1 Earliest Rome

11.8b Not in front of the children
Juvenal, Satires 14.96-106
î 1.9 Regulation of clubs
Juvenal's fourteenth satire, a warning against setting bad examples to one's children,
includes an attack on those who point their children towards Judaism.
Some who have a father who observed the sabbath worship nothing but clouds and the
divinity of heaven, and think there is no difference between human and pig's flesh, from
which their father abstained; before long, they go on to remove their foreskins. 1
Accustomed to despise Roman laws, they learn, follow and observe Jewish law, whatever
Moses handed down in his arcane volume: for example, that one should show the way
only to a fellow believer, and with people in search of drinking water that one should
assist only the circumcised. 2
But it is the father who was at fault; for him every seventh
day was given up to laziness, and kept apart from all the concerns of life.
1. Juvenal is apparently referring to a penumbra of Jewish sympathizers, 'god-fearers', who
observed only part of the Jewish law, bur he depicts their sons as lull proselytes. Ct.
12.6e.
2. The alleged refusal of Jews to help non-Jews was seen as extremely anti-social. Jewish
authors (e.g. Josephus, Against Apion li.211) sought to counter the charge.
11.9 Regulation of clubs and associations
Justinian, D/^fXXXXVII.22.1
Regulation of private gatherings first occurred in Rome in the middle of the
first century B.C. amid fears of social and political disorder. Under Augustus
a more extensive Law on Associations was passed which required all associations
to be authorized by the senate or emperor, with the exception of burial
societies (for the poor) and meetings for the sake of rcligto. In the second
century governors could ban social clubs, with consequences for Christian
gatherings (11.1 lb), and by the third century A.D. (as the following passage,
from a jurist of the first half of the third century A.D., explains) the principles
were extended systematically to the provinces in imperial instructions
to provincial governors.
See further: Vol. 1, 230; 12.2; Mommsen (1899) 875-7; Schulz (1951)
95-102.*
Marcianus, Institutes, Book III: By the imperial mandates to provincial governors it is laid
down that neither fellowship societies be tolerated nor soldiers' clubs in the camps be
permitted; but it is permissible for the people of poorer means to pay a monthly
subscription provided that they gather onlv once a month; this limitation is to prevent
any pretext for an illegal club. DivusSzvems issued a riding that this
regulation applies not only in Rome, but also in Italy and the provinces. 'But meetings