ABSTRACT
For early Christians, the Bible was the ideological source for assessing family life. Re-definitions were needed both for the Christian concept of abandoning the family and for the traditional Roman idea of familial pietas. In general, however, to grant only a secondary place to earthly relations, and especially to family ties, should be the ideal for all Christians. In connection to the contempt for kin, the rejection of riches was a key requirement for the perfection of saintly Christians in the fourth- and fifth-century writings. Chaste Christians have no earthly patriae, but their place of origin and final rest is the heavenly Jerusalem. In the context of mainstream Christianity the ultimate value of pietas is not called into question; the requirement for commitment to the heavenly family was not directed against familial pietas or natural emotions and the connection between the various family members.
