I don't know why so many people on this forum jump at the word "Constantine". He really isn't all that important in the big picture. It's really a remnant of the poor anti-establishment JW-type junk kicking around in the 1800's to think that all of ones complaints against the established churches can be laid at the feet of some dead guy.
It is indeed unfortunate how many things get laid at the feet of Constantine that he was NOT
responsible for - seeing how his actions were really in connection with other Emperors since there was another who he was a Co-Ruler with that made a difference (Licinius in specific).
Many do not keep in mind the extensive ways that Jews actually were favored more so than Christians throughout Roman History - with
Constantine not changing various parts of those laws and with other benefits given to the Jews that were not present before his rule - and
many extensive sites pertaining to Jews/Judaism being preserved rather than allowed to be destroyed (and
destroying Hadrian's temple in the attempt to
restore archeological history in the Holy Land ) with anti-Semitism not
being traced back to him so much as to previous Emperors (i.e. Hadrian or Vespasian) who slaughtered the Jewish Population. The man did grant everyone - Christians, Jews and others - the liberty to worship as they pleased....but
his religion to promote was Christianity - with believers rejoicing in it in the same way that the Jews of Ezra's time rejoiced
when the King of Persia promoted their culture/beliefs politically (Ezra 1-4) .
As one believers noted to me when it came to the ways others may blast Constantine:
Constantine had a specific vision of the cross and established not only Christian "tolerance", but also worked toward Christian exclusivity. When he found that Rome was too paganized to serve as the center of Christianity, he moved that center to Byzantium (later called Constantinpole), which is in modern day Turkey. If anything, Constantine helped to shield Christianity from pagan ideas
And as
another noted best when it comes to claiming against Constantine that he was responsible for the de-Judaizing of Christianity by merging the Christian faith with the Roman Empire (for brief excerpt):
What about Constantine and the Jews? Were his policies a change towards anti-Semitism? In fact Roman law long before Constantine had basically prohibited Jews from proselytizing for their faith. For example they had been prohibited from circumcising converts unless they were slaves. Constantine did not change this law, but what he did do was give rabbis and other Jewish leaders the same tax exemption as clergy, and under Constantine, for the first time since Hadrian’s rule, Jews were allowed to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Furthermore, Constantine left the Jewish patriarch in Constantinople alone, and allowed him to judge religious issues within his own community, but not only religious issues, also civil issues. The same privilege would be extended to Christians as they built up church law and canon law. It is true of course he threatened Jews who harassed converts to Christianity and strengthened rules against circumcising non-Jews. Constantine does not appear to have been as anti-Semitic as many of his predecessors in the Emperor’s chair, but there is clearly some prejudice in evidence in his life and work...... Christianity was overwhelmingly Gentile in character long before Constantine. Indeed, it may even have had a majority of Gentile members by the end of the first century A.D.
On a good review on the subject:
And for other books on the issue which stand out, one can consider
Judaism and Christianity in the Age of Constantine: History, Messiah, Israel, and the Initial Confrontation
Of course, between executions of Crispus and Fausta and all the bloodshed he man caused ( patronizing the Church but living a debauched life married to a prostitute,
killing his son Crispus and wife in cold blood and embroiling the empire in horrific wars, torturing people...more discussed
here,
here ), many do not see him as saintly material. They feel that what was credited to him with the Edict of Milan is something that should be given to Christ--and others feel that Constantine was the instrument used by the Lord even though he was very political and ambitious in his use of Christianity....paticularly,
IMPERIAL CHRISTIANITY (more discussed
here).
Additionally, others are of the mindset that what he did made it possible for Christianity to become secularized in a rather quick amount of time---with Christianity being a religion that became one of preference for political reasons since all of the leaders could now use Christian language/terms .....and with Constantine forcing all of the churches together in councils to decide (in light of many herectical ideas of the day), the amount of blood shed (i.e. Gangster Synod in example) that went down due to certain church groups wanting to have more political power was horrendous.
Although councils were established, it often seemed based more so on who had the most power or the right politican to back up their views that often determined what was either "right" or "wrong"---and many in that era saw the Church becoming extremely wordly/corrupt due to what Constantine made possible.
One very prominent leader within Christendom and Messianic Jew, known as Alan Hirsh noted how traditional/institutional forms of the Church that were birthed in Christendom are things which did not necessarily have to be where all focus goes...and he alongside others have shared the thought that some dynamics with Constantine thought are similar to the battles others have had with the U.S when it comes to saying they want a "Christian" nation and yet there's no discussion on what happens when one form of Christianity is pushed above all others, with the differing versions of it either marginalized or persecuted. To be clear, Allan Hirsch relies on the restorationist meta-narrative that the New Testament church was pure in all things but at one point in history, identified by him as the conversion of Constantine/that era, everything went wrong, and has continued wrong.. That meta-narrative is something I cannot go with fully, even though I do feel there were
many things in early Christendom that were not necessarily the ultimate in what the Lord desired ---and one can go either
here ,
here ,
here or here in his book entitled
"The Forgotten Ways" for more on his view/where it has been critiqued.
Christianity of Antiquity looked radically different than how many today believe it to be - and no one reading the life of Constantine can say that his revolution didn't have alot of blood that went with it..and yet, as another wisely said to me before, God consistently "paints" using broken brushes. .
When looking at the people in scripture and the many ways they were messed up and yet used mightily for the Lord - simply in studying Hebrews 11 alone - it's odd to see how many of us may think the same isn't possible for others today.
Constantine made many mistakes and yet he was used greatly by the Lord to ensure that many things were made possible.
