"Early Christianity was primarily an urban movement. The original meaning of the word pagan (paganus) was "rural person," or more colloquially "country hick." It came to have religious meaning because after Christianity had triumphed in the cities, most of the rural people remained unconverted."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Academics from the United StatesNon-fiction authors from the United StatesHistorians from the United StatesSociologists from the United StatesPeople from North Dakota
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
“Cities of God: The Real Story of How Christianity Became an Urban Movement and Conquered Rome”, HarperCollins, (Oct 31, 2006), p.2
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rodney_Stark
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Rodney Stark
(July 8, 1934 – July 21, 2022) was an American sociologist of religion who was a longtime professor of sociology and of comparative religion at the University of Washington. At the time of his death he was the Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University, co-director of the university's Institute for Studies of Religion, and founding editor of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion.
2 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Rodney Stark →
Related Quotes
"Contempt is not a scholarly virtue."
"Scientific education is catholic; it embraces the whole field of human learning. No student can master all knowledge …"
"Honest investigation is but the application of common sense to the solution of the unknown. Science does not wait on …"
"Years of drought and famine come and years of flood and famine come, and the climate is not changed with dance, libat…"
"The verb is relatively of much greater importance in an Indian tongue than in a civilized language."
"Possible ideas and thoughts are vast in number. A distinct word for every distinct idea and thought would require a v…"
"The integers of language are sentences, and their organs are the parts of speech. Linguistic organization, then, cons…"
"Indian nouns are extremely connotive; that is, the name does more than simply denote the thing to which it belongs; i…"
"In Seneca the north is "the sun never goes there," and this sentence may be used as adjective or noun; in such cases …"
"In Ute the name for bear is "he seizes," or "the hugger." In this case the verb is used for the noun, and in so doing…"