Council of Nicea
Offline Why are the several posts on this forum that talk about the Canon of the Bible being set in 325 AD at the Council of Nicea? Given the amount of publicity that this and other errors in Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code generated in recent years, you'd have to have been living under a rock in a cave on Mars not to realise that this is wrong.
If this is the level of research done for your book, then good luck getting it published by any credible academic press Rook. You might want to be a bit more careful with checking your facts. And no, I'm not a Christian, just someone who believes if you claim to study history, do it properly.
The "Wise Old Atheist" says: They decided to invent a god and came up with one who looked like a peasant preacher from Galilee?! Were they on crack?
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Link to proof of statement, please.
Link to proof of what statement? Proof that Rook claims the Canon was set at Nicea? Look at his discussion with LifeofApollos on the "What is the Jesus Mythicist's Position?" thread. LifeofApollos says:
Despite slight variations of the Gospel accounts we see that they are all included in the Canon.
And Rook replies:
That was decided upon by an Ecumenical Council in 325 CE.
The only ecumenical council held in 325 was the Council of Nicea (it was also the first ever such council) and we have multiple sources on what was discussed at Nicea and we also have the statement issued at the end of the Council about what had been decided. The Canon was not even on the agenda.
What's even more weird is that Rook includes Bart Ehrman's Truth and Fiction in The DaVinci Code in his footnotes to the very same post. Ehrman has a whole chapter on Nicea, how the Canon was NOT decided there and on how the Canon evolved.
Which means not only does Rook make a truly elementary mistake, but he clearly hasn't even read the works he cites properly.
As I said, if this is indicative of his quality of scholarship, he'll probably be yet another "Jesus Myther" forced to self-publish like Doherty et al, because no real academic press will touch research this sloppy.
The "Wise Old Atheist" says: They decided to invent a god and came up with one who looked like a peasant preacher from Galilee?! Were they on crack?
Yeah, as I understand it, the Council of Nicaea was convened to deal with the question of who Jesus was. In short, followers of a man by the name of Arius held the view Jesus was not an equal to to God. To make a long story short, a series of wars broke out between the two factions of early Christians prompting Constantine to convene the council. While it was not responsible for the "canon" in any way, it set the stage for what was to come and established the modern day "trinity" as we know it.
Also, the word canon does not necessarily refer to Biblical books. As it was used then, it could simply refer to a list of objectives or statements that were met at the (or any) Council....possibly a source of confusion.
There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots.
Sort of. "Not completely equal to God the Father" would be more accurate.
"Wars"? They were factions of a small, illegal and persecuted sect - they weren't in the position to fight "wars" with anyone. The dispute was a theological one and consisted largely of some letters and perhaps some shouting in church. No "wars" were involved.
Constantine had a policy of "consensus and co-operation, or else!" He was determined to put a stop to the factionalism that had led to civil wars that had almost destroyed the Empire in the Third Century and had risen again after the reign of Diocletian.
So he wanted the two factions in the Arian Controversy to sort the problem out (even though he barely understood what the problem was and thought the whole thing was trivial)
Exactly. Why the hell people keep trying to claim the Canon was set at Nicea is a mystery. It's not as though there's any doubt about the way the Canon evolved from the Second Century to the end of the Fourth.
Yep - from the Greek "kanon" meaning rule. David L. Dungan's new book Constantine's Bible: Politics And the Making of the New Testament outlines how the early Christians took the analytical tools used by Greek philosophical schools to determine which of the works by their founders and his followers were 'canonical' and applied them to Christianity's scriptures. Ehrman's Lost Christianities covers some of the same ground, though that's more for a beginner in the subject.
But if anyone tries to tell you the Canon was voted on or determined at Nicea, that's a sure sign you're dealing with a kook.
Cheers.
The "Wise Old Atheist" says: They decided to invent a god and came up with one who looked like a peasant preacher from Galilee?! Were they on crack?
Eh yeah, I should have been more clear..."wars" used in a broad sense. Maybe "in-fighting" would have been a better term. Although wasn't Arius associated with Licinius who Constantine fought with? My history on that part is a little fuzzy.
There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots.
Well, in a VERY broad sense of the word these debates were "wars" I suppose ...
Though quite a few people who have read The Da Vinci Code will have read Dan Brown's claim that Constantine championed a paganised Christianity because "Christians and pagans began warring, and the conflict grew to such proportions that it threatened to rend Rome in two. " (p. 232) This is, of course, total crap.
No. Licinius was too busy persecuting Christians to get chummy with a presbyter from Alexandria.
The "Wise Old Atheist" says: They decided to invent a god and came up with one who looked like a peasant preacher from Galilee?! Were they on crack?