Ninth International Conference on Religion & Spirituality in Society

Abstract

Early Christians referred to their fledgling religious tradition as “The Way.” Using primary and secondary sources from Late Second Temple Judaism and Early Christianity, the author has endeavored to reconstruct the spiritual practices of Jesus that may have constituted the The Way for his earliest followers. The author examined Biblical and extra-biblical texts to search for continuance, divergence, discontinuance, and new development of spiritual practices from Judaism to Christianity. The research revealed that Jesus engaged in the traditional Jewish practices of prayer, hospitality, Sabbath observance, pilgrimage, Temple and synagogue worship, and festival observance. The research also revealed that Jesus engaged in asceticism, solitude, feasting (not fasting), and open table fellowship. In terms of spiritual practice, “The Way” for the earliest Christians likely included these elements.