Saints and Legions; Julian the Apostrate

Do. Do. Do. Do. Audio. Very good to be with you again.

But today we still talk about one of the strange episodes and early Christian or late Roman history the reign of Julian called of costs in Christian annals Julian the Apostate not the immediate successor of Constantine the Great Successor to Constantine following won the reign of Constantine sun Constantia Constantine died in 337 A.D. was baptized a strangely and heretical Christian and airy and Christian on his deathbed and he said Let there be no more ambiguity. According to Eusebius the Christian historian who was his father confessor let there be no more ambiguity and he was baptised and airy and Christian not an

Orthodox Christian and buried in the Church of the Twelve Apostles. A Christian burial and named ECE couple stole also equal to the Apostles the 13 Apostles yet after his reign anarchy and wall came to the Empire as it came so often he had three sons that Constantine Constantine the second the eldest. Who inherited from his father the Weston off of the Empire. Gaul now France of cos. Britain up to the wall. Spain. A young son Constanza Only 15 year old on his father's death was given Italy and the island's provinces to the law. Not a common

illiterate come which is the present Yugoslavia and the province of Africa had on them all of them coast of Africa. Constantia justs was the third son probably the most able of the three and Constantia us was given the key provinces to the east of Egypt Syria and Palestine. Asia Minor to the Persian front with the always aggressive need Persians under a very able monarch named the King of Kings or oppressing with heavy cavalry and the Persians on the Roman front. Three divisions of the Empire three sons. How strangely and terribly the army ferrying us so often it happened in the past that civil war might

take place. Murda Murda all the relatives of Constantine the Great except the three sons murdered them out of hand and Constantia ce the second son was the only son present in the capital of Constantinople and whether he acquiesced to the Smetana whether he meant it was false to do a position what he had to acquiesce we don't know. The fact remains that his conscience always hurt him and he always attributed to his child lessness to this murder of his relatives which took place in 337 when his father died. Well the righteously or unrighteously we don't know cos rightly on rightly This was his feeling and he felt that all of his life a dedicated man can stand just so inclined toward cruelty. A good general

and like his two brothers Constantine and Constans a Christian. Now I realize fully that Christianity Today and Christianity then two different models. The fact that these men were Christians at least baptized Christians does not prevent them from carrying out some enormous cruelties. This is part of the era and we have to accept it as part of the era. Very briefly only two two members of Constantine the Great's family were left alive aside from the three sons after the great massacre and they were the two sons of Constantine's younger brother Julius Constantia Yes one was a semi-invalid named god or goddess and got about 14 to 15 years old at this time. It was felt because of his health to be no danger

to the regime. And so they spat in and the other was goddesses younger brother Julian. A mother had died when Julian was born and 330 to 88 approximately we think that was his date of birth. They'd been brought up of cost by the usual royal governesses both rather sensitive lonely lads apparently got lost turns out to be a right psychopath when he comes and Apollo later in life. Possibly Julian was too one can hardly blame them. Very strange and rather shocking upbringing. Naturally again with three songs ruling and Constantine in the West Conn stands in the center on Constantia in the east. You had civil war. This was almost part of the Roman picture just still a tremendous position of the Emperor had yet to be established.

Constantine marched to the east against his now 17 year old brother Konstanz comes Constantine was ambushed and killed in a cavalry skirmish in the Alpine passes and Konstanz inherited Italy and all of the West Britain and Gaul and Spain and Africa come his brother's domain and his own. This was in 338 339 a deed. Within a few Yeah up to Constanza who turned out to be in spite of his youth an excellent soldier. Within a few yells after he took control of the entire West he by the way seated or yielded the capital which he'd held as part of the subtle but Constantinople was rather constant just for that brother's support. So Constantia snow has Constantinople within a few young Constanza who turned out to be an excellent soldier against the various

German peoples pushing against the front there as they were doing at this time. A rebellion broke out in the West led by the son of the slave a professional soldier whose Roman name was magnetic. We don't know what his real name was he probably was not Italian. The taken the Latin name the Roman name a bag a general and a slave sunless could have been the Roman army and Mag meant just the purple in the West raised his people the army all turned with him against Konstanz whose personal excesses. Unfortunately had ruined his reign. Konstanz was ambushed and killed in the south. The goal by a Moorish cavalry attached to his army Moorish cavalry from North Africa serving up in Gaul but also happened in the Roman army and this left a pretender on the throne in the West and only

Constantia watching softball on his Persians in the east and the Persians were pressing at all times on the Eastern Front a constant pressure of a major civilized enemy Constand just said just as the enemy of my brothers the Persians are the enemy of the Empire I must watch the Persians very dedicated very high mountain. Finally Of cos he turned and marched West and met Magnan justs all the hay up. Now the city of Sir me among the sea. But the bottle of Marsala will sa and there are the armies of the East. No utilizing a heavy cavalry a heavy Lance. Cavalry of some 3000 strong a brigade modeled after the Persian Persian heavy cavalry these are the cut to flock toy the heavy armed cut the front means

covered over with a fully armed male chivalry who later want to dominate the battlefields of Europe in the Middle Ages this these are their predecessors arriving on the scene. That he completely destroyed the armies of Magneto committed suicide and that was the end of the pretend goes attempt to take over the top of the Empire. Helo Constantia CE Emperor from Britain surprised. The German tribesmen ranks ship Mavi Burgundians Saxons pressing down upon the front tails. This was the time of vortex and change the Gothic peoples were on the march and the Visigoth than Ostrogoths your Burgundians and vandals all were pressing down the eastern part of Europe pushing all West

Germans ahead of the Germans in other words and all the new Europe was a vortex for the movement of the peoples of the tribes enemies pressing on the Rhine and the Danube enemies pressing out of Persia. No children no sons and so he brought the last survivors of his family out of exile. The last survivals Julian and got us. They had lived a very strange life. After the murders of their father and uncles and cousins in 337 338 then festa been placed on the other side of the strait from Constantinople Nika but where Julian a very sensitive lot as I have said very scholarly a rather fanciful young boy had come out of the influence of his mother's old Tuta a Scythian or they called him a city and that means a Celt Russian and Iranian nomad by

ancestry whether he was a Scythian or not we don't know but they called him a Scythian with the Greek name of Mardonius or recall Persian name Mardonius Mardonius a classical scholar that educated the young prince of the great classics. You've read Plato. It read out of startle it read all of the great writings of the past the beautiful writings of classical Greece become totally imbued with the myths and the legends the gods of the ancient world. After all has a lonely little boy reading with his two and a god. When Constantia just said they had been removed Julian and got us to a fortress and capital a fortress called McCullum there they live like the little lame prince in the old old story we heard as children all here on Capitol

isolated with only servants around them. Julian writes It was like being a Persian slave but now with the death of all the relatives Constand just turn and bring these young relatives out of their exile Gospel's married to Constantia and rule rather briefly in Syria. For young man he was Papa logical and very badly indeed and finally was arrested after his excesses and or gays and executed for his sins by Constantia ce. That leaves only Julian Julian in the meantime had lived in Constantinople. As a student at the university what had become just a boy in his late teens. The toll sed the various sometimes what might be called a hot chariot set. These were the young

exquisite the young officers the young nobleman the smart set of the capital and Julian a very charming young man from all accounts was able to captivate their imaginations and Constantia just fed him. The Empress a kindly woman persuaded her husband to have him sent to Athens and there in Athens a very center of your pagan school still this is the Christian year I grant you but the pagan schools in Athens and Antioch and rolled particularly was still going strong. There he attended the university the scholar. After all a scholar can be very harmless. He also could be as has been proved in the past an excellent soldier when need arises and probably in Athens Judea and threw aside his Christianity which he never really followed. I was initiated into the mysteries.

Probably went through that bloodbath we've talked about already the total volume which the neophyte descended into the pit and the Bull was killed over the pit and he bathed in the blood. We still say bathed in the blood of the Lamb and certain Christian concepts out of the ancient custom. Probably he was bathed in the blood of a bull around which cleansed him of his sins and made him a new man according to the beliefs. In this particular aspect of ancient religion Judea and then became a neo Platonist that the last flare up of pagan philosophy and repudiated his Christianity. And 355 a deed his cousin Constancia just brought him up to Constantinople. A sole survivor of the royal family. No children of his own. And then he persuaded him to accept the purple as a Caesar he needed a man of his own blood. And Julian was made a Caesar. In other words a junior opera.

Lifted on the shield of the ancient German custom having permeated the Roman army by this time lifted on a shield by his troops in front of the Emperor and was sent with part of the Imperial God to take all the very dangerous front. Well the refugee soldiers of magnetic just while wandering as bandits or German tribes over the Rhine from Tehran Gaul one of the most civilized areas the Empire had become a cockpit to war and difficulties and banditry and blood. How the young scholar a secret pagan a secret non-Christian what he was only in his early twenties mind you will set up him with a battalion of the Imperial God marched over the Alpine POS is and march north to loot of the proto CII the modern city of Paris was named for the tribe that inhabited the area the party's Lutetia of the powerhouse that East told the front with the German tribes were pressing across the Rhine.

Probably to his own amazement the Scala turned out to be a soldier and a real soldier. Blood will tell I suppose. He came of a long line of fighting men and warriors and very brief. The lad in his twenties fresh from the halls of the universities of Constantinople in Athens the secret pagan and ethical moral theist was a pagan in the sense of Zeus. Jupiter and Juno and the rest this is an ethical theist in the pocket of many ethical moral theist but not a Christian. You worship the summa the highest God and the pantheon of all the other gods too. That's part of his religion and Judea in the pagan marches east and defeats the Germans very badly indeed the various German tribes coming across the re-establish to patrol fleet on the Rhine setup.

An excellent government in Gaul reduced taxes to prevent chills loved and he made his headquarters. As many young intellectuals have made sense in his novel new and beloved city of well we'll call it power us of Lou to see of the put as the guy with his headquarters probably but pretty close to what Milton Domhnall stands today on the eve of the CTA. That's what the government's policy was made his headquarters on the eve of the CTA and powerless and govern Gaul and govern Gaul and Spain. Very well. It was there. Remember that Mercy had been fought between bagmen and Constantia and forty thousand men had died all Romans all Roman soldiers on both sides of a civil war south invaded from the East the Persian king swept into Asia Minor captured the city of media.

But she wanted to hail pressed over this area head as a meteorite and pressed across the lands of the Tigris and Euphrates into Roman territory. I want all troops to hold him and can stand just very properly called on the legions of the West and sent a message to his young cousin and I want all of the auxiliaries and three hundred men from every god like Legion. I want them sent east as rapidly as possible we have to stop the Persians but remember what this meant. This meant these Gallic Lodz and German Lodz and British lads that leave behind their families the winds that children and go permanently to the east and front in this tremendous army of migration which occurred all the time across the Roman Empire. Julian obeyed his cousin. The legions were brought down and camped outside of the palace.

Julian addressed the officers and troops told them to be loyal to the Imperial cousin. He entertained at his governor's palace and even to see today the offices of the Legions and during the night while the officers with the troops rebelled and started shouting guilty on US import duty on us Augustus the Emperor and the officers took it up and they brought the purple to Judea and the lesson went to his room and spent the night wrestling with his conscience and his gods with the symbols they ass and the money he said it was the will of God and the crown name with an acquittal fals torque the gold color of an eagle bare rock and lifted him on their shields and a gun in barbaric fashion and Judean was a rebel and I'm proud you marched East against his cousin. We march down to the saucers of the

Danube sees the Danube fleet. What down the Danube to the Suki the iron gates which he seized in the Danube now rolls Constand just marched against him from the Persian front and on his way home comes down just died of fever and Judean first at Serbia on the side declared himself a pagan and his troops declared themselves pagans with them most of them Judea in the pagan Judea in the heathen Judea in the non-Christian Judea in the fighting intellectual marched into his capitol unopposed and was crowned as I'm proud in the last year and strange of his reign take place. The Christian church have been given special privileges he took these away. He opened up the pagan temples he established a pagan church on the model of the Christian church with himself. If you wish. Patriarch or Pope he was the

Pontifex Maximus of this new pagan church to introduce to the people to explain to the people the deeper ethical truths behind ethical paganism behind ethical. Even as a non Christianity it is in its own way had a great deal of dignity and beauty as Judean explained it was very provocative to certain intellectuals who failed this religion from the east. This religion as Julian called it of. The Galilean peasant called him Galileans and held him in contempt the Eastern religion which had come into the Roman empire of Christianity established a pagan church and gave open all the pagan temples and yet this wasn't the old paganism of the Roman Empire the Greeks. It was a strange as it's been said mosaic of neoplatonic philosophy of Oriental mysticism of the old Greek mysteries and it didn't appeal. The people didn't accept it.

He brought back to Constantinople all the exiled bishops off the docks area and there'd been a tremendous conflict in that except the nation and the Council of Nicea fame of the Athanasian Creed and all the natures and exiled Malay said rather cynically grumbling all this will pass and all this did. Julian having established his pagan church and that's what it was modeled on the Christian Church the Christians no longer have preference went down for his next great effort he was going to be a Marcos a radius the great philosopher Emperor. He was going to be an Alexander the Great and cockup Persia for once and all he marched to Antioch the powerhouse of the east now we have an excellent salsa Ammianus Marcellinus was an awful Sonny's Roman army and untie a key and Ammianus Marcellinus who writes beautiful Latin tells us all about this.

He marches down to Antioch. We might call it the motto of the east a sophisticated city still a center of pagan philosophy. And then the Anti of Keane's expected with a heathen pagan Ampara pick up homes and processions fun and games if you wish. Joy and laughter and all the rest of it and it turned out to be an ethical pagan a puritanical pagan who came in and did his best to put down the Christian church. You remove the bones of St. bibelots from the church in the precinct of Daphne and the Christians burned down the pagan temple. He tried to control the grain trade on a thriving black market grew up. He finally when his critics the satirists who were the political cartoonists of the day started writing funny diatribes amusing diatribes cartooning him in public. He wrote something called the simple God he descended

to the level and the law of the Emperor rang from Antioch to the British wall. You drain the couple but he was a laughing stock. The young emperor a disappointed disillusioned his pagan church had not worked. The Christians ignored it. Most of the Empire ignored it at least could conquer Persia. He marched up to toss us Paul's city. Oddly an anomaly right. The St. Paul's city and they're with an army of 65000 man march down to camp to testify on the capital of the Persian Empire. He divided his army in hot. Why we don't quite know 35000 will hold the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates probably a flight with 35000 man and some Bedouin Arab cavalry he pressed down the Euphrates River. With his army and an

attendant fleet of about a thousand transports from some what 20 major warships crossed at the Nore Homolka of the canal that used to join the two rebels took Trajan's canal land above testified on and invaded the Persian empire with 35000 Roman regulars the legionary army. He drove the Persians away from the riverbank and then in a tremendous flamboyant just Joe which has no precedent the wall to prevent his own retreat. He burned his ships. This is a quixotic gesture that the super Valerie Emperor burning as ships so he can retreat burned his ships except ten and marched out into the doesn't meet the Persians that Linus's who was with the Army tells us what happened. They didn't see the Persians along the horizon in the early morning they saw a dust cloud rolling over the

deficit. The Persians all cavalry heavy cavalry and light cavalry lances and mounted Ochoa's riding up and they could see the twinkle of the Lance points in the dust cloud. The Persians attacked Julian's Ami was driven back went into a circle and Judean rioting followed to rally around a god attack lifted his rights and the throne spit took him out of the armpit. The Persians carried bulls or alliances they were not only the Christian cavalry carried militants but isn't always the suspect and even then it was a Christian soldier. Carried back and I did his tent with great dignity and all of that and just as awful Nations said of all that as well just as if you never had been. See.