The role of the oracles during the Great Persecution

Abstract The persecution of Christians under the Tetrarchy involved a series of oracles delivered to the imperial court. The course of the events reflects a change in the political elite's attitude: the emperors – beside more respectable sanctuaries, such as Didyma – also relied on oracles with a moderate prestige (Daphne, a suburb of Antioch) and methods whose legitimacy was questionable at the time (theurgical rituals performed by Theotecnus, curator of Antioch), thereby reducing political control over oracles. The oracular responses suggested that Christians posed a threat to the channels of sacred communication. This could lead to a moral panic, making these prophecies the actual triggers of the persecution under the Tetrarchy, and not only a pretext to cover the political goals of the emperors. What is more, the tetrarchs let obscure, second-tier sanctuaries influence governmental policy. In the context of the oracles and the political communication, the traditional motifs of miasma and pax deorum remained present. Christian responses represented two markedly different stances: (1) according to Eusebius, pagan diviners were charlatans, (2) according to Lactantius and others, demons acted in the pagan oracles, and thus the pagan accusations were true in some sense: the presence of Christians indeed repelled the demons, proving the power of God and Christian rituals. Thus, paradoxically, this accusation could have contributed to the final triumph of Christianity.