The Cannonization of Early Christian Church

Roman Religions

Christianity has obviously made its make on mankind. However, the early Christians, coming from different religions, cults, and worldviews before the emperor Constantine converted the empire, would have experienced this transitions at varying levels from revolutionary to marginally different. This analysis proposes that a member of the Roman society such as the Vestal Virgins saw a dramatic and revolutionary change in their daily lives. However, by contrast, not all members would have perceived the transformation as dramatically. For example, a devotee of the cult of the sun might have found rituals such as Christmas entirely familiar and consistent with previously held beliefs. This analysis proposes that although the introduction of Christianity was a dramatic change for the whole of Roman, the differences were not felt by all demographics equally.

Discussion

Of all the different groups that would have taken a welcoming to the conversion to Christianity in the Roman Empire, it is reasonable to suspect that the Vestal Virgins would be high on the list. The Vestal Virgins sole responsibility in society and to the Roman religion was to remain pure until which point they were sacrificed to the gods. The Pontifex Maximus was the chief priest that was responsible for the ultimate interpretation of the divine law as well as guarded the Vestal Virgins. Their responsibility was to preserve a fire that was associated with the preservation of Rome and could not let the hearth go out.

The Vestal Virgins had a limited range of freedoms and a substantial amount of power in the Roman society however at the same time, to maintain this power they also had to accept a life without any minor faults (from the opinion of the Pontifex Maximus).

"If these vestals commit any minor fault, they are punishable by the Pontifex Maximus only, who whips the offender, sometimes with her clothes off, in a dark place, with a curtain drawn between; but she that has broken her vow of chastity is buried alive near the gate called Collina, where a little mound of earth stands inside the city reaching some little distance ... When they come to the place of execution, the officers loose the cords, and then the Pontifex Maximus, lifting his hands to heaven, pronounces certain prayers to himself before the act; then he brings out the prisoner, being still covered, and placing her upon the steps that lead down to the cell, turns away his face with the rest of the priests; the stairs are drawn up after she has gone down, and a quantity of earth is heaped up over the entrance to the cell, so as to prevent it from being distinguished from the rest of the mound. This is the punishment of those who break their vow of virginity. (Plutarch, 110 CE).

Although the Virgins lived under the threat of a horrific death, they actually had a range of great privileges in society as well.

Some believed that they had access to many divine secrets and could administer their own time as they saw fit; also, they were relinquished from their duties after thirty years and could marry or chose to live their lives in whichever way they saw fit (Plutarch, 110 CE). Some scholars have proposed that these figures were actually witches based on there 1) their unique legal status; 2) their murder at moments of political crisis; 3) the odd details of those murders (Parker, 2004).

The cult of the sun, or sol invictus, was another sanctioned cult by the Roman Empire. Some emperors overtly worshiped this god such as Aurelian who not only promoted the worship in Rome of Sol, but also was said to have instituted his birthday on 25th of December as well as been associated with the opening of the templum Solis, or temple of the sun (Pedroni, 2011). The iconography of this god was also portrayed as the god Sol as a bust with sunrays surrounding the head.