The Busy Bishops of Bithynia

Finally, the council handed down a list of 20 canons (rules) that dealt with administrative matters within the church. Nothing was secretive or conspiratorial about that, either. And that was it. On Aug. 25, 325 AD, they closed up shop, and went home.

So, what about the conspiracies that are popularly credited to the council? Let’s look at a few, and see.

• Christian reincarnation. Now there’s an oxymoron. Neither Judaism nor Christianity taught this. Reincarnation is a concept utterly foreign to ancient Palestine, and it’s unlikely any of the bishops gave it a thought. They didn‘t ban it, possibly because they never heard of it.
• The canon of the New Testament (NT). No action of any sort was taken, and no record mentions any discussions on the subject. It is likely, according to many historians, that all 27 books of the NT were in circulation no later than 70 AD, and according to virtually all scholars, no later than 100 AD. That sinks the claim that the Gospel of John got into the canon by a single vote. Nobody ever voted. In fact, none of the four Gospels was ever in doubt. The churches themselves chose the books they recognized as inspired, and today’s canon reflects their process of elimination.
• The gnostic gospels. The church dealt with these, for the most part, before 325 AD. Because they came along too late (mid-2nd century and later) to be authoritative, they were easily culled out. Despite scattered support for a few legitimately Christian books – The Shepherd of Hermas, for example – the NT was mostly settled before the council. Within 50 years after the council, Athanasius published a list of the NT books that matches today‘s, and following that, so did two regional councils. No one voted anything in or out. They simply published the known list of writings accepted as inspired at that time.
• Origen. One claim says the council of 325 AD declared Origen a heretic. Not so. That didn’t happen until 553 AD, if then. Scholars disagree over exactly what happened that year, and what, or who, was anathematized.
• The 50 cathedrals. One claim is that Constantine ordered 50 cathedrals to be built. Actually, according to reports, he ordered 50 copies of the scriptures to be published, which is a bit less ambitious. How 50 Bibles became 50 cathedrals is a bit of a mystery, though not a surprise, given the way conspiracy theories go.
• Possibly the most ridiculous charge is that the busy bishops destroyed the original New Testament and replaced it with forgeries. Now there’s a feat that equals anathematizing Origen 200 years after the council ended. For more than 250 years before the council was held, the books of the Bible had been faithfully copied and sent out all over the civilized world, even as far away as parts of Europe. Manuscripts dating to more than 100 years before the council, have been found. They match today’s Bible. In fact, they have been used to translate modern versions. If Nicea left us only forgeries, how did the bishops forge manuscripts a century or more before they were born? Time travel? And how were they able to round up every manuscript in the known world, destroy them all, and replace them with hand-copied forgeries – all in a few months?

Despite the wealth of valid material produced by credentialed scholars, the Council of Nicea continues as a hot spot for those with a theological, or conspiratorial, axe to grind. Change is unlikely. The drudgery of research is no match for the next breathless discovery that “will shake Christianity to its roots,“ as the book cover will surely exclaim.

Never mind how zany it sounds. Enough people, for whatever reason, will buy into it to keep it going. That’s human nature. And when it comes to human nature, the Book of Ecclesiastes got it right: There’s nothing new under the sun.