CC 302 
Lecture 19 Images
Updated 4/11/2011

Lecture 19: Rome as a multi-cultural world

First: Finish up Lect. 18, plus one more item:

The problem of historical relativism: the Christian ethics of submissiveness

I. Some general considerations on race and culture in Rome

1. a. Romans always a mixed people

   b. slavery and intermarriage

   c. social vs. cultural prejudice

   d. political vs. cultural imperialism

   e. the initiative for acculturation; municipia

   f. laissez-faire vs. indifference

   g. blacks and others seen as strangers (externi) rather than inferiors

II. The voice of the Roman Bubba: Juvenal, Satire 3 (Course Packet, pp. 179-189)

Intermission (maybe): The other side of Roman justice (from The Passion of the Christ, 2004)
Rated R for graphic violence

III. Mithraism

A. historical development; Zarathustra, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman; dualism

B. the myth of Mithras; December 25; Sol

C. Rome and the soldiers; 7 grades of initiation

D. cult; sacramentum, taurobolium ;"baptism"

E. shrines; symbolism: Cautes, Cautopates

F. the revisionist view; VFW rather than religion

G. strengths and weaknesses

Please bring Course Packet today (we'll go over pp. 155-161 and 171-189) and pick up Test #2.