Syncreticism

[Primus Aurelius Timavus]

Since first studying Latin in middle school, I have always had the impression that the Roman religion was syncretic. My teacher told us that when the Romans attacked an enemy, they would pray to the enemy's gods to come over to their side, promising more consciencious devotion than was being offered by the incumbent worshipers.

The Romans' ability to absorb newly encountered deities into their pantheon seems borne out by the story of their transfer of the goddess from Veii after its capture, the easy adoption of the Greek myths, and the constant reference in written sources to foreign gods as, for example, "the Mars of the Germans".

My question is the following: If in fact the Religio Romana was syncretic, why did it fail so miserably in absorbing Christianity? I know there were attempts to do so; I have even seen a depiction of Jesus as Apollo. Why was it not successful?

A related question: was there ever an attempt on the part of Rome to absorb the God of the Jews into the Pantheon?

[Marcus Pomponius Lupus]

Salve Tergeste,

There will probably be various reasons as to why the Romans and Christians didn't really get along (in the first days that is, later on Christianity even became the prime religion of the empire), but I think the main one is this:

Christianity came in Rome at a pretty bad time, the time that the Republic had failed and that the first emperors took over. It was Augustus of course who set the course for many emperors to follow and one aspect of his rulership was the carefull beginning of an Emperor-cultus, thus making the emperor a god as well.

Christians, however, believed that there was only one God, and that this God didn't sit on a throne in Rome. So by holding on to that thought, the Christians denounced the god-like status of the emperor, thus undermining his gouvernment and the very fundament of his rulership.

Because the Romans had a polytheistic religion they could quite easily adopt various other deities from other religions or do their little interpretatio romana trick ("hey, that god you worship, we worship him too, you know, but under a different name, so basically we even have the same religion" ). But a monotheistic religion of course posed a great problem to them.

Hoping that helped
Vale bene
Lupus

[Primus Aurelius Timavus]

Salve Marce,

I imagine the Neoplatonists probably argued that the myriad gods worshipped by the Romans were manifestations of a single godhead which could then be equated to the God of the Jews and Christians using the interpretatio Romana you quoted. Was the obstacle, then, a rejection of by the Church of that argument?

I take your point about the Emperor's cult. Most of the martyrs I've read about died for refusing to sacrifice to the Emperor or to Rome herself.

Vale bene.

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

What you describe of the Romans was quite true. Through the evocatio Romans invited foreign gods to Rome, adopting some gods of other nations into their own pantheon. That however is not quite what syncretism means. In early Rome distinctions were maintained between the Roman gods and those of foreign deities. I would argue that Juno Regina of Veii is not the same goddess as Juno Capitolina, any more than Carthaginian Tanit, as Juno Caelestis, could be taken to be the same goddess as Roman Juno. Etruscan Uni is related to Astarte while Roman Juno can be more closely identified with Ceres. The fact that the temple of Juno Regina of Veii was placed on the Aventine, outside the pomerium, shows that the Romans distinguished between Her and that of their own Juno. The same is seen with some other deities arriving from Italic tribes. When you see at Rome a temple or a reference to Jupiter Dolichenus or to Jupiter Heliopolitanus, or where in the provinces there is reference made to Jupiter Apenninus, those titles distinguish that these deities were considered to be different gods from the Roman Jupiter. In the cities of provinces, at the center of town, would be built a Capitolia, or temple districts dedicated to Jupiter Capitolinus, where again Roman Jupiter was ditinguished from the Jupiters of other nations. Adoption of a foreign deity into the Roman pantheon was signified by having a temple built at Rome within the pomerium. Thus the fight over Isiac shrines being erected inside the pomerium was not over a policy of tolerance towards Isiacism, but of Roman acceptance of Osiris and Isis into the Roman pantheon. The other place where foreign deities are indicated as accepted into the Roman pantheon is where their festivals were included into the Fasti. For example Celtic Epona.

Syncretism involves something different than foreign deities being recognized as gods in their own right, or their being recognized into the Roman pantheon. The Greeks would recognize the deities of other nations as being aspects of their own gods. That is what syncretism entails. Egyptian Thoth was not considered by the Greeks to be a different god, but was regarded to be a local aspect of Hermes. Attributes of foreign gods were then grafted onto Greek gods to emphasize that they were the same gods and not just similar gods. With imperial Rome syncretism did grow in certain intellectual circles. Syncretism was more a philosophical theory than a religious practice. Imperial Roman policy was to respect and maintain the ex patria culti deorum at every locale. Therefore Romans who went to different parts of the empire would participate in local celebrations while still maintaining their own practices in the Religio Romana, and accepted that foreigners servicing in the army or administration, or living at Rome, would maintain their own ex patria culti deorum while participating in the local festivities of wherever they happened to be living.



This policy on the ex patria culti deorum was extended towards Judaism in a unique way. The Greeks and Romans respected Judaism as an ancient tradition and considered their teachers to be philosophers. Philo of Alexandria was viewed and respected as a philosopher and it was only incidental that he was a Jew. Because the Jews were respected as having their own ancient tradition, the Romans allowed them certain exemptions with regard to participation in the ex patria culti deorum of other communities. Judaism was unique in teaching that its practitioners not participate in rites towards foreign gods, and the Romans, for the most part, respected that part of their tradition.



With Christianity a new situation arose. Initially Romans viewed Christianity as another form of the multitude of forms of Judaism that existed at the time, in the first century of the common era. But as Christianity furthered developed and distinguished itself from Judaism, and as local disturbances ensued within Jewish communities over admitting Christians into their synagogues, the Romans came to recognize that Christianity represented a group that opposed the ex patria culti deorum of Palestine. One problem Romans had with Christianity was that it had no ancient tradition, and in most forms of early Christianity there was even a rejection of the Judaic ex patria cultus. Further, some forms of early Christianity, although not all, rejected participation in the ex patria culti deorum, and its members even rejected the divinity of other gods, thus the charge of atheism that was leveled against some Christians. The problem was in certain forms of Christianity and not in Roman policy towards Christianity.



Rome never did come to persecute Christians to the extent later Christians claimed. The "Great Persecution" under Diocletius fell on only twelve Christian leaders, a few being executed but most only having their property confiscated. Other "persecutions" occurred at local levels, in most cases performed by Jews casting Christians out of their communities or by one form of Christian against a different form of Christian, while in other cases it was the local pagan comunities who conducted their own persecutions of Christians. You can recognize in some stories that it is 'orthodox' Christians who persecuted Gnostic Christians, or Gnostic against orthodox, Arrians against non-Arrians, and so on. With the letters between Pliny the Younger and Traianus you can see that agitation for persecuting the Christians came from the local population, not by imperial policy, and Pliny goes so far as to tell Traianus that as the local governor he has greater problems with the Bacchae than with the Christians. Stories of Christians being tossed to the lions at Rome in the Colleseum never took place, as any guide at the Colleseum today will tell you. Tales of Christian martyrs, in many cases being ridiculous fantasies of surviving all sorts of torments first, did not appear until centuries after they supposedly occurred. Early Christian writers conducting debates among themselves and with pagan philosophers make no mention of these supposed martyrdoms. The policy of imperial Rome towards early Christianity was generally one of tolerance, except at local levels when it threatened civil unrest, and was one quite in contrast to the policy of persecution later conducted by Christians against pagans.



Elsewhere there were attempts by Romans to engage in discussion with Christians and attempts to understand their philosophy. Paul, in one of his epistles, refers to his exchange of letters with Seneca. Some letters have come down to us purported to be those of Seneca written to Paul. These are most likely later Christian forgeries but were based on the tradition that Seneca and Paul were in communication. The most widespread form of early Christianity followed after the teachings of Valentinius, who was a student of Theudas, a disciple of Paul. The centers of Valentinian Gnosticism were at Antioch, Alexandria, and Rome, while other forms of early Christianity were more locally limited. All of the churches to which Paul wrote his epistles are known to have adopted Gnosticism. Valentinius himself came to Rome and founded a Christian school there in 139. He turned down an offer to be made bishop of Rome in 143, and died peacefully at Rome in 155 without ever suffering any Roman persecution. Plotinus is known for writing a philosophical treatise against the Gnostics, most specifically against the Valentinians Adelphius and Aquilinus. It has since been wondered why he did not mention other Christians as well. The simple explanation would be that early mainstream Christianity was Gnostic, as can also be seen in the writings of Paul. What emerged later as an orthodox tradition opposed to Gnosticism was most likely a heretical movement inside Christianity. The first attack against Valentinian Gnosticism arrives with Irenaeus of Lyons in 178 after Valentinius' death. Plotinus is later and it seems that this 'orthodox' or 'literalist' form of Christianity had not yet arrived at Rome in his time. With Porphyry, Celsus, and Origin you can see that the real conflict between Christianity and paganism, and within Christianity itself, was conducted not in political persecutions but in philosophical debate. Mention is also made later of Alexander Severus placing an image of Jesus in his private lararium, alongisde that of Apollonius of Tyana. In that case Jesus and Apollonius were both regarded equally as wisemen and as miracle workers. Celsus, writing around 125 CE, compares Apollonius with Jesus as two holy men, healers, and philosophers. [You can find out more about Apollonius of Tyana at http://www.theosophical.ca/AppolloniusTyana.htm ] In all of this you can see that there were attempts made to tolerate and integrate early Christianity into Roman society and into the imperial intellectual life.



With Severus it can also be seen that the Romans did not have a problem accepting aspects of Christianity into their own practices. On the other side, early Christians had no problem participating in the ex patria culti deorum of their cities. Early Christians were an integral part of imperial society, extending into all classes of Roman society. In answer to your question, I would say that through the second century Christianity was perhaps distinct but not in conflict with paganism. The change comes in Christianity itself. First there are doctrinal disputes. Then there is complaint by some Christians leaders over Christians participating in the ex patria culti deorum. There began a movement in Christianity late in the second century that was exclusionary, that refused to be integrated into the imperial society. This new movement can be compared with today's Christian fundamentalism, as it emphasized a literal interpretation of sacred texts where Gnosticism did not, it emphasized a Christian reinterpretation of the Judaic texts where Marcius had rejected Jewish scriptures as replaced by the teachings of Jesus, it inverted the teachings of Jesus from universal brotherly love into a religion of exclusiveness, and emphasized rigid conformity in practice over individual spiritual growth. The new literalist orthodoxy also rejected participation in Roman society, whether in participating in civil festivities, in the army, or in civil adminstration, and made its main attacks against those Christians who did integrate in imperial society.

So I would say your question is basically misstated. It was not a matter of why Rome could not integrate Christianity alongside the pagan culti deorum, but rather why a certain form of Christianity came to be so intolerant towards all other faiths including other forms of Christianity?

Vale optime
Marcus Moravius Horatius Piscinus

[Aldus Marius]

Salvete omnes...

The usurpation of Christianity by the fundamentalists continues to this day...or perhaps has 'merely' begun anew. There has always been this intolerant streak about the faith, this urge on the part of its missionaries to walk up to perfectly well-functioning cultures and say, 'All your Gods are demons and you're going to hell.' I do not know why this thing is, but it is, and it is the major reason why I no longer go to church.

I would like to find out more about Valentinian and other early (pre-Fundie)-Christian practice and belief. My own practice has been of a similarly tolerant strain, that of Pelagius of Britain, but even there materials are hard to come by--not to mention mostly written in condemnation by the Catholic Church which declared us heretics. My understanding of it allows me to pay my respects to the little gods and numina I encounter every day. Should this turn out not to be so, I may well jump the fence entirely; my original faith just has too much baggage attached to it to be worth carrying otherwise.

In fides,

[Primus Aurelius Timavus]

Salve Marce Horati,

Thank you very much for your detailed reply. I was unaware of the distinction between gods that were merely recognized by Rome and those that were fully admitted to the pantheon.

In your discussion of the prosecutions against the Christians, you pass over Nero's, in which burning Christian bodies were said to light up the Appian Way at night. Is this merely later Christian propaganda as well?

More broadly, your response makes me wonder whether any monotheistic religion has been able to remain tolerant toward polytheists. Certainly the early Church was unable to and so was early Islam against the pagans of the Arab peninsula.

Indeed, it is hard to think of any religious war in the West that was fought before the advent of Christianity and the spread of monotheism. Both the Maccabean Revolt (just before Jesus) and the Jewish Revolt (just after Jesus) obviously involved a monotheistic religion that was asserting itself agains polytheists. Yes, the Romans were disgusted by the child sacrifice of the Punic religion, but that was not the reason for their wars with Carthage. And the Romans destroyed the druidic groves, but again that was for political reasons. Wars fought for purely religious motives appear to be characteristic of monotheistic cultures.

Maybe monotheism wasn't such a big advance in human thought after all...

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salvete Mari et omnes

Salvete omnes...


My understanding of it allows me to pay my respects to the little gods and numina I encounter every day. Should this turn out not to be so, I may well jump the fence entirely; my original faith just has too much baggage attached to it to be worth carrying otherwise.

In fides,

I would not understand why it should be necessarily incompatable to be a Christian and still honor other gods as well. Of course, I am coming from a pagan background, but did attend Christian schools. Judaic scriptures do not deny the existence of other gods, and refers to goddesses as well. And the whole trinity concept seems a bit forced to me. As I mentioned before, religious practice, in the understanding of the Religio Romana, concerns the lesser gods and the ancestors as Lares, while recognizing that there are higher gods of a more sacred nature. The higher gods I refer to as the Involuti and think of Them in the plural. In Judaism there is reference to a Council of Gods. Christianity's insistence of a single higher god, although not appealing to me, I do not see where it must prohibit honoring the Lares, Di inferi, and lesser divinities of this earth.

All religions have some baggage in how their worshipers have employed them in the past. Intolerance can be found in all human societies, and although religion has often been the excuse used for such intolerance, it is not necessarily the nature of the religion itself. The sacred scripture of Christianity, both orthodox and Gnostic, that of Islam, and some other religions I have always found thought provoking. Jesus I like, even if I do not see him as a god and do not care for what some have done in his name.

How you would reconcile any differences you may see in your beliefs is a personal matter. But I do not think you could or should entirely jump ship. That is pertinent for others here as well, for although they now embrace the tradition of the Religio Romana or some other pagan tradition, their ancestors may have been Christians, and that is something that must be respected.

With regard to the Valentinians, any websearch on Gnosticism should turn up some information and Valentinian texts for you to read. You should also look at some works on Gnosticism in general, such as Pagels or Filoramo's. Gnosticism has some features that are quite different than you would find in modern Christianity, and its doctrine of the earth being evil I would find in conflict with my own beliefs.

Valete optime
Moravius Piscinus

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

Scripsit:
In your discussion of the prosecutions against the Christians, you pass over Nero's, in which burning Christian bodies were said to light up the Appian Way at night. Is this merely later Christian propaganda as well?

You refer to the passage in Tacitus' Annales 15.44 that mentions Nero placing the blame for the Great Fire of Rome in 64 on the followers of Christos. That has often been cited to assert the early presence of Christians at Rome. A few problems with that interpretation. Paul's epistle to the Romans dates to 57-58 CE where he gives 28 names of his associates in Rome. Paul was arrested and brought to Rome in 63 for violating Judaic law. Romans did not recognize Christians as distinctly separate from Judaism at the time. Paul was brought to Rome for trial because of his Roman citizenship. Acquitted, released, Paul travelled back east and was then arrested and returned to Rome in 66-7 for violating Roman law, and subsequently executed. The Acts of the Apostles ends with Paul in a Roman prison, Paul's letter to Timothy is written as he awaits execution (II Timothy), while I Peter is said to have been written immediately after Paul's execution. Not one of those Christian sources mention Nero's persecution of Christians, or attributes Paul's execution to a general persecution of Christians. Why would they anyway since it had not yet been settle even among Christians whether they were Jews or separate at the time, so how could the Romans have targeted Christians specifically?
Christos was a common name for freedmen. Tacitus' passage seems to pose that this Christos was living in Rome, executed along with his followers. Christos was more likely a gang leader like Milo or Clodius. The form of execution by crucifixion was reserved for slaves or traitors, and may have been applied in either case towards Christos' followers. A contemporary source might have referred to early Christians as followers of Paul, more likely than of Jesus. The passage though is written later by Tacitus. Tacitus was a friend of Pliny the Younger, who was himself familiar with Christians as governor of Bithynia. Both Pliny and Tacitus would have been children in 64, they worked together in a prosecution of an administrator of North Africa where a Christian community was well established, and Tacitus supposedly attain the office of consul in 97, prior to writing his Annales. If Nero's persecution of the followers of Christos was in fact directed against Christians, assuming such could have been identified so early and made into a political threat, surely the attitude towards Christians held by Pliny and Tacitus would have been different than was expressed by either. In the particular passage under consideration, Tacitus would have been aware of Christians as a more distinct group in his own time and have been better able to identify them as such than to refer to them so ambiguously. I do not think the available evidence from Tacitus when compared to Christian sources contempory with Nero shows that Christians were the target of Nero's persecution.

In addition, Paul's mention of 26 Christians at Rome does not offer a picture of a very large Christian following in the Jewish community of the time. Most of those he mentions are women. One is known to have set up a chapel in his house, two others have been posed as doing the same. That still places Christians at Rome in 64 at maybe a few hundred at most. Their numbers may have been large enough to upset the Jewish community, but I do not see how they could have been a convenient group to place blame on that would distract the rest of the Roman population. Where as the Jews as a whole would have been a more convenient target, and one already ordered out of Rome in the past. No mention of Jews being persecuted in this instance. Then too, when previous to Nero there were purges of religious groups from Rome they had always been sent away, not executed. Excuses for purging religious groups at Rome, even later with the Christians, had always been on certain grounds - human sacrifice, infant sacrifice, necromancy or other magical practices. In this case the excuse is arson without any religious connotation, and towards a religious group that up to that point had no record of any sort of civil disobedience or advocating social unrest. Roman attitudes towards Jews, and Christians among them, would soon change after 64 with the Jewish Revolt, but at the time this occurred I just do not see how any religious group would have been singled out in this manner, and certainly not some minor sect within Judaism that Romans knew little about..


Vale
Marcus Piscinus

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

Scripsisti:
Indeed, it is hard to think of any religious war in the West that was fought before the advent of Christianity and the spread of monotheism. Both the Maccabean Revolt (just before Jesus) and the Jewish Revolt (just after Jesus) obviously involved a monotheistic religion that was asserting itself agains polytheists. Yes, the Romans were disgusted by the child sacrifice of the Punic religion, but that was not the reason for their wars with Carthage. And the Romans destroyed the druidic groves, but again that was for political reasons. Wars fought for purely religious motives appear to be characteristic of monotheistic cultures.

Maybe monotheism wasn't such a big advance in human thought after all...

If you want to talk about religious wars, you might begin with the history of Mesopotamia, and that would involve polytheists. Religious wars in the West... We would not know anything prior to Greece and Rome. Greece did have three Sacred Wars fought over control of Delphi. Rome was not tolerant in every situation and you would have to look at many different things in Roman history. There was a religious element in the conflict between the plebeians and patricians during the early Republic. The issue of regulating foreign cults at Rome comes up with the Bacchae in 186 BCE. The Isaics then begining in the 50's. Roman "restoration" of cult centers in the provinces often imposed a Roman model on local culti deorum, and some were not accepted into Rome until they were Romanized. The first instance I can think of where the Romans tried to extinguish a religious faith took place shortly after 97 BCE in Spain. That was over the practice of human sacrifice, the Romans posing themselves as a civilizing force that took on a definite religious aspect. Roman policy towards the Druids was political as you say, but also had a definite religious aspect. The Romans claimed that the Druids practiced a regimen of human sacrifice, and that was something Romans would not tolerate. Where Rome did persecute religious groups, whether the Bacchae, Magi, Druids, or Christians, it fell on the religious leaders rather than on the practitioners themselves. One thing about the Christian portrayal of Roman persecutions is that it is inconsistent with what Romans are known to have done.
_________________

Vade in pacem deorum
Moravius Piscinus

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

Scripsisti:
Scripsit:
More broadly, your response makes me wonder whether any monotheistic religion has been able to remain tolerant toward polytheists. Certainly the early Church was unable to and so was early Islam against the pagans of the Arab peninsula.

I hardly think that monotheism in itself would lead to the kind of mindset that produces intolerance. Polytheists do not have any better history on religious intolerance either. The Roman principle of the rule of law made their state more tolerant of other faiths than had previously been seen. Claudianus may tell you that Hellenist Isaicism was basically monotheist, as there was a monotheist undercurrent in some schools of Greek philosophy, notably Stoicism and Platonism, that were incorporated into Isaicism. Monotheism has also been argued with regard to Egyptian religious beliefs, the cult of Aten being one expression of that. I am trying to think of other examples of monotheism outside of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition. Zorostrianism perhaps, but it is related, or influenced Judeo-Christian-Islam. In Stoicism, monotheism led to an avowed belief of universal brotherhood, so the problem of intolerance cannot be placed on monotheism alone.

There is an "us-and-them" thread that runs in Judaism that was picked up into forms of Christianity, and later in Islam. There is also the dualistic nature of Judeo-Christian-Islam that sees the universe as divided into good and evil. Those are more important factors, I think, in providing a fertile ground for intolerance than monotheism would necessarily provide. Today we see intolerant forms of fundamentalism in Judaism, in Christianity, in Islam. There is also a fundamentalism in Hinhuism today, that is also nationalistic and at times turns intolerant. Then too, from what I have heard about recent occurances in some other place, and have experienced in some groups claiming to be pagan, there is apparently intolerant 'fundie' pagans as well. I would point out that fundamentalism in any faith does not necessarily translate into intolerance. The term fundamentalism has taken on a connotation of intolerance because of how it has been applied recently.

Your reference to early Islamic intolerance I am curious about. There is not a great deal of evidence on polytheism in the Arabian peninsula prior to Islam. It did exist as we know from some Roman sources. The Ka'abah was originally a shrine of the mother goddess Allath, the Black Stone itself representing Her son. That the Arabian polytheistic tradition was extinguished is evident, but I have not read on how that process came about. Outside of Arabia, as Islam spread, it was not intolerant towards all other faiths. The pagan community of Harran was tolerated under Islam up until the end of the 11th century. Harran became a refuge for those pagan philosophers expelled by Justinian. Likewise Nestorians and Gnostics forced to flee Byzantium domains found refuge in Islamic regions. Jews were treated better under Islam than in Christian Europe. Sabeans were tolerated and exist still today. Under the impact of the Crusader invasion, and more recent western imposition following WW I, Islam reacted with an anti-western response that has a religious element to it. But reading the Qoran, and some Islamic treatises on Islamic law and philosophy, I did not find much that would support intolerant forms of Islam. But then, like Christianity, how a religion is practiced by its followers is not always consistent with what the religion teaches. So I would be interested to learn more on Islam.


Vade in pacem deorum
Moravius Piscinus

[Primus Aurelius Timavus]

Salve Marce,

Would you agree that the examples cited are basically different from the religious wars we've witnessed since about 600 CE?

The Sacred Wars were between belligerants of (broadly) the same religion for control of a sacred locus common to them. Roman repression of local deities appears to be a consequence of, but not a motivation for, its conquests. The repression of the Druids in Britannia serves as a clear example.

The cases of Roman religious intolerance are, for me, very different from the Muslim conquest, the Crusades, the Thirty Years war, the Reconquista in Spain, and the Spanish conquest of the New World. I am not claiming that religion was the only reason that those wars were fought, but it was a big reason in each case.

You have read more broadly than I. Is there any evidence that the Romans were motivated to conquer in order to "save souls"?

[Primus Aurelius Timavus]

Salve Marce,

I must apologize in advance: all of my books have been in storage in Denver for the last two years and so I cannot quote them in this reply. I'm going by my memory of the Islamic Civilization course that I took at the University of Chicago almost twenty years ago.

The course started out with a survey of pre-Islamic religion in the Arabian peninsula. It appeared to be almost animist to me. We read surviving poems to a moon goddess and about the remains of local shrines to nature spirits. The Ka'abah itself was originally a pagan shrine as you pointed out. I recently read of an Egyptian scholar that was getting in hot water because she pointed out connections between Islam and its pagan predecessors - there are more than the religious authorities in Egypt would like to believe.

Anyways, during the conquest of the peninsula, most of which occured when Mohammad was still alive, Islamic troops were ordered to destroy cult statues wherever they were found and to massacre pagans unless they converted. Jews, Christians, and Zorostrians were encouraged, but not required, to convert. Jews, Christians, and Zorostrians were considered to be "peoples of the book" and thus to have some, albeit incomplete, understanding of the truth. Later, those communities were forced to pay an additional tax to provide an incentive to convert. As you say, Jews received better treatment under Islamic rulers than under many Christian rulers.

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

Scripsisti:
Is there any evidence that the Romans were motivated to conquer in order to "save souls"?

In a sense yes. Rome posed itself as a civilizing force and equated that with ending the barbaric practice of human sacrifice. For whatever reason they may have had for conquest, they were using religious grounds to justify their actions. Savage barbarians in the wilderness had to be civilized by imposing the standards of belief of the civilized world. The Greeks took their own standards of belief to be civilized, as opposed to all others who had to be barbarians, as did the Romans, as did the Conquistadores, as is the US today. I do not see where there is much difference in the approach. What it still came down to was "My gods are better than your gods."

Scipsisti:
Would you agree that the examples cited are basically different from the religious wars we've witnessed since about 600 CE?

"Give up your old gods and convert to our gods." I suppose there is a difference in intensity in the intentions. The Romans did not force the Celts to give up their gods, only their druidic priesthood, their cultus, sovereingty, lands, property women and children, and the Romans did not insist the Celts adopt all the Roman gods to worship, only that they recognize the emperor as a god and perform the required sacrifices, adopt the Roman form of cultus for their old gods, accept Roman names for their gods, and submit to Rome's civilizing influence over their culture. Kind of like saying give up your Shari'a and adopt a constitutional democracy, keep your old god as long as you will admit he is our god, and oh, by the way, we are going to bring your people into the twenty-first century by dropping twinkies on them, dressing your women in western fashions, and allowing your children to play rock-n-roll because you have a barbaric culture that needs civilizing. Yes, the kinder, gentler way of cultural genocide.

I assume what you are really referring to is that afterward, the Romans did not insist that their conquered subjects think Roman. No Inquisition, no thought police, well, maybe an occasional witch trial, but form more than ideology was important to the Romans. So in that it was different after 600.

Vale optime
Moravius Piscinus

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salve Aureli

University of Chicago almost twenty years ago.

I recently read of an Egyptian scholar that was getting in hot water because she pointed out connections between Islam and its pagan predecessors - there are more than the religious authorities in Egypt would like to believe.
.

U of Chicago, that is most interesting. What field of study? And twenty years ago...would put you around my time too. I started at Kent State in 1970, until a certain incident cost me a scholarship, then a stint in the army, and did not finish up until in the '80's from U of Akron.

I read the piece on Egyptian scholar.

Vale optime
Moravius Piscinus

[Horatius Piscinus]

Salvete comreligiones

Here is a related article, a piece on who destroyed the library of Alexandria:

http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=20347