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“Eusebius of Caesarea - Persecution under Nero and the martyrdom of Peter and Paul - original Greek Text with English translation”
From Historia Ecclesiastica, 2.25.
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Relevant
books Eusebius studies and translations Several also below TEXTS & TRANSLATIONS
History of the Church Andrew Louth ed. ----- Cameron and Hall ----- -----
W. J. Ferrar -----
Eusebii Pamphili Evangelicae Praeparations, Tomus I (Greek Edition) -----
Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea - the Ecclesiastical History and the Martyrs of Palestine. Two Volumes ----- -----
Notley and Safrai ----- STUDIES Eusebius, Christianity and Judaism Harold W. Attridge ----- Constantine and Eusebius Timothy Barnes ----- Glenn Chesnut ----- Robert Grant ----- Eusebius of Caesarea Against Paganism Aryeh Kofsky ----- Eusebius of Caesarea and the Arian Crisis C. Luibheid ----- Christ as Mediator: A Study of the Theologies of Eusebius of Caesarea,
Marcellus of Ancyra, and Athanasius of Alexandria ----- Wallace-Hadrill
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When the government of Nero was now firmly
established, he began to plunge into unholy pursuits, and armed himself even
against the religion of the God of the universe. To describe the greatness of
his depravity does not lie within the plan of the present work. As there are
many indeed that have recorded his history in most accurate narratives, every
one may at his pleasure learn from them the coarseness of the man’s
extraordinary madness, under the influence of which, after he had accomplished
the destruction of so many myriads without any reason, he ran into such
blood-guiltiness that he did not spare even his nearest relatives and dearest
friends, but destroyed his mother and his brothers and his wife, with very many
others of his own family as he would private and public enemies, with various
kinds of deaths. But with all these things this particular in the catalogue of
his crimes was still wanting, that he was the first of the emperors who showed
himself an enemy of the divine religion. The Roman Tertullian is likewise a
witness of this. He writes as follows: “Examine your records. There you will
find that Nero was the first that persecuted this doctrine, particularly then
when after subduing all the east, he exercised his cruelty against all at Rome.
We glory in having such a man the leader in our punishment. For whoever knows
him can understand that nothing was condemned by Nero unless it was something of
great excellence.” Thus publicly announcing himself as the first among God’s
chief enemies, he was led on to the slaughter of the apostles. It is, therefore,
recorded that Paul was beheaded in Rome itself, and that Peter likewise was
crucified under Nero. This account of Peter and Paul is substantiated by the
fact that their names are preserved in the cemeteries of that place even to the
present day. It is confirmed likewise by Caius, a member of the Church, who
arose under Zephyrinus, bishop of Rome. He, in a published disputation with
Proclus, the leader of the Phrygian heresy, speaks as follows concerning the
places where the sacred corpses of the aforesaid apostles are laid: “But I can
show the trophies of the apostles. For if you will go to the Vatican or to the
Ostian way, you will find the trophies of those who laid the foundations of this
church.” And that they both suffered martyrdom at the same time is stated by
Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, in his epistle to the Romans, in the following
words: “You have thus by such an admonition bound together the planting of Peter
and of Paul at Rome and Corinth. For both of them planted and likewise taught us
in our Corinth. And they taught together in like manner in Italy, and suffered
martyrdom at the same time.” |
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