Christianity and the Christian Church of the First Three Centuries

Christianity and the Christian Church of the First Three Centuries is the first volume in Baur's five-volume history of the Christian Church. It and the last volume, Church and Theology in the Nineteenth Century, are being published in new translations. This book, based on the second German edition of 1860, is the most influential and best known of Baur's many groundbreaking publications in New Testament, early Christianity, church history, and historical theology. It is divided into six main parts and discusses such matters as the entrance of Christianity into world history, the teaching and person of Jesus, the tension between Jewish Christian and gentile Christian (Pauline) interpretations and their resolution in the idea of the Catholic Church, the opposition of Gnosticism and Montanism to Catholicism, the development of dogma or doctrine in the first three centuries, Christianity's relation to the pagan world and the Roman state, and Christianity as a moral and religious principle.

""No historical theologian has contributed more than Baur to a rational understanding of Christian origins and history . . . Professor Hodgson is his outstanding English-language interpreter. His introduction and, with Robert Brown, lucid translation of this most important synthesis invites fresh assessments of modern New Testament scholarship by revisiting the origins of that discipline's dominant paradigm.""
--Robert Morgan, University of Oxford

""Long neglected or dismissed, Ferdinand Christian Baur is re-emerging as one of the most important Christian theologians of the nineteenth century. Christianity and the Christian Church of the First Three Centuries is the book that showcases Baur's diverse theological interests most poignantly and powerfully. Peter Hodgson and Robert Brown have breathed new life into this important text with their definitive English translation. A masterful accomplishment, and a gift to students of Baur and of early Christianity!""
--John A. O'Brien, University of Notre Dame


Ferdinand Christian Baur (1792-1860) was Professor of Theology at the University of Tubingen. The Editor's Foreword introduces the work, and the translators have added critical footnotes.

Peter C. Hodgson is Charles G. Finney Professor of Theology Emeritus at the Divinity School of Vanderbilt University. He has specialized in works by Baur and Hegel, as well as in contemporary issues of constructive theology.

Robert F. Brown is Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the University of Delaware. He has specialized in the history of philosophy and the philosophy of religion, with a focus on German idealism.