Social and historical setting
The Cambridge History of Early Christian Literature, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, (2004)Аннотация
In the aftermath of the crises of the third century the Roman Empire was transformed in the time of the Emperors Diocletian (284–305) and Constantine (proclaimed emperor 306; in power over Western Empire from 312; sole emperor 324–37). The administrative structure, the society, the imperial office and the court underwent far-reaching changes under their reforms. The secular changes in the Empire could not fail to affect the life of the Christian Church. None, however, cut as deeply into its historical development as the change in its worldly status initiated by the advent of the first Christian emperor. Constantine's victory over his rival in 312, represented as God-given, seemed to usher in a new era. Not – as is often said – because it allowed the Christian Church to grow from a minority cult into a recognized, soon to be a dominant, and eventually legally enforced, religion. It had been well on the way to respectability in the later third century; and its full legal ‘establishment’ did not come about until the end of the fourth. The significance of the ‘Constantinian revolution’ lies rather in the fact that it transformed, almost overnight, the conditions of the Church's existence.
The main directions in the Church's development had been established in the first three centuries of its existence. The Church entered the fourth century with a set of beliefs and an organizational structure which gave it a recognizable identity. During the last forty years of the third century it had also spread rapidly and extensively.