against pagans?

[Augustus]

Is not that one side of the story? Who is reporting?

The Pagan Romans mostly: Emperors, historians, etc over 3+ centuries.

Crucifixion of Isis priest, burnings at the stake of Manichaeans, execution of Bacchanals, eradication of the Druids, expulsion of Jews and Chaldeans (astrologers), etc.

eah, proselytization always creates problems, playing the numbers game

Everything I said would still be true even if we completely ignored the Christians.

 

[Aupmanyav]

The Pagan Romans mostly: Emperors, historians, etc over 3+ centuries.

Yeah, Manichians and Christians were seeking adherents. So, they were in conflict with Roman religion.

 

[Augustus]

Yeah, Manichians and Christians were seeking adherents. So, they were in conflict with Roman religion.

Manichaeans were persecuted as they were seen as being too Persian. Those who followed Isis and Serapis were persecuted at times for being seen as too Egyptian. 'Foreign' Chaldean astrologers were seen as corrupting innocent Romans.

Persecution or acceptance of sects often depended on the swinging of the political pendulum.

“You should not only worship the divine everywhere and in every way in accordance with our ancestral traditions, but also force all others to honour it. Those who attempt to distort our religion with strange rites you should hate and punish, not only for the sake of the gods … but also because such people, by bringing in new divinities, persuade many folks to adopt foreign practices, which lead to conspiracies, revolts, and factions, which are entirely unsuitable for monarch.” Dio Cassius - History of Rome

 

[Augustus]

Ignoring all but that which confirms your bias is not really the idea of evidence.

More than 300 years of intermittent persecutions from Augustus to Galerius that confirm my 'bias'.

I know there were less great persecutions, so what

Yesterday you didn't even know about The Great Persecution of Diocletian. It would be almost impossible to have read much on the topic without actually knowing of that.

The "what" is that they are centuries of evidence that one should adopt a more nuanced position than simply repeating platitudes like "The Romans were very tolerant".

I have repeatedly explained that contravening the law is a crime. You seem to ignore that

Seeing as you didn't notice Diocletian the first 3 times he was mentioned, perhaps you have missed this too as I've already answered it multiple times:

1. The Christians were not the only ones persecuted, and repeating "but it was treason" does nothing to address the other groups who were persecuted for a variety of different reasons (the other groups you have studiously avoided discussing).

2. The idea that legal status of an action is the be all and end all for whether it should be considered tolerant is inane and requires you to ignore millennia of historical oppressions that were 'legal'.

Religiously intolerant laws that kill people for peaceful conscientious objection are still intolerant whatever 'crime' you put it as in the statutes. When Reconquista Spain passed laws requiring all Muslims to convert to Christianity, that was intolerant too, you can't simply say "but it was the law!". That the law is understandable in historical context =/= tolerant.

 

[ChristineM]

More than 300 years of intermittent persecutions from Augustus to Galerius that confirm my 'bias'.

More than 300 years of constantly committing treason, that confirms my statement... Thanks for that

Yesterday you didn't even know about The Great Persecution of Diocletian. It would be almost impossible to have read much on the topic without actually knowing of that.

The "what" is that they are centuries of evidence that one should adopt a more nuanced position than simply repeating platitudes like "The Romans were very tolerant".

Sheesh? Dance a jig why dont ya? know the topic pretty well, i have not studied Diocletian or any emperor emperor after Severus. There were after all 70 of them, you buddy was what, around 50th.

Yes centuries of christianity commuting treason. Thanks again.

Seeing as you didn't notice Diocletian the first 3 times he was mentioned, perhaps you have missed this too as I've already answered it multiple times:

What makes you think i trawled though all your voluminous puffed out, oft repeated posts? I have better things to do than go over and over and over the same biased rhetoric and strawmen several times a day.

 

[Aupmanyav]

“You should not only worship the divine everywhere and in every way in accordance with our ancestral traditions, but also force all others to honour it. Those who attempt to distort our religion with strange rites you should hate and punish, not only for the sake of the gods … but also because such people, by bringing in new divinities, persuade many folks to adopt foreign practices, which lead to conspiracies, revolts, and factions, which are entirely unsuitable for monarch.” Dio Cassius - History of Rome

That is right. There is no need for new divinities and new practices, when those too are lies and nothing else.

 

[Augustus]

More than 300 years of constantly committing treason, that confirms my statement... Thanks for that

Yet the post says most of them had nothing to do with treason

Yes centuries of christianity commuting treason. Thanks again.

Yet the post says it was about far more than Christianity.

What makes you think i trawled though all your voluminous puffed out, oft repeated posts? I have better things to do than go over and over and over the same biased rhetoric and strawmen several times a day.

Oft repeated historical facts, yet you haven't even managed to grasp the most elementary idea that persecutions involved Pagans, Dualists and Monotheists, not simply Christians.

If you choose wilful ignorance, then that's up to you.

 

[ChristineM]

Yet the post says most of them had nothing to do with treason



Yet the post says it was about far more than Christianity.



Oft repeated historical facts, yet you haven't even managed to grasp the most elementary idea that persecutions involved Pagans, Dualists and Monotheists, not simply Christians.

If you choose wilful ignorance, then that's up to you.

How ignorant of you, you continue to ignore the law and its consciquences of treason. But instead go round and round with your pet dream and accuse me of ignorance.

I have previously stated that other faiths were guilty of the same offence so why do you keep harping back to that strawman?

 

[Augustus]

How ignorant of you, you continue to ignore the law and its consciquences of treason. But instead go round and round with your pet dream and accuse me of ignorance.

Seriously, your last few replies have been to not far off the opposite of what I actually said. It's like you've read one word and then just made the rest up to suit your needs

I have previously stated that other faiths were guilty of the same offence so why do you keep harping back to that strawman?

And again. Your reading comprehension can't possibly be this bad, so I have to assume you're doing it on purpose. There is no way you could consistently misunderstand basic sentences this much.

Each to their own I suppose. Never mind.

 

[ChristineM]

Seriously, your last few replies have been to not far off the opposite of what I actually said. It's like you've read one word and then just made the rest up to suit your needs



And again. Your reading comprehension can't possibly be this bad, so I have to assume you're doing it on purpose. There is no way you could consistently misunderstand basic sentences this much.

Each to their own I suppose. Never mind.

More insult based on ignorance, why do you ignore the law? Why do you ignore treason? Two questions you have not only failed to answer but have either ridiculed or ignored complely.

And another insult, 2 in one post, are you going for a record?

 

[Augustus]

More insult based on ignorance, why do you ignore the law? Why do you ignore treason? Two questions you have not only failed to answer but have either ridiculed or ignored complely.

And another insult, 2 in one post, are you going for a record?

Genuinely, I was being serious, and it was the most generous possible interpretation of your posts.

The alternative is believing that you were that far off the mark while actually trying to respond honestly, accurately and in good faith which would be far more insulting. But you are not, so it's not worth discussing any more.

Seeing as you didn't notice Diocletian the first 3 times he was mentioned, perhaps you have missed this too as I've already answered it multiple times:

1. The Christians were not the only ones persecuted, and repeating "but it was treason" does nothing to address the other groups who were persecuted for a variety of different reasons (the other groups you have studiously avoided discussing).

2. The idea that legal status of an action is the be all and end all for whether it should be considered tolerant is inane and requires you to ignore millennia of historical oppressions that were 'legal'.

Religiously intolerant laws that kill people for peaceful conscientious objection are still intolerant whatever 'crime' you put it as in the statutes. When Reconquista Spain passed laws requiring all Muslims to convert to Christianity, that was intolerant too, you can't simply say "but it was the law!". That the law is understandable in historical context =/= tolerant.

 

[ChristineM]

Genuinely, I was being serious, and it was the most generous possible interpretation of your posts.

The alternative is believing that you were that far off the mark while actually trying to respond honestly, accurately and in good faith which would be far more insulting. But you are not, so it's not worth discussing any more.

So still not answered my questions, in fact totally ignored again

And you are not discussing, you are stomping your foot while ignoring facts.

And i sure i said it was a waste of time a few days ago

 

[shunyadragon]

More insult based on ignorance, why do you ignore the law? Why do you ignore treason? Two questions you have not only failed to answer but have either ridiculed or ignored complely.

And another insult, 2 in one post, are you going for a record?

No just a consistent pattern.

 

[Augustus]

No just a consistent pattern.

Of basing my posts on cited historical evidence rather than ideological bias, yes. Thanks for noticing

 

[ChristineM]

Of basing my posts on cited historical evidence rather than ideological bias, yes. Thanks for noticing

Narrowly selected historical evidence and by ignoring inconvenient points such as the law and roman custom

Yes we noticed

And of course, @shunyadragon was referring to your insults not your lack of comprehensive understanding about Rome

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Yeah, Manichians and Christians were seeking adherents. So, they were in conflict with Roman religion.

That wasn't why the Romans were scandalized by them. It was because they refused to sacrifice to the Roman deities. Roman religion was heavily contractual and focused on the performance of exact rituals in order to keep the peace with the deities. If you didn't hold up your end of the contract, the deities would be angry with you. Even Jews had eventually been given a pass to get out of that (after a bunch of wars, of course), but Christians totally refused.

 

[Augustus]

That wasn't why the Romans were scandalized by them. It was because they refused to sacrifice to the Roman deities. Roman religion was heavily contractual and focused on the performance of exact rituals in order to keep the peace with the deities. If you didn't hold up your end of the contract, the deities would be angry with you. Even Jews had eventually been given a pass to get out of that (after a bunch of wars, of course), but Christians totally refused.

The days when Christians were punished for being atheists

“the Christians’ “atheism” was the basic cause of their maltreatment. Some intellectual pagans decried the forms of contemporary cult, but almost all concurred with them when necessary; the Christians refused to concur, and their lack of respect was intolerable. It was also dangerous. “Perhaps some god has conceived spite against us, angry because of the sacrifices: hard, indeed, is the anger of a god…” These Homeric verses still spoke for a widespread fear and attitude. If a god was dishonoured, he might send his anger against the community, in the form of famine, plague or drought. “No rain, because of the Christians,” had become proverbial by the mid-fourth century.

The persecutions, therefore, connect neatly with the features which we identified as the living heart of pagan religiousness: honour and anger, and the appeasing advice of oracles. Persecution would have occurred at any period, because it attached to the bedrock of this religiousness, as old as the age of Homer, in which it was first expressed for us. The persecutions are good evidence that the essential continuity of pagan religiousness was still significant. It was not the preserve of a few antiquarians: it still animated whole cities...

[Pliny] already beheaded those Christians who were not Roman citizens. Formally, the nature of their crime was by now their “name” as Christians, and there, on the whole, the matter has been left. In any given case, governors may have felt personal outrage at other aspects: the apparent treason and disloyalty, the success in influencing other converts, the obstinacy, the “steadfast face,” the un-Roman behaviour with the rumours of immorality in the background. Christians disturbed the peace of a province, and detracted from the gods’ honours and most governors would agree that “atheists” might provoke anger in heaven. If many governors in the second century had been asked to be more precise, one suspects they would simply have said that Christians were Christians; they had been persecuted elsewhere, and precedent required governors to take up accusations and persecute them again, without too much thought for the niceties.”
Robin Lane Fox - Pagans and Christians


Hope things are a little bit better with you btw