The Judaeo-Christian Basis of the Civilizing Process
Benny J Peiser
Liverpool John Moores University
Introduction
Ever since Norbert Elias pubished the English translation of his influencial work on The Civilizing Process1, scholars have regarded the development of modern sports as exemplary of the gradual humanisation of European cultures since the close of the Middle Ages.
Elias tried to explain the gradual introduction of more `civilised' forms of behaviour among European populations at the close of and subsequent to the Middle Ages as the consequence of centralisation, state-formation and parlamentarisation. The religious revolutions in 16th and 17th centuries Europe, however, which had a dramatic impact on moral attitudes, pastimes and sporting behaviour, were conspicuously passed over by Elias. His studies also failed to acknowledge the Judaeo-Christian basis of Western civilization and the European civilizing process.
In this paper, I intend to shed light on the moral foundations of Western civilization and will attempt to explain the suppression of pagan (blood) sports in light of Judaeo-Christian ethics. I will demonstrate that the so-called civilizing process in general and the civilizing process of sport in particular emanated at a much earlier stage of European history and that its `modern' appearance cannot be understood without elucidating its ancient foundations.
What are the reasons for the end of ancient (blood) sports?
One of the most important turning points in the history of sport occurred between the 4th and 6th century CE, at a time when most ancient sports were abolished. All pagan contests and combat rituals, in particular those which included blodd sacrifices and which, for more than 1000 years, had been integral to Greek, Roman and Near Eastern cults and festivals, were radically suppressed. Those who dared to continue participating in such contests were persecuted and threatened with capital punishment. Most of these extremely popular sports were entirely wiped out. Those sports and games, on the other hand, which `survived' the dramatic purge of early Christianity were no longer linked to pagan rituals. What was the catalyst behind the ban of ancient sports?
Several writers have attempted to explain the conspicuous demise of ancient sports. There are some 20 different theories about the decline and end of the ancient Olympic Games alone.2 None of the prevailing explanations and theories, however, are adequate, (on their own or in combination), to derive the main reasons for Olympia's end.3
Interestingly, Roman gladiator contests were eradicated simultaneously with most of the Greek sports. It can be demonstrated that both of these historical events, which occurred at the same period in time in the Western and Eastern parts of the Roman Empire respectively, were influenced by the same distinctive factor: the emergence and gradual establishment of a new world view, the concept of the sanctity of life.
The abolition of ancient sports
As early as 325 CE, Constantin, the first Christian Emperor of the Roman Empire, banned all gladiator spectacles. Not surprisingly, this first attempt to abolish these most popular pastimes of the Empire failed. In fact, the first Christian Emperors faced significant opposition over the abolition of the most violent features of ancient sport. As a result, their struggle lasted for more than 200 years.
Twenty years after his first attempt to rid the Empire of heathen blood sports, in 353 CE, Constantin banned all pagan sacrifices and temple rituals.4 This edict not only threatened the traditional games at Olympia, but all athletic festivals in the entire Empire. If Constantin intended to erase the famous cults at the ceremonial centres, his order failed to deliver this result. Despite his prohibition, the athletic games and sacrificial rituals at Delphi, Argos, Corinth and Olympia continued. Consequently, the Emperor Theodosius was forced to re-issue several edicts in 391 and 392 which repeated the ban of all pagan cults, in particular the heathen festival at Olympia.5 Nonetheless, these measures failed to successfully suppress the famous games or indeed other cults which focused on blood sacrifices.
By the late fourth century, worshippers would sit in a trench and be spattered with the blood of a bull which was sacrificed above their heads. The date at which this highly prized `blooding' began is disputed, but it was not the rite of a culture which had started to soften on the topic of sacrifices. Animal bloodshed remained central to pagan cult, and when Christian Emperors banned sacrifice, they were aiming at the living heart of pagan cult acts.6
Since the traditional pagan festivals proved too popular, it was necessary to introduce even more drastic measures 30 years later. On 13th November 426 CE, Theodosius II finally gave the order to destroy all of the remaining pagan temples of the Empire. The world famous temple of Zeus, which had been the ceremonial and cultic centre of ancient Olympia and the Olympic Games for almost 1000 years, was burned down to its foundations.7
Yet even Theodosius' radical plan failed. While Olympia was abandoned as the site for Olympic Games, a similar festival with athletic contests continued to be held for another 100 years at Antiochia. In fact, these games proved to be so popular that in 520 CE, the Roman Emperor Justin issued an edict which banned the Olympic Games at Antiochia, threatening any violation of his prohibition with the death penalty.8 This was the final blow for the ancient Olympics and all the other pagan festivals which had survived 200 years of Christian persecution.
The denunciation and suppression of blood sacrifices
Why, alas, were the athletics cults considered to be such an evil? Why were their participants threatened with capital punishment, and which were the main arguments cited against these activities; in short, what are the underlying reasons for the abolition of ancient sports?
If we were able to enlighten these questions satisfactorily, we might be able to determine the main differences between ancient and modern sports. The most interesting factor with regard to the cruelty of Roman gladiator contests is the lack of moral outrage among Roman authors. Only very few, most significantly Seneca, raised their voices against the outrageous brutality inherent in those spectacles.9
When gladiatorial shows spread to the Eastern Empire, Greek philosophers disapproved of their brutality. Yet despite the harsh criticism of individual authors, the Greek public enjoyed these Roman spectacles no less than the Roman populus.10
Even less criticism was targeted at the sacrificing of the hundreds of thousands of animals which were offered to the gods as part of the sporting festivals of Greece and Rome. At the annual horse sacrifice in Rome, after a two-horse chariot race, one of the winning horses was ritually slain with a spear.11
His tail was cut off and carried to the Regina, in the Via Sacra, devoted to the use of the priests. There the warm blood was dripped on the hearth and the ashes were preserved. The head, after a battle for its possession by men of the two neighbouring quarters, was carried off by the winners and fixed to a prominent place; its blood was also preserved.12
The use of blood sacrifices and ritual bloodshed in purification rites and athletic festivals was a common feature of Greek and Roman sports. While Greek athletics were considerably less cruel than the Roman spectacles, the level of sanctioned violence was nevertheless remarkable. The Greek and Roman death cults originated from a common concept which considered the ritual torture, combat or killing of animals and, in earlier times, of human beings as an apotropaic rite. Blood sprinkled or smeared on altars of the various gods would, according to heathen belief, appease the gods who were feared for their destructive powers reported in myths and legends. Blood sacrifices, therefore, seemed appropriate to protect communities from any future disasters.13
Greek athletics were inseparable with these death rituals. In fact, all athletic festivals originated from death cults in which the shedding of blood of animals or humans was central.14 The cult of the goddess Artemis Orthia at Sparta was associated with both athletic contests and the ritual flogging of Spartan youths. Pausanias reports how Spartan boys were brutally whipped and `thus the altar is filled with human blood'. According to Pausanias, this cruel flagellation (the diamastigosis) was a substitute for an earlier human sacrifice.15A similar ritual was practised at Olympia. Once a year, young boys (the so-called ephebes) from all over the Peloponnes, visited the grace of Pelops, the Olympian god, and whipped themselves until the blood flowed from their backs.16
Many centuries of audiences in Greece, Rome, and in the provinces of the Roman Empire found it entertaining to watch animals, men and women being slaughtered in stadia and arenas.
That they did enjoy it is attested not merely by the longevity of this type of spectacles, but by the graphic representations of the amphitheatre scenes (...) and by the wealth of literary evidence.17
Recent studies on animal sacrifices and spectacles in antiquity, however, claim that modern authors have failed to understand the meaning and function of animal contests and blood sacrifices since we would erroneously project our `modern' view of animal rights to antiquity.18 According to some historians, concern about cruelty to animals is a modern phenomenon which was lacking in antiquity.19Yet if this were the case, it would be even more incomprehensible why the most popular animal spectacles and sacrifices were eventually banned.
The Biblical persepective of sport
While Christian Emperors of the 4th, 5th and 6th centuries CE repeatedly attempted to abolish Greek and Roman combat shows and sacrificial rituals for good, they did not issue a general ban on sports such as chariot races, ball games, wrestling or other contests.
The Biblical perception of man does not implicate a devaluation of the body or physical contests. On the contrary, man's character was understood as the imago Dei, the image of God. The necessity of and the moral rejection and legal prohibition of ritual killings, murder and bloodshed was a direct consequence of the Judaeo-Christian idea of the sanctity of life.
Sports and games, in particular physical activities for recreation and health reasons, were generally accepted by Jews and Christians under the condition that they were not related to cultic or sacrificial acts. Clearly, sport itself was not the main challenge to Judaism and Christianity.
Like their gentile neighbours, the Jews used to perform all kind of exercises of the body, and the Rabbis tolerated it.20
Poliakoff rightly stresses the fact that
since rabbinical writings both admire and praise physical activity and physical beauty it is clear that there was no intrinsic unacceptability about athletics as long as they did not engender transgressions of halacha (religious law) such as idolatry, nudity, and violence".21 "Judging from the milieu of ancient Israel, the priestly nation was not devoid of sport. It clearly did not develop an athletic festival system like that of ancient Greece, but it is important not to argue from this omission that sport was categorically hateful and sacrilegious to Jews in antiquity.22
It is clearly detectable that games, wrestling contests and other physical activities were also popular among early Christians. In a document by Clemens of Alexandria he says:
Nude men might wrestle or play with a ball, in particular the so-called Phaininda-Game which is played in open air. Others prefer to walk in the country side. Wrestling, however, which we have accepted, should not be conducted for reason of contest but instead to make the body sweat (...) Such a decent exercise which is undertaken in the interest of health is more beautiful and manly.23
But if Jews and Christians participated in various sports, games and physical activities, the underlying reasons for their total opposition to Greek and Roman contests become even more conspicuous. In order to determine why Jews and Christians opposed the Greek and Roman sporting festivals, we have to elucidete their main objections.
Although Greek athletic contest were always associated with ritual animal sacrifices to the gods, the introduction of gladiator shows in (Roman) Greece was not greeted enthusiastically by all.
It is certain that Greek sport aroused outrage in some quarters", writes Poliakoff. "When the Romans brought their arenas to the Greek East and staged gladiator combat and wild beast events, Greek sport became associated with displays of cruelty and bloodshed.24
Although gentiles expressed little criticism against these spectacles, rabbis and Jewish authors unambiguously voiced their strong opposition.
When Herod, the new King of Judea, staged athletic and gladiatorial contests in Jerusalem during the 1st century BCE, most Jews of ancient Israel reacted with utter repulsion. Flavius Josephus, the Jewish-Hellenistic historian, emphasised the disgust and hostility of his fellow Jews in view of these spectacles:
Herod went still further in departing from native customs, and through foreign practices he gradually corrupted the ancient way of life, which had hitherto been inviolable (...). For in the first place he established athletic contests every fifth year in honour of Caesar, and he built a theatre in Jerusalem, and after that a very large amphitheatre in the plain, both being spectacularly lavish but foreign to Jewish custom, for the use of such buildings and the exhibition of such spectacles have not been traditional with the Jews.25
Herod invited athletes from every corner of the Roman Empire who were attracted `by the hope of winning the valuable prizes offered by Herod and by the glory of victor'.26 But why did these extremely extravagant buildings and sensational spectacles provoke outrage among the religious Jews?
Josephus accentuated the main factors for their opposition:
There was also a supply of wild beasts, a great many lions and other animals having been brought together for him, such as were of extraordinary strength or of very rare kinds. When the practice began of involving them in combat with one another or setting condemned men to fight against them, foreigners (i.e. heathen spectators) were astonished at the expense and at the same time entertained by the dangerous spectacle, but to the natives it meant an open break with the customs held in honour by them. For it seemed glaring impiety to throw men to wild beasts for the pleasure of other men as spectators, and it seemed a further impiety to change their established ways for foreign practices.27
The antagonism of a nation, whose ethical principles are based on the commandment "Thou shalt not kill", in response to gladiatorial brutality, is thus hardly surprising. Jews objected to the hecatombs of animal sacrifices which were offered to statues and idols with equal abhorrence.28
Philo of Alexandria underlined this Jewish rejection of pagan athletics, condemning the inherent intra-human violence of the Greek athletic festivals:
Do not regard as holy the Games which the cities put on every other year, having built theatres to receive thousands of people. For in these festivals, the man who outwrestles an opponent and stretches him on his back or prone on the ground, or the one powerful in boxing or pankration who doesn't stop short of violence and wrongdoing wins the first prize (...) Now the only contest which can be rightly be called Olympic the inhabitants of Elis do not hold, but it is the contest for the gaining of divine, truly Olympian virtues.29
Judaism's fundamental criticism of ritual killings, cruelty and violence, which was an essential feature of ancient sports, was subsequently embraced by both the Jewish followers of Jesus and the early Christians. With remarkable unanimity, Jews and early Christians condemned the brutality and bloodshed of ancient sports.
In contrast, the criticism of athletic festivals by Greek and Roman authors were often directed against an alleged lack of courage and aggression of athletes and competitors.30 This ambiguous approach to life and the glorification of violence and death was one of the reasons why many Roman authors belittled Greek athletics. Some Greek intellectuals, who were equally critical of athletics, were also concerned with the lack of military training. Yet only very few authors disapproved of the inherent violence, the bloodshed and injurious contests such as boxing, wrestling and pancration.
Monotheism and the anti-sacrifical alignment of rabbinical Judaism
The practice of ritually killing and offering animals to a multitude of pagan deities were practised at all pagan festivals. In most cases, these sacrificial offerings were made to gods in the form of idols. The Jewish and Christian concern with gentile idolatry was to prevent all contact with paganism and its paraphernalia. Religious Jews avoided theatres, circuses and arenas since these were venues of the gentile world in which the ritual killing of animals (and often men) was a common feature.
As early as the 6th century BCE, more than 500 years before the emergence of Christianity, the prophet Hosea stressed his hostility to the idea of sacrifices. "I desire loyal love, and not sacrifices".31 This and other prophetic statements underline the anti-sacrificial alignment of monotheistic Judaism which succeeded in the first century CE due to the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem and the emergence of rabbinical Judaism.32 The central idea of Jewish monotheism is that one must not expect salvation from the sacrifice of others, be it an animal, a god or a human being. In pre-Christian antiquity, in the Near Eastern, Greek and Roman sphere of culture,
the non-believers were shown in Judaism something quite unique. Those elements of religion and cult which were elsewhere in the centre, had been completely omitted: it knew neither temples nor images of the gods, nor sacrifices. The abolition of the sacrificial services, the central element of all local cults, with the exception of the Temple in Jerusalem was valid for the majority of the Jews. For this reason, the temple with all the details of the sacrificial service made an enormous impression on Jews who came to Jerusalem (...) contrary to other peoples, they had never seen anything like it elsewhere.33
Monotheism is characterised not only by the new idea of mercy, love and clemency but also by a resolute resistance to the idea that God could be assigned to a temple, i.e. a place of sacrifice. This position, characteristic of monotheistic Judaism, is expressed by Isaiah:
He who kills an ox is as if he slew a man; he who sacrifices a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck; he who offers an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood; he who burnes incense, as if he blessed an idol.34
As a result of the total ban of animal sacrifice outside the Jerusalem temple, the Jews were the first people in antiquity to generally abandon blood sacrifices. When, in 70 CE, Titus destroyed the temple in Jerusalem, the perception of the Jews as a non-sacrificial nation became even more prevalent. Having overcome the sacrificial cult altogether and the idea that blood sacrifices were necessary for redemption, rabbinical Judaism emerged. In place of blood sacrifices prayers, the learning of law and history in addition to moral education became the central part of religious service.
It was the Roman author Tacitus who, in the 1st century CE, conceded to Judaism the creation of the most crucial of human rights, the right to live. In his Histories (V:5), he writes about the Jews of the Roman Empire: "It is a mortal sin to kill an unwanted child". According to Jewish law, it was one of the most serious crimes to kill an animal outside the gates of the temple. It carried the most severe penalty next to capital punishment for murder.35 With equal force, Jewish law banned the most popular pagan pastime: hunting and killing animals for pleasure.
The sanctity of life as the core value of Judaeo-Christian morality
It is the idea of the holiness of life (which in Jewish law includes all animals not considered for consumption) which led to the general condemnation of pagan blood sacrifices as well as animal contests and hunting. And it is the rejection of animal sacrifices which was shared by the new Christian religion. "A Christian", says Tertullian, "actually rejects these spectacles with his baptismal vow because of the link of these games to idolatry".36 In particular, Tertullian's opposition to these spectacles derived from the fact that they originated from pagan death cults:
What is there then to wonder at, if the whole equipment of the contests is stained with idolatry - with profane crowns, priestly judges, attendants from various sacred colleges, and, finally, the blood of bulls?
Not surprisingly, Cyprian of Carthage calls sacrifices and idolatry "the mother of all games".37 And he continued:
What spectacle takes place without idols? Which game is held without sacrifices? Which contest is not consecrated to a dead person? What has a faithful Christian to do at such events?.38
I should, however, underline the meaningful fact that it was not the Greek and Roman contests as such which provoked Jewish and Christian anger; it was only their congenital part of pagan ritual which led to their fundamental rejection. "Temples or tombs, we abominate both kinds of idolatry", said Tertullian.
We know neither sort of altar; we adore neither sort of image; we pay no sacrifice; we pay no funeral rite. No, and we do not eat of what is offered in sacrificial or funeral rite.39
Tertullian repeatedly stressed this line of thought. He emphasised his main objection in particular with regards to the non-violent, inoffensive looking equestrian contests. "Equestrian skill", he says,
was a simple thing in the past, mere horseback riding; in any case there was no guilt in the ordinary use of the horse. But when the horse was brought into the circus games, it passed from being God's gift into the service of demons (...) chariots very probably have their drivers clad in the colours of idolatry.40
Much more radical was the aversion against boxing, pancration and gladiatorial contests. Tertullian continuously warned his fellow Christians to keep away from the stadium for the things done inside them were wholly inappropriate for believers to see: blows, kicks, cuffs, "all the recklessness of the fist, and and every disfigurement of the human face, God's image".
In the last resort, and despite a long lasting struggle against their prevailing popularity among the heathen masses, the termination of most (but not all) pagan blood sports
must be attributed to the spreading of Christian ideas. They did not, it is true, limit other forms of carnage in the Roman world. Even massacres of and by, wild beasts continued for a long time; persecution flourished; and the other cruelties and miseries of ancient life did not diminish. Yet those who believed in the Gospel of Christ could not, and did not, for ever tolerate the fighting of gladiators for public entertainment.41
Conclusion
As Christianity gradually became the officially sanctioned state religion of the Roman Empire, most Greek and Roman sports were radically suppressed between the 4th and 6th centuries CE. The violent nature of many of these contests contradicted the very basis of Judaeo-Christian ethics. Jews and Christians were uncompromising in their attitude towards pagan contests and spectacles. They attacked the nature of cruel combat sports, arguing that they were incompatible with the notion of the holiness of life. The belief that God made man according to His image and likeness led them to question the participation in physical activities which involved the infliction of pain and the killing of other living beings.
Eventually, the ancient Olympic Games were abolished. It took, however, nearly 200 years to eradicate the most popular pastimes of ancient culture. In the middle of the 6th century CE, after a life-span of more than 2000 years, the last cultic remnants of ancient civilisation, the Greek and Roman contests and sacrificial festivals, came to an end. The notion of the sanctity of life finally replaced the ancient belief in pagan blood sports and cultic blood sacrifices. This ethical revolution was, I would suggest, the main Judaeo-Christian contribution to the civilizing process of sport. While some of the most popular of ancient blood sports survived the repeated church bans throughout the Middle Ages, this lasting idea took on a wholly new direction when the emergence of modern sports in Britain coincided with renewed and vigorous efforts to abolish the last remnants of pagan blood sports for good.
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Notes
1 Elias 1978, 1982
2 Weiler, 1984; 1985; 1988.
3 Weiler, 1984, p. 135.
4 Lennartz, 1974, p. 13.
5 Weiler, 1985/86, p. 257.
6 Fox, 1986, p. 72.
7 Lennartz, 1974, p. 15.
8 Lennarz, 1974, pp. 15-17.
9 Müller, 1995, pp. 249-255.
10 Wiedemann, 1992, p. 145.
11 Yerkes, 1975, p. 57.
12 Yerkes, 1975, p. 57.
13 Heinsohn, 1991, 1992.
14 Peiser, 1993, 1995.
15 Pausanias III:16,9-10.
16 Drees, 1967, p. 19.
17 Coleman, 1990, pp. 57/58.
18 Kyle, 1993, p. 182.
19 Kyle, 1993.
20 Liebermann, cf. Poliakoff, 1984, p. 62.
21 Poliakoff 1984, p. 63.
22 Poliakoff 1984, p. 65.
23 Koch, 1978, p. 317.
24 Poliakoff, 1984, p. 60.
25 Jewish Antiquities, XV:267-268.
26 See in more detail Lämmer, 1972, 1973, 1974.
27 Jewish Antiquities, XV:273-275.
28 Landmann, 1959, pp. 25-38.
29 Philo of Alexandria, Husbandry 113, 119, cf. Polikaoff 1984, p. 64.
30 Müller, 1995, pp. 88-108.
31 Hosea 6:6.
32 See in more detail Heinsohn, 1991, 1992.
33 Meyer, 1921, p. 26.
34 Isaiah 66:1-3.
35 Landmann ,1959, p. 44.
36 Tertullian, De Spectaculis, 4.
37 Koch, 1978, p. 319.
38 Koch, 1978, p. 319.
39 Tertullian, De Spectaculis, XII:98.
40 Tertullian, De Spectaculis IX:95.
41 Grant, 1973, p. 124.