by
Damien F. Mackey
“And
just as Judas Maccabeus is promised divine aid in a dream before his
victory
over
Nicanor, so Constantine dreams that he will conquer his rival Maxentius”.
Paul Stephenson
Some of the Greek (Seleucid)
history, conventionally dated to the last several BC centuries, appears to have
been projected (appropriated) into a fabricated Roman imperial history of the
first several AD centuries.
Most notably, in this regard,
is the supposed Second Jewish Revolt against emperor Hadrian’s Rome, which - on
closer examination - turns out to have been the Maccabean Jewish revolt against
Antiochus ‘Epiphanes’, of whom Hadrian is “a mirror image”. See e.g. my series:
Antiochus 'Epiphanes' and Emperor Hadrian. Part One: "… a mirror image
beginning with:
For more on this, see:
and
and
Judas
Maccabeus and the downfall of Gog
Now, last night (2nd
December, 2019), as I was reading through a text-like book on Constantine: Roman Emperor, Christian
Victor (The Overlook Press, NY, 2010), written
by Paul Stephenson, I was struck by the similarities between the Dyarchy (Greek δι-
"twice" and αρχια, "rule") - which later became the Tetrarchy (Greek τετραρχία) of the four
emperors - on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the Diadochoi following on from Alexander the Great. Concerning the
latter, we read (The Jerome Biblical Commentary,
1968, 75:103): “With Alexander’s death, the leadership of several successors
(Diadochoi) was ineffectual, and finally a fourfold division of the empire took
place”.
Compare
the Roman Tetrarchy with the “fourfold
division” of Alexander of Macedon’s empire.
Added to this was the parallel
factor of the ‘Great Persecution’ against Christians (c. 300 AD, conventional
dating), and, of course, the infamous persecution of the Jews by Antiochus ‘Epiphanes’.
And I have already pointed to
similarities between one of the four Roman emperors, of the time of Constantine,
Galerius, and Antiochus ‘Epiphanes’:
King
Herod ‘the Great’, Sulla, and Antiochus IV ‘Epiphanes’. Part Two: Add to the
mix Gaius Maximianus Galerius
But these are the sorts of similarities of which Paul Stephenson (author
of the book on Constantine) is also aware (on p. 128 below he uses
the phrase “the remarkable coincidences”).
P. 109:
Lactantius’ On the Deaths of the
Persecutors is the best and fullest account of the period 303-13 and this is
indispensable. But it is also an angry screed, with no known model in Greek or
Latin literature, nor in Christian apologetic. Not only did Lactantius delight
in the
misfortune and demise of the persecuting emperors, he also attributed them to the intervention of the god of the Christians, defending the interest
of the faithful. Such an approach
rejected the very premise on which martyrs had accepted death at the
hands of their persecutors: that their god did not meddle in earthly affairs to bring misfortune upon Roman
emperors. This was the first step in
articulating a new Christian triumphalist rhetoric, which we shall
explore more fully in later chapters.
In
doing so, Lactantius drew on an Old Testament
model, the Second Book of Maccabees, which still forms an accepted part of the Orthodox canon. Thus, the opening
refrain of each text thanks God for
punishing the wicked, and the agonizing
death of Galerius mirrors that of Antiochus Epiphanes (2 Maccabees 9). And
just as Judas Maccabeus is promised divine aid in a dream before his victory over
Nicanor, so Constantine dreams that he will conquer his rival Maxentius.
P. 127
Lactantius took great pleasure relating [Galerius’] death
as divine punishment for his persecutions, describing his repulsive symptoms and the failure of pagan
doctors and prayers to heal him.
Here I (Damien Mackey) will
take the description from:
“And
now when Galerius was in the eighteenth year of his reign, God struck him with
an incurable disease. A malignant ulcer formed itself in the secret parts and
spread by degree. The physicians attempted to eradicate it… But the sore, after
having been skimmed over, broke again; a vein burst, and the blood flowed in
such quantity as to endanger his life… The physicians had to undertake their
operations anew, and at length they cauterized the wound… He grew emaciated,
pallid, and feeble, and the bleeding then stanched. The ulcer began to be
insensible to the remedy as applied, and gangrene seized all the neighboring
parts. It diffused itself the wider the more the corrupted flesh was cut away,
and everything employed as the means of cure served but to aggravate the
disease. The masters of the healing art withdrew. Then famous physicians were
brought in from all quarters; but no human means had any success… and the
distemper augmented. Already approaching to its deadly crisis, it had occupied
the lower regions of his body, his bowels came out; and his whole seat
putrefied. The luckless physicians, although without hope of overcoming the
malady, ceased not to apply fermentations and administer remedies. The humors
having been repelled, the distemper attacked his intestines, and worms were
generated in his body. The stench was so foul as to pervade not only the
palace, but even the whole city; and no wonder, for by that time the passages
from waste bladder and bowels, having been devoured by the worms, became indiscriminate,
and his body, with intolerable anguish, was dissolved into one mass of
corruption.”
P. 128
… Already dying [Galerius] issued
the following edict [ending persecution] ….
…. Lactantius cites the edict in full. The story has much in common
with the account of the
death of Antiochus, persecutor
of the Jews in the Second Book of Maccabees. Lactantius must have been struck by the remarkable coincidences, and
borrowed Antiochus' worms and stench.
….
The
plot now thickens, with the heretical Arius also dying a horrible (Antiochus-Galerius)
type of death:
P.
275
Under imperial instruction, Arius was to be marched into church
and admitted into full communion, but he never made it. Tradition holds that he died on the way, a hideous death reminiscent of Galerius', which
in Lactantius' account drew heavily upon the death of
Antiochus, persecutor of the Jews in 2 Maccabees. ….
Part Two:
Constantine more
like ‘Epiphanes’
Some
substantial aspects of the life of Constantine seem to have been lifted
right
out of the era of king Antiochus IV ‘Epiphanes’ and the Maccabees.
As briefly noted in Part One:
Constantine’s victory over
Maxentius is somewhat reminiscent of the victory over Nicanor by the superb Jewish
general, Judas Maccabeus.
“And just as Judas
Maccabeus is promised divine aid in a dream before his victory over Nicanor, so
Constantine dreams that he will conquer his rival Maxentius”.
Other comparisons can be drawn
as well.
For instance, Constantine’s
army, too, was significantly outnumbered by that of his opponent.
Again, after Constantine’s
victory the head of Maxentius was publicly paraded:
“His body was recovered, his head removed, then mounted on
a lance and paraded triumphantly by Constantine's men”.
Cf. 2 Maccabees 15:30-33):
Could this be the origin (in
part) of the Excalibur (King Arthur) legends?
For Constantine apparently
occupies a fair proportion of Arthurian legend according to:
Constantine
the Great, who in AD 306 was proclaimed Roman emperor in York, forms 8% of
Arthur’s story, whilst Magnus
Maximus, a usurper from AD 383, completes a further 39%. Both men took
troops from Britain to fight against the armies of Rome, Constantine defeating
the emperor Maxentius; Maximus killing the emperor Gratian, before advancing to
Italy. Both sequences are later duplicated in Arthur’s story.
In Part One I had likened somewhat the fourfold division of the empire
of Alexander the Great and the tetrarchy of Constantine’s reign, including the case
of the emperor Galerius with whom I had previously identified Antiochus IV ‘Epiphanes’:
King
Herod ‘the Great’, Sulla, and Antiochus IV ‘Epiphanes’. Part Two: Add to the
mix Gaius Maximianus Galerius
And, as I pointed out in the
following article, historians can find it difficult to distinguish between the
buildings of (the above-mentioned) Herod and those of Hadrian:
Herod
and Hadrian
Of chronological ‘necessity’
they must assume that, as according to this article:
In the later Hadrianic period material
from the earlier Herodian constructions was reused, resetting the distinctive
"Herodian" blocks in new locations.
…. The first
pair of roundels on the south side depicts Antinous, Hadrian, an attendant and
a friend of the court (amicus principis) departing for the hunt (left tondo)
and sacrificing to Silvanus, the Roman god of the woods and wild (right tondo).
Tondi Adrianei on the Arch of
Constantine, Southern side – left lateral, LEFT: Departure for the hunt, RIGHT:
Sacrifice to Silvanus
....
The first
pair of roundels on the south side depicts a bear hunt (left tondo) and
a sacrifice to the goddess of hunting Diana (right tondo).
….
On the north
side, the left pair depicts a boar hunt (left tondo) and a sacrifice to
Apollo (right tondo). The figure on the top left of the boar hunt relief
is clearly identified as Antinous while Hadrian, on horseback and about to
strike the boar with a spear, was recarved to resemble the young Constantine.
The recarved emperor in the sacrifice scene is likely to be Licinius or
Constantius Chlorus.
....
Tondi Adrianei on the Arch of
Constantine, Northern side – left lateral, LEFT: Boar hunt, RIGHT: Sacrifice to
Apollo
....
On the north
side, the right pair depicts a lion hunt (left tondo) and a sacrifice to
Hercules (right tondo). The figure of Hadrian in the hunt scene was
recut to resemble the young Constantine while in the sacrifice scene the
recarved emperor is either Licinius or Constantius Chlorus. The figure on the
left of the hunt tondo may show Antinous as he was shortly before his
death; with the [first] signs of a beard, meaning he was no longer a young man.
These tondi are framed in purple-red porphyry. This framing is only
extant on this side of the northern facade. ….
Fred S. Kleiner (A History of Roman Art, p. 326, my emphasis) will go as far as to
write that “every block of the arch [of
Constantine] were [sic] reused from earlier buildings”:
The Arch of Constantine was the largest erected in Rome since the end of the Severan
dynasty nearly a century before,
but recent investigations have shown that the columns and every block of
the arch were reused from earlier buildings. …. Although the figures on many of
the stone blocks were newly carved for this arch, much of the sculptural
decoration was taken from monuments of Trajan, Hadrian …. Sculptors refashioned the second-century
reliefs to honor Constantine by recutting the heads of the earlier emperors
with the features of the new ruler. ….
The highly paganised (Sol Invictus) polytheistic worshipping,
family murdering, Constantine makes for - somewhat like Charlemagne - a very
strange, exemplary Christian emperor.
The whole account of it is
vividly narrated in 2 Maccabees 9:1-29.
