This volume brings together some of the English-speaking world’s leading Constantinian scholars for an interdisciplinary study of the life and legacy of the first Christian emperor. Focusing on the questions that have for so long intrigued historians, classicists, and theologians, the papers collected in this volume prove once again that Constantine is not so much a figure from the remote past, but an individual whose legacy continues to shape our present.

Constantine: Religious Faith and Imperial Policy brings together some of the English-speaking world’s leading Constantinian scholars for an interdisciplinary study of the life and legacy of the first Christian emperor. For many, he remains a "sign of contradiction" (Luke 2:34) whose life and legacy generate intense debate. He was the first Christian emperor, protector of the Church, and eventually remembered as "equal to the apostles" for bringing about the Christianization of the Empire. Yet there is another side to Constantine’s legacy, one that was often neglected by his Christian hagiographers. Some modern scholars have questioned the orthodoxy of the so-called model Christian emperor, while others have doubted the sincerity of his Christian commitment, viewing his embrace of the faith as merely a means to a political end. Drawing together papers presented at the 2013 symposium at Stockton University commemorating the 1700th anniversary of the Edict of Milan, this volume examines the very questions that have for so long occupied historians, classicists, and theologians. The papers in this volume prove once again that Constantine is not so much a figure from the remote past, but an individual whose legacy continues to shape our present.

The subject of this book is politics and religion, the relationship between Constantine and Christianity. Something happened in the reign of the Emperor Constantine that transformed both politics and religion in Europe, and anyone who seeks to understand modern Christianity must analyze this transformation and its consequences. The reign of Constantine is remembered as the victory of Christianity over the Roman Empire; the subtitle of the book indicates a more ominous assessment: "the triumph of ideology." Through a careful analysis of the sources, Dr. Kee argues that Constantine was not in fact a Christian and that the sign in which he conquered was not the cross of Christ but a political symbol of his own making. However, that is only the beginning of the story. For Constantine, religion was part of an imperial strategy, and the second part of this book shows just what that strategy was. Here is the development which marks a transition to a further stage, the way in which by using Christianity for his own ends, Constantine trans­formed it into something completely different. Constantine, Dr. Kee argues, along with his biographer and panegyrist Eusebius, succeeded in replacing the norms of Christ and the early church with the norms of imperial ideology. Why it has been previously thought that Constantine was a Christian is not because what he believed was Christian, but because what he believed came to be called Christian. And that represents "the triumph of ideology."

Roman Emperor Constantine raised Christianity from a minority religion to imperial status, but his religious orientation was by no means unambiguous. In Constantine and the Cities, Noel Lenski demonstrates how the emperor and his subjects used the instruments of government in a struggle for authority over the religion of the empire.

Historians who viewed imperial Rome in terms of a conflict between pagans and Christians have often regarded Constantine's conversion as the triumph of Christianity over paganism. Here Drake offers a fresh understanding of Constantine's rule.

Most college and seminary courses on the New Testament include discussions of the process that gave shape to the New Testament. David Dungan re-examines the primary source for the history, the Ecclesiastical History of the fourth-century Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea, in the light of Hellenistic political thought. He reaches new conclusions: that we usually use the term "canon" incorrectly; that the legal imposition of a "canon" or "rule" upon scripture was a fourth- and fifth-century phenomenon enforced with the power of the Roman imperial government; that the forces shaping the New Testament canon are much earlier than the second-century crisis occasioned by Marcion, and that they are political forces. Dungan discusses how the scripture selection process worked, book-by-book, as he examines the criteria used-and not used-to make these decisions. He describes the consequences of the emperor Constantine's tremendous achievement in transforming orthodox, Catholic Christianity into imperial Christianity. --From publisher's description.

Drawing on over a quarter of a century of the author's research and experience, this book focuses on the man and his life for scholars, students, and those interested in Roman imperial, early Christian, and Byzantine imperial history. It is illustrated with ninety-two photographs and eight maps.

"313 AD is generally considered a "turning point" in religious and political Western history. The meeting of Constantine and Licinius in Milan and the subsequent "edict" not only gave Christians the right to assemble and practice their faith, but opened the way to the Christianisation of Roman imperial structures and, finally, to the declaration of Christianity as the only religion allowed in the Roman Empire. The papers collected in this volume tackle this complex historical phase from a number of perspectives (from Church history and theology to political and juridical history), following a strongly multidisciplinary approach. The chronological schope [sic], stretching from the decades preceding the meeting of 313 to the reign of Julian the Apostate, sheds light on the cultural, political and juridical premises of Constantine and Licinius's decisions as well as the way those premises affected a number of aspects of everyday life within the Empire up to Julian's pagan "restoration" and afterward."--

This “knowledgeable account” of the emperor who brought Christianity to Rome “provides valuable insight into Constantine’s era” (Kirkus Reviews). “By this sign conquer.” So began the reign of Constantine. In 312 A.D. a cross appeared in the sky above his army as he marched on Rome. In answer, Constantine bade his soldiers to inscribe the cross on their shield, and so fortified, they drove their rivals into the Tiber and claimed Rome for themselves. Constantine led Christianity and its adherents out of the shadow of persecution. He united the western and eastern halves of the Roman Empire, raising a new city center in the east. When barbarian hordes consumed Rome itself, Constantinople remained as a beacon of Roman Christianity. Constantine is a fascinating survey of the life and enduring legacy of perhaps the greatest and most unjustly ignored of the Roman emperors—written by a richly gifted historian. Paul Stephenson offers a nuanced and deeply satisfying account of a man whose cultural and spiritual renewal of the Roman Empire gave birth to the idea of a unified Christian Europe underpinned by a commitment to religious tolerance. “Successfully combines historical documents, examples of Roman art, sculpture, and coinage with the lessons of geopolitics to produce a complex biography of the Emperor Constantine.” —Publishers Weekly

"Constantine was the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity. The book explores the emperor's image as conveyed through literature, art, and architecture, and shows how Constantine reconciled the tradition of imperial divinity with his monotheistic faith. It demonstrates how the traditional themes and imagery of kingship were exploited to portray the emperor as the saviour of his people and to assimilate him to Christ. This is the first book to study simultaneously both archaeological and historical information to build a picture of the emperor's image and propaganda. It is extensively illustrated" --Provided by publisher.