‘SUFFERING FOR CHRIST’: A NEW TESTAMENT PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

The Early Christian narratives often demonstrate the struggle of human beings because of their unique faith. The New Testament writings provide ample evidences concerning the afflictions of Early Christianity in the Jewish and pagan environment. The study attempts to delineate the following aspects in detail: the etymology of „persecution‟ in the NT narratives; persecution of the church in the early Christian context; the Jewish and Roman persecutions against the church; the implications of the study in the contemporary Indian context; followed by concluding statements. The following questions are important in the process of addressingthe topic: How the NT and extra-Biblical documents help us in understanding the Early Christian situation? How the Jewish and Roman persecutions against the Christians shaped the community as co-sufferers with God/Christ? How the Biblical axioms are paradigmatic in the contemporary Indian context? The aim of the paper is threefold: to foreground the NT and extra-Biblical records of persecution; to detail theconcept of „suffering for Christ‟ in perspective and in rhetorical terms and to see the implications of the Biblical understanding of persecution in the contemporary Indian context.