says Yale University's Wayne A. Meeks, for The Rise of Christianity makes a compelling case for startling conclusions. Welcome back.

Rodney Stark. Studies of the rise of Christianity all stress the movement's rapid growth, but rarely are any figures offered.

-- Wayne Meeks, Yale University"A provocative, insightful, challenging account of the rise of Christianity." A Star in the East draws on two major national surveys to sketch a close-up of religion in China. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the legitimate uses of social scientific theories to reconstruct history in the absence of adequate information on what actually occurred. "—Irving Hexham, "A provocative, insightful, challenging account. Although Peter Brown is quite right that this text has functioned in the history of Christian interpretation as a Rohrschach test,39 it is also the case that recent commentators despite their many differences have tended toward a consensus that Paul's words here do not reflect a pf attempt to establish a counter- cultural Utopian parity within Christian marriage. By BREMMER, J.N., To download The Rise of Christianity through the eyes of Gibbon, Harnack and Rodney Stark.

"—Publishers Weekly, "This brilliant and highly provocative book will revolutionize the way people think about both biblical studies and church history. The Rise of Christianity, first published in 1996. He digs deep into the historical evidence on many issues - such as the social background of converts, the mission to the Jews, the status of women in the church, the role of martyrdom - to provide a vivid and unconventional picture of early Christianity. In the meantime, voluntary martyrdom, especially a generation after the death of Christ, reinforced the commitment of the Christian rank and file. Categories : Living people People from Jamestown, Yale University, North Dakota American Christian writers American sociologists American historians of religion American male non-fiction writers American hhe writers Converts to Christianity from atheism or agnosticism Sociologists of religion Researchers of new religious movements and cults Baylor University faculty University of California. ebook. Directions, 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock His pitting of Christian culture versus the pagan culture displays Christian moral values superseding the brokenness and failure of the pagan religions. Something went wrong. What Stark ultimately offers is a multifaceted portrait of early Christianity, one that appeals to practical reasoning, historical curiosity, and personal reflection. Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2017, Reviewed in the United States on November 6, 2014. 1 shall qualify this assumption at several later points in the chapter. Something went wrong. From the book it seems as if one of his purposes in writing the Rise of Christianity is to debunk this myth. There is absolutely no attempt on Stark’s part to convince the reader that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who was crucified and raised from the dead. Nevertheless, we must quantify--at least in terms of exploring the arithmetic of the possible--if we are to grasp the magnitude of the phenomenon that is to be explained. Combining his expertise in social science with historical evidence, and his insight into contemporary religion's appeal, Stark finds that early Christianity attracted the privileged rather than the poor, that most early converts were women or marginalized Jews--and ultimately that Christianity was a success because it proved those who joined it with a more appealing, more assuring, happier, and perhaps longer life (Andrew M. Greeley, University of Chicago). Very interesting indeed. They did this to care for the sick and afflicted which was opposed to the pagans who left cities with epidemics. . Now for an ending number. Stark, a sociologist who has written extensively on the history and philosophy of religion, has publicly described himself as an agnostic in terms of his own belief. Stark makes an argument similar to the views and consensus that developed among modern New Testament historians which is that Christianity was mainly a religion practiced by the middle and upper classes. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. -- "Library Journal""This book raises, simply and brilliantly, just the kinds of questions anyone concerned with early Christianity should ask." The Power of the Blood of Jesus - Updated Edition: The Vital Role of Blood for Rede... To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. "[14], David Lehmann, "Rational Choice and the Sociology of Religion", in, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, economic principles in the study of religion, The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, "Of Churches, Sects, and Cults: Preliminary Concepts for a Theory of Religious Movements", “Why Is Stark Wrong on His Criticism of the Secularization Theory?”, “Concepts of religion in debates on secularisation”, “A Baptist Scholar Debunks Anti-Catholic Historical Hogwash”, A Christmas conversation with Rodney Stark, How Christianity (and Capitalism) Led to Science, The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism and Western Success, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rodney_Stark&oldid=973537316, Converts to Christianity from atheism or agnosticism, Researchers of new religious movements and cults, University of California, Berkeley alumni, Wikipedia articles with BIBSYS identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WorldCat identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, Rodney Stark. The idea that Christianity started as a clandestine movement among the poor is a widely accepted notion. Discusses the rise of Christianity including the Christian revolution, its Jewish roots, Jesus, Constantine's revolution, and the Christianization of Europe. Something we hope you'll especially enjoy: FBA items qualify for FREE Shipping and Amazon Prime. He is presently the Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University, co-director of the university's Institute for Studies of Religion, and founding editor of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion. United States Having established a plausible growth curve for the rise of Christianity, I will review sociological knowledge of the process by which people convert to new religions in order to infer certain requirements concerning social relations between Christians and the surrounding Greco-Roman world. He comes equipped not only with the logic and methods of social science but also with insights gathered firsthand into why people convert and how new religious groups recruit members. In Christianity, "doctrine took on actual flesh," and all seekers not only found a place but flourished in the culturally strange (for its time) dynamic of the nonethnic Christian community. How the West Wondisplays Rodney Stark’s gifts for lively narrative history and. The Evolution of the Christian Religion in America: Christianity at the Crossroads ... One in Christ: Bridging Racial & Cultural Divides. This is not the case.