Did the Chruch of Rome select writings for the Bible?

[Zzyzx]

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Did the Chruch of Rome select writings to be included in the Bible?

If so, might that indicate a bias toward writings that were acceptable to / in Rome and/or writings that were in accord with Roman practices and policies?

[historia]

This flatly contradicts your assertion that Christians were not persecuted for their beliefs.

Ohh really? where does it contradict what i said?

You said this:

News Flash, the Jesus Christians were probably never persecuted in the roman empire because of their faith.

In the video you referenced, Jones points out that, in the 3rd and 4th centuries, Christians were persecuted for refusing to worship other gods:

In the third and fourth centuries, Christians throughout the Roman world, even those in Egypt, suffered persecution. Their refusal to worship other gods and their persistence in flaunting their own beliefs created tensions and suspicions, and thousands were killed for their faith.

In other words, Christians were persecuted for their beliefs. That is a direct contradiction of what you said.

Yes they suffered persecution not because they were Christians but because they were Christians that did not agree with the Christians in power in Rome.

Basically they were heretics, they believed that Jesus did not die, some even that Jesus did not exist but was an allegory of how to live. The Gnostic Christians.

I'm afraid this is simply mistaken. What Jones is describing in the portion of the video cited above is, in part, the Diocletian Persecution of the early 4th Century. The Wikipedia article on this topic provides a succinct overview:

The Diocletianic or Great Persecution was the last and most severe persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. In 303, the Emperors Diocletian, Maximian, Galerius, and Constantius issued a series of edicts rescinding the legal rights of Christians and demanding that they comply with traditional Roman religious practices. Later edicts targeted the clergy and ordered all inhabitants to sacrifice to the Roman gods (a policy known as universal sacrifice).

The persecution varied in intensity across the empire"weakest in Gaul and Britain, where only the first edict was applied, and strongest in the Eastern provinces. Persecutory laws were nullified by different emperors at different times, but Constantine and Licinius's Edict of Milan (313) has traditionally marked the end of the persecution.

This persecution was directed at all Christians -- orthodox, Gnostics, or otherwise. But the Gnostics largely escaped persecution by giving in to Roman demands rather than facing martyrdom. Whereas orthodox Christians refused to give in and were killed for their faith.

In the documentary, Jones makes this very clear. Here is the quote from above again, now with added context:

The world of the early Christians was very, very different [from our own]. And there was one reason in particular why early orthodox Christian leaders wanted to believe that it was Jesus' victory over death that was the only path to salvation.

In the third and fourth centuries, Christians throughout the Roman world, even those in Egypt, suffered persecution. Their refusal to worship other gods and their persistence in flaunting their own beliefs created tensions and suspicions, and thousands were killed for their faith.

And for these Christians living in fear, there was one aspect of Jesus' life that in particular sustained them, and it was his suffering on the cross. But more importantly the knowledge that on the other side of that suffering lay redemption, the resurrection. Jesus was a role model. If he had suffered and been resurrected, then their own suffering had a purpose.

A gospel which placed no importance on Jesus' death and physical resurrection, like Thomas, was never going to provide reassurance to those facing martyrdom, and it's no surprise that Gnostic Christians were well known for not being prepared to die for their faith.

He is talking here about orthodox Christians being killed for their faith not Gnostics.

Both the Wikipedia article and the documentary make it clear orthodox Christians suffered persecution at the hands of Roman authorities in the 3rd and early 4th Century. So your assertion that this was only aimed at Gnostics is unfounded.

So their persecution was from other Christians that were supported by the roman empire not because of a 200 year old decree against the Messianic movement against Christians who refute the authority of Rome on earth.

I suspect you are conflating two different things here.

In the 3rd and early 4th Century -- before Constantine came to power -- the Roman government sporadically persecuted Christians. After Constantine came to power, he formally ended that persecution and elevated one sect of Christianity -- what we today call orthodox Christianity -- to a privileged position of power. Later, in the 4th and 5th centuries, under Constantine's successors, the government began persecuting Gnostics and other heretical Christian groups.

So it is true that orthodox Christians persecuted Gnostics, but only later. That is not what Jones is talking about in the clip above. He's talking about pagan persecution of Christians.

Jesus Christians accepted Rome's authority, while the Jewish messianic movement (Christians) did not, they declared war to Rome.

Basically all those that believed that a messiah sent by god would rise to defeat Rome had to be persecuted by the Romans.
But by 300 ad all those militaristic Christians were extinct, the Romans did a very good job at that, so the edict of Milan was issued to avoid any misunderstanding and for propaganda purposes.

You're making a lot of odd claims and using unusual terminology. If you want us to take any of these assertions seriously you're going to need to cite scholarly sources.

Nowhere in the video does he even mention Christian persecution because they were Christians and not pagans, he says their different beliefs.(gnostic rather then literalist)

He says very explicitly in the first quote I provided that Christians were persecuted for "refusing to worship other gods." That is the very definition of persecuting Christians for not being pagans.

[historia]

And if you can show some primary source wherein Constantine or another Roman emperor said this, I'd be happy to entertain your argument. Until then, you have no evidence to support your assertions. And therefore the rest of us have no good reason to believe your ramblings on this topic are anything other than wishful thinking.

This shows that you are haven't bothered to check out the entire Constantinian backstory. Perhaps you should do that before making such extraordinary claims.

I'm not making extraordinary claims. I'm simply asking you to support your assertions with evidence. If you have some, quote it here. If you can't, then I see no reason to take anything you say seriously.

Whether the Bible is true or not is completely irrelevant to the question of this thread, which concerns when, how, and who decided which texts should be included in the New Testament canon. Your argument here is simply fallacious.

This is cute: If the Roman Emperors placed what they wanted in the Bible, which personally is a default, seems highly relevant whether the Bible is true or not. Maybe it's just me.

The position I have expressed in this thread is not a "Christian" position. It does not require a belief that the Bible is "true." It is held by historians and scholars who are atheists and agnostics. It is based purely on the historical evidence.

[Willum]

[Replying to historia]

You know, I think that is what you want to say, however, the Bible is extraordinary claims.

However, as soon as you read the story of why Constantine began all this, being honest, you'll concede and present an apology. It is obvious your assertions are out of sync with history and the OP, thus far.

As a final note, I really think you should keep track of your posts, or at least not bounce my referrals to different posts of yours. Keep track of the conversation please, you've said many things, referring to other that the particular one under discussion is confusing to other readers.

[Tetragrammaton]

[Replying to post 41 by historia]

I do not deny that Christians might have been persecuted for other reasons, but the fact remains that Christians were not persecuted by Rome for being Christians, if they were their text would not have survived to this day just like the Jewish text of the Messianic movement Christians.

Jones or your opinion on the matter are irrelevant when you see that christian artifacts emerging in the late first/second century in Rome.
Facts speak for themselves much louder than anything else.

Especially when you find letters of bishops throughout the roman empire discussing things for 200+ years.

That cannot happen if they are persecuted because they are non pagans.

However if they were persecuted is because of political reason as I mentioned above.

If the church supported the wrong emperor rise to power and he died or did not make it to become emperor, the new emperor would persecute Christians with the excuse that they are"refusing to worship other gods."
Decius in 250 did issue edicts to make sure Rome is unified and he demanded sacrifice to the roman gods.
Some Christians refused to obey a roman edict, and thus they were punished for their insult to the emperor.
That is not persecution that is what happens when a fascist empire is insulted.
Again a political reason, that emerged from religious zeal since Jesus never said to not follow the laws of the state, but to give to Caesar what is of Caesar.

Again Jones is not discussing the issue of why they were truly persecuted, he just mentioned it. Where he is correct that they were persecuted for various reasons but not because they were Christians.
Being a christian was not banned from the roman empire like what you seem to imply.

What I meant to say is that Christians were not persecuted for their faith, but for other reasons which are apparent once one starts to see when they were persecuted and by who.

Go re-read my post I did say this.

"He says very explicitly in the first quote I provided that Christians were persecuted for "refusing to worship other gods." That is the very definition of persecuting Christians for not being pagans."

No, it is not, in the roman empire you could worship anybody you like but you had to at least acknowledged that the emperor was one of them, especially in the Julio Claudian period. Where the emperor was god.

Some Jews had problem with that and some declared war to Rome with a serious of messiahs(Christs). We call this the messianic movement a Christ movement.
They were called Christians by the Romans since they were the followers of a Christ/Messiah.

They were persecuted because they refused to accept that the emperor was god.
They were persecuted because of their faith that there is only 1 god.
They were banned in the roman empire for that reason.

In 250 Decius did not ban Christians, he just wanted the appropriate respect for Rome. Also these edicts were only in effect for 6 months so you cannot call this a persecution because he was dead before proper action was taken by the Romans to start to exercise their authority against those Christians.

"You're making a lot of odd claims and using unusual terminology. If you want us to take any of these assertions seriously you're going to need to cite scholarly sources. "

On which claim do you want scholarly sources?

May I remind you that the burden of proof is not on me.
I am not claiming that the Christians were persecuted in the roman empire as if they were banned to practice their faith like the messianic movement was.
The Church did make this claim.

I say it again, there is no evidence what so ever to support the claim that Christianity was considered illegal in the roman empire and thus persecuted.

What there is evidence of, is that anybody who disobeyed roman law was persecuted in the roman empire.
Believing in Christianity was not against roman law and thus they weren't persecuted for that reason.

If you ignore Eusebius claims there is really nothing to support the idea of a mass christian persecution what so ever, hell Christianity was so popular in the roman empire that it become the state religion in just 130 years after Decius edict.

Common sens tells you that that could not have happened if Christianity was persecuted as Eusebius claims.

Is Eusenius to be trusted as a historian that would tell us the actual events even if they were unfavorable for his objectives?

This is what he says:

"How far it may be proper to use falsehood
as a medium for the benefit of those
who require to be deceived;"
--- Eusebius Pamphilus of Caesarea, (circa 324)

[Tetragrammaton]

To answer the OP question.

One place to get an understanding of how the canon was selected one can read the research by Richard carrier on the subject which outlines and summarizes some well documented research on this subject.

https://infidels.org/library/modern/ric ... canon.html

[historia]

[Replying to Tetragrammaton]

Again, it seems to me you've presented us with a series of unsubstantiated assertions, many of which are, in my opinion, dubious. But, in the interest of not going further afield from the topic of the thread than we already have, let's focus on the main point of your post, on which I don't think we actually disagree:

Being a christian was not banned from the roman empire like what you seem to imply.

Let me be clear, no one here is implying that Christians were banned from the Roman Empire. That would be silly. Rather, I've simply challenged your assertion that Christians were never persecuted because of their faith.

The word "persecute" does not, of course, mean to ban or exterminate. It means "to pursue with harassing or oppressive treatment, especially because of religious or political beliefs."

As we've seen above, the Diocletian Persecution was a major example of Christians being persecuted because of their faith. You offered a second example of an earlier persecution under Decius:

Decius in 250 did issue edicts to make sure Rome is unified and he demanded sacrifice to the roman gods.

On both of these occasions, Roman officials (for a time) tried to enforce traditional Roman religious practices on the inhabitants of their district. They believed this was necessary to ensure the prosperity and safety of the Empire itself -- and, at least in the case of Diocletian, with the knowledge that such practices were expressly against Christian belief. Many Christians were beaten, imprisoned, or killed for refusing to engage in those practices.

I don't know what you would call that other than persecuting someone for their faith. To suggest this was just an "excuse" for some other (purely political) reason, without citing any evidence to support that assertion, makes for an unconvincing argument.

In the end, then, we have enough evidence to show your assertion that Christians were never persecuted for their faith is simply wrong.

[Willum]

[Replying to historia]

That's odd. I find them quite substantiated, substantiated and logical.
There you go again, making claims against your debating partners as if they were true.

[Tetragrammaton]

[Replying to post 46 by historia]

"In the end, then, we have enough evidence to show your assertion that Christians were never persecuted for their faith is simply wrong."

You misunderstood my assertion on purpose and even though I clarified it several times you keep going back to it instead, because you are in denial.

Let me say it again so we are clear:

"What I meant to say is that Christians were not persecuted for their faith, but for other reasons which are apparent once one starts to see when they were persecuted and by who. "

You ignored this point completely on purpose, we call that a straw-man.

Let me be clear, no one here is implying that Christians were banned from the Roman Empire.

Christians died only if they went against the roman law, that is the harsh fact you cannot deny.
And we both seem to agree that there was no roman law to ban Christians from the roman empire.

Now if there are parts of the theology which went against roman law and some Christians decided to act upon it, it does not mean that they were persecuted because they were Christians/non pagans but it means that they were persecuted because their version of Christianity was against roman law.

That means that it was either the very minority or the least favored by the empire and it did not survive through history, but the Christianity that we know today(the one I'm talking about) was never persecuted for their belief, since their belief conforms to roman law.

So Eusebius is lying and so is the church about Christianity being persecuted, it was their enemies that were persecuted, the ones with a different christian theology that were persecuted, probably because the church(of today) had a hand in it.

The word "persecute" does not, of course, mean to ban or exterminate.

It could mean yes.
The only way the Romans could persecute/exterminate a cult without fear of punishment is if the cult went against roman law.

The Romans were very superstitious and would punish severely anybody who does offenses against any god/cult unless the law said otherwise, since only the emperor/god had the authority to change that norm.

That is why every church was constantly trying to get the favor of the emperor through out history.

[help3434]

[Replying to historia]

That's odd. I find them quite substantiated, substantiated and logical.
There you go again, making claims against your debating partners as if they were true.

Then why didn't you substantiate them with historical evidence instead of trying to derail the subject and make it about religious belief instead of history?

[help3434]

[Replying to historia]

You know, I think that is what you want to say, however, the Bible is extraordinary claims.

What the heck does that have to do with how the Bible was canonized? NOTHING. That is what.

However, as soon as you read the story of why Constantine began all this, being honest, you'll concede and present an apology.

Huh? Began what? What story?

It is obvious your assertions are out of sync with history and the OP, thus far.

Obvious to who? Certainly not to me, a fellow non-theist. What assertions of historia's are out of sync with history?