"This work, calling upon the realm of anthropology of religion, psychology, and particularly psychoanalysis, explores how the inner workings of the minds and hearts of the early Christians led to the formation of the initial Christian community. It discusses how subjective events and psychic forces that form an individual influence the forming of a religious community and how the cultic process in the pre-Christian Palestinian background led to Christianity developing from the mission and preaching of Jesus."--BOOK JACKET.