_Banbha_
April 16th, 2006, 08:22 PM
Julian the Apostate or HERO?
Christianity and Paganism in the 4th Century
Flavius Claudius Julianus had spent a mere 20 month on the Roman throne, a negligible time that could have been a simple footnote in the chaotic history of the later Roman Empire. His name could have been forgotten amongst those of his illustrious predecessors, such as the great Constantine, and successors, such as the equally great Theodosius, if he hadn’t embarked in this short time available to him, on an ambitious project that secured his persistent fame and notoriety.
In these two years as Roman Emperor, Julian attempted nothing less than to restore the old pagan cults of Greek and Roman antiquity to their accustomed place in Roman society, and thus to revoke the process to install Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire that had began a few decades earlier when Constantine I had adopted the new faith.
Consequently, Julian has become a highly contentious figure in historiography, and the commentaries on his short reign are extremely polarised. On one side he has been vilified by Christian historians, like Gregory Nazianzen and Cyril of Alexandria, who condemned his Pagan sympathies and gave him the epithet “the Apostate” under which he has become known. On the other side he has been praised by the admirers of Classical antiquity, like Gibbon, as an heroic figure that had tried to salvage a golden age of civilisation....
http://www.allempires.com/article/index.php?q=Julian_apostate
Christianity and Paganism in the 4th Century
Flavius Claudius Julianus had spent a mere 20 month on the Roman throne, a negligible time that could have been a simple footnote in the chaotic history of the later Roman Empire. His name could have been forgotten amongst those of his illustrious predecessors, such as the great Constantine, and successors, such as the equally great Theodosius, if he hadn’t embarked in this short time available to him, on an ambitious project that secured his persistent fame and notoriety.
In these two years as Roman Emperor, Julian attempted nothing less than to restore the old pagan cults of Greek and Roman antiquity to their accustomed place in Roman society, and thus to revoke the process to install Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire that had began a few decades earlier when Constantine I had adopted the new faith.
Consequently, Julian has become a highly contentious figure in historiography, and the commentaries on his short reign are extremely polarised. On one side he has been vilified by Christian historians, like Gregory Nazianzen and Cyril of Alexandria, who condemned his Pagan sympathies and gave him the epithet “the Apostate” under which he has become known. On the other side he has been praised by the admirers of Classical antiquity, like Gibbon, as an heroic figure that had tried to salvage a golden age of civilisation....
http://www.allempires.com/article/index.php?q=Julian_apostate