The Power of Plagues. Irwin W. Sherman

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The Power of Plagues - Irwin W. Sherman


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but these individuals were neither moral nor spiritual. In time the emperor himself became a god, and so loyalty had to be sworn to him.

      The rise and consolidation of Christianity may have also been affected by disease. The expectations of the poor Romans were that with Christ’s second coming they would be freed from their rich masters. Christianity, unlike paganism, preached care of the sick as a recognized religious duty. Those who were nursed back to health felt gratitude and commitment to the faith, and this served to strengthen Christian churches at a time when other institutions were failing. Another positive feature of Christianity was that the teaching of the faith made life meaningful even in the face of sudden death since it was perceived as a release from an individual’s suffering. The capacity of Christian doctrine to cope with the psychic shock of epidemic disease made it attractive for the populations of the Roman Empire. Paganism, on the other hand, was less effective in dealing with the randomness of death. In time the Romans came to accept the Christian view. Rome became the headquarters of Christianity, and in A.D. 337, with the conversion of Emperor Constantine, Christianity became the church of the empire.

      The Antonine Plague

      The Antonine plague (A.D. 164 to 189) is also associated with the physician Galen of Pergamum (A.D. 129-216), whose ideas dominated medicine until the 16th century. Galen’s hero was Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.), who had laid down the principles of medicine in Greece. Galen was first appointed surgeon to the gladiators in Asia Minor and then moved to Rome, where he practiced medicine. Though Galen was a skilled anatomist, an experimentalist, and a searcher for new drugs, when faced with the plague he fled Rome. He was, however, recalled by Emperor Marcus Aurelius to Rome, where he died. But before his death he left a description of the plague’s symptoms: high fever, inflammation of the mouth and throat, thirst, diarrhea, and a telltale sign: pustules on the skin that appeared after 9 days. Even today precisely what this plague was remains a mystery, but most historians suspect that this was the first record of a smallpox epidemic. Some believe either that smallpox moved into the Roman Empire with the legions returning from Mesopotamia or else that the Huns carried it with them from Mongolia and then on to Rome.

      The Cyprian Plague

      The plague of Cyprian strengthened Christianity. Cyprian wrote:

      Many of us are dying in this mortality, that is many of us are being free from the world. This mortality is a bane to Jews and pagans and enemies of Christ; to the servants of God it is a salutary departure. … Without any discrimination the just are dying with the unjust. … The just are called to refreshment, the unjust are carried off to torture; protection is more quickly given to the faithful; the punishment to the faithless. … This plague and pestilence which seems horrible and deadly, searches out the justice of each and every one.

      This ability of Christianity to deal with the horrors and hardships of a plague made church doctrine an attractive alternative to the stoic and pagan philosophies, which were impersonal, uncompassionate, and ineffectual in explaining the randomness of death due to disease, and so served to strengthen its hold on the Roman peoples. The attraction of Christianity for the people of Rome not only altered their current religious and cultural practices but also influenced future social and political development.


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