ABSTRACT
It remains for us now to assess Constantine’s personality and his place in history. Unlike Nero and Domitian on the one hand and Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius on the other, Constantine cannot simply be assigned to the list of the “bad” emperors or to that of the “good” emperors. Any such attempt would not do justice to the complexity of the record. That complexity is reflected in the fact that there is no consensus of scholarly opinion on important aspects of Constantine’s person and reign. Not surprisingly, it is especially in the religious sphere that we note this lack of consensus. At one end of the spectrum of opinion, Alistair Kee concludes that Constantine’s imperial ideology conquered the church and betrayed Christ. At the other end of the spectrum there is the judgment of Paul Keresztes, who holds that Constantine was “a truly great Christian Emperor and a genuine Apostle of the Christian Church.”
