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

emphasised that they amount to less than one percent of all Imperial laws on
religion issued during this period.
Detailed and comprehensive efforts to prohibit certain practices and beliefs
are again most manifest during Theodosius' reign; in which there also appears to
have been a sustained effort to extinguish a number of heresies through
progressively more restrictive legislation on practices. Such a programme is not
apparent under earlier emperors and this is to be expected. There is good evidence
that the character, religion and temperament of the addressee was influential in the
nature and temperament of the law issued. Under Constantine this is most
apparent in his letters, preserved by Eusebius, which appear to have been tailored
in order to suit the religion of the addressee. Perhaps the clearest example of an
individual influencing legislation is that of Evagrius, whose eastern Prefecture
covered the end of Constantine's reign and the beginning of Constantius’. He was
responsible for the promulgation of two anti-Jewish laws that appear to have been
in contrast with the general tenor of his emperors’ other laws on Jews. In further
contrast, these two laws also demanded the death penalty.
By contrast, and under Valens, a more moderate individual emerged who
appears to have exercised some influence over the legislation. Modestus, whose
own beliefs appear to have shifted with every wind of religious change that swept
through his life and through a succession of high positions, displayed a similar non
partisan attitude to the legislation which he promulgated. This model, of the
influence of an important official shining through the legislative record, is not so
apparent under Theodosius, but nevertheless the fundamental concept that
individuals influenced legislation remains sound, as can be seen from the legislation
issued to Tatianus.
Constantine issued two laws on heresy as well as his letter to heretics
preserved by Eusebius. There is no surviving legislation against heretics from the
reigns of Constantius, Jovian or Valens. After Constantine, it was to be more than
thirty years until another law on heresy was issued, that of Valentinian CTh. 16.5.3
268