11. The Witness of the Early Church: Who Is Jesus? Part 2

What History Actually Proves—and What It Does Not

History does not prove that Jesus is not God.

I want to be explicit about that.

If Arius had been kind and Athanasius cruel, that would not prove Arius’s exegesis correct.

If Constantine had been perfectly Christlike, that would not prove homoousios was biblical.

If most Christians before Nicaea had believed exactly what I believe, that still would not make my theology true.

Scripture must decide the theological question.

But history does establish several things that matter enormously:

1. Early Christianity contained genuine Christological diversity.

2. Some early Christians understood Jesus as a human Messiah rather than the preexistent Almighty God. (Justin, Dialogue 48; Eusebius, Church History 3.27; Luomanen)

3. Some very early Christians used divine language for Jesus. (Ignatius, Ephesians 18; Tuggy)

4. Among the major pre-Nicene proto-orthodox Logos theologians, subordination of the Son to God the Father was widespread and explicit—even when Jesus was called divine or “God.” (Justin, Dialogue 56; Irenaeus 5.18.2; Tertullian 7, 9; Origen, Commentary on John 2; Tuggy)

5. No theologian from the first three Christian centuries clearly articulates the later doctrine of one tripersonal God containing three coequal, coeternal divine persons. The mature pro-Nicene formulation emerged through the fourth-century controversy. (Tuggy; Hanson; Ayres)

6. Nicaea in 325 was a decisive development, but it did not end the controversy and did not yet articulate the later full doctrine of the Holy Spirit. (Council of Nicaea; Parvis 225–55; Hanson; Ayres)

7. The pro-Nicene consensus consolidated through later fourth-century theological argument, councils, ecclesiastical politics, and imperial enforcement. (Parvis 225–55; Hunt 57–68; Hanson; Ayres)

8. Nicaea was geographically broad but did not literally represent every surviving Christian stream; identifiable Jewish-Christian movements were not meaningfully represented, while Constantine’s post-council rhetoric deliberately distanced Christianity from Jewish practice in deeply hostile terms. Because Christianity arose from Israel’s Scriptures and Jesus was the Jewish Messiah, this rupture is relevant not only morally but hermeneutically to evaluating the council’s conclusions about who Jesus is. (Gwynn 90–110; Ipgrave 235–48; Eusebius, Life of Constantine 3.18–20)

9. The broader 4th century and 5th century struggle to define God and Jesus repeatedly produced fruit—factions, coercion, exile, threats, political pressure, mutual condemnation, and at times violence—that Scripture identifies with the flesh, not the fruit of the Spirit. (Hilary 4–5; Hunt 57–68; Price and Graumann; Smith)

10. Christological definition continued into the fifth century with Ephesus and Chalcedon. (Price and Graumann; Smith) (Tuggy; Ayres)

Those are not minor historical observations.

Together they undermine one common argument for Jesus’ deity:

“The Church has always believed this, so questioning it means abandoning historic Christianity.”

The Church did not always articulate the same doctrine. (Tuggy; Hanson; Ayres)

And questioning the fourth-century settlement is not the same thing as rejecting Jesus.

Christians were asking how Jesus related to the one God long before Nicaea. (Tuggy; Eusebius, Church History 5.28)

A Word to My Trinitarian Brothers and Sisters

I do not write this because I think Christians who believe in the Trinity are insincere.

Quite the opposite.

Some of the most God-loving, Christlike, Scripture-centered people I know believe Jesus is God.

Many pastors study these passages seriously and conclude that the Trinity best explains Scripture.

Many Christians do not understand every philosophical detail of the doctrine but trust God, worship Him sincerely, love Jesus deeply, and bear beautiful fruit of the Holy Spirit.

I am grateful for them.

Their sincerity matters.

Their Christlike fruit matters.

But sincerity cannot make a doctrine true.

Mine cannot either.

A godly pastor can be wrong.

A Church Father can be wrong.

A council can be wrong.

A majority can be wrong.

And I can be wrong.

That is why the Bible must remain open in front of all of us.

For Protestants in particular, sola Scriptura should mean that no creed is beyond biblical examination.

Words such as Trinity, God the Son, homoousios, three persons in one God, and hypostatic union are not biblical phrases.

That fact alone does not make them false. Non-biblical terminology can sometimes summarize biblical truth accurately.

But if these expressions are true, they must be demonstrable from Scripture.

They cannot become true merely because councils eventually required them.

Why Church History Does Not Settle Whether Jesus Is God

When I began examining this subject, the weight of Christian history made questioning Jesus’ deity feel almost impossible.

I now see the history differently.

I see Clement of Rome speaking of Almighty God acting through Jesus Christ, and presenting Jesus as our High Priest, not God. (1 Clement 1, 36)

I see Polycarp speaking of the God and Father of Jesus Christ, while calling Jesus God’s Son and everlasting High Priest, not God. (Polycarp 12)

I see very early Christians who spoke of Jesus in extraordinarily exalted ways. (Ignatius, Ephesians 18; Tuggy)

I also see very early Christians who understood him as a human Messiah. (Justin, Dialogue 48; Eusebius, Church History 3.27; Luomanen)

I see Justin calling Christ God while simultaneously calling him subject to the Maker of all—and using Greco-Roman analogies about divine sons when explaining Christianity to pagans. (Justin, Dialogue 56; Justin, First Apology 21–22)

I see Irenaeus saying the Father is above all and the Head of Christ. (Irenaeus 5.18.2)

I see Tertullian using the word Trinity while still describing the Son as second to the Father. (Tertullian 2, 7, 9)

I see Origen explicitly placing the Son beneath the Father. (Origen, Commentary on John 2; Tuggy)

I see Irenaeus and Athanasius using the extraordinary language of human beings becoming “gods” or being “made God”—language they carefully qualified, but language that shows how far patristic theological vocabulary developed beyond Jewish categories and simpler categories many Christians assume were always fixed. (Irenaeus 4.38.4; Athanasius 54.3)

I see human-Messiah Monarchians arguing that their theology was what the apostles believed. (Eusebius, Church History 5.28)

I see Nicaea drawing a new and enormously consequential boundary around homoousios. (Council of Nicaea; Gwynn 90–110; Kinzig)

I see decades of confusion and conflict after Nicaea rather than immediate universal agreement. (Parvis 225–55; Hanson; Ayres)

I see Constantine—who publicly claimed Christian allegiance but whose life also included the execution of his own son and probably his wife—using imperial authority to pursue ecclesiastical unity and enforce the Nicene settlement. (Woods 70–86; Gwynn 90–110)

I see Athanasius courageously enduring persecution while also operating within an ecclesiastical struggle surrounded by serious and partly corroborated accusations of coercion toward rivals. (Hardy 187–96; Parvis 225–55)

I see anti-Jewish language coming from Constantine immediately after Nicaea, even though Christianity itself was born from Judaism. (Eusebius, Life of Constantine 3.18–20; Ipgrave 235–48)

I see the Roman state in 380 A.D.—before the Council of Constantinople met in 381—legally defining approved Trinitarian belief, branding dissenters heretics, and subsequently using imperial power to enforce theological conformity. (Theodosius I; Hunt 57–68)

I see the definition of Jesus’ two natures continuing to develop into the fifth century. (Price and Graumann; Smith)

And when I apply the New Testament’s own test of spiritual fruit to the 4th and 5th century debates—its factions, coercion, exile, political pressure, mutual condemnation, and at times violence—I think the most biblically natural conclusion is that much of this coercive, factional, and violent process was not the work of the Holy Spirit. Its fruit points the other way. (Hilary 4–5; Hunt 57–68; Price and Graumann; Smith)

That still does not tell me, by itself, whether every doctrinal conclusion reached in that environment was true or false.

But it prevents me from treating the councils as self-authenticating proof.

That does not look to me like a doctrine simply handed down in a complete, universally understood form from Jesus and the apostles. (Tuggy; Hanson; Ayres)

It looks like development.

A Trinitarian can look at that development and conclude:

The Holy Spirit guided the Church into a progressively clearer understanding of what Scripture had always taught.

That is a possible historical-theological position.

But it is a theological interpretation of the history.

It is not what the history itself proves.

My own conclusion is different.

I believe the development moved Christianity away from the Bible’s simpler presentation of one God, the Father and the Holy Spirit, and one human Messiah, Jesus Christ, whom God sent, empowered, raised, exalted, and made Lord.

But I do not ask the reader to believe that merely because of history.

These claims, like all theological claims, should be tested against the Bible.

The Question History Forces Us to Reopen

The most important thing I want Christians to take from this essay is not:

“The councils were bad, therefore the Trinity is false.”

That argument would be too simple.

It is this:

The later dominance of the Trinity does not relieve us of the responsibility to test the Trinity from Scripture.

The doctrine developed.

Earlier Christians were diverse.

Many leading pre-Nicene Fathers subordinated Jesus to the Father and did not share the exact theological understanding about God and Jesus developed in the 4th and 5th centuries. (Justin, Dialogue 56; Irenaeus 5.18.2; Tertullian 7, 9; Origen, Commentary on John 2; Tuggy)

Alternative Christian understandings of Jesus existed from very early centuries. (Justin, Dialogue 48; Eusebius, Church History 3.27, 5.28; Luomanen)

The fourth-century settlement emerged through fierce theological controversy and became intertwined with imperial power. (Parvis 225–55; Hunt 57–68; Hanson; Ayres)

Therefore, I do not think “the Church decided this” can be the final answer.

The Church is not God.

The Nicene Creed is not Scripture.

The Chalcedonian Definition is not Scripture.

And seventeen centuries of repetition cannot transform a human theological conclusion into divine revelation if Scripture itself does not teach it.

For me, history no longer closes the question.

History opens the question.

And once the question is open, we must go back to Jesus, the apostles, and the prophets.

Who did Jesus say he was?

Who did he call God?

Did Jesus possess the attributes Scripture says belong uniquely to God?

Was Jesus Almighty, omniscient, independent, immortal, unable to be tempted, and inherently authoritative?

Or did he receive authority, depend upon God, learn obedience, pray to God, worship God, call the Father his God, and identify the Father as the only true God?

Those are biblical questions.

And those are the questions that ultimately matter.

I believe Scripture shows that Jesus is not God.

History does not establish that conclusion for me.

Scripture does.

But history has given me every reason to refuse to let later creeds answer the question before I have allowed the Bible to answer it.

If Nicaea, Constantinople, and Chalcedon correctly interpreted Scripture, then Scripture should be able to bear the weight of their conclusions.

If they did not, no number of councils, emperors, theologians, pastors, or centuries can make those conclusions true.

So let us put history in its proper place.

Let us respect it.

Let us learn from it.

Let us acknowledge both the brilliance and the failures of Christians who came before us.

But then let us open the Bible.

Only God’s Word can finally tell us who Jesus is.

See my page "Who Is Jesus?", in addition to my New Testament Study Bible page, for my full biblical explanation of why I do not believe Jesus is God.