Before Jerusalem Fell

82 BEFORE JERUSALEM FELL
the last decade of the first century there occurred any open and
systematic persecution of the church.’”g
Significantly, Domitian’s “persecution” warranted his being called
a “Nero” by many, Christian and non-Christian alike. The Roman
satirist Juvenal, says Domitian was regarded by the Roman aristocracy
as a “bald Nero.”8° Martial even refers to Domitian’s death as
“Nero’s death.”81 Tertullian speaks of Domitian in terms of Nero: to
Tertullian he was not only “somewhat of a Nero in cruelty,”8 2
but a
“sub-Nero.”83 That he was known as a “Nero,” indicates Nero-% name
win paradigmatic of anti-Christian evil, not Domitian %.
Tertullian (virtually a contemporary with Clement of Alexandria)
also notes in his Scorpiaze that “Nero was the first who stained
with blood the rising faith. “8 4
Elsewhere he speaks of Domitian much
more favorably than of Nero, thus evidencing the especial early
Christian hatred of Nero’s tyranny: “Consult your Annals: there ye
will find that Nero was the first to wreak the fury of the sword of the
Caesars upon this sect, now springing up especially at Rome. But in
such a first founder of our condemnation we even glory. For whoever
knoweth him, can understand that nothing save some great good was
condemned by Nero. Domitian too, who was somewhat of a Nero in
cruelty, had tried it, but forasmuch as he was also a human being,
he speedily stopped the undertaking, even restoring those whom he
had banished.”8 5
Indeed, he mentions only Nero3 persecution when
citing the persecution of the Apostles who were the foundation of the
Church (Eph. 2: 19ff) – and was not John one of the Apostles?
Christian apologist Paulus Orosius (c. A.D. 385-418) writes in
this regard: “For [Nero] was the first at Rome to torture and inflict
the penalty of death upon Christians, and he ordered them throughout
all the provinces to be afflicted with like persecution; and in his
attempt to wipe out the very name, he killed the most blessed apostles
79. George Eldon Ladd, A Comrrrmtary on th Revelation of John (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
1972), p. 8.
80. Juvenal, Satires 437ff.
81. Martial, Ep@am 11:33.
82. A~okru 5.
83. On the Mantle 4.
84. Antidotej6r ttu Scorpion’s Sting 15.
85. Tertullian, ApologY 5, in C. Dodgson, trans., T~tullian, vol. 1 of Apologetic and
Prastisal Treatises, in A Libray of Fathers of the Ho~ Catholic Church (Oxford: Parker, 1842).