A Quote by Larry Hurtado
In Destroyer of the gods I focus on several major features of early Christianity that made it distinctive, even odd or bizarre .We don't today realize just how different early Christianity was in that context.
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Galen's observations reflect one of the distinctive features of early Christianity. Roman-era religion was mainly about ritual actions vis-à-vis the gods, and there was little to do with ordering behavior otherwise.
In those early centuries of Christianity,
Christianity did not go into the world apologizing. It went to slay the powers
of darkness and undo the works of the devil, and it lived in holy triumph.
A Christianity that does not have as its primary focus the deepening of passions for God is a false Christianity, no matter how zealously it seeks conversions or how forcefully it advocates righteous behavior.
True Christianity today is not different from primitive Christianity ... She remains what she has been since her foundation: always the same.
The idea that Christianity is basically a religion of moral improvement... has its roots in the liberal Protestantism of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century... It is this stereotype which continues to have influence today... But then came the First World War... What had gone wrong was that the idea of sin had been abandoned by liberal Christianity as some kind of unnecessary hangover from an earlier and less enlightened period in Christian history.
The Nazi regime intended eventually to destroy Christianity in Germany, if it could, and substitute the old paganism of the early Germanic gods and the new paganism of the Nazi extremists.
With an abstract idea it is possible to enter into a relation of formal knowledge, to become enthusiastic about it, and perhaps even to put it into practice; but it can never be followed in personal obedience. Christianity without the living Christ is inevitably Christianity without discipleship, and Christianity without discipleship is always Christianity without Christ.
Let us remember that every worldview-not just Christianity's-must give an explanation or an answer for evil and suffering...this is not just a problem distinctive to Christianity. It will not do for the challenger just to raise the question. This problem of evil is one to which we all must offer an answer, regardless of the belief system to which we subscribe.
Early Christianity, like Roman-era philosophical traditions, laid emphasis on everyday behavior, about how to live your life.
My parents were early converts to Christianity in my part of Nigeria. They were not just converts; my father was an evangelist, a religious teacher. He and my mother traveled for thirty-five years to different parts of Igboland, spreading the gospel.
In America, about the only thing censored today is Christianity, the same Christianity that was the driving force behind the building of this great nation.
There is a reason Christianity is violently opposed in our world while other religions and philosophies are tolerated... Biblical Christianity evokes violent responses from some people, because only in Christianity is there an absolute right and wrong. People hate the Bible and Christianity because of the law of God.
When I recall today my early youth, I should take the boy that I then was, with the exception of a few individual features, for a different person, were it not for the existence of the chain of memories.
What is clear is that the Gospel of Judas has joined the other spectacular discoveries that are exploding the myth of a monolithic Christianity and showing how diverse and fascinating the early Christian movement really was.
To me, the Craft is what Christianity was 2,000 years ago. It was a religion that was not corrupted. I personally think Jesus was a Crafter. We believe in all the things that he spoke of. The early Christians believed in reincarnation, and that was later removed from the belief system. Early Christians had a female Divinity, and that was taken out of their belief system, or as with Catholicism, replaced with Mary. Look at how incredible the growth in devotion of Mary is. It's amazing. The desire for a female Divinity is not just Wiccan. It speaks of a global need.
If you take away the Jewish contribution to Christianity, there would be no Christianity. Judaism does not need Christianity to explain its existence; Christianity, however, cannot explain its existence without Judaism.
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