Many critiques of Christianity at the time were also based on this assertion that Christians were atheists for rejecting Greco-Roman paganism. For example, one of the most common arguments against Christianity leveled by Greco-Roman pagans was that the Christians’ rejection of the Roman religion would lead to the Greco-Roman gods withdrawing their protection of Rome and allowing the city to fall to invaders as punishment (Pax Deorum).
Early Christian writers often responded to these accusations of atheism by saying “actually it is you are the real atheists because you don’t worship the one true God.”
by TheIronzombie39
11 Comments
Athiesm doesn’t only apply to christianity. I’m sure there were similar arguments in every culture from Egypt to India
This sort of rigidity and inflexibility was quite alien to the syncretic cultures of the time. And here we are now.
Clement of Alexandria: “just pay your fucking taxes guys, render unto Caesar’s what is Caesar’s”
Early Christians: “Noooo we can’t burn incense in front of a statue, we’ll go to hell forever!”
Bro just learnt that early christians got persecuted for centuries.
SPQR: You reject our gods, yet others who don’t worship our gods don’t deny their existence, you must be an atheist >:(
When St Polycarp was standing before a Roman proconsul, about to be executed, the proconsul told him, “‘Swear by the genius of Caesar; repent and say, Away with the atheists.’ Then Polycarp with solemn countenance looked upon the whole multitude of lawless heathen that were in the stadium, and waved his hand to them; and groaning and looking up to heaven he said, ‘Away with the atheists’” (The Martyrdom of Polycarp). And after refusing to repent, he was burned at the stake.
Roman religion wasn’t about believing in the gods really hard (that was considered “superstition”) but about fulfilling the proper rituals.The best modern equivalent might be Shinto; there are no “born-again” Shintoists who have intense emotional conversions to the religion, there are just people who work/volunteer for shrines and those who don’t.
So it didn’t matter what Christians believe, the fact that they refused to participate in the festivals worshipping the Roman pantheon made them – to the Romans – atheists.
>”If we stop worshipping the gods, Rome will fall!”
>(Stop worshipping the gods to worship Yaweh instead).
>(Rome falls to Germanic barbarians).
What did the writters intended with this?
My did My brain literally go to Scoractes at the “Actually it is you are the real atheists because you don’t worship the one true God.”
Probably just the “actually”.
But yea, and the good ol’ “My God/’s is/are the only true one/s!”
How many eons of this bullshit? I’m getting tired, just like all the other gods out there.
It goes deeper than that. The Romans were INCREDIBLY superstitious. So much of their early history and history changed was shaped by omens and whether or not this or that leader made the correct sacrifices at the correct times. They believed that failing to honor the gods properly could bring about their wrath. It was a huge driver for why they allowed others to worship and keep as many of their local traditions as possible. They were terrified of insulting a deity and being punished for it.
So when Christian’s showed up and started preaching that the only god who should be venerated is invisible and tangentially related to an executed holy-man it wasn’t just a difference of religious opinion. It was a threat to civic order and public safety. There was a very real belief that the Christians would anger a local deity and get a bunch of innocent people killed.
In a lot of ways early Christianity can kind of be compared to the anti-vax movement.
Exclusivist monotheism is literally just one step away from true atheism, so they were almost completely right. Real theism would really be polytheism.