Why were Christians considered traitors by the Romans?

Answer 1

AnswerThe Romans noticed that the early Christians seemed to give greater loyalty to their bishops than to the Roman state. Bishops seemed to have enormous power and authority among the Christians. Thus the Romans suspected Christians of disloyalty.

Individual instances of disloyalty only confirmed the general suspicion. Edward Gibbon tells of an African youth who had been produced by his own father before the magistrate as a sufficient and legal recruit, but who obstinately persisted in declaring that his Christian conscience would not permit him to become a soldier. In another example, Marcellus the centurion threw away his arms and the ensigns of his office at the time of a public festival, and exclaimed with a loud voice that he would obey none but Jesus Christ the eternal King, and that he renounced forever the use of carnal weapons and the service of an idolatrous master. This was not a case of being unwilling to serve as an army officer, rather a case of being unwilling to serve a pagan emperor.

Answer 2

The Romans were tolerant of any religion which was open and not a threat to stability. However they were used to people practicing their religion openly at temples. Those who met in secret were suspected of plotting revolution. There was a great slaughter of the Baccanalians in the 2nd Century BCE when they began to get completely out of hand. Christianity was for 50 years the Nazorean sect of Judaism, but was expelled from Judaism in the late 1st Century CE, and as they met in private houses, drew suspicion on themselves a plotters. The fact that most of the early followers were Greek didn't help - the Romans regarded the Greeks as perennial troublemakers and plotters. The Romans took pre-emptive action in many centres.

Answer 3

It's not so much that they were Christians; truth be told, the Romans weren't happy about the Jews either. Rome had a state religion-- an official faith that everyone was expected to follow. Jews and Christians tended to regard the Roman gods as pagan-- idols, in other words-- rather than divine. This did not make the Romans happy-- part of their faith was to believe the country's leader was like a god, and deserving of worship. Needless to say, most Christians and Jews did not believe they should worship the emperor, or the generals, or anyone else other than God (for Jews) and/or God and Jesus (for Christians). The Romans saw any other religion as competition; the official state religion was the one they believed to be superior. Thus, Christians (and anyone else who dissented from the official state religion) were seen as traitors because they were not willing to pray to the Roman deities or participate in emperor-worship.