A New History of Early Christianity

Author: Charles Freeman
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 030012581X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Book Description
"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' and an institutional framework that enforced orthodoxy were both consolidating and stifling. Uncovering the church's relationships with Judaism, Gnosticism, Greek philosophy and Greco-Roman society, Freeman offers dramatic new accounts of Paul, the resurrection, and the church fathers and emperors."--BOOK JACKET.

The Early Christian Book (CUA Studies in Early Christianity)

Author: William E. Klingshirn
Publisher: CUA Press
ISBN: 0813214866
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 357

Book Description
Written by experts in the field, the essays in this volume examine the early Christian book from a wide range of disciplines: religion, art history, history, Near Eastern studies, and classics.

Writing the History of Early Christianity

Author: Markus Vinzent
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108480101
Category : Bibles
Languages : en
Pages : 493

Book Description
Brings a new approach to the interpretation of the sources used to study the Early Christian era - reading history backwards. This book will interest teachers and students of New Testament studies from around the world of any denomination, and readers of early Christianity and Patristics.

Jesus and the Rise of Early Christianity

Author: Paul Barnett
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 9780830826995
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 452

Book Description
Paul Barnett not only places the New Testament within the world of caesars and Herods, proconsuls and Pharisees, Sadducee and revolutionaries, but argues that the mainspring and driving force of early Christian history is the historical Jesus.

Books and Readers in the Early Church

Author: Harry Y. Gamble
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 9780300069181
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 356

Book Description
This fascinating and lively book provides the first comprehensive discussion of the production, circulation, and use of books in early Christianity. It explores the extent of literacy in early Christian communities; the relation in the early church between oral tradition and written materials; the physical form of early Christian books; how books were produced, transcribed, published, duplicated, and disseminated; how Christian libraries were formed; who read the books, in what circumstances, and to what purposes. Harry Y. Gamble interweaves practical and technological dimensions of the production and use of early Christian books with the social and institutional history of the period. Drawing on evidence from papyrology, codicology, textual criticism, and early church history, as well as on knowledge about the bibliographical practices that characterized Jewish and Greco-Roman culture, he offers a new perspective on the role of books in the first five centuries of the early church.

Backgrounds of Early Christianity

Author: Everett Ferguson
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 9780802822215
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 676

Book Description
New to this expanded & updated edition are revisions of Ferguson's original material, updated bibliographies, & a fresh dicussion of first century social life, the Dead Sea Scrolls & much else.

Early Christianity in Contexts

Author: William Tabbernee
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1441245715
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 737

Book Description
This major work draws on current archaeological and textual research to trace the spread of Christianity in the first millennium. William Tabbernee, an internationally renowned scholar of the history of Christianity, has assembled a team of expert historians to survey the diverse forms of early Christianity as it spread across centuries, cultures, and continents. Organized according to geographical areas of the late antique world, this book examines what various regions looked like before and after the introduction of Christianity. How and when was Christianity (or a new form or expression of it) introduced into the region? How were Christian life and thought shaped by the particularities of the local setting? And how did Christianity in turn influence or reshape the local culture? The book's careful attention to local realities adds depth and concreteness to students' understanding of early Christianity, while its broad sweep introduces them to first-millennium precursors of today's variegated, globalized religion. Numerous photographs, sidebars, and maps are included.

The First Thousand Years

Author: Robert Louis Wilken
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300118848
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Book Description
Describes the first 1,000 years of Christian history, from the early practices and beliefs through the conversion of Constantine as well as documenting its growth to communities in Ethiopia, Armenia, Central Asia, India and China.

Medieval Christianity

Author: Kevin Madigan
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300158726
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 512

Book Description
A new narrative history of medieval Christianity, spanning from A.D. 500 to 1500, focuses on the role of women in Christianity; the relationships among Christians, Jews and Muslims; the experience of ordinary parishioners; the adventure of asceticism, devotion and worship; and instruction through drama, architecture and art.

Medicine and Health Care in Early Christianity

Author: Gary B. Ferngren
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421420066
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 261

Book Description
Drawing on New Testament studies and recent scholarship on the expansion of the Christian church, Gary B. Ferngren presents a comprehensive historical account of medicine and medical philanthropy in the first five centuries of the Christian era. Ferngren first describes how early Christians understood disease. He examines the relationship of early Christian medicine to the natural and supernatural modes of healing found in the Bible. Despite biblical accounts of demonic possession and miraculous healing, Ferngren argues that early Christians generally accepted naturalistic assumptions about disease and cared for the sick with medical knowledge gleaned from the Greeks and Romans. Ferngren also explores the origins of medical philanthropy in the early Christian church. Rather than viewing illness as punishment for sins, early Christians believed that the sick deserved both medical assistance and compassion. Even as they were being persecuted, Christians cared for the sick within and outside of their community. Their long experience in medical charity led to the creation of the first hospitals, a singular Christian contribution to health care. "A succinct, thoughtful, well-written, and carefully argued assessment of Christian involvement with medical matters in the first five centuries of the common era . . . It is to Ferngren's credit that he has opened questions and explored them so astutely. This fine work looks forward as well as backward; it invites fuller reflection of the many senses in which medicine and religion intersect and merits wide readership."—Journal of the American Medical Association "In this superb work of historical and conceptual scholarship, Ferngren unfolds for the reader a cultural milieu of healing practices during the early centuries of Christianity."—Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith "Readable and widely researched . . . an important book for mission studies and American Catholic movements, the book posits the question of what can take its place in today's challenging religious culture."—Missiology: An International Review Gary B. Ferngren is a professor of history at Oregon State University and a professor of the history of medicine at First Moscow State Medical University. He is the author of Medicine and Religion: A Historical Introduction and the editor of Science and Religion: A Historical Introduction.