This is a summary of everything I understand about the creation and development of the thing we call “Christianity”, from its very start to the seventh century or so, and written as concisely as possible. Due to the nature of the topic, there are quite a few connections I’ve had to make on my own based on the context. More than a few items are marked with question marks to indicate that this is a guess based on context. For the rest, this is a highly abridged version of a standard Roman history ascribed to Roman historians, with some additional observations from myself.
My purpose in presenting this summary is to serve as an antidote to the mythic Early Church stories, and as a framework for future research. It specifically doesn’t reference the Bible except as a product of organizational development. I’m leaving out a lot of detail in order to keep focused on the overall arc that covers seven centuries, and it’s painful not mentioning everything. Trying to keep this short was the point, and this is a dreadfully complex story to tell.
The only material we have that describes this history was translated from Arabic, from Greek and Latin originals, since the Christians burned everything in the 4th century.
Yet even so, the following tells a complete story, dot-to-dot, without any hand-waving or missing time – which is far more than any Early Church myth could do.
TL;DR: Christianity was created to celebrate the traditions and cultures of Rome. Everything about it is characteristically Roman. The traditions, the rituals, and the mythology all stem from Roman traditions, Roman rituals, Roman culture. Elements from the cults popular in the 2nd century are present in Christianity, but Christianity originally derived from an earlier cult that had been established by Augustus Caesar.
(forward to Imperial Cult)
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