Clivedurdle

It was very forced - look up about Ambrose, and Gore Vidal, Julian.

The xians then under Constantine were a proto Taliban. The true gods were defenceless

No Robots

[P]hilosophical speculation could not avoid being seized by Christianity and by Christ, because by its very nature Christianity was originally not religion at all, but mysticism; Christ was not the founder of a religion but the mystical genius at the height of perfection, the appearance of the Spirit in a man, such as Greece and Rome had never seen. The phenomenon of Christ, the prophetic man, was so unlike that of a founder of a religion, that ancient speculation, far from showing hostility, actually identified the phenomenon with its own most sublime abstraction, the Logos, as early as the beginning of the second century.—Constantin Brunner, Our Christ, p. 330.

Tammuz

The philosophical discourses attracted mainly an intellectual elite among the Greeks and Romans. At this time, Greece proper as well as much of the Diadochi kingdoms had been conquered by the Romans.

Various mystery cults, such as the cults of Hercules, Isis, Mithras etc had appealed to the inhabitants of the Roman Empire for centuries. A large number of Greek-speakers also converted to Judaism (before the rise of Christianity I think).

Christianity emerged triumphant over Mithraism because the latter was a religion for soldiers, Christianity was more inclusive and had place also for the poor, slaves and women.

Clivedurdle

http://iidb.infidels.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=245630

OneInFundieville

Karen Armstrong. And this book is a must read.

A History of God (or via: amazon.co.uk)

One of my favourites.

DrZoidberg

Lost Christianities (or via: amazon.co.uk) is also great.


Karen Armstrong doesn't mention the alternative Christian sects that didn't make it so much. It's understandable since it'd be way too long if she did. But she should have, since it's important.

Lost Christianities explains the content of the other Bibles. When people mention "the Bible" or the various gospels it's often missed that the contents of these Gospels was very fluid up until the compilation of the Versio Vulgata.

The Gnostics, Ebionits, Marcionites and so on all had quotes from Jesus that were completely different from what's in the Bible today. And the accounts of Jesus' life is completely different.

All the earliest sects Bibles talk about Jesus' twin brother, Thomas and sometimes Juda. Where he dissapeared in later Bibles I guess is a political thing.

Anyhoo.... it's a great read if you're interested in Christianity. The author was an Evangelist at the time of research, so it's not a vitriolic attack on Christiainity. The author quite recently converted to agnosticism... So it's a solid bit of devout Christian research.