The first volume of the Penguin History of the Church examines the beginning of the Christian movement during the first centuries AD, and the explosive force of its expansion throhgou the Roman world.

Henry Chadwick paints a portrait of the early Christians, constructed out of a mosaic of the ancient sources, giving the general reader a fresh awareness of the life of this momentous community. The Church is seen in close relation to its original setting in Jewish and Gentile society, toward which the Christians were indebted, and yet at the same time, with the zeal of martyrs, defiant. The internal controversies among the Christians are analysed with a rare clarity. In conclusion, the author examines the conversion of Constantine and the suppression of paganism by Theodosius, which led to the development of the social and political role of the church, and the contrasting institutions of Papacy and Monasticism, which continue to assert the independence of merely secular values. For further reading there is a list of books, which has been brought up to date for this revised edition.