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| An aethiest billboard in Times Square |
By Alan Caruba
It is a great regret that arrogant
atheists attack Christmas at this time of year and that too many institutions
from schools to stores feel intimidated enough to remove mention of it. It is
one thing to deny the existence of God, but the attacks are intended to
undermine the faith of millions of Americans. The atheists forget or neglect the
fact that the pilgrims came here to freely practice their interpretation of
Christianity.
It is a habit of mine to revisit the
classic literature of the past and, with the advent of Christmas, I picked up an
excerpt from Edward Gibbon’s famed “The History of the Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire” that addressed in part the role of Christianity.
Gibbon’s vast knowledge of the Empire
eventually filled six volumes. The first three volumes were published in 1776
and became a bestseller. The final three volumes cemented his reputation as a
historian.
Gibbon (1737-1794) not only possessed
a vast body of knowledge, but also a felicity of prose that enhances the
pleasure of reading him. His history of Rome also contained open criticism of
organized religion which no doubt evoked a great deal of discussion at the time.
The religion of Rome, however, being
polytheistic with many gods could only be called organized insofar as temples to
those gods were built wherever it exercised its power. Suffice to say, the
then-new religion of Christianity was declared illegal and Christians were
widely persecuted.
Initially, the adherents to
Christianity were Jews. Gibbon notes that “The first fifteen bishops of
Jerusalem were all circumcised Jews; and the congregations over which they
presided, united the law of Moses with the doctrine of Christ.” Judaism had been
around for a thousand years by that time, but there were a variety of factors
that kept it isolated and limited in numbers. It did not actively proselytize
and the requirement for circumcision was a deterrent. Judaism also had many
restrictions such as dietary laws and requirements that further reduced its
attraction for the masses.
All that changed with the advent of
Saul of Tarsus, now known as St. Paul, a Jew who experienced an epiphany that
threw open the doors to the philosophical and theological basis of Judaism.
“Christianity offered itself to the world, armed with the strength of the Mosaic
Law and delivered from its fetters,” wrote Gibbon. “The divine authority of
Moses and the prophets was admitted, and even established, as the firmest basis
of Christianity.”
“The promise of divine favor, instead
of being partially confirmed to the posterity of Abraham, was universally
proposed to the freeman and the slave, to the Greek and the barbarian, to the
Jew and to the Gentile.”
“When the promise of eternal happiness
was proposed to mankind, on condition of adopting the faith, and of observing
the precepts of the gospel, it is no wonder that so advantageous an offer should
have been accepted by great numbers of every religion, of every rank, and of
every province in the Roman Empire.”
The Roman Empire had reigned supreme
for almost 300 years when Christianity came on the scene and would last another
200 until, in the view of historians; it became too tired to maintain itself. It
stretched across the known world from the British Isles to India, exacting taxes
and offering protection. By the third century it could not be effectively
governed from Rome and split into two factions, East and West, seen today in the
Eastern and Western churches.
Christianity offered something that
Judaism did not; the promise of life after death, of Heaven, and, conversely, a
vision of Hell. Neither the prophets, nor the sages of Judaism devoted much
attention to what occurred after death because there is no way to determine what
occurs in its wake. Instead, Judaism has always placed an emphasis on how one
can pursue a life of proper behavior based on the interpretation of the Torah or
Old Testament whose heart is found in the Ten
Commandments.
Gibbon wrote “It was by the aid of
these causes, exclusive zeal, the immediate expectation of another world, the
claim of miracles, the practice of rigid virtue, and the constitution of the
primitive church, that Christianity spread itself with so much success in the
Roman Empire.”
The gospels were composed in the Greek
language “at a considerable distance from Jerusalem” and after gentile converts
had grown in numbers. “As soon as those histories were translated into the Latin
tongue, there were perfectly intelligible to all the subjects of Rome” with some
exceptions.
The conversion of Constantine in the
fourth century made Christianity the official religion of Rome. It is estimated
that, by then, almost a third of the population had previously embraced
Christianity and the Empire had already begun to decline. In the early 400s,
Rome was conquered by the barbaric tribes of northern Europe, the Gaul’s,
Visigoths, and others. Europe was plunged into the Dark Ages.
In time Christianity would spread to
much of the world though it would compete with the more ancient faiths of
Hinduism and Buddhism, and the tribal faiths of Africa and the New World.
In 632 A.D. Islam, the invention of
Mohammed, would spread as much by the sword as by its doctrine. It is the enemy
of all other religions and its persecution of Christians is a warning to the
world. Mohammed told his followers, “The sword is the key to heaven and hell.”
These days, the Middle East is being “cleansed” of Christians. No accommodation
can be made with Islam.
The demographics of Christianity have
shifted significantly in the last century, largely due to the enmity of
Communism. As noted in a recent article, “In Latin America alone, there are 517
million Christians. In Africa, 411 million. Asia tallies 251 million. Once a
global powerhouse of Christianity, Europe is home to an ever-shrinking 553
million (expected to drop to 480 million by 2050) while North America has 275
million.”
"Whatever we once were,
we are no longer a Christian nation,” said President Barack Obama on June 28,
2006. A true Christian would never have uttered those words.
America was and is a
Christian nation. Obama either misspoke or deliberately lied. His words barely
acknowledge the role of Christianity in the founding and history of our nation.
His words betray its role today.
Gibbon’s great work about the fall of
Rome is a warning to all present empires and great powers. It fell because it
lacked a doctrine of virtue as much as from the attacks by the barbarians who
finished it off.
Today Communism is the faith of the
new barbarians and Islam is the faith of its enemies. The defense of
civilization falls heavily on the worldwide Christian
community.
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