Huon

During the reign of Augustus (31-17 BCE) the old Roman religion was already in its decline. Augustus thought that the ancient rites would be a factor of unification of the Empire. He rebuilt 82 temples, forced some daughters of the senators to become Vestals, enforced the cult of Apollo, who had helped him in winning at Actium against Anthony (so he believed). He forbade the cult of Isis in 21-20 BCE. (Well, Isis and Cleopatra were Egyptians… but this interdiction could not give him the support of the priests of Isis and their fidels).

Later, the cult of the emperors absorbed some features of the oriental cults. Caius Caligula (37-41 CE) built a temple of Isis (Isaeum) in the center of Rome. Nero (54-68 CE) saw himself as the representative (possibly the incarnation) of Helios (the Sun), as were the egyptian pharaohs. This was possible because Rome was at that time a mixed town, with many Oriental people. The Sun could be a common god to many religious people, with many different names. And the Sun could become the god of a monolatry (worship of only one important god, even if there are many smaller gods). However, the cult of Sol Invictus (Undefeated sun) is not a personal cult, where the believer can be in direct contact with the god, but a collective cult. And, the deification of the emperor can also be seen as a devaluation of the true gods !

Huon

from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism

Achaemenid era (648–330 BCE) : Zoroastrianism developed the abstract concepts of heaven, hell, personal and final judgement, all of which are only alluded to in the Gathas. Yasna 19 (which has only survived in a Sassanid era (226–650 CE) Zend commentary on the Ahuna Vairya invocation), prescribes a Path to Judgement known as the Chinvat Peretum or Chinvat bridge (cf: As-Sirāt in Islam), which all souls had to cross, and judgement (over thoughts, words, deeds performed during a lifetime) was passed as they were doing so. However, the Zoroastrian personal judgement is not final. At the end of time, when evil is finally defeated, all souls will be ultimately reunited with their Fravashi. Thus, Zoroastrianism can be said to be a universalist religion with respect to salvation.

Zoroastrianism could not be accepted by the Roman empire, because it was the religion of the Persian empire.

Huon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithras

Mithraism reached the apogee of its popularity around the 3rd through 4th centuries, when it was particularly popular among the soldiers of the Roman Empire. Mithraism disappeared from overt practice after the Theodosian decree of 391 banned all pagan rites, and it apparently became extinct thereafter.

Evaluation of the relationship of early Christianity with Mithraism has traditionally been based on the polemical testimonies of the 2nd century Church fathers, such as Justin's accusations that the Mithraists were diabolically imitating the Christians. This led to a picture of rivalry between the two religions, which Ernest Renan summarized in his 1882 The Origins of Christianity by saying "if the growth of Christianity had been arrested by some mortal malady, the world would have been Mithraic." This characterization of Mithraism and Christianity as "deadly rivals" became mainstream in the early 20th century with Cumont's endorsement, but was later criticized as too sweeping. Martin (1989) characterizes the rivalry between 3rd century Mithraism and Christianity in Rome as primarily one for real estate in the public areas of urban Rome.

http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-01/...m#P3596_621006

The First Apology of Justin

Chapter LXVI.-Of the Eucharist.
And this food is called among us Eu0xaristi/a143 [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh.144 For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when He had given thanks, said, "This do ye in remembrance of Me,145 this is My body; "and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, "This is My blood; "and gave it to them alone. Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done. For, that bread and a cup of water are placed with certain incantations in the mystic rites of one who is being initiated, you either know or can learn.

Another point about Mithraism : the corridas can be seen as ceremonies where a bull is sacrificed, which was one of the ceremonies of Mithraism !

Huon

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manichaeism

The Manichaean faith was also widely persecuted. Mani was martyred by the Persian religious establishment in 277 CE, which ironically helped to spread the sect widely. In 291, persecution arose in the Persian empire with the murder of the apostle Sisin by Bahram II, and the slaughtering of many Manichaeans. In 296 CE, Diocletian decreed against the Manichaeans: "We order that their organizers and leaders be subject to the final penalties and condemned to the fire with their abominable scriptures.", resulting in numerous martyrs in Egypt and North Africa. In 381 CE Christians requested Theodosius I to strip Manichaeans of their civil rights. He issued a decree of death for Manichaean monks in 382 CE.

Malachi151

Aside from what I mentioned about the importance of the Gospels, there are a few other factors that have to be taken into account to explain why those Gospels and that religion became popular.

I see it as a two fold issue.

#1) Why did it become adopted by the social elite, various scholars, statements, emperors, etc.

#2) Why did it become popular among the masses.

I think that there are two largely different reasons here.

#1) It the educated people that it did become popular among (and this certainly wasn't all educated people by any means) had largely to do with the fact that it was such a written religion, that followed relatively ordered patterns. Extremely important in all of this was the idea of prophecy, which the Romans were obsessed with and which the Christian scholars believed that they had found proof positive of in the Hebrew and Gospel scritpures.

The idea for educated people, including statement and emperors, that positive evidence had been found which proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Hebrew scriptures were prophetic had a profound and huge impact.

A lot of the discussion among the elite revolved around the idea that this religion was "proven" to be true because one could simply show that things which were written "thousands of years ago" had come true and been fulfilled by "Jesus", all of this based on the fact that passages in the Gospel "fulfill" "prophecies" that were written in the Hebrew scritpures. The reality, of course, is that the Gospel writers simply based their stories on the Hebrew scritpures.

#2) As for the masses though, what made Christianity appealing was what came to be the relevance of its message and the social movements that were taking place.

I view the rise of Christianity as something very similar to the first Communist revolution.

It was largely part of a mass movement of a growing underclass that was opposed to the ruling elite and the status quo.

Most of the Roman, Greek, etc., religions were state religions that ultimately served the interests of state and of the ruling families. These religions were highly corrupt, and the ruling elite knew that they were corrupt and everyone else knew it too.

The values of these religion were also based on the values of a thriving and dominant and successful culture, but the values of Judaism and Christianity were based on the values of an oppressed and unsuccessful culture.

As a result, what you find in Judaism, and by proxy Christianity, is a lot of attention paid to the weakest members of society and to the poor and the homeless, and the out casts, etc. These are the general hallmarks of a religion that is created by poor, oppressed, outcast people.

Well, during the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th centuries the Roman empire suffered major economic declines and social problem became rampant and people no longer felt secure in the power of their state and the traditional "pagan" religions, built on the mindset of powerful and dominant cultures, were no longer relevant to the issued that many people faced.

Now that increasing numbers of people in the Roman empire were becoming oppressed, a religion created by oppressed people had more appeal.

Likewise, on the political front, Christianity became a way of overthrowing the status quo and overthrowing long time entrenched political families.

When you look at the laws that were written in the 4th-6th centuries, what you see is that they made it so that only Christians could pass on inheritance, only Christian could own certain property, only Christians could effectively own slaves, only Christians could engage in certain business.

The result was a massive redistribution of wealth and transfer of property from the long-time ruling and elite families to the Roman state and the Church and to new families.

This was much like the Communist revolution, where large amounts of property were transfered from private ownership into state collectives, and largely Catholic Church collectives.

This had major mass appeal among the poor, and became a political tool for undermining the entrenched political families.

If you were an emperor or governor, then, you wanted to become Christian in order to protect your wealth,and you wanted to write and enforce these laws as a way of undermining your political enemies.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Malachi,

Yes, the better analogy than Mozart would be James Bond. Why are there still James Bond movies being made while hundreds of other secret agents have disappeared from movie and novel serials. Perhaps it is the combination of machismo attitude, special effects, toys and pin-up sexuality that makes it attractive to teenage boys. They have been a key movie market demographic for the last fifty years.

In the same way, Christianity has been marketed to wealthy aged widows who enjoy its anti-sexual, yet romantic (love-thy-neighbor) morality, sophisticated costumes and eloquent ceremonies. By marketing towards wealthy widows over the last eighteen hundred years, each individual church assures itself of free secreterial, advertising and cleaning help, constant weekly contributions, and big windfalls when the prime market customers die off. The widows also relate well to the character of the dead/risen "son," Jesus Christ, as many of them have sons who have died or now ignor them. They like to think of him as their own only,loving, and obedient son.

One might also examine many Churches' secondary marketing to repressed gay males. It is from this pool that the churches gets many of their best and most skillful ideological workers (not to mention great architects and interior decorators).

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

No Robots

For an opposing viewpoint, see Klausner, "The Character of Jesus and the Secret of his Influence":

The contradictory traits in his character, its positive and negative aspects, his harshness and his gentleness, his clear vision combined with his cloudy visionariness—all these united to make him a force and an influence, for which history has never yet afforded a parallel.

douglas

So, you are saying that Paul's ministry and letters had little to no impact on the gospels themselves? I think we have to draw at least some connection between Paul and the four cannonical gospels.

What do you think of this statement? If Paul had not existed, the gospels would not have been written, and therefore Chrisitinity would not exist today.

Toto

<smacks head> It is all so clear now!

No Robots

Yup. Grandes dames and nancy boys. And I didn't even see it comin'.