The Spread Of Christianity And Christianity

Christianity began its succession into the most dominant worldwide religion after Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. “We heard Him say, ‘I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days build another made without hands.” Upon Jesus’ death and resurrection, he completed this task setting forth the development of Christianity. Since Jesus left no formal authoritative power, organization, or agreed upon scriptures, a wide variety of sects gained popularity in the development of Christianity. Most of these sects were later deemed as heretic, one of the most notable being Gnosticism. Gnosticism was a dualist religion believing the material world evil and the invisible spirit realm good. This belief obligated Gnosticism to follow Docetic interpretations. Docetism is the belief that Jesus was never truly man but rather a divine from the spirit world. All forms of Christianity, however, believe Jesus is son of God sent as humanity’s savior from damnation. Docetism, along with other aspects of Gnosticism, drove other Christians condemn Gnosticism as heresy. Gnosticism, however, is more comparable to Canonical Christians than realized. Specifically, the distinction between Docetism and strict Canonical belief is not only insignificant but also justifiable due to Canonical contradictions surrounding Jesus’ existence.

Several factors contributing to the rapid spread of Christianity from the period ca. 50 to 500 CE but, among the more influential were political and social conflict, missionary work, word of mouth, and women in leadership. Starting as a Jewish sect, Christianity gradually began to attract those outside of the Jewish heritage. Though the first few centuries of this movement were anything but glamorous, both Jewish and Gentile Christians remained steadfast. The ecclesiastical works of the early Church Fathers offer solace to such who were continually persecuted, a people of lower society status or even slaves. During this era, the dissimilation of subversive ministries advanced the appeal of Christianity by challenging previously established social order and its structures of power, authority, and hierarchy. By late 300 CE, Christianity had revolutionized and was adopted as the universal religion of the Roman Empire as a result of the conversion of its emperor. Thus the strength behind Christian communities lead to the discovery and conversion of indigenous cultures around the world using force, wealth, missionary work, and the gospel.

The conditions in the Roman Empire were optimal for the development of what is now a prevalent and well established religion. Many factors were influential in the development of Christianity in Rome, and they all were successful in their own way. From Constantine to Paul, and the people their messages reached throughout the empire, they were all united under one

A lot of Jewish Christians were seen as traitors for fleeing after the revolt between the Jews and Romans. Jewish Christians diminished and made their way for a separate Christian Church. The Jews and Christians did not associate with each other and developed a separate identity. By this, they celebrated the Lords day on Sunday and the Eucharist every week instead of once a year. Becoming larger and more complex, centralized authority became stronger and bishops were acting more like Kings who could decide right from wrong. The early church now tried to bring their faith to others, which in return, was extremely difficult. When introducing Christianity to the Greeks, the Christian people brought up some Greek ideas and made a systematic Christianity with philosophical ideas. For the Romans, they brought in political identity and focused on form and rite instead of spiritual teachings. From this, Christians in the Roman Empire suffered severe persecution, because they refused to believe in the Roman Gods. Bibles were burned and bishops were killed in hopes to end Christianity in the Roman

Christianity was born and flourished in an empire where the common language was Latin and Greek. Two important people like Paul and Constantine further influenced and were a major part of the development of Christianity. The history of the Jews leading up to the time of Jesus had a major impact on the development of Christianity. “When Christianity was clearly identified as a distant religion, the new religion was considered by its members to be the fulfillment of Judaism rather than a new religion.” “Since Jesus was a Jew and preached to the Jews, Christianity was closely linked to Judaism.” The development of Christianity was due to several historical, political, and social circumstances.

The spread of Islam and Christianity. Both belief systems spread both rapidly and were efficient religions that brought great change for the greater good. They were the largest religions in the entire world and both happened to be monotheistic. Both religions share a similar history and tradition. Christianity appealed to the people because of their unwillingness to live on and how hopeless they were to move forward in poverty. Travel played an enormous role in conversion because of the missionaries sent out to unknown lands to spread the faith through trading routes (Christianity) and contacts (Islam). Islam prospered, on the other hand, with a vision of the angel Gabriel from Muhammed (became a god messenger and prophet of Allah). Interactions with other civilizations developed the Islamic World. These new religions led to more growth in the aspects of their social, economic, and political systems in addition to influencing other upcoming religions in history.

Throughout history many universal religions have spread throughout the world. From cities to cities, countries to countries and so on. Christianity and Buddhism are two of the top universal religions that were practiced and spread throughout the early world. A series of events lead to the early and quick spread of Christianity and Buddhism throughout the early world. As turmoil engulfed the Jews in Judea, Christianity arose. The teaching of Christianity began with a Jew named Jesus. At the age of 30, Jesus began preaching the word of God to villagers near the Sea of Galilee. As Jesus preached, significant amounts of groups crowded around him to learn about his teachings, especially when word spread that he had performed acts of healing. Soon Jesus later formed a group of disciples or close followers to help spread his teachings.

Christianity and the Roman Empire shared an important bond. Christianity offered the Roman Empire joy, hope, a shift in their world view, and a monotheistic God. Rome offered Christianity a more efficient way of spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Factors Which Led to the Spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire Christianity was not born in a vacumn. There were many social, geographical, historical and religious issues prevailing at the time of Christ and all of which were favorable to the spread of Christianity. Geograpicly, Christianity came into being in the Meditation world, the largest of the various centers of civilization at that time. Israel stands almost central to the five continents, dividing the east and west.

As Christianity was spread throughout Rome, people began to question the teachings of Jesus. Out of fear, officials arrested and killed a multitude of Christians as a result. The everyday plebeian became impressed with these people dying for a belief. Although persecutions became more common, the number of Christians stayed the same and maybe even grew because of the influx of polytheistic Romans converting to the monotheistic religion of Christianity. People were converting quicker than they were being killed off because of the likeable teachings of love, the bravery of these people dying because of what they believed in, and their appealing message to those not in the affluent classes.

Throughout history, Christianity always had a reputation, or a “name” following it. Different perspectives approached the reputation that was attached to Christianity in different manners. Justin Martyr and Porphyry had objectives when defining whether this “name” really defined Christianity and the past. They wondered whether the past really represented Christianity. Additionally they honed in on the question of was the past that people represented as Christianity really the roots of Christianity? All around Porphyry and Justin was perceptions of what Christianity rooted from and stood for.

Before the predominance of Christianity as a world religion, a majority of the peoples of Europe and throughout the world acknowledged and worshiped a multitude of spirits. The Romans and the Greeks believed in a pantheon of gods while the Celts in the British Isles believed in the wildfolk or Faeries. These are just some examples of cultures who worshiped multiple beings. It would also be these same people who would be condemned for their beliefs and labeled by Christians as Heathens and Pagans. Christian missionaries would attempt to stamp out these old beliefs by tearing down pagan temples, cutting sacred trees, and replacing those beliefs with their own. However, the belief in faeries would remain largely intact in the British Isle due to the fact that it was so deeply ingrain in locals’ beliefs systems which can still be seen today through surviving records, ballads, and stories about fairies.

Christianity was unlike other religions of the time in that it was a monotheistic worship though transcendentalism. The religions of Northern and Central Europe focused on gods in nature that explained the world around them. Christianity does not allow an explanation of this life, only that of existence in itself and the afterlife. The religions of these people at the time was also not as much a worship and commitment as that of the Christian religion. It is actually a great surprise to anyone that studies these religions as to how it could be that a religion that focused on piety, abstinence outside of marriage, and loving one’s enemy would be more fruitful a religion than the religions of Europe at that time that promoted feasts and festivals with excessive food, drink, and even orgies. The most compelling answer is that

Christianity did not spread very quickly initially, but in the 2nd century it spread like a wildfire. The spread of the religion was rapid and was due to many factors. Christianity spread due to its universality, its familiarity to the Roman people, and the fact that it gave people hope. Christianity gave something to the people of the Roman Empire that they had never experienced before. Although Jesus was dead, his teachings were still very much alive and thriving within his followers. This is evident in Christianity’s expansion throughout the Roman Empire.

One influential cult was based upon a mystical interpretation of Plato. Neo-Platonism was like a rational science that attempted to break down and describe every aspect of the divine essence and its relationship with the human soul. An Alexandrian Jew named Philo tried using Greek philosophy to interpret the Jewish scriptures. He wanted to unite the two traditions by suggesting that the Greek philosophers had been inspired by the same God who had revealed himself to the Jews.