Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

archaeologymag.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 310 posts

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#131

Post by dragonwriter »

wolfhelius wrote: post #48
bjackman wrote: post #28

I find it pretty cool how the spread of Christianity can be tracked so finely that a 50 update in earliest arrival time is exciting! I started listening to a podcast called "the history of the early church" to learn a bit more about that but unfortunately I think the target audience was Christians interested in theology rather than nerds interested in history. Recommendations for books etc are welcome!

I had a long drive where I listened to The Great Courses, which had a set on early Christianity. I think the professor was from Notre Dame. The early church was wrestling with polytheism (is the OT god seemed really different from the NT god) and it eventually had to get resolved by the Council at Nicaea at Constantine's behest.

Note that to non-Christian monotheists, the Christian resolution of that problem is often seen as polytheism with circumlocution.

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#132

Post by kibwen »

JackFr wrote: post #107
3pt14159 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is dangerously close to a polytheistic practice in its own right. I don't really think so. We're supposed to pray with Mary to God and everyone recognizes that all of creation came through Christ, not Mary or any other saint.

As Mary asked Jesus to perform the miracle at the wedding at Cana, for the said of her friend, we too are called to pray to ask Mary to intercede for us for our intentions.

Yes, with "saint" I wasn't even trying to invoke a discussion involving Mary at all, because in practice she's so far above the saints that to equate them feels like heresy (and might literally be heresy in some contexts; hyperdulia vs. dulia and all). In practice the absolute adulation of Mary is such that she nearly feels like the fourth member of the trinity.

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#133

Post by snapcaster »

PittleyDunkin wrote: post #78
snapcaster wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found that interesting too, and curious about what it implies for how people thought about religion at the time

> I found that interesting too, and curious about what it implies for how people thought about religion at the time Religion is an invention of the rennaisance. People at the time would have just perceived what we see as "religion" as worldview, much like people today typically believe in a fusion of economic theories.

That's fascinating but makes sense. any places to go learn more about this you recommend? googling things like invention of religion don't really lead anything on this specific topic

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#134

Post by wslh »

bjackman wrote: post #28

I find it pretty cool how the spread of Christianity can be tracked so finely that a 50 update in earliest arrival time is exciting! I started listening to a podcast called "the history of the early church" to learn a bit more about that but unfortunately I think the target audience was Christians interested in theology rather than nerds interested in history. Recommendations for books etc are welcome!

I think one of the oldest historical mentions of Jesus is by Josephus [1][2]. There is, however, scholarly discussion about whether parts of his references to Jesus were altered by later Christian scribes [3].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus

[3] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=jose...

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#135

Post by bjourne »

FearNotDaniel wrote: post #5
Oarch wrote: post #4

I'll never be able to read about us digitally unrolling fragile scrolls without it seemingly like otherworldly sci-fi technology. The translated blessing text itself seems almost modern. Funny to see how little we've changed in some ways.

Speaking as a participant in a number of somewhat "modern" Christian traditions, I think one factor is that we have changed quite a lot and then some strands of the faith have decided to go back into the past and seek what we lost from the early days. One example being certain rock'n'roll churches where people stick their hands up in the air while singing and praying: I heard one pastor defend this as being "this is…

That's because Yahweh was a sky god and lived high up in the clouds. So raising your hands, standing on mountain tops, etc, reduces your distance to him. Raising your hands while praying doesn't make as much sense anymore since Heaven is a metaphysical concept and not a place in the skies.

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#136

Post by markeroon »

wslh wrote: post #134
bjackman wrote: post #28

I find it pretty cool how the spread of Christianity can be tracked so finely that a 50 update in earliest arrival time is exciting! I started listening to a podcast called "the history of the early church" to learn a bit more about that but unfortunately I think the target audience was Christians interested in theology rather than nerds interested in history. Recommendations for books etc are welcome!

I think one of the oldest historical mentions of Jesus is by Josephus [1][2]. There is, however, scholarly discussion about whether parts of his references to Jesus were altered by later Christian scribes [3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus [3] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=jose...

This blew my mind when I first learned of it

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#137

Post by ben1040 »

Oarch wrote: post #4

I'll never be able to read about us digitally unrolling fragile scrolls without it seemingly like otherworldly sci-fi technology. The translated blessing text itself seems almost modern. Funny to see how little we've changed in some ways.

>I'll never be able to read about us digitally unrolling fragile scrolls without it seemingly like otherworldly sci-fi technology.

I similarly had my mind blown reading an article last week, about how sports & game card collectors are now having their packs CT scanned so they can identify what cards are inside (and the value of the pack) while keeping them sealed.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5987857/2024/12/12/trading-...

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#138

Post by PittleyDunkin »

snapcaster wrote: post #133
PittleyDunkin wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I found that interesting too, and curious about what it implies for how people thought about religion at the time Religion is an invention of the rennaisance. People at the time would have just perceived what we see as "religion" as worldview, much like people today typically believe in a fusion of economic theories.

That's fascinating but makes sense. any places to go learn more about this you recommend? googling things like invention of religion don't really lead anything on this specific topic

I'd probably start here: https://oxfordre.com/politics/display/10.1093/acrefore/97801...

Or at the wikipedia page that links to that article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secularism

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#139

Post by throw0101c »

giraffe_lady wrote: post #112
JackFr wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filioque - to this day the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church disagree on whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, or from the Father and the Son.

Yeah but most lay people from either branch couldn't tell you the practical consequences of this. It's widely known & considered important because it's a remaining theological justification for the schism, not the other way around.

An interesting take on the dilemma between the two 'sides':

> You see the problem. If you include the filioque, you fight the Arians in the West while inadvertently supporting the Sabellians in the East. But if you exclude it, you fight the Sabellians while inadvertently supporting the Arians. At its heart, the filioque is really a linguistic debate, not a theological one.

* https://old.reddit.com/r/Catholicism/comments/68hb00/eli5_th...

(I don't know about the intricacies/subtleties enough to know how 'technically accurate' the above assessment is.)

Re: Silver amulet is the oldest evidence of Christianity north of the Alps

#140

Post by throw0101c »

bjackman wrote: post #28

I find it pretty cool how the spread of Christianity can be tracked so finely that a 50 update in earliest arrival time is exciting! I started listening to a podcast called "the history of the early church" to learn a bit more about that but unfortunately I think the target audience was Christians interested in theology rather than nerds interested in history. Recommendations for books etc are welcome!

> Recommendations for books etc are welcome!

See perhaps the references / (printed) sources at:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

Post reply on HN