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LETTER TO THE CHURCH
` . . . I will build My Church . . . '
Much has been written under the title `The History of the Church'. Much more has been spoken concerning the Ekklesiolia, the gathered Church within the Ekklesia, the Church Body. Even more has been spoken by zealots repudiating the Ekklesia as being man-made whilst the true Ekklesiolia has been created by the Holy Spirit. Few understand that both are needed in God's Providence: First, the Ekklesiolia - living stones being built into a spiritual Temple, and second, the Ekklesia - revealing to the world the Grace of God in the Ekklesiolia who are called to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
And so to this short history of the Ekklesia, which is prophetic for all true prophecy foresees the future from the position of the present, following an understanding of the past and centered on the Scriptural Redemptive act of God for Israel. We will therefore start our search at the only possible place - at the beginning when Peter stood up in the Temple Compound, `raised his voice and addressed the crowd: Fellow Jews, and all of you who are in Jerusalem'. This was at the time of the Feast of Pentecost, the Feast of the First Fruits, when two loaves baked with the first fruits of the wheat harvest were waved before the LORD - first for the Jews who were in the Temple Compound and second for the Gentiles, following Phillip's later meeting with the Gentile Ethiopian and Peter's meeting with Cornelius. And so began the fulfillment of the words of Jesus, `You will be My witnesses in Jerusalem . . . . '. When talking of the History of the Church we are of course referring to the Great Ekklesia of the historical Church, both East and West, both Latin and Orthodox, but it was not until the 11th century at the time of the Great Schism that the separation came. At the same time we are not talking of the many and varied independent Churches and Fellowships that sprang up at the time of the Reformation of the Western Church. Neither are we concerned with the autonomous Orthodox Churches of the East for in all of them, no matter what their failings - and there are many - no matter what falsehoods and worldly power struggles - and they are many - at the Heart of all of this great Behemoth called the Church lies the abiding belief in the Risen Lord Jesus.
As we have said previously, the period of time covered by the Acts of the Apostles extended over fourty years, a Probation Period, a testing of the character of the Jews in relation to Peter's declaration in the Temple Compound at that Feast of Pentecost. There is therefore little sign of `the Church' as a recognisable body at that time, but there was a fulfillment of the words of Jesus before He was taken away to Glory. The first twelve chapters are concerned with Peter as the central person taking the Good News to Jerusalem, to Judea and Samaria. whereas the remaining sixteen chapters have Paul as the central person taking the Gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth. The first seven years following the ascension of Jesus centre on the ministry of Peter and John in Jerusalem; One year later brings us to Paul's meeting with the Risen Lord Jesus on the road to Damascus, when he hears the words, `Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute Me?' and responds, `Who are You, Lord?'; Six years followed until Barnabas was sent from Jerusalem to bring Paul to Antioch; Twenty-three years after the ascension of Jesus we find Paul, Barnabas and others attending the Council in Jerusalem where they were to present to the brethren the fullness of the revelation Paul had received from Jesus on the Damascus road: (Acts 15:12)
" The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul
telling about the miraculous signs and wonders God had done among the
Gentiles through them. "
James gives them his judgement and then: (15:30-31)
" The men were sent off and went down to Antioch, where they gathered
the church together and delivered the letter. The people read it and were
glad for its encouraging message. "
The following year saw the first of Paul's Epistles to the churches, which later were to form the Doctrine of the Church. But it was not until towards the end of the fourty-years Probation, that in 62 AD Paul set out his great Epistle to the Ephesians, revealing the great truth of the fullness of the Feast of Pentecost: (Ephesians 2:11-15 in part)
" Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and
called uncircumcised' by those who call themselves `the circumcision' . . . .
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought
near through the Blood of Christ . . . . His purpose was to create in Himself
one new man out of the two . . . . "
Seven years later, in 69 AD, Paul was in prison in Rome awaiting his departure to Glory whilst Jerusalem was awaiting its destruction by the armies of Rome, to be followed by the Great Diaspora of the Jews among the nations and the taking of the Good News of the Risen Lord Jesus by the `Christ followers' to the uttermost ends of the earth!
Now would come the `birth of the Church', the sighting of the institutional Ekklesia, held in check and at `the point of birth' for fourty years - now fully birthed and ready to grow to maturity with all the associated problems of childbirth! Now would come the struggle to establish the Canon of Scripture of the Church. The first indication of that struggle can be seen in the `New Testament' Scriptures where we read of Paul's continuous struggle to establish his calling as an Apostle, called by Christ Jesus Himself - and do not doubt the intensity of that struggle, even to the point of hatred towards Paul when the `Jewish Christians', steeped in Rabbinical Law, strenously denied the `new thinking' of Paul and others. Meanwhile the `Gentile Christians', revelling in their new-found freedom, sought to throw off the `yoke' of Jerusalem. This can be clearly seen in Paul's Epistle to the Galatians where he writes of the contrast between `Law and Grace: (Galatians 4:25-26)
" Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the
present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children.
But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. "
For the next three to four centuries the disputes would rage, and this was the time of the Great Councils called to establish Doctrine and the Canon of Scripture. It is difficult to establish a precise date upon which the Canon of Scripture was closed for disputes continue even today between the various Christian `traditions'. By 250 AD the Canon of Hebrew Scripture was accepted as `closed', but the New Testament Canon was still a process - and a lengthy process at that! It was not until the Council of Carthage in 397 AD (confirming the Council of Laodicea's acceptance in 393 AD) that the Canon of Scripture was more or less accepted as inspired by God, as it is today, and even then the Book of Revelation was disputed - and still today the Apocrypha is not accepted among some `traditions'. But - and within any process there is always a `but' - it was not until the 16th century that the Latin Church could be said to have a closed Canon, followed by the Greek Orthodox Church at the Council of Jerusalem in the 17th century. Therefore it can be said that there is no closed Canon of Scripture in the universal Ekklesia with its many traditions still being contested and disputed.
For this `History of the Church' it is those Great Councils of the East to which we must now turn, for by this time the early Jewish Christians had been almost pushed out of that history as the `Church' cut its ties with (literally) fallen Jerusalem in the Great Diaspora. And so there emerged the great Christian intellectuals, steeped in rhetoric, sophistry and debate, as befitted the Greek culture from which they had been drawn. In fact it was the time of Gentile Christians who would be called to bring to maturity the Doctrine and Canon of Scripture of the new-born Church. The loss of the influence of Jewish Christians was profound, and the loss of Hebraic Scriptural understanding has formed a great barrier in a full understanding of God's purpose for His other called-out people, the nation of Israel. However this is being slowly corrected as we appraoch the Day of Jacob's trouble.
We turn our `journey' back to the 4th century and the calling of the Great Councils during early 300 AD. By this time Christians were scattered throughout the Roman Empire, largely in the Eastern Provinces. Doctrinal differences were threatening not only the unity of the churches but were spilling out into civilian affairs, thereby threatening the whole of the newly-unified Empire, both spiritually and politically. Constantine called the bishops of the churches in the Provinces to an Imperial Synod, an Ecumenical Council, at his palace in Nicea, thereby showing that the Emperor of Rome was the sole authority over this and any successive Great Councils. Through his own chosen bishops Constantine convened and concluded these Synods, and he alone decided the judgements of those Synods which would pass into Imperial law. He therefore ensured that the Church was fully integrated into the State - one undivided and unified Religio/Imperial system of government. Although Constantine was the Convenor of the Synods, an important speaker in the following debates was the Court Theologian and Church Historian Eusebius. The Synod's primary work was to determine Constantine's Empire as embracing `one God , one Emperor, one Kingdom and one Church' - in simple terms one Church and one Empire!
And so would continue the `battle' over priest and king, manifested in one person - as seen in the Scriptural Melchizedek, priest and king, and in his blessing - for who was the greater, he who blesses or he who is blessed? The principal concern in the first Synod was the union of God the Father and God the Son, or as in the Creed of Athanasius:
" God from God, Light from Light, very God from very God,
Begotten not created, being of one Substance with the Father "
The Nicean Synod was not concerned with the Person of the Holy Spirit, for that issue would soon bring forth yet more disputes. Much is being said in this 21st century deploring what is called `the Hellenisation' of the Christian message of salvation through the Pauline Epistles, but the Nicean Synod did not seek to Hellenise Scripture and did not engage in any such thinking concerning the nature of the Godhead in those debates. Nevertheless, as the theologians attending the Synods were almost exclusively Greek-thinking, Greek thought patterns would certainly have prevailed during those debates, but Hebraic thought patterns were embedded in their conclusions - this wider understanding would not have been so with the early Jewish Christians who were totally steeped in Rabbinical thought culture. Thus there was a massive change taking place here, for the emphasis had changed into seeing the Godhead as a `community' of God the Father and God the Son in what can be called a `Temple setting' of God, with His Begotten Son, His anointed Christ, enthroned after His earthly life had accomplished its purpose. This concept of a King reigning on His Throne had not been in Rabbinical thinking since the Babylonian captivity and this change now elevated the natural into the spiritual realm.
Next would come the Arian battle through the person of Arius with his belief that Jesus was created not begotten and was in subjection to God the Father who had created Him. In the second Great Council Arius was declared a heretic and his followers were persecuted, but his beliefs lingered on for many decades. The disputes were finally ended by the Emperor Theodosius the Great who was born in Spain. He was to be the last of the Emperors to rule over a unified Eastern and Western Empire of Rome, for upon his death the Empire was split into two parts by his two sons. By this time Christianity and State had been fused into one system, with Christianity sheltering under the protection of the State which demanded total allegiance. Arianism had been defeated and doctrine, as defined at the Council of Nicea, was established throughout the Empire. However by the time of the Second Council of Constantinople the next dispute was already emerging, and this concerned the Person of the Holy Spirit.
With Arianism completely defeated the Church had finally established the Nicean Creed as the foundation of its doctrine, the Son of God, Begotten not created by God the Father, equal in Majesty and Divinity. And it was at this Second Council of Constantinople that the third Person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit, was brought into the Nicean Creed - that is a belief in:
" The Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father,
who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified. "
A significant shift had occurred in fifty-six years, for whereas the First Council of Nicea had spoken of One God - the earlier Jewish Christian belief - the belief now was in the `Three in One', Father, Son and Holy Spirit, equal in Majesty and Divinity. And so eventually there came the Great Schism between the Eastern and Western Churches, both linked into the separation of Eastern and Western Imperial Rome. Dismiss if you will these historical shifts in religious and State power, but never doubt the Hand of God working though it all, for now there can be seen the `two legs' of Nebuchadnezzar's dream which Daniel was able to interpret as: `a divided kingdom, yet it will have some of the strength of iron in it, even as you saw iron mixed with clay'. It is this fourth kingdom which Daniel spoke of, a mixture of iron and clay, which has been the centre of history these last two thousand years!
But we must return to the Councils of the Church in which its doctrines were to be established. This led to the Great Schism of `East and West', for behind these great Doctrinal debates there lay a powerful power struggle between the Patriarchates concerning primacy. In short it was the beginning of an hierarchical system of Church governance for at the Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople it was confirmed that:
" The Bishop of Constantinople shall have the place of honour above the
Bishop of Rome because this city is the new Rome. "
This is the so-called Canon 3 (that is, section) coming out of the final Creed or Decree of the Council of Chalcedon. But there was also a Canon 28, which was not recognised by the Bishop of Rome for it gave the same primacy to both Patriarchates, Constantinople and Rome. Thus was established the two religious `legs' of Nebuchadnezzar's statue, with both East and West claiming primacy, not based - as Western (Latin) Rome claimed - on the Apostle Paul, but on the status of the capital of Imperial Rome with its five Ecumenical Provinces, equal in authority and subject to Rome. The battle continued between the Eastern and Western Patriarchates but the separation was now complete. The first shock came when the Visgoths sacked Latin Rome in 410 AD, which caused Augustine to write `The City of God', refuting the allegations that Rome's acceptance of Christianity had provoked the ancient gods. Augustine stated that although the city of the earthly Empire was destroyed, the City of God, the new Jerusalem, would prevail, and his writings continued to focus Latin Christianity's eyes upon Jersualem.
The next stage in the separation came through the Great Schism of 1054 AD, coming mainly over Latin Rome's insertion into the Nicene/Constantinople Creed of the `Filoque', which literally means `and from the Son'. The dispute concerned the `Source' of the Holy Spirit: Did He proceed from the Father or from the Father and the Son? Such deeply dividing issues eventually led to the sack of Constantinople in 1204 AD by Latin crusaders who established a Latin-based Empire. At the centre was the universal Kingdom of God under the primacy of the Latin Bishop of Rome. It did not last, for in 1453 AD Constantinople fell to the Ottomans, who drove Byzantine Orthodoxy up into Kevian Russia where eventually it was declared to be the third Rome. Prior to this event the Universal Church was totally Eastern in its great Doctrinal Councils, of which the Bishopric of Rome was one equal part of the whole Great Ecumene of Christianity, but now with the separation complete our `history' must move between these `two legs' of Nebuchadnezzar's statue. It will continue to do so until State and Religion combine to make a final attempt to bring in its own universal kingdom, for we need not remind our reader of the concluding part of Nebuchadnezzar's dream of a rock not cut by human hands that broke the legs of the statue.
But we have gone ahead in historical time, albeit to set out the continual disputes over primacy which spread over many countries. And so we must return to the middle of the 6th century, where we find the Roman Emperor Justinian the Great ruling over a united Empire centered in Constantinople with Christian Orthodoxy being the sole State religion. Under Justinian there arose a unified Roman Empire in Christian clothing. The Bishop of Rome (as with all other Bishoprics) became an Imperial subject, the State protecting and the Church accepting this order of a State-Religio Imperial Rome - the Patriarch was relegated to preserving orthodoxy whilst the Emperor was the unchallenged ruler of the State and guardian protector of the Church! Thus the early Church saw itself as a great catholic community of believers spread throughout the Empire, not as an hierarchical organisation but as an autonomous provincial Church adhering to one doctrine, as determined by the Great Councils under the authority of the Emperor.
From this came Orthodoxy's greatest strength, which was seen in its liturgy with its Scriptural emphasis on the Glorified Risen Christ Jesus. This liturgy centered on the exalted Glorified Christ within His community, and yet it was able to accomodate the different languages and regions of this great Ecumene, thereby forming a variety of liturgies but always they were meetings of Believers in joyful assembly with their Risen Christ. The Latin Church under the Bishop of Rome was experiencing a restoration following the destructive onslaught of the Visgoths. In that restoration it sought to establish a change from a State/Religio Universal Ecumene into a Religio/State Universal Ecumene under the protection/guardianship of the Bishop of Rome, with earthly Kings, Princes and Emperors subject to him as the spiritual head of the Church, as the Vicar of Christ on earth.
As Latin Rome finally cut its ties with Orthodoxy and rose to dominance its own distinctive liturgy developed around the central act of the Mass with its bloodless, repetitive ritual of the Sacrifice of Jesus. This became more developed in the West in the Middle Ages with a pious Mary, the Mother of God, interceeding through her Child. Such was the centrality of the Mass in the liturgy of Latin Rome that continual acts of repentance, confession and forgiveness of sins developed, all under the absolution of the Pope. In such a liturgy the Pope held sway over the whole of Latin Christianity, enslaving kings and the people through the threat of excommunication and eternal damnation. This Latin liturgy has been fully integrated into the Western institutional established Churches with its centrality based on the cross of Jesus in one form or another. Meanwhile Eastern Orthodoxy finally succumbed to an acceptance of a common liturgy, primarily a last attempt to hold together the declining power of Byzantine Orthodox Rome.
We have said much of liturgy in this `history' because it brings understanding of the inner life of institutional Churches in both Eastern and Western Christianity. However as Orthodoxy began to lose its individuality in its liturgy it began to conform to the liturgy of John Chrysostom. This was a natural progession, for from the time of Emperor Constantine a unified, centralised Empire was his ambition and driving aim, consolidated by a uniform (although not heirarchical) Orthodox Church - a Fellowship or Koinona of Churches whose unity in sacramental terms was in a Ecumene of Churches under City Bishops, all in fellowship with regional Metropolitans and Patriarchs who recognised the Bishopric of Rome as `first among equals' out of respect for the `old Rome'. Many of the Eastern Orthodox Churches were `apostolic', in the sense that they received `the faith' directly from the first Apostles and not from old Rome. But decay in this early Ecumene was already apparent as the all-powerful Bishops began to form their own power bases, and this decay would result in the separation between clergy and laity. The word `liturgy' simply means `a uniformed one', and by Justinian times Churches were being built and organised by priests. Indeed it was said that Justinian had said: `Solomon, I have surpassed you', on seeing the great Cathedral Church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. And so began the final cutting of ties with early Jewish Christianity through a misunderstanding that God's blessing had been removed from Jerusalem and passed to `new Israel'.
And so with this uniform Religio/State Imperial power at its apex the understanding of a Christian world came into being. Christianity formed that world, but that world entered the Church. Professionalism soon entered the Church, with Bishops, deacons, priests and musicians by the score, paid to establish and govern a bureaucratic, hierarchical system of paid professionals wielding religious power which could be used politically for its own ends. This privileged class, clothed in the elaborate robes of imperial power together with lighted candles, incense, processions and musicians now celebrated worship for the people with a passive laity looking on. Celibacy soon entered the Western Latin Church, not as a gift but as a law for its priests, further separating the laity from the priests. However celibacy would not enter the Eastern Orthodox Church, apart from the monastic rule which was to play an important part in the development of Eastern Orthodoxy. Celibacy is not unique to the Latin Roman Church for it appears in many State systems of antiquity - enforced celibacy ensures that no one family with dynastic ambitions would become powerful thus threatening the entire rulership, in this case, the Bishop of Rome. The priesthood of all believers, as seen in early Jewish Christianity, was fast disappearing through Church dogma, and by the 6th and 7th centuries the priesthood had become sacramental, and therefore, as the word implies, set apart.
As we now have two `legs', East and West, in our Church history, we need to move from one to the other and trust that the reader will not become confused. Monastic rule quickly moved into Eastern orthodoxy, which most likely originated through contact with Asian countries. We know of course that there was a Jewish tradition with the Essenes at Qumran, and most certainly the Jewish prophets lived in their own set-apart communities. Monasticism in orthodoxy was well established by the 6th century at the time of Justinian, and by the 9th century it had reached its peak, causing a great dispute through the veneration of icons. Pious remembrance of `saints' now moved into veneration of `saints'. This would certainly have come through the direct influence of the Greek philosopher Plato, but also through the growing influence of the monastries with their ascetic lifestyle. The understanding of icons came through Scripture - albeit twisted out of context - that if man was made in the image of God then images made of the divine originals of `pious saints' could be venerated so that through the images they could enter the Presence of God. Paganism entered Orthodoxy and led beyond mere veneration to the endless kissing and dressing of the images.
Eventually in the 8th century Emperor Leo 3rd placed a complete ban on religious images due to pressure from the Orthodox Church, but the monastries fiercely opposed Leo's ban as the monks owed their influence and their financial existence to the production of icons, as did the Bishop of Rome to a certain extent! Lastly, one of the great Orthodox theologians, Father John of Damascus, opposed Leo's ban. He wrote:
" Seeing is more than hearing, and the image of God, in human form, is
clearly more than hearing the Word of God. "
The protests prevailed, when in 754 AD at the Council of Hiereia Leo's son and heir, Constantine 5th, declared iconoclasm to be doctrine of the Eastern Orthodox Church. This was condemned by the Pope of the Western Church with the words:
" The impossibility of knowing God, who is incomprehensible, and the
impossibility of duplicatig God or Christ in images. "
Father John of Damascus was declared a heretic, and so in the 8th century there came a great purification against participants in the veneration of images. Whatever opinions we may have regarding icons they were made by monks with a high sense of the Divine nature which they attempted to portray, and they were surpassed only by the early Jewish Massorites, who were entrusted with copying the Divine Scriptures.
In the 9th century the issue of icons reared up once again, for in 787 AD the Dowager Empress Irene called the Second Council of Nicea to debate the question of icons. (Irene came from the Greek heartland and was heavily influenced by monasticism.) The outcome was once again acceptance of the veneration of images by the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is upheld even today. Since that time tradition has been the basis for truth rather than Scripture and was established by the seven Ecumenical Councils of which this Second Council of Nicea was the last. There then followed some 35 years of `palace' intrigue, leading to Depositions and the banishment of Patriarch Nicephorus. But finally the Dowager Empress Theodora - who had appointed Methodius (a monk) as the new Patriarch at the Synod of Constantine in 843 AD - settled the question of icons. All was now settled for faith and belief in icons in the Greek Orthodox Church and even today on the first Sunday in Lent the victory over these heresies is commemorated with the `Feast of Orthodoxy'.
By the 9th century Greek Orthodoxy had drawn into its orbit the northern Slavic people and the majority of the southern Slavs of the Balkans, such as Bulgaria. But by the 11th century the western Slavs began to look to the Bishopric of Rome as their spiritual authority, and here we can clearly see the separation of the early Greek universal Church from what could be called the medieval Latin Church of Rome - a frontier, long coming, had been established between East and West. It was not so much a clean break but a slow, progressive, inevitable separation which coincided with the progressive growth of Latin Rome's power and authority. There was also increasingly a language problem, with Orthodoxy speaking Greek and Latin Rome speaking Latin in all their debates, councils and liturgies and through Orthodoxy clinging to tradition and Scripture. The progressive authority of the Western Church was therefore a monarchical, absolutionist, centralised system, which was totally rejected by Orthodoxy which never based itself on a Universal Bishopric but on a Communion of Believers, a Koinona, a `federal' communion of churches. The Orthodox Church began to be known as `The Church of the Seven Councils', referring back to the Second Council of Niceae of 787 AD where a last attempt was made to maintain The Universal Orthodox Church. The Orthodox traditions of the East were ignored by the West, and the West continued its claim to primacy, `the first among equals' over the universal Church under the authority of Rome.
Stepping back to the end of the 5th century for a moment we see that this seeking for primacy was indeed progressive, for following the Germanic invasion of the first Rome, with all the ensuing upheaval, we find Pope Gelasius 1st laying claim to the whole Universal Church independent of State power. However, the traditionalists of the Imperial Church (Church and State combined) simply imprisoned the unruly Pope, carried him off to Constantinople and then turned to Frankish power to seek support for this Universsal authority to be established. If Pope Gelasius had succeeded then the Pope of the Latin Church of Rome would have usurped the position of the Emperor and would have held supreme political and religious authority! The deciding break came when Pope Leo 2nd bestowed (unlawfully) the title of Emperor upon a barbarian ruler - that is, upon Charles king of the Franks - in Rome on Christmas Eve 800. Thus in the eyes of Orthodoxy Western Latin Rome became heretical, which many Eastern Orthodox Churches maintain to this day. We cannot but see the Apostle John writing of these events in chapter 13 of his `Book of Revelation'! By the middle of the 9th century this seeking to establish Primacy raged on with Pope Nicholas 1st claiming authority over Illyricum and the Eastern churches when in 847 AD he called a Synod and declared the Eastern Patriarch deposed - correspondingly, the Eastern Synod deposed the Pope - the so-called `Photian Schism'.
In the Western Latin Church there arose a flurry of forged documents, all seeking to establish the supreme authority of the Western Popes. No doubt these were attempts to deal with the dispute we mentioned earlier where at the Second Council of Constantinople they sought to settle the question of Primacy, which saw the `twisting' of Canon 3 and Canon 28 of the agreed document and the Pope claiming to be first among equals - which any Church lawyer could, and did, overturn but which the Pope ignored! The two most important forgeries were called `The Donation of Constantine' and the `Pseudo Isidorian Decretals'. The first we look at is the `Donation of Constantine' which said that before Constantine departed for Constantinople he bestowed on Pope Silvester 1st the right to wear the Imperial Regalia and bequeathed to him Rome and all its Provinces, and cities in Italy and the Western regions. In effect, upon Constantine's death this made the Pope Pontifax Maximus, Emperor and Primate over all other churches in accordance with the position the Pope now held as head of State and Church. The second, the `Pseudo Isidorian Decretals', was a collection of letters, one of which was a letter from Pope Clement 1st to the Apostle James wherein it stated that James had said that the Apostle Peter had given `the keys of the Kingdom' to Pope Clement in 94 AD, who had then passed on `the Apostolic Succession'. These documents were established as forgeries in the 15th century, but like all untruths, if they are repeated often enough (and here we are talking of centuries), they become accepted `truths' - even those accepted as forgeries!
By the 11th century the Western Popes regarded the Eastern Orthodox Church as `separated brethren', schismatic and heretical, and finally the Crusades of the West in the 12th century were launched against Islam and the Eastern Church when Constantinople was plundered by the West in 1204. However these continuous conflicts between the Eastern and Western Churches had left both weakened, and finally Byzantine was overwhelmed by the rising power of Islam, and in 1453 Constantinople finally fell to its armies. From Constantine the Great to Constantine 6th the Second Rome came to an inglorious end But although Byzantine fell Orthodoxy continued. In the Balkans it was the `glue' that bound together the Greeks and the Southern and Eastern Slavs, and over many dark centuries it kept them from being absorbed into Islam. The `heart' of Orthodoxy was driven to a new destiny in the Russian Empire of the north, centered on Kievian Russia and Moscow. Russia therefore became the `Guardian of Orthodoxy'.
The conflict between Latin and Orthodox Rome continued, for even though Orthodoxy was now centered in Russia Latin Rome still sought to impose total authority over it with its military arm `The Order of Teutonic Knights'. The full title of this order was `The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary'. Like `the Knights Templar' it was formed to aid and protect Christians on their pilgramages to the Holy Land, and it played a part in the formation of Outremer, the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem. But with the fall of the last of the cities of Outremer to the Muslim armies in 1291 AD the Order turned its efforts to supporting the Pope's authority over the Balkan tribes and on into frontier battles with the Orthodox principalities of Novgorod and Pskov. (The Order of Teutonic Knights was dissolved by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1809.) The invasion by the Catholic Poles finally saw the occupation of Moscow as they sought to extend their Latin Catholic Empire, thus subjecting Russian Orthodoxy to the Primacy of the Western Pope. (These medieval Religio-Imperialist State battles have continued from the time of Constantine right up to the present day, and will continue until the end of this Age.)
Orthodoxy had a `legal' right to move its centre to Kievian Russia, for Russia was a Church Province of the Patriarch of Constantinople, and with the fall of Byzantine Orthodoxy fell back to this Church Province of Russia. The Grand Duchy of Moscow had thrown off the `Tartar yoke' of the Mongols, and always fearful of its newly-won independence it now absorbed Orthodoxy into its own Religio-Imperial State for it was always aware of Latin Rome's claim to the Primacy. Earlier the Mongol Tartars under Genghis Khan had founded an empire extending as far as the Black Sea, and by 1240 under Khan's successor their rule extended into Russia from Moscow to its capital in Kiev. Thus Russia remained under Tartar rule for two centuries and its political rule had all but ceased. But the Orthodox Province of Russia had not, and in the 13th and 14th centuries it became the focal point of unifying the Russian States, and to this day Orthodoxy remains the central `heart' of Russia. It was this primary conflict that had been (and will again be) the main drive for universal Religio-Imperial power, and it was this primary conflict that turned Orthodoxy towards the Mongols, seeking protection from Latin Rome and thus accepting the `Tartar yoke'. `Better death than Rome, and better the Tartars than the mitre', became the Religio-Political cry of Russia. It was not so much that Russia turned East for protection, for its roots already lay in the East and its spiritual heart was in Orthodoxy - and so it remains to this day. This seeking `protection' came through Alexander Nevsky the Grand Prince of Novgorod in the 13th century, when fearful of the imperial ambitions of the Pope he turned to the Khans of the Golden Horde and warred against the Latin Teutonic Knights, the Swedes and Lithuanians. Alexander was canonised as a saint and patron of Russian saints - a powerful symbol for Russian independence for it was he more than any other who secured the division between Orthodoxy and Latin Rome, for to be Russian was to be Orthodox!
By the 14th century State power had transferred from Kiev to Moscow, and so began the end of Tartar domination and the beginning of Russian national consciousness. However, through the long period of Mongol enslavement Orthodoxy was not able to throw off Russia's orginal paganism. This together with subservience to its Tartar masters had formed a Russian culture of prostration before the strong and oppression of the weak, resulting in a dark world of alcholism, dissipation and violence. At Russia's religious heart lay Orthodox Monasticism which released a counter-revelation of holiness, purification and penance, for Monasticism was not so much `the crown of Orthodoxy' but a light shining in the darkness of Slavonic paganism. By the 15th century Moscow had become the centre of a great Russian kingdom, a beacon of high culture and the new stronghold of Orthodoxy. In 1438 an 8th Council attempted to join Orthodoxy to Latin Rome. It was short-lived, and on his return from this Council Isidore, the Orthodox Metropolitan of Kiev and all Russia, was thrown into prison. He escaped and was made a Papal Cardinal, and at the time of his death he was the Latin Patriarch of Constantinople in Rome. Orthodox Bishops were elected by the Metropolitan of Kiev and all Russia without the permission of this new `Patriarch of Constantinople' who remained in union with Latin Rome, and so the long but inevitable break between East and West was complete. From this time on Russia chose its own Metropolitan, but at a high cost to Orthodoxy for it was now tied to the Russian State and therefore subject to every kind of manipulation of its rulers.
From this time on Russia with its own kind of Imperial ambitions laid claim to the inheritance of Byzantine, and in line with the original Eastern Imperialism of Rome it claimed authority over Orthodoxy, thus preparing Russia, both State and Religion, to be a universal empire, placing itself in direct opposition to Latin Rome with its own iniversal ambitions. In the late 15th century when Grand Duke Ivan 3rd married Zoe, that is Sophia, the niece of the last Byzantine Emperor, Russia took upon itself divine State-Religio mission, and in 1472 it entered into the inheritance of Constantinople as the Third Rome. Ivan's title of Czar of all Russia was conferred on him by the Patriarch of Constantinople, confirming that the Russian Czar was now God's representative on earth with total control over the Church - a complete reversal of the old Byzantine ruling where the Patriarch had the right to correct error of doctrine up to and including the Emperor! Now in Russian Orthodoxy the Church was under the direct control of the Grand Princes and the Czar. There would be no Eastern Church reformation as would be seen in the Latin Church. Indeed reformation was considered to be blasphemous, for Orthodoxy claims it has retained the original teaching of the Apostles, unlike the Latin Rome of the Middle Ages which allowed innovation and abberation which Orthodoxy said was unscriptural when proclaimed by a Pope unrestrained by State power. Russian Orthodoxy claims that it alone has kept its original roots, for elsewhere Orthodoxy came under the authority and beliefs of an alien religion, namely Islam. At this point in history there has been an emphasis on the Eastern Orthodox Church, which was the power centre of the universal Church in the care of its Bishops, Metropolitans and Patriarchs, of which the Bishop of Rome was one, under the protection and direction of the Emperor in Constantinople.
The Bishop of Rome and his Province, Latin Rome, was brought into this `history' mainly to give understanding of the continuous disputes between `East and West' of the equally divided Imperial State power of the Emperor. And so it is now time to look at the Bishop of Rome and the Latin Church. Firstly we must return to the very beginning, to the time when Peter stood up in the Temple compound, to the time of the `Community of Jesus'. It was not a world of Hellenisitic culture and thought for it was a Jewish world at the very heart of a geographical land-mass which was totally Gentile in character and pagan in practise. The Jewish believers, separated by language, sacred writings, customs and national belief in the one true God, had forged a thoroughly Jewish identity in their spiritual life, which had been so from the time of the exodus from Egypt and remains so to this day. The first followers of Jesus had little or no commercial power, neither did they seek it. They were a weak marginalised group within Jewish society, ridiculed and discredited by the Jewish religious leaders and the Romans. Certainly one aspect of the life of `the community of Jesus' was that there was complete acceptance of one another - as the Apostle Paul was to write some 30 years later: `Neither Jew nor Greek; slave nor free; male nor female; you are all one in Christ Jesus'. More importantly, they were all disciples of their Messiah Jesus! Their whole focus was on proclaiming the Risen Lord Jesus and waiting with intense expectancy for His Return, the end of the present Age and the establishment of the Eternal Kingdom of God. They were not interested in worldly power in this world for they were interested only in their glorious future which they believed was imminent. The early Jewish Christians were not interested in an earthly Messiah, for they knew what had happened to the Maccabees in their belief that the Kingdom would come through the defeat of the Greek armies. They knew that true and lasting deliverance would come from their heavenly Messiah alone.
This early community was clearly apocolyptic in thought and action because of what they knew of the resurrction of Messiah Jesus and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at the Feast of Pentecost. There was an awareness of a dramatic change in their earthly lives - Pentecost was a real and life-changing experience and Jesus their Messiah was alive and would soon return for them. Their Messiah was alive, exalted to God's Presence, dwelling with Him in Heavenly Glory, returning soon to judge and rule His world. This was the complete life of the Community of Jesus, a Messianic people centered on the reality of the completion of two of the Jewish Feasts - Passover, when their Messiah had brought salvation, and Pentecost, the receiving of the Holy Spirit. Now they were looking forward to Tabernacles and His Coming to be with His people for ever. They wore His Robes of Righteousness; they were secure under His Banner; there was a new Kingdom which could be experienced and lived, not yet manifest but knowing their Messiah's soon return to His Kingdom. Consequently there was a withdrawal from their still-existent Jewish world. The early Christians were fully integrated within the established Jewish communities and yet `spiritually complete', and in view of their Lord's soon return there was an urgency to witness and to proclaim the Risen Messiah Jesus, `now exalted to the right hand of God' but soon returning to establish the long-awaited Jewish Kingdom of God.
Those new believers were trusting that through their witness and proclamation `all Israel would be saved', for their whole life and purpose was totally centered on the Messiah Jesus, crucified and raised up by God and returning in Glory to judge and to reign over the whole world. This was the foundation of the Community of Jesus, the early Jewish Believers and the Gentiles who were added to their number: First, faith and trust in Jesus, expressed in proclamation of Him; second, baptism into His death and resurrection into His new life, and finally the regular sharing together in a Meal of Remembrance. But this would not last, and the earlier expression of the new life faded as the expected immediacy of the Messiah's return did not materialise . . the `end times' did not occur within the Believers' time of expectancy. Time elapsed allowing the religious life to be re-established in the wider community in which the Believers lived out their lives. Thus a `church system' began to emerge, restoring the status quo and quenching the vibrant spiritual life of the Community of Jesus. The difference between a vibrant community and a religious system needs little comment, but it led to two thousand years of a `Church system' becoming deeply entrenched in the culture and daily lives of a people who are not part of the Community of Jesus.
So the question must be asked: What of this Church system - was it truly asked for or required by the Head of this Body of Believers? The Community of Jesus had been embedded in the people to proclaim a New Kingdom, but it changed to a community which became part of the people, serving it and working to maintain it! Within 40 years of the wondrous spiritual events of that Pentecost in Jerusalem the vibrant dynamic Body had become a `Church', and this would lead to a change beyond their imagination. As this new Community was embedded in the religious Jewish community it too worked out the fourty years Probation since that Pentecost, which began with the religious Jewish establishment's rejection of their Messiah and was completed with the official rejection of Him. Judgement followed and came through the Roman armies in AD 70 when they destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple and the Jewish people, including the new Community of Jesus, were scattered in the Disapora into the wider Roman world. This scattered Community of Jewish Christians would not face a fourty-year Probation of testing of belief, nor a four hundred years Probation (such as was spoken of by Malachi), for they and all Believers who came to faith later would know a two thousand-years Probation of Grace - that is, five times longer than Malachi's Great Probation wherein all Believers would outwork their respective calling.
Now would come the institutionalising of that once-vibrant dynamic Community, where personal individual charisma, that is gifts, would be replaced by the `gift' of office, with the `institution' becoming the centre of life. But first those Jewish believers - and at this stage they were mainly Jewish - would find that the synagogues which at first had been merely critical of Jesus were now openly hostile to Him. People were cut off from all social and personal contact with the synagogues, and through being so clearly rejected they, the new Believers, in their turn rejected the synagogues and found themselves separated in a very hostile Jerusalem. Cut off from their very beginnings they experienced persecution by the Jewish leaders - which led to the martyrdom of Stephen, James and the brothers - and finally they were scattered by the Romans throughout the greater Roman Empire. Here they formed small groups, still largely Jewish Christian but increasingly with Gentile Believers joining them they combined their faith in Jesus as Messiah with their Jewish perspective of Mosaic Law and its rituals. Later on these small groups were branded heretics by the increasing numbers of Gentile-Greek Believers until they were eventually pushed outside the emerging Gentile Church with their `High Christology' of Jesus as the Son of God and God the Son. Certainly by the 2nd century the early `Christian Fathers' such as Ignatius and Irenaeus declared them heretical and ebonites.
The modern-day excessive search among many Believers for `our Jewish roots' can - and often does - take the Believers back to `Jewish Christianity' and rejecting `Gentile Christianity', building once again a `wall of hostility' between Jew and Gentile which has been a problem within `the Church' for the past two thousand years. Such proponents can lead (and indeed have led) some to accuse the Apostle Paul and his followers of rejecting the legitimate Jewish culture of early Christianity and forming a Gentile Christianity permeated with Greek mythology. Such a move begins to merge Judaism with Islam and becoming `Brothers of the Covenant'! The Jewish Shemah `Hear, O Israel, the LORD your God is One' is paralled by Islam's `God has no son', and could quickly merge with the search for `Jewish roots' amongst Christians today who are eager for deeper truth provided by Messsianic teaching of the Word, the `new truth' - "our common heritage of one monolithic faith for we are all on the same journey towards `god'". Such is the reality of the `captivity' of today's Western Church following the fourty-year Probation of 1967-2007.
We leave this brief digression into modern Western Christianity and move back again to those early 4th century times, to another `Church Father', John Chrystostom, who in an attempt to stop the slide of Christianity back into Judaism gave 8 anti-Jewish sermons against the `heretics'. But in doing so he cut out still further the truth of the `Old' Covenant, proclaiming the `New' as not only superior but as the final revealed Truth. By the 5th century Jewish Christianity had all but disappeared. The Synagogue had been separated from the Church, pushing Jewish Christianity into the outer regions of the Roman Empire, primarily into 3 main geographical areas - into Ethiopia to emerge as Monophysite Christianity; into South India, emerging as the Southists following Thomas of Cana; and more importantly, into Persia, following Mano, the leader of the Manichaeists, a mixture of Judaism, Buddahism and a mix of Gnosticism. Another early group of Jewish Believers were driven into Arabia, intermingling with the paganism of Mohammad whilst in exile in Medina which resulted in the Quram. Islam, a mixture of Jewish Christianity and Arabian tribal paganism was the result, and today is seen as one of the so-called three Monolithic Faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Here is the danger of the growing Jewish Christianity re-emerging and drawing the Church back into its `Jewish Roots'! There had to be a clear break in those early years, just as surely as there has to be a break in today's Church in order to see, know and proclaim the Risen Son of God, God the Son who is coming to judge the world!
Yet again we have to step back in time and return to the 1st century, for major historical-theological shifts do not happen overnight but come through slow, persistent developments. The next great shift away from Jewish Christianity came without doubt through the great revelation of Jesus that came to Saul in the road to Damascus. The Lord's choice of Saul (later to be known as Paul) was no random choice for the great commission given to Paul carried over into the emerging largely Gentile Church. The choice had to be Paul, steeped as he was in the Hebrew Scriptures. He did not bring to the Church a new idea . . it was not a form of Greek mythology polluting Judaism. Paul's writings were, and are, totally Hebraic in thought and words, enriching and expanding what was already set out in the Hebrew Scriptures, not replacing them. Under the anointing of the Holy Spirit the Lord of the Church ensured that `Jewish Roots' were not cut off from the Church, for they were in thought and word embedded in the total Word of God which was being formed and codified in the later great Councils of the Church. This could never have happened with those first Jewish Believers for the time had come for the Church to grow and mature into the fulness of God's revelation.
The next great shift away from Jewish Christianity came with Barnabas, who had fled to Antioch following the martyrdom of Stephen. He now went to Tarsus to bring Paul to Antioch, which next to Rome and Alexander was the most important city of the Imperial Roman Empire. Once again this was no random choice for Antioch was on an international trade route. In those days it controlled the land routes linking Asia Minor, Mesopotamia and Egypt, thus it was placed to become the centre of Christian outreach into the whole Roman Empire. A group of Greek-speaking Jewish Christians had gathered in Antioch and had been evangelising in the city, bringing into fellowship many Gentiles - the title `Christians', (Christ's people)' was first used here. Here in Antioch we see the first clear break: In Jerusalem the Believers were in a largely rural setting outside the city walls of Jerusalem and speaking Aramaic, whereas in Antioch, which was predominately Gentile, the people spoke the languages of universal communication, Koine-Greek and Latin. After his conversion Saul, a Pharisee of Pharisees and steeped in Torah, became a fervent believer in the Risen Jesus, and with his great intellect and also now being situated in Antioch he knew without a doubt his calling to go to the Gentiles with the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus.
This was to be more than just a shift within Judaism; Paul's Revelation of Jesus and his subsequent Gospel completely undermined the early Jewish Believers' message of the exclusive `saving' ritual of Jewish Law, the Halakhah, and their belief in the Messiah sent from God (but not of God `the only Begotten Son of God before the foundation of the earth'). The Jesus of early Jewish Christian thought was a man, a prophet sent by God, who was crucified for His message, elevated and raised from the dead into Heaven as had Enoch and Elijah been, men anointed by God, pre-eminent men. Little wonder that Paul was continually attacked by the Jews and the early Jewish Believers, for his Gospel was of the Begotten Son of God, God the Son, who came to earth as a man, was crucified and resurrected to His eternal place in Heaven. This Man Jesus was not an expression of the oneness of the God of Jewish belief but was truly a Person of the one Triune Godhead. Paul's Good News that Gentiles were able to partake of all the promises of God without first becoming a Jew and then having to fulfil the works of the Law was indeed a revelation, and under the anointing of the Holy Spirit his message spread throughout the Roman Empire and was not restricted to the narrow confines of Judaism.
The revelation of the Gospel of God which Paul preached turned a small Jewish sect within Judaism into a universal proclamation of the Kingdom of God, and of its soon-returning King who would reign over the whole earth from Jerusalem, joining East and West (as understood in Imperial Rome) into one joyous community of Christians - the followers of Christ Jesus. The founder of this community was not Paul but the Person of Jesus Christ, crucified and resurrected into the Glory of God the Father, now seated in Glory at God's right hand as God the Son. It can be said that Paul was the first Christian theologian with a mind steeped in Judaism but with a hellenistic education. Paul was entrusted by Jesus to take this message of salvation by faith in Jesus and not by works of Jewish Law to the Gentile nations of the Roman Empire, and his work continues to this day through his Letters to the Churches. Christianity is a totally different religion to Judaism, although paradoxically it is the fulness of Judaism for its roots are embedded in the Covenants and Promises given by God to Abraham, from whom came the Seed of Promise, the Jewish Messiah Jesus.
Among those Christians, those Christ's people, there was a sense of community, one people, the Body of Christ as Paul declared. There was no hierarchical Church system in the early post-Pentecost time. The earliest mention of a Church (other than its meaning of `widespread') did not appear in the early Church writings until in the very early 2nd century Ignatius of Antioch briefly mentioned `Catholic', meaning a conformity of practice and belief. But from his time onward `sightings' of an hierarchical system of Church government began to appear, modelled on the Council in Jerusalem of the Apostle James' time which was mainly called to debate and discuss theological matters. This `Jerusalem model' would form the pattern for the Great Councils of the Church during the times of Constantine and Theodosius, bringing together Bishops from the autonomous Church assemblies of the region - the early Bishops were appointed to represent, not rule, the people! So when did the monarchical Episcopate arise in the Western Church? Very little is heard of the Western Church until the 3rd century, and the first definite mention of a Roman Pontiff is dated 235 AD through the resigntion of Pope Pontian. Nevertheless Latin Rome had a very high self-esteem, and with good reason for Latin Rome had the tombs of Peter and Paul, two of the early Apostles. It prided itself on being the guardian of Apostolic tradition together with its stand at the great Church Councils against Gnosticism, and it was also the oldest Christian community outside of Jerusalem. After the fall of Jerusalem and the scattering of the Jewish believers Latin Rome became the new centre for Christianity, leaving Jerusalem (now known as `Aelia Capitlina') a mainly Gentile Christian community. Certainly change is always with us, but some changes of significance take time to be recognised.
The early Chuch was practically almost Jewish, developing slowly into `Jew and Gentile', but after the fall of Jerusalem Greek and Latin became the dominant languages rather than Hebrew and Aramaic. Instead of Jewish Believers evangelising in Israel and close by, the Good News went out into the Greco-Roman world. Rome, not Jerusalem, became the principal centre of Christianity under Roman influence, through which a hierarchical pseudo imperial system developed in the Western Church. It was an inevitable development and the office of leadership quickly became the norm. Consequently spiritually anointed charisma became suppressed with the Church claiming the office to be a gift, thereby developing a clergy-laity dichotomy. Prophetic teaching became Greek sophistry, and eventually through the Reformation of the 15th century the Roman Catholic Church broke up into a proliferation of Churches. Each one had their own doctrinal positions and power centres surrounding the embattled centralised Latin Roman Church, which still proclaimed its Apostolic succession from the Apostle Peter, and through Peter claiming sole legitimacy of an absolutionist rule
for the Papacy - albeit using forged documents through the `twisting' of various statements coming from the 2nd Council of Constantinople. But we must return to history rather than critical judgement on the Ages through which the Ekklesia is passing.
The first official report of Roman Christianity in the West came through Pliny the Younger to Emperor Trajan in the early 2nd century. Christians were refusing to worship Roman State gods. This was a crime against the State, with the verdict of death which led to the matyrdom of many Christians. Although the State did not allow indiscriminate accusations, and trial by Roman standards was fair, Christian `pogroms' - such as were seen later in the 19th-20th century Jewish pogroms in Europe - were spasmodic and violent. It was during this time that the first Christian literature came forth when the so-called `Apologies' were written and presented to the Emperor. The authors wrote in Greek and could be considered to be Church theologians on a par with such men as the Apostle Paul, for although they were writing `letters' for the Church their work was intended for the public also, presenting Christianity through Greek thought and culture and using Greek philosophical style of writing and debate. From these men came the first of the many Christian theologians who would later come into fulness in the great Church Councils which met to determine Scriptural doctrine. And so through those `Apologies', and the Letters that followed, Christianity flowed throughout the Empire, releasing the Good News of Jesus into a Universal Religion, and from the `Apologies' - written first to the Emperor setting out the truth of the `Christ's people' - the spoken and the written words were welcomed into Greek culture.
There was, however, an unintentional adverse effect, for such philosophical work turned Christian thought and practice away from its early Jewish Christian awareness and proclamation of a returning Messiah. It led to a `settling down' in order to establish and present doctrine, encouraging Believers to stand and to stand believing whilst they waited for the return of their Messiah. Expectancy gave way to waiting, and although there is no doubt that the Lord was building His Church it did cause a separation from the early Jewish Believers centered in Jerusalem. This cutting off of its `Jewish roots' led to an increasing institutionalising of the Church, yet by the Lord's great mercy and grace it left a remnant with those Jewish roots intact and passing them on for a future time. Two thousand years have passed and now that `future time' is emerging in the Western Church, much to the irritation and anxiety of many Church leaders whose `life' is centered on stability and ritual whilst they wait for what they are not sure of.
But we must return to our `history', for following the `Apologies' there came great spiritual battles through the natural Great Councils called by Roman Emperors and centered in the Eastern regions of the Empire. We need to be reminded that in this part of our `history' we are concerned with the Western Latin Church, which in those early years was but a small Bishopric amongst many. The battle over Gnosticism was and is still today a battle to be won. In religious terms it affects Christianity, for Gnosticism seeks redemption through higher knowledge. Much of the Gnostic writings talk of a `Divine spark of Light' in people seeking to flee from an evil world of matter to the Divine Home of Light - the so-called `Journey of Light'. To combat such heresies, and there were many, there came the beginning of Church Authority which set out boundaries of Scriptural acceptance. Today we call those writings ` the Canon of Scripture', the word coming from the Greek `Kanon', meaning `a measure, a guideline of rule', referring initially to the Letters of the early Apostles which were codified by trusted men of God such as Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, and Tertullian of Carthage. And so by the 3rd century Christians were living by these established main acceptances of faith:
First: The Believers' confession of faith at baptism, trusting in the finished work of Christ Jesus.
Second:Their acceptance of the Canon of Scripture, not only the Hebrew Scriptures but also the new Canon, the collection of sacred writings, as being of Apostolic origin.
Third: In the case of disputes within the Church such matters would be adjudicated, that is judged by the Episcopacy, the accepted Church Authority.
By this time the Episcopacy was largely a teaching office in matters of doctrine and Church governance and had separated itself from the laity. As the numbers of Christians increased and were scattered all over the Roman Provinces this inevitably led to the formation of Metropolitan Provinces under the pastoral care of Bishops. The size and importance of those Metropolitan Provinces within the imperial Roman jurisdiction gave their Bishops a special Dignity of Office, and the greatest of these were the Provinces of Rome, Alexandria and Antioch. Initially it was those Provincial Bishops who called the various Synods and Councils together to hear disputes and adjudicate them. The traditions of the early Apostles became the yardstick or rule for the conduct of those gatherings, with gifted speakers and teachers gaining prominence over the Prophetic Voice - which `voice' has always looked to the imminent return of Christ Jesus! Once again we see the Church `closing down' from the Apocalyptic to the Intellectual and leaving all power and authority to the Provincial Bishops, to the loss of the holy priesthood of all Believers and their participation in the life of the Church.
It takes little intelligence to see that a major separation was coming as the `Special Dignity of Office' in the three major Provinces sought primacy. As to the `Special Dignity of Office' concerning the Bishop of Rome and the Latin Roman Church, such battles led to the medieval Church Age and the great religio-politico turmoil of that Age. `Primacy' - as conceived by the Bishop of Rome - meant that full spiritual and secular authority was to be centered in the Roman Catholic Church of the West, and so truth gave way to tradition. Apostolic succession became central to the office of the Bishop of Rome as successor to the Apostle Peter rather than the succession of Apostolic teaching, which had long been established through the great Church Councils. For Western Christianity the middle of the Medieval Age was a time of decay and decadence, and in its popular culture it was thoroughly wicked. Nevertheless the battle for the `soul' of the Gospel continued through such men as Wycliff and Hus. But clearly it was the Age during which the Bishop of Rome and the Latin Church came to dominate western kings and princes as the Church sought to bring `everything under His feet' in its belief that it was chosen to bring in the universal Kingdom of God under the authority of `the Vicar of Christ', Pontifax Maximus - the charge that was supposedly given to the first Pope in the pseudo `Donation of Constantinople' we mentioned earlier.
However we must not stay at the level of judgemental criticism of the wickedness of men in the Western Latin Church, for that separation between East and West was already spoken of in Daniel's interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar's dream and therefore all was within the purposes of God. The rise of the Western Latin Church coincided with the increase in power of the Western countries, both `rising from the ashes' of past devastation. The separation was made complete as Latin became the language of the West, whereas as Greek became the language of the East amongst the common people in trade and commerce, law and religion, the East was totally Hellenised in thought and deed. It was not until the 4th century that Latin Rome officially used Latin in all its religious works, and it remains so today. Now a clear and separate Latin theology was established which quickly spread through the North African Provinces, and apart from the central fact of the Risen Lord Jesus, the Person of Salvation, Latin theology was grounded in pastoral care and a sanctified walk of discipleship, atonement, forgiveness and Church order in its sacraments. Orthodox theology, however, was more centered on deep spirituality concerning a high Christology of Christ Jesus and the relationship of the Triune Godhead. History of course suggests `time' and tradition, for such separations and different theologies take time to fully evolve, and even in the 5th century the Province of Rome was seen merely as one of the many Provinces in the backwaters of Imperial Rome - `the first among equals' only out of respect for antiquity and the tombs of the Apostles Peter and Paul.
But finally through the work of Augustine a clear Latin theology emerged and Latin Rome entered into its full place in Church history. Augustine's theology was not accepted by Orthodoxy - as is still the case today - and so with his theology a clear separation was finally sealed. In all aspects of his life Augustine was thoroughly Latin-thinking, just as such theologians as Origen were thoroughly Greek-thinking, although a century or more separated these men for Augustine was born one hundred years after Origen's death. St Augustine of Hippo was appointed Bishop of Hippo Regius in the Roman Province of Numidia, which is somewhere in present-day Algeria. He was a thoroughly Western man, having no interest in Greek philosophy or spirituality - for him Latin Rome was the centre of the world. He had had no contact with the early Church fathers of the great Theological Schools of Antioch and Alexandria, and Greek writings came into his thinking only when they appeared as translated into Latin. He was 40 years old before he encountered Jesus Christ and his background was totally secular and hedonistic, but very quickly - maybe because of his secular knowledge and interest - he became Bishop of Hippo Regius in 396 AD and he remained a Bishop for a further 35 years. Although not ascetic in the monastic style he was called to a life of celibacy, living a communal life with other priests, deacons and clergy. Throughout this time he lived a life of poverty, wearing black robes and renouncing the worldly clothing of his earlier years, but such a life nevertheless separated him from the people.
Augustine was at the forefront of two major crises that would affect the Latin Roman Church. First there came the Donastic Crisis - the name comes from Bishop Donatus Magnus who came from the North African Roman Province and who headed up a large Christian group or sect. During the 4th-5th centuries persecution led many Christians in the Province to renounce their faith, with the clergy handing over sacred manuscripts to be publicly burnt. When the persecutions ceased those apostate people sought to re-establish themselves into Church life through the Sacrament of Penance, but Donastists refused to accept the ministry of priests and clergy who although renouncing their faith continued their priestly ministries. This led to unrest in the people, who were told they needed re-baptism, and although this may be difficult to understand in this 21st century the people of those times would have believed that if this was so then those who had received the ministries of the apostates were outside the Church and without hope. This resulted in terrible anger and anxiety for those who had died during that time and led to repression of Donastism to the point of death.
The importance of this crisis was that it would eventually lead to the infamous Inquisitions of medieval times and further control by the Latin Church over the people, whether they were radicals, reformists, kings or queens. For the first time in Christianity religious authority in the name of Christ Jesus was used for `conversion' - even `conversion' though the purging fires of the stake! The persecuted Church had become a persecuting Church! This major shift in the Western Roman Church came through the Emperor Honourius, the successor of Theodosius, who decreed that the Donastists must be brought back into the now fully secularised Western Catholic Church by force, for only the Established Church would be allowed by the State - one united religio-political-imperial power. But as we are concerned here with history and not with theology a passing comment will suffice: This Augustinian drive for what was called the `Ekklesia Catholica' - that is, the Church expanding over the whole world led by Bishops under the authority of the Bishop of Rome - Donastists, and those of other names who came later must be eliminated for they destroyed the universality of the Church.
The second great crisis which came to this universal Church concerned salvation itself and came through the Pelagius Crisis, and once again Augustine was involved. Pelagius, an ascetic of the early 5th century, was a British Celt, and as such would have matured in an earlier strand of Christianity to that of the later strand of the Latin Roman Church. However, we are not entering into the reality of the many doctrinal disputes such as were debated and closed at the great Church Councils, but merely briefly recording the historical path of the Church, noting the shifts of religious movements which have occurred to bring the Church into our contemporary times. Such times would have caused Pelagius and Augustine to despair, for their desire was to bring about the Ekklesia Catholica, the Universal Kingdom of God on earth. Pelagius was deeply concerned with the human will, that is, freedom of choice. Personal responsibility was paramount in the theology of Pelagius - the Grace of God was accepted by him concerning salvation itself but thereafter freewill came into force in the individual's walk into salvation. This struck directly against Augustinian theology of the Grace of God alone at the beginning and the end, and everything in between! And so the Doctrine of Original Sin entered the Doctrinal Lexicon, that is, the original sin of Adam. This dispute also brought in the controversy of Pre-destination - and eventually Double Pre-destination, that is some are pre-destined for eternal life and some to eternal damnation. Such controversies continue to this day!
Augustine's great work led to the accepted understanding that salvation and sanctification are a sovereign work of the Grace of God. Such doctrinal issues and debates further separated the Latin Church from Eastern Orthodoxy with its own belief in freewill and the Grace of God. Pelagius was denounced as a heretic in the 5th century at the Council of Carthage, and so Augustinian theology became `the heart' of Latin Rome's doctrine. Recently Pelagian thought has come to be seen as in line with early Orthodox Christianity, centered on such Scriptures as a verse in Deuteronomy: `Each is to die for his own sin' (24:16). No doubt the Pelagian emphasis on free will together with God's Grace was in direct conflict with Augustinian extreme discipleship and doctrine of salvation by God's Grace alone, brought about by his earlier licentious life - how often do our experiences become doctrine? Next came the crisis leading to the Great Schism of 1054 AD between the Eastern Orthodox and the Western Latin churches which we have set out earlier. Augustine, the leading scholar of his day, set out his explanation of the Trinity, the Triune Godhead, put as simply as possible. Using Scripture as his base Augustine understood from Genesis that `man was made in the image of God, and he related the Threefold Godhead to the threefold dimensional man with his memory, intellect and will, and yet one whole man. This Augustinian understanding of the Triune God was one God with one Divine Essence, Glory and Majesty common to all three Persons.
The Orthodox position, however, was of one God and Father Who is the principal Godhead, Who bestows the Godhead on the Son and the Holy Spirit. We have written earlier of this great dispute, which came to a head with an insertion into the Nicene-Constantinople Creed:
" And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life,
Who proceeds from the Father and the Son . . . . ."
It was the insertion `and the Son', the so-called Filioque, literally meaning `to proceed from' that led to this eventual Great Schism. However what was in question was the authority of the universal Church vested in its Bishops, all of them equal under the authority of the Emperor. By the insertion of the Filioque the Bishop of Rome was proclaiming his sole authority over doctrine and teaching. And there we will leave this `History of the Church', for we are looking at a wider canvas then would traditionally be looked at, for the `outline picture' of the remaining history is already there and only requires the `coloured oils' to be painted on.
The onslaught of Islam upon the Eastern Church shattered the Ecumune of the Eastern Church, with the 3rd Rome declared and established in Kievan Russia in about 1510 AD and other Eastern Patriarchs established throughout the eastern region of old imperial Rome. The Reformation of Western Latin Christianity began when Martin Luther nailed his 95 thesis to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenburg in 1517 AD, although he had been widely critisised earlier, and this Protestant Reform Movement cut through the Latin Catholic Church leaving a great divide which lasts to this day. Within the context of this `History of the Church' it must be seen as a Protest Movement, calling for the reform of corrupt practices and traditions purposed as doctrine of the universal Church as declared by the earlier Great Councils.
The next 500 years would see `splinter churches' forming, leading to National State Churches being formed, with priests blessing the guns of the competitive Nation States. It would also see the scattering of these `splinter churches' as they became more and more institutionalised and brought into the political and social life of the State. Without wishing to offend anyone, the present-day proliferation of groups, assemblies and sects (now collectively called Protestants) are but `small pebbles' coming from the continuous shattering of the original Reformation. Indeed, the present Roman Catholic Church still considers all such groups as `separated brethren' and seeks with increasing results to bring them back to its fold - cords that are not cut will draw all back to that fold, leaving a small Remnant Church to complete the picture. The corruption and wickedness of the Church during those 500 years is enthusiastically catalogued by `Protesters' and not needed on this canvas of the larger picture of this `History', for the principal parts of the Church are clearly seen and Eastern Orthodox and Western Latin Churches must now play their full part in the events of these End Times.
In closing this `History of the Church' we have come to see the whole in the sense of a giant Chessboard, the great people of the Ages playing against a Master Chess Player, moving their pieces, winning a Pawn here, losing a Knight there, yet forgetting that in Chess there is but one objective, which is to checkmate the King! If you remember how the game is won, the Chess Master knocks over the opponent's King with the words `Checkmate'. The Chess Master is taught to look at the whole board before moving a piece, but lesser players look only to gaining a Rook! The prophets studied the Scriptures to see and understand the Strategem of God outworking on the Chessboard of Israel and the known world. and they understood `the times and what Israel should do'. The object of this `game of chess' is to bring about the fall of the Great Deceiver, the Prince of this world. All is in the hands of our Chess Master, and working through the `pieces' of the Church and State over the long years He has everything in place. We see these events in terms of Church schisms and Imperial States with their mighty Emperors, high-ranking Prelates, scholars and theologians . . . in terms of Islam . . . in terms of the European and Presidental elections of this age, but our closing words are this: `Look at the whole board' and marvel at the final movements of our Chess Master:
" Who works out everything in conformity
with the purpose of His Will . . . "
Selah
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You may E-mail us at: derek@northernstyletrust.com or Telephone (01493) 444494 (UK)
Our Web Address: www.northernstyletrust.com
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