The Christian Empire 313 - 476
Before Constantine I, Christians suffered from sporadic and localized persecutions over a period of two and a half centuries. Their refusal to participate in Roman Imperial cult was considered an act of treason and was thus punishable by execution.
The first recorded official persecution of Christians on behalf of the Roman Empire was in 64 AD, when, as reported by the Roman historian Tacitus, Emperor Nero blamed Christians for the Great Fire of Rome. According to Church tradition, it was during the reign of Nero that Peter and Paul were martyred in Rome.
The most widespread official persecution was carried out by Emperor Diocletian during the Great Persecution (303–311). The emperor ordered Christian buildings and the homes of Christians torn down and their sacred books collected and burned. Christians were arrested, tortured, mutilated, burned, starved, and condemned to gladiatorial contests to amuse spectators. The Great Persecution officially ended in April 311, when Galerius, senior emperor of the Tetrarchy, issued an edict of toleration (Edict of Milan), which granted Christians the right to practice their religion, though it did not restore any property to them.
Constantine, Caesar in the Western empire and Licinius, Caesar in the East, also were signatories to the edict of toleration. It has been speculated that Galerius' reversal of his long-standing policy of Christian persecution has been attributable to one or both of these co-Caesars.
The emperors who followed Constantine I continued his legacy; they were all Christian except one. A little later in the century, Theodosius I (379-395) required that all of his subjects be Christian.
Constantine 313 A.D.
Flavius Valerius Constantius (c. 285-337), Constantine the Great, was the son of Emperor Constantius I and his concubine, Helena. When his father died in July 306, Constantine became emperor of Britain, Gaul (now France), and Spain. Gradually he gained control of the entire Roman empire.
Just outside of Rome, Constantine won the Battle of Milvian (Mulvian) Bridge in 312 A.D. against Maxentius. Eusebius of Caesarea and other Christian sources point towards this victory as the turning point of his conversion to Christianity. According to these sources, Constantine looked up to the sun before the battle and saw a cross of light above it, and with it the Greek words "Ἐν Τούτῳ Νίκα" ("by this, win!", often rendered in the Latin "in hoc signo vinces"). Constantine commanded his troops to adorn their shields with a Christian symbol (the Chi-Rho), and thereafter they were victorious.
Constantine claimed the emperorship in the West and Following the battle, Constantine claimed the emperorship in the West. The new emperor ignored the altars to the gods prepared on the Capitoline and did not carry out the customary sacrifices to celebrate a general's victorious entry into Rome, instead heading directly to the imperial palace. He was made senior Augustus by the Roman senate.
In 313, Constantine and Licinius, who married Constantine's sister Constantia, agreed to end the persecution of Christians and issued the Edict of Milan. Constantine was ruler of the West; Licinius became ruler of the East after defeating Maximim.
Trouble arose between the two rulers. Licinius, a pagan who never was a Christian, began to restrict the public life of the Eastern churches. As a "champion of Christian faith," Constantine invaded Licinius' territories in 323 and forced Licinius to abdicate in 324. Licinius was executed. "Constantine became sole ruler of the empire, and the churches awoke to find that the cause of Rome and the cause of Christ had become one."
The Roman Emperor Constantine the Great (reigned 306–337) ruled the Roman Empire and Christianity became the dominant religion. Constantine brought Christianity from the position of being a persecuted minority to the dominant power in religious life in the Roman Empire.
Most influential people in the empire, however, especially high military officials, had not converted to Christianity and still participated in the traditional religions of Rome. Constantine's rule exhibited at least a willingness to appease these factions. The Roman coins minted up to eight years after the battle still bore the images of Roman gods. The monuments he first commissioned, such as the Arch of Constantine, contained no reference to Christianity.
Historians remain uncertain about Constantine's reasons for favoring Christianity (despite the story of the Battle of Milvian), and theologians and historians have argued about which form of Christianity he subscribed to. Although Constantine had been exposed to Christianity by his mother Helena, there is no consensus among scholars as to whether he adopted his mother's Christianity in his youth, or gradually over the course of his life. However, writing to Christians, Constantine made clear that he believed his successes were owed to the protection of that High God alone.
He was over 42 when he finally declared himself a Christian. He did not receive baptism until shortly before his death in May 337. Constantine was baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia in May 337 (presumably on his deathbed, which was common for the times).
Constantine took over the role of the patron for the Christian faith. He supported the Church financially, had an extraordinary number of basilicas built, granted privileges (e.g. exemption from certain taxes) to clergy, promoted Christians to high-ranking offices, returned property confiscated during the Great Persecution of Diocletian, and endowed the church with land and other wealth.
He gave large gifts of land and money to the Church and other special legal status to Church property and personnel. These gifts and later ones combined to make the Church the largest landowner in the West by the 6th century.
Many of these gifts were funded through severe taxation of pagan cults. Some pagan cults were forced to disband for lack of funds. When this happened the Church took over the cult's previous role of caring for the poor. In a reflection of their increased standing in the Empire, clergy began to adopt the dress of the royal household, including the cope (cape or cloak, liturgical vestment).
Constantine played an important role in the rise of Christian architecture. He brought artists together from many places and gave them special favors. Some examples of basilicas that Constantine had built are the Lateran Basilica and old St. Peter's in Rome, the Church of the Apostles and the original Hagia Sophia in Constantinople , and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. An example of the Roman basilica of the age of Constantine is the church of S. Maria Magiorre.
Between 324 and 330, Constantine built a new imperial capital at Byzantium on the Bosphorus, which would be named Constantinople for him. Unlike "old" Rome, the city employed overtly Christian architecture and contained churches within the city walls and had no pre-existing temples from other religions. In doing this, however, Constantine required those who had not converted to Christianity pay for the new city.
The new capital city became known as Constantinople (it is now Istanbul, Turkey). Constantine made Constantinople his imperial headquarters.
Constantine built a number of Christian churches, including those of the Holy Apostles, where he was buried. Hagia Sophia, an early basilica erected in 325 and restored many times since then, is one of the most important monuments of the Byzantine architecture.
Constantinople became a major center of Christianity along with:
• Antioch in Syria
• Alexandria in Egypt
• and Rome in Italy
• Caesarea in Israel
Between 330-565, Constantinople became arts and cultural center of the world. During the reign of Justinian (527-565), early Christian civilization gained momentum and created some of the best landmarks of the history of civilization.
Constantine's laws enforced and reflected his Christian reforms. Crucifixion was abolished for reasons of Christian piety, but was replaced with hanging, to show there was Roman law and justice.
On March 7, 321, Sunday was declared the official day of rest, on which markets were banned and public offices were closed, except for the purpose of freeing slaves.
There were no restrictions on farming work, which was the work of the great majority of the population. Some laws were even humane in the modern sense, possibly originating in his Christianity. For example, a prisoner was no longer to be kept in total darkness but must be given the outdoors and daylight; a condemned man was allowed to die in the arena, but he could not be branded on his "heavenly beautified" face, since God was supposed to have made man in his image, but only on the feet. Gladiatorial games were ordered to be eliminated in 325.
He is revered as a saint and isapostolos in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Oriental Orthodox Church for his example as a "Christian monarch."
Edict of Milan
In 313 Constantine and Licinius announced "that it was proper that the Christians and all others should have liberty to follow that mode of religion which to each of them appeared best", thereby granting tolerance to all religions, including Christianity.
The Edict of Milan went a step further than the earlier Edict of Toleration by Galerius in 311, returning confiscated Church property. This edict made the empire officially neutral with regard to religious worship; it neither made the traditional religions illegal nor made Christianity the state religion, as occurred later with the Edict of Thessalonica. The Edict of Milan did, however, raise the number of Christians within the empire and it reaffirmed the importance of religious worship to the welfare of the state.
After the Edict of Toleration (Milan) in 313, Christian art was permitted by the state. Emperor Constantine encouraged Christian art. In 380, Theodosius I (379-395) recognized Roman Christianity as the state religion. The Empire became a powerful patron of the Christian art.
No longer did art have to be "underground," such as in the catacombs of Rome and inside house churches. For the first time, basilicas (churches whose design was adapted from that of Roman secular basilicas) were built for Christian worship. Inside the basilicas, artists did paintings and mosaics of biblical stories that could be viewed publicly.
During the time of the Christian Empire, the first ecumenical councils were convened; early statements of orthodoxy, such as the Nicene Creed, were written; and the church recognized and Old and New Testament but the canon was not yet completely closed.
The state church of the Roman Empire was established on 27 February 380 with the Edict of Thessalonica, when Emperor Theodosius I made Nicene Christianity the empire's sole authorized religion. Thus referred to as the Imperial Church.
Like the Roman Empire, the church of the 4th and 5th centuries was divided into two groups, the East, where most Christians spoke Greek, and the West, where most Christians spoke Latin. In the first two centuries of Early Church, most of the churches had been Greek-speaking; some spoke Aramaic and other languages. The church expanded beyond the Roman Empire to places such as Ethiopia and India, where other languages were spoken and other Christian traditions developed.
After the Edict of Milan, many more people became Christians. Most were not Jewish and were ignorant Judeo-Christian scripture, tradition, and theology. With more converts from multiple geographical, language, and other cultural contexts, additional variations of Christianity developed.
Conflict and controversy were not new to Christianity, however the Christian Empire experienced some substantial disputes. When Constantine I became the ruler of Rome in 313, the Donatist controversy was raging in North Africa and Numidia. A soldier and a statesman who liked order and agreement, Constantine tried to quell it but not very successfully. Constantine was not a theologian, but he took steps during his rule to try to make Christianity less conflictual by calling the Council of Nicea to settle the Arian controversy.
Ultimately creeds such as the Nicene Creed and the Apostles' Creed were affirmed as "orthodox" -- right teaching. Those teachings not considered orthodox, such as Gnosticism, were defined as heretical.
The process of canonization continued during the era of the Christian Empire. Those communities that became known as orthodox came close to agreeing on an authoritative collection of scriptures. As far as we know, Athanasius was the first person to name in 367 A.D, the 27 books of the New Testament accepted by most Christian groups today.
According to some accounts, in 382 the Council of Rome first officially recognized the Biblical canon, listing the accepted books of the Old and New Testament, and in 391 the Vulgate Latin translation of the Bible was made. Other accounts list the Council of Carthage of 397 as the Council that finalized the Biblical canon as it is known today.
Constantine played a significant role in the canonization of the Bible. His desire for and actions to create unity and uniformity contributed to the process of deciding upon a fixed canon. In addition, he financed fifty copies of the scriptures to be produced for use in Constantinople. The production of these manuscripts were supervised by Eusebius of Caesarea, who tells about of the request in his book Life of Constantine. Presumedly, these scriptures were the complete New Testament but some scholars think they consisted only of the four gospels.
In the late second century, more formal scholarly approaches to biblical interpretation developed in the Eastern church beginning with the School of Alexandria in Egypt. The School of Alexandria was known for using an allegorical method of exegesis. It was founded by Pantaenus, who was followed by more famous interpreters such as Clement and Origen.
The Bible as it has come down to the 21st century was first officially laid out in Church Councils or Synods through the process of official 'canonization'. Prior to these Councils or Synods, the Bible had already reached a form that was nearly identical to the form in which it is now found.
The Council of Ephesus in 431 clarified the nature of Jesus' incarnation, declaring that he was both fully man and fully God.
Two decades later, the Council of Chalcedon solidified Roman papal primacy which added to continuing breakdown in relations between Rome and Constantinople, the see of the Eastern Church. Also sparked were the Monophysite disagreements over the precise nature of the incarnation of Jesus which led to the first of the various Oriental Orthodox Churches breaking away from the Catholic Church.
Constantine & Nicaea 325 AD
Discussed in separate topic
Christian Empire from Constantine to 476 A.D.
Formation of the Bible
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