Emperor Constantine: "Hey Lucinius, how is it all going?"

Lucinius: "Hmmm, not all that good really, Coni"

Emperor Constantine: "Ooooh, you're always on the moan. What's the matter now?"

Lucinius: "Well, there is quite a few things, actually."

Constantine: "There always is. The day that you walk in here and tell me that everything is okay I'll eat my toga. Go on then, let's get it over with. I have got a meeting with the head of the Plebs at half past ten."

Lucinius: "Well, there are three main things. Firstly we are down to our last 50 wild pigs in the coliseum pig fights, we haven't had any elephants delivered for three weeks and the tigers are looking really moldy.

It just doesn't look very well on our gladiators when they are supposed to be brave and fearless killers of the first degree when all we have got to send against them are a few moth-eaten lions without teeth and a few wild rabbits. Admittedly the wild rabbits really are wild, but they really are too cuddly to have much of a real effect. They have even nicknamed Marcus Wildorus who is one of our greatest killer gladiators 'bunny chopper', and the crowd don't roar quite as loud as they used to "

Constantine: "True, and we must keep the population happy and contented. Oh boy, I wish that somebody would invent the television and then we could show soap operas each night, that would keep them all happy and brain-dead. Anyway, leave it with me, I will send an envoy up to Africa and get some new stock."

Lucinius: "Yeeeees, weellll, that brings me to my second point. The North African campaign isn't going too well. That's why the stock of fighting tigers is so poor. In fact to be pretty damned blunt about it some of our legions are getting their arses kicked up there and we are having difficulty in raising more troops. These conscripts just aren't up to it, their heart isn't in it"

Constantine: "Well, we can throw a few more Christians to the lions, that will keep the mob happy for a bit and that will answer one problem."

Lucinius: with a sharp intake of breath "Hmmmmm, yes well that was the third thing that I was coming to, Hades, coni, they are getting hard to find these days."

Constantine: "Hard to find?

Lucinius : "Yes, they have grown wise to the free bread and wine stall down at the market wheeze. They just aren't falling for it any more. And we even tried offering a free bath night with Drusilla Luscius to anybody who would turn one in but it didn't really work. Just about everybody who is anybody has already been with Drusilla anyway. And this Christian lot are getting very powerful you know?"

Constantine: "Oh, I was wondering what happened to her, I haven't seen her for a bit....... Powerful? What do you mean, Powerful?"

Lucinius: "Well they are. According to my spies down at the fish market, there are quite a few senators now who have taken to not eating meat on Friday, and there have been rumours that more than a few of them are wearing that fishy-like symbol on a chain around their neck. And, well, to be totally honest they are turning into a very powerful political force. I mean, we keep on lobbing them to the lions whenever we can catch one, but they are getting very hard to catch. They are getting nearly as hard to catch as the wild rabbits."

Constantine: "Hmmmmm - I've got it, by the God Mithra, I have got it."

Lucinius: "You have, Coni? "

Constantine: "Absolutely."

Lucinius: "What's that then?"

Constantine: "Well, these Christian's are pretty good fighters aren't they? I mean, I have heard that they are training pretty hard these days in case they get caught and have to face a lion or two."

Lucinius: "Quite a few of them, yes. I mean they fight like the devil when we lob them in the arena. There are some real crazies among them. I saw one last Friday after tea, all covered with hair he was, just brought him in from the desert, and boy did he put up a fight. He started pretty quiet, just standing there shouting "in the name of Jesus I command you to SIT!" But when he got the idea that the lion didn't give a donkey's chuff for Jesus he just started to knock the shit out of it with an ass's jawbone that one of the crowd threw in. He fair whooped it. So we let another one in and boy, he whooped that one as well. Hades, he was a tough sucker."

Constantine: "Well, that's it."

Lucinius: "What's that then, Coni?

Constantine: " I will say that I have had a vision from their God telling me that they are all okay and to stop persecuting them. We can then bring them on board and re-supply our army with fresh troops and before you can say Uriculus Dementia Cunfudisious we will be getting fresh tigers and elephants by the dozen."

Lucinius: "Oh, hey, Cony, that's brill. Do you reckon that they'll fall for it."

Constantine: "I don't see why not. They seem to fall for just about anything else. I still can't get over how they fell for the free bread and wine scam."

Okay, so it didn't quite happen like that, but hey, it's not all that far out.

313 C.E. to appx. 430 CE
In 313 there was a Roman Emperor called Constantine, who by all accounts was a bit of a git as emperors went. The records tell us that under his control and supervision wholesale acts of genocide were committed in his campaigns in North Africa. He sent prisoners of war to the lions to keep the citizens of Rome amused. He was known and remembered by his own as bullying, egotistical, and ruthless, etc.

As far as his religious beliefs were concerned he was the sort of a guy who believed in hedging his bets. He followed and worshiped several gods at the same time. I mean - if you can't really make up your mind, what's a guy supposed to do? Worship the Sun god on Sunday, the Moon god on Monday, and so on which is why we basically have the days of the week named after different gods.

Even though quite a number of Christians had been turned into lion food over the years the Christian sect still grew in popularity. More and more people were adopting Christianity as their religion, or half adopting it as a religion to be considered which made them grow in power and also began to make them more influential in the political power stakes.

Now, Constantine was no fool. You did not remain as Roman Emperor for long if you were lacking in the brain department and failed to see an impending threat, so he began to change his tune slightly and he and his co-emporer (a chap called Lucinius) started to send out letters to all of the Roman Governors, telling them to give the Christians some respect. Statements like -

" it is salutory and most proper that "complete toleration" be given to anyone who has "given up his mind to the cult of the Christians" or any other cult which "he personally feels best for himself."

By doing this both the Emperor and Co-Emperor were again hedging their bets and attempting to get on the right side of the new cult and to bring it on board along with the political power which their adherents were developing.

This move quite pleased the Christians, as they were a bit sick at the memory of those who had been turned into instant lion fodder, and it also gave them some proper standing in the political stakes.

Enter - The Edict Of Milan

The Edict of Milan, as this decree was called, had the effect of legalizing Christianity throughout the Roman Empire.

By all accounts, the Emperor Constantine was a deeply superstitious man. He adhered to and practiced several different religions, as always, being a hedger of bets he evidently reckoned that if there was a possibility of another god being in the running, then it could be advisable to worship them a bit. Even after his supposed conversion, it would seem that he still worshiped a few other gods, just in case.

Christianity was really just another cult, another religion, another set of beliefs at the time of Constantine and he apparently viewed the new religion as just that, taking them on board and practicing Christianity along with all of the others which seemed to be worth some merit. He didn't actually get baptized until he was on his death bed. Evidently at such a late stage and undoubtedly with some great encouragement from the other Christian advisors around him he reckoned that perhaps he ought, just in case it was as important as his Christian advisors said it was.

Constantine was a very serious and good politician who evidently had the wit and insight to be able to recognize a political threat. He could see that the Christians were becoming very numerous and that their beliefs were becoming wildly popular. If such a group of people which was growing so rapidly actually stood against him he could have a wee bit of a job putting them down, so he conveniently had a 'miracle conversion' and became their ally faster than you can say "vision".

This move was very clever because by the year 312, a year before the Edict of Milan, Constantine found himself at odds and at war against a usurper of his title at a place called Milvan Bridge, and among his army were many Christians which could be identified as such because they were already advertising the fact on their shields which were embellished with the Christian Chi-Rho sign.

Constantine's main religion to which he remained totally faithful was the Mithraic sun-cult which was very common and highly popular from one end of the Empire to the other at that time. Quite a few years after his victory at Milvan he raised a monument and a triumphal arch, which you can still see today if you go and have a look. It claims on it as a testimony to the "Unconquered Sun" and refers to Jesus Christ "driving the sun's chariot across the sky."

Now because there were a lot of Christians in his army, he did have a bit of a problem because the Mithraic sun cult worshipped the God Mithra on a Sunday, and the Christians worshiped their God on the old Jewish Sabbath which was Saturday. This meant that his army's fighting time was reduced to a five day week. Not many soldiers who may well not see another sunset were too happy at ignoring their days of worship. I mean, if your next stop could be the hot seat of judgement in heaven, then you would want to make sure that everything was okay between you and your God.

The answer? He commanded the Christians to hold their services on Sunday, so that all his troops only had one day off from fighting each week and as a bonus he incorporated the Nativity Feast of Mithra, held on the 25th of December because it was near the winter solstice, and adapted it so that it became the birthday of their Saviour Jesus, as it still is to this day - the Christian nativity - Christmas.

I am not going to go on any more about Constantine because the history books are there for all to read for themselves.

But, what is important is with regard to the compilation of the Bible and the early Christian structure of belief.

You see, these early Christians just couldn't agree on anything. Well, it wasn't really their fault was it? I mean, look what they had to work with! They had inherited a bunch of sacred writings from the Jewish leaders which condoned anything from killing witches, adulterers and blasphemers and a whole host of laws that were quite insane and totally irrelevant. They had a few letters from Paul, which in general didn't quite agree with the letters that they had from Peter, and to cap it all they had the stuff that had filtered down from John on Patmos which resembled something out of the Star Wars trilogy. Just what were they putting in the water over there on Patmos?

So when Constantine became the sole Roman emperor in 324 he convened the First Council of Nicea the following year and by Emporial edict told the bishops to Get it sorted out! And get it sorted out NOW! Stop fannying about and stop your bickering and squabbling. Get your heads together and come up with a universally (catholic) acceptable doctrine.

The bishops didn't really want to upset Constantine too much because they still remembered the lion fodder days, and one would presume that they did also want to get it sorted out, so they all duly turned up at Nicea, argued like hell for a week or two and then all went home again having agreed on absolutely nothing except the first version of the Apostolic Creed and a few totally meaningless and uncontroversial doctrines such as creation and the nature of the universe.

To cut a very long story short, it took about sixty years to get it all sorted and to get the headquarters of the new Christian church set up in Rome. Well, where else? The Roman bishops obviously wanted it in Rome and Constantine wanted it in Rome because then he could keep an eye on the bishops. I am not sure about the rest of the bishops. I don't think that many of them would really have trusted Rome or anything to do with it because the memory of those blasted lions would still have been quite fresh in their minds. I mean, it is very difficult to forget when your Uncle Ernie spent his last few moments on planet earth running around an arena with a pair of lion gnashers reaching out for his dangly bits. And in general they were all proved correct, because as soon as the church headquarters was set up in Rome and given a bit of authority the slaughter began all over again, but this time it wasn't Constantine as much as the Church leaders themselves who were ordering the massacres.

You see, there was a group of Christian believers called the Gnostics. They had been around for a long time and had fallen in and out of favour for a long time, but as far as the Mainstream church in Rome was concerned they really were a pain in the bum. They wouldn't agree to anything, they didn't agree with anything, certainly not the authority of the Roman headquarter church.

The Gnostics were a peaceful sort of sect which believed in personal revelation and personal enlightenment. Their goal in life was to reach a personal high level of communion with God and learn the mysteries etc. The afore mentioned John of Revelation fame was a Gnostic. Jesus himself had great Gnostic tendencies as many of the things that he said sounded very Gnostic. The Christian church won't admit this, of course. In fact they deny it at every opportunity, but for the more broadminded of us it sticks out as much as a bishop in a brothel.

Many of the Gnostics were not in the least bit interested in "sin" or "the forgiveness of it". Their chief aim was to become free forever from the body and everything to do with anything which was connected with the body, matter, materialism and the things of this earth. They believed that death meant their returning to the heavenly realm as Pure Spirit. They totally rejected any idea of the resurrection of the body. And more importantly they believed that one could climb to a higher plane whilst still here, that one could achieve "Gnosis" - revelation, understanding and knowledge of the higher things which were only attainable by Pure Spirit.

They had always been a pain in the bum to the organised church, even in the days BC. And Rome wasn't very fond of them either, because whilst they did in the main tend to stay out of the way in communes such as the one at Nag Hammadi, they didn't pay many taxes because being a none materialistic sect they didn't have much wealth.

And for those who object to my saying that Jesus was himself was probably a Gnostic. If I am to be honest I think that there is a lot going for the suggestion. Statements such as "The kingdom of God is within you", "Seek and ye shall find", "Knock and it shall be opened up unto you" etc are typically Gnostic in their outlook.

The gospel of Thomas another Gnostic gospel was outlawed by the Church, and in later years the penalty was "death for heresy" for anybody found with a copy or teaching what it said.

Good fun, these Christians, aren't they? Really open-minded.

Well the head church at Rome which had very quickly cottoned on to the idea that there was some real dosh to be made here if they could just keep in control of it all didn't want any loose cannons knocking about disagreeing with everything that they said, and the Gnostics were a law unto themselves as they always had been, and they were growing in popularity. So with Constantine's blessing and his army they hunted them down and persecuted them as hard as they could. Many of them were crucified which was the national flavour for punishment, and the rest of them who were caught were lobbed in with the other old favourite - the lions.

The Dead Sea Scrolls found at Nag Hammadi have a lot of Gnostic texts among them.

The big headquarters in Rome built a big fine church as well as numerous basilicas all with the agreement of Constantine, and the head of the Church gets to be known as the Pope. The Chi Rho and the symbol of the fish gets replaced by the symbol of the cross.

Now, Constantine starts to build his new capital city - Constantinople and a few new churches within the capital, and both he and the church at Rome decide that it is about time the Christians have a few festivals to help bond and cement the belief structure together and the first one on the cards is Easter. So Constantine decides that it would be a great thing to give them all a present.

So in the year 367 he calls up some poor sap called Eusebius who was the bishop of Caesaria which was a Roman port further up the coast. Eusibius limps up to Rome, and is greeted by Constantine with -

"Eusibius, my man, now that all of you bishops have sorted out all of your differences, I am going to have a grand opening of the new Capital city and the new churches there and we are going to have a new festival called Easter, so I want you to put together a few volumes of some scriptures that all of you have agreed are common ground so that I can present them as a present to all of the different bishops. I, don't know, let's call it a nice round figure - say fifty copies."

Oh poo!

So, Eusebius limps off back home and doesn't know really what to do. He knew very well that his arse was ready for hanging out to dry if he didn't comply, but he has got a major problem because even though they have all been meeting regularly to sort it all out for the most part they just treated it as a free get-together and nobody had really agreed on anything. He has got literally hundreds and hundreds of scriptures and manuscripts to choose from but most of them contradicted each other.

He does however fulfill the command of the Emperor and supplies the 50 volumes. We don't know which manuscripts he included because there aren't any copies left, or at least that's what the church says. It is rumoured that there might be one in the Vatican library, but if there is they are keeping very quiet and denying all knowledge of it.

Now the poo really hits the fan, because once it is understood that there has got to be a volume of Scriptures for the masses to adopt as the "inspired oracles of God" everybody who is anybody in the church wants their favourites and those which support their viewpoint included, but nobody can agree with each other which ones should be in and which ones should get the order of the boot. The church is still split into quite a few different factions which all support different ideas. And if the wrong books got in then it was a nightmare for those who supported the beliefs which were outlined in the scriptures that were not included.

And that was just the beginning. Volume after volume of what had previously been considered "scripture" by some of the bishops and adherents of the early church were rejected. There weren't just four gospels to begin with, there were many! There were gospels who were accredited to all sorts of people, the gospel of Thomas, the gospel of Peter, the gospel of Nicodemus, the gospel of James, the gospel of Bartholamew, the gospel of Philip and on and on it went. Not to mention the hundreds of other Gnostic texts and the other scripture manuscripts too numerous to mention.

And so began the greatest con of all. It was a result of the church at Rome being backed by Constantine with rule and authority negotiating and contriving a compilation of scripture which would include certain texts in a book called the Bible which was for the popular masses, and the exclusion of any and all texts which stood in opposition to the belief structure that they were attempting to set up.

It was and still is a contrived book, contrived by the church, contrived to consolidate a group of people under one leader and one helmsman so that the church could remain in control and grow powerful and wealthy just like Constantine who set them up in the first place.