{"product_id":"after-jesus-before-christianity-a-historical-exploration-of-the-first-two-centuries-of-jesus-movements-isbn-9780063062153","title":"After Jesus Before Christianity: A Historical Exploration of the First Two Centuries of Jesus Movements","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFrom the creative minds of the scholarly group behind the groundbreaking Jesus Seminar comes this provocative work of early church history—an eye-opening look at the roots of Christianity that offers a thoughtful reconsideration of the first two centuries of the Jesus movement, transforming our understanding of the religion and its early dissemination.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eChristianity has endured for more than two millennia and is practiced by billions worldwide today. Yet that longevity has created difficulties for scholars tracing the religion’s roots, distorting much of the historical investigation into the world of the New Testament and the first two centuries of the Jesus movement. But 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?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eConsidering these questions, three Bible scholars from the Westar Institute summarize the work of the Christianity Seminar and its efforts to offer a new way of thinking about Christianity and its roots. Synthesizing the institute’s most recent scholarship—bringing together the many archaeological and textual discoveries about life in the Roman Empire over the last twenty years—they have found: \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThere were multiple Jesus movements, not a singular one, before the fourth century\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThere was nothing called Christianity until the third century\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThere was much more flexibility and diversity within Jesus’s movement before it became centralized in Rome, not only regarding the Bible and religious doctrine, but also understandings of gender, sexuality and morality.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003eExciting and revolutionary, \u003ci\u003eAfter Jesus Before Christianity\u003c\/i\u003e provides fresh insights into the real history behind how the Jesus movement became Christianity. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eAfter Jesus Before Christianity\u003c\/i\u003e includes more than a dozen black-and-white images throughout.\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e“This book is a work of genius. You are about to read a book that possesses the potential to rewrite history.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSue Monk Kidd, bestselling author of The Dance of the Dissident Daughter and The Secret Life of Bees\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"There have always been Jesus people who challenged the assumptions of Empire and created refuge for the oppressed. This noble effort to uncover movements that were silenced reminds me of the saints who sing, 'I know Jesus for myself.'\" - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBishop William J. Barber, II, President of Repairers of the Breach and author, We Are Called To Be A Movement\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"With a prose cool, clear, and crisp, a tone positive, powerful, and persuasive, and a vision confident, collective, and collegial, \u003cem\u003eAfter Jesus Before Christianity\u003c\/em\u003e is good news, truth, and joy—as Christianity itself should always be.\" - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJohn Dominic Crossan, author of The Birth of Christianity and Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Well-conceived, well-organized, honestly and bravely argued. It provokes consideration of what persistently haunts us as moderns.\" - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eVincent L. Wimbush, Director of the Institute for Signifying Scriptures\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e“After Jesus Before Christianity \u003c\/em\u003edescribes a time of widespread resistance to violence and oppression in the ancient world while also providing models of hope for modern day seekers of justice and wholesome spirituality.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eChebon Kernell, executive secretary of Native American and Indigenous Ministries, United Methodist Church\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A ground-breaking, truth-telling account of the development of early Christianity, a must read and will have implications for generations.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLiz Theoharis, director of the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights, and Social Justice at Union Theological Seminary\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Here is a room full of forgotten stories about what it once meant to follow Jesus. Some are so strange that they tell me what a stranger I have become to my own faith. Others are so compelling that they refresh my sense of what this faith asks of me.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBarbara Brown Taylor, author of Holy Envy\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Reading this book is like finding a secret staircase to a room full of forgotten stories about what it once meant to follow Jesus. Some are so strange that they tell me what a stranger I have become to my own faith. Others are so compelling that they refresh my sense of what faith asks of me. In every case, they remind me how much my Christian story hangs on my grasp of Christian history--a relationship that is always in need of the kind of renewal offered in this book.\"   - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBarbara Brown Taylor, author of Holy Envy\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Tracing the early history of Christianity from Jesus to Constantine, this book serves as an excellent preparation for the emergence of Christendom. Its timing is auspicious, given the current confusion in America about the definition of Christianity and the relations between Christianity, culture, and society.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBurton L. Mack, author of The Lost Gospels\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"HarperOne","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44889574473957,"sku":"NP9780063062153","price":29.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780063062153.jpg?v=1730231526","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/after-jesus-before-christianity-a-historical-exploration-of-the-first-two-centuries-of-jesus-movements-isbn-9780063062153","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}