After Jesus Before Christianity

A major premise of the book is that the idea that Christianity was a well formed, unified community with a clear corpus of beliefs that were universally accepted is unfounded. They talk instead about a multiplicity of kinds of groups/gatherings. These groups reflect a diverse set of ideas, practices, and beliefs. A provocative challenge in the approach of this book is that they ask the question: “what if Christianity died in the fourth or fifth centuries after it began? How would that change how historians see and understand its first two hundred years?” Implicit in these questions is the obvious burden for any modern adherent of religion: Is what I experience today as Christianity the same as what the first followers experienced and understood?

Of particular interest to me were the parts of the book that challenged word usage and formation. For instance, the suggestion that transliterated words are unhelpful in many instances. “Christ” is a transliteration of Christos (Χριστός) and is more appropriately translated “anointed one” as opposed to Christ. This feels self evident, even the most conservative of scholars would not object to this translating this word instead of transliterating it. But for some reason, many of our English translations transliterate this word, surely as a result of some developed tradition. But does this give us the right feel of the word? To broaden the conversation, the word “Christian” would generally be understood to describe religious followers of Jesus. But if we compare it to other words from the time, like “Herodian” (belonging to the party of Herod), the best understanding of the word “Christian” would be, “belonging to the party of Christ.” This translation opens the possibility that the nature of following Jesus in the early part of the development of Christianity may have had more political overtones than we have entertained previously.

Other words that are discussed are the terms “baptism” (which they assign the primary meaning of “bath'), “kingdom” which contextually may be better translated “empire,” and “Judean” which often is translated “Jew” or “Jewish.”

Other subjects I found intriguing:

- Early expressions of “Christianity” are many times reactions to the violence of the Roman empire
- The death of Jesus should be seen in light of the noble deaths of antiquity and that the death of Socrates is a template for these kinds of deaths
- Gnosticism has been misrepresented in our common descriptions and definitions
- Many of our texts fit into the category of Hidden or Secret Texts that use code to speak out against the powers that be. Demon possession was a common vehicle for these hidden messages.

I took Sue Monk Kidd's advice in the preface to this book, and I found it rewarding:

“Whether your relationship to the Christian religion is deep, shallow, past, present, or nil, the way you read this book matters. If you do so while loving the questions, the book will plunge you into the freedom of unknowing.” I “tried to love the questions” that it raised. I was not disappointed, I have a lot more questions.

Read my full review