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Part 1b
Church
history
A priest named Arius began to make waves in the church
around 318 AD. Arius denied the deity of Jesus Christ. He reasoned that since
the Son was begotten, he could not be eternal. He could not believe that the
begotten Son could also be the pre-existing Son. He said that there had to be a
point in time when the Son did not exist. He believed that Jesus was exalted
over all creation, but was also himself a created being.
He was heavily influenced by Gnostic philosophies as well as Christian
doctrine. He believed that God was not triune (three persons). He reasoned that
by human definition, this would make God divided. He also believed that Jesus
held his rank because of obedience to the Father, and because Jesus was a
created being, it was possible for him to fall from grace and become
disobedient.
Soon after, Arius was removed from office by his bishop.
However, Arius had friends and contacts all over the Roman Empire, and he began
a writing campaign. He wrote songs and jingles to teach his doctrine and created
a large division in the church. He also had a good friend named Eusibius who
knew Constantine personally and was also the bishop of Nicodemia. Through
Eusibius, he petitioned for Constantine’s help. Constantine tried to play
peacemaker and wrote a letter to Athanasius, advisor of bishop Alexander who removed Arius in an
attempt to gloss over the issue.
Arius’
campaign was beginning to get a following. This group would become known as the
‘Arians’. In an attempt to end the dispute, Constantine called for a council
of bishops to resolve the issue. Almost all of the council consisted of eastern
bishops. The heresy of Arius was not a problem in the western churches, but it
was troubling the eastern churches. Over 300 eastern bishops attended, while
only 10-12 western bishops participated.
At the
council, the most divisive issue by far was the deity of Jesus Christ. Those who
opposed Arius believed that man’s sin was against God alone and only God could
redeem man. If Jesus was not God, then He was not capable of being our Savior.
Athanasius debated against Arius and brought to open discussion everything that
the Arian’s believed. His strategy was to present the Arian belief along side
scripture, with the belief that the arguments presented by Arius would be
self-refuting. When Arius saw that an open debate was a losing battle, he used
political arguments as his stance. He contended that the unity of the church was
the primary issue. He tried to persuade the council that unity was valued over
truth and to condemn the Arians would cause divisions in the church.
The
council produced a statement of faith, which was an earlier version of today’s
Nicene Creed. It contained the crucial word ‘homoousios’ which affirmed that
the Son was ‘of one substance’ with the Father. All but two of the bishops
signed this statement of faith and Arius was condemned.
Arius
lost the battle but the Arians would make a comeback through Constantine. As the
Arian group grew, they influenced Constantine and he provided them with the
political clout to gain control. Soon the Arian doctrine was the official
religion of Rome and those who opposed it were banished. Athanasius, who
stood against Arius was banished several times but finally returned permanently
in 366 and died in 373. Constantine was baptized as an Arian shortly before he
died in 337 AD.
It is interesting to note that many people accuse
Constantine of forcing the doctrine of the Trinity into the church. In reality,
it was just the opposite. He was baptized as an Arian and supported the Arians
from the Council of Nicaea until his death. The Arians were anti-Trinitarian.
After the Arians gained a foothold, they were joined by a group called ‘Pneumatomachians’.
The Pneumatomachians had similar beliefs to the Arians but took it a step
further. They also believed that the Holy Spirit was an impersonal force.
Historically it wasn’t the Council of Nicaea that departed from the original Christian doctrine. They fought against those such as Arius that introduced changes in the Christian doctrine. In the next section we will look at some of the writings of the early church to see if they believed in the modern doctrine of the Trinity or if this came later. It is not enough to claim that the church changed the truth to introduce the Trinity. It is also not enough to claim that the early church believed in the Trinity. To get an accurate understanding we must go to the source.
We have the scriptures and we also have the writings of the
early church leaders. Some of these leaders were discipled by the apostles
themselves. This adds a credible piece of evidence to this age-old debate.
Ultimately we draw truth from the scriptures. However, since the reliability of
scripture is attacked by those who don’t believe the Trinity, we will call the
early church fathers as witnesses to support those who wrote scripture. All of
the writings I will discuss in the next section predates the council of Nicaea.
The easiest way to get around scriptures that can’t be
refuted is to discredit them. Critics of the Trinity accuse the 3rd
century church of altering scripture to suit their purposes. However, it is an
attested fact of history that the New Testament canon was distributed to almost
every church before the Council of Nicaea. If the writings of Arius created such
havoc in the church, what would have happened if the Council of Nicaea altered
the scriptures? There is not one church document validating this claim. If the
council had made changes, it would have split the church. Instead of a
controversial creed or disputed scripture, we see an acceptance of the
council’s actions among all leaders except the few who supported the Arian
heresy. All the church writings refute Arius, but politically he reclaimed
power. If there were a historic church source disputing the alteration of
scripture or the conclusion of the creed adopted, critics would wave this as a
banner each time they presented their case. However, their position does not
agree with historic Christianity. Instead, critics make unsubstantiated claims
and provide no source other than themselves and other critics.
We know that the New Testament canon was already widely
accepted by the church because it is referenced throughout early church writings
before the Council of Nicaea. In 266 AD, the Synod of Antioch rejected Paul of
Samosata's epistle teaching modalistic doctrine as foreign to the ecclesiastical
canon. In fact, almost the entire Bible can be observed from the early church
writings in the first and second century. When the council of Nicaea debated
against Arius, both sides quoted from almost every book in our New Testament.
The modern Bible was already distributed, and by 170 AD the
expression 'the New Testament' was used for these books of the Bible. Even
though the Council of Nicaea used almost every book in our modern New Testament
during the debate against Arius, the canon of scripture was not officially
approved until the Council of Carthage in 397. How did the early church
determine what was accepted as scripture? The church acknowledged scripture
based on basic biblical rules. The word Canon comes from the Greek word 'Kanon'
which means rule. There were some basic rules in the authenticity of scripture:
Did the writer have apostolic authority? The apostles were
acknowledged as were the apostolic legates. The apostles wrote under the
authority of their appointment by Christ and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Luke wrote the gospel of Luke and Acts under the apostle Paul's authority. Luke
is an example of an apostolic legate. None of our New Testament writings are
outside of direct apostolic authority. Many valid writings are in the history of
the church, but without apostolic authority, they did not meet the criteria of
scripture.
God does not change and His word does not change. Does
scripture agree with scripture? For example, Paul preached in Berea and
presented the gospel of Jesus by showing it agreed with the accepted writings of
the Old Testament. He did not present it as a new revelation, but the
fulfillment to the old revelation prophecies. The Holy Spirit will never testify
against Himself, therefore, an authoritative book must also be in unity with
what has been revealed. Many forged letters arrived throughout the church. To
verify the authenticity, it would be placed beside a known letter from an
apostle and tested to see if it agreed. If it was not consistent with what was
already received, it was rejected as a false epistle. Critics argue that the
church 'picked and chose' what to include, but there was a method and reason for
this discernment.
The councils did not meet to determine what truth would be. The councils only served to apply the canonical test to what were claimed as apostolic revelations. In the first 10-15 years after Christ, epistles were not common because the church was concentrated in Jerusalem and all the witnesses were alive and available. After the martyrdom of Stephen in Acts 7 and 8, the church fell under heavy persecution. They were forced to scatter and went preaching the word (Acts 8:4). It was after this dispersion that writing became a necessity. A letter would then be written by an apostle and distributed to several churches. For example, Colossians 4:16 says,
Now when this epistle is read among you, see that
it is read also in the church of the Laodiceans, and that you likewise read the
epistle from Laodicea.
The letter was written to the church in Colosse with the request that it be sent to other churches and receive their epistles to be read in Colosse. Paul also gives instructions as to how to interpret what is delivered by letter or by person. Look at Galatians 1
8 But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other
gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.
9 As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone
preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be
accursed.
Paul makes it clear that the church is to evaluate what is
being received by comparing it to what has already been delivered. Even if it is
from Paul himself, if it doesn't agree, count it as accursed. This is true even
if an angel of God appears and delivers it - he also is to be counted as cursed
by God. That is a bold statement. But it is also a basic biblical principle. God
does not change and His word will not change. New doctrine is false unless it
agrees with what is already known to be true. Let me give an example from one of
the most popular Gnostic gospels, the ‘Gospel of Thomas’. The Gospel of
Thomas 114:1–3 says, “Simon Peter said to them, ‘Make Mary leave us, for
females don’t deserve life.’ Jesus said, ‘Look, I will guide her to make
her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For
every female who makes herself male will enter the domain of Heaven.’”
This clearly does not agree with anything in scripture.
Women don't have living spirits? The Bible says that God created man in His own
image – both male and female. Jesus taught women and men alike. Never does
Jesus distinguish salvation based on sex or any physical characteristic. The
apostles taught that in Christ, there is neither bond nor free, rich nor poor,
male nor female, Jew nor Greek. We are all the same in Christ.
The council solidified the church’s belief in a closed canon. Gnostic and heretical doctrines depended and still depend on ‘new revelations’ and establishing the scriptures as complete eliminated the deception that many cults depended upon. There are no new revelations that have been acknowledged by the church since the first century when the apostles died. We have fragments and manuscripts that date every book of the Bible back to 45-80 AD. Archaeologist Nelson Gleuck wrote: “We can already say emphatically that there is no longer any solid basis for dating any book of the New Testament after A.D. 80.” The only book in dispute is John’s writing of the book of Revelation which is believed to have been written around 95 AD. Some argue that it could have been written before 70 AD. Because Polycarp referenced John’s writing as the end of Domtian’s reign, I believe that it is closer to 95 AD. Polycarp said,
