Great Awakening: On July 7, 1731, Edwards preached in Boston the "Public Lecture" afterwards published under the title "God Glorified - in Man's Dependence," which was his first public attack on Arminianism. The emphasis of the lecture was on God's absolute sovereignty in the work of salvation: that while it behooved God to create man pure and without sin, it was of his "good pleasure" and "mere and arbitrary grace" for him to grant any person the faith necessary to incline him or her toward holiness; and that God might deny this grace without any disparagement to any of his character. -- In 1733, a religious revival began in Northampton and reached such intensity in the winter of 1734 and the following spring as to threaten the business of the town. In six months, nearly three hundred were admitted to the church. The revival gave Edwards an opportunity for studying the process of conversion in all its phases and varieties, and he recorded his observations with psychological minuteness and discrimination in A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God in the Conversion of Many Hundred Souls in Northampton (1737). A year later, he published Discourses on Various Important Subjects, the five sermons which had proved most effective in the revival, and of these, none, he tells us, was so immediately effective as that on the Justice of God in the Damnation of Sinners, from the text, "That every mouth may be stopped." Another sermon, published in 1734, A Divine and Supernatural Light, Immediately Imparted to the Soul by the Spirit of God set forth what he regarded as the inner, moving principle of the revival, the doctrine of a special grace in the immediate, and supernatural divine illumination of the soul. -- By 1735, the revival had spread-and popped up independently-across the Connecticut River Valley, and perhaps as far as New Jersey. However, criticism of the revival began, and many New Englanders feared that Edwards had led his flock into fanaticism. Over the summer of 1735, religious fervor took a dark turn. A number of New Englanders were shaken by the revivals but not converted, and became convinced of their inexorable damnation. Edwards wrote that "multitudes" felt urged-presumably by Satan-to take their own lives. At least two people committed suicide in the depths of their spiritual duress, one from Edwards's own congregation-his uncle, Joseph Hawley II. It is not known if any others took their own lives, but the suicide craze effectively ended the first wave of revival, except in some parts of Connecticut. -- However, despite these setbacks and the cooling of religious fervor, word of the Northampton revival and Edwards's leadership role had spread as far as England and Scotland. It was at this time that Edwards was acquainted with George Whitefield, who was traveling the Thirteen Colonies on a revival tour in 1739-1740. The two men may not have seen eye to eye on every detail-Whitefield was far more comfortable with the strongly emotional elements of revival than Edwards was-but they were both passionate about preaching the Gospel.They worked together to orchestrate Whitefield's trip, first through Boston, and then to Northampton. When Whitefield preached at Edwards's church in Northampton, he reminded them of the revival they had experienced just a few years before. This deeply touched Edwards, who wept throughout the entire service, and much of the congregation too was moved. Revival began to spring up again, and it was at this time that Edwards preached his most famous sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" in Enfield, Connecticut in 1741. This sermon has been widely reprinted as an example of "fire and brimstone" preaching in the colonial revivals, though the majority of Edwards's sermons were not this dramatic. Indeed, he used this style deliberately. As historian George Marsden put it, "Edwards could take for granted...that a New England audience knew well the Gospel remedy. The problem was getting them to seek it." -- **Sinners in the Hands of An Angry God, A Sermon Preached at Enfield, July 8, 1741, by Rev. Jonathan Edwards. Published at Boston, 1741 -- The movement met with opposition from conservative Congregationalist ministers. In 1741, Edwards published in its defense The Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God, dealing particularly with the phenomena most criticized: the swoonings, outcries and convulsions. These "bodily effects," he insisted, were not distinguishing marks of the work of the Spirit of God one way or another; but so bitter was the feeling against the revival in the more strictly Puritan churches that, in 1742, he was forced to write a second apology, Thoughts on the Revival in New England, his main argument being the great moral improvement of the country. In the same pamphlet, he defends an appeal to the emotions, and advocates preaching terror when necessary, even to children, who in God's sight "are young vipers… if not Christ's." He considers "bodily effects" incidental to the real work of God, but his own mystic devotion and the experiences of his wife during the Awakening (which he gives in detail) make him think that the divine visitation usually overpowers the body, a view in support of which he quotes Scripture. In reply to Edwards, Charles Chauncy wrote Seasonable Thoughts on the State of Religion in New England in 1743 and anonymously penned The Late Religious Commotions in New England Considered in the same year. In these works he urged conduct as the sole test of conversion; and the general convention of Congregational ministers in the Province of Massachusetts Bay protested "against disorders in practice which have of late obtained in various parts of the land." -- In spite of Edwards's able pamphlet, the impression had become widespread that "bodily effects" were recognized by the promoters of the Great Awakening as the true tests of conversion. To offset this feeling, Edwards preached at Northampton, during the years 1742 and 1743, a series of sermons published under the title of Religious Affections (1746), a restatement in a more philosophical and general tone of his ideas as to "distinguishing marks." In 1747, he joined the movement started in Scotland called the "concert in prayer," and in the same year published An Humble Attempt to Promote Explicit Agreement and Visible Union of God's People in Extraordinary Prayer for the Revival of Religion and the Advancement of Christ's Kingdom on Earth. In 1749, he published a memoir of David Brainerd who had lived with his family for several months and had died at Northampton in 1747. Brainerd had been constantly attended by Edwards's daughter Jerusha, to whom he was rumored to have been engaged to be married, though there is no surviving evidence for this. In the course of elaborating his theories of conversion Edwards used Brainerd and his ministry as a case study, making extensive notes of his conversions and confessions.

Doctrines and theology: The 20th century Wesley scholar Albert Outler argued in his introduction to the 1964 collection John Wesley that Wesley developed his theology by using a method that Outler termed the Wesleyan Quadrilateral. In this method, Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in Scripture; and the Bible was the sole foundational source of theological or doctrinal development. The centrality of Scripture was so important for Wesley that he called himself "a man of one book"-meaning the Bible-although he was well-read for his day. However, he believed that doctrine had to be in keeping with Christian orthodox tradition. So, tradition was considered the second aspect of the Quadrilateral. -- Wesley contended that a part of the theological method would involve experiential faith. In other words, truth would be vivified in personal experience of Christians (overall, not individually), if it were really truth. And every doctrine must be able to be defended rationally. He did not divorce faith from reason. Tradition, experience and reason, however, were subject always to Scripture, Wesley argued, because only there is the Word of God revealed "so far as it is necessary for our salvation." -- The doctrines which Wesley emphasised in his sermons and writings are prevenient grace, present personal salvation by faith, the witness of the Spirit, and sanctification. Prevenient grace was the theological underpinning of his belief that all persons were capable of being saved by faith in Christ. Unlike the Calvinists of his day, Wesley did not believe in predestination, that is, that some persons had been elected by God for salvation and others for damnation. He understood that Christian orthodoxy insisted that salvation was only possible by the sovereign grace of God. He expressed his understanding of humanity's relationship to God as utter dependence upon God's grace. God was at work to enable all people to be capable of coming to faith by empowering humans to have actual existential freedom of response to God. -- Wesley defined the witness of the Spirit as: "an inward impression on the soul of believers, whereby the Spirit of God directly testifies to their spirit that they are the children of God." He based this doctrine upon certain Biblical passages (see Romans 8:15-16 as an example). This doctrine was closely related to his belief that salvation had to be "personal." In his view, a person must ultimately believe the Good News for himself or herself; no one could be in relation to God for another. -- Sanctification he described in 1790 as the "grand depositum which God has lodged with the people called `Methodists'." Wesley taught that sanctification was obtainable after justification by faith, between justification and death. He did not contend for "sinless perfection"; rather, he contended that a Christian could be made "perfect in love". (Wesley studied Eastern Orthodoxy and particularly the doctrine of Theosis). This love would mean, first of all, that a believer's motives, rather than being self-centred, would be guided by the deep desire to please God. One would be able to keep from committing what Wesley called, "sin rightly so-called." By this he meant a conscious or intentional breach of God's will or laws. A person could still be able to sin, but intentional or wilful sin could be avoided. -- Secondly, to be made perfect in love meant, for Wesley, that a Christian could live with a primary guiding regard for others and their welfare. He based this on Christ's quote that the second great command is "to love your neighbour as you love yourself." In his view, this orientation would cause a person to avoid any number of sins against his neighbour. This love, plus the love for God that could be the central focus of a person's faith, would be what Wesley referred to as "a fulfilment of the law of Christ." Wesley believed that this doctrine should be constantly preached, especially among the people called Methodists. In fact, he contended that the purpose of the Methodist movement was to "spread scriptural holiness across England." -- Advocacy of Arminianism: Wesley entered controversies as he tried to enlarge church practice. The most notable of his controversies was that on Calvinism. His father was of the Arminian school in the church. Wesley came to his own conclusions while in college and expressed himself strongly against the doctrines of Calvinistic election and reprobation. -- Whitefield inclined to Calvinism. In his first tour in America, he embraced the views of the New England School of Calvinism. When in 1739 Wesley preached a sermon on Freedom of Grace, attacking the Calvinistic understanding of predestination as blasphemous, as it represented "God as worse than the devil," Whitefield asked him not to repeat or publish the discourse, as he did not want a dispute. Wesley published his sermon anyway. Whitefield was one of many who responded. The two men separated their practice in 1741. Wesley wrote that those who held to unlimited atonement did not desire separation, but "those who held 'particular redemption' would not hear of any accommodation." -- Whitefield, Harris, Cennick, and others, became the founders of Calvinistic Methodism. Whitefield and Wesley, however, were soon back on friendly terms, and their friendship remained unbroken although they travelled different paths. In 1770 the controversy broke out anew with violence and bitterness, as people's view of God related to their views of men and their possibilities. Augustus Montague Toplady, Rowland, Richard Hill, and others were engaged on the one side, and Wesley and Fletcher on the other. Toplady was editor of The Gospel Magazine, which had articles covering the controversy. In 1778 Wesley began the publication of The Arminian Magazine, not, he said, to convince Calvinists, but to preserve Methodists. He wanted to teach the truth that "God willeth all men to be saved." A "lasting peace" could be secured in no other way. His system of thought has become known as Wesleyan Arminianism, the foundations of which were laid by Wesley and Fletcher.

The Wesley family was made famous by the two brothers, John and Charles, who worked together in the rise of Methodism in the British Isles during the 18th century. They were among the ten children surviving infancy born to Samuel Wesley (1662 - 1735), Anglican rector of Epworth, Lincolnshire, and Susanna Annesley Wesley, daughter of Samuel Annesley, a dissenting minister. -- John Wesley was born June 28, 1703, died Mar. 2, 1791, and was the principal founder of the Methodist movement. His mother was important in his emotional and educational development. John's education continued at Charterhouse School and at Oxford, where he studied at Christ Church and was elected (1726) fellow of Lincoln College. He was ordained in 1728. -- After a brief absence (1727 - 29) to help his father at Epworth, John returned to Oxford to discover that his brother Charles had founded a Holy Club composed of young men interested in spiritual growth. John quickly became a leading participant of this group, which was dubbed the Methodists. His Oxford days introduced him not only to the rich tradition of classical literature and philosophy but also to spiritual classics like Thomas a Kempis's Imitation of Christ, Jeremy Taylor's Holy Living and Dying, and William Law's Serious Call. -- In 1735 both Wesleys accompanied James Oglethorpe to the new colony of Georgia, where John's attempts to apply his then high-church views aroused hostility. Discouraged, he returned (1737) to England; he was rescued from this discouragement by the influence of the Moravian preacher Peter Boehler. At a small religious meeting in Aldersgate Street, London, on May 24, 1738, John Wesley had an experience in which his "heart was strangely warmed." After this spiritual conversion, which centered on the realization of salvation by faith in Christ alone, he devoted his life to evangelism. Beginning in 1739 he established Methodist societies throughout the country. He traveled and preached constantly, especially in the London-Bristol-Newcastle triangle, with frequent forays into Wales, Ireland, and Scotland. He encountered much opposition and persecution, which later subsided. -- Late in life Wesley married Mary Vazeille, a widow. He continued throughout his life a regimen of personal discipline and ordered living. He died at 88, still preaching, still traveling, and still a clergyman of the Church of England. In 1784, however, he had given the Methodist societies a legal constitution, and in the same year he ordained Thomas Coke for ministry in the United States; this action signaled an independent course for Methodism.

George Whitefield and John Wesley did not see eye-to-eye on a theology of grace however. In 1740 Wesley published "Free Grace," saying that God's grace was extended to all. Wesley rejected the concept of divine election. Whitefield was a Calvinist. He once wrote, "God, himself, I find, teaches my friends the doctrine of election. If I mistake not, my dear and honored Mr. Wesley will hereafter be convinced of it also." -- The two men were never to agree on divine election. Whitefield thought Wesley's was preaching universal redemption whereas Wesley thought Whitefield's preaching implied Christians need not take moral responsibility. They parted ways but managed, in the end, to maintain a respect for each other in that their hearts were the same in terms of unity in Jesus Christ. After Whitefield's death, John Wesley preached a memorial sermon. -- Wesley said: "Let my last end be like his!" How many of you join in this wish? Perhaps there are few of you who do not, even in this numerous congregation! And O that this wish may rest upon your minds! - that it may not die away till your souls also are lodged "where the wicked cease from troubling, and where the weary are at rest!"

But this book by Johnson and Vanvonderen is different. Drawing upon years of ministry experience as pastor and counselor (respectively), they examine the fine line between Biblical leadership and abuse. Without mentioning groups or demonizing those involved, they discuss how well-intentioned leadership can have abusive effects. This "high road" approach is highly helpful in identifying some of the critical factors that have led to harsh and harmful leadership in churches. -- Marks of a Spiritually Unhealthy Environment: For example, the authors identify the marks of a spiritually unhealthy system. I'd like to include these here as a sample of how the authors address these issues. (The following consists of verbatim citations of copyrighted material from Chapter 5,6 of "The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse.") -- 1. Power-Posturing: Power-posturing simply means leaders spend a lot of time focused on their own authority and reminding others of it, as well. They spend a lot of energy posturing about how much authority they have and how much everyone else is supposed to submit to it. The fact that they are eager to place people under them-- under their word, under their "authority"-- is one easy-to-spot clue that they are operating in their own authority. -- 2. Performance Preoccupation: In abusive spiritual systems, power is postured and authority is legislated. Therefore, these systems are preoccupied with the performance of their members. Obedience and submission are two important words often used. The way to tell if someone is doing the right thing for the wrong reason is if they are keeping track of it. Let's say that another way. If obedience and service is flowing out of you as a result of your own dependence on God alone, you won't keep track of it with an eye toward reward, you'll just do it. But if you're preoccupied with whether you've done enough to please God, then you're not looking at Him, you're looking at your own works. And you're also concerned about who else might be looking at you, evaluating you. What would anyone keep track of their godly behavior unless they were trying to earn spiritual points because of it? For many reasons, followers sometimes obey or follow orders to avoid being shamed, to gain someone's approval, or to keep their spiritual status or position intact. This is not true obedience or submission, it is compliant self-seeking. When behavior is simply legislated from the outside, instead of coming from a heart that loves God, it cannot be called obedience. It is merely weak compliance to some form of external pressure. -- 3. Unspoken Rules: In abusive spiritual systems, people's lives are controlled from the outside in by rules, spoken and unspoken. Unspoken rules are those that govern unhealthy churches or families but are not said out loud. Because they are not said out loud, you don't find out that they're there until you break them. The most powerful of all unspoken rules in the abusive system is what we have already termed the "can't talk" rule. The "can't talk" [rule] has this thinking behind it: "The real problem cannot be exposed because then it would have to be dealt with and things would have to change; so it must be protected behind walls of silence (neglect) or by assault (legalistic attack). If you speak about the problem, you are the problem. -- 4. Lack of Balance: The fourth characteristic of a spiritual abusive system is an unbalanced approach to living out the truth of the Christian life. This shows itself in two extremes: Extreme Objectivism - The first extreme is an empirical approach to life, which elevates objective truth to the exclusion of valid subjective experience. This approach to spirituality creates a system in which authority is based upon the level of education and intellectual capacity alone, rather than on intimacy with God, obedience and sensitivity to His Spirit. Extreme Subjectivism - The other manifestation of lack of balance is seen in an extremely subjective approach to the Christian life. What is true is decided on the basis of feelings and experiences, giving more weight to them than what the Bible declares. In this system, people can't know or understand truths (even if they really do understand or know them) until the leaders "receive them by spiritual revelation from the Lord" and "impart" them to the people. In such systems, it is more important to act according to the word of a leader who has "a word" for you than to act according to what you know to be true from Scripture, or simply from your spiritual growth-history. As with the extreme objective approach, Christians who are highly subjective also have a view of education-- most often, that education is bad or unnecessary. There is almost a pride in not being educated, and a disdain for those who are. Everything that is needed is taught through the Holy Spirit. ("After all, Peter and Timothy didn't go to college or seminary...") -- 5. Paranoia: In the church that is spiritually abusive, there is a sense, spoken or unspoken, that "others will not understand what we're all about, so let's not let them know-- that way they won't be able to ridicule or persecute us." There is an assumption that (1) what we say, know, or do is a result of our being more enlightened that others; (2) others will not understand unless they become one of us; and (3) others will respond negatively. In a place where authority is grasped and legislated, not simply demonstrated, persecution sensitivity builds a case for keeping everything within the system. Why? Because of the evil, dangerous, or unspiritual people outside of the system who are trying to weaken or destroy "us." This mentality builds a strong wall or bunker around the abusive system, isolates the abusers from scrutiny and accountability, and makes it more difficult for people to leave-- because they will then be outsiders too. While it is true that there is a world of evil outside of the system, there is also good out there. But people are misled into thinking that the only safety is in the system. Ironically, Jesus and Paul both warned that one of the worst dangers to the flock was from wolves in the house (Matthew 10:16, Acts 20:29-30). -- 6. Misplaced Loyalty: The next characteristic of spiritually abusive systems is that a misplaced sense of loyalty is fostered and even demanded. We're not talking about loyalty to Christ, but about loyalty to a given organization, church, or leader. Once again, because authority is assumed or legislated (and therefore not real), following must be legislated as well. A common way this is accomplished is by setting up a system where disloyalty to or disagreement with the leadership is construed as the same thing as disobeying God. Questioning leaders is equal to questioning God. "We Alone Are Right" There are three factors that come into place here, adding up to a misplaced loyalty. First, leadership projects a "we alone are right" mentality, which permeates the system. Members must remain in the system if they want to be "safe," or to stay "on good terms" with God, or not be viewed as wrong or "backslidden." - Scare Tactics - The second factor that brings about misplaced loyalty is the use of "scare tactics." We're already seen this in some of the paranoia described in the last section. Scare tactics are more serious. This is more than just the risk of being polluted by the world. We have counseled many Christians who, after deciding to leave their church, were told horrifying things. "God is going to withdraw His Spirit from you and your family." "God will destroy your business." "Without our protection, Satan will get your children." "You and your family will come under a curse." This is spiritual blackmail and it's abuse. And it does cause people to stay in abusive places. - Humiliation - The third method of calling forth misplaced loyalty is the threat of humiliation. This is done by publicly shaming, exposing, or threatening to remove people from the group. Unquestionably, there is a place for appropriate church discipline. In the abusive system, it is the fear of being exposed, humiliated or removed that insures your proper allegiance, and insulates those in authority. You can be "exposed" for asking too many questions, for disobeying the unspoken rules, or for disagreeing with authority. People are made public examples in order to send a message to those who remain. Others have phone campaigns launched against them, to warn their friends and others in the group about how "dangerous" they are. -- 7. Secretive: When you see people in a religious system being secretive-- watch out. People don't hide what is appropriate; they hide what is inappropriate. One reason spiritual abusive families and churches are secretive is because they are so image conscious. People in these systems can't even live up to their own performance standards, so they have to hide what is real. Some believe they must do this to protect God's good name. So how things look and what others think becomes more important than what's real. They become God's "public relations agents." The truth is, He's not hiring anyone for this position. Another reason for secrecy in a church is that the leadership has a condescending, negative view of the laity. This results in conspiracies on the leadership level. They tell themselves, "People are not mature enough to handle truth." This is patronizing at best. Conspiracies also develop among the lay people. Since it is not all right [sic] to notice or talk about problems, people form conspiracies behind closed doors and over the telephone as they try to solve things informally. But since they have no authority, they solve, and solve, and solve-- but nothing really gets solved. And all the while, building God's true kingdom is put on hold. -- Conclusion: I hope that what I have cited gets your attention and motivates you to read this book. The subtle patterns of unhealthy characteristics are discussed in a way that actually helps people identify them, resist them, and recover from them. Copyright © 2000 John Engler. All rights reserved. The Barnabas Ministry

Reaching4Truth says: January 3, 2012 at 3:01 pm -- Hanna, you said: "I still keep my hopes up that we will find a church, but as I have said before..in our town it is all about who can have the biggest church, who can draw the largest crowd, who can own more hotels and claim more territory on the monopoly board. People have no idea what the Pastor is purchasing in terms of real estate and investments, and they don't really even care because they trust him completely." -- This is not just a phenomenon in your town, but is widespread everywhere. Because in this era, pastors have been given celebrity status and encouraged to build their kingdoms, their resume, on ideas borrowed from the business realm. Over time they've been seduced by numerous voices from without and within the evangelical world, to produce measurably "effective" and "successful" ministries.. Pursuing and inculcating worldly business values and methodologies and wrongly applying them to the church and the realm of ministry. And basically it turns out to be an abandonment of their allegiance to the Lord in exchange for the approval of men and the respect of men, both in the church and in the world. -- Pastors and ministry leaders have been seduced by things appealing to their pride to pursue accomplishments and a measure of renown - respectability - for themselves. To be someone that others in the community (church and beyond) look up to and speak well of. -- Through many avenues and means, Christian pastors and ministry leaders have received worldly advice dressed up in acceptable Christian language, and coming from trusted "christian" sources. I employ the quotes because to look at the nature of what has come to be accepted as wise Christian insight and counsel, through resources such as Leadership Journal and Christianity Today, just to name two among a plethora of resources with a large readership among pastors, is to find, if one compares the "wisdom" offered from such sources, they wander quite a distance from sound spiritual wisdom or true compatibility with the word of God. -- Our pastors have been drinking from poisoned wells, even from what have been in the past trusted Christian sources. But, minus the requisite discretion and discernment that is expected of those we trust, a scourge has set upon the churches. Having listened to and consulted the voices of so many Pied Pipers in the business realm, there is very little left now of truly Holy Spirit-inspired leadership. We have been in the business of exchanging the truth of God for a lie for so long that we can barely distinguish the difference. Church and ministry leaders, in their efforts to win the worldly (yes I mean "worldly") to Christ through clever means, have drunk deeply from the wells of "vain philosophy and empty deceit". And we are sadly observing the results of that exchange. -- Clever wolves have entered in, and/or risen up from our midst, and had their effect upon the churches. I have observed with great sadness and sobriety the Christian establishment being given over to a host of clever lies and the spirit of the world. -- And hero worship has had a lot to do with it. A WHOLE lot to do with it. I think it's for lack of (or for need of) a hero in our lives that we (pastors and their flocks) have become worshippers of admired Christian men, inclined to enshrine them in a sort of "holy glow" - a sort of spiritual 'static' where we assume they will always and forever continue in a faithful path, as if they can do no wrong and, like their Lord, were immaculately conceived of the Holy Spirit. -- We have been, the whole lot of us - pastors and others alike - led onto deceptive paths because of having given our unquestioning trust to men with feet of clay. I believe we have entered a time of the Lord cleaning house, and waking His people up from a long slumber, a longer slumber than we would guess, wherein the enemy has now effectively infiltrated the mustard tree and overspread the churches. -- Jesus was careful to warn us that these days would come, and tremendous deception all around us was given as a key sign of the nearness of His return. He led with "See to it THAT NO MAN DECEIVES YOU." It was much more a matter of having our eyes/hearts exercised to recognize cleverly cloaked deception and delusion than it was ever a call to make an idol of earthly Jerusalem, for instance. JESUS is to be our focus; ALWAYS JESUS. We were instructed not to put our trust in man, but only IN HIM. -- So… pastors are to blame, for having wandered from the scriptures as their sole source of spiritual light, life and guidance, and succumbing to spiritual blindness… but so are we. We are living in a time of strong hero worship, leading to strong delusion, with sobering effect. The sooner we return our affection to the LORD and away from faulty leaders, the better for all of us. -- Chuck Smith is simply one example of what hero worship - the desire to elevate a hero in our midst (besides Jesus) can lead to. By giving our indiscriminate trust to men we admire, we forget that they can be just as prone to sin and error as the rest of us. The mercy of God is a great need in all of our lives, and our relationship with Him is to be first and foremost. I need these reminders as much as the next person. --- Lord, I'm thankful for your MERCY and your GREAT, GREAT kindness to us. Help us wind our way out of this mess we find ourselves in and into singlehearted allegiance to You and affection for your word. Clean us up and restore the broken places? and rekindle our love for YOU.

Did the Denominational name begin on shaky ground? At the beginning of TCotN [The Church of the Nazarene] both Phineas Bresee and Joseph Widney were made general superintendent "for life". This info is from the book by Carl Bangs "Phineas F. Bresee", 1995, Beacon Hill Press of Kansas City. p. 196-197; He goes on to write that the naming of the Church was the work of Joseph Widney. "For Widney, the name "Church of the Nazarene" conveyed nothing explicit about the Methodist doctrine or the experiences of conversion and entire sanctification. It was much more an expression of late-nineteenth-century "Jesus of history" theology, which preferred the name "Jesus" to the more exalted name "Jesus Christ." The "Jesus of history" was not so much the eternal Second Person of the Trinity who on the Cross made a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world," as He was the human Person remembered for words and deeds whom Christians were to follow as Teacher and Example. Widney's subsequent religious pilgrimage bears out the connoation of low Christology, and also low ecclesiology, that the term suggested." It is suggested that Bresee accepted the Name because he did not know Widney's true theology. To Bresee the name "Nazarene" represented Jesus association with the common man. So what was the outcome with Widney? He became increasing seperated from the Nazarenes and eventually started his own church. "He wrote a number of books on the borderline of politics, history, and culture. These were laced with mysticism and with a core theme of Aryan racial theory (Q. Nazism?). He developed a syncetistic religion followed by relatives and friends in his privately built "Beth-El", A Chapel and Manse of the Church of the All-Father" (or "All Fader")." (P. 214). Notice that this was not someone outside the Naz. throwing mud. This was published by Beacon Hill. Are we seeing sowing and reaping? It is amazing to me how quickly things seemed to change. Yet as we see from the origins our name, one of our first Generals began on shaky ground. -- posted by Robert Bruce Fruehling at 'Concerned Nazarenes' Facebook Page

Here you will find articles by or about George Muller, the man of faith, to encourage you to trust God for great things and to deepen your walk with God. We trust you will be encouraged to trust in the prayer-answering God for your needs. The Bible says "For all the promises of God in Him (Christ) are yea, and in Him (Christ) Amen, unto the glory of God by us" (2 Cor. 1:20) and "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and forever" (Heb. 13:8).

Early life: John Newton was born in Wapping, London, in 1725, the son of John Newton Sr., a shipmaster in the Mediterranean service, and Elizabeth Newton (née Seatclife), a Nonconformist Christian. His mother died of tuberculosis in July, 1732, about two weeks before his seventh birthday. Two years later, he went to live in Aveley, the home of his father's new wife. Newton spent two years at boarding school. At age eleven he went to sea with his father. Newton sailed six voyages before his father retired in 1742. Newton's father made plans for him to work at a sugar plantation in Jamaica. Instead, Newton signed on with a merchant ship sailing to the Mediterranean Sea. In 1743, while on the way to visit some friends, Newton was captured and pressed into the naval service by the Royal Navy. He became a midshipman aboard HMS Harwich. At one point, Newton attempted to desert and was punished in front of the crew of 350. Stripped to the waist, tied to the grating, he received a flogging of one dozen lashes, and was reduced to the rank of a common seaman. Following that disgrace and humiliation, Newton initially contemplated suicide. He recovered, both physically and mentally. Later, while Harwich was on route to India, he transferred to Pegasus, a slave ship bound for West Africa. The ship carried goods to Africa, and traded them for slaves to be shipped to England and other countries. Newton proved to be a continual problem for the crew of Pegasus. They left him in West Africa with Amos Clowe, a slave dealer. Clowe took Newton to the coast, and gave him to his wife Princess Peye, an African duchess. Newton was abused and mistreated along with her other slaves. It was this period that Newton later remembered as the time he was "once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in West Africa." Early in 1748 he was rescued by a sea captain who had been asked by Newton's father to search for him. And he made it to freedom. In 1750 he married his childhood sweetheart in St. Margaret's Church, Rochester. -- Spiritual conversion: He sailed back to England in 1748 aboard the merchant ship Greyhound, which was carrying beeswax and dyer's wood, now referred to as camwood. During this voyage, he experienced a spiritual conversion. The ship encountered a severe storm off the coast of Donegal and almost sank. Newton awoke in the middle of the night and finally called out to God as the ship filled with water. After he called out, the cargo came out and stopped up the hole, and the ship was able to drift to safety. It was this experience which he later marked as the beginnings of his conversion to evangelical Christianity. As the ship sailed home, Newton began to read the Bible and other religious literature. By the time he reached Britain, he had accepted the doctrines of evangelical Christianity. The date was March 10, 1748, an anniversary he marked for the rest of his life. From that point on, he avoided profanity, gambling, and drinking. Although he continued to work in the slave trade, he had gained a considerable amount of sympathy for the slaves. He later said that his true conversion did not happen until some time later: "I cannot consider myself to have been a believer in the full sense of the word, until a considerable time afterwards." Newton returned to Liverpool, England and, partly due to the influence of his father's friend Joseph Manesty, obtained a position as first mate aboard the slave ship Brownlow, bound for the West Indies via the coast of Guinea. During the first leg of this voyage, while in west Africa (1748-1749), Newton acknowledged the inadequacy of his spiritual life. While he was sick with a fever, he professed his full belief in Christ and asked God to take control of his destiny. He later said that this experience was his true conversion and the turning point in his spiritual life. He claimed it was the first time he felt totally at peace with God. Still, he did not renounce the slave trade until later in his life. After his return to England in 1750, he made three further voyages as captain of the slave-trading ships Duke of Argyle (1750) and African (1752-1753 and 1753-1754). He only gave up seafaring and his active slave-trading activities in 1754, after suffering a severe stroke, but continued to invest his savings in Manesty's slaving operations." -- Anglican priest: In 1755 Newton became tide surveyor (a tax collector) of the port of Liverpool, again through the influence of Manesty. In his spare time, he was able to study Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac. He became well known as an evangelical lay minister. In 1757, he applied to be ordained as a priest in the Church of England, but it was more than seven years before he was eventually accepted. Such was his frustration during this period of rejection that he also applied to the Methodists, Independents and Presbyterians, and applications were even mailed directly to the Bishops of Chester and Lincoln and the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. -- Writer and hymnist: The vicarage in Olney where Newton wrote the hymn that would become "Amazing Grace". In 1767 William Cowper, the poet, moved to Olney. He worshipped in the church, and collaborated with Newton on a volume of hymns, which was eventually published as Olney Hymns in 1779. This work had a great influence on English hymnology. The volume included Newton's well-known hymns "Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken", "How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds!", "Let Us Love, and Sing, and Wonder", "Come, My Soul, Thy Suit Prepare", "Approach, My Soul, the Mercy-seat", and "Faith's Review and Expectation", which has come to be known by its opening phrase, "Amazing Grace". Many of Newton's (as well as Cowper's) hymns are preserved in the Sacred Harp. He also contributed to the Cheap Repository Tracts.

At age 15 Bach joined the choir at St. Michael's church. At age 19 Bach left St. Michael's and became a professional organist at St. Boniface. Bach studied music until 1703. In 1707, when Bach was 22 he married his cousin Maria Barbara. Maria had 7 children with Bach. Three of them died. In 1716, when Bach was thirty-one, he was put in jail for thirty-one days because people didn't believe that he shouldn't be writing that kind of music at that time. In those 31 days, Bach wrote five to ten musicals. Those five to ten musicals he wrote when he was in jail turned into two hundred musicals. In 1717 Bach became the court conductor at Anhalt-Cothen. 14 years later in 1721 Maria died leaving Bach to take care of four children. Bach was thirty-six at this time. One year later when Bach was thirty-seven in 1722 he married another woman. This woman's name was Anna Magdalina. Anna had thirteen children. ... Bach wrote 300 religious and nonreligious pieces called cantatas. Some people think that bach was the best composer of all time. Bach was a very religious man. Bach showed his religions in his music. Bach joined an orchestra at Weimar as a violinist. His home town was famous for music. One time when Bach was young, he walked thirty-five miles to a town named Hamburg to hear a concert.

Grace Abounding To the Chief of Sinners is John Bunyan's spiritual autobiography. In it he tells of his conversion and struggle with faith. He wrote it while he was imprisoned for preaching without a license. His main issue was a kind of "spiritual obsessive compulsive disorder" as one reviewer puts it. Bunyan was constantly concerned about the state of his salvation and whether God deemed him worthy enough for eternal life. This story communicates the author's anguish over his sin, his confession, and the life-changing impact of God's saving grace. Bunyan's spiritual struggles will remind readers that even the great minds of faith had issues with belief, and his personal testimony will encourage anyone who is doubting the status of their salvation.

"WOW - what a great series!!" A couple years ago I followed the journey of the early church by a comprehensive study of the Acts of the Apostles, etc., and have wanted to fill in the gap of church history from that time to present, but don't have much time to read. I like to listen to sermons on the treadmill and in the tractor, so I searched for a series on church history. I found the first 3 and did extra time on the treadmill today so I could keep listening! Pastor Phillips has a way of telling the facts in a very interesting way and then finishes with application and lessons for today. After the 3rd sermon (on Augustine) I really wanted to hear more so I searched again. I was THRILLED to find 39 messages on church history by Pastor Phillips!! I plan to download all of them since spring seeding is coming up and I will be spending many hours in the tractor, and now I am looking forward to that! In the meantime, I'll keep at the treadmill. Thanks for posting all those great sermons!

Imprisonments: As his popularity and notoriety grew, Bunyan increasingly became a target for slander and libel; he was described as "a witch, a Jesuit, a highwayman" and was said to have mistresses and multiple wives. In 1658, aged 30, he was arrested for preaching at Eaton Socon and indicted for preaching without a licence. That same year his wife died leaving him with 4 children, one of which was blind. He continued preaching, however, and did not suffer imprisonment until November 1660, when he was taken to the County gaol in Silver Street, Bedford. In that same year, Bunyan married again, Elizabeth, by whom he had two more children, Sarah and Joseph. The Restoration of the monarchy by Charles II of England began Bunyan's persecution as England returned to Anglicanism. Meeting-houses were quickly closed and all citizens were required to attend their Anglican parish church. It became punishable by law to "conduct divine service except in accordance with the ritual of the church, or for one not in Episcopal orders to address a congregation." Thus, John Bunyan no longer had that freedom to preach which he had enjoyed under the Puritan Commonwealth. He was arrested on 12 November 1660, whilst preaching privately in Lower Samsell by Harlington, Bedfordshire, 10 miles south of Bedford. -- John was brought before the magistrate John Wingate at Harlington House and refused to desist from preaching. Wingate sent him to Bedford County Gaol, to consider his situation. After a month, Bunyan reports (in his own account of his imprisonment) that Wingate's clerk visited him, seeking to get him to change his mind. The clerk said that all the authorities wanted was for Bunyan to undertake not to preach at private gatherings, as it was suspected that these non-conformist meetings were in fact being used by people plotting against the king. In answer to the clerk, John argued that God's law obliged him to preach at any and every opportunity, and refused to consider the suggested compromise. -- In January 1661, Bunyan was brought before the quarter sessions in the Chapel of Herne, Bedford. His prosecutor, Mr. Justice Wingate, despite Bunyan's clear breaches of the Religion Act of 1592, was not inclined to incarcerate Bunyan. But John's stark statement "If you release me today, I will preach tomorrow" left the magistrates - Sir John Kelynge of Southill, Sir Henry Chester of Lidlington, Sir George Blundell of Cardington, Sir Wllm Beecher of Howbury and Thomas Snagg of Milbrook - with no choice but to imprison him. So Bunyan was incarcerated for 3 months for the crimes of "pertinaciously abstaining" from attending mandatory Anglican church services and preaching at "unlawful meetings". -- Strenuous efforts were made by Bunyan's wife to get his case re-heard at the spring assizes but Bunyan's continued assertions that he would, if freed, preach to his awaiting congregation meant that the magistrates would not consider any new hearing. Similar efforts were made in the following year but, again, to no avail. In early 1664, an Act of Parliament the Conventicles Act made it illegal to hold religious meetings of five or more people outside of the auspices of the Church of England. -- It was during his time in Bedford County Gaol that John Bunyan conceived his allegorical novel: The Pilgrim's Progress. (Many scholars however believe that he commenced this work during the second and shorter imprisonment of 1675, referred to below.) Bunyan's incarceration was punctuated with periods of relative freedom - lax gaolers allowing him out to attend church meetings and to minister to his congregation. -- In 1666, John was briefly released for a few weeks before being re-arrested for preaching and sent back to Bedford's County gaol, where he remained for a further six years. During that time, he wove shoelaces to support his family and preached to his fellow prisoners - a congregation of about sixty. In his possession were two books, John Foxe's Book of Martyrs, the Bible, a violin he had made out of tin, a flute he'd made from a chair leg and a supply of pen and paper. Both music and writing were integral to John's Puritan faith. John Bunyan was released in January 1672, when Charles II issued the Declaration of Religious Indulgence.

Bunyan began his work while in the Bedfordshire county gaol [jail] for violations of the Conventicle Act, which prohibited the holding of religious services outside the auspices of the established Church of England. Early Bunyan scholars like John Brown believed The Pilgrim's Progress was begun in Bunyan's second shorter imprisonment for six months in 1675, but more recent scholars like Roger Sharrock believe that it was begun during Bunyan's initial, more lengthy imprisonment from 1660-1672 right after he had written his spiritual autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. -- The English text comprises 108,260 words and is divided into two parts, each reading as a continuous narrative with no chapter divisions. The first part was completed in 1677 and entered into the stationers' register on December 22, 1677. It was licensed and entered in the "Term Catalogue" on February 18, 1678, which is looked upon as the date of first publication. After the first edition of the first part in 1678, an expanded edition, with additions written after Bunyan was freed, appeared in 1679. The Second Part appeared in 1684. There were eleven editions of the first part in John Bunyan's lifetime, published in successive years from 1678 to 1685 and in 1688, and there were two editions of the second part, published in 1684 and 1686.

I had recognized that, in Hebrew, V=6, therefore, W=66. 66 in kabbalism is the number of the fallen angels or qlippoth. Hitler was a kabbalist, as well, and incorporated the VV(66) of the fallen angels into the Volks-Wagon symbol; two V's interlaced, making a third, therefore equaling 666, the number of the beast. Can you spot the number of the beast in this photo? The beast, "W", had arrived, and I knew they would wait no longer. I felt they needed 2 weeks for public reaction, therefore something would need to happen in mid-September. I picked the date 9/11 because it was the date that HW(H stands for the Emperor) stated, "there will be a New World Order." Had I known that both the Pentagon, and the "Twin Towers" had begun construction on 9/11, I would have predicted the targets, as well. I did not feel prophetic, I felt that everything was going according to plan. But, who's plan?

The 1662 Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England (you can download it by clicking the picture to the left or the link below) is still technically the only "official" prayer book of the Church of England, the mother church (for the moment at least) of the Anglican Communion. It itself is the result of more than a century of liturgical development through a turbulent time in British history. Its literary and theological influence is immense; this alone makes it an important document.

Book of Common Prayer (1548-1549) -- The 1549 Book of Common Prayer: As the use of English in worship services spread, the need for a complete uniform liturgy for the Church became evident. Initial meetings to start what would eventually become the Book of Common Prayer were held in the former abbey of Chertsey and in Windsor Castle in September 1548. The list of participants can only be partially reconstructed, but it is known that the members were balanced between conservatives and reformers. These meetings were followed by a debate on the Eucharist in the House of Lords which took place between 14 and 19 December. Cranmer publicly revealed in this debate that he had abandoned the doctrine of the real presence and believed that the Eucharistic presence was only spiritual. Parliament backed the publication of the Prayer Book after Christmas by passing the Act of Uniformity 1549; it then legalised clerical marriage. -- It is difficult to ascertain how much of the Prayer Book is actually Cranmer's personal composition. Generations of liturgical scholars have been able to track down the sources that he used, including the Sarum Rite, writings from Hermann von Wied, and several Lutheran sources including Osiander and Justus Jonas. More problematic is determining how Cranmer worked on the book and with whom he worked. Despite the lack of knowledge of whom might have helped him, however, he is given the credit for the editorship and the overall structure of the book. -- The use of the new Prayer Book was made compulsory on 9 June 1549. This triggered a series of protests in Devon and Cornwall, the Prayer Book Rebellion. By early July, the uprising had spread to other parts in the east of England. Bucer had just taken up his duties in Cambridge when he found himself in the middle of the commotion and had to scurry to shelter. The rebels made a number of demands including the restoration of the Six Articles, the use of Latin for the mass with only the consecrated bread given to the laity, the restoration of prayers for souls in purgatory, and the rebuilding of abbeys. Cranmer wrote to the king a strong response to these demands in which he denounced the wickedness of the rebellion. On 21 July, Cranmer commandeered St Paul's Cathedral where he vigorously defended the official Church line. A draft of his sermon, the only extant written sample of his preaching from his entire career, shows that he collaborated with Peter Martyr on dealing with the rebellion.

To download the entire Tyndale Bible click here. You will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader for this file. To read a particular book, click on the appropriate link below: -- About the Wesley Center Online -- The Wesley Center Online web site is a collection of historical and scholarly resources about the Wesleyan Tradition, theology, Christianity, and the Nazarene church. Copyright © 1993-2011. Wesley Center for Applied Theology, c/o Northwest Nazarene University. All Rights Reserved.

The Authorised (British spelling) Version of the holy scriptures, commonly known as the Authorized King James Version or KJV, is the word of God and the glory of the English language. For almost 400 years it has led multitudes to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and a whole new life in him and his word. The King James Bible has spread across the world reaching mankind generation after generation. It has saved, comforted, exhorted, rebuked, admonished, warned, enlightened, and edified without ceasing. King James VI & I, founding monarch of Great Britain, not only commanded the translation of the Authorised Version but he actually took an active role in developing the rules for translators and encouraging the completion of the work. The King's College website states, The development of the Bible in English differs from that of other European vernacular translations. Only England has an "authorised version", issued under the auspices of a king who was also the head of the Church. The vernacular Bible was illegal in England long before the Reformation and so began its development at a great disadvantage, but once England became a Protestant country the translated Bible became a symbol of state.

Egypt's Golden Empire: In 1570 B.C., when Rome was still a marsh and the Acropolis was an empty rock, Egypt was already 1000 years old. Although the period of the pyramid-builders was long over, Egypt lay on the threshold of its greatest age. The New Kingdom would be an empire forged by conquest, maintained by intimidation and diplomacy, and remembered long after its demise. Led by a dynasty of rich personalities, whose dramatic lives changed the course of civilization, Egypt's Golden Empire presents the most extraordinary period in Egyptian history: from 1570 B.C. to 1070 B.C., when the Egyptian Empire reached its zenith. -- The Medici: Godfathers of the Renaissance - From a small Italian community in 15th century Florence, the Medici family would rise to rule Europe in many ways. Using charm, patronage, skill, duplicity and ruthlessness, they would amass unparalleled wealth and unprecedented power. They would also ignite the most important cultural and artistic revolution in Western history- the European Renaissance. But the forces of change the Medici helped unleash would one day topple their ordered world. An epic drama played out in the courts, cathedrals and palaces of Europe, this series is both the tale of one family's powerful ambition and of Europe's tortured struggle to emerge from the ravages of the Dark Ages. -- Japan: Memoirs Of A Secret Empire - Commanding shoguns and samurai warriors, exotic geisha and exquisite artisans -- all were part of the Japanese "renaissance" -- a period between the 16th and 19th centuries when Japan went from chaos and violence to a land of ritual refinement and peace. But stability came at a price: for nearly 250 years, Japan was a land closed to the Western world, ruled by the Shogun under his absolute power and control. Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire brings to life the unknown story of a mysterious empire, its relationship to the West, and the forging of a nation that would emerge as one of the most important countries in the world. -- The Roman Empire in the First Century: Two thousand years ago, at the dawn of the first century, the ancient world was ruled by Rome. Through the experiences, memories and writings of the people who lived it, this series tells the story of that time - the emperors and slaves, poets and plebeians, who wrested order from chaos, built the most cosmopolitan society the world had ever seen and shaped the Roman empire in the first century A.D. -- The Greeks: Crucible [melting pot] of Civilization - The Greeks - Classical Greece of the 4th and 5th centuries, B.C. was a magnificent civilization that laid the foundations for modern science, politics, warfare, and philosophy, and produced some of the most breathtaking art and architecture the world has ever known. Through the eyes and words of the great heroes of ancient Greece, this dazzling production charts the rise, triumph, and eventual decline of the world's first democracy. Now, through dramatic storytelling and state-of-the-art computer animation, you witness history, art, and government with giants like Pericles, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

On January 3, 1521 the Vatican published the bull Decet Romanum Pontificem ([It] Befits [the] Roman Pontiff), excommunicating Martin Luther for Luther's refusal to recant. The pope [Leo X] had issued a previous bull, Exsurge Domine (Arise, O Lord), giving Luther 60 days to recant and another 60 days to make his recantation known to Rome. Meanwhile, Luther's books were being burned for allegedly containing heresy. On December 10, 1520 Luther responded by publicly burning his copy of Exsurge Domine. -- The Church usually handed excommunicated persons over to civil authorities to be burned at the stake. However, circumstances prevailed that spared Martin Luther this fate and paved the way for Luther's stand at the Diet of Worms in April 1521. The pure teaching of Scripture would not be snuffed out by the flames. -- Luther wasn't looking to split the Church; he wanted the Church to institute reforms and took a more conciliatory tone at first in his writings. When it became clear that the pope cared not at all for Scripture and reason, only for Luther's recantation, Luther rose to the challenge and prepared to take his stand. The truth of God's Word, long muffled or distorted by the noise of human traditions, would find a voice in Martin Luther and others willing to risk everything on the authority and benevolence of Sola Scriptura.

Calvinism was based around the absolute power and supremacy of God. The world was created so that Mankind might get to know Him. Calvin believed that Man was sinful and could only approach God through faith in Christ - not through Mass and pilgrimages. Calvin believed that the New Testament and baptism and the Eucharist had been created to provide Man with continual divine guidance when seeking faith. In Calvin's view, Man, who is corrupt, is confronted by the omnipotent (all powerful) and omnipresent (present everywhere) God who before the world began predestined some for eternal salvation (the Elect) while the others would suffer everlasting damnation (the Reprobates). The chosen few were saved by the operation of divine grace which cannot be challenged and cannot be earned by Man's merits. You might have lead what you might have considered a perfectly good life that was true to God but if you were a reprobate you remained one because for all your qualities you were inherently corrupt and God would know this even if you did not. However, a reprobate by behaving decently could achieve an inner conviction of salvation. An Elect could never fall from grace. However, God remained the judge and lawgiver of men. Predestination remained a vital belief in Calvinism.

Ulrich Zwingli was a Swiss Protestant leader in the Reformation. Ulrich Zwingli is not as famous as the likes as Martin Luther or John Calvin but he did play his part in the break with the Roman Catholic Church. Ulrich (sometimes spelt Huldreich) Zwingli was born in 1484. He attended universities at Basle and Vienna and served as a parish priest in Glarus, Switzerland. Zwingli went with soldiers from Glarus to fight in the Habsburg-Valois Wars and between 1516 and 1518 he started to question the whole issue of Catholicism as Humanism started to make an impression on him. It is possible that Zwingli did not read any Lutheran literature until he moved in 1518 to Zurich as a Common Preacher (Leutpriester) at the Great Minster. It was at the Great Minster that Zwingli stated what is called the Zurich Reformation with sermons that were based on the Bible. Zwingli soon converted the city's council to his points of view. The council pushed the city into becoming a stronghold of Protestantism and Zurich's lead was followed by Berne and Basle. -- Zwingli's '67 Articles' (1523 A.D.) were adopted by Zurich as the city's official doctrine and the city experienced rapid reform. Preaching and Bible readings - known as prophesyings - were made more frequent; images and relics were frowned on, clerical marriage was allowed, monks and nuns were encouraged to come out of their isolated existence, monasteries were dissolved and their wealth was used to fund education and poor relief. In 1525, Zurich broke with Rome and the Mass became a very simple ceremony using both bread and blood which merely represented the body and blood of Christ. The church of Zwingli attempted to control moral behaviour and strict supervision became common in Zurich. -- As with Martin Luther and John Calvin, the problem Zwingli faced was that some people were concerned that he had gone too far too soon while others, especially the Anabaptists, felt that he had not gone far enough. The Anabaptists were dealt with when Zwingli fell in with the city's magistrates and supported the move to exile the Anabaptists or if they refused to leave the city, deal with them in another way - drowning. -- Zwingli and Luther met at Marburg in 1529 in an attempt to unite the Protestant faiths. This meeting failed to do this. Both men could not reach an agreement on what Christ said at the Last Supper. Luther believed that 'this is my body' meant just that whereas Zwingli believed that 'my' meant signifies. Such disunity among the Protestant faiths only served to encourage the Catholic Church that the Counter-Reformation was having an impact. -- Though Zurich became a stronghold of Protestantism, the areas surrounding the city remained wary of a resurgent Catholic Church. They also feared that Zurich might become too powerful and assert its city powers within these regions. Also the area around Zurich was famed for the mercenaries it provided and such a 'profession' was frowned on by Zwingli. In 1529, these areas around Zurich formed the Christian Union and joined with the catholic Austrian monarchy. Zwingli preached a religious war against them and two campaigns were launched in 1529 and 1531. Zwingli was killed at the Battle of Keppel in October 1531. His work was continued by his son-in-law, Heinrich Bullinger.

Lull based his Art on the importance which Christian, Moslem [Islam], and Jew each attached to the Divine Names or Attributes, or, as he called them, Dignities. Lull mentioned nine Dignities (or Dignitaries): Bonitas (Goodness), Magnitudo (Greatness), Eternitas (Eternity), Potestas (Power), Sapientia (Wisdom), Voluntas (Will), Virtus (Virtue), Veritas (Truth), and Gloria (Glory). These are shown in the follwing diagram. ... In addition we also find the incorporation of the four elements [earth, water, air and fire] and the qualities, the seven planets and twelves [astrological] signs, medicine, alchemy, geometry, a letter notation, and so on. There is an elaborate system of correspondences, in that the nine Dignitaries have their correspondences in the celestial sphere, the human level, and the animal, plant, and material creation. In all this we see the influence, not only of Kabbalah, but also of Aristotlean categories, Augustinian Platonism (nearly all the Lullian Dignities can be found listed as Augustine's Divine Attributes), and the celestial hierarchies of angels of the Christian Neoplatonist Dionysius. [Frances A. Yates, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age, pp.9-12]. -- Renaissance Kabbalah: Renaissance Christian Kabbalah was derived from a number of sources. Firstly, the christological speculations of a number of Jewish converts from the late 13th to the late fifteenth centuries. Secondly, the philosophical Christian and Renaissance speculation concerning the Kabbalah that developed around the Platonic Acadamy founded by the Medici family in Florence. Pico della Mirandola The Florentines, headed by the renowned Renaissance hermeticist Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-94) believed they had discovered in Kabbalah a lost divine revelation that could give the key to understanding both the teachings of Pythagoras, Plato, and the Orphics, and the inner secrets of Catholic Christianity. Pico himself had a considerable amount of Kabbalistic literature translated into Latin by the scholarly convert Samuel ben Nissim Abulfaraj. Among the 900 theses Pico presented for public debate in Rome was the claim that "no science can better convince us of the divinity of Jesus Christ than magic and the Kabbalah", and he believed he could prove the dogmas of the Trinity and the Incarnation through Kabbalistic axioms. All this caused a sensation in the intellectual Christian world, and the writings of Pico and his follower Johannes Reuchlin (1455-1522) led on the one hand to great interest in the doctrine of Divine Names and in practical (magical) Kabbalah (culminating in Cornelius Agrippa of Nettesheim's De Occult Philosophia (1531) and on the other to further attempts at a synthesis between Kabbalah and Christian theology. [Gershom Scholem, Kabbalah, pp.197-8] -- Rosicrucian Kabbalah: By the late 16th century Christian Kabbalah began to be permeated with alchemical symbolism; a trend that continued through the 17th and 18th century. Well known representatives are the Rosucrucian philosopher and alchemist Robert Fludd (1574-1637) and the alchemist Thomas Vaughan (1622-1666) among others. One of the works of Fludd presents an interpretation of the Sefirotic Tree which he illustrates as a Palm (left), whose ten spreading branches raying forth from the lowest world suggest that man on earth is a microcosm or reflection of the macrocosm or universe. In the second half of the 18th century this alchemical kabbalah was combined with Freemasonic numerology and occultism, from which was ultimately to develop the extraordinary occult/magickal revival of the late 19th century known as the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn illustration (left) from World Trees by Hazel Minot Kircher's Tree from Oedipus Aegyptiacus published in 1652 by Athanasius Kircher, a Jesuit priest and hermetic philosopher -- Occult Kabbalah: By the 19th century the occultists of the French magician revival, such as Eliphas Levi (Alphonse Louis Constant; 1810-1875) and Papus (Gerard Encausse; 1868-1916) had lost all understanding of the original Jewish meaning of Kabbalah, and brought in various extraneous elements such as Tarot. Levi was an influential figure both on the Theosophy of Blavatsky and even more so the Golden Dawn Order of Mathers and Westcott, with it's unique Kabbalistic (or Qabalistic, to use the prefered spelling) formulation of Sefirot and paths, through which Kabbalah established itself in the contemporary Western Occult Tradition.

Huh? What God of "green" hope? Why does The Message do this? -- Before we examine what seems suggestive of earth reverence/earth worship, let us restate some of what has been covered elsewhere about The Message: A generation has been raised on this disturbing "paraphrase" of the Bible. This is the primary version so many now rely on, and nationally known preachers quote from it with regularity. Yet, as we have seen, The Message flat out omits the sin of homosexuality from several key passages. We see this in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, and also in 1 Timothy 1: 8-11 (read about that here). -- Does the acceptance and use of The Message explain why many Christians are lukewarm on the issue of homosexuality? Certainly The Message is not the only factor-we dwell in a pro-homosexual media/culture-but place this "Bible" in a person's hands and it can have, over time, significant influence. How can we understand God's Truth when Truth is no longer there to be read? - "My son, give attention to my words; Incline your ear to my sayings. Do not let them depart from your sight; Keep them in the midst of your heart." (Proverbs 4:20-21) The beloved author of The Message, Eugene Peterson, has now endorsed two heretical books: The Shack, and Rob Bell's sly ode to universalism, Love Wins. - The Message, bluntly stated, seems written to make Christians less knowledgeable about the Word of God. While that may seem a strong comment, please consider what Eugene Peterson himself said about the Bible: "Why do people spend so much time studying the Bible? How much do you need to know? We invest all this time in understanding the text which has a separate life of its own and we think we're being more pious and spiritual when we're doing it….[Christians] should be studying it less, not more. You need just enough to pay attention to God….I'm just not at all pleased with the emphasis on Bible study as if it's some kind of special thing that Christians do, and the more the better." I believe The Message is forerunner to a christless, sinless bible that will be used by the false church. There will be a "christ" mentioned, but not our Christ. Not the sinless Savior of humanity. Sin will be addressed, of course, but perhaps more in line with the Alcoholics Anonymous generic theology of "wrongs" and "making amends."

Remember! All the modern versions are based on the Westcott and Hort text, compiled by two men who both believed that the sacred text of Holy Scripture was to be approached and treated like any secular text of history. The English people, who felt secure in their trust that these two Cambridge scholars would take care of attacks on the Scripture, unknowingly accepted the public utterances and writings of men who boasted between themselves that they held doctrines that would be considered dangerous heresy. Nowhere in all literature can we find a more perfectly clear self-revelation of Fenton John Anthony Hort than in the Life and Letters of Fenton John Anthony Hort published in 1896 by his son, Author Fenton Hort. Hort was brought up by a well taught Bible-believing evangelical mother. She recognized the fact that her son had departed from the faith "once delivered to the saints" and was saddened thereby. -- Hort acknowledged his departure from the Evangelical faith when he wrote, "Further I agree with those who condemn many leading specific doctrines of the popular theology, as to say the least, containing much superstition and immorality of a very pernicious king... The positive doctrines even of the Evangelicals seem to me perverted rather than untrue. There are I fear, still more serious differences between us on the subject of authority, and especially the authority of the Bible," Life and Letters, Vol. I, p.400. Again Dr. Hort states, "Another idea has lately occurred to me: is not Mariolatry displacing much worship of scattered saints and so becoming a tendency towards unity of worship? I have been persuaded for many years that Mary-worship and Jesus worship have very much in common in their causes and their results" Vol. I, p.50-51 "Life and Letters." -- Hort was completely deceived by Darwin Vol. I, p.374 "Life and Letters." "Have you read Darwin?...in spite of difficulties, I am inclined to think it is unanswerable (page 416). "...another last word on Darwin...I shall not let the matter drop in a hurry, or, to speak more correctly, it will not let me drop...there is no getting rid of it any more than a part of oneself." Vol. I, pages 433-434. On the atonement Hort writes, "Certainly nothing can be more unscriptural than the modern limiting of Christ's bearing our sins and sufferings to His death; but indeed that is only one aspect of an almost universal heresy." Vol. I, page 430 "Life and Letters." -- Hort in writing to a friend, John Ellerton, Dec. 20, 1851 said: "I had no idea till the last few weeks of the importance of texts, having read so little Greek Testament, and dragged on the villainous Textus Receptus... Think of that vile Textus Receptus leaning entirely on late manuscripts. It is a blessing there are such early ones." Hort refers of course to the very corrupt Codex Vaticanus and the Codex Alexandrius in which its finder, Tischendorf, noted 12,000 alterations, Codex Sinaiticus. We ask, "From where did Hort get this great antipathy and hatred for the Textus Receptus so early in his career? How did he conceive his ingenious theories to do away with the fact that the Textus Receptus (the Greek text underlying the King James Version) and that which is representative of a very, very high percentage of all Greek Manuscripts?" -- Look at the hidden background for the modern spreading rejection of the King James Version. The followers of Westcott and Hort are following the lead of men who have departed from the faith and have given themselves over to a strictly forbidden prying into the occult. They had received from the world of spirits a hatred for the true Word of God. After we learn that Hort describes the sacred text as "being that vile Textus Receptus," we read Hort's words, "Westcott, Gorham, C.B. Scott, Benson, Bradshaw, Luard, and I have started a society for the investigation of ghosts, and all supernatural appearances, and effects, being all disposed to believe that such things really exist, and ought to be discriminated from hoaxes and mere subjective delusions; we shall be happy to obtain any good accounts well authenticated with names. Our own temporary name is the [occult] Ghostly Guild." Vol. I, page 211.

It derives its name from Alexandria where it resided for a number of years before it brought by the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch Cyril Lucaris from Alexandria to Constantinople. Then it was given to Charles I of England in the 17th century. Until the later purchase of the Codex Sinaiticus, it was the best manuscript of the Greek Bible deposited in Britain. Today, it rests along with Codex Sinaiticus in one of the showcases in the Ritblat Gallery of the British Library. As the text came from several different traditions, different parts of the codex are not of equal textual value. The text has been edited several times since the 18th century.

He opposed Jerome's translation in two vital areas. He detected that the Greek text [of the Egyptian manuscripts] had been corrupted as early as the fourth century [by the desert monks - desert fathers]. He knew that Jerome's translation had been based solely on the Alexandrian manuscript, Vaticanus, written itself early in the fourth century. He also differed with Jerome on the translation of certain passages which were vital to the claimed authority of the Roman Catholic Church. Jerome rendered Matthew 4:17 thus: "Do penance, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand." Erasmus differed with: "Be penitent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Erasmus was also a staunch defender of both Mark 16:9-21 and John 8:1-12. Zeal which our modern day scholars cannot seem to find. -- Possibly Erasmus's greatest gift to mankind was his attitude toward the common man. In the rigidly "classed" society in which he lived, he was an indefatigable advocate of putting the Scripture in the hands of the common man. While Jerome's Latin had been translated at the bidding of the Roman hierarchy, Erasmus translated his Latin with the express purpose of putting it into the hands of the common people of his day. A practice that the Roman Catholic Church knew could be dangerous to its plan to control the masses. Erasmus is quoted as saying, "Do you think that the Scriptures are fit only for the perfumed?" "I venture to think that anyone who reads my translation at home will profit thereby." He boldly stated that he longed to see the Bible in the hands of "the farmer, the tailor, the traveler and the Turk." Later, to the astonishment of his upper classed colleagues, he added "the masons, the prostitutes and the pimps" to that declaration. Knowing his desire to see the Bible in the hands of God's common people, it seems not so surprising that God was to use his Greek text for the basis of the English Bible that was translated with the common man in mind, the King James Bible. -- It has been said that "Erasmus laid the egg that Luther hatched." There is probably far more truth to this statement than can be casually discerned. For the reformers were armed with Erasmus's Bible, his writings and his attitude of resistance to Roman Catholic intimidation. Of Luther he said, "I favor Luther as much as I can, even if my cause is everywhere linked with his." He wrote several letters on Luther's behalf, and wholeheartedly agreed with him that salvation was entirely by grace, not works. He refused pressure by his Roman Catholic superiors to denounce Luther as a heretic. If Erasmus had turned the power of his pen on Luther, it would undoubtedly have caused far more damage than the powerless threats of the pope and his imps were able to do. As it is, only his disagreement with Luther's doctrine of predestination ever prompted him to criticize the Reformer with pen and ink. Erasmus's greatest point of dissension with the Roman Church was over its doctrine of salvation through works and the tenets of the church. He taught that salvation was a personal matter between the individual and God and was by faith alone. Of the Roman system of salvation he complained, "Aristotle is so in vogue that there is scarcely time in the churches to interpret the gospel." And what was "the gospel" to which Erasmus referred? We will let him speak for himself. "Our hope is in the mercy of God and the merits of Christ." Of Jesus Christ he stated, "He ... nailed our sins to the cross, sealed our redemption with his blood." He boldly stated that no rites of the Church were necessary for an individual's salvation. "The way to enter paradise," he said, "is the way of the penitent thief, say simply, Thy will be done. The world to me is crucified and I to the world." Concerning the most biblical sect of his time, the Anabaptists, he reserved a great deal of respect. He mentioned them as early as 1523 even though he himself was often called the "only Anabaptist of the 16th century." He stated that the Anabaptists that he was familiar with called themselves "Baptists." (Ironically, Erasmus was also the FIRST person to use the term "fundamental.") So we see that when Erasmus died on July 11, 1536, he had led a life that could hardly be construed to be an example of what could be considered a "good Catholic." But perhaps the greatest compliment, though veiled, that Erasmus's independent nature ever received came in 1559, twenty-three years after his death. That is when Pope Paul IV put Erasmus's writings on the "Index" of books, forbidden to be read by Roman Catholics.

Known as Erasmus of Rotterdam, was a Dutch Renaissance humanist, Catholic priest, social critic, teacher, early proponent of religious toleration, and theologian. Erasmus was a classical scholar who wrote in a pure Latin style and enjoyed the sobriquet "Prince of the Humanists." He has been called "the crowning glory of the Christian humanists." Using humanist techniques for working on texts, he prepared important new Latin and Greek editions of the New Testament. These raised questions that would be influential in the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation. He also wrote The Praise of Folly, Handbook of a Christian Knight, On Civility in Children, Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style, Julius Exclusus, and many other works. Erasmus lived through the Reformation period, but while he was critical of the Church, he could not bring himself to join the cause of the Reformers. In relation to clerical abuses in the Church, Erasmus remained committed to reforming the Church from within. He also held to Catholic doctrines such as that of free will, which some Reformers rejected in favor of the doctrine of predestination. His middle road approach disappointed and even angered scholars in both camps. He died in Basel in 1536 and was buried in the formerly Catholic cathedral there, which had been converted to a Reformed church in 1529. Erasmus was his baptismal name, given after St. Erasmus of Formiae. Desiderius was a self-adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The Roterodamus in his scholarly name is the Latinized adjectival form for the city of Rotterdam. -- Biography: Desiderius Erasmus was born in Holland on October 28th. The exact year of his birth is debated but some evidence confirming 1466 can be found in Erasmus's own words. Of twenty-three statements Erasmus made about his age, all but one of the first fifteen indicate 1466. He was christened "Erasmus" after the saint of that name. Although associated closely with Rotterdam, he lived there for only four years, never to return. Information on his family and early life comes mainly from vague references in his writings. His parents almost certainly were not legally married. His father, named Roger Gerard, later became a priest and afterwards curate in Gouda. Little is known of his mother other than that her name was Margaret and she was the daughter of a physician. Although he was born out of wedlock, Erasmus was cared for by his parents until their early deaths from the plague in 1483. He was then given the very best education available to a young man of his day, in a series of monastic or semi-monastic schools, most notably a Latin school in Deventer run by the Brethren of the Common Life (inspired by Geert Groote). During his stay here the curriculum was renewed by the principal of the school, Alexander Hegius. For the first time ever Greek was taught at a lower level than a university in Europe, and this is where he began learning it. He also gleaned there the importance of a personal relationship with God but eschewed the harsh rules and strict methods of the religious brothers and educators.

Johannes Gutenberg was born into a noble family of the city of Mainz, Germany. His early training was in goldsmithing. In 1428, he moved to Strasbourg for political reasons, where he remained for over 20 years. It was in Strasbourg that he probably made his first experiments with moveable type. -- Gutenberg had the idea of utilizing techniques of metalworking, such as casting, punch-cutting, and stamping, for the mass production of books. European books at this time were hand written by scribes in a gothic script with many flourishes and ligatures (interconnected letter pairs). To reproduce this "look" Gutenberg fashioned a font of over 300 characters, far larger than the fonts of today. To make this possible, he invented the variable-width mold, and perfected the blend of lead, antimony, and tin used by type foundries up to the present century. -- Many years of Gutenberg's life are lost to history, but by 1450 he was back in Mainz at work on a printing press. Between 1450 and 1455, while preparing to produce a large folio Latin Bible, Gutenberg is thought to have printed a number of smaller books, a calendar, and a papal Letter of Indulgence. The Bible of 42 lines, the oldest surviving printed book in the western world, was completed by August 15, 1456, and while it is now credited to Gutenberg, he appears to have been relieved of his supervisory position, and his press, before the time of its publication. In fact, no printed material was ever credited to Gutenberg during his lifetime. -- Gutenberg is also believed to have worked on the Catholicon of Johannes de Janua, an enormous encyclopedia: 748 pages in two columns of 66 lines each. In later years, he received a position as a courtier to the archbishop of Mainz, and was buried in the town's Franciscan church.

Gutenberg's printing technology spread rapidly throughout Europe, and may well have been refined and perfected by others. The process quickly replaced most of the manuscript methods of book-production throughout the world. Woodblock printing and manuscript rubrication continued to be used to supplement Gutenberg's printing process. His first major work using his printing methods was the Gutenberg Bible. -- Legacy: Although Gutenberg was financially unsuccessful in his lifetime, the printing technologies spread quickly, and news and books began to travel across Europe much faster than before. It fed the growing Renaissance, and since it greatly facilitated scientific publishing, it was a major catalyst for the later scientific revolution. The capital of printing in Europe shifted to Venice, where visionary printers like Aldus Manutius ensured widespread availability of the major Greek and Latin texts. The claims of an Italian origin for movable type have also focused on this rapid rise of Italy in movable-type printing. This may perhaps be explained by the prior eminence of Italy in the paper and printing trade. Additionally, Italy's economy was growing rapidly at the time, facilitating the spread of literacy. Christopher Columbus had a geographical book (printed by movable types) bought by his father. That book is in a Spanish museum. Finally, the city of Mainz was sacked in 1462, driving many (including a number of printers and punch cutters) into exile. -- **Printing was also a factor in the Reformation. Martin Luther's 95 Theses were printed and circulated widely; subsequently he issued broadsheets outlining his anti-indulgences position (certificates of indulgences were one of the first items Gutenberg had printed). The broadsheet contributed to development of the newspaper. -- In the decades after Gutenberg, many conservative patrons looked down on cheap printed books; books produced by hand were considered more desirable. Today there is a large antique market for the earliest printed objects. Books printed prior to 1500 are known as incunabula. There are many statues of Gutenberg in Germany, including the famous one by Bertel Thorvaldsen (1837) in Mainz, home to the eponymous Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz and the Gutenberg Museum on the history of early printing. The later publishes the Gutenberg-Jahrbuch, the leading periodical in the field. Project Gutenberg [www.gutenberg.org], the oldest digital library [of FREE eBooks], commemorates Gutenberg's name. In 1961 the Canadian philosopher and scholar Marshall McLuhan entitled his pioneering study in the fields of print culture, cultural studies, and media ecology, The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man. Gutenberg remains a towering figure in the popular image. In 1999, the A&E Network ranked Gutenberg the No. 1 most influential person of the second millennium on their "Biographies of the Millennium" countdown. In 1997, Time-Life magazine picked Gutenberg's invention as the most important of the second millennium. In space, he is commemorated in the name of the asteroid 777 Gutemberga. A French opera on his life, by Philippe Manoury, was staged in Strasbourg in September 2011.

In A.D. 637 Jerusalem was surrendered to the Saracens. The caliph of the Saracens called Omar gave guarantees for the safety of the Christian population and because of this pledge the number of pilgrimages to Jerusalem still continued to increase. In 1065 Jerusalem was taken by the Turks, who came from the kingdom of ancient Persia. 3000 Christians were massacred and the remaining Christians were treated so badly that throughout Christendom people were stirred to fight in crusades. The Knights Templar were formed to to ensure the safety of the pilgrims of the Middle Ages who flocked towards Jerusalem. Their original name was the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ. ... the Temple of Soloman At first the Knights Templar had no church and no particular place of to live. In 1118, nineteen years after the freeing of Jerusalem, King Baldwin II of Jerusalem, granted the Knights Templar a place to live within the sacred enclosure of the Temple on Mount Moriah. This place was amid the holy structures which were exhibited by the priests of Jerusalem as the Temple of Solomon. The "Poor Fellow-soldiers of Jesus Christ" became colloquially known as "the Knighthood of the Temple of Solomon" and subsequently the Knights Templars. ... They were received with great honour by Pope Honorius, who approved of the objects and designs of the holy fraternity. The Knights Templar History moved on and in 1128 the ecclesiastical Council of Troyes gave the Knights Templar official recognition and granted their rule of the order. The Council of Troyes was instigated by Bernard of Clairvaux and the Knights Templars were represented by Hugues de Payen and Andre de Montbard. The Papal approval at the Council of Troyes resulted in many new recruits joining the order - the Rules of the Knights Templar Order: In 1130, Bernard of Clairvaux drew up the rules for the new Knights Templar order. Bernard set up the order with two main classes of knighthood, the knights and sergeants or serving brethren. Sergeants or serving brothers wore a black or brown mantle to show their lower status, whilst the Knights wore a red cross granted by Pope Eugenius III. Married men who joined the order could only join as sergeants, their property coming into the possession of the Order rather than to their wives upon their death. - A Papal Bull was issued in 1139 by Pope Innocent II, a protege of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, stating that the Knights Templar should owe allegiance to no one other than the Pope himself. - The Knights Templar History saw 1146 as the year when the Knights Templar order adopted the splayed red cross as their emblem. The Battle cry of the Templars was "Beau-Séant!" which was the motto they bore on their banner. - The Knights Templar order supported the second crusade in 1148. The decision was made to attack Damascus and armies were assembled in Acre. ... The army of Jerusalem and Guy of Lusignan, the King of Jerusalem, was beaten by Turkish forces in 1184. All Knights Templar and Hospitallers who survived the battle were executed afterwards. This event prompted the Third Crusade headed by Richard the Lionheart who was supported by the Knights Templar order. The city of Acre is taken by the Crusaders in 1191. Richard the Lionheart dies in 1199 and is succeeded by his brother John. - The Knights Templar History goes on and in 1263 problems in England lead to the Baron's revolt led by Simon de Montford opposing Edward I. On the pretence of removing his mother's jewels, Edward I entered the Knights Templar Temple in London and ransacked the treasury, taking the proceeds to the Tower of London. In 1271 Edward leads another crusade and is attacked by an assassin with a poisoned knife. He survives the attack and his life was saved with drugs sent by the master of the Knights Templar, Thomas Bérard. In 1272 King Henry III of England died and the English Council met at the Temple in London and draft a letter to Prince Edward informing him of his accession to the throne, illustrating the political importance of the Knights Templar in England. - King Philip IV of France (1268-1314) who was already heavily in debt to the Knights Templar requested a further loan. The Knights Templar refused his request. King Philip IV subsequently ordered the arrest of all Knight Templars in France. The order to arrest the Templars was sent out several weeks before the date possibly giving the Templars time to hide their wealth. On 11 October, two days before the arrest of many Templar Knights, it is recorded in French Masonic history that Templar ships left La Rochelle, heading to Scotland. On Friday the 13th, in October 1307, Jacques de Molay, the Grand Master of the Knights Templar, and 60 of his senior knights were arrested in Paris. They were charged with heresy and accused of homosexual acts. Admissions of guilt were extracted due to the use of torture. Pope Clement V initiated enquiries into the order and thousands of Knights Templar were arrested across Europe. The Medieval order of the Knights Templar become extinct in 1312 when the order is dissolved by the Council of Vienne. Anyone found sheltering a Templar was under threat of excommunication. Much of the Templar property outside of France was transferred by the Pope to the Knights Hospitallers, and many surviving Templars were also accepted into the Hospitallers. - The Death of the last Medieval Master: The Knights Templar leader Jacques de Molay and Geoffroi de Charney were burnt at the stake on March 18th 1314 for rescinding their former admission of heresy under torture. Jacques de Molay cursed the Pope and King Philip and prophesied that they would soon die. Pope Clement V was dead within 40 days and King Philip died that year. Jacques de Molay was the last Master of the Knights Templar.

When we think about the Middle Ages, it is easy to view Europe in light of what it became rather than what it was. The colossus of the medieval world was Islam, not Christendom. The Crusades are interesting largely because they were an attempt to counter that trend. But in five centuries of crusading, it was only the First Crusade that significantly rolled back the military progress of Islam. It was downhill from there. When the Crusader County of Edessa fell to the Turks and Kurds in 1144, there was an enormous groundswell of support for a new Crusade in Europe. It was led by two kings, Louis VII of France and Conrad III of Germany, and preached by St. Bernard himself. It failed miserably. Most of the Crusaders were killed along the way. Those who made it to Jerusalem only made things worse by attacking Muslim Damascus, which formerly had been a strong ally of the Christians. In the wake of such a disaster, Christians across Europe were forced to accept not only the continued growth of Muslim power but the certainty that God was punishing the West for its sins. Lay piety movements sprouted up throughout Europe, all rooted in the desire to purify Christian society so that it might be worthy of victory in the East. ... Yet, even while these close shaves were taking place, something else was brewing in Europe-something unprecedented in human history. The Renaissance, born from a strange mixture of Roman values, medieval piety, and a unique respect for commerce and entrepreneurialism, had led to other movements like humanism, the Scientific Revolution, and the Age of Exploration. Even while fighting for its life, Europe was preparing to expand on a global scale. The Protestant Reformation, which rejected the papacy and the doctrine of indulgence, made Crusades unthinkable for many Europeans, thus leaving the fighting to the Catholics. In 1571, a Holy League, which was itself a Crusade, defeated the Ottoman fleet at Lepanto. Yet military victories like that remained rare. The Muslim threat was neutralized economically. As Europe grew in wealth and power, the once awesome and sophisticated Turks began to seem backward and pathetic-no longer worth a Crusade. The "Sick Man of Europe" (the Ottoman Empire) limped along until the 20th century [WWI], when he finally expired, leaving behind the present mess of the modern Middle East.

Wars with the Moors [Muslims]: The conquest of Italy brought Charlemagne in contact with the Saracens who, at the time, controlled the Mediterranean. Pippin, his son, was much occupied with Saracens in Italy. Charlemagne conquered Corsica and Sardinia at an unknown date and in 799 the Balearic Islands. The islands were often attacked by Saracen pirates, but the counts of Genoa and Tuscany (Boniface) kept them at bay with large fleets until the end of Charlemagne's reign. Charlemagne even had contact with the caliphal court in Baghdad. In 797 (or possibly 801), the caliph of Baghdad, Harun al-Rashid, presented Charlemagne with an Asian elephant named Abul-Abbas and a clock. -- In Hispania [Spain], the struggle against the Moors continued unabated throughout the latter half of his reign. His son Louis was in charge of the Spanish border. In 785, his men captured Gerona permanently and extended Frankish control into the Catalan littoral for the duration of Charlemagne's reign (and much longer, it remained nominally Frankish until the Treaty of Corbeil in 1258). The Muslim chiefs in the northeast of Islamic Spain were constantly revolting against Córdoban authority, and they often turned to the Franks for help. The Frankish border was slowly extended until 795, when Gerona, Cardona, Ausona, and Urgel were united into the new Spanish March, within the old duchy of Septimania. -- In 797 Barcelona, the greatest city of the region, fell to the Franks when Zeid, its governor, rebelled against Córdoba and, failing, handed it to them. The Umayyad authority recaptured it in 799. However, Louis of Aquitaine marched the entire army of his kingdom over the Pyrenees and besieged it for two years, wintering there from 800 to 801, when it capitulated. The Franks continued to press forward against the emir. They took Tarragona in 809 and Tortosa in 811. The last conquest brought them to the mouth of the Ebro and gave them raiding access to Valencia, prompting the Emir al-Hakam I to recognize their conquests in 812 A.D.

Alaric [the older son] died that same year 410 A.D. Two years later, his kinsman Athaulf led the Visigoths into southwestern Gaul, where, in AD 418, Honorius was obliged to recognize their kingdom at Toulouse. The Vandals and other Germanic tribes who had crossed over the frozen Rhine on the last day of AD 406 now were in Spain under their leader, Genseric. Honorius permitted them to stay, as well, although there was little he could have done otherwise. In AD 423 Honorius died and eventually was succeeded by Valentinian III, who was still a child at the time. The Vandals crossed into North Africa, defeated the Romans there, and, in AD 439, conquered Carthage, which Genseric made his capital. In AD 451, Attila and the Huns, who already had become so powerful that they were paid an annual tribute by Rome, invaded Gaul, in alliance with the Vandals. They were defeated at the Battle of Châlons by the Visigoths under the command of Flavius Aetius, magister militum of the west. In AD 455, the death of Valentinian III served as a pretext for the Vandals to enter an undefended Rome, which they plundered for two weeks, carrying away the treasures of the Temple of Peace and the gilded bronze tiles from the Temple of Jupiter. Temple of Vespasian.

Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus was born at Stridon around 347. He was not baptized until about 360 or 366, when he had gone to Rome with his friend Bonosus (who may or may not have been the same Bonosus whom Jerome identifies as his friend who went to live as a hermit on an island in the Adriatic) to pursue rhetorical and philosophical studies. He studied under the grammarian Aelius Donatus. There Jerome learned Latin and at least some Greek, though probably not the familiarity with Greek literature he would later claim to have acquired as a schoolboy. As a student in Rome, he engaged in the superficial activities of students there, which he indulged in quite casually but suffered terrible bouts of repentance afterwards. To appease his conscience, he would visit on Sundays the sepulchers of the martyrs and the Apostles in the catacombs. This experience would remind him of the terrors of hell: Often I would find myself entering those crypts, deep dug in the earth, with their walls on either side lined with the bodies of the dead, where everything was so dark that almost it seemed as though the Psalmist's words were fulfilled, Let them go down quick into Hell. Here and there the light, not entering in through windows, but filtering down from above through shafts, relieved the horror of the darkness. But again, as soon as you found yourself cautiously moving forward, the black night closed around and there came to my mind the line of Vergil, "Horror unique animos, simul ipsa silentia terrent. Jerome used a quote from Vergil - "The horror and the silences terrified their souls" - to describe the horror of hell. Jerome initially used classical authors to describe Christian concepts such as hell that indicated both his classical education and his deep shame of their associated practices, such as pederasty. Although initially skeptical of Christianity, he was eventually converted. After several years in Rome, he travelled with Bonosus to Gaul and settled in Trier where he seems to have first taken up theological studies, and where he copied, for his friend Tyrannius Rufinus, Hilary of Poitiers' commentary on the Psalms and the treatise De synodis. Next came a stay of at least several months, or possibly years, with Rufinus at Aquileia, where he made many Christian friends. Some of these accompanied him when he set out about 373 on a journey through Thrace and Asia Minor into northern Syria. At Antioch, where he stayed the longest, two of his companions died and he himself was seriously ill more than once. During one of these illnesses (about the winter of 373-374), he had a vision that led him to lay aside his secular studies and devote himself to God. He seems to have abstained for a considerable time from the study of the classics and to have plunged deeply into that of the Bible, under the impulse of Apollinaris of Laodicea, then teaching in Antioch and not yet suspected of heresy. ... The works of Hippolytus of Rome and Irenaeus greatly influenced Jerome's interpretation of prophecy. He noted the distinction between the original Septuagint and Theodotion's later substitution. Jerome warned that those substituting false interpretations for the actual meaning of Scripture belonged to the "synagogue of the Antichrist". "He that is not of Christ is of Antichrist," he wrote to Pope Damasus I. **He believed that "the mystery of iniquity" written about by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:7 was already in action when "every one chatters about his views." To Jerome, the power restraining this mystery of iniquity was the Roman Empire, but as it fell this restraining force was removed. He warned a noble woman of Gaul: "He that letteth is taken out of the way, and yet we do not realize that Antichrist is near. Yes, Antichrist is near whom the Lord Jesus Christ "shall consume with the spirit of his mouth." "Woe unto them," he cries, "that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days."... Savage tribes in countless numbers have overrun all parts of Gaul. The whole country between the Alps and the Pyrenees, between the Rhine and the Ocean, has been laid waste by hordes of Quadi, Vandals, Sarmatians, Alans, Gepids, Herules, Saxons, Burgundians, Allemanni, and-alas! for the commonweal!-- even Pannonians. His Commentary on Daniel was expressly written to offset the criticisms of Porphyry, who taught that Daniel related entirely to the time of Antiochus IV Epiphanes and was written by an unknown individual living in the 2nd century BC. Against Porphyry, Jerome identified Rome as the fourth kingdom of chapters two and seven, but his view of chapters eight and 11 was more complex. Jerome held that chapter eight describes the activity of Antiochus Epiphanes, who is understood as a "type" of a future antichrist; 11:24 onwards applies primarily to a future antichrist but was partially fulfilled by Antiochus. Instead, he advocated that the "little horn" was the Antichrist: We should therefore concur with the traditional interpretation of all the commentators of the Christian Church, that at the end of the world, when the Roman Empire is to be destroyed, there shall be ten kings who will partition the Roman world amongst themselves. Then an insignificant eleventh king will arise, who will overcome three of the ten kings... after they have been slain, the seven other kings also will bow their necks to the victor. In his Commentary on Daniel, he noted, "Let us not follow the opinion of some commentators and suppose him to be either the Devil or some demon, but rather, one of the human race, in whom Satan will wholly take up his residence in bodily form." In interpreting 2 Thessalonians's claim that the Antichrist will sit in God's temple, Jerome preferred the view that the "temple" should be interpreted as the Church, not as the Temple in Jerusalem. Jerome identified the four prophetic kingdoms symbolized in Daniel 2 as the Neo-Babylonian Empire, the Medes and Persians, Macedon, and Rome. Jerome identified the stone cut out without hands as "namely, the Lord and Savior". Jerome refuted Porphyry's application of the little horn of chapter seven to Antiochus. He expected that at the end of the world, Rome would be destroyed, and partitioned among ten kingdoms before the little horn appeared. Jerome believed that Cyrus of Persia is the higher of the two horns of the Medo-Persian ram of Daniel 8:3. The he-goat is Greece smiting Persia. Alexander [the Great] is the great horn, which is then succeeded by Alexander's half brother Philip and three of his generals.

Priesthood: In 361 Gregory returned to Nazianzus and was ordained a presbyter by his father, who wanted him to assist with caring for local Christians. The younger Gregory, who had been considering a monastic existence, resented his father's decision to force him to choose between priestly services and a solitary existence, calling it an "act of tyranny". Leaving home after a few days, he met his friend Basil at Annesoi, where the two lived as ascetics. However, Basil urged him to return home to assist his father, which he did for the next year. Arriving at Nazianzus, Gregory found the local Christian community split by theological differences and his father accused of heresy by local monks. Gregory helped to heal the division through a combination of personal diplomacy and oratory. By this time Emperor Julian had publicly declared himself in opposition to Christianity. In response to the emperor's rejection of the Christian faith, Gregory composed his Invectives Against Julian between 362 and 363. Invectives asserts that Christianity will overcome imperfect rulers such as Julian through love and patience. This process as described by Gregory is the public manifestation of the process of deification (theosis), which leads to a spiritual elevation and mystical union with God. Julian resolved, in late 362, to vigorously prosecute Gregory and his other Christian critics; however, the emperor perished the following year during a campaign against the Persians. With the death of the emperor, Gregory and the Eastern churches were no longer under the threat of persecution, as the new emperor Jovian was an avowed Christian and supporter of the church. Gregory spent the next few years combating Arianism, which threatened to divide the region of Cappadocia. In this tense environment, Gregory interceded on behalf of his friend Basil with Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea (Maritima). The two friends then entered a period of close fraternal cooperation as they participated in a great rhetorical contest of the Caesarean church precipitated by the arrival of accomplished Arian theologians and rhetors. In the subsequent public debates, presided over by agents of the Emperor Valens, Gregory and Basil emerged triumphant. This success confirmed for both Gregory and Basil that their futures lay in administration of the Church. Basil, who had long displayed inclinations to the episcopacy, was elected bishop of the see of Caesarea in Cappadocia in 370. -- Gregory at Constantinople: Emperor Valens died in 378. The accession of Theodosius I, a steadfast supporter of Nicene orthodoxy, was good news to those who wished to purge Constantinople of Arian and Apollinarian domination. The exiled Nicene party gradually returned to the city. From his deathbed, Basil reminded them of Gregory's capabilities and likely recommended his friend to champion the trinitarian cause in Constantinople. In 379, the Antioch synod and its archbishop, Meletios, asked Gregory to go to Constantinople to lead a theological campaign to win over that city to Nicene orthodoxy. After much hesitation, Gregory agreed. His cousin Theodosia offered him a villa for his residence; Gregory immediately transformed much of it into a church, naming it Anastasia, "a scene for the resurrection of the faith". From this little chapel he delivered five powerful discourses on Nicene doctrine, explaining the nature of the Trinity and the unity of the Godhead. Refuting the Eunomion denial of the Holy Spirit's divinity, Gregory offered this argument: "Look at these facts: Christ is born, the Holy Spirit is His Forerunner. Christ is baptized, the Spirit bears witness to this… Christ works miracles, the Spirit accompanies them. Christ ascends, the Spirit takes His place. What great things are there in the idea of God which are not in His power? What titles appertaining to God do not apply also to Him, except for Unbegotten and Begotten? I tremble when I think of such an abundance of titles, and how many Names they blaspheme, those who revolt against the Spirit!" -- Gregory's homilies were well-received and attracted ever-growing crowds to Anastasia. Fearing his popularity, his opponents decided to strike. On the vigil of Easter in 379, an Arian mob burst into his church during worship services, wounding Gregory and killing another bishop. Escaping the mob, Gregory next found himself betrayed by his erstwhile friend, the philosopher Maximus the Cynic. Maximus, who was in secret alliance with Peter, bishop of Alexandria, attempted to seize Gregory's position and have himself ordained bishop of Constantinople. Shocked, Gregory decided to resign his office, but the faction faithful to him induced him to stay and ejected Maximus. However, the episode left him embarrassed and exposed him to criticism as a provincial simpleton unable to cope with intrigues of the imperial city. Affairs in Constantinople remained confused as Gregory's position was still unofficial and Arian priests occupied many important churches. The arrival of the emperor Theodosius in 380 settled matters in Gregory's favor. The emperor, determined to eliminate Arianism, expelled Bishop Demophilus. Gregory was subsequently enthroned as bishop of Constantinople at the Basilica of the Apostles, replacing Demophilus.

Athanasius is counted as one of the Great Doctors of the Church in Eastern Orthodoxy where he is also labeled the "Father of Orthodoxy". He is also one of the four Great Doctors of the Church from the East in the Roman Catholic Church. He is renowned in the Protestant churches, who label him "Father of The Canon". Athanasius is venerated as a Christian saint, whose feast day is 2 May in Western Christianity, 15 May in the Coptic Orthodox Church, and 18 January in the other Eastern Orthodox churches. He is venerated by the Oriental and Eastern Orthodox, the Roman Catholics, the Lutherans, and the Anglican Communion. ... Athanasius' letters include one "Letter Concerning the Decrees of the Council of Nicaea" (De Decretis), which is an account of the proceedings of that council, and another letter in the year 367 which was the first known listing of the New Testament including all those books now accepted everywhere as the New Testament. (earlier similar lists vary by the omission or addition of a few books, see Development of the New Testament canon). Several of his letters also survive. In one of these, to Epictetus of Corinth, Athanasius anticipates future controversies in his defense of the humanity of Christ. Another of his letters, to Dracontius, urges that monk to leave the desert for the more active duties of a bishop. There are several other works ascribed to him, although not necessarily generally accepted as being his own work. These include the Athanasian creed, which is today generally seen as being of 5th-century Galician origin. Athanasius was not what would be called a speculative theologian. As he stated in his First Letters to Serapion, he held on to "the tradition, teaching, and faith proclaimed by the apostles and guarded by the fathers." In some cases, this led to his taking the position that faith should take priority over reason. He held that not only was the Son of God consubstantial with the Father, but so was the Holy Spirit, which had a great deal of influence in the development of later doctrines regarding the Trinity.

Clement was born probably c. 150 A.D. of heathen parentage at Athens. The circumstances of his conversion are not known. It is supposed that he was troubled, like Justin, by the problem of God and, like him, was attracted to Christianity by the nobility and purity of the evangelical doctrines and morals. His conversion, if it had not yet taken place, was at least imminent when he undertook the journeys spoken of in his writings. He set out from Greece and travelled through southern Italy, Palestine, and finally Egypt, seeking everywhere the society of Christian teachers. -- Towards 180 A.D., he met Pantaenus at Alexandria, and took up his permanent residence in that city. There he was ordained a presbyter and, from being a disciple of Pantaenus, became, in 190, his associate and fellow-teacher. In 202 A.D. or 203 A.D., he was forced to suspend his lessons on account of the persecution of Septimius Severus, which closed the Christian school of Alexandria. He withdrew into Cappadocia, residing there with his former disciple, Bishop Alexander. We meet him again in 211 A.D., carrying to the Christians of Antioch a letter from Alexander, in which are mentioned the services he, Clement, had rendered in Cappadocia.-- In 215 A.D. or 216 A.D.the same Alexander, now bishop of Jerusalem, writes to Origen and speaks of Clement as having gone to his rest. Clement must therefore have died between 211 A.D. and 216 A.D. Ancient authors speak of him as St. Clement, but his name was not admitted to the Roman Martyrology by Benedict XIV.

Hippolytus of Rome (170 - 235) was the most important 3rd-century theologian in the Christian Church in Rome, where he was probably born. Photios I of Constantinople describes him in his Bibliotheca (cod. 121) as a disciple of Irenaeus, who was said to be a disciple of Polycarp, and from the context of this passage it is supposed that he suggested that Hippolytus himself so styled himself. However, this assertion is doubtful. He came into conflict with the popes of his time and seems to have headed a schismatic group as a rival bishop of Rome. For that reason he is sometimes considered the first Antipope. He opposed the Roman bishops who softened the penitential system to accommodate the large number of new pagan converts. However, he was very probably reconciled to the Church when he died as a martyr. He is the person usually understood to be meant by Saint Hippolytus. Starting in the 4th century, various legends arose about him, identifying him as a priest of the Novatianist Schism or as a soldier converted by Saint Laurence. He has also been confused with another martyr of the same name.

Relatively little is known of the life of Irenaeus. As a boy he had, as he delighted to point out, listened to the sermons of the great bishop and martyr, Polycarp of Smyrna, who was regarded as a disciple of the apostles themselves. Here he came to know, 'the genuine unadulterated gospel', to which he remained faithful throughout his life. Perhaps he also accompanied Polycarp on his journey to Rome in connection with the controversy over the date of celebrating Easter (154 CE). Later he went as a missionary to southern Gaul, where he became a presbyter at Lyons. A Catholic Encyclopedia article is online at St. Irenaeus. Irenaeus was absent from the city when the persecution there reached its zenith. It seems that he had been sent to Rome by the Gallican churches in order to confer with Pope Eleutherus, perhaps as a mediator in the Montanist disputes. Evidently Irenaeus stayed in Rome for just a short time, and soon after the end of the persecution we find him again in Lyons as the successor to Bishop Pothinus (178). When and how he died is unknown to us. Jerome and others state that he died as a martyr in the persecution under the Emperor Septimus Severus (202), but there is no certainty about this tradition. In short, we know Irenaeus almost solely from his writings, and these have not been preserved in their entirety. ... The era in which Irenaeus lived was a time of expansion and inner tensions in the church. In many cases Irenaeus acted as mediator between various contending factions. The churches of Asia Minor (where he was probably born) continued to celebrate Easter on the same date (the 14th of Nisan) as the Jews celebrated Passover, whereas the Roman Church maintained that Easter should always be celebrated on a Sunday (the day of the Resurrection). Mediating between the parties, Irenaeus stated that differences in external factors, such as dates of festivals, need not be so serious as to destroy church unity. Irenaeus adopted a totally negative and unresponsive attitude, however, toward Marcion, a schismatic leader in Rome, and toward the Valentinians, a fashionable intellectual Gnostic movement in the rapidly expanding church that espoused dualism. Because Gnosticism was overcome by the Orthodox Church, Gnostic writings were largely obliterated. In reconstructing Gnostic doctrines, therefore, modern scholars relied to a great extent on the writings of Irenaeus, who summarized the Gnostic views before attacking them. After the discovery of the Gnostic library near Nag Hammadi in Egypt in the 1940s (see Robinson), respect for Irenaeus increased. He was proved to have been extremely precise in his report of the doctrines he rejected. The oldest lists of bishops also were countermeasures against the Gnostics, who said that they possessed a secret oral tradition from Jesus himself. Against such statements Irenaeus maintains that the bishops in different cities are known as far back as the Apostles - and none of them was a Gnostic - and that the bishops provided the only safe guide to the interpretation of the Scriptures. With these lists of bishops the later doctrine of "the apostolic succession" of the bishops could be linked.

Justin became a Christian, but he continued to wear the cloak that was the characteristic uniform of the professional teacher of philosophy. His position was that pagan philosophy, especially Platonism, is not simply wrong, but is a partial grasp of the truth, and serves as "a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." He engaged in debates and disputations with non-Christians of all varieties, pagans, Jews, and heretics. He opened a school of Christian philosophy and accepted students, first at Ephesus and then later at Rome. There he engaged the Cynic philosopher Crescens in debate, and soon after was arrested on the charge of practicing an anauthorized religion. (It is suggested that Crescens lost the debate and denounced Justin to the authorities out of spite.) He was tried before the Roman prefect Rusticus, refused to renounce Christianity, and was put to death by beheading along with six of his students, one of them a woman. A record of the trial, probably authentic, is preserved, known as The Acts of Justin the Martyr. ... Justin's works are found in the multi-volumed set called The Ante-nicene Fathers [Church leaders before the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D.], and in various other collections of early Christian writings.

But even more importantly than the tweaking of Modalism so that it gets a place at the table is the attitude McDonald has displayed toward the Nicene definition. He says he does not trace his beliefs to credal statements. Really? If by that he means creeds are always subject to the higher authority of Scripture, of course. But this is where you fall off the other side of the narrow path and rather than believing in sola scriptura, you end up with something much less, and in fact, much different. Nicea's authority comes from its fidelity to Scripture. It does not stand alone as a new revelation, and it survived simply because it is, despite all the arguments to the contrary, the consistent, harmonious testimony of divine writ. To throw its authority into the dustbin of history in the service of some kind of "emergent" attitude is not only to display an astoundingly arrogant hubris, it is to show deep disrespect to those who fought, and some who died, in defense of its truth. And for what? For some kind of post-modern feel-goodism that cannot even recognize modalism when it is standing right in front of you. A truly educational example of just how far the emergent movement is willing to go in pursuit of its ultimately destructive goals. -- Recently Jamin Hubner has raised issues relating to a simple question: is the modern secular state of Israel religiously and theologically significant? Is it "Israel" as in the Israel of Scripture, or Romans 11? And if it is not, is it open to criticism? He is concerned about the strength of the movement, mainly amongst American evangelicals, that has granted to Israel not only a theological position it does not actually hold, but which precludes even the slightest mention of criticism of a secular state. Now, I am not going to re-hash everything here, but he has even been accused of being a "shill for Hamas" due to sources he has cited and issues he has raised (which seems to me to provide strong evidence of the need to raise such issues and challenge the knee-jerk reactions of many in the Evangelical community as a whole). While he has sought fair and non-emotional responses to questions he has raised, his requests have, in the main, fallen upon deaf ears, for I see no evidence that his critics really want to have a give-and-take.

At the time, most followers of Jesus (which historians refer to as Jewish Christians) were Jewish by birth and even converts would have considered the early Christians as a part of Judaism. According to Alister McGrath, the Jewish Christians affirmed every aspect of then contemporary (Second Temple) Judaism with the addition of the belief that Jesus was the Messiah. Unless males were circumcised, they could not be God's People. Genesis 17:14 said "No uncircumcised man will be one of my people." The meeting was called because, according to the NRSV translation of Acts 15:1-2, "Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved." However, this command is given considerably before Moses' time, stemming from the time of Abraham (see also Abrahamic covenant), but it is cited as 'the custom of Moses' because Moses is the traditional giver of the Law as a whole. And then the circumcision mandate was made more official and binding in the Mosaic Law Covenant. Jesus himself also says in John 7:22 that Moses gave the people circumcision. It was hard for Gentile Christians to keep up with all the laws listed in the Jewish Scriptures, which many Christians came to generally call the "Old Testament", a term linked with Supersessionism.

He is infamously known as the Emperor who "fiddled while Rome burned", although this is now considered an inaccurate rumor, and as an early persecutor of Christians. He was known for having captured Christians burned in his garden at night for a source of light. This view is based on the writings of Tacitus, Suetonius, and Cassius Dio, the main surviving sources for Nero's reign. Few surviving sources paint Nero in a favorable light. Some sources, though, including some mentioned above, portray him as an emperor who was popular with the common Roman people, especially in the East. The study of Nero is problematic as some modern historians question the reliability of ancient sources when reporting on Nero's tyrannical acts. ... According to Tacitus, the population searched for a scapegoat [for the fire] and rumors held Nero responsible. To deflect blame, Nero targeted Christians. He ordered Christians to be thrown to dogs, while others were crucified and burned.

1st Under Caesar Nero A.D. 54-68 {the last Caesar} The Apostle Paul was beheaded during this persecution. -- 2nd Under Emperor Domition A.D. 81- 96 The Apostle John was [said to have been] boiled in oil and survived through a miracle of God. Later he [John] was banished to [the island of] Patmos (Revelation 1:9). -- 3rd Under Emperor Trajan A.D. 98-117 Ignatius was martyred. -- 4th Under Emperors Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius Antoninus A.D. 138-180 Polycarp (a disciple of the Apostle John) of Smyrna was martyred (Saturday, February 23 in about either 156 A.D. or 166 A.D.). -- 5th Under Emperor Severus A.D. 193-211 Irenaeus (a disciple of Polycarp), Bishop of Lyons, was beheaded in 202 A.D. The two women Perpetua and Felicitas were martyred in the city of Carthage, North Africa in the year 203 A.D. -- 6th Under Emperor Maximus A.D. 235-238 In some provinces everything was done to exterminate all Christians. -- 7th Under Emperor Decius A.D. 249-251 This persecution was brought on because of Decius's hatred for his predecessor Emperor Phillip [from Syria - Reigned 244-249 A.D.] a Christian, and partly by his jealously concerning the amazing increase of Christianity. Heathen temples began to be forsaken, and the Christian churches grew. -- 8th Under Emperor Valerian A.D. 253-260 The martyrs that fell during this time period were innumerable and their tortures were various and painful. Neither rank, gender, nor age were regarded. The Edict of 257 A.D. and 258 A.D. ordered all Christian leaders to be put to death that did not take part in sacrificing to the gods. -- 9th Under Emperor Aurelian A.D. 274-287 He had the whole legion [of Christian soldiers] butchered by the other soldiers. This event took place on 09/22/286 A.D. -- 10th Under Emperor Diocletian A.D. 292-304 During this persecution, the emperor ordered 4 edicts against the Christians.

Marcionism, similar to Gnosticism, depicted the Hebrew God of the Old Testament as a tyrant or demiurge (see also God as the Devil). Marcion was labeled as gnostic by Eusebius. **Marcion's canon consisted of [only] eleven [NT] books: A gospel consisting of ten sections from the Gospel of Luke edited by Marcion; and ten of Paul's epistles. All other epistles and gospels of the 27 book New Testament canon were rejected. Paul's epistles enjoy a prominent position in the Marcionite canon, since Paul is credited with correctly transmitting the universality of Jesus' message. Other authors' epistles [Notably: Peter, James, Jude, Matthew and John] were rejected since they seemed to suggest that Jesus had simply come to found a new sect within broader Judaism. Religious tribalism of this sort seemed to echo Yahwism, and was thus regarded as a corruption of the "Heavenly Father"'s teaching. ***Marcionism was denounced by its opponents as heresy, and written against, notably by Tertullian, in a five-book treatise Adversus Marcionem, written about 208 A.D. Marcion's writings are lost, though they were widely read and numerous manuscripts must have existed. Even so, many scholars (including Henry Wace) claim it is possible to reconstruct and deduce a large part of ancient Marcionism through what later critics, especially Tertullian, said concerning Marcion.

Ephesus: The findings obtained in this region where the native people, namely the Lelegs and the Carians have lived since the beginning, indicate that the city is dated back to 2000 years B.C. As far as the years of 1000 are concerned, it is assumed that the Ions came to this region, lead by Androckles. Ephesus was captured by the Kimmers (Cimmerians) in the 7th century B.C., by the Lydians in 560, and later in 546 B.C. by the Persians; and was rescued from the Persian domination when Alexander the Great defeated the Persians in 334 B.C. -- Lysimachos, a commander of Alexander's, had the settlement removed from the whereabouts of the Temple of Artemis to the location between the Mount of Panayir and the Mount of Bülbül, and had a wall built around the city. The city was taken by the Kingdom of Pergamon after 190 B.C., by Rome in 133 B.C., and later by Byzantium. Ephesus maintained its importance during the period of Christianity; the apostle St. Paul arrived there during the years of 50 A.D., and St. John was buried on the hill of Ayasuluk (Selcuk, near Izmir) at the beginning of the 2nd century. Ephesus lived through its third glorious period during the reign of Justinian in the middle of the 6th century A.D. At this time, the Church of St. John was built by the Byzantine emperor. -- The ruins of Ephesus, situated near Selçuk town at 70 kilometers (44 miles) south of Izmir, is a main center of archaeological interest owing to the ancient remains that still exist. When you enter through the Magnesia Gate (south gate or upper gate), you can see the State Agora (or Upper Agora). The Temple of Isis is situated at the center of the Agora, and Stoa is placed on the North side of it. The Odeion (Bouletarion or Parliament) with a capacity of 1,400 persons is placed behind it and the Prytaneion (Town Hall) where the sacred fire used to burn, is on its flank. The Baths of Varius are placed on the east side of Odeion. On the west of the Agora, the Monument of Memmius built in the 1st century BC., the fountain of Sextilius Pollio built in the year 93 A.D., and the Temple of Domitian (81-93 A.D) are placed. On the south of the Agora, the fountain of Laecanius Bassus is situated. The Curetes street starts downwards from the Temple of Memmius. The Gate of Heracles (Hercules) is placed on this avenue. After passing through this part, the fountain of Trajan built in the years 102-114 is seen on the right hand side and after this, the Temple of Hadrian appears in front of us, in all its splendid beauty (117-138 A.D). The Scholastica Baths, built in the 4th century A.D., are situated behind the Temple of Hadrian. The houses of the rich people of Ephesus which were in front of it, have been restored and opened for visits at present with special permits. -- At the corner formed by the Curetes street and the Marble Road, the House of Love (Pornaion or Brothel) is placed and the Library of Celsus, restored and reestablished in recent years, stands right in front of this. The library which had been built in the name of proconsul Gaius Celsus completed in the year 135 A.D. by his son Tiberius Giulius Aquila, is entered by way of a stairway, 21 meters (69 feet) in width and having 9 steps. The southeastern gate of the Trade Agora opens to the Library of Celsus. Emperor Augustus' slaves, Mazaeus and Mithridates, liberated by him had this gate built in the year 1st century A.D.; it comprises three sections and has been restored today. The Corinthian columns of the Stoa encircling the Trade Agora with the dimensions 110 x 110 meters (361 x 361 feet), are standing erect today. The Temple of Serapes built in the period of Antony (138-192 A.D.) is placed behind the Trade Agora. -- One of the magnificent buildings of Ephesus is the Great Theater, largest in Asia Minor, which had a capacity of more than 24.000 people and is in a rather well preserved condition. The construction had started during the Hellenistic period but it could only be completed during the time of Trajan (98-117 A.D.). St. Paul was dragged into this theater to face the crowed because of his famous letter to Ephesians, but rescued by the security corps of the city. Festivals are celebrated in this theater today. -- All the streets of Ephesus were illuminated at night with oil lamps, this shows us the richness of the city. The Port Avenue extends in front of the theater. The avenue is 11 meters (36 feet) wide and 600 meters (1970 feet) long, and it has been called Arcadian Street because it was renewed during the time of Arcadius. On the whole north side of the avenue, there are the Harbor Gymnasium, baths and the Theater Gymnasium. The avenue that passes along the front of the theater, extends towards the Stadium built during the Nero period (54-68 A.D.) and towards the Vedius Gymnasium. The Church of the Virgin Mary built at the beginning of the 4th century A.D. is situated behind the Port Gymnasium just before the exit from the lower gate (north gate). **This was also the meeting place of the 3rd Ecumenical Council [The Council of Ephesus may refer to: The First Council of Ephesus of 431 AD. The Second Council of Ephesus of 449 AD. The Third Council of Ephesus of 475 AD. - Wiki.com]. ... The House of Virgin Mary: On Bulbul Dag (Nightingale mountain) there is the House of the Virgin where it's believed that she passed last years of her life and passed away. She came to Ephesus together with St. John and taken up to Panaghia Kapulu mountain to survive the Roman persecutions. The House was destroyed by many earthquakes and not discovered until 1951 thanks to a German nun, Catherine Emmerich, who saw its location in her visions. The site is recognized as a shrine by Vatican and visited by the Popes. Today, the House of Virgin Mary is renovated by George Quatman Foundation from Ohio and serves as a small church which attracts many Christians as well as Muslims coming to pray for Her. The Mass is held here every Sunday. On the 15th August 2000 there was a great ceremony for the Assumption of the Virgin, the year which marked the two thousand years of the birth of Jesus.

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The Apostle Paul - The apostle Paul was one of the most famous citizens of the Roman Empire and without question one of the most influential individuals in history. He was used by the Lord in his missionary and evangelistic activities to set in motion a great deal of the organization known as the Christian Church, the Body of Christ on earth, to the extent that billions of human beings have been directly or indirectly affected by his ministry. Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he wrote the foundation documents for the Christian way of life, the Word of God which has changed the lives of millions. -- Paul's Education: Paul was educated by his mother until the age of five. From age five to ten he studied with his father in the Hebrew scriptures and traditional writings. At the same time, being a Roman citizen and living in a Greek and Roman environment, he received a thorough education in the Greek language, history, and culture. He was sent to Jerusalem at about the age of ten to attend the rabbinical school of Gamaliel, who was the son of Simeon the son of Hillel. Gamaliel was a most eminent rabbi who was mentioned both in the Talmud and in the New Testament (Acts 5:24-40; 22:3). Gamaliel was called Rabban - one of only seven teachers so called. He was a Pharisee, but he rose above party prejudice. He composed a prayer against the Christian "heretics". He lived and died a Jew. At this time, Herod was dead, and the Romans had complete control of Judea, hence, there was Roman money, language, and culture. The Jews, therefore, were inclined to cling more closely to their religion as the center of unity. [Refer to the topic: Judean History] There were two great rabbinical schools, those of Hillel and Schammai. Hillel, the grandfather of Gamaliel, held that tradition was superior to the Law. The school of Schammai despised traditionalists, especially when there teachings clashed with the writings of Moses. The religious school of Gamaliel (Hillel) was chiefly oral and usually had a prejudice against any book but Scripture. They used a system of Scriptural exegesis, and Josephus in his writings expressed the wish to have such a power of exegesis. When school was in session, learned men met and discussed scriptures, gave various interpretations, suggested illustrations, and quoted precedents. The students were encouraged to question, doubt, even contradict. -- When Paul became a Christian, his very thorough education was enormously helpful. He was able to assimilate Christian doctrines rapidly and relate them accurately to the Scripture teaching he had received. From his education, both from Gamaliel and in the desert from the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul developed a divine viewpoint attitude toward human history. Paul knew that the existence of God can easily be perceived by anyone, that man can become aware of God, but that many men's deliberate sin halted this good beginning by immoral activities which accompanied their idolatry. Therefore, Paul had an intense hatred of idolatry of any kind. Paul's teaching shows that the only reality is God. Idolatry distorts man's conception of the world and external nature. Idolatry is the enemy of mankind. Paul knew the law of growth of human nature. As a Roman, Tarsian, Hebrew, and culturally Greek, he knew of the many distortions of the life of his society. As a nation becomes unhealthy, development is halted. Societies errors as to the nature of God and the true relation of God to man prevented nations from getting rid of their besetting evil. The books of Acts is the chief authoritative record for the ministries of Paul and the other apostles. For a brief outline of Paul's ministry, see the Chronological Table of Paul's Ministry. The most thorough, accurate, and interesting secular work on Paul is The Life and Epistles of St. Paul, by Conybeare and Howson.