Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom

by Peter J. Leithart

  Thus far, the decision merely confirmed the status quo determined by the decree of Galerius and Constantine's own earlier cessation of persecution. The legal substance of the letter was to order the return of church property that had been seized during the persecution: "Now we will that all persons who have purchased such places, either from our exchequer or from any one else, do restore them to the Christians, without money demanded or price claimed, and that this be performed peremptorily and unambiguously." Even those who had received church properties as gifts from another party must return them to the Christians. In short, "all those places are, by your intervention, to be immediately restored to the Christians," not only "places appropriated to religious worship" but also other property that belonged to "their society in general, that is, to their churches." The emperors promised that "the persons making restitution without a price paid shall be at liberty to seek indemnification from our bounty." By diligently carrying out these orders, Licinius and Constantine declared, the local and provincial officials of the East will secure "public tranquility" and guarantee "that divine favor which, in affairs of the mightiest importance, we have already experienced, continue to give success to us, and in our successes make the commonweal happy."9

  Liberis mentibus-"with free minds"-all are to worship their gods. It is a remarkable policy, an unexpected one, since "it would have been natural for a ruler after his conversion to Christianity to shift all the previous relations." 10 Was this a concession to the pagan majority? A sign of Con stantine's syncretic monotheism? A principled decision?

  Beyond the policy, Daia could see that Constantine and Licinius had differing degrees of personal commitment to the faith. Constantine was already publicly identified with Christianity, while Licinius' attachment to the church was looser and more indirect. Licinius's wife was a devout Christian, and Licinius was close enough to the new faith to replace the traditional prebattle sacrifice with a monotheistic, though not explicitly Christian, prayer." These differences might, Daia thought, be exploited for his benefit, if he could find some way to use them as a wedge to drive the two Augusti apart. Militarily, Daia knew he had to act. Eventually, Daia thought, the Augusti would strike, and Daia decided to preempt that attack by striking first. He began to prepare for war, and in the meantime, to gain support of the Christians in his realm, he issued two decrees of toleration at the end of 312 and again in 313. His heart was not in it. Prior to the battle with Licinius, he "vowed to Jupiter that if he gained the victory, he would utterly extinguish Christianity." 12

  Jupiter did not come through. When on April 30, 313, Daia's army faced Licinius's across a "bare and desolate plain" near Campus Ergenus, Licinius's soldiers put aside their shields and helmets, knelt to pray Licinius's prayer three times, and then stood up and proceeded to win a thoroughgoing victory. Daia fled to Nicomedia, gathered his family, and sped on to Tarsus, where he may have hoped to wait out a siege. He did not have the patience. When Licinius marched on the city, Daia committed suicide and his family was slaughtered.13

  Licinius continued to Antioch, where he secured his power by wiping out all he could find of the family of Galerius. Galerius's wife, Diocletian's daughter Valeria, and her mother, Diocletian's widow Prisca, fled, and lived in hiding and wore disguises until Licinius's agents tracked them down and beheaded them. Two years before, six men had claimed the purple. By the end of 313, Diocletian and Galerius had died of natural causes, Maxentius and Daia had fallen in battle. Constantine and Licinius were the only Augusti left standing, and they had jointly agreed to a policy of toleration of Christianity.

  EMPEROR OF THE EAST

  Marriage alliances rarely work, and the marriage alliance of Constantine and Licinius did not work for long.14 Political and dynastic issues initially raised tensions and led to war in 316-317. Tensions were exacerbated because Licinius did not keep the commitment made at Milan and expressed in the letters that confirmed the policy of religious toleration. But the decisive factor was Constantine himself, perhaps beginning to wonder if a tetrarchy could function in a world ruled by one God, gripped with a sense of divine mission, annoyed with the limits of shared power, and hugely ambitious.

  The first issue to crack the alliance had to do with children and the future shape of the imperial college. Licinius and Constantia had their first child in the middle of 315, and Constantine and Fausta followed with a child of their own, named for Constantine's father, in August 316. Sensing rising tensions between Licinius and himself, Constantine sent his half-brother Constantius to Sirmium in the late summer of 316 with a proposal. Constantine suggested that the two Augusti appoint Bassianus, Constantine's brother-in-law by marriage to Anastasia his half-sister, as Caesar of Italy, thereby eliminating Italy as a possible bone of contention between them. Bassianus was a shrewd choice, related to both Augusti. According to the official story, Licinius refused the offer and also persuaded Bassianus's brother Senecio to turn Bassianus against the Western emperor. When the plot was discovered, Constantine condemned and executed Bassianus and then demanded that Licinius turn over his coconspirator Senecio.15 Licinius refused and toppled statues of Constantine at the border between their territories. By Roman reckoning, it was an act of war.

  Constantine attacked and won a battle near Cibalae on October 8, 316, more than two hundred miles into Licinius's territory and well on the way to Licinius's central city of Sirmium. Constantine won again at Adrianople and pressed on toward Byzantium. Licinius was able to cut his lines of communication and force Constantine into negotiations. They signed a peace treaty at Serdica in spring 317, entirely to Constantine's advantage. Licinius acknowledged Constantine as senior Augustus, gave up all his claims to the Western empire except Thrace, and deposed and executed Valens, whom he had appointed as Caesar in the lead-up to the war. They agreed to a revived Tetrarchy of sorts, Constantine and Licinius serving as Augusti, assisted by three Caesars: Crispus, the infant Constantius, and Licinius's son, also an infant. Crispus, Constantine's son from his first marriage, was the only one who could exercise any real power. He was able, well-liked, a rising commander in Constantine's army destined, as we will see, to play a decisive role in his father's conquest of the Eastern empire.16

  The arrangement lasted six years, and then, by Eusebius's account, Licinius went mad. He abandoned the policy of mutual toleration agreed to at Milan17 and revived persecution, mild by fourth-century standards. After application of the sacrifice test, Christians were expelled from the imperial court and army. Licinius prohibited church councils, forced Christian assemblies to take place outside the city walls, prevented men and women from worshiping together, and revoked some of the tax privileges granted to churches and clergy.18 In the provinces, officials realized that they could use the mechanisms of Roman law to attack Christians. Magistrates treated Christians as criminals, punished them when they confessed Christ, and released apostates immediately.'9 During the celebra tion of the fifteenth year of his rule (quindecennalia) in 323, Licinius's officials threatened Christians with death or exile if they refused to sacrifice, which elicited a stinging rebuke from Constantine.20 Despite agreeing to liberate the Christians and despite the early respect granted to him by Eusebius, Licinius had remained a pagan. Political and religious concerns overlapped. The older Licinius, envious of Constantine's evident successes, plausibly suspected that the Christians of the East would prefer to have Constantine as their emperor, though Christians assured him that they prayed for both emperors equally.21

  The alliance between Constantine and Licinius frayed further when Constantine fought back against the Sarmatians along the Danube in 323, intruding deep into Licinius's eastern territories.22 Both Augusti felt they had reason for war-Licinius because Constantine had trampled the boundary between them, Constantine because his colleague was apparently incapable of protecting the frontier.23

  Over time, other reasons were presented. Praxagoras of Athens, a pagan historian writing in the late 320s, said that Constantine went to war to
deliver Licinius's subjects, who were being treated "in a cruel and inhuman manner." Constantine hoped to "change him from a tyrant into a kingly ruler." The later Origo charged Licinius with "a frenzy of wickedness, cruelty, avarice, lust" in putting "many men to death for the sake of their riches" and violating their wives.24

  According to the Christian historians, the aim of Constantine's war against Licinius was liberation of persecuted Christians. The Western Augustus, "perceiving the evils of which he had heard to be no longer tolerable, took wise counsel, and tempering the natural clemency of his character with a certain measure of severity, hastened to succor those who were thus grievously oppressed." Constantine considered it a "pious and holy task to secure, by the removal of an individual, the safety of the greater part of the human race" and worried that "if he listened to the dictates of clemency only, and bestowed his pity on one utterly unworthy of it, this would, on the one hand, confer no real benefit on a man whom nothing would induce to abandon his evil practices, and whose fury against his subjects would only be likely to increase." Meanwhile, "those who suffered from his oppression would thus be forever deprived of all hope of deliverance."25

  Open war broke out in 324, and larger armies than had been seen for centuries and would not be seen again for a millennium converged in Eastern Europe.26 During the summer, Crispus's eighty ships defeated Licinius's three hundred at the Sea of Maramara, and the next day winds broke up all but four of Licinius's ships against the shore. Constantine followed with victories at Byzantium and Adrianople, but Licinius escaped to Chalcedon, where he still had enough support to raise an army. On September 18, Constantine defeated him conclusively at Chrysopolis. Constantia, half-sister of Constantine and wife of Licinius, negotiated a peace, and Licinius and his son were promised their lives and sent off to Thessalonica. By the spring of the following year, however, Constantine had found reason to suspect that Licinius was plotting against him, and he was strangled.

  Both parties saw their struggle as a religious war. Licinius sought the guidance of soothsayers and magicians, and he condemned Constantine for being "false to the religion of his forefathers." As the sacrificial smoke arose before the battle, he told his troops that this battle would "decide between our gods and those whom our adversaries profess to honor." For his part, Constantine prepared for battle with prayers in his tabernacle and went to the field following the labrum and probably wearing a helmet marked with the initials of Christ; before the battle his men knelt to pray the generic monotheistic prayer he had prepared for them. Eusebius claimed that Constantine's victory was over his enemies "and their gods," and in the celebrations that followed the soldiers sang "hymns of praise" in which they "ascribed the supreme sovereignty to God."27 As at Rome, Constantine was hailed as liberator and salvator-Liberator and Savior.

  Chrysopolis 324 stands close to Milvian Bridge 312 as a decisive moment in the history of European civilization, and especially of Christianity in Europe. Not only did Constantine become the sole Christian emperor of the Eastern and Western empire, but he also laid the foundations for a new Christian capital city near ancient Byzantium, named for himself.

  LIBERATOR OF THE CITY, LIBERATOR OF THE CHURCH?

  Constantine's conquest of the East was, more than one historian has suggested, the first crusade .2' Hardly surprising, say critics of Constantine. A Christianized imperium is inherently a crusading imperium, intolerant, oppressive to minorities and other religions, likely to burn heretics at a moment's notice. As we have seen, the "edict of Milan" set out a quite different policy. That means that the story of Constantine's religious policies is more complicated, and therefore more interesting, than is often supposed. But would he be consistent with the principle of religious liberty articulated there? Now that he had sole control, would he press his advantage and force the empire to embrace Christ? Would Christ simply fill the vacuum left by the removal of the Roman gods? Would Christ become the patron of Rome, Christianity a new form of civic religion?

  In a number of works H. A. Drake has argued that the question "Did Constantine become a Christian?" is the wrong question.29 The more per tinent political question is "What kind of Christian did Constantine become?" Christians disagreed on all manner of practical and theological issues in the early fourth century, and they disagreed about politics too. Some hoped for escape from persecution so that they could take the reins of power and apply a retributive "good-for-the-goose" policy. (You made us sacrifice; here, eat this Host!) Others developed a principled understanding of religious freedom, rooted in a particular understanding of the nature of religion and the nature of humanity.

  Most of the apologists who defended the church in the early centuries advocated freedom of religion. For some it may have been only tactical, the rhetoric of an oppressed minority. The Latin rhetor Lactantius, however, developed a theological argument for religious freedom. Lactantius was close enough to Constantine later to serve as tutor to the emperor's sons, and his influence is evident in many ways in Constantine's own writings. I noted above that Constantine was convinced, either by Lactantius or by his own observation, of Lactantius's claim that God would avenge those who persecute his people. Lactantius also wrote a short treatise on the anger of God (De ira Dei), again a theme central to Constantine's own religious outlook. Lactantius's Christianity was a hardy, tough-minded, very Latin Christianity that appealed to the sensibilities of a soldier and a politician.

  Though he detested the persecuting emperors and merrily detailed their gruesome deaths, Lactantius's basic plea was for freedom of conscience. "Religion is the one field in which freedom has pitched her tent," Lactantius wrote, "for religion is, first and foremost, a matter of free will, and no man can be forced under compulsion to adore what he has no will to adore." At best, coercion will force people to make a "hypocritical show" of devotion, but force cannot make a man or woman will to worship. "If, then, anyone, out of fear of the tools of torture or vanquished by the torture itself, finally assents to the accursed pagan sacrifice, he never acts of his own free will, as compulsion was involved." This is obvious from the fact that "as soon as opportunity offers and he recovers his freedom, he comes back to his God and begs with tears for forgiveness, doing penance for that which he did, not of his own free will, which he did not possess, but under the compulsion to which he submitted, and the Church will not withhold its forgiveness." To the persecutors, he asked, "What good can you do, then, if you defile the body but cannot break the will?"30 It is a surprisingly modern statement, arguing, as modern theorists like John Courtney Murray and George Weigel do, that religious liberty is the "first freedom," rooted in the very nature of religious life as an exercise of free will.

  In the Divine Institutes, Lactantius was responding to Porphyry's arguments in his treatise against Christians and also his treatise Philosophy from Oracles. Porphyry believed that many roads led to the truth and bliss, and this included the road of Jesus. This did not lead Porphyry to endorse a policy of toleration. Christians worshiped a man-a good man, to be sure, but only a man. Porphyry did not think the Roman Empire should be willing to put up with the man-worshiping Christians indefinitely for some greater good. Christianity's humanism offended the gods and needed to be stopped. Porphyry advocated "threatening the use of force against those who worshiped a human being" but at the same time "suggested that Christianity, by forsaking its worship of Jesus, might be made compatible with traditional worship and philosophy. 1131 Christians, he argued, should conform to Roman practice, offer the prescribed sacrifice. They could believe whatever they liked, so long as they did what the empire and its gods demanded. But Rome could not condone Christian worship in its current form.

  Lactantius' response draws in part on earlier strands of Roman political theology. Cicero had claimed that God should be approached chastely and with piety, and Lactantius takes this to mean that a true God will not want to have force used in religion, since one cannot be chaste and pious in religion if one is coerced to worship. Force pol
lutes rather than purifies religion. "For religion is to be defended," he wrote, "not by putting to death, but by dying; not by cruelty, but by patient endurance; not by guilt, but by good faith: for the former belong to evils, but the latter to goods; and it is necessary for that which is good to have place in religion, and not that which is evil. For if you wish to defend religion by bloodshed, and by tortures, and by guilt, it will no longer be defended, but will be polluted and profaned."32

  Lactantius also deployed traditional Roman ideals of freedom. As in the "edict of Milan," the keynote of Lactantius's argument is liberty (libertas). Libertas pitches her tent in the area of religion, and religion belongs in the realm of will rather than in the realm of necessity (necessitas). Libertas has a long history in Roman political theology.33 Caesar and Octavian both posed as liberators of Rome from tyranny and as conservative restorers of the Roman past. Constantine's imperial propaganda rings the same note. The triumphal arch completed in 315 titles him "Liberator of the City" (liberator urbis), other inscriptions in the capital acclaim him as "Restorer of Public Liberty" (restitutor libertatispublicae), and coins claim him to be "Restorer of Rome" (Restitutor Romae) and "Recoverer of His City" (Recuperator urbis suae). Much the same is implied by the designation of Constantine as emperor (princeps), for the emperor was expected to be a "suppressor of tyranny and the surety for freedom."34 Coins declare him to be "greatest emperor" (optimus princeps), and on one coin the goddess Roma herself hands over imperial power to the new prince.35