Whatever we think of him, there is little doubt that the Roman emperor Constantine is a polarizing figure. For Catholics and Orthodox he is often seen as heroic – even gaining the title “Saint” among the latter. For many Protestants he is a villain who compromised the Church with paganism. For secularists, he is a scheming political genius. In reality, he might be a little of all the above.

Rather than thinking anachronistically, we should place Constantine in the proper historical context as a Roman general fighting for supremacy in the subculture that surrounded the Roman army. Roman soldiers (as with many soldiers anywhere) were incredibly superstitious. Victories and defeats were often attributed to the favor and scorn of various gods. If you fought with some god’s favor and the opponents fought with a different god’s favor, the outcome might be viewed as much owing to the relative interests of gods as to the skill of the soldiers – particularly if natural phenomena (e.g., weather) assisted in determining the outcome.

During the Roman persecution of Christians under Diocletian, Constantine’s father and later Constantine himself were never major enforcers of the edicts. This might be because they had relatives who were Christians, they were sympathetic nonbelievers, or they were facing barbarian hordes and so had better things to do than worry about than some pacifist religious sect. In fact, it seems that Constantine’s army had a number of Christians in it.

Constantine’s main opponent for the dominance of the Western part of the Empire was Maxentius who had the backing of the Roman establishment, an impressive army, and ruled from Rome itself. Thus the pagan religious establishment in Rome also looked with favor upon him since he was by far the favorite in the forthcoming battle. As one would expect, the various pagan oracles “predicted” his victory. This last item is significant since it would show Constantine’s army that the heavens were against him. It is not too much to imagine that Christians in Constantine’s army might have approached him and said they would intercede with God (or in Constantine’s mind – their god) for his victory knowing he would grant the Church freedom from persecution.

Constantine likely latched on to any god who might come to his aid. I honestly cannot judge the veracity of his alleged “vision” in the sky – it was reported long after the event and may have originated in legend. I have seen strange clouds myself on occasion but I heard no voices and no one has made me emperor. What we know for sure is that Constantine fought under the emblem of the chi-rho symbol at the battle of Pons Milvius in the year 312. At that battle, an amazing thing happened as Maxentius apparently drowned crossing the river, his army fell apart, and Constantine marched victoriously into Rome. He would then grant Christianity toleration with the edict of Milan.

The theory that he was planning to unite the Empire under some hybrid religion simply does not make sense. Christianity was weakened by the persecution of Diocletian and it was weakest of all in Rome where Constantine would presumably rule. The area of its greatest strength was in the East – not in Europe – and even there it was recovering from a decade of severe oppression where many had renounced the faith under threats of death and others were tortured and killed. Moreover, those who remained would likely be the most hesitant to compromise. Finally, Constantine never made it the religion of the Empire but just one of many tolerated religions. Constantine himself never was baptized until near his death and it is difficult to judge when he decided to become a Christian.

So what was Constantine’s motivation? Why did he build all those churches after his victory at Milvian bridge and then later his complete dominance of the Eastern empire as well. I believe the answer lies in the same attitude of a Roman soldier alluded to earlier. To understand Constantine, one must understand the Roman way of thinking.

Now, what would a Roman general do if some god gave him a great victory – even if he didn’t understand the cult’s beliefs and practices? He would finance temples and promote the cult of that god. What did Constantine do? He financed temples and promoted the cult of the Christian religion. After all, there were many better choices of a cult to choose than one that was extremely unpopular with the centers of Roman power.

There is little doubt that at the time, he was not a Christian in any orthodox sense of the word. But it appears he gradually became one over the years and finally sought baptism in his last days on earth (a common thing at the time). Under his rule, the Council of Nicea defended the divinity of Christ although it is unlikely he understood the theological issues or cared. He more likely wanted to promote peace within the religion since the division might cause this Jesus to withdraw his support. In other words, he was still at the time seeing Jesus as Romans saw their gods. None of this means God could not use Constantine for His purposes. If God could use a King of Persia, why not use a Roman emperor?

The reason for his being demonized in Protestant circles can be traced to the early debates of the Reformation. Catholic apologists used a document called the Donation of Constantine to prove that Constantine – whose reputation was pretty high among all at the time – had given control to the papacy (as if an emperor could do that). Protestants understandably decided all the problems started then and Constantine was blamed for Catholicism’s perceived errors. The document was later proven to be a medieval fraud, but by then Constantine had been established as a Protestant bogeyman.

The reality is just the opposite. By his moving the capital of the empire to his “New Rome” at the city of Byzantium (later renamed Constantinople), he effectively prevented the complete centralization of power in the Church at Rome. The other patriarchates of the Church (Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem) would align with Constantinople against Roman claims of ecclesial jurisdiction. Thus, if anything, Constantine may have actually diminished papal power by creating a rival to papal power in the Church.

We must keep in mind that, contrary to much Western thinking, the Roman Empire did not collapse with the sacking of Rome. The grand old city of Rome was no longer the main capital and had not been for about a century. The empire continued from Constantinople until 1453 when it was sacked by the Ottoman Turks. Historians call the empire of this period the Byzantine Empire but its citizens considered themselves Roman and was known by all as Roman. The tag “Byzantine Empire” is a creation of modern historians, blinded by Western prejudices, using the city’s original name.

The Ottomans who recognized nations (millets) within their empire called the Orthodox Christians the Millet Roma. The Church of the East in Persia called the Orthodox the Roman Church. The Catholics were referred to as the Frankish Church (the Catholics “Holy Roman Empire” created under Charlemagne was controlled by descendants of Franco-Germanic tribes and they gradually gained control of Rome and the Church from the native Romans). Constantine had set up a Christianized Roman Empire apart from old Rome that lasted another millennia.

The behavior of Constantine in favoring the Christians is easily explainable apart from any debates over whether he was a good Christian. Our current understanding of what this constitutes would have been foreign to him – he grasped Christianity in the context of his own culture. The labels of great saint, great sinner, or great schemer do not describe the man but an image derived from later beliefs and imposed anachronistically upon him. The truth is that he was a complex figure who changed the ancient world and whatever mistakes appeared after his reign in a region outside of the jurisdiction of the new Christian empire he created should not be laid at his feet.