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For centuries into the Common Era, Christians faced social
ostracism and suspicion from neighbors and authorities alike. At
times, this antipathy erupted into violence. Following Christ was a
risky allegiance: to be a Christian in the Roman Empire carried
with it the implicit risk of being branded a traitor to cultural
and imperial sensibilities. The prolonged experience of distrust,
oppression, and outright persecution helped shape the ethos of the
Christian faith and produced a wealth of literature commemorating
those who gave their lives in witness to the gospel.Wolfram Kinzig,
in Christian Persecution in Antiquity, examines the motivations and
legal mechanisms behind the various outbursts of violence against
Christians, and chronologically tracks the course of Roman
oppression of this new religion to the time of Constantine. Brief
consideration is also given to persecutions of Christians outside
the borders of the Roman Empire. Kinzig analyzes martyrdom accounts
of the early church, cautiously drawing on these ancient voices
alongside contemporary non-Christian evidence to reconstruct the
church's experience as a minority sect. In doing so, Kinzig
challenges recent reductionist attempts to dismantle the idea that
Christians were ever serious targets of intentional violence. While
martyrdom accounts and their glorification of self-sacrifice seem
strange to modern eyes, they should still be given credence as
historical artifacts indicative of actual events, despite them
being embellished by sanctified memory. Newly translated from the
German original by Markus Bockmuehl and featuring an additional
chapter and concise notes, Christian Persecution in Antiquity fills
a gap in English scholarship on early Christianity and offers a
helpful introduction to this era for nonspecialists. Kinzig makes
clear the critical role played by the experience of persecution in
the development of the church's identity and sense of belonging in
the ancient world.
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