posted ago by newfunturistic ago by newfunturistic +2 / -2

709

01:01:29,391 --> 01:01:33,228

The Good Book did not arrive by facsimile from heaven.

The Bible as we know it was finally presided over by one man:

The pagan emperor Constantine.

I thought Constantine was a Christian.

Oh, hardly, no. He was a lifelong pagan...

...who was baptized on his deathbed.

Constantine was Rome's supreme holy man.

From time immemorial...

...his people had worshiped a balance between nature's male deities...

...and the goddess, or sacred feminine.

But a growing religious turmoil was gripping Rome.

Three centuries earlier...

...a young Jew named Jesus had come along...

...preaching love and a single God.

Centuries after his crucifixion...

...Christ's followers had grown exponentially...

...and had started a religious war against the pagans.

Or did the pagans commence war against the Christians?

Leigh, we can't be sure who began the atrocities in that period.

We can at least agree that the conflict grew to such proportions...

...that it threatened to tear Rome in two.

So Constantine may have been a lifelong pagan...

...but he was also a pragmatist.

And in 325 anno Domini...

...he decided to unify Rome under a single religion, Christianity.

Christianity was on the rise. He didn't want his empire torn apart.

And to strengthen this new Christian tradition...

...Constantine held a famous ecumenical gathering...

...known as the Council of Nicaea.

And at this council...

...the many sects of Christianity debated and voted on, well...

...everything, from the acceptance and rejection of specific gospels...

...to the date for Easter...

...to the administering of the sacraments, and of course...

...the immortality of Jesus.

I don't follow.

Well, ma chère, until that moment in history...

...Jesus was viewed by many of his followers as a mighty prophet...

...as a great and powerful man, but a man nevertheless.

A mortal man.

Not the Son of God?

Not even his nephew twice removed.

Constantine did not create Jesus' divinity.

He simply sanctioned an already widely held idea.

  • Semantics.
  • No, it's not semantics.

You're interpreting facts to support your own conclusions.

Fact: For many Christians, Jesus was mortal one day and divine the next.

For some Christians, his divinity was enhanced.

Absurd. There was a formal announcement of his promotion.

They couldn't even agree on the Nicene Creed!

Excuse me. "Who is God, who is man?"

How many have been murdered over this question?

As long as there has been a one true God...

...there has been killing in his name.