The Diversity of Early Christianity.....................................................

Lecture 6

I

n the last lecture, we discussed the important role played by the apostle
Paul in the explosive expansion of Christianity across the Roman Empire
in the middle decades of the 1st century. Because his letters occupy such
an important part of the New Testament and because he is the great hero of
the Book of Acts, it is tempting to elevate Paul’s historical importance to the
level of his canonical (or literary) prominence. But it is an important function
of historical study to correct simplistic and distorted views of the past. In
this lecture, we will look at other manifestations of earliest Christianity
witnessed by the New Testament.

Popular Perceptions of Early Christianity
• Popular perceptions of Christianity’s first decades tend to be
simplistic and distorting.
o Consider, for example, the view that Jesus was the real “founder
of Christianity” and that Paul distorted the Jesus movement
because of his own sick personality or, more benignly, the
view that Paul is the real “inventor of the Christ cult.” Both
distort by oversimplifying: There were many more players than
just these two. Indeed, the Book of Acts itself places Paul in
the midst of a larger and more complex movement involving
many people.

o Similarly distorted is the view that the first decades of

Christianity generated a wild diversity of writings but that

all the interesting versions were eliminated at the Council of

Nicaea. Once more, the view distorts by oversimplifying. There

were other gospel accounts in addition to the four canonical

Gospels, but none was earlier, and most were far from being

more interesting.

•    A more adequate historical account is almost always one that

respects complexity.