Monday, November 8, 2021
Church History Early Day’s (100 A.D.-500 A.D.)
- Writings of early Christianity (1st century)
• Oral Tradition (1 Corinthians 15:1-4)
• NT begins being written in the 50s, by the Apostle Paul
• NT ends with John’s writings
- Rituals in the early church (1st century)
• Baptism: derived from Jewish practices of puri cation called “Tvilah”
• Eucharist: Means “Thanksgiving”
- By the end of the rst century, it became the central Christian ritual
- Reenactment of the Last Supper
- Liturgy (1st century)
• Apostles
• Bishop, Presbyter
• Structure of authority is rather undeveloped
- Decline of Judaism
• Jewish revolt in 66 AD against Rome
• Temple destroyed in 70 AD by Rome
• Traditional Judaism declines, and rabbinic Judaism rises to prominence
- Christian Persecution
• Persecution helped the expansion of Christianity
• Peter and Paul were martyred in Rome
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- Age of the Church Fathers
• 2nd-5th century
• Christianity is illegal in the Roman empire
• Church is becoming more of an institution
- Ignatius (107 A.D.) implored Churches to submit to the Bishop
- Didache (2nd century) Bishops are subject to the Prophets and teachers.
- By the end of the 2nd century: Threefold structure beings to appear Bishop over
Priest and deacons
- Hellenization (2nd Century)
• Moving from Jewish roots into a more greek culture
• Gentile believers outnumbered Jewish believers
• A more appreciation for philosophical and intellectual disciplines
• Apologists rising up due to intellectual attacks on christianity (Justin Martyr)
- Diversity in Christianity
• Montanist
• Ebionites
• Gnostics
- Physical world was evil, and the spiritual was good
- God of the OT was evil and not the God of the NT
- Denied Jesus’s human nature
- Irenaeus
• Need rose to de ne orthodoxy
• Asserted there is no secret knowledge passed from Christ it was available to all
- Tertullian
• There is a unbroken chain of tradition from Jesus
• Correct churches de ne the correct faith
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- Formation of the Canon (2nd-4th century)
• Marcion
- 160 A.D.
- Gnostic approach to scripture (Physical is bad, spiritual is good)
- excluded the OT
- Only used Pauls letters, and an edited version of Luke
• Muratorian fragment gives 22 of the NT books (roughly 92.7% of the NT)
• Athanasius in 367 gives the 27 book list
• Council of Hippo and Carthage a rm the same 27 books
• After the 4th century there is unanimous consensus on the NT canon
- Criteria for Canon
• Use in Churches
• Apostolic origin
• They had to be universal, not hidden
- Constantine
• Converts to Christianity after having a vision
• Edit of Milan 313 ends Christian persecution
• Church hierarchy develops
• Metropolitans develop giving some bishops more power over neighboring
churches
• By the 4th century there were 3 main patriarchs: One in Rome, Jerusalem, and
Antioch
- Pluses and Minuses
• Minus: Rome had authority over the church
• Minus: Church gained great wealth, contrary to the poverty of Jesus and the
Apostles
• Minus: Persecution of those who didn’t subscribe to certain doctrines
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• Plus: Church became the conscience of society
• Plus: Church created a welfare system
• Plus: A council of Bishops
- Controversies
• Trinitarian debate 3rd-4th century
- Arius (250-336 A.D.): Christ was God’s rst creation, there was a time when
Jesus did not exist.
• “There was a time when he was not”
• Valued a works based salvation
• Opposed by Athanasius of Alexandria
- Nicene Creed (325 A.D.)
• Ecumenical council, binding on all of the churches
• De ned the doctrine of the Trinity
• Christological debates
- Council of Chalcedon (451 A.D.)
• Hypostatic union
- Christ has 2 natures
- “Perfect in Godhead and perfect in manhood, truly God and truly man”
• Donatist controversy (4th-6th century)
- Question: What validates sacraments and spiritual authority?
- Argued that clergy had to be pure and faultless
- Opposed by Augustine
• Monasticism
- Practice of renouncing worldly pursuits
- St. Anthony the Great was an early “Hermitic Monk”
- St. Pachomius started a community of monks
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