Book description
Geza Vermes, translator and editor of The Complete Dead Sea
Scrolls and worldwide expert on the life and times of Jesus, tells
the enthralling story of early Christianity and the origins of a
religion.
The creation of the Christian Church is one of the most important
stories in the development of the world's history, but also one of the
most enigmatic and little understood, shrouded in mystery and
misunderstanding. With a forensic, brilliant re-examination of all the
key surviving texts of early Christianity, Geza Vermes illuminates the
origins of a faith and traces the evolution of the figure of Jesus
from the man he was - a prophet fully recognisable as the successor to
other Jewish holy men of the Old Testament - to what he came to
represent: a mysterious, otherworldly being at the heart of a major
new religion. As Jesus's teachings spread across the eastern
Mediterranean, hammered into place by Paul, John and their successors,
they were transformed in the space of three centuries into a
centralised, state-backed creed worlds away from its humble origins.
Christian Beginnings tells the captivating story of how a man
came to be hailed as the Son consubstantial with God, and of how a
revolutionary, anti-conformist Jewish sub-sect became the official
state religion of the Roman Empire.
Reviews:
'A beautiful and magisterial book' Rowan Williams, Archbishop of
Canterbury, Guardian
'An exciting and challenging port of call, sweeping aside much of
the fuzzy thinking and special pleading that bedevils the study of
sacred scripture ... courteously expressed and witty' Diarmaid
MacCulloch, The Times
'A challenging and engaging book that sets out to
retrace the route by which a Jewish preacher in 1st-century Israel
came to be declared as consubstantial and co-equal with the
omnipotent, omniscient only God' Stuart Kelly, Scotsman
'A major contribution to our understanding of the historical
Jesus'
Financial Times
'A very accessible and entertaining read'
Scotland on Sunday Books of the Year
'A magnum opus of early Christian history and one of the
year's most significant titles'
Bookseller
Geza Vermes was born in Hungary in 1924. He studied in Budapest and
Louvain, and was the first Professor of Jewish Studies at Oxford. He is
one of the world's greatest experts on early Christianity and the Dead
Sea Scrolls.
