Jagd wrote: ↑Wed Dec 22, 2021 1:25 pm
Did ancient people find the adoption of
pseudo-Judaean customs and stories exotic? Or did the
foreignness of the religion become a hard barrier?
I think for the common pagan that all they knew about Christianity was hearsay. My most favorite piece of Second Century apologist writing is Minicius Felix's "Octavius". The story has the author meet up with a pagan friend and a Christian friend. The first half is the pagan friend ripping into Christianity as he saw it at the time. The second half is the Christian friend's response. I think this gives you an idea of what people thought about Christianity in the second half of the Second Century.
Just a taste (pun intended!) of some of the criticisms about Christianity in the first part:
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/t ... avius.html
I hear that they adore the head of an ass, that basest of creatures, consecrated by I know not what silly persuasion,--a worthy and appropriate religion for such manners. Some say that they worship the virilia of their pontiff and priest, and adore the nature, as it were, of their common parent. I know not whether these things are false; certainly suspicion is applicable to secret and nocturnal rites; and he who explains their ceremonies by reference to a man punished by extreme suffering for his wickedness, and to the deadly wood of the cross, appropriates fitting altars for reprobate and wicked men, that they may worship what they deserve. Now the story about the initiation of young novices is as much to be detested as it is well known. An infant covered over with meal, that it may deceive the unwary, is placed before him who is to be stained with their rites: this infant is slain by the young pupil, who has been urged on as if to harmless blows on the surface of the meal, with dark and secret wounds.
Thirstily--O horror!--they lick up its blood; eagerly they divide its limbs. By this victim they are pledged together; with this consciousness of wickedness they are covenanted to mutual silence. Such sacred rites as these are more foul than any sacrileges.
On the question of the difference between Judaism and Christianity, the antagonist says this:
Moreover, whence or who is he, or where is the one God, solitary, desolate, whom no free people, no kingdoms, and not even Roman superstition, have known? The lonely and miserable nationality of the Jews worshipped one God, and one peculiar to itself; but they worshipped him openly, with temples, with altars, with victims, and with ceremonies; and he has so little force or power, that he is enslaved, with his own special nation, to the Roman deities. But the Christians, moreover, what wonders, what monstrosities do they feign!--that he who is their God, whom they can neither show nor behold, inquires diligently into the character of all, the acts of all, and, in fine, into their words and secret thoughts; that he runs about everywhere, and is everywhere present: they make him out to be troublesome, restless, even shamelessly inquisitive, since he is present at everything that is done, wanders in and out in all places, although, being occupied with the whole, he cannot give attention to particulars, nor can he be sufficient for the whole while he is busied with particulars.
There's lots more criticisms about Christianity as well. Seriously, well worth a read! Though it is written by a Christian apologist defending Christianity, the whole thing is an insight into the beliefs of the time, both Roman and Christian.