Tyro

Christians have since long been claiming that the Roman emperor Septimus Severus c. 202 forbade Roman citizens, or even anyone, to become Christians. This view seems founded on two sentences in Historia Augusta, translated to "He forbade conversion to Judaism under heavy penalties and enacted a similar law in regard to the Christians." (Loeb Classical Edition 1921) - in Latin "Iudaeos fieri sub gravi poena vetuit. idem etiam de Christianis sanxit."

What do you all think about the "edict of Septimus Severus"? Was it really in
effect?

andrewcriddle

I agree that the Historia Augusta is an unreliable source, both in general, and about Christianity in particular. However we do have other evidence of organised persecution of Christians under Septimus Severus. Origen's father Leonides was a victim.

Andrew Criddle

Toto

The Manual of Christian Archeology (or via: amazon.co.uk) By Orazio Marucchi (Google Books) has some discussion starting at p. 42.

Edicts of the time were sometimes mere proclamations and were not enforced. The evidence seems to be in favor of some sort of restrictions on Christians at the time, at least in some areas of the Empire.

Roger Pearse

Tertullian tells us, in the Apologeticum (ca. 194), that the pagans sneered "non licet esse vos" -- "you are not allowed to exist." He himself was in danger of arrest (intro to Scorpiace). Some 15 years later he writes an open letter to the proconsul, Tertullus Scapula (Ad Scapulam) suggesting that his policy of persecution was unwise and dangerous to any who pursued.

I seem to recall T.D.Barnes in his Tertullian: A literary and historical study (Oxford, 1971) saying "Christianity was illegal, and its illegality was reaffirmed by every emperor of the second and third centuries." (I hope I have remembered that correctly). But enforcement of this was at the discretion of the proconsul, which might be erratic.

Early apologists directed their pleas to the emperor; Tertullian was the first to recognise that the real decision was made by the local authorities, and directed his Apologeticum accordingly.

Lactantius tells us in his Divine Institutes that book 7 of Ulpian's De officiis proconsularis (On the duties of the proconsul) specified the penalties and punishments appropriate to inflict on Christians.

Trajan tells Pliny the Younger not to hunt out Christians or listen to informers; but to punish those found. Tertullian (in the Apologeticum) derides the logic of this; if Christianity is as terrible as the media of the day pretend, if Christians eat babies etc, why is it OK to leave them be; and if it is OK to leave them be, for what are they being punished, other than a name?

So this would be the background for any edict. That said... the Augustan History is a 4th century document, and although it contains much true information it is not reliable. I don't know if there is any evidence that Severus made any change in the legal position of the Christians.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

mountainman

The edict is highly conjectural, very much like the conversion
of the Roman Emperoro Philip the Arab to Christianity about
the same time, in order to celebrate one thousand years
of the founding of Rome.

Huon

Septimius Severus (193-211)
Philip the Arab (244-249)