Church History: Notable Concepts (inc. Heresies, Creeds, etc.), Notable Groups (inc. Denominations), and Notable Anonymous Documents

Confessor (All Facts)

• Type of Christian during Christian Persecutions in Rome who suffered torture or was sentenced to work in the mines 

• Recognized as saints in recognition of their steadfastness in their faith

• The court records of their trials sometimes were preserved and served as the basis for popular biographies known as “saints’ lives,” which provided models for how to lead a Christian life 

Martyr (All Facts)

• Type of Christian who was executed for not renouncing their faith, becoming “witness” to the faith during Christian Persecutions in Rome

• Recognized as saints in recognition of their steadfastness in their faith

• The court records of their trials sometimes were preserved and served as the basis for popular biographies known as “saints’ lives,” which provided models for how to lead a Christian life 

100s - Pauline Christians (All Facts) 

• Founded by (St.) Paul

• Believe that Jesus’s death and resurrection introduced a New Covenant that fulfilled the Old Covenant and superseded Jewish law and custom, thus they did not have to follow Jewish law or custom

• Believe that gentiles could also be Christians, not just Jews

• Christians who are gentiles and thus believe gentiles can be Christians, not having to follow Jewish law or customs

170 - Montanism (All Facts)

• Heresy started by the namesake founder around 170

• It is the first Christian heresy

• Heretical belief that

  • Declares that there are prophets of God that ministered (or are currently ministering) after the time of the New Testament 

  • Overemphasizes spiritual experiences and contends that personal revelations are more valuable (or more authoritative) than what the bible says

  • Spiritual ecstasy is more valuable than a biblical understanding of the faith

0s CE - Gnosticism (All Facts)

• Heresy that started in the 0s CE 

• It is one of the first Christian heresies 

• Heretical belief that

  • The only goal of Christianity is to escape the fallen / physical world and enter heaven

  • The fallen / physical world is inherently bad and that spiritual goals should be directed towards entrance into the spiritual world, which is inherently good

  • Rejects the idea that a good God made our fallen / physical world very good, and that this world was created created by a lesser deity called the Demiurge instead

  • Rejects the idea that Jesus took on a fully human nature to come and redeem the fallen / physical world and/or emphasizes Jesus’s divinity but rejects Jesus’s humanity 

  • Emphasizes salvation through spiritual knowledge rather than faith alone 

• Those who held this belief believed

  • They possessed a divine spark that needed to be awakened by a divine messenger, such as Jesus, to escape the material prison that is the world and return to the divine realm

  • They possessed secret knowledge about the spiritual world 

• Term used to to a number of groups including the Valentinians and Sethians

• Influences the modern, non-Christian religion of Mandaeism 

• Considered non-Nicene

306 - Melitians (All Facts) 

• Heresy started by the namesake founder around 306

• It was essentially Donatism, but their Church was located in West North Africa instead of Egypt 

• Like Donatists, they believed that those who had renounced their faith while persecuted (during the Diocletianic Persecution) could not reenter into the Church 

311 - Donatism / Donatists (All Facts)

• Heresy started by the namesake founder around 311

  • Was condemned as heresy at the Council of Arles in 314

• Heretical belief that

  • The Sacraments only work on someone if they are done by a “true Christian”

    • For example, if a person is baptized and then that person later finds out the person who baptized them was a false believer, then that person would have to get re-baptized

  • Rejects the idea that the Sacraments exclusively depend on God

  • “Traditores” (betrayers), those who had turned over Christian books during the Diocletianic Persecution, had lost their spiritual authority and could no longer hold church office 

• When it first came about in the Roman Empire, it split off from mainstream Christianity because it disagreed with its response on persecution

  • It held that anyone who had sacrificed to the Roman gods should be refused readmission to the Church

• In contrast, those who opposed this heretical belief believed that spiritual authority lay in the office, not the man, and that after doing penance, the “traditores” (betrayers) could continue in office again

313 - Edict of Milan (All Facts)

• Issued by Constantine, it

  • Granted religious autonomy to all groups including Christians

  • Effectively made Christianity legal throughout the Empire

  • Ordered the compensation of Christian property that had been

    • confiscated by the imperial treasury

    • acquitted by private persons prior

  • Marked the first time that the imperial government recognized the Christian church as a lawful institution

  • Transformed Christianity from a potentially persecuted to a legally recognized religion

318 - Arianism / Arianists (All Facts)

• Heresy started by the namesake founder around 318

  • Was condemned as heresy at the First Council of Nicaea in 325 and the First Council of Constantinople in 381

• Heretical belief that

  • God created Jesus, meaning there was a time when Jesus did not exist and thus that He could not be God because God is eternal

  • Rejects the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father

    • They were Christians that taught that The Son (Jesus) was different in substance and subordinate in authority to The Father (God)

  • Rejects Christ’s fully divine nature

  • Jesus is like God, but not actually God

  • Results from the Analogical Fallacy: “The Trinity is like how the sun, its light, and its heat are all the sun”

    • This teaching struck a chord with those who viewed the Christian Trinity as analogous to a human family 

  • Was absorbed by the newly converted Germanic tribes, such as the Celts / Gauls, Vandals, and Lombards

  • Influences modern-day Jehovah’s Witness Theology

  • The Holy Spirit is distinct from God the Father and Jesus the Son 

• One of their supporters, Eusebius, is credited with having baptized Constantine the Great on the Emperor’s deathbed

  • This underlined how strong the namesake heretical movement became, as orthodox church leaders had thought that they had won the day after the Nicene Creed and Council of 325 

• In contrast, those that opposed and rejected this heresy believed that all three persons of the Christian Trinity were of the same substance and thus equal in status 

325 - Nicene Creed (All Facts)

• Established at the First Council of Nicaea 

• States that

  • God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are all co-eternal

  • God is 1 essence, but 3 persons

  • Christ is truly human and truly God

  • Christ was born of the Virgin Mary

  • Christ died for humanity’s sins

  • Christ resurrected

  • Christ ascended and will return

325 - Nicene Christians / Nicene Christianity (All Facts)

• Historical term used to refer to contemporary Christian body including Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Protestant denominations and their churches

  • Any “Christian” who denied these tenets is not considered, by most Christians, to be Christian

  • Was absorbed by the Roman Empire

Bishop (All Facts)

• Within each Roman province, the church in each “civitas” was under this namesake authority 

Archbishop (All Facts)

• Bishop of the capital city of a province

Patriarch (All Facts)

• Specific Archbishop, there are 5 of them at any one time and include the bishops of Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Rome (the Pope)

Pope (All Facts) 

• The Bishop / Archbishop of Rome, a position which claims to have the highest status of all the bishops based on the argument that they were the successors of St. Peter the Apostle, an argument called Apostolic Succession 

Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (All Facts)

• Church started by King Ezana of Axum and St. Frumentius, the missionary who baptized him

325 - 360 - Codex Sinaiticus / Sinai Codex / Sinai Bible (All Facts)

• Christian manuscript of a Greek Bible in the 300s, it contains the majority of the Greek Old Testament, including the deuterocanonical books, and the Greek New Testament, with both the Epistle of Barnabas and the Epistle of the Shepherd of Hermas included as well

Nestorianism (All Facts)

• Heresy started by the namesake founder around 428

  • Was condemned as heresy at the Council of Ephesus in 431

• Heretical belief that

  • Jesus’s divine nature is separate from his human nature

  • Treats divine Jesus and human Jesus like two different persons

  • Jesus’s divine nature is “God the Son” and Jesus’s human nature is “Jesus,” and “Christ” refers to both of them

  • Rejects the idea that God died for Christians, only that Jesus and Christ died for Christians, but not God

  • Mary is the mother of Jesus and the mother of Christ, but not the mother of God

  • Jesus and Christ died on the cross, but God did not die on the cross

• Opposite of Monophysitism

Monophysitism (All Facts)

• Was initially accepted by the Council of Ephesus in 449 

• Heretical belief that

  • The incarnate Christ is of a single, divine nature

  • Jesus’s divine nature and human nature are mixed into one combined nature

  • Jesus resembles something like the Greek demigods in that he would be part god and part human

• Opposite of Nestorianism