Brilliantly written and documented, A History of the Early Church is a seminal work, important for laymen, indispensable for students. Hans Lietzmann's four-volume history of Christianity from its founding through the early Church Fathers and the origins of monasticism is published here in a new two-volume paperback edition. The whole work is complemented by a foreword and updated bibliography by W.H.C. Frend.
Volume 1 contains the first two volumes of the original version: Part I: The Beginnings of the Christian Church, and Part II: The Founding of the Church Universal. Part I covers the period from the ministry of John the Baptist to the Marcionite and Gnostic heresies of the second century. Part II continues the narrative through to the death of Origen. In addition to brilliant character studies of such figures as Tertullian and Origen, it contains notable chapters on the principal problems confronting the early Church.
Volume 2 contains the third and fourth volumes of the original version: Part III: Constantine to Julian, and Part IV: The Era of the Church Fathers. Part II covers the period in which the Church, emerging from the persecution under Diocletian, found comparative security under Constantine. It also encompasses the stormy years of the Arian controversy and the short-lived attempt at a pagan revival under Julian the Apostate. Part IV concludes with treatment of the dramatic encounters between Ambrose and the Emperor Theodosius I; the account of Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzus, Basil of Caesarea, and their formative influence on Eastern Orthodoxy; and an exhaustive final chapter on the origins of monasticism.