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The triumph of Christianity

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Many early Christians violently opposed Paul's approach, and after his death at the hands of the Romans in about AD 67, few proselytised quite so radically. But Paul's version eventually became dominant, and this was because it successfully appealed to the most people.

The rise of Christianity
• Early Christianity proved very popular with the lower echelons of Roman society. It provided them with gains in practical matters, status and present and future survival.

• This enhanced survival was quite real. Among the early Christians, there were higher rates of fertile marriages, and because they tended to band together for mutual support, fewer of them died from hunger and disease.

• Christianity was difficult to stamp out because of its flexibility, portability and in-built theology of martyrdom and resistance. Even the aggressive persecution that affected the early Christians from time to time simply confirmed them in their beliefs.

• A sufficient number of higher-echelon people found the new religion attractive enough to give periodic injections of significant resources and protection.

In AD 312, on his way to battle, the emperor Constantine is said to have had a vision, seeing the Christian cross in the sky accompanied by the legend: 'By this, conquer!' (He did.) The following year, in the Edict of Milan, toleration of Christianity was officially sanctioned.

The demise of paganism
The end of paganism was not sudden or even rapid. It persisted well into the 5th century and beyond, even after the decisive triumph of Christianity at the highest level of Roman society.

Paganism was particularly popular in rural areas, and many of the élite continued to regard Christianity as unspeakably vulgar. In fact, one emperor – Julian the Apostate – declared himself a pagan on his accession in AD 361. But he only lasted two years, and his successor Jovian restored state support to the Christian Church.

But paganism did gradually disappear, for a number of reasons:

• It remained largely a temple system and hence was vulnerable to the destruction of these sacred buildings, and to the diminishing ability of the élite to endow and support them.

• This money disappeared into the temples themselves and was not redistributed to the needy among their supporters – a Christian practice that attracted many potential converts.

• Paganism attempted to deliver many of the same services as Christianity: freedom from sickness, demonic oppression, anxiety and so on. However, paganism was a 'user pays' system trying to compete with the Christians' free one.

• Women, while not enjoying equality, were nevertheless often seen to be better treated and to have more scope within Christianity.

As Christianity increased its grip, it began to persecute the pagans and to attempt to remove all trace of them from the Western world. At the same time, the Christian Church – now the official state religion throughout the West – was pouring its money into buildings and shrines and so increasingly resembling its former rival.

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