A Consequence of Legitimacy : 9781620800584 : 16 Oct 2015 : A Consequence of Legitimacy examines the political interaction between the Roman emperor Domitian, the Roman senate, the province of Asia, the imperial cult, the Jewish population, and the emerging Christian population at the end of the first century AD. Surveying the first century from various points of view, Rhodes offers a fresh perspective on the relationship of Domitian to a persecution of Christians during his reign, an historical perspective that has implications for the date of the New Testament book of Revelation. Historians agree that Domitian and the Senate were in conflict, but they fail to identify the reason why, outside of blaming Domitian's character. However, by considering the nature of this relationship and the political interaction it produced, one can construct a series of spiraling events that held consequences for the Senate, for Domitian, and, though almost wholly unconnected to them, for Christians as