The Weird and The Wacky Meet

Where YouBetIAm comes to write….

Various History Essays

Essay Number Three

                 At the time of Jesus' ministry, Roman civil authority was rooted in religious authority, in that the Emperor's right to rule came from being accepted as the son of a god, himself divine.  If a religion did not pay lip service to the Roman gods, then the authority of the state religion, and therefore of the state itself, was challenged.  Jesus' ministry did just this, by promoting an apocalyptic vision and a general discontentment with Roman authority.  In addition, by having a messiah figure, it directly contradicted Roman teachings about who exactly can be the son of God.  In short, it was treasonous.

            Peasants, slaves and other members of the underclass had a very hard existence with little to hope for.  Roman authority was swift and brutal, and the upper classes enjoyed a lavish lifestyle that depended on a slave economy.  Because of this, free peasants did not always enjoy life's luxuries, like food and shelter, and things were, if possible, worse for slaves.  This was fertile ground for the growth of messianic movements that offered these people the vision of a better life, albeit it after death.

            Messianic movements promoted an apocalyptic view of the world, with doctrines giving much emphasis to an afterlife.  Good people, defined as those who followed the religion, would go to heaven, and bad people, meaning everyone else, would go to hell.  No matter how poorly you were treated in this life, it would all be made up to you in the next, while your oppressors would suffer horribly. The messiah of the cult would come to punish or reward all, thereby freeing downtrodden peoples of their sorry existence.

            It was through this message, so appealing to the downtrodden, that these various movements expressed an extreme discontentment with Roman rule.  Paradoxically, by promising justice in the afterlife rather than here and now, these movements placated the underclass and made them easier to control, which is one reason why Christianity was eventually chosen to be part of the state religion.  But at the time, it was just one out of many that espoused some messianic ideals, with others including the Essenes, Mithraism, and the Cult of Isis all espousing some messianic ideals.

            It's easy and even somewhat accurate to say that the Jesus movement won out over all of these because it was endorsed and forced by Emperor Constantine, but that doesn't answer the question of why it was chosen.  It was chosen because it had attributes that made it popular, convenient and, above all, flexible.  It had a written doctrine that made it easy to standardize and sell, but didn't hesitate to change itself when needed or to incorporate outside beliefs.  Various previously existent festivals, rituals, and doctrines quickly became commonplace in Christianity, and its Jewish roots were quickly buried under Greek and other pagan influences.

                 Legend became that Jesus was born on December 25th, Mithras' birthday.  Isis was replaced by Mary as a virtuous and forgiving mother figure.  Various pagan patron gods quickly became patron saints.  As the Germanic influence grew, those traditions were likewise absorbed into the mythology of Christianity.

            The key to success was to separate itself from its roots.  For example, the inconvenient requirements of circumcision and kosher laws were dropped under Paul, a Roman convert who preached to gentiles.  When the Jews revolted in 67 C.E., Christianity was quick to separate itself from Judaism further and side with the Romans.  This shift made it into the canonical gospels, which were beginning to be written at that time, launching Christianity away from being a splinter of Judaism and towards being the  state religion of the Roman Empire.

 

Essay Number Five

        The various Germanic tribes were Neolithic and brought with them a nomadic culture that didn't have money, centralized government, literacy, or advanced technology.  This lack of development pulled Europe backwards and began the middle ages.   Written language disappeared into the monasteries and was used by just a few select people.  Latin was used for business transactions for most of the early middle ages, but was preserved in the church.

                 As the Germanic tribes settled down and started to combine with the Roman towns and villages in what we now call France, Spain, and England, the people began to form local identities that were separate from their Roman one.  No longer just Roman citizens who happened to be in a part of the empire that was far from Rome, they identified strongly with the place they were born.  One reason for this is that their culture had been shifted away from Roman norms by this foreign influence.  Another is that it had become increasingly dangerous to travel around the empire, so people were more likely to spend their entire lives near their place of birth, developing stronger ties to it.

            The term "barbarian" originally comes from a Greek word meaning someone who spoke a different language.  Under this foreign influence, as people became more localized, so did their languages.   Germanic languages began to merge with Latin to form many different local dialects.  Religion had the same fate as language, as the various tribes brought their own religious customs to the table.  There are still many elements of

pre-Christian Germanic religion in modern Christianity.  For example, the word "Easter" comes from the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, Eastre, and Christmas trees are left over from pagan tree worship.

            As the power of Rome faded, the coins put out by the empire lost their value and were melted down.  The German tribes, lacking currency, were already quite used to bartering.  In this way, the German system of barter replaced Roman currency.

            In return, the Germanic peoples adopted much of Roman culture.  While the Visigoths were living under Roman protection, Emperor Theodosius proclaimed that all people living in his empire were to be Christian.  More and more Germanic peoples began to adopt Christianity and live a life of self-denial that was coming to characterize Christianity.

            Wealthy Romans had been retreating to the country for years, where they built huge, self-sufficient agrarian villas.  Once the Germanic peoples stopped being nomadic and adopted Roman agricultural practices, their warlords emulated these villas.  Everything became very local because everything that was needed for living came from the villa.  Eventually, these villas turned into manors, and gave way to feudalism.

 

Primary Source Essay

                 By taking into account a letter by Pliny the Younger about the life of a refined Roman gentleman and a portion of Cato the Elder’s work on the proper care and feeding of a slave there is a lot to be said about the nature of class and social status in Roman society.  Rome was sharply divided between the wealthy and the poor, with the poor growing in numbers as the pursuits of the wealthy became more opulent.  Quality of life was reflected strongly in one’s social status.

                 Class was maintained by the Roman love of order.  Both essays reveal very regulated people.  Spurrina is said to walk and ride the same amount of miles every day, and the slaves are given an extremely regimented diet.  Order is what upheld the social stratification system that allowed wealthy Romans to pursue their other values of physical fitness and light entertainment.  Slavery became a necessity for an opulent lifestyle, and was easily reconciled with the idea that slaves were just part of the social order.

                 Roman gentlemen differed from Athenian ones in several important ways.  The first is that an Athenian gentleman would work very hard to stay close to the city so he could remain active in political life.  Athenians valued their ability to participate in even a limited democracy.  Their intellectual pursuits would revolve around trying to make the best decisions for their people.

                 “Afterwards he enters his carriage, taking with him his wife...” (Pliny). An Athenian would never dream of chatting away with his wife in a pleasant carriage ride.  Women were considered distinctly inferior and were left out of any sort of intellectualism.

                 Over time, slavery was becoming a bigger and bigger Roman institution.  As the numbers of slaves grew, slavery became more brutal because slaves became more replaceable.  It took great force to keep the slave population in check, and even with the increase in military there were still rebellions and uprisings.  Still, slavery remained and eventually was almost completely replaced by serfdom when the military failed, because the rich depended on having a permanent underclass.

                 As Rome went into decline, Romans were becoming more decadent.  The rich lived spoiled, disconnected lives. The poor became poorer and as the gap widened more effort had to be expended into enforcing that gap.  The state depended on a slave economy that caused more problems than it solved. Rome eventually signed its own death warrant, as it spent more and more resources controlling the poor population when those resources would have been better spent restructuring the slave economy.

 

Copyright 2003

by Amanda Evans

Date: 11/05/03