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CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION
Our journey along the road to Nicea began in Rome, where a rudimentary trinitarian
doctrine was being developed. However, Hippolytus, a contemporary of Tertullian, found himself
running into difficulty remaining within the very restrictive parameters of orthodoxy. Too far to one
side or another resulted in heresy. From Rome, our journey takes us to Carthage where Tertullian, a
more gifted theologian than Hippolytus, was able to develop a fully realized doctrine of the Trinity.
However, the West is separated from the East by language and cultural barriers, effectively insulating
the gains made in the West from having an impact on the East. Because Tertullian provided a
satisfactory solution, the West had no need to continue to Nicea, and the Western leg of the road
stops here. In order to travel the entire road to Nicea, our journey must make our way to first
century Antioch, where the second leg of the road begins, then to Alexandria, where things come to
a boil.
Along the journey, different forces made their presence known. In the West, politics played
only a minor role. While secular politics wreaked havoc on the Western Church, the Eastern Church
had the double blessing of being torn apart by both secular and ecclesiastical politics. In this way,
politics played a more important role than theology in the Eastern Empire.
Geography also played a large part in the development of the trinitarian doctrine. In the
West, Rome and Carthage essentially developed unhindered from the other. Only after Tertullian
produced a thorough resolution to the trinitarian question was there any indication of a shared