Nazarene (sect)

The Nazarenes originated as a sect of first-century Judaism. The first use of the term "sect of the Nazarenes" is in the Book of Acts in the New Testament, where Paul is accused of being a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes ("πρωτοστάτην τε τῆς τῶν Ναζωραίων αἱρέσεως"). Then, the term simply designated followers of "Yeshua Natzri" (Jesus the Nazarene), as the Hebrew term נוֹצְרִי (nôṣrî) still does, but in the first to fourth centuries, the term was used for a sect of followers of Jesus who were closer to Judaism than most Christians. They are described by Epiphanius of Salamis and are mentioned later by Jerome and Augustine of Hippo. The writers made a distinction between the Nazarenes of their time and the "Nazarenes" mentioned in Acts 24:5, where Paul the Apostle is accused before Felix at Caesarea (the capital of Roman Judaea) by Tertullus.

The title "Nazarene" is first found in the Greek texts of the New Testament as an adjective, nazarenos, (Ναζαρηνός) used as an adjectival form of the phrase apo Nazaret "from Nazareth." In the New Testament, the form Nazoraios or Nazaraios (Ναζωραῖος, Ναζαραῖος) is more common than Nazarenos.

The name Nazaraios is the standard Greek spelling in the New Testament for a man from Nazareth; the plural Nazaraioi means "men from Nazareth" (see Nazarene (title)). The title Nazarenes, "men from Nazareth," is first applied to the Christians by Tertullus (Acts 24:5), though Herod Agrippa II (Acts 26:28) uses the term "Christians" which had first been used at Antioch (Acts 11:26). The name used by Tertullus survives into Rabbinic and modern Hebrew as notzrim (נוצרים) a standard Hebrew term for "Christian", and also into the Quran and modern Arabic as nasara (plural of nasrani "Christians").

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