Who killed Christianity?

By Jason

23 Jan 2006


Any one catch this programme on BBC Radio 4?
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“Dr David Starkey argues that five major Christian figures distorted, even betrayed, the Christian faith as envisaged by Jesus. Defenders argue back. St.Paul, Martin Luther, Constantine, etc.”

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  1. Comment by fernando

    1.41 pm on 23 Jan 2006

    Both Sean at Sean the Baptist and Mark over at NT Gateway have bloggged on this one (links on my blogroll).

  2. Comment by Brett

    1.55 pm on 23 Jan 2006

    at first i was tempted to audiohijack the streams and give them a listen, but remembering starkey’s other stuff, i have a deep suspicion that i will be angered more than i will be informed.

    why is it that great minds like starkey (and dawkins, et al) seem to go completely irrational when they hit the area of religion?

    you’d think an honorary associate of the secular society would be a little more balanced :-)

  3. Comment by Jason Clark

    2.12 pm on 23 Jan 2006

    Thanks for the links fernando, I’ll check them out.

    Brett: guess it shows how atheists are as irrational as christians sometimes, and being smart doesn’t mean you are smart.

  4. Comment by imagine!

    3.59 pm on 23 Jan 2006

    …I heard the Martin Luther programme. Really poor limited debate. Not worth following up. They set up two sides like a 6th Form debate with little room for nuance and a travesty of any detailed analysis of the subject.

  5. Comment by Jason Clark

    4.01 pm on 23 Jan 2006

    shame about that…I’ll give the rest a miss then I think.

  6. Comment by ConradGempf

    9.27 am on 24 Jan 2006

    I’ve listened to both Paul and Constantine. Nothing special or surprising except that they have allowed the ‘experts’ to make telling points against the host. (“Paul” was especially interesting to me as I’m working on my “How To Like Paul Again” book and thinking through stuff that naive people like Starkey believe about Paul).

    Some of the series has been unintentionally funny for most of us. My favourite line so far was when Starkey concludes his programme about Constantine “were I a Christian, I would find it impossible to forgive him” thus showing in a single stroke how little he understands either Constantine or Christianity.

  7. Comment by Suzie Lipscomb

    10.53 pm on 24 Jan 2006

    I have listened to all of these programmes, and I have rather despaired of David Starkey, who is normally quite a decent historian, and should know better than to play so far outside his area of expertise. I felt that his public persona as historian, resident expert, orator and antagonist here dominates the more subtle qualities he used to display in his historical writing.

  8. Comment by dh

    4.43 pm on 25 Jan 2006

    I have never heard of this guy but he seems, as you and I agree Jase, to be off the wall on this one. No one killed Christianity. I’m reminded of the passage which says “The message of Christ is foolshness to those who won’t believe.”

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