therefore, that Professor Eamsay has to some extent antedated the existence of anything like a policy of proscription on the part • Plin. ad Trai. 97. ' Lactaut. Inst, v, 11, 19 : ' Domitius de officio proconsulis libro septimo rescripta principum nefaria coUegit, ut doceret quibus poenis adfici oporteret eos qui se cultores dei confitereutur.' THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 157 of the Eoman government ; and he does this because he antedates the time when Christianity was regarded as a serious and practical danger to the social and political foundations of the empire. No doubt there came a time when this was the case, but it did not come within the first two centuries, with which alone Professor Eamsay deals. To a certain extent, if I may presume to say so, he argues in a circle on this subject. Speaking of what he describes as the ' Flavian policy,' he says : ' ' But soon the Flavian government recognised that the united organisation of the Chris tians was no whit weakened by the destruction of the Temple. The Christians stiU continued no less than before to maintain a unity independent of and contrary to the imperial unity, and to consolidate steadUy a wide-reaching organisation.' "What evidence, we may ask, is there of any wide-reaching organisa tion between 70 and 80 a.d. ? However, it is from the assumption of this organisation that Professor Eamsay draws a general inference as to the hostile policy of the imperial government. ' Either Eome,' he says, ' must now compel obedience, or it must acknowledge that the Christian unity was stronger than the empire ; ' " and so, quite in accordance with this, he says ' the Flavian action was directed against the Church as an organised unity.' ' In another passage, however, we find Professor Eamsay arguing that there must have been a Christian organisation in order to explain the persecution of the Christians. ' An organisation strong, if only rudimentary, is ' p. 356. ¦' p. 356. ¦¦> p. 274. 158 CHRISTIANITY AND required to explain the imperial history, and such an organisation is attested by the Christian documents.' ' That is to say : there was a far-reaching organisation, therefore a' strong government must have inaugurated a policy of pfersecution; and there is evidence of persecution, therefore we must assume some Christian organisation to explain it. However, putting on one side what is no doubt only a seeming inconsistency, I quite admit that from the time when the government became convinced that Christianity was developing into a widespread organisation — was, in fact, becom ing a state within- the state— its action approached more and more to being a policy in the proper sense of the word, and a pohcy definite, permanent, and hostile to Christianity. I do not propose, and I am not competent, to enter here into the question of Church organisation, either its nature or the steps by which it was accomplished, but merely to point out very briefly that as far as our • evidence goes, the unity of Christianity was almost up to the end of the period treated by Professor Eamsay a unity of idea, of belief, of doctrine, and of , hope, but not a unity of organisation : though it was only the latter kind of unity which would seem a practical danger to a- government like that of impe rial Eome. We are unfortunately very much in the dark as to the numbers of the Christians, not only during the first two centuries, but even up to the so-called conversion of the empire. In some of the provinces, and especially in the great centres of ' p. 372. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 159 HeUenic civilisation, such as Antioch, Ephesus, Smyrna, they were j)robably a numerous bnriy a,f. a. tolerably early period, though not so numerous as to be in t,bems(;1vea a politicar^iigerT/^ In Bithynia we have the evidence of Pliny-— whiclTrhowever, may be variously interpreted. In Eome the numbers of the Christians must have received a considerable check" by the Neronian persecution^ and there can hardly be a ao^h ihat TOfing"We''"wEole of this period they were quite an insig^nificant body, amid the numerous population of the caprtaT^ WEm'we remember that even in the time of Theodosius,. seventy years after the conversion of Constantino, the Christians num bered no more than one-fourth or one-fifth of the population in a city like Antioch,' it is quite im possible to imagine that, as far as numbers went, the Christians would have been a serious political danger- in the first two centuries. Tertullian, no doubt, in a rhetorical and characteristic passage," seems to assert that the Christians formed the greater part of the popu lation, but the exaggeration is so flagrant and appa rent as to deprive the statement of all statistical value. ' Friedlander, Sittengeschichte, iii. 598. \_ '¦ \ ' Tert. Apol, 37 : 'Hesterni sumus et vestra omnia implevimus, urbes, insulas, oastella, munioipia, conciliabula, castra ipsa, tribus, decurias, palatium, senatum, forum : sola vobis relinquimus templa. PosBumus dinumerare exercitus vestros : unius provinciae plures erunt.' Cf. c. 1 : ' Obsessam vociferantur civitatem, in agris, in castellis, in insulis Christianos; omnem sexum, aetatem, condi- tionem, etiam dignitatem, transgredi ad hoc nomen.' Ad Scap. 2 : ' Tanta hominum multitude, pars pene maior civitatis cuiusque ; ' ibid, 5 : ' Quid fades de tantis milibus hominum, tot viris ao feminis, omnis sexus, omnis aetatis, omnis dignitatis ? ' etc. 160 CHRISTIANITY AND But a comparatively small numerical strength might very conceivably, with the help of organisation and common action, become, if not politicaUy danger ous, at least a force to be reckoned with and looked at with suspicion. / Of this wide-spread organisation I do not know what proof can be adduced. That during the earlier years of Christianity there was a certainjntercom- munication between the principal CEurches through "the apostles to whose preaching they owed their origin ; that the apostles, while sojourning in one part of the empire, sent letters of admonition and encouragement to the Christians in another ; that on occasions alms might be sent from Philippi to Eome, or from Eome to Phihppi ; that, somewhat later, letters were written in the name of one congregation by its bishop to another, hke that of the Eoman Clement to the Corinthians under Domitian, are, of course, well- known and indisputable facts. The Christians all over the empire _were~-the«lJbr.ethren ' with common hopes, common beliefs, and to a certain extent com mon sufferings. The splendid system of military and commercial roads which formed a network over^the empire made communication comparatively easy, and a f rater nalhospifalit^^was^one-fif Jhe,.distinguishing featuresTof^Sie^rly Christians. Hence, to a certain ""extent, the various congregations, even after the apostles had ceased to wander from one to another, were en rapport with one another, sympathising with one another in time of persecution, and sending accounts to one another of the way in which their THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 161 several martyrs witnessed to the common faith. Thus the Church at Smyrna sends a letter to the brethren in Pontus, describing the martyrdom of Polycarp ; ' Ignatius, on the eve of his own martyrdom, sends letters of comfort and encouragement to various cities in Asia and Europe ; " whUe our knowledge of the persecution at Lugdunum is gained from a letter of the Churches of Lugdunum and Vienna to the Christians of Phrygia.' Thus, in a sense, the Christians were conscious of thejr own unity, but this is by no means the same thing as the development of' a widespread organisation. The several communities were of course becoming organised ; the episcopal constitution was developing, but the unity of whichi they were conscious was still an ideal unity : inter-' communication was casual, occasional, and informal. It is often said, and no doubt with truth, that the Gnostic heresies jdidjnuch towards bringing out the unity of the Church ; but stUl, even this was a unity resting, not upon organisation, but upon the preach ing of the same doctrine and community in the same belief ; this was the aim, the essential unity of the Christian body, and the outer sign or manifestation of this unity was as yet nothing more definite than what TertuUian calls ' communicatio pacis et appel- latio fraternitatis et contesseratio hospitalitatis.' " ' Euseb. H. E, iv. 15, 2 ; cf. Lightfoot, vol. i. p. 588 foil. 2 Ibid. iii. 36, 4, and 15 ; ui. 38, 1. » Ibid. V. 1. ' Neumann, p. 53 : ' Ihre Einheit ruht auf der Predigt derselbe Lehre und dem Besitz desselben Glaubens.' Tert. De Praescript. Haereticor. 20. M 162 CHEISTUNITY AND We shaU perhaps be less surprised at the absence for so many years of any common organisation, if we remember that it was not tiU the middle of the second century that the belief in the immment second ^oming"orTniiniraST'|^i^^ "f bia mil- lennium upon earth ceased to be the general Christian 'ggt{gf— gnSSE^^i^Teft no room for questions of com mon organisation. As Neumann very weU says,' 'Even a considerable number of people, scattered in different places, united only by a common belief, and expecting the speedy end of aU things, though they might be a source of annoyance to the state by their refusal of divine honours to the emperors, were nevertheless no source of danger, so long as no common action was to be feared from them.' This seems correctly enough to describe the state of affairs till nearly the close of the second century. The troubles connected with the Christians were local and provincial, and though, like other provincial matters, they were from time to time referred to the emperors, they were stiU merely part of the police administration of the various governors. It is inconceivable to me how Professor Eamsay can say ' that Trajan found himself unable to resist the evidence that this organisation was illegal and dangerous.' " Illegal he no doubt recognised it as being in the sense that the Christian obstinatio in volved disobedience to the omnipotent state, and on ' p. 57. Cf. Mommsen, Histor. Zeitschrift, p. 419 : ' Den Christen dieser Epoche vor der Entwickelung der Episkopalordnung und der okumenisohen Conoilien die Centralisation und damit die Staatsgefahrlichkeit abging.' ¦' p. 372. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 168 that ground he could not but sanction the extreme punishment in the extreme resort, but he also saw that this disobedience was an abstract and not a con crete or practical danger, and gave expression to this discernment in the order ' conquirendi non sunt.' / But, of course, there came a time when the scattered comniunitiesjaf^^Christians cemented their ideal umty of belief by a system of commorToFganisa-" tlfflTout of which emerged the CafEoIic"nEiarcEr an organised body, wEEmHSW' "natnroTme-ey ' W^ CgaSiiation i^T!Ee'"e5ipirerem"Bra^^ it "the particular communities, sub3m3Sr"into provinces, diGces^^xEaEE^SHjolding from time to time synods rxr ^^nnj^fWa^ \r\ TOl:ilc]a,jifHmrgIj^nTriTTii-irii'tipg"7S^rnpt^ mom, jjiOTBetimea fewer)^met together B'FcoSsuIfalioh or common action, and above all cIaimiiig"lorTKe common Christian principles an aiithoi^jty which vyp,g ^2-2Ifi^^^"'^"j ^'n Pr'"'^ fi^ J?;^!'^'"'""" J jihe Jr,w of j;];ie..atate.' It is not my purpose to trace the growth of this organisation, but only to point out (1) that it gave an , entirely different aspect to the Christian question, which from being a local and provincial difficulty camUfllM^ .unperiaLjffQbleJU ; (2) that it was not till the close of the second century that this change ' Cf. Tert. Apol. 45 : ' Deum non proconsulem timentes ; ' also 0. 4 : ' Si lex tua erravit, puto, ab homine concepta est, neque enim de caelo ruit.' Celsus calls this (Orig. G. Cels. viii. 2) the ' voice of insurrection,' ardaeas (payii. Cf. Orig. 0. Cels, i. 1 : ot v6p.oi rHv iBvuv 01 ir€pl hyaXpLdrav Kal t^j aBeov iraXvBe6rriros v6p.oi elal SkvBSiv Kal eX ti ^kvBuv htre^earepoy. So a distinction is made between o/ Kel/xeyoi iv ra7s ir6Xeat vipioi and oi Be7oi y6iiot. Orig. C. Cels. viii. 26 ; the former were oi &yop.oi y6p.oi, ibid. v. 37. See Neumann, p. 234. u 2 164 CHRISTIANITY AND > could have manifested itself to the Eoman govern- ment. The development~Towar3s common action among the Churches commenced, as was natural, in the Eastern provinces, where the frequent meetings /of the provincial concilia in connexion with the ; imperial worship, with delegates from the most im portant cities, may well have suggested the idea of organisation, and where the Montanist heresy made ^ some common action on the part of the orthodox Churches almost a necessity. The phrase pisydXr) iKKXrja-ia is found in Celsus,' iKKXrjo-la KadoXiKrj in one of the Ignatian letters ; " but in both cases it seems to be used of the orthodox Christians as opposed to the various heretical sects, and^^to imply the ideal unity of belief/ rather than any unity of orgaai^E^! In the Tast"years, however, of M. Aurelius, we find informal meetings of ' the faithful ' within the province of Asia, with a view to oppose the Montanist heresy.' Ten years later synods are held in Palestine under the presidency of the bishop of Caesaraea, in Pontus under that of Palmas, bishop of Amastris ; in Gaul under Irenaeus of Lugdunum, to come to some agree ment on the question of the Easter festival.* On this occasion the common action goes still further, for the decrees of the several synods are apparently sent to ' Orig. 0. Cels. V. 59. ^ Ad Smym. 8. ' Euseb. H. E. v. 16, 10 : rHv yhp Karh rijy 'Aaiav irtarav iroXXaKis na\ iroXXaxrj rrjs 'Aaias els rovro avveXB6vray, Kal robs irpuaspovrss nroXXoits dvatrsidovaiv dXXorpiovop,£iv • KaK rovrov Kal crvvaipkoalai Kal a-vardasis sraipsiai rs yiyvovrai. It was this principle which was embodied in the Lex lulia, a law which, as we have already suggested, primarily concerned only Eome and Italy, though it soon came to be regulative of the action of the provincial governors as well. But there are certain social tendencies which legislation finds it impossible to overcome, and which it is the part of wise statesmanship only to repress when the public interests imperatively demand it. The imperial government had certainly enough statesmanship to realise this, and therefore while the Lex lulia expresses the general attitude of the government towards asso ciations, it can hardly be taken as a stringent rule, literally observed, admitting of no exceptions and enforced with equal rigour in all parts of the empire. The Lex lulia, as we have seen, consisted of two parts : the dissolution of existing collegia ' praeter an tiqua et legitima,' and a provision for the licensing of new ones by the senate or the emperor. Only those _ coZie^ia therefore, strictly speaking, were legitima or licita which were either specially exempted from the action of this law, like the Jewish communities, or Qiaaoi,^ or those, the constitution of which had been specially licensed, and we should probably be tolerably safe in assuming that this licence would only be allowed to those collegia which were (1) non-political, and (2) which served some public utility, 'si . . . idcirco instituta sunt ut necessariam operam publicis utihta- ' Ant. lud. xiv. 10, 6. THE EOMAN GO"VEENMENT 177 tibus exhiberent.' ' So we find among the collegia expressly licensed by the senate dendrophori,^ fabri ' and centonarii * for the extinguishing of fires ; sympho- niaci ludorum causa ; ^ mensores machinarii frumenti publici,^ fabri navales at Ostia,' etc., while Pliny expressly bases his request for a collegium fabrum at Nicomedia on the need of a public fire-brigade.' But without a special staff of officials to see that the provisions of the law were carried out, it was quite impossible among the multiplicity of associations all over the empire, and especially in the great cities, to insure the ' legitimate ' character of all or even most of them. At ordinary times and as a general rule there was, no doubt, considerable laxity in this respect, and a very large number especially of the rehgious col legia, but probably of funeral and mutual-assistance clubs as well, had received no licence and were there fore, strictly speaking, illicita. Most of them were probably too insignificant to attract notice, or if noticed, too obviously harmless to call for interfer ence. And therefore, at ordinary times, when there was no special cause to look askance at associations in a particular province, most of these illicita collegia were let alone, especially as most of them were composed of the lowest classes of society, and to a great extent of slaves, against whose combination there was no objection, if their masters consented.^ ' Dig. 1. 6, 6, 12. " Liebenam, p. 105. ^ C. I. L. vi. 3678, cf. 9405-9415. ' Liebenam, p. 102. • C. I. L. vi. 2193. " Liebenam, p. 75-78. ' C. I. L. xii. 256. » Ad Trai. 33, 3. » Dig. xlvii. 22, 3, 2. 178 CHEISTIANITY AND Sometimes, of course, the action of the govern ment was more stringent than at others, and Cahgula apparently removed all restrictions — a policy which Claudius did not continue.' Trajan set his face, at any rate in Bithynia, against the whole system of collegia. Severus again showed himself more indul gent." Nor was it only the varying policy of the emperors themselves which made the treatment of collegia now more lax, now more severe. Much also would depend upon particular governors. Thus we hear that Flaccus, praefectus of Egypt under Tiberius, rds sraipsias Kal crvvoSovs at itrl rrpotpdirsi 6vv sitrn&pro rols Trpdy/jiacriv ipLtrapoivrja-ai SisXvs,^ and ¦ what he did, no doubt other governors may have done from time to time in other provinces. Still it is quite certain that numerous collegia, which were unhcensed or illicita,'^ existed, though their existence was always precarious, and they might at any moment be put down. ' Nulla dubitatio est,' says the Digest, ' quod si corpori cui licet coire legatum sit, debeatur ; cui autem non licet, non valebit nisi singulis legetur, hi enim non quasi collegium sed quasi certi homines admittentur ad legatum.' ' In other words, the only ¦necessary disadvantage suffered by a collegium illi citum was its non-recognition by law as a juristic /'person. Similarly Tacitus, in describing some dis turbances -which had taken place at Pompeii, says, ' Dio Cass. Iix. 28. ' Dig. xlvii. 22, 1. ' Phil. Adv. Flacc. p. 966 : Mang. p. 518. * aBeptirov Se aiarrifui, fj aapi,drei6y iari rh fi)) airh v6pi,ov ^ fiaaiXeas avardv. Basilica, Ix. 32. ' Dig, xxxiv. 5, 20. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 179 * collegia quae contra leges instituerant dissoluta ; ' ' i.e. certain collegia illicita were in existence at Pompeii which were now dissolved, not because they were illicita, but because disturbances had been caused. So at Amisus, the eranus about which Pliny inquires, had clearly had no licence, but it was never theless left untouched out of respect to vested rights." When, however, there was any suspicion of poli tical danger, these collegia illicita were at once put down, as by Flaccus in Egypt, by the senate in , Pompeii, by Pliny in Bithynia ; and as it was this political character and not the mere want of a licence which brought down state interference, in course of time the term ' illicitum ' came to get the meaning of • political ' rather than ' unlicensed ' — a distinction which is more clearly marked in the Greek translation by the substitution of rrapdvop,a for ddsp^itrra. It is in this sense of the word that such statements in the ' Digest ' as the following are to be explained : ' Quisquis illicitum collegium usurpaverit ea poena tenetur qua tenentur homines qui hominibus armatis loca publica vel templa occupare iudicati sunt,' ' and ' sed per- mittitur tenuioribus stipem menstruam conferre dum tamen semel in mense coeant, ne sub praetextu huius modi illicitum collegium coeat.'* So Trajan reluc tantly sanctions the eranus at Amisus, provided that it does not tend ' ad turbas et inlicitos coetus,' ^ where the word must mean ' political.' ' Tac. Ann, xiv. 17. ^ Plin. ad Trai. 94. ' Dig. xlvii. 22, 2. •" Dig, xlvii, 22, 1. * loc. cit. N 2 180 CHRISTUNITY AND It results from what has been said that the practice of the government in regard to unhcensed collegia was not by any means so strict and stringent as by the letter of the law it might have been. It ' has been very truly said: 'Der Caesarismus nahm den obern Classen das Associationsrecht und liess es den andern.' ' It seems to me that this explains a good deal. Apart from the purely rehgious associa tions which were generally speaking tolerated," there was a distinction more or less broad between the collegia opificum and the collegia sodalicia (sraipiKa a-va-r7]fiara, hetaeriae). ¦ About the former we unfor tunately know very little. Some of them were of extremely ancient date, and on that ground were ex pressly exempted from the Lex luha. But what seems lo have characterised them is the fact that their members either belonged to the same trade or calling, such as the pistores, the fabri navales, the caudicarii, etc., or at least combined for some definite pubhc object, such as the purpose of a fire brigade, e.g. the fabri, centonarii, dendrophori. On the other hand, the collegia sodalicia seem to have been more social in their character, to have had no special public utility in view, but to have had common meetings for -feasting and recreation, and to have combined either for the special object of a burial club ' or of a mutual ' Rodbertus, Hildebrand's Jahrb. v. 299, cited by Liebenam, p. 32. 2 Dig. xlvii. 22, 1 : ' Sed religionis causa coire non prohibentnr, dum tamen per hoc non fiat contra senatus consultum quo illicita collegia arcentur.' , ' ' Qui stipem menstruam conferre volent in funera.' Wilm. 819. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 181. assistance society,' or of both combined." Probably these two classes frequently overlapped, but still we find that Trajan drew a sharp distinction between them, in refusing to hcense a fire hng&de— collegium fabrum — on the express ground that it might de generate into an hetaeria : ' Quodcunque nomen ex quacunque causa dederimus iis qui in idem contracti fuerint, hetaeriae aeque brevi fient.' ' While the coUegia opificum would probably aU be found among the lower classes, this would not be so necessarily the case with the collegia sodalicia, and no doubt from the first the practical policy of the govern ment would be to enforce the law in the case of those who from wealth or social position might have pohtical influence which combination might make dangerous, but to tolerate the harmless associations composed of poor people and slaves.* In the course of time this practical policy appears to have crystallised itself in legislation. Thus Marcian states in the ' Digest : ' * Mandatis principalibus praecipitur praesidibus pro vinciarum ne patiantur esse collegia sodalicia, . . . sed permittitur tenuioribus stipem menstruam conferre, dum tamen semel in mense coeant, ne sub praetextu huiusmodi illicitum collegium coeat.'* The collegia among the lower classes and slaves, alluded to in the last clause, were technically known as coUegia tenuio- ' ' Ad sustinendam tenuiorum inopiam.' Plin. ad Trai, 94. * ' Egenis alendis humandisque.' Tert. Apol, 39. ' Plin. ad Trai. 34. ' As the Christian communities usually were ; of. Min. Fel. Octav. ' de ultima faece coUectis imperitioribus.' ' Dig. xlvii. 22, 1. 182 CHRISTIANITY AND rum.^ Mommsen supposes that they were collegia funeraticia, and that they were especially exempted from the provisions of the Lex lulia by a senatus con- sidtum at some time between Augustus and Hadrian." In the inscription relating to the ' Collegium Dianae et Antinoi' — a funeral club at Lanuvium, dating from 133 a.d. — we have apparently a clause from the preamble of this senatus consultum : ' Kaput ex s. c. populi Eomani — Quibus coire, convenire col- legiumque habere liceat — qui stipem menstruam con ferre volent in funera, in it collegium coeant, neque sub specie eius coUegii nisi semel in mense coeant conferendi causa unde defuncti sepeliantur.' ' The collegium in question was apparently a purely funeral club, though its members were allowed to have common dinners five times a year, but the statement of the ' Digest ' seems to show that there were prob ably at least two other clauses in the senatus con sultum, one giving a qualified sanction to religious associations (' sed religionis causa coire non prohi bentnr,' etc.), and another sanctioning collegia tenuio rum for somewhat wider objects than burials alone. By this senatus consultum — which could have had reference at widest to the city, Italy, and senatorial provinces — a legal sanction was given to existing ten dencies, and the senate was perhaps relieved from the constant business of licensing these numerous collegia.'^ At what precise time the general exemption ' Dig. 1. 6, ' tenuiores per collegia distributi ; ' cf. also xlvii. 22, 3. * See Liebenam, p. 39 foil. ^ Wilm. 319. ' Cf . Plin. Panegyr, 32. THE ROMAN GOVEENMENT 183 from the Lex lulia was extended to the provinces we do not know. The action of Pliny in consulting Trajan about a collegium of this description at Amisus shows that it was not in force at that time in Bithynia, and it was possibly not till the time of Severus that it was a general rule throughout the empire — ' quod non tantum in urbe sed in Italia et in provinciis locum habere divus quoque Severus rescripsit.' ' The general result of what has been said is to show that within the restrictions laid upon collegia and associations there was still in practice room for Christianity to develop, though it was quite possible at various times for collisions to occur between it and a specially vigilant executive. In this connexion there is no necessity to enter into the question of the early Christian organisation. The growth of rrpsa-^vrspoi as an order in the community, the differentiation of sTnoKo^n^^ and their original functions, and the de velopment from an aristocratic to a monarchical form of government, concern the history, of Christianity, and not the history of the Eoman policy towards it. Whatever was the exact constitution of the early communities, it is beyond all doubt that they had certain general and external resemblances to the collegia or dlaaoi, or religious associations around them. If they were in any way affiliated to the Jewish synagogues, these latter were certainly re garded as dlaaoi, and the Christians would there fore be ranked among them too: or again, if ' Dig, xlvii. 22, 1. 184 CHEISTUNITY AND Weingarten ' is right in supposing that the earliest communities grouped themselves round some leading family, it is still easy to find analogies in the heathen world, where we have a ' collegium quod est in domu Sergiae PauUinae ' " — a ' collegium quod consistit in praedis Larci Macedonis,' ' etc. The term iKKXrjaia itself was used of Greek associations,* whUe conversely Eusebius uses the terms a-vvaycoyj, a-vvoSos and to KOIVOV of the Christian Church.* To this it may be added that Lucian describes the president of a Christian community as Oiaadpxns,^ that Celsus speaks of Christians as iSioi diaamrai of Jesus,' and finally that a Christian inscription in Africa uses the terms ecclesia fratrum, cultor, area, cella, ' all of them familiar enough in heathen collegia. In any case, merely as religious associations, the Christians might well, either ' sub umbraculo religionis certe licitae ' ' or in common with many other externally similar bodies, have escaped under ordinary circumstances interference from the government. > There were, however, certain features about Christianity which might bring it into occasional con flict with the Eoman policy towards collegia. In one ' Histor. Zeitschr. xiv. 401 foU., ' Die Umwandlung der urspriing- lichen ohristlichen Gemeindeorganisation zur katholischen Kirche,' 201. Cf. 1 Cor. xvi. 19 ; Rom. xvi. 3-16. 2 C. I. L, vi. 9148. » C. I. L. vi. 404. ' Le Bas-Waddington, 1381-2. C. J. Or. 2271. 5 Euseb. H, E, vi. 19, 16, and vii. 32, 27. ' Lucian, De Mort. Peregr. ; with which cf . apxtBiaalrrjs, C. I, Or. 2271. ' Orig. Contr, Cels. iii. 22. » C. I. L, viii. 9585. • Tert. Avol. 21. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 185 respect especially these communities resembled the hetaeriae of which Trajan had so much suspicion in Bithynia, in that they met, not only for purely religious purposes, but also for common meals, paid for by con tributions from each member (spavos), or by a com mon fund (area). At first these common meals, the breaking of bread, were of daily occurrence.' At a later time, as the immediate expectation of the Second Advent grew fainter, they were held once every week." While the religious services took place in the morning, these Agapae or Love-Feasts, at which what was later developed into the Eucharist was combined with an ordinary supper, were held in the evening,' and while at the former strangers were admitted, and even welcomed, at the latter no one was aUowed to be pre sent except baptised members of the community.* As long as the communities were small or undistinguish- able from the Jewish, or consisted solely of the very poor and humble, these social meetings might for the most part escape notice and interference. But still, apart from the general principles of the Christians, of which we have already treated, it was here that occa sion might always be found against them by a suspicious governor. These common meals consti tuted them sraipsiai, or sodalitates, and these if unlicensed, as the Christian bodies were, might at any time be put down in the same way that the religious associations in Egypt were by Flaccus.* Nor are there wanting indications that the Christians were ' Acts ii. 46, but cf. xx. 7. ' ' Stato die.' Plin. ad Trai. 96. > Ibid. * Justin. Apol. i. 65. ' See p. 177. 186 CHEISTUNITY AND actually to some extent affected by their existence as sodalitates, and that they occasionally laid themselves open to the suspicion of violating the conditions under which religious associations were tolerated : ' dum tamen per hoc non fiat contra senatus consultum quo illicita collegia arcentur.' At the same time, incidents of this kind could never amount to anything like a proscription of Christianity.' In Bithynisj factiones or clubs were a crying danger in Trajan's time. The disturbances caused by them ^ei:e one of the reasons why Pliny was sent out," and we have already several times noticed Trajan's refusal to sanction a collegium fabrum, lest it should become an hetaeria. At one time I was inclined to hold the view that Pliny's action against the Christians was on the score of their being a collegium illicitum. This view I have now given up. Pliny would have had no • ' Bishop Lightfoot says {Apostolic Fathers, Part II. vol. i. p. 11) : ' The mere negative fact that the Christian religion had not been recognised as lawful would be an ample justiflcation for proceeding against the Christians, as soon as it came to be recognised that Christianity was something distinct from Judaism. No positive pro hibition was needed. Here was a religion rampant which had never been licensed by the state, and this fact alone was quite sufiicient to set the law in motion.' This is an altogether misleading and inac curate statement. The law might in certain cases be set in motion against the Christians as an illicitum collegium. As a religion, its unlicensed character would only come into consideration when it drew Roman citizens away from the national cult. What is the authority for the statement on p. 20 that ' lawful religions held a licence from the state for worship or for sacriflce, and thus their gatherings were exempted from the operation of the law against clubs ' ? ' Plin. ad Trai. 34 : ' Meminerimus provinciam istam eiusmodi factionibus esse vexatam.' THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 187 need to consult the emperor on a matter about which his views had been already so clearly expressed, nor would Trajan have uttered his famous decision, ' conquirendi non sunt,' if he had regarded them as members of an hetaeria. But still, the incident shows that the Christians might have been affected in this way. They, as Pliny discovered, contained among their members some of the better classes of society,' and these, according to the Christian principles, would take part in whatever of common life there was in the community ; " and one of the features of this common life was a weekly meeting for the purpose of a common meal. If the view taken above is correct, this would have rendered the Christians liable to interference. Bithynia, too, was in an exceptional state, and the ordinary toleration of unlicensed collegia was at any rate for the time replaced by a stringent enforcement of the provisions of the Lex lulia. Pliny, by Trajan's order, had issued an edict forbidding hetaeriae.^ This did not, indeed, actually affect the Christians. But the reason why it did not is almost more striking than if it had. For in consequence of this edict we find that the Christians gave up their common meal,* and so became a purely religious association, and not an hetaeria : • quod ipsum facere desisse post edictum meum quo secundum mandata tua hetaerias esse vetueram ' — a ' ' Multi omnis ordinis.' 2 Lactant. Divin. Inst. v. 14, 15 : ' Apud nos inter pauperes et divites, servos et dominos interest nihil.' ' Plin. ad Trai. 97, 7 : ' Post edictum meum quo secundum mandata tua hetaerias esse vetueram.' ' Ibid. ; ' Quod ipsum facere desisse post edictum meum,' etc. 188 CHEISTUNITY AND step which of course left the general position of the Christians qua potentially ' hostes publici ' as it was before, though it made them safe from interference on a particular point. There is no reason to suppose that this edict was anything more than a local one, but still there were always similar dangers in other provinces, and prob ably in Eome. Nor is it altogether an improbable conjecture that in certain parts of the empire the Agapae were given up in consequence of similar •edicts against hetaeriae ; and the Eucharist in con sequence made a part of the morning religious ser vice. At any rate, we find Justin Martyr in his first Apology' giving an account of the Eucharist as a separate religious service unconnected with the Agape. We are not without evidence, too, that in the course of the second century the Christians were occasionally regarded as belonging to a secret and iUegal associa tion. Celsus seems to have placed this accusation in the forefront of the indictment which he drew up against them : trpairov rm KeXcra) KstpdXaiov iari Sia^aXsiv Xpiariaviap.ov ws avvdijKas Kpv^Srjv trpos dXXtjXovs troiovp.ivajv Xpianavwv rrapd rd vsvo- piia/isva.^ Similarly in Minucius Felix they are spoken of as 'homiaes deploratae inlicitae ac de- speratae factionis,' as holding 'nocturnae congrega- tiones ' as a ' latebrosa et lucifuga natio.' ' It is probable that by about the middle of the second century the Eucharist was generaUy separated from ' Justin. Apol. i, 65 foil. ' Orig. C. Cels. i. 1. ' Min. Fel. Octav 8. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 189 the Agape, the latter being given up or maintained according to times and circumstances, but always liable to bring the Christians into trouble as an hetaeria. Tertullian is a not unimportant witness on this point. We infer from his words that the Eucharist was celebrated in the morning, and as a rehgious service,' but that the Agapae, in the African Church at any rate, were still celebrated ; and though Tertullian is conscious of the charge of illegality made against them, he attempts to remove the pre judice and to find with his legal knowledge a legal basis for the social meetings of the Christians. 'Proinde .... inter hcitas factiones,' he says, 'sec tam istam deputari oportebat a qua nihil tale com- mittitur quale de illicitis factionibus timeri solet.'" The object of prohibiting associations was ' ne eivitas in partes scinderetur,' but to attain this end com pletely it would be necessary to put down the comitia, the concilia, the contiones, and even the spectacula. The bases of the Christian union were ' conscientia rehgionis, disciphnae divinitas, et spei foedus.'' The Christians should be judged by facts, not theories : ' haec coitio Christianorum merito sane illicita si illicitis par, merito damnanda si non dissimilis damnandis.' * And he finally exclaims : ' Quum probi, quum boni coeunt, quum pii, quum easti con- gregantur, non est factio dicenda sed curia.' ' Tertull. de Cor. 3 : ' Eucharistiae sacramentum et in tempore victus et omnibus mandatur a Domino, etiam anteluoanis ccetibus, nee de aliorum manu quam Praesidentium sumimus.' ' Tert. Apol. 38. - " Ibid. 39. • Ibid. 39adfm. 190 CHEISTUNITY AND All this clearly enough implies that, in spite of the innocent and harmless nature of the Christian gather ings, they were as a matter of fact regarded as a factio illicita. In another passage he asserts this explicitly : ' forte in senatus consulta et in principum mandata coitionibus opposita delinquimus.' ' But it is not only on the general harmlessness of the Chris tian meetings, and on the innocence of their feasts, which, as he says, * de nomine rationem sui ostendunt,' that Tertullian bases his defence of the Christian communities. The ' Apologeticus ' was written very shortly after the rescript of Severus, by which the formation of collegia tenuiorum was allowed generally throughout the provinces, and there seems to be no doubt that TertuUian attempted to take advantage of this rescript and to vindicate the meetings of the Christians as a ' collegium tenuiorum,' After saying that the meetings were presided over by ' probati quique seniores,' he goes on : ' etiam si quod arcae genus est, non de honoraria summa quasi redemptae religionis congregatur : modicam unusquisque stipem menstrua die vel cum velit et si modo velit et si modo possit apponit : nam nemo eompellitur sed sponte confert . . . Nam inde non epulis nee potaculis nee ingratis voratrinis dispensatur, sed egenis alendis humandisque et pueris ac puellis re ac parenti bus destitutis' etc." There are so many technical terms here, such as area, honoraria summa, slips, menstrua die, and so much simUarity to the words in the ' Digest ' already cited, that we have really no • Tert. Adv. Psychicos, 18. « Tert. Apol. 39. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 191 alternative but to suppose that TertuUian is referring to the rescript in question. The Christians, in bis view, had the right to be regarded as ' hcitae factiones,' because their objects were the same, though with less admixture of luxury and social enjoyment, as those of the collegia tenuiorum. Nor does there seem any reason to suppose that such a claim on the part of the Christian communities to be regarded as in the eye of the law a collegium tenuiorum ' would be disaUowed by the authorities. Such a recognition would not in the slightest degree affect the general relations of the Christians and the government ; it was no recognition of Christians and Christianity. In all probability the Christiana would describe them selves as * fratres cultores dei,' ' or in some such way : at any rate the designation of Christiani, in face of the name being a punishable offence, would be avoided. And therefore their position as a recognised or tole rated collegium would in no way prevent persecution ' for the name ' or accusation under the law of maiestas.^ It would merely give the various Christian ' Cf . C. I. L, viii. 9585. Tert. Apol. 39 : ' Quod fratrum appella- tione censemur.' Just. Apol. i.,65: ^irl robs Xeyofiivovs aSeXtj>ovs. De Eossi, Bom. setter, i. 105 ; Liebenam, p. 273. See also Acts XV. 23 and 36, xxi. 7 and 18, xxviii. 14. Min. Fel. Oct. 31 : ' Sic nos . . . fratres vocamus ut unius dei parentis homines.' '' So it is quite a mistake to suppose that Gallienus in desisting from the persecution set on foot by Valerian acknowledged Chris tianity as a ' licita religio.' All that he did was to restore to the Christian communities the possession of their burial-grounds (Euseb. H. E. vii. 13, 3), which had been taken away by his predecessor {H. E. vii. 11, 10). Naturally, in times of persecution even licita collegia would not be safe from interference if they were known to consist of Christians, and at times apparently the popular 192 CHEISTLVNITY AND communities a certain locus standi for their ordinary meetings ; it would facUitate their combination for charitable purposes, making it more possible for them to approximate, without the suspicion of dangerous or anti-social communism, to their principle of having all things in common (' omnia indiscreta sunt apud nos ' ') ; and finally it would secure to them the right of common burial, and the possibUity of possessing common burial-places, which the vast system of the Catacombs round Eome proves to have been so essential an element of early, Christianity. Indeed, the undoubted possession by the Christians at the end of the second century of areae or coemeteria of their own seems necessarily to imply that in some way or other they had corporate rights, that their communities ranked as juristic persons — a result which could only follow from their being generally or specially licensed. It was M. Aurelius who first granted these cor porate rights to licensed collegia. Thus they had the right of manumitting slaves," and of receiving legacies,' and no doubt, either then or little later, of owning land.* From the first the Christians, like the Jewish hatred of the Christians, instead of expressing itself by the cry ' Christianos ad leones,' substituted that of ' areae non sint.' Tertull. ad Scap. iii. 2 : ' Sub Hilariano praeside cum de areis sepul- turarum nostrarum adolamassent : Areae non sint.' ' Tert. 4^oZ. 39. ' Dig. xl. 3, 1 : ' Divus Marcus omnibus coUegiis quibus ooeundi ius est manumittendi potestatem dedit.' ' Dig, xxxiv. 5, 20. * Cf. Dig, iii. 4, 1 : ' Quibus autem permissum est corpus habere coUegii societatisve sive cuiusque alterius eorum nomine, proprium est ad exemplum reipublicae habere res communes, arcam com- munem,' etc. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 193 communities at Eome, would if possible be buried to gether, but this would only be possible if the richer among them who owned burial-places of their own, aUowed members of the sect to be buried there too along with their own families. Thus it is proved by inscriptions that Flavia DomitUla owned land which was used as an early Christian burial-place,' and in which there were in later times extensive cata combs. There is similar evidence to support the view that the Acilii Glabriones owned a burial-place in which Christians were buried together," while smaller family burial-places limited to Christian members of the familia are also exemplifications of the same tendency.' '• " ^"^^^^ No doubt, one of the ^^t^ .iJises which the Christians would make of their rfe -/acio, recognition as collegia tenuiorum, would be the purchase of ' Lightfoot, Clement, i. 35 foil. ; De Eossi, Bom. sotter. i. 306, ii. 280 and 360 ; O. I. L. vi. 948, 8942, 16246. See also De Eossi, Btillet. di Archeol. cristian. 1865, pp. 17 foil., 33 foil., 41 foil., 84 foil. ; 1874, pp. 5 foU., 68 foil., 122 foil. ; 1875, pp. 5 foil., 46 foil.; 1877, pp. 128 foil, etc. From De Rossi's investigation it seems that the ' coemeterium Domitillae ' is to be identified with the Catacombs of the Tqr Marancia near the Ardeatine Way. A plot of ground was graUjted to P. Calvisius Philotas ' ex indulgentia Flaviae Domitillae.' A tablet is put up to herself and her freed-people by Tatia 'nutrix septem liberorum Divi Vespasiani atque Flaviae Domitillae Vespasiani neptis ' on land belonging to Flavia Domitilla. 2 See De Eossi, cited by Eamsay, p. 262. " De Eossi, Bom. sotter. cristian. i. 109 : ' M. Antonius Resti- tutus fecit ypogen sibi et suis fldentibus in Domino.' Also Bullet, di Archeol, cristian, 1865, p. 64: ' Monumentum Valeri Mercuri et luhttes luliani et Quintilies Verecundes libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum ad religionem pertiuentes meam.' O 194 CHRISTUNITY AND ground for burial-places. It is not material to our present subject to decide at what date this took place. We know that Pope Zephyrinus, at about 199 a.d., put Callistus over the cemetery at Eome, i.e. probably made him curator of it ; ' and Neumann " has inferred partly from this that Pope Victor was the first to register the Christian communities at Eome as collegia funeraticia. His argument seems to me far from con vincing. The general licence given to collegia of this kind in Eome dates back at least as far as to Hadrian's reign, and if we find the African Christians within a very few years of its extension to the provinces by Severus taking advantage of it, we may surely sup pose with some reason that the Eoman Christians had long since set the example of doing this. However this may be, the organisation of the Christian communities as collegia tenuiorum or fune- i raticia, and thek recognition as such by the state, , would only remove, as has already been shown, one particular ground on the score of which they might have been interfered with — an interference which, however j frequent, could never have been described as religious ! persecution on the part of the state. It would, how ever, give a certain protection and sanction perhaps to the Christian meetings, certainly to the Christian burial-places, which might probably remain unviolated and secure to them in any but a general and sys tematic persecution. But when this has been said, ' Hippolyt. Haer, ix. 12: p^eB' o5 [Victor] Koiptriaiv Ze(pvp7vos rovrov /.eTa7a7i';' airh rov 'AvBeiov is rh Koip.r)ri]pioy Karearijaey ^ p. 108. THE EOMAN GOVERNMENT 195 all has been said : there was nothing in the partial recognition by the state which would in any way exempt or help to exempt the Christians from what ever measure of persecution they were subject to from the Eoman government on more general grounds, as dOsoi, as rei maiestatis, or as hostes publici. o 2 196 CHRISTIANITY AND APPENDIX ON TWO 'ACTA MAETYEUM.' It was one of the causes of Pliny's hesitation in Bithynia that he had never been present at any of the ' cognitiones de Christianis.' Our knowledge of the Christian question suffers from the same cause. If we only had accounts of one or two- Christian trials similar to those given by Tacitus of the cases of Piso ' and Libo Drusus," or by Pliny of those of Marius Priscus ' or Caecilius Classieus,* we should be in, a position to form much clearer ideas of the relations between the Christians and the government. Still there are two documents which at least deserve to be mentioned in this connexion, and which, so far as they go, give some kind of confirmation to the views which have been expressed above. In all cases, civil and criminal, both at Rome and in the provinces, official protocols were made of the eases which came before the judicial magis trates. Instances of such protocols or ' Acta ' in civil cases are found in the ' Digest ' in reference to a ease tried before a procurator ^ and to a case in the emperor's court,^ while the general rule is stated in the Justinian code from an edict of 194 a.d. : ' 'Is ad quem res agitur acta > Tac. Ann. iii. 10-18. « Tac. Ann. ii. 27-32. ' Plin. Ep. ii. 11. * Plin. Ep. iii. 9. ' Dig. xxvi. 8, 21. « Dig. xxviii. 4, 3. ' Cod. Just. ii. 1, 2. THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT 197 publica tam criminaha quam civilia exhiberi inspicienda ad investigandam veritatis fidem iubebit.' That this rule was extended to such trials as those of the Christians we have positive evidence. Dionysius of Alexandria gives an account drawn from such official ' Acta ' of a Christian trial under Valerian before the praefectus Aegypti ; ' and Cyprian's profession of faith was read by his disciples in the ' Acta Proconsuhs : ' ' Quid nos discipuli secuti apud praesidem dicere deberemus prior apud acta proconsulis pronuntiasti.' ''' That the Christians, in cases where they had no opportunity of themselves taking notes at the trials of their martyrs, would gladly avail themselves of these official protocols, is what we should naturally expect ; and, as a matter of fact, many instances, according to Professor Eamsay,' are recorded in which they purchased from the clerks {commentarienses) copies of the official shorthand reports of the proceedings. That there was a collection of such accounts before the time of Eusebius we know from several passages of his ' Ecclesiastical History.' * In the course of time these authentic ' Acta ' developed or degene rated into the kind of legend with which such coUectionfi as that of Euinart make us familiar. Miraculous incidents of all kinds were added, and in most cases almost every trace of the original account is lost, though Le Blant and Ramsay have shovm that careful criticism may occasionally detect a substratum of authentic fact. In striking contrast to these miraculous l^ends are two documents to which attention has recently been called, and which, by the ' Euseb. H. E, vii. 11, 5 : avruy Se iir^Kovaare ruv vir' apiporepuv XexBiyrav as virepLvripariaBri. ^ Cyprian, Ep, Ixxvii. 2, p. 834. 3 p. 330. < Euseb. H. E. iv. 15, 47 : tois ray hpxaluv avvaxBe7aiv p.aprvplois. V. 4, 3 : rhv iy rfi SrjXuBeiari ypa(p^ ray p.aprvpav KardXoyov, v. 21, 5 ; iK rrjs ray apxaiuv p.aprvpluv avvaxBelans ijfuv avaypaip^s. 198 CHEISTUNITY AND absence of miraculous features and of exaggeration generally, as well as by their consistency with what we know of the period, seem to be early, if not contemporary, records of Christian trials. Both of them relate to the reign of Commodus : one of them to the trial of the martyrs of Scili, in Numidia, under the proconsul Saturninus in 181 a.d., the other to the trial of Apollonius in Rome between 180-184 a.d. The ' Acta ' of the African martyrs were discovered in Greek, probably translated from an original Latin account,' in a Parisian MS. of the tenth century," and may profitably be compared with the later version of the martyrdom given in Ruinart.' The trial took place before Saturninus, the proconsul, in the ^ovXevr-qpiov at Carthage. The proconsul said to them : ' Ye can find indulgence with our emperor, if ye call to your aid a prudent consideration.' ¦* The holy Speratus answered and said : ' We have never injured nor cursed any man : nay, we rather give thanks if any entreat us e-vil, for we serve our Lord and King.' The proconsul said : ' But we also worship God, and our worship is simple. We swear by the genius of our lord the emperor, and we pray for his safety. Ye must do the same likewise.' The holy Speratus answered : ' If ye will vouchsafe us a favourable hearing, I will reveal to you the mystery of true simplicity.' The proconsul said : ' So soon as you utter any word disrespectful to our worship I will aUow you no further hearing. Swear rather by the safety of our lord the emperor.' The holy Speratus answered: 'I recognise not the kingdom of this present ' They are published by Usener — Acta Martyrum Scilitanorum Graece edita, Bonn, 1881 — who points out such expressions as iriBavSriis =perstiasio and SMp.e7vai iropevopiai =perseveratum eo as indi cating a Latin original. 2 Cod. Par. Oraec, No. 1470. » pp. 84-89. * ehv a^ippoya Xoytapthy hvaKaXearjaBe. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 199 world. I praise my God and serve him, whom no man hath seen, for that is impossible to the eye of flesh. Robbery have I never committed. Contrariwise, in all my business I render the tax due, for I recognise our Lord the King of kings and the Ruler over aU peoples.' The pro consul said to the others: 'Abjure the faith which this man hath professed.' The holy Speratus answered : ' To commit murder and to bear false witness is a dangerous persuasion.' The proconsul said : ' Take no part in such folly and obstinacy,' The holy Cittinus took up the word and said : ' There is no one whom we can fear save the Lord our God, who dwells in heaven.' The holy Donata said : ' We give honour to the emperor as the emperor, but fear we render to our God.' The holy Hestia said : ' I am a Christian,' The holy Secunda added : ' What I am, that wiU I also remain.' Then said the proconsul to the holy Speratus : ' Dost thou likewise continue a Christian ? ' The holy Speratus said : ' I am a Christian.' Likewise also said all the other holy ones. The proconsul said: ' Will ye not have a space for reflection ? ' The holy Speratus said : ' In a matter so approved ' there is no deliberation and no reflection.' The proconsul said: ' What books have you in your satchel ? ' " The holy Speratus said : ' Our holy writings and the letters also of the holy man Paul.' The proconsul said : ' Ye shall have a space of thirty days, if so be ye may perchance come to reason.' The holy Speratus answered thereto: 'I am unchangeably' a Christian.' The others also with one voice affirmed the same thing. Then the proconsul Saturninus pronounced judgment over them in the fol lowing way: 'Inasmuch as Speratus, Martzallus, Cittinus, ' iyKplrcp. -' iro7ai irpaypMreTai iy tois ip.erepois hirSKeivTai aKeieaiv ; No doubt the question points to a suspicion of magio. ' h/ierdBeros. 200 CHRISTUNITY AND Donata, Hestia and Secunda, as well as the others who have not appeared before us, have professed that they live according to the Christian mode of life, and inasmuch as they remain obstinate in their resolution, not-withstandhig that a space was allowed them in which to return to the Roman worship, we give orders that they be executed with the sword.' ' There is no sign in this account of any departure from the principles of Trajan's rescript. If M. Aurelius in augurated a severer course, Saturninus at any rate did not carry it out. He clearly had not hunted out the Christians who were brought before him ; he not only offers pardon on condition of recantation, even pressing on them a delay of thirty days, but he goes so far as to dispense with the test of actual sacrifice to the emperor, if the accused would only swear by his genius. On the other hand the Christians are punished for the name, in consequence of their obstinate profession of it (aKXiveis rijv yvoiivrjv), their disobedient refusal to return to the Eoman cult, and their refusal to recognise the authority of the kingdom of this world in religious concerns." There is no question of maiestas ; no mention of any charge of immorality ; if any suspicion of magic is imphed,' no stress is laid on any such charge, and the whole trial is evidently summary and informal, the number of questions asked being solely due to the anxiety of the proconsul to avoid, if possible, extreme measures. The other document, if anything a still more interesting one, is an account — probably the original ' Acta '—of the trial of Apollonius in Eome. This martyrdom is, as is ' lov Svreparou k. r. X, iaoi r$ XptartavtK^ Beap.^ eavrobs Kareirny- yetXavro iroXtreieaBat eirel Kal xaptaBelaiiS avro7s iTpoBeap.tas rov irphs r^v ruv *Pap.aiuy iirayeXBetv irap'dSoaiy aKXive7s r^y yvdjpLriy Siep.eivay, ^le7a8ai rovs fin-ol eis SiKaaT-lipioy irapidvras Kal piiiSap.us rrjs irpoBeaews pLeTa^aXXofievovs apxalov irap' avro7s v6p.ov KiKparriKoras,: 202 CHEISTUNITY AND thou resist the invincible law and decree of the emperors,' and dost refuse to sacrifice to the gods ? ' Apollonius said : ' Because I am a Christian ; " therefore I fear God, who made heaven and earth, and sacrifice not to empty idols.' The prefect said : ' But thou oughtest to repent of this mind of thine, because of the edicts of the emperors,' and take oath by the good fortune of the autocrat Commodus.' Apollonius rephed :'.... it is best to swear not at all, but in all things to live in peace and truth ; for a great oath is the truth, and for this reason is it a bad and an ill thing to swear by Christ, but because of falsehood is there disbelief, and because of disbehef there is swearing. I am willing to swear in truth by the true God that we, too, love the emperor and offer up prayers for his majesty.' The prefect said : ' Come then and sacrifice to Apollo '' and to the other gods and to the emperor's image.' Apollonius said : ' As to my change of mind and as to the oath, I have given their answer ; but as to sacrifices, I and all Chris tians offer a bloodless sacrifice to God .... Wherefore according to the command of the God-given precept, we make our prayers to him who dwells in heaven, who is the only God, that men may be justly ruled upon this earth, knowing for certain that he, your emperor, also is estab lished, not through anyone else, but only through the one King, God, who holds everyone in his hand.' The prefect said : ' Surely thou wast not summoned hither to talk philosophy. I will give thee one day's respite that thou ' This need imply no more than the de facto procedure -which we have seen was pursued in such cases, and which no doubt rested on rescripts from different emperors. ^ Cf. Plin. ad Trai. 96, 5 : ' Quorum nihil posse cogi dicuntur qui sunt re vera Christiani.' ' Cf. Trajan's words : ' Qui negaverit se Christianum esse idque re ipsa manifestum fecerit, id est supplicando dels nostris.' * Probably, as Harnack suggests, the senate was held in the temple of Apollo on the Palatine. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 203 mayest consider thine interest and advise thyself concern ing thy life.' And he ordered him to be taken to prison. After three days he ordered him to be brought forward and said to him : ' What counsel hast thou found for thyself ? ' Apollonius answered : ' To remain firm in my religion as I told thee before.' The prefect said : ' Because of the edict of the senate ' I advise thee to repent and to sacrifice to the gods to whom all the earth gives homage and sacrifices for it is far better for thee to hve among us than to die a miserable death. Methinks thou art not unacquainted with the edict of the senate.' Apollonius said : ' I know the command of the Omnipotent God, and I remain firm in my religion," and I do no homage to idols made with hands. . . . .' The prefect answered : ' You have philosophised enough and filled us with admiration ; but dost thou not know this, 0 ApoUonius, that it is the command of the senate that no one shall anywhere be named a Christian ? ' ' Apollonius answered : ' Ay, but it is not possible for a human statute of the senate to prevail over the command of God ' The prefect said : ' Art thou bent upon death ? .... I would fain let thee go, but I cannot, because of the command of the senate,'' and yet with benevolence I pronounce sentence on thee.' And he ordered him to be beheaded with a sword. Apollonius said : ' I thank my God for thy sentence.' And the execu tioners straightway led him away and beheaded him. ' The edict of the senate was probably a resolution that Apol lonius should be treated in the same way as other Christians were. ^ ApoUonius manifests the same obstinatio as that displayed by the Bithynian Christians, which Pliny considered to be deserving of death. ' i.e. the senate sanctioned, in this particular case of a member of their own body, the course usually pursued, that the nomen or profession of Christianity was punishable with death. ¦* The motive of Perennis in putting the matter in this light is obvious. 204 CHRISTIANITY AND There are several points which are unusual about this trial. In the first place the accused is brought before the court, not of the praefectus urbi, as Ptolemaeus and his companions were under Pius, and as Justin was under M. Aurelius, but of the praefectus praetorio. This, however, is sufficiently explained by the exceptional position of Perennis, who occupied under Commodus a position similar to that of Sejanus under Tiberius. There was at no time a very distinct line separating the judicial sphere of the praefectus urbi and the piraefecti praetorio, and as the latter became more and more civil rather than military functionaries, their court, even in ordinary circumstances, came to encroach upon and to overshadow that of the senatorial praefectus. A more difficult problem is the part taken in the trial by the senate. Apollonius was clearly first brought before Perennis, evidently because the crime of Christianity was one for the police administration to deal with. Perennis, however, insists that the accused should give an account of himself before the senate. But this by no means meant that the senate was to try the case. This is con clusively proved against Neumann in two ways : (1) by the fact that even in the senate it is Perennis — though not a senator, and strictly having no right to be present in the senate at aU, except as an escort to the emperor — who puts the questions and conducts the examination ; (2) after the reprieve of three days, Apollonius was brought, as Harnack very clearly shows,' not before the senate again, but before Perennis, who passes sentence upon him. We ' (1) Whereas on the first day, the prefect based his action on the edicts of the emperors, he on the second hearing mentions only the resolution of the senate. (2) The way in which Perennis refers to the senate makes it impossible that the proceedings were still in the presence of that body. (3) A philosopher interposes a remark : which might happen in the prefect's court, but was hardly possible in the senate, where non-senators were not admitted. THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT 205 therefore have no instance here, as Neumann thinks, of a Christian trial before the senate. The expressions of iiiUSeblUS, ixrav airo Soyfjiaro^ (TvyKXi^ov and eirl rov SiKarrrov, were in themselves against this view, and the 'Acta ' clearly show it to be wrong. What then was the part which the senate took ? and what was the cause of its exceptional interference? The answer, it seems to me, can only be that ApoUonius was a senator. Eusebius does not say so : but he teUs us that about this time several persons in Eome conspicuous by wealth and birth became Christians.' There had clearly been Christian senators when Tertulhan wrote the ' Apology,' " and he had been in Rome under Commodus ; and Hieronymus ' describes Apollonius as ' Romanae urbis senator ' — a statement which, whether due to e-vidence independent of Eusebius, or to an in ference from his account, as Harnack thinks, is not without its weight. Professor Harnack is inclined to give up the view that Apollonius was a senator, apparently on three grounds : (1) neither Eusebius nor the ' Acta ' speak of him as one ; (2) he was not tried by the senate, but by Perennis ; (3) his appearance before the senate is quite well explained by the following passage from Mommsen's ' Staatsrecht : ' * ' Wenn in der Stadt die capitale Coereition in Fallen von politischer Wichtigkeit zur Anwendung kam, ist dabei wohl regelmassig der Senat hinzugezogen worden. Dasselbe geschieht bei ausserordenthcher Gefahrdung der offentlichen Sicherheit, namentlich bei weit und insbeson dere liber die Biirgerschaft hinaus sich verzweigenden Verbrechen, also bei religiosen Assoeiationen mit crimi- nellen Tendenzen, bei den Gruppenverbrechen der Gift- mischerei, der Brandstiftung u. s. w. Das fiir diese Judication erforderliche Imperium kann der Senat nicht verleihen, wohl aber die ihm zustehende Einwirkung auf • Euseb. H. E. v. 21, 1. ' Apol. 37. ' De Vir. illust, c. 42 ' Staatsr. iii. 1066. 206 CHRISTUNITY AND die effective Competenz der Imperientrager in der Weise ausiiben, dass er einen Consul oder einen Prator mit der Handhabung dieser Criminaljustiz beauftragt. In Folge eines derartigen Auftrags richtet der betreffende Magistrat, je nach Umstanden mit Zuziehung eines Consilium: der Senat selber fungirt auch in diesem Fall niemals als Gerichtshof.' Of these reasons the first alone seems to me to have any force, and, as Professor Harnack himself aUows, it is not conclusive, even apart from the possibility that Apol lonius is described as a senator in the lost beginning of the ' Acta.' The second reason proves nothing. Senators were by no means invariably tried by the senate, except perhaps in the reign of Tiberius. ApoUonius, if a senator, would much more naturally have been tried, as no doubt Flavius Clemens and Acilius Glabrio were, by the emperor himself. But Commodus, as we learn expressly from Dio Cassius, neglected aU the duties of his position, and Perennis was compelled to administer, not only military affairs, but all other matters as weU, and, in fact, to act as vice-emperor.' This by itself seems a sufficient explana tion why a senator, accused of being a Christian, should come before Perennis rather than the praefectus urbi. With regard to the passage quoted from Mommsen, it is enough to say that it has reference solely to republican times, and is quite inappropriate even to the first century of the empire, and still more to the second. On the other hand, the hypothesis that Apollonius was a senator enables us to suggest a consistent account of what really happened. Apollonius, a senator, -was accused by an informer — perhaps, as Hieronymus states, by one of his own slaves — of being a Christian. An ordinary Chris- ' Dio Cass. Ixxii. 9 : toC Kop.pi.6Sov . . . ray rrj hpxfi irpoariK6yruv ovSev us elire7v irpdrrovros 5 XlepevvLos ifvayKd^ero ovx Srtrh arpariariKh aXXh Kal T&XXa Sth x^^pbs Ix^'^ Kal rov koivov irpoardrreiy. THE ROMAN GOVEENMENT 207 tian would have been tried by the praefectus urbi, a senator naturally by the emperor. Commodus, however, delegated all such duties to Perennis, and accordingly before Perennis the accused was brought. The prefect, in these somewhat exceptional circumstances, may naturally have desired to relieve himself of some of the responsibility of putting a senator to death, especially as at the beginning of his reign the emperor, perhaps with a rather bad grace, made some show of deference to the senate's authority,' and he accordingly not only allowed but ordered Apollonius to make a statement to him in the presence of the senate, and induced the senate to pass a resolution that the ordinary course of procedure was to be observed in this case, viz. that pardon could only be secured by retracta tion." Armed with this semi-official authority,' Perennis resumed the trial in his own court, and as Apollonius persisted in his profession of Christianity and refused to worship the emperor, he was condemned to death, the only concession made to his senatorial rank being that he was beheaded instead of being exposed to wild beasts.* ' Schiller, Oesch. der riim. Kaiserz. i. 663. ' This seems the best explanation of the words m^' a^e7aBai &XXus robs oiro| eis SiKaariiptov irapUvras Kal pnSap.as rrjs irpoBeaeas p.era^aXXop.eyovs apxaiov irap' avro7s v6pov KeKparr]K6ros ; cf . Hieronym. ad loc. cit, : ' veteri apud eos obtinente lege absque negatione non dimitti Christianos.' ' This seems to give exactly the force required by uahv airh Soypiaros avyKXijrov. ' Professor Harnack gives a different explanation. He supposes that the favourable attitude of Commodus towards the Christians under the influence of Marcia had already commenced ; that it was with reluctance that the information of the slave was received ; that Perennis was expected by the emperor to bring the matter to a favourable termination ; that he sought to do this by inducing the senate to pass a resolution exempting Apollonius from the conse quences of his obstinacy, and that it was only because he faUed in this that he passed sentence on the accused, to whom he showed his 208 CHRISTIANITY AND THE EOMAN GOVEENMENT For the rest it is sufficient to point out (1) that Apollonius was not sought out, but accused ; (2) that it was the mere profession of Christianity apart from any more specific charge which was laid against him, (3) that the worship of the emperor was, as in other cases, used as a test and sign of retractation ; (4) that Perennis, no less than the provincial governors, is anxious to induce this recantation, and so to avoid the necessity of capital punishment. favourable attitude by a lighter sentence. This account leaves quite unexplained the position of the senate in the matter, and probably antedates by several years the more indulgent attitude of Commodus. PniNTrD BY SPOTTISWOODE AM-) CO., NKW.STILI-JiT .-iQUAKS LOS DOS YALE UNIVERSITY a39002 0Q3121101b *« g i ' "^'-IS "*ri __ji. V. _