Episode 3 of 4:

"From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians" tells the epic story of the rise of Christianity. The four episodes explore the life and death of Jesus, and the men and women whose belief, conviction, and martyrdom created the religion we now know as Christianity.


Episode 3 follows the story of the first attempts to write the life of Jesus--the Gospels: The Gospels were products of social and religious reconstruction in the period after the war, ranging from roughly 70 to after 100 C.E. The program looks at how these stories were passed down before they were written. And how the writing of each Gospel reflects the experiences and circumstances of early Christians. They do not all tell the same story of Jesus because each one is responding to a different audience and circumstances. For example, Matthew's gospel is clearly written for a Jewish Christian audience; it is the most Jewish of all the gospels.
During this time, a growing tension appeared between the emergent Christian groups and their Jewish neighbors. The result was a process of debate, identity, and separation that shaped both religious traditions forever. And there were still other external forces, including a second, devastating Jewish war, the Bar Kochbah revolt, which erupted in 132 C.E.