The First 150 Years of Christianity

Summary

A portrait of Christianity's first 150 years (roughly AD 50–200) seen largely through Roman eyes — especially the letter the governor Pliny the Younger wrote to the Emperor Trajan asking how to handle this puzzling new sect. It explores who the first Christians were, why they unsettled Roman society, what actually happened in their gatherings, how they responded to local persecution, and why — against every expectation — people kept converting to a faith that could cost them their lives.

Key Points

A strange new movement

• The earliest surviving image of Jesus is a piece of mocking graffiti from around AD 200 on Rome's Palatine Hill: a man with a donkey's head on a cross, with a jeer at a Christian named Alexamenos for "worshiping his God."
• Christianity began with a Jewish boy born in Bethlehem — said to be the Son of God, born of a virgin, who taught love of God and neighbor, was crucified, and (Christians believed) rose after three days and ascended into heaven.
• In some ways this wasn't wholly alien to Romans, who knew tales of divine sons walking the earth — Perseus born of a virgin, Asclepius the miraculous healer, Hercules who suffered, died, and was deified — and saw their own emperors as sons of the gods.
• But worshiping a crucified criminal was deeply unsettling, and the worshipers themselves — meeting in secret, winning converts fast, destabilizing the social order — made Rome nervous.

Pliny's problem (112)

• Around AD 112 Pliny the Younger, governor of Bithynia-Pontus in northern Turkey, wrote to Emperor Trajan for advice as people kept denouncing members of this new sect to be tried in court.
• Christians refused to take part in core elements of Roman life: they wouldn't offer sacrifices, salute shrines, attend festivals, go to the theater or games, take public office, or even accept many dinner invitations — because all of it involved honoring the Roman gods.
• To officials this wasn't merely antisocial but dangerous. The historian Tacitus accused Christians of "hatred of humanity"; to Romans they were atheists whose refusal to worship the gods risked divine punishment for everyone — and they seemed to be everywhere and growing.

Christians could be anyone

• The faith had spread far beyond its Jewish origins in Jerusalem; the apostles carried Jesus' message across the empire and beyond, and large numbers of Gentiles were converting.
• Interrogating Christians, Pliny met a striking cross-section: city and country people, men and women, slaves and Roman citizens, the poor and also the wealthy and highly educated — including trained philosophers and lawyers like Justin Martyr and Minucius Felix who wrote intellectual defenses of the faith.
• This diversity alarmed a rigidly stratified Rome. Christians called one another "brothers and sisters" across class and status lines — Pliny even interrogated two female slaves who were apparently community leaders — replacing the natural social order with new religious bonds.

Frightening rumors

• Because Christians met in secret, lurid rumors spread: that they conspired against the emperor, and even that they tricked new members into eating children disguised as bread and licking up blood.
• Convinced these were capital crimes, Pliny set out to discover what really happened in their meetings.

Inside an early gathering

• Drawing on Pliny's letter and early Christian documents, the video reconstructs a typical service: believers gathering before dawn on Sunday, at a home or in the open country, led by an overseer (episcopos) appointed in succession from the apostles.
• They prayed the prayer Jesus taught, turned to face the sunrise, and sang a hymn honoring Jesus as Lord and God. Someone then read aloud — from the Jewish Scriptures (the Old Testament) where they saw prophecies of Jesus, or from the apostles' accounts; sometimes an elder retold stories he'd heard from the apostles in person, for hours.
• A leader gave practical teaching on Jesus' commands — especially loving enemies and giving to all who ask — and the meeting closed with a collection for widows, orphans, the sick, prisoners, and visitors.
• These morning gatherings were open to all; converts were baptized outdoors in running water "in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." A smaller, baptized-only meeting gathered later — the one all the rumors were about.

What the secret meal really was

• For all Pliny's interrogations, the dreaded "mysteries" turned out to be a thanksgiving meal with bread and wine the Christians called the body and blood of Jesus — no children hidden in bread.
• Far from killing children, Christians were known for rescuing and raising abandoned Roman babies, rejecting the common practice of exposing unwanted infants.
• Their way of life flowed from their teaching: a loving God who demanded love even of enemies, rejection of magic and violence, care for the sick, and a notably restrained sexual ethic. Even critics like the physician Galen and the satirist Lucian pitied and admired how Christians actually lived these ideals — making the community seem both frightening and strangely attractive.

Local persecution and the resurrection

• Trajan replied that Christians shouldn't be hunted down, but if publicly accused and unwilling to recant, they could be executed for the name "Christian" alone.
• There was no empire-wide persecution in these first two centuries, but local outbreaks were brutal — most notably under Nero around AD 64, who had Christians burned alive, torn apart by dogs, and crucified. Such efforts often backfired, drawing public sympathy and strengthening the communities.
• Christianity undercut Rome's usual tool of social control: the threat of death. Because their God had died and risen and promised the same to them, death had lost its sting. By the end of the second century, Christian courage in the face of death was among their most-noted qualities.
• Notably, Pliny's region was where Christians had earlier received the letter we know as 1 Peter, which urges believers to persevere and even rejoice in suffering for the name of Christ.

Why people kept converting

• Conversion was costly — it could mean losing friends and family even when it didn't mean death — yet people kept joining for many reasons.
• Jewish believers were convinced Jesus was the promised Messiah; intellectuals like Justin were drawn to the philosophical depth, seeing currents like Plato's single good Creator pointing toward Jesus; others found dignity and purpose in the communities' radical inclusivity; many were drawn by the hope of forgiveness and life beyond death.
• Running through their surviving writings is the conviction that they had personally encountered the living, risen Jesus — seeing his crucifixion not as defeat but as ultimate love, and his resurrection as proof of his divinity.
• By the year 200 there were perhaps 200,000 Christians across the Roman Empire, with still more spread through the Parthian Empire from Mesopotamia and Persia to Ethiopia and possibly India — an endurance Pliny and Trajan could never have predicted.

Notable Quotes

"Do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal… if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name." — 1 Peter 4:12, 16

"They were in the habit of meeting on a fixed day before dawn and singing… a hymn to Christ, as to a god." — Pliny the Younger, reporting to Trajan on Christian worship (c. AD 112)