In his discussion of the imperial cult in Paul and the Faithfulness of God, Tom Wright notes that Domitian liked to be addressed as dominus et deus (“lord and god”)—a phrase “familiar to readers of John’s gospel” (341).
Domitian was emperor from AD 81-96. He revived the imperial cult, which had languished under Vespasian. Among other self-aggrandizing projects, he constructed an imperial temple at Ephesus, where, according to Wright, “fragments of what must have been a positively enormous statue of Domitian have come to light”. He also came down hard on foreign religions. Suetonius records that the tax on the Jews was “levied with the utmost rigour” (Suet. Dom. 12.2), and according to Eusebius, Domitian “became a successor of Nero in his hatred and enmity toward God”: he was “the second that stirred up a persecution against us” (Eus. Hist. eccl. 3.17). Tertullian accused Domitian of a rather half-hearted approach to persecution:
Domitian, too, a man of Nero’s type in cruelty, tried his hand at persecution; but as he had something of the human in him, he soon put an end to what he had begun, even restoring again those whom he had banished. (Tert. Apol. 5.4)
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Author: Andrew Perriman
Keywords: Lord and God, My Lord and My God, Thomas confession, Domitian, Imperial cult, Emperor worship, Caesar worship, Caesar as God, Imperial temple, Nero, Christian persecution, Nero persecution, Nero persecution of Christians, Domitian persecution, Domitian persecuted, Tertullian, Trinity
Bible reference(s): John 20:28, 1 Corinthians 8:5
Source: “My Lord and My God,” P.OST.
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