Philip Jenkins

The Lost History of Christianity

The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia--and How It Died

Talking Points

Jenkins provided this first controversial study that looks at Christian history through the lens of when, how, and why churches die. As a professor at Penn State University, Philip Jenkins has impeccable credentials and is highly regarded as a leading scholar of religious history. Jenkins’ work has been a featured cover story of The Atlantic, he writes and blogs regularly for The New Republic, has been reviewed in all the major daily newspapers, and is a frequent guest on top national NPR shows.

Description

The Lost History of Christianity is a paradigm-shifting history that reveals how the largest and most influential churches lay to the east of Rome, covered the world from China to North Africa, ruled the Middle East for centuries, and became the chief administrators and academics in the new Muslim empire, only expiring after a thousand-year reign after Constantine. Many people will find the very concept of vast Christian extinction controversial and unsettling. This is the first book to tell the story of Christianity’s decline in major parts of the world.