criminals or busybodies: they must correct by word or deed all such misrepresentations and make it clear that they are reproached—or what not ?—simply because they are Christians.1 Their adversary the devil—in the persons of all his agents—goes about seeking whose faith he may destroy; they must resist him and survive the ordeal.? Throughout the world the Christian brotherhood is exposed to the same temptations and varied persecutions.
From this evidence Professor Ramsay ὃ concludes that the Epistle belongs to the time when Vespasian revived the policy of Nero. “‘ The Christian communities of Asia Minor north of the Taurus are regarded as exposed to persecution (i. 6), not merely in the form of dislike and malevolence on the part of neighbours, . . . but persecu- tion to the death (iv. 15, 16), after trial and question (iii. 15). The persecution is general, and extends over the whole Church (ν. 9). The Christians are not merely tried when a private accuser comes forward against them, but are sought out for trial by the Roman officials (v. 8, iii. 15). They suffer for the Name (iv. 14-16) pure and simple; the trial takes the form of inquiry into their religion, giving them the opportunity of ‘ glorifying God in this name’.”
Of this persecution by Vespasian there is no evidence except an inference from the statement of Sulpicius Severus, that Titus his son and successor wished to exterminate both Judaism and Christi- anity, and the general deduction from the letter of Pliny, that persecution for the Name was an established practice. Apart from this objection, it may fairly he said that even the rigorous interpre- tation which Professor Ramsay puts upon different passages is not necessarily inconsistent with the conditions of the reign of Nero when persecution of the Church did, as a fact, begin. If the vague terms, in which the various sufferings of Christians are described, are to be pressed and limited to mean State persecution and persecu- tion to the death, there still remain indubitable references to un- official persecution which did not go to such lengths. The author, as Professor Ramsay himself says, looks forward to a period of persecution as the condition in which Christians have to live. Further he exhorts Christians to be loyal subjects and therein proves that the obvious test of loyalty had not yet been applied to, them. And he definitely excludes the narrow interpretation of the roaring lion, when he urges the Christians to resist it.
For these and other reasons, Professor Ramsay’s theory is re-
liv 13-16. Seto kos 3 The Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 279 ff.