The Council of Nicaea

1700 years ago, the Roman Emperor Constantine called an unprecedented meeting of early Christian leaders from across the empire to settle a fierce dispute threatening to split the early Church. The result? The Council of Nicaea - Christianity’s first great general council and the birthplace of the Nicene Creed. In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by Dr Dafydd Daniel to explore this this pivotal moment in history. From the dramatic showdown between Bishops Arius and Alexander to how this momentous gathering shaped the core beliefs of Christianity. Join us to discover the lasting legacy of one of the most influential councils in history. Presented by Tristan Hughes. The producer and audio editor is Joseph Knight. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff. All music courtesy of Epidemic Sounds The Ancients is a History Hit podcast. Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. You can take part in our listener survey here https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/6FFT7MK: Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

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• 0:00Tristan Hughes?

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• 1:43Tristan Hughes?

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• 3:05Tristan Hughes?

  Seventeen hundred years ago, an unprecedented council of early Christian bishops gathered at Nicaea, not far from present-day Istanbul. The council had been convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine, Constantine the Great, to address a theological dispute, a schism amongst early Christians that threatened to explode across the empire. Constantine wanted it sorted. At the centre of the council was the issue of homo uscion, this idea that the Father, God, the Son, who would be Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit were all equal. The two figureheads on opposing sides of this dispute were Alexander, the bishop of Alexandria on one side,

• 3:49Tristan Hughes?

  and Arius, a member of the clergy on the other. Arius had the idea that there was almost this divine hierarchy, that the Son was subordinate to the Father. Alexander and his followers believed that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were of equal weight and shared the same divine substance. This dispute was the so-called Arian controversy.

• 4:14Tristan Hughes?

  The bishops had gathered at Nicaea to determine which was the correct doctrine and which was heresy. Their decision remains central to Christianity even today. It's The Ancients on History Hit. I'm Tristan Hughes, your host. Joining me to explain the Council of Nicaea and why this ecumenical council was one of the most important events of early Christianity, I was delighted to interview Dr Daphid Daniel, a lecturer in divinity at the University of St Andrews. We delve into the fascinating details of this early Christian theological dispute, and I really do hope you enjoy.

• 4:58Tristan Hughes?

  Daphid, it is a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.

• 5:01Speaker 02

  Well, thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here.

• 5:04Tristan Hughes?

  And it's a special anniversary, it feels, this year because 2025 is the 1700th anniversary of one of the most pivotal moments in Christian history, the Council of Nicaea. But this isn't just a dry theological debate. It's got power, politics, intense religious rivalry, all set against the backdrop of the Roman Empire's first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great. So with that established, I mean, let's start with the basics. For listeners who might not be familiar with early Christianity, what was the Council of Nicaea? And why does it still matter so much today?

• 5:36Speaker 02

  So the Council of Nicaea was a church council called by the Emperor Constantine in 325. It's the first ecumenical council, so worldwide council. In fact, the word ecumenical was coined by Eusebius Caesarius, one of the early church historians who was there to describe this council as worldwide. It's significant because it decides really two of the most fundamental doctrines in Christianity that we've all heard about, the Trinity and the Incarnation. But also because through that, it really is the beginning of, well, one of two things, depending on your point of view. It's either the beginning of modern Christianity, Christianity is a public, visible religion, civic religion, or it's the beginning of the corruption of Christianity, because it involves this decision of what is orthodox and therefore what is heretical,

• 6:21Speaker 02

  and involves the state's action in that.

• 6:23Tristan Hughes?

  Is it quite a definitive line that either you go the way that is agreed and that's orthodox, or if you don't, and anything else is seen as heresy?

• 6:31Speaker 02

  Yes, this is where the Church Council produces this Nicene Creed. Something still read out today, this is sort of foundational text. Now, it certainly is trying to clearly decide a distinction between orthodoxy and heresy. One of the interesting things is that it's not necessarily entirely clear what Nicene has decided, that these obscure phrases homo lucion, which I'm sure we'll get to, what does that really mean? Is that heretical itself, which was one perspective at the time? And then even though Nicene, the council, makes this decision, in the immediate aftermath, really, the opposing side, who are the Arians, seemed to come to the fore a bit more than the Nicenes.

• 7:12Speaker 02

  So it's part of a very vibrant struggle or discussion, depending how you want to phrase it, through this period.

• 7:18Tristan Hughes?

  Well, we're going to be exploring all of that in detail. But David, at the beginning, as we kind of explored the background, you also mentioned in passing a figure called Eusebius of Caesaria. Do we have many literary sources for this event and this time in history?

• 7:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's striking is that because we don't, really, that's the, I suppose that's the interesting thing, because I think now we'd, certainly I would think of something like a church council of any kind would have all sorts of minutes taken and there'd be all these records and everything else. But that's not the case here. I mean, it goes on for a couple of months, it seems, we're not entirely, maybe starts on the 20th of May, ends in July, in Nicene 325, even that's not that clear. Our main sources for it are Eusebius of Caesaria, who was there, and also Athanasius of Alexandria. Obviously, they have their own particular point of view and perspective, which may well interfere with their accounts and recognition of what's gone on. But it's in their books that we have their account of what went on, but also extracts

• 8:16Speaker 02

  from some of Constantine's letters, which follow the council, which go out to the church to tell them, tell the church what the decisions that have been made. And of course, other records of, for example, the writings of Ares. And, you know, part of the build up to the controversy is sort of hundreds of letters being exchanged all over the place between these various bishops and versions of those recorded in those historical accounts, as well as others later on. So there's Theodrette of Cyrus and a couple of other sort of historians more in the fifth century, who also have some sort of access to documents that don't seem to survive and only survive in those histories. Constantine also wrote other letters to try and prevent the council happening, to try and stop, stop everyone arguing and everyone to calm down.

• 8:58Speaker 02

  Again, we've got sort of versions of those letters, whether they're, how accurate they are, is open to debate.

• 9:04Tristan Hughes?

  Well, let's explore the context as to why this council is happening in 325 AD. Big question, David. What is happening in the Roman Empire and the church in those years running up to 325?

• 9:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, okay. So in the empire itself, and so we're coming out of the, you know, so-called crisis of the third century, sort of unsettled period in Roman history, right? So, you know, we've had the plagues, like Plague of Cyprian, which has wiped out 50% of Alexandria and things like that. And all these barbarian tribes attacking in the third century, a lean to unsettled situation, various people declaring themselves Caesar all the time, right? You know, they win a battle and they're going to be the new emperor. So the crisis of the third century has led to, at the end of that period, the tetrarchy. So tetrarchy system of government has been established by Diocletian, which has seemed to work sort of fairly well, right? You've got two Augusti, right? Two senior emperors, east and west, then these junior Caesars beneath them. And that, of course, means

• 10:01Speaker 02

  you've got more imperial people closer to the action across the empire, to the troubled areas. And that seemed to work fairly well until 306, when the Augustus at that point, the lead Augustus in the west, Constantius, who is Constantine's father, dies. And that then leads really to set off to civil war in the empire between these rival Augusti and Caesars. They all start fighting each other. Not least Constantine, of course, but another chap, Maxentius, who was one of the original Augusti, but he's been left out of the equation. And then this other fellow, Licinius, who'd been promoted above both Maxentius and Constantine, much to their consternation. And so they've all been fighting with each other. Maxentius is significant because it leads us to the Battle of Milvian

• 10:44Speaker 02

  Bridge, which I'm sure we'll come to. That's 312. That's where Constantine gets rid of him, his half-brother. And then later on, Constantine gets rid of his other half-brother, Licinius, in the Battle of Chrysopolis in 324. So a period of civil war and settlement. Now you've got this single man, Constantine, has become the sole emperor. So a period of settlement has emerged there through periods of unrest. That's the empire at large. The church, well, the church has also come through really its main periods of persecution. So...

• 11:13Speaker 02

  There's only two really empire-wide persecutions of the church. One of them is Decius in 250s. It's not aimed at Christianity as such. Decius wants a return to the worship of the ancient gods as that gathers Christians up into it. As part of the tetrarchy, however, Diocletian, Glerius do have concentrated persecution against Christians. This is called the Great Persecution. And that has continued until softly in 311, when Glerius releases an edict of toleration. But finally, with the edict of Milan, which comes out of Constantine and Licinius before they separate. So it's been a period of unrest for the empire and the church and persecution for Christians, which is part of this, does feed into Nicaea.

• 11:58Speaker 02

  Because part of the struggle, sort of internal politics of the church and part of Constantine's concern is the fact that after those periods of persecution, you have certain Christian groups who are claiming to be the true church. And this is most famously with the Donatists in Africa. I mean, one of Constantine's first acts in 314. So even before he's getting towards Nicaea is to have the Council of Arles, which is to try and quiet these Donatists. So the Donatists oppose people who apostatize during the persecution. They surrendered the Bible, surrendered their faith. Now they want to come back into the church and the Donatists refusing. And the same thing is happening in Egypt with a chap called Militius.

• 12:39Speaker 02

  And so the militias are also this group that don't necessarily seem suspect in their orthodoxy, unlike Ares and others that we'll come to. But they are claiming to be the real church, the spiritual church, the church of saints. And so again, there's a threat of schism and separation.

• 12:54Tristan Hughes?

  So already in those immediate decades before the Council of Nicaea, and before we get to the figure of Ares, there are other figures, as you've highlighted there, the Donatists and so on, which are almost a symbol of what's to come, that there are divisions emerging, maybe catalyzed by these persecutions that have happened in recent history. There are divisions in how people are viewing Christianity and how they should approach it.

• 13:16Speaker 02

  Yes, yeah, exactly right. No, exactly right. I mean, the status of Christianity even as a religion in the empire has been much debated, right? It's only in that Edict of Milan that Christianity actually becomes officially recognised as a religion. I mean, that's that's part of a significant stage, right? It's not even viewed as religion at that point. And yes, as you say, there's unrest about the status of the Church, is Christianity, is it a suspect cult? Is it something serious or not? Even before this point, you've had the persecution of Dicius in 250s. After that is what's known as the Little Peace of the Church, the sort of 40 years or so between that persecution and the Great Persecution. And then we've got this, the Emperor Aurelian. And he is already asked to try and decide a controversy about another heresy, which is still being debated at the time of the Nicene Church,

• 13:59Speaker 02

  which is known as subalianism with this extraordinary character, Paul of Samosata, who's a bishop of Antioch, who claims the privilege of the Queen Zenobia, who's sort of an ex part of Egypt and Syria from the empire. So, yeah, already the empire has been involved in trying to decide what's going on. And of course, that goes back, you know, the earliest record that we have of Christianity even being discussed is Pliny with Trajan, you know, saying he's found these odd people, you know, I've tortured them anyway. Now, what should I do with them now, you know, sort of thing.

• 14:29Tristan Hughes?

  Yes, he's like, don't go looking for the Christians, but if they do, you can execute them, or something like that.

• 14:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's it, that's right.

• 14:35Tristan Hughes?

  They've got a very interesting relationship with the Christians early on. It seems like in regards to the events of the Roman Empire up to the Nicene Creed, some key events and things to highlight, as you have highlighted already, Daphyth, is at the end of the third century crisis, the Emperor Diocletian comes along, creates the rule of four, the tetrarchy, those two senior emperors and those two junior emperors. Seems to work for a period of time, but then after Diocletian goes, the next successor is Constantius Clorus. He dies early on. His son Constantine is proclaimed emperor in 306. And very quickly it all starts falling apart and you get those civil wars like Constantine versus Maxentius and so on. Ultimately, leading to Constantine ditching the tetrarchy completely and becoming a

• 15:20Tristan Hughes?

  sole emperor again by the time he gets to the Council of Nicaea. So let's focus on Constantine's career a bit to get more context into his adoption or his relationship with Christianity by that time, because it seems it's been 13 years or so, hasn't it, by 325 and his, the beginning of his relationship with Christianity. I feel this is where we probably want to explore the Milvian Bridge and why that's important.

• 15:44Speaker 02

  It's an extraordinary story, isn't it? And, you know, much debated how much truth there is in this and how it relates to wider sort of political motivations for Christian conversion as well as anything else. But Constantine is about to fight this battle against Maxentius and has this vision of a sign in the sky and this line in this sign conquer and later has a dream, a dream of Christ coming to him. This is how it's relayed by Lactentius and you see, you see this of Caesar, both of whom knew Constantine personally. And the sign in question is the Cairo symbol. So the Cairo symbol is just the first two letters of Christos in Greek. It's an X with a big P sticking out the top of the X. And Constantine makes this his symbol,

• 16:29Speaker 02

  right? He puts it on his standards, on his shield and fights with this and wins an extraordinary victory. It's not clear why Maxentius comes out to fight even at such an exposed area and so on. And so because of that, Constantine thanks the Christian God, you know, dedicates the victory to it, thinks it's come from that and carries on using this symbol. It's said that Licinius lived in great fear of it, you know, at this later battle, Chrysopolis 324, it's sort of pagan symbols of Licinius against this Cairo symbol. So what's his real view of Christianity? I mean, it's clearly, it seems to have been a monotheist, right? It seems to have believed in one God and seems like a lot of people in the ancient world too, and not least Christians themselves, have had the view that you may have sort of natural revelation of God and then further revelation of him. So there's no inconsistency to say, well,

• 17:14Speaker 02

  The sun god is revealed as actually being this this other one god, this Christian god. And then you take Christianity very seriously. And as I mentioned, the Council of Viles very early on when he's deciding about Donatus, but, you know, St Peter's Basilica, right in Rome, that's 318, starts to build that, then 330 establishes Constantinople as a new capital. That's sort of the stewed with Christian buildings. It's a vibrant pluralist sense of religion, isn't it? That religion can appear in different forms as long as it's peaceful. And that the particular religion that you worship in this day for Christianity for Constantine doesn't have to, he doesn't have to repeal the Edict of Milan, which is about freedom of religious worship and convert to a Christian. That's sort of what I'm trying to get across, I suppose.

• 17:57Tristan Hughes?

  There seems to be a bit more toleration at that time, doesn't it? And I remember interviewing Professor David Potter, and he was saying how with Constantine, it almost seemed like he was hedging his divine bets at times. Patronage to Christians, but also building temples and churches. So doing both things at hand, but as time goes on, as you say, that endures. So by the time we get to 325 AD, does he feel a responsibility? Is he the one who calls the council together? Or what do we know about that?

• 18:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, so he does call the council and seems to preside over it in some form, interjecting the debate so far as we can tell. He feels bound to call it, as far as we can tell from the documents we have from the time. It's not that he's very interested, going back to your point about hedging the bets, not as very interested in the theological question. That's an issue. In fact, he thinks it's ridiculous, as far as we tell that, you know, they should stop messing around and introducing disorder debate over this sort of minute and obscure. You know, theologians of any age, I suppose, can find something to disagree over. They need to not to bother with that sort of stuff, just to keep peace in the in the church. So his interest definitely in peaceableness in order.

• 19:06Speaker 02

  When Eusebius stubs him bishop of those outside the church, so he's not an official churchman, not baptized, of course, as he isn't until he's just before he dies. But he's responsible for those who are believers. Another way of putting it, I suppose, is that what Constantine represents is the laity, right? The voice of the laity coming into Christian affairs, they should be. Represented, they should have a sense of it because you can't allow theologians to entangle things in endless debates, especially when those debates spill over into civic disorder.

• 19:33Tristan Hughes?

  So is it a case then that Constantine, he hears that there are these divisions emerging in the Christian church and he's worried about dissent, about trouble within the empire if it's not sorted?

• 19:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's right. That's it. So Ares is a priest in Alexandria, so just a priest. And he objects to what his bishop, Alexander, is teaching. So objects to it. And he makes his objections very clear and then writes to loads of other people to say that, you know, this patriarch is a heretic, basically, and, you know, should we really be following him? Should we actually maybe organise our own deacons? It seems that some of their followers of Ares are even sort of ordaining their own deacons and so on. So a threat to that order, right, that principle of order within the church. So then both Alexander and Ares are writing all over the place to sort of hundreds of other, you know, bishops across, you know, Syria, Libya, Egypt, Turkey, in modern day terms, writing to all of them to try and get them on their side. And of course, then they are

• 20:28Speaker 02

  then appealing to imperial power, imperial authority to help try and decide this debate. And so in the end, Ares is exiled in three two one, he's thrown out, but he doesn't wish to be thrown out. So he appeals back and Constantine says, look, can't you just both, you know, shake hands and call it a draw or whatever and move on? And they have their own individual synods to try and decide the answer to the question. And that can't decide it. So then finally Constantine says, right, well, he's going to organise something just to decide this question once and for all. This question's caused disorder through Africa, through Turkey, whatever else. If people are saying this is something that they're going to disagree about, then we better try and settle the question. And that's why it's the first ecumenical council. So it seems to be 315 bishops, extraordinary

• 21:10Speaker 02

  number of people, and that would then include thousands of priests, right, brought in from across the empire. Only five from the West, interestingly. Most of these are Eastern bishops, only five from the West. But, you know, they're all coming in to try and decide this question. Just if we can decide this question, then maybe everyone can just move on and stop arguing about it. I think a Constantine's point seems to be if you want to debate some minute point of theology, then you can. But the idea of then threatening a schizop, really, which is what this is, threatening the church become divide into different types of different churches to rival each other, then that's not going to help simple battle and disagreement.

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• 24:06Tristan Hughes?

  David, before we explore the Council of Nicaea, I hope you don't mind if we delve into a bit more detail about what Arius and Alexander were disagreeing about and really, really get that sorted for us so we can nail that down. And also, I guess, first of all, why it's happening in Alexandria? You mentioned there's a patriarch of Alexandria. So, set the scene of Alexandria at this time in Egypt and the strength of Christianity there. And then, what is the root of this disagreement that erupts between Arius on one side and Alexander on the other?

• 24:39Speaker 02

  It's incredibly interesting, isn't it? Important to remember that we've got Paul's letters as the earliest documents of the Christian religion, and these are writing to these churches in the eastern world, Ephesus, Corinth in Greece and so on. So, really, the Eastern Empire, which later will become the Byzantium Empire, is the start of Christianity. It's where Christianity comes from and grows out into the West. So, just fewer bishops in the West, fewer Christians in the West. This really is a thriving Greco-Christian culture in these areas of the world: Asia Minor, Alexandria and so on. And so, later on, we're going to have Jerusalem as a important place, then Constantinople a little bit later important place. But at the moment, we've got Antioch in Syria and Alexandria in Egypt. These are really key posts in the Christian world. And

• 25:22Speaker 02

  this is where a concentration of bishops are, then across these areas, metropolitan bishops. And then they have their own priests and everything else. The estimate is really that by 300, 10% of the empire is Christian, so sort of 10 million people. And then, by the middle of the fourth century, you've got about half of the empire is Christian. So, you know, growing numbers and large numbers to debate these issues with each other. The actual debate, the actual debate between the two, we all know Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Ghost. We've got an issue here then of the Father and the Son. Are they all equal? Are they equal? Are there any differences between them? What's the difference between the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost? Are they the same or different? If you're saying they're really different, then you're saying you've got three gods. So, you don't want to have that. You don't

• 26:06Speaker 02

  want to be a polytheist. So, you want to connect them in some way. So, how are you going to connect them and bring them together?

• 26:14Speaker 02

  Now, Ares's claim is really straightforward semantics, is that the son must be subordinate to the father, otherwise it's not a son and it's not a father. So, his claim, Arianism, is a form of a particular viewpoint that we call monarchianism. So, monarchianism comes from monarch, right, monos, one, and then arke, principle, rule. So, one principle rule, a belief then that God is one, that God is not just a being, God is being, God is everything, God is all, God is this essence beyond description, a particular substance, a divine substance, a deity, something above all things, he's created a world completely different from it, that's utterly transcendent from it. Now, the Christian religion then poses a great threat for these Greek philosophically-minded

• 26:58Speaker 02

  figures like Ares and others, that you've got this principle of God. How can you then explain that it becomes incarnate? Ares solves it in interesting ways. So, Ares's point is that there's the God, God as substance, God that becomes a father when he begats a son. So, Ares's tagline is that there was a time that the son was not. The son is not eternal, because he hasn't existed always, unlike God. So, what the son is for Ares, in effect, is divine, but not the deity, not the godhead. It's another level or ranking of divinity between the two. And so, it means the son is the creator of the world, is the mediator of the world,

• 27:38Speaker 02

  can become incarnate to save the world, but you leave the father as pure godhead, if you like, above it. So, that allows Ares to solve that problem.

• 27:47Tristan Hughes?

  So, the son is Jesus, is it? This idea that Jesus wasn't there at the beginning, but he's created by God for his mission on earth and that?

• 27:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's right. So, the son is Jesus. So, the son becomes incarnate then as Jesus in the world, and then can exist to save it in the world. So, I mean, let's put it in these sort of terms, right? The son is at home with the father in heaven or whatever, right? Now, the son then decides to leave that place and become incarnate as a particular human being. Which is Jesus and then acts to save it. Well, I mean, one thing I suppose to emphasise about Arianism is that it shouldn't be confused with a later heresy called Sassanianism, which denies the divinity of Jesus. I mean, this is still saying that Jesus is the Son of God and is divine. It's just he's a different level of God. He's not the highest God.

• 28:35Tristan Hughes?

  So that is Arius's position. So how does that differ then from Alexander's?

• 28:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, okay. So what's the problem with Arius? Well, Arius is suggesting what's called heterousio, right? So usia is substance and hetero is different, that the Father and the Son are different substances, different divine substances. So one problem there for Alexander is that that seems to return us to polytheism. We've got more than one God, more than one divine substance. So this is where you get then the homoousion viewpoint. What that is saying is that the Father and the Son are the same substance, they're equal. Now, what's the problem with saying that? Right, why is that such a problem? Like, that seems to be okay, right? You say they're the same, they're equal. Well, the problem for Arius, why Arius views it as a heresy, is that then what you're saying is that the Father becomes incarnate and dies on a cross.

• 29:25Speaker 02

  And you shouldn't be saying that, right? Because you should be able to distinguish something about these persons. They must be different persons. In Arius's own lights, he's actually being the most Christian, because he's preserving that there's three different persons in the Godhead. Whereas for their opponents, Alexander, they're being really Christians, because they're preserving the fact that Christ is fully divine in the same sense as the Father. And so that's why they want to push that homoousion language.

• 29:52Tristan Hughes?

  Well, let's now move on to the debate. You've already highlighted how this explodes out of Alexandria. It reaches the Emperor Constantine and he starts getting worried that it will affect concord and harmony in the empire, so the creating of this council. And as you've also highlighted, this feels unprecedented. It doesn't feel like this has happened before, has it? When the council is called and the people get together, what should we be imagining at Nicaea? What should be imagining with this council and how it looks?

• 30:20Speaker 02

  Well, it's a great question because no one's entirely sure. I mean, it's slightly open to our imagination a little bit. I mean, and I find it very difficult to imagine. It must be the most extraordinary thing ever. I mean, so Constantine pays for it all to bring all of these bishops together. The discussion is in Greek. Constantine, when he speaks, speaks in Latin, it seems, the most part, rather than Greek, although he does understand Greek and occasionally talks in Greek. And he's actively there as well. He's not dictating it from afar. Okay. No, no, he is actively there. So he opens the council. So you can imagine these, I mean, in effect, thousands of people gathered together in Nice. He moves it to Nice just so he can attend, because that's closer to where he is. And, you know, Eusebius and Athanasius give these extraordinary glowing descriptions of Constantine opening the debate.

• 31:02Speaker 02

  You know, Eusebius is describing this sort of transfigured figure, right, sort of in this glowing gold, opening the discussion. Then what it is, is really heated argument for months between these bishops and others. They are heavily disagreeing. As you alluded to earlier, they're not always clear whether in actual fact they are agreeing rather than disagreeing. There's one great story, which seems sadly not to be true, that Father Christmas himself, Saint Nicholas, who maybe was not even actually there, but he was around and was in Nice, that he was at the council and sort of biffed Arius on the nose. He sort of slapped him across the face for his views, which says... Father Christmas, how you wouldn't have imagined it. I know, surely. So, yeah, really heated, heated discussion that each side feels

• 31:44Speaker 02

  that their view is the orthodoxy, right, should be the view, and that each other's view is really in danger of doing something. You know, one view feels it threatens the divinity of Christ and therefore salvation, the other that it really diminishes our idea of what God and the Godhead is. And then there are even compromises suggested. And according to Eusebius, it's actually Constantine himself who rejects those sorts of compromises. He insists on homosion. Constantine seemed to prefer that sort of language of clarity, just say, well, this is the point of view, and that's it. And then in the end, they all have to sign this creed, sign their agreement to a Nice creed, which only two bishops don't do, Secundus of Ptolemais and... Theonis of Mamaris, I think, those two, they don't sign, they don't sign and they're

• 32:29Speaker 02

  deposed as a result. Eris is exiled, they're exiled. Then Constantine at the end, you know, we decide homoouson, that's the end of the debate, we settled it all, and then he issues Eris's work to be burned. You know, you're not meant to support his works, not meant to even own them or have them. This is now the orthodoxy.

• 32:45Tristan Hughes?

  And is this all written down then, if it was important to then cover this, in the Nicene Creed? Because what is this? And is this almost, as you say, the kind of the confirmation written down of what they've agreed?

• 32:55Speaker 02

  That's right, yeah. And so that is the Nicene Creed. So it is emphasizing the divinity of Jesus as the Son incarnate, and that the divinity of Jesus is equal with that of the Father, that God and the Father are one. And so this is where it says, you know, the substance of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, all that sort of language, and begotten not made, that later on becomes, you know, eternally begotten, to emphasize that God, His Son is also eternal. And then further to emphasize that, you know, of one substance, right? Homouson. The Son is from the substance of the Father, from this Godhead, that divine substance, but it's also one with that substance. It's really emphasized the fact that the Son is divine and equal, and therefore Jesus is divine

• 33:37Speaker 02

  and equal. And so it is, you know, that great Arian tagline, you know, there was a time when he was not. So in other words, the Son was born at a certain point, was made. Well, that's anathema. There was not a time when he wasn't, and so on. As I say, the Holy Spirit is just mentioned as an aside, right? And the Holy Spirit, so that's still to be settled. And then this fundamental question, right? Okay, we're clear now, there's the Trinity, the Son is equal with the Father, they're all divine, they're homoouson, the same substance. How can Christ be both human and divine? I won't go to that now, because that's a huge other thing. But when that is decided, this language of homoouson returns. So, you know, what does Nicaea settle in itself? It gives great clarity as a substantive statement with a controversial word, and then it still leaves open many questions

• 34:20Speaker 02

  how God can be three persons in one. But then part of the point then is that maybe some things just have to be left to mystery, right? Maybe things are not inaccessible to human reasoning and everything else, that's part of the viewpoint here. And that seems to be Constantine's view in his letters. We've got a letter of Alexander's when he's complaining about Eris to another Alexander of Byzantium. And he's saying that Eris is straying into things that are beyond human reason, right? So there's certain mysteries that have to be left there. That might be part of the argument.

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• 35:27Speaker 03

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• 36:04Tristan Hughes?

  So at the Council of Nicaea, they ultimately come up with the Nicene Creed and the understanding of Homo Usion and being three different parts. Is there anything else big that we haven't covered that is achieved at the Council of Nicaea alongside the Nicene Creed? And the condemning of Arianism or what Arius believes is heresy?

• 36:22Speaker 02

  It does do much more than the creed, which is part of why the debates went on for months about a lot of things. I mean, even celibacy of priests is something. Just whether priests can be married is something that's been heavily discussed as well. So one thing is the date of Easter. Again, the idea of uniformity. It doesn't work, of course, because East and West still have different dates for Easter following that because they date the spring equinox at different times. But that was the idea, that you could move away from the Jewish calendar, but also try and get everyone to agree when they celebrate Easter. Also, Sunday, established as the day of rest, one thing that Constantine does. You know, one thing that comes out of the Nicaea Council is not just the creed, it's also the canons. This is the beginning of canon law, right? Church law, the first end of canon law. What they are not about is about church structure, organisation. How do you organise things?

• 37:04Speaker 02

  So a lot of these canons are setting rules for how you decide who's going to be a bishop. It's setting rules that you, as a deacon and priest, you have to follow the direction of your particular bishop in your area, that if you're exiled or anathematized in one area of the church, one province, one bishop prick, you can't just move next door, right? And then become, carry on being a priest over there. So a lot of that is decided, laid down as that canon law. You know, I mentioned our celibacy of priests. I mean, it's decided that priests can remain married there, they just can't live with any woman that they want to live with, or isn't of upright character, I think is how they put it. Also about whether eunuchs can be priests, and it's decided they can be, but you can't castrate yourself, you know, you can't willfully do that. But if you've already gone through that process, you can become a priest and so on.

• 37:46Speaker 02

  So those are some of the other things that come out of Nicene and laid down and sent round to churches. And that's why we have those to survive, right? They're sort of gathered together and they're the things that are sent out and laid down and kept. I mean, we talk about this as the first ecumenical council, and you see, as Caesar describes it in those terms, but, you know, but so after this, and even before this, there were so many synods and, you know, I've mentioned Constantius, the son of Constantius. He tries to have lots of his own councils to go in a more Arian direction, to reject Nicene. They're not then classed anymore as ecumenical councils, right? Because they don't fit this, this list of what's decided as what is orthodox. But no, Nicene is doing a lot of different things. And you can see there, this, this laying down of, maybe centralisation isn't necessarily

• 38:30Speaker 02

  the right word, but, you know, the church has, what has the Christian church been? I mean, the earliest churches that survive are in, sort of from the 230s, these house churches, right? More informal churches, private gatherings, you know? But now we've got Constantine is building churches, a visible display of Christianity. You can see already, there's this huge network of bishops. I mean, staggering really, how Christianity was already organised in, in this way, even before Constantine's conversion. And so really the structure was already in place, but now it's being more formulaised, right? There's a sort of formal idea of what we've got. You know, once there's a rule, once a rule's decided, you can say, well, look, you're disobeying this rule. We all agreed this, right? We got together, we agreed it, and so let's all follow it.

• 39:10Tristan Hughes?

  It does seem as if it's an important moment in the changing relationship between the church and the state, doesn't it? And especially also with the Emperor Constantine's presence as well, as, as an overarching figure. I mean, Daphne, this has been brilliant, but just to wrap it up. With the aftermath. So Arianism, it doesn't disappear after the Council.

• 39:27Speaker 02

  It doesn't disappear. No, it doesn't disappear. I mean, it has immediate afterlife in that it becomes more successful in the short term because Constantius, Constantine's son, was educated by Eusebius of Nicomachea, who was the great Arian defender at Nicaea. So, and he's greatly embedded in the imperial court and his part really of exiling all sorts of Nicene people. Athanasius goes, Eustaceus of Antioch goes, you know, and Alcides of Ankyra, all these figures who are nice pro-Nicaean figures, actually get into trouble and lose their seas for a while. And so actually the Arians gain ground and it seems that Constantius is more interested in it. And so Jerome has this line later on, he says, "The world groaned to wake up and find itself Arian." But really, Arianism was this short-term successor for a while. Then, of course, you've got Judean apostate and that sort of fall spa. And then

• 40:11Speaker 02

  we go back to Nicaean Empress Jovian and then finally Sadosius. I mean, also, Arianism has an interesting afterlife in two very different contexts. One I always find really interesting is that through, I'm going to get his name wrong now, but it's Olphila, a priest ordained by this Eusebius of Nicomachea. He is the apostle to the Goths. And so the Visigoths and the Vandals who sacked Rome are actually Arians. They're Arian Christians at that time. But no, Arianism survives. And of course, you know, some great figures are in. The most famous Arian really is Isaac Newton. Isaac Newton is Arian. And he despises Athanasius. He thinks Athanasius was the Antichrist, that Nicaea, and obviously this was the beginning of the end of Christianity, has been destroyed from being a pure biblical religion, where you look at this scripture, what it's conveying to you, to something that

• 40:56Speaker 02

  is corrupted by an immoral murderer and power-seeking in Athanasius away from it now. And of course, you know, he's wasn't public about that because of the Test and Corporation Acts. You know, in Britain, from the middle of the 17th century to the middle of the 19th century, you have the Test and Corporation Acts, which meant you had to sign up to not being an Arian, to believing in the Trinity, in the Nicene way, to go to university, well, in Oxford and Cambridge, to have political office, to join the church. And this was to get rid of sort of variant of Arianism, Unitarianism, we just don't believe in the Trinity at all. I mean, Samuel Clarke is called a Thras択 Newton's Bulldog because of his argument with Gottfried Leibniz. He's called Arian or Semi Arian. Again, it's this interesting

• 41:38Speaker 02

  about Arianism. We say it's called anti-Trinitarianism. That's why we now call things like Arianism. But of course, they do believe in the Trinity. It's just they don't believe in the equality of the divine figures in the Trinity. That's the thing. They're not radical modalists or whatever that don't believe in it, or Unitarians who wouldn't have Trinity. They're a particular type of Christian. No, so Arianism thrives a little bit. But of course, Nicene really has its great victory at what's now known as Second Ecumenical Council, which is the one called by Theodosius in Constantinople in 381. And that's why the Nicene Creed that we had is the Niceno Constantinople Creed, because that then settles, goes further into the language of the Son, but also adds in the Holy Spirit and settles that. It's a slightly longer creed, but that's the Nicene Orthodoxies combined with that. Now,

• 42:23Speaker 02

  of course, one last thing I should just mention, what then happens after all this is that a clause is added, which is called the Filoquae Clause, which is to say the Holy Spirit doesn't just proceed from the Father, it proceeds from the Father and the Son. Because again, it emphasizes the equality, right? Father and Son are equal, so the Holy Spirit must come from both. Now, the Eastern Church doesn't like that. So what becomes the schism between East and West, where they finally divide in 1054, the schism is over the clause that is added to the same creed about whether or not the equality of the Father and the Son is such that the Holy Ghost also proceeds from both Father and Son rather than just the Father.

• 43:00Tristan Hughes?

  So equality in the Trinity and Homericion, you can trace its roots back to the debate between Arianus and Alexander, the Council of Nicene, and ultimately the split between East and West. It just continues throughout. I mean, Daphith, this has been absolutely, it's been really, really interesting to learn all about this. And it's a lot of deep theological debate as well to get through, but I think we succeeded in covering all the main points as well. Daphith, it just goes to me to say thank you so much for taking the time to come on the podcast and explain this big anniversary in Christian history.

• 43:30Speaker 02

  Okay, well, thanks very much. A really great pleasure to have been here.

• 43:37Tristan Hughes?

  Well, there you go. There was Dr. Daphith Daniel explaining the first Council of Nicaea that occurred 1700 years ago, exploring key parts of the story such as the Arian Controversy, the issue of Homo Usion, and of course, the Nicene Creed. I hope you enjoyed the episode. Thank you for listening. Please follow The Ancients on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps us and will be doing us a big favour. If you leave us a rating as well, we'd really appreciate that. Don't forget, you can also listen to us and all of History Hits podcasts ad-free and watch hundreds of TV documentaries when you subscribe at historyhit.com/subscribe. That's enough from me, and I'll see you in the next episode.

• 44:30Speaker 05

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