Pagans and Christians

...The public and well-placed locations of oracular shrines also point to their significance, as do the appearances of forged oracles and "fake" oracular prophets...

...Here he relies heavily on the scholarship of Louis Robert, whose work on inscriptions has enriched our understanding of the Roman Empire...

...A second point that will occasion dis______19 June 1987: 389 agreement is Lane Fox's almost exclusive concentration on the Christians who "won," i.e., the "orthodox...

...Lane Fox's emphasis on oracles as central to pagan religiosity buttresses his claim that late paganism remained a predominantly oral phenomenon, in contrast to Christianity, which relied heavily on written texts...

...The triumph, in Lane Fox's eyes, was very slow in coming, particularly to the countryside...

...One rests on the changing social status of civic officials in the second and especially the third centuries: as the wealthier classes began to absent themselves from municipal service, room was opened up for men of "lesser families" (including Christians) to assume more important roles in the government of their towns and cities...

...Whether or not the non-specialist receives a "correct" understanding of paganism and Christianity will be more fiercely debated...

...On the last two points — Pionius's martyrdom and Constantine's "Oration to the Saints" — scholars may debate whether Lane Fox has been too eager to accept as "historical'' some evidence that appears less convincing to others...

...Why asceticism is treated before "visions and prophecy" (largely centered on second-century evidence) or "persecution and martyrdom" (late first- to early fourth-century evidence) is not entirely obvious...

...that relied heavily on the citizens' love of honor and civic patriotism to motivate them to accept expensive municipal responsibilities, such as the erection and upkeep of public buildings...

...To be sure, Lane Fox concentrates his discussion on ascetic manifestations in the first two-and-a-half Christian centuries rather than on the development of Egyptian asceticism and monasticism in the early fourth century, but by focusing on the earlier rather than later material, he downplays the fact that asceticism by the time of Constantine's death was in some areas rapidly becoming a mass movement that developed out of an already-prominent Christianity...

...Throughout, Lane Fox argues against the view that Christianity was contiguous with paganism: even when Christians appropriated pagan sites and symbols, their meaning, he claims, was entirely changed...

...On the point of pagan oracles, his contributions will be readily acknowledged...

...onward at the Claros shrine in Asia Minor...

...witnessed a notable spurt of temple building: no sooner had Jesus died, Lane Fox writes, than shrines and temples' 'began to spring back to life in a resurrection which nobody could deny...

...First, has not Lane Fox underplayed the progress of Christianiza-tion, perhaps in order to showcase his important interpretation of Constantine...

...Since these values could be espoused without the overthrow of the existing social system, people of property could comfortably become Christians...

...Lane Fox hoped that his book would establish "something new on the topic of pagan oracles, the story of an early martyrdom, and a text ascribed to Constan-tine himself...

...Second, against the "growing social exclusivity" that enlarged the gap between the very wealthy and everyone else, Christianity posed an alternative vision in which selflessness, charity, and brotherly love were coupled with a powerful ideal of community...

...Elizabeth A. Clark In this ambitious book, Robin Lane Fox seeks not only to provide a survey of paganism and Christianity from the second to the mid-fourth century, he also attempts to overturn several standard theories of paganism and Christianity in late antiquity, and to ground as historical "fact" some ancient reports whose credibility has been doubted by previous scholars...

...Disputing the view popularized by E.R...

...Lane Fox also argues for the lateness of Christianity's triumph: he estimates that by 250 A.D., only about 2 percent of the Empire's population was Christian, and that after Constantine an entire century passed before the balance decisively tipped toward the Christians...

...The author, a fellow of New College, Oxford, and a university lecturer in ancient history, won awards for his earlier book, Alexander the Great...

...The second century A.D...

...For example, over 300 civic dedications are attested from about 100 A.D...

...Was Christianity so slow to catch on before the time of Constantine, and did it take an entire century after Constantine for the balance between Christian and pagan to be "tipped...

...Paul...

...Moreover, inscriptions that list the questions asked of the oracles by civic notables and the answers they received demonstrate a continuing interest in traditional theology and philosophy...

...Our growing knowledge of Gnosticism precludes such an approach for many recent scholars of early Christianity...

...Lane Fox centers traditional civic religion in the worship of divinities whose anger must be avoided or (if incurred) propitiated...

...Lane Fox cites evidence to prove that the popularity of oracles remained into late antiquity...

...when they felt friendly, they might manifest themselves directly to humans in supportive "close encounters," or indirectly through dreams and oracles:' 'That God could visit man was the least novel feature of Christian teaching in a pagan's eyes...

...Dodds some decades ago that late antiquity was fraught with spiritual "anxiety" to which mysticism, magic, and mystery cult offered non-rational 388: Commonweal remedies, Lane Fox shifts the focus away from human anxiety to divine anger, away from the mystery cults to traditional civic religion...

...The following issues will undoubtedly be raised for discussion...

...Lane Fox's emphasis on the relative freedom that asceticism offered to women, however, seems entirely correct to this reviewer...

...Against other scholars who deemed pagan religion to be a mindless performance of ritual devoid of theological and philosophical content, Lane Fox claims that paganism was both articulate and theologically oriented...

...To explicate the meaning of "civic religion," he provides a vivid sketch of late ancient cities (many of them larger than the cities of 1600 a.d...

...Lane Fox has succeeded at a nearly-impossible task: to' write a book teeming with scholarly detail that can be enjoyed by non-specialists...

...He discounts the diversity of early Christian belief and practice, giving the reader a rather monolithic view of early Christianity...

...The first section of the book, on paganism, is undoubtedly the most important...

...The gods could be approached through animal sacrifices and public ceremony...

...His use of inscriptions pertaining to paganism help him to unravel the evidence of the second, third, and early fourth centuries better than scholars who rely on texts alone to assist them in their historical reconstruction...

...Yet even here, he has undoubtedly opened the way for lively discussion of the issues...

...The chapter on oracles ("the language of the gods") is among the most impressive in Lane Fox's generally impressive book...

...He does not under-dramatize the significance of the event: "The public statements and circular letters of 324/5 mark the start of a new chapter in the life of the Greek-speaking city culture...

...A third point of debate will focus on Lane Fox's unsympathetic treatment of asceticism...

...He points to fundamental changes "in people's self-awareness, and in their opportunities and social organization," not least, the shift from the pagan view of "error" as the explanation for misfortune to the Christian view of "sin...

...Lane Fox's chief attempt at "re-historicization," however, concerns the Christian commitment of the Emperor Constantina, described as "the most tireless worker for Christian unity since St...

...The liveliness of pagan civic religion well into the third century suggests that converts to Christianity "were not abandoning a static or dying religious culture," but "were joining the most extreme option in a period when religious issues were lively...

...The rapidity with which he dismisses Walter Bauer's theory on the lateness of Christian orthodoxy in some areas is startling, as is his excessively brief consideration (and snide denunciation) of the Gnostics...

...He proposes several interrelated answers to the question...

...If we posit more rapid Christianization in the late third and early fourth centuries, as some evidence suggests, the fuller Christianization of towns and cities by the late fourth century (accepted by many scholars) seems more understandable...

...In his discussion, Lane Fox centers on the martyrdom of Pionius, which he believes he can document as "historical event" from inscriptions that mention persons with the same names as some of the principal actors in Pionius's Martyrdom...

...Before Christianity's triumph, however, it suffered through darker days of persecution...

...In contrast, Lane Fox champions the vigor of paganism in ways that readers who believe the Christian apologists' claim that paganism was "dead" would not expect...

...Against earlier scholars such as Norman Baynes, Lane Fox argues that Eusebius's version of the speech represents a faithful rendition of Constantine's own words and beliefs...

...indeed, the number of oracular shrines actually increased between the years 80 and 200 A.D...

...He criticizes those scholars who view Constantine's Christianity as a "compromise": they rely too heavily on court publicity issued on Constantine's behalf rather than on Constantine's own letters, edicts, and actions, especially his program of church-building.-Lane Fox's argument centers on the speech reproduced by Eusebius in his Life of Con-stantine, usually entitled "Oration to the Saints...

...370) and ten or more times, ascetics are referred to as "overachievers...

...Why and how, then, did Christianity "triumph...

...Lane Fox's emphasis on pagan theology provides, him with an explanation for persecutions: pagans were genuinely angry that Christians had dishonored their gods...

...His very language reveals his bias: renunciatory practices are called "types of refined torture" (p...

...Third, the organization of Christian communities also contributed to Christianity's triumph: the distinctive style of Christian leadership exemplified by bishops lent both a cohesion and a source of authority to Christianity that paganism lacked...

...Lane Fox pinpoints the occasion and the date of the speech: "Good Friday" of 325, before the Council of Antioch presided over by Ossius of Cordova...