Why did Constantine's religious revolution succeed where Akhenaten's failed?

Question

Why did Constantine's religious revolution succeed where Akhenaten's failed?

Answer 1

Rome was actually very tolerant of all religions and faiths and only persecuted Christianity for a very short period, the Historian Gibbon estimated that only about two thousand Christians suffered persecution by the Romans.



Constantine needed something to replace, slowly the policy of bread and circuses to control the masses so the institution of a state religion that could be Romanized like Christianity was an appealing idea for him

Answer 2

Really a great question. To some extent some revision work needs to be done. First of all, there is good reason to think the Christian persecution wasn’t as wide spread as commonly believed. By and large the persecution of Christians was largely a regional affair with Carthage and Alexandria being particular hot beds for Christian persecution. And by no means was persecution a constant, sometimes it flared up, and sometimes it cooled down. In Western Europe, however, there is much less persecution going on. I think it is important to note that Constantine came from the West and that probably contributed to his “open mindedness” towards Christianity.



Also important to note with Constantine was that he didn’t turn Europe into Christendom. Europe’s conversion to Christianity was a long period of time that does really reach its end until 1000 or 1100 AD. Constantine merely legalized the open practice of Christianity, which I wasn’t all that objectionable to your typical Roman. Certainly Constantine made no attempt to force Christian conversions or change Greco-Roman Pagan beliefs. To be honest, while Constantine’s conversion seems to be a ligitimate one, he doesn’t seem to understand some aspects of Christian theology. He was a soldier after all, not a scholar or theologian. For example, he seems to associate Sol Invictus with Christ in several ways. Frankly, I don’t think he really realized that as a Christian he should have totally abandoned all of his old pagan beliefs, and I don’t think Christian bishops were eager to tell Constantine what to do. The point here is, while there is no real good reason to doubt Constantine’s conversion, he was certainly still sympathetic and fair to pagans.



Finally, I would argue that the organization of the Christian Church was brilliant. Greco Roman paganism was really loosely organized with no overarching doctrine, religious texts, or political offices. Christianity had the beginnings of cannon law, which was based of Roman law, they had a hierarchy of bishops and priests, they had somewhat standardized religious texts circulating. Christianity was well built. So much so that when Emperor Julian the Apostate converted from Christianity to paganism years after Constantine, he actually tried to make Roman paganism organize more like the Christian Church. As a result, he alienated Christians by making draconian rules against them, and he alienated Pagans who had a tradition of being only very loosely organized.



Akhenaten, on the other hand, was already a disliked leader before his religious reforms. In addition, he made changes to the Egyptian religion and cult practices which actually mirror someone like Julian the Apostate more than Constantine. Sorry I can’t contribute more about Egypt, I simply know a lot more about Roman and Medieval history than I do about Egyptian history.

Answer 3

Well I think a few reasons. Xtianity had been around for a while so when Constantine converted, he was not converting to something that no one was familiar with (or just a handful were familiar with). People may not have believed it but they were not unfamiliar with it. It would be like saying we all had to be Mormon. Most of us are aware of the religion even if we are not Mormon and do not believe. Some are already Mormons. Such was the case with Constantine. Some people were already xtian. In addition, his own mother had exposed him to xtianity. Akhenaten was introducing something very new and radical in the eyes of almost every Egyptian. "Just one?" must have seemed very wrong to the ancient Egyptians.

Akhenaten was not groomed for leadership. Constantine was so Akhenaten didn't know how to deal with the underpinnings of rebellion that were lurking.

In addition to this, Constantine had GREAT control but Akhenaten, while true he was a Pharaoh and considered a deity himself, had angered the Temple priests who worshiped the many deities of ancient Egypt and those were powerful enemies. When he died and his young son took over, it was very easy for the priests to manipulate the boy to bring back the old ways and thus, their power.

It is really complex but had Akhenaten lived to be 100 it might have been MUCH different.

Answer 4

Akhenaten had to contend with a powerful and independent priesthood and culture that was deeply conservative. The priests of Rome were usually senators and it was an honorary title, religion was very loosely organized in Rome. Also there was a turning towards monotheism that had been going on for some time, especially among the intellectual elite. This manifested itself as "The One" or Sol Invictus. You must remember that Constantine was a cruel and cunning man and there must have been some clear advantage in him adopting Christianity.

Answer 5

Akhenaten attempted to force monotheism on a completely pagan populace. monotheism was completely alien to them.



Constantine *allowed* and *encouraged* (not forced) Christianity in an area that had been familiar with it for hundreds of years. Christians were a minority, but they were a significant minority. Christianity wouldn't be forced on Romans for another 70ish years. In that time Romans were given plenty of reasons why they might want to voluntarily convert.

Answer 6

the egyptians didn't want one god. akhenaten had no support from his officers or advisers and was considered a fool. of course, he wasn't as inspiring or charismatic as constantine either.

Answer 7

Akhenaten And Monotheism

Answer 8

in case you gain your meant objective then you've succeeded. As your meant objective became into to fail then you've succeeded in failing. In different words you have failed ... effectively.

Answer 9

Constantine's successor, Julian (aka the Apostate) reinstated pagan worship. His rule was cut short though when he was killed in battle. I think it was about 18 months. He undertook a massive campaign to extend the empire to match Alexander the Great's. Because he didn't stop to consolidate his gains, they fell shortly after his death - both land and religious reform. If he had been more judicious, Christianity's reign as the religion of Rome might have been short-lived.



In other words, it was all about politics. Who was in charge, their vision for their world and the situation after their deaths.



Politics had a role in the dismantling of Akhenaten's reforms as well. A new dynasty needed to discredit Akhenaten and his successors in order to strengthen their claims to legitimacy. A return to old forms of worship was useful in that. It's quite a stretch to say that Akhenaten was 'doomed to failure from the start'. It could well have succeeded if the political landscape had been different.



The political will amongst Roman rulers was a single religion to unify their increasingly fractious empire. Thirty-nine years before Constantine succeeded with Iesus, Marcus Aurelius Antonius had tried with the synthetic sun-god Sol Invictus. Julian was the colourful exception. The particular theology didn't much matter to Rome, although Christianity's cheek-turning, Caesar-rendering bits certainly were politically useful in distracting people from revolution. All that really mattered was having a single religion.

Answer 10

Tut's daddy tried to make the change over night, and wound up pissing off the priests. He was a walking dead man from that point.

Constantine incorporated pagan beliefs into 'christianity' and brought most of the priests on-board.

Answer 11

Rome had become a world ruling power . This helped Constantine greatly.



Exodus 20:8-11

SDA

Answer 12

Because of the political climate in Rome at the time...



From "The Final Years" :



By 300 CE, the end was near. Rome was morally and spiritually bankrupt, and corruption in the government was rampant. An empire which had derived it's prosperity from conquest and exploitation now found itself badly over-extended... and military defeats, rebellions, and economic hardships were rapidly mounting. As the empire began to collapse, a nervous population was searching frantically for some form of salvation. It was in this climate of apprehension and fear that the religion of Christianity began to gather social and political momentum.



Christianity was carefully crafted to offer something to everyone. Not only did it incorporate all of the most popular myths of it's day, such as life after death, gods taking human form, virgin births, rising from the dead, etc., but in addition, it very conveniently presented extremely simplistic solutions to spiritual matters. For example, people were told that the death of Jesus automatically absolved them of all their sins, and by simply believing in him they were guaranteed a place in Heaven.

Answer 13

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Answer 14

who cares? in the mean time have a few laughs. God Bless

My favorite Atheist quotes R&S #2.................enjoy



Apparently atheists and everyone who doesn't share the Christian beliefs are immune to the real "hysteria" type of demonic possession.



The majority are self-righteous assholes.



If meeting and talking are all you can do, you'll never make a difference in the world. Heros are almost always people who not only work alone, but have no like minds.



The Greeks actually knew that the world was round 300 years BC, then that knowledge got lost when christianity popd up



Religion is for the weak of mind, easily open to the worst ideas man has to offer like flying a plane into a steel structure while screaming god is good. Or setting yourself on fire a way of protest. Or best of all, kill of all who don't believe in what you believe in.



"When we think God is responsible for suffering, we don't take responsibility ourselves."

In other words, we are going to threaten you with Hell until you actually become so terrified you will actually start to believe it, thereby emptying your pockets to us.What else could it be? The people who write xian indoctrination KNOW what they're doing. That's why they're rich! -atheist



ANOTHER DUMBASS.

YAHOO SHOULD HAVE AN IQ TEST BEFORE SOMEONE CAN PARTICIPATE IN THE FORUMS



Evolution takes millions of years, it doesn't occur in a few thousand. Therefore, perhaps baldness is becoming less common.





You just offended intelligent hard working people calling them evil.

Anyone who goes around acting like a stupid jerk claiming to be an atheist is an imposter.



All gods are unreal. There's no You Tube video showing any god. Yahoo answer never trended the existence for any god. There's no image on Bing or Yahoo showing any god outside of a drawing or art. There's no governmental record for any god. There's no scientific data for any god. There's no medical record for any god. There's no artifacts belonging to any god. There's no personal letters for any god. There's no EVP recording or ghost hunting footage showing any god. All god are 100% unreal.



Since there is no more evidence for a Deistic god than there is for the Judeo-Christian god, atheism is still the logical default.



I'd tell them to f*ck themselves



"for something to exist it must be made of matter or energy."

Nah. I don't think you get to say that. At all.

Life is so much easier if you just make some assumptions to limit your field of vision and then just keep throwing out anything that seems outside those limits.

Great! You'll never learn, but it does make the shadow of life you live a lot "easier."



obviously there is NO kind loving compassionate god thingy ! .. ask the MILLIONS of starving Africans !



In general because of their not very advanced education.

In YA! because they are kiddies who want to be obstinate. 12 year old are proud to say silly nonsense they usually later regret. I used to be the same at that age.



I would say there is not a single YEC creationist that understands evolution properly, and most people throughout the world do not understand it properly regardless of other life pursuits.



Bingo. Either that or they are too stupid to understand it.



Yes. They only learn humorous attempts at discrediting evolution at church seminars



its a tough topic and a difficult one to understand at times im not surprised most dont fully understand it. i just hate the way they pose arguments like they know everything about it.



He's made of happy thoughts and wishful thinking with a dash of genocidal tendencies. Oh! Rapture!



Your mind makes it real Wait. . . no. That's dying in the Matrix, not God. Your mind doesn't make God real at all.



ur a dum dum head. lol also ur feet smell.



That just saying is an annoying term and should never be used within these walls as to piss everybody off.



There is a huge flaw in your scenario. You see, heaven doesn't exist.



we must 'worship him' because those are buzzwords for submitting to clergy and paying them tribute of the financial variety.



Religion is just a method of scare-mongering



Jesus was one of many cult leaders at the time. He preached and performed magic shows as displays of his gods power. He gained followers because he was probably charismatic like David Koresh or Jim Jones was. He traveled and preached against the church and certain social and cultural practices just like many people do today.He met a lot of people but eventually the church and the government got some complaints and then he was publicly tortured and killed along with many others.