Emperor Constantine (Byzantine mosaic ca. 1000 from the Hagia Sophia)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cConstantine has been a whipping boy for a very long time and still is today,\u201d Leithart begins. The historical and theological consensus identifies Constantine with \u201ctyranny, anti-Semitism, hypocrisy, apostasy, and heresy.\u201d Constantine, the conventional wisdom goes, was a \u201cpower hardened politician … a hypocrite who harnessed the energy of the Church for his own ends … a murderer, usurper, and egoist.\u201d<\/p>\n

This opinion has its roots in the work of John Howard Yoder, a prominent pacifist and \u201cprobably the most influential Mennonite theologian who ever lived,\u201d Leithart argues. His influence is far reaching and includes such prominent names as Stanley Hauerwas of Duke University among others. \u201cIn Yoder’s telling, the Church ‘fell’ in the fourth century (or thereabouts) and has not yet recovered from that fall. This misconstrues the theological significance of Constantine … \u201d<\/p>\n

Challenging Yoder’s thesis is not the only reason Leithart wrote the book but it certainly is the most compelling. Leithart believes Yoder’s pacifist preconceptions distort the historical record to such a degree that they blind us to the inherent moral power of the Christian faith to transform and elevate human culture. The pacifism of Yoder and like-minded disciples, Leithart argues in so many words, is nothing less than a debilitating emasculation of the Christian faith.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rescuing the historical narrative from the strictures of a Yoder-like pacifism is no easy task. Pacifist ideas hold tremendous moral power because they appeal to an unblemished definition of personal virtue. It enables the pacifist to occupy a moral high-ground that is virtually unassailable. Who, after all, really wants violence? And who, in defending the necessity of violence, does not feel the heat of the pacifist\u2019s disapproving stare?<\/p>\n

The culture surrounding the early Christians was often violent. But the violence, while often senseless, still has a cultural and thus comprehensible context. Violence was endemic in pagan culture. It often was seen as divinely ordained. It\u2019s the historian\u2019s task to uncover, define, and describe it for us. It takes real work to describe it properly and the reader must labor to understand it. When the narrative has to throw off the strictures of pacifism and other anachronistic preconceptions, the task is even harder.<\/p>\n

Rescuing the historical narrative then requires two things. First, the modern animus against violence must be seen for what it is: a moralistic precondition imposed on the text and fundamentally a-historical. Second, a new narrative free of the precondition has to be written; history needs to be rediscovered. This requires an able historian who is also a good writer.<\/p>\n

Leithart accomplishes both. First he is very clear in his purposes and approach. He pulls no punches, couches nothing in euphemism, and makes no appeals to false virtue. Second, Leithart has the novelist\u2019s gift for description and detail. He captures the native lyricism of the language. The book is a joy to read.<\/p>\n