Download or read book Christianity in Ancient Rome written by Bernard Green and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-04-15 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: of the Pope." --Book Jacket.

Download or read book Early Christians Adapting to the Roman Empire written by Niko Huttunen and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-03-31 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Early Christians Adapting to the Roman Empire: Mutual Recognition Niko Huttunen challenges the interpretation of early Christian texts as anti-imperial documents. He presents examples of the positive relationship between early Christians and the Roman society. With the concept of “recognition” Huttunen describes a situation in which the parties can come to terms with each other without full agreement. Huttunen provides examples of non-Christian philosophers recognizing early Christians. He claims that recognition was a response to Christians who presented themselves as philosophers. Huttunen reads Romans 13 as a part of the ancient tradition of the law of the stronger. His pioneering study on early Christian soldiers uncovers the practical dimension of recognizing the empire.

Download or read book Pagan Rome and the Early Christians written by Stephen Benko and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 1986-07-22 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In the early Roman empire, Christians were seen by pagans as overthrowers of ancient gods and destroyers of the prevailing social order. Allegations that Christians recognized each other by secret marks, met at night and made love to one another indiscriminately, worshipped the head of an ass and the genitals of their high priests, and ate children were widely believed. In examining these charges and the Christian response to them, Benko has provided a persuasively argued and refreshing, if controversial, perspective on the confrontation of the pagan and early Christian worlds."[book cover].

Download or read book Christianity and the Roman Empire written by Ralph Martin Novak and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2001-02-01 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rise of Christianity during the first four centuries of the common era was the pivotal development in Western history and profoundly influenced the later direction of all world history. Yet, for all that has been written on early Christian history, the primary sources for this history are widely scattered, difficult to find, and generally unknown to lay persons and to historians not specially trained in the field. In Christianity and the Roman Empire Ralph Novak interweaves these primary sources with a narrative text and constructs a single continuous account of these crucial centuries. The primary sources are selected to emphasize the manner in which the government and the people of the Roman Empire perceived Christians socially and politically; the ways in which these perceptions influenced the treatment of Christians within the Roman Empire; and the manner in which Christians established their political and religious dominance of the Roman Empire after Constantine the Great came to power in the early fourth century CE. Ralph Martin Novak holds a Masters Degree in Roman History from the University of Chicago. For: Undergraduates; seminarians; general audiences

Download or read book Coming Out Christian in the Roman World written by Douglas Ryan Boin and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2015-03-03 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The supposed collapse of Roman civilization is still lamented more than 1,500 years later-and intertwined with this idea is the notion that a fledgling religion, Christianity, went from a persecuted fringe movement to an irresistible force that toppled the empire. The “intolerant zeal” of Christians, wrote Edward Gibbon, swept Rome's old gods away, and with them the structures that sustained Roman society. Not so, argues Douglas Boin. Such tales are simply untrue to history, and ignore the most important fact of all: life in Rome never came to a dramatic stop. Instead, as Boin shows, a small minority movement rose to transform society-politically, religiously, and culturally-but it was a gradual process, one that happened in fits and starts over centuries. Drawing upon a decade of recent studies in history and archaeology, and on his own research, Boin opens up a wholly new window onto a period we thought we knew. His work is the first to describe how Christians navigated the complex world of social identity in terms of “passing” and “coming out.” Many Christians lived in a dynamic middle ground. Their quiet success, as much as the clamor of martyrdom, was a powerful agent for change. With this insightful approach to the story of Christians in the Roman world, Douglas Boin rewrites, and rediscovers, the fascinating early history of a world faith.

Download or read book In Stone and Story written by Bruce W. Longenecker and published by Baker Academic. This book was released on 2020-02-18 with total page 471 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This beautifully designed, full-color textbook introduces the Roman background of the New Testament by immersing students in the life and culture of the thriving first-century towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum, which act as showpieces of the world into which the early Christian movement was spreading. Bruce Longenecker, a leading scholar of the ancient world of the New Testament, discusses first-century artifacts in relation to the life stories of people from the Roman world. The book includes discussion questions, maps, and 175 color photographs. Additional resources are available through Textbook eSources.

Download or read book The First Christians in the Roman World written by E. A. Judge and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2008 with total page 828 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collection of previously published essays and lectures.

Download or read book Christianity in the Roman Empire written by Robert E. Winn and published by Hendrickson Publishers. This book was released on 2018-10-09 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christianity in the Roman Empire is a topical and biographical introduction to Christianity before Constantine. While its focus is the historical development of the proto-orthodox community, Robert Winn aims to bridge the gap between contemporary Christians and those who lived in the Roman Empire. To do this, his chapters discuss particular topics such as prayer, biblical interpretation, worship, and persecution, as well as prominent and controversial individuals such as Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Melito of Sardis, and Tertullian. Part One addresses the world of the apostolic fathers, Part Two addresses hostility to Christianity and the response of Christians to this antagonism, and Part Three addresses doctrinal and communal issues of the third century. The book will pique readers’ interest and provide them with a deeper appreciation for the religious identity of early Christians in the Roman Empire: what they believed and how they lived. Part One: Christianity in the Year 100 1. Christians, Jews, and Romans in the First Century 2. New Way of Life: Didache and the Epistle of Barnabas 3. Clement of Rome and the Church of Corinth 4. Ignatius of Antioch and True Christianity 5. Worship and Church Order in the Year 100 Part Two: Christianity in a Hostile World (100–250) 6. Celsus, a Critic of Christianity 7. Justin Martyr, a Defender of Christianity 8. The Persecution of Christians 9. The Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicity 10. Cyprian of Carthage and the Unity of the Church Part Three: Faith and Practice in the Third Century 11. Reading the Bible with Early Christians 12. Irenaeus of Lyons and True Christianity 13. Tertullian of Carthage and True Christianity 14. Prayer and the Spiritual Life of Early Christians 15. Eusebius of Caesarea: After Two Hundred Years

Download or read book Christian and Pagan in the Roman Empire written by Tertullian and published by CUA Press. This book was released on 2001-09 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this volume, Robert D. Sider undertakes a judicious pruning of the original texts and brings a fresh accessibility to the important writings of Tertullian.

Download or read book The Patient Ferment of the Early Church written by Alan Kreider and published by Baker Academic. This book was released on 2016-03-29 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How and why did the early church grow in the first four hundred years despite disincentives, harassment, and occasional persecution? In this unique historical study, veteran scholar Alan Kreider delivers the fruit of a lifetime of study as he tells the amazing story of the spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire. Challenging traditional understandings, Kreider contends the church grew because the virtue of patience was of central importance in the life and witness of the early Christians. They wrote about patience, not evangelism, and reflected on prayer, catechesis, and worship, yet the church grew--not by specific strategies but by patient ferment.

Download or read book Christianity in the Greco Roman World written by Moyer V. Hubbard and published by Baker Academic. This book was released on 2010-01-01 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Background becomes foreground in Moyer Hubbard's creative introduction to the social and historical setting for the letters of the Apostle Paul to churches in Asia Minor and Europe. Hubbard begins each major section with a brief narrative featuring a fictional character in one of the great cities of that era. Then he elaborates on various aspects of the cultural setting related to each particular vignette, discussing the implications of those venues for understanding Paul's letters and applying their message to our lives today. Addressing a wide array of cultural and traditional issues, Hubbard discusses: • religion and superstition • education, philosophy, and oratory • urban society • households and family life in the Greco-Roman world This work is based on the premise that the better one understands the historical and social context in which the New Testament (and Paul's letters) was written, the better one will understand the writings of the New Testament themselves. Passages become clearer, metaphors deciphered, and images sharpened. Teachers, students, and laypeople alike will appreciate Hubbard's unique, illuminating, and well-researched approach to the world of the early church.

Download or read book Destroyer of the Gods written by Larry W. Hurtado and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Silly," "stupid," "irrational," "simple." "Wicked," "hateful," "obstinate," "anti-social." "Extravagant," "perverse." The Roman world rendered harsh judgments upon early Christianity--including branding Christianity "new." Novelty was no Roman religious virtue. Nevertheless, as Larry W. Hurtado shows in Destroyer of the gods, Christianity thrived despite its new and distinctive features and opposition to them. Unlike nearly all other religious groups, Christianity utterly rejected the traditional gods of the Roman world. Christianity also offered a new and different kind of religious identity, one not based on ethnicity. Christianity was distinctively a "bookish" religion, with the production, copying, distribution, and reading of texts as central to its faith, even preferring a distinctive book-form, the codex. Christianity insisted that its adherents behave differently: unlike the simple ritual observances characteristic of the pagan religious environment, embracing Christian faith meant a behavioral transformation, with particular and novel ethical demands for men. Unquestionably, to the Roman world, Christianity was both new and different, and, to a good many, it threatened social and religious conventions of the day. In the rejection of the gods and in the centrality of texts, early Christianity obviously reflected commitments inherited from its Jewish origins. But these particular features were no longer identified with Jewish ethnicity and early Christianity quickly became aggressively trans-ethnic--a novel kind of religious movement. Its ethical teaching, too, bore some resemblance to the philosophers of the day, yet in contrast with these great teachers and their small circles of dedicated students, early Christianity laid its hard demands upon all adherents from the moment of conversion, producing a novel social project. Christianity's novelty was no badge of honor. Called atheists and suspected of political subversion, Christians earned Roman disdain and suspicion in equal amounts. Yet, as Destroyer of the gods demonstrates, in an irony of history the very features of early Christianity that rendered it distinctive and objectionable in Roman eyes have now become so commonplace in Western culture as to go unnoticed. Christianity helped destroy one world and create another.

Download or read book The Acts of the Apostles written by P.D. James and published by Canongate Books. This book was released on 1999-01-01 with total page 93 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Acts is the sequel to Luke's gospel and tells the story of Jesus's followers during the 30 years after his death. It describes how the 12 apostles, formerly Jesus's disciples, spread the message of Christianity throughout the Mediterranean against a background of persecution. With an introduction by P.D. James

Download or read book Augustus to Constantine written by Robert McQueen Grant and published by Westminster John Knox Press. This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This masterful study of the early centuries of Christianity vividly brings to life the religious, political, and cultural developments through which the faith that began as a sect within Judaism became finally the religion of the Roman empire. First published in 1970, Grant's classic is enhanced with a new foreward by Margaret M. Mitchell, which assesses its importance and puts the reader in touch with the advances of current research.

Download or read book The Christians as the Romans Saw Them written by Robert Louis Wilken and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2003-01-01 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers an engrossing portrayal of the early years of the Christian movement from the perspective of the Romans.

Download or read book Christianizing the Roman Empire written by Ramsay MacMullen and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 1984-01-01 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offers a secular perspective on the growth of the Christian Church in ancient Rome, identifies nonreligious factors in conversion, and examines the influence of Constantine

Download or read book New Testament Christianity in the Roman World written by Harry O. Maier and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-27 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What did it mean to be a Christian in the Roman Empire? In one of the inaugural titles of Oxford's new Essentials in Biblical Studies series, Harry O. Maier considers the multilayered social contexts that shaped the authors and audiences of the New Testament. Beginning with the cosmos and the gods, Maier presents concentric realms of influence on the new religious movement of Christ-followers. The next is that of the empire itself and the sway the cult of the emperor held over believers of a single deity. Within the empire, early Christianity developed mostly in cities, the shape of which often influenced the form of belief. The family stood as the social unit in which daily expression of belief was most clearly on view and, finally, Maier examines the role of personal and individual adherence to the religion in the shaping of the Christian experience in the Roman world. In all of these various realms, concepts of sacrifice, belief, patronage, poverty, Jewishness, integration into city life, and the social constitution of identity are explored as important facets of early Christianity as a lived religion. Maier encourages readers to think of early Christianity not simply as an abstract and disconnected set of beliefs and practices, but as made up of a host of social interactions and pluralisms. Religion thus ceases to exist as a single identity, and acts instead as a sphere in which myriad identities co-exist.