Contrary to what devout Christians might like to believe, the birth of Christ had very little effect on the world at large during this first one hundred years. Pagan Rome continued to dominate western Europe, the Mediterranean and north Africa, dividing the Middle East with the great Parthian Empire. A new power developed in south central Asia and part of India - the Kushan Empire, while the far advanced Chinese continued under the Han Dynasty. Since this chapter does begin the Christian era, however, we shall start our regular discussions of the Christian church at this time.
In this first century Paul (who had actually never seen the living Jesus) and others gradually changed the simple teachings of Jesus into the complex sacerdotal religion of Christianity, merging the principle ideas of many oriental faiths into the new religion. Each of the great cults of the Mediterranean region had "mysteries" which were usually ceremonies of purification, sacrifice, initiation, revelation and regeneration centering about the death and resurrection of the god. All sects assumed the possibility of magic and miracles, as well as the promise of personal immortality, of an endless happiness after a life of subjection, poverty or toil. This was the final and irresistible attraction of the oriental faiths and of the Christianity that absorbed and finally succeeded them. The entire western world seemed ready and prepared for the new Christ but initially the following was confined largely to Greeks and to urban merchants. (Ref. 48, 213)
Very recently some fifty-two papyrus texts, including gospels and other secret writings, some dating from this early Christian era, were found near Nag Hammadi in the upper Egyptian desert in an earthenware jar. These so-called "Gnostic" writings describe many of the people and events found in the New Testament, including many alleged quotations from Jesus, but with a greatly different perspective than found in orthodox Christianity. These texts were apparently hidden at some later time when their proponents were under indictment as "heretics". The writings included, for example, the "Gospel of Mary", which depicts Mary Magdalene as one favored with visions and insight surpassing even Peter. Some of these Gnostic Gospels discuss the possibility of the ultimate God being feminine and most indicate a belief that Jesus never was human and existed entirely as a spirit.
The Gnostics gave a better place for women in religion and had no hierarchy of elders, priests, bishops, etc., feeling that each individual looked within himself for God and guidance. Dr. Elaine Pagels, author of the text describing these recent finds, feels that this individualism in their philosophy is the reason that the "orthodox" church, with its social and political organization, won out over the Gnostics. (Ref. 163 ) Still further sources of early Christian doctrine will be discussed under NORTHEAST AFRICA, below. (Continue to Christian Church 2nd Century)
In the south of this region the kingdom of Meroe continued its iron-making and gold production, unmolested. The kingdom of Axum in north Ethiopia and southwestern Arabia now became a strong empire, with a capital city of the same name and Adulis (now Massawa) as the Red Sea port and with a wealth founded on ivory. Axum was a pagan city of palaces and temples which now had many Jew[87] and Greek immigrants. The country had many Greek insignias and a Greek educated king. (Ref. 45, 175, 83)
Egypt continued under Roman rule. In Alexandria the Jewish population increased reaching perhaps to 40% of the total of the city. Among those was the Jewish philosopher and theologian, Philo, who developed the Logos ideas of the Greek Stoics into a concept which has come straight down through the centuries in the Christian theology. "God, in Philo's writings, is the essential being of the world, incorporeal, eternal, indescribable; reason can know his existence, but can ascribe no quality to him--."[88] In order to create the world and establish relations with man, Philo felt that God used a group of intermediary beings. While these had been called diamones by some Greeks and Ideas by Plato, they were called angels by the Jews. Although popularly conceived as persons, Philo thought they existed only in the Divine Minds as the thoughts and powers of God, such powers as the Stoics called Logos, which created and then guided the world. "Philo sometimes thinks of the Logos as a person. In a poetic moment he called the Logos 'The first-begotten of God', son of God by the virgin Wisdom, and says that through the Logos God has revealed himself to man. Since the soul is part of God, it can through reason rise to a mystic vision, not quite of God, but of Logos[89]. Durant (Ref. 48) felt that Philo's Logos was one of the most influential ideas in the history of thought, although its antecedents in Heracleitus, Plato and the Stoics are obvious. "Philo was a contemporary of Christ, but he apparently never heard of him although he shared unknowingly in forming Christian theology. Philo tried to mediate between Hellenism and Judaism. From the Judaic point of view he failed; from the historical point of view he succeeded, and the result was the first chapter of the Gospel of John”.[90]
During the period of the Roman administration of Egypt the irrigation systems were raised to great efficiency. While the government remained Roman, the people remained Egyptian (and Jewish in the cities). Additional Notes
Roman Carthage was the capital of proconsular Africa and second only to Rome, itself, in the western Mediterranean. It became a center for education and soon a strong- hold for early Christianity. Plutarch, living in this century, allegedly described voyages of the Carthaginians to North America (Epeiros, in his language) via Iceland (Ogygia) and a return route following the anti-trade winds around latitude 40 degrees north, back to Spain and Carthage. Diodorus of Sicily described a southern route when he spoke of the discovery of an island by Carthaginians which may have been Cuba. (Ref. 84, 66)
The ruler of Mauretania (northern Morocco and western Algeria), another Ptolemy, was murdered in A.D. 40 on the order of the Roman Caligula, but it did not destroy the Berber spirit of independence and they never completely gave up to the Romans. The dromedary, one-hump camels first were brought to the Sahara in this century but they were not used to any great extent for another seven hundred years with the Arab invasion. (Ref. 260)
In West Africa on the inland delta of the great Niger River there existed at this time, and probably it had existed for over two hundred years, the village of Jenne-jeno, which has just recently been excavated. Situated only about 300 miles up river from Timbuktu it is probable that even in this early time there were beginning trade relationships by water. Pottery in use through this period was of a design seen several centuries earlier in the southern Sahara, indicating that the original population may have originated there. We shall hear much more about this community which did not reach its peak of development until about A.D. 100. (Ref. 268)
Madagascar had probably been unknown to men until about the time of Christ, when Indonesians arrived with out-rigger canoes and eventually sails. Beginning in this century these sea-farers brought "wet-zone" crops like the Asian and Coco yams and banana to Madagascar and thus to East Africa[91]. Madagascar had probably been unknown to men until about the time of Christ, when the Indonesians arrived with out-rigger canoes and eventually sails. With their new crops the Negroes found it possible to start moving into the humid forests and low-lying river valleys, thus beginning the settlement of more central Africa. The Bantu-speaking people continued their slow migration down the east coast of Africa. There was iron smelting in Kenya by A.D. 100. (Ref. 222)
Forward to Africa: A.D. 101 to 200
From this century on until the 19th century first the Aksumite and then the Christian Amhara were expansionist, seizing land and incorporating people. (Ref. 311)
Back to The Near East: 100 B.C. to 0
As direct voyages across the full width of the Arabian Sea had become routine, trade across the peninsula increased, linking Alexandria with India. The Himyarite Arabs absorbed Oataban about A.D. 50 and the Hadramaut about A.D. 100, while farther north the Nabatean Empire was conquered by Rome. Across the gulf from Ethiopia the Kingdom of Axum developed as a part of its Ethiopian counterpart, but on Arabic soil. At the end of the century Christianity gradually filtered into the peninsula. (Ref. 136)
Rome formally annexed Palestine in A.D. 6 and in A.D. 44 Judea was finally placed under direct rule of Roman procurators. The early century is the period of Jesus' teaching of universal love and forgiveness, but in general the Jews were not won over. The first of the Romano-Jewish Wars occurred in the last third of the century (A.D. 66) when the Jews, under John of Giscala, revolted against Roman misrule. It ended in a great battle (A.D. 70) with 600,000 to 1,000,000 Jews killed, their temple destroyed and the survivors forced to undergo another "dispersion". When the new Christians had failed to support this Jewish uprising, anti-Christian riots also broke out. After the Roman victory, the Sadducees disappeared entirely and the Pharisees, previously a sort of priest-elder group, now became the Rabbis, or teachers of the people. Overall at that time there were in the Roman population Jews in the ratio of 7%, a number twice that of the Jews in the United States in the Mid-twentieth century. (Ref. 8, 222)
This century was one of relative stability along the frontier dividing the Parthian and Roman Empires. Syria (although perhaps it was Egypt) was probably the site of the invention of a technique of glass blowing so that soon glass utensils were in general use all over the Mediterranean. Christianity came to Malula in the mountains just north of Damascus and still today some 1,500 Christians live there, speaking Western Aramic, the language of Jesus. Adjacent caves may have been used in this first century as places of refuge. (Ref. 136, 118)
Persia was the hub of the Parthian Empire. The people spoke Pahlavi and wrote in Aramic on parchment, but unfortunately not a line of the Parthian literature has been preserved. They were either too rich or too poor to indulge in literature, but they did excel in self-adornment, with both sexes curling their hair and enjoying elaborate clothing. They hunted, ate and drank abundantly, were brave warriors and usually honorable foes. Polygamy was practiced and women were veiled and secluded, with divorce easy for either sex. They were perhaps less civilized than the Achaemenid Persians but more honorable gentlemen than the Romans. They were tolerant of religions while they worshipped the sun and the moon and preferred the God Mithras to Ahura Mazda, much as later Christians preferred Christ to Yahveh. The Arsacid Dynasty ruled from just before the beginning of this century for two hundred years. (Ref. 48)
Most of Asia Minor was firmly under Roman rule with Commagene falling to them by A.D. 17. Armenia was divided and actually was another frontier between the Romans and the Parthians while the cultural orientation of that country was definitely toward Persia and Parthia. In the middle of the century, in Nero's reign in Rome, his legions had a ten year war with Parthia over Armenia. This ended in A.D. 63 with a scion of the Parthian royal house recognized as king of Armenia, although under Roman suzerainty. Seven years later Vespasian moved some eastern troops from Syria to forts on the upper Euphrates to consolidate the eastern frontier against Armenia and Parthia, thus paving the way for later expansion by Trajan. (Ref. 176, 136)
An interesting bit of trivia is that while fermented drinks had been known and used by mankind for thousands of years, the process of distilling was discovered only in this first century of the Christian era. The Gaelic uisge beatha was corrupted to "whiskey" and the Germanic Gebrannterwein or Brandewin meaning "burnt wine" was eventually Anglicized to "brandy". (Ref. 211)
A part of the Roman Empire.
The city-states of Greece continued to govern themselves although theoretically they were under Roman rule. They were poor by virtue of Roman taxation and were almost destitute morally, spiritually and physically. This was the-time of Plutarch and of Epictetus, the slave philosopher who combined the concepts of the Stoics and Cynics into many ideas paralleling the attitudes of early Christianity, including the Golden Rule. Thus Stoicism, originally the proud and scornful philosophy of aristocrats, found its final and most eloquent voice in a slave. Its doctrine of a final conflagration of the world, its rejection of all pleasures of the flesh, its humble surrender to the hidden will of God, all were preparing for the theology and ethics of Christianity. The age of the Cyrics paved the way for the Christian monks.
Corinth became the wealthiest city of Greece while Athens remained an intellectual center. Eleusis, across the Aegean Sea, became a religious center of sacraments and "mysteries". (Ref. 48)
The Roman province of Pannonia, the most southern portion of which comprises present day Yugoslavia, was established in A.D. 9 after defeat of the native Illyrians.
Moesia, which had never been penetrated by Grecian influence, was organized as a province in A.D. 44. The upper Balkans now showed increased activities of all kinds. There was considerable agriculture, mining and herding, as well as commerce with Asia through the port of Salonika in Macedonia. Great cities were built and roads constructed, such as the Via Egnatia, that ran across the Albanian alps to Salonika and Constantinople. In Dacia (Romania) there was a strong tribe of the same name who were never subdued by the Romans in this century. In A.D. 85 they surged out across the Danube into Moesia (now Serbia and part of Bulgaria) but were pushed back by Domitian. The Romans could go no further, however, as the Marcomanni and Quadi, who had occupied Bohemia west of Dacia, joined the fray and defeated Domitian. A peace was signed with the Dacian king, Decebalus, and he subsequently turned on the Germanic tribes and defeated them. Iazygians were also squeezing in between Quadi and Dacians and Roxolani were approaching Dacia from the east. In the area that they did control, the Romans found Thracians useful as soldiers, slaves and especially as gladiators. (Ref. 206, 48, 136, 171)
This was a century of some great and some lesser emperors of Rome in what has been called the "Silver Age" to indicate that it was not quite as good as the previous "Golden Age" under Octavian. The Julio-Claudian Dynasty continued under TIBERIUS Claudius Nero who reformed the government and law, advanced construction of public works, elevated the legal status of the provinces and re-subdued and Romanized Gaul and Britain. Tiberius' reign had been saved from any serious Parthian threat because of dynastic quarrels within Parthia. In A.D. 37 when Tiberius was dying he indicated as his successors his young grandson Tiberius Gemellus and the surviving son of Germanicus, Gauius Caesar Germanicus. The latter soon put the former to death and ruled alone as "CALIGULA", a probably insane, megalomaniac given to excesses and obscenities of all kinds. He was assassinated in 41 and Tiberius CLAUDIUS Drusus became emperor. His four wives were his undoing but he actually was a fairly able man and instituted some definite administrative improvements.
He was followed by Nero who began his reign well under the guidance of Seneca, but in spirit he was an actor and had to play the monarch in the grand manner. He was recklessly cruel to the aristocrats, but generous to the poor, with the possible exception of the new Christians who were first persecuted about A.D. 64, when Rome was burned.
Thereafter followed the Flavian Dynasty. Vespasian was a man of sense, ability and honor who directed the war against Judea and established the first system of state education. The last of this line was Domitian (A.D. 81 - 96) who managed the flourishing empire well during a great age of construction. At the end, however, like many others, he became very cruel, deified himself, indulged in sexual discrepancies and became paranoid about possible conspiracies against him. Throughout this age there was a decay of the native religion in Rome and the multiple gods of Jove, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter and others began to give way to the Stoic philosophy. (See GREECE, above)
We should mention some of the non-political figures of this century. Seneca was born in Spain in 4 B.C. and became a copious writer, tutor to and later financial backer to Nero. Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23 - 79) was a great mind of the day, but his book Natural History with dissertations on humans, animals, metals, chemistry, medicine and astronomy, was actually a monument to Roman ignorance. He also compiled an encyclopedia citing 150 Roman and 400 Greek scholars, before he was killed in the eruption of the volcano Vesuvius in A.D. 79. Of interest also is De Materia Medica by a-Greek botanist, Pedanios Dioscorides, who had served as a military surgeon in Nero's army. He detailed the properties of some 600 medicinal plants in this text, which remained an authoritative guide for 1,500 years. (Ref. 222) At about the same time a patrician layman, Celsus, tried to summarize all knowledge. Only eight of his many books have survived, the De Medicina, and even these were lost for centuries. (Ref. 125)
As noted above it was in the year 79 that Mt. Vesuvius on the Bay of Naples erupted after 16 years of violent surrounding earthquakes. The cities of Heraculaneum and Pompeii were buried and thousands were killed. At 95 a severe form of malaria appeared in the farming areas surrounding Rome and became endemic there for the next 500 years. At that time ten aqueducts supplied Rome with 250