"

of the anti-imperial Tertullianus. "We are always praying for all emperors," he says, "that their life may be prolonged, their rule secure, their family safe, their armies strong, the Senate faithful, the people upright, the world quiet, and whatever (else) they wish for in their human or imperial capacity."1 (Scripture) says Pray for kings and governors and authorities, in order that all things may be peaceful for you.' For when the Empire is disturbed, and the other members of it are disturbed, we also, though strangers to disorder, are (sure to be) found in the locality affected." 2 We pray for Emperors, for their ministers and authorities, for the stability of the age, for the prevalence of peace, for the postponement of the end." 3

THE STATE AS THE CHURCH'S BENEFACTOR.-We have hitherto traced the varieties of Christian thought and sentiment in regard to the State from the one extreme of antipathy and disapprobation to the other extreme of full theoretical recognition and honour. Our study of the latter attitude has been for the most part confined to the Church's view of the State as an organization virtually unconnected in any practical way with herself. The Christian gratitude for the maintenance of peace has brought us to the brink of a fresh phase of the subject, viz. the rapprochement between Church and State in the practical affairs of life. We find the Christians naturally very willing to receive benefits from the State and its rulers and very grateful for what they receive. Thus Marcia, the concubine of Commodus, was, if not a Christian, a religious woman and a friend of the Christians; and, after obtaining from Victor, bishop of Rome, a list of the Christians who had been sent to the Sardinian mines, she procured from the Emperor orders for their release, and seems to have succeeded in putting a stop to the persecution. Hippolytus speaks of her kindness in highly appreciative terms. Tertullianus tells us that Cæcilius Capella, the persecuting governor of Byzantium, when he could no longer hold the town against the besieging forces of Severus (196 A.D.), exclaimed: "Christians, rejoice! He

1 Tert. Apol. 30 (i. 232f): .

quaecunque hominis et Caesaris vota sunt.

2 Tert. Apol. 31 (i. 235f): 1 T ii. 2. 3 Tert. A pol. 39 (i. 255f) (see above, p. 346 n 5). While Tertullianus was no doubt quite sincere in his prayer that the imperial government might be able to maintain peace, it is doubtful whether he was equally sincere in his wish for the postponement of the end through the stability of the government: see above, p. 346.

Hipp. Ref. ix. 12 (7, D. and S. 454) (@eλhoaoan Maрkia pyov тɩ ảɣaðòv ἐργάσασθαι, οὖσα φιλόθεος παλλακὴ Κομόδου, κτλ.); Dio Cassius lxxii. 4: Neumann SK 85-87; Bigelmair 157f; Harnack ME ii. 47f; Gwatkin ECH i. 170f.

counted on the Christians welcoming Severus as their liberator.1 The apologetic interest led to a great historical exaggeration of the favours which former rulers of the Empire had bestowed upon Christendom. According to Tertullianus, none of the Emperors except Nero, Domitianus, and Trajanus had persecuted the Christians. Tiberius had been prevented only by the opposition of the Senate from giving their religion official recognition and favour. Even Trajanus had forbidden them to be sought for. Neither Vespasianus, nor Hadrianus, nor Pius, nor Verus, had enforced the laws against them. Marcus Aurelius had protected them by threatening severe penalties against their accusers. 2

A more significant point of contact with the government was formed when the churches of Rome and other places-perhaps availing themselves of the rescript of Severus, issued in 198 A.D. or earlier, re-authorizing the existence of burial-clubs (collegia tenuiorum)—got themselves enrolled as such, and in this disguise obtained a measure of State-recognition and with it the legal right of holding property. It was, doubtless, under this arrangement that Callistus, some time after his return from Sardinia, was placed by Pope Zephyrinus in charge of the Christian catacombs on the Appian Way.3 Alexander Severus (222-235 A.D.), while he does not seem to have declared Christianity a 'religio licita,' yet secured a de facto toleration for it.4 On one occasion, a piece of public ground, which had been occupied

1 Tert. Scap. 3 (i. 545). Cf. Neumann SK 97; Bigelmair 122.

2 Tert. Apol. 5 (i. 130ff); Harnack KS 145. We are unfortunately not in a position to say whether the forgery of the so-called Letter of Antoninus to the Koinon of Asia and the so-called Letter of Marcus Aurelius to the Senate about his Christian soldiers, belongs to this period or not. On the former, see above, p. 204 n 8; on the latter, p. 278 n 1.

Wir

3DCA ii. 1123; Doulcet vif, 155-164; Neumann SK 102-113 (esp. 112f: "Dass die Christen es versuchen, sich ein Gesetz zu nutze zu machen, das durchaus nicht etwa einer Rücksicht auf das Christenthum entsprungen ist, zeigt deutlich, dass sie daran denken, in der Welt sich einzurichten. können aus christlichen Schriften jener Jahre" [i.e. about 195 A.D.]" vielmehr die deutliche Einsicht darein gewinnen, dass die Christen sich im Irdischen einleben"); Ramsay CRE 430-432 (he believes the registration of Christian communities as burial-clubs began about 130-140 A.D.); Hardy 168–195 (he also [194] carries the arrangement, so far as the Roman church is concerned, back to a time long before that of Pope Victor); Workman 67-72; Bigelmair 57-59 (thinks the church of Rome was enrolled under M. Aurelius); Gwatkin ECH ii. 119–121. In The Expositor III. viii. 407ff, 419 (Dec. 1888), Ramsay refers to inscriptions, belonging to the third century, in which the Christian communities of Acmonia, Apameia, and Hierapolis in Phrygia, are referred to under non-committal titles, thus: 'The Society of the Neighbours of the First-Gate People,' the Neotheroi,' the Council of Presidence of the Purple-dippers.'

Lampridius, Alexander Severus, xxii. 4 (in Hist. Aug. ed. Peter i. 263): Christianos esse passus est. On the favour shown by the House of Severus to the Christians, cf. Bigelmair 53f, 59, 123.

by the Christians, was claimed by the victuallers as their own: Alexander assigned it to the Christians, giving as his reason that it was better that God should be worshipped there in some fashion than that the place should be given to the victuallers.1

2

CHRISTIANS AT COURT AND AMONG THE GOVERNING CLASSES.-With the rapid spread of Christianity throughout the population of the Empire, all classes of society became affected by the new faith, and the Church came to include among its members a considerable and growing number of people of high social rank.3 Bardaisan's parents were probably wealthy people of noble station.1 Origenes describes his friend Ambrosius as "honoured and accepted by very many cities "5-probably in allusion to the custom of conferring honorary citizenship on distinguished people. If, as seems likely, conversions to Christianity took place more rapidly among women than among men, the fact would throw an interesting light, not only on cases where Christian women of high social rank are mentioned, but also on a few instances in which Christian women appear as the wives of important pagan officials, occasionally exerting in that capacity an influence favourable to Christianity, but in some cases exposing their co-religionists to peril. Tertullianus tells us of the Christian wife of Claudius Lucius Herminianus, governor of Cappadocia, who persecuted the Christians through rage at his wife's conversion. On the other hand, Hippolytus, writing about 202-204 A.D., tells us that not

8

1 Lampridius, op. cit. xlix. 6 (i. 285): Cum Christiani quendam locum, qui publicus fuerat, occupassent, contra popinarii dicerent, sibi eum deberi, rescripsit melius esse ut quemammodumcumque illic deus colatur, quam popinariis dedatur. Cf. Neumann SK 107.

2 Tert. Nat. i. 1 (i. 306) (omnem sexum, omnem aetatem, omnem denique dignitatem transgredi a vobis quasi detrimento doletis); similar words in Tert. Apol. I (i. 115); cf. 37 (i. 250f) (vestra omnia implevimus, etc.).

3 Eus. HE v. xxi. I ( . . ὡς ἤδη [time of Commodus] καὶ τῶν ἐπὶ Ρώμης εὖ μάλα πλούτῳ καὶ γένει διαφανῶν πλείους ἐπὶ τὴν σφῶν ὁμόσε χωρεῖν πανοικεί τε καὶ TAYYEVEî σwτnplav); Minuc. xxxi. 6 (nec de ultima statim plebe consistimus). The Acts of Peter (3, 8, 23, 30, 41) contain accounts of the conversion of imperial courtiers and servants and others of high rank in the time of Nero. See above, p. 266 n 2, and cf. Harnack KS 139f.

4 See below, p. 390 n 2.

Б Orig. Mart. 36 : δοξασθεὶς καὶ ἀποδεχθεὶς ὑπὸ πλείστων ὅσων πόλεων.

Perpet. ii. I (Vibia Perpetua, honeste nata, liberaliter instituta); Tert. Cul. ii. 9 (i. 726) (si quas divitiarum vel natalium vel retro dignitatum ratio compellit ita pompaticas progredi, etc.). For the obscure case of Pescennia Quoduultdeus, whom many assign to this period, see below, p. 556 n 4.

? One naturally thinks of Marcia, the " God-loving concubine of Commodus; but we cannot count her as a Christian, though she was a friend of the Christians" (Gwatkin ECH i. 171). See above, p. 387 n 4.

Tert. Scap. 3 (i. 544). It is stated in Prosopographia Imperii Romani (i. 381) that the man's real name was Hieronymianus, and his date is given as 'sub finem saeculi II."

"

long before his time the Christian wife of the governor of Syria was able to prevent her husband slaughtering as robbers a number of wandering Christian eschatological fanatics, and instituting a general persecution of the Christians in that region.1

We find Christians moreover enjoying friendly intercourse with persons of royal rank. Bardaisan was educated with the prince of Edessa, and in later years advanced the cause of Christianity at Abgar's court. We have already observed how Marcia got into communication with Pope Victor for the purpose of relieving the persecuted Christians.3 She herself appears to have been educated by a Christian presbyter, Hyacinthus, and later to have employed him as her confidential agent.4 The Emperor Severus had been cured of an illness by a Christian named Proculus, and in appreciation of this service kept him in his palace until his death. His son Antoninus (Caracalla) had a Christian wet-nurse. During the first nine years of his reign, Severus took no measures against the Christians (though there was a local persecution in Africa in 197 A.D.), but conferred signal marks of favour upon them, and protected them openly from the attacks of the populace. Julius Africanus undertook in 221 A.D. an embassy to the Emperor Elagabalus to ask his help for the ruined town of Emmaus, and was placed by him at the head of a commission for its restoration. He was a friend of Alexander Severus, dedicated his Keσroí to him, and

1 Hipp. Dan. IV. xviii. 1-3.

6

2 Epiphanius, Haeres. lvi. 1 (Migne PG xli. 989, 992); cf. DCB i. 250b.

3 Hipp. Ref. ix. 12 (7) : προσκαλεσαμένη τὸν μακάριον Ουίκτορα, κτλ.

4 She entrusted the letter ordering the release of the Christians in Sardinia Υακίνθῳ τινὶ σπάδοντι πρεσβυτέρῳ. Hyacinthus prevailed on the governor to release Callistus as well, páσkwv Opéyas eivaι Mapkias (Hipp. Ref. ix. 12 (7)) : cf. DCB iii. 182b; Harnack ME ii. 48 n 1; Bigelmair 157.

Tert: Scap. 4 (i. 547f) (quanti honesti viri-de vulgaribus enim non dicimus aut a daemoniis aut valetudinibus remediati sunt! Ipse etiam Severus, pater Antonini, Christianorum memor fuit. Nam et Proculum Christianum, qui Torpacion cognominabatur, Euhodiae procuratorem, qui eum per oleum aliquando curaverat, requisivit, et in palatio suo habuit usque ad mortem ejus: quem et Antoninus optime noverat lacte christiano educatus. Sed et clarissimas foeminas et clarissimos viros Severus sciens hujus sectae esse, non modo non laesit, verum et testimonio exornavit, et populo furenti in nos palam restitit). There is a slip in the English translation of this passage in Harnack ME ii. 48. Cf. Neumann SK 99; Bigelmair 50; Westcott TE 1320 ("The conjecture 'Euhodi' for 'Euhodiae' is very plausible. Euhodus was a freedman of Severus who had charge of Caracalla (7popeús, Dion C. lxxvi.), and would be likely, if a Christian himself, to give the young prince a Christian nurse"). The Acts of Charalampius (Acta Sanctorum, 10 Feb. 384f) mention a daughter of Severus, Galena, who was a Christian, but the extravagantly miraculous character of the Acts discredits their historical value (Neumann SK 293f; Harnack ME ii. 48 n 4).

Eus. Chron. ad Ann. 221 A.D. (Migne PG xix. 569f); Hieronymus. Vir. Illustr., lxiii: DCB i. 54a; Bigelmair 85; Schürer i. 641.

designed a library for him at Rome: he was also a friend of Abgar, king of Edessa.1 Hippolytus dedicated one of his treatises to Julia Mammæa, the mother of Alexander Severus.2 Origenes was more than once brought into contact with persons of official and royal rank. Sometime before he left Alexandria in 215 A.D., the governor of Arabia sent a soldier with letters to Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, and to the prefect of Egypt, asking that Origenes might be sent to him for an interview: the request was complied with.3 Either in 218 or in 232 A.D., he was summoned to Antiochia by Julia Mammæa, a religious woman, who, having heard of his fame, was desirous of seeing and listening to him. She sent a military escort to conduct him; and he spent some time with her, discoursing on religious topics. He addressed a letter to the Emperor Philippus, and another to his wife Severa. Origenes complained later of the misconstruction which unsympathetic pagans put upon such intercourse between Christian teachers and men and women of high rank, in attributing it to a desire for distinction on the part of the former."

CHRISTIANS IN THE SERVICE OF THE IMPERIAL HOUSEHOLD.—There had apparently been Christians in the imperial household ever since the days of Paul. The service was so like that of many other wealthy establishments, that the engagement of Christians in it would not seem to involve any new or different principle. But the imperial court had grown from a private household into a recruiting ground for state-officials; and it seems to have been

1 Syncellus, Chronogr. P 359b; Harnack ME ii. 50 n I. The library is mentioned in a fragment of the 18th book of the Keorol, published in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, iii. (1903) 39 (ἐν ̔Ρώμῃ πρὸς ταῖς ̓Αλεξάνδρου θερμαῖς, ἐν τῇ ἐν Πανθείῳ βιβλιοθήκῃ τῇ καλῇ ἢν αὐτὸς ἠρχιτεκτόνησα τῷ Σεβαστῷ. I do not know what authority Milman had for saying (HC ii. 179): "In the reign of Alexander Severus . . . Christian bishops were admitted, even at the court, in a recognised official character." The remark is repeated in DCA ii. 941b.

2 The work is described in the Syriac excerpts as Sermo de resurrectione ad Mammaeam, and by Theodoretus as πpòs ẞaoiλída éπioтoλý, though this latter has by some been identified with another treatise by Hippolytus, πротрETTIKOS πpòs Zeẞepeivav, who has, on slight ground, been identified with Julia Aquilia Severa, the second wife of Elagabalus cf. Neumann SK 206, H 137; Harnack C ii. 215f. Orosius (VII. xviii. 7) says that Mammaa was a Christian.

3 Eus. HE VI. xix. 15.

4 Eus. HE vi. xxi. 3f. On the date of the incident, cf. DCB iv. 99b; McGiffert's note to Eus. ad loc. in Nicene and post-Nicene Fathers, i. 269; Gwatkin ECH ii. 147.

Eus. HE VI. xxxvi. 3.

* Orig. Cels. iii. 9 : νῦν μὲν οὖν τάχα, ὅτε διὰ τὸ πλῆθος τῶν προσερχομένων τῷ λόγῳ καὶ πλούσιοι καί τινες τῶν ἐν ἀξιώμασι καὶ γύναια τὰ ἁβρὰ καὶ εὐγενῆ ἀποδέχονται τοὺς ἀπὸ τοῦ λόγου, τολμήσει τις λέγειν διὰ τὸ δοξάριον προΐστασθαί τινας τῆς κατὰ Χριστιανοὺς διδασκαλίας.

'Bigelmair 154ff ("In späterer Zeit sind die glänzendsten Posten des Landes die Domäne für die Männer des Hofes "); Harnack ME ii. 49.