Rome was one of the great powers of the ancient world and it was a powerful factor in the spread of Christianity. Find out more about the history of this mighty empire. In 700 B.C., Rome was a small city in Italy that controlled only the area close around… Read More

The New Testament didn’t appear out of thin air. Find out how the New Testament was compiled and explore the reliability of the canon. In the ancient world, pseudonymous writing was not unknown. Letters written in the name of an apostle, originating in a circle of early Christians, perhaps… Read More

The Gnostic ideas in The Da Vinci Code are not new. In fact, Irenaeus addressed these ideas thousands of years ago in his work Against Heresies. The Bible did not arrive by fax from heaven. … The Bible is a product of man, my dear. Not of… Read More

Find out about the novel The Da Vinci Code from a scholarly perspective. An Interview with Professor Charles W. Hedrick Charles W. Hedrick is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Missouri State University. Among his many publications are The Apocalypse of Adam (Wipf & Stock, 2005), Many Things in Parables: Jesus… Read More

What weight do early Christian writings have in biblical scholarship? Find out in this interview with Scott Elliott, Nida Institute for Biblical Scholarship about ancient texts and the Da Vinci Code. During an interview, Mr. Scott Elliott, then a Bible scholar at the Nida Institute for Biblical Scholarship, was asked… Read More

Learn about Jesus in the context of first century historical documents. The recent deluge of books and movies on early Christian literature has generated much interest among Christians and non-Christians alike. Amid skepticism and apologetics, readers seek answers to questions that bring the historical Jesus to the forefront of… Read More

In ancient Rome, social class was everything. It determined a person’s rights, privileges and opportunities. The Roman Empire had a class structure based on wealth, birth, and citizenship. At the very top of Roman society was the emperor, who was considered the empire’s “first citizen.” Some emperors even… Read More

The Roman Empire used local rulers to maintain order in the regions they conquered. Find out who these leaders were and what authority they had. Roman policy was to respect local customs and the laws of the peoples they ruled. They let local people form councils to control local… Read More

The Greek word for martyr means “witness.” In the New Testament martyrs were individuals were those who bore witness to the life, death and work of Jesus. Two words, “martyr” and “witness,” are translated from the same Greek word, martys. The earliest meaning for the word is probably “witness.”… Read More

Within 100 years of Jesus’ death, Christianity had spread throughout the Middle East into Africa and northern Europe. Check out this map of the world influenced by early Christianity. Read More