Homage to Diocletian

Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus effectively ruled the Roman Empire in the late 3rd century and the very early 4th century A.D. (or C.E., depending on the date of the work you read about him).  He did so for about 20 years, though he shared power with an Augustus of the West along with two Caesars, one of the West and one of the East, through his creation of the Tetrarchy, or the Roman version of it at least--a system by which the Empire was administered by 4 individuals. 

You can still see the Tetrarchs.  They are huddled together, hugging each other rather uncomfortably it seems, in a stone sculpture snatched from a Byzantine palace by the Venetians and now in place in Venice at St. Mark's Basilica.

Ruling the Empire for 20 years at that time was most impressive in itself, as the 3rd century was something of a mess.  One emperor followed another with amazing rapidity.  Even those sanctioned by the increasingly irrelevant and no doubt bewildered Senate were many, and those declared Augustus, unsuccessfully, by one legion or another were many as well.  Diocletian was a relative unknown from the province of Dalmatia who rose up through the legions.  Though he shared power he was without question the senior Augustus, primus inter pares, though that phrase was even less applicable to Diocletian than to the first Augustus who coined it or had it coined for him to help lessen the appearance of regal autocracy 300 years before.

Perhaps even more impressive is the fact that Diocletian actually abdicated, retiring to his huge palace at what is now Split.  That palace resembles a Roman military encampment, called a castrum, which was typically laid out in the form of a playing-card with four major streets.  Perhaps he had spent so many years overseeing the creation of castra that he wasn't certain it was possible to build anything else.  He lived on for 8 years after his abdication, tending his garden, which is said to have been made up mostly of cabbages.

He's remembered most by us barbarians for his effort to impose price controls and the so-called "Great Persecution" of the Christians, policies which were failures.  Price controls continue to be debated and poor Diocletian's edict is generally held up as the first example of their use or misuse as the case may be.  The failure of the "Great Persecution" was trumpeted by Christian apologists at the time and has been ever since as evidence Christianity was/is divinely sanctioned, but recorded deaths of martyrs are actually very few, relatively speaking.  The Christians were known to have exaggerated the severity of persecution in that case and other cases.  In fact, the Christians were by that time so firmly in place among the bureaucracy and the military that there could be no extirpation of the religion even then let alone during the reign of Julian the Apostate.

Diocletian was most impressive, though, in his reformation if not reconstruction of the Roman State as a much more efficient (and large) bureaucracy.  He also transformed the status of the emperor, rending that position even more autocratic and sacrosanct in some ways, but less omnipotent.  His reforms of the military were impressive and effective as well.  He's been considered a kind of second Augustus, restorer if not creator of the Empire, and his achievement was such as to assure its continuance in one form or another for a thousand years, in the East.

Why do homage to such a man?  There is a disturbing tendency among some of us to treat as heroes or as truly great those who are, at the end of the day, great autocrats, dictators, rulers, generals.  Alexander, Julius Caesar, Napoleon for example.  These were men who were responsible for the slaughter of hundreds of thousands, however, and the oppression of even more.  It's unclear to me why they are selected for honor, but it is difficult for me to believe that the fact they are honored by us is honorable.  Is Diocletian different?

Diocletian was a cruel ruler in a cruel time, a ruthless organizer and administrator who imposed order where there had been chaos through the relentless imposition of absolute policies which sometimes worked and sometimes did not, but overall worked to prevent the Empire from dissolving.  It's probable the preservation of the Empire was more desirable than the alternative.

Constantine is sometimes given the credit for the preservation of the Empire, but he merely perpetuated the reforms Diocletian imposed, and didn't obtain power in similarly chaotic circumstances.  It may be that he came to be thought of in this way because of his rather ambiguous acceptance of Christianity, which sufficed to make Constantine almost holy as far as the Church and its chroniclers were concerned.

But beyond that, the preservation of the Empire and its restoration in a new form, however autocratic, was a colossal achievement, and the fact that it was accomplished by someone who started so low and was raised so high is impressive in itself, to me at least.  It is also representative of one of the truly odd aspects of the Empire.  Although it grew out of an oligarchy, it came eventually to allow for if it did not contemplate the acquisition of real power, even ultimate power, by certain individuals who were not aristocrats, not wealthy, not privileged in any real sense.  There is something I find fascinating about such a society and such a people.

Perhaps it was a society where power was more naked, that is to say that power was less influenced by other factors traditionally recognized as bringing power.  Roman imperium may have been authority "pure and simple" which could be exercised in and of itself, by anyone regardless of lineage, origin or economic status.  As far as power is concerned, the more honest and simple its use and creation the more respect it should be accorded. 

The Etiology of the Christian Persecutions

Reading about the remarkable reign of the Emperor Diocletian prompts some speculation regarding the causes of the persecutions of the Christians during his principate and at other times during the Roman Empire.

The empire was normally fairly tolerant when it came to religious worship.  However, it disliked certain forms of worship.  Prior to the advent of Christianity, Rome banned some cults it considered weird and outlandish and so, of course, un-Roman.  For example, the thought of being, literally, washed in the blood of the bull (so to speak) was initially frowned on, and the tendency of certain male worshipers of the Great Mother to castrate themselves created some not unnatural distress.  Most of the banned religions managed to sneak back into the Roman world, however, and even came to be accepted in the sense that no effort was made by the emperors to stamp them out.

Christianity, though, was subject to persecution more than once.  It was certainly considered weird, at one point.  There were all sorts of stories regarding orgies and cannibalism being part of Christian worship, also incest (orgies themselves being, perhaps, not necessarily objectionable to the Roman mind).  But, there had to be more involved for certain of the emperors to react as they did.

And there was, of course.  Christians, or at least some of them, refused to pay homage to the emperor in the religious sense, generally by sacrifice.  It's thought that this in particular made them the subject of persecution.  This makes some sense, as Christians therefore would be considered to be against, if not a threat to, the emperor and thus the empire.

What I find interesting is why Christians would refuse to engage in this act, which probably required nothing in the nature of sincere belief or intent, and was simply a ritual gesture.  The answer that they refused because they were good, or wise, or honest, and the empire and/or emperor bad, and the emperor not divine, is generally given.  But I think there was more involved.

The Christians worshiped a God who became human.  The possibility that a human could be divine, therefore, would presumably not be objectionable to them.  However, their religion provided that only a particular human could be divine, and no other.  In this sense, the Christian view of a divine human differed from the Greek and Roman view which had been prevalent for some time.  The Olympian gods obviously had various human offspring.  The emperors had been granted divine status on their death for some time (some, like Caligula, claiming it during their lifetimes).  The divine status of the emperor was not objectionable to most pagans; they were not unused to the thought of humans having or asserting divinity in some sense.  Christians, however, at least those who were not Arians, believed that the one God had become human only once, in the form of Jesus.  And, as the Arians cam to learn, the orthodox Christians strongly objected to the idea of Jesus having a limited divinity--he was the same in substance with the Father, not merely similar.  The thought of someone being divine but not God was foreign to Christianity.

When Diocletian as part of his efforts to reform the empire sought to protect the emperor from assassination and deposition by formally taking on divine status, he struck at the heart of the Christian doctrine.  If only one human could be divine, the emperor could not be.  In this and in other things Christianity was (is) an exclusive religion.  There was only one God, all others therefore were false, and evil.  There could be only one human who was divine, and all other claimants therefore were false, and evil.  The idea of someone who was not Jesus claiming to be divine was inherently inconsistent with Christian doctrine.  It does not justify the persecutions, but it seems to be true that Christianity's own intolerance of other gods, and other religions, played a role in its persecution under the empire.  Certainly it explains its persecution of pagans, and Jews, and heretical Christians, after it subsumed the empire itself