Early Christians did believe that Jesus was God.

[Jack Ryan]

Holy Land's 'oldest church' found at Armageddon

Chris McGrealFirst published on Mon 7 Nov 2005 05.28 EST

Prisoners help unearth remains at jail on site of final biblical showdown

As if Megiddo, the biblical city of Armageddon - scene of three millennia of battles, the last cavalry charge of the first world war and the final showdown between good and evil - did not have enough on its plate. Archaeologists now claim to have unearthed the remains of the oldest Christian church discovered in the Holy Land.

Unfortunately for Israel's beleaguered tourism industry, the find was made behind the walls of one of the country's maximum security prisons.

Inmates were put to work alongside the specialists to excavate a corner of Megiddo jail for the construction of a new cell block ready for the next intake of Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants.

Toiling behind the barbed wire and watchtowers, they uncovered a detailed and well-preserved mosaic, the foundations of a rectangular building, and pottery dated to the third or early fourth century. One of several inscriptions on the mosaic floor in ancient Greek said the building was dedicated to "the memory of the Lord Jesus Christ".

Other inscriptions name a Roman army officer, Gaianus, who donated money to build the floor, and a woman called Ekoptos who "donated this table to the God Jesus Christ in commemoration". The table is believed to have served as an altar.

"There are no crosses on the mosaic floor," said Yotam Tepper, an archaeologist who led the dig on behalf of the Israeli Antiquities Authority. "In their place is a picture of two fish lying side by side - a very early Christian symbol.

"This is an extremely dramatic discovery, because such an old building of this type has never been found either in the land of Israel or anywhere else in the entire region. The structure and the mosaic floor date back to the period before Christianity became an officially recognised religion, before St Constantine.

"Normally we have from this period in our region historical evidence from literature, not archaeological evidence. There is no structure you can compare it to - it is a unique find."

The Roman empire forbade Christian rituals before AD313 and Christians were forced to worship in secret. The earliest churches, until this discovery at Megiddo, include the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, said to stand on the site of Christ's crucifixion, dating from about AD330, and the church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The inscriptions at Megiddo were interpreted by Professor Leah Di Segni of the Hebrew University.

"I was told these were Byzantine but they seem much earlier than anything I have seen so far from the Byzantine period. It could be from the third or the beginning of the fourth century," she said.The use of the word "table" in one inscription instead of "altar" might advance the study of Christianity, she said, because it is widely believed that rituals based on the Last Supper were held around a table used as an altar.

The church might never have been discovered had it not been for the needs of Israel's ever-demanding security apparatus. Megiddo prison is home to about 1,200 "security prisoners" who are held in "administrative detention" without ever being told exactly what it is they are accused of.

The prison is a series of fenced-in compounds with the bulk of inmates sleeping in long brown army tents enclosed by barbed wire and surrounded by open sewers. The prisoners nicknamed the jail "Jabaliya" after a poor and overcrowded refugee camp in the Gaza strip.

Megiddo has long been described by religious scholars and archaeologists as the most important biblical site in Israel. Over the centuries, more than 25 cities rose and fell at Megiddo. Some were powerful commercial centres on the ancient thoroughfare between Egypt and Mesopotamia.

Five of the conflicts fought in the 30-mile-wide Jezreel valley around Megiddo are recorded in the Old Testament. The New Testament names Armageddon - a Greek corruption of the Hebrew word "har", meaning mount, and Megiddo - as the scene of the final great battle between good and evil.

Some specialists remain sceptical about the latest discovery. "I think this is a little myth to boost tourism," said Michel Piccirillo, a respected biblical archaeologist. "The idea that it is ancient comes from the pottery and the shape of the letters on the inscriptions, but this is not definitive."

Israel's tourism minister, Avraham Hirchson, is not deterred. "If we nurture this properly, then there will be a large stream of tourists who could come to Israel. There is great potential ... " he told national television.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/nov/07/israel.artsnews

[Jack Ryan]

And coming from a Centurian roman officer is home run.

[JW Insider]

10 hours ago, Jack Ryan said:

The church might never have been discovered had it not been for the needs of Israel's ever-demanding security apparatus. Megiddo prison is home to about 1,200 "security prisoners" who are held in "administrative detention" without ever being told exactly what it is they are accused of.

WOW! Israel has long been a fascist state. Israel was once proud of being a terrorist state, and often admitted even in writing that it's early 20th century founders excelled at terrorism.  Now, it has the support of at least one overriding vote in the UN, so that the people whom it terrorizes are the only ones who are officially called terrorists. Most Palestinians are now in a national "concentration camp."

[Just testing the limits for discussing controversial politics here.]

On the topic at hand, this church looks to be 3rd century at the earliest, but even the first century Christians accepted that Jesus was "the only-begotten God" just not "the God."

 

[Jesus.defender]

Funny, isn't it that the majority of manuscripts read ‘the Lord’.

Question: Isn’t it coincidental that all modern versions, based on the corrupt Egyptian readings, have one major fact in common: that they omit many Deity of Christ verses?

The KJV ‘the second man is the Lord from heaven’ is a clear proof of Christ being God, as there is only one Lord from Heaven, and He is ‘Jehovah’.

What manuscript support is there for ‘the Lord’ in I Corinthians 15:47? See UBS Greek NT:

Thirteen early writers known as Church Fathers quote it:

a) Hippolytus 170-236 AD, Vol. 5, p 167
b) Tertullian 200-250 AD against Marcion,
Vol. 3, page 451
Vol.3, page 529
c) Victorinus, Vol 7, page 342
d) Basil 379 AD
e) Chrysostom 407 AD
f) Maximinus 428 AD
g) Cyril 444 AD
h) Euthalius 450 AD
i) Theodoret 466 AD
j) Ps-Athanasius 550 AD
k) Cosmas 550 AD
l) John Damascus 749 AD
m) Origen 254 AD
(2) Six Uncial Greek Manuscripts contain ‘the Lord’:
a) Codex Sinaiticus corrected (Aleph)
b) Codex Alexandrinus (A)
c) Codices D, K, P, ?.
(3) Nineteen Minuscule Greek Manuscripts numbered 81, 104, 181, 326, 330 436, 451,
614, 629, 1241, 1739, 1877, 1881, 1962, 1984, 1985, 2127,2492, 2495.
(4) Byzantine lectionaries contain the words ‘the Lord’.
(5) Ancient versions containing ‘the Lord’ are:
a) Syriac Peshitta d) Gothic
b) Syrian Harclean e) Armenian
c) Syriac Palestinian

Conclusion: 44 ancient witnesses from all over the ancient world testify to Jesus Christ as being ‘the Lord from heaven’. NWT is wrong here because no man originated from heaven.

 

Don't believe the false anti-Christian booklet "Should you believe in the Trinity" by the devious and deceitful watchtower which invented quotes of Church fathers on p7.

 

Here is what they actually said AND THE SOURCE:

 

Ignatius (30-107 AD) taught by John, believed in the Deity of Christ and Trinity: “Our Lord and God, Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, first did and then taught, as Luke testifies (p 56) continue in intimate union with Jesus Christ our God (p. 68)… loving Polycarp even as I do you (p. 58),… For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with the Father (p. 74). Those things have been fulfilled in the Gospel, (our Lord saying), Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” (Matt 28:19) (Ante-Nicene Fathers VI, p.85).

Tertullian (160-225 AD) was a juriconsult (law authority) familiar with the Roman archives which influenced his acceptance of Divine truth. He would not have boldly appealed to the archive records before the Roman Emperor, his colleagues and the Senate, had he not known that the evidence was irrefutable. He writes as follows:
Tertullian (first half of the third century AD), Apol. XXI:
“The Jews were so exasperated by His teaching, by which their rulers and chiefs were convicted of the truth, chiefly because so many turned aside to Him, that at last they brought Him before Pontius Pilate, at that time Roman governor of Syria; and, by the violence of their outcries against Him, extorted a sentence giving Him up to them to be crucified. He Himself had predicted this, which, however, would have signified little had not the prophets of old done it as well. And yet, nailed upon the cross, He exhibited many notable signs, by which His death was distinguished from all others. At His own free-will, He with a word dismissed from Him His spirit, anticipating the executioners work. In the same hour, too, the light of day was withdrawn, when the sun at the very time was in his meridian blaze. Those who were not aware that this had been predicted about Christ, no doubt thought it an eclipse. You yourselves have the account of the world portent still in your archives. (XXI.19:Et tamen suffixus multa mortis illius propria astendit insignia.. nam spiritum cum verbo sponte dimisit, praevento carnificis officio. Eodem momento dies medium orbem signante sole subducta est. Deliquium utique putaveruni qui id quoque super Christo praedicatum no sierunt. Et tamen eum mundi casum relatum in arcanis vestries habetis.) Then, when His body was taken down from the cross and placed in a sepulcher, the Jews in their eager watchfulness surrounded it with a large military guard, lest, as He had predicted His resurrection from the dead on the third day, His disciples might remove by stealth His body, and deceive even the incredulous. But, lo, on the third day there was a sudden shock of earthquake, and the stone which sealed the sepulcher was rolled away, and the guard fled off in terror: without a single disciple near, the grave was found empty of all but the clothes of the buried One. But nevertheless, the leaders of the Jews, whom it nearly concerned both to spread abroad a lie, and keep back a people tributary and submissive to them from the faith, gave it out that the body of Christ had been stolen by His followers. For the Lord, you see, did not go forth into the public gaze, lest the wicked should be delivered from their error; that faith also, destined to a great reward, might hold its ground in difficulty. But He spent forty days with some of His disciples down in Galilee, a region of Judea, instructing them in the doctrines they were to teach to others. Thereafter, having given them commission to preach the gospel through the world, He was encompassed with a cloud and taken up to heaven, a fact more certain far than the assertions of your Proculi concerning Romulus. All these things Pilate did to Christ; and now in fact a Christian in his own convictions, he sent word of Him to the reigning Caesar, who was at that time Tiberius.’ (Apologies, XXI, 19).
1252

1) Ignatius (30-107 AD) taught by John, believed in the Deity of Christ and Trinity: “Our Lord and God, Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, first did and then taught, as Luke testifies (p 56) continue in intimate union with Jesus Christ our God (p. 68)… loving Polycarp even as I do you (p. 58),… For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with the Father (p. 74). Those things have been fulfilled in the Gospel, (our Lord saying), Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” (Matt 28:19) (Ante-Nicene Fathers VI, p.85).

2) Pliny the Younger (61-112 AD) was the Governor of Bithynia in 112 Ad and a Roman Senator. He wrote to the Emperor Trajan asking for the guidance on how he should treat the Christians in his province. He stated that Christians were ‘meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verse a hymn to Christ as to a god, and bound themselves to a solemn oath, not to do wicked deeds, never commit fraud, theft, adultery, not to lie, nor to deny a trust…’ (Epistles X.96). This reveals that early Christians: i) Worshipped Jesus Christ as God.

ii) Met on a fixed day of the week.
iii) Were committed to holy, truthful, honest behavior.
Pliny described the Christians as people who loved the truth at any cost, and were willing to die as martyrs rather than deny their faith in Jesus as the Son of God.

3) Cornelius Tacitus Governor of Asia Minor (Turkey) in 112 AD. Tacitus (55-120 AD) has been called the greatest historian of Ancient Rome, as well as being Governor of Asia Minor (Turkey) in 112 AD. He wrote two major works: Annals and Histories. Being a Roman Governor and historian, he had access to the Roman Government archives. He confirmed many historical details in the Gospels, Acts and Romans.

In his Annals, written after 64 AD, he referred to Emperor Nero’s persecution of the Christians for allegedly burning the city of Rome, which Nero himself had done:
“Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of the Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a mighty illumination, when daylight was expired” (Annals 15,44).
This reference shows that: i) Christ lived during the reign of Tiberius Caesar (AD 13-37).

ii) Pontius Pilate put him to death.

iii) The word ‘superstition’ suggests a religion.

iv) Christ had followers who were named Christians.

v) The Christians suffered under the Roman emperor Nero and were hated by others.