Imperial Power and the Emerging World Religions

During the Classic Period (500 BCE-500 CE), a succession of increasingly impressive imperial regimes appeared in the civilizational centers of Eurasia. This pattern of development culminated in the emergence of a virtually uninterrupted band of immense regional states in the last centuries before the Common Era that persisted for over four hundred years. Thinking comparatively about these imperial structures, we see empire builders attempting to resolve their common problems with strikingly similar approaches. Among their various methods, ruling elites relied on the ritual practices and sacred beliefs of public, state-organized religions to inculcate loyalty, legitimate authority, and heighten social integration and cultural uniformity among their diverse subjects. There were, as a result, close connections between these empires and the emerging world religions, notably Christianity, Mahayana Buddhism, and a more coherent form of Hinduism. These movements, despite their obvious differences and the contrasts between the various imperial regimes, proved useful to ruling classes because they set forth claims and objectives universal in scope and provided compelling justifications for constituted authority. However, the favored belief systems became increasingly independent of their imperial sponsors and spawned leaders more inclined to pursue their own purposes. When, after 200 CE, the immense imperial states of the Classic Period approached the limits of their possibilities and fell on hard times, the favored orthodoxies acquired a stronger and more pervasive influence as they broke free from the empires that once sponsored them. By adopting a comparative approach to the interactions between imperial states and emerging world religions, this paper will highlight the similarities as well as the differences between complex human experiences in the civilizational centers of Eurasia during the Classic Period.