above all in times of crisis. At such moments the Romans feared that the gods were
venting their wrath on the Empire because Christians would not carry out the proper
sacrifices. True, the Jews also refused to honor the Roman gods, but the Romans
could usually tolerate—just barely—Jewish practices as part of their particular
cultural identity. Christians, however, claimed their God not only for themselves but
for all. Major official government persecutions of Christians began in the 250s, with
the third-century crisis.
Meanwhile the Christian community organized itself. By 304, on the eve of the
promulgation of Diocletian’s last great persecutory edict, when perhaps only 10 per
cent of the population was Christian, numerous churches dotted the imperial
landscape. (See Map 1.2.) Each church was two-tiered. At the bottom were the
people (the “laity,” from the Greek laikos, meaning “of the people”). Above them
were the clergy (from kleros, or “Lord’s portion”). In turn, the clergy were
supervised by their bishop (in Greek episkopos, “overseer”), assisted by his
“presbyters” (from the Greek presbyteros, “elder”: the priests who served with the
bishops), deacons, and lesser servitors. Some bishops—those of Alexandria, Antioch,
Carthage, Jerusalem, and Rome, whose bishop was later called the “pope”—were
more important than others. No religion was better prepared for official recognition.
