Constantine the Great: The reorganization of the Empire and the triumph of the Church

by John B. Firth

Elsewhere, in the same chapter, he says: “It would, indeed, have been childish to attempt to banish metaphysics from theology. Any religion with a doctrine about God or man must, as such, be metaphysical.” And for the Arians to complain of the borrowing of technical terms from philosophy by their opponents was palpably absurd. The whole raison d’être of the Arian movement was its professed rationalism, its appeal to reason and logic, its consciousness, in other words, “of its debt to the wise,” and its desire to be able to debate boldly with the enemy in the gate. Really, therefore, the adoption of such a term was of great practical convenience, especially when once its meaning was rigidly defined. The Homoousion, whereby the Word or the Son was declared to be of one essence or substance with the Father, asserted the undiminished Divinity of the Son of God, through whom salvation came into the world.

It is for theologians to expand upon such a text, but it needs no theologian to point out the obvious truth that any diminution of the majesty of the Son of God must have impaired the vitality and converting power of Christianity. The word, therefore, was eagerly adopted by those who had been commissioned to draw up a creed to meet the views of the orthodox majority of the Council. That creed was at length decided upon; Hosius of Cordova announced its completion; and it was read aloud for the first time to the Council, apparently by Hermogenes, subsequently Bishop of Cæsarea in Cappadocia. It ran as follows:

“We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things both visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, only begotten, that is from the substance of the Father, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, both in heaven and earth. Who for us men and for our salvation came down and was made flesh, and was made man, suffered and rose on the third day, ascended into the heavens and will come again to judge the quick and the dead. And we believe in the Holy Ghost.”

Such was the text of the famous document which ever since has borne the title of the Nicene Creed. It has been added to during the centuries. It has even lost one or two of its qualifying and explanatory sentences. But these modifications have not touched its central theses, and, above all, the Homoousion remains.

In order to make the position absolutely clear and preclude even the most subtle from placing an heretical interpretation upon the words employed, there was added a special anathema of the Arian doctrines.

“But those who say, ‘Once He was not,’ and ‘Before He was begotten, He was not,’ and ‘He came into existence out of what was not,’ or those who profess that the Son of God is of a different ‘person’ or ‘substance,’ or that He was ‘made,’ or is ‘changeable’ or ‘mutable’—all these are anathematised by the Catholic Church.”

This was the formal condemnation of Arianism in all the Protean shapes it was capable of assuming, and the vast majority of the bishops cordially approved.

But what of Arius and his friends, and what of the Eusebian party? Interest centred in the action of the latter. Would they accept the text and sign? Or would they hold fast to the condemned doctrines? They loudly protested, of course, against the anathema, and the Homoousion in the creed itself was repugnant to their intellect. Eusebius of Cæsarea asked for a day in which to consider the matter. Then he signed, and wrote a letter to his flock at Cæsarea excusing and justifying his conduct, and explaining in what sense he could conscientiously subscribe to the Homoousion. He bowed to the clear verdict of the majority and to the passionate wish of the Emperor. Constantine insisted that the creed should be accepted as the final expression of Catholic belief, though he would have been just as ready to accept the creed of Eusebius himself. The presence or absence of the Homoousion was of little consequence to him. What he wanted was unity, and he was determined to have it, for he was already threatening recalcitrants with banishment. Eusebius of Cæsarea signed. He submitted, in other words, when the Church, meeting in Council, had spoken. The Palestinian and Syrian bishops who had supported him in the debates followed his example, complying, we are told, with eagerness and alacrity.

Eusebius of Nicomedia, Theognis of Nicæa, and Maris of Chalcedon made a rather more resolute stand. According to one account, they consulted Constantia, the Emperor’s sister, and she persuaded them to sign on the ground that they ought to merge their individual scruples in the will of the majority, lest the Emperor should throw over Christianity in disgust at the dissension among the Christians. According to another story, Constantia recommended them to insert an “iota” into the text of the creed, and thus change the Homoousion into the Homoiousion, to which they could subscribe without violence to their consciences. They could admit, that is to say, that the Son was of “like” substance to the Father when they could not admit that He was of the “same” substance. The story is obviously a fiction and part of the campaign of calumny against Eusebius of Nicomedia. He and his two friends signed the creed—not fraudulently or with mental reservations as the story suggests—but for precisely the same reason that Eusebius of Cæsarea had signed it. It was the Emperor’s wish and they were willing to accept the decision of the Council, but they still stood out against signing the anathema. Two of them, Eusebius and Theognis, were deprived of their sees and sent into exile. Whether their degradation and exile were due wholly to this refusal is doubtful, though as an interesting parallel it may be pointed out that Eusebius, Bishop of Vercellæ, and Dionysius, Bishop of Milan, were exiled by the Emperor Valens in 355 because they refused to subscribe the condemnation of Athanasius at the Third Council of Milan. Arius and his two most faithful supporters were excommunicated and banished and their writings, notably the Thalia, were burnt with ignominy.

The labours of the Council were not yet concluded. The Bishops decided that Easter should be observed simultaneously throughout the Church, and that the Judaic time should give way to the Christian. They then drew up what are known as the Canons of Nicæa. We may indicate some of the more important, as, for example, the fifth, which provided that all questions of excommunication should be discussed in provincial councils to be held twice a year; the fourth, that there should be no less than three bishops present at the consecration of every bishop, and the fifteenth, which prohibited absolutely the translation of any bishop, presbyter, or deacon from one city to another. Some of the canons, such as the twentieth, which prohibited kneeling during church worship on Sundays and between Easter and Pentecost; and the eighteenth, which rebuked the presumption of deacons, have merely an antiquarian interest. The seventeenth forbade all usury on the part of the clergy; the third enacted that no minister of the Church, whatever his rank, should have with him in his house a woman of any kind, unless it were a mother, a sister, or an aunt, or some one quite beyond suspicion. While this canon was under discussion, one of the most exciting debates of the Council took place. The proposal was made that all the married clergy should be required to separate from their wives, and this received a considerable measure of support. But the opposition was led by the confessor Paphnutius, whose words carried the more weight from the fact that he himself had been a lifelong celibate. He debated the subject with great warmth, maintaining at the top of his shrill voice that marriage was honourable and the bed undefiled,[^[100]] and so brought a majority of the assembly round to his way of thinking.