Voting About God in Early Church Councils
Ramsay MacMullen
Yale University Press
In this study, Ramsay MacMullen steps aside from the well-worn path that previous scholars have trod to explore exactly how early Christian doctrines became official. Drawing on extensive verbatim stenographic records, he analyzes the ecumenical councils from A.D. 325 to 553, in which participants gave authority to doctrinal choices by majority vote.

The author investigates the sometimes astonishing bloodshed and violence that marked the background to church council proceedings, and from there goes on to describe the planning and staging of councils, the emperors' role, the routines of debate, the participants’ understanding of the issues, and their views on God’s intervention in their activities. He concludes with a look at the significance of the councils and their doctrinal decisions within the history of Christendom. 

Review from Amazon:

I was looking for a historical book about the early church councils, and thought that this book would be a good start. I wanted an unbiased opinion, but unfortunately there was nothing but bias. It was clear from the start that the author had strong feelings against the councils, which can be understandable, but I was still hoping to get some facts out of it. Chapter after chapter, the author bashes every aspect of the church, leading me to believe that the church did no good, or that the author simply chose to ignore the good in his text. Imagine if the United States' history only mentioned taking land from the Native Americans, enslaving Africans, the Civil War, the Great Depression, and using the first nuclear weapon. That's how this book reads. Finally, it's written like prose from Shakespeare. I had a hard time following his train of thought because the writing was so dense, almost as if he was writing from the mind of a bishop in 500 AD.