Action Quote by Larry Hurtado

"Religions" of the Roman world varied. Most of it was ritual practices. There were periodic occasions when cities honored their guardian deities with sacrifices…

— Larry Hurtado

Early Christianity, like Roman-era philosophical traditions, laid emphasis on everyday behavior, about how to live your life.

— Larry Hurtado

Galen recognized, with some considerable puzzlement it seems, that Christians exhibited the virtues that he associated with the discipline of philosophy.

— Larry Hurtado

In Destroyer of the gods I focus on several major features of early Christianity that made it distinctive, even odd or bizarre .We don't…

— Larry Hurtado

“One of the early critics of Christianity was Celsus (fl. 180), the witty philosopher who observed that Christianity was a "degraded kind of Platonism,…

— D.M. Murdock

The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as…

— Edward Gibbon

Though the ancients were ignorant of the principles of Christianity there were in them the germs of its spirit.

— Herman Melville

Superficial similarities exist between Christianity and some ancient pagan religions. But careful study reveals that there are far more dissimilarities.

— Anonymous

“The ultimate triumph of Christianity was aided by the internal drive within Roman paganism toward some kind of monotheism. By 150 A.D., whatever vitality…

— Norman F. Cantor

[Christians] practiced moderation and chastity in marriage, for example, and Galen was puzzled at how they were able to do so. His comments are…

— Larry Hurtado

“Later times have laid all the blame upon the Goths and Vandals, but, however unwilling the partizans of the Christian system may be to…

— Thomas Paine

Before Christianity became the Roman Empire's official religion in the 4th Century, 'mystery religions,' organized around a central canon of secret knowledge, were widespread.…

— Trevor Paglen