Western Civilization I
Notes from 3/07/01

Today, I recapped some of the material brought out in the PBS video From Jesus to Christ, and I discussed the development of early Christianity.  As stated in the video, we have no contemporaneous accounts of the life or ministry of Jesus, and historians disagree on many details of Jesus' background.  Scholars believe he was born sometime before 4 B.C.E., which is the year King Herod of Judea died.  The New Testament Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) present different and sometimes contradictory information about Jesus' mission, the names of his disciples, the content and style of his preaching, the events surrounding his birth, and the reason for his execution by the Romans.  The "official" New Testament, adopted during the 5th century C.E., also excluded other gospels, such as the Gospel of Thomas and the "Secret Gospel of Mark" which present still different (and controversial) accounts of Jesus' ministry.

One thing we can be sure of is that Jesus' ministry must be understood in the political and social context of the Roman occupation of Palestine, and the reign of Octavian (27 B.C.E. - 14 C.E.) and his successors.  Recall from last week that Octavian had used Roman religion to enhance his own authority, proclaiming Julius Caesar a god, and declaring himself "Pontifex Maximus" or "highest priest."  If Julius Caesar was a god, then Octavian, Caesar's (adopted) son, was the son of a god, and god's kingdom was none other than the mighty Roman Empire.

It's easy to understand why Romans and subjects of the Roman Empire were willing to deify (make into a god) Caesar, and after Octavian after his death in 14 C.E.  After all, Caesar had brought wealth to the Empire with his conquest of Gaul and Egypt, and Octavian had brought peace after over a century of civil unrest and instability.  But the Pax Romana or Roman Peace that Octavian engineered came at the cost of ruthlessly crushing any dissent or challenge to Roman authority, whether that came from within Rome itself or from the far reaches of its Empire.

The death of King Herod in 4 B.C.E. is significant, because instead of remaining under a local king, Judea was incorporated by the Romans into the greater province of Syria, and therefore placed under the rule of a succession of Roman governors.  Jews were permitted to continue practicing their unique monotheistic religion, but any challenge to Roman authority, however minor or indirect, would be swiftly and brutally crushed.  Jews continued to come to the Temple in Jerusalem, but they worshipped under the watchful eye of Roman centurions.

Historians generally view Jesus as one of many charismatic and messianistic figures to appear in Roman-occupied Judea during this period.  Some messiah movements, such as that of the Essenes (who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls) were certainly more radical, but all of these groups shared two things: (1) an apocalyptic vision and (2) discontent with Roman rule and the Jerusalem Temple's worldliness and collaboration with the Romans.  By apocalyptic vision we simply mean some belief in an "end time," during which the forces of good will do battle with the forces of evil, whether on some cosmic level or right on earth itself.  Those who believe in a coming apocalypse often look for various signs that such a time is near, perhaps natural disasters or other omens, or perhaps the appearance of a messianistic figure or prophet who will lead the people to righteousness.

Roman governors were always on the alert for these kinds of movements, which in Judea often attracted the poorer classes of the society, who had not obtained discernible benefits from Roman rule.  These movements, however small or insignificant, presented an implicit challenge to Rome's authority, and to the religious "cult" of the emperor first established by Octavian.  During the Jewish festival of Passover each year, tensions would run especially high, as Jews from throughout the province converged on the city.  It is in this context that the Roman governor or procurator named Pontius Pilate (r. 26-36 C.E.) probably had issued "standing orders" for the arrest and summary execution of any "rabble rousers" during the Passover celebration, and it is probably under these circumstances that Jesus was identified and executed by the Romans.  As noted in the video, Jesus' actual crucifixion went largely unnoticed in Jerusalem, and certainly did not get anyone's attention back in Rome, but what happened in the decades after would reshape western civilization.

After his crucifixion, some of Jesus' followers no doubt disbanded, fearful of further retribution.  But others remained faithful to the ministry, meeting in synagogue and planting the seeds of a new religion.  During the 40's C.E., Saul of Tarsus, better known as St. Paul, began to take up Jesus' ministry, and Paul's travels throughout the Mediterranean, made possible by Roman roads and the long Pax Romana, helped establish the early church.

Besides the Pax Romana, another factor in the success of the "Jesus Movement" was its flexibility.  The early church made a critical decision to accept Gentiles (non-Jews) into its fold, without requiring them to convert to Judaism or to adhere to some of the stricter requirements of the faith.  This decision meant that the Jesus Movement would eventually become a separate and distinct religion from Judaism, rather than a branch or sect of Judaism.  The break with Judaism became even more pronounced when Jews in Judea rebelled against Roman rule (66-70 C.E.).  This revolt, which was sparked by a Roman desecration of the Jerusalem Temple, was brutally crushed by the Roman Army (under the command of future Emperor, Vespasian, and then his son, Titus).  Some historians theorize that the early Christians, and the writers of the Gospels, anxious to avoid Titus' brutal persecution, placed the blame for Jesus' crucifixion on the Jews, rather than the Romans, thus further differentiating the new faith from its Jewish origins.  Of course, the exoneration of the Romans and the decision to blame the Jews for the crucifixion, would become the source of European anti-Semitism for centuries to come.  (The Roman Catholic Church officially renounced the idea that the Jews were to blame in the 1960's).

Rome generally ignored the emerging Christian faith, although Paul was executed in Rome sometime around 67 C.E.  Rome mainly required that its subjects show veneration (respect), mainly on official occasions, to its deceased and deified emperors, but most early followers of Jesus refused to make even this compromise with pagan rituals.  Their stubbornness, known as contumacia, was the Christians' main offense in Roman eyes, but even so, the persecution of Christians remained relatively sporadic and inconsistent.  Rome realized early on that too many martyrs would merely help the new religion by strengthening the resolve of its adherents, and so Christianity was able to quietly spread throughout the Empire, so that by the 4th century C.E., one in five subjects of Rome called themselves Christians.  The story of how Christianity would become the official religion of the Empire, and how the Roman Church would become the dominant institution of the early Middle Ages, will be told during the next couple of weeks.