Persecution and the Art of Writing between the Lines: De vita beata, Lactantius, and the Great Persecution

Abstract

Patristics scholars and historians have tended to ignore Book 7 (De vita beata) of Lactantius’ Divine Institutes, a seeming pastiche of prophecies about the end times, penned between 306 and 310. If it is situated in the broader context of Porphyry of Tyre’s contemporary critique of the Book of Daniel as ex eventu prophecy, however, its diatribes against two ruling “ beasts” point to the emperors Diocletian and Galerius who had launched and pursued the “ Great Persecution” against the Christians. Pressing these parallels further suggests that the “ heavenly king” who will rescue the world and impose sole rule for a new millennium is none other than Constantine, who had gained control of the northwestern empire in 306.