HADRIAN.
Life (§ 1). The Rescript Concerning the
Character (§ 2). Christians (§ 4).
Hadrian and Christianity Policy Toward the Jews
(§3). (§5).
Publius /Elius Hadrianus, Roman emperor 117— 138, was born at Italica, in the Spanish province of Bcetica, Jan. 24, a.d.; d. at Baiae July 10, 138. After the early death of his father, he was educated under the care of his kinsman, the subsequent emperor Trajan, and early entered the i. Life. service of the State. Upon the death of Trajan, in Aug., 117, he obtained the imperial dignity, probably on the ground of a simulated adoption by the empress and her party. He strove effectually to raise the standard of official life, to procure well-regulated financial conditions and to shape the laws by his own humane spirit. One dominant object of his government was the welfare of the provinces. In 120 or 121 he began a series of extensive journeys, which led him into all the domains of his empire, and were prompted alike by the deeply felt need of seeing the situation with his own eyes, and by a very marked interest on his part in behalf of science, archeology in particular. From 136, a grave dropsical affection seriously interrupted his activity, and led him, unsuccessfully, to attempt to put a violent end to his life. The present Castle of St. Angelo or the Mole of Hadrian (moles Hadriani) in Rome became his imposing mausoleum. The effectiveness of Hadrian's excellent natural
Ill
RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Hadoram Haering
endowments was seriously impaired by abrupt alterations in his moods and conduct. Especially, as he aged, did distrust and severity
2. Charac- increasingly come to the surface. Re-
ter. ligiously he lived in the faith and forms
of antique piety. He directed many temples to be built, or restored, in the course of his journeys, and not a few of them were dedicated to him. He had himself solemnly initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries; he accepted, with faith in its operation, the voluntary sacrificial death of Antinous, instituting an elaborate worship for his dead favorite; and he firmly believed in magic. In his ethics, the influences of Stoic philosophy, and of the contemporary philanthropy, are distinctly apparent. He carried forward, on a larger plan, the benevolent foundation begun by Trajan for dependent boys and girls; he gladly sought out the sick, both high and low, and strengthened them with comforting words and good advice. Legislation affecting slavery underwent at his hands momentous reforms in a more humane direction. He kept sharp watch on the administration of justice, and its instrumentalities.
It is obvious that a ruler so highly interested in
all the issues and circumstances of his time, could
not fail to take account of Christi-
3. Hadrian anity, either in Rome or during his
and journeys, which led him into Chris- Christianity, tendom's principal districts and centers (Ephesus, Antioch, Alexandria, Bithynia). Among his immediate attendants his trusty freedman Phlegon had deemed it important enough to refer to its history in his writings (cf. Harnack, Litteratur, i. 867-868). On the other hand, Hadrian's much quoted letter to the consul Servianus (Vopiscus, Vita Saturnini, viii.), with its utterances concerning Christendom and Christians, must be characterized as a clumsy counterfeit of the fourth century (cf. Victor Schultze, Hadriani epistola ad Servianum, TLB, xviii., 1897, 561-562). Events in Asia Minor, however, elicited a momentous imperial manifesto concerning the Christians, which is still extant. When Hadrian, in the years 123-124, was in western Asia, a native Christian of high standing, Quadratus (others transfer the occurrence to Athens, and date it about 125-126), presented to him an apology, which was inspired by an undoubtedly ominous oppression of the Christians at the hands of "evil men." There soon afterward followed, possibly by mandate and in consequence of this letter, an official report to the emperor by the proconsul, Quintus Licinius Silvanus Granianus. By the time the imperial decision had been rendered, the proconsul had already found a successor in Caius Minucius (Minicius) Fundanus, and accordingly the rescript was issued to the latter. Exact chronological data are lacking, but it is customary to assign the proconsulship of Silvanus Granianus to the years 123-124 and that of his successor to 125-126, and this date for the apology of Quadratus is supported by both internal and external reasons (see Quadratus).
The substance of the rescript is as follows: the statutory methods of proceeding against the Christians are to be accorded to the provincials; if any
unlawful act be ascertained as a result of a statutory judicial investigation, the legal penalty is to be imposed. But all compulsion of official 4. The Re- intervention by means of public rioting, script Con- or underhand promotion of the same cerning the by self-seeking denunciation, is to be Christians, repelled, and, if need be, to be severely punished. At the very beginning the emperor declares it his earnest will, that there be an end of both turbulence and sycophancy. The sense is plain: the Christians in Proconsular Asia are exempted from uncertain and arbitrary official procedure, and committed, when calumnies are charged against them, to the due course of criminal law. Justin Martyr appends this rescript, in its original Latin text, to his first apology, either because it became known to him only after completing his work, or because he disdained to derive his evidence in favor of the claims of tolerance elsewhere than from the essence of Christianity. Eusebius (Hist, eccl., iv. 9) turned it into Greek, and this translation subsequently took the place of the original text, and caused the latter to pass out of use. The genuineness of this rescript, important in its eccesiastical and civil bearings alike, is insured beyond doubt, on both internal and external grounds. On the other hand, the story that comes to light in a later author (Lampridius, Vita Alexandri, xliii.), to the effect that it was a part of the emperor's purpose to have Christ accepted into the number of the gods, and to dedicate a temple to him, must be regarded as legendary. Very different was Hadrian's policy with the Jews. The prohibition of circumcision and, still more, the establishment, from 130, of the colony of jElia Capitolina, together with the 5. Policy erection of a temple to Jupiter upon Toward the ruins of Jerusalem, fanned the the Jews, religious ardor of Judaism, and about 132 it burst into a powerful flame of insurrection under the leadership of Bar Kokba (q.v.). Only after the legate Julius Severus had been summoned thither from Britain, did Rome succeed, through wearisome and sanguinary conflicts, in gradually crushing the insurgents. The campaign ended in 135; hundreds of thousands of men had perished and the country had been laid desolate; and now a heathen colony grew up in the environs of the Holy City, and over the foundations of the destroyed sanctuary there arose a temple of Jupiter, the Jews being even forbidden entrance to the city under penalty of death. Victor Schultze.
Bibliography: A. Hausrath, Neutestamentliche Zeitgeschichte, vol. iii., Heidelberg, 1874, Eng. transl., London, 1895; T. Keim, Rom und das Christentum, Berlin, 1881; H. Schiller, Geschichte der romischen Kaiserzeit, i., part 2, Gotha, 1883; F. Gregorovius, Der Kaiser Hadrian, Stuttgart, 1884, Eng. transl.. London, 1898; E. G. Hardy, Christianity and the Roman Empire, London, 1894; Neander, Christian Church, i. 101-103 et passim; Schaff, Christian Church, ii. 49-50; Moeller, Christian Church, i. 95, 162.
HAERING, ha'ring, THEODOR: German Protestant; b. at Stuttgart Apr. 22, 1848. He was educated at the universities of Tubingen and Berlin (1866-71), and after being a lecturer in the Evangelical theological seminary at Tubingen (1873-76),
Haerter Hafenreffer