Freethought & Rationalism Archive

neilgodfrey · 07-20-2008, 02:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

IF Tacitus' claims about why Nero persecuted Christians were not widely or generally known, then I don't think Christians would have wanted to publicise them.

Andrew Criddle

But Tacitus nowhere blames the Christians for starting the fire. He says it was caused either by accident or by Nero himself:

From the old Thomas Gordon translation:

Quote:

There followed a dreadful calamity, but whether merely fortuitous, or by the execrable contrivance of the Prince, is not determined; for both are by authors asserted . . .

and accuses Nero of setting up the Christians as scapegoats because of the widespread suspicion that he himself was the one responsible for the fire:

Quote:

But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the Prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the Gods, availed to acquit Nero from the hideous charge, which was still universally believed, that by him the conflagration was authorized. Hence to suppress the prevailing rumour, he transferred the guilt upon fictitious criminals, and subjected to most exquisite tortures, and doomed to executions singularly cruel those people who, for their detestable crimes were already in truth universally abhorred, and known to the vulgar by the name of Christians.

Tacitus effectively says the Christians (however much he disliked them) were innocent victims of Nero's tyranny. This seems to me a passage screaming out for use by the Church Fathers and Apologists. "Even their own historian, Tacitus, testifies that we Christians are the innocent victims of unjust Emperors!"

Neil

andrewcriddle · 07-20-2008, 03:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilgodfrey

But Tacitus nowhere blames the Christians for starting the fire. He says it was caused either by accident or by Nero himself:

From the old Thomas Gordon translation:

Quote:

There followed a dreadful calamity, but whether merely fortuitous, or by the execrable contrivance of the Prince, is not determined; for both are by authors asserted . . .

and accuses Nero of setting up the Christians as scapegoats because of the widespread suspicion that he himself was the one responsible for the fire:

Quote:

But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the Prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the Gods, availed to acquit Nero from the hideous charge, which was still universally believed, that by him the conflagration was authorized. Hence to suppress the prevailing rumour, he transferred the guilt upon fictitious criminals, and subjected to most exquisite tortures, and doomed to executions singularly cruel those people who, for their detestable crimes were already in truth universally abhorred, and known to the vulgar by the name of Christians.

Tacitus effectively says the Christians (however much he disliked them) were innocent victims of Nero's tyranny. This seems to me a passage screaming out for use by the Church Fathers and Apologists. "Even their own historian, Tacitus, testifies that we Christians are the innocent victims of unjust Emperors!"

Neil

The Gordon translation is classed by Church and Brodribb as a complete failure
The Latin for the passage in which Nero accuses the Christians is
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin...out=&loc=15.44

Quote:

sed non ope humana, non largitionibus principis aut deum placamentis decedebat infamia quin iussum incendium crederetur. ergo abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos et quaesitissimis poenis adfecit quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Christianos appellabat.

Church and Brodribb
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin...out=&loc=15.44

Quote:

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

Although I agree that Tacitus does not say that the Christians were really guilty, the Gordon translation overemphasises their innocence.

Andrew Criddle

aa5874 · 07-20-2008, 03:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

This is an extremely weak suggestion. Chistians were accused of being atheists and cannibals and the early so-called Christian writers made mention of these accusations in their writing.

That's a good point.

However in those cases, Christian writers were trying to refute current widespread beliefs about them.

IF Tacitus' claims about why Nero persecuted Christians were not widely or generally known, then I don't think Christians would have wanted to publicise them.

Andrew Criddle

But, your suggestion or clarification is just as weak. You are just imagining things. The Christians that Tacitus mentioned cannot be ascertained to be followers or believers in Jesus. You are just making assumptions after assumptions to suit what appears to be a prioiri belief.

So why would Christians not refute a claim that they were arsonists? And why would not other Christians know that Nero persecuted Christians as arsonists when the persecution involved the ultimate penalty of death?

Another explanation MAY BE that the passage 15.44 was interpolated or that the "Christians" mentioned were NOT believers of Jesus, i.e, NOT Jesus Christians.

EarlDoherty · 07-20-2008, 04:09 PM

Hello Simon,

You went off on a tangent in responding to my answer to your question. The comparison I made with Josephus' Testimonium was an opening remark, meant only to note the simple fact that it wasn't mentioned by early Christian writers any more than Tacitus' Annals passage was. Any differences between the two cases is beside the point. I did not use Josephus in any way to argue my point about Tacitus. It was simply an observation of a commonality of silence.

In the course of doing that, you completely ignored my answer to you. You originally asked me what reason early Christian writers would have had to mention the Tacitus passage, implying that there wasn't any. I gave one to you: that all the Fathers were concerned with, many of them fixated on, the persecution of Christians in the early centuries, and this would have been one fundamental reason why they would have noted and talked about the Tacitus account of the Neronian persecution. You did not address my answer to your question at all.

Your comment that Jesus was not respected enough to warrant mention by pagan writers seems irrelevant to the discussion. I don't see why you brought it up.

Tertullian does not mention the Neronian persecution a la Tacitus. Not only is the term "histories" not that specific (see below), you haven't taken the context into account. As well, his description of what Nero did is too vague, and what he does have in mind by it can be seen in other passages in his writings (see below).

When I posted my OP, I mentioned that I might include other parts of my Tacitus chapter in the course of this thread to answer points that came up. Obviously, this is one of them. One often encounters the claim that Tertullian's "consult your histories" remark is a clear indication that he had read Tacitus' Annals 15:44 and was referring to it. I think that is anything but the case.

Quote:

Tertullian

Tertullian is a case in point. His Apology (written around the year 200) is one great rant against the injustice of Roman hatred and persecution of the Christians. As we shall see later, in Chapter II he dissects Pliny’s letter to Trajan on the subject. Yet no such attention is given to the Tacitus passage. Now, there is a remark in Chapter V which might be taken—and has been—as an allusion to it. It is worth looking at the context of the remark (in bold):

Quote:

“Tiberius, accordingly, in whose days the Christian name made its entry into the world, having himself received intelligence from Palestine of events which had clearly shown the truth of Christ’s divinity, brought the matter before the senate, with his own decision in favor of Christ. The senate, because it had not given the approval itself, rejected his proposal. Caesar held to his opinion, threatening wrath against all accusers of the Christians. Consult your histories; you will there find that Nero was the first who assailed with the imperial sword the Christian sect, making progress then especially at Rome. But we glory in having our condemnation hallowed by the hostility of such a wretch. For any one who knows him, can understand that not except as being of singular excellence did anything bring on it Nero’s condemnation. Domitian, too, a man of Nero’s type in cruelty, tried his hand at persecution; but as he had something of the human in him, he soon put an end to what he had begun, even restoring again those whom he had banished."

The opening remarks about Tiberius, if it is not an oral legend, may relate to a Christian document known by Tertullian, one which would have had no basis in reality and was probably part of a complex of forgeries in the latter 2nd century of alleged letters and reports from Pilate to the emperor on the subject of Jesus’ crucifixion. Justin is the first to witness to such things in his Apology 48, although some scholars suggest that his “Acts of Pilate” may be simply a product of his own wishful thinking. But is Tertullian’s succeeding reference liable to be anything different? What are the “histories” that he urges his pagan reader to consult? We should note that the word for “histories” here is “commentarios” which may be better translated as “records,” whereas when he elsewhere refers directly to Tacitus’ works he calls them “historiae,” thus calling into question that he has in mind here the Annals of Tacitus. It could be no more than the same sort of ‘record’ he has just described about Tiberius, which is to say, a Christian fabrication which he assumes the Romans have a copy of. Such is indicated when later in the Apology (ch.21) he declares that the Romans also have “in your archives” an account of the world darkness at the crucifixion. This is perhaps another reference to a communication from Pilate, a circulating forgery in Christian communities. Or, he could simply be presuming that documentary records of all these things exist even if they do not, somewhat in the manner of Justin. The “records” Tertullian refers to which supposedly contain the history of the Neronian persecution may have had no more substance than the report of the darkness or the efforts of Tiberius to champion Christ’s divinity. To recommend these fantasies to the pagan shows the height of naivete to which early Christian apologists attained.

However, we are still left with his silence on the Tacitean passage itself. Only a few chapters earlier, he has taken apart Pliny’s letter to Trajan, waxing furiously and bitterly about the injustices and contradictions in the Roman policy toward Christians at that time. Why did he not do the same for Tacitus, with its much more lurid and offensive descriptions of the horrors and injustices inflicted on the Christians, in language that rivaled Tertullian’s own? It is almost inconceivable that he would not be led to discuss it directly. As for what he does say, referring to Nero being the first “who assailed with the imperial sword the Christian sect,” this may well be limited to the legendary executions of Peter and Paul. In fact, that is precisely what he conveys in his Scorpiace (ch.15):

Quote:

“We read the lives of the Caesars: At Rome Nero was the first who stained with blood the rising faith. Then is Peter girt by another, when he is made fast to the cross. Then does Paul obtain a birth suited to Roman citizenship, when in Rome he springs to life again ennobled by martyrdom. Wherever I read of these occurrences, so soon as I do so I learn to suffer; nor does it signify to me which I follow as teachers of martyrdom, whether the declarations or the deaths of the apostles, save that in their deaths I recall their declarations also.”

The reference to “lives of the Caesars” would seem to be a reference to Suetonius, and perhaps that work is what he had in mind in the above quote about “consult your histories.” But Suetonius, in his brief reference to “punishment” of the Christians, had given no specifics, and Tertullian’s only example of those whom Nero “stained with blood” are Peter and Paul, an example formed by Christian legend. He speaks of the “teachers of martyrdom,” but these for him are limited to the apostles. Had he been familiar with Tacitus, he would have had many more dramatic examples and teachers to present.

In De Praescriptione (On Prescription Against Heretics), ch.36, Tertullian praises the apostolic churches of the empire. When he gets to Rome itself, he eulogizes its heritage in blood:

Quote:

“How happy is its church, on which apostles poured forth all their doctrine along with their blood! Where Peter endures a passion like his Lord’s! Where Paul wins his crown in a death like John’s! Where the Apostle John was first plunged, unhurt, into boiling oil, and then remitted to his island-exile!”

This passage alone, with its silence on any martyrs beyond the apostles, should demonstrate that Tertullian knows of no general persecution of Christians under Nero.

Tertullian also refers to a persecution under Domitian, showing that he was capable of highlighting general persecutions beyond that of individual apostles, though scholars today doubt a Domitian persecution entirely or else view it as having been low-key and sporadic (see below). In any case, Tertullian is a prime illustration of the Christian obsession with persecution, which raises the question of why no one before the end of the 4th century offered any comment reflecting the dramatic account in Tacitus.

Later in the chapter, I point out that Eusebius is also not only silent on the Tacitus passage as well, he too, like Tertullian, focuses on a persecution by Nero which relates only to the apostles Peter and Paul, again entirely dependent on Christian legend, and not to any general slaughter of Christians in Rome. In neither Eusebius nor Tertullian is there any indication that they have knowledge of Annals 15:44, or indeed of any tradition that Christians had been accused of setting the great fire and suffered persecution on that account.

Earl Doherty

neilgodfrey · 07-20-2008, 04:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Although I agree that Tacitus does not say that the Christians were really guilty, the Gordon translation overemphasises their innocence.

Andrew Criddle

Fair enough. That was the only one I could find online, and I'm happy to ditch it for your translation, or the Michael Grant translation that I am familiar with, but need to type out myself. If this is also wanting, I'm happy to be informed. (I concede his choice of "scapegoats" is very likely contextual.)

Quote:

Disaster followed. Whether it was accidental or caused by the emperor's criminal act is uncertain -- both versions have supporters.

Quote:

To suppress this rumour, Nero fabricated scapegoats -- and punished with every refinement the notoriously depraved Christians (as they were popularly called).

And he continues by asserting that popular opinion, however much it detested the Christians as Christians, also acknowledged their innocence:

Quote:

Despite their guilt as Christians, and the ruthless punishment it deserved, the victims were pitied. For it was felt that they were being sacrificed to one man's brutality rather than to the national interest.

Neil

andrewcriddle · 07-21-2008, 11:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilgodfrey

Fair enough. That was the only one I could find online, and I'm happy to ditch it for your translation, or the Michael Grant translation that I am familiar with, but need to type out myself. If this is also wanting, I'm happy to be informed. (I concede his choice of "scapegoats" is very likely contextual.)

Quote:

To suppress this rumour, Nero fabricated scapegoats -- and punished with every refinement the notoriously depraved Christians (as they were popularly called).

fabricated scapegoats corresponds to subdidit reos. reos on a literal translation should be culprits. The real problem is subdidit which has a range of meanings from substitute to substitute falsely to counterfeit. So IIIUC fabricated scapegoats is a perfectly possible rendering but so is the weaker substituted other culprits

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilgodfrey

And he continues by asserting that popular opinion, however much it detested the Christians as Christians, also acknowledged their innocence:

Quote:

Despite their guilt as Christians, and the ruthless punishment it deserved, the victims were pitied. For it was felt that they were being sacrificed to one man's brutality rather than to the national interest.

Neil

IMHO popular opinion is represented as objecting to the indiscriminate sadism of Nero rather than holding that the Christians were entirely innocent.

Andrew Criddle

andrewcriddle · 07-21-2008, 12:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

Quote:

Tertullian

.................................................. ........................................
Tertullian also refers to a persecution under Domitian, showing that he was capable of highlighting general persecutions beyond that of individual apostles, though scholars today doubt a Domitian persecution entirely or else view it as having been low-key and sporadic (see below). In any case, Tertullian is a prime illustration of the Christian obsession with persecution, which raises the question of why no one before the end of the 4th century offered any comment reflecting the dramatic account in Tacitus.

Later in the chapter, I point out that Eusebius is also not only silent on the Tacitus passage as well, he too, like Tertullian, focuses on a persecution by Nero which relates only to the apostles Peter and Paul, again entirely dependent on Christian legend, and not to any general slaughter of Christians in Rome. In neither Eusebius nor Tertullian is there any indication that they have knowledge of Annals 15:44, or indeed of any tradition that Christians had been accused of setting the great fire and suffered persecution on that account.

Earl Doherty

Hi Earl

Eusebius certainly knew I Clement http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1010.htm which after describing the martyrdom of Peter and Paul goes on

Quote:

To these men [Peter and Paul] who spent their lives in the practice of holiness, there is to be added a great multitude of the elect, who, having through envy endured many indignities and tortures, furnished us with a most excellent example. Through envy, those women, the Danaids and Dircæ, being persecuted, after they had suffered terrible and unspeakable torments, finished the course of their faith with steadfastness, and though weak in body, received a noble reward.

This presumably refers to other Christians killed together with Peter and Paul.
Hence I think it most unlikely that Eusebius saw the persecution by Nero as confined to Peter and Paul. In fact Eusebius explicitly attests (Book 3 chapter 30) to the martyrdom of Peter's wife presumably just before Peter was killed.

Andrew Criddle

Roger Pearse · 07-21-2008, 11:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Hi Roger thanks for this.

One point: in the part I think you may have inadvertently got a heading mixed up with the main text (the phrase I've bolded) I would translate

Quote:

Paulinus has copied from Tacitus' 13th and 14th and 15th book of the "Annals", (and at the same time emphasized in the Mediceus II by marginal notes), those passages which

Ah! I knew something was wrong there but my eyeballs were crossing with tiredness and I couldn't work out why I had a problem. Thanks for fixing that, and for posting that stuff in the first place. Always interesting to hear about such things.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

EarlDoherty · 07-22-2008, 10:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Andrew

Eusebius certainly knew I Clement http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1010.htm which after describing the martyrdom of Peter and Paul goes on

Quote:

To these men [Peter and Paul] who spent their lives in the practice of holiness, there is to be added a great multitude of the elect, who, having through envy endured many indignities and tortures, furnished us with a most excellent example. Through envy, those women, the Danaids and Dircæ, being persecuted, after they had suffered terrible and unspeakable torments, finished the course of their faith with steadfastness, and though weak in body, received a noble reward.

This presumably refers to other Christians killed together with Peter and Paul.
Hence I think it most unlikely that Eusebius saw the persecution by Nero as confined to Peter and Paul. In fact Eusebius explicitly attests (Book 3 chapter 30) to the martyrdom of Peter's wife presumably just before Peter was killed.

A reference to Peter's wife being killed along with him doesn't really speak to a multitude of Christians being martyred. It is simply an expansion on the legend of Peter and Paul's death at Nero's hands. And it still doesn't explain why Eusebius makes no specific reference to the Neronian persecution as presented by Tacitus, regardless of what we might think to 'infer' from his knowledge of other writings.

(We see a similar expansion in the Acts of Paul in which Paul's martyrdom account includes certain people who admit to being Christians along with him, but there is no general martyrdom of Christians and no mention of the Great Fire accusation. Nero has those Christians burned with fire because Paul has made a rash prediction to Nero about Christ destroying the world by fire.)

As far as 1 Clement is concerned, that 'inference' based on Eusebius' knowledge of this letter depends on how you interpret it. I happen to have a different take on that passage (chapters 5 into 6), and I'll post the section in my Tacitus chapter on it:

Quote:

Epistle of Clement

It is sometimes claimed that the epistle 1 Clement, evidently written in the 90s of the first century, refers obliquely to the Neronian persecution. After the writer has spoken of Peter and Paul in chapter 5, he goes on in chapter 6 to say: “To these men with their holy lives was gathered a great multitude of the chosen, who were the victims of jealousy and offered among us the fairest example in their endurance under many indignities and tortures.” He speaks of women “suffering terrible and unholy indignities,” who “steadfastly finished the course of faith and received a noble reward” (translated by K. Lake, in the Loeb Classical Library).

This is woolly language which fails to speak explicitly of death and execution. But it follows on similar language which has been applied even to Peter and Paul. While chapter 5 is often appealed to as early evidence of those apostles’ martyrdom in Rome, the text does anything but tell us that. Verse 4, for example, is frustratingly vague: “Peter, who because of unrighteous jealousy suffered not one or two but many trials, and having thus given his testimony went to the glorious place which was his due.” Neither is Paul explicitly said to have been martyred in Rome, but simply “passed out of this world (after) bearing his testimony before kings and rulers.” (And this from a writer who is supposed to be speaking from Rome itself.) In fact, it is not even explicitly stated that they were martyred. Verse 2 says that they “were persecuted and contended until death” (ediōxthēsan kai heōs thanatou ēthlēsan). Another translation (by Staniforth, in the Penguin Early Christian Writers) renders the clause, “and had to keep up the struggle till death ended their days.” In this document from the turn of the 2nd century, a hundred years before Tertullian, not even a firm tradition about the deaths of Peter and Paul seems to have been established.

It is thus difficult to feel any confidence with those who regard the opening of chapter 6 as a reference to a Neronian persecution. It is not even clear that the “great multitude of the elect” that were “gathered” to Peter and Paul and suffered persecution as well did so at the same time. The author may simply be referring to subsequent persecutions in general since the days of those apostles’ experiences. Staniforth, in fact, renders it along such lines: “Besides these men of saintly life, there are many more of the elect who have undergone hardships and torments instigated by jealousy…”

Ben C Smith · 07-22-2008, 11:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

And it still doesn't explain why Eusebius makes no specific reference to the Neronian persecution as presented by Tacitus.

No novel explanation is necessary; the usual one will do. Eusebius simply offers us very little in the way of references to Latin literature, while his references to Greek literature are profuse. Refer to Andrew Carriker, The Library of Eusebius of Caesarea, page 312.

Even Tertullian he knew in a poor Greek translation (which happens to have botched the very line that Eusebius quotes from Tertullian that most clearly refers to a general persecution under Nero).

Ben.

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