I’ve recently realized that I have huge gaps in my knowledge of pre-modern Christianity. I don’t know why all the extra-biblical rules were added on. I don’t know why all of the schism happened. I don’t know who designed the Pope-hat.
My requirements:
It has to be accessible to a non-history buff.
It can’t be written by anyone with an obvious bias against Christianity, or for any one sect of Christianity.
You might try The Faith: A History of Christianity by Brian Moynahan or A History of Christianity by Paul Johnson - both are general histories. But with a subject so large, any one volume work is going to have major gaps and neither of these is an exception. Both books concentrate more on Classical and Western Christianity and give relatively slight attention to Eastern Christianity.
I have just the book for you. A History of God by Karen Armstrong. Available on Amazon and in many bookstores. That’s a link to a review with some quotes. It’s really what it says it is, a history of the concept of God, from pre-judiasm to christianity to muslims to modern day.
Armstrong is excellent, I would highly suggest it.
If you are interested in primary sources as well, I have a few suggestions.
Check out the Penguin edition of Eusebius’ History of the Church. It is an important work not only for early Christianity but also for history-writing in general. I would also recommend Athanasius’ Life of Saint Anthony. Any decent translation of the martyrdom of Perpetua is also must-read. It is one of the few extant works in Latin by not only a woman but a woman of truly awesome literary talent. For an eastern view of early monasticism, read the Sayings of the Fathers (apothegmata patrum) and the Lives of the Desert Fathers.
You can’t learn about the early church and avoid the works of the Latin Fathers: Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, and Gregory the Great. The Greek Fathers are: Athanasius, Basil, Gregory of Naziansus, and John Chrysostom. None of them are
to be missed. Of all of the above, the most accessible (and probably most interesting) are the letters of Jerome and the Confessions of Augustine.
There is, well, lots of stuff here. Perhaps if you could give us a little more detail about what interests you we can better target some reading material.
Oh, missed something. As for the Scism, that happened roughly five hundred years after any of the books I suggested were written. Totally different ball of wax.
The medieval church is a vast subject. My favorite primer is RW Southern’s Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages. It is not speedy going, but it is an outstanding book and should be very accessible to non-specialists.
There was a PBS Frontline on this.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/
Available on DVD:
http://www.shoppbs.org/product/index.jsp?productId=1851094
Companion book:
http://www.shoppbs.org/product/index.jsp?productId=1402572
Brian
Another vote for Armstrong. She is a former nun who is now a professor at a rabbinical college (odd career move) and though she writes on esoteric topics she writes in a readable style (with a glossary of terms you may be unfamiliar with in back) for a lay audience and presumes no great foreknowledge.
I second Paul Johnson’s History of Christianity. Excellent and insightful.
Heh. I have so much ignorance in this area that I don’t even know where to begin. I guess I just get frustrated at my lack of understanding of the evolution of Christianity, and how it has affected the developement of Western culture and civilization. So, while Eastern Christianity is fascinating in its own right, I’d like to focus on Western European and American history.
I have read several books on the intersections of religion and science throughout history (I’m familiar with Augustine, Aquinas, Gallileo, and Newton).
These are all great suggestions, though. I’ll start ordering today.
We’ve got the two-volume, “The Story of Christianity ,” by Justo Gonzalez. I thought it was a little bit on the dry side, but it certainly seemed thorough enough.
I haven’t read the other ones mentioned, but one used repeatedly in my undergrad and grad classes is Justo L. Gonzalez’s two volume Story of Christianity. It’s accurate enough for my profs, but very very accessable and easy to read. There are lots of pictures and maps and Gonzalez ties it into what was going on in the politics and culture of the times.
I believe a one-volue edition is available now, but if not, don’t let the size intimadate you. I’m pretty sure it was done that way to accomodate colleges teaching a two semester course and students who didn’t want to pay for the part of the book they weren’t going to read that semester. It’s pretty easy to get through despite the length.
Amazon has used copies of the Johnson, Moynahan, and Armstrong books at around six bucks each. And it looks like you can get both Gonzalez volumes for under twenty.
This is an interesting book, but I’m not sure if it fits your requirements. It mostly deals with Paul’s role in shaping Christianity. I consider it to be rather hostile toward PAUL, rather than toward Christianty itself, but you might feel otherwise. Don’t read it first, necessarily, but give it a peek if you get a chance. The Mythmaker:Paul and the Invention of Christianity, by Hyam Maccoby.
20 years later, it’s still in print!
A textbook from the Comparative Religions course I took in college, an excellent read:
Elaine Pagels has written several good books about the VERY beginnng of Christianity, specifically about the “lost” gnostic gospel. “Beyond Belief” is about how we ended up with the gospels we did and not the others. Fascinating stuff.
And yet another vote for Karen Armstong.
You know, I should start a thread about a Doper’s Library for All Situations. I probably will, later. Armstrong, Shermer, Gardner, Randi…
This is a good book, but it is extremely tendentious. It is a great read once you have some background under your belt.
I learned a new word! Tendentious: Partisan. Having a strong slant or point of view.
It’s been nearly a week, and I just noticed that carlb beat me to the punch. Sorry for not recognizing your contribution, carlb.
I like Will Durant’s “The Age of Faith”.