But wherever the idea of sacred exists, sacrilege is possible..
To tamper with a constitution that had so proved its quality seemed not so much a sacrilege as a folly.
Indeed the country people would look on the destruction of the high places with their Asheras and Mazzebas as sacrilege and would consider Josiah's death in battle as a divine punishment for his sacrilegious deeds.
In other words the governors were ordered merely to punish sacrilege, and, under Aurelius, Christianity was regarded as such.
Old age was held in high honour, but it was sacrilege to speak, or even to think, of the dead.