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The Birth of Christianity: Discovering What Happened in the Years Immediately after the Execution of Jesus (1998) is a book by John Dominic Crossan.

Abstract

"In this national bestseller, John Dominic Crossan, the world's leading expert on the historical Jesus, reveals how Christianity emerged in the period following Jesus' death. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, Crossan shines new light on the theological and cultural contexts from which the Christian church arose. He argues powerfully that Christianity would have happened with or without Paul and contends that Jesus' "resurrection" meant something vastly different for his early followers than it does for many traditional Christians today--what mattered was Christian origins finally illuminates the mysterious period that set Western religious history in its decisive course."--Publisher description.

Editions

Published in San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998.

Table of contents

• Preface: The Lost Years
• Prologue: The Content of Your Vision
• Part I: Continuation and Reconstruction
  • 1. Voices of the First Outsiders
  • 2. Reconstructing Earliest Christianity
• Part II: Memory and Orality
  • 3. The Mystique of Oral Tradition
  • 4. Does Memory Remember?
  • 5. A Tale of Two Professors
  • 6. Chasm or Interface?
• Part III: Gospels and Sources
  • 7. Admitting Gospel Presuppositions
  • 8. Relating Gospel Contents
  • 9. Comparing Gospel Manuscripts
• Part IV: Methodology and Anthropology
  • 10. The Problem of Methodology
  • 11. Cross-Cultural Anthropology
• Part V: History and Archaeology
  • 12. Judeo-Roman History
  • 13. Galilean Archaeology
• Part VI: Kingdom and Eschatology
  • 14. A Comparison of Two Early Gospels
  • 15. Apocalyptic and Ascetical Eschatology
  • 16. Ethical Eschatology
• Part VII: Healers and Itinerants
  • Prologue: The Meaning of Healing
  • 17. Negating Apocalyptic Eschatology
  • 18. Affirming Ethical Eschatology
  • Epilogue: The Social Status of Jesus
• Part VIII: Teachers and Householders
  • 19. Criticizing the Householders
  • 20. Controlling the Itinerants
  • 21. Interpreting the Commands
  • 22. A Divided Tradition
• Part IX: Meal and Community
  • 23. The Common Meal Tradition
  • 24. Communities of Resistance
• Part X: Story and Tradition
  • 25. The Other Passion-Resurrection Story
  • 26. Exegesis, Lament, and Biography
• Epilogue: The Character of Your God
• Appendixes

External links

• Google Books (partial text)