I’ve never heard that it was the Christian army that did the Romans in. Instead, barbarians and laziness on the part of the Romans were largely the cause.
I think Buckley has lost it.
I think Edward Gibbon considered Christianity one of the factors. Gibbon created quite a scandal for so arguing. Buckley hasn't "lost it" by repeating a theory that is centuries old.
You heard right...
I agree. It wasn’t the Christians that overpowered the Romans. They didn’t even have a military contingent. It was the barbarians and the only reason they won was because the Roman Senate attempted to micro-manage their legions. One thing the Romans did that worked for them for hundreds of years was make it a law that those that served in the Senate could only be there “ONE” year. Then, I believe, they had to wait five years before serving again. Senators in Rome used the Senate as a stepping stone for other offices. Most were part of the Equestrian military also.
I think that WFB is saying that the official pagan Roman state, largely agnostic and unbelieving by that time, fell to Christians, who believed passionately. Rome went on for another 200 to 1200 years, depending on how you figure it, as a Christian state, but the old Rome was dead.
Poorly worded. Unusual for Buckley.
I don't think it's exactly true. It's hard to imagine that Rome could have sustained itself indefinitely, though the Eastern half did go on to survive for another millennium. One could argue that Christianity gave the empire a new lease on life, at least in the East (Byzantium).
The Western empire was internally rotten. It depended on Germanic barbarians for its defense, and those barbarians didn't have Rome's best interests at heart. It's hard to see what Christianity had to do with that, though there were some sectarian differences between Goths and Romans.
Gibbon's view came naturally to Enlightenment thinkers. His belief was that if one kept one's eyes on "the next world" one neglected one's duties on this earth. That's something to think about, but most historians of antiquity would find Gibbon's explanation simplistic today.
It is true, though, that sectarian differences between orthodox and unorthodox Christians did a lot to bring Byzantium down in later centuries. According to some accounts, Nestorians, Monophysites and others didn't see much difference between living under Orthodox or Muslim rule, even preferring Islamic rulers to Byzantine ones.
What this all has to do with Iraq now is very unclear. Buckley makes important points, but doesn't make them well. The title doesn't fit the article (it may have been added by an editor) and the parallel with Prohibition also isn't the most apt or best expressed, either.
I think Buckley has lost it.
Since Pat died he has lost his marbles. Or maybe it’s “Maryjane’s” fault.
Somebody should have vetted this piece before it was published. His Roman history is off by a thousand years.
Buckley is right. Republicans, alone, can’t win this fight against Islamic fanantics.
When asked why it took so long to defeat the Gauls, Ceaser replied, there were a great number of them.
I’ve seen commentary that it would be a good thing if the left win everything in 2008. This would force them to implement their version of national security. Predictably great tradgedies will follow.
My plan is to upgrade my disaster supplies and hope - hope - no one in my family is killed in a terrorist attack.
Greed, reliance on a large professional standing army which owed its allegiance to Generalissimos instead of the state, massive civil wars which destroyed the military professional elite, mass “immigration” by unassimilable tribes, a primitive form of “gun control” (Roman citizens were denied the use and possession of weapons - only those professional soldiers and the unassimilable masses of barbarians carried them) contributed to the fall of Rome.