Emperor Nero rises to power, and, needing someone to blame for the suffering caused by his excesses, persecution of Christians begins under his reign. This leads to Christian apologetics and martyrdom, as well as a new policy dictating how and when Christians should be punished for their obstinacy. Thus, the martyr becomes a hero and model of Christian perfection, and someone to be venerated as a saint.
Show Transcript
Shalom, and welcome to our history podcast. This is a production of Kingdom Preppers.org. I’m your host, Kingdom Prepper, and you’re listening to: Churchianity: Two Thousand Years of Leaven. We continue with our history.
Part 2: Persecution and Martyrdom
With the rejection of Yeshua by the Judahites on a whole, and the subsequent suppression of the efforts of the emissaries—that being the Messianic movement—Jerusalem’s fate was sealed. Many Messianic Judahites had heeded Yeshua’s warning when he foretold of the destruction of Jerusalem. Companies of Judahites fled the city well beforehand, but a great many—political rebels for the most part—stayed to resist the Romans and attempt to free Jerusalem from their grip, just as the Maccabees had done against the Seleucid Empire.
Rome dispatched an able general to end the Judahite revolt in Jerusalem. In 67 CE, Vespasian marched into Palestine and effectively put down pockets of resistance throughout Galilee. But in 70 CE, Vespasian was made emperor, thus he returned to Rome to rule. This left his son, Titus, in charge of the ongoing war against the Judahites. In February of 70 CE, Titus began the siege of Jerusalem. The Judahites managed to resist him till May, when he finally broke through the new northern wall. A week later, the Second Wall around the markets was breached, and fighting broke out around the temple itself. Three of the Good News books record the same event, but Luke in particular states that, just prior to Yeshua’s death:
[44] It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, [45] while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.
—Luke 23:44 – 45
The curtain of the temple was torn, from top to bottom, allowing all to see inside the apartments. This was done in fulfillment of a prophecy recorded in the book of Daniel:
[27] And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. . . .
—Daniel 9:27
The curtain of the temple being torn should have brought a decisive end to the custom of sacrifices on earth, as Yeshua, the great sacrifice, had become the substance of that shadow representation. Despite this, however, sacrifices continued to take place in the temple after his death, resurrection, and ascension, and the last such sacrifice was offered on August 6, 70 CE of the Roman Calendar. Even with the systematic bombardment of the temple courts by Titus and his Roman army, the Judahite rebels, comprised of the radical Zealots, still put up a fierce resistance. They somehow believed that Yah was still on their side. One false prophet even predicated that the Most High would intervene at the last hour to save the temple and its valiant defenders. But Yeshua’s prophecy would not fail. By August 28, the Romans broke through to the temple’s inner courts, where they were met by six thousand Judahite Zealots prepared to die for their cause. Even the priests—the only ones still allowed inside the temple—put up a resistance.
Once raging fires began to consume the temple itself, the fight went out of the Judahites, and those who survived either fled in horror or watched helplessly as their last hopes went literally up in smoke. Following the destruction of their beloved city, persecution and new restrictions on the Judahites forced thousands to leave the now desolate region, many migrating to Egypt, West Africa, and Arabia. Others were carried by General Titus into exile to other lands.
The picture could not look any different for the rest of the inhabitants of the Greco-Roman world at that time and the periods that immediately followed. The Roman Empire successfully maintained an unrivaled political unity in the Mediterranean basin. As long as its citizens adhered to established Roman law and lived happily within the Hellenistic culture that prevailed, all would be fine. It was within this framework that the new Christian movement was allowed to grow and even thrive. Christians were afforded freedom of travel along well-paved roads that were policed by Roman soldiers. But water was the basis for the main mode of transportation, making trade possible. So, by road and sea, therefore, the message of Christianity was able to spread to various parts of the known world through the efforts of, not only Christian missionaries, but also by Christian merchants and traders, and even slaves, who were, at times, the cargo.
When the number of Gentiles joining the Christian movement increased, it became necessary on the part of the leadership to provide a method of training and initiation to ease them into the belief system and ready them for official baptism. This gave birth to what is called, the catechumenate, which involves a person receiving instruction in preparation for baptism or confirmation. It stems from a Greek word that means, “being instructed,” hence the modern Catholic term, “catechism.”
Catechumenates were conducted in two parts. The first part is called, “the service of the word,” where large portions of scripture were read and explained to the new Gentile convert. If the convert was not a baptized member of the church, he or she would be dismissed following this portion of the catechumenate. If he or she was a baptized member, the service would move to part two: “service of the table,” or, communion, a corrupted representation of the Passover meal observed by Yeshua and his disciples. This practice of catechumenates was an early staple of the Christian movement and was maintained for the first three centuries of the early church system.
The Romans were initially tolerant of the Christian movement, but persecution and martyrdom of Christians came with the arrival of Nero, and did not abate until the conversion of Constantine. It was Roman custom to have all citizens of Rome worship the sitting Roman Emperor. This custom involved burning a pinch of incense at a Roman altar, offering incense or wine to a statue of the emperor, or simply swearing by the emperor himself. Christians were seen as obstinate by refusing to perform such acts of loyalty by virtue of their religious convictions. Rome first viewed Christianity as a sect within Judahite culture, which it was, initially. But Christians eventually made pains to disassociate themselves entirely from their Hebraic roots and were eventually considered as followers of a distinct religion in the eyes of Rome.
The problem with this distinction is that the Romans had come to accept the Judahites and their bizarre adherence to Torah—coupled with their belief in the one true Creator—as something that did not arise out of a spirit of national rebellion. Forcing them to go against their strong spiritual convictions would result in true rebellion, therefore Judahites were exempt from having to perform rites that demonstrated their allegiance to the emperor. When Christians were seen as a sect within the Judahite culture, the same tolerance was extended to them. But by choosing to disassociate from the Judahites, Rome saw Christians, who were a growing collection of disparate Gentiles from across the realm, as a new religion within the milieu of mystery religions that already existed in the empire. This meant that Christians, like other regular subjects, had to demonstrate their loyalty to the emperor through open worship of him. Note that, despite this early reluctance on the part of Christians to venerate the emperor by these acts, elements of this kind of worship would later worm their way into Christendom through the veneration of supposed saints.
The Christian refusal to openly worship the emperor was part and parcel of the persecution that was unleashed on them during the first two centuries of their new movement. Other factors contributed to the cause of the prolonged persecution as well. Choosing to worship a man who had been condemned by a Roman governor on the charge of being a messianic king was one major demerit; their failure to express political loyalty to Rome on the grounds of their faith, was another.
At this time, governors throughout Rome’s territories were the only ones allowed to pronounce the sentence of death on offenders, so the occasional martyrdom was largely restricted to great provincial cities. Christians responded to the early persecution in two ways: by writing what are called apologetics and accounts of martyrdom. The apologies are derived from a Greek word meaning, “defense,” while the word martyr derives from another Greek word meaning, a “witness.” So the body of writings produced and dispatched were either in defense of their beliefs, or else they recounted the murder of their fellow Christians who died in testimony of their faith. Both pieces of writing were meant to state the Christian case in their plea for tolerance on the part of Roman officials.
From the apologetics we can see the shape that Christian thought and doctrine took in the second century. An early apology titled the Epistle to Diognetus, written by an anonymous author, attempts to argue for the divine origin of Christianity, which it states is superior to the Judahite culture and its ritual worship. Christianity had, at this point, nearly shaken off adherence to the Torah in full. A clearer picture of Christian thought in this era is painted by one of the most well known and influential of all the second century Christian apologists, Justin Martyr. He taught Christian doctrine at a private school in Rome, and was executed in 167 CE when charges were brought against him.
Justin Martyr is one apologist who recognized the importance of the Hebrew Scriptures, but at the same time, he presumptuously expressed the fulfillment of their prophecies in Christianity. He redirected the promises made to a literal people descended from the patriarch Jacob to Christians of his day. His view, which shaped the view of other Christians, was that the Torah comprised a set of laws that was forced on the people of Israel as a punishment, and those laws were only in place until the advent of the Messiah, who, he believed, removed their obligation for all Christians through his perfect life, death, and resurrection. He maintained that Sabbath-keeping and physical circumcision should cease. And Christians, he also argued, were now the true people of Yah. With this we see that, as early as the second century, the foundation for replacement theology was being laid.
Now, Christian persecution, which gave rise to the prolific writing of apologetics and martyrdom, began under the emperor Nero, who came to power in October of 54 CE—with the help of his mother. Early on, he was seen as a reasonable ruler, one who regarded the poor and landless citizens of Rome via favorable laws. But Nero soon succumbed to an insatiable lust for both pleasure and grandeur, which compelled him to fill his courts with people who catered to his wishes. Within a decade, Nero was largely despised by his population, who eventually considered him to be insane.
On the night of June 18, 64 CE, a massive fire blazed through Rome, with Nero mere miles away, holed up in his palace at Antium. We are told that when he heard of the fire, he immediately rushed to Rome to lead the fight against it. His palace gardens and certain public buildings were opened to the homeless and displaced as a means of shelter.
Despite these noble efforts on the part of Nero, there were those who immediately suspected him of ordering the city to be burned. To this day, it is believed that he did this so he could rebuild vast sections of Rome in his honor. The fire, which lasted six days and seven nights, destroyed ten of Rome’s fourteen sections, and affected citizens cried out for justice amid the chaos that ensued. Nero attempted to deflect all suspicions against him and rise above the rumors, but his efforts failed. And when all fingers pointed at him, he sought someone else to blame.
There were two known areas that had not burned in the fire, where many non-Messianic and Messianic Judahites and Gentiles resided. The emperor lay blame squarely on the Messianic Judahites and Gentiles, who, by that time, were already known by the Greek term, Christians.
We’ll be back with more exciting scriptural history . . . in a moment.
[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]
We now continue with our podcast.
The Roman historian, Tacitus, wrote in his Annals that:
“In spite of every human effort, of the emperor’s largesse, and of the sacrifices made to the [deities], nothing sufficed to allay suspicion nor to destroy the opinion that the fire had been ordered. Therefore, in order to destroy this rumor, Nero blamed the Christians, who are hated for their abominations, and punished them with refined cruelty. . . . Thus, first those who confessed [that they were indeed Christians] were arrested, and on the basis of their testimony a great number were condemned, although not so much for the fire itself as for their hatred for humankind.”
Tacitus’s charge that Christians were “hated for their abominations” speaks to the spiritual stance Messianic believers took in those days, before the doctrinal leaven truly set in. To everyday pagan Romans, social activities were the norm, and these included: the theater, classic literature, sporting events, and even involvement in the Roman army, since Roman soldiers were required to offer sacrifices both to the emperor and to the false deities.
Pagan worship went hand-in-hand with these interests, but first-century Messianic believers insisted on abstaining from such secular and heathen fair for the sake of their strong spiritual convictions. To a pagan like Tacitus, who treasured his Hellenistic culture and Roman society, this was an abomination. As to Tacitus’s charge of the Christian hatred of humankind, in his book, Medieval Christianity, Kevin Madigan writes:
“Christians were mistrusted for supposedly meeting secretly, and for being anti-social and taciturn. This caused the Romans to charge them with misanthropy, or hatred of the human race.”
Again, quoting from his Annals, Tacitus goes on to say:
“Before killing the Christians, Nero used them to amuse the people. Some were dressed in furs, to be killed by dogs. Others were crucified. Still others were set on fire early in the night, so that they might illumine it. Nero opened his own gardens for these shows, and in the circus he himself became a spectacle, for he mingled with the people dressed as a charioteer, or he rode around in his chariot. All of this aroused the mercy of the people, even against these culprits who deserved an exemplary punishment, for it was clear that they were not being destroyed for the common good, but rather to satisfy the cruelty of one person.”
Even a Christian-hating pagan like Tacitus points out that Nero’s persecution was unjust. At that time, persecution of Christians seems to have been restricted to Rome, and it stemmed from the accusation of arson. But eventually, Christians were persecuted in Rome simply for their belief, and the abomination of being anti-pagan. Ironically, they were even called atheists by pagans because they worshipped an unseen Creator, rather than the pantheon of stone deities the Romans sacrificed to. Nero’s reign ended about four years later, in 68 CE, when he was deposed by a successful rebellion against him that was supported by the Roman senate. After his murder, the persecution of Christians ceased for a time, as the next official emperors, Vespasian and his successor Titus, would have their hands full with a war against Judahites and the destruction of their beloved city and temple.
The idea of the martyr, while a Judahite concept throughout the Messianic Writings, took on quite a new meaning when Christians employed the word during the persecution of the second century. The word, as we pointed out, originates from Greek and means “witness.” The emissaries demonstrated various uses of the word in their writings, mostly in the form martureó—word G3140, to bear witness, and marturia—word G3141, to testify. For instance, when Luke uses the term, he refers to one who has borne “witness” to Yeshua’s resurrection. John uses the word to denote someone who bears “witness” to Yeshua being the Son of Elohim. By the time we get to the book of Revelation, John uses the word to refer to the blood-witness of those who gave their lives for their testimony.
Second-century Christians adapted the sense of the word martyr and made it specific to those who gave their lives in persecution. Those who bore witness of their faith through confession alone (which qualified one as a martyr according to the word’s use by the emissaries) and did not give their lives, were merely “confessors.” In this way, martyrdom, being narrowed in scope, became, in the eyes of Christians, a privileged state conferred on one by the Creator alone, so one could not force themselves into martyrdom. Those who were selected for this cherished experience were viewed as heroes of the faith, because their deaths represented a defeat of the devil himself, much in the way the Messiah’s death did. The Christian martyr, it was thought, shared in the very sufferings of the Messiah. Martyrs were also thought to be perfect Christians in their suffering and death, and many believed—despite what Scripture says—that they entered heaven and stood in the presence of Yeshua the moment the breath left their bodies.
To some, this might sound like the act of a radical Muslim engaged in a modern-day jihad, where one sacrifices himself (or takes his own life) for his religious cause, thinking that the privilege of a special place in paradise will be enjoyed immediately upon death. That is the Muslim shaheed, the equivalent of the Christian martyrdom. Essentially, the same spirit is behind both lines of ideology. I say this not to disparage the death of true martyrs, but the genuine article has since been abused and cheapened. Interestingly, the Christian martyr was also thought to share in the role of judge, alongside the Messiah, and was thus equally able to forgive the sins of his fellow mortal Christians from heaven. This was the foundation for the false, pagan custom of praying to so-called saints for intercession.
Accounts of Christian persecution and martyrdom in the first century, beginning with Nero, are scarce, but many records are left to us regarding that of the second century. We get a clear picture of the Christian attitude toward martyrdom, as well as the attitude of the Roman authorities toward the new Christian movement. There is an important exchange between a Roman governor and the sitting emperor, Trajan, that gives shape to the policy that set the terms for Christian martyrdom. In the year 111 CE, a man named Pliny the Younger was made governor of Bithynia, a region in northwest Asia Minor, in what is modern-day Turkey.
Pliny appears to have been a just ruler who honored Roman law and upheld Roman traditions. But something began to disturb him. Bithynia was littered with converts to a new religion called Christianity. There were so many people flocking to this new religion in fact that the pagan temples were largely deserted, and the market for animal sacrifices to the deities had dried up. A list of those suspected of being Christians in the region soon reached Pliny, and he began to inquire into the matter, because the new religion was illegal.
Pliny had those accused of being Christians brought before him, and through this he learned both what they believed and practiced. Out of fear, some denied being Christians, while others confessed that they once were but had since abandoned the faith. These souls were simply required to offer a prayer to the deities, burn a pinch of incense before the emperor’s image, and curse the Messiah. True Christians, Pliny knew, would never submit to any of these requirements, so those who performed the customs were released with all charges dropped.
For the ones who stubbornly refused to deny their faith, Pliny offered them three chances to recant upon threat of death. When they still refused, they were executed. Pliny, who strove to be a just Roman ruler, as stated, wanted to know if Christians were worthy of death based on their obstinacy alone, or if they were truly guilty of greater crimes. He tortured two female Christian ministers to arrive at an answer, but they merely confirmed all that he already knew about Christians. Still torn, Pliny wanted to know exactly how to proceed in punishing Christians according to defined Roman law, thus, he wrote the emperor.
Trajan wrote back saying that there was currently no general rule regarding the punishment of Christians. They committed no crimes against the state, so the state should not waste time or resources seeking them out. But if they are accused locally and refuse to abandon their beliefs and practices, they should be punished. Those who did recant and openly worshipped the deities would immediately be pardoned. However, proceedings could not develop from the accusations of anonymous persons. Trajan’s policy was in place throughout the realm long after his reign. While the authorities agreed that Christians did in fact commit no crimes against the state, the Christian refusal to worship the emperor indicated their rejection of his right to rule, and if the courts did nothing, they would be viewed as powerless in the eyes of the public.
This policy was in place when Polycarp, the beloved bishop of the assembly in Smyrna, was martyred. Polycarp was highly respected in the eyes of his Christian followers, and was seen as one of many successors to the emissaries. Of course, neither he nor his advisor, Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, were officially appointed by the emissaries themselves, despite the legends that surrounded the two leaders. Also, Peter, James, John, and the rest of the twelve were never known as bishops. This title was conferred upon them by subsequent Gentile leaders of the Christian movement. The original emissaries, had they lived, would not have recognized what became of the assemblies they established, which were now churches, nor of the Messianic movement they headed, which was now something called Christianity.
By the time of Polycarp’s death, even martyrdom had taken on new meaning. But that is the case with Christianity, as well as many religions: they tend to change to suit the times. The martyrdoms witnessed by various crowds helped to elicit sympathy and compassion for persecuted Christians, and in effect, their various murders became somewhat a draw, bringing publicity to the Christian cause, and inspiring many others to join. Often, crowds of thousands sat in the amphitheaters, gazing in awe at the Christians who faced torture and finally death with an incredible degree of courage that was fueled by pure conviction of faith.
Now, while persecutions were ongoing throughout the first two centuries of Christianity’s existence, Christians were never killed on a broad scale in this period, as is often portrayed in various media. Persecutions and martyrdoms did widen in scope and scale in the third century and beyond, but not to the exaggerated levels often related in print and film.
Dr. Ryan M. Reeves, an assistant professor of historical theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, has this to say about the Roman persecution of Christians in the first two centuries:
“Persecution of Christians is often misunderstood. There are popular misconceptions about how Christians were persecuted, and about the ways in which the Roman world, and the Roman government, treated Christians as a whole. Often, particularly in textbooks, or in popular books on the subject, the first centuries of the church are treated as if the Christians were subject to ethnic cleansing; or to something as heinous as the Nazi treatment of the Jews in World War II.
“In fact, with some diffidence, we want to stress that that is not the case. But we have to understand that, in general, overall, given the breadth and the depth of the Roman government, and the amount of land that it covers, and looking at the church as a whole for several centuries, by and large, as we’ll see, persecutions were sporadic, and they were local. In fact, at times, only a handful would be persecuted, not thousands, and thousands of Christians. We don’t see Rome attempting to wipe Christians from the face of the earth, at least not in these centuries. When we get to the third-century crisis, and up into Diocletian in the early fourth century, we do see something close to that. It gets significantly worse by that period of time. But from the earliest days, up until the early 200s, Christianity is sporadically persecuted, and it is, by and large ignored, though it is, on the books, oppressed and illegal.”
That wraps it up for this episode of Churchianity: Two Thousand Years of Leaven. A production of Kingdom Preppers.org, this episode was written, produced, and hosted by yours truly, Kingdom Prepper. All praise, honor, and glory are due to my boss, Yah Elohim, and to his right hand, Yahushua HaMashiach. You can access the transcript for this episode on our website. Yah willing, our history will continue in the next podcast. Shalom.
Keywords: Diocletian, pliny the younger, epistle to diognetus, nero, persecution, martyr, Polycarp, Ignatius, Antioch, Smyrna, catechumenate, catechumen, trajan, tacitus, churchianity, two thousand years of leaven, history of Christianity, church history, Hebrew history, kp, kingdom preppers
Feedback Form
View Video Excerpt
