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

to Rome to his death in 107. 10
In the third century, when the pressures on the empire were immense, there
was increasing concern by the imperial authorities that the support of the pagan
gods of Rome was being lost through the refusal of the growing number of
Christians to sacrifice to them. In the 250s, all were required to participate in
public acts of sacrifice, which would be acknowledged by a signed certificate
from a state official. Many Christians acquiesced - in Carthage, Cyprian was
shocked by the way in which his congregation capitulated - but others held out
and Cyprian himself was martyred in 258. Another major persecution took place
fifty years later, in the reign of Diocletian. Diocletian himself appears to have
been reluctant to waste resources on rounding up Christians, but Galerius, his
Caesar in the east, was more vindictive. At first, only Christian property was
affected, and many bishops surrendered this without feeling they had
compromised on their faith. Then the imprisonment of clergy was ordered, and
finally, in April 304, all Christians were condemned to die if they failed to
sacrifice. As with all such proclaimed laws, local officials differed considerably
in the vigour with which they enforced them. In some areas Christians were
rounded up en masse; in others governors continued to turn a blind eye to
Christian worship. Constantius, the father of Constantine and another of
Diocletian’s Caesars, based on the Rhine frontier at Trier, was said to have
actually favoured the Christians of his household who refused to betray their
faith, on the grounds that this showed an admirable strength of character.
In 305, Diocletian did something hitherto unprecedented for a Roman
emperor: he abdicated, together with his fellow Augustus Maximian. The system
of government that Diocletian had introduced required that the Caesars be
promoted to Augusti to fill the vacancies, and Constantius became emperor of
the west, with one Severus appointed as the new Caesar. When Constantius died
the very next year in York, he should have been succeeded by Severus, but
instead, in a gesture that had become common in the previous century,
Constantius’ troops proclaimed his son, Constantine, emperor. Diocletian’s
system had broken down and Galerius, who had been promoted legitimately
from Caesar to Augustus of the eastern empire on Diocletian’s abdication, had
no option but to acquiesce in Constantine’s promotion. Things were made more
complicated when Maxentius, the son of Diocletian’s co-emperor Maximian,
seized power in Italy and in 307 was proclaimed Augustus by the Senate in
Rome.
Galerius remained Augustus in the eastern empire, delegating power over the