WI Constantine loses?

PhilippeO

Banned
Christianity and Judaism appear to be large enough to survive several persecution. and if no longer persecuted, its large size would make it 'legitimized' sooner or later.

And i'm very doubtful about "slave religion" or "near destruction" of Christianity, it sounds like just propaganda to enhance status of past leaders and teaching of early church. 1) Constantine wouldn't choose Christianity to inspire his troops if there are no large Christian community that can be swayed to his side. 2)Its success after Constantine also indicated it had already fairly large and well-accepted (Elagabalus Sol Invictus did not get become majority religion just because of favor of one emperor) 3) Also the cancelation of persecution by several different Emperor indicate it had enough political power to make noise. All those three indicate Christianity that already large enough community before Constantine. I think Christianity pre-Constantine can be compared to Mormons in 1900-2000, large enough community to have some weight in politics, and sooner or later would win some presidency.
 
If such an emperor is of lesser caliber than Constantine,he's screwed.It cannot be stressed enough that there's a reason why Constantine never became a Christian until the day he died.

He didn't get Baptised until the day he died.

As I understand it this was a common early Christian practice. Baptism wiped out all your previous sins, but could only be done once. So it might pay you to have it late in life, when hopefully all your really serious sins were behind you.

This was especially true for magistrates and the like, who might have to pass death sentences and do other unpleasant things - some of which might turn out to be unjust. So it made particularly good sense for an Emperor.

Doing this does not at all imply that Constantine was not a Christian. He had even presided at Church councils, so quite clearly he was.
 
Remember that prior to Constantine,Christianity was viewed as a slave's religion.It's a complete stretch to say that sooner or later a Christian would ascend to the throne.There won't be a civil war if they cracked down on Christianity.A rebellion in the same vein as the Jewish revolts is more likely.

It didn't stay a slave religion for long. We know from The Acts of the Apostles that St Paul and at least one of his fellow missionaries (probably Silas) were Roman citizens, who were quite an exclusive club at that time
 
It didn't stay a slave religion for long. We know from The Acts of the Apostles that St Paul and at least one of his fellow missionaries (probably Silas) were Roman citizens, who were quite an exclusive club at that time
Common conception at the time was that it was a 'slave's religion'.It's not meant to be taken literal that only slaves are in it,but that most of it's followers are folks from the lower class.
 
Constantine ' s mother was a Christian.

And his father Constantius Chlorus was, if not actually Christian himself, at least pretty tolerant of them. From what I can gather, the Persecution never went very far in his (Gallic) Prefecture.
 
Without Constantinople, does Rome remain the capital?
Nikomedia remains the de facto capital in the east. Mediolanum remains the de facto capital in the west. Rome was in a poor strategic position. Mediolanum was centrally located where the emperor could quickly respond to problems on the Danube and Rhine. The same was true in the east for Nikomedia.
 
Is there any particular evidence for this?

After his defeat, of course, Constantinians duly vilified him, but if his Wiki article can be believed, contemporary sources don't mention him as a persecutor.

I was going by modern sources (Encyclopedia Britannica; Seaby's Roman Coins and their Values), so if they were misled by Constantinian propaganda, I would have been too. For what it's worth, the reverses of Maxentius's coins often had traditional Roman religious themes (so did some of Constantine's) and in OTL Maxentius and Maximinus II did form a de facto alliance after Galerius's death.

Overall, political calculation seems to have factored into the religious policies of all the rulers in the early 4th century. (Same goes for the 21st.)
 
There were, of course, many major Eastern mystery cults that did not convert an emperor. I don't see how Christianity would "inevitably" convert a Roman emperor, when many of its alternatives failed to do so.

A big proportion of the Roman population was already Christian (estimates range up to about 30% on the eve of Constantine's reign), and the overall trend over the past three hundred years had been for Christianity to increase. Assuming this trend continues (and there's no real reason to think it wouldn't), eventually it's pretty certain that you'll end up with a Christian on the throne.

Remember that prior to Constantine,Christianity was viewed as a slave's religion.

If that had ever been true, it wasn't by the time Constantine was born. The Church of the third century was wealthy; at Rome, for example, the Church was supporting from its official funds 1 bishop, 46 presbyters, 7 deacons, 7 subdeacons, 42 acolytes, 52 other ranks (exorcists, lectors, etc.), and more than 1,500 widows and poor people.
 
A big proportion of the Roman population was already Christian (estimates range up to about 30% on the eve of Constantine's reign), and the overall trend over the past three hundred years had been for Christianity to increase. Assuming this trend continues (and there's no real reason to think it wouldn't), eventually it's pretty certain that you'll end up with a Christian on the throne

In the absence of Constantine, you could very well see the Religio Romana pull off Sassanid-esque reforms before a Christian emperor is crowned, thus stopping the rise of Christianity. In such a scenario, the rise of Christianity is almost certainly delayed substantially, and it gives the pagans enough time to stop the rise of Christianity, which is more than plausible. Even IOTL, efforts like those by Julian the Apostate were planned out, except that they were too late to stop the death of the Roman religion. With more time to reform, suddenly the scene changes.

Also, you argue that the overall trend of Christianity is to go up. That's an intensely weak argument, especially when other religions like the Cult of Serapis and the Cult of Isis grew in the same period. Precise estimates are, of course, difficult, because devotees of these cults didn't abandon their old religious beliefs, but they certainly did go up - there were even Kushan coins with Serapis on them, which really shows his sheer popularity. Yet, they all ceased to grow.

Even if this Whiggish argument of inevitability is accepted and we assume that a Christian emperor is crowned, that Christian emperor could very well be an Elagabalus-type figure, pissing all over Roman traditions and causing a reaction of intense from pagans.
 
In the absence of Constantine, you could very well see the Religio Romana pull off Sassanid-esque reforms before a Christian emperor is crowned, thus stopping the rise of Christianity. In such a scenario, the rise of Christianity is almost certainly delayed substantially, and it gives the pagans enough time to stop the rise of Christianity, which is more than plausible. Even IOTL, efforts like those by Julian the Apostate were planned out, except that they were too late to stop the death of the Roman religion. With more time to reform, suddenly the scene changes.

There's no reason to think that they would want to, though. Julian's reforms owed a lot to his Christian upbringing, and were widely derided by his pagan subjects, who had no desire to see their traditional rites turn into an ersatz church of the kind Julian was pushing. Really there's very little evidence that the majority of pagans were all that concerned about stopping the rise of Christianity; one of the reasons why Diocletian failed to stamp out Christianity was that most of the Emperor's pagan subjects were either indifferent or actively opposed to his persecution.

Also, you argue that the overall trend of Christianity is to go up. That's an intensely weak argument, especially when other religions like the Cult of Serapis and the Cult of Isis grew in the same period. Precise estimates are, of course, difficult, because devotees of these cults didn't abandon their old religious beliefs, but they certainly did go up - there were even Kushan coins with Serapis on them, which really shows his sheer popularity. Yet, they all ceased to grow.

Most of the mystery cults were more exclusive than Christianity, which put a cap on the number of people they could attract in any given area, even if their geographical spread was broad. By the fourth century Christianity was by far and away more successful in terms of numbers than any of the mystery cults, and its greater organisation meant that it had an easier time leveraging its numbers into power/influence.

Even if this Whiggish argument of inevitability is accepted and we assume that a Christian emperor is crowned, that Christian emperor could very well be an Elagabalus-type figure, pissing all over Roman traditions and causing a reaction of intense from pagans.

I can only think of three Emperors from OTL who could be reasonably described as "Elagabalus-types": Elagabalus himself, Caligula, and Nero. I think therefore that the chances of a hypothetical first Christian Emperor being another Elagabalus would be very low, especially since after the anarchy of the thirst century any Emperor who couldn't keep a firm grip on things would either be assassinated pretty quickly or find himself under the dominion of distinctly un-Elagabalus-like courtiers or generals.
 
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