Constantine the Great and Christianity

Some scholars allege that his main objective was to gain unanimous approval and submission to his authority from all classes, and therefore he chose Christianity to conduct his political propaganda, believing that it was the most appropriate religion that could fit with the imperial cult.

[2] His formal conversion in 312 is almost universally acknowledged among historians,[1][3] despite that it was claimed he was baptized only on his deathbed by the Arian bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia in 337;[4][5][6] the real reasons behind it remain unknown and are debated also.

Christians were arrested, tortured, mutilated, burned, starved, and condemned to gladiatorial contests to amuse spectators.

[9] The Great Persecution officially ended in April 311, when Galerius, senior emperor of the Tetrarchy, issued an edict of toleration which granted Christians the right to practice their religion, although it did not restore any property to them.

[13][14] Writing to Christians, Constantine made clear that he believed that he owed his successes to the protection of the High God alone.

[17] The panegyricist recounts that the god Apollo appeared to Constantine in company with Victoria and together presented him with three wreaths representing thirty years of power.

[17] This vision was perhaps in a dream experienced by the emperor while practising incubation at the shrine of Apollo Grannus in Grand, Vosges.

Eusebius of Caesarea and other Christian sources record that Constantine experienced a dramatic series of events sometime between his father Constantius Chlorus's death in 306 and the Battle of the Milvian Bridge on 28 October 312.

[17] The battle secured Constantine's claim to the title of augustus in the West, which he had assumed unilaterally when his father died.

[17] Instead, Lactantius mentions only that Constantine's dream took place on the eve of the climactic battle on the Ponte Milvio across the Tiber, with the crucial detail that the "sign" was marked on the Constantinian soldiers' shields.

[17] According to Lactantius: Constantine was advised in a dream to mark the heavenly sign of God on the shields of his soldiers and then engage in battle.

He did as he was commanded and by means of a letter X turned sideways, with the top of its head bent around (transversa X littera, summo capite circumflexo), he marked Christ on their shields (Christum in scutis notat).

Eusebius concurs with Lactantius that a new device was added to Constantine's soldiers' shields but does not connect this with the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, saying only that the "sign of the saving trophy" was marked, but not specifying when.

On it two letters, imitating by its first characters the name "Christ," formed the monogram of the Saviour's title, rho being intersected in the middle by chi ... From the transverse bar, which was bisected by the pole, hung suspended a cloth ...

But the upright pole ... carried the golden head-and-shoulders portrait of the Godbeloved Emperor, and likewise of his sons.This later description of Eusebius's, written after 324, suggests a more elaborate symbol than does Lactantius's earlier text, involving the Greek letters rho (Ρ) and chi (Χ) ligatured as the chi rho (☧), a monogram of Ancient Greek: χριστός, romanized: khrīstós, lit.

[22] Following the battle and the defeat and death of Maxentius, Constantine became the undisputed emperor in the West and performed an adventus, a ceremonial entrance to the city.

The Edict of Milan did, however, raise the stock of Christianity within the empire and reaffirmed the importance of religious worship to the welfare of the state.

[25] Most influential people in the empire, especially high military officials, had not been converted to Christianity and still participated in traditional Roman religion; Constantine's rule exhibited at least a willingness to appease these factions.

Men from leading Roman families who declined to convert to Christianity were denied positions of power yet still received appointments; even up to the end of his life, two-thirds of his top government were non-Christian.

Crucifixion was abolished for reasons of Christian piety but was replaced with hanging, to demonstrate the preservation of Roman supremacy.

[35] Some laws made during his reign were even humane in the modern sense and supported tolerance, possibly inspired by his Christianity:[36] a prisoner was no longer to be kept in total darkness but must be given the outdoors and daylight; a condemned man was allowed to die in the arena, but he could not be branded on his "heavenly beautified" face, since God was supposed to have made man in his image, but only on the feet.

According to Eusebius, in 331 Constantine had commissioned him to deliver fifty volumes of scriptures for the churches of Constantinople, which were to be bound in leather and easily portable.

Emperors considered themselves responsible to the gods for the spiritual health of their subjects, and after Constantine they had a duty to help the Church define and maintain orthodoxy.

After the Nicene council, and against its conclusions, he eventually recalled Arius from exile and banished Athanasius of Alexandria to Trier.

[50] With the exception of a short period of eclipse, Eusebius enjoyed the complete confidence both of Constantine and Constantius II and was the tutor of Emperor Julian the Apostate.

They inhabit our territory and agree with Caesar, our enemy.Constantinian shift is a term used by some theologians and historians of antiquity to describe the political and theological aspects and outcomes of the 4th-century process of Constantine's integration of the imperial government with the Catholic Church that began with the First Council of Nicaea.