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[LINK | Article]

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Who's preaching world democracy, democracy, democracy? —Who wants to make free people free?
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September 27, 2015

Roman Empire - Blood Sacrifice

Article
ROMAN EMPIRE | BLOOD SACRIFICE
SOURCE
PRIMARY - EXTRACTS / SUMMARIES
http://aquila.usm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1267&context=honors_theses

OTHER SOURCES - AS MARKED
*Yeshua inserted where 'Jesus' appears,
as this would be the Hebrew given name
Likewise, *Saul inserted where 'Paul' appears




Rome
imperial cult worship
a state duty




EXTRACTS & SUMMARIES

Roman Death Rituals
sacrifice in ritual & munus

munus - gladiator

1. (ancient Rome) man compelled to fight to death in a public arena for entertainment of spectators.

usually professional combatant, a captive, or a slave, trained to entertain public by engaging in mortal combat with another person or a wild animal

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/munus


Romans viewed purposeful death
as purifying, salvific, & regenerative agent

spilling of blood

  • gods appeased, honoured
  • dying purified / ready to be received by ancestors
  • honour could be restored or shame avoided
  • blood in the amphitheatre
  • nourished the gods / placated gods' anger
  • petition to the gods
  • symbolic magic that purified the empire (and/or the individual), preparation for regeneration

Decimation
"removal of a tenth"
military discipline
Roman Army
to punish units
guilty - eg mutiny or desertion

those convicted subjected to the fustuarium
(beating to death with a cudgel)

"There is some injustice in every great precedent, which though injurious to individuals, has its compensation in the public advantage."  -- Tacitus

Tacitus
(b. perhaps in southern Gaul, c.55-c.120)
Roman historian, author of
a/o
  • Histories
  • Annals
father
wealthy man
belonged to the second tier of the Roman elite
knights (equestrian order)

sent to Rome to study rhetorics
grand cultural education
included everything a magistrate need know

Tacitus a quaestor (magistrate, investigator) 81 or 82
admitted to the Senate afterwards

Tactius served as a as praetor (magistrate) b/w  89 & 93
must have commanded a legion or governed a province
  • Senate was weak
  • Emperor and the Senate were on bad terms
Tactius may have been glad to be away

appointed consul for 97

http://www.livius.org/articles/person/tacitus/

Praetor  {L. to go before}
-- annually elected magistrate of the ancient Roman Republic, ranking below but having approximately the same functions as a consul.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/praetor

public death by decimation
*not as common as spectacles {gladiatorial}
  or even mors vuluntaria
*also not revered or anticipated
mors vuluntaria - suicide


Rome - Warrior State

PUBLIC DECIMATION
did provide foundational tool for the warrior state
that was Rome

DISCIPLINE & TRAINING of LEGIONS
owe much to practice of decimation
recruits comply
to harsh military conditions
not only b/c honourable & ingrained in psyches
but also b/c of whispered threat of
fustuarium & legends that surrounded it

Such soldiers not afraid of death in battle
death was inevitable to all men
but death by decimation was dishonourable death

decimation itself not consequences of military crimes
dishonour that came with decimation is the consequence

fustuarium
from the Latin fustis, a branch or rod)
Roman military form of execution by cudgeling (clubbing)
*Also associated with running the gauntlet
-- captive to run b/w two rows (a gauntlet)
   of soldiers who repeatedly strike running captives

Cohort
480 soldiers
divided into groups of 10
drew lots (sortition)
all who drew lot subject to punishment,
regardless of fault, rank or distinction
execution by:  stoning or clubbing
remaining soldiers given inferior rations & quarters for few days

471 BC
Wars against Volsci
{Italic tribe who settled south of Rome}
army had scattered
culprits punished for desertion
scourged & beheaded
remainder drew lots & were stoned or clubbed

Professional soldiers
cooperating with indiscriminate
execution of comrades doomed
3rd Century AD
Entire Thebian Legion refused
Whole legion was killed:  Martyrs of Agaunum

[comment:  sensible thing.  disobedience cannot go unpunished, where discipline & obedience is everything]


SECOND BATTLE OF BREITENFELD
aka First Battle of Leipzig
Battle of Breitenfeld 1642
Field Marshal Lennart Torstenson
v. Imperial Army of the Holy Roman Empire
 command of Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria
near Leipzig, Germany
Protestants vs Catholics
Imperial army 15,000 casualties,
5,000 were taken prisoner
4,000 Swedes were killed or wounded
Result:   enabled Sweden to occupy Saxony
Empire fighters fled without fighting
Archduke narrowly escaped capture
Court-martial in Prague
Six regiments:  cowardice & misconduct
  • Ordered to lay down arms
  • ensigns torn
  • deleted from register of imperial troops
  • council of war sentence pronounced:  decimation
rolling dice chosen by 90
day 1:  cords were broken [backs?]
day 2:  beheadings (some accounts: shootings) & hanging from trees
mass grave:  Black mound in Rokycany

Other:
Emperor inclined to peace
Shortly thereafter: preliminaries of peace Hamburg confirmed.

Victory ensured German states
would not be forcibly reconverted to Roman Catholicism

----------------------------------
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Breitenfeld_%281642%29
http://memim.com/battle-of-breitenfeld-1642.html


Gladiatorial Events
originated as a component of funeral games in BC264-3
at the funerary rites of Decimus Junius Brutus Pera

ludi funebres (funeral games)

funerary games transitioned into full-blown
gladiatorial spectacles of the high empire

Ancient Mediterranean
Societies were honour - shame cultures.
Honour was everything.
Ultimate sin to be judged lacking.
Suicide was the only honourable method of reparation.

Alternative:
shameful death
would affect one’s afterlife
deceased would not be permitted to join
the Di Manes (or ancestors)
-- cult of the ancestors

Honourable death eased passage to afterlife
blood was the conduit of purification

Burial was important:
factor for deceased's ability to reach afterlife.

Martyr (martyros), in Greek, means “witness.”

2nd Century Christian literature - meaning shifts.

Portion of Christian martyrs: were voluntary suicides.

Theory:
Christian martyrs had a link to Roman death rituals.

Romans executed *everyone*
-- not just Christians
-- ie everyone who refused to participate in
    rituals for safety of the emperor & empire
-- declared themselves enemies of the state

Early convergence of Christianity & rabbinic Judaism

Christianity
inextricable relationship to its parent religion-- Judaism

66 – 70 CE
Roman annihilation or weakening of number of Jewish sects
Zealot groups gone / made inconsequential
Temple in Ruins
Pharisees remained
Rabbinic Judaism grew out of this group

Pauline Christianity sprang from rabbinic Judaism
From this group martyrs born

Saul / Paul of Tarsus
the apostle to the apostles

ie Saul of Tarsus became the apostle Paul

Tarsus (West Syrian Diocese)

Tarsus, famed in Christian tradition as the birthplace of Saint Paul
=  metropolis of the Chalcedonian ecclesiastical province of Cilicia Prima

Saul / Paul of Tarsus
=  Jew who had Roman citizenship
=  tried to stamp out Christianity
=  until, we are told, he had a "vision on the Road to Damascus."

SAUL OF TARSUS
(known as Paul, the Apostle of the Heathen)
founder of the Christian Church

Not a Hebrew scholar; a Hellenist.
Saul (whose Roman cognomen was Paul) was born of Jewish parents in the first decade of the common era at Tarsus in Cilicia
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11952-paul-of-tarsus

Cognomen
=  third name of a citizen of ancient Rome, under Roman naming conventions.
Cognomen started as a nickname, but lost that purpose when it became hereditary.

=  Hereditary cognomina were used to augment the second name (the family name, or clan name) in order to identify a particular branch within a family or family within a clan.

=  otherwise, surname (esp. a nickname)

eg.   Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus
cognomen Magnus
earned after his military victories under Sulla's dictatorship

Today, we refer to prominent Romans by only their cognomen
eg.  Caesar for Gaius Julius Caesar


http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/cognomen

jewishencyclopedia:

NO indication in Paul's writings or arguments that he had received the rabbinical training ascribed to him by Christian writers, ancient and modern.

His quotations from Scripture, which are all taken, directly or from memory, from the Greek version, betray no familiarity with the original Hebrew text.

Affliction
=  "a thorn in the flesh," and as a heavy stroke by "a messenger of Satan"

= likely epilepsy

"may have greatly impressed some of his Gentile hearers, but could not but frighten away and estrange from him the Jew, whose God is above all the God of reason"

"The conception of a new faith, half pagan and half Jewish, such as Paul preached, and susceptibility to its influences, were altogether foreign to the nature of Jewish life and thought. For Judaism, religion is the hallowing of this life by the fulfilment of its manifold duties."

"Paul shrank from life as the domain of Satan and all his hosts of evil; he longed for redemption by the deadening of all desires for life, and strove for another world which he saw in his ecstatic visions. The following description of Paul is preserved in "Acta Pauli et Theclæ," an apocryphal book which has been proved to be older and in some respects of greater historic value than the canonical Acts of the Apostles (see Conybeare, "Apollonius' Apology and Acts, and Other Monuments of Early Christianity," pp. 49-88, London, 1894):

"A man of moderate stature, with crisp [scanty] hair, crooked legs, blue eyes, large knit brows, and long nose, at times looking like a man, at times like an angel, Paul came forward and preached to the men of Iconium: 'Blessed are they that keep themselves chaste [unmarried]; for they shall be called the temple of God. Blessed are they that mortify [deny] their bodies and souls; for unto them speaketh God. Blessed are they that despise the world; for they shall be pleasing to God. Blessed be the souls and bodies of virgins; for they shall receive the reward of their chastity.'"

It was by such preaching that "he ensnared the souls of young men and maidens, enjoining them to remain single"


[comment:  Saul / Paul -- philosophy doesn't hold much appeal ... chastity, self denial, estrangement from the material world (I presume), and virginity:  holds zero attraction.  lol  ... What did anyone see in Christianity?]


"Anti-Jewish Attitude.

Whatever the physiological or psychological analysis of Paul's temperament may be, his conception of life was not Jewish. Nor can his unparalleled animosity and hostility to Judaism as voiced in the Epistles be accounted for except upon the assumption that, while born a Jew, he was never in sympathy or in touch with the doctrines of the rabbinical schools. For even his Jewish teachings came to him through Hellenistic channels, as is indicated by the great emphasis laid upon "the day of the divine wrath."

[comment:  big issue for the ancient Hebrews was Hellenisation of their culture; hence the resistance and rebellions that eventually led to the destruction of the Temple by the Romans (as I understand it).]

"His Personality.

To judge from those Epistles that have all the traits of genuineness and give a true insight into his nature, Paul was of a fiery temper, impulsive and impassioned in the extreme, of ever-changing moods, now exulting in boundless joy and now sorely depressed and gloomy. Effusive and excessive alike in his love and in his hatred, in his blessing and in his cursing, he possessed a marvelous power over men; and he had unbounded confidence in himself. He speaks or writes as a man who is conscious of a great providential mission, as the servant and herald of a high and unique cause. The philosopher and the Jew will greatly differ from him with regard to every argument and view of his; but both will admit that he is a mighty battler for truth, and that his view of life, of man, and of God is a profoundly serious one. The entire conception of religion has certainly been deepened by him, because his mental grasp was wide and comprehensive, and his thinking bold, aggressive, searching, and at the same time systematic. Indeed, he molded the thought and the belief of all Christendom."

"Jewish Proselytism and Paul.

Before the authenticity of the story of the so-called conversion of Paul is investigated, it seems proper to consider from the Jewish point of view this question: Why did Paul find it necessary to create a new system of faith for the admission of the Gentiles, in view of the fact that the Synagogue had well-nigh two centuries before opened its door to them and, with the help of the Hellenistic literature, had made a successful propaganda, as even the Gospels testify?

... and others, in order that they may reserve the claim of universality for Christianity, deny the existence of uncircumcised proselytes in Judaism, and misconstrue plain Talmudic and other statements referring to God-fearing Gentiles (Bertholet, l.c. pp. 338-339); whereas the very doctrine of Paul concerning the universal faith of Abraham (Rom. iv. 3-18) rests upon the traditional interpretation of Gen. xii. 3 (see Kuenen, "Prophets and Prophecy in Israel," pp. 379, 457) and upon the traditional view which made Abraham the prototype of a missionary bringing the heathen world under the wings of the Shekinah (Gen. R. xxxix., with reference to Gen. xii. 5; see Abraham; Judaism; Proselyte). As a matter of fact, only the Jewish propaganda work along the Mediterranean Sea made it possible for Paul and his associates to establish Christianity among the Gentiles, as is expressly recorded in the Acts (x. 2; xiii. 16, 26, 43, 50; xvi. 14; xvii. 4, 17; xviii. 7); and it is exactly from such synagogue manuals for proselytes as the Didache and the Didascalia that the ethical teachings in the Epistles of Paul and of Peter were derived (see Seeberg, "Der Katechismus der Urchristenheit," 1903, pp. 1-44).

[comment:  not sure what the deal is with 'uncircumcised proselytes,' (as in, were there any uncircumcised heathen among Hebrews?), but trying to find out, I came across 'we are all sons of Abraham' ...  That sounds deluded to me.]

The answer is supplied by the fact that Jewish proselytism had the Jewish nation as its basis, as the names "ger" and "ger toshab" for "proselyte" indicate. The proselyte on whom the Abrahamic rite was not performed remained an outsider. It was, therefore, highly important for Paul that those who became converted to the Church should rank equally with its other members and that every mark of distinction between Jew and Gentile should be wiped out in the new state of existence in which the Christians lived in anticipation. The predominating point of view of the Synagogue was the political and social one; that of the Church, the eschatological [Last Judgement doctrine] one. May such as do not bear the seal of Abraham's covenant upon their flesh or do not fulfil the whole Law be admitted into the congregation of the saints waiting for the world of resurrection? This was the question at issue between the disciples of Jesus and those of Paul; the former adhering to the view of the Essenes, which was also that of Jesus; the latter taking an independent position that started not from the Jewish but from the non-Jewish standpoint. Paul fashioned a Christ of his own, a church of his own, and a system of belief of his own; and because there were many mythological and Gnostic elements in his theology which appealed more to the non-Jew than to the Jew, he won the heathen world to his belief."

[Essenes -- freaky ancient Jewish sect; monastic living males (excluded women); property in common; while they adopted beliefs that diverge from Judaism, they followed Mosaic law to the letter  - here ]

"Paul's Conversion

[ ... ] Paul was a young man charged by the Sanhedrin of Jerusalem with the execution of Stephen and the seizure of the disciples of Jesus. The statement, however (ib. xxii. 8-9), that, being a zealous observer of the law of the Fathers, "he persecuted the Church unto death," could have been made only at a time when it was no longer known what a wide difference existed between the Sadducean high priests and elders, who had a vital interest in quelling the Christian movement, and the Pharisees, who had no reason for condemning to death either Jesus or Stephen. In fact, it is derived from the Epistle to the Galatians (i. 13-14), the spuriousness of which has been shown by Bruno Baur, Steck, and most convincingly by Friedrich Maehliss ("Die Unechtheit des Galaterbriefs," 1891). The same is the case with Phil. iii. 5. Acts xxii. 17-18 speaks of another vision which Paul had while in the Temple, in which Jesus told him to depart from Jerusalem and go with his gospel to the Gentiles. Evidently Paul entertained long before his vision those notions of the Son of God which he afterward expressed; but the identification of his Gnostic Christ with the crucified Jesus of the church he had formerly antagonized was possibly the result of a mental paroxysm experienced in the form of visions."

"Paul’s Church versus the Synagogue.

In order to understand fully the organization and scope of the Church as mapped out by Paul in his Epistles, a comparison thereof with the organization and the work of the Synagogue, including the Essene community, seems quite proper. Each Jewish community when organized as a congregation possessed in, or together with, its synagogue an institution (1) for common worship, (2) for the instruction of young and old in the Torah, and (3) for systematic charity and benevolence. This threefold work was as a rule placed in charge of men of high social standing, prominent both in learning and in piety. The degree of knowledge and of scrupulousness in the observance of the Torah determined the rank of the members of the Synagogue. ..."

" ... Little value can be attached to the story in Acts xviii. 18 that Paul brought a Nazarite sacrifice in the Temple, since for him the blood of Christ was the only sacrifice to be recognized. Only at a later time, when Pauline and Judean Christianity were merged, was account again taken, contrary to the Pauline system, of the Mosaic law regarding sacrifice and the priesthood; and so the Epistle to the Hebrews was written with the view of representing Jesus as "the high priest after the order of Melchizedek" who atoned for the sins of the world by his own blood (Heb. iv. 14-v. 10, vii.-xiii.). However, the name of Paul, connected with the epistle by Church tradition, was not attached to it in writing, as was the case with the other epistles."


Epistle to the Hebrews, Yeshua / Jesus
assumes the role of High Priest once and for all

Melchizedek is venerated as a saint
in Latin & in Eastern Orthodox tradition

Melchizedek
aka Malki-Tzedek

Ch.14 Bk Genesis

fm.  melek(h) "king"  +  ṣedeq "righteous(ness)"

name literally translates to "my king is righteousness" (or "my king is Ṣedeq")

king of Salem and priest of El Elyon ("God most high")

El Elyon ("God most high")
associated with Jebusite god (pre-Israelite inhabitants of Jerusalem)
= astral deity / assoc. with Salem (Sali or Shalem)
identified with evening star in Ugaritic (now Ras Shamra, Syria) mythology.

Šalim
would be the city of Salim, the Jebusite astral deity.

Name also preserved in Phoenician.

Deity identified with Roman Jupiter.

Melchizedek
prototype of the messiah

name of the Archangel Michael, interpreted as a heavenly priest

Contrasts with:
Belial -- who is given the name of Melchi-resha "king of wickedness"

Dead Sea Scrolls
Melchizedek
= divine being
= Hebrew title applied to him: Elohim

Melchizedek
= first person in the Torah to be titled a Kohen (priest)
= medrash records:  he was preceded in priesthood (kehuna) by Adam

Torah Laws require that the Kohen (priest) must be a patrilineal descendant of a prior Kohen.

[Melchizek not patrilineal descendant -- so it doesn't make sense that he was a kohen.

Explanation too confusing for me, re this & who got the high priesthood.]


Identification of Melchizedek with the Messiah pre-dates Christianity & developed during the Second Temple period.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melchizedek

The Chief Angelic Priest?
In the mystical Qumran documents known as “Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice” (originally called “The Angelic Liturgy”), Melchizedek appears to be a superior angel. The texts are broken up too badly to be sure of this identification.

...  “Songs” depict a hierarchy of angelic priests who serve in the heavenly temple. They are surrounded by other divine beings known as elim or elohim (gods, divine beings) or holy ones, spirits, princes, and ministers. And Melchizedek seems to be a leader of this assembly of servants.

In the so-called “War Scroll” ..., Melchizedek appears to be the archangel Michael, who is “the prince of light” ... and “the angel of [God's] truth” (1QS 3:24). Scrolls scholar Carol Newsom says, “it would seem most plausible that Melchizedek is to be identified with the seventh and highest of the chief princes, as Michael is customarily identified with the highest of the archangels.”

Dead Sea Scrolls Translation

http://www.hebrew-streams.org/works/qumran/melchizedek-dss.html
 
"... brought the teachings of the monotheistic truth and the ethics of Judaism, however mixed up with heathen Gnosticism and asceticism, home to the pagan world in a form which appealed most forcibly to an age eager for a God in human shape and for some means of atonement in the midst of a general consciousness of sin and moral corruption.  ..."

Gnosticism - material world shunned.
asceticism - abstinence in worldly pleasures.
 

"... Paul with his austerity made Jewish holiness his watch word; and he aimed after all, like any other Jew, at the establishment of the kingdom of God, to whom also his Christ subordinated himself, delivering up the kingdom to the Father when his task of redemption was complete, in order that God might be all in all (I Cor. xv. 28). He was an instrument in the hand of Divine Providence to win the heathen nations for Israel's God of righteousness."

His System of Faith.

On the other hand, he construed a system of faith which was at the very outset most radically in conflict with the spirit of Judaism: (1) He substituted for the natural, childlike faith of man in God as the ever-present Helper in all trouble, such as the Old Testament represents it everywhere, a blind, artificial faith prescribed and imposed from without and which is accounted as a meritorious act. (2) He robbed human life of its healthy impulses, the human soul of its faith in its own regenerating powers, of its belief in its own self and in its inherent tendencies to goodness, by declaring Sin to be, from the days of Adam, the all-conquering power of evil ingrained in the flesh, working everlasting doom; the deadly exhalation of Satan, the prince of this world, from whose grasp only Jesus, the resurrected Christ, the prince of the other world, was able to save man. (3) In endeavoring to liberate man from the yoke of the Law, he was led to substitute for the views and hopes maintained by the apocalyptic writers the Christian dogma with its terrors of damnation and hell for the unbeliever, holding out no hope whatsoever for those who would not accept his Christ as savior, and finding the human race divided between the saved and the lost (Rom. ii. 12; I Cor. i. 18; II Cor. ii. 15, iv. 3; II Thess. ii. 10). (4) In declaring the Law to be the begetter of sin and damnation and in putting grace or faith in its place, he ignored the great truth that duty, the divine "command," alone renders life holy; that upon the law of righteousness all ethics, individual or social, rest. (5) In condemning, furthermore, all human wisdom, reason, and common sense as "folly," and in appealing only to faith and vision, he opened wide the door to all kinds of mysticism and superstition. (6) Moreover, in place of the love greatly extolled in the panegyric in I Cor. xiii.—a chapter which strangely interrupts the connection between ch. xii. and xiv.—Paul instilled into the Church, by his words of condemnation of the Jews as "vessels of wrath fitted for destruction" (Rom. ix. 22; II Cor. iii. 9, iv. 3), the venom of hatred which rendered the earth unbearable for God's priest-people. Probably Paul is not responsible for these outbursts of fanaticism; but Paulinism is. It finally led to that systematic defamation and profanation of the Old Testament and its God by Marcion and his followers which ended in a Gnosticism so depraved and so shocking as to bring about a reaction in the Church in favor of the Old Testament against the Pauline antinomianism. Protestantism revived Pauline views and notions; and with these a biased opinion of Judaism and its Law took possession of Christian writers, and prevails even to the present (comp., e.g., Weber, "Jüdische Theologie," 1897, where Judaism is presented throughout simply as "Nomismus"; Schürer's description of the life of the Jew "under the law" in his "Gesch." 3d ed., ii. 464-496; Bousset, "Religion des Judenthums in Neu-Testamentlichen Zeitalter," 1903, p. 107; and the more popular works by Harnack and others; and see also Schechter in "J. Q. R." iii. 754-766; Abrahams, "Prof. Schürer on Life Under the Jewish Law," ib. xi. 626; and Schreiner, "Die Jüngsten Urtheile über das Judenthum," 1902, pp. 26-34).
an antinomian is "one who holds that under the gospel dispensation of grace the moral law is of no use or obligation because faith alone is necessary to salvation"  [here]
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11952-paul-of-tarsus

Roman death rituals 
& Christian martyrdom

Jews, Greeks, Romans, and Christians within
the empire

overarching theme of blood sacrifices
and the use of death as a purification ritual

Martyrdom itself was a tool of assimilation
bridged the communities of the Empire together

[not clear to me how so]

Blood and death were fixtures of Roman society
spilling of blood was protective and life-giving
promised longevity and created new beginnings

spilling of blood
purifying aspect of death rituals
/ animal & human
Roman death was integrated into everyday life


'Public deaths' incl:
Military deaths
meted out as a warning or as punishment
among deaths:  that chose the mors voluntaria
-- voluntary death
-- forced to commit suicide


public deaths
daggers, knives,and swords
-- later drama:  wild animals & theatrical productions

gens
(tribe or clan sharing a common name)

Human sacrifice in most every ancient society’s
religious and funerary rituals
supported through literary and archaeological records

Revisionists attempt to distance Rome
claiming foreign influence re barbaric practices
do not ring true

Bloodshed Rituals

appease gods
petition gods -- for safety or victory

blood of captives, slaves, and gladiators
shed at the tombs to appease deities
& assist deceased's journey in afterlife

Acts of bloodshed
at very heart of munera
seeding the empire, society, gens, and religio of the Roman people
['munera' must be plural for 'munus']

bloodshed through rituals
allowed for continuation of:

*deceased's existence in afterlife
*continuation of Rome (& by extension, the empire)

Blood-letting shows homage (submissive) relationship between gods & men.


'obeisance' fm Old French:  to obey
*submission*

Other scholars:
for a sacrifice to be true, the victim must be willing

Gladiators
unflinching [comment:  'slaves']
trained to
consider nothing but giving satisfaction to their masters
unflinching deaths
force  of  practice,  deliberation,  & custom.

NOTE
blood-letting via public spectacles
instil bravery and fear into the citizens who attended the game


Law of the Twelve Tables
introduction of magic

657 -- decree forbidding human sacrifices was passed by the Senate


77AD -- writing Livy
gladiatorial combat via funeral games morphed
into political and entertainment value

96BC -- Pliny
sacrifice permitted & used in ritual
-- stands to reason also part of funerary rites,
 incl. ludi funebres (funeral games)

Blood was offered:
  1. to the land on which it was spilled 
  2. for the longevity of the empire
  3. to the shades (spirits/ghosts) of the deceased to ease passage into Nether World
  4. to the gods for their nourishment
  5. to the gods for protection or victory

Public death and blood-letting
ingrained in Roman culture
-- symbolism of regeneration & purification

Despite shift to spectacular entertainment,
sacrificial element of gladiatorial games
was blood offering to screaming masses

Arena was the centre of the public spectacle
Colosseum seated 45,000 
+  standing room for thousands more.

Gladiatorial battles
Roman beginnings in a religious, funerary setting

First funeral games
264BC -- Livy, wrote

Sibylline books
decemviri [ten magistrates]
inspect the Sibylline books
/  prophetic books
rarely decreed

If the war should proceed favourably & state continue
in the condition it was in before the war, then:
  1. vow which made to Mars
  2. great games must be vowed to Jupiter
  3. temples must be vowed to Venus Erycina & Mens
  4. entreaty/petition lectisternium
  5. [feast of the gods] must be made
  6. a sacred spring must be vowed


Gladiatorial games
leaders & sponsors of the games
      curried favour of Roman people no matter
their station
People had begun to demand
bigger and better shows
That spectacles grew in exoticism & size
(& length of days – some lasting months at a time)
suggests another purpose:
the games were a financial success /
substantial economic resource in city hosting games

Games that began as religious or funerary
shifted towards public / civic orientation
& included more than just gladiatorial combat
*chariot races
*wild beast hunts
*execution of criminals
*re-enactments historical battles
*divine rituals

Bulls, lions, tigers,bears,
& elephants forced to fight each other to
the death, & pitted against
gladiators, athletes in arena competitions

damnatio ad bestias
(damnation to the beasts) was reserved
for military traitors, conquered foes, and convicted
criminals bound for execution, incl.
Christians accused of sedition & treason


Gladiator Status
despite marginalised social status
respected for:
  • skill in killing
  • willingness to die
{rather like modern-day soldiers?}

Gladiator Class
= slaves
= criminals
= prisoners of war
= some free men {who accepted a degraded social position for the pay}

Gladiators - Celebrity
received celebrity

Nobles & Emperors
who performed arena combat
sought like public awareness / approval

Gladiator vs Beast

Gladiator plays part of:  hero & god
- vs -
Enemies of Rome
(other gladiators or condemned criminals)

For public who would never see live battle in honour of Rome
gladiatorial spectacles represented:  military virtue

For public with no real
power in civic life or politics
rush of literally owning
for an instant,
power of life and death


Mercy or Death?
 crowd’s opinion could sway
the host’s response
{gesture to receive blade or not}
-- esp. if he was:
  1. *in need of popular opinion on current issue
  2.  *in need of reversal of opinion* {if he was despised}
What were the games without the spectators?

Public deaths must be witnessed

by humans & by gods

offering from host to spectators

witnessing end of those who bravely met death
allowed the audience to pretend
they were far from the spectre of death


Link between
deaths of polytheistic Romans
& early Christian martyrs:

honour and shame components of suicide
philosophical & religious ideologies of such acts
clear that blood —  that is blood-letting  —
was most often required
to make the death an honourable one

Scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxima cogi
“Man’s first fate is to know how to die – 
but the second, to be forced to die.”
- Lucan, 1st Century AD

Ancient Greco-Roman world
suicide was a means of maintaining
honour & status

What is known about prevailing philosophies,
religio (religion),and death practices in ancient Rome
shows suicide as a conventional way of preserving
individual and family honour, of representing freedom,
and of repairing the stains of shame.


Honour
=  automatically assigned
     to the elite & noble class (as a birthright)

If honour was lost or damaged, so was
the status of the individual

Latin word for shame,
pudor, had a societal assignment also

Pudor
entailed the lower classes
rarely was there a chance
for honour to be earned,
although there were exceptions

eg. if one had citizenship granted to them
or were esteemed members
of an upper class household


Word pudor
itself has several uses:

=  sense of shame or shyness, disgrace or humiliation
=  blush, to be chaste, scrupulous, or decent

Pudor / shame
implies emotional distress
–  even when the use implies “decency”
b/c  the principal definition in this set [to blush],
pudor refers to a physiological response

Blushing
has minor sting of pain & shame
Pudor
also entails exclusion / detachment
from the community at large,
the Populus Romanus

Honour & shame
were not present simply in the military arena,
but in every area of life

Religion was an important part
of the honour/shame society of ancient Rome

Romans
were exceedingly devout, loyal to their local
deities, and to the cult of their ancestors.

Honoured their gods, the emperor
(after the shift from republic to empire in 31AD)
& their ancestors with worship, ritual, and libations
{from libatare -- to pour out liquid as an offering}


No separation of church & state,
all Romans were required to participate in traditional
rituals to maintain a good working relationship with their gods,
thus religio took on a social aspect.

Strong belief in the afterlife


Honourable suicides:

there were conversations with friends,
relatives, or troops that sometimes
lasted hours

last words written down

instructions given to
the bereaved on how to go on living

Laws were made in order to protect
the city & state from the dead

Illegal to cremate or bury a body within the city

fires of crematorium could spread
easily to the wooden structures over
narrow alleyways & destroy the city,
or perhaps b/c of spread of
disease from open pits that
contained the corpses


Romans typically believed
soul travelled to Hades upon death, 
& depending on the type of life & death
 of the deceased,
appropriate rewards awaited

Romans did believe in
spirits – malevolent and benign, 
welcome and unwelcome,
who wandered their old haunts.

souls of ancestors
could be counted on
to communicate with the living
/ in Nether World, whether buried or cremated

Communicate with the living
from the Nether World,
had to be libations of blood, wine, milk,
or honey offered to the spirits

souls could then
advise the living so as to
avoid punishment of living in after life

Roman afterlife as an extension
of the natural world, thus,
however death may occur

whether by suicide or otherwise souls would continue

If dishonourable death
might be forced to wander
the earth as shades
(formless apparitions who were
allowed no contact with the
human world or peace in the Nether World)


If the deceased left this life with honour intact
would be worthy of veneration in ancestral cult

Stoicism & suicide went deeper
than just practical advantage

Marcus Porcius Cato
(d. 46 AD), a noted Stoic
chose suicide as a political statement
against the expected tyranny of Julius Caesar
/  loss of republican ideal

citizens of Utica admired Cato
b/c he died a free man

suicide
entwined in Roman society as
a tool of control

Like Cato the Younger,
who would control his freedom
through his death,
others chose
the same liberty.

Blood-Letting / Blades
disembowelment or the cutting
open of arterial vein
= for honourable & quick death

Swords, daggers, or poison might
= facing execution, interrogation, or political anarchy
   & the like

Starvation
starving to death
= old & ill

Hanging / Jumping
Shame attached to hanging or jumping
b/c only elite or members Roman army
could afford the swords & daggers used in suicide

Hanging
= dishonourable

jumping from a high place was
=  considered crude

Lethal Potion
Only the nobility had
access to pharmacists or doctors
who could prepare a lethal potion

Crucifixion
{a form of hanging}
though not a form of suicide

was reserved for the lowest caste of
degenerate criminals and traitors
or non-citizens of the empire


Goddess Fortuna
Fortuna
herself had set forth

Ortho's destiny,
and that he accepted it
"Others may have held the throne for a longer time, but no one can have left it with such fortitude.”
fortitude from fortitudo from fortis (strong)

clemency of which Ortho speaks is not only for him
but for troops who chose to fight for him
/ common for the conquering general to execute those
who had been most loyal to the losing general


Otho’s
willingness to commit suicide,
assured his family’s honor, safety,
& status

Fell upon his sword. 

Loyal among his troops committed
suicide on finding he had done so.
Became common practice in other
castra (military encampments)

65AD emperor Nero

former mentor {teacher and tutor}, Seneca
had been implicated in conspiracy
without proof of any wrongdoing

Nero had an execution
decree sent to Seneca at his home

Seneca chose to die by poison
ordered from his doctor.

Poison did not do its job
Nor did slitting his wrists with a dagger
Suffocated in a steam bath hours later

in this forced suicide,
Seneca met the requirements of a noble suicide
  • met it bravely (due to its inevitability)
  • choose the time, manner, & place of death

Seneca wrote much on
Stoic philosophy 
& how death relates to
virtus (virtue) and libertas (freedom)


DISAPPROVERS OF SUICIDE:  Epicureans

Followers of:  Epicurus
(341–270 BCE)
believed 
true happiness was in the current life
nothing (even pain)
should make a man despair of life
/  no belief afterlife
death a true end

Death is the privation of all sentience
understanding that death is nothing
to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable
/ not by adding to life a limitless time
/ but by taking away the yearning after immortality

Epicureans
importance placed on attaining
peace in this lifetime
through moderation

In early years of Roman Empire
Epicureans
were the only opposition to
honourable & voluntary deaths
based on a disbelief in afterlife

Hebrews

Jewish acceptance of suicide
/ siege of Masada in Judaea c. 67 AD

Flavius Josephus
an eyewitness
of the Siege of Yodfat / Jotapta (67 AD)
/ wrote an account
suicide pact made in the fortress at Masada

Image Attrib: Ailngd אילןגד
Replica Roman ballista at Gamla (Golan Heights)
{a catapult type device - 'ancient missile/projectile weapon - here'}
Gamla is a symbol of heroism for the modern state of Israel
Gamla -- one of only 5 cities in the Galilee & Golan who stood against Vespasian's legions  -- here

Image Attrib:  Oren Rozen
Breached Wall -- Gamla (Golan Heights) 
[comment:  Gamla looks amazing / hills are beautiful  ... I could handle living there]

Other

Josephus lead defender of Yodfat
Subsequent collaboration with Romans
Servitude to Flavians
Yodfat never settled or built over
more on Siege of Yodfat
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Yodfat

Reason for the mass suicides
/ to avoid capture &  indignities
at the hands of the Roman soldiers
who had spent nearly 1 year
trying to take the town from the Zealot Jews

Early Christians
many early Christians
chose to die willingly through martyrdom

by definition, a voluntary death

Jews and Christians of the empire would
make suicide taboo, and cast a sinful essence upon it


Romans
placed the utmost importance on interpersonal
relationships, family and state bonds, and truth
–  all building blocks of their society.

Ancient Romans, the mors voluntaria
often first &  only choice to repair to reputation
or to choose freedom (Seneca & Cato)
or to preserve personal/family honour
(short-lived Emperor Otho)

Role of mors voluntaria
/ voluntary death
/ allowed the Romans a semblance of
control in the honour-shame society of ancient Rome

Martyrdom in Early Christianity

Christian
Blood-letting through martyrdom
{voluntary or not}

dual parentage:

1  via Judaism
2  Greco-Roman traditions
   {prevalent in cities where Christian churches grew}

partial offshoot of imperial mores
Saul / Paul of Tarsus (c.5 – c.67AD)

went against the mandates
of the Council of Jerusalem (c. 50 CE)
/ and had an open, & divisive, dispute
with Peter over the matter

Saul / Paul accused Peter and other apostles
of being afraid of the circumcision faction
after Peter backed away from sharing meals
with Gentile Christians in Antioch.

Saul / Paul’s view diverged
from Christianity
against Jewish parentage
& inclined in important ways
toward Greco-Roman ideals

thus:  more Pauline the movement was, the more martyrs


Martyr: What Does it Mean?
Greek word
μάρτυς (martyros)

“witness”

context of the word “martyr” began to mutate,
--  foundational aspect of
Christianity itself
{after adherents to the Yeshua/Jesus movement
  were called as witnesses before
  local magistrates and judges}

current definition, a martyr
=  willing and/or sacrificial victim,
=  sufferer for a cause, an idealist

Suggestions re martyrdom:
*product of Greek literary devices
*exaggerated to advocate the spread of Christianity
*Jewish context emerged because of the Maccabean rebellion

1 Maccabees
{Hebrew text}
rationale
willingly & innocently dying at the
hands of the enemy, as:
heaven and earth testify for us
that you are killing us unjustly”

*crucifixion of Yeshua/Jesus of Nazareth

martyrdom, in its complexity,
cannot be owned by any one culture,
or defined by a rigid set of rules

martyrdom in Christian context
can be seen as purification ritual

Modern connotation re 'martyr'
loss of life or freedom in defence of
  • religious
  • social
  • political beliefs
  • cause
    {put on mantle of public self-sacrifice to gain attention for a cause}

Modern is far removed from 2nd Century AD
& original Greek 'martyros'
meaning & its equivalents in
New Testament (as it appears -- “witness”)

Meaning of word shifts
*not witnesses in the Athenian legal sense
*rather:  witnesses of suffering, of another’s death, or of glory of God

eg  
stoning of Stephen 
{written c.85AD}

Stephen
died at the hands of fellow Jews for the crime of blasphemy

Saul / Paul
remanded to Rome to defend
re crimes against Jewish Law,
the Temple, and the emperor
/ held in Rome for two years at
his own expense
late in the reign of Nero
–  probably in the wake of the Great Fire in 64

(54 – 68 AD)

-- rumours that he was released
   after his trial and travelled to
   Spain & Britain
-- no proof
-- widely accepted Saul/Paul was martyred
  during Nero’s persecution
   in mid AD60s, 
   as part of Nero’s sweeping retaliation 
   of Christians’ perceived part in 
   Great Fire of 64 CE (cf. Tacitus, Annales)

Martyr
Witness to Persecuted

Many Christians executed
first 300 years of Church
*NOT UNTIL mid 3rd Century
-- Christians *as a group* legally persecuted

"They will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. ... You will be hated by
all because of my name ... By your endurance you will gain your souls. "  -- c. 85AD - Luke re Yeshua (Jesus)

NOTE:

indicates
even before
imperial edicts of Decius (250 AD) & Diocletian (303-304 AD)
against Christians,
apostolic communities (early as 85 AD)
were aware of &  writing re
tensions b/w themselves & Empire

*mere 20 years earlier Emperor Nero
had placed blame for Rome burning on Christians

*emperor Claudius had ordered an exile of Jews from Rome during
his reign (r. 41– 54AD)

70AD -- Titus 
destroyed & looted the temple in Jerusalem

Luke’s intention in this gospel
more than just educating
his patron, Theophilus re Yeshua / Jesus
Luke wrote for a political reason also

Beginning
Luke portrayed Christians as descendants of the
Jews and Yeshua/Jesus as a practising Jew who obeyed the Law.

Later Luke deionizing Pharisaical Jews as the persecutors
of Jesus, while exonerating Herod Antipas and Pontius Pilate,
and by extension, Rome, of the guilt of Jesus’s execution.

Pauline Speech
first time, makes a connection between the Jews’ rejection of Yeshua's/Jesus’
messiah-ship & Saul/Paul’s subsequent mission to the Gentiles

Saul / Paul
own writings in Romans (3.19-20)
and Galatians (3.24-28)
blur lines between Jewish & non-Jewish peoples
condemning separatist rhetoric & the notions
of the Jews’ unique and singular chosen-ness
& arguing that the Yeshua/Jesus Movement
should rightly include Gentiles

Members of the Sanhedrin took
Yeshua/Jesus to the Roman governor, Pilate

Sanhedrin
assembly or council
20-23 men, every city of biblical Land of Israel
court dealing with religious matters / the judges
have powers that the lower religious courts do not
eg.
  • power to try king, 
  • extend boundaries of Temple
  • extend boundaries of & Jerusalem etc
a 'supreme court'

[comment:  that number (20-23) must be out.  Jewish accounts indicate 71 members of council, as I understand]

High Priest
before 191BC
High Priest acted as ex officio
head of Sanhedrin

191BC confidence lost in High Priest
Office of Nasi created
Nasi invariably descendent of Hillel the Elder

By end of Second Temple period
Sanhedrin reached its pinnacle of importance
-- legislating all aspects of Jewish religious and political life
{within limits of Biblical and Rabbinic tradition}

Final binding decision of Sanhedrin in 358
=  Hebrew calendar was adopted

Thereafter Sanhedrin dissolved
after continued persecution from Roman Empire

Revivals since attempted:

eg.

Grand Sanhedrin convened
by Napoleon Bonaparte
legal sanction to principles expressed
by the Assembly of Notables
in answer to 12 questions submitted
to Assembly by the govt

1806, the Assembly of Notables issued a proclamation to all the Jewish communities of Europe, inviting them to send delegates to the Sanhedrin

proclamation, written in Hebrew, French, German, and Italian, speaks in extravagant terms of the importance of this revived institution and of the greatness of its imperial protector.

While the action of Napoleon aroused in many Jews of Germany the hope that, influenced by it, their governments also would grant them the rights of citizenship, others looked upon it as a political contrivance.

When in the war against Prussia (1806–7) the emperor invaded Poland and the Jews rendered great services to his army, he remarked, laughing, "The sanhedrin is at least useful to me."[citation needed]

David Friedländer and his friends in Berlin described it as a spectacle that Napoleon offered to the Parisians.

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Sanhedrin

Napoleon Bonaparte Sanhedrin - 1806
6 October 1806

Jewish Assembly of Notables
convened by Napoleon Bonaparte


issued a proclamation to all the Jewish communities of Europe

inviting them to send delegates to a Grand Sanhedrin (20th Oct)

Sanhedrin would rule
re answers given by the Assembly of Notables
to 12 questions posed by Bonaparte back in April, including:
  • Is it lawful for Jews to have more than one wife?
  • Does Jewish law order that the Jews should only intermarry among themselves?
  • Do  Jews born in France, and treated by the law as French citizens, acknowledge France as their country?
  • Are they bound to obey the laws and follow the directions of the civil code?
  • What kind of police jurisdiction do the rabbis exercise over the Jews?
Postponed until February, the Sanhedrin ruled (without discussion) that the Assembly’s assimilationist responses to these questions were authoritative in Jewish life.

Bonaparte then promulgated three decrees concerning Jews in France in March, 1808 ...

... emancipated Jews from discriminatory laws and made France their homeland, but also obliterated many aspects of Jewish life that had preserved Jewish communal identity.


http://jewishcurrents.org/october-6-napoleons-sanhedrin-7418

[1843 -- Karl Marx -- 37 years later -- dissatisfaction with German status quo.  Seeks emancipation.  Need to get back to reading that Marx paper ... not sure what that was about.  Found paper hard to focus on.]

Sanhedrin members
took Yeshua/Jesus to the Roman governor, Pilate

Accused him of

“perverting our nation, forbidding us to pay taxes to the emperor, and saying that he himself is the Messiah, a king.”  Luke 23:3
  • Charges
  • treason
  • sedition
Death penalty in Roman Empire

Not primarily religiously motivated
were politically motivated

Yeshua's / Jesus’ execution
result of prosecution, but not Roman persecution
[it is argued by author other than one of article]

Argued that:
Christians invented the “myth of persecution”
to prove their superiority over their enemies

& to demonise:
providing foil to substantiate Christian persecution

Argued that Christians were not:
*consistently* persecuted by Romans is astute

However, author of source article argues to contrary:

"We cannot discount sources simply because of bias.  Understanding an author’s bias allows the reader to understand how to read a source and place it in its proper context."

whether victims were persecuted or prosecuted, or by whom,
the result was the same somebody was going to die.

Perception of why ppl being killed
that scholars are at odds
on certain positions;
but to the masses, perception is reality.

Source article author argues:
persecution & martyrdom
were interwoven into fabric of history of
the Church, and that, for good or ill, is what is promoted.

Persecution & martyrdom intrinsic
to very framework of early Church
/ belief that if one suffered for the name of Yeshua/Jesus,
that suffering led to the glorification of God
& proved that the victim was a genuine believer

Early Church
promoted their reputation of being persecuted,
which, no matter what terminology is used,
ultimately equates to martyrdom
[Yeah, but that doesn't mean that they actually *were* persecuted]
see --Stephen (c. 35–40 AD)
see -- reign of Constantine (r. 306–337 CE) & beyond

Martyrs -- began to transition from
being mere legal witnesses to something more,
something akin to dying for God

Role of the Jews
Saul / Paul,  Pharisaic Jew
earlier life in Judaism
saw himself as a defender of purity of Judaism
upholding the strict interpretation of Mosaic law

Forbidden to:
  • perform idolatry,
  • intermingle with foreigners, 
  • ignore the tiniest facet of Law

punishment, divine retribution = subjugation of the Jews by enemies

Rome Conquers Syria-Palestine - 63BC
General Pompey (Roman)
conquered Syria-Palestine
annexing 'Jewish homeland'
to Roman Empire 63BC

Jewish community already
in Rome & most large imperial cities
therefore:  Romans familiar with Judaism
Romans see Judaism as:
Jewish constituents’ religion
as archaic & ancestral,
as mos maiorum (the custom of the ancestors)

Thus for Romans:
kinship
with the Jews
in revering traditions of one’s ancestors 
=   a key component in initial tolerance

Jewish communities in empire
given special dispensation:

  • to send monetary assistance to Temple in Jerusalem
  • Jews were not required to participate in imperial cult worship 
  as it went against their mandate to worship only their god
  • Jews exempt “from going into the army” (see Josephus
(were later conscripted into the military)
  • Jews permitted to assemble:
“use the customs of their forefathers in assembling together for
sacred and religious purposes, as their law requires and for collecting oblations necessary for sacrifices.”
[comment:  I thought sacrifices were only to be performed at the consecrated Temple in Jerusalem.]
Proclamation suggests:
Jews had a certain amount of autonomy in their communities,
re religious responsibilities.

Jews in various imperial cities, like Antioch
even with rights of full citizenship
status remained ambiguous among their neighbours
“Their strict monotheism, their ‘imageless’ worship, the strong cohesion of their communities won admiration among many of their pagan neighbors, leading some to become outright proselytes, others to become sympathizers or even formal adherents to the synagogue,”
Same qualities caused resentment

If the Jews were to be politai (citizens) rather than katoikountes (alien residents), they should worship the local gods and keep all monies within the city rather than send it to other provincial towns.

Resentments arose from neighbours throughout empire.

Jewish elite in Judaea had close ties with imperial Rome.

Judas Maccabeus
(c. 161 BCE) initiated a political alliance
with Rome to gain leverage against Seleucids

Hasmonean priests
supported:   Julius Caesar


support 
returned when Caesar proclaimed
certain Syrian & Judean cities as “free” cities,
with Roman citizenship bestowed on inhabitants.

Herodian dynasty
= established through friendship
= with the Julio-Claudian emperors.


Herod the Great’s own sons
were fostered at the imperial court in Rome,
sent there to “enjoy the company of Caesar”

Regardless of above, Jewish-Roman relationship
=  completely peaceful

After death Herod the Great,
successors incapable of satisfying both
the Roman govt  & Jewish population

thus:

restoration of Roman power in Judaea
& Rome appointed governors and procurators
as direct rulers

Zealot faction of the Judean Jewry rebelled
re slights local governors & pagan neighbours committed
against the Jewish population.

ultimately led to the Great Revolt (66-78) [here]

70 AD, under Titus
Romans sacked & destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem.

Important to note that in spite of the Jewish
Roman wars, Jewish communities spread
throughout the empire did not suffer a loss of rights
as Roman citizens,

religious privileges were not rescinded
-- eg  right to assemble & to decline participation in imperial sacrifices

Jews, as a whole, still received
same special dispensations as before

Except:

after Temple’s destruction
Vespasian created a tax, the fiscusiudaicus
on all Jews throughout the empire.

New tax took Jewish financial support
previously earmarked for the Temple at Jerusalem,
transferring the funds to Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus in Rome.

minor reparation cannot be truly considered a
punishment since Rome already had taxes placed on the provinces,
/  removing one of the complaints other communities had
against the Jews.

Note:
  • Jewish communities were large, had wealth, & political clout
  • ties were still strong ties between Rome & certain sects, like the Pharisees, of Second Temple Judaism.
Jerusalem’s landscape - no Temple (destroyed), result:
Sadducean Jews (Temple elites and powerful members of the Sanhedrin) found themselves without a power base.
Judaism was a topocosmic religion: 
  • the Temple in Jerusalem was its physical centre
  • with the Sadducees as its moral centre
Pharisaic Jews 
=  rising in power b/c they were less Temple-centric
belief Jews could stay true to Judaism anywhere 
(if 632 admonitions of Mosaic Law were kept)
[comment:  no wonder the Jewish-Christian sect eventually ditched the Mosaic Laws for the heathens.  Nobody would adopt that many rules and regulations.   lol]
Pharisees 
= gain in cooperating with imperial edicts 
  • in Judaea; or 
  • in large communities all throughout the empire.

Understanding relationship b/w Jews & Romans
= foundation for understanding
why Jews are considered to be Christians’ first persecutors.
Jewish communities
=  first to hear messianic message. 
Some accepted Yeshua/Jesus = messiah
But:
“most Jews found the Christian claims about [Jesus’ messiah-ship] unbelievable & ludicrous, or even blasphemous.”


Yeshua/Jesus movement viewed as:  a wicked new superstition (at best)
Jewish-Christian sect beliefs & blatantly radical actions created enmity b/w themselves & their communities.
Jewish communities’ connection with these Christian-Jews
=  climate dangerous for Jewish leaders
relationship with the imperial house strained due to:
 Ongoing tensions b/w:
  • privileged and populous Jewish communities
  • Greek neighbours throughout the Empire
  • + other zealot factions which remained hostile to Rome

Romans and the Christiani


Christians reportedly
met in large groups for teaching,
promoting strange new customs
at odds with Roman and Jewish traditionalism.

"Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the  most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. 

Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular." -- Tacitus

Tacitus
says only Christians in Rome were arrested
so this persecution was not empire-wide.

Any sympathy re excessive punishments
came only after the executions
had become gruesome & ruthless to
extent deaths viewed as:
“one man’s brutality rather than the national interest.”

Burned as human torches in Nero’s garden
dressed as Danaids and Dirce to
perform in deadly circus games
torn apart by wild dogs

Tacitus specifically calls this group “Christians,”
which points to a marked
distinction between the Christians 
within and outside of 
Jewish communities in Rome by 64AD


Emperor Nero
responsible for first recorded
Roman persecution of
Christians in 64 CE

Christians in Rome were singled out for their
anti-social behaviour
+ unsubstantiated rumours
surrounding activities

Punishment
for suspicious & separatist behaviour
that stemmed from their
religious beliefs, but not from those beliefs themselves

[comment:  that doesn't make sense, given separatist behaviour of Jewish communities.  Jewish community must have been the exempted religion, permitted to meet openly (see below)]

As early Christians were unpopular
and despised for keeping themselves apart
from their communities,
Nero could choose them as the guilty party
and, whether or not true,
citizenry would not care
enough to seek out
the truth.

Christians’ crimes were in:  assembling together since
{secret societies were forbidden}
Only approved
  • clubs
  • guilds
  • religions
permitted to meet openly.

Pliny thought them harmless,
if having “depraved, excessive
superstition.”

Main problem (Pliny’s perspective),
=  their growing number, which he deemed dangerous.

Christians were being pointed out
to authorities, some anonymously.

Reason dictates
anonymous accusations would
come from those with something to gain

property & fortunes, most likely

if accused were found guilty & stripped
of belongings.


Emperor’s statement of
acceptance of anonymous accusations
as inappropriate has its basis in
pietas and philosophia.

Justice and honour
=  hand-in-hand with piety & philosophy

Law breaking
(assembling & refusing to submit to imperial sacrifices)
prosecutable offences
& execution acceptable

BUT not religious beliefs

Historical sources
make clear prosecution
for behaviour as separatists
anti-social and anti-imperial,

and

for cleaving to their illogical
superstitio (as opposed to religio),
but we cannot ignore
the reason behind this behaviour:
their beliefs & doctrines.

In very real sense,
Christians were being persecuted for beliefs.

Romans
see invented group,
Christians,
as atheists, literally “without the gods.”

[But the Jewish community is also 'without the gods']

Refusal to sacrifice to imperial & local cults,
or even to pray for the safety of the emperor,
viewed as dangerous to provinces & to Empire
[But the Jewish community was exempt] 

Every citizen had to submit to
local gods to ensure safety of town
[But the Jewish community was exempt]  

to deny deities, tantamount to turning back on
city, empire & tradition
[But the Jewish community was exempt]

talk of 'new king' & coming 'kingdom to supplant' this one
secretive meetings
consumption of body during meals
= distrust

Order in Roman Empire kept through:
  • military
  • governors in provinces
  • systemisation on balance of:
    # lex (law); and
    # religio (religion)

with

    # pietas (piety)
    # gens (family)

and
    # the state
        at the foundation of honour-shame society

No separation of church & state
externo religionibus (foreign religions)
=  considered inferior

Roman Empire & Religion

“Religion and the preservation of the Roman state were intimately connected.”  [Frend]

Romans would take issue with:
  • Christians
  • Jews
  • Bacchanals
  • Druids
  • or any number of religious cults
if disturbance of peace or 'immoral behaviour'

and Romans would seek to eradicate.

Christianity cannot claim exclusivity
re martyrdom or persecution/prosecution.

Christian Acts on a Roman Stage

By the end of 2nd Century,
persecution & martyrdom
different than


when the Jews experienced
it in the first Jewish war and the mass suicide
at Masada & by Jews in 1st Century

or

when when the priests and priestesses of
externorum religionum

pagan cults
in the Roman provinces experienced it

Author goes on to say:
it was
different to when the Christians were specifically
targeted in the 2nd to 4th Century

[does not make sense to me]

Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch in Syria, 
was arrested (c. 110AD) / sent to Rome for trial.

knew by dying in
a sacrificial manner it would bear witness
to the truth of the religion
therefore, would be
instrumental in spreading the gospel


Circa 110AD

accounts of Christians in
  • Rome
  • Gaul urban cities
  • North Africa urban cities
  • Asia Minor urban cities
executions
155 - bishop burned at the stake
177 - group Christians various tortures, finally being thrown to the beasts in the amphitheatre (Gaul – Lyons and Vienne)
180 - Christians in Scillium were beheaded.
202 - group of Christians placed in the arena with wild beasts


Accounts of:

solicited martyrdom
in other parts of Empire
Carthage order of Christians
came forward to demand martyrdom
at the hands of the Romans,
reportedly
with nooses already tied
around
their necks   [ ... lol, those crazy Christians]

Wanted to die a martyr’s death
 -- not arrested, not on trial

Antoninus responded,

“Wretches, if you simply must die do you not have cliffs and ropes?”

Following invited consequences of actions:

  • seen teaching doctrine in the
agora (marketplace)

  • seen assembling with known Christians
visiting condemned Christians being held in prison

  • displaying obstinate behaviour towards
their captors soon caused rancor (would quicken sentence & execution)

NOTE
None of these 'please martyr us'
accounts were reported in
rural areas or small towns.

All in major
urban centres, most commonly
in Asia Minor & North Africa
+  scattered throughout the provincial cities
in Europe & Greece.

“an urban manifestation of Christian zeal.”

No courts or trials were held in small territories.

[So is lack of provincial courts why it was only an urban Christian zeal?]

If crime seen as detrimental to empire,
Christian and non-Christian sentenced alike:
non-lethal punishment; or
in case of sedition or treason, execution.


Martyrs & church
did not hesitate to
use executions / martyrdom to own purpose

Christian ethos
reflected a growing desire to stand
against pagan idolaters of the Empire
very openly through martyrdom

Blood Baptism

Tertullian
blood shed during executions catalyst for:

1.  purification of the victim
2.  attraction to the religion

Christians deemed as
'other' & their role in the games
only served to unite the already hostile Jews
&  polytheists against them

hostility of some turned to curiosity

then admiration

led some to embrace Christianity


“sight of condemned Christians provoked some volunteers
[to martyr themselves]   [... lol that'd be the Christian era leftie, hippie types]

Tertullian
believed it was duty
of Christians to suffer
and die in emulation of Yeshua/Jesus’ suffering and death
[check this:  think he was just a historian.  Could be error.]


Voluntary Martyrdom
caused much debate b/w pre-Augustinian
Christian theologian schools of philosophy,
Platonism, for one,
as parallel to Christian doctrine
in that
“both [Christians and Platonists] were radically other-worldly:

Yeshua/Jesus had said:,

‘My kingdom is not of this world’ 

Plato 
said the same of his realm of ideas.

Platonists
uniformly against idea of self-destruction.

Many Stoics & Epicureans
saw the morality & nobility of the mors voluntaria.

[comment:  check 'morality']


Clement

Belief that purposefully seeking a martyr’s death
=  tantamount to suicide,
Clement claimed martyr-suicides were not truly Christians.


Tertullian
was violently opposed to
idea that any Greco-Roman ideals or philosophies
could truly influence Christianity

yet he employed noble pagan
deaths of the past as justification that

“if these courageous people destroyed themselves
for a false way of life, should Christians not
do the same for the true way?”

In debate re voluntary martyrdom
b/w Christian sophists (teachers, philosophers, scholars, thinkers)
& theologians (students of religion)
strong a connection to
Greco-Roman ethos.


Core of both Greco & Roman cultures:

complex system of beliefs & rituals
associated with every type of death

Romans
relatively short life spans
  • closely tied to cycles of nature
  • tied to land
  • cycles of
  • fertility
  • blood
  • death
  • blood, birth
  • blood, spilled
  • blood, hunting
  • blood, food
  • blood, religious rites
  • blood, war
  • blood, funerary traditions -- admission afterlife

Christians
preoccupation with death
exchange of life
by shedding of blood as sacrifice for
better more peaceful afterlife

Roman Death + Christian Martyrdom
tied symbolically by idea that:
spilling of blood entailed
a ritual of purification

Author says:
close antecedent to
spilling of blood 
as ritual purification
=  Roman death rituals


PRIMARY SOURCE (ABOVE) -- OTHER, AS MARKED
http://aquila.usm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1267&context=honors_theses


SACRIFICES -- JUDAISM


'For the LIFE of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul', Lev. 17. 11.

"Capital punishment is by express divine command, Gen. 9. 4-6."  -- penalty for shedding blood of man.

"... emphatic prohibition against eating blood or flesh with the blood undrained from it. The prohibition was heavily enforced upon the Israelites"

"The blood belonged to God and was to be poured out before the Lord. Under law, disobedience meant the death penalty."

Sacrificial Offerings

"Abel slew the firstling of his flock and offered this, including the richest element, the fat, Gen. 4. 4"

"Noah opened the new era by offering clean beasts and birds and these were burned with fire on the altar, Gen. 8. 20. "

"Abraham ... four altars which he built, climaxed on Mount Moriah when he offered his son Isaac in a figure and then a substitutionary sacrifice of a clean animal, a ram, Gen. 22"

"Isaac and Jacob built and worshipped at altars at critical points in their lives, Gen. 26. 25; 35. 3, 7. "

"Job likewise offered burnt sacrifices on behalf of his family in case they had sinned against God, Job 1.5."

substitutionary sacrifice
man to god
innocent substitute dying in the place of the sinner
no mention of the blood of the sacrifices
*YET:   blood poured out at the altar means vicarious death

"blood of the passover lamb, the Levitical offerings, and the Day of Atonement all point forward to the final fulfillment of the pouring out of the precious blood of Christ for rebels and for sinners on Calvary's cross"

Sacrificial blood is mentioned 18 times in the book of Exodus
re Passover
re blood covenant made with Israel at Mount Sinai

Moses built an altar and offered upon it burnt and peace offerings. Half of the blood was sprinkled on the altar and the rest upon the people, after they had committed themselves to do and obey the law written in the book.

Leviticus atoning blood occurs about 60 times in relation to the sacrifices, the consecration of the priesthood, and the ritual of the Day of Atonement.

Verbs are used relating to the application of the blood including i) poured out, at the altar (5 times); ii) sprinkled, (12 times); iii) wrung out (twice); iv) offered (once); v) presented (twice).


Role of Blood - Judaism
  • Cleansing, Lev. 14. 14,
  • Sanctification, Num. 19. 1-6; Heb. 9. 13.
  • Consecration, 
a) the priesthood. Exod. 29. 20-21;
b) the leper on the 8th day of his cleansing, Lev. 14. 14.
  • covenant of blood, Exod. 24. 4-8. cf. Gen. 15. 7-21; Jer. 34. 18, 19

http://www.ternestwilson.com/sac9.html

Sacrifices - Judaism

Abraham passed the test, and human sacrifice has never become a part of our heritage.

Once the Holy Temple was built Hebrews longer permitted to bring sacrifices anywhere else.

King Solomon
Holy Temple (1 Kings 8:46-49)
King Solomon prayed that if the Jews get captured and taken away from the land of Israel, they should be able to pray and their god should hear their prayers, even when they are not at the Holy Temple (1 Kings 8:46-49)
explicitly says *pray*, because outside of the Holy Temple we may not offer any sacrifices.
Laws of all previous eras and situations were no longer relevant -- clock could not be moved back.
That is what the Torah commands.

Forgiveness
through repentance, confession and prayer
But when it is possible to bring sacrifices, we are required to, and we must.

King David
"Do good, as You see fit, to Zion. May You rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. Then will You desire the sacrifices brought by the righteous, burnt offerings and whole offerings; bullocks will then be offered upon Your altar" (Psalms 51:20-21).

70 years of Babylonian Exile
-- exile ends
-- return to Holy Land
-- Temple rebuilt
-- forbidden to bring sacrifices anywhere else

420 years later
-- Temple destroyed by Romans
-- exile once more
-- when Messiah comes, the Holy Temple will be rebuilt
-- once again Hebrews will bring sacrifices on the Holy Altar
-- still forbidden to bring sacrifices outside of the Holy Temple
-- pray conducted without bringing sacrifices

In summary:

Hebrews no longer bring Sacrifices because the Torah forbids us to bring any Sacrifices outside of the Holy Temple (since we have no Holy Temple, and it is impossible for us to rebuild it at this time)

http://www.beingjewish.com/unchanged/sacrifices.html


[comment:  may have something to do with the Muslim invasions and the building of mosques on top of Hebrew holy sites]

More -- reasons no sacrifice:
  • precise area where the Holy Temple used to be is ritually impure (entry is violation of Biblical prohibition, punishable by death).
  • exact location must be determined & altar must be built.
  • then there's difficulty appointing a High Priest: Mosaic Ordination ceased to exist in the year 358AD
  • Sanhedrin (body of 71 ordained rabbis as Supreme Court of People of Israel) cannot be assembled because Sanhedrin must be composed of rabbis ordained under Mosaic traditions (which was passed from rabbi to rabbi since Moses).
  • return of the Ten Tribes is also a requirement. 
[comment:  ten tribes aren't coming back.  they've assimilated.]

http://www.beingjewish.com/unchanged/rebuild.html


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COMMENT

I really enjoyed looking at this material.





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