HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

126 THOMAS J. HEFFERNANChristian Epistle to Diognetus (ca. 150) makes this very point: “Christiansare not distinguished from the rest of humanity by country, languageor custom”. 26 They differed from other citizens, however, by theirrefusal to participate in many public rituals that required sacrificeto the gods and to the genius of the emperor. As the Roman Stategrew in complexity and became ever more ethnically and linguisticallydiverse, the figure of the emperor functioned as a totem to promotepolitical and social stability. Rome’s insistence that Christianssacrifice to the emperor was an effort to legislate Roman customsin an ever-burgeoning and diverse empire. Christians, however, sawresistance to such legislation as a measure of fidelity to their religionand an opportunity to repudiate the values of the state. As long asRomans viewed Christians as apostate Jews, they were well withinthe law regarding the legitimacy of established religions. However,this all changed by the middle of the second century, when sporadicpersecution of Christians became intense. 27In the Laws Cicero remarked: “Let no one have separate gods,either new or foreign, unless they are officially allowed” (II, 19).Such sentiment underscored a traditional hostility for any religionthat would deter individuals from revering their ancestors. ProminentRomans believed that the success of Rome was indebted in part tothe ‘custom of these ancestors’, the mos maiorum. New cults wouldjeopardize not only these revered traditions but also the very stateitself. Tacitus believed that Christians were another eastern cult thatwould undermine the purity of Roman tradition and argued thatfear was the only remedy to hold them in check (Annals, xiv, 445).Juvenal’s comment that “the Syrian Orontes has been pouring intothe Tiber for a good while now” identifies the east as the birthplaceof these superstitions that pollute the quality of life in Rome withtheir unspeakable oriental vices (Satires, iii, 62). In the Martyrdom ofFructuosus (ca. 259), Aemilianus, the Roman governor, makes the connectionamong the gods, the state, and the emperor crystal clear:“If the gods are not worshipped, then the images of the emperorsare not adored”. 28 These sentiments were to harden as the empireexpanded and the eternal city became a world that incorporated26The Epistle to Diognetus V.1–4, ed. J. J. Thierry (Leiden, 1964).27Barnes (1981), 136–39.28Musurillo (1972).