Religious Intolerance in the Later Roman Empire - Bad request ...

cities. Decurions and defenders were to report to the courts any information that they
received concerning infringement of the law and if any suggestion that decurions and
defenders had “concealed [such a crime] through favouritism or overlooked through
carelessness, they shall be subjected to judicial indignation.” If judges knew of such
crimes, but deferred punishment, then they would be fined 30lbs of gold and their
staffs collectively the same amount. 329
Unlike the previous laws, it cannot really be suggested that the injunctions
against the lares and pen ates should be read in conjunction with the prohibition on
blood sacrifice. No justification for the prohibition of these ancient customs can be
advanced and as such, and in that respect, this law appears highly intolerant. Similarly,
the prohibition on venerating images, although veneration of the actual image itself
may reasonably be said to be a superstitious practice and not the sort of injunction
against which more sophisticated and educated pagans, such as decurions and
governors, may have had strong feelings. However, paragraphs one and four seem to
refer back to the prohibition on sacrifice given at the beginning of the first paragraph,
but with the additional reference which suggests that such sacrifices were to be used for
divinatory purposes, which, of course, had long been prohibited and as such this law
marks no new departures in that respect. A more innovative departure appears to be
contained in the first paragraph which formally prohibits what appears to be other
forms of blood sacrifice, i.e. non-divinatory forms. But again, as stated, such
occurrences in Egypt may well have been remarkably few, due to local and long
established custom. The law is thorough through both its detail of persons affected by
its provisions, as well as through its demands of enforcement though local officials and
courts; this indicates a serious desire by the authorities to eliminate the practices of
329 Quod quidem ita per iudices ac defensores et curiales singularum urbium v olum us custodiri, ut ilico per hos
com perta in iudicium deferantur, per illos delata plectantur. si quid autem ii tegendum gratia aut incuria
praeterm ittendum esse crediderint, com m otioni iudiciariae, subiacebunt; illi v ero m oniti si v indictam
dissim ulatione distulerint, triginta librarum auri dispendio m ultabuntur, officiis quoque eorum dam no parili
subiugandis.
278