With the preceding post as context, let us reconsider the development of Christianity from the persecution of Nero until the conversion of Constantine.
The RE Nero instituted the persecution of Christians, murdering St. Peter and probably St. Paul in 67, about the time Mark’s Gospel was written, which seems to have been before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70, since that event was not mentioned. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke incorporated much of Mark’s version of the life and teachings of Jesus, while the Gospel of John was a later and more theological work, emphasizing that Jesus was Messiah or Son of God.
Thus, by the end of the first century GW per the OT was known to Jews from Jerusalem to Rome, and GW per the NT was known only to a few thousand Christians including Messianic Jews as they left the synagogues to form churches and Gentiles associated them. Much of GW was transmitted orally as the gospels and epistles were being collected and copied. It would be interesting to know how their understanding of the Creed compares with ours, but it seems unlikely that it would be very complete, which is why it was problematic for Christians about the time of Irenaeus (c.180) to view unity as submission to the authority of bishops, and then for the bishop of Rome to gain a predominant position among Christian churches by 200, before the New Testament was canonized.
During this period NT teaching regarding salvation via personal faith in Jesus as Lord and obedience to his command for universal love was supplanted by a belief that stressed conformity to the interpretation and authority of Roman Catholicism (RC). Tertullian (d.c.220) was the first person to speak of God as a Trinity, and he became a follower of Montanism, which taught continuing ecstatic prophecy was equally as authoritative as the doctrines of the original apostles. Origen (d.254) wrote De principiis, interpreting scripture allegorically and espousing universal salvation.
About 260, Plotinus wrote the Enneads, the founding document of Neo-Platonism, which taught that there is a transcendent “One” that is beyond being, although we identify it with Good and Beauty, and that existents emanate from the One in succeeding stages of declining perfection from nous (logos, reason) to world soul to human soul to matter. About 310, Apollinarius maintained that Christ was God incarnate in opposition to Arius, who denied that Christ was eternally begotten of God.
After Trajan, the RE declined as non-Christian (pagan or heathen) Germanic tribes (Goths, Franks, Alemanni, Saxons, Thuringians, etc.) gained strength. Germanic and Norse religion was polytheistic, with Odin as chief god. Its earliest extant source document is the Eddas (probably composed about 850). During the reign of Diocletian, the RE was divided east and west in 285, until it was reunited by Constantine in 308, who ended the persecution of Christians with an edict in 313. He moved the capitol to Constantinople in 331.
Perhaps there are some CC folks who have studied this history enough to be able to share with us the content of the Christian Creed as manifested by the Nicene or other creeds?
The RE Nero instituted the persecution of Christians, murdering St. Peter and probably St. Paul in 67, about the time Mark’s Gospel was written, which seems to have been before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70, since that event was not mentioned. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke incorporated much of Mark’s version of the life and teachings of Jesus, while the Gospel of John was a later and more theological work, emphasizing that Jesus was Messiah or Son of God.
Thus, by the end of the first century GW per the OT was known to Jews from Jerusalem to Rome, and GW per the NT was known only to a few thousand Christians including Messianic Jews as they left the synagogues to form churches and Gentiles associated them. Much of GW was transmitted orally as the gospels and epistles were being collected and copied. It would be interesting to know how their understanding of the Creed compares with ours, but it seems unlikely that it would be very complete, which is why it was problematic for Christians about the time of Irenaeus (c.180) to view unity as submission to the authority of bishops, and then for the bishop of Rome to gain a predominant position among Christian churches by 200, before the New Testament was canonized.
During this period NT teaching regarding salvation via personal faith in Jesus as Lord and obedience to his command for universal love was supplanted by a belief that stressed conformity to the interpretation and authority of Roman Catholicism (RC). Tertullian (d.c.220) was the first person to speak of God as a Trinity, and he became a follower of Montanism, which taught continuing ecstatic prophecy was equally as authoritative as the doctrines of the original apostles. Origen (d.254) wrote De principiis, interpreting scripture allegorically and espousing universal salvation.
About 260, Plotinus wrote the Enneads, the founding document of Neo-Platonism, which taught that there is a transcendent “One” that is beyond being, although we identify it with Good and Beauty, and that existents emanate from the One in succeeding stages of declining perfection from nous (logos, reason) to world soul to human soul to matter. About 310, Apollinarius maintained that Christ was God incarnate in opposition to Arius, who denied that Christ was eternally begotten of God.
After Trajan, the RE declined as non-Christian (pagan or heathen) Germanic tribes (Goths, Franks, Alemanni, Saxons, Thuringians, etc.) gained strength. Germanic and Norse religion was polytheistic, with Odin as chief god. Its earliest extant source document is the Eddas (probably composed about 850). During the reign of Diocletian, the RE was divided east and west in 285, until it was reunited by Constantine in 308, who ended the persecution of Christians with an edict in 313. He moved the capitol to Constantinople in 331.
Perhaps there are some CC folks who have studied this history enough to be able to share with us the content of the Christian Creed as manifested by the Nicene or other creeds?
