“This, then, is the doctrine I shall champion and adopt,” he announced, whereupon they fell prostrate before him. He asked them to compile for him a book of rulings, to make the direction of prayer toward the East—because there the shining stars rise—and to place in their churches painted images that showed complete human figures. They reached a compromise with him that such images would be confined to the walls. Once they had agreed, he set about supporting them, propagating their teaching, establishing their creed, removing those who opposed them, and weakening the dissenters’ influence. Backed by his prestige, his partisans prevailed over their rivals and gained the upper hand. He ordered churches to be built according to their religion; these adherents were henceforth called the Melkites, that is, followers of the king’s faith. In Constantine’s days more than twelve thousand churches were erected throughout Syria and elsewhere, in both cities and villages. The king took special care to build Bethlehem on the site of the Messiah’s birth, while his mother Helena built the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem on the spot where, in the ignorance of Jews and Christians alike, the crucified man—whom they claimed to be the Messiah, peace be upon him—had been executed.

It is also said that he slew some of their enemies, dug trenches in the ground, kindled fires in them, and burned those foes alive, just as we related in Sūrat al-Burūj. Through Constantine, the Christian religion gained tremendous prominence and wide acceptance, yet he vitiated it with a corruption that admits of no remedy, success, or salvation. Their festivals multiplied in honor of their grandees, and their churches increased, each bearing the name of some revered devotee. Their disbelief deepened, their calamity grew harsher, their misguidance became perpetual, and their doom intensified. God did not guide their hearts or set their affairs aright; rather, He turned their hearts away from the truth and diverted their condition from the path of uprightness.

After this they convened two further councils over the Nestorian and Jacobite controversies. Each faction declared the other disbelievers and judged them doomed to eternal punishment in Hell, and they would not gather together in the same temples or churches. Yet all of them profess the three hypostases: the hypostasis of the Father, the hypostasis of the Son, and the hypostasis of the Word. They differ, however, on the question of indwelling and union between divinity and humanity—whether He donned it like a garment, dwelt within it, or united with it. Their dispute on this point is fierce, and the disbelief that ensues from it is grave. They are all in error except the Arians, followers of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Arius, who say that the Messiah is God’s servant and messenger, the son of His bondmaid, a Word He cast to Mary, and a spirit from Him—exactly as the Muslims affirm. But once the Arians had settled upon this creed, the other three sects drove them out and banished them until their numbers dwindled, so that, to the best of one’s knowledge, none of them is known today. God knows best.