Paul shepherds the uncircumcised
The future saint turned a little Jewish sect into a new religion of Jews and gentiles. They called themselves 'Christians'
This is Who made our minds?, my Thursday essay probing the greatest, cruellest and most beautiful minds of the past 5,000 years, inspired by my book, The Soul: A History of the Human Mind (Penguin 2024).
Next Thursday: Smithies of the Soul (5th of seven essays on Christianity)
IN THE DECADE after Jesus’ death, a fierce dispute broke out over whether gentiles who wished to become Christians should first become Jews – that is, accept the Law of Moses and undergo circumcision, among other rites of membership.
At the time, the ‘Jesus movement’ was still a Jewish sect, and many of its followers ‘could hardly have imagined a non-Jew becoming their companion’, as the historian Géza Vermes writes.
The issue boiled over at Antioch, the ancient city where the members of the Jesus movement would first call themselves ‘Christians’.
Antioch was unusual in that it permitted non-Jewish or u…