Editing Religious persecution (section)

==History==
The descriptive use of the term religious persecution is rather difficult. Religious persecution has occurred in different historical, geographical and social contexts since at least [[Classical antiquity|antiquity]]. Until the 18th century, some groups were nearly universally persecuted for their religious views, such as [[Discrimination against atheists|atheists]],<ref name="onfray">{{cite book|last=Onfray|first=Michel|others=Leggatt, Jeremy (translator) |title=Atheist manifesto: the case against Christianity, Judaism, and Islam |publisher=Arcade Publishing|year=2007|isbn=978-1-55970-820-3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QpEAYMo7pFkC&pg=PA24}}</ref> [[Persecution of Jews|Jews]]<ref name=Flannery /> and [[Persecution of Zoroastrians|Zoroastrians]].<ref name="hj303">{{Cite book|last =Hinnells|first =John R.|title =Zoroastrians in Britain: the Ratanbai Katrak lectures, University of Oxford 1985|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E4l0J5bf3GYC&pg=PP1|year=1996|edition=Illustrated|publisher =Oxford University Press|isbn =9780198261933|page=303}}</ref>

===Roman Empire===
[[File:Caravaggio-Crucifixion of Peter.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Saint Peter]], an apostle of Jesus, was executed by the Romans.]]
{{See also|Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire|Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire}}
Early Christianity also came into conflict with the Roman Empire, and it may have been more threatening to the established polytheistic order than Judaism had been, because of the importance of [[evangelism]] in Christianity. Under [[Nero]], the Jewish exemption from the requirement to participate in public cults was lifted and Rome began to actively persecute [[Monotheism|monotheists]]. This persecution ended in 313 AD with the [[Edict of Milan]], and Christianity was made the [[Edict of Thessalonica|official religion of the empire]] in 380 AD. By the eighth century, Christianity had attained a clear ascendancy across Europe and neighboring regions, and a period of consolidation began which was marked by the pursuit of [[Heresy|heretics]], [[Paganism|heathens]], Jews, [[Muslim]]s, and various other religious groups.

===Europe===

====Religious uniformity in early modern Europe====
{{Main|Religious uniformity}}
[[File:La masacre de San Bartolomé, por François Dubois.jpg|thumb|The [[St. Bartholomew's Day massacre]] of French Protestants in 1572]]
By contrast to the notion of civil tolerance in [[early modern Europe]], the subjects were required to attend the [[state church]]; this attitude can be described as ''territoriality'' or ''[[religious uniformity]]'', and its underlying assumption is brought to a point by a statement of the Anglican theologian [[Richard Hooker]]: "There is not any man of the Church of England, but the same man is also a member of the [English] commonwealth; nor any man a member of the commonwealth, which is not also of the Church of England."<ref>''The Works of Richard Hooker'', II, p. 485; quoted after: John Coffey (2000), p. 33</ref>

Before a vigorous debate about religious persecution took place in England (starting in the 1640s), for centuries in Europe, religion had been tied to territory. In England, there had been several [[Act of Uniformity (disambiguation)|Acts of Uniformity]]; in continental Europe, the Latin phrase "[[cuius regio, eius religio]]" had been coined in the 16th century and applied as a fundament for the [[Peace of Augsburg]] (1555). It was pushed to the extreme by [[Absolute monarchy|absolutist regime]]s, particularly by the French kings [[Louis XIV]] and his successors. It was under their rule that [[Catholicism]] became the sole compulsory allowed religion in France and that the [[huguenots]] had to massively leave the country. Persecution meant that the state was committed to secure religious uniformity by coercive measures, as eminently obvious in a statement of [[Roger L'Estrange]]: "That which you call persecution, I translate Uniformity".<ref>quoted after Coffey (2000), 27</ref>

However, in the 17th century, writers like [[Pierre Bayle]], [[John Locke]], [[Richard Overton (pamphleteer)|Richard Overton]] and Roger William broke the link between territory and faith, which eventually resulted in a shift from territoriality to religious voluntarism.<ref name=Coffey58>Coffey 2000: 58.</ref> It was Locke who, in his [[A Letter Concerning Toleration|Letter Concerning Toleration]], defined the state in purely secular terms:<ref name=Coffey57>Coffey 2000: 57.</ref> "The commonwealth seems to me to be a society of men constituted only for the procuring, preserving, and advancing their own civil interests."<ref name=Locke89>{{Cite web|date=1689 | title= A letter concerning toleration| author1= John Locke | author1-link= John Locke | translator= William Popple |url=http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke2/locke-t/locke_toleration.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150414011127/http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/locke/locke2/locke-t/locke_toleration.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=2015-04-14 }}</ref> Concerning the church, he went on: "A church, then, I take to be a voluntary society of men, joining themselves together of their own accord."<ref name=Locke89/> With this treatise, John Locke laid one of the most important intellectual foundations of the [[separation of church and state]], which ultimately led to the [[secular state]].

===Early modern England===
One period of religious persecution which has been extensively studied is [[Early modern period|early modern]] England, since the rejection of religious persecution, now common in the Western world, originated there. The English 'Call for Toleration' was a turning point in the [[Christian debate on persecution and toleration]], and early modern England stands out to the historians as a place and time in which literally "hundreds of books and tracts were published either for or against religious toleration."<ref name="Coffey00-14">Coffey 2000: 14.</ref><!--This time has been debated thoroughly by historians, whereas, for the obvious reason of the over-abundance of material, historians generally avoid writing books on the whole of human history. reword?-->

The most ambitious chronicle of that time is [[Wilbur Kitchener Jordan|W.K.Jordan]]'s [[Masterpiece|magnum opus]] ''The Development of Religious Toleration in England, 1558–1660'' (four volumes, published 1932–1940). Jordan wrote as the threat of [[fascism]] rose in Europe, and this work is seen as a defense of the fragile [[Value (personal and cultural)|values]] of [[humanism]] and [[Toleration|tolerance]].<ref>Coffey 2000, 2</ref> More recent introductions to this period are ''Persecution and Toleration in Protestant England, 1558–1689'' (2000) by [[John Coffey (historian)|John Coffey]] and ''Charitable hatred. Tolerance and intolerance in England, 1500–1700'' (2006) by Alexandra Walsham. To understand why religious persecution has occurred, historians like Coffey "pay close attention to what the persecutors said they were doing."<ref name="Coffey00-14"/>

====Ecclesiastical dissent and civil tolerance====
No religion is free from internal dissent, although the degree of dissent that is tolerated within a particular religious organization can strongly vary. This degree of diversity tolerated within a particular church is described as ''ecclesiastical tolerance'',<ref>John Coffey (2000), p. 12</ref> and is one form of [[religious toleration]]. However, when people nowadays speak of religious tolerance, they most often mean ''civil tolerance'', which refers to the degree of religious diversity that is tolerated within the state.

In the absence of civil toleration, someone who finds himself in disagreement with his congregation does not have the option to leave and chose a different faith—simply because there is only one recognized faith in the country (at least officially). In modern western [[Civil law (legal system)|civil law]] any citizen may join and leave a religious organization at will; In western societies, this is taken for granted, but actually, this legal [[separation of Church and State]] only started to emerge a few centuries ago.

In the [[Christian debate on persecution and toleration]], the notion of civil tolerance allowed Christian theologians to reconcile Jesus' commandment to [[Expounding of the Law#Love for enemies|love one's enemies]] with other parts of the [[New Testament]] that are rather strict regarding dissent within the church. Before that, theologians like [[Joseph Hall (bishop)|Joseph Hall]]<!--or [[Thomas Thorowgood]] in protestant England--> had reasoned from the ecclesiastical intolerance of the early Christian church in the New Testament to the civil intolerance of the Christian state.<ref>John Coffey (2000), p. 33</ref>

===Russia===
The Bishop of Vladimir Feodor turned some people into slaves, others were locked in prison, cut their heads, burnt eyes, cut tongues or crucified on walls. Some heretics were executed by burning them alive. According to an inscription of Khan Mengual-Temir, Metropolitan Kiril was granted the right to heavily punish with death for blasphemy against the Orthodox Church or breach of ecclesiastical privileges. He advised all means of destruction to be used against heretics, but without bloodshed, in the name of 'saving souls'. Heretics were drowned. Novgorod Bishop Gennady Gonzov turned to Tsar [[Ivan III]] requesting the death of heretics. Gennady admired the Spanish inquisitors, especially his contemporary [[Tomás de Torquemada|Torquemada]], who for 15 years of inquisition activity burned and punished thousands of people.{{citation needed|date=April 2019}} As in Rome, persecuted fled to depopulated areas. The most terrible punishment was considered an underground pit, where rats lived. Some people had been imprisoned and tied to the wall there, and untied after their death.<ref>А.С.Пругавин, ук. соч., с.27–29</ref> [[Old Believers]] were persecuted and executed, the order was that even those renouncing completely their beliefs and baptized in the state church to be lynched without mercy. The writer [[Mikhail Lomonosov|Lomonosov]] opposed the religious teachings and by his initiative a scientific book against them was published. The book was destroyed, the Russian synod insisted Lomonosov's works to be burned and requested his punishment.{{citation needed|date=April 2019}}

{{Blockquote|...were cutting heads, hanging, some by the neck, some by the foot, many of them were stabbed with sharp sticks and impaled on hooks. This included the tethering to a ponytail, drowning and freezing people alive in lakes. The winners did not spare even the sick and the elderly, taking them out of the monastery and throwing them mercilessly in icy 'vises'. The words step back, the pen does not move, in eternal darkness the ancient Solovetsky monastery is going. Of the more than 500 people, only a few managed to avoid the terrible court.<ref>Ал. Амосов, "Судный день", в списание "Церковь" № 2, 1992, издателство "Церковь", Москва, с.11</ref>}}