Nero, the Execution of Peter and Paul, and the Biggest Fake News in Early Christian History

The Daily Beast ^ | July 23, 2017 | Candida Moss

[EveningStar]

Christian tradition maintains that after Rome nearly burned to the ground, Nero engaged in a brutal crackdown on Christians which led to the executions of Peter and Paul.

On the evening of July 18, in the scorching summer of 64 CE, a fire started in a shop under the Circus Maximus in Rome. The fire quickly spread to nearby homes and businesses and the Circus itself. The fire burned for six days, ravaging the city. It left only four of Rome’s fourteen quarters untouched.

The reigning emperor, Nero, a man known for his cruelty and love of theater, scapegoated the Christians for the disaster. According to tradition and later historians, as a punishment, Nero devised grotesque executions for the Christians: he covered them in animal skins and had them torn apart by dogs, and he doused them in tar and used them as human torches to light the night sky for his dinner parties. It was in the wake of the fire, Christian tradition maintains, that the most important Apostles–St Peter and St Paul–were arrested and executed. But while the fire of Rome was a devastating historical reality, did Nero actually target Christians as a result?

[laplata]

“I really hate the CE/BCE designations. I do not use them. BC & AD”.

Same here.

Political Correctness can go to Hell where it belongs.

[gop4lyf]

We’ll probably end up converting to the moslem calendar.

[Mrs. Don-o]

“The answer, my friend, us blowin,’ in the wind...”

OK, so here’s the scoop. Mary never made it to Rome. Came to the end of her earthly life at Ephesus.

Left no earthly remains, however. Hm. That’s funny.

[left that other site]

I remember cringing to that song many years ago! hahaha.

Who would name their girlchild after an STD? LOL!

Candida is a nasty infection that often occurs in people who have just undergone a large dose of antibiotics. Because a broad spectrum antibiotic kills all the bacteria that exist in “warm, moist places”, the Candida, which is NOT a bacterium and is therefore not affected, is left to go into overdrive. The beneficial bacteria that used to keep it in check have been eliminated, and the Candida is free to flourish.

Many people who die from AIDS have actually succumbed to Candida, which takes over once the immune system is compromised.

What is interesting is that the “Candida” in questioned is surnamed “Moss” which is yet another organism that grows in dank, dark, places.

Eyew.

[InABunkerUnderSF]

But how accurate is Acts?

Sort of sums up the author's thesis right there. I find Tacitus generally credible. You can cross check his accounts of events with other writers of the era including Livy, Pliny the Younger and Suetonius and his descriptions are generally consistent. The works of each include details not mentioned by the others. They were all essentially Emperor Trajan's house historians. You have to keep in mind that it was history with a political purpose - Julius Caisar and Augustus were great, the Julio-Claudians and Flavians suck and Rome's best days are ahead. Cassius Dio wrote about 100 years later and sourced a lot of his material from Tacitus and others of the Trajan school.

I trust Acts and the works of Tacitus a lot further than Candida Moss and her blatantly anti Christian sources.

[ForYourChildren]

CE - Christian Era
BCE - Before Christian Era

[Jan_Sobieski]

I believe Mary died in Ephesus

[Doche2X2]

I am suspicious of any writer who uses CE and BCE instead of BC and AD. The dates refer to the same time-the birth of Christ. If we accept this devious attempt to exclude Jesus from the dating of history by calling the same time from by another name, we are accepting defeat. I will resist it at all times, and I hope others will too. Common Era? And just what was it that made it common?

[Nifster]

meh

An author with an axe to grind agrees with an author who agrees with him

[Nifster]

Ignorance...she suggests tha because early followers of Jesus that believers in Rome ( who were never Jews) wouldn’t have been called Christians ( followers of Christ)

[Engraved-on-His-hands]

Contrary to the realization of most, the greatest persecutions of Christians by the Romans were during the mid-third (Decius) to early fourth (Diocletian) centuries. However, to say that there is no evidence that Christians were persecuted in the first and early second centuries is historical revisionism.

The earliest Christian document outside of the New Testament that can be definitely dated is the letter of Clement of Rome to the church at Corinth in A.D. 96. I post and excerpt from it here:

But let us not dwell only upon ancient examples. Let us come to the most recent spiritual heroes. Let us take the noble examples furnished in our own generation. Through envy and jealousy the greatest and most righteous pillars [of the Church] have been persecuted and put to death. Let us set before our eyes the illustrious apostles. Peter, through unrighteous envy, endured not one or two, but numerous labors. When he had at length suffered martyrdom, he departed to the place of glory due to him. Because of envy, Paul also obtained the reward of patient endurance, after being seven times thrown into captivity, compelled to flee and stoned. After preaching both in the East and West, he gained the illustrious reputation due to his faith, having taught righteousness to the whole world. When he came to the extreme limit of the West, he suffered martyrdom under the prefects. Thus was he removed from the world and went into the holy place, having proved himself a striking example of patience. (I Clement. 5) More to follow.

[Engraved-on-His-hands]

About 112 A.D., Pliny the Younger, the Roman governor of Bithynia and Pontus, wrote a letter to the Emperor Trajan (to which Trajan replied) regarding how he should address accusations against Christians. I post a small portion of Pliny's letter here:

It is my practice, my lord, to refer to you all matters concerning which I am in doubt. For who can better give guidance to my hesitation or inform my ignorance? I have never participated in trials of Christians. I therefore do not know what offenses it is the practice to punish or investigate, and to what extent. And I have been not a little hesitant as to whether there should be any distinction on account of age or no difference between the very young and the more mature; whether pardon is to be granted for repentance, or, if a man has once been a Christian, it does him no good to have ceased to be one; whether the name itself, even without offenses, or only the offenses associated with the name are to be punished.

Meanwhile, in the case of those who were denounced to me as Christians, I have observed the following procedure: I interrogated these as to whether they were Christians; those who confessed I interrogated a second and a third time, threatening them with punishment; those who persisted I ordered executed. For I had no doubt that, whatever the nature of their creed, stubbornness and inflexible obstinacy surely deserve to be punished. There were others possessed of the same folly; but because they were Roman citizens, I signed an order for them to be transferred to Rome.

More information could be produced. To reject the evidence is itself evidence of an ulterior motive.

[beelzepug]

So, Tony Orlando’s song was about an infection? In my best Johnny Carson impression, “I didn’t KNOW that!”

[left that other site]

Weird, huh? LOL!

[sauropod]

Bkmk

[Larry Lucido]

It left only four of Rome’s fourteen quarters untouched.

I'm no math expert, but it sounds like Rome had ten extra quarters than it needed.

[Mr. Lucky]

Excellent summation.