What Christians believed before New Testament was written ?

Question

New Testament was written atleast after 40 years after Jesus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Testament
It is a really a long period of time, for example, it would be equivalent of writing about an event that happened in 1966 in 2006. So many of the believes that current Christian believe are derived from New testament, like the belief that Jesus died for our sins in cross. So did people who lived before New testament was written beleive in this ? Surely people during the time of Jesus could'nt have not believed this since he was not yet crucified. Or are people before new Testament was written Jews ?

Answer 1

Great Question.

The earliest Christians didn't think of themselves as part of a new religion. They saw themselves as devout Jews who believed that the Jewish Messiah was Jesus. They practiced all of the Jewish rituals and upheld the Jewish laws.

It was only after the Jewish authorities in the temples and synagogues began to harrass them (and in some cases kill them) that they branched out and claimed to be different. But if accepted by the rest of the Jewish community as legitimate Jews who believe that the promise had been fulfilled, there would have been no Christianity as we know it. It would simply have been another sect of Judaism.

In fact, today, there are many Jews who try to live as these early "Jewish-Christians" did. They call themselves "Jews for Jesus."

Answer 2

It's complicated, but I'll try to give you the Cliffnotes version. The people who believed that Jesus was the Christ while he was alive simply had faith that he was who he said he was. (the Christ, our savior, the Redeemer, etc) There was no way to prove it....they just believed based on his teachings and miracles. After his death, the apostles went around preaching the gospel and also performing miracles. Jesus told his disciples as he was going into heaven to go out into all the world and preach/declare the gospel. It was all verbal back then. So, just like it is today....it's just a story that each individual can CHOOSE to believe or not. Whether it's written down or not....there is not physical proof. It's just a choice that we have to make. Do we believe the story or not??? But even when the New Testament was being written, they were just epistles or letters being dispersed among all the churches. It wasn't until King James had the bible translated into a common language that people really began to have access to scriptures. Before that the common people relied on the scolars and priests of the Catholic Church to TELL them what the bible said. And we all know how that turned out. So really it was more like 1600 years before the average person had access to scriptures in bible form....written in a language they could understand.

by the way, wikipedia is a good resource, but don't forget that it's written by users. people like you and me.....not scolars or experts.

Answer 3

Before Jesus' ministry, there were a number of religions, including Judaism, but clearly there could have been no Christian concept nor Christian religion.

Christ defined that concept during his ministry, and during the ministries of those who kept on with the task afterwards.

The story was only verbal at first...word of mounth. As the movement grew, followers of the belief came to be known as Christians. (In Antioch, IIRC)

The books of the New Testament were written down, as you say, some years after the death of Jesus. Not all the stories that were written became a part of the NT. Some of them still exist, and you may find it interesting to locate and read some of them.

Some people tried to keep their Jewish origins and traditions, and rationalize Jesus' ministry into their old faith. Consider this
if you read some conflicting stories in the Bible.

Answer 4

The New Testament came to being around 500AD as did christianality as we know it today. Before this there were many, many other testaments, like the book of Phillip. Even Jesus wrote a book. The believes of the masses before 500AD would have been much more aligned to our true nature. The New Testament was formed by the church to gain back power over the people. It was a successful attempt to rob people of their true freedom, which thankfully is been reversed today

Answer 5

I imagine they believed in a combination of the old testament and Jesus teachings. Remember that for the most part of human history, information was passed on orally and only later did things started to be recorded and we started relying on books. Before that, oral history was everything and some people were "walking books". They memorized everything and recite it over and over again. In some cultures today, mostly in remote areas in not so much contact with the industrialized world, this is still kind of the case.

Answer 6

they shared the gospel ( good news) by word of mouth repeating it often for new comers. those that were with Jesus shared what they saw with others and so on Luke was not written by an eye witness but some one who made a thorough investigation the only Gospel we can be sure was written by an eye witness is John the letters in the testament were written later to encourage and guide the new churches

Answer 7

At the time, the events surrounding Christ was still fresh in the minds of the Apostles. They likely had better mental capabilities than we do now, as they were closer to the creation. But, things did begin to fall apart, as the Apostle Paul said that he felt that he had worked for nothing because Christians had gone back to celebrating pagan observances, such as birthdays.

Consider also how much longer they were living than now. They were in their 20s or later than Christ was on Earth, so they were in their 60s and older at the time they began writing the scriptures, yet, except of Timothy, they were in generally good health.

Answer 8

The oral teachings of Jesus and the apostles, as brought to mind by the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, empowered and guided the members of the early Church, just as they continue to empower and guide the modern Church.

God is good at doing stuff like that, Bible or no Bible.

Answer 9

There were a large number of Gospels and Christians divided since very early about the nature of Jesus.

They followed the oral teaching more than written one

Answer 10

well you can follow the ideals of a prophet by his sayings that are passed down by word of mouth.. I am not a christian, but a muslim, we have hadeeths which are the sayings and doings of our prophet Mohammed. They werent written down for a few years. but that doesnt mean we dont follow his ideals.. the same with early christians.. Im sure everyone knew the ideals and rules by which Jesus brought, they just werent written down, then someone had a bright idea to gather them all together and write them down for future sake.. Its like in a family group, you follow certain traditions and cultural things your family has done for years.. probably no one in your family has a book about it, but you still practice it. same idea here.. hope this helped..