Adora

I'm not sure whether this belongs here or not, so if a mod wants to move it somewhere more appropriate, I'll understand.

I've seen some posts in other threads discussing the "Persecutions of Christians" being a common myth. I know Tacitus supposedly "documents" the persecutions of the Jesus-follower in his 'Annals, and I'm curious to know how he came to write this. For example, what sort of influences would have cause him to write it, who was paying him when did the myth become socially accepted as a "fact", how subsequent translations and social influences have changed the text etc etc.

I'd also be interested to know if anybody also has insight into to the context and agendas of other Greeco-Roman writers such as Seutonious and Pliny who also "document" the "persecution".

Thanks.

Peter Kirby

I suppose that now would be a fine time to submit my Early Christian Writings entry for the discussion.

http://earlychristianwritings.com/tacitus.html

The most famous passage in which Tacitus mentions Christianity is as follows (Annals 15.44 quoted from http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/tacitus/TACANN15.HTM):

Such indeed were the precautions of human wisdom. The next thing was to seek means of propitiating the gods, and recourse was had to the Sibylline books, by the direction of which prayers were offered to Vulcanus, Ceres, and Proserpina. Juno, too, was entreated by the matrons, first, in the Capitol, then on the nearest part of the coast, whence water was procured to sprinkle the fane and image of the goddess. And there were sacred banquets and nightly vigils celebrated by married women. But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order.

Consequently, 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 by the populace. 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 the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, 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 were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or stood aloft on a car. Hence, even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment, there arose a feeling of compassion; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good, but to glut one man's cruelty, that they were being destroyed.

There has been some question about the integrity of this passage. Jeffery Jay Lowder responds to Gordon Stein in a footnote on this issue:

Gordon Stein denied the authenticity of this passage, arguing: (1) there is no corroborating evidence that Nero persecuted the Christians; (2) there was not a multitude of Christians in Rome at that date; (3) 'Christian' was not a common term in the first century; (4) Nero was indifferent to various religions in his city; (5) Nero did not start the fire in Rome; (6) Tacitus does not use the name Jesus; (7) Tacitus assumes his readers know Pontius Pilate; (8) the passage is present word-for-word in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus. However, Stein's arguments are extremely weak. At best, (1), (2), and (5) only cast doubt on the reliability of the passage; these are not good reasons for rejecting the authenticity of the passage. (3) and (4) are likewise irrelevant. Contrary to what Stein claims, (6) and (7) suggest that Pontius Pilate might have been relatively unknown. Finally, (8) is irrelevant. The fact that a later author expanded the passage in no way makes it probable that the original passage was interpolated. Furthermore, there are good reasons for accepting the authenticity of this passage: the anti-Christian tone of the passage, the scapegoat motif, the Latin style, and the integration of the passage with the story. Stein's argument for interpolation is completely unconvincing. See Stein 1982.

Robert Van Voorst comments on the question of authenticity (Jesus Outside the New Testament, pp. 42-43):

But there are good reasons for concluding with the vast majority of scholars that this passage is fundamentally sound, despite difficulties which result in no small measure from Tacitus' own compressed style. The overall style and content of this chapter are typically Tacitean. The passage fits well in its context and is the necessary conclusion to the entire discussion of the burning of Rome. Sulpicius Severus's Chronicle 2.29 attests to much of it in the early fifth century, so most suggested interpolations would have to have come in the second through fourth centuries. As Norma Miller delightfully remarks, "The well-intentioned pagan glossers of ancient texts do not normally express themselves in Tacitean Latin," and the same could be said of Christian interpolators. Finally, no Christian forgers would have made such disparaging remarks about Christianity as we have in Annals 15.44, and they probably would not have been so merely descriptive in adding the material about Christ in 15.44.3.

Even though the passage is authentic to Tacitus, it might be argued that Tacitus received his information about the origin of the Christian name from Christians themselves. This could be argued on six grounds: (1) Tacitus does not identify his source explicitly. (2) Tacitus anachronistically identifies Pilate as a procurator, when the proper title would have been prefect. (3) Tacitus refers to the founder of the name as 'Christus', while written records would presumably have used the name Jesus. (4) As meticulous as the Romans were, crucifixion records hardly went back nearly a century in time (the Annals being written c. 115 CE). (5) There is insufficient motive for Tacitus to research about this Christus in any detail, as the reference appears in Tacitus merely as an explanation of the origin of the name Christian, which in turn is being described only as an example of Nero's cruelty. (6) Finally, there would be no reason for Tacitus not to take the basic Christian story at face value, especially since the idea that they were of recent origin would correctly classify Christianity as a superstitio.

On (1), this evidence could go either way. It has been pointed out that Tacitus relied heavily on written material, and so the lack of explicit reference could suggest a written source per his normal practice. On (2), this could be resolved on the supposition that the source identified Pilate as "PR," which could be misread as an abbreviation for procurator. Of course, this is only a supposition. On (3), the purpose of referring to Jesus as "Christus" is to elucidate the origin of the Christian name, as Van Voorst points out: "even if Tacitus did know the name 'Jesus' he presumably would not have used it in this context, because it would have interfered with his explanation of the origin of Christianoi in Christus, confusing his readers" (Jesus Outside the New Testament, p. 46). On (4), it could be suggested that the written report on which Tacitus relies is not a letter from Pilate, as it would indeed be remarkable for it to survive so long. Rather, it could be that Tacitus relied upon a report that described the Christian sect and their classification as a religio prava. This classification would have been made sometime before the official persecution of Domitian, which could not have been undertaken legally without such a classification. A report of this classification would have been found in at least the Acta Diurna and the Acta Senatus, both of which were available to Tacitus. This report would have included such basic information on Christianity as to its origin and founder such that we find in Tacitus' description. On (5), it may be suggested that Tacitus didn't expend considerable effort but rather had a servant find what could be found on the Christian sect (not necessarily on Jesus), which would have included the report on their classification as a religio prava. On (6), this fails to show that Tacitus received the "basic Christian story" from Christian channels.

There are five arguments that might suggest that Tacitus consulted some kind of written record for this information. (1) As his practice, Tacitus was a meticulous researcher, frequently consulting written documents and multiple sources. (2) Tacitus shows hostility towards the Christian sect and thus wouldn't have trusted them. (3) Tacitus does not mention any important Christian doctrines such as the divinity and resurrection of Jesus. (4) According to Goguel, the source is not Christian "since it presumed an eclipse of Christianity after the death of Jesus" (Jesus the Nazarene, p. 41). (5) Also according to Goguel, the mention of Christ "must originate in some documentary source, since it contains no such word as 'dicunt' or 'ferunt,' which would authorize us to suppose that Tacitus is only relating gossip" (Jesus the Nazarene, p. 40).

On (1), although this may be suggestive evidence, this doesn't prove that Tacitus consulted written records in this particular case. On (2), even though Tacitus may have held some contempt towards Christians, that does not prevent him from taking their story about the origin of their name at face value. Similarly, a modern writer may be indifferent towards Mormons but may nevertheless take their story of the origin of the name "Mormon" at face value. On (3), Tacitus is giving merely the briefest account of the origin of the name Christian and so cannot be expected to mention such Christian doctrines. On (4), Goguel depends on an interpretation of the passage according to which the superstition was checked for several decades until the time of Nero, and this interpretation is unnecessary. On (5), this is an important point, as it can be shown that Tacitus is normally careful to make the distinction when relying upon oral testimony.

According to John P. Meier (A Marginal Jew, p. 91), "It could be, instead, that Tacitus is simply repeating what was common knowledge about Christians about the beginning of the 2d century." According to Robert Van Voorst (Jesus Outside the New Testament, p. 52), "The most likely source of Tacitus's information about Christ is Tacitus's own dealings with Christians, directly or indirectly." However, note well the contrary opinion of Maurice Goguel (Jesus the Nazarene, p. 43): "But one fact is certain, and that is, Tacitus knew of a document, which was neither Jewish nor Christian, which connected Christianity with the Christ crucified by Pontius Pilate." The present writer believes that the most persuasive case is made by those who maintain that Tacitus made use of a first century Roman document concerning the nature and status of the Christian religion. As to the reliability of that source, following normal historical practice, it is prudently assumed to be accurate until demonstrated otherwise. The reference from Tacitus constitutes prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus.

best,
Peter Kirby

Peter Kirby

The following is probably more germain to the OP. The historian A.N Wilson writes of the Neronian persecution/massacre (Paul: The Mind of the Apostle, pp. 8-10):

"The deftness, for a political point of view, of blaming the Roman fire on the Christians, lay in the fact that this sect - presumably unknown to most Gentiles - was detested by the generality of Jews, so that there would be no danger of offending any but the tender-hearted (not many of them in Nero's Rome) bby arresting them as arsonists and making them into a public display. There was a death penalty for arson in Roman law. Even those who had started fires accidentally in Italian cities were bastinoed. But for the band of scapegoats whom the theatrically-minded princeps had decided to stigmatise, only the most spectacular of punishments would suffice.

"Variety, for the sadist, is the spice of a public spectacle. Some of the Christians were crucified, as their Master had been thirty years before in Palestine. Others were dressed in the skins of wild beasts and put into an arena with wild, hungry dogs, who tore their human prey to pieces with their teeth. Others were forced into leather jerkins, liberally daubed with pitch, set alight, and used as illuminations in Nero's gardens in the Vatican.

"It is worth emphasizing the obvious point that, in making this grotesquely vicious public example, Nero had no religious interest whatsoever. He did not care, any more than did any Roman magistrate, what strange spiritual fancies passed through the brains of his subjects. The Roman Empire, like the Ottoman Empire after it, survived in large measure because of its cynical and tolerant attitude towards the different religious persuasions of its inhabitants. It was the first totalitarian state in history and its imposition of state-sponsored emperor worship was an innovation; but if local religions did nothing to upset the harmony of the state then the emperors and their legions did nothing to interfere with them. Widespread persecution of Christianity belongs to a period long after the lifetime of Nero's victims. It did not really happen on any appreciable scale until the middle of the third century, ending in Diocletian's persecution of 303, when, as Gibbon reminds us, 'fraud, envy and malice, prevailed in every congregation'. Even these, in terms of numbers, were modest atrocities compared with the persecution of heretics by the Christian Church once it had become the official religion of the Empire in the reign of Constantine (who died in 337). The anathematising of religious opponents, the punishments, for religious heresy, of exile, imprisonment, torture and death were unknown to the polytheistic mind-set of the 'pagans'; no Roman emperor, however brutal, was to launch a Crusade to match that of Innocent III against the Albigenses when, in the massacres of Bezier (1209) and the battle of Muret (1213), thousands of innocent cranks were put to the sword.

"Nero's cruelty to the Christians in the gardens of the Vatican at the dawn of the gentle age of Christendom has been seen ever afterwarrds in Christian tradition as the beginning of a religious persecution. It was nothing of the kind. The advantage of singling out the Christians for special blame after the fire consisted in their tiny numbers, in the fact that, as a sect, they were quite obscure. Few would feel aggrieved at their demise. Christian folk-legend has not been slow, in the intervening centuries, to build up Nero as a religious persecutor; nor is it any accident that the Bishops of Rome should have chosen to take up their residence on the supposed site of this hideous torture. But if a martyr is someone who dies for their faith then the victims of Neronian persecution were not martyrs. Jesus was in all likelihood a martyr - a man who died for his own particular vision of what it meant to be Jewish, and who was arraigned by the Roman governor as a troublemaker: 'the King of the Jews'. The human torches screaming in Nero's gardens were not martyrs in this sense.

"But Nero had given the Christian movement two vitally important priveleges: a public name and a number of dead, who could be seen instantaneously as martyrs. Any obscure group poised to play an important part on the world stage must thank, in retrospect, the ruling power that first bans, or drives into exile, or murders, some member of the sect. The magistrate who decreed that Lenin's brother should be hanged can have had no more idea that he was going to have an influence over world history. Similarly, Nero, with a theatricality of which only he would be capable, provided the Christians with a 'send-off' into the history books. Tacitus, ever eager for a florid example of cruelty in Nero's character, immortalised the scene for us, but this was caviar to the general; and it is only be the merest of accidents that Tacitus survives in the world at all. The Christian literature, by contrast, flourished from the beginning, and this is one of the most remarkable phenomena in the story. The fact, for example, that Nero had no religious motive whatsoever in wishing to make human torches out of the Christians in his garden pyrotechnics did not prevent their instant canonisation in the eyes of their coreligionists."

Toto

Hi Peter - good to see you.

The case for the reference to Christ in Tacitus being a forgery was made by Remsburg, discussed in Zindler's book at page 7. He points out that

• The passage was never quoted by the church fathers
  
• Tertullian discusses Nero and states that "Nero's cruel sword sowed the seed of Christian blood at Rome" but makes no reference to Tactus' tale of burning Christians
  
• Clement of Alexandria did not list Tacitus in his compilation of all of the recognitions of Christ made by pagan writers
  
• Origin did not mention this passage
  
• Eusebius cites all evidence of Christianity from Jewish and pagan sources, and does not mention Tacitus.
  
• No Christian writer quotes it before the 15th century, at which time only one copy existed, which it is claimed, was made in the 8th century, and which was in the possession of a Christian
  
• The works of Tacitus have not been preserved with any degree of fidelity.
  
• The blood-curdling story sounds like a medieval romance
  
• This story, in nearly the same words, is found in the writings of Sulpicius Severus in the 5th century. It is apparently modeled on the story of Galerius' burning of Nicomedia in 303 CE, and may have inspired a Christian forger to add it to Tacitus. (see also this lurid tale of Christian martyrdom.)
  
• Suetonius claims that Nero avoided killing people in his public entertainments, even condemned criminals.

The most favorable point in the argument in favor of authenticity is the critical language against Christianity ("abominable superstition"), but Remberg and Zindler seem to think that this is a clever forger who covered his tracks in this way.

See also here. Christian Humphries states:

All in all, the section in Tacitus seems rather thin as a source. It could be a forgery; if not a forgery, it could be generally unreliable or based on a rumor.

I think the strongest argument against relying on Tacitus is it does not appear that Christians were separate from Jews in the mid first century, so it is not clear how Nero's agents would have identified them to make them scapegoats. This casts doubt on the underlying incident.

Haran

Remsberg's list seems rather contrived to me... He has some interesting points, if true, but most of them are simply arguments from silence.

What kind of a bullet point is this? "Blood-curdling" stories were found all throughout historical works. There is no reason to think that the story is a medieval romance... This is probably Remsberg's silliest point. It seems to be more of a rhetorical ploy against evidence for Christianity than any sort of actual reason...

Seems like a convenient way to dismiss the story. A somewhat similar story from a later work was borrowed, reworded, and inserted in an earlier work. Unreasonable speculation at best.

This bullet point seems flat disingenuous to me. This paraphrase of Suetonius appears to be about one particular event from very early in Nero's reign when he seemed to have a better grip on himself and before he began his murderous streak:

Suetonius 6:12:
"Nero watched from the top of the proscenium. The gladiatorial show took place in a wooden theatre, near the Campus Martius, which had been built in less than a year; but no one was allowed to be killed during these combats, not even criminals."

In fact, there is a break of sorts that comes several sections after this that states the following:

Suetonius 6:19
"I have separated this catalogue of Nero's less atrocious acts - some deserving no criticism, some even praiseworth - from the others; but I must begin to list his follies and crimes."

After this break come many discriptions (and even a few before) of the evils Nero inflicted on those close to him and on the public. It would be hard to say that Nero would have any reservations about publicly executing Christians, who were probably not well liked in pagan cities anyway if we can judge by the comments of other ancient authors.


That is, if all you want to do is attempt to dismiss it as a possible source for ideological reasons, not even considering that it is possibly the truth...

According to Suetonius, the Christians could apparently be recognized:

Suetonius 6:16:
"During his [i.e. Nero's] reign.... Punishments were also inflicted on the Christians, a sect professing a new and mischievous religious belief...."

Of course, you can probably make many speculative claims about this also, like Remsberg did about Tacitus, that Suetonius was transmitted poorly and that this was a later insertion by an over-zealous Christian.

I think there is little reason (aside from weak speculation based on silence) for necessarily believing the passage in Tacitus to be a later forgery.

Finally, it is not a "myth" that ancient Christians were persecuted in many different ways (i.e. from burning of their holy books to death) before the time of Constantine. The persecutions were wide-spread throughout the empire, though probably sporatic. There are much better examples that I don't have the time to find, but Pliny the Younger, though he stated that he did not make an effort to seek out Christians would nonetheless execute those Christians that appeared before him who would not denounce Christianity and sacrifice to their idols. It just takes more study to realize that these persecutions did happen. The scale can perhaps be debated, but they are not "myth".

Haran

If you want some other "blood-curdling" stories of persecutions, I believe Eusebius wrote about some. However, since the stories were so incredibly "blood-curdling", one might have to consider the possibility that they were later medieval romantic stories inserted into Eusebius. :banghead:

Haran

Some of Stein's arguments not addressed in-depth by Lowder:

(2) there was not a multitude of Christians in Rome at that date;

I suppose this depends on what is meant by multitude. If one can trust Suetonius, there were enough Christians to be recognizable and get "punished".

(3) 'Christian' was not a common term in the first century;

Perhaps not common, but that does not mean the term was not used. Apparently the term "Christians" got a mention in Suetonius in the very section about Nero.

(4) Nero was indifferent to various religions in his city;

This does not seem to be the case according to Suetonius when considering Nero's "punishment" of "Christians" and the following which doesn't make it sound like he was very indifferent to various religions:

Suetonius 6:56
"He [i.e. Nero] despised all religious cults except that of the Syrian Goddess [i.e. Atargatis], and showed, one day, that he had changed his mind even about her, by urinating on the divine image. He had come, instead, to rest a supersitious belief...in the statuette of a girl sent him by an anonymous commoner as a charm against conspiracies. It so happened that a conspiracy came to light immediately afterwards; so he began to worship the girl as though she were a powerful goddess, and sacrificed to her three times a day, expecting people to believe that she gave him knowledge of the future."

(5) Nero did not start the fire in Rome;

Again, Suetonius seems to believe that Nero did start the fire. I suppose if one wanted to be petty, they could argue that "Nero's men" started the fire and caused the destruction. However, Suetonius and the people seemed to lay the blame squarely on Nero's shoulders:

Suetonius 6:38:
"Nero showed no greater mercy to the common folk, or to the very walls of Rome. Once, in the course of a general conversation, someone quoted the line, 'When I am dead, may fire consume the earth', but Nero said that the first part of the line should read, 'While I yet live,' and soon converted this fancy into fact. ....he [i.e. Nero] brazenly set fire to the city..."

It appears that Stein, Remsberg, and others never really read Suetonius or were simply skimming the texts for any quote that looked like it would support their theories (without respect to the entire context)...

spin

Suetonius was writing in the 120s, so he can't be considered primary evidence on the matter. It is important to note that

1) the text doesn't mention much other than the name ("Christians"), that they were punished and that they were involved in a superstition;

2) these Christians were in no were specified as connected to the fires (so either Tacitus or Suetonius has problematic information, or they don't have the full story -- but then that also allows that the information from both texts is plain wrong as well);

3) as the Tacitus citation is highly questionable, and neither Tacitus nor Suetonius are writers contemporary to the events, we acn conclude that no case can be based on such unsupported single testimonies.

When do you honestly think that the term "Christian" was first employed and by whom?

That's the problem using Suetonius as if it were a primary source. It simply isn't. Both Tacitus and Suetonius were paid to write their histories by enemies of the Julio-Claudian family. This explains why we have such a warped idea of many of the rulers. Both Caligula and Nero were well-loved by the populus.

There was an extended "smear" campaign against Nero who was not in Rome when the fire started, but who returned as quickly as possible to help fight the fire and was seen directly involved in such efforts. He simply didn't act like someone who wilfully started the fire.

Scholars have to read past the words and look at the indications that the writer doesn't hide. There is often still useful information in a partisan writer. The problem is extracting it.


spin

Haran

Why? We commonly rely on current historians to tell us the details of what happened only a half century ago. Why can they get the story right? Because there are eye-witnesses still alive who can give them the stories. Who are the historians closer to the events? I cannot remember if there are any at the moment. If there aren't any, then these guys are who we have always had to rely on for this information. Numerous reputable and scholarly books make reference to Nero's burning of Rome and blaming it on Christians.

Besides, Tacitus wrote about the same time as Suetonius. If one knew of Christians, the other more than likely did.

Pliny the Younger also wrote of Christians at about the same time as Tacitus and Suetonius. He wrote to Trajan as if he would know about them... The evidence of "Christians" as a recognizable group just kind of piles up.

It is ridiculous, in my opinion, to hold that no one knew of Christians. Whether they knew much about them is another matter.

So both texts are now wrong? :banghead:

The Tacitus citation does not seem "highly questionable" to me. In fact, wasn't Lowder (an Atheist) defending its authenticity? Methinks that those who find the citation highly questionable are doing so mainly based on the desire to remove as much support as possible from Christianity. Look around. You can find some scholar who will deny just about everything that has to do with Christianity. If something supports Christianity or supports the support for Christianity, it is called a forgery to shed doubt on it. Your point number 2 is exactly the way this works. One provides evidence to back a point, and doubt is immediately cast on the evidence for the evidence. I suppose that Pliny the Younger's citation about Christians is a later interpolation as well? I would imagine one can find some scholar who think both the Suetonius and Pliny citations are forgeries as well if that fits with ones ideological stance. Where does this reductio ad absurdum stop?

I have not researched this in-depth, so I cannot say for sure. With all the evidence from ancient authors from approximately the time of the emperor Trajan, I would say that they were definitely a recognizable group labeled "Christians". Before this, I am not sure what the evidence is.

This seems like another convenient way to simply dismiss the evidence at hand....simply speculate that they would not have told the truth. What is your source that they were both paid by "the enemies of the Julio-Claudian family"?

What is your evidence for this claim? I do not believe this was the case. They both did horrible things to the public in general. Some may have loved them, but many did not. I think they got their bad reputations and lived such a short time before being assasinated because they were evil and cruel leaders.

So is Tacitus a reliable source for you or not? You seem to be using him here. I don't believe Suetonius says that Nero was gone. Suetonius has him actually starting the fire. Perhaps he left and came back after his henchmen had done the rest of the job. Perhaps Nero let the story get out that he was gone and Tacitus bought it while Suetonius had a source that knew better... Who knows. Regardless, they both report the fire and blame it on Nero.

I agree, but I also think that others think that writers were hiding things when they were not, especially when it is with respect to Christian evidence (as can be shown by the many scholars to call some part or other of the Bible a forgery - if they find it disagreeable to their theories, then just cast doubt on it any way possilbe, that's all).

Amaleq13

Peter,


I tend to accept the passage as authentic but I don't find the arguments claiming it is based on written records credible.


I have to admit that I am not familiar with Tacitus beyond this reference to Christianity but it seems to me that this is a circular argument unless we know that he always identified gossip or always identified written sources. Your comment on Goguel’s point suggests otherwise (i.e. “normally”) so I don’t see how we can assume that the absence of ‘dicunt’ or ‘ferunt’ is necessarily meaningful. For all we know, Tacitus only included those terms when he doubted the truth of the claim. If he didn’t consistently identify written sources, it seems circular to assume that an absence of any identifiers can be considered conclusive (i.e. Goguel’s “must”).



Keep up the excellent work!