24.12.5 The Trinity Doctrinal Controversy Begins

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The Trinity Doctrinal Controversy Begins (AD 325) and Concludes After 126 Years (AD 451) The Council of Chalcethon

1. The Council of Nicaea (325)

(1) Background of the Convocation of the Council of Nicaea

After a long period of conflict, trial, hardship, and persecution, the early Church was given new vitality and freedom by the Edict of Milan (313) in 313 A.D. between Licinius (?-325) of the East and Constantine the Great (272-337) of the West.

                      ⁑tri·al [tráiəl] n.① 〖法〗 공판, 재판, 심리 ② 시도, 시험; 시용, 시운전 ③ 시련, 고난, 재난

                      ᛜper·se·cu·tion [pə̀ːrsikjúːʃən] n.① (특히 종교상의) 박해

오랜 기간 갈등과 시련, 고난과 박해를 겪은 초대 교회는 서기 313년 동방의 리키니우스(?-325)와 서방의 콘스탄틴 대제(272-337) 사이의 밀라노 칙령에 의해 새로운 활력과 자유를 얻게 됩니다.

Emperor Constantine liberalized Christianity, returned confiscated Christian property, subsidized the clergy, and declared Sunday a day of rest and worship.   

                 con·fis·cate [kάnfiskèit, kǝnfís-/kɔ́n-] vt. 몰수〔압류〕하다; 징발하다

                 sub·si·dize [sʌ́bsidàiz] vt.보조금〔장려금〕을 주다; 증회(贈賄)하다;

               ⁑wor·ship [wə́ːrʃip] n.󰇆① 예배, 참배; 󰆴 예배식 ② 숭배, 존경; 숭배의 대상

콘스탄틴 황제는 기독교를 자유화하고, 몰수된 기독교 재산을 반환하고, 성직자에게 보조금을 지급하고, 일요일을 휴식과 예배의 날로 선포했습니다.

Later, however, the Roman Empire made a great decision to maintain good relations with Christianity in order to effectively govern an empire that expanded its vast territory and mixed with many foreign cultures, but the church began to experience conflict and infighting.

그러나 그후 로마 제국은 광대한 영토를 확장하고 많은 이방 문화와 혼합된 제국을 효과적으로 통치하기 위해 기독교와 좋은 관계를 유지하기로 큰 결정을 내렸지만, 교회는 갈등과 내분을 겪기 시작했습니다.

This is because the latent heresy began to appear in the world with the freedom of belief to raise its head in the church. This was not what Emperor Constantine wanted. Politically, for the sake of the stability of the empire, all the churches were also hoped for peace, but due to the unexpected appearance of heresy, infighting began in the church, and the emperor had to step in and settle the situation. The reason for this was that the early Church had not been able to establish a clear doctrine of the Trinity, believing that Jesus was the Son of God and that God was His Father, for about 300 years. Because of trials and persecutions, there was no room for a doctrinal system. However, Emperor Constantine believed that ruling a vast empire would only be at peace with the support of the Church, so on May 20, A.D., the first ecumenical Christian Council summoned the bishops of the Church, the representatives of the Church, to meet in Nicaea. The meeting lasted until two months later, on July 25. Nicaea is located on the shores of the Bosporus in a small town in Asia Minor, about 45 miles from Constantinople. Emperor Constantine wanted as many Church bishops as possible to attend the council. A total of 318 delegates from Africa, Syria, Phurussia, Soasiya, Italy, and as far away as Spain attended, most of them bishops of the Greek-speaking Eastern Churches. The bishops, however, came with two elders and three attendants, numbering about 1,500 people, but all expenses for them were borne by the treasury of the Roman Empire.

(2) Causes of controversy at the Council of Nicaea The reason for the convening of the Council of Nicaea was the Church's fight against heresy in order to defend the truth. At the beginning of the fourth century, the doctrinal system was not established in the church, which led to conflicts and infighting. This is because in 318 Athanasius of Alexandria (296-373) argued that the Son and the Father were completely "of the same quality," and Arius (256-336) argued that the Son was "heterogeneous" and lower than the Father. Controversy ensued, and as a result, the Council of Nicaea confirmed that the claim of "homogeneity" was doctrinally correct with the Bible, as suggested by Eusebius (263-339), and the Nicene Creed was drawn up. However, after the death of Emperor Constantine in 337, Arianism once again continued to assert that the Father and the Son were of different essences. Thus, the conflict within the Church with the Athanasians, who insisted that the Son and the Father were of the same essence, did not cease. The orthodox Christian emperor Theodosius I (347-395) promulgated the Cunctos populos (Decree of Common Faith) in 380, proclaiming the support of Nicaean Christianity that the Son is of the same essence as the Father, and permanently banished Arius as a heretic at the Council of Constantinople in 381. Soon after the Synod of Nicaea, the Empire and the Church became closely related, and in 392 Emperor Theodosius decreed that Christianity was the state religion, and in 393 he banned all pagan festivals and the Olympic Games on the grounds that they were God's festivals. Thus, the first Olympic Games were suspended for 1,500 years before they were held again in Athens in 1896. Emperor Theodosius is said to have been baptized in 397 and served as a Christian emperor. Another problem for the church at that time was the observance of Easter Sunday. The Eastern Church observed Easter Sunday on the same day as the Jewish Passover, the 14th day of the Nissan month, while the Western Church observed the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Sunday, the Sunday after the spring equinox, the Sunday after the full moon. But the question of the date of Easter Sunday has not been resolved in agreement for a long time. However, the Council of Nicaea decided that Easter Sunday should be observed on the first Sunday after the full moon after the vernal equinox, according to the date of the Western Church. This was also a great help in achieving the unity of the church.

(3) The Nicene Creed We believe in one God the Father Almighty, the Creator of all things, visible and invisible. We also believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God, the only begotten Son of God from the essence of the Father, the God of God, the Light of Light, the true God of God, who was not created, but conceived of the same essence as the Father, through whom all things in heaven and on earth were created. He came down to earth for the salvation of us human beings, became flesh, suffered in becoming a human being, was resurrected on the third day, ascended into heaven, and will come to judge the living and the dead. We also believe in the Holy Spirit. But the Church is cursed by those who say that there was a time when He did not exist, or that He did not exist before His conception, or that He came from nothing, or that the Son of God is a different essence or essence, or that He was created or that He could be changed. Oh boy

Feminist Biblical Interpretation: History and Goals

Feminist biblical interpretation is more than simply paying attention to texts about women. It is also a means of achieving a more accurate understanding of life in ancient Israel and of the composition of the Bible.

Morality and Ethics

Feminist Biblical Interpretation: History and Goals

The Readers, Clara von Rappard, 1886. Wikimedia Commons

What Is Feminist Biblical Interpretation?

At its most basic, feminist biblical interpretation is analysis of biblical texts about women or that deal with matters of concern to women. Because so much of mainstream biblical scholarship, historically, has focused on men and been written by men, the primary motivation for many feminists has been to make sure women are included as more than incidental figures in discussions of the Bible, whether from a historical, a literary, or a theological viewpoint. To state the obvious, although the culture that produced the Hebrew Bible was undoubtedly headed by men, at any given time its population was roughly half female.

Beyond just an interest in women, feminism is also concerned with the relationship between men and women and the differences in power and status that that relationship creates and helps preserve.[1] Ancient Israel, like all societies, was not just a patriarchy in which all men dominated all women. Instead, a variety of social hierarchies existed—what Carol Meyers terms heterarchy (from the Greek heteros, “other, different,” and archein, “to rule”). For example, Sarah might be subservient to her husband Abraham, but she exerts considerable power over Hagar, an enslaved Egyptian woman in her household.

Feminist Interpretation and Political Feminism

Feminism is often equated with a political stance, i.e., the push for women’s equal rights in all areas, but this is only one type of feminism, which cannot be reduced to just one perspective. What all feminisms have in common is the premise that women’s experience as women is relevant. They also share a recognition of the fact that every reader brings biases to the text, whether they are aware of that fact or not: pure objectivity is impossible.

Feminist scholarship does not claim that it provides the only legitimate approach to interpreting texts. Good scholarship tries to take in as many perspectives as it can; like lenses on reality, each perspective has a limited range of vision. If we use multiple lenses, combining the image that each generates, we can begin to create a panorama that more truly reflects the experiences of all people. Which lens we choose to use—which questions we choose to ask of the text—influences the image and the answers we produce.[2]

The Roots of the Feminist Movement

Feminist biblical interpretation has its roots in the larger feminist movement—the two were inseparable in their origins. The early women’s equality movement in the mid-nineteenth century—mainly in the United States but also in Great Britain and elsewhere—was focused on both gender equality and the abolition of slavery, though it eventually made women’s right to vote in elections its central focus.[3]

The exclusion of women from voting was enshrined practice in most countries at the time; in the United States, the extension of voting rights was left to individual states and territories, and although some municipalities allowed women to vote, it was not a right addressed by the Constitution. The suffrage movement took a two-pronged approach, pushing individual states to extend women the vote and simultaneously pushing for a constitutional amendment to give women the franchise nationally.[4]