Question

Provide an overview of persecution in the first century in the gospel of Mark. (200 words)

Answer 1

Christianity went through a huge level of torture and killing during the first century for few reasons such as Jesus proclaiming himself as son of God thus placing himself above Ceasar, Christians following monotheism as against the polytheistic practices of the contemporary Romans, disturbing the pagan practice by trying to convert them to Christianity. This and the Roman emperors and they unleashed all levels of torture and pain on the early Christians. The emperors also feared that if more number of people join the new way, it would threaten the mere existence of the Roman empire.
Although, early Christians feared the torture and went underground, they slowly came out and presented themselves to death due to the rising thought of martyrdom. No one was afraid of the torture and death anymore and thus motivated more people join the new religion because they were happy to die. Some forms of torture involved cooked or dragged to death, removing the skin, thrown to the dogs, starved to death etc. that are by today's standards are very barbaric and inhuman. Although these tortures we used to threaten people, the same tortures helped more people die as martyrs and bring more people to Christianity.

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