Monotheists All?

Barnes, T. D.; Edwards, Mark; Goodman, M.; Price, Simon; Rowland, Christopher; Athanassiadi, Polymnia; Frede, Michael

doi:10.2307/1089029

Cited by 59 publications

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“…Therefore, apologetics is a very useful field to understand how the "market-place of religions" 23 worked in the first centuries of the Empire, before Christianity came to be considered a religio licita in the time of Constantine and consequently the peremptory need for self-justification and defence disappeared. 24 The apologists use rhetoric extensively and share a series of topics, which in essence, are the following: 1) a refutation of the accusation of atheism, which they suffered from a very early time as they had abandoned the customs of their ancestors; 2) the defence of the antiquity of Christianity and its character of religio, based on the argument of "racial" legitimacy; 3) the consideration of Christianity as a philosophy, the only true one; 4) the defence of the irreproachable morality of Christians against accusations of sexual offences, such as incest and infanticide; 5) the civic nature of Christians, excellent citizens of the Empire; and 6) the justification of the divinity of Jesus and the answer to other 21 On the apologetic genre, if the literature aimed at defence/attack can be called a "genre", given its variety of forms: Grant 1988; Edwards/Goodman/Price 1999; and the remarks by Barnes 2001;Cameron 2002: 221;Klostergaard 2009. The recent emphasis on religious pluralism and religious debate in the Roman Empire has stimulated the reflection on the notion and functions of apologetics: Pouderon/Doré 1998;Fiedrowicz 2000;Wlosok/Paschoud 2005;Ulrich/Jacobsen/Kahlos 2009.…”

Section: Persecution and The Apology For Tolerancementioning

confidence: 99%

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Persecution, Apology and the Reflection on Religious Freedom and Religious Coercion in Early Christianity

Marcos

2012

Zeitschrift Für Religionswissenschaft

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As it had been the current situation throughout the history of the ancient Mediterranean world, a plurality of religious groups and traditions coexisted under the Roman Empire, without any theoretical discourse over religious freedom having ever been formulated. Religious cohabitation changed dramatically with the spread of Christianity. As a monotheistic, exclusivist religion with a universalistic scope, Christianity was incompatible with the traditional religious practices of the Greco-Roman world as well as with the religious demands of the Roman state. Persecutions originated a great deal of apologetic literature, in which Christians defended themselves from pagan criticism, claimed legitimacy and, as an argument for that, reflected on the idea of religious freedom, which at the turn of the second century Tertullian considered as one of the natural rights of the individual. Following closely the arguments of Tertullian and his rhetorical techniques, Latin apologists developed a more elaborated discourse on the illegitimacy of religious coercion and about the advantages of persuasion, a set of ideas assumed in the so-called Edict of Milan and in other "edicts of tolerance" at the end of the Tetrarchy. This paper studies the formation and early development of the Christian discourse on tolerance in its apologetic and polemic setting, and its impact on the rhetoric used in legal documents to justify the end of the persecutions.Zusammenfassung: Unter der Herrschaft des Römischen Reiches lebten religiöse Gruppen und verschiedene Traditionen neben-und miteinander, ohne dass ein theoretischer Diskurs über Religionsfreiheit geführt werden musste: Religiöse Pluralität gehört zur Normalität der antiken Mittelmeerwelt. Die religiöse Nachbarschaft verändert sich dramatisch mit der Ausbreitung des Christentums. Die neue Religion als eine monotheistische und exklusivistische Religion mit universalem Anspruch vertrug sich nicht mit den traditionellen Praktiken der griechisch-römischen Welt und stand im Konflikt mit den religiösen Erfordernissen des Römischen Staates. Die Verfolgungen verlangten umfassend apologetische Texte zur Verteidigung gegen die pagane Kritik. Sie forderten für ihre Legitimität die allgemeine Religionsfreiheit. Tertullian verlangt sie um 200 n. Chr. als natür-liches Recht jedes Individuums. In seiner Argumentationslinie entwickelten die lateinischen Apologeten das Argument weiter gegen religiösen Zwang und für die Überzeugung. Das sog. Mailänder Edikt (i. J. 313) Konstantins und andere

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Section: Persecution and The Apology For Tolerancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although Porphyry has been extensively studied, many uncertainties still remain about the date and the historical setting of his writings. See Barnes 1973Barnes , 1994Barnes , 2001Goulet 2004;Riedweg 2005 with further references.…”

Section: Apologetics Religious Freedom and The Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persecution, Apology and the Reflection on Religious Freedom and Religious Coercion in Early Christianity

Marcos

2012

Zeitschrift Für Religionswissenschaft

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“…43 Note the reticence of some scholars to use the term monotheism to refer to the religious aspirations outside Judaism and Christianity. SeeBarnes (2001);Chaniotis (2010) 112-114. 44 Berger (1969 137;North (1992).…”

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1 Introduction: Religious Practices and Christianization of the Late Antique City

Busine¹

2015

Religious Practices and Christianization of the Late Antique City (4th – 7th Cent.)

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In modern scholarship, Christianity and the classical city, which constitues the original founding element of Greco-Roman civilization,1 are often deemed to be incompatible. The communis opinio may be summarized in Mogens Hansen's assertion that the polis, with its polytheistic cults and events, was a Pagan institution in which worthy Christians could take no part.2 More generally, Voltaire's idea3 of a causal relationship between two distinct historical phenomena, viz. the conversion to Christianity and the end of the Ancient World, prevails in a signifĳicant number of studies of Late Antiquity.4 The confusion encourages one to reassess the relationships between those two key events. This volume, which results from the conference on "Religious Practices and Christianization of the Late Antique City" held at the Université libre de Bruxelles from January 19 to 21, 2012, seeks to study the phenomenon of the Christianization of the Roman Empire within the context of the transformations and eventual decline of the Greco-Roman city. The studies brought together here aim to describe with greater precision the possible links between religious, but also political, economic and social mutations engendered by Christianity and the evolution of the antique city. More particularly, an efffort will be made to measure the impact on the city of the progressive abandonment of traditional cults to the advantage of new Christian religious practices. The papers in this volume will cast a new light on the intersection between the Christianization of the Roman Empire and the progressive disappearance of the municipal civilization characteristic of Greco-Roman Antiquity. It is hoped that this Introduction, though not intended to offfer an exhaustive 5 Cf. the terminological analysis in Inglebert (2010) 9. 6 Cf. the historiographical assessment established in Inglebert (2010).

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2006

A Companion to the Roman Empire

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Monotheists All?

Cited by 59 publications

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Persecution, Apology and the Reflection on Religious Freedom and Religious Coercion in Early Christianity

Persecution, Apology and the Reflection on Religious Freedom and Religious Coercion in Early Christianity

1 Introduction: Religious Practices and Christianization of the Late Antique City

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