The spread of Christianity was dying out at the beginning of the second century, many of them were Essenes, who believed in celibacy. Had it not been for one man, Paul of Tarsus, a Pharisee, who converted to Christianity on the basis of a vision of Jesus that he claimed to see while on the road one day. In this vision he was told to spread the word of Christianity. Being a Jew, he realized that the fate of the faith lay not with the Jews but with the non Jews.
Paul sold to the pagan world the moral dream of Judaism — love, fairness, honesty, and monotheism. He was also telling of the coming of redemption of the world with the second coming of Jesus which he believed was imminent. The appeal to non Jews and others went to many that were vassals or slaves beholden to Rome, where human freedom was unimaginable. The new Christian message changed the world with the idea of human freedom grounded in Jewish moral values, and in a life style that professed that slaves were as good as masters; that the poor was as good as the rich; and that the weak were as great as the mighty. Christianity offered a new, much more appealing vision of the world, promoting a simple viewpoint of life, love, and religion.
Christianity was one of many religious groups that existed in the Roman Empire for centuries, however, the Roman government viewed them with suspicion and persecution for the refusal to conform, as a result followers were tortured and punished. The Roman persecutions failed to make Christians conform, it merely created Christian martyrs which inspired futher oppositon against Rome. Ultimately, the persecutions failed to destroy Christianity, it was around 311, Constantine found the persecutions he witnessed to be disturbing. He realized that the persecutions had failed and caused disharmony; secondly, he had a deep admiration for the values of Christians. He believed that their love, charity, and mercy would bring about unity and harmony to the Roman Empire. Constantine decided to proceed with caution to Christianize the empire.
In 313, Constantine came to an agreement with the Eastern emperor, Licinius which resulted in the Edict of Milan. Through his church, Constantine controlled the Christians in his empire. The church was legitimized and legalized. The majority of people were pagans who held control over the empire, but his new policies worked to weaken the pagan communities through his new practices. Constantine confiscated the precious metals of pagan temples to fill his treasury for his builiding projects. By the end of his reign in 337, Constantine succeeded in crippling paganism, making Christainity the official religion of the Roman Empire.
As the first Christian emperor, Constantine changed the world forever. He laid the foundation for many emperors to follow him in the future. The rise of Christainity over paganism was probably inevitable, he did much to hasten the process. As a result, the medieval ages and much of Europe became Christian thanks to him.
Had Constantine decided to promote paganism or Islam for the betterment of the Roman Empire, could today’s Christians be Muslms?
