Persecution of Christians

The work presents the first Slovak translation of the work On the Deaths of Persecutors by the important Christian apologist Lactantius. His work is an extremely important source for the period of the turn of the 3rd and the 4th century AD because it captures THE important events of the outbreak of the last great persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire called the Great Persecution. Lactantius depicts not only the outbreak and THE course of this difficult period for Christians but also its conclusion and the legalization of Christianity within the Roman Empire through the edict of toleration by Emperor Galerius of 311 and later The Edict of Milan by Constantine the Great of 313.
The monograph deals with the development of the religious situation in the Roman Empire from the 2nd Punic War to the turn of the 3rd and 4th century AD while presenting a point of view at its development in several areas. He focuses on traditional cults, monotheistic religions, the empire's relationship with Christianity and especially the persecution of Christians, the scope of which ranges from local pogroms to empirewide persecution in the 3rd and the beginning of the 4th century AD. The work brings new knowledge and perspectives on the issue and shows that the traditional view, for example, of the set of four edicts issued against Christians during the Great Persecution is no longer sustainable, because in fact, as evidenced by Lactantius' De mortibus persecutorum, there was only one anti-Christian edict issued right at the beginning of the state interventions against Christians.

Pour un cinquième de l’Église mondiale, le leadership s’exerce dans un contexte de persécution. Si la persécution et le leadership suscitent l’un et l’autre un intérêt croissant tant parmi les érudits que chez un public plus profane, il a été jusqu’ici mené peu de recherches au carrefour de ces deux domaines d’études, qui portent sur l’expérience du leadership face à la persécution. Cet article en appelle à une étude consciente et approfondie du leadership chrétien dans ce dernier contexte, qui prenne en compte les défis du témoignage à Jésus-Christ en pareilles circonstances, des perspectives bibliques, de la pertinence des théories du leadership et des profits à en retirer pour l’Église mondiale, notamment pour les communautés persécutées, pour les missionnaires et pour ceux jouissant d’un degré plus important de liberté religieuse. La théorie du leadership de Robert E. Quinn est un exemple de modèle de recherche prometteur, testé dans le cadre de l’étude du leadership de l’église Meserete Kristos, en Éthiopie, entre 1974 et 1991.

OPEN LETTER TO PM MODI
SIR, YOU RESPECT DIVERSITY BUT RSS MOURNS IT, WHOM DO WE BELIEVE?
My Dear Prime Minister Modi ji,
Namaskar.
It is heartening to note that you as PM of our democratic-secular state have underlined the great diversities in the Indian nation which needed to be celebrated. While addressing a conference on 'Islamic Heritage: Promoting Understanding and Moderation' in the presence of the King of Jordan, Abdullah II in Delhi on March 1, 2018 you were kind enough to declare that India's democracy was "a celebration of our age-old plurality" recalling that "religions and beliefs from all over the world" flourished in the country. It was great to hear you to commit that "We Indians are proud of our diversity." While specially addressing the Muslim youth of India you were kind enough to advise them to hold Quran in one hand and computer in the other for an all-inclusive progress and welfare. However, I would beg to say that this call for Quran or any other scripture in one hand is a risky proposition. The US taught Afghan youth Quran in one hand and AK47 in other hand and what price Afghan Muslims paid for it is well known.
Read the whole letter....

Religious groups existing on the fringes of US Society can quickly find themselves pushed outside the borders of acceptability by the onset of war, especially if they hold pacifist convictions and an avid desire to proselytise. Gary Perkins shares the history of one such group, the International Bible Students Association.

Attempts for Political Rehabilitation
in the Reformed Church in Hungary before 1956

On the 20th of October 1956, the General Convent, then the highest
executive body of the Reformed Church in Hungary, issued a Rehabilitation Edict. The Edict’s attachment sorted the pastors who were sidelined in the early 1950s supposedly for political reasons.
It is to be noted that the Edict was issued three days before the ’56
Hungarian Revolution started and the pre-Bereczky church government led by László Ravasz was reinstalled. It becomes apparent that the low-church reform movement (later known as the Reformed Renewal Movement), Bishop Bereczky’s belated High-Church reform steps – like Dean Sándor Fekete’s exclusion from power and László Papp’s appointment to deputy bishop of the Danubian Church District – moreover the positive precedent of the rehabilitation of the Lutheran Bishop Ordass all resulted in the start of the church rehabilitations before the ’56 Revolution turned the tables, reinstalling the pre-Bereczky church government. Because of this aspect, László Papp’s role in the starting of the rehabilitations and the inner-upper renewal attempt
of the church must be made clear.

This impressive book is probably also the most comprehensive study available concerning the topic of persecution in 1 Peter. While there have been many previous studies in forms of articles, and a few larger sections in some commentaries, this volume will probably remain a standard presentation and a must reading for students of 1 Peter for years to come both because of its comprehensive discussion and its tightly knit argumentation. That is not to say that all readers will be convinced by all its arguments; but a serious discussion of its topic -Persecution in 1 Peter - should not be carried out without engaging in its views and arguments.

ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN INDIAN AND HINDU NATIONALISM
Indian nationalism and Hindu nationalism are two different things. While the former is unconcerned with a person‟s religious or cultural identity, the latter imagines the nation as an exclusive community of Hindus. From the time of Independence till now, this distinction has never been in doubt.
But today there is a move by flag-bearers of Hindu nationalism to equate it with Indian nationalism. What exactly is the provenance of these two nationalist ideologies? Who were their earliest proponents? What role did either play in India‟s freedom struggle? These are some of the questions that author and dramatist Shamsul Islam dwells on in Hindu Nationalism and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh , a fine primer on the history and dynamics of Hindu nationalism.
Islam cites extensively from the works of historians and thinkers who themselves are part of the Hindu nationalist canon, such as R.C. Majumdar and V.D. Savarkar, to interrogate many of its claims. For instance, he shows how Majumdar contradicts the Hindu nationalist claim of India being a „primordial nation‟, given the historian‟s observation that the idea of India “had no application to actual politics till the sixties or the seventies of the nineteenth century.”
Indian nationalism was born in opposition to British colonial oppression. Its most significant moment of resistance was the 1857 mutiny, in which Hindus and Muslims battled together against foreign rule. Islam cites Thomas Lowe, a British army commander, who observed that “the cow-killer and the cow-worshipper, the pig-hater and the pig-eater” fought together.
But this nascent Indian nationalism that was composite in nature underwent a process of bifurcation in the “third quarter of the nineteenth century”, notes Islam. Two things played a role in this: a „divide and rule‟ policy adopted by the British, and the bickering between the elites of the two communities “for securing a favourable place in the eyes of the victor”. Together they created a “scenario in which only competitive Hindu and Muslim varieties of nationalism could flourish.”
Islam‟s book also raises interesting questions: If Indian civilisation is more than 3,500 years old, why is it that only a period of 500 years (the period of so-called Muslim rule) is closely scrutinised by Hindu nationalists? What about the period before?
It might be interesting to read Islam‟s book alongside his primary sources: V.D. Savarkar‟s The Indian War of Independence of 1857 and R.C. Majumdar‟s Three Phases of India’s Struggle for Freedom.
Link for procuring Shamsul Islam’s books in English, Hindi & Urdu:
https://tinyurl.com/shams-books

محققان و عموم به هر دو موضوع جفا و رهبری، گفتگوهای اندکی بین این دو حیطه یا تحقیق روی تجربۀ
رهبران جفادیده صورت گرفته است. هدف این مقاله این است که لزوم مطالعۀ هدفمند و پایدار رهبری
مسیحی تحت جفا را نشان داده و چالشهایی که شاهدان امین عیسی مسیح تحت این شرایط تجربه میکند،
دیدگاههای کتابمقدسی، ربط داشتن نظریۀ رهبری، و مزایای آن برای کلیسای جهانی را در نظر گیرد- از
جمله جوامع جفادیده، و میسیونرها و آنانی که از آزادی مذهبی چشمگیری برخوردارند. نظریۀ رهبری رابرت رهبری برای یکپنجم کلیسای جهانی در بافتها و محیطهای جفا صورت میگیرد. با وجود توجه
ای. کوین یک نمونه از مدلهای تحقیق نویدبخشی است که در رابطه با مورد رهبری کلیسای
در اتیوپی )از ۱۹۷۴ تا ۱۹۹۱ ( آزمایش شده است. Meserete Kristos روزافزون

Tesis de Doctorado / PhD Thesis.
Since J. Parkes invented it in 1934, the expression “Parting of the Ways” has deeply rooted in the scholarship to study the distance between Jews and Christians during Antiquity. Indeed, issued from the same common background, which was the Second Temple Judaism, Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism became two opposing orthodoxies which excluded each other and, largely, based their own identity in opposition to the other one, in a process started by the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in the year 70. This doctoral thesis analyses how this parting of the ways happened throughout the first three centuries of the Common Era in the different regional realities of the Roman Empire, taking as a main source the literature of the Church Fathers, though also other ones, as the rabbinic literature, the so-called “cycle of the Talmud”. So, despite their rivalries, Judaism and Christianity form a large spectrum where, in an extreme, we find the Rabbinic Judaism, for which Jesus represents nothing, and, in the other, different forms of Gnostic Christianity, which fully denied the identification between the Jewish Jahveh and the God Father preached by Jesus Christ and, because of that, refused all the Jewish heritage of Christianity. Between both extremes became established the self-proclaimed Orthodox Christianity, over the basis of the anti-legalistic thought of the Apostle Paul. This form of Christianity also felt obliged to harmonize Hebrew Scriptures as a part of the history of salvation with the idea that the Mosaic Law had been abrogated with the coming of the Messiah. This proto-Orthodox Christianity found in the method of allegory applied to the interpretation of the Old Testament the legitimation of its doctrine and its universalistic and uniformist wishes. On the other hand, the rabbis, with the Patriarch as their leader, got the decisive support of the Roman authorities in their purpose to proclaim themselves as the leaders of Judaism, which was decapitated after the disappearance of the Temple. This Judaism found its way of expression in the so-called Talmudic literature, where the Rabbis systematized an orthodoxy that excluded from the people of Israel all those who did not share their doctrines, as we can see, for example, in the Birkat ha minim, imprecation which, included in the liturgy of the synagogue worship, was pronounced against the Followers of Jesus of Nazareth.

While protestant churches see the priesthood of all believers mantra as a badge of honour, they all have senior church leaders set aside as ordained, commissioned or called leaders. About one hundred years after the reformation, Baptist leaders including John Smyth and Thomas Helwys
quit the Church of England and started their own nascent Baptist Church because they agreed with Luther’s teaching of priesthood of all believers. Both Smyth and Helwys taught that all Christians were priests with direct access to God.
    The second London Confession of 1677 affirmed that all members were bound to further the good of the church by exercising their gifts
to promote communion, love, and edification in the community of faith. The US Baptists hold to the same principles expressed in the London Confession, a position they adopted in 1925. Southern Baptists also opted for a similar concept in 1925 as expressed in the Baptist Faith
Message.

Severe persecution has been an on-going phenomenon in Somalia since the disintegration of Somalia‘s central government in 1991. The purpose of this study was to investigate the nature of the persecution of Christians and its influence on the growth of the Church in Somalia. The objectives of the study were to: examine selected episodes of persecution of the church throughout history and their effect on church growth, discover the challenges that persecution poses to the Church in Somalia, determine if the Church in Somalia has a locally developed distinctive theology of persecution, assess the role ministers play in this church during severe persecution, and draw conclusions that could contribute to the understanding of the relationship between Christian persecution and church growth in Somalia. The study employed a descriptive survey research design. A sample of 220 respondents who included Christian clergy, Christian lay leaders, Christian elders, Christian lay members, and Muslims was selected using non-probability sampling methods, namely purposive and convenience sampling methods.

Zu den wesentlichen Kennzeichen der religiösen Szene der Gegenwart zählt die paradoxe Erfahrung, dass die Akzeptanz des traditionellen Christentums in Europa zurückgeht, während das Interesse für religiöse Fragen und Themen gleichzeitig präsent bleibt. Diese Entwicklung vollzieht sich im Horizont heutiger multikultureller und multireligiöser Gesellschaften.

The goal of this paper is to examine early Christian martyr stories and to compare them with contemporary accounts of persecution according to content, themes, players, and actions. Widespread global persecution in the past one hundred years validates the authenticity of persecution during the early centuries of the church.

This work is devoted to the theological thought of a distinguished representative of the Polish Church in the 19th century – Zygmunt Szczęsny Feliński. Zygmunt Szczęsny Feliński was a participant of the Greater Poland
Uprising and a friend of the renowned Polish poet Juliusz Słowacki. He was a professor at the Catholic Theological Academy in Petersburg and founded the Congregation of the Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary. Between 1862-1883 Feliński served as the Archbishop of Warsaw, but a year after he became the head of the diocese, he was exiled further to what then was Russia. Beatified and canonized at the beginning of the 21 st  Century, Feliński is still a relevant figure today and his life reflects the complexity of the Polish fate during the Partitions period.

In this report, the European Centre for Law & Justice and the American Center for Law & Justice examine some of the most pressing issues concerning religious freedom in Israel and the Palestinian Territories, with a special emphasis on the plight of the Christian communities.

Persecution and suffering are not new to the Christian experience. At the same time, they have not gone away to become the things of the past. In fact, persecution remains one of the most persistent themes in the history of world Christianity. This paper aims to explore the panorama of persecution within the framework of world Christianity today.

This article examines how John crafts the narratives and discourses to address the issue of fear and secrecy, and to guide his audience/readers on how to face persecution. It is proposed that: first, John uses dualistic language with the rhetorical purpose of bringing across ironies, exposing underlying motives of characters, and heightening the impossibility of a middle ground; second, he deliberately portrays a few characters ambiguously to reflect the complexities of life—one cannot and should not easily classify everyone neatly into dualistic categories; and third, John has a distinctive emphasis on divine providence with regard to facing persecution.

Brent D. Shaw has questioned the historicity of the Neronian persecution based on two arguments from silence: Tacitus's use of the term "Christians" is an anachronism; and Suetonius knows of no connection between the fire in Rome and Nero's police actions against the Christians. Both of these untestable arguments from silence are inherently weak logically. One can make a good case for the claim that Chrestianus, Christianus, and Χριστιανός are not creations of the second century and that Roman officials were probably aware of the Chrestiani in the 60s. Tacitus's and Suetonius's accounts of the persecution are fundamentally reliable.

The thesis is based on history with a linear time-line. It begins with what a cult is and then heads back to the 70’s when Paul started writing his mystery letters to his new church’s--which later progressed by the 4th c. into the Christianity that we know today.
  Using quotes from Christian, agnostic and Jewish historians along-side Paul’s cultish theology gives the reader clues as to how this cult progressed throughout the centuries. This includes the later persecutions of Pagans and Jews through history and up to the Reformation era.

The successive bans on Christianity in Early Modern Japan led to several persecution campaignsespecially during the early seventeenth centurywhich resulted in numerous deaths, among both the local converts and the missionaries. These events made a major impact on Europe, including the beatification of the Twenty-Six Martyrs of Nagasaki, who died in 1597 and were blessed 30 years later. Active missionary efforts ended by the late 1630s, but during the three centuries of the Edo era (mid-seventeenth-mid-nineteenth centuries), Christianity survived within hidden communities. Such communities kept legends of local martyrs, and they were sometimes the subjects of administrative control. A few incidents also saw people killed due to alleged links to Christianity. The martyrs of Japan came back to the forefront of Western discourse during the nineteenth century, with the rediscovery of “hidden Christians”
in 1865 and the persecutions that followed. This process culminated in the
beatifications of the martyrs in Japan and the official recognition of Christianity. In this context, the notions of Christian martyrs/martyrdom and persecution were accepted in Japan for the first time, and these terms became officially translated. After that, Japanese Christians started building a new identity through the construction of narratives on Christian martyrs. They especially tried to locate the alleged locations of the executions of martyrs in the early modern period. Such efforts resulted in the establishment of the Twenty-Six Martyrs Museum in Nagasaki and the beatification and canonizations of various groups of martyrs (in 1981, 1987, 2007, and 2016), as well as the recognition of relevant locations as World Heritage Sites. After the Second World War, the martyrs of Japan were also linked to the atomic bomb in Nagasaki, a fact which was stressed during the visit of Pope John Paul II to Japan, becoming an important part of the identity of the city.

This volume is the fourth edition of academic studies examining the lives and struggles of persecuted Christian
communities around the world. | Évente megjelenő Budapest-Jelentés 2020-ig évi kiadásában megjelent írásomban összefoglalom a tábori lelkészek szolgálatának azon dimenzióját, melyek érintik a keresztényüldözés vizsgálatának területét.

2 FILES (1 hungarian, 1 english is downloadable)

This study examines the perceptions of Christians within the most important socio-political milieus in today’s Turkey. Methodically it undertakes a qualitative content analysis of five Turkish daily newspapers. First a retrospect depicts the most prominent historical factors for the attitude towards Christians in Turkey: early Islam, the societal status of Christian minori-ties in the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic, the interference of “Christian” powers during the crusades and later in the age of colonialism.
The analysis of the newspapers Yeniçağ, Millî Gazete, Yeni Şafak, Milliyet and Cumhuri-yet, which are selected for representing the different milieus, proves to provide meaningful and adequately differentiated results concerning the perceptions of Christians. It becomes obvious that secular Kemalism, Turkish-Islamic nationalism, Islamism in its different flavors, and democratic liberalism manifest thoroughly different perceptions of Christians. Simultane-ously, significant common ground of the perspectives under examination can be demonstrat-ed, especially in terms of a deep mistrust against Christian missionary activities in Turkey.
In the systematizing part of the study, ideological, historic-political, and psychological-sociological reasons are established for the mostly negative attitude towards Christians in Turkey. In addition the necessity of a Christian theological interpretation of the accusations against Christians is substantiated. Appropriate Christian responses are identified, with special attention to the First Letter of Peter. A theologically justified integration of verbal abuse into the broader framework of persecution creates the interpretational foundation for determining a variety of possible responses. Prominent among these responses are a debate about the accu-sations against Christian mission and the self-assurance of one’s Christian identity. The First Letter of Peter suggests active strategies to mitigate societal prejudice, but at the same time calls for Christians to patiently bear accusations according to the example of Christ and for his sake.

An edited and updated version of the dissertation was published as:

2017. Anschuldigungen und Antwort des Glaubens: Wahrnehmungen von Christen in türkischen Tageszeitungen und Maßstäbe für eine geistliche Reaktion. Berlin: LIT (Beiträge zur Missionswissenschaft/Interkulturellen Theologie, Bd. 38).

Ever since Albert Schwegler published his monumental study of Montanism, 7 the movement has been caricatured as consisting of people obsessed by a reckless desire for martyrdom and an uncompromising attitude towards the state. Whilst it is granted by some historians that Montanists merely developed tendencies which also existed in other sections of the church, it is claimed, repeatedly, that Montanists, unlike catholics, made martyrdom a duty binding on all Christians. Ronald Knox, for example, characterized the history of Montanism as that of a 'naked fanaticism, which tried to stampede the church into greater severity, when she had not forgotten how to be severe'. 2 He claimed that Montanists flaunted their Christianity in the face of the persecutor so as to show up the cowardice of the catholics. Frederick Klawiter, more recently, not only repeated the traditional view that their extreme emphasis on voluntary martyrdom distinguished Montanists from catholics, but argued that the value they placed on martyrdom explains why women could attain ministerial status within their ranks.·* This view of Montanism has rarely been challenged, 4 but did Montanists really value martyrdom more highly than their catholic contemporaries? Did they, consequently, differ from them on the issue of voluntary martyrdom? In order to answer these, and similar, questions it is necessary to analyse the Orthodox' attitude to martyrdom and then to compare it with such evidence as we have concerning Montanist opinion and practice.

The purpose of this chapter is to explore the Christian response to violence envisioned by the book of Revelation. My thesis is that the book of Revelation functions as a prophetic call to Christian believers to respond to violence not with further violence, but by worshiping the one true God, by bearing witness to his work in Jesus Christ, and by waiting patiently for his final victory in the world. Part 1 provides a brief orientation to the book of Revelation. Part 2 sketches the origins and nature of the persecution of Christians within the Roman world, with specific reference to the Roman imperial cults and the province of Asia. Part 3 explores the book’s prophetic call to worship, witness, and wait.

Severe persecution has been an ongoing phenomenon in Somalia since the disintegration of Somalia’s central government in 1991. The purpose of this study was to investigate the nature of persecution of Christians and its influence on the growth of the Church in Somalia. The objectives of the study were to: examine selected episodes of persecution of the church throughout history and their effect on church growth, discover the challenges that persecution poses to the Church in Somalia, determine if the Church in Somalia has a locally developed distinctive theology of persecution, assess the role ministers play in this church during severe persecution, and draw conclusions that could contribute to the understanding of the relationship between Christian persecution and church growth in Somalia.

The study employed a descriptive survey research design. A sample of 220 respondents who included Christian clergy, Christian lay leaders, Christian elders, Christian lay members, and Muslims was selected using nonprobability sampling methods, namely purposive and convenience sampling methods. Data was collected using open-ended questionnaires. Content and construct validity were ascertained by incorporating the experts’ opinions, consisting of university supervisors and examiners. The researcher, after pretesting the questionnaire in the pilot survey in a city code-named L0, conducted reliability testing using interrater reliability testing since the questionnaire had many open-ended questions. After carrying out the study in three cities code-named L1, L2 and L3, the results so obtained being predominantly qualitative were analysed using Microsoft Excel and Maxqda 2020. The quantitative results were analysed using SPSS 26. Based on the findings of the study, the null hypothesis of this research which states that persecution of Christians is not related to the numerical growth of the targeted Church in Somalia was rejected. On the contrary, the results of the study proved that persecution contributes to the numerical growth of the Church in Somalia.

The findings of the study indicated that the church in Somali is a Creative Access Christian (CAC) model with no expatriate and non-Somali membership. The study further indicated that the period between 1994 and 1996 was the period when the church experienced the greatest persecution (65%); and there was evidence that this persecution led to a period of sustained growth, as reported by 6.7% of believers who reported coming to faith between 1900 and 2000; 26.3% between 2000 and 2010, and 67.5% of respondents who were believers for less than ten years. The data collected suggest that an understanding of extreme persecution, martyrdom, and the way in which those events gave birth to their community of faith is a foundational part of the identity and the collective memory of the Somali CAC believing community. The research recommendations are that the Somali Church must live a Christ-like life, facilitate an effective interfaith dialogue, harness the provisions of the clan system, and have a good relationship with the government. The study recommends the use of interfaith dialogue (IFD) to create an IFD movement of all people in Somalia. This IFD incorporates active nonviolence with inclusivity which reduces exclusivity of the Muslim majority allowing religious pluralism in the context of IFD. This study will therefore contribute to the understanding of the relationship between persecution and church growth in the Somali context.

Under persecution during the Ethiopian Revolution (1974-1991), highly committed men and women led the Meserete Kristos Church (MKC) through remarkable transformation and growth. Although persecution has been an enduring reality in the global church, leadership in that context has received scant research attention. Drawing on interviews and other first-person accounts of faithful MKC leaders in the Derg era, this essay explores the dynamics of their experience using the leadership theory of Robert E. Quinn as a conceptual lens. Persecution forced MKC leaders to clarify the priority of their commitment to Jesus and the mission of the church. Prepared to die for the sake of the gospel, they demonstrated leadership marked by a highly effective pursuit of purpose, compelling integrity under pressure, attractive love, and remarkable creativity—leading to extraordinary results. Between 1974 and 1991 the Meserete Kristos Church (MKC)—an Anabaptist Christian renewal movement in Ethiopia—experienced a profound transformation. Under pressure from a Marxist regime bent on eradicating evangelical Christianity from the country, the MKC grew from 800 to 34,000 baptized members, greatly expanded its geographic reach, dramatically increased the pool of people in active ministry, became financially self-supporting, adopted a radically new ministry structure, and nurtured a contagious spiritual vitality among its members. A remarkable group of leaders—both men and women—played an essential role in this transformation, leading the MKC with courageous purpose, integrity, love, and creativity. This essay, based largely on extensive interviews with twenty-four MKC leaders, explores the dynamics of leadership that enabled the MKC not only to survive but also to flourish under circumstances of persecution and extreme hardship. Research participants were selected based on the recommendations of various people with personal knowledge of MKC

The Roman legal system did not discriminate the citizens on the basis of their religious affiliation. We are aware of individual cases in which certain ethnic groups and/or religions—mostly Greeks, Egyptians, Jews—have suffered certain disadvantages or restrictions, but we have no knowledge of a case in which the practice of a religion was forbidden in toto. It seems that until the persecution of Diocletian, which is already outside the time frame of this study, Roman laws (leges publicae populi Romani) did not name Christianity, therefore they could not prohibit its practice. Although imperial letters—such as Trajan’s, Hadrian’s, or Marcus Aurelius’ sacrae litterae—were also considered legal sources, and these occasionally referred to the Christians by name, they did not speak of the legal basis for the persecution, but only regulated the order of proceedings against Christians who have been already arrested. Thus, to the best of our knowledge, we would search in vain for the origin of the “You are not allowed to exist!” (non licet esse vos) quoted by Tertullian in the Roman laws of the 1st‒3rd century AD. The Roman legislators were aware of the origin and essence of Christianity, so instead of an open ban—which, I repeat, would have been unprecedented in the history of Roman law—they tried to repress them by laws and regulations about which they knew exactly that Christians would not obey them because they could not without breaking their religious precepts.

"Bízzál, mert ahogyan bizonyságot tettél az én ügyem mellett Jeruzsálemben, úgy kell Rómában is bizonyságot tenned!" ApCsel 23,11 Nero császár keresztényüldözése mindig is vitás és rejtélyekkel övezett részét képezte a történelemnek. Nehéz elválasztani a tényeket a hozzájuk szövődött szóbeszédtől. Többen foglalkoztak a témával, más-más kérdésekre keresve a választ, ezek a kutatók azonban jobbára mind a XX. század elején dolgoztak. Mára a téma kutatása iránti érdeklődés alábbhagyott. A különböző kérdésekre eltérő válaszokat adtak, ennek következményeként nem létezik az eseményről egy nagyobb méretű összefoglaló mű sem, amely részletesen tárgyalná a keresztényüldözés előtti időszakot, az üldözés részletességét, időtartamát, a két apostol, Péter és Pál halálát, valamint az üldözés hatását magára a kereszténységre nézve. Kutatásom fő kérdését az képezte, hogy milyen körülmények vezethettek Rómában egy 1 Canfield 1913, 43. 2 Erkölcstelenségeket jelentettek Róma számára többek között a zsarolások, erőszakok, pénzzel való manipulációk, kínzások, gyilkosságok, ahogyan az Isis és Bacchanália kultusz kapcsán is látni fogjuk. Lásd: Livius VI. 39. 8-18.; Iosephus Flavius, XVIII. 3. 3 Pecz 2001, Dionysus. 4 Pecz 2001, Dionysus. Ez a kultusz eleinte csak asszonyok helye volt, és napközben avatták fel Bacchus híveit. Az egyik papnő, név szerint Paculla Annia azonban ezt az egész rendet megváltoztatta. Ő már férfiakat is felavatott (a fiait), majd a szertartásokat nappalról éjszakára helyezte át, és minden hónapban öt napon tartották a beavatásokat. 5 "… ott férfiak és nők összekeveredtek, s féktelenségüket még az éjszaka is növelte, alig van olyan bűn, olyan gaztett, amit ott ne követtek volna el. S a férfiak egymás között még több fajtalanságot műveltek, mint a nőkkel szemben. Aki pedig nem tűrte elég készségesen a megbecstelenítést, s túl renyhe volt a gaztettek elkövetésében, azt, mint valami jószágot, feláldozták. Semmit se szabad bűnnek tartani -ez számít náluk a legfőbb vallási szabálynak." 6 Akik nem voltak velük hajlandóak együttműködni, azokat elhurcolták barlangokba, és ki tudja mit műveltek velük… 7

The Somali people in the Horn of Africa have been exposed to the Gospel for over a century by different intrepid missionaries of various denominational persuasions. The
most significant Big Three are the Roman Catholics, the Sudan Interior Mission

(SIM), and the Mennonite Mission. The Swedish Overseas Lutheran Church (SOLC) is also one of the earliest pioneers in Somalia. The SOLC set up a mission base in Kismayo, southern Somalia, in 1896 and eventually expanded its mission work to Jilib, Mugaambo and Jamaame, all in southern Somalia.

Is Involvement in the Fight Against the Persecution of Christians Solely for the Benefit of Christians? – “But with gentleness and respect”: Why missions should be ruled by ethics – Persecution – May a Christian Go to Court? – Putting Rumors to Rest – Human Rights and Christian Faith – There Has to Be a Social Ethic.

Currently this is the most comprehensive and biblically theological analysis of Christian persecution worldwide.

“In this situation I can highly recommend Dr. Thomas Schirrmacher’s new book. It gives a clear and logical insight in many of the questions even people who con- sider themselves non-religious people now ask. It can best be read with an open Bible and some open daily newspaper. It will give a surprisingly new insight into what it means to live in ‘a time like this’.”

(From the preface by the Very Rev. Johan Candelin, Director of the Religious Liberty Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance)

“Suffering comes in many forms, but the one that Scripture tells all Christians to expect is persecution for one’s faith. As Thomas Schirrmacher’s theological study will demonstrate, the Bible has a tremendous amount to teach us about persecu- tion. Without a Biblical understanding, we are unlikely to fully grasp the nature of the spiritual battle. I am delighted, therefore, that his book puts the Bible’s teaching on persecution centre stage.”

(Preface by Julia Doxat-Purser. Socio-PoliticalRepresentative & Religious Liberty Coordinator for the European Evangelical Alliance)

The proposed paper endeavours to survey and analyze the main features of the imperial intervention into religious affairs during the Tetrarchy. Principal discussion will be centred around what motivated the tetrarchic rulers to initiate an openly intolerant and strongly coercive policy against Christianity after several decades of relative calm, how this policy was implemented in different parts of the Empire, and what finally precipitated the profound change in which Christians and their religion were to be treated by official authorities, that is to say, in what manner, to what end and with what consequences the transition from hostility to tolerance, to favouritism, was effected. Special attention will be paid to the question to what extent the religion was viewed by the tetrarchic imperial governments as a mere tool for specific policy goals, and, on the other hand, how much emperors’ personal
religious persuasions or affinities might have influenced their respective policymaking. With regard to the attitude of the imperial authorities towards religious issues, it will be contended that there was no real change between their perceived tolerance before and intolerance after Christianity became a religio licita and the Christian values were adopted and imposed by the emperors as exclusively valid. In other words, the shift that occurred from polytheistic “tolerance” – notwithstanding
the fact that Christianity was not among religions enjoying such forbearance – to monotheistic “intolerance” was rather a matter of implementing the same political notions and governmental mechanisms to a newly created situation. Several other issues will also be addressed: how contemporary and later sources perceived the Diocletianic Persecution; what degree of participation in the persecution of non-Christian ordinary people can be determined from the sources; and why there is no mention of the persecution in the works of non-Christian late antique writers.