How Did Christianity Change Over Time

‘Christians to the lions’ as Trajan would say, an emperor in the early centuries Christianity to them have alienated the favour of their gods which has and would continue to cause disasters in the Roman Empire. The misfortune of Christians did not stop during this period, but it did come to a composed halt as Galerius, gave Christians the right to worship in some sense. Christianity during the early stages was clearly a course of persecution and forced pagan accusations. Constantine dramatically changed the recourse of religions with the battle of Milvian Bridge as Christianity became the predominant religion of the Roman Empire.

The Pax Romana allowed Rome to expand, and created a period of peace that would spread the important religion of Christianity throughout the strong empire. The new religion of Christianity was Jesus’ interpertation of monotheistic religion, Judiasm. Christianity was unlike the polytheistic Roman religion which infuriated many Roman rulers. Despite the hatred of rulers it spread quickly throughout the empire and continued even after Jesus died. Although Christianity followers were persecuted they felt strongly about their beliefs and eventually the Edict of Milan was passed whih meant that Christianity was a religion approved by the emperor. Christianity changed from a sect of persecution to a state religion within the Roman Empire because

The History of the Jews in the Roman Empire traces the interaction of Jews and Romans during the period of Roman Empire. Emperor Constantine I is often credited with converting the Roman Empire to Christianity. In fact, though he ended the persecution of Christians and eventually converted, some historians debate the true nature of his faith. When Constantine, the emperor of Rome, became a Christian it meant that the empire became Christian,

Although Christianity was initially practiced within Semitic populations of the Roman Empire, by the 4th century A.D the Christian religion had a huge impact to the Greeks and also the early Byzantine Empire. But by this time Christian communities had been established in all the important cities in the Roman Empire. In 313 the next emperor Constantine legalized Christianity throughout the empire. He also

From the third to the fourth century, the Roman Empire witnessed a widespread attempt to stop the spread of Christianity. Initially, leaders of the church were predominately targeted, but later anyone admitting to Christianity became a target. The persecutions hit a climax during Diocletian’s reign. These persecutions actually helped the spread of Christianity by glorifying Christians and beginning a tradition of martyrdom that shaped the Church, and the strength that Christians displayed shows that the persecutions could not have possible stopped the spread of Christianity.

Christianity, is well known for its many accomplishments, great leaders, and many followers. One of these people involved in the community of Christianity was Constantine. This man was also commonly known as “Roman Emperor Constantine” and was one of the most crucial people in the spread of Christianity of his time. He laid down the infrastructure for European development to this day and was described by Eusebius as “such an emperor as all history records not.” (Hardenbrook).

Although scholars debate whether he was actually a convert to Christianity, Constantine’s legalization of the religion helped to spread Christianity and secured Constantine’s political authority over a large geographic region. During the 30 years of Constantine’s reign, many changes were made to the status, structure, and beliefs of the Christian Church. These changes helped to secure Constantine’s power and ensured both the survival of the Christian faith and its proliferation.

As the founder of the Christian empire, Constantine began a new era. He was an absolute ruler, and his reign saw the end of the tendency toward despotic rule, centralized bureaucracy, and separation of military and civil powers evolved by Diocletian. Constantine's legal reforms were marked by great

At the time when the time Emperor Constantine came into power, Rome was deeply rooted in various anti-Christian crusades. Majority of those in the Roman Empire believed in traditions rather than religion. Christianity was deemed illegal and Christians within Rome went through a lot of persecution (Markus, 1990). In most of the persecutions, the ulterior motive was settling of personal vendettas.

People would only do things, if there was money in it for them. In Rome, the rise of Christianity started and people joined to worship Jesus. The Roman government was not a fan of Christianity. For years they tried, and tried to end the religion once and for all, but their attempts were in vain. Most emperors thought Christianity was a barbaric religion, until Emperor Constantine declared that he was Christian. Unlike Constantine, his father believed in the Roman gods, which led him and his father declared a battle on each other. Constantine ended up winning the fight, and made sure the government would stop harassing people for being Christian. After Constantine won, uproar in Rome started over Jesus, and their beliefs. After trying to solve the uproar in Christianity, Constantine changed the location of the Roman capital, and renamed it to Constantinople. He then tried to convince more noble families of Rome to move there. This caused the empire to split into two. The two sides also adapted two different forms of Christianity. They were also separated from each other, which caused them to fall at different times. Augustine then finally decided to put his faith into

1 Throughout history, changes are made in organizing civil principles such as laws, leaders, trade, and especially religion. These developments have been influenced by a multitudinal developments, in particular, the rise of authority of both government and the current regime. Constantine, the emperor of the Roman Empire, was an authoritative leader throughout history, but specifically his legacy is largely reflected in the profound changes he made in Christianity. The transformation in the original model of Christianity can be traced to the Rule of Constantine, the religious power he put into place during his reign by the changes made from his ways of uniting the Church, the formation of his empire and the impacts made within it.

The conversion of Roman Emperor, Constantine, marked the start of a reform that would change Rome forever. A once pagan society, Rome was one of the last to grasp the Christianity concept. The start of “Christianizing” Rome began with two of Jesus’ disciples, Peter and James, as well as the apostle Paul in the Roman province of Antioch during the first century ("New Women of Color Study Bible" 1742). From this, Christianity spread all over the province, by the time it got to Rome it was not widely practiced. It wasn’t until the reign of Constantine that Christianity took its place as the empires forefront religion. Since Rome was known for its worship and idolizing of gods, how and for what reasons did Constantine transform his subjects’ beliefs? According to authors, Ramsay MacMullen, John Curran, and A.H.M. Jones, a number of tactics were used to sway the masses’ minds. Use of coercion, money, and campaigns aided Constantine’s questionable Christian “cleanse”.

Constantine brought about many changes in the empire. Here are some of the good changes which he made: “he abolished executions by crucifixion, he called a halt to the battles of gladiators as a punishment for crimes and in 321 he made Sunday a public holiday”, (Shelley, 100). Constantine tried to help the Christian church in many ways. He chose Christian men as his advisers. Constantine frequently used the word "Catholic" to describe the Church. The word Catholic means universal. Constantine wanted all men everywhere to embrace the Christian faith and he wanted Christians to be united together. He thought that Christianity was the one thing that could unite his empire and make it great. Nonetheless, at the age of 65 when death was approaching

From the first emperor, Augustus, to emperor Constantine, Christianity was illegal. During that time Romans practiced the Pagan religion which meant the persecution of Christians was legal. The emperor after Constantine, Theodosius, was the one who eventually legalized Christianity. This change caused much controversy and decline throughout the empire. The introduction of Christianity especially had a major influence of the decline of Rome.

Constantius’ reign and the Council of Nicea helped Rome in gaining more Christians since they were under the rule of a Christian ruler. This did not last long as a Pagan ruler followed. In 361, emperor Julian came into power and restored Paganism in the Roman Empire. Julian felt the need to restore Paganism. His goal was to rid Christians from the highest orders of government. He did not want any Christian judges so that no Christian laws would be passed. Julian targeted the wealthy Christians as he was not as concerned with the common people. He believed that if he could get Christians out of political power, people would convert back to Paganism. This time in history brought Pagan conversions and Pagan members of political authority. After Julian was killed in battle in 363, his successor came into power to restore Christianity. He passed laws that made worshipping Pagan gods punishable by death. Christianity went from the minority religion to the majority religion in fifty years due to converts in favor of the religion of their political leaders. Christian law remained unchanged until 382 because Rome was in a crisis. This was extremely influential in gaining Christian converts.