Notes

Due to a rumor spread about the doings of the Christians, the Romas began to treat the individuals who followed that religion horribly. Yet with all that’s the christians powered through it.. During the reign of emperor Nero, the people began to loath the Christians. According to the Roman historian Tacitus, the Christians were hated because of their outrageous practices and had a hatred towards humanity. that was a misconception, as the romans didn’t quite understand what the Christians were doing in these supposed “outrageous practices”. Nevertheless, the romans thought Christians were a threat to Its people, so they began to publicly kill and torture people who followed it. Tacitus also stated that the Christians would be fed to dogs, crucified, and burned alive. All this was put on display for the roman people to see, but also served to prevent people from switching to Christianity. Two-hundred years after the rumors began, Diocletian rose into power. During this time letters were sent out allowing people to destroy Christian churches and for their sacred documents to be burned. This was a straight up hate crime towards the Christians as those places had meaning to them. Also, if a Christian held a place honor would degrade and if they continued to practice christianity they would deprived of freedom.the romans constantly humiliated and encouraged people to terrorize the christians. This continues to show how harsh the romans were towards the christians. During 311 ad an edict of emperor Galerius states that he wanted for the christians to take back the old customs instead of continuing to be christian. this was absurd, the people wouldn’t give up christianity after many murders let alone a letter from the emperor. He ultimately decided to pardon the man persisting and allow them to follow christianity as long as they didn’t offend the good order of the Roman Empire. This might sound like a god way of getting both sides to come to an agreement but deep down the romans didn’t want christianity to be a competitor when it came to Roman people’s belief. This later causes for the christians to be given the name of heretic. A heretic is a person who goes against the dominant religion. The emperor at the time decided that the christians would suffer the chastisement of divine condemnation and anything they decided to inflict according to the will of heaven. The christians were excluded from the thresholds of churches and if they caused a disturbance with their own meetings they would be expelled from the city. The Romas completely disregarded the previous rules set by Galerius and began to once again maltreat the christians. .