Constantine Has Been Beaten to Death (by anti-catholics)

I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “beating a dead horse.” It refers to something that has been said or done so many times that it has outlived its usefulness. This is especially true of arguments that are not only old but also untrue.

Like the proverbial horse, the Roman emperor Constantine has been beaten to death by anti-Catholics.

I make it a point to check all of the comments posted on our YouTube and Facebook pages at least twice a day. As sure as fish live in water, I have come to expect at least one message a day from a Christian Fundamentalist about how the Catholic Church was founded by Emperor Constantine sometime in the fourth century.

It’s almost unfathomable to me that in this day and age Fundamentalists still have not learned to verify the validity of their anti-Catholic arguments. But then again, with so many websites making claims like “Constantine founded the Catholic Church” living on in cyberspace, it’s no wonder some folks still cling to what blogger Mark Shea refers to as “pseudo knowledge.”

It would be nice if this falsity were confined to Fundamentalist circles, but sadly it is not. As atheist podcast host and blogger David Smalley explains on his website:

There’s no doubt that Constantine was favorable to Christianity. Still, many people mistakenly believe that he not only favored it but that he made it the state religion. He did not. He signed the Edict of Milan, which made it legal to practice Christianity and ordered that the Christians’ confiscated property be returned to them.

Another mistaken notion is that Constantine exercised complete control over the First Council of Nicaea in 325. The primary reason for the council was due to the growing Arian heresy. Jimmy Akin summarizes Arianism this way:

Constantine did not fully understand why Arianism was so controversial, and he even endorsed many of Arius’s ideas. Historian Dr. James Hitchcock explains:

If Constantine held as much sway over the Council as many claim, then it is a peculiar thing that the Christology he favored was the big loser.

The next anti-Catholic claim is summarized in Mr. Smalley’s quote above: It is the idea that Constantine decided which books belonged in the Bible and that the ones he did not favor were left out.

The Council Fathers discussed many things besides Arianism, including the proper dating of Easter, the validity of baptisms administered by heretics, and more. One issue they did not discuss, however, is which books belonged in the Bible. They drafted a list of canons (ecclesiastical laws) that you can read for yourself here.

Mr. Smalley’s assertion that “quick research on the Council of Nicaea” will prove his claim in fact proves otherwise; unless, of course, you are getting your information from anti-Catholic websites that don’t provide any primary sources to back them up.

Finally, there is the claim that Constantine introduced pagan elements into what was “pure” Christianity up to that point. Many Fundamentalists will claim that doctrines like transubstantiation, the communion of saints, or the sacrifice of the Mass were pagan ideas. But all of these teachings and more can be traced back to the time of the Apostles through the writings of the early Christians.

RobbyS: "The whole empire was in decline in the 3rd Century.
That does not mean that locally —as in Syria and Parthia and Arabia —that Jews might not have been proportionally well-represented, especially in an area that was still highly urbanized."

Sure, but the purpose of your argument is to emphasize the power and threat that Jews represented to Christians at the time of Roman Emperor Constantine, circa 4th Century AD.

A fair reading of the historical data is as follows:

Jewish Revolts of the First and Second Centuries nearly exterminated Jewish populations in precisely those areas where they had previously been strongest: Judaea, Alexandria, Cyprus, Libya and Syria.
These left roughly half the previous Jewish populations surviving, but in areas far removed from their previous centers of strength, and including many whose beliefs were not entirely, shall we say, orthodox.

Among those non-orthodox Jews were many who considered themselves Christians, others we might call "Hellenized Jews".
These were doubtless sources of various Christian "heresies" which attempted to down-play Christ's divinity and emphasize God's Unity.

Over many years, these non-orthodox Jews were forced to chose between Trinitarian Christianity, Orthodox Judaism and, eventually, Islam.

As various groups made their choices, the total Jewish population world-wide fell from around two million in the Second Century to fewer than one million by, say, the Ninth Century (Middle Ages).

Finally, at the same time that the number of Jews was falling from four million to fewer than one million, the number of Christians rose from circa 500,000 in 100 AD, to 2 million in 200 AD, to 5 million in 300 AD to 10 million by 400 AD.
So the question of when, exactly, did Jews stop being a powerful threat to Roman Empire Christians is answered: certainly no later than the Third Century AD -- long before Emperor Constantine's rise to power.

RobbyS: "my point was to emphasize the wealth and power of Jews in Antioch and maybe Asia and the Straits, which is where the Arian Party and later the Nestorian Party were strong...
The diatribes of Chrysostrom against the Jews would have been pointless unless they had not been a plausible threat..."

First of all Chrysostom lived nearly 100 years after Constantine, mostly indeed after 380 AD, when Christianity became the Empire's state religion, and Judaism was being suppressed everywhere.

Second, from the time of Constantine (300 AD) to Chrysostom (400 AD), the Christian population rose from 5 million to 10 million, while the numbers of Jews continued to fall, from perhaps two million toward fewer than one million.

If Antioch in 400 AD represented a last remnant of Jewish strength, it's Christian population had already grown to 100,000 out of 200,000 total inhabitants.
Of those, many remained loyal to Jewish traditions, and these are precisely the Christians Chrysostom denounced.

So, the point is not that Jews represented some kind of powerful threat, suppressing Christians, but rather that many Antioch Christians still loved their Jewish neighbors.

Imagine that!!!

RobbyS: "Furthermore, in Parthia Christians began to be persecuted after they gained religious freedom from the Roman government because they could be accused of being disloyal.
Jews in that land suffered no disabilities.
After all, the Jews had supported the Diaspora uprising against Trajan, which came damn close to success."

Again, it is highly instructive to note that in your desperate attempts to find some example, any example, of Jews persecuting Christians, the best you can come up with is:

Go back to 200 years before Constantine: to the Kitos War of 117 AD,
To the middle of the (2nd of three) Jewish Revolts against Rome,
At a time when the Jewish population was being reduced by half (4 million to two million), and Christians growing from 500,000 to 2 million --
And, you must look in a country (Parthia) which was then outside the borders of the Roman Empire.
Even then, the nature of alleged persecutions of Christians is not specified, and was not clearly at the hands of Jews.

And this Parthia example is enough to justify millennia of Christians persecuting and exterminating Jews?

RobbyS: "The Parthian example shows that religion and politics make a witch’s brew."

The question on the table is: who were the victims and who the aggressors.
I'm saying that's not even debatable -- after the second century Jewish Revolts against Rome, there are no serious examples of Jewish persecutions of Christians within the Empire.
And to judge by the vagueness of your Parthia example, very few outside it either.

The aggressors were Christians, whose populations doubled every century, and whose leadership exercised its political powers to suppress anyone and everyone -- be they heretics, pagans or Jews -- who didn't tow their line.

The irony, of course, is that unlike heretics and pagans, Jews were not targeted for extinction, thanks to St. Augustine of Hippo.
Instead, Jews were to be kept in a permanent state of subjection, so that they could serve as examples and warnings to Christians.

So after the second century Revolts, Jews were invariably the victims, and after 380 AD, Christians the aggressors.

Pray tell how Christians were able to be the aggressors prior to their being made the established religion, at a time when they themselves, unlike the Jews, had almost no legal standing in the empire? And you are resisting the plain fact that Jews and Christians were rivals for the loyalty of young .Jews. The very similarity of the two faiths comes out in Justin’s Martyr’s dialogue. Jews had been hellenized for hundreds of years, since the time of Alexander, and the Pharisee movement was occasioned the need to go against this, to establish a clear tradition for the people to follow. Christianity offered an alternative, and one that that did not require one to cut oneself off as much as the rabbis and sages did. My guess is that after Constantine’s time, many Jews joined with many pagans to follow the path to power by joining the Church. The Church Fathers were not entirely happy about the swelling of numbers. Especially those who had suffered through hard times knew opportunists when they met them, or thought they did. Jealousy made many “old” Christians in 15th Century Spain, do their best to cut down converted Jews to size, by spreading lies.

RobbyS: "Pray tell how Christians were able to be the aggressors prior to their being made the established religion, at a time when they themselves, unlike the Jews, had almost no legal standing in the empire?"

quoting from my post #245: "So after the second century Revolts, Jews were invariably the victims, and after 380 AD, Christians the aggressors."

quoting from daniel212's post #17:

"It was the The Edict of Thessalonica jointly issued by Theodosius I, Gratian, and Valentinian II on 27 February 380 that made the catholic church the state church.
"After the edict, Theodosius spent a great deal of energy suppressing all non-Nicene forms of Christianity, especially Arianism, and in establishing Nicene orthodoxy throughout his realm.[4].

"In 383, the Emperor ordered the various non-Nicene sects (Arians, Anomoeans, Macedonians, and Novatians) to submit written creeds to him, which he prayerfully reviewed and then burned, save for that of the Novatians.
The other sects lost the right to meet, ordain priests, or spread their beliefs.[6]
Theodosius prohibited the residence of heretics within Constantinople, and in 392 and 394 confiscated their places of worship.[7] "

Sorry, I do my best to be both brief and accurate, sometimes arriving a bit short of the mark.

RobbyS: "And you are resisting the plain fact that Jews and Christians were rivals for the loyalty of young .Jews."

Just as they are today, without that justifying any state-sponsored terrorism against Jews, or anyone else who doesn't submit to ecclesiastical authorities.

RobbyS: "My guess is that after Constantine’s time, many Jews joined with many pagans to follow the path to power by joining the Church.
The Church Fathers were not entirely happy about the swelling of numbers."

Christian numbers more than doubled every century until the year 400 AD, and have continued to grow every century since.
Along the way, the Catholic Church and others have accommodated a wide variety of regional cultural practices and values within its own teachings -- especially where local traditions dove-tail Christian messages.

But there is also a "dark side", a long history of misusing its political powers to suppress and oppress non-believers.

There is the “small”matter that until the time of Theodosius, which followed the critical battle of Adrianopolis, which changed the whole calculus of power, that it was more than two generations after the Edict of Milan which first legitimized the Christians. I was speaking of the situation before the Diocletian persecution, which itself was the climax of more than 50 years of “hard times” for the Christians. This is far more relevant to the question of the influence of the Jews on the Christians of Antioch than any discussion of persecution after the Establishment of Catholicism as the state Church under Theodosius. That, of course, was soon followed by the sack of Rome and the German invasions in the West, which ended the Catholic political ascendency is Gaul, Spain, and Africa, and finally Italy itself. The situation of the Church of Rome, as the Latin patriarchy, was pretty bleak in 500, with the only bright spot being the conversion of the Frankish king and his court about that time. There was a dark side, all right, and Church persecution of others had little to do with it.

RobbyS: "There is the “small”matter that until the time of Theodosius... that it was more than two generations after the Edict of Milan which first legitimized the Christians."

Sure, the 313 AD Edict of Milan is often cited as an ancient model of religious tolerance.
Indeed, had that model been followed consistently up to our current time, the world would likely have been a different place.

But it was not, and though large-scale persecutions of non-orthodox Christians did not begin for some time, it's foundations were laid by the Emperor Constantine at the Council of Nicaea, in 325 AD.
So, we can say, the Roman Empire's first experiment with religious freedom lasted all of twelve years.

Already at the Council of Nicaea, heterodox Christians -- especially Arians -- were condemned to death by decree of Constantine.
At the time, that affected only a few, but it was a beginning.

RobbyS: "I was speaking of the situation before the Diocletian persecution, which itself was the climax of more than 50 years of “hard times” for the Christians.
This is far more relevant to the question of the influence of the Jews on the Christians of Antioch than any discussion of persecution after the Establishment of Catholicism as the state Church under Theodosius. "

You didn't somehow forget, did you, that Jesus was Jewish, so were his original followers, and so were many who later called themselves "Christians" in places like Antioch?
You didn't ignore that ideas of being both Jewish and Christian were considered a punishable "heresy" only by those first elevated to power by Emperor Constantine, right?

RobbyS: "The situation of the Church of Rome, as the Latin patriarchy, was pretty bleak in 500, with the only bright spot being the conversion of the Frankish king and his court about that time.
There was a dark side, all right, and Church persecution of others had little to do with it."

There is a long dark history of Christian sponsored persecutions of heretics, pagans, Jews and others who refused to submit to Catholic doctrines.
It all began with the Emperor Constantine at the Council of Nicaea, when the spirit of toleration seen in the Edict of Milan was first overthrown.

The Edict of Milan aimed to empower Christians, not to establish religious toleration as we understand it. It was a political act, which sought to strengthen the Emperors hand. He intervened to strengthen the orthodox party in the Christian Church, and even before he dealt with the Arian issue, dealt with the Donatists. It was the divisions in the church more than the secular power that was at the root of the matter. It was their divisions, their lack of unity that prompted them to let Caesar decide. It was the same thing that recurred in the 16th century, in what is called the Reformation, but which was in fact a bloody war between Christians, that played into the hands of princes, and in the end, caused such slaughter that Christianity was discredited in the eyes of reasonable men. What a difference an iota in a creed can make can make, or as the Jews discovered once upon a time, the taking of one man’s life can cause fountains of human blood to flow.

RobbyS: "The Edict of Milan aimed to empower Christians, not to establish religious toleration as we understand it."

On Lininius' 312 AD Edict of Milan:

it goes even further and grants liberty to all religions

'When you see that this has been granted to [Christians] by us, your Worship will know that we have also conceded to other religions the right of open and free observance of their worship for the sake of the peace of our times, that each one may have the free opportunity to worship as he pleases; this regulation is made that we may not seem to detract from any dignity of any religion.' "

"Since Licinius composed the Edict with the intent of publishing it in the east upon his hoped-for victory over Maximinus, it was expressive of the religious policy accepted by Licinius, a pagan, rather than that of Constantine, who was already a committed Christian. [sic]

"Constantine's own policy went beyond merely tolerating Christianity: he tolerated paganism and other religions, but he actively promoted Christianity."

RobbyS: "It was a political act, which sought to strengthen the Emperors hand.
He intervened to strengthen the orthodox party in the Christian Church, and even before he dealt with the Arian issue, dealt with the Donatists."

First, remember that Constantine did not issue the Edict of Milan, Licinius did.
Second, remember that the Edict of Milan had nothing to do with either Donatists or Arians.
It was a document of religious tolerance, not enforcement of doctrinal uniformity.

RobbyS: "It was the divisions in the church more than the secular power that was at the root of the matter.
It was their divisions, their lack of unity that prompted them to let Caesar decide."

That statement alone should clue us that the long-term outcome could not be good.

RobbyS: "It was the same thing that recurred in the 16th century, in what is called the Reformation, but which was in fact a bloody war between Christians, that played into the hands of princes, and in the end, caused such slaughter that Christianity was discredited in the eyes of reasonable men."

First, the Reformation was in fact a religious reformation, which resulted in bloody wars (i.e., 30 Years War) whose levels of destruction were not seen again until 20th Century World Wars, and arguably not even then.

Second, there are no better examples of "reasonable men" in the Age of Enlightenment than our own Founding Fathers.
Without exception, they all respected Christianity as the basis for morality and civilization, but were also keenly aware that when the Church becomes politically powerful, it can also go insane with lust for vengeance against its enemies -- real or imaginary.
Therefore, the absolute right of religious freedom is not simply in the Bill of Rights, it is the first clause of the First Amendment.

That's as basic as you can get.

RobbyS: "What a difference an iota in a creed can make can make, or as the Jews discovered once upon a time, the taking of one man’s life can cause fountains of human blood to flow."

So you are familiar with the "iota's worth of difference"?
And so you perhaps understand that whatever other virtues the old Church Fathers may have had, when it came to non-biblical religious doctrines, they were stark raving insane?

And just possibly you've inherited their religiously insane gene, in your apparent lust to punish Jews for allowing Romans to execute a heretic that the New Testament tells us was required by God to forgive our sins?

Some Jews did what God required, and you wish forever to punish their descendants?

How much more insane is it possible to get?

RobbyS: "The Edict of course did not have these divisions in mind because they were important only to the Christians involved."

So you agree that the Edict of Milan had nothing specifically to do with Arians or Donatists, except to grant them the same religious liberty as everyone else?
Indeed, I'm not so certain if the Edict of Milan had anything to do with Emperor Constantine.
In hindsight, it seems quite out-of-character for him.

RobbyS: "As to the principle of religious liberty as we understand it, this would have been foreign to the Romans.
Madison understood the Romans, but his views would have been incomprehensible to the Romans."

Sure, "religious liberty" as a principle may have been beyond most Romans, but in practice, Romans tolerated a very wide variety of religions, just so long as they met basic minimum standards.
Religions which openly practiced human sacrifice, for example, were not tolerated.
And the Romans did require, in addition to worshiping your own gods, that you acknowledge the Emperor as a deity.

That was a big problem for both Jews and Christians.
So Jews negotiated a deal, to pay a head-tax (around $100 in today's values) in exchange for no Emperor worship.
Christians couldn't & wouldn't pay such a tax, and so were often persecuted.

Indeed, in the eyes of your typical Roman administrator, if you paid the head-tax, then you were a good Jew, but if not, then you were a stinkin' Christian.
And that's really what it was all about, from the Roman Empire's perspective.

RobbyS: "Furthermore, Madison was not so “conservative” about matters of religion as some seem to believe.
He never grasped where the deism of the early French revolutionaries was leading their country, a quick evolution from state Christianity to atheism.
and the spreading of such policies and attitudes wherever French armies prevailed."

First, I think you mean Jefferson, not Madison, since Jefferson was there at the beginning of the French Revolution (1789), and mistook it for a carbon-copy of the American Revolution.
Madison did not come to France until as Secretary of State under Jefferson (circa 1802), long after Napoleon seized power.

Second, while nearly all US Founders had some religious affiliation, very few could be considered seriously religious.
Among the more actively religious, the names of George Washington and John Jay come to mind, both Anglicans.
But there were also many Presbyterians, Congregationalists and Quakers, along with some Catholics, Lutherans and Unitarians.
They all clearly understood the principle and necessity for religious freedom.

Third and by stark contrast, the French Revolution was a very different matter.
There centuries of state-imposed Catholic religion resulted in a Revolution and Reign of Terror which attempted to destroy not only the old state, but also the aristocracy and Church necessary to maintain it.
These were not events that Jefferson or Madison anticipated.

RobbyS: "The same path taken by the Russian Revolution from 1917 onwards."

I have long argued here that the Russian Revolution took the course it did only because the Communist Bolsheviks -- Lenin -- were backed financially and otherwise by Germany, which used the Revolution to take Russia out of the First World War.
In short, the Communist Revolution was, in effect, just another military assault on Russia by Germany.
Without such backing (and/or with more support from Britain & France for Democrats), Lenin's party was unlikely to have been so victorious.

Anyway, your comparison anti-Christian actions of the most radical revolutionaries in France of 1793 to those in Russia of 1917 is apt.
In both cases they persecuted and murdered Church officials who supported the old royal regime.

RobbyS: "The Reformation was about an “iota” of difference.
Zwingli, Luther and Calvin found political protectors with the power to use the wedge issues of these theologians to shatter Christendom."

If we set aside numerous strictly religious issues -- indulgences, simony, communio sub utraque specie, marriage of priests, liturgical languages, non-biblical doctrines such as Purgatory, biblical questions of salvation by works over grace, etc...
If we set all that aside, and focus just on worldly politics, then the Protestant Reformation was all about breaking the stranglehold of power exercised by the Bishop of Rome over the political community loosely known as "Christendom".

The Roman Bishop's worldly political (as opposed to spiritual) powers were inherited from traditions first established under Roman Emperor Constantine (center) and the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD.

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