Persecution. NERONIAN OR FIRST PERSECUTION. A.D. 64. 87 Cause of the During the reigns of Tiberius and Claudius, Christianity passed unmolested, and almost unnoticed by the Roman government. At Rome itself no tumult, such as occurred in the provinces, had attracted the attention of the government to it. In the provinces, too, the interference of the civil magistrate had been generally exercised to protect the innocent victims of popular prejudice. Whatever may be thought of the tradition, that Tiberius proposed to the Senate the enrolment of Christ amongst the deities of the empire, it is certain that no encouragement was given by the emperor further to indulge the Jews in their malice, in consequence of Pilate's report of the crucifixion, and of the subsequent proceedings of his followers. The procurator ended his days in disgrace and exile; nor is it very improbable, that some rebuke might have been given him for his conduct on that particular occasion; and that owing to this it was that the enemies of our crucified Lord quietly submitted to the mortification of seeing their scheme baffled by the bold assertion of his resurrection, without obtaining from the Roman authority another blow to suppress it. Under Claudius we have seen Paul, even in the character of a criminal, enjoying the favour of Cæsar's household; and Nero himself would hardly have been induced to commence the work of persecution, either from political motives, or from personal dislike. Alarmed at the odium which he had incurred by the burning of Rome, whether truly or falsely attributed to him, he appears only to have cast his eye round for an object on which he might conveniently divert the popular fury. The Christians had become a cause of jealousy to so many, that they naturally presented themselves to his unprincipled mind as precisely the objects he wanted. On them, therefore, the guilt was charged; and in allusion to the nature of their crime, they were burned as public spectacles of amusement: in the exhibition of which, the idle ingenuity which was displayed in aiding the scenic effect, seems more unnatural and inhuman than the most brutal acts of malevolence. Nero escaped: the great mass of people cared not on whom they were avenged for their losses and sufferings; and a large party looked on with silent and malicious satisfaction, at the apparent ruin and suppression of a class of men who had become the objects of the deadliest antipathy. Of these secret enemies, a large portion were Jews. The peculiar character of the Jews of this age cannot but strike 87 The Edict of Claudius, no doubt, included Christians as a sect of Jews, but was not directed against them specifically. 88 They were smeared with pitch, as if to represent torches, and so burnt, in reference to their pretended crime.Taciti Ann. Lib. XV. C. 44. the attentive inquirer into the history of the times as singular-as Malicions marked by an unnatural readiness to seize every occasion of boldly Jews at this Spirit of the claiming the blood of their enemies. As a nation, they displayed period. perpetually an inveterate malice, and a monstrous delight in acts of revenge, such as ordinarily only exists in certain individuals who are exceptions to their sect or nation. All this admits of explanation Explained. from their singular fate. Dwelling in all the great cities of the empire, their malevolent feelings were doubly excited, by the presence of their political oppressors, and by the triumph of idolatry. This for a time did not produce any sudden burst of mutiny; which, according to the usual course of things, would have subsided into torpid and slavish insensibility, as each unsuccessful effort rendered them more hopeless, and their oppressors more watchful and more imperious. There was a secret amongst them, which at once fostered their malice and restrained its ebullition; which gave a higher tone to their sense of wrongs, and yet stifled their complaints; it was the daily and hourly hope of a temporal Messiah, and the certain presage of retribution, in obtaining through him dominion over their rulers, and being made the oppressors instead of the oppressed. Like the assassin who had attended on his master for years, and crouched beneath his blows without a murmur, waiting for the moment of revenge; so waited the Jewish people, inmates of every city, and even favourites of the court: to all outward appearance content and peaceable citizens, so much so as to be able to separate their cause from that of the persecuted Christians, but in secret nourishing daily the feelings which at length found vent and caused their ruin. To this may be traced their obstinacy beyond human nature in maintaining the last siege of their city, as well as the monstrous scenes which were exhibited in Cyprus, Alexandria, and elsewhere, and which are, perhaps, the bloodiest on the pages of history, not excepting those of the French Revolution.8 Gentiles Among the causes which would produce an increasing party-spirit Hatred ofthe opposed to the Christians among the Gentiles also, no one, perhaps, against the was more powerful than that sense of interest, which operated with Christians. the large class of tradesmen and artisans. As long as the tenets of their religion were confined to few, its character was as abominable to the pious Gentile indeed as when it spread abroad; but it was then only that it sensibly affected the gains of the silversmith and the sculptor, the seller of victims, or the expounder of oracles. It was then that it operated on the public feeling in each separate place, as the introduction either of a body of superior artists, or a 89 See note to Gibbon, Vol. II. p. 377, from Dion Cassius, Lib. LXVIII. p. 1145. "In Cyrene they massacred 220,000 Greeks; in Cyprus, 240,000. In Egypt a very great multitude. Many of these unhappy victims were sawed asunder, according to a precedent which David had given the sanction of his example. The victorious Jews de- Extent of the First sale of better manufactures, would operate in any commercial city; and the condition of the Flemish settlements formerly in England and elsewhere, may, perhaps, not unfitly illustrate the way, in which the harmless, unoffending sect of primitive Christians became the marks of general hatred. With such a feeling, persecution would be raised, not professing the source from which it sprang, but sheltering its selfish origin under various honest pretexts. Demetrius and the craftsmen would act from a sense of interest, but would appeal to a sense of religion; and hence, Christians would not only be branded as "atheists," but all sorts of crimes and foul practices would be attributed to them, in order to furnish motives in which men could sympathize, instead of the interested feelings from which the instigators themselves either altogether or originally acted. No wonder that the heathen historian should be found speaking of them with a disgust which would be felt for Bacchanalian associations; or that it should be whispered at Rome, that all kinds of abomination were practised in those meetings, which having been secret originally from fear, continued to be secret from custom. It has been questioned by modern authorities, whether this first Persecution. persecution extended beyond Rome, as was once commonly asserted; and doubtless the strongest historical testimony in support of this assertion does not appear to be authentic. The famous Spanish or Portuguese inscription, which is given by Gruter in his Inscription. Roman. Corpus, has been justly suspected by Scaliger and others. Independently of the objections urged against it by those writers, it may be observed, that no native of Spain and Portugal reports it on his own authority. It professes to commemorate Nero's glory, for freeing the province from robbers; and also "for cleansing the province of those who were infecting the human race with a new superstition." This, if authentic, would decide the question; but the denial of its authenticity leaves the fact not contradicted, but only less certain. It seems, indeed, highly probable that the persecution was general. It was long currently believed to be so; and nothing is more likely, with the existence of prejudices such as have been described, and which only lay smothered and dormant in a large portion of every community, than that the erection of an inquisitorial tribunal at Rome would be imitated, by the nearer provinces at least; under the pretence of a general conspiracy, a harbouring of fugitives, or whatever other pleas there might be, such as always suggest themselves on similar occasions. 90 The continuance of this persecution through a space of four years renders it still more probable that it was general; and although the legends which have been handed down in the several Churches of Spain and Italy-especially of Lucca, Pisa, Aquileia, and Romeconcerning the martyrdom of their respective saints, are doubtless 90 Tom. I. p. 238. Mosheim de Rebus Christ. ante Const. Magn. p. 109. A.D. 67. fabulous; yet that circumstance scarcely contradicts the general statement. It appears to have been in the last of these four years Martyrdom when the persecution closed, only because of Nero's death, that the of St. Paul, great apostle of the Gentiles suffered. He is said to have been and of beheaded. About the same time also, St. Peter is asserted to have St. Peter. been crucified, according to the prediction of his blessed Master. 18, 19. There is, however, some difficulty in reconciling this statement with the established chronology. John xxi. H. M CHAPTER IX. MINISTRY OF ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND THE OTHER THUS far I have attempted to follow the sacred narrative in tracing the course of the Holy Spirit's dispensation through its several successive stages through the period when the Gospel was preached to the Jews only, through that during which it was preached to Jews and devout Gentiles,-through that, again, when an especial commission was in force to declare it to the idolaters also. In conformity, likewise, with that which appears to have been the design of the sacred narrative, I have thus far confined my notice to the main line of its progress: only touching on the ministry of the agents of the blessed Comforter, as they were in succession called on to throw open the way wider and wider; and taking no note of the acts and fortunes of the rest. But we are now approaching near to the period when, by the destruction of Jerusalem, the first blow was given to all distinction between converts from Jews and Gentiles, proselytes of the gate and idolatrous heathen; that is, when all distinction of ministry and of teachers was removed, and the unity of the Church completed. Before we quit, then, the last stage of the mystery of godliness, it will be neither useless nor uninteresting to pause, and inquire into the labours and the fate of those other holy men, from whom we have gradually parted, in pursuing with St. Paul the course of Gentile ministry. Not that much authentic information, beyond what has been given, can be laid before the reader, respecting either him or any other of the apostles and inspired ministers of the Gospel. Not only are the notices of them in the Acts so scanty as to furnish no materials for a narrative; but the greater part have left behind them no epistolary or other monuments; which, as in the case of St. Paul, might have served to confirm or to refute, to complete or to illustrate, the imperfect and uncertain accounts given by uninspired writers. St. John, St. James, St. Peter, and St. Jude, each have left something; but in each case their writings are insignificant, if considered as a source whence to glean biographical notices. Eusebius's account is brief, and yet it contains nearly all besides that can be relied on. So silently did the apostles proceed in their mighty task of building up the Church, and so truly did the Luke xvii.20. kingdom of God come upon men without observation." |