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Synod Of Elvira
The Synod of Elvira (, ) was an ecclesiastical synod held at Elvira in the Roman province of Hispania Baetica, now Granada in southern Spain.. Its date has not been exactly determined but is believed to be in the first quarter of the fourth century, approximately 305–6. It was one of three councils, together with the Synod of Arles (314) and the Synod of Ancyra, that first approached the character of general councils and prepared the way for the first ecumenical council. It was attended by nineteen bishops and twenty-six presbyters, mostly resident in Baetica. Deacons and laymen were also present. Eighty-one canons are recorded, although it is believed that many were added at later dates. All concern order, discipline and conduct among the Christian community. Canon 36, forbidding the use of images in churches, became a bone of contention between Catholic and Protestant scholars after the Protestant Reformation. It is one of a number of pre-ecumenical ancient church council ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christians
A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the world. The words '' Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title (), a translation of the Biblical Hebrew term '' mashiach'' () (usually rendered as ''messiah'' in English). While there are diverse interpretations of Christianity which sometimes conflict, they are united in believing that Jesus has a unique significance. The term ''Christian'' used as an adjective is descriptive of anything associated with Christianity or Christian churches, or in a proverbial sense "all that is noble, and good, and Christ-like." According to a 2011 Pew Research Center survey, there were 2.3 billion Christians around the world, up from about 600 million in 1910. Today, about 37% of all Christians live in the Americas, about 26% live in Europe, 24% live in sub-Saharan Afric ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sacraments (Catholic Church)
There are seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, which according to Catholic theology were instituted by Jesus Christ and entrusted to the Church. Sacraments are visible rites seen as signs and efficacious channels of the grace of God to all those who receive them with the proper disposition. The sacraments are often classified into three categories: the sacraments of initiation (into the Catholic Church and the mystical body of Christ), consisting of Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist; the sacraments of healing, consisting of the Sacrament of Penance and the Anointing of the Sick; and the sacraments of service: Holy Orders and Matrimony. Furthermore, Baptism and penance were also known as the "sacraments of the dead" (in the meaning that the souls of the sinners which are regarded dead before God may obtain life through these sacraments), whereas the other five are collectively the "sacraments of the living". Enumeration History The number of the sacraments in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bishop
A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of dioceses. The role or office of the bishop is called episcopacy or the episcopate. Organisationally, several Christian denominations utilise ecclesiastical structures that call for the position of bishops, while other denominations have dispensed with this office, seeing it as a symbol of power. Bishops have also exercised political authority within their dioceses. Traditionally, bishops claim apostolic succession, a direct historical lineage dating back to the original Twelve Apostles or Saint Paul. The bishops are by doctrine understood as those who possess the full Priest#Christianity, priesthood given by Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ, and therefore may ordain other clergy, including other bishops. A person ordained as a deacon, pri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lactantius
Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius () was an early Christian author who became an advisor to Roman emperor Constantine I, guiding his Christian religious policy in its initial stages of emergence, and a tutor to his son Crispus. His most important work is the '' Institutiones Divinae'' ("The Divine Institutes"), an apologetic treatise intended to establish the reasonableness and truth of Christianity to pagan critics. He is best known for his apologetic works, widely read during the Renaissance by humanists, who called Lactantius the "Christian Cicero". Also often attributed to Lactantius is the poem '' The Phoenix'', which is based on the myth of the phoenix from Egypt and Arabia. Though the poem is not clearly Christian in its motifs, modern scholars have found some literary evidence in the text to suggest the author had a Christian interpretation of the eastern myth as a symbol of resurrection. Biography Lactantius was of Punic or Berber origin, born into a family that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arnobius
Arnobius (died c. 330) was an early Christian apologist of Berber origin during the reign of Diocletian (284–305). According to Jerome's ''Chronicle,'' Arnobius, before his conversion, was a distinguished Numidian rhetorician at Sicca Veneria (El Kef, Tunisia), a major Christian center in Proconsular Africa, and owed his conversion to a premonitory dream. However, Arnobius writes dismissively of dreams in his surviving book. According to Jerome, to overcome the doubts of the local bishop as to the earnestness of his Christian belief he wrote (c. 303, from evidence in IV:36) an apologetic work in seven books, which St. Jerome calls but which is entitled in the only (9th-century) manuscript that has survived. Jerome's reference, his remark that Lactantius was a pupil of Arnobius and the surviving treatise are all the surviving facts about Arnobius. was composed in response to arguments justifying Diocletian's persecution of Christians by claiming that Christians had brough ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Book Of Exodus
The Book of Exodus (from ; ''Šəmōṯ'', 'Names'; ) is the second book of the Bible. It is the first part of the narrative of the Exodus, the origin myth of the Israelites, in which they leave slavery in Biblical Egypt through the strength of Yahweh, their deity, who according to the story Chosen people, chose them as his people. The Israelites then journey with the prophet Moses to biblical Mount Sinai, Mount Sinai, where Yahweh gives the Ten Commandments and they enter into a Mosaic covenant, covenant with Yahweh, who promises to make them a "holy nation, and a kingdom of priests" on condition of their faithfulness. He gives them laws and instructions to build the Tabernacle, the means by which he will come from heaven and dwell with them and lead them in a holy war to conquer Canaan (the "Promised Land"), which has earlier, according to the Book of Genesis, been promised to the "seed" of Abraham, the patriarch of the Israelites. Though traditionally Mosaic authorship, ascri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apologist
Apologetics (from Greek ) is the religious discipline of defending religious doctrines through systematic argumentation and discourse. Early Christian writers (c. 120–220) who defended their beliefs against critics and recommended their faith to outsiders were called Christian apologists. In 21st-century usage, ''apologetics'' is often identified with debates over religion and theology. Etymology The term ''apologetics'' derives from the Ancient Greek word (). In the Classical Greek legal system, the prosecution delivered the (), the accusation or charge, and the defendant replied with an ', the defence. The was a formal speech or explanation to reply to and rebut the charges. A famous example is Socrates' Apologia defense, as chronicled in Plato's ''Apology''. In the Koine Greek of the New Testament, the Apostle Paul employs the term ''apologia'' in his trial speech to Festus and Agrippa when he says "I make my defense" in Acts 26:2. A cognate form appears in Paul ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Icon
An icon () is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, in the cultures of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Catholic Church, Catholic, and Lutheranism, Lutheran churches. The most common subjects include Jesus, Mary, mother of Jesus, Mary, saints, and angels. Although especially associated with portrait-style images concentrating on one or two main figures, the term also covers most of the religious images in a variety of artistic media produced by Eastern Christianity, including narrative scenes, usually from the Bible or the lives of saints. Icons are most commonly painted on wood panels with egg tempera, but they may also be cast in metal or carved in stone or embroidered on cloth or done in mosaic or fresco work or printed on paper or metal, etc. Comparable images from Western Christianity may be classified as "icons", although "iconic" may also be used to describe the static style of a devotional image. In the Greek language, the term for icon painting uses ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Idolatry
Idolatry is the worship of an idol as though it were a deity. In Abrahamic religions (namely Judaism, Samaritanism, Christianity, Islam, and the Baháʼí Faith) idolatry connotes the worship of something or someone other than the Abrahamic God as if it were God. In these monotheistic religions, idolatry has been considered as the "worship of false gods" and is forbidden by texts such as the Ten Commandments. Other monotheistic religions may apply similar rules. For instance, the phrase '' false god'' is a derogatory term used in Abrahamic religions to indicate cult images or deities of non-Abrahamic Pagan religions, as well as other competing entities or objects to which particular importance is attributed. Conversely, followers of animistic and polytheistic religions may regard the gods of various monotheistic religions as "false gods" because they do not believe that any real deity possesses the properties ascribed by monotheists to their sole deity. Atheists, who do n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Duumvir
Diarchy (from Greek , ''di-'', "double", and , ''-arkhía'', "ruled"),Occasionally spelled ''dyarchy'', as in the '' Encyclopaedia Britannica'' article on the colonial British institution duarchy, or duumvirate. is a form of government characterized by co-rule, with two people ruling a polity together either lawfully or '' de facto'', by collusion and force. The leaders of such a system are usually known as corulers. Historically, ''diarchy'' particularly referred to the system of shared rule in British India established by the Government of India Acts 1919 and 1935, which devolved some powers to local councils, which had included native Indian representation under the Indian Councils Act 1892. 'Duumvirate' principally referred to the offices of the various duumviri established by the Roman Republic. Both, along with less common synonyms such as biarchy and tandemocracy, are now used more generally to refer to any system of joint rule or office. A monarchy temporarily co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flamen
A (plural ''flamines'') was a priest of the ancient Roman religion who was assigned to one of fifteen deities with official cults during the Roman Republic. The most important of these were the three (or "major priests"), who served the important Roman gods Jupiter, Mars, and Quirinus. The remaining twelve were the ("lesser priests"). Two of the served deities whose names are now unknown; among the others are deities about whom little is known other than the name. During the Imperial era, the cult of a deified emperor () also had a flamen. The fifteen Republican flamens were members of the Pontifical College, who administered state-sponsored religion. When the office of flamen was vacant, a could serve as a temporary replacement, although only the is known to have substituted for the , one of the . Etymology The etymology of remains obscure, and perhaps undecidable. Andrew Sihler ''New Comparative Grammar of Greek and Latin,'' Oxford University Press 1995 p.198:’ Tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
