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Sunday, October 27, 2024

Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire

Head of Aphrodite, 1st century AD copy of an original by Praxiteles. The Christian cross on the chin and forehead was intended to "deconsecrate" a holy pagan artifact. Found in the Agora of Athens. National Archaeological Museum in Athens.

Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire began during the reign of Constantine the Great (r.306–337) in the military colony of Aelia Capitolina (Jerusalem), when he destroyed a pagan temple for the purpose of constructing a Christian church. Rome had periodically confiscated church properties, and Constantine was vigorous in reclaiming them whenever these issues were brought to his attention. Christian historians alleged that Hadrian (2nd century) had constructed a temple to Venus on the site of the crucifixion of Jesus on Golgotha hill in order to suppress Christian veneration there. Constantine used that to justify the temple's destruction, saying he was simply reclaiming the property. Using the vocabulary of reclamation, Constantine acquired several more sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land.

From 313, with the exception of the brief reign of Julian, non-Christians were subject to a variety of hostile and discriminatory imperial laws aimed at suppressing sacrifice and magic and closing any temples that continued their use. The majority of these laws were local, though some were thought to be valid across the whole empire, with some threatening the death penalty, but not resulting in action. None seem to have been effectively applied empire-wide. For example, in 341, Constantine's son Constantius II enacted legislation forbidding pagan sacrifices in Roman Italy. In 356, he issued two more laws forbidding sacrifice and the worship of images, making them capital crimes, as well as ordering the closing of all temples. There is no evidence of the death penalty being carried out for illegal sacrifices before Tiberius Constantine (r.578–582), and most temples remained open into the reign of Justinian I (r.527–565). Pagan teachers (who included philosophers) were banned and their license, parrhesia, to instruct others was withdrawn. Parrhesia had been used for a thousand years to denote "freedom of speech." Despite official threats, sporadic mob violence, and confiscations of temple treasures, paganism remained widespread into the early fifth century, continuing in parts of the empire into the seventh century, and into the ninth century in Greece. During the reigns of Gratian, Valentinian II and Theodosius I anti-pagan policies and their penalties increased.

By the end of the period of Antiquity and the institution of the Law Codes of Justinian, there was a shift from the generalized legislation which characterized the Theodosian Code to actions which targeted individual centers of paganism. The gradual transition towards more localized action, corresponds with the period when most conversions of temples to churches were undertaken: the late 5th and 6th centuries. Chuvin says that, through the severe legislation of the early Byzantine Empire, the freedom of conscience that had been the major benchmark set by the Edict of Milan was finally abolished.

Non-Christians were a small minority by the time of the last western anti-pagan laws in the early 600s. Scholars fall into two categories on how and why this dramatic change took place: the long established traditional catastrophists who view the rapid demise of paganism as occurring in the late fourth and early fifth centuries due to harsh Christian legislation and violence, and contemporary scholars who view the process as a long decline that began in the second century, before the emperors were themselves Christian, and which continued into the seventh century. This latter view contends that there was less conflict between pagans and Christians than was previously supposed. In the twenty-first century, the idea that Christianity became dominant through conflict with paganism has become marginalized, while a grassroots theory has developed.

In 529 CE, the Byzantine emperor Justinian ordered the closing of the Academy at Athens. The last teachers of the Academy, Damascius and Simplicius were invited by a Persian ruler Khosrow I to Harran (now in Turkey), which became a center of learning. Paganism survived in Harran until the 10th century thanks to its practitioners bribing local officials. In 933, however, they were ordered to convert. A visitor to the city in the following year found that there were still pagan religious leaders operating a remaining public temple.

Tolerance or intolerance

Roman religion's characteristic openness has led many, such as Ramsay MacMullen to say that in its process of expansion, the Roman Empire was "completely tolerant, in heaven as on earth". Peter Garnsey strongly disagrees with those who describe the attitude concerning the "plethora of cults" in the Roman empire before Constantine as "tolerant" or "inclusive". In his view, it is a misuse of terminology. Garnsey has written that foreign gods were not tolerated in the modern sense, but were made subject, together with their communities, when they were conquered.

Roman historian Eric Orlin says that Roman religion's willingness to adopt foreign gods and practices into its pantheon is probably its defining trait. Yet he goes on to say this did not apply equally to all gods: "Many divinities were brought to Rome and installed as part of the Roman state religion, but a great many more were not".

Andreas Bendlin has written on the thesis of polytheistic tolerance and monotheistic intolerance in Antiquity saying that it has long been proven to be incorrect. According to Rodney Stark, since Christians most likely formed only sixteen to seventeen percent of the empire's population at the time of Constantine's conversion, they did not have the numerical advantage to form a sufficient power–base to begin a systematic persecution of pagans.

Brown reminds his readers, "We should not underestimate the fierce mood of the Christians of the fourth century", and, he says, it must be remembered that repression, persecution and martyrdom do not generally breed tolerance of those same persecutors. Brown says Roman authorities had shown no hesitation in "taking out" the Christian church which they saw as a threat to the peace of the empire, and that Constantine and his successors did what they did for the same reasons. Rome had been removing anything it saw as a challenge to Roman identity since Bacchic associations were dissolved in 186 BCE; this had become the pattern for the Roman state's response to anything it saw as a religious threat. According to Brown, that attitude and belief in what was required to maintain the peace of the empire didn't change just because the emperors were Christian.

Constantine I (306–337)

Rome-Capitole-StatueConstantin

According to Hans-Ulrich Wiemer, German historian of Antiquity, there is a persistent pagan tradition that Constantine did not persecute pagans. However, by twenty-first century definitions, Constantine can be said to have practiced a mild psychological and economic persecution of pagans. There are also indications he remained relatively tolerant of non-Christians throughout his long reign.

Nine years after Diocletian celebrated twenty years of stable rule with sacrifices on a smoking altar in the Roman Forum and the most severe persecution of Christians in the empire's history, the victorious Constantine I entered Rome and, without offering sacrifice, bypassed the altar. He proceeded to end the exclusion and persecution of Christians, restored confiscated property to the churches, and adopted a policy toward non-Christians of toleration with limits. The Edict of Milan (313) redefined Imperial ideology as one of mutual toleration. Constantine could be seen to embody both Christian and Greco-Roman religious interests.

Constantine openly supported Christianity after 324; he destroyed a few temples and plundered more, converted others to churches, and neglected the rest; he "confiscated temple funds to help finance his own building projects", and he confiscated funds in an effort to establish a stable currency; he was primarily interested in hoards of gold and silver, but he also, on occasion, confiscated temple land; he refused to support pagan beliefs and practices while also speaking out against them; he periodically forbade pagan sacrifices and closed temples, outlawed the gladiatorial shows while still attending them, made laws that threatened and menaced pagans who continued to sacrifice, while also making other laws that markedly favored Christianity; and he personally endowed Christians with gifts of money, land and government positions. Yet, Constantine did not stop the established state support of the traditional religious institutions, nor did society substantially change its pagan nature under his rule.

Constantine never engaged in a purge. Opponents' supporters were not slaughtered when Constantine took the capital; their families and court were not killed. There were no pagan martyrs. Laws menaced death, but during Constantine's reign, no one suffered the death penalty for violating anti-pagan laws against sacrifice. "He did not punish pagans for being pagans, or Jews for being Jews, and did not adopt a policy of forced conversion." Pagans remained in important positions at his court.

Constantine ruled for 31 years and never outlawed paganism; in the words of an early edict, he decreed that polytheists could "celebrate the rites of an outmoded illusion," so long as they did not force Christians to join them. His earlier edict, the Edict of Milan, was restated in the Edict of the Provincials. Historian Harold A. Drake points out that this edict called for peace and tolerance: "Let no one disturb another, let each man hold fast to that which his soul wishes…" Constantine never reversed this edict.

Drake goes on to say the evidence indicates Constantine favored those who favored consensus, chose pragmatists over ideologues of any persuasion, and wanted peace and harmony "but also inclusiveness and flexibility". In his article Constantine and Consensus, Drake concludes that Constantine's religious policy was aimed at including the church in a broader policy of civic unity, even though his personal views undoubtedly favored one religion over the other. Leithart says Constantine attributed his military success to God, and during his reign, the empire was relatively peaceful.

Conversion and baptism

Lenski says there can be no real doubt Constantine genuinely converted to Christianity. In his personal views, Constantine denounced paganism as idolatry and superstition in that same document to the provincials where he espoused tolerance. Constantine and his contemporary Christians did not treat paganism as a living religion; it was defined as a superstitio – an 'outmoded illusion.' Constantine made many derogatory and contemptuous comments relating to the old religion; writing of the "true obstinacy" of the pagans, of their "misguided rites and ceremonial", and of their "temples of lying" contrasted with "the splendours of the home of truth". In a later letter to the King of Persia, Constantine wrote how he shunned the "abominable blood and hateful odors" of pagan sacrifices, and instead worshiped the High God "on bended knee".

Church historians writing after his death wrote that Constantine converted to Christianity and was baptised on his deathbed, thereby making him the first Christian emperor. Lenski observes that the myth of Constantine being baptized by Pope Sylvester developed toward the end of the fifth century in a romantic depiction of Sylvester's life which has survived as the Actus beati Sylvestri papae (CPL 2235). This story absolved the medieval church of a major embarrassment: Constantine's baptism by an Arian bishop, Eusebius of Nicomedia, which occurred while on campaign to Persia. Constantine swung through the Holy Land with the intent of being baptized in the Jordan river, but he became deathly ill at Nicomedia where he was swiftly baptized. He died shortly thereafter on May 22, 337 at a suburban villa named Achyron.

Ban on sacrifices

Scott Bradbury, professor of classical languages, writes that Constantine's policies toward pagans are "ambiguous and elusive" and that "no aspect has been more controversial than the claim he banned blood sacrifices". Bradbury says the sources on this are contradictory, quoting Eusebius who says he did, and Libanius, a historian contemporary to Constantine, who says he did not, that it was Constantius II who did so instead. According to historian R. Malcolm Errington, in Book 2 of Eusebius' De vita Constantini, chapter 44, Eusebius explicitly states that Constantine wrote a new law "appointing mainly Christian governors and also a law forbidding any remaining pagan officials from sacrificing in their official capacity".

Other significant evidence fails to support Eusebius' claim of an end to sacrifice. Constantine, in his Letter to the Eastern Provincials, never mentions any law against sacrifices. Archaeologist Luke Lavan writes that blood sacrifice was already declining in popularity by the time of Constantine, just as construction of new temples was also declining, but that this seems to have little to do with anti-paganism. Drake has written that Constantine personally abhorred sacrifice and removed the obligation to participate in them from the list of duties for imperial officials, but evidence of an actual sweeping ban on sacrifice is slight, while evidence of its continued practice is great.

All records of anti-pagan legislation by Constantine are found in the Life of Constantine, written by Eusebius as a kind of eulogy after Constantine's death. It is not a history so much as a panegyric praising Constantine. The laws as they are stated in the Life of Constantine often do not correspond, "closely, or at all", to the text of the Codes themselves. Eusebius gives these laws a "strongly Christian interpretation by selective quotation or other means". This has led many to question the veracity of his record.

While most scholars agree it is likely Constantine did institute the first laws against sacrifice, leading to its end by the 350's, paganism itself did not end when public sacrifice did. Brown explains that polytheists were accustomed to offering prayers to the gods in many ways and places that did not include sacrifice, that pollution was only associated with sacrifice, and that the ban on sacrifice had fixed boundaries and limits. Paganism thus remained widespread into the early fifth century continuing in parts of the empire into the seventh and beyond.

Magic and private divination

Maijastina Kahlos, scholar of Roman literature, says religion before Christianity was a decidedly public practice. Therefore, private divination, astrology, and 'Chaldean practices' (formulae, incantations, and imprecations designed to repulse demons and protect the invoker) all became associated with magic in the early imperial period (AD 1–30), and carried the threat of banishment and execution even under the pagan emperors. Lavan explains these same private and secret religious rituals were not just associated with magic but also with treason and secret plots against the emperor. Kahlos says Christian emperors inherited this fear of private divination.

The church had long spoken against anything connected to magic and its uses. Polymnia Athanassiadi says that, by the mid fourth century, prophecy at the Oracles of Delphi and Didyma had been definitively stamped out. However, Athanassiadi says the church's real targets in Antiquity were home-made oracles for the practice of theurgy: the interpretation of dreams with the intent of influencing human affairs. The church had no prohibitions against the interpretation of dreams by itself, yet, according to Athanassiadi, both Church and State viewed using it to influence events as "the most pernicious aspect of the pagan spirit".

Constantine's decree against private divination did not classify divination in general as magic, therefore, even though all the emperors, Christian and pagan, forbade all secret rituals, Constantine still allowed the haruspices to practice their rituals in public.

Constantinople and temple looting

Early coin of Constantine commemorating the pagan cult of Sol Invictus

On 8 November 324, Constantine consecrated Byzantium as his new residence, Constantinoupolis – "city of Constantine" – with the local pagan priests, astrologers, and augurs, though he still went back to Rome to celebrate his Vicennalia: his twenty-year jubilee. Two years after the consecration of Constantinople, Constantine left Rome behind, and on 4 November 328, new rituals were performed to dedicate the city as the new capital of the Roman empire. Among the attendants were the Neoplatonist philosopher Sopater and pontifex maximus Praetextus.

A year and a half later, on 11 May 330, at the festival of Saint Mocius, the dedication was celebrated and commemorated with special coins with Sol Invictus on them. In commemoration, Constantine had a statue of the goddess of fortune Tyche built, as well as a column made of porphyry, at the top of which was a golden statue of Apollo with the face of Constantine looking toward the sun.

Libanius the historian (Constantine's contemporary) writes in a passage from his In Defense of the Temples that Constantine 'looted the Temples' around the eastern empire in order to get their treasures to build Constantinople. Noel Lenski [de] says that Constantinople was "literally crammed with [pagan] statuary gathered, in Jerome's words, by 'the virtual denuding' of every city in the East". Historian Ramsay MacMullen explains this by saying Constantine "wanted to obliterate non-Christians, but lacking the means, he had to be content with robbing their temples". Constantine did not obliterate what he took, though. He reused it. Litehart says "Constantinople was newly founded, but it deliberately evoked the Roman past religiously as well as politically".

Constantinople continued to offer room to pagan religions: there were shrines for the Dioscuri and Tyche. According to historian Hans-Ulrich Wiemer [de], there is good reason to believe the ancestral temples of Helios, Artemis and Aphrodite remained functioning in Constantinople. The Acropolis, with its ancient pagan temples, was left as it was.

Desacralization and destruction of temples

A cult statue of the deified Augustus, deconsecrated by a Christian cross carved into the emperor's forehead
 
Bust of Germanicus, disfigured and with a cross engraved on the forehead
Ivory diptych of a priestess of Ceres, ca 400: it was defaced and thrown in a well at Abbey of Montier-en-Der.

Using the same vocabulary of restoration he had used for Aelia Capitolina, Constantine acquired sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land for the purpose of constructing churches, destroying the temples in those places. For example, Constantine destroyed the Temple of Aphrodite in Lebanon.

However, archaeology indicates this type of destruction did not happen as often as the literature claims. For example, at the sacred oak and spring at Mamre, a site venerated and occupied by Christians, Jews and pagans alike, the literature says Constantine ordered the burning of the idols, the destruction of the altar, and erection of a church. The archaeology of the site, however, demonstrates that Constantine's church along with its attendant buildings, only occupied a peripheral sector of the precinct, leaving the rest unhindered.

Temple destruction is attested to in 43 cases in the written sources, but only four have been confirmed by archaeological evidence. Archaeologists Lavan and Mulryan write that earthquakes, civil conflict, and external invasions caused much of the temple destruction of this era.

The Roman economy of the third and fourth centuries struggled, and traditional polytheism was expensive. Roger S. Bagnall reports that imperial financial support declined markedly after Augustus. Lower budgets meant the physical decline of urban structures of all types. This progressive decay was accompanied by an increased trade in salvaged building materials, as the practice of recycling became common in Late Antiquity.

Church restrictions opposing the pillaging of pagan temples by Christians were in place even while the Christians were being persecuted by the pagans. More common than destruction was the practice of "desacralization" or "deconsecration". According to the historical writings of Prudentius, the deconsecration of a temple merely required the removal of the cult statue and altar, and it could be reused. The Law Codes from around the same time as Prudentius say that temples “empty of illicit things” were to suffer no further damage and idols were only “illicit” if they were still venerated. However, this was often extended to the removal or even destruction of other statues and icons, votive stelae, and all other internal imagery and decoration.

Mutilating the hands and feet of statues of the divine, mutilating heads and genitals, tearing down altars and "purging sacred precincts with fire" were seen as 'proving' the impotence of the gods, but pagan icons were also seen as having been “polluted” by the practice of sacrifice. A ritual and chiseling crosses onto them cleansed them. Once these objects were detached from "the contagion" of sacrifice, they were seen as having returned to innocence. Many statues and temples were then preserved as art. For example, the Parthenon frieze was preserved after the Christian conversion of the temple, although in modified form.

According to historian Gilbert Dagron, there were fewer temples constructed empire-wide, for mostly financial reasons, after the building craze of the 2nd century ended. However, Constantine's reign did not comprise the end of temple construction. In addition to destroying temples, he both permitted and commissioned temple construction. The dedication of new temples is attested in the historical and archaeological records until the end of the 4th century.

Under Constantine, (and for the first decade or so of the reigns of his sons), most of the temples remained open for the official pagan ceremonies and for the more socially acceptable activities of libation and offering of incense. Despite the polemic of Eusebius claiming Constantine razed all the temples, Constantine's principal contribution to the downfall of the temples lay quite simply in his neglect of them.

Constantius II (337–361)

Constantine's policies were largely continued by his sons though not universally or continuously.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, Constantius issued bans on sacrifice which were in keeping with his personal maxim: "Cesset superstitio; sacrificiorum aboleatur insania" (Let superstition cease; let the folly of sacrifices be abolished). He removed the Altar of Victory from the Senate meeting house. This altar had been installed by Augustus in 29 BC, and since its installation, each Senator had traditionally made a sacrifice upon the altar before entering the Senate house. When Constantius removed the altar he also allowed the statue of Victory to remain, therefore Thompson concludes that the removal of the altar was to avoid having to personally sacrifice when he was visiting Rome. In Thompson's view, this makes the altar's removal an act to accommodate his personal religion without offending the pagan senators by refusing to observe their rites. Soon after the departure of Constantius, the altar was restored.

Constantius also shut down temples, ended tax relief and subsidies for pagans, and imposed the death penalty on those who consulted soothsayers. Orientalist Alexander Vasiliev says that Constantius carried out a persistent anti-pagan policy, and that sacrifices were prohibited in all localities and cities of the empire on penalty of death and confiscation of property.

There is no evidence that the harsh penalties of the anti-sacrifice laws were ever enforced. Edward Gibbon's editor J. B. Bury dismisses Constantius’ law against sacrifice as one which could only be observed "here and there", asserting that it could never, realistically, have been enforced within a society that still contained the strong pagan element of Late Antiquity, particularly within the imperial machinery itself. Christians were a minority and paganism was still popular among the population, as well as the elites at the time. The emperor's policies were therefore passively resisted by many governors, magistrates, and even bishops, rendering the anti-pagan laws largely impotent when it came to their application.

Relative moderation

According to Salzman, Constantius' actions toward paganism were relatively moderate, and this is reflected by the fact that it was not until over 20 years after Constantius' death, during the reign of Gratian, that any pagan senators protested their religion's treatment. The emperor Constantius never attempted to disband the various Roman priestly colleges or the Vestal Virgins and never acted against the various pagan schools. He remained pontifex maximus until his death.

The temples outside the city remained protected by law. At times, Constantius acted to protect paganism itself. According to author and editor Diana Bowder, the historian Ammianus Marcellinus records in his history Res Gestae, that pagan sacrifices and worship continued taking place openly in Alexandria and Rome. The Roman Calendar of the year 354 cites many pagan festivals as though they were still being openly observed.

Legislation against magic and divination

In 357, Constantius II linked divination and magic in a piece of legislation forbidding anyone from consulting a diviner, astrologer, or a soothsayer; then he listed augurs and seers, Chaldeans, magicians and 'all the rest' who were to be made to be silent because the people called them malefactors. In the fourth century, Augustine labeled old Roman religion and its divinatory practices as magic and therefore illegal. Thereafter, legislation tended to automatically combine the two.

Temples

There is a law in the Theodosian Code that dates to the time of Constantius for the preservation of the temples situated outside of city walls. Constantius also enacted a law that exacted a fine from those who were guilty of vandalizing sites holy to pagans and placed the care of these monuments and tombs under the pagan priests. Successive emperors in the 4th century made legislative attempts to curb violence against pagan shrines, and in a general law issued in 458 by the Eastern emperor Leo and the western emperor Majorian, (457 to 461), the temples and other public works gained protection with strict penalties attached.

Mob violence

Mob violence was an occasional problem in the independent cities of the empire. Taxes, food and politics were common reasons for rioting. Religion was also a factor though it is difficult to separate from politics since they were intertwined in all aspects of life. In 361, the murder of the Arian bishop George of Cappadocia was committed by a mob of pagans, A Christian mob threw objects at Orestes and, finally, Hypatia was killed by a Christian mob though politics and personal jealousy were probably the primary causes. Mobs were composed of lower-class urban dwellers, upper class educated pagans, Jews and Christians, and in Alexandria, monks from the monastery of Nitria.

Restoration of paganism by Julian (361–363)

Julian, who had been a co-emperor since 355, ruled solely for 18 months from 361 to 363. He was a nephew of Constantine and received Christian training. After childhood, Julian was educated by Hellenists and became attracted to the teachings of neoplatonists and the old religions. He blamed Constantius for the assassination of Julian's father, brother and other family members, which he personally witnessed being killed by the palace guards. As a result, he developed an antipathy to Christianity which only deepened when Constantius executed Julian's only remaining brother in 354. Julian's religious beliefs were syncretic and he was initiated into at least three mystery religions, but his religious open-mindedness did not extend to Christianity.

Julian lifted the ban on sacrifices, restored and reopened temples, and dismantled the privileged status of the Christians, giving generous tax remissions to the cities he favored and disfavor to those who remained Christian. He allowed religious freedom and spoke against overt compulsion, but there was little other option open to him. By the time Julian came to rule, the empire had been ruled by Christian emperors for two generations and the people had adapted.

Bradbury writes that Julian was not averse to a more subtle form of compulsion, and in 362, Julian promulgated a law that, in effect, forbid Christians from being teachers. Julian wrote that "right learning" was essential to pagan reform, and that such learning belonged only to those who showed 'piety toward the old gods'. In a letter written by Julian that still exists, he says: "Let [the Christians] keep to Matthew and Luke". Christians saw this as a threat that barred them from a professional career many of them already held.

On his trip through Asia Minor to Antioch to assemble an army and resume war against Persia, he found the cities falling short of pagan revival. His reforms were met by Christian resistance and civic inertia. Provincial priests were replaced with Julian's sympathetic associates, but after passing through Galatia and seeing the strength of the church and its charitable institutions, he wrote to the high priest of the province that all the new priests were to "follow a thoroughgoing programme of personal moral example and public institutions to outdo the Christians at their own game... for it is disgraceful that none of the Jews is a beggar and the impious Galilaeans provide support for our people as well as theirs".

Julian reached Antioch on July 18 which coincided with a pagan festival that had already become secular. Julian's preference for blood sacrifice found little support, and the citizens of Antioch accused Julian of "turning the world upside down" by reinstituting it, calling him "slaughterer". Altars used for sacrifice had been routinely smashed by Christians who were deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars. "When Julian restored altars in Antioch, the Christian populace promptly threw them down again".

Blood sacrifice was a central rite of virtually all religious groups in the pre-Christian Mediterranean, and its gradual disappearance is one of the most significant religious developments of late antiquity. Sacrifice did not decline according to any uniform pattern, but...In many of the larger towns and cities of the Eastern empire, public blood sacrifices were no longer normative by the time Julian came to power and embarked on his pagan revival. Public sacrifices and communal feasting had declined as the result of a decline in the prestige of pagan priesthoods and a shift in patterns of [private donations] in civic life. That shift would have occurred on a lesser scale even without the conversion of Constantine... It is easy, nonetheless, to imagine a situation in which sacrifice could decline without disappearing. Why not retain, for example, a single animal victim in order to preserve the integrity of the ancient rite? The fact that public sacrifices appear to have disappeared completely in many towns and cities must be attributed to the atmosphere created by imperial and episcopal hostility.

Julian became frustrated that no one seemed to match his zeal for pagan revival. His reform soon moved from toleration to imperial punishment. Historians such as David Wood assert there was a revival of some persecution against Christians. On the other hand, H. A. Drake says that "In the eighteen brief months that he ruled between 361 and 363, Julian did not persecute [Christians], as a hostile tradition contends. But he did make clear that the partnership between Rome and Christian bishops... was now at an end, replaced by a government that defined its interests and those of Christianity as antithetical. Scholars agree that Julian tried to undermine the church by ordering the construction of churches for Christian “heretical” sects and by destroying orthodox churches.

After Antioch, Julian would not be deterred from his goal of war with Persia, and he died on that campaign. The facts of his death have become obscured by the "war of words between Christians and pagans" which followed. It was "principally over the source of the fatal spear... The thought that Julian might have died by the hand of one of his own side... was a godsend to a Christian tradition eager to have the apostate emperor accorded his just deserts. Yet such a rumor was not solely the product of religious polemic. It had its roots in the broader trail of disaffection Julian left in his wake".

From Jovian to Valens (363–378)

Jovian reigned only eight months, from June 363 to February 364, but in that period, he negotiated peace with the Sassanids and reestablished Christianity as the preferred religion.

Bayliss says the position adopted by the Nicene Christian emperor Valentinian I (321–375) and the Arian Christian emperor Valens (364–378), granting all cults toleration from the start of their reign, was in tune with a society of mixed beliefs. Pagan writers, for example Ammianus Marcellinus, describe the reign of Valentinian as one “distinguished for religious tolerance... He took a neutral position between opposing faiths, and never troubled anyone by ordering him to adopt this or that mode of worship ... [he] left the various cults undisturbed as he found them”.

This apparently sympathetic stance is corroborated by the absence of any anti-pagan legislation in the Theodosian Law Codes from this era. Classics scholar Christopher P. Jones says Valentinian permitted divination so long as it was not done at night, which he saw as the next step to practicing magic.

Valens, who ruled the east, also tolerated paganism, even keeping some of Julian's associates in their trusted positions. He confirmed the rights and privileges of the pagan priests and confirmed the right of pagans to be the exclusive caretakers of their temples.

Ambrose, Gratian, and the Altar of Victory

Ambrose and Gratian

In 382, Gratian was the first to formally, in law, divert into the crown's coffers those public financial subsidies that had previously supported Rome's cults; he appropriated the income of pagan priests and the Vestal Virgins, forbade their right to inherit land, confiscated the possessions of the priestly colleges, and was the first to refuse the title of pontifex maximus. He also ordered the Altar of Victory to be removed again. The colleges of pagan priests lost privileges and immunities.

Gratian wrote Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, for spiritual advice and received back multiple letters and books. It has long been convention to see the volume of these writings as evidence Gratian was dominated by Ambrose, who was therefore the true source of Gratian's anti-pagan actions. McLynn finds this unlikely and unnecessary as an explanation: Gratian was, himself, devout, and "The many differences between Gratian's religious policies and his father's, and the shifts that occurred during his own reign, are to be explained by changed political circumstances [after the Battle of Adrianople], rather than capitulation to Ambrose".

Modern scholars have noted that Sozomen is the only ancient source that shows Ambrose and Gratian together in any personal interaction. That event occurred in the last year of Gratian's reign. Ambrose crashed Gratian's private hunting party in order to appeal on behalf of a pagan senator sentenced to die. After years of acquaintance, this indicates Ambrose could not take for granted that Gratian would see him, so instead, Ambrose had to resort to such maneuverings to make his appeal.

After Gratian

Gratian's brother, Valentinian II and Valentinian's mother strongly disliked Ambrose and generally refused to cooperate with him, taking every opportunity to side against him. Yet, Valentinian II still refused to grant requests from pagans to restore the Altar of Victory and the income of the temple priests and Vestal Virgins or to overturn the policies of his predecessor.

After Gratian, the emperors Arcadius, Honorius and Theodosius continued to appropriate for the crown the tax revenue collected by the temple custodians. Urban ritual procession and ceremony was gradually stripped of support and funding. Rather than being removed outright though, many festivals were secularized and incorporated into a developing Christian calendar, often with little alteration. Some had already severely declined in popularity by the end of 3rd century.

Ambrose and Theodosius I

Saint Ambrose and Emperor Theodosius, Anthony van Dyck.

John Moorhead says that Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan is sometimes referred to as having influenced the anti-paganism policies of the emperor Theodosius I to the degree of finally achieving the desired dominance of church over state. Alan Cameron observes that this dominating influence is "often spoken of as though documented fact". Indeed, he says, "the assumption is so widespread it would be superfluous to cite authorities".

Modern scholarship has revised this view. Cameron says Ambrose was only one among many advisors, and there is no evidence Theodosius I favored him. On occasion Theodosius I purposefully excluded Ambrose, and at times, got angry enough with Ambrose that Theodosius sent him away from court. Neil B. McLynn observes that the documents that reveal the relationship between Ambrose and Theodosius seem less about personal friendship and more like negotiations between the institutions the two men represent: the Roman State and the Italian Church.

According to McLynn, the events following the Thessalonian massacre cannot be used to "prove" Ambrose' exceptional or undue influence. The encounter at the church door does not demonstrate Ambrose' dominance over Theodosius because, according to Peter Brown, it never happened. According to McLynn, "the encounter at the church door has long been known as a pious fiction". Harold A. Drake quotes Daniel Washburn as writing that the image of the mitered prelate braced in the door of the cathedral to block Theodosius from entering, is a product of the imagination of Theodoret who was a historian of the fifth century. Theodoret wrote of the events of 390 "using his own ideology to fill the gaps in the historical record".

Theodosius I (381–395)

Theodosius seems to have adopted a cautious policy overall toward traditional non-Christian cults. He reiterated his Christian predecessors' bans on animal sacrifice, divination, and apostasy, but allowed other pagan practices to be performed publicly and temples to remain open. Theodosius also turned pagan holidays into workdays, but the festivals associated with them continued. A number of laws against sacrifice and divination, closing temples that continued to allow them, were issued towards the end of his reign, but historians have tended to downplay their practical effects and even the emperor's direct role in them. Most of Theodosius' religious legislation was against heresy.

Modern scholars think there is little if any evidence Theodosius pursued an active and sustained policy against the traditional cults. There is evidence Theodosius took care to prevent the empire's still substantial pagan population from feeling ill-disposed toward his rule. Following the death in 388 of his praetorian prefect, Cynegius, who had vandalized a number of pagan shrines in the eastern provinces, Theodosius replaced him with a moderate pagan who subsequently moved to protect the temples. During his first official tour of Italy (389–391), the emperor won over the influential pagan lobby in the Roman Senate by appointing its foremost members to important administrative posts. Theodosius also nominated the last pair of pagan consuls in Roman history (Tatianus and Symmachus) in 391.

Between 382 and 384, there was yet another dispute over the Altar of Victory. According to the Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity, Symmachus requested the restoration of the altar that Gratian had removed and the restoration of state support for the Vestals. Ambrose campaigned against any financial support for paganism and anything like the Altar that required participation in pagan practices. Ambrose prevailed. Theodosius refused the appeal. Pagans remained outspoken in their demands for respect, concessions and support from the state.

Classicist Ingomar Hamlet says that, contrary to popular myth, Theodosius did not ban the Olympic games. Sofie Remijsen [nl] indicates there are several reasons to conclude the Olympic games continued after Theodosius and came to an end under Theodosius II instead. Two scholia on Lucian connect the end of the games with a fire that burned down the temple of the Olympian Zeus during his reign.

Anti-pagan legislation

Anti-pagan legislation reflects what Brown calls "the most potent social and religious drama" of the fourth-century Roman empire. From Constantine forward, the Christian intelligentsia wrote of Christianity as fully triumphant over paganism. It didn't matter that they were still a minority in the empire, this triumph had occurred in Heaven; it was evidenced by Constantine; but even after Constantine, they wrote that Christianity would defeat, and be seen to defeat, all of its enemies - not convert them.

The laws were not intended to convert; "the laws were intended to terrorize... Their language was uniformly vehement, and... frequently horrifying". Their intent was to reorder society along religious lines and enable Christianity to put a stop to animal sacrifice. Blood sacrifice was the element of pagan culture most abhorrent to Christians. If they could not stop the private practice of sacrifice, they could "hope to determine what would be normative and socially acceptable in public spaces". Altars used for sacrifice were routinely smashed by Christians who were deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars.

One of the important things about this, in Malcolm Errington's view, is how much legislation was applied and used, which would show how dependable the laws are as a reflection of what actually happened to pagans in history. Brown says that, given the large numbers of non-Christians in every region at this time, local authorities were "notoriously lax in imposing them. Christian bishops frequently obstructed their application. The harsh imperial edicts had to face the vast following of paganism among the population, and the passive resistance of governors and magistrates, thereby limiting their impact.

Twenty-first century studies on the nature of the presence of the state, how it makes itself felt by the populace, "the subtle nature of power" and the eventual complete elimination of public sacrifice all show that, while the impact of imperial law was limited, it was not completely without influence.

Secondly, the laws reveal the emergence of a language of intolerance. The legal language runs parallel to the writings of the apologists, such as Augustine of Hippo and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, and heresiologists such as Epiphanius of Salamis. Christian writers and imperial legislators both drew on a rhetoric of conquest. These writings were commonly hostile and often contemptuous toward a paganism Christianity saw as already defeated.

Lastly, on the one hand the laws, and these Christian sources with their violent rhetoric, have had great influence on modern perceptions of this period by creating an impression of continuous violent conflict that has been assumed on an empire-wide scale. Archaeological evidence, on the other hand, indicates that, outside of violent rhetoric, there were only isolated incidents of actual violence between Christians and pagans. Non-Christian, (non-heretical), groups such as pagans and Jews enjoyed a tolerance based on contempt through most of Late Antiquity.

Temple destruction and conversion

Praetorian prefecture of the East
Praefectura praetorio Orientis
Ἐπαρχότης τῶν πραιτωρίων τῆς Ανατολῆς
Ἑῴα Ὑπαρχία
Praet. Prefecture of the East Roman Empire
337–7th century

Praetorian Prefectures of the Roman Empire (395). The Praetorian Prefecture of the East is in grey.
CapitalConstantinople

Historical eraLate Antiquity

• Established
337
• reorganization into themata
7th century


According to Brown, Theodosius was a devout Christian anxious to close the temples in the East. His commissioner, the prefect Maternus Cynegius (384-88) commissioned temple destruction on a wide scale, even employing the military under his command and "black-robed monks" for this purpose. Garth Fowden says Cynegius did not limit himself to Theodosius' official policy, but Theodosius did not stop him.

The pagan historian Libanius wrote "this black robed tribe" were acting outside the law, but Brown says Theodosius did not enforce those laws. Theodosius voiced his support for the preservation of temple buildings, but passively legitimized the monk's violence by listening to them instead of correcting them, thereby failing to prevent the damaging of many holy sites, images and objects of piety by Christian zealots. However, in 388 at Callinicum, (modern Raqqa in Syria), the bishop along with monks from the area burned a Jewish synagogue to the ground, and Theodosius responded, "The monks commit many atrocities", and he ordered them to pay to rebuild it.

These examples were seen as the 'tip of the iceberg' by earlier scholars who saw these events as part of a tide of violent Christian iconoclasm that continued throughout the 390s and into the 400s.

However, archaeological evidence for the violent destruction of temples in the fourth and early fifth centuries around the entire Mediterranean is limited to a handful of sites. Most recorded incidents of temple destruction are known from church and hagiographical accounts which are eager to portray their subjects' piety and power. They offer vividly dramatized accounts of pious bishops doing battle with temple demons. The temples of Zeus at Apameia and of Marnas at Gaza City are said to have been brought down by the local bishops around this period, but the only source for this information is the biography of Porphyry of Gaza which is considered a forgery.

Trombley and MacMullen say part of why such discrepancies (between the literary sources and the archaeological evidence) exist is because it is common for details in the literary sources to be ambiguous and unclear. For example, Malalas claimed Constantine destroyed all the temples, then he said Theodisius did, then he said Constantine converted them all to churches.

According to archaeologists Lavan and Mulryan:

If one accepts all potential claims (several of which are very shaky) only 2.4% of all known temples in Gaul have evidence of being destroyed by violence (17 out of [approximately] 711) ... In Africa, only the city of Cyrene has produced good evidence (the burning of several temples) whilst work in Asia Minor has produced just one weak candidate (undated), and in Greece the only strong example may relate to a barbarian rather than a Christian raid. Finally, Egypt has produced no archaeologically-confirmed temple destructions at all dating from this period, with the exception of the Serapeum, a situation paralleled in Spain. In Italy, we have only a single burning; Britain has produced the most evidence, with 2 Romano–Celtic temples out of 40 ...being burnt in the 4th c., whilst another was deliberately destroyed, with its mosaics smashed.

Earthquakes caused much of the destruction that occurred to temples in this era, and people determined not to rebuild as society changed. Recycling and pragmatism contributed to demolition as well, with one building being taken down and another constructed according to the needs of the community with no anti-paganism being involved. Civil conflict and external invasions also destroyed temples and shrines. Lavan says: "We must rule out most of the images of destruction created by the [written sources]. Archaeology shows the vast majority of temples were not treated this way".

Some scholars have long asserted that not all temples were destroyed but were instead converted to churches throughout the empire. According to modern archaeology, 120 pagan temples were converted to churches in the whole empire, out of the thousands of temples that existed, and only about 40 of them are dated before the end of the fifth century. R. P. C. Hanson says the direct conversion of temples into churches did not begin until the mid fifth century in any but a few isolated incidents. In Rome the first recorded temple conversion was the Pantheon in 609. None of the churches attributed to Martin of Tours can be proven to have existed in the fourth century.

Anti-paganism after Theodosius I until the collapse of the Western Empire

Anti-pagan laws were established and continued on after Theodosius I until the fall of the Roman Empire in the West. Arcadius, Honorius, Theodosius II, Marcian and Leo I reiterated the bans on pagan sacrifices and divination and increased the penalties. The necessity to do so indicates that the old religion still had many followers. In the later part of the 4th century there were clearly a significant number of pagan sympathizers and crypto-pagans still in positions of power in all levels of the administrative system including positions close to the emperor; even by the 6th century, pagans can still be found in prominent positions of office both locally and in the imperial bureaucracy.

From Theodosius on, public sacrifice definitely ended in Constantinople and Antioch, and in those places that were, as Lavan says, "under the emperor's nose" by around 350. However, away from the imperial court, those efforts were not effective or enduring until the fifth and sixth centuries.

By the early fifth century under Honorius and Theodosius II, there were multiple injunctions against magic and divination. One example was the law of 409 de maleficis et mathematicis against astrologers ordering them to return to Catholicism, and for the books of mathematics that they used for their computations to be "consumed in flames before the eyes of the bishops". A fifth century writer Apponius wrote a condemnation of methods "demons used to ensnare human hearts" including augury, astrology, magical spells, malign magic, mathesis, and all predictions gained from the flights of birds or the scrutiny of entrails.

The prefecture of Illyricum appears to have been an attractive post for pagans and sympathisers in the 5th century, and Aphrodisias is known to have housed a substantial population of pagans in late antiquity, including a famous school of philosophy. In Rome, Christianization was hampered significantly by the elites, many of whom remained stalwartly pagan. The institutional cults continued in Rome and its hinterland, funded from private sources, in a considerably reduced form, but still existent, as long as empire lasted.

Bayliss writes that "We know from discoveries at Aphrodisias that pagans and philosophers were still very much in evidence in the 5th century, and living in some luxury. The discovery of overt pagan statuary and marble altars in a house in the heart of the city of Athens gives a very different impression from that presented by the law codes and literature, of pagans worshipping in secrecy and constant fear of the governor and bishop".

After the fall of the Western Empire

In 476, the last western emperor of Roman descent, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by Odoacer, who became the first "barbarian" king of Italy. By the time the Emperor Anastasius I, who came to the throne in 491 as the first emperor required to sign a written declaration of orthodoxy before his coronation, the Goths had been Christian for over a hundred years.

The extent of the Byzantine Empire under Justinian's uncle Justin I is shown in brown. The light orange shows the conquests of his successor, Justinian I also known as Justinian the Great.

Peter Brown has written that, "it would be profoundly misleading" to claim that the cultural and social changes that took place in Late Antiquity reflected "in any way" an overall process of Christianization of the empire. Instead, the "flowering of a vigorous public culture that polytheists, Jews and Christians alike could share... [that] could be described as Christian "only in the narrowest sense" had developed. It is true that Christians had ensured that blood sacrifice played no part in that culture, but the sheer success and unusual stability of the Constantinian and post-Constantinian state also ensured that "the edges of potential conflict were blurred... It would be wrong to look for further signs of Christianization at this time. It is impossible to speak of a Christian empire as existing before Justinian". 

The Byzantine emperor Justinian I, also known as Justinian the Great (527-565), enacted legislation with repeated calls for the cessation of sacrifice well into the 6th century. Judith Herrin writes that Emperor Justinian was a major influence in getting Christian ideals and legal regulations integrated with Roman law. Justinian revised the Theodosian codes, introduced many Christian elements, and "turned the full force of imperial legislation against deviants of all kinds, particularly religious". Herrin says, "This effectively put the word of God on the same level as Roman law, combining an exclusive monotheism with a persecuting authority".

According to Anthony Kaldellis, Justinian is remembered as "the last Roman emperor of ecumenical importance ... the arbiter of the Roman legal tradition." Yet it is as the emperor who sought, once again, to extend Roman authority around the Mediterranean, that he is often seen as a tyrant and despot. Justinian's government became increasingly autocratic. He persecuted pagans, religious minorities and purged the bureaucracy of those who disagreed with him. As Byzantine imperial culture became more orthodox, it led to the creation of the Monophysite church, which set Constantinople against both Rome and the Eastern provinces. "Few emperors had started so many wars or tried to enforce cultural and religious uniformity with such zeal... In the words of one historian, 'Justinian was conscious of living in the age of Justinian'.

Herrin adds that, under Justinian, this new full "supremacy of Christian belief involved considerable destruction". The decree of 528 had already barred pagans from state office when, decades later, Justinian ordered a "persecution of surviving Hellenes, accompanied by the burning of pagan books, pictures and statues" which took place at the Kynêgion. Most pagan literature was on papyrus, and so it perished before being able to be copied onto something more durable. Herrin says it is difficult to assess the degree to which Christians are responsible for the losses of ancient documents in many cases, but in the mid-sixth century, active persecution in Constantinople destroyed many ancient texts.

Evaluation and commentary

Roman empire at its greatest extent

In the early 21st century, every aspect of Antiquity is undergoing revision as "a hotly debated period". What was thought to be well-known concerning the relation between society and Christianity "has been rendered disturbingly unfamiliar".

In the last decade of the twentieth century and into the twenty–first century, multiple new discoveries of texts and documents, along with new research (such as modern archaeology and numismatics), combined with new fields of study (such as sociology and anthropology) and modern mathematical modeling, have undermined much of the traditional view. According to modern theories, Christianity became established in the third century, before Constantine, paganism did not end in the fourth century, and imperial legislation had only limited effect before the era of the eastern emperor Justinian I (reign 527 to 565).

Even periodization is debated, but late antiquity is generally thought of as beginning after the end of the Roman empire's Crisis of the Third Century (AD 235–284) and extending to about AD 600 in the West, and AD 800–1000 in the East.

Differing scholarly views

According to The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity (OHLA), scholars of the late Roman Empire fall into two categories on this topic; they are referred to as holding either the "catastrophic" view or the "long and slow" view of the demise of polytheism.

Catastrophic view

The classic inception of the catastrophic view comes from the work of Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Written in the 18th century, historian Lynn White says that Gibbon gave four reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire: "immoderate greatness", wealth and luxury, barbarians, and Christianization, but it was Christianization that Gibbon saw as primary. White says that, by Gibbon's own self-description, Gibbon was a "philosophical historian" who believed that the primary virtues of civilization were war and monarchy. He saw Christian teaching as pacifistic and Christians as unwilling to support the virtue of war and join the military; he said Christians were hiding their cowardice and laziness under the cloak of religion. It was this unwillingness to support war that Gibbon claimed was the primary cause of Rome's decline and fall, saying: "the last remains of the military spirit were buried in the cloister". Gibbon disliked religious enthusiasm and zeal and singled out the monks and martyrs for particular denigration as representative of these "vices". According to historian Patricia Craddock, Gibbon's History is a masterpiece that fails only where his biases effect his method, allowing the "desertion of the role of historian for that of prosecuting attorney".

Even so, historian Harold A. Drake writes that, "It is difficult to overestimate the influence of Gibbon's interpretation on subsequent scholarship". Gibbon's views developed into the traditional "catastrophic" view that has been the established hegemony for 200 years.

From Gibbon and Burckhardt to the present day, it has been assumed that the end of paganism was inevitable once confronted by the resolute intolerance of Christianity; that the intervention of the Christian emperors in its suppression were decisive; ... that, once they possessed such formidable power, Christians used it to convert as many non-Christians as possible – by threats and disabilities, if not by the direct use of force.

Long, slow demise

The modern alternative is the "long view", first stated by Peter Brown, whom The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity calls the "pioneer" who inspired the study of Late Antiquity as a field in itself, and whose work remains seminal. Brown used anthropological models, rather than political or economic ones, to study the cultural history of the period. He said polytheism experienced a "long slow" demise that lasted from the 200s into the 600s.

The Christian church believed that the dominance over other philosophies had begun with Jesus; they marked the conversion of Constantine as the end — the final fulfillment — of this heavenly victory, even though Christians were only about 15–18% of the empire's population at the time of Constantine's conversion. This narrative imposed a firm closure within the Christian literature on what, according to Pierre Chuvin, had in reality been a "wavering century."

Sources

According to MacMullan, the Christian record declares pagans were not only defeated, but fully converted, by the end of the fourth century, but he says that this claim was "far from true". Christians, in their triumphant exaggeration, and sheer bulk of material, have misrepresented religious history, as other evidence shows that paganism continued. MacMullen says this is why "We may fairly accuse the historical record of having failed us, not just in the familiar way, being simply insufficient, but also through being distorted".

The historical sources are filled with episodes of conflict, however, events in late antiquity were often dramatized for ideological reasons. Jan N. Bremmer says that "religious violence in Late Antiquity is mostly restricted to violent rhetoric: 'in Antiquity, not all religious violence was that religious, and not all religious violence was that violent'". Brown contends that the fall of Rome is a highly charged issue that leads many to "tendentious and ill supported polemics". Antique Christian accounts proclaim uniform victory while some current historiography begins with the "infinite superiority" of the Roman Empire based on an "idealized image" of it, then proceeds to vivid accounts of its unpleasant, ignorant, and violent enemies (the barbarians and the Christians), which is all intended to frame a "grandiose theory of catastrophe from which there would be no return for half a millennia". The problem with this, according to Brown, is that "much of this 'Grand Narrative' is wrong; it is a two dimensional history".

Legislation

The Theodosian Law Code has long been one of the principal sources for the study of Late Antiquity. It is an incomplete collection of laws dating from the reign of Constantine to the date of their promulgation as a collection in 438. Religious laws are in book 16. The code contains at least sixty-six laws targeted at heretics. Most are found in Book XVI, ‘De Fide Catholica’, "On the Catholic Faith". The laws fall into three general categories: laws to encourage conversion; laws to define and punish the activities of pagans, apostates, heretics and Jews; and laws concerned with the problems of implementing the laws, that is, laws aimed at the conversion of the aristocracy and the administrative system itself. Most importantly, it details the cult activities that the emperor and the Catholic Church considered unsuitable. The language of these religious laws is uniformly vehement and the penalties are harsh and frequently horrifying.

Contemporary scholars question using the Code, which was a legal document and not an historical work, for understanding history. According to archaeologist Luke Lavan, reading law as history distorts understanding of what actually occurred during the fourth century. There are many signs that a healthy paganism continued into the fifth century, and in some places, into the sixth and beyond. Christian hostility toward pagans and their monuments is seen by most modern scholars as far from the general phenomenon that the law and literature implies.

Archaeology

Archaeologists Luke Lavan and Michael Mulryan point out that the traditional catastrophic view is largely based on literary sources, most of which are Christian, and are therefore considered too partial. Christian historians wrote vividly dramatized accounts of pious bishops doing battle with temple demons, and much of the framework for understanding this age is based on the “tabloid-like” accounts of the destruction of the Serapeum of Alexandria, the murder of Hypatia, and the publication of the Theodosian law code. Lavan and Mulryan indicate that archaeological evidence of religious conflict exists, but not to the degree or the intensity to which it was previously thought, putting the traditional catastrophic view of "Christian triumphalism" in doubt. Rita Lizzi Testa, Professor of Roman history, Michele Renee Salzman, and Marianne Sághy quote Alan Cameron as saying that the idea that religious conflict is the cause of the swift demise of paganism is pure historiographical construction.

According to Salzman: "Although the debate on the death of paganism continues, scholars ...by and large, concur that the once dominant notion of overt pagan-Christian religious conflict cannot fully explain the texts and artifacts or the social, religious, and political realities of Late Antique Rome". Lavan says in The Archaeology of Late Antique 'Paganism':

Straightforward readings of the laws can lead to a grossly distorted image of the period: as thirty years of archaeology has revealed. Within religious history, most textual scholars now accept this, although historical accounts often tend to give imperial laws the greatest prominence... we have to accept the fact that archaeology may reveal a very different story from the texts... The anti-pagan legislation of the Christian emperors drew on the same polemical rhetoric and modern scholars are now all too aware of the limitations of those laws as historical evidence.Bayliss states that the Christian sources have greatly influenced perceptions of this period, to the extent that the impression of the conflict which they create has led scholars to assume that the conflict existed on an empire-wide level. However, archaeological evidence indicates that the decline of paganism was peaceful in many places throughout the empire, for example Athens, was relatively non-confrontational. While some historians have focused on the cataclysmic events such as the destruction of the Serapeum at Alexandria, in reality, there are only a handful of documented examples of temples being entirely destroyed through such acts of aggression. According to Bayliss, this fact means that the archaeological evidence might show that Christian responsibility for the destruction of temples has been exaggerated.

As Peter Brown points out with regard to Libanius’ anger: “we know of many such acts of iconoclasm and arson because well-placed persons still felt free to present these incidents as flagrant departures from a more orderly norm". Scholars such as Cameron, Brown, Markus, Trombley and MacMullen have lent considerable weight to the notion that the boundaries between pagan and Christian communities in the 4th century were not as stark as some prior historians claimed because open conflict was actually something of a rarity.

Brown and others such as Noel Lenski and Glen Bowersock say that "For all their propaganda, Constantine and his successors did not bring about the end of paganism". It continued. Previously undervalued similarities in language, society, religion, and the arts, as well as current archaeological research, indicate that paganism slowly declined for a full two centuries and more in some places, thereby offering an argument for the ongoing vibrancy of Roman culture in late antiquity, and its continued unity and uniqueness long after the reign of Constantine.

Christianity and paganism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_paganism
The Triumph of Christianity over Paganism, a painting by Gustave Doré (1899)

Paganism is commonly used to refer to various religions that existed during Antiquity and the Middle Ages, such as the Greco-Roman religions of the Roman Empire, including the Roman imperial cult, the various mystery religions, religious philosophies such as Neoplatonism and Gnosticism, and more localized ethnic religions practiced both inside and outside the empire. During the Middle Ages, the term was also adapted to refer to religions practiced outside the former Roman Empire, such as Germanic paganism, Egyptian paganism and Baltic paganism.

From the point of view of the early Christians, these religions all qualified as ethnic (or gentile, ethnikos, gentilis, the term translating goyim, later rendered as paganus) in contrast with Second Temple Judaism. By the Early Middle Ages (800–1000), faiths referred to as pagan had mostly disappeared in the West through a mixture of peaceful conversion, natural religious change, persecution, and the military conquest of pagan peoples; the Christianization of Lithuania in the 15th century is typically considered to mark the end of this process.

Early history

Early Christianity arose as a movement within Second Temple Judaism and Hellenistic Judaism, following the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. With a missionary commitment to both Jews and Gentiles (non-Jews), Christianity rapidly spread into the greater Roman empire and beyond. Here, Christianity came into contact with the dominant Pagan religions. Acts 19 recounts a riot that occurred in Ephesus, instigated by silversmiths who crafted images of Artemis, and were concerned that Paul's success was cutting into their trade. These conflicts are recorded in the works of the early Christian writers such as Justin Martyr as well as hostile reports by writers including Tacitus and Suetonius.

The pattern for the Roman state's response to what was seen as a religious threat was established in 186 BC. Roman officials became suspicious of the worshippers of Dionysus and their practice of Bacchanalia because it "took place at night" (also a later Christian practice). Magic and secret plots against the emperor were seen as products of the night. Bacchic associations were dissolved, leaders were arrested and executed, women were forbidden to hold important positions in the cult, no Roman citizen could be a priest, and strict control of the cult was thereafter established. In the first century of the common era, there were "periodic expulsions of astrologers, philosophers and even teachers of rhetoric... as well as Jews and...the cult of Isis". Druids also received this treatment, as did Christians.

Persecution of early Christians

Christianity was persecuted by Roman imperial authorities early on in its history within the greater empire. By the early part of the 2nd century AD Christians were no longer viewed as forming a breakaway sect of Judaism, but were considered as belonging to just another of many foreign cults which had infiltrated the Empire. They gradually became conspicuous by their absence from festival activities where ritual sacrifices for the health of the emperor and well-being of the empire took place, behavior that carried a "whiff of both sacrilege and treason".

Persecution under Nero, 64–68 AD

The first documented case of imperially supervised persecution of the Christians in the Roman Empire begins with Nero (37–68). In AD 64, a great fire broke out in Rome, destroying portions of the city and economically devastating the Roman population. Nero himself was suspected as the arsonist by Suetonius. In his Annals, Tacitus (who claimed Nero was in Antium at the time of the fire's outbreak), stated that "to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians, or Chrestians, by the populace" (Tacit. Annals XV, see Tacitus on Jesus). Suetonius, later to the period, does not mention any persecution after the fire, but in a previous paragraph unrelated to the fire, mentions punishments inflicted on Christians, defined as men following a new and malefic superstition. But Suetonius did not specify the reasons for the punishment; he just listed the fact together with other abuses put down by Nero.

Persecution from the 2nd century to Constantine

Drawing of the Alexamenos graffito, c. 200

The Persecution in Lyon was preceded by mob violence, including assaults, robberies and stonings (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 5.1.7). Further state persecutions were desultory until the 3rd century, though Tertullian's Apologeticus of 197 was ostensibly written in defense of persecuted Christians and addressed to Roman governors.

Although there was sporadic local persecution, there was no empire-wide persecution of Christians until the reign of Decius in the mid-3rd century AD. A decree was issued requiring public sacrifice, a formality equivalent to a testimonial of allegiance to the Emperor and the established order. Christians who refused were charged with impiety and punished by arrest, imprisonment, torture, and/or executions. Some Christians complied and purchased their certificates, called libelli, which certified their compliance; others fled to safe havens in the countryside. Several councils held at Carthage debated the extent to which the community should accept lapsed Christians.

The Diocletianic Persecution

The Christian Martyrs' Last Prayer by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1883)

The persecutions culminated with Diocletian and Galerius at the end of the third and beginning of the 4th century. Beginning with a series of four edicts banning Christian practices and ordering the imprisonment of Christian clergy, the persecution intensified until all Christians in the empire were commanded to sacrifice to the gods or face immediate execution. This persecution lasted until Constantine I, along with Licinius, legalized Christianity in 313. The New Catholic Encyclopedia states that "Ancient, medieval and early modern hagiographers were inclined to exaggerate the number of martyrs. Since the title of martyr is the highest title to which a Christian can aspire, this tendency is natural". Attempts at estimating the numbers involved are inevitably based on inadequate sources.

The failure of the Great Persecution of Diocletian was regarded as a confirmation of a long process of religious self-assertion against the conformism of a pagan empire. Freedom to assert a belief not recognized by the State was won and held. 'However much Christian churches and states may have sinned in later times by their religious coercion, the martyrdoms of the Roman Persecutions belong to the history of freedom.

Prohibition and persecution of paganism in the Roman Empire

Triumph of Christian religion (over paganism) by Tommaso Laureti (1582), Vatican Palace

According to Rodney Stark, since Christians most likely formed only sixteen to seventeen percent of the empire's population at the time of Constantine's conversion, they did not have the numerical advantage to form a sufficient power–base to begin a systematic persecution of pagans. However, Brown reminds us "We should not underestimate the fierce mood of the Christians of the fourth century", nor should it be forgotten that repression, persecution and martyrdom do not generally breed tolerance of those same persecutors. Brown says Roman authorities had shown no hesitation in "taking out" the Christian church which they saw as a threat to the peace of the empire, and that Constantine and his successors did the same for the same reasons. Rome had been removing anything it saw as a challenge to Roman identity since Bacchic associations were dissolved in 186 BCE. That military action against a mystical religion became the pattern for the Roman state's response to anything it saw as a religious threat. That position of the state toward internal threats did not change once the emperors were Christian.

Within this environment, Christians of the fourth century also believed the conversion of Constantine (traditionally 312) showed that Christianity had triumphed over paganism (in Heaven) and little further action against pagans was necessary; everything was done but the sweeping up in the Christian view. As a result, the fourth century included a focus on heresy as a higher priority than paganism. According to Brown, "In most areas, polytheists were not molested, and apart from a few ugly incidents of local violence, Jewish communities also enjoyed a century of stable, even privileged, existence".

After Constantine, except for the brief period of Julian's rule, paganism never regained its previous status as a state religion. Yet despite its inferior status in the Christian Empire, paganism still existed and was practiced. Up to the time of Justin I and Justinian, there was some toleration for all religions; there were anti-pagan and anti-heretical laws, but they were not generally enforced. Thus, up through the sixth century, there still existed centers of paganism in Athens, Gaza, Alexandria, and elsewhere.

Constantine

The Edict of Milan of 313 finally legalized Christianity, and it gained governmental privileges, such as tax exemptions to Christian clergy, and a degree of official approval under Constantine. Constantine destroyed a few temples and plundered more, converted others to churches, and neglected the rest; he "confiscated temple funds to help finance his own building projects", and in an effort to establish a stable currency, so he was primarily interested in hoards of gold and silver, but he also confiscated temple land; he refused to support pagan beliefs and practices while also speaking out against them; he periodically forbade pagan sacrifices and closed temples, made laws that threatened and menaced pagans while other laws markedly favored Christianity, and he personally endowed Christians with gifts of money, land and government positions.

As the emperor, he openly supported Christianity after 324, but there are indications he also remained tolerant of pagans. He never engaged in a purge. Opponents' supporters were not slaughtered when Constantine took the capital; their families and court were not killed. There were no pagan martyrs. Laws menaced death, but during Constantine's reign, no one suffered the death penalty for violating anti-pagan laws against sacrifice. There is no evidence of judicial killings for illegal sacrifices before Tiberius Constantine (574–582), and many temples remained open into the reign of Justinian I (527-565). Peter Leithart says of Constantine that, "He did not punish pagans for being pagans, or Jews for being Jews, and did not adopt a policy of forced conversion." Pagans remained in important positions at his court. Constantine ruled for 31 years and never outlawed paganism.

All records of anti-pagan legislation by Constantine are found in the Life of Constantine, written by Eusebius, as a kind of eulogy after Constantine's death. It is not a history so much as a panegyric praising Constantine. The laws as they are stated in the Life of Constantine often do not correspond, "closely, or at all", to the text of the Codes themselves. Eusebius gives these laws a "strongly Christian interpretation by selective quotation or other means". This has led many to question the veracity of the record, and whether, in his zeal to praise Constantine, Eusebius generously attributed actions to Constantine that were not actually his.

Gratian

In 382, Gratian was the first Roman emperor to formally, in law, divert into the crown's coffers those public financial subsidies that had previously supported Rome's cults; he appropriated the income of pagan priests and the Vestal Virgins, forbid their right to inherit land, confiscated the possessions of the priestly colleges, and was the first to refuse the title of Pontifex Maximus. The colleges of pagan priests lost privileges and immunities. He also ordered the Altar of Victory to be removed again.

Gratian and Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, exchanged multiple letters and books on Christianity, and the sheer volume of these writings has often been seen as evidence that Gratian was dominated by Ambrose. Ambrose, therefore, was the 'true source' of Gratian's anti-pagan actions. McLynn finds this unlikely and unnecessary as an explanation: Gratian was, himself, devout, and "The many differences between Gratian's religious policies and his father's, and the shifts that occurred during his own reign, are to be explained by changed political circumstances [after the Battle of Adrianople], rather than capitulation to Ambrose".

Modern scholars have noted that Sozomen is the only ancient source that shows Ambrose and Gratian having any personal interaction. In the last year of Gratian's reign, Ambrose crashed Gratian's private hunting party in order to appeal on behalf of a pagan senator sentenced to die. After years of acquaintance, this indicates Ambrose did not personally feel he had enough influence to take for granted that Gratian would grant a request to see him. Instead, Ambrose had to resort to such maneuverings to make his appeal. Gratian's brother, Valentinian II, and his mother disliked Ambrose, but Valentinian II also refused to grant requests from pagans to restore the Altar of Victory and the income of the temple priests and Vestal Virgins.

Between 382 and 384, there was yet another dispute over the Altar of Victory. According to the Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity, Symmachus requested the restoration of the altar that Gratian had removed and the restoration of state support for the Vestals. Ambrose campaigned against any financial support for paganism throughout his entire career, and anything like the Altar that required participation in blood sacrifices was anathema. Ambrose responded to Symmachus' and his arguments prevailed; the requests were denied. Pagans became outspoken in their demands for respect, concessions and support from the state, voicing their resentment in historical works, such as the writings of Eunapius and Olympiodorus.

After Gratian, the emperors Arcadius, Honorius and Theodosius continued to appropriate for the crown the tax revenue collected by the temple custodians, though this may have been more about the empire's ongoing financial difficulties than religion. Urban ritual procession and ceremony was gradually stripped of support and funding. Rather than being removed outright though, many festivals were secularized, and later, these were incorporated into a developing Christian calendar (often with little alteration). Some had already severely declined in popularity by the end of the 3rd century.

Theodosius

In the Eastern Empire, up until the time of Justinian, the Byzantine emperors practiced a policy of tolerance toward all religions. This pertained to both devotions to the Greco-Roman gods and the religion of barbarians living within the empire. Although there were anti-pagan laws, there is no record of their harsh punishments ever being enforced. As the eastern emperor, Theodosius seems to have practiced this same type of cautious policy from the beginning of his reign. Theodosius declared Nicene Christianity the official religion of the empire, though this was aimed more at the local Arians in Constantinople than the pagans. For pagans, he reiterated his Christian predecessors' bans on animal sacrifice, divination, and apostasy, but allowed other pagan practices to be performed publicly and temples to remain open. He also turned pagan holidays into workdays, but the festivals associated with them continued.

There is evidence that Theodosius took care to prevent the empire's still substantial pagan population from feeling ill-disposed toward his rule. Following the death in 388 of his praetorian prefect, Cynegius, who had, contrary to Theodosius' spoken policies, vandalized a number of pagan shrines and temples in the eastern provinces, Theodosius replaced him with a moderate pagan who subsequently moved to protect the temples. During his first official tour of Italy (389–391), the emperor won over the influential pagan lobby in the Roman Senate by appointing its foremost members to important administrative posts. Theodosius also nominated the last pair of pagan consuls in Roman history (Tatianus and Symmachus) in 391.

Classicist Ingomar Hamlet says that, contrary to popular myth, Theodosius did not ban the Olympic games. Sofie Remijsen [nl] indicates there are several reasons to conclude the Olympic games continued after Theodosius and came to an end under Theodosius II instead. Two scholia on Lucian connect the end of the games with a fire that burned down the temple of the Olympian Zeus during his reign.

Legislation

A number of laws against pagan sacrifice, and against heresy, were issued towards the end of Theodosius' reign in 391 and 392.

Anti-pagan legislation reflects what Brown calls "the most potent social and religious drama" of the fourth-century Roman empire. From Constantine forward, the Christian intelligentsia wrote of Christianity as fully triumphant over paganism. It did not matter that they were still a minority in the empire, this triumph had occurred in Heaven; it was evidenced by Constantine; but even after Constantine, they wrote that Christianity would defeat, and be seen to defeat, all of its enemies – not convert them. As Peter Brown says, "Conversion was not the principal aim of a social order that declared the God-given dominance of Christianity".

The laws were not intended to convert; "the laws were intended to terrorize... Their language was uniformly vehement, and... frequently horrifying". Their intent was to reorder society along religious lines with the 'triumphant' Christian church in charge, and pagans and Jews at the outskirts of influence, so that laws could be made that were sufficiently intimidating to enable Christianity to put a stop to animal sacrifice. Blood sacrifice was the element of pagan culture most abhorrent to Christians. If they could not stop the private practice of sacrifice, they could "hope to determine what would be normative and socially acceptable in public spaces". Altars used for sacrifice were routinely smashed by Christians who were deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars.

Blood sacrifice was a central rite of virtually all religious groups in the pre-Christian Mediterranean, and its gradual disappearance is one of the most significant religious developments of late antiquity. ... Public sacrifices and communal feasting had declined as the result of a decline in the prestige of pagan priesthoods and a shift in patterns of [private donations] in civic life. That shift would have occurred on a lesser scale even without the conversion of Constantine... It is easy, nonetheless, to imagine a situation in which sacrifice could decline without disappearing. Why not retain, for example, a single animal victim in order to preserve the integrity of the ancient rite? The fact that public sacrifices appear to have disappeared completely in many towns and cities must be attributed to the atmosphere created by imperial and episcopal hostility.

By the time the pro-pagan emperor Julian (r. 360–363) made his trip through Asia Minor to Antioch to assemble an army and resume war against Persia, opposing sacrifice had become the norm among the people. Julian reached Antioch on July 18 which coincided with a pagan festival that had already become secular: it did not include sacrifice. Julian's preference for blood sacrifice found little support, and the citizens of Antioch accused Julian of "turning the world upside down" by reinstituting it, calling him "slaughterer". "When Julian restored altars in Antioch, the Christian populace promptly threw them down again". Julian succeeded in marching to the Sassanid capital of Ctesiphon, but during the Battle of Samarra, he was mortally wounded. The facts of his death have become obscured by the "war of words between Christians and pagans" which followed. It was "principally over the source of the fatal spear... The thought that Julian might have died by the hand of one of his own side... was a godsend to a Christian tradition eager to have the apostate emperor accorded his just deserts. Yet such a rumor was not solely the product of religious polemic. It had its roots in the broader trail of disaffection Julian left in his wake".

One of the first things that is important about this, in Malcolm Errington's view, is how much anti-pagan legislation was applied and used, which would show how dependable the laws are as a reflection of what actually happened to pagans in history. Brown says that, given the large numbers of non-Christians in every region at this time, local authorities were "notoriously lax" in imposing them. Christian bishops also frequently obstructed their application. The harsh imperial edicts had to face the vast following of paganism among the population, and the passive resistance of governors and magistrates, thereby limiting their impact. Limiting, but not eliminating impact altogether, as Anna Leone says, "Temple closures and the prohibition of sacrifices had an impact... After AD 375 the majority of [pagan] religious offices disappear completely from the epigraphic record".

Secondly, the laws reveal the emergence of a language of intolerance. The legal language runs parallel to the writings of the apologists, such as Augustine of Hippo and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, and heresiologists such as Epiphanius of Salamis. Christian writers and imperial legislators both drew on a rhetoric of conquest. These writings were commonly hostile and often contemptuous toward a paganism Christianity saw as already defeated.

Lastly, on the one hand the laws, and these Christian sources with their violent rhetoric, have had great influence on modern perceptions of this period by creating an impression of continuous violent conflict that has been assumed on an empire-wide scale. Archaeological evidence, on the other hand, indicates that, outside of violent rhetoric, there were only isolated incidents of actual violence between Christians and pagans. Non-Christian, (non-heretical), groups such as pagans and Jews enjoyed a tolerance based on contempt through most of Late Antiquity.

Temple destruction

It has been common for much of scholarship to attribute rampant temple destruction to Theodosius through his prefect, Maternus Cynegius. Cynegius did commission the destruction of temples, using the army under his control and nearby monks, especially in the territory around Constantinople in the diocese of Oriens (the East). Peter Brown says that in 392, inspired by the mood created by Cynegius, Theophilus of Alexandria staged a procession ridiculing statues of pagan gods. Political complications contributed to turning it into a riot, and the Serapium in Alexandria, Egypt was destroyed. Some scholars think this is when the philosopher Hypatia was killed, (though there is evidence this happened in 415 instead). These examples were seen as the 'tip of the iceberg' by earlier scholars who saw these events as part of a tide of violent Christian iconoclasm that continued throughout the 390s and into the 400s.

Problems with this view have arisen in the twenty-first century. Archaeological evidence for the violent destruction of temples in the fourth century, from around the entire Mediterranean, is limited to a handful of sites. Temple destruction is attested to in 43 cases in the written sources, but only 4 of them have been confirmed by archaeological evidence.

In Gaul, only 2.4% of over 500 known temples and religious sites were destroyed by violence, some of it barbarian. In Africa, the city of Cyrene has good evidence of the burning of several temples; Asia Minor has produced one weak possibility; in Greece the only strong candidate may relate to a barbarian raid instead of Christians. Egypt has produced no archaeologically confirmed temple destructions from this period except the Serapeum. In Italy there is one; Britain has the highest percentage with 2 out of 40 temples.

Trombley and MacMullen say part of why discrepancies between literary sources and archaeological evidence exist is because it is common for details in the literary sources to be ambiguous and unclear.  For example, Malalas claimed Constantine destroyed all the temples, then he said Theodisius destroyed them all, then he said Constantine converted them all to churches. "According to Procopius, in the 530s Justinian destroyed the temples of Philae widely identified as the last bastion of paganism in Egypt. But no priests are attested to after the 450s, Christianity was thriving there from the early fourth century, and the temples themselves are among the best preserved in the ancient world".

Archaeology suggests that religious buildings were subject to three different directions of change during the imperial period: early abandonment, destruction and re-use. The financial struggles begun in the third century continued on into the fourth century to negatively impact available funding to maintain the large temple complexes and their festivals. Lower budgets, with less spent on statuary, monuments, and simple maintenance, meant the physical decline of urban structures of all types. Many Temples were left to fall into disrepair and in many instances, such as in Tripolitana, this happened before any Christian anti-pagan legislation could have been a factor.

Progressive early decay was accompanied by an increased trade in statuary and salvaged building materials, as the practice of recycling became common in Late Antiquity, resulting in their complete destruction and removal. "Even churches were reused in similar ways". Some temple restorations took place throughout the imperial period, but there is no evidence of state participation or support. Restorations were funded and accomplished privately.

Overall data indicates that a number of elements coincided to end the Temples, but none of them were strictly religious. The economy, necessity, and political expressions of power were the primary driving forces for the destruction and conversion of pagan religious monuments. Lavan says: "We must rule out most of the images of destruction created by the [written sources]. Archaeology shows the vast majority of temples were not treated this way".

Temple conversion

Some scholars have long asserted that not all temples were destroyed but were instead converted to churches throughout the empire. According to modern archaeology, 120 pagan temples were converted to churches in the whole empire, out of the thousands of temples that existed, and only about 40 of them are dated before the end of the fifth century. R. P. C. Hanson says the direct conversion of temples into churches did not begin until the mid fifth century in any but a few isolated incidents. In Rome the first recorded temple conversion was the Pantheon in 609. None of the churches attributed to Martin of Tours can be proven to have existed in the fourth century.

Rival literature

Some pagans blamed the Christian hegemony for the 410 Sack of Rome, while Christians in turn blamed the pagans, provoking Saint Augustine, a Christian bishop, to respond by writing The City of God, a seminal Christian text. It is alleged that Christians destroyed almost all pagan political literature and threatened to cut off the hands of any copyist who dared to make new copies of the offending writings. Yet there is no evidence any Christian in authority ever "actually punished the expression of pagan sentiments" and there is no known prosecution of any pagan work. Many pagan poets and writers were popular among the still classically educated Christian elite, for example, Seneca was referenced 13 times in Augustine's City of God.

Mob violence

Mob violence was an occasional problem in all the independent cities of the empire. There were no police forces as such. Taxes, food and politics were common reasons for rioting. Religion was also a factor though it is difficult to separate from politics since they were intertwined in all aspects of life. In 361, the murder of the Arian bishop George of Cappadocia was committed by a mob of pagans, although there is evidence he had cruelly provoked them; the conflict over the Serapeum involved both a Christian and a pagan mob; the Jews and the Christians each gathered to fight in 415, although the sources indicate it was the upper levels of the Jewish community who decided to massacre the Christians after Cyril made serious threats to their leadership. A Christian mob threw objects at Orestes and, finally, Hypatia was killed by a Christian mob though politics and personal jealousy were probably the primary causes. Mobs were composed of lower-class urban dwellers, upper class educated pagans, Jews and Christians, and in Alexandria, monks from the monastery of Nitria.

Pagan influences on early Christianity

Art

Hermes Kriophoros

The early Christians adapted many elements of paganism. Ancient pagan funeral rituals often remained within Christian culture as aspects of custom and community with very little alteration. A type of song sung at death, the ritual lament, is one of the oldest of all art forms. As soon as death was imminent, the ritual began, then came the "struggle of the soul" and prayer for the dying. John Chrysostum gives a vivid account of the dying soul seeing angels and demons – "account books in hand" – struggling against each other in a contest for possession of the dying person's soul. Macarius of Egypt (fourth century) writes of such a contest which is only resolved by the intervention of the person's guardian angel – which is roughly parallel to Plato's daimon.

Spontaneous lamentation would break out among those present once the struggle of the soul was over. All evidence suggests this was a violent display of grief – the laceration of the cheeks, tearing one's hair, and the rending of garments along with the wailing of the lament song. The church saw this immoderate behavior as improper for people who believed death was not the end, so they attempted to moderate it by singing Psalms, with two groups of singers on opposite sides chanting an antiphonal lament, with rhythm, harmony and order instead. However, this too is similar to the pagan lament sung for Achilles and one suggested by Plato for his Examiners in the Laws.

Pagans and Jews decorated their burial chambers, so Christians did as well, thereby creating the first Christian art in the catacombs beneath Rome. This art is symbolic, rising out of a reinterpretation of Jewish and pagan symbolism. Christian piety infused the symbols with its own fresh interpretation. Christian art had something fundamentally new to say as it gave visual expression to the conviction that the human soul can be delivered from death to an everlasting life. Neither Judaism nor any pagan religion had previously made such a claim. "The Jewish faith puts little emphasis on immortality, and pagan beliefs about the afterlife were vague, uncertain, and sometimes dismal".

Noah catacomb (orans)

While many new subjects appear for the first time in the Christian catacombs – i.e. the Good Shepherd, Baptism, and the Eucharistic meal – the Orant figures (women praying with upraised hands) probably came directly from pagan art. Pagan symbolism in the form of Victories, cupids, and shepherd scenes are scattered throughout the catacombs.  Jewish and pagan use of sheep and goats, birds in a tree or vine, or eating fruit, especially grapes, seven steps leading up to a tomb, a pair of peacocks, the Robe of sanctity, the reading of scrolls, are all found in pagan art and adapted in the Christian art to express the hope of immortality in Christian terms. Pagan sarcophagi had long carried shells, and portraits of the dead often had shells over the head of the dead, while some put a shell over a grave. Christians and Jews adapted the convention, identifying it with another symbol – the halo. For the Christians who made the catacombs, these symbols were necessary to convey their message.

Many previously pagan holy places were converted to Christian use. In 609 Pope Boniface IV obtained leave from the Byzantine Emperor Phocas to convert the Pantheon in Rome into a Christian church, a practice similar to that recommended eight years earlier by Pope Gregory I to Mellitus regarding Anglo-Saxon holy places, in order to ease the transition to Christianity. According to Willibald's Life of Saint Boniface, about 723, the missioner cut down the sacred Donar's Oak and used the lumber to build a church dedicated to St. Peter. Around 744, Saint Sturm established the monastery of Fulda on the ruins of a 6th-century Merovingian royal camp, destroyed 50 years earlier by the Saxons, at a ford on the Fulda River.

Calendar

Many names for months and days of the week – even the concept of a seven-day week – were borrowed from Roman paganism.

In its first three centuries, Christianity did not celebrate the birth of Christ. Birthdays were seen as pagan, no one knew Jesus's true birthdate, and many early church fathers were against the idea. The earliest source giving December 25 as Jesus's birthdate is the Chronograph of 354, which liturgical historians generally agree was written in Rome in AD 336. A supposedly earlier reference by Hippolytus of Rome is considered a later interpolation. In the ancient Roman calendar, December 25 was the date of the winter solstice.

A widely-held theory is that the Church chose December 25 as Christ's birthday (Dies Natalis Christi) to appropriate the Roman winter solstice festival Dies Natalis Solis Invicti (birthday of Sol Invictus, the 'Invincible Sun'), held on the same date. This festival had been instituted by the emperor Aurelian in AD 274. Gary Forsythe, Professor of Ancient History, says "This celebration would have formed a welcome addition to the seven-day period of the Saturnalia (December 17–23), Rome's most joyous holiday season since Republican times, characterized by parties, banquets, and exchanges of gifts". Historian Stephen Nissenbaum says this choice was a compromise with paganism, arguing there is no avoiding "Roman midwinter parties and Christianity's conscious decision to place a Christmas celebration right in the middle of them" as part of that compromise. Many observers schooled in the classical tradition have noted similarities between the Saturnalia and historical revelry during the Twelve Days of Christmas and the Feast of Fools. William Warde Fowler notes: "[Saturnalia] has left its traces and found its parallels in great numbers of medieval and modern customs, occurring about the time of the winter solstice."

Some way or another, Christmas was started to compete with rival Roman religions, or to co-opt the winter celebrations as a way to spread Christianity, or to baptize the winter festivals with Christian meaning in an effort to limit their [drunken] excesses. Most likely all three.

John the Baptist was said to be six months older than Jesus, thus the Church began holding the feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist on 24 June, the Roman date of the summer solstice. John the Baptist "was understood to be preparing the way for Jesus", with John 3:30 stating "He must increase, but I must decrease". The sun's height in the sky and length of the day begins to decrease after the summer solstice and to increase after the winter solstice. Thus 'Johnmas' was held at midsummer and 'Christmas' at midwinter. With the spread of Christianity, some of the local Germanic Midsummer traditions were incorporated into St John's Eve festivities.

Another theory, first proposed by French writer Louis Duchesne in 1889, is that Christmas was calculated as nine months after a date chosen as Christ's conception: March 25, the Roman date of the spring equinox. This is based on a belief that the spring equinox was the day of God's act of Creation.

While attending Crozer Theological Seminary c.1950, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote an essay titled "The Influence of the Mystery Religions on Christianity". King noted that the place at Bethlehem selected by early Christians as Jesus's birthplace was an early shrine of a pagan god, Adonis. After the Bar Kokhba revolt (c. 132–136 CE) was crushed, the Roman emperor Hadrian converted the Christian site above the Grotto into a shrine dedicated to the Greek god Adonis, to honour his favourite, the Greek youth Antinous.

Influence on early Christian theology

Justin Martyr was a pagan who became a Christian around 132. In his First Apology, Justin used the concept of the "Logos" as a way of arguing for Christianity to non-Jews. These references demonstrate that Justin's knowledge of Stoicism was the knowledge of an ordinary man of his time in ordinary conversation, and that it is unlikely he ever studied Stoicism. However, he calls himself a Platonist, his references to Plato are much more detailed, and parallels to Plato's writings can be found in Justin's, though they do not suggest direct influence. Since a Greek audience would accept references to Greek philosophy, his argument could concentrate on identifying the Logos with Jesus. Scholars generally recognize that Clement went much farther, perhaps the farthest "any Orthodox Christian ever did in his appropriation and use of Hellenistic philosophical and ethical concepts for the expression of his Christian faith".

Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo (354–430), who ultimately systematized Christian philosophy after converting to Christianity from Manichaeism, wrote in the late 4th and early 5th century: "But when I read those books of the Platonists I was taught by them to seek incorporeal truth, so I saw your 'invisible things, understood by the things that are made'." Until the 20th century, most of the Western world's concept of Manichaeism came through Augustine's negative polemics against it. According to his Confessions, after eight or nine years of adhering to the Manichaean faith (as an "auditor", the lowest level in the sect's hierarchy), he became a Christian and a potent adversary of Manichaeism. When he turned from Manichaeism, he took up skepticism. In AD 386, he published Contra Academicos (Against the Skeptics). J. Brachtendorf says Augustine used the Ciceronian Stoic concept of passions to interpret Paul's doctrine of universal sin and redemption.

The influence of paganism can also be found in the development of many non-Orthodox theologies such as the Cathars of the Middle Ages. Cathars were dualists and felt that the world was the work of a demiurge of Satanic origin. Whether this was due to influence from Manichaeism or another strand of Gnosticism, and whether it was originally Zoroastrian has been impossible to determine. The Bogomils and Cathars, in particular, left few records of their rituals or doctrines, and the link between them and Manichaeans is unclear. Regardless of its historical veracity the charge of Manichaeism was leveled at them by contemporary orthodox opponents, who often tried to fit contemporary heresies with those combated by the church fathers. Not all Cathars held that The Evil God (or principle) was as powerful as The Good God (also called a principle) as Mani did, a belief also known as absolute dualism. In the case of the Cathars, it seems they adopted the Manichaean principles of church organization, but none of its religious cosmology. Similarly, Priscillian and his followers apparently tried to absorb what they thought was the valuable part of Manichaeism into Christianity.

Christianization during the European Middle Ages

Anatolia

A safe area for the pagans was the city of Harran which, Despite the persecution of its pagan inhabitants by Byzantine Emperor Maurice, remained a largely pagan city well into the early Islamic period. When the city was besieged by the armies of the Rashidun Caliphate in 639–640, it was the pagan community that negotiated its peaceful surrender. Under the subsequent rule of the caliphates, Harran became a major settlement within the Diyar Mudar region and retained a significant degree of autonomy. During the First Fitna, the people of Harran sided with Mu'awiya I over Ali at the Battle of Siffin in 657, which allegedly resulted in a brutal retaliation by Ali, who massacred much of the population.

Under the Umayyad Caliphate (661–750), Harran prospered and was selected as the capital by the last Umayyad caliph, Marwan II, from 744 to 750. This move may have been influenced by the city's pagan sympathies and its strategic position near the empire's eastern provinces. The city's prominence under Umayyad rule saw it grow as a cultural and scholarly center, with the establishment of the first Muslim university in 717 under Umar II, attracting scholars from across the Islamic world.

Although Harran lost its capital status under the Abbasid Caliphate, it continued to flourish, particularly during the reign of Harun al-Rashid (786–809), when its university became a key center for translation and intellectual activity. The local religion, blending elements of Mesopotamian paganism and Neoplatonism, persisted into the 10th century, though periodic decrees enforced conversions to Islam, especially under Al-Ma'mun in 830. Nonetheless, Harran retained its heterogeneity, with a population that included Muslims, Christians, Jews, and a variety of other religious groups.

Anglo-Saxons

Part of seventh-century casket, depicting the pan-Germanic legend of Weyland Smith, which was apparently also a part of Anglo-Saxon pagan mythology

The most likely date for Christianity getting its first foothold in Britain is sometime around 200. Recent archaeology indicates that it had become an established minority faith by the fourth century. It was largely mainstream, and in certain areas, had been continuous.

In early Anglo-Saxon England, non-stop religious development meant paganism and Christianity were never completely separate. Arthur Weston wrote that, "When Gregory the Great was taking steps for the conversion of the heathen Saxons, he is said to have warned his missionaries not to interfere with any traditional belief or religious observance which could be harmonized with Christianity".

Tell Augustine that he should be no means destroy the temples of the gods but rather the idols within those temples. Let him, after he has purified them with holy water, place altars and relics of the saints in them. For, if those temples are well built, they should be converted from the worship of demons to the service of the true God. Thus, seeing that their places of worship are not destroyed, the people will banish error from their hearts and come to places familiar and dear to them in acknowledgement and worship of the true God.

Further, since it has been their custom to slaughter oxen in sacrifice, they should receive some solemnity in exchange. Let them therefore, on the day of the dedication of their churches, or on the feast of the martyrs whose relics are preserved in them, build themselves huts around their one-time temples and celebrate the occasion with religious feasting. They will sacrifice and eat the animals not any more as an offering to the devil, but for the glory of God to whom, as the giver of all things, they will give thanks for having been satiated. Thus, if they are not deprived of all exterior joys, they will more easily taste the interior ones. For surely it is impossible to efface all at once everything from their strong minds, just as, when one wishes to reach the top of a mountain, he must climb by stages and step by step, not by leaps and bounds.

Richard A. Fletcher suggests that holy wells developed out of a like adaptation.

The word Easter is linked, by a single documentary source, to an Anglo-Saxon goddess, though the roots of the Easter celebration predate Christian contact with the Anglo-Saxons. In his eighth-century The Reckoning of Time the venerable Bede wrote that "Ēosturmōnaþ was Anglo-Saxon for 'Month of Ēostre', the month that corresponded to April, so-named "after a goddess of theirs named Ēostre, in whose honour feasts were celebrated in that month". The German cognate of the goddess Eostre is called Ostara, and likewise the word for Easter in German is Ostern. Richard Fletcher, however, speculated that the name Easter might come from the Anglo-Saxon eastan, meaning east.

The conversion of the Anglo-Saxons was begun at about the same time in both the north and south of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in two unconnected initiatives. Irish missionaries led by Saint Columba, based in Iona (from 563), converted many Picts. The court of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria, and the Gregorian mission, who landed in 596, did the same to the Kingdom of Kent. They had been sent by Pope Gregory I and were led by Augustine of Canterbury with a mission team from Italy. In both cases, as in other kingdoms of this period, conversion generally began with the royal family and the nobility adopting the new religion first.

The conversion of Æthelberht, king of Kent is the first account of any Christian bretwalda conversion and is told by the Venerable Bede in his histories of the conversion of England. In 582 Pope Gregory sent Augustine and 40 companions from Rome to convert the Anglo-Saxons. "They had, by order of the blessed Pope Gregory, brought interpreters of the nation of the Franks, and sending to Æthelberht, signified that they were come from Rome, and brought a joyful message, which most undoubtedly assured to all that took advantage of it everlasting joys in heaven, and a kingdom that would never end with the living and true God." Æthelberht was not unfamiliar with Christianity because he had a Christian wife, and Bede says that there was even a church dedicated to St. Martin nearby. Æthelberht was converted eventually and Augustine remained in Canterbury.

Reliquary of St. Oswald, Hildesheim

After his death, King Oswald of Northumbria came to be regarded as a saint, and the spot where he died was associated with miracles. Reginald of Durham mentions one, saying that Oswald's right arm was taken by a raven to an ash tree, which gave the tree ageless vigor; when the bird dropped the arm onto the ground, a spring emerged from the ground. Both the tree and the spring were, according to Reginald, subsequently associated with healing miracles. Aspects of the legend have been considered to have pagan overtones or influences and may represent a fusion of his status as a traditional Germanic warrior-king with Christianity. The cult surrounding him gained prominence in parts of continental Europe.

Some time prior to 655, Œthelwald of Deira gave Chad of Mercia land upon which to build a monastery. According to Bede, Chad felt it necessary to fast for forty days in order to cleanse the place. This ritual purification indicates that the new monastery was likely built on the site of a pre-Christian cult.

Greece

Pagan Continuity in Mani and Mistra (800-1100) Christianity was introduced late in Mani, with the first Greek temples converted into churches during the 11th century. Byzantine monk Nikon "the Metanoite" (Νίκων ὁ Μετανοείτε) was sent in the 10th century to convert the predominantly pagan Maniots. Although his preaching began the conversion process, it took over 200 years for the majority to accept Christianity fully by the 11th and 12th centuries. Patrick Leigh Fermor noted that the Maniots, isolated by mountains, were among the last Greeks to abandon the old religion, doing so towards the end of the 9th century:

Sealed off from outside influences by their mountains, the semi-troglodytic Maniots themselves were the last of the Greeks to be converted. They only abandoned the old religion of Greece towards the end of the ninth century. It is surprising to remember that this peninsula of rock, so near the heart of the Levant from which Christianity springs, should have been baptised three whole centuries after the arrival of St. Augustine in far-away Kent.

According to Constantine VII in De Administrando Imperio, the Maniots were referred to as 'Hellenes' and only fully Christianized in the 9th century, despite some church ruins from the 4th century indicating early Christian presence. The region's mountainous terrain allowed the Maniots to evade the Eastern Roman Empire's Christianization efforts, thus preserving pagan traditions, which coincided with significant years in the life of Gemistos Plethon.

Saxons

The conversion of the northern Saxons began with their forced incorporation into the Frankish kingdom in 776 by Charlemagne (r. 768–814). Thereafter, the Saxon's Christian conversion slowly progressed into the eleventh century. The Saxon conversion was difficult for a number of reasons including that their pagan beliefs were so strongly tied to their culture that conversion necessarily meant massive cultural change that was hard to accept. Their sophisticated theology was also a bulwark against an immediate and complete conversion to Christianity.

Saxons had gone back and forth between rebellion and submission to the Franks for decades. Charlemagne placed missionaries and courts across Saxony in hopes of pacifying the region, but Saxons rebelled again in 782 with disastrous losses for the Franks. In response, the Frankish King "enacted a variety of draconian measures" beginning with the massacre at Verden in 782 when he ordered the decapitation of 4500 Saxon prisoners offering them baptism as an alternative to death. These events were followed by the severe legislation of the Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae in 785 which prescribes death to those that are disloyal to the king, harm Christian churches or its ministers, or practice pagan burial rites. His harsh methods of Christianization raised objections from his friends Alcuin and Paulinus of Aquileia. Charlemagne abolished the death penalty for paganism in 797.

Scandinavia

The first recorded attempts at spreading Christianity in Norway were made by King Haakon the Good in the tenth century, who was raised in England. His efforts were unpopular and were met with little success. In 995 Olaf Tryggvason became King Olaf I of Norway. Olaf I then made it his priority to convert the country to Christianity. By destroying temples and torturing and killing pagan resisters he succeeded in making every part of Norway at least nominally Christian. Expanding his efforts to the Norse settlements in the west the kings' sagas credit him with Christianizing the Faroes, Orkney, Shetland, Iceland, and Greenland. After Olaf's defeat at the Battle of Svolder in 1000 there was a partial relapse to paganism in Norway under the rule of the Jarls of Lade. In the following reign of Saint Olaf, pagan remnants were stamped out and Christianity entrenched.

Northern Crusades

Armed conflict between the Baltic Finns, Balts and Slavs who dwelt by the Baltic shores and their Saxon and Danish neighbors to the north and south had been common for several centuries. The Christianization of the pagan Balts, Slavs and Finns was undertaken primarily during the 12th and 13th centuries, in a series of uncoordinated military campaigns by various German and Scandinavian kingdoms, and later by the Teutonic Knights and other orders of warrior-monks. It was during these Northern Crusades that armed conversion of paganism first became a part of Christianity.

Dragnea and Christiansen indicate the primary motive for these wars was the noble's desire for territorial expansion and material wealth in the form of land, furs, amber, slaves, and tribute. Medieval historian and political scientist Iben Fonnesberg-Schmidt says, the princes were motivated by their desire to extend their power and prestige, and conversion was not always an element of their plans. However, conversion was part of the language for all these invaders, and conversion was almost always by the direct use of force or the indirect force of a leader who had converted and required conversion of his followers as well. There were often severe consequences for populations that chose to resist. For example, the conquest and conversion of Old Prussia resulted in the death of much of the native population, whose language subsequently became extinct.

"While the theologians maintained that conversion should be voluntary, there was a widespread pragmatic acceptance of conversion obtained through political pressure or military coercion." The church's acceptance of this led some commentators of the time to endorse and approve it, something Christian thought had never previously done. Dominican friars helped with this ideological justification. By portraying the pagans as possessed by evil spirits, they could assert the pagans were in need of conquest, persecution and force in order to free them; then they would become peacefully converted. Ideals of peaceful conversion were rarely realized in these crusades; monks and priests had to work with the secular rulers on their terms, and the military leaders seldom cared about allowing the time necessary for peaceful conversion.

Absorption and erasure of pagan traditions

The practice of replacing pagan beliefs and motifs with Christian, and purposefully not recording the pagan history (such as the names of pagan gods, or details of pagan religious practices), has been compared to the practice of damnatio memoriae.

Free-electron laser

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia   The free-electron laser FELIX Radbou...