Who was Pliny the Younger?

But Christianity, in spite of Roman emperors, and Roman prisons, and Roman executions, pursued its silent steady course. In little more than seventy years after the death of Christ, it had made such rapid progress in some places as to threaten the downfall of paganism. The heathen temples were deserted, the worship of the gods was neglected, and victims for sacrifices were rarely purchased. This naturally raised a popular cry against Christianity, such as we had at Ephesus: "This our craft is in danger to be set at nought, and the temple of the great goddess Diana to be despised." Those whose livelihood depended on the worship of the heathen deities, laid many and grievous complaints against the Christians before the governors. This was especially so in the Asiatic provinces where Christianity was most prevalent.

About the year 110 many Christians were thus brought before the tribunal of Pliny the younger, the governor of Bithynia and Pontus. But Pliny, being naturally a wise, candid, and humane man, took pains to inform himself of the principles and practices of the Christians. And when he found that many of them were put to death who could not be convicted of any public crime, he was greatly embarrassed. He had not taken any part in such matters before, and no settled law on the subject then existed. The edicts of Nero had been repealed by the Senate, and those of Domitian by his successor, Nerva. Under these circumstances, Pliny applied for advice to his master, the Emperor Trajan. The letters which then passed between them, being justly considered as the most valuable record of the history of the church during that period, deserve a place in our "Short Papers." But we can only transcribe a portion of Pliny's celebrated epistle, and chiefly those parts which refer to the character of Christians, and the extension of Christianity.

C. Pliny to Trajan Emperor

These divine truths, given for the instruction and guidance of the church in all ages, were strikingly illustrated in the case of Pliny and the Christians of Bithynia. He is spoken of by all historians as one of the most enlightened, virtuous, and accomplished men of antiquity. He was also possessed of great wealth, and he had the reputation of being most liberal and benevolent in private life. Why then, it may be asked, as a Roman statesman and governor, did he become such a persecutor of the Christians? This question he answers in his own letter. It was simply for their faith in Christ — nothing else. It had been proved to him, both by friends and foes that the Christians were guilty of no evil, either morally, socially, or politically. Having thrice asked the question, "Are you Christians?" if they stedfastly affirmed that they were, he condemned them to death. The only pretext which he gave to cover the injustice of his conduct as a governor, was the fact that the Christians were obstinate professors of a religion not established by the laws of the empire.

Many, from private malice and other reasons, were at this time anonymously accused of being Christians, who were not really so. These were tested by being called upon to deny the faith, offer incense to the gods, worship the image of the emperor, and revile Christ. All who complied with these terms were dismissed. But none of those things, Pliny is made to witness, can those who are true Christians ever be compelled to do. He next had recourse to the brutal custom of examining innocent persons by torture. Two females, noted servants of the church, were thus examined. But, instead of the expected disclosures as to the rumoured seditious and licentious character of their meetings, nothing unfavourable to the christian community could be tortured out of them. The governor could detect nothing by every means he tried, except what he calls "a perverse and extravagant superstition."

Letters written at the time of an event are always valuable evidence; persons looking back after a long course of years are apt to view things differently from what they really were. Now there is an interesting letter written by the younger Pliny, proconsul of Pontus and Bithynia, to the emperor Trajan, and the emperor's reply, which will throw light upon these persecutions.

"The following is the method I have pursued," wrote Pliny, "with regard to such as have been brought before me as Christians. I have asked them whether they were really Christians. On their confessing that they were I have questioned them a second and a third time, threatening them with punishment; and on their persevering in the confession, I have commanded them to be led forth, not doubting but that inflexible obstinacy ought to be punished. Nothing can compel those who are really Christians to adore thy image with incense, or to call on the gods, or to curse Christ. This is the sum of their error. They are accustomed to assemble on a stated day before light; to sing a hymn to Christ among themselves by turns; and to bind themselves by an oath to commit no wickedness — neither fraud, nor robbery, nor adultery — and they never violate faith. These things having been done, it is their custom to depart, and assemble again to take meat, but promiscuously and without offence. Many persons of all ages, of all orders, and of either sex even, are placed in peril; for the contagion of this superstition has invaded not only the towns, but even the villages and fields. It is sufficiently evident, indeed, that our temples are almost deserted, that our sacred rites have been for a long time interrupted, and that there is rarely to be found a purchaser of the victims."

To this the emperor Trajan replied, "You have done perfectly right, my dear Pliny, in your proceedings against the Christians who have been brought before you; it being impossible to establish any regular or general form in affairs of this kind. No search should be made after them, but if they are accused and convicted, they must be punished. Should the accused, however, deny that he is a Christian, and prove that he is not by invoking the gods, then let him be pardoned, whatever may have been his former profession." No anonymous accusation was to be received. It would not be right.

Hymns had indeed been sung in Christian assemblies from the earliest times. It is held by many that Luke 1:46-54 (the Magnificat), Luke 2:29-32 (Nunc dimittis), Ephesians 5:15, 1 Timothy 3:16, and 6:15 and 16 were Christian hymns before incorporation in the respective books and epistles. This, however, seems to be almost pure speculation. Pliny, the Roman governor of Bithynia, reporting to the Emperor Trajan on his enquiries concerning the practices of the people called Christians in A.D. 112, informs him that when the Christians assembled they sang hymns to Christ "as to a God." Similar language is used by a third century writer quoted by Eusebius: "hymns and odes such as from the beginning were written by believers, hymns to the Christ, the Word of God, calling Him God." In the Middle Ages singing of hymns (Greek and Latin), was mainly practised by priests as part of their daily offices.

Doddridge seems to have been the first to suggest the comparison of Pliny the younger's letter to Sabinianus (ix. 21), not merely the brief sequel of thanks which Alford cites (ix. 24): models, both of them, of fine natural sentiments expressed with beauty, terseness and force, as became a refined Roman of ability and rank, who writes to conciliate an intimate friend with his freedman that had offended and been discarded. In the heathen, as we might expect, nothing rises above self. In the Christian the love of Christ is drawn out on behalf of one brought to God from the depths of sin and wretchedness, whose conscience prompted a return to his master armed with authority to punish his delinquency; but that master a Christian dear to the apostle, not only for other things but for his habitually gracious bearing to the saints.

It must also be borne in mind, both to the credit and also to the deeper guilt of Pliny, that he did not proceed against the Christians from mere popular prejudice — unlike his friend Tacitus, who allowed himself to be carried away by prevailing rumours, and without further inquiry, to write against Christianity in the most unreasonable and disgraceful manner. But Pliny considered it his duty to enter into a careful investigation of the whole matter before giving his judgment. How then can we account for such a man, apparently desirous of acting impartially, persecuting to death a blameless people? To answer this question, we must inquire into the outward, or ostensible causes of persecution.

Pliny, the younger, writing to the Roman Emperor Trajan, reports to his imperial master with the impartiality of one who is reporting facts, elicited in cross-examination of the Christians, “The Christians meet before daybreak, and sing among themselves, a hymn to Christ as God.” The Emperor Adrian writing to Servian describes the population of Alexandria as divided between the worship of Christ and the worship of Serapis. Lucian, in the 2nd century A.D., said with contemptuous sarcasm, “The Christians are still worshipping that great man who was gibbeted in Palestine.”

Bear in mind that revealed truth condemns the world, and must be so unpalatable to men, that one cannot expect their testimony save unwittingly. Yet the Roman remains (for we have no more) testify by the way to the appearance of Christ at the very time when Scripture puts Him in Palestine; and to a new faith in His followers, most offensive to those who loved, or at least sanctioned, the demoralising idolatries of Jupiter, Venus, Mars, and the other imaginary deities, or real demons, the empire honoured. I am away from my library or any books that I could cite. But if you are familiar with the scanty residue of the Latin classics so-called, you will not have forgotten the references in the brief historical works of Tacitus (bitter, haughty, and cynical as he was), or in the Lives of the Caesars by Suetonius, or in the Letters of Pliny the younger from his Bithynian government with the Emperor Trajan's replies. The later scoffing sketches in Greek of Lucian (of Samosata) also bear witness to the facts of Christ's history ("more suo," of the Punch style, or indeed lower still), and notably of His most widely known follower the apostle Paul. It is irrational (taking the ground of nature) to doubt what even these avowed enemies of Christianity attest. The men who then defended traditional and effete Paganism, regarded it as a new and dangerous superstition. That they did write of Christ and of His religion in a hostile spirit is beyond controversy, as then uprising and progressing far and wide. Pilate's act, as crucifying Him, is disputed neither by Jew nor by Gentile. So that we assuredly have adequate proof of His birth, life, and death from His enemies, confirming the allegations of scripture. Later still, Celsus and Porphyry wrote against Christianity as philosophers. But the outward facts are not disputed; and Christ's allowed miracles are imputed by Gentiles to magic, as the Jews at the time imputed them to Beelzebub.

Domitian had not been dead more than eighteen months when the church, which had enjoyed immunity from persecution during the brief reign of his successor, Cocceius Nerva, was again called upon to suffer. Nerva, a man of mild and generous disposition, had treated the Christians well; and with praiseworthy humanity had recalled all who had been banished under the persecution of Domitian; but after a reign of sixteen months he had been seized with a fever, from which he never recovered. Trajan succeeded him, and for awhile left the Christians unmolested, but having been induced to look upon them with suspicion, he determined to renew the persecution, and, if possible, to exterminate by decisive and severe measures, the new religion. In his haughty view Christianity was an offence an insult to human nature, and its teaching (as was indeed the case) entirely opposed to the philosophy of his times; a philosophy which exalted men into gods, and made the humility and gentleness which marked the former, effeminate and contemptible. But Trajan had neither the cruelty nor malignity of Nero and Domitian; and one may notice a wavering and indecision in his conduct on this occasion, which contrasts significantly with that inflexibility of purpose which usually marked his actions. That he had no pleasure in the torture or execution of his subjects we may learn by his letter to Pliny, the governor of Bithynia and Pontus, in which he says distinctly, "These people must not sought after;" and again, "if any one renounce Christianity, and evidence his sincerity by supplicating our gods, however suspected he may be of the past, let him on his repentance obtain pardon." In short, it was the religion, and not the professors of it, which Trajan hated.

Full of interest is that letter of Pliny to the emperor, which brought the reply from which the above has been extracted. In one place the governor writes, "The whole of the crime or error of the Christians lay in this they were accustomed on a certain day to meet before daylight, and to sing among themselves a hymn to Christ, as a god; and to bind themselves by an oath not to commit any wickedness; not to be guilty of theft or robbery, or adultery; never to falsify their word, nor to deny a pledge committed to them when called upon to return it. When these things were performed, it was their custom to separate, and then to come together to a harmless meal, of which they partook in common without any disorder; but this last practice they have ceased to attend to, since the publication of my edict, by which, according to your commands, I prohibited assemblies. After this account I judged it the more necessary to examine, and that by torture, two females, who were said to be deaconesses, but I have discovered nothing except a bad and excessive superstition." So much for Pliny. A stranger to the grace of God, it is not surprising that he saw in the religion of the despised and lowly Jesus, only a bad and excessive superstition. It is no matter for wonder that the polite and learned governor, whose importance filled the world, should write with careless disdain of a people whose views were so unlike his own. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."

These letters are important in many particulars. Notice, in the first place, that Pliny says that refusing to adore the image of the emperor (which image was set up to be worshipped), and to call on the heathen gods, and to refuse to curse Christ, is the sum of their error. No evil is laid to their charge — nothing but refusing to perform acts of idolatry, and to curse the One to whom they looked for salvation. This coming from a heathen, is a strong testimony in favour of Christians of that day.