The first century of the Christian era was morally the darkest in history. The apparent splendor of the Roman Empire did not conceal from even its own thinkers the corruption which foretold approaching dissolution. The moral influences of the past seemed to have spent themselves, and no new power of righteousness had arisen for Rome's redemption. Government was an absolute despotism. Society was divided into two classes — many paupers and a few rich. Public corruption was not a public disgrace. Gluttony and drunkenness were fine arts, and licentiousness and prostitution a religion. The laborers were slaves; public education there was none; marriage was a partnership dissoluble at the will of either partner. In Palestine, also, there was decay, though yet not so complete. Thanks to the system of public education which Moses had founded, there was a parochial school for the children of the peasantry in every village that had a synagogue; thanks to the restrictions which Moses had put about slavery and polygamy, there were few or no slaves in Jewish households, and not a harem in all Palestine. And yet even in Palestine the church had fallen under the dominion of a corrupt and infidel priesthood, who were agnostics in their creed, though they were still ritualists in their practice.

At this time there appeared a young man of thirty whose brief life and simple teaching were to reconstruct the social order.