In 64 AD, a 6 day fire destroyed over half of Rome. Rumors began that Emperor Nero set the fire to clear a slum area for one of his building projects. The Roman historian Tacitus reports that Nero found a scapegoat in the Christians and began to kill them: To stop the rumor [that he had set Rome on fire], he [Nero] falsely charged with guilt, and punished with the most fearful tortures, the persons commonly called Christians, who were hated for their enormities. Christus, the founder of that name, was put to death as a criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea, in the reign of Tiberius, but the pernicious superstition - repressed for a time, broke out yet again...through the city of Rome also, whither all things horrible and disgraceful flow from all quarters, as to a common receptacle, and where they are encouraged. Accordingly first those were arrested who confessed they were Christians; next on their information, a vast multitude were convicted, not so much on the charge of burning the city, as of hating the human race. In their very deaths they were made the subjects of sport: for they were covered with the hides of wild beasts, and worried to death by dogs, or nailed to crosses, or set fire to, and when the day waned, burned to serve for the evening lights. Nero offered his own garden players for the spectacle...(Annals 15.44).
Posted on: Thu, 31 Jul 2014 15:29:39 +0000