Church History in Plain Language

by Bruce L. Shelley

Christianity has always been a religion of the Spirit. According to the Fourth Gospel Jesus had promised to his people the Paraclete, the Spirit of Truth, to guide them (John 16:13–15). How, then, did there ever come a time when the church declared that all the inspired books that could be written had been written, and that nothing more could ever be added to the written word of God? How did it come about that, as Tertullian bitterly put it, “the Holy Spirit was chased into a book”? In the second half of the second century a change was coming over the church. The days of enthusiasm were passing and the days of ecclesiasticism were arriving. The church was no longer a place where the Spirit of prophecy could be heard. More and more people were joining the churches, but the distinction between church and world was fading. The church was becoming secularized; it was coming to terms with heathen thought and culture and philosophy. The way of the cross was no longer rough and steep.

Montanus argued that the new age of the Spirit had displaced the previous ages. The Old Testament age, with its ten commands or law, had been surpassed by the age of the Son with its more demanding Sermon on the Mount. The age of the Spirit would call for even greater rigorous obedience, as well as surpassing revelations.

In the name of the Spirit, Montanus denied that God’s decisive and normative revelation had occurred in Jesus Christ.

It was not that the church had ceased to believe in the power of the Holy Spirit. The difference was that in the first days the Holy Spirit had enabled men to write the sacred books of the Christian faith; in the later days the Holy Spirit enabled men to understand, to interpret, and to apply what had been written.

The first complete list of books, as we have them today, came in an Easter letter written in 367 by Bishop Athanasius from Alexandria. Shortly thereafter councils in North Africa at Hippo (393) and at Carthage (397) published the same list.

In one sense, of course, Christians created the canon. Their decisions concerning the books were a part of history. In another sense, however, they were only recognizing those writings that had made their authority felt in the churches. The shape of the New Testament shows that the early churches’ primary aim was to submit fully to the teachings of the apostles. In that purpose they shaped the character of Christianity for all time. The faith remained catholic precisely because it was apostolic.

Paul made sure, however, that the churches planted in the path of his missionary journeys had pastoral leaders to care for the spiritual needs of believers in a given place. These local leaders were of two sorts. One group was called elders or presbyters (from the Greek for elders). These same men were also known as bishops (overseers) or pastors (shepherds). The other group of leaders was called deacons.

Spiritual regeneration and the moral life were not merely one side of Christianity to Paul but its very fruit and goal on earth.

The high level of morality evident in the Christian congregations was, in fact, a primary argument for the truth of Christianity. In his Apology, Justin devotes lengthy sections to a statement of the moral principles in Christianity and to a proof that these are observed by Christians. What the apologist wants to prove is that goodness among Christians is not an impotent claim or a pale ideal but a power developed on all sides and actually exercised in life. Athenagoras, a Christian philosopher at Athens, put it this way: “Among us are uneducated folk, artisans, and old women who are utterly unable to describe the value of our doctrines in words, but who attest them by their deeds.” But Christians were not alone in testifying that they had been lifted into a new world of moral power and holiness: even their opponents witnessed to their exemplary lives. Pliny told the Emperor Trajan that during his examination of Christians he had been unable to find anything criminal or vicious in them. Justin confessed that the steadfastness of Christians convinced him of their purity, and that these impressions proved decisive in bringing him over to the faith. We frequently read in the accounts of the martyrs that the courage and loyalty of Christians made an overwhelming impact on those who witnessed their trial or execution, so much so that some of these spectators suddenly decided to become Christians themselves. At the beginning of the third century, however, something significant h...

Callistus (217–222) readmitted penitent members who had committed adultery and abortion. He argued that the church is like Noah’s ark. In it unclean as well as clean beasts can be found. Then he defended his actions by insisting that the bishop of Rome was “close to Peter” and the Lord had given keys to Peter to bind and to loose the sins of men. This marks the first time a bishop of Rome claimed this special authority.

In AD 250 the most violent persecution the church had yet faced was instigated by the Emperor Decius (249–251). A general from the Danubian frontier, Decius was determined to have no nonsense from Christians. In his eyes, they were enemies of the empire. Their atheism was responsible for the many troubles in the realm. Thus Decius commanded all citizens of the empire to sacrifice to the traditional Roman gods. Those who did so were given certificates (libelli, in Latin) as evidence that they had obeyed the order. Those who refused to obey and were unable (or unwilling) to obtain false libelli from sympathetic or corrupt officials faced death. To save their lives many Christians complied. Others were able to obtain certificates without having actually sacrificed. But an unknown number of Christians were imprisoned or executed, among them the bishops of Rome, Antioch, and Jerusalem. Those who were killed were called “martyrs,” that is, “witnesses.” Decius, however, was not out to make heroes. He wanted to discredit Christianity, so many Christians were tortured until they denied Christ by saying “Caesar is Lord.” If a Christian endured this persecution without denying Christ he was called a “confessor.” If a believer under torture did what the Romans demanded, he was classed among the “lapsed,” the fallen ones. The fury ended, at least for a season, in AD 251, when Decius, deserted by his gods, was killed in a battle with the barbarian Goths. Then the question of readmission...

In Carthage, Cyprian confronted those who held that the confessors by their unusual courage had achieved a special power from God. The Holy Spirit had ordained them extraordinarily so that they had the power to absolve men of their sins. They could “cover with their merits the demerits of the lapsed.” Many urged Cyprian to announce such a blanket pardon.

Cyprian declined, however, in favor of a system of readmission based on the degrees of seriousness of the sins. Leniency, he said, should be extended to those who had sacrificed only after excruciating torture and who well might plead that their bodies, not their spirits, had given way. Those, however, who had gone willingly to make sacrifices must receive the severest punishment.

The church always stands in a dual relationship to human affairs. Jesus summarized the role best when he spoke of his disciples: “not of the world” but “sent into the world” (John 17:16, 18). This suggests that in God’s plan the church feels the rhythm of detachment and involvement: detachment because the gospel and eternal life are not from men but from God, yet involvement because God sends the church into the world to shine as light and to lead men to the truth. Thus the church moves through history to a special beat: separation from the world yet confrontation of the world. This means struggle, because Christians often differ with each other over the boundaries of withdrawal and engagement. Witness to some is compromise to others.

In the third century the most violent opponent of Christian reconciliation with Hellenic philosophy was Tertullian. Heresies, he shouted, are prompted by philosophy. Valentinus was a Platonist! Marcion was a Stoic! “What do Athens and Jerusalem have in common? Away with all attempts to produce a mottled Christianity of Stoic, Platonic, and dialectic composition! We have no need of curiosity reaching beyond Christ Jesus. When we believe, we need nothing further than to believe. Search that you may believe; then stop

During the third century when Christians were struggling to retain their faith under the persecuting policies of the emperors, they were also discovering ways to present the gospel in terms of Hellenic thought. Eventually the emperor accepted the gospel, and Rome became Christian. But the path to that reconciliation was paved by those Christian teachers who demonstrated that faith and philosophy could live in harmony when both bowed before Christ.

Leadership in this union arose in Alexandria at the so-called catechetical school led by Clement and Origen. They were the first of a succession of Christian scholars thoroughly familiar with the wisdom of Greece and enthusiastic for its philosophy, yet loyal to the teaching of Christ. They tried to blend into Christianity all that was best in the culture of the Hellenic world, especially in the Platonic and Stoic philosophers. “The way of truth,” Clement said, “is one. But into it as into a perennial river, streams flow from all sides.”

Apparently around 180 a Sicilian Christian named Pantaenus established a similar school of Christian Gnosticism in Alexandria and lectured there on Christianity as the true philosophy. He aimed to enter the thought world of pagans to show the superiority of the catholic faith. The teaching was gnostic (literally, knowledge) because it asked the big questions of meaning; but it was Christian Gnosticism because it retained orthodox answers. Pantaenus appealed to all who hungered for knowledge, not only to Christians but also to pagans seeking truth. By his thorough and inspiring expositions, he won many a pagan for Christianity and lifted many Christians with him to the theological heavens.

Clement, “the first Christian scholar,” was versed not only in the Holy Scriptures but also in the knowledge of his time, including Greek philosophy and classical literature. He understood the questions and problems of the young people who came from such educational centers as Rome, Athens, and Antioch. They were just as dissatisfied with their instruction as he had been and now sought and found the last and highest wisdom in the Christian revelation. Many of the students, no doubt, had encountered Christianity before in the form of some heretical gnostic theory. Clement had to enter their world, disentangle their conceptions, and lead them slowly from error to the true knowledge of Christianity. He lived and taught like a philosopher and used the forms and the language of the Gnostics of his time.

Clement’s purpose was clear. He seized not only the external garb and forms of expression of the contemporary pagan philosophers but also their problems. If, for example, he discussed the universe and its meaning (cosmology), so loved by Gnostics, he did not do it with the intention of proving these ideas wrong offhandedly and then discarding them quickly, but instead he pointed out how the fundamental religious questions about the creation of the world, the existence of evil in this life, and the salvation through the Word, Jesus Christ, found their last and deepest answer in Christian revelation.

He wanted to be an apostle to the Hellenistic intellectual world. His purpose was not purely or even primarily theological, but pastoral. His greater purpose was not to win argument...

“Before the advent of Christianity,” he says in the opening chapter of his Miscellanies, “philosophy was needful to the Greeks for righteousness. Now it is useful to piety for those who attain faith through demonstration. Philosophy was a schoolmaster to the Greeks, as the law was to the Hebrews, preparing the way for those who are perfected by Christ.

Clement and Origen differ from the Gnostics in another important respect: Christian behavior. Many gnostic heretics believed that acquiring knowledge was unrelated to the training of character, since matter and body were inherently evil and corrupt. But Clement insists that spiritual insight comes to the pure in heart, to those humble enough to walk with God as a child with his father, to those whose motive for ethical behavior goes far beyond fear of punishment or hope of reward to a love of the good for its own sake. It is an ascent from faith through knowledge to the beatific vision beyond this life, when the redeemed are one with God. The basis for this possibility of mystical union is the image of God implanted by creation.

Clement makes creation central. God, he believed, had implanted the good seeds of truth in all his rational creatures. The Christian can learn from the Greeks because all truth and goodness, wherever found, come from the Creator.

If we see some admirable work of human art, we are at once eager to investigate the nature, the manner, the end of its production; and the contemplation of the works of God stirs us with an incomparably greater longing to learn the principles, the method, the purpose of creation. This desire, this passion, has without doubt been implanted in us by God. And as the eye seeks light, as our body craves food, so our mind is impressed with the . . . natural desire to know the truth of God and the causes of what we observe.

There can be no genuine piety toward God in the man who despises the gift of philosophy. But true philosophy, said Origen, always focuses on the Word, “who attracts all irresistibly to himself by his unutterable beauty.

He produced a book entitled Hexapla, which displayed six versions of the Old Testament in six parallel columns. He added to this scores of commentaries and hundreds of sermons on particular books. The Scriptures, he believed, are the treasury of divine revelation. Students, therefore, must see them as a whole. Any occasion where the apparent sense of a passage contradicted the morality or nature of God was a God-given sign that there must be some deeper lesson underneath the surface of the passage. This conviction led Origen into what we usually call the “allegorical interpretation” of Scripture. He held that there are three levels of meaning in the Bible: the literal sense; the moral application to the soul; and the allegorical or spiritual sense, which refers to the mysteries of the Christian faith.

Origen’s overriding concern was to allow the whole Bible to speak for itself, whatever a single text may seem to say, for when the Bible speaks it speaks for God who inspired it.

The persistent tendency of heresy, whether ancient or contemporary, is to lay hold upon a few impressive texts and to wrench some rigid and erroneous interpretation from these. This Origen would not allow. He wanted the whole Bible to speak, because he knew that what the Bible taught in its entirety is the central Christian truths of catholic Christianity.

Origen’s enormous work in the Scriptures was immensely important. It enabled intelligent Christians to believe the Bible and so to remain Christians. What would have happened to Christianity without a rationally interpreted Bible to feed the mind and control the development of Christian thought? Origen saved the Scriptures for the church and thus protected the historical foundation of the Christian faith.

The great scholar’s achievements in Bible study were matched by his pioneering work in systematic theology. Most earlier Christian theology aimed at the refutation of heresy. Origen was the first theologian to set forth his whole intellectual framework of the Christian faith. He produced his work on First Principles early in his ministry, but he never found the need to modify it to any degree. It was addressed to educated readers and dealt with ideas they would recognize. Origen felt no contempt for the simple faith of peasants, but he realized that if Christianity were to succeed in shaping civilization, it must justify itself to the intellect as well as to the heart of mankind.

Origen’s vision, it seems, knew no limits. It extended so far as to teach that all creatures, including the devil himself, would one day be restored to communion with God. Hell would be emptied. That doctrine, above all others, caused him no end of trouble. Many humane souls in the history of the church have dreamed that God’s love would someday triumph over all sinful rebellion. Origen’s error lay in turning a dream into a doctrine.

Orthodox Christians felt that they could not turn the dream into a doctrine because such an idea almost always tends to deny man’s free will and its eternal consequences.

If God has character, as Charles Williams argued in Descent of the Dove, and if man has choice, an everlasting rejection of God by man must be admitted a...

Some, such as the historian Eusebius, saw Constantine’s embrace of Christianity as its victory over the empire. Others, such as the monks, believed the culture was capturing Christianity.

Many contemporaries recognized that Constantine’s conversion to Christianity and his victory over his enemies was “inspired by the Godhead” and marked a turning point in history.

The Christianization of the empire and the imperial interference in the affairs of the church begins. We can detect the fallout of these two developments to this day.

In 311, on his deathbed, Galerius realized that his attempt to do away with the upstart religion had failed. “Thousands upon thousands of terrified Christians had, to be sure, recanted, but other thousands had stood fast, sealing their faith with their blood.” So eager, in fact, did many Christians prove to suffer for their faith the bishop of Carthage demanded that those who needlessly rushed into martyrdom should not be revered as martyrs. The effect on public opinion throughout the empire was tremendous. “Even the throne could no longer take the risk of continuing the torturing, maiming, and killing. So, in his last official act, Galerius, reluctantly, grudgingly, issued an edict of toleration,” and for all practical purposes, the last and worst persecution of Christians by Rome came to an end.

311, on his deathbed, Galerius realized that his attempt to do away with the upstart religion had failed. “Thousands upon thousands of terrified Christians had, to be sure, recanted, but other thousands had stood fast, sealing their faith with their blood.” So eager, in fact, did many Christians prove to suffer for their faith the bishop of Carthage demanded that those who needlessly rushed into martyrdom should not be revered as martyrs. The effect on public opinion throughout the empire was tremendous. “Even the throne could no longer take the risk of continuing the torturing, maiming, and killing. So, in his last official act, Galerius, reluctantly, grudgingly, issued an edict of toleration,” and for all practical purposes, the last and worst persecution of Christians by Rome came to an end.

In a dream he saw a cross in the sky and the words, “In this sign conquer.”

Some historians have considered Constantine’s “conversion” a purely political maneuver. Plenty of paganism remained. He conspired; he murdered; he even retained his title Pontifex Maximus as head of the state religious cult. But a purely political conversion is hard to maintain in the light of his public and private actions. From the year 312, he favored Christianity openly. He allowed Christian ministers to enjoy the same exemption from taxes as the pagan priests; he abolished executions by crucifixion; he called a halt to the battles of gladiators as a punishment for crimes; and in 321 he made Sunday a public holiday. Thanks to his generosity, magnificent church buildings arose as evidence of his support of Christianity.

In the year 390 a charioteer in a Greek city was accused of homosexual practices. The governor of the area threw him into prison but did not count on the reaction of the people. With the chariot races about to begin, the people asked for the charioteer’s freedom. The governor refused. So the people rose in arms, murdered the governor, and freed their hero. Theodosius, then in Milan, was incensed. He ordered that the people be punished, so at another chariot race in the circus at Thessalonica the gates were closed and the soldiers of Theodosius were stationed at the entrances. At a signal they fell upon the people. In three hours seven thousand Thessalonians fell by the sword. A cry of horror rose through the empire. Ambrose, who regarded himself as the imperial conscience, felt utterly ashamed. In the name of common humanity and the church, he had to speak out. Theodosius would have to admit he had committed a crime and repent. Ambrose decided to write Theodosius. “I cannot deny that you have a zeal for the faith,” he wrote, and that you fear God, but you have a naturally passionate spirit which becomes un-governable when you are excited. I call on you to repent. You can only atone for your sin by tears, by penitence, by humbling your soul before God. You are a man, and as you have sinned as a man so you must repent. No angel, no archangel can forgive you. God alone can forgive you, and He forgives only those who repent. Ambrose refused the emperor Communion until he had c...

Bishop Alexander, however, would have none of it. He called a synod at Alexandria about 320, and the assembled churchmen condemned Arius’s teaching and excommunicated the former pastor. Arius turned to his friend, Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia, and won his backing. Thus the theological quarrel became a test of strength between the two most important churches in the East: Nicomedia, the political capital, and Alexandria, the intellectual capital. With the backing of his friends, Arius returned to Alexandria, and riots erupted in the streets.

“True God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father.”

The expression homo ousion, “one substance,” was probably introduced by Bishop Hosius of Cordova (in today’s Spain).

I believe in one God the Father Almighty; Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds. God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; by whom all things were made; who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; he suffered and was buried; and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father; and he shall come again, with glory, to judge both the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end. And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceedeth from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified; who spake by the Prophets. And I believe in one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins; and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

All but two bishops present signed the Creed, and these two, along with Arius himself, were soon afterward sent into exile.

After Nicaea, however, first Constantine and then his successors stepped in again and again to banish this churchman or exile that one. Church teaching too often depended on control of the emperor’s favor. The court was overrun by spokesmen for some Christian party. As a result, the imperial power was forever ordering bishops into banishment and almost as often bringing them back again when some new group of ecclesiastical advisers got the upper hand in the palace.

No career better illustrates the way in which imperial power took over actual control of the church than that of Athanasius. He may well have attended the council as secretary to Alexander, bishop of Alexandria. If so he could claim to be a contributor to Nicene faith as well as its champion defender. Soon after that, at the age of thirty-three, he succeeded Alexander upon his death. For the next fifty years, however, no one could predict who would win in the struggle with Arianism. During these decades, Athanasius was banished no fewer than five times, each banishment and return to Alexandria representing either a change in emperors or a shift in the makeup of the palace ecclesiastical clique that had the emperor’s ear. At times Athanasius was so completely out of imperial favor that he felt deserted by all his supporters. During one such hour he uttered his famous defiance, Athanasius Against the World. He would stand alone, if need be, against the whole empire.

These fifty years continued the heated debate over the Arian question. Not long after the Council of Nicaea a moderate group, sometimes called the Semi-Arians, broke away from the strict Arians and attempted to give a new interpretation to the one substance statement. They defended the use of homoios, meaning “similar,” to describe the Word’s relation to the Father. Thus two parties arose. The one led by Athanasius insisted upon using homoousios because they believed that the Word (Christ) was of the “same” nature as the Father. If Christ had not been fully God, they said, he could not have fully saved us. The other party, the Semi-Arians, argued for homoiousios because they held that the Word was a being “like” God the Father. Edward Gibbon, in his memorable history of the fall of the Roman Empire, passed on a sneer that, in this struggle, Christians fought each other over a diphthong. Well, so it was—a diphthong. But that diphthong carried an immense meaning. In one of his books, William Hordern tells a story about a woman touring in Europe, who cabled her husband: “Have found wonderful bracelet. Price seventy-five thousand dollars. May I buy it?” The husband promptly cabled b...