After the death of Septimus Severus—except during the short reign of Maximin—the Church enjoyed a season of comparative peace till the reign of Decius, A.D. 249. But during the favorable reign of Alexander Severus, a considerable change took place in the relation of Christianity to society. He was through life under the influence of his mother, Mammsea, who is described by Eusebius as “a woman distinguished for her piety and religion.” She sent for Origen, of whose fame she had heard much, and learned from him something of the doctrines of the gospel. She was afterward favorable to the Christians, but there is not much evidence that she was one herself.
Alexander was of a religious disposition. He had many Christians in his household; and bishops were admitted, even at the court, in a recognized official character. He frequently used the words of our Savior, “As ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.” (Luke 6:3131And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise. (Luke 6:31).) He had them inscribed on the walls of his palace and on other public buildings. But all religions were nearly the same to him, and on this principle he gave Christianity a place in his eclectic system the first public buildings for Christian assemblies.
An important point in the history of the Church, and one that proves its altered position in the Roman Empire, now comes before us for the first time. It was during the reign of this excellent prince that public buildings were first erected for the assemblies of Christians. A little circumstance connected with a piece of land in Rome shows the true spirit of the emperor and the growing power and influence of Christians. This piece of land, which had been considered as a common, was selected by a congregation as a site for a church; but the Company of Victualers contended that they had a prior claim. The case was judged by the emperor. He awarded the land to the Christians, on the ground that it was better to devote it to the worship of God in any form than apply it to a profane and unworthy use.
Public buildings—christian churches, so-called now began to rise in different parts of the empire, and to possess endowments in land. The heathen had never been able to understand why the Christians had neither temples nor altars. Their religious assemblies, up till this time, had been held in private. Even the Jew had his public synagogue, but where the Christians met was indicated by no separate and distinguished building. The private house, the catacombs, the cemetery of their dead, contained their peaceful congregations. Their privacy, which had often been in those troublous times their security, was now passing away. On the other hand, it must also be observed that their secrecy was often used against them. We have seen from the first, that the Pagans could not understand a religion without a temple, and were easily persuaded that these private and mysterious meetings, which seemed to shun the light of day, were only for the worst of purposes.
The outward condition of Christianity was now changed—wonderfully changed—but, alas, not in favor of spiritual health and growth, as we shall soon see. There were now well-known edifices in which the Christians met, and the doors of which they could throw wide open to all mankind Christianity was now recognized as one of the various forms of worship which the government did not prohibit. But the toleration of the Christians during this period rested only on the favorable disposition of Alexander. No change was made in the laws of the empire in favor of Christians, so that their time of peace was brought to a close by his death. A conspiracy was formed against him by the demoralized soldiery, who could not endure the discipline which he sought to restore; and the youthful emperor was slain in his tent, in the twenty-ninth year of his ago, and the thirteenth of his reign.
The Lord’s Dealings with The Clergy.
Scarcely had the new churches been built, and the bishops received at court, then the hand of the Lord was turned against them. It happened in this way.
MAXIMIN, a rude Thracian peasant, raised himself to the imperial throne. He had been the chief instigator, if not the actual murderer of the virtuous Alexander. He began his reign by seizing and putting to death all the friends of the late emperor. Those who had been his friends he reckoned as his own enemies. He ordered the bishops, and particularly those who had been the intimate friends of Alexander, to be put to death. His vengeance fell more or less on all classes of Christians, but chiefly on the clergy. It was not however for their Christianity that they suffered on this occasion, for Maximin was utterly regardless of all religions, but because of the position they had reached in the world. What can be more sorrowful than this reflection?
About the same time destructive earthquakes in several provinces rekindled the popular hatred against the Christians in general. The fury of the people under such an emperor was unrestrained, and, encouraged by hostile governors, they burnt the newly-built churches and persecuted the Christians. But happily, the reign of the savage was of short duration. He became intolerable to mankind. The army mutinied and slew him in the third year of his reign; and a more favorable season for the Christians returned.
The reign of GORDIAN, A.D 238-244, and that of PHILIP, A.D 244-249, were friendly to the Church. But we have repeatedly found that a government favorable to the Christians was immediately followed by another which oppressed them. It was particularly the case at this time. Under the smiles and patronage of Philip, the Arabian, the Church enjoyed great outward prosperity, but she was on the eve of a persecution more terrible and more general than any she had yet passed through.
One of the causes which may have contributed to this was the absence of the Christians from the national ceremonies which commemorated the thousandth year of Rome, A.D 247. The secular games were celebrated with unexampled magnificence by Philip; but as he was favorable to the Christians, they escaped the fury of the pagan priests and populace. The Christians were now a recognized body in the state, and however carefully they might avoid mingling in the political factions or the popular festivities of the empire, they were considered the enemies of her prosperity and the cause of all her calamities. We now come to a complete change of government—a government that afflicts the whole Church of God.
The General Persecution Under Decius.
DECIUS, in the year 249, conquered Philip and placed himself on the throne. His reign is remarkable in church history for the first general persecution. Τhe new emperor was unfavorable to Christianity and zealously devoted to the pagan religion. He resolved to attempt the complete extermination of the former, and to restore the latter to its ancient glory. One of the first measures of his reign was to issue edicts to the governors, to enforce the ancient laws against the Christians. They were commanded, on pain of forfeiting their own lives, to exterminate all Christians utterly, or bring them back by pains and tortures to the religion of their fathers.
From the time of Trajan there had been an imperial order to the effect, that the Christians were not to be sought for; and there was also a law against private accusations being brought against them, especially by their own servants, as we saw in the case of Apollonius; and these laws had been usually observed by the enemies of the Church, but now they were wholly neglected. The authorities sought out the Christians, the accusers ran no risk, and popular clamor was admitted in place of formal evidence. During the two succeeding years a great multitude of Christians in all the Roman provinces were banished, imprisoned, or tortured to death by various kinds of punishments and sufferings. This persecution was more cruel and terrible than any that preceded it. But the most painful part of those heart-rending scenes was the enfeebled state of the Christians themselves—the sad effect of worldly ease and prosperity.
The Effects of Worldliness In The Church.
The student of church history now meets with the manifest and appalling effect of the world in the Church. It is a most sorrowful sight, but it ought to be a profitable lesson to the christian reader. What then was, is now, and ever must be. The Holy Spirit, who dwells in us, is not now less sensitive to the foul and withering breath of the world than He was then.
What the enemy could not do by bloody edicts and cruel tyrants, he accomplished by the friendship of the world. This is an old stratagem of Satan. The wily serpent proved more dangerous than the roaring lion. By means of the favor of great men, and especially of emperors, he threw the clergy off their guard, led them to join hands with the world, and deceived them by his flatteries. The Christians could now erect temples as well as the heathen, and their bishops were received at the imperial court on equal terms with the idolatrous priests. This unhallowed intercourse with the world sapped the very foundations of their Christianity. This became painfully manifest when the violent storm of persecution succeeded the long calm of their worldly prosperity.
In many parts of the empire the Christians had enjoyed undisturbed peace for a period of thirty years. This had told unfavorably on the Church as a whole. With many, it was not now the faith of an ardent conviction such as we had in the first and second centuries; but of truth instilled into the mind by means of christian education—just what prevails in the present day to an alarming extent. A persecution breaking out with great violence, after so many years of tranquility, could not fail to prove a sifting process for the churches. The atmosphere of Christianity had become corrupted. Cyprian in the West and Origen in the East speak of the secular spirit which had crept in—of the pride, the luxury, the covetousness of the clergy, of the careless and irreligious lives of the people.
“If,” says Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, “the cause of the disease is understood, the cure of the affected part is already found. The Lord would prove his people; and because the divinely-prescribed regimen of life had become disturbed in the long season of peace, a divine judgment was sent to re-establish our fallen, and, I might almost say, slumbering faith. Our sins deserve more; but our gracious Lord has so considered it that all which has occurred seems rather like a trial than a persecution. Forgetting what believers did in the times of the apostles, and what they should always be doing, Christians labored with insatiable desire, to increase their earthly possessions. Many of the bishops who, by precept and example, should have guided others, neglected their divine calling to engage in the management of worldly concerns.” Such being the condition of things in many of the churches, we need not wonder at what took place.
The emperor ordered rigorous search to be made for all suspected of refusing compliance with the national worship. Christians were required to conform to the ceremonies of the Roman religion. In case they declined, threats, and afterward tortures, were to be employed to compel submission. If they remained firm, the punishment of death was to be inflicted, especially on the bishops, whom Decius hated most bitterly. The custom was, wherever the dreadful edict was carried into execution, to appoint a day when all the Christians in the place were to present themselves before the magistrate, renounce their religion, and offer incense at the idol’s altar. Many, before the fearful day arrived, had fled into voluntary banishment. The goods of such were confiscated and themselves forbidden to return under penalty of death. Those who remained firm, after repeated tortures, were cast into prison, when the additional sufferings of hunger and thirst were employed to overcome their resolution. Many who were less firm and faithful were let off without sacrificing, by purchasing themselves, or allowing their friends to purchase, a certificate from the magistrate. But this unworthy practice was condemned by the Church as a tacit abjuration.
DIONYSIUS, bishop of Alexandria, in describing the effect of this terrible decree, says, “that many citizens of repute complied with the edict. Some were impelled by their fears and some were forced by their friends. Many stood pale and trembling, neither ready to submit to the idolatrous ceremony, nor prepared to resist even unto death. Others endured their tortures to a certain point, but finally gave in.” Such were some of the painful and disgraceful effects of the general relaxation through tampering with this present evil world; still it would ill become us, who five in a time of perfect civil and religious liberty, to say hard things of the weakness of those who lived in such sanguinary times. Rather let us feel the disgrace as our own, and pray that we may be kept from yielding to the attractions of the world in every form. But all was not defective, thank the Lord. Let us look for a moment at the bright side.
The Power of Faith And Christian Devotedness.
The same Dionysius tells us that many were as pillars of the Lord, who through Him were made strong, and became wonderful witnesses of His grace. Among these he mentions a boy of fifteen, Dioscurus by name, who answered in the wisest manner all questions, and displayed such constancy under torture that he commanded the admiration of the governor himself, who dismissed him in the hope that riper years would lead him to see his error. A woman, who had been brought to the altar by her husband, was forced to offer incense by someone holding her hand; but she exclaimed, “I did it not: it was you that did it;” and she was thereupon condemned to exile. In the dungeon at Cartilage the Christians were exposed to heat, hunger, and thirst, in order to force them to comply with the decree; but although they saw death by starvation staring them in the face, they continued steadfast in their confession of Christ. And from the prison in Rome, where certain confessors had been confined for about a year, the following noble confession was sent to Cyprian: “What more glorious and blessed lot can, by God’s grace, fall to man than, amidst tortures and the fear of death itself, to confess God the Lord—than, with lacerated bodies and a spirit departing but yet free, to confess Christ the Son of God—than to become fellow-sufferers with Christ in the name of Christ? If we have not yet shed our blood, we are ready to shed it. Pray then, beloved Cyprian, that the Lord would daily confirm and strengthen each one of us, more and more, with the power of His might, and that He, as the best of leaders, would finally conduct His soldiers, whom He has disciplined and proved in the dangerous camp, to the field of battle which is before us, armed with those divine weapons which never can be conquered.”
Among the victims of this terrible persecution were Fabian, bishop of Rome, Babbles of Antioch, and Alexander of Jerusalem. Cyprian, Origen, Gregory, Dionysius, and other eminent men, were exposed to cruel tortures and exile, but escaped with their lives. The hatred of the emperor was particularly directed against the bishops. But in the Lord’s mercy the reign of Decius was a short one; he was killed in battle with the Goths, about the end of 251.