Constantine I (Hellenes)

Constantine I 1868-1923, king of the Hellenes, eldest son of George I , whom he succeeded in 1913. Married to Sophia, sister of the German emperor William II, he opposed the pro-Allied policy of the Greek premier, Eleutherios Venizelos , and was forced to abdicate in 1917 under Allied military pressure. His second son, Alexander , succeeded to the throne. Recalled (1920) on Alexander's death, he continued the war against Turkey, although the Allies withdrew their support from Greece. The Turkish victory at Izmir caused a military rebellion, and Constantine in 1922 was again deposed and exiled. His eldest son, George II , succeeded. Constantine is also known as Constantine XII.

Hellenism. Greek life and culture in the period from the conquests of Alexander the Great (4th cent. BCE) to the death of Constantine. For both Judaism and (in different ways) Christianity, Hellenism offered both threat and challenge. On the one side, it offered opportunity to enhance the Jewish understanding of God's nature and action toward his creation (as in the philosopher Philo or the historian Josephus). On the other hand, the adoption of Hellenistic ways threatened the requirements of Torah. For Christianity, Hellenism offered a vehicle of missionary extension and of theological (and christological) reflection. Yet at the same time there were those who thought that the involvement of the gospel in classical thought was an erosion of it.

Constantine (c.274–337), first Christian Roman emperor (306–37), known as ‘the Great’. Born at Naissus (now Nis), Constantine was the son of Constantius I by Helena. In 305 Constantius succeeded as Augustus (senior emperor) of the West. Constantine fled from the court of Galerius, eastern Augustus, in time to be at his father's death-bed at York in 306. He was illegally proclaimed Augustus by the army there. In 312 he invaded Italy and defeated Maxentius near Rome, apparently after a Christian vision. By 324 Constantine was sole Augustus. He was an energetic general and recast the Roman army. He also continued the administrative and fiscal reforms of Diocletian. Constantine promoted Christianity financially, legally, and theologically, being baptized on his death-bed in 337. He probably revisited Britain in 312 and 314, taking the title Britannicus in 315, and an edict of 319 is addressed to the Vicarius of the Britains, Pacatianus.

Alan Simon Esmonde Cleary