Why was Edward Gibbon criticized during his lifetime?

Edward Gibbon faced significant criticism during his lifetime primarily due to his treatment of Christianity in his seminal work, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.1

In the final two chapters of his first volume, published in 1776, Gibbon analyzed the rise of the religion with irony, treating it as a phenomenon of human experience rather than a divine revelation. This skeptical approach alarmed those who feared it would undermine the established religious order, leading to personal ridicule and attacks from various pamphleteers.1

Beyond his intellectual work, Gibbon was also a target of mockery due to his physical appearance; his corpulence and penchant for elaborate clothing made him an easy subject for detractors. While he largely ignored these personal slights, he did issue a formal response in 1779, titled A Vindication of Some Passages in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Chapters of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, to address specific accusations that he had falsified his historical evidence.1