Bart Ehrman Quotes
Nero did not, technically speaking, prosecute Christians for being Christian. He executed them for committing arson.
True, they probably were not guilty, but that was the charge. Being a Christian was not punishable, but setting fire to Rome was.
Nero’s persecution was localized. It involved only the city of Rome. Nothing indicates that Christians elsewhere in the empire suffered any consequences.
Even more significant, it appears that none of Nero’s successors down to Trajan (ruled 98–117 CE) persecuted Christians.
Between Nero in 64 CE and Marcus Aurelius in 177 CE, the only mention of an emperor’s intervention in Christian affairs, apart from the episode involving Trajan found in Pliny’s letters, is a letter from the emperor Hadrian that gives instructions to a local governor to conduct his trials against the Christians fairly.
Bart Ehrman
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I'm trying to grow. I don't want to stay on the same page.
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He's protected the football, which is very important. I think he has made good decisions when things aren't there, which is really important. Everybody is going to hit something that's open. But when it's not there, Mark has played well.
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When we become advocates of a creed, something dies; we do not believe God, we only believe our belief about Him.
Oswald Chambers
Here's a tip...If you leave a girl crying you're probably not doing your Don Juan routine right, asshole.
Rachel Caine
Composing on the typewriter, I find that I am sloughing off all my long sentences which I used to dote upon. Short, staccato, like modern French prose. The typewriter makes for lucidity, but I am not sure that it encourages subtlety.
T. S. Eliot
As we passed over the dark bridge her wan face fell lazily against my coat's shoulder and the formidable stroke of thirty died away with the reassuring pressure of her hand.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
I don't like politicians who vacillate.
Eliot Spitzer
Our true remembrance to President Kennedy is in our actions to honor the unspoken words and finish the unfinished work today and tomorrow and for as long as it takes.
Marian Wright Edelman
Fine manners are like personal beauty,--a letter of credit everywhere.
Cyrus Augustus Bartol
There is a great difference between the irreconcilable and the self-contradict ory.
Charles Hodge
Imagine, a Being with a mind as great as God's, with feet like trees and a voice like rushing wind, telling you that you are His cherished creation.
Donald Miller
Such loyalty is admirable, of course,” said Scrimgeour, who seemed to be restraining his irritation with difficulty, “but Dumbledore is gone, Harry. He’s gone.” “He will only be gone from the school when none here are loyal to him,” said Harry, smiling in spite of himself.
Joanne Rowling
It is the useless things that make life worth living and that make life dangerous too: wine, love, art, beauty. Without them life is safe, but not worth bothering with.
Stephen Fry
There is nothing more foreign, more alien, to our nature than holiness.
R. C. Sproul
Humiliating events have a way of capturing the public's imagination. So it has been since antiquity, when gladiators were pitted against each other and the legions of Spartacus were crucified in endless rows on the way to Rome.
Gary Weiss
Nero did not, technically speaking, prosecute Christians for being Christian. He executed them for committing arson.
True, they probably were not guilty, but that was the charge. Being a Christian was not punishable, but setting fire to Rome was.
Nero’s persecution was localized. It involved only the city of Rome. Nothing indicates that Christians elsewhere in the empire suffered any consequences.
Even more significant, it appears that none of Nero’s successors down to Trajan (ruled 98–117 CE) persecuted Christians.
Between Nero in 64 CE and Marcus Aurelius in 177 CE, the only mention of an emperor’s intervention in Christian affairs, apart from the episode involving Trajan found in Pliny’s letters, is a letter from the emperor Hadrian that gives instructions to a local governor to conduct his trials against the Christians fairly.
Bart Ehrman
