PAGANS & CHRISTIANS

I'd be surprised if any single text replaces this edition as THE authoritative work on this origins of the evolution of the Western world into Christianity Dominance. Only thing that I did not like: all the colons. He uses colons like Elaine Benes used exclamation points: too freely. There are times when other punctuation is called for: a semi colon, such as Mother had after her surgery. Is this a particular style: maybe British? Anyway, there is no missing the plethora of colons: you will see it right away.

As a commoner and nascent tourist I visited Western Turkey earlier this Spring (2006). One of the tour highlights was a stop at Sardis. Immediately alongside the remains of the Temple of Artemis are the ruins of the Church of St. John. Two utterly contrasting worlds - a mixed scene of palatial pagan columns and common Christian brick rubble. The architectural contrast shocks the senses, living the struggles shocked the Western world. This incredible story is probed and poked by R.L. Fox in his magnificent book "Pagans and Christians". For thought-provoking content, I give "Pagans and Christians" full 5 stars; for ease of reading, others have adequately expressed my concurring sentiments. Fox will likely make you think long and hard about long ignored facts. Read it closely and then return to it again and again for advancing insights buried within the hundreds of resting places provided by R.L. Fox in this monumental work.

This book contains a history of evolving religious experience both Christian and otherwise. For anyone interested in the development ethics and religious experience it is one of the best sources (sources on the history of dogma are very common, but this is different). I am convinced that if terminology is confusing that readers will find that they can penetrate the book with a dictionary, and that the book will help them select primary sources to study to enhance their comprehension of the period.

In the autumn of 312CE a revolution took place. It was a relatively violent one that had an improbable beginning. The classical world was turned upside down. The old gods were banished. The temples destroyed and ancient festivals and rituals were forgotten or appropriated in a new guise. The revolution extended over the whole of Europe and much of Turkey and Egypt over a period of some two centuries during its most intense and violent phase. The improbable event was emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity - and once this became the "legal franchise" any competition was ostracised or hunted out of existence. Yet what kind of world was the world of the "Pagan"? This book lovingly brings to life the kind of religion that prevailed in the civilised Western world from around 500BCE to around 400CE and its increasingly fraught relationship through its ups and downs with Christianity. Most of the action centres from 150 to 312CE. Paganism is losely defined and we can see that all it stands for is "other than Christianity". We begin to see the world of the Pagan that existed not just in the areas once occupied by the Romans but also extending east to the Middle East and beyond. Regions that were subsequently overrun by alternative versions of monotheism, perhaps taking their cue from Western Christianity. This subject would be too vast for any canvas. Noted scholar Robin Lane Fox teases together the most vital threads of Paganism and Christianity, how they were similar, how they differed and how they were united. The book is a monumental work of some 800 plus pages yet we can see that the scope is yet narrow. Nothing here about architecture or specific details of daily life. You are expected to come with some background knowledge though the book is suitable for the interested beginner. Paganism gives way to Christianity in a well balanced gradation of chapters. Towards the end, the revolution is only summarised. This book is concerned with the build up. We note that Christianity's triumph was slow and convoluted - even improbable. We are treated to topics such as oracles, the prominent sites of paganism with good maps, the distinctions between Greek and Roman approaches to paganism - the attitudes of Pagans to different gods, their views on sex and marriage and their topics of concern. Civic metropolitan life (including private lives) in general leaps out of the pages. We begin to understand what the gods meant to the ancients. Many details are blurred, e.g., on Pagan attitudes to re-incarnation. I feel that Fox's grasp of this issue is vague and uncertain. He does not advance the ideas from Protograros and Meno (Plato) or Pythagoras. There may be other areas in this book that a Classical scholar could pick holes in. Perhaps the ideas of Gnostic Christians and the various sects of Christianity and their differences are not highlighted. On Christianity in general the topics are fuller than for Paganism - the latter i

The Christian Church does not talk much about how it obtained dominance in the European world. One reads of BIble stories and martyrs and popes but nothing on the events that led to the overthrow of the gods of a religious people. In this book, one discovers that early Christians were the "Atheists" since they did not worship a pagan god. Pagan gods were wondrously easygoing. Each town or family had their own god. Acceptance or rejection was entirely personal. Gods could be adopted, created, borrowed or discarded depending on the social circumstance. Christianity demands that only "God" (Jesus) receive adoration, thus setting up a conflict that resulted in one side winning and outlawing the former gods. What is particularly interesting is the daily life of the people and how their religion affected them. Pagans were generous with their money, held services, performed rituals and prayed for success or money. Even more interesting is the manner in which Christianity adapted and adopted from pagans - both in theology and ritual. The mystical union of god and man was a uniquely pagan thought as was the "Mind of God". We read about the ferocious fights concerning divinity ("Was Jesus one or separate with God?"), scripture (books were "voted" holy at synods) and ceremony. Christianity owes at least as much to paganism as it does Judaism. Get this book and The Unauthorized Version, Fox's other masterpiece.

Fox has written a definitive, if not THE definitive, study of the transition from Greco-Roman paganism to a Christian Empire. Fox paints a picture of a thriving pagan worldview, and debunks the view that paganism in late antiquity was already on its deathbed when Christianity came onto the scene. The book is divided into three major sections. The first examines the the nature of paganism in the Hellenistic World, and explores what it meant to "practice pagan religion" in the 3rd century Roman Empire. Fox pays considerable attention to the role of oracles in expounding pagan theology, and provides a more concrete study of how the ancients viewed the gods than I have seen elsewhere. In the second section of the book, Fox turns to the early Christians. He fleshes out the social and economic situation under which Christianity developed. The concerns and attitudes of 3rd century Christians are seen to be very different from those of their modern counterparts. Early Christians are seen to have had an obsessive, perhaps pathological, concern with sexuality and martydom that to modern sensibilities will seem extreme, even to a committed Christian. Fox considers such questions as to how quickly Christianity spread, how widespread it was in the generation before Constantine (not very), and who was likely to become Christian. Fox also considers why Christians were persecuted, while other groups (Jews, for instance) were not. In the final section of the book, Fox turns to the figure who proves to be most responsible for the triumph of Christianity--the emperor Constantine. Constantine is seen to have played a pivotal role in organizing the church, settling doctrinal disputes, and aggressively promoting the new religion, at the expense of the established paganism. Fox's answer to why Christianity triumphed seems in the end to be Constantine himself. The chance rise to power of a Christian emperor, who then put all the power of an emperor behind his religion, made all the difference. The rise of Christianity is then seen not as a result of any inherent superiority in that faith, or any fatal weakness in paganism, but rather as the result of what was essentially a historical accident. The biggest drawback of this book is that it ends with the death of Constantine. At the time of his death, the Empire was by no means Christian, nor was the end of paganism assured. Fox sets the stage for the rise of Christianity as a major religious force, but does not cover the endgame, which was to play out over the next two centuries.