Did the Council of Nicaea Make Up the Idea that Jesus is God?

Actually, the first Christian documents – Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians – used language indicating that Jesus is God 275 years before the Council of Nicaea.

Stained glass presentation of the Holy Trinity in the church of St. Peter & St. Paul in Brockdish, United Kingdom. The artist is unknown. CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

A common myth is that 1700 years ago, in AD 325, a gathering of bishops at the First Council of Nicaea created the idea that Jesus is God.  According to the tale, the early Christians never thought Jesus was God.  (You might be aware of a famous novel and movie in the early 2000s that made such a claim.)

The earliest Christian writings we have today show the contrary.  The belief in the divinity of Jesus first appears in the first two documents that were included in the Bible: Paul’s first and second letters to the Thessalonians.  1 Thessalonians was written in AD 50, just 20 years after Jesus’s death and resurrection and 275 years before the Council of Nicaea.  2 Thessalonians followed a few months later.  Both indicate that the apostle Paul believed in the divinity of Jesus.

Paul treats the Lord Jesus and God the Father as a unity

In 1 Thessalonians 3:11, Paul prays that God the Father and the Lord Jesus will direct his path back to the Thessalonians.  But the verb he uses for “direct” is a third person singular verb – the verb you use when the noun is a singular noun.  In other words, he speaks of God the Father and the Lord Jesus as a single entity, not as two entities.

What do I mean by that?  Let me explain by offering an analogy.  Suppose I say that “John is directing traffic.”  The word “is” is a third person singular verb, which goes with the third-person singular noun “John.”  If I say that “John and Paul are directing traffic,” the word “are” is a third person plural verb that goes with the third person plural subject “John and Paul.”

In ordinary circumstances, I would never say, “John and Paul is directing traffic.”  That would be bad grammar.  The word “is” requires a singular noun.  There is only one reason why I would use “is” in that sentence: if “John and Paul” is a singular entity rather than a plural group of entities – for example, if “John and Paul” is the name of a security service.  In that case, “John and Paul” is a singular entity, not a pair of separate entities, and I could correctly say that “John and Paul is directing traffic.”

In 1 Thessalonians 3:11, Paul uses the third person singular verb that treats God the Father and the Lord Jesus as a single entity, using the third person singular verb.

Paul prays to Jesus as he would to God

In the next verse (1 Thess. 3:12), Paul prays that the Lord Jesus will help the Thessalonians abound in love.

This is another subtle sign of his belief in the divinity of Jesus.  Paul would not pray to a mere human; God is the one who can answer prayer.  But he directs his prayer to Jesus.  This indicates that, 20 years after the Resurrection, Paul sees Jesus was as having the power of God.

Contrary to the confusion of the skeptics, the Christians of Jesus’s time believed that he was one with God the Father and was God.  He was not just a man, elevated 300 years later to divinity by the Council of Nicaea.

Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians takes a similar approach

In his second letter to the Thessalonians, Paul begins a prayer by describing our Lord Jesus Christ and God our Father as having given us eternal comfort and good hope by grace (2 Thess. 2:16).

He continues the sentence by saying, may he encourage your hearts and may he strengthen them.  He does not say, may they encourage and strengthen your hearts.  Again, as in 1 Thessalonians 3:11, Paul uses the third personal singular, indicating by his grammar that he sees the Lord Jesus Christ and God the Father as one God, which means that he believes in the divinity of Jesus.

The skeptics think church leaders waited 300 years to declare Jesus divine.  Paul treats it as a given in the way he writes about God the Father and the Lord Jesus, in AD 50.

Other passages in the Bible assert Jesus’s divinity

Other Bible passages state Jesus’s divinity even more explicitly.  See my article When Did Christians First Recognize the Divinity of Jesus? for more, including examples from the Gospels of Mark and John that show the early Church’s belief in the divinity of Jesus.  I focus here on Paul’s letters because my Bible Study group has been exploring these letters and they were the first Christian writings to survive until today.

Throughout history, some people, both within and outside of the Church, have questioned the belief that Jesus is divine.  But it was not a novel idea decided out of nowhere in 325.  It is present in the New Testament documents.

The Council of Nicaea merely gave us formal, doctrinal language to express these truths of the Christian faith, truths that Paul signaled 275 years earlier in his choice of verbs and pronouns in his letters to the Thessalonians.

NOTE: There is much more in Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians.  My Bible Studies occasionally pause to explore a doctrinal issue like this, but the main focus of our studies is to figure out how we can apply the practical wisdom of the Bible to our everyday lives.  Paul’s letters to a brand-new Thessalonian church focus on how to live together as a community.  See what you can apply in your own life here: 1 Thessalonians and 2 Thessalonians.  Or check out my full set of Bible Studies and see where God leads you.