3 Solid Reasons Why Christianity is Part of Roman History

Photo by Yaopey Yong

The story of Lucius is about a Roman soldier in search of truth. And in the book, the rise and fall of the Roman Empire are two very distant events. Instead, it touches heavily on the rise of Christianity as it was beginning to go beyond the boundaries of Judea to the rest of the Empire.

Some might find this type of story typically preachy and write it off as a work of religious propaganda.

But make no mistake: Christianity is a part of the Roman Empire’s own story, if not a really big part in the latter half of it.

Say what you will about Christians today. There are certainly plenty of them who give the religion a bad name. Plenty are hypocrites, and many more certainly give a lot of young folks reason to stop attending the church they went to as a kid.

That doesn’t change the fact that Christianity is part of Roman history. There is no refuting this, and one does not have to write a work of religious propaganda to see that the rise of Christianity in the centuries after Jesus’ crucifixion is just as much a part of the Empire’s annals as its conquest of Gaul, the crossing of the Rubicon and the Battle of Carthage.

Unfortunately, some intellectuals have had such a massive axe to grind with the religion that they are willing to spread misinformation and get people’s knowledge of history all mixed up.

It’s a sad fool’s errand, and sadder still is that even a spiritually indifferent student of history need only hit the books to see it. The massive footprint left behind by Christians on the Roman Empire, for good or for ill, exists for many irrefutable reasons.

Rome’s History Extends to the Byzantine Period

Many people place the date for the Roman Empire’s fall in 476 AD. However, this is more accurately understood to mean the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Prior to this, the Empire had already been split in two during the reign of Diocletian in 286 AD (and he did this for mainly administrative reasons).

This is important because the Eastern side of the Roman Empire would actually outlast the Western side all the way past the 1400s!

That means the total length of the Empire’s lifespan is right up there with those of Imperial China, Ancient Egypt, the Mongolian Empire, and other historical civilizations.

Is it really a shock that, given its length, it would be impossible to erase the impact of Christianity from the Roman historical record? Christianity is part of Roman history in part because the Empire conquered dozens of nations, cultures and peoples. Jesus Christ started an offshoot of a religion that was but one of hundreds of others practiced in an empire that spanned all the way from the British Isles to the lands of Babylonia.

To ignore the reality of Christians being born, baptized, and living under Rome’s centuries of rule would be saying the same things about Muslims who lived centuries under the Mongols.

Rome Conquered Judea (and Had to)

Photo by Phil Goodwin

If someone was so bent on going back in time to keep Rome from being touched by Christian influence, then they shouldn’t stop at the time of Jesus. They would have had better luck keeping Rome from invading Judea as a whole, thereby keeping any offshoot religion from them strictly under the ‘barbarian’ category. 

Of course at that point, they’d need all the luck they could get to fend off the one and only Pompey the Great.

Whether one likes it or not, there was really no preventing the vast conquering ambitions of Rome’s greatest generals.  It was how the Empire expanded, and Judea was smack dab in the way of that. It was a strategic location for its Middle East campaigns, even though most Romans considered it a pretty backwater place. 

Now, this wasn’t the only reason why Romans and Jews didn’t quite get along. Despite the image some modern humanists have about an ‘enlightened, philosophical Rome,’ plenty of them genuinely believed in supernatural deities. 

In fact, they feared the wrath of their gods so much that they saw the monotheism of Judaism and the Jewish mutual rejection of their faith as cause for much suspicion. This was usually not a problem the Romans had with other polytheistic cultures and peoples. This was exclusively an issue they had from the people of Judea. 

So even if some time traveler could prevent Rome from conflicting (let along contacting) Judea, they wouldn’t be very successful for very long. The two states were vastly different while being right next door to each other. The clash was inevitable. 

And yes, Christianity would have still eventually found its way to the Empire as a result. Looks like they’re still stuck with Christianity being a part of Roman history.

Christianity Spread Long Before Constantine

Photo by Chris Czermak

On a final note, it bears mentioning that people give the line of Constantine either too little or too much credit when it comes to the spread of Christianity during the Roman Empire (and why the Eastern, Byzantine half of it effectively died as a Christian one). 

Constantine certainly did make his mark as being the first Roman ruler to outright illegalize the persecution of Christians. However, some have interpreted this to mean that Christianity had been just this small, peculiar, and deeply underground sect throughout that time. 

That’s not really the case. 

Christianity is part of Roman history because it had managed to reach that point both in spite of those persecutions and because of them. So for the one with the unenviable task of trying to pluck the religion out of the fabric of Roman history, they’d have to account for why the Empire had to go to such lengths to suppress it. 

For such a supposedly minor sect that supposedly shouldn’t have had the historical attention it deserved, they certainly made quite the impact prior to the Edict of Milan. 

Many scholars of history today, even those who don’t profess Christianity, have reached a consensus that pre-Constantine Christianity had the appeal of universality, acceptance, and identification with the large masses of the disenfranchised. 

Again, say what you will about the Christians of today. 

The fact remains that Christians of the past were also part of Roman history. 

Want to see what a Roman legionnaire’s life would have been like during Jesus’ time? The story of Lucius: A Soldier’s Journey. You can find it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and ReadersMagnet.