Book Reviews -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Southeastern Theological Review
Volume: STR 04:1 (Summer 2013)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous


Book Reviews

Rodney Stark. The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion. New York: HarperOne, 2011. 506 pp. Hardback. ISBN 9780062007681. $27.99 Hardback.

Rodney Stark serves as Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University. He is the author of several books on Christian history and the impact of Christianity on civilization, including The Rise of Christianity (Princeton University Press, 1996), The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success (Random House, 2005) and God’s Battalions: The Case for the Crusades (HarperOne, 2009). This work is a continuation of Rise of Christianity. Stark seeks to broaden the scope of his earlier work beginning with the religio-political context of the early first century CE through the present status of Christianity as a global faith. The issue the work addresses is how Christianity grew to become the world’s largest faith system. While Stark treats this issue broadly, his work also serves as a defense of Christianity as an indispensable element in the progress of human civilization.

The book is divided into six parts and twenty-two chapters. It is not a work of theology, but an historical/sociological work examining Christianity’s growth and impact on human cultures spanning the past 2000 years. Stark makes numerous assertions about the essence, growth, character, and value system of the faith and of its followers. In the first three centuries of its existence, the faith spread over the Mediterranean world less as a result of powerful preaching or climactic events, but more because of ordinary Christians winning over those in their social circles with the power of the gospel. Contrary to the belief that conversions were predominately among Gentiles, Stark points out that the first successes of Christianity were within the Jewish community. As late as the fifth century, the churches and synagogues were closely connected.

Stark argues that Christians fulfilled Christ’s calling to be salt and light within the culture in the Roman world. He wrote, “In the midst of squalor, misery, illness, and anonymity of ancient cities, Christianity provided an island of mercy and security” (112). By being obedient to Christ’s teachings, early Christians transformed the ancient world where life was short and cheap. They laid the foundations for the idea that human life is precious and ought to be preserved. Still, Stark acknowledges that Constantine’s conversion in the early fourth century, and the legalization and later institutionalization of Christianity in subsequent years was a mixed blessing. The church in the late Roman Empire would grow to be intolerant. Stark wrote, “Far better that [Constan...

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