Christian Thought” by Hugh Kerr, “Pocket History of the Church” by D. Jeffrey Bingham and “A Concise History of Christian Thought” by Tony Lane, all cover the history of Christian studies. Out of the first seven Ecumenical Councils there are three councils mentioned in this essay which include, the First Council of Nicaea (325), First Council of Constantinople (381), and the Council of Chalcedon (451). Overall these early ecumenical councils have changed the outlook of Christian beliefs, actions and practices within the Christian world. During the times of early church history, the controversies over the deity of Christ were debated over the years. The First Council of Nicaea (325) claimed that Jesus is God and is equal to the Father. Arianism denied the full deity of Christ where Arius point of debate states that “the Son has a beginning, but without…
Thus, the rise in Arianism led to such a rise in internal conflict within the Church that it drew his attention. As a result, under the pretence of uniting his kingdom once again, he became another strong adversary to the spread of Arianism. Constantine first attempted to negotiate the matter through the court Bishop Hosius of Cordova, the most influential Bishop of Christendom at that period in history. This had no lasting effect on Arius as his heresy still spread across Alexandria and the…
Necessitated by the three way schism within Arianism, Basil the Great and the Cappadocian Fathers further developed the Nicene Creed to attract the more moderate Arians, as well as answer the heresies of Macedonianism. The Fathers distinguished the persons of Father, Son, and Spirit, separate from the substance of the Godhead. “It sanctioned the theology of the Neo-Nicenes, confessed that the Spirit, too, was homoousios, and thus apparently enlarged the Nicene symbol…” (Margull, p.…
In the span of fifteen hundred years, Eastern and Western Christianity had comparatively been influenced by Jesus’ teachings. The ideology of Jesus Christ included his virginal birth, his death, and resurrection. With this in mind, some of the important reoccurring issues in understanding both concerns for the East and West are founded in the sacramental and liturgical practices. Christ’s death and “resurrection became koinonia: or communion, fellowship, or the church [p. 33, Vol. 1].” The…
The development of Christology in the patristic period of Christianity was formed out of two main arguments, the logos’ relation with God and the logos’ relation with the human Jesus. It was of agreement that Jesus the Christ was on earth and that he was the logos, i.e. “Word of God” or “Son of God”. Two orators in particular drew the proverbial line in the sand between homoousios and homoiousios, of the same and of similar substance as the Father. This division was later coined the Arian…
Why was Arianism so important in the History of the Church and how did it affect the Church? Well, Arianism was one of the most important and one of Catholicism bigger problems. A heresy which believed that Jesus Christ, was not on par with the Father in regards to his holiness and divinity. They said Jesus was instead “created” by the Lord to do his deeds. It took the Church a long time to prove to everyone that this heresy was false. Arianism was started in the Fourth century by a priest,…
Athanasius’s significance to Christian Theology is his continuous fight with Arianism, despite the exiles he had to go through, and trials he had to face. St. Athanasius sets a great example of not giving up ones beliefs in order to escape punishment. Athanasius is counted as one of the four great Eastern Doctors of the Church of the Roman Catholic Church. Athanasius is considered to be the “Father of Orthodoxy” in Eastern Orthodoxy. Athanasius is celebrated on May 2, feast day, in Western…
faith was raging. During this time, various sects of the Christian religion were at odds with each other. Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus, known to history as Constantine the Great, was the Roman Emperor from 306 to 337 AD and played a vital role in this religious movement. The Orthodox (Roman Catholic) and Arianism sects eventually became the primary sects, and it was after the death of the baptized Constantine I, that the Orthodox Church delivered a little known coup de grace,…
Christianity. After Christianity began to spread is also when different interpretations of the bible began to emerge, which is where the birth of heresy began. This would latter affect society in a major way. Although heresy was all about different interpretations of the same religion, it really affected society. One of first and largest heresies of the fourth century was Arianism which was created by a priest from Egypt named Arius. The difference in this religion from the main Christian…
Gregory’s life he witnessed the Catholic Church and tradition under attack by Arianism. Arianism rejected the divinity of Jesus Christ. Many of St. Gregory’s work defend Christ’s divinity and introduce the Holy Trinity; rather he describes the relationship within the Holy Trinity as procession. "The Holy Spirit is truly Spirit, coming forth from the Father indeed but not after the manner of the Son, for it is not by generation but by procession, since I must coin a word for the sake of…