Who Is Most Responsible for the SUCCESS of the Christian Religion?

Please note this poll is about the sustained success of the Christian religion. Not the creation of the Christian religion.

 

Strictly speaking I think it was Theodosius but I am going with the spirt of your poll rather than the letter I think.

 

Thanks for your comment. I have two comments on my own poll that I am going to hold off making for a couple of days. One comment references the opinion of noted historians and the other my opinion which does not agree with the noted historians.

 

The dominant civilization in the west, the Roman Empire, making it the official religion.

 

God, the Father, Son and Holy spirit is in control of it all.

 

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The answer is God [Jesus is God]

Paul and all Jesus' disciples brought the good news to God's lost sheep [those "gentiles" who were descended from the Northern Kingdom of Israel = the vast majority of Israelites who God divorced in the OT and remarries in the NT under the New Covenant.]

Like Cyrus in the OT, Constantine was God's king who liberated God's people and brought the different bishops together to agree on a set Bible and doctrine.

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As for the continuation of the Christian religion... I choose Luther and Tyndale who risked their lives to translate the Bible into their own languages [German and English.] Tyndale was martyred for his translation [much of which was later used in the King James Bible.]


The KJV -- A Lasting Monument to William Tyndale

By Julie Roys
Moody Radio

CBN.com – For the past four centuries, the King James Version of the Bible has reigned supreme. Soon after its completion in 1611, it became the translation of choice for almost all English-speaking Protestants. Some 350 years after its creation, Winston Churchill hailed it a “masterpiece” and George Bernard Shaw called the King James Version “magnificent.” Today, even the famous atheist Richard Dawkins admits, “Not to know the King James Bible is to be, in some small way, a barbarian.”

Yet, who do we have to thank for this incredible work? Truly, King James provided the vision and resources necessary to create the version that bears his name. This published scholar, linguist, and poet assembled some 47 scholars who worked tirelessly for seven years to produce the king’s “Authorized Version.”

Still, King James’ magnum opus never would have been produced had it not been for a simple cleric who lived nearly 100 years earlier. His name was William Tyndale. And, Tyndale lived and died for one consuming passion: he wanted the boy who quote – “driveth the plough” – to know Scripture every bit as well as the priest who led his congregation.

That’s a noble aspiration today, but in the 1520s, it was heretical. The Catholic Church had forbidden that the Bible be translated into the common language. The church viewed an informed public as a threat to its power. And, many priests feared a biblically literate populace would better recognize their corruption. As the Bishop of London expounded at the time, the Bible in “the vulgar tongue . . . will without doubt infect and contaminate the flock committed to us.”

Tyndale, however, embraced the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers – that God commissions all believers to be ministers of His Word. Tyndale also rightly understood that the church would never reform as long as laypeople were denied God’s truth.

Tyndale fled to Germany in 1524 and the next year, produced the New Testament in English. This New Testament was then printed and smuggled into England. And, in 1530, Tyndale completed and printed the Pentateuch in English, as well. Five years later, though, a friend betrayed Tyndale. He was captured and imprisoned in a castle near Brussels. There he languished for more than 430 days without heat or light. Eventually, Tyndale was charged with treason and hanged. Yet, right before Tyndale died, he cried out, “Lord, open the king of England’s eyes!”

That God did in the early 1600s. And, nearly 90-percent of Tyndale’s Bible passed into the King James Version. Truly, this version stands as a lasting monument not just to King James, but to William Tyndale – a martyr and hero of the faith. All of us who own a Bible owe Tyndale a great debt..

http://www.cbn.com/spirituallife/churchandministry/churchhistory/KJV-Roys-WilliamTyndale.aspx

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Who was most responsible for the success of the Christian religion? The guy who invented the
long bow and the guy who invented gun powder. When successful armies march in, their religion is adopted.

 

Roman Emperor Constantine also created a new capital in the east, Constantinople, that would be established Christian from the beginning. Constantinople was called the "Second Rome." The eastern part of the Roman empire based in Constantinople became the Orthodox Christian Byzantine empire that ruled that part of the world for over a 1000 years. The Byzantine Empire also ruled Jerusalem for a time. The Byzantine empire Christianized the Rus [Russians.] When the Byzantine empire was destroyed by Muslims, the last Byzantine princess married Russian Tsar Ivan III and Moscow became known as the "Third Rome."

Something similar happened in the West. After the Roman empire fell... the Christian torch was later passed to Emperor Charlemagne and the "Holy Roman Empire."

Later the church itself broke apart along similar east/west lines.

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Jesus himself.
Without his resurrection Christianity ceases to exist already in the first days after Golgotha

 

I was tempted to go with Paul.....
but the power and wisdom in Matthew chapters five, six and seven.....
as well as John chapters fourteen, fifteen, sixteen and seventeen are beyond anything that Paul wrote..........

... but technically Paul did get even more people researching the words of Messiah Yeshua - Jesus even than Jesus himself did during his lifetime.

 

I voted for Jesus because it's the Holy Spirit that enlightens people. I didn't vote for Saint Paul because he is not the only Saint that brought Christianity to the world, since there were thousands of them. Saint Paul was better able though to interpret doctrine to a Greek world since he did know Greek.

 

Christians didn't force conversions, it was an individual thing. It was brought to the people by the Apostles and the Saints that came after them. They were the ones who sacrificed everything - even their lives. What I noticed is that it wasn't until they made the ultimate sacrifice, that people's hearts would soften and they would start converting en mass.

 

Most responsible? Those forward thinking souls who flipped Jesus' instructions to "But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you'" Instead they went on 'hating their enemies' and 'slaying those that persecuted them'. They realized they were wiser than Him, and thanks to them Christianity was able to survive, thrive and prosper to the extent it did.

 

Even over this past century it is kind of astonishing how many people meet Jesus during a near death experience.

In 1943 Dr. George Ritchie feels that he met Jesus during his brush with death and his testimony led many to become Christians as well and.................... his meeting with Jesus brought Dr. George Ritchie up out of a rather lukewarm spiritual condition.


https://near-death.com/george-ritchie-nde/

 

Interesting.

The "Morning Star" of the Reformation, John Wycliffe, oversaw the publication of the first English language Bible over a century before Tyndale's translation. Wycliffe also influenced the Bohemian theologian Jan Hus and his followers, the Hussites, who became the first successful reform movement in Western Christendom.

 

I voted for Jesus but the patriarch of the Carolingian Dynasty - Charles Martel - deserves an honorable mention here. It was Charles Martel's victory at the Battle of Tours in 732 AD that turned back the Muslim invasion of Western Europe and ensured the survival of Christianity.

 

Actually you're wrong since in Christian beliefs, it's prayers that changes people's hearts and minds, so survival is dependent on how devout people are. While the further people are away from God, the colder people's hearts are, so what you get is a lot of infighting, hatreds, wars, etc., etc.

 

Christianity thrives under persecution, but Constantine did make Christianity the official religion. His major achievement was bringing together all the bishops in the empire, so they could determine true Christian beliefs from heresy - and especially from the Arian heresy which at the time was rampant.

 

Actually Christianity didn't die out in the Middle East and the Balkans. It just wasn't in a dominant role. Even these past years, when the genocide towards Christians was being estimated at 300 a day, they say Christianity is growing - but it is underground - and that includes Israel.

Today the Orthodox commemorate Saint George, and I know that on this day last year 300 thousand Muslims attended his shrine outside of Istanbul.

 

The emperors Theodosius I, Gratian and Valentinian II made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire with the Edict of Thessalonica in 380AD.

Ironically, the so-called "barbarians" who brought down the Western Empire - the Visigoths and Vandals - were both predominantly Arians.

 

Many Jordanians believe that Islam derived from the Arians in Spain - and according to Islam, that means that Spain belongs to them.

 

Who Is Most Responsible for the SUCCESS of the Christian Religion?

Da Jews!

https://www.amazon.com/Jews-Modern-Capitalism-Werner-Sombart/dp/161427763X

 

And thus the Gnostics and their gospels were expelled.
The Gospel of Thomas (Gnostic) is the oldest gospel manuscript known!

The "spirit" is lost for "the flesh".

 

My point being that those farthest from God did the most to spread and propagate His message.