Milton Public Library

Death of Augustus, his conversion to Christ, Colin Kirk

eng

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non fiction

Death of Augustus

electronic resource

dictionaries

Colin Kirk

his conversion to Christ

Myth and the Church Augustus Caesar, Son of God, started the Christian calendar. Moreover, he also contributed massively to the persona of Christ, to Christianity and to the Christian Church. Indeed, Jesus, a Jewish prophet, was transformed in the process to become the God of Christian Europe. Augustus, the Godfather of Europe, spawned a religion alien to Rome and the world of Rome he had created. This was not the work of Augustus himself. However, Augustus was the luminary of the Roman state religion before he was transformed into the second person of the Trinity. The processes involved in these changes are followed through the rest four centuries of the Christian era. A brief look at developments since highlight the Christian churches continued innocence on the western European knowledgebase. Here you can check out your own mindset, against factors that are still crazily inertial. The cover illustration is of a restored cult gure of Augustus, one of thousands destroyed by Christian zealots let loose in 395. Most of the hood of the toga of Pontifex Maximus is missing. This example is at Thyatira, to where John sent a copy of his Revelations. All seven churches of the Apocalypse were in the Roman province of Asia. Just off the coast is the island of Samos, where Augustus lived when he was in the area. Patmos, where John wrote his Revelations during his exile there, is a bit further out in the Aegean Sea. The reverse of an Augustan aureus, on the spine, shows the winged victory standing on the globe that Augustus had installed as centerpiece of the Roman Curia. It was carried at his funeral to lead the procession from the forum to his mausoleum. At the end of the fourth century it was removed from the Curia and reinstated three times. Finally Ambrosius, Bishop of Milan, insisted it be taken out and utterly destroyed. Rome and the world of Rome collapsed shortly afterwards. Augustus last 100 days were extremely busy. He was supposed to have suffered from the weariness of old age before then. But after official functions in Rome he went to Capri for a few days, then on to the Games in Naples, where he indulged in horse play with the athletes and on to Beneventum to review his armies, before they set off to war. His death at the old family home at Nola is well documented, down to time and day. It's the year that's in dispute here. Christian historians strove to prove Jesus was the Messiah by his date of birth. They also wanted to know when the Second Coming of Christ would occur. In the process they had to alter the date of Augustus death. Much was destroyed to cover their tracks. Fortunately enough remains in the debris to reconstruct the real chronology of the period. Surprisingly much else remained to be unearthed. Cicero, not Herod, ordered the massacre of the innocents. Wise men from the east visited Augustus. It's all there for the digging

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