Distorting Jesus' Crucifixion

Candida Moss is no heathen. She is a professor of Theology and Scripture at Notre Dame University.  The article of myth of Christian martyrdom will be helpful to anyone interested in knowing how Christianity developed in the early centuries.

Most histories of early Christianity focus on how the religion became institutionalized during the era of Constantine who recognized that the organization of the Church offered a mechanism for ensuring his security and prosperity if he became its protector. Even though he never became a Christian himself, Constantine’s support enabled the Church to become a power in itself.

When we trace back Christianity further, i.e., between the time Jesus was speaking his message and 300, there was less known until the last 50-70 years.

With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and other writings of the time of Jesus, scripture scholars started to understand the New Testament was written not as history, but as a belief document. Moreover, the target audiences of the writers, e.g., Jews or Gentiles, colored the document itself. If the target audience was Jewish, then there often would be many references to the scriptures which were familiar to them. The Gospel of Matthew was written for Jesus Jews, i.e., all the early Christians were faithful Jews who identified also with Jesus. They would attend synagogues as well as home gatherings to remember Jesus. If they were Gentiles, then the Gospel (as Luke’s) conveyed the message in a way that would be understood by followers of Jesus with no background in Judaism. The scriptures were also colored by actual experiences in the first century.   For example, when the expectation of the Jesus Jews that all Jews would become Jesus’ disciples was thwarted, the Jesus Jews became antagonistic to these Jews, as seen the Gospel of John where Jews are cited as the cause of Jesus’ crucifixion. In fact, Jesus was crucified because he was a social troublemaker.

Between the end of the first century and Constantine, there has been less written. Candida Moss delves into the history of this time to demonstrate the Christians were not persecuted as martyrs, as often thought. Rather, they identified themselves as martyrs to align themselves with Jesus’ crucifixion, which now enabled pain and death to be understood as a “badge of glory”.  To be sure there were some deaths that could be considered attacks based on animosity to the person’s religion. But, she makes clear that most Christians in these early times lived in peace.

As Easter is celebrated, it is always helpful to be sure that we do not distort Christianity.  Just as Easter eggs have no relationship to the religious celebration, it is helpful to distinguish myth (understood as stories designed to convey a religious belief) from history.