All shows are idolatrous inventions of the devil

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Novatian is answering the objection that Scripture nowhere forbids public shows by arguing that Scripture condemned them all when it abolished idolatry, the mother of every kind of show.

What has Scripture forbidden? It has forbidden watching what it forbids doing. I say it condemned all these kinds of public shows when it took away idolatry, the mother of all games, from which these monsters of vanity and frivolity came. For what public show is without an idol, what game is without a sacrifice, what contest is not consecrated to a dead man? What is a faithful Christian doing among these things? If he flees idolatry, what place is there for him? Why does someone who is now holy take pleasure from criminal things? Why does he approve superstitions against God by loving them while he watches? Let him know, moreover, that all these things are inventions of demons, not of God. He shamelessly exorcizes demons in the church whose pleasures he praises in the public shows: and although he renounced the devil once and every tie was cut in baptism, when he goes to the devil's public show after Christ, he renounces Christ as if he were the devil. Idolatry, as I have already said, is the mother of all games, and to make faithful Christians come to her she flatters them through the pleasure of eyes and ears. Romulus first consecrated circus games to Consus, supposedly the god of counsel, in order to seize the Sabine women; others consecrated the rest. When famine had seized the city, stage plays were introduced to summon the people, dedicated to Ceres and Liber, and afterward to the remaining idols and the dead. Those Greek contests, whether in singing or in stringed instruments or in voices or in strength, have various demons as their presiding powers: and whatever else moves the eyes of the spectators or soothes their ears, if you ask about its origin and institution, it presents as its cause either an idol or a demon or a dead man. So the devil, the artificer, because he knew that idolatry by itself, naked, was shuddered at, mixed it with public shows so that it could be loved through pleasure.

Latin

Quid scriptura interdixit? prohibuit enim spectari quod prohibet geri. omnia, inquam, ista spectaculorum genera damnauit, quando idololatriam sustulit ludorum omnium matrem, unde haec uanitatis et leuitatis monstra uenerunt. quod enim spectaculum sine idolo, quis ludus sine sacrificio, quod certamen non consecratum mortuo ? quid inter haec christianus fidelis facit: si idololatriam fugit, quid loci ei? quid qui iam sanctus sit de rebus criminosis uoluptatem capit ? quid contra Deum superstitiones probat quas amat dum spectat? ceterum sciat haec omnia inuenta daemoniorum esse, non Dei. impudenter in ecclesia daemonia exorcizat quorum uoluptates in spectaculis laudat: et cum semel illi renuntians rescissa. sit res omnis in baptismate, dum post Christum ad diaboli spectaculum uadit, Christo tamquam diabolo renuntiat. idololatria, ut iam dixi, ludorum omnium mater est, quae ut ad se christiani fideles ueniant blanditur illis per oculorum et aurium uolupta.tem. Romulus Conso quasi consilii deo ob rapiendas Sabinas circenses primus consecrauit, ceteri reliquis. dum urbem fames occupasset, ad aduocationem populi adquisiti sunt ludi scenici et Cereri et Libero dicati postmodum reliquisque idolis et mortuis. graeca illa certamina uel in cantibus uel in fidibus uel in uocibus uel m uiribus praesides suos habent uaria daemonia: et quidquid est aliud quod spectantium aut oculos mouet aut delinit aures, si cum sua origine et institutione quaeratur, causam praefert aut idolum aut daemonium aut mortuum. ita diabolus artifex quia idololatriam per se nudam sciebat horreri, spectaculis miscuit, ut per uoluptatem posset amari.

About this text

Novatian warns Christians who quote Scripture to defend going to the public games and shows.

Novatian (fl. c. 250) was a Roman presbyter and Christian teacher who wrote this treatise to the faithful, whom he addresses as brothers. He composed it because some Christians were defending attendance at public spectacles by appealing to Scripture, and he feared that wounds poorly bound might break open again. His aim was to admonish those already instructed rather than to teach them anew.

The occasion is a dispute within the Christian community. Some believers argued that Scripture does not forbid the circus, theater, and athletic contests, and they cited examples such as Elijah, David, and an unnamed apostle whose athletic imagery matches Paul's epistles. Novatian quotes these opponents directly and refutes their appeals, showing that the biblical examples were written to stir virtue, not to permit spectacles. He also names Romulus, who first consecrated circus games to the god Consus, and Ceres and Liber, to whom stage plays were dedicated.

A reader should know that public shows means the circus games, stage plays, and athletic contests of the Roman world, all of which Novatian traces to idolatry and the devil. He argues that even apart from idolatry these shows are marked by vanity and immodesty, and that Christians have better spectacles in God's creation and in Scripture. The treatise cites Old Testament figures such as Elijah, David, and Daniel without formal book citations, and it alludes to the apostle's athletic imagery in the epistles. The term Eucharist refers to the consecrated body of Christ, which in Novatian's time a believer might carry home from church.

New English from the Latin base text; no published English used as wording.

Printed text used

Translated from CSEL 3.3 (1871) (Latin)

This work has passed this project's source check. This is an AI-assisted study translation. Source fidelity and completeness have not been independently certified. Open Latin on each section (or the Latin source witness link) for the source text. This is not a complete critical edition.