A.D. 381 heretics, pagans, and the dawn of the monotheistic state ( PDFDrive )

Theodosius was compassionate to the other survivors, not least because the
emperor urgently needed good men. The historian Rufinus, writing shortly after
the battle, linked the fortuitous arrival of the bora to the miraculous intervention
of God, and by the time of Theodoret, two generations later, Eugenius had been
placed fighting alongside statues of Jupiter and Hercules in a last stand for
paganism. ‘Such was Theodosius in peace and war,’ concludes Theodoret, ‘ever
asking and never refused the help of God.’ 9
The accounts of the Battle of the River Frigidus by Christian historians such
as Rufinus and Theodoret provide an excellent example of how historical events
were now presented. Traditional Greek and Roman historians such as
Thucydides and Tacitus had allowed no place for divine intervention. Events
were explored through the natural and human forces that shaped them, with a
strong emphasis on the activity of individuals. This made their narrative
intrinsically interesting and immediate, not least as it showed how human
societies worked. The historian Ammianus Marcellinus, who was probably
writing his history at the very time of the battle, was heir to this tradition. There
is a strong emphasis on narrative, which is full of detail of the personalities of
his time and the way in which they shaped the events around them. Ammianus
mentioned religion only in passing, and as such appealed to the eighteenthcentury
historian Edward Gibbon, who praised him in his Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire: ‘It is not without the most sincere regret that I must now take
leave of an accurate and faithful guide, who has composed the history of his own
times without indulging the prejudices and passions which usually affect the
mind of a contemporary.’ 10
By contrast, in the new ‘Christian’ history the hand of God is seen as essential
to explaining the unfolding of events. The Battle of the River Frigidus is not won
through the superior tactics of Theodosius but through the intervention of God
via the medium of the bora. This confirms an approach to history that links
belief in God with success in war. This had already been evident in Eusebius of
Caesarea’s account of the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, and in his De Fide,
Ambrose attributed the victories of an emperor to Nicene orthodoxy, with God
sending defeat to those who clung to Arianism. Ambrose’s assertion in De Fide
that Christ leads the legions shows how powerful the new ideology had become.
Some sixty years later, in 452, Attila the Hun’s retreat from Italy is attributed by
Christian historians to a meeting with Pope Leo in which the pope persuaded
him to withdraw. One version has Peter and Paul appearing with swords and