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Historiography of early Christianity is the study of historical writings about
, Concordia University Wisconsin, retrieved on 2 November 2007 Christian theology considered time as linear, progressing according to divine plan. As
early Christianity
Early Christianity (up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325) spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and beyond. Originally, this progression was closely connected to already established Jewish centers in the Holy Land and the Jewish ...
, which is the period before the First Council of Nicaea
The First Council of Nicaea (; grc, Νίκαια ) was a council of Christian bishops convened in the Bithynian city of Nicaea (now İznik, Turkey) by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in AD 325.
This ecumenical council was the first effort ...
in 325. Historians have used a variety of sources and methods in exploring and describing Christianity during this time.
The growth of Christianity and its enhanced status in the Roman Empire after Constantine I led to the development of a distinct Christian historiography, influenced by both Christian theology
Christian theology is the theology of Christianity, Christian belief and practice. Such study concentrates primarily upon the texts of the Old Testament and of the New Testament, as well as on Christian tradition. Christian theology, theologian ...
and the Development of the Christian Biblical canon
A biblical canon is a set of texts (also called "books") which a particular Jewish or Christian religious community regards as part of the Bible.
The English word ''canon'' comes from the Greek , meaning " rule" or "measuring stick". The use ...
, encompassing new areas of study and views of history. The central role of the Bible in Christianity is reflected in the preference of Christian historians for written sources, compared to the classical historians' preference for oral sources and is also reflected in the inclusion of politically unimportant people. Christian historians also focused on development of religion and society. This can be seen in the extensive inclusion of written sources in the first ''Ecclesiastical History
__NOTOC__
Church history or ecclesiastical history as an academic discipline studies the history of Christianity and the way the Christian Church has developed since its inception.
Henry Melvill Gwatkin defined church history as "the spiritual ...
'' written by Eusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea (; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος ; 260/265 – 30 May 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilus (from the grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος τοῦ Παμφίλου), was a Greek historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christia ...
around 324 and in the subjects it covers.''Historiography'', Concordia University Wisconsin, retrieved on 2 November 2007 Christian theology considered time as linear, progressing according to divine plan. As
God's
In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...
plan encompassed everyone, Christian histories in this period had a universal approach. For example, Christian writers often included summaries of important historical events prior to the period covered by the work.
Paul Barnett pointed out that "scholars of ancient history
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cove ...
have always recognized the 'subjectivity
Subjectivity in a philosophical context has to do with a lack of objective reality. Subjectivity has been given various and ambiguous definitions by differing sources as it is not often the focal point of philosophical discourse.Bykova, Marina F ...
' factor in their available sources" and "have so few sources available compared to their modern counterparts that they will gladly seize whatever scraps of information that are at hand." He noted that modern history
The term modern period or modern era (sometimes also called modern history or modern times) is the period of history that succeeds the Middle Ages (which ended approximately 1500 AD). This terminology is a historical periodization that is applie ...
and ancient history
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cove ...
are two separate disciplines, with differing methods of analysis and interpretation.
Since the 19th-century, historians have learned much more about the early Christian community. Ferdinand Christian Baur
Ferdinand Christian Baur (21 June 1792 – 2 December 1860) was a German Protestant theologian and founder and leader of the (new) Tübingen School of theology (named for the University of Tübingen where Baur studied and taught). Following Hegel ...
applied Hegelian philosophy
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (; ; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a German philosopher. He is one of the most important figures in German idealism and one of the founding figures of modern Western philosophy. His influence extends a ...
to church history and described a 2nd-century Christian community fabricating the gospels
Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
. Adolf Harnack
Carl Gustav Adolf von Harnack (born Harnack; 7 May 1851 – 10 June 1930) was a Baltic German Lutheran theology, Lutheran theologian and prominent Church historian. He produced many religious publications from 1873 to 1912 (in which he is s ...
was the leading expert in patristics, or the study of the Church Fathers
The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity. The historical per ...
, whose writings defined early Christian practice and doctrine. Harnack identified dramatic changes within the Christian Church
In ecclesiology, the Christian Church is what different Christian denominations conceive of as being the true body of Christians or the original institution established by Jesus. "Christian Church" has also been used in academia as a synonym fo ...
as it adapted itself to the pagan culture of the Roman Empire. He also claimed early dates for the gospels, granting them serious historical value. Early texts such as the Didache
The ''Didache'' (; ), also known as The Lord's Teaching Through the Twelve Apostles to the Nations (Διδαχὴ Κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν), is a brief anonymous early Christian tr ...
(in 2nd-millennium copies) and the Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical Logia, sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars specu ...
(in two manuscripts dated as early as about 200 and 340) have been rediscovered in the last 200 years. The Didache
The ''Didache'' (; ), also known as The Lord's Teaching Through the Twelve Apostles to the Nations (Διδαχὴ Κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν), is a brief anonymous early Christian tr ...
, from the 1st century, provides insight into the Jewish Christians
Jewish Christians ( he, יהודים נוצרים, yehudim notzrim) were the followers of a Jewish religious sect that emerged in Judea during the late Second Temple period (first century AD). The Nazarene Jews integrated the belief of Jesus ...
of the Jerusalem church. The Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical Logia, sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars specu ...
apparently reflects the beliefs of 1st-century, proto-gnostic Christians in Syria
Christians in Syria make up about 10% of the population. The country's largest Christian denomination is the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch, closely followed by the Greek Catholic Church, one of the Eastern Catholic Churches, which has a commo ...
.
In the 20th century
The 20th (twentieth) century began on
January 1, 1901 ( MCMI), and ended on December 31, 2000 ( MM). The 20th century was dominated by significant events that defined the modern era: Spanish flu pandemic, World War I and World War II, nuclear ...
, scholars became more likely to see early Christian faith and practice as evolving out of the religious beliefs and practices of Second Temple Judaism
Second Temple Judaism refers to the Jewish religion as it developed during the Second Temple period, which began with the construction of the Second Temple around 516 BCE and ended with the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE.
The Second Temple pe ...
and Hellenic beliefs and practices, rather than standing out in sharp contrast to them. Modern historians have come to accept Jesus' Jewish identity and that of the apostolic church (referred to as Jewish Christianity
Jewish Christians ( he, יהודים נוצרים, yehudim notzrim) were the followers of a Jewish religious sect that emerged in Judea during the late Second Temple period (first century AD). The Nazarene Jews integrated the belief of Jesus a ...
). The relationship of Paul of Tarsus and Judaism
Paul may refer to:
*Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name)
* Paul (surname), a list of people
People
Christianity
*Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Chri ...
is still disputed. The anti-Jewish
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
Jesus of the gospels is now recognized as a later interpretation, perhaps Marcionite
Marcionism was an early Christian dualistic belief system that originated with the teachings of Marcion of Sinope in Rome around the year 144. Marcion was an early Christian theologian, evangelist, and an important figure in early Christianity. ...
, as are the universalist themes in Acts and Luke. H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells"Wells, H. G."
Revised 18 May 2015. ''
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a collection of about 900 documents, including texts from the Hebrew Bible, discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven The Qumran Caves, caves in and around the ruins of the ancient settlement of Qumran, Khirbet Qumran on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea in the West Bank.
The texts are of great religious and historical significance, as they include the oldest known surviving copies of Biblical and extra-biblical documents and preserve evidence of great diversity in late Second Temple Judaism. They are written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Koine Greek, Greek, mostly on parchment, but with some written on papyrus. These manuscripts generally date between 150 BCE and 70 CE. The scrolls are traditionally identified with the ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes, though some recent interpretations have challenged this association and argue that the scrolls were penned by priests, Zadokites, or other unknown Jewish groups.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are traditionally divided into three groups: "Biblical" manuscripts (copies of texts from the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 40% of the identified scrolls; "Apocryphal" or "Pseudepigrapha, Pseudepigraphical" manuscripts (known documents from the Second Temple Period like Book of Enoch, Enoch, Jubilees, Book of Tobit, Tobit, Sirach, non-canonical psalms, etc., that were not ultimately Biblical canon, canonized in the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls; and "Sectarian" manuscripts (previously unknown documents that speak to the rules and beliefs of a particular group or groups within greater Jew, Judaism) like the Community Rule, War Scroll, Habakkuk Commentary, Pesher (Hebrew ''pesher'' פשר = "Commentary") Habakkuk Commentary, on Habakkuk, and the The Rule of the Blessing, Rule of the Blessing, which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls.
The works of Josephus provide crucial information about the First Jewish-Roman War and are also important literary source material for understanding the context of the Dead Sea Scrolls and late Herod's Temple, Temple Judaism. Josephus includes information about individuals, groups, customs and geographical places. His writings provide a significant, extra-Biblical account of the post-Exilic period of the Maccabees, the Hasmonean dynasty, and the rise of Herod the Great. He makes references to the Sadducees, Jewish Kohen Gadol, High Priests of the time, Pharisees and Essenes, the Herod's Temple, Herodian Temple, Quirinius' census and the Zealots, and to such figures as
The ''Annals'' is among the first-known secular-historic records to mention 
The surviving copies of Tacitus' works derive from two principal manuscripts, known as the ''Medicean manuscripts'', which are held in the Laurentian Library, and written in Latin. It is the ''second Medicean manuscript'' which is the oldest surviving copy of the passage describing ''Christians''. In this manuscript, the first 'i' of the ''Christianos'' is quite distinct in appearance from the second, looking somewhat smudged, and lacking the long tail of the second 'i'; additionally, there is a large gap between the first 'i' and the subsequent long s. Georg Andresen was one of the first to comment on the appearance of the first 'i' and subsequent gap, suggesting in 1902 that the text had been altered, and an 'e' had originally been in the text, rather than this 'i'.
In 1950, at Harald Fuchs (historian), Harald Fuchs request, Dr. Teresa Lodi, the director of the Laurentian Library, examined the features of this item of the manuscript; she concluded that there are still signs of an 'e' being erased, by removal of the upper and lower horizontal portions, and distortion of the remainder into an 'i'. In 2008, Dr. Ida Giovanna Rao, the new head of the Laurentian Library's manuscript office, repeated Lodi's study, and concluded that it is likely that the 'i' is a correction of some earlier character (like an ''e''), the change being made an extremely subtle one. Later the same year, it was discovered that under ultraviolet light, an 'e' is clearly visible in the space, meaning that the passage must originally have referred to ''chrestianos'', a Latin word which could be interpreted as ''the good'', after the Greek word χρηστός (chrestos), meaning 'good, useful'. "I believe that in our passage of Tacitus the original reading Chrestianos is the true one" says Professor Robert Renehan, stating that it was "natural for a Roman to interpret the words [Christus and Christianus] as the similarly-sounding χρηστός". The word Christian/s is in Codex Sinaiticus (in which Christ is abbreviated – see nomina sacra) spelled Chrestian/s in the three places the word is used. Also in Minuscule 81 this spelling is used in Acts of the Apostles 11:26.
The Catholic Church believes itself to be the continuation of the Christian community founded by Jesus in his consecration of Simon Peter.Barry, p. 46. In the Catholic view, modern bishop (Catholic Church), bishops are the apostolic succession, successors to the apostles.
The See of Rome is traditionally said to be founded by Peter and Paul. While the New Testament says nothing directly about Peter's connection with Rome, indirectly may indicate that when Paul wrote it, another Apostle was already in Rome, and it is highly probable that the Babylon (New Testament), "Babylon" mentioned in , a letter attributed to Peter, is Rome."Peter, St" Cross, F. L., ed. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. New York: Oxford University Press. 2005 The tradition that links Peter with Rome is "early and unrivalled". In the first years of the 2nd century, Ignatius of Antioch implies that Peter and Paul had special authority over the Roman church.In his ''Epistle to the Romans'', chapter 4:3, he told them he was not giving them orders like Peter and Paul (οὐχ ὡς Πέτρος καὶ Παῦλος διατάσσομαι ὑμῖν). The context of this phrase is, i
Lightfoot's translation of 1891:
:4:1 I write to all the churches, and I bid all men know, that of my own free will I die for God, unless ye should hinder me. I exhort you, be ye not an unseasonable kindness to me. Let me be given to the wild beasts, for through them I can attain unto God. I am God's wheat, and I am ground by the teeth of wild beasts that I may be found pure bread [of Christ]. :4:2 Rather entice the wild beasts, that they may become my sepulchre and may leave no part of my body behind, so that I may not, when I am fallen asleep, be burdensome to any one. Then shall I be truly a disciple of Jesus Christ, when the world shall not so much as see my body. Supplicate the Lord for me, that through these instruments I may be found a sacrifice to God. :4:3 I do not enjoin you, as Peter and Paul did. They were Apostles, I am a convict; they were free, but I am a slave to this very hour. Yet if I shall suffer, then am I a freed-man of Jesus Christ, and I shall rise free in Him. Now I am learning in my bonds to put away every desire. Irenaeus of Lyons, also of the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd century, believed that Saint Peter, Peter and Paul the Apostle, Paul had been the founders of the Church in Rome and had appointed Pope Linus, Linus as
James D. G. Dunn has proposed that Peter was the "bridge-man" between the two other prominent leaders: Paul and James the Just. Paul and James were both heavily identified with their own "brands" of Christianity. Peter showed a desire to hold onto his Jewish identity, in contrast with Paul. He simultaneously showed a flexibility towards the desires of the broader Christian community, in contrast to James. (This balance is illustrated in the Antioch episode related in .) Thus, Peter became a unifying force in the church.
The See of Rome is traditionally said to be founded by Peter and Paul, see also Primacy of Simon Peter, who had invested it with apostolic succession, apostolic authority. The New Testament says nothing directly about Peter's connection to Rome, but an early Catholic tradition supports such a connection.
Most Catholic and Protestant scholars, and many scholars in general, conclude that Peter was indeed martyred in Rome under Nero.Duffy, p. 8. A 2009 critical study by Otto Zwierlein has concluded that "there is not a single piece of reliable literary evidence (and no archaeological evidence either) that Peter ever was in Rome."Pieter W. van der Horst, review of Otto Zwierlein, ''Petrus in Rom: die literarischen Zeugnisse. Mit einer kritischen Edition der Martyrien des Petrus und Paulus auf neuer handschriftlicher Grundlage'', Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2009, in ''Bryn Mawr Classical Review'
2010.03.25
First Letter of Clement#The First Epistle of Clement, 1 Clement, a document that has been dated anywhere from the 90s to the 120s, is one of the earliest sources adduced in support of Peter's stay in Rome, but questions have been raised about the text's authenticity and whether it has any knowledge about Peter's life beyond what is contained in the New Testament ''Acts''. The ''Letter to the Romans'' attributed to St. Ignatius of Antioch implies that Peter and Paul had special authority over the Roman church, telling the Roman Christians: "I do not command you, as Peter and Paul did" (ch. 4). However, the authenticity of this document and its traditional dating to c. 105–110 have also been questioned, and it may date from the final decades of the 2nd century. Later in the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd century, Irenaeus of Lyons believed that Peter and Paul the Apostle, Paul had been the founders of the Church in Rome and had appointed Pope Linus, Linus as succeeding
The Speeches in Acts
/ref> Despite these suspicions, historian-attorney Christopher Price concludes that Luke's style in ''Acts'' is representative of those ancient historians known for accurately recording speeches in their works. Examination of several of the major speeches in Acts reveals that while the author smoothed out the Greek in some cases, he clearly relied on preexisting material to reconstruct his speeches. He did not believe himself at liberty to invent material, but attempted to accurately record the reality of the speeches in Acts. Ferdinand Christian Baur, F. C. Baur (1792–1860), professor of theology at Tübingen in Germany, the first scholar to critique Acts and the Pauline Epistles, and founder of the Tübingen School of theology, argued that Paul, as the "Apostle to the Gentiles", was in violent opposition to the original 12 Apostles. Baur considers the Acts of the Apostles were late and unreliable. This debate has continued ever since, with Adolf Deissmann (1866–1937) and Richard Reitzenstein (1861–1931) emphasising Paul's Greek inheritance and Albert Schweitzer stressing his dependence on Judaism. Maccoby theorizes that Paul synthesized Judaism, Gnosticism, and mysticism to create Christianity as a cosmic savior religion. According to Maccoby, Paul's Pharisaism was his own invention, though actually he was probably associated with the Sadducees. Maccoby attributes the origins of Christian anti-Semitism to Paul and claims that Paul the Apostle and women, Paul's view of women, though inconsistent, reflects his Gnosticism in its misogynist aspects.
Christianity throughout the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd and Christianity in the 3rd century, 3rd centuries has generally been less studied than in the periods that came before and after it. This is reflected in that it is usually referred to in terms of the adjacent periods with names as such "post-apostolic" (after the period of 1st century formative Christianity) and "ante-Nicene" (before the First Council of Nicaea). However, the 2nd and 3rd centuries are quite important in the development of Christianity.
There is a relative lack of material for this period, compared with the later Church Father period. For example, a widely used collection (''Ante-Nicene Fathers (book), Ante-Nicene Fathers'') includes most 2nd- and 3rd-century writings in nine volumes. This includes the writings of the
The church fathers are generally divided into the Ante-Nicene Fathers, those who lived and wrote before the First Council of Nicaea, Council of Nicaea (325) and the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, those who lived and wrote after 325. In addition, the division of the fathers into Greek and Latin writers is also common. Some of the most prominent Greek Fathers are Justin Martyr, John Chrysostom, and Cyril of Alexandria. Among the Latin Fathers are
Revised 18 May 2015. ''
Walter Bauer
Walter Bauer (; 8 August 1877 – 17 November 1960) was a German theologian, lexicographer of New Testament Greek, and scholar of the development of Early Christianity.
Life
Bauer was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, and raised in Marburg, ...
and Bart Ehrman
Bart Denton Ehrman (born 1955) is an American New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He has written and edited 30 books, including t ...
have emphasized the diversity of early Christianity, with Proto-orthodox Christianity
The term proto-orthodox Christianity or proto-orthodoxy is often erroneously thought to have been coined by New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman, who borrowed it from Bentley Layton (a major scholar of Gnosticism and Coptologist at Yale), and des ...
being one thread, against the traditional account of catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
unanimity. The historical and contextual time of the early church.
Sources
In its first few centuries, Christians made up a small minority of the population of the Roman Empire. The religion attracted little attention from writers with other religious beliefs, and few artifacts have been found to document Christianity in its earliest days. Most of the surviving documentation was written by Christians.MacCulloch, p. 112.Historical Jesus
All the sources for the life of Jesus are documents, there is no physical or archeological evidence. Except for a few proponents of theChrist myth theory
The Christ myth theory, also known as the Jesus myth theory, Jesus mythicism, or the Jesus ahistoricity theory, is the view that "the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology", possessing no "substantial claims to historical fact". Alternatively ...
, it is generally accepted among scholars that Jesus existed.In a 2011 review of the state of modern scholarship, Bart Ehrman
Bart Denton Ehrman (born 1955) is an American New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He has written and edited 30 books, including t ...
(a secular agnostic) wrote: "He certainly existed, as virtually every competent scholar of antiquity, Christian or non-Christian, agrees" B. Ehrman, 2011 ''Forged: writing in the name of God'' . p. 285 The main sources for biographical information about Jesus are the synoptic Gospels
The gospels of Gospel of Matthew, Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Mark, and Gospel of Luke, Luke are referred to as the synoptic Gospels because they include many of the same stories, often in a similar sequence and in similar or sometimes identical ...
of Matthew
Matthew may refer to:
* Matthew (given name)
* Matthew (surname)
* ''Matthew'' (ship), the replica of the ship sailed by John Cabot in 1497
* ''Matthew'' (album), a 2000 album by rapper Kool Keith
* Matthew (elm cultivar), a cultivar of the Ch ...
, Mark
Mark may refer to:
Currency
* Bosnia and Herzegovina convertible mark, the currency of Bosnia and Herzegovina
* East German mark, the currency of the German Democratic Republic
* Estonian mark, the currency of Estonia between 1918 and 1927
* Fi ...
and Luke
People
*Luke (given name), a masculine given name (including a list of people and characters with the name)
*Luke (surname) (including a list of people and characters with the name)
*Luke the Evangelist, author of the Gospel of Luke. Also known as ...
.Sanders, E. P. ''The historical figure of Jesus''. Penguin, 1993. The synoptic Gospels do not agree on many of the details of Jesus' life, but the two events scholars agree actually took place were his baptism
Baptism (from grc-x-koine, βάπτισμα, váptisma) is a form of ritual purification—a characteristic of many religions throughout time and geography. In Christianity, it is a Christian sacrament of initiation and adoption, almost inv ...
by John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
and crucifixion
Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the victim is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross or beam and left to hang until eventual death from exhaustion and asphyxiation. It was used as a punishment by the Persians, Carthagin ...
under the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilate (; grc-gre, Πόντιος Πιλᾶτος, ) was the fifth governor of the Roman province of Judaea, serving under Emperor Tiberius from 26/27 to 36/37 AD. He is best known for being the official who presided over the trial of J ...
.''Jesus Remembered'' by James D. G. Dunn 2003 p, 339 states of baptism and crucifixion that these "two facts in the life of Jesus command almost universal assent".''Prophet and Teacher: An Introduction to the Historical Jesus'' by William R. Herzog (4 Jul 2005) pp. 1–6''Jesus as a Figure in History: How Modern Historians View the Man from Galilee'' by Mark Allan Powell 1998 pp. 168–173 Besides his baptism and execution, the synoptic Gospels describe Jesus' birth, ministry, miracles and resurrection.
Oral tradition and the Q source
Early Christianity relied on the Sacred Oral Tradition of whatJesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
had said and done, as reported by his Apostles and Disciples. Apostles who had witnessed Jesus's teachings travelled around the Mediterranean basin
In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin (; also known as the Mediterranean Region or sometimes Mediterranea) is the region of lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have mostly a Mediterranean climate, with mild to cool, rainy winters and w ...
, where they established churches and began oral traditions in various places, such as Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
, Antioch
Antioch on the Orontes (; grc-gre, Ἀντιόχεια ἡ ἐπὶ Ὀρόντου, ''Antiókheia hē epì Oróntou'', Learned ; also Syrian Antioch) grc-koi, Ἀντιόχεια ἡ ἐπὶ Ὀρόντου; or Ἀντιόχεια ἡ ἐπ ...
, Caesarea
Caesarea () ( he, קֵיסָרְיָה, ), ''Keysariya'' or ''Qesarya'', often simplified to Keisarya, and Qaysaria, is an affluent town in north-central Israel, which inherits its name and much of its territory from the ancient city of Caesare ...
, and Ephesus
Ephesus (; grc-gre, Ἔφεσος, Éphesos; tr, Efes; may ultimately derive from hit, 𒀀𒉺𒊭, Apaša) was a city in ancient Greece on the coast of Ionia, southwest of present-day Selçuk in İzmir Province, Turkey. It was built in t ...
, all cities with sizable Jewish populations. These oral traditions
Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication wherein knowledge, art, ideas and cultural material is received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another. Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Tradition as History'' (1985) ...
were later written down as gospel
Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
s.Chadwick, Owen p. 48.
When those who had heard Jesus's actual words began to die, Christians started recording the sayings in writing. The hypothetical Q document
The Q source (also called Q document(s), Q Gospel, or Q; from german: Quelle, meaning "source") is a hypothetical written collection of primarily Jesus' sayings (λόγια : ). Q is part of the common material found in the Gospels of Matthew ...
, a collection of Jesus' sayings, is perhaps the first such record (''c'' 50). Historians use the extant gospels to surmise the nature and content of the oral tradition and the Q source.
New Testament
The Gospel of Mark was written during c. 65–70, possibly motivated by theFirst Jewish-Roman War
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
. The Gospel of Matthew was written c. 80–85 to convince a Jewish audience that Jesus was the expected Messiah (Christ) and greater than Moses
Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...
. The Gospel of Luke, together with Acts (see Luke-Acts) was c. 85–90, considered the most literate and artistic of the gospels. Finally, the Gospel of John was written, portraying Jesus as the incarnation of the divine Word
A word is a basic element of language that carries an semantics, objective or pragmatics, practical semantics, meaning, can be used on its own, and is uninterruptible. Despite the fact that language speakers often have an intuitive grasp of w ...
, who primarily taught about himself as a savior. All four gospels originally circulated anonymously, and they were attributed to Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John in the 2nd century. Various authors wrote further epistles and the Apocalypse of John.
In the one-hundred-year period extending roughly from AD 50 to 150 a number of documents began to circulate among the churches. Also included were epistles, gospels, acts, apocalypses, homilies, and collections of teachings. While some of these documents were apostolic in origin, others drew upon the tradition the apostles and ministers of the word had utilized in their individual missions. Still others represented a summation of the teaching entrusted to a particular church center. Several of these writings sought to extend, interpret, and apply apostolic teaching to meet the needs of Christians in a given locality.
Among the writings considered central to the development of Christianity are the Pauline epistles
The Pauline epistles, also known as Epistles of Paul or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen books of the New Testament attributed to Paul the Apostle, although the authorship of some is in dispute. Among these epistles are some of the earliest extan ...
, letters written or more accurately "dictated"It may be that he employed an amanuensis
An amanuensis () is a person employed to write or type what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another, and also refers to a person who signs a document on behalf of another under the latter's authority. In one example Eric Fenby ...
, only occasionally writing himself, for example see , , , , , . Joseph Barber Lightfoot
Joseph Barber Lightfoot (13 April 1828 – 21 December 1889), known as J. B. Lightfoot, was an English theologian and Bishop of Durham.
Life
Lightfoot was born in Liverpool, where his father John Jackson Lightfoot was an accountant. His mo ...
in his ''Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians'' writes: "At this point [] the Apostle takes the pen from his amanuensis, and the concluding paragraph is written with his own hand. From the time when letters began to be forged in his name (; ) it seems to have been his practice to close with a few words in his own handwriting, as a precaution against such forgeries… In the present case he writes a whole paragraph, summing up the main lessons of the epistle in terse, eager, disjointed sentences. He writes it, too, in large, bold characters (Gr. pelikois grammasin), that his handwriting may reflect the energy and determination of his soul." by Paul of Tarsus
Paul; grc, Παῦλος, translit=Paulos; cop, ⲡⲁⲩⲗⲟⲥ; hbo, פאולוס השליח (previously called Saul of Tarsus;; ar, بولس الطرسوسي; grc, Σαῦλος Ταρσεύς, Saũlos Tarseús; tr, Tarsuslu Pavlus; ...
to various churches. Many of these are now regarded as scripture. Some scholars think Paul articulated the first Christian theology: namely that all people inherit Adam's guilt (see Original Sin
Original sin is the Christian doctrine that holds that humans, through the fact of birth, inherit a tainted nature in need of regeneration and a proclivity to sinful conduct. The biblical basis for the belief is generally found in Genesis 3 (t ...
) and can only be saved from death by the atoning death of the Son of God, Jesus' crucifixion.
General epistles
The catholic epistles (also called the general epistlesEncarta-encyclopedie Winkler Prins (1993–2002) s.v. "katholieke brieven". Microsoft Corporation/Het Spectrum.) are seven epistles of the New Testament. Listed in order of their appearance in ...
, written by other hands than Paul's, circulated in the early church. Many of them, including one written as late as ''c'' 150,Harris, p. ??. were eventually included in the New Testament canon. Many later epistles concern issues of church leadership, discipline, and disputes. Apocalyptic literature
Apocalyptic literature is a genre of prophetical writing that developed in post- Exilic Jewish culture and was popular among millennialist early Christians. '' Apocalypse'' ( grc, , }) is a Greek word meaning "revelation", "an unveiling or unf ...
also circulated in the early church; one example, the Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament (and consequently the final book of the Christian Bible). Its title is derived from the first word of the Koine Greek text: , meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The Book of R ...
, was later included in the New Testament.
Defining scripture
Debates about scripture were underway in the mid-2nd century, concurrent with a drastic increase of new scriptures, both Jewish and Christian. Debates regarding practice and belief gradually became reliant on the use of scripture. Similarly, in the 3rd century a shift away fromdirect revelation
Direct revelation is a term used by some Christian churches to express their belief in a communication from God to a person, by words, impression, visions, dreams or actual appearance. Direct revelation is believed to be an open communication b ...
as a source of authority occurred. "Scripture" still had a broad meaning and usually referred to the Septuagint
The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond th ...
among Greek speakers. Beyond the Torah
The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the s ...
(the ''Law'') and some of the earliest prophetic works (the ''Prophets''), there was no universal agreement to a canon
Canon or Canons may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Canon (fiction), the conceptual material accepted as official in a fictional universe by its fan base
* Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture
** Western ca ...
, but it was not debated much at first. By the mid-2nd century, tensions arose with the growing rift between Christianity and Judaism
Christianity began as a movement within Second Temple Judaism, but the two religions gradually diverged over the first few centuries of the Christian Era. Differences of opinion vary between denominations in both religions, but the most import ...
, which some theorize led eventually to the determination of a Jewish canon by the emerging rabbinic movement,White (2004). Pp 446–447. though, even as of today, there is no scholarly consensus as to when the Jewish canon was set, see Development of the Hebrew Bible canon
Development or developing may refer to:
Arts
* Development hell, when a project is stuck in development
*Filmmaking, development phase, including finance and budgeting
*Development (music), the process thematic material is reshaped
*Photograph ...
for details. Some scholars argue that the Jewish canon was fixed by the Hasmonean dynasty (140–37 BCE).
Regardless, throughout the Jewish diaspora
The Jewish diaspora ( he, תְּפוּצָה, təfūṣā) or exile (Hebrew: ; Yiddish: ) is the dispersion of Israelites or Jews out of their ancient ancestral homeland (the Land of Israel) and their subsequent settlement in other parts of t ...
newer writings were still collected and the fluid Septuagint collection was the primary source of scripture for Christians. Many works under the names of known apostles, such as the Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical Logia, sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars specu ...
, were accorded scriptural status in at least some Christian circles. Apostolic writings, such as I Clement
The First Epistle of Clement ( grc, Κλήμεντος πρὸς Κορινθίους, Klēmentos pros Korinthious, Clement to Corinthians) is a letter addressed to the Christians in the city of Corinth. Based on internal evidence some scholars sa ...
and the Epistle of Barnabas
The ''Epistle of Barnabas'' ( el, Βαρνάβα Ἐπιστολή) is a Greek epistle written between AD 70 and 132. The complete text is preserved in the 4th-century ''Codex Sinaiticus'', where it appears immediately after the New Testament an ...
, were considered scripture even within the orthodoxy through the 5th century. A problem for scholars is that there is a lack of direct evidence on when Christians began accepting their own scriptures alongside the Septuagint. Well into the 2nd century, Christians held onto a strong preference for oral tradition
Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication wherein knowledge, art, ideas and cultural material is received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another. Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Tradition as History'' (1985 ...
as clearly demonstrated by writers of the time, such as Papias.
The acceptance of the Septuagint was generally uncontested (even the Peshitta
The Peshitta ( syc, ܦܫܺܝܛܬܳܐ ''or'' ') is the standard version of the Bible for churches in the Syriac tradition, including the Maronite Church, the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Syriac Catholic Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church, the ...
appears to be influenced). Later Jerome
Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, th ...
would express his preference for adhering strictly to the Jewish canon, but his view held little currency even in his own day. It was not until the Protestant Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
that substantial numbers of Christians began to reject those books of the Septuagint which are not found in the Jewish canon, referring to them as biblical apocrypha
The biblical apocrypha (from the grc, ἀπόκρυφος, translit=apókruphos, lit=hidden) denotes the collection of apocryphal ancient books thought to have been written some time between 200 BC and AD 400. The Roman Catholic, Eastern Ort ...
. In addition, some New Testament books were also disputed, see Antilegomena
''Antilegomena'' (from Greek ) are written texts whose authenticity or value is disputed. Eusebius in his ''Church History'' (c. 325) used the term for those Christian scriptures that were "disputed", literally "spoken against", in Early Christian ...
.
Historicity of the canonical Gospels
TheHistoricity of the canonical Gospels
The historical reliability of the Gospels is the reliability and historic character of the four New Testament gospels as historical documents. While all four canonical gospels contain some sayings and events which may meet one or more of the five ...
refers to the reliability and historic character of the four New Testament gospels as historical documents. These gospels, Matthew
Matthew may refer to:
* Matthew (given name)
* Matthew (surname)
* ''Matthew'' (ship), the replica of the ship sailed by John Cabot in 1497
* ''Matthew'' (album), a 2000 album by rapper Kool Keith
* Matthew (elm cultivar), a cultivar of the Ch ...
, Mark
Mark may refer to:
Currency
* Bosnia and Herzegovina convertible mark, the currency of Bosnia and Herzegovina
* East German mark, the currency of the German Democratic Republic
* Estonian mark, the currency of Estonia between 1918 and 1927
* Fi ...
, Luke
People
*Luke (given name), a masculine given name (including a list of people and characters with the name)
*Luke (surname) (including a list of people and characters with the name)
*Luke the Evangelist, author of the Gospel of Luke. Also known as ...
and John
John is a common English name and surname:
* John (given name)
* John (surname)
John may also refer to:
New Testament
Works
* Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John
* First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John
* Secon ...
recount the life, ministry, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Historians subject the gospels to critical analysis, attempting to differentiate authentic, reliable information from what they judge to be inventions, exaggerations, and alterations.
Many prominent mainstream historians consider the synoptic gospels to contain much reliable historical information about the historical existence of Jesus as a Galilean teacher Van Voorst, p. 16. and of the religious movement he founded, but not everything contained in the gospels is considered to be historically reliable.
The Gospel of Mark
The Gospel of Mark), or simply Mark (which is also its most common form of abbreviation). is the second of the four canonical gospels and of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells of the ministry of Jesus from his baptism by John the Baptist to h ...
, believed by scholars to be the first Gospel written, narrates the historically authentic baptism of Jesus
The baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist is a major event in the life of Jesus which is described in the three synoptic Gospels of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark and Luke). It is considered to have taken place at Al-Maghtas (also called Bethan ...
, his preaching, and the crucifixion of Jesus
The crucifixion and death of Jesus occurred in 1st-century Judea, most likely in AD 30 or AD 33. It is described in the four canonical gospels, referred to in the New Testament epistles, attested to by other ancient sources, and consid ...
. Matthew and Luke follow Mark's narrative, with some changes, and add substantial amounts of Jesus' ethical teaching, such as The Golden Rule. Elements whose historical authenticity is disputed include the two accounts of the nativity of Jesus
The nativity of Jesus, nativity of Christ, birth of Jesus or birth of Christ is described in the biblical gospels of Gospel of Luke, Luke and Gospel of Matthew, Matthew. The two accounts agree that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judaea (Roman ...
, as well as certain details about the crucifixion and the resurrection.Stagg and Stagg, p. ?? Funk, Robert W. and the Jesus Seminar
The Jesus Seminar was a group of about 50 critical biblical scholars and 100 laymen founded in 1985 by Robert Funk that originated under the auspices of the Westar Institute.''Making Sense of the New Testament'' by Craig Blomberg (Mar 1, 2004) ...
. ''The acts of Jesus: the search for the authentic deeds of Jesus.'' HarperSanFrancisco. 1998. "Empty Tomb, Appearances & Ascension" p. 449-495. The fourth gospel, John
John is a common English name and surname:
* John (given name)
* John (surname)
John may also refer to:
New Testament
Works
* Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John
* First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John
* Secon ...
, includes a number of historically reliable details, but it differs greatly from the first three gospels, and historians largely discount it. The canonical gospels, overall, are considered to have more historically authentic content than the various non-canonical gospels.
While some Christian scholars maintain that the gospels are inerrant descriptions of the life of Jesus, other scholars have concluded that they provide no historical information about his life.
The teachings of Jesus in the Gospel of John
The Gospel of John ( grc, Εὐαγγέλιον κατὰ Ἰωάννην, translit=Euangélion katà Iōánnēn) is the fourth of the four canonical gospels. It contains a highly schematic account of the ministry of Jesus, with seven "sig ...
are very different from those found in the synoptic gospels.Sanders, pp. 57–77. Thus, since the 19th century scholars have generally believed that only one of the two traditions could be authentic. Today, prominent, mainstream historians largely tend to discount the historical value of John. Few scholars regard John to be at all comparable to the Synoptics in terms of historical value.Sanders, p. 57. E. P. Sanders
Ed Parish Sanders (April 18, 1937 – November 21, 2022) was an American New Testament scholar and a principal proponent of the "New Perspective on Paul". He was a major scholar in the scholarship on the historical Jesus and contributed to the v ...
and other critical scholars conclude that the Gospel of John contains an "advanced theological development, in which meditations of the person and work of Jesus are presented in the first person as if Jesus said them."Sanders, p. 71. The scholars of the Jesus Seminar
The Jesus Seminar was a group of about 50 critical biblical scholars and 100 laymen founded in 1985 by Robert Funk that originated under the auspices of the Westar Institute.''Making Sense of the New Testament'' by Craig Blomberg (Mar 1, 2004) ...
assert that there is little historical value in John and consider nearly every Johannine saying of Jesus to be nonhistorical. Geza Vermes discounts all the teaching in John when reconstructing "the authentic gospel of Jesus."
The Gospel of John also differs from the synoptic gospels in respect of its narrative of Jesus' life and ministry; but here there is a lower degree of consensus that the synoptic tradition is to be preferred. In particular John A.T. Robinson has argued that, where the Gospel narrative accounts can be checked for consistency with surviving material evidence, the account in the Gospel of John is commonly the more plausible; and that it is generally easier to reconcile the various synoptic accounts within John's narrative framework, than it is to explain John's narrative within the framework of any of the synoptics. In particular he argues that, where in the Gospel of John, Jesus and his disciples are described as travelling around identifiable locations, then the trips in question can always be plausibly followed on the ground which he claims is not the case for the narrative accounts of any other of the four Gospels.
Some scholars today believe that parts of John represent an independent historical tradition from the synoptics, while other parts represent later traditions. The Gospel was probably shaped in part by increasing tensions between synagogue and church, or between those who believed Jesus was the Messiah and those who did not.
Nevertheless, John is not entirely without historical value. Critical scholarship in the 19th century distinguished between the 'biographical' approach of the three Synoptic Gospels and the 'theological' approach of John, and accordingly tended to disregard John as a historical source. This distinction is no longer regarded as sustainable in more recent scholarship, which emphasizes that all four gospels are both biographical and theological. According to Barnabas Lindars
Barnabas Lindars (born Frederick Chevallier Lindars; 1923–1991) was an English New Testament scholar. Born 11 June 1923, Lindars was educated at Altrincham Grammar School and then studied at St John's College, Cambridge. He was ordained as a ...
, "All four Gospels should be regarded primarily as biographies of Jesus, but all four have a definite theological aim."Lindars, p. 26. Sanders points out that the author would regard the gospel as theologically true as revealed spiritually even if its content is not historically accurate.Sanders, p. ??. The gospel does contain some independent, historically plausible elements.Theissen and Merz, p. ??? Henry Wansbrough
Henry Wansbrough (born Joseph Wansbrough, 1934) is an English biblical scholar, Roman Catholic priest, and monk of Ampleforth Abbey. From 1990 to 2004, he served as Master of St Benet's Hall, Oxford.
Biography
Born as Joseph Wansbrough on 9 Oc ...
says: "Gone are the days when it was scholarly orthodoxy to maintain that John was the least reliable of the gospels historically." It has become generally accepted that certain sayings in John are as old or older than their synoptic counterparts, that John's knowledge of things around Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
is often superior to the synoptics, and that his presentation of Jesus' agony in the garden and the prior meeting held by the Jewish authorities are possibly more historically accurate than their synoptic parallels. And Marianne Meye Thompson writes: "There are items only in John that are likely to be historical and ought to be given due weight. Jesus' first disciples may once have been followers of the Baptist (cf. ). There is no ''a priori'' reason to reject the report of Jesus and his disciples' conducting a ministry of baptism for a time. That Jesus regularly visited Jerusalem, rather than merely at the time of his death, is often accepted as more realistic for a pious, 1st-century Jewish male (and is hinted at in the other Gospels as well: ; ; ) ... Even John's placement of the Last Supper before Passover has struck some as likely." Sanders, however, cautions that even historically plausible elements in John can hardly be taken as historical evidence, as they may well represent the author's intuition rather than historical recollection.
Fathers of the church
From an early date the title "Father" was applied tobishop
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
s as witnesses to the Christian tradition. Only later, from the end of the 4th century, was it used in a more restricted sense of a more or less clearly defined group of ecclesiastical authors of the past whose authority on doctrinal matters carried special weight. According to the commonly accepted teaching, the fathers of the church are those ancient writers, whether bishops or not, who were characterized by orthodoxy of doctrine, holiness of life and the approval of the church. Sometimes Tertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
, Origen
Origen of Alexandria, ''Ōrigénēs''; Origen's Greek name ''Ōrigénēs'' () probably means "child of Horus" (from , "Horus", and , "born"). ( 185 – 253), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an Early Christianity, early Christian scholar, ...
and a few others of not unimpeachable orthodoxy are now classified as Fathers of the Church.
The earliest Christian writings (other than those collected in the New Testament) are a group of letters credited to the Apostolic Fathers
The Apostolic Fathers, also known as the Ante-Nicene Fathers, were core Christian theologians among the Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD who are believed to have personally known some of the Twelve Apostles or to have be ...
. These include the Epistle of Barnabas
The ''Epistle of Barnabas'' ( el, Βαρνάβα Ἐπιστολή) is a Greek epistle written between AD 70 and 132. The complete text is preserved in the 4th-century ''Codex Sinaiticus'', where it appears immediately after the New Testament an ...
, the Shepherd of Hermas and the Epistles of Clement, as well as the Didache
The ''Didache'' (; ), also known as The Lord's Teaching Through the Twelve Apostles to the Nations (Διδαχὴ Κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν), is a brief anonymous early Christian tr ...
. Taken as a whole, the collection is notable for its literary simplicity, religious zeal and lack of Hellenistic philosophy or rhetoric. Fathers such as Ignatius of Antioch (died 98 to 117) advocated the authority of the apostolic episcopacy (bishops).
Post-apostolic, or Ante-Nicene Fathers, Ante-Nicene, Fathers defined and defended Christian doctrine. The Apologists became prominent in the 2nd century. This includes such notable figures as Justin Martyr (died 165), Tatian (died c. 185), and Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-211/216). They debated with prevalent philosophers of their day, defending and arguing for Christianity. They focused mainly on monotheism and their harshest words were used for ancient mythologies. Fathers such as Irenaeus advocated the role of the apostolic succession of bishops in preserving apostolic teaching.
Dead Sea Scrolls
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a collection of about 900 documents, including texts from the Hebrew Bible, discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven The Qumran Caves, caves in and around the ruins of the ancient settlement of Qumran, Khirbet Qumran on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea in the West Bank.
The texts are of great religious and historical significance, as they include the oldest known surviving copies of Biblical and extra-biblical documents and preserve evidence of great diversity in late Second Temple Judaism. They are written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Koine Greek, Greek, mostly on parchment, but with some written on papyrus. These manuscripts generally date between 150 BCE and 70 CE. The scrolls are traditionally identified with the ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes, though some recent interpretations have challenged this association and argue that the scrolls were penned by priests, Zadokites, or other unknown Jewish groups.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are traditionally divided into three groups: "Biblical" manuscripts (copies of texts from the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 40% of the identified scrolls; "Apocryphal" or "Pseudepigrapha, Pseudepigraphical" manuscripts (known documents from the Second Temple Period like Book of Enoch, Enoch, Jubilees, Book of Tobit, Tobit, Sirach, non-canonical psalms, etc., that were not ultimately Biblical canon, canonized in the Hebrew Bible), which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls; and "Sectarian" manuscripts (previously unknown documents that speak to the rules and beliefs of a particular group or groups within greater Jew, Judaism) like the Community Rule, War Scroll, Habakkuk Commentary, Pesher (Hebrew ''pesher'' פשר = "Commentary") Habakkuk Commentary, on Habakkuk, and the The Rule of the Blessing, Rule of the Blessing, which comprise roughly 30% of the identified scrolls.
New Testament apocrypha
The New Testament apocrypha are a number of writings by Early Christianity, early Christians that give accounts ofJesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
and his teachings, the nature of God, or the teachings of his apostles and of their lives. These writings often have links with books regarded as "canonical". Not every branch of the Christian church agrees on which writings should be regarded as "wikt:canonical, canonical" and which are "wikt:apocryphal, apocryphal" (See the Gospel according to the Hebrews).
Gnostic Gospels
The Gnostic Gospels are gnostic collections of writings about the teachings ofJesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
, written from the 2nd – 4th century. These gospel
Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
s are not part of the standard Biblical canon of any major Christian denomination, and as such are part of what is called the New Testament apocrypha.
Nag Hammadi library
The Nag Hammadi library is a collection of Early Christianity, early Christian Gnosticism, Gnostic Gnostic texts, texts discovered near the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi in 1945. That year, twelve leather-bound papyrus codex, codices buried in a sealed jar were found by a local peasant named Mohammed Ali Samman. The writings in these codices comprised fifty-two mostly Gnostic treatises, but they also include three works belonging to the ''Hermetica, Corpus Hermeticum'' and a partial translation/alteration of Plato's The Republic (Plato), ''Republic''. In his "Introduction" to ''The Nag Hammadi Library in English'', James Robinson suggests that these codices may have belonged to a nearby Saint Pachomius, Pachomian monastery, and were buried after Athanasius, Bishop Athanasius condemned the uncritical use of Biblical canon, non-canonical books in his Festal Letter of 367 AD. The contents of the codices were written in Coptic language, though the works were probably all translations from Greek language, Greek. The best-known of these works is probably the ''Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical Logia, sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars specu ...
'', of which the Nag Hammadi codices contain the only complete text. After the discovery it was recognized that fragments of these sayings attributed to Jesus appeared in manuscripts discovered at Oxyrhynchus in 1898, and matching quotations were recognized in other early Christian sources. Subsequently, a 1st or 2nd century date of composition c. 80 for the lost Greek originals of the Gospel of Thomas
The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical Logia, sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars specu ...
has been proposed, though this is disputed by many if not the majority of biblical matter researchers. The once buried manuscripts themselves date from the 3rd and 4th centuries.
The Nag Hammadi codices are housed in the Coptic Museum in Cairo, Egypt. To read about their significance to modern scholarship into early Christianity, see the Gnosticism#Significance of the Nag Hammadi library, Gnosticism article.
Josephus
The works of Josephus provide crucial information about the First Jewish-Roman War and are also important literary source material for understanding the context of the Dead Sea Scrolls and late Herod's Temple, Temple Judaism. Josephus includes information about individuals, groups, customs and geographical places. His writings provide a significant, extra-Biblical account of the post-Exilic period of the Maccabees, the Hasmonean dynasty, and the rise of Herod the Great. He makes references to the Sadducees, Jewish Kohen Gadol, High Priests of the time, Pharisees and Essenes, the Herod's Temple, Herodian Temple, Quirinius' census and the Zealots, and to such figures as Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilate (; grc-gre, Πόντιος Πιλᾶτος, ) was the fifth governor of the Roman province of Judaea, serving under Emperor Tiberius from 26/27 to 36/37 AD. He is best known for being the official who presided over the trial of J ...
, Herod the Great, Agrippa I and Agrippa II, John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
, Josephus on Jesus#Reference to Jesus as brother of James .28xx 9.1.29, James the brother of Jesus, and a pair of Josephus on Jesus#The Testimonium Flavianum, disputed and Josephus on Jesus#Reference to Jesus as brother of James, undisputed references to Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
(for more see Josephus on Jesus). He is an important source for studies of immediate post-Temple Judaism and the context of early Christianity
Early Christianity (up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325) spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and beyond. Originally, this progression was closely connected to already established Jewish centers in the Holy Land and the Jewish ...
.
Tacitus
The ''Annals'' is among the first-known secular-historic records to mention Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
which Tacitus does in connection with Nero's persecution of the Christians. The passage contains an early non-Christian reference to the origin of Christianity, the execution of Christ described in the Bible's New Testament gospel
Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
s, and the presence and Persecution of Christians#Roman Empire, persecution of Christians in 1st-century Rome. While a majority of scholars consider the passage authentic, some dispute it. Those supporting authenticity argue it is too critical of Christians to have been added by later Christian scribes.
Some who argue against authenticity assert:
*No early Christian writers refer to Tacitus even when discussing the subject of Nero and Christian persecution. Tertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
, Lactantius, Sulpicius Severus, Eusebius and Augustine of Hippo make no reference to Tacitus when discussing Christian persecution by Nero. (This is wrong, as Tertullian does refer to Tacitus' annals in his Apology ) If authentic, the passage would constitute one of the earliest, if not the earliest (see: Josephus on Jesus) non-Christian references to Jesus. Those critical of the passage's authenticity argue that early Christian writers likely would have sought to establish the historicity of Jesus via secular or non-Christian documents, and that their silence with regard to the ''Annals'' in this manner may suggest that the passage did not exist in early manuscripts. Furthermore, because the text derives from a single surviving 11th century monastic copy, skeptics of the passage's authenticity argue that it may be the result of later Christian editing. Supporters of the passage's authenticity, however, counter on the basis of the criterion of embarrassment that the passage's critical remarks on Christianity as a "mischievous superstition" argue against its having been made by later Christian editors who, it is argued, would have cast Christians in a positive and not negative light. Critics counter that the criterion of embarrassment wrongly assumes that a scribal interpolator would not intentionally write details critical of his or her religious group, and that a scribe may have found it advantageous and convincing to supply a less embarrassing fact (e.g., that Christians were regarded by the Romans as subscribing to a "mischievous superstition") in the place of a more embarrassing one (e.g., no early, non-Christian references to a historical Jesus).
*Pontius Pilate's rank was prefect when he was in Judea.See Pilate Stone, The Pilate Inscription from Caesarea. The Tacitus passage mistakenly calls Pilate a procurator, an error also made in ''translations'' of a passage by Josephus. (However, Josephus wrote in Greek and never used the Latin term.) After Herod Agrippa's death in AD 44, when Judea reverted to direct Roman rule, Claudius gave procurators control over Judea. This was made possible when he augmented the role of procurators so that they had magisterial power. Tacitus, who rose through the magisterial ranksThese ranks were exclusively available for patricians only, while equestrians could become procurators. to become consul and then proconsul had a precise knowledge of significance of the terms involved and knew when Judea began to be administered by procurators. It is therefore problematical that he would use "procurator" instead of "prefect" to describe the governor of Judea prior to the changes that ''he'' tells us Claudius brought in.
*The passage implies that the Christians may have been guilty of setting fire to Rome, another argument against veracity, for Tacitus was attempting to lay the blame of the fire on Nero by aspersion.
*Another ancient writer, Suetonius, mentions Christians being harmed during this period by Nero, but there is no connection made with the fire.
The surviving copies of Tacitus' works derive from two principal manuscripts, known as the ''Medicean manuscripts'', which are held in the Laurentian Library, and written in Latin. It is the ''second Medicean manuscript'' which is the oldest surviving copy of the passage describing ''Christians''. In this manuscript, the first 'i' of the ''Christianos'' is quite distinct in appearance from the second, looking somewhat smudged, and lacking the long tail of the second 'i'; additionally, there is a large gap between the first 'i' and the subsequent long s. Georg Andresen was one of the first to comment on the appearance of the first 'i' and subsequent gap, suggesting in 1902 that the text had been altered, and an 'e' had originally been in the text, rather than this 'i'.
In 1950, at Harald Fuchs (historian), Harald Fuchs request, Dr. Teresa Lodi, the director of the Laurentian Library, examined the features of this item of the manuscript; she concluded that there are still signs of an 'e' being erased, by removal of the upper and lower horizontal portions, and distortion of the remainder into an 'i'. In 2008, Dr. Ida Giovanna Rao, the new head of the Laurentian Library's manuscript office, repeated Lodi's study, and concluded that it is likely that the 'i' is a correction of some earlier character (like an ''e''), the change being made an extremely subtle one. Later the same year, it was discovered that under ultraviolet light, an 'e' is clearly visible in the space, meaning that the passage must originally have referred to ''chrestianos'', a Latin word which could be interpreted as ''the good'', after the Greek word χρηστός (chrestos), meaning 'good, useful'. "I believe that in our passage of Tacitus the original reading Chrestianos is the true one" says Professor Robert Renehan, stating that it was "natural for a Roman to interpret the words [Christus and Christianus] as the similarly-sounding χρηστός". The word Christian/s is in Codex Sinaiticus (in which Christ is abbreviated – see nomina sacra) spelled Chrestian/s in the three places the word is used. Also in Minuscule 81 this spelling is used in Acts of the Apostles 11:26.
Jesus
The historicity of Jesus concerns the Historicity (Bible Studies), historical existence ofJesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
of Nazareth. While scholars often draw a distinction between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith, and while scholars further debate what can specifically be known concerning Jesus' character and ministry, essentially all scholars in the relevant fields agree that the mere historical existence of Jesus can be established using documentary and other evidence.
The lines of evidence used to establish Jesus' historical existence include the New Testament documents, theoretical source documents that may lie behind the New Testament, statements from the early Church Fathers
The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity. The historical per ...
, brief references in histories produced decades or centuries later by pagan and Jewish sources, gnostic documents, and early Christian creeds.
Historical Jesus
The Historical Jesus is a scholarly reconstruction of the 1st-century figureJesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
of Nazareth using modern historical methods. This reconstruction is based upon historical methods. These include biblical criticism, critical analysis of gospel texts as the primary source for his biography, and non-biblical sources for the Cultural and historical background of Jesus, historical and cultural context in which he lived.
Since the 18th century, historians and biblical scholars have undertaken three scholarly quests for the historical Jesus, each with distinct characteristics and based on different research criteria, which were often developed during each specific phase.''The Jesus Quest: The Third Search for the Jew of Nazareth''. by Ben Witherington III, InterVersity Press, 1997 (second expanded edition), pp. 9–13''The Quest for the Plausible Jesus: The Question of Criteria'' by Gerd Theissen and Dagmar Winter, Westminster John Knox Press 2002) pp. 1–6''Jesus as a Figure in History: How Modern Historians View the Man from Galilee'' by Mark Allan Powell, Westminster John Knox Press 1999) pp. 19–23 From Albert Schweitzer’s revolutionary work in 1906, to the controversial Jesus Seminar
The Jesus Seminar was a group of about 50 critical biblical scholars and 100 laymen founded in 1985 by Robert Funk that originated under the auspices of the Westar Institute.''Making Sense of the New Testament'' by Craig Blomberg (Mar 1, 2004) ...
, much has been learned. The purpose of these scholars is to examine the evidence from diverse sources and critically bring it together in order that we can compile a totally up-to-date composite of Jesus. Use of the term the ''Historical Jesus'' implies that the figure thus reconstructed will differ from that presented in the teaching of the ecumenical councils ("the dogmatic Christ"). It will also sometimes differ from Jewish, Christian, Muslim or Hindu beliefs.Historical Jesus, Quest of the." Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church.
The historical Jesus was a Galilean Jew living in a time of messiah, messianic and apocalypse, apocalyptic expectations. He was Baptism of Jesus, baptized by John the Baptist, and after John was executed, Jesus began his own Ministry of Jesus, preaching in Galilee. He preached the salvation, everlasting life, cleansing from sins, Kingdom of God, using pithy Parables of Jesus, parables with startling imagery and was renowned as a teacher and a healer. Many scholars credit the apocalyptic declarations that the gospels attribute to him, while others portray his Kingdom of God as a Realized eschatology, moral one, and not apocalyptic in nature. He sent his apostles out to heal and to preach the Kingdom of God.Crossan, p. ???. Later, he traveled to Jerusalem in Christianity, Jerusalem in Judea, where he caused a Jesus and the Money Changers, disturbance at the Temple. It was the time of Passover, when political and religious tensions were high in Jerusalem. The Gospels say that the ''temple guards'' (believed to be Sadducees) arrested him and turned him over to Pontius Pilate for execution. The movement he had started survived his death and was carried on by his apostles who proclaimed the resurrection of Jesus. It developed into Early Christianity (see also List of events in early Christianity).
The quest for the historical Jesus began with the work of Hermann Samuel Reimarus in the 18th century. Two books, both called ''The Life of Jesus'' were written by David Strauss, published in German in 1835–36, and Ernest Renan, published in French in 1863. The ''Historical Jesus'' is conceptually different than the ''Christ of Faith''. The former is physical, while the latter metaphysical. The ''Historical Jesus'' is based on historical evidence. Every time a new scroll is unearthed or new Gospel fragment is found, the ''Historical Jesus'' is modified. And because so much has been lost, we can never know him completely.
In ''The Historical Figure of Jesus'', E.P. Sanders used Alexander the Great as a paradigm—the available sources tell us much about Alexander’s deeds, but nothing about his thoughts. "The sources for Jesus are better, however, than those that deal with Alexander" and "the superiority of evidence for Jesus is seen when we ask what he thought." Thus, Sanders considers the quest for the Historical Jesus to be much closer to a search for historical details on Alexander than to those historical figures with adequate documentation.
Consequently, scholars like Sanders, Geza Vermes, John P. Meier, David Flusser, James H. Charlesworth, Raymond E. Brown, Paula Fredriksen and John Dominic Crossan argue that, although many readers are accustomed to thinking of Jesus solely as a theological figure whose existence is a matter only of religious debate, the four canonical Gospel accounts are based on source documents written within decades after Jesus' lifetime, and therefore provide a basis for the study of the "historical" Jesus. These historians also draw on other historical sources and archaeological evidence to reconstruct the life of Jesus in his historical and cultural context.
In contrast, Charles Guignebert, Professor of the History of Christianity, at the Sorbonne, maintained that the "conclusions which are justified by the documentary evidence may be summed up as follows: Jesus was born somewhere in Galilee in the time of the Emperor Augustus, of a humble family, which included half a dozen or more children besides himself." (Emphasis added). He adds elsewhere "there is no reason to suppose he was not executed".
Recent research has focused upon the "Jewishness" of the historical Jesus. The re-evaluation of Jesus' family, particularly the role played after his death by his brother James, has led scholars like Hans Küng to suggest that there was an early form of non-Hellenistic "Jewish Christianity" like the Ebionites, that did not accept Jesus' divinity and was persecuted by both Roman and Christian authorities. Küng suggests that these Jewish Christians settled in Arabia, and may have influenced the story of Christ as portrayed in the Qur'an.
Jesus as myth
The existence of Jesus as an actual historical figure has been questioned by few biblical scholars and historians, some of the earliest being Constantin-François Chassebœuf, Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 18th century and Bruno Bauer in the 19th century. Each of these proposed that the Jesus character was a fusion of earlier mythologies.Dupuis, p. ???.Durant, p. ?? The views of scholars who entirely rejected Jesus' historicity were summarized in Will Durant's ''Caesar and Christ'', published in 1944. Their rejections were based on a suggested lack of eyewitnesses, a lack of direct archaeological evidence, the failure of ancient works to mention Jesus, and similarities early Christianity shares with then-contemporary religion and mythology. More recently, arguments for non-historicity have been discussed by George Albert Wells, Earl Doherty (''The Jesus Puzzle'', 1999), Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy (author), Peter Gandy (''The Jesus Mysteries'') and Robert M. Price. Doherty, for example, maintains that the earliest records of Christian beliefs (the earliest epistles) contain almost no reference to the historical Jesus, which only appears in the Gospel accounts. He suggests that these are best explained if Christianity began as a mythic savior cult, with no specific historical figure in mind. Nevertheless, the historicity of Jesus is accepted by almost all Biblical scholars and classical historians. The New Testament scholar James Dunn (theologian), James Dunn describes the mythical Jesus theory as a 'thoroughly dead thesis'.Founding of the Christian Church
According to Christian tradition, the Christian Church was founded by Jesus. In the Gospel according to Matthew, the resurrected Jesus gathered his Twelve Apostles together, issued the Great Commission, and selected Simon Peter as their leader, proclaiming "I will give you the Keys of Heaven, keys of the kingdom of heaven". Many modern scholars, including some Catholic ones, flatly deny that Jesus ever even intended to found a Church, much less that he did so. Even those scholars who agree that Jesus founded some kind of Church are divided on whether he founded it on Simon Peter or gave him any sort of Petrine Primacy, primacy. Even those scholars who accept that Peter held some sort of primacy among the apostles are divided on the issue of whether Jesus intended that primacy to be continued by others after Peter's death (apostolic succession). Even those scholars who accept that Jesus intended a continuing Petrine primacy are divided on whether this primacy was Primacy of the Roman Pontiff, uniquely devolved upon the Church of Rome; some, for example, following the lead of Cyprian of Carthage, insist that the Petrine primacy is possessed by every bishop throughout the world who stands in legitimate apostolic succession, whether in communion with Rome or not. Even those scholars who accept that a unique Petrine primacy attached to the See of Rome are divided on exactly how and why that primacy became attached to Rome, by what means or succession it was passed down within the See of Rome, whether Rome itself remained true to that primacy, and exactly what authority the primacy legitimately exercises in the world today.Catholic Church
The Catholic Church believes itself to be the continuation of the Christian community founded by Jesus in his consecration of Simon Peter.Barry, p. 46. In the Catholic view, modern bishop (Catholic Church), bishops are the apostolic succession, successors to the apostles.
The See of Rome is traditionally said to be founded by Peter and Paul. While the New Testament says nothing directly about Peter's connection with Rome, indirectly may indicate that when Paul wrote it, another Apostle was already in Rome, and it is highly probable that the Babylon (New Testament), "Babylon" mentioned in , a letter attributed to Peter, is Rome."Peter, St" Cross, F. L., ed. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. New York: Oxford University Press. 2005 The tradition that links Peter with Rome is "early and unrivalled". In the first years of the 2nd century, Ignatius of Antioch implies that Peter and Paul had special authority over the Roman church.In his ''Epistle to the Romans'', chapter 4:3, he told them he was not giving them orders like Peter and Paul (οὐχ ὡς Πέτρος καὶ Παῦλος διατάσσομαι ὑμῖν). The context of this phrase is, iLightfoot's translation of 1891:
:4:1 I write to all the churches, and I bid all men know, that of my own free will I die for God, unless ye should hinder me. I exhort you, be ye not an unseasonable kindness to me. Let me be given to the wild beasts, for through them I can attain unto God. I am God's wheat, and I am ground by the teeth of wild beasts that I may be found pure bread [of Christ]. :4:2 Rather entice the wild beasts, that they may become my sepulchre and may leave no part of my body behind, so that I may not, when I am fallen asleep, be burdensome to any one. Then shall I be truly a disciple of Jesus Christ, when the world shall not so much as see my body. Supplicate the Lord for me, that through these instruments I may be found a sacrifice to God. :4:3 I do not enjoin you, as Peter and Paul did. They were Apostles, I am a convict; they were free, but I am a slave to this very hour. Yet if I shall suffer, then am I a freed-man of Jesus Christ, and I shall rise free in Him. Now I am learning in my bonds to put away every desire. Irenaeus of Lyons, also of the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd century, believed that Saint Peter, Peter and Paul the Apostle, Paul had been the founders of the Church in Rome and had appointed Pope Linus, Linus as
bishop
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
. Dionysius of Corinth also serves as a witness to the tradition.
The traditional narrative starts with Peter being consecrated by Jesus, followed by Peter traveling to Rome sometime after Pentecost, founding a church there, serving as its first bishop and consecrating Linus as bishop, thus starting the line of Popes of whom Francis I is the current successor. This narrative is often related in histories of the Catholic Church.Orlandis, p. 11.
Elements of this traditional narrative agree with the surviving historical evidence, which includes the writings of several early church Fathers (among them Pope Clement I) and some archaeological evidence. While some historians of Christianity assert that the Catholic Church can be traced to Jesus's consecration of Peter, others argue that Jesus did not found a church in his lifetime but provided a framework of beliefs. Other historians disagree with the traditional view that the papacy originated with Peter, instead asserting that the papal office developed at an unspecified date before the mid 150s and could possibly have been superimposed by the traditional narrative upon the primitive church.
The only part of this narrative that is supported directly by the Scriptures is the consecration of Peter; however, elements of the rest of the narrative are attested to in the writings of Church Fathers such as Ignatius of Antioch, Ignatius, Irenaeus and Dionysius of Corinth. Largely as a result of a challenge to this narrative initiated by Alfred Loisy, some theologians have challenged the historicity of the traditional narrative, resulting in a less literal interpretation of the Church's "founding" by Jesus and less specific claims about the historical foundations and transmission of the Petrine primacy in the Church's early years. Some historians have also challenged the traditional narrative of Peter's role in the early Roman Church.Brown and Meier, p. 98.Cullman, p. 234.Chadwick, Henry, p. 18.Kelly, p. 6.''Building Unity'', Ecumenical Documents IV (Paulist Press, 1989), p. 130. "There is increasing agreement that Peter went to Rome and was martyred there, but we have no trustworthy evidence that Peter ever served as the supervisor or bishop of the local church in Rome."
The New Testament offers no proof that Jesus established the Papacy nor that he established Peter as the first Bishop of Rome. The official documents of the Catholic Church do not apply to Peter the title "Bishop of Rome", applying it instead to the "successor of Peter", and presenting the Pope as Peter's successor in his relationship with the ''whole'' of the Catholic Church. However, some present the Church as linking Peter's primacy with his being bishop of Rome: Eamon Duffy says the official Catholic Church position is that Jesus had essentially appointed Peter as the first pope, with universal primacy ''as bishop of Rome''.Duffy, chapter 1 Some historians have challenged the view that Peter was bishop (as the term is now understood) of Rome.
While most scholars agree that Peter died in Rome, it is generally accepted that there was a Christian community in Rome before either Peter or Paul arrived there.
The Catholic Church draws an analogy between Primacy of Peter, Peter's seeming primacy among the Twelve in New Testament texts such as , , and and the position of the Pope among the Church's bishops.
Two Apostolic see, apostolic and Pentarchy (Christianity), patriarchal sees are claimed to have been founded by Peter: those of Patriarch of Antioch, Antioch and Holy See, Rome. With the see of Alexandria, see Coptic Pope, viewed as founded by a disciple of Peter, these formed what became known as the three Petrine Sees, endowed with special authority as recognized by the First Council of Nicaea.
Apostolic Age
The apostolic period between the years 30 and 100 produced writings attributed to the direct followers of Jesus Christ. The period is traditionally associated with the apostles, apostolic times and apostolic writings. The New Testament books were connected by Early Christianity, the early church to the apostles, though modern scholarship has cast doubt on the authorship of most New Testament books. In the traditional history of the Christian church, the Apostolic Age was the foundation upon which the entire church's history is founded. The ''Apostolic Age'' is particularly significant to Restorationism (Christian primitivism), Restorationism which claims that it represents a purer form of Christianity that should be restored to the church as it exists today. The unique character of the New Testament writings, and their period of origin, is highlighted by the paucity of the literary form in later writing. Once the Development of the New Testament canon, canon of the New Testament began to take shape, the style ceased to be used on a regular basis. Noncanonical writings persisted, but died out within a historically short period of time. Early patristic literature is dominated by apologetics and makes use of other literary forms borrowed from non-Christian sources.Peter and Paul
According to 19th-century German theologian F. C. Baur early Christianity was dominated by the conflict between Saint Peter, Peter who was Biblical law in Christianity#Torah Submissive view, law observant and Paul the Apostle, Paul who advocated partial or even complete Antinomianism, freedom from the law. Later findings contradicted this theory. The allegedly continuous conflict was not supported by the available evidence. However, Incident at Antioch, theological conflict between Paul and Peter is recorded in the New Testament and was widely discussed in the early church. Marcion and his followers stated that the polemic against false apostles in Epistle to the Galatians, Galatians was aimed at Peter, James the Just, James and John the Evangelist, John, the "Pillars of the Church", as well as the "false" gospels circulating through the churches at the time. Irenaeus andTertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
argued against Marcionism's elevation of Paul and stated that Peter and Paul were equals among the apostles. Passages from Galatians were used to show that Paul respected Peter's office and acknowledged a shared faith.
Simon Peter
James D. G. Dunn has proposed that Peter was the "bridge-man" between the two other prominent leaders: Paul and James the Just. Paul and James were both heavily identified with their own "brands" of Christianity. Peter showed a desire to hold onto his Jewish identity, in contrast with Paul. He simultaneously showed a flexibility towards the desires of the broader Christian community, in contrast to James. (This balance is illustrated in the Antioch episode related in .) Thus, Peter became a unifying force in the church.
The See of Rome is traditionally said to be founded by Peter and Paul, see also Primacy of Simon Peter, who had invested it with apostolic succession, apostolic authority. The New Testament says nothing directly about Peter's connection to Rome, but an early Catholic tradition supports such a connection.
Most Catholic and Protestant scholars, and many scholars in general, conclude that Peter was indeed martyred in Rome under Nero.Duffy, p. 8. A 2009 critical study by Otto Zwierlein has concluded that "there is not a single piece of reliable literary evidence (and no archaeological evidence either) that Peter ever was in Rome."Pieter W. van der Horst, review of Otto Zwierlein, ''Petrus in Rom: die literarischen Zeugnisse. Mit einer kritischen Edition der Martyrien des Petrus und Paulus auf neuer handschriftlicher Grundlage'', Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2009, in ''Bryn Mawr Classical Review'2010.03.25
First Letter of Clement#The First Epistle of Clement, 1 Clement, a document that has been dated anywhere from the 90s to the 120s, is one of the earliest sources adduced in support of Peter's stay in Rome, but questions have been raised about the text's authenticity and whether it has any knowledge about Peter's life beyond what is contained in the New Testament ''Acts''. The ''Letter to the Romans'' attributed to St. Ignatius of Antioch implies that Peter and Paul had special authority over the Roman church, telling the Roman Christians: "I do not command you, as Peter and Paul did" (ch. 4). However, the authenticity of this document and its traditional dating to c. 105–110 have also been questioned, and it may date from the final decades of the 2nd century. Later in the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd century, Irenaeus of Lyons believed that Peter and Paul the Apostle, Paul had been the founders of the Church in Rome and had appointed Pope Linus, Linus as succeeding
bishop
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
.
Tertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
also writes: "But if you are near Italy, you have Rome, where authority is at hand for us too. What a happy church that is, on which the apostles poured out their whole doctrine with their blood; where Peter had a passion like that of the Lord, where Paul was crowned with the death of John (the Baptist, by being beheaded)." Dionysius of Corinth also serves as a late 2nd -century witness to the tradition. He wrote: "You (Pope Soter) have also, by your very admonition, brought together the planting that was made by Peter and Paul at Rome and at Corinth; for both of them alike planted in our Corinth and taught us; and both alike, teaching similarly in Italy, suffered martyrdom at the same time". Later tradition, first found in Saint Jerome, attributes to Peter a 25-year episcopate (or apostolate) in Rome.
Paul's Epistle to the Romans (c. 58) attests to a large Christian community already there,Cross, F. L., ed. The Oxford dictionary of the Christian church. New York: Oxford University Press. 2005, article ''Rome (early Christian)'' although he does not mention Peter.
Paul of Tarsus
Elaine Pagels, professor of religion at Princeton University, Princeton and an authority on Gnosticism, argues that Paul was a Gnostic and that the anti-Gnostic Pastoral Epistles were "pseudo-Pauline" forgeries written to rebut this. British Jewish scholar Hyam Maccoby contends that the Paul as described in the Book of Acts and the view of Paul gleaned from his own writings are very different people. Some difficulties have been noted in the account of his life. Paul as described in the Book of Acts is much more interested in factual history, less in theology; ideas such as justification by faith are absent as are references to the Spirit, according to Maccoby. He also points out that there are no references toJohn the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
in the Pauline Epistles, although Paul mentions him several times in the Book of Acts.
Others have objected that the language of the speeches is too Lukan in style to reflect anyone else's words. Moreover, some have argued that the speeches of Peter and Paul are too much alike, and that especially Paul's are too distinct from his letters to reflect a true Pauline source.Price, Christopher. "The Speeches in Acts." ''Christian Colligation of Apologetics Debate Research & Evangelism,'' 2003. WebThe Speeches in Acts
/ref> Despite these suspicions, historian-attorney Christopher Price concludes that Luke's style in ''Acts'' is representative of those ancient historians known for accurately recording speeches in their works. Examination of several of the major speeches in Acts reveals that while the author smoothed out the Greek in some cases, he clearly relied on preexisting material to reconstruct his speeches. He did not believe himself at liberty to invent material, but attempted to accurately record the reality of the speeches in Acts. Ferdinand Christian Baur, F. C. Baur (1792–1860), professor of theology at Tübingen in Germany, the first scholar to critique Acts and the Pauline Epistles, and founder of the Tübingen School of theology, argued that Paul, as the "Apostle to the Gentiles", was in violent opposition to the original 12 Apostles. Baur considers the Acts of the Apostles were late and unreliable. This debate has continued ever since, with Adolf Deissmann (1866–1937) and Richard Reitzenstein (1861–1931) emphasising Paul's Greek inheritance and Albert Schweitzer stressing his dependence on Judaism. Maccoby theorizes that Paul synthesized Judaism, Gnosticism, and mysticism to create Christianity as a cosmic savior religion. According to Maccoby, Paul's Pharisaism was his own invention, though actually he was probably associated with the Sadducees. Maccoby attributes the origins of Christian anti-Semitism to Paul and claims that Paul the Apostle and women, Paul's view of women, though inconsistent, reflects his Gnosticism in its misogynist aspects.
Separation from Judaism
The split between Pharisee, Pharisaic/Rabbinic Judaism (the period of the Tannaim) and Early Christianity is commonly attributed to the Rejection of Jesus#Hometown .28Nazareth.29 rejection, rejection of Jesus in his hometown c.30, the Council of Jerusalem in 50, the Destruction of the Second Temple in 70, the postulated Council of Jamnia of 90, and/or the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–135. However, rather than a sudden split, there was a slowly growing chasm between Christians and Jews in the 1st centuries. Even though it is commonly thought that Paul of Tarsus and Judaism, Paul established a Gentile church, it took centuries for a complete break to manifest. However, certain events are perceived as pivotal in the growing rift between Judaism and Christianity, Christianity and Judaism.Post-apostolic period
Christianity throughout the Christianity in the 2nd century, 2nd and Christianity in the 3rd century, 3rd centuries has generally been less studied than in the periods that came before and after it. This is reflected in that it is usually referred to in terms of the adjacent periods with names as such "post-apostolic" (after the period of 1st century formative Christianity) and "ante-Nicene" (before the First Council of Nicaea). However, the 2nd and 3rd centuries are quite important in the development of Christianity.
There is a relative lack of material for this period, compared with the later Church Father period. For example, a widely used collection (''Ante-Nicene Fathers (book), Ante-Nicene Fathers'') includes most 2nd- and 3rd-century writings in nine volumes. This includes the writings of the Apostolic Fathers
The Apostolic Fathers, also known as the Ante-Nicene Fathers, were core Christian theologians among the Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD who are believed to have personally known some of the Twelve Apostles or to have be ...
, Apologists, Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Irenaeus of Lyons, Origen, Origen of Alexandria and the New Testament Apocrypha, among others. In contrast, ''Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers'' (consisting mainly of Augustine of Hippo, Augustine, Jerome
Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, th ...
and Chrysostom) fills twenty-eight volumes.
According to Siker the developments of this time are "multidirectional and not easily mapped". While the preceding and following periods were diverse, they possessed unifying characteristics lacking in this period. 1st-century Christianity possessed a basic cohesion based on the Pauline church movement, Jewish character, and self-identification as a messianic movement. The 2nd and 3rd centuries saw a sharp divorce from its early roots. There was an explicit rejection of then-modern Judaism and Jewish culture by the end of the 2nd century, with a growing body of ''adversus Judaeos'' literature. Christianity in the 4th and 5th centuries experienced imperial pressure and developed strong episcopal and unifying structure. The ante-Nicene period was without such authority and immensely diverse. Many variations in this time defy neat categorizations, with as various forms of Christianity interacted in a complex fashion to form the dynamic character of Christianity in this era.
By the early 2nd century, Christians had agreed on a basic list of writings that would serve as their canon,Bokenkotter, pp. 34–35. see Development of the New Testament canon, but interpretations of these works differed, often wildly.Bokenkotter, p. 32. In part to ensure a greater consistency in their teachings, by the end of the 1st century many Christian communities evolved a more structured hierarchy, with a central bishop, whose opinion held more weight in that city.Duffy, pp. 9–10. By 160, most communities had a bishop, who based his authority on the apostolic succession, chain of succession from the apostles to himself.Bokenkotter, p. 33.
Bishops still had a freedom of interpretation. The competing versions of Christianity led many bishops who subscribed to what is now the Mainstream Christianity, mainstream version of Christianity to rally more closely together.Duffy, p. 13. Bishops would call synods to discuss problems or doctrinal differences in certain regions; the first of these to be documented occurred in Early centers of Christianity#Western Anatolia, Roman Asia in about 160. Some bishops began to take on a more authoritative role for a region; in many cases, the bishop of the church located in the capital city of a province became the central authority for all churches in that province. These more centralized authorities were known as ''metropolitan churches'' headed by a Metropolitan bishop. The churches in Antioch, Alexandria, and Rome exerted authority over groups of these metropolitan churches.Bokenkotter, p. 35.
Church Fathers
The church fathers are generally divided into the Ante-Nicene Fathers, those who lived and wrote before the First Council of Nicaea, Council of Nicaea (325) and the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, those who lived and wrote after 325. In addition, the division of the fathers into Greek and Latin writers is also common. Some of the most prominent Greek Fathers are Justin Martyr, John Chrysostom, and Cyril of Alexandria. Among the Latin Fathers are Tertullian
Tertullian (; la, Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus; 155 AD – 220 AD) was a prolific early Christian author from Carthage in the Roman province of Africa. He was the first Christian author to produce an extensive corpus of L ...
, Cyprian, Jerome
Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, th ...
, Ambrose of Milan, Gregory the Great and Augustine of Hippo.
Apostolic Fathers
The earliest Church Fathers (within two generations of the Twelve apostles, Apostles of Christ) are usually called theApostolic Fathers
The Apostolic Fathers, also known as the Ante-Nicene Fathers, were core Christian theologians among the Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD who are believed to have personally known some of the Twelve Apostles or to have be ...
. Important Apostolic Fathers include Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch and Polycarp of Smyrna. In addition, the Didache
The ''Didache'' (; ), also known as The Lord's Teaching Through the Twelve Apostles to the Nations (Διδαχὴ Κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν), is a brief anonymous early Christian tr ...
and Shepherd of Hermas are usually placed among the writings of the Apostolic Fathers although their authors are unknown.
Eusebius of Caesarea
The ''Church History (Eusebius), Church History'' (Latin: ''Historia Ecclesiastica'' or ''Historia Ecclesiae'') ofEusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea (; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος ; 260/265 – 30 May 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilus (from the grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος τοῦ Παμφίλου), was a Greek historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christia ...
was a Christianity in the 4th century, 4th-century pioneer work giving a chronological account of the development of Early Christianity from the Christianity in the 1st century, 1st century. It was written in Koine Greek, and survives also in Latin, Syriac and Armenian manuscripts. The result was the first full-length historical narrative written from a Christian point of view. In the early 5th century two advocates in Constantinople, Socrates Scholasticus and Sozomen, and a bishop, Theodoret of Cyrrhus, Syria, wrote continuations of Eusebius' church history, establishing the convention of continuators that would determine to a great extent the way Historiography, history was written for the next thousand years. Eusebius' ''Chronicon (Eusebius), Chronicle'', that attempted to lay out a comparative timeline of pagan and Old Testament history, set the model for the other historiographical genre, the medieval chronicle or universal history.
Eusebius made use of many ecclesiastical monuments and documents, acts of the martyrs, letters, extracts from earlier Christian writings, lists of bishops, and similar sources, often quoting the originals at great length so that his work contains materials not elsewhere preserved. For example, he wrote that Matthew the Evangelist, Matthew composed the Gospel according to the Hebrews and his Church Catalogue suggests that it was the only Jewish-Christian Gospels, Jewish gospel. It is therefore of historical value, though it pretends neither to completeness nor to the observance of due proportion in the treatment of the subject-matter. Nor does it present in a connected and systematic way the history of the early Christian Church. It is to no small extent a vindication of the Christian religion, though the author did not primarily intend it as such. Eusebius has been often accused of intentional falsification of the truth; in judging persons or facts he is not entirely unbiased.
Reformation
Some of the new words and phrases introduced by William Tyndale in his translation of the Bible did not sit well with the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church, using words like 'Overseer' rather than 'Bishop' and 'Elder' rather than 'Priest', and (very controversially), 'congregation' rather than 'Church' and 'love' rather than 'charity'. Tyndale contended (citing Erasmus) that the Greek New Testament did not support the traditional Roman Catholic readings. Contention from Roman Catholics came not only from real or perceived errors in translation but a fear of the erosion of their social power if Christians could read the bible in their own language "the Pope's dogma is bloody" Tyndale wrote in his ''The Obedience of a Christian Man''. Tyndale translated "Church" as "congregation" and translated "priest" as "elder."Moynahan, p. 72 Moynahan explains Tyndale's reasons for this: "This was a direct threat to the Church's ancient- but so Tyndale here made clear, non-scriptural- claim to be the body of Christ on earth. To change these words was to strip the Church hierarchy of its pretensions to be Christ's terrestrial representative, and to award this honour to individual worshipers who made up each congregation."Modern perspectives
Historicity of the Acts of the Apostles
The historical reliability of the Acts of the Apostles, the primary source for the Apostolic Age, is a major issue for biblical scholars and historians of early Christianity. While some biblical scholars and historians view the book of Acts as being extremely accurate and corroborated by archaeology, others view the work as being inaccurate and in conflict with thePauline epistles
The Pauline epistles, also known as Epistles of Paul or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen books of the New Testament attributed to Paul the Apostle, although the authorship of some is in dispute. Among these epistles are some of the earliest extan ...
. Acts portrays Paul as more inline with Jewish Christianity
Jewish Christians ( he, יהודים נוצרים, yehudim notzrim) were the followers of a Jewish religious sect that emerged in Judea during the late Second Temple period (first century AD). The Nazarene Jews integrated the belief of Jesus a ...
, while the Pauline epistles record more conflict, such as the Incident at Antioch.
Orthodoxy and heterodoxy
Traditionally, orthodoxy and heresy have been viewed in relation to the "orthodoxy" as an authentic lineage of tradition. Other forms of Christianity were viewed as deviant streams of thought and therefore "heterodox", or heretical. This view was dominant until the publication ofWalter Bauer
Walter Bauer (; 8 August 1877 – 17 November 1960) was a German theologian, lexicographer of New Testament Greek, and scholar of the development of Early Christianity.
Life
Bauer was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, and raised in Marburg, ...
's ''Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum'' ("Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity") in 1934. Bauer endeavored to rethink early Christianity historically, independent from the views of the church. He stated that the 2nd-century church was very diverse and included many "heretical" groups that had an equal claim to apostolic tradition. Bauer interpreted the struggle between the orthodox and heterodox to be the "mainstream" Roman church struggling to attain dominance. He presented Edessa and Egypt as places where the "orthodoxy" of Rome had little influence during the 2nd century. As he saw it, the theological thought of the Orient at the time would later be labeled "heresy". The response by modern scholars has been mixed. Some scholars clearly support Bauer's conclusions and others express concerns about his "attacking [of] orthodox sources with inquisitional zeal and exploiting to a nearly absurd extent the argument from silence." However, modern scholars have critiqued and updated Bauer's model. For example, subsequent analysis of Bauer's geographical model have generally fallen against Bauer such as in Egypt.
Perhaps one of the most important discussions among scholars of early Christianity in the past century is to what extent it is appropriate to speak of "orthodoxy" and "heresy". Higher criticism drastically altered the previous perception that heresy was a very rare exception to the orthodoxy. Bauer was particularly influential in the reconsideration of the historical model. During the 1970s, increasing focus on the effect of social, political and economic circumstances on the formation of early Christianity occurred as Bauer's work found a wider audience. Some scholars argue against the increasing focus on heresies. A movement away from presuming the correctness or dominance of the orthodoxy is seen as understandable, in light of modern approaches. However, they feel that instead of an even and neutral approach to historical analysis that the heterodox sects are given an assumption of superiority over the orthodox movement. The current debate is vigorous and broad. While it is difficult to summarize all current views, general statements may be made, remembering that such broad strokes will have exceptions in specific cases.
In his ''Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum'' (Tübingen 1934; a second edition, edited by Georg Strecker, Tübingen 1964, was translated as ''Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity'' 1971), Walter Bauer
Walter Bauer (; 8 August 1877 – 17 November 1960) was a German theologian, lexicographer of New Testament Greek, and scholar of the development of Early Christianity.
Life
Bauer was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, and raised in Marburg, ...
developed his thesis that in earliest Christianity, orthodoxy and heresy do not stand in relation to one another as primary to secondary, but in many regions heresy is the original manifestation of Christianity. Bauer reassessed as a historian the overwhelmingly dominant view that for the period of Christian origins, ecclesiastical doctrine already represented what is primary, while heresies, on the other hand somehow are a deviation from the genuine (Bauer, "Introduction").
Through studies of historical records Bauer concluded that what came to be known as orthodoxy was just one of numerous forms of Christianity in the early centuries. It was the form of Christianity practiced in Rome that exercised the uniquely dominant influence over the development of orthodoxy and acquired the majority of converts over time. This was largely due to the greater resources available to the Christians in Rome and due to the conversion to Christianity of the Roman Emperor Constantine I. Practitioners of what became orthodoxy then rewrote the history of the conflict making it appear that this view had always been the majority one. Writings in support of other views were systematically destroyed.
Bauer's conclusions contradicted nearly 1600 years of writing on church history and thus were met with much skepticism among Christian academics such as Walther Völker (see below).
The cultural isolation of Nazi Germany precluded a wider dissemination of Bauer's ideas until after World War II; in the international field of biblical scholarship, Bauer continued to be known solely as the compiler of the monumental ''Wörterbuch zu den Schriften des Neuen Testaments'' (in its English translation ''A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature'' or simply the Bauer lexicon), which has become standard. ''Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei'' was finally translated into English in 1970 and published in 1971.
Bart Ehrman has written widely on issues of New Testament and early Christianity at both an academic and popular level, with over twenty books including three New York Times bestsellers (''Misquoting Jesus'', ''God's Problem'', and ''Jesus, Interrupted''). Much of his work is on textual criticism and the New Testament. His first book was ''Didymus the Blind and the Text of the Gospels'' (1987) followed by several books published by the Oxford University Press, including ''The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture'', and a new edition and translation of ''The Apostolic Fathers'' in the Loeb Classical Library series published by Harvard University Press. His most recent book ''Jesus, Interrupted'' was published in March 2009 and discusses contradictions in the Bible.
In 1999 ''Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium'' was released as a study on the historical Jesus. Ehrman argues that the Historical Jesus#Apocalyptic prophet, historical Jesus was an apocalypse, apocalyptic preacher, and that his apocalyptic beliefs are recorded in the earliest Christian documents: the Gospel of Mark
The Gospel of Mark), or simply Mark (which is also its most common form of abbreviation). is the second of the four canonical gospels and of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells of the ministry of Jesus from his baptism by John the Baptist to h ...
and the authentic Pauline epistles
The Pauline epistles, also known as Epistles of Paul or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen books of the New Testament attributed to Paul the Apostle, although the authorship of some is in dispute. Among these epistles are some of the earliest extan ...
. The earliest Christians believed Jesus would soon return, and their beliefs are echoed in the earliest Christian writings.
Much of Ehrman's writing has concentrated on various aspects of Walter Bauer
Walter Bauer (; 8 August 1877 – 17 November 1960) was a German theologian, lexicographer of New Testament Greek, and scholar of the development of Early Christianity.
Life
Bauer was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, and raised in Marburg, ...
's thesis that Christianity was always diversified or at odds with itself. Ehrman is often considered a pioneer in connecting the history of the early church to textual variants within biblical manuscripts and in coining such terms as "Proto-orthodox Christianity
The term proto-orthodox Christianity or proto-orthodoxy is often erroneously thought to have been coined by New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman, who borrowed it from Bentley Layton (a major scholar of Gnosticism and Coptologist at Yale), and des ...
." Ehrman brought this thesis, and textual criticism in general, through his popular level work ''Misquoting Jesus''.
Notes
References
Sources
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * translation of ''Origine de tous les cultes'', published by Chasseriau in 1794. * * * * * * * translated by S.H. Hooke * * * * * * * *Diarmaid MacCulloch, MacCulloch, Diarmaid (2010). ''A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years''. * * * * * * * * * * translated by Michael Adams in 1985 from ''Historia breve del Cristianismo'', published 1983 by Ediciones Rialp, S.A. in Madrid. * * * * * * * * * * * * * translated from ''Les ruines, ou Méditations sur les révolutions des empires'', published by Desenne in 1791. * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Historiography Of Early Christianity Early Christianity Historiography by topic, Christianity Ancient Christianity studies, Early Christianity