This chapter narrates the emergence of the pro-Nicene alliance by arguing that it was a consensus-building movement. It begins by tracing the history of other consensus-building movements in the fractured theological landscape of the years 325-61 in order to demonstrate their development of various consensus-building tactics, which were ultimately used unsuccessfully. The impetus for the pro-Nicene alliance itself was dissatisfaction with, or the failure of, these previous efforts. Pro-Nicenes adopted four tactics of previous consensus-building efforts and deployed them successfully: (1) defining itself as the center between extreme positions, (2) promoting a minimalist creed that nonetheless ruled out extremes to be avoided, (3) acknowledging that the meaning of a creed was not self-evident and producing supplementary material to insure its correct interpretation, and (4) securing imperial patronage. The chapter then turns to shifts in thinking which occurred in the early 360s and made consensus between former opponents possible, taking Athanasius of Alexandria and Basil of Caesarea as paradigmatic examples of these shifts. The chapter concludes by narrating the consolidation and ascendency of the pro-Nicene alliance in the late 370s and early 380s.

This chapter explores the role of violent pedagogic practices in the formation of elite males in the later Roman Empire. It draws on the work of the sociologists Pierre Bourdieu and Basil Bernstein to inform an analysis of education’s key role in social and cultural reproduction. Focusing on selected writings of two late-fourth century contemporaries, Libanius and Basil of Caesarea, the chapter suggests that violence of various sorts played a pivotal role in the formation of elite male subjects, whether in the school of the teacher of rhetoric (Libanius) or in monastic training (Basil). Violence played a pivotal role in both the form and content of late Roman education – as well as suffering and inflicting violence on others, students read about and performed violent narratives. The considered cultivation of feelings of fear was viewed as maintaining the pedagogic order and helping to form ideal masculine subjects. Through such experiences and by reflecting on them in pedagogic contexts, students learnt to understand the parameters of legitimate and illegitimate violence, enabling them to protect themselves and their community in a competitive social context.