The Greeks and Romans were pagans. They had many gods — gods of war, of harvest, of health, of marriage, of family, of the hearth and threshold, of the grove and fount and the sea. Everything that was wonderful or important or special had its presiding deity. The mystery of the passion of war was represented in the god Mars, the mystery of the deep, active sea was embodied in the god Neptune. To all the great gods temples were built, beautiful buildings of marble, with pillared fronts, and interiors decorated with carving and with statues, with gold and silver and ivory. There was always the altar, where the fire burned, and sacrifice was offered. Often there was a figure or statue of the god of the temple, sometimes exposed, sometimes veiled. The hill of temples in Rome was the Capitol. Here, on the Capitoline Hill, was the temple of Capitoline Jove, the greatest of the Roman gods. But the lesser gods had simple shrines, perhaps just a niche in the rock by a stream, or a plain altar among the trees of a grove.
There were really no settled priests in the pagan world. Some influential man in the neighbourhood was given the charge of a temple or sacred building, which he often had to take care of at his own expense. He had also to perform the sacred rites, as we nowadays get an important personage to perform the rite of laying a foundation-stone. Some very rich man was usually given the responsibility for the great games — which often cost him large sums of money — so there was no sacred profession, no special beings were set apart, like our clergy. All were men alike, none was more sacred than another. The richest and most important man in any district usually was responsible for the temple, that was all. There were certain servants of the temple, who attended to funerals and so on. But these were not priests — they were just servants of a different sort.
Thus there was no preaching, no praying, no talk about sin or salvation, no service at all. The people just came to the temple by themselves; or on special days they came to see the rites performed, the sacrifices offered, the acts of the ritual gone through. After the sacrifice the officiating priests — priests for the moment — might sprinkle the crowds with water, or the blood of the offerings, as a sign of purification. And then there was usually dancing and festivity, or perhaps public mourning. On feast days the people were crowned with flowers, or with leaves, or with ears of corn, according to the god of the day. People just cast a few grains of incense on the fire, in token of offering. And on certain days they made gay processions, the dancers going in front, dancing for the gods. And of course the great games were an offering to the gods also; there was a special ritual sacrifice and special songs were sung. But it was all part of the active, actual, everyday, normal life — not something apart. In the country the peasant people loved to take flowers, or a little cake, or a gift, to the shrine of some nymph by the fountain, to the god Pan among the trees, to Priapus in the orchard, to some fauns or nymphs in a cave. There would perhaps be a statue of Pan, with a stone altar; perhaps only an altar; perhaps a mere stone; or simply a tree or grove or spring of water; and offerings would be hung on the trees or laid on the rocks around. But there was no priest. It simply pleased the people to visit these little sacred places, and sometimes to make processions through the fields, the women carrying garlands and corn, one leading the kid that would be sacrificed, the boys playing on flutes or whistles, and dancing in front. Then when they came to the sacred place they imagined a god or nymph was hidden there, inside the trees or deep in the running spring. So they offered gifts and made little songs or speeches or dances to the hidden deity.
Since everything that was wonderful had its god, the Greeks and Romans were not jealous of strange gods. Rather they were anxious to sacrifice on the altars of strange gods also, for this would bring an added blessing. They would leave out no deity if they could help it. St. Paul tells how he saw an altar in Athens inscribed to the Unknown God. This was so that no god, lacking an altar, should in anger take revenge on the remiss men of the town. The Romans did not hate the Ephesian Diana, the Asiatic many-breasted mother, or the bull-slaying Persian sun god. They even welcomed them to Rome, these strange deities, and built them new temples.
But, if they freely respected all gods, they expected the same free reverence for their own shrines from all strangers. If the Romans exterminated the Druids of Gaul, it was because the Druids were a curious, special priesthood, who inflamed the people to rebellion, not because of their worship. The Romans, indeed, never understood the worship of the Druids, which was a worship of the mysterious tree of life, the dark, inhuman mysteries of the beginning of creation. The Romans could only understand human things. They could not comprehend the Druid inhuman creed, and they were filled with vague horror. They disliked the secret, powerful priests, who had such power over the people. In their own pagan world it was different. If there were priests in Egypt or Syria, they were no longer very important. There was an amiable equality between diverse gods. Only the Druids were a hostile priesthood. And only the God of the Jews was a jealous God. Only the Jews showed their hatred and horror of the free-and-easy pagan worship. Augustus very politely gave orders and gifts to have sacrifices made in the temple of Jerusalem to Jehovah, that Jehovah might not forget him, Augustus Caesar. This was very flattering to the Jews, to think that the Roman emperor acknowledged their God. None the less they scorned even Augustus for worshipping his own great Jove on the Capitol of Rome. They thought even Augustus an abomination, an idolater, one not fit to live in the sight of Jehovah. Continually, when in Palestine the Romans celebrated the festivals of their own gods, the Jews, looking on with black hatred and horror, could not refrain from breaking out into fury, trying to stone to death these hated idolaters and their idols. It inflamed the Jews to such fury, to see the temples and shrines of the strange gods in their land, and to see the Roman processions, with their flute-playing and their garlands and their dancers and their dressing-up, moving in the streets of Jerusalem, that they rose again and again, great crowds of Jews killing the surprised Romans, and breaking the altars. When Caligula tried to put his statue in the Temple of Jerusalem, the Jews turned as one man, and it was taken away by the wise Roman governors. But while ever there were idols in Zion, no Jew could rest, insurrections were continual.
The Romans at first were puzzled. Why should not all gods be polite and respectful to one another, as civilised men are polite and respectful to each other, they wondered? But at length they were irritated, and finally infuriated against these uncouth, jealous, vindictive Jews, who were so unreasonable in their hatred. Why should this stubborn and fanatic people disturb the world with their hatred? the Romans asked themselves.
At last there was a general rising, and the Roman government had to fight for its own existence in the land of Israel. When Vespasian was emperor, Titus, his son, besieged Jerusalem. The rebellious Jews made the most obstinate resistance. The Romans, however, took the town and killed the people in front of them. The streets were heaped with dead Jews. But the last defenders were still at bay, in the Temple precincts. After terrible fighting, the defenders saw that the Holy of Holies must be taken. So the Jews themselves set fire to the great Temple, to prevent its falling into the hands of the enemy, and heaps of the faithful defenders preferred to die in the flames, rather than by the swords of the Romans. The Temple burned furiously, a great conflagration. Yet the Romans got much treasure, and holy relics like the Ark, the seven- branched candlesticks, the sacred vessels. And these they took to Rome to adorn the triumph of Titus. Away there in Rome the citizens were not much impressed by these most holy relics of the Jews. But they had satisfaction in seeing them, for already the Jews were beginning to be detested, because of their fanatical pride, the pride of the Chosen People.
The burning of the Temple took place in the year 70 A.D., forty years or so after the death of Christ. There were at this time already many Christians, most of whom, naturally, were Jews of Jerusalem. They were called Nazarenes. They did not cease from their old religion when they accepted Christ. They still went to the Temple, and took their children as Jesus was taken, to be circumcised; went, as Joseph and Mary went, to the holy feast of the Passover; they observed the Jewish Sabbath, and the Jewish rites, eating no unclean meat, such as we now eat. They were Jews who believed also in Jesus.
These Nazarenes founded the first Christian congregation, which is called the Church of Jerusalem. Their first fifteen bishops were circumcised Jews. Thus the Romans, who did not care about details of religious belief, knew no difference between Christians and Jews, in Jerusalem. At the same time, in the great cities Antioch and Ephesus in Syria, Alexandria in Egypt, Corinth in Greece, even in Rome, Christianity was quietly spreading among Gentiles who did not keep the feast of the Passover, or any of the Jewish observances. So that already, before the fall of Jerusalem, there were two kinds of Christians: Nazarenes, or judaising Christians, and gentile Christians. There was the Nazarene Church of Jerusalem, and there were the gentile Churches of Antioch, Ephesus, and so on.
When the Temple was destroyed, and Jerusalem ruined, the poor Nazarenes were desolate. They retired away beyond Jordan to the little town of Pella, and there they remained, lonely and disconsolate. But still they could make many comforting visits to the Holy City, returning at the appointed times. For they had a passion for their old observances, their old solemn feasts. They longed for the day when the Temple would be re-built, and Jerusalem restored as it was before. They were still the chosen people, more important than any one in the world, according to their own idea; and now most important even among Jews, since they had their Messiah.
Again, however, in the time of the Emperor Hadrian, about fifty years after the fall of Jerusalem, the Jews rose once more in a terrible rebellion, all over Palestine. A new town had been re-built in place of the destroyed Jerusalem. The Romans gave it the new name of Aelia Capitolina. And on Mount Moriah they erected a temple to the Roman Jupiter. This last offence caused the last, fatal insurrection of all the Jews.
Hadrian was merciless this time. His soldiers fought, and spared none. They took towns and villages, and reduced them to ashes. It is said that about 600,000 Jews were destroyed, and a thousand towns and villages. For now the Roman hatred of Jews was confirmed.
Hadrian built up Jerusalem this time as a purely Roman city. The very name of Jerusalem was abolished, and that of Aelia put in its place — just as St. Petersburg has become Petrograd. Moreover, no Jew was allowed even to approach within sight of the town. Hadrian’s soldiers kept strict watch, and any native found creeping back to the passionately-loved hills of the Holy City, now crowned with Roman temples, was either hanged or crucified or otherwise severely punished.
So, the Jewish nation was broken and scattered — and for ever; thrown out into the world, where for more than a thousand years it still refused to mix with the world.
The Nazarenes at Pella were heart-broken by this new disaster. They felt they were not Jews in religion. Yet they must suffer. They at last took the only wise course. They chose a Latin bishop, Marcus, a Gentile. And Marcus gradually persuaded the congregation to renounce the Mosaic law. This they did, reluctantly. But once it was done, they were free from the taint of Judaism. They appealed to the Romans, saying that they were not Jews at all any more, but Gentile Christians. And finally, the Romans allowed them to return to Aelia. For it was recognised that a Jew was not a Jew because of his nation, but because of his religion. Nationality or citizenship or race made a Greek or a Roman or a Gaul. But religion made a Jew. So that when the Nazarenes abandoned the Judaic religion, they ceased to be Jews. In a little while they were permitted to restore the old-time name to Jerusalem. But the Temple was no more re-built, Zion which kept the Feast of the Passover did not exist any more. And bitterly did the true Jews now hate the Christian Jews, traitors to the old faith.
Thus Christianity became a Gentile religion. It spread rapidly in the Roman Empire. Almost everybody in the Eastern Empire spoke Greek, many spoke Latin also: in the West Latin was spoken. Preachers and teachers went everywhere, speaking Greek in Asia, Latin in Italy, and telling that there was but one God, whose Son was Jesus; telling that through love men should have everlasting life, in immortal happiness. They had to go quietly, secretly, for they had many enemies, the bitterest being Jews. But they found many hearers; particularly many Roman soldiers and officers listened closely. For soldiers have time to think.
Now, in a world weary of strife and excitement, and clogged with slavery, the thought of peace and innocent love, and of a life of still, gentle, everlasting happiness, was most beautiful. So many people in the world of that day were weary of the continual fighting, the continual excitement of wild combats in the circuses, wild or pompous displays, and the stifling physical luxury of the daily warm baths, the daily feasts, or long evening banquets which lasted from afternoon till sleeping-time, a long meal of talking and eating and drinking wine, and telling stories or reciting poems. For the well-to-do people it was a life all of one sort, stifling. And for the slaves it was a life of ignominy. On both hands, men were tired.
What could a slave want more than to be told that in the sight of God all men were equal, were brothers: and that all those who believed in Jesus would spend eternity with the Son of God, in continual happiness? And what could the tired, satiated soldiers and citizens of Rome want more than to realise that this fighting, this feasting, this excitement, this continual warm luxury of baths, was nothing but a clog on the spirit: that the spirit of Jesus did away with all this barrenness, and left men free from bodily necessities, unhampered as the angels or the beams of the sun, eternal as these?
Gradually, these beliefs became enlarged. The Christian Romans turned with dislike from the theatres and circuses and baths. They disliked physical luxury, all the pleasures of the body became hateful to them, for they had had too much of such gratification. Their spirits wanted to be free, infinite, their bodies were a drag and a burden. So they kept strictly away from the temples, the feasts, the games; they were quiet and inspired with holy, spiritual desires. They began to dream of the Second Coming of Christ, which was prophesied, and regarded as near at hand. Christ would come soon, and destroy the kingdom of the world, and make the kingdom of bliss on earth. The Judgment Day was near at hand, and after that, the Millennium, the era of bliss, when men would walk the shining streets of the new city, here on earth, at peace and in shining concord with all men. Every one would be good and pure. When these happy days should come, there would be no more luxurious feeding and drinking and dressing, and no fighting and no hard work. All would wear pure white, none would need more than a little pure food and drink, there would be no rich, no poor, no hungry people and none greedy. There would be sufficient of all things for all, and men and women, shining and beautiful in their clean clothes, would walk the streets of the New Jerusalem, the New Rome, bright as flowers, blissful in the bliss of love, speaking gently, and coming to the throne of Jesus to sit near Him. For Jesus would reign like a Caesar, all majesty and love.
All Christians believed in this Millennium — but for the slaves it was pure transportation. Then, they too would walk the streets of gold, and sit with the King of Kings: they too would wear pure white robes, and Jesus would love them even more than the rest, because they had been despised and oppressed on earth.
It was calculated when the Second Coming would take place. The Six Days of Creation, when God made the world, were taken to mean six thousand years. On the seventh day the Lord rested — and He blessed that day. Therefore when the seventh thousand of years should approach, the Lord would look at His works, judge them, and prepare for the Millennium of rest and blessedness. Now the primitive Church at Antioch calculated that from the days of Adam to their own day, that is, to the year 100 or 150 A.D., would be just 6000 years. Therefore the Second Coming must be at hand. Jesus Himself had spoken of it, St. Paul had warned them.
These early Christians went in daily expectation of the terrible event. They had been told that famine and earthquake would precede the Second Advent, and that fire would fall from heaven. Famine and pestilence came, as well as earthquakes. In Vespasian’s reign a great fire, that raged for three days, again gutted a large part of Rome. And then, in the year 79 came the terrible eruption of Vesuvius which buried Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabiae in a rain of fire and lava and ash. Clearly these were the signs of the Second Coming, when Christ would judge the world.
The Christians trembled, and purified themselves. Their lives were rigidly holy. As darkness fell, at evening, they quivered, thinking that perhaps that night the heavens would break, and Christ with His angels and prophets would appear, summoning all men alike to His footstool. The slaves, as they silently submitted to their masters, and the poor men, as they saw the Roman ladies borne through the streets in golden litters, thought to themselves: ‘ Ah, if they but knew, these proud and vainglorious Romans! If they but knew the sword that even now is unsheathed in the sky, ready to strike! If they could know, how, in a short time, a short time now, they will be cast down into eternal punishment. Their Rome will be wiped out, and I shall be walking the bright streets of glass in the New Jerusalem, the New Rome, with the Saviour, the King of Kings. He who is greater than any Caesar is coming down upon Rome — ah, if they knew this, they would change their behaviour. They would cease to command so proudly, they would get down from their litters . . .’
The Romans could feel some secret working against them. They could feel, as it were, a silent threat in these people who were so quiet and humble and mysterious. They tried to fathom the mystery, but could not. For the Romans knew nothing about Christians, they thought them just a sect of the detested Jews.
It is surprising how little the Romans knew about the new religion. A famous man, named Pliny, was sent to be governor of Bithynia in the year 111. There, some men were brought before him, charged with the crime of being Christians. But Pliny knew nothing about the sect nor the crime. He had heard the name of Christians merely — but what were they? And how was he to proceed against criminals whose crime he did not in the least understand?
He made a careful examination of the Christians, and sent to his friend and master, the Emperor Trajan, a curious account of the new sect. Pliny was in some ways very favourable to the Christians. He disliked, with true Roman fairness, to prosecute people whose guilt he could not perceive. Yet he lamented that the temples in Bithynia were almost deserted, and that the sacred victims, birds, kids, found hardly any purchasers, and that even the ignorant country people were infected with the new superstition. Bithynia was the province just across from Constantinople, in Asia, along the shores of the Black Sea. It is evident there were more Christians there than in Rome.
Now Pliny was a great and famous man, and a lawyer. He must have known about the trials of all the criminals in Rome. He must have known the proceedings of all the more important cases. Yet it is quite evident he knew nothing of Christianity when he went to Bithynia, and that he had before him no laws, and no previous cases against Christians, to guide him. He was quite at a loss. And he showed no dislike of the new people: it only troubled him that they refused to be Romans as well as Christians.
This shows us that the educated Romans were ignorant of what the Christians were; that there cannot have been any real legal prosecution; and that the Church in Rome either was not very large, or was very secret, or did not extend into the upper classes, at the end of the first century. We are forced to think that the early Christians, from the days of Paul, were very secret, like a secret society, very cautious in revealing their mysteries: particularly that mystery of the Second Coming.
The Romans must have heard, of the Christians, because of the famous prosecution under Nero, in the year 64.
Now just at the time that Pliny went to Bithynia, Tacitus the Roman was writing his famous history. This was some forty years after the fire of Rome, which, as we know, Nero is suspected of causing, in order to enjoy the spectacle. Tacitus writes that ‘Nero wanted to find some people on whom to lay the blame of this great fire: ‘ Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the common people. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for a moment, again broke out, not only in Judaea, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs, and perished; or they were nailed on crosses; or they were doomed to the flames, and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired.
‘ Nero offered his garden for the spectacle, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer, or stood aloft on a car. The guilt of the Christians deserved, indeed, the most extreme punishment, but there arose a feeling of compassion in the people; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good that they were sacrificed, but to glut one man’s cruelty.’
This is all Tacitus says about the Christians: and it is probably all he knew. Pliny seems to have known no more. Yet why should Nero suddenly have fallen on these obscure people? We cannot say. Only we do know that the Christians were confused with the Jews; that the Romans truly believed the Jews hated mankind; and that Nero hated the Jews. But Poppaea, Nero’s favourite wife, was a Jewess, and his favourite player was a Jew. And the Jews have always been accused of betraying the Christians, when they themselves were in danger. For of all their enemies, the Jews hated the Christians most. So perhaps it was suggested to Nero that certain persons, Christians, were the vilest and most evil of all Jewish sectaries.
However that may be, it is certain that a terrible fate befell these poor Christians. But we may be almost as certain that the persecution was as short as it was sharp and sudden. Nero had probably forgotten in a month’s time that there were such people as Christians.
We see, however, both from Tacitus and Pliny, that there was current a vague but deep hatred of the Christians. Why should Tacitus think that the guilt of the poor creatures deserved the most extreme punishment? What was the guilt? All he says, is that they are convicted of hating mankind.
Now we can understand how the Romans came to imagine that the Christians hated mankind. In the first place, they considered the Christians were simply a set of Jews, and the Jews, the Chosen People, really did hate or despise all who were not of their own race. And then the Romans believed, above all, in the social, public life — men living usefully and openly together; and the Christians shunned the social and public life of the Roman world. The Roman was interested most of all in the State, in the affairs of the empire. The Christians turned darkly away from such affairs, and would have nothing to do with them. They were a secret people. They held their meetings at night, in underground places. But this was probably because the poorer Christians, such as slaves, were only free at night; and also because the congregations could not meet without being disturbed, save in some remote place, such as the catacombs.
The Romans detested secrecy, and at once suspected evil. No matter how a Rorftan came unawares on these Christian meetings, he could never find an idol or a statue, no sign of a god, no sacred ornaments, no ritual going on, no altar with its fire, no sacrificial objects. The places of worship were bare. And therefore, said the Romans, the Christians must be devilishly cunning. They hid all their objects of worship. They had horrible secret rites. The tale went round, how a convert when he joined the Christian community was taken into a dark room, and given a knife, and made to strike: and how, under the heap of flour which he struck, was a hidden babe, on whose blood he was made to swear to keep secrets — and so on. These are tales which men always make up out of darkness and ignorance.
The vulgar populace of Rome hated the Christians, because they could feel the strange exulting secret of the Second Coming burning in Christian breasts. They hated them also because this secret people would not mix in with the rest. But the Christians could not mix in with the rest. Religion in those days was not a private matter that concerned a man’s private soul only. It was part of every act of public life. If a man went out to dinner, he must spill wine to the gods, and call on the deities of the house, and the deities of hospitality, to witness his service and his thanks. If a family moved to a new house, the house must be devoted to the family gods, and blessed, with a whole festival and a sacred ritual. At a wedding, a funeral, a christening, the gods were supposed to be present, men made sacrifice and wore special emblems. On certain days, all doorways must be decked with laurel, men must all wear crowns of leaves. On other days, processions with dancing passed through the streets. The great games were dedicated to the gods. Men attended the altars beforehand, brought offerings or threw sweet incense on the fire, and were sprinkled with holy water or blood of victims.
From all these things the Christians kept gloomily apart, afraid to offend their own God. They could not go to the houses of their pagan friends and relatives, nor to a wedding or funeral, nor to any festival, nor to the games. They could hardly walk in the streets without being required to pay some attention to some pagan god, throw incense on some altar. They kept gloomily and unsociably apart, they looked upon the great show of Roman daily life with dark eyes of reproach and foreboding. This gradually infuriated the sociable Romans, who lived all their life out of doors, in the porticoes of the Forum, in the baths, in the streets — or, at evening, sociably reclining round the table.
Yet the Christians were bound to keep apart. They had a curious belief that the Roman gods were really powerful demons. When Lucifer, or Satan, the bright angel, rebelled against God, and was cast out with all his rebellious host, he fell down to earth and to hell. But he had the power of appearing in disguise to the souls of men. Thus it was the great angelic demon, Lucifer, who appeared to the Greeks or Romans as the great god, the Jupiter or Jove of the Capitol. Jupiter was not a mere nothing. He was Satan himself, terribly powerful, whom the Romans worshipped. And it was Satan, under the name of Jupiter, who had given the Romans their terrible, but evil power over the world. And Satan possessed the soul of every Roman who worshipped him, or who worshipped any other of the great powerful demons, under any name — Venus, or Mars, or Neptune, or Pan, or Priapus.
So the Christians believed. And they were terribly afraid of putting their souls into the power of these living demons, the pagan gods. Men used to swear then, more solemnly than they swear now, by the name of Jupiter, or Jove. If a Christian caught himself saying, in the common fashion, ‘ By Jove!’ then he must stop himself, and pray to Jesus to save him from this same terrible Jove. The Romans said, ‘ Jupiter bless you ‘ quite commonly. But if a pagan said it to a Christian friend, the Christian must lift his hand to ward off the evil influence, and protest that Jupiter was not God.
Thus naturally there grew up in Rome a great dislike of these quiet, silent Christians, with their distant manners and humble bearing and their patient looks of reproach, and their air of secret power. And the Christians became more secret. They had various signs, amongst themselves, whereby they knew one another. If a Christian were talking with another Roman, of whom he was not sure, he might carelessly, as if unheeding, draw the shape of a fish in the dust with his toe. Then he would wait to see if the other noticed. If not, the Christian would smear out the sign. For the fish was the symbol of Jesus.
Secrecy grew on the one hand, hatred on the other. It was the vulgar crowds who hated the Christians most. And the greatest troubles came when the greatest crowds gathered together. If the Christians were timid, they trembled as the days of the great games approached. If they were fervent and fanatic, they looked forward to a chance of martyrdom. For on these days the great mob of citizens, after serving at the altars, and being inflamed with wine, would remember the silent mystery and threat of the absent Christians. For the Christians taught that men should turn away from the world, particularly the world of Rome; and this maddened the Romans. If there had been a flood, or an earthquake, or la famine some one would suggest that the Christians had caused it by their secret magic. Then up would go the great howl of a mob, a vast herd of vulgar people — ’ The Christians — the Christians — to the lions with the evil-working Christians!’ In this torrent of vulgar frenzy the governors were helpless, and many Christians were martyred.
The Roman government almost always tried to be just. But even the magistrates disliked the Christians, not for their crimes, but for their opposition to the government. The will of the father was sacred in Rome — all authority was established upon it. But if a father bade a Christian son or daughter attend any pagan festival, the youth or maiden quietly refused, which horrified the Romans. If a master bade his Christian slave attend him to the temple, the slave refused. The Christians would take no part in the government whatsoever. Even the soldiers threw away their arms, even officers threw away their swords and helmets, and loudly declared they would serve no pagan master whose soul was destined for hell, but only Christ the Lord. Such soldiers were promptly tried by martial law, and executed — as they would be to-day. But the pagan Romans were shocked. The magistrates felt that a great secret body of people was working to undermine the State altogether, and bring it down in ruin. They felt the danger. And, of course, it was a real danger. For surely it was the Christian religion finally which brought down the great pagan world into nothingness.
Still the magistrates and governors wanted to be fair. It was the people themselves who were violent and base’ — the great mob. When Pliny asked the Emperor Trajan how he should proceed, Trajan made these two wise conditions concerning the prosecution of Christians: first, that there should be no search or inquiry made about any citizen, to find out whether he were guilty of the crime of Christianity; and secondly, any person who accused another man of this crime falsely, should pay a heavy forfeit. So that, as far as the government went, the Christians were fairly safe. And again, the magistrates did not want to punish. They admitted that the lives of Christians were blameless, as far as could be proved. Later, they admired the charity of the sect, their care of the poor and helpless. They only wanted the Christians not to persevere in opposing the great Roman State. If they could only persuade a Christian prisoner to cast a few grains of incense on the altar of one of the gods, as a sign of respect for the old gods, and for the great State these gods represented, then the magistrates dismissed the accused man with praise. But alas! the Christians often preferred martyrdom — nay, they even claimed the honour of martyrdom, which would raise them up to be saints in glory. And this astonished and repelled the pagan magistrates, who could not understand, and who detested, such an attitude.
As the Christian Church grew in numbers and power, the Roman government felt the danger more, and became more strict. At first, each congregation of Christians humbly and quietly elected from their own community a minister, or presbyter, to lead them and guide them. Then, as congregations grew larger and more numerous, there must be some authority to keep them all together. So the worshippers elected from among the presbyters a wise, capable leader, called an episcopal presbyter, which really means an inspector. These inspectors held meetings among themselves, settling all disputes among congregations, and governing all equally. But then it was necessary to have a head even of these meetings of inspectors. So at last they decided to choose one of the oldest and wisest of the episcopal presbyters, and make him the episcopal leader or governor, for life. And thus bishops first came into being, governing the communities of Christians.
But for more than a hundred years the Christian communities were mildly and wisely governed by the humble bishops, who accounted themselves just simple Christians, with special duties to perform. They settled all troubles, and they wrote famous letters, like those of St. Paul, to the Christian groups in other great cities, Alexandria, Corinth, Antioch. So the whole Christian community kept closely in touch, and was really strong, however it was hidden and obscured under the brilliant Roman Empire.
By the end of the second century there was a large community in Italy called the Church in Italy, another in Syria, another in Africa, another in Greece. These great provinces each had its own Church, or community of Christians. It was arranged that the episcopal presbyters should meet regularly in the chief town of the province — Rome, Corinth, Antioch, as it might be — and hold councils. These councils were called synods. And at these councils the laws of the Church, called canons, were drawn up, saying how a presbyter should be elected, and how a bishop; how the Church service should be conducted, what the priest or minister should do, and what the congregation should do; also exactly what they should believe; also how the large sums of money given to the Church by the Christians should be used.
At first each town or community in Italy sent its bishop to Rome, to the synod, and all bishops were equal. But again it was inevitable that there should be one among them who stood first. And it was inevitable that this should be the bishop of the chief city, the metropolis. It came to pass that the metropolitan bishop — that is, in Italy, the bishop of the Christians in Rome; in Egypt, the bishop of the Alexandrian Christians — should be the leading Christian in the whole province. And soon, instead of advising and entreating his brother bishops, his brother Christians, the metropolitan bishop began to command them, to instruct them what they should do. He became a dictator, with a great deal of power and pride.
The Churches of the different provinces kept closely together, under the ban of the Roman Empire. But they disputed which was the leading Church. And again Rome claimed the lead. She claimed two apostles — St. Peter and St. Paul, both martyred in Rome. No other city could claim more than one. And on the merits of St. Peter the Romans established their Church, using the phrase from the Bible — ’ Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church — as their justification. Rome claimed the lead. Her primate, or metropolitan, was the first of the bishops. The episcopal office, the established office of the bishop, had made each bishop equal. But now the primates or metropolitans rose above the simple bishops, and the Primate of Rome rose above the metropolitans. This took place about the end of the third century. Gradually the metropolitans became powerful as princes, and the Primate of Rome, the Father, or Papa, Pope, in time came to be almost as powerful as an emperor — indeed, at certain periods much more powerful. So there came into being an established priesthood or clergy, such as the Roman and Greek world had not known; an order of men set apart in life, having a separate, if very great power in their hands, the so-called spiritual power, or power of the Church.
Even as early as 260, Paul of Samosata, metropolitan of Antioch, aroused the indignation of the East by his rich living, palaces, slaves, splendour — his haughty pride, and his scandalous deeds. So soon was the simple, humble Christian Church changed. And as early as the third century terrible disputes tore the Churches of the East and West, Rome and Antioch. This was concerning the time when Easter should be celebrated.
Following these came worse conflicts, quarrels as to matters of fact, and as to the meaning of the Trinity. The early history of the Church, particularly in Africa and the East, is horrible with warfare and massacres between contending parties of Christians. Certainly the Christians destroyed each other in far greater numbers, and with much more terrible ferocity, than they were ever destroyed in the pagan persecutions.
Yet as the Church grew richer and stronger, the Roman government grew more strict, more frightened, more vindictive, and the Roman mob more violent. In the time of the Emperor Maximian, who was a savage soldier, and half a barbarian, there was a horrible massacre of Christians — 236 A.D. Just before this, however, under the reign of Severus, the Christians had been allowed to build their own public churches, and Christian bishops, for the first time, had attended at the Roman court. But in 249 began such a fierce persecution, that the Christians could not for two years elect a bishop of Rome, after Fabianus their primate had been martyred in 250. The emperors were now awaking to understand the strength and power of Christianity, so that either they hated the religion violently, and persecuted the Christians, or they were attracted, and definitely friendly.
In the time of Diocletian began the great persecution which the Church has called the Era of Martyrs. Yet for eighteen years that famous emperor reigned in the spirit of mildest and most .liberal religious toleration. It was Maximian and Galerius who really instituted the persecution. They were soldiers and originally ignorant peasants. They became generals and emperors at a time when Christian soldiers began publicly to throw away their arms, and declare for Christ and martyrdom. Maximian and Galerius naturally were mad with fury. Then Diocletian became terrified. He saw the power of the new sect: he knew that the Christians of that day claimed supernatural power to perform miracles. He believed they actually did perform the stupendous miracles they claimed. It terrified him. He called it magic, evil. And severe persecution began, about the year 300.
All the property of the Church was to be taken away; all the Christian writings over all the Roman world were to be delivered up, seized, and publicly burned; churches were to be levelled with the ground. When the edict was published in Nicomedia, a Christian at once tore it down, shouting his scorn of such tyrants. He was roasted over a slow fire. This was in 303. Within ten days’ time, Diocletian’s bed-chamber in Nicomedia was twice in flames. The mind of the Emperor was filled with a terrified horror of such people. Every mode of torture was put into practice to discover which of the Christians had committed the deed. Nothing could be extorted.
Even Galerius fled from Nicomedia. There was general terrible persecution.
But almost immediately Diocletian abdicated from the throne, weary of governing. Constantius and Galerius followed: Constantius always a friend of the Christians. And in 313, as we know, Constantine issued his edict of toleration. The favoured church in Constantinople was the Christian Church. Constantine was baptized just before he died.
Christianity had triumphed. For two short years, however, there was a relapse. The wise, clever, sad Julian the Apostate reigned in Constantinople from 361 to 363. He passionately wanted to restore paganism. He detested Christianity, though he was too humane to be a persecutor like Galerius. He was pierced with an arrow in the Persian war, and, dying, he is said to have grasped a handful of blood that flowed from the wound in his breast, and tossed it up to heaven, crying: ‘ Thou hast conquered, Galilean!’ Julian is the last great pagan.
In 394 Christianity was established as the only religion of the empire. In Constantinople the Church sank before the power of the Emperor. In Rome the empire collapsed, and the curious, unstable power of the popes began. Everywhere the pagan religion was prohibited. But still in country places the simple people took offerings to the hidden shrines, groves, and springs.
The Christian Church now had two centres — Rome and Constantinople. In Constantinople was the Greek church, which had no images, only flat, quaint pictures of the Mother of Jesus: the priests of the Greek church also must marry, and wear a beard; the ruler or chief of the church was called the Patriarch. The Patriarch never acquired in Constantinople such power as the popes acquired in Rome.
As the empire collapsed in Rome and Italy, the Christians became more unsettled. There were fierce conflicts between the parties in Rome, Alexandria, Constantinople, Antioch. But gradually the great religion of the new era established itself. Rome governed the Christians of Europe and North Africa, Constantinople was head of the Church in the East until the Mohammedans arose to break her power.