The First One Hundred Years of Christianity
Udo Schnelle
The First One Hundred years of Christianity: An Introduction to its History, Literature, and Development.
Trans. James W. Thompson.
Grand Rapids: Baker, 2019.
Okay, I know I’m five years late to this party, but I’ve long had Schnelle’s book on my to-read list.
There is something wonderful about seeing how a scholar understands each bit of the New Testament in the larger theatre of the emergence of Christianity in the first century. Schnelle is a scholar who has specialized in John and Paul and so this book shows how he packages them together in the story of the early church.
He covers A LOT of ground including history writing, historical context, the Easter events and their aftermath, the Jerusalem church, the Jerusalem council, the mission of Paul, the events of 70 AD, the formation of the Gospels, internal divisions and external threats, the persecution of Christians, and transition to the ancient church.
It is very German in terms of its style of argumentation and second literature, yet that does not detract from a formidable range of knowledge covered from Platonic philosophy to imperial cults, and great depth in covering things like the problem of the delay of the parousia to the rise of an incipient gnosticism.
Perhaps what was most interesting was Schnelle’s “Fifteen reasons for the Success of Early Christianity,” which include:
The Roman Empire was a unified cultural and political theatre that few borders between regions.
The Greek language provided a lingua franca for the eastern Mediterranean.
The utility of pre-existing social and intellectual infrastructure provided by Hellenistic Judaism.
Most Greco-Roman religions were regional rather than universal in their appeal.
The appeal of monotheism to ancient peoples.
Christianity was not about religious participation but about an exclusive personal commitment to a deity.
The ability to connect Jewish and Greco-Roman streams of tradition.
A highly mobile network of itinerant leaders with a robust supporting base to support “mission.”
Christians were able to translate and transport their faith easily to new cities due to their networking.
A novel teaching about love and new social forms.
House churches with their rituals, mutuality, and corporate love created a distinct identity and intense forms of solidarity.
Development of a literary culture in the form of interpreting old texts (LXX) and writing new texts (Gospels).
The ability of Christianity to diversify into several different streams.
The formation of several urban nodes in Jerusalem, Galilee, Antioch, and Ephesus made it possible to diversify and mutually reinforce each community.
Belief in the direct accessibility of God without a priestly class, instead there was a democratization of the faith open to all, with eternal life opened to all as well.
I’d argue that some of the points might be distinctive of Christianity, but are not necessarily unique to Christianity. Some people like Aristides had a very intense love of his main deity Asclepius! And the last point does sound very, very Protestant over and against the impersonal rituals of (supposedly) Judaism, paganism, and Catholicism.
Otherwise, this is a very good book, it has a wealth of information, it maps out the details and the big picture of the early church, and is a learned analysis of the first Christian century.