According to Christian tradition all but one of Jesus' apostles met gruesome ends, the most horrendous of all being Bartholomew who was, allegedly, flayed alive. It was in the drama of these stories that their appeal lay. They became the stories to tell one another and to inspire new converts that martyrdom was a necessary part of Christianity. As Tertullian, a North African lawyer observed "the blood of the martyr is the seed" of the church. The tradition maintains that in the first 300 years of its existence, Christianity was a persecuted and suffering religion. This Age of the Martyrs, so the tradition tells us involved Christians being hunted down and executed, their books and property burned by crusading emperors. Their women and children thrown to the lions or boiled alive in cauldrons while baying mobs of blood crazed Romans watched.
That traditional "history" of Christian martyrdom is mistaken. Christians were not routinely persecuted, hounded or targeted by the Roman authorities. Very few Christians died, and when they did so they were often executed for what today, might be considered political reasons. It should be noted that there is a distinct difference between persecution and proscription.
[see Moss, C. The Myth of Persecution] which is well worth reading.
That traditional "history" of Christian martyrdom is mistaken. Christians were not routinely persecuted, hounded or targeted by the Roman authorities. Very few Christians died, and when they did so they were often executed for what today, might be considered political reasons. It should be noted that there is a distinct difference between persecution and proscription.
[see Moss, C. The Myth of Persecution] which is well worth reading.
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