Abstract

How successful was the Christian Church’s mission to the Jews? The answer to this is a function of numerous factors, such as underlying demographics, fertility rates, competition, and (most importantly) when Christians and Jews severed their ties with one another. Some believe the split as early as 70 CE, but others present evidence that Jews and Christians regularly interacted until the 4th and possibly 5th centuries. In this paper, using computer network simulations that capture various factors, we run a series of models that estimate the proportion of Jewish converts to Christianity from approximately 40 to 600 CE. Our models suggest that whether one considers the Church’s mission to the Jews a success largely depends on what one considers a "success". If one measures it solely in terms of raw numbers, then probably not. However, if one considers that the potential pool of Jewish converts was relatively small compared to Gentiles, it was perhaps more successful than many early Church scholars believe.