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Christianity is now the religion of over two billion people on every populated continent,
but the faith began as a small movement in the city of Jerusalem in the Roman province
of Judea. Jerusalem is a city on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the modern
nation of Israel. Most of the people who lived in and near Jerusalem
during the reign of Caesar Augustus were Jews who believed in one God. This was unusual
because at that time, most Romans were polytheists. Polytheists are people who believe in many
gods. The Romans allowed the Jews to practice their
faith and did not force the Jews to worship Roman gods. About 30CE, a holy man named Jesus
began to attract a following in Jerusalem. Jesus’ followers came to believe that Jesus
was the son of the God of the Jews and that he performed miracles.
The followers of Jesus angered Roman authorities because they refused to follow either Jewish
or Roman laws. The authorities arrested and executed Jesus by nailing him to a cross.
This form of execution is known as crucifixion. Three days after his execution, Jesus’ followers
said they saw him risen from the dead. The followers of Jesus called him Christ.
Christ is a Greek word that means “chosen one,” because his followers believed Jesus
was chosen by God to be his messenger. In time, the followers of Jesus became known
as Christians. The Christians taught that people’s sins would be forgiven if they
became Christian. Their message was not successful with many Jews, but countless pagans throughout
the Roman Empire responded to the idea of Christian salvation.
Many passionate believers carried the message of Jesus throughout the Roman Empire. One
of the most successful was a Greek-speaking Jew named Saul of Tarsus, known to Christians
as Saint Paul. As a young man, Paul helped to persecute Christians, but one day, shortly
after the crucifixion of Jesus, Paul had a vision in which he believed Jesus spoke to
him from heaven. Paul spent the rest of his life writing about Christianity and winning
new converts to the faith. Through the persistence of Paul and other Christian missionaries,
small Christian communities developed throughout the Roman Empire.
The first Christians believed that Jesus would quickly return to earth, and so saw no need
to create any written records of his life. About fifty years after the crucifixion of
Jesus, Christians combined the stories of the life and wisdom of Jesus into four books
known as Gospels. Gospel means “good news.” The Bible is the holy book of Christianity;
it consists of the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament was written long
before the time of Jesus; it contains the sacred writings of the Jewish people. The
New Testament includes the Gospels, along with letters written by Paul and other Christian
writers. The Bible has been translated into more than 1,500 languages and has been read
by more people than any other book. At first, the Romans did not mind that Christians
did not worship Roman gods. The Roman Empire was prosperous, and there were not many Christians.
The Emperor Nero began persecuting Christians in 64CE. Nero blamed Christians for causing
a great fire that burned for more than five days and destroyed much of Rome. Within the
next two hundred years, barbarian warriors attacked the empire. Many Romans suggested
that the Roman Empire was experiencing bad times because a growing group of Christians
did not worship the Roman gods. Roman emperors became increasingly intolerant
of Christianity. In 202CE, Emperor banned any Roman citizen from converting to Christianity
or Judaism. Those who disobeyed the emperor were often tortured by soldiers or forced
to fight wild animals at sporting events. Despite the persecutions, Christianity continued
to grow. Emperor Constantine ended persecution of Christians
when he seized power in 306CE. Four years later, Constantine made Christianity legal
throughout the Roman Empire. A legend says that on the eve of a battle, Constantine saw
a Christian symbol in the sky with words that translate to “By this sign you shall conquer.”
Constantine never went so far as to establish Christianity as the official religion of the
empire, but he did legalize the religion and encouraged its growth.
While Constantine supported the Christian Church, he continued to worship Roman gods.
In 337CE, Constantine was dying. Only then did the emperor call for a bishop so that
he could be baptized into the Christian Church. Fifty years after Constantine’s death, Christianity
became the official religion of the Roman Empire.