The Rise of Western Christendom

The Rise of Western Christendom
Author: Peter Brown
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 741
Release: 2012-12-18
Genre: History
ISBN: 1118338847

This tenth anniversary revised edition of the authoritative text on Christianity's first thousand years of history features a new preface, additional color images, and an updated bibliography. The essential general survey of medieval European Christendom, Brown's vivid prose charts the compelling and tumultuous rise of an institution that came to wield enormous religious and secular power. Clear and vivid history of Christianity's rise and its pivotal role in the making of Europe Written by the celebrated Princeton scholar who originated of the field of study known as 'late antiquity' Includes a fully updated bibliography and index

The Rise of Christianity

The Rise of Christianity
Author: Rodney Stark
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 274
Release: 1997-05-09
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0060677015

This "fresh, blunt, and highly persuasive account of how the West was won—for Jesus" (Newsweek) is now available in paperback. Stark's provocative report challenges conventional wisdom and finds that Christianity's astounding dominance of the Western world arose from its offer of a better, more secure way of life. "Compelling reading" (Library Journal) that is sure to "generate spirited argument" (Publishers Weekly), this account of Christianity's remarkable growth within the Roman Empire is the subject of much fanfare. "Anyone who has puzzled over Christianity's rise to dominance...must read it." says Yale University's Wayne A. Meeks, for The Rise of Christianity makes a compelling case for startling conclusions. 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).

The Rise of Western Christendom

The Rise of Western Christendom
Author: Peter Brown
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
Total Pages: 636
Release: 2003-01-08
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780631221388

This book offers a vivid, compelling history of the first thousand years of Christianity. For the second edition, the book has been thoroughly rewritten and expanded. It includes two new chapters, as well as an extensive preface in which the author reflects on the scholarly traditions which have influenced his work and explains his current thinking about the book's themes. New edition of popular account of the first 1000 years of Christianity. Thoroughly rewritten, with extensive new preface of author's current thinking. Includes new maps, substantial bibliography, and numerous chronological tables.

The Next Christendom

The Next Christendom
Author: Philip Jenkins
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 367
Release: 2011-09-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0199911533

In this new and substantially expanded Third Edition, Philip Jenkins continues to illuminate the remarkable expansion of Christianity in the global South--in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Drawing upon the extensive new scholarship that has appeared on this topic in recent years, he asks how the new Christianity is likely to affect the poor, among whom it finds its most devoted adherents. How should we interpret the enormous success of prosperity churches across the Global South? Politically, what will be the impact of new Christian movements? Will Christianity contribute to liberating the poor, to give voices to the previously silent, or does it threaten only to bring new kinds of division and conflict? Does Christianity liberate women, or introduce new scriptural bases for subjection? Acclaim for previous editions of The Next Christendom: Named one of the Top Religion Books of 2002 by USA Today Named One of the Top Ten Religion Books of the Year by Booklist (2002) Winner of the Christianity Today Book Award in the category of "Christianity and Culture" (2002) "Jenkins is to be commended for reminding us, throughout the often gripping pages of this lively work...that the history of Christianity is the history of innovative--and unpredictable--adaptations." --The New York Times Book Review "This is a landmark book. Jenkin's thesis is comprehensively researched; his analysis is full of insight; and his projection of the future may indeed prove to be prophetic." --Baptist Times "A valuable and provocative look at the phenomenon widely ignored in the affluent North but likely to be of enormous importance in the century ahead.... The Next Christendom is chillingly realistic about the relationship between Christianity and Islam." --Russell Shaw, Crisis "If the times demand nothing less than a major rethinking of contemporary global history from a Christian perspective, The Next Christendom will be one of the significant landmarks pointing the way." --Mark Noll, Books & Culture

Christendom and Christianity in the Middle Ages

Christendom and Christianity in the Middle Ages
Author: Adriaan Bredero
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Total Pages: 424
Release: 1994
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780802849922

This is a print on demand book and is therefore non- returnable. Though buffeted on all sides by rapid and at times cataclysmic social, political, and economic change, the medieval church was able to make adjustments that kept it from becoming simply a fossil from the past rather than an enduring institution of salvation. The dynamic interaction between the medieval church and society gives form to this compelling and well-informed study by Adriaan Bredero. By considering medieval Christianity in full relation to its historical context, Bredero elucidates complex medieval realities -- many of which run counter to common modern notions about the Middle Ages. Bredero moves beyond the usual treatment of history by framing his overall discussion in terms of a fascinating and relevant question: To what extent is Christianity today still molded by medieval society? The book begins with an overview of religion and the church in medieval society, from the early Christianization of Western Europe through the fifteenth century. Bredero counters earlier romanticized assessments of the Middle Ages as a thoroughly Christian period by arriving at a definition of Christendom, not in its original sense as the empire of Charlemagne, but rather as "the countries, people, and matters which stood under the influence of Christ."

Millennium

Millennium
Author: Tom Holland
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 490
Release: 2011-04-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 0748131043

Bestselling historian and broadcaster Tom Holland gives a thrilling panoramic account of the birth of the new Western Europe in the year 1000 'An exhilarating sweep across European history either side of the year 1000; riveting' ALLAN MASSIE, SPECTATOR 'I relished the blood and thunder narrative - the work of a great storyteller at his best' DOMINIC SANDBROOK, EVENING STANDARD 'A splendid, highly coloured canvas' NORMAN STONE, GUARDIAN In AD 900, few would have guessed that the splintering kingdoms of Europe were candidates for future greatness. Hemmed in by implacable enemies and an ocean, there were many who feared that they were nearing the time when the Antichrist would appear, heralding the world's end. Instead there emerged a new civilisation. It was the age of Otto the Great and William the Conqueror, of Viking sea-kings, of hermits, monks and serfs. It witnessed the spread of castles, the invention of knighthood, and the founding of the papal monarchy. It was a momentous achievement: for this was nothing less than the founding of the modern West.

Medieval Christianity

Medieval Christianity
Author: Kevin Madigan
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 512
Release: 2015-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0300158726

A new narrative history of medieval Christianity, spanning from A.D. 500 to 1500, focuses on the role of women in Christianity; the relationships among Christians, Jews and Muslims; the experience of ordinary parishioners; the adventure of asceticism, devotion and worship; and instruction through drama, architecture and art.

The Emergence of Christianity

The Emergence of Christianity
Author: Cynthia White
Publisher: Fortress Press
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2010-10-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0800697472

This brief survey text tells the story of early Christianity. Cynthia White explores the emergence of Christianity in Rome during the first four centuries of the Greco-Roman empire, from the first followers of Jesus Christ, to conflicts between Christians and Jewish kings under Roman occupation, to the torture of Christian followers, Diocletian's reforms, and Constantine's eventual conversion to monotheism, which cemented Christianity's status as the official religion of Rome. The text's chapters will integrate key pedagogy, including introductions, study questions, textboxes, photos, maps, suggested readings, and a glossary and timeline.

Christendom

Christendom
Author: Peter Heather
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 561
Release: 2022-10-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 0241215927

'A fascinating story about a religion in a surprisingly precarious position' Dan Jones, Sunday Times 'Superb storytelling ... captivating and profound' Literary Review 'A page-turner' The Spectator In the fourth century AD, a new faith exploded out of Palestine. Overwhelming the paganism of Rome, and converting the Emperor Constantine in the process, it resoundingly defeated a host of other rivals. Almost a thousand years later, all of Europe was controlled by Christian rulers, and the religion, ingrained within culture and society, exercised a monolithic hold over its population. But, as Peter Heather shows in this compelling history, there was nothing inevitable about Christendom's rise to Europe-wide dominance. In exploring how the Christian religion became such a defining feature of the European landscape, and how a small sect of isolated congregations was transformed into a mass movement centrally directed from Rome, Heather shows how Christendom constantly battled against both so-called 'heresies' and other forms of belief. From the crisis that followed the collapse of the Roman Empire, which left the religion teetering on the edge of extinction, to the astonishing revolution in which the Papacy emerged as the head of a vast international corporation, Heather traces Christendom's chameleon-like capacity for self-reinvention and willingness to mobilize well-directed force. Christendom's achievement was not, or not only, to define official Christianity, but - from its scholars and its lawyers, to its provincial officials and missionaries in far-flung corners of the continent - to transform it into an institution that wielded effective religious authority across nearly all of the disparate peoples of medieval Europe. This is its extraordinary story.

The Decline of Christendom in Western Europe, 1750–2000

The Decline of Christendom in Western Europe, 1750–2000
Author: Hugh McLeod
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 246
Release: 2003-07-17
Genre: History
ISBN: 1139438158

Christendom lasted for over a thousand years in Western Europe, and we are still living in its shadow. For over two centuries this social and religious order has been in decline. Enforced religious unity has given way to increasing pluralism, and since 1960 this process has spectacularly accelerated. In this 2003 book, historians, sociologists and theologians from six countries answer two central questions: what is the religious condition of Western Europe at the start of the twenty-first century, and how and why did Christendom decline? Beginning by overviewing the more recent situation, the authors then go back into the past, tracing the course of events in England, Ireland, France, Germany and the Netherlands, and showing how the fate of Christendom is reflected in changing attitudes to death and to technology, and in the evolution of religious language. They reveal a pattern more complex and ambiguous than many of the conventional narratives will admit.