Abstract
Jesus was born in Palestine. He was the main determinant for the foundation of a religious movement or sect later called Christianity. This movement, founded in Palestine after the ascension of Jesus, with Jerusalem as its main centre of worship, was merely a Judaeo-Christian sect. In Jerusalem, the adherents to this movement were not really distinctive from the Jewish religion, as they worshipped the same God, Yahweh, went to the same Temple and/or synagogues and kept the same Jewish Laws. After the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, many Jews, including the �believers in Christ�s teachings� (the earliest Christians) fled Jerusalem for different parts of the Roman Empire such as Transjordan, Syria and Africa. Different �Christianities� developed in the main cities of the Roman Empire � Rome, Antioch and Alexandria. In each of these cities, the believers in Christ�s teachings developed their own religion alongside Judaism. This article argued that it was in Alexandria, a world famous city during the time of the Roman Empire, especially renowned for its academic excellence, that the new religion best found and made its own stand. The Catechetical School, with scholarly heads and writers, such as Clement and Origen, started to develop a theology that set the standard for Christian theology in the Empire.Intradisciplinary�and/or�interdisciplinary implications: The general assumption is that Jerusalem, as the origin of Christianity, was the place where it had its formation. This article proposed that it was actually Alexandria where Christianity was best found and became distinctive from Judaism. However, a lack of original sources on this subject area limited the research.
Highlights
Africa, and Egypt as part of the Eastern region of the Roman Empire, is more than oft neglected as a source of intelligence and academic knowledge in the world
This includes a reference to early Christianity in Alexandria, as well as the setting of Christian theology in Egypt
Quite a few scholars, such as Darkwah (2005), Oden (2007), Pheko (1982), Schaff (1910) and Stanley (1883), argued to the contrary and stated that Christianity found its first real feet in Africa. This has been acknowledged by Stanley (1883:56) when he stated in his Lectures on the Eastern Church that the field of Eastern Christendom is a comparatively untrodden field. He called on his hearers to enlarge their petty Occidental (Western) horizon and to acknowledge the Eastern Apostolic Churches as the main stem of Christendom, of which the church of Rome itself was for 300 years a mere colony, unfelt in theology except by contributions to the Greek literature of Christians
Summary
Egypt as part of the Eastern region of the Roman Empire, is more than oft neglected as a source of intelligence and academic knowledge in the world This includes a reference to early Christianity in Alexandria, as well as the setting of Christian theology in Egypt. These characteristics are mostly allotted to the West, to Europe, Rome, with Antioch not far behind. The books of the New Testament (as we have them today) were written elsewhere, Alexandria was the most important root for the theology of Christianity and that it spread from there to the rest of the Roman Empire, that is, the known parts of Africa, Asia and Europe
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