How Christianity became a religion in conflict with itself and with other beliefs

A worried man reading the bible. [Courtesy/GettyImages]

Approaching the Christmas period focuses on one man whose life personified conflict and He left a conflictual legacy.

This was Jesus of Nazareth, born in Bethlehem and raised in Alexandria and Nazareth as Caesar Augustus was consolidating power and changing Rome from being a ‘Republic’ into an ‘Empire’.

When Augustus died in 14 CE, his stepson, Tiberius, inherited the Empire. Thus Jesus, revered as the ‘Christ’, lived during the reigns of Augustus and Tiberius. He claimed to have divine connections and being the only ‘way’ to reach God.

He created a faith movement, based on a promise that he is coming back to earth and on his last supper instructions to the disciples to eat and drink in his “Memory.” The movement became a religion called Christianity which has grown into thousands of splinter groups. Those waiting for Jesus and remembering him through drinks increased in number and penetrated empires.

The growth of Christianity makes Jesus a religious grand strategist and he probably envisioned the subsequent conflicts. The only other person to come close to Jesus in terms of global influence is Mohamed bin Abdullah, roughly 600 years after Jesus. Known as ‘The Prophet’, Mohamed was God’s ‘Messenger’, sent to clean up idolatry and religious deviations in Mecca.

In the process of cleaning up, he created a religion that became Islam and has many splinter groups throughout the world and rivals Christianity in terms of global presence. While Islam’s success probably exceeded Mohamed’s expectations, successful Christianity was most likely not surprising to Jesus who had envisioned it because he was a great grand strategist.

Christianity started in conflict and survived while spreading through assorted conflicts, and is still in conflict. His earthly parents escaped to Egypt to avoid death and he died with religious authorities baying for his blood.

Among the group of 12 men, probably bodyguards, that he led as disciples was Peter the Fisherman who cut the ear of a security officer; Jesus simply told him to return the sword to its place. The greatest of his followers, Saul/Paul, changed Christianity from being a Jewish cult into a universal religion that penetrated empires and produced thousands of quarreling culturally based divisions.

These led to many wars within ‘Christianity’ and against such other religions as Islam. Paul’s ‘Great Commission’ and Aurelia Augustine’s advocacy for ‘just wars’ opened the way for Christian imperialism that ended in the Atlantic Slave Trade, intra-religious wars in Europe, and slavery in situ or territorial colonialism in Africa. They engaged in all those conflicts in the name of Jesus who seemingly delayed his return to earth for over two thousand years.

Colonialism, in the name of Christianity, effectively planted conflicting Western European cultural norms in Africa which some people challenged. This made Christianity a religion in conflict with itself and with other beliefs.

Envy, power rivalry, and greed explain the proliferation of competing ‘churches’ that had an assortment of names as each claimed to have direct connectivity to Jesus. The churches indulged in conflicting activities that led to more splintering. ‘Independent’ churches, called “Indi”, rose to question European cultural trappings in the imported Christianity but not the essence of Christianity.   

In Kenya, the obliterating of African culture in the name of Christianity was distortion which also occurred in the proliferation of competing ‘churches’. John Mbiti complained of cultural distortions through translations.

Most disturbing was the seeming dalliance between religious and government officials in condoning destructive cults. The cults’ brainwashing expertise entices the vulnerable to lose senses, in the name of Jesus, and to engage in self-destruction activities. The mystery of ‘Shakohola’ is evidence of conflict within the Christianity and the State.

Jesus planted seeds of conflict prone Christianity. He should give guidance on avoiding conflicts. Or were conflicts part of His Grand Design?