ABSTRACT
WHILE the Church was thus being ground between the upper and lower millstones of pagan hatred and Jewish intolerance, it might have been thought that its inner life and teaching would have been welded into a complete homogeneity. That, however, did not happen: then as always there was room for a wide divergence of opinion among the followers of Christ. Baur and the Tübingen scholars indeed have seen in the earliest history of the movement signs of an internecine struggle between the Pauline and Petrine interpretations of the gospel. According to their view the Christianity of the Twelve, with Peter at their head, remained always Judaistic. Against such an exclusivist Christianity the universalism of S. Paul waged a long conflict and ultimately triumphed. But the conquerors learnt something from the conquered and out of the combination of both schools arose the early ‘Catholic’ Church with its stereotyped organisation and worship.
