Cracking The Da Vinci Code
Part Five:
The Deity of Christ & Nicea
“Until that moment in history, Jesus was viewed by his followers as a mortal prophet… a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless.” (TDC, 233)
The Truth
a. What did the eyewitnesses believe?
John wrote his gospel before A.D. 90. Listen to his opinion in John 1:1-3, 14; 5:18-29; 8:58; 17:5; 20:28, 30-31.
Paul’s witness in Philippians 2:5-8 is dated A.D. 50-55.
Paul’s witness in Colossians 1:15 and 2:9 is dated near A.D. 60.
Hebrews 1:1-9 is dated A.D. 64-68.
b. What about the martyrdom of thousands of Christians by Rome because they would not confess “Caesar is Lord,” but only “IHSOUN TON KURION” (Jesus is Lord)?
(e.g., Diocletian in A.D. 303)
The Attack
“The church’s version of the Christ story is inaccurate, and that the greatest story ever told is the greatest story ever sold.” (TDC, 267)
“The Council of Nicea from where we get the Nicean Creed was controlled by Constantine to consolidate his power. Establishing Christ’s divinity was critical to the further unification of the Roman Empire and to the new Vatican power base. By officially endorsing Jesus as the Son of God, Constantine turned Jesus into a deity who existed beyond the scope of the human world, an entity whose power was unchallengeable.”
“Christ as Messiah was critical to the functioning of Church and state. Many scholars claim that the early church literally stole Jesus from his original followers, hijacking His human message, shrouding it in an impenetrable cloak of divinity, and using it to expand their own power.” (TDC, 232-233)
“The Priory believes that Constantine and his male successors successfully converted the world from matriarchal paganism to patriarchal Christianity by waging a campaign of propaganda that demonized the sacred feminine, obliterating the goddess from modern religion forever.” (TDC, 124)
The Truth
The Council of Nicea was organized by Constantine in A.D. 325 to resolve an emerging division among the leadership of the church. It did indeed address the subject of the identity of Christ. It was called to address the teachings of Arius, a priest in Alexandria, who was teaching that Christ was in essence inferior to the Father because the Father created him.
The Council strongly embraced as orthodox the position of Athanasius that Christ is eternal and of the same essence (homoousios) as the Father. One of Brown’s characters said it was “a relatively close vote.” Wrong again! 316 – 2 is not relatively close. The Council merely affirmed (albeit strongly) what you can read from our New Testament and the earlier Church fathers. It did not steal Jesus and reinvent him.
Several other things were accomplished at the Council of Nicea:
The celibacy of Priests was discussed and decided against.
They agreed upon a dating system for Easter (strange compromise between East & West)
Twenty canons to help the Church in the East.
Santa Claus slapped Arius.
The Trinity
There is one God, eternally existing in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These three are equal in essence but functionally distinct.
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:18-19).
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. (2 Co. 13:14)
The Trinity in Salvation
“Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who reside as aliens, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood” (1Pe. 1:1-2).
The Trinity & Prayer
We pray to the Father, as Jesus instructed in the Lord’s Prayer (Matt. 6:9; cf. 6:6).
We pray in the name of the Son, meaning we pray in conformity to the person and will of Christ. We also approach God in prayer by the access gained for us by the work of Christ (Mark 15:38; cf. Eph. 2:18).
We pray “in the Spirit” (Eph. 6:18), meaning we pray in the enablement and guidance of the Holy Spirit. He nurtures our experience of prayer, as He is the “Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out ‘Abba, Father’” (Ro. 8:15).