Constantine convened the Council of Nicea in the year 325 A.D. as much for political reasons for unity in the empire as religious ones. The primary issue at that time came to be known as the Arian controversy.

“In the hope of securing for his throne the support of the growing body of Christians he had shown them considerable favor and it was to his interest to have the church vigorous and united. The Arian controversy was threatening its unity and menacing its strength. He therefore undertook to put an end to the trouble. It was suggested to him, perhaps by the Spanish bishop Hosius, who was influential at court, that if a synod were to meet representing the whole church both east and west, it might be possible to restore harmony.
Constantine himself of course neither knew nor cared anything about the matter in dispute but he was eager to bring the controversy to a close, and Hosius' advice appealed to him as sound.” — (Arthur Cushman McGiffert, A History of Christian Thought, 1954, Vol. 1, p. 258)

Arius was a priest from Alexandria in Egypt who supposedly taught that Christ, because He was the Son of God, must have had a beginning and therefore was begotten, or created or established. Further, if Jesus was the Son, the Father of necessity must be older. Opposing the teachings of Arius was Athanasius, a deacon also from Alexandria. His view was an early form of Trinitarianism wherein the Father, Son and Holy Spirit were one but at the same time distinct from each other.

The decision as to which view the Church council would accept was to a large extent arbitrary. Karen Armstrong explains in A History of God, “When the bishops gathered at Nicaea on May 20, 325, to resolve the crisis, very few would have shared Athanasius's view of Christ. Most held a position midway between Athanasius and Arius.” — (p. 110)

As emperor, Constantine was in the unusual position of deciding Church doctrine even though he was not really a Christian. (The following year is when he had both his wife and son murdered, as previously mentioned)

Historian Henry Chadwick attests, “Constantine, like his father, worshipped the Unconquered Sun.” — (The Early Church, 1993, p. 122). As to the emperor's embrace of Christianity, Chadwick admits, “His conversion should not be interpreted as an inward experience of grace ... It was a military matter. His comprehension of Christian doctrine was never very clear.” (p. 125)

Chadwick does say that Constantine's deathbed baptism itself “implies no doubt about his Christian belief,” it being common for rulers to put off baptism to avoid accountability for things like torture and executing criminals (p. 127). But this justification doesn't really help the case for the emperor's conversion being genuine.

Norbert Brox, a professor of Church history confirms that Constantine was never actually a converted Christian, “Constantine did not experience any conversion; there are no signs of a change of faith in him. He never said of himself that he had turned to another god ... At the time when he turned to Christianity, for him this was Sol Invictus (the victorious sun god).” — (A Concise History of the Early Church, 1996, p. 48)

When it came to the Nicene Council, The Encyclopaedia Britannica states, “Constantine himself presided, actively guiding the discussions, and personally proposed ... the crucial formula expressing the relation of Christ to God in the creed issued by the council ... Overawed by the emperor, the bishops, with two exceptions only, signed the creed, many of them much against their inclination.” — (1971 edition, Vol. 6, “Constantine,” p. 386)

With the emperor's approval, the Council rejected the minority view of Arius and, having nothing definitive with which to replace it, approved the view of Athanasius which was also a minority view. The Church was left in the odd position of officially supporting, from that point forward, the decision made at Nicea to endorse a belief held by only a minority of those attending. Constantine is also believed to have exiled those who refused to accept the Nicean creed being Arius himself, the deacon Euzoios and the Libyan bishops Theonas of Marmarica and Secundus of Ptolemais. He also exiled the bishops who signed the creed but refused to join in the condemnation of Arius, Eusebius of Nicomedia and Theognis of Nicea. However, there is no evidence that Constantius II who was his son and successor was exiled for being an Arian Christian. The Emperor also ordered all copies of the Thalia to be burned, which was the book in which Arius expressed his teachings. The groundwork for official acceptance of the trinity was now laid, but it had taken more than three centuries after Jesus Christ's death and resurrection for this unbiblical teaching to emerge!

Several years later Constantine became more lenient toward those he had condemned and exiled at the council. First he allowed Eusebius of Nicomedia to return who was a protégé of his sister, and then Theognis once he had signed an ambiguous statement of faith. These two and other friends of Arius worked towards getting Arius returned. In 335 A.D. they brought accusations against Athanasius and so Constantine now had Athanasius banished! In the same year, the Synod of Jerusalem under Constantine's direction readmitted Arius to communion in 336 A.D. So Arius was returned from exile when he suddenly died an abysmal death on the way. Some historian Scholars believe that Arius was poisoned by his opponents and question if Athanasius arranged it. Either way, Constantine who was now an Arian ordered Athanasius exiled. Eusebius and Theognis remained in the Emperor's favour and when Constantine accepted baptism on his deathbed, it was performed by Eusebius of Nicomedia.

[Previous two paragraphs source: Edward Gibbons, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chapter 21, (1776–88), Jonathan Kirsch, God Against the Gods: The History of the War Between Monotheism and Polytheism, 2004, and Charles Freeman, The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason, 2002]

 

Note that all references to Arius presented outside of this section is the generally accepted historical view. But there is more to the generally accepted historical view that has been covered up as you are about to see.

Those who understand how the Papal Church came to rule for 1260 years known as the dark ages also know they had to uproot three opposing kingdoms. But did you ever notice that these were all Arian tribes? We know Athanasius taught the unbiblical pagan view, and that the Catholic Church is known for casting truth to the ground as explained in scripture, so it would certainly make sense that the Arians actually had Biblical truth and explains why these Arian tribes were all destroyed.

“The three divisions which were plucked up were the Heruli in 493, the Vandals in 534, and the Ostrogoths in 538 A.D. Justinian, the emperor, whose seat was at Constantinople, working through the general Belisarius, was the power which overthrew the three kingdoms represented by the three horns, and the reason for their overthrow was their adherence to Arianism in opposition to the orthodox Catholic faith. The details of the overthrow, and the religious controversy which was the root of the trouble, are fully given by Gibbon in the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” — (S.N. Haskell, The Story of Daniel the Prophet, p. 117, 1908) Further, “The contest between Arianism and the orthodox Catholicism was the means of enthroning the papacy.” — (lbid, p. 266)

Ever since the inception of the Trinity doctrine into Christianity in the 4th century, in one way or another, Trinitarians have consistently persecuted those who did not hold to the trinity faith. They generally regarded them as heretics and the record of Christian history shows this and it is still happening today! So what spirit is behind persecution?

I have seen non-Trinitarians falsely accused of teaching that Christ was created as a means to discredit them. When the accusers were corrected, they still continued with their false accusations even though they knew it was not true. This of course is dishonest and can only be a deliberate attempt at discrediting non-Trinitarians. Did this same thing happen to Arius? Were rumours started to say that he taught Christ was created when in fact he did not, and was just a means of discrediting him to help the pagan doctrine of the trinity take hold?

“'His [Arius'] book, 'Thalia,' was burnt on the spot; and this example was so generally followed, that it became a very rare work.' — Stanley 'History of the Eastern Church,' Lecture iv, par. 39. The decree banishing Arius was shortly so modified as simply to prohibit his returning to Alexandria.” — (The Two Republics, A.T. Jones, p. 351)

The Catholic Church exerted all her power to destroy any records of what Arius believed. The only records we have are those that either fell through the hands of the Catholic power, or those which they have chosen to keep, whether in their original form or altered by them.

“An erroneous charge was circulated that all who were called Arians believed that Christ was a created being. [Footnote: It is doubtful if many believed Christ to be a created being. Generally, those evangelical bodies who opposed the papacy and who were branded as Arians confessed both the divinity of Christ and that He was begotten, not created, by the Father. They recoiled from other extreme deductions and speculations concerning the Godhead.]” — (Benjamin G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 92)

“Whether the teachings of Arius were such as are usually represented to us or not, who can say? Phillipus Limborch doubts that Arius himself ever held that Christ was created instead of being begotten [Footnote: Limborch, The History of the Inquisition, page 95].” — (Benjamin G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 142)

In 538 A.D, the Arian believers were completely wiped out by the Catholic Church, leaving the Papacy as the sole “Corrector of heretics.” Anyone opposing the Catholic teaching of the trinity was exterminated, for “the Mystery of the Trinity is the central doctrine of the Catholic Faith.” — (Handbook for Today's Catholic, p. 11)

So how was the trinity doctrine finally established? Was it through careful study of the Scriptures by all parties to establish what the truth was? No! It happened through decades of persecution and bloodshed and by the Papal Church murdering the three Arian tribes that opposed them! The Trinitarian view was won by taking out the opposition.

 

It is interesting that the history of the Arian controversy has been so well hidden that it is hard to determine just what Arius believed. Yet it seems doubtful that all the accusations brought against Arius and those of like persuasion are accurate. It had become the general rule to brand all those who did not subscribe to the trinity doctrine as Arians. Since it is commonly thought that Arians believe that Christ is a created being, and thus not divine, it has been the continual accusation that if you deny the trinity doctrine, you believe that Christ is a created being, and deny the divinity of Christ. This accusation, when applied to those who dissented from the accepted teachings of the Catholic Church on this subject, has seldom been accurate. I have very reluctantly quoted mainstream history elsewhere in this document but I think other historical evidence reveals the real truth. Looking at the background of Athanasius and Arius for example sheds a lot of light.

Since the trinity doctrine belongs to Satan, then we can expect him to do all he can to protect his counterfeit. That would mean hiding any false teaching from Athanasius but doing all he can to condemn Arius by having history altered, false rumours spread and destroying what Arius did believe, which we know was actually done. The Catholic Church are known experts at this. Since Satan has this base covered, what one can do instead is look at the people Athanasius and Arius received their education from and see what they taught and then the truth becomes very clear.

Athanasius (296-373) who came up with the Catholic Trinitarian view was very strongly influenced by the writings of Origen (184-254) who was a Greek philosopher and theologian who reinterpreted Christian doctrine through the philosophy of neo-platonism. When he taught, he wore the pagan robes of the pagan philosopher. He castrated himself in a lecture in front of his students based on his Gnostic views of the evil of the flesh among other strange practices. Origen also wrote that the creation account in Genesis is a fictitious story. His work was later condemned as unorthodox. Arius (250-336) on the other hand was a student of Lucian of Antioch (240-312). Lucian was responsible for producing what is known as the Textus Receptus that was later restored by Erasmus, and is what gave us the trusted New Testament of the KJV Bible.

This excerpt speaks volumes. “Unlike Origen, Athanasius's reputation is unsullied in all major branches of Christendom. Although some of his opinions turned out to be heretical by later standards of orthodoxy, he was never condemned or even harshly criticized.” — (Roger Olson, The Story of Christian Theology, p. 162)

So what was Satan's goal? Make sure the truth is discredited and that those teaching his counterfeit can do no wrong.

The following author states that the influence of Origen on the writings of Athanasius is seen throughout his work. “That being said, Athanasius is applying these standard arguments to a more highly developed neo-Platonist philosophy and a more cultural diverse society than any previous theologian had faced. Still, the influence of Origen is felt throughout the work, particularly in Athanasius' opening statements about the existence (or rather, non-existence) of evil and the refutation of various dualistic cosmologies.” — (Critique of Athanasius Two Books against the Heathens, Jonathan Shelley)

There can be no doubt that Athanasius incorporated neo-platonism into his works and was greatly influenced by Plato, Origen and Greek philosophy rather than following the true meaning of Scripture. Origen was a student of the humanistic philosophies of Plato, Aristotle and Ammonius and he altered the Bible to make God's Word say what he wanted it to say. Origen was also a student of Clement of Alexandria who sought to combine Greek philosophy with Christianity as many religions do today corrupting Christianity by combining it with pagan ideas. (See George E. Karamanolis, Plato and Aristotle in Agreement, Oxford University Press, 2006, p. 208)

As previously seen, the trinity doctrine is not found in Scripture but it is found in Greek philosophy and paganism. So the trinity was not derived from scripture but was conceived in philosophy. Note the definition of neo-platonism. “1. A philosophical system developed at Alexandria in the third century a.d. by Plotinus and his successors. It is based on Platonism with elements of mysticism and some Judaic and Christian concepts and posits a single source from which all existence emanates and with which an individual soul can be mystically united.” — (TheFreeDictionary)

James Strong who wrote the famous Strong's Concordance stated, “Towards the end of the 1st century, and during the 2nd, many learned men came over both from Judaism and paganism to Christianity. These brought with them into the Christian schools of theology their Platonic ideas and phraseology.” — (Cyclopaedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature, 1891, Vol. 10, “Trinity,” p. 553)

Almost two thousand years ago Origen wrote, “Could any man of sound judgment suppose that the first, second, and third days (of creation) had an evening and a morning, when there were as yet no sun or moon or stars? Could anyone be so unintelligent as to think that God made a paradise somewhere in the east and planted it with trees, like a farmer, or that in that paradise he put a tree of life, a tree you could see and know with your senses, a tree you could derive life from by eating its fruit with the teeth in your head? When the Bible says that God used to walk in paradise in the evening or that Adam hid behind a tree, no one, I think, will question that these are only fictitious stories of things that never actually happened, and that figuratively they refer to certain mysteries.” — (Tadros Y. Malaty, Before Origen, p. 134)

Origen also “believed the Holy Spirit was a feminine force, that Jesus was only a created being and Gnosticism taught that Jesus became Christ at his baptism but that he was never God. He was a just a good man with very high morals. He believed in the doctrine of Purgatory, transubstantiation, transmigration of the soul and reincarnation of the soul. He doubted the temptations of Jesus in Scripture and claimed they could have never happened. The Scriptures were not literal. Genesis 1-3 was a myth, not historical or literal, as there was no actual person named “Adam.” Based upon Matthew 19, a true man of God should be castrated, which he did to himself. He taught eternal life was not a gift, instead one must grab hold of it and retain it. Christ enters no man until they mentally grasp the understanding of the consummation of the ages. He taught there would be no physical resurrection of the believers.” — (See Dr. Ken Matto, Origen's Gnostic Belief System)

Origen's belief system clearly indicates that he was a Gnostic Greek Philosopher and not a true child of God.

Now let's look at how much influence Lucian had on the teachings of Arius and if he was grounded in the Word. “The leaders in the Arian movement (Arius himself, Eusebius of Nicomedia, Maris and Theognis) received their training under Lucian and always venerated him as their master and the founder of their system.” — (New World Encyclopedia, Lucian of Antioch)

It was Antioch where Lucian was taught to love and obey God's Word as a child and is also where the disciples were first called Christians. (Acts 11:26) As a young man he became aware of disturbing news from the Roman Churches in the West. Two movements were forming within the early Christian Church. The Churches in Rome looked to the famous college at Alexandria for spiritual guidance, while the Syrian's trusted their leaders in Antioch to guide them. Lucian taught that the Church must choose obedience to the Bible rather than allowing manmade traditions to creep into worship.

“Lucian quickly discerned that there were two movements taking shape in Christendom, one loose in doctrine and affiliating itself with heathenism, the other based on the deep foundations of the Christian faith.” — (Benjamin G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 46). It was Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Athanasius who were affiliating themselves with heathenism and hence came the doctrine of the trinity. Lucian on the other hand was the other based on the deep foundations of the Christian faith that produced the Textus Receptus which gave us the trusted New Testament of the KJV Bible.

“The Alexandria catechetical school, which revered Clement of Alexandria and Origen, the greatest theologian of the Greek Church, as its heads, applied the allegorical method to the explanation of Scripture. Its thought was influenced by Plato: its strong point was [pagan] theological speculations. Athanasius and the three Cappadocians [the men whose Trinitarian views were adopted by the Catholic Church at the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople] had been included among its members.” — (Hubert Jedin, Ecumenical Councils of the Catholic Church: an Historical Outline, 1960, p. 28)

When Babylon was conquered in 538 B.C, the Babylonian pagan priests went to Rome and Alexandria and took their pagan teachings with them. It was about 200 B.C. when the Jews began sending their best scholars to Alexandria, but they were introduced to many pagan teachings. Hebrew students were taught to accept manmade traditions and to look for mystical meanings in Scripture rather than accept the plain teachings of the Bible. Lucian was aware that the Jewish leaders rejected Jesus as their Messiah because of their faulty teaching in Alexandra.

“Lucian believed in the literal sense of the biblical text and emphasized the need for textual accuracy. Lucian undertook to revise the Septuagint based on the original Hebrew. By comparing the Greek text with Hebrew grammatical styles, and giving priority to the literal sense, Lucian sought to limit the symbolical interpretation characteristic of the Alexandrian (Egyptian) allegorical tradition which incorporated pagan philosophy into Christianity. Lucian's influence permanently oriented Christian theology towards historical realism in its debate with classical non-Christian thought.” — (New World Encyclopedia, Lucian of Antioch)

Satan had success in changing the Jewish Church and now plotted to use the school at Alexandria to destroy the Christian Church. Two well known teachers at Alexandria, Clement of Alexandria and his famous pupil Origen taught students how to allegorize the Bible. For example, they made people, cities or stories in the Bible represent something else. Lucian knew that accepting Clement's and Origen's way of interpreting Scripture would change the meaning of Scripture and would result in the truths of the Bible being changed by human reasoning and tradition.

“The Alexandrines incorporated Greek Pagan philosophical beliefs from Plato's teachings into Christianity (Neoplatonism), and interpreted much of the Bible allegorically, ... Lucian rejected this system entirely and propounded a system of literal interpretation that dominated the Eastern Church for a long period.” — (New World Encyclopedia, Lucian of Antioch)

Lucian would not compromise with the manmade changes Alexandria and Rome were bringing into Christianity. Knowing that Christians must have nothing to do with these pagan practices, Lucian began a college in Antioch which would give young people a true Biblical foundation. Now early Christianity had two rival cities; Alexandria being a powerful center for Satan's errors, and Antioch being the protector of true Christianity.

So unlike Origen and Athanasius, Lucian followed Scripture only and was well aware of the problems with Greek philosophy and paganism. Being strongly opposed, Lucian tried to counteract what was happening. Because Antioch was on the border between Rome and Persia, news and culture steadily streamed in. Lucian saw that “the churches of Rome and Alexandria had entered into an alliance. Alexandria had, for more than two centuries before Christ, been the real capital of the Jews who were compromising with paganism.” — (Benjamin G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 47)

From the history of the Jewish nation Lucian could see the effect of accepting the Greek education taught in Alexandria. It was because of their acceptance of Greek culture that the Jews were unprepared to accept Christ. “The church at Alexandria was in this atmosphere. The city of Rome had been for seven hundred years, and was still to be for some time, the world capital of paganism. This environment greatly influenced the church at Rome. Lucian grew up in the churches of Syria and of the Near East, which were modeled after the churches of Judea. Lucian founded a college at Antioch which strove to counteract the dangerous ecclesiastical alliance between Rome and Alexandria.” — (lbid)

The graduates from Lucian's school were solid Bible students. Their goal was to share with others the peace and joy they had received from accepting Jesus into their heart. Pagan superstitions were swept away as faith in God produced transformed followers of Christ. We owe a lot to Lucian who resulted in the true gospel spreading through the world.

Students at Lucian's college also received training in trades and occupations including foreign languages, the sciences and medicine. Antioch became world famous for its medical school and students were skilled in all branches of natural healing. Because of their excellent education, students were hired for important jobs with government officials and even royalty. God blessed them with remarkable occupational success.

But Lucian's greatest gift to Protestant history was his editing of the Textus Receptus. Lucian took all the manuscripts that were known to the early Christians and compiled them together into the New Testament. Dr B. G. Wilkinson states that “The Protestant denominations are built upon that manuscript of the Greek New Testament, sometimes called the Textus Receptus, or Received Text. It is that Greek New Testament from which the writings of the apostles have been translated into the various languages. During the Dark Ages, the Received Text was practically unknown... It was restored to Christendom by the labors of that great scholar, Erasmus. However, neither Lucian nor Erasmus, but rather the apostles wrote the Greek New Testament.” — (Benjamin G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 50)

“Lucian had an enduring influence on Biblical textual study and is known for his critical revision of the text of the Septuagint and the Greek New Testament. Basing his revision on the original Hebrew, Lucian emphasized the need for textual accuracy and sought to limit the allegorical interpretation of the Alexandrian Christian tradition, which incorporated pagan philosophy. Lucian's edition contributed significantly to the Syrian recension, that was used by Chrysostom and the later Greek fathers, and became the basis of the textus receptus from which most of the Reformation era New Testament translations were made. Lucian's rationalist approach permanently oriented Christian theology towards historical realism.” — (New World Encyclopedia, Lucian of Antioch)

The Textus Receptus from Lucian is also called the Majority Text because it was based on the majority (90%) of the 5000 plus Greek manuscripts in existence. It did not have material added, removed or modified as did the Minority Text.

Origen also made translations and commentaries of the Bible. But these were written in a way that allowed many errors to be introduced into Christianity. “Origen... denied the deity of Christ, teaching that Jesus was a lesser, created god. He and other false teachers who did not confess the Lord Jesus Christ set to mutilating the Alexandrian group of manuscripts, 'editing,' omitting, and changing passages of Scripture. The Alexandrian texts underlying the modern Bible versions are based on these corrupted manuscripts.” — (Matthew Brill, Evangelism Expounded, WinePress Publishing, 2011, pp. 113, 114)

“Origen, being the textual critic, is supposed to have corrected numerous portions of the sacred manuscripts. Evidence to the contrary shows that he changed them to agree with his human philosophy of mystical and allegorical ideas. Thus, through deceptive scholarship of this kind, certain manuscripts became corrupt.” — (Les Garrett, Which Bible Can We Trust, Prophecy Club, 1998)

There is an explosion of new Bibles today. However, very few use the Textus Receptus as the basis for their translations as the King James Version has. These modern translations come from the Greek text produced by Wescott and Hort who used the Codex Sinaiticus, which has 14800 edits which is more than any other manuscript in Biblical history. The other is the Codex Vaticanus which comes from the Vatican and is claimed to be older than what was used by the reformers. However, it is said that most of it has been overwritten by a fifteenth century scribe, and we know what that means when it comes from the Papacy! Satan is doing everything he can to lead people away from God and has found a very clever way to give us something that looks like Scripture but actually contains some of his lies in place of God's truths.

History is very clear and leaves no doubt that God used Lucian of Antioch for many very important works and that he played a major role in keeping God's true Church alive, though it was eventually driven underground. But Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Athanasius are major figures in the origins of the Apostate Church that persecuted the Christian saints through the dark ages. God calls this Apostate Church Babylon with very good reason. What are two of the biggest errors they introduced in opposition to the Word of God? Sunday worship and the trinity doctrine that both originated from sun and Satan worship in Babylon. It is clear that Lucian was part of God's true Church and those who studied under him and called him master were no doubt also. This as you have seen includes Arius.

So Arius who studied under the Biblical teachings of Lucian of Antioch who was opposed to Greek philosophy is almost certainly the one who had Biblical truth and was deliberately discredited just as Trinitarians do to non-Trinitarians today. Origen on the other hand who Athanasius learned from was definitely influenced by Greek and Platonic philosophy and reinterpreted Christian doctrine through the philosophy of Neoplatonism. So these facts also verify that the trinity doctrine came from paganism and Greek philosophy. The weight of evidence is overwhelming.

Those who understand Bible prophecy also know from history and the following verse that God's true Church was hiding in the wilderness from Papal persecution for 1260 years called the dark ages. “And the woman [God's true Church] fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days [1260 years on the day for a year rule].” Revelation 12:6. Parentheses are added. The Papal Church ruling instituted and enforced the trinity doctrine, but the true Church hiding in the wilderness was non-Trinitarian. So Scripture and history reveal the non-Trinitarian view is correct. You cannot be the true Church if you are teaching serious error on the Godhead!

“No wonder that the Celtic, the Gothic, the Waldensian, the Armenian Churches, and the great Church of the East, as well as other bodies, differed profoundly from the papacy in its metaphysical conceptions of the Trinity and consequently in the importance of the Ten Commandments.” — (Truth Triumphant, Church in the Wilderness, B.G. Wilkinson, Ch. 7, pp. 87, 88)

 

The Council of Nicea did not end the controversy. Karen Armstrong explains, “Athanasius managed to impose his theology on the delegates ... with the emperor breathing down their necks ...
“The show of agreement pleased Constantine, who had no understanding of the theological issues, but in fact there was no unanimity at Nicaea. After the council, the bishops went on teaching as they had before, and the Arian crisis continued for another sixty years. Arius and his followers fought back and managed to regain imperial favor. Athanasius was exiled no fewer than five times. It was very difficult to make his creed stick.” — (pp. 110, 111)

So after Constantine's death in 337 A.D. disputes continued. Constantine's son Constantius II who had become Emperor of the eastern part of the Empire encouraged the Arians and set out to reverse the Nicene creed. His advisor in these affairs was Eusebius of Nicomedia who had already at the Council of Nicea been the head of the Arian party and who was also made bishop of Constantinople. Constantius used his power to exile bishops that followed the Nicene creed and especially Athanasius who fled to Rome. In 355 A.D. Constantius became the sole Emperor and extended his pro-Arian policy toward the western provinces. The continuing debates resulted in numerous synods. Among them was the Council of Sardica in 343 A.D, the Council of Sirmium in 358 A.D. and the double Council of Rimini and Seleucia in 359 A.D. There were no fewer than fourteen further creed formulas between 340 and 360 A.D.

So the fires of this Godhead quarrel burned brightly for over fifty years. From 351 to 360 A.D, Emperor Constantius (son of Constantine) convened no fewer than nine councils of bishops for the sole purpose of trying to settle them to no avail.

After the death of Constantius in 361 A.D, his successor Julian who was a devotee of Rome's pagan gods declared that he would no longer favor one church faction over another and allowed all exiled bishops to return. This resulted in further increasing dissension among Christians. The Emperor Valens however revived Constantius' policy and supported the “Homoian” party exiling bishops. During this persecution many bishops were exiled to the other ends of the Empire.

The ongoing disagreements were at times violent and bloody. Of the aftermath of the Council of Nicea, noted historian Will Durant writes, “Probably more Christians were slaughtered by Christians in these two years (342-3) than by all the persecutions of Christians by pagans in the history of Rome.” — (The Story of Civilization, Vol. 4: The Age of Faith, 1950, p. 8). Ramsay MacMullen in his book Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries wrote, “...more Christians died for their faith at the hands of fellow Christians than had died before in all the persecutions.” While claiming to be Christian many believers fought and slaughtered one another over their differing views of God!

Of the following decades, Professor Harold Brown writes, “During the middle decades of this century, from 340 to 380, the history of doctrine looks more like the history of court and church intrigues and social unrest ... The central doctrines hammered out in this period often appear to have been put through by intrigue or mob violence rather than by the common consent of Christendom led by the Holy Spirit.” (Heresies: Heresy and Orthodoxy in the History of the Church, 2003, p. 119)

 

The Nicean Council, convened by Emperor Constantine in 325 A.D, did not actually declare the belief in the doctrine of the trinity as it is today. The bishops decided that Jesus is God just as the Father is God, but the creed they adopted did not mention the deity of the Holy Spirit. The statement issued at the Council of Nicea in this regard simply said, “We believe in the Holy Spirit.” This “seemed to have been added to Athanasius's creed almost as an afterthought,” writes Karen Armstrong. “People were confused about the Holy Spirit. Was it simply a synonym for God or was it something more?” — (p. 115) Trinitarian professors Roger Olson and Christopher Hall said, “the Spirit had appeared almost as a footnote to the Creed of Nicea...” — (The Trinity, p. 40) So disagreements soon centered around the nature of the Holy Spirit.

Professor Charles Ryrie writes, “In the second half of the fourth century, three theologians from the province of Cappadocia in eastern Asia Minor [today central Turkey] gave definitive shape to the doctrine of the Trinity.” — (Basic Theology, p. 65). They proposed an idea that was a step beyond Athanasius' view, being that God the Father, Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit were co-equal and together in one being, yet also distinct from one another.

These three men were Basil “the Great” who was bishop of Caesarea (330-379 A.D.), his younger brother Gregory, bishop of Nyssa (335-394 A.D.) and their friend Gregory of Nazianzus (330-390 A.D.), and they were all “trained in Greek philosophy,” (Armstrong, p. 113) which undoubtedly affected their outlook and beliefs. Together they comprised what has come to be known as “the three Cappadocians.”

In the view of these three, as Karen Armstrong explains, “the Trinity only made sense as a mystical or spiritual experience ... It was not a logical or intellectual formulation but an imaginative paradigm that confounded reason. Gregory of Nazianzus made this clear when he explained that contemplation of the Three in One induced a profound and overwhelming emotion that confounded thought and intellectual clarity.
'No sooner do I conceive of the One than I am illumined by the splendor of the Three; no sooner do I distinguish Three than I am carried back into the One. When I think of any of the Three, I think of him as the whole, and my eyes are filled, and the greater part of what I am thinking escapes me.” — (p. 117). So Karen Armstrong concludes, it is little wonder that, “For many Western Christians ... the Trinity is simply baffling.” — (ibid.)

 

It was not until the co-reigns of Gratian and Theodosius that Arianism lost control among the ruling class and elite of the Eastern Empire. Theodosius' wife St Flacilla was also instrumental in his campaign to stop Arianism. Valens died in the Battle of Adrianople in 378 A.D. and was succeeded by Theodosius I who followed the Nicene creed.

On 24 November 380 A.D, two days after Theodosius arrived in Constantinople, he expelled the Homoiousian bishop Demophilus of Constantinople and surrendered the Churches of that city to Gregory of Nazianzus who was the leader of a small Nicene community there. This act provoked rioting. Bishop Acholius of Thessalonica had just baptized Theodosius during a severe illness as was common in the early Christian world. In February he and Gratian had published an edict that all their subjects should profess the faith of the bishops of Rome and Alexandria (i.e., the Nicene faith), or be handed over for punishment for not doing so. [Above information sourced from Sozomen's Church History VII.4]

So what was the significance of Rome and Alexandria? They were the only places in the world where many Christians kept only Sunday and not the true Sabbath. Why? Because this is where the pagan practices of Babylon landed after it was conquered. And what was the dominant pagan practice that the Babylonian priests brought with them? Sun worship which was done on Sun-day! Throughout the entire history of the change of Sabbath to Sunday, Rome and Alexandria had worked together. Alexandria provided the philosophical reasons for the changes and Rome provided the decrees and anathemas.

Church historian Socrates Scholasticus (5th century) wrote: “For although almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [of the Lord's Supper] on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this.” — (Socrates Scholasticus, Ecclesiastical History, Book 5, Ch. 22)

So the trinity doctrine and Sunday worship both came from sun and Satan worship that grew in power from the Catholic Church that came from the bishops of Rome and Alexandria. Two pagan practices with the same origin!

In the year May 381 A.D. being 44 years after Constantine's death, Emperor Theodosius convened the Council of Constantinople (today Istanbul, Turkey) to put an end to the disputes. Gregory of Nazianzus who was recently appointed as archbishop of Constantinople was to preside over the council to urge the adoption of his view on the Holy Spirit.

Historian Charles Freeman states, “Virtually nothing is known of the theological debates of the council of 381, but Gregory was certainly hoping to get some acceptance of his belief that the Spirit was consubstantial with the Father [meaning that the persons are of the same being, as substance in this context denotes individual quality].
Whether he dealt with the matter clumsily or whether there was simply no chance of consensus, the 'Macedonians,' bishops who refused to accept the full divinity of the Holy Spirit, left the council ... Typically, Gregory berated the bishops for preferring to have a majority rather than simply accepting 'the Divine Word' of the Trinity on his authority.” — (A.D. 381: Heretics, Pagans and the Dawn of the Monotheistic State, 2008, p. 96)

However, Gregory soon became ill and had to withdraw from the council. Who would preside now? “So it was that one Nectarius, an elderly city senator who had been a popular prefect in the city as a result of his patronage of the games, but who was still not a baptized Christian, was selected ... Nectarius appeared to know no theology, and he had to be initiated into the required faith before being baptized and consecrated.” — (Freeman, pp. 97, 98)

It is absolutely bizarre that a man who up to this point wasn't a Christian was appointed to preside over a major Church council tasked with determining what it would teach regarding the nature of God!