This book deals with the question of how Christianity in the beginning of the second century became a non-Jewish, Gentile religion. Since Christianity was originally one of many Jewish factions within the diversified Judaism of the period, the problem of its separation from Judaism is a major puzzle in the history of Western civilization. While previous attempts to solve this problem have focused mainly on ideological aspects, Zetterholm's study emphasizes the interplay between sociological and ideological elements.