jbarntt

HI Jeffrey,

Temples being built depends on whether they were built in the emperors lifetime and whether they were in the eastern part of the empire.

Deification was a posthumous honor granted by the senate and does not mean that that body considered the dead emperor a god. It is true that that there was a cult of emperor worship, esp. in the east because these people were used to thinking of kings as gods. Not surprisingly emperors took advantage of this.

You might note that not all emperors were deified. Also it is important to understand that the reasons for deification have to do with ancient Roman religious practice, and that that practice bears little resemblance to what we would today call "religion".

To be deified meant that the emperor was an honored member of the family, the empire being the family writ large. Decades before the empire Cicero said that "religion is the foundation of the state" and he did not mean what we might think now about such a statement. "Religion" is a Latin word and meant something different to them than it does to us.

Find out about this and you will change your simple minded idea about emperor worship.

Jeffrey Gibson

Did I ever say it did?

Perhaps while I'm finding this out, you'd do us the kindness of actually answering the question I asked you in my previous message, but which, notably, you dodged in the above, of what the nature and extent of your contact with primary sources about, and scholarship on, the Imperial Cult in both East (where Christianity was born) and West (where it took hold) actually is.

What actually is it that that informs your claims not only about emperor deification and the nature and character and beliefs of the Imperial Cult, but that my idea about emperor worship (have I actually expressed one?) is "simple minded"?

Jeffrey

Jaltus

Of course there were cults in the Roman provinces dedicated to the emperor. Both Julius and Octavian had temples in Rome.

You have a point in that religion was inherently political (or is that politics was inherently religious?). Well, either way religion was an arm of politics in Rome itself, often used to enhance standing and get patrons in order to support one's political cause. The emperors that were not deified typically suffered from lack of heirs or popularity. If lack of heirs, then the person who followed would not want to deify the previous ruler simply because it would undercut their own rule. If there was a blood connection, the new emperor would deify the previous (see Kenneth Scott, The Imperial Cult Under the Flavians and Elias bickermann, "die romische Kaiserapotheose" in Romischer Kaiserkult).

To be deified was to be given the honors of the gods. Martial went so far as to say the gods worshiped the emperors (Epigrams 8.4 and 9.64.6).