This is a woefully small historical record. Far from invalidating his historicity, though, this is precisely what we would expect. Jesus was (apparently) a devout Essene, similar to his older cousin John the Baptist. If we accept the gospel accounts of him (which differ from each other in a few details), he actively preached for only 3 years, & spent most of this time wandering the hinterlands of Palestine. He avoided population centers, namely Jerusalem, until the last few days of his life.
Thus, we should not expect that there would be much of a non-sacred record of his life. We're indeed lucky that we have Josephus's mention of him. While one might expect that his trial before Pilate would be recorded — well, it probably was, however, in 70 AD and again in 135 AD there were Jewish uprisings in Palestine, & these had to be put down by the Romans. Because of the sporadic fighting, few Roman records from that time survive.
I listed the date of Christ's birth as 1 AD, even though many historians argue that he was not born in this year, but rather probably as much as a generation prior. I cannot really address this, & in any event, such quibbling is beside the point of my essay. It doesn't matter if he was born in 4 BCE or 26 BCE or whenever — the world has arbitrarily decided that he was born in 1 AD & this is what has "stuck."
What I wish to point out is that Christ's historicity is something that pretty much is a matter of faith. The historic record is unlikely to produce much more evidence of his existence, because of the nature of the time & place & the nature of his own career. This is why I cannot really address the issue of Christ's historicity; the lack of a record of his life, oddly, both supports & undermines His historicity.
Among the early converts was a Jew named Saul, who was renamed Paul, the famed missionary who brought news of Christ to the Gentiles (non-Jews) & wrote so many epistles. A number of Greeks soon latched on to the movement, & in fact, within a few years, efforts to convert Jews essentially ground to a halt, due to their resistance & the Judaic priesthood's pressure against the Christians.
By the end of the 1st century there were small Christian enclaves in cities throughout the Near East, including some Greek cities in Anatolia, and major centers such as Antioch & Alexandria, as well as the major cities of Greece. Also, they had reached the middle of the Roman Empire, having an enclave in Rome and several other cities in Italy.
Generally, the Romans tolerated the mystery cults — so long as their members made proper observance to the Roman deities. Some, however, the Christians in particular, refused to do this. As a result, they were persecuted. Rome did not tolerate dissent, & many traditional Romans feared the wrath of the gods might descend on them, if these intransigents failed to make the proper observances.
Within the next century, Christianity had started to overtake the other mystery cults, & became the main object of derision for traditional Romans. The Christians had to worship in secret, or else they would be denounced to the authorities. Even so, the kinds of atrocities that we think of from this time period — Christians being thrown to the lions, crucified, etc. — was actually much less common than we think. What was more likely was, that if a Christian was exposed, he or she would be ostracized, unable to do business with anyone & unable to get by in the urban centers they tended to live in.
Constantine himself is recorded by some as having converted to Christianity, although he kept for himself the title pontifex maximus, or "high priest" of the (pagan) Roman religion — so it's doubtful that he did much more than just accept Christianity as a harmless faith. Regardless of whether or not Constantine actually converted to Christianity, he did do the still-young faith many favors, in addition to issuing an edict of tolarance; he donated lands to the Church & made an abortive attempt to resolve some of its theological conflicts (at the Council of Nicæa; see below).
In any event, Constantine's edict caused Christians to embark on a renewed period of missionizing. Within another two centuries, almost all of the cities of the Roman Empire were almost entirely Christian, & Christianity had made inroads in more remote, rural areas (although paganism persisted there for another couple of centuries yet). By the time Rome fell, and the last Emperor in the West was long gone, the Empire had more or less adopted Christianity as its chief religion.
Already by this time there was some theological conflict within the Church. The Arian heresy — the belief that Jesus had simply been a man, though totally innocent, & not actually the son of God — had been denounced at the Council of Nicæa in the 4th century (this is another of my "Greatest Moments in History." In the 5th century the canon of the New Testament had been decided, & the Bible translated into vulgar or "common" Latin, by St. Jerome. The Church Fathers had begun to develop the theology of the Trinity, established at Nicæa. The east was torn between "orthodox" Christianity & monophysitism, a belief which denied the Trinity, but didn't go as far as Arianism had in denying the divinity of Christ.
But as the 8th century ended, Christianity found itself under attack. Moslems had overrun Egypt, & converted that land to Islam at swordpoint, & had swept across Africa, & gone into Iberia. Charles "the Hammer" Martel, the leader of the Franks, defeated them in battle, keeping them out of modern France. In doing so he made himself a champion of Christianity. His successor Pepin later saved Rome from destruction by the Lombards, a Germanic tribe who had invaded Italy, & established the Pope — the Bishop or Patriarch of Rome — as the ruler of central Italy.
This had two primary ramifications. First, it later became the foundation of the German state which would come to be known as the Holy Roman Empire. Second, it was the beginning of an effort by the Popes to involve themselves in politics & try to shape Europe according to their wishes.
While the Carolingians & the Popes enjoyed a cozy relationship, later on, it would deteriorate. Holy Roman Emperors such as Henry IV attempted to limit the power of the Church; and many Popes, reliant on the Holy Roman Emperors for support, relied on them to the point where they became puppets. As the Church tried to rectify this situation, occasions arose wherein multiple Popes vied for control of the Church (usually, one chosen by the Emperor, another chosen by the clergy of Rome). Over the centuries the two basically eroded each other's own positions; later Holy Roman Emperors frequently had no power beyond their own personal holdings, & the Church lost some of its credibility — to the point where people like Martin Luther openly questioned its sanctity.
By this time, also, the monastic movement was alive & well & the Church. The monks, abbots & priors were the regular clergy, meaning they lived according to regulations or "Rules." These "Rules" were ascetic in nature; the monks lived a simple, ascetic lifestyle, usually apart from the rest of society (as much as they could, anyway). The monastic movement traced its roots to the work of St. Anthony, an Egyptian hermit & later a saint who lived in the late 3rd & early 4th century. Anthony's movement sputtered, until St. Benedict established an ascetic community near Monte Cassino in Italy, and established a list of formal rules of conduct, known as the Rule of St. Benedict. Early followers of Benedict brought their Rule, and the concept of ascetic communities, to all parts of Europe. Monasteries were founded as far away as England, before the end of the 6th century. By the 9th century, monasticism was a thriving movement which attracted many followers.
This was not a problem in the west, where the Popes' Carolingian alliance gave them political clout. In the east, the Patriarch of Constantinople was seen as the primary representative of the Church — not in the sense that he "governed" the Church, as the Popes sought to do, but in the sense that he was merely its chief representative, an "ambassador of goodwill," as the saying goes. In the east, the idea that the Church should be ruled, as a body, like a political state, was unacceptable.
Inevitably this led to a falling out, which culminated in the "Great Schism" of 1054, in which the eastern Church officially broke away from the Roman Church. From this time onward, one could no longer speak of the Christian Church, for there was no longer a single Church. Rather, there was the Roman Catholic Church, and the Orthodox Church, which — having rejected the notion of a supreme ecclesiastical chief — has since drifted apart into a number of Churches (the Russian Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox, Serb Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, etc.).
The next division in the Church — & by now I mean the Roman Church — was between the secular and regular clergy. The secular clergy, having gotten entwined into politics & economics, was seen by the regular clergy as corrupt & wayward. The Benedictine monks of the abbey Cluny in France in particular seem to have taken great offense to this. They began a movement, within the Roman Church, to have their ascetic ideals welded into the rest of the Church. This effort resulted in the appointment of a Cluniac monk as Pope, who took the name Gregory VII, in 1073.
This led to a succession of strong Cluniac Popes, who instituted several reforms — such as enforcing celibacy for all clergy — designed to bring the Church more in line with their ideas. Furthermore, they sought to use the Church's spiritual power to control political states. It was a Cluniac Pope, Innocent III, who eventually bested Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, and forced him to accept the Church's legal jurisdiction over the clergy & the appointment of bishops & other offices.
Movements such as the Crusades (which I discuss in another essay) showed the awesome power of the Church, to turn the tide of society.
Intellectualism within the Church became more prominent, as I described in another essay. Christian thought — & even "secular" ideas — began to grow and flourish, as never before.
At the close of the Middle Ages, the Church was a complicated organization, with a great deal of economic & political power & it exerted a great deal of control over people's lives. As this went on, discontent grew, both within & outside of the Church.
In 1302, Pope Boniface VIII issued a fateful bull (papal decree) declaring the office of Pope to be the ultimate spiritual & secular authority in Europe. This arrogant decree led to his overthrow & the papacy began to unravel as a result (this is yet another of my "Greatest Moments in History"). Ultimately, the discredited papacy engendered discontent, which led to the Reformation, arbtrarily said to have begun in the early 16th century when Martin Luther nailed his "Ninety-Five Theses" to the door of a German church. (This is yet another of those "Greatest Moment in History!")
For all that, however, the Catholic Church never regained its control over Christianity in western Europe. We are left today with a plethora of Christian denominations. While Roman Catholicism is the largest single Christian denomination, it consists of somewhat less than half of all Christians. The rest are in a bewildering array of other Protestant denominations.
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