The Triumph of Christianity

By: Bart D. Ehrman, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Professor Bart D. Ehrman

Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins

Publisher's summary

The growth of Christianity in the early centuries of the Common Era is one of the most extraordinary stories in world history. What began with a preaching day laborer and his dozen or so disciples soon grew to be the largest religion in the world, eventually taking over the entire Roman Empire. How did that happen? How was such a movement possible?

Over the years, scholars have offered a variety of theories, including:

• The nature of Christianity as both exclusive and evangelical
• The single-handed efforts of the Apostle Paul
• The appeal of the Christian message for pagan audiences
• The conversion of the Roman emperor Constantine

While all of these theories may have been involved, the rise of Christianity nonetheless feels like an impossibility. Delve into this fascinating occurrence in The Triumph of Christianity. Taught by Dr. Bart. D. Ehrman, these 24 investigative lectures trace the exponential growth of Christianity, from its origins in a Jewish outpost of the Roman Empire to its spread throughout the entire Western world.

In this extraordinary course, you will investigate the historical events that led to such an astonishing feat. With the objective eye of a historian, Bart takes you through the ancient Roman world, offering analysis on what we can know for sure and what lies in the realm of myth. While Bart is careful to delineate history from religion, he walks you through a number of theological discussions and debates around the nature of Christ, salvation, “end times”, and more.

Along the way, you will meet the historical Jesus and other figures from the beginnings of Christianity; learn about the Acts of the Apostles as they spread the message far and wide; see how the apocalyptic message of Jesus transformed into a theology of salvation; and witness the development of a unified church. From the message of Jesus of Nazareth to the beginnings of a Christian Roman Empire, The Triumph of Christianity provides new insights into one of the most compelling stories ever recorded.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2021 The Great Courses (P)2021 The Teaching Company, LLC

How Christianity Came to Dominate Rome

This book offers a great set of lectures describing how Christianity grew from a small group of illiterate day laborers to the dominant religion in the Roman Empire in just 400 years. Despite the title, this is not a parade of examples of how wonderful Christianity is—“triumph” is literal, not a qualitative judgment. Christianity did defeat its competitor religions even if most of them didn’t realize they were in competition with it.

There are a lot of highlights that really made this course stand out among the various Great Courses texts. For one thing, the author teaches students the majority of whom are evangelicals and he sprinkles his lectures with insights into how they view early Christianity. For example, they have a modern understanding of the term messiah, not the original Jewish understanding. (More on that later.) And like many religious adherents, they assume that their faith started in the same form it is in today. These points of understanding were useful starting places in shaking off the modern world to gain insight into how the ancients thought and reacted.

One of the strengths of the book is Erhman’s understanding of what it meant to be a pagan polytheist. They recognized many gods and did not seek to exclude the worship of other gods. This was a stark difference from the early Christians who actively sought to convert and get the converts to abandon all the other gods out there. This is, ultimately, why Christianity triumphed. Erhman quite clearly demonstrates how a very few number of converts each generation became millions over the early centuries. Because the pagans weren’t converting back, every conversion strengthened early Christianity and weakened the pagans.

He also explains why the Jewish people were not convinced by Christian arguments. It all comes down to the term “messiah”. The messiah was expected to be a worldly leader who would triumph over the enemies of the Jewish people and give them their independence again. Jesus was the opposite of a successful worldly leader. He had been executed by the Romans. Calling him the messiah made no sense.

But these are just a couple of examples as Erhman marches through the early centuries of the growing faith and explains convincingly how it rose to a position of dominance. The one topic I would have liked to see that he did not address was Christianity’s similarities to the mystery religions of the period, but while I expected him to discuss the issue, the lectures are so well structured that I didn’t notice he had skipped it until after I had finished the book.

Non biased

Bart Ehrman has impressed me for many years with his non biased appraisal of Christian topics.

Good overview

I enjoyed hearing the actual author read this lecture in his unique Bart Erhman way.

Great courses!

Great balanced course. Just the facts with no personal opinion. Love the instructors final comments.

Went by too fast! Wish there were more

Only complaint is that I wish there were more lectures! Dr Ehrman presents a complicated and often sensitive subject in an even handed and easily understandable way.

Extremely valuable

This should almost be required listening to understand the world we face today. This.course isn’t afraid to tackle tough issues and my hope is that no one’s mind is too closed to appreciate it

Enjoyable

Bart Ehrman is brilliant and this is a fascinating course about a significant point in world history and religion.

Another solid title by Ehrman

Bart Ehrman spends this course reviewing the growth of the early Christian church, its trials and triumphs, and its own internal struggles as it tried to figure out some of the finer theological points of who God was.

He makes clear early on that Christianity had an advantage shared by none of its contemporaries: the desire to spread and grow. Polytheists (referred to largely as pagans in this work) were happy to worship their gods as they always had, and saw no real need to recruit new followers. Judaism similarly lacked a missionary bent. Given this environment, as long as Christianity continued to grow it would eventually become dominant.

This course takes the reader to the end of the fourth century of the Common Era, at which time Christianity becomes to official religion of the Roman Empire. It still had plenty of growth ahead, but this was the beginning of the end for the 'pagan' religions.

Well worth a listen.

Powerful & Compelling

Wow. That final chapter was breathtaking. It was a brilliant summary taking in the strengths and weaknesses of Christianity and created reflection and philosophical self re-examination. Every chapter builds to this stunning climax. Excellent!

An extremely excellent course

This is one of Ehrman’s great works. Not the critical thinking effort of many of his works but how did this religion captivate and shape modern western civilization. He does this quite fairly, each lecture is fascinating and well planned out. If you have any interest in this subject, this book is very highly recommended.