LEADER 04861nam 2200565 a 450 001 9910462144403321 005 20200520144314.0 010 $a0-300-16658-3 024 7 $a10.12987/9780300166583 035 $a(CKB)2670000000233757 035 $a(StDuBDS)AH24038142 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000721325 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11473010 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000721325 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10687894 035 $a(PQKB)11389071 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC3421034 035 $a(DE-B1597)485948 035 $a(OCoLC)811405743 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780300166583 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL3421034 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10587844 035 $a(OCoLC)923600032 035 $a(EXLCZ)992670000000233757 100 $a20090323d2009 uy 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aur||||||||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 12$aA new history of early Christianity$b[electronic resource] /$fCharles Freeman 210 $aNew Haven $cYale University Press$dc2009 215 $a1 online resource (400 p.) 300 $aBibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph 311 $a0-300-12581-X 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references and index. 327 $aPart one: Beginnings. A trial ; The seedbed : Judaism in the first century AD ; Jesus before the Gospels ; Breaking away : the first Christianities ; What did Paul achieve? ; The letter to the Hebrews ; Fifty years on : the Gospel writers reflect on Jesus ; John and the Jerusalem Christians ; Creating a New Testament ; No second coming : the search for stability -- Part two: Becoming Christian. Toeholds in a wider empire ; Open borders : the overlapping worlds of Christians and Jews ; Was there a gnostic challenge? ; The idea of a church ; To compromise or reject : confronting the material world -- Interlude one: the earliest Christian art -- Celsus confronts the Christians -- The challenge of Greek philosophy -- Origen and early Christian scholarship -- New beginnings : the emergence of a Latin Christianity -- Victims or volunteers : Christian martyrs -- The spread of Christian communities -- Part three: The imperial church. The motives of Constantine ; Debating the nature of God ; The stifling of Christian diversity ; The assault on paganism ; 'No one is honoured before him' : the rise of the bishop -- Interlude two: the art of imperial Christianity -- An obsession with the flesh -- The end of optimism : Augustine and the consequences of sin -- Divine but human -- The closing of the schools -- A fragile church : Christianity and the collapse of the western empire -- Faith, certainty, and the unknown God. 330 $aThe relevance of Christianity is as hotly contested today as it has ever been. A New History of Early Christianity shows how our current debates are rooted in the many controversies surrounding the birth of the religion and the earliest attempts to resolve them. Charles Freeman's meticulous historical account of Christianity from its birth in Judaea in the first century A.D. to the emergence of Western and Eastern churches by A.D. 600 reveals that it was a distinctive, vibrant, and incredibly diverse movement brought into order at the cost of intellectual and spiritual vitality. Against the conventional narrative of the inevitable "triumph" of a single distinct Christianity, Freeman shows that there was a host of competing Christianities, many of which had as much claim to authenticity as those that eventually dominated. Looking with fresh eyes at the historical record, Freeman explores the ambiguities and contradictions that underlay Christian theology and the unavoidable compromises enforced in the name of doctrine.Tracing the astonishing transformation that the early Christian church underwent-from sporadic niches of Christian communities surviving in the wake of a horrific crucifixion to sanctioned alliance with the state-Charles Freeman shows how freedom of thought was curtailed by the development of the concept of faith. The imposition of "correct belief," religious uniformity, and an institutional framework that enforced orthodoxy were both consolidating and stifling. Uncovering the difficulties in establishing the Christian church, he examines its relationship with Judaism, Gnosticism, Greek philosophy and Greco-Roman society, and he offers dramatic new accounts of Paul, the resurrection, and the church fathers and emperors. 606 $aChurch history$yPrimitive and early church, ca. 30-600 608 $aElectronic books. 615 0$aChurch history 676 $a270.1 700 $aFreeman$b Charles$f1947-$01046213 801 0$bMiAaPQ 801 1$bMiAaPQ 801 2$bMiAaPQ 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910462144403321 996 $aA new history of early Christianity$92472959 997 $aUNINA