Why Rome Persecuted the Christians
If only the primitive Christians had filled in the right forms and said that one man’s god is as good as another’s, they wouldn’t have had to die.
89-96
If only the primitive Christians had filled in the right forms and said that one man’s god is as good as another’s, they wouldn’t have had to die.
89-96
After telling the tale of St John’s banishment to the island of Patmos in 92, Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa (?1228-1298) and compiler of The Golden Legend, hazarded some guesses as to why the Roman Empire persecuted Christianity so pitilessly. The English translation below was made by William Caxton, pioneer of printing, in about 1483.
spelling modernised
IT ought not to be believed that the emperor did these persecutions unto Christian people because they believed in God, for they refused none,* but it was a displeasure to them that they worshipped God without authority of the senators. Another reason there was, and that was that the service of their other gods was lessed and minished* thereby. The third reason was that he [Christ] preached to despise the worship, the honour, and the avoir* of the world, and that was the thing principal that the Romans loved. But Jesu Christ would no thing* permit it lest they held that it was done by puissance human.*
Another cause there was, as Master John Beleth saith, why that the emperor and the senate pursued Christ and his apostles, and that was that them seemed* that God was over proud and envious, because he deigned not to have a fellow. Another cause allegeth Orosius,* and saith that the senate had despite of this,* that Pilate had written the miracles of Jesu Christ to the emperor only, and not to the senators, wherefore they would not accord that he should be admitted to be worshipped among the gods. Therefore Tiberius the emperor did do slay some of the senators and some he sent in exile.
spelling modernised
* That is, the Roman Government was quite happy for the first Christians to believe in their god, for they welcomed gods of all kinds into their official pantheon. As Jacobus de Voragine goes on to explain, what the Romans did not like was the way that Christians refused to let the State regulate their religion, and refused to say that all Rome’s recognised religions were — so long as they were recognised — equally valid. Frankly, to Christians the other gods were at best imaginary, at worst demons, and to reckon them as gods would be to deny Christ’s words to St Thomas in John 14:6: “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” See also Matthew 10:33, and The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus.
* Today, we would write ‘lessened and diminished’.
* A French word meaning assets, resources, material possessions.
* That is, ‘in no way’.
* More French, this time meaning ‘human power’, especially the kind of power wielded by a king or government.
* ‘That them seemed’ means ‘that it seemed to them’.
* Joannes Belethus (fl. 1135-1182) was a twelfth-century French theologian and liturgical scholar. In the sixteenth century, he was said by some to have been of English origin, a theory few would entertain now.
* Paulus Orosius (?375-?420), or Paul Orosius, was a pupil of St Augustine of Hippo.
* That is, the Senate despised the action of Pilate in writing to the Emperor and not to them.
1. What are the authors aiming to achieve in writing this?
2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the authors communicate their ideas more effectively?
3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?
Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.