What's up with people saying Constantine the Great wasn't really Christian and just boosted Christianity's stock in the empire for political points? Was he not baptized? Was his mother not a devoted Christian? Did he not pray to God before his major battles?Like, what is it that the people who say his faith was ingenuine are going off of?
>>16535900The fact he didn't formally convert until he was old and dying.
>>16535903You mean baptism, which he did multiple times throughout his life before he was old.
>>16535900I think his form go christianity had Pagan elements.
>>16535900He corrupted the people real church by introducing pagan elements
>>16536375That ship had sailed generations prior.
>>16535900>Was he not baptized? Political stunt>Was his mother not a devoted Christian?Irrelevant to his own beliefs. Hitler's mom was a Christian and he was an atheist>Did he not pray to God before his major battles?Most likely not
>>16536454He was most certainly not an atheist, but he probably just treated Jesus like a patron deity.
>>16536559Maybe, he definitely wasn't atheist, but I have severe doubts on the veracity of claims that he was a proper Christian. He recognized the burgeoning religion as a tool to maintain order. It's why he intervened in the Monophosite question, he basically just wanted everyone involved to shut up and get back to work instead of denouncing each other.
>>16536572It wasn't Monophysitism, but Arianism and Trinitarianism. I agree, he was an Emperor and the unity of the Empire was imperative, granted that he had just unified it. I think he was a Christian in the sense that he believed in the power of Jesus and was willing to get baptized on his death bed only because the demands of his job forced him to do what would be considered grave sins.
>>16536580Been a while since I read up on my first Christian heresies but yeah, pretty much. Another thing to remember is that we only have fragments of official histories and that's basically just state propaganda. The baptism of Constantine is one of those things we'll never really know for certain.
>>16536590True, not to mention that, according to the Orthodox school in Christianity his baptism was not actually valid, since it was performed by an Arian bishop, Eusebius of Nicomedia. I think that shows that Constantine was largely indifferent to the matter. He did his best though.
>>16536592"Fuck it, that'll do" - Constantine, Roman Emperor
>>16535900>What's up with people saying Constantine the Great wasn't really ChristianBasically, he viewed Christianity as a useful tool that could be adapted to help his political ambitions. Recall that Diocletian had initiated the largest-scale persecutions of Christians and it clearly wasn't working. So it's a combination of 1) If you can't beat them, join them, and 2) proto-Machiavellianism, create a religion to control the masses and make false shows of piety. In other words, represent something politically in order to get political support even if you don't actually believe in it at all. Similar to what Machiavelli wrote about later.Another thing to note is that while Constantine made it legal to be a Christian and rolled back the Diocletianic policies of persecution, he also created a personal state church not more than two years after this, where he was in charge and appointed bishops, which is a model that was followed by later state churches in Europe. But this isn't how the Biblical church operates at all. It is composed of local congregations who elect (ordain) their own Pastors/Bishops and Deacons. Therefore Constantine was involved in the process of making something new, along with the Armenians who did something similar about a decade earlier.Many churches didn't comply with Constantine's new heirarchy that he wanted to impose, and these were labelled "Donatists." All these groups had in common though was their political opposition to Constantine's brand of Christianity. Some Donatists just didn't like Constantine's appointees while others were congregationalists. Constantine initiated a campaign of persecution against the nonconformists. His son Constantius II also attacked them around the year 340.Constantine increasingly promoted Arianism through his promotion and endorsement of Arius. His successors also promoted a non-trinitarian heresy called Arianism. Allegedly Theodosius changed this but still kept the other unbiblical doctrines.
