Did the Early Church become corrupt?

Question

To be Protestant you must believe the Church became doctrinally corrupted at some point, otherwise there would be no reason to be outside it.

Can anyone show when and where this change happened? For example show that the Church believed one thing in the second century and changed it in the fourth.

I am not interested in personal disagreement with any particular Church doctrine, but in historical evidence of a change.

Answer 1

Looks like most of your responses speak on misbehavior of the individual rather than corruption of doctrine.

Most of them can't even re-tell what their own faiths believe. For instance, what is said here about Martin Luther is incorrect.

You know, he never really nailed his 95 thesis to any church. And the Catholic Church never forbade anyone to read the bible. People were poor and illiterate. Bibles were expensive.

FYI, darling, everyone was scandalized by the selling of indulgences. FYI - the POPE NEVER SOLD THEM. It was individual priests looking to gain a lot of money to build big churches.

More FYI - the only thing that changed about the church at the time of Constantine was that it became LEGAL to be Christian. Constantine had NO effect on the church at all.

Yes, there were corrupt people within the church. From the very start!

Even within Jesus's own followers. Judas Iscariot. Yet we're going to expect a larger group of people to be corruption free?

But to make your point, the church has never changed her doctrine.

Answer 2

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH is the world's largest, and Christianity's oldest, religious body. Her 860 million members inhabit the width and breadth of the earth, comprising almost one-fifth of the total human population. She is far and away the most popular religious concept the world has ever known. Paradoxically, however, the Catholic Church is also the world's most controversial religious concept. Catholic belief is different, too different to be orthodox, say Protestants and Christian cultists. Catholic belief is too ethereal to be logical, and too strict to be enjoyable, say the humanists and agnostics Hence to millions of people, Catholicism is not only a colossal success, it is also a colossal enigma. Of course, there has to be an explanation for these contradictory opinions-- and there is an explanation: Protestants and others who have questions about Catholic belief too often make the mistake of going to the wrong place for the answers. Too often books written by religious incompetents are consulted. The result is incomplete and distorted information. With such information, one cannot help but see the Catholic faith as a colossal enigma.
The right place to go for information about Catholic belief--in fact the only place to go for complete and authoritative information--is the Catholic Church herself. As any detective will tell you, no investigation is quite so complete as an on-the-spot investigation. Hence, dear reader, if you are a Protestant, an unaffiliated Christian, or an agnostic, who wants to know the truth about Catholic belief, take this friendly advice: Seek out a Catholic priest and put your questions to him. You will find him a very understanding and obliging person. Or read this little booklet. This booklet was written by a Catholic who knows the questions you are likely to ask, as well as the answers, because once he, too, was outside of the Catholic Church, looking in. The questions in this booklet are basically the same ones he put to a Catholic priest, and the answers are basically the same ones given him by that priest. Read this booklet; then forget all the fiction you have heard about the Catholic Church, for you will have the gospel truth.

Answer 3

Even before the last of Christ's 12 disciples had passed away, various church's were established - under Christ's name - who were rebuked by either John or Paul (I think it was John). They were less than two generations past Christ's resurrection, and were already off tangent from Christ's original teachings. Remember also that there were those who were disciples of Jesus (while still living) who fell away at the end, unable to 'capture' and hold His purpose and meaning in their hearts, and they moved on - perhaps to start up ministries of their own (under the umbrella of being Christian, of which they weren't).
This has been an on-going struggle within the Christian Church, is that there are those who only read or follow portions of Christ's message, and disregard the rest. Whatever suited their agenda is what they promoted. This has continued for hundreds, and now 2 thousand years. When religion was king, then many joined up for their own survival, the power, the wealth, to hide human frailties. And when the government or invading forces changed what was deemed as 'acceptable' and Christianity did not fall into that mode, then the sheep were quickly seperated from the goats, and True Christianity once again went underground.
So, in less than 80 AD, there was trouble within the new Christian Churches. John spoke of them (some say symbolically) in the book of Revelation. Some of the Churches were "ok" some very corrupt, and perhaps only one continued the straight and narrow road following Christ's message correctly. (I believe it was the Church of Philadelphia)
If you want to read further on this, from a source outside of the Bible, try Fox's Book of Christian Martyrs. It was written in the 1550's, but it does follow the Christian movement from the time of Christ to the time of it's publication. Most of it is written from first person accounts of heinous acts waged against Christians. It is a very reputable historical document. I suggest it strongly.
Today, you can find a variety of those who make claims to follow Christ, but so many have agendas or just poorly follow Christ. That is why it is imperative that you read the Bible for yourself, so that you may be wise to the false prophets that seem to capitalize well in this free religious society we have today.
070207 7:40

Answer 4

Dearest Josiah,

The most prevelant case of the church believing in one thing and changing it to another was the split in the time of Jesus Christ. His presence alone caused a great rift in the spiritual threadwork of Judaism. Of course Christianity is a direct contradiction of the Jewish faith as they do not believe he was the Son of God. So that is the most outward example of the church believing in one thing and changing it the next.

The next most important aspect of this is the Bible itself.

There was a fantastic documentary on the lost book of Judas on the Discovery Channel. Why this is important is they lightly touch on the topic of the early church and how a priest selectively - and of his own agenda - decided what books should be included in the Bible. There are over 30 gospels not included in the New Testament that should have been as they were all disciples of Jesus. But the priest did not agree with the doctrine within and therefore excluded them. You can find these gospels on the internet. The most widely read is the gospel of Thomas.

So even the Bible was touched by corruption. It doesn't make it any less true or any less sincere but it does shed light on the fact that even 3,500 years ago man was exercising his power and therefore breeding corruption within the church. He decided what the general public of Christians would read and left out the gospels that spoke of man's mystic connection to God through the spirit.

And the other gospels can be considered advanced reading and they somewhat contradict the simplicity of the Bible but I believe anyone of today's average intelligence would see how they apply.

Good luck in your journey of knowledge, it is the strongest power you can ever have.

Answer 5

We have denominations because of Martin Luther. At one time in history (16th century) Martin Luther didn't agree with the ideas of the Catholic Church, such as: 1) The Pope has the power to sell indulgences 2) Good deeds can get you into heaven 3) The Pope can forgive you of your sins 4) You have to go to Church to go to heaven 5) Everyone isn't equal in Gods eyes. etc. Actually, Martin Luther stapled his 95 theses to the doors of the Catholic Church in Whitingburg Germany. This was the beginning of the Protestant Refomation. Many more people began to have their ideas including John Calvin & John Knox. As more and more people read and interpreted the Bible in their own way, they had different beliefs, thus splitting and creating different denominations.

John Calvin - Calvinists
John Knox - Presbyterian
Martin Luther - Lutherans

Check out Martin Luther's 95 Theses online


Addition: Only certain people in the Catholic Church were doing corrupt things, such as selling positions in the Church. It was Martin Luther who thought the things that I mentioned were wrong.

Answer 6

Yes, the early church did become corrupt.
In several of the Pauline letters Paul exhorts faithful members of the church to be aware of those specific members who have been teaching false doctrine, as well as ALL members from certain towns who have ALL become corrupt and have been teaching corrupt doctrine, and to not welcome them or allow them into their towns. It wasn't a 2nd century vs. 4th century thing. It began happening during the lifetime of Paul. I'm not a scriptorian, but I would think that since Paul lived during the time of the original 12 Apostles that the apostasy began even before all of the original 12 Apostles died.

I am not Protestant, but I am Christian.

Answer 7

Well,I'm Catholic and I certainly don't share the protestant view that we somehow someway somewhere at some time just went off on a detour and never came back,what to speak of the idea that they have rediscovered the long-lost True Road. But I do believe that in the Ist century Jewish converts sought to maintain their dominance by playing Christ's teachings not as a new dispensation of God's wisdom but as a mere extension of Judaism,for which purpose they interpolated a lots of stuff designed to link Christ with the Jewish messiah concept. Take that story of Christ among the doctors - that's lifted verbatim out of a spurious text called the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. I think we need to weed this stuff out. Christ is not the messiah of the Jewish people. He is the Saviour of all humanity.

Answer 8

The official church wasn't set up until the 4th century. You mean to tell me that there was no Church before that? I won't admit that the Catholic church is The Christian Church and that all the others are but her daughters. I say that ever since Pentecost there has aways been members of the Church. It didn't require a Roman king to make Her "official". Jim

Answer 9

It was corrupted extremely early.

Many of the letters of Paul are dealing with corruption that had already crept into the church.

By the time of Constantine it was pretty much corrupt and after the council of Nicea they pretty much persecuted those who hadn't corrupted themselves either out of existence or into hiding. I think the great corruption was at that point.

The Protestants have nothing to brag about by the way. They still bow the knee to the catholic church and in some cases weekly. I visited a Sunday go to meeting church this last weekend defiantly protestant from the reformer himself and they are declaring their allegiance to the Catholic church when they recite the apostles creed.

They still teach corruption of the scriptures.

Repent! The kingdom of God is at hand!

Answer 10

while i replaced into Protestant I in no way knew that early Christian writings even existed, much less study any of them. the reason Protestants do no longer point out them, or renowned them, is with the help of the fact the ideals of the early Christians have been of course Catholic ideals.