Why would people continue to join a small cult which was punishable by death? Was the real Christian movement replaced by a controlled opposition faction that was allowed to exist and would therefore defeat the true Christian faith? Example of what I mean is proto-Orthodoxy being made legal and supported in order to kill the Gnostic factions.
>>18628056Christianity wasn't always punishable by death, that depended on the emperor. It wasn't even punishable in every corner of the Roman Empire.Furthermore, defining it merely as a small cult gives it a dark connotation. Like any religion, it fostered community, with all that entails. You suddenly find yourself with a group of people in your town or city who are likely to help you with some financial or personal problem because you share a religion.And I don't know much about the religions of that time, and while Christianity was one of the few that enjoyed this characteristic, the fact that Christianity wasn't exclusive in its beginnings must have been appealing. People of any social class, gender, or background could theoretically be Christian. It was simply a matter of enduring the difficult times as a minority religion for it to survive
>>18628056The Bible itself. Early Christianity was an overglorified book club, Biblical texts were shared and passed around amongst early religious scholars and this became the basis for the Nicene Creed and its attempts at forming a Canon around them. Then Jews got jealous and responded with the Talmud
>>18628310the bible didn't even exist during early christianity
