World history · Roman Empire
Trajan, Pliny, and the Legal Status of Christians
c. AD 112
Around AD 112, the Roman governor Pliny the Younger wrote to Emperor Trajan asking how he should handle Christians brought before his court, and Trajan's reply — punish the defiant, but don't hunt Christians down or accept anonymous accusations — became the practical legal standard for how Rome treated the church for decades.
The event
By the early second century, Christianity had spread widely enough across the empire that Roman officials increasingly had to decide, in practical terms, what to do about it. Pliny the Younger, serving as governor of the province of Bithynia-Pontus in Asia Minor, found so many Christians brought before him — and was so unsure of standard procedure — that he wrote directly to the emperor Trajan for guidance. His letter is remarkable for what it reveals of ordinary Christian life at the time: Pliny reports that Christians met before dawn 'to sing a hymn to Christ as to a god' and bound themselves by oath to avoid theft, adultery, and breach of faith — hardly the description of dangerous criminals, even as Pliny still executed those who refused, under interrogation, to recant.
Trajan's brief reply set an influential precedent: Christians should not be actively sought out, anonymous accusations should be disregarded, but anyone formally accused and proven to be a Christian who refused to recant and offer sacrifice to the gods should be punished. This 'don't-hunt-but-don't-spare' policy left the church in a precarious, unpredictable position for decades — legally vulnerable to persecution, yet not subject to the kind of empire-wide, systematic manhunt that would come later under emperors like Decius and Diocletian.
Church tradition also places the martyrdom of Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, within Trajan's reign — condemned to be thrown to wild beasts in Rome's amphitheater, and remembered for the series of letters he wrote to churches along the route of his final journey, urging them toward unity and eager, even joyful, faithfulness unto death.
Dating
Pliny's correspondence with Trajan is usually dated to around AD 112, during Pliny's governorship of Bithynia-Pontus (roughly AD 110-113); the exact year within that span is not certain but does not affect the substance of the exchange.
Other witnesses
- Pliny the Younger, Letters 10.96-97
- Ignatius of Antioch, Letters
Further reading
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