Talk:Christianity/Archive 10

message: Being raised as a Christian I have heard the phrase Jesus is Lord a thousand times, however what exactly does that mean? In the opening sentence I would like a statement that explains this, rather then just affirms it.
Sethie 19:09, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I linked Lord in the sentence, so a reader can investigate further.  KHM03 22:58, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: First Sentence

message: I wonder if anyone can cite a source for the 2.1 billion adherents/world's largest religion claim other than the adherents.com website, which seems to have a pretty clear bias toward Christianity (numerous links on the site take the surfer to Christian Appologist web pages, etc...). Also, a simple Google search for the world's largest religion came up with claims that Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism are the world's largest religion within the first 20 hits. Additionally, estimates of the number of Christians world-wide ranges in the high end at about 2.1 billion, but also as low as 1 billion, again just from a simple Google search.
If a more definitive source can't be found, could the language simply be changed to say "With an estimated 2.1 billion adherents, it is arguably the world's largest religion."
Sorry to post this anonymously, but I'm new to this wiki thing and don't have an account.  (comment posted by Anonymous user 203.151.141.193)
:I made the change, which certainly seems fair enough to me.  KHM03 19:09, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  regarding the number of adherents/world's largest religion claim 

message: Template:Christian theology...help is solicited and appreciated!  KHM03 13:19, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New template 

message: ...was properly removed from Weekly worship services.  Real presence links to all the various relevant theories and theologies, and there is no need to add any particular one.  If we add one, we have to add all; that discussion belongs at Real presence and Eucharist.  JHCC  (talk) 19:27, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The section isn't about Roman Catholic theology, else transubstantiation might be an appropriate link.  The section concerns weekly worship practices throughout Christendom.  Certainly, the Eucharist  needs to be mentioned (and it is), but if we start getting into specific theologies (consubstantiation, memorialism, transubstantiation, etc.), the article will get significantly lengthier.  (See Template:Communion) for more links.)  KHM03 21:07, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Transubstantiation 

message: If there is a section on the persecution of Xians, shouldn't there also be a section that addresses the fact that they in turn persecuted others? If we talk about them as being oppressed in some intstances, they why does balance not require a section that talks about their oppression of others? Maybe a section that talks about the tremendous amount of violence and bloodshed that this organized superstition has played major roles in bringing about, in addition to their direct oppression and outright murder of those who do not hold to their dogma throughout history? 216.104.211.5 22:09, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's correct; because your changes made the article far too POV.  KHM03 01:17, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  That reflects your own bias. The argument is stated above and has agreement. What is your argument to counter it? 64.121.40.153 01:23, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: The only bias I'm acting upon is toward accuracy.  The argument is proposed above and has the agreement of one user...you.  Hardly a consensus.  Two other editors have reverted the changes as POV, so clearly we have a problem with it.  Please explain why you wish to make these edits and what makes them POV or NPOV.  Thanks...KHM03 01:29, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Wrong. User [[User:216.104.211.5| is a different user (not me). See argument already listed above. I agreed with it and proposed yesterday that I would make the changes. Since the argument is already made and you dispute the accuracy, then please point out what is not accurate. Note that most of the changes are only layout so then you dont object to the lay out change just the additional sentence I included as examples of persecution? 64.121.40.153 01:36, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: So one user (216.104.211.5) made a proposal, and another user (64.121.40.153) agreed.  That's hardly a consensus.  Please explain your proposed edits in order to reach a consensus. Thanks...KHM03 01:44, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The explanation has already been provided above. Again, what is your argument? What do you specifically disagree with with that proposal and its rationale? Silence  points to aquiesence.
64.121.40.153 01:54, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Also...please be clear and correct in your edit summaries; both Musical Linguist and I reverted your changes because they were POV, not only inaccurate.  Thanks...KHM03 01:47, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Persecution 2

message: Is it common practice to leave the boxes at the top of this transcluded? - ElAmericano | talk 16:24, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Transcluded boxes 

message: Shouldn't the "Overview" subsection be moved to the intro paragraph? It seems that is how articles are normally set up. - ElAmericano | talk 16:26, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overview subsection 

message: Christians in Rome are first attested after the Great Fire of Rome in 64, see also Tacitus on Jesus. XXX
:I removed it because it is not true, as there are earlier references as Paul's Letter to the Romans (written in the 50s) and possibly the "Chrestus" passage in Sueton. Str1977 12:06, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Paul never uses the term Christian. Acts 24:5 calls Paul the ringleader of the Nazarene sect. Christian is found in the NT only at Acts 11:26, 26:28, 1 Peter 4:16. The Suetonius cite (Claudius 25.4) is early, placed in 49, and is about a person named Chrestus: "Since the Jews constantly made disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he [Claudius] expelled them from Rome." Chrestus was a normal Roman name, generally a slave name, in Latin and Greek it means Useful. Maybe the sentence should be changed as such:
Christians in Rome are first clearly attested after the Great Fire of Rome in 64, see Tacitus on Jesus. User: 209.78.19.247
No, 209 .. (and please sign your posts), they are not. Above you are arguing that Paul doesn't count as he doesn't use the word "Christians", but your edit in the article didn't refer to the name but to the people. And these are clearly attested by Paul writing a letter to them. I was careful not to insist on any interpretation of the Sueton quote, but you cannot just ignore that it is a possibility that "Chrestus" could be a variation on "Christus" and that the intra-Jewish quarrels could be caused by arguments about Christ. But even if that is not the case, among those Jews expelled from Rome at that time were at least two Jewish Christians - Prisca and Aquila (Acts 18,2). Str1977 19:37, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Prisca and Aquila are Jews, "Jewish-Christians" is an anachronism. To say that Paul's Letter to the Romans is a letter to the Christians in Rome is an anachronism. However, the statement could be clarified:
Christians, as a distinct term, in Rome are first clearly attested after the Great Fire of Rome in 64, see Tacitus on Jesus.
User: 209.78.19.247
Dear 209...,
we don't need to clarify an erroneous statement which as it stands claims that the existence of Christians in the city of Rome is first attested with the Great Fire. 
You should clarify whether you are talking about names or about people.
What you call "anachronism" are perfectly fitting descriptions. The Apostles, Paul, Prisca, Aquila etc were Christians (as we talking about post-Antioch days) but also Jews, as were most early Christians. Hence the term "Jewish Christian".
And please, again, sign your posts by typing four tildes (~). Str1977 22:04, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Why was this sentence deleted?

message: Cites below.
Not sure why I'm required to give detailed citations but you are not (none in the whole article)
Suggest you read Chadwick again to refresh your memory.
I love the idea that the greatest ever autority on the subject can be dismissed with the line "Gibbon is widely recognized for having had his own biases" I don't believe this is true
Robin Lane Fox, does not "minimize" persecution of Christians by the Roman Empire - he gives an authoritative factual account of it. - You can't simply dismiss authorities because they say things you don't want to hear.
Persecution, as you say was sporadic and usually localized (and evidenced only ny partisan believers) - but there is no hint of this in your repeated edits. Please indicate where I have ever asserted that there was no persecution at all.
You views on Judaism v Christian persecutions is clearly a PoV, which I'd be interested to see justified with some reliable citations.
I agree that the appropriate place for dealing with this matter in any great depth is in the article which itself is devoted to Persecution of Christians, and will be doing that. The present text is very much a high level overview.
I'd like to question your approach of demanding citations and then deleting them when they are supplied via external links.
Here's some supporting text, with citations.
Anyone who has benefited from a conventional western education will be familiar with the dreadful persecutions endured by untold numbers of early Christians.  According to the conventional story these early Christians were meek and innocent, and invariably went to the lions with a preternatural bravery inspired by their great faith.  For their part, the Roman oppressors were brutal and merciless, and killed the unfortunate Christians for no better reason than that they chose a new and harmless faith.  Yet even these heartless pagans could not help but be impressed by the fortitude of their victims.  
Enjoyable as it is, the story is flawed in almost every respect, a fact which has been known to scholars for many centuries and which has been well known to the educated classes, at least since the publication of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire in the last quarter of the eighteenth century.  Religious persecution was virtually unknown in the ancient world.  The Romans especially were universally tolerant.  Their principal reactions to the religions of others were interest and occasional amusement.  Their toleration did not extend to cults which acted merely as a cover for sedition or criminality, but all genuine faiths were respected and protected.  As far as we know no-one in the classical world hit upon the idea of exterminating others because of the god they chose to worship1.  As Gibbon put it: "The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people as equally true, by the philosopher as equally false, and by the magistrate as equally useful.  And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord."i 
How strict this principle was is illustrated by the Roman attitude to the Jews, the sole dissenters from the religious harmony of the ancient world.  Gibbon noted of Jewish beliefs that "according to the maxims of universal toleration, the Romans protected a superstition which they despised"ii.  Soldiers were transferred or executed for offending Jewish sensibilities.  Legions by-passed Judæa to avoid offence by carrying the imperial portraits on their standards across Jewish soil.  Alone amongst the Roman provinces the Judæan coinage did not bear the Emperor's face, again because of Jewish sensibilities.  In place of emperor worship, the Jews were permitted to show their respect for the state by offering sacrifices on behalf of the emperor.  Jews could become full Roman citizens. Paul of Tarsus was one of many. All in all the Romans were flexible and tolerant.  
There was no obvious reason why Christians should not also be tolerated as the Jews were.  And yet they were not.  Christians seem to have provoked a great deal of hostility, and to have made themselves outstandingly unpopular.  Tacitus wrote around 110 AD that they were "notoriously depraved".  He described their beliefs as a deadly superstition, adding that all degraded and shameful practices collect and flourish in Rome.  Nero, he noted, had arrested Christians in Rome for arson and for other anti-social behaviouriii.  Suetonius (AD 70-160) recorded that Claudius expelled them from Rome for causing continual disturbancesiv. Because of widespread misgivings about them Pliny the Younger made enquiries but found only squalid superstition carried to great lengthsv.  
One way or another they made enemies everywhere.  Some Christian leaders, like Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, noted that Christians deserved the treatment they were gettingvi.  The philosopher Celsus disapproved of their intolerance.  In AD 248 Origen noted that hostility to the Church was increasing rapidly.  Soon the citizens of Antioch were asking that Christians be forbidden from living in their cityvii.  The citizens of Nicomedia made similar requestsviii.  Other cities passed resolutions making further such requests.  In 312 the Emperor Maximin Daia was being petitioned to suppress the disloyal Christiansix.  Despite popular dislike of the Christians, the authorities were generally still tolerant.  In response to Pliny's requests for guidance the Emperor Trajan advised moderation.  There should be no general inquisition.  Anonymous accusers should be ignored, and accusations made by responsible citizens should be properly investigated.  
Christians were sporadically investigated by the authorities, mainly because they were believed to have been promoting sedition.  They seem to have been unnecessarily secretive and did little or nothing to counter beliefs that they opposed the established government, apparently because they did oppose the established government.  They reviled the Imperial capital, referring to it as the Whore of Babylon.  They looked forward to its destruction (as in Revelations 14:8 & 17:3-6).  They prayed for the end of the World: "Let grace come and let this world pass away"x.  Indeed it was widely believed that they tried a number of times to ignite fires which would destroy the earth and hasten the coming of their new kingdom.  They were accused of arson on a number of occasions.  Nero accused them of arson in Rome, a charge that enjoys less publicity than the Christian counterclaim that Nero was the arsonist.  
Christians were also accused of cannibalism, and incest.  The charge that they ate human flesh might well have arisen through misinterpretations of the Lord's Supper.  Had not their dead leader claimed that "Except ye eat the flesh of the son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you" (John 4:53).  If the charge was mistaken, then the mistake could easily have been explained.  Instead, accused Christians refused to explain their practices, or to refute stories that they ate children at their ceremonies.  Some declined to answer any questions at all - even refusing to give their name or nationalityxi.  Sometimes they lied, for example claiming to be Old Testament characters like Elijah or Daniel.  They also refused to take oaths.  No doubt the accusations of canibalism were mistaken, but Christians were certainly guilty of other crimes. Infused with the truth of their own religion they were openly hostilite to the religions of others, frequently amounting to criminal behaviour.  They reviled the Roman and other gods, they razed temples, vandalised sacred sites, destroyed images, and incited riots, especially in synagogues.  
The Romans thought these Christians were atheists.  They denied the gods, and were known to revere a condemned criminal who had been executed for his opposition to the state.  They declined to acknowledge the head of state, refusing to refer to Caesar by his honorific Lord.  For them Jesus was the only Lord, and the only ruling monarchxii.  People believed that this sort of disrespect angered the gods.  The gods sent famines, draughts and plagues to punish the empire for allowing such blasphemy.  By the fourth century the phenomenon was proverbial: "no rain because of the Christians".  
Christians were not only blasphemous atheists; they were also treasonable army deserters.  As Robin Lane Fox, a prominent Oxford historian, notes of the supposed persecutions prompted by an edict of the Emperor Gallienus:
"We know of at least one martyrdom which followed its despatch, but it occurred in a province which was not at first under Gallienus's control: otherwise, we have no knowledge of martyrdoms, as opposed to Christian fictions of them, between 260 and the 290s.  When we find Christians being martyred, they are soldiers in the army.  The charge against them is not their religion and their refusal to sacrifice, but their refusal to serve in the ranks, an offence which was punishable on other grounds".xiii
Christian leaders actively encouraged soldiers to desert from the army.  So all in all there was plenty of evidence that Christians were seditious. They did little or nothing to counter the charge, again apparently because it was true.  Paul himself had been accused not only of stirring up trouble, but of offending against Caesar (Acts 25:8).  That Christians posed a threat to public order is demonstrated by an imperial decree that they might practice their faith unmolested as long as they were not "scheming against the Roman Government" and according to another decree "on condition that they do nothing contrary to public order"xiv.  Christians were widely hated and became the victims of mob violence throughout the empire.  It cannot have been surprising in view of their open displays of disloyalty and hostility to the state, their trouble making, their arson and vandalism, and their refusal to refute a range of charges from sedition to baby-eating.  There must also be a suspicion that Christians were adept at murdering their enemies.  Time and time again surviving records boast of the untimely deaths of these enemies.  They died in agony with their insides mysteriously eaten away, they unexpectedly committed suicide in private, they somehow toppled over cliffs.  Invariably these deaths are explicitly or implicitly attributed to God by Christian chroniclers.  Those who do not believe in murder-miracles might suspect that God enjoyed the benefit of his followers' assistance.  
Despite all this, the persecution of Christians was slight, intermittent, and limited geographically.  Moreover it was political, not religious.  The authorities were invariably very cautious about proceeding against them.  In the few cities where they were thought to pose a threat only a few of those suspected were charged.  Not all of those were indicted.  Of those indicted not all were convicted.  And those who were convicted were generally imprisoned or exiled, many subsequently being reprieved under the terms of amnesties.  Despite their crimes, ancient rights of sanctuary were extended to the most guilty Christians.  Under Roman law all burial places were regarded as sacrosanct, so all Christian criminals enjoyed inviolable sanctuary in the catacombs.
If we look at those who are generally held responsible for the persecution of Christians we encounter another surprise.  Instead of bloodthirsty monsters we find men of culture and moderation.  The emperor most usually cited as a bloodthirsty monster, Diocletian, turns out to have been a humane, prudent, and magnanimous statesman, whose reign, as Gibbon pointed out, was more illustrious than that of any of his predecessorsxv.  For most of his reign the Christians appear to have suffered no persecution at all, and one cannot help but wonder what happened towards the end of his reign to excite his displeasure.  In his most savage persecution Diocletian was responsible for perhaps 2,000 Christian deaths throughout the known world, though this may be an overestimate.  To put things in scale it might be noted that in centuries to come Christian churchmen would be responsible for the deaths of ten times as many Christians in a single city in a single dayxvi.  
A major reason for the execution of Christians in Roman times was that they actively sought their own deaths.  They believed that martyrdom guarantied immediate and automatic admission to paradise.  As Eusebius said, they despised this transient lifexvii.  Many of them therefore sought their complimentary ticket to the hereafter - "glorious fulfilment" Eusebius called itxviii.  Christians spoke of winning the crown of martyrdom, as though death was the ultimate prize.  Ignatius of Antioch, one of the most famous early martyrs, who won his crown early in the second century, would probably have been released if he had wanted to be.  He begged the church at Rome not to intervene with the authorities on his behalf.  In a letter to them he said "it is going to be very hard to get to God unless you spare me your intervention" (Romans 1).  He was yearning for death with all the passion of a lover (Romans 7) and he wanted no more of what men call life (Romans 8).  He mentioned his yearning for death in another letter, and said that he was praying for combat with the lions (Trallians 4 and 10).  His death-wish shines through all his surviving letters.  So does his delight at being bound in chains during his journey to execution.  He clearly sees himself as a sacrifice (Romans 4), and in another letter considers himself invested with a title worthy of a god (Magnesians 1).  We do not know what he did to warrant his arrest, but we do know that he wanted to die.  Yet the modern Church regards him not as a suicide, but a saint.  
Other Christians also committed public suicide, vying to kill themselves before anyone else did.  At Alexandria an old woman called Apollonia voluntarily jumped into a fire and was burned to ashesxix.  At Nicomedia "men and women alike leapt on to the pyre with an inspired and mystical fervourxx.  Fellow martyrs must have sought their deaths even more fervently, for in the early centuries the Church criticised many of its own number as suicides.  So did non-Christians.  For Romans suicide was generally an honourable death if carried out with discretion.  No one thought less of Seneca, for example, because of he took his own life.  The emperor Marcus Aurelius had no objection to suicide in principal, but he found the Christian examples vulgar and theatrical.  The Roman authorities begged accused Christians to spare themselves.  So did friends and relatives.  Judges tried to find reasons not to execute them.  They were allowed to relent and save their lives right up to the last moment.  On grounds of compassion they were asked to reconsider, to think of their age, of their wives, of their children.  Some did. Possibly most did. But a few fervent ones would be satisfied with nothing short of their crown of martyrdom.  
The death of Polycarp, a bishop of Smyrna (modern Izmir) in AD 155 or 156 is well known to modern Christians but the circumstances are not quite so well known.  His crimes, including the destruction of sacred images, were sufficient to incite the "whole mass of Smyrnaeans, Gentiles and Jews alike" to boil with anger.  According to Eusebius he was burned alive in order to fulfil a prophetic dream he had had.  The Smyrnaeans were sufficiently generous to play their part in its fulfilmentxxi.  A little earlier a Christian called Germanicus had faced death there.  The governor urged him to have pity on his own youth, but Germanicus desired a speedy release from this world.  He was faced with savage beasts, and when they failed to attack him he dragged one of the animals towards him, and goaded it, no doubt with the required resultxxii. 
Origen, destined to become a Church Father, craved martyrdom as a boy.  His fervour cannot have been as vigorous as that of others, for it was frustrated by his mother's expedient of hiding his clothes.  Still the young Origen played his part and sent letters to his father encouraging him to face a martyr's death insteadxxiii.  His father did die, leaving a destitute widow and seven children, whereupon the eldest, the divinely inspired seventeen year old Origen, left home and got himself adopted by a rich female heretic.  After this, as a teacher, he inspired a clutch of his pupils to embrace martyrdom as well.  Somehow Origen failed to win his own crown of martyrdom.
Those who witnessed Christian martyrdoms/suicides were bewildered and horrified by the Christian desire for death.  Perpetua and her pregnant slave Felicity were two Christian women driven by this desire.  Romans were too civilised to kill pregnant women, so Felicity was obliged to live.  She was delighted when she gave birth prematurely since the birth meant that she could now win her crown of martyrdomxxiv.  The two women succeeded in securing their deaths in Carthage in AD 203, Felicity's breasts still wet with milk for her new-born infant.  Christians were impressed. Others were appalled.  A few years earlier a group of Christians had approached a proconsul in Asia, asking him to have them killed.  "Unhappy men!" he said "if you are thus weary of your lives, is it so difficult to find ropes and precipices"xxv.  Neither are these isolated incidents.  There were numerous cases of Christians, alone or in groups, explicitly asking to be martyred, sometimes turning up with their hands already boundxxvi.
Even including suicides the number of those executed was not great.  Reliable numbers are very hard to come by, but where they are available they are low.  Eusebius described a mere 146 of them in the whole empire, and some of those sound rather fanciful to modern ears.  Polycarp, the episcopal vandal already mentioned - "destroyer of our gods" - became the twelfth martyr in his great city in the middle of the second centuryxxvii.  This number included martyrs from Philadelphia, and may well have included genuine criminals as well as suicides.  Origen (c185-254) stated openly that few Christians had died for their faith.  They were he said "easily counted"xxviii.  The fact is that we do not know how many Christians died during the persecutions of the first few centuries.  In all probability they numbered only a few thousand.  If we discount those who were genuinely guilty of sedition, those who chose not to mount a defence, and those who actively sought their own deaths, we may not have any real martyrs left at all.  In any case it is certain that in total the number of Christians who died at the hands of pagan persecutors can have been at most only a tiny fraction of the number who later died at the hands of their fellow Christians.  From the reign of the first Christian Emperor onwards, Christians were persecuted far more savagely by other Christians than they were by anyone else. 
::Now WHO wrote the above?  Where is it published?  --Midnite Critic 16:20, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Gibbon has been largely discredied by contemporary historians...no need to make a big deal of it.  KHM03 11:45, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Even if Gibbon were not biased in his own way, he is not of much use here. He wrote in the 18th century and today only serves as an example of 18th century historiography. Unfortunately, his work is in the public domain and therefore spread all over the internet, whereas contemporary, more scholarly works are much harder to come by. Str1977 12:11, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Re Midnight critic above