I have been listening to the History of Rome podcast recently.
An outline of the reforms that Julian wanted to make to the traditional Hellenic cults is described, but not to the degree that I would like.
As such, I was wondering if anyone here would be able to provide me with any reputable sources/book suggestions that really cover what Julians religious reforms were in detail.
Bumping for interest. Seemd like the last true Roman.
I would too like to know.
>Seemd like the last true Roman.
He wasn't really a traditional Roman, since he favored Greek over Roman gods.
He also was a Neoplatonist and grew a beard. Obviously was larping as a Greek.
Quite pitiful how short his reign was and how quickly the Roman religion was extinguished in Rome.
He did nothing wrong. Except for getting himself killed.
Ok. Thanks for explaining that. So the last classical antiquity champion. Something like that.
Bump.
>He did nothing wrong
Yes he did, he left the true religion
Get a copy of Ammianus Marcellinus. Do yourself a favour.
He was still a fairly amazing general, a skilled administrator, and still one of the most downplayed of the Roman Emperors. [spoiler]Aurelian still a best[/spoiler]
does it matter? He was so aloof, he literally tried to revive the Principate model and empower the senate. It's best he died early and did not live long enough to become a villain.
This.
I'm aware of Marcellinus.
However I was under the impression that his work on Julian was more biographical, then any sort of detailed exploration of Julians religious reforms.
I'm personally very interested in what a 4th century take on a centralized, Neoplatonic, Christian influenced Hellenic faith would look like.
Some small detail is given in a 'History of Rome' episode on Julian, so I would imagine that the host would have sourced that from somewhere.
>empower the senate.
Is there anything wrong with that? He could have ended the whole military usurpation model of political power transfer.
the senate was hopelessly out of touch and had been for centuries, which is why the empire happened in the first place
I personally think that there was hope for the senate.
Maybe if Julian had been in power for 50+ years he would have been able to fix the many systemic problems with it and successfully re-empower it.
Doubtful, nothing the imperial era senate did or tried to do seemed very successful
As an institution the senate just wasn't equipped to deal with the empire
>book recommendation thread
>16 posts
>not a single book has been mentioned
Do people on Veeky Forums actually read books?
Anyway:
Julian's gods: religion and philosophy in the thought and action of Julian the Apostate by Rowland Smith
Julian: Philosopher and Emperor, and the Last Struggle of Paganism Against Christianity by Alice Green
Well I would put that down to the fact that they had been an almost totally irrelevant institution for generations by the 4th century.
I think that if Julian had 'cleaned house' when it come to the senators themselves.
Getting rid of those that only used that position as an empty title and replaced them with educated people that had an actual desire to govern - we could have seen the return of a useful senate.
Maybe even a full return to a principate model.
Thank you.
I was getting worried that I was the only one with an interest in this subject.
Happen to have a digital copy of any of those?
He first recognized the weakness of the old system of paganism where every town had their local customs and traditions, and from there started making changes. First he tried to create a centralized pagan priesthood similar to Christianity, then he acknowledged that there were too many pagan gods and people couldn't be bothered to remember or worship all of them so he tried to combine them into one super Sun Deity who would be the protector of the Roman Empire.
So whereas in ancient times all the people of Rome had worshiped their own several local gods in their own local ways, Julian's new paganism would give a monotheistic Roman paganism to all the people of Rome in a standardized Roman way.
Thanks, that is pretty helpful.
>So what role did the emperor have if any?
>Who was the head of the religion?
>How was Neoplatonism integrated?
>Where the 'lesser' gods just demoted like in Zoroastrianism or eliminated all together?
>Was this 'Sun Deity' Sol Invictus?
>Was there any sort of central religious scripture somewhat analogous to the bible?
>What is your source for this information?
I am not an expert on this but from my working knowledge
The imperial cult was heavily associated with Sol Invictus.
The Emperor was as Pontifex Maximus, and the high priests were his chosen members of the College of Pontiffs.
Plato's Timaeus was basically the book of Genesis for the new religion.
He wanted to preserve their worship but either failed to do so or gave up.
Yes
It may have been heavily inspired by already existing Platonic texts, but I don't think it had a Bible.
Gibbon's Decline and Fall/John Julius Norwich's Byzantium: The Early Centuries/ wikipedia mostly, very entry level stuff
What did Julian, as a Neoplatonist , think it Gnosticism?
Thank you so much for that.
That is exactly the sort of information I'm looking for.
I don't know about Julian but Neoplatonists generally were disdainful of Gnosticism.
Plotinus called them imbeciles.
If he wanted to preserve the old ways of Rome, why not make the chief deity of his paganism Zeus/Dyeuspater/Jupiter?
He didn't. The "old ways" is a neopagan meme.