Christian ERE and Pagan West

The main obstacle was their WRE or ERE, as historiographical concepts, didn't really existed as such IOTL. Considered as a bicephal organisation of a same state contemporary (even if it was less and less true with the latter half of Vth century), a lot of features appearing in the East were adopted or at least had a real influence on WRE such as the Theodosian Code (and it was widely adopted in western Romania while it was obviously crumbling).

What I mean is that, in the context of historical post-tetrarchy Romania, I doubt that one part would go Christian and not the other (and especially not the west that had only a superficial Christian presence before the early IVth century).

And from the IVth century onwards, Christianisation became so much of a Romanity feature, would it be only being an imperial cult and tied with secular politics, that a de-Christianisation in the West seems really hard.

That said, there's possibility to have Eastern Romania turning Christianized, while the west doesn't. It requires a PoD predating tetrarchy, tough.

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You best chance may be another military civil war between some imperial wannabees candidates in the latter part of IIIrd century crisis, but eventually one with more skills and more brains would emerge : you'd be "restricted" with doing as far damages you can deal before that happens.

Frankly, you could just pick among early Aurelian's reign usurpers. You don't even need that the "official" emperor fails in battle : Gallienus was skilled, and it didn't prevented several rebellions or secession.

Eventually, you'd end with a more or less stable situation, with more or less autonomous if not independent regions (although less ruled by usurpers, that having leaders de facto acknowledging imperial Roman rule, but acting on their own. That said, you could have some usurpers, as Gaul's*, formally acknowledging some sort of "suzerainty").
Something we could call a "ducal" system (reference to the Dux Oriens title that Palmyrenians had, more or less vice-emperor or co-emperor) with Dux Hispaniae, Dux Occidens, Dux Brittaniae etc. on a military-based command.

While organised, the Barbarian peoples weren't as strong they became IOTL trough a process of structuration (with Roman support, conscious or not). I'd rather think about a more gradual Barbarian presence, as auxiliaries/laeti/foederati, than a general takeover at least in a first time, Barbarians possibly turning into patricians, à la Odoacer, eventually ruling over a given region in the name of the duke and/or emperor.
The important point would be these Barbarian peoples, while Romanised, would advance in a period where Romanisation and Christianisation are two different features.

I could see Christianity having fair chances, ITTL, with eastern "duchies", as it was relatively well present there (and fairly absent elsewhere, except important towns). It could make things easier for Christianity at first, with one duchy with pro-Christian (or Christian) policies serving as harbor and base; but could make a religious/political reaction more likely in west.

You'd still have a sense of unity, although the economical/cultural continuum may be likely weakened, so I'd still see eastern cults scoring in the West, but more easily rivaled by western provincial practices. If cults as Mithra's still dominate among soldiers, it would be as IOTL : a "classist" cult without much hope to expand socially.
For what matters West, we may end with a more or less syncretic society (although with some gods having a more important weight, rather than lost into a big pantheon : Apollo, Mithra, Sol, Triple-headed God, maybe a regional practice supported by a duke**)

*Remember that the so-called Gallic Empire was only an usurpation attempt that never managed to go to Rome, but had enough of a regional support base in the west to continue claiming the roman imperium. Not a proto-nationalist state.

**As an, unlikely, exemple : a Pyrenean-originated duke putting in front a Romano-Pyrenean God, as Abelio.
 
LSCatilina said:
And from the IVth century onwards, Christianisation became so much of a Romanity feature, would it be only being an imperial cult and tied with secular politics, that a de-Christianisation in the West seems really hard.
I'm not an expert, but couldn't a more successful Julian the Apostate end up influencing that?
 
I'm not an expert, but couldn't a more successful Julian the Apostate end up influencing that?

The meteoric reign of Julian points that you had still a strong anti-Christian political faction among Roman elites (it's as well highlighted by the relative softness of his predecessor on pagan features), but how quickly his policies were reverted point as well how rooted Christianity was politically wise (the Semi-Arianism/Homeism successive crisis probably helped a lot to provide anti-Christian nobles with an opportunity)
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Would Constantius II have lived yet a bit more, I wonder if Julian's usurpation and neo-platonicist policies wouldn't have been marked as some passing curiosity (while it's definitely not anecdotal)

Julian looks a bit like a Late Antiquity equivalent of Marcus Aurelius : competent, efficient and philosopher...
But eventually unable to really go against the tendencies of his time, attempting to create an alternative to imperial Christianity trough revival of the situation before Constantine (non-structured Christianity and various cults) as if almost a century of identification of Christianity as an imperial feature never happened.

And that's the problem : when predecessors to Constantine pulled imperial cults, they neither faced a structured rival, or attempted to pull an universal religious policy.
Julian did both. It certainly pleased a large part of traditional Roman aristocracy, but wasn't understood from most of the population (see how well he was received in Antioch), and rejected from a not much less important part of Roman aristocracy.

I'd say it was too much and too late to really work out.
That said, yes, it certainly delayed a full conversion (politically wise) of the imperial structures by, maybe, some decades : Jovian having to abide to Julian's supporters when he acceded to the purple.
 
What about Africa? People do like to emphasise the relative absence of Christianity in the West, but it was already pretty robust in and around Carthage (and Rome itself!) by the mid-third century.
Heh. Outside the really big urban centers as Rome and Carthage (which were the two main cities of western Romania in the IIIrd, so it's not exactly representative), as well some important cities (Arles, Cirta, Illiberis), there's no real trace of strong peri-urban or rural Christianisation before the IVth century.

Even if we're talking of a guesstimate, that Christian population in the whole empire by the early IVth century represented 10% of the population and massively an eastern one with that is generally well accepted.
On this regard, for what matter religious presence in main western urban centers, Manicheans or Jews could have been as much represented.

I'm also sceptical about your idea of the conversion of barbarians--it is far from obvious that Christianisation and Romanisation were identical processes for the 'Germanic' peoples in actual fact, granted that the process had already begun quite early in the fourth century, and that most of them converted (and continued to hold to) a form of Christianity that fell out of favor pretty quickly with the Roman imperial hierarchy.

I never said Romanisation and Christianisation were the same.
What I said is, very litteraly, that Christianity was part of Romanity. Not identical process (a bit like, if you will, the difference between Americanisation and Westernisation. The former is a key feature of the latter, but both aren't identical).

That said, the conversion of Germanic population to Christianity was certainly due to its structuration in Romania : that most of missionary effort on Danubian peoples was made by Homeans at a time it was favoured by the imperial circles doesn't really challenge this.
If something, the quick homeisation of border peoples, with a window of opportunity of 20 years, point how important and dynamic was Imperial Christianity would it be Homean or Nicean.

It's worth noting, furthermore, that the differences between both of these beliefs is extremely reduced on a day-to-day practice, and explain the regular switches (Burgondians elites originally converted to Niceism, then Homeism after their entry in Romania, for example) : in order to differentiate Romans and Barbarians, a lot of identitarian features were either systematized, if not elaborated since the IVth century.

This distinction, along the political structures, eventually was convenient for everyone : it's no big wonder if Frankish elites converted to Nicean beliefs after the fall of Roman state in the west.

And if we remember that Barbarian populations (in no small part made up from peoples already present within Romania in the IVth century) were religiously diverse (we have knowledge of Nicean, Homeans, Pagans, even Jewish Franks before Clovis, for instance) : from a cultural perspective, the difference appears superficial at best, on identitarian grounds, and really relevant only in the Vth century.

That the religious denomination (which was often radicalized a posterori) wasn't exactly the same, in a period where even in Romania it wasn't easy to sort it out, doesn't really hinder that Christianisation was a key feature of Romanisation of Barbarian peoples (far from the only one, of course) or even peoples within the Empire.

I'd finally add that Romanisation or Christianisation doesn't imply at all an imperial initiative : contacts between Romans and Barbarians were constant and would it be only trough sheer mixing (as it happened since the IIIrd), acculturation (trough slaves, for instance or prestige matters, it would be quite limited to consider only the contemporary elite stance on this.

Ah, but that's the whole point of Julian, isn't it?...
I don't think I mentioned a "pagan church" as well, tough I can understand why it could be understood this way. But it certainly wasn't my intent.

Basically my point is that Julian tried to keep an "universal" imperial religious policy and domination over a lot of various non-Christians religions and beliefs. Not that much trying to create a structured paganism, but treating the aformentioned entities as various Christian beliefs were : diverse but eventually the same core.

Again, I think you misread me : I didn't said the problem in Antioch was that the inhabitants rejected paganism but that they rejected the universal religious policy, meaning a paganism centered around imperial conceptions rather than their own beliefs.

Basically that they rejected the idea of an emperor deciding how traditional beliefs should look like in a similar way previous emperors had a final word on what Christian orthodoxy should look like.

I'm not at all convinced that he was competent as a ruler--he certainly wanted to seem so, but he didn't exactly handle the Antiochenes well;
Antioch rambling about the political clumsiness of the emperor is kind of soft compared to the stream of usurpation, riots or fiscal revolts that his predecessors or successors had.

Not to say that not having the situation devolving into urban revolt is a proof of competence, of course, but if it's the worst we can reproach to Julian, he was at least not incompetent.

Just, in my opinion, trying to change too much and too late the non-Christian religious structures while calling it a return to tradition. My opinion is that he was certainly competent, but bogged down by this important contradiction.
 
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No expert, but...could we have this happening with a different type of acceptance of Christianity?

Like, rather than an Emperor converting, the Roman Empire just allows Christianity as one of many faiths but places limits on it and continues to promote the official pantheon as the religion of political power. In my (admittedly poorly-thought-out) idea, this gradually leads to a deeper East-West split: the East gets all the hard-line political Christians who end up taking over the state; while the West gets ones whose main interest is more in living their lives and preparing for the Kingdom of Heaven, so it stays religiously mixed.

Is that even remotely possible?
 
Do the Goths etc still get converted to Arianism? If so, and assuming that they still enter the WRE much as OTL, does that mean the Christianity comes to the West in that form?
 
Jews, maybe, in Rome itself (and perhaps in Carthage, though their near-total absence from the works of Cyprian

The main problem with identifying African Jews is that we're either talking of Hellenized populations, less identifiable, or Berberized (which make them less known) but we know for certain about Jewish communauties on coastal Africa by the imperial era : trough both archeological (Gammarth's tombs, Synagog of Hammal Lif) and litterary sources (Yerosolemite Talmud, but also Roman texts).

I don't think the Jewish presence in Africa and Mauretania (both coastal, but also deeper, as hinter by the Judaised Berber tribes in Late Anqituity) is debated now (at the contrary of their origin : how much native element, and how much came from Italy or Spain, especially in Late Antiquity for the latter).

It's not really much of a regional specificity, you have a relatively important presence in coastal Spain and southern Gaul.

But Manichaeans? In the early fourth century? What evidence do you have for that?
The main problem with Manicheans is that we're tributary from polemical texts, as with Augustine, and that archeologically the difference with paleo-Christian communauties is hard to do.

That said, we know it was present in Africa at roughly the same time than Christianity : the presence of an egyptian "bishop", Addas, in the IIIrd century or, of course, Diocletian's anti-manichean edict being due to Julianus ,then Africa's proconsul, being worried about the development of Mani's followers in his province.

We're not talking of some converts, but of an organized (possibly with important ties with Egypt) communauties.


And how much does rural Christianisation matter? The bulk of the empire was always rural, of course, but nearly all of its sophisticated culture, governance, etc. went on in cities.
It began to change with the IIIrd century and the IVth : municipal power began to wane in the western provinces (even if it's less the case for pronconsular Africa and most of Italy) at the benefit of semi-rural centers.

It's why really secondary cities in the West you'd struggle hard to find mention in earlier centuries, became seat of bishopries in the IVth/Vth centuries : it means that even if relatively superficial by the beginning of the IVth century, Christianity became an unavoidable institution into territorial and social organisation.

Not that the absence of strong semi-rural or rual presence is an hindrance to Christianity development, but it certainly prevent Africa playing the role that Oriens did, where you had the aforementioned presence by itself.
Christianisation in the East wasn't just on metropolis and urban centers, and that makes a huge difference.

They aren't just going to go away, and they are likely to have some effect.
Possibly, but at this point, Christianity is anything but really formed and well defined : more open to outer influences and without the structuring help of imperial power, you'd end with a mosaic of small communities with their own doctrinal and pastoral conceptions.
Eventually, it could go either as Judaism did in western Late Antiquity, or being absorbed as Manicheism was.

The reality was more complicated, as you recognise in discussing the Franks (I hadn't realised that there were Jewish converts among them; do you now what the reference for that is? I would be very interested to look it up); the barbarians developed their own approaches to Christianity which existed in a real relationship to Roman Christianity, but did not assimilate them straightforwardly into Roman culture or government or anything else.

Actually, they did get assimilated into Roman culture or governemental structure from the start : their ethnogenesis was entierly due to Roman influence and meddling. Franks, for instance, wouldn't have existed as such if Rome wouldn't have created a series of laeti and foederati status to "fix" what was basically a league of peoples.

On this regard, Barbarian approach to Christianity eventually joined up with Roman approach, while from a different standpoint : both saw the necessity to distinguish populations that were extremely close, and both strived about a similar religious policy (as it was underlined by Bruno Dumézil)

A different, early, approach of Christianity (which, again, they didn't developed but rather "received" and eventually kept as identitarian feature) doesn't mean a different religious approach for Barbarians.

As for Franks, it's admittedly hard to have one source : it's more a case of not that differentiated religious differences, and known cohabitation of various religions (see Council of Vannes) : in spite of the likely superficiality, you have some exemples up to Carolingian era as with Bodo's conversion.
Basically, the recurent mention of "Judaising" errors by the Councils of Orléans points to a possible Judaic transmission parallel (not really outside, of course) to traditional communauties, among Franks (which were less "ethnics"* Franks that Gallo-Roman population quickly identifying as such).

Admittedly, I should have said "Judaised" Franks rather than Jewish.

*If we can use the word "ethnic" for a mix-up of various Germanic and Roman elements.

Take, for example, the Vandal persecutions of Nicene Christians in Africa: famously, Huneric and other Vandal kings mimicked Roman repression of adherents of their own 'Arian' doctrine, but turned it against 'Catholic' homoousian Christians.
There was a lot of exaggeration on this regard, tough, essentially from Victor of Vita.
Not only the troubles mostly touched the episcopal institution, rather than the clerical institutions as a whole (it's not clear if there was a double hierarchy as it existed with Visigoths or not). Was it bad politics from Huneric? Possibly.

That said, contrary to the attempts of, say, Alaric II to pull a compromise synod that could have worked thanks to (and because of) episcopalian structures forming the bulk of post-imperial Romanity cities; it wasn't this much the case in Africa : it doesn't seem Africano-Roman aristocracy much minded these religious issues until it backfired and that Berber swallowed up the kingdom.

You could be a Christian, you could even exercise religious policy in the Roman style, and still be neither Roman nor an adherent of the kind of Christianity advocated by the Roman government.
Romanized doesn't mean being Roman, as much as Americanized doesn't mean being American.
I don't think anyone claimed the contrary on this thread : Roman and Barbarian, in spite participating to the same Late Roman structure remained two distinct political identities.


we simply cannot know that barbarians would not have become converted independently of imperial support.
I agree even more that I stress the contrary : romanisation and christianisation weren't always a matter of imperial initiative. I gave earlier the exemples of Burgondians switching from Nicean to Homean beliefs (or rather their leading aristocracy) because it was more convenient for identitarian and political purposes. And that wasn't certainly imposed by Ravenna.

My whole point is : as Christianity became a key feature of Roman institutions and culture, regardless the (sometimes really minor to anyone but theologians and imperial factions) difference; and giving that Barbarians themselves were going trough an important romanisation as they entered in Romania (or even at its margins), one wouldn't likely go without the other.

Without Christianity, you'd certainly have something roughly similar, with or without imperial intervention but benefiting from institutional prestige, as some sort of equivalent to IIIrd century's Mars Thingsus. I think we're agreeing there.

I would agree, except that we cannot ignore his many letters to priests. 'Structured paganism'? Maybe not, but he really did want to change the appearance of 'paganism' on the ground.
Was it more changing the appearance of paganism, than attempting to make anti-Christian elites or elites that prided themselves from tradition to simply be more credible, theologically and culturally?

For instance, I can't remember the name of this Roman noble that, at the end of the Empire, collectioning almost all traditional religious high titles, joking about how, if he could be pope, he would convert to Christianity.

"Paganism" seem to have suffered from a huge credibility crisis at this point, at least among urban population, and I wonder if Julian didn't tried to resolve that with a philosophical answer to philosophical dismemberment of traditional beliefs.

But can't we be more specific than that? It isn't simply a matter of the emperor deciding; it is (I suspect) a matter of the emperor's advocating a kind of earnest, more philosophical, frankly more 'serious' kind of paganism than the local people wanted.
Possibly, but I suspect myself that it's more a mistake due to the incestuous relationship between personal beliefs of the emperor and imperial religious policy in the IVth.
Julian seemed honestly confused by the ruckus he caused, less (in my opinion but I should check myself the sources) because he actively wanted to modify traditional rites to purify them, but because he didn't saw the relation between openly expressing a more philosophical minded approach of religion (that existed at least since the Ist century) and how it would influence on the religious policies of the empire.

He would have been right if he would have ruled during the Ist or IInd century (with each emperor having his domestic philosopher, and quasi-gnostic take on traditional beliefs, but after almost one century of institutionalizing Imperial cult, it couldn't hold.

That said, we may have to agree to disagree on this.
Perhaps my assertion of 'incompetence' goes too far, but I think Julian failed as a politician--he just wasn't good at winning over the bulk of the urban population
I think we can agree on that.

Like, rather than an Emperor converting, the Roman Empire just allows Christianity as one of many faiths but places limits on it and continues to promote the official pantheon as the religion of political power.

Very roughly, it's not impossible to have such happening (and you had several occurrences of emperors having a belief much different than traditional civic cults), but it doesn't seem particularly likely to last with the growingly personal and charismatic imperial figure (admittedly, it accompanied the imperial cult importance rather than causing it).

Religion played an important role for imperium, the lesser not being political legitimacy and military one (whatever Mithra, Sol Invictus or Christ, it allowed giving an esprit de corps to imperial troops).

As Calaritanus pointed, it was dependent as well from personal (and factional) politics more than deep down belief (let's be clear : it did played a role, but we can see that Constantine himself hesitated a lot before choosing Christianity).

Eventually, you'd have someone pulling an In hoc signo vinces in behalf of a spiritual figure relevant enough to their political and spiritual needs. Doesn't mean it had to be something monotheist : Sol Invictus or Mithra didn't challenged the civic, traditional or personal cults as Asclepsios (this one was immensely popular).

I think it would quickly go down to two holistic or even monist beliefs, rather than traditional vs. Christian.
 
Do the Goths etc still get converted to Arianism? If so, and assuming that they still enter the WRE much as OTL, does that mean the Christianity comes to the West in that form?

As Calaritanus said, it's extremely contingential to Imperial policy during Constantian dynasty. Some people's ruling elite converted to Homean Christianity, some to Nicean (then reverted), some didn't; and the reason of these choices wasn't exactly written in the marble : if Constantine died earlier, if Valens didn't died, if Goths didn't amassed such prestige...

Frankly, Romania could have as well turned Homean as a whole and Barbarians still massively adopting it, than turning Donatist and most Barbarians (while partially Christianized) not having their ruling elites adopting this religion before their entry within the Empire.
 
Thoughts:

a) would there be an 'Arianism' at all without Constantine?


I think it would pretty certainly have existed - though possibly under another name.

From what I can gather, there were an incredible number of heresies around in the 4 and 5Cs. You name a theological notion, someone advocated it. So "Arianism" most likely gets founded even if not by Arius.

The interesting question is whether it gets the same sort of following as OTL, or whether it , like most of the others. just attracts a handful and then fades into obscurity. The interesting thing about Arianism is not that it was founded (what wasn't?) but that it attracted a sizeable chunk of Roman society, including several emperors, before dying out. Is the society so different TTL that it doesn't catch on to the same degree, and if so what catches on instead?
 
Or vice versa.

Is either possible, likely or interesting?

Well...
- possible
- unlikely
- definitely interesting :)

We are speaking about the Roman Empire(s) before Constantine, no doubt. Because after it's a little bit late.
Or at least after Julian the Apostate.

You see, if Christianity wins in one part of the Roman World it is highly likely wins in the other part(s) of the Roman World.
So you can imagine the Roman Empire(s) without Christianity; difficult, but doable.
But having Christianity in one part of the Roman World and not having it in the other part(s) in the long run... that just won't work.

In our case it is either all or nothing.
If Christianity suited one part of the Roman World/Empire(s) - than it definitely suites the other part(s).
Because the Western and the Eastern "empires" were very similar in their religious spiritual needs, they were parts of the whole.

The only way to have Christianity win in one Roman "Empire" and losing in the other Roman "Empire" is making these "roman empires" very different. As opposed to what we had in OTL.


That have to be alternative Roman "empires".
I don't know... for example Eastern/Western division of the Roman Empire stayed from Octavian Augustus vs. Mark Antony times. And it stuck.

We have the "Eastern Roman Empire" built on the principles of Hellenistic monarchy since very beginning and the Latin "Western Roman Empire" closer to republican tradition of old and hostile to the 'degenerate' Greeks.
So these empires are different polities they have little to no diffusion of ideas and in a century or so they will be very different entities having little in common except the world "Roman" in their official names and titles/dignities.
And Christianity (well, alternative version of some proselytizing Jewish sect) winning in one "Roman Empire" doesn't effect the other "Roman Empire" as these are the enemies and your enemy's religion looks very suspicious, to say the least.

But I am afraid the above scenario is possible only with some little help of some extraterrestrial flying mammals :)
As the Romans of the first centuries A.D. were very serious about keeping their Empire united, in one piece.
 
What I mean is not whether or not Arius would have propounded his doctrines (the controversy started in 318, so with a late enough point of departure it's entirely plausible), or whether or not Arius would have become the bug-bear of theologians opposed to the strand of thought of which he was an extreme example, but whether or not 'Arianism' would have attained the importance it did, let alone whether it would ever have become a distinct church as it did in some of the barbarian kingdoms (all this, of course, without entering into the debate over the term 'Arian' and its validity; I accept that it is a term of polemic and so of limited use for analyzing the beliefs of anyone accused of it, but I'm not convinced 'Homoian' is an adequate replacement--a term that can cover both Auxentius of Durostorum and the young Cyril of Jerusalem (!) is too vague to be anything but a kind of slogan, as indeed it was: saying that you want everyone to agree that Christ is 'like' the Father, without defining what that means, might be a politic compromise, but hardly a means to real theological agreement, especially when people like Valens of Mursa and Ursacius of Singidunum, or indeed Auxentius, really do sound like Anomoians at times). That is a matter of social and political history, and it does depend very much, albeit in ways that cannot be traced out to a nicety, on Constantine and especially on Constantius II. It's entirely plausible that something akin to 'Arianism' would have become a theological flash-point, and that Christians would have rallied to one side or another over it, but I don't think we can just remove imperial support for Christianity and expect anything to go the same way, not least when it was Constantine who called a 'universal' synod for the first time.


Exactly.

Arianism (under one name or another) will still happen, but the question is whether it will attract the same number of adherents. IoW, has having a different bunch of Emperors in the 3 and 4Cs make any noticeable difference to late Roman society, to the point where something else catches on in its place.
 
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