Editing Apostasy (section)

===Historical persons===
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* [[Julian the Apostate]] (331/332{{snd}}363 CE), the [[Roman emperor]], given a Christian education by those who assassinated his family, rejected his upbringing and declared his belief in [[Neoplatonism]] once it was safe to do so.
* [[Mindaugas]], the first and only Christian king of [[Kingdom of Lithuania|Lithuania]], accepted Christianity in 1251 but rejected it in 1261 to return to [[Lithuanian mythology|his pagan ways]]. It is believed that accepting Christianity was a political move on his part and thus after the victory at the [[battle of Durbe]], the king's nephew [[Treniota]] convinced him to reject Christianity.
* [[Sir Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford]] was declared 'The Great Apostate' by Parliament in 1628 for changing his political support from Parliament to [[Charles I of England|Charles I]], thus shifting his religious support from [[Calvinism]] to [[Arminianism]].
* [[Abraham ben Abraham]], ([[Count]] Valentine (Valentin, Walentyn) Potocki), a [[Szlachta|Polish nobleman]] of the [[Potocki]] family who is claimed to have [[Conversion to Judaism|converted to Judaism]] and was [[Execution by burning|burned at the stake]] in 1749 because he had renounced [[Roman Catholic Church|Catholicism]] and had become an [[613 mitzvot|observant]] [[Jew]].
* [[Maria Monk]] (1816–1849), sometimes considered an apostate of the [[Roman Catholic church|Catholic Church]], though there is little evidence that she ever was a [[Roman Catholic|Catholic]].
* [[Lord George Gordon]], initially a zealous Protestant and instigator of the [[Gordon riots]] of 1780, finally renounced Christianity and converted to [[Judaism]], for which he was ostracized.