The leading atheist Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman said of Atwell's ouevre "I know sophomores in college who could rip this ... to shreds" and pointed out that Atwell had "no training in any relevant field."
Why should anyone endorse his theories over that of the consensus of mainstream academics?
His historiography makes no sense.
Christianity started out as a thoroughly Jewish movement with beliefs that would have seemed utterly alien and abstruse to Romans. Moreover, it was a radical sect that rejected the very pillar of Roman life: sacrifice of animals to the imperial cult, refusal to conform with which was deemed 'atheism' (rejection of the gods who upheld Rome) by the state.
The other foundational pillar of Roman society was the paterfamilias (uncontested authority of the Roman father as master of his household, because he had both auctoritas (authority) and potestas (power) of life and death over his wife, children and slaves i.e. the right to discard unwanted offspring or punish disobedience) and Jesus expressed harsh opposition to this institution, indeed going so far as to claim that he had come to "divide in two a man against his father...and a man’s enemies shall be those of his own household" (Matthew 10:34-37).
Jesus is reported to have said:
"And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father—the one in heaven...The greatest among you will be your servant. All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted." (Matthew 23:9, 10-12).
The fatherhood of God and the resulting equality of all people (male or female, slave or free, Roman or barbarian) as brothers in one household (the Church), made the rule of earthly paters (fathers) over their subordinate household members defunct. And this was met with horror by upper-class Roman males as the most socially dangerous doctrine they could possibly envisage.
Jesus had taught about a 'kingdom' of the Jewish God on earth that was rival to the corrupt order (as he saw it) controlled by both the client Jewish rulers (high priests and Herod) or the Empire. He explicitly condemned gentile Roman rulers as tyrants with no true legitimacy in God's eyes who lorded it over their peoples:
Matthew 20
25 But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 26 It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant
25 But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 26 It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant
In the Book of Revelation, this early Christian prophet symbolically depicted the Roman Empire as a great whore and beast fat on the blood of innocent victims, whom God would bring to judgement.
The secular Roman sources (i.e. like Tacitus and Pliny) make it clear that Christianity was viewed as a pernicious threat by the Romans to their culture - as indeed it was. The spread of Christianity resulted in the eclipse of the traditional Roman civilization, both intellectually and literally.
Here is how a learned Greco-Roman pagan, Lucian of Samosata, described Christianity in the second century A.D:
http://lucianofsamosata.info/TheDeathOfPeregrine.html
It was now that he came across the priests and scribes of the Christians, in Palestine, and picked up their queer creed...The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day,–the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account...
You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on trust, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property...
As you can see, Christian beliefs were the subject of bemusement and scorn on the part of prominent Romans.You see, these misguided creatures start with the general conviction that they are immortal for all time, which explains the contempt of death and voluntary self-devotion which are so common among them; and then it was impressed on them by their original lawgiver that they are all brothers, from the moment that they are converted, and deny the gods of Greece, and worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws. All this they take quite on trust, with the result that they despise all worldly goods alike, regarding them merely as common property...
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