Clivedurdle

I understand references "christians."

1 Did capital letters exist?

2 Might he have been referencing a group who believed in annointing? Would "annointers" be a reasonable translation?

DCHindley

Clive,

1: No.

2: Could have, but I don't think it is the case here. I think a general reference to "annointers" is more likely in the case of citations by Suetonius and possibly Tacitus, probably signifying a kind of Jewish subversive movement with messianic theology.

The "Christians" he encounters here are clearly a private association which Pliny initially treats as a political threat but upon investigation starts to think is a harmless mystery cult. So he asks Trajan for advice: "Should I make a distinction?"

Trajan says, "No, treat all private associations like threats." Private associations, except for a few long established religious ones, were prohibited by Roman law because they had been used to sow sedition during the Roman civil wars, although the prohibitions were not always enforced at local levels, especially in the cases of mystery cults.

In another letter, Pliny had also been advised by Trajan not to even allow a private association of fire fighters in one city, on the reasoning that "you never know which private associations will end up plotting against us" (yes, that is paraphrased).

DCH

Minimalist

I've always thought that the most significant aspect of the Pliny letter is that he, as an educated Roman aristocrat, never seemed to have heard of "christians" until he assumed his post in Asia Minor. If the Tacitus reference to a Neronian persecution of Christians for the Great Fire were true it just seems that Pliny would know something about it, especially as he and Tacitus were friends.

jackal5096

The report by Tacitus is the only one that implicates christians as responsible for the fire. Two other historians mention the fire, Seutonius in "The Lives of Twelve Caesars" and Cassius Dio in "Roman History". Christian writers don't make note of Nero blaming the christians until the late 4th century, in Sulpicius Serverus. Irenaeus doesn't mention anything about Nero persecuting Christians, and Tertullian makes a brief allusion to Neronian persecution, but with no connection to the fire. Makes me wonder if the part in Tacitus may have been a later interpolation.

Minimalist

You are not alone in that.

http://users.drew.edu/ddoughty/Chris...s/tacitus.html

aa5874

But wouldn't this reference to 'Christians' causing the fire be an anamoly? This havoc and destruction would be against the teachings of Christ and there is no other reference to this band of violent 'Christians' and the name of the leader for such a treacherous group of believers.

DCHindley

What he actually says is that he had never participated in the prosecution of Christians, so he really was not sure exactly what was supposed to be wrong with them. He goes into it assuming sedition (torturing the witnesses to extract information, executing the obstinate, but forgiving those who sacrifice to Caesar), but instead finds a "silly superstition" and is genuinely surprised by this.

Christianity, whatever it was that had made it illegal to start with (presumably sedition against the Roman government), was by this time a mystery religion, and had been so already about 20 years.

I forget offhand exactly what date is associated with this letter, but I seem to recall it being somewhere about 113 CE. That takes the transition date back to 93 CE at the latest.

DCH

Minimalist

Livius.org accounts his governorship as being from 109 - 111 AD.

Minimalist

Yes but the line about being "unacquainted with the nature of their crimes" does seem to indicate that he is unaware of any tradition that they were responsible for burning down half the city of Rome. For that matter, Trajan's reply was pretty mild, as well.

On another board I'm dealing with a guy who insists that ALL christian references prior to the mid-third century are later forgeries. Why write a forgery which makes Trajan look like Oliver Wendell Holmes? It doesn't make sense.

Roger Pearse

Surely. But what you mean is did Pliny write in a mix of upper and lower case as we do, and the answer is no -- no-one before the renaissance did that.

No.

All the best,

Roger Pearse