Beate Dignas & Engelbert Winter - Kaveh Farrokh

216 7 Religion: Christianity and Zoroastrianism
Apart from Zoroastrianism there were many groups of different faiths in the
Sasanian Empire, namely Jews, Buddhists, Hindi, Mandaeans, Christians
and Manichaeans. To some extent these were severely persecuted by the
Magians. Kartēr intended to restore the ‘right order’, which translated into
sanctions against those who did not follow ‘orthodox Zoroastrianism’. In
particular the Christians, Jews and Manichaeans, who adhered to the socalled
‘supranational’ religions, faced coercive measures by the Zoroastrian
priesthood. 34 From Kartēr’s perspective and that of the Magians it was above
all Manichaeism which represented a serious rival to their own religion
because during the third century it enjoyed great success also outside Iran.
In 277 the founder of this religion, Mani, was captured. R. Ghirshman refers
to reasons for the persecution of the followers of non-Zoroastrian religions
that we have touched on already, ‘The problem of an imperial religion must
have arisen . . . at a time when the young Empire was winning success in
foreign policy and needed to mobilize all its national forces for the struggle
with Rome.’ 35
But already Narsē (293–302) turned his back on the religious policy of
his predecessors. The fact that the persecution of religious minorities ceased
can be attributed partly to an attempt to limit the increasing power of the
Zoroastrian priestly caste but must primarily be seen in the context of the
renewed conflict with Rome (6). In the West, we observe a simultaneous
persecution of Manichaeans, followers of a faith that was certainly associated
with the Persian opponent (31).
31: From Diocletian to Constantine – Religious change in the West
and the consequences for Roman–Sasanian relations
Diocletian’s Edict against the Manichaeans, 297 (or 302 36 ): Collatio legum
Mosaicarum et Romanarum xv.3.1–8
The emperors Diocletian and Maximianus, Augusti, and Constantius and Maximianus,
37 the finest Caesars, send greetings to the proconsul of Africa, Julianus.
A very leisurely life tends to encourage people in a community to transgress the
limits of human nature and incites them to introduce some kind of empty and
despicable superstitious doctrine, so that by making their own erroneous judgement
they seem to sway also many others, my dearest Julianus. (2) But the immortal
gods in their providence intended to stipulate that what is good and right should
34 Wiesehöfer 1993: 362–82; on the persecutions under Bahrām II see Schwaigert 1989: 42–4.
35 Ghirshman 1954: 315.
36 For a date 302 see Barnes 1982: 169.
37 This is Galerius (6), whose full name was Gaius Galerius Valerius Maximianus; Diocletian made
him ‘Caesar’ on 21 May (?) 293.