We know Christians existed at the beginning of the second century. Before that time, it gets very hazy. My contention is that the paucity of evidence for Jesus or Christians in the middle of the first century is no mere aberration. What has been described as a hiatus in the development of Christianity is actually an absence. Christianity, I assert, did not linger for forty years after its legendary inception; it bolted from the starting blocks as all successful religions do. One has only to consider the first twenty years of the Mormon religion, or Islam to see evidence of this. There is no reason to suppose Christianity was any different. 

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