On "Gods and the One God" by Robert M. Grant ****

This book sets out to describe the state of religion during the first century insofar as it related to what Christians would have encountered, then goes on to describe how those religions and philosophical thought based in them went on to influence the development of the Christian idea of the trinity.

What's interesting about the book is the way Grant ties in Christianity with an overall movement in philosophical and religious thought that was increasingly sliding toward monotheism. Centuries before Christians came on the scene, philosophers were beginning to describe concepts that emphasized one god (e.g., Zeus) as the father or hierarch over all the other pagan gods. Such reasoning would play an important role in the development of the Christian trinity as Christians tried to explain how God could be one and yet Jesus and the Holy Spirit were also God with the Father.

The through-line unfortunately isn't that clear in what Grant presents to readers, and for a book aiming for general readers, it's still a bit technical at times, something that probably can't be helped given the complexity of trinitarian ideas (e.g., Grant acknowledges a triad existed early on but it wasn't a true trinity, which is a difficult distinguishment). Still, it's an excellent reference.