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The Romans never had a single uninterrupted policy of persecuting Christians between the first and fourth Century, but rather the Romans developed policy as the Christian Religion impact on Roman society grew. As each century progresses the Christian Religion continued to grow, and in response the Roman government adapted their policy to deal with the changes. In the first century Christianity was working to establish an identity by spreading the word that God’s promise had been fulfilled, but Romans could not or take the time to see the difference between Christianity and Judaism. The second century Romans started to differentiate between Christianity and Judaism, but Romans were still at a loss at what to do with Christians. The third century Romans saw the speedy expansion as too much of a growing threat to the Roman pagan culture and decided what to do about Christianity with a couple large scale persecutions. In the fourth century there is another turn for Christianity when Constantine converts and bestows new rights and privileges to Christians that evolved them to a whole new peek on the worlds scale. So no the Romans never had a single uninterrupted policy of persecuting Christians between the first and fourth Century because of the quick immergence of Christianity into the population creating confusion, also different leaders had different views on how to handle Christians, Christians themselves were trying to create and unify themselves, and finally because Christianity rises up through perseverance and finds new rights in the Roman Empire.
In the first century the Roman Empire did not have to do much work to persecute Christians, because Jewish practitioners saw the new Christians as blasphemers and persecuted them on ...
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...th the actual beliefs and show that he has a lack of understanding of Christianity. But it is true that there were divisions amongst Christians. Christians are working on spreading the One Word of God but through their ministry that Christians became very spread out and different interpretations that created divisions amongst the Christian community. Different sects like the Gnostic’s challenged doctrines and traditions trying to change the setup of worship faith and
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Livy’s The Rise of Rome serves as the ultimate catalogue of Roman history, elaborating on the accomplishments of each king and set of consuls through the ages of its vast empire. In the first five books, Livy lays the groundwork for the history of Rome and sets forth a model for all of Rome to follow. For him, the “special and salutary benefit of the study of history is to behold evidence of every sort of behaviour set forth as on a splendid memorial; from it you may select for yourself and for your country what to emulate, from it what to avoid, whether basely begun or basely concluded.” (Livy 4). Livy, however, denies the general populace the right to make the same sort of conclusions that he made in constructing his histories. His biased representation of Romulus and Tarquin Superbus, two icons of Roman history, give the readers a definite model of what a Roman should be, instead of allowing them to come to their own conclusion.
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Nearly 300 years separated Ignatius of Antioch and Augustine of Hippo, during that time a lot changed for Christians in the Roman Empire. The church moved from being a criminal religious organization, to a legal religious organization, to the only legal public religion. Christians during this time were always engaging the culture around them—religion, politics, literature, education, etc. This paper will describe the Christian Roman religion before Constantine and after Constantine.
One of the earliest trends in Christianity was the need for Councils to settle disagreements on the religion. There have been many times where Christians had disagreements on what to consider as the base concepts of Christianity. Some
The earliest recorded text teaching Christianity has its roots buried deep within Judaism. The birth, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, as the Messiah, created a new ideology of worship. The Messiah is the savior for all people and of all sins. Paul carried the message of the Messiah to the Gentiles. His missionary journeys and establishment of churches enabled the spreading of the message throughout the Roman Empire. Christianity grew in acceptance; those that believed in the Messiah separated and began to worship on their own. This marked the beginning of the split of Judaism and Christianity.
Gonzalez, Justo L. 1984. The early church to the dawn of the Reformation. San Francisco: Harper & Row.
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Lutzer, Erwin. The Doctrines That Divide: a Fresh Look at the Historic Doctrines That Separate Christians. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1998.