What Did Ancient Christians Believe?

chulbert

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I just finished reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I realize it's fiction and mean to entertain but some of the conspiracy theory history it suggests has intrigued me.

The contentious point I'm trying to verify/research right now is:

Did the early Christians (cir 25 - 325 CE) believe Jesus was God?

Brown states they did not. They saw him as an enlightened spiritual leader but just a man nonetheless. He further states that the matter of his divinity was decided at the Council of Nicaea as a political move.

Anyone have any input? As far as I've found, there's enough "wiggle room" in the historical facts to allow for the above interpretation but nothing to really confirm it.

Thoughts? Opinions? Facts?
 
ceo_esq said:
The online Catholic Encyclopedia suggests that the doctrine of Christ's divinity was present from the very beginnings of the Church:

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14597a.htm

That said, it looks as though there have been detractors from the very beginning as well.
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Ummm, not to be a conspiracy theorist myself, but of course the Catholic Encyclopedia says that. :)
 
I moved this thread because I felt it was more appropriate for the R & P forum.
 
I posted it in History because I'm more concerned with the historical accuracy of what happened, not the philosophical or religious nature of their beliefs.

Either / or...
 
The early Xians were Gnostics. They were an offshoot of the Jewish Gnostics (Alexandria). Jesus was not a real living person to them. The Jesus story was an allegory that followed the Exodus allegory. This story and the secrets revealed to initiates at a secret gnostic ceremony were for a spiritual understanding of life - a spiritual awakening that would free the mind. (This Mystery Religion had been participated in by Pythagorus, Plato, Philo, etc.)

The most vile 'Church Fathers" were the ones that made it 'history'. These fathers also chucked all the gospels that were gnostic in nature in favor of the four you see now. They needed to stamp out gnosticism because of the threat it posed on their authority.

Pauls letters are gnostic. Paul is referred to as "The Great Gnostic" by gnostics. The forged letters called the Pastoral Letters (Timothy 1 and 2, Titus(?)) are the letters attributed to Paul that damn gnosticism. Again the church forgers...I mean, fathers.

There was a big fight in 300 (something) over whether Jebus was a god or a man. (People were executed etc) You know who won.
 
Plus later on you get the argument over whether Jesus was "God" (i.e. the same person as God the father) or just "a god" (i.e. not the same person) - if my memory serves me correctly, this was the main point of contention between the Arians and the Catholic/Orthodox Churches. Both views were based on interpreting the New Testament, but I'm not sure who had the best argument.

But probably the best answer to the question "What did Ancient Christians believe?" is that it varied wildly from sect to sect, making generalisation very difficult - even more so than it is today.
 
chulbert said:
I just finished reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I realize it's fiction and mean to entertain but some of the conspiracy theory history it suggests has intrigued me.

The contentious point I'm trying to verify/research right now is:

Did the early Christians (cir 25 - 325 CE) believe Jesus was God?

Brown states they did not. They saw him as an enlightened spiritual leader but just a man nonetheless. He further states that the matter of his divinity was decided at the Council of Nicaea as a political move.

Anyone have any input? As far as I've found, there's enough "wiggle room" in the historical facts to allow for the above interpretation but nothing to really confirm it.

Thoughts? Opinions? Facts?
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Earl Doherty:

I suggested this author in this forum before but did not receive any comments. So I don't know if his level of scholarship meets established standards or receives much criticism, and I appreciate anyone's comments on this. Acharya S., on the other hand is not considered all that scholarly. Here is his Doherty's site:

http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/jesus.html

I read most of his book The Jesus Puzzle, but found it a bit tedious.

The gist of his book is the first believers of Christ did not believe Jesus was Christ. In other words, Christ was a concept, a god, that Jesus upheld, but they did not believe Jesus was the son of a god. Fascinating book. I also bought Acharya S' book, and have read about half The Christ Conspiracy but have my doubts ...... considering others' posts about her work.
 
The early Xians were Gnostics.

Not exactly. The "early Christians" were many things, including Gnostics, but also many other things.

Actually the Gnostics predated Christ if I remember correctly and probably were and influence on the religous and political climate that Jesus came from.

Now, from what I understand, early post Jesus Christianity was very diverse. It was different from city to city and a religion that had many regional differences, and had no real core or central beliefs.

This is part of what prompted the actions of the Catholic Church.

Part of what the Romans did when they created teh Catholic Church was they said that Christianity was too diverse to survive as a religion on its own so they felt they had to create a centralized structure and create a single book to unify the religion.

As Romans they also had other goals. Christianity was a form of social revolution, it was rebellion against the Roman establishment and the Jewish establishment, it was a revolution for personal freedom and increasing the value of the individual. It was kind of like the Marxism of its day. As such much of it posed a threat to the establishment.

So, what they did was to create a new offical state version of the religion that would support the establishment and reduce the rebellion that it was causing.

This is Roman Cathalocism, and every form of modern "Christianity" stems from it.

So really modern Christianity is almost the antithisis of the origional Christianity.

The origional Christianity did more liekly view Jesus as a man, and a political figure. The Bible we have now is NOT what the early Chrisitans read or knew, or believed in. The Bible is made up to be a controlling document, not a liberating one, which is what early "Christianity" was all about.

But probably the best answer to the question "What did Ancient Christians believe?" is that it varied wildly from sect to sect, making generalisation very difficult - even more so than it is today.

Right. This would be like George Bush putting together a book today and calling it the Republican Bible and then 1,000 years later people thinking that that 400 page book defined the real views of all Republicans today.
 
Malachi151 said:
The early Xians were Gnostics.

Not exactly. The "early Christians" were many things, including Gnostics, but also many other things.

Actually the Gnostics predated Christ if I remember correctly and probably were and influence on the religous and political climate that Jesus came from.
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I agree with everything you said. But I'd like to clarify the point above.

The mystery religions spawned a Jewish Gnostic movement - a mystery religion for the Jews.

Eusubius speaks of the Theraputae, as being the first Christians. The Theraputae thrived in 10CE. These may be considered the first Xians based on their belief of a "good man" wrongly accused and killed in shame. Thus, you have Xians worshipping "a Jesus-like figure" BEFORE "Jesus". (The Essenes had the same story going)

In other words, the 'story' of Jesus was around before Jesus.

The Theraputae were gnostics (as was Paul).

It is known that the first (literal) xians were ridiculed by pagans because they believed their story was historically true - even though they were telling the same story the pagans had for hundreds of years.

This is why I say the first xians were gnostics - because they were. The Literal xians came much later.
 
I too just read that book. I found the Mary Magdelene as Christ's wife/partner more intriguing. Also the analysis of the last supper by Da Vinci (that's Mary on Christ's right) was an interesting premise.

This was also explored in the Knights Templar history book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" (errr or something like that)

Charlie (broken down angel) Monoxide
 
Charlie Monoxide said:
I too just read that book. I found the Mary Magdelene as Christ's wife/partner more intriguing.
Click to expand...

Chuck Mo,

Find out who Sophia is for the epiphanectic key to enlightenment.
 
Bentspoon

Ah those Gnostics: What did they believe? Well, for one thing they believed that all things light and bright were good and things dark were evil. For instance they would have loved cucumbers as a food because when you cut into them, they glisten in the sun and reflect light.

They took this concept to mean that semen was a good thing, a heavenly thing. It was bright and light and brought the gift of life. They would have semen rituals where men and women would be annointed in semen (I have practiced this ritual and it does have some merit).

Semen here, semen there; where did it all come from - one can only imagine.

I think this sect might have attracted my interest had I been part of that society.

Yes I could be a priest of the semen sect. I would have done well.

This isn't a joke. The gnostics did have orgiastic semen rituals. ("Testament - John Romer). They must have been something to see. I hope they make a movie someday.

Bentspoon
 
What did the first Christians believe?

I'm sure if you spoke with 100 'Xians' from 70 C.E., you'd get 100 unique belief systems.

Similarly, if you get ten early Xian scholars in a room today, you get ten different opinions.

Crossan - separate bands following a non-divine itinerant preacher, Jesus.

Meier - (more traditional) people with a more uniform belief in a risen Christ

GA Wells - a highly imagined memory of a preacher from 100 B.C.

Eisman - the Jewish Essenes were the first "Christians" and Hellenized greeks from Paul to Origen erased their Jewishness and invented Jesus
 
I found this thread and the link to Doherty's site interesting.

I have read through a variety of Jesus didn't exist sites on the internet before, but this guy seems to put forward the best case.

It also introduced a new idea to me. That is that the reason Christianity spread so fast around the time that Jesus was supposed to have lived was that Christianity actually predated the alledged historical Jesus.

I'd be interested in SFB's question about whether Doherty's reputation. Is his work generally considered serious and scholarly?

As an aside, I found that when I first came across the Jesus didn't exist theories, I was saddened and pissed off. The reaction was illogical, especially since to the best of my knowledge I have never held a religious belief in my life. But I had believed that Jesus was a real person and resented the person suggesting otherwise.

For the first time in my life, I could understand how at least some anti-semitism stems from the Jews denial of Jesus as a supernatural figure.
 
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