Page 121 - Edessa, 'The Blessed City'-01, by J. B. Segal (Oxford, 1970). Chapters 1-3

io8 THE BLESSING OF JESUS AND THE TRIUMPH OF CHRISTIANITY
nondescript term for heathen—rites. They were executed and their property
confiscated. At about the same time, another group of pagans was arrested
in the capital; their leader, a patrician, committed suicide by taking poison.
Some twenty years later there was another purge of distinguished persons
accused of heathen practices. Five priests from Athens, Antioch, and Baalbek
were burnt with their idolatrous writings. In 578 or 589 it was learnt that the
pagans of Baalbek were persecuting the Christians, perhaps in revenge for
the 'miraculous' destruction of their great and beautiful temple twenty
years previously. By order of the Emperor the people of Baalbek were
brutally punished by the army. The inquiry then led to Antioch. It was
discovered that the vice-prefect of the city (who later committed suicide)
had gone to Edessa to celebrate there the festival of Zeus with its Governor
Anatolus. Anatolus vainly attempted to arrange an alibi with the bishop; but
a statue of Apollo was found in his house, and he and his secretary were
tortured and killed. Accusations were freely made against leading personali-
ties, including the Patriarch of Antioch. One of the trials, which became a
cause cdlebre, lasted many years at Constantinople. The mob rioted both at
the capital, where blame was laid at the door of the Jews, and at Antioch.
But we hear nothing of rioting at Edessa, although the evidence of paganism
there seemed to be beyond dispute: evidently at that city the revelations
caused no public concern.
The pagans of Harran, among them the Governor himself, had been
cruelly persecuted by Emperor Maurice. In 639 the approaching Moslem
army gave them the opportunity to free themselves of their Byzantine
oppressors. But before surrendering their city to the Moslems they consulted
the people of Edessa for guidance. Evidently there was still an organized
pagan community at Edessa. Jacob of Edessa at the end of the seventh
century describes an argument between a Harranian devotee of the planets
and an Edessan follower of Bardaisan. This is the last mention of overt
paganism at Edessa. Where Christian divines had failed, Moslems succeeded
with more subtle methods.

The Jews and the pagans of Edessa were, however, no more than minority
groups, probably few in number and with little authority. By the fifth
century, Edessa was a Christian city, Very great and populous, most famous
far and wide for its observance of religion'.1 Its monasteries and academies
were celebrated for the piety and the theological acumen of their scholars.
Inside the city were 'many shrines and also holy monks, some living among
the shrines, others further from the city in convents in more remote places.'2
Outside the walls the hills, honeycombed with caves, were populated with
devout, and sometimes also learned, anchorites 'in great numbers and
1 Theodoret. 2 Egeria of Aquitania.

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