CHHI 520 - History of the Christian Church I

1. Summarize chapters One through Nine. The Bible consists of Old and New Testament historical books, and church history is a continuation of God's dealing. Through studying church history, a person can avoid past mistakes, be motivated, and learn about his or her Christian heritage. Eusebius was the first most comprehensive historian, and he was also a contemporary of Constantine.

The Jews were an Oriental people because the Old Testament took place in the Orient. Part of the Old Testament experience was in Assyria and Babylon because of Israeli captivities. The Greeks made contributions to the first century church in religion, philosophy, culture, and language. The Romans copied the Greek religion by renaming the Greek gods into nine of their own. The Roman culture was good, with a well-organized government. There was a peaceful environment and well-established shipping lanes. The church did not suffer persecution so long as the Romans saw it as part of Judiasm. The Jews contributed their sects, Pharisees, Sadducces, and others, and everything combined had a huge influence on the Apostle Paul.

Jesus was eternal, so He existed prior to his incarnation. Not much is known about His early years. Each of the four gospels represented a different aspect of Christ. There were some secular records of His life to prove that the writers of the Gospels were not just making everything up. His ministry was active and passive. It became passive when He was taken into custody.

The actual beginning of church history was 30AD at Pentecost. The period of Jewish witnessing occurred until 45AD. The missionary journies occurred next with the first journey, then the Jerusalem Council, and then the final two journies. The Gospel was spread as far as Spain and France and probably even England because of the converted Roman guards. In 100AD, ekklesia was the word that best decribed the church. Also, during the first century, leaders were selected and the two ordnances of baptism and the Lord's Supper were observed.

Some of the causes of church persecution were economics, angry Jews, the Christian's unwillingness to join the army, and the Christian's aggravating enthusiasm. The legal accusations brought against them included atheism, cannibalism, and treason. The sporadic persecutions were orchestrated by Nero and Domitian. The organized persecutions were by Trajan, Hadrian, Antonius Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Commodus, and Septimus Severus. The universal persecutios were by Decius and Diocletian.

The persistent heresies that the church battled were christological, dualistic, apocalyptic, reformators, and the ways of salvation. The historical development of heresy was Gnosticism, Montanism, Manichaenism, Arianism, Nestorianism, Monophysites and Monothelites, Pelagianism, Iconoclasm, Medieval dualism, Materialism versus poverty, and economics and nationalism. The heresies looked at in class were Legalism (had to obey certain laws), Gnosticism (evil in material things), Neoplatonism (largely negative with metaphysical mystics), Manichaenism (left sacramentalism as a residue), Pagan corruptions (untrained converts with their unbibical views), and an inadequate view of the Trinity (always a problem for the church).

Lowering Christian standards occurred because of the Montanists (emphasis on the Holy Spirit and rid church of gnostics), Novationists (led split against Cornelius after Decius persecution), and Donatists (followed Diocletian persecution and was based on strictness in dealing with lapsers and traditores).