The evangelist Luke, in his opening sentence to his gospel,
lets us know that there had been some believers who had endeavoured
to put into writing some of the events that had occurred in
the life of Jesus. So as to clearly distance himself from these
disorganized Jesus-tales, he, "having studied all these
matters from the beginning", wrote an orderly account "that
the full truths of all these matters" become known (Lk
1:3).
By the third century quite a few spurious Jesus-biographies
were circulating among the Christian community. Even around
150 A.D. Christians began to demand a clearer orientation from
Church authorities regarding the authenticity of some of these
writings. It is certain that around that time the Church authoritatively
had accepted the four gospels written by the evangelists Matthew,
Mark, Luke and John.
Even in these early days the Christians were divided by conflicting
theologies. Around 140 AD Marcion had collected a number of
"sacred writings" which spurred the leadership within
the Church to produce their own `canon' of acceptable sacred
literature. The word canon comes from the Greek, meaning "rule"
or "yardstick" and this canon produced by the Church
contains the books that we presently find in our New Testament.
Other apochyphal words which circulated among various sects
were excluded from any official recognition.
At this time other issues relating to doctrine and discipline
also were concerning the growing Christian communities. The
Trinitarian Church found itself on the one hand in opposition
with monotheistic Judaism, and on the other hand, in opposition
against the gnostics who had falsified the Trinity into a Tri-godly
reality. Furthermore the early Church was faced with fundamental
dogmatic issues: Was baptism administered by heretics and apostate
priests or bishops valid? Should those that had been baptized
and had denied Christ during persecutions be re-baptized on
readmission into the Church? A further pre- occupation that
concerned the Roman Church was the growing number of laity,
priests and bishops - particularly along the north African coastline
who did not recognize or give allegiance to the pre-eminence
of Rome. Even in Rome itself, especially in the middle of the
third century during the time of the opposing bishops Hippolytus
and Novatian, the Church was experiencing internal opposition
and conflict.
More and more of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire were turning
to Christianity. In 311 AD Galerius granted Christians permission
to hold their religious assemblies provided that Christians "after
this manifestation of grace, should pray to their God for the
welfare of the emperors, of the state, and of themselves, that
the state might prosper in every respect and that they might live
quietly in their homes" (Schaff, 1980: 71). Christianity
was at the threshold of institutional acceptance; it was divorced
from its Semitic cultural and linguistic roots, had undergone
a period of trial-by-fire, and now was ready for an accomodation
with political forces that would make it a "comprehensive,
unifying and reconciling social whole which included both the
sociological circle of religion itself, as well as all politico-social
organisations" of the time (Marty, 1980: 98).
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