Lesson 4 Flashcards
• AD 247 was the ____ birthday of the city of Rome.
• Because the celebrations focused on Roman gods and goddesses, many Christians refused to participate in the
festivities.
• Soon after the celebration, plague ravaged the city of Rome.
1,000th
Hoping to regain the gods’ good favor, Emperor
____ launched an empire wide persecution of
Christians.
Decius
Anyone without a _____ granted by
sacrificing to a pagan god—could be imprisoned.
• Origen of Alexandria was martyred during this
persecution.
• This persecution ended with the death of Emperor Decius in AD 251.
“sacrifice certificate”
“These church members should be given a second chance; re-admit them to the church after they show the authenticity of their repentance through prayer and fasting.
CYPRIAN SAID …
These church members were never true believers; furthermore, if one of them had been a pastor, every
baptism or ordination ever performed by that pastor was invalid.”
DONATUS SAID …
• In the early 4th century, Emperor ____ recognized that, despite harsh persecution, most Christians still
refused to worship the gods.
• On his deathbed in AD 311, He declared that it
was legal for Christians to worship Jesus alone “as long as they don’t disturb the public order.”
Galerius
• In A.D. 312, ___ was fighting to become
sole emperor of the Roman Empire.
• Constantine claimed to have seen a vision of Jesus before his victory in Rome.
Constantine
• Constantine’s soldiers chalked the ___ on their shields - a figure that some seem to have understood as an abbreviation for “Christ.”
“Chiron”
• Constantine declared in the Edict of Milan: “Our purpose is to allow Christians … to worship as they desire, so that whatever Divinity lives in the heavens will be kind to us.”
The Edict of Milan—AD 313
• Emperor Constantine granted favors to churches and
to church leaders.
• In A.D. 312, a group of church leaders asked
Constantine to settle a dispute in the churches
regarding whether Donatus had been correct.
• Constantine decided against the followers of Donatus and established a precedent of imperial involvement in church decisions.
• This controvery would emerge again later, in the 5th century.
The Donatist Controversy
• In the early 4th century, _________ began to teach that Jesus was not eternal God.
• The followers of Arius sang in the streets, “There was a time when the Son did not exist!”
Arius of Alexandria
• Those who rejected Arius responded with the Gloria Patri:
“Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end.”
• To maintain peace, Constantine convened a council in the village of ____ , in northern Asia Minor.
Nicaea
• More than 300 bishops (some historians give the number as 318) made their way to Nicaea; many elders and deacons— including Athanasius of Alexandria—were also present.
> The Council of Nicaea—AD 325
• On July 4, 325, Constantine called the council to order and declared himself a ____ and an ____.
a bishop and an apostle.
• When Arius stated that Jesus had not existed
eternally, all but ___ bishops agreed that this
contradicted.
two
After decades of persecution, now there no longer seemed to be any possibility of persecution or martyrdom.
Many Christians — longing for a morebdemanding faith
retreated to the deserts, to live alone.
They lived in extreme poverty, eating only enough to stay alive. These men and women became known as ____ and _____ from Latin terms that mean “alone.”
monks and nuns
• They lived in the region of _____ and became known as the “Great ____.”
A “Rock Church”
Cappadocia, cappadocians
the sister of Basil and Gregory, Nazianzus,
founded the first communities for nuns and monks in the eastern Empire.
Macrina
• Instead of retreating from the world, these
communities served the people around them.
Cappadocians
• ____ lived in the desert for two years before he
realized he was not called to live alone.
• When he returned to Rome, the bishop asked him to create a reliable Latin Bible.
Jerome
• A wealthy widow named ____ financed
Jerome’s translation.
• Jerome, Marcella, and a friend named Paula
embraced extreme self-denial—even to the point
of refusing ever to bathe.
Marcella
• The Latin text that Jerome finished in AD 405 became known as the “____” (or “Common”) Bible.
Vulgate
For nearly 1,500 years, the _____ was the Bible of
the Roman Catholic Church
Vulgate
